Tophat Top 5: Debut

So, trying something new today, please bear with me. I wanted to add more stuff to this blog than just a weekly review, and since I don't have the income to fund more than one review a week, I thought to myself, why not do a top five countdown of things related to whatever I reviewed last? So here it is, the first of my Tophat Top Five's on Tuesdays! This week, best settings in a Rockstar title!

NUMBER 5
Vice City

With GTA3 bringing the sandbox crime mayhem into the 3D polygonal realms, it was time to do some interesting things with it. While GTA3 and Vice City were quite similar, Vice City added some cool things that have endeared the setting to me.

The gloriously ridiculous 80's style oozes from every building, car and NPC, the settings a varied (included are construction sites, beaches and dirtbike tracks to name just a few interesting places) and the vehicle list was expanded to include motorbikes, which have remained as one of my favourite modes of transportation in these sandbox games.

NUMBER 4
Liberty City (GTA4)

Many people would argue that a sandbox is only as good as the features that dwell within it. While this is somewhat true, I find that a visual style and attention to detail is also important. That's why GTAIV's Liberty City was so good in my opinion.

It had slick graphics and alot of detail in the physical city, while also offering hundreds of distractions like comedy clubs, bowling alleys and internet cafes. While the greyish next gen visuals don't hold as much personality as previous worlds such as Vice City, Rockstar's signature humour and social commentary invades via the TV shows, NPC chatter and the radio stations in particular.
All that said, GTAIV's rendition of Liberty City loses points for being a straightfaced New York clone.

NUMBER 3
Los Angeles (L.A. Noire)

While the main storyline is quite linear when compared to other Rockstar affiliated titles, L.A. Noire does still feature a big open city just made to explore. While not featuring many distractions like GTA4, the attention to detail and period authenticity really sold me on 40's L.A.

What can I say? I, the Tophat Gamer, loves me some classy hats. And L.A. Noire's male NPCs almost always wear a fedora. Win. Oh and the vehicles all look awesome. So, why did I like 40's L.A.? It seems somewhat authentic for the time, and driving around in an old timey car, looking for landmarks is a great way to spend my time. Also, I don't know if this is just me, but I noticed a sort of sepia tone to the visuals and it just looked... right.

NUMBER 2
San Andreas

Now, correct me if I'm wrong, San Andreas is still the biggest world map in any free roam game. It was so big that it couldn't be happy cloning just one real city. It featured three distinct areas, Los Santos (Los Angeles), San Fierro (San Fransisco) and Las Venturas (Las Vegas). The game featured many distractions, including basketball, arcade games and various gambling games.


But the awesomeness of San Andreas doesn't stop at the varied locations or random distractions. The radio stations are back and feature not only hilarious dialogue, but also some of the best music I've heard in a Rockstar game. Songs such as Hellraiser, Horse With No Name, Welcome to the Jungle and, of course, All My Ex's live in Texas accompanied some of the strangest moments in my video gaming life.


To top it all off, the game gave us a number of insane toys to go nuts with, such as the bloody fun Combine Harvester, the Harrier jump jet and (possibly the most insane thing in a GTA game) the fan-favourite Jetpack. Pure. Awesome.
Besides, what other game had everyone looking for Bigfoot when there never was a bigfoot in the game?

NUMBER 1
The Old West (RDR)

As fun as jacking a car and going 10okm/h down the sidewalk through a crowd of squishy NPCs is, theres no doubt that people were looking for something different. Red Dead Redemption offered us something familiar, but alien at the same time. With similar mechanics to previous Rockstar games, it's the setting that makes Red Dead a completely new game.

Red Dead Redemption is set during the fall of the old west. It takes place in multiple locations ranging from the snow covered mountains in West Elizabeth, the dusty plains of New Austin and the rocky deserts of Nuevo Paraiso, Mexico. Inhabited by various animals who want to do nothing but eat your face and NPCs who want to steal your horse, Red Dead Presented us with a world where, if you didn't pay attention, you could be swallowed whole.

