Star Wars: The Force Unleashed (Video Game Review 7)

Star Wars: The Force Unleashed was a Star Wars game that had a lot of build up and hype, and as such sold over 7 million copies just by the 'Star Wars' name alone, but did it live up to the expectations?

The Force Unleashed, was released on September 16, 2008 and follows a story line that is supposed to bridge the two Star Wars trilogies, taking place somewhere between episodes 3 and 4. You play Darth Vader's secret apprentice codenamed "Starkiller." You have been raised by Darth Vader since early childhood as a killing machine, designed for the sole purpose of killing off the remaining Jedi that were not killed in Order 66, and also to kill The Emperor.

I had high hopes for this game once upon a time. Promising storyline, characters, it seemed as though Lucas Arts Ltd. was finally releasing a decent light saber wielding hack 'n' slash. *Sigh* I was mistaken. The game opens somewhat strong with the player controlling Darth Vader on Kashyyyk, hunting down a lone Jedi. As you make your way to the Jedi you walk at a menacing pace to The Imperial March, which that by itself gave me high hopes for the rest of the game. Various Storm Troopers are strewn about shooting at different types of Wookies, and you as Darth Vader are able to kill Storm Troopers AND Wookies. Why, you ask??? Because you are Darth Vader and are that much of a badass to get away with it. Walking through with breeze, blasting trees down, blasting wookies away, hurling storm troopers at the wookies, force choking storm troopers and wookies alike, slashing away with my lightsaber, it made for good fun. But as soon as I made it to the Jedi and started fighting him, I realized this game was not going to be as good as I thought it was. That duel was such an incredible annoyance, I didn't enjoy fighting in that duel at all. Yeah I was able to throw him some, throw some crates at him some, and hit him some with my light saber but that was it. The controls felt EXTREMELY clunky at this point, it made me feel like more of a Darth Vader wannabe then Darth Vader himself. Several times I tried to hit the Jedi he had some force field protecting him as he yanked tie fighters down from the sky to hit me with. THAT is epic, Darth Vader should be able to do that! And the game does not bother telling you how to deflect the tie fighters either. You are left alone, pressing random buttons in hopes of not getting hit by an exploding ship. You aren't able to do anything cool against this Jedi until you get his health low enough to activate a mini game cut scene similar to God of War. This was okay, with hitting timed button presses to make for a cinematic fight sequence that gets you more involved. I was a big fan of this in the God of War franchise, and it was done okay in The Force Unleashed, but not as well. The whole mini game cut scene I couldn't help but wonder why I couldn't do any of what I was doing, previously. And anytime I messed up the mini game by hitting the wrong button, the only penalty I got, was having to restart the mini game sequence, where as in God of War, if you messed up that then the guy you were fighting HURTS you, where if you mess up too much, you die. Also in the God of War mini game sequences, you are doing things to your enemy that you feel you could do outside of just the cut scene, you weren't forced to getting them to a particular amount of health.

Let's carry on though. From here on out the game just goes downhill. Various logic issues pop up in the plot, which are just plain silly, but when it's Star Wars I come to accept it as coming with the territory, what with the terrible episodes 1-3 in all. That's right I said it, and I'm a Star Wars fan! The Jedi's son witnesses Darth Vader killing his dad, then he takes Vader's light saber somehow with super duper force powers, then looks up at Darth Vader like a sick puppy, then a bunch of Storm Troopers rush in and start blasting, but Darth Vader takes his light saber back and deflects the light sabers killing them, saving the boy, and the boy grows up to be YOU GUESSED IT, Starkiller aka Darth Vader's secret apprentice. Darth Vader was somehow able to brainwash your character into thinking Vader was a good guy, and Jedis were bad guys, causing you to forget about you Jedi father completely, which doesn't make too much sense considering you were like 8 when your father was slain right before your eyes. I feel as though that would be cause for some pretty scarring unforgettable memories, but who cares!!! It's Star Wars right?

The game progresses introducing you to your training robot 'Proxy' giving you the impression you've known the droid for years, and that you're good friends. Then shortly after you are introduced to some blonde British chick who your character clearly has the hots for (hooray for love interest tension!!!) Vader gives you various missions where you have to go hunt down the remaining Jedi, in order to prove yourself worthy of the task of killing The Emperor, as HE is the root of all evil, not Darth Vader at alllll!!!!! Then some spoilers happen in the story so I won't tell you any of that.

