Xbox 360: X-Men Origins: Wolverine

He's The Best At What He Does!......... so he keeps saying.

Wolverine. One of the most beloved comic book characters comes to life finally in his own game loosely based on the same titled movie in cinemas now. I didnt have big hopes for this one as the movie to video game concept doesnt usually work. I gotta be honest, I was never a comic book geek and I only started to learn about X-men from the films so I dont have any extensive knowledge of the man whos the best at what he does.

As soon as I heard about the film and game I was quite intrigued. From what you see Wolverine do in the movies it would seem a brilliant idea to have a game about him. The leaping, the dicing, the regenerating health. All points to a video game from what I can see. So as soon as I got my copy I slammed it into the 360's disc tray, turned up the speakers to 11 and sat back waiting for the blood to spill!

From the off, the main menu looks extremely polished. It's basically Wolverine ( or Logan as he is referred to ) in the tank where he is injected with the, let me get this right, adamantium, which basically reinforces his skeleton. Logan moves and wriggles about in the background while you surf about the menu. As this is only a single player game thats all you got to choose really apart from the obvious options menu. So, you start the single player campaign and get the ball rolling as they say.

The game starts off with a short intro cutscene which tells you the background of Logan's missions in the jungle with the black ops team led by William Stryker who runs the whole Weapon X programme. Oh yeah by the way, if your not familiar with X-men, Wolverine, or anything to do with these two you wont understand the story at all. I would think many have seen the X-men films anyway so it shouldnt be too much of a problem. Stryker and the team go around killing who they see fit to get answers but Logan doesnt like killing the innocent villagers for no reason so he pretty much ups it and leaves Stryker and the rest of the team of mutants which includes marksman Agent Zero, mercenary Wade Wilson, teleporter John Wraith, invincible Fred Dukes and electricity-controlling Chris Bradley in the jungle. From here on in the game jumps from the movie story which is in the present and in the past before he left the Weapon X programme in the jungle.

The story is a bit hit and miss, if you seen the film then played the game like I did it makes sense, if you do it the opposite way around though it may become a bit confusing. You play through a couple levels here and there then all of a sudden you go to a flashback and your in the jungle again working for Stryker. Do a bit there and your chucked back into the present. Makes you feel like your in an episode of Lost sometimes. Anyway, onto the core gameplay.

This game is what you would call a hack 'n' slash. God of War comes to mind? Indeed. Take away Kratos god powers, give him claws and your not far off. The game consists of battling through various "areas" which are cornered in by everyones favourite invisible walls. When your in the jungle you fight tribesmen and the like. In the present day you fight armed forces sent by Stryker to hunt you down. Thats pretty much all you need to know. That is the core game in a nutshell. There are quite a few Tomb Raider like platforming levels and a few puzzles thrown in but the focus is really on the combat rather than jumping around levels.


One thing that makes the game extremely fun to play is the combat system itself. You can take aim at someone and pounce like a rabid animal across the screen onto them. Oh its awesome! Most games makes you run across the screen to other enemies. Wolverine? Running? Hell no! He leaps and lands on the victim with the claws embedded deep into their chest. On the earlier stages that will kill them instantly. Later on, not so easy. This is easily done by aiming with 1 shoulder button and making the leap by tapping the other. Simple. As you play it more and more it becomes second nature. After that you have the standard basic attack, strong attack and grapple motions. All done by the X, Y and B buttons. By holding the RT you can bring up "raged" versions of these attacks. Rage builds up by every kill you achieve. Once the meter is full up enough you can launch one of these major attacks which unleashes hell onto whoever is near by. One awesome thing this game does is an RPG like character building system. Every kill gives you XP. XP gives you access to new moves etc etc. You also can find and assign Mutagens which give you specific help. If you find an Experience Mutagen, you gain extra XP per kill. You get the idea. Very good system indeed. One mroe thing I HAVE to mention. Physical Damage. You can actually see Wolverine get damaged right in front of your eyes. Someone cuts him? He gets a cut. Take alot of damage, his clothing gets ripped. Take enough damage and you eventually see his skeleton! Now that is frickin' awesome! Sometimes I would get my ass handed to me on purpose because it was so cool seeing Wolverines skull!

