Cam's Eye View: Uncharted 3 for the PS3 review

I love the video game character Nathan Drake from the Uncharted series. I know a lot of critics like to bash him for being “bland”, but like Kratos from God of War, I don’t really see what the heck they are criticizing. I find Nathan Drake to be an extremely likeable and memorable character. He is smart, but cocky. I find his reaction to certain events real. For example, early in Uncharted 2, Drake gets chased down an alleyway by a truck and he has to keep shooting it until it explodes. After that little chase, he is happy he got out of there alive, but he is still a little rattled and out of breath since he almost died, and that thought just caught up with him. He is a guy you would like to have a beer with. Sure, he might look and act like the everyday guy, but he is more than that. That is what makes this third person shooter franchise so fun. I mean, other third person shooter series like Gears of War are good, but in that series, they just make the scale of the game epic. The characters however, are not that interesting, nor memorable. They are just muscle-bound men with steroid rage. I am getting a bit off-track, so how about we take a look at Uncharted 3 for the PS3? This has to be yet again one of my favorite games of all time. I mean, besides a couple of little flaws that add up, I might love this game more than Uncharted 2 and that game was amazing. Just put in your Indiana Jones theme music and let’s get started.

Before I get even more biased and over my head, let’s get into the story. Nolan North reprises his role as Nathan Drake. He and his friend Victor Sullivan, once again voiced by Richard McGonagle, search for some more clues and treasures that were left behind by Drake’s famous ancestor. They of course, run into trouble from an old female acquaintance by the name of Katherine Marlowe, voiced by Rosalind Ayres, who wants the ring that Nathan Drake wears around his neck, because it is a key to find what Drake’s ancestor left behind. What happens is mostly what you expect. You get Indiana Jones-style action scenes, a mystical culture, a mystical artifact, gunfights, some kind of demonic being, and many summer blockbuster movie-style scenes that are all combined to make a really amazing story. I think what makes the story so good is how it dives into Nathan Drake’s past, how he met Victor Sullivan, why Nathan Drake wants to find what his ancestor left behind all those centuries ago. I felt more involved in this story since, on top of the great characters, you got a more in-depth story about the characters and their relations. Don’t get me wrong, I love the stories of the last two games, but they always felt like popcorn summer blockbusters with over-the-top and 2-dimensional villains, while this film has a more 3-dimensional cast of characters, both good and bad. It is definitely the best story in any third-person-shooter besides Mass Effect.

The gameplay is still the stuff you love. You have third-person-shooting, platforming, climbing everywhere like Spiderman, hand-to-hand combat, some minor stealth mechanics, treasures hidden around the game, over-the-top cinematic-like sections that would be perfect in a summer blockbuster, and some huge puzzles to solve. The third-person mechanics work like you would expect. You can take cover and hold up to two guns and about 4 grenades. You can take aim, and fire upon the enemies. New to the formula is the more streamlined hand-to-hand combat to where you can actually get close to the enemy and serve him a couple of knuckle sandwiches. The previous games had combat, but the first game’s combat was not very polished, and while the second game’s melee combat was improved, it is perfected here. You can punch and beat the tar out of your opponent, counterattack, grab, and sometimes grab something like a fish and slap them with it. The platforming is just like the last game. You will be climbing and jumping your way through areas, like a couple of desert towns, underground taverns, a cargo plane, a hidden city in the sand, a castle, and a few other areas. The puzzles are complex and can make you scratch your head, but are not too hard to where it becomes tedious, since if you wait awhile you will get the answer to solve the puzzle. Multiplayer has been enhanced with the return of co-op missions for offline and online play, a character creation for online multiplayer, new perks, an equalizer to losing teams, and multiple maps to play on and other things carried over from Uncharted 2. I know I just skimmed through this part, but for me anyway, I play Uncharted for the story and not the multiplayer, unlike most shooters that have issues with having an endearing single player. Overall, besides Mass Effect 2, Uncharted 3 is a third-person-shooter that I can recommend that has a huge amount of content that will keep you busy for quite some time.

The Uncharted series has always had amazing graphics and this game is really no different. The detail on everything is amazing. Sure, it might not be as amazing as L.A. Noir’s facial animation capturing, but Uncharted 3 has amazing detail to everything from the wind hitting the sand to the boats floating in the ocean. The music, once again provided by Greg Edmonson has the same incredible music that you can expect with help from Clint Bajakian and a female Iranian American musician named Azam Ali. Overall, you can expect another great package music-wise from Uncharted 3. The voice acting is also top-notch, which again is an issue with a lot of shooters. You really believe that the characters are real and not hearing a voice actor or celebrity just doing the voice.

However, I do have some gripes, but not many. The AI is still terrible. A sign of this is when you see an enemy toss a grenade at a wall in front of him and it bounces off the wall and lands right next to him and someone else. It was hilarious to see, but sometimes it made me nod my head that everything else is so polished until you see the enemy AI. It is definitely better than the last game’s AI, but I still saw some areas where the enemies did some incredibly stupid things. The controls also still felt stiff, and it is one of those games that forces you to do what it wants and you can’t really do much about it. I mean, it plays more like a movie so you can’t just do whatever you want without some consequence.

The third game in the series in my opinion, has the biggest hurdle to go over. Usually the third game is the best, but someone ALWAYS complains that it doesn’t have the wow factor the second game had and it is played on the safe side. Well, I think this game is the best out of the three and has some of the best moments in any third-person-shooter. While I enjoy shooters like Vanquish, I can easily and fully recommend Uncharted 3 to anyone who is looking for an incredible PS3 third-person-shooter experience. The game is still relatively new so you might want to wait a bit for it to get cheaper. The collector’s edition while not worth it in my eyes is just 100 dollars, and it might go down in price in the future. This is one of the best experiences I have ever had with a video game and you all should play it or at least watch a walkthrough of how amazing this game can be. Just check it out. SERIOUSLY! Stop reading this and go!

