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I am continuing with the rather futile task of playing all the video games.

After sinking into a Diablo III shaped hole for a few months, I thought I'd finish off the game of 007: Everything or Nothing which I'd previously started.

Game 000006: 007: Everything or Nothing (Home Console)

Having been underwhelmed by the handheld version of this game, I wasn't sure what to expect of this. However, "the internet" does seem to think that this third person action game is the one half-decent Bond game post Goldeneye, so I was prepared to enjoy it. I started playing the PS2 version of the game back in May and completed about two thirds of it over a period of a couple of days. I finally picking up the game again and completed it this morning. It took me around 15 hours in total.

I must confess that my first impressions of this game were not good. The controls didn't feel particularly tight, and there are noticeable improvements in both controls and graphics between this game and 007: From Russia with Love. The game also has quite a steep learning curve; it is very easy to find yourself completely surrounded and out gunned unless you take the levels at a slower pace than a typical shooter. However it is the game-play variety which really makes this game stick out above the other Bond games I've played so far. Once I learned how to use the game's nuanced cover mechanics I found myself able to overlook the fact that this game has aged poorly and appreciate some of the great level design.

Everything or Nothing opts for a larger quantity of shorter missions than most games, so your objectives tend to feel more focussed and less padded out with long sections of running around and shooting generic bad guys than many shooters. I particularly enjoyed the variety of gadgets which Bond has at his disposal in this game. From remote control robotic spiders to invisibility suits, this game certainly celebrates the more gimmicky side of franchise. Additionally every level has a few "Bond moments" to find - small set pieces of hidden content where you interact with the environment in interesting ways.

The game features an original story and soundtrack, and with its mission variety and frequent cut scenes it certainly captures the feel of the films much better than many of the movie based games. I particularly enjoyed some of the vehicle based missions as the combat felt satisfying... Although once again, the controls definitely felt dated... I particularly enjoyed one of the motor bike levels where you had to take out a tanker with your bikes in built flame throwers!

This certainly isn't an easy game, and I found myself notching back the difficulty on a few missions in order to get past them. However, there is a sense that you could learn the levels - and with the short missions and high score based unlocks, it certainly seems that the developers went out of there way to add some re-playability. Although personally, there were only a couple of missions which I enjoyed quite enough to warrant a rerun.

There were a couple of incredibly frustrated quick-reaction events throughout the game, typically at the end of missions, and failure to realise what I was doing and hit the trigger in time left me replaying entire missions from the start. In a game where ammo can be scarce, and so you soon learn to pick your shots carefully these quick time events certainly feel a little against the grain. Moreover in a game which prides itself on its mission variety, nothing says "unique experiences" less than sitting through the same 10-15 minutes of content twice.

A few people have asked me whether they think this game is worth revisiting. I think that I'd cautiously recommend it to any 007 fans who have been disappointed by recent games in the series. It certainly offers something a little bit different. However, be prepared for some frustrating controls at times. Clearly the developers still hadn't entirely figured out how to make the most of the dual-analogue controller. Big fans of the Sean Connery films will probably find more to like with the nostalgic nods and better controls, offered in From Russia with Love. For everybody else, this is the superior game.

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Following Alex's review of 007 Legends, I can't say that I'm looking forward to the game. However, it arrived in the mail this morning, so I'll be playing that next.

Braid

Portal 2

Portal

@AdzPearson: Yes, I think I have the original... a little speaker plays a satisfying click noise when you type on the rubber keys.

@AjayRaz I'm not emulating these games. The ZX Spectrum was quite popular in the UK - so quite a few people have them stored away. I picked mine up a couple of years ago at a low cost. The games don't seem to be too rare - at least I didn't have any trouble picking up a copy of this game from ebay... I've just discovered that I also seem to own a copy of this game for the Commodore 64 - so maybe I'll do a side by side comparison some day. It'll be interesting to see the differences between the two machines.

I am continuing with the rather futile task of playing all the video games.

I've been a little busy this week taking part in a thoroughly enjoyable puzzle hunt. My team still has 2 more puzzles to solve, but these games aren't going to play themselves, so I took a few hours break this afternoon to play through 007: Licence to Kill on the ZX Spectrum. Or, more aptly, I should probably say that I took a few hours break to figure out how to connect a spectrum to a modern telly, find a working cassette player, a suitable power converter - and figure out how to load games from cassettes onto the console. I then spent about 30 minutes playing the game - stopped for a break, realised that in the process of loading the game, I'd broken the "play" button on the cassette, and so had no way of reloading the game! Still, I think I saw the majority of it...

