DCEmu Games Reviews Latest News

Quake 4
Publisher: Activision
Developer: id Software
Genre: First Person
Players: 1

Quake 4 is produced by id Software inc. for the PC and Xbox 360 Computer Entertainment system.



Quake 4 may not be as well known around as Doom 3 (even though they were made by the same people and company), but that doesn't keep it from being an all-around better game. Quake 4 looks to have incorporated all the needs that Doom 3 didn't have fullfilled, such as the flashlight-on'a-gun for one. Quake 4, when first shown at the 2005 E3 convention, fans flipped out of their minds for this game. The graphics, gameplay, and classic scenerio had many people, me included, waiting on the edge of their seat for this incredible FPS. We were waiting for gold...and we got platinum. The graphics, AI, weapons, and pretty much anything else incorporated in this game were much more advanced then the best up to this point. The gameplay becames highly repetitive after a while, though. The multiplayer is also a bit overused for various reasons.

The graphics for Quake 4 are the best I've seen until the time I bought it in 2006 as the first 360 game I got. I was stunned at the level of detail on each individual level. Textures were different for almost every part of the level, none repeated themselves through consistancy. Even when looking close to walls and sides, weapons and pretty much anything, the textures didn't became grainy or pixaled, for lack of a better term. They retained their smooth and shiny display from point-blank to distances half-across the level. The characters were almost life-like, having individual features such as a larger nose, bigger jaw, different eye colors, and whatever else there is to have on physical featuring. Such as the detailing in the next screen-shot:

The lighting is often very dark, which makes the light attachment for the guns come in very handy.

The AI in the game, both enemy and ally were nice, to say the least. It wasn't what I'd call an AI revolution, but the enemies often knew when to dodge and when to shoot, as did the allies. What amazed me is how id made the allie's movement. They used actual people with motion sensors to replicate movement into a virtual "skeleton". They used that skeleton as a basis for the movements of your buddies in-game. They add in textures and physical features of the characters and put them in-game. The result? An artificial ally thata replicates the same movements in the same style that the actor performed in reality.

Gameplay is the real deal in Quake 4. The gameplay features the standard shoot-and-get-shot style that all good FPS have and has made id Software famous. You, as corporal Mathew Kain set out with Rhino squad to break through the Strogg enemy lines to take out their central system called the Nexus. While along the way, you confront the Makron, the leader of the Strogg whom Mathew Kain killed in Quake 2. How hes standing in front of you is another story. You are shipped to a Strogg processing facuility where you are turned into a Strogg--literally. But before they have time to implant in your head the chip to make you obey they're every command, the remaining Rhino squad busts you out. Thus you, in your strogganized state go with the rest of Rhino squad to finish the job, and take Quake 4 features a great variet of weapons from both Quake 2 and Quake 4 introductees. This can range from the Rotosaw and the Nuclear pistol, to the clip-loaded shotgun and dark matter cannon(the Quake alternative to Dooms BFG9000) which creates a black hole, sucking in furnature and enemies alike.
While writing this my friend next to me said "I'd hate to be on the recieving end of that" when I showed him a shot of what it can do. Try being on the recieving end in multiplayer. It's not too fun I'll bet...

Multiplayer isn't near as good as it could have been. Still gun, don't get me wrong, but it doesn't utilize some of the nicer features of Quake 4. For instance, its maps are directly ported maps from Quake 2 with better graphics. There are very little parts of Quake 4 multiplayer that are original to Quake 4 and not the rest of the Quake series. Another bad let down is the fact that Quake 4 cannot be played multiplayer by 2 or more people on one Xbox 360. You can system link up to 8 Xbox's though for a game of up to eight players. You can also play online multiplayer through Xbox Live. The sad part is id seems to have forgotton all about co-op, which would be very nice in Quake 4 considering its dim storyline and levels. Heres a screenshot for the masses, although its shrunk so it doesn't show good detail.


Now onto ratings:

Graphics: 5 out of 5
I couldn't really ask for anything better. For its time up until this day, its graphics have proved amazing. Those shots ...

Dead Rising
Publisher: Capcom
Developer: Capcom
Genre: Action
Players: 1
Reviewed on Xbox 360 by gdf

Ah, zombies. The shambling, brainless undead. Long hunted down by many a gamer, they have created numerous great games over the years, most notably Capcom's infamous Resident Evil series. Dead Rising is another zombie game from the survival horror masters, but is in an altogether lighter, more humorous tone.

