Assassin’s Creed III: Liberation – Review (Vita)

Liberation has long been hyped as one of the ‘saviours’ of Playstation Vita (the others being Call Of Duty: Black Ops Declassified and Persona 4: The Golden). Offering a scaled down Assassin’s Creed experience to better suit the handheld style of play, does it do enough to shine?

The good news is that Liberation is a very solid game. Telling the story of Aveline de Grandpré, an assassin in New Orleans in 1765, it sees the series take on a female main character for the first time. Aveline is modelled really well and has some really great animation – especially her fluid movement through trees, which mirrors Connor’s animation in the full PS3 Assassin’s Creed III.

I found the story of Liberation to be pretty engrossing for the most part and Aveline as a character was fun to control. The game uses a new idea in terms of disguise – you have three different ‘personas’ available as you play, each with individual abilities.

The ‘Lady’ will not attract much attention from guards and can also charm characters into talking to her/following her. However she can’t climb. The ‘Assassin’ has the normal abilities of an assassin and will raise attention in guards very quickly. And the ‘Slave’ persona allows Aveline to blend into crowds of the poor and also pass for a servant/slave to gain access to restricted areas.

This gives you a fair bit of freedom to approach missions in different ways (although certain missions require you to use a specific outfit) and another thing I really enjoyed about Liberation was that it brought back a more stealthy element of play.

Unfortunately you still have your usual open world glitches, such as people spawning into the game in front of you, characters stuck on geometry and just random odd things. This isn’t limited to Liberation of course, lots of open world titles suffer similar issues and actually the game does have a small get out clause in that Liberation is a game created by Asbergo (the fictional bad guy company from the Assassin’s Creed series). Yes, you’re playing a game within a game Very Inception isn’t it?

The touch controls are fairly intuitive, you open letters that Aveline finds by running your finger and thumb across the front/back of the Vita touch screen/pad together. Once you kill a few enemies you can activate ‘Chain Kill’ which pauses the action and lets you highlight enemies by touching them – Aveline will then despatch them in turn. Sadly my Vita bugbear returns… ‘Hold the Vita to a bright light source to see the note/letter.’ This should always be optional in my opinion, not very convenient when on the train or in the office

There is also a little bit of cross-over with the PS3 version if you link your Vita to Assassin’s Creed III on PS3. You get a playable mission as Connor and unlock his Tomahawk, along with a few other bits.

Overall Liberation is a good, fun experience. It’s certainly one of the better Vita games out there at the moment and if you like Assassin’s Creed it’s well worth checking out. I won’t know for sure until I finish Assassin’s Creed III (I’m halfway through) but at this stage I prefer Liberation to Assassin’s Creed III, which is pretty surprising and speaks to the quality of the Vita game.

Rating: 8/10

Dishonored – Review (PS3)

Dishonored puts you in the shoes of Corvo Attano – Royal Protector (Bodyguard) of Empress Jessamine Kaldwin. You arrive back from a trip abroad investigating potential cures for the plague that is ravaging your city, only to find yourself framed for the murder of the Empress and thrown in jail.

As you escape, try to clear your name and find Emily, the Empress’ daughter, you’ll take on the role of assassin rather than protector. Corvo receives a boost of supernatural proportions which allows you to unlock various powers, such as freezing time, teleporting or possessing enemies.

Sadly this array of powers leads to one of the more confusing aspects of the game design – the second ‘tier’ of these powers is so steep in cost that if you choose to back one power you will miss out on lots of the others. So you’ll need to make that choice early on or spend an extended amount of time during the game to find the runes scattered about the level.

I understand wanting to keep a reign on the player’s power so they don’t just get everything too early in the game but I felt disappointed that I didn’t get a chance to try out some of the powers at all because of my choice of levelling up one power. I do see that they don’t want it to be too easy but I genuinely feel all the powers at the lowest level should have been unlocked during the story playthrough.

