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Re: Recently Played
Posted by ReNo on Tue Jan 17th at 11:19pm 2006

Picked up some cheapy games in the sales recently, though haven't actually played them all yet.

I had to buy the Sims 2 as my uni honours project is quite closely related to what those games are all about, and while there is certainly some novelty to the game and definately a challenge (looking after a family of 4 complete bloody idiots is a near impossible task from my limited experience with it), it just isn't my cup of tea. Doubt I'll be playing much more of it - I've given it a shot and noted what it does well and what it doesn't, so it will probably reside in my collection of underused titles.

While ordering the Sims 2 I saw Unreal Championship 2 for a decent price so decided to pick it up. I'd played a demo of it a while ago and enjoyed it's twist on the familiar Unreal Tournament style gameplay, so I knew what to expect. That said, I wasn't quite ready for something so challenging. I'm playing on adept - a slightly above middle difficulty level and one I have no problems with in the UT games normally - yet it took me about 3 goes to get past the tutorial level, and every level since has taken more than one shot. I'm not very far in, as I've got a few too many games to play at the moment and not enough time, but I'm glad I bagged it for the price I did. If you haven't heard of it, just think of a console friendly UT complete with third person camera, added emphasis on acrobatic movement, simplified weapon system (not simplified weapons however), special moves, melee weapons, and a proper story. Probably not for the UT purist, but I think it's a nice reimagining of the series.

Yesterday I snagged a few more games - Timesplitters: Future Perfect for under ?5, Psi-Ops for ?3, and Silent Hill 2 for ?12. The first two were mostly just "why not?" purchases though as a fan of Timesplitters 2, I'd always meant to give Future Perfect a try. Silent Hill 2 I've heard is the best of the series and having enjoyed both the first and fourth in it, I decided it was about time I picked it up.

As of yet the only one I've actually played of these three is Psi-Ops, which I had played a short demo of before but not really been excited about. Playing it now however has proven it a very worthwhile purchase. Though physics objects aren't anything new these days, Psi-Ops was one of the earlier games to really focus on it, with impressive ragdoll physics shown off thanks to the lovely and over the top psychic powers. Telekinesis is at first a bit awkward but quickly becomes a joy to control, letting you pick up crates and run around using them as cover, fling an enemy into another to trip them up, or just hold them up in the air while you fill them with bullets. Unlike HL2 where hitting an enemy with an object instantly kills them, in Psi-Ops enemies quite happily pick themselves back up off the floor once you've smacked them against a wall a few times or knocked them off their feet with a flying barrel. The AI is pretty daft, graphics fairly run of the mill, and the storyline and character design nothing to write home about, but the action is fast paced and the various powers and odd environmental feature lend to a very fun experience with plenty of "Oh man!" and laugh-out-loud moments. Had I paid full price for it I'd have been relatively underwhelmed, but for ?3 I'm ecstatic

ReNo
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