Year of Doctor Who

Ok So it has been a while since I have done this but I will try and do this again and update regularly what I am going to try and be doing over the next year is be watching one Story from each doctors run for each of the doctors so this month in January its first Doctor story time and the in February 2nd Doctor etc etc.

By Story I mean all of the parts of that single event so I will review a multi part story such as the war games or the Doctor dances & The empty Child I wont review all of an over reaching arc such as trial of the time lord or espace trilogy

 

 

 

Motivation

I know this out of my normal geeky remit but i saw it and just had to share it

Star Trek Enterprise Season 1 – Review

Enterprise season 1 when it first aired didn’t click with me, I dont know why exactly it may have been due to franchise fatigue seeing as i had watched star trek solidly for years in the past following Voyager all the way through & DS9, and even when i first heard the idea of Enterprise it really didn’t appeal to me in fact I thought it sucked I wanted to go further into the future to the 27 centuery, however i feel that if i was the age I am now I would love the idea. I did watch most of the series however I had forgotten large parts of the series.

When watching through this all again I was actually really enjoying it so much so that I want to plough through the other series, I found the quality of the episode to be mostly good, their is nothing really stand out about the season but they are largely enjoyable and it never feels a slog, their are a few episode where you can notice a dip in quality. My personal favorite episode are normally the ones in which the andorians are around mainly for the coombs factor. They do try and do some over reaching story arcs mainly involving the temporal cold wars now these story elements normally get a lot of hate from people however I secretly enjoy most stories involving time travel especially from the far future.

I would have liked to have seen some more charecter development in the show, it does feel very compact around the main three charecters in the series mirroring the original series however it does feel like I hardly know some characters such as Travis apart from the generic small bits of information such as how he was born on a transporter but you never get a sense of who he is. and perhaps this is where Enterprise mainly falls down, where as in shows like TNG & DS9 there was great character exploration in Enterprise I am never given that sense.

Visually the series is still as appealing as ever it always used to make me chuckle and still does that the series that is set furthest back in the past does look the best. but it is explained in one of the enterprise novels why their is a downgrade in looks of technology, however their is no real idea why suddenly the womens uniform swapped from a normal jumpsuit to a dress.

I have found this series to be very enjoyable and fun and much better than I remember it to be and I am really looking forward to getting the next series.

Star trek / dr who crossover comic

Mother of god make this so, is this not the coolest thing ever matt smith on the enterprise D oh my god i am about to explode this is going to be awesome. 11 with picard & data amy pond with riker, rory with worf this has so much potential you at IDW do not by any means fuck this up here me you must not fuck up potentially the most awesome comic ever, there was talk in 2004 of a dr who / enterprise tv cross over but never got made that could have been good but this has the potential to be great. oh my god this is the most awesome news i have heard this year. I am preordering this

from bleddingcool.com http://www.bleedingcool.com/2012/02/10/scoop-doctor-who-star-trek-official-crossover/

Dragon Quest IX – Sentinels of the Starry Skies

I brought this game this time last year, I would often dabble a couple of hours here and there until early in january where in the past month I have but about 24 hours into it. This is my first outing into the Dragon Quest series and wont be my last.

The game in design and the way it plays is a very very very traditional JRPG, apparently the Unique selling points of this game compared to the other games are the online functionality and the customization, I haven’t at the point of writing this completed the extra downloadable quests however if i was to 100% the game like someone i saw online did it would take me 773 hours… However I really did enjoy the customization of this game the ability to design the look and the abilities of your party all the way through the game was actual a great way of helping me connect with the game. However I found the main quest to be fun and engaging, although it is very simple of finding 7 Fyggs ( some other things happen)  and then beating the final bad guy. although it did feel a bit generic I still found it fun enough to play. Their was some good link up for the story line and some threads that was done earlier and i did enjoy how some of it did feel like it all slotted together .

Also there didn’t really feel like long period of grinding required for me to progress yes their we occasions when I had to but i never felt like I have to stay in a field for 6 hours to kill random enemies

Ther enemies in this game are another reason why I felt this game worked with me where as with other JRPG’s I had tried all the monsters and bad guys seemed to be the most serious thing ever, however in this game they all seemed to be somewhat light hearted , By this I mean there were some really fun enemies such as cucumbers with spears and bags of money that attack you. To me this felt great it never felt to overly serious and grave  in contrast to some final fantasy games where every cutscene makes you feel depressed with the state of the world.

Graphically I didnt really like the big heads or DK mode look of the characters I think i would have prefered with people all in regular proportions however i wonder if part of this was due to the DS’s technical limitations and how much was down to options. Also another improvement i would have like to have seen would be allow you to make a full save anywhere you want  I just got annoyed having to run to the church every so often to save.

