All Things Gaming http://breakmanx.com 2010-07-29T07:32:45+01:00 http://breakmanx.com http://breakmanx.com/images/M_images/rss.png text/html 2010-05-01T00:00:47+01:00 http://breakmanx.com http://breakmanx.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=851&Itemid=2 The May 12th launch of Steam for OSXhas gotten me thinking about the implications of a real gaming platformcoming to Macs. I’ve seen many friends, Break included, switch fromWindows to OSX for various reasons; the one downside being that theylose their ability to play PC games. This time period marked one ofthe biggest declines in PC gaming, so it was understandable, but nowthat the two major platforms will have support for games will it bringpeople back into the fold? Oneof the biggest obstacles for this is the fact that Macs are notoriouslydifficult to do serious upgrades on. PC gamers take pride in keepingtheir systems up to date by swapping out graphics cards and CPUs likethey were different color crayons coloring a motherfucking Technicolordinosaur or something. Apple’s website even has misinformationregarding upgrading. I know that Break put a new video card in his MacPro, despite the Apple store telling him it was incompatible. For Macsto be really viable for gaming they must be able to be upgraded, withease, regularly. Otherwise, people on Macs will be running seriouslyinferior versions consistently. Anotherbig downfall is that PC games primarily run on Microsoft’s DirectX API,and any game coming to Mac will have to be ported to OpenGL. Not aninsurmountable issue, but any game developed for more than one platformalmost always suffers on one side or both. Any console game has asuperior version that makes the fanboys of other systems come up withridiculous reasons why their version is actually better. Don’t youknow that the fact that there is an extra crack in the wall negates theother version’s steady framerate? Don’tlet this article fool you, I think it is a good thing that Steam iscoming to Mac. Great games to more people. I just feel that theseissues need to be properly dealt with, or the Steam client on OSX willbe the special Olympics to Windows regular Olympics. Here’s hopingthat May 12th ushers in a new viable way to play games. text/html 2010-04-13T14:40:10+01:00 http://breakmanx.com http://breakmanx.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=850&Itemid=2 Nintendo Entertainment System, or “The NES” as it was referred to,first garnished my appetite for video games in the fall of 1988. I wasone of the many fortunate souls who came home from Toys R’ Us with theMario/Duck hunt package, complete with an orange zapper gun. It was abig deal, spending over $100 on a toy for a kid. But having no conceptof money I equated the intrinsic value of an NES as something closer tothat of all the birthday presents I ever accrued in my short lifecombined.Game cartridges quickly became thecurrency of my youth. My friends and I became day traders of sorts,gathering on the playground floor to discuss the importance andavailability of games like Double Dragon. It was a fun game and not many kids owned it, bringing up its value. When Final Fight was released however, Double Dragon nolonger had a hold on the market. Stock prices tumbled. And seeing ashow there was no Internet, we were forced to wait for the monthly issueof Nintendo Power to read in depth analysis of current market trends.Times were slow back in those days.This riseand fall was common until the summer of ’91 when Nintendo released itsfollow up gaming system. With 16 bit graphics it doubled the renderingpower of the original, truly earning its title of “Super Nintendo.” Itwas the most beautiful piece of machinery I had ever laid eyes on. Theindustrial design was years ahead of its time, replacing sharp pointyedges with beautifully rounded ones. The stark black and red colorscheme was exchanged for gray and shades of purple. Everything was sosubtle, so subdued.Needless to say, it becamethe must have toy for every kid on the block. I begged my dad to dishout the required $150 in order for me to become part of the video gameelite. But a lot had changed since the release of the NES. As a smallchild, no parent can put a price on your happiness. But as you getolder and start to talk back, that value quickly begins to drop. Myfather now had a price, and it sure as shit wasn’t worth $150.Beingan immigrant, my father had no concept of being 9 years old in Americaand the importance of keeping up with social standards. He sufferedmany financial hardships growing up so like most fathers, he felt itnecessary for me to do the same.That beingsaid, he never said I couldn’t get one; He simply wasn’t going to payfor it. He made a simple proposition in order to help me: sell my NESand all the games to raise money so I could buy it myself. This ofcourse was like putting a dagger through my heart. I had spent yearsbuilding and perfecting my collection. Suddenly it became as expendableas my happiness.But in business terms, itmade perfect sense. The NES was quickly depreciating in value and wouldsoon become obsolete. Little did my father realize he was giving me acrash course in business strategy. Or maybe he did. I suppose I justnever thought of him to be that clever. text/html 2010-04-05T00:35:43+01:00 http://breakmanx.com http://breakmanx.