I finally got around to finishing the game.  After actually getting it two months ago, I got the chance to properly play through it on THE BEAST. 

In one sentence, Call of Duty 5: World at War, surpasses all my expectations as to a overused genre (World War 2) in a shooter, and also, in my personal opinion, thrashes anything that has come before for war games INCLUDING Call of Duty 4. 

Which is why I begin this review rather perplexed.  I read a lot of reviews when the game first came out at the end of last year, a lot of people were saying it was just a copy of Call of Duty 4 in World War 2.  A lot of people also said that there wasn't anything new about the game that could make it stand above its predecessor.  A lot of people also said that the game was made by a different game dev group, and so it couldn't be as awesome.

I know my blog is hardly the number one place for the best opinions on games, but I truly wish that people will come to learn that Call of Duty 5 is seriously an underappreciated classic.  Why?  First of all, I'm a true fan of Call of Duty, I've played ALL of them (well, the ones on PC anyway) and seriously, no other Call of Duty is as brutal, as intense, and as punishing as this one.

In all my time with all the Call of Duty's, I've never played anything less than the 2nd hardest difficulty setting, why?  Because it's realistic.  I've also never played ever (including in multiplayer, which can be considered retarded) with a crosshair.  Why?  Because looking down a gun's ironsight is realistic.  Hence, I've always revelled in having to stay under cover for 15 minutes, and then once in awhile peeking my head out quickly just to take a shot at some enemy soldier.  I love this game because I die so much.  I die at least 3 times on an easier level, and 15 times on the really hard ones.  And it stresses me out, I get tired, and frustrated, and at times I want to quit the game, but hey, that's what real war is like.  Who the fuck wants to be able to storm through the Reichstag on their first go and own all the Nazis with a bolt-action rifle?  That's seriously retarded.



On the last level especially, the stairs leading up to the Reichstag, I must've probably spent a good part of an hour trying to get past that bit.  The grenades were lobbed in my direction and I had to constantly run for cover, and everytime I stuck my head out, 50 Germans were aiming directly at me.  I could probably shoot one every few minutes only.

Now some of you may think to yourself that I must be a shit player or something, but hardly the case.  I'm confident of my shooting skills, I've played too many, and until Call of Duty 5, I was looking for a game that would seriously put my skills to the test.  Far Cry 2 was nonsense for me, even on Infamous difficulty.

People say games should be games, but then if that were the case, why are people still looking for realism?  Treyarch provided that.  Treyarch protrayed the intensity of the warfare in the jungles of Pelliliu and the streets of Berlin, and it isn't some fun and games where you can really beat it in one go.  Unless of course you were ghey and played it on easier settings.

Call of Duty 4 in comparison was just really a rollercoaster ride of no-brainer fun.  It was a made up story and sure, there were exciting set pieces, and at the time, it was really fresh considering it was modern warfare on top of being the series' entry into the new-gen, but Call of Duty 5 brought back the REALNESS to war.  Blood spurts everywhere, limbs fall off when you shoot them with a Browning, and people die everywhere.  You die too.  The enemy stays behind cover a lot of the time and try to flank you.  Japanese kamakazes rush out from the foliage with a serious look to end your life, and there you are, a Private in an unknown land, with your ragtag bunch of soliders trying to stay alive.  You really feel that with this game. 



The graphics is seriously top-notch, although it's hard for me to make a comparison with Call of Duty 4 when that was played on THE MINION, so of course the settings would be far lower, but with CoD 5 maxed out, you could see the textures in the stone, and the intricate detailing of fabric or carvings in buildings.  Wood gets chipped, glass cracks, and the material of the soldiers' uniforms ripple.  Lighting is used really well, it shows on the metal of the guns, and when it rains, you can see the sheen, or the wetness of the wood. 

