Shank 2 [PS3 REVIEW] [QUICK&SHORT]

Gory-Gorgeous platformer fighter that has an awesome, tight retro control system... if you can stomach the shanking.

This square-jawed brute is our hero - Shank - who just loves to..... er..... chop vegetables?

What's It All About Then?

This is Shank 2, a 2D side-scrolling brawler where you play the part of "Shank" - a guy who loves to use knives (do you see what they did there?). This is the sequel to the extremely popular 2010 original - which impressed players with it's beautiful graphics and brutal combat.

In this outing, Shank is somewhere in South America, and there's this evil dictator who is obviously up to no good. Shank is a tough hitman, out to help nobody, but the violent struggle going on around him draws him back into action.

Grab the brute, break his arm, jump over and slash that guy with the gun....
it's all in a day's work for our boy Shank.

So Is It Any Good?

+++ Retro-Perfect Controls +++
The big draw for me to this game was the controls - they are wonderfully tight and well-designed. You use square for your knives, triangle to use heavy weapons (ranging from chainsaws to sledgehammers) and circle to use ranged weapons (throwing knives and guns). The combat rockets on at an intense pace - with enemies spawning left-right-and-centre to cut up into little pieces. 


There's some extra moves that help to get you out of tight spots (launching jumps and grab/throw moves) and these allow the combat to get very tough without feeling impossible. Add to that the wide range of environmental helpers that you can use - such as explosive canisters around the place and spike pits to smash enemies into.


Basically you're never short of ways to violently kill anyone in your path - and the game keeps things tense by having quite a high difficulty level (especially on the boss fights).


If you found the combat a bit too easy then there's a Hard Mode to try as well, with less health pick-ups and more soft squishy baddies to put your namesake to. Special mention goes to the "Survival mode", which puts Shank into a small combat arena where he must take on wave after wave of increasingly powerful enemies. There's a shop system here too, where you buy bonus items to make the action slightly more bearable - but if you are still in the mood for a challenge after the main story then there's another hour or so of play here.

You can even gross-out a friend in Co-op Survival Mode!

+++ Gorgeous Graphics... ish +++

Each of the nasty ways you can dispatch baddies is animated with bright, bloody, cartoon graphics - looking truly awesome in high-def... if a little stomach-turning. Shoot grunts with a shotgun to see them splat into pieces. Throw them into rotating blades to see them splat into pieces. Run at them with a chainsaw to see them... you get the idea.


The cutscenes are just as comic-book beautiful - but the game seems to feel the need to be brutal and offensive as much as possible - so be prepared for some guts being spilled, heads being lopped off, and limbs flying everywhere.


The story that links these all up is good enough - even though one level you traipse through a swamp filled with cannibals for no good reason other than it allowed the developers to throw in some humans chomping on human bowels. It's not really about the story though, is it? It's about being a tough-as-nails hitman who slashes people to shreds in the same way you might viciously tear up a copy of the Daily Mail.

It's not just DmC's Dante who can juggle baddies with his guns.

--- Short and Brutal ---

The only bad things I can say about Shank 2 are that the game is just a little too short to be a stellar success. The main story - even if some fights take a few tries - will be over in under 3 hours. Hard Mode is there if you want it, but there's little difference in the actual gameplay. The Survival Mode again adds an hour or so, but still isn't quite meaty enough to keep me hooked for very long.

The second negative point is that with so much video violence, it all feels just a little bit cheap. Graphic nasties are thrown in for shock value alone - but when the entire game is about carving people into grillable lumps then it comes across as a little pointless. 

Basically, there's violence because it's necessary (such as taking down an evil dictator) and then there's violence because it'll make people go "Eeeeeewwww!". I found myself feeling slightly queasy at several points in the game, and it didn't really add to the experience for me.

Conclusions

The gameplay and graphics in Shank 2 are spot on - really tight and fun to play.

The difficulty level is set just right too - so you're constantly having to make the most out of the control system without it ever feeling too hard.

There is still room for improvement though - taking out some of the "filler" violence and just sticking with a longer, more-focused campaign mode and this would be a big hit.

Feel free to post comments or contributions to improve the experience!
Any images in this review are subject to relevant copyrights and are kindly provided by: http://www.shankgame.com/

Sly Raccoon and the Thievius Raccoonius - HD Update [PS3] [QUICK&SHORT]

The original PS2 box art.

So What's The Story Then?
This is the first title of the Sly Cooper trilogy, which were released on the Playstation 2 between 2002 and 2005, and chart the antics of a master thief raccoon - Sly Cooper - and his gang of helpful animal friends. 


