Sega terminates repair service for Dreamcast and Saturn 30.03.07 - Sega Japan communicates they will stop the internal repair service for Dreamcast and Saturn in 28.09.07. Defective consoles will not be repaired starting from this date. The same applies to the accessories of the two systems (e.g. stromkabel, A/V cable, etc.).
March 2007
Monthly Archive
Fri 30 Mar 2007
Sega Terminates Repair Service for Dreamcast and Saturn
Posted by aleatorio under Console NewsNo Comments
Mon 26 Mar 2007
The Tony Hawk franchise has attained a rare status that only a select few games can claim: critic-proof.
Other games which fit this category include various sports franchises and Nintendo’s long-in-the-tooth icons - these games are for the established fanbase, and really don’t require much in the way of critical analysis, because they’re largely exempt from terms like ‘good’ or ‘bad’. There’s enough fans who will buy them, sight unseen, and unless the developer seriously upsets the apple cart, that’s exactly what they will do. Those who aren’t already fans need not bother even considering it, because if there’s a reason you didn’t like the series before, odds are that isn’t going to be addressed in this, or any future, iterations. The important thing is to keep the diehards happy.
Tony Hawk’s American Wasteland (the game that would otherwise be known as Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 7, but thankfully developer Neversoft and publisher Activision have helped distinguish between the first four enjoyable Pro Skaters and the three bleh ones that don’t even bother to have the word ’skate’ in the title) is certainly more palatable than the wretched two Undergrounds that preceded it . . . but that’s like saying getting a wart burned off your feet with a laser is better than getting a rotting tooth pulled without anesthesia. Neither activity is particularly fun.
For the most part, though, THAW is the same as the THUGs - you’ve got the Story Mode that passes for some sort of innovation with this series, since not much else changes, and for those who can do without a narrative when it comes to their skating, there’s Classic Mode.
In Story Mode, you play one of a number of pre-selected no-name skaters, using the stereotypical teen angst of “oh, woe is me, no one ‘understands’ me” as its core. Spoiler warning: your avatar starts out as a nobody and eventually becomes a pro skater. Do yourself a favor and constructively use the hours I’ve just saved you slogging through lame attempts at satire with goals like “do a kickflip over actor Ben Whofleck’s head, and man, didn’t he suck in Pearl Harbor?”
For a game that’s supposed to represent a hipper-than-thou fringe subculture, there’s a bad sitcom mentality at work here. Most of THAW’s Story Mode seems firmly aimed at the gamer who feels they’ve recently just outgrown Pokemon, and I apologize to any thirteen-year-olds out there who are a little too smart for this tripe.
Like many other developers, Neversoft patiently waited their turn in line to be able to rip off Grand Theft Auto, and the end result is the elimination of levels in THAW - Los Angeles is one huge level open for your skateboarding bliss. So many lines in this vast urban playground, so little time . . . but thankfully, you can just hop off of your board and run around on foot while keeping your combo points racking up. (A couple more installments of this series and you’ll simply be able to score points by walking around holding your skateboard, shopping for new clothes and hairstyles. Combos will be based on how quickly you can get a mullet at the barber and then run down the street to nab a really cool pair of shoes.)
If you get bored of walking and skating, there’s always BMX bikes, because nothing screams Tony Hawk like riding a bike (which, admittedly, is a step up from driving cars in THUG). Activision’s O2 line of extreme sports titles (like Tony Hawk but with snowboards, bikes, surfboards, etc.) collapsed when the bottom fell out of the genre and the corpses of all the Tony Hawk clones that other publishers cranked out began to smell, so rather than risk a stand-alone BMX game, it’s now a ‘feature’ in Tony Hawk. Next year, in THAW 2: surfboarding.
Of course, as a nod to cynics like me who claim they used to really like the older THPS games, there’s Classic Mode, which has ‘old-school’ levels with ‘old-school’ timed goals and none of that new fangled streaming levels and weak attempt at a plot. Sorry, guys, no dice. These levels either aren’t as smartly designed as the THPS classics, and those levels that are essentially the old levels repackaged . . . I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: these levels looked better on the Dreamcast in 2000 than they do on the Xbox, PS2, and GC in 2005, and that just shouldn’t be.
