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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.

"Yummy Mummy" Dr. Hurley

“If you’ve never really been in the market for a self-improvement game, Brain Challenge will do nothing to change your mind. On the other hand, if you already count yourself as a hardcore fan of the genre or simply want to jump onto the edutainment bandwagon then Brain Challenge is not only fun but it’s also very cheap.”

You can read the full review and get that all important score over at WiiWare-World.com.

Out November 14th if you fancy it.

Dead Space Looks Fucking Awesome

There are a ton of video games being released this month so I guess it’s kinda my job to tell you about the ones I deem to be worthwhile reading about/buying/thinking/putting on Christmas lists.

• Disaster: Day Of Crisis (Nintendo Wii)
• LittleBigPlanet (Playstation 3)
• Fallout 3 (Multi)
• Fable 2 (XBOX 360)
• Far Cry 2 (Multi)
• Dead Space (Multi)
• Bioshock (Multi, Playsation 3)

There you have it. You saved up? Good, ‘cos wait until you see November.

Watch and weep my friends because the most unanticipated game announcement from Nintendo yesterday actually looks like the best Wii game in a long, long, long, long, long, long, long time.

And I say that with a smile on my face.

The New Nintendo DSi Certainly Looks Sexy

Nintendo went announcement crazy today. Amongst the ranks of some pretty awesome games (Punch Out!!!!) saving their bacon from this years lacklustre E3 was the announcement of a no-longer rumoured DS - the DSi.

Summed up pretty well by Kotaku, the Nintendo DSi now packs bigger screens, camera support and functionality for music playback via an SD Card slot. If that wasn’t enough the DS is also to set to get it’s own WiiWare-esque service titled “DSiWare”. Payment for new software will be charged via the Wii Points system but it’s unclear whether the service will be available to DSLite or original DS users. It’s looking pretty bleak at the moment though.

Coming in Spring in Europe the DSi will cost around $180 so we’re probably looking at a £130 price point here in the UK.

Also announced today were Punch Out Wii and Sin & Punishment 2 for the Wii. Punch Out looks to have a cel-shaded pseudo-2D look to it much like the rose-tinted Super Punch Out before it. We’ll let this video get you excited over the Wii again:

So ok… some of the lineup is a bit shit but at least they actually showed games. And I have to say the 3-5 seconds of Punch Out gets me so excited. I - LOVE - PUNCH OUT!

Too fucking hard.

I do like these “spin off” T-shirts though. Guess where it only ships too?

This Image Does Not Depict House Of The Dead: Overkill; it's from the House Of The Dead 2 (or 3).

I put up a Wii game related poster in my room today. A pretty amazing feat because I have barely touched my Wii since March. If I take a quick glance at the release schedule for the waggle-box only Wario Land: Shake Dimension remotely interests me this year.

But next year there is an extremely amazing game coming. A totally new, original, House Of The Dead game. Made in the style of a 70’s horror movie. It’s going to be unbelievably amazingly amazing. My one request is - can we have House Of The Dead 4 too please? Thanks.

Watch this amazing trailer:

Favourite quotes from literally the best trailer ever:

• “They’ve come for brains. You’ll give them… bullets!”
• “Where the dead walk… and bullets talk!”
• “So frightening… you cry blood from your own eyes!”

SEGA. You know I still love you. Please, please just take those godawful Werewolf parts out of Sonic Unleashed. Thank you.