Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince is remarkable. Remarkably unentertaining and hideous, that is. It manages to shatter that border that distinguishes a bad game from a good one, and puts itself into its own dreary category of the Worst “Game” of 2009 by far and for a long while. The story is incoherent, the dialogue is as dull as the previous title, and the gameplay makes Atari games seem next-generation.

There is not much more to say about Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. While reviewing something takes a lot of energy to pinpoint details and concepts on a developer’s title, EA Bright Light gave us a very easy time to review Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. Why? EA Bright Light’s work on Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince is so tragic, and their dependency on the name “Harry Potter” as a franchisee profit cow-machine, that there is absolutely nothing to review.

The first problem, rather catastrophe, becomes apparent with spells. The game begins with a grudging task of learning basic-set skills for the gameplay to proceed: Wingardium Leviosa, Lumos, etc. The use of spells boils down to a very simplistic interaction with items around the game for the most part. Using Leviosa, Harry Potter is tasked to get rid of cauldrons in the beginning of the game into a river to avoid Ron Weasley from getting into trouble. While the originality lacks with spell-casting, it further continues onto insulting levels for the players later on. Players will find themselves being harangued around with drone tasks of repairing levers, to setting off vacuous fireworks and other monkey-like tasks for the making. While EA Bright Light tries to incorporate spells into Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, it begrudgingly fails to the dismay of the players and also to the cause of consistent headaches.

Harry Potter continues this trend of a demurral of bad gameplay through to the Duel Club. The duels are as painful as the spells in the game, and have little to no action. Throughout carrying on tasks in Hogwarts, many people/bullies want a piece of Potter for a challenge. Any challenge can be feasibly won by constantly sending out stupefy a bunch of times, followed by some charged attacks that are used by holding the right analog stick backwards then lunging it forward in the direction of the spell. Duels are candidly useless as the storyline, and does not help the game one bit.

For anyone to ever play a game, it needs to make sense. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince completely falters at this, making it shocking to title it a “video game.” The storyline, whatever little there is, verges on ingenuous disappointment. The game just starts off at a random point at Ron Weasley’s house. From there, it jumps to a big newspaper article of Harry Potter as ‘the chosen one,’ deeming his fame to publicity and annoyance at the public, to a very confusing sequence of Draco Malfoy around a cauldron with other evil-doers of ‘He Who Shall Not Be Named.’

From there, it idiotically hops to a sequence in a train where Harry Potter puts on an invisibility cloak and then gets beat around by Malfoy. Another example comes where a quidditch match starts right away, not exactly subtle transition. An hour later, another confusing cutscene happens with a necklace, and a girl. The stupidity continues and it is far too much to list. For the sake of the readers, we will stop here.The level of chaos and the amount of migraines we had at the remarkably half-baked assets of the game cannot even begin to summarize Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.

I Am Never Coming Back to Hogwarts

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince is an OK piece of “interactive entertainment.” But let us be real, EA Bright Light. Calling Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince a video game is wrong, and that is more than enough of a fact. There is virtually any decent gameplay, zero originality with any sort of concepts if there are any, and a confusing story that is not frankly a story. While Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince will arrive in theaters July 15th, 2009 worldwide, there is no reason to make software that is completely reliant on the franchise name and fearful of ruining anything for the movie. It would have been better to just wait until the film came out to provide a full experience to actually “Relive the Action of the Movie” and not “Relive a Nightmare” in the mask of a video game. The only thing done right was the environment design, so give that developer a medal. For Harry Potter fans and new fans alike, straying away from this title is the logical option. Renting it from the bottom rack would be a tough decision to consider.

Talk about intense. E3 was packed this year with resellers, and less media —but it got bigger, better, and more selective. We were there to get every exciting moment: from Project Milo to Heavy Rain, and exclusive interviews. As always, it was certainly a great time, and now that time is over. It’s time to look forward, ahead to newer and better releases, and to ennoble titles in this year’s WhatIfGaming’s Best Of E3 Awards 2009.

Criteria: The Best of E3 Awards, a subcategory for the WhatIfGaming Prizes, are given solely to those video games that demonstrate a pure excellence in the field for which they are not only nominated but also chosen. These awards only apply to playable games at E3 given a few exceptional categories.

