Kinect (Xbox 360)

It’s here. After months of advertisements in men’s restrooms, on cereal boxes and even plastered all over Justin Bieber’s world tour — Microsoft’s multi-million dollar motion sensing camera, Kinect has hit shelves. Do you need it in your home theatre system?
Maybe. Much like Sony’s Move, Microsoft’s Kinect is a mixed bag. The tech is undeniably awesome, and you’re not going to believe some of the things it can do, but it is at the mercy of a lackluster launch lineup that doesn’t truly show exactly what its capable of. The main draw of Kinect is not what it does now, but what developers may be able to do with it in the future.

Kinect is a neat peripheral with some cool tech. It may not revolutionize the gaming industry like Microsoft claims yet, but it shows some great promise. More than anything, we’re excited about what developers will do with it after they really get time to open up the peripheral’s engine and tinker around. How these developers build these experiences will determine whether Kinect is a failure or the next big thing in gaming.

Microsoft promised a lot in the year and a half since they announced Kinect, and while most of the tech is here, some is missing or not working as well as it should. You’ll still be able to control the console without the use of a controller — which is admittedly impressive in most cases. Just wave to engage Kinect and a menu will pop up, hover your hand over what you’re looking for to select it. As of this writing, not all of the Xbox features were controllable via motion, but Microsoft assures us that they will be added shortly after launch. What i really liked was that unlike the Wii, where you could sit and fake many of the movements for games, Kinect almost forces you to be active. It is watching you after all.

Another way to control your system using Kinect is with your voice. As cool as this sounds, it’s very limited and can be quite annoying. Again, as of this writing, you can’t actually power on your system using voice commands, to engage the Xbox, you’ll have to power it on the old fashioned way. Once you actually have the option, you’ll be saying Xbox…a..lot. Say you want to play the disc in drive; you’ll need to say “Xbox” then “Kinect” and then “Play Disc.” Yes, it’s a bit long of a process to do something you could have done by pressing the A button, but it’s cool and friends will love the novelty of it. Much like the motion sensing, it could be more useful if its improved after launch.
One of Kinect’s coolest features is the new video chat. While the Xbox 360 has always had a video chat, going from the Xbox Live Vision camera to Kinect is like going from a betamax player to a Blu-ray on an HDTV screen. While the camera can get a bit distorted at times, the image quality is mostly superb and follows you around the room so you never have to worry about adjusting it.

Need For Speed: Hot Pursuit 2

As you wrap your hands on the steering wheel, you can feel the metal beast trembling.  Suddenly the other racers around you come to life and you slam your foot on the pedal, making your own racer dart out into the open road at top speed.  From behind you comes the police in their equally fast and sophisticated vehicles, their only intent is to stop this illegal race no matter what.  In Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit 2, all you can do is strap on your seat belt and gun it--this is one wild race.

Like in the first Need for Speed, you have a slew of fast cars at your disposal from the sleek and sexy Dodge Viper GTS to the fast and furious Ferrari 360 Spider.  And again, the basic objective is to elude police cars that are trying to put an end to the race or you can do the chasing as the police (complete with spike strips, road blocks and helicopter support).  The emphasis is on speed and quick reflexes as you race to win while trying not to get rammed off the road.

There are five different ways of playing the game: Hot Pursuit, Championship, Single Challenge, Quick Race and Multiplayer.  Quick Race takes gamers directly into the racing action whole Hot Pursuit is a more orderly game mode that takes you through a list of thirty-three challenges while eluding the police to gain the Ultimate Road Racer title.  Championship is similar, only here there is no police interference.  Single Challenge is a customizable game mode where you can design the race with or with police interference and the number of racing opponents.  And Multiplayer is an Internet or LAN multiplayer mode where there are no computer-controlled opponents, just players either friends or just fellow gamers from all over.

First of all it should be noted to those gamers that have played either the Xbox or PS2 version that the controls are not as smooth or as gratifyingly responsive in this version of the game.  The PC version skips and occasionally freezes for fractions of a few seconds even on fast machines so don’t expect such a smooth ride all the way through a race, especially when you find yourself smashing up against three or four racers during the race.  Secondly, this game was definitely not meant to be played with a keyboard so it is a good idea to play this one with a controller.

