Guitar Hero III

Bringing Back the Old and Mixing in the New

So I know someone has already posted about Guitar Hero III, but I am not here to ask who wants to go head-to-head with Slash or anything. I am not here to give you a review of the game. I am simply here to discuss, if you will, the publicity that the artists get from having there music on such a popular game. Not only does it let old school rockers reminisce on some old school tunes, but it broadens their horizons to the new and up coming bands. All three of the Guitar Hero installments have new songs from the garage bands and indy bands alike, trying to get a name for themselves. Having their song come after Bark at the Moon or More Than a Feeling really makes them look good. I know when I played Guitar Hero I and saw Freezepop for the first time, I was like, "WTF, who are they?" After you hear them, you can't help but love them. My friends actually went and saw them in concert just after Guitar Hero came out. Now who saws that Guitar Hero doesn't sell? It helps all bands just like Freezepop gain popularity and some name recognition goes a long way.

Who can't forget some of the best classics that they brought into the 3 Guitar Hero games. Some of my favorites are Frankenstein by Edgar Winter Group, Carry On My Wayward Son by Kansas, Free Bird by Lynyrd Skynyrd, School's Out by Alice Cooper, and Cities on Flame and Rock and Roll by Blue Oyster Cult.

Overall, I love the games. I'm not that great on them just yet, still have to play on a Medium and Hard difficulty, but it is fun and exciting and the music is the best picked. Rock on!

Resources: Wikipedia

Look Inversion

Up is Down and Down is Up??

So for all you FPS (First Person Shooters) fans out there, I pose the question of if you prefer using the look inversion or keeping the classic default settings for your character when you run around.

First of all, for anyone who isn't into video games or isn't a fan of the shoot 'em up type of games such as Halo or James Bond, I should maybe explain the look inversion option and its great importance to the gaming world. Basically the default controls for a first person shooter is having one control stick to control your moment forward and backward and side stepping from left to right (or what some would call "strafing"). The other control stick is defaulted to move the cross-hair up and down and looking to your left and right. The latter control stick is where this "look inversion" comes into play. You see, the default for looking up is pushing up on the control stick, and down on the stick is down for the cross-hair or characters head looking down, however you want to look at it. BUT, there are a few people out there that prefer to have look inversion on, which makes the controls switch, making up on the stick make you look down and down on the stick make you look up. Crazy right? Well lets compare both.

Looking up for up and down for down makes sense logically. If you think of the screen you want the shooter to look above the screen or the radical to move higher, so you move the stick up. Same goes for down. So why would you want it the other way around? Many feel that the look inversion came from games that resembled flight simulators or pilot games. For all who don't know, the cockpit of a plane has a control stick. To lift the plane off the ground, the pilot has to pull back on the stick. To land, they must push forward on the stick. This is how any flying game is defaulted. Somehow this tactic of up being down and down being up migrated its way to shooting games too. So using look inversion can be thought as tilting forward or up on the control stick to look down and leaning back or down on the stick to look up.

So which is it? I personally for whatever reason have been accustomed to the look inversion, which inevitably pisses off all the default players. It is definitely a pain to switch controllers or use someone else's profile and find that they use the other type of look inversion than you. It really messes with you. You usually can't play as well. The ironic thing is that if I accidently start to play with inversion off and switch back after one game, I start off the game thinking the default setting is still on and am uncomfortable with it for awhile.

Well I hope you can make sense of all that and understand what possibly goes through other inversion-ist heads when playing the game. My point should be understandable so cut us look-inversion minorities some slack!

Resources: Game Trailers

Gunbound

So over the weekend I had the chance to go home and visit some high school friends. One of them that I have known for a long time reminded me of a game he got me hooked on for a while called Gunbound.

The beauty of this game is trifold. First off its simple to play. Second, its multiplayer. But best of all its free!

The idea of the game is indeed simple. You take turns with other players moving around shooting each other. The whole game is in 2D, so the way a player shoots is by choosing and angle and picking how much power to put behind it. The beauty of the game play is that while it is simple to start, it takes time and skill to become a true pro.

When making shots, wind is a big factor, and it tends to change... a lot. Other than wind, you have different vehicles which you use to shoot and move with. Each vehicle has different types of shots, different amounts of armor, and certain shots/vehicles which it is especially weak to. Also, the turn order is based on delay. Delay is increased by more powerful shots and taking a lot of time during your turn. Oh yeah. You only have 20 seconds to take your turn, so think fast.

During each game you can earn gold and GP, which is basically reputation or experience, however you want to look at it. The more GP a player gains, the higher their rating will be. Also, gold can be used to buy items for your avatar. Items not only make you look unique, but they add certain stats to your vehicle, and players will stack stats that reflect their style of game play. A quick note however, you have to make sure you play in a zone that is designated "Avatar On" for these stats to actually work in battle.

Now its time to stop rambling and actually get you to try the game yourself. First you will need to download and install the game. Once it is installed, go here and create an account. Just remember you don't actually have to put in real information to play the game. Next you have to create a Game ID. Go here (that is the site you'll be sent to every time you click the game's desktop icon), log on using the User ID you just made, and look for this button:

Click on it, follow the steps, and make a Game ID. This Game ID will be the name that shows up for your character when you actually play the game. Finally go back here again and click the large "Play Live" button. It will probably install different crap needed to play the game for the first couple times you click it, but just keep pressing "Play Live" until you get a window that says "Start" and actually starts the game.

Well there you go. I hope some of you actually try this game and enjoy it. ^_^