Red Faction: Armageddon

I didn’t actually complete the Red Faction: Guerrilla campaign, as I was distracted by the free-roaming possibilities.. buildings to destroy, vehicles to steal.. and the ever-respawning EDF to kill.

Red Faction: Armageddon is linear rather than open-world, which means there will be less to distract me from the story’s objectives.  I started this game on the PS3, and I’m not sure whether it’s the console controls, or the rather close-view that I’m not so comfortable with.. I felt that the player character took up far too much room on the screen at first too.

The destruction is fantastic, as expected, with plenty of explosive barrels and fuel tanks around to aid in wiping out as much as possible in an area.  My favourite weapon so far is the Magnet Gun which is great for destroying enemies and buildings.. or more accurately, destroying enemies with buildings!  The Nano Forge is a nice addition in this game, allowing the repair of buildings you actually want to leave standing.. maybe for cover, maybe to blow up again 😉

As in the last game, salvage is available everywhere, and here you use it to purchase new abilities.  Abilities and upgrades for abilities are presented on a tier system, allowing you to choose the ones you think are most useful or just coolest.. I quite like the Impact upgrade as it allows you to blast away enemies and anything else in your path.. very useful when swamped!

Leaving the campaign unfinished for now, I’ve had a quick go on Ruin Mode, chasing down a friend’s high-score..

The first map is Junction, and to unlock the next maps you need to.. destroy everything! 😀

I have indeed nabbed the top spot on the Junction map.. though I imagine it’s going to get stolen back fairly soon!

New things at E3

I’ve been looking at some of the info on the games and tech, and there has been plenty to get my interest.

The Fallout series holds a special place in my heart, so after seeing that Fallout: New Vegas has been dated for October 22nd, I’ve mentally written off the end of October in terms of playing other games.  This is despite the announcement of an October 26th release date for Fable III, another game I’ve been looking forward to – it will have to wait until after Fallout 😉

Pre-E3, there were rumours about what Valve might be revealing, after they said they’d be revealing something big.  It looks like the big secret was the fact that Steam is to come to the PS3 – while that’s good news for console players, I was rather hoping for Episode 3.

Portal 2 is on the way, but this was hardly new for E3, though the trailer was quite nice.  I’m quite excited about the co-op mode, and find the idea of playing as a robot or turret rather amusing 🙂

In addition to the two Warhammer 40,000 games, Dark Millennium Online and Space Marine, which I mentioned in the last post, THQ have also announced Red Faction: Armageddon, follow-up to Red Faction: Guerilla.  There was also a very brief mention of Darksiders 2.  I have yet to complete Red Faction: Guerrilla or Darksiders – again, with the consoles..

Must try harder 😉

Call of Duty: Black Ops is another game in my wanted list, though not as high up as the previous games.  I enjoyed Modern Warfare 2, but beyond single player, I didn’t find myself playing it so much.
I tend to prefer playing with a few friends rather than strangers with their camping, mic-spamming, teabagging ways.  Though sometimes I still get the latter from friends.. ah well.

Kinect, formerly Natal, is being shown at E3 too.  Along with the child-oriented Kinectimals, there are a large number of fitness and sports type games planned to use the system.  While I love the tech, these titles are very close to titles I already have for the Wii and so what’s on offer here isn’t going to make me rush out to buy the system.
PlayStation Move had more games on offer, but again doesn’t really add much on from the Wii.