Blogfail

My blog has failed to take a server move in it’s stride unfortunately and as such, is currently, to not put too fine a point on it, fucked.

I will be attempting to sort it eventually. When I am less hung over.

Declare driving electorally betwixt.

I couldn’t think of a good title for this blog, so I’ve just made something up. This blog post is not a campaign to vote driving a continuous never-ending process.

Unfortunately the cold is making it very hard to type right now. This room is larger than Katie Price’s fun-bags, and the central heating is having no effect whatsoever. I hate the cold, and since the news channels have nothing better to do right now except report on the impending snow storm, I doubt it’s going to get any better. Whatever happened to the summer? I don’t remember any warm weather, do you?

I’ve been in my new job now for about 7 weeks (already!) – my new colleagues are pretty cool, still miss my old job though. I’m pretty fed up with being kept in the dark on my own future, I have no idea of my contractual status or how long I’m going to be employed for. I also still have no idea why I was made redundant in the first place, my old colleagues seem to be in every day after a quick favor and telling me how much they’re struggling a man down – I’m sure the whole experience will make a nice case study toward the company’s goal to become an Investors in People accredited business.

Sonic 4 – I played it, I played it some more, and I liked it – I wasn’t sure what to expect from this game, it is certainly not a 1:1 remake of the classic Sonic games, and there are a few flaws with it. The physics are, to say the least, different, although not unenjoyable. You have to give time to adjust to the way the game plays. The graphics are wonderful, the levels are good, the only issue I have with this game apart from the obvious physics problem is it’s just too damn short. I did expect more from this game, unfortunately I managed to see all there was to see in one night. I have written a longer review for this game, which you can find below this post. I’ve decided not to make it the only new blog post today though, since I’ve left it far too long and I’m sure not everybody wants to read a scripture on the subject.

Fallout New Vegas – Christ, I wish I had more time to play this game properly, but from what I’ve played so far, it’s not been too bad. It does seem to be lacking somthing, the quests seem a bit dull sometimes, but it’s more of the same and, as the old adage goes, if it isn’t broke, don’t fix it. Good stuff indeed. I’m looking forward to the new DLC which is coming out soon though as that sounds quite interesting indeed.

I went out to see Due Date which I have to admit was a pretty hilarious film. If I was to have my critical head on I would say some of it was formulaic and predictable, but the comedy from Zach Galifianakis was gold, and Robert Downey Jr. was also hilarious. Also, a very satisfying punch to a very annoying kid, I like those.

Finally I would just like to say that FileFront changing it’s name to GameFront is a sad sort of day indeed. It’s a logical name change under the circumstances but it is the end of an era so to speak, it’s the last of the original names from when I first joined up, so for it to go is a bit strange, but I suppose life moves on, blar-de-blar. Unfortunately, the glory days do seem to be behind anyway, perhaps the new editorial approach can bring about more life to the place.

Oh, one more thing. If you’ve not swung by and checked out FileSheep, please do so! It’s our funky forum that we’re creating ourselves, just we need a few more faces to make it lively. There’s a good crowd already in there so, come check it out. Plz? Pretty plz? <3

More bloggage soon!

Yup, I'm going there. Sonic 4.

If you had asked me a year ago if I ever thought I would ever get to review Sonic The Hedgehog 4, I would have hospitalised myself laughing at the stupidity of the idea. They say a lot can happen in a year, and now, 16 years after Sonic 3 & Knuckles was released, Sonic The Hedgehog 4 has come speeding onto our screens in an effort to recapture those glory days where Sonic was king of the mountain.

There is a lot of controversy surrounding this game, some of you may be aware of it, some may not, but to briefly set the scene, Sonic the Hedgehog has had a veritable smörgåsbord of bad games since his last 2D outing in 1994. Sonic Adventure, while generally considered a good game, did have it’s flaws, while every 3D adventure since then has been bogged down with pointless gimmicks, broken gameplay, and annoying characters – yes, I’m looking at you, Shadow.

This all came to a bit of a head in 2006 with Sonic the Hedgehog, a game that held high expectations for many fans - only to end up suffering from extremely broken gameplay, more annoying characters, beastiality, and loading screens an Atari Jaguar would have been proud of.