Nomination & Selection Process: Compared with other site awards, the WhatIfGaming Prize nomination and selection process is long and extremely rigorous. This is the sole reason why WhatIfGaming Prizes have grown in importance over the years to become the most important prizes in their field. Forms, which amount to a personal and exclusive invitation, are sent to about over 1,000 selected individuals to invite them to submit nominations months in advance from the latest builds per video game. Self-nominations are disqualified. For WhatIfGaming Prizes, inquiries are sent to such people as developers, industry experts, analysts, among others. After our deadline passes, the nominations are chosen by permanent committee of 5 selected individuals from staff and only the final stage of nominees remain per category. From all of these, a winner is chosen.

The names of the nominees are not publicly announced, and neither are they told that they have been considered for the WhatIfGaming Prize. Some are announced publicly by practice. Nomination records are revealed approximately 2 years after each respective award year.

Overlord II places players into the skull encrusted, blood stained boots of a ‘Lord’ with glowing eyes and a huge axe and allows you to command minions to do your deeds. Be evil, or be dark (the light form of good) – it is up to you. The interesting thing about the Overlord series is undeniably the diminutive minions that take the primary picture. They are ultimately the ones that run the course of the gameplay, with humor and intrigue that is simply incredible. With the similar and perfect formula from the old game and amazing visuals and upgraded features, Overlord II is one game that anyone needs to take a commanding destruction towards.

Overlord 2, like its predecessor, is a dark humor Pikmin. We all remember those furry little plant looking animals in Pikmin for Gamecube, and cannot believe the scope that Overlord II twists it with. Overlord II branches out in its puzzles and seamlessly integrated mini-games. As different varieties of minions are acquired, newer areas of exploration open up and eliminate the backtracking aspect from Overlord. The mission structure continues to require things to do, but it serves as anything far from distraction. There are mission design pieces which make for a break from the usual gore-fest in other games, and give an opportunity to extend beyond into something better and more improved. The only disappointing gameplay aspect comes with the armies and barricades. It seems rather unruly and kind of annoying that enemy types in the mission have no substance than an army unit or something completely random, but there still remains a fair amount of engaging gameplay with a lot of opportunities to increase your power as the Overlord in Overlord II.

Overlord II continues to keep the same formula, but greatly revenges upon the issues of the first game. Minion death was excruciating because when they acquired spoils from a sacking, these would all vanish when they died. These losses eventually found their way into reloading from a previous save, or to simply give up. Overlord II finally tethers the accomplishments and gives them names and titles based on their individual actions. Furthermore, there is an interesting revival feature that really aids in returning minions with the equipment and spoils. The only downside comes in the form of high-level minions that are just expensive as a measure that weighs resources of best minions with the downside of their death.

Overlord II places a vast importance on one word: customization, either in the form of minion upgrades, spell specializations, or just aesthetic options with the Overlord Fortress. While all of these are largely implacable to the gameplay and the core structure of mission design, it continues to expand on the sheer number of things to do and makes a difference in overall strategy in terms of fun and entertainment. All of these form withing a system of micromanagement as the Overlord walks around in the fortress to change, which is a welcome derivation from the traditional menu-style gameplay management system. You feel the abode with the fortress is much larger in scale, and then there is the actuality of the scope of the fortress that makes sure to let you see the changes over time that happen. There is variety in Overlord II as opposed to a majority of Overlord I, not to mention a lot of focus that Codemasters made sure to get right.

Replayability seeks a lot of room in Overlord II with the endless customizations and areas to explore, but Overlord II is by no means a game where the world is completely vast. To the humble beginnings, the sequel still remains a micro-world with different land forges to manage or destroy to your liking. While the game maintains the illusion of open-area exploration, it is essentially limited after the main storyline is over, and all the chaos that needs to be ensued, ensues.

Pick up the controller and travel to that dark place in your heart where there is some innate evil, even though you would like to deny this. Overlord II lets you control an evil army of minions to wreak havoc and eventually control the lands, which is a great retreat for anyone looking to let out their inner evil. That is, unless you already are an Overlord somewhere, with a tower, and a little minion army to do you evil bidding.

Turn your mouse clickers and scroll wheel timers to WhatIfGaming this upcoming Saturday July 1st, 2009 for an exclusive presentation of our 9th year anniversary of the WhatIfGaming E3 Awards for 2009, with official public listing that celebrated from late 2001.

