A Gaming Diary
360
Red Faction: Guerilla (360)
Sep 25th
Lovefilm sent me this yesterday, which was nice of them. I loved the demo, so I was very much looking forward to the full game. It doesn’t disappoint. Took ages to install and update it, then there’s a load of cut scenes and tutorial stuff, but once into the game I was having a grand old time.
Basically, although you get to drive around and shoot people, destruction is the key element. (Just as in Crackdown, thinking about it, where jumping was the thing that brought the open-world shooting and driving gameplay to life.) Not that the shooting and driving isn’t fun. The run and gun approach to killing enemies feels a bit wooly, but if you use cover and aim your shots it’s a lot better. (And sneaking up on people and walloping them with a sledgehammer is unlikely to ever get old.) The driving is great fun, with trucks that just love to go flying through the air.
But, yeah, it’s watching buildings fly apart and collapse that’s the real draw here. The game knows this and populates the first area with impressively tall smokestacks that are amazing to bring down – and which you’re rewarded for destroying with the game’s currency. Excellent.
I think I’m going to enjoy this.
I’m only a silver member of Live these days, so I won’t be able to try out the multiplayer, but I’ll try to finish the single player before sending the game back.
The Bigs 2 Demo (360)
Aug 6th
Played a proper, real console for the first time in ages and choose The Bigs 2 demo as the game to welcome me home. Arcade baseball, with bizarre little QTEs and what may or may not be mini games scattered around. I didn’t really fully understand it and it took me several innings to even begin to get the timing down, but I started to get into it after a while. As the full game’s a budget title I’m quite interested. Shame I can’t get screen shots off the 360, but at least that means I can post this from my iPhone, even if I’m not actually writing about it for once.
Trivial Pursuit (360)
Jul 20th
On Friday evening I played three games of Trivial Pursuit against my wife.
In the first game, she got all six wedges, leaving me with no lives for the Wedge Off. She won. In the second game, I got one or two wedges but still lost. In the third game I scraped a win, leaving me with a little bit of pride left, but not much.
It wasn’t as if the questions were favouring her – I just wasn’t as good.
Fuel (360)
Jul 10th
I finally got to the part I was dreading. I’ve got two stars on all the races I’ve unlocked and it’s not enough to unlock any more areas. So I’m having to go back and do races on three-star difficulty. Going through the menus to do this means the load times are more of an issue than normal, but I’ve been surprised by just how much fun I’ve been having. Some races have been very easy, some hard, but I’ve enjoyed them all.
Fuel (360)
Jul 6th
Bombing around Firemoor Fields, doing a two or three more career races, a couple more vista points, an Achievement for getting clothes for my driver, etc. I think I’m still quite a long way from opening up any new areas.
Solar Demo (360)
Jul 6th
A community game that people had recommended I play. I tried out the Sanbox mode until it kicked me out (i.e. about ten minutes or so) and it seemed nice enough and quite relaxing, but it didn’t really grab me. I’ll have to play it some more and see if it clicks for me.
Gunstar Heroes Demo (360)
Jun 30th
Probably the best Megadrive/Genesis game in the whole world. Fast, fluid and fun. But did it always look so horrible?
Played it, loved it, but didn’t buy it. Why? Well, because I’m awful it, that’s why, and didn’t actual get to where it asked me to buy it. If I’m so terrible that I don’t need the full game, then I think I’ll keep my points.
(Although, I know the boss that killed me was pretty easy when I used to play on the Genesis, so I’ll probably cave eventually.)
Fuel (360)
Jun 30th
Got an Achievement last night. First one in a while. It was the one for collecting one hundred liveries. As luck would have it, it wasn’t just a random livery for a vehicle I never use, but a new design for my beloved Dustgrinder bike. Hooray!
Collected another livery after that, then went off to do an actual career race – this one a buggy race that took place mostly on roads. Took me three tries, but was pretty easy once I discovered a shortcut at the beginning of the race that put me far enough ahead that I could avoid being overtaken on the bits that I couldn’t do very well. There was a hairpin on to gravel which I could never quite get right, a jump it was hard to hit at the correct angle and a curved, woody section where I knew there must be a shortcut – the AI cars were certainly finding it – but which I couldn’t find. Excellent race.
Sam & Max Save The World Demo (360)
Jun 26th
Didn’t play this for long. I probably want it, despite the voices being all wrong, but I don’t honestly know if I’d ever play it. I can see myself spending 1,600 points and then never even finishing episode one. Something to ponder.
Rocket Riot Demo (360)
Jun 26th
Lovely art style, brilliant “Rocket Riot, Rocket Riot” sound burst at the end of levels (almost enough to make me buy it on its own), plays as well as an unholy union of Bangai-O and Worms ever could. Very generous demo, too. If I had points to throw around, I might well throw them around on this. But I don’t. And after hearing complaints about a terrible second boss, I’m not going to add points for this game.
If that makes sense.