Its been said before and i’ll say it again that Zombies are 2nd only to nazi’s in terms of thins that gamers share no sympathy for when they murderify them. now that raises a valid point i might talk about sometime in the future, but for now i want to talk about what sort of games these monsters work well in

I credit the modern zombie (as many do) to the man himself, George A. fucking Romero (please note fucking is not a middle name of his, but wouldn’t that be both cool and funny?) Dawn of the dead is the holy grail of zombie killing, mall blasting fun, And the shambling insurmountable undead masses provided a scary thought, one bite and you are lost (kinda unfair ain’t it?) since then there have been over 5 zuthillion pieces of media about Zombies in every genre possible, with comedy being one of the best (enter shaun of the dead fanage here) 

     But i’m not here to talk about movies! you can go and watch any zombie movie and get the idea that zombies are bad and we’re all fucked, but i like to think games can be more refined than that, because they last longer periods of time, and zombie games can be filed into some fairly straightforward gameplay aspects

(I need this book)

1. Survival - One of the best categories of zombie game, the aspect of surviving the never ending undead hordes. The great thing about this category is it can be so different, you could be fighting never ending waves of undead, trying to get better weapons and more points all arcade style 
(Killing floor or Call of duty nazi zombies springs to mind)

 
(Nothing is more annoying :| )

  Or you can be let loose in a world of possibilties, where you have nothing but the world around you and you’re own twisted logic of paddles and chainsaws 
(Dead rising is the obvious one here, but other lesser known titles like Project zomboid absolutely nail this) 

(batter up!…. too easy)

2. Objectives - The next big one is the one that can be fantastic if done right, now this is not to say survival zombie games do not have a goal to them, its kinda in the name, and i know things like dead rising offer true story and objectives, but i put that i survival because that crap is optional. this is the older of the 2 categories, as only recently has the hardware been able to support persistent worlds, Now every game is different and its a given that gameplay with be different with all zombie games, but the idea behind the objective based zombie game is pretty much the same all the way through the category, unlike survival

There are only 2 main differences i can come up with

1. story based malarky -now i love a good story, it makes the game…if done right, and this can be where lots of objective zombie games die, because they have to rely on it more, no matter how good the gameplay is it can be ruined by a frankly retarded story, Now with zombie games you gotta have suspension of disbelief, but theres a limit. Now it terms of games that do pull it off I think Resident evil tops the list, even though for resident evil 5 i could have not cared less about the story, it was boring and really un-imerssive, Dead rising also comes into this category and theres only one thing to say about that…zombies in space = awesome, no arguments

(Isaac Clarke ~ Interstellar badass)

2. run and gun fun - now there are plenty of games where the main calculation is Run + Gun = Fun, its a primal thing to hold down the trigger and let them taste your wrath! In my mind the undisputed king of this is Left 4 dead, theres nothing more fun than grabbing an auto shotty and mowing down those speedy bastards, there are others but just seeing a trailer for left for dead gives you the general idea

(Fucking clowns man)

Now Personally i love both categories, but you really can’t have 1 without the other. Take for example Dead Rising 2, that game was immense fun, making daft weapons to kill undead hordes, but without the story it would have gotten very boring very quickly, its why a progressive story is needed to keep me occupied, its also why i get very bored of Call of duty nazi zombies very quickly, the only real progression is opening rooms and upgrading weapons, and when you have gotten to that point where you have 2 good upgraded guns, the appeal candle is long since melted (EPIC ANALOGIES!)

(Oh shit they’re getting ready to dance)

Now no game can hold you forever, its truly impossible, gamers need variety in one game, and they need variety between games aswell, but persistent game worlds can keep you occupied for good lengths of time, you have the need to explore, learn…and make a big bloody mess along the way. All the games i have mentioned in this long winded rant i have enjoyed very much so, so don’t get me wrong on that front. 

Where does the future of these games lead? well pretty soon to a tropical island, in the form of what looks to be one of the best zombie games i’ve seen in a while. 
Dead Island is a free roam zombie survival game set on a large tropical island, it focuses on the melee aspect of survival, keeping guns realistically scarce and ammo even scarcer, so to be short combining elements from game such as dead rising 2, with the co op first person aspects of left 4 dead, all in all a great sounding game, lets hope it pulls it of, there are other things i know i haven’t mentioned, like i didn;t even touch upon survival horror, but its not always zombies that make those games great.

( I…WANT…THIS)

All in all zombies are great enemies forthe sheer fact that they are never ending, the unending masses of the dead will get you, but its always fun to go out in style ;)

Thanks for reading, in the words of the immortal Ash “…Groovy”

(Don’t fuck with Ash)

Ok, so i know this blog REALLY isn’t out there atm, mainly as i’m sure only 1 person reads it XD BUT!!! i like posting on it all the same so i can feel like i’m doing something with all my free time

The next step is really a leap for me as its something i have not done before…VIDEO!!!…wow that makes me sound so old, anyway. Video reviews are on their way will full voice spoken reviews…i know you people get tired of reading -_-.
I also have a friend helping me with a review since the game in question is a beast of a thing and he has been playing it for years.