Like the previous GTA game, Red Dead Redemption featured a slew of minigames, from Five Finger Fillet, to Horse Shoes, to Bounty Hunting. But that wasn't enough for Rockstar. Outside of preset minigames, there were ambient challenges split into the cateagories of Sharpshooting, Hunting and Survivalist (based around the ever so manly flower picking mechanic). Back on the detail and personality side of things, theres newspapers and silent movies to watch which allow us to drink in the social fears and views from the time. Remember kids, "Medical Science will kill you and leave you dead!".

A beautiful, interesting landscape, filled with minigames and ambient challenges was more than enough to get this on my list. But the feel of a living world full of unique situations and active wildlife got this to the top. And the soundtrack didn't hurt either.

L.A. Noire

It's been a while since I played something that made me think further than "which target should I shoot first" or "is there a more interesting way to complete this goal". L.A. Noire is a game that doesn't really have a genre, though if I had to put it in one, I'd say adventure sandbox. Adventure, in reference to the old point and click adventure games, where puzzle solving was a big part of the game, but not so prevalent as to let the game be known as a puzzle game.

Anywho, L.A. Noire is a departure from Rockstar's usual sandbox, where you get to cause as much insane destruction as you feel you need to. L.A. Noire is right on the other end of the spectrum; you aren't allowed to go on killing sprees, and for a sandbox game, it's fairly linear. Time to share my thoughts on the first AAA title to be made mainly in Australia (GO TEAM BONDI).

STORY
L.A. Noire follows the story of Cole Phelps, a hero returning from WWII, who works his way up the ranks of the LAPD, moving from desk to desk with each promotion. As a detective, Phelps bears witness to the dark underbelly of 1940's Los Angeles, as well as the rampant corruption of the system that you work within.

The narrative features many film noir characteristics; particularly the sometimes convoluted and twisting storylines, filled with lies and half truths. Cole's story only really focuses about halfway through, with the first half being about his rise through the ranks, and the second half dealing with the heroes flaws and it really fleshes the character out. While I felt very little towards Phelps in the first few desks, eventually I grew to like him as he became more human in my eyes.

PRESENTATION
L.A. Noire features a distinctly film noir inspired visual and sound style, as the name suggests. The colour scheme is surprisingly varied during the daytime sequences, while the night settings give a greater focus on light and dark, with light fog adding that little extra something to the atmosphere.

The cars, clothes and random items are all from the period in which L.A. Noire is set, and the authenticity of these things adds another layer to the already immersive interactive experience.

The soundtrack of L.A. Noire features a lot of licensed songs from the time, which are all rather catchy when heard over and over again, as well as cool jazz and orchestral scores for investigations and cinematics respectively.

Here, I'd normally talk about the voice acting of the game, and I will in just a moment. But for this title, it would only be telling half the story. Using new facial capture technology, Team Bondi and Rockstar have effectively given full on performances from actors to bring each character to life.
Every forehead crease, every facial twitch, every nervous tell is delivered perfectly with each characters lines; and it's a huge part of the games appeal. The actors give magnificent performances, both vocal and facial.


GAMEPLAY
Gameplay in L.A. Noire consists of about 4 things... The first two are pretty straight forward. Gun-play and vehicle driving, if you've played a Rockstar game, you know exactly how this works. The guns and vehicles are all from around that point in history, which is really cool.

As by the numbers as this sounds, there are a couple of restraints on these gameplay aspects. You aren't able to pull your gun from your holster unless you are faced with a criminal and the game deems it necessary, and you wont kick people in the head and take thier cars (although you can take vehicles with a flash of your badge and a kind word).

At first, this seems kind of stranges for a Rockstar game, but they want to tell the story of a police detective. Not only that, but a really good, by the books detective. Yes, he has character flaws, but he knows right from wrong. And as such, the GTA freedom we've come to expect seems rightfully absent here. It didn't worry me too much. If you'd rather be mowing down pedestrians and going to town with an AK47, your game has been made before. 6 or so times before, in fact.

Now, the other two aspects of L.A. Noire revolve around your detective work; consisting of investigation of crime scenes, and interrogations. Working your way around a crime scene is a somewhat slow process, however the crime scenes are amazingly detailed and the key to succeeding in the interrogations is to be prepared with all the clues you can find.

