Friday, April 15, 2005

Nostalgia

I really should have saved yesterday's title for today. Nostalgia is a nasty nasty thing. I was in a video game store in town (well more of a city, but isn't that irrelevant to the point of the sentence?). Anyway, when I was there, I spotted this game, Time Traveler. I remember seeing this in St. Louis... in some little out of the way video game museum... Holograms...It was all 3-D and all really very cool. I was what in eighth grade I think, just beginning it so 13. Anyway... I didn't know the gameplay of it... I just saw this little cowboy walking around on this chessboard type surface.

First of all it should be stated... 99 percent of the novelty is lost by putting this on a TV screen.... now it feels like watching a movie. And a very low budget one at that. The gameplay is a bit jarring, but more than that you have a very limited amount of time to react. It is shoot them before they shoot you. Or in one case... drag you off to their cave/lovenest for a little-- well you are bedded by what appears to be a rather husky cavewoman... off-camera of course. Anyway, nostalgia is a lying she-devil...

I also bought Van Helsing for the PS2. So far this game is not bad... there is one factor that drops it down quite a bit for me. Lack of interactive camera. in other words I want to control what the character sees... not have the camera controlling me. I don't know what it is that makes a handful of games drop this capability, when they desperately need it. In Mario it was fine to have the one view... but if you are going to make any advanced fighting game with multiple enemies and a surrounding enviroment. You need to be able to focus on areas at a moment's notice. Luckily I only paid a bit for each game. But I tell you a camera locked game can make you feel like you paid too much quite quickly.

I got comics too. Ultimates met my expectations... Powers exceeded them. MK Spider-Man was ok... here's a tip, don't show your issues ending in Marvel Previews... it was a let down. Black Panther... it was a pretty good week so I will say that it also met expectations... which is good enough. And Mary Jane Homecoming, I really consider this the apple to my oranges. It was really very good. Expect a review on Tales from Riverdale #1 coming next week. Have a good weekend.

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