You play Frank West, a photographer who has hitched a chopper ride into a sleepy American town that has recently been blocked off by the army. Chasing the scoop, you land on a mall and have 72 hours before your lift returns. When you get down to the shop floor, you find survivors of the outbreak barricading themselves in and fighting off zombies using whatever they can find, and when the undead brain munchers break in, you must employ similar tactics. After the initial scrap, you are taken up to the security room, a safe haven from your enemies, and meet all manner of mysterious people. You can try to uncover the outbreak of the scoop, try to save survivors or just kill piles of zombies, the choice is yours!

To begin with all you have is a camera, a watch and the clothes on your back; however, if you can pick an item up, you can use it in battle. There are literally HUNDREDS of weapons to be found, from novelty masks, to lawnmowers to plastic lightsabers, and almost all of them are useful in some way. Though there is just one attack button, the range of items negates the need for complex combos and each weapon has several different attacks: they can be swung, thrown, made to do a special attack and more, depending on the weapon. Some of the weapons are highly inventive and excellent fun to use and can cut through swathes of enemies. Body parts go flying all over the place and claret pours across the screen as you hack into a crowd with the small chainsaw or bash them up with the sledgehammer. The action is great and there are thousands of zombies to be brutally dispatched in increasingly inventive ways (death by shower head anyone?), so it never gets boring. It's a far cry from Resident Evil: there's no wandering around the same locations for scarce ammo, code guessing, or saving the best guns for the really bad boys; just a huge amount of zombies and an unlimited stock of badass weaponry with which to pwn their sorry hides.

When you bring up your watch in game a list of missions will appear; some important to the story, most just survivor escorts. Escorting survivors is an absolute ******* as they seem to be willing to hurl themselves into large crowds of zombies and get themselves eaten. After a while you'll get used to it, but it's not usually worth the bother to herd a fat man across the whole mall whilst being pursued by a gaggle of zombified shoppers and psychopathic cultists. There is only one door to the security room and save points are scarce, so trying to take others there could result in the loss of an hour or two's play. Hardly fair. Another complaint is that you are extremely unlikely to complete the game first, or even second, time round as it is hard to keep up with the tight time schedule of story missions. You can, however, choose to restart any time but keep your previously earned abilities and level, something that will come as a relief to those who just kept running out of time after the medication mission on day two and saved an already failed game. We know Capcom like to make their games challenging, but this is a step too far. All of this makes completing the game close to impossible to the casual gamer, who is the market this game should really appeal to.

Once you do properly get going on story mode you'll have great fun, and the kill count will rack up surprisingly fast. You can, as previously mentioned, gain new abilities and improve your stats and this is done in a clever way. Instead of the usual killing stuff gets exp. points (prestige points in this game, or PP), here you do it by taking photographs. Each photo you take is ranked and counts up target markers or special events, such as the high ranking PP stickers, which can be taken at specific moments. Once your photo is done you get PP for it and certain types of photo get more than others. This system works well, as it is down to player skill, not just awarded for winning a battle or whatever. PP are supplemented by completing missions or successfully escorting those bloody survivors to safety, and when you level up you improve your stats, and get special moves, like the head-busting knee drop, or zombie owning wall pounce.

After the missions are done you can continue to play, but I can't say much more without ruining it. There are loads of achievements in the game and many can be done with simple tasks like: "walk ten metres over a crowd of zombies"; "hit 30 zombies with a parasol"; ...

SSX On Tour
Publisher: EA Games
Developer: EA BIG
Genre: Sports
Players: 1-4
Reviewed on PSP by gdf

SSX is the Snowboard series. First appearing on PS2 in 2000, it has grown and changed over the years, dominating the snowboarding corner of the extreme sports genre virtually unchallenged. On Tour is the latest, appearing on the creaky old PS2, Xbox and PSP. After the brilliant predecessor SSX3, many expected this to be the be all and end all of boarding games, and though it is solid and competent, it doesn't quite measure up to this expectation. Some of the magic has been lost and the title is misleading- the whole game takes place on the same mountain- don't expect to be hurtling down the French Alps one minute and snapping your neck on Mt. Everest the next.

