Smoking cigs and killing Nazis

The Saboteur is far from perfect. Far far far far far. That’s five fars for those not counting. It is littered with glitches and bad control schemes, suffers from unclear mission objectives at times, and fails graphically once France starts slipping back into color. But I can put that all aside because–and this is important here–the game is a lot of fun. And it’s more forgiving than Grand Theft Auto IV ever tried to be.

So yeah, here’s the summary so far. You’re Sean Devlin, an Irishman now living in Paris, France, who gets sucked into a plot to take down some Nazis. Revenge is the fire in his blood, and along the way he’ll meet a cultured cast of characters, as well as strengthen the resistance of the people to the Nazi regime. I’m not too far into the main missions yet so that’s kind of all I know at this point. Maybe he’ll meet Brad Pitt…I mean Lt. Aldo Raine at some point. No one can predict the future.

The main missions so far are of the usual open-world ilk. There’s one where you follow another car, but don’t get too close to it. There’s another that charges you with escorting a lady friend around. There’s one that puts you into the sniper role, handing out death from high above. A lot of the missions are just set before you with a generic objective: kill the Nazis, for instance. It’s up to you to figure out how to make the end happen. You can either be sneaky and go around the enemy base or charge right in, guns a-blazing. I don’t recommend the latter. While Sean can certainly handle guns and grenades and setting off timebombs, he’s a much stronger assassin. It might take an extra ten minutes or so, but sometimes it is safer to walk the long and slow road, creeping by, silencing those that need it.

But the best thing about The Saboteur, for me at least, is the ambient freeplay missions. These show up on your map as tiny white dots, indicating that something there is important. It might be a Nazi sniper tower you have to destroy or a lookout point (a la Assassin’s Creed) or even just a perfectly placed spot to do a wicked car jump. Either way, there are hundreds of these. Maybe thousands. Remember, I can’t count higher than five. Just check this image out, which is only a tiny part of the world map:

Yeaaaaaaaah. But what is so nice about this is that it caters to my completionist OCD and allows me to just pop into the game for thirty minutes, take out a few ambient freeplay missions, save, and shut down for the night, fully knowing that I at least accomplished something. That I whittled the number of white dots down a sliver.

There’s always something to do in The Saboteur. Going after perks, ambient freeplay missions, collecting cars, playing the game’s main missions, just exploring, smoking cigs, saving citizens. It kind of goes on and on.

That said, Sean, just like Niko, is hard to like. He curses a little too much and a little too dramatically; there was one comment he made about eating a nun’s arse. I don’t know. I cringed? Yes, I cringed. Then again, he’s easy to like because he kills Nazis. And we all dream about going back in time and doing that ourselves. Well, maybe I do. Can’t speak for you, silent reader.

But all in all, a fun game. Maybe even an underappreciated one. Will come back to that claim once I’m further through it.

Not So Hopelessly Devoted to You, UNO

I needed a little distraction last night. Nothing too involving, nothing too counteractive. Just something. And so, bring on the UNO. It’s one of my favorite games to play before bed. Between the light jazzy background music and simple–if addicting–game mechanics, my eyes begin to droop after a few rounds. This is a good thing; this is what I want. What I’m saying is that I don’t play the game to become King of the Mountain.

So, when I unlocked the following Achievement last night, I couldn’t help but feel like an impostor:

Devotee (25G): Win 40 games of UNO®.

I bought UNO in June 2009. It is now June 2010. A true devotee would’ve won 40 games in maybe that first month alone. Me? Took a year. My player stats currently say this:

Wins: 40
Losses: 79

Ouchie. Well, not really. A lot of UNO is luck, with a pinch of planning and strategy. So, you win some, you lose some. Achievement-wise, all I have left is to win 10 games of UNO over Xbox Live. I believe, at this point, I’ve won three. In short, I have some grinding to do in that fashion, but it’s okay. A game or two here before bed can surely help (me fall asleep). Just hope it doesn’t take me another year to accomplish this; I only have a month of Gold access at the moment.

PURCHASES OF THE MONTH: Picross 3D and The Saboteur

Well, I caved over the weekend. Had to pick up something new before May ended, and so I nabbed Picross 3D for a cool $20.00 and a used copy of The Saboteur for $15.00. Yeah, not two games I’d really ever think of pairing together, but good deals nonetheless.