Probably the most exciting aspect of gameplay is the inclusion of the Pacific theatre, which is, obviously absolutely new, with the introduction of the Japanese army from the Axis.  They truly are brutal and is a fresh departure from the Nazis.  On some levels, the Japanese are hard to spot from the tall grass when they are decked out in camo, and you feel real vulnerable if you haven't got a flamethrower to torch them out with.  The snipers in the trees are unforgiving, and when your ammo is low (which is wont to happen frequently on Hardened difficulty), every shot with a stupid bolt-action counts.  Cause if a sniper hits you once, you're a goner.  The trench warfare is frenetic, and there is little room to duck and cover, especially when the enemy fights from all sides.  The most important thing is if the game can make you understand just a little bit about what it really was like during that time.

I mean, most of us play the games because they are games, but if you stop and think about it.  If the game devs historical research was truly accurate, you really were seeing history through the eyes of the individual soldier.  THOSE were really the trenches they jumped into, THOSE were really the temples they raided, and THAT was really the war they fought.  If this were so, man, we are lucky to be living in an age of peace. 

Voice acting is always interesting with Call of Duty games, especially for the senior characters like Captain Price of old, and in this one Sgt Roebuck for the Americans, and Sgt Reznov for the Russians.  Played by Keifer Sutherland and Gary Oldman respectively, the voice acting is played with great aplomb.  Keifer Sutherland is all world-weary, and battle hardened, by the atrocities he's seen but also with an element of sensitivity for his men, as he is forced to take them into the harshest of battlefields where the likelihood of survival is 1 in 5.  Reznov on the other hand is a larger than life character who plays up the Communist idealogy, shouting of victories and avenging the Motherland and freedom and whatnot.  Sure, his character was a bit over the top but I enjoyed following them around and after awhile, they kind of grew on me.  Roebuck was more like an aspiring heroic leader, whilst Reznov was more of a friend, and the contrast made their relationships with you as the player more poignant.  Especially with the events that transpire near the end of the game, but I won't spoil anything for you.

To increase playability, Treyarch has not only made the levels bigger (as was the case with Call of Duty 4), but they also introduced branching paths.  There were times when Roebuck would tell you to choose to go right or left to flank a castle, and other times it won't be so obvious but there can be two paths to choose from.  It helps to give the player some choice, as obviously, the game is pretty much rails-on shooter.

Now that I have like gotten a lot of the waxing lyrical out of the way, I can probably throw in a few bad points too.

About that rails-on shooter point, it sometimes feels blatantly obvious, and that's probably a weakness with the CoD engine overall.  It feels like a war of attrition, you push to a point, hold down at it, survive, and then try to push further.  Your teammates A.I. don't move until you do at times, so you get the sense that you're going to be bogged down very long in one spot unless you make a mad dash ahead of enemy MG fire.  That's really retarded especially when there doesn't seem to be an opening for you to take opportunity of, and when the enemies just keep respawning.  If there's one thing the game should change, for future titles, is that it feels more dynamic.  Enemies shouldn't appear through triggering of some threshold, they should be there, and dynamically move and place themselves regardless of what you are doing.  Of course, if the A.I was too unpredictable, you wouldn't have the intense battles that Call of Duty is known for, but heck, I'm sure the devs can figure this one out. 

At times too, the A.I is a bit naff.  Whilst most of the time, the enemies take cover and also blind fire to save their own skin, other times, they stand right in the open and shoot standing straight as if waiting for you to shoot them in the face.  But that rarely happens so I'm not complaining.  There's hardly a story in this reiteration of CoD, in CoD 4, there was much more dialogue, and more intrigue as to an enemy that was going to commit world destruction, and what the heroes were going to do about it.

Here, you really were just a nobody in the army, and it didn't matter whether the enemy was Tojo or Hitler, or whatever, you just have to secure this hill, or clear out that building, until there's no more enemies left standing.  But really, that's, I guess how it was in war.  I don't think the common man cared much for the grand scheme of things other than staying alive.  But there were moments where it felt larger than life, felt like an awesome Hollywood blockbuster (although suspiciously, Call of Duty 5 seems to steal from the best of World War 2 movies:  Enemy at the Gates, Saving Private Ryan, Letters from Iwo Jima, etc).  Oh, and the vehicle driving parts are back, the tank mission I hated, but the one where you're flying in a Black Cat (a sea plane with guns over the Pacific), and you get to switch between gun ports, that was different and exciting. 

