Drjuki
1994
If you had told me that out of all the major racing series this was the one that first had cockpit view I would not have believed you
EDIT: Marked twice for the SE edition, which I really should have just played from the start
EDIT: Marked twice for the SE edition, which I really should have just played from the start
1997
This game is rough to play, but I mean what game from 1997 isn't? The technical achievements that this game made for it's time obviously can't be debated, and it shows why this series is still around to this day.
Boy you can really tell this game had a campaign planned only to have the rug pulled out from under them about 20% of the way in.
I didn't even touch the multiplayer or Blackout modes on this yet so I guess you can't really call this a full review when I've only played like a third of what the game offers, but just based off the Zombies and Specialist modes, you can really tell just how "corporate" this franchise has become at this point. This honestly feels like a game without a soul, like the developers weren't even invested in it and were just doing what the execs were telling them to do, who in turn were just doing what focus groups and pop culture were telling them to do.
It would almost be forgivable if it didn't seem like they snuffed out any ounce of creativity a team dared to try and sneak in. Things like the cancelled campaign mode and the continuous deterioration of the Zombies production quality shows that Activision really didn't want an actual quality game, but rather just another entry in a tentpole series to boast about to investors.
To put it simply, it's a game where its worst crime isn't that it's bad but that it's boring.
I didn't even touch the multiplayer or Blackout modes on this yet so I guess you can't really call this a full review when I've only played like a third of what the game offers, but just based off the Zombies and Specialist modes, you can really tell just how "corporate" this franchise has become at this point. This honestly feels like a game without a soul, like the developers weren't even invested in it and were just doing what the execs were telling them to do, who in turn were just doing what focus groups and pop culture were telling them to do.
It would almost be forgivable if it didn't seem like they snuffed out any ounce of creativity a team dared to try and sneak in. Things like the cancelled campaign mode and the continuous deterioration of the Zombies production quality shows that Activision really didn't want an actual quality game, but rather just another entry in a tentpole series to boast about to investors.
To put it simply, it's a game where its worst crime isn't that it's bad but that it's boring.
The story on this game is honestly good enough I feel that it probably could have been just as successful as a full-fledged FPS rather than a twin-stick shooter, but I still enjoyed it.
The difficulty jump between the early levels and later ones is kinda steep, but not enough to take away from the game too much. All in all a pretty fun game to explain some of the lore between 3 and 4.
The difficulty jump between the early levels and later ones is kinda steep, but not enough to take away from the game too much. All in all a pretty fun game to explain some of the lore between 3 and 4.
2012
This review contains spoilers
This is another game I feel like I remember getting a lot more hate back when it released than it really deserved. It seemed like everyone just kind of automatically didn't like 343 because they weren't Bungie. Does this game have problems? Sure. Not enough to warrant that much discord though.
I remember when I first started up this game and I was looking around to find the first enemies, I actually hoped that the game would go in a different direction from the previous trilogy, and have us fight an enemy that wasn't Covenant or Flood. Only to immediately come across a grunt trying to kill me. While we eventually got what I originally wanted with the Didact and his combatants, the whole inclusion of the covenant as an enemy feels annoying in the beginning and downright unnecessary by the end. Especially in the later levels when you spend a bunch of time fighting the Didact forces only to then come across a covenant squad that also conveniently wants to kill you. The most infuriating thing about this is that it isn't even explained how the treaty forged in Halo 3 apparently fell apart, I mean I'm assuming they'll cover that in the next games, it just does feel rather unaddressed.
New characters are fun, I liked Lasky but the old captain was a total rundown of the "meathead military general that doesn't listen to anybody" trope to an almost embarrassing degree. I mean Chief has been out for only 4 years and the other captain looks to be in his 60s, you're really telling this me this dude has no idea who Master Chief is and isn't gonna take whatever he says very seriously?
And man, Cortana. By the end of the game every time she tuned in I'd just be grimacing at everything she was going through. But also, is anyone else left kind of confused as to what exactly Cortana is?....was? I mean in CE we're led to believe she's been with the team and chief for a while, that she's more standard class and every ship has some sort of Cortana. Then in Reach we find her in a forerunner artifact and transfer her to the Autumn like a week before CE, meaning she couldn't have interacted with Chief prior to that. Now with this one they seem to be back to Cortana being more standard issue, with her talking about remembering her learning/training, etc. It really makes finding some consistent canon here difficult.
All in all though, not that bad a game, could have been a little bit longer but honestly I didn't mind it too much.
