Video Game Reviews

[Meg]

Write a review for a game you played! Be sure to explain your reasons for why you like it or don't like it. Maybe have a final score to. Let's try to get lots of different games for all the systems, so don't review a game if there's already several reviews unless you feel differently about the game.

 

[Darth Angelo]

Beens that it's not actually out yet :$ I guess there won't be that many reviews for Assassins Creed Bloodlines which I finished last night so I guess I will put down my verdict.

Pros

The gameplay was actually really good, so good in fact that sometimes I forgot I was playing it on a handheld. You start off with every move you unlock by the end of the first game and the timing regarding combo kills and counters is the same so if you are familiar with the first game you can just jump straight into the combat with no worries.

Unlike the first game where you are sent somewhere, do a bunch of side missions to find out about your target and do the business X9 the story is played out in a more straightforward way, for the most part your contacts will tell you who is causing trouble and you go to take care of them, they also throw in a few interrogation and tailing missions to keep it interesting and there are also some fun boss fights throughout.
The side missions like viewpoints, rescue civilians and stealth assassinations are still there but they are more for money than anything else. You can just skip them if you want.

As you play through you will earn exp points which you can use to upgrade Altiar's sword, health and hiding speed as I think the only point to the templar coins you earn are to be able to transfer them over to Ezio in AC2 which is a cool idea. There are a number of Gold and Silver collectable templar coins hidden in each area which was enough to make me want to go back after beating it of search for them but if I didn't have a PS3 I probably wouldn't have bothered.

Cons

My biggest problem with this game is not actually with the game itself, it (with most PSP games I play) is with the PSP and its absence of a second analogue nub which this game is just crying out for. Luckily the camera can be defaulted by tapping the L trigger but this really is a game where you need an easier access to a 360 degree camera.
Getting around with that little nub also takes some getting used to. Especially when Altiar is getting stuck on corners and walls etc.
Something else which got on my nerves were the soldiers for several reasons.
-they seem to be a lot more easy to turn hostile this time around, you have to be very careful around them and there are no benches so finding a hiding spot is a pain once you have been noticed.
-in some parts of the game new enemies will spawn out of nowhere and continue spawn out of random places making it nearly impossible to ever get out of the situation simply by killing everyone. Maybe that was some sort of lesson about the importance of stealth but I ended up throwing myself off cliffs more than once because I was sick of fighting soldier after soldier after soldier. In any case this is not a game you are going to want to battering ram your way through; stealth and patience are always the easier option it seems.

All in all I enjoyed it. It had a fairly decent story and was short but not too short and fairly easy to get through. It really felt like the engine from AC1 had been pasted into a PSP game which was amazing I couldn't think of a single thing they pulled out of the original game.
I'd give it an 8/10 - the only real issues were obvious issues which I expected from a PSP game. ^_^

 

[Meg]

how about people that want to see a review for a certain game can ask for it, and anyone that's played it can write a review for it?

I'd like to see a review for Borderlands.

 

[DeviRyuuD]

Well, here`s a review of Risen that i did a while back.

Hello and welcome to Myojinoir reviews + adding a little guide for gameplay, todays victim:

Risen is a single-player fantasy-themed action role-playing game by the German company Piranha Bytes, and published by Deep Silver. Piranha Bytes itself developed the Windows version, which was released on October 2, 2009, along with the European version of the Xbox 360 port. The Xbox 360 port has been outsourced to an experienced console team under the close supervision of Piranha Bytes. The North American version of the Xbox 360 port has been delayed to "early 2010". Today, as always reviewing the PC version.


Storyline.
You`re one of the three survivors of a sea storm caused, catastrophic shipwreck, you find yourself washed up on an island that you`ve never been on before and set up a goal to find what to do next.
When i said one of the three, i mean you`re not the only one there, soon after you wake up you stumble upon a woman named Sara, she`s pretty much your tutor on how to play the game, not going to spoil the fun on what role she plays in the game. After the short tutorial you find a man in a house, who then leads to the path you chose: To the left to become a Thief(One of Don Estebans men, or it would be okay to say "rebels") or to the right - to become a pawn of the Inquisitor(The saviour of human kind(the third survivor(not really a spoiler))). You take on quests given by them, or one of them, to save the world of the Titans wrath or to gain control over the island. Titans in fact are the ones that caused the storm that wrecked your ship. And are terrorizing the rest of the world, except the island you`re on. There`s more to it, but i won`t spoil the fun.
7/10 (not too original)

