Sunday, February 06, 2005
For I am... The GOD of WAR
Hey, guess what I'm going to write about?
First, a few words about Resident Evil 4. Though I've told everyone who will listen to me, there are, perhaps, a few entities still on Earth who haven't heard me gush all over this sublime experience. Hopefully, those few souls read this site so they can know, once and for all, the game that will fill that horrible dreck they call a life with brightly colored zombie rainbows. Zombows. As far as innovation, presentation and sheer enjoyment, Resident Evil is the greatest game I have played since Ocarina of Time. It has even moved past, however narrowly, Perfect Dark and Grand Theft Auto 3. Simply put, if Super Mario World is as good as video games get, RE4 is in the tier directly below that.
Just a quick note here: RE4 has not moved past PD on my all-time favorite games list. I'm not sure how I would rank it on my favorites list, I just know a super great game when I see one.
The only problem is, after playing through all 27 hours of RE4 in a little over 3 days, no other game quite feels right. Since I beat RE4 last weekend, the only game I've really had fun with was NBA2K5 - and that is only because of the sheer competitivism. Yoshi's Island and Echoes, as good as they are, were simply not worth playing after seeing what else is out there. Just when I thought all hope was lost, I played God of War. If RE4 is all about amazing presentation, GoW is pure fun trapped on a disc.
For those who have never heard of this game, it's a 3rd person action adventure title made by the dude who made Twisted Metal and Downhill Domination. A pretty wide genre that could easily incorporate Katamari Damacy, Metal Gear Solid and Blast Corps, and still have plenty of room left over for Pikmin. If you want a more direct comparison, it feels almost like a toned down version of Ninja Gaiden. Kind of. Or maybe it's like Devil May Cry? Does that sound right? I'm going with Devil May Cry as my comparison, though I've only played it for about an hour more than 3 years ago.
First of all, if I trapped you in a burlap sack and beat you with reeds, then let you peak your head out to see this game you would swear, on the hope that a right answer will provide no additional beatings as a reward, that this is an Xbox title. I mean that as a compliment. It's not like this game is Brute Force 2 (another 3rd person action adventure title) or anything. The game looks absolutely gorgeous. I wish more developers could push the PS2 like this.
After sitting through some boring movie about how you, the God of War, must kill Poisiden and his eleventeen children to appease Persephone, you are forced into combat immediately. The controls are shockingly simple - /\ and [] are attacks, X jumps, O grabs, there are dash and block mapped to the shoulder buttons, and the right stick makes you roll every which way. It's a great system that makes combat and exploration pure candy. And the best part is, there isn't even a way to adjust the camera. This game is so perfectly designed the developer, the dude who made War of the Monsters, just decided to screw that useless control feature completely. In my short time in the demo, I never experienced a problem with the camera at all. It's really intelligent, knowing where I'm going before I even do, and never was the cause of my failures.
The demo only lasted about 20 minutes, but it fulfilled two pressing video game needs in one smooth swoop. First, it delivered a boss I desperately wanted to fight in RE4 but, unfortunately, it never actually existed - a hydra. I think it even has the requisite 42 heads. They made the hydra huge in this too. You travel across a few different ships, large ships mind you, and fight a head or two per ship. And these are incredibly fun battles. The first fight was pretty standard at first - head lunges at me, I dodge and lunge right back at him. After you hit it enough a Simon Says game is activated. Hit O to dodge, /\ to slam his head into the wall, and /\ again to finish him off. I love stuff like that.
The second awesome thing... hang on, let me find a picture of the inspiration -
That's right, God of War features honest to goodness fence climbing. You can't flip to the other side via secret revolving door, but you can grab enemies and throw them to their untimely deaths. It's super awesome. I was nearly giddy while playing that part. Completely shocking it would be included, and every bit as fun as Super Mario World's. Man, what a great game.
There are mild puzzle-solving portions thrown in, such as moving a crate so you can jump higher or dropping an anchor on the head of a hydra, but most of this game is just combat. With a system as fun as this, where you can pull off incredibly long combos and flashy yet effective moves in a few button presses, all you really want to do is fight. And like any effective trailer cutter or demo maker knows, this game ends at the perfect spot. The final fight places you against 3 hydra heads. The first two are pretty easy, just beat them till they cry and drop anchor on them. Then you climb to the lookout tower or something to get face to face with momma hydra head. She snaps at you and roars... then the demo ends. Even if the game wasn't incredibly fun, I would have needed to run out and play this when it came out anyway. Thankfully, Nick will pick this up come March so I can just "borrow" it. Anyone who isn't lucky enough to live a few minutes from Nick's should make sure they buy this gem as soon as they can.