Picross 3D is a unique puzzler that, a bit to my dismay, relies heavily on math skills to solve. Me? I’m no good with the multiplication tables and such. But I’m getting the hang of it despite have trouble on some of the Beginner and Level 1 puzzles. There’s over 350 in the game, and I’ve gotten through about 50 or so at this point. Presentation is nice and unobtrusive, and you can change the game’s overall soundtrack to whatever you want…Latin, twinkly (?), calm. I locked it down on the 8-bit selection. Doot doot doot beet boot…

Also, evidently there’s a commercial for the game. And it shows a group of girls playing the game, having a blast, solving puzzles. Is this being marketed as a girl’s game and easy one, too? I should hope not. I think anyone can play it so long as they have patience.

Oh, and one puzzle solved resulted in creating a blocky dachshund. Tara liked that.

As for The Saboteur, it’s an open-world game set in Paris, France during World War II. Yup, a WWII that is not a first-person shooter. Crazy, right? What it is though is stylish and arcade-like. You play an Irishman named Sean who hates Nazis and ends up in France due to an earlier run-in with the Aryan race. He meets some other fellow Nazi haters, and the plot is on: uh, kill Nazis. Haven’t gotten too far in this one yet, but it seems like there’s a ton of things to see, do, and collect. Looking forward to exploring the world a bit more, but I can already tell that I like the map in black, white, yellow, and red much more than in full color. Once color returns, the game world sort of loses something.

Also, I ended up buying one month of Xbox Live Gold for $1.00 thanks to a spotlight advertisement. I mean, that’s a pretty rockin’ deal and so I figured to give it a shot. Now I have exactly a month to try and get some more multiplayer-only Achievements in some of my games and maybe try out co-op in Borderlands. Will have to plan accordingly.

Either way, that’s it for May. No more purchases until the end of June hits with LEGO Harry Potter: Years 1-4.

From Bloodletter to Grand Champion in just 30 minutes

At this point, I’m kind of drifting. I’ve beaten several games now–Borderlands, Dragon Age: Origins, and Pokemon HeartGold to name a few–and don’t really plan to buy anything new until LEGO Harry Potter: Years 1-4 comes out at the end of June (though I’m not promising I won’t get something new if it is cheap and shiny enough to catch my eyes). I’m also having a hard time going back and replaying some previously beaten games; that said, I did pop back in Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion last night to see if there was anything worth doing.

And there was: the Arena.

I’m not sure why I didn’t tackle the Arena questline sooner. Maybe I was scared at what it would throw at me or maybe it was because I just was no good at confrontations during my early levels, mostly because I was relying too much on throwing fireballs. But this time around, as a bow-wielding LV. 19 Bosmer elf…well, I made quick work of all my enemies. Seriously, I went from being a Bloodletter to Myrmidon to Warrior to Gladiator to Hero to Champion to Grand Champion in under thirty minutes without getting attacked more than, oh, five times.

My strategy was simple. I zoomed in with my bow, waited for the gates to lower, and loosed an arrow or two before my challenger even got halfway across the arena. Then I hurried back inside, collected my monetary reward, and accepted the next battle to do it all over again. Rinse and repeat. Take a small break once to restock on arrows. The only fight I had trouble with was against three enemies: a soldier, an archer, and a mage, but they all fell to my glass arrows in time. Plus, my bow is powered by electricity. Don’t ask.

The last fight, the big one, the tune-in-and-watch, was against an orc. I guess he was supposed to be tough or intimidating. He wasn’t. He took four arrows to drop, but still, he didn’t even reach me at that point as I skated backwards to avoid his sword’s swing. Sigh. No challenge at all. And six easy, quick Achievements, but you really only need to see one to get the full effect:

Grand Champion, Arena (50G): Completed the Arena Questline

Upon exiting the Arena, you’re greeted by the Adoring Fan, who loves you and admires you and just wants to follow you around. Pretty annoying, and he only spoke a few lines. I told him no, but I might change my mind in the future and lead him straight into troll territory.

But yeah, Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. I should play you more. You do have a lot of “easy” Achievements left to unlock; by easy, I mean they are relatively straightforward and are just based off quest progression and not skill or luck or doing something random (like killing X deer or making X health potions with alchemy). Maybe I’ll try to finish up the Fighters Guild questline next. Or the Dark Brotherhood. Mwahaha?

