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• Genres I'd Like to See on the Wii: 3rd Person Shooters

  Hello, developer studios? Yes, the Wii remote is motion sensitive. It's pretty nifty and I know some of you are super excited about he Motion Plus add-on. However, did you know the Wii-mote also has a pointer function? Yeah, that sensor bar thing with the infrared light. Oh? You keep forgetting about that function eh? Keep getting distracted by the wiggle waggle hmm? Well wake the hell up already because you're missing some golden opportunities! Maybe I'm a touch off base here, but it seems to me that the pointer functionality is a little bit neglected within the Wii library. Considering how superior an experience the pointer offers over the analogue stick when it comes to aiming, you'd think, you'd really think, the Wii library would abound with quality titles that take advantage of that function, and you'd be wrong. Read More... Posted Apr 16 2009, 10:00 PM by Amber Ahlborn with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: metroid, wii, fps, mega man, amber ahlborn, ratchet & clank, game design, third person shooters, jak

• Whatcha Playing: Far Cry 2

  I know, I know. This is a week of enormous wallet-destroying power, and I should probably be playing Street Fighter IV or something. I’m saving myself for tonight’s release of Noby Noby Boy, actually, but in the meantime I’ll be enjoying something a little bit more mainstream. Surely you won’t deny me the pleasure. And besides, Far Cry 2 is about the best the industry is currently offering to the typical testosterone-filled gaming male at the moment. It’s a confident and meticulously designed work that is happy to eschew the status quo for a better way. Here’s why I think Far Cry 2 is the future of the shooter.* *: Note that I am talking about the single player elements of first-person shooters only. The internet would have you believe that most people play their shooters online these days. This is a lie. The internet is where people play online shooters, so it’s not exactly an unbiased sample. Read More... Posted Feb 19 2009, 11:00 AM by Joe Keiser with | with no comments Filed under: xbox 360, fps, far cry 2, joe keiser, first-person shooters, open world shooters

• Things I Didn't Know Existed: GoldenEye: Source

  No matter how snobbish we may act about it today, if you had friends and access to video games in the late 90s, then it's likely you spent an inordinate amount of time playing GoldenEye for the N64. It's really nothing to be ashamed of; after all, until Halo came out, GoldenEye was basically the only FPS in town for consoles. Today, however, it's little more than a curious relic. Anyone going back to GoldenEye more than a decade after its release shouldn't be surprised by the slow, swimmy movement and awkward shooting mechanics of Jimmy Bond--remember, the N64 controller had no second analog stick. This means that returning to GoldenEye for an N64 nostalgia trip might not be the greatest of ideas--unless, of course, you seek out alternative methods for playing the game. And this is where GoldenEye: Source comes in. Read More... Posted Feb 10 2009, 12:00 PM by Bob Mackey with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: rare, goldeneye, fps, n64, retro, fan projects, fandom, bob mackey

• Black Mesa: Source: Oh Right, That Still Exists

  In honor of the first Half-Life's 10th anniversary, I've been thinking of replaying the original over my long-awaited Christmas break.  But now, I may hold off a bit longer after seeing the trailer for the Black Mesa: Source mod and nearly pooping myself.  I just gave you fair warning. If you've been anticipating this mod as much as I have, then you'll know that seeing this much content is pretty big news. I'm no programming genius, but I imagine it takes quite a bit of work to remake an entire game--and a pretty big one, at that--in an entirely new and more powerful engine.  The Source engine may be beginning to show its age a bit, but there's no denying this is a major step up from Valve's previous attempt to give Half-Life a minor graphical upgrade with their own Half-Life: Source.  For now, this entire production is fan-made and free, but it wouldn't be too strange for Valve to pull another Willy Wonka (as they did with the Portal team) and invite the Black Mesa: Source folks onto their team.  As of now, this thing legitimately looks like it's worth money. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go chug a bottle of NyQuil. When I wake up months from now, I should be greeted by both Black Mesa: Source and the Policenauts fan translation. Cheers!  (Tell my friends and family it was an accident.) Related Links: Now At Your Local Dollar Store: Half-Life Entitled PC Gamers Whine about Rights GOG is Great Read More... Posted Dec 01 2008, 08:00 PM by Bob Mackey with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: valve, half-life, fps, bob mackey, pc games, mods, black mesa: source

