my thoughts on assassin's creed (1&2)

seriously. this year's been nothing but a bag of DEE EYE SEE KAYS for me and i've been pretty much abstaining from any kind of communication as much as possible.

on to lighter news, a review if you will.

my thoughts on assassin's creed II:

i finished it last night after playing it nonstop this entire thanksgiving break especially since i have nothing to do nowadays. overall, it's quite good. no, scratch that, it's really !#@#%ing amazing, especially after the awesome/okayness of the original assassin's creed.

backtrack to late 2008. i always wanted to try out assassin's creed, i dig it's free-running mechanics a whole lot, so a friend of mine let me borrow it. i played it like, once. and it gathered dust upon my shelf til' early '09.

fast foward about...6-7 months, and assassin's creed II is about to get released. after watching a ton of trailers for it on TV, i grew intrigued, read the previews and did some research. i remember coming across a line from a preview that pretty much stated i had to play the first game to "get" the second game.

prior to this, i remember my experience with AC1, about less than an hours worth from some time ago. so i hop on ebay and order me a copy of AC1. super cheap, came to my house quickly, who cares about that.

assassin's creed 1 in my honest opinion had something going for it. pretty accurate representations of crusades era middle east with lush environments and hugely scaled cities. the controls were simple yet contained a ton of commands at your disposal. i really dug that, fight's were nearly perfectly choreographed, but enemy AI sucked a ton of balls, which almost made sneaking around kind of pointless.

but if you do decide to be a pacifist, the game is truly rewarding, it makes you feel like you're the most sneaky, agile killer ever. i really dug that as well. the free-running mechanics harkened back to another franchise ubisoft is most famous for, and that's the prince of persia sands of time trilogy. though this time, it doesn't feel as floaty as said games. the physics of it, the feel of it in general just seemed like the next logical step for the developers, catering more towards realism than total fantasy. and after playing PoP 08, i found myself playing AC more.

what i didn't like:

in order for you to carry out assassination missions, you need to gather some information about your target. and that's understandable, but to do the same missions over and over again, was ridiculous. this pretty much cripples the game's replay factor. at times i had to force myself to get through the game.

but other than that, i think that's all i can say about AC1 it's a good game, it has it's wow moments, and the themes, visuals and gameplay are pretty spectacular, but the mission structures and repetitiveness really slow this game down.

8/10

this game is longer than it should have been, there were times where i was convinced i was through (rushing through it partially because i already had a copy of ACII and was dying to play it, but forced myself to finish the first game beforehand.)


Assassin's Creed II:

wow, this game was boss. it improved on everything AC1 in every possible aspect. unlike altair, you actually grow to love the new protagonist, ezio. the game starts when he's 17 years of age, and ends when he's 40.

unlike altair who is already a skilled assassin, ezio needs to work his way up the ranks of an assassin, and doesn't become a member of the assassin's guild til' about 20 hours into the game (depending on how much time you spend with it.)

the mission structure is incredibly varied, which span from beating up cheating husbands, free running races, assassination contracts, courier missions, timed killings, finding treasures, collecting assassin's emblems, raiding templar temples, finding glyphs and solving it's cryptic messages, catching thieves and robbing messengers. there's so much to be done in this game it's ridiculous.

the story moves at a smooth pace, and spans around the next 20 something years of ezio's life. the moves you have at your arsenal look breathtaking if you time your kills right. you can assassinate while hiding in a haystack, you can assassinate while hanging off a ledge, you also wield dual wristblades and you can pretty much kill two birds with one stone.

my favorite weapon was definitely the wrist-gun, specifically when i hired courtesans to keep me from being spotted, and took out a target without anyone noticing.

my favorite part in the game by far, were the assassin's temples which are located in some of italy's most famous architectural hotspots. and there are basically free-running puzzles, in vein of the prince of persia series. but it's done so much better in ACII. you collect six assassin's emblems in order to gain altair's armor.

this game does so much justice, that it's hard to really nitpick imo.

but if i had to nitpick, i don't like having to constantly switch weaponry. for example, you use RB to access a weapon wheel, and it would be normal for you to keep the weapon you've chosen right? no, instead if you switch to another weapon, and you try to switch back to the weapon you've just selected, it'll be brought back to it's default, causing you to go back into the wheel and selecting whatever weapon you used before.

other than that, there's a ton of fun to be had in this game.

depending on how much you like open world games, and your tendancy to explore everything outside of the main story, it's easily a 40 hour game.

it has this whole religious / da vinci code conspiracy going on, which is pretty amazing for a video game to tread those kinds of waters in terms of story.

so if you liked AC1 but wanted more out of it, check out ACII.

after i finished the game, i was kinda bummed cuz i was so immeresed in the story, it was getting really good and then it abruptly ends, at least leaving it open for ACIII.

