Another E3 has come and gone and with it some awesome new stuff to look at and some things we would have rather not seen.
Here at the TGA we are going to show you the top 10 the best things that you should look at and the 5 worst things from E3 2012.
Nintendo had big shoes to fill at this E3. All eyes were looking to Nintendo and what the Wii U was going to bring to the table. Most of the conference was spent on Wii U with 23 titles shown during the conference and little of 3DS as well. Let’s get down to business and see if Nintendo hit a home run this year at E3.
Next up on the list at E3 is Sony. Right out of the gate Sony does a great job at really dropping a bomb on the world with the announcement the makers of Heavy Rain are developing a new title. Not much is known about this title other than the trailer released at E3, but with Quantic Dream making this project it will sure to be nothing other than a smash hit. With Beyond: Two Souls you will play as Jodie Holmes and go through points in her life spanning 15yrs. But there is something very special about Jodie; she is surrounded by an invisible and powerful unknown presence that she talks to. In the video we see her sitting at a local police station not saying a word to a jabbering officer trying to help. The officer later becomes frightened when the coffee mug he placed on the table is lifted off and thrown against the wall, and chooses to leave Jodie. Left alone she starts to interact with this supernatural being stating that she knew that SWAT was coming for her. Right after SWAT members start to storm the building and position themselves to try to capture Jodie. The door to where she is opens than the video than cuts to an amazing montage of what else is in store for the game. The video alone was enough to give me goose bumps.
Out of the big 3 of press conferences Microsoft did not choose to step up to the plate. However, Microsoft had a very strong start and quickly gained momentum by revealing Halo 4 gameplay. Master Chief is in search of a ship that crash landed as it flew over his head. When the gameplay starts we were greeted with the trusted Battle Riffle (my favorite gun) and shortly after a familiar enemy, The Covenant. At this point I had yet to be impressed as Halo 4 seemed like it was just a graphically better Halo game, but quickly I was proved wrong as I saw new and interesting things. A strange red beam takes out the last Covenant as he disintegrates directly in front of you. As Chief pushes forward he as ambushed by a group of mechanical AI dogs. Once those are cleared another new enemy appears as well as a new gun. The new gun as equipped reminded me of something out of transformers and looked bad ass, Cortana recognizes that the tech is Forerunner. This new gun looks sick as does all the new Forerunner enemies. I was not sold on Halo 4 given that Bungie was no longer part of the project, but after seeing this at E3 I am sold on buying it. But don’t take my word for it, watch it for yourself and see.
Final Fantasy XIII-2 is the newest installment of the FF franchise. Trying to make up for the amount of complaints from the FF XIII and possibility of lacking creative ideas Square Enix attempts another console FF sequel. The first thing that came to mind was, “Why?” After the travesty that was FF X-2 I was very resilient to think that doing another FF sequel would be a good idea. The feedback that I received from reviews and word of mouth put my worries at ease and also stating that the complaints I had about the first one were also changed. Did the title live up to or exceed its predecessor? Let’s take a look and see.