So yeah thats the low down on updates, for MY first video review i am going to do a bigger more mainstream game…i’m thinking oblivion, its old i know but i never specified what games i would be reviewing so i can do whatever the crap i please. Thanks for reading.

This being the first musical post of my blog i wanted to make it something special ,  something awesome and something personnel.
So i am going to be talking about my friends blog (the one that scored that beastly score on that beat hazard photo)

A couple of months ago my friend started turning his favorite songs into 8-bit renditions, He started Mainly with Coheed and Cambria (because they are fucking awesome) he posted them on the Coheed fan site and they soon shot up in popularity, and someone even posted it on Coheed Facebook page (which speculation may suggest Claudio Sanchez, the man himself may have heard them)

After he had done 2 of their albums he took a break because of life, but he did some random songs here and there up until the end of may when he came back in a big way.

The end of May marked my friends return to the world of AWESOME when he came back with 2 tribute albums for 2 of my all time top ultimate awesome (too many descriptive words but who cares) favorite bands.
System of a down and Deftones were the bands in question and the question was how awesome can 1 day be, and since this was the day i also saw Pirates of the Caribbean 4 i think it couldn’t have been better.

I can’t tell you enough how awesome these 2 albums are, If you like these 2 bands, you owe it to them to hear these songs, if you don’t well first you can gtfo and go like them, THEN come back and like this.

It is now today (duh) and i have no idea what he will do next, but i know it will rock, its more than a novelty, its just to awesome for words and you need to go listen to them now

PS: “Only in System of a Down is the drummer the most normal looking member” <— THAT WAS MEEEEEE :D

http://blooders23.blogspot.com/ <— here is his blog, GO THERE NOW!!

In a world of so many games and so  many musical genre’s there’s pretty much a game for everyone when it comes to music in the form of Beat Hazard, where the music is the game.

Now there have been musical games before it and there will be musical games after it but that does not and will never stop this game from being some of the best fun you can have filling up the screen with bullets in accordance to  your music.

Beat Hazard is a shooter…theres not much to say about it, yet theres so much to say about it…yes i know that made no sense but those who have played this game know what i mean, this game is only limited by your musical taste. This is the best way to listen to music.

Gameplay

 Beat Hazard’s game play is simply something to behold, as the title image suggest the game play is powered by your music, and it really is. You start by selecting a song that is on your computer, then you are away, its simple and easy to use.

When you get in game, the music will start up and you are away, based on the speed and volume of the music your shots will be stronger and more plentiful, as will enemies and bosses.

The basic game play is really about lasting through the entirety of the song, surviving enemies,bosses and debris to rack up the points and just generally have a damn good time rocking to your music.

A pretty nifty thing you can do with Beat Hazard is to plug in an Xbox 360 controller and play it with a game pad instead of the keyboard and mouse, it allows more fluent movement and aiming with the unison of thumb movement, as of yet there is no integrated PS3 dual shock support but with a simple software download you can get that running easily

This said the game can get very VERY hectic at time, if you listen to the sort of music that allows it the game will be merciless and you will die and die and die until you get good, then you’ll die again…and you’ll love every pulse pounding second

The game uses points on a level based system, the more you level up the better your starting upgrades and powers will be and as you go on you will unlock 2 new difficulty modes that really pile on the death.

There are a number of different game modes to this game, but most revolve around the same principle but they each have levels of incresing difficulty. the first is pretty simple, its just play, you pick a song and play it.
The next is survival, where you chose a playlist or album and try and see how  long you can last, survival has its own difficulty, not surprisingly called survival, its damn hard and a lot of fun, its all really about seeing how long you can last and having fun to music

(I’d like to claim this was me…but it wasn’t)

Presentation

Beat Hazards visuals are probably the closest thing to LSD you can get to without taking the drug, it can turn any song into a mad rave and it works well, even on the lower down computers of the world you can have the best of eye pain.

The game generates an incredible colour and light show that changes much like any visualizer, its really impressive and is  a sight to behold, as long as it doesn’t make your eyes bleed. There’s not much to say of visuals, its just a truly good looking thing

(I must point out there is a warning for people who suffer from Epilepsy brought on by flashing lights then i must advise you take heed before purchasing this game)

Story

In space…your music is so loud people become violent…not really, but that’s what i like to go by

Conclusion

When I first saw this game I will admit I was skeptical, it looked like any other shooter out there, hell i thought asteroids was on par with this game. Then i saw my friend playing it and i was really hooked, not because what he was playing was particularly to my liking, but that it could be. I could load my music up and really have fun with a game i other wouldn’t  if i were playing his music, that’s why it works so well. Its your music you play, so you know you will like it.