The only disappointment I had truly, was that the sniping level was rather short and not as snipey as All Ghillied Up as I mentioned earlier, but it evokes that whole Enemy at the Gates feel, running through the back streets of Berlin, just you and Reznov, kicking some Nazi ass, with Reznov expounding his great love for Mother Russia.  I'm amazed it's Gary Oldman lolz, cause I keep picturing him as Commissioner Gordon in the Dark Knight.  He was all mustachioed, and old American, how the heck could he be Russian lolz.

Other things to mention are multiplayer, and that's hardly different from Call of Duty 4's, cause it's just shootey shootey in nice environments with nice old guns.  It's pretty exciting and quite difficult especially with the added realism so be prepared to die a lot, even if you're pro.  Once you finish the single player mode though, do look out for the zombies unlocked mode, where you have to defend a bunker from Nazi zombies.

Shit they are the scariest things.  Left 4 Dead zombies are hardly scary as they just look human but very bloodthirsty.  These Nazi zombies look like the classic zombies all shambling and soulless and out to eat your face.  Some of them hobble and others moan really scarily, and when you play it alone, you just want to cower in a corner and cry for mommy.  It's cool that you get to upgrade guns, and build back the barricades, but I think playing with others would make it a whole lot more enjoyable and a little less freakish.

So I"ll probably do a full blown review of that along with the Coop mode in CoD 5 when my friends get that up and running. 

Okay, all in all, this was the most fun ride I've had with a game in a long while.  It was a ride because whilst all other games were proud of their sandbox feel, Call of Duty 5 tells you that you should enjoy the intense atmosphere and stop trying to run off the map.  Just play the game, seriously, it's friggin awesome.  Although if I remember correctly, Infinity Ward isn't all too happy with Treyarch stealing their Call of Duty thunder, I think Treyarch did an awesome job.  It's a game developing company made up of once-modders for the old CoDs so they know what the gaming public community wants, because they are the community, and it feels so absolutely like war. 

4.5 out of 5.  The end.

Next up, Fallout 3.

Wadup Gs. 

Hope y'all had an awesome weekend, I spent mine in Manila with my girlfriend and came back with some GAMES MmmMmMM. 

Fallout 3, Tomb Raider: Underworld, and Grid.

"Wow, what a varied collection of games, Jun" you say, "normally you just play first person shooters"

"That's not true," I say, "I'm very varied in the kind of games I play" >_>

Yeah, in all seriousness, I used to play Need for Speed: Most Wanted like it was a drug.  And of course RPGs like Diablo 2.  So YEAH i don't just play FPS >_> ... *mumbles* I tried World of Goo

Anyhoo, what's new in gaming news?  A whole slew of interesting games will be out soon, including Warhammer 40k: Dawn of War 2, and FEAR 2.  Sims 3, Godfather 2, Dungeon, and Demigod pique my interest too.  Demigod is supposed to be an official answer to the highly popular Warcraft 3 mod, DOTA.





In Demigod, it's DOTA in 3D with mega scale of enemies, heroes, and whathaveyou.  I don't entirely have all the details, the game's been kept under wraps but it seems to be a blend between RTS and RPG.  Which brings me to my next point, it seems that a lot of RTS games now are blending RPG elements ever since DOTA has changed the face of RTS.

Sure, you have slow RTS still like the Total War genre, or Red Alert 3, but if you notice, even the latter has hero elements with special skills and whatnot that can turn the tide of the battlefield.  It is attempting to engage more than just the tactical strategy crowd, as now, gamers want to be part of that action.  Many a time, in Company of Heroes, I'd love to zoom in, pause the action, and it'll be like some wicked table-top game.  That reminds me, Tales of Valor for CoH is coming out soon. 

Which is why you've got a game like DoW 2 which has little to no build-time whatsoever and throws you into the thick of the action 24/7.  Whether that's a good thing or not, I can't tell because I'm more used to being in the driver's seat rather than in some orbiting spaceship commanding little men anyway, whether or not you get more micromanagement out of individual units. 

