Sunday 4 January 2009

Games @ X-Mas

So this X-Mas we had a good set of games as presents (of course most of them being for my son): 2 xbox360 and 1 Wii games.

The Wii game was a no brainer for this year - I carried on the Raving Rabbids series and got the latest one :- Rayman Raving Rabbids TV Party. The nice part of this game is that it exploits the Wii Balance Board as a component for controlling your character. The game is still a riot and you can have some serious fun (in the stupidity sense) but with the Wii Balance Board it adds another dimension that makes the antics more physical ranging from space surf boarding to rhythm dancing. The kids (my cousin's & my son) played together and it was giggles all evening. Honestly these kinds of games, the Wii and the social interaction they bring is the platforms advantage. I keenly have to give this game a thumbs up just for the stupid fun.

For the xbox360, it was Star Wars Force Unleashed [SWFU] and Guitar Hero World Tour [GHWT] Band Pack. SWFU I find to be your typical FPS type of game where instead of being armed with a gun, you end up going around killing with a lightsaber & powers of the force... The twist here is that your on the dark side , w00t! Overall the game plays quite well and is fast paced. The ability to manipulate & throw things with the force is fun but I am bit disappointed in the lightsaber attack moves. The graphics are impressive and you get a wide range of open spaces to explore but it is still very directional based so the environment still seems stunted. Overall this turns out to be a neutral rating for me and to be honest my son has played this more than I have for the moment but I will get back to it someday...

Very much having enjoyed Guitar Hero 3 and having learnt a little about drumming when I was young, I'd been quite excited and impatient for the release of GHWT. Truth be told, I preferred to look at GHWT than Rock Band as, at least in France, the release dates were similar and I'd already had experience with Guitar Hero franchise and wanted to continue to support it. It was a good choice, GHWT turns out to be all around a good continuation of the franchise and, at least for me, continued to be a good multi-player experience on both a local and online level. If you're already familiar with the play still then you can quickly jump into the game. As previously said the experience and interface has a lot of similarity, however, I did find that game play was much faster as well as being some what easier in the sense more forgiving of mistakes. I find the new instruments well balanced but find the vocal part some what difficult (definitely not a singer) as hitting the right tone is hard. The new guitar feels much better than the default guitar in GH3 but the slide bar touch buttons I find difficult to move to (it' s locating the right colour that takes time and mess you up). Overall though, GHWT is a definite winnner and a great play solo or with others - definite thumbs up!

So that was a quick dirty review of my first days impression! If you want more details visit your usual game review online sources...

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