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=849&Itemid=42 I finally got around to picking up Devil Survivor for the DS. The game follows the main character (get to choose his name) as he and his friends are stuck in Tokyo. Hero (my name for the main characters) gets a COMP (short for something a looks like a DS) to summon demons to battle other demons. The plot consist of you trying to find a way out of the Tokyo lockdown and learn why the lockdown was started in the first place. Along the way you will meet interesting characters that might join your team.The gameplay works by having you start in a main screen to that allows you to talk to other characters or have practice battles for experience. This is the weakest part of the game. Essentially you can choose where to go and examine the area. However there is no noticeable benefit to choosing this and you start to choose the sections to advance the plot and level up. These are marked with red exclamation points. The blue dot advances the time as you have 7 days to get out of Tokyo.Battle gameplay works by having your units on a grid. It is a turn base system and as you move next to enemy units you can attack. This takes you to a second 3 vs 3 battle screen. Each character and demon can attack, use a special skill or defend.The best part of the gameplay was the storyline. Each character was interesting and the mystery of what was happening kept me interested. Additionally, I felt that my actions changed the story, especially in inquiring new characters. Do to my mistake on a mission a character died. More interesting this happened off screen and all that I got was notification that she was dead. The weakness was in acquirying new demons through fusion. You can two demons and combine them into one for the most part better demon. However the game tells you exactly which one combines into what, which takes away the mystery fun. The auctioning process to get new demons is fun. I would rate the game 8 out of 10. Bump this score up in you are a RPG fan and if you are not then stay away. text/html 2010-03-29T23:43:20+01:00 http://breakmanx.com http://breakmanx.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=848&Itemid=2 Recently, Criterion Games announced an exciting offer: Burnout Paradise and all of it’s downloadable content would become available for a limited time for the low price of $29.99. That’s an excellent deal, considering the whole shebang is otherwise worth more than $100. Luckily, I hadn’t yet expanded my game, so I was thrilled to hear about this deal. I could add all of the downloadable content for under $20. What a steal! Until I learned of the upsetting flipside to this offer: this would likely be the last offer or the sort for Burnout Paradise, because Criterion will no longer be creating new DLC for the game.I was saddened by the news, but only for a few minutes, because once the DLC installed, I realized just how much new stuff I had to play with. All kinds of new vehicles, new terrain to explore, and with it, new events. I couldn’t wait to get started.One of my favorite aspects of Burnout Paradise, and why it will remain a timeless game, is that there is no real end to it. Sure, eventually I’ll complete all the races, all the road rages, all the stunt runs, smash all the billboards, and land every super jump. Maybe someday I’ll finish all the bike challenges and conquer Big Surf Island. But I’ll still love my game because of how I feel when I play it. Burnout Paradise doesn’t expect anything from me. I don’t have to advance through levels to be able to enjoy my game. I can speed through the streets of Burnout Paradise, feel the virtual wind in my hair, and just have fun. So that’s what I’ll do. text/html 2010-03-06T11:46:52+01:00 http://breakmanx.com http://breakmanx.