Universe at War: Earth Assault

Developer: Petroglyph Games
Publisher:  Sega

Universe at War has a bit of a misleading title, when I first heard about the game, I thought you'd pick from several alien factions and then duke it out throughout the Universe. Well I got the first part right, but you only get to fight on Planet Earth despite the Humans not even being a playable faction (huh?).

The campaign progresses in a linear fashion as you take control of the stealthy but underpowered Novus, the amazingly awesome and devastating Hierarchy, whose production facilities also double as giant walking mechs of death and the Masari, who are the more traditional RTS faction, I definitely enjoyed playing as the last two, but I got the feeling Novus' stealth abilities don't really make up for how weak their units really are.

I was also not a fan of the campaign, didn't care for most of the plot or the characters with the exception of Orlok, a battle weary Hierarchy General, the missions themselves weren't too interesting either, with the exception of the final stage for each faction, I always felt like the skirmishes were too small in scale.

Universe at War features cross-platform multiplayer, meaning you can play the PC version against  Xbox 360 players, I'd love to see how well implemented this is, but unfortunately the servers are completely empty, so no luck there. At least you have the usual single player Skirmish options as well as Scenario mode, which places you in a map similar to "Risk" as each player takes turn in taking over territories for bonuses, that mode was pretty fun.

Overall, I have to say, there's no real point in getting this game, the campaign is pretty dull and the online servers are empty and while the Hierarchy is pretty fun to play, it alone can't save the rest of game's shortcomings.

Trivia: Did you know that a lot of the developers behind Universe at War were also involved in the creation of Dune 2?

Pros:

- Three very distinct factions
- Playing as the Hierarchy is awesome
- Scenario mode is pretty cool

Cons:

- The Campaign is pretty boring

- Online servers are completely empty
- I'm fairly certain the Novus are underpowered

Final Grade: D+

I remember buying the game, staring at the box art and having no idea what the heck I was looking at! Is this an alien? A Reactor? A Power Core? After finishing the campaign I now know that it's Kamal Rex, one of the bad guys from the Hierarchy, but still, I really have to wonder how could anyone think that this was a good cover?

 The Manual itself is pretty decent by RTS standards it tells you a little backstory, and gives you some small stats for your vehicles, overall the information is not terribly deep by RTS manual standards, but it does its job fine I suppose.

Packaging score: C-

Star Trek Invasion

Developer: Warthog

Publisher:   Activision

As a casual Star Trek fan I was somewhat intrigued by the idea of a fighter-pilot space combat shooter based on Gene Roddenberry's fictional setting, mostly because the space battles in Star Trek are usually all about strategy, tactics, diplomacy, manipulation, misdirection and freaking giant spaceships being blown up by the Enterprise.

Well after playing Invasion I can now safely claim none of that is in the game, no, not even the Enterprise or any form of giant ship, the few capital ships you get to see are medium-sized at best (think Colony Wars: Red Sun) and the game itself is a by the numbers space shooter, which isn't a bad thing, but it's bogged down by a slew of issues.

The first problem you might notice is how overly sensitive the controls are, if you turn your fighter for more than two seconds then chances are you already did a 180º turn and completely missed whatever target you were going for, after a few play sessions I did eventually get used to this, but I was never too comfortable with it, especially when dogfighting the Borg (yes, apparently the Borg use fighters now). This just makes the game so unnecessarily difficult, made even worse by the fact that the game's objectives are really strict without the control issues. How strict you ask? Well I actually got a game over TWICE while playing the tutorial missions, now that's harsh!

Control and difficulty issues aside, the missions themselves are... okay, when compared to games like Colony Wars or Freespace there's just nothing about them that really stands out, most of them involve you shooting other fighters until the numbers deplete with the occasional extra objective thrown in, but more often not these are done in a very aggravating manner, like how you're sent alone to a nebula and are expected to tractor beam an escape pod to safety, the problem is that your enemies are constantly spawning and you're a sitting duck while towing the pod away, eventually I got through the mission but I couldn't find a definitive strategy for it, it was all blind luck.

With that said, you do have a two player mode, something very rare for this sort of game, in fact, I'm sure this was a first on consoles, you can play either in Deathmatch, which hasn't aged all that well to be honest or a set of co-op missions which are actually pretty fun, it's just a shame you can't take on the singleplayer campaign with a friend.

