Retro Review: Dark Forces – Steam Edition

Tomorrow is the release of the new Star Wars movie! “Star Wars: The Force Awakens”! Actually, so is today I guess if you live in one of the areas doing an early showing..But tomorrow is the official opening day! So, in honor of the films release, I decided to do a review of a classic Star Wars game! So, I dove into my Steam library and picked out Star Wars: Dark Forces!

This title is a classic FPS(or as they were called back in the day, a Doom Clone) set in the Star Wars Universe. I played this game first on the original Playstation, and it was my first encounter with the expanded universe. I quickly fell in love with the idea and started buying other EU games, the books(And Comic books) and it all started with this title.

While this game may no longer be canon, it’s still an extremely fun experience. If you are familiar with DOOM, then you know what this is. You run around, blast your enemies and press switches and gather colored keys to open doors. Typical 90’s FPS gameplay mechanics.

The game has held out really well over the years. The graphics obviously are dated, but not so much as to leave you scratching your head trying to figure out what that batch of pixels is supposed to be. Difficulty is fairly challenging. Not so much in combat, but some of the levels get downright confusing and might leave you lost.

The only major downside to this classic titles is the control system! It uses your standard arrow key controls, but looking up and down is a bit of a pain. In order to look up and down, you need to use page up and page down keys. Since you are having to move around with the arrow keys, take your hand off the movement keys in order to aim at an attacking enemy on the ledge above you can be a tad annoying.

Thankfully the game does have Auto-Aim. So, if you fire your weapon in the general direction of your enemy, it will start shooting at him, even if he is a level above you. Yes, it would be nice to aim at your foe easier, but you technically never even have to look up or down to finish the game thanks in no small part to auto-aim.

Pros

• Star Wars!
• Good graphics for the time
• Runs well on modern systems
• Auto-Aim!
• Classic look and feel adds to the Nostalgia.
• Most levels are fun
• Good UI
• Great story

Cons

• No longer Canon 😦
• Dumb AI
• Levels can get boring and repetitious. Mainly the sewer level.
• Clumsy controls.

 

RATING: 7/10

 

 

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Star Wars: The Force Awakens Trailer

Everybody who knows me, knows that I am a geek. Especially when it comes to 5 major Sci-Fi franchises. Those Being Star Trek, Firefly, Doctor Who, Babylon 5 and Star wars(I don’t consider Marvel/DC movies Sci-Fi, even though many of them fall into that category. Super Hero flicks I consider more Adventure than Sci-Fi). So, I have been very anxious for the release of the new Star Wars move “The Force Awakens”. Unfortunately, that won’t be until December, However they DID release a trailer. Obviously I was breathless with anticipation!

If you have been living under a rock or a bridge with a secret troll lover, then you have heard about it, and already watched it. However, I will put it below so that the Troll lovers out there can catch up with what the rest of the world is experiencing.

Watched? Good! Now, most people I know thought it was awesome. One in particular cried because seeing Han Solo brought her so much joy. Yeah, I’m not the biggest geek in my circle of friends. Surprised? You can be surprised about me either not being the biggest geek in my social circle, or about me having friends in general. Both are acceptable surprising factoids.

Anyway! My point was that I didn’t love the trailer. In fact, I was somewhat disappointed? The whole Melted Vader helmet thing? Seemed stupid, and like it was some kind of forced lip service to fans of the franchise. It just didn’t feel natural. Then there is Darth Wannabe! I hate his voice! He doesn’t sound bad ass at all! Not like Vader did!

In fact, the trailer didn’t reach out and grab me at all, which is insane because it’s Star Wars. It seemed even MORE boring than the prequel trilogy. The only good thing I saw in this trailer was a lack of lens flares! I was honestly expecting the movie to be unwatchable due to lens flares!

It’s like Abrams is going out of his way to direct and ruin all the Sci-Fi movies that are based on franchises that I hold dear. Please keep him away from Doctor Who! I don’t want that ruined for me any more than it already has been.

Lastly, there’s the poster!