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=847&Itemid=2 One morning, like any other day, I was wandering aimlessly to no particular place when I had happened upon what seemed to be a quarter that was sitting there just waiting for me to pick it up. I approached the George Washington metallic portrait and grabbed it in less than the shake of a lambs tail. Holding the quarter in my hand told me that this was unlike any quarter, it was as if it had been waiting for me to pick it up, since it had been resting next to entrance of an establishment with lights and sound exuberating and emanating from its remote location. A young lad, like myself, exited through the double doors in defeat of what had seemed to be an arcade of some sorts. So I thought it would be best to enter.Immediately in front of me, there was a crowd of guys lined up and screaming at the top of their lungs waiting for their turn against the champion. Next victim! I stepped forward through the masses at the amazement of how many people there were lined up for what appeared to be, Marvel Vs. Capcom 2, a game not for the feint of hearts. The enthusiasm from the crowd overwhelmed my senses and gave me just enough ambition to want to give it a shot. A first time player like myself could only hope to survive this. I patiently waited for other competitors to squander their loose change on this leader of sorts who was the reigning champion of this game. At first it seemed like a typical fighting game between two opponents, but the amazement of having three fighters and assisted attacks was too much for me. I watched as each player would combat with a frontal attack and then combining it with an air combo that would be equivalent to a super move. Some would need assistance from their remaining players, others would fight the good fight, mano e mano. One after another, competitor after competitor, suffered a similar fate that would be irrevocably safe to say to sum up in one word, defeat. By now, the fallen retreated back to darkness from wence they came to the womb of their mothers waiting to cradle them to sleep while I stood their wondering if I should dare to step forward. There was no one left in sight, the only people left were me and the winner who looked around to see if there were any more opponents. When our eyes met, the first thing that entered my mind was a quote from Oscar Wilde, She lacks the indefinable charm of weakness. She pulled up a stool beside her and tapped on it twice with her hands. I took a few steps forward. Before sitting down I noticed that she was on the last level facing the boss, apparently someone tried to step in as she was going through her routine of practicing beating this game, I knew I had no chance, but at least she was hot. I sat down ignoring the smell of her perfume, put in the quater, and was directed to the character select screen. I didn't know who to pick from or where to begin. I had three choices, 2 too many. I started looking for Ryu hoping that I would be able to remember my street fighter moves, fortunately there was Akuma and Ken, I chose both. The last character was wolverine. While selecting the characters, I was allowed to choose what type of assists to help my fighter, I didn't even know what the assists did. Her three choice were Cable, Magneto, and a Sentinel, I knew I was in trouble. The screen loaded to the opening round, Ready, Fight. For the first time in my life, I began to pray. text/html 2010-03-06T11:00:20+01:00 http://breakmanx.com http://breakmanx.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=846&Itemid=2 There are so many franchise games being put out there these days. So many.Hollywood and Video Game makers are similar in that regard; they are ever on the lookout for remakes and adaptations they can make because its cheaper to run off of an existing fan-base than to advertize a new idea. Sometimes it works (Batman: Arkham Asylum) and sometimes it fails horribly (Street Fighter: The Movie: The Game). And despite those failures, we keep buying in, time and time again, for the hope that this time we'll see our heroes done right.After all, there's nothing more fun than being, say, Spider-Man, without having to worry about all of that 'Great Responsibility' bullshit.But, despite the hundreds of sequels and franchise games being pumped out month after month, there are some real missed opportunities out there. There are properties with rabid, built-in fan bases that would be the perfect cornerstone of a viral marketing campaign, that are largely untouched by the game world. Or, even worse, they had a game but something went horribly awry, and the game was unfinished, or maybe even a complete piece of garbage when it DID finally come out.I present to you now, five great game ideas that have been overlooked, criminally, for years. Lets hope someone's paying attention out there...Dr. Strange- Straight from the pages of your favorite comic, presented in the Mighty Marvel Manner!Doc Strange has been in a couple games before, but never his own title. In fact, out of the Ultimate Alliance series, Strange has been relegated to a side character, or a plot device