Wrong Way On A Dead-Way Track

Last night I received my first legitimate shock while playing Telltale's The Walking Dead adventure game. I finished Episode 3: Long Road Ahead, with many of the original party dead or left behind.

The most shocking was the reporter girl's death. Heh, I've already forgotten her name. Lilly, heart attack dad's bitch daughter, blew her freakin' head off. So I left Lilly in the ditch and drove away. That will probably come back to bite me in the ass.

If they don't die on-screen, they don't die.

Anyway, I'm happy to be rid of heart attack dad and his bitch daughter; I have been wanting to get rid of them since episode one.

Also, we met a wise, old homeless man named Chuck. He kind of reminds me of Gandalf because he was wise enough to tell me that I should have a plan and that I should teach Clem how to shoot a gun.

This seems like very wise council, except I'm not sure I even know how to shoot a gun. In fact, I hate guns in this game. Two times in episode three I had difficulty with, you know, dying. And both involved guns. I'd prefer a blunt melee weapon over a firearm any day in the world of The Walking Dead. But, for some reason, the game insists on making me use guns.

I also encountered my first serious glitch in the game: the action options and target reticle didn't load in one area. When I entered the area, I could walk around, but I couldn't interact with anything. I couldn't talk to the people there and I couldn't open the door at the other end of the area. Luckily, I could go back the way I came and re-enter. After a couple minutes trying other options, I had power down and restart the game. Luckily, this didn't happen during an action sequence; it was one of those, you-need-to-talk-to-everyone-to-progress sequences.

Shocking, but boring and glitchy...not a good outing for The Walking Dead Episode 3. In my honest opinion, I think the series has gone downhill since episode one. We'll see how four and five work out.

Heart Attack Dad Is Dead

In the refrigerator room with the salt lick. I always called them salt "blocks" when I was a kid, but whatever. It was a brief, gleeful moment in what I thought was an all-too-familiar outing in Telltale's The Walking Dead Episode 2, subtitled, we're hungry, but not that hungry.

The button-time or quick-time events weren't as annoying as they seemed in the first episode, maybe because I knew when to expect them; I still died a couple times, mostly because I don't have the A, B, X, and Y buttons memorized on the Xbox. And if they were to mix up the colors and the letters, holy cow, I would be screwed.

I really didn't want the dairy "farmers" to be cannibals, so much in fact that I engaged in all the dialog trees multiple times to see if I could get a different answer. And once I knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that we would be eating Mark (the convenient new addition at the beginning of the episode), I did everything in my power to make it happen. I even tried not to find him in the secret, hidden room on the second floor of the farm house.

Yes, even the little fruit girl, Cantaloupe, no wait Clementine, ate some of Mark.

After that, I went on a killing spree. And I chose to kill heart attack Dad while his daughter Lilly was trying to (incorrectly) resuscitate, him. Well, technically, Kenny did it, but I helped by saying it was a good idea.

Unfortunately, I couldn't kill Lilly during this episode, even though she just stood there as the last "farmer" was kicking the crap out of me. Eventually I got away from him and the farm's electric fence. At that point, I wanted to make him take a bite out of the electric fence for feeding all of us (except me) roast human. But I settled with a headshot.

Episode 2: "Starved for Help" was definitely predictable and a little bland. I don't think the story was as well-crafted as the first episode, but the second episode was not bad, by any means. It's like a good B movie; glad I watched it, but happy I didn't pay for it.

Getting through the last three episodes before April may be a challenge, but I think I'll go for that goal. Happy zombie hunting!

Walk The Dead

So I took a break from Diablo 3 and Disgaea: Afternoon of Darkness (the two games that I've been consistently playing as of late) to finally sit down and play Telltale's The Walking Dead. A friend let me borrow his copy of all five episodes on disc for the Xbox. I played the first episode from beginning to end when I should've been watching the newest episode of The Walking Dead on AMC.

The game has received pretty positive reviews, and after playing the first episode, I understand why. But I still didn't really like the first episode of this game series. The story-telling was good, but I didn't like that it relied on "celebrities" from the comic. When I ended up on Hershel's farm in the very beginning, I was confused. It didn't look anything like it did in the comics or on the TV show. As soon as I realized where I was, I wanted to leave and meet new characters in this world.

Luckily, my wish was granted with Kenny and his family. I have a clear allegiance to Kenny and keeping that allegiance will guide most of my decisions throughout the game. I'm going to skip around here, to keep from spoiling the game.

Once I was inside the pharmacy, my problems with the game reared their ugly heads. I was charged with breaking into the pharmacy to get pills for heart-attack Dad and that became my ultimate goal. Frustration set in as the keys were nowhere to be found in the office. What I did find was a family picture of Lee with his parents and brother. He immediately ripped himself out of the photo and stashed it in the edge-of-the-screen inventory. For me, that was a very meaningful moment in how I understood Lee's story.

It was a weird thing to do, rip oneself out of a family photo but still keep the family photo. I was perplexed, in awe, and hooked. I left the office and the little girl's radio went off with Glenn, who went to fetch gasoline, calling for help. I brought the gun-girl with me to save Glenn and we saved his Korean ass. Upon returning with my axe, I tried to chop my way into the pharmacy and Lee, in so many words, basically said, "No dip-shit, you need the key."

So I was back where I left off and I talked to everyone again. Last being Doug, the guy guarding the door to the outside. And that's when I noticed the trapped zombie. The action button instructed me to show Doug my family photo, which convinced him that the trapped zombie had the pharmacy key. What just happened? Then it clicked: I had done things out of order. When I first talked to door-guard Doug, I was to see the trapped zombie (which I didn't) and try to convince Doug that the zombie worked at the pharmacy. He would have said something like, no it's too risky, I need proof. Then I would have gone back to the pharmacy office, picked up the photo, ripped myself out to hide my identity, and then showed the photo to Doug.

The moment I had with Lee, removing himself from the family photo, was ripped away. I had done things out of order. And from that moment on, I was pissed. So pissed, that I let Doug die in one of my decision button-time events.

As a general rule, I hate button-time events. They suck. I hated them in Resident Evil 4, especially after that knife fight, and I've hated them ever since.

The Walking Dead can basically be construed as an awesome story with a long string of button-time events. Awesome story-telling = good. Long string of button-time events = bad.

The episode ended with heart-attack Dad telling me to stay away from his daughter. My only thoughts were: I must have missed something because I think you're an asshole and I think your daughter is a bitch. As soon as I get the chance to let either or both of you die, I will do just that.

In some ways, I guess the first episode of The Walking Dead game succeeded because I am invested in these characters, whether its helping keep them safe, or having a hand in their gruesome deaths, I am invested.

As the episode ended, I was satisfied to see Glenn off in his pizza-delivery car. Get outta here kid; get yourself to the Georgia big time and be awesome (yeah, I like Glenn).

Nothing Is Sacred

Let's just say, I wouldn't be surprised if Capcom decided to remake Resident Evil 2.

After running into this post on Destructoid, I decided that it makes financial sense. After the rage subsided, I came to that conclusion. RE2 is my favorite Resident Evil game; it's quite possibly my favorite video game ever. I don't venture over to Gamespot very often, but the article about Capcom appealing for fan support is pretty lacking. The comments, however, are awesome. It's a healthy mix of action-RE enthusiasts and the classic-RE lovers (that's me). I don't have much to say about this; I could go into another Resident Evil rant, but I think I've said all there is to say. When I find something else to add, you can bet that I'll post it here.

In other news, the Columbus Comic Con is this weekend in the gloomy autumn buckeye state. For right now, I'm planning on attending and taking some sweet pictures.

I've never actually been to a comic convention before. The experience is the big draw for me; I'm not going to see a particular artist or celebrity. However, I would wait in line to see a couple guests. The Boondock Saints will be there, which is cool. If I could get all three of those guys to sign my Saints DVD that would be awesome. But honestly, I'd be happy just shaking their hands and telling them that I'm a fan.

The other person I'm semi-interested in meeting is Arthur Suydam; he's a cover artist. I know of him from Marvel Zombies and Deadpool: Merc with a Mouth. His Deadpool movie parody covers are my favorite.

Unfortunately, Ohio doesn’t get the big spectacle that the San Diego Comic Con gets. Ohio disappoints me. But it is Ohio. My expectations are not lofty.

Resident Evil 6 Demo: The Rule of Thirds

After a boring, 8-hour work day, I came home yesterday knowing that the Resident Evil 6 demo was going live. I hopped onto the PlayStation and I found nothing. No Resident Evil 6 Demo to download. WTF, I thought to myself. Eh, it's probably just Sony being Sony and effing something up. I'll play Skyrim instead (yeah, I haven't killed a dragon in months).

So I killed a dragon outside of Riften. Then I looked at my to-do list of quests and thought they all seemed mundane. Pausing, I checked the Internet for any news about Sony not having the RE6 demo (couldn't find any) and I switched to a Skyrim wiki and landed on a page about the Ghostblade. That's what I need, the Ghostblade. So I played until I obtained the Ghostblade.

An hour or two later, with the Ghostblade in my hot little hands, I checked PSN again and the RE6 demo was there. Spooky. So I downloaded it and played it. Here are my thoughts:

Finally, I can set aside all my speculation and muckraking - I have played a demo for Resident Evil 6 and it wasn't that bad. I'll get into more detail below, but I generally enjoyed the appetizer experience contained within the demo. As a preview for all three main campaigns, the demo lets you play as Chris, Leon, and Jake (their partners we're also selectable, but I only played the main characters). Each campaign is different and each character plays differently (we already knew that) but there is wide gulf that separates them, wider then I suspected.

Twenty Minutes of Chris

Band of Bros

No, I'm not abbreviating "brothers" here or alluding to the epic series. This is the BRO GAMER campaign. "Is he always this awesome?" says the rookie BSA moron as Chris Redfield walks away. Yes rookie...Chris is so awesome that he's probably the only one who will survive this mission. This means you’re going to die a horrible death at the hands of zombie hulk.

The running and gunning in Chris's twenty minutes felt exactly like RE5, but slightly faster. Switching weapons has the same intuitive directional pad controls as RE5. Healing was less intuitive until I realized herbs were picked up and compressed into Tic-Tac form. You have to go into your inventory to combine herbs and load them into your Tic-Tac container. The pop-a-health-Tic-Tac button is R2 and you can pig out like fat kid with Pez dispenser (as long as your container is loaded).

I used Chris's pistol more than his automatic weapon; the machine gun hopped around as you fired (I guess that's realism for you). Anyway, I was able to pick off a rocket launcher goon all the way across the map with the pistol as I was killing time while the BSA rookie was planting charges or something. Timed survival seemed to be a common theme. Twenty minutes of Chris's foray into the world of Call of Duty wasn't bad. But I don't know if I can survive the brotastic bullshit for an entire campaign; I played Chris's first because I knew it would be the hardest for me to stomach. And I was right.

Twenty Minutes of Jake

Zombie Tyranitars

Of the three characters, I am the most curious about Jake Muller, the supposed son of Albert Wesker. The demo didn't give away much of Jake's story; he is paired with Sherry Birkin and that can't be for no reason at all.

Jake's gameplay featured the most variety and the most surprising enemies. He comes fully loaded with a pistol, hand-cannon (think elephant gun, stranger), machine gun, sniper rifle, and hand-to-hand. Yes, you have to equip hand-to-hand. Jake's twenty minutes trained me in the ways of melee and close combat of RE6 and that's only because it was the best way to deal with the zombie lizards.

More like zombie tyranitars. Almost every infected enemy crusted over after you defeated them. Some of the crusties then broke apart revealing this new enemy. Sure, I could've wasted all my ammo on the zombie tyranitars, but it was most effective to engage the beasts in hand-to-hand and beat the brains out of them. More satisfying too.

Jake's run felt more familiar then Chris's; it actually felt the most like RE4 when you get onto the island. And I'm okay with that. I can only hope that Jake's story is well hashed out in the full game. After all, he has his father's shoes to fill.

Twenty Minutes of Leon

My Knife and the Ghostblade

I almost played as Leon S. Kennedy first, but I'm glad I didn't; I saved the best for last. Leon's twenty minutes felt like classic Resident Evil crossed with RE4.

I remember when books were used to hide things like keys, emblems, and clues.

The opening cut-scene drew from the first zombie encounter in the mansion back in 1997. Only I didn't actually get to shoot the zombie...cut-scene Leon shot the zombie and he looked cool doing it too. You then assume control of Leon on a college campus with a new flesh-bag partner (who isn't completely worthless) and joining the team again, codec-style is Hunnigan. Yesh!

Leon comes equipped with a pistol and his combat knife. I switched to the combat knife right away because the pistol only had forty bullets. Better conserve ammo, I thought. It was a good feeling, one I've not felt since Code Veronica. The zombies are zombies, occasionally they'll be carrying something that you can snatch away and use against them only once. I used the knife and the melee attacks for Leon's entire twenty minutes. Awesome. But I did notice the new stamina bar, which I drained quickly going all up-close-and-personal with the undead. My partner did help me get out of some tight spots and I had to use grapple quick-time events to get the touchy-feely zombies off me.

Resident Evil 6 now includes decorative urinal cakes.

The demo ended with an awkward quick-time event in a police car looking for the keys as zombies attacked and climbed all over the cruiser. Annoying, but it was tense. Leon's run was definitely my favorite; I might even play it again. I might even use his partner...I forget her name already and I don't feel like googling it.

Two Thirds Satisfied

One Third Worried

That seems to be a good summary of my experiences with the Resident Evil 6 demo. Overall, I was happy with it. Chris's campaign bothers me and it will probably still bother me when I play it in full. However, if I hadn't already pre-ordered Resident Evil 6, this demo would've sealed the deal. I am looking forward to playing the full game on October 2.

I Am Weak: Forgive My Flip-Flopping

It happens every fall; the do-nothing feeling sweeps over me and all I want to do is watch the gray sky rain and play video games.

My autumn line-up is pretty much in stone: Resident Evil 6, Doom 3 BFG Edition, and Halo 4.

Yes, I know I caved to Capcom on the whole RE6 thing, but I'm choosing to remain an annoyed yet optimistic fan of the series. With a replay of Resident Evil 4 nudging out Diablo 3 for my prime-time gaming slot, I'm reminded of how "fun" the over-the-shoulder-action-horror Resident Evil can be. Sure, I still miss the fixed camera and the atmosphere of the early games, but I am enjoying RE4. Again.

It also helps that one of my good friends is picking up RE6 and we're planning on co-opping through it. I know I'm definitely excited about playing RE6 with another long-time Resident Evil fan. This guy and I played through RE2, RE3, and Code Veronica together, passing the controller back and forth. That's how we had to co-op back in the '90s.

The Mercenaries Mode is another factor in RE6's favor. Ever since Resident Evil 3, I have enjoyed the Mercenaries minigame though it has changed considerably since then. I wish I could customize the load-out for each of the mercenaries, but that's never been an option, ever. So I'll just stay in my corner and whine about it.

Plus, the new RE6 demo actually drops today. Look at me, being all timely and current. If I'm not engrossed in RE4, I'll be downloading that tonight; might even write about it later.

Doom 3 and Halo 4 are going to be big-budget diversions; I've already played and beaten Doom 3 on the Xbox (it'll be fun to revisit in the dark and in HD) and Halo 4 is just for the online multiplayer (maybe I'll actually complete a Halo single player campaign, probably not).

The Nostalgia Sell: Resident Evil 6

It's time for more of this Resident Evil crapfest. Is crapfest a word? It should be, because it paints a perfect picture of how Capcom has transformed Resident Evil. Quite a feat, if you ask me; if Capcom set out to maim the Resident Evil franchise, then they deserve to celebrate, because they have ruined a magnificent series of games.

The truly sad part of all this: I still like Resident Evil games. I can't say love. I used to love Resident Evil back in the PlayStation days. So when I saw this on Amazon, I was excited. Harkening back to my craving for sweet pre-order bonuses, when I saw the Resident Evil Anthology pack, I thought: that's a super-awesome deal. Forget Leon's jacket, an Africa necklace, or a mini Chris Redfield (and think other shiny pre-order goodies), let's give out the other RE games.

The Resident Evil Anthology: at first glance, this looked like an amazing deal. Then my common sense started tingling.

Wait a minute...
This contains six Resident Evil games. Three of my favorite games (the first three) and three that I'm not all that crazy about.

Wait a minute...
I already own all of these games (in disk form) except the 6th one.

Wait a minute...
Resident Evil 6 costs $59.99 alone, which means they're charging thirty bucks for the five other games.

Wait a minute...
That means Resident Evil 6 is insanely over-priced.

Nostalgia clouded my judgment, nearly causing me to make a bad decision. Touché, Capcom. You almost had me there. Marketing strategy suggests that when we look at this bundle, we think we're getting all this awesome stuff with the new game. The reversal (and maybe closer to the truth, I fear) is that Capcom is re-selling what made Resident Evil so great and tacking on RE5 and RE6 like the backwards little runts that they are.

Kind of like the Indiana Jones 4 Pack. Nobody's going to buy Kingdom of the Crystal Skull by itself. So they have to bundle it with the other three good movies.

I'm being pretty harsh here. I haven't played Resident Evil 6 nor have I played its demo. I've seen some cool gameplay footage over at Kotaku and that's about it. The bottom line is that I'm not fond of the Resident Evil action game. And I hope Capcom doesn't turn Resident Evil 6 into a knock off of Call of Duty Zombies.

Apartment 101

Three years and nine months. That's how long I've been living in Apartment 101; that's a long time for me, considering I moved every summer while I was in undergrad. In the end, it'll be three years and ten months because the lease is up at the end of June. But my new lease at my new place starts sometime in May. So I'll be doubling up on rent for part of May and all of June. Easy for moving. Bad for the budget. So let's take a moment and remember the good times at Apartment 101.

I can't think of any. Kidding.

Apartment 101 housed me at my most productive and my most lazy. I think of John Nash and Jeff "The Dude" Lebowski; spanning one far end of the spectrum to the other and back again. Graduate school, teaching, working for the university, and unemployment (six sweet long months of it). Video games, video editing, and travel preceded job hunting, interviews, and eventually returning to work. I'm not back to John Nash, but I moving in that direction. Thousands, if not millions, of zombies have died by my hands in bowels of Apartment 101.

The Northern Alaska University was founded in Barrow, Alaska thanks to my Apartment 101 roommate and NCAA Football 2007 on the PS2. The NAU Grease Rats football team is still undefeated. However, the NAU Grease Rats synchronized swimming team has a very high mortality rate. University officials are currently investigating this problem. If I want to continue coaching the Grease Rats, I'm going to have to pick up my own copy of the game. Shouldn't be too hard to find.

When I talk about the bowels of Apartment 101, I'm specifically referring to my bedroom. I used to call my bedroom Frostbite Heights because as I moved from apartment to apartment during my undergrad years, I always seemed to occupy a third floor room. The name didn't stick in Apartment 101, because we were basically in the basement of our apartment complex. No complaints here; I always think of basements are really shallow dungeons. The new place is an actual house and I'll be occupying a second floor bedroom (there's no third floor) so I can break out the Frostbite Heights sign again.

In the end, Apartment 101 has been an awesome stop on my journey so far. It will be missed; it will always be remembered.

Black and Blue and Zombified

I feel like I complain a lot in this space. Whine. Whatever you want to call it. This post starts in a whiney way, but stay with me.

Magic: The Gathering has always been a fun pastime. Most of the close friendships I have now began in my basement with the neighbor boys playing video games or trying to play MTG. We knew the basics of the 6th Edition but our misunderstanding of more complicated rules led to weird "house rules" and we still play that way when we're just having fun. Undead mode was my favorite; when your opponent hit zero life or below he got a special undead bonus and you couldn't win until he reached negative 15 life.

These days, we pack our decks up and head to the local card store for Friday Night Magic (yes, FNM is a thing). It's competitive. Kill or be killed, a go for the throat mentality. I like the competition, but I hate the seriousness. I'm the guy who built a rat deck during the Kamigawa block (it's still one of my favorite decks to play even though it hardly ever wins).

Lately, I haven't taken Type 2 seriously at all. Innistrad? Gothic horror setting? Vampires are red now? Where are the goblins. I swear, if the vampires sparkled I'd probably burn all my cards and never think about Magic again. Thank God they haven't crossed that line. But, for the sake of having a legal Type 2 deck, I made list of all the zombie cards in Innistrad and Dark Ascension. The plan is to build a black/blue zombie deck with no creature card duplicates. There's even a zombie cat now. Seriously. I may exclude that one out of shear principle. It's a cat.

Because my friends and I share cards like basement communists, I probably won't have to buy that many. Check the creature card list below.

