Glock - All of them

This sounds like a good time to introduce to you all that I am also a bit of a gun nut (psychopath) and weapon enthusiast *twitch*. I know I've only done one game review but whatever eat a shit. This review will detail the weapon system developed by the Austrian weapon manufacturer Glock Ges m.b.H. If you want to know it all you can read Wikipedia's article on Glock. This will be a streamlined ass and awesome comparing mainly second and third generation pistols.

Let me start by saying I'm not a fan of Glock. I recognize it as an effective, durable, and versatile bullet thrower at a price for every man and maniac. But I would take many other pistols over it in a heartbeat given the choice.

The Ass (3rd Gen):
- The trigger is probably the most uncomfortable piece of shit I've ever used. I've worn more blisters on my index finger with that gun than any other i've put hundreds of rounds through
- Plastic picatinny rail does NOT (usually) play nice with metal accessories
- 4.5 to 5.5 lbs (in most civilian models) trigger pull that will piss you off with that trigger
-Glock uses a polygonal (got lots of angles kids) barrel design so if you reload make sure you buy the jacketed rounds. Or so they say
- Lack of a safety or other extras people have become accustomed to (like a deCOCKer)


The Awesome:
- Durability. Drop it, run it over, smother it in mud and shit that bitch will still fire. Sometimes called the AK of pistols, I'd trust my life to it
- Easy field strip (tease) and cleaning
-High ammo capacity regardless of caliber 

-  13+1 .357 Sig here
- There is a pistol for practically every caliber. You can think it, Glock will shoot it
- On top of a multitude of calibers, most have a full size, compact, and subcompact model with barrel lengths ranging from 6.02" to 3.46"
- PRICE. $400 is low for a brand new fucking gun

 That's the gist of it for pros and cons. I just want to elaborate on a few points. First is the safety. There isn't one really. There is a lever in the middle of the trigger that needs to be depressed before it can fire. I guess its to help prevent a discharge in the holster or in a brawl, but I can't picture anything pulling the trigger and not depressing the lever. All it does is make for an uncomfortable trigger. So, WTF were you thinkin' Glock? FAIL FTL FML<good. 

Now, if a lack of safeties is a con for you, then someone needs a lesson on shooting off your load too soon and accidental discharges. Your finger is all the safely you should need.

  Oops not that one, Though it still applies...

 Train yourself on indexing your trigger finger. It will save a lot of headache and accidents later.

I also want to touch on the differences in Glock's generations. I hated the Generation 2 with a passion. Everything about it was awkward and uncomfortable. I was inaccurate as fuck with it too. However, Generation 3 came along and gave us an ergonomic grip that was smaller and fit a lot better. They kept the same checkered design which is fine. Generation 3 also finally added a picatinny rail (tactical rail for the n00b3 out thar). The 4th Generation came along in 2010 and attempts to reduce recoil with a familiar dual recoil spring. This makes the pistol slightly wider and really doesn't impact performance that much.

Additionally, you can get the "C" models, C for (cunt?) compensated. The barrel is machined lighter and there are two long notches cut into the top of the slide to reduce weight and make it aerodynamic, or something. Regardless, the differences are benign, but somehow the 3rd and 4th Generations are NOT interchangeable. Don't go changing barrels and have it blow up in your FACE. 

My final point is to say that Glocks are very good pistols. You can rely on them and many, many police agencies do. They are cheap for what you get. If there are any questions you can ask and I'll reply. With what I don't know, but you will get a reply.

J 

 

Castlevania: My Previous Addiciton

So I'm still trying to finish Dissidia Duodecim but I have yet to formulate a FULL opinion of it. So I decided I would do a rather lengthy review (in pretty colors I might add) Of what I have played of the Castlevania series.


*INHALES BIG BREATH*

Castlevania:
Many reviewers such as AVGN and Egoraptor have played the original when they were young, during the ACTUAL NES days. Me, not really. I actually didn't really even try it until a friend of mine hacked my psp and gave me an iso that had a bunch of NES games on it. So I tried it then. It was fun. ALOT of fun. But FUCK that game is hard. Super hard. Like, god dammit! Somehow I was able to play through to the end, and made it all the way to Dracula, only to get my balls rocked. My theory is I am doing it wrong, but who knows. I liked the game, walking around and whipping shit was alot of fun, the sounds were cool and the music was fun. The game is not only notoriously difficult, but jumping was hard too. All in all, a castlevania game I never beat, just too hard...