I will admit that while it is very addicting it soon can feel slightly bare, but all is not lost, in June (scheduled) comes a DLC package that will cost $5 or about £2.99, it will add many, many things, one of the most notable things is online co-op, but also new enemy and boss types and new power ups

So for these final words i will say again this game is not for all…well, yes it is, but only for you…what i mean to say is, you’ll like this game if you have music. Its really one of the best indie buys I have taken my time to play recently, its fun and enjoyable and i recommend it.

((all screen shots were taken by a good friend, none of which i take credit for))

For those astute among you,  you  may have heard of the impossibly fast growing indie game known as Minecraft.
Now this is not to be affiliated with Blizzard’s fucking stupid plan of putting craft at the end of the 2/3 games they make, no this is a new craft!

Now for  those of you who don’t know what Minecraft is then you have given me the near impossible task of doing it justice in an explanation but i shall try never the less .

Minecraft is a open world sandbox game based around the notion of destroying and placing blocks of differing materials in 3 dimensions, in lamens terms you build shit.
Now there is much more to it than that but more on that later, this is gonna be a fancy structured review as i can’t be bothered to have originality at this point.

Gameplay
remember that later i just spoke about? well that’s now! efficient ain’t i? So as i have already said Minecraft is an open ended sandbox world explorer survival builder thing…i did say that right?
There is no main goal in Minecraft other than what you make your goal to be. The default game type is known as survival, where each night monsters come out of the darkness to try and murder you in as many gleeful ways as possible 

the main goal here is survival for the first couple of nights, once you have done that you can try and be more daring to explore caves get materials build tools to get more materials to build a castle and blah blah blah
Alternatively you can set the difficulty to peaceful and have a quiet relaxing time building to your hearts content, if you like doing that sort of thing of course. 

You’ll have to learn sooner rather than later, in fact you’ll have to learn almost instantly how to craft, this can be rather annoying to figure out for first time plays who now nothing of the mysterious realm of YouTube tutorials, its all based on a 2x2 and a 3x3 grid crafting method, you place the appropriate resources in the corresponding places and you’ll get your item, this can be tools refined materials and food, its a very effective system and works well at managing a usually menu heavy system in other games.

You can also head online with your friends to build and/or survive together if you trust them not to burn down your house.

The creativity  of the Minecraft community extends to wanting to change they game they adore, with a huge number of of mods and texture packs avaliable if you get bored of the base game (which is nigh impossible) you can hope someone agreed with you and there will be a mod of it, if not? well i suppose you could try it yourself…

Presentation
There is no other way to put it, Minecraft is simply beautiful.

 It’s simple look speaks more to the eyes than most any modern game, you wouldn’t think it as an on looker, i didn’t myself. But really its just one of those games that when you see its truly breathtaking what it can accomplish with such simple colors and blocky Lego style terrain (there was bound to be a Lego comparison sooner or later) is simply breathtaking…wow i used simple a lot in that description there didn’t i?

Minecraft uses a unique random world generating engine that means 2 worlds can never possibly be the same, they can also stretch 8 times round the world, or so they so, i doubt anyone has had the to do that as of yet. The enviroments can be varied and detailed having a number of different varieties of weather and landscape (these are known as Biomes)

You can keep making new world after new world and always be surprised and amazed, you think one world is amazing and nothing can top it…

Then you just get lucky

And when you are feeling adventurous you can browse the Internet for a texture pack, which will usually revamp all the default Minecraft textures with whatever the hell you want, be it just improved colors or change them entirely to a new theme, its so easy to do and so worth it.

Story
HAHAHAHAHAHAH…no

Conclusion
In all i have said i have not even yet begun to scratch the surface of why this game belongs on your computer. Its a very hard game to explain to someone and ever harder to explain why you or anyone else should like  it, but really. go buy it, its currently on its in Beta testing stage and its only going to increase in price once the full game is released (scheduled for 11/11/11) even after that there will be frequent updates and mods to be added so it may never end.

Theres no way i can ever convince you fully why you should go buy this game right now but if there was then it would take the magic out of discovering it for yourself, i will admitt it may not be for everyone, but for those who it is for, go buy it now

Hello…I am heavy weapons guy and THIS…is a crappy introduction.
for those of you  who don’t know what whats ripping off well then it  sucks to be you, for those of you who didn’t laugh…you aren’t alone, no one did.

Now! if you cannot read the description that is mere inches to the right of this post i’ll simply go through what this is about.
This blog will be what 9001+ blogs and videos and articles are about and that is Games…slightly predictable for those who know me but yeah its what i do and it what a lot of others do to. There will be other things but don’t hold your breath. no seriously don’t hold your breath at all, i have no idea when i will post or if there will be any structure to it. I’ve never kept a schedule before and i doubt i will keep one now.

So that’s about it, if anyone is still reading this which is doubtful then welcome to the show. I’d say something cool like buckle your seat belts but chances are you won’t be most interested in this entirely ;)