Nick Kyme

Can’t believe I missed this. There’s a stonking website (admittedly, a little spartan but still awesome) devoted to the new Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine game. This is the one described as an ‘action RPG’ that’s coming to consoles from Relic and THQ.

I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again: the trailer for this game looks absolutely stunning. Even if you’re not into 40K, this just looks like a great gamer’s game.

And before you say anything, I’m not just banging on about this because I DO love 40K – it just looks so damn good. If it plays as good as it looks, there’ll be a lot of happy Space Marines out there.

Favourite bit of the trailer so far: got to be when the Ultramarine comes down with his jump and thunder hammers a whole horde of orks on their stumpy green asses. Classic.

If you’ve not been to the website or have it on your favourites – why in the name of the God-Emperor not? Here it is, right here. Ave Imperator…

So, it’s not a great surprise to learn I am eagerly anticipating the release of God of War III for the PS3. Also rather cool is the fact that there’ll be a God of War Collection, which comprises the first two instalments of the franchise (but not the PSP’s Chains of Olympus) in HD format together with a juicy voucher to use on PSN for an exclusive GoW III demo.

I’ll take one of those too Mr Computer Game salesmen, thank you very much.

I remember way back when, during an afternoon in Grimsby town centre no less, where I first got my mitts of the first God of War. What I loved so much about the game was the sheer level of bloody, visceral action but with a puzzle solving, adventuring-cum-platformer element to it. Levelling up skills and magic also lent the game a flavour of the RPG about it with all the tedious character building and endless pointless questing.

I liked (though ‘liked’ isn’t really the right word) Kratos, the central character, so much that he became part of the inspiration for Tsu’gan in the Salamander stories. All that rage and feelings of entitlement of being done wrong by the powers that be  – it was the perfect vessel for one of Third Company’s angriest members.

God of War, unsurprisingly, became a franchise and what a franchise. The launch of the sequel provoked quite a bit of controversy with a promotional campaign that included sacrificial goats and half-naked warrior gods. The game’s arrival on PSP was of the best selling titles ever released on the troubled system, really stretching its boundaries and limits, and even opening the door for other ‘big’ game franchises to find their way onto the portable handheld (Little Big Planet, Soul Calibur and Assassin’s Creed to name three).

Aside from the brutal gameplay and it’s central figure, one of the things that has remained consistent through each iteration is the monsters. God of War has some of the best and most brutal beasts ever conceived. Greek myth is a wonderful stomping ground for its creatives and I have fond memories of slaying gigantic hydras, basilisks and gorgons, amongst other horrors.

It’s not all about the hack n’ slash, either – a souped up Golden Axe for ground-ups this is not (not that there’s anything wrong with Golden Axe, you understand – that’s my misspent youth at the Empire Arcade in Cleethorpses that is). God of War is a step above not just because of the graphics, the story, the creatures, the character or the combat – it’s the gameplay. It’s riding a pegasus whilst fighting off hordes of harpies, it’s cracking ludicrous difficult puzzles, it’s freeing titans to reach the next part of the level, it’s climbing up columns of flesh embedded with razor blades in the realm of Hades – it’s all of this mad stuff and more.

So, why babble on, why take up our time with all of this God of War back slapping? Well, God of War III is soon to hit the shelves and the good people at IGN.com have put together everything they know about the game so far in one handy little article. Have a butchers and, if you don’t mind the sight of blood and violence, you should definitely check this game out. There are loads of screenshots and videos too.

It’s one of the game I’m looking forward to in 2010, along with a few others (Dante’s Inferno is also looking extremely good and I’d suggest borrows quite a bit from God of War’s uncompromising ethos).

Get your buts over to IGN and read all about it now.

And while we’re at it, here’s the games I’ll be shelling my pennies out for in the New Year… (keep going after the pics – there’s more…)

Cripes! I’ll be having nightmares after this lot!

Seriously though, everything I’ve seen so far makes me believe that these will be the games for me next year, so speaks the Console King!

Coincidental, they all have a sort of gods & monsters theme to them, too. Dante’s Inferno is obviously about one knight’s descent in the depths of Hell, God War III speaks for itself and Darksiders features War, one of the Horsemen of the Apocalypse, hunted by demons and angels at the world’s ending.

Epic stuff indeed. Here’s hoping they’ll live up to the hype.

So, brave readers, what’s floating your boat for the New Year? Answers on a blog comment-shaped postcard please…

It’s been a quiet-ish day today. I’m off work sorting out a few final bits and pieces for Louise’s 30th (cake and such – shhh…).

Anywho, after meeting my mate Timbo for a cuppa and then going off to buy a couple of nice new shirts, I decided to check out the Playstation Store and download some demos – if any struck my fancy.

I went for a Star Wars: Clone Wars game, TMNT and Brutal Legend. The latter, I went for on a whim. “Who know’s”, I thought, “could be good”. It was great, and the other two demos sucked quite a bit of ass.

I vaguely remembered hearing about the game on IGN.com but just assumed it was some derivative Rock Band/Guitar Hero clone. It’s definitely not that.

After installed the beast, I was treated to a very funny and really rather cool intro movie in which the game’s lead character Eddie Riggs is lamenting the loss of rock and the sad excuse for what passes for heavy metal ‘these days’. Now, I wouldn’t regard myself as a hard core rocker in any way but I do like Jack Black, and he’s doing the voice for Eddie, and there is something refreshingly cheesy and unabashed about Rock Gods and supping at the Chalice of Rock, and all that malarky.

In the intro story, Riggs is rescuing some pseudo-rocker whom he’s roadying for and ends up being crushed to death by his own set. This is merely the beginning for our hero, however, as he’s transported to an Age of Metal where Rock Gods exist and demons are real.