The WhatIfGaming E3 Prizes had their origins ever since the end of 1999’s E3 ceremony when we revealed to select publishers what our site cherished for their offerings during exclusive press meetings through an official sticker prize from yours truly. Very few gained them, and some were only notified. Over the years, the awards became public but remained even more strenuous in criteria, with no nominees ever being publicly listed until  a future predetermined date. 5 members of our staff in a permanent committee select the winners from a long line of industry related inquiries taken and personal consideration.

Also, feel free to log on Friday June 26th, 2009 for an Overlord II review (with over 46 hours played and timed only from us) and also an exclusive post-release interview with the creative minds behind Overlord II and their future plans!

Fight Night Round 4 has the challenge of improving on the title that helped shaped the generation of gaming ever since the debut of the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. EA Canada had to essentially improve on the game that delivered the first HD gaming experience and is taking the responsibility from the dead EA Chicago studio with plenty of chances to make mistakes, or make another hit title. Does Fight Night Round 4 live up to expectations or does it get knocked out?

To start off, taking a look at changes brings us to career mode. The control mechanics have been reshaped by doubling the speed and adding an all-new physics system. They’ve made changes to the career mode, they’ve changed the control mechanics, and they’ve reshaped every move in the game by doubling its speed and adding an all-new physics system. Fight Night Round 4 delivers the best boxing ever seen in a videogame this generation. Once you are in the ring with your own fighter, there is an experience that no other game can provide. Deliver punches while moving around and leaning is essentially incredible. The new physics and scoring system deliver far from many moments that register it as a hit, and make a great experience.

In Fight Night Round 4, the basic strategy revolves around a different approach. Haymakers are now more annoying than they were but everything places a focus in the way you approach fighting and your fighter’s style. Parrying punches is not an option and blocking is now high or low, so guarding left and right quadrants has finally been alleviated as an annoying concern.

The countering system does an incredible job of emulating realistic boxing and there is a great window that works with the camera that allows for a launch with an open area of the body. You will have plenty of chances to evade punches and bring in a totally different counter-opportunity. The incredible camera system follows up very well to the moves and helps strategies come alive. See a boxer uncovering on his left side, and jab an undercut straight from Muhammad Ali. The only issue with counter-punching is that the AI is very difficult. They react too quickly to the moves and there is a lot frustration when it comes to beating them at their own game. Despite this, the countering system works best when fighting against a human opponent as they make logical decisions and predictable ones that aid in the realism of the fight.

Career mode has one annoying aspect that is worth mention. It has no soul. The rivalry system from Fight Night Round 3 has been remedied somewhat. While you no longer are given arbitrary rivals to go up against, there is now no rivalry call-out at all and no special attention paid to your rivals. Instead, you are instantly challenged to a rematch when you have a great fight with someone. It is just too made up and less involved.

Online is the same as single player in Fight Night Round 4, but much better thanks to the realism of the fight and the believable strategy and difficulty of human opponents.

Fight Night Round 4 is simply a wonderful and great boxing game. There are issues in career mode such as the random and awful training games outside of sparring and one-hand training while punching a handbag. The online offering, while not hugely different from the previous Fight Night, still delivers with no lag and an additionally great EA online statistics leader board and match-making system. Fight Night Round 4 is a game that anyone who loves boxing should get, but do not be annoyed by the small inconveniences. Fight Night Round 4 will knock you down anytime of the day.

Any game that allows the player to rip humans in half and cut them limb from limb is instantly deemed fun and Prototype is no different. The comparisons to other games of a similar nature are hard to ignore but Prototype does enough to separate it from the pack to avoid the tag of copycat.

Prototype’s story is told through a series of interesting and original ways, as well as the usual character dialogue and flashbacks. You play as Alex Mercer, a character who has a past but has to use his incredible powers to unlock those distant memories and find out who he really is. After waking up in a morgue, Alex escapes the military and is on a personal vendetta to find whoever infected him and bring vengeance to that person. After playing the tutorial. Alex talks to some unknown character about the events that happened during the previous 18 days, and it is this time frame in which the players interact and the story of how the destroyed New York reveals itself.

The complete freedom Prototype allows is staggering. Assassin’s Creed invented the free roam parkour style with Infamous nearly perfecting the style with unlimited access to climb every building, but none of these titles can quite compete with the ease of holding a button to run up any building that takes your fancy. If that is not enough, the extremely powerful jump Alex can perform never makes traversing an open world city quite the same again. However, as in every open world game, it falls into the same problem with repetitive side missions commonplace. Side missions fall to the realm of the flawed that becomes disappointing as the main story missions are done well through variety and engaging adrenaline. Side missions are clearly there to lengthen the experience, and it would have been more appropriate to add extensive creativity and effort to something that would end up creating a major part of the game.