The irony is that this franchise has been around long enough to be able to actually attempt a stab at some sort of nostalgia, but playing Classic Mode just made me want to pull out the old Pro Skaters, create some new avatars, and play them.
If there’s a saving grace to THAW, it’s the online modes on the PS2 - and finally Xbox - and in my opinion, this is the only thing worth bothering with the game for. This part is still actually fun.
The Tony Hawk franchise is like a popular, top-of-the-ratings TV show whose creators are driven by the money rather than any sort of creativity, and just keep cranking out new episodes, even though half the original cast has since left and the writers are dipping into the bottom of the barrel for ideas. It’s sad to see sequelitis claim one of the few truly original styles of gameplay to debut the past ten years, and even sadder to see a game that once had a very anti-establishment, cutting edge vibe become a bloated, marketing-driven self-parody of itself.
It’s hard to believe that a skateboarding game has become as popular with such a wide audience as this franchise has, and that fairy-tale sort of unexpected success makes it so annoying to watch the series dive head-first into repetitive mediocrity - I guess sales can justify cranking out a new disc every twelve months, but I find it hard to believe that more gamers aren’t getting bored out of their skulls with this.
Of course, what I think is irrelevant. As I said in the opening, Tony Hawk is critic-proof, so by this point, you’re likely either agreeing with me about the sad decline of a once-great name, or hating me for ‘unfairly’ blasting one of your favorites. There’s a third group, those who really don’t care about Tony Hawk one way or the other, and they may have the right idea, because they’re certainly not missing much in THAW.
Thu 22 Mar 2007
A fair amount has changed Amstrad-wise since this page was first built. CaPriCe 32 still seems to be the emulator of choice, though I now find my version 1.11 (from 1998) has broken down and the latest version (3.61) refuses to run at anything like normal pace. Should it ever end up working properly, it looks like it will be the CPC’s answer to the Spectaculators, Spins and ZX32s of the Spectrum world. I have also been recommended to use Arnold, though a test of that reveals the most horrific sound problems you’ll ever hear. It also seems that Arnold has no way of switching off the irritating scanline display which appears to be becoming a common trait amongst later 8-bit emulators. Here’s some basic operating instructions for CaPriCe 32 v1.11, for those who can find a copy. To run a game, press F6 to enter the disk selection menu. Highlight either RICKD.DSK or RICKD2.DSK (as they should be named) - press ENTER and nothing happens. To load the disk, type cat to first see the contents of the disk. The file required should have a .BAS extension. If this is FILE.BAS or marked with a star then type run”file (no other quote needed) to start the game. To cut a long story short, run”rick and run”rick2, respectively, is what you need to type in each case. CaPriCe 32 has a save-snapshot facility. Press CTRL+F4 to enter the snapshot menu, press INSERT to add a new snapshot to the list. CTRL+F2 will load the snapshot again. In both cases here, the “Go to the site” links to the NVG’s FTP server, as the versions on classicgaming.com had no cheats and were prone to crashing. Their version of Rick 2 completely left out the Fat Guy’s Headquarters…
If you want to remember old times and play with the beautiful 8 bits Amstrad CPC, you can download it here: http://caprice32.cybercube.com/
Sun 18 Mar 2007
Street Figther 2 Turbo is one of the most memorable figthing games. This classic game, was the first Super NES game in use more than 16 Mb. It used 20 Mb !! Super NES port of the game that single-handedly kick started the fighting game craze, Street Fighter II introduced, among other innovations, combos (by accident, nonetheless!) and the now-standard half/quarter circle and charge moves found in countless other fighting games. Never before had the world experienced a fighting game that offered players an in-depth fighting system, let alone amazing (at the time) graphics. Innovations aside, the game is just plain fun. The sheer amount of people who still play Street Fighter II to this day is a true testament to the game’s timelessness. An eclectic group of world warriors, some of the most memorable sound samples in history, an uncompromising fighting system — what’s not to love?