Missing Luke Skywalker! Now, for me I am fine with this. His trilogy was the original trilogy. I don’t believe it’s his story, but on that same note I don’t think it’s Hans or Leias story either. However, THEY made it to the poster! So, while I don’t have as big an issue with this omittance as much as others in the geek circle do, it’s still a tad frustrating that they give two other supporting characters a poster place, but not another. His name is printed on the poster, between Harrison Ford and Carrie Fisher, so It’s obvious that he is going to be in it. Either put him on the poster, or Remove Han and Leia!

Anyway! I will probably still see it, but I won’t be one of those people dressed as Ewoks(Not that it’s ALWAYS a bad thing) and camping in line for tickets…though you don’t really need to do that now anymore I guess huh? You can just order them online these days! If I see it, most likely I won’t even bother going to the movies. Might wait for DVD….Might even just wait for it to come out on Netflix. I’m just not that into it anymore. I would rather have the expanded Universe back. At least THAT was enjoyable. Instead they made that non-canon and gave us this. Not a good trade for Star Wars geeks.

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Battlefront Open Beta Opinion

Recently I cancelled 2 preorders I had. The 2 games were for Battlefront and Rainbow Six: Siege, both cancellations might be surprising to anyone who REALLY knows me. Everyone knows I love starwars, and most people who know me personally also know that I enjoy Tom Clancy stuff! So, why would I cancel both a Tom Clancy title, and a Star Wars title? The answer is simple! I discovered that neither games contained a single player campaign.

See, for me gaming has always been about the story! The main reason I get a game, is going to be for the story. Sure, I’ll play online too, but the first thing I will always do is play and complete the single player campaign. Basically I look at games like a cake. The story, is like a cake. The main bulk. The online mode is frosting. Now, you can certainly eat that cake without frosting, and it would be enjoyable, but it tastes so much better with frosting! However, I sure as hell wouldn’t want to just eat the frosting without the cake.

Unfortunately, a lot of games are starting to do that. Skip the cake and force feed you frosting, while still charging you for a frosted cake. If a game doesn’t have a single player story, that’s just lazy. If that same game charges you the same amount as other games that have BOTH….then that’s highway robbery! Especially when you consider the DLC they will eventually be trying to sell you later on down the road.

So, while many of these games are going down this lazy road(Evolve and Titan off the top of my head), these games normally fail. Evolve and Titan both have a fairly poor user base these days, and yet they are still charging you full price for the game. Also, what happens when the server inevitably goes down? You don’t  even have a single player experience. You just got a game you can’t do anything with. You literally are buying a game that at some future point you KNOW will be absolutely useless!

So, naturally I cancelled my preorders. Mainly for the principle. Sure, both games look good, but I refused to pay 60 bucks for a partial game that will in a few years be unplayable. I’m no sucker!

Then the battlefront open Beta came out. I decided to try it out. It’s free after all! Couldn’t hurt! So I downloaded it to my computer, and after an insanely long installation I was in and playing, and I do admit that it was pretty cool! Sure, it’s your typical “Run around and shoot your enemy til you get killed then respawn and repeat” formula, but it feels so much better in the star wars universe!

In fact, I enjoyed it so much that I am half tempted to reinstate my preorder, but then I remember that Fallout 4, a game with an actual epic long lasting plot is being released around the same time, and for the same price. Just makes more sense to give the money to them to award them for their lack of laziness. A thing DICE seems to have an abundance of. In the end, despite it’s coolness I most likely will still pass on this game due to the reasons stated earlier in this post

Hey DICE & Ubisoft! Next time, add a single player campaign(Even a short one) and I’ll consider being a customer again.

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Abrams set to direct Star Wars

Well, it’s official! J.J. Abrams won’t be directing the next Star Trek film, and is now set to direct the upcoming Star Wars flick. Apparently the fans are rejoicing with this news. I am not exactly sure why! Maybe it’s fans of Star Trek that are rejoicing? Since now, they will actually be able to watch the next Star Trek movie without having to squint through a barrage of lens flares. Perhaps the rejoicing fans are fans of Lens Flares in general! Maybe, they are so excited about the idea of a possible light saber duel that can’t be seen because it’s entirely blotted out by one giant lens flare!

