Skyrim

If you are reading this article, let me tell you right off the bat that none of my words can do this game justice. This is one of those games that you literally have to set down and play for yourself to experience because what you are about to read in my post is nothing compared to the actual game itself.

Let me start off by saying that this game is the best game I have ever played in my entire life. I will go so far as to say that it will continue to be the best game until Bethesda decides to release another game.  Bethesda has done nothing but impress me over the years with their release of Morrowind and of course the powerhouse game Oblivion which got game of the year when it was released.  I will try my best to cover everything I can in this post but it is extremely hard to do when a game leaves the player speechless.

First off, the graphics are unbelievable.  Bethesda told us before the release that they were going to use a different physics and graphics engine for this game and I think it paid off because any faults that were found in Oblivion have been corrected in this game. On a side note, there were barely any faults in Oblivion but you could tell the graphics aren't as nice as Skyrim. The player is submersed into a Nordic frozen world with very tall mountains (where most dragons are found) and deep valleys (where most cities and wildlife are found). The map is very large, much larger than the map on Oblivion which is impressive in itself when you think about the better graphics.  They also have improved the underground game play which means they have made caves, forts, and castles look much more realistic when going inside.  Most caves have streams flowing through them which the player has to rely on when trying to escape which is a cool bonus when searching for treasure and you happen to run into a hoard of skeletons or ghouls.

Much like Oblivion, Bethesda made sure to include the third person, first person toggle. I was happy about this because I am actually one of those players that uses both views pretty evenly. The fighting is about the same, there are the same controls of Oblivion but they have added a neat type of kill cam that reminds me of the kill cams one might see in Fallout 3 when getting a critical hit.  Anytime you strike an enemy and get a critical hit that kills the enemy, the camera uses different angles and your character will do different finishing moves when killing the enemy.  The finishing moves can change depending on your leveling up which is another cool feature of the game.  The leveling up is all done without sleep in this game, but is broken up into the same categories except for a few.  You can only make it to level 81 so you have to spend your skill points wisely on the areas that your character uses the most.

The groups or factions of the game are much like the ones found in Oblivion.  There are the Companions (Fighters guild), Thieves Guild, College of Winterhold (Mages guild), and various other subcategories of groups.  The Companions guild gives you the ability to transform into a werewolf which was a huge twist in the game when it was found out! Bethesda also included the Vampire missions along with Nirnroot missions much like the ones found in Oblivion.

Much of the armor is the same as oblivion except for the new dragon armor that can only be made by having a skill of 100 in smithing and it requires the bones and scales of a dragon.  I have only done this once by doing the leveling up cheat done with a book found after retrieving the first elder scroll. Videos are all over youtube on how to do it, so I will let you do the research. 


The dragons in the game are basically the cherry on the cake.  The programmers of the game have made them completely unpredictable, they show up at any time, and you have no clue what they will do in battle.  Most of the time I find them high up in the mountains but every once in a while you might come across some attacking small farms or giant camps and mammoths. Killing a dragon allows your character to absorb their soul which can in turn be used to purchase shouts or upgrades of shouts.  The shouts are obtained by coming across ancient walls with what looks like Babylonian scribbles.  Your character can somehow read this stuff because he is dragon born or contains the blood of a dragon. These shouts can be used in battle and each have their own special use.


I know I am forgetting plenty and whenever I think of more stuff I will get on here and edit my post to add it. Until then my rating of this game is easily a 10/10.  If it were possible I would give this game like an 11/10 or 12/10 because it is that good!

Evil InFamous

So as I was trying to get all the trophies for InFamous I realized that I had to start a new game and play the "evil" side of the game.  It is a completely different game if you play and make all evil decisions! The powers are different, the story line is slightly different, the side missions are different, most of the dialogue is different, and even your character's appearance changes! I was impressed after seeing this.

The character takes on a dark look which is extremely cool compared to the good side.  Most of your friend's dialogue is telling you that you look dark and that your powers are taking over you whereas the good side, they love that you use your powers for good. There are advantages to playing both sides and there are negatives but I won't spoil the game too much for those who haven't played it.

