Fail to the king, baby, and PR blacklisting ballyhoo

I’ve only ever played a single Duke Nukem title in my entire gaming life, and that was Duke Nukem: Time to Kill, and even then it wasn’t for terribly long as it was just a snippet of the game included on some free demo disc. Think it might’ve been shipped to me thanks to my die-hard subscription to PSM. Can’t remember. Might have to search through boxes later to see if I even still have it. I remember it opening in a strip club, having to fight off piggish cops (literally), and that the titular Duke never ran out of one-liners. He was like a manlier version of Gex that reveled in crude violence and raunchy topics. I was 14 or 15, and even then I didn’t think he was too c0ol. Gex and Bubsy and Blasto were more my style.

And so, while the fact that Duke Nukem Forever, a game long burdened with problems, was finally released this week, I couldn’t care less. It’s getting ripped apart left and right. What’s truly fascinating though is watching the industry unfold as bad reviews pepper the Internet and PR companies get cranky. Take Jim Redner of The Redner Group, a PR company that is trying to promote Duke Nukem Forever. Just the other day, in response to numerous bad reviews, he tweeted the following:

Ah, the distinct scent of blacklisting. It stinks, for sure. And usually, it’s a behind-the-scenes sort of thing in the gaming industry; websites surely get blacklisted all the time, but it’s done with a cold shoulder, a lack of email responses and no more review copies sent over. That sort of thing. Here, however, was a public threat, and Jim Redner quickly saw the error of his ways, delivering an apology:

“I have to apologize to the community. I acted out of pure emotion. I will be sending each of you a private apology. I need to state for the record that 2K had nothing to do with this. I will be calling each of you tomorrow to apologize. Again, I want everyone to know that I was acting on my own. 2K had nothing to do with this. I am so very sorry for what I said.”

Shortly after, The Redner Group was dropped by 2K Games as a representative of their games. Good for them.

In all my many months here at Grinding Down, I’ve only ever been sent one review copy, and that was for Monster Tale. I really enjoyed the game, and I wrote a nice review for it, giving it good praise while still pointing out its flaws. If I had hated the game or thought it to be a pile of monster poo, I would’ve said so, and maybe I might have been blacklisted for such “venom.” Hard to say. The point is, you gotta stay objective and can’t let online bullying and threats of being locked out stop you from doing your job, which, as game journalists, is telling the public whether X game is truly worth $59.99. This is why I trust websites like GiantBomb or smaller gaming blogs over corporate headliners like GameSpot.com and IGN.com; I’d rather someone tell it to me straight than dance the line by upping a review from bad to mediocre because of fear and want of SWAG and cool perks.

Top five E3 2011 announced games that I desperately do want

I’ve never really paid too much attention to E3 in the past, but this year I got the itch, and I actually watched some of the press conferences live over the Interwebz as they happened and, thanks to the killer kids at GiantBomb, listened to many podcasts and interviews, as well as devoured every bit of data put out there. And there was a lot to be put…out. Um, that sentence didn’t work as well as I’d have liked, but whatever. Let’s move on.

Videogames! They’re always coming out, and I always want ’em. And while E3 is usually about the big names, the same ol’ shooters and Kinect jazz hands and next iterations in the big name franchises, there’s also a lot of smaller titles there. Sure, they don’t get the same coverage and applause, but dang it, they should. A lot of them have potential, I promise. More so than the Wii U “experiences” at least.

Here’s the top five games that debuted or were announced at E3 2011 that I want to gobble gobble in the near future. Well, probably not the near future, as many of these titles are still a ways off, but a gamerboy can dream.

5. OverStrike

Insomniac Games is one of my favorite developers, and one of the big losses of choosing the Xbox 360 over the PlayStation 3 was losing access to the wonderful Ratchet & Clank series. So, when the rumormill started churning recently, and word was that Insomniac Games was going to announce a new multiplatform game, well…I got excited. Welcome, OverStrike! It’s not a shared Ratchet & Clank title, but it still focuses on crazy weapons, as well as class-based shooting. I’m usually not fans of these types of games, but knowing what kind of creative team is behind it is more enough for me. Okay, I’m in.