Sonic Unleashed attempted to address these issues with a simple plot, returning to th e core characters, and coming on leaps and bounds in terms of gameplay - unfortunately a certain warehog and a man that resembled Morshu from the Phillips CDI Zelda games ment that unfortunately, this game wasn’t the one to restore Sonic to his throne.

It’s understandable then, that after being force fed a game that ranked only 20 places away from Big Rigs Racing, fans and general gamers alike are sceptical of Sonic 4 – expectations for this title are exceptional, and no matter how good it actually is, for some, it will never be good enough – but the question is, objectively, how good is this game?

This is a tuff question to answer. I have my own opinions on the game, largely positive, but what about the average joe who may never have played a Sonic game since 1994?  I tried to find out.

The first person I forced into playing this game was Dave – now Dave is, as anybody who knows him, easily bewildered by video games. He did have a Sega Mega Drive and the classic Sonic games however, so he seemed an ideal choice for a random test. His verdict? He found it simple and fun to play, enjoyed the fact it only had one action button, and surprisingly, he’s actually not that bad at it, either. He also found the special stages a lot of fun, aquiring a chaos emerald!

I also had my brother have a play – his first words where “woah, this isn’t sensitive enough” – but after a few moments he got into the swing of things and, surprisingly, quite liked the game, even though he hates the old games (crappy graphics and annoying sound, he says).

There’s no point hiding from the facts when it comes to this game – the gameplay is not a 1:1 of the Mega Drive games. Now, the issue has been blown somewhat out of proportion by the Sonic faithful, but anyone expecting to pick this title up and play somthing that feels like Sonic 1-3 will find themselves in for a surprise. Wheather that surprise is good or not is entirely down the player.

There are some physics oddities in the game, and these tend to crop up if you try to play the game like a Mega Drive title. Yes, you can make Sonic stand on a wall, and yes, he does uncurl when going up ramps, and yes, when you jump, he does loose momentum when you let go of the direction button, all things that the old games generally did not do, however, once you get past the fact that it’s different to play, you start to realise that it’s not nessasarily any worse to play.

Sonic’s moveset from Sonic 2 is present, including the spin dash, however, the homing attack from the more recent games (first introduced in Sonic 3D Blast for Sega Mega Drive) has also been included. Sega’s PR machine has been trying hard to push the homing attack as “optional”, and insist you can completely ignore it if you choose – but trust me, this just isn’t the case. The game will force you at a number of points to use the homing attack to proceed, and in general it feels much more natural to use it, as jumping simply isn’t accurate enough,  due to the loss of momentum when letting go of the directional pad.

The homing attack is well implemented and fun to use, however, as long as you’re comfortable with the fact that it’s there and able to accept it as a much more substantial change to the gameplay than Sega would have you believe – it’s not a bad gameplay mechanic, but it’s different.

The gameplay feels much more natural during the second half of the game, as Lost Labyrinth and Mad Gear provide many more platforming challenges suited to the new control system, and these levels do give you that same satisfaction you felt when playing the previous games. During these levels, the niggles are practically gone, whereas Casino Street and Splash Hill’s loops and curves, combined with it’s relative lack of platforming challenge, only serve to highlight the differences.

As for the levels themselves, they’re a bit of a mixed bag – Lost Labyrinth and Mad Gear are the superior of the four main zones, featuring the most unique elements and challenge. All of the stages in the game are brand new, but they do borrow heavily from previous 2D games. Splash Hill is quite clearly supposed to be your typical Green Hill Zone – and frankly, who would have expected anything less? This level delivers as a nice dose of nostalga, and adds freshness to a familiar setting.

The Splash Hill Zone boss, however, will give you a sense of Deja-Vu, as it is pretty much exactly the boss from Sonic 1′s Green Hill Zone. The boss battles are probably the biggest let-down in this game for me, they’re all rehashed from previous bosses, and although they feature new attacks as you get towards the end, by the time Robotnik starts doing these new and exciting moves, you’re only one hit or so away from victory, and that makes it rather pointless.