On Tour has made some additions to the franchise; it is the first game to include skiing and there are more challenges to do. Skiing is fun for the first ten minutes but seems to fade when you realise it is exactly the same as boarding. The tricks work in the same way, the characters are the same, the speed is the same, the designs are the same, the levels are the same and the handling is...you guessed it, the same. This poses a problem as all skiing really brings to the game is more challenges, all of which are mirror images of the boarding ones. It is like a driving game claiming to have 50 tracks, but really there are just 25 reversed. Thankfully the handling is good all round anyway, so at least the game isn’t twice as long and a bitch to play at the same time.

The controls work surprisingly well on the handheld. Cross is crouch/jump, Circle and Square are trick buttons and Triangle is the modifier. To flip you press the D-Pad like in SSX of old. This actually works better than on PS2, where EA's bumming of the right analog has led to a poorly implemented "Trick Stick". On paper this sounds more natural, but series veterans will be put off by the fiddlyness and are better off playing on the portable. Unfortunately, the absence of four shoulder buttons on PSP has led to the boost being mapped to Square, so even a tiny lift off the ground could send your protagonist rolling off a cliff because they tried to do a 180 Stalefish three inches in the air.

The boarding itself hasn't changed much, which can be seen as a relief. There is little better than bombing down a mountain at 90 miles per hour, trees rushing past and only your pure, concentrated skill stopping you ramming into one. When this game works, it works beautifully. There are times when you will feel nothing else, hear nothing else and see nothing else; undiluted gaming Zen, but given the skill of this particular reviewer, that headfirst tree-rape comes a little too often! On a more serious note, it has to be said that there are too many tracks. Wait...don't criticise me for saying this. SSX3 had three parts to a single mountain, with a few secret routes here and there. You could, with some practice, learn the course inside out and choose your own way down, knowing where to go next. On Tour has loads of separate courses, none of which are particularly memorable, so finding that personal route is hard to achieve. You may recognise a course, but you won't be able to go the same way time and time again, honing your skills to a knife edge. With this lost, it is all too often that the hardened SXX fan will lose on the easiest difficulty for the seventieth just because they didn't know where to go next.

The visuals in OT are quite impressive, though not outstanding. Motion blur is well done and really adds to that sense of speed as the screen melts in your face. The snow looks really good when it puffs and whooshes out from the board, and you can really feel like Mr Cool cruising down the mountain with a trail of sparkling snow behind you (Sorry if that sounds a bit gay). Character models are fine, but on close inspection can look a bit ropey. The soundtrack is impressive, featuring a raft of great bands. The playlist is customisable too, so if you think a song sucks, you can simply refuse to ever let it piss in your beautiful ears again. The sheer amount of music that has been jammed onto the UMD is amazing, as there is at least an iPod Shuffle's worth of tuneage here.

This review may have sounded harsh, but that is only because the series has offered so much more in the past. Number three was easily the best snowboard game ever, so On Tour is really a bit of a disappointment. It is by no means a bad game, don't get me wrong. It is solid, fun, and well made. Series newbies will love it and enjoy every last minute, but for those of us who have played the previous titles it is slightly flat. If you are buying SSX on PS2, go for the previous instalment, which can now be found for fewer than ten notes. For PSP owners hankering for some mountainside action there is no other ...

Metal Gear Acid 2
Publisher: Konami
Developer: Kojima Studios
Genre: Action
Players: 1
Reviewed by gdf

Coming across like a bizzare cross between Advance Wars, Yu-Gi-Oh and the original Metal Gear Solid, Acid 2 is the second MG game on the PSP. Following on from the original Acid (though not plot wise), numerous changes and tweaks have been made and new features added. The basic idea is that you have a deck of cards and each turn you have to use those cards to perform various actions, such as moving, shooting, healing and disguise. At intermisson you can edit your deck and add new cards you have found in game.

Acid 2 is a very tactical game. You have to decide which cards you will sacrifice for movement most turns as the dedicated movement cards are pretty limited in number. This is where the AW comparisons come in. The areas are split into blocks and you can only move so many at a time, and when you engage in battle the camera zooms into the action. Mostly the gameplay is good enough fun and particularly good for long journeys because of the slow burning nature. There is a surprising amount of skill involved in negotiating the levels and avoiding being spotted, along with fair supplies of luck and strategy.