Graphically the ships look stunning for the PS1 and the shield effects looks pretty damn cool, but the environments are a bit stale and lifeless, especially when compared to the aforementioned Colony Wars series, the soundtrack is pretty forgetful but the voice acting isn't, mostly because you have Patrick Stewart (Picard) and Michael Dorn (Worf) reprising their roles, as well as a few other minor actors reprising their roles unfortunately, their great performances often clash with that of other minor characters.

As for the story itself, I think I forgot what's it even about, it starts out with a Borg Invasion, but you spend most of the game fighting a new, unknown alien race that is not nearly as dangerous or interesting as the Borg, Klingons, or the Romulans, in fact, between the new species and the fact that this is a fast paced dog-fighting space shooter it hardly even feels like a Star Trek game.

Trivia: Did you know originally the game was going to let you order your squad mates and call for reinforcements? It was even mentioned in the official PlayStation demo. A shame it never made the cut, it could have been a great feature.

Pros:

- The ship models look stunning and so do the shield effects
- A two player Option in this style of game is certainly unique, especially for a console
- Patrick Stewart and Michael Dorn reprise their roles

Cons:

- Controls are extremely sensitive

- Missions quickly become very frustrating
- The action itself is a little too standard
- It doesn't really feel like a Star Trek game

Final Grade: C

I'm not a fan of the boxart at all, it looks lifeless and generic, yes, it's a space battle but I'm just not drawn to the image, maybe it's the overuse of yellow in the background, but the worst part is that it doesn't even look like a Star Trek game at all, I mean look at it! Do you recognize any of the ship designs in there? 

None of them really resemble the typical federation vessel, even the torpedoes don't look like they're from Star Trek, they never left a blue trail in 'The Next Generation'.

As for the manual itself it's pretty decent, featuring one tiny paragraph of backstory while the game's instructions feel a bit cramped, but at least they it tells you what each weapon does, something which the game never bothered to (Seriously, how else are you supposed to know the difference between a Type 9 phaser and a Type 10 phaser?).

Packaging Grade: D+

Haze

Developer: Free Radical Design
Publisher:  Ubisoft

I remember there being a fair amount of hype for this game, there was even a publication that called it a 'Halo killer', I also remember how the game seemed to have fallen off everyone's radar after it released and now that I had a chance to play it, I can see why. Halo has absolutely nothing to fear from Haze.

Haze is bad, it's really bad, not in the sense 'so bad it's good', but instead 'so bad it's painfully boring'. 

You play as Shane Carpenter, an annoying hipster kid who joined Mantel, a futuristic private security/mercenary force because he felt 'it was the right thing to do', said corporation keeps its forces in line by constantly pumping them up with a performance enhancing drug named 'nectar' which makes you faster, more resistant, makes it easier to spot enemies and turns your douchey squadmates into super-douchey squadmates. 

Seriously, these guys are completely unlikable they don't even feel like characters as much as they feel like parodies of high-school bullies, I get that the game is trying to portray them as the bad guys so that Shane eventually joins the rebels, but the way the writing handled it was embarrassing and when you do join the rebels it's complete opposite: The rebels have no personality at all, outside of their leader whom you don't really know that much about you never talk to anyone, you just assume they're the good guys.

On the gameplay aspect, things don't fare much better, there is zero enemy variety, they all look the same (especially when fighting Mantel), they all act the same and the vast majority of them use the same weapons, made even worse by how laughably bad the A.I. we're talking early-to-mid PS2 gen levels of A.I. here.

The game also tries to add some gameplay variety by giving you vehicle sections, but most of these are handled very poorly, for starters, you only get to one vehicle per faction, moreover I found that these stages consist of little more than one long corridor and the levels where you have to drive these through a minefield are just unbearable.

Graphically the game is extremely inconsistent, the Mantel land carrier looks great and crisp, whereas the jungle, explosions or the surrounding environments look sub-par, or at times, downright lazy, the worst offender being an on rails assault on the Mantel carrier, where you'll be shooting it's weakpoints on one side and once you're done, it magically teleports you the other side without so much as a cutscene.

Finally, if you thought the multiplayer might be its one saving grace, you're out of luck as Haze's servers have been shut down, meaning no competitive play and no multiplayer co-op.