After meeting up with sara.​

Quests and the world.
Quests are solid, interesting and even quite challenging. There are ofcourse main quests and side quests, main quests lead you deeper into the story, while sidequests support you with experience, money and even nice equipment. Though there might not be as many of them as you would like, they are quite time consuming. The world, or the island, to be more specific, isnt too large if you compare it to games such as TES or Gothic, at least i don`t think so, but what the world does have that the others don`t - it`s the atmosphere. The world is just beautiful, each angle you look from gives a feeling that you`re in digital heaven, i seriously can`t compare the world to Crysis, this is so much better, by the means of atmosphere. You can feel that the developers put their heart into this game.
10/10

A temple, i wonder what`s in there...​

Graphics.
Like i said, the world is fantastic, developers worked on every inch of the game to make it beautiful, but there still are some little issues, like some objects aren`t really round, you can see circles having angles there and there, but don`t let that spoil your fun. NPCs and your character ofcourse don`t have such small details on their faces like they do in Fallout 3, but it`s not what the game was oriented on. At least the game has more advanced graphics than Gothic 3 had, in fact, the engine used for Risen is very similar to the one used for Gothic 3 - Genome Engine, though very much enchanced.
9/10

Nice view..​

Sound.
Can`t complain about the sound, the voice actors did very well on doing the voices, ambient sounds are really great, though i`m not too fond of the music, could do better.
8/10

Gameplay.
The game has a lot in store for you. Your character, has two paths to chose from - fighter or mage. Fighter focuses on using all kinds of weapons, of your choice, swords, axes, bows, crossbows, staffs.. your choice, while mage uses, pretty much the same, only he has the advantage of magic, the only disadvantage is that you need to become one of the Inquisitors. Aside from that there are a lot of talents to learn, smithing and alchemy (which are in fact the most useful talents through out the game, as a gamer to gamer advice - the herbs, mushrooms, roots and all other stuff you find in the game, that including even wine and grog bottles - DON`T sell them, weapons and shields, rings and such are meant for selling though), ore prospecting is useful if you`re going to make your own weapons and jewelry, lockpicking and pickpocket - can`t live without them, acrobatics and sneaking are both useful, and the rest is pretty much up to you. Surely from this you learn that you character isnt just going to be a mage, he`s going to be an all-in-one character, capable of everything. To gain these talents you need learning points, but you don`t just add them, you need to find an NPC to teach you these talents, that consumes learning points and a bit of money. Combat is great. Left click attack and right click block, simple aye? Combat is quite challenging when you`re facing enemies that are by far stronger than you are and that in fact makes it more fun. AI isnt the smartest out there, i tend to be complaining about this alot, but it`s good enough.
9/10

The choice is yours, Blue pill - left, red pill - right? LOL.​

Overall.
That`s about all i have to tell you about this game, and now it`s time for the final verdict.
Pros
- Succesor of Gothic series (IMO)
- Astounding graphics
- Funfactor
- Atmosphere
- AI
- Replayability
Cons
- Cliche beginning
- Music(just my thoughts)


All in all - 43/5 = 8.6


For more information about the game you can either read some blogs about it, or experience it yourself. I suggest buying this one.

One of the three most promising RPGs of the year.
Brought to you by Myojinoir.​

 

[Chaos Raiden]

Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 4 Review

This game is one of my my favourite game. Probably one of the best RPG games that I have ever played, next to Final Fantasy X, Final Fantasy VII, Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3 Fes, and other games.

Plot

Cool guy. Love his hairstyle and glasses.​

Persona 4 takes place in the near-future, fictional, rural Japanese town of Inaba, which lies among floodplains and has its own high school and shopping districts. Unexplained murders have taken place in the small town, where bodies are found dangling among television antennas and their cause of death unknown. At the same time, rumor has begun to spread that watching a switched-off television set on rainy midnight's will reveal a person's soulmate. A group of high-school students decided to investigate the murders on their own, and discovered a fog-shrouded world accessed through television sets infested with monsters called Shadows. They also discovered each of their Other self, symbolizing their suppressed personalities. Confronting their Other selfs awakened their ability to summon beings known as Personas. Using Personas, the students formed the Investigation Team to investigate the connection between the TV world and the murders, and possibly capture the culprit.

(Taken from Wikipedia.)