Sadly it isn't really Metal Gear. The plot is stand alone and is pretty weak if the truth be told; It is something to do with Snake having amnesia and...snore. In comparison to Solid, the story is really uninvolving and dull, with the famous cutscenes replaced by speechless drawings. There isn't even much movement to watch, just scrolling text, and after a while it becomes easier just to tap square and skip the scenes all together. Fans of MGS will feel disappointed as the plot doesn't fit anywhere into the complex timeline; it could be anything, even a VR training program or Raiden's wet-dream. Surely filling in the backstory of a character like Revolver Ocelot or Vamp (or even Liquid), or covering the events in the period between MGS3 and the 1 would have been preferable, if just to appease MGS fans. Some would argue that the game isn't called Metal Gear Solid, so therefore doesn't need to be part of that series and while this is true to an extent, anything with the name Metal Gear comes with certain expectations of plot and production values and Acid doesn't satisfy in those areas.

One thing you will notice is the striking visual style. In a departure from the serious look of Acid 1, the game looks like a cartoon. The cel-shading is very nice looking and helps the game feel more fun overall, if only because you are slaughtering characters that look like refugees from Gundam. The colours look quite odd to start with, all black, yellow and purple, and while at first you can be irritated you will soon get used to it. Overall the graphics are one of the best elements and help give the game a distinct identity, unlike the very grey Acid 1.

Thankfully there are more positives to be found in the gameplay itself. Given the deeply tactical, turn by turn style of play, Acid is one of those "Dip-in-dip-out" games that games journalists seem to clamour for on PSP. Play it for five minutes and get bored? Put the console to sleep and come back in half an hour. Another good thing about the game is that, aside from the first Acid, it is a very unique experience. It isn't quite an RTS, but then it isn't an Action or Card Game either. For tactics fans it is one of the only options on PSP too.

As mentioned previously, there are numerous changes and tweaks over the original. Forgoing the obvious visuals, the gameplay has been subtly changed to make it a little more friendly. For starters you can now pretty much move as you like, crouching and crawling away. Elsewhere more cards have been added in order to vary the gameplay a little. There are some neat bonus features like the "Solid Eye". Basically a pair of 3d goggles, they let you view movies so they appear to have depth. This is all very well, but sadly the twat who traded the game in forgot to put the goggles in the pack, so when I boughty it I never got them. Crossing my eyes gave me an idea of how it should look, if a slightly blurred, pupil cramping idea...

In intermission you can buy cards from a shop, either as individual cards or full theme packs (MGS3, for instance, contains things like "The Fury" and "The End"). From there you can organise your deck to include which cards you want, with a minimum limit of 30 cards and a maximum that changes as you progress. Sound in the game is a mixed bag, with some neat effects hampered by the total lack of dialogue. The game will keep you going for a while and it is worth returning to levels to find all the cards or complete them in a different way. Overall MGA 2 is competent enough and well worth a look, especially as you can find it quite cheap ...

Tom Clancy's Rainbow 6: Vegas
Publisher: Ubisoft
Developer: Ubisoft
Genre: First Person
Players: 1
Reviewed on Xbox 360 by gdf

Rainbow 6 Vegas is somewhat a redemption for French developer/publisher Ubisoft. Two years ago, the Rainbow series took a turn for the worse with the terrible and shamelessly mainstream Lockdown. Hardcore veterans were left cold as numerous compromises were made and the game turned out more like Project Snowblind than a tactical, tough to beat Rainbow game. For its first next-gen outing the series has raised its game cosiderably, managing to please both the old guard and new blood whilst still proving a challenging and absorbing FPS; Vegas is a fantastic game.

The training is set in Mexico City (possibly a homage to GRAW, another big Clancy franchise?) and lasts for slightly longer than you would probably like. You are introduced to the mechanics of the game and the streamlined command controls prove much more accessible than those of GRAW. So for around three hours (told you it was long) you charge round the impossibly dusty town, tactically pwning those Filthy, Freedom-Hating Wetbacks. So far, so Clancy, and the game continues like that throughout, playing "Rousingly patriotic" music from time to time. America, **** YEAH(!) and so on. Just as you begin to wonder when it will in fact live up to its title and actually go to Vegas, you are whisked away in a chopper and dumped onto the Strip. From here on in it's all good.