I destroyed the Destroyer and all I got to show for it was this t-shirt

I’m going to be talking about the ending to Borderlands here so I’d like to mention two things up front: 1) spoilers and 2) that it was totally lame.

After you make your way safely through the Eridian Promontory, which is definitely one of the hardest areas yet thanks to the numerous flying Guardians, you’ll come across a transition map-screen that reads THE VAULT. Oooooh. Truthfully, I was a little hesitant to press X and cross over into the place my guardian angel had been talking about non-stop since I got off the bus way back in, uh, April 2010.

It’s not like the game built up the hype about the Vault too much, but rather I did. See, in my mind–and maybe this is Fallout 3‘s fault–a vault is a place that holds…stuff. Most likely important stuff. In my mind, orange-colored weapons danced like happy CL4P-TPs! I mean, I’m a treasure hunter. I want treasure.

Upon entering the Vault location–which is an odd mix of a snowy landscape and fiery mountaintop–we’re treated to a cutscene. Some woman named Steele says the contents of the Vault is hers, but no worries…a giant tentacle jumps out of the Vault’s portal door and turns her into a Siren shish kabob. Then it’s time for a big baddie boss fight. This thing is large and unmoving; it’s mostly a horribly disgusting bean bag chair with tentacles and an eye for shooting for critical hits. Did not take me long (and remember, I’m playing solo) to whittle it down; my turret threw corrosive rockets, I hid behind pillars and took pop-shots when I could, and my shields, health, and ammo all recharged as I waited. Just took patience, which I have in droves, and then kablooey, it’s dead:

Destroyed the Destroyer (50G): Killed the Vault Boss

Sweet, with the Destroyer dead I now get to loot the Vault, right? Mmm guns, guns, guns.

No. Roll credits.

I watched the credits for a bit and listened to the music, but then I hit some buttons and I was back in the game, still at the Vault’s now broken portal door. I picked up some loot from the dead Destroyer, as well as the Vault key, but there was nowhere else for me to go. Checking my questlog, I saw I had a new quest to bring the key to Tannis. So I did. And she paid me money. And then I was officially out of jobs to do. I wandered around for a bit unsure of what to do next; I even returned to the Vault to see if I’d missed a door or something. I thought there’d be treasure or something. What happened with the Vault? It opened once and out came a demon and I killed the demon and now, what, we have to wait another 200 years to try again?

If so, laaaaaaaaaame. So, so lame, Borderlands.

I know you aren’t all about story, but you most certainly are interested in rewarding the player. Except when it comes to the final payoff. Then you’re out to lunch or something.

I didn’t even know how to get into playthrough 2. Had to look it up on the Interwebz. Grrr. Basically, you just quit the game you’re in currently and when you select your character again, you get the option to continue playing in playthrough 1’s world or start again in playthrough 2. Not sure why anyone would return to a quest-less Pandora though.

Oh, and I forgot to mention that, in the end–and I assume this was supposed to be a twist or cliffhanger for Borderlands 2–one of the CL4P-TPs becomes an evil ninja assassin thanks to your guardian angel. I traveled back to Fyrestone–as that’s where it looked like it was from–but that CL4P-TP was fine and dandy, chilling at the vapid bounty board. Some things never change.

Discovered Eridian Promontory and then ran away

I’m sure my readers (all three of you) are just dying to see me get through Borderlands so I can shut up about it and move on to other ramblings about videogames. Me too, actually. But alas, I’m not done with the Capital Wasteland just yet.

I made it to the Eridian Promontory last night only to discover my assault rifle-wielding soldier is not ready to move on. That’s not a LOST metaphor either; he totally got creamed fast by two enemies at the start of the level, and so I ran away, back to New Haven, to finish up a bunch of sidequests I wasn’t interested in before. Either way, they’ll be extra experience points and maybe a new weapon or two depending on the quest rewards.

It’s funny that the enemy types don’t really get tough or more varied until you reach the Vault, which I’m assuming is pretty much end-of-game time. Besides numerous Crimson Lance soldiers, the zone is flooded with Guardians, which, depending on your level and skill set, can be a whole new bag of tricks. They got shields, they got speed, and they got you gasping for a Second Wind before you know it. Again, having a co-op player in these sorts of situations is much desired. Alas, my pillows have no opposable thumbs and so I’m out of luck there.

