Leveling Down

I’m glad I finally gave Grand Theft Auto IV a chance, as it’s nearly consumed my entire week of gaming.

Grand Theft Auto IV – Had a lot of free time this week so I decided to get back into GTA4. This game I bought at launch and after playing it for about 30 minutes, decided I would eventually pick it up again later. Well, I started playing it this past weekend and I got hooked. Already beat the storyline, and am now just trying to clear all of the extra stuff. I’m surprised how much I like the game today, and realize now why it’s so good. Expect a (quite overdue) review on it next week.

Ace Combat 6 – All done! Sucks that 400 of the 1000 Achievement points are multiplayer based, but what can you do. Maybe I can go pick up Tom Clancy’s H.A.W.X. now…

Left 4 Dead – The free DLC has arrived for the game, consisting of Versus for the two other campaigns, as well as a new Survival mode for all four campaigns and a new lighthouse level. I already sold my 360 version, but I’ve been playing it a bit on the PC. I have to say, going from a 360 controller back to mouse and keyboard is really difficult. I’m so out of it when it comes to gaming on the PC now that I’m trying to map the Left 4 Dead controls to my Logitech PC control pad just so it can feel like I used to play it on the 360. Talk about regressing! Anyway, I need to play the survival a bit more to see if it’s really good but for now I’m not too impressed. It feels like I’m just playing the finales to each of the scenarios again, and I wasn’t that big of a fan of them to begin with. Now it’s even harder since regular infected still pour out at the same time as the tanks so it definitely doesn’t send you to a happy place when you play this mode haha

Ace Combat 6 – perhaps the best air combat game on the 360, but is that saying much?

In my initial impressions for the game, I was complaining about how difficult the game was. Once I discovered that you were able to have your Allied forces assist you in the more troublesome spots in the game, I was able to get through areas that I thought were ridiculously tough. Now I feel the game is not too hard, provided you can handle arcade flight sim games where down is up and up is down. For the most part, I’ve enjoyed my time with this short game as it had a lot of hardcore things for me to do to complete it, but overall, I don’t know if it’s that good of a game. Read on for my review for a game that I bought nearly two years ago but didn’t get to play until now.

Good
- still one of the best arcade flight sims on the 360
- lots of unlockables and challenges for the more hardcore player
- co-op, while very limited, can be pretty enjoyable

Bad
- weak story
- short game
- lack of matchmaking and empty multiplayer

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Battlefield Heroes simplifies the core Battlefield gameplay a bit but adds in a lot of character customization, unlocks, and MMORPG style leveling.

Besides the two DS games I’ve been playing lately that I wrote about this week, I’ve also spent my gaming time on the following:

Battlefield Heroes (PC) – I just got into the beta this week, so I’m still exploring it and will give some impressions on it soon. It’s pretty crazy since I’m coming from Battlefield 2 and Battlefield Bad Company experience, but so far it works. It’s cartoony and web based so it’s relatively simple, but you create a character and level up through playing so it has an MMORPG style feel. It’ll also be free to play, but EA will be making money on it through advertising and charging for in-game items. It could work, based on what I’ve played so far – but of course, I personally won’t be paying for anything.

Ace Combat 6 – In my initial impressions, I thought the game was ridiculously hard. It was only shortly afterwards I finally figured out how to get help from other fighters, making the game a lot easier. Combine that with the fact that the best fighter unlocks in the game when you beat it on hard, and now I’m smiling and singing that I can actually unlock all of the single player Achievements in the game. And here I was thinking I was going to have to give up on this game for being too hard…

Halo Wars – Hit the Lieutenant rank this week by playing a ton of multiplayer. I stopped playing 1v1 just because at higher levels the game seems to be more about rushing, and I wanted to play more “full” games. Thus, I spent most of my multiplayer this week playing 3v3 Random Team, and I won about 2/3 of the games. Instead of 10-15 minute games that I used to play 1v1, they’re now 30-40 minute big games where everyone expands and techs to their end game unit. Definitely a lot of fun and I realize now how powerful a scarab with 5 engineers is for the Covenant. Probably going to take a break from it for the time being, now that I’ve unlocked all of the Achievements I wanted to unlock for the game. Maybe I’ll give it a spin later once the rebalance patch comes out.

Ace Combat 6 looks great while still adhering to the gameplay of its predecessors.

I’m finally attacking my backlog once more now that I’m not interested in any current 360 releases. I picked up Ace Combat 6 on release day back in 2007, and for some reason or another, I never got around to it until now. For fans of the series, you’ve most likely already bought and played through it already, but for others who are unsure and want to learn more about this game, read on.

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Rhythm Heaven is a collection of rhythm based minigames, like playing table tennis according to the rhythm of a song.

Rhythm Heaven (DS) – I just started playing this game and I’m having a total blast. It’s so wacky and hilarious that I can’t help but love it. Unfortunately for me, the game really is about rhythm and my rhythm is terrible. I started writing about it here, but then realized I could write enough about it to give it its own impressions article. I will instead post it next week to give it its proper spotlight.

Halo Wars – Been spending most of my time on the multiplayer aspect of the game lately. What’s funny is that I’m discovering that 2v2 is the most difficult of the three types. Right now I’m 10 and 2 for 1v1 and I think I’m in the positive for 3v3, but I’m practically losing every 2v2 game I play in. I feel like for 1v1 I have a good feel for counters and strategy, so I can pretty much hold on my own against anyone, and 3v3 is usually about just massing. But 2v2 is a different beast altogether, because it incorporates some gameplay from both 1v1 and 3v3, but not completely so it’s difficult to figure out what to build. Plus it seems like all the good players are playing 2v2 or something! Oh well…I’m sure I’ll get better as I continue to play.

Ace Combat 6 -Oldie but I finally broke it out of its shrinkwrap since I was slightly interested in Tom Clancy’s HAWX game and told myself that I can’t pick that up until I at least beat Ace Combat 6. For those wondering, it very much is more of the same as its PS2 predecessors, for better of worse. I’ll get some detailed impressions out on it soon.

Street Fighter IV -Started tearing my way through the Challenges and playing my brother of and off. What’s interesting is that I’m starting to play other characters more nowadays, and I’m even starting to feel like Sagat is getting boring after coming back to him. But who knows how serious I’ll really get into this game. Still, I figure being able to use other characters will also at least allow me to get better at Street Fighter IV overall, since I’ll know more about how each character fights. I’m surprised though that I’ve almost logged 50 hours. The game is really good and keeps me coming back. That’s really rare for a fighting game these days.