• Now At Your Local Dollar Store: Half-Life

  It may be hard to believe, but Half-Life, the FPS that redefined its "shoot your way out of hell while grabbing card keys" genre, is already ten years old.  Actually, since 1998 was such a monumental year of our little hobby, a hell of a lot of games turned 10 this year: Metal Gear Solid, Starcraft, Ocarina of Time, Gran Turismo, and quite a few I'm probably forgetting.  But out of all of these titles, only Half-Life can be had in these frightening modern times for the low, low price of 98 cents.  That's right; if you have a dollar in the bank and a Steam account, you can experience one of the best games ever made for less than the cost of most McDonald's menu items. There's one catch, though; this deal is only good until this Friday at noon PST--after that, Half-Life reverts to its original Steam price of $9.99 (still a good price). I'm not the biggest PC gamer of all time, but I have a gigantic man-crush on Steam.  I didn't think much of the service until it allowed me to get the entire Orange Box plus a Half-Life version of Peggle for only 40 bucks last Fall.  It also warmed my heart when I typed in the registration code on my 10 year-old Half-Life CD and found that Steam let me download it, and also every single product tangentially related to the first Half-Life for free.  Now, if only there was a way to pry those old Bullfrog titles from the sticky hands of EA... Read More... Posted Nov 20 2008, 11:00 AM by Bob Mackey with | with 1 comment(s) Filed under: half-life, fps, bob mackey, pc games, steam, 1990s, 1998, deals

• F.E.A.R. 2 and Crafting the Bigger Sequel That’s Actually Better

  It was F.E.A.R. that pulled me, for the first time in twenty years of gaming, into first-person shooters. Like everyone else, I played my fair share of id’s shooters throughout the ‘90s. But being a console gamer, my time with turn-of-the-century FPSs, games that saw the genre evolve into a serious creative force and not just “Doom clones”, was always second-hand. I downloaded the demo for F.E.A.R. off of Xbox Live just looking for something to play and was entranced. The scares weren’t exactly gripping. Spooky little girl walks down the hall and *GASP* disappears! Walk into a room that’s covered in bloooOOOoood and then *WHOA* it’s not! The action, though, was unlike anything else I’d played up until 2006 thanks to the game’s still-impressive enemy AI. Walking down a hallway with the barrel of a shotgun jutting from the base of the screen was something I was used to. Bad guys jumping through windows to avoid exploding grenades and cursing at me wasn’t. Every single encounter was dangerous and forced you to consider how you moved through the mundane office cubicles and hallways that made up the bulk of the game’s setting. Unfortunately, F.E.A.R. was a classic example of how a game needs to have more than just an excellent set of fundamental rules to be great. Despite the incredible programming that made the baddies so interesting, there wasn’t much else to F.E.A.R. Every environment was the same, the story too vague to ever really hook you. After nine hours of wandering through identical hallways and realizing I was only three-quarters of the way through the game, I shelved it, opting to watch the ending on YouTube rather than finish it myself. If the demo of F.E.A.R. 2: Project Origin I played today is indicative of the entire game, I think I’ll be finishing the whole thing this time out. Read More... Posted Nov 10 2008, 08:30 PM by John Constantine with | with 1 comment(s) Filed under: john constantine, half-life, fps, fear, monolith, project origin, fear 2, warner bros

• Movie to Game to Movie: Goldeneye

  Like everyone else who was alive in the late 90s, I played a hell of a lot of Goldeneye for the N64; as primitive as it may seem today, Rare's take on the Bond franchise was the first console shooter to make waves in a pre-Halo world. But despite the hours and hours I'd virtually murder my friends with the world's sexiest Englishman (not my definition), the source material never really interested me. At the time, I had never seen a James Bond movie, so I wasn't exactly worried if Goldeneye was a faithful movie-to-game translation. The N64 adaptation could have included a Kart racing level, and I wouldn't have known any better. All these years later, it's safe to say that I have Rare's version of Jimmy Bond's adventure inscribed in my brain where so much useful knowledge could be, so I thought it would be a surreal experiment to finally sit down and watch the movie I had already had a great amount of exposure to, albeit in a different form. It was weird. Read More... Posted Sep 26 2008, 12:00 PM by Bob Mackey with | with no comments Filed under: rare, goldeneye, fps, movies, n64, bob mackey

• The Art of Gore in Project Origin

  There are many, many first-person shooting games. Doom was the ship that launched a fleet of thousands fifteen years ago and, since its release, a lot has changed in the genre. Engrossing narratives (Bioshock), ever evolving team play (Team Fortress, Counterstrike, etc.), the capacity for sociopolitical commentary (Call of Duty 4). But, as the old folks say, the more things change, the more they stay the same. First-person shooters are still about shooting and, like their ancestor Doom, are very pre-occupied with blood. Loathe as I am to admit it, I’m still pretty engaged by it myself. I find bombastic, gory violence deeply satisfying in my entertainment, often as much as a perfectly portrayed human relationship or an honest, unsentimental depiction of emotion. Like anything else in fantasy, it’s the heady experience of the unreal that satiates. Blood’s just another type of icing. Mark Wood, developer Monolith’s FX artist extraordinaire, has written up a short essay on the process of creating blood effects for Project Origin and it's a fascinating read. Read More... Posted May 22 2008, 03:00 PM by John Constantine with | with no comments Filed under: john constantine, fps, doom, counterstrike, fear, monolith, project origin, team fortress