Gameplay:
The gameplay of FF 13-2 is very similar to that of FF13. The battle system is based off of 6 interchangeable class types and managing those into 6 on the fly class combos in order to heal, stagger, or devastate your opponents. If you played FF13 than you will feel right at home with the battle system. There were minor tweaks in place that now give some enemies the ability to wound your health making you unable to heal wounded damage, also some of the class abilities aren’t as vast as they were in FF13, and now your 3rd battle partner is a monster. You now have the ability to capture, infuse, and level up monsters in the game. While this makes it able to build the ultimate monster for each class type I would much rather have static characters that I can level up just like Noel and Serah. Having to worry about grabbing new monsters or not knowing which ones are good to level up can be frustrating at times. Monsters can only be leveled up, depending on the class of monster, using items you can either buy or earn in battles. This can also be very frustrating as you have a limited number of items and don’t want to waste them on monsters that aren’t going to ever be as strong as the monster you are using now. The crystarium system of leveling up is back again but with a small change. In the previous title you could level up one of the 6 classes and each one had a cap and you could dump XP into any one you wanted. This time around you dump those points into each class type and get stat boosts in strength, HP, and Magic depending on which class you level. Each time you do that specific class will level up and each class caps at level 99. Each time you fill an entire crystarium field you also get a bonus which can range from boosting a class or raising your accessory limit amount. In this game you can’t just wear any accessory you want as each accessory has a number attached to it. If you don’t have a high enough number cap than a lot of accessories are dead to you and this really limits what you can wear to 1 maybe 2 accessories at best. Overall I feel gameplay took a step back from FF13
14/20
Presentation:
The game has Serah in search of her sister Lightning who she saw in a dream fighting in Valhalla in the beginning. Shortly after she is met with the last human in existence from the future, Noel as they both travel through time solving paradoxes created in the timeline in order to bring back Lightning. You travel to a great array of places scattered all throughout time as well as multiple versions of the same time but changed after fixing paradoxes. In each time you spend anywhere from 30min to 3hrs following the trail of the next time period unlocked by gates. Since the previous title was too linear this one is too open. I quickly felt overwhelmed with the amount of stuff that I had open to me in the timeline, and had to also revisit the same places to see if I could find more fragments in each time. The storyline was sub-par at best as it unfolded with a cast of characters that never moved or inspired me. Over the 38hrs of my time with the game I found myself playing it more out of not having anything else better to play rather than wanting to know what happens next. Most of the game posed no difficulty except for the final boss that resulted in me spending another 5hrs of leveling and creating stronger monsters in order to just barely win. The ending (spoiler free) infuriated me with the direction in which it played out. Overall, I would have rather played through FF13 a 2nd time than my one play through of FF13-2.
11/20
Visuals:
Visuals are usually a department that Square Enix does right. This title is an exception to that rule. The vast array of locations and geography always made it seem fresh. I would jump from one time period to the next and be immersed in a whole new world completely different from where I just was. However, the character models often seemed pixelated and it looks like there wasn’t a lot of effort into making this a well-polished and visually astounding title. The turnaround is that the cutscenes look as good as would be expected, but the environments, characters, and everything else outside of cutscenes looks like ass.
13/20
Sound:
The soundtrack for this game is atrocious. Most music consisted of not just music but some of them also had someone else singing in the background. I found the music to be so horrible that I would try to leave certain time periods quicker than others or play over the video game music with stuff from my computer because it just hurt my soul. I took the time to listen to what those people were actually saying I hung my head in disgust to hear that the lyrics were horribly written. Below I have linked some Youtube links to a few examples of what I mean.
10/20
Lasting Appeal:
The game has a vast amount of content with 160 fragments to collect, multiple endings, and a casino to blow all your money and time at. The only problem is that it was hard enough to stomach one full play through that I could never see myself going back to playing this title ever again. Do yourself a favor and do not waste your money on this game.
10/20
Final Score: 58/100
I completed this game on the PS3 with a time of 38:27:20. I was able to collect 77/160 fragments in the game and was able to reach 56% trophy completion
What did you think about FFXIII-2? Post your comments in the section below and remember to follow us on http://www.facebook.com/thegamersabstract
It’s been a while since I have had the time to be able to write an article. I was buried under the black hole that is retail as well as the start of my next college semester. However, some my time was well spent as I was able to polish off a number of hit games that came out during the holiday season that I will be reviewing today.
