Halo Wars Demo Impressions
The Halo Wars demo has hit the XBL Marketplace and we have our demo impressions for you. Halo Wars was developed by Ensemble Studios and published by Microsoft Game Studios. The game is a Xbox 360 exclusive title and releases March 3rd in North America. Hit the jump for my impressions.
The demo gives you the opportunity to play 2 missions in the human campaign, and play unlimited amounts of 1v1 skirmish matches versus the computer. I'll start off with the campaign. Your army is on the UNSC ship the Spirit of Fire orbiting the planet Harvest. Your first mission is a basic tutorial on how to move around and fight. You are then given a hero unit and you set off on the missions. The missions are nothing to scream about, the main part of this demo is the skirmish mode.
Skirmish mode allows you to play as both the covenant and the UNSC, but you must use the preselected leader. For the covenant you can be the Prophet of Regret and for the UNSC you can be the Captain of the Spirit of Fire. Each leader (Six total in retail game; 3 UNSC/ 3 Covenant) has unique units, bonuses, powers, upgrades, perks, etc. to help define their play style. The Captain can use an orbital "sniper bomb" known as the MAC Bomb. With the MAC bomb you pinpoint an area and deal major damage in that small Area of Effect. The Prophet of Regret can use his power to destroy enemies quickly. The prophet, who is a decent fighter/defender early game, can call down a "holy beam" for 10 resources a second to nearly "insta-kill" and units found under it. He also has the unique Honor Elite Guards. These are basically Elites equipped with only energy swords and can cloak to sneak around. From what I tested they are only good to make an early rush with or defend from an early rush. Once the opposing side has middle tier units they are useless, except to be canon fodder.
The demo does not include all units or all of the tech tree so it is hard to estimate how deep this game will be, but from the demo it looks deep enough to keep you interested but will look like a flat experience to hardened PC RTS fans. Another issue is the controls. Many sites have critically acclaimed the controls, but I beg to differ. Sure, the controls work for a console, but there are many useless things maped to buttons that could be used better off. For example, you can use the right trigger to jump between bases and when you pass one and want to go back, you'd click the left trigger...right? Wrong. The left trigger is used to increase scroll speed accross the map. Sure, the increased speed is nice, but could have been implemented much better. They could have just made the scoll speed gradually increase as you scroll, for larger maps.
Overall, Halo Wars looks like a step in the right direction for a console RTS, but it is not the final step. Future console RTS should use Halo Wars as a model, but expand on it. Think of Halo Wars as the skeleton, we just need to add the muscle to it now. Also, after playing EndWar, lack of voice commands seems like a step backwards for a console RTS. I would have really liked to see Ensemble add an option for voice commands for tedious controls, that would free up the controller even more for a deeper experience.
Enjoy!
The VGToday Crew
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Free Limited Editons
Participating Gamestops have now made all Limited Editions of games released before December 25th the normal price of $59.99. Limited Editions used to cost 10$ more than the normal game. Below are some great ideas for limited editions!
- Fallout 3 Limited Edition ($59.99 at Gamestop): Basically, a lunchbox with lots of neat collectibles in it. Including and awesome Bobblehead.
- Prince of Persia Limited Edition ($59.99 at Gamestop): Has the full soundtrack included, a Prima Strategy Guide, "Making of" videos, and much more.
Enjoy!
The VGToday Crew
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My Games of the Year
The year of 2008 is finally coming to a close, after a great year of gaming. Many great franchises have gotten their anticipated sequels, and some good, new IP has arisen. As most other gaming websites do, I'd like to present you with my personal Game of the Year picks. Note, these are my opinions, not VGToday as a whole. Kitsune will be posting his shortly. Now, without further adieu...
Age of Booty
Runner Up: Braid
Did he really...? Yes, I did. Braid did not win my top spot, as popular opinion has expected in most game of the year lists. The reason Age of Booty won was because it was actually fun, and complex enough to keep my attention past an hour or so (The problem with most XBLA titles). Braid was nice, "artsy", innovative, etc. But was it really fun? Did it pull you back to play time and time again? If you said no, then you're right. If you said yes, then just stop reading. In all seriousness, Braid is highly overrated due to its reliance of pulling users in by its art and innovation, rather than actual longevitable fun.
Best Studio
Valve Software
Runner Up: Bethesda Softworks
Valve gets the award for its game Left 4 Dead. Left 4 Dead, in my opinion, is one of the first games to actually make co-op, cooperative. Many games add co-op, but players normally do not stick together and just do their own thing. In Left 4 Dead, especially in the higher levels, players must stick together or the innovative AI Director will pick off the survivors, one by one. The AI Director is another reason for Valve's winning here. The Director makes the game fresh each play through, and challenges you. If it sees you surviving too easy, you will soon hear the noise signaling the dreaded Tank, or other special infected.