The only bad thing about going to the dark side is that you don't receive as much XP for killing foes and it is impossible to achieve all the stunts.  One of the stunts requires you to stick an enemy with a grenade and precision shoot him before it blows up but on the evil side, the grenades don't stick. They burst into 3, 5, or 7 other grenades on impact depending on which upgrade you purchase.

Now that I have played the evil side as well, I highly recommend playing this game because whatever type of player you are, I guarantee this game has it.

InFamous

After this long period without the PSN network, it finally comes back on and to our surprise we are able to download 2 free games for each account and have 30 days of PSN Plus! I had 3 accounts so I was able to download all 5 games. I just recently finished the game InFamous which is the game I will be discussing in this entry.

InFamous is an older game and came out around the same time as prototype which I think are two very similar games. Same genre, just two different super powers. In InFamous you have the power of electricity after a freak accident and a huge explosion involving some weird scientific sphere...blah blah, I'm sure you have all heard this mumbo jumbo before. The story line is actually really great and I won't spoil the ending but it might be one of the best endings I have seen on a game in a long time.

The missions are repetitive after a while because you are constantly being attacked by the same type of enemy all game and doing the same thing to kill them all. But the one neat thing about the game is that you have the ability to make good and bad decisions in the game. You can choose to be the super hero at any time or you can choose to be a bad guy at any time. Of course choosing the hero makes the city love you and in some cases they can help you in missions, or being the bad guy turns the city against you which makes them attack you on sight. As you gain XP through completing missions and killing enemies you can upgrade your abilities which are also different depending on the good/path you choose.

The graphics are terrific throughout most of the game and the creators did a fantastic job creating a slum-like city because it has a sort of post-nuclear feel to it (from the explosion that turned you into a superhero). The fight scenes with bosses are very well put together and creative. The bosses are unique with there own special abilities and it is extremely fun to play them. Most of the time I found myself just button smashing R1 which is your most basic move because it takes no energy to use and is very effective if upgraded so I didn't find the other moves too effective. The only other move I liked was a grenade type of attack where your character chucked a ball of lighting at an enemy that exploded.

All in all I was impressed with the game mainly because of the story mode. It was set up like a comic book style which made it more traditional to the whole super hero genre. Like I said before, the ending made the game for me and I would highly recommend playing this game twice, once as a good guy and once as a bad guy because you will experience two different games if you do. I give this one an 8/10.

Medal of Honor

Okay you gamer fans, strap in because I am going to take you through the ups and downs of the latest EA release, Medal of Honor. This game had me on the edge of my seat the entire game with phenomenal graphics and an excellent story mode. This little portion of my blog will cover the pros and cons of the game along with providing a little bit of additional information.

You start the game off in a cloud of bullets but this is actually like footage from the last level, then as usual the screen goes dark and you get the text "__ days earlier." I love how games tease you like that. Anyway you notice right off that the graphics are amazing. Everything from character graphics to the environmental graphics. The game play is smooth and I never had any trouble with lag.


The weapons portrayed seem to be fairly modern even though this game takes place post-cold war so there really isn't much of a difference from the weapons then, and now. Most of the missions remind you a lot of Infinity Ward's big release MW2. The dialogue and the objectives are literally no different. You are sent to take out one man, then lots of men, then more men...sometimes you get to fly in a helicopter, and then a four wheeler. There are stealth missions along with sniper missions so really, if you have played MW2, you are not missing much.

There wasn't really anything that really stood out to me in this game. Nothing I haven't really seen before. I was hoping to have that "new experience" that I could talk to other people about and go "Oh man, you remember this part of the game!," but I never saw anything like that. There were a few "up close and personal" scenes with the enemy that were pretty cool though.

The older Medal of Honor: Front Line did come with the CD however. I thought this was an awesome feature of the Disc. I hadn't played this game since the PS2 was popular back in the day, so this was incredibly exciting for me. The game was remade with HD supported graphics and trophies so I spent some time racking up some extra trophy points.

