E-SWAT
(But not first, obviously.) Instead, I'll delay the inevitable fanboyism until part two. Right now, I'll follow the exact same model I used for the controversial blog that haunts me to this day. So instead of starting things off on the wrong foot, I'll begin with an obscure Genesis shooter that nobody has ever heard of: E-SWAT: Cyber Police. I know I play a lot of obscure games, but unlike quite a few of them, this one was actually good.In E-SWAT, it's the future, and the government extended its "Make Firemen More Badass" plan to cover police. (For those who don't understand that joke, read my blogs more often.) However, what funds were left were meager, so the best they could do was strap the cops into robo-suits. That out of the way, the actual goal of the game is to beat the hell out of random criminals with robot empires. Apparently, the future is run by MTV, since nobody does what their job dictates they should do.
So like Burning Rangers, the story is iffy. But also like Burning Rangers, we're here for the shooting action, which in E-SWAT, is good, but takes a bit of time to build up. The first two levels are without a single robot suit, so you're stuck without many of the things that make the game good, like a varied arsenal or jets. You'd think that the first two levels are there just so you get used to the mechanics of the game, but no, E-SWAT takes it all seriously.
Yet once you actually get the super-suit, the game really picks up. There are a variety of weapons, all of them useful (except for shot, which you only use once you lose all the others) and fun to use. There's the regular super-shot, the penetrating charge shot, the "creep along the floor" rocket launcher, and my favorite: the flamethrower, which drains all your burner energy and makes you spin around like a deadly dreidel. The reason I didn't use it that often was because the burner is also used for your jets.
While the jets were a good idea that was pulled off OK, they bring up one of the most noticable flaws of the game: stiff controls. You can't shoot down, jumping between planes is a bit finicky, your jet can only go in the eight cardinal directions (and your gun aims the same direction your jets do), I could go on and on. But you get the point, right? The other mortal flaw is a high difficulty. By the second level (on the NORMAL setting, mind you), I was having my ass handed to me. It's a bit easy to lose life, and stiff controls don't help.
Despite all that, I like the game for several reasons, the most important of them being that it's fun. I know, it seems to be the one thing reviewers resort to far too often, but that's the only way I can describe the game. Maybe it's the variety of weapons, the fact that it is at least functional, or perhaps the Ren & Stimpy-esque announcer at the end of each level, but something about this game made it better than it should be. Since I can't figure it out, I'll go with the amazingly clear music on a console where the standard was a cyborg digitally sodomizing a goat. I'll honor that by giving the game the SonictheHedgehog3AwardforExcellenceinGenesisMusic.
Now then, I know for a fact that this next review will incite a lot of responses, and that a lot of them will be about how I hate shooters or something. In the event you are one of those people...just shut up. Here's a review for you, in case you like me enough to view my blogs but not enough to actually read them:
Call of Duty 4
(Oh, I can already hear most of you revving up your crossaws so that you can tear my skull in thirds.) But yield in your hatred, my fellow gamers! I have news that will change the results: unlike Halo 3, I LIKED this game. Yes, I'm comparing it to Halo 3 (for a bit), as these two games are, for some reason, eternally comparable. Speaking of Halo 3, I (obviously) got a lot of crap for what I said about it. Some people said I set my standards too high, which I find just plain weird. But whatever, I followed their advice for this game, placing my expectations in the 7 region. The results?: 8.2.The first thing that I liked about COD4 was the story. Set in the Middle East (the shooter fad area before Africa), you're charged with taking out a terrorist leader who trying to get nukes for no better reason than to kill America. The Russians are supplying him with the nukes, and as an added bonus, Nazis have been funding the research from 60 years in the past. OK, so it isn't the most original story I've seen (that would probably go to Conker's Bad Fur Day, I think), but it's the presentation that makes it work, which is a theme that runs throughout the entirety of the game.
The story is presented in a realistic way (whatever complaints you may have about characterization (mine being lack of proper motivation for several characters) notwithstanding). The tutorial, for example, unlike many other games, comma, fits incredibly well within the story. Rather than being told that you have to press A to shoot, your superiors actually tell you how to operate your guns, and everything you need to know about each. Also, there's a little mini-game afterward that determines what difficulty you should play on. I got Easy on my first go, but I was under the impression that it was still a tutorial. After one or two more tries of getting used to the game mechanics, I got the normal difficulty I love so much (and you hate so much).
Once I got into the actual game, I found it to be really, really good. There's a variety of weapons, a lot of them very useful and decently balanced, although there were a few that I found to be nothing short of useless. The flash bangs come to mind immediately; whenver I tried using them, the screen turned pure white and enemies started using my dazed body as target practice. The grenades also have this problem, since enemies are smart enough to dodge yours and throw them right at you when you can't do crap about it.
I guess this was supposed to add a bit of strategy to the game, but why would they need to add strategy? It's already there. Do you guys remember those two elements I hated in Halo 3? Yea, the cover system and the limited inventory? And remember how I said that these COULD work under different circumstances? Well, the circumstances are different, and they both work. I tried running into the fray of battle like doing so would guarantee me a medal upon my return, but only found death and explosions each time I did. So I had to hide behind a nearby dumpster, let me allies take care of the baddies, and think of the best way to approach my nearby enemies. Like I was forming a strategy. And remember how in Halo 3, you could arm yourself with a Gravity Hammer and Energy Sword and just plow through enemies with little effort? Doesn't work that way when you run into battle with a rocket launcher and shotgun.
Why? Well, aside from the fact that the rocket launcher magically becomes 900% less accurate when you pick it up, there's also a weight system in this game. You know, like the one I suggested several weeks ago. It works in COD4, but it works weirdly. You'd think that a soldier carrying a rocket launcher and a pistol would run at the same speed regardless of what he had equipped, but no, pistol beats rocket launcher. (In speed, obviously.) Again, this adds strategy to the game; do you pick off most of the enemies to make your journey safer, or do you bolt for the nearest tree you can hide behind?
While I'm complaining about the story, let me throw two more logs onto the fire. First, the characters: there's a complete bastard with a funny moustache, a black guy who refused to wear armor in one of the early levels (something I still can't get past, for some reason), a guy named Soap, a guy named Gaz, and about nine samey looking/sounding/behaving Russians. Well, that's all the complaining for the first part, so let me move onto the second: the final level. No, not the silo level where I kept hearing fart noises; I'm talking about the airplane. It comes after the end (even after the game tells you that you beat it), and I don't see much of a point to it. The character you rescue has no story importance, and it adds nothing to the game at all. Why is it here? Did the developers run out of time and decide to fit this level in at the end due to an inability to reasonably insert it into the game proper?
OK, that's a bit much over nothing, especially since I ended up liking the game. The only thing I didn't try out was the multiplayer, as I don't have a Gold account, but the game stands out on its own as a single player game (which is more than can be said of several games today). Yea, a lot of what it did was done in previous games, and COD4 could benefit from a few touch-ups, but what this game does, it does well. Yes, I liked this game and give it the Cuban Missile Crisis Award for Avoiding Serious Controversy. Now if you'll excuse me, I'll get back to playing a slightly (SLIGHTLY) better game for the 360: Lost Odyssey.
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