Grand Theft Auto - PC

"See what that bitch is up to."

You are a criminal. Don't deny it, you know it is true. Every time you break the speed limit, drive after a couple beers, copy a movie, steal cable, rip that little tag off the furniture, or lie to the credit card company (I swear I sent the check), you are committing crimes. Face it, we're all criminals to some degree or another. Anyone who says they've never committed a crime is lying. Grand Theft Auto allows us to nurture that criminal instinct and to have a lot of fun along the way.

The plot of Grand Theft Auto is simple. You are a minor player in a criminal syndicate. You answer pay phones and check your beeper to get jobs from your mob boss. He can order you to steal cars, kill cops, kill other gangs, do drug delivery runs, have you tail his girlfriend, and much more. Essentially, when anything illegal needs to be done, it gets handed to you. How you complete the job determines how much money you get, and gives you access to other, hidden, missions. If you thought Postal was bad, you ain't seen nothing. This game has no morals whatsoever. You even get bonus points for running someone over with their own car! Sounds good to me!

The controls are fairly basic. Since you are in a car most of the time, the controls are geared toward that setup. This means that when you are walking around, the arrow keys are relative movement, not absolute movement. Though this can be annoying at the beginning, you quickly get used to it. Grand Theft Auto is the first game, however, to have a hijack key. By pressing this key next to a car, you open the driver's side door, slug the driver, pull him onto the pavement, and hop into your new vehicle. Not bad, eh?

The graphics in Grand Theft Auto were obviously not the focus of the developers attention. The cities are remarkably huge, however, and they really make you feel as though you are driving in New York, San Francisco, or Miami (they have different names in the game, but it is obvious what cities they're supposed to be). The manual claims that there are over 6,000 city miles in the game, and, frankly, I believe it. Some of the cars, however, need a lot of work. There are cars that, to this day, I have not figured out what they're supposed to be. Also, they couldn't use the real names of the vehicles, so they made up names that were close enough, like Porka instead of Porsche.

Unfortunately, in order to run the game in the best graphics mode, you have to do something not seen for awhile . . . run the game in DOS. *gasp* Though the game says it's Win95 compatible, no one in their right mind would play the Win95 version. I had to call tech support in order to discover that if you want any sort of resolution, you have to run the game through DOS. Also, 3Dfx only works through DOS. While this might have been acceptable six years ago when people were using Win3.1 and routinely had to exit to DOS, nowadays most new computer owners have never even seen the DOS screen. Happily, Grand Theft Auto installed all the needed drivers in DOS, and I only had to change the sound card setup. Why they did this, I will never know, but you can bet that it messes with Internet play.

Since I connect to the Internet through Win95, I lack the DOS drivers for my modem. So, if I want to play online, I have to play with the dumpy graphics. Needless to say, I don't play online very much.

Another drawback is the repetitive nature of the game. First off, you can't save in the middle of the game. You have to either complete the level or die to end a game in the middle. This leads to gamers playing the first missions over and over and over again when they are first getting used to the game. Needless to say, this gets a bit frustrating. Also, a lot of the missions are remarkably similar.(i.e. drive to point B, meet someone, drive to point C, kill someone, drive to point D, and get rid of the car.) While the immoral aspects of the plot are entertaining and fun, they don't mask the fact that you have to do almost the same thing for every mission.

In the end, we have a game that is a great idea, but not very well executed. With mediocre graphics and repetitive gameplay, some gamers might be disappointed. Like Postal, Grand Theft Auto is depending a lot on controversy to sell the game, not gameplay. While this works for sales, it tends to upset many hard-core gamers. However, if you're looking for a fun, goofy, immoral game, than Grand Theft Auto should definitely be on your list.

Final Fantasy VIII - PC

Squall Leonhart--victim of trauma inducing parents

What's in a name? Well, take Squall Leonhart. What the hell were his parents thinking? I mean, what kind of gonzo book of names did they use when they named their son after a weather condition? You might argue, "But Johnny - it's symbolic of the inner torment and struggles he faces." Shaddap and go back to your English class. Stop and think how much less moody he'd have been if only he were named Milhouse.

