Keri Honea - 122/183 - Strategy Guide Reviews

Resistance: Fall of Man Mini-Review

February 2, 2012 By Keri Honea Leave a Comment

Old game is old, blah blah blah, but it’s new to me, dammit! Since I’ve gotten into shooters, I’ve really wanted to sample a bit of everything. I also wanted to see first-hand what Colin Moriarty loves so much about it.

I’ll say one thing: the story is what makes the game. Yes, the idea of people getting infected and becoming zombie-like is nothing new. Halo pretty much started that route with shooters, and then Gears of War 3 took it, and I could go on forever with other examples. But what makes the story of Resistance so unique is that it is historically based. In fact, it takes a cue from something that was suspected post-WWII. The Chimera were born from Russian labs while they were developing a secret weapon after World War II, which is actually something that both FDR and Winston Churchill believed was going on. They were convinced–and most likely with good reason–that Stalin was developing a bio-weapon that would help the USSR take over the world. In the world of Resistance, it kind of did, but not in the way Stalin envisioned.

And that’s kind of where the fun stopped for me. The gameplay was standard fare, with nothing earth-shatteringly new, but I had to remind myself that this was a very early PS3 title. Of course I’m going to see things that have already been done. However, I didn’t like some of the horror elements that were thrown in. It reminded me a lot of the first Gears of War game, and I was not a fan of little monsters jumping out of dark corners when everything is quiet.

I also didn’t really like the main character, Nathan Hale. I get that he’s infected and is therefore a bit tormented, but he was so boring. Rarely talked. Compared to Hale, Master Chief is the king of eloquence. Cartwright is constantly talking to him when they team up, so why couldn’t Hale offer some returning banter? Or what about the woman lieutenant whom I cannot remember her name? He never once responded to anything she said, and she yammered at him more than Cortana from Halo. I need a little more from my main characters.

But am I going to continue with Resistance 2? Yeah, I am. I have this thing about seeing things through–how else did I finish Twilight series (and I’m not proud of it)–and well, I have the game. Plus, I’m going to need something actiony and shooty to play while working on Final Fantasy XIII-2. But yeah, I can’t recommend it to anyone else. So far, the Xbox reigns when it comes to exclusive shooters.

Final Fantasy XIII-2 CE Strategy Guide – Why Should I Buy?

January 31, 2012 By Keri Honea 7 Comments

Happy Final Fantasy XIII-2 day! I’m one of the rare few people who loved the first game for pretty much everything and didn’t hesitate in preordering the sequel. Apparently a lot of reviewing sites like this game more than the first, which will probably equal in me hating it. Seems to be the case with everything else, but I’m excited all the same.

If you’re like me and refuse to play a Final Fantasy game without a strategy guide–seriously, I have no interest in playing for hours on end finding every little thing–then I’m sure you’ll make no exception for this strategy guide. However, before you make the plunge in spending an extra $10-20 (depends on where you buy it) for the Collector’s Edition, please read this handy comparison of the two editions. I’m glad I have the Collector’s Edition, just because I love hardback covers, but other than that…I have really nothing to recommend.

Like most CE guides, the inner artwork is slightly different from the regular edition. However, the CEs usually sport the same inner artwork as the paperbacks, including the extra artwork as extra first pages. This one, does not. And after flipping through the CE guide, I have not been able to find the paperback’s inner artwork.

CE front fly page artwork

Paperback front fly page artwork

Furthermore, the back fly pages artwork of the CE has the same image. That was fairly disappointing as well.

There is an extra artwork section in the back of the CE that includes behind-the-scenes interviews with developers. It’s a nice touch for die-hard fans.

At the end of the day, I can’t fully recommend the Collector’s Edition over the paperback, unless you are a true collector who loves hardbacks and included ribbon bookmarks. In other words, insane, like me.

Monday Gaming Diary: I LIVE!

January 30, 2012 By Keri Honea Leave a Comment

The faces of streptococcus

I apologize for the complete lack of posts last week. Streptococcus decided it would choose Monday to invade my throat and I was left fairly comatose to the world for about four days. I wasn’t entirely unproductive, though. I read the first two Hunger Games books in two days and played lots of Final Fantasy Origins on my PSPgo.

Final Fantasy Origins is a bit different from what I’ve played of the original Final Fantasy on my iPad. The iPad version only offers one difficulty level, and it sits somewhere between the Normal and Easy modes on Origins. Hardly any of the item locations contain the same items as Origins, and of course, nothing costs the same. I probably would have continued playing on my iPad if I didn’t hate the controls so much. The placement of the virtual d-pad is just flat awkward and there are no options to move it. So to Origins I go.

