Wet Review

Seems like most games I play lately all have male lead characters.  It was refreshing to play a sword swinging, dual wielding, whiskey drinking female character.  Some folks might like the visual style that Bethesda and Artificial Mind and Movement have come up with.  What you get is a video game that looks like a 70s style movie.  You think this game was directed by Quentin Tarantino himself.  If this game ever gets picked up to be a real movie than he the only guy that can make this film.


Story:
Rubi Malone is a gun for hire or a "Fixer" from Texas.  One year earlier, she was hired by a man Trevor Ackers to get the heart for William Ackers - his dad, who needs the heart for his transplant.  It was taken by a small criminal named Richard Simmons.  Haha no that Richard Simmons (although it be a great pleasure to shoot that guy).  She tracks him down and after many gunfights, the heart is return to Mr. Ackers.  A year later, William Ackers hires our protagonist for a job.  This deal goes south...

Gameplay:
If you played the demo then you get the jist of what the gameplay is.  Killing baddies while doing some stylish acrobatics all while in slo-mo.  Don't be fooled, Rubi also deadly with her sword.  Wet is a great mixture of acrobatic stunts, dual wielding, QTE (yes there are some quick time events throughout the game) and swordplay.  What the demo doesn't tell you is there are upgrades to her weapons and abilities.  You earn style points during your single player campaign.  Style points are accumulated by doing those acrobatic kills you have learned.  The more stylish the kill, the more points you get.  There are hidden points as well.  So keep your eyes peeled.  After each arenas or at the end of each chapter (total of 12 chapters according to the achievements), you can goto the upgrade shop by pressing the Y button..

It took a bit of time to learn the controls.  I've killed myself many times jumping over ledges instead of just hanging on the ledge.  There were times when I think Rubi could of grab hold of the ledge but sadly she would fall to her death.  It was kinda frustrating performing a acrobatic stunt, only to have slide or jumped over a building by accident leading to my death.  This game provides a solution to finding that Rubi can use to her advantage.  Holding the left trigger activates Rubi Vision.  It highlights ledges, poles, ladders that you can use to your advantage. Another innovation was split targeting.  If there more than one enemy in the area, Rubi automatically targets one, while you try to aim at the other.  I like it.  Took awhile to get use to it with all the jumping, running and sliding going on.

Rubi weapons come in a few varieties.  You start off with her pistol and a sword. What great about the pistols is that they have unlimited ammo.  No need to worry about finding ammo packs or reloading them for that matter.  Once you get the shot guns, SMGs, or crossbows they don't have unlimited ammo.  Don't worry, you'll still have your pistols if you run out of ammo.  Rubi is not bullet proof. So she will take damage.  She can regenerate health by drinking whisky you find throughout the chapters.  In the areans, she regains health faster the higher her multipler is.

I do have two major complaint about this game and it the challenges you have to complete a few times at Rubi's home.  Home being the boneyard.  These challenges consist of running through these red rings.  Also rings on fire.  These rings on fire activate these hubcap targets.  Rubi split targeting targets that, while you aim and shoot the other targets that pop up.  This is suppose to help in using the split targeting while doing your acrobatics.  You have to complete this challenge before time runs out.  When you destroy the targets, each target takes 2 seconds off your clock.  Another challenge was destroying 90 targets in 3 mins.  That was the easiest and the most enjoyable challenge.  Still I did not like it because you cannot advance until you complete them.  I thought it ruined the flow of the game.  Plus you don't get any style points.  Come on!  Give me something!  Ok they do unlock new guns for you to use.  Big yippe....  I rather unlock them through the upgrade shop.  Second complaint I have was the lame boss fight at the end.  Mostly involves quick time events.  The fight was over before I knew it.

Graphics:
Wet is a heavy visualize game.  Throughout the game including the main menu, it has a film scratch effect.  This what makes Wet look more like a 70s movie.  Certain parts of the campaign when Rubi face gets splattered by blood, the visuals goes all red, white, and black.  Red mostly.  Once this happens, look out bad guys.  Rubi angry and it shows.  When she kills her foes with her guns or sword, her enemies turn into black smoke that slowly dissipates.  Really cool to see for yourself.  If you are not a fan of this film scratch,  you can turn it off in the options menu.  I on the other hand will leave it on because I like it.  Otherwise graphics are sort of meh.  If you played Stranglehold, that what the graphic is like in Wet.  Characters models are ok.  Not the best in the world.