A.I. is pretty great for the most part when it comes to believability. They yell, have emotion, and really make you feel as if you are interacting with a New York crowd. Like a New York crowd. Unfortunately, enemy A.I. could be better in most places especially within the “highly-trained” military. Luckily, the infected monsters at least retain their goal stratagem: attack and kill anything. The powers that are unlocked and upgraded throughout the game are where the most fun is streamlined. Whether it be 2 foot claws or giant fists or any other power you have equipped, you know you will have fun ripping apart anything that crosses your path. Even though these powers may seem a bit overpowering against standard human military when it comes to the greatly enhanced infected, it is this very aspect which balances the game perfectly.

Prototype is not perfect and has the same problems found in similar games. Regardless, it does a lot more than other games of the kind. Alex Mercer and his sexy voice alone are enough reasons to play this game, even though the storyline is predictable. Ripping people apart, and just being a completely stoic villain is a lot more to ask for than it is to ever get, something which Activision and Radical Studios graces us with. The positive elements it has are very well done overall. Ignoring the repetitive nature of the side missions and the sometimes shoddy A.I., Prototype is a very enjoyable game that you will spend hours playing, even past the point of no-return endings.

When there is something strange in your neighborhood, who are you going to call..? A copy of Atari’s incredible Ghostbusters title. After literally dozens of cancellation threats on the project, the long-awaited Ghostbusters game is back – and one that I have personally hoped would come out ever since I watched the original back in the day. The iconic quartet return an excruciating 20 years after their last ghost-busting outing, bringing with them the original humour and feel of the Ghostbusters which is perfectly realized perfectly in game form. The original cast (Dan Aykroyd, Harold Ramis, Ernie Hudson and of course the always witty Bill Murray) return to give the game the authentic feel to make it feel like a sequel to the films and it does nothing short of a simply fantastic job at making players literally feel as if they are a part of it.

Set two years after Ghostbusters II, Manhattan is once again spooked by ghosts and supernatural forces. Ghosts, poltergeists and giant marshmallow men make an effulgent return to the familiar zone of fans of the film. This time the team is kicking it up a notch and hires an experimental technical advisor as a 5th member of the group, or ‘New-Guy’ as Bill Murray’s character calls him. The defining thing about Ghostbusters is simply that the original writers were contumacious and decided to step out of the normal: to write the storyline of the game in all seriousness as if it were a sequel, e.g. Ghostbusters III, thanks to Terminal Reality and RedFly. The plot is controvertible to a relaxing and engaging experience into the world of Ghostbusters that few games manage to pull off. Ghosbusters drives players into the eerie and lets them experience the environment in a strong sense of realism. The beginning of the game starts off with a large electro-pulse emanating from a museum, where a Gozer event is taking place the following day and it is the job of the four ghostbusters plus a stereotypical silent-player controlled character to take down the spirits and ghouls around the city while causing chaos and mess everywhere they shoot their proton stream.

As the new recruit in charge of experimental techniques, players will test a variety of new weapons, equipment, and gadgets to trap the very unique and quirky ghosts out on the loose. The primary weapon is the proton stream pack. When trying out the proton packs for the first time, it seems daunting at first when different methods to capture ghosts is described but after a couple of times it becomes easy. The learning curve is not steep, and makes it easy for any players to get in the action and capture ghosts, although some ghosts may take ages to capture.

The gameplay feels extremely responsive, whether trying to capture ghosts or moving to your next mission objective. There is just one problem with Ghostbusters: the lack of a jump button is very annoying. Everything in Ghostbusters is so action-tethered that it seems almost impossible to not include this, unless you count the small dodge button the jump action. It just seems that with a lack of the jump button, Ghostbusters can definitely serve to be more action-packed than it tries to be. The mission design is essentially repetitive: capture a ghost, capture this ghost, evade this ghost, capture a ghost, capture him, and her, and so on.  The A.I. of your fellow ghostbusters can be patchy at times which does not help the mission structure but they come to your aid when your down 99% of the time. Regretabbly, they also will not think twice about running full speed into a group of enemies and being overwhelmed which is frustrating when you have to heal them while also being attacked and flanked from all angles. The missions themselves, however, are well thought out when it comes to gameplay design even though its that same dreaded repetition of a scenario of capture a few ghosts, move on, capture a few more ghosts, move, fight boss type character – you understand the picture. Conducive to repetition aside, the dialogue and fresh humour added on by original voice cast keeps it fresh up to a point.

