First off, I wanted to start off with an easier review so I'm going with Prototype 2. Also, I bought the Blackwatch Collector's Edition, which came with a bunch of fairly nice goodies so I'll review those, too. Mass Effect 3's review is probably going to take me quite a long time to write, maybe the longest review I've ever done and might ever do, so that will be written when I have more patience to do so. Anyway, let's start this review.
Why buy the Blackwatch Collector's Edition? What's in it? Well, like any LE game, it comes with bonus DLC and whatnot. It came in this nice hard case that was easy to open and easy to access everything, unlike ME3's Collector's Edition, which made it hard to get the bottom disc to the point it felt like I was going to snap the disc. Anyway, the CE came with: Radnet Edition Content (Includes access code to unlock a massive in-game content package of over fifty-five events, challenges, and exclusive rewards), Exclusive Prototype 2 Hardbound Art Book (which was pretty cool to see the concept art and whatnot), Dark Horse Digital Comic "Prototype 2: The Labyrinth (I have yet to read this yet), Official Prototype 2 Soundtrack CD (I've also yet to listen to this), Downloadable Content Pack "Colossal mayhem" Coucher Code (Includes Thermobaric Boomstick Super weapon, Force Multiplier powers and more), and Prototype 2 Merchandise Store Voucher (20% discount on merchandise including hoodies, t-shirts, lithographs and more). Just so you know, I listed all of this as it is written on the back of the CE case.
OK, now let's get to the game. Right off the bat, this game threw me off because I thought we were going to continue as Alex Mercer, the main character from the first game, but, no, we start off as Sergeant James Heller. When you return from war, you find out your wife and daughter have been killed by Alex Mercer and request to be re-enlisted to the "Red Zone" where the infection is the worst to find and kill Mercer. At first you are denied this request because of your mental state, but then are granted the request as you are now needed to help restore order. I'm not sure if this is a spoiler, but if it is, skip to the next paragraph and don't read the next statement. After you arrive, you actually run into Mercer and he gives you the infection and you become the same as he is, which gives you god-like powers as you level them up over the course of the game.
One of the first things I noticed was the amount of destruction you can create, which is A LOT and I LOVED it. You're also able to gain new powers/mutations which allow you to create huge amounts of destruction in various different ways. Being able to hijack, destroy, or rip the rocket launcher off of a tank is just amazing. You can also do so with helicopters as well, which adds a whole new element of surprise and destruction to the game.
Secondly, Blackwatch is hugely more involved in this game than the last, which I can't really remember how much they were involved in the first game, but that doesn't matter. Almost everywhere you see the normal military soldiers as well as special Blackwatch soldiers. "Consuming" any person, whether they are just a citizen, infected, military, or Blackwatch allows you to use their appearance to gain access to restricted areas as well as "hide" from those same soldiers and Blackwatch troops if you want to avoid a confrontation, although it becomes unnecessary at a certain point into the game where no one can defeat you if you know what you're doing. In this game, there are different infected. Most of them are just infected people, but there are also creature-like abominations that you can fight and destroy either as Heller or disguised as a soldier/Blackwatch troop on the ground, in a tank, or in a helicopter, which adds a new element of fun for a while if you want a break from the story. Be advised, though, if you hurt, injure, kill, or consume anyone in front of those soldiers/Blackwatch troops, they'll know it's you and start fighting you even if they're in the middle of a million infected. It doesn't make sense to me to go after one person if he's helping you when these infected could kill you, but that's the game.
There are quite a few side missions that come with the Radnet Edition that get unlocked at intervals over a few month period to add replay value to the game and also where you can rank yourself against friends and the world. Some are about destruction and killer, others are timed missions. I enjoyed the ones I tried and was able to get 1st amongst my friends on a few of them. There's also this new thing which tallies up your "total destruction cost," which is just the total amount in dollars of the destruction you've cost the government. I think my total is in the tens of millions or billions, I don't really remember, but it's another thing to compare with your friends.