Tokipedia's Last Days

Due to shenanigans and words from an anonymous whistleblower, I will be shutting down Tokipedia once and for all. I honestly believe that the joke was once kinda funny then it began to decline in both quality and respect, Tokipedia represents all of the vulgarity that was not permissable on the GameFaqs message board and I don't really want that as my claim to fame. However, Tokipedia stemed a union where we could write up silly articles about Frydo and Makoto being the Chuck Norris of Third Strike and of course, SKN sucking. A certain someone posted a fair bit of hate speech on one of the pages and that made me think, is this what I'm promoting? Is this what I'm permitting?





Tokipedia was a website without boundries, no censoring, no nothing unlike the other FGB media like Mashymania. Tokipedia was arguably the red light district for the FGB and that's kind of icky.





But let us remember the good times, our fond memories of Roy Bromwell being the love child of Kenshiro and Jack Bauer. Let us remember Alex's days in the American Task Force along with Captain America and Stan Smith of TV's American Dad in their base, the Statue of Liberty. Let us remember Makoto.....





Let us remember $29.99.....





Let us remember....Oscar Wilde.





Tokipedia RIP 2007-2009

"Fresh"

-Oscar Wilde

BORE-DURR-LANDZ!!

Well, I've been playing Borderlands as of recent and it's great! I've poured all of my free time into shooting raiders and grinding dem levels. Borderlands is a immersive experience and by immersive I mean you can waste a load of time and it's like Diablo with guns and stuff, everyone except Cliff Blezinski figured that out day one of announcement.











Gameplay:
Alot of people make parallels to Fallout 3 when I beg to differ. Unlike Fallout 3, Borderlands has some real staying power and replayability, Fallout 3 on the other hand collects dust given how disappointing the DLC was. You fight Mad Max styled raiders on the post-apocalyptic wasteland planet, Pandora. You build different skills and perks and come across a multitude of all kinds of guns. Not the promised 67 Bazillion but a hell of a lot more than most FPS's let alone FPSRPG's like Fallout or Deus Ex. You can party with up to 4 compadres and blast some goons. The enemies are interesting however the constant same respawning and SKAG F*@!ING GULLY get a tad stale. This game is best played with a bunch of pals and under various influences. 9.5/10

Visuals and Sound:
The visuals are very neat, they've got this stylized cel shade thing going on to cover up the hideous texture popping ways of Unreal Engine 3. Now don't get me wrong, UE3 has lead to some breathtaking visuals in games like Mass Effect, Lost Odyssey and Batman:Arkham Asylum but the engine has to be used properly to have it shine. We all remember the Mass Effect texture pops during conversations or integral parts of the game and titles like The Last Remnant haven't handled the engine well. It all depends on who's in control, I think Borderlands has a neat style but the visuals aren't spectacular.

Titles like Prince of Persia, Naruto UNS and Valkyria Chronicles have set the bar really high when it comes to cel shading. The sound is lacking in terms of aesthetics, I like the western 'Firefly' tone to some of the music but the fact is, there isn't much music. Sometimes you're wandering the desert with a guitar's twang in the background and nothing else, I think that's to get across the feeling of lonliness after the heat of battle but I...wouldn't mind custom soundtracks...just sayin'. The voicework is corny and over the top...so it's perfect! 8/10

Style:
Games these days lack a significant sense of style, this game doesn't try and trail blaze, in fact it mimics the trail blazers. Borderlands is basically a parody of every single post apocalyptic film and video game ever made as well as a hell of a lot of movie references. Hideo Kojima school of thought is that if you like a movie alot, force it on everyone else and you'll either get yawns and sighs or admiration. I admire what this game does, when I had to take on 'Mad Mel' and I found out one of the guns had the tagline "Your move, creep!" I knew I was in love.You don't always have to remake the wheel, sometimes you just have to give people the wheel and put a little spin on it e.g the RPG elements, the art direction, etc. I'm a sucker for cool visual effects and references to RoboCop. 10/10

Overall:
Overall, I love this game and I'm gald they're making DLC for it. I will be playing Borderlands for a long, long time. Hopefully it doesn't go all Oblivion/Fallout on me and stop being interesting. If Gearbox wants to, they have a chance to make Borderlands a big ass thing in gaming history and it is definetely a contender for GOTY 2009.