My time with Saints Row: The Third can be summed up in one word, Amazing. My 30hrs spent lost in the nostalgia that was Steelport was nothing short of an incredible ride. From the very beginning you get a sense of the crazy antics you should expect as you progress. The game not only met my expectations it exceeded them. From sprees of beating people with a giant purple dildo bat, killing waves of mascots in Prof. Genki’s, or tiger escort missions and that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Needless to say that I never wanted my experience to end. This game boasts one of the best soundtracks incorporating a wide range of genres and song selections that could satisfy any gamer’s musical tastes. The gameplay is the heart and soul of the game giving you power ups as you level your saints, guns, cars, cribs, gang members, or yourself. The game plays out just like your standard open sandbox world video game, but quickly you will notice that this game relays heavily on the WTF factor. While the side missions are a fun means to tack on more hours the storyline is what ties the game together into the beautiful masterpiece that I experienced. The closer you get to game’s end the more I could only sit there bursting out laughing at character interactions and the objectives that I had to complete. The game also has a great deal of customization allowing you to customize any article of clothing or vehicles to the color or style that you want. The graphics were not anything impressive, but that’s not why you’d be playing this game in the first place. Places look as though a city would with a nice amount of detail but it’s a standard look that we’ve seen before from this type of game. There are a few times that my gameplay got drastically slowed for having too many things on the screen, but this only happened a few times. With co-op, single player, whored mode, challenges, plenty to upgrade, and a wide variety of side missions this is one title that will be a long and enjoyable experience from start to finish.
Gameplay: 18/20
Presentation: 19/20
Visuals: 17/20
Sound: 20/20
Future Playability: 20/20
Final Score: 94/100 I spent a total of 30hr playing this game, achieved 80% of the trophies, and completed 98% of the total single player experience.
Next up is the strange and horror filled love experience that was Catherine. When I started the game I had no idea what to expect. You play as Vincent a man who is tied down to his long term girlfriend Katherine, but after a long night at his usual bar he finds himself in a love triangle. The story becomes so compelling that you will want to spend hours solving the games incredibly difficult puzzles in order to see what happens next. The game is divided into 3 sections: the part you watch, the part you play, and the part where you interact and shape how the game will progress. Each morning you are greeted with a series of cut scenes that reveal what troubling situation Vincent got himself into next. The visuals in the animation are beautifully done in mostly an anime style of drawing. Outside of these cut scenes the game does a good job at making the rest of the experience to be visually detailed even if you are too busy to pay attention as you run for your life. The second is spent at your favorite bar The Sleeping Sheep where here you interact with people, text the two K/Catherines and try to help people with their problems and woes. You can also play the bar’s arcade game which can help you work on your climbing skills, or sit and drink to increase the speed of Vincent as he climbs. Once you leave the bar is where you’ll be running for your life. Each night is the same in that you have a series of levels and you have to climb to the top in order to make it to the next stage. The difficulty curve climbed exponentially quick with the introduction of new block types and more difficult puzzles to try to climb up. By the second night my opinion went from thinking the game was easy to Holy $&#* at this rate I am not even sure I will beat the game. The game does a great job at immersing the player into a constant state of panic as you tackle each new puzzle. However, no matter how difficult and frustrating they may be once the game sinks its teeth into you there is no stopping you from trying to finish the night to see what happens next. The voice acting as I would expect coming from a Japanese game is impressive. The score of the game sets the mood for the epic and puzzling climbs that you will have to make each night. With multiple endings, high scores and medals to achieve on each puzzle, and a challenge mode that unlocks from getting enough gold medals in campaign there is plenty that will keep you coming back for more.
Gameplay: 19/20
Presentation: 20/20
Visuals: 16/20
Sound: 16/20
Future Playability: 20/20
Final Score: 91/100 I spent 12:38 playing through the game and got 35% of the games trophies.
