Eurogamer Expo 2008

It’s a bit late coming, given the expo was 2 days ago now, but better late than never eh?

The expo itself was a somewhat unimpressive affair, especially given the amount of hype, being little more than a large hall with a load of games consoles, and very little else. Some developer appearence there would have been nice. But being able to play the games there was genuinely useful.

First off the bat, Left 4 Dead. It’s hard to know where to start. Maybe it’s those moments where you go round a corner to see 20 or more zombies out for blood. Maybe it’s when one of the boss monstrosities throws even the best organised team into distress. Maybe it’s the sublime feel of the weapons that are a joy to unleash on the horde. Quite simply, this is a quintessencially Valve game. It’s balanced to sheer perfection, and unbelievably polished. The cinematic touches that have put their singleplayer endevours at the heights of many gamer’s lists have finally come to the multiplayer arena, in a procedural method no less. It’s utterly brilliant. I simply cannot wait to get my hands on it now more than ever.

The biggest surprise to me was Prince of Persia. When announced, I was skeptical: The art style seemed to me more manga than middle eastern, while Elika particularly struck me as appealing to the Final Fantasy crowd. And the Prince seemed like a douche. Well, unfortunatly the Prince is a douche, and the new female lead “Elika” really is more Final Fantasy than anything else. But for some reason… I still loved what I was playing. The environments that I feared would loose the middle-eastern charm of the last games, actually come off as being more Persian in style than ever, with classic Persian mythology being brought to life in stunning environments. I particularly liked the Cuniform writing adorning much of the terrain. I’m still not sold yet, but I’m now somewhat considering it now rather than leaving it as a complete write off.

Mirrors Edge was basically what I thought it would be. An undeniably polished and unique game that’s ultimately more hype than substance. The animation was fantastic, and retained an excellent sense of place in its first person perspective. The environment was entirely unique in its art style, but contrary to all that’s been advertised, I found it incredibly linear. Essentially the game gives you a building, and a few ways around it. Then another building. Then another. I can’t help but feel this, and the art style, will render it repetitive and unsatisfying.

Call of Duty 5 was in a nutshell, bloody awful. Retrogressive, unattractive and dull. The lighting was impressive, but the texture work was truly shoddy. The AI was pretty tragic, me being able to charge across the enemy line without taking a hit, while managing to find myself behind the enemy line, without even being seen apparently. Maybe I just played the wrong moment or something, but it really was not capturing my attention.

Fallout 3 is going to be a clear hit, but since I’ll have that tomorrow anyway, I won’t offer any more than that.

And game of the show? War Twat. I don’t need to describe it. The name does enough. Download it here. Now you heathen.

That basically sums up my experience with the games there. I had a look at some of the others, but I didn’t really feel any compulsion to try them, mostly being console games. I have to say the PS3 versions of basically anything that wasn’t a PS3 exclusive with bloody ugly. Very glad I’ve not invested in one now.