My gripe with power design aside, Dishonored is pretty good fun. Depending on the powers available to you and your approach to the missions (in terms of where/how you get into buildings/areas etc) you can have some varied playthroughs. Add to that the numerous ways you can kill characters (or non-lethally complete the missions) and the chances are you and your friends will have all completed the same mission in a different way.

The game also features a morality meter of sorts in it’s ‘Chaos’ system. The more people you kill, the higher the Chaos rating per mission. This accumulates over missions and eventually contributes to which of the three game endings you’ll get. However it should be noted that Dishonored’s endings are more in line with Bioshock 2′s subtlety different endings as opposed to something with drastic changes likes Heavy Rain.

While the game has a strong graphical style I actually wasn’t overly impressed with the visuals themselves. Some of the water effects didn’t look that great and on occasion the game just didn’t look as sharp as I would’ve expected. The style of the game is a positive though, despite those graphical issues.

Dishonored looked like being one of the freshest, inventive games of the year – unfortunately the design choice of not allowing you to unlock more on your first playthrough hinders things somewhat. It’s a good, solid, rewarding experience but I was just left feeling it could have been so much more.

Rating: 7/10

Borderlands 2 – Review (PS3)

I really enjoyed the first Borderlands but I think even it’s biggest fans would admit it had some issues. The enemy AI wasn’t great and it took a *long* time for the game to get going. Quite frankly the less said about the ending the better but as a whole the title was good solid fun and it sold a huge amount of copies.

So Gearbox Software greenlit a sequel, with the blueprint (based on the trailers) seemingly being bigger, funnier, crazier and just generally better.

Rather than directly continuing the stories of Brick, Lillith, Roland and Mordecai from the original game, Borderlands 2 uses those characters as non-playable ‘mission-givers’ which grants it a nice feeling of familiarity to anyone who played the previous Borderlands title.

This time out you’ll have a choice of Salvador (Gunzerker), Zer0 (Assassin), Maya (Siren) or Axton (Commando). In addition to the four characters that come with the game a fifth, Gaige (Mecromancer), was added as DLC if you want to try something different.

Each of the characters brings something different to the playing field and mixing in the variables for shields/weapons/relics etc means that it’s unlikely two people, even playing the same class, will have similar characters.

The story isn’t the best narrative experience out there but it’s funny, well written and does the job it needs to… giving you a reason to travel to different places, kill stuff and pick up loot.

The game was built for co-op (up to 4 players) and when you get a few of your friends online to blast through some missions, Borderlands 2 is in it’s element. You’ll get to see your friend’s true colours as well – though it’s not like anyone would stop reviving a fallen colleague to grab some more loot, would they @jtdangerman?

Borderlands 2 can definitely be played on your own but for the full experience get some friends together and explore Pandora to your hearts content.

The environments are more varied than the first game and you are thrown into the deep end pretty much from the off here, which is a good thing.

Borderlands 2′s cartoon aesthetic and larger than life characters give the game a unique and very fun feel. The player characters and AI are well balanced and the game is really solid. I encountered only two problems (one technical – stuck under the map and one map design – we had no idea where to go next) during my entire 25+ hours with the game. For a game of this size that is fairly impressive.

I can’t recommend Borderlands 2 enough – Gearbox have improved on the original in almost every way and have delivered a fantastic open world first person shooter. Now, where’s that DLC *downloads*.

Rating: 10/10

Sleeping Dogs – Review (PS3)

Sleeping Dogs had a troubled development – starting life as a new game in the ‘True Crime’ series before being abandoned by Activision and picked up, sans title, by Square Enix. Initial footage looked promising but could developers United Front (makers of Modnation Racers) deliver a great, open world experience?

The short answer is yes and I’ll go into more detail on why…

Firstly Sleeping Dogs is hugely fun. It’s been a while since I played an open world game so over the top that I had a grin permanently attached while playing (that honour goes to Just Cause 2). While the game does have some serious moments, which I thought were handled quite well, this is a title in which you drive the narrative forward by hijacking cars from an already moving vehicle or beating up numerous enemies with some kickass kung fu.