I would have to say if you have never played a JRPG game before in your life and don’t know if you would enjoy them play this game first the game is just the ultimate game for beginners such as my self, this game is so much fun its all ready in my game of the year candidates 9/10

The Simpsons Arcade game

 

So when i was younger when ever i went on holiday with my parents there was always an arcade nearby on the pier and one of the fun things that i used to love doing as a 4-7 year old was to play on this game with my parents I loved it and for years afterwards i would ask people why had no goddam console version of this game been made yet and i was waiting for the next 20 years but totday the day has arrived I own the simpsons arcade game.

Ok now if you have never played this game before you probably wont get the same level of fun an enjoyment as I got out of it thats because there is a huge nostalgic factor i have with this game, the game keeps its self faithful to the original arcade port with the original graphics et al, and even has a mock arcade game boarder around the screen to make you think that you are playing the game

the game play is side scrolling beatem up game where you have the options to be bart homer, marge and lisa and play though the game ether in multiplayer online with up to 4 people or by your self, I beat the game earlier as Homer, the game takes about 45 minutes to get from end to end, I started the game with 40 credits in the system and still had 30 in the end of it. from my memory homer was the hardest character to play as due to him not having a range attack.

although playing this game i am aware of hell generic it can bee seen just a game with a simpsons skin on it. It does feel like their is very little of the simpsons brand humour in this 😦 and perhaps there could have been more bonuses for winning some of the mini games. but this game as quite a few game modes in this and the ability to play online can lead to a lot of replay value.

Like i said if you have played this game as a kid and were as amazed and wanted more of it as i did you will love this game if you have never played this game and want to see what the hype is about try the demo first but I love it 8/10

Star Trek Enterprise – Romulan War – To brave the storm

Ok so what fees like an eternity since the last one was released checking back i did my review on it in 2009 we then had to wait for 2 years to actually find out what happens in the book and I had forgotten some elements of what had happened in the first book.

This is the second and final book in this romulan war, I found this almost to be a book in two halves the first half was all about enterprise still being out of the war making friends and taking names and the last part of the book is more about just total warfare. and to be honest I did not really enjoy the first half of the book that much. where as my intrest was more engaged in the latter half.

What the author tries to do first of all is have the story of enterprise making alliances and seeking help on behalf of earth in the war and it also hasthe sub plot with tucker as an undercover spy, now i really did not like the tukcer story line that much and i often found parts of it to be confusing and unnecessary, where as with the Enterprise searching for friends felt bit did work although I would have preferred more action or even to bring home the realities of war even just todo the simple things that were done in ds9 when sisko would be sad because he found out someone he went to the academy with died. or the realities of rationing and enterprise not always having enough parts etc.

However i did like many of the battle scenes in the book even though the last battle in the book felt a little bit cliched in the nature with one massive battle in a solar system, it works well dramatically but it still feels a little predictable. and to be honest I did guess at what was going to happen but it still made it feel exciting.

So I would have like to have seen more of the hardships that a war like this would have brought on earth and also less of the spying game part, perhaps i would have like to have seen also the ending to have been more about the recovery of the conflict it just felt it jumped to one of those post 40 year parties which i really didnt enjoy.

So in conclusion if you are interested in the romulan war and want to find out what happens in this then by all means go a head and give this series ago however by all means the stories and the way the conflict was displayed was not perfect. 5/10

Sonic Generations

Segaaaaaaaaaa, with Sonic the Hedgehogs 20th birthday sega decided to release a game to celebrate this that would draw up on previous sonic games in a form of celebration of all that has come in the past. be it the good or the not so good.

The game tries to put you back in classic sonic levels where you can play both as 2D sonic or 3D sonic and it is the early stages of the game when you play the classic levels from the mega drive sonic and to be able to go to these into 3D HD what ever D is when the fun starts as anyone who would have played these games in the mid 90’s to suddenly be able to revisit these levels but play it in a new perspective is quite a treat. and as I was playing through the game i was finding that I was enjoying the 3D style more and more.

The level selection of this game has been kept as broad as possible to truly celebrate the entire franchise however this means that there are some levels of the more forgettable sonic games such as sonic 06. Although the game did give me a chance to play through some of the dreamcast levels which I hadn’t had a chance to play previously. and to experience some really good levels for the first time. Also with this game it really gave you the chance to actually see how Sonic has evolved over all these years. However with some of the poorer levels i was some what wishing for more Mega drive era levels in the games ( oh well maybe some DLC )

I have found that there are some faults in this game there were often times where in 3D mode the lock on didnt quite work which really did frustrate me as I was racing through that the game only to be forced to stop to wait for the lock on to work. another problem that i found was that the game is quite short, it can be completed in 5-6 hours with quite an easy level of difficulty. The Final boss in the entire game was also quite a disappointment for me  I found where as most of the game it flowed where as the final boss was just pony and such a let down from the rest of the game.

