Alien vs Predator - Xbox 360

You’d think that after several films, a handful of games and numerous graphic novels the Weyland Yutani corporation would of learned its lesson and steered well clear of any Xenomorphs and strange looking pyramids.

Yet here we are in the presence of what I believe is the 4th incarnation of the Alien vs Predator series, once again watching Bishop admiring the Xenomorph’s simplistic and primal beauty, and once again witnessing the bloodbath of events that happens when you put a Predator, Marines and a Xenomorph all in the same room.

Fortunately this game is set in the future, and all but completely abandons the environment and settings that was established in the awful films released a few years earlier.

Taking the imagery and feeling from the earlier Alien films was definitely a wise move for the developers, as the world established by Ridley Scott (and later developed by James Cameron, followed reluctantly by David Fincher), makes a perfect setting for a game of this type.

There are three campaigns to play.

First is the Marine campaign, which sees the gamer take control of a character simply known as the Rookie.

Arriving on-planet after your command ship is destroyed by a massive Predator cruiser, you have to pick up the pieces of the events and find out what has happened on the planet.

Taking instructions from a female marine called Tequila, you have to fight off the Xenomorph hoards and run round the facility switching on power generators and searching for the remaining survivors scattered around the complex.

Unfortunately for some of the survivors they have been “hived”, and are expecting an ickle baby Alien to burst through their chests at any minute.

Playing as the marine you find various weapons scattered through the world, all which bear the signature sounds established in the classic 1986 movie Aliens.

There’s the explosive pulse rifle, sounding exactly as if it’s been pulled from the feature film, and the repetitive beep on the motion detector, which ramps up the tension and makes you feel just as petrified as Bill Paxton’s character did.

For the most part the campaign plays quite well. However, there are a few omissions that are glaringly obvious.

Unlike most first person shooters out there, Rookie appears to be unable to duck and take cover. This really bothered me, partly because I am massive chicken and all I wanted to do was hide – especially during those moments when the eggs containing facehuggers hatched. The other reason was because I noticed my NPC counterparts had the ability to do it, which just made me jealous.

Perhaps it is because he is a real rookie, and due to health and safety regulations he hasn’t passed the Weyland-Yutani training course on how to duck properly – futuristic political correctness gone mad. I don’t know, but none the less it’s an odd omission that makes the game feel quite dated.

It’s also strange that you can’t view down the iron sights on your pulse rifle or shotguns – a mechanic that has pretty much become standard on first person shooters in this day and age.

The Alien campaign is completely different and gives a bit of back story to the events of the Marine campaign.

Taking control of a captured Xenomorph, number Six, you start off trapped within a science lab in the Weyland-Yutani complex.

Needless to say something goes wrong, the facility’s power is knocked out, you then escape and the humans panic as you and your siblings run around, killing the poor employees in the most grisly way possible.

The lack of any long distance weapons is noticeable during the Alien campaign, but the developers have countered this by changing a few of the in-game mechanics.

Darkness is the Xenomorph’s best friend, so you have the ability to smash lights around the complex so you can confuse the humans, crawl right next to them and spring your attack from out of nowhere.

It also helps (and at times confuses you), that the Xenomorph can run on any surface. Whilst it is a nice little addition, the controls can be a little frustrating and will quite often leave you wondering where the hell you have ended up.

Playing as the Predator is a rewarding experience. Taking control of a Young Blood hunter, who is proving himself to the extra-terrestrial clan, you come equipped with all the weapons and technology featured in the movies – there’s the red cross-hair laser, the thermal vision and, not to mention, the twin wrist blades that come in so handy during those melee attack moments, especially when fighting off the “serpents” (the Predator’s word for the Xenomorphs).

Overall the look and feel of the game is spot on – with the developers throwing in nods to all the movies, and it features quite a number of chilling sequences. Sadly the graphics do look a little dated, and a few tweaks to the motion and movement of playing the Alien could of vastly improved the experience.

The gameplay can get very repetitive at times as well, especially in the Marine campaign – which after several levels becomes a standard bug hunt.

The multiplayer can be good fun, but it still suffers from the same mechanical problems that plague the singleplayer campaigns. It can also take ages to find a game.

