Oooh... Suits You Sir.

Everyone loves special edition versions of games right? Particularly when they don’t charge you at an £843 premium just for the privellidge of a poorly cut “Making Of” DVD and a tin case that doesn’t fit on your shelf. Right?

Well my most hotly anticipated Wii game (one hotly anticipated game out of about three) is getting an uber-awesome special edition when you preorder the game with selected retailers. I read the press release twice and unless I blacked out over the same sentence on numerous occasions I don’t believe they told us which special retailers. This particular blogger hopes for Amazon.

Anyway you get a Sin City meets Planet Terror graphic novel for your preordering troubles which acts as a prelude to the games plot. Because everyone cares about House Of The Dead’s plot right?

It looks pretty neat but it presents a problem. If you can only get this with pre-orders that means February is going to be pretty expensive. Street Fighter IV, Killzone 2 and House Of The Dead Overkill. And let us not forget Bionic Commando comes in January and Resident Evil 5 (cums) in March. I was thinking the ridiculous months of overspending on video games was over but apparently not.

Should we watch that House Of The Dead trailer again? Of course we should:

“They’ve come for brains. You’ll give them… Bullets.”

Never gets old, that.

I Hate Heights.

Mirror’s Edge is a 7 out of 10. A big fat 7. I haven’t reviewed it myself because I couldn’t be arsed. You can get plenty of other opinion over at Metacritic should you desire it.

So, why exactly would this particular video gamer give it a 7? Well on the positive side it’s innovative, COLOURFUL, mostly fun and makes you feel badass. On the negative side it’s frustrating, JAGGED, somewhat irritating and makes you feel like ass. Mirror’s Edge is as up and down as a… yoyo?

To say I have been the biggest Mirror’s Edge fanboy EVER leading up to it’s release would be an understatement. I think people actually questioned whether I worked for EA or not. Which I might by the way. You’ll never know.

So anyway - with Mirror’s Edge having it’s fair share of problems I thought it was high-time someone pointed out in detail how you can turn that frown upside down for the inevitable sequel.

• Please God no more “I know where to go but have no idea how the fuck I get there” moments. I actually don’t have a problem with runner vision being on everything. Every ledge you need to grasp, every wall you need to wall run, every block you need to climb up. I know they didn’t do it in order to make you think but… I just feel Mirror’s Edge is a game a bit like Sonic - you should spend more time feeling bad ass and less time thinking. Runner vision on everything would allow you to consistently see your way, how to get there and keep the flow of the game constantly moving.
• Make Faith tougher or the guards less tough or take out combat all together. There are moments in Mirror’s Edge where you’re like “shit, guards, shit I don’t know where to go, shit if I punch them they’ll kill me, shit if I run past them they’ll kill me, shit… SHIT” and your face will go purple and explode. If there was an easier way of getting past the guards it would be much, much better. A hand gun perhaps would work extremely well? You could pull it out when you need it, get some quick headshots and keep running? Whatever they do the combat needs to be tweaked because I understand the purpose of Faith not being very tough (because she’s not really meant to fight at all) but getting past the guards at times can be frustrating at best.
• The graphics could be more simplistic. I’m a big fan of the art direction in Mirror’s Edge. A big fan. It’s so refreshing, so gloriously fresh and clean that it makes me want to cry red, white and blue tears of joy but we all those that have played it know it’s not quite perfect. The problem is, given the nature of the game you’re constantly closed in next to walls and various other elements of scenery. And while the game looks glossy and sassy from a distance, those textures become horribly yucky when up close. The solution? Don’t have textures at all. Am I the only one that thought Mirror’s Edge would look much better if every element of scenery looking like a shiney piece of rubber. The shape of the objects would remain unchanged… I just think it would stand out even more if it went for an entirely minimalistic look.
• Get rid of those “animated” cut scenes. Faith is a fucking cool character in my opinion. Celeste is a fucking cool character in my opinion. All the characters are fucking cool characters in my opinion. So how come they never get rendered into cutscenes. If Mirror’s Edge was a bit less video gamey and a bit more Half-Lifey, Dead Spacey, Bioshocky where the story unfolds as you play without “cut-scenes” as such I think it would be a lot, lot, lot, lot, lot more immersive. They need to find a way of getting you more attached to Faith. I’d need to put more thought into how but I loved the way they did the reflections when Faith is hanging from the helicopter. The game is called Mirror’s Edge after all? Perhaps more of a focus on the ol’ looking glass could be made? Everytime I pass glass, everytime I see water, everytime I’m near a metallic surface there’s Faith’s face staring back at me, reacting to what’s going on, beads of sweat on her brow.
• More lovely swooshy electronic dream pop. I’m sure one of the things that sold the game to a lot of people was the soundtrack. It may sound odd but it just walked hand in hand with the tone of the game the trailers were setting. So it was a shame to see said soundtrack horrendously underused. Music is a big part of the video game experience even though it’s often the last thing people talk about but I think Mirror’s Edge is the kinda game that would benefit from a real kicking soundtrack. At present the ambient blips and blobs suit the tone but they don’t exactly stand out… it would be interesting to hear the synths swoosh when you’re high up and then the mids and bass shuffle into the mix as you move between varying heights.
• Tweak the story please. I realise they’ve kinda already set the story in motion now, and I have no desire to give anything away to those that haven’t played it yet, but please can it be more like Brave New World and 1984. I love the whole dystopian nightmare setting thing… but in this game… I dunno, something felt wrong with the government. From the way they were called “blues” to the way they were constantly trying to kill you. I’d rather it was much more a gothic, frightened world that TOTALLY antithesised the visuals than the current world with pro-wrestlers and just cringey moments.