Ezio Auditore and Desmond are back in another hit installment of the Assassin’s Creed series in Assassin’s Creed Revelations. In order for Desmond to make it out of the Animus with his mind intact he must complete the tale of both Ezio and Altair that blur memories within his own timeline. The gameplay hasn’t changed much since the previous installments with combat seeing very little performance tweaks. If you love the fight, climb, and move mechanics of the previous titles than you’ll feel right at home in this one. The game adds a new feature to create bombs to help kill, distract, or infect the minds of opponents. Another new feature is tower defense which has you strategize troops of assassins to stop invading forces from taking over your controlled bases. Truthfully, I feel that with each new Assassin’s Creed title the developers try to add more and more content that can be a bit too cumbersome at times. The game would consistently break the flow of my game experience by wanting me to rush back to the complete other side of town in order to protect my bases. The stealth mechanics are more difficult this time around as the developers want to try to force you to craft bombs to help progress even as it felt against my will to want to. The Presentation is set in Constantinople as Ezio is trying to track down the keys to unlock the truth behind Altair’s secret room. The journey will take Ezio through a love interest, building the Assassins Order in Constantinople, and becoming involved in a struggle for power over the crown. The game also adds backstory scenes involving Desmond before he went to Abstergo in the first one and Altair after the end of the first Assassin’s Creed took place. The story developed in Revelations within Constantinople was bland and my only driving force was to continue the storyline shaped from previous titles. The visuals are on par with the last two Assassin’s Creed titles with nice visuals stretching as far as the eye can see from rooftops and the soundtrack fit the setting of the game. With tower defense, tons of collectables and gear to obtain, 2ndary objectives, an Assassin’s Order to manage, and multiplayer this is a game that could keep you busy for a long time to come. If you’re looking to continue the story I would recommend playing it just to see what happens. Otherwise there are far superior Assassin’s Creed titles in the lineup.
Gameplay: 14/20
Presentation: 14/20
Visuals: 16/20
Sound: 16/20
Future Playability: 12/20
Final Score: 72/100 I spent 12:01 playing through the game with 56.52% completion and 36% trophy completion
What did you think about any of the above games? Post your comments in the section below and remember to follow us on http://www.facebook.com/thegamersabstract
With E3 beginning in just a few short hours we here at The Gamer’s Abstract would like to throw out some predictions for the major press conferences. Alongside those predictions will be stuff that is most anticipated and the biggest shocker announcement of E3. This will be written in the order of the press conferences themselves.
You will see the big heavy hitter first party titles here. Expect to see some new clips involving Epic Games new Gears of War title, and also more in depth with Halo 4. Microsoft will want to reinforce why gamers choose Xbox 360 above all else with the strength of their first party IP’s and how they have exclusive content first to the market. Microsoft will remind users that Xbox is the only place to get Call of Duty content first on the market and show some gameplay footage from Black Ops 2. Look to Microsoft to have a dedicated time slot to just showing off the Kinect. As always this might include a bunch of kids or adults doing silly things on stage in their 2 minutes of fame. Xbox 360 seems to want to become more and more integrated for being the only media device one might need for a household (cable, dvd, bing, ESPN, etc.) . It will come as no shock to see that Microsoft will announce further integration with the mobile market and moving more into a cloud based system. Microsoft wants to be like Apple in that all their devices will talk and communicate with one another. I do not anticipate that there will be any announcement or buzz for the new Xbox and will be absent from E3 until next year.
Sony may never outsell Microsoft but they do gain more and more ground with their IP’s each year. Look for videos of the new Assassin’s Creed, Sly Cooper 4, The Last of Us, The Last Guardian, God of War: Ascension, and the newly announced All Star Battle Royal. The Last of Us and All Star Battle Royal will be the highlight of the unreleased games during the press conference. The big push will not only reinforce why gamers choose the wide variety of exclusive games on the PS3 but will also focus on the Vita. Vita sales are less than what Sony would like them to be and gamers need a reason to go out and buy a Vita. I would recommend that Sony get Kevin Butler to do this segment as if anyone could get people pumped about buying anything gamer related it would be him. Expect Kevin to make an appearance at the conference and just like his appearance in 2010 people to be hanging on his every word. Vita will be seeing a price drop due to lackluster sales in the range of $50-$100. PS Move seems to be something that didn’t and still hasn’t caught on. Move will be mentioned but not to very much extent. Sony has been rumored in doing a strictly streaming based form of gaming sort of like onlive, I expect to see more details announced as to what exactly is in the works. With the PS3 still strong and the Vita in need of more sales it would not be smart for Sony to announce a new system at E3. I do not expect that this will be in the arsenal for Sony
All eyes are on the Big N this conference with buzz and hype all centered on Wii U. The name is here to stay as recent pictures of the tablet controller have the Wii U branded logo all over it. People want to know what it is, what the intended way to play this new system is, and what the recently leaked Rayman Legends trailer with Wii U means. (For those of you who do not know there was a trailer that showed putting action figures on the Wii U tablet controller and being recognized on the screen as an item, possibly game, or character. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RSlccZt5O2o ) Consumers will see a release date of Early 2013 and no price point yet. There will be announced 1st and 3rd party games for the system possibly in the realm of Metroid, Mario, and Super Smash and how these games will work with the new tablet controller. Pikmin 3 along with the New Super Mario Bros 2 and the popular upcoming 3DS titles like Paper Mario and Luigi’s Mansion 2. And last as always we will be graced by the wonderful and charismatic personality of Reggie Fils-Aime. Who always manages to bore and annoy the crap out of me every E3 press conference.