If you are a fan of either the Alien or Predator films series then you’ll enjoy Rebellion’s latest effort for it’s novelty value. It’s incredibly faithful to the series, even going so far to make use of the likeness and voice of the actor Lance Henriksen (who famously played the recurring character Bishop). But if you are looking for the next big first person shooter, this game narrowly misses the mark.

Due to the commercial success of Alien vs Predator, a sequel will no doubt be on the way. Fingers crossed they’ll address the problems with this current title, as it really does have the potential to be an entertaining FPS franchise.

Verdict: 6.5 out of 10

The Good
Very faithful to the films
The three campaigns play differently

The Bad
Poor controls
Dated graphics

Topics up for discussion were:

Battlefield: Bad Company 2
Alien vs Predator
Bioshock 2
Heavy Rain

And more…

Bioshock 2 - Xbox 360

Raising a lot of eyebrows when it was announced, due to various development issues, Bioshock 2 is easily one of the best first person shooters to be released in the last year.

Picking up 10 years after the events of its predecessor, Bioshock 2 sees you controlling one of the first Big Daddies of Rapture: ‘Subject Delta’.

If you are unfamiliar with the 2007 game, Bioshock is set within the underwater city of Rapture and tells the tale of Jack, an individual who’s plane crashes into the Atlantic, allowing him to discover the city, and the horrors within.

In the first game it was explained how the scientists of Rapture found a substance within a certain sea slug, ADAM. Once harvested – through inserting the slugs into young girls’ stomachs – the Little Sisters (as they became) would extract the ADAM from dead bodies to create plasmids.

The plasmids would then be used to overwrite the user’s DNA, granting them superhuman abilities, with the slight side effect of insanity.

Eventually the populace of Rapture became addicted, thus putting the Little Sisters in vulnerable position, so the scientists counteracted this by creating protectors for the Little Sisters – Big Daddies – mentally conditioned humans in armoured diving suits.

Returning to the city of Rapture, it appears despite the decade of rust and degradation the city is still airtight, though now it is under the control of a new individual – insane psychiatrist Sophia Lamb.

Unlike the first game, where you were an outsider to the city, with Bioshock 2 your character is already established, and is part of the everyday proceedings in Rapture.

Starting off with a cutscene set in 1958, you learn that your little sister, Eleanor, is in fact Sophia Lamb’s daughter.

Your character is then forced to commit suicide.

Ten years pass and you find yourself revived in Vita Chamber, receiving psychic messages from Eleanor.

If you are familiar with Bioshock not much has changed with the sequel. The environment is every bit as creepy as the previous installment, with all the signature art deco features and waterfalls in place.

Exploring the city can be quite rewarding, as you will find many corpses to loot and various weapons scattered around. All of these items will come in handy in the fight against the ADAM addicted “Splicers”.

The former residents of the city have also been very considerate in leaving various audio diaries around for you to find and listen to.

As you progress you learn Sophia Lamb and her “family” of splicers have taken control of Rapture, and she was original brought to Rapture by its founding father, Andrew Ryan, to help those who were unable to cope with the life underwater.

Bioshock 2 handles very well. Controlling Delta you come equipped with a massive drill and a host of plasmids, and as you progress you pick up various weapons, all of which are quite satisfying to use.

There’s the rivet gun and the hacking pistol, not to mention the various plasmids that grant you all sorts of weird and wonderful abilities. These include telekinesis and the ability to shoot electricity (Emperor Palpatine style), at the various Splicers and Big Daddies you encounter.

During the exploration of Rapture you’ll encounter other Little Sisters, who you can choose to adopt or harvest. Adopting them will give you an extra job to do, since they will harvest ADAM from various corpses as you protect them.

Opting to harvest them will reward you ADAM, and as a result will eventually lead to gaining further powers. But be warned – doing either will attract the attention of the Family, and the wrath of the Big Sisters (Little Sisters from the previous game who are all grown up).

Another means of achieving more weapons and plasmids is through hacking the vending machines scattered around Rapture.

The controls for Bioshock 2 are easy to slip into, and the game quickly becomes a breeze to play. The ability to run faster by pressing R3 would be nice, but generally the game plays very smoothly.

Graphically, the game is not up there with its predecessor, but it’s still very impressive despite a few bugs here and there.