The game feels familiar, reminiscent of Rainbow 3, yet somehow fresher and more accessible whilst retaining its depth. One of the things you'll notice, especially in the casinos, is the variety of ways you can complete the level. There are usually a few routes to each objective and when you reach a room filled with terrorists you can enter in numerous ways. For instance, you could set your men up dangling above a window and move round to a door, using the snake cam to pick out priority targets then giving the order to flash and clear while chucking in a smoke grenade yourself, throwing on your heat goggles and providing covering fire for your teammates as they crash through the glass and into the fray. All of this takes place in the space of around 5 seconds. It really is exhillerating stuff when you pull off a perfectly executed move and have the room cleared before you can say "Fourth of July".

A new cover system has been implemented and proves far more useful than the old leaning trick. For a start it actually works. Akin to, though not quite as smooth as, the system used in Gears Of War, it manages to let you see round and over the object, blindfire, pinpoint shoot, throw grenades and snipe from your position. How so you ask? This is a first person game, so it must be impossible right? Wrong. The camera cleverly zooms out into a third person view, retaining the crosshair and, magically, not disturbing your play at all. It feels like a natural transition, as if you are still viewing in first person. You'll never notice it, and it is second only to the mighty Gears.

The firefights themselves are intense as you try to second guess the enemy and outflank the scumbag without letting him do the same to you. Clever use of grenades works much of the time, but not as you would expect. Smoke and flash grenades aren't as impotent as in other games and often work better than a frag or incendiary, as your enemy loses his accuracy and you can pop out to shoot his face off quite easily. Though the game isn't gory, it is extremely violent, with blood splattering up the walls as a foe falls in an excellently mo-capped action. The same can happen to you just as easily however, especially on Realistic mode, as your enemies will go for the headshot and a few hits can be deadly. It isn't quite as punishing as GRAW, as you have a Gears/CoD vision blur thing going on instead of a health bar; just sit for a few seconds and you are good to go.

The guns are very well thought out, each handling in a different way. There are several categories of weapon too so it's good to mix and match. In the end I plumped for an MP5N Sub-Machinegun fitted with a rifle scope as primary, a pump action Shotgun as secondary and the Raging Bull revolver as my pistol. You can add different scoped and attatchments to your guns which helps you create your own custom weapon set. The graphics in Rainbow are great, Ubisoft's trademark excellent lighting used to good effect throughout. An improvement on GRAW is that the screen is less cluttered with markers and arrows etc. so even when you get a video feed to your cross-com you can see the cation perfectly. The sounds are convincing to say the least, though the music can get repetitive from time to time because of its annoying American patriotism.

Rainbow 6 Vegas is a stunning return to form for the series ...

The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
Publisher: 2K Games
Developer: Bethesda Game Studios
Genre: Sports
Players: 1
Reviewed on Xbox 360 by gdf

Where to start? Where on Earth can you begin a review concerning one of the most vast, ludicrously freeform games of all time? Well, you start by rambling on like this, then saying how absolutely immense it is. Yeah, that should do, because Oblivion is something of a phenomenon. Out on 360 and PC for just over a year now, with a PS3 version due soon, developer Bethesda Softworks has tried to reach as many people as possible with their game. This may seem at first like a ploy for more cash, but with such a masterpiece, it most definitely excusable and very correct of them to do so.

So what makes it so good? Well, for starters, it is the biggest game ever created, bar none. The sheer size is enough to give anyone a headache and to call this "Sandbox" or even "Free Roaming" is an insult to the game. It laughs in the face of even the mighty GTA, and though Oblivion has been surpassed in terms of square miles of game area, the games that have done this were much shorter (Oblivion is at least 100 hours if you stick at it) and usually had some kind of transport faster than a horse. Yes, Oblivion is very much a traditional text based adventure at heart, but is brought to life with great vibrancy. The Medieval esque world draws unashamedly from these ancient games, but can also give credit to LOTR and D&D. Hardcore beards will feel right at home, and will positively savour ludicrous character creation options such as "Nose Bridge Depth".

