I’ve enjoyed Mass Effect 2 immensely, but I have to concede that it’s practically a different game from its predecessor, which is one of my favorite of all time. Certain changes seem like simple, direct responses to common gripes, such as including bathrooms on your space ship; others completely throw the baby and the bathwater alike right out the airlock. The much-maligned inventory management system—which included tons of useless items that needed to be deleted regularly—has been scrapped entirely for no real inventory management at all. The somewhat tedious, optional vehicle missions—which included unreasonably unnavigable terrains and battles with guns that took forever to destroy anything—have been replaced by a much less optional, much more tedious “minigame” which essentially amounts to “a metal detector looking for quarters,” which is precisely as dull as it sounds. The somewhat lackluster third-person-shooter mechanics have been replaced with a more intuitive system akin to other shooters, complete with extra damage from head shots and crippling effects from leg shots—but the characters’ sci-fi super powers have been rendered much less effective and interesting to compensate for being so overpowered in the previous game.

All of that said, the interaction between characters is where this series really shines. Mass Effect had a fairly interesting dialog system, allowing you to choose between short statements that would then be acted out and elaborated upon by the protagonist. It allowed for a sense of control by the player but also some room for surprise when lines get delivered in unexpected ways. Mass Effect 2 improves upon this with better facial expressions, better gestures, a greater variety of cinematic camera angles, and generally better dialog writing. While some players have criticized the story for not being as straightforward and epic in scope as the previous game, I think it’s worth comparing to a mid-series season of Buffy the Vampire Slayer: There are a few “episodes” here and there about the apocalyptic evil that must be stopped, but mostly you get self-contained stories about dealing with your friends’ and allies’ personal problems so that everyone is comfortable working together when it all hits the fan.

It’s not a perfect game, and playing it has made me realize just how much room for improvement the first game had. Both games are still way ahead of the pack in terms of telling an interesting, interactive action story, though. If you haven’t played Mass Effect, I recommend borrowing a copy, doing only the plot-relevant missions, and carrying the character over into the sequel, which follows up on key choices made in the first game. I complain a bit here, but I think those of us who have been playing way too much of these games sometimes forget just how amazing this whole series is in its ambition and scope.

Or, a random assortment of things that I can quantify, though perhaps not 100% accurately.

12 Number of flights taken
411 Number of bylined Macworld articles I wrote
32 Number of books I read
3 Number of books I read that were graphic novels
45 Number of movies I watched
37 Number of new movies I watched
2 Number of Dungeons & Dragons adventures completed as DM
5 Number of Xbox 360 games purchased
4 Number of above games completed (for reasonable definitions of completed)
50,574 Number of words written for NaNoWriMo
84,508 Number of words written in non-NaNoWriMo novel
1,089 Number of photos taken (not including iPhone)
1 Number of spoof movies produced
10 Number of Doomcast episodes released
2:55:17 Length of total Doomcast episodes

If you have 7 or more hours to kill, and you wish someone would make more 2D Metroid clones (with occasional, iffy use of the Z axis), this is the game for you. I hear it’s based on some Orson Scott Card novel, but I don’t know why they’d even bother claiming that, as it is a generic video game plot about a guy who has to take down a conspiracy of generic militants in robotic armor who want to conquer the U.S., and the characters don’t even appear in the novel. (That said, Peter David actually does much of the script writing, and it’s extremely enjoyable to sneak through ductwork and overhear bad guys saying the stuff that we always assumed bad guys must be discussing in video games.) Anyway, it’s slightly more expensive than a movie, but I’d say I’ve gotten decent bang for my buck.

I got bored of playing the Chronicles of Riddick games, so I popped in The Darkness—the next story-oriented game I’d picked up on sale—not even realizing they’d been made by the same people. As it turns out, they’re basically the same game at their core: traverse a map which feels “open world” but is really quite linear; do optional errands for strangers; collect pieces of paper to unlock bonus art you’ll never look at; and shoot everyone who you’re not doing errands for.

The main difference, as I see it, is that The Darkness has an actual story, characters that you can may give a damn about, and more variety to the ways you can dispatch your foes (and literally eat the hearts out of their chests afterward). It is more effectively cinematic than many other games that try to be cinematic, working narrative interludes pretty effectively into in-game moments, and using loading screens to give us more of a glimpse into the protagonist’s head. Overall, I’d say that makes it better than Riddick, but it was lacking in Vin Diesel, so perhaps I’ll call it a tie.

Forming a review in my mind early into playing, I was tempted to call this “Grand Theft Rhino” and just leave it at that. That’s more than a little unfair. The comparison to Grand Theft Auto IV is obvious, as it’s squarely in the same gameplay and thematic genre of “open-world game of doing errands for horrifically evil people,” but Far Cry 2 is its own game. You play as a man sent to kill a notorious arms dealer, sidetracked by malaria and playing off two sides of a war in some unnamed African nation. Nearly everything you do is calculated to make you feel both exhilarated and guilty.

