Gaming Art: Advance Wars.

As many of my friends will know I'm a great fan of the Advance Wars series of games and a keen follower of fan made gaming art. So imagine my delight when I found some great Advance Wars artwork over at Deviant Art!

The author's profile/galley page is here and is well worth checking out.

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Review: Shadow Complex (XBLA).

Unless you missed the multitude of adverts on Live, you may very well be aware that Shadow Complex (the collaboration between Epic Games and Chair Entertainment) was released on XBLA yesterday.

Shadow Complex has been billed by Microsoft as the “height of old-school side-scrolling design combined with modern, cutting-edge gameplay” and early previews have all suggested that it was set to be a stellar title. So is it?

In a word, yes. In fact Shadow Complex may very well change the expectations of what consumers on XBLA expect in future as it raises the bar some distance in terms of graphics, gameplay and production values.



Essentially Shadow Complex is a 2D side scrolling adventure shooter set in a rich 3D environment (which is powered by Unreal Engine 3) and harks back to the days of greats such as Super Metroid, Flashback and Castlevania SOTN.

Based on Orson Scott Card’s Empire series of novels (the second of which is launched this December), Shadow Complex casts you in the role of Jason Fleming, a fairly unassuming guy who stumbles across a secret base run by Progressive Restoration. Having kidnapped his lady friend Fleming (voiced by Nolan North who also voices Nathan Drake in Uncharted) takes off in hot pursuit and so begins the start of your adventure as you enter the base.

In all honesty despite the collaboration with one of sci-fi’s most interesting writers, the plot of Shadow Complex is rather thin and for the most part very much part of the background.

That said, you probably will not notice or care that much because the game itself is just so playable; you’ll be far more interested in what’s in the next room ahead or seeking out hidden entrances (more on this in a moment) which lead to a variety of collectables and upgrades.

The weapons and items of Shadow Complex are introduced gradually starting off with your Torch; the use of which is essential if you want to find all of the many hidden routes.

This is not because of an over use of darkness but because the torch beam will reveal the entrances through the use of a colour system which changes the colour of an item (such as a vent hatch) to show the player what item is needed to pass (in most cases a weapon). It may sound complicated but it is in fact a very simple system that is completely intuitive to use.

In terms of weapon control, you aim with the right stick and in some instances you can fire into both the background and foreground. This system makes the world feel much more vast and alive as although the game essentially plays in 2D, you will feel very much part of a 3D environment.

Fleming jumps and climbs around his environment with ease and this is many ways reminiscent of the recent Drakes Fortune (but thankfully no where near as frustrating!) and Shadow Complex certainly rewards thorough exploration.

Along your travels you’ll encounter numerous enemies ranging from the basic cannon fodder grunts to the large boss enemies which are often large mech type contraptions. You’ll earn XP as you go which boosts your abilities and this rather nicely carries across different games which is handy for when the difficulty ramps up and for gaining the level 50 achievement.

The game also has leader boards which up date as you are in game and this provides an extra and welcome competitive element.

Shadow Complex is in many ways a hard game to criticise. It has the production values of a full price game and yet it’s cheap to purchase, it’s immensely fun to play and exploring its vast environment is a genuine joy.

The aiming mechanic can at times feel a little loose and the story is certainly not very apparent in many ways despite the writing heritage but to be frank you won’t care, there’s simply too much enjoyment on offer here for these things to really grab your attention.

I could quite easily write a lot more about this game, but for now I will hold fire, Shadow Complex is a title which you need to experience for yourself and discover the joys it has to offer.

You certainly won’t find a better way to spend around a tenner this year and in many ways Shadow Complex puts the vast majority of its full price brethren to shame. Grab yourself some points and buy it, you won’t regret it.

9/10.

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Plants Vs Zombies coming to XBLA.

Popcap have announced that they are bringing their rather excellent tower defence style game Plants Vs Zombies to Xbox Live Arcade! An iPhone version has also been reported as in the works.

No release date has been confirmed yet but this is great news for 360 owners. Here’s hoping they also sort out a PSN release so the PS3 crowd don't miss out on some Zombie mayhem!

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Fallout 1, 2 and Tactics now available on Steam.

Good news for RPG fans - the classic Fallout series of games are now available to purchase on Steam; either individually or together as part of the Fallout collection.

The only major downside is the price. Each game costs £6.99 with the complete pack selling for £15.99 which is over double what you could pick the set up for in your local games store.

Interplay has also made available Sacrifice and Kingpin from their back catalogue.

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PS3 Slim won't support Linux.

Sony’s soon to be released PS3 Slim will be losing it’s older brothers ability for users to install their own custom operating system.

This is a pity as installing Linux on the PS3 can really expand it's functionality as a living room computer/media centre. I'm also rather disappointed in that one of the things I've always applauded Sony for with the PS3 was this forward thinking option.

No doubt there will be ways found around it but even so its sad news for what otherwise looks to be a good machine.

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PS3 isn’t the best games machine, but it is a great piece of kit.

The current generation of consoles marked something of a departure for me. At any other time in my gaming life I have always brought all the new consoles at the point of (or very close to) their release dates. This time around however I’ve only just now completed the ‘set’ with our recent acquisition of an 80GB Playstation 3.

When the machine launched it was extremely expensive and given the lack of any real decent exclusive titles I decided to wait until there were some titles on the system I wanted to actually play.

Since then the PS3 has hardly set the world on fire with its games and thus I never really got round to making the purchase. A console should live and breathe in the quality of its games library and to date the PS3 has offered very little that isn’t already being done better on Microsoft’s winter heater.



