Which was the last game you finished?

[Nietzsche]

Nice to know my thoughts on the game wasn't just my own. The biggest and best change is the enemy actually attcks you which speeds up the combat so much. I didn't like the story that much though.

[Jarrod]

I feel very similar to Denny in regards to the Assassin's Creed series, specifically liking Brotherhood a lot more than AC2. I can see where AC2 improved over the original and in important areas, but could not see the fuss as I still felt the game had very weak mission structure. Brotherhood was leaps and bounds better than AC2 in pretty much all areas, especially in terms of being a PC port.

Given you've come this far, play Revelations. I don't like the AC series story at all, but Revelations finally brings amazing closure to both Ezio and Altair's plot lines. Mechanically its just more of Brotherhood, only not quite as consistently good, but still fun.

And old Ezio owns.
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[Terrestrial_Hominid]

American McGee's Alice.

The worst game I have ever played. How this joyless, monotonous turd of a game ever achieved cult classic status I will never know.

There is literally nothing good about it.

If I owned it on disc, I would snap the disc in half and burn it, but since it's only DLC on the 360's hard drive, all I can do is delete it and try never to think about it again.

[ObsoletE]

I really enjoyed AC2 when it came out, but i also adored AC1 at the time too, even with all the side-quests in order to get your target.

but i don't think i could go back and replay them as each subsequent title comes out. far too much gets fixed between titles to just simply improve the game. if they can fix it now so the free-running doesn't occasionally throw me sideways to my death in AC3, it could be perfect.

that all said, i think ACB was probably the most perfect the series has been. ACR has some cool ideas, but i don't think it ever fully realised them, and suffered for it imo - or i guess it could also just be that i was expecting a cash-in with ACB, so had no expectations for it, and was treated to a real game, whereas for ACR, my expectations were already higher. (it's not a bad game, i still thoroughly enjoyed it.)

And i'll reiterate what Benza said about the glyphs - they're important to the story. tbh, considering Desmond is the constant between all the games, and AC3 should be more about him in 2012, it's almost as though the glyphs are the real story.
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My Play-Asia Affiliate Link.

[grim-one]

God of War III

Lame ending is lame. A relief to finish off all those damn fights I was complaining about the other day though. It will be interesting to see where they take the series now. There's not really much left of the Greek Pantheon, so I guess they'll have Kratos or an equivalent show up in another time/culture.
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Steam:grim_one | PSN/Live:najakh | Flickr

[Benza]

I actually really liked the ending to GOW 3. It felt like it gave pretty good closure. I'm really hoping if they do decide to continue the game they just drop Kratos completly and go with a new character cause his story is done.
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[Frozencry]

So after grabbing a backup save online of the sequence I was up to after the fucking game corrupted my file, I smashed through Assassin's Creed: Revelations.

This is easily the most emotionally gripping and cinematic of the games, and also the most well structured in narrative. It had a point, it stuck to it and it progressed ridiculously well until the insane ending.

Pros:

-Ezio this time was a very lovable character, and the way Ubisoft shifted his personality to showcase the wisdom and maturity he's developed over the years is fantastic. I was attached to him the whole way through and he really came into his own as a character.

-Altair's memories and life was awesome. It was really well implemented and nicely paced with Ezio's story and came full circle really well.

-Visually excellent. Constantinople's design is great and the use of colour is really good too.

-Pretty much refined Brotherhood gameplay with a couple of extra touches. Some of the kill animations were fucking awesome to witness and the hook blade was pretty cool albeit underdeveloped.

-The ending. Answered a lot of questions and ended two characters stories incredibly well. It's a really fantastic kind of end and it certainly makes me sad that this is the last time we'll see Ezio and Altair. When Ezio speaks out to Desmond it freaked me out in the "OH GOD HE'S TALKING TO ME" kind of way. Will make AC3 very interesting.

-Music as always is so fucking good.

-Pacing, particularly nearing the end. While the structure overall isn't quite as tight as Brotherhood, the final few hours really picks up and gains a lot of steam.

Cons:

-The mini game stuff like Tower Defence was pretty uninspired and boring.

