Blog de Dyer

I tend to do my best to try and like games, and I’m not fond of physically throwing my controllers. NBA Ballers: Chosen One, seen in all of its malicious evil above, is a game that defies my attempts to like games and my resistance to hurling my gamepad. I’ve thrown it more than once, been frustrated to the point of literally throwing the instruction manual, and an empty can of iced tea on top of my 360 controller.

The fundamental gameplay mechanics of this game are built to make you lose. I’m in the fifth chapter now, and I’ve got the feel for the game. It involves a lot of me-using-superpowers, but no matter how many times I try, the opponents ALWAYS have the upper hand. It seems to me, as a player, that the AI is built to cheat, and that the mechanics of the game are deliberately built against you. I don’t know how many times I’ve failed to steal, block, or even PICK UP the basketball in this game, but it’s getting a little fucking ridiculous. I can’t fathom how a company like Midway would ship something that is so frustratingly broken. Seriously, I am not kidding when I tell you I can not pick up the basketball in this game… It just doesn’t happen.

Also angering is that you’re kicked to the main menu after a 90 minute epic ladder climbing match, only to lose in the final tier because the game didn’t give me the win, despite my having correctly followed the criteria. I’ve seen more than my fare share of bullshittery in this game, man, and I’m getting tired of it. Opponents teleporting in front of me, the ball mysteriously disappearing from my hands for reasons unexplained, my slam dunks (that DO go in) aren’t counted, missed rim-shots from in the key count as 3 pointers for my opponent — it’s all here, and it’s enough to drive me batty. It has. I am going to bed to avoid kicking my fucking television in its stupid, smug, Baller displaying face.

There really is nothing redeeming or remotely fun about this game. I am not joking. This is the worst game I’ve played in 2008, and I dealt with both Turok and Turning Point. Turning Point is Bioshock in comparison to this rubbish.

Anyways, off to bed. It’s probably a poor choice, logging on to the blog and ranting. It’s pretty late, and I’m super tired on top of being choked about losing 90 minutes of play time because I was screwed by the game. That sounds like “Oh waaaaah, I really suck so I’ll blame the game” banter, but it’s not. This is some shitty shit, man.

I’ve updated my resume here on the blog so it looks a tad more professional, as opposed to its original catastrophic-atrocity form. That’s cool, but you don’t care.  As I write this I’ve got Universe at War (360) on pause. It’s a cool game, and I’m enjoying it a lot. It drives me nuts waiting five minutes for a worker-unit - courtesy of the god-awful slowdown the game experiences when you’ve capped your buildings/units - but the controls are slick as hell, though there are a few things I miss. I don’t like that I can’t set “modes” for my dudes, like patrol, guard, or attack. I’d love to have them run full force to an objective as they blast everything along the way to hell, but they mosey on passed everything.

Also, If I hear “The unit Mirabel has been destroyed” one more time, I am friggin’ done. I hate babysitting Hero units, I’d rather build a base and wreck some alien invaders, but I’m forced to escort my giant anime robot to a beacon, or protect a human colony with her… But if she dies, it’s Game Over. I appreciate the addition of a PC-like save-anywhere option, it’s really come in handy. I’d recommend it, though only for the patient. I guess it’s an RTS, so you already know if you care about it or not.

It’s my birthday today, too, apparently. My sister walked in to my room and gave me a fifty-dollar filled birthday card - the card is the real gift. It’s an “A long time ago…” Star Wars-y card that friggin’ sings the theme song when opened. Holy shit. - which is a bonus. I can bank that cash for the New Zealand trip that’s coming up. Speaking of that, I’ll be taking a month long vacation to Peter Jackson-land, so if you want to know how that trip is going, we’re going to be blogging our antics at this blog. Check it out, it’ll be an interesting read. Less videogame talk, more “we got too drunk and went Zorbing”.

Sorry to DJDrastic, my one and only reader who comes here to read my reviews on a regular basis. I’m busy dude, so calm down, put down the knife and just keep makin’ your podcast for me to listen to. I’ll get a review or two up before I go I think. I’ve got to lay the beats on Escaflowne.

I’m struggling through Crisis Core. I like it and all, but I’m worried my X button is going to fall off because I’ve just been jamming on it for 7 hours. Who knows how long is left in this game… Who knows how many dudes are going to sprout a single wing… and then fly away? Not I, man, not I. Still, I am enjoying the beat-the-shit-out-of-monsters ethics this game enforces, and that I don’t need to take turns exchanging punches with the enemies. I’m fond of dodging magic attacks, but am violently against the slot machine thing that levels you up. Seriously, there are few things more annoying than playing a game and having some bullshit pop up in your face that completely wrecks the pace and intensity of the game. And it happens every ten seconds! Come on, Square-Enix.