Overall Rating 9.5/10

INSTANT GENDER REVIEW Pt. 2

Men & Women = Dogs & Cats

This has been Luis H. Garcia's INSTANT GENDER REVIEW. Enjoy!

So I'm playing Fatal Frame II Turbo HD Remix: The Director's Cut

It's a good game so far. I'm on Chapter 6.

It's like, it's not horrifying like Silent Hill 3 was for me, but at the same time it's kind of spooky and neato. You expect ghosts to jump out at you and put static on your screen whenever you enter a new room, and you're rarely dissapointed.

At one part, I looked out a window and then a little ghost boy jumped out at me from the other side and was like "Sup." I jumped a little, but then I just said "sup" back and took a picture.

Oh yeah, I should tell you what this game is about:

Mio and her twin sister Mayu are trapped in a village because they can't step over dead leaves and twigs that block their path. The village is full of ghosts that want to kill them in a ritual sacrifice. You have to lead Mayu around most of the game, Ico-style, and try to prevent ghosts from killing either of you. It's not annoying like an escort mission where the AI keeps getting itself killed.

You fight the ghosts by taking pictures of them. No joke. The closer the deformed, cross-hatched, sometimes bloody ghosts are to you when you snap a picture, the more damage you do. This isn't like RE or SH where it's better to run away from monsters, cuz the ghosts can go through walls and floors and will chase you around until you exorcise them. You also get experience points for taking better pictures that you can use to level up your camera. It's less silly than it sounds.

It's a spooky game that suceeds at what it tries to do: be a fun adventure game with ghosts.

However, the game has one awful flaw: I keep getting stuck in the game because I didn't press A Button in PRECISELY the right place. I end up wondering what I'm supposed to do next until I check GameFAQs and realize that I didn't press A button on EXACTL Y the correct angle of this one table in the room I came to a dead-end in. It's p frustrating. Be sure to ALWAYS be mashing A Button while walking around haunted houses.

The original game is a PS2 game, while the Director's Cut is an Xbox original game. However, it's fully back-wards compatible with the 360, and it hasn't given me a single problem so far. Most other people agree that it's one of the few XBox games you can play on the 360 without a single glitch.

The twins are totally incestuous for each other.

I highly recommend this game if you are better at mashing A Button at every corner of every room than I am.

Very Bad Games

Do you remember how back in the day, you would be ready to set EVERYTHING aside just to get the best ending for your favorite games? Well, here is why that magic doesn't happen any more for games like...

1. DEAD SPACE EXTRACTION (Wii)
This game is awesome because you can only kill bad guys by shooting them in the knees and elbows. And it doesn't matter whether you're packing a handgun or an atom bomb.

2. MURAMASA THE DEMON BLADE (Wii)
Colorfully animated 2D graphics always win over minor elements like gameplay.

So what the hell is this game doing at the bottom of my collection?

3. SOUL CALIBUR LEGENDS (Wii)
If you swing your hand left, Ivy will swing her whip to the left. If you swing your hand to the right, Ivy will swing her whip to the right.


And if you...






...well, no. I'm afraid that's all she does.

4. THE CONDUIT (Wii)
This game has got some outstanding reviews from everyone who's played it. So if I tell you that it's a piece of repetitive crap, this will mean that I haven't played it, even if the in-game timer reads "4 hours". (P.S. It's a piece of repetitive crap.)

5. PRINCE OF PERSIA - THE TWO THRONES (PS2)
I'm sure this game is one of the best of the series, but games like this just don't cut it for me. Actually, I'm not really complaining about the game - just only the characters, the gameplay, and the entire concept.

6. VALKYRIE PROFILE 2 SILMERIA (PS2)
Every time I see this game, I want to pick it up and play it. I remember it had very nice graphics and a serene overall theme to it, but the gameplay could have been better. And it could have been made by anyone other than Square-Enix.

7. KILLER 7 (PS2)
If I start playing this outright weird game, my family will sign me up for rehab.

8. CASTLEVANIA: CURSE OF DARKNESS (PS2)
My brother has played this game inside out, and I always used to watch him play this back in the day. But ever since, I haven't really bothered to play it myself. That could be because it blows.

9. MEGAMAN 9 (Wii)
I hate jumping over pits only to get hit by a bird and fall straight down. %%%%ing Capcom.

10. PERSONA 4 (PS2)
OMG why is this game collecting dust! *picks up and starts playing*

Mash / Nov'09

G.I.*JOE (2009)

Summary: I watched it twice
G.I.*Joe is a fun movie. It's not amazing, it's not Oscar material, it's not even intelligent. It's pure mindless fun, and it gets full marks for not wasting 4 hours of my life.