The physics in this game are pretty spectacular at best, with various objects you destroy being destroyed differently depending on how you hit it, how hard you hit it, where you hit it, etc. Also, when you throw people, or just force hold them in the air dangling them, they flail about like a rag doll which is amusing. The graphics however, in this game are sub par. Especially after being released a year after God of War 2 which was for the PS2. God of War 2's cut scenes had better graphics then The Force Unleashed. Normally I'm not one to gripe about graphics, but when it comes to the type of budget ANY Lucas funded game has, you would THINK it could top a top notch PS2 games graphics, but alas, this game is just another Star Wars game where the developers got lazy, knowing that fanboys everywhere would come drooling to this game JUST because Star Wars was in the title :(. Furthermore, the controls. Holy crap, what TERRIBLE controls! I can not remember the last time I played a game with such a poor controlling scheme. I constantly struggle to pull of the "cool" combos, particularly the lightsaber combos. Which being an awesome light saber wielder, I want to look cool! But I find myself just looking like an idiot half the time, force blasting the crap out of enemies, and slashing at enemies repeatedly with no detachment of limbs, or anything!!!! Light sabers should be able to cut off a Storm Troopers arm, their armor is NOT that strong. Who cares if they had to make the game 'M' rated??? It wouldn't have any blood or cursing in it, as the wounds get sealed by the blade upon contact, and since when was there a cuss word in Star Wars??? Anywho, I felt as though a game coming out after God of War, could have taken several pointers from the game, considering especially the fact that The Force Unleashed and God of War are both hack 'n' slashes with upgradable abilities and combos, etc. Is it really that hard to come up with good tight controls for a hack 'n' slash? Is God of War really that industry breaking of a game? Or were the developers behind The Force Unleashed that lazy?

There are aspects of this game I did like, such as upgrading your powers, combos, unlocking costumes, and light sabers. However, the menu system for navigating these various options is tragically clunky just like the controls. Between each menu item, 'upgrades', 'costumes', 'lightsabers', it has a loading screen every time you select it, and go back to the main menu. So if You want to change your costume, lightsaber, and make upgrades at one time, you will have to wait through 6 different loading screens....... Provided, the loading screens do have various Star Wars Trivia, but I am playing this God forsaken Star Wars game because I am a fan boy and know half the trivia already! Additionally, the upgrades were far too many, and the controls were so annoyingly frustrating that I didn't particularly care for learning NEW moves and such. And unlocking new light sabers seems fun, but it isn't. I never had a desire to seek out new light saber colors. There are tons to unlock, I only unlocked 2, and 2 crystal modifiers for those color crystals. You unlock half the costumes just playing through the game once, as you have a different outfit each level you play. These are cool, but again, I was happy with just half of the costumes, and had no desire to replay the game to unlock all the costumes and what not.

The soundtrack, thank goodness this game is a Star Wars game, the soundtrack was one thing that prevented me from just cracking the disc in half. It was full of original Star Wars songs from all 6 episodes, which was just a sight for sore eyes, or rather a sound for the ears that are pained from sore eyes, and brain. But enough ranting, let's do it to it!

Story: 6/10

This storyline is not that great. I do not know why so many people think it's so great. The storyline never gets you attached to any of the characters, and it doesn't "bridge" the 2 trilogies by any means. It just shows how more Jedi are killed, woohoo! There is no need to know this story whatsoever, it just feels like a way for George Lucas to make more money.

Sound: 10/10

This game has great sound. The sound effects are great, the voice acting is good enough, and the soundtrack is AMAZING!!!!!!!!!! It's a soundtrack consisting of original Star Wars songs, what more could you ask for in the soundtrack???

