[The video game thread]

[Notabot]

I started digging into my backlog of games since I finished inFamous, and installed Arkham Asylum GOTY. Yow, that's not one for the kids, is it?! Kinda glad they weren't around this week because I probably would have let them watch me start playing it, and it gets creepy right away.

[angloconvoy]

Same as HeavyArms.

[StoneCold Skywarp]

Dl'ed Spec Ops, NFS Most Wanted and When Vikings Attack (amongst a whole host of other PS+ goodies)

[The PS3 KILLeR]

I want ps plus. but I've only 9 gigs left on my ps3 and it takes me at least 3 days to download a game on psn, so I simply can't do it. Shame I've missed out on a lot of free stuff.

[Heinrad]

Went yomping through the Nintendo eShop for my 3DS, and figuring I needed some more games on the system(I can curse the Medusa heads in Castlevania for only so long before I get sick of dealing with them, and that even with the Virtual Console being able to do save states), I downloaded a few and earmarked a few more for the future.

Gunman Clive: Apparently this game started life as an iOS app. It doesn't show, though. It's an odd little game, but a lot of fun. You can play as grizzled heroic gunman Clive to save the damsel in distress.... Or you can play as the damsel to save the gunman in distress.

Liberation Maiden: Fun, if too short, bullet hell shooter. The thing that surprised me was the fact that there's actually animation in it. My only complaint is that the game seems to be set up in such a way that those of us southpaws who play it will have to use our right hands.

Shantae:. I downloaded the second game (Shantae in Risky's Revenge) for my DSi a few years ago, and now I can play the original game, which came out for the Game Boy Color about a year after the Game Boy Advance came out(which means hardly anybody bought it and it now commands stupidly high prices on the secondary market), and while the graphics aren't as sharp as the sequel, it's still a lot of fun. Maybe I won't get lost in this one.........

[The PS3 KILLeR]

Picked up Assassins creed 3 liberation AND Hot Shots Golf World invitational (both vita exclusives) for only $17.67 at my local Walmart! 2 new games for under 20 bucks, feels like a real life steam sale!

[ganon578]

Using some Coins on Club Nintendo, I downloaded Mario Golf for the GBC via the 3DS Virtual Console. Looking forward to playing this one after I finish Kid Icarus: Uprising, and it should be a good little golf romp with some RPG elements.

[angloconvoy]

Just had a go of Payday:The Heist.
Not for me. If you're into playing FPS online (especially if you have 3 similarly inclined mates) I can see how it would appeal though.
Think it'll be a long time before any FPS can live up to Spec Ops: The Line for me though.

[The PS3 KILLeR]

Just had a go of Payday:The Heist.
Not for me. If you're into playing FPS online (especially if you have 3 similarly inclined mates) I can see how it would appeal though.
Think it'll be a long time before any FPS can live up to Spec Ops: The Line for me though.

I bought PayDay well over a year ago played it for about 3 days and gave up. Until 2 weeks ago when I decided to give it another go and once I got used to the somewhat sluggish controls (for my tastes) and googled some help for class building for solo play, I've had no problem playing the game whatsoever. It takes awhile to really master, but once you do it's just so much fun! Granted I'm an avid shooter player, but the random levels and unpredictable enemies makes each heist unique. You can play the first world bank level 10 times in a row and it will never be the exact same, which I have done. But I honestly can see why someone wouldn't like it especially if they aren't big into shooters like me.

[StoneCold Skywarp]

I thought Payday lent itself to a keyboard/mouse setup WAY more than a PS3 pad.
You're definitely right though, it plays way better with a squad of humans to add to the randomness.
NFS:Most Wanted is currently on my playlist...went back to SSX too, but the magic's gone out of that

[angloconvoy]

I don't mind a good FPS with decent single player, but for the time being I think Spec Ops: The Line has ruined the genre for me for a while. Not much can mtch up to that.

