Various Impressions: Multi-platform

Here are some small write ups on a few of the multi-platform games. All of the following games are for the PC, 360, and PS3.

Videos of all 4 games set in a playlist:


Dark Void - An interesting take on the recent "cover" fad, Dark Void has you, a awesome guy with a jet-pack flying around shooting shit. Once you gather the necessary upgrades you will be able to fly freely and even hijack UFOs to fly yourself! The game is supposedly inspired by gears of war, and it shows. The twist is, the cover you're behind isn't on the ground, its on the wall. With your back to the ground you fire upwards at your enemies then once clear, jet yourself up to a higher ledge. It's a very interesting concept and should bring a fresh feeling to the old stop and pop routine. Their are various quick time button pressing cut-scenes placed in the game which you must complete to do certain actions such as stop yourself from slipping off a edge or stealing a aircraft. Oh yeah, can't forget the best part, the story! A cargo pilot gets thrown into a parallel dimension! Wooo! All made possible by the Unreal engine.

This Is Vegas - Riding the success of open world games as of lately is "This is vegas". But this one has a crazy angle! It's in Las Vegas... *Ehem* From what I could tell by the hands-on the game didn't take itself too seriously. While the gameplay wasn't really shown besides a mini-game or two, and I didn't get a extensive amount of time to watch the game, I did notice that the game had rather bland graphics, the textures seemed slightly lower resolution, and fuzzy, and their where no impressive effects as far as I could see. But I won't hold this against the game because it still has a few months before it's release in 2009... and that... is Vegas.

Star Wars: The Force Unleashed - This one is looking mighty impressive, and I'm guessing if you even relatively care about Star Wars you already know quite a bit about this game so I'll keep it short and just touch on the important points. The game is beautiful, and uses the euphoria engine, like GTA4 did, it was amazing there and I can see it will be here. Anyways, you will be able to level up and gain new powers for use in the combat system, which to me look quite complex. Also, for the sake of longevity they have added unlockables in the form of different costumes and lightsaber crystals. This game really looks like a must buy, for both Star Wars fans and non-fans alike.

Bionic Commando - A remake of the classic grappling arm game, Bionic Commando will be shipping to stores this winter. But will it be worth the buy? I can't tell yet, but I can say that it looks pretty damn fun. While the stages look linear, the interaction with the varying environment through your bionic arm looks quite enjoyable. Throughout the gameplay I have seen, city-wreckage and a forest have been shown as environments. While traveling through these environments you will be able upgrade your weapons. If you get bored of single-player, there is always multi-player, with all the "average" modes of play. You will be able to use your hookshot like appendage in all modes of play, which sounds like a blast. The game looked easy to control, your gun aim is separate from your grappling aim, the grappling aim will automatically lock onto things closely the the weapon aiming marker and looks like it works quite well. You will be able to grapple onto all areas besides certain toxic areas, so their seems to be quite a bit of freedom. The movement didn't look as smooth as I would have liked it, if you don't jump on the first swing forward the animation seems awkward, but that is a minor complaint, the rest of the game looks very fun and I look forward to playing it later this year.