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inFamous 2 Mini-Review

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In case you hadn’t noticed from my Monday gaming diaries, I loved inFamous 2. I’ve rarely ever played a game through completion TWICE, so playing it twice back-to-back is rather unprecedented–I didn’t even play renegade Mass Effect right after I finished my paragon playthrough of ME2. Granted, by the time I got near the end of my evil playthrough of inFamous 2, I was more than tired of the gameplay and of the swamp monsters, especially.

However, I had to see how being evil changed things immediately. I wanted to know far more badly than I did Mass Effect. (It also helped that I knew I could burn through the story quickly, but that’s a different matter.) That says volumes about a game as someone who is never looking for replay value in a game.

As for the gameplay, when I said I was tired of it by the end, I really meant that I was tired of playing these missions again. Zapping people with lightning really never gets old, but there were some boss fights and mini-boss fights that I really didn’t want to relive. However, I think we can all say that about games. I personally loved the gameplay, aside from how “sticky” Cole would seem to get. In other words, Cole would gravitate toward things to climb up or grab all the time. While you’re trying to make a weird jump or float to a grindwire, this is awesome. But when you’re just running down the street, you don’t want to suddenly grab onto a pipe to climb, particularly when you’re getting shot at from all directions. This is, though, my only complaint so hey, if that’s all I found wrong with it, then there’s really not much a problem.

Many complained that the game provided just more of the same from the game, with no real improvements on powers or newness to Cole’s abilities. I think this is another case of “damned if you do, damned if you don’t.” I personally like that it kept the same premise and power ideas from the first game, especially since it let me float around from the get go. If the game deviated too much or tacked on even more, I think there would have been plenty of complaints that it wasn’t like the first game. After everyone bemoaned Cole’s new look, did anyone really think SuckerPunch was going to change up Cole’s powers?

So yes, inFamous 2 is basically more of inFamous, but that is exactly what this gamer wanted. If you’re a fan of the first, you’re definitely going to like the second. Just, uh, be prepared for the unusual endings.

inFamous 2 IGN Strategy Guide Review

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So it seems that IGN is moving towards wikis for their guides for some of the bigger games. Their wiki for inFamous 2 has been the first time I’ve ever seen it, so I’m assuming–probably wrongly so–that this is a new trend. It’s most likely a way for the IGN editors to connect with more of their readers and encourage them to contribute to the site in some way. The guides seem to be written by the IGN guide editors, but then it looks like IGN members can make edits. What this all adds up to is some seriously sloppy work, and oh how it shows.

Right off the bat, I’m smacked with incorrect capitalization of the game’s own title. It’s one thing to capitalize the “i” in inFamous 2 at the start of a sentence, but it’s absolutely incorrect to do so within a sentence. Look at the game case, people. It can’t be that hard. Shortly after I get over that, I see a bunch of grammatical errors. I expect this when I look at GameFAQs guides, but on IGN where there are editors for this stuff? Inexcusable.

As for the content of the guide itself, the walkthroughs are okay; at least those that have anything written at all are okay. That’s right, the walkthroughs are not finished. In addition, the ones that are finished have few to no screenshots. The trophies guide has zero screenshots as well. Don’t expect any maps, either, unless you need a map for dead drops.

And while there is a fairly helpful tutorial for the user-generated content options, there are no walkthroughs for any of the side missions. I can think of more than a few side missions that could potentially need assistance. I can understand these not being finished–I mean, the main walkthrough isn’t finished–but to not have them listed at all?

Now one thing that is super useful with the IGN inFamous 2 guide is their section on finding blast shards. They divide up the blast shard locations by four sections of New Marais, and they show on a map which section is which. From there, users can click on the particular regions and find every blast shard, screenshot by screenshot. When you know a blast shard is in a particular spot, and you can’t figure out which building or tree it’s attached to, these screenshots are a lifesaver from frustration. So for those who only want a guide for help with the blast shards, then here is your best option.

Sad to say, IGN’s guide does not warrant any recommendation beyond the blast shard assistance. It’s incomplete, it’s not written well, and it overall reeks of sloppiness.

