Well..we’re staying here…for now.
But in June, we’ll be getting the new site together thanks to my friend Kazz who will be giving us free server space and a free domain (Not a .co.uk or .com domain) which is also part of the deal before we can officially be recognised by Ubisoft.
As to when in June, it’ll be most likely before Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots.
So keep an eye out for more news for the new site.
Developer: Polyphony Digital
Publisher: SCEI
Released: Friday March 28th 2008 (On the PSN and Blu-Ray. It was due on the PSN on 27/3/08)
Console Played on: Playstation 3
Also on: Playstation 3 Exclusive
Rating: PEGI 3
I learnt alot of things this weekend. Dont have too many Kinder eggs, the smell on them afterwards in your hands smell rotten. Dont drink too much skimmed milk, you’ll have a bad aftertaste. And most of all, dont believe the hype.
Sadly, all of them things happened to me with the latter been the most important. Gran Turismo 5: Prologue is out and is the biggest hyped Playstation 3 exclusive to date (and will be till probably Haze is out, if not Haze, MGS4 will be). But…despite the fact its a Prologue, it somewhat lets down a little. How? Read on.
Gameplay: Its the norm for a Gran Turismo games, just pick a car and drive. But to get certain cars, you have to win races and this is where Events come in. You get 3 classes to pick from. Class C, Class B and Class A, pending on what classes your cars are at.
And where is Events you ask? It’s in a new bottom down menu, My Menu. You got all you need in this menu, the Events themselves, a new splitscreen 2P mode and more but there are 2 new main features that included in this menu, both of which you need online for (No online for me at the mo, normal service will return this week hopefully. Check back then for our review of the online service).
The first of the two is something called GT:TV aka Gran Turismo TV. Its a new downloadable service for users of the game, whatever verison you got for the game, which lets you download videos of motoring stuff including documentary’s, Japanese motoring shows and in a deal with the BBC, coming soon is…TOP GEAR! HOORAY!
The 2nd part of this is, for the first time ever in a Gran Turismo game, online play that supports 16 players. There was originally going to be 12 player online for Gran Turismo 4 for the PS2 but due to some problems, was ditched at the last second.
But now it’s back for the first time ever in GT. But so far, all we have heard is bad things. Noobs, online updates that fail halfway through and very bad lag.
But there is a serious lack of content, all despite this is a Prologue. Compared to Gran Turismo 4, there was 721 cars and just over half a dozen tracks. Now, in GT5: Prologue, take out the 2 in those car figures, you only get 71 and 5 tracks, 2 of which are new to a Gran Turismo game, the Eiger Nordwand from the free teaser demo off the PS Store, Gran Turismo HD Concept and a street course from London, which is all well and good but you could have added over 100 cars and 10 courses at least.
And rejoice people for the first time ever in a GT game, there are Ferraris!!! Including the F1 2007 Formula One car that Kimi Raikkonen used to win the F1 championship last year.
Graphics: Well, naturally they look nice, of course they do. The cars look really authentic with a in-car view for the first time in a GT game and once you see the inside of a Ferrari, you’ll be very impressed. But…there are 2 major flaws to the graphics. The first is that there is a slight bit of slowdown, nothing too bad to put you off the game and isn’t too frequent but it is annoying a little when it happens but nothing too annoying to put you off the game.
And the 2nd is that there is some graphic jiggies to this, it’s mostly noticable on a HDTV but it doesn happen on a SDTV as well (Like mine…I need a BRAVIA =( ) and while, like the slowdown, it isn’t anything to put you off the game, it does tend to be a bit annoying.
And I am going to add a 3rd major flaw.
THERE IS TILL NO CAR DAMAGE IN THE GAME!!! Kazunori Yamauchi has recently said that the car manufacturers are slowly but surely coming round to the idea of damnage to their cars. Hopefully, it’ll come soon in a patch for Prologue or is in Gran Turismo 5 itself when it is released next year.
Its a Prologue yes and it does very well at that but if this is pretty much what we are expecting in Gran Turismo 5 next year, we may just be a little let down. If you dont have online, take a point off the score for it but overall while worth £25, if it was a full priced £40 game, you’d feel slightly ripped off.
Graphics: 9.0 – They look amazing as per usual in a GT game, they almost look real. But a few issues bring it down a little.
Gameplay: 8.5 – Amazing as usual but a lack of content, despite the Prologue title, brings it down.
Longtivity: 9.3 – It cant last a good while with online when the issues are sorted. Otherwise, if you dont have Broadband in your house, take off 2 points of the score.
Overall: 9.1 – Other then the lack of content, the online issues, the graphics issues and the lack of damage, its a very good game. But may Polyphony Digital pay attention to the people who made the GT franchise a success and stuff Gran Turismo 5 with a shitload of content, get a great online service sorted (32 player Le Mans sort of race would be nice as well as Home intergration although thats been confirmed) and in-car damage sorted.