4x - Diregraf Ghoul
4x - Black Cat
4x - Walking Corpse
4x - Highborn Ghoul
4x - Diregraf Captain
1x - Armored Skaab
1x - Ghoulraiser
1x - Headless Skaab
1x - Mikaeus, the Unhallowed
1x - Relentless Skaabs
1x - Sightless Ghoul

1x - Army of the Damned
2x - Cellar Door
1x - Curse of Echoes
2x - Endless Ranks of the Dead
1x - Heartless Summoning
2x - Moan of the Unhallowed
1x - Rooftop Storm
2x - Zombie Apocalypse
2x - Zombie Infestation

6x - Island
14x - Swamp

Sweet. Anyway, this deck faired well in its debut weekend. But I'm open to suggestions. It could certainly use some tightening up. And I'd like to get rid of the zombie cats.

Destroy the Secret Raccoon Civilization! Oh wait..

On Tuesday, during my lunch break I jetted over to Best Buy to pick up my reserved copy of Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City (the special edition) which I will, from here on, refer to as RE:ORC because its short and orcs are awesome. Anyway, I did my best not to check out any reviews of the game, but I did inadvertently skim the beginning of the joystiq review while scrolling down their post line up. Sorry. That was my bad. I've quarantined myself from the Internet so I can play the game and give my unadulterated opinion on the long-awaited return to Raccoon City.

Clearly, every Resident Evil game should include hidden taxidermied raccoons from here on out.

After three days of killing and being killed in RE:ORC, I can say that I'm enjoying the game. This game won't pull the foul-mouthed children from their Halos or CoDs (which is a good thing in my opinion) and therefore RE:ORC won't explode in the world of online multiplayer. The problem though, is that there's not enough campaign meat to justify the weak multiplayer effort.

The campaign is lackluster fan service to say the least. I've only played up until the beginning of the 5th mission, which is where you watch Leon and Claire crash their police car into a wall. Then you watch the trucker zombie run over their crash with his semi. "Command" immediately says to kill that cop. And now I'm chasing Leon through a series of parking garages. But the journey to this point was good; it wasn't bad. As far as shooters go, the missions are straight forward with plenty of flesh bags (infected and regular) to kill. The humans that get in U.S.S.'s way won't be getting awards for their smarts, but they make up for this lack of intelligence with hit points. They are stupidly hard, like three-shotgun-blasts-to-the-face-and-still-kicking hard. The zombies and monsters, on the other hand, scale in difficulty: zombies are the easiest and hunters are the hardest, which holds true to the classic Resident Evil style. Plus, it feels good shotgun zombies, lickers, and hunters all in one game. RE:ORC feels like a Resident Evil game, in that respect.

Who leaves incendiary grenades on a fire truck? That's just wrong.

Unfortunately though, most of the game doesn't feel like a Resident Evil game. There's ammo and health sprays everywhere. It's like the currency of Raccoon City was ammunition and you get to take every zombie's wallet after you kill it. Random attache cases and ammo boxes also pop up, so every U.S.S. team member has infinite ammo. The amount of health, sprays and herbs, is significantly less than the amount ammo, but to a Resident Evil veteran, RE:ORC has a veritable forest of green herbs. The game never frightens, let alone horrifies, (although there are parasites that look speciously like face-huggers and face-huggers are effing terrifying) and survival doesn't seem difficult. So, I can't in good judgement, call this game a survival-horror game.

I also have some reservations calling this game a squad-based shooter. Yes, there are three computer-controlled teammates, but there is very little squad control. If you've unlocked all the different abilities and weapons, you can equip your squad with goodies, but that's it. The good news is that your three squad mates are significantly less stupid than the gun-toting humans who get in your way. Imagine a competent Sheva divided equally into three people, well that's your squad. They're dumb, but not completely useless. You can sit back and let your squad do everything, but it's more fun to kill stuff yourself and it's much faster (besides you get more xp, yay). The U.S.S. squad will deal damage, but they can't clear an entire room. And they die, either by a tyrant playing patty-cake their skulls or by turning into a zombie themselves (then you get to kill them). As soon as they're dead, you can run up, hold a button, and BAMF! They're back.

So, infinite ammo, near infinite health, and infinite lives for your party. This doesn't sound like Resident Evil at all. And it's not. But for that brief moment, when I'm unloading shotgun rounds into an un-phased tyrant while he lifts his fists to smash me into the floor, I hold the controller just a little tighter, and remember the good times.