As you progress and rank up, you're able to add abilities to your mutations so that adds a level of customization that's pretty cool to utilize. The plot is pretty good as you try to figure out what happened to your wife and daughter as well as try to find and kill Mercer. You will kill, consume, infiltrate, and destroy a lot in your adventures to finding out the facts. Here's a definite spoiler so skip it if you haven't played yet and go to the next paragraph. Soon enough, you find out that your daughter is actually alive and is being held by someone, which becomes your main mission. Along the way, you get help from an old friend, a pastor that gives you intel and whatnot as well as an unlikely source, Alex Mercer's sister. There is another woman that helps you in a way, but there's a major twist to that "help" that would be a huge spoiler so I'll leave it out.
Before you can get your daughter back, the ultimate fight happens, Heller VS Mercer. A quick tip, you have to use all of your mutations to beat him, but don't use the same one he's using at the time. You'll find out why if you haven't played it yet. Skip to the next paragraph, too, as it's a spoiler. Once you defeat and consume Mercer, you become the most powerful being alive as Mercer's sister brings your daughter to meet you where she sees you for what you really are. At first she's scared of you, but moving along she goes to you and you're finally reunited with your only living family member. A happy ending to a game with so much destruction and despair.
Overall, I loved this game. Almost everything was on point and enjoyable. During the beginning, it was somewhat hard to win battles so I found myself running away more times than I wanted to, but, like I said, once you level up, you become unstoppable. I once just went on like a 2-hour destruction spree because it was fun. Some of the achievements/trophies in this game are pretty sweet, too, so try to get as many as you can. Some are easier than others as long as you look for them. The replay value is moderate as they are releasing side missions over a few month period, but, besides those, there's not much else to do except just go destroy everything and everyone in sight. It can be fun for a while, but it will get boring after a while. Because of all of this, I'd definitely recommend this game to just about anyone.
GameSpot Score: 7.5 (Good)
Metacritic Score: 75 (67 Reviews)
User Score: 8.2 (316 Votes)
My Score: 8.5
HAPPY GAMING!
GeNiO
Saturday, June 2, 2012
My Absence & Upcoming Reviews/Previews
First off, I'd like to apologize for my absence. I don't really have a reason other than I really didn't feel like writing any reviews or previews for a long while, but I'm going to be posting a few reviews of some of the games I've played as well as some reviews of games I'm looking forward to. I think I'm also going to cover some of the gaming industry's news and such that have happened over the past month or two that I never wrote about yet.
Here is a list of what I'm going to try to write reviews on:
- Mass Effect 3 (This was my most anticipated game of 2012 and it really did NOT disappoint, except for the ending, which I'll touch on in the review, but I'm sure most people have already heard about the ending and heard a lot of different opinions on it so I'll give mine, too.)
- Prototype 2 (I really enjoyed the first game and sequels are usually better than their predecessors so I'll give you all my own opinions on the game for that review.) DONE.
- Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon: Future Soldier (After seeing a bunch of awesome videos on the campaign, co-op, and online multiplayer, I was pretty excited for this game and it met most of my expectations with a few hiccups that I've found along the way so stay tuned for that review.)
- L.A. Noire (Rockstar normally does a great job with their games and this was no exception.)
- Just Cause 2 & Crysis 2 (I'm putting these together for a couple of reasons; Just Cause 2 I just wasn't into. It looked like a good game, but when I started playing it, it was just not my type of game and I returned it to GameFly within a day or two. For Crysis 2, it was a good game up until the game kept freezing on me and I couldn't get past one spot. I even tried my brother's new bought copy of the game and it was getting stuck at the same point so, after a while of trying to get past that point, I just gave up and sent it back. I will, however, review what I played, though.)
- Ace Combat 6: Fires of Liberation & Ace Combat: Assault Horizon (This series, in my opinion, is the best flight simulator/fighting series out there and, yes, better than the H.A.W.X. series. I've played both and the Ace Combat series is better to me. I'll review both of these games as they're the same series.)
