With today’s media climate as it is, with Weiner bringing sexty back and Tracey Morgan speaking out against anybody not straight, it’s nice to play a video game that is exactly how it’s advertised.

For your viewing pleasure:

Now, did you see that big fucking spider thing pop up like three times? You get to drive that thing! And shoot people. It’s great. We also are pretty sure you saw the protagonist rebuilding a walkway with his left arm “forge nova.” You get to do that too!

Here’s how the game started out for us.  You know when you have just one thing to do? It happens about once or twice a year. Everything else is already done or can’t be started, and that leaves you with one measly little chore for the day. These are the days where you only have to put on pants for like, maybe, fifteen minutes? Then you go back to your pajamas and t-shirt as if annoyed that being dressed like a grown-up is more contagiously shitty than the black plague.

Well, that was yesterday for me. And my one thing was to put in some game time for RFA. And for the record, I didn’t start playing until about 4pm. I’m a lazy sloth at times.

I honestly think Volition coded crack into the game. I couldn’t put the controller down. Seriously, I completely forgot the Mavericks were playing the Heat in Game 5 of the NBA Championships. I’m a moderate NBA fan, but only because I like to watch theatrics of professional sports.  Then I didn’t even watch the end of the game where apparently Lebron James pulled a Chris Angel and vanished in the fourth quarter.

Now that the introduction is through, here’s the rest of my neural firings.

More Playtime
Creative deaths. Part of me wishes we could transplant the environmental deaths of Bulletstorm with absolutely everything else from Armageddon. Then we’d be all set. I hammered a guy into a twenty-foot gas tank only to watch him bounce off. I would have enjoyed the explosion.

Epic battles. One of the pleasant surprises of Armageddon is the sheer amount of killing that takes place in a short amount of time. Headshots are fun – but erasing twenty people from God’s red Mars in under five seconds dwarfts that.

Secrets. I know I sound like a fucking five year old just discovering the joys of bombable walls in the original Legend of Zelda, but I can’t deny I would spend hours blasting shit up that doesn’t make sense just for one minute of ecstasy of finding something buried.

Less Playtime
Asshole CO’s. Every CO in the game is a stereotypical Patton. Nobody can be right going against the commanding officer. It’s more than played out, and this seems to be the norm for FPS’s these days. Oh well, can’t have it all, can we?

Fatality sans blood. Armageddon doesn’t really employ blood, and that’s something we definitely want to see. It doesn’t need to be spurting out of every orifice…ok, it needs to be spurting out of every orifice.

Final review up by the end of the week – probably Saturday morning.

Just yesterday I turned  on the TV to watch a spot of Comedy Central when this commercial comes on.  You know which one I’m talking about.

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A short review for a small-impact game.

Glitchoris BLUF (Bottom Line Up Front)

Could have been a fun game.  Should have been a fun game.  But…it’s just not a fun game.  NBA Jam just does not evolve from its predecessors.  Its like if The Legend of Zelda 2 came out for the NES, and instead of side scrolling, it was a third quest for the first game.  Don’t spend time on it, and for the love of everything that is right and holy about video games, don’t buy it.

The Glamor And Glitz

Like a mildly attractive girl on her best day, NBA Jam falls short when compared to the games on the market right now.  Sure, it’s fun for about the first five minutes, then you wonder when it gets fun.  Well…it really doesn’t.  Swatting a ball to half court and shoving a player in the air fifteen feet is fun for awhile, but the fun does not last very long.

Just watch the trailer.  The trailer will bring back fond memories of ’96.

…And there you have it.  Really, that’s the entire game.

I can not help but think the end fight scene in Halo: Reach is a metaphor of how Bungie feels about the end of the Halo series.  Arguably one of the gaming industries most pivotal, literally game-changing franchises, Bungie just pumped out one hell of a capstone game.

Glitchoris BLUF (Bottom Line Up Front)

Reach is a fitting end to an extraordinary line of games.  Whether campaign or multiplayer, solo or team-based, the action and fun is non-stop.  Buy it; this game is not going away anytime soon.  Nor should it.

Hardcore Ending

In today’s society of sequels and trilogies, lots of games always leave some opening for a next installment.  Here, Bungie pulled out all the stops.  Especially the ending which will have you asking the air in front of you if Bungie really did pull this on you.  Sure, there is death.  And yes, of course you save humanity.  We knew those things were coming.  But Bungie can’t be blamed for that; it’s the nature of the beast.

However, the final fight scene is so ethereally desolate and sporadic that you don’t know how to consciously play the level.  And while I am not on Bungie’s dev team, this had to be their intention for this level.  Such attention to detail is unheard of in our industry.  Not only did they try this maneuver; they fucking pulled it off.  Sorry, I won’t spoil it for you.  Just know that you truly are missing a piece of our industry if you don’t play it.  And I mean play it.  No Youtube video, cubicle conversation, or Glitchoris.com article can recreate this neuron-firing end sequence.

Shoot To Thrill

If you haven’t read the mid-game thoughts yet, you haven’t read how much I loathe how many bullets are needed to take down a shield.  Then, after another couple hours of emptying bullets into alien skulls, I realized how much pure, sadistic fun I get out of shooting an alien in the head.  Maybe Bungie did not want to rob me of that fun.  Sure, they could increase the mob counts by say 100%, or they could increase the capacity to take concentrated metallic projectiles by 100%.  Either way, the goal is the same: have fun shooting alien baddies in the head.

Another added element in Reach is your environment.  Wait for an alien to circle around an enlarged gas tank, then ignite one to ignite the other.  Want to outflank a hunter?  With the larger playable maps, you can do this.  There is more than one direct path to get to many of the games next playable areas; this was something the previous games lacked (severely).

Upgrade Downloading…

It is simply a matter of time before the next map pack releases, the newest armor upgrades are available, and MLG hosts a massive Halo: Reach tournament.  Hours may be spent increasing your rank and/or increasing  your tolerance for seeking out those hard to get and elusive achievements.

While you may not get all the fun weapons to start, and I did spend a solid five minutes one Saturday night over Live bitching about the back-to-back times I picked up a sword only to end the mission in the next three seconds, they are out there waiting for you to pick them up and put someone down.

Just ask a friend who is playing Reach at the moment what rank they are.  They can tell you without even thinking about it.  Ask them what visor they wear; they will tell you with a smirk while telling you which one they are saving up to purchase.  Ask them what voice they attributed to their character for multiplayer.  They’ll know…they’ll know.

Final Thoughts…

With online gaming what it is today, Reach brings out the best in its gamers.  It brings out our enthusiasm to work together as a team and simultaneously bestowing us with enthusiasm for the achievements.  Buy it.  If not for the ending, for everything you will gain in the process.

Growing up in Chicago in the 1980′s and early 90′s, I followed in my dad’s footsteps and became a diehard Chicago Bears fan, even though they’re perpetually horrible.  When I first heard the name, “Kevin Butler”, I was like ten years old.  That was about 17 years ago, so we ain’t talking about the new Playstation 3 “mascot”, Kevin Butler, who seems to be VP in every Sony department.  The Kevin Butler I’m talking about was a kicker for Da Bears, and a damn good one.  This new Kevin Butler however, seen now in millions of homes on I think about a dozen different commercials, is absolutely friggin hilarious – and one of the coolest marketing campaigns for video games in a long time.

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