[Warcry]

I was so impressed by Assassin's Creed II after downloading it as part of Microsoft's free games promotion that I snagged the first game in the series from a used store. I don't expect it to be quite as good, since it's older, but I'm quite interested in the backstory that I saw snippets of in ACII and would like to play through it first-hand.

[The PS3 KILLeR]

I was so impressed by Assassin's Creed II after downloading it as part of Microsoft's free games promotion that I snagged the first game in the series from a used store. I don't expect it to be quite as good, since it's older, but I'm quite interested in the backstory that I saw snippets of in ACII and would like to play through it first-hand.

Not sure what backstory your talking about, was it the flashback to the first games hero or the ending (wont spoil it if you haven't reached it yet) or maybe Desmond's story in the present day? Tbh none of those really come into play until ac2, except Desmond's story which you have to dig for. But ac1 is my favorite of them all. Simply because it focused more on the assassinations, which is lacking in later titles, they tend to focus more on telling a big overarching story rather than making the game about what it should be... Assassinations. Ac2 was the last one that even really bothered making you feel like an assassin, the rest are *follow this dude* *talk to this dude* *scripted moment* *scripted kill of target*. Which is a shame really. But I'm pretty sure you'll like the first one except for one thing, you can't swim.

[Heinrad]

Downloaded Shantae: Risky's Revenge and The Starship Damery for the 3DS.

I've already beaten Damery. It's a fun game, nice twist ending and the cutscenes are great. My only major complaint with it is it's pretty much got zero replay value.

[Warcry]

Not sure what backstory your talking about, was it the flashback to the first games hero or the ending (wont spoil it if you haven't reached it yet) or maybe Desmond's story in the present day?

No one thing in particular, to be honest. The backstory of the second game just told me enough about the locations and timeframe of the first that I was very intrigued. I've always been a bit of a sucker for fiction set during the Crusades, and if ACI weaves the story around real historical people and events as well as ACII did then I suspect the first game will be right up my alley.

Desmond can disappear entirely and I wouldn't miss him even a little, to be honest. Way more interested in the historical characters and events than the odd Deus Ex-wannabe mildly futuristic conspiracy world that he lives in.

Simply because it focused more on the assassinations, which is lacking in later titles, they tend to focus more on telling a big overarching story rather than making the game about what it should be... Assassinations.

I'll be honest...I never really felt much like an assassin in ACII. I expected the gameplay to be a lot more stealth-based than it actually was, which is one of the reasons I've never played anything in the series until now. Not a huge fan of forced stealth, and usually prefer a game to give me the option of how to tackle any given objective. ACII is pretty good about that, though it does strain credulity a bit that I can openly murder rival government officials while wearing the coat-of-arms of the Medici clan without starting a war between Florence and Venice...

[The PS3 KILLeR]

if ACI weaves the story around real historical people and events as well as ACII did then I suspect the first game will be right up my alley.

Desmond can disappear entirely and I wouldn't miss him even a little, to be honest. Way more interested in the historical characters and events than the odd Deus Ex-wannabe mildly futuristic conspiracy world that he lives in.


I'll be honest...I never really felt much like an assassin in ACII.

then you'll love AC1. it does great job of using historical events and items from the time period to tell its own story.

As for Desmond be careful what you wish for. If you have ANY intrest in playing AC3 do NOT read this spoiler.

SPOILER! (select to read)

At the end of AC3 Desmond gives up his life to save the world from those who came before. But he gets betrayed and sets juno (i think her name was) free to rule the world into slavery. Such a piss poor ending IMO, coupled with the glitch-fest that was AC3 makes it the worst in the series by far.

And trust me as someone who's played every game in the series the first is by far the best with the assassinations as well as the mysterious story. you actually make plans to kill your target, which was a complaint from many people saying the build up was to slow and that they just wanted to kill people. It felt like an old age Hitman game which is why i was draw to it in the first place. Its a shame it had to become an annual franchise and cater to the masses *cough* callofduty *cough*. I though they were just doing that to beat the 2012 end of the world story line, which ended in AC3, but that wasn't even handled well. And now with AC4 coming out this year it shows no signs of stopping which is a shame as this series had so much potential.