The multiplayer in Ghostbusters is more of the same old missions and objectives as seen in any other shooter. With several different modes or “jobs” including Containment, Survival, Destruction, Slime Dunk, Protection and Thief,  the gameplay sounds like it could bring new styles to multiplayer. Sadly, these modes are similar to capture the area and destroy enemy-held objectives which are seen everywhere these days. It does not necessarily do anything wrong in this department just brings nothing new to the table.

Ghostbuster’s graphics seem to be too cartoon-influenced for hardcore audience that are used to intensively real graphics and life-like quandries, but they work extremely well for this game and art-style.

Ghostbusters follows in the footsteps of the films and will undeniably serve as a rightful homage to the franchise and something a lot of people can look forward to, regardless of whether they are fans of the witty Ghostbusters group or even have a strong dislike for ghosts in general. Ghostbusters surprisingly faced numerous threats of never coming to the market, which would have been a shame. Whoever initially did deny it publishing rights is rightly a fool and we will stop from embarassing them further. Games like this prove  that fun is still in gaming even though more serious forms are dominant at the moment. Ghostbusters by Terminal Reality and Atari is the most realistic attempt to mimic the film that any game developer has ever achieved and you have to buy it to experience this.

The scene is titled “Mad Jack,” and rightly so as we soon had a chance to see. Cage described this scene to us as a “classic dark thriller” and then introduced us to one of the main stars, Norman Jayden, a young FBI agent who has been called in to investigate the case of the Origami Killer, a killer that leaves an Origami figure in the hands of his victims. Jayden is an organized, methodological, and simply mercurial character with degrees in psychology and forensics. His background is the reason he was assigned to the case, given that he spent the last two years talking to serial killers in prison. Cage makes clear that the character has a sense of tension to him from substance-abuse problem. Eventually Jayden approaches a bulky looking character named Mad Jack, a tough looking man with some possible traces to the killer. The investigation leads to a murder near a building that involves a blue car.

Jayden is one clever fellow. He is armed with ARI: (added reality interface) prototype, which consists of a pair of glasses and a black glove that can detect and analyze DNA, footprints, and other traces in the environment in real time, something that is simply incredible and vivifies the CSI scene.

The beginning scene takes place in an eerie and yet beautiful/clustered junkyard that Jayden decides to scope out because the man running it, Mad Jack, supposedly might have ties to the killer. As the rain pours down, Jayden pulls up in the ribald place as he opens the car door. The atmosphere is just simply incredible in Heavy Rain. While he is in the car, you can hear his angst from being stressed by the current situation. Top this all off with his drug abuse problem, and you get a simply interpretative character to the highest extent. Details in the environment such as the murky weather and the gloomy palette add to the incredible draw of the incredibly sound music that adheres to the mood. Every movement and detail in Heavy Rain is simply subtle and worthy of applause from just the demo alone, which says a lot whereas most demos do not reveal much. A box with a small white arrow is displayed on the side of the car to indicate that the door can be opened by pressing the right analog stick. Symbols will appear onscreen when there is an action available. Quite interestingly, this lends itself to making sure every single exploration technique is executed carefully. Being drenched from the rain, our Jayden asks Jack to come inside to talk, but surprisingly unlike the E3 Stage Demo, this Mad Jack denies. So we were left to go inside and explore with ARI, a simply revolutionary technology.

Suddenly, a curve arrow by Jayden’s shoulder indicates that he can put his ARI specs on by pushing the right analog stick in a half-circle motion. Color faded as contrast became heightened from his vision until everything was tinged with a green hue. Data appears on screen dynamically with the press of the R1 button to indicate points of interest such as footprints, blood, and orchid pollen related to the Origami Killer himself. Speckled clues eventually led Jayden to the acid bath with a body in it, unfortunately Mad Jack appears out of nowhere with a gun pressed to the back of his head. A series of intense quick-time events allows Jayden to steadfastly evade harm’s way, using surroundings to distract Mad Jack long enough to disarm him. A series of well-choreographed punches were exchanged, and while the fast-paced action unfolded onscreen, the intensiveness translated to the controllers directly.