Gameplay: 1/10

The controls in this game are absolutely TERRIBLE. Nothing you do with your character EVER feels right, and anytime you fight a boss fight, you just hit it with your light saber repeatedly and monotonously, until it gets low enough health for you to initiate a cut scene that somehow makes you EXTRAORDINARY!!!!! These mini game cut scenes are just so that you can pull of cool stuff successfully, that you could never do otherwise, which is just disappointing because you really want to be awesome all the time, not just when you slash their health low enough. Each and every duel with the Jedi felt clunky, and way too difficult, nothing I did seemed cool or fresh, it was just bleh. Oh yes, I forgot to mention the platforming in this game as well as the level design. Jumping feels like SUCH a chore, and you will often miss your place to jump to, and can't grab onto ledges. What sort of force user can't grab ledges??? The level design is the same for each level. Every level begins with an amazing environment, where you can see things go on in the background going on etc. But then you traverse a little ways an it becomes "bleh" and "blah," just all too bland, with no puzzle solving whatsoever. Just "kill these guys, now kill these guys, now blast this door open, now throw this generator out with your force power to destroy the force field, now go kill these stormtroopers that have impenetrable shields except for by light saber, now go kill these rock 'em sock 'em robots by electrocuting them then slashing them, now go kill this mini boss by electrocuting it and slashing it, then initiating a mini game cut scene, where you do timed button presses to pull of cool stuff you could never do any other time in the game, now go fight a Jedi, and pull your hair out while doing so because the controls SUCK!" Okay the end. But seriously, the only thing earning this a score of 1, were the physics in the way things were destroyed, that was cool.

Final Verdict: 5.7/10

Should you get this game?

Nope! The soundtrack is all this game has got going for it, which you can pick up in cd format and listen to without having to play this piece of crap.

This game is rated teen for terrible. And violence.

inFAMOUS 2 (Video Game Review 6)

inFAMOUS 2 is a great successor to the previous title, with revamped melee, and of course new powers. But does it surpass the first inFAMOUS title???

inFAMOUS 2, is the 2011 open world super hero sequel to inFAMOUS for the Playstation 3 video game console developed by Sucker Punch Productions and published by Sony Computer Entertainment.

Where can I start? Well first off, a lot of things that were great about the last game were improved upon in this game. Such as the controls, the controls were great in the first game, and have only been made tighter. Graphics have been improved VASLTY, the graphics really do shine in this game compared to the first. The soundtrack is just as great as well. Melee in the last game was not so great, but in the sequel it is pretty freakin' fantastic. The powers also have become more varied, and there are more of them, as well as certain powers from the last game being improved upon such as the hover power getting an upgraded "oomph!" that shoots you up a tad before gliding downward. (That 'tad' is surprisingly helpful.) The story while not as original as the first still make good for a sequel. Things I did not like about this game was for one, the change in voice actors. Cole MacGrath's voice in the first game may have been a bit gruff, but I got used to it! I was expecting that deep gruff voice from the first game, but instead got a nasally attempt the the first voice trapped inside of a 13 year old pubescent boy voice. In simple terms, they changed voice actors, I do not know why, but they did, and I never got used to the new voice *sigh*. Secondly, the character model of Cole MacGrath changed drastically. In the first game you play a bike messenger. You got your little coat, and small messenger bag, jeans, sneakers... But in this game you become RIPPED, now wearing a T-Shirt to show off your muscly tattooed arms. The coat in the first game hid your arms so you couldn't see the tattoos, but making him a Vin Diesel clone was a mistake, not only because there seem to be a lot of those popping up, but because it is a bad Vin Diesel clone, and more closely resembles Jason Statham. The face was also changed, the nose is the most noticeable thing. His nose is not short and stubby, compared to the long nose int eh first game, so it looks like he got a nose job. The change in voice actors in combination with the change in character model made Cole MacGrath seem WAY different, completely different! Cole MacGrath is an American Jason Statham, with super powers!

Speaking of super powers, gone are the days of being able to do your alpha bolt with zero energy in your energy meter, if you are out of juice, it sucks to be you, until you recharge. This makes sense logically, but who's thinking logically here? I mean, a human battery??? Come on, at least make it to where you have SOMETHING to shoot with no energy, at least to fend guys off till you find something to recharge with, melee isn't enough in this case. Another complaint about the Alpha bolt, was that it USES energy. Your weakest attack actually uses energy! The alpha bolt in this game does an extremely low amount of damage, on top of sucking your energy out? No thanks, I'll stick with Electricity Grenades, rockets, and sniping. And while the controls were better, there were TOO many super powers. So many in fact that you have to use a quick menu to switch out powers, and normally I would have no beef about a quick menu, but it detracts from the heat of the moment, pausing the game, and taking away all noise, and the soundtrack as well. If they could have made it so that you could access the quick menu while still moving around and blasting things, it would have been a more immersive experience.

