Gears of War 3 Full Review

Campaign

Let’s start off with the campaign, in my opinion the Campaign is probably the second best mode of this game, the graphics and story just sucked me in and before you know it I had beaten the entire thing in a night. Now I’ve never played Gears 1 or 2 so I had no idea what the storyline was, but I felt that I didn’t need too. This is a game you can just pickup and play and not have to know really anything about the previous games if you’re not into knowing everything before you play it. So I give the campaign a 5/5, no glitches, no extremely tough spots of the game, it was a great immersive experience and I’ll definitely go back and play the first two.

Multiplayer

Ok, now its time for what most of the Gears fans couldn’t wait for, the multiplayer. Let me just start off saying I am not going to give it a bad review because I suck at it, even though I was bringing in scores of 2-15 in Team Deathmatch I was having so much fun, I believe that’s what the developers wanted. I did have one game where I went 22-7 which I thought was near impossible, but back to the point I loved the multiplayer. Now if I invested time into it I could probably kick ass at it but I just don’t have the time to invest. One of the things I didn’t like was AI being in multiplayer, I know it’s just there to fill in a position until someone else joins but I often found the AI on my team never getting a kill and constantly dying, made the experience not as fun when playing with AI. So my final verdict is a 4/5 for the multiplayer.

Horde Mode

Now this is probably the best mode in the game for me, it is an amazing experience when you get a group of friends together to play horde mode. About midnight the other night I hopped on with four randoms and played for like 2 hours (Made it to Wave 43). It was a good fun especially when I accidently took a teammates silverback and didn’t realize he had bought it, I though it had just spawned in, so for the next 24 waves he spent his time shooting me trying to get me to get out of the silverback, I though he was just some annoying brat. Anyways the Horde mode is a great way to just chill from campaign and multiplayer and have some fun with some friends. 5/5

Beast Mode

Now I only had the time to play a match of Beast mode and found it intriguing, I didn’t get too sucked in but thought it was an interesting addition to an already great game. 4/5

So that pretty much concludes this review, I hope it was insightful and if you haven’t picked up the game yet then I highly recommend you do.

Final Score 9.5/10

New Updates!!

Alright ladies and gents, the posts are going to be starting again, sorry for the very long hiatus, I was taking time off and I have been extremely busy working and doing school. Yesterday I just opened an account with GameFly, my first game shipped today (Gears of War 3) and Ill play it the rest of the week and all weekend, I'll have you a review by Monday.

I know its a little late seeing as GoW3 was released exactly a month ago but I thought I'd do it anyway, tomorrow I will give you my impressions of the Battlefield 3 Beta and a full review once I purchase the game later this month. Other than that I will try to get you one review a week and two or three small reviews during the week. So a week will consist of

Monday: Big Review: Indepth Analysis of every mode in the game and the game itself.
Tuesday: Nothing
Wednesday: Mini Review: Of an Arcade Game or Indie Game off Xbox Live or an Arcade Game off PSN
Thursday: Nothing
Friday: Mini Review: Of an Arcade Game or Indie Game off Xbox Live or an Arcade Game off PSN
Saturday: Nothing
Sunday: A recommendation of some games to check out on various consoles.

So you guys will have plenty of content and eventually I may even get some sort of capture card and start doing video reviews.
-Jordan McCaleb

P.S. If there is a day that I wont be able to post I will notify you ahead of time.

My Top Ten: July Update

Ok guys lets get started with my top 10 games to watch for, July edition

#10: Rage
I saw a bit out of Rage at E3 with their campaign demo, it was solid and I like the Borderlands style gameplay with realistic graphics and the vehicle driving point of the game. Developer id Software has stated that a large focus of the game is vehicle driven; I'm excited to see how that plays out in the long run in terms of the game's entire single player campaign.

#9: Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon Future Soldier
I saw some good stuff from Future Soldier at E3, like the Kinect compatibility with the whole gun cage thing, where you can use your hands and body to create your own gun, and they tested the gun using Kinect. Future Soldier would definitely be an interesting campaign to play through using Kinect; I'm excited to see what Ubisoft brings to the table in this latest installment.

#8: Batman: Arkham City
AC looks like another successful entry into the Batman game city, the opportunities, and abilities in this game are astounding, I can’t wait to get my hands on a copy. This game is turning out to be a hit, if you haven’t seen the gameplay go search for it on Youtube; this is a definite game to watch.