Note: Thanks to IGN for the stolen pictures. We're hosting them at least, which is arguably a good thing.
First, a few words about Resident Evil 4. Though I've told everyone who will listen to me, there are, perhaps, a few entities still on Earth who haven't heard me gush all over this sublime experience. Hopefully, those few souls read this site so they can know, once and for all, the game that will fill that horrible dreck they call a life with brightly colored zombie rainbows. Zombows. As far as innovation, presentation and sheer enjoyment, Resident Evil is the greatest game I have played since Ocarina of Time. It has even moved past, however narrowly, Perfect Dark and Grand Theft Auto 3. Simply put, if Super Mario World is as good as video games get, RE4 is in the tier directly below that.
Just a quick note here: RE4 has not moved past PD on my all-time favorite games list. I'm not sure how I would rank it on my favorites list, I just know a super great game when I see one.
The only problem is, after playing through all 27 hours of RE4 in a little over 3 days, no other game quite feels right. Since I beat RE4 last weekend, the only game I've really had fun with was NBA2K5 - and that is only because of the sheer competitivism. Yoshi's Island and Echoes, as good as they are, were simply not worth playing after seeing what else is out there. Just when I thought all hope was lost, I played God of War. If RE4 is all about amazing presentation, GoW is pure fun trapped on a disc.
For those who have never heard of this game, it's a 3rd person action adventure title made by the dude who made Twisted Metal and Downhill Domination. A pretty wide genre that could easily incorporate Katamari Damacy, Metal Gear Solid and Blast Corps, and still have plenty of room left over for Pikmin. If you want a more direct comparison, it feels almost like a toned down version of Ninja Gaiden. Kind of. Or maybe it's like Devil May Cry? Does that sound right? I'm going with Devil May Cry as my comparison, though I've only played it for about an hour more than 3 years ago.
First of all, if I trapped you in a burlap sack and beat you with reeds, then let you peak your head out to see this game you would swear, on the hope that a right answer will provide no additional beatings as a reward, that this is an Xbox title. I mean that as a compliment. It's not like this game is Brute Force 2 (another 3rd person action adventure title) or anything. The game looks absolutely gorgeous. I wish more developers could push the PS2 like this.
After sitting through some boring movie about how you, the God of War, must kill Poisiden and his eleventeen children to appease Persephone, you are forced into combat immediately. The controls are shockingly simple - /\ and [] are attacks, X jumps, O grabs, there are dash and block mapped to the shoulder buttons, and the right stick makes you roll every which way. It's a great system that makes combat and exploration pure candy. And the best part is, there isn't even a way to adjust the camera. This game is so perfectly designed the developer, the dude who made War of the Monsters, just decided to screw that useless control feature completely. In my short time in the demo, I never experienced a problem with the camera at all. It's really intelligent, knowing where I'm going before I even do, and never was the cause of my failures.
The demo only lasted about 20 minutes, but it fulfilled two pressing video game needs in one smooth swoop. First, it delivered a boss I desperately wanted to fight in RE4 but, unfortunately, it never actually existed - a hydra. I think it even has the requisite 42 heads. They made the hydra huge in this too. You travel across a few different ships, large ships mind you, and fight a head or two per ship. And these are incredibly fun battles. The first fight was pretty standard at first - head lunges at me, I dodge and lunge right back at him. After you hit it enough a Simon Says game is activated. Hit O to dodge, /\ to slam his head into the wall, and /\ again to finish him off. I love stuff like that.
The second awesome thing... hang on, let me find a picture of the inspiration -
That's right, God of War features honest to goodness fence climbing. You can't flip to the other side via secret revolving door, but you can grab enemies and throw them to their untimely deaths. It's super awesome. I was nearly giddy while playing that part. Completely shocking it would be included, and every bit as fun as Super Mario World's. Man, what a great game.
There are mild puzzle-solving portions thrown in, such as moving a crate so you can jump higher or dropping an anchor on the head of a hydra, but most of this game is just combat. With a system as fun as this, where you can pull off incredibly long combos and flashy yet effective moves in a few button presses, all you really want to do is fight. And like any effective trailer cutter or demo maker knows, this game ends at the perfect spot. The final fight places you against 3 hydra heads. The first two are pretty easy, just beat them till they cry and drop anchor on them. Then you climb to the lookout tower or something to get face to face with momma hydra head. She snaps at you and roars... then the demo ends. Even if the game wasn't incredibly fun, I would have needed to run out and play this when it came out anyway. Thankfully, Nick will pick this up come March so I can just "borrow" it. Anyone who isn't lucky enough to live a few minutes from Nick's should make sure they buy this gem as soon as they can.
Note: Thanks to IGN for the stolen pictures. We're hosting them at least, which is arguably a good thing.
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