This review concerns the high-definition remaster of the first instalment, Sly Raccoon and the Thievius Raccoonius. Originally released by developers Sucker Punch and updated by Sanzaru Games in 2011. In this game, Sly is searching for the stolen pages of a family heirloom - the Thievius Raccoonius - an ancient manuscript which generations of Cooper thieves have added the knowledge of their special sneaky powers and secrets. These pages have been stolen by a gang of criminal masterminds and taken away to opposite ends of the Earth - so Sly must break into each of their headquarters in turn to steal back what is rightfully his! At all times he must be wary of the long arm of the law, always trying to chase Sly down, the form of the foxy Inspector Carmelita!

This is Sly swinging into action with the foxy Inspector Carmelita on his arm.... phwoar!

So Is It Any Good?
+++ Cartoon Colourful +++ 
Graphically great, excellent use of colour and with a really vibrant, cartoon style.... but that was all from the original version. This new HD update offers a higher resolution and some very minor graphical refinement - it's pretty much the same graphics but adapted for bigger TVs.



Sly's special moves - dive bombing, quick rolling, rail grinding - are all great fun and get unlocked as you carry out robberies. Special mention goes to slow motion - this really brings out the best in the updated HD graphics - allowing you to let things smash up as you jump away and watch the action unfold at a quarter speed.


The sections where Inspector Carmelita tries to shoot you with her laser gun are particularly fun - you have to race across the level while she blows up the structures you are standing on - and when combined with the slow motion these sections look and play incredibly. 


The variety in traps and special moves is complemented by the an nice bunch of scenarios and villains - such as a Haitian swamp with a voodoo crocodile, and a Chinese palace complete with a firework-flinging panda. They're well characterised, fun to beat, and perfectly matched to the cartoon tone of the game.



+++ Glorious Platforming +++

This is a 3D platformer from the glory days when platformers rule the gaming charts. You can tell that a lot of effort was put into the design of the characters, gameplay and environments - but that was just the way we used to make games (ah, nostalgia trip...)


Early levels are nicely paced and allow you to get used to Sly's skills and try out a few robberies. Later levels are a web of platforms to cross, enemies to fend off, and traps to avoid - and if you fail at the end of the level you can find yourself having to trek a loooooong way back to continue. 


This is because the health system is archaic and punishing. By collecting a hundred coins, which are produced by smashing background objects to bits, you earn a shield to protect you from one hit of damage. Once that is gone, or if you still haven't collected all one hundred coins, then a single hit of damage and you're dead. You have to go back to the start of the level and try again.


That's not a bad thing, it means that you have to take care and not just run recklessly through the levels. It builds a sense of danger - the traps and enemies are all threatening because they can easily lead to a "Game Over".



Then we get to the bosses - they always have a sneaky change or a last-minute trick to catch you off guard - and then you have to start the whole boss fight again. No handy mid-fight checkpoints or autosaving in Sly's boss stages - you have to get from start to finish without taking any damage. Boss fights are three-tiered: the first stage is basic and you learn what the boss's moves are, the second mixes it up a bit and makes you do something slightly different, and the third stage normally has the boss do some sneaky attack (like a frog who bounces around all battle until at the last minute he starts viciously whipping his tongue around).


Again, even though they are quite challenging this is not a criticism - it makes you adapt and learn how to beat each of them - and you become a better master thief as a result.

You are aided on your quest by a tech genius tortoise and a hippo.... who drives the van.

--- Minor Sound and Control Issues ---
Some of the sounds can be distinctly "low-fi" - most of the music sounds great but certain effects can sound very tinny and unpleasant (especially when played over the music). This doesn't happen too often, but it would surely have been part of the HD update to remaster the sound as well so that it works on bigger stereo systems.

Again, a very minor gripe, but Sly can sometimes ignore commands because he is millimetres out alignment with the object you want to interact with. Rails, ledges and wires are the big culprits - leading to a lot of deaths on-screen and a lot of blood boiling in my veins.


With a game that demands you to make as few mistakes as possible, when you input perfectly correct button presses and still end up watching a raccoon plummeting to his death - you feel a little cheated.


The same goes for the two driving sections - your hippo friend takes over and you have to complete a three-lap race. The controls are so pants that these sections get really annoying - particularly when you have to try them a couple of times. Luckily you'll only be spending about fifteen minutes of your total play time in the driving sections.

Conclusions

This is a welcome blast-from-the-past - and surely a welcome addition to anyone's platformer collection. If you missed Sly's adventures the first time around then I strongly recommend you give this a go now.