Gameplay

Like Persona 3 and Persona 3 Fes, the gameplay is turn based RPG like Final Fantasy X and has dating simulation elements like the Sims games. The game takes place in one year, doing things like exploring dungeons, spend time with your friends, buying items, work part time, and other activities. Please be noted that the main activities will take up time, such as exploring dungeons, work part time jobs, and spend time with your friends.

The gameplay is awesome. You can fight battles effectively if you know the enemy's weaknesses.​

Dungeon exploring is quite fun. You will explore the dungeons to save someone. Usually, you will fight bosses which are the shadow of a person trapped in the dungeon. You have to use your weapons, and your special powers called Persona to fight your enemies and the dungeon bosses.

Persona are your special powers that will help you to defeat your enemies. There are elemental, physical, and healing skills that can be used when you equip your Persona. Only the hero gets to use and change multiple Personas in combat, while the rest use one Persona only. Each character has their own weaknesses and strengths, as they have unique Personas. For example, one of your party has a Persona that can use Wind skills. This means that he has resistance to Wind attacks but weakness to Electric attacks. This applies to your enemies too, as they have have immunity and resistance to certain type of attacks. It is very important to make sure that your Hero has a variety of Personas to use in battle. Like your party has their level, Personas also have their own levels to determine their stats.

Summon your Persona to hit your enemy's weakness to inflict major damage.​

Even though your party has weaknesses, your enemies have their own weaknesses too, though some regular enemies and most bosses did not have any weaknesses. By hitting your enemy's weakness, you can have extra turn to react and it will be knocked down. If you have knocked all your enemies down, you can execute a powerful attack with your party members to unleash a powerful attack on your enemies. However, enemies can knock your party down too if they hit their weaknesses, and take extra damage and a 'Dizzy' status if they hit while knocked down.

Bosses are really smart, and they require special tactics to defeat them. They have their own set of unique skills that can obliterate you, so make sure you are high level and have good and a variety of Personas, for your hero at least.​

Unlike in Persona 3 and Persona 3 Fes, you can control your party members like usual RPG games. You can also command the AI to do tactics like guard, automatic healing, automatic offensive frenzy, and so on. 'Guard' command is an important command to remember and to use, as it will save your party members lives and give an opening to attack your enemy.

Fusing Personas is the key to get powerful and effective Personas.​

Fusing Personas is the way to get more powerful Persona. Sacrifice 2 to get 1 Persona, while sacrificing 3 will still get you 1 Persona. However, the more Persona fused, the more powerful it is. However, you have to be high enough level to fuse more powerful Personas. You can get Personas after winning battles.

You can also use items bought from shops or found in dungeons. Your party members also can equip weapons, armour, and accessories. It is crucial to buy strong equipment to tackle the dungeons, although finding money will be hard, but working part time and selling stuffs obtained from your enemies will reward you a lot.

Raising Social Links is important to get stronger Personas, and get various bonuses by increasing your Social Links with your party too. More than 20 Social Links available.​

One of your most important daily activities is raising your Social Links. Social Link is a bond that you create by spending time with your friends. Some Social Links can be initiated if you talk to them, some needs requirement to initiate it. Also, Social Links also have their levels. Level 1 is the lowest, while 10 is the maximum level. The important Social Links that you should maxed is your party members' Social Links, as they will grant you various benefits. Other Social Links are optional, but are very useful if you maximise them too.

Be mindful with the weather status and make sure you save the person trapped in dungeons as soon as possible.
​

In one day, there are various phases. Such as 'Morning', 'Afternoon', 'Evening', and so on. Also, weather plays an important role in this game, unlike moon phases in Persona 3 and Persona 3 Fes. There are 'Cloudy', 'Rainy', and so on. Different weathers affect the dungeons enemies and items gained after battle. However, you must save the person trapped in the dungeon within a time limit. If not, game over, so be careful and be mindful with everyday's weather. Balancing your activities is a good idea to tackle this game effectively.

Story

This is the only the start of the game, but there are more of these excellent funny cutscenes in the game.​

The story is excellent, with good voice acting and great suspense and plot twists. There is more than enough funny humours in the game that will never make the game old. You may think they are typical normal anime humour, but they are original and excellent humour. All characters have their own plot development, coupled with Social Links, makes them alive as in they are real people.

Graphics

Graphics may not be as good as Final Fantasy games graphics, but they are colourful and nice to look at. Also every characters' artworks are detailed and great looking.

