Wii Hidden Gems #1 - The Sky Crawlers: Innocent Aces

So here I am with the first of my new Wii Hidden Gems series - which incidentally will be full blown reviews rather than using the format of my older Hidden Gems articles. The Sky Crawlers game is based on a series of novels by Japanese author Hiroshi Mori. His books have been adapted into an anime film, the game which I'm covering here and a manga series. The basic premise is somewhat strange - although the world is actually at peace, in order to prevent a full blown war from breaking out amongst the aggressive human population, several corporations stage battles for show. Both the film and the game make reference to "Kildren" - genetically engineered children that are immortal unless shot down in battle, when they are simply cloned and the copy is sent out again with a new identity. The game is a combat flight sim developed by Project Aces - the same team that have worked on most of the Ace Combat series, and it shares many similarities with those titles. Now that I've filled you in on what the game is about, let me try and explain why you should give it a try.

Publisher: Namco Bandai
Developer: Project Aces
Expect to pay: £10 (source: Amazon Marketplace)

Graphics: 7 out of 10
Sky Crawlers is by no means an ugly came unless you happen to get fairly close to the ground whereupon the textures and general lack of detail leave you in no doubt that you’re playing on a machine that has less power under the hood than Xbox 360 or PS3. There are a nice variety of different skyboxes throughout the missions creating the atmosphere that you are flying against a sunset or during a thunderstorm for example. The various different planes (more of which can be unlocked) all look good and like they could feasibly be real machines, and importantly there is no trace of slowdown when there are a lot of bogies in the sky. Aside from the in game graphics another major visual component of this game are the anime style cut scenes, which have been given the same level of polish as the feature film. You don’t get to watch one of these after every mission but there is over 30 minutes of animation spread between the games 17 missions. All in all Sky Crawlers is a decent looking Wii game but obviously if you put it up against its fully HD counterpart on the other current generation consoles then it is going to suffer.

Sound and Music: 8 out of 10
I’m going to mention the voice acting first because surprisingly I feel that it is a good deal better than the voice work in the English dub of the film. Whereas a lot of the acting felt stilted and lacking emotion in the movie the VA’s tend to do a much better job. I definitely recognised the acting talents of Heather Hogan as Lt. Orishina (probably most well known for playing Collette Brunel in the Tales of Symphonia games).

The music is also nicely composed and features Celtic influences which helps gives the Sky Crawlers universe its own unique feel. The music was also a strong component of the animated film so its good to see this carry across from one medium to another.

Neeooooowwwww... dugga-dugga-dugga-dugga!

Game Mechanics: 7 out of 10
As mentioned previously, The Sky Crawlers takes place over 17 separate missions, some of which have multiple sections. These predominantly involve shooting down other planes, but there are a few missions which diverge from this pattern to involve taking reconnaissance photos, destroying generators before shields can be activated, or protecting a downed sea plane from both naval and aerial attack.

I have to praise Project Aces/Namco now for being considerate enough to provide multiple controller options for the game. The default controls sees you using the nunchuk in your dominant hand as the joystick of your plane, and the Wii remote as your throttle control. You can also perform various evasive maneuvers by carrying out motions with the remote, and these can be very important in some of the trickier missions as they allow you to position yourself directly behind an enemy plane and take them out efficiently. These can sometimes make the missions rather too easy though and reduce the amount of actual dogfighting skill necessary to take down the opposition. You can also use either a Gamecube controller or a Classic controller, which is typically something that only Nintendo is thoughtful enough to offer. I have played many Wii games which are hampered by there insistence that you must use the motion controls and nothing else (Tiger Woods 2010 comes to mind).

Innovation and Cleverness: 6 out 10
Though I have said that the Classic controller is my preferred control method for playing Sky Crawlers, the motion controls are in fact very well implemented and do a good job of making you feel that you are in control of a plane. There is also the small but very useful addition of a zoomed in targeting reticule that appears one you are in a certain range of your target, which makes lining up shots in the the middle of a hectic dogfight much easier.