The soft jazz music plays as you wander the scene, and when you near a piece of evidence, a chime plays and your controller vibrates. This is a helpful feature, but can be turned off if you feel it helps too much. Rotating a piece of evidence in hand is more interesting than it should be, and the situational clues are fun little puzzles to break up the sometimes monotonous investigations.

After you gather your clues, it's time to do some questioning. This is where the new facial capture technology really shines, as you must study the interrogatee's facial ticks to determine whether they're being straight with you, holding information back, or flat out lying. While this works on the most part, I did notice a few problems with the system.

When it comes to lying, you need to prove your accusation with evidence. Occasionally, the accusation following the line of questioning will go out on some random tangent, basically giving you an extra hint, or throwing you off completely from where you thought the accusation was going. Still, this is a somewhat minor complaint, and it didn't get in the way of my enjoyment.

I have some other small problems with the rest of the gameplay, but it revolves mainly around minor bugs, such as sliding cars and clipping issues. But these are miniscule problems, and the actual gameplay is fairly solid. It's nice to play a game where the more common gameplay features are just a frame for the real meat of the game. Something new? I'm on board!

REPLAYABILITY
As with many Rockstar gamnes, the open world of L.A. Noire features many collectibles and quite a few side missions to take part in. Aside from that, you always have the option to go back and play cases for a higher star rating. Hell, for me, just racing around in the authentic 1940s vehicles is damn satisfying, as it lets me soak in the detailed, immersive atmosphere.

OVERVIEW
I don't want to jump the gun (especially with so many amazing titles set to release this year), but L.A. Noire is already high on my list of best games of 2011. While I ran into a few small bugs and glitches, they rarely interfered with my enjoyment. L.A Noire is an interesting story, set in a beautifully detailed environment with very human characters and intriguing situations.
While some parts of the story seem like strange design choices (like the use of a narrator for the tutorial desk) and the main characters development doesn't start for quite some time; when it does kick in, the characters become more like real people and I found myself emotionally invested in the fate of these characters.


So yea, next week I'm doing Marvel VS Capcom 3: Fate of Two Worlds. Yep... Another fighting game. Odd. I suppose it's ok though, because I did something so different in between. See you next time!

Mortal Kombat

As many of you might know, a couple of months ago the 2011 reboot of Mortal Kombat had been refused classification, and therefore banned in Australia. Well, being the type of guy who asks the tough questions, I decided it was worth acquiring the game from a country with a less retarded classification board. So, now its time... for MORTAL KOMBAAAAAAAAAAAAAT.

STORY
OK, so over the last few editions of the MK series, the storyline got kinda stupid (even for mortal kombat), the roster of fighters got too bloated and the trademark violence was watered down. The new Mortal Kombat looks to have a do over, going back to the first 3 titles while keeping the previous games in the series canon.

You see, as the final moments of Armageddon come to a close, Raiden sends a message to his past self which sets of a chain of events that would change the course of the Mortal Kombat universe. In terms of fighting game storylines, Mortal Kombat is interesting, kind of nuts and familiar, but with enough changes to keep it from bing a straight remake of the first 3 MK games.

Yes, the dialogue could use some work, but its the kind of quality that could only be acceptable in something as over the top as MK.

PRESENTATION
Over the past 3 or so games, the Mortal Kombat games have used the same engine; and while they were fine at the time, they were starting to get stale. The reboot uses the unreal engine 3 to great effect, with update character models and particle effects. The game looks amazing and part of that is due to the amount of detail used. The backgrounds look amazing, despite the fights only taking place on 2D planes, and each character shows how physically damaged they are through clothing tears, scarring and armour damage.

The sound effects are clear and visceral, especially the dripping of blood or the screams of agony. This may sound like a disturbing thing to note, but why do people play Mortal Kombat? More often than not, the answer is for the over the top, stylized and visceral violence.

The music is fairly standard when compared to the last few entries in the series. I was disappointed to learn that there was no MK theme to be found (as far as I could hear) but as it stands, the soundtrack is adequate.


GAMEPLAY
The last few MK games had strayed from the path of the original over the top, ultra violent characteristics that MK displayed. Mortal Kombat2011 brings the series back to its roots, the basis of the game being straight up fighting on a 2D plane, with the signature special moves of the originals making a triumphant return. In addition to this, the Fatalaties that had been watered down for so long have returned in glorious form, with notable mentions going to the Noob Saibot "Make a Wish" fatality and the Quan Chi "leg rip" fatality. Go look them up. I dare you.