There are a LOT of powers in this game, you of course have several spots in the game where you can shift your karma one way or the other, just like in the last game. Something new though, is you have two friends with super powers too. And often time you have to choose between doing a mission a more evil way, or a more good way, and your friends represent that good or evil way. I played good the entire game, because I'm like that, I like to be the super duper goody two shoes hero, in games that give me the choice. There is one part with you essentially choose to have some powers like your good super friend, or your evil super friend, and depending on who you choose, you get different powers. There are fire powers (evilish friend), and ice powers (good friend), I chose ice powers of course, not only because the chick was smokin' hot, and good, but because I like ice powers. And MAN, do those ice powers ROCK! I found that I used my ice powers more than anything else. I used ice grenades, the ice jump, the ice shard blast, and the ionic ice power. So, awesome. I must say incorporating ice/fire with electrical powers was a great new feature to the game.

Melee. Melee was really lame in the first game. In the second game however, the melee is AWESOME. You have this kick ass tuning fork that you pummel your enemies with, and with each hit, you have a combo meter that goes up, when it goes up enough, you press another button, and you go into this cinematic mini scene that finishes off the enemy your fighting, and it is siiiiiick. The melee while improved, did have it's faults though with finicky times with the controls, but overall, way better then the last game. As you progress through the game you can unlock abilities that your melee can do, for instance the last ability is, if your combo meter is fully charged, and you do that cinematic finsher move, then your energy meter gets fully charged, which was SO sweet! Okay that's enough of my inFAMOUS 2 melee-gasm, let's do it to it!

Story: 8/10

I found the story to not be NEARLY as intriguing as the previous game, because I felt as though all the secrets had been revealed, and I was now just dealing with the aftermath of the first game, this random character called "The Beast." I also did not like that a lot of my powers I had in the end of the previous game, I had to unlock in this game... Didn't make too much sense to me. I realize they like to make you work for your powers, but there were enough powers to last the game, that you should have started with what you had in previous game. The upside to the story is that the plot IS there, and there are more secrets and twists to be revealed as well. The addition of characters to the story that are super heroes was a really good addition to make the plot more interesting. Also, the emotions going on between you and your best friend Zeke with the tension of Zeke's actions in the last game carrying over, makes for some decent drama, sort of.

Sound: 10/10

The sound effects were on par with the previous game, and the soundtrack was just as good if not better. The voice acting was acted well, despite me not liking what the voice SOUNDED like. I really liked that a lot of the music was stylized to make it feel more New Orleansy, as the game does take place in a New Orleans inspired city, "New Marais." There was a lot more use with stringed instruments too, which added well to the darker tone of this game. And of course, the music was themed perfectly to what you were doing, chase scenes had the fast paced music, etc.

Gameplay: 9/10

The controls were even better in this game, and the additional powers were awesome, and upgrading various powers was a neat feature. The quick menu was not, and neither was the drastically changed character model of Cole. The melee was much more satisfying though, and gratifying with charging up your energy meter. The game will last about 20 hours also, with all the side missions and blast shard collecting. If you want to collect all the dead drops though that will take more gameplay hours. Plus, if you plan on playing the game again in the more evil way, then that's double the play time, so there is bang for your buck here. The only think keeping this from a 10 is the character model change, and the quick menu freezing game play, detracting from the immersion.

Final Verdict: 9.0/10

Should you get this game?

Absolutely. If you played the first game, then definitely get the second game, as it is a more than worthy sequel. And if you haven't played the first game, then you should not be reading this review, go back and read the first game's review and if you should play that game, THEN come read this review and play this game.

This game is rated teen for blood, drug reference, language, sexual themes, use of alcohol, and violence. (This game is okay for people younger then teenagers in my opinion. I don't recall any blood, or drugs. And the language is definitely PG worthy, there isn't any sex, just a smokin' hot friend of yours, there IS some beer drinking, but it is ONE scene, and it does look like it COULD be soda? The game is violent, hahaha, you are blasting everything with super powers!)

L.A. Noire (Video Game Review 5)

L.A. Noire is a video game that tries its best to be different, and new age, and succeeds, but at the expense of letting other aspects of the game fall short. Here's what I mean:

L.A. Noire is a 2011 action-adventure 3rd person shooter developed by Team Bondi and produced by Rockstar Games. L.A. Noire is set in Los Angeles in 1947 and challenges the player, controlling a Los Angeles Police Deptartment detective Cole Phelps (WWII War hero), to solve a range of crimes. Players must investigate crime scenes for clues, follow up leads, and interrogate suspects.

