God of War III Impressions

I recently had a chance to sit down and play God of War III, the third entry in the franchise from Sony’s Santa Monica Studio. After playing through the first 25 minutes or so, I only had one thought: Where the hell can this game possibly go from here?

Spoilers to follow.

God of War III starts where the second game left off. Kratos, the brutal Spartan warrior turned God of War, has been betrayed by the other Greek deities and stripped of his godly powers. Hell-bent on revenge, Kratos has allied himself with the mighty Titans, with their help he begins his assault on Mount Olympus the stronghold of the Gods.

Epic does not even begin to describe the opening of God of War III. The player is immediately thrust into the fray, riding on the back of Gaia, a massive 100-story tall Titan, as she scales Mount Olympus. As Gaia and the other Titans ascend the peak they face the full fury of the Olympian Gods defending their home. After dispatching several dozen minor minions, Kratos is confronted by none other than the god of the sea, Poseidon. The ensuing fight against Poseidon is a lengthy, multi-stage boss battle that constantly changes its orientation. The whole battle takes place on the aforementioned skyscraper-sized Titan as it lumbers up the mountain.

Part of what makes the visuals in God of War III especially impressive is the fact that 98% of the action is being rendered in real-time by the game engine. And as for the 2% of the game that isn’t in engine, the pre-rendered bits are seamlessly integrated with the rest of the game; you won’t even realize these moments are not being rendered in-engine. While battling smaller foes, you’ll observe the other battles going on in the background. You may become distracted while fighting skeletal warriors when you see Helios in his flaming chariot take down a Titan in the distance. Graphically, the game has come a long way from the 2009 E3 demo that became available in February. God of War III is easily one of the best looking games on the Playstation 3, and that’s saying something when you consider the cababilities of the hardware.

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No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle Review

Travis Touchdown and the Rose Nasties. Sounds like a band.

Looking for a game where bloody assassin massacres and cutesy kitten playtime are equal priorities?

No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle is one of the biggest, and strangest, releases for the Nintendo Wii in the first quarter of 2010. Its predecessor No More Heroes won critical acclaim back in 2008 for its adult themes and stylish visuals, but the sequel hopes to match and exceed the former in both overall design and unit sales.

Let’s get one thing straight: Desperate Struggle is about as adult a game as you can find on the Wii System – a system generally designed with Family Game Night in mind.  Before you can even save for the first time the game features blood fountains, self-mutilation, sexually suggestive weaponry, and about half-a-dozen or so ‘questionable’ pieces of language not fit for print in this website (Okay, that’s a lie, but hey, there are kids around). Not a bad list. Only potty humour could make the opening any more visceral, and for that, well, just wait for the first save point. It won’t disappoint.

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DorkShelf.com One Year Anniversary!

Dork Shelf was conceived in a bar over beer and breakfast nearly one year ago. That’s right, drinking before noon led to what you see now. Inappropriate alcohol-consumption aside, we’ll be marking the actual anniversary of the site based on when the first post happened, which was in fact one year ago today.

I want to take this opportunity to thank my co-founders Jeff and Lucas and all of our contributors for the hard work they’ve put in over the past year. We’ve got something special here, be proud of it guys!

I’d also like to sincerely thank all of our readers, without you guys there would be no Dork Shelf. As always, we appreciate your readership and your comments!

Our second year at DorkShelf.com is going to be even better. Expect new features, new contributors, some events and that long awaited site redesign!

Stay tuned…

Thought Bubble: The Self-Hating Game Designer

Heavy Rain from Quantic Dreams

The Playstation 3 exclusive Heavy Rain hits store shelves tomorrow. Much to-do has been made over the game from developer Quantic Dreams. Since its debut at E3 2006, Heavy Rain has been lauded for its revolutionary graphics, and with good reason. To say that the game looks gorgeous would be an understatement. But the appeal of Heavy Rain has not been purely graphical. Part of the reason the game has been receiving so much attention is due to Quantic Dreams’ own hype. The developers have emphasized the game’s characters and their realistic performances. After seeing the game in action a few months ago and having played the recent demo, I can see some of what they’ve been talking about. The characters are disturbingly realistic (though not always convincing) with eerily familiar facial expressions, which can cause the characters to lean into the uncanny valley at times. Visually, Heavy Rain is without question one of the best looking games of this console generation.