Sound
The music is one the best in Shin Megami Tensei games. The battle theme, the dungeon themes, and others are fitting in this game. In essence, this game has one of the best music.

The voice acting is great. The voice acting is on par with Resident Evil 4, Final Fantasy X, and other games' voice acting. Featuring popular and talented voice actors, like Johnny Yong Bosch as the hero in Persona 4, Yuri Lowenthal, Amanda Winn Lee, Troy Baker, and Laura Bailey. Atlus did a good job of hiring these great voice actors for localisation of the game.

Summary

In short, this game is one of the best games I played. The only complaints I have are slow prologue and reuse of enemies from Persona 3 and Persona 3 Fes. My final score is:

Story: 10/10
Gameplay: 9/10
Music: 10/10
Graphics: 9/10

The total score is 38/40. In my opinion, if you enjoy RPG games with social simulation elements, with great story, then buy this game. It is worth your money. If you need any more info for this game or you need my help playing this game, feel free to send a Visitor Message, but you have to invite me in your Friends List first, because I set my Profile in Private.

 

[aka958]

I don't have time to write a review that very long but i hope this works.

Dissidia: Final Fantasy

Dissidia: Final Fantasy is a Final Fantasy fighting game for the PSP.

Story

It story wasn't all to great and i heard others didn't like it very much, i liked one thing with the story and that was the fact that Final fantasy characters throughout the series gather and they actually talked to each others wich was pretty nice. But otherwise i think that the story was quie bad, at least better than other fighting game stories i've seen.

Sound

Nostalgia all over it, remixed and original music from the Final fantasy series, the only let downs was that some music wasn't in and those new songs that has vocals like DFF Cosmos, Chaos last battle 1,2 and 3 just destroyed everything, the epicness of the last boss was destroyed by some strange guy starting to sing in the music...

Graphics

The best i have ever seen on a PSP! Detailed scenes and everything looked great.

Gameplay

It is a fighting game but unlike games like Tekken, mortal kombat and Street fighter you can walk around mor freely and uses the enviroment freely and not so many limitations. It also got levels, abilities, equips, accessories and summons for your characters wich helps you make your own fighting style.
Dissidia Final Fantasy has two different groups of attacks, Brave attacks and HP attacks. Brave attacks lower your enemy brave and higher yours and HP attacks damages your enemy with the brave you got, i could explain further but that would take lots of time.
You attack with the circle (Bravery) and square (HP), You can place your attacks to how your gonna use them yourself, example: for brave attacks you can align O , O + towards opponent , O + Away from opponent on ground and O , O + Forward on analog stick, O + Backward on analog stick in air, many attacks are exclusive to either ground or air and some can be placed both on ground and in air.
There where 22 characters to play in total, 10 main characters and villains from their respective games in the final fantasy series (Final fantasy 1-10) and 2 secret characters.
And 10 stages from final fantasy 1-10 plus 2 other stages, the only thing that bored me that all the stages was resembling somewhere in the final dungeon of each final fantasy...

The game is great and i think i'll give it a 9,5/10 .

 

[Meg]

Uncharted 2
PS3

This game is pretty amazing. The graphics are the best I've seen on any console. The voice acting and script are surprisingly good and not just for a game. The story started off good, but the conclusion was pretty stupid. The game play was also good.The controls were tight, aiming was extremely easy, and the battles were fast paced without being overwhelming. The only thing is that every so often it was a pain to get to where you wanted to go quickly. For instance, you have to be in EXACTLY the right spot in order to do anything. Drake will also run right off a cliff, but won't drop two feet with out grabbing hold of the ledge and refusing to let go. There were several levels of primarily acrobatics which were well done and still managed to be interesting. The puzzles hardly counted as puzzles, but were pretty quick so it wasn't to annoying. Last is the multi-player. It was fun, but didn't hold my attention for more than a few rounds. I would still recommend trying it.

Overall this is one of the best games I ever played.

As much as I want to give this game a perfect 10 I can't because of the few problems it as. 9.5/10

 

[Angelo Credo]

Here's a review I wrote a while back for mine and Keaton's gaming blog, Five Lives, which we've sadly fallen a little out of touch with, what with both of us being broke/in full time education/lacking new games to play, but hell, here we go anyway.

The Elder Scrolls: Oblivion.
Format: Xbox 360.

