Casual Gaming

Microsoft managed to pack 90 minutes with some tasty looking games and the newly named Kinect motion control camera. The slimline 360 makes a late appearance too. Here’s the Game Hub summary of what looked good and a bit of what didn’t.

Call of Duty: Black Ops

The Treyarch team have been busy with this one, it looks incredible. The level we’re shown seems to be set in Vietnam, starting in a dark, atmospheric, claustrophobic underground tunnel with some great lighting effects. It then opens up into the stark contrast of a sunlit jungle clearing before seamlessly throwing you into a helicopter to storm a river side base with machine gun and missile fire. It wasn’t clear if the player has full flight control or just control of aiming, we suspect the later. Normal gunplay looks like business as usual (yay!), but the awful ‘jam effect’ returns when you’re getting shot. 360 fans can smug it up too as all COD DLC will be coming to them first each time until 2012. Black Ops looks like a title unafraid to take on Modern Warfare 2, Halo Reach and Killzone 3, good times for shooter fans. Read More  »

Despite the DS outselling its Sony rival and even the big consoles on a regular basis, Nintendo are determined to get one into every gamer’s (and their relative’s) hands. With the children's market sorted they’re going for the grownups in force.

Handheld console manufacturers just can’t help but fiddle around. With both the DS and PSP getting numerous make-overs over the last few years getting bigger, smaller, slidier but rarely cheaper.

So it’s surprising to say that this is one upgrade that looks pretty good. Adding all the extra functions of the still recent DSi and supersizing the console to fit in adult hands and give them a screen big enough to make all the extra features worthwhile for once. While still not exactly cheap, the console will retail at £150 which is only £10 more than the smaller DSi.

So what does it do that we haven’t seen before on the DSi? Well not much to be honest. No Nintendo, new colours don’t count. There are only two colours available at launch, Wine Red and Dark Brown. It would seem Nintendo believe this the best strategy to attract the more ‘mature’ gamer, assuming they all like merlot and dirt. Read More  »

All your votes are in and counted. So who were the winners of the Game Hub Games of the Year Awards 2009? There are a few surprises amongst the obvious ones.  Fortunately for all the nominees, nobody got zero votes (somebody got one though). So here are the Top 3 for each of the 13 categories:

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Web-based games often get a bit of a bum rap from mainstream gamers. Either they’re seen as mere diversions from the real meat of the games industry, and often the games are designed as such, or they’re compared unflinchingly with retail games and obviously come off worse. However, as more and more non-gamers come into contact with these games through finding them on Facebook and other social networking sites, it seems they provide a valuable service. They act as a kind of ‘gateway’ game, leading the first-time player on to more complex and ultimately rewarding games. Read More  »

Ok, so the new PS3 Video Delivery Service has been online in the UK for a couple of weeks now and the collection of titles is fattening up nicely so it’s about time we got stuck in.

First up I tested an SD version of Escape from LA (101 mins) starring Kurt Russell. The file size was 1570MB and my ‘20 Mbps’ broadband was running at its typically poor Friday night rate of around 10 Mbps. Wanting to test how good the film would play while it was downloading, I gave it a few minutes head-start, during which time it got up to 5%.

Fantastically, I managed to watch the whole film without it stopping once, the download itself finished with half an hour to go before the film finished. You can monitor the grey line (like a buffering bar on YouTube) ahead of the playtime when you press Select to see if the film is going to catch up the current download progress. The quality of the visuals and sound was surprisingly high considered it wasn’t the HD version and was more than a match for the PS3’s excellent DVD upscaling. Read More  »

After our recent review of MMORPG hit Maplestory Gamehub was able get in touch with the masterminds behind the game and ask them a few questions.This is what the korean develoment team had to say:

1. When you released the game almost six years ago did you think it would become as popular as it has?
We did expect MapleStory to bring great impact to the online game society, but didn’t expect this much support and popularity with over 92 million registered accounts across the world.

 2. What were your main influences when designing and developing the game?
We are influenced by numerous factors, but the most important factor is the reaction and satisfaction of our players. We always review our content to check if they will be able to present fun and excitement to the majority of our players. As in designs, warm and cute designs were developed in the beginning, but as MapleStory service develops, we are bringing more fantasy factors to designs.

3. Was the decision to make the game two dimensional a difficult one?
It wasn’t a difficult decision. We had confidence that the two dimensional theme would be welcomed by our players as a pleasant surprise. Read More  »

Emerging from the deepest depths of Korea for European consumption in 2007, Maplestory is a massively popular MMORPG, with over fifty million players worldwide.Inspiring everything from Anime and fan art to a range of snacks. Whilst being extremely popular, the game is also very different from its online siblings, boasting unique visuals and side scrolling gameplay, while retaining many of the classic elements that make the genre so popular. With the recent release of the expansion pack, Knights of Cygnus, the time seemed right to look at what makes the game such a fan favourite.

After the initial, coma inducing tedium that comes with installing any downloadable PC game, it quickly becomes apparent that Maplestory is much more, and in some cases much less, than an ordinary MMORPG title. Visually the game looks like a cross between an upscale anime and the psychedelic imaginings of an overactive twelve year old splattered across the monitor. Colourful players roam across 2D backgrounds reminiscent of an early Megadrive title, interacting with surprisingly detailed characters and items, while a retro digital soundtrack will either serenade them or drive them insane. This style will instantly put a lot of more mature gamers off, but for those willing to look past Maplestory’s out of retirement presentation, a deep and engrossing MMORPG experience awaits. Read More  »

Ten years ago, turn based RPG action ruled the gaming world. Titles such as Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest had gamers craving multiple discs, turn based battles and logic defying haircuts. Not only were these games massively popular with both their fan boy audience and casual gamers but, in the case of Final Fantasy, were some the best games of their generation. Due to the fact that the majority of these games originated from Japan and shared similar themes, the genre was affectionately crowned the ‘JRPG’. Hours were chalked up, bosses were beaten and potions were thrown, all in the name of this eccentric and engrossing brand of gaming.

It’s no exaggeration to say that in its golden age, the JRPG really was the most popular gaming genre of its time. There’s not a gamer in their twenties that hasn’t at least heard of Final Fantasy VII and almost ten million of those gamers bought the game.  This giant fan base has inspired everything, from the standard geek fare of cosplay, to the big budget heights of films and energy drinks. This success allowed other JRPGs to break into the mainstream, with Pokémon becoming a global Gameboy phenomenon and Square going on to release a host of other Final Fantasy titles, each gaining commercial and critical success.

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