The latest in Electronic Arts' Need for Speed series hit game store shelves early last month and like its redecessors the action once again focuses heavily on illegal street racing.
The game comes with several standalone modes like "beat the clock" and "circuit challenge," but players will no doubt spend most of their time in the career mode. Here gamers take on the role of a mysterious driver, whose face we never see, who gets involved with a gang of road racers that goes by the moniker, The Blacklist.
The aim of the game is predictable enough; beat all 15 members of the gang in a series of one-on-one races, take their cars as reward, make one's way to the top of the list and become the game's "most wanted" road racer.
The storyline is stronger and easier to follow than that of previous games in the series, but is let down by the graphics. Instead of simply using computer generated representations of the game's leading characters EA has chosen to use full-motion video cut scenes featuring real actors.
It might sound pretty neat -- and indeed red-blooded males will find some of the characters' real-life "assets" pleasing to the eye -- but on the whole it falls rather flat. It makes the game seem kitsch and even cheap.
While road racing plays a large part in the game it is not the game's biggest draw. The police pursuit segments are much more fun. After all what could be more enjoyable than out-running hoards of cops? If EA focused solely on these police pursuits then they'd certainly be leading the pack in regards vehicular PC/console games. Unfortunately the company didn't and as a result Most Wanted is, in all fairness, little but an average driving simulation game.
Long considered to be one of the best strategy games of all times, Civilization recently got a makeover and is back with a fourth installment that boasts a myriad of exciting new gameplay options and even sharper graphics.
Like previous games in the Civilization series, gamers are tasked with controlling a fictitious world. The game begins in the Stone Age and takes players on a wondrous journey through time to the Space Age. Gamers are political leaders who have special traits that will help or influence their reign.
By automatically being able to opt for a leader who has special organizational skills it cuts down somewhat on the time needed to organize certain aspects of one's fiefdom, thus allowing gamers to concentrate on other more important matters such as war and trade.
While the battle sequences in previous games were often predictable affairs, Civilization IV offers far more realistic battles. You can't send a bunch of ill-trained spearmen out to take on an elite cavalry unit and expect to return home triumphant this time around.
Of course, one of the great things about Civilization is that you don't have to go to war. Diplomacy works well and helps in regard trade and technology. Now gamers are able to pit rival cities against each other, watch as they lay waste to each other and simply move in and take over after they've been wea-kened by war. It's not nice and certainly not sporting, but if you want to win Civilization IV then double-dealings and dodgy diplomacy are a must.
James Bond PC/console games got a new look last year when Electronic Arts finally did away with the annoying first-person shooter mode and allowed armchair Bond wannabe's to take on the role of Pierce Brosnan's Bond in third-person mode.
For its latest installment of the Bond saga Electronic Arts has kept to the third-person format and traveled back in time. Brosnan gamers now get to control the most famous of all Bonds, Sean Connery in what is a very enjoyable, yet slightly flawed shooter/adventure game.
Although based on the 1963 movie adaptation of Ian Fleming's novel, From Russia with Love, the game follows the plot in a pretty loose fashion. The basic story line is correct, but certain parts are missing and, no doubt for legal reasons, Bond and Her Majesty's Secret Service's arch enemy, Spectre has been renamed Octopus.
If you're not a Bond purist, however, then the game is hugely playable. Like any good Bond game, spy gadgets are an important aspect of gameplay and here From Russia with Love doesn't disappoint. Bond, or rather the players get to use the nifty little Q-copter, which although based on "Little Nell" from the bond flick You Only Live Twice is great fun to whiz around in, with a belt that doubles as a rappelling device and a jet-pack that allows Bond to float around and get a better perspective on his environment.
Gameplay is certainly flawed in regards an accurate retelling of the spy tale, but graphically EA has done a marvelous job of recreating the 1960s Bond era. The veteran Scottish actor provides the voice over and employs many of his classic one-liners, the character looks like Connery's Bond and has many of his mannerisms, the most telling of which is shooting from the waist.
Ffed up with being a human character? If so, then you should check out Ubisoft's PC/console version of the recent big screen retelling of the classic King Kong, which gives gamers the chance to take on the role of the world's most famous ape.
The game's story line follows that of the movie almost exactly and after some brief introductory segments the action picks up as the film crew nears the mysterious Skull Island. Gamers begin by seeing the world through the eyes of movie director Carl Denham as voiced by Jack Black.
The fantastic graphics, which make up the island's lush green environments, make sightseeing fun and as this section of the game is non-linear you can roam anywhere. But the fun really starts when gamers get to take on the role of King Kong.
In late October of 1873 the government of Japan decided against sending a military expedition to Korea to force that nation to open trade relations. Across the government supporters of the expedition resigned immediately. The spectacle of revolt by disaffected samurai began to loom over Japanese politics. In January of 1874 disaffected samurai attacked a senior minister in Tokyo. A month later, a group of pro-Korea expedition and anti-foreign elements from Saga prefecture in Kyushu revolted, driven in part by high food prices stemming from poor harvests. Their leader, according to Edward Drea’s classic Japan’s Imperial Army, was a samurai
The following three paragraphs are just some of what the local Chinese-language press is reporting on breathlessly and following every twist and turn with the eagerness of a soap opera fan. For many English-language readers, it probably comes across as incomprehensibly opaque, so bear with me briefly dear reader: To the surprise of many, former pop singer and Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) ex-lawmaker Yu Tien (余天) of the Taiwan Normal Country Promotion Association (TNCPA) at the last minute dropped out of the running for committee chair of the DPP’s New Taipei City chapter, paving the way for DPP legislator Su
It’s hard to know where to begin with Mark Tovell’s Taiwan: Roads Above the Clouds. Having published a travelogue myself, as well as having contributed to several guidebooks, at first glance Tovell’s book appears to inhabit a middle ground — the kind of hard-to-sell nowheresville publishers detest. Leaf through the pages and you’ll find them suffuse with the purple prose best associated with travel literature: “When the sun is low on a warm, clear morning, and with the heat already rising, we stand at the riverside bike path leading south from Sanxia’s old cobble streets.” Hardly the stuff of your
April 22 to April 28 The true identity of the mastermind behind the Demon Gang (魔鬼黨) was undoubtedly on the minds of countless schoolchildren in late 1958. In the days leading up to the big reveal, more than 10,000 guesses were sent to Ta Hwa Publishing Co (大華文化社) for a chance to win prizes. The smash success of the comic series Great Battle Against the Demon Gang (大戰魔鬼黨) came as a surprise to author Yeh Hung-chia (葉宏甲), who had long given up on his dream after being jailed for 10 months in 1947 over political cartoons. Protagonist