Awesome:
- To quote egoraptor: "Whippin dudes yeahuh!"
- Music was cool
- Enemy range was very interesting for its time
- Feels accomplishing that you get anywhere in that game.

Ass:
- Fucking hard.... TOO frustrating
- Bosses were strong, and some (DEATH) were nearly impossible.
- Dracula gets his own mention, just cuz he's hard as shit
- Hated the jump mechanic most of all. It's like you jump a little bit, and drop like a stone. Realistic yes, but nothing else about the game was. Also, you can't change direction DURING your jump, you basically made a choice and had to live with it. Bullshit.

Castlevania 2 - Simons Quest:
This game technically(chronologically) can't even apply to me, as the beginning states Simon beat Dracula. I didn't. I gave up.


ANYWAYS... there has also been a copious amount of reviews on this game, and really, I don't know too much about it. I just started it and didn't really like it.


Awesome:
- Nothing, really.


Ass:
- All of it?

Castlevania III:
No Idea, this thing wouldn't even load on my iso dealy.

Super Castlevania IV:
Didn't really play this either, although after seeing AVGN's review, I'd like to try it. I've considered looking to see how much a cartridge fetches for. I dunno...

Rondo of Blood:
I did play this, in it's various incarnations. My favorite was the PSP remake, namely cuz the awesome overhaul in graphics. I liked how it wasn't TOTALLY straightforward, you could take different paths based on finding a hidden area, etc. Another of the games I never beat, the iso for my psp was giving me grief. Or my psp is dying. No idea.

Awesome:
- RICHTER BELMONT!!!
- Very colorful
- Music is cool

Ass:
- My biggest complaint is the controls, still clunky as shit.
- Difficulty was pretty high too

Here's the intermission, when the HUGE change in castlevania occurred

Castlevania: Symphony of the Night
When I first played this, I was driving my friend home from work, and he said something about it. I said I never played it, and he said we'd have to change that. So I played the first part of the game, which picks up at the end of Rondo of Blood. So I started, and liked it. Really liked it. It was like.... a vast improvement of what I played at the time. The friend who hooked me up with the NES iso was able to get me the PSX version of SotN, and boy did I play it. The hell out of it. Beat it several times. Then bought it on XBLA and beat the shit out of there too.

Awesome:
- New, "Castleroid/MetroidVania" gameplay
- Level up, if an enemy is too strong, level up and come back. It's also an indicator of places you shouldn't be at yet.
- Customize weapon/armor, increase stats or just make it easier, with a long range/short range weapon
- Lots to play and explore, game doesn't end too quickly.
- Design was really cool
- Music was great
- Sound effects spectacular
- Character design cool
- Alternate "Richter" mode, really cool.

Ass:
- Voice acting was hideous. So much so it's actually pretty funny.
- Making the castle upside down for the second half is sort of redundant. Could've changed the layout
- Some enemies are too hard
- Dracula too easy

Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow
The follow up for me, to SotN. Not a bad game, the idea of taking enemies souls and using them as abilities and weapons was cool. Not as good as Symphony though, and more to the point, the design was fairly bland. I didn't like the sound Soma(Main character guy) makes when he gets hit. Or when he dies (DWAHHHHHHH). Fucking stupid. The story was meh, and the final boss was challenging.

Awesome:
- Being able to fuse enemy souls with weapons to make new ones

Ass:
- Bland design
- Sounds annoying
- Music meh
- Story was ok, just ok
- Enemies were gay
- Dying sound REALLY annoying
- Game just felt redundant
- Julies/Yoko mode. God was it terrible. Julius looks like a tree trunk with arms, legs and a head.

Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin
An interesting game, because at first I didn't like it and rushed through to beat it. Upon playing it recently though, I really like it. Essentially you play as 2 characters, Charlotte Aulin, a descendant of the Belnades clan(Featured originally in Castlevania III, and referenced in DoS) and Jonathan Morris, son of John Morris from castlevania bloodlines. It's the Castleroid setup again, but whats interesting is that the story is quite a twist. A vampire has used a power to seal Dracula within a different space in his own castle, thus making his power available to the vampire. He then seals the rest of the power within paintings, and it's your job to go through each one and kill the master of it to break each extra chain. There were alot of things I liked about it, because of the different paintings(portals) you get to see a diverse set of backgrounds, as opposed to moving in JUST Dracula's castle. The choice of playing JUST as Jonathan or Charlotte, or having both together made it interesting too. Some enemies are weak to magic, others, weak to physical attacks. It branches further by different elemental magics, and different weapon types(Holy, sword, Axe, Whip). Also cool is the quest mode, which has you go from killing enemies to picking stuff up. A wide variety, none of it too difficult.

Awesome:
- More or less everything...
- Story was good
- Choice to play as Spell master or Weapon user
- Depth of strategy involved by alternating the two to effectively defeat enemies
- Hidden dungeon, "The Nest of Evil"
- Cool Weapons
- Can unleash the true power of Vampire Killer, which is EXTREMELY effective
- A 2 on 2 battle between Death, Dracula, Jonathan and Charlotte
- Dual Crush, an ability that combines the strength of two for an awesome attack
- "Greatest Five" dual crush, summoning the power of 5 of the strongest Belmonts.
- New Game+
- 2 different alternate modes, Vampire Sisters/Richter +  Maria

Ass:
- Some enemies are stupid hard
- Leveling up becomes difficult
- Some Fetch quests

Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia
This is the most recent in the Castlevania DS franchise, and very...interesting. I have to give Konami credit, they don't make you play the same damn game over and over, they at least add twists. The twist to this one, other than the more Gothic painting art style(Overtaking the anime style prevalent from the previous DS titles) is that this game has the 'glyph' system. Essentially you play as Shanoa, a member of the order of ecclesia(hence the title) who basically are there to kick Dracula's ass, should he ever come back. Where are the Belmonts? In most Castlevania games(until lately) you play as a Belmont, or at least directly interact with them, Such as Richter in SotN, or Julius in DoS, or Richter again in PoR. In this one it's said that the villagers you're setting out to save are descendants of Belmonts. What? No Belmonts...?

Anyways... So yeah it's Ecclesia's job to make sure these power glyphs, the Dominus Glyphs, do not fall into the hands of evil, who can resurrect Dracula with it. Well, a close friend named Albus takes the Glyphs and runs away, and you lose your memory. I don't really remember the explanation. So, the boss of Ecclesia tells you Albus wants to resurrect Dracula, and you gotta stop him. So after you save all of the villagers, you eventually recover the glyphs, and fight Albus, who reveals to you that using Dominus comes at the price of her life, and that you should talk to Leader Jerk to find out what the deal is.

You fight him, and he resurrects Dracula, then you go into the castle and fight Dracula, the end.

Awesome:
- Glyph system allows you to use weapons for each arm, plus a third on your back, which allows you to cast enhancement spells, and things of the like.
- One of the big things that AVGN hated is how the WHOLE Castlevania game took place in the castle, where it used to be outside, then going in. This game is like that, the first half of the game is in random locales, and the second is in Dracula's Castle. A perfect mix.
- Design was pretty cool
- Bonus Dungeons to gain special items
- Albus mode

The Ass:
- Truly hate how EVERYTHING kills you in this game. You have to save often, cuz if you're like "Oh I'll just do this real quick and then save" no. No then you're gonna get killed by something insignificant and STUPID.
- I hate how when you die, you levitate a second, let out this stupid "ahhhh" sound, and blood flies out of you for like 5 to 10 seconds. Doesn't sound like much, but it takes FOREVER
- Bosses are too hard
- Too many fetch quests, some of which can take 5 seconds or 5 hours
- You shouldn't base a quest on Luck, there are some quests that require enemy drops, and it takes for fucking ever for the enemy to drop what you want. I actually had to beat EVERYTHING about the game FIRST(Bonus Dungeons too, just didn't fight Dracula) then come back and do those last ones
- Dracula laughs WAY too much, like every time he disappears he laughs. I know you think it's funny you dick, I don't WANT TO HEAR ABOUT IT SO FREAKING MUCH!!!!
- Music was meh.