4. Luigi’s Mansion 2

The Internet has been quick to remind us all that the original Luigi’s Mansion was not as good as we are remembering it to be, but phooey on them. I thoroughly enjoyed Luigi’s Mansion, thinking it to be a great change of pace, giving the other brother some love. Hearing him call out for Mario always got a chuckle in the room. Plus, I believe in ghosts, and they should all be vacuumed up for being very real things that really scare me. Think this will be perfect on the 3DS; a little ghost-busting on the go. Okay, I’m in.

3. LEGO City Stories

An open-world GTA-esque game featuring…LEGO characters. Y’all know my deep love for the LEGO games, and y’all know my deep hatred for the majority of GTA-like games. Hopefully, this fusion will be a game-changer. Maybe because it won’t be so serious. The fact that it’s coming out for the 3DS is interesting; hopefully they can fit an entire seamless city on one of those wee carts. Okay, I’m cautiously in.

2. Rayman: Origins

It looks simply gorgeous, retains the same fun and strong side-scrolling gameplay, and is going to allow for user-generated levels. Okay, I’m in.

1. Sly Cooper: Thieves in Time

Sonofabitch, now I need to buy a PlayStation 3. Okay, after I rob a bank, I’m in.

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What newly announced games are y’all excited for? Phineas and Ferb: Across the 2nd Dimension? Shame on you, Grinding Down readers.

Games Completed in 2011, #21 – Fallout: New Vegas, Honest Hearts DLC

I managed to type up my first impressions of Honest Hearts, the second slice of Fallout: New Vegas DLC, back when I was playing it, and I meant to write more about the Courier’s trip to oppressed Utah, but, unfortunately, I completed the DLC shortly thereafter, clocking in at a surprising few measly hours. I guess that was my fault…for, um, following the main story missions? I don’t know. It was over fast, and that’s a bummer as it, from a design perspective, stood mountains taller than Dead Money.

Add-on DLC for Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas has always struggled with overpowered characters because the majority of us have already been building our stats and weapon caches up long before these new bits of adventuring come out. To compensate for this, we’re often stripped of our gear, forced to survive with whatever new stuff we find. This always feels cheap and annoying, but Honest Hearts tries something different, enforcing a weight limit as to how much we can realistically carry from the Mojave Wasteland to Utah. I still wasn’t in love with dropping some of my beloved weapons and armor to the ground, but it worked better in that it allowed me to continue on with what I was already comfortable with. So, um, two irradiated thumbs up for that idea, Obsidian.

Dead Money was very claustrophobic…on purpose. You were meant to feel stuck, closed in, on your own as you tried to get inside the Sierra Madre, and even then, with the massive hotel filled with poisonous red clouds and broken hallways, things got cramper. You don’t feel like that ever in Honest Hearts. It’s all open sky and winding rivers and abandoned campgrounds and tiered landscape and a good sense of scale. This was, pun intended, a breath of fresh air. I liked looking up at the clear sky, or listening to the rain fall (yes, rain!) as I slept under the stars. They nailed the atmosphere for sure.

Disappointingly, Honest Hearts features a severe lack of new enemy types. The best Obsidian could do was create larger cazador and bring back Yogi Bear yao guai. Otherwise, it’s the same wildlife we experienced from before, and the human enemies aren’t anything to get excited about, even if they have crazy names like Stare-at-Sky and Eats-Dirty-Shoes. At least there were no “unkillable” Ghost people, I guess. But still, would’ve liked to have shot at something new and different for a change as everything has become predictable after many hours of using V.A.T.S.

At this point, I barely remember much of the plot. The Courier goes to Utah with a traveling caravan, watches them get slaughtered by the angry natives, meets Joshua, also known as “The Burned Man,” does some effortless fetch quests, and then makes a decision to either evacuate the people of Zion National Park or stand and fight back. I high-tailed it, which still felt like fighting back in that there were a lot of skirmishes before reaching the zone’s exit. I feel like there were missed opportunities in speaking with Joshua and that other dude between the few quests, and while a few sidequests for others popped up, I decided to stay focused on the plan at hand, and for that I was punished with a quicker conclusion. You can return if you want, but I think I’ll just wait for the third add-on, Lonesome Roads, to hit sometime this month.