Graphically I really enjoyed this game with a lot of nice shiny happy graphics to play through with a lot of good effects.

The storyline of this game is basically non-existent what i gathered from the cut scenes is that sonic is having a party with his friends ( yes all of them) then suddenly some weird shaddow monster kidnaps all his friends and it is up to both sonics some how to resuce them, and to get 3 keys to unlock the box, there that’s the entire game.

The re-playability in this game is in the challenges and what times you can beat each level and you are meant to compete with your friends on the leaderboard but seeing as i am the only person on my xbox friends list with this game it falls quite short for me and some of these challenges are annoying as fuck.

So in conclusion if you are looking for a fun look back at the sonic then this is a game right up your street to play trough some classic levels and just to have fun although it does mean that you have to meet some of his annoying friends. however this game just wants to be fun and found it a great alternative to playing halo 2. 7.5/10

Netflix UK

Ok so the other day netflix was finally launched in the uk as a streaming device after hearing the wonders of this service for years but being in the uk i had never really had a chance to see it. until the other day when it was launched over here. ]

All I have to say is WOW this is awesome my only previous experience of streaming on my gaming console had been with lovefilms service which buffered….. every other sentance it felt however with this I have watched quite a lot of content already from 2 hour movies to 25 mins retro xmen cartoons and have to say that so far I have only encountered one part of buffering.

the amount of shows that were on offer is enough to start off with to keep me going for a while although i do hope they begin up loading more shows to it and if they manage to pull of a similar deal that they have in the usa with star trek on their i think i will explode with joy.

so in short I am very impressed with the service the only gripe i have on the xbox version is not being able to select and episode until im already watching one if that makes sense but as i say 9/5/10

Halo 2 – Review

so on the back of completing Halo reach i decided to pick up Halo 2 the Halo game that when I am reading about the franchise that most people seem to talk about and praise so i picked this up pretty cheap on ebay to give it a go, thank goodness for xbox backwards compatibility  (gives a glancing look down my nose at my ps3). When playing through the game part of me was naturally comparing it to the current halo games to see how it has evolved and what has changed but it would be unfair to totally compare the two. naturally i cant compare the online mode as Microsoft has turned the servers off.

What I found when playing Halo 2 when thinking back to other fps’s on consoles at the time is they were really trying to push the barriers of what was on offer, to be honest I found the graphics and look of the game to be acceptable now by modern contexts, of course you can see some of the games age when you go into an urban environment and look at building and the level of detial etc. There were a lot of things in which i was playing that I thought must have been innovative at the time for things such as in the storyline being able to play as both sides of the war and as there stories intertwine.

I found the levels in this game to be just to damm long maybe it is because i have grown more use to modern fps’s or another reason but i did just find the missions seem to last way to long and there was audible groans from me of oh god how much longer do I have to play, and to be honest this began to make the game feel like a drag, from memory there are 3 times when you play as the person from the ”bad guys” and this character seems to have the longest levels ever.  this just makes the pacing feel awful for me.

There are other good things in this game i really like the way that they have implemented the use of vehicles in this game and i really did like these sections and found that they were done really well at keeping the fun in the game but still having a good challenge

Also some of the level designs and enemies really pissed me off in this game it felt like there were quite a few corridors and similar things constantly reused to then find an open space which would just strike me as a multilayer map and the flood enemies really pissed me off not because they started off as little things that were hard to shoot but then they would cause all the other people you killed to get up and just start chasing you in benny hill fashion. Also on level design for the love of god don’t make it that i can fall off the edge of a cliff all the time.

But the biggest thing that pisses me off about this game is 95% of the time you are by your self suddenly you have a soldier or 2 to keep you company you think finally I have support awesome you walk into the next room and boom they all get massacred by the weakest enemy

The difficulty in this game is quite high i found i was dying way more than i was on halo reach which means this is more challenging

Just another point there seems to be a cult about the main charecter to master chief on the internet and you see some people going crazy about him as some all out action hero well this is the second game I have played with him in and to be honest it doesnt work for me I just find him a token generic action hero nothing special in fact none of the charecters really work for me in this game.

So in conclusion this was probably good and fun at the time now but now it feels slightly dated. now a days 7/10