Then again, I've been a mindless G.I.*Joe fanboy for as long as I remember, so my opinion may not count. At the same time I'm also a Spider-Man and Transformers fan, but I can tell you a secret - their last two movies were terrible.

Public reception: Empty hall
It wasn't very heartening to sit in a barely-there crowd for both times that I went to the local Cineplex to watch G.I.*Joe - The Rise of Cobra. Then again, what was I expecting? Summer vacations are over and kids are in school or in detention. And 90% of the rest don't even know what G.I.*Joe is because it has nothing to do with Miley Cyrus.

It was a relief however to not stand in an endless queue only to get a ticket for a movie that may turn out to be garbage. I remember gate-crashing for Transformers 2 not too long ago, and that movie was the worst thing I've ever seen in my life. I got the tix for Joe in less than a minute. (What queue?)

My favorite review of Transformers 2

Performances: LOL, except Ray Park
The characters who made the movie worth watching were Storm Shadow, the Baroness, Snake Eyes and General Hawk. Everyone else was simply reading off their lines from the script. I've seen emoticons show more emotion than Duke / Channing Tatum.

The most over-the-top performances were by "Commander" and the President. Doctor Mindbender almost made the list with his impression of a gay hobo.

Storm Shadow and the Baroness made every scene they were in worth watching. You can simply fast forward the entire movie and just watch their parts because they're that much fun. And Snake Eyes - nuff said.

G.I.*Joe >
Star Trek
Trashformers 2 Revenge of the Failure
Hitman
Max Payne
James Bond 007 Quantum of Nonsense

Final Score: 70%

Samsung Corby - cellphone review

It so happened that last week I had a really good exam after the longest time and decided to celebrate by blowing money away on a new cellphone. (And also because my (old) cellphone would keep re-starting at random and I doubt its warranty would cover that.)

The Samsung S3650 AKA Corby was priced at PKR 14K (around US$175) as of 1 November 2009 - not cheap by any means, but I'd heard it would be $190 and was prepared to cry a little.

It's your standard 2G slim touch-screen cell-phone that has all the works, minus WiFi. For nubs, this means it has 80mb internal memory, Bluetooth wireless, USB capability, a 2MP camera, a Media Player that plays wav, mp3, mp4, wmv, midi and standard cellphone format media files (video + audio). Plus you can send / receive emails, and there's a separate Samsung web-browser v.1.0. It also has a bunch of shortcut buttons that take you straight to Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, YouTube, ImageBucket and other popular "community websites", as well as a Google Toolbar.

Oh, and before I forget - it has a straight out touch-screen, so you're not going to fold open or slide up / down any keypad. Everything is on-screen and will need to be touched. No stylus included and no stylus necessary, really, because the touch-screen is very responsive. (I haven't been able to locate the screen calibration options so far, but haven't had the need to reconfigure anything anyway.)

There is no way that you can prop the Corby like this without invoking the warranty.

In terms of appearance, and as you can tell from the promo pic above, it has a black front face. This is fixed and can't be changed, unless you have an airspray can and some paint handy. The cover on the reverse side is interchangeable, and you have 3 different covers boxed in to begin with. I got the yellow flavor which came with 1 yellow, 1 festive yellow (which was the same thing but with a fancy little spiral design printed on it) and 1 black back cover.

It's slim, but healthier than Naomi Campbell.

I guess the only drawback with the Corby is that you don't get a virtual QWERTY keyboard on-screen. You only have the standard numbered keypad, which means if you're going to text, you're going to have to hit the on-screen "2" key three times to enter "C". It's not something for which you'd want to hold a grudge against Samsung, but just to let you know, this is what you get.

The sound-quality / reception is good. (I haven't tried the speaker-phone option yet.) The phone isn't heavy and won't give you a bicep workout if you're making a long call. I haven't challenged Samsung's claim of the 4-hour talk-time, but I'll take their word for it. I'm re-charging it right now after 3 days of random use.

The package is very nicely done - a box within a box. I mean, I actually felt I'd bought something worth $175, so that's a good thing. 1 green mushroom goes to Samsung on the packaging design and quality.

Here is what you get -> 1 phone handset, 3 back covers, 1 battery, 1 charger, 1 really neat earphone / mic set, 2gb micro SD card, and a manual plus warranty card.

I'm no expert on cellphones and don't want to be one, but this phone is better than anything I've used so far. Let's be real now - it's an iPhone wannabe, and a really nice one.

Final score 88%