Taking up a fallen axe, Eddie proceeds to batter and hack apart a band (pun intended) of weird-looking, Iron Maiden-esque cultists. Other ‘weapons’ follow, including Eddie’s other ‘axe’ his guitar which sends out lightning bolts and fireballs with abandon (a special power move even brings down the scenery with a sort of rocking slam attack). In the demo, you also get to drive around in Eddie’s rock car, which he builds from spare parts.

Brutal Legend is a weird sort of a game. It’s an adventure cum beat-em up, which reminds me a great deal of Overlord. Eddie gathers followers (some of which are played/portrayed as famous rockers if the demo videos I’ve seen are anything to go by) and progresses through a weird Heavy Metal landscape, smiting demons and other beasties. That’s not all, though. There are also sections where you have to play a flawless Guitar Hero-style riff in order to progress (I had to do this to get Eddie’s car, which was a blast).

Jack Black is great as the lead character, and the story is actually quite funny. I was quite taken by the in-game option to switch off the swearing and gore, which was done in quite a knowing, amusing way (needless to say, I kept it all in for the full, visceral experience).

It’s hard to say why I enjoyed this demo so much. I’ve never really played a game like this (at least looking like this). It’s not technically awesome, nor is the gameplay innovative but it’s a lot of fun. I found after completing the demo that I wanted more, that I wanted to explore the other levels and gather my army of rockers to lay waste to the demons and free the land.

Brutal Legend may just have to go on my to buy list (unless it gets some really cack reviews, then I might re-think). I wasn’t expecting much, but I got a lot and I liked it.

Right, I’m off to go listen to Tenacious D – Rock Oooooonnnnn!

On a routine trip to the supermarket, a copy of X-Men Origins: Wolverine for the PS3 caught my eye. With a few funds knocking around this month, I figured I buy it. Boy, I wasn’t disappointed.

Just played the first couple of levels (currently, I’m roaming the Weapon X facility without any of my powers and feeling vulnerable – eek!) and I’m loving it. To say it deviates from the movie a fair bit is something of an understatement, but then direct movie tie-in games that follow the plot religiously are seldom any good.

The entire first level in set in Africa (I think) and there’s more than a fair share of hacking, slashing and maiming to be done as Wolverine cuts his way through the jungle, ancient temples, across rope bridges and even down rivers (there’s a great little section when you get behind a boat-mounted machine gun and have at it – nice!). As well as mercs toting machine guns and machetes, there’s also weird lava-swordsmen types and a huge Leviathan lava monster to cap off the level with. Pretty sure that didn’t make it into the film.

I’ll say right now, this is mindless fun. There are some puzzles, but the gameplay mainly resorts to kicking the snot out of anything that comes at you. It’s a gore-fest from slash one with Wolverine cutting of arms, severing heads and generally bathing in his enemies’ blood. Not for the youngsters then – certainly not. There’s a nifty upgrade system whereby Wolverine earns experience for killing enemies, achieving objectives and retrieving dog tags that can be spent on new skills or upgrading existing ones. As well as claws attacks and lunging, Wolverine can also make use of his ‘Feral Senses’. This is just a dupey way of directing you if you get lost or highlighting items of interest in a particular location (such as those elusive dog tags). It also comes in handy if you’ve got invisible enemies to fight.

So far, I’ve had a total blast with this game. You don’t need to think that much, it’s button-mashing heaven (which is nice if you just want to unplug brain for a while) and satisfyingly brutal. As well as the Leviathan beast, I’ve also taken on Sabertooth (two pretty large fight sequences, inside and outside a Canadian bar) and a Wendigo beast (a big, Hulk-like monstrosity that took great joy in throwing me around the room before I started leaping on its back and stabbing the crap out of it with my claws – grr!).

I’ve always been a fan of the Wolverine character (what comic book fan isn’t?) and this game really helps bring him to life. It’s carnage personified and embraces a lot of X-Men lore not shown in the movie. I’m really looking forward to the next gaming session now, where I can unsheath my adamantium claws and start ripping through the bad guys again. Snikt!

Head on over to IGN.com for the latest Darksiders video.

This, like a lot of the trailers I’ve seen, is really getting me excited about the forthcoming game and now I really can’t wait to get my mits on it. There’s a little bit more from the angels in this installment, plus some of the clips from previous trailers too.

For those who are not in the know (and if you liked console games, then I suggest you get in the now, at least you should on the evidence so far…), Darksiders is essential an apocalypse story where the minions of Hell are waging war against the denizens of Heaven and the good guys are losing (or have lost, a significant victory for Hell in any case). Earth is pretty much their battleground. In steps Death, one of the Four Horseman of the Apocalypse, who’s really not happy because it’s his and the other three horseman’s jobs to bring about apocalypse and this one has come too earlier. But Death has been duped by powers unknown and unseen, stripped of all his strength and slapped right in the middle of all the carnage.

Here's our boy, good old Death himself...

So as the tagline goes: hunted by Heaven and hated by Hell, Death has not only got to try and survive while restoring his old powers, he must try and figure out who has brought about the apocalypse and why, and then restore balance to the world.

The game looks seriously awesome with shades of Devil My Cry about it in the style and combat system employed by the protagonist. The beasts are huge and impressively varied (at least those shown in the trailers), and some of the E3 footage looked stunning. It has a Fall Out element to it too, in that the levels are reputably ‘free-roaming’ with all sorts of hidden bonus missions and extra material that lies off the beaten central storyline track.

I’m going to wait for the reviews before I commit, but Darksiders is one game that I am keeping my Console King’s eye on…