Stuntman: Ignition

Xbox 360, Playstation 3, Playstation 2, & PSP
released August 2007

Ah Stuntman. I still have the videos I recorded of my misadventures with the original PS2 game. The original game was a brutal, unforgiving game that had you racing along set paths in a variety of vehicles in an attempt to hit a series of stunts for a feature film. It required precise timing and course memorization, and resulted in more restarts than any game I've ever played. The main portion of the game was torture, but looked pretty for it's time. The most compelling thing in the game was the stunt construction arena. It allowed you to place different ramps and destructible objects in a large arena and just go to town. I spent hours sending cars off ramps into school-buses and exploding barrels. The car damage was so extensive and realistic that I'd record them on my VCR and watch them in slow motion. Pieces and parts flying everywhere. Beautiful. Stuntman: Ignition is the next-gen follow-up, and I had high hopes for it. You see this look on my face? It's disappointment.

Where does Stuntman: Ignition go right? Well, actually, just about everywhere. The new career mode is far more forgiving than the original, allowing you to miss up to 5 stunts per run, and still have the chance of getting a perfect 5-star score. This is done by allowing players to string stunts together with various style moves such as power-slides, wheelies, jumps, and driving on 2-wheels. For you Tony Hawk Pro Skater players out there, think of this as the equivalent of adding the manual and revert moves to your trick line. They aren't very flashy, but they keep your combo going until you can find something else to grind or trick off of. This works on the same concept.

The game inspires perfection. I should stress that it inspires, but does not require perfection. If a course is just too difficult to string together, I had no problem just accepting a 3-star rating and moving onto something more fun.

However you will have those runs where you find yourself saying "I know I can string this whole thing. I know I can." Another great fix is the lack of load times between restarts. You will end up restarting it a dozen times before you actually pull it off. But thankfully, you will see no loading screens whatsoever. It's an immediate reset at the start with a 3 second countdown. It seems trivial, but the lack of load-screen between restarts was a major plus for me.

Controls are also much tighter in Ignition than it's predecessor. The new motorcycle stunts are a welcome addition, and finishing a perfect run on a bike gave me a great deal of satisfaction. The stunt-runs themselves benefit from better design as well. The previous game required pinpoint accuracy on passing through gaps, scraping other vehicles, or overtaking other drivers. Sometimes you had to learn not only where the stunt spot was, but at what angle you needed to drive through it for it to count. Ignition is far more forgiving in this area, and lead to far fewer thrown controllers.

The original game's strength mainly relied on it's visual department. This is, surprisingly, where the new game fails. In career mode, it's hardly noticeable since you're speeding through a level at breakneck speeds. But when I fired up the stunt construction arena, all the excitement the game had built up within me quickly evaporated. Each time I finished a stunt in career mode, I'd unlock a new part for the arena. Stacks of cars, ramps, billboards, etc. I spent 10 minutes preparing my elaborate death course and prepared to see the glorious power of the Xbox 360 in action as I sent my exotic car soaring into the air towards stacks of cars, semis, and gasoline barrels. I expected some evolution of the fantastic physics engine from the first game. Sadly, the car you drive is nearly indestructible, as well as the other cars you can place in the field. Boxes and gas cans break nicely, but that's about it. I was driving what I could only describe as a cardboard box with wheels. Some of the sides my get crinkled up if you hit something hard enough, but gone were the days when your car came apart at the seams.

Watch this clip of the original Stuntman constructor set, and remember this was on PS2 five years ago:


And now the only clip I could find showcasing the modern version of the constructor:


I didn't cherry-pick these either. The original Stuntman had a remarkable physics engine that made for some amazing crashes. The new one does not. This disappointed me. It seems the game itself was designed on the weakest platform it was being developed for (the Playstation Portable) and then ported up to the higher-end systems. The 360 version does have higher-resolution textures and fantastic lighting effects, but it's physics engine actually feels like it was built for the PSP.

My issues with the game don't actually take away from the fact that it is actually an excellent follow-up to the original. They've introduced an interesting stunt competition multi-player mode that might entertain some for a few hours, and I have to stress how much of an improvement the career mode has seen. The game can be finished in a few days of casual play, but for those who quest for perfection, it could last weeks. For me, the game was a rental, but I can definitely see the appeal and plan to rent it again in a few months. I just wish more time had been spent developing the stunt constructor mode.