Surely the rejoicing fans can’t be fans of Star Wars right?  Apparently they are! Again, I am not sure why the rejoicing! Am I the only one who seriously finds Abrams over-use of Lens Flares to be more than a little annoying? Sure, his directing isn’t bad in general! I mean, I genuinely enjoyed LOST, but that was before the whole flare fetish thing kicked in. It’s now gotten to the point where his love of all things bright has ruined his actual talent as a director. At least to me, and judging by response of the Star Wars community, I maybe the only one in this mind-set.

I just think they could have went with better directors. Zemeckis would have been good,  Jackson would have been great, as would Spielberg! Hell, I would have even settled for Burton, granted I would have to tolerate Johnny Depp as a sith lord, with claymation troopers doing his bidding on a planet with a bunch of curly leafless trees, but it’s infinitely better than lens flares!

I’m not saying Abrams is the worst possible choice! There are plenty of worse directors for Star Wars! They could have stuck us with Woody Allen or Quentin Tarantino. However, just because there are worse choices, does not make the current choice a good one! Will he ruin Star Wars for me? Doubtful! If he didn’t completely ruin Star Trek for me, I doubt if he could possibly ruin Star Wars. He could however make the experience of watching it, highly unenjoyable.

Related articles

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The Old Republic now Free to play

Star Wars: The Old Republic has now officially gone free to play! If you are a previous subscriber, you are urged to hop back into your account and enjoy the epic gameplay again, with all new content and a new companion. Also, new players should definitely check it out! Especially if you are a fan of Star Wars, or of Bioware game in general! This is now officially the best f2p MMORPG on the market.

Now, the game is f2p, however like all f2p games, there is a marketplace, that allows you to buy access to some things, but overall the game is completely enjoyable even without the purchases, but I would strongly urge everyone, to subscribe if they really like what they see. The cost is well worth it, and the benefits are many.

There really is no downside to the game going F2P, I was worried about it at first, but they handled the transition like champs, and everything’s balanced out quite well. If I was playing f2p, I would be able to enjoy myself, and as a paying subscriber, I don’t feel like I am being ripped off. It’s really a win/win situation.
The only issue I can see with it, is that there aren’t very many servers, and with so many new and returning players, the servers are getting bogged down, and slightly laggy. I am not a huge fan of heavy population servers, but as of right now, those are the only servers there are.

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Star Wars: The Old Republic

Image via Wikipedia

It’s been awhile since my last blog post, and by awhile I mean a few months. Rest assured though, that Iam not dead. In fact, I am not even slightly ill, though I did have a rough day with a BBQ pit, but that’s a story for another time.

So, where have I been, I like to imagine that you are asking your monitor right now, and in response I will answer.

You see, that last few months have been a gamers wet dream come true. Games have been popping up left and right, trying to get on the shelves, so that they can make it under your tree.

These aren’t small games either. These are big name titles! We are talking about powerhouses here! Games like Uncharted 3, Modern Warfare 3, payday, Battlefield 3 and Infamous: Festival of blood. Huge titles, that I have been looking forward to, and thus had to play.

The biggest release though has got to be Star Wars: The Old Republic! Chances are you have heard of this, even if you aren’t into Online gaming. It’s a highly anticipated chapter of the old republic game series, and if you aren’t familiar with that aspect of the star wars era, I strongly urge you to pick up Knights of the Old republic.

The game is made by Bioware, which also made the popular Knights of the Old Republic games, as well as Dragons Age and Mass Effect, and as such is similar in some aspects to all of them! The game has moral choices that Bioware is famous for, as well as easy to navigate conversation trees.

Bottom line: Is the game good? This is a dificult thing to answer. Do you like Star Wars? Do you like Bioware games? Do you like MMORPGs? If you answered yes, to any of those questions, then the answer is: Yes! The game rocks on so many levels!