The graphics, physics, and attention to detail are simply incredible: watching plants bend over before you as you sneak through the jungle; seeing a zebra running alongside your jeep; standing stock still as a flaming canister spins past you, barely missing you before it explodes. It does certainly prioritize stories of the moment rather than an overarching narrative, though, which is good and bad. I did indeed find it affecting to have to anesthetize a dying man who had repeatedly dragged me out of gunfights to save my life. I rarely ever had any sense what the hell I was doing at any given time or why, though, other than “go to this place and kill some more guys.” The game is purposefully brutal, and I’m hoping they explore that sense of purpose a bit more in depth in the upcoming sequel.

I waited to borrow Batman Arkham Asylum from a friend rather than buying it myself, but I was only barely into it when it became clear that purchasing this would have been well justified. Arkham Asylum is a really solid game that combines platforming, combat, and light puzzle solving in ways that remind me of how awesome Prince of Persia was on the original xbox. Strong gameplay elements combined with a near fetishistic obsession with Batman trivia and voice acting by many of the folks who made the Batman Animated series make this an absolute joy for any Batman enthusiast. Countless hours into it and the combat is still fun, the pacing is solid, and the side quest style content still hold my attention. My one gripe is that the character designs are a little over the top; the attempts to make an “adult” Batman game with even-more gruesome villains and over-sexed vilenesses makes me feel like I’m playing “Todd McFarlane presents Batman.” Arkham Asylum is a fun game and one of the few non-co-op games I keep feeling motivated to come back to.

Borderlands has been out for four weeks now and I can only  assume that the reason neither myself, Jason, Dan, or Kai has written anything about it is because we’ve been too busy playing it. I don’t follow previews and game development news as much I used to, so Borderlands kind of came out of nowhere as a surprise hit for me. Usually I only buy games on release day if it is something I’ve been anticipating for months (Left 4 Dead, Halo ODST, etc.) but many of my friends were set on getting it when it came out and I made what turned out to be a wise decision to follow them.

The most efficient description I’ve heard of Borderlands is that it is Diablo meets Fallout 3. In longer form: Borderlands is a first person shooter meshed with a loot-and-level-style RPG set on a post apocalyptic alien world where you’ll enjoy shooting things, taking on quests, managing an inventory, and allocating points on a skill tree (every nerd loves point allocation!) Consistently fun game play, near endless weapon permutations, amusing dialogue, and a novel art style combine for an extremely solid game playing experience. I’ve played through roughly the first half of the game with each of the four character types and even playing through a battle for the forth time is still fun because of the neat environments and the variety of weapons and skills you can employ. The story feels a little thin, but so few games that allow co-op even consider the other players in the storytelling that I’m willing to be pretty forgiving (I’m looking at you Halo ODST, Rainbow Six, and HAWX.)

I’m not sure what Borderlands is like single player as I’ve been exclusively playing it with 1-3 other people. The drop-in-drop-out systems for multiplayer works well and even with players having some range in their levels or duplicate classes is still fun. I personally like playing the Solider and the Hunter the best, but my partners in crime seem to get plenty of enjoyment from the the Brick and the Siren.

Is there anything bad to say about Borderland? Well it might serve as a dangerous gate way drug that will subvert console gamers into addicted MMORPGers, but it is probably worth the chance.

I finished the story mode in Halo 3 ODST last night so I now feel pretty safe telling you that this is a good game, and though markedly different from the other Halo games, possibly the most interesting. 

Rather than placing you in the boots of Master Chief, Halo ODST has you take on the role of Rookie, a rather generically named soldier who is an Orbital Drop Shock Trooper, basically a space paratrooper. The game starts with you dropping to Earth to fight the Covenant invasion, crash landing,  getting a concussion, and waking up 8 hours after all your squad mates have theoretically started their mission. Right off the bat you know this is going to play out somewhat differently than the others Halo games in that at the start of Halo 3 Master Chief basically shrugs off reentering the Earth’s atmosphere sans special equipment.

As the Rookie you find yourself alone, abandoned, and up against the standard cadre of Halo aliens you’ve seen before, except that suddenly they seem much more threatening. Through your search for clues as to the whereabouts of your squadron, much of the gameplay takes place via flashbacks that basically show the events of the day while you were busy being passed out. There is a nice thematic divide between these section with the flashback gameplay through the eyes of the veteran soldiers set during the day and filled with lots of explosions and vehicle combat, compared to the Rookie’s experience wandering the relatively desolate streets at night by himself. The use of music in the night time scenes is particularly well done; the music in Halo games have always been a nice touch but I feel like the designers have usually let it serve more functional than thematic purposes (because there is still dramatic music playing, that means there must be one enemy still hiding behind a rock we have to kill.)

My friend Twon referenced some mixed reviews when asking if he should buy Halo ODST, and I’m guessing that those might be due to how the gameplay shakes out a little differently than other Halo titles. You’re much less durable than Master chief, you can’t dual wield guns, and you never get to use an energy sword. Instead of shields that recharge there is a peculiar stamina system and you actually have health, so its back to old school FPS hunt for the health packs. Some people might not like the night vision/targeting display visual mode, but once you get the hang of it I found it helpful. Feeling much more vulnerable than in previous Halo games does take some getting used to, and might be something other people don’t want to get used to. I’ll admit that a couple hours into the campaign you encounter a pair of hunters, and I simply avoided them. That’s right, instead of laying waste to entire races of alien creatures Master Chief style, I ran away!  So ODST plays somewhat differently than previous Halo games, but it is still very, very Halo: you’ll fight grunts and brutes, you’ll drive warthogs, and you’ll have a the standard arsenal of assault rifles and rocket launchers at your disposal. 