With Predictions also comes the most anticipated already expected stuff that here at The Gamer’s Abstract are itching to know more about or can’t wait to see. Below is a list of what we here at TGA will be looking out for. Those things would be:
Castlevania DS and Lords of Shadows
Wii U (We want to know wtf this thing is)
Kevin Butler as always makes a great addition
Paper Mario and Luigi’s Mansion 2
Bioshock infinite
Resident Evil 6
Tomb Raider
Assassin’s Creed 3
The biggest shocker prediction to hit E3:
Valve will finally man up and announce Half-Life 3
What do you think will happen at E3? Post your comments in the section below and remember to follow us on http://www.facebook.com/thegamersabstract
The events leading up to the release of the PS Vita thus far has been filled with great anticipation alongside an equally matched hype. The System boasts a quad processor, front and back touch pads, Wi-Fi/3G (depending which model you get), front and back cameras, and that is just the tip of the iceberg. The question for me has always been, “How is it that this system can dump all these specs into one handheld system and only cost $249.99-$299.99? It must be too good to be true.” It seemed that way until just recently I came across a news article about the system.
How is it that PS Vita is able to have such a low price for a lot of bells and whistles? Well that’s because the means in which Sony is going to profit is proprietary memory cards. I thought in this day and age that no one would be so bold as to make something that couldn’t be universally used by standard forms of media. The system doesn’t have a single bit of on board memory, and should you own one will be forced to pay for overpriced memory cards that are only used by the PS Vita. The memory cards range in size from 4GB to 32GB and in price. The memory cards start at $29.99 to a whopping $119.99. That is absurd to charge that kind of money for a digital storage medium. Upon hearing this I was completely turned off from buying the system at launch. I understand that the system has high specs, a low price point and will likely see a next to nothing profit, but the solution is not to charge outrageous prices on a memory card that I can only use on my PS Vita. I would rather pay a higher system price to get a PS Vita with on board memory or a widely used form of memory storage then revert back to the old ways of technology.
I recently started reading articles that the memory card prices are not set in stone using Google. Even though the price points might not be the premium that I first read, the cards themselves are not going to be cheap. This seems to be the money maker for Sony on the PS Vita, but I feel that this decision could be the downfall of the system at launch. As it currently stands I will not be buying a PS Vita at launch and wait to see what happens before purchasing one down the road.
It will be a long time before I get to play Drake’s next adventure
Angry, frustrated, or do you feel the idea is justified? Leave your comments and opinions in the section below, and don’t forget to follow us on Facebook at The Gamer’s Abstract or at Twitter @GamersAbstract or @Shalashaska8986.
Skyward Sword is the newest installment in the Zelda series and with it, brings both old and new concepts that appeal to diehard fans and newcomers alike. Taking into accounts all the potential that the Wii motion plus has to offer this is certainly a game that the Wii was designed for, but was the newest installment everything that it could have, and dare I say should have lived up to?
Gameplay:
If there is one title that stands out from the rest fully utilizing the Wii’s motion control capabilities this would be the 1st title that would come to mind with the sword swings almost (key word) perfectly mimicking my horizontal, vertical, and diagonal slashes in order to correctly attack a well-guarded foe. Each enemy brings a new challenge of having to learn how to attack using the Wii Motion Plus. At the core of the gameplay mechanics makes for a challenging but enjoyable experience from start to finish. The items earned though out the game also make great use of the Wii’s motion control capabilities with new items such as the beetle to old favorites like the bow just about each item in the game adds a beneficial degree of some kind.