That said, going back to do some of these sidequests was almost downright silly. Bandits barely touched me, and I flew through everything without a single worry of being taken down. Overpowered in one place, underpowered in another. The mantra of RPGs, I guess.

I’m somewhere around the middle of level 35/36, I think. Not sure when a good time to return to the Eridian Promontory is or whether it’s just me and the set of guns I’m using, but I will try again shortly. Gotta get inside the vault and discover what secrets it holds! Speculative spoiler: I bet it’s more guns.

One, the loneliest of numbers

Running around by myself and shooting skags, bandits, and spiderants in Borderlands is fine…if a bit repetitive, a bit predictable. A little lonesome. But the game clearly demands co-op action during it’s boss battles, something I don’t have access to, making these grand set pieces either extremely hard or totally lame.

Take for instance the Rakk Hive, the wondrous beast shown above. I love it’s design, and the eyes on the thing remind me a lot of the Ohmu from Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind. Except this is no gentle beast; it’s a monster of a monster and will attack you in a variety of ways, spewing Rakk from its body, too. I’m guessing a great co-op strategy would be to divulge tasks, meaning one player handles the flying Rakk, the other goes for the thing’s eyes for critical hits, and the rest can move around to distract it or protect their fellow teammates. What did I do all by my little soldier self? I stood behind a rock and shot. Then I reloaded. Then I shot some more. Reloaded. Shot. Reloaded. Pew pew pew. Reloaded. Shot. Shot. Shot. One more shot. Oh good, it’s falling over now, dead. Level up!

It was not very exciting, I’m sad to say.

Let’s look at another boss battle: Baron Flynt. Man, what a toughie. And the quest was marked at a difficulty of normal, but still…a toughie. Flynt wields The Boom Stick, a deadly combat shotgun that can deplete your shield in about two hits. He’s also quick on his feet. The battle zone is multi-tiered, making it easy to avoid him by dropping low or running high, but if you don’t attack him constantly he shield recharges and then what’s the point of it all. This would have been a good time–nay, a vital time–to have another player in the mix to shoot him from behind or toss grenades or whatever, but alas I had to resort to a lot of hiding and running. Thankfully, I’m Roland and have the turret action skill, which, as he says from time to time, “It’s like having another soldier on the field!”

Yes, my co-op partner is a stationary turret gun. Wee!

It took me about 30 levels to truly see that Borderlands is a co-op game, through and through. When I bought it, I was hoping it had a deep enough–and fun enough–single-player mode to warrant the purchase. Alas, it’s thin. Rakk wing thin.

But I’m soldiering on (pun intended) because the numerous quests do keep me busy, and I do see myself becoming a much better FPS player with each level earned. That or I have just found powerful enough guns to keep me alive and well through most firefights. Also, as of last night, I found my first orange-colored weapon. That’s pretty exciting…except it was a shotgun, and I am not interested in using close-range weaponry. I prefer shooting from a distance. But I think I’m getting closer to the Vault; I just hope I can make it through by myself.

Planning out the next set of purchases

So, I’ve been thinking a lot lately about time and money and videogames. Because, as most of us know, they all go hand-in-hand with each other. You need money to play games; you need time to play games. You also most likely need a job, but the Catch 22 of that is if you have a job, you have less time, but more money.

To be truthful, I have enough money for games, but not enough time, and that therein causes me to feel guilt about buying new games when I’ve yet to get through a good chunk of my collection. I mean, I did toss down $5.00 for six games thanks to the Humble Indie Bundle, and of them, I’ve only played a few hours of Aquaria. Haven’t even touched the others yet. Problem? Problem. Plus, I’m still working on Borderlands, Pokemon HeartGold, playing Dragon Age: Origins a second time, and a slew of other abandoned children.

