Consolation Prize

Prince of Persia is a glorious game to behold – a visual feast for the eyes. From the outset as I witnessed the prince wandering aimlessly amidst a sandstorm, his shouts for his lost donkey “Farah” muffled by the roaring wind; to the first encounter with Elika as she tries to evade her pursuers, I was impressed by the visual splendor. There’s little doubt in my mind that as an opening sequence Prince of Persia successfully seduces the player.

And believe me I was seduced – for most of the time.

Beyond the cell shaded graphics there is a charm to the game that I find appealing. The interaction between the Prince and Elika, which starts out as a necessary companionship born out of the circumstances, develops as the adventure progresses. The early flirtatious sarcasm and teasing matures to become a more heartfelt relationship, and I actually believe that there is some genuine affection between the two - or maybe that’s all just wishful thinking in my head.

However, juxtaposed with the good there are some aspects within Prince of Persia that aren’t quite to my liking. The four magical abilities gained by Elika at the temple of the Tree of Life, which are awarded upon gathering a set amount of light seeds are really just variants of the same theme. The Step of Ormazd shoots you directly from one magical pad to the next like a cannon ball, The Hand of Ormazd shoots you from one pad to another but in a less direct route; and upon gaining the Wings of Ormazd, Elika flies the Prince all over the map, but with only limited control to move up-down-left-right to avoid objects. We really should just view these abilities for what they are; a method to control the players exploration and provide some linearity, but some more interesting and diverse abilities certainly wouldn’t have gone amiss.

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Continuing a series of posts looking at free games for the iPhone, this second part focuses on Tap Defense, Maze Finger, Topple, and Space Deadbeef. If you’re interested in reading the first part of the guide then you can find that
here.

Tap Defense

As it is only the second Tower Defence game I’ve played on the iPhone, Tap Defense has a lot to live up to considering my last journey with the genre was with the sublime Fieldrunners, however, this game can more or less hold its own comparatively speaking.

In Tap Defense your role is to defend the gates of heaven from hordes of demons, all intent upon gaining entry into the Promised Land. As is the norm with the genre there are a variety of towers to choose from ranging from the basic Arrow, Bomb and Water towers; to more specialist varieties such as Storm, Ice, Magic and Earthquake, but unlike the basic towers these more powerful variants must first be researched – using awarded halos – before they can be picked from the build menu. All of them can, as you may expect, be upgraded for a price to increase both there power and effective range.

Tap Defense features a number of hellish creatures like Gremlins, Succubae, Hell Hounds, and of course the Devil, but it’s a shame they’re all quite hard to differentiate between and sometimes merge together like a muddy mess when swarming because of there minuscule size and lack of detail. Visually, Tap Defense is passable, and in no way does the average appearance detract from the overall playability, but it does compare unfavourably with Fieldrunners which is in an altogether different graphical class.

The levels in Tap Defense use one of three different maps depending upon the difficulty chosen. The path to the gates of heaven is predefined and knowing the route the demons will traverse leaves you free to concentrate on the strategic placement of towers, but personally I miss the freedom and flexibility of being able to design “rat runs” for the hordes to wander through. Speaking of the level design it must be mentioned that Tap Defense not only features a Classic mode, but it also offers five Challenges that alter the game rules dramatically like “Sudden Death” which gives you just the one life, and “Ten Towers” that limits you to ten towers - unsurprisingly.

In addition to the normal tower defence game mechanics Tap Defense also incorporates an interest rate - awarding you additional gold per round based upon the amount saved in the coffers. It’s a great little feature which promotes money management and strategic depth as you to balance spending versus saving – the more you save, the more you will have available during the latter rounds when the difficulty curve really spikes.

Although Tap Defense may not have the presentation and the overall spit and polish that Fieldrunners has to offer, it’s still a very playable and enjoyable tower defence game and is well worth investigating.

Rating:  

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The skateboarding crown once held by the Tony Hawk franchise was put in dire peril in 2007 when a new kid on the block, namely Skate, made its appearance. Developed by EA Black Box Skate generated quite a lot of praise for its innovative controls and environments upon release, and now 16 months later we’re getting a sequel. To wet your appetite a demo of Skate 2 was recently released on Xbox Live Marketplace and is scheduled to arrive on Playstation Network imminently.

The career demo lets you sample the initial first moments of the game, enabling you to comprehensively design your avatar’s look and then jump into some simple challenges. The vast customisation options not only extend to tinkering with your facial features and clothes, but also your skateboard deck, truck and wheel selection - albeit only as far as your limited $300 budget will stretch. You can appreciate that in the full game you’ll certainly be able to completely style the look of your skater as more funds become available and additional items are unlocked.