End rant.

[The PS3 KILLeR]

OK First off sorry for the double post.

Secondly i have a Question! Is the 3DS XL worth the extra $30-$40 over the regular 3DS? I've heard nothing but good things about it for awhile now and a friend of mine has gotten back into Pokemon after a 10 year break and i simply must have Pokemon Y. Walmart is running a deal right now where you can get a 3DS XL (color of your choice) free game(of your choice of a few selected titles), carrying case (of your choice), and extra stylus (of your choice) for the same price as a normal 3DS XL. I'm wondering if its worth it and should i jump on that offer asap?

[Warcry]

then you'll love AC1. it does great job of using historical events and items from the time period to tell its own story.

I like it so far, though Altair isn't as instantly gripping as Ezio was character-wise. Also I really don't like his voice, which doesn't help.

As for Desmond be careful what you wish for. If you have ANY intrest in playing AC3 do NOT read this spoiler.

Ha! That implies that I have even the vaguest bit of interest in what happens to Desmond in any way, shape or form.

Not sure whether I'll ever wind up playing AC3, though. There's still a huge backlog of content for me to work through, and the American Revolution interests me far, far less as a setting than the Middle Ages or Renaissance -- not being American it doesn't have much cultural meaning to me, there's much less room for historical revisionism in more modern times before it becomes groanworthy in my books.

And trust me as someone who's played every game in the series the first is by far the best with the assassinations as well as the mysterious story. you actually make plans to kill your target, which was a complaint from many people saying the build up was to slow and that they just wanted to kill people.

Yeah, as much as I enjoyed the second game I found that there was very little strategy involved in Ezio's kills. That's probably accurate to the character since he's something of a rough-and-tumble sort of guy, it's a shame that more than half of the time your only option is to bullrush your way though the target's guards and murder him in open view/beat him in a swordfight. A few times the game presented you with the option to do the deed more subtly, but more often in the side-quest assassinations than the main plot ones.

[The PS3 KILLeR]

Not sure whether I'll ever wind up playing AC3, though. There's still a huge backlog of content for me to work through, and the American Revolution interests me far, far less as a setting than the Middle Ages or Renaissance -- not being American it doesn't have much cultural meaning to me, there's much less room for historical revisionism in more modern times before it becomes groanworthy in my books.

As someone who is a history buff and proud American, believe me when I say that the way they handle some events is just a farce... just terrible imo. They made Paul's "The British are coming!" moment seam like a little whiny b***h screaming for help and not a heroic moment at all. Granted i have a somewhat biased view teaching me my history since i grew up here, but when you advertise a product based around that and say on the back of the damned box "interact with historical figures" it just doesn't sit well with me. But honestly most people in this country don't give two craps about history and more than likely found it funny. I'm gonna give AC4 (open world pirates!) a chance on my xbox one but if it disappoints me as much as AC3 did i'm out for good.

[Heinrad]

! Is the 3DS XL worth the extra $30-$40 over the regular 3DS? I've heard nothing but good things about it for awhile now and a friend of mine has gotten back into Pokemon after a 10 year break and i simply must have Pokemon Y. Walmart is running a deal right now where you can get a 3DS XL (color of your choice) free game(of your choice of a few selected titles), carrying case (of your choice), and extra stylus (of your choice) for the same price as a normal 3DS XL. I'm wondering if its worth it and should i jump on that offer asap?

It depends. The bigger screen is great, especially to watch Netflix on. Physically, it doesn't feel as polished as the regular, but it's a great system. And I'd jump on that deal Walmart's doing. You'd wind up spending more(depending on the free game they're offering) buying the smaller system, the game, and the carrying case individually. I just wish they'd put Metroid Fusion back in the eShop.........