Graphics wise, its pretty decent. Not the best looking game on the console, not the worst, its fine for what it is. The damage on character model deserves praise. Definately. The levels are well designed even if they are pretty linear. But its a hack 'n' slash. I didnt expect an open world. All in all the textures aren't too bad. With all the blood and limbs flying around everywhere I dont think a few odd textures here and there are gonna bother you.

Few pitfalls in this game are the mini bosses. Without spoiling anything, one boss comes to mind when I think about what is wrong with this game. As you progress there are 2 types of mini bosses. A rock type creature that you face numerous times in the jungle levels and soldiers who transform into towering monsters in the present day levels. Variation indeed. Only problem is you take them both down the exact same way. Leap onto their backs, smash the X button a few times, jump off and repeat. You have to dodge a few of their attacks but its not reaally that hard. Other bosses that I actually enjoyed fighting against is various characters from the film. One being Deadpool and the other being Gambit. They were nicely handled I thought. Tough in all the right areas.

To sum it up, I would say X-men Origins: Wolverine is a pretty good purchase if all your after is a fun and violent single player experience.

7/10

Xbox 360: Damnation

Damned if I do, Damned if I don't in Codemasters, Damnation!

This game is ironically called Damnation. Ironic I say? Yes, that is correct. Why? Because I kinda got the feeling I was "damned" as soon as the game began. I was kinda following this game straight from the off, mainly because of the concept.

You play as a so-called freedom fighter named Hamilton Rourke who, with a few other freedom fighters, are trying to prevent a rich industrialist from destroying the Union and Confederate armies with his own type of futuristic robot army. Yes, this is set in an alternative world where Steampunk is the main culture.
For people who are not familiar with the term Steampunk should google it as it is, personally, intriguing. The bases is where everything runs off steam instead of electricity. Sounds interesting? To me it did.

So as the release date came nearer I felt excited. Sure, there are many other games that most people are more interested in buying but now and again there are a few titles that are overlooked and I felt this may be one. So when I got a hold of this title, opened the casing up eagily and popped it into my 360.

The main menu is a pretty bog standard menu. Nothing special at all. Has a bit of a Gears of War vibe to it I would say. Have various background images flickering and flashing. You have the choice of starting a new game in solo or co-op mode and a versus mode. I noticed an option to enter a code or some sort. Maybe this is a cheating way to unlock items that you would normally unlock as you progress through the game? or maybe this is for other items. Personally I don't know so I cant really comment on that right now. Now we have the menu covered it's onto the game itself.

As people may or may not know this game started out as a mod for Unreal Tournament 2004. So as you can guess it uses the Unreal Engine. Alot, and I mean ALOT, of games use this engine as it's a pretty solid engine...... when it's used correctly. Damnation does not use it correctly.
One thing I noticed as the game began the graphics are pretty bad. Jaggies and low res textures are the first things I spotted..... but the list goes on. Sure, you can see pretty far into the distance but that doesnt mean much when all the action happens right in front of your face. The buildings are extremely boring to look at and the grass... oh the grass... looks like bit of cardboard just sticking out of the lifeless floor. Pretty much all of the buildings are made of wood so to be honest theres nothing more I can say about them, it's wood. Wood is wood. The colour pallette of the game is dull. People say Gears of War has a lack of colours and Damnation falls right into the same category. Everything is pretty much grey. You get the odd browns here and there but its all very dull indeed. The framerate is ok, just ok. You get the odd stutter here and there but for what its trying to display it really shouldnt have any problem at all!

Onto the animations, one word comes to mind. Crap. Seriously. The guy moves like he dropped a load in his pants. Maybe its the excitment of ......... actually there isnt any excitement. The developers have been going on and on about how this game is gonna revolutionize platform gaming. From what I can see it's basically platforming that Tomb Raider has been doing for numerous years. You can shimmy up poles, climb and hang on ledges and jump through windows. Thats about it. I also like the way Hamilton defies gravity when you have your back to a ledge and you want to jump up to one above you. He does a sort of back flip up the wall to the ledge above. Come on! Its silly to watch him do this. Made me chuckle everytime he did it.