in a cut-scene at best. Marvel's failure to develop an on-going series or a movie for this character is sadly matched by the gaming world.But what a game the Doctor could have! As a brilliant neurosurgeon turned sorcerer, the game could have a dash of Trauma Center for dramatic effect, and the rest of the game could be new types of mystical action that push the boundaries of what your gaming system. Not only could you do battle with some of Marvel's nastiest, and most frighting villains, but you could spend time flying through tremendous, alien, 3-D dimensions, battling monsters that wish to conquer the 616 Earth.I picked Dr. Strange as a front runner, as magic itself is sorely misrepresented in games so far. The energy blasting, flying, future reading, reality warping possibilities of magic could make for some really tricky action/puzzle play, and lead to an adventure that is psychedelic and mind-bending. And what do we get? All the magicians we ever see in video games are relegated to firing energy beams; they're so generic. Magician Lord was awesome back on the Neo Geo, guys, but its 20-years later. Lets see what you can do.The Dungeons and Dragons series is a good start for Wizards, but one read through the early Dr. Strange comics of Steve Ditko and Stan Lee will show you the boundless possibilities of magic done right.Cthulhu Mythos- This property had a game come out, but sadly it was not well received. But when I think of Mythos games, I don't tend to think of Dark Corners of the Earth, rather, I think of Eternal Darkness.ED was arguably the best game on the Gamecube, but also under-appreciated. This game was the forerunner M-rated game on an otherwise very juvenile system, and it was a rough transition. those who took the time to find a copy have never forgotten the terror and mystery, the literal madness, of Eternal Darkness.With Horror games having cinched a major spot in video gaming, with titles like FEAR and Resident Evil, its remarkable no one else has tried to take the reigns of the Mythos monsters, created by H P Lovecraft, and make horrific and entertaining video games from them. Though he wasn't a prolific writer by the standards of some of today's writers, the concepts Lovecraft came up with are still pushing the boundaries of the human imagination, and in creative hands, could be the most frightening games ever! You see many of his ideas bleed over, inspiring other series, Afraid of the Dark coming to mind first, but stories themselves are untapped and boundless resources.Bone- Bone is a property that has been left sadly untouched since its original creation, a comic book from acclaimed writer Jeff Smith. But recently, Bone was reprinted in a series of hardback, easy to read digests. Bone's kid-friendly content caught the eye of Scholastic, who has been putting them in school libraries all over. Now the kids in the libraries are taking time to read them in schools all across America. Its taken ages for Bone to circulate properly, but now its in the hands of the youth, building that fanbase. The comic series was a runaway hit when it came out in the '90s, and this new resurgence in the hands of a fresh generation are bringing back whispers of an animated film.And why not? Bone is easily one of the best comics ever printed, a real masterwork. It features the 3 Bone cousins, who make, at first, comical characters, lost in the woods, racing cows, and fighting off Rat-men at every corner. As the story progresses though, it becomes more and more epic, and soon Bone is taking up arms to fight a horde of monsters something like that of Sauron's army from Lord of the Rings.Story-telling like this naturally lends itself to video games. This is the kind of tale video game writers try to grasp constantly, and often fail at. Fun, quirky, comical, the early stages of the tale are fun and light and make you fall in love with the characters, so much so that at the end, you can feel every hit your characters take, and their mission feels important in your hands. Imagine a game that feels like Mario at the beginning, fun and whimsical, battling silly monsters and finding treasures and hidden jokes along the way, but as you progress, the world grows darker, and the fight more deadly and serious.If you want a good basis for a game, companies need to look no further than the adventures of Phone Bone and his battle with the Locust King.Dr. Who- The Doctor, that nameless, immortal, time-traveling hero from the end of existence would make the perfect video game hero. There was an effort to make a game of him a few years ago, but it came out as a lame PC card-game program. Travesty. Dr Who is the Superbowl of Sci-fi, being easily the highest rated British TV show ever, and its episodes from 1980's 