The combat feels good, once you get into the rhythm needed for counters you won’t look back and some of the more brutal moves you can learn will make you wince on behalf on your victim. Then there are the environmental kills – activated by using items around you (an electric fan or the protruding nose of a dead swordfish) to impale, maim or just downright kill enemies.

You play as Wei Shen, an undercover cop in Hong Kong trying to bust the triad gangs. This gives you a nice game mechanic in terms of mission type. You can do side missions for the cops or the triads, which will raise your XP in each area and grant you new moves for fighting or disarming enemies. There are also a third set of missions that you do for just random folks on the street that raises your ‘Face’ meter. This gives you a damage bonus in combat and also unlocks different outfits for Wei Shen.

The game floats between Wei taking down bad guys as a cop and dishing out some pretty brutal beatings as a triad. Occasionally things felt a little forced in one direction or the other but in general the game gives you enough to do so if you want to take a break from the story you easily can.

The voice acting is top notch, with great performances from Tom Wilkinson, Lucy Liu, Emma Stone and Will Yun Lee, who plays Wei Shen. Shen’s voice acting is really well done and even the smaller characters are convincing.

There is no online as such but the game automatically compares various stats with your friends and will remind you what needs to be beaten as you do different activities.

Something that struck me as out of the ordinary for a game of this style was that you don’t get a gun (or encounter many armed enemies) until you’re about 2 or 3 hours into the game. This grants Sleeping Dogs a refreshing feel as you rely on the hand to hand combat for the early sections of the game. Even when you do get a gun you’ll often find yourself sticking with hand to hand, especially against big groups of enemies.

Overall, Sleeping Dogs is a fantastic game. It does lack a little bit of polish – there are some jagged edges here and there – but I found it to be an engaging and hugely fun to play game. Square Enix did a great job of picking this game up off the dumpster and releasing a really strong title. If you like open world games this is the perfect title to tide you over while the world waits to find out when we will finally get our hands on Grand Theft Auto V.

Rating: 9/10

Spec Ops: The Line – Review (PS3)

Once in a while a game will show up out of the blue and knock your socks off. Spec Ops: The Line is one of those games but maybe not for the reasons you might think.

Spec Ops: The Line tells the story of Captain Martin Walker, a soldier who is part of a squad sent into Dubai to investigate the failed evacuation of citizens by an army squad called ‘The 33rd.’ As things quickly unravel you find yourself under attack from all directions and hampered by the constant threat of sandstorms.

You see this isn’t present day Dubai but an alternate version in which the country has been decimated by sandstorms that have left thousands stranded and desperate behind the ‘Storm Wall’ – a huge permanent sandstorm that has disrupted communication and stopped travel in (or out) of the area.

I won’t spoil the story for you here as it is the best thing about the game – this isn’t a title you’ll come out of brimming with joy and with a smile on your face but it really is one of the best stories I’ve played through in the last few years. And while a couple of the twists were a touch obvious, for the most part I didn’t anticipate many of them.

The gameplay itself is solid but unspectacular and you’ll spend a lot of time in cover popping out to take down enemies. One thing I liked about the game was the feel of the weapons, with some of the more powerful ones genuinely delivering an appropriate sense of recoil and a real kick.

The setting is pretty stunning and the sand tech is well realised. I was personally more impressed with the way the game portrayed the intense heat of the environment, with harsh sunlight and a nice shimmer on surroundings.

Speaking of the sand, one of the game mechanics they showed off lots in pre-release media was the ability to shoot out windows/glass roofs to take out enemies. However in the final product that is all fairly scripted stuff and doesn’t factor in greatly.

A quick shout out is needed on the music front as I felt Spec Ops really delivered on that note. A great soundtrack and paced perfectly. Also the voice acting is superb. I thought it might be an issue having Nolan North (of Nathan Drake/Uncharted fame) in the lead role but after the first 20 minutes or so I completely forgot he was even voicing the character.