After the encounter, Jayden faints from substance-abuse blurredness and is shown appearing in a car that is about to be compiled by metallic compacters. From here, Quantic Dream sets up the traditional Indigo Prophecy-esque camera angle showing a side view of the car and an inside view as Jayden struggles while figuring out what to do. The character’s moods themselves also act to the intense action in which players carry out their moves. The players do not solely affect the characters, but the characters also affect the players and their actions –simply marvelous.

With more than 12 hours of confirmed gameplay, Quantic Dream is shaping out to make a title that is fit for simply none other than a positive reception come review time from us, that is if they can stick to their roots long enough and be as meticulous as they already are with Heavy Rain, so far one of our most anticipated PlayStation 3 titles this year.

Mass Effect Commander Shepard is back again in Mass Effect 2. All the rumors of his death have been greatly exaggerated. First off, BioWare intends to make Mass Effect 2 accessible to those new to the series. If you played the original and had the save games left over, you can continue the character from where you left off. All the choices you made, everything still had an effect. This fact alone had our staff simply drooling: the prospect of the sequel directly linking itself to the first half was simply incredible. Gameplay choices and moral standing will carry over into Mass Effect 2, giving a full and continuous experience.

At the E3 2009 Electronic Arts press demo, Dr. Ray Muzyka and Dr. Greg Zeschuk showed us more about Shepard, a commander we so longed for since our Mass Effect 1 Review ‘back in the day.’ Commander Shepard is going to take on the task of handling the Cerberus Corporation and many fallacious plans they have in store for the star sectors of the Mass Effect universe. Colonies are disappearing all over the galaxy, and an investigation is struck up by Shepard himself. Initially, the other characters such as Rex, and Nihlus included are shocked to find out that Shepard lived after the fatal incident in Mass Effect 1. Furthermore, the Geck are not the only enemies to fear — the Reapers are still at a large and are a venerable threat. Within the game, Shepard searches for powerful individuals to recruit to his team, including an assassin that belongs to an uncovered race called the Drell. Thane, the mysterious assassin from the demo, is revealed to have some connection to the instances of Mass Effect 1 and the beacon itself. This entire cast selection remains a mystery in the origins of the plot as BioWare explains to us later on towards the end of the demo.

The exclusive demo starts off where we saw a cutscene in which flying vehicles speed through the vivacious metropolis as Shepard and an Asari partner are in a speeder. The dialogue options are certainly much more improved. Aside from the brilliant voice acting, the amount of urgency is projected much better and becomes more equivocal. The camera angle pulls out dynamically, something which the first game made us slightly irritated. Dynamic camera angles add to the livelihood of the scene and the constant activity on the screen becomes something players can relate to rather than simply watch. There was more interactivity this time around, and BioWare makes sure to underscore this tweaked feature. Once the car landed, Shepard and his companion entered a daunting tower. Once inside, Shepard meets a security officer. Or so he thought, but eventually a conflict ensued where Shepard throws the man over a balcony to his own death. The focus of this was to show that unlike Mass Effect 1, conversations can be changed and modified through “interruptions” that will prompt during interactions as they progress.

Mass Effect 2 also gets combat options amazingly right as well. Commander Shepard will now be able to issue move and attack orders to each squadmate individually. The pause-and-play action still remains, but BioWare stressed real-time action would be made more viable than ever before. Shepard continued to fight his way across the space station. BioWare showed off multiple physics-based attacks that sent Shepard’s exigent enemies to their deaths. Mass Effect 2 also comes with nine new classes of weapons, which include heavy weapons, such as a missile launcher and light weapons.

Mass Effect 2’s visuals are simply more regnant of a darker and grittier tone than before, as well as a lot smoother. The new character models speak smoothly. As Shepard moved closer to his target recruit, the environment’s details poured forward with red and blue and all the pretty colors giving incredible contrast and aspect. Shephard encounters an Asari that is shocked to see Shepard. She turns to Shepard in shock, pronouncing “Shepard?! But…you’re dead.” A conversation ensues, and it is extremely noticeable how lifelike the characters are in the mannerisms in which they present their dialogue and emotions.

Mass Effect 2 is refining everything about Mass Effect: from combat to graphics and simple emotion, bringing the best of Mass Effect 1 and making it even more glorious than it ever was. Mass Effect 2 is dated for 2010, and we cannot wait to preview it some more.