It was nice exploring a new place, one rather untouched by bombs, but still plagued with problems. I only wish it had lasted longer and gave us, the players, more decisions to think about in terms of siding with Joshua Graham or the White Legs or the flaming bears. I guess it was worth it to get the black coffee recipe for crafting at campfires. I do love me some coffee.

Games Completed in 2011, #20 – Fallout: New Vegas, Dead Money DLC

I’ve decided to count DLC as completed titles for my super cool and impressive ongoing megalist of games I’ve conquered for the year so far, considering most of the DLC I’ve bought 1) is purchased with real money, 2) takes a decent amount of time to complete (3-8 hours), and 3) has end credits. That’s good enough for me, and so I figured before I get to discussing the Honest Hearts DLC I’ll first have to tackle musing gravely on the Dead Money DLC. Oh wait. I’ve already done that…like a ton. Just click on the links below so I don’t have to regurgitate for y’all:

Take the Dead Money and run

All my greatest critics in the Mojave Wasteland think I’m a hack

Fallout: New Vegas – Dead Money DLC is more like deadweight

In summary, Dead Money is too frustrating to be fun, even if it is more Fallout: New Vegas. Next!

How to play Caravan in Fallout: New Vegas

Currently on my third playthrough of Fallout: New Vegas, I’ve logged somewhere around 120+ hours in the Mojave Wasteland, and, amazingly, I only won my first game of Caravan last night. Now, this wasn’t my first time trying to earn some extra bottle caps in a friendly card game between strangers, but each time I did try I’d end up throwing cards down misinformed, losing quickly without any notion as to why. I even looked up a few videos and tutorials online, and the dang thing still did not click. Until, without warning, it did, and then I won three games in a row against NCR ambassador Dennis Crocker, unlocking this pretty gem:

Know When to Fold Them (10G): Won 3 games of Caravan.

Unlike other Caravan players, Crocker will continue to play even when he runs out of caps, and each win still counts as a win. So far, I’ve beat him 11 times. Just need to do so another…uh, 19 more times to unlock the Caravan Master Achievement.

Right. How to play Caravan. The point of the game is to create three stacks of cards equaling 26. Your opponent is also trying to do this so the speedier you can get there, the better. This is why it’s important to have as many 10s, 9s, and 7s in your Caravan deck because 10 + 9 + 7 = 26 exactly. A Caravan deck must consist of at least 30 cards, and many online tutorials suggest taking out everything from your deck that is not a 10, 9, or 7 before playing; however, this can be very time-consuming, and I found it fine to just hit “random deck”. Once a match begins, before you play your first card, you have the opportunity to discard as many cards from your hand as you want, and I did this until my hand was mostly filled with 10s, 9s, 8s, 7s, and 6s. Face cards like Kings and Queens won’t help you, same with Aces despite what you might assume, so drop those like they’re laced with cazador poison.

After you’ve discarded enough to get a good handful of desired cards, try to place a 10 (of any suit) in each of the three rows first. Next, try to place a 9 beneath each 10 (it has to go below as cards can then only be played in descending order). Lastly, aim for a 7 below the 9 in each column to make for a perfect 26; more than likely, your opponent is still struggling to build strong Caravans on their end, and then you’ve won a match in a matter of a few turns. Rinse and repeat.

It sounds simpler than it first appears to be, and the biggest problem for me was that I kept trying to place cards next to the first card I played, only to have them turn up red and “unplayable.” I couldn’t figure out what I was doing wrong, and decided that Caravan was not for me despite my love for many in-game card games like Triple Triad, Tetra Master, and Xeno Card. I’m glad I went back to try again, and now I’ve got some grinding to do for that “win 30 games of Caravan” Achievement, with victory match #30 being the last match of Caravan I’ll ever play.

Keeping it casual with Red Faction: Guerrilla

I was hoping to write this post before I completed the game, but it seems I was able to burn through Red Faction: Guerrilla‘s final missions pretty fast over the last few nights, and as the credits rolled, I did not feel a pinch of regret for the decision that made it all possible: turning the difficulty down from Normal to Casual.