Value and Replayability: 7 out of 10
It will probably take you in the region of 10 hours to play through the main story mode on the default difficulty setting. Then you have the option of either playing individual missions again in free play, or playing through the whole story again a second time on the hard setting. Though the amount of play time you will glean from this game is by no means huge, it is quite possible to find a new, sealed copy of the game for £10 which means that I still recommend that you pick it up, especially if you're already a fan of the film. The game and film are best experienced as part of a package, as both of them fill in missing details of the others storyline and are more understandable (not to mention enjoyable) once you are aware of all the back story.

Overall: 7 out of 10
Sky Crawlers is a game that is likely to fly under the radar of many, especially in the west where there original series of novels haven't been translated. Fans of anime and aerial combat games should definitely take the time to check this cross media project out, as there's a lot to enjoy.

Red Dead Redemption single player review

I have bought every major entry in the Grand Theft Auto series, but haven't completed a single one of them. Every time I've either just lost interest and drifted away to other games, or got stuck on a particular mission. While Red Dead Redemption belongs to the same stable of sandbox titles from Rockstar, it goes way beyond anything they've done to date in my opinion. It held my attention for around 35 hours spread over about three weeks, and very few games manage to do that these days before I get distracted by something else. Let's explore why this is a very strong Game of the Year contender...

Format: Xbox 360 (PS3 also available)
Publisher: Rockstar Games
Developer: Rockstar San Diego
Expect to pay: £30 - £40

Graphics: 10 out of 10
The vistas throughout New Austin, Mexico and West Elizabeth are truly stunning. Your HUD basically boils down to a handy mini map/compass combo in the bottom left corner of the screen, with the rest being taken up by the game world. By keeping things simple Rockstar keeps you fully immersed in the living, breathing world that they have created, and it truly is impressive stuff.

While certainly not the first game to feature wildlife, I have never encountered anything quite as diverse and believable as the range of animals to be found here. Rabbits, armadillos, coyotes, wolves, elk, cougars, bobcats, grizzly bears... the list goes on and on, and they all interact with each other as you would expect. So you will see village dogs chasing chickens for example, or a big cat take down a deer. Every animal in the game can be killed, and then you can gather resources such as pelts, meat, horns etc. which you can sell in the shops throughout the land. Likewise there are many different types of plant life that can be harvested for saleable materials.

The wide open landscapes make a very refreshing change from the bustling, cramped environs of Liberty City, and you can while away many an hour simply exploring on your horse, seeing what you can find or triggering one of the many random events. A full day/night cycle is of course included, as is dynamic weather conditions such as rain, thunder storms and the occasional bit of snowfall up in the mountains. When the heavens open, pools of water slowly form on the dry ground, which is a nice little detail.

The many characters that you meet are very well designed as well, each one looking convincingly lifelike and having their own little quirks. They vary from the like able such as the Marshall of Armadillo, or Bonnie McFarlane, to the strange, such as Seth with his fascination with the dead, to the downright detestable like Bill Williamson or Agent Edgar Ross. I encountered a few graphical glitches during my time with the game, such as an invisible train that meant that parcels appeared to be floating in thin air, but in a game of this size and scope such things are unavoidable.

All in all Red Dead Redemption is one of the finest looking games available for whichever system you decide to buy it for, and the good stuff doesn't end there!

This sort of view is pretty common in Red Dead Redemption

Sound and Music: 10 out of 10
First off, the music. The Morricone inspired soundtrack suits the game perfectly as you would expect, and the style and instruments shift as you move from the US into Mexico. There are also a few songs scattered throughout the game at key points in the story by Jose Gonzalez, which boost the cinematic feel of the game. The voice acting is also very competently done, with Rob Wiethoff and Antony De Longis proving excellent performances as John Marston and Marshal Leigh Johnson respectively, backed up by solid performances from the rest of the cast.

