WTF: GAMETRAILERS GOTY AWARD FOR BEST STORY

WTF: GAMETRAILERS GOTY AWARD FOR BEST STORY

"The following tales were judged by the size of their heart as well as the complexity of their character," the video states about it's nominees. Now let's go through all of them one by one:

BioShock: totally agree. This game got an amazing setting, that is the underwater city of Rapture. Though it joins the likes of Half-Life 2 in breathing no life into the player's character, who opens the game with one line of dialogue and never speaks again, it has interesting characters and complex relations between them from the Big Daddies and the Little Sisters to Atlas and Ryan. It also has a great sense of discovery as the player learns about the city and its citizen.

Halo 3: here's where the bullshit starts. If you played any Halo game you would hit the credits screen, at least for the first couple playthroughs, without noticing that it has a story to begin with. I cannot understand how could someone nominate a game in best story category, no matter how great it is as a game, if it has a story that didn't matter and none other than the hardest of core players cared about. This game, in story context, has no interesting character, setting or dialogue. Halo series has a great fiction behind it but all Halo games did a poor job presenting it in the context of a story.

Assassin's Creed: couldn't agree more. This game tells two stories and link them together in a creative way. Most of the game is set in the Holy Land where you play as an assassin name Altair who is one of the most interesting fictional characters I've seen in the last few years. I do not need to say more than that I am looking forward to a sequel to know what happens to all the characters and how the story progresses as a whole.

Mass Effect: this is a tricky one. Mass Effect does NOT have a good story though it definitely has one of the best dialogues in a video game. I certainly did not find the universe of Mass Effect interesting or even it's characters (except for Wrex who is not the main character). Again, this is all considered in the context of stories and storytelling since some of the alien characters design is fascinating.

Kane & Lynch: cannot say much since I only played the demo.

And the winner is: this doesn't matter since my only objection is about the nominees and what makes my blood boils most is what is not in the list of nominees. Unfortunately I cannot remember all games of 2007, but I sure remember that God of War II was release in March. God of War II had a surprising sense of story even considering the high expectations the first game set. It is more than enough to say that the unveiling of Gaia in this game was the biggest surprise I had all year long (in the context of a game's story, of course).

Between the sheer genius of Mass Effect's dialogue and the depth of Rapture where a city becomes a character in its own right, one can only say that 2007 shows how much games have matured especially in their storytelling. Game on!

THE SAVE SYSTEM IN MASS EFFECT

THE SAVE SYSTEM IN MASS EFFECT

So I finished Mass Effect, or should I say my first playthrough. I love the game but I'm still mad at it, a lot. Why? The save system reminds me of Dead Rising's save system, though it certainly is not as bad.

Near the end of the game, I finally find my first armor for one of my favorite characters, Tali (picture above). And since I am playing after a week break, I forgot to save myself. My character dies later and I choose "Resume" only to find that one and only armor for this character gone. I load my save game and try again and again to get it from the same enemy encounter but no, it's freakin' gone, as simple as that.

Another stupid "accident" that is totally the game's fault: I start a new game to try a different character class only to find all my previous save files gone. You would expect some sort of warning from the game before it deletes your precious save files, but hell no; the game is just THAT stupid. Now I want that save because I could start a new game using the same save file with all my hard earned items, weapons, upgrades, armors and character level (39 if you must know).

What can I say? I still love the game and it would be very interesting to see how they handle the different story aspects affected by players' choices. Is it really that hard for new games (especially on XBOX 360) to figure a good save system? Am I asking for too much here? Why can't all games at least have a good "Resume"/"Continue" system? I mean look at Uncharted, you practically don't have to save at all while playing it; it takes care of the whole mess and you, the player, don't need to micro manage anything. I hope BioWare gets it right next time. And here's a tip for you, always save while playing Mass Effect.

CAN'T PUT YOU DOWN: UNCHARTED

CAN'T PUT YOU DOWN: UNCHARTED

While you enjoy Burnout Paradise demo (out on both PSN and LIVE, though you need a Gold account on LIVE to download it thanks to Microsoft), I bore myself to death studying for my exams next week. Anyway, since I cannot stop thinking about Ratchet & Clank Future: Tools of Destruction and how I should collect all skill points, upgrade all weapons to Lvl.10 and get that RYNO IV, or imagining myself collecting all treasures and medals in Uncharted, I thought why not just right about my experience with Uncharted: Drake's Fortune? Why indeed. So here we are.

One thing is certain about Uncharted: once you are holding the SIXAXIS playing it, you cannot, and will not, put that SIXAXIS down. When I first got it very late at night after a very tiring trip from Riyadh to Hofuf, I put the game's blu-ray disc into my PS3 around 1AM with the intention of only trying it out (for a few minutes). Being tired and sleepy as I was, I couldn't stop playing till five hours later only to sleep then wake up and hit it again till I am watching the credits. Now I am in a second playthrough and I am planning a third as well.

Now I don't want to spoil the game for you or anything but I have to state my one complaint about the game: there's more shooting than I expected, a lot more. This, as I mentioned, is because of what I was thinking/expecting Uncharted would be so it isn't the game's fault in anyway. And it really shouldn't be called a complaint but I'm out of words here.

If you have a PS3, and I see no reason for any sane person not to have one at this point, you MUST buy and play Uncharted.

On another note, I cannot believe how many re-playthroughs I'm doing these days: with God of War II, Heavenly Sword, Uncharted, Ratchet and Clank and maybe Gears of War, Assassin's Creed and Mass Effect, just maybe.