I’ve been playing Red Faction: Guerrilla off and on since July 2010 (almost a year ago!), and I eventually got to a point that I could not conquer. I’m finger-pointing the missions to liberate the Dust sector of Mars, and I would do them in the same fashion that I would tackle Grand Theft Auto IV‘s mission, with a furrowed brow and curse words just begging to get out. Naturally, I’d die mid-way through the mission for reasons like unclear objectives or just getting caught out in the open and having six EDF troopers riddle me with bullets. It would be hard to go back so I’d instead wander around the map, knocking buildings down, mining ore locations, and occasionally doing a guerrilla side-quest.

Recently, as I journey towards trying to complete more games than buying more games and never finishing them, I went back to the liberating Dust missions. Died again. Only took a few shots, which was frustrating. In my Martian heart, I have to believe I’m not terrible at the game; so I decided to change the difficulty, something I don’t do often or with glee, something I’ve only also done as of late with Dragon Age: Origins, but I did it; I completed all the final Dust missions in one go, no deaths. The game suddenly changed. Mason took less damage, and enemies dropped faster, did not swarm in droves. I even feel like some of the mission structures might have been altered too, becoming shorter or more lenient.

Yes, I’d have loved to go through Red Faction: Guerrilla on the default difficulty, as it was meant to be played, but ultimately I’d rather experience the story and missions and crumbling buildings. Such are the sacrifices gamers must make from time to time. I’ll be back later with a full write-up. Until then, keep it casual y’all.

Games Completed in 2011, #19 – LEGO Pirates of the Caribbean: The Video Game

“A LEGO pirate’s life for me” would’ve made for a good post title. I’m just saying…

Traveller’s Tales has pretty much cemented their LEGO videogame formula, and it seems like they like what they have in the blueprints and are probably not going to stray from it too much. This is both good and bad. The good comes from the aspect that, nine times out of ten, the formula is fun and silly and an OCD gamer’s utopia, with a billion different things to collect and tasks to complete. The bad is that if you’ve played one LEGO videogame, you’ve played every LEGO videogame, whether it came out today or five years back.

LEGO Pirates doesn’t do anything new or shiny, but it is probably the second most appropriate franchise for LEGO-izing next to Star Wars because the Pirates of the Caribbean films are fun, light-hearted, goofy, epic, and made up of a variety of wild locations. Plus, there’s the character of Jack Sparrow, a man that sways and sways your attention towards him immediately; I still can’t believe how perfectly they nailed him and his persona in LEGO form, right down to the drunken swagger. It truly is a sight to see.

LEGO Pirates covers the main cinematic trilogy, as well as the newest film On Stranger Tides. The cutscenes do a great job of moving the plot along humorously, but a lot of giggles were lost on the fourth movie as I didn’t really understand what was happening and why; these games certainly do benefit from a gamer already knowing the tales in and out, allowing the jokes to resonate more without losing out on crucial plot details. Here’s my guess for the fourth film: Jack Sparrow doesn’t want to grow old so he’s off to find the Fountain of Youth. Blackbeard feels the same way. However, for the Fountain to work, they need to make mermaids cry or something. Then some stupid wannabe pirate girl gets stabbed, and we need to use the Fountain to heal her. Oh, and Captain Barbossa has a peg leg now. Maybe a mermaid ate it. The end.

As mentioned before, the gameplay remains the same. You play through a level by yourself or with a co-op partner, smashing everything in your path to collect studs and open new places to explore. Some new tricks include using Jack’s magical compass to find hidden treasures or looking through a telescope and tracking a certain someone as they move around. Other than that, the game is much more puzzle-heavy than combat-heavy, and sometimes the puzzles can be a little difficult to solve, especially when one requires you to have destroyed X over there to complete. I was particularly stuck on the final level of On Stranger Tides, mad to discover that all I was missing was pushing in a block that did not look, um, pushable. Grrr.