More Mirrors In Mirror's Edge?

And that’s how I think they should make Mirror’s Edge 2. Because the basis is there. And it’s fucking great. Don’t get me wrong I love Mirror’s Edge. But you just feel that it could be so, so, so much more.

Still, props to DICE and EA for doing something totally, totally different.

Oh. My. Goodness.

Go on admit it - how many times did you watch that?

Keep your Gears 2, your Metal Gear Solid 4 and your Soul Calibur. This right here might be the most generic shooter ever made but you can be sure of one thing - it’s going to be the best looking console game ever for a long, long time.

Gutsy But Still Ugly.

She ate testicles and stuff. She has more guts than I gave her credit for.

School Of Seven Bells. Best thing since the Cocteau Twins.

Oh, and in response to the original question, most things!

Yet another show off performance from Miss. Lewis.

To Miss. Lewis: “We all know you can sing.”

1/10.

(She scores one point because she looks yummy on the CD cover).

Ewww. ^

I promise not to write about I’m A Celebrity too much. Like I’ve already said, I have an inexplicable affection for the show and well… I just quickly want to give quick summaries on all the people I’ve never heard of because first impressions count for everything, right?

I currently like:

George Takei.

Carly Zucker

Because… George is God and Carly wotsherface (who is famous for going out with Jo[k]e Cole! WTF?) seems like she’s going to be a larff. Plus she’s genuinely ten times hotter than the other bimbo they’ve put in for the “lads”.

I currently don’t like:

Nicola Mclean. Ewww.

Kilroy. Twat.

Becuase… Nicola is a yucky tacky looking bimbo who seems to have no idea what she’s doing in the jungle seeing as she complains about everything. And Kilroy is a twat.

I couldn’t care less about:

… all the others.

GO GEORGE AND CARLY! BRAP!

In Private - Dusty Springfield.

*runs away dancing*

Everyone Should Own This CD For Amazing Memories.

Amazingly this was one of the first CD’s I ever bought. Way, way, way back in the day. You can’t beat a good Bond tune. And being as I’ve posted a lot of Bond stuff this week I thought I’d cap it all with my favourite Bond themes. So in no particular order - here are my personal favourites:

A View To A Kill - Duran Duran

Live & Let Die - Paul McCartney & Wings

The Living Daylights - a-Ha

You Only Live Twice - Nancy Sinatra

Goldeneye - Tina Turner

The World Is Not Enough - Garbage

Goldfinger - Shirley Bassey

Tomorrow Never Dies - Sheryl Crow

So there you have it. What’s your favourite dear reader? And what do you think of the new tune?

The Game Can Look This Good. But Not Often.

Quantum Of Solace is obviously the latest Bond game to tie in with the new movie. It’s out on just about every system you could imagine, ever.

What I liked:

• Quantum Of Solace uses the Call Of Duty 4 engine. That means every bullet feels ultra satisfying, the multiplayer matchmaking algorithm is wonderful and everything just feels smooth as fuck in the gameplay.
• The cover system is well implemented - you’ll be able to run towards any nearby walls and snap Bond behind them allowing for some pop-and-shoot gameplay. You’ll need to use the cover too if you want to survive as the game has been tweaked with this in mind. The levels are well designed to include enough unique spaces to hide behind.
• Early on in the game some of the environments look phenomonal. Bright, colourful and exaggerated. I’d almost like to say it has a lovely look to it but… well it only looks great sometimes.
• The train level was better than most Goldeneye levels. When you race to jump across the seperating train, run through the rain and watch Daniel Craig’s clothes drip when in cover — it looks brilliant and the level has some awesome set pieces.
• The Golden Gun multiplayer mode is great fun. This mode has players competing to takedown the person with the Golden Gun.
• The “poisoned Bond” mission. While gimmicky it was fun controlling Bond’s journey from the card game in Casino Royale to the defib in his car. Some of the visual effects are impressive.

What I didn’t like:

• Single player is ridiculously short. You’ll literally only spend about 4 or 5 hours completing the single player portion of the game. Thankfully the hardest difficulty is particularly tough so will keep you occupied for some time.
• To boot the single player is relatively linear. There is usually only one route you can take and while the missions are generally well put together; passaged blocked by boxes or strips of fire are particularly “video gamey”.
• The multiplayer mode “Bond Versus” is too drawn out and frustrating. In this mode one player is Bond, trying to defuse two bombs while all the other players work as a team to take Bond out. Everyone has a turn as Bond and given each round can be 5 minutes long, it’s… well… irritating.
• The graphics in cutscenes and later levels are horrendous. In the final level I questioned whether I was playing the Playstation 2 version of the game. Clearly more attention was paid in the earlier levels.
• The story is tied together by a series of debriefing sequences that become a little muddled throughout.
• The title of the game is misleading. Most of the missions in the game are from Casino Royale.

Overall, Quantum Of Solace is definitely a solid shooter. It fails to ever make you feel like Bond and has it’s ups and downs in the graphical stakes but if you’re happy to overlook the length of the game there is plenty of fun to be had from the competent shooting mechanics and multiplayer modes.

7/10.