Once you’re happy with your skater then it’s straight into the tutorial as you head off to Slappy’s Skatepark, learning the odd trick or two along the way. What’s initially quite impressive is the use controller to perform tricks; from simple ollies and nollies to kick flips and rotations, they’re all handled by flicking or rotating the right analogue stick. It does take a little bit of time to get used to, and undoubtedly you will fall off your board at some point, but it does feel like a more natural control method than just simply pressing a sequence of face buttons. Once at Slappy’s you’re met with the usual assortment of ramps, and rails to perfect your jumps and grinds, but there are also a few challenges to complete as your sick tricks can be photographed for Skateboard Mag.

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My time with Fallout 3 has come to an end - for the time being at least. And while I look forward to the first tranche of downloadable content; namely Operation Anchorage, which will no doubt drag me back to the desolate wasteland, I thought I’d take a moment to reminisce about my adventure.

It occurred to me that during the course of playing Fallout 3 I had become an obsessive hoarder. It started out innocently enough. I would scavenge whatever I could find in the wasteland to make an extra few caps in order to buy weapons, ammunition, healing meds, and to pay for repairs. It’s a harsh and dangerous environment in the D.C wasteland where the phrase “the survival of the fittest” reigns supreme and if you’re ill equipped then you’re as good as Mole Rat meat, and thus these early scavenging trips were at least justifiable.

** Spoilers Ahead **

But after a while scavenging became less about survival and more a compulsive necessity. Eventually I was earning more than enough caps from a variety of different incomes - be it from collecting bounties (fingers) by ridding the wasteland of evildoers, mapping locations for the mercenary outfit Reilly’s Rangers, or just plainly as a reward for services rendered, that I really didn’t need to carry on with my obsessive pastime. I had decked out my luxury Megaton apartment with all the latest mod-cons one could possibly want in a post apocalyptic shack; I had gathered enough weaponry to kit out a small army of freedom fighters, and I had more caps then I really knew what to do with, but still whenever I was out on a mission I just couldn’t resist strip-mining locations and enemies.

The worst case scenario was during the downfall of President Eden and the destruction of the Enclave at Raven Rock. The fortress was littered with heavily armoured enclave troopers all sporting Power Armour and Laser Rifles, or better still Tesla Armour and Plasma Rifles. Of course I couldn’t leave one iota behind, and thus I was compelled to make multiple relay runs to ensure that everything that was possibly salvageable was carried beyond the fortress limits before it was destroyed. I’ve not sold any of the armour or weapons that I took the time and effort to accumulate from Raven Rock. They’re just gathering dust in my TARDIS like desk draw next to the bed.

So do I really need one more Toy Car, Lunchbox or Nuka Cola for the collection? Is another Chinese Pistol really going to be of any more use than the hundreds I’ve already collected? The logical part of my brain tells me not to bother, just to concentrate on the rarer items and pick the others up if-and-when they’re needed. But the compulsive magpie wants just one more shiny bauble for the nest.

Although my iPhone will always play second fiddle to the Xbox 360 as a gaming platform, the sexy mobile device does however provide a convenient distraction that whittles away the time when I’m not in the comfort of my own home. The majority of games available are undeniably still in there infancy, but there are certainly signs of improvement with games such as Rolando that wouldn’t seem too out of place if it appeared on the Nintendo DS or Sony PSP. I am however still holding my breath, waiting for that standout title that blows me away and convinces me that the iPhone really could be a serious gaming platform.

There are an obscene number of so-called-games on the application store. Quantity rather than quality seems to be the driving marketing strategy as developers fall over themselves in a rush to get a piece of the gaming pie, and there are certainly plenty of free games to try out. The question is, even through they’re free, are any of them worth downloading?

Well to help you decide I’ve been trying out quite a few free games recently. Most of which have been picked from the “Top 25 Free” application list, but a few of the others I’ve heard about on the grapevine. In the first part of the guide I’ll be checking out Crazy Penguin Catapult Lite, PAC-MAN Lite, Touch Hockey, and Labyrinth Lite Edition.

Crazy Penguin Catapult Lite

You can probably guess, just from the title, what this game is about. But just to avoid ambiguity this game involves firing penguins from a catapult so that they can dive bomb polar bears – which for the record are naturally evil and have resorted to capturing penguins rather than eating them, but for what ever reason nobody knows.

