Bioshock review

This game is amazing. There's just so much to explain. I don't know where to start. I guess I'll start with the story.

Welcome to Rapture. Biggest hellhole in existence. Andrew Ryan built it to escape the looming nuclear war around the time of World War 2. He invited the greatest artist, scientists, and pretty much the cream of the crop. Anyway, he didn't want to deal with the "Parasites" so he built the city underwater. So everything went fine and dandy until they discovered Adam. Adam allowed someone to modify their genetic code, it transformed one's genetic code into something that could be shaped to the shapers vision. So you want to get stronger? Just use some Adam and rewrite your code. At first people used it for major things, like cancer and other serious illnesses.
Then vanity kicked in. They used it like makeup. It's use got more and more trivial.

Until they used it as a weapon. You could freeze someone with naught more then a couple hand gestures. People shot electricity out of their hands, Emperor Palpatine style. And then, the shit hit the fan. As it turned out, if you use Adam, you need even more Adam to keep it from exploding in your face. The people that used Adam as makeup had their faces butchered. 9 out 10 people in Rapture had their minds and body's destroyed. Everyone looked like this:
Rotting bodys? Check. Sycopathic minds? Check. Genetically modified dna? Check. Yeah, well they look like zombies. Some of them are exactly like zombies, at least tactics wise. But the others do triple backflips and dodge bullets. Great. Splicers, as they are called, are very varied. They nail you with bullets, hack security drones( and no, that's not scripted. They will hack security bot's and get them on their side. It's pretty amazing) and climb on ceilings. They work with each other, at least until you get the enrage plasmid.

Speaking of plasmids, if Adam is blank paper, plasmids are the paint. Plasmid is just a codename for super gene modifying weapon. So, basically, you stick yourself with a needle and shoot fireballs out of your hands. So think about what happens if you have a crazed junkie that needs a fix and can fry you like your in an electric chair with his mind? Now you know what went wrong with rapture.

So you get in a plane crash. You swim to a lighthouse. You get to Rapture. You use some Adam. You become a goddamn Splicer.

One of the things that Bioshock do's good is screw with your mind. You don't actually have to get Adam, but you find yourself-not your character, but you! YOU get addicted to Adam(I'm not joking)- and you to choose how far you will go to get Adam.

How do you get Adam? You get it from Little Sisters. There these ghoulish little girls that walk around, jabbing dead people with huge needles and eat the fluid that comes out. It's even grosser then it sounds. They have the Adam. Everyone want's it. You need it. And there only defense is a...

TWO TON METAL HULK. A jules verne era guy in a diving suit armed with a huge drill or a rivet gun. Half your healths gone if your hit. It's insane. This adds another element of unpredictability to the game. Imagine a roaming boss battle that go's berserk if a stray bullet hit's a little sister. The last thing your experience is a huge roar before your pounded into a wall and get your face drilled to a bloody pulp. So he walks around, protecting the ghoulish little sisters as the continue their unyeilding search for adam.

So, I haven't really saidmuch about the basic gameplay yet. Well that's also amazing.

So Bioshock plays like a normal fps. You have to save your ammo, maybe think abit about tactics, and just keep in mind what enemy is vulnerable to what. But, in most fps's, your only option to take down enemys is to bury lead into them. Not so in Bioshock. You can turn them against each other, or set traps with proximity mines and cyclone traps. You can electrocute the water their standing in, or you can set fire to them and watch as the room turns into an inferno.

Or you can set the security forces of Rapture against them.

In order to be succsesful in Bioshock, you can't play it like a shooter. You really have to think. You really have to think outside the box, while most shooters force you inside the box. And I can't really explain the feeling of absolute freedom that I get when I play this game.

But, Bioshock is not perfect. I think, close to the end, the combat get's a little repetitive. If you really did no homework(didn't read some tips, just ignored the game until it came out) then you will be lost in a sea of innovation. So if you really don't know how to play and use the games awsome tutorial( there isn't one. The game teaches you while you go along and do's it really well) and take the advice to heart, you might feel like your being force-fed the game.

The game's atmosphere is amazing, but this is one of the creepiest games I have ever played. The game do's a good job of making your enemys feel human, and this just get's creepy. By the end of the game, you will feel like you could be a splicer if you were in the same city as them when it hit the fan. And Bioshock is the first game to do this.

Overall 9.9 out of 10

I'm unplugged!!!

Yup. I'm unplugged. I'm going camping. Three weeks. Your probably thinking" Where will I waste my time for three weeks?". Well, there are a hell of allot more gaming sites out there. Here's just the cream of the crop:

Gamespot
www.gamespot.com
By far the beat gaming site out there. Coverage for every game, reveiws for a most, and a large community and good forums. And I also happen to be a member. My name on that site is Funkyskunk5.

Gamespy
www.gamespy.com
This site, whilst pc-centric, is notsble for it's planet site's, which are pretty sweet.

Electronic Gaming Monthly.
egm.1up.com
If you suscribe to the magazine, this is the place to go. Otherwise, only go for the small reveiw scores.

By using those sites, you can get to most most of the other decent ones.

Tequila!

No, I am not drunk. I just beat the Stranglehold demo. And I was blown away. Quite literally, in fact.