Publisher: Capcom
Developer: Capcom
Platform: Super NES
Genre: Fighting
Release Date: 07/11/93
Sun 18 Mar 2007
Let me set the scene: Way, way back in the day, (1992 to be precise) I walked into my local games retailer to have a look around. There were rumours that, in our tiny town, they had somehow managed to get hold of Nintendo’s new console, the successor to the mighty NES. Not only that but it was on display to the public and was playable. A few friends and me decided to check out the rumours. On the way various bits of info that we’d all heard were spouted out. “ I heard Mario gets to ride on a dinosaur!” “I heard its even bigger then Mario 3 with wicked graphics!” “I heard it’s so powerful it costs a small fortune”. You have to understand we were fairly young. We arrived to a surprisingly empty shop and optimistically walked in. What happened next I’ll never forget for it was the first time I ever got to play Super Mario World and I’ve been playing it ever since.
Back in 1990, Sega’s Mega Drive was making fairly big strides in terms of the market against Nintendo’s NES, because it was more powerful, it had better graphics and it had a game you might have heard of called Sonic the Hedgehog. This cheeky blue spike ball appeared to be beating Mario at his own game and Nintendo needed to get their 16bit console out with a killer launch title that would put Mario firmly back on the platform throne. Legendary designer Shigeru Miyamoto was put in charge of making Mario 16bit but what he achieved no one could have imagined. Super Mario World was as close as gaming perfection could get.
Bowser had once again stolen the Princess, this time whilst Mario and Luigi were soaking up the sun in Dinosaur land. Of course plot was never a Mario games major concern. Rescuing the princess meant traipsing through 96 levels, from creepy forests to chocolate mountains, to reach a final confrontation with the dastardly Bowser. The game was one or two player and was bundled with the SNES when it was first launched.
The first thing that would strike you was the graphics. They were bright, bold and clearer then anything the Megadrive had to offer. It didn’t move as fast as Sonic but each world had its own style and the game as a whole was incredibly individual and yet familiar if you had played Mario before. It also featured some fairly technical (for the time) transparency effects and made full use of the SNES’s sprite rotating and resizing abilities, with the final Bowser battle being the best example of this. It didn’t quite match Nintendo’s other 16-bit big launch title, F-Zero, but the graphics did an admiral job of creating a fun and vibrant atmosphere. It’s a testament to the game that the graphics were hardly touched in the recent Gameboy Advance remake.
The sound was fantastic, with the SNES instantly making a mockery of anything Sega had to offer. It featured crystal clear instruments and noises and unforgettable jingles that would be whistled for days after hearing just once. However, the most impressive thing I found about the sound was the way it added to the atmosphere. When you are in a cave the music is backed by dripping and eerie echoes. In the ghost houses you have to put up with creepy single strings fading in and out. And who can forget the first time you jumped on Yoshi and a whole bongo drum beat seamlessly joins the music.
The core of the game, the reason it is loved so much is how it plays. Mario controls exactly like you would expect and when he has the cape he flies like a dream. Also, when upon Yoshi’s back, eating up monsters is so simple it becomes second nature in no time. The levels are all widely varied, with each one being different from the last, and there is an intelligent difficulty curve that makes the game feel difficult but never unfair. However, it’s really the depth of the game that makes it stand out. There is so much to see and do on each level that you never really feel finished. Most levels have more then one exit and some are incredibly fiendish to find. You can complete the game straight through, and the game shows the number of exits you have found next to your save game, but you will never feel satisfied until you have the full 96 next to your game. And that’s the beauty of the game. You’re always left wanting more and not once do you ever feel bored.
Looking at the game in 2007, it’s still hard to find fault. It was such a perfect piece of platforming in its day that its still fantastic fun to play now. Since nearly all platform games are 3d now there has not been much of a revolution in 2D platforming so it’s safe to assume that Super Mario World was and is the peak of the genre. Now that Nintendo saw fit to release it on the GBA hopefully it will open up whole new audiences who missed out the first time, and maybe, just maybe, they’ll release and new 2D Mario. After all, that’s where Mario is most at home.