Oblivion, we all know it and most of us love it, it’s a game I’ve been trying to avoid since the moment it came out, don’t ask me why, I’m not even sure of the answer to that myself, all I know is this, the major summer gaming drought has made me incredibly desperate for something to the pass the time, so here we have my first contribution to this site, an Oblivion review.

This is the part where I talk about the technical details of the game to avoid making valid points.

Oblivion is the fourth game in the Elder Scrolls series, developed by Bethesda Softworks and released in 2006, set in the province of Cyrodil, the Imperial Capital of Tamriel, the game starts with you, the player character, in the dungeon of the Imperial City.
You’re never told why you’re in there, I filled that one in for myself, I like to imagine I was tossed, arse first in there for extreme drunk and disorderly behaviour, with a touch of the old Ultraviolence.

There are several different races to choose from, each with their own specific set of unique qualities, and each with their own pros and cons.
Redguards, for example, are incredibly strong melee based fighters, but have very low pools of magic, whereas say, High Elves, aren't quite as effective at melee, but have the highest reserves of magic energy, though at a cost of being weak against the three types of elemental spells.

Though, these starting factors tend to be mostly irrelevant, as I made a High Elf with the intention of being a mage, and in the end, I'd still made him into a melee fighter to rival a Nord who took down most enemies with one swing of the blade, whilst still having insanely powerful magical abilities...Makes you wonder why you bothered choosing a class at all really.

Then there's the different birth signs, each one offers a particular bonus, The Thief, for example, adds to your lockpicking, sneaking and agility, whilst being born under The Warrior gives an inherent increase to one's Endurance and Strength.

After all this messing about with character creation, the game itself actually starts.
You’re greeted by Captain Picard, who plays the emperor of Cyrodil, known as Uriel Septim, and as you follow him through the dark, dank under sewers of the Imperial Dungeon, he gets well and truly assassinated, but not before handing you the good old, plot important McGuffin, known as the Amulet of Kings.
You’re then tasked with seeking out Uriel’s last remaining heir so he can take the throne in a world where a Daedric Prince, Mehrunes Dagon, is hell bent on taking over and destroying the world through use of the Oblivion Gates.

So far, so standard, you’re a poor lad or lass caught in the wrong place, at the wrong time, more or less forced to save the world from some horrible and despicable evil.
Thankfully, it doesn’t end there, otherwise I’d be questioning why this game got Game of The Year.
You see, the beauty of Oblivion is the fact that you’re allowed absolute free reign over everything you do, you can choose to go along with the main quest if you so wish, or you can explore the province of Cyrodil and do whatever the hell you want.

I picked the latter option, exploring and questing to my heart’s content, to the point where I was level 24, tottering around with the strongest sword and armour set before actually even getting on with the main quest line.

See, what gives Oblivion the right to wear the Game of The Year title is this.
Oblivion is one of those rare, delightful games, one you can utterly lose yourself in and sink so much time into, and you still feel like you’ve gotten something out of it, the sheer magnitude of things to do in this game is astounding, you’ll never find yourself bored with it once the flow gets going, and you’ll keep plugging away at random side quests until you realise you should’ve really gone to bed about 3 hours ago.

You’ll be left speechless at the intensity of the graphics, how beautifully everything is laid out, the scenery is purely pleasing to the eye, so much so that you’ll actually want to drop everything you’re doing to close any Oblivion Gate you see, just because they’re an eyesore…But even the planes of Oblivion are pretty to look at, you’ll be enthralled by the sheer detail that’s gone into just about everything you find in the game world, the Oblivion realm especially, it’s such a stark contrast between awe inspiring beauty and war-torn planes of destruction that’ll leave your jaw hanging at the floor.

…Although, as much as I hate to say it here, Oblivion is by no means perfect, there are some major flaws that need to be addressed to stop this review being turned into a several page wedding vow, so here it is.

I said everything in game was detailed, and that’s true, the only thing is, everything is so repetitive, once you emerge from the sewers into the daylight, you’ve pretty much seen it all, sure, you can walk around for a bit, see some new things, but after that, it’s like you’ve seen the entire thing, and the same pretty much goes for the Oblivion planes.
The map is huge, granted, that’s a good thing, if you want to walk from one end to the other, you’d best have a lot of free time on your hands, but coupled with there being little variety, you’re not going to want to walk from one end to the other, you’ll just fast travel everywhere like I did.

