At first, I wasn’t planning on getting Assassin’s Creed because the reviews were all over the place. Gabe from Penny-Arcade made a good point about what the reviewers had to say. Basically, he made the point that reviews have to review games. They look at games differently than a normal gamer. Also, AC was a game so large, that during this time of so many ‘AAA’ titles, there was just no way of absorbing the game that AC was. And he said that game was good. I went ahead and bought it, and while my first impressions were what I thought, they only got better.

Then they got worse.

IGN’s recent podcast made mention of what Gabe had said – which the way they delivered it was unnecessary, but he was defending himself. Then Gabe made another post. But this is what I have come to realize. And as Adam Blue of BlueGamer, I feel this opinion is very valid.

Assassin’s Creed is not much of a game. You only have a few simple game play types. Save a citizen, pick-pocket, find flags, eves-drop, interrogate, and assassinate. Each one of this is very simple, and takes no time at all. The fighting is as simple as pressing ‘x’, then the right-trigger at the correct time. Tonight, I realized I’m bored of this. The game features TONS of these same things. Over and over. And over and over. I want to see the ending by playing through, but it was be grueling. The game is huge, has great graphics, but has no real ‘game’. It does nothing new, it does nothing inventive, and it contains what developers should not do.

Gabe made a point about their relationship with Ubi-Soft. He said they will only advertise games that they thought were good enough to be worth the space.

So, while he made good points about reviewers reviewing games and the bias that can come from that, Assassin’s Creed is very mediocre. I would actually think that Gabe would feel the same way. But, with all the games to play right now, it’s possible to put only enough time in the game to think you dig it, but for the reviewer they had to finish it which made the problem with the game apparent – there is not much of a game here.

In Episode 2 of the Bluecast, Sean and I discuss gaming over the holidays as well as possible game of the year contenders. We also review the Hitman movie, and talk about the graphical limits of consoles. I also start the podcast off with the track, Grinder, from the Red Alert 2 soundtrack by Frank Klepacki. I’ve come down with a cold of sorts, so my voice is a little…nasaly. But enjoy, and remember to send us hate mail.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

This week, most of my game playing has been done between Assassin’s Creed and CoD4. The unlocks for CoD4 are just addicting. On Thanksgiving I brought my 360 and computer monitor over to my parents house to do some CoD4 online with Sean. We played a whole lot. I love how much you can customize your load-out. And I think certain combinations will suit different players to their needs and likes. Right now I mainly use an M16 and double-tap, and before that I was a big fan of ’slight of hand’.

The one thing that bugs me about Assassin’s Creed are the controls. I feel like the control scheme is a little much and could have been simplified. I also think Ubi Soft relied to much on Prince of Persia and didn’t seem to evolve much from it. Too many times in AC I’d be ’steering’ my character only to to some times hydroplane when I really shouldn’t have. Sometimes I’ll take dives into the ground or jumps off a wall when that was not at all what I was trying to do. But I can totally look past that and enjoy the game.

At Toys R Us, I picked up a Wii Zapper and Ghost Squad. I need to mess around with it a little more, but so far the Zapper feels a little off. I also picked up these nice Wiimote chargers. It came with a charger to stand the Wiimote in, along with two batteries and can be charged via USB if so pleased. This is what I’ve been waiting for.

We’ll have more on all this on tomorrow’s podcast.

Well, here’s the first podcast from Bluegamer.net: Bluecast Ep 1

We’ll hopefully be adding an embedded player soon.

Sean and I sit around talking about gaming while figuring out exactly what it is we’re doing. We talk about the latest releases and our run in with the PMS Clan in Call of Duty 4. We also discuss Optimus Prime’s appearance in Assasin’s Creed, and the Treeman.

Take a listen and let us know what you think. It runs at a little under an hour, and I can’t promise you won’t be bored.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Assasin’s Creed is great. I never realized it was pretty much just a GTA Prince of Persia. But I’m loving it. It’s huge! I wish I could get more play time into it, but I got a new movie game, Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune. It is simply badass. Imagine playing a game that at no point you thought, ‘Ok, this is the last part for tonight’, or ‘Agh…I’ve got to start over from here? I’m done’. No. You don’t do that. I didn’t want to stop playing. But I had to. The first few chapters(maybe only two?) so far kept me on the edge of my video chair(think rocker on the ground). I wanted to know what was going to happen next, story-wise, and when the story wasn’t the center focus, I was Prince of Persia-ning around the jungle, or playing an action game. It’s seriously two games in one with an awesome story. I compare the shooting to WinBack, which I still consider one of the greatest games of that generation, and one of my top favorite on the N64. The cover/shooting/rolling mechanic was way ahead of its time, and it seems like only now that other developers are using it. It does require a little more skill, though. While in cover, you can’t see where the reticile is. When you pop out to shoot, you then have a few seconds to aim your shot, in which this game teaches you to be a crack head-shot artist. It’s definitley a win for the PS3, but with all that hating out there, no one’s going to notice.