Castlevania: Harmony of Despair
What do you get if you went out and bought SotN, DoS, PoR, Castlevania 1, and OoE? Well you'd have half the library of games in the castlevania series. What you need to do is find a way to pile them up, and smash them with a sledge hammer, until it becomes a sweet, digital goo.

Didn't make sense? Ok basically the games I listed in the paragraph above were taken and made into an XBLA game that has maps and characters from the games. The story is that some Grimoire summons Heroes and villains from various time periods in the timeline of castlevania, and pits them together in an epic battle. I've only gotten to like, level 3...

The awesome:
- I like how it's so many characters for 11 levels(total).  It spans from the first Castlevania(1986) all the way to OoE(2011).
- Music is pretty good
- Design was also good
- Another Double edged sword is the level system is somewhat... awkward Based on the character you are using is how they level up. For instance, for the Belmonts, it's their subweapon. For every hit you get on an enemy, the subweapon gets EXP. Eventually it levels up, and so forth. Thats just weird to me.
- Liked the various locales from a variety of games
- Loved the idea of the 10th level, origins. It's the whole of the original castlevania, with no real changes.
- Boasts up to 5 partners(6 players total) although it's Live only.
- Cool equipment options, such as boots that speed up your running ability.
- The name is a play on words, "Castlevania: HD", a play on words because the game is High Def.

The Ass:
- VERY difficult
- Origins is stupid hard.
- Seems to lack originality. There isn't anything new, no new characters or new locales
- Like PoR's Nest of Evil, too much is based off of Dawn of Sorrow. I mean, at least 4 of the default levels were DoS. Alot of SotN's levels were DLC.
- Speaking of DLC, why is so much of the features DLC? WTF Konami? My friend says that Konami likes to microcharge up the ass, and I'd say he's right. You start with 5 characters and 6 levels, and you can purchase and additional 5 Levels, and 6 extra characters to buy.
- Disliked how you have to play on Live to play with friends, I would've liked it if you could do Co-op on a console. It makes sense why you can't though.

That's just about it for all that I've played. There were others, like "Castlevania: Judgement" that I wouldn't touch with a stick, and others like Bloodlines, that I've never really gotten a chance to play. Over all I'd say the series is REALLY quite good, and maintains it notoriety of difficulty. If I could get J to play along on HD I may finish faster, as well as getting my friend to help me. My favorite titles would be SotN, Portrait of Ruin and Order of Ecclesia, in that order. I call it my previous addiction because I was playing it for a long ass time, and didn't touch anything else. It's fizzled a little, because I've beaten the hell out of PoR and OoE, and don't want to play DoS. I still aim to play HD, just don't know when.


Anyways, it's been quite a write on this one, and I don't know when I'll do a review next. Maybe later today, I dunno. I heard J was going to be doing a review soon, so keep a lookout for that! Peace!

M

Total War: Shogun 2

This is also something of an intro for me. I'm the #2 man and co-writer for this shindig we got here. And since I am currently playing this game, this is where I'll start.

This a PC game (PC FTW MF). It has multiple single player campaigns and two main multiplayer modes. Each campaign can run you about 30 hours depending on how you play and if you pick a long or short conquest.

The objective of these campaigns is to wage a total war (LOL) and conquer Japan. The main campaign map plays like the Total War games before it, and for those not accustomed its a map of the country where you and all other players take turns building, moving armies, recruiting units, making treaties, declaring war, establishing trade, and all other manner of diplomatic actions. Its like a pimped out version of Risk.
 The game utilized an RTS style of gameplay when your army attacks or is attacked, but this is completely optional and you can use numbers to fight your battles. During RTS play you will have the chance to place your units on a field and deploy against another army or castle. Each army can contain thousands of men and each one of those fuckers is fully rendered and acts individually. You can zoom right up and watch your men get shot in the face by arrows, its great. The game also has a historical battles mode where you can command either side of a realistic army in a famous Japanese battle that actually took place. There aren't very many of these, but its neat none the less.

The multiplayer component is the same as the single player, just all the other clans are controlled by people instead of AI. Its actually pretty in depth, but no one is ever on the damn thing. The single player campaigns also allow for drop in battles in case you want to kick yourself in the ass and give away an easy victory against the AI.

I'll go to list the good and bad about the game. I'll start by saying this game is fuckin great. I've got almost 100 hours invested in this thing on Steam, so I wouldn't have that much if I hated it. Now for the shit...