The NPCs are idiots, they evoke no real emotion, you feel nothing for them because you have no reason to, the dialogue assessment is also well and truly screwed, it seems like there are about 4 or 5 voice actors acting every NPC in the game, so you’ll often find someone talking to themselves about how ridiculously high the prices are in a store run by themselves.

Combat can start out as a sticky mess, slow and painful to participate in, imagine trying to swing a sword through a river of custard and you'll get the general idea, though it picks up and becomes quite fluid and enjoyable once you get a half decent skill in Blades and Speed, your combat speed picks up nicely, making everything feel a little bit more real.

But these complaints, to me, are minor, all the flaws are balanced out by the sheer brilliance of everything else, it’s certainly an above average RPG with a lot of fun elements and requires a hell of a time commitment, if you work, you might want to consider taking a holiday.

The only thing I will say is this, if you own Fallout 3, then you’ve basically got the Oblivion experience right there, but that’s still no excuse to pass it up, Oblivion is BethSoft magic in action, and it really shouldn’t be missed, it’s cheap as hell these days, and after you finish the main story, Shivering Isles and Knights of the Nine will keep you entertained for even longer, it’s great value for money and will certainly keep you fed nicely for this year’s summer gaming drought.​

 

[Chaos Raiden]

Resident Evil 4 (PS2) Review

A lot of Resident Evil fans are ****ed with this game because it does not have the key elements of past Resident Evil games. Fixed angled camera, zombies, limited ammo, tough puzzles, B.O.W.s, and so on. But I don't give a crap about these fans, and to me, it is one of the best Resident Evil game to date, if not, the best of all Resident Evil games.

Plot

In 2004, the Umbrella Corporation's secret activities within Raccoon City have become a public affair. Following an investigation conducted by the U.S. government, several Umbrella officials are implicated and prosecuted. The government indefinitely suspends Umbrella's business, bankrupting the company.

Leon S. Kennedy was recruited by the U.S. Secret Service after they learned of his actions in Raccoon City. Leon is sent on a mission to rescue Ashley Graham, the President's daughter, who has been kidnapped by a mysterious cult. Leon travels to a rural village in Europe, where he encounters a horde of violent villagers who pledge their lives to "Los Illuminados" ("The Enlightened Ones" in Spanish), the cult that has kidnapped Ashley.

(Taken from Wikipedia.)

Gameplay

Aim your enemies weakness to damage big time, such as shoot in the head.​

Unlike past Resident Evil games, this game is third person shooter, and the camera is 'over the shoulder', basically means that you can see Leon from behind. Now, you can aim your weapon to shoot with the help of a laser sight, at the enemy's head, hand, leg, etc. be careful though, unlike zombies in the previous games, your enemies are much smarter as they can dodge your fire and can run, throw things, and other stuffs. This is a very good implemented shooting system, which I applaud of. Also, you have your knife as a default weapon and action, and you can use it to slash away enemies, boxes, etc.

Manage your weapons, items, and ammos so that it is easily manageable. Sell off any unwanted weapons, items, and ammos to gain some funds to buy new ones.​

The Safe Box system is not available in this game, instead, you have Attache Case system. Now you can carry weapons, items and store in your case. Each items and weapons has their own size, and the case itself has limited space. Bigger cases are available after you advance enough in the game. This is much better item storage system that the Safe Box in the previous games, and it is easily used. Also, you need to buy items, and weapons from a merchant to defeat your enemies. Like the previous games, most of the weapons are upgradeable, but with a cost. Don't worry, if you found some unwanted items or treasures, sell them to get extra money.

Press the right button to the command prompted in screen. Some of these buttons are useful to avoid enemy attacks.​

The game also features context-sensitive controls. It means Leon can interact with the environment in multiple ways, such as climbing the ladders, jump put of windows, and other actions. This basically means that Leon is not only can shoot and run, but he can do many more things. He can also use these context-sensitive controls to dodge enemy attacks. Several boss fights have these controls to dodge their deadly attacks.

However, not only during fights have these controls, but cutscenes too. So make sure you prepare to press the right buttons during cutscenes, or you will have die in the game.

Prepare to meet some scary and fearsome creatures in this game in the Resident Evil series. They are really tough, strong, and deadly. Not to mention that they are smart too and need some tactic to fight them.​

Boss fights are tough, and several other creatures are so tough that they qualify as mini bosses. Make sure you find enough ammo, and have good weapons as well as healing items. Unlike previous games, ammo are easily found, as your enemies drop them quite oftenly.