'City of Death' arc remain the highest rated fiction shows in the UK to this day. The Doctor deserves better than he's gotten.The possibilities are literally endless. The Doctor's TARDIS (a time machine disguised as a Police Box) can travel anywhere in space and time, guiding him where he's needed. If you want to battle the Aztecs over a cursed gem, you've got it. Robot Men come to the present from another world to destroy mankind? The Doctor is on it. How about a trip to another world that lies in the far future on the edge of a dying star, and you need to save the inhabitants. Literally, if you can think it, the Doctor can do it; its the perfect set-up!Dr. Who would be a thinking man's game for sure. The Doctor doesn't use guns, only his sonic screw-driver. At best, he MAYBE punches a bitch. That said, the Doctor's games would rely on puzzle solving, creative thinking, and quick-witted reflexes to survive. If anything, that's probably been the greatest challenge for game designers in putting together a Who game, they have to set aside their reliance on blowing shit to ribbons with guns as the answer to any scenario.Having the ability to alter and visit different time-lines, ala Chrono Trigger, would make for great in-game Easter Eggs, too!Captain N: The Game Master- Ah, a lost treasure from my youth. Captain N was on Saturday mornings in the halcyon days of the old NES entertainment system. This cartoon featured Kevin, a typical high school guy who's sucked into his TV, and to the land of Nintendo, where he finds that all the games on the NES co-exist peacefully in this same place... except for that bitch Mother Brain, of course, which Kevin has to fight on a weekly basis.The best part of the show was the mix of video game characters at its disposal. Its pretty rare to see companies loaning out licenses so freely, but then, it was a different time back then. You had Mega Man, Simon Belmont, Kid Icarus, Link, Bayou Billy, Donkey Kong, King Hippo, all of these classic characters crammed into one show! A lot of the plots seem fairly silly now, but there's a good number of 8-bit Nintendo gags thrown in there, and at the time it was just great to be able to watch a show with friends and share in your revelry for those early games.Just think about seeing that kind of franchise interaction in one game. Each character, Link, Mega Man, Simon, would need your help in ridding their world of Mother Brain's influence; choose who to help and when, and find yourself playing through their world. A player could find themselves fighting Dr. Wily's robots one moment, and in the middle of Castlevania the next, maybe top it off with a Zelda-style 3-D dungeon crawl. And in each of these levels, you'd find not just your usual bad guys, but a host of deadly enemies from any and all of the video game worlds. Robots popping up in Castlevania or aliens invading Donkey Kong Country! It would be the greatest tribute to that golden age of Nintendo.Sadly, despite Smash Brothers and its success, it seems unlikely all these characters will ever be able to get together under one roof. The paperwork and licensing of what have become multi-million dollar characters is far too complex anymore. But if Capcom and Konami are ever able to agree to it, maybe we can see a few of these classics together again on the screen. We got Freddy Vs Jason, didn't we? Anything can happen. There's still a few great ideas left out there, and I'm sure these five are just the tip of the iceberg. What kind of things do you want to see? The great thing about video games are the endless possibilities for adventure. text/html 2010-02-18T00:32:44+01:00 http://breakmanx.com http://breakmanx.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=845&Itemid=2 The last several years have seen the emergence of the blockbuster video game, a game usually influenced strongly by the notion of cinematic presentation of story. This line between video games and film will continue to blur, especially with the imminent release of Quantic Dream’s Heavy Rain, which, judging by early reviews, is shaping up to be an emotional roller coaster that entangles the player. Thinking Heavy Rain is meant for anything other than a niche audience is naïve, contrary to whatever hopes both QD and Sony may have for the title. However, in terms of blockbusters, Uncharted 2: Among Thieves and Modern Warfare 2 instantly spring to mind. What interests me most is the execution of both games in terms of action set pieces and how they add up to vastly different experiences, at least in terms of satisfaction. I’ll save the instant gratification people a read: Uncharted 2 stomps all over Modern Warfare 2 in how it handles the action the player experiences, and is the stronger of the two games because of it. First, allow me to backtrack / cover my ass. These two games have predecessors that I enjoy far too much. Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare and Uncharted both rank near the top of my personal favorites from this console cycle. I share this to show that I didn’t wander into the successors with unreasonable or inexperienced expectations. Once the dust settled, I preferred Uncharted 2 to Uncharted, but ended disappointed in Modern Warfare 2 as it fell short of the near perfection for a run-and-gun FPS established in CoD4. Upon further examination, I found it was the incorporation of the action pieces, those moments where the game excels its normal gameplay formula, that affected my overall opinion of the games. Specifically, the motivation of these moments. Both games drop the players in a variety of adrenaline pumping situations, from the scaling of a train car over the side of a cliff to an attempt to reclaim the White House from an enemy army. However, the moments in Uncharted 2 feel, in my opinion, motivated by the game’s story, while Modern Warfare 2 feels more like a string of “wouldn’t it be cool if…” ideas generated at an Infinity Ward meeting. Yes, it is easy to imagine that all great gameplay moments spring from those ideas, but actually incorporating them into the story takes skill, and both these developers have that skill. Call of Duty 4 worked as a whole because all the events contained within felt like they were working towards a greater story goal; namely, the prevention of a full blown war. Modern Warfare 2 eschews this build towards a climax by having an unstoppable enemy force invade the U.S. in the comfort of a cutscene. This moment in the plot is justified by my actions a few levels before, in which I participated in a terrorist act. These moments, one of which feels like a more intimate (in terms of character / player relations) and personal moment (in case you’re curious, I am talking about the airport shooting) and follows it with an impersonal full blown assault throughout suburbia. However, the first doesn’t feel sufficiently powerful enough to justify the second, thus leaving the player (in my experience) scratching their head and feeling unstatisfied. Compare this to the moment in Call of Duty 4 when you are storming the bunkers and see the missiles launch. It is such a heart pounding moment, since you’ve been working the whole game to prevent this moment, yet you’ve possibly failed. That affects me more than random engagements set in historical locales. Uncharted 2, on the other hand, makes you strive for payoff. The game makes you want to progress, because you’ll be damned if all the events you’ve suffered through were in vain. While you want to stop Makarov and the “surprise” villain in Modern Warfare 2 on the simple grounds that they’re “bad”, Uncharted 2 makes it personal by compounding hellhole upon hellhole, an almost unyielding build to a climax that you feel that you’re always progressing towards. I’m actually trying to strive away from examples in order to avoid spoiling any moment of gameplay or story, which I feel is hurting my argument (though, if you haven’t played Uncharted or Uncharted 2 and you own a PS3, there is no excuse). In my experience with narrative driven games, the more you make the player feel like they’re interacting and experiencing the world and adventure of the character, the better the game. Modern Warfare 2 is a fantastic FPS, but one I ultimately found disappointing. Maybe it was because I played it immediately after Uncharted 2, or maybe it was because the sense of importance in my actions from the first game was so good. There should never be a moment where the player questions why they’re doing what they’re doing in the story. This isn’t to say that a game shouldn’t have questions in its plot, but I shouldn’t wonder why I’ve gone from one level to another that the game is telling me are directly related. This moment never occurs in Uncharted 2, which brings to mind George Mallory’s response to the question of why he climbed Everest: “Because it is there.” Uncharted 2 forces the player towards many mountains (some actual mountains), and I climbed them because they were there. text/html 2010-02-17T21:41:27+01:00 http://breakmanx.com http://breakmanx.