Strangely, I noticed that Traveller’s Tales did not include a level editor this time around, which previously showed up in LEGO Harry Potter, Years 1-4 and LEGO Indiana Jones 2. That’s fine. I only tinkered with it a few times and just didn’t find it too much fun, especially since there was no way to share levels online or download new ones. No big loss. I still think drop-in, drop-out co-op via online would be marvelous, as the screen splitting up is often headache-inducing.

If you’re not a fan of the LEGO videogames, this one won’t certainly convince you. However, if you do love collecting studs and building items from broken LEGO bits and listening to dozens of characters mumble their way through a scene or riding giant crabs, then you’ll love LEGO Pirates. There’s plenty to do, to see, to be, and if you love carrots you’ll be especially pleased to know that there’s a lot of carrot humor. Whatever that means.

Pick-pocketing glitches from the pockets of Fallout: New Vegas

At this point, y’all should know how I like to roleplay in my big, open-world RPGs, especially in Fallout: New Vegas–stealthily. I love skirting conflict, sneaking around the building’s side, lockpicking my way in, tampering with the security computer to switch the turret’s targeting assignment from me to raider, and then creeping up on anyone left standing to pop em once–critical damage guaranteed–in the head. Then we loot and move on to hopefully do it all again.

That said, there’s one aspect that goes hand-in-hand with being sneaky that I just don’t like to do or take advantage of, and that’s picking someone’s pockets, whether it’s to grab a key they got or drop a live grenade into their trousers. I just don’t like doing it. It seems to me that, even with a high Sneak skill, you’re chances of getting caught are greater than not, and then I usually have to reload my game because I don’t like getting caught and having the entire New Vegas strip mad at me because I stole somebody’s fresh apple.

How then, you most certainly ask, did I unlock the following Achievement over the weekend?

Artful Pocketer (15G): Picked 50 pockets.

Here, let me tell you. I used a glitch. Yup, even with two (or is it three at this point?) patches for Fallout: New Vegas, there’s still a few glitches to lovingly grope. I mean…use with love. Because 50 pockets is a lot of pockets, and I know that I’d never actually get that many in a single playthrough especially since I hate doing it so much, but this glitch made it all too easy. First, let me explain how pick-pocketing in Fallout works: you crouch, you wait until it says hidden, you search their pockets, and you take an item. If done successfully, the item will disappear and  you’ll hear the sound cue for losing karma. If done unsuccessfully, the menu closes, and the victim turns into an enemy, ready to beat you down for your blatant thievery.

Okay, so on the New Vegas strip, there’s a hotel hangout place called Vault 21; it’s actually a true Vault-Tec vault that’s been transformed into a rich place for some R&R. It’s a little bizarre you’re first time through as it’ll feel a bit like returning home in Fallout 3. Anyways, all the residents of Vault 21 are glitched; the items in their pockets do not disappear when pick-pocketed, but the sound cue for losing karma still happens, and when you check the stats menu it clearly shows you were successful. This means you can sit there and just pick-pocket someone over and over and over. I did this to a woman snoozing with her eyes open. Took me less than 15 minutes to go from three pockets picked to 50. I did, however, have to save frequently as the woman did seem to catch me after the third or fourth try, but if that happens, you just reload and try again. Easy peasy. Sometimes glitches are good, time-savers. Sometimes they’re not, like in the case of the Achievement for recruiting every companion, which I’ve done, but which has not yet pinged. Grrr…

Thanks for listening, chiiiiiiildren!

30 Days of Gaming, #19 – Picture of a game setting you wish you lived in

Fable II was an okay game. It did not wow me, but it had a lot of pretty to it, and bumbling into a new location was always a joyous moment because it meant immersing myself in a place and seeing how everything clicked. Oh, okay. That’s where they get their food, that’s where they sell their wares, that’s where a talking gargoyle head insults my intelligence. Bowerstone is an impressive main city hub, very busy with lots of shops and shoppers, as well as being broken up into distinctive districts. Bloodstone is moody and dangerous. Westcliff is a dump though you do get the opportunity to change its tides.