#7: Gears of War 3
I'm excited about Epic Games' next chapter in the GoW series, the previous two campaign wise have been great, 2s multiplayer was not so great but I'm confident there going to pull out all the stops for this one, the beta was fantastic. I would hope that this campaign will knock 1 and 2s out of the park.

#6: Elder Scrolls: Skyrim
I don’t have a lot to say about Skyrim except wow, so far it looks like this game is going to do everything ES IV veterans want it to; Skyrim will be yet another successful chapter in the series.

#5: Assassins Creed Revelations
AC Revelations looks like a good entry into the series, I didn’t get into the Assassins creed series until recently but I enjoyed it, Brotherhoods multiplayer was a good addition and I'm glad there bring that back for Revelations.

#4: Halo Combat Evolved HD
I am excited for CE HD because Halo CE was the second FPS I played and I had a successful 3 year Major League Gaming career with Halo 3 and Halo Reach, I'm glad 343 took this step to revive a classic, with the added multiplayer and updated graphics Halo CE HD will be everything it would have been if released for the first time today.

#3: Halo 4
Halo 4 doesn't come out for well over a year (Holiday 2012) but 343 reviving the series with not one, not two, but three confirmed new Halo games creating a new trilogy surprised gamers all around. I expected 343 to continue the Halo series but not with direct sequels to 3, I'm very excited for next year.

#2: Modern Warfare 3
I'm slowly starting to build my interest back into the Modern Warfare series, Infinity Wards next installment along with the assistance of Sledgehammer Games and Raven Software is looking to be another great entry, but how long can they continue to make good CoD games, the public will grow bored eventually.

#1: Battlefield 3
I am so excited for Battlefield 3, I cant wait for this visual breakthrough of a game and as always Dice's expert sound design, I am glad Dice decided to port Battlefield 3 to consoles, I would have not been to happy knowing I had to buy a PC to play it.

Yes I know there are a few games that should have made this list and dont worry, they will, I havent forgotten Mass Effect 3 and Deus Ex Human Revolution, there still out there and they'll make it into the top 10.

Thanks for reading guys -Jordan

A Post!

Sorry for another hiatus guys, I lost track of time, later on I'll be posting an update of the 10 games I'm watching out for as of July, hope you all had a great July 4th weekend to the US readers.

Note: I decided to not post a full Duke Nukem Forever review because I HATED the game, I wont go into to much detail but the gameplay was almost worse then the demo and the actual game was just flat out apalling, so many crude jokes and refrences that were uncalled for even for Dukes' character, my final score is a 5.0.

Short Break

Ok guys Im going to be taking a short break until Thursday, I am writing a book (Yes I am really writing a book) and I need finish this chapter I'm on and give it to my editor so there probably wont be any posts till Friday, but dont worry I'll have an extra long Duke Nukem Forever review for you come Friday.

Sincerely
-Jordan

Everything E3 Part 2

Ok guys so here is part 2, I am pretty excited about games that were shown at E3, games like Ghost Recon Future Soldier, Star Wars Kinect, Battlefield 3, Saints Row 3, Forza 4 and many more. So lets get started with my favorite games of E3 and why.

My #10 would have to be Saints Row The Third:
I played a little Saints Sow 2 at a friends house and eventually bought it to play through it myself, it had alot of flaws but the flaws made it fun, things like customizing police cars and the insurance fraud were probably my favorite things to do in that game. So I do look forward to the Third.

My #9 would have to be Rage:
Rage looks like an interesting FPS and from footage I have seen I definitely look forward too Rage.

My #8 would have to be Halo Combat Evolved Anniversary:
This would be higher on my list because Halo is a big part of my gaming career (I just retired from MLG Halo gaming after a 2 1/2 year career) but its just the campaign remastered with multiplayer.

My #7 would have to be Modern Warfare 3:
I am giving Call of Duty its last run for me, not because I hate it but because I have been playing CoD since CoD 2 and MW3 will be my final ode to Cod, I'll hit top rank and set it on my shelf of honor.

My #6 would have to be Resident Evil Raccoon City:
I got a late start on the Resident Evil series buying and playing through the entire co-op campaign of Resident Evil 5 with my brother while we were home for holiday. I enjoyed that all nighter 9 hours of gaming beating it and its a big example of what gaming should be.