Biggest Letdown
Fable II
Runner Up: Fallout's Ending
What can I say except that this game has the typical Peter Molyneux problem. Too many promises, too little follow throughs. Molyneux once again promised that Fable II would be the hit game of the year, improving upon everything in Fable I. It fixed alot, but did not really "improve". The game still, to this date, has many game breaking bugs. Some include falling out of the map when jumping over certain objects. One major problem is the lack of main storyline, and the story it does have is "been there, done that". As for Fallout 3, when, and if, you reach the very end...you will understand why this made the list.
Best RPG
Fallout 3
Runner Up: Fable II
Fallout makes Best RPG of 2008 for obvious reasons. Some people call it "Oblivion with guns", I call it "Oblivion with guns, zombies, nukes, mutants, drinking out of toilets, etc." Fallout 3 is truly a landmark in RPGs, reaching to the ranks of such RPG giants as Final Fantasy. Fallout 3 does nearly everything right...except it's ending. Fable II was also fun to play, but did not make number one due to its lacking story and some gameplay elements that make it unenjoyable.
Best Shooter
Left 4 Dead
Runner Up: Gears of War 2
Left 4 Dead gets the rank of best shooter because of what I said above (See "Best Studio"). Gears of War 2 is held back from the number one for reasons I have already posted about. You can read the article here: Click Here. Since my picks have been mostly explained, that is all I am going to say for this section.
Best Strategy
Civilization Revolution
Runner Up: Age of Booty
It seems so long ago, when the big games coming out were Civilization Revolution and Battlefield: Bad Company. Not to be forgotten is Sid Meier's Civilization Revolution, the (by far) best strategy game of the year. Many people doubted whether a Turn Based Strategy could work on a console. CivRev proved everyone wrong, it worked magnificently. The game has numerous civilizations to play as, and keeps you coming back for more and more. In fact, I am planning on putting this disc in later in the week.
Game of the Year
Left 4 Dead
Runner Up: Fallout 3
Left 4 Dead received this title for obvious reasons that I have previously stated in this post. It is fun, innovative, has great longevity, great cooperative play, and much more. I was going to make my GotY Fallout 3, and the runner up be Gears of War 2, but I finally put my Left 4 Dead disc in, and was "wowed". This is quite possibly the game of the past few years. If you have an Xbox 360, or a decent PC, and do not have this game you should not consider yourself a gamer until you play it. This is a must play title. Fallout 3 really missed the mark for me after I saw the ending, it was horrible, compared the Left 4 Dead's near flawlessness.
Notice that I missed Best Fighting Games, Action/Adventure, etc? Well, the titles in those category I have most likely not played, so it was not fair for me to judge a whole category if I only played one or two of the titles within it. Hopefully you will see the categories you missed in Kistune's GotY picks. Hope you enjoyed by insight, AND GO BUY LEFT 4 DEAD!!
Enjoy!
The VGToday Crew
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Left 4 Dead Demo Impressions
Left 4 Dead is Valve's latest project which releases next Tuesday, the 18th of November. The game is a survival horror which brings the "survival" part of the genre to the fullest. You are one of four survivors of a zombie infection, which is very similar to the Resident Evil series, who must fight to stay alive in the infested city. From what I gathered from the demo you must work your way, in the campaign, to escape the city and get to a government refuge. At the intro of the game a government helicopter is shouting to the city for survivors to head to the hospital for evacuation.
So you pick one of the four survivors you want to play as, none of any has an advantage or disadvantage over any other of them. There is a table in front of where you spawn with a pump shotgun and what appears to be a MP5, or other SMG. You may pick one of them and grab the First-Aid kits on the table, which you will need. You also have a pistol that has unlimited ammo. As it stands, the pistol is way to powerful for it to have unlimited ammo. I found myself using the pistol more than my shotgun because of range. I'd only use the shotgun if the zombies got up close to be, which happens alot. Valve needs to make the pistols have an ammo cap, or lower damage. As is, it takes 2-4 hits with a pistol to kill. Also, if you find a pistol on the ground you can dual-wield.
The co-op element of this game, and it's major selling point, is great. It is probably the best co-op experience I've had it awhile, if not ever. If you are constricted by a smoker zombie, or tagged by a boomer zombie, or on the ground because of a hunter zombie you NEED the help of your allies to survive. There cannot be a lone ranger in this game because of that. Also, the AI Director keeps this game fresh. Each time I ran through it, it was different. The zombies never came the same way, nor in the same numbers or types. This will give the game untold amounts of replay value.
Since this is only a Demo Impression and not a full on game review I will stop here and give more time to reviewing this game when it releases. I highly suggest this game, and it will most likely have my vote for game of the year.
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