Game 000005: 007: Licence to Kill

Licence to Kill was a video game developed by Quixel and released on a variety of cassette based home computers in 1989. I played through the spectrum version of the game - but the differences between the versions seem only to be cosmetic.

My time with this game was relatively short, and I only managed to see four of the six levels before the difficulties of relying on decades old technology caught up with me. The game took about 2 minutes to load, but once it was stored in memory the transitions from level to level were practically instantaneous.

Level one begins with Bond flying a helicopter, dodging some incredibly accurate anti-aircraft guns and chasing down "the evil drug smuggler Sanchez". Not that you'd know any of that by playing the game - as the story, controls and level objectives are only found in the games instruction booklet /cassette case insert, (so much for in-game tutorials!) This proved an issue several times during the game, as I couldn't work out how to pause. So upon starting a new level I would inevitably die within the first few seconds while looking up the controls, lose all three lives and have to restart the game from scratch.

Perhaps the most interesting level was the second, which had you infiltrate an enemy base on foot while shooting down Sanchez's henchmen. Conserving ammo was essential here, which was a challenge due to the game's confusing controls. (Hold down the fire button and the direction keys are no longer used for walking, but instead for aiming.) Being forced to duck in and out of cover gave this mission some depth that the other stages seemed to be lacking.

Having very little familiarity with games from this era I feel ill equipped to pass any judgment of this game relative to its peers. It was nice to see that each level had essentially been coded from scratch, and introduced a new game-play mechanic - but some of these were more entertaining that others, and after my half an hour stint with this game I felt no incentive to return to it. Messing around with this older hardware however, was a lot of fun. I'm certainly looking forward to to playing through some more Spectrum games in the future, (I recently acquired a box of about 100 of them from some guy who was going to throw them out!)

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In other news, my copy of 007: Everything or Nothing finally arrived this week - so I look forward to playing through that over the next week. For now however, back to the puzzles...

I am continuing with the rather futile task of playing all the video games.

Since my last blog Activision have announced the release of 007 Legends, a new Bond game featuring scenes from 6 of the films, including the new one, Skyfall, to be released later this year. So that's a game I'm going to have to come back to later. Talking of coming back to games, still no sign of 007: Everything or Nothing for the PS2! So in between sessions of playing Waves, Fez, TrialsEvolution and after eight years finally finishing the magnificent 4-player competitive co-op Gamecube game Zelda: Four Swords Adventures, I have also played through 007: From Russia with Love. I’ve heard good things about Everything or Nothing, so I definitely will be returning to this once it arrives!

Game 000004: 007: From Russia with Love

From Russia with Love was the final game EA developed before losing the Bond license. The game was released towards the end of the lifespan of the PS2, Xbox and Gamecube. A PSP game was also released for this game, but reviews suggest that this was a poor port of the home console versions.

I played the PS2 version of this game over several small gaming sessions during the last few days, spending a total of seven hours with the game. To my surprise, unlike the last two games on my list - I thought that this one was actually quite good. Not that the last two games were actively bad, but this is the only one of the three that I could make an argument for a four star rating... Maybe. Let me however, caveat that statement with the remark that I haven't yet played Everything or Northing. A game which, from what I've read, did everything that this game does, but did it two years earlier - and did it better. Still, I guess my point is, I think that the 3rd person shooter is a better format for a modern Bond game - or at the very least, I admire it for being slightly different.

The game is roughly based on the film - but perhaps does a better job of capturing the feel of the early Sean Connery films in general, rather than From Russia with Love in particular. In particular there are some great nostalgic scenes early on in the game that have Bond visit M's office, and Q's lab. If memory serves, this was actually the first film to introduce Q - and Bond was only given one gadget. In the game however, the player has the usual plethora of gadgets - including a remote controlled toy helicopter fitted with wireless camera and explosives. While fun to use, it did stick out as being a little out of place in a game that otherwise is visually and stylistically quite faithful to the Connery ear. Talking of Connery, he returns to the role to provide new dialogue for Bond throughout the games frequent cut-scenes and story-beats. Initially this dialogue is actually a little jarring, as Sean Connery actually sounds more like "Sean Connery playing Sean Connery" than "Sean Connery playing James Bond" (his accent is thicker than in the films), but as this is a re-imagining of the film, I soon got used to this.

From Russia with Love has 14 missions, plus a handful of optional unlockable levels. As with Agent Under Fire, there were essentially three types of mission - and yet again the on-rails shooter (this time on the back of a boat) and the driving levels were the poorest parts of the game. They provided nice mission variety, and were fun in short bursts - but didn't provide anything that you'd want to go back through to play again... which is unfortunate, because 3 of the 14 missions are driving levels that have you drive around the exact same streets each time.