My #5 would have to be Fable The Journey:
I am super excited to play Fable The Journey with kinect, it looks like a genuinely satisfying experience and I look forward to blasting people away with my spells.

My #4 would have to be Star Wars Kinect:
After seeing gameplay of this it gave me goosebumps, being able to hack away droids and force push troopers makes me so happy and excited Kinect is the next thing I'm buying.

My #3 would have to be Forza 4:
I recently bought the Xbox 360 250gb slim in January and got Forza 3, I played the hell out of that game and loved it so I look forward to the graphically amazing Forza 4.

My #2 would have to be Ghost Recon Future Soldier:
I played the Ghost Recon series on my PS2 playing the first game and loved that game, after that I fell of that wagon and haven’t picked one up since. Future Soldier looks absolutely awesome, to me its like a blend of Metal Gear Solid and Ghost Recon, I look forward to building a gun with kinect and killing enemies.

My #1 would definitely be Battlefield 3.
I have played the battlefield series since Bad Company #1 and when I saw gameplay for Battlefield 2 I thought will there ever be a three, so I went on too Bad Company 2 and heard an announcement about 3, oh my god this game will take the cake over MW3 by miles. Dice has outdone themselves again and it isn’t even out yet.

So these are my top 10, there were many more I liked and will get but they just didn’t make the Top 10 list.

My thoughts on E3 Part 1: Microsoft PC

This will be coming out in 4 parts, Microsoft PC, Sony PC, Nintendo PC,  My favorites of E3) Note: PC stands for Press Conference.

Ok guys here it is late and ready, my everything at E3 post, I decided to wait until E3 was over so I could include more than my first thoughts.

So lets start of with Press conferences, I think Microsoft had a successful press conference, I did like that it was Kinect heavy and I enjoyed seeing what is turning out to be good quality Kinect games. Also all the amazing games included like

Kinect Star Wars

Kinect Sports Season 2

Kinect Sesame Street

Ghost Recon Future Soldier (An amazing display of Kinect integration)

Forza 4 (Xbox 360 controller and Kinect compatible)

Fable the Journey (Xbox 360 controller and Kinect compatible)

And more…

They knocked it out of the park with those games and more, and they also displayed more amazing games such as Halo Combat Evolved HD which blew me away and I’ll be first in line at midnight for that on November 15^th. As well as announcing all the new Xbox Live additions come this fall, full Kinect integration, a dashboard all in one place, an all around better experience.

And to round it out and send it off they finished with a visually amazing trailer directed by Tron Legacy Director Joseph Kosinsky for the new trilogy of Halo by 343, Halo 4 continuing the story after 3 and also announced was Halo 5 and 6. Hold your breath Halo fans because Halo 4 is coming to stores near you come Holiday 2012.

Microsoft didn’t have the best press conference but they definitely had one worthy of the record books, way to go Microsoft.

I give you a 9.0 out of 10

My First Thoughts on everything E3

My First Thoughts on everything E3 post will be delayed untill tomorrow, I have most of it written but I have alot on my plate today so I wont have time to finish it. It will be a long post so be happy for that, till tomorrow. -Jordan.

Duke Nukem Forever Demo

I have one word for the Duke Nukem Forever demo, amazing, after 12 years Gearbox did an amazing job pushing this game across the finish line, and I say that now because the game is being released in five days and I highly doubt they are going to push the release date back a third time five days before its release.

Anyway to get on with the demo you start off taking a piss in a toilet, now being the little pervert it wants you to be I happily controlled the rate his piss came out and even made a little song (piss, piss, piss, piss ,piss, drip) anyways after that you come out of the bathroom and into this locker room where there are some soldiers coming up with a game plan to fight this big effing monster out on the football field (No its not a sports game).

So you weave in and out of some hallways and go out onto the field with a big rocket launcher and shoot the guts out of the beast. Its not to hard to beat him, just shoot and run, the monster will have a hard time turning fast enough to hit you and dont get too close our he'll use his super foot slam.

After you beat that you move onto the next level which consists of you fighting your way through some kind of old coal mine, I wont go into to much detail but this mission involved monster trucks, machine guns, golden M1911s, shrink rays, laser guns, mine carts, and a big ass pig drop ship.