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=844&Itemid=2 Does poor video game box art push you over the edge so much that you refuse to buy a game? Does it affect sales? That is a question that comes to mind whenever I see another wonderful game get the American treatment of shitty box art. One recent game to do this is Yakuza 3. With such an emphasis on open and cinematic gameplay, the cover the art depicts the game in a horrible light. Out is the slick and stylish black and white japanese boxart with a view of Kamurocho blistfully in the background, with a close up of the in-game model of the main character's face in it's place for the American version.Another example of this is ICO. If you live under a rock, ICO was an beautiful atmospheric puzzle game released on the PS2 in 2001. Once again the american artwork looks like a pre-teen made for TV disney movie, with a full close up of the game's main protagonists posing and ready for action. The japanese art on the other hand, looks like a piece of artwork you would hang your wall. Do americans really tend to buy a game based on this style of cover art? Maybe they misread their audience and felt this style of box art with bring children to beg their mothers to buy the game with box with horns and the giant stick.Perhaps I'm over analyzing this whole topic. While I'm not gonna refuse to buy a copy over it's box art anytime soon, I'm sure any gamer would love to have a box art they can show off to others and not be embarrassed over. However, in this day and age, most companies are allowing gamers to download and print out different covers for their games. Sony is currently planning on this for this release of Heavy Rain which also got the American treatment. This is a trend I like and I hope more companies follow suit. text/html 2010-02-17T01:00:28+01:00 http://breakmanx.com http://breakmanx.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=843&Itemid=2 Dragon Age Origins vs. the MMORPG Who doesn’t like a good old fashion role playing game (RPG)? The gaming community in the last decade has been overrun by the increasingly popular massively multiplayer online role playing game (MMORPG) genre. This style of gameplay has lead the classic gamer astray, where once a solitary elf could peacefully rend justice against a horde of the undead, s/he now requires 24 of his or her virtual “friends” in order to defend herself/himself. This forced social behavior has a new enemy in Dragon Age Origins, the new Bioware game released late in 2009. This solitary RPG touted by Bioware as a “Dark fantasy epic” has won over the playing time of many a digital gamer. As many stories of this type begin the main character is a somewhat exceptional young member of his or her society who is shaped by the retreat from that society and into another. In the case of this game the “Gray Wardens” provide that new home. The Gray Wardens are a foreign band of militants that rely on their fabled ability to defeat the mythical “Blight”, in order to have freedom of movement throughout the world of Tedas. This game provides a stark contrast to that of MMRPG’s in that once again a gamer can enjoy to solitude of ripping through evil minions without being forced to deal with n00bs running up and asking them for gold, or pug’s who don’t know how to play their class and then ninja all of the loot. Dragon age Origins provides a light at the end of the darkness with both the classic party style game play of Baudur’s Gate, or the freedom to focus your control on a single character and pre program the rest of your parties tactics into the game. Thank you Bioware, for at least the temporary freedom you provide us from the clutches of the MMORPG’s or this world. text/html 2010-02-17T00:45:56+01:00 http://breakmanx.com http://breakmanx.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=842&Itemid=2 The Internet seems to have been set aflame by the possibility of new Nintendo hardware to be announced at their media summit on the 24th. I think there will be new hardware, but it will likely be something we already know about; Vitality Sensor, DS xL etc. Nintendo will hold off with the big guns until E3... AT LEAST. With the Wii still doing strong, even though it is not as strong as it was, Nitntendo will hold onto the Wii train for at least another year. Also, everyone has a DS, why change everything up now.Nintendo has a very similar position to what they had in the NES days and they were quite content to hold on to that until they absolutely needed to move on and I see this situation to be very similar. The stranglehold will not be released until their victims begin to loosen their icy grip from their wallets. As a last resort, the DS slightly better and the Wiimproved will be announced. ....And we will all buy it. This article seems negative, but we are all very excited to see what Nintendo has to show us on the 24th, and at E3. There has to be at least one big announcement in the next few months, as well as some trailers of stuff we know are coming; Metroid Other M, Zelda. Then of course there will be some Wii Music-esque disasters... but we will happily ignore them and do our Nintendo happy dance... and for that my excitement grows.