This game while not 100% developed by Rockstar Games, still has a semi Rockstar feel. With mediocre Rockstar graphics, the controls, etc. So anyone who has played other Rockstar titles such as GTA IV will be able to pick up this game with ease, control wise. I found no fault with the controls in this game, nor the music. I am a huge fan of jazz, and it is throughout the game. And as the title of the game suggests, it has a very film noir feel to it, which is good because that is what they were going for. Morals, sex, crime, etc. Are all apart of this game, but don't quite play out very well. The environment in this game is very cool, the coloring used in this game is beautiful and certainly plays homage to the stark blacks and whites of film noire. Driving around L.A. is fun because there are no sky scrapers, therefore, you can see lots of the blue sky. There is a new feature in this game never before seen that is pretty awesome. And that is a little tool called MotionScan. This device scans the actors faces for scenes they are acting, and when all is said and done, each characters face in this video game is astonishing. The best graphics in this game are the characters faces. Never before have I been able to see a characters facial expressions so well, a characters emotion, their anger, their sadness, frustration, nervousness. It all shows in their facial expressions and you can see it all, which is amazing. I can definitely see MotionScan being used in the future of video games. MotionScan was primarily used in this game so that the you the player can read peoples faces while interrogating them, then you can tell whether they are lying or not.

Now for those of you expecting to buy hookers, go to strip clubs, kill random pedestrians, go to the comedy club with your best bud, etc. You will be disappointed, or not, I don't know. What I do know, is that this game should not be compared to GTA games, except for some of the graphics, and the controls. It is not very open world, L.A. Noire is extremely linear. However, you can still take anybody's car only now it's legal, because you're commandeering their vehicle. And while you do get fined for hitting people with your car, damaging your car, or damaging property, it doesn't mean you can't do it. I still drove wrecklessly as ever, I just accepted that my score at the end of each case would not be as good as a result, which was fine with me considering I was able to drive how I wanted, even so it did kind of suck that I was penalized for doing so, but it makes sense for your character, being a good cop and all. The story in this game is say-so, you play Cole Phelps who was a war hero from WWII, he has a wife and kids, and now he's trying to work his way up through the legal system from Traffic to Homicide, to chief of police. There is not much to the story in this game, at first. But there are certain points where it feels as though the game is trying to present to you little bits and pieces of certain things that may or may not come back later into a huge grand scheme of things, but you never can really tell because it is all just way too vague. Furthermore, there are times when it feels as though the developers of the game are trying to pull conflict out of their 'you know what' to add to the otherwise somewhat empty plot, and it was that moment that I knew this game was not well planned. It begins to feel a little rushed towards the end like the developers were getting tired of making the game. I could divide this game into 5 parts. Part 1: Pretty awesome, part 2: AWESOME, part 3: WTF?! That's lame!, part 4: BORING, part 5: woah that just happened way too fast. The game only having a pretty awesome, and an awesome (2/5 of the the game) is not good, in my opinion. It was like the developers started strong, but then they didn't know where to go with it so they struggled to throw in plot devices that just made for a pretty boring game story wise.

This game is quite linear in that you go to a crime scene, find clues, question people, then either interrogate someone and charge them, or just charge someone else for the crime, with a chase scene or shootout thrown in there at some point. Rinse, repeat, for each and every case, it got to be a pretty predictable sequence of events. Going into this game, I was under the impression I would have certain choices, and based off my choices there would be different consequences, this was not the case. When interrogating or questioning individuals you are given 3 options after every question and response, you can either believe what they're saying "truth," you can doubt what they're saying "doubt," or you can flat out not believe what they are saying "lie," in which you have to present some evidence you found earlier to prove that they are lying. First off, I just have to say, the "doubt," option is not doubt at all. Beware, when you choose doubt, your character will not say "I don't know if I like what you're saying, we'll come back to you later," no instead your character will be enraged and go hulk on their ass saying things like "LISTEN HERE PUNK! WE DON'T LIKE UNCOOPERATIVE PUNKS! NOW GIVE ME SOME ANSWERS OR I'LL BLOW YOUR HEAD OFF!!!!!" So that may have been exaggerated a BIT, but seriously, the 'doubt' option was labeled wrong. It should have been labeled 'flip your shit.' I would have been happy with the options 'truth,' 'lie,' and 'flip your shit.' Also, when you select the wrong option, or accuse someone wrongly, there are no consequences. I did not feel obligated by any means to think through my accusations, or choose my options of truth lie or flip your shit. Because I knew that in the end everything was predetermined, no matter what you did as a character, this was going to happen nothing else. The developers don't allow for any choices of your own. It is like playing a game as a little kid with your friends and your friend is controlling everything that happens, that isn't fun! And with today's day and age of open world, open decision, choices lead to consequences game era, I expected a bit more. But alas, the developers did not feel this way. They wanted everything THEIR way. It was impossible to lose this game, unless you got shot to death. Even if you yourself, the person knew you were accusing the wrong person, that they had been framed, it didn't matter. You just had to sit back and watch in agony as the dull character you controlled accused wrongly one after another, when it was obvious that you were after the wrong person. Enough of my ranting though, let's do to it!

