Analyzing the Halo Anniversary gameplay trailer

Millions of Halo fans, both old and new, are looking forward to Halo Anniversary, but will it hold up to today's games, and will they mess up the graphics upgrade let's take a look.

Gameplay looks like the same halo style, should keep the fans happy. Graphics looks great, very well done, but will have to play it to see how good they really are. Now classic mode is a great idea, i never got to play the first halo and i'm sure i will be playing in classic mode for at lest one play through. I'm sure there will be a achievement for playing the whole game in classic mode.  Halo Anniversary looks great, it seems 343 is doing a good job so far, but how they will Handel the Halo series? I'm waiting for Halo 4 to make my judgment on 343 on the front.

  

Goldeneye 007 gets reloaded to PS3 and 360

Well Activision is beating the horse known as Goldeneye again, bringing Goldeneye 007 reloaded to Xbox 360 and PS3.
Along with HD graphics, a M16 opp mode (like MW2's special opps) and PS move support(Microsoft please make a gun that works with kinect, it will just look stupid making a gun with you hand to shoot things). I just want to know why they just put all this effort in to remaking goldeneye into making a new GOOD James Bond game?If this this is a fall release, I passing and waiting for a price drop, I've already decided to get Halo CE, by the way, if you pre-order on amazon, you get Master chief Armor for your avatar, don't believe me, click on the link below.
      

Happy 30th Birthday Donkey Kong, now go teach that young whipper snapper Mario A lesson or too.

Today (or at least a web sites says) is Donkey Kong's birthday, and he turns the bis 3-0! If it was not for DK, we would never have so many of Nintendo's great games back in the day and now. Let's take a look back at this stupid monkey;s (that what Donkey Kong means in Japan) Video Game Career.

The granddaddy of them all, the one that put Nintendo on the map, Donkey Kong. At some point in your gaming life you have played this, it has been on so many platforms and in other games (like DK 64), there's no way you missed playing it. They even made a documentary about getting the all time high score. As a then named jumpman aka Mario started his "rescuing ladys in pink" carrier, by climbing up beam and ladders while jumping barrels throw by DK. You chase DK though I think 4 levels....then you do it again, but harder each time you do. I think beat DK 2 times before it got too hard for me. Such a great classic game.

Next was Donkey Kong JR,, this time the tables are turned. The evil Mario has captured DK, and it's up to DK JR  (who I believe is the DK of today, just based off of Donkey Kong Country) to save him. You jump from vine to vine working you way up to stop that Mario from hurting your Dad. I have the e-reader version of this, and a unplayed Atari 7800 version too. A variation of DK jr called Donkey Kong JR math was released, and thanks to Animal Crossing, I've played it and do not care for it.

In Donkey Kong 3, the game takes a different approach. As Stanley, you gotta get rid of DK, who's slumming in his greenhouse. To get rid of DK.......by shooting bug spray up his ass. I played this also, and remember liking it. here's a video showing gameplay and some DK 3  history

DK entered the SNES era in Donkey Kong Country. DK and his little buddy Diddy, must get there bananas back from King K. Rool. You got help along the way by the Kong family and you animal pals. This was Rare's first Nintendo Game and it put them on the map. This was one the 3 games that I got with my SNES and I have fond memories of it. There was 2 sequels, Diddy Kong's quest which I also like, and DK Country 3, which I didn't care for. Donkey Kong Land was the portable version of DK Country, it also had 3 releases.

Ahh Diddy Kong Racing, I was obsessed with this game. I maintain till this very day that it was better than Mario Kart 64. Car, Planes, and hovercrafts were the vehicles of choice. And an open environment, great race tracks, and boss battles. The N64 version has banjo and a pre-mature ratted Conker. I REALLLLLLYYY need to the DS version someday. 

Donkey Kong 64 was the first game I got on day 1, mainly for the N64 memory update. Like Super Mario 64, it was a 3d adventure game. I don't remember much of the story, or the characters, except the little girl kong was Dixie's sister. I do know it has the original Donkey Kong it it and Rare's jetpac, both I played a lot of. 

The Donkey Konga Games.....to be honest i never gave a shit about them. They never interested me one bit. The did pre-date guitar hero in the music game controller business I think. Well any way here's a gameplay vid.

Donkey Kong has been one of Nintendo's well know characters for many, well, 30 years, A part from all his appearances in many great Nintendo games, he's held his own. Here's to another 30 years DK!














list info from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Donkey_Kong_video_games

CivWorld, quite possibly the best Facebook Game out there

Sid Meir's CivWorld has arrived on Facebook, and it is one pretty nice game. You control one town in a country (you get to pick which country you want to be in or just stay independent), and as in other Civ games, the main goal is to rule the world. This is not your normal FB game where you spam you friends to giver in game crap, you only send word of you achievements and invites. And it's just not an few people you play with, you are playing with over 100 people as you all strive for that one goal. In your town you have people of course, and they have jobs. Farmers make food, which increases population, workers that make production, which allows you to build stuff, scientist that make science which allows for more technology, artist that make culture, which makes great people that help make wonders, and merchants that make gold.

