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The ever-funny Charlie Brooker will be doing something someone should have done a long time ago. No he hasn't cured the common cold, but what he has done is get a gaming programme on the BBC at a decent time: 10pm.

The programme promises to deliver discussion on gaming's rise to power, and how it might change the industry. Personally I can't wait.

It's probably also worth mentioning that this won't be aired in America for a good while. Sorry! As an apology on behalf of Britain, I present to you, a video of a cat unplugging a light.

However, those of us with UK passports will be able to watch Gameswipe tonight on BBC4 at 10pm, or probably on the BBC iPlayer for a week after broadcast.

Matt

Labels: Gameswipe, Matt, Matthew Meadows, Reminder, Televison

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Those of you who aren’t familiar with older video games may have never even heard of Wolfenstein before, allow me to educate you – Wolfenstein was one of the pioneers of the FPS genre that is... well it’s pretty darned popular, isn’t it? This game’s ancestor, Wolfenstein 3D (that ran on MS-DOS) may not look pretty to the eye, but its influence on modern gaming cannot be overstated. Such a shame is it then, that Wolfenstein does nearly nothing new for the ever so slowly stalling genre.

But hey, do you like shooting guns? At Nazis? Well then my friend, ignore the rambling diatribe above and go out and buy Wolfenstein. Yes, as you may have imagined this game is an incredibly competent first person shooter that makes good use of a very well made upgrade system and some cool magical powers.

Wolfenstein’s “plot” is little more than a flimsy premise to set you on your way to capping some olde-worlde skinheads. That isn’t necessarily bad, per-se, and didn’t really influence my enjoyment of the game; I mean, if you wanted a deep meaningful story... well, you probably shouldn’t be considering playing a game in which the main character is constantly addressed as ‘BJ’. Go to the German WWII town of Isenstadt and kill the leader of the ‘Nazi Paranormal Division’? Sure, why not. Use the magical crystals to walk through walls? Absolutely.

The game completely quashes any smouldering embers of narrative left by making every single German (that’s pretty much everyone in the game apart from ‘BJ’) have a terrible, terrible accent, that reminds me of some sort of semi-racist impression of a Nazi which your drunken uncle might impose upon you at a wedding. Then... well, towards the end, a character that is reasonably important in the grand scheme of things dies in a gunfight. This may sound reasonable, but the game presents this as some kind of huge calamity when you have talked to this character for literally at most; 2 minutes. It was at this point I realised Wolfenstein was awesome.

Sure, it has a terrible story, but you know what: Raven Software doesn’t give a damn, and neither should you. The shooting system is terrific, there are eight weapons in all that will absolutely quench your blood lust, and dude, when you shoot a Nazi’s head, it pops off like a coconut in a sideshow. Speaking of weapons, as I mentioned earlier, they are all super upgradable, to a point where at the end of the game I was completely unstoppable, mowing down Nazi’s with a super-charged laser cannon that leaves a smouldering pile of bones. During the course of the game you pick up four crystals, one that allows you to see things not visible in the real world, one that allows you to slow down time, one that deploys a bubble shield, and one that gives you extra damage power. However, these magical powers won’t last long - at most 15 seconds - meaning the fight isn’t too unbalanced.

It’s probably worth mentioning that Wolfenstein has a multiplayer component. The little I played of it (about 45 minutes in all) was really enough to prove to me that it was passable. There’s a Team Deathmatch and two objective based modes that really just add another bullet point on the back of the game’s box. However competent it is doesn’t really matter, however, as I’m willing to bet that within a couple of months the servers will be empty.

Wolfenstein isn’t pretty, it’s not got some new “cutting edge” art style, it wasn’t written by J.J. Abrams and its multiplayer is forgetable, so if you want any of those things, move along. However, if you like shooting then you’ll get a good solid 8+ hours out of this game that are incredibly enjoyable, even if only for low-brow thrills.

Matt

Labels: Activision, Matt, Matthew Meadows, Review, Wolfenstein

Gearbox have released some pictures of Borderlands’ box art, and boy, does it make us guys at GGTL even more excited for Borderlands.

In case you don’t know, Borderlands is a game that has been through development hell over the last 4 or so years, shifting art style completely last year (thankfully). The game’s main claim to fame is its guns. There’s quite a few of them; somewhere over the 1 million mark (they lost count).

Anyway, at some point I’ll write a longer article about why I’m excited about Borderlands, but for now, take a look at this awesome box art!

Borderlands is currently shooting for a release date of October 20^th in North America and October 23^rd in the EU.

Are you excited about Borderlands? Do you think this box art looks cool? Tell us in the comments!

Matt

Labels: Borderlands, Box art, Gearbox, Matt, Matthew Meadows

You know what I love about PSN arcade games? That nearly all of them have an amazing electro soundtrack. Super Stardust HD, Cell Factor and Wipeout HD all prove my point here, but Shatter stands head and shoulders above the rest in terms of audio goodness. That aside, Shatter provides a gameplay experience which won’t blow you away, but will please fans of arcade games.