Sun 11 Mar 2007
Rock the Rhythm, Lead, and Bass Guitar tracks in the follow-up sequel to “Guitar Hero.” Form your guitar duo and shred riffs cooperatively or go head to head in all new multiplayer modes. With over 55 tracks to rock out to, you’ll go from Guitar Hero to Guitar god in one press of a fret button. Choose from multiple rock characters and jam at concert venues that grow in size as your rock career progresses. You’ll start your rock career playing small clubs and bars, but if you play well you’ll work your way up to stadiums and arenas. Guitar Hero II takes the guitar rock experience to new volumes by allowing players to play 3 different guitar tracks: Rhythm, Bass, and Lead. Guitar Hero II introduces all new multiplayer modes like: cooperative, pro-face off, and face off, letting 2 Guitar Heroes conduct their own symphonies of destruction. Shred School: Guitar Hero II features an all new practice mode, allowing Guitar Zeroes to become Guitar Heroes with enough practice. With Guitar Hero II for Xbox 360 rock rhythm, lead, or bass guitar tracks with downloadable content and the new X-Plorer controller, designed specifically for the Xbox 360.
| PUBLISHER: | RedOctane |
| DEVELOPER: | Harmonix |
| GENRE(S): | Music |
| PLAYERS: | 2 |
| ESRB RATING: | T (Teen) |
| RELEASE DATE: | April 3, 2007 |
Sun 11 Mar 2007
They’ve got your spaceship, so blow up anything in your path to get it back. Completely hand-drawn high-definition graphics coupled with old-school game play results in ultimate mayhem. This side-scrolling shooter features cute, quirky humor and adjustable cartoon gore. Alien Hominid HD features jump-in-anytime multiplayer action, immersive environments, award-winning bosses, and over 30 fashionable hats. This 2-D console experience comes jam-packed with seven mini-games, including several four-player party games. All You Can Eat, Neutron Ball, and PDA Games will keep the party going for hours on end. All 16 levels and seven mini-games are included in this version, in addition to 720p HD support and 150+ brand new PDA mini-game levels. Two players locally in the main game, and up to four players offline or on Xbox Live in mini-games. Per-player difficulty: Difficulty settings can be adjusted on a per-controller basis.
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GAME INFORMATION: |
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| PUBLISHER: | The Behemoth |
| DEVELOPER: | The Behemoth |
| GENRE(S): | Third-Person Shooter |
| PLAYERS: | 4 |
| ESRB RATING: | T (Teen) |
| RELEASE DATE: | February 28, 2007 |
Fri 9 Mar 2007
Arguably, the Nintendo Wii is the most important console launch in some time. The reason? Its ethos is different. While Sony and Microsoft are happy to slug it out for the fast performance crown, Nintendo - as it did with the DS handheld machine - has popped off in the opposite direction and tried something different.
To an extent, Nintendo tried this with the Game Cube too, which it sold as a gaming box rather than any kind of multimedia machine. The result? It was perceived as a kids’ toy and the numbers nearly wiped Nintendo out of this particular segment of the console market.
That won’t be happening with the Wii, though. The first reason is a resurgent, confident Nintendo, whose persistence with its way of thinking has resulted in the huge success of the DS, where it was tipped to fail against the technically superior Sony PSP. The second reason is that Nintendo has been bolder with the Wii, and it really does deliver good fun.
The specs inside the box are fairly modest and well known, easily eclipsed by Sony and Microsoft’s latest console juggernauts. But it’s the way you interface with the machine that’s won the headlines to date, and rightly so.
The main Wii control looks like a remote control, albeit with a speaker and motion sensors built in. It’s a wireless device, and a flexible one at that. Using the Wario Ware Smooth Moves game, at times you need to turn it horizontally and grip it like handlebars, whereas in the tennis segment of Wii Sports you turn side on and swing it like a tennis racquet.
The tanks game within Wii Play and the boxing segments of Wii Sports require you to plug an extra controller into this remote, and the result is staggeringly intuitive. Picture a ten pin bowling minigame where you literally do a bowling motion. Or an air hockey-type game where you wave your controller around, with the movements replicated on-screen by your paddle. It’s delightfully simple and yet adds a genuinely fresh perspective to what otherwise would be fairly unspectacular software.
What’s more, when we went along, you could barely wipe the grin off our faces. The software titles that play to the Wii’s strengths are tremendous fun, accessible for all levels of gamer and contain plenty to enjoy. Multiplayer can be just awesome.