Story: 6/10
This story starts out to seem pretty intriguing. It tricks the player into thinking there will be an awesome story. However, as events unfold, the story gets revealed as being a very shallow, not so interesting story, that you otherwise would expect from a Noire styled game.

Sound: 9/10
The sound in this game very well done. The soundtrack is very fitting with jazz playing over the radio as you drive, and eerie trumpets playing as you investigate a crime scene etc. It all fit very well into the jazz of 1947 as well as the noire feel of the game. The voice acting was also awesome, due to every character in the game being acted out by actual actors. The only thing keeping the sound from getting a 10/10 was the redundancy. Every crime scene had the SAME. EXACT. SONG. playing while you investigated. And every car chase, every foot chase, every shootout, had the SAME. EXACT. SONG. playing.

Gameplay: 5/10
The only thing earning this category a 5, are the decent controls, and the MotionScan graphics. Otherwise I was very disappointed with a game that had so much hype. The lack of consequences, the predictable nature, the linear gameplay in combination with no choices you yourself get to make, made for a not so great game for me. On top of that there were various glitches I ran into, that just made no sense to me. None were game ending, two were really weird. And one was just frustrating and made me laugh at how stupid it was that it could happen. First off, I was investigating a scene, when my partner comes up behind me. I turn around, and he won't move, so now I am trapped in a corner of this room, and it takes me close to 15 minutes to get out of the corner, and I was only able to move when he finally decided to move. Normally in a game, you could punch someone to get them to move, but with being a goody two shoes cop, you can't do that, to ANYone, unless designated at the right time by the developers. So I was stuck with having to wait for my partner to move out of the way on his own. Another glitch was when I was having to blend in, I was supposed to sit down at a table and read a newspaper, but instead my character crouched next to the chair, and the newspaper was held open at the table as if a ghost was reading it, and I was trying to sniff the ghosts butt. And lastly, there was one cut scene where one guy was talking to another, but you could not hear anything the other guy was saying, the other guy wasn't even moving his mouth. At first I thought it was supposed to be that way. But then at the end of the cut scene a hat was floating away, where a person should have been walking, wearing the hat, that was bizarre, and caused me to not get anything out of the cut scene itself. One last thing tarnishing this category's score were the crime scenes. You don't ever look at stuff YOU think is suspicious, you just walk around, and wait for the game to sound off a chime, and for your controller to vibrate, then hit a button to investigate whatever made that chime and vibration. What makes this aspect of the game even more dull is the fact that they will do the chime on objects that are irrelevent. You pick it up then say "it'll take a smarter man then ME to link this piece of evidence!" That's when you're thinking "WHY WAS THERE A CHIMEY VIBRATION THINGY THEN???!?!?!!!" I could deal with this when I was in the homicide division, when things were interesting. But when it got to vice it just got boring, and then when I had to investigate arson, that just blew my mind with how boring that was. Everything is burnt to a crisp so you yourself have NO idea what you are looking for, so you are forced to walk around blindly waiting to run into a chimey vibration thingy to hit the button to investigate further. Alright I should stop complaining, and get on with it.

Final Verdict: 6.7/10.......

Should you get this game?

No. Just, in short, no. Okay maybe that's a little harsh. If you are okay with being spoon fed your evidence, and not being a detective yourself, and letting your character decide everything for you, and not facing any consequences, and repetitive music, in combination with linear predictable gameplay. Then hooray, this is JUST the game for you! Otherwise, don't bother. The 1-3 hours of playtime it takes to get through homicide is not even worth the rental of the game.