The controls are as standard as they come. The LS moves Hamilton around, RS controls the, very lazy, camera. LT readies the selected weapon and RT fires. Clicking the RS adds a zoom so you can get a better shot on the seriously retarded enemies while clicking the LS reloads. The D-pad (minus Up) is basically your inventory. Hamilton can carry 3 weapons. Close range, long range and a pistol. Press the corresponding button to equip that weapon. A is jump and dive when sprinting. Sprinting is done by holding RB btw. X performs a really weak melee attack while B is your typical crouch button. Y is for either throwing or planting an explosive. LB is to use a feature they call "Spirit Vision". You gain this ability after the first level. It basically shows you where your enemies and partners are in the world even if there are walls etc blocking your view. Pretty useless ability if you ask me. Few levels in and I totally forgot about it.


The weapons, oh the weapons. We have come to use the term "weapon" as something you could possibly kill someone or something with. Yes, thats what they also do in Damnation but from how they appear and sound gives the impression that by using these "weapons" the enemies must be made from sponge. They sound like peashooters. Remember in school, when you used to take a pen apart so you just have the tube and spit out bits of rolled up paper through it? Thats what the guns sound like pretty much. Ive had farts that sound more like a shotgun than the feeble sound Damnation offers you. I only came across 3/4 different weapons while playing through. So to say theres a mixed bag is an understatment. You got rifles, shotguns and pistols. One pistol alternative is some sort of spike firing mini-crossbow. It's a 1 hit kill but takes a few seconds for the steam to power it and fire. What? You want explosives? Not here your not. They suck. I think I used 1 in the whole game. Pointless.

The level design is pretty good. You can tell they obviously had the vertical idea in there heads when creating them. Everything goes about a million miles into the sky. There are multiple ways to move about the level but whatever way you choose to go you always end up at the same point. Its the tried and tested formula. Start here, shoot everything you see on your way to here. There are a few odd sections where you can drive a steam powered motorbike which basically looks like a rocket with 2 wheels. The AI or "Real" friend can stand on the back shooting while you drive through. Only problem with this is that the bike moves so fast any enemies you encounter on the way dont even need to be killed, you can just drive right by and leave them choking on your fumes..... or steam I should say.

The enemies are just a bunch of mismatches robots. Some look like the Tinman from The Wizard of Oz on crack, some just look like they came straight out of The Terminator. Only a couple variations but all boils down to the basics. There are a few human NPC's along the way but I wont go into that much as it may spoil the story.

I have yet to test the multiplayer but from what Ive heard that is also pretty basic. Got the Deathmatch and TDM's etc etc but after playing the single player campaign I wouldnt wanna play it with friends.

So all in all Damnation may be worth a weekend rental but I wouldnt advise parting with £40 for it.

4/10

Introduction

Hi, my name is Gavin.......... good start to a blog I always think! Now you know my name im gonna tell you a little bit about myself. I'm a 22 year old guy living in Plymouth, England who is currently pretty much housebound due to what the doctors are calling Chronic Fatigue. Also, just for the record, I suffer with Tourettes Syndrome....... if there was an illness tree I would say it kinda feels like I hit a branch or two on the way down.

Now I have got that out of the way, the reason I thought I would start this "blog" is because I play alot of games, listen to alot of music, watch alot of films and also watch a hellova lot of television. Why am I telling you these things? Well, as I do these things I also tend to read alot of reviews about various forms of media to see what other people think of the product. So this leads me to my "blog". I want this to be somewhere people can read what I, The Average guy (see what I did there?) thinks.

As this is just the start I wouldnt expect too much but hopefully this thing grows and grows like a newely planted seed which one day blossoms into a fully grown tree. So......... let the games..BEGIN! Always wanted to say that....hmph.. now I have.