SomTervo

There's only one functionality I wanted from these HD re-releases, and that was to have MGS4's Free Camera in all the games. At the very least in MGS3 as well, as the game was at least 2x better with the Free Camera in MGS3: Subsistence. In MGS2 it'd still be totally awesome, and as you can go into FPS at any point as it is, there wouldn't be any need for them to cover up missing textures or models or parts of the map. It's all there. But as far as I can tell it's only like that in Peace Walker, which already had the 3D camera. Waaaaant

Also: lol

Huh, I never posted in here. Probably because the story is so mundane. And I'm not sure if I actually like this name that much but it'd be a fucking Universe of bother trying to change it at this point. I must have been 11-12 when I chose the name. I thought of Kenshi, and couldn't remember what it came from. So I went with that. It does for a few things like Steam, but often it's taken, so I need another part. It was a couple of years later that I remembered Kenshi is the blind samurai from Mortal Kombat. Not even a fan of the series. Ryden is (believe it or not) a Scottish letting agency. I see their property signs all over town. So I went with Kenshi Ryden. It sounds more Japanese than I'd like, and I chose it just before "Raidengate" in MGS2; so I took quite a bit of shit for that. But people seem to remember it, so hey, all fruit's ripe.

I lol'd.

The map could have been handled better, indeed. Also, thanks for the heads up on the camera servers thing! I had no idea. The game doesn't tell you that anywhere. And this explains why I've sometimes gone to some effort to unlock a room where there's just a hackable terminal and nothing else. I'm assuming it's a CCTV server now. I was actually disappointed at the size of Arkham City, too. I was expecting a much larger outdoor area for some reason. A real "you can get lost in this" place, like a GTA game. But it's actually pretty small, just a thin horseshoe of land. But is is incredibly intricate, and has plenty of indoor areas, which makes up for it.

There's a pretty solid foundation in that theory, but the evidence itself isn't solid. The theory is that American's moved to North America with the English of the 17-18th century, and that linguistically they haven't innovated very much. So it's basically Georgian [Early Modern] English, taken to an extreme up till now. In reality, there has been extremely consistent and varied emigration to the USA since that time, so the innovation is far more complex and relatively comparable to the contemporary UK itself (as people have kept moving there the whole time since original colonisation). Far more interesting is southern hemisphere (Australia/ New Zealand) English, which is largely cockney. Cockney isolated for 200 years. That's the Australian accent (with little touches of Scots and Irish and Northern English.) New Zealand is actually far more interesting yet, as it is a tabula rasa, there was no existing accent; Cockney, Scots, Irish, and Northern English all came together in the same proportions , with no existing accent in place. So the NZ accent is a totally legit merging of British accents from the Victorian period. Nice. [Also, linguistically we have, USA-wise, General American (which is something like New England American accents. Not very general at all.), and UK-wise we have Recieved Pronounciation (BBC, or queens-, English; which again aren't general in any way.) There is blatantly no standard American or British accent. RP is probably referred to as the British Accent by Americans. Shunting the hundreds of "British" accents that exist currently. All accents have changed considerably and depending on geographic/ social contexts. This counts for both UK accents and USA accents. No accent in history has stayed the same for centuries. It isn't possible.] A woman I used to work with had good friends from Scotland. They sent her an email before they were heading across the pond to visit her. They asked if they could take a day trip to go see the Grand Canyon as they always wanted to see that. My coworker lived in New England. According to Google it would require 1 day and 17 hours driving straight with no stopping to get to the Grand Canyon. Yeah, no daytrip there. You would get quite the drive through Albany, Rochester, Buffalo, Cleveland, Indianapolis, Springfield, Amarillo and well ... Also, Kansas reminds me of Vermont but probably with less tress and less guns. Doing a course on Western Fiction (i.e. the fiction that created the mythology of the "Wild West"), my tutor (who has, for the last 20 years done a road trip of the USA, coast to coast, every summer) can attest to how inconceivably large the middle-Western and Southern USA states are in comparison to the UK as an entire nation. Ridiculously mind-boggling to us who can do the whole country in < 8-9 hours. Also, fun fact: in Arkansas it's illegal to mispronounce the state's name as "ark-ahn-zas". Kansas with an added ark. Petty legislation. Classic USA.

Nightwing's interesting. Very different rhythm. If you tap the strike button once he'll often do two little strikes (one electro-stick then the other), but the game doesn't accept your counter command until he has executed the latter strike, so often you'll get hit even though you pressed the counter button in time. Once you have the rhythm, though, it's somewhat more addictive than Batman or Catwoman's. @Atomsk: Can't you see the Tyger camera on the map once you have all the interrogatable riddler informants?

The narrator gets better as the story gets better. Also, I gave this one a good review on PXoD. Really good game, if it seems a bit basic or bland at first, believe me it really picks up in the last 3rd. The middle 3rd is a little slow (but I probably just felt that way because I did it almost in one sitting so it felt briefly repetetive.)

Amazing trailer. It's Los Santos and evidently some of the surrounding countryside. I'm actually not too bothered about the size atm, as long as the simulation is better. Which it looks like it is. The lighting is incredible, and the models look brilliant. Faces are great. Really rounded and human. My favourite thing about the trailer is the bit where you see a big group of hobos hanging at the underpass. If they start working more group dynamic stuff into the simulation, that'll be unreal. One of the main things that is missing from all the games is groups and pairs of people behaving realistically. This shit's gonna be good. (Also, we're potentially playing a middle aged family man. That'll be interesting.)