The game is fairly tough and isn’t afraid to throw a large number of difficult to deal with enemies at you all at once. My main gripe with the combat was the enemy grenades. They felt too overpowered and I didn’t think the game did enough to warn me when they were nearby, or maybe more accurately it didn’t warn me quickly enough. I died a lot of times unnecessarily because of that.

Spec Ops makes a comment on the shooter genre, taking several pot shots during loading screens and differentiates itself from games like Call Of Duty and Battlefield by giving you several ‘moral’ choices during the story. Unlike games such as Infamous, where the choice is simply good or bad, in Spec Ops you’re choosing between bad or bad. There is no right or wrong answer. So who do you punish? Who do you sacrifice? I would love to see more games give you this kind of choice as opposed to the more straight forward options we usually get.

Another great addition in this game is the degradation of your character and squad over the course of the game. This is something that I can’t believe hasn’t been done before in this genre. The Batman games attempted something similar in terms of Batman’s appearance changing during the game but here, as well as physical changes, you and your squad take a psychological battering as well.

Late in the game, when your character finally takes down a heavy enemy and screams an expletive he is echoing the cry of gamers across the globe when defeating a tough enemy. Even reloading calls are shouted through gritted teeth further on in the game. It just makes the game feel incredibly visceral.

I didn’t touch the multiplayer as even the developers have said it was forced upon them by the publisher and brings nothing to the table. This is a game that *definitely* didn’t need multiplayer.

Spec Ops: The Line might not be for everyone and the gameplay might not be anything special but it has a great, interesting story and makes a decent comment on today’s shooter genre.

Rating: 9/10

NB. If you do play and finish the game I’d strongly recommend checking out this interview with the writer of the game (contains massive spoilers): GAMESPOT INTERVIEW

Ghost Recon: Future Soldier – Review (PS3)

Ghost Recon: Future Solider puts you in the boots of a member of the Ghost Recon squad ‘Hunter.’ After a bomb denotes and wipes out another squad, ‘Predator’, you are assigned the task of finding out who set the bomb off and where it came from.

So far, so military third person shooter. What supplements the usual gameplay here is that because the game is set in the near future the developer has given you a few ‘toys’ to play with.

Active camouflage is probably one you’ve seen in other games (most notably the Metal Gear Solid series) but it’s done well here and comes in very handy when making your way into enemy territory. You also have UAV drones that can scout/mark targets, a big hulking robot walker that looks a bit like ED-209 from Robocop and a few other, less impressive, gadgets.

The gameplay is solid, this is a third person based shooter that also features an iron sight view for those that want it. It reminded me of SOCOM 4 in terms of control and feel but obviously having those extra gadgets makes it a different beast to play through.

There were times when the game dragged a little – that troublesome 2nd act around halfway through that trips up a lot of games – but for the most part Future Soldier was a really enjoyable experience. I didn’t see any of the techincal issues/glitches that we reported in early reviews of the game but I suspect most of that will have been patched out by now.

The online is good fun but with so many other great third person shooter multiplayer games out there (Uncharted 3/Mass Effect 3/Max Payne 3) I just don’t think there was enough to tempt me into coming back and really putting some serious time into the online experience.

Overall I would recommend Ghost Recon: Future Soldier if you enjoy third person action games. It’s not a title that will blow you away but it’s a really solid, enjoyable experience.

Rating: 8/10

Need For Speed: The Run – Review (PS3)

I hadn’t played a Need For Speed game for years as they didn’t really interest me. Then I played the demo of Hot Pursuit back in 2010 and, while I didn’t go on to get the full game, I found it to be a very enjoyable experience.

When EA announced that the follow up game would be The Run, a Cannonball Run style race across the US, I was a lot more intrigued.

Then all of a sudden we were seeing scenes where the character was out of the car and the player was taking part in Quick Time Events to progress the story. It looked completely out of whack with what you’d expect from a driving game.

However, knowing that EA had done a great job of bringing a story element to Fight Night Champion, I was willing to give it a chance.

So first off, let me say the cut scene Quick Time Events are minimal and, while not bad, don’t add anything to the game. Need For Speed: The Run is strongest when you’re behind the wheel.