Haze is just one big mess after another, at times you get to see what they were going for but it was just so poorly handled and at times it feels so rushed that it ultimately makes for a very boring game.

Pros:

- Graphically looks pretty good in some areas
- It had some nice ideas

Cons:

- Terrible story, terrible characters annoying voice acting

- Mantel Squad mates are all a-holes, Rebel squad mates have no personality
- Terrible enemy A.I., boring weapon variety, boring enemy variety
- Driving sections range from decent to unbearable
- Multiplayer servers have been shutdown
- Graphically it's somewhat inconsistent

Final Grade: F+

Though the boxart borders on the generic side, I can't deny how eye catching it is, the broken helmet with the soldier staring at the viewer really draws me in.

Inside you'll find the disc and a 28 page manual and an inner box artwork.

The game's manual is actually pretty good, going into more depth on how to play the game then you'd expect from a shooter in this day and age, it also features character background information and some artwork stills I also liked the ad for the first Assassin's Creed game on the back of the manual.

Overall, it's a pretty good packaging, the manual makes for an interesting read, the boxart is certainly catchy and if  it doesn't appeal to you there's always the alternate inner boxart.

Packaging Grade: B

Banner Special: The First Christmas

As the blogger's first Christmas comes to a close it's with a heavy heart that I realize how hard it is to find Christmas themed games and it's even harder to find games which make good Christmas themed banners.

Alas, this was the best I could do, here's to hoping I find some new stuff by the next December 25th:

 Game: Jack in the Dark

The game is part Halloween and Part Christmas themed, regardless, the ending itself makes for a great Christmas Banner.

The Daedalus Encounter

Developer: Mechadeus

Publisher:  Virgin Interactive

Often named as one of the best (and I use that term loosely) FMV games, the Daedalus Encounter had the rare distinction of actually being granted a decent budget for the time and for better or worse, it kind of shows.

For starters, they seemed to have hired B-list Hollywood actress Tia Carrere, though honestly I had no idea who she was, it wasn't until I checked her IMDB page that I learned she played Cassandra from Wayne's World and while I mean no disrespect to Ms. Carrere, the truth is anyone could've played her role, it's not like there's much to work with in the first place, but maybe I'm getting ahead of myself.

You play as Casey, a poor sod who right at the end of an intergalactic war is nearly killed and has his brain placed inside a ship, serving as a sort of A.I. it sounds cool in theory, but the reality is you never actually do anything, you see your two shipmates interact and occasionally you have to solve a puzzle or two, most of the time your pay-off is that you got to open a door for your squad mates...yippee.

Honestly... there's really not much to the 'gameplay', most of the game is just you watching a low budget movie, I'll give credit where credit is due, both actors are actually trying, Zack does get some funny line and the overall cheesiness is pretty fun at first, I especially loved how the ship's cockpit uses office chairs that creek every now and again or when you see Zack drinking from a water container with his bare hands but they actually never get wet.

With that said, the cheese value does wear out its welcome, I reached a point where seeing two actors acting on a green screen filled with bad 90's CGI just stopped being entertaining (crazy I know) and it probably didn't help that the puzzles got way too hard for me later on.

Honestly, I wouldn't really recommend this game to anyone, you might as well just watch a playthrough a YouTube, at least then the puzzles won't frustrate you.

Pros:

- So cheesy even the syfy channel would find something to cringe about
- The actors are pretty decent and they manage to sneak in a few funny lines
- It does seem to have a decent budget for the time
- It has Tia Carrere! Who's Tia Carrere? I don't know, but the game won't rest until you know she's in this thing

Cons:

- The cheesiness eventually wears out its welcome

- The fact that it had a higher budget means it's not as cheesy as it could have been
- The puzzles get pretty frustrating later on
- You never really feel that you contributed anything to the plot
- Okay! I get it! You hired Tia Carrere

Final Grade: D

The first time I saw the boxart I thought this was a budget re-release of the game, after all, why else would it have that ugly dark green border? But nope, this is a first print edition of the PAL release.

As for the cover itself it's... okay, it's pretty much what you'd expect from an FMV game, real people wearing a costume or an outfit, posing in front of a green screen, what I don't quite get is why do our characters have a white outline? I'm guessing Photoshop hadn't been invented yet.