The single gripe I would have with the gameplay mechanics….? The constant need to put absolutely everything into Wii Motion control. There was a lot that benefited from Wii motion but there were some elements that made the game more frustrating. The mechanics behind freefalling, navigating the world, and the occasional sword swing which sometimes was nowhere even close to the direction that I was swinging my sword took away some of the enjoyment. It was very frustrating when I finally found my window to attack only to have link swing vertical when I took my time making sure I had a horizontal slash. Another key factor that got old really fast was the need to recalibrate and center my controller each and every time I not only turned on my game, but also each time the remote went to sleep because I walked away for a few minutes. It just pulls me out of the game when I come back and I have to spend extra time trying to find a flat surface (the first few times I actually did not have a surface to put my remote on within the vicinity of my chair.) to recalibrate my remote. Overall the gameplay was solid and I found myself having tons of fun hacking and slashing through enemies, but the few buggy controls kept me out of touch on more than one occasion.
18/20(few bugs but overall not a ton of complaints.)
Nothing more gratifying then successfully landing an attack on a well defended foe
Presentation:
With a new storyline, new characters, and a whole new world to explore the developers were allowed to take any direction they wanted. The game world is set up with three central locations all different from one another and one central hub world to fly around in. You bounce back and forth between locations completing tasks and later on opening up new sections of re-visited areas. The formula has not changed much nor did I expect it to: complete a series of tasks in order to finally gain access to a temple, find the temple item as well as a master key, defeat the boss and then repeat. It is the standard Zelda formula and as always holds true. The story felt fresh, new, and original and kept me interested through the long haul. The story does something for the first time in the series in that really it starts to establish a timeline between some of the other titles in the series. I often found myself finding references to another Zelda title as I progressed through the events in Skyward Sword. The puzzles were very well developed sometimes leaving me stumped for quite some time trying to figure out what to do next. However the turn off from that was when I wasn’t involved with a temple everything else seemed to be spelled out for me. There was very little degree of confusion within the outside world of where I had to go and what I had to do next as if the game had an on and off switch on the difficulty. The game introduced the ability to farm items from creatures, collect bugs, and upgrade most of the items in your arsenal to be better than they already were. I would farm for hours in order to get the items needed from enemies in order to have the best gear I could get.
While I was determined to complete this installment I couldn’t help but stop and think during my play through, “Is this really necessary?” and the more time went on the more I found myself asking this question. The game seems to just add stuff in order to add length to the game rather than know when to progress with the important parts of the game. Out of my near 50hr play though there was about 38-40hrs I could justify of that time to stuff that needed to be there adding to the whole experience. The scale of the game also felt small looking back at everything I explored and unlocked. The game seemed to have a wide open sky with very few places to visit and 3 locations on the ground that did not feel very large either. You end up going to each of the locations time and time again for one task or another, and there was only so many times I could visit one place before I sighed in disgust when they told me that in order to complete the next task I would have to travel back to where I just was. The opening parts of my experiences with the game were filled with met and exceeded expectations while the tail end never quite gave me the epic close I was looking for. The side quests mostly mini games or fetch quests that I was able to complete a fair amount of them, but they weren’t very fun to complete nor did they really offer a must have item that I had to have or depth to the characters. It seemed like most of them existed for me to spend more hours playing the game.
16/20 (the good parts where great, but the game dragged on a bit too long coupled with a lacking latter game experience)
This got old fast, where’s my horse?
Visuals:
The Wii was never really built for stunning visuals, and unfortunately this does a great disservice to the Zelda series. The visual in the game are par from what I would expect from a Wii title and did nothing to stimulate my eyes as I progressed. The landscapes are generic for the series (I called pretty much all the landscapes before I even opened them up) for any seasoned veteran player, but I feel this category got sold short. I know that the Wii is capable of producing far better visuals using component cables but chose not to. The visuals look something I would expect to see on Gamecube and not the visual level I have seen the Wii capable of.