If you happen to have a 5.1 surround sound system or better, the positional audio can actually be helpful to you, as you may hear gunshots in the distance and be able to deduce where they are coming from based on which speaker they are coming from. Speaking of gunshots, there is quite a large range of weaponry, from pistols, through to shotguns, repeaters, rifles and mounted machine guns. They all sound unique and are based on the real life weaponry.

Game Mechanics: 9 out of 10
Rockstar have taken the basic blueprint of a GTA style game and refined it until it is almost perfect. There are many small improvements that have been made to Red Dead Redemption, from the way that missions are now sensibly broken up into smaller segments with checkpoints, to the overall difficulty curve that means that the game gradually gets tougher as you get better at it, it seems that all the years spent making games like this have finally paid off in this, their masterpiece.

As well as the main storyline missions that will have to be tackled sooner or later if you want to beat the game, there is a ton of optional stuff to see and do as well. First off, there are 18 optional quests for strangers that can be taken on, which vary from the simple to the weird. These often consist of multiple parts, and you will sometimes have to carry on with the story or just allow a few days of game time to go by before you can continue them. In addition to these, there are 4 sets of ambient challenges that can be taken on and completed at your leisure: survivalist - which involves find various plant life in the wilderness, sharpshooter - which entails shooting stuff (usually wildlife) as you might expect, hunter - finding, killing and skinning various animals, and treasure hunter - figuring out where gold is hidden based on treasure maps with clues on them. Reaching certain levels in each of these challenges and completing them entirely bestows various benefits on your character, and finishing them all gives you the title of "Legend of the West" along with access to a special outfit.

Like Rockstar's previous games, Red Dead Redemption also features a whole range of optional mini games: from gamblers favourites such as poker, blackjack and liars dice, through to arm wrestling, a game of horseshoes, five finger fillet, horse breaking, killing or capturing bandits from wanted posters, or a side job as a night watchman. You could quite easily spend many an hour on these distractions alone (liars dice is my personal favourite). As you travel the country, random events are also triggered at fairly regular intervals - such as a lawman needing help to round up some escaped criminals, a shopkeeper being robbed, or someone about to be hanged unless you can arrive in time and shoot the rope around the victims neck. Taking time out to help people will boost either you honour, fame or both. As your fame increases you will actually hear the dialogue of random passers by change as they begin to recognise you, and they may even ask start giving you gifts.

Of course, honour can be affected negatively as well as positively if you decide to go on a killing spree in a town for example, which also comes with a price on your head. You can clear your name either by paying off your bounty at a train station, or by using a pardon letter. The bigger the bounty on your head, the better the US Marshall's assigned to take you down become, and there's also the likelihood that gunslingers throughout the land will form posses to try and take you down.

For the most part, I didn't have much trouble with the controls, with the odd exception of the auto targeting snapping to a random animal instead of an outlaw during some of the gunfights. After a while you get used to pressing the left trigger to lock onto an enemy, shifting the left stick up slightly to line up with their head, and then firing a shot off with the right trigger to take them out. For large bands of enemies or beasts, you can click the right stick to enter Dead Eye mode, where you can paint targets in slow motion before blowing everyone away. Should you decide that stealth is the way to go, you can also click the left stick to sneak, and then either use throwing knives or simply get up close and slit the enemies throat. This sometimes make more sense that going in guns blazing if there's a large number of heavily armed bandits - sneak around, take a few of the ones on the outskirts out silently, then mop up the rest.

I did encounter a fair few bugs whilst playing through the game, some of them being just graphical glitches such as invisible train which meant that boxes looked like they were floating in mid air, and other more serious bugs which caused the game to freeze up altogether. While these were very annoying when they occurred, the game auto saves very often which meant I seldom actually lost any progress. All in all though, Red Dead Redemption is a stunning technical achievement.

In your face!