Squall is an angst-ridden student of Garden, a military school that trains soldiers of the highest ability. The few that make it that far are known as SeeD. Squall's entry into this elite force embroils him in a conflict against the evil witch, Edea. Long thought to be the stuff of legends, witches are powerful sorceresses who seek to control the world. Can you stop her? When the Playstation version came out back in September of '99, I said that eventually the PC version would come out with cleaned up, sharpened graphics. Well, I take it all back. The Playstation was better. The PC conversion hacks blew it big time. While the characters are sharper, polygonal errors are everywhere. Just look at the triangle that pops up on Seifer's head or the broken seams that show up far, far too often. The font, the menu screens, the save system, backgrounds... just name it, and you'll find a sloppy mess. Even the card game is jacked up. This port shows a complete lack of effort. There are times you can even see gray lines outlining areas of the background. Do these people even know Photoshop? Thankfully, the gameplay stays intact. Magic is still operated through a "junction" system. Different traits of your character can be affected by how much magic you have. Magic is found in the different enemies you face. By "drawing" magic from an opponent, you can stock up on as many units of magic as you want... or have the patience for. The blatant flaw of this system is that in order to truly "strengthen" your character, you must endlessly draw those important spells to the max (100). Let me spell it out for you: B-O-R-I-N-G. With no armor upgrades, and weapon upgrades as a more minor aspect, the need to draw magic becomes far too important. The last area in the game is really nothing more than an easy chance to max out all your spells. It would've been better if spells were harder to accumulate and enemies didn't have unlimited spells to draw. In order to draw magic, you must first equip a Guardian Force (GF) to your characters, thereby inheriting the GF's traits and abilities. The GF's gain experience points, developing more abilities as you fight with them equipped. Sure, people bitch about how long the animations take and how boring it gets (all true), but you can eliminate that by just choosing to use the GF's less. If only there was programmed limit to using the GF's... It wouldn't be a Square game without overblown, glorified videos. And thankfully, the video has survived the port; sharper and brighter than before. But who cares if the main graphics can't back the FMV up anymore. Musically, there are a few tracks that really stand out. Most of the other songs have a looped, emptiness to them. Compared to past Final Fantasies, the music of FF8 is rather mediocre. And the MIDI of the PC version sounds even more mechanical and lifeless. Yet again, I must complain: Why aren't there any voices? If you really want to read, go buy a book. Text-only dialogue should be an option, not the standard. This had better be the last "silent" Final Fantasy.

There are still some great moments in the plot and some fun aspects to the gameplay, but it's all overshadowed by the disappointing, shabby port. Final Fantasy 8 was a great game turned crappy by lazy programmers who don't know the meanings of conversion or quality. Go replay the PSX version instead.

FIFA 2000 - PC

Atomic Bomberman - PC

Definitely Not The Bomb

Those of us who remember the original Bomberman (1 and 2) on the NES recall it as one of the best multiplayer games of its time. It incorporated simplistic controls, simple graphics and game play that just kept the players wanting more. It proved that a game didn't have to be the most technologically advanced to be great, it just had to be fun. Unfortunately, Atomic Bomberman, Interplay's PC version of the original Bomberman, offers minimal advancements since the original came out 7 years ago. While diehard classic arcade fans may appreciate this, they also still have all their Atari 2600 carts. For most of us it looks incredibly basic when compared to many hits out today.

You would think that with the high-end machines they had to work with, Atomic Bomberman's graphics would have had new "twists", cool little scenes or camera angles that don't take away from the basic game design but add a little spice. However, it fails to live up to this. All graphics are 2D bitmaps, while levels are the same 2D tiles. All graphics including player sprites, power-ups and level tiles look absurdly large. The game would have been better with larger levels (this means smaller objects). The only noticeable graphical improvement since its predecessor would be the fact that Atomic Bomberman has better death-sequence animations. