Birthday Loot + Preordered Skyrim

First things first - I've ordered Skyrim for the PlayStation 3 along with the monster 528 page Prima Game Guide for £50.50 (Amazon UK). I am super uber hyped and cannot wait till its release on 11/11/11 after I watched the E3 gameplay footage and some other videos on Youtube. Bethesda have revamped the whole graphics engine and let me tell you, it looks amazing! My only problem with the whole thing is that they've taken away 3 skills. It seems each time they release an Elder Scrolls game they take away skills. But, they do say the axed skills have been incorporated into other skills. I still think it is more awesome if you have more skills to level up though. The major things I'm hyped about are...

Skill Tree Screenshot (Skyrim)

• Level-Up Perks

These were epic in Fallout 3 and it's really fun as some perks let you do different things and open up different gameplay experiences. For example, in Fallout 3 there was a perk which would allow you to eat corpses, thus  giving you a small health boost.

Dual Wield screenshot (Skyrim)

• Dual Wielding

The more swords the better I say, even though this time around I'm going to be focusing more on the Marksmanship and the Magical skills I still think dual wield is going to be great. Bethesda have said that you can dual wield magic as well as normal weapons and doing so will allow for a more powerful spell.

Apparently there's a Forge
 in this screenshot (Skyrim)

• Woodcutting, Mining and more

Apparently these extra gameplay experiences will be included although there's not much info on them yet. You'll be able to forge your own weapons as well if you collect the right ingredients (sort of like Monster Hunter Tri I guess).
I'm not too interested in the whole dragon thing, still looks great though.
Anyway that's my little bit about Skyrim, now onto my Birthday Loot...

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For my Birthday I got a ton of awesome stuff - all to do with gaming!
I got an epic gaming chair with built in Sub-Woofer, amazing sound quality and it's even wireless! It's really comfy as well which is an important factor for lazy slobs like me.
I also got some excellent headphones so that my parents don't hear the sound of the Hidden Blade ripping through the craniums of people from the Middle Ages and Renaissance periods (Assassins Creed).

Assassins Creed - PS3 - Box Art

That brings me on to the Assassin Creed series which I also got. I got all 3! And... embarrassingly  I've already completed 1 & 2 and have started Brotherhood without blogging about them at all! They're really great and the concentration when you're focusing on making that next assassination just right is key. The 1st AC was interesting due to the amount of historical information included. Being the first in the series it had some flawes (like being fairly repetitive and actually pretty boring at times) but it's still fun to play. The only thing I really disliked was the linear factor of it. There wasn't much to do other than the storyline except run around, bored stiff, trying to find flags.

The second one was much better. There were plenty of things to keep you occupied like finding the 6 seals to open the vault in the bottom of the Monteriggeroni Villa and collect Altair's armour; raising money to buy weapons, armour, paintings and even dyes for Ezio's assassin clothes. You could also renovate buildings to raise the value of Monteriggeroni and earn tons of income every 20 minutes. The storyline was great playing as Ezio from when he was born to when he turned 40 and infiltrated the Vatican to assasinate the pope (long story).

The Third one has the good stuff from the first and second ones put together and is absolutely epic! I haven't played much of it so far, but it follows on immediately after the last part of the second one. My favourite thing to do so far is to throw massive two handed axes at people's heads :)

You probably won't hear much from me till Skyrim is released, and when it is i'm going to make a series of posts like I did with Oblivion... except this will be MUCH bigger as there's AT LEAST 300 hours of gameplay!

L.A. Noire finished and other stuff

Wow! It's been over a month since I've done a post... again! Guess I'm just getting lazier and lazier!

Anyway, I managed to finish L.A. Noire which I bought a while back. It's a great game and I have to say, the storyline begins to get really good nearer the end. It is a detective game so it feels really good when you begin to link stuff together from earlier points in the game to later parts. There's plenty of dramatic irony near the end too and in the last few missions the storyline splits and you have to play as two characters (I won't spoil it!). The visuals on this game are the best I've ever seen for the PlayStation 3. The technology used to create the faces of characters is shockingly realistic and you can see each muscle flex as the characters speak each word. It's very realistic. Car and on-foot chase scenes are very dramatic with each movement of the joystick threatening to smash you into a tree or another vehicle. The interrogation scenes require quite a lot of focus as you try to work out if the person you're interviewing is lying or not. Some of these interrogation scenes are very vague and I actually ended up guessing on some parts, but the rest of the game keeps you occupied and this can be overlooked. Some parts of the game are actually quite disturbing as well... but this does show the realism of the game and real-life crime.

I really recommend buying this game. It looks amazing, the storyline is decent but gets better nearer the end and overall this game is revolutionary! Especially the facial technology. This is by far the best detective game I've ever played, if not the best on the PlayStation 3! If you like detective games, or just want something interesting and not just another standard FPS or button-masher, get this!