I remember when I first started up this game and I was looking around to find the first enemies, I actually hoped that the game would go in a different direction from the previous trilogy, and have us fight an enemy that wasn't Covenant or Flood. Only to immediately come across a grunt trying to kill me. While we eventually got what I originally wanted with the Didact and his combatants, the whole inclusion of the covenant as an enemy feels annoying in the beginning and downright unnecessary by the end. Especially in the later levels when you spend a bunch of time fighting the Didact forces only to then come across a covenant squad that also conveniently wants to kill you. The most infuriating thing about this is that it isn't even explained how the treaty forged in Halo 3 apparently fell apart, I mean I'm assuming they'll cover that in the next games, it just does feel rather unaddressed.
New characters are fun, I liked Lasky but the old captain was a total rundown of the "meathead military general that doesn't listen to anybody" trope to an almost embarrassing degree. I mean Chief has been out for only 4 years and the other captain looks to be in his 60s, you're really telling this me this dude has no idea who Master Chief is and isn't gonna take whatever he says very seriously?
And man, Cortana. By the end of the game every time she tuned in I'd just be grimacing at everything she was going through. But also, is anyone else left kind of confused as to what exactly Cortana is?....was? I mean in CE we're led to believe she's been with the team and chief for a while, that she's more standard class and every ship has some sort of Cortana. Then in Reach we find her in a forerunner artifact and transfer her to the Autumn like a week before CE, meaning she couldn't have interacted with Chief prior to that. Now with this one they seem to be back to Cortana being more standard issue, with her talking about remembering her learning/training, etc. It really makes finding some consistent canon here difficult.
All in all though, not that bad a game, could have been a little bit longer but honestly I didn't mind it too much.
It's quite easy to get lost in the remaster in a way, to the point that when I would switch the quality back to the original it was practically jarring, almost like playing two separate games.
If anything this game is surely a testament to the graphical upgrades that can happen over a 10 year span
If anything this game is surely a testament to the graphical upgrades that can happen over a 10 year span
2010
This review contains spoilers
Man, you think knowing the ultimate outcome for these characters beforehand might soften the ending of this game but.....nope.
It's inevitable that some comparisons to ODST pop up as well after having played that one recently, however Reach succeeds over ODST in building much more memorable relationships with your squad mates. While I liked the characters in ODST, you only spend a couple of minutes with them before spending the rest of the game assuming they're already dead, as opposed to this game where you get to meet and fight with your team from the beginning, making the ultimate dissolution of your squad even more tragic.
Also, I have to say while I knew and expected my entire team to die (did Jun make it out? I don't think we ever saw him die, he just went off with the scientist lady), from the context of Combat Evolved and everything else, I assumed this was going to end in some grand, star wars death star-type planetary explosion or something, that they were going to completely destroy Reach. Instead what I got was more of a quiet whimper instead of a grand bang, with each member going out on their own throughout the story, constantly whittling down the team until it's just your last stand against endless wave of covenant. And that is MUCH more effective than the alternative, and really brings home a certain "war is hell" theme, rather than the fantastical space battles we've become accustomed to. One of the best sequences in that vein was Kat's death, which caught me so genuinely off guard that I audibly gasped.
Lastly, can I just say how relieved I was when the ancient artifact they were experimenting with under Reach didn't turn out to be Flood, but was instead Cortana? Much better than retreading that storyline again, only thing is I thought Cortana was part of the Pillar of Autumn from the beginning? I'm going to have to replay CE again but it seemed like her and Keyes had a deeper relationship beyond the week between this one and CE, and I definitely thought her and John already knew each other. I don't know I could be totally missing something here, but seriously other than that confusion near the end, can't think of any actual complaints.
It's inevitable that some comparisons to ODST pop up as well after having played that one recently, however Reach succeeds over ODST in building much more memorable relationships with your squad mates. While I liked the characters in ODST, you only spend a couple of minutes with them before spending the rest of the game assuming they're already dead, as opposed to this game where you get to meet and fight with your team from the beginning, making the ultimate dissolution of your squad even more tragic.
Also, I have to say while I knew and expected my entire team to die (did Jun make it out? I don't think we ever saw him die, he just went off with the scientist lady), from the context of Combat Evolved and everything else, I assumed this was going to end in some grand, star wars death star-type planetary explosion or something, that they were going to completely destroy Reach. Instead what I got was more of a quiet whimper instead of a grand bang, with each member going out on their own throughout the story, constantly whittling down the team until it's just your last stand against endless wave of covenant. And that is MUCH more effective than the alternative, and really brings home a certain "war is hell" theme, rather than the fantastical space battles we've become accustomed to. One of the best sequences in that vein was Kat's death, which caught me so genuinely off guard that I audibly gasped.