I started two games, one on Normal and one on Easy so I could feel the differences. Holy cow, Normal mode is unbelievably punishing. I love barely surviving a boss fight just to die on my way out of the dungeon. I would heal myself if I had any frickin’ magic. Oh and Red Mage is so dang useless. He couldn’t hit the broadside of a Buick with his attacks. And then there’s his weak spell casting. Useless dude, absolutely useless. Sadly though, Easy mode is a complete polar opposite. It should be called “Win” mode instead of Easy, because unless you’re a complete idiot, you can win every fight the first time. You can still die if you try to be invincible and never heal yourself, but the amount of magic the mages get is insane, so you never run out of spells to cast. I’ve stopped needing to buy potions a long time ago, and I still haven’t gotten the first Crystal. Middle ground, people. Middle ground.

In stack of shame news, I’m still plugging away at Resistance. This has taken me far longer than planned, thanks to distractions like Final Fantasy Origins and the demo for Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning. According to the IGN Wiki that I use to monitor my progress–the game has no Trophies, so I could care less about using a guide for completionist purposes–I have two chapters left, and thank God. I find the overall story to be intriguing, but damn the game feels unnecessarily drawn out. I thought it was over twice already just to be sent out somewhere else. I have to, HAVE TO beat it tonight, because tomorrow is Final Fantasy XIII-2 day, and the start of a fresh season of strategy guide reviews.

Can you smell the excitement? It smells like beautiful, beautiful collector’s editions of guides.

Game of the Year Winners!

January 17, 2012 By Keri Honea Leave a Comment

Can a strategy guide site vote for GOTY awards? Sure we can! After all, we have to play these games in order to write a decent review. So I rounded up nominations from a few of my fellow writers here, and without further adieu (because really, who doesn’t hate those shows that take an hour to say five things?) here are our games of the year from SGR.

RPG of the Year – Skyrim

Action Game of the Year – Batman: Arkham City

Adventure Game of the Year – Uncharted 3

Shooter of the Year – Gears of War 3

Sports Game of the Year – MLB 11: The Show

Platforming Game of the Year – Super Mario 3D Land

Puzzle Game of the Year – Portal 2

Game Soundtrack of the Year – Bastion

Drumroll please…

THE Game of the Year – Portal 2

If you don’t understand why these games won these categories, make yer own list. On another note, if you haven’t listened to the Bastion soundtrack, do it now. It doesn’t matter if you haven’t played the game before, trust me.

Next week, we’ll post what we’re looking forward to the most for 2012. The first release rush is upon us!

Uncharted 3 Strategy Guide Review

January 16, 2012 By Keri Honea 5 Comments

I admit that I’ve not been a fan of strategy guides that Piggyback Interactive has written in the past for various reasons. I won’t get into why here–because you should have read all of them in the past–as they have nothing to do with the Uncharted 3 strategy guide. What I mean to say is that the strategy guide for Uncharted 3 is the best guide I have ever seen from Piggyback Interactive. In fact, the guide is downright PERFECT.

Yes, you read that right. PERFECT.

To start with, the guide incorporates Piggyback’s usual art book design, but it’s done in a way that doesn’t impede upon using the guide. It’s so rare to find this in guides. Usually they are able to be artsy at the expense of being a guide, or they just choose certain pages to be artsy with that are free of guide content. The Uncharted 3 strategy guide is designed to appear as if the pages were something out of Drake’s own journal, but they don’t come off as cluttered as the last strategy guide did.

The walkthroughs are clearly laid out, and all collectibles are both mentioned in the walkthroughs and separated from them. In other words, the walkthroughs mention the collectibles, but the guide to find them are in separate call-out boxes on the page. The guide does the same for the platforming “puzzles,” which I greatly appreciated, because sometimes I had trouble discerning where I needed to jump and climb, especially while getting chased.

In case you are wondering just how well the collectible portions of the walkthroughs are, I’ll just say this: I found all 101 collectibles in my FIRST playthrough. That’s a miracle, people. I was able to do the same with Gears of War 3, but there weren’t 101 of anything there–except for maybe enemies to kill at one time.

The Uncharted 3 strategy guide also contains fabulous tips for Trophy hunters. One of the back appendices lists every Trophy, and where applicable, it describes the best places to attempt the Trophy acquisition. For example, for the RPG Trophy, the guide suggests replaying a particular scene in the desert a couple of times for easy acquisition. Every guide should do this, and I develop a soft spot for a guide every time I find one that does instead of simply explaining what the Trophy is. I can see what it is when I turn on my PS3, thanks.

I also really, really enjoyed the game developer commentary that was strewn throughout the book. It was fun learning about the origins of the names of the Trophies, where developers got inspiration for certain scenes, or what their overall goal was with depicting a certain moment this way or that. Little extra touches like these really make the book come together and feel like it’s more than just a strategy guide, and therefore, worth the money.

Well done, Piggyback Interactive and Prima Games. The Uncharted 3 strategy guide is definitely one of the best strategy guides I have ever come across. I look forward to seeing future strategy guides from these companies being just as polished, if not as perfect.

SGR Rating: 5/5

Author: James Price
Publisher: Piggyback Interactive
Editions available: Paperback and Collector’s Edition
Acquired via Distributor (Prima Games)