The sound is also spot on – the Little Sister’s voices balancing perfectly on the edge between cute and just plain freaky.

Unlike the first game Bioshock 2 has an online counterpart, featuring a variety of multiplayer modes. Set just prior to the events of the previous game there is a selection of matches to take part in, ranging from standard team deathmatch to objective-based games like capture the flag – or in the case of Bioshock 2, capture the screaming Little Sister.

Overall, Bioshock 2 is a great game, and while not as groundbreaking or fresh as its predecessor, it is most certainly worth a purchase.

Verdict: 8 out of 10

The Good
Great level design
Beautiful environments
Simple controls

The Bad
A bit too similar to its predecessor

UK Truck Simulator - PC

I hate trucks.

As a driver, Ive often found myself stuck behind a truck on a motorway, or stuck behind a truck on a country lane, or stuck in a queue of traffic – caused by a truck.

In fact, Im of the belief that trucks should only drive at night, and save the rest of humanity from the endless pain of watching a truck try to overtake another truck at 50 miles per hour at 6pm on a Friday evening.

So, despite my apparent hatred of the haulage industry, I was surprised to find that UK Truck Simulator, latest in a long line of sims from SCS Software, isn’t that bad, despite how boring it sounds.

The game does exactly what it says on the side of the shipping container- it simulates the life of a trucker, starting you off with one rig before allowing you to move up to running a company and maybe even a haulage network of your own, all rendered on a pretty decent recreation of Britain’s roads.

The gameplay is straightforward, and thankfully the gear changes are set on automatic by default, as a truck seems to have 1,000,000 gears, as well as some furry dice. The arrow keys control the rig’s steering, with other keys controlling speed, camera view, cabin controls and the links between cabin and container.

Once you’ve got all the controls sorted out, it’s time to get trucking.

The basic idea is to pick up cargo in one city, drive it to another and drop it off. Along the way you have to navigate around Britain’s motorway system, driving carefully to avoid breaking the law, causing accidents or damaging the cargo itself.

The various highways and byways are all well created, and give the impression that youre really driving from A to B – I tested the M42 (a motorway I’m very familiar with) and found it to be well recreated, even down to the bridges.

The weather effects are also nicely rendered and often switch mid-drive, going from sun to rain in a few minutes- a fact of life us Brits have come to accept.

The roads are also filled with other drivers and trucks, who are only to happy to beep you if you get slightly out of line (or if you go careening into them at high speed.)

If you make any legal or literal mistakes the game deducts cash and kudos from you and your rig, and as you can spend money upgrading the cabin, or even buy a new one, its a good idea to try and drive within the rules of the road- not easy for a gamer raised on a diet of Grand Theft Auto.

But, once you get past the fact that youre playing a truck simulator, the game can be quite good fun.

While it is at times mind-numbingly dull, the game is quite therapeutic and, thankfully, a lot of the longer journeys can be made shorter with a spot of time dilation.

Once you reach your destination, provided you didnt spread it all over the A192, you have to navigate into a major city and drop off your cargo.

This is where the game struggles a little as the map interface isnt clear enough, leaving you driving around trying to find a turn which isnt clearly marked (which is also true in real life in many cities).

Once you finally locate the yard you have to reverse in and drop off the container, a feat made all the more difficult by the dodgy camera and awkward nature of reversing a truck. While you can switch to third-person or overhead view, both struggle to show the angles correctly and can make parking up awkward.

The game also suffers a little with the AI programming of other vehicles. While most follow the rules of the road, quite often I found myself being cut up by the driver of the little Mini-like car in front of me and, as any driver will know, you dont cut up a truck which is barrelling up the outside lane.

Graphically the game is pretty good. You wont need a powerful graphics card to run it, but the trucks themselves, the cabin interior, the roads and the cities are all pretty well rendered, with only a little drop-in on trees. Kudos has to go on the weather effects, with fog, snow and rain realistically restricting your view and rendering a simple drive from Manchester to Grimsby a terrifying experience filled with close calls.

But, if all this careful driving isnt your thing, dont despair – you can crash the trucks, and I cant deny I did this a lot.

There’s just something satisfying about sending a big rig full of panes of glass into a petrol station at high speed, or barrelling into another truck head on.