Lastly, can I just say how relieved I was when the ancient artifact they were experimenting with under Reach didn't turn out to be Flood, but was instead Cortana? Much better than retreading that storyline again, only thing is I thought Cortana was part of the Pillar of Autumn from the beginning? I'm going to have to replay CE again but it seemed like her and Keyes had a deeper relationship beyond the week between this one and CE, and I definitely thought her and John already knew each other. I don't know I could be totally missing something here, but seriously other than that confusion near the end, can't think of any actual complaints.
2009
Easily the most contained and small-scale campaign we've seen in this universe up to this point. The cast of Nathan Fillion, Alan Tudyk & Nolan North has only gotten more impressive with age, the fact that we get so attached to these characters with such little time given is a testament to their abilities.
My only complaint seems to be a common one, that the game itself wasn't longer. While I love how small-scale the ultimate storyline is in this game, I wouldn't have minded some more time with these characters.
My only complaint seems to be a common one, that the game itself wasn't longer. While I love how small-scale the ultimate storyline is in this game, I wouldn't have minded some more time with these characters.
2001
I really think this series might be the perfect example of "if it isn't broke don't fix it".
I mean they hammered out the formula perfectly with this game. All the essential aspects of the later Burnout entries are present here: high-octane street racing with a focus on crashes and an extremely impressive damage engine. Whereas games like Forza, Gran Turismo, and Need for Speed aren't able to license fancy cars like Ferrari and Porsche and then show them absolutely demolished once you crash, Burnout goes their own route crafting their own unique cars and loading in a damage engine that honestly rivals more popular racing franchises that have survived to today.
If you ever wonder why games like BeamNG.drive are so popular nowadays, look no further than the game that started it all.
I mean they hammered out the formula perfectly with this game. All the essential aspects of the later Burnout entries are present here: high-octane street racing with a focus on crashes and an extremely impressive damage engine. Whereas games like Forza, Gran Turismo, and Need for Speed aren't able to license fancy cars like Ferrari and Porsche and then show them absolutely demolished once you crash, Burnout goes their own route crafting their own unique cars and loading in a damage engine that honestly rivals more popular racing franchises that have survived to today.
If you ever wonder why games like BeamNG.drive are so popular nowadays, look no further than the game that started it all.
2007
14 years later and this game easily still holds it own.
Really my only issue is I was expecting the same jump in quality from 2 to 3 as there was from CE to 2. That's not even a slight against the game, more against myself for creating unrealistic expectations in hindsight.
Also, now having completed the trilogy, as good as this entry was I'd have to say it feels a little bit more "safe" than the others, but also I'd attribute that more to Bungie (and myself) being much more familiar and involved with the Halo universe now than we were at the beginning of the series, and as a result the games themselves become more familiar as well.
Really my only issue is I was expecting the same jump in quality from 2 to 3 as there was from CE to 2. That's not even a slight against the game, more against myself for creating unrealistic expectations in hindsight.
Also, now having completed the trilogy, as good as this entry was I'd have to say it feels a little bit more "safe" than the others, but also I'd attribute that more to Bungie (and myself) being much more familiar and involved with the Halo universe now than we were at the beginning of the series, and as a result the games themselves become more familiar as well.
2004
A perfect example of a sequel that manages to improve on simply every aspect of it's predecessor. With Halo 2, Bungie took the Halo Universe into much more experimental storytelling, and I have to just say how much I loved the device of introducing the game through our supposed "enemies", showing us how the covenant view master chief and his actions.
Looking outside this game had the disadvantage of appearing as any other generic first person shooter of the time, however this game truly goes the extra mile to not fall into the tired tropes of "evil aliens want to destroy earth because reasons".
I have to say, I really appreciate the fact that I'm playing all these entries years later, as I really cannot imagine having to wait 3 years after the cliffhanger of this game for Halo 3. Now that I think of it, the amount of hype surrounding the release of Halo 3 back in 2007 now makes sense though....
Looking outside this game had the disadvantage of appearing as any other generic first person shooter of the time, however this game truly goes the extra mile to not fall into the tired tropes of "evil aliens want to destroy earth because reasons".
I have to say, I really appreciate the fact that I'm playing all these entries years later, as I really cannot imagine having to wait 3 years after the cliffhanger of this game for Halo 3. Now that I think of it, the amount of hype surrounding the release of Halo 3 back in 2007 now makes sense though....
It's interesting how a game as simple as a controllable car sprite over a pre-rendered video can be so captivating. When I was a kid I genuinely thought I has as much control over the environment as any other game.
Playing back now it's obvious that this is ultimately a game meant for children, however it really is a testament to this era of gaming that a concept as simple as this still has a ton of love and effort put into it.
Playing back now it's obvious that this is ultimately a game meant for children, however it really is a testament to this era of gaming that a concept as simple as this still has a ton of love and effort put into it.
2001
I had consciously been putting this game and series off since my early childhood for a point where I could play and digest it all in a consistent sitting, and I really can't say that after 20 years of anticipation I was disappointed.
As this was my first playthrough a lot of the personal enjoyment more came from connecting all the fragments I had already been privy to via pop culture, but even besides that narratively this game is fascinating. It builds an amazing world and universe that is ripe for further exploration, but everybody's already said that a million times over of course.
I honestly can't think of anything new to say about this game that hasn't already been rightfully said of it. Personally, I found some of the later levels progression system of "fight through 20-30 gray corridors killing a constant onslaught of aliens and bugs until you get to the objective" a little tiring after a while, and also I managed to get lost in a couple of levels but I'll chalk that up to my faults versus the games.
As this was my first playthrough a lot of the personal enjoyment more came from connecting all the fragments I had already been privy to via pop culture, but even besides that narratively this game is fascinating. It builds an amazing world and universe that is ripe for further exploration, but everybody's already said that a million times over of course.
I honestly can't think of anything new to say about this game that hasn't already been rightfully said of it. Personally, I found some of the later levels progression system of "fight through 20-30 gray corridors killing a constant onslaught of aliens and bugs until you get to the objective" a little tiring after a while, and also I managed to get lost in a couple of levels but I'll chalk that up to my faults versus the games.
2005
I have a really complicated relationship with this game.
I love the details and effort that went into building the cars and tracks in this game. The fact that they apparently couldn't get enough licensed tracks to fill up for a whole game and instead designed their own original tracks is really cool and honestly heartwarming to see from where the series ended up at.
But oh my god....the AI in this game can be problematic at points and downright sadistic at others. It honestly felt like the game was gaslighting me at times when I would try to complete a race only to be absolutely demolished by a computer with a different car. When I would then switch to the car that I was being overtaken with, the same computer would then lap me with the car I had just used. It really makes you question whether the game is skewing the odds against you for the sake of challenge or if you're just shit at it.
Apparently they couldn't afford to license any Lamborghini cars but for 2004 and Turn10's initial game the amount of really nice detailed cars is impressive.
Also I just want to point out how my mind was completely blown when I first loaded this game up and saw that they had Drivatar AI, a feature that I'm pretty sure wouldn't be reintroduced until 9 years later in Motorsports 5. I never ended up using it, but I did do all the training sessions to "build up" the profile. While it's much more simpler a feature than its later introductions obviously, it's still an impressive marker of the consistency and improvement of the series today.
I love the details and effort that went into building the cars and tracks in this game. The fact that they apparently couldn't get enough licensed tracks to fill up for a whole game and instead designed their own original tracks is really cool and honestly heartwarming to see from where the series ended up at.
But oh my god....the AI in this game can be problematic at points and downright sadistic at others. It honestly felt like the game was gaslighting me at times when I would try to complete a race only to be absolutely demolished by a computer with a different car. When I would then switch to the car that I was being overtaken with, the same computer would then lap me with the car I had just used. It really makes you question whether the game is skewing the odds against you for the sake of challenge or if you're just shit at it.
Apparently they couldn't afford to license any Lamborghini cars but for 2004 and Turn10's initial game the amount of really nice detailed cars is impressive.
Also I just want to point out how my mind was completely blown when I first loaded this game up and saw that they had Drivatar AI, a feature that I'm pretty sure wouldn't be reintroduced until 9 years later in Motorsports 5. I never ended up using it, but I did do all the training sessions to "build up" the profile. While it's much more simpler a feature than its later introductions obviously, it's still an impressive marker of the consistency and improvement of the series today.
The only thing I have to say is, I think due to playing through COD4 Remastered before this I lost that initial "wow" reaction to the remastered visuals on that game instead of this one, but all the added tidbits and features in this one more than make up for that. Other than that this pretty much delivered exactly what I wanted from it and then some.