New features include tag team matches, (not a new feature for the genre as a whole, just this series), X-Ray moves and a test your luck mode. The tag team matches are fast paced, with combos and special moves that switch characters halfway through and they work fairly well.
The X-Ray moves are absolutely brutal and add a graphical flair to each fight. These super moves often turn the tide of battles, but are able to be blocked, so saving up for one may not be the best idea. It adds an extra layer of strategy to the classic violent gameplay.

Lastly for the new features, a Test Your Luck game mode allows players to take a spin and apply random effects to each match. The stipulations range from upside down kombat, to rainbow blood, to homing missiles raining down from the sky. It's challenging and truly hilarious to witness most of the time.

Now, the game trips up in a couple of places. A few of the characters are severely unbalanced, with teleporting fighters having a distinct edge over non-teleporters. Secondly, during the story mode, alot of the fights are heart explodingly frustrating. This, I can handle, until you get such uber bastards as Shao Kahn, who neglect to flinch when they're hit. This can get frustrating, and is extremely annoying, but is by no means a deal breaker.

REPLAYABILITY
As a fighting game, Mortal Kombat is best played with friends or online, and from what I've heard, it has a solid multiplayer system. Along with this, theres a cubi fuckton of unlockables to discover in the Krypt, such as fatalities and alternate outfits. The story mode is fun, but offers little replayability, unlike the challenge tower, which can be a bit schitzophrenic about its difficulty, but is entertaining none the less.

OVERVIEW
So, Mortal Kombat is a damn good fighting game. It takes what it's learnt throughout the many games leading up to here and filtered out the useless crap that the series had accumulated up until now. It does away with alot of the series former problems, while adding in some new brutal features that bring the series back to its former glory. If you like fighting games, get this. If you live in Australia, I can't tll you to import it. If you decide to, and risk the $300 fine, I will not take responsibility for and criminal charges. LOL.

Now, let's see... Did Mortal Kombat deserve to get banned? In my honest opinion... no. Yes, Mortal Kombat is violent. It's at the most violent point of the entire series. But the thing is, it's completely unrealistic. I don't think we need to worry about kids getting the idea to uppercut peoples heads off, or shooting freeze rays from thier hands. First off, any person who buys this would be at the very least 15. Contrary to popular belief, not all young teens are idiots. Secondly, if some kids got their hands on this title, it wouldn't be the fault of the game. The blame lands squarely at the parents feet. Anywho.. enough ranting.

Final Word: Mortal Kombat is violent, funny and the gameplay is solid. Fighting fans, buy it. Australians... use your judgement. Weigh the pro's and con's of importing a banned substance.



Anywho, next week, a game made mainly in Australia. Rockstar and Team Bondi team up for the 1940s detective thriller, L.A. Noire. See you next time.

Operation Flashpoint: Red River

Oh look, the Tophat Gamer is reviewing a semi realistic first person shooter concerning conflicts in a middle eastern setting! How unlke him!

Fuck you buddy, I like other things. Fuck you twice over for being wrong, too. If we're calling CoD semi realistic, then Op Flashpoint is no where near as surreal as that. So, you think you're hardcore? You ain't seen nothing yet.

STORY
Operation Flashpoint: Red River's plot concerns a fictional conflict in Tajikistan in 2013. A terrorist group known as the ETIM launches mortar attacks on a US FOB in Afghanistan, prompting the United States to launch operation Enduring Shield, having the United States Marine Corps to invade west Tajikistan and wipe out the Insurgent threat.

The story follows Outlaw squad as they carry out Enduring Shield, and then dealing with involvement from the PLA of China. The story seems pretty out there, but it grounds itself far better than any CoD or Battlefield game I've seen.

PRESENTATION
The game has smooth graphics and animations on the most part, but they're used to show fairly unimaginative settings that have been done before. They're certainly acceptable visuals, but they aren't groundbreaking. I also saw my teammates spaz out alot but recover soon after. It really took me out of the otherwise rather immersive setting.