14/20 (Nothing terrible but nothing to write home about either.)
Hmm a mountain volcano how original.
Sound:
When I think of this category songs from previous Zelda titles fill my head and bring a smile from ear to ear singing all the classics. For this portion I listened to the soundtrack that came with my LE copy of SS and took time to analyze the music throughout the game. The game did a great job of setting the mood and emotion with each piece that surrounded the game. Each orchestrated piece sounds magnificent and was used to the full potential where necessary for what was reflected at that time in the game.
19/20 (Great soundtrack but there wasn’t a single track that will be remembered long after this game is around)
Future Playability:
With roughly 50hrs of play time invested in the title I still had another 10-20hrs left of side quests left to go back to as well as a boss rush mode. For those who cannot seem to get enough after the first play through and looking for a more difficult experience the game offers a more difficult play through.
18/20 (Game offers a lot of lasting replay value, but it’s entirely dependent upon your desire to want to.)
A great new installment in the Zelda series
Final Thoughts:
This game is one to be enjoyed and treasured by all who own a Wii. If there was a title that would shine as something the Wii Motion controller was designed for this would be it. The game wasn’t afraid to try something completely new and in most regards it succeeded. A few setbacks of trying to make the game longer then it needed to be, Wii motion controls in a few areas that it wasn’t necessary coupled with constant recalibration, and repeated visits to the same few locations making the game seem smaller than it actually was kept this game short of reaching the pinnacle that this game had every opportunity to seize.
Final Score – 86/100 (Great score and a great contender for GotY, but not quite the best Zelda title in the series)
Leave your comments and opinions in the section below, and don’t forget to follow us on Facebook at The Gamer’s Abstract or at Twitter @GamersAbstract or @Shalashaska8986.
This game was purchased by me for $70 retail for the LE copy. I completed this game once with a play through time of 49:23 completing most of the sidequests the game has to offer.
Out of all the games this holiday season none other than Uncharted 3 was at the top of the list. Each title seems to immerse you in almost what feels like a roller coaster action movie, with a touch of puzzle solving, and a great cast of characters. This title is no different in the series delivering on all fronts. The game puts you in a wide variety of locations from the streets of England, to the jungles of France, or across a vast desert with each new location visually astounding. In the visual department this game has no console equal putting every detail possible into not just the way things look but how you interact with objects or with the terrain you walk upon. The soundtrack and voice acting is spot on adding the right emotions for danger, combat, casual, and voice acting. The story sucked me in from start to finish and I couldn’t tell what was going to happen next. This game will keep you guessing until the credits roll. The gameplay has not changed too much from the mechanics, and button lay out of the previous title. The AI got a vast improvement seeming to know when to attack and rush me when I was close to death, low on ammo, or reloading. I was able to get 3 full playthroughs of the game, and a full night of multiplayer and co-op before putting this title down. I had a lot of fun playing the multiplayer experience, and coming from the UC2 they packed in a lot more extras, upgrades, and perks to keep players involved for months to come. Never once did I experience that the connection may be off or that someone else had an unfair advantage over me. I had no trouble being able to hold my own and enjoy my matches win or lose. I did not experience all the match type and co-op types the game had to offer, but should I find myself getting an invite to play with friends I will gladly load up my copy to enjoy more this game has to offer. During my playthroughs I did experience where my body got stuck inside of a cardboard box, times when the game lost all of the graphics and I was peering into walls another other objects alike, and times when Drake just didn’t do what he was supposed to do or that I wanted him to do. These times made the multiple campaign playthroughs a bit frustrating and took away some of the flow and experience of the game. However that aside this is the must play title of 2011 and a great contender for game of the year.
97/100
This was purchased at the full $60 price tag, it was completed on Hard, Crushing, and Easy campaign difficulties. I was able to achieve 100% trophy score over a span of one and a half weeks. I played the multiplayer for a total of about 3hrs so far and made it to level 7.
The Gamer's Abstract 