Megaman Maverick Hunter X - review

For PSP
Released January 2006


The PSP is still struggling against the might of the Nintendo DS for it's place in the portable gaming market. Some blame the lack of quality games for this, but the more PSP games I play, the more I think this excuse just doesn't hold up. Maverick Hunter X is a perfect example of a great PSP game that has been brushed aside as everyone clamors for the newest touch-screen gimmick game. I, for one, am still a big fan of traditional gaming (I like pushing buttons, what can I say?), and Maverick Hunter X is as traditional as it gets.


Maverick Hunter X is a remake of the classic MegaMan X for the SNES. It's been completely remade with 3D graphics, but retains the level design, power-ups, and game-play of the original side-scrolling masterpiece. However, if that were all there was to it, I'd call it a rental and be done with it. After all, I played through the original dozens of times as a kid. Thankfully, Capcom jammed the disc full of extras that will please fans of the original, and entertain first-time players as well. These extras include a 30 minute prequel movie detailing the events leading up to the destruction of the city and Sigma's rise to power.

Many of the attempts in the past to animate Megaman and give him a voice have been cringe-worthy. This time, I was pleasantly surprised. It's still got a few groan moments, but overall, the voice-acting and animation are top-notch. The game script itself has also been reworked and includes the same voice-actors from the movie. A few minor changes to the script ended up creating a very interesting relationship between our hero, X, and the first boss in the game, a Boba-Fett inspired maverick named Vile. This rivalry is fleshed out in the movie sequences, and upon completion of the game, we are treated to the most satisfying extra in the package: Vile becomes a playable character.

I will keep the review of the first play-through rather brief. You play as Megaman X. You run through levels with your trusty mega-buster. You get power-ups that increase your abilities, and upgrades to your health. You fight a robot boss at the end of each level, and upon vanquishing them, you take their weapon. Rinse, repeat. In my opinion, it was the pinnacle example of Megaman game-play, and nothing has been changed about it. The real treat, however, comes from Vile's play-through.

Vile plays very differently than previous Megaman games. The closest thing I can compare it to is the Megaman Zero series, in which you play as Megaman's former partner, Zero. In Maverick Hunter X, Vile starts each level with 3 main weapons, each assigned to a different face button. Square is your typical straight ranged shot, triangle fires a mortar style cannon at a 45 degree upward angle, and circle fires a napalm device that bounces along the ground and then explodes. Vile has no dash ability, and gets no suit upgrades like X does throughout the game. This is not just some extra mode tacked on at the last minute. Vile's game has a fully animated opening and ending sequence (and I must say I was very impressed by how grim the ending was), completely new script for each boss encounter, and dozens of new weapons unlocked after each stage. Vile's play-through felt like it should have been the main game.

The main difference in the game-play between X and Vile is the weapons, obviously. X can change to use the ability of any boss he has previously defeated simply by switching to it in the pause menu. Vile, however, must chose 3 weapons at the beginning of each stage, and is restricted by a power gauge that prevents you from simply equipping the 3 most powerful ones. You've got your ranged weapons that vary from the slow, armor piercing Distance Needler, to the enemy-seeking Infinity Gig rocket punch. You've got your shoulder cannon equipped with weapons such as the boomerang-like Homesick Crescent, to the high powered Necro Burst laser cannon. The ground attacks can range from the napalm style grenades such as the Bang-Away Bomb, to underwater flamethrowers like Sea-Dragon's Rage. You decide which 3 weapons suit your playing style and the environment before you begin the stage, and then set out. You must play through the entire stage with that selection. This adds a nice twist to the classic levels (some of which are altered to compensate for Vile's abilities) and forces players to adopt new strategies during boss fights.

This is, hands down, the most entertaining Megaman game I've played in over 10 years. Classic gamers should come for the remake of X, but stay for Vile. It's worth seeing through all the way to the end. Is this game worth the cost of the PSP? By itself? I'd say no. But with the upcoming remake of Castlevania Rondo of Blood (which includes the remastered Symphony of the Night), and the remake of Final Fantasy Tactics on the way this year, the PSP is shaping up to be a great investment for 90s era gamers. Maverick Hunter X is a fantastic start to a trend I hope continues.



---edit----ouch, just checked Wikipedia and apparently sales weren't very good, and the director has no interest in making further remakes of the X series. it's things like this that make me want to rush out and buy new games the day they come out, instead of waiting so long.