Alan Wake has been at the epicenter of attention at Remedy Games and Microsoft Games Studios ever since it was announced. Heralded as another notable DirectX 10 game, Alan Wake describes the story of a critically acclaimed author Alan Wake and his tense and dark world that contributes to the atmosphere of this survival horror genre. While the game is primarily about mystery and looking for clues, the overall facilitation lies with exploration and horror. We were given yet another exclusive look at Microsoft’s Meeting Room this year at E3 2009 for a one on one look at Alan Wake after the Microsoft Conference E3 Stage Demo, the primary reason we held off writing impressions. We wanted to bring everyone the real thing, and here it is.

Open the scene to Alan Wake in a book store. Slowly and realistically, he moves a chair back and stands over the self-titled book created by him, imagining it finished. Outside, trees and a river can be heard as the landscape moves believably. Alan Wake and his wife, Alice, have decided to take a vacation to take a break from his writing of the supernatural book, according to the developers. His wife ends up being kidnapped at a time unknown to the players and it is up to Alan Wake to track her down by hunting down pages of his novel. Essentially, Alan Wake is one entirely interesting piece of work. Spoiler Alert: The interesting notion that Alan wake is a story in a story is not revealed according to Remedy until nearly the end of the game, when the players will have an “awe-inspiring” sense of déjà vu. Essentially, all the action sequences are taking place to the players’ unknown confusion either in a pseudo-reality: where dreams and reality intertwine on the border, where the beauty of the entire game comes into play.

A cutscene lends itself to Alan Wake consoling with Barry Wheeler about his wife’s disappearance. As a neurotic but interesting character in Bright Falls, he simply thinks Wake is crazy about assuming his wife is missing. Barry gives Wake information about Rusty, the local cop, saying he found some missing pages from Wake’s manuscript. Wake’s mission is to meet up with Rusty. The next scene is a very dark night near the cabin where the two were staying. Alan Wake seems to be having a bad dream and arises from the sounds of his wife, clearly in his own mind. “Alan…Save Me Alan,” can be heard which raises Goosebumps. He decides now is the time to head out to Rusty’s. The night atmosphere is tense and extremely eerie. Owls can be heard, and if the players do not move at all to hear their own footsteps, there is a level of cold dead in the night. Alan Wake slowly walks through the darkened forest, a flashlight in his left hand providing the only source of light. Inanimate objects suddenly spring to life in this forest and Alan has to start swinging at the boxes with his flashlight. The controls are interestingly inverted for Alan Wake. The right analog sticks control the actual player movement while the left analogs provide a steady support for the physical view of the head, an interesting concept that surprisingly works well to place players in the tension of always progressing forward and using their opposite writing hand to exaggerate a closeness to auxiliary view.

On the path down towards Rusty’s place, Wake comes across a page of his manuscript. A narration follows where Wake is shocked, “He screamed,’They’re here!’ and then he pulled the trigger.” And that’s when things get weird. The lights along the trail blow out and a scream is heard from Rusty’s place, followed by a bullet sound. Rusty is in serious trouble. Alan slowly lit his flashlight, when suddenly, a group of infected townsfolk surrounded him in a dead pan stare. The sparks from the light sends them to a screeching agony, and Wake is shocked.

The primary reason these things are here is because of one thing: Darkness. “A darkness grows in the world of bright falls,” says a Remedy rep. At least, that is what Alan Wake believes. His wife goes missing, taken by something or someone that wants the missing pages of Wake’s new manuscript. A large focus of the missions involves hunting down these pages, which foreshadow coming events. While there are many pages that you are required to find to progress the story, many more can be collected that add to the detail of the atmosphere. WhatIfGaming is a smart media site with an even smarter audience (considering most of our staff went to Ivy League’s) so we figured out quite quickly that this darkness is actually the key villain in Alan Wake’s supernatural novel, where the darkness infects the locals thereby providing a sense of irony in the whole fictional yet realistic realm of Wake. To kill these bad people, you must first expose them to the light which can be done either with your trusty flashlight, any other light-based weapon, or lights in the environment. Once exposed to the light, these enemies are vulnerable to physical attacks and can be defeated.

While this Alan Wake exclusive hands-on preview ended here, it was definitely worth the wait. Alan Wake presented a simply creepy environment while providing subtle details that will certainly relate much better once the full game is released. With the good 20-30 minutes we had with it, we can see that Remedy is clearly geared to making a game that is simply worthwhile and shows it at the same time too.