My own issue with Heavy Rain has more to do with the pedigree of Quantic Dreams. Their first game, Omikron: The Nomad Soul was released in 2000. It was an interesting cyberpunk adventure that many now consider ahead of its time, The game let you travel freely around a bustling futuristic cityscape, plus it combined the adventure and first person shooter genres in a way that really had not been tried before, Another intresting element of Omikron was its soundtrack; the music was composed by David Bowie, who also made a cameo appearance in the game. Omikron was a very promising start for Quantic Dreams. It was the company’s follow up to Omikron, Indigo Prophecy (known as Fahrenheit in Europe) that would start the developer on the path to Heavy Rain.

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Huge Turnout for Hand Eye Society Social

Hand Eye Society social photos by Mark Rabo

The Toronto gaming scene came together last week for the Hand Eye Society social. Not only was it an opportunity for the local game development, game journalism and enthusiast community to schmooze, but those in attendance were also treated to a preview of Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP, a collaborative project from local developer Capybara Games (Critter Crunch, Might & Magic: Clash of Heroes), pixel artist/filmmaker Craig “superbrothers” Adams and acclaimed singer-songwriter Jim Guthrie.

Developed for Apple’s mobile touch devices, Sword & Sworcery is described by its creators as “a brave experiment in I/O cinema” and “a crude videogame haiku about life, love & death”. While the presentation raised more questions than it answered, based on what I saw I’d have to call the game a highly stylized touch adventure game. A quick survey of those in attendance revealed that people loved what they saw, but were still hard pressed to tell me what the game actually was. It was unlike anything I’d ever seen; the game recently won the IGF Mobile 2010 achievement in art award and you can immediately see why. Adams’ amazing pixel art has a simple, yet haunting quality to it. Guthrie’s sonic accompaniment lent Sword & Sworcery an eerie silent film vibe; it felt like a trippy, avant-garde version of King’s Quest.

Unit Bar in Parkdale was standing room only for the event, the largest Hand Eye Society social to date. Zack, Lucas, Joel and myself were there and managed to catch up with some of our favourite local game folk including Raki from Controller Punch!, Mark and Jaime of Gamercamp and Nathan from Capy to name a few. If you’re a local game developer (indie or otherwise), writer/blogger or just a fan be sure to check out The Hand Eye Society.

Check out the official site for Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP

More photos from The Hand Eye Society Social

Saw: The Video Game: The Review

Editor’s Note: This review was originally intended for publication late last year, but was misplaced by yours truly. My apologies to Zack – Will

Do I want to play a game? Yeah sure, why not? I’m always down for a good bout of Tetris, but with Fall winds rattling my bones, scary games are definitely on the menu. Saw? The game? A game of Saw? Now I know the high brow savant in me wants to slide this concept away and move on to something… European, I need to honestly admit that Saw, the obnoxiously successful torture porn series of films that have a new entry annually if only to prove how much thought and effort is needed for the next installment, is not nearly as offensive as a video game. In fact I find that most things that tend to make you groan in films are usually the very same things you’ll fist pump for in a video game. So perhaps, conceptually, Saw: The Video Game may have something going for it. Thus begging the question, do you want to play THIS game?