SGR Grade: 2

 

Duke Nukem Forever Strategy Guide Review

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Duke Nukem Forever Strategy Guide ReviewI’m here to review strategy guides and chew bubble gum…and I’m all out of gum. I am back from Duke-Vegas to review the Duke Nukem Forever: Balls of Steel edition strategy guide. Duke Nukem has always been a cult favorite who dropped off the map for quite some time, but he’s back to deal with the Alien Scum who have kidnapped his babes.

Trekking through Duke’s world can be dangerous on its hardest difficulty, but with some steroids and some beer, anything is possible!*

*please do not take steroids and beer together as I am sure it’s quite dangerous unless you are Duke himself.

Going through the first couple of pages, the guide does a nice job of telling you the history of Duke Nukem. If you are under the age of 20 or so you probably never heard of Duke Nukem before his latest game. No problem there, though, as the chapter “There And Back Again: A Duke’s Tale” has you covered on that. It chronicles his history from 1991 to the infamous delays and ultimately the revival of the game as well as all of the characters in the latest game. I always like it when a guide takes you through the history of a series.

The thing I liked about this game initially was the ability to pretty much interact with anything. Whether it is a toilet, sink, or whatever, if it has a switch to it, you can pretty much interact with it, and some of them provide an “Ego” boost thus making your health bar larger (sounds like a Beavis and Butt-Head joke). The guide does a good job of showing you which interactions earn you that precious Ego Boost you will need by the end of the game.

With all of the great stuff I have liked about the guide so far, here is where I find it not as necessary. The game’s objectives are simple enough and even glow and the levels are very linear so really there is no need to back track, and you cannot get lost unless you really are not paying attention. What ended up happening was instead of following the guide for what to do next I was following it to see exactly what Ego Boosts I was missing since some are obscure. Not the guide-makers’ fault, though, about the game being so linear, but I still wanted to point that out.

The guide does do a good job of letting you know what Trophies/Achievement opportunities are coming up too, which is always a plus for me. There was an annoying trophy in which you had to get 280,897 points for an Ego Boost and one million points on a pinball table for a trophy. The tips it provided helped me get a trophy that I was ready to come back to on another playthrough.

The main area I needed the guide for was the last boss, which can be quite frustrating on its hardest difficulty, but there are some tips/pictures provided to help. After a few tries with the guide’s details, I was able to overcome the boss and get that nice shiny trophy for beating it on “Balls of Steel” difficulty.

There is a section for multiplayer, but the multiplayer component is pretty shallow so don’t expect anything mind blowing as far as tips and tricks go, but it does show you the spawn points of armors and weapons throughout the levels.

The end of the guide is actually what I ended up liking the most, the “Art From The Vaults” section weighs in at over 100 pages of concept art and comments from the development team. I am a sucker for concept art and this collection is pretty nice and gives you a behind-the-scenes style look at what they were going for with this game.

I really liked the presentation of this guide, but unfortunately this is one of those games that does not need a big detailed strategy guide to complete it any differently other than finding all of the Ego Boost moments and the tips for the boss fights. If you are a Duke Nukem fan though such as myself I can still recommend the guide for those who want a collection of art from the game and a history of the series. But for those who do not even know who Duke is or they don’t care then this guide doesn’t really offer much for them.

SGR Rating: 3.5

Guide Authors: Joe Epstein, Doug Walsh
Publisher: BradyGames
Editions Available: Paperback and Limited Edition
Acquired via Publisher

inFamous 2 Strategy Guide Review

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inFamous2 Strategy Guide ReviewInFamous 2 had a lot to live up to due to its predecessor’s high bar of quality, and its strategy guide had very similar standards to live up to. I raved and glowed over the inFamous strategy guide, and I expected the same results from the inFamous 2 strategy guide, even though they come from two different publishers. With the exception of a few annoyances, BradyGames’ strategy guide for inFamous 2 did not let me down.