Innovation and Cleverness: 8 out of 10
Sandbox games are nothing new, but the execution of Red Dead Redemption raises it above everything that has come before. Just the staggering range of wildlife that adds an extra layer of realism to the game world ensures the game a pretty high score in this category. The little I've seen of the multi player, with its own version of the open world for you to roam in and the ability to form posses, should also be taken into consideration (though it is by no means perfect). Although it took many years to make, it would seem that the hard work put in by Rockstar has really paid off.

Value and Replayability: 9 of 10
Should you decide to rush through all the story missions as quickly as you possibly can, you could probably "complete" the game in under 20 hours, but you'd be completely missing the point. Take your time to explore the world, help out all of the strangers, enjoy the many mini games on offer, and raise your Fame and Honour points, and you can spend many many more hours on just the single player portion of the game alone. When you add in multi player and the promise of more DLC packs on the horizon, you will keep coming back for a long time to come.

Overall: 10 out of 10
Not so long I go I handed out my first 10 out of 10 to Mass Effect 2, but Red Dead Redemption equals it in every way in my opinion. It is every bit and deep and involving as any RPG I've played in recent times, so if you loved exploring the wasteland in Fallout 3, the world of Fable 2, or the galaxy of the aforementioned Mass Effect 2, then you will love wandering in the wilderness of Red Dead Redemption. Giddyup!

Below you can watch the 30 minute Red Dead Redemption film directed by John Hillcoat (The Road). It is made up of cut scenes from the earlier parts of the game, so if you'd rather play through the story unspoiled at your own pace, don't watch it.

Mass Effect 2 review

Note: I will be making the following review of Mass Effect 2 as spoiler free as possible. If you haven't completed the first game by now however, I may mention the plot of that game. You have been warned. I will now return you to your regularly scheduled article...

Format: Xbox 360 (PC also available)
Publisher: Electronic Arts
Developer: Bioware
Expect to pay: £30 - £40

Graphics: 9 out of 10
For the most part, the original Mass Effect looked really good but the frame rate could get really choppy at times. Bioware have really taken care to make sure that the game is fully optimised however as this time around the game is silky smooth throughout, even when you're surrounded with enemies and biotic powers are being fired off with wild abandon.

We still have the "uncanny valley" phenomenon though - human characters have a slight waxy sheen to their skin which makes them look somewhat unnatural. Aliens don't suffer from this problem, basically because we don't know what alien skin would look like anyway and so our brains don't notice that anything is wrong in the same way, and the design of the races is as good as anything you're likely to see in Star Wars (I have soft spot for Turians, myself). Hair is also something of a problem - it doesn't flow or look like real hair does - which is why my male version of Shepard is a skinhead.

These are only really minor issues in the grand scheme of things, however. The design of the game is fantastic, with the Afterlife bar on Omega fairly early on in the game being a highlight. The repetitive structures of the somewhat empty unexplored planets are also a thing of the past, as not only have Bioware done away with the Mako vehicle completely but they've also taken the time to ensure that each environment feels unique. Mass Effect 2 is definitely one of the visual highlights of the 360's life span thus far.

Sound and Music: 9 out of 10

Voice acting in Mass Effect 2 is as good as you would expect from any Bioware RPG of recent times - amazing in other words. Jennifer Hale returns to play the female incarnation of Shepard once again, and she is my preferred choice for the role. Big name celebrities that lend their vocal talents this time include (deep breath): Adam Baldwin (Firefly), Tricia Helfer, Michael Hogan (both from Battlestar Galactica), Carrie-Anne Moss (Matrix Trilogy), Yvonne Strahovski (Chuck), Martin Sheen, Michael Dorn (Star Trek: TNG), Martin Jarvis and Robin Sachs (Buffy). Phew. A list of this magnitude really does serve to demonstrate just what a big business video games have become.