The voice acting isn't bad; with one excellent, memorable character in particular, coming in the form of SSgt Knox. What made him so memorable wasn't his chewing out of his suboordinates, but the excellent manner in which he does it. I haven't heard that many funny drill seargeant talk downs in a long time, and Knox is certainly funny. I've talked about how swearing in dialogue is normally unnecessary, but Knox uses it in such great effec, that I don't mind so much.

The rest of the voice acting isn't nearly as good, but it plays alongside a somewhat killer soundtrack, filtered in game through the radio's of vehicles. Among the songs I heard were "Symphony of Destruction" (Megadeth) and "Cowboys from Hell" (Pantera) and in my book, thats a win. Like ice cream.

GAMEPLAY
This is where things get really interesting. Yes, it has a similar story to CoD or Bad Company, and the visuals are like holding a mirror up to those titles, but the gameplay sets it apart. Yes, you're a disembodied hand holding a gun of some description, but it's deeper than that.

In single-player, you have almost full control over your team, allowing you to pull off flanking manouevers or to lay down supressing fire on a target. For those who want deeper control, you have the option to command each team member by themselves, as opposed to the whole group. And best of all, the system is easy to use. I confess, I enjoy simple FPS games and that I wasn't ready at all for OF:RR giving me all that control. I ran with it, and found that I was pulling of successful tactics without too many problems.

Also different from other FPS games is the health system. Got shot? You aren't going to regenerate by hiding in the corner sucking your thumb. You have to take cover and physically heal yourself using first aid kits. No, it doesn't go into great detail, but its more immersive than sitting in a corner waiting for the strawberry jam to slide off your eyes. Your teammates are mortal too, so the same applies to them.

What's more, is that even if you only get shot once, you can bleed out. If you don't patch yourself up, your health will decrease. Frustrating for some players, I'm sure, but damned if it isn't challenging.

The actual FPS like controls aren't much to write home about, but they fit with the uber realistic style of the game. You won't be jumping or circle strafing to victory here. Taking cover and utilizing your team is the path to victory. Can it be difficult? Yea, but it never feels cheap. Though I'm not sure if the CoD/Battlefield players will appreciate all the realism..

REPLAYABILITY
OK, so this is interesting. There's NO competitive multiplayer in Operation Flashpoint: Red River. However, there is the option to play the campaign with human teammates. Theres a robust levelling system too, and though there aren't millions of options, what the developers have included is certainly enough.

As much as I loved coordinating an awesome flank on enemies with my BOT allies, doing that with a complete human team would just be magical. It more or less makes up for the lack of competitive MP. Or it would have, if I got to try it.

Fucking hackers, ruining my PSN...

OVERVIEW
This is where I tell you if the game is good, or if it's worth a buy. Op Flashpoint is a difficult one to recommend, at least, to the people who would normally go for FPS games in a modern setting. The look and story are there, but the gameplay just wouldn't mesh with the usual FPS players style.

If you're looking for more depth than just running down linear firing ranges where the targets shoot back, OF:RR may just be for you. It's meant to fill that niche market between fast-paced action games and hyper-realistic military simulators. If you think that might interest you, I highly recommend it.

So, another week down... If anyone's wondering why theres only one pic, it's because my internet is being a whore.... I'm really enjoying this, but as usual, FEEDBACK IS APPRECIATED. Oh....guess what's next week..... It may be a little unfair for Aussie readers but.... MORTAL KOMBAAAAAAAAAAAT.
See you next time!

Test Drive Unlimited 2

So, my girlfriend had been telling me for some time about how much she enjoyed this game, Test Drive Unlimited. Then I found out (probably via her) that a sequel came out only a couple of months ago. So I figured, how often do I review a new racing game? Lets do it! And here we are now. You up to speed? Good. Lets go!

STORY
Test Drive Unlimited 2, being a racing game, lacks a decent, coherent story. The premise however, is that you have 2 islands (Ibiza and an Island in Hawaii), and a potentially huge garage. The "Less than decent, rather incoherent" story I mentioned involves your character getting fired from his/her valet job, then somehow getting the dream job of Professional Racer. Yea... I told you.

The premise itself is a good enough excuse to give you free reign over a wide selection of cars, and two large vehicular playgrounds.