Audio:
Wet has one of the better soundtracks for a video game.  70s style music by various artist that blends well with the game play.  You can unlock songs when you play through the campaign.  Listen to them in their entirety in the extras section.  Yes the entire soundtrack on the same disc as the game.  Nice move on Bethesda and A2M on including the soundtrack for us to enjoy.  There probably 20 tracks to listen to.  I've hear some of the song and their not bad.  Eliza Dushku and Malcolm McDowell provide their voices for Rubi and Mr. William Ackers.  Their performance are outstanding.  Fits theirs characters well.  Same goes to the actors that voice other characters.

Longevity:
After you get done with the single player portion of the game, You unlock the challenge mode and harder difficulty settings.  With that plus the bios of each character, concept art and the soundtrack.  There really nothing else to keep you occupied.  There are monkeys you can go back to collect for those who are achievement whores.  5 levels of difficulty.  One called "Golden Bullet".  A one hit one kill type game play with limited health.  Only drawback is you have to unlock it first.

Overall:
Good for a weekend rental.  If you like this sort of visual style and game play then you will have a great experience.  Total of 12 chapters, challenge mode (after you finish campaign), soundtrack included, it should keep you entertained for a couple of days.  Again, did not like the challenges that I had to do 3 time in the game for no reason.  Last boss fight was a let down.  Small learning curve with the controls.  Some areas may require trial and error.


Score - 7/10

Batman: Arkham Asylum Review

After days of beating up many henchmen, solving riddles, finding trophies and stopping the Joker and his pals.  I have finished Batman: Arkham Asylum.  All I can say is wow.  Best single player game since I played Dead Space.  Dead Space was fucking awesome btw.  Batman: AA is right up there in terms of single player.  Sadly there not multiplayer but you don't need multiplayer.  What you do get is a great single player game and challenge mode.  Let get down to it.

Story:
Batman: AA is about the bat catching the Joker and taking him to Arkham.  Only to have a suspicion that something gonna happen and it does.  Joker breaks free and takes over the asylum.  Now you must stop him.  First you have to fight his minions and villains like Harley Quinn, Croc, Poison Ivy, Bane and Scarecrow.  I don't wanna spoil much but Scarecrow is most undoubtedly the best villain in this game.  If you wanna know why play this game now!  The Riddler is in this game to but he mostly behind the scenes.  Instead of fighting him, you have to find his trophies and solve his riddles all while he taunts you thru bats communicator.  You also have to solve the biggest mystery, the Chronicles of Arhkam.  To make it more fun to find things, there is also patient interviews and chatting teeth.  These are interviews of the main villains in the game when they first came to Arkham.  Worth while to listen to.  Chatting teeth are scattered about the island  Believe me, finding these items it more fun than a chore.

Graphics:
Batman:  Arkham Asylum uses Epic's Unreal Technology to power this game.  It looks stellar.  Has a very gritty and dark tone.  I love it.  Fits this game very very well.  Character models look good.  Some do look a little like plastic figurines.  Only minor gripes I have is it needs more various henchmen.  It seemed that Rocksteady only used 3 models for Joker's henchmen.   More visual damage to the batsuit.  I notice towards the end, that batman had a scare on his face and his cape was ripped.  Batman went through a lot and his batsuit should of shown that with more tears in it.  Like I mentioned, only minor gripes. 


Gameplay:

Using the freeflow combat takes awhile getting use to.  For the tougher battles, using the counter button is necessary.  You can probably get away with mashing the X button to fight but if you playing on hard mode, it very important to learn to use the counter button and using your upgrades.  When you upgrade your combat and string together enough combos, certain options appear like a super takedown, tossing a hechmen or using your batarang without breaking up your combo.

