E3 2012 Predictions - What's going down in LA?

After the riotous success and accurate predictions made about this year’s show, I have decided to try and extend my ‘kill-streak’ and lay down the Only Logical E3 2012 Predictions even earlier.

E3 2012 Predictions Time!

Level System in Mass Effect 3: unclenching at Eurogamer

This weekend I had the privilege of attending the Eurogamer Expo 2011. Among the many highlights of the show was the chance to play Bioware’s Mass Effect 3 long in advance of the game’s March 2012 release date. Here are my thoughts after my hands-on preview of Mass Effect 3.

Talkradar UK, you called me out. Now I respond!

On this weeks Talkradar UK my comment criticising the zero-g missions in Halo and Killzone was received with some…confusion by the hosts. They proceeded to challenge me to defend my claims and prove my scientific girth (just for you, Cundy) by shedding light on the issue of gravity in space. I will now do so, one erroneous comment at a time.

Eurogamer Expo 2011 - An Unmissable Event!

5am, Saturday October 2^nd, 2010. A small, converted farmhouse in West Yorkshire. I awake to the gentle sounds of my iPhone alarm, and immediately, a wide grin manifests itself across my face. Why am I so cheerful at this most ungodly hour of the morning? Because today is a special day. Today is the Eurogamer Expo.

England is different to America in many ways. One disadvantage of living on the British Isles is the relative lack of geeky conventions. To all intents and purposes, there is only one such event in the UK: Eurogamer Expo.

The Physics of Mass Effect

Recently I have been playing Mass Effect 1 and 2 for the second time. During these play-throughs, I have taken more time to read the codex entries, and I have become fascinated with the Mass Effect Universe. Naturally, one of the parts that really fascinates me the most is the science behind Mass Effect.

Then I stumbled onto this video, in which Theoretical Physicist Michio Kaku examines the various aspects of Mass Effect, and tires to comment on the plausibility of each aspect. 

For example, how far off of ‘invisibility’ are we? Are Biotics physically plausible? Could we travel faster than light using “the Mass Effect”?

While the video is enjoyable and all of what he says is accurate, unfortunately it seems as if Dr Kaku has never played the game, as he doesn’t actually address the “mass effect” in good detail. Instead he talks about dark energy and matter, which is nothing to do with the mass effect. I will now attempt to jump in!

3DS vs NGP (Specs) - Will Sony win Round 2?

Today Sony officially announced the successor to the PSP. It is being referred to by the codename “NGP”, which stands for “Next Generation Portable”. The usage of a codename for the product is nothing new, for example think of Kinect’s original codename, “Natal”.

As it stands, there are currently only two major portable dedicated gaming consoles: Sony’s PSP and the Nintendo DS. So the question is, “How do they compare?”

Gaming Setup: My First Living Room

The holiday period is over. For most people, that means that the time to relax and take stock of their home, friends, and family is over too. Not the case for me. I spent the 2010 holiday season moving to my first place.

Which means that now that the season is over, I finally get chance to relax and enjoy it. As you can imagine, for a geek like me the best part of getting my first place was s putting together my gaming setup. If the readers of this care about anything I write (and they probably don’t) they will like to see my gaming setup.

But it doesn't stop here.

Should I Buy an Xbox or a PS3:Tales of a 360 Owner

I am a self-confessed 360 fan boy. It has not always been this way, I was a Playstation man up until this generation. But with the delays to the Playstation 3, and the steep asking price, I ended up spending a respectable £300 on a shiny new Xbox 360. Since then, I’ve never looked back. But I always wondered, what would have happened if I had waited, saved, and gone the Sony route?

 

PS360

 Well, thinking along these lines inspired me to ask fellow Gamer, Geek, and TDard Mark “Breener96” Breen about his recent acquisition of a 360. Up until Christmas 2010, Mark has been a Playstation 3 gamer, and I was interested too hear about his journey across the gaming bridge.

Street Fighter IV: A Cry for Help

Calling anyone bored enough to be reading this blog: I need your help! Recently I’ve been sliding deeper and deeper into an addiction to Street Fighter IV. On iPhone.