However, like in all MMORPGs you get Trolls and basically childish dumbasses who come onto the general chat and become an annoyance. They tend to type in all caps, about how the game sucks and how much better the last game they played was.  They like to belittle anyone who plays the game differently from them. Not leveling fast enough? You are a N00B who doesn’t know how to play the game. Level too fast? You are a cheat or a haxx0r. Best case scenario, is you are rushing too fast through the game. They want to control your playtime! You don’t PvP, then you suck. You RP, then you suck. Luckily though, the game has an ignore feature, that doesn’t seem to have a limit to the ammount of names it can hold.

The trolls are a common occurance in any MMORPG though, and shouldn’t push you away from an exceptional game though!

Another thing I should mention is, that the game is very story driven, which for me is great! since I play a game to experience a story, not to rush through and see how fast I can level up and gather phat lewtz.

The game is also fully voice acted. Meaning, that every NPC you talk to will speak to you! Some don’t speak galactic english though, so you will need to read subtitles. However, this full on voice acting helps imerse you into the star wars universe like never before.

Personally, I think this is the best MMORPG on the market currently. Sure, there are other good ones, but this title has made me forget all about them. The player base leaves a lot to be desired though, however the server I ended up playing on, might have just attracted more dicks and douches than other servers. Maybe, that’s what I get for choosing a server simply because it had Darth in the name.

Am I surprised that I liked it? Honestly, I am! I thought I would detest this game! Simply because of my past experiences with Star Wars: Galaxies, which has got to be one of the worst games of all time! I was afraid The Old Republic was going to be similar to that. Thankfully, it wasn’t.

This is NOT a review, simply an endorsement. If this had been a review, I would have discussed the companions, the fact that you get your own ship, and I would have went on about how you can fly to iconic planets, Like Hoth and Tatooine. I however did not, because this is not a review. It’s just me, saying you really should try this game out. Even if you have a crappy older computer. One of the most amazing things about this game, is the fact that it will run on most machines. If you have a semi-modern computer, odds are you can run it. Maybe not at the highest setting, but you should still be able to run, and run it smoothly at the lowest setting.

Related articles

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KOTOR Online official

Ok, as of today KOTOR Online is officially announced, even has it’s own spiffy web address. I am really STOKED about this game, and since it’s being brought out by BioWare, I have high expectations! It’s hard not to with classics like KOTOR, Jade Empire and Mass Effect. I mean, how can you NOT have faith in this game company.

Granted, this isn’t the first Star Wars MMO to come out. There was also Star Wars Galaxies, but come on…have you guys played this game? It sucks! It made me wish I had a light sabre so i could stab my eyes out. SOE did what I thought was the impossible, and completely DESTROYED the Star Wars mythos. It took the KOTOR series to restore my faith in the franchise.

I have been wanting to try out Warhammer Online, but instead…I think im going to hold off for the KOTOR online game, and stick with the games i have now.

KOTOR: Online?

Well, fans of the Knights of the Old Republic gaming franchise should be dancing a little jig..possibly. Apparently there’s a rumor traveling around the rumor mill that the next KOTOR game will actually be an MMORPG. Not sure if this will replace the talked about KOTOR III title, or will be produced alongside(Possibly using KOTOR III to set the stage for the events of KOTOR Online? One can only speculate.)

I am a huge KOTOR fan, and am hoping the rumors are true. I would love nothing more than to play KOTOR online. As for what the premise would be? Could be anything really, but most of the internet populace is hoping for a game set during the Mandalorian wars, and since that’s what the peoples are wanting..i’m thinking there is a fairly large chance the people will get it.

I’ll wrap this up with my speculation on what to expect. I believe KOTOR Online will be KOTOR 3 and will be the final one in the franchise(All good star wars sagas have three chapters, and what better finale than an online version? That’s been something people have been wanting since the first one was released). It will most likely be set during the Mandalorian wars. You will begin the game by waking up in a space ship without any memory of who you are.

No matter what, I am sure it will be good since it’s being released by BioWare.