Controller1.com Focus Test 39: Trials HD
One Man. One Motorcycle. Ramps. Glass. A Focus Test.
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DEMO MEMO- WANTED
Here’s a quick look at the demo of the first episode of Wanted (PSN tested). Operation Winback on the N64′s lawyer called and they want their game back.
Based loosely on last year’s movie Wanted which you control a main character who doesn’t look like James McAvoy or Angelina Jolie, but could be the result of a transporter accident, so we’ll call the playable character Tuvix.
Wanted is a third person title that makes you think of a 10 year old n64 game rather than Gears of War. Why? It doesn’t look all that bad, but it doesn’t look all that great either. How does it play? It plays ok as a game where you sneak up an press the melee button, but as a shooter, its kinda painful. I couldn’t recommend it.
A demo is obviously meant to make you buy the full game but when your whole game is merely an episode, the demo for this game is at least a substantial experience, enough to say: this is shash.
The look is kinda fizzy though the framerate holds up well. Sound is fine to be sure but its somewhat lacking charisma.
DUKE NUKEM 3D
Reviewed on XBLA. Also on PC, N64. Developed by 3d Realms
Well Duke is back and this time its the original 1996 adventure in its entirety on XBLA. This isn’t a remake, merely a port but even after all these years, this is still a good game.
The game is a first person shooter starring Ass-kicking Duke Nukem, originally a star of a side-scrolling shooter before getting this 3D makeover in 1996. An instant classic managing to hit all the sweet spots for a typical teenage gamer (action, gore, smart ass wrestling style commets and some pixelated T and A), the game is also a case study in making a varied FPS. So much of the game play is done right that its hard to remember its rather unrelenting difficulty and some rather obtuse puzzle elements.
This port brings features online multiplayer and 8-player coop. It also manages to make the difficulty a non-issue without completely re-engineering the gameplay. When you play, the game is recording every move you make so that when you die, you can restart anywhere along the timeline of your current playthough of the level. The game is still hard, its just not as punishing as it was.
The multiplayer is like stepping into a time portal and emerging in 1996. All that’s missing is Ace of Base on the radio and giant cell phones that could cave in the skull of a hippopotamus. If you loved that sort of intense deathmatch gameplay, you might get some feelings of nostalgia but this is an excellent single player experience.
Graphically its still a 4:3 game with either decals or black bars on the side (though you can zoom the image to see more of the VERY PIXELATED graphics. The sound is just as crunchy as it was back in the pre HD era. But you are playing this game because you remembered it being fun and cool, not because you miss 3D games using sprites instead of 3D models.
Is this a portent for Duke Nukem forever actually coming out? I’ve no idea and after playing this and enjoying it, I really don’t care anymore. This sates any desire I had for more Duke unless DNF is very, very, very, very, very good.
controller1.com Rating 2/3
Controller1.com Focus Test #3 PODCATS ATTACK!
This week Fighting Games. Normally the best fighting games are made in Japan. So today we go all Ninja Gaijin and play fighting games developed in the West.
Mortal Kombat on DS, International Karate something on Commodore 64 and Castle CRASHERS!
HAIL TO THE KING, BABY!
So rather than release a new game, or outsource a 3rd person Duke Nukem game to someone else, as happened on PlayStation and N64, 3D Realms have instead just stuck 1996′s Duke Nukem 3D onto XBLA
So Duke Nukem 3D is exactly the same game from back then. Except its got 8 Duke co-op, MP over Live and a rewind feature. Considering the difficulty levels in the game are pretty high that’s a bonus and a half. Some people say the vita Chambers in Bioshock made it too easy. To them I say, “your mother is a whore.”
So Duke’s witticisms may seem old hat now, as well as pandering to the then target audiences more base instincts, but this game still has it with clever level design that made you explore, think and try new stuff. It also begs the question: “What the fuck have 3D Realms been up to for the last 11 or so years?”
How many engines does it take to build a Duke Nukem game? The Answer, apparently is thirty-nine. In the time since Duke Nukem Forever was announced we have already laughed at how long Daikatana, Spore, Too Human, Prey and Team Fortress 2 took to come out. There have been three entire generations of consoles in the meantime. PC has gone from being at the vanguard of gaming to being the ugly stepsister you take out of the cage and slap a dress on at Xmas time – the dress being so you don’t eat the wrong turkey when you’re drunk.
Duke Forever, the sequel to Duke Nukem 3D was begun in 1997.
We’ve had wars, 4 Olympic games (which means 4 crappy Olympic games games) and the Olsen Twins became legal and suddenly everyone didn’t care. In 1997, The Simpsons was good. In 1997, the internet was slow and Amazon was a river, a jungle and a compliment to a hot chick. In 1997, Kristen Bell was in elementary school. In 1997, Google was just a big number. In 1997 Paris Hilton was an expensive hotel with whores in the lobby (as opposed to an expensive whore who owned Hotels). In 1997, nerds in South Korea still attempted to get dates. And since development on DNF was started, I have gotten to 55% of a PS3 firmware update downloaded
We’ve come along way in that time. How about you guys at 3D Realms?
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