My early prediction for the scores mainstream review companies will give is probably anywhere from 8.5 to 9.5, I dont know yet if it's worthy of a 10.0 from me but we'll see in five days, I'll have an in depth review of the game out probably on the 18th or the 19th.

Ok guys whats coming up.....

Ok guys sorry for the hiatus, I will be posting my Duke Nuke demo review tomorrow, as well as my E3 first thoughts on all the amazing things brought forth so far at E3, hang in there for just one more day.

Dirt 3 Early Review

Whats up guys its time for my early review of Dirt 3! I'll talk about a few aspects of the game that I like and I'll probably give it a longer review later.

So lets kick off with the interesting Gymkhana mode, Gymkhana is a viral video created by Ken Block featuring him doing some amazing drifting stunts, this video also feature Pro Skate Border Rob Dyrdeck, this lead to Gymkhana 2.0, you should definitely go watch these videos.

I also like the addition of night racing, that adds a bit of thrill to the expirence.

The addition of a wide variety of vehicles ranging from the 1950s to current 2011 spice up the driving expirence making it more fun to try out multiple cars.

I love the driving mechanics in this game, there very smooth and I didnt find myself hitting that rewind button to much.

I wont talk about much more now until I put some more time into the game but for a first impression score Id give it a 9.5 for now, for the final review it might earn a 10.

Modern Warfare 3

Ok guys I dont know about you but I am getting syked for Modern Warfare 3, I caugt the world wide reveal trailer watching my boys the Dallas Mavericks own the Thunder, anyways to get back on track I am pretty excited. Now that three gaming studios (Raven Software Latest Wolfenstein game: Sledgehammer: Infinity War MW CoD games) are working on it that makes me even happier. I cant wait for the release and I know I'll be first in line at my gamestop for that midnight opening.

Whats Coming up?

Hey guys just wanted to let ya'll know real quick that I'm sorry I didnt write the Lego Pirates or Thor Reviews, I got bogged down and decided not to do them.

Coming up is a review of The Duke Nukem Demo review, and a few others that I'll tell you about when we get closer, so thanks for checking out my blog and stay tuned for new reviews.

L.A. Noire Video Game Review

Ok guys here it is, an indepth review of L.A. Noire

Ok so L.A. Noire is a open world 1940s Cop Game developed by Rockstar. This game puts you into the shoes of Cole Phelps, a newly recruited LAPD Officer who has joined the force to "right the wrongs" he had commited in WWII. In the game Cole slowly works his way up advancing in the ranks as you complete a number of interesting cases.

Campaign:
Ok so in the campaign which is supposed to offer you 30 hours of gameplay I'm told, you complete cases and missions that ascend you through the ranks of an officer. These cases vary from petty crime cases to murder and bank robberies. The campaign has an extremely interesting campaign in my oppinion, some other reviews have stated that the missions can cometimes become repetetive but I respectfully disagree. The missions in this game are heart racing white knuckle cluching action. The campaign has a nice pace introducing you to the controls which I think are a little clunky but otherwise solid.

Graphics:
Ok lets start off with how the graphics are amazingly beautifull and should be a standard in every game, the graphics system is called MotionScan where the actors face is surrounded by 32 cameras to capture every little move a muscle. Its amazing how real the characters look and its definitely an award winning technology.

Now this graphics system is so indepth I was recognizing the actors that played there characters, in my eyes this game shoulds win game of the year for everything, Graphics, great story, actors and the list goes on.

Gameplay:
The gameplay is pretty strong, its from a 3rd person perspective which is where the controls get a bit clunky, all you have to do to open a door or climb a ladder is to just move your guy to that object but sometimes your character will just kind of skip past it and it can be frustrating when your in a foot chase. Other then that the gameplay is fun and exciting, taking cover behind a car as you engage in a gun battle with bank robbers, never gets old.

Final Score
Ok so lets get down to my final score, I'm gonna rocket out and give this game a 9.5 out of 10.
It has a solid exciting story and great gameplay plus amazing Graphics, there are a few minor problems which earn it that 9.5 but for me there easily overlooked.

Ok guys I hope you enjoyed this interview, thanks for reading.
-Jordan

Reviews Coming Up

Ok guys whats up its Jordan here and I got a little info on my upcoming reviews. Ok so on my next reviews I'll try to get more in depth so I hope that works out.