Although this is a kids game, it still has enough character and depth to keep adults entertained until the end. The colourful graphics aren't quite High-Definition quality, but are functional and bright enough to make the game both fun and enjoyable.

Perhaps with a bit more time and care taken over the update to the graphics, sounds and controls then this would be a stand-out title. As it is, this is an excellent reminder of one of the PS2's treasures.

Feel free to post comments or contributions to improve the experience!
Any images in this review are subject to relevant copyrights and are kindly provided by:
http://www.suckerpunch.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=category&layout=blog&id=57&Itemid=107
http://www.sanzaru.com/wp/games/the-sly-collection/

Trine 2 [PS3] [QUICK&SHORT]

Absurdly pretty, fantastically colourful game 

that ticks nearly every box.

What's It All About?

The Trine is a magical object which binds three people together and grants them special powers.  These powers will be required in order to get through the puzzles the game world presents - with goblins, trolls, living forests, giant creatures.... and a witch with a dark secret to uncover. The 3 characters brought together in this fantasy tale are:

1. A Wizard - he has the ability to conjure objects and levitate them from afar
2. A Soldier - he has a sword, shield and hammer to fight and throw at destructible objects
3. An Archer - she has a bow and arrow, plus a grappling hook that can be used to swing to higher areas.

The action plays out as a side scrolling 2D-frame but 3D-graphics set-up - with extra powers earned by collecting hard-to-reach gems and beating baddies - and the story unravelled through small, sparse segments of text and a normally a small cutscene at the end of each level.

So Is It Any Good Then?

+++Spectacularly Colourful+++ The visuals are the big winner here - fantastic use of colour all around means that even the backdrops are worth a few minutes to stop and take a look at. Each scenario has its own colour scheme - with lighter and greener levels at the beginning, moving through to purple and blue mystical and aquatic levels through the middle, right through to black and red as we approach the climactic finale. It's great to see a game use such a variety of colours and settings in such a short game - it means that the environments never get boring and hold your attention for the duration of the story. The characters are funny and enjoyable enough to keep you interested as well.

+++ Co-op Physics Puzzler +++ Well I can't get enough of these - the use of clever tricks such as weighted platforms and levers that build in difficulty as the game progresses is great. You can get through the game on your own quite easily, and even using just the one character - but the fun lies in switching things up and getting a friend to join in and play along. There are some issues with the physics - momentum doesn't work properly and there's a glitch with the wizard's conjuring skill that I call the "magic carpet trick" that means you can fly through most of the puzzles in the game - but these flaws don't actually make the game any less playable. It isn't perfect but it works well enough to still be enjoyable.

--- Short and Unambitious --- The big problems with the game - other than it's a physics puzzle platformer with a buggered physics engine - are that the game is over too quickly and doesn't really take off. The story is well paced - revealing itself slowly until all is revealed at the end - but you reach that level so quickly that a lot of the suspense is lost. Added to that the lack of any real improvements over the original Trine and it means that while the game is very good - its graphical shine isn't matched in the rest of the game.

Conclusion

Trine 2 has charm, humour, great puzzles, spectacular visuals and a novel concept that makes for a brilliant all-round experience.

The game is great - and worth a play through for anyone - but the game isn't ground-breaking nor polished enough to grant it too revered a place in the Gaming Halls of Fame.


If they could double the size and number of levels, add in a few new gameplay mechanics and really go wild with the story - then the game would do the visuals justice.

Feel free to post comments or contributions to improve the experience!
Any images in this review are subject to relevant copyrights and are kindly provided by: http://trine2.com/site/index.php?page=media#screenshots

Tomb Raider: Underworld [PS3]

Nearly gets the classic Raider formula spot-on. 
Underworld has gorgeous environments, novel puzzles, grappling rope fun - but in the end, terrible design choices made this a chore to finish.

Initial Buzz

You know what? 

If I based my review on the first level of this game, the conclusion would be: 

"Stunning and great fun - feels like the old Tomb Raider!"

Sadly, the game did not stop at the first level......

The game starts by throwing you in at the deep end (quite literally) when you dive into tropical seas in search of an underwater temple. Right from the start, there is much more of an open feel to the settings: you swim/run/jump around all over the place until you get the hint of a trail and then start to climb up a cliff face that looks promising. This sense of exploration, crossed with ancient ruins and local animals feels just how Lara's adventure is meant to.

The underwater sections are easily big enough for you to feel "out of your depth".

At the bottom of this giant underwater temple, 

you meet the first big bad - a giant octopus!

And the level works! The whole section feels natural - like you're playing around in a room until you figure out the secret that allows you to move on. The puzzles and climbing sections have a much more organic feel to them... that sounds weird, so I'll elaborate - the ledges and crumbled ruins look ancient, meaning that you spend your time searching for the gap in a wall or hand holds rather than have neon strips highlighting where you need to go (a-la Uncharted). 