The box itself is small, lightweight and easily expandable. It’ll support old Game Cube games and controllers and it’ll also sport the Virtual Console, which we didn’t get a chance to play with, where you can buy and download old Nintendo classics for a couple of quid apiece.
There are downsides, of course. Much though we enjoyed first person shooter Red Steel - and that works a treat with the Wii controller - the graphical limitations of the machine shone through, against something like Call Of Duty 3 on Xbox 360. We also found that in one or two games the controller can be a little too sensitive, demanding that you point it exactly at the screen. And while the Wii-centric software we’ve seen is both great fun and exciting, we wonder how third party franchises will fare.
Yet these are minor points. Every one of us who went into the Wii house that day came back out with something new at the top of their shopping list. And that’s when Nintendo really plays its trump card, as the machine is selling for a princely £180 at launch, with the excellent Wii Sports bundled in.
That really is the gaming bargain of the season, and Nintendo deserves your support, your custom and your appreciation for continuing to take risks and innovate in a gaming market that otherwise seems a little stale. It isn’t the most powerful games console on the planet by any measure. But at this moment in time it’s by far the most interesting.
Sat 3 Mar 2007
Two years ago, a judge sided with Immersion Corporation in that company’s suit against Sony, ordering the electronics giant to pay $82 million for patent infringement. Immersion claimed the rumble feature in the PlayStation’s DualShock controllers was based on its own technology.
Now the two companies have put the patent dispute behind them and have formed a new agreement “to explore the inclusion of Immersion technology in PlayStation format products.” The Immersion announcement does not mention the PlayStation 3 specifically, but the system’s Sixaxis controller has been criticized for not having a rumble mechanism, a feature shared by the competing Xbox 360 and Wii, as well as the last generation of gaming consoles.
“Our new business agreement with Sony Computer Entertainment is specifically intended to enable advanced vibration capability for the benefit of the PlayStation gaming community,” Immersion CEO Victor Viegas said in a statement. “We are happy to provide our technology in this regard and hope to make technical proposals very soon with respect to use of our technology in the PlayStation products.”
A Sony representative gave the following comment: “We are very pleased to have reached a cooperative agreement with Immersion regarding the use of its advanced vibration technology (haptics technology). We look forward to working closely with them as we explore new and innovative ways to utilize this technology in PlayStation products.”
According to an Associated Press report, Immersion will receive $22.5 million from Sony over three years, while Sony gets the licenses to use some Immersion patents.
Sat 3 Mar 2007
Here you have 2 God of War 2 screenshots and 1 video:
The original God of War was an action gaming masterpiece from start to finish. Its Greek mythology-derived storyline, blanketed with larger-than-life set pieces and timeless characters and themes, provided the perfect backdrop to an incredibly intense and engaging action romp. We dubbed it our pick for not only Best Action Game but overall Game of the Year for 2005, and to this day it stands as one of, if not the greatest, action games ever released. Though Kratos wound up sitting atop his throne as the God of War at the first game’s finale, his tale was far from over. God of War II picks up right where the original left off and follows the anti-hero on his continued path of revenge.
When the sequel was announced, fans wondered not if it would be a worthy follow-up but whether Sony’s Santa Monica Studio would actually be able to outdo the original. After all, rather than making the leap to next-gen, the developer decided to keep the franchise on the PlayStation 2 for the time being. Citing matured technology that would allow them to focus on content rather than having to work through the growing pains associated with in-progress engine development, Santa Monica Studios took the road most traveled and wound up producing what amounts to a near-perfect sequel.
The answer is that yes, Santa Monica has indeed managed to better the original, though given how fantastic the first title was, just barely. It’s not an exponential improvement, one that an appearance on the PlayStation 3 may have brought, but rather an evolutionary one that has seen what small imperfections the original God of War contained polished out.