When GTAIV's engine stood out, it really stood out. I'll always remember in that first mission where you get a knife and have to kill a guy down by the docks. Most of my friends got the animation where you stab him and he falls over dead. But in my game... I just slashed him. But he stepped backwards and tripped over backwards through the window. It shattered, he fell out and down, bashing headfirst off an awning, bouncing off it out to the water, cracking his back (seemingly breaking his spine) off the pier's metal railing, then fell limp into the sea and floated to the surface. It was totally unscripted and I stood there stunned for half a minute.

I really didn't enjoy Vice City. I think I've got a bit of confirmation bias- I was unwell when playing it, so in my mind it's synonymous with feeling like shit. Generally though, I felt it was exactly like 3 but with a worse city, worse story, more frustrating missions, and controls that really started to feel dated. Some of the 80s stuff was really incredible, but it was a superficial sense of satisfaction; from playing the actual game I got nothing. I still feel 3 is the most fun, but I think SA is the best. Sure, they added a LOT of stuff; but you don't even need to do most of it past the one story mission where it teaches you how to do it. SA just had the best freedom. I'll always remembering doing the long-haulage missions, travelling across the state and back in a lorry; car chases off mountains (unscripted), riding a harley through the desert, going for a cycle in the country. On top of that the slightly heftier controls and the ability to actually climb stuff, which was incredible. And a bit of leeway on stealth in-game, the silenced pistol etc. And the RPGing stuff to tie it all together. I really love SA. Vice city just felt pretty empty and dull gameplay-wise for me. 3 was pure, SA was bursting at the seams and had a brilliant world, Vice City was just a grey area in-between.

The Mad Hatter bit was definitely great. (Don't think this is a spoiler as it's completely separate and unpredictable from the main storyline). However,

I got all the first spoiler tag there- most of the actual details are left unsaid and that's where the plot hole lay. But yeah, Hugo basically had way too much power, and that's it. But on your second spoiler tag: good catch, I never heard that. But I'm far from done with the side missions, so will probably hear it soon.

Jesus, it's the whole thing? That's disappointing. It is called the "multiplayer experience". I'm definitely holding out for SP and Co-op; the things I enjoyed most in UC2.

Cannot wait. "L.A." is, imho, the perfect setting for a GTA game. Captures that surreal artificiality of USA culture that GTA just rips the shit out of. Plus, Los Santos was an amazing place in San Andreas. And they can only improve on GTAIV; there's no way they'll make it more mundane.

Amazing shirt. Just a heads up because it was so awesome last year that Halloween can't come soon enough this year, and I just can't hide my excitement. I will have some seriously retarded pics coming on 11/1/11. It's two bands for me this year, maybe even three! The Cure is the solid one, and the additional one(s) will be The Clash and/or Green Day (of the mid-late 90's). Still ironing that out. As long as these shows keep happening every year, Halloween is my new favorite Holiday. That's probably the coolest fucking thing I've ever heard of.

Eurogamer and Edge are definitely my go-to guys. The score is just a superficial value backed up by the actual review. Which you have to read. In order to understand the score. The reviews I read of UC3 say that is doesn't make much headway over 2, but it's still incredible, obviously. I really look forward to it. I think they overcomplicated the competitive side of things with UC3. At least, the first go around of the Beta was way too cluttered. Too much going on, weird powerups, complicated and hard-as-nails customisation system. The Beta version that's currently on the PSN seems much improved; but I still enjoy playing Hardcore mode the most as it's just about you and your skills, not all this Powerplay and Booster bullshit.

I'm def getting the Nightwing and Robin pack. The challenge mode seems great now. Much, much better than the original's. There are so many more layers to the combat, it's unreal; even more addictive trying to get the best scores. I noticed that plot point too. New Game Plus seems brilliant. I actually feel more like the B-Man playing that than the regular story mode. The lack of attack warnings means it feels like you're actually standing on your own two feet in a fight. And the stealth bits are harder. Lord, are they harder.

I got this game. Played it for about 2 hours. Two days later I traded it in for Gears 3. (First time I've traded a game for yeaaars). Have not regretted that decision.

Hahaha. THAT GODDAMN KID. How does he do it from both inside the store behind a window, and outside the store in front of the camera, in such an obviously small span of time?! It's like the most elaborate photobomb ever concieved. I've done a few good ones over the years. Also: just chillin' with sully.

Jesus Christ I hate Brian Crecente's writing. Holy shit. http://kotaku.com/5828649/the-fantastic-flying-book-of-inventive-story-telling "Wall of text"'s are annoying. But he makes a wall of text consisting of millions of ridiculously tiny tenuously connected paragraphs, with bluntly simple writing and a lack of any opinion other than "it's good". I really think he's the worst writer on there. He's got no sense of how to make something interesting to read, even if what he's reporting on is usually interesting. He never makes me laugh, never makes me feel suspense, he never does anything for me except think "this is nice" in a very bland, kitch kind of way. Jesus, shit. Seems like a nice guy though.

Hurm, I'm not sure. I think maybe they rebalanced it for singleplayer or multiplayer in one of them. Anyway. Halo 4! And Halo: CE: Anniversary actually looks pretty good!

Also, just finished it. Really liked that ending. Very bittersweet.

Hmm, yeah this is probably just my preference. It's hard to describe. I heard the constant halo-dropping (har-har) of Section 8 was one of its best bits? And that they dumbed that down in Prejudice?