The cars handle well and this is definitely the arcade style of driving. You’ll have great fun power sliding a Porsche through corners as you swerve to avoid oncoming traffic.

Unfortunately the pace of the game feels a little off. Some ‘levels’ are, literally, minutes long which wouldn’t be so bad if the game didn’t suffer from horrendous load times. I could accept this if it only happened the first time you get to a level. But if you fail and have to restart you’re treated to another loading screen for anywhere between 30 seconds and a minute. Annoying doesn’t cover it.

There is a good, but limited, selection of cars which all look fantastic. The Run does look really nice and some of the set pieces (racing against an avalanche for example) showcase the Frostbite engine that works so well for the Battlefield game series.

Occasionally I found that I hit a wall in terms of difficulty. Whatever I did I just couldn’t make it through one particular section. It was extremely frustrating but is something that happens across most driving games of this style at some point (Driver: San Francisco I’m looking at you). However the load times I mentioned above make it ridiculously annoying in The Run.

The story is much of a muchness and was a bit too serious for my liking. It left me wondering whether EA might’ve been better to just go the opposite direction and create a cast of deep, colourful characters to race against. If they’d taken a bit more inspiration from Cannonball Run this could’ve been a great title.

Don’t get me wrong, The Run is a fun game and you’ll have a good time playing it for the most part. The load times and odd difficulty spike do have an impact but the biggest issue I had with the game was walking away from it thinking it was one hell of a wasted opportunity to create something a little more unique.

Rating: 7/10

Assassin’s Creed: Revelations – Review (PS3)

Assassin’s Creed: Revelations was met with a slightly mixed response when it was announced. Mainly because it was only a year since Brotherhood had hit shelves and people were concerned the series might end up stuck in a Call Of Duty style yearly release cycle.

The game continues Ezio Auditore da Firenze’s tale while linking in Altair from the original game, meaning that Revelations rounds the story out nicely in anticipation of Assassin’s Creed III, which is released in November.

Ezio now finds himself in Constantinople and is on the trail of a set of keys that unlock a hidden fortress, in which Altair hid a weapon so powerful it could finally end the war between the Templars and the Assassins.

The gameplay is fairly similar to the last few games with the new addition of a tower defence style mini game. I only played it once in the mandatory main mission as it wasn’t of any interest to me. I don’t really feel it was needed but thankfully if you’re not bothered you’ll only need to do it once.

One of the few additions to make a difference is the Hookblade which, as well as aiding in combat, can also be used to climb up buildings quicker and, in certain locations, be used as a zipline between buildings. It genuinely increases the speed at which you can traverse the environment and is a welcome new accessory.

You can still buy shops and banks etc and build up your portfolio of property, which increases the money you’ll earn. You’ll be spending time capturing districts and running all over town, as well as completing the main story missions. There is a lot to do and plenty to keep you entertained but you can’t escape the feeling you’ve seen it all before.

Assassin’s Creed: Revelations is the third Assassin’s Creed title in as many years and the burn is beginning to show. Thankfully Assassin’s Creed III (with a new game engine, character and setting) is just around the corner and looks set to revitalise the series.

Revelations is a good, solid game that does build a little on what went (recently) before. It closes out Ezio’s story in an interesting way but does little to really advance Desmond’s story. If you’re a fan and not burnt out on Assassin’s Creed then you’ll love this. I enjoyed it but I am definitely ready for a change of scenery.

Rating: 7/10

The Darkness II – Review (PS3)

I didn’t play the original Darkness game, though I heard mainly positive things about it. It happened to come along at a time when I was snowed under with other games and it was one of the titles to get left behind.

There were some questions regarding the sequel as it was handed to a different developer (Digital Extremes) and people were wondering whether they could capture the spirit of the first game and comic book series.

Jackie Estacado is once again the main character of the game and following the events of the previous title he now finds himself as ‘Don’ of the Franchetti family. The Darkness II is set two years after the last game and Jackie has been doing a great job of keeping the ‘Darkness’ (a hugely powerful supernatural presence) under wraps.