For a while now, once in a lifetime moves(like Legolas shield-boarding whilst firing arrows in Lord of the Rings) have been solely in cut-scenes. Not with Stranglehold. The game is modeled after an action movie. So, instead of circle strafing, you will end up diving into cover, nailing some poor guy in the head with a gun, while everything around you blows up. Then, once your in cover, you can wait for enemies to come, then literally leap out and spew bullets at every exposed piece of flesh in your sight. But then you might jump on a trolley and ride it while still firing madly(yes, you will shoot allot in this game). When your ride comes to an end, you might leap off and backflip off a nearby wall.

And this happens every minutes in Stranglehold. You play as Inspector Tequila. I don't know too much about the plot, but it appears to be a kidnapping. You have to blast,backflip, and trolley ride your way through thousands of thugs.

One of the first things you will notice first about the Stranglehold is that everything will be destroyed. Not just the crates or one or two other items, but almost everything. They fly all over the place, and then end their trip by being completely and utterly destroyed. The end result is stunning. Instead of a scorch mark or two, everything is destroyed. Tables are smashed, fruit is squished, signs have fallen(more often then not killing someone in process) and all other matter of hell has been wreaked.

There's just so much to say about Stranglehold. So, do yourself a favor and download the demo. Now.

video game violence,part 2

In all fairness, the game industry has not really been too worried about the ratings. You really have to go out of your way to make an AO game. Any game that receives this rating is,in short, screwed. But, game makers don't seem to care too much about the rating.

An after effect of this is the in-between state many game's are stuck in. You see, a game's rating greatly affects it's demographic. So, if a game is rated M for one small thing, and the rest of the game is T-content, then that game will hit that weird in between state. It definitely should not be rated M, and gamer's that aren't allowed to play M games (or cant purchase them) will not-can not- buy that game. And, just like that, a game loses about 20 to 50 percent of it's market.

And then there are game's like Unreal Tournament and Gears of War. They come default with plenty of blood and guts, but have the options to turn it off. While they still lose that youth demographic, they make gamers who would not normally be able to play them can.(note: Gears of War multiplayer,can, in all respects,become T rated. Just set the following options: Extreme content off, dialogue volume 0, and only play multiplayer. Works for me).

Video game violence,part 1

Video game violence is very,very complicated. There are many side's and important figure's. On one hand, there are level-headed, somewhat honest and logical people(Patricia Vance, head of the ESRB)and on the other there are bull!@&$ spewing dumb#!*$(Like Jack Thompson, game hating and free speech constricting lawyer.) and even my neutral parties( My mom. Completely misinformed and pumped full of anti-game propaganda by the media.).

Everything is very confusing. For someone who is not "In the know", it's completely indecipherable. So, here are some of the major event's:

After the release of Mortal Kombat, which was over the top and brutal, the ESRB(entertainment software ratings board) was formed. They would rate every game they could get their hands on. Game stores would require the game's they sell to have rating's. It was Fact: After the release of Mortal Kombat, which was very brutal and over the top, the ESRB designed to help parents make the right choices for their kids. And, for the most part, it has worked. But, throughout all this, the system is not perfect. The one flaw that most people would say"Good. It should be that way". The flaw was that the system was to strict.

Let me put it like this. You know that little warning on a dvd case that says "Bonus Material not rated"? Well, that can't happen in a game. Anything on a the game disc must be rated. Even content that was locked out and can only be accessed by illegally hacking into the game's code and exploiting the content. Now, that's just stupid. If someone illegally hacks into a game, and find's content that would affect the rating, then that person should be held at fault.

Let's say the same thing happens on a dvd. The movie is rated pg, but there are some pg-13 visual and audio file's on the disc. These file's are locked out. You have to insert the disc into a computer and go through the file's onme by one to find the right one's. Then, whoever did it calls his kid's, shows them the scene, and sues whoever made the movie. The case would be closed and he would lose miserably. But, if exactly the same thing happens in a game, that same guy would win the case. Why? Why are video games rating's and anything to do with rating's twice as strict?

Crackdown review

Crackdown, places you in the shoe's of a super cop(Really. This guy eats superman for breakfast) and task's you with the cleansing of the streets of criminal scum. I think that allot of the fun of Crackdown comes with just screwing around. This "screwing around" usually involves parking tickets.

Now, if you a parking ticket in real life, you get fined $50 dollars or so. In Crackdown, a parking ticket is one of the following:
1: The super cop shoots out all the wheels on the vehicle, get's in, and drives around town while being shot at by gangsters. It also involves a unhealthy amount of driving into large building's at high speeds. And a lot of failed stunts. The "Parking ticket" usually culminates with the being comepletly and utterly destroyed.

2: The second punishment, is a rather effective way of taking out criminals. You drive towards them, then jump out of the, sending it speeding towards a group of criminals. You then shoot the gas cap, and watch the resulting explosion from a safe distance.

3: This punishment is for less serious violations. Have you ever played the game "kick the can"? Well, you do that, but to a car instead.

Now, I will let you in on a little secret. There are no parking violations in Crackdown. You just do that when you get frustrated.
8.5 out of 10.