There isn't some of the other modern additions to action/adventures either, like giant floating arrows telling you which way to go, or help messages reminding you that you've picked up the Skull-shaped key, which may go in the skull-shaped lock... 
(hint hint, nudge nudge, know what I mean?)


Although I'm happy for the game to let me find my own way through the levels, it could have made more of an effort guiding me through the storyline:
Someone who killed Lara's mum/dad has kidnapped an angel, who is evil, and they're all trying to get hold of Thor's hammer. We're all jetting across the globe to find Thor's gloves (hidden in Thailand) and then we'll use the gloves and hammer to get into Valhalla. Oh, and there's a Lara Croft clone in the mix too. Chuck Norris may or may not make an appearance.
Makes you miss the good old days of "Bad guys to the right - keep moving that way".

I can tell you this for free, Lara - that pistol ain't gonna' do jack to Monsieur Octo.

Tarzan, Eat Your Heart Out

One addition that really boosted the game's appeal for me was the grappling hook. Used in a variety of ways (some wonderfully clever), the grappling hook allows Lara to swing, climb and drag to progress through the levels.

I really can't emphasise this point enough: it really does work. The swinging, the physics of Lara and the rope, the applications of the grappling hook - all spot on.


So, after climbing to the top of the giant octopus chamber Lara then swings across a daunting gap to make her way out to freedom. I shamefully uttered little yelps as she slipped on the edge and struggled to climb up - 

"EEEEK! Shit I've missed! Oh no! She made it! Boy, do I hope no-one heard that!".

Lara is as athletic and gymnastic as ever - but still forgot to put a waterproof on.

Sleek, Shiny and Manageable
As I said before, the environments all look the stuff - ruins seem to crumble before you, water shimmers in the sunlight, and the trees look....er....like trees. Each setting has a distinctive feel to it as well, with Thailand's jungle looking noticably different to Mexico's. 


As you complete puzzles, ancient mechanisms groan into life and open up to reveal new areas. The cutscenes that show these changes taking place often use wide, sweeping shots that show off the supreme shiny prettiness of Underworld. Getting to leap around them afterwards should be a massive bonus. Surely? You'd think, wouldn't you?

This area evolves as you progress through the level - finishing in the state shown below.

Maybe these captures don't do it justice, but the fire and rain do look amazing.

Poltergeists (or Invisible Walls)

OK so, after finishing that glorious introductory level it's time to get out of the sea and take the adventure on to dry land. Well, actually the next step is to get on a boat.

The boat section(s) are one of the main problems in the game, lasting for far too long and spending far too much time shooting at appalling AI characters. I'll talk a bit more about the shooting sections later on.

So anyway, the next climbing/adventure level is more of the same searching for a hand hold, climb, leap, grapple and so on. The issue arises when the environments get a bit more cluttered and the climbing/grappling sequences get more complicated. Climbing turns from fluid joy to plunging leap of death far too frequently - the game has a tendancy of aiming Lara towards a climbable ledge half the time, and jumping off into thin air the other half.


The next major grappling section involves swinging between two large boulders, and if Lara comes within 2 metres of either one - SPLAT - she collides with an invisible wall and plummets down into a spike pit (which is badly animated too, maybe trying to avoid showing any blood).


After trying some of these sections 3 or 4 times, and certain that my aim was fine, I became convinced that there was some sort of poltergeist at work, sabotaging my progress to loot ancient tombs (though for the life of me, I cannot think of any motive for this).


The final straw came at one of the final "puzzle rooms" in the game, where there was a leaping section necessary to move on that required both accuracy and timing to leap from a bar onto a moving chain. Lara then needed to climb along the chain, against the movement, to get over to a ledge. 

Would she carry out this simple set of instructions? Would she buggery!  

Hanging and climbing kept making her fall off. Leaping as far as she would go at the right time led to some long falls as Lara aimed at her old friend thin air. Trying to climb on the chain and walk along it and boosh - INVISIBLE WALL (slash POLTERGEIST). 


Something was in the way - Lara would walk halfway along and then just freeze, causing her to be pulled back by the chain until she fell off and died. I repeated this enfuriating chain of events in sequence, testing each one to find out what I was doing wrong, for nearly an hour. 

An hour of my life spent trapped in a room in the body of Lara Croft.... and I was having a horrible time.