Controlling the bat is not difficult to learn.  Just like the combat, his movements are also fluid.  If your running towards a huge hole in the ground, batman will automatically jump over and continue running.  So there is no need for a jump buttom.

Besides single player campaign, there also challenge modes.  In these challenges, you fight some henchmen in each round or for predator mode, you take down each henchmen with a silent takedown all while not getting caught.  Think Splinter Cell but replace Sam Fisher with Batman.


Audio:
The voice talent in this game is spot on.  Mark Hamill voicing the Joker certainly was a shock.  Still he did a fantastic job.  Same goes for the other actors and actresses doing voice over.  Compelling dialog with talented voice actors made this game very enjoyable.  There was some repeated dialog but not much.  When roaming outside, you'll hear the Joker over the PA insulting the bat.  There funny at first but tends to get annoying after awhile.


Longevity:
Length wise, I'd say maybe 12 hours (on normal difficulty) if you take your time and explore.  If you blast through it without finding all the hidden items then it will be much much shorter.  After beating the game, you can free roam the joint to find all the hidden items and chatting teeth without worrying about anyone getting in your way.  That with challenge modes, it adds to the longevity of the game.  I hear the challenge modes on extreme are a bitch to complete.  There is downloadable content on the way and it FREE!  Free is certainly good.


Overall:
To sum it up, you won't be disappointed.  I found the game to be engaging.  At work, I find myself wanting to go home and play more.  Even after beating the game,  I went back to discover all the trophies and patient interviews.  Now I'm working on the challenge modes.  I just love fighting the henchmen and doing silent takedowns.  Very satisfying hanging a henchmen upside down from a gargoyle statue.


Score: 9/10

LG EnV Review

When I was deciding to buy a new cell phone, I first decided which service. Well Verizon had a cell tower nearby. So the obvious choice is Verizon. So now was the hard task of picking a new phone. At work, I notice a few customers had the LG EnV. A DJ that works with us had this particular phone. I also wanted a phone with a keyboard. Since I do a lot of texting, I figure having a full QWERTY keyboard would be good. So I checked out Verizon website and sure enough the EnV phone is available for $150. If I waited a month, I could of gotten the LG Voyager. I basically the EnV with a touch screen like Iphone.

Now the next decision was picking a color. There was 3 colors to choose from. Silver, Orange or Green. Out of the 3, the orange really stood out to me. Silver look alittle ugly in my opinion and green was more of a dark green. Didn't look appealing to me at all. It was a easy choice for me to get orange.

So when this baby arrived, I fell in loved with this phone. The 2 screens looked fantastic. I fliped it open and there the keyboard brightly lite. I immediately started texting my friends. Taking advantage of my unlimited texting. Now let rate the phone.

Signal: 4/5 - Compared to my pay as you go phone, the signal is great when at work. At home, I loose about 2 to 3 bars. 4 bars total. But I have not had a dropped call yet.

Features: 5/5 - Keyboard, seakerphone (only when phone is flipped open), 2.0 megapixel camera, video wallpaper, 2 preloaded trial games. One is tetris. Forgot what the other game is. text to speech. Yes your text messages can be read to you. Add more memory with a SD micro cards.

Camera: 4/5 - Camera takes good pictures. It got auto focus. Takes about 5+ seconds to take a picture. Alittle long for my taste. Built in lens cover. Got it own picture button. So your taking a picture like a regular camera. You take a picture with the phone flipped open or closed.

Call Reception: 5/5 - All calls are crystal clear. They can also hear me fairly well.

Battery: 5/5 - Battery is great. I get 2 weeks of battery life. I'm guessing. It could be more. Never took the time to actually find out. After 4 months, still have a great battery life.

Overall: 4.5/5 - Great phone. I recommend it if you love to text like me. Holds about 32MB of pictures, videos or ringtones. Does have a slot for SD micro cards if you need more space. Although there is a tiny flimsy doors to the charging port and SD Micro card slot. You feel like your gonna break it off when opening them. I also recommend a screen protector for the front screen. Protect it from scratches. After 4 months with this phone, no worn out buttons. Everything works great still. Get this phone or the LG Voyager!