Seriously, almost every time I pull my phone out these days I almost instinctively open my “Gamz” folder (thank you iOS4) and tap on the image of Ryu’s determined looking squint. But I don’t need your help with my addiction, the problem comes with how I’m playing the game. Heres the thing: I only ever play as Ryu. And even I know that that is just dumb.

I refuse to buy Super Street Fighter IV until I start playing this game properly!

TDard Saturday – Jump on board!

For quite a while now, listeners to the weekly gaming Podcast TalkRadar have had a weekly play-session, when gamers can jump onto a current or popular video game and play online together. It’s a great way for members of the community to interact, and if you are a new member of the TalkRadar or GamesRadar community then I highly recommend joining in.

Credit: Batman5273

Motivational Game Music: MoWaDuece

Nope, this won’t be a regular thing. I just wanted to throw up a link to this video in a place that I can easily find at any time. I was going to simply ‘favourite’ the video on YouTube, but then I thought “what the heck, a few of my friends like this song too so I’ll put it somewhere public.” Plus, It’s been a while since the last post here.

The song is by Hans Zimmer, and is called “Going Loud”. You will remember it from the Modern Warfare 2; it plays both during the epic Gulag mission, and at the beginning of certain online game modes.

It certainly lives up to its name, never fails to get the adrenaline flowing. TARGET NEUTRALISED!!

VIDEO: TDard Kinect Party

Just after Kinect was released in the UK, my friends and I decided to have an unofficial lauch party where we tried out some of the games.

The alcohol fueled result is below.

Forza 3 Just Saved my Life

The time is 10pm, on a freezing December night, 2010. England is experiencing an extended period of icy cold weather. Probably not the best time to be making a long, night-time drive alone? Well it didn’t stop me last night.

Forza 3 on Xbox360

Now, let’s do a “Lost” style flash-back to four weeks ago - the height of my obsession with the Xbox 360 game “Forza Motorsport 3”.

During 2010, I have been going through an achievement-whore phase, spending unholy amounts of time chasing virtual achievement scores on some of the most embarrassing games ever released (yes, Avatar). At some point I decided that if I was going to beat this multitude of sub-par ‘gamer-whore’ games, I should at least set myself the goal of beating ‘triple-a’ games like Halo, Call of Duty, or Forza at least 50%. Otherwise I’d feel too cheap.

E3 2011 Predictions - What's going down in LA?

June 7^th, 2011 seems like a long way away right now. But once you’ve finished your Boxing Day turkey leftovers, and New Year hits, it will be on you before you can say “Hideo Kojima” three times quickly.

You certainly will!

With that in mind, I wanted to put out my e3 2011 predictions nice and early. And, with a view to keeping things interesting, I’ll split it into four things I think we will see, and a couple of things we probably won’t see.

Think Gamestop is bad? You clearly haven’t been to GAME in England

Today I’m going to take a quick break from talking about space (don’t worry, the following article will be a tribute to the International Space Station) and instead I’ll talk about Gamestop.

I listen to several gaming podcasts, a number of which are American, and something I’ve heard mentioned a number of times is how irritating gamers find shopping at Gamestop. I went to a gamestop during my time in Chicago, and honestly, I didn't mind it. Why not? The UK equivalent is a store called “GAME” which you will find in any given town or City in England.

GAME - the horrible British version of Gamestop

Let me tell you, if you think that Gamestop is bad, you’ve clearly never been to GAME. It was reported that in the Fiscal Year 2009-2010, GAME had a rough time. I’m not surprised, given their frankly awful customer service.  Let me talk you through my usual customer journey every time I make the mistake of setting foot in a GAME store.

Now before I continue, let me add this disclaimer: I am what I would call a “proper gamer”. In other words, not a casual gamer. But, if anyone from GAME is reading this, don’t use that as an excuse; funnily enough, it is logical to assume that a good chunk of GAME’s customers  are “proper gamers”, so you’d damn sure better think about how you treat them.