GYG Blog

I don’t get it.  Why do game developers continue to make games based on hit TV shows, expecting great results?  I’m a fan of this show; I’ve enjoyed getting to know the characters over the last few years, and I believe them when they say that crab fishing is one of the world’s deadliest jobs.  I was curious how that would translate to a video game, and now I have my answer.  Not well.

I have to be honest though; I only gave Deadliest Catch: Alaskan Storm about 30 minutes of my time, outside of the incredibly long tutorial level (but hey, I got 60 achievement points from it!).  I’d love one of our customers with much more patience than me to give it an honest review, because I just don’t think I gave it enough time.  But, I had better things to do, like watching paint dry.

The game’s tutorial lesson is comprehensive and lays out the game very well.  But, once I was on my own, I found myself forgetting everything that I learned.  I will give the game credit though; it really puts the player in the seat of being a ship’s captain, because you will find that you have to manage every part of the game.  First, I had to hire a crew.  I made the mistake of giving a greenhorn a chance, only to have him complain about how cold it was then hurt himself seriously enough that I had to fly the coast guard in for an evacuation, leaving my crew down a member.

Graphically, the game is so-so.  I had to turn off the “seasick cam” because I didn’t want to be the sorry sack who puked from a video game.  Seriously, the boat’s rocking back and forth was enough to do me in.  The game has great audio, although you’ll get tired of hearing the seagulls constantly fussing on your boat.

This game is definitely a simulation game, because you’ll get your hands in every aspect of the game.  I think if I had given it more time, I probably would have enjoyed it more.  I just didn’t have the heart to do it, especially with reviews to do on Don King’s gaming turd and Alone in the Dark.

I’ll give the game 2.5 Captain Sig’s out of 5 for now, with a possible upgrade coming when I give it more time.

I used to be a big fan of boxing.  I’ll never forget the night that Tyson lost to Buster Douglas in an incredible battle.  But, I slowly lost my appreciation for the sport as it seemed to get more and more corrupt, and I solely place the sport’s demise at the feet of one Mr. Don King.  And now, Don has managed to get his tentacles wrapped around the video game consoles as well.

I have to admit that this game was going to have a hard time living up to its predecessor, Fight Night Round 3.  The Fight Night game was excellent with incredible graphics and realism, but I always found the “story” mode to be lacking.  Luckily, the game overcomes that with its play.

Don King Presents: Prize Fighter manages to accomplish exactly the opposite of what Fight Night did.  The story in Prize Fighter is compelling, and I found myself actually being interested in the documentary-focused campaign mode.  I thought the little injuries were a nice touch as well; one fight I had to fight primarily with my left hand because of two broken fingers suffered on my right during training.

But, the true focus of any sports game has to be the game play, and this is where this game suffers greatly.  To keep this review from running even longer than it already has, I’ll limit my complaints to two chief areas: player graphics and hit detection.  The graphics of the boxers are very poor (and don’t even get me started on the ring girls!) and even look like a last-gen title, which is inexcusable at this point in the game.  And the hit detection is atrocious; I can’t tell you how many knockdowns I had thanks to punches to the shoulder, or somehow managing to hit my opponent in the ear with my forearm.  In fact, several times my entire arm seemed to pass through my opponent, only to have my gloves and wrist appear behind him.

As I mentioned before, this game has a great storyline.  Sadly, the game play just doesn’t back it up.  Don King once said “It ain’t about if he knocks a guy out. It’s about how he knocks a guy out. It’s the style, the improvisation.”  Clearly he wasn’t concerned with the style of the game that he graciously lent his name to.

The best I can give this game is 1.5 shoulder knockdowns out of 5.

Let me start by making a statement: Hi, my name is Matt, and I’m a huge fan of the Bourne franchise. There, I said it, and I’m not ashamed. I have absolutely loved each movie in this action franchise, and was thrilled to see a trilogy with the 3rd installment being the best of the bunch. Needless to say, I was really looking forward to the release of “The Bourne Conspiracy,” and I’m pleased to say that I was not disappointed.

Once you get over the fact that Jason Bourne is not Matt Damon, but rather some standard action hero, the game progresses quickly. Rumor has it that Mr. Damon was not willing to lend his likeness to the game due to the amount of violence in it, and if that’s indeed the case, I applaud him for it. Luckily, from a gamer’s point of view, not having Matt Damon in the game doesn’t detract from it much.

I was curious to see how they would play out the events of “Conspiracy” in a video game (what, with all of the memories and what not), but the developers did an excellent job. The game plays out exactly along the lines of the first movie, but with missions added in to help fill in some of the blanks in Bourne’s memory. The graphics are good (but not great) and the sound is excellent. The gameplay is a mix of hand-to-hand combat, shoot ‘em up, and driving through the street of Paris (sadly only one mission in the game involved driving though). It’s a fairly standard fighting game, but has a cool “takedown” component that allows you to severely hurt or finish off the baddies in one move.

The boss battles can be a challenge as you progress through the game. Mostly you’ll find yourself holding down the A button to block, trying to time your X & Y attacks to land. The final battle took me a good 10 times to finally get through on normal “Agent” difficulty, which probably doesn’t say much about me.

I enjoyed the game immensely, but it is a bit on the short side. Overall I’d give it 4 bad-ass shovel takedowns out of 5.

Gamers unite!  Uncle Grant’s back with a look at another big release called Universe At War, available for your Xbox 360.  Unleash the fury, kids — it’s go time.

Okay, so lately the Xbox has become the home for first-person shooters and not much else.  And you want something else, don’t you?  Well, that in and of itself is enough for you to take a gander at a title like Universe At War.  But since you probably want more of an endorsement than “won’t give you motion sickness”, let’s get into the deets.

Universe At War is a real-time strategy title that puts you in the roles of three alien races that are currently using Earth as their own personal port-a-potty.  Each race has their own strengths and weaknesses as you’d expect, and all of them hate each other.  Oh, and here’s the kicker — humanity is still around, but they’re basically getting slapped around during every battle and you can’t properly control them anyway so who cares.

Universe At War has an interesting backstory that most gamers will completely ignore in favor of setting up battles and watching their men fight.  That’s right, FPS addicts — the key is WATCH other people fight, so don’t go into this expecting a lot of Halo action.  The subtlety behind the title is the enjoyment of watching your factions perform flanking maneuvers and unleash mass destruction upon the Earth.  If you have a problem with that, this isn’t the game for you.

All told, Universe At War is an interesting and challenging diversion with a lot of complexity, but it’s still a very pleasurable ride for a few hours.

That’s my time, kids.  If you want to see more of my reviews, drop by GYG.com.  That’s Gamez with a Z.

See you soon, troops.  At ease.