While we’re not going to provide any significant spoilers that anyone who’s followed the game thus far wouldn’t already know, those of you who want to know absolutely nothing about the story should skip ahead to the next paragraph right about… now. The second chapter of Kratos’ story once again revolves around revenge, and after being Metroided out of your godly status and powers, you head off to find the Sisters of Fate to set things right again. Well, “right” is only from Kratos’ perspective as the story in God of War II isn’t about black and white / good vs. evil, but rather all about perspectives. Even more so than the first game, God of War II taps into Greek mythology for a vast assortment of characters, settings and, more importantly this time, purpose, power and greed. Does that make this tale better? Frankly, it’s quite arguable and it’s a close one to call, but we think so. Only time (and really, another game) will tell us which chapter stands up stronger in the long run, but God of War II’s story certainly doesn’t disappoint. It’s likely that some folks may be a little disappointed in the ending as it’s obvious Kratos’ journey is far from over, but it’s been known for some time that a third game has been planned all along so none of this should come as a shocking surprise.
While it certainly approached flawlessness, God of War was imperfect, though fortunately many of its problems were tied directly to individual segments of the game rather than commonly-used mechanics. God of War II is practically devoid of these fallacies and even improves on the original’s fantastic mechanics in a number of small and subtle ways. For example, you can now drop down walls while scaling them so that you have quick movement in all four directions. Kicking boxes or statues pushes them much farther than before, cutting down on the tedium of moving objects, and the repeated tapping of R1 to open doors has been moved to the much more repetition-friendly Circle button.
All of this works to create an experience that is perfectly paced. If you’re not in the middle of a fight, you’re almost certainly working on one of the game’s interesting puzzles. There are few times when you’ll find yourself climbing alone on walls or running down an empty pathway, though most of these times are short and the scenery around you is enough to keep your eyes engaged. Indeed, God of War II is as polished and refined an experience as you’ll find in gaming.
If you thought the scale and scope found in God of War was impressive, you haven’t seen anything yet. Some of the set pieces found here are absolutely monstrous and dwarf anything we’ve seen on the system. Monstrous horses tethered to the Isle of the Fates are so large that Kratos can easily run down their chains without feeling an ounce of acrophobia. Statues simply meant to adorn the environments are large enough to easily walk into should they be hollow, and buildings in the distance that you’ll eventually wander into stand tall next to the mountains around them.
While the environments are bigger and grander in scale, you’ll also find that they vary more than what we saw in the first game. In addition to areas based on marble and stone or fire and metal, you’ll find lush gardens flanked by rows of trees, massive wooden structures, mountainsides covered in snow and underground caverns cloaked in organic stuff. The art direction is once again absolutely outstanding, and the guys holding digital pens over in Santa Monica deserve a pat on the back.
The combat mechanics are practically identical to the original title, and for good reason as it was already perfect the first time out. Kratos does have a few new moves up his sleeve however, some of which are just cooler versions of previous moves while some are totally brand-new and replace some existing techniques. But mechanically, if you’ve played the first game you’ll be able to jump right in and slice the living hell out of everything around you. Instant gratification in the palm of your hands, just the way we like it.
Combat wouldn’t be of much use without someone or something to kill, but luckily ancient Greece was filled with all sorts of crazy SOBs with their guts hanging out, just begging to be sliced in half. There’s a larger pallet of minions to kill this time, some of which have come back for a second helping. Medusas are back, more decayed in form than before, and some of which are able to flash-freeze you if aren’t careful. Cyclops are here in full effect, usually showing up when called out by little dwarfish-demons that tend to climb atop a nearby Cyclops and steer it like a wrecking machine. Boars, Cerberi, skeletons, hulking green beasts and more stand in your way to the Sisters of Fate.
One thing everyone wished there were more of in the first game is boss battles. God of War II features roughly double the number that we saw in the original, though they’re not all gigantic, screen-filling beasts. While it means that some battles don’t necessarily feel quite as classic as what we’ve seen in the past, it does allow for more variety. Part of the reason for the downscaled size of some of the battles is because you actually fight mortal men this time out, others who have ventured to seek the Sisters of Fate for their own causes. While, again, this means that some of them aren’t quite as epic as we would have hoped, they’re still fantastic fun and actually work into the story really, really well.