The level of freedom is astonishing. It is entirely possible to do whatever the hell you want, whenever the hell you want. I tend to go for the more murderous, thieving side of things, rather than the goody two shoes complete-every-quest-to-a-tee approach, and who can blame me; being a badass is fun! The game is deeper than the ocean and once the (slightly unconvincing) training level is finished you are thrown out into it. With nothing to keep you afloat. Carrying a dead albatross. Naked. The game really starts there and you can pursue the main quest, indulge in a spot of crime, chat with the locals or just run off into the wilderness. The locations are very well made and the vistas are nothing short of breathtaking. The draw distance is HUGE. On a clear day, you can see for miles and can sometimes spot several villages from one viewpoint. It is these times that the "Go anywhere" element truly comes into play. It is a joy to just pick a spot in the distance and head off for it, unsure of whom or what you will discover or what great treasures you will stumble across. Sometimes stalking a random stranger whets the appetite; Like the look of that guy's dagger? Follow him then stab him in the face when nobody's looking!

There are a few guilds to join that each have their own quest line. You try to go up the rankings by doing ever more risky missions until you are the guild master. Some will enjoy the Arena Battles or the Fighters Guild knight style missions, others will prefer to complete tasks for the Mages Guild, but for me it has to be the Thieves Guild and the Dark Brotherhood. As I said, I'm a sneaky, murderous kind of guy. Anyhow, completing the guild missions is fun, but I wouldn't recommend breaking the rules... (Anyone fancy collecting 20 Dragon Tongue to get back in the Mages Guild?). You can get missions from the public as well, through either talking directly to people or overhearing conversations. These all go in your quest log and can be picked up any time, great for when you get bored of another quest or just wandering about all the time.

Throughout the game there a few little minigames. The lock picking in particular is entertaining, with convincing (or bribing) people to like you worth an honourable mention. Even in the simplest task there are numerous skills and factors which affect your performance. Buying goods (even though stealing is better) can turn into a guessing game of haggling and bribing in order to get the best deal. As with all RPGs, the devil is in the detail.

The in game character menu seems daunting at first. It has four sections, each with several sub-sections which are filled with stats or items. After you get used to it, managing your character is a cinch and you can actually enjoy trawling through the list, deciding which items you should drop so you can carry that shiny blade over there. The weapons are a great part of the game. You have to maintain them yourself for maximum performance, but when you are wielding a fully magically charged Glass Warhammer of the Dynamo, that Faded Wraith round the corner doesn't seem nearly as much of a badass. The combat itself is fun and feels much more direct and enjoyable than most other RPGs. The game is a first ...

In the words of the immortal......screw it. Halo 3 f**ing rocks. End of story.

Or it would be, if I didn't want to explain why. Halo 3 as you know is probably the most highly esteemed and hyped game in the history of games, weighing in at a massive 1.5 MILLION preorders. Following the obviously badas* Master Cheif, the last of his kind of warrior-race, he and the rest of humanity continue their desperate attempt to finish the fight against the alien invaders, the Covenant.

Now as far as graphics go, they are pretty stunning. Great textures, framerate almost never misses a beat, and I have yet to see a graphical glitch. That said, they aren't as good as maybe Gears of War and Bioshock, but they hold a huge candle to pretty much any other game. Huge improvement over Halo 2, as character models are much, much, MUCH more detailed as well as the environment.

Sound...its Halo. You get what you expect, and what you expect, is pure awesome-ness. So you get it.

Gameplay, the greatest part (obviously) of the game. Plays almost exactly the same as Halo and Halo 2, but with revamped controls which I personally am not too fond of. Halo 3 brings the same excitement and thrilling addiction that the first 2 did, and as usual you just can't put your finger on just what makes it so fun and awesome. Well, it is. I could try to explain for 3 weeks and you'd still have to actually play the game to know what I'm talking about. And multiplayer....the only multiplayer yet holding a candle to this is Gears of War. No question. Still, expect people who can head shot with they're eyes closed. You get that from the Halo series which spawns tons and tons of people who live, breath, and eat Halo. Maybe even crap Halo, you never know. Guns are great as usual. Even though some are still lackluster such as the assault rifle, nothing quite beats the enjoyment of just smashing a brute in the face with the gravity hammer. AI is better then ever, such as the AI's new cover system. ya know, they cover and shoot around walls from time to time? Yeah. Your teamates are still dumb as he** and drive like they're drunk, but they're witty banter and helpfulness in combat more then makes up for it.