I was hoping this would be longer tbh. 1:19 doesnt exactly cut it =( I know I wasnt going to get it very long (Compared to Metal Gear trailers) but 2 – 3 minutes would have been nice =(
Still, may this do you over, its out a month tomorrow =D
It went down as what could have been one of the finest PS Store updates since the release of Warhawk with Gran Turismo 5 Prologue, a demo of Euro 2008 from EA and the final Grand Theft Auto IV trailer (That we’ll post in a while).
However sadly, twas not to be as we saw no update last night. No GT5, no Euro 2008 demo and no GTA IV trailer. Originally, everybody thought that the update would come online when the embargo on the Grand Theft Auto IV trailer was lifted at 10pm last night.
However…it passed…and nout happened.
Lestrade, Community Manager at the SCEE forums (Great guy btw, his voice on a headset is super sexy, half English half Aussie <3) has released a statement why this happened.
Hi all,
We’d like to apologise for the lack of a PS Store refresh yesterday. Unfortunately we experienced some last minute technical difficulties and were unable to publish the new content as planned. We are working hard to resolve these issues and content will be refreshed as soon as possible.
Lestrade
So will we see GT5 on the store at all? Maybe not today but if threads on the SCEE forums are to believed, a few forumners have phoned SCEE as to when it could come with it possibly coming tomorrow in a special store update but pricing wasn’t mentioned. All that was said was that it will most likely be coming tomorrow.
So the only way Europeans are getting GT5: Prologue is if they buy the Blu-Ray verison of the game. Gran Turismo 5: Prologue is a teaser game to tempt us into buying the main game, Gran Turismo 5, sometime next year in 2009. I’ll be reviewing it all weekend (Bar its online features, check the notice to the right) and Monday before posting a review on Tuesday.
Saturday March 22nd 2008 – Between 3:30pm and 5:00pm was when our hands on for the game. The place: the first WTF at The Nerve Centre, Derry. Me and Brendan were given a hands on of the US verison of the game (infact, I didnt even know Brendan was gonna turn up until I seen him with his brother playing Halo 3 8 player LAN xD).
And…lets put it this way. Its as bonkers and brillant as Melee was before it. At first there was trouble with it getting it set up as it was in Black and White but after 15 – 20 mins, it was moved from a projector screen to a HDTV and for 480P, it dont look half bad.
First thing you need to know is that the controller of choice you need to use when Brawl is released in Europe (WHEN FOR FUCK SAKE, WHEN!!!???) is either a GameCube controller or a Wii classic controller because the Wiimote doesnt do wonders to it, so best not use the Wiimote for it.
Brendan playing Brawl, playing as Ganondorf
We played through a fair number of levels as well as characters. Brendan played as Ganondorf, Kirby, Samus fron Metroid and Pikachu whilst I played as Mario, Kirby, Bowser and, me being the big MGS fanboy I am, Snake…like…a million times. The levels we played on it were Pokemon stadium, Sonic’s Green Hill Zone, Battlefield and Shadow Moses Island from Metal Gear Solid (IT HAD METAL GEAR RAY FROM MGS2 FFS! IT SHOULD HAVE HAD REX, NOT RAY!!! RAY SHOULDNT BE ON THE ISLAND, MGS4 ISNT OUT YET YA KNOW!!!)
The gameplay is as bonkers as before then you can imagine. There was another 2 players playing with us but it was to make a 4 player Brawl. Infact, none of us knew how to unleash a Final Smash when all of had a scamble each time to get the Smash Ball as all of us bar one were noobs on Super Smash Bros… and thats despite the fact Melee was on the Gamecube earlier in the day.
Me playing Brawl, Brendan’s brother is siiting beside me to the right…he was damn good at Guitar Hero…
If you remember, I said a few weeks ago when I said that this would be the only reason that convinced me to buy a Wii? I’ll quote you from it.
Hopefully, Ryan will get off his high horse and stop striking about Goldeneye and hopefully give a review of the game when it is released but right now, this is only the real game thats tempting me to buying a Wii.
Well…it has. Got a Wii yesterday for £260 with Super Mario Galaxy and Guitar Hero 3. It proves that a game like Brawl has the potential to sell Wii’s like hotcakes once it comes out. That and Mario Kart Wii, which Ryan will be doing a review of when its out in 2 weeks time but as for Brawl…
Our Thoughts: Brawl is one of them games that makes sense of the words, epic, bonkers, crazy and brillant. I’ll be getting it imported soon (and hopefully have a Wii classic controller by then or a GC controller at least) and will have a review for it soon after. But in the meantime, if you want a great reason to buy the Wii, Super Smash Bros. Brawl is one of them, maybe the most important reason of the lot, did the trick with me. Whenever it comes out here is unknown yet, but when it does happen, you have your reason.