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In other news... my Birthday is this Friday (15th July)! I hope to be receiving a 'Wireless Ghz Foldable Gaming Chair with built in Sub Woofer, Surround Sound Speakers and Adjustable Headrest'! This will replace the horrible wooden stool I'm sitting on right now. I also asked for all of the Assassin's Creeds as it is one of the few major series I have yet to play, along with The Orange Box which includes: Half-Life 2, Half-Life 2 - Episode: 1, Half-Life 2 - Episode: 2, Portal and Team Fortress 2! Epic!

Finally, last Saturday I bought Bioshock for the PlayStation 3, in the wrapper at my school summer fate for £9. It's pretty damn awesome (and scary!) so far. I'll blog about that later on though.

L.A. Noire

Sorry I haven't done a post in a few weeks now. Between getting addicted to L.A. Noire I bought a week back, creating my own Minecraft Server and getting back into Oblivion (Yes! Again!) I haven't really had the time. I'll tell you more about Oblivion later on in the week but for now I want to talk about the revolutionary L.A. Noire!

I bought it 2 days after release for £39.99, a lot, but I've been looking forward to this game for months so it was a worthy expenditure in my ever decreasing stash of money. I also bought it because Rockstar produced it and anything with their logo on rocks! *ahem* Red Dead Redemption *ahem*

You play as Cole Phelps an ex-marine-lieutenant who fought in Okinawa in WWII. He won the Silver Star, one of the navy's highest honours and then retired. When he got back he wanted to continue serving his country on home soil. Consequently, he joined the LAPD.

Long story short, you start off as a normal copper and your first case is to go to a crime scene where someone was shot dead. The detectives there tell you to find the murder weapon and then they drive off (lazy twats!). At every crime scene you visit, the 'Investigation Theme' will play. This is a moody piece of jazz music that continues to play until you discover all of the clues at the crime scene. Walking near clues will cause a light jiggling sound to play, you can then press the X button to investigate the object further. Not all objects are linked to the case. For example, on the first case, situated in an alleyway, you find lots of beer bottles that have nothing to do with the crime. If you find a significant clue, Cole will right info about it in his notebook which you can access with the Select button. You can view POIs' (Persons of Interest), Locations (which you can set as waypoints on your minimap) and Clues.

On every case there's always a POI to interrogate. When the interrogation begins, you can select any of the available questions from your notebook to ask them. They'll tell you an answer... but they may be lying. This is where the stunning facial motionscan technology comes into play. After they've told you an answer the camera zooms in on the POI's face and you have to study their facial expressions to determine if they are lying or not. This is usually seen through the evasion of direct eye contact, fidgeting or scratching or overall discomfort. If you think they're telling the truth you can select 'Truth' and see if you were right. You can also select 'Doubt' if you think they're lying or 'Lie' if you actually have evidence to prove they're lying. When you press 'Lie' you must then select a clue from your notebook to support your accusation. If you get it right, then a tick will be shown next to the question in the notebook and if you get it wrong a cross will be shown. Succeeding in all the question goes towards your end of case report.

You usually have to drive to each part of the case. Say if you learned that a POI lives in a certain apartment building and you need to interrogate them then you'd set a waypoint for the apartment building under 'Locations' in your Notebook then drive there. You can also make your partner drive there to basically skip the driving sequence all together (as you move up in the police force you get different partners).

Injuring civilians by running them over or causing damage to other vehicles and city property has a dramatic effect on your end of case report.

Most of the time when you try to confront a suspect they'll run away, sometimes on foot and sometimes they'll hi-jack a car quickly. The on-foot chases usually require you to run top-speed after the suspect. They sometimes climb up drainpipes to the top of buildings and up stairwells and so-on. When you get close enough you can tackle them to the floor to end the chase early, but if you're too slow the chase sometimes ends in a brawling sequence. You can also stop the suspect by pointing your gun at them or scaring to a halt with a warning shot. When suspects get in cars it's much more fun to be honest. You have to drive full-speed and get close enough for your partner to shoot out the suspect's car's wheels or ram them enough times so that they stop. It is very fun and is actually extremely realistic. Apart from  the 40 different street-crimes which activate when you are driving to the next location. There's not actually much else to do on this game. It's very linear focusing mainly on the story. Most people are under the misconception that it plays rather like Grand Theft Auto. This is untrue. L.A. Noire is a much more dark and serious game and that's what i really like about it. It isn't silly like sometime GTA can be. It's dead serious and the mood across the game (especially when on the Homicide Desk cases) is brilliant.

I definitely say it's worth picking this up. It's new and it's unlike anything i've ever played before... and it looks so great!