Shatter is a breakout style, block-destroying game that requires the destruction of all of the blocks in the level before progress can be made. In this sense Shatter is a classic game, but the main new mechanic introduced in Shatter is ultra-important. Suck and blow. No that isn’t an offer, and no don’t email me asking about it. Suck and blow is the ability to draw the ball, points (which also power your shield and turret), and any debris towards, or away from the paddle. This introduces a really cool risk-reward mechanic , as sucking everything towards you will help you to get more points, and thus more power and a better hi-score...but good luck with those massive blocks hurtling towards you.

Does that paragraph pique your interest in Shatter? If no, then let me give you another reason to buy this game. An amazing soundtrack. I was about to put amazing in full caps, but GGTL is too classy for that. Shatter’s soundtrack is so mind-numbingly awesome, that I found myself rocking from side to side while playing my game, probably looking like an absolute moron. If you like electro music, I’d be tempted to say that that’s enough of a reason to buy the game – especially for the low price.

Shatter’s mode selection is pretty standard fare. There’s the main story mode (and I use the word story very lightly), a mode which allows you to fight the bosses in the game over and over again, and a “bonus mode” which gives you extra points if you can keep 3 fast flying balls up in the air with your paddle...uh, yeah. The main story mode will take you around an hour and a half to complete, but, the fun comes in trying to get that frickin’ silver trophy for completing the game without ever getting a game over (I hate you level 10 boss).

All in all, Shatter offers a really cool soundtrack alongside a pretty cool game. If you don’t like arcade games on PSN/XBLA or don’t like electro music, then this game probably won’t change your mind, but if you are into one of those two things, then Shatter will offer a fantastic deal for a low price.

8/10 - Solid game for fans of the genre

Matt

Labels: Matt, Matthew Meadows, PSN, Review, Shatter

As a someone who adores all things Terminator I can’t help but recommend this epic, genre defining shoote...nah I can’t keep it up. This game is terrible. Terminator Salvation doesn’t try anything new, and in the end, offers an unsatisfying experience that leaves a bitter taste.

I feel like I have to preface this review by saying that I played the game on hard mode from the get-go. Surely this is irresponsible for a game reviewer, right? Well, no. Arguably the game’s biggest claim to fame is its easy 1000/1000 achievement points or platinum trophy. If you aren’t interested in either of those two things then check out a review on another site or (probably a better idea) just skip this game. This review is built for someone who is only interested in this game for its trophies; which I’m guessing is probably most of you.

Terminator Salvation is a – stop me if you’ve heard this before – 3^rd person, cover mechanic based shooter. The plot revolves around John Connor on a mission to save a group of resistance fighters, who are trying to bring down the evil Skynet robots. The plot is okay, but all of the characters have such little development time (the game can be completed easily in one 4 hour sitting) that they just end up looking like they have really weird social links to each other, two people that meet each other for the first time will, within ten minutes, be BFFs.

The best bit about Terminator is the shooting. Tackling ‘spiders’ by going behind them and hitting their weak spot is pretty satisfying, especially in the game’s co-op mode, but the thing is, that’s seemingly all you do for 90% of the game (the other 10% I will cover in the next paragraph). There are only, get this, 5 enemies; Spiders, T-600s, T-800s, Aerostats and Hunter Killers (whom make up the sole cast of the game’s boss battles). This causes the combat later in the game to become repetitive, which led the developers (GRIN) to think, “hmm the cover mechanic based shooting is okay, but you know what’s great in games, vehicle sections”. How wrong they were.

Terminator’s vehicular sections are by far the most vomit inducingly appalling parts of this game, and probably any game this side of 2008. There are probably about 4 or 5 of these monstrosities in the game, one of them okay – firing RPGs out of the back of a train - the others horrifically bad. For example, one of the sections is a mind-fuck inducing mech-style mini-game that involves shooting at enemies with rockets and turrets while moving automatically through a level. While it doesn’t sound bad, the screen is painted in a Virtual Boy style; orange background that not only gave me and my co-op partner a headache, but also made the Hunter Killers that fly around far in the distance, slowly sapping my health, impossible to distinguish from the fog that they hover in.

Another “highlight” is the grenade-turret section which features vehicles which hover above the ground, even though they have wheels. It was here I decided that literally no quality control time was spent on the game. I don’t really blame them, at this point in the game, about 60% through, it was time to just tie up all the loose ends and abandon this cluster-fuck of a game.

I’ll wrap up this review by saying that while this game does have easy trophies, and can be found at a cheap price, it isn’t worth your time. This is much worse than a normal movie game, they are normally at least polished and good for young kids, but this game doesn’t appeal to anyone, even me as a trophy hunter (see: whore).

3/10

Matt

Labels: Matt, Matthew Meadows, Review, Terminator