That's why I've never been good at RTS haha, i want to be able to send my armies to the enemy's base and let them handle the destruction automatically, rather than me having to direct them to which base to destroy, or which troops to attack.  Seriously, they should invent AI that would make ground-level decisions on their own. 



Either you give me just one hero (RPG) or let me command all of them and not have to worry that this little guy has this special ability and that little guy has a special ability, and I get all confused and unable to multitask, and all of them die in one go...

lol maybe I just need to get better at these sorta games.  But whatever it is, I will have another proper go at DoW 2 when it comes out.

Another game to look out for that looks phenomenal is Bioware's Dragon Age: Origins.  Hot on the heels of Mass Effect, Dragon Age is Bioware's answer to Fable 2.  An epic RPG that follows in the footsteps of Baldur's Gate, with deep branching storylines that are affected by every action and dialogue you make.  Apparently this game has more written dialogue for it than any of Bioware's other games.

Your conscious will be weighed heavily upon in the game, where you have to make a lot of moral choices, and you get to have a history as a character, giving you the chance to immerse more in the character.  For instance, I read in PC Gamer, the game previewer played as a dwarf from a noble family, who then is betrayed by a brother who wishes to take the throne from him, the rightful heir.  The player is defamed and thrown into the streets like a nobody and thus begins the player's adventure.  And that is only the start of the game lol.

Pretty interesting huh?  It means that everyone who plays the game will have a different start from everybody else, and it'll be very personal, more so it seems than even Oblivion which was pretty awesome as a personal RPG (I have yet to try Fallout 3). 

Anyhow, as of now, I'm still slogging through Call of Duty 5 which is really, an epic on-the-rails shooter masterpiece.  A lot of people thought Call of Duty 4 was mind-blowingly explosive, and that may be so because back then, it was the new generation of war games with improved graphics and everything, but CoD 5 to me really defined the refinement of this new-gen of shooter.

There is a more defined story, characters seemed more fleshed out (Captain Price is just all mustachio and balls really, and after awhile, that does get dull), and the action is top-notch.  I breezed through CoD 4 pretty easily on the second hardest difficulty, but on hardened in CoD 5, I'm nearly always getting my brains blown out left right and centre.  And that's how real war is like.  Frenetic, chaotic, and realistic.  Treyarch's attention to detail is phenomenal, and the landscapes are so wide open.  The most novel addition to CoD 5 is the branching pathways, so a mission could play out in two different ways, granting the game definite replayability. 

Although really superbly freakingly unoriginal, I love the start of the Russian campaign with the sniping, that is so ripped off from Enemy at the Gates.  "All Ghillied Up" sniping mission from CoD 4 still wins though, nothing beats the coordination and tense action of two snipers sneaking through some Eastern European territory. 



Left 4 Dead still never gets old, and the best part is how me and my best mate have been cutting through campaigns on expert with just the two of us and two retarded bots.  There's less friendly fire, having just the two of us make coordination so much simpler, and we're just pure legends, so expert is not as tough anymore.  I remembered the first time I ran through expert with a full human team of 4, shit, we moved at the speed of a turtle and still got owned by the AI.  Now I speed through expert like I'm running with scissors.

Wow, long post, which goes to show, people, ITS NOT GOOD TO HOLD IT ALL INSIDE!  IT MIGHT JUST EXPLODE.

ciao. 

YEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA



YEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA F*CK YEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA



OMFGAWWWWWWD RAWRRRRRRRRRRRR  AARGHAKLJ YEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA



ok breathe yo breathe.  lol here's a nice photo of my PWNAGE KEYBOARD with glowing touchpad.  EVEYRTHING FRIGGIN GLOWS SHITTT HOLY OMG!!!!!



YOU READ THAT??!?  YOU READ THAT??!!?  THATS WHAT THIS COMPUTER WILL DO TO YOU!!! IT WILL OWNAGGEEE YOU!!!!



HOLY MOTHER OF MARY A FREE FRIGGIN MOUSE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  oh wait, sorry, that's my current OWNAGE mouse.  but yeah, they do give a free Razer, but it ain't as good as mine, it's a copperhead or summat.  