The walkthrough is as straight forward as the game’s story missions, and while it’s next to impossible to get lost with the walkthrough’s assistance, it’s very possible to get frustrated with the occasional lack of direction. For example, the tesla missile missions are quite possibly the most frustrating missions in the story. The player is given very little direction as to where the tesla missile needs to be guided, and the guide offers almost nothing in addition. For the most part, this is fine, but a little map of where you’re supposed to end up with a screenshot of the final destination would have been really, really nice for some of the trickier tesla connections. And in other instances, when the guide does give tips on where to send your tesla missile, there are far easier routes to be found than those given, such as those in Fort Philippe.

My only other gripe with the story walkthrough is its spoilers. The inFamous 2 strategy guide is one of those guides that has every piece of the narration and action written down. If you look too far ahead, such as while flipping to the next section for help with side missions, you may accidentally stumble upon a major spoiler. That said, I’d rather a guide say too much than too little, so this isn’t detrimental, but it was still a bit annoying to me to see all of the cut scenes dictated out before me while I’m trying to find exactly where I need to go post-cut scene.

However, anyone who has played inFamous 2 knows that the story is not what takes up most of the time of the game; it’s collectible hunting and the side missions that eat up your time, and fortunately, this is where the strategy guide shines the most.

inFamous2 Strategy Guide ReviewMost of the side missions are far more difficult and/or tedious than the story missions, and you can’t unlock a good number of them without performing a certain act first, whether it’s by completing a particular side mission or killing a specific person in a specific location. All side missions in the strategy guide are organized by the time of their appearance, so it’s fairly easy to find out which side mission you are missing without flipping through the entire section. Every side mission has its own map and clear set of screenshots, and side missions are never found on two pages outside of the fold. It was incredibly easy to quickly look down at the book and figure out instantly where I needed to go next. This was especially helpful for the Overcharge missions (see image on right).

Another section in the guide contains separate maps for the blast shards and dead drops, which I really only found useful for the dead drops. There are way too many blast shards for a map alone to really be useful, especially when trying to hunt down those elusive ten last shards. In that situation, it’s really best to do 60 side missions and acquire the blast shard sensor upgrade.

The most useful part of this section is the trophy guide. Many of the trophies are straight forward, but a number of them are a bit baffling, particularly the one that contains the secret to finding the last dead drop. For example, the Mountaineer trophy is awarded for climbing to the top of the three tallest buildings in New Marais. While one can simply climb to the tip top of every building and hope one of the climbs will sound the chime, it was nice to have them all neatly pointed out as well as provide tips for combining trophy attempts.

For bonuses, the inFamous 2 strategy guide includes a very hefty section on creating your own levels for the UGC–something that all of the UGC creators should have looked at before shelling out their drivel for the trophy. And of course, there is a back section just for fans consisting of gorgeous concept art and interviews with the game’s creators. In other words, this guide is not missing a thing.

BradyGames has knocked yet another strategy guide out of the park with their inFamous 2 strategy guide. Not even a tour guide could give you a better tour around New Marais.

SGR Rating: 4.5/5

Professor Layton and the Unwound Future Mini-Review

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Professor Layton and the Unwound FutureI specifically packed Professor Layton and the Unwound Future in my Japan luggage because I knew this would be the perfect time to play it. This game was meant for those train rides! And sure enough, I was right; those train rides were perfect for solving a puzzle or two.

However, like its predecessors, the story behind the puzzles is what kept me up until 1 am playing, despite the fact that I had walked my feet off all around Japan that day.

All of the Professor Layton games have stories that completely jump the shark, but they fit in a way for why this professor of archaeology and his groupie constantly run into people with puzzles to solve. The stories would NEVER fly by anyone without the puzzle solving mechanics, and I think that’s part of the charm and fun of the games. The story of the Unwound Future jumped a bigger shark than the others–I’d love to explain why but I won’t for spoilers’ sake–but I found that I liked it best. It centered around some of Layton’s past and explained the histories behind a few running characters, which really appeals to fans of the series.

As such, it’s difficult to recommend this game unless you have played the first one, Professor Layton and the Curious Village, as so many characters are given zero background information. For example, without playing the first game, you will really have no clue about Don Paolo or Clara or even Layton’s history with Inspector Chelmey. It also goes without saying that if you didn’t like either of the first games, you won’t like this one either. It’s more of the same, more mini-games, and more brainteasers.

I cannot wait for the fourth game to release in the states.

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