You are Detective Tapp, one of the detectives aggressively hounding Jigsaw, the main antagonist of the franchise. Tapp was apparently shot in the first Saw film, though I’m no expert on the subject. So instead I have come to the conclusion that Detective Tapp was on his way to his buddy’s Bill Cosby dress up party when he was shot and kidnapped by the Jigsaw killer then awoken in a house o’ nightmares. If I have to give the writing team one medal it is for coming up with a great reason for complete strangers to want to tear Tapp a new one. You discover that Jigsaw has surgically implanted a key somewhere in Tapp’s body, and it is this key that so happens to be the path freedom for every other victim in the building. The way the encountered enemies incorporate Jigsaw’s lore is also fairly clever, from blinded brawlers who have steel boxes mounted to their head, to some with their hands bound to a stick of dynamite. Things descend into dumb pretty quickly though. To every victim of Jigsaw’s torture is some kind of justification, though they are really stretching it with this one. Tapp’s moral failing is that he’s just too obsessed with Jigsaw, and so Jigsaw decided to punish him. It just feels like the needle wagging its finger at the junkie. I guess the obvious cure for Tapp would be for Jigsaw to stop, y’know, killing people, but Jigsaw acts above it, and in this game especially rubs off as more hypocritical and smug than interesting. Tapp’s carrot on a string is to use this opportunity to figure out who Jigsaw is once and for all, though since the films have already treaded on that ground, it’s not nearly as tantalizing for the player.

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Podcast 16: Spock is Dead

Will, Jeff, Lucas and Noah sit down to discuss the Oscar nominations, the return of Lost, Mass Effect 2, Star Trek Online and its effects on social lives, Iron Man’s suit redesign and what people can expect from Iron Man 2.

Download: Dork Shelf Podcast 16 (44 MB, MP3, 64:54)
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Programme:

• 0:00 — “The CN Tower can work it out (Final Fantasy ft. Q-Tip)” by Tor
• 2:26 — Academy Award nominations
• 19:20 — Lost Season 6 Premiere
• 24:49 — Dorky television and franchise cross-pollination
• 28:42 — “Royal Flush (Instrumental)” by Big Boi ft. Andre 3000 & Raekwon
• 29:26 — Mass Effect 2
• 42:31 — Star Trek Online and Martin Luther King Jr.
• 52:43 — Iron Man redesign, Iron Man 2 and The Avengers
• 46:15 — “Cousins” by Vampire Weekend

Discussed:

• Mass Effect, Mass Effect 2, Star Trek Online
• The Avengers, The Invincible Iron Man, Captain America
• Lost, The Hurt Locker, District 9, Inglourious Basterds, Avatar, Star Trek, Iron Man 2

Fallout: New Vegas Trailer

Bethesda Softworks has announced that their new Fallout game is set for release this Fall. Announced last year, Fallout: New Vegas is not Fallout 4, but is more of a spin-off and direct sequel to 1998’s Fallout 2. Bethesda also released a teaser trailer for the game to coincide with their announcement.

New Vegas is being developed by Obsidian Entertainment, best known for developing the NeverWinter Nights series and Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic 2. Obsidian was formed shortly after Interplay’s Black Isle Studios (the developers of Fallout and Fallout 2) shut down. Many of the key players from Black Isle ended up at Obsidian, so hopefully Fallout: New Vegas can recapture some of the heavily-irradiated magic that made the first two games in the franchise so great.

Via Kotaku

Holy Invasion Of Privacy, Badman! What Did I Do To Deserve This? Review

What is it to be bad?  Is it because you do bad things? Do you have to intend to do bad? Is one only bad because they find themselves at ends with good? Is bad only just a constructed concept to begin with? NIS America brings you the tale of a frustrated bad guy, whose private life is in constant barrage of pesky noblemen sneaking into his dungeon. He comes to you, the player, to help him design a lair with solid enough foundations to put an end to his unusual pest problem. Through playing this title the player will discover a new sort of cruelty. It brings into question who is truly the villain. Could it be the bad guy, the hero, their politics, or the sadists who created this game?