When Brawl drops, you’d best be there to catch it.
Credit for the pics go to WTF Derry
Tomorrow, we will be giving you our opinion on a hands on we did recently at at a gaming event in Derry. Super Smash Bros. Brawl. Me and Brendan were there and we will be giving our thoughts of the hands on tomorrow. We will be doing it in 2 posts, one mine and one Brendan’s (Expect mine tomorrow…as to when you’ll see Brendan’s, you’ll see it when PS Home comes out…never)
Come back tomorrow, got a somewhat tiny other surprise for you as well if that wasn’t enough.
There was never gonna be no real surprise as to what the game of the year was. For all we know, we could have picked Barbie’s new game and you wouldn’t be surprised. In the end though, we picked a worthy winner in what will be 2008′s most innovitive game.
Media Molecule only formed just over 2 years ago in January 2006 but you can tell with the wealth of experience they got while working at Lionhead Studios, the experience is showing with Little Big Planet.
Play. Create. Share.
Thats the tagline been given for the game and it certainly rings true as that is the simple gist of the game.
Play: Just play about with many levels already built into the disc either by yourself or 3 other players offline or online. You can also mess up the levels MM have already built for you so you can adjust and shape it the way you want it. But this is why the 2nd part is much better then that.
Create: Better then messing the levels MM have already done for you, you can create your own levels for the game the way you see fit. Best of all, practically anywhere in level is open for custom. You can also lay down photos from your HDD and stick them anywhere. So if you wanna make a level that is also a shrine to the girl you are badly in love with (STALKER!!! STALKER ALERT!!!) or build a level based on your favourite band (Lord knows I’ll make one for Radiohead), go for it.
Share: After that, if you feel your up for it, you can then share your custom levels throughout the world via the Playstation Network. You can also download other levels that other players made for free but if a rumor I heard is to be believed, you could also be charged for them as well…on the other hand, you can also charge for your levels as well if you so wish.
We know that we could have gone for the blockbuster titles for No 1 like GTA IV, MGS4or Gears of War but it was innovation, great gameplay and all those cute sackboys that made us go for Little Big Planet as the No. 1 game we should all go for in 2008. Hopefully, we will see a demo very very soon before the September release but for now, when September does roll out, if you have a PS3 or will have a PS3 by then when GTA IV or MGS4 comes rolling, you must get this. Little Big Planet will one of the games of the year that will bring innovation and great fun to the player.
You can bet my PS3 and Xbox 360 and my games for both consoles on it.
I’m pretty certain that there are a fair bit of games on our list, some great, some debateable and 2 of them…Grand Theft Auto IV and Metal Gear Solid 4…will be corkers, that much is a given.
But what about the games that never made our list that should get an “honorable mention”? Lets see shall we? Here are 10 games that…just never quite made it.
- Splinter Cell: ConViction (Xbox 360)
- Fallout 3 (Playstation 3 and Xbox 360)
- Too Human (Xbox 360)
- Haze (Playstation 3)
- Unreal Tournament 3 (Xbox 360)
- Final Fantasy XIII (Playstation 3 [It's here and not the list because its 09, not 08 but in the unlikely case it is 08, its here])
- Final Fantasy Versus XIII (Playstation 3)
- Battlefield: Bad Company (Playstation 3 & Xbox 360)
- Legendary: The Box (Playstation 3 & Xbox 360)
- Prototype (Playstation 3 & Xbox 360)
Those games, while not on the same level as our top 20, are certainly buys. So…lets insert the final puzzle…what is Gamzsone’s No. 1 Game of 2008? Check back in a few…
Today, I noticed something on N4G about Gurrella Games website. GG are the ones behind Killzone 2 for the PS3 and recently, Gurrella and the SCEE forums have been adding a complosory option to link their PSN accounts with their forum accounts on both the SCEE forums and the Killzone forums with this taking effect on Monday (St. Paddys Day)
But while the transition over at SCEE has been going fine so far, the same cant be said over at Gurrella. When I posted the story on the PS Forums, a few members experience that they werent on their profile pages, they were on other people’s pages.
With a few experiencing going onto an account from a French person….and others going onto my Killzone profile!!! Yes, mine.
In fact, one person took a screen of what happened (Just to point out, I dont use vista), here it is below.
Credit for the pic goes to lordsynbios over at the PS Forums.
Plus, there aint exactly alot of content on their forums which is something they need to pic up on very soon. And they need to fix this soon before the switch when SCEE and Gurrella revert to PSNs as usernames as of Monday with a 3 day downtime between then and Thursday.
Killzone 2 Rated PEGI 16, Now Able to Link PSN Account [SCEE PS Forums - English Community Section]
