Little Crysis Auto

I’ve been a busy boy over the last week or so, and I’ve made some real headway into a couple of games, whilst also finishing off three others.

The first thing I finished was Little Big Planet 2, a cutesy platform game sequel that seemed much easier than the equally cutesy first game had been. The levels were shorter and didn’t contain as many tricky bits that forced you to watch your poor little Sackboy burst into flames again and again, and as a result I powered through this in a couple of days.

While it was essentially more of the same there were plenty of entertaining sections, in particular one level near the end that features you as the General of an army of Sackboy robots, leading the fight through a Little Big Planet interpretation of The Future War from The Terminator. While that may sound dark and moody, it was all done with the usual Little Big Planet charm and whimsy that makes it such a unique franchise. It was a nice change to play something a bit more light-hearted for once, especially considering that one of the other games I finished last week was Crysis 2.

My God, how many shooters are there in my pile of shame? So far I’ve already completed seven first person shooters, and seven more third person shooters or games that have shooting elements. That’s two thirds of the games I’ve completed so far being about putting a bullet or a laser beam into someone or something. That’s not to say I don’t enjoy them, I obviously do, otherwise I wouldn’t have bought them in the first place, I just didn’t realise how much my game library could benefit from a bit of diversification.

I’d enjoyed the freedom that the first Crysis had offered the player. As a super-soldier in a super-suit you take on a bunch of invading aliens, as well as some human counterparts, on a lush tropical island, utilising stealth and firepower in whatever ratio you deem fit. The ability to complete objectives in the manner of your choosing was a welcome variation to the bog-standard “Follow” above some nameless NPC’s head that each Call of Duty and Battlefield game suffer from. This freedom of choice was once again well implemented in Crysis 2, even if the move from the island setting of the first game to this iteration’s New York reduced the scale of the playing area somewhat. The ability to turn invisible and act like a human version of The Predator, targeting and hunting your prey, and then silently dispatching them, provided hours of fun. In one level the music was almost identical to the Predator soundtrack, and applying your cloak produces a sound uncannily similar to the Predator’s famous clicking purr. I enjoyed these little homages, especially considering I was no great fan of the last game to feature Predators.

After completing Crysis 2 and rescuing the city of New York from the alien menace (although the city was left in a pretty bad state), I ventured into another video game version of New York, this time in the form of Grand Theft Auto IV’s Liberty City in “Episodes from Liberty City: The Lost and Damned”.

Going back and spending time in Liberty City was strange. I’d thoroughly enjoyed my time there a few years back, and what I experienced when jumping into The Lost and Damned showed me just how much Rockstar’s games have evolved since then. The movement and combat felt unbelievably sluggish, like my character was running through treacle in a feverish nightmare. The smooth, fluid movement and gunplay of Rockstar’s recent best efforts, Red Dead Redemption and Max Payne 3, are leaps and bounds ahead of the mechanics on display here. I really felt like I was taking a step back a generation. But after this initial struggle I soldiered on, got comfortable with the controls once more, and got myself back into the groove. The city came to life, and I started to enjoy myself in this crazy town once more.

The benefit of this type of additional content is that the developers can focus on telling a concentrated story without the distractions inherent within the usual Grand Theft Auto framework. There are a couple of mini games and side missions, but the main goal is to tell this story in as economical a manner as possible.

And while the storyline is more streamlined, without the plethora of side missions and the constant phone calls from your reprobate family and friends that blighted Niko’s experiences in Liberty City, I couldn’t help wonder how a character whose moral compass is so diametrically opposed to that of the other members of The Lost Motorcycle Club, ever ended being a member there in the first place. This guy starts off seeming to be more interested in appreciating a nice cup of tea and a good sit down. He’s not all about chasing hookers, scoring blow, and shooting people in the balls like the rest of the guys he hangs out with. 

I started to wish that he’d show a little bit of a darker side so that his association with his crew was a tad more believable. Luckily enough by the end of the game he’d stormed a prison with his motorcycle club brothers and murdered at least 87 innocent, hard-working prison officers, just so that he could murder some bastard who’d crossed him. I guess the idea of having another inmate shank this double-crosser never entered his mind.

But nevermind all that, this is GTA, it’s all about riding motorcycles over pedestrians whilst on your way to pick up drug mules from the airport, going on hectic road rage rampages whilst listening to Wet Wet Wet’s ‘Wishing I Was Lucky’, and accepting missions from naked politicians who want you to blow up a helicopter with a bazooka.

I loved every minute of it.

24 down, 26 to go.

Time to pick up the pace.

When I started this journey I hoped that I’d complete one game a week in order to stay on target. I’m in the 21st week and I’ve now finished 19 games. That’s not too bad, especially considering that Christmas and New Year ate into my gaming time a lot more than I had originally envisaged. I didn’t complete any games, or even really play much of anything for nearly three weeks, a shocking lapse. So now is the time to really start ramping it up in terms of effort and dedication. I did that by finishing off game number 19, Max Payne 3.

This game was pretty much the same the whole way through. Take cover and shoot some guys. Enter slow motion and shoot a bunch of guys. Jump forwards through the air in slow motion and shoot loads of guys. If you really wanted to switch it up you could jump sideways though the air and shoot up some guys... in slow motion!

But you know what? This game was fantastic. It just goes to show what presentation and polish can really do for a game. The grim tone, maudlin narration, excellent cut-scenes, and the driving, pulsing soundtrack made this an entertaining and immersive affair, one whose repetition could be overlooked in favour of the experience as a whole. Besides, the shooting was so tight and so much fun that it didn’t really matter that that’s all there was. Rather than being a Jack-of-all-trades, it was a master of one. I loved it. I wanted to restart on a higher difficulty level as soon as I’d finished it. But that’s strictly against the rules. There's too many other games sitting there unfinished.

So then, what do I do about that pile of shame? It’s going down, but it’s still pretty intimidating. I was looking at the games that I’ve completed so far. Some, like Skyrim, were ones that I knew would take a fair amount of time to get through, so it’s good to have that one out of the way. I look at Dark Souls, sitting there barely touched and I know that that one is going to require a massive investment.

I think the best thing to do is to commit to one longer game, while trying to get through shorter, lighter fare at the same time. I can chip away at something like Dark Souls or The Witcher 2, and then jump into something a bit less challenging and involved, such as Halo or Super Mario 64. Hopefully that will keep the pile of shame decreasing, and the pile of pride steadily increasing.

19 down, 31 to go. Stay on target.