As a kid I always would pretend that I’m an awesome rock star by playing the air guitar. I would rock my head back and forth and throw some rock signs in the air to appease the imaginary crowd. Flash forward about 10 years and my dreams of becoming a rock star came true (sort of). Harmonix, brought the music rhythm genre to a whole new level with Guitar Hero to the gaming world. Released back in November 8, 2005, the world learned how to be rock stars and play some of the greatest rock songs of all time in their living room.
The guitar peripheral that came with the game is what made this game. In fact, Guitar Hero wasn’t even the first game to even use a toy guitar as a controller. Konami released Guitar Freaks before Guitar Hero even came out. However, it was rarely seen in the arcade scene and never got the publicity as Guitar Hero did. Guitar Hero came with a Gibson SG model controller that allowed you to rock out to one of the best soundtracks of all time in a video game. The plastic controller wasn’t a big, cumbersome toy. It actually was a well made controller that lets you bash on the buttons and “strum” the controller to extreme extents. Playing at higher difficulty levels will require you to use and abuse the guitar controller, but it can take one hell of a beating if you ask me.
The First Person Shooter (FPS) genre is one of the most popular in the gaming world. There are so many classics to name from such as, Counter Strike, Goldeneye, Half-Life, Halo, etc. etc. The list just goes on and on. Many can argue the Top 10 FPS games for decades and they will never get to an agreement. However, one of the ones that solidified it’s own franchise was Call of Duty.
It’s all in the details.
The Call of Duty series of games mainly started out as a World War II era game. But the idea of heading into the 1940s to shoot some Nazis was getting stale. Then the guys over at Infinity Ward tried something entirely different…set the time to the modern era and let loose upon the world on November 5, 2007, a game that would…well…change everything. Now…the modern era has been explored before in a FPS, but not to an extent like what Call of Duty 4 did. They pretty much looked at the Michael Bay handbook on “How to blow shit up” and James Cameron’s guidebook to “Making a damn good action movie” and combined both for one hell of a ride. Continue reading →
This is Genesis, the first of the action sports games that caught the attention of millions of kids. Nothing brings back memories of trying to get 1,000,000 points on Warehouse with Rowley (even though the score counter stopped at 999,999). Tony Hawk games today are nothing compared to the ones of yesteryear. This was a time when Activision was a decent company (not like today’s standards) and brought out some interesting games to the market.
It first came out on the Playstation (One) on August 31, 1999 (!!!) and then onto some other systems later in life. Man this game makes me feel old, but not as old as other games I’ve played. Anyways, this game had a new revolutionary control system for…well…the whole skating genre. Games in the past were never as smooth and simple as this game. The controls reminded me of playing a fighting game. Certain combination of buttons equaled into awesome string of tricks. The layout of the controls were perfect.
The graphics back then were pretty good on the system, as it showed pretty detailed levels. The best level design is the Warehouse level, it was simple yet, it was the one level you can pretty much max out on the scoreboard. The characters were nicely detailed as they each came with their own personalities. The different levels offered in the game came with great variety, where some were just an open area to just go about your own speed and there were some that forces the player to go one way.
The gameplay was amazing. It was seriously innovative at the time. Nothing was remotely close to what Tony Hawk Pro Skater provided at that time. The levels were timed and you had to find the best places to pull the best combos for points. Each skater had a special move once you filled up your special bar, so you can pull crazier combo and raise your score. The combination of moves that can be pulled off were complex, but simple the more you practiced. There were objectives you had to complete on each level as well. For example, you had to collect letters that spelled S-K-A-T-E, collect videos, and run into boxes to name a few, which then help boost your stats on each skater. Plus you can get new wheels and deck designs…even though you can’t really see them during game. It made you want to finish EVERYTHING, so you can brag to your friends that you completed the game by doing all the objectives and finding the secret level.
The number of tricks available were incredible. There were so many, it kept the trick combos from getting stale. You wanted to try out every kind of variable possible. It was again, perfect.
The videos that were included in the game showing the AWESOME skills of each real life pro skater featured in the game made it even more of a reason to complete the game. The montage of the skaters were amazing. Also the montage of the random skaters getting injure was great. This game was the main reason I tried picking up skating as a hobby…but that never really got anywhere, so let’s just skip that part of my life.
The sound effects were clean as you can distinguish the grinding metal of the rail and the trucks of the skateboard to the skaters making “Uhhhh…” sounds when the mess up and fall. The music was freaking dope as well. You had music from The Dead Kennedys to Goldfinger. The various punk, ska, and rock just kept you well in tuned with the game. It just added to the amazing experience. Everything from the sound, to the graphics (at the time), and gameplay just made this game into a monster. There was just enough realism and just enough of fantasy put together that just made sense.
There were still some chinks in its armor, such as some bugs where you fell through a level or get stuck (literally) on a level. Also, the level design could have some room for improvement, but these are nit picking the game really. Overall, the game gets a 9.1 out of 10. Easily a classic.
Old Video Games 