Game play is simple yet can seem complicated at first, by making you workers happy(which you do by build special  building, putting their home next to the sea/forest and those building) you get more stuff from them. And who do you get that stuff, by using your harvest. The number of harvest depends on how many you store, horde your harvest, get less of them, you more, you get your harvest faster.Now lets take a look at what you use the stuff you workers make for.

this is the production menu, this is where you use you production points on building and army units. Oh battles are set up like a card game, the more units you have, the stronger they are. My nation was not in battle so I could not get any pics of one.

here's the tech tree, where you put your science points to work, along with the rest of the players in your nation.

With culture, when you gain enough of it, you earn a great person, which you use to help you nation build wonders.

Here's the marketplace, a stock market like place you spend your gold. You can buy/sell food, production, science, and culture, even great people and army units. You can even also buy items like marble and silk, which are  treated like stocks, buy low and sell high.

There are three mini games in civworld, the maze, picture puzzle, the the market road. With the science and culture games, the more you produce, the more moves you get. With the market game, finish the road by using the least amount of road tiles, the more gold you get. Unlike the other two mini games, you can play the market game every ten minutes, but it will be for less gold.

the meat of civworld is working with the other players inn you nation, you have to coordinate with them if you want to win the current era. You have to tell  (well more like suggest) what wonders to work on, which science to focus on, and building up the army. You can hold cabinet  positions for completing task. You can even hold votes on what you countries social policies are and to start wars with other nations.

CivWorld is a great additive game for any civilization fan or strategy game fan out there. Right now the game is having problems logging you into a game, but if stick to it you can get in, and they are working on it. CivWorld is a must try for those who don't like the tradition Facebook game model, go play it today.

LA Noire (360) review , 1940's LA is just a dirty as today

It's 1940's Los Angeles California,  World War II is over, an america is just about to prosper again. The town is full of glitz, glamour, famous pepole, war vets, cars, drugs, corruption, and lady killers. As Cole Phelps, it's you job to keep the order in this crazy town. Let's take a look at LA Noire.

Like I said, You're Cole Phelps, a ex-marine, sliver star award wining rising star of the LAPD. You begin as a patrol man, wanting to rise the ranks. You get your big break and become a detective, a work the traffic, arson  homicide ,and vice (which is short for advice). Along the way you meet noisy neighbors, famous people, bad husband, drunk wives, Innocent childern, bad cops, old marine buddies, druged up jazz musicians, corupt businessmen, and serial killers. The game is story driven, Phelps past and current life is both woven into the plot. You see in flashbacks between cases of you marine days. Also there is are newspapers that help explain the background of the story.

Let's go into gameplay now. Gameplay comes down to two thing, Finding Clues at crime scenes and interrogation. When you arrive at a crime scene , or someone's home, you look for clues. Finding clues is easy, your controller vibrates and you hear a little chime when you walk past one, the trick is to find them. Not all clues are important, but if you want a five star rating on the case, you have to find them all. Once you find a clue, you move it around via the analog stick and find a mark that will move that case along. There also little puzzles you have to figure out to. One other clue finding technique is finding a name in document (like a hotel ledger) and get a suspect's name and address and other important info off it. Next is interrogation, which breaks down to 3 things: truth, doubt, and lie. After asking a question, look at the perp for signs the he or she is lying, usually not looking at you, or moving of the head. Pick doubt if you think they know more than they are saying, or if you have the prof, pick lie. Now interrogation can get hard, that whats intuition points are for. You get one every time you rank up. Use them to help you find clues, and in interrogations. This is when interrogations become "Who wants to become a millionaire". You can remove one of the choices, or as the social club, which show the percentages of who pick the three choices.

Other gamplay aspects are driving, shooting, and fighting. This is not GTA, unless you're chasing someone, you can't drive like a bat out of hell. Trying to roll a car in a chase can get hard, and you partner shooting out the guy's tire seems not to help. Shooting guns wise, don't expect any targeting or aiming help. Fighting is just block, punch, grapple, and finisher, nothing special. There are s40 side quest in the game, which you can do when you get the call over the radio. And like any other Rockstar game, there are a lot of hidden stuff to find.

Graphics in LA noire are great, the face technology is amaizing. You will recognize many actors in the game, many from Mad Men. Parkman from Heroes and John Noble of Fringe and LoTR fame are both in here. And LA is been done great in this game, real landmarks, and streets are in here.If you have little kids, I would keep them out of the room for some of the cases(most of the homicide cases) the gore in this game may be a little disturbing.  I also think the cars are real too, and some of the hidden cars are great and interesting as well, the three wheel one is my favorite.


LA Noire is great, but it's not for the usual rockstar game crowd, fans of PC adventure games will like this game (by the way, LA Noire is coming to PC this fall). Fans of crime shows and the Noire genre will also like it. LA Noire is a great game, but not for everyone.