The Playstation Portable seems to be the new ark for quirky Japanese titles. While I eagerly await my purchase of Half-Minute Hero, I am glad to see that Badman can satisfy my hunger in the meantime. The presentation is adowable. The dialogue charming. The Badman rambles on about your greatness, even when your decisions make him a little uneasy. The heroes all chant their battle cry before stepping into the fray, each being progressively weirder than the last. All is sprite rendered. The frantic, flute based soundtrack will keep you humming with a smirk. It’s not all original per se, but the overall effect feels cozy. Which is good, seeing as the game has you dealing with a lot of cramped spaces. Your evil monsters, all as itty-bitty sprites, live, die, and reproduce in the ant-farm-like environment you build for them. You need to create a layout that functions on two levels: One, complex and winding enough to busy and disorient the meddling heroes hunting for your Badman; and two, they also must be competent and structured in order to support the ecosystem of all the deadly monsters within. It’s not the first evil-dungeon sim by a long shot, but it’s definitely unlike any of the others that came before it.

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The Absolute Best of the Century (Thus Far)

When it was first suggested that each Dork Shelfer (we’re kinda like the Maple Leafs that way) write a blurb about their favourite comic book, video game and movie of the past decade, reactions were mixed. It’s the general consensus that the only thing more arbitrarily reductive than declaring the ‘best’ of the year is pretending to know what was the ‘best’ of the last ten years (if you’re thinking to yourself ‘what about the best of the last one hundred years?’ then you’re a smartass who’s missing the point). I mean, who am I to tell you that Wild Hogs will become the under-appreciated Citizen Kane of our generation?  Of course, this is by no means what we’re trying to do, but merely attempting to relay our personal impressions of what stuck out as our favourite sources of entertainment since recovering from the Y2K scare (I still keep all perishable food items at least 10 feet away from my computer at all times, just in case).

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Interview with Gareb Shamus of Wizard Entertainment

Local convention fans have been abuzz since it was announced that Wizard Entertainment had purchased the long running Paradise Toronto Comic Con. Wizard Entertainment is a well known quantity amongst dorks, not only for putting on some of North America’s largest comic conventions, but also publishing the popular Wizard and Toyfare magazines. Originally started in 2003 by Paradise Comics proprieter Pete Dixon, the newly minted Wizard World Toronto Comic Con will be Wizard’s first show outside of the United States. Where the original Paradise show was a comic book focused event, the new Toronto Comic Con will be multi-genre event similar to Wizard’s other conventions.

So what can fans expect from the upcoming Wizard World Toronto Comic Con? Jeff recently had a chance to find out in a conversation he had with Wizard Entertainment CEO Gareb Shamus. The two discussed the upcoming Toronto Comic Con, the Wizard World brand and how Wizard is adapting to the changing magazine marketplace.

Listen:  
Download: Dork Shelf Interview: Gareb Shamus (18 MB, MP3, 25:50)

Wizard World Toronto Comic Con runs March 26, 27 and 28th 2010 at the Direct Energy Centre, Exhibition Place in Toronto. Featured guests include Dollhouse’s Eliza Dushku, Battlestar Galactica’s Kandyse Maclure, Iron-Man artist Adi Granov and Wonder Woman writer Gail Simone. Be sure to check out the official Wizard World Toronto Comic Con site for more details and to see the constantly growing line-up of guests.

Podcast 15: New Word Unlocked

Will, Lucas, and Chris talk about what they’re looking forward to in 2010, mostly video games.

Download: Dork Shelf Podcast 15 (32 MB, MP3, 46:52)
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Programme:

• 0:00 — “Casio Bossa Nova” by Holy Fuck
• 2:30 — Comics and Martin’s Song of Ice and Fire
• 9:00 — BioShock 2, Deus Ex 3, and ten-year titles
• 19:40 — Mass Effect, continuing game stories and characters
• 29:30 — “Go Shoppin’” by Bran Van 3000
• 33:00 — Melville and his narcissists
• 37:30 — Clash of Heroes and Dark Messiah
• 46:15 — “Boxcutter Emporium Pt. 2″ by Sixtoo

Discussed:

• BioShock 2, Deus Ex 3, Mass Effect 2, Might & Magic: Clash of Heroes
• Scott Pilgrim, Transmetropolitan, A Song of Ice and Fire
• Game of Thrones, Avatar, Jean-Pierre Melville