For anyone that cares *cue crickets* my time has been split mainly on my PC between DMC: Devil May Cry and Saint's Row The Third.
There's not too much to say about DMC. If you've played any action games like previous Devil games, Ninja Gaiden, or God of War you've played this as well. In this game you play as Dante, the same protagonist from other games but this time it's when he's in his early 20's. This does lead to a few cringe worthy moments when they try to make him act young with a cocky attitude but overall it works.
The action is fast and furious and fun, although there are a few rather annoying components that nearly all games of the genre seem to suffer from. For one, there are platforming sections, which for some reason, unless your protagonist is a fat Italian plumber, doesn't flow well. I've probably lost close to an entire energy bar of life from times I've fallen off various platforms simply because I couldn't line things up properly. Also, the game gives you dozens upon dozens of combos which are spread across different weapons, but odds are you'll only remember about 4 combos and just use those all the time.
Finally, the plot is rather wonky in that it feels like they just ripped things off from other properties. The plot is a weird mix of The Matrix with dual worlds and V with the oppressive government. Perhaps the designers were big fans of Hugo Weaving. Finally, ironically the game seems to have ripped off random elements of God of War. You get a massive fist weapon that's basically a rip off of The Gauntlet of Zeus, and because Dante's dad is constantly referenced, who is named Sparda, people constantly call Dante "Son of Sparda."... really? Oh, and some enemies have some frankly overpowering attacks. No character in the first half of the game should be allowed to have an attack that can take off nearly 1/3rd of my life bar when extra energy is very scarce and hard to find.
Overall though none of these things are preventing me from wanting to keep going in the game, and I have to say that Capcom did a FANTASTIC job putting this on the PC. This does not feel like a half-assed port at all, and feels like it was built specifically for PC gamers in mind. That may explain why, amazingly, reviewers have declared the PC version to be the best. Worth a look if you have a good PC or Xbox 360. Yes, it is also available for PS3, but it is the worst version in terms of frame rate.
Speaking of bad ports, I tried out Saint's Row 2, which I picked up via the latest
Humble Bundle. Saint's Row is basically GTA on crack. Everything is much more over the top, realism is thrown out the window, and it really is about building a criminal empire and being an a**hole, as opposed to all the GTA games following Vice City. I played SR 2 years ago for a little while and enjoyed it but eventually I just zoned out. I picked it up again on this sale and tried it out on my PC, and unfortunately as good as DMC was on PC, this game is as BAD. It is a HORRIBLE PC port. CLEARLY this was made for console gamers first and PC gamers were an afterthought. My biggest complaint is with the controls. I tried to use my Xbox 360 wired controller (which, BTW is a NECESSITY if you want to do serious PC gaming) but the game acted like it didn't know how to play with the controller. Get this crazy scenario: Unlike most driving games, by default the acceleration and reverse are bound to X and A respectively, as opposed to R trigger and L trigger. R trigger is what you use to shoot while on foot and while driving. If you try and bind RT to acceleration though, the game will make RT acceleration AND shooting while driving! It also doesn't help that the game never gives you button context hints for the gamepad, and instead will tell you what to press on the mouse/keyboard. This along with rather sub par graphics and random glitches and bugs make this harder to recommend on PC than on consoles, which is a shame because many have said that SR2 is better than 3.
Saint's Row the Third (I hate calling it that because honestly whenever I think of the title
this theme song plays in my head) is basically SR2 but even MORE over the top. One thing that I DO like is that you get to customize your character, which is a nice change from the GTA series where you basically are stuck with whatever the protagonist is scripted to do. I think why I liked GTA: Vice City so much is because Ray Liotta/Henry Hill as Tommy Vercetti was so awesome in that role, unlike CJ and Niko. I was able to create a character to my liking, which in this case was a blonde haired woman with a heavy Russian accent and proportions similar to Khloe Kardashian (sorry but I did want a body type that would at least be imposing.) The game is fun for balls to the wall action and silliness, but from a story standpoint that is also a bit of a detriment. Unlike earlier SR games and GTA games, where you build up from nothing to become all powerful, in this game you start off powerful as the head of the Third Street Saints, where you are driven out of your home city and displaced in another one, but within about 2 hours you've already taken over a large penthouse on a high rise where you can actually get jet fighters delivered to it. Also, if you get all the game's DLC (
which you can for about $5 on the Humble Bundle) you are given a bunch of advanced weapons at your first save house. Hell you even get 2 different cars with turrets on them. Overall though, this does seem to be part of the whole theme of SR, which is to just let the gamer rip loose and have fun. I definitely was smiling in ways I haven't done since I tore sh*t up in GTA:VC and Prototype. Seriously folks, if you have a competent PC it's worth picking up (along with a bunch of other games) for $5 at the link posted above.
I also picked up a copy of Dishonored on PC for about $10 that I'll likely get into after these games, and hopefully Deadpool will arrive soon in Gamefly so I can go through that and get my queue ready for GTA V. I do expect to get a lot more gaming done in the near future as in September I'll be on my own for 3 weeks when my wife takes the kids with her to China. I fully expect my life to revert back to my 2004-2008 routine of "Sleep, Eat, Work, Game."
