TwiddleGeek

GTA IV may be one of the most hyped games since Halo 3 or Bioshock, and the critics are eating it up. It’s sitting at a whopping 98/100 on Metacritic, currently putting it at the top of the 360’s list and quite high on the all-time lists, at least for the moment. While overall scores almost always go down with time, both Mario Galaxy and The Orange Box recently broke into the overall top 10’s over at GameRankings.com, and GTA IV may just do the same. San Andreas really didn’t do it for me story or gameplay-wise, but GTA IV might be the best yet.

I’ve just picked up my first HDTV, and after having my 360 unplugged for the last month a half while moving, GTA IV was the obvious choice as the first game from my play list to break it in. Is it worth the hype? Depends. Like Halo 3, if you disliked or was indifferent to the series before — this one probably won’t change your mind. That said, there’s a lot here for people sitting on the fence and fans. The graphics looks kinda bland at first glance, but once you’re ripping down streets, cars are wrecking with wonderful detail, and people are flying through windshields — you’ll forget all about that. The driving mechanics are vastly improved, cars feel weighty and crash with satisfying crunch.

I’ve still got a long way left to go in the game, but so far I’m really enjoying it. The mini-games and cellphone text messages with friends and dates are pretty boring really, but the missions are the story has been keeping me playing. It almost seems less sandboxy than previous GTA games, there seems to be less incentive to go exploring, but that’s fine by me. Between the great story and all the improvements to an already solid gameplay system, it’s easy to see why GTA IV is getting rave reviews… but like Halo 3, though the game is solid, the hype is still a bit extreme.

Code Geass is finally starting to pick up steam again in the R2 season, and it’s reminding me why I loved this series last time around. Not that the first two episodes weren’t interesting, but Episode 3 gets back into the cat and mouse character driven chase with all the wild twists Code Geass loves to throw in.

I’m certainly interested in how the ‘brother’ character plays out, and I can help but be amused at the academy of spies headed up by Villetta. Looks like R2 is going to recover from the rather lackluster ending of R1 24 & 25. I’m still quite dissatisfied with the way Zero cut and ran, leaving the big climax of the series to simply fall apart. It’s like they decided they couldn’t end it, then made another season. Or perhaps were granted another season, then dragged out the ending. Regardless, R2 has been fun.

By way of Kotaku I came across this interesting little demo of Noitu Love 2. It’s not terribly long honestly, but it’s worth at least one quick run through just to try the hyper combat and see the incredible design.

I like how the combat flows fast and feels fun using a combo of mouse and keyboard controls, and the unusual moves like shields and nearly screen length attack dashes. Picture a really hyper version of Mega-Man and you might be close. The graphics aren’t very high res, but they have plenty of old-school appeal. The full version is a whopping $20 (no way), but I had fun with the demo. I’ll have to give Noitu Love 1 a shot someday soon.

I’ve always written off Trackmania, but since switching over to a laptop I’ve been looking for some fun and low-spec games to populate it with. All my consoles are packed for a move, so I decided to grab the recently released TrackMania Nations Forever and give it a shot. Why not, since it’s free?

The first impressions were definitely good. I had expected some shoddy Linux-esque racing clone, but TrackMania actually looks pretty good and scales really well to my laptop’s specs. It certainly feels like a professional, fully realized title right from the first menus rather than some basement hobby project.

One of the things that threw me about TM is that, from the shots, it looks like a formula type racing game. Actually, it’s an arcade racer with crazy jumps, track suspended in midair, and a focus on speed. The best way I’ve heard it described is something like Hot Wheels, actually. In solo play, the goal is to beat set times and win medals, with increasingly difficult tracks. The cool thing is that you can race a ghost of the medal time, and also a ghost of your best time. The game even tracks your progress vs other players locally and around the world.

What I like most though is that hitting the backspace key will instantly restart the race with absolutely no delay at all. I’ve certainly had to hit it quite a few times since a single mistake in a time trial race means you’re not going to beat the goal time. If there were a delay, I’d probably lose patience with it far quicker. Haven’t tried the online play yet, but I plan on it soon. Really, for a free game, you can’t ask for much more. I’d even consider getting the full Trackmania United Forever game, but I think Nations alone has plenty to satisfy most players. It’s far better than I was expecting.