Casino Street is probably the closest level in the game to a previous one, as it more or less looks exactly like Casino Night Zone from Sonic 2 . Casino Night was the most popular game possibly of all the 2D games, so it seems natural that a casino-themed level be included in Sonic 4, and Casino Street does bring enough new level layouts and gimmicks to keep it fresh, again while providing that nostalgic value. It’s a good comprimise between reliving the old days in HD, and also getting somthing fresh, it really is a nice ballance that, to be fair, is a hard line to walk. Xbox 360 and PS3 gamers will esepcially enjoy playing Casino Night’s music while playing Casino Street for an extra High Def nostalga kick. Act 2 is also especially enjoyable, with an interesting card gimmick that’s fresh and enjoyable – and flying through the sky on a deck of cards? That’s awesome.

Lost Labyrinth is where things start to get interesting. While this level clearly takes ques from Labyrinth Zone, much like Hydrocity from Sonic 3 or the axed Hidden Palace from Sonic 2, graphically, Lost Labyrinth’s design is the most unique. The background art on this level is simply amazing, depicting a lost underground civilisation, with the light shimmering in from above. There are several new gameplay mechanics in this level, including the falling bolders, some of which you have to balance on as you run along on top of them, and some of which you have to run away from. Act 2  is probably the most unique level in the game, and possibly of any 2D Sonic to date, as you use a flaming torch to find your way in the dark and light dynamite to blast through walls. Act 3 is very much the underwater level of the 3, which is good news, by the way, as by the time you got to Act 3 of Labyrinth Zone on Sonic 1, any hair you did have was on the floor.

Lost Labyrinth also has the most original boss level, where a completely new boss mechanic has been devised – hurrar! This zone is, quite easily, the best overall level in the game. Oh, and it has Orbinaughts. Those are awesome.

Finally, we have Mad Gear, the obligatory industrial zone and home to some of the most annoying badniks in the history of the universe. This level is quite clearly a take on Metropolis from Sonic 2, and sure enough, those Slicers and Shellcrackers will have you screaming at your TV before very long. There’s not a great deal of originality to this zone, but it does offer the best platforming and some awesome level music, making it a pleasure to play.

Speaking of music, the soundtrack to this game is sumiseable in one word: awesome. The retro samples really take you back to what made Sonic music great, and the tunes are memorable and catchy . Playing Splash Hill with Green Hill’s music or Casino Street with Casino Night’s music, however, does highlight one thing – we do remember the old music with rose tinted glasses. It seems apparent to me that the music in the new game is of no less quality – or cheesyness – than the old tunes, it’s just they lack the nostalga value right now, and I think that’s why some people do find them hard to accept and enjoy.

Special Stages in this game are also a lot of  fun, they’re very similar to the Sonic 1 special stages, so if you’re comfortable with them, you’ll be comfortable with this – the only difference is this time, you control the maze, and frankly, it’s much more fun this way.

There are some other fun things to do with this game, including achievements / trophies (a few of which are quite hard, makes a change from the Sonic 1-3 achievements) – and leaderboards, which at the moment seem to be suffering from the usual spot of cheating (can someone explain to me how The#1SonicFan has not been banned yet?).

So, how do I summerise my judgement of Sonic 4? Well, I don’t. I’ve not played it all yet. This is merely the first part of a much larger game, and while things are subject to change, I won’t make a final verdict on a game that’s only mid-way through development. I will however say that Episode 1 is a good start, and although dissapointingly short, it does leave me wanting for more and looking forward to Episode 2. It delivers a lot more than it misses, and once you get used to some of the changes, you do realise that this is the best Sonic title since Sonic Adventure.

Danny’s “Retro” Rating:

Things that should never have been invented.

There’s an old addage in the blogosphere, “If you’re stuck for content, do a list” – so that got me to thinking, actually, what ARE the worst products that anyone has ever invented?

It took me long and hard, I mean there are many bad inventions out there, from a wide range of batty individuals. For example, there’s the Apple III, Macintosh IC500, Macintosh IIVI, the Umax Supermac, The Macintosh Portable, The Apple Network Server, The Mac Colour Classic, ibook, emac 2007, Powerbook G3 and second generation iPod Shuffle, to name a few.