Review - Crackdown

Xbox 360
Newish Release
$60

In Crackdown, one plays a superhuman cop wandering around a large city, looking for nests of criminals to kill. It is a lousy, shallow game. The stages are uninventive and repetitive, each one consisting of a buttload of generic thugs with a tougher boss in the center of them. As the game progresses, the number and durability of thugs increases. Combat is simple and dull, with autofiring ranged combat, a single melee attack, and the cool factor of being able to throw at people wears off once one realizes that it is stupidly hard to hit anyone with those cars.

Yet, as cruddy as this game is, I’m almost glad I bought it, and not just for reasons rhyming with “Shmalo 3 beta.” You see, the city in this game is built vertically and the badass hero character is capable of jumping increasingly great distances. This means that one can spend the game climbing buildings and leaping rooftops. Running and jumping and climbing were some of my greatest pleasures as a child, and Crackdown rekindles those passions. There is real joy to be had from Crackdown by climbing as high as one can, and seeing how far across the city one can get before being forced to cry “No more roof!” Crackdown might be the first sandbox game where traveling to your objective is consistently more fun than achieving your objective.

The city in Crackdown is large, beautiful, and built for climbing. I generally place a higher premium on gameplay than on graphics, but the first month I had my 360, I was playing Crackdown just to soak in the visuals. From a high enough vantage point you can look all the way across the city, and this game is all about high vantage points. I enjoyed the map so much it made the lack of anything in the map all the more frustrating.

A game that manages to be fun in spite of its actual gameplay is an odd anomaly. Does a video game actually have to be a game? Could a game that provided a city to stomp around in without any objectives or goals be a worthwhile, complete product? People who enjoy Animal Crossing might believe in non-games, but I haven't seen a satisfying game built to those specs yet. Jumping around Crackdown was genuinely fun, but ultimately it was an empty exercise. Playing it, I kept wishing I had something to do, something to justify the game. Climbing buildings and looking for hidden orbs (I found 498 out of 500 Agility Orbs before giving up) just didn’t add up to a satisfying experience when all was said an done. I think video games need concrete objectives.

Warhawk Review

Playstation 3
$40 via Playstation network store
$60 retail w/ pack-in blue-tooth headset

Watch the Trailer

The Playstation 3 got a price drop, and I got a Playstation 3. Funny how things work out.
Two months later, I finally purchase my first physical Playstation 3 game, Warhawk.
Within 60 minutes, I wanted to throw my Sixaxis through a window and take the game back.
Two days later, I played 5 hours straight without a break, and it drove me to actually sit down and write a review.
So let's discuss Warhawk.

Warhawk was the first game I fell in love with on the original PSone (we called it the PSX back in my day). Developed by Singletrac, it was on the demo cd that came with the system, and it was the first exciting flight combat game I'd ever played. It was pretty (for an early 3D game anyway), and if you put the demo cd into a cdplayer, you could listen to the epic music from the game (which I loved). Sadly, I never owned the game. I was young, and on a limited budget. But I played the demo countless times and loved every second. Many people must have done the same thing, because Warhawk never saw a sequel. It faded into obscurity, overshadowed by Singletrac's other major franchise, Twisted Metal.

Years have passed. Twisted Metal was sold to 989 studios, who promptly ruined the franchise. 989 studios shut down, and sold Twisted Metal back to it's creators, formerly Singletrac, now known as Incognito. Twisted Metal Black put them back on the map. War of the Monsters came from Incognito a few years later and showed they still had the ability to make genuinely fun games that didn't involve blowing up cars. But as the years continued to pass, Warhawk was only regarded as a forgotten gem.

12 years later, we finally see Warhawk reborn on Sony's newest system, with the original developers still at the helm.

I could talk for several paragraphs about the games difficult development, and how the final product is only half of the game that was originally planned. But this is a review, and I should focus on what we have now, instead of how we got here.

As I said earlier, after 1 hour of play, I hated this game. There is frustration, then there is Warhawk. The game itself is an online multi-player action game. To be clear, there is no single-player campaign at all. There is also no tutorial whatsoever. When you pop this game in, you had better have read the manual. My recommendation would be to read it once before playing, then again after the first couple hours. Once you log in and find a server with room (more on that in a bit), you're dropped into a battlefield with little to no knowledge of what you are doing, surrounded by people who want to kill you. And kill you they will. For the first several hours, I amassed maybe 5 kills total.