The online play is a whole different story. I was very displeased with the weapon selection. Like any other online game, you must earn XP to get the good guns, but there are only about 10 guns that you can actually unlock. Out of the 10, only like 3 are actually worth playing with. The attachments for other guns must be unlocked before guns are unlocked, which I found sort of annoying and the online game play is actually pretty tough. The online portion was actually created by the same company that created Bad Company 2 so it has that Battlefield feel to it. It seems like you have to shoot the enemy quite a bit for him to die unlike the 2 or 3 shots in MW2.

For the most part, this was a pretty decent game. It was extremely fun to beat, and the ending sort of hints the audience that there will probably be another one. So be excited for that gamer fans. For this game, I rate it at a 9/10.

Fallout New Vegas

So just recently I played through Bethesda's game Fallout New Vegas. Reviewing this game is very difficult for me because I was spoiled by the all mighty Elder Scrolls: Oblivion. To me, Fallout 3 doesn't compare the medieval action you can find and slash in the game of the year, Oblivion. However, I am not saying that it is a bad game, because there were definitely some positive experiences while playing through the story.

Before going into depth on reviewing the game, you should also know that I never got the chance to play through the first Fallout release. From what I have heard from several people, it really wasn't worth the 40+ hours of game play to beat it. On that note, lets get started.

You start off the story with a doctor who somehow heals you from a bullet wound to your head. You walk outside after being healed, choosing your attributes, and perks and you notice that you are completely surrounded by desolate wasteland. This is one factor that I found to be necessary for the sake of the story but also not aesthetically pleasing. The land is a total desert which takes so much away from the graphics. Again, I am comparing this to Oblivion's rolling hills, trees, and beautiful buildings. On top of the par graphics, the game lags every 20 seconds. It's almost as if the game can't load the crappy graphics fast enough which makes no sense.

I found that the game was set up very similar to Oblivion in that you level up. Only in this game you choose perks for like shooting guns, shooting lasers, and building/fixing equipment. This was a nice change from the sword fighting, spell casting, alchemy perks found in Oblivion.

The story line is probably the best thing about the game. You are shot in the head at the beginning of the game and you set out to kill him but depending on how you play the game and make choices, you can end up running the entire city of New Vegas. The entire region is split up by several factions. NCR (New California Republic), Legion, and the Great Khans are just a few of them. You can choose to do missions for any of the factions but if you start missions for one faction and jump to another faction, you become unanimously hated by the original faction which is kind of annoying.

Another one of my favorite features to this game has to be the animals and creatures that you run into in the game. During the game play, I couldn't help but sit back and enjoy seeing two-headed cows, giant ants, giant praying mantises, and demon looking species. This was definitely a pro in the game.

The weapon selection was unbelievable (if you could find them). Depending on what missions you pick up and who you kill, the weapons are extremely cool. You start out with a regular hunting rifle that is used early in the game to kill giant geckos. As you progress, you can pick up guns like incinerators, laser rifles, and grenades. The one true problem that I kept running into was running out of ammo. Of course this ties in with the story because ammo is hard to come by after a nuclear war apparently. There are places to go to buy ammo but depending on what you buy it can be expensive.

To wrap things up, this game took me about 40 hours to complete. I did a lot of side missions that were not necessary to beat the game but I enjoyed every bit of it. I give this game a 7/10

Black Ops Review

I have just recently played through Black Ops and got all the trophies and this is now my official review of the game. I must say that this game is very VERY well done! The story line is amazing and takes you through the life of a Black Ops agent named mason. The game ties in beautifully with Treyarch release of Call of Duty: World at War by bringing back a few characters. Mainly Resnov, the Russian soldier you meet in the fountain during the sniping mission. This game takes place post-world war II and the last of the Nazi regime has created a bio-chemical weapon called Nova 6. Of course they have plans to attack major cities and it is your job to stop them but enough about the story lets get to the pros and cons!