5/18/2011: L.A. Noire In depth game review
5/18/2011: Lego Pirates of the Caribean
5/19/2011: Thor God of Thunder

Only three this week so far, I haven't had an extreme amount of time to play these games, I just started L.A. Noire this morning around 1 am after getting back from the midnight release and I'll probably play it for at least 5 hours until I am worthy of a decent review, I have put about 6 hours into Lego Pirates and about 5 hours into Thor. I am scanning the new games release for upcoming games so stay tuned.

And another special treat will be the Duke Nukem Forever Demo on June 3rd, I am part of the first access club through Borderlands Game of the Year Edition and will be gaining acess to the demo on the 3rd. I will write a small review for the demo and a normal review for the game when it comes out.

Thanks for checking in and come back tomorrow around 5:00 pm pacific central time for L.A. Noire and Lego POTC reviews, thanks guys.
-Jordan.

Brink Video Game Review

Whats up guys, Jordan here to bring you a review on the new game Brink developed by Splash Damage for the Playstation 3, Xbox 360, and Windows.

"In Brink, two factions, Resistance and Security, battle in a once-utopian city called The Ark, a flotaing city above the waters of a flooded Earth.
Brink is a first person shooter with a focus on parkour-style movement. Online multiplayer servers hold up to 16 players; players can play cooperatively or competitively, or against artificially-intelligent bots." Wikipedia

Story:
"The game is set in the near future on an enormous floating city called The Ark, which is situated off the coast of San Francisco and is designed to sustain humans in the event of an environmental catastrophe.
The Ark was meant to house only 5,000 people, but ended up having to accommodate 50,000. Facing a lack of food, clothing, and water, many residents became dissatisfied and formed a faction called the Resistance, demanding more of these essentials.
The Ark's leaders refused, so the Resistance armed themselves to seize power and freely distribute water and food, claiming that the Ark had plenty of resources.
At its inception, The Ark had little need for a security force, but the city quickly began recruitment and went on a firearm shopping spree to defend themselves against the Resistance, resulting in the creation of a powerful defence force known as Security.
Now the only place on The Ark where there is any level of peace is around the central capital, where the Ark's leaders are frantically trying to contact the outside world for aid.
Security sees the Resistance as a terrorist group, and the Resistance sees Security as oppressive soldiers hired by the Ark's "leaders" to crush the Resistance. Both factions are playable." Wikipedia

The Story is interesting, in the way it revolves around the battle between Resistance and Security. The story has a purpose and that's what makes Brink's story not so interesting. Its that sterotypical struggle between the underdogs and the military type force. These days coming up with a totally new and interesting story is hard concidering that many of the ideas have already been used over and over again. I will say this, Brink has an interesting spin on the story and its enough to keep me hooked to finish it at least once.

Multiplayer/Campaign:
The Campaing in this game basically is the Multiplayer, one team is Security defending an objective and the other team is the Resistance attacking the objective. It supports 16 players online and also as AI Bots, the player can choose to play cooperatively or competitively. The game has four classes, the Soldier, the Medic, the Engineer, and the Operative.

The Soldier can resupply himself and his teammates with ammo, and can also use explosives to destroy objectives.

The Medic can heal or revive fallen teammates and buff up other teammates' health making them stronger.

The Engineer can buff his teammates' weapons making them stronger and can also plant stationary gun turrets as an assitant to fighting the enemy team.

The Operative can interrogate enemies to receive intel on enemy locations as well as preforming acts of sabotage and disguising himself as the enemy team.

Customization:
The custmization options in this game are absotlutely astounding, to quote wikipedia's Brink article there are "102 quadrillion unique character combinations" varying from weapons and weapon attachments, to outward appearance such as shirts, pants, masks, and other items. From my personal oppinion developers need to take note of this games customization option, its definitely a deal maker for me.

Graphics:
The graphics all in all aren't too amazing, there pretty average, they will most likely appeal to the average gamers eye but if your thinking about purchasing this game for graphics I would rethink that decision. It runs on the smooth modified version of the Id Tech 4 Engine, in my personal oppinion the game really does utilize the engine well.

8.5 out of 10
I'm giving this game an 8.5 out of 10 for its stellar gameplay and customization options, everything else is sort of average.

This interview wasn't too indepth but hopefully it was good enough for you to make a decision, if your still unsure then go watch some videos and read some other reviews, never make your decision based on one review.