Inside you'll find a one page hint book, a 17 page manual and 3 CDs, the hint book is very bare bones giving you information that applies to just about every FMV and adventure game out there, the manual fares a bit better though, it tells you a little of the game's backstory and it's just as cheesy as you might expect, you'll also find some basic information on how to use the controls and that's a good thing because the game's tutorial leaves a bit to be desired.

Packaging Grade: C-

Infinite Undiscovery

Developer: Tri-Ace

Publisher:  Square-Enix

Released exclusively and with little fanfare at the time for the Xbox 360, Infinite Undiscovery seems to have acquired a bit of a cult following and though I don't think the game is as good as some of the fans have said, I do understand why it has its fanbase.

You play as Capell, a very annoying, whiny and unlikable character whose only noteworthy feature is that he resembles Lord Sigmund, the hero of the people, fighting his crusade against the Order of Chains who seek to tether the moon with giant chains because of... reasons I guess, yeah, the story is pretty iffy.

In fact, I found the game's writing to be lackluster on just about every level, non-sensical plot, boring characters, a bland world, even the voice acting is inconsistent, though to its credit, halfway through the game tries to throw you a curve ball, but it's really not very hard to see it coming.

On the gameplay side of things I absolutely loved the real time combat in this game, it's fast, flashy, you have plenty of skills to learn and you're required to keep some form of control over your team and by the end of it, you'll have over a dozen party members to choose from and for the most part the battles looks great with tons of flashy visual effects thrown in for good measure, unfortunately you are likely to run into some framerate issues.

There are plenty of towns to visit, but they along with the NPCs feel a bit too sterile for me, you'll often run into some sidequests, but the game doesn't give you a quest log, you also have the ability to craft your own gear, there are dozens of items used for crafting and hundreds maybe even thousands of weapons and gear to craft, but I found the whole process pretty tedious and underdeveloped.

Graphically, the game looks great during battles, but the towns and cities tend to look a bit boring, as for the sound, there are quite a few memorable songs, but the battle themes will quickly start to grate on you, though not as much as some of the voice actors, especially the very annoying pair of underage twins, seriously they're not even 12 years old and their mother just sends them off into war without a second thought, what's up with that?

Overall, I can see why the game has its fans, the game's combat is just so damn fun and even after you finish the 30+ hour campaign you'll still unlock a new multi-level dungeon that should take you quite some time to beat it, unfortunately, I feel the game fails on almost every other level.

Trivia: Did you know that originally the game was meant to have situational choice/consequence scenarios that would drastically change the main plotline? Originally, the game had some very ambitious design ideas in which the story would progress even while the console was turned off, a shame that none of this made it to the final cut.

Pros:

- Combat is extremely fun, flashy, engaging and requires some strategy
- Over a dozen party members to choose from
- Graphics look pretty good during battles
- Some Memorable songs

Cons:

- Terrible story with a twist that you'll probably guess before it happens

- Your characters are either annoying, bland, interesting but undeveloped, or a combination of these
- The battle songs will quickly grate on you, Inconsistent voice acting
- Occasional framerate issues, graphically, the towns don't look too great
- Underdeveloped crafting system
- Annoying underage twins... why did it have to be twins?

Final Grade: D+

The boxart isn't bad, though it's a bit on the generic side, it shows either Sigmund or Capel, proudly posing after destroying one of the Moon Tethers.

Inside you'll find a 36-page manual which features a different cover art (I love it when they do that) and two discs.

The manual is pretty good, it tells you everything you need to know on how to play Infinite Undiscovery and uses screenshots as visual aids, you'll also get some brief background and character information, though for some reason the manual only covers roughly half of your party members, not sure why the rest got left out.

Overall, this is a pretty good packaging by today's standards, it's good to know that some publishers still believe in manuals.

Packaging Grade: B

Hello, I'm the game blogger and I have a drug addiction

I know I haven't posted many reviews lately, I apologize and for that I want to come clean:

The reason why I haven't been here is because I discovered I have a drug problem and the name of that drug is FTL: Faster Then Light.

If you do not hear from me in a week, then it means I've starved to death because I couldn't bring myself to pause the game, get up and get a snack.


Final Advice: If you have a social life, or responsibilities in your life either do not buy this game... or be prepared to lose them, that is all.