- H.A.W.X. & H.A.W.X. 2 (The videos of these games did more for me than the actual games, which isn't a good sign. After seeing the videos I was really looking forward to playing both, but they kind of let me down quite a bit.)
That's about it for the reviews for now. Some of those games are a little old so I'll try to keep it to newer games that I've played. Now, onto the previews...
- Assassin's Creed III (This just might be tied for Mass Effect 3 for my most anticipated game of 2012. After all, almost everything about this game will be brand new from the main character to the new engine to the new setting and so forth. I can't wait to see what Ubisoft has in store with their new engine and what they've been working on for the past 2 years or so. I'm a very big fan of the Assassin's Creed franchise and I've loved every single game, even though there were a few things I hated (most notably the "tower defense" in AC: Revelations.)
- Halo 4 (Well, what can I say about Halo? I've always enjoyed the majority of each game's campaign, although the multiplayer really has done much for me up to this point. I'm just going to get the standard version as the Limited Edition mostly has MP content that I won't ever use.) I wound up not getting this for now.
- Medal of Honor: Warfighter (I loved Medal of Honor 2010 and this looks very promising. By love, I'm referring to the campaign, not the multiplayer as I only played that for a few hours and then stopped. Everything I've read and seen so far has been great and looks exciting so I definitely can't wait to see what they do with this game.)
- NHL '13 (I'm a huge hockey fan so this is a must for me. Each game seems to improve on the previous title so hopefully they continue that trend and move forward with this one. There were a few things I didn't like in '12 and '11 so I hope they try to fix some of those things and whatnot.)
- FIFA Soccer '13 (Another sport I'm a huge fan of, football/soccer, FIFA '13 should be another amazing game in the franchise as FIFA is usually the best EA Sports game. I'm definitely looking forward to what more they can do in the upcoming game.)
- Rainbow Six: Patriots (This game looks intense. It hits close to home as I was born and raised in the United States and have felt some of the repercussions of our terrible government's decisions. Hopefully they move this in the right direction and make a quality game.)
- Spec Ops: The Line (As you might tell, I love war games. I'm very big of these types of games and I don't hold back when criticizing the quality of them. From what I've seen with this game, it looks pretty solid, but, then again, so did a few others. Hopefully this one doesn't disappoint.)
And, last, but not least...
- Call of Duty: Black Ops II (OK, so how many people ARE NOT looking forward to this game? I guarantee it will break even more records as every title has done so since Modern Warfare. At first, I hated Black Ops, but then it grew on me the more I played it with friends and completed the campaign and tried the Combat Training for fun. There were a few things I thought ruined parts of the game (the SR-71 Blackbird not having a counter, how weird the characters looked when running, walking, moving, etc., the hit detection), but the majority of the game was tolerable and pretty fun. I hope they don't add dumb things such as "lag compensation" like in MW3. That was the worst idea to add that. Also, they need to NOT reward bad players who don't do well in the game. Sure, don't make it impossible to level up and whatnot, but don't add last/final stand to players who die too much or dead man's hand or any of that other garbage. That ruins the game more than the developers care to know. Anyway, I'll save my thoughts and opinions for the preview.)
There is one thing I'll be touching on that happened in the gaming community regarding ME3, the ending. I'll talk about what happened and what MY OWN thoughts/opinions are on the ending and the backlash that has happened so look forward to that in ME3's review. OK, well, I can't really think of much else on the schedule so I'll get started on some of those soon enough.
HAPPY GAMING!
GeNiO
Here is a list of what I'm going to try to write reviews on:
- Mass Effect 3 (This was my most anticipated game of 2012 and it really did NOT disappoint, except for the ending, which I'll touch on in the review, but I'm sure most people have already heard about the ending and heard a lot of different opinions on it so I'll give mine, too.)
- Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon: Future Soldier (After seeing a bunch of awesome videos on the campaign, co-op, and online multiplayer, I was pretty excited for this game and it met most of my expectations with a few hiccups that I've found along the way so stay tuned for that review.)
- L.A. Noire (Rockstar normally does a great job with their games and this was no exception.)
