Rockstar has really done a stellar job of recreating the many different types of terrain in the American west, capturing the subtle differences in the flora and fauna of each region. As you travel from one end of the map to the other you see a number of distinct types of landscapes which really add to the feeling of traveling from say Texas to New Mexico to Arizona to California, with mountains and trees giving way to tall cacti and eventually the joshua trees of the Mojave desert.

The sky effects throughout the day are just amazing and I dare say beautiful, a word I’ve rarely ever used to describe a video game’s graphics, especially during the sunrise and sunset hours and also the night sky… it’s all just done in such a seamless way that even to my cinematographer’s eyes the lighting effects are incredibly realistic. And the sheer size of the map is incredible. Those things you see way off in the background aren’t just a background — they’re places you can actually get to after making a considerable journey. The detailed sound design along with the graphics really work together to create an immersive and incredibly realistic environment, really capturing the feeling of being in the environment.

My only real gripe about the game is the in-game weapon selection system. Changing weapons requires holding one button with one hand while using an analog stick at the same time with the other hand to select from 8 different slots. This system is slow and cumbersome and has often resulted in the death of my character when I couldn’t for example switch from my lasso to a gun fast enough, or worse, accidentally switched to fists while outnumbered in the heat of a gun battle.

Story-wise, the game hasn’t really drawn me in, at least not in the same way I was really taken by my personal favorite game of all time: Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. The back story of the main character being a bad guy gone good isn’t fleshed out very well and as a result is not all that compelling and honestly I have the most fun just riding on my horse traveling from one mission to the next, stopping occasionally to hunt wild animals or gamble, but to be honest, that’s plenty fun enough for me. I’ve only spent a few minutes in the multi-player mode and though one on one death matches are definitely not this games strong suit, the cooperative activities seem to have some potential.

Lately I’ve been pretty much addicted to Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 and I’ve found Red Dead Redemption to be a relaxing counterpoint to the frantic stress and constant paranoia needed to survive in MW2. With it’s incredibly detailed and rich world, playing Red Dead Redemption is almost like taking a relaxing little vacation out into the desert and it’s worthy of standing alone without any comparisons to Grand Theft Auto.

-Bryan

The Big Picture – Haiti, 70 days later:
Amazing pictures from The Big Picture.

AP – Raw Video: Dog Attacks Police Cruiser:
Freakin’ dogs, man:

YouTube – Modern Warfare 2 Mythbusters Episode 4:
Chickens can survive tactical nukes, and the thing about using equipment on ladders was like a revelation to me.

]]> http://blog.twentysix.net/2010/03/26/links-of-the-day/feed/ 0 http://blog.twentysix.net/2009/11/27/happy-thanksgiving/ http://blog.twentysix.net/2009/11/27/happy-thanksgiving/#comments Fri, 27 Nov 2009 08:29:07 +0000 Bryan http://blog.twentysix.net/?p=304 Happy Thanksgiving, everybody. Here’s a little random update on some random stuff.

I worked as an extra on this past week’s episode of Cold Case. I didn’t see myself at all but I did see my car… waaaaaaaaaay in the back, haha.

A little over two weeks ago I bought Forza III for XBOX 360. I played it for about two hours before I had to go somewhere. When I came home I went to turn on my xbox and I got the dreaded red ring of death. It was quite frustrating to have that happen right after getting a new game, haha. Well I finally got it back the other day and I’ve been thoroughly enjoying Forza. I don’t think I’ll be needing a Playstation 3 or waiting for Gran Turismo 5 anymore. It’s awesome.

And now on the topic of thanksgiving. I recently came to the conclusion that rule of law is the most taken-for-granted thing in America. Few people who grew up here know what it is like to live without it. Let me tell you that without rule of law, everything pretty much sucks and nothing can get better.

I’ve seen this first hand in Tajikistan, rated one of the most corrupt governments in the world. It’s a place where any sufficiently well-connected person can seize any kind of private property or business they want and where the most top level government officials funnel foreign investments directly into personal offshore accounts. Even people doing charitable work suffer the consequences. If you want to give something away for free, you’re gonna have to pay a bribe to somebody, somewhere.

So this year I’m especially thankful to be living in a place where we have a working legal system where at least theoretically, no one is above the law, not even the president.

Once again, happy Thanksgiving, everybody.

-Bryan

P.S. Dear Sarah Palin, if you didn’t want your pictures to be used “out of context” (ie. not the context you intended), you shouldn’t have gone and pursued fame. Every celebrity knows that the person who takes the picture owns the rights, not the person in the picture. Ain’t you ever heard of the paparazzi? Or could you not see them from Alaska? Haha. And to everybody else — never take a picture or video of anything you don’t want appearing on the Internet. Words to live by.

P.P.S. Dear Apple, I find it rather weaksauce that Safari’s spellchecking dictionary does not include the word “Tajikistan”, or “weaksauce”, for that matter.

My favorite game of the series was and still is Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. I loved the characters and the character development. I loved the variety of different missions, and I love mid-’90s hip hop and I love Vegas and I grew up in L.A. and so it basically had everything I loved all in one game. OK so the exercising and eating thing was pretty irritating but overall I feel like it was the best game.

When Grand Theft Auto 4 came out, I bought an XBOX360 just to be able to play the game. I was absolutely dazzled by the improved graphics, the level of detail, the massive size of the world (and just how densely packed with detail it was), its complexity, and pure realism. In fact, I even consider GTA4 to be the most realistic driving simulator ever.

Now before all the Gran Turismo fans start jumping on me and complaining about how inaccurate the physics are, yes, I agree, the physics of the driving in GTA4 are not at all realistic. But what other game is there where you can drive while reading text messages on your cell phone, all the while plowing over pedestrians and lamp posts on the sidewalk?

But for all of is magnificent detail and realism, I found GTA4 to be somewhat disappointing in one particular area. The lead character, Nico, turned out to be little more than a hitman and I began to tire of the relentless string of similar hitman-type missions. The story and the characters just didn’t have the kind of depth that I came to expect after Vice City and San Andreas.

Now the reason why I just took you through my whole history with Grand Theft Auto I guess was to say that The Ballad of Gay Tony, the downloadable expansion for GTA4 is the game that GTA4 should have been from the beginning. There’s a much wider variety of types of missions (hitting golf balls at people at a driving range… cage fighting… BASE jumping) and a great plot that weaves itself well into the background of the main GTA4 story.

I found TBoGT to be very enjoyable, and it’s actually the first downloadable content for a game that I’ve gotten on my XBOX360 that wasn’t disappointingly simple and short. There are quite a few new weapons and cars as well as radio, TV and Internet content. It’s a great game in its own right and I probably won’t go back to playing the regular old GTA4 game any more, something that the previous expansion (The Lost and Damned) could not achieve.

Two thumbs up!