Sleepy Gamer » psn

Super Street Fighter II Turbo: HD Remix Review

Van — Tue, 30 Dec 2008 03:54:45 +0000

Out of all the games out this holiday season, this is what I’ve been pouring most of my hours into. It’s gotten to the point in which other epics, like Fallout 3 and Little Big Planet, are simply neglected and collecting dust. There’s something about the original Street Fighter II formula that makes it so fun and addicting. Capcom must have an entire division that is solely dedicated to appeal to our nostalgic appetites. These re-releases are certainly easy money for Capcom, but at least they know how to do them right.

HD Remix is the same game from 14 years ago except with a major face lift. The original fighting game engine are still intact while all of the graphics have been redone with gorgeous high resolution sprites. Udon Comics has done an extraordinary job recreating the characters in beautiful Hi Def. The once pixelated and blocky textures are now smooth and extremely detailed. Nothing is left to the imagination anymore since all of the character models are finely illustrated with minute detail. There is an option to play the game with the classic visuals, but it’s definitely an eye sore to view those outdated graphics on the HD screen.

Although the detail in the character models and backgrounds are superb, the animation department is not up to par. Because Capcom wanted to keep the core mechanics of the original game, all of the animation frame counts have been preserved. Unfortunately, this results with every move looking jerky and abrupt when performed. With the low resolution sprites, this problem was not nearly as noticeable in the original game. But the upgraded visuals expose holes in the animation that doesn’t look as smooth as it should be.
Read more »

© van for Sleepy Gamer, 2008. | Permalink | 2 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: capcom, hdremix, psn, sf2, xboxlive

Initial Impressions: Playstation Home Beta

Van — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 21:49:46 +0000

When Home was first announced, Sony had built up a lot of hype for this service. First of all, it’s absolutely free and it provided a full 3-D interactive experience to online gaming. Also, did I mention it was free? However, after the long delay, it seemed that Home’s momentum has slowed down. It has definitely lost its steam that it gained a couple years ago. Plus, with the recent release of the new Xbox experience, will Home provide the revolutionary gaming experience that Sony promised?

So what is PlayStation Home? Home is essentially a virtual online 3-D space that allows you to meet up and socialize with other PS3 users. You can chat, dance, flirt, and also play games with them. It’s basically the Sims meet Second Life, in which you create a personal avatar to traverse through the virtual realm. Like Second Life, Home also serves as a breeding ground for advertisements. Everywhere you go, there are large monitors that constantly loops movie and video game trailers. There’s even a movie theater that you can enter just to watch game trailers. Since its a free service, I suppose this is how Sony had to find some way to make money back.

Starting Home, you are immediately introduced to create an avatar. The avatar creation tool is much more robust than the Xbox 360’s, but I’m not convinced if that it’s a good thing. For a beginner, Home provides so many options that it can be quite intimidating for a non-core player. Just customizing the face alone has hundreds of possibilities if you factor things like cheeks, forehead, and chin structures. On top of that, all of these features can be adjusted with a grid that allows you to adjust the dimensions of your head. Call me lazy, but it got to the point where I stopped caring and just picked a preset character model.
Read more »

Rise of the Downloadable Games

Garret — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 06:05:55 +0000

While PC gaming has enjoyed smaller downloadable games for just about as long as the Internet has been around, the console space has only just begun to embrace this concept. The incredible ease of obtaining digitally distributed content along with the rising cost of game development for AAA titles has carved out a nice niche for independent developers to showcase their wares.

Sony has proved that downloadable games can offer large, retail game-sized experiences (see Warhawk , GT 5 Prologue and the upcoming Ratchet & Clank: Quest For Booty), however, the space is primarily inhabited by more casual “pick up and play” games. Titles like Geometry Wars Retro Evolved or Super Stardust HD are extremely addictive twin stick shooter gems, but they’re also great games to play for 10 to 15 mins, while you wait for your buddy to join you online. In a way, they’re really more like palette cleansers that can be loaded up quickly while you’re in between game sessions. These games also don’t require individual discs, which means you can turn on your console and then decide what you want to play, possibly after you’re glanced at your friend’s list. And since they tend to be smaller, less complicated games, you’re more apt to find a local multiplayer game everyone can join in on. Rather than entice your friends to come over and play Halo 3 or Madden, you can boot up N+ or Calling All Cars! to bring out some good old fashioned couch rivalries.

Creating these smaller bite-sized games also means you can charge less and still turn a decent profit because the development times are drastically lower. Independent development studios like thatgamecompany or NinjaBee would have probably never existed or at least might not have been as successful had it not been for the smaller canvas and digital distribution. Rather than deal with one of the incredibly massive multi-national publishers, Xbox Live Arcade, Playstaion Network, and Wiiware, offer direct channels for consumers to buy their products. Since a lower cost of development means lower investment risk, developers are given more freedom to innovate. The single-man production of Everyday Shooter is a great example of a game that seems unlikely to have ever existed on a console 5 years ago. Such is the potential for this brand new medium.
Read more »