-Graphical glitches, largely due to the fact that the engine is simply incapable of properly utilising anisotropic filtering and efficient object LOD. It was in previous games too so it's fairly annoying that in 2011 I'm still seeing random npcs pop in out of nowhere because I'm running into an area quickly, and the LOD on shadows drives me fucking nuts.

-Bugs. This game likes to make my system BSOD a lot, and it's the reason why my save game was fucked up. The way they're using page files can cause some really nasty instabilities and there were some weird load times and freezes on occasion too. Definitely not quite as polished as Brotherhood was for PC.

-Mission structure is generally not as tight as Brotherhood until the end. Many of the things that you have to do feel hollow and weak in execution, and it can lead to some stretches of minor boredom.

-Not as much content, from what I've played anyway. Brotherhood had lots to do as did AC2 (though in a bad way for AC2). Revelations feels much more focused on story and that's about it.

Overall:

Story wise it's the best of the games imo, as it ties things up well and is very well told, both from Desmond's and Ezio's side. Gameplay and general polish however is below that of Brotherhood which is the shining example of how to do AC games really, really well.

In terms of AC3, I'm really hoping they go for the Qin Dynasty era of China or Feudal Japan, as both have fantastic historical value and potentially encountering Oda Nobunaga in a game gives me a history-boner. I love that they've gone to Renaissance Italy, Crusades and the Ottoman Empire, but I really want some Eastern love.

TL;DR Revelations has the most well told story and is the most emotionally gripping, but fails to live up to Brotherhoods polished standards in the gameplay department. Also, crashes and bugs are shit.

Requiescat in pace, Ezio Auditore.

4.0 out of 5
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[Jarrod]

Given Feudal Japan has been used quite a bit in games, especially from the East, I'd say its unlike that AC3 will use that setting. The team is dead set on using time periods and locations that are practically non-existent in the medium.

And old Ezio owns. I hated him in AC2, was eh on him in ACB, but he's a cool character in ACR for the reasons you stated. Same reasons I thought Old Snake owned too. I like old, wise characters.
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[Benza]

I think the surest bet for AC 3 is going to be a modern setting playing as Desmond for the majority. There is some hints towards a feudel japan setting though with the assassin from Embers.

I kind of hope they don't though.

The big issue would be tying an ancient asian setting into Desmonds bloodline.
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[qwas]

I bought Costume Quest on Steam for sale y'day and finished it off today. I need the last achievement (you have to play the game on Christmas or something) though. For $4 it was a great buy. The mechanics are simple and each area was pretty much a carbon copy of the last, setting aside, but I had a lot of fun.

[PixieGirl]

Tomb Raider: Underworld (PC)

Lara has a handful of new moves she can perform around the world which I quite enjoyed and felt added to the fluidity of everything, and in general everything did feel a lot more fluid than Legend and Anniversary, but with that fluidity of movement unfortunately comes a sacrifice of accuracy which led to a lot of falls to my death which I didn't feel were my fault and started to get very frustrating later in the game. The controls just feel quite imprecise. The camera is just as bad as it ever was too, never looking where I need it to and I'm never able to move it in a good position where the screen isnt filled up by Lara's bum. There are a lot of clipping issues too, she can clip through the environment more than ive ever seen in a game. It's also possible to get her stuck in the ground so you have to reload a save to fix it. Really annoying.

The environments are designed well though and portray a great sense of scale, as well the graphics being pretty, lush, and colorful. Lara is much more detailed, as is every other character, and her animations are pretty good, particularly facial animations. The lighting effects are actually quite nice too. It's the prettiest Tomb Raider so far.

There are a lot less enemies in the game than in Legend, and its obviously took a leaf from Anniversary's book in regards to its pacing which is great. It's like the biggest enemy is actually your environment and getting from one place to another. But maybe thats just because of the bad controls :/

I was glad that Zip & Alistair play mostly subdued roles in this game as I really didn't like them much in Legend. I liked the way Lara was characterized in this more than I did in Legend and Anniversary, she is much less flirtacious and I took her much more seriously. Also the few times she gets really angry towards the end of the game it gave me chills, probably because you don't get many main female characters in games who really just lose it like that and I thought it was really good I think she can be a great character sometimes, I'm really looking forward to seeing how they characterize her in the 2012 game.