As the game kicks off, with a wonderful opening sequence, Jackie finds himself close to death and releases the Darkness once more – dealing devastating damage to his enemies and allowing him to recover quickly from his injuries. From there on out you’ll guide Jackie through various scrapes and even make some choices that can affect the outcome of the game.

The Darkness II plays like your average first person shooter… right up until the moment your release the Darkness. The power manifests itself as two demon snake-like tentacles. Controlled with L2 and R2 (L2 to grab an enemy, R2 to swipe an attack at them) this means you have twice as much firepower as usual and can hand out some serious beatings to the onslaught of enemy thugs.

Although it sounds like a lot to concentrate on, it soon becomes second nature to grab an enemy with the Darkness and use one of the face buttons to rip him in half, all the while shooting at other enemies using R1. Pressing a face button while an enemy is grabbed will activate an execution animation which, depending on the button, will net you a health bonus, more ammo or a piece of the enemy as a shield While the animations are limited I personally didn’t tire of them at all.

This could be down to the fantastic cell shaded art style which gives everything a great sense of sharpness. The Darkness II looks amazing and manages to keep things running smoothly, even at particularily hectic moments.

The story is well told and I think one of the more interesting campaigns I’ve played so far this year. I really liked the characters and while the end of the game wasn’t exactly a massive surprise it made sure you’ll be hooked for a third title if they make one.

One of my few complaints was that in the final third it felt like the game ran out of ideas. The steady stream of new, different enemies gave way to just more of the same enemies. One particular fire fight went on for far too long simply because the game was hurling enemies at me left, right and centre – not in a challenging way, in a frustrating way.

Unfortunately it slightly soured the overall experience for me as I felt, in the end, the game was probably an hour or so longer than it needed to be. Cut a few of those elongated fire fights out and the campaign would’ve been nearly perfect.

I could go into more detail regarding the story but I don’t want to give anything away for those yet to play it. Needless to say it does some very interesting things and makes you question exactly what Jackie is doing.

The Darkness II is a hidden gem in the game releases of 2012, I’d recommend you unleash your inner darkness and give this one a shot.

Rating: 8/10

Gravity Rush – Review (PS Vita)

I wasn’t entirely convinced that Gravity Rush would be for me. It looked a bit too much like an RPG – running round town talking to people to get missions etc – and those games aren’t usually my cup of tea.

But I decided to give it a shot following some positive reviews out of Japan (where the game launched first) and I wasn’t disappointed.

Telling the story of a girl called Kat who wakes up having lost her memory (yes it’s a cliched plot device but stay with me) you discover you have the ability to shift gravity so that you can float, fly and essentially walk on any surface in the world.

Soon enough Kat finds herself helping the citizens of Heksville and trying to unlock her past. Graphically the game looks gorgeous, it’s cell-shaded design showing off some wonderful art work. Kat herself moves fluidly and despite a few issues with the camera when in tight spots I had a great time exploring Heksville and checking out some beautiful skylines.

The mechanic for manipulating gravity is well handled: a tap of R makes Kat float on the spot and you simply aim the right stick where you want to go and press R again to fly there. You can combine this with the attack button to do some real damage to the Nevi.

Nevi monsters are the main bad guys in the game, a series of weird looking alien-type creatures that Kat has to defeat. There are big boss battles but you will spend a lot of your time fighting the Nevi. Only on the odd occasion did I feel that these were used simply to stretch out a gameplay sequence. For the most part when a bunch of them were thrown at me it felt like an appropriate force of resistance.

I enjoyed the story and felt like the game was challenging without being overly punishing. The gravity mechanic lends the game a really different feel to most games out there.

If you have a Vita I strongly recommend checking this one out. There’s no multiplayer component so bear in mind that this is a single player game. It’s not perfect and occasionally camera problems hamper the experience but fantastic visuals and a distinct play style means Gravity Rush is worthy of your time.

Rating 8/10