The graphics in the campaign are amazing and there are so many places throughout the story where I found myself on the edge of my seat. There are other moments that just blow your mind. However, for some reason the graphics aren't as good when you switch over to the mutliplayer mode and play online which really doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

The entire online concept is phenomenal! I love the money system that gives me the option of buying parts for my gun instead of waiting to unlock them. I also LOVE that every game is recorded and saved so that you can go back and watch them later. This is usually when I go back to see the campers set in rooms and not get a single kill for 5 minutes until someone runs in completely oblivious of him in the corner. That irritates the crap out of me. Also, the hit detection in the game is awful. After going back and watching some of my videos, there were many cases where I would pull up to shoot someone and my crosshair would be on the guy. I could get two or three hit markers and still not kill the guy. But when looking at his screen he just sprays his gun all over the place and gets like two hit markers on me but I die. So my guess is that there is some server issues that still need to be worked out.

The customization in this game is the most in depth in a COD game that I have ever seen thus far. You can customize guns, clan tag, red dot reticles, and load outs. The list seems endless for all the customization that you can do as long as you have the cash to unlock it. Earning cash is not that hard either. Playing matches, getting kills, completing contracts, and winning games is the easiest way. But for those gamers that want to put their hard earned money on the line can join wager matches. These matches allow you to gamble your money and compete with other players to finish challenges and win larger sums of money fast.


The zombie game is back and better than ever. There are two maps to choose from which are amazing and filled with many new features along with some of the classic stuff from the first zombies game. They also have added Dead Ops which is a third person overhead camera game version of zombies which is very addicting!

All in all, this game is a legitimate purchase. In my opinion the online gameplay doesn't compare to Modern Warfare 2, BUT the customization and ability to save videos makes it a good contender. I give this game an 8.5/10

Unreal Tournament 3

I know this is an older game, but I have recently started to go back to this game because it now supports trophies which aren't impossibly hard to get. This is also a great game to escape to when you are sick of campers and the god awful spawning of all the Call of Duty games online.

This game has online but I rarely play it because the servers have integrated the PS3 and PC's together. So you basically have a bunch of keyboard/mouse players that are insanely good vs. us PS3 players with joysticks and low sensitivity levels that can't compete. There is however an option for PS3 users to choose servers with PS3 users only so bravo to the makers of Unreal Tournament. If only we had smarter people like you working for Infinity Ward instead of the monkeys that work there now.

I play this game mainly for the instant action that doesn't require you to be online. The game produces bots that are completely adjustable from novice bots which are easy to kill and god-like bots which are half impossible to kill. I love this about the game because I get sick of playing online a lot so I love popping this game in and enjoying a nice death match or capture the flag that is more relaxing than games like MW2 or Black-Ops.

This game also has a great weapon selection as long as you can find them in the maps. My gun of choice would have to be the Link Gun which fires fully auto bursts but has a secondary fire that heals allies and ally vehicles. There are many guns to choose from and it depends on the player and their playing style to which gun suits them the best.


There is also a player customization menu with items that can be unlocked while playing the campaign. The customization isn't the best I have seen, the items are unique, but the options are limited which is a slight downfall, BUT there are websites online that allow you to download all kinds of mods that give you more stuff for the game including options for this customization.

This biggest downfall to the game is the campaign mode. You can definitely tell that this game was designed for online game play and the creators really slacked off when making the campaign. It is basically made up of a series of death matches, capture the flags, and warfare matches that progressively get harder as you play through chapters. There is almost no story line and no goal except beat the other team in the matches. I thought it would be more of a story filled campaign where you fight your way through hoards of creatures to save the universe or something but no it is not like that at all. You might as well just create your own instant action match because there is no difference.

This website www.ut3mod.com has crazy amounts of free content for Unreal Tournament 3 including maps, mutators, and even entire gamemodes! I personally recommend the third person mod which allows you to toggle the camera view from first person to third person and the jet pack mutator that give your charactor the ability to fly by holding the jump button. I have yet to download a map that I didn't like and almost all the material can completely change the game somehow. That is why I refuse to give this game up because there is always new things coming out for me to download and the game is constantly changing. I highly recommend this game especially now that the trophies are available. My rating = 8/10