Looooooong Way Down

The middle section of the game - Mexico - has a lot of time spent speeding around on a motorbike. After some really annoying grappling sections, I was in the mood for a change of pace (actually I was about to turn the game off once it had autosaved, but carried on once I saw Lara was on a big bike). 


So there's a few areas that you need to get between in this area, connected by long roads which have nasty spike pits. The best way around them? Going top speed on a motorcycle (obviously). Then you fight some bad blokes or vicious animals, and search around to find a puzzle piece to solve a main puzzle back at the centre of the map. You are therefore expected to speed backwards and forwards around this map for quite a long time, especially in the beginning while figuring out what exactly you are up to.


And I am sad to report that I got bored of this too - especially at the end when one of the already adjusted puzzle mechanisms "slipped back out of place", as the game smugly told me. "Waste a bit more racing around on a bike in the jungle", it should have said.


Thus far, Underworld has managed to take all the fun out of grappling physics and motorcycle stunts. What else can it ruin before the end?

I quite liked the puzzle shown here - until the second and then third time I had to do it

Pea Shooter Vs. Puma

During most of the levels, there is a large great thick shooting section. The targets on offer range from small animals, such as bats, to large animals, such as pumas. Now bats, I can just about accept... but pumas? Two of them at once? While wearing nothing but a tank top? Really? 


Later on, Lara takes on heavily-armed guards and undead demons - again with no body armour or any significant firepower. As if the ridiculous situation wasn't enough, the way the game handles the shooting sections is just crap. You lock onto targets with auto-aim, and the guns fire pathetically and do virtually no damage per hit. You have to shoot at the same enemy for several minutes, frantically firing weak-as-piss shots to eventually wear their health down.

With the undead enemies, you then have to smash their motionless corpse to bits by jumping on it once it has fallen to the ground. When three enemies swarm you while you are trying to do this, and the bastard just gets straight back up again, you get the joy of shooting him a few thousand times more. Lucky you.


Sufficed to say that I really didn't enjoy the shooting sections, and hated the fact that about half of my time in the game was spent drudging through them. So that's swinging on ropes, motorcycling and shooting ruined now - Arnold Schwarzenegger films are looking less  appealing by the minute....

The shooting sections are one of my biggest annoyances with Underworld - totally unnecessary filler.

Conclusion

So very nearly a return to triumphant form for Ms. Croft. 

All the elements are here - but the developers felt the need to pad the game out with shooting and bike sections that were laborious and unnecessary. 

Add to that climbing sections that are actually broken and the magic is lost. 

Nearly, Lara, very nearly....

All images used in this review are courtesy of: http://www.gamercenteronline.net/2008/06/20/tomb-raider-underworld-screenshots/ and also http://www.realmofgaming.com/screenshots/xbox360/TombRaiderUnderworld

Please note: I do not own the copyright to these images.

Costume Quest [QUICK&SHORT] [PS3]

Overview
It's Halloween and you play the role of Reynold, a young boy off trick-or-treating wearing his best robot costume with his twin sister in tow. Suddenly, a monster attacks from out of nowhere and kidnaps your dear sibling and it's left up to you to save her - and the rest of the town - from alien monsters!

Major Points
Novel Concept - the unique selling point here being that as you put on new costumes you take on each costume's powers. This works well and gives a nice variety of options to go into battle with (Turn-Based-RPG/Quick-Time-Event style).
Cute, but Adult Cute - yes, it's colourful and inoffensive and you're a young kid playing dress-up but it's that type of cute which is clearly written with adults/semi-adults in mind (a la Spongebob). Subtle humour and pop culture references bounces off childrens ears with no harm done while adults giggle (ashamedly).
Much, much, much too bloody short and easy - fine, maybe I'm asking too much for a game I got free and is probably aimed at children but I was done with this in 5 hours (practically 100% too) and I didn't feel desperately challenged once I'd got my costume/abilities set-up how I wanted it.

Conclusion
A nice (though annoyingly short) romp with an charming quirkiness that is present throughout the game. It really is nice to see a game that sticks to a strong theme in every element.
The game is both accessible and functional meaning that a non-gamer could come in and pick the game up fairly easily, with all usual RPG-stat-studying out the window.
Sadly, this means that for a regular gamer the difficulty level never picks up and ends rather promptly - either because it hopes you'll fork out more for extra missions or perhaps simply because it ran out of steam and funky ideas.


*By the way, this was one of the games I got FREE (see http://eclectic-review.blogspot.com/2011/10/ps3-review-update-october-2011-1st.html for more info). As such I can't really complain that much but would certainly say that you should not under any circumstances pay more than a tenner for this. If you do, you'll beat the TV screen to pieces once you find yourself at the end credits before the pot of tea has brewed.