The game is rated mature for blood and gore, nudity, sexual themes, strong language, use of drugs, and violence. (This game is quite graphic, I do not recommend this game to anyone under the age of 17. Okay, maybe 16 is okay, but definitely not 15. Maybe 15 and a half? No, on second thought, I don't recommend this game to anyone, unless you are one of the few that the last paragraph may pertain to.)

Uncharted: Drakes Fortune (Video Game Review 4)

Uncharted is one of those game series that will be known through the ages. And anyone that owns a PS3 MUST play this series. If you do not own a PS3, and are considering getting one, look at the Uncharted series and your mind will be made up for you. Here's why:

Uncharted: Drake's Fortune is an action-adventure game developed by Naughty Dog, and published by Sony Computer Entertainment for PlayStation 3 exclusively. Combining platforming and third-person shooter elements, the game charts the journey of protagonist Nathan Drake, supposed descendant of the explorer Sir Francis Drake, as he seeks the lost treasure of El Dorado, with the help of friend Victor "Sully" Sullivan and journalist Elena Fisher.

This game has a really nice cover and shoot system similar to Gears of War, combined with lots of climbing, scaling, platforming. It makes for a great combination, similar to Tomb Raider that is tons of fun. The controls in this game are fantastically smooth and make for easy aiming, and decent melee. The melee is pretty simple with just light attacks, heavy attacks, and a combo of the two, and it can be finicky at times, but it is fun to mix in melee with shooting nonetheless. This game has amazing voice acting, probably the best I have ever heard in any video game to date, and amazing graphics as well. Never before have I seen someones clothes get wet, and stay wet for a period of time before drying off, the texture of wet clothing is surprisingly stunning! This game is not a very long one, running about 8 hours on your first play through, but if you are like me you will want to play it at least 2 more times. Additionally, there are little treasures you can collect throughout the game, for you completionists out there this could take you a while leading to a lot more hours of gameplay. Furthermore, I did not experience ANY glitches in this game! HOORAY for no glitches!

Story: 10/10
The story in this game is awesome, if you are a fan of any action flick, this game's story is quite sufficient, and then some. As you progress through the game it becomes more than just a treasure hunt, it becomes a mystery, and as it unravels it makes for a very awesome story.

Sound: 10/10
The sound in this game is phenomenal. The sound effects are perfectly done, whether it's water trickling in a stream, or splashing as you run through it, or explosions, gunfire, it is all done perfectly. Additionally, the voice acting is the BEST voice acting in a video game I have ever heard, it is absolutely wonderful. The voice actor Nolan North, has a vast amount of voicing experience and it shows off when he voices Nathan Drake. Lastly but certainly not leastly, the soundtrack. The soundtrack for this game is great, it is very heroic and action hero sounding, but fitting. With fast music when you're running away, or scary music, or action music, etc. it all meshes wonderfully with the scene at hand.

Gameplay: 9/10
This game is purely one player, no splitscreen, no online play, no multiplayer whatsoever. It is one heck of a one player game though. The controls in this game are very easy and fluid, the only thing keeping it from getting a 10/10 was the lackluster melee controls. Otherwise the gameplay in this game is very exciting and fun from cover and shoot tactics, to sniping, to running and gunning then punching someone in the face, to climbing up huge rock faces, jumping from ledge to ledge, you feel like and action star constantly. The graphics in this game are also cutting edge, and cut scenes are very crisp with good voice acting to boot. This is not your longest game running at approximately 8 hours your first play through, 6-7 your second play through, and about 5 your 3rd play through. That is just not normal difficulty too, it will definitely last you longer on a higher difficulty setting, but I suggest going with normal on your first play through. I ma not a completionist so I did not go out and collect every treasure there was to collect, but I did pick them up as I came across them. It may be a short game but having played it 3 times already I have now put about 21 hours into this game making it well worth the purchase.

Final Verdict: 9.7/10!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Should you get this game?

Yes. If you do not have a PS3, get one today, and play this game. You will not be disappointed. If you are disappointed, well that sucks. No I'm just kidding. If you like action movies, and video games (duh), and own a PS3 then get this game!!!!!!
But seriously... This game is worth getting a PS3...

The game is rated teen for blood, language, mild suggestive themes, use of tobacco, and violence. (Nothing out of the ordinary for your typical PG-13 Movie. And if you are worried of the F-word being used once like the rule for PG-13 movies, don't worry, Uncharted as very little to no cussing, none of which includes the almighty F-bomb, or the G-D word.)