YES YES YES~!!!!!  FREAK YEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA  

A Siberia gaming headset, the BEST in the market for audio in gaming!  FREAK YEA.  Now i can shout at my noobish teammates in Left 4 Dead THROUGH A MIC!!!!



And last but not least, an ugly green backpack.  But hey, it's still free.  But I've got a COOLER ORANGE ONE to go with my AWESOME LAPTOP.  

Shame I couldn't take any photos of in-game at the mo, you would've seen the high-definition screen at work, but perhaps ANOTHER TIME!!!

Also, I should've taken a photo of the laptop lid in action, it pulses and glows blue, like the heart of a DRAGON!!!!!!

Here are the specs if anybody's interested, and not yet JEALOUS OR ANNOYED at my awesome bragging.  But hey, at least feel excited for me.  I have waited long for this day, and if you remember several posts ago, I did say I was eyeing this very PC.  The only difference is that, since I waited awhile, the version I got is only three days old now in Singapore, and has a Geforce 9800m GS as opposed to the lower 9700m GT.  I was in a dillemma over this and the Gateway seeing as the Gateway has a 9800m GT, but heck, Asus is known for its superior stability and support, so it's always good to be safe.

Asus G50Vt-A2 Centrino 2
Motherboard PM45 Montevina
4 GB DDR2 800 (2X 2G)
Centrino 2 T8600 2.4ghz 6MB 1066 FSB
Vista Home Premium 32bit
320gb HDD 5400rpm SATA
nVida GeForce 9800M GS 512M GDDR3
Intel WiFi Link 5100 a/g/n
Built-in Bluetooth™ V2.0+EDR
DVDRW Optical Drive
15.4” WSXGA+ 1680X1050 Color Shine (Glossy)

I've optimized the drivers, cleaned out all the bloatware, and booted up Call of  Duty 5.  That game was eaten up by the computer.  Maxed out res and graphics settings, no lag, and seriously, you could see the freaking creases in the soldiers' uniforms!!!  How awesome is that?!?

So there you have it guys, my new computer lolz.  Yesterday was indeed, one of the happiest days of my life. 

Yeah, there's like an orgasm of movies coming out. Shit.. new Star Trek, new Transformers, and last but not least, new Terminator complete with f**in Christian Bale. All ye trailers below.

Star Trek



Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen



Terminator: Salvation

(Oh poo, I just found out embedding of this trailer was disabled by request. LAME. Well you can go look it up yourself)

I know this is a gaming blog, but the important thing all ye folks must remember, the transition between game to movie and movie to game has always been like a knife through hot butter. The plot devices, the characters, the cutscenes, the cinematics, the interactivity, and the non-interactivity, draws parallels between the both forms of art. You just have to look at shit like Metal Gear Solid and you know that games will be as compelling as movies were in the past for people. Heads up, new Gears of War movie in the works too, and here's the awesome part, VERY LITTLE CGI. Apparently, whoever the director making the movie (can't remember his name) was, he said he wanted to make the Gears of War movie as realistic as possible.

In other news, I got to try the multiplayer beta of the new Warhammer 40k: Dawn of War 2. It is... alright lolz. I know I know, i havent' been very impressable (is that even a word?) of late. Played FEAR 2, didn't think much of it, played DoW 2, didn't think much of it. Perhaps it was just that the MINION isn't a very high-powered computer so I couldn't very well be impressed by the low level of graphics in DoW 2. But what about the gameplay mechanics?



Things have definetly changed. in this age of ultra hyper micromanagement (think of the new Starcraft 2 coming out), DoW 2 has taken it one step further by stripping away all that base building shit. There's only one, your headquarters, and your droppod landing pad. The only thing you build are your troops, and the one or two vehicles, and of course, your dreadnoughts (if you were Space Marines as I always am). You amass your army slowly and then you take 'em out to kill some people.

Company of Heroes engine at work here, you can see the level of detail in the textures, and it made me laugh when my vehicle's "engine" was "damaged", and they explicitly display that warning in big red, the same way it does in CoH, when some Panzer blows a hole in your little mini tank. Heroes, or rather the Commanders of the battlefield now have more devastating powers, their more akin to Warcraft 3 type heroes now, what with them being able to gain more powerful abilities and amass awesome weaponry. The difference being instead of it all being levelled up, you purchase all these upgrades. The cool thing then is that not only do you have to be a smart tactician, you have to be fast too, in amassing all those waypoints, or territory marks. Those are still around, after all, how are they going to measure currency?