After much deliberation, I managed to find the five most insane ideas anyone has ever created. I hope you appreciate the effort I went too to Google these things for you.

1) The Golfing Wig Hat

Golf, the arena of gentlemen. The place where high flying business types go to hit balls with big sticks and try to get them in the hole. ‘Course, problem is, by the time you get to that age where golf is the only sport you can play, you have, much like yours truly, gone completely bald. The solution? Well, check this bad boy out.

The golfing wig hat allows you to protect your forehead from the shade and restore that luscious hair you once so had as a young man. I almost want to buy one of these myself, I think it’d suit me, no? The beauty of this invention is that the hat hides the join between the dark brown hair and the thin gray hair, I mean, if it wasn’t for the before and after shot I wouldn’t even have known.

There is a slight drawback, however, and that’s what happens when you’re not playing golf or going for a walk in the park. You’re going to have too take it off sometime, y’know? You can’t go to a corporate board meeting wearing that thing. Somebody clearly didn’t think it through.

2) The Shoe Umbrella

Don’t you just hate it when you get home from a night out, a day in the office, or a trip to the shops, and find that the rain has made your SHOES wet? It really does grind my gears, but thankfully, some bright spark has invented just the thing for me, and you!

The shoe umbrella protects the tops of your shoes from the ever constant British weather. No more will you have to look at your shoes and think, “yes, they look wet!” – of course, I’m not entirely sure how this stops the soles from getting wet, which is kinda the crux of the matter when it comes to messing up the carpet. It probably doesn’t handle puddles very well either. Infact, I’m not entirely sure it’s dealing with the rain that effectively, but hell, it looks cool, so, why not?

3) The Noodle Fan

Japan, trust me, there’s not a problem they haven’t tried to tackle, and today it’s hot Noodles. I hate it when Noodles burn my tongue, and since I get tired easily, I can’t be arsed blowing to cool them down. The solution? Well, it’s so obvious to me now, but strapping a USB desk fan to a pair of chopsticks seems to be just the ticket!

The fan cools down the noodles! Awesome, huh? I struggle with chopsticks anyway, but strapping a fucking Pratt and Whitney too them seems like an excellent idea, I imagine it will in no way impeed my ability to pick up slippery pasta products with two peices of smooth wood and guide them sucessfully into my mouth. Fuck, I struggle with forks.

I’m not entirely sure what else there is to say.

4) The Two Person Sweatshirt.

There’s nothing nicer than going for a walk in the park with your loved one. I mean, I don’t imagine there is anyway, I neither have a loved one nor a park. But the point is, in those winter afternoons, there’s a better way to keep yourselves warm, and share some tender love.

May I present to you, the two person sweatshirt. It’s pretty simple really, it’s a sweatshirt that two people can fit into. Immediate observations of this advert lead me to draw the following conclusions;

a – The man in that photograph is fucking frightened.
b – The woman in that photograph has taken a LOT of Prozac.
c – You can tell this was her idea.
d – She will probably hack him to death with a pick axe if she ever discovers he sleeps with hookers.
e – Neither of them are going to be able to walk.

I sware, if I ever saw two people walking along inside one of those, I would quite literally shit myself laughing. I don’t even know what else to say, the picture really does speak for itself. I wonder if they do three person versions……

5) And finally, the greatest thing in the world, ever.

I’m not even joking this time, I really do want one of these. It’s a clockwork tea dunker that looks like a penguin. I fucking love penguins and tea. Seriously, what a combo. Am I right?

Dunking your tea bag to diffuse the flavour is a pain in the arse, so why not get this clockwork penguin to do it for you? Not only that, I’m sure it could be adapted to all sorts of uses, for example, repeated stapling, pressing the “N” key during a setup program, or keeping the wife happy. Infact I don’t think there’s a single task that is beyond this truly epic penguin.

At least, I think it’s a penguin. it looks more like a cow from the neck down, but clearly it’s a bird because it has a beak, and wears a top hat. Oh, and a nice bow tie, too.

I’ve honestly tried to find one of these on the internet to buy but I can’t find one. If anyone knows where I can get one, I will seriously see to it you are made the greatest person in the universe after myself, God and Google.