PRESENTATION
The visuals of Test Drive Unlimited 2 are decent enough and, at times, the game looks really amazing. The selection of cars is huge, and they all look authentic and shiny; whereas the environment is sprawling and varied. The landscape goes from seaside roads, to dirt tracks through plains, to city driving. But then your customizable avatar gets out of the car for some arbitrary reason... And he/she looks shite. The character models here are pretty bad, even if most of the time you'll be watching the cars.

Speaking of your ugly avatar, they also have a really terrible voice too. Just like every other character in the game. They all have bland, horrible voices; which repeat lines ad nauseam. The soundtrack is pretty lame, but I'm sure someone will appreciate it. If only they would let us import tracks. On all platforms.

GAMEPLAY
The gameplay of TDU2 is primarily focused on, you guessed it, RACING! What kind of racing? I'm still not sure. I spent a decent amount of time with the game, and it still feels like a strange Arcade/Racing Sim hybrid. That's not to say it's bad. It actually works on the most part, and requires a relatively small amount of finesse compared to Forza or GT5. TDU2 also grounds itself in realism more than say, Need for Speed or (clearly) Split/Second.

The driving is solid, and the skill testing and varied tracks really are the icing on the cake. Like, really good icing on a somewhat average, but tasty cake. That said, the tracks provide more of a challenge than the AI competition. They're really not as competitive as they should be, and if you make a large enough gap between you and the following AI player, you can make a buttload of mistakes.

Speaking of AI, when they try to be competitive, it just comes off as being cheap. While I could win most races easily, when the computer racers caught up, they'd seem to intentionally spin me out. I even tried to return the favour, and the AI just compensated for it perfectly. It took me right out of the game. I know it sounds like I'm complaining, and I kind of am... but this was a source of major frustration for me.

So, after that, lets end the gameplay section on a high note. I like how you have to get different licenses for different championships, and that there are different car classes and championships. The offroad races are pure, slidey offroad awesome, and the other classes contain some truly amazing vehicles. Oh, and theres an "Island tour" race, that basically encompasses the entire island of Ibiza. It was awesome.

There are some pretty pointless features like avatar customization and house buying/customization, but the game never forces you to do any of that (unless you want to look like less of a douche, and own more than two cars at a time). Also, theres no way to quickly access races from a menu. The only way to do this is go to the map, and try to go directly to the race. This only works with roads you have unlocked however. All in all, the sandbox seems just a little bit pointless.

I almost forgot, theres a pretty cool multiplayer feature. Seeing as the game is held together by an open world sandbox where you can drive freely, you can see every online player occupying the same world that you're in. This is the only reason that the sandbox seems somewhat useful.

Theres also a levelling system, which allows players more unlockable items each time you level up. Although, the stuff you unlock is mostly arbitrary, and the requirements to level up aren't confined to just racing. Often it involves collecting clothes or exploring the island. While it's nice to do that anyway in some games, being forced to makes it annoying.

REPLAYABILITY
It's a racing game.. That should tell you all you need to know. While there isn't any split screen multiplayer, the online seems like it could be pretty awesome (though I didn't get to try it). On top of that, theres a lot of stuff to collect.. although alot of that seems really useless.

OVERVIEW
While the game does boast fast cars and interesting, varied tracks, I can't help but feel like something with TDU2 just doesn't work. Maybe it's all the pointless avatar customization, or the AI that feels somewhat broken. However, I do like the amount and quality of cars, as well as the variety of racing classes and types. The levelling system, I love alot less. The arbitrary customization and collection surrounding your avatar just ruins it for me though.

Fuckin' ugly avatars.


Next week, the uber realistic modern day shooter, Operation Flashpoint: Red River! See you next time!

Homefront

OK, last week someone commented on my Portal 2 review, concerning my wishing of a Happy ANZAC day. Just wanted to say that I didn't mean any offence by it, I was just wishing everyone a happy long weekend. On the ANZAC note, I have all the respect in the world for soldiers currently serving, and veterans of wars past. Lest We Forget.

Now, onto the review. When Homefront was revealed, I wasn't particularly excited. "Ooh, a gritty near future shooter where your character doesn't speak. Yippee". Later in it's development cycle, I found out it had Red Dawn author, John Milius and that it has a fully fleshed out (if somewhat implausible) alternate history. Colour me intrigued. Did that intrigue turn to sheer disappointment?