- Just Cause 2 & Crysis 2 (I'm putting these together for a couple of reasons; Just Cause 2 I just wasn't into. It looked like a good game, but when I started playing it, it was just not my type of game and I returned it to GameFly within a day or two. For Crysis 2, it was a good game up until the game kept freezing on me and I couldn't get past one spot. I even tried my brother's new bought copy of the game and it was getting stuck at the same point so, after a while of trying to get past that point, I just gave up and sent it back. I will, however, review what I played, though.)
- Ace Combat 6: Fires of Liberation & Ace Combat: Assault Horizon (This series, in my opinion, is the best flight simulator/fighting series out there and, yes, better than the H.A.W.X. series. I've played both and the Ace Combat series is better to me. I'll review both of these games as they're the same series.)
- H.A.W.X. & H.A.W.X. 2 (The videos of these games did more for me than the actual games, which isn't a good sign. After seeing the videos I was really looking forward to playing both, but they kind of let me down quite a bit.)
That's about it for the reviews for now. Some of those games are a little old so I'll try to keep it to newer games that I've played. Now, onto the previews...
- Assassin's Creed III (This just might be tied for Mass Effect 3 for my most anticipated game of 2012. After all, almost everything about this game will be brand new from the main character to the new engine to the new setting and so forth. I can't wait to see what Ubisoft has in store with their new engine and what they've been working on for the past 2 years or so. I'm a very big fan of the Assassin's Creed franchise and I've loved every single game, even though there were a few things I hated (most notably the "tower defense" in AC: Revelations.)
- Medal of Honor: Warfighter (I loved Medal of Honor 2010 and this looks very promising. By love, I'm referring to the campaign, not the multiplayer as I only played that for a few hours and then stopped. Everything I've read and seen so far has been great and looks exciting so I definitely can't wait to see what they do with this game.)
- NHL '13 (I'm a huge hockey fan so this is a must for me. Each game seems to improve on the previous title so hopefully they continue that trend and move forward with this one. There were a few things I didn't like in '12 and '11 so I hope they try to fix some of those things and whatnot.)
- FIFA Soccer '13 (Another sport I'm a huge fan of, football/soccer, FIFA '13 should be another amazing game in the franchise as FIFA is usually the best EA Sports game. I'm definitely looking forward to what more they can do in the upcoming game.)
- Rainbow Six: Patriots (This game looks intense. It hits close to home as I was born and raised in the United States and have felt some of the repercussions of our terrible government's decisions. Hopefully they move this in the right direction and make a quality game.)
- Spec Ops: The Line (As you might tell, I love war games. I'm very big of these types of games and I don't hold back when criticizing the quality of them. From what I've seen with this game, it looks pretty solid, but, then again, so did a few others. Hopefully this one doesn't disappoint.)
And, last, but not least...
- Call of Duty: Black Ops II (OK, so how many people ARE NOT looking forward to this game? I guarantee it will break even more records as every title has done so since Modern Warfare. At first, I hated Black Ops, but then it grew on me the more I played it with friends and completed the campaign and tried the Combat Training for fun. There were a few things I thought ruined parts of the game (the SR-71 Blackbird not having a counter, how weird the characters looked when running, walking, moving, etc., the hit detection), but the majority of the game was tolerable and pretty fun. I hope they don't add dumb things such as "lag compensation" like in MW3. That was the worst idea to add that. Also, they need to NOT reward bad players who don't do well in the game. Sure, don't make it impossible to level up and whatnot, but don't add last/final stand to players who die too much or dead man's hand or any of that other garbage. That ruins the game more than the developers care to know. Anyway, I'll save my thoughts and opinions for the preview.)
There is one thing I'll be touching on that happened in the gaming community regarding ME3, the ending. I'll talk about what happened and what MY OWN thoughts/opinions are on the ending and the backlash that has happened so look forward to that in ME3's review. OK, well, I can't really think of much else on the schedule so I'll get started on some of those soon enough.
HAPPY GAMING!
GeNiO
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