I think the story is perhaps Halo ODST’s strongest feature, which was somewhat a surprise to me as I bought it mainly for a new multiplayer experience. The search for your comrades is interesting and seeing the flashbacks of what happened to them was interesting in a way most FPS stories simply don’t deliver on. The other characters are all variations on the generic soldier archetype but I still found them more compelling than the Arbiter/Cortana/Gravemind/who exactly am I supposed to care about in the other Halo games? Voice acting by the several Firefly actors was kind of neat, though I find it somewhat distracting when game designers also model a character’s visuals off the exact appearance of the voice actors. ODST even manages to deliver a kind of interesting mystery that is actually resolved before the games ends (!)  

My one gripe with ODST is that the main character, Rookie, plays the stupid video game role of silent protagonist. Later in the game where characters attempt to engage in one-sided conversation with you it feels particularly awkward, but it just seems an odd choice given that you play half the game as the veteran soldiers who each has their own personality and offers commentary throughout their exploits. I’m sure there was some rationale for this, perhaps that it lets you put yourself into the role of the rookie and decide if you are are terrified to be abandoned or courageous in the face of adversity etc., but I’m sick of cut scenes where someone says “oh you’re the strong silent type”, “you don’t say much” and so on, it just feels clumsy. Designers: if you’re going to take this route please don’t smile and wink at it with weird one way conversations; I simply don’t believe that other characters are going to open up to me and tell what is going on with them when my character won’t said hello. 

Even though I keep screwing up the acronym and calling it Halo ODSTK or Halo SDK, this is a fun interesting game. The choice to tell a story on a different scale (spoiler: you don’t save the galaxy) was used well to tell an entertaining story set in the Halo universe and I’d recommend this to anyone thinking of checking it out. Special bonus to be aware of if you don’t own any other Halo games: ODST includes a disk that gives you access to all the existing Halo multiplayer stuff, so now you can do that as well!

I’m not sure I’ve been looking forward to Dark Void, a video game about a guy with a jet pack, but let’s say I’ve been cautiously optimistic and curious to hear more. I mean, jet packs! But still, for me, it’s tough to justify a single-player game purchase at full-price unless it’s going to be the next quantum leap in video game storytelling. I figured I’d either wait for a friend to buy it for me to borrow, wait for it to be discounted, or wait to hear my most trusted online reviewers assure me that it is the greatest thing since sliced bread.

That said, I was really interested to read that the developers have been so receptive to criticisms by bloggers who got to a preview of the game. We often hear the conventional wisdom that the internet has collapsed the boundaries between fans and media producers, but it’s neat to actually see the it in action. As Kotaku notes:

Another major change to come to the game was a tweak to the perhaps too realistic injuries that mid-air collisions caused. In previous versions of the game bouncing into a wall or any other solid object killed a player immediately: Something Kotaku’s preview labeled Death By Touching. Capcom said they took note of the issue. “We read that article and printed it out and made a sign that said ‘No more death by touching,’” Bryant said. Now that game allows players to deflect two or three times off of a wall without dying.

Printing out signs! Changing features! Now witness the firepower of this fully armed and operational blogosphere!

I may still wait for it to see a price drop, though. Sixty bucks still feels like kind of a lot when you spend a summer living off student loans.

I hear tell that the Xbox Dashboard is going to be getting an update later this year, and it will make things faster. That is good! Hopefully that means I will no longer get stuck in a frozen guide when I try to rate players between Gears 2 matches. But here are some other things I think we need to see.

Notification options. Currently, you can turn notifications on or off. As Microsoft starts integrating Twitter and Facebook into its dashboard interface, it should take a page from social networking protocol and give users more control over how we want to be contacted. Personally, I’d turn off achievement notifications and announcements of friends logging on, but leave on direct messages and invitations. I dislike being distracted during an immersive game by anything besides an invitation to play some other game (and if I don’t want even that, I’ll make myself appear offline). I know that some players are similarly distracted by achievements, but might still want to see the comings and goings of their friends. It can’t imagine it would take much to offer more robust user control over this.

Sensible navigation. I once wrote a very long critique of the New Xbox Experience’s confusing, disorganized, and bloated interface, and have since commented on how the Web Marketplace demonstrates that more sensible navigation is indeed possible. My comments still stand. And I don’t imagine that Microsoft is interested in taking the focus off advertising, but considering that we are paying $50 a year for access to this service already, is it too much to ask that they not drop us in the Spotlight channel every time we go to the Dashboard?

Customizable sounds. I don’t actually care about this feature, really. I just thought it would be cool if I could change the sound for when you get an achievement to the “extra life” music from the old Sonic the Hedgehog. I’d turn off achievement notifications for most games, but for something like Geometry Wars, that would really get me pumped.