3 1/2 sprinkles of pixie dust out of 5

[topaz]

Just finished VVVVVV, short and sweet, can't complain. Love it when the characters do their sad face with the matching sound effect. Difficulty is similar to Super Meat Boy in that it's hard, and death comes often, but you'll gradually get better once you memorise the level structure. Love the soundtrack too, and it's freaking sweet that you can download the whole thing after you buy the Humble Bundle!
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[emwearz]

Bastion - PC
I thought this game was brilliant, a breath of fresh air from what is starting to feel like generic game after generic game. Great little action/adventure with the best use of narration if I have ever seen in a game.

Battlefield 3- PC
The story was pretty average by all accounts, it looked amazing, even on my GTX285. I thought the story telling and structure was very similar to Call of Duty: Black Ops.

[embersilvermoon]

VVVVVV

Very simple game - I really enjoyed it. It was difficult at certain points (Veni Vidi Vici, Do as I say, not as I do and Edge Games... I'm looking at the three of you specifically). Managed to get through to the very end and get all 20 of those trinkets. Not sure if I'll attempt to get the trophies - some of those challenges look really crazy...

Score: 4/5
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Recently Finished: Legend of Heroes - Trails in the Sky (8/10)

[Onislash]

Fire Emblem : Shadow Dragon

I am probably guilty of severely overpowering certain characters to try and avoid the permadeath, still watching one unit solo 20+ others singlehanded is always fun.
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[topaz]

[WarAdept]

It's difficult for a lot of people who started the FE series from the GBA games onwards. A lot of the little stuff taken for granted such as carrying, pushing and whatnot was non-existant and so a lot of the time, you basically just had to rely on the sheer staying power of your units to win battles.

I was fine with Shadow Dragon, seeing as how it was just a remake of the first game (as I started with FE3, which came with an FE1 remake itself), but I can see how many people would find the DS version quite boring with no convos and whatnot.

[Onislash]

Shadow Dragon does get much easier later on. My favourite was a recruited unit from a village in one stage just about beating the entire enemy force, including the boss!
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[Frozencry]

Finished Batman: Arkham City, and it was an awesome, awesome ride, especially nearing the end. Thoughts.

Pros:

-Story is mostly excellent, particularly at the end. There's some really left field stuff that happens that you really don't expect, and it's quite shocking. Well told and fairly mature in its execution.

-Gameplay like Asylum is excellent and further expands upon the freeflow combat system. It's still simple minded as hell but the point is to feel empowered and it does it really well. Gadgets that you acquire throughout the game diversify the combat as do upgrades, so you don't get bored doing the same thing over and over again. And most importantly, you feel like Batman (mostly). Super polished.

-Voice acting is mostly really good, and once agan Mark Hamil makes me nerdgasm. He's so awesssoommmeee.

-The open world system is initially jarring, but flows quite well once you get used to it. Lots and lots of things to do and lots of variety, and much more enticing than many other sandbox titles for collection, as the reward seems to be well worth it.

-Visually awesome. One of the best uses of Unreal Engine and it keeps itself clean from the grips of the UE3 sheen that many games suffer from. Streaming tech is much better this time round too (especially on PC) and texture LOD is minimal if not completely gone.

-Very replayable. Lots to do and lots to play around with and it's all pretty damn fun.

Annnnnd Cons

-The beginning is nice, but clumsy. It kind of just throws you into an open world with hardly an explanation of what's going on, and through there it progresses into the main plot. It could've been done better, and unless you're a gigantic batman fan it's somewhat hard to get into because of it.

-The story while really good for the most part, continues to feel disjointed as it progresses in a couple of areas. Some things are left unexplained or ommited, while other points make no actual sense as you progress, as something is really important for a good hour or two of game time then BAM, it's totally cool now, no explanation as to why or how it's not a major issue anymore (even though it should be).