Right. Chances are I’m just babbling here, but basically, I’m not going to be making a Purchase of the Month for May 2010. Generally, I allow myself to buy one new videogame–often ranging in the $30 to $40 range–each month as a reward for working hard and staying alive. However, I have more than enough on my plate right now, and there’s actually nothing terribly new calling out to me…save for Red Dead Redemption, which a lot of reviews are giving the thumbs up on. Yet…I still do not enjoy GTA IV and think maybe, just maybe, I should stay away. Who knows. I might cave over summer; I’ve always wanted to ride a donkey into the sunset.

I do, however, know with certainty some of my next purchases. And here they are:

• June 2010: LEGO Harry Potter: Years 1-4
• July 2010: Dragon Quest IX: Sentinels of the Starry Skies
• August 2010: ???
• September 2010: ???
• October 2010: Fallout: New Vegas

And that’s really all I know at this point. Nothing else on the radar. Nope, not even Fable III. Feeling kind of meh about it at this point. But I do like having a battle plan and things to look forward to…

A short spurt of success in GTA IV

Something strange happened recently; I beat a couple of missions in Grand Theft Auto IV.

Now, I had not played the game since admitting to the rage it caused me back at the end of April 2010. Other games became my distraction, and I soon lost interest in moving Niko’s revenge plot forward. But then, recently, Red Dead Redemption was released, and all the buzz about it reminded me that I really do love an open world and that Rockstar can make a decent game, and so I popped GTA IV back into my Xbox 360, totally expecting to just drive around a bit and see the sights.

But I took a chance again on that mission “Museum Piece,” which had previously caused me a lot of heartache after failing it three times. I prepared myself by loading up on ammo, grenades, and armor, and then procedded to take my time clearing out the museum. Once outside, I stayed in the park as I remembered that taking to the streets was instant death. Here’s where it got tricky…and I got lucky. I could not see the two cars trying to run me over, but they kept bashing into the park’s gated walls, and several cop cars had shown up to assess the situation. I tossed grenades like hot potatoes and took those two (of three) targets down. The third guy was on foot in the park, a shotgun in hand, but I made a mess of him quickly. Now to lose my three stars. I grabbed the car I drove to the mission with and hit the street, trying to find a Spray ‘n Pay shop. Luckily, I didn’t need it, and made it to safety before getting there. Ping, Achievement unlocked!

Impossible Trinity (10G): You completed the mission “Museum Piece”.

And then I took on the next mission from Italian Ray…and successfully completed it. And the one after that. I think at some point, I pinched myself, but all of this was happening. I was doing well!

Until I had to chase a guy on a scooter around a park…on a scooter, too. Scooters are motorcycles’ demon babies. They handle horribly, and one mess up and your target will escape with ease. Grrr. So I failed that mission…twice, saved, and shut off for the night.

Maybe I’ll wait two more weeks to play GTA IV again. I guess I gotta save up a whole bunch of success and then spend all in one shot.

Currently, my favorite gun in Borderlands: The Spy

Isn’t it pretty?

Given as a quest reward for putting King Wee Wee in Tetanus Warren six feet under, The Spy is a crazy good gun. Cah-razy good. It’s a Hyperion SMG (or maybe it’s considered an assault rifle?) with a highly effective scope, making it almost pass for a multi-clip, fast-damaging sniper rifle. Almost. There’s definitely perks to using a sniper rifle to snipe from a distance, but The Spy can hold its own, too. It also takes out shields relatively fast.

Now, I’ve written before about my distaste for big guns, so I sell every rocket launcher I pick up. Otherwise, I do try to swap a lot of my guns in and out of my hand to try them all. Borderlands claims it has a godzillian amount of weapons, and though a lot will look the same, most will perform completely different. It’s good to give each one a test run, even the silly repeaters. But The Spy has not been swapped out since I got it. It’s too good, especially for the character I’ve built; my soldier has a high capacity shield that also regenerates health over time, as well as a class mod that regenerates ammo at a good clip (pun intended). That means I can basically sit back and fire at a decent distance thanks to The Spy, and throw down my corrosive-laced turret for extra support.

There’s a couple other guns that I like to use, like Krom’s Sidearm and an assault rifle that likes to make things explode, and they all have a time and a place. By chance, The Spy seems right for each of these except when I’m getting mobbed by three crazy suicide pyscho bandits. Then I have to rely on grenades and hiding and mixing it up.

I guess if there’s one good thing to playing this game all alone is I don’t have to fight over awesome loot like the above. It’s just mine, now and forever.