I did some more tweaking with the site. The header problem still boggles the mind, but I’ll eventually get around to it. I think I want a semi-elaborate background design, which covers a portion of the page, but then transforms itself into the explosive BLUEGAMER title. Yeah.

It will take me a long time to get all the stars in Super Mario Galaxy.

There’s probably another game or two I could reference in the title. But yeah, that’s what I’m playing now and for the rest of the month…and next month. There are just so many games to play, but for now I don’t have the time to get it done quickly.

Super Mario Galaxy is fantastic. Every release of a major Mario game was alwasy a big deal to me. I remember how large Super Mario World was. How much there was to do. All the secrets. Mario 64 was a fully 3D game…it was amazing. But Mario Sunshine was rather boring. It was more of an expansion of Mario 64, rather than a whole new Mario.

Mario Galaxy brings back the kiddie giggles. The big change Mario made was from 2D to 3D, and now Mario Galaxy seems to be this insane THREE-DEE. There’s no where you can’t go. I haven’t played too much into it, but so far every mission for a star is different. Yeah, it goes back into Mario 64’s star collecting, but the means of collectiong are so varied that I feel I’m going through multiple gaming experiences to do so. It’s addictive, and similar to the addiction to puzzle games, like the first few hours of Lumines that never stops. It’s a deep puzzle with infinite variables and total freedom of minipulation.

I’ll probably pick up Assasin’s Creed tomorrow, only because I can see it as the game to fill the void between the abundance of games from here on out. The game is supposed to be rather big with much to do, and like I’ve said: I don’t have the time to play all these games. So, when I beat CoD4 and Mario Galaxy, inbetween Haze and Uncharted, I’ll have time well spent with Assasin’s Creed. Also, if you’ve been paying attention to the internets, you probably know by now that no one understands how to score Assasin’s Creed. Gabe said it best.

Well tonight I plan on cramming in a ton of Mario Galaxy. Yes, this is a game I’d definitley buy the Wii for.

I don’t understand any of this Gamestop/EB Games hate. Sure, they always ask you to preorder or trade in games, but it’s part of the business. Like having to tip a waiter. I recent Penny Arcade article mentioned the problem of a game store not having a particular title on its release day. Now, a few things here. The game is huge, it can sell out like crazy. But you may ask, why didn’t they order much more? Well, it’s simple really.

Funcoland was the place to go for used games. Used games and trading in games is a great source of profit. See: EBay, Garage/Yard Sales, Craig’s List. Now, a company purely selling new games won’t make any money. They sell the games for how much they bought them for. That’s why Blockbuster got into the used territory. They know there’s money to be made there. And Best Buy has been debating this structure, and if I’m not mistaken, some stores tested this. Gamestop soley relies on used game sales and preorders for their money. That’s why we can see, and they will make, many stores pop up around every corner.

Now, back to the PA article. They go in for CoD4 and are first asked if they preordered it. They say no, so they don’t get a copy. The scenario here is, by preordering the game, you get it early…that was the deal with CoD4. Now, since most stores already had it, they did go a head and sell it early, negating the benefit for the preorderers.

Now, if it was the day the game was supposed to be out everywhere…I’m talking about the actual date the publisher advised, and I was told I couldn’t pick up a copy….well, then they are wrong, because I will pick up a copy and leave the store. This is where I’m assuming most gamers decided to leave their scrotes at home.

I hear it all the time though, “GS/EB eployess are incompetent, wah, wah, wah…”. But honestly, they’re are like anyone else in retaill There are the good and the bad.

Why does this bother me so much? I hate going into forums of gaming sites and seeing all the douches cry over what reality is. Gamestop is no different than any other retail chain, and you are the customer, you are always right. If not, do what I do, and make the system work for you.

The Gamestop near me got the game in early. I picked it up int he morning, and waited all day to go home after work and play it. There’s not much to say. It’s just as awesome as I remember from the Beta. The difference here is I got to spend some time with the single-player. And I’m digging that too. It throws you into the action and relies on the environment as the ultimate A.I. And it works.

The header is bugging me. Between the image on the left, and rss image on the right, there’s a gap. The rest of the image won’t show up there…and I’ve changed the width accordingly. Oh well, I’ve got time to work on that.

So what’s next for me? Uncharted. I can’t wait to see how that turns out.

I’ve been meaning to get around to changing up the place. I like having a 3-column page so users can navigate easily without having to do much scrolling. So for now, here’s the new look. It may change slightly over the next week, but this is the gist of it. And if you’ve noticed, the header is cutoff. I’m still working on that one… For now I put up a temp header that is much smaller, but eventually I want to fill the whole thing. I also dig that little(or big) RSS image link I added to the right.

From Xbox360Achievements:

 ”Cockpit, Austin, TX – November 1, 2007 – Gamecock Media Group announced today that Blazing Lizard’s Pirates vs. Ninjas™ Dodgeball will debut on Xbox LIVE™ Arcade on Xbox 360™ in early 2008. The title looks to answer the age-old question of which much-revered profession is better, by settling the score…with (dodge)balls.”

Here are some screenshots.