The ASS:
- The controls often don't give a flying fuck about you. You'll tell a unit on the main map to move somewhere and he'll take the longest route to get there at times. I told an army to move to a town and not only did he take off on an obscure route, he backtracked to where he was on the second turn. As if to say "oops, I didn't know where the fuck I was going."
- Some actions are based on chance, which add up to do whatever the fuck it wants. 5 star ninja can't kill a 2 star, then is killed by him? WTF is that noise? And this is a consistent problem that works both ways, good and bad
- NAVIES SUCK ASS/COMPLETELY USELESS
-Army movement is inconsistent when it comes to attacking. For some reason it looks like you'll be able to make it and then you just come short.
-This game WILL crash anything less than last gen graphics and OS. my laptop uses Intel i7-720QM and ATI 5870 1G GDDR5 and has never crashed
- Campaigns can drag on FOREVER at times


The Awesome:
- Pretty much everything else.
- The game (with good hardware) sports literally thousands and thousands of men engaged in bloody combat without a hitch. Riderless horses take off running, men cower with defeat and run, Generals are important characters that you care about and don't want to die. The detail is amazing
- The level of intricacy involved with managing your empire is aw inspiring. You have to carefully manage towns or you will incite revolts. You can change your religion, designate heirs to the throne, manage taxes, very realistic diplomacy with other clans. The game is incredibly deep and satisfying.
-  Runs on Steam, and Steam is awesome

I wish I could do a video review of this game, since that seems to be how people do it nowadays, but I'm retarded in the field of animation engineering. I will say that I recommend the fuck out of this game if you enjoy RTS games even a little bit. Hell even you don't, if you like strategy games pick this shit up. All the RTS elements are completely optional, except in multiplayer, but no one plays it so doesn't fucking matter now does it? This is the best Total War to Date (LOL) and will give you hours upon hours of medieval joy. You can always pick it up straight from Steam for a cheap price too. 

That's my review. Hope it helps, and I hope you buy it. If not, find a skunks ass and suck wind for an hour cause I don't give a flying fuck :)

J
 

Brief Review of Dissidia Duodecim/Introduction

Hello, if you have stumbled upon this site, my partner and I have started something like a game review blog. It's kinda inspired by AVGN, and 'Sequelitis' by egoraptor. I really liked hearing their opinions on things, which inspired me to want to do this.

So, for a brief review, I just REALLY started playing the new Dissidia game, the 2011 sequel to the 2009 game.

First off, the graphics seem the same, the controls and menus are *fairly* similar. That being said, there have been some upgrades as well.

Pros:
Naturally it's going to be compared to the previous...It's a sequel, right?! For the Pro's I'd say...

-Familiar Battle style and control, if you played the first it's easy to adapt

- Ditched the "Destiny Points" system, where you had like 5 moves, and you didn't get any bonuses, and instead have the "Kupo Points" system, where winning, chaining/winning or fufilling certain requirements gives you more, where you can access better equipment

- Made it easy to carry shit over. I really like that alls it took was "Do you want to load your info from the previous game to this file?" then, "All of this will be moved. Ok?" And THATS IT.

- New CHARACTERS! Of course if you aren't a Final Fantasy nerd and played them all, some will be unfamiliar.

CONS
- Something that really bothered me is how you have to play through with the characters it chooses for you, as opposed to the first where you can choose who to play as, then play through their story.

- Kain's armor is purple?!

- Seriously, in the DS remake, it was green. GREEN WAS GOOD.

- Purple... REALLY

-Disliked how they emphasized tutorial on REALLY basic stuff, like to dash, do this, or to fight do this. But when it came to the newer features it doesn't explain until fairly later. If you're importing my data from the first, it's likely to assume I know the basics of the first.

-It's kind of a double edged sword, but I didn't like how you have to move freely about in the world, then go into gates, where it takes you to the board you fight on. I do, but I don't. lol

I can't think of anything else off the top of my head, but hopefully this will provide me enough enjoyment until I get my 3DS. Anyway if you're reading this, welcome to the page, keep an eye out, as me and my partner will probably review just not games, but other shit, like me upgrading the jailbreak on my phone, or me running Mac OS X and Windows 7 on my iMac.

Alright peeps, stay cool.

M