For some reason I can't quite put my finger on, the music wasn't as memorable as it was the first time around. Some of the themes remain the same - the galactic map music for example, but a good deal of it is new. I don't know... it just seem to fade into the background for some reason. The sound effects for both weapons and guns are really cool and unique for each one so you can identify what's going on around you without having to see it. I especially like the noises for the Warp power.

Here we are in the Afterlife bar, which comes complete with Asari pole dancers!

Game Mechanics: 10 out of 10
The inner workings of Mass Effect 2 is the area that has improved the most. Last time the combat was kind of OK, but it was stuck somewhere between being a proper RPG and a third person shooter. This time Bioware has put much more emphasis on the action side of the game, which will probably piss off some but I personally had no problem with. Honestly, the combat is every bit as good as a dedicated third person shooter such as Gears of War 2.

Bioware have also pruned back the length of the missions for this sequel, with most of them not taking much more than an hour to complete this time. rather than the longer sections spent on one planet from the first game. You basically choose where you want to go, get in, do what needs to be done, and then you're given a debriefing screen that details what happened, how much experience was earned and whether you gained any levels, and how much stuff like or you picked up along the way. This means you can play the game in bite sizes doses should you want or need to play it that way.

As previously mentioned, the Mako has been removed entirely this time around and visiting uncharted worlds has been streamlined. Basically, if there isn't something to do there then you can't land - there's no aimlessly trundling around scouring the ground for minerals. Instead you scan the planets from orbit until you get a spike on your scanner and then send it a probe which gathers the minerals for you. These can then be used on various upgrades that you either find during missions or by talking to your fellow crew members.

A lot of Mass Effect 2 will be taken up by you amassing a squad for the big mission at the end. There are more NPC's than there were in the last game, but they're all fleshed out about as much as the old bunch were. These characters basically fit in with one of the six classes that you can choose to be yourself, so some are pure soldiers, some mainly use biotic powers, and others have a nice balance. If you know what type of enemy your going to be facing in advance, then you can pick the right characters for the job. When going up against mechs for example, you will probably want to bring someone with the Overload ability or the ability to hack the mechs and temporarily have them fight on your side.

For me though, the most impressive part of Mass Effect 2 is how the save data from the first game is carried across. The choices you made in the first game don't radically change the outcome of the story, but a lot of things are different. It makes the world feel more real and gives you more of a connection to you character, as you have directly shaped the type of person that they have become. I also really like the emails that you receive from people that you helped out in the first game, even if they were just from minor side quests. Other choices are more significant - whether or not you managed to talk down Wrex in the first game or if you had to kill him, and whether you chose to sacrifice Kaiden or Ashley will of course have an impact here. The number of variables and the amount of data that Bioware had to keep track of must have been immense, and it's incredibly impressive that they have managed to pull it off as well as they have.

Some mechs go on the rampage.

Innovation and Cleverness: 7 out of 10
I'm going to give Mass Effect 2 a pretty high score in this area simply because of the way you can bring your old character and all of your choices over. It really does make the game feel a lot more personal. Sure, other games have let you carry over save files in the past, but never to the degree seen here. The really exciting part is that we can expect even bigger things from the final part of the trilogy!

Value and Replayability: 8 out of 10
This game held my attention all the way through to the end, which amounts to roughly 30 hours of gameplay if you endeavour do find and complete every mission. I'm not one to finish RPGs all that quickly, but I had completed my first play through at the end of the second week of owning the game. I fully intend to go back and play the game as a renegade character this time, making all the opposite decisions to see how things play out.

Overall: 10 out of 10
This is the first time I've seen fit to award a game 10 out of 10 in the history of this blog (which dates back to September 2004). I have come incredibly close from time to time with games like Resident Evil 4, Dragon Quest VIII and Final Fantasy XII, but none of them engaged me to the same degree as this game. It's not completely perfect (nothing is) and RPG purists may disagree with me, but this is the conclusion I have come to. I can't wait for Mass Effect 3 to come out, but in the meantime there may be some interesting downloadable content in the future...