One brand-new element of the game can be seen in the first trailer as well as some of the latest footage, the flight sections. At two points in the game (if memory serves us correctly) you jump atop the back of a Pegasus, wings aflame with the fires of Olympus. Taking to the skies, you have rudimentary control over your carrier while you mainly focus on fighting airborne enemies and dodging their oncoming fire. These sections don’t last long, but they’re fun and work well, if mostly because they help the story and look really cool, especially when you see the Isle of Fates creeping up in the distance below the clouds.
God of War II features a number of small puzzles scattered throughout the game, and while none of them are exactly classics in the Zelda sense of the word, they’re almost all really well done and are short enough as to not slow down the pacing of the game. One or two were a bit tricky and a little more difficult to solve than what we saw in the first game, but we all know Kratos to be a thinker first and foremost so they’re quickly overcome.
We did come across two puzzles however that seemed a little rough around the edges and whose otherwise straightforward solution suffered a bit from imperfect implementation. By that we mean that both of them required putting something in just the right place, and if it was off by just a tad, it looked like we were on the wrong path altogether. One involved putting a pedestal on a platform and using it to block the platform from rising all the way up. On our first try, the pedestal “popped” off the platform as if it was either supposed to be all the way on or off, so we wound up trying a number of other things until we finally came back and happened to put it in just the right spot. In both of these cases the areas were rather small without too many other things to try, but it was certainly confusing to attempt the actual solution first only to have it fail and then wind up being lost for 10 minutes.
As was the case with the original game, God of War II ships with a very large amount of unlockable content and bonus materials. The Challenge of the Gods is back, though in much better form. Featuring seven challenges rather than ten, you’re now able to save after each challenge so that you don’t need to leave your system on for days or weeks at a time. Additionally, you’ll be given a ranking when you complete each challenge, be it Mortal, God or Titan, based on bonus objectives, how much damage you took, the time you took to finish it and so forth. While you’ll be able to advance after simply earning a Mortal ranking, you’ll need to go back and claim Titan on everything for the highest rewards.
This, however, brings up an issue of challenge and reward vs. fun. While playing through the game is certainly well worth your time, and really a mandatory experience for PlayStation 2 owners, most of the unlockable content is only available once you’ve completed the game and Challenge of the Gods at the highest difficulty levels, which is punishingly hard for most everyone. There’s a new arena mode that allows you to place whatever creatures you want into a battle to take them on, though you can’t do this until you’ve perfected Challenge of the Gods and achieved the Titan ranking. Sure, there’s a very good reason to reward those who can actually beat the game and its bonus modes at the highest level, but in this game there’s so much locked away that it looks like a carrot dangling on the other side of a chasm. Fortunately, you’re able to take the contents of any save game and carry them back and forth between the bonus sections and the main game, so if you’re short on orbs to fill up a necessary magic for a challenge, you can hop back into the game and earn some more before trying again, or vice-versa.
The last two things that we want to talk about unfortunately can’t be tested yet as we won’t have the boxed copy of the game for a few weeks (though what we’ve reviewed is the final code), though neither would alter the score in any fashion anyway and we want to point them out. The first is that God of War II will not only be playable on the PlayStation 3, of course, but that it will run at a true HD resolution of 720p. We’re unsure as of yet whether or not we’ll see additional texture detail because of this, but we’ll update this section of the review when we can test it. Editor’s Correction: After posting the review, we’ve gotten word from an SCEA representative that the game will support 480p on the PlayStation 3 but not 720p. Our error was due to crossed information and we’re sorry for the confusion. We will report back once we have the final copy in our hands.
Secondly, God of War II will ship as a two-disc set with the entire second DVD dedicated solely to bonus content, like a behind-the-scenes documentary on the making of the game. Again, as is the case with the 720p support, we’ll update this section with details when we have the second disc in our hands.
- Closing Comments:
God of War II may in fact be the best action game ever made. It outdoes the original God of War in every way, even if only by a tiny bit as the first was so good to begin with. It’s an evolutionary step rather than a revolutionary leap, but it has basically perfected the formula that the original set up. If you own a PlayStation 2 (or PS3) and don’t mind excessive amounts of blood, you absolutely must play this game. If you don’t own a PS2, find someone who does and sit yourself down in front of their TV for 12 or so hours as you’ll otherwise be missing out on one of gaming’s most intense and engaging experiences available.