You start on foot, 20 seconds later, a guy in a tank blows you up. You start again and find a jeep. Some guy on foot blows you up. You start again and hop in a jet, some guy in another jet blows you up. You will die over, and over, and over again. I can't stress this enough. This game hit me with an Enrage plasmid that got me more upset than any game I've played in years. But I could see what potential there was, and I stuck with it. I'm glad i did.

The game offers a wide range of game-play styles and tosses them all into 5 giant battlefields. Your on-foot combat give you access to 8 different weapons, with enough difference in each that none of them feel ignored. Your combat knife is a one-hit kill weapon which makes you invisible on radar. Your pistol has infinite ammo and can be fired as quickly as you can hit the button. Your Machine gun is your classic pray-and-spray weapon of choice. Your RPG is useful against vehicles and has a lock-on function. Sniper Rifles are just what you would expect. Proximity mines make defending choke points plenty of fun. Flamethrowers are a nice alternative to the standard shotgun; relatively close range with lots of damage. And my personal favorite, the Binoculars, used exclusively for designating air strikes. You also come equipped with standard issue frag grenades. If it weren't for this weapon selection, you'd have little reason not to jump in a vehicle at the very start of a match.

The ground vehicles and turrets are simple by design, but still useful. You've got heavily armored tanks that seat 2, light but fast jeeps equipped with a mounted machine gun that seats 3, AA turrets, and Missile Launcher turrets. These all play important roles in the large scale battles.

Finally we have the Warhawks. These aircraft can hover like helicopters, and streak through the skies like jets. They have access to 8 different secondary weapons, in addition to the primary machine guns. Mines, unguided bombs, lightning guns, remote guided missiles, etc. The variety of aircraft weaponry is just as diverse as on-foot.

Controls are fairly easy to come to grips with. The triggers are usually for forward and reverse, left and right shoulder buttons are for primary and secondary fire. However, if you try and use motion-controls, the learning curve becomes much sharper. It's recommended that you learn to master the motion-controls for flight, since they give you the ability to aim independently, but I found it too difficult and just stuck with standard analog controls.

So the first knock I have against the game is the aforementioned learning curve. With no tutorial, and no single-player campaign, it really does become a trial-by-fire. Many people will be turned off by the repeated deaths and brutal opposition. But when given some time, the game begins to shine. It's got a strong balance between the different forms of combat, and successfully gives the player the feeling of being in a major large-scale war (in 32 player matches anyway).

The second knock against the game is against its ranking system. In games like Socom, Halo, or Gears of War, I always found myself playing the game for kicks. I'd jump online, join a few random matches, have a good time, and log out. My rank never entered into my mind, due to the fact I hardly ever had time to play. When I did play, I just wanted to have some fun. If I wanted to, I could focus on my rank. It was easy to join a ranked match and see what I could do. But I didn't really care. However, Warhawk's character customization options are tied to your rank. There are plenty of interesting skins and paintjobs you can unlock by increasing your overall rank. And ranks aren't gained just by getting kills. There are certain objectives and achievements you have to meet in order to go up in rank. Connecting rank with customization encourages players to play in ranked games. I consider this to be a wise decision. The problem comes in when you look at the number of games available to join. Out of 800+ servers up, you may find 6 or 7 currently hosting a ranked game. 4 of them will have a ping of over 250 (which means your connection would suffer), and the last 3 or 4 will be full. Sony hosts ranked games on banks of PS3s stationed around the country. Players can also host ranked games on their PS3s as well, but cannot participate in them. It's the consensus among players online that the real challenge to getting a high-rank isn't in defeating other players, it's in actually finding a ranked match with an open spot.

These issues regarding rank advancement and open servers will mostly likely be solved withing 3-6 months. The lack of friends-list integration will also be getting some attention soon. There has already been one patch regarding some rank problems within 1 week of it's release. Hopefully the only remaining complaint in 6 months for a new player will be the steep learning curve. The game is beautiful, and the gameplay itself is varied and balanced. The simplistic design choices make it accessible and addictive, but the server issues and online competition may ruin it for some. And as a $40 download via the playstation network store, it seems a bit pricey for just 5 maps, no box, and no manual. Your best option would be the $60 retail copy that comes with a pack-in blue-tooth headset.

So if you're looking for something to justify your PS3 purchase, Warhawk is definitely worth picking up. If you're looking for a reason to pick up a PS3, Warhawk is not it. It is definitely the best PS3 exclusive out at this point, but I still wouldn't call it a "killer app."

Personal Score: Z 4 Q Q Q and the Batman Symbol out of The State of Illinois.
Subjective Score: It's fun. See above.