STORY
The story takes place during the year 2027 in America; Colarado to be specific. America has suffered an economic downfall, and a newly unified Korea (yea, crazy, stick with me) has occupied it's borders during the ensuing problems. This is the severely cut down set up. The actual history here is quite interesting, if a little far fetched.
Moving right along...
The game puts you in the shoes of Robert Jacobs, a former Marine pilot and eventual American Resistance Fighter. The main plot revolves around you and your allies in the attempt to give America back to Americans.

While the alternate history of a unified Korea does sound a little bit far fetched, its all rationalized in such a way that it almost seems plausible. And Even if it wasn't, it's still interesting. After all, American soldiers are almost always the stronger force in today's shooters. It's nice to see a game put you in the shoes of the little guy, in a world thats out to get you.

PRESENTATION
While I've never found superb graphics to be a largely important factor in games, being exposed to messy and unpolished visuals can take me out of a game. And thats what Homefront did. The settings weren't particularly varied, and all seemed quite mess; which I guess made sense since alot of the battle grounds are abandoned homes and back yards. But the people just look kinda awful. I've seen better looking characters in Half Life 2, and that was made years ago!

The sound effects and music are all quite adequate, but nothing as epic sounding as other modern shooters have given us. The voice acting isn't bad, on the other hand. Certain characters (Connor Morgan, I'm looking at you) just make me want to stab them repeatedly, mainly due to their annoying or try hard voice acting.

As a whole, the game doesn't look particularly impressive, but it gets the job done. Certain stages really did feel like wartorn, abandoned U.S streets. It's just that Modern Warfare 2 did them better. (Lifts flame shield)


GAMEPLAY
The control scheme is a lot like any COD's layout, and you'll essentially be doing the same sort of actions as any recent shooter. Shooting and taking cover work fairly well, but alot of the time, I found myself shooting my cover, more than my enemies. It was a weird, because I could clearly see what I was aiming for through my gun's sights. And again on the cross hair while aiming from the hip. I don't mind your visuals being messy and chaotic Homefront, but when it impacts gameplay you've made a mistake.

I like that a game involving americans with guns has finally put the player on the smaller, underdog side. As much as I like being a part of the full american military in CoD or Battlefield, having to conserve ammo and be sneaky as a guerrilla fighter is just as fun, if not moreso. The problem is theres a few games that have done sections that do Guerrilla fighting better than this entire game.

Speaking of the entire game, it took me 3 hours. Three fucking hours!! Some of the aforementioned guerilla sections from other games take almost a third of that time. What the fuck?? It seems I have an almost never ending list of gripes with this game, but I'll wrap this up now.
The NPC companions are A) Not helpful, B) Slow as fuck when moving to the next checkpoint or gate that THEY need to open and C) are not terribly smart. I'm not even talking about just bad AI anymore. Connor Morgan is kind of an idiot. Why hide from a helicopter behind trucks when theres a pit full of bodies to jump in? White phospherus? A fantastic idea for when our guys are right next to the enemy!!!... GOD I HATE HIM!

REPLAYABILITY
Yea, theres collectables and such. And I guess if you're into trophies and achievements, thats reason enough to play through the story again. For others, there is multiplayer, however during my time with the game, I didn't get to use it. Blame SONY. However, I hear its the highlight of the game, with interesting maps and an innovative in game currency system.

OVERVIEW
Homefront has an interesting premise, a somewhat believable setting and some truly spine chilling "What the fuck" moments. One bit I actually had to pause the game to think if I had just seen what I thought I had.
However, the game falls down in the gameplay and presentation departments. With a little bit of polish, Homefront's abandoned U.S streets could have looked so much more than just "messy". It could have been a real shock. And the gameplay needs some work.
Also, I would never recommend buying a game with a hardly substantial single player game. The multiplayer may well be awesome, but a game almost always has to stand up on its single player merits.

Is Homefront worth a play? Perhaps, but it isn't worth a purchase. Maybe rent it, but thats all I can truly suggest without taking a massive bribe from the developers.


Not sure what to do next week, suggestions? Oh and it was nice to get a comment last week! =D
See you next time!