Sure, while there arent any explosions, it’s still a laugh and quite cathartic after half an hour or so of driving at a very slow speed and minding your mirrors.

While I’m still convinced trucks should only drive late at night – and not at any other time – UK Truck Simulator is sure to please the trucking or sim purist. While the slow nature of the gameplay isnt for everyone, the decent detail provided by the game and the chance to get behind the wheel of a road titan is pretty good. While there are a few flaws in the graphics and control department the game stands pretty well on its own and, though its not one for me, if you’re a sim or trucking fan it is well worth a look.

Score: 7/10

Good Stuff:
Detailed simulator
Nice weather effects
Trucking fans will love it

Not So Good Stuff:
Dodgy controls and camera
Poor driver AI
Fairly dull unless youre into trucks

The Saboteur - Playstation 3

Ultimately, Pandemics swansong, The Saboteur is all a bit hit and miss. Which is a shame, because under the surface of it all, there is a good game screaming to be let out.

While the idea of a World War II sandbox style game is a mouth watering prospect, there are elements of it that are about as much fun as meeting a Nazi sympathiser. But more on these flaws later.

The game starts off in a burlesque nightclub in Paris, packed with strippers and Nazi soldiers. As the camera pans past the boobs and booze, it focuses on the protagonist Sean Devlin. Holding a torn photograph, the man is clearly upset.

After an introduction mission in which Sean is coerced in to blowing up a Nazi fuel depot, the game shifts itself back in time a bit, just before the Nazi’s invade France and provides us with a bit of back story (this gives us insight as to why Sean hates the Nazi’s, because you do need a reason don’t you).

Sean and his friend Jules, are in the city of Saarbrúcken and Sean is taking part in a car race.

During the said race, a German called Kurt Dierker shoots Sean’s car tyres when it becomes apparent that Sean will win. In retaliation, Sean and Jules steal Kurt’s car when he isn’t looking and drive it off a cliff. Unfortunately for them however, Kurt is a prominent Nazi and even more unfortunate for Jules, Kurt decides to kill him.

Sean escapes, rescues Jules family just as the Nazi’s are crossing the border and they relocate to the Belle De Nuit.

Pretty soon after that, Sean is living with a bunch of burlesque dancers and is recruited by the French Resistance, finding himself doing a variety of jobs all over the city and blowing more things up.

Being a sandbox style game, its all a bit like Grand Theft Auto, but set in a Nazi occupied Paris. There’s a main campaign to follow and through out the city, there are a variety of side missions to take part in.

The missions themselves vary from full on gun fights, to quests with a more espionage nature.

For the most part, it’s a case of driving over there, shoot that person, run away, go over there and blow that up. During the process of these missions, Sean slowly liberates parts Paris and public morale is gradually restored. If Sean gets in a fight with a Nazi, in an area with high morale, Seans allies (such as the French Resistance) will get involved and help him out.

Through out the game, there is the option to upgrade Sean’s skills such as his accuracy, ammo count and damage. These are gained through a variety of actions, such as evading high level security, sniping targets and demolishing Nazi areas.

Presented in the 3rd person, the developers have done a good job with the design of the environments and have captured the feel of the period very amicably.

This is helped in part by the fact that the areas that are controlled by the Nazis, are presented in black and white – it’s all a bit ‘Sin City’, with a high contrast between the lighter shades and the darker ones.

With this saturated filter only a few colours are left untouched, with examples including the red spray of blood, street lights, red Nazi signs and the burning end of Sean’s cigarettes. This is a neat little design touch and it’s during these moments that the game looks best.

When Sean liberates an area, the colour is returned to the environment and as a result, it looks a lot less exciting and unfortunately, highlights the rather drab animation.

Sean can climb pretty much any building and doing so will raise the suspicions of any nearby Nazi soldiers. This is a pretty neat mechanic that keeps the player on their toes and aware of their surroundings. The same thing happens when you run – although, I wouldn’t personally count running as a suspicious activity, for all they know Sean could be going for a jog or something. Anyway, I digress.

The aiming during the shoot outs is pretty loose at times and it seems to take Sean a lifetime to equip or reload his gun. The handling during the driving moments is pretty stiff as well, making the races and escape sequences much more of a chore than they should be.

The game also suffers from some questionable animation and character rendering. These are highlighted during a number of cut scenes and when Sean is climbing up buildings. The animation just doesn’t have the grace and elegance of other titles out there.

Audibly, the game is quite impressive. The vehicles have that 1930s engine sound that you would expect to hear and as you drive through the city, you can hear music suitable from that period.

The sound of the weapons also hit the mark, particularly those that involving an explosion.

The voice acting is rather dire and features some of the worst accents ever attempted since Harrison Ford pretended to be Russian. It lacks a certain flow and doesn’t do the story justice.

The script could also do with a tidy up – call me a prude, but there is far too much swearing in this game – so much that it doesn’t sound as natural as it should. It’s needless and doesn’t help advance the story. It’s almost as if the game is so busy trying to appeal to the adult gamer, that it in the process it comes off as immature.

Speaking of which, there is the option to download “The Midnight Show” for free. This extra content offers further places for Sean to hide, oh and the option to see all the burlesque dancers with the tops off – something that baffles me completely, as they weren’t wearing much in the first place.

On paper, The Saboteur is a great idea, the plot is engaging and the missions are for the most part quite exciting, however it is let down by a number of flaws that make it fall short of the mark.

It could have been brilliant and whilst there is a certain amount of enjoyment to be had with the game, I can’t help but feel it could have been better.

Verdict: 7 out of 10

The Good
Nice black and white effect in Nazi areas
Variety of missions

The Bad
Weak animation
Questionable voice acting

I got my hands on a preview build, thankfully in a high rise tower in central London, and not underground in a bomb shelter.

Adapted from the book of the same name – penned by Russian author Dmitry Glukhovsky – metro 2033 is a blast for survival in the remains of Moscow’s Metro network – the world’s largest series of bomb shelters (which also doubles as a public transport system.)

In the case of Metro 2033, it was nukes that destroyed the world, and like every other post-apocalyptic game, who shot who and when doesn’t matter all that much – it’s all about survival.

The fighting takes place both underground and on the blasted, irradiated surface, which has now become a nightmarish maze of mutants, starving humans, radioactive water and giant rats – hell on earth.

Into this world steps the lead character, Artyom, who is tasked with reaching the heart of the network to warn the populace of a new threat – one that has the potential to wipe out the last vestiges of humanity.

So far so Fallout 3, but what really set this game apart for me was the design, gameplay and sheer detail the developers, Ukrainian newcomers 4A Games, have crammed in.

The sewer system itself is a work of art, each zone offering a new look at what’s become of humanity.

Pigs live alongside humans, everyone’s armed and fearful and threats are always around the corner. Of course, the fact that your bullets are also your currency makes a heavy firefight even more galling – every wasted shot makes you that little bit poorer.

The action is brutal – mutated horrors come screaming at you, and your puny home-made rifle, the ‘bastard’, is hard pressed to hold them off.

Psychic attacks cause you to have nightmares, and if you’re in an irradiated zone you have to don a gas mask and keep a wary eye on your in-game watch – stray into the red, and you’re dead.

It all adds to a terrific feeling of immersion, and the story being set on the other side of the Iron Curtain really makes it feel fresh – this game has sleeper hit written all over it.

Though the preview code was a little patchy at times, with some of the animation a little rough and the lack of a melee button being particularly prominent (try switching to your knife when being mauled by mutated horrors – not fun 4A, not fun at all) the game seemed pretty solid, and the sound was a particular selling point – all moans and atmospheric music, which really heightens the experience.

The author, Dmitry, was also at the press gig and was quick to talk the assembled acolytes through his inspiration for the game: As a small boy he rode the Metro every day for ten years, and knew it backwards.

When hearing of the system’s hermetic seals and thick armour he was inspired to start his book, which he described as “my own personal journey”.

In it he created a world full of fear, where different underground stations have splintered and become feral: Nazis, Stalinists, traders and normal people all thrown into a mixing pot – a scene rife for movie adaptation, or in this case, a game.

He said: “Of course this is just fiction. But with the world entering a new cold war of sorts, with Iran and Israel and Palestine at each other’s throats, with rising global temperatures and global warming. Who knows? Maybe I’m closer to the truth.”

For all our sakes, let’s hope not.

Metro 2033 is scheduled for release on March 19.

Heavy Rain - Playstation 3

Let me get this out of the way first: Heavy Rain is not your average, bog-standard game, It’s as close to a cinematic gaming experience as you’ll get on the current generation of consoles.

Very much a labour of love by David Cage and his team at Quantic Dream, Heavy Rain is a tour-de-force that completely draws you in.

The plot centres around a murder mystery. There is a killer on the loose who has been kidnapping children and drowning them in rain water. Needless to say, a central character’s child disappears and the ‘Origami Killer’ is suspected.

With the torrential rain building up the clock is ticking and the tension builds up throughout the proceedings.

Initially taking control of the main protagonist, Ethan Mars, the game takes a little while to get going, but once it does you will find it quite hard to put the controller down.

As the game progresses you also take control of three other characters – each one having their own plotlines, which will later cross into each other in the final stages of the story.

There’s also a fair amount of character development to keep the gamer interested.

I’ll be honest here, It’s a hard game to review.

Very much of it is plot-driven, and if there is one thing that I cannot stand it’s reviews that are laden with spoilers. The surprises along the way are enlightening, shocking and to go into too much detail about it would ruin the experience for anyone reading this.

If you are familiar with Quantic Dream’s previous effort, Fahrenheit (also known as ‘Indigo Prophecy’ in some regions), you’ll probably know what to expect as Heavy Rain – it is very much in the same vein.

The control mechanism is quite unique as the game is a little bit like one massive quicktime event. However should you miss a button or hit the wrong the one, it doesn’t necessarily mean game over.

In fact there is no game over screen whatsoever. What happens is that the game will either encourage you to do the action again (for the more minimal tasks), or, for example during an action scene, your character will take an extra smack in the face, prolonging the sequence.

Throughout the game decisions have to be made, and quite often they will affect the outcome of the story. Should one of the characters die the story will simply go on, incorporating the death into the plot.

Depending on your reactions and decisions the narrative of the story varies greatly. For this style of game the mechanic gives Heavy Rain a nice little bit of replayablity, albeit in a way that you wouldn’t want to play again so soon after completing it.

I say this because the experience itself is completely unique the first time. Once you know the outcome and the plot twists, I suspect the game loses a certain quality.

Should you find that you are just curious as to how the sequence could have been played out, there is an opportunity in the main menu to play each chapter again. This also gives you the option to save your progress from whatever point in the story.

The game also rewards the player’s progress with several bonuses. These include a number of in-game trophies and unlockable content such as documentaries, concept art and trailers.

The cinematic and visual presentation of Heavy Rain is extraordinary and does a fantastic job in upping the tension. During certain situations the camera angles will change, adapting to suit the atmosphere or whatever the task your character is doing.

These tasks range from the more important events that affect the overall plot to simpler moments like having a drink, brushing your teeth, taking a shower and even changing a baby’s nappy.

Quantic Dream have also incorporated the SIXAXIS controls for these moments, as it’s a feature quite often ignored on the PS3 and it works rather well – feeling more like a feature than a gimmick.

For the most part the controls do work well. However, on occasion they can work to your disadvantage.

The game is quite often presented with fixed camera points and the mechanic of holding R2 and using the left analogue stick can at times leave you walking round in circles – it’s a bit like a throwback to the earlier days of the Resident Evil series.

Graphically, the game is very impressive and with the character models rendered extremely well (each one featuring detailed facial features and expressions), it is quite easy to overlook the shortcuts that Quantic Dream have taken. The environments themselves are beautifully designed and make good use of the lighting effects.

Though certain objects in the game’s world,are lacking the quality of the character design, this is quite easy to overlook and doesn’t affect the gaming experience. Another visual flaw is the noticeable frame rate, which does stutter a bit too often.

On the audio side of things, it’s all a little hit and miss. The music, whilst fitting the mood of the game like a glove, can be a little too loud and does at times completely miss the mark.

The voice acting is also a little drab here and there, with the accents sounding a little off.

However these are minor gripes and they don’t affect the overall experience.

If it wasn’t for the small technical hitches Heavy Rain would be a complete masterpiece. It is fantastically written, completely engaging and emotionally rewarding. If you own a Playstation 3, Heavy Rain is not to be missed.

Verdict: 8.5 out of 10

The Good
Good plot
Interesting controls
Fantastic character design

The Bad
Weak movement controls
Several plot holes

Dante's Inferno - Playstation 3

“Through me is the way into the woeful city; through me is the way into eternal woe; through me is the way among the lost people. The supreme Wisdom and the primal Love made me. Before me were no things created, unless eternal, and I eternal last. Leave every hope, ye who enter!”

While the idea of basing a game on a 14th century Italian poem may not occur to all of us, the developers of Dante’s Inferno have done a pretty reasonable job of transferring the feel of Dante Alighieri’s descent into hell into game form, even if the depth of Dante’s great story has been rendered entirely in cartoon-style cutscenes.

Our hero, Dante, has messed up.

As a soldier in the Crusades he was called up to purify the ‘heretics’ who had the gumption to believe something other than Christianity -a simple task for a man like him – but he never bargained on Beatrice.

Dante’s lover, and a suspicious maiden to be sure, Beatrice made a deal with Lucifer – If Dante remained true to her on his mission the devil would bring him back alive, but if he got a little frisky with some slave girl the devil could have Beatrice’s soul, forever.

And, as Dante couldn’t keep it in his codpiece, he’s left in a bit of a bind – enter Hell and rescue Beatrice, or face eternal damnation.

Naturally, he chose option A.

That’s the basic premise to Dante’s Inferno, and while it stands up pretty well on its own, two minutes of play is sure expose the game for what it is – a blatant and unforgiving clone of God of War.

The similarities are quite startling – Dante moves through epic environments, taking on titanic bosses, killing scores of snivelling enemies in disgusting ways and dousing the screen in buckets of claret – it’s obvious what the game was trying to emulate.

It’s just a shame it falls short.

The game itself is pretty solid, if uninspiring. Like the poem it draws its inspiration from, Dante has to traverse the seven circles of Hell, each one of which is patterned to one of the deadly sins – wrath, greed, sloth, pride, lust, envy, and gluttony, as well as a little stop in ‘Limbo’ – and I don’t mean the beach kind.

Now while wrath, greed, lust and gluttony are ripe to be turned into different types of enemy, with lust producing horribly distorted prostitutes (with stereotypically huge sexual organs) and gluttony barfing up diseased blobs of bile the game starts to fall down later when Dante enters the circles of sloth, pride and envy.

How do you turn sloth, pride and envy into enemies? The simple answer is – you don’t, and this is where the game stops being an interesting alternative to the God of War series, and descends into its own personal hell.

This is a shame as the first half of the game is good fun.

Dante carries out all the GoW traditions – bloody battles, check, massive environments, check, lava and high drops everywhere, check, but the second half is a let down.

Towards the end of the game it seems as if the developers decided to pad it out, turning the clever design and brutal action into what equates to a corridor shooter – little more than endless streams of enemies to be defeated on a series of floating platforms and similar rooms – repetitive and boring.

That said, the action itself is all very satisfying third-person hack and slashing, and while Dante can only wield a couple of weapons (one of which is a brutal scythe once wielded by Death himself), combo upgrades and magic keep things interesting and bloody.

A variety of special finishers makes the combat more fun, and various quick-time-events make boss battles easier, if a little less fun.

The controls are quick and simple, though the auto lock-on for ranged attacks (which largely consists of throwing magic crosses at enemies) is a little dodgy.

The climbing controls are also a little stunted, and I fell to my death more than once from unresponsive jumps.

The combat also suffers serious difficulty issues – certain enemies can be offed in their thousands, but the blade-armed unbaptised babies (you heard that correctly) can knock you down and keep attacking you as you lie prostrate on the floor.

The game also has a problem with combos – where as most games let you cancel a combo with a push of the ‘block’ button, Inferno forces Dante to finish every single move of the entire combo – leaving you open for attack constantly.

As many combos as can be unlocked with the souls you collect, that unbreakable combo is a mistake that wrecks them all.

However, despite the repetitive nature of the action and the GoW-esque combat, graphically the game is quite a looker.

The early environments are nicely rendered and simulate the descent into Hell in horrific imagery and high definition.

The levels themselves are all fire and brimstone – grasping hands stick from every wall and screams overwhelm your ears – it’s brilliantly done, as immersive as God of War and detailed as Bayonetta.

The later levels are a different story – It all becomes dull and repetitive, the action stilted and boring, the enemies repeated over and over – if only the developers could have kept that momentum the game wouldn’t just be a clone of GoW, it would be an alternative, and a decent one at that.

There’s a lot to be said for Dante’s Inferno. It starts well, the hero’s journey into the darkness choreographed perfectly, the action exciting (if familiar) and Dante himself nicely fleshed out through the cartoon cutscenes. It’s just a shame the game peters to a halt halfway through, replacing the epic nature of the early levels with repetitive enemies and predictable bosses.

While it can stand on its own as a decent action hack-and-slasher, its disappointing downturn and lack of originality leave it vying with the might of Bayonetta and God of War, and that’s a battle even Dante can’t win.

Score: 6/10

Good Stuff
Great art design (early on)
Great enemy design (early on)
Compelling storyline

Not So Good Stuff
Second half is a let down
Repetitive
Lack of varied weapons

Expected for release towards the end of the year, Fable 3 will be set 50 years after it’s predecessor and will see the gamer becoming the ruler of Albion.

Safe Cracker - Nintendo DS

I’ll be honest, I’m not really one for DS puzzle games, whether that’s because I’m thick, impatient or perhaps both, I am not sure.

Quite frequently, I find myself sitting there, scratching my head and screaming at my DS , calling Dr Kawashima all manner words that I cannot repeat on family friendly website like this.

Needless to say, this doesn’t put me in the greatest position to review a game that prides itself on being “the ultimate puzzle adventure”.

Developed by Kheops Studio, Safe Cracker puts you in the shoes of a….. that’s right, you guessed it, a safe cracker.

The game tasks you with finding the last will and testament of Duncan W Adams, the recently deceased CEO of DWA Petroleum.

Naturally, being an oil tycoon who has recently found one of the worlds largest deposits of crude oil, he was quite a rich man and all of his descendents are eager to get a slice of the cash filled pie.

That’s where you come in – hired by the Adams family, you have to search his estate for his will.

Unfortunately for you, old dead Duncan was an eccentric who liked to keep important documents, such as wills, clues and tools, in the kind of safe devices that you would only find in a James Bond film.

All sorts of elaborate and incomprehensible contraptions are scattered through out his home.

For the most part, the puzzles do keep you entertained, however on occasion they can be excruciating hard – this is not helped by the lack of clues that are provided to you.

In fact, come to think of it, there aren’t even instructions as to what you should be doing, no help button, no tips, nothing – you literally have to work it out for yourself.

This problem is further exacerbated when you manage to crack open a safe and within it, is a clue that is often so vague and cryptic, it makes you wonder why you are bothering.

If the game was to reward you with sensible clues and become gradually more difficult, I would understand. However, “Safe Cracker” fails to ease you into the process and pretty much punishes the gamer from the get-go with some rather harsh puzzles to solve.

For a game that is rated “3 and up”, yet I can’t see many toddlers playing this. As I said, I know that I am not the brightest bulb out there, but I like to think I am smarter than your average infant.

Apart from the main campaign, the game also offers the player a chance to do previously solved puzzles up against the clock. Each time you solve a puzzle during the course of the main game, it is unlocked for the time trial section.

Graphically the game is rather uninspired, with a presentation that harks back to the adventure games last seen on the likes of the Amiga and Atari ST. The environments are static and you navigate yourself from room to room, using the touch screen controls.

With each view point you are given the option to investigate items, using the spying glass, this will reguarly sometimes present you with one of those random and impossibly cryptic clues out there.

As for the sound, it’s pretty much what you would expect from the DS, there’s not much action going on so it’s nothing too exciting (a door opening here, a safe beeping there). The music is rather suitable and does do a good job in raising the tension a little bit.

This game is really designed the hardcore puzzle solver. With it’s lack of accessibility and a warm welcome for those not too familiar with the genre, it is unlikely to appeal to the average gamer in the same way other puzzles games have.

Verdict: 5 out of 10

The Good:
Lots of puzzles

The Bad
Far too hard