Assassin´s Creed Brotherhood

When Ubisoft announced that a sequel to Assassin’s Creed II was on the way, it seemed like a no-brainer. Ubisoft has claimed that it is unlikely to develop any new IPs (intellectual properties) until the next generation of consoles, so its current library of titles — of which there are many — will be the focus for the company.  And of those existing titles, Assassin’s Creed seems like the one with the most potential to expand on. The Tom Clancy games are always going to be around, but the universe created for Assassin’s Creed is ripe for expansion. Just look at the multiple comics for Assassin’s Creed coming out soon, and even the rumored (emphasis on the “rumor” part) animated series and Hollywood movie adaptations.
So when a new game was announced, it seemed obvious and welcome. But to put it out less than a year after the previous game? That seemed potentially problematic.
Activision does it with Call of Duty, and most sports games have annual entries, but sports are a different type of game, and the Call of Duty titles are developed by multiple companies with at least two years between entries. So many people feared that this new Assassin’s Creed would be little more than Assassin’s Creed 2.5.
Turns out they are right, but that isn’t necessarily a bad thing.
Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood basically takes the game created for ACII, adds a new setting with an original story, puts in a few new tricks, then ships it off with a multiplayer. Now, while that might not sound like a glowing endorsement, ACII was one of the best-selling and best-rated games of the current generation of consoles. It redefined open-world gaming, and delivered one of the most compelling stories ever written for a video game. ACB’s biggest problem is simply that it is competing against itself and the expectations of fans. If you can put those aside, and if you give the multiplayer a shot, then ACB jumps from being a little more than a lengthy add-on to one of the must-have games of the year.

Call of Duty Black Ops (CoD7)

The release of a minor title, an indie game developed on a shoestring budget, with no real expectations. If you believe that, we should totally play a wager match together.  After months of hype, and following one of the most drama-filled situations in recent gaming history with Infinity Ward, Call of Duty: Black Ops has been released. Thanks to the appeal of the subject, the pedigree of the name, and the monstrous success of the last game in the series, Modern Warfare 2, Black Ops was destined to be a massive hit from the moment it was announced. But would it be any good?

Activision could have sold Black Ops on name recognition alone. It could have released a terrible game and still made money on the pre-orders, but it would have damaged the most successful third-party property in video game history. After the falling out between Activision and Infinity Ward, the level of scrutiny on the franchise has been at an all time high. But the behind-the-scenes drama isn’t important right now. If you are curious about the telenovela surrounding the Infinity Ward and Activision split, you can read more about it here. Or just wait for the multiple lawsuits to begin. But for now, it is Treyarch’s big day. So with the video game world watching, did Treyarch manage to succeed with the shadow of its predecessor looming so large?

Yep, they sure did.

Call of Duty: Black Ops does a few things very well — mainly by not doing anything at all. Rather than reinvent the wheel, Treyarch looked at what worked and what didn’t with Modern Warfare 2 and its last title, Call of Duty: World at War, then made changes — some subtle, some innovative — but for the most part the game looks and plays like the previous games in the series. In a good way. The multiplayer is as strong as ever and some of the new features have added a layer of depth that will keep fans playing for a long time, while the campaign delivers one of the most intense stories you will ever see in a video game. So basically, Black Ops lives up to the hype

Gran Turismo 5 (GT5) Review

With perfect physics, 100 tracks, over 1,000 cars, a full Blu-ray of content and more modes and challenges than Takeshi’s castle GT5 is not only the best Gran Turismo game to date, or even the best racing game to date -- but could quite possibly be the one of the best games to date.
 Being a flagship title GT5 supports all of the latest technology Sony has to offer. This includes both 3D and PlayStation Move, as well as supporting all of the expected steering wheel peripherals.
As a PlayStation user Gran Turismo 5 is a title than can really show off your home AV setup with the entire game presented in 1080p at 60 frames per second only dipping slightly when a lot of action is going on (we never noticed this, but it’s what the notes say). 3D support is also executed extremely well with the perspective of the cars on the track distinctive and providing players with a certain advantage due to being able to gauge distance accurately, not overstated but certainly beautiful.

From the deep red skies of rally tracks merging to night to the long drawn shadows of tarmac city ventures everything from reflections to shadows and lighting to heat waves from exhausts are presented in what can only be described as awe-inspiring detail - it’s perfect. The new inclusion of the weather engine heightens the realism immeasurably, with rain effects perfectly replicated even down to car window wipers smearing your view. The wind physics also interact well with precipitation both rain in normal races changing direction and velocity to the snow in rally events changing from gentle showers to intense winter storms.

A new addition to the Gran Turismo series B class racing is a management mode where you act as a drivers advisor and aid rather than actually racing.
The aim is to help your driver become the best by progressively pushing up the leaderboard from race to race, leading to you controlling up to 6 different drivers.