I dunno, I loved most of it, but a lot of it was left unexplained, and for the people who have finished it, I'm talking about [spoiler]Batman is poisoned, almost dies heading towards Ras' lair, then is totally fine for the entirety of the game after this and casually drinks away the cure while Joker conveniently dies at this point when from the fucking beginning he was deadly sick. It makes no sense that he's capable of surviving this long without anything yet Batman almost dies within a few hours of exposure but then is totally fine after drinking Demon's blood (which was only temporary). Also, what happened to the people that were poisoned outside of Arkham as well? A lot of this is unexplained and kind of left untouched, and to me it really doesn't add up.[/spoiler]

-While freeroaming is a lot of fun, it still didn't feel quite as smooth and consistent as Arkham Asylum did and has the problem of feeling a little souless, which tends to be an issue with many sandbox titles bar a handful (and even those handful have a very confined kind of sandbox that has a very focused design to it rather than sprawling). I enjoyed it, but wasn't as engaged as I was with Asylum, though this could also be due to the story not really kicking into awesome mode until around midway through.

-There is a really spastic difficulty spike about halfway through the game where everyone suddenly has guns and it's really offputting. You get accustomed to it pretty quick, but the problem I found with guns is that it makes some abilities you have absolutely useless. What good is pulling the gun away from the guy when he just runs to a crate full of unlimited guns and re-arms anyway? Kinda stupid.

-Sometimes it felt like I was doing Spiderman's job rather than Batman's. I mean the whole swinging around a city thing...yeah. It's a minor thing though, nothing actually bad.

-I really disliked Catwoman from the moment she opened her mouth. There is sexy, but then there is slutty, and she fits the latter imo. She's just oversexualised, and plays a weird role in the story that didn't sit well with me. I just found her to be an annoying character particularly in her dialogue, as she came off to me as more of a slutty character rather than one of intrigue and genuine allure.

-Voice acting is mostly amazing, but some of the execution with the dialogue is woefully bad.

Alfred: So who will win? The world's greatest detective or the world's greatest assassin?
Batman: HE WON'T *rage hangup*

When Batman says things like this, I cringe very hard. It was cheesy in Asylum but in this I just found it realllyyyy cringe worthy and stupid sounding.

-Minor PC woe, but DX11 sucks balls. Tessellation is cool and all but a giant performance killer for no legitimate reason apart from poor optimisation, and apart from Tessellation is adds hardly anything. Was disappointing to see DX11 not used to its full extend. Physx was nice though, on an AMD card, LOLOLOL.

Overall:

Lots of cons, but nonetheless I thoroughly enjoyed Arkham City. I don't think I'd put it higher than Asylum as though City has more impact in a lot of its story (and a much better endgame), Asylum in general had better structure and focus.

It's a really, really good game and Batman fanboys/girls will go absolutely insane over it as it really is a gigantic amount of fan service, but it's got plenty of little things that they could've done to make it an even better game.

Cool game, would play again (and collect things)

Overall: 4 out of 5
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[WiseNinjaNikki]

Finished Skyrim about a week ago. I didn't really expect to play it, let alone finish it. Previously, I had completed the main quest in Oblivion, and played a bit of Morrowind. Neither game really appealed to me at the time though, feeling more like a chore than something enjoyable.

Watching my Dad create his character and start his game in Skyrim though, I saw how I would've done things differently and decided to give it a go myself. I'm glad I did, because I've been really enjoying immersing myself in the gameworld. And an immersive gameworld it is. It's so easy to just go off and do your own thing, spending as long as you like doing whatever you like. With nothing pulling you by the nose down some predetermined path, there is a great sense of freedom.

My character is a female Imperial, skilled in magic and archery.

One of the first things I did, and it's something that ended up contributing to me enjoying Skyrim so much, was having Faendal as a companion. With him I was able to build my archery skill quite high by paying for lessons and then taking the money back from his inventory. From there I just made my way through the game killing everything with arrows.

I absolutely LOVED the Dark Brotherhood quests, and having sided with the Stormcloaks, I found their missions pretty fun as well. The ending was slightly anti-climatic, but I still have lots of stuff to do if I decide to go back to the game.

