Free Guitar Hero Times Two

I'm part of the Best Buy Reward Zone Gamer's Club. I don't know the rules, but they send me coupons - in store money, actually - every few months. I saw on-line that Guitar Hero Aerosmith was $9.99. So, I stopped in to Best Buy to pick it up. I also found Guitar Hero 3: Legends of Rock was $9.99.

I had a $20 coupon. At the check out, the clerk would not let me use it because the subtotal was $19.98; I had to buy a pack of gum. So, for the price of the gum ($1.50!), I was able to bring home some new games. I'm not too excited about these games, but it should be fun. I've played GH3:LoR on a PS2 was was not impressed. I know Aerosmith has Trophies, so I can add some easy ones to my collection.

Fat Princess Beta

You must act quickly! Two ways to get an access code for the two week beta:

• USA Today (the first 1600 people)
• PlayStation Blog (only 250)

I tried for the USA Today code because I don't have access to FaceBook at home (and I don't use FaceBook).

If you get a code, let me know...

Voltage divided by Current

Another campaign completed! Late Saturday morning (2AM) I finished Resistance 2. Bottom line: This is an awesome game and I plan on playing through the campaign again. Many times I finish a game and think, “Good, but that’s enough.” For example, I have not gone back to Mirror’s Edge, Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune, or even Call of Duty: World at War (finished two weeks ago). I WANT to do R2 again. As of this writing, I am in the middle of the Orrick stage on the Difficult setting. I liked Resistance: Fall of Man – I played it through once. But R2 has – I feel – some improvements:

• You don’t ‘worry’ about your health level or looking for heath packs in R2, it now works similar to Call of Duty, where you recover your hit points. This makes sense, even in RFoM, Nathan (you, the main character) recovered to half health over time.
• In RFoM, you carried every weapon and only worried about ammo. In R2, you can only carry two guns. I like pressing Triangle rather than going to the Ratchet & Clank weapon selector popup. It’s funny: every time I find a Laark lying around, I know the Boss is coming.
• The color is much brighter in R2. I liked the brown/gray of RFoM – it felt like it was set in the 1950’s during war time. The color palette of R2 looks like it was borrowed from Insomniac’s R&C. More in the Scenery section below.

The story of humans versus Chimera is continued and follows Nathan Hale (I have not played Resistance: Retribution on the PSP). I never really like the core concept of the story: Aliens (either a virus or entities) arrive on earth at the Tunguska Blast of 1908. These aliens can mutate humans (or multiple humans) into humanoid (or EXTREMELY large) creatures. The Chimera, like all villains, desire to take over the world. After taking Europe in RFoM, the battle continues in North America. One of the best parts of this game is the varied scenery. I thought Orick, California was amazing. You do battle in Iceland; small city Twin Falls, Idaho; big city Chicago; the swamps of Louisiana; and inside the modern world of a Chimeran ship and facility. Great variety! The maps are creative and long.

Bosses are back! The only thing missing is the health bar. R2 often ended each of the levels with a large beast.

• Kracken: bad breath and tentacles
• Mother Spinner: a huge dragon spider The Swarm: a swirling mass of sharp metal pieces that rip it’s prey apart. No way to kill it! Or is there?
• Leviathan: Bigger than Godzilla.
• Maurader: Part elephant, part T-Rex. It remined me of a Dewback.
• Daedalus: AKA Jordan Shepherd.

The best part of the bosses is that you don’t kill them with the conventional method. Usually you have to set a trap or trick them. Fun.

My favorite moment was sniping the house at the beginning of the Louisiana level. Once you clear the house you find a Laark – uh oh. A call comes in telling you that a Maurader was seen sniffing around your area. The Maurader turns out to be a big T-Rex like creature; the darn thing scared the crap out of me! (My mother uses the word crap, so it must be OK). It peeks in the window as you hid from it trying to get a good shot. All you hear is the earth pound and the building shake. I would not say it was a surprise ending – I knew what the final 'conflict' would be. There are only about four ways out of it. No Spoiler given. I am not even close to finishing the R2 experience. I have co-operative and competitive on-line modes to complete. Buying this game – which I encourage any PS3 owner to do – is well worth the money.

Oh, I should explain the title. “Resistance” is part of Ohms law: V=IR. Solving for “Resistance” produces V/I or Voltage over Current. Geek humor; almost as bad as RDRR.

Love the Gold Box

I just bought Fallout 3. I got a good deal from Amazon. I called GameStop: used for $53 and change. Even with my 10% discount it does not beat this price ($40). I just finished Resistance 2 (post coming) - I'll start Fallout after I complete Bioshock. I check the Gold Box every morning...

World at Peace (my hope & prayer)

A little late in posting this, but I finally finished the Call of Duty: World at War campaign (end of March 2009).

Good game; definitely on par with COD4:MW. But I think the newness of the COD experience was gone. The game play was great; the environment was beautiful because it was old and gritty. The story was OK – a little campy at the end. I feel I would have enjoyed my character better –Dmitri – if his story was not interrupted by the Japanese story line.

I thought the gore was over the top in COD:WaW. In fact, it may have been glorified. The cut scenes with actual footage – which I liked – had actual executions and battles. The enemy deaths were more graphic: blown apart and missing limbs. You stab the Japanese solders in the neck when they try to stab you – and when you use the bayonet on them, the blood rushes from their heart. I didn’t like using the flamethrower – you actually hear the screams of the thrashing soldiers as they burn to death. At the entrance to the subway, you decide how two German prisoners will die. Treyarch may have been trying to teach gamers about the horrors or war (I watch Saving Private Ryan every Memorial Day for the purpose. “Earn this.”). At the end of the game, just before the credits, “60 million lives were lost as a result of World War II” is written on the screen. Having this appear after the final victory didn’t work for me.

The addition of zombies is great – and ‘Nazi’ zombies are somehow better (“Nazis! I hate these guys,” Indiana Jones). This mini game is much better with a friend or three. And ‘Thank you’ Treyarch for the new Zombie level.

I guess the best part of World at War is the on-line multiplayer. It’s so additive and so rewarding. I like that there are no classes unlike KillZone 2 or Resistance 2 – it’s just simpler. It takes some time to find your weapon load-out for each map and devise a strategy. And I like the After Gameplay statistics – I wish there were more. I have not reached the first prestige yet – it takes a long time – but I am close.

FroZone 2

Sorry. I think I got too cute for the title: "KillZone 2" plus "Frozen." I hope the rest of the article is better. I am playing the Killzone 2 campaign – and really enjoying it! It took a couple boards before I realized how good it was. Then a horrible thing happened. I was working through the Cruiser board (the turret was fun) and just about to finish the level when the game suddenly froze. The only way out was to turn off the PS3. Not too bad… yet. When I restarted the game, it happened again at the exact same spot. Now I am in trouble. I tried different things, including restarting the level – but it always froze – four times in total. I went to the Web for help. My solution came from the PlayStation boards: Thread: Campaign Freeze To get through the level, I needed to delete any game updates (patches). Ahhh, it was a happy moment when I moved on to the Maelstra level. (There is a great "vehicle" in that board.) It seems like this only effects the Asian version of the game.

It is also interesting to note that a Guerrilla Games producer Seb “motherh666” Downie replied to my post. It is encouraging that they are monitoring the boards to improve their software. GG has made my list (along with Insomniac and Infinity Ward) of quality developers. I wonder if Seb lives in the Netherlands (about GG).

I’m on the last level now – I’m going slow – I don’t want it to end. But end it will and I will post my thoughts and memories on the campaign.