The main campaign game finds you wandering from stage to stage on an overhead map, with each stage generally consisting of two elements. The first part is to launch your squad of penguins into the air using said catapult – usually through a narrow gap – so they can proceed to the next part, hopefully without suffering too many casualties if you timed things correctly. The second part sees the now flying penguins zooming across the screen whereby you have to time where and when to dive bomb the polar bears below. A successful strike will knock the bear from the screen and a set number of bears are required to be removed to be victorious. That is more or less the entire game, although each stage does get progressively more difficult by placing bears behind ice fortifications that need to be destroyed first.

So the game looks fine; with cute penguins and gleefully evil looking polar bears, and it has an annoyingly jovial music track. However, no matter how good the presentation is the game is severely let down by the one dimensional gameplay and I just didn’t find it remotely enjoyable. This is the “Lite” version of the game, and perhaps there’s more to see in the retail version that costs £2.99, but on the evidence I doubt I’ll ever find out.

Rating:  

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So here we are again; on the verge of another Christmas. A time to be merry, a time to rejoice, and a time to be with loved ones, family, friends, and of course a festive video game!

So what are you going to be playing this holiday? Is Santa Claus leaving a sack of gaming goodness beneath your Christmas tree?

As usual I’ve got a stack of games baying for prioritisation. However, before they even get a look in I’m planning on finishing Fallout 3 – which if I’d played earlier (and completed) in the year would easily have ranked in my top five games of the year. Maybe, just maybe, if I’m still playing it into 2009 then it will make next years list.

After Fallout 3 then it’s really going to be a toss up between Fable 2, Far Cry 2, and Prince of Persia.

All that remains to be said is to say thank-you to everyone that reads any post here on Consolation Prize. I hope that on occasion I’ve written something that you’ve thought was worth reading, and I really do appreciate your time and any comments that you leave. I’ll be back in the new year, hopefully recovered from any excesses, and raring to write some more.

Happy Christmas!

Christmas Tree image courtesy of
Manu M stock.xchng

The economy is in trouble; Governments have responded by pouring billions of pounds / dollars into the banking sector and into key industries in order to avoid further economic disaster. It saddens me to learn how the economic downturn is affecting development studios across the globe – The doors to Factor 5 and Free Radical Design are now closed, and even big hitters like Electronic Arts have been forced to make mass redundancies to help weather the storm. And on a personal note, I sincerely hope all those affected will soon once again be back in the industry.

The current economic crisis is very unfortunate, but there is, at least from a consumer’s perspective, a silver lining in this dark tumultuous cloud - In a rush to gain at least a modicum of profit I’ve seen retailers slash the prices of lots of high profile games soon after release. Far Cry 2, Prince of Persia, Fable 2, Fallout 3, Gears of War 2, and Little Big Planet; all released in the chaotic build up to Christmas can all now be picked up - at least here in the UK - for on average 50% less than if you had bought them upon release. That’s a huge saving to anyone, especially in these troubled times when every penny counts. It makes me wonder how many of us have held off from purchasing a game just because we had a hunch the prices would be reduced, or alternatively did we just hold off because there were too many games to pick from?

I’ve bagged some great “bargains” over the last few weeks; games I would have happily bought on release, at full price, if it wasn’t for the ridiculous release schedule we annually have to endure during the festive period. I’m assuming that many gamers out there, like me, have to prioritise what to buy, and are fed up of being force fed games in such a short period of time like some sort of video game “Foie gras”. Surely this sales model wasn’t always going to be sustainable was it? Weren’t there bound to be some losers eventually as supply outstripped demand? Or were we all just caught with our pants down?

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Before I was struck down with one of the millions of nasty bugs that seem to be lingering around at this time of year, rendering my mind and body virtually useless and capable only of watching dreary daytime TV shows, I was thoroughly enjoying Fallout 3 – the post apocalyptic role-playing-game from Bethesda.

I must admit that to begin with I wasn’t hooked. The visually impressive post nuclear wasteland can, at least early on in the game, be a torturous affair as even the briefest of encounters with a vicious dog could lead to a fatal outcome. Realising that wandering aimlessly across the landscape wasn’t perhaps the best course of action, and possibly why I was pointed in the direction of the safe haven of Megaton to begin with, I headed off for the nearby settlement and things certainly improved from there on in.

I really should have anticipated the opening salvo of frustration that this kind of game represents; after all, didn’t I clock up over a hundred hours in Oblivion, a stable mate that plays much the same as Fallout 3? Well yes, I probably had a similar first impression of Oblivion, but it’s the kick-ass character at the end of the adventure that I remembered, not the weakling at the beginning that struggles to defeat sewer rats. However, perseverance is rewarded and developing your character is certainly one of the highlights of the game.

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