I finished Bully, which I mentioned in the last post, and if I didn’t have to write about Army of Two for the Scoreboard (a feature I’m helming at OXMOnline) I’d probably still be grinding through the Endless Summer and laying the boots to some greaser jerks. It makes me even more depressed that I can’t go back because Army of Two is freakin’ unbearable. I was really looking forward to this game, but Dan’s review had me skeptical of it. I still wanted to play it, and while I enjoy the multiplayer, single player is just boring. The team-mate AI is atrocious, to the point where they’ll drag your wounded ass around in circles until you die without healing you. Great. Back 12 minutes to the last checkpoint. Awesome.

Hot Shots Golf is staring me in the face, but I’ve got Mythos and WoW to play. I’m working on a preview for Mythos for Nukoda, which Ryan McCaffrey of OXM has kindly agreed to edit and give me some hot-shit tips on. My WoW server was down this morning, and I couldn’t really do anything about it, so I shot up two levels in Mythos, giving my Cyclopian monster a new hat in the process. It’s adorable. It seems I’ve really been getting in to the MMO scene lately, and I’m wondering what the potential for them is on consoles. There’s enough of them coming this year that I guess we’ll see what’s gonna happen, but I’m suspicious as to how dev teams are going to utilize a worthwhile UI for controllers. We’ll see, I guess.

If anyone gets in to the Mythos beta, drop me a line. I’m “Hashbrowns.”

It’s been a while since I’ve posted anything “personal” on this blog in a while, but I think I’m going to start doing that more often. For the three or so folks that read this blog, I’ll have more reviews soon, but for the next while it’s going to be yammering drivel.

Chit-Chat

So, why am I posting personal things? Well, to be frank, I don’t have a spare second to watch anime or movies much anymore. I did 21, which was painfully bland, and I recommend against it. The last anime DVD I watched would have been a bit of Cromartie High School, which I couldn’t finish. Each episode is ten minutes long, sure, but god damn that show is just so stupid. It’s ten minutes of absolute insanity, and it blows me away how much they managed to cram in to each ten minute episode. It’s hilarious, and I recommend it, but only in portions.

I finished Bully for the Xbox 360, literally right now. Like, the credits just ended. I never finished it on PS2, because I was bored of it. I really don’t like open-ended-free-roaming-do-what-you-want-go-anywhere-do-anything-etcetera-etcetera games, which is why I’m not really looking forward to GTA IV as much as the rest of the Milky Way. I’m excited, yeah, because it’s new and it has the potential to wow me, but let’s face it, unless it’s more Bully than GTA IV.

What  Bully did with relationships is really interesting, and I’d like to see Rockstar take something from that at least. Bully’s array of ways to get around - feet, skateboard, bike, moped - mixed it up without ever forcing anything down your throat. I enjoyed fetch questing, escorting, and ass kicking in all of the 16 hours and 30 minutes I’ve played. Maybe I’ll play more, probably for Achievements, but I enjoyed nearly every second of the game, in spite of some absolutely infuriating glitches.

Written Word

On the topic of Achievements, I recently got hired to write a bi-weekly article for OXMOnline.com, Official Xbox Magazine’s website. It’s a big deal for me, since it was a combination of mad luck and wicked connections. I owe a big thanks to the creator of “The Scoreboard” - the article I have taken over and am now writing - Casey Lynch. The dude hooked me up big time when he went to “the other side,” to development, and he’s now VP of Communications at the Radar Group. Those folks are doing Prey 2 among others, and I am going high-five that fool hardcore style whenever I meet him. He referred me to the editor(s) of the mag/site, and Dan Amrich, another person who’s helped me out in the last 10 or so months in a way I never thought anyone would. Dan also threw some work my way for the magazine, so we’ll see how that goes. I’ll keep y’all posted on that.

Snooooooze

In other news, holy crap I’ve been sleeping horribly. I need to stop going to bed at 3am. I would, but I’ve got too much awesomeness. I have been reading too much manga - Ode to Kirihito, EyeShield 21 - and playing too many games. I picked up Hot Shots Golf for the PS3 and haven’t touched it for more than a couple minutes. I need to plow through Orson Scott Card’s Empire, too, because I picked it up ages ago. Also, there’s apparently a movie in the works, and I’m always That Guy who reads the book because of the movie. I should finish it before it comes out, and deny having any prior knowledge of its release. This post kind of nullifies it, but whatever.

I’m also going to New Zealand at the beginning of May, so this blog will be ignored entirely in favor of this one, which is a terrible Blogspot blog, but hey, it lets me have Twitter while WordPress apparently won’t. If anyone knows how to hook that up, let me know.

So until next time, I’m off to freakin’ sleep or something.