Multi-format titles have on the whole been better on the 360 (The Orange Box debacle instantly springs to mind as does the more recent Ghostbusters ‘admission’ by Terminal Reality) and to date the exclusives generally have been more appealing (Halo series, Gears of War, PGR, GTA IV exclusive DLC).

Some developers such as Haze’s Free Radical have voiced complaints over the PS3 being difficult to code for, whilst heavy hitter Valve have gone one step further and simply refused full stop to code for the system. This decision alone means that PS3 owners may never get to experience the brilliance that is Left 4 Dead and potentially the up and coming (soon I hope!) Half Life 2: Episode 3.

I must admit that Uncharted: Drakes Fortune and Little Big Planet have both nearly persuaded me to part with my cash previously but unusually the sensible family man overruled the impulsive gamer’s heart.

It’s also worth noting that although I do not consider myself a ‘fan boy’, I do at times tend to think of Sony more negatively than the other two big hitters. This is mainly due to the impact Sony has had on Sega over the years; they are after all responsible for Sega’s exit from the hardware market, they killed the Dreamcast right? Well no, Sega unfortunately managed that all by themselves.

Sega failed to recognise the importance of 3D with the Saturn, produced a machine for the ‘hardcore’ (I prefer the term old skool mind you) and missed out on a whole new generation of ‘clubbing’ gamers.

They then produced the brilliant and pioneering Dreamcast, failed to market it so anyone really knew what it was and again produced old skool games. Now that’s great for someone like me but was hardly likely to entertain the newer (and by now much larger) gaming demographic.

Now you may well assume given so much negativity on my part and the minor bias towards all things blue and spiky that I’m simply writing here to bash Sony and its black monolith. But to my own surprise I’m actually writing to say how impressed with it I really am.

Whilst many will no doubt disagree, it’s not in this writer’s opinion the best out and out system for games, something I have covered enough above. It’s expensive (although at the time of writing there are numerous price cuts around due to the imminent arrival of the PS3 Slim) and very surprisingly the word Playstation is no longer synonymous to many with the phrase games console. Owning a Playstation isn’t the cool thing it was in the past.

Bizarrely we actually never really ‘paid’ for our PS3, it came ‘free’ with my partners new mobile phone contract (I’m holding off on renewing mine for the launch of the PSP Go!).

Our sole reason at the time for picking the PS3 as our freebie was that due to various circumstances we no longer had a DVD player in the main living room. Since the PS3 is both a DVD and Blu-ray player it seemed the obvious choice for us despite its gaming shortcomings.

What we never realised at the time was just how good the PS3 is at serving as our complete family entertainment centre. And it’s here that the PS3 really excels, it is because of this the PS3 sees use in our household every day and by several occupants.

We have our DVD and Blu-ray player for our films. We have a music centre which streams music from our PC effortlessly along with our photo and video collection. Then there’s Vidzone, essentially a free music video channel where you pick what plays. And of course there’s the games, finally Uncharted and Little Big Planet are getting my well deserved attention (Uncharted being the first game in ages that I’ve actually bothered to complete). Heck we can even surf the net with it during the television ad breaks.

Of course the 360 also has some media features of its own but they simply are not as well implemented.

The DVD player is DVD only and it’s intrusively noisy for a front room. The media streaming works to a point but it’s not as easy or as smooth as on the PS3. The music videos on Live are limited and have to be paid for. It can’t surf the internet and unless you own an Elite model the HDD is woefully small. And also, somehow, the 360 just doesn’t look like an entertainment centre. It looks like a games console; it looks out of place under my main TV.

My partner has never really touched a non-handheld games console before and yet with the PS3 she presents our photos to friends and family, pops music on in the morning to keep the kids quiet (our 1 year old daughter dives across her pen when the PS3 power button beeps because she loves to dance away to the videos) and even watches the odd film.

And so, it’s only now that I’ve come to realise that the old skool gamer in me has blinded me into ignoring this great machine.

No it’s not the best games console, the 360 is currently the choice here with its vast library and it’s excellent (though still annoyingly chargeable) Xbox Live. But it is a great all rounder, it serves the purpose Sony always said they wanted to serve, the central family hub of entertainment, the unseen box of tricks that quietly delivers all of your living room needs without you even realising it. And for that Sony should be applauded.

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Playfire - Facebook for Gamers.

I have to say it, Playfire has certainly impressed me!

It was quite odd how I found the site in many ways; we had a thread active on my clan forum over at 22g discussing things we would like to see in the future of gaming.One of the things that came up was the idea of a website that collected all of your player data across all of your formats (XBL, PSN, Steam etc) and then lo and behold we discover Playfire!



Hopefully the Steam integration will get better (achievements, direct link to profile etc) and to this end I have already used the feedback option to suggest this and been informed that they have added this to their 'to do' list. I have to say as well it was nice that one of the co-founders of the site got back to me regarding my suggestion so quickly.

For those who have yet to check it out, Playfire is a Facebook type social space designed especially for gamers. Within your Playfire profile you can display both the games you have played and owned (with ratings/mini-reviews), microblog and link up to your PSN and XBL accounts. Instant chat, user made groups, game forums and much more are also present so be sure to check it out.

For those wondering about the Steam Community Network I recently founded on Playfire, it is simply an effort to bring those Steam users on Playfire together. I noted that there was no Steam related group on there so rather than sit back and wait I got a bit pro-active and made one! Hopefully it will take off and people will enjoy taking part. Thanks to all those who have joined so far.

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