Well, conclusion time. Short, eh? Well, thats why its called a Miniview.



Like I said, its extremely hard to say just what makes Halo 3 so gosh-darn fun to play. Graphics are great, sound is great, replay value is off the charts, and gameplay is stunning. Whoot! :thumbup:

if you have a 360, don't waste time. Make your 360 happy too by buying Halo 3, and for cryin' out loud, Finish the Fight. ...

Before I do the miniview, lemme tell ya something--

Miniviews are a new idea for reviews that I'll be making after I get a game and wish to impart knolwdge that I have from its gameplay thus to the public. Like the title says, its a "mini" review. So yeah. CAW!

Coded Arms, the original, I got it when I got the PSP. While I wasn't impressed it was pretty fun, but the shortcmonings were obvious: Lack of Story, screwy scenerios, and the ****-awful controls. Well, while the controls haven't changed, this game certainly has gotten much more depth to it. For instance, now there seems to be a nice story (Im 2 hours in ) that blends well with the Coded Arms franchise, ya know, the virtual world thing? Great cinematics, and the voiceovers are near top notch. New guns, new enemies, and something really cool--

The upgrade system. You will get points in the game and throughout it that allows you to continually level up your weapons fire rate, damage, clip, ect. You are even able to upgrade your health, your scanners battery life, among other things, with these upgrade points. In this game, though, you actually hack. When you find a turret or door you can hack it through a series of number coded hacks. (Turret and door, sound fumiliar? Cough cough Bioshock.)

Overall its been a great game for the PSP so far. I'd give it somewhere around an 8.5-9/10
If you liked Coded arms, then you will like this even more since its everything Coded arms SHOULD have been.

THE MINIVIEW HAS SPOKEN!!! ...

Let me first say that this is only the demo, as I'll be Miniviewing fairly often. Who knows what they will do with the full game...

The demo starts off nicely, with a cutscene that looks almost movie quality. Ya don't really know whats happening, only that Spiderman is getting ambushed by practically all his foes at once. After he's done thoroughly pummeling them (with the help of the New Goblin) he and the villians are surprised to find a new enemy--so called phantoms--appear. They are then teleported off to a ship or more of a UFO.

The begining of the demo doesn't go in-line with the cutscene in the least. Your sucked up into a spaceship then you appear in Tokyo with Venom as your sidekick. I didn't really care too much for that, seeing as I had an extremely low expectaion to begin with.

Then came the fighting. Let me again first say that for the passed few weeks I've been absolutely obsessed with God of War. And this game tries very hard to be God of War. And the surprising thing is, it starts to do it well. You have a good deal of combos you can use using the A and B buttons. However, thus far I have yet to see a cooperation between the 2. Ya know, like a combo involving both A and B? You can use charge attacks for all of you RB and LB web specials (Which really did come in handy). Another neat trick for some enemies is, after you knock em around a little, you'll be able to use a Button Sequance attack, identical to God of War. Like a little cutscene where Spidey messes up the enemy in one fell swoop. You also get temporary upgrades such a Max damage and invincibility.

Now for the problem with these combos: They lack flavor! They lack the punch and slam that we want. They are simply punch punch punch instead of BAM ZOOM BOOM! If you didn't catch my meaning, I mean that they really are not interesting in the least. Well, with 13 playable characters all with they're own combos, its does give the user quite a bit of variety, if bland variety. Now this is real annoying problem with this game:

You can't lose.

No matter how many times you die, it seems as though you just keep coming back again and again and again. ( Trust me, I launched myself off the rooftops more then enough times to know this)

But unlike God of War, this game has a really nice feature: drop in co-op. This co-op is exactly like Lego Star Wars co-op down to the nail. I don't know about you, but I liked that kind of co-op. But don't worry, no two screens needed. SMFoF has the camera like its a movie, also from games like Lego star wars, God of War and Too Human.

The graphics...could use work to say the least. But I don't really think they were going for an amazing style of design. It kinda looks like it came out of a comic book. I'm still wondering how Spidey landed in Tokyo, though...

Well, all in all, its probably a game I'm gonna rent at one time or another. I guess I'd give this game a 3.5/5. Probably too lenient but I really do think this title will deserve more then a 3...

Overall:

NOTE: Don't forget, this is JUST THE DEMO! We have no clue how the real game will be! ...