The two things are noticed that was interesting about the game was first of all, before the game starts, you have to choose your hero, and each race (Space Marine, Ork, Tyrranid, Eldars) had three heroes. Since I only played with Space Marines so far, you could either have your hardcore fighting unit (can't remember his name), the Librarian, or the Healer dude. They were all there in the first DoW although you could recruit all of them at the same time. It looks to me you're going to have to make a choice in DoW 2 and your choice will affect the tactics on the battlefield. In my short time with the demo (I haven't the time to keep playing yet), I tried the fighting guy with his massive warhammer, and he's kinda shitty in my opinion.

Or maybe I'm just crap with RTS, but he doesn't really stand a chance running up against firefights. It says his warhammer is good against infantry but if the enemy (I played with CPU only, although it is a multiplayer demo meaning I could play against other people, but I'm pretty noob at RTS) has a small army, he could literally get cut down before he touched the first rank. Dreadnoughts are awesome still as ever, essentially meatshields absorbing so much enemy fire and still being able to stand.

DoW was never about variety with units, they all looked and did pretty much the same things with a novel addition or two, like jumppacks and chainsaw blades, or those Terminator dudes with their big sticks and shields, but it seems to me the game has been stripped down to the core units, that will balance the gameplay, and also allow for some very refined tactics. You send Terminators into a small group of lowly infantry, it's gotta be very good for you, in the same way, you send a hero unit up against a Dreadnought, well... I wonder. Although I did send a hero up against an enemy half-track thing (it was a Space Marine tank thing) and it actually destroyed it single-handedly.

I always liked the visceral intensity of DoW, even more so than CoH, but they are essentially two different games. One is all about the bloodshed and the mind-blowing awesomeness of space war, and the other is all about the slow, realism that will blow your mind when you actually score a hard-earned victory. But DoW 2 seems to meld all of that into one. The game feels a lot slower than its predecessor, and perhaps it's for the better.

For now, I can safely say this game will probably do very well against the slew of new RTSs coming out like Starcraft 2, or Empire: Total War. People are going to be long-time fans of this reiteration because of the fact that tactics are heavily inputted, but still keep things fairly no-nonsense when there isnt' all that base building to do. Personally I like having no bases to build. Just build the troops and keep sending them to their death. Oh, and the Hero unit, when he dies, a huge revive button appears over his corpse and you have to hit it for him to return to base. I don't know what happens if you don't click it, lol, but I assume it's not pretty.

Well, I can't say much more because I only had about half an hour with the thing before I stopped.

I also got World of Goo, but I haven't played that long enough to talk about it either. But from the first few levels I've fiddled around with, the game's definetly got interesting qualities. Everything is so peaceful in comparison to all the hardcore shooters I've been playing, little gobs of ... well, goo, squirming around a little sticky network, until you pull one up and then it creates a new frame, and slowly you build it up as high as you can until it gets sucked into a little pipe Mario-style.

The only gripe I have about that game so far is that I can't seem to change resolution option. it feels all 800 x 600 when I want it bigger, or at least windowed for a sharper res. Ah well, griping at indie games won't get anybody anywhere.



Speaking of Mario, hoped you guys liked the new webcomic site lol.

That's all for now. Only just over 2 weeks left to go before my new computer, and I am getting real excited about the prospect of playing all my games on higher settings, especially Left 4 Dead. Immersion here I come.

Is anyone else experiencing something weird with Google? Whenever I search for something and click on the results, it takes me to a page that says this site is harmful and cannot be visited. in fact, all the results that appear on the search engine says "this site may be harmful", from something like Left 4 Dead.com, to anything.

I tested this out on my bro's Mac, and he's experiencing the same thing too. Lol, Google's system is screwy, which is a first.

[EDIT 11.30pm] Seems to have cleared up now. Haha, minor hiccup worldwide for the great search engine