The new gameplay is awesome, something which I hope that future Resident Evil games will take the gameplay system too (although Resident Evil 5 did).

Graphics

The graphic details are awesome, no doubt. One of the best looking PS2 games.​

Graphics are undeniably, awesome. It ranks even the Final Fantasy games graphics, and they are realistic. Resident Evil 4's graphics are on par with many great games, such as God of War II, Assassin's Creed, and other games.

Story

The storyline is great. Easy to understand, and easy to follow. Not only that, but Leon kicks ass in this game in every way.

Sound

As with the previous Resident Evil games, the sound is eerie. Most of the boss themes are eerie, and scary. However, this fits the atmosphere of the game, and the soundtrack is amazing.

The voice acting is awesome, especially by Paul Mercier (Leon S. Kennedy). Other voice actors did great job in this game.

Unlockables

Unlike in Gamecube version, the PS2 version has several unlockables. One of the most popular one is The Mercenaries, where you must defeat your enemies in a certain time limit and rank up your score. One of the best mini game ever.

Comparisons

The Wii version has better graphics and has all unlockables from PS2 version. However, there is no laser sight in Wii version, but the targeting is easier by using Wii controls. If you have a choice of buying which one, buy the Wii version.


My final thoughts are that this game deserves an entry to Resident Evil main series, eventhough a lot of fans doesn't like it. My minor complain of this game is that there should be more chapters in this game. My final score are:

Story: 10/10
Gameplay: 10/10
Music: 9/10
Graphics: 10/10

Total score is 39/40.

If you want a great action experience, a cool hero, and etc, then buy this game. You will not regret it.

 

[DeviRyuuD]

Hello and welcome to Myojinoir(NFSCars.net) aka DeviRyuuD(here at DMC.org) reviews, I`ve finally decided to review this game, so here it is. Todays victim:

Dragon Age: Origins (also known as simply Dragon Age) is a computer role-playing game developed by BioWare's Edmonton studio. The game was released for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 in November 2009.
Dragon Age: Origins uses a new game engine named Eclipse, for which a toolset for creation of fan-made content is available to owners of the PC version. The game is single-player only and does not provide LAN support. BioWare co-CEO Ray Muzyka described Dragon Age: Origins as a "spiritual successor" to the Baldur's Gate series, though it is not based on Dungeons & Dragons.


Before i start, i just want to say, i hate this game for its overwhelming, but unused potential.

Storyline
The game is about you, as the main hero, combining forces of humans, elves and dwarfs to defeat the darkspawn and their boss - Archdemon to end the Blight. When you first start the game, you`re given a character editor where you choose a race - human, elf or dwarf, their gender and class - rogue, mage, ranger, warrior and can modify your virtual selves face. But hey, you think this has nothing to do with the storyline, well, it does. Each race and each class have different beggining stories, explaining the origins of where you come from and why is it that you`ve been chosen to become one of the Grey Wardens. Every NPC in the game treats you a bit differently depending on your race, racism much? But you as the player should be left fully satisfied on how different the gaming experience could be with each playthrough.
After the short background you are forced to go to a fortress called Ostagar, to perform the ritual of becoming a Grey Warden. War is night, but something isnt right, when Duncan, the man that brought you there gives a quest to light a torch in a nearby tower, to signalise the other troops to head into battle, the tower appears to be taken over by darkspawn, meaning only one thing - betrayal. After a series of short events you and your companion Alistair are the only Grey Wardens left, and to spice things up, the man that was supposed to lead the rest of the force into battle, now has put a bounty on your head.
Well, the storyline is very juicy, it is pretty dramatic and heavy, It is as if came from a book, astonishing and beautiful in every way.
10/10