I stopped playing in the end because of a glitched mission. What happened is, there's an enemy in my Windhelm home who is incorrectly marked as essential by the game. So he never dies properly and is always attacking me or my wife. Really annoying. He's always there because it used to be his house (and because of his connection with the glitched quest).

Because I got sick of that, I resumed my old Oblivion game. Thanks to Skyrim, I feel I have a deeper appreciation of Oblivion now. Compared to Skyrim, it doesn't seem quite so overwhelming with the sheer amount of things to do. In Skyrim it could become a little daunting until you just relax and take everything at your own pace. Oblivion is slightly prettier too imo. The gameplay isn't quite as deep; there's no smithing (apart from repairing with hammers), no companions (outside of certain quests) and all the guilds and who is who is pretty straight-forward. So it's kind of like a less glitchy Skyrim-lite.

But yeah, I'd probably give Skyrim like an 8. If it was less glitchy, perhaps a 9.
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[Phreakuency]

Trine 2 - PC

Great little game, once again!

Wasn't quite as clever as the original though. Probably dumbed it down a bit for a wider audience.

Saying that, there were some good puzzles and a number of ways to do them.

The graphics, while not as crisp in terms of high detailed textures, were absolutely stunning in a different style.

8/10 to cut a long story short

Cheap and highly recommended!
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My YouTube game videos!

[PixieGirl]

wrong thread please delete

[Jarrod]

[Big Pete]

Zelda Twilight Princess

Worthy entry in the series but the realistic setting mixed with the slow Twilight Realm elements prevented me from engaging with this game as I would have liked. Dungeons were terrific, everything else was underwhelming with the exception of the couple Epona rescue/escort sections which there was far too little of.

Item dispensation left a lot to be desired delaying the acquisition of exclusive items until the game was nearly over and then basically making them useless except for that particular dungeon. The characters were also severely underdeveloped. I didn't give a rats about Zelda or Link's friend who just so happened to have...AMNESIA. With the exception of Midna, none of these characters had an interesting personality and in a game such as this that is striving to be more realistic it does sap some enjoyment out of it.

Still, it's Zelda and the dungeons certainly make it worth playing through. It's just a shame everything else feels like a chore.

Zelda Skyward Sword

A definite step up from TP, weaving a fun fresh mythology of it's own with a far more interesting cast of characters and a far more vibrant setting. There seems to be two camps when it comes to this game pro or neg motion controls and ultimately...I found a way to fall in the middle. When they worked, I really enjoyed them. Yeah, sometimes it felt too gimmicky with enemies holding their weapons in unrealistic ways to essentially say 'hit me here stupid' but when it clicked it really clicked. But when they did it...oh boy did it become frustrating. No other move caused me to curse more than the thrust. I think I had a 40% success rate with that move and boy did it hurt me when it came to that third dungeon. The harp also gave me nightmares, especially when I was trying to get my groove on with the bar maid at the ol' Pumpkin Pub. Curse that judgemental crowd.

Padding has been a constant complain with this game and at first I thought people were just being far too critical...but by the 6th dungeon I could completely understand. That escort mission in particular was probably one of the worst excuses for time wasting in a video game I've ever seen. I also felt like the hero songs, while also padding were really fun additions (well at least the 2nd and 3rd part) that should have been included earlier in a different fashion. A stealth mission upon entering the second world would have been a great way to break the gameplay up so early on when it really felt formulaic.

I enjoyed the interface and how easy it was to access my inventory and I liked how they incorporated a very basic upgrade feature. I hope Zelda games continue to go down this route and really reward exploration through vast worlds and towns.

I think in the end, that's my disappointment. In terms of the Zelda series, this is a good addition that should put the series on the right track. Unfortunately, I feel it's behind the times and the lack of alternative towns, worlds and challenges prevent this game from achieving the excellence it otherwise could have. A good game worth checking out...but I don't think it's really worth the 35+ hours it takes to complete. Not in this day or age.
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[Frozencry]