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There was a fairly bonkers sale on games at Amazon.co.uk earlier on in the week. Not sure if it's still running, but it's worth having a look - there were some ridiculous bargains hidden away there.
Grabbed myself Metal Gear Solid 3. Can't play it yet, though, because the left analogue stick on my third party controller's lost all its spring. Boo. Had a quick fiddle, and it looks just as ace as the previous two games - the fourth wall-breaking little touches seem to be in place (die and, as it's a prequel to the other games in the series, the 'Game Over' message slowly morphs into 'Time Paradox') and the intro movie is as stunningly directed as ever. To see it running, you wouldn't believe it's on the PS2. Really looking forwards to getting my other pad back off the brother so I can spend some time with this.
Also, the Xbox version of Manhunt. Struggling to understand what the fuss was about - it's playable enough, but it's not doing anything special for me. All the stuff about it being disturbing just feels like so much hype when I'm actually playing it. The third person viewpoint, the way that you have little to no control over your character's actions, the sudden, jolting switch to a totally seperate camera angle when the brutality goes down - these things only serve to leave me totally detached from proceedings. It uses the Xbox communicator in a funky way, letting you hear your orders through the headphone and providing you with the opportunity to divert your enemies by actually yelling at them down the mic, or coughing, or burping, or whatever (something which more stealth games should do, really), but that's not enough to make it deserving all the praise it received, as far as I'm concerned. Computerised hide and seek - an even more reductive treatment of the stealth thing than the original Splinter Cell.
But that's a slight disappointment that's more than made up for by the wonder that is Otogi 2. It's simply the most beautiful game I've ever seen - Ninja Gaiden has nothing on this. Visually even more detailed than the first. Bulked out quite a bit in the gameplay department, too - six playable characters instead of the one, some choice in the order in which you tackle levels, slightly increased RPG elements, more varied battles and missions. But really, it's the core concept that still pushes things along so smoothly. Plonk a willowy, delicate character down in a gorgeous world of falling blossoms, drifting snowflakes, lush greenery, desolate mountains and hypnotically magical lakes and then have them rip the fucker to shreds with attacks that tear the Earth's surface apart.
Aurally magnificent, too - the music is much the same as before, all minimalist Oriental pipes and strings, with the occasional "POM" of a hand slapping a drum or bit of wooden percussion, this time aided by the fact that they've included an option to play with the original Japanese vocal track and subtitles. It's not that the English translation is bad, nor that the acting is particularly poor, but the English laguage soundtrack in the previous game really missed out on some fantastically spooky effects on the voices. There the demons and ghosts were all given huge, booming speeches filled with reverb and echo. In comparison, the Japanese vocals are far more suited to the style of the visuals (especially the character design), with ghouls that whisper threats over layer upon layer of reversed voices and spider demons cursing you in tones that sound like eggs cracking.
Shows that people are still capable of pushing the Xbox further and makes a complete mockery of Microsoft being in such a rush to get the 'next generation' started. Even more so when you look at those fucking awful screenshots from Perfect Dark Zero. Yuckiness. |
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