A review of some of the games that I recently played

Some time ago, I went to the city library to vote and I noticed that they even lend out video games. You can borrow games for a week free of charge and you can renew your loan as long as you want to provided that you go there: yet again another proof of the library being the pathetic government funded kid who despite having good toys no one wants to play with, but that's totally another story. Anyway, I started to try out some games and here's what I think:

Call of Duty Black Ops

The very start of the campaign mode is very intense fighting in late 80's which I thought, apart from being quite realistic, was very heavy and exhausting. Later on the story line shifts to future and gradually loses its coherence and attraction which is quite opposite to first Black Ops. Overall, it felt like the writers didn't have much to offer and the game developers focused their efforts on the action instead. I also tried the Zombie mission which were obviously much better than the first one but they tend to be pointless as there is not much advancement in these missions. Overall, the actions were improved but not to an enjoyable level ad the story sucked.

Heavy rain

I have never played any game like this which brings us to the fact that if Heavy Rain can be regarded as a game or not. It's more like watching a thriller e.g. The silence of the lambs with a good amount of suspense elements: The story of a serial killer dubbed as Origami killer and we follow a couple of characters who are chasing him. The player has the possibility of changing the course of the game by the decisions that he makes. That's all as far as playing is concerned and at the very end, the killer is someone who we least suspect. I read later that they are actually four alternative endings to the game and I just happened to see one (which was actually a downer) and since the identity of the killer of revealed, I really didn't felt like to going back and changing some of the choices to see the other endings. It was a good interactive movie to watch because of its story but the graphics have to be developed to a large extent. So if Activision had taken this story and made it instead of COD Black Ops II it would have been awesome.

Dark Souls I and II

I went for Dark Souls II since it swept a bunch of gaming awards but then I was advised to start from the first one so I got the box which had both of the in it. One the first one, I was directly pt off by how primitive and low level the graphics are so I dropped it quite quickly.






On the Dark Souls II, I found it very difficult to get going as the tutorial were not that good and it jumped directly to the difficult parts which was kind of frustrating. Also I had problem following the game direction as it was not clear which direction/mission you should go in somewhat indefinite space. Given all these, I didn't bother to challenge myself and try to finish the game which I'm sure would have taken much more than what I expected. Disappointing is the right word to express my experience with these two games.

Assassin's Creed II

In contrast to Dark Souls, this game is very straight forward and gradually grows on you and you get hooked up. The graphics despite being a couple of years old is amazing and the get to like your character little by little as it develops and gets better. The drawback is the whole thing can be easily cut into half and almost after half of the story, it gets repetitive and somewhat pointless. You have to basically the same thing over and over again. Some of the missions that are to challenge your jumping skills get very frustrating  specially toward the end when you are running against the time and you can simply get stuck at one point for a good while. Perhaps if you don't have time constraints as I did and if you plan to plan one short mission at a time or something, you wouldn't feel about it as I did but that strategy keeps you busy for a very good while, I promise you that, this game is very long but like I said, it is addictive. Well, I guess, there are worse addictions, right?

Battlefield 4

Surprisingly, BF4 didn't have much of small irritating issues that you normally see with EA games and much effort has been put in making fights as realistic as possible which was good. But unfortunately, like other BF games, the story was really bad, so bad that it discouraged me totally from finishing the game. Like other BF games, you get to ride different vehicles which is very cool but again, it can get so difficult at times at leads to frustration. The choice of weapons (some unlocked!) seems pointless as you really have much time to test the rifles and what not. The use of tactical weaponry such as land mine and C4s, despite being a nice idea per se, is at times very difficult and tricky. I didn't finish the game but as far as I played, the story sucked. I guess after all, it did not disappoint in being yet again another disappointing product by one of the most hated companies in the world.