Reviews I Never Posted

I have 10 games I never did reviews for! All of my PS3 games and Phantom Hourglass on DS need to be typed up. So, over the next 10 days I'm going to write 1 a day, starting tomorrow!

Not much to say other than that. I felt like Red Dead Redemption, so I basically spent 2 hours playing it today! It never gets old. I also dabbled in Minecraft online Multiplayer, it's very confusing.

Fallout: New Vegas completed

Wow! I haven't done a post in a little while now. This is only my second this month!

Anyway, I completed New Vegas over a week ago, and to be honest I stopped straight afterwards and I'm going through yet another obsessive Minecraft phase.

The joy of delving deep into unadventured caverns and hunting for rare ores... and then a creeper comes out of nowhere, scares the crap out of you whilst killing you in the process. Oh, and by the way, I learned my lesson... my house is now creeper-proof.

The final battle at Hoover Dam found me siding with the NCR and Rangers, mowing my way through Legion troops and reaching Legate Lanius' cam p. That part was extremely difficult as (with the combonation of an urgently low supply of Stimpacks/Super Stimpacks, damaged armour and Legate Lanius himself who lopped off a 3rd of my HP every hit) there were snipers everywhere and the Legate himself was a formidable foe. In the end I managed to corner him behind a wagon with a crippled leg. From their I destroyed half his health with a trio of Plasma Grenades and finished him off with my Ballistic Fist... it was awesome! :)

Luckily I saved before the Legion commenced their attack on the dam because the story ends completely and restarts you at your nearest save! I still have plenty of quests to complete and many, many places to visit. Before I finish that off, however, I'm returning to the sweet, sweet world of Fallout 3 to find every location, collect every weapon and do all there is to do!

Replaying Fallout: New Vegas

I sort of abandoned this game when I got Oblivion and now, returning to it after finishing Fallout 3 about a week back, I have no idea whatsoever about what I was supposed to be doing, what all my weapons were like, who I was even! So, I did the only sensible thing a gamer would do... started a new game, overwriting my old one!

Yeah, it felt pretty good doing that because if I continued from where I left off, i don't think I'd enjoy it as much, not knowing what I was doing and such. This time round I opted out of Hardcore mode (dropped a Gold Trophy for doing this, but it's a lot more fun to play when you don't have dehydration messsages popping up every 10 minutes!). I found a bunch of new weapons I never knew existed in my old save and have made better use of toolbenches and reloading benches, creating my own ammunition out of scrap materials. Skipping a whole lot, I'm level 19 now and instead of talking to Ceasar, leader of the Legion in his camp, I went in there and mass murdered every single evil scumbag in that camp. I actually killed Ceasar! I felt so amazing watching his head explode, I'm so sick! Errr... yeah, anyway, I won 32,000 caps on a slots machine by getting 3 oranges in a row... that was pretty cool too. Oh, yeah! I found this weapon shop called the 'Gun Runners'. The weapons there are in 100% condition and cost thousands, luckily those 3 oranges got me a lifetime supply of caps, well like a couple of days caps, but hey.

Platinum PSN Trophy - 1 (Fallout 3)

Yep, 92 hours, 29 minutes and 21 seconds was the time it took me to get all 50 non-DLC trophies and earn myself a Platinum! My first platinum! I'm so happy. That's 80% of Fallout 3's trophies completed as I haven;t got all of the DLC ones. 6 of the trophies needed for the Platinum forced me to start a new game and reach level 8, 14 and 20 with neutral or good karma levels. It took me 3 whole days of gaming to get to level 20!
Anyway, It was great fun and now I guess all I've got to do is get the DLC trophies and I'm done with this game. Shame, because it's such an amazing game. I've been decorating my Megaton house with guns, chems and other miscellaneous rubbish just like I did in Oblivion (except with swords!).

Here are my very own Fallout 3 statistics, straight from my Pip-Boy 3000!

Quests Completed:                                  47
Locations Discovered:                            140
People Killed:                                         593
Creatures Killed:                                   1026
Locks Picked:                                         254
Computers Hacked:                                  50
Stimpacks Taken:                                    754
Rad-X taken:                                             66
RadAway taken:                                      108
Chems Taken:                                          299
Times Addicted:                                         34
Mines Disarmed:                                        28
Speech Successes:                                     51
Pockets Picked:                                         27
Pants Exploded:                                           0
Books Read:                                              56
Bobbleheads Found:                                  20
Weapons Created:                                       5
People Mezzed:                                           4
Captives Rescued:                                       2
Sandman Kills:                                            6
Paralyzing Punches:                                     0
Robots Disabled:                                        0
Contracts Comnpleted:                               0
Corpses Eaten:                                           0
Mysterious Stranger Visits:                         27