Saying good-byes to mah` brotha`

Quests and the world
Quests are mainly story-driven, if there are sidequests, there is so very, very little of them, as if the developers didn`t care about them, but with a story and amount of things to do here, it`s clear why they didn`t bother. Quests are solid, and depending on your choices of speech they`re variable in many ways. Some quests and deeds that you do appeal to your comrades as approval or disaproval, which either can make your comrade(s) to love you or hate you, which unlock special dialogues and some neat tricks, that might be either fun or actually useful. And yes, it is possible to make love with your comrades... what were the developers thinking? As for the world, it isnt really that big, i mean you`ll spend most of your time in battles with something rather than exploring, because as soon as you find a locked chest - billions of enemies pop out of nowhere and you engage battle once more, so there isn`t really much point to huge worlds. But then again, i wish the world was open, rather than location based. On your map there are cities that you can travel to, by traveling there and finding halls, caves, forests, whatnot, where you can go in and explore, you unlock more locations on the map. The travel system is i`d say is very similar to Fallout 1, 2, Tactics, or even Arcanum`s traveling system, you might engage battle while traveling, however you cannot travel freeley. Either you go to the city or you stay where you are.
I don`t really care about comrade relationship, but if it has bonuses, then they`re fine. about quests, there should have been more sidequests, just for the heck of it. And as for the world it`s no gem, but if you really must you can go with it, otherwise open world or no go.
6/10

Pretty boys...

Graphics
This isn`t a gem either. While lately games have been oriented more on high texture quality, Dragon age: Origins offers very average textures, very blured out, unsharp. The world isn`t beautiful either, from the three(Divinity 2, Risen and DA: O), Dragon Age has the worst graphics IMO. Very much attention has been put on the character design, which is pretty pleasant and detailed compared to the world. But just that won`t quite cut it.
6/10

Sound
I suppose the music is very accurate, by making the right mood wherever you go, however i couldn`t say it`s very pleasant. It`s more cold and gloomy rather than pleasant to listen to. I`d go with my own music if you`re going to play.
Dialogues are very good, there are loads of choices, some are funny, some are weird, but the best part is that they`re all voiced, and prolly this is one of the finest voice acting i`ve heard in recent games.
8/10

3 dwarfs <= 1 human

Gameplay
At the very beginning the game introduces party and tactical combat system. It isn`t too complicated, but if you`re a more of a loner rather than dependant on your party, this could get ugly. Normally everyone wants their character to be the best at everything, but Dragon Age: Origins is very strict class-wise. If you`re a warrior you`re never ever going to learn spells and if you`re a mage, you`re never ever going to learn lockpicking and so on. Meaning that if you want to advance in game, you`ll have to live with your party, even if you don`t like it, or just not play. An inovation is Combat tactics - you can modify your characters behaviour in battle to do strict things. If its health bar is at 25% it heals himself, if he has and can use ranged weapons - you can make the character never to engage close combat and just shoot from afar, all that without you controling them, mostly. Like i said, you`ll spend more time in combat rather than actually experiencing the story and traveling. I won`t be telling about classes and such, if you`re going to play you`ll be quite pleasantly surprised on how big the lore is.
8/10

The 4/5ths "A Team"

Final verdict
The game offers a breath taking adventure everytime you play it, and it is truly a masterpiece of a game... well not really. Like i said, it has so much more potential that it does not use, for example LAN, why didn`t they implement LAN in a game that would be just so much more fun to play with friends rather than alone with the computer. Why did they make it location based, to save memory? - I think not.
Pros:
- High replayability value
- Breath taking story
- Great dialogues
- Modability
Cons:
- Not-so-good graphics
- No freedom ( -1 )

In the end it gets 37/5 = 7.4


And with this, concludes the TOP 3 RPG of the year reviews, nominating Risen as the best, Divinity 2 as my favorite but only in the second and finally Dragon Age: Origins as third.
Thank you all for reading, leave comments, compaints and flames, i appreciate all of them. Until we meet again!

 

[Angelo Credo]

^ I'd just like to raise my hand and point out, what format were you playing DA: Origins on?

 

[DeviRyuuD]

Oh sorry, PC ^^

 

[Angelo Credo]

That's odd, I'd heard that with a PC able to run the game with all the bells, whistles and lovely little sliders maxed, the graphics were pretty bloody impressive. Hmm.

 

[DeviRyuuD]

Yeah... i run the game on max, but it still isnt as impressive graphics wise as the other two i mentioned in the review. I mean, when you look at what Risen has to offer with its graphics as a whole, you see that it has no AA, but it still is eye candy, it is made by artists and you can see that everywhere you look. Divinity 2 is a bit worse graphics as a whole wise than Risen, then again it offers very highly detailed textures, unlike Risen and DAO. But Dragon Age has none of that, yes you can see that developers were trying to make it look great, but it just doesnt. Alot of attention has been put to details, to make them right, just look at the houses, but the world is simply boring to look at, there`s nothing to put your eye on. Not to mention unsharp textures, which luckily have been fixed with mods(but that does not count).