The game has plenty to like, with a reasonably intelligent AI that use the scenery well in order to take cover - but are ultimately foiled by the games ridiculously lenient auto-aim system. There are well designed stealth mechanics as well, but it is perhaps a shame that there really is little incentive to use them, as even on the hardest difficulty setting the vast majority of the missions can be completed by just running and gunning through them.

The weapon select system was well implemented using the d-pad, and the game pauses to give you time to choose the right gun depending upon the task at hand. Each gun and gadget in the game can be improved by spending research points that are found hidden around each level - providing plenty of secret areas to find during the course of a mission.

Perhaps the best parts of the From Russia with Love were the levels that gave you the jetpack to fly through. With unlimited fuel and ammo - these sections were always trivial, but somehow immensely satisfying, as the device handled well and it gave a sense of speed that was perhaps lacking from the rest of the game.

There have been improvements made to 3rd person shooters in recent years, but this game doesn't feel quite as behind the curve as Bond's 1st person equivalents - and as such is the best of the Bond games I've played so far.

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I'll continue to wait for Everything or Nothing to arrive - but until then I guess it's time to figure out how on earth you get a Spectrum to work on a modern TV!

I believe that: 007 James Bond

Is just a port of: James Bond 007

Sources: http://piratesportal.cbm8bit.com/a/j/007/sg1000/main.html has a drop down menu where you can compare different versions of the same game and http://www.segaretro.org/007_James_Bond states it explicitly.

@JJGIANT - there's a reason why I describe the task as futile! About 15 new games have been releases since I started this... I've played 2 games - so even if I were to carry on at the current rate forever, statistically speaking I'd never get past the 'C's... So unless I live to 300 AND people stop making games, then no - I do not truly believe I can do this. I'm having fun trying though!

I am continuing with the rather futile task of playing all the video games.

The PS2 version of the game still hasn't arrived - so I've had to pass the time with the Gameboy Advance version of 007: Everything or Nothing.

Game 000003: 007: Everything or Nothing (Gameboy Advance)

The portable version of the game was developed independently of the home console version by Griptonite Games. Whilst the PS2, Xbox and Gamecube versions of this game were generally well received, the GBA version obtained "mixed reviews". (Which I believe is a video game euphemism for "not very good")

I played this game in two sittings on the default difficulty setting and finished it in just over 2 hours. There's something quite fun about listening to familiar tunes down-sampled through tinny speakers, so the familiar Bond motif certainly put me in a good mood going in!

The game has eight missions, and the first one is over within a minute of starting the game. The game is an isometric shooter with a very generous auto-aim. The central mechanic of hiding behind objects and sneaking up on the AI to perform stealth kills works reasonably well - but the camera was slightly too zoomed in for my liking, meaning that it was difficult to plan an unseen path around some of the levels. The inclusion of a radar, showing you both the locations and the orientations of nearby enemies was a nice touch though. Visually the game looked a little bland with the same textures and objects used repeatedly throughout most levels.

Each mission has a number of primary (compulsory) and secondary objectives. At the end of each level you are rewarded with 100 style points for each primary objective you complete, and 200 for each secondary objective. These points can be spent on stat-increases that take effect in all subsequent missions (including any that you choose to replay.) My approach was just to save up for the most expensive perk - slowly regenerating health, which I soon regretted as it turned a moderately challenging game with limited opportunities to pick up health packs, to an incredibly easy one. Consequently the second half of the game was much easier than the first half - and I doubt that this was the developer's intention.

The game had a small selection of gadgets and secondary weapons - almost all of which seemed less effective than using your guns, and required the select button to cycle through. I find myself wondering whether I might have made more use of that if I'd been playing on the original GBA rather than the GBA-SP, which has an awkwardly positioned select button.

Although the majority of the levels provided nothing of particular interest, I feel like I should mention that I really enjoyed the games 3 boss fights. Each one required using objects found in the world in interesting ways, and provided a slight puzzle element to an otherwise mindless game. On the other hand, the unlockable Blackjack mini game rewarded for collecting 2500 style points was clearly coded by someone who'd never played the game before... Never heard of a 5-card trick?

It is worth briefly mentioning that the game has a multiplayer mode, which I didn't have the opportunity to check out, and also features support of Nintendo's GBA to GC adaptor in order to offer hints and statistics on the small screen to anybody playing Everything or Nothing on the big screen.

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So another fairly inoffensive, yet bland game. More Bond next time...

Played this yesterday. I thought that mission 6, "Night of the Jackal" was the best. I'm not sure if this was by design, but I ended up being really low on ammo, which made for an interesting challenge. It was also the only mission where I found anything with the Q-goggles, but I suspect I may have missed things elsewhere.