This game gets a solid 9 out of 10

Gaming With Killatia Trouble Witch Neo

Death Smiles - the gothic look and feel = Trouble Witch Neo for xbla

Gaming with Killatia Sin and Punishment Star Successor

Today on Gaming with Killatia we take a look at the new wii game Sin and Punishment Star Successor. Fans of the orginal N64 cult hit will definitely enjoy this game, but will new comers like it? watch to find out.

Note: I was hoping to use more footage for the review but some of the video files I had on me had crappy A/V synch. Oh well I liked how the review came out. Anyways enjoy. 

Cam's Eye View: Import Surprise part 1: Star Parodier

Recently, I have been watching videos of Japanese-only games, like Ganbare Goemon 2 and a video series on thatguywiththeglasses.com that is all about Japanese import games that American gamers can easily play and obtain. The real reason I got interested was because of a guy named JewWario, who hosts the “You Can Play This” series on the site. I got inspired and decided to go get a few Virtual Console cards, and downloaded a couple of games. I decided to have my own little import review series known as Import Surprise! For the first import review, I wanted it to be special, so I decided to pick a game called Star Parodier for the PC Engine, which is an add-on for the Turbografx-16. I decided to choose this game because it’s good, and it’s simple and easy to pick up, though you will have to read this review to see what I think of it.

Even though in games like this you don’t really care about the story, I’m going to tell it to you anyway, since, well, I want to. However, I thought at first I wasn’t going to since the story is in Japanese, but I will sum it up to all you gamers who haven’t played this. Basically, a ship was flying around and saw something flying through space. Sadly, that thing was evil! It hit a planet and started to attack the planet. The planet then called out to the Bomberman planet, and the people of the Bomberman planet made a ship from Star Soldier, a giant Bomberman, and a giant PC-Engine robot thing to go out and fight the evil that has taken over the land. Yeah, I don’t know why they would make a giant PC-Engine robot to fight crime when the world has stuff like Gundam and other giant robots, but this is a video game and such, so I won’t question its logic.

The game play in Star Parodier is of a top-down 2D shooter like 1943 and Raiden 3. Like I said above, you have three different ships to control as you go through multiple levels, shooting down enemies, facing a boss in the middle of the level, and then another boss at the end of the level. There are different kinds of power-ups that are different for each character. That is something that is good in my opinion. In other games like Raiden, where no matter what ship you are, you have basically the same attacks. Star Parodier has different attacks depending on what character you are. For example, the Bomberman ship can shoot a wave of bombs, the ship shoots sonic booms all across the screen, and the giant PC Engine robot ship thing shoots CDs at the enemies. When you beat the game you can go do 2 and 5 minute challenges and see how many points you can get in those challenges.

The graphics are very bright and colorful. Not meaning that other shooters are not as bright, I mean, look at R-Types, R-Type Delta, and the Raiden games. They are fully colorful. However, Star Parodier has very colorful graphics that you would find in games that Treasure makes. The whole feel of the game is kind of out of an anime that is a satire of shooters. I think some of my favorite parts of the game are the boss fights. They are all so creative, like fighting two crabs that talk, a snake charmer, a walrus shooting a giant laser beam, and even a giant Bomberman, which is just so cool. The music is also very colorful and cheerful to listen to. Then again, a lot of games made by Hudson Soft, like on the NES and SNES, have really good, cheerful music. I also like the humor in the game. When you shoot some enemies, they wave white flags, which is just silly. It’s interesting to note that Star Parodier is actually a parody of Hudson’s shooter franchise, Star Soldier. The “paro” in the name means parody. The difficulty is rather easy, but I enjoyed playing through it. It is definitely one of those shooters, like Mobile Light Force, to get started on if you’re new to the series. I know it does get harder as you play through the game, but you can do it rather easily through a good chunk of the levels.

Now, let’s get to the bad parts of this Japanese-only game. There isn’t really much wrong with this game. The bad parts that are part of this game do come from the fact that it plays like an arcade shooter. Each time you die, you lose all your power-ups, and once you get up to this Egypt-like level, it is REQUIRED to have some power-ups. Don’t get me wrong, this game does have unlimited continues and you can change your ship, but I guess it is just a minor gripe. Other issues only come from the game being Japanese-only. Some of the power-ups actually power you down, so I guess they should be called power-downs or something. What I am trying to say is that if you don’t know which ones will power you down, then you won’t notice until you’ve realized your powere-up ship is now powered-down. I also wish there was a health bar instead of the whole one-hit death. It just gets annoying.

Overall though, as one of the first import games I have ever played in my life as a gamer, I think it’s very fun. I think it should be on everyone’s list of games to download from the Virtual Console. Now, to new people who are on the VC, import games are a little more expensive only by like 100 or 200 points (a.k.a 1 or 2 dollars). I would say get the VC version since tracking down this game along with a TurboGrafx-16 and a PC Engine would get very expensive, and being a gamer means you go by a budget, or you get some gift cards or something. Either way, this was a great game to review and I hope you all liked it.

This game gets a solid 9 out of 10



Game Review: Fire Shark (Sega Genesis Version)

Game Review: Fire Shark (Sega Genesis Version):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2bRMZlpjGfE

A awesome Sega Genesis game, a nice little top down shooter game. I really enjoy the game, Hope you enjoy the review. Thanks for watching!