For me, the place to be in Fable II is Oakfield, a small village of farmers and monks north of Rookridge. It’s serene and open, quiet and nice, a place to spend the day either tilling the land or walking the paths, with a single bar hot-spot, the Sandgoose, to go to at night where, more assuredly, everybody knows your name. Some other points of interest include the Temple of Light and Manure Manor.

And if you play to the good-natured side, when you return from the Tattered Spire, you’ll find Oakfield thriving, with new houses and an expanded Temple of Light. Plus, autumn will be in full swing, with gorgeous reds, oranges, and yellows to feast upon, and probably nothing else comes as close as to feeling like a true fantasy village than Oakfield. Evil people get to destroy the village, which only makes me want to never finish my evil second playthrough even more.

A lot of Fable II is spent running after the golden breadcrumb trail, your dog desperately trying to keep up. Considering the game’s tiresome loading screens and sluggish menus, running was a blessing. I ran just about everywhere. Except for Oakfield in the sunlight, where I’d stroll leisurely around, doing little expressions for its inhabitants and keeping the peace. It’s the sort of place I dream about, where I could leave behind the plastic and pointless, be one with my surroundings, spend every day soaking up the sounds and smells.

Runner-up:

That’d be Serenity Farm, also from Fable II. It’s the inside of Oakfield’s Demon Door, and it’s special in that no one but your family (wife/husband and kids) can follow you there. Meaning no enemies, truly a secret spot all to your own. That also sounds good to me. Either way, fantasy farms…I kind of like ’em.

Honest early impressions for the Honest Hearts DLC

As expected, things go horribly wrong the minute you begin the Honest Hearts DLC for Fallout: New Vegas. First, the Courier needs to meet up with Jed Masterson, a traveling merchant working for the delightfully named Happy Trails Caravan Company. He tells you a bit about the caravan’s history, as well as his need for someone with a Pip-Boy 3000 to help him and his groupies navigate safely through Zion Canyon in hopes of trading with the Mormons in New Canaan. And off you go, zipping from state to the other in a matter of a single loading screen. However, once you arrive, your caravan is attacked and, sorry to say, you’re the lone survivor…which is a shame as Ricky would’ve made for a hilarious albeit annoying companion all the way through.

Speaking of companions, you can’t bring anyone with you in Honest Hearts. Sorry, ED-E. You’ll also need to drop your inventory down to only 75 lbs, which is irksome, but understandable. Thankfully, I was only at like 112/215 at that point, so I dropped some stupid things like lunchboxes and clothes I’ll never wear. At least they didn’t strip you of every awesome thing you worked really hard for like Bethesda has done in the past with Operation Anchorage, The Pitt, Mothership Zeta, and Dead Money.

So far, I’m enjoying Honest Hearts a thousand and five times more than Dead Money. It’s less claustrophobic, focusing more on exploring and looting through abandoned places considered too taboo for the native folk. The landscape itself is varied, but sparse of life, and at this point I’ve shot some geckos and steered clear of cazador groups. I was particularly surprised to see the Courier coming face to face with Joshua Graham, also known as the Burned Man, so soon into the adventure as I figured he’d be too pivotal and big for open chatting. Guess he’s desperate for help.

Also, kind of like when one first arrives at the Strip, the player is overwhelmed with a great number of quests to do. Like three at once, and then another five at once. It’s both great and maddening. I’m currently working on Rite of Passage, a side quest that’s more than a little trippy, while I figure out exactly how I want to go about Zion and saving its people (or not). I got to the end of the quest and quickly met death so I’m not sure if I’m ready for this or just if I need to plan better. We’ll see…right, Ghost of She?

And here’s what I’ve gotten so far Achievement-wise, both of which are simply tied to completing specific quests:

When We Remembered Zion (20G): Arrived at Zion.

Restore Our Fortunes (30G): Resupplied Daniel and the Sorrows.

Sadly, the Achievements for these DLC add-ons are never very exciting. If only the brains behind them would open up and get creative; I mean, the in-game challenges do a much better job of getting players to express their characters fully, encouraging my current Courier to melt enemies and damage limbs, rewarding us with bonus XP. Why not go the extra three feet and make some of those into Achievements? But I digress…

Looking forward to exploring more Utah territory. Most likely this weekend.