Dead Men

Finished The Two Thrones. Great game. Played through BlackSite: Area 51 and, wow, I can't believe how low the scores have been for this title! It's got great graphics, solid acting, reasonably varied locales, a poignantly politically charged narrative, and classic Area 51 gameplay successfully transplanted into a modern-day FPS mould. I think that's where a lot of people missed the point; this is an Area 51 game (i.e. a dumb shooter a la Lethal Enforcers, Virtua Cop, Time Crisis, House Of The Dead, etc...) with an anti-war message. It is not Call of Duty 4. It was a bit short, but very pretty and a lot of fun to play through.

There was one thing that really bugged me about BlackSite though: You can't turn off the rumble function of your gamepad, so if you choose to play with a mouse and keyboard, your gamepad will rumble across the desk as you play... Yeah, wonderful :\ It gets worse though; I've started playing Kane and Lynch: Dead Men, another harshly received title, and it won't even let me use my mouse and keyboard while my gamepad is plugged in! Argh! For a game that is near unplayable with a gamepad (yet satisfyingly entertaining with a mouse and keyboard), you'd think they'd give you the option...

This brings me to my next point: I'm about a third of the way through Kane and Lynch, and I'm loving it. The graphics are really fantastic at times, the story is compelling, and the acting is great. The gameplay, while admittedly little more than a simple mechanic to involve players in the story, is still pretty satisfying... Play the nightclub level, and you'll see. No, Kane and Lynch is not a particularly challenging game, but it does entertain with its simplistic gameplay and high production values.

It looks as though many reviewers got a little wrapped up in the hype and pretense surrounding these two games and kinda missed the point. Both titles are mindless fun and tell stories that are a cut above what the majority of games are laden with. While I don't think either is worth the ~$60 they're going for (I don't like paying more than $50 for any game, personally), they are both definitely worth picking up of you ever find them on the cheap.

Speaking of on the cheap, I got my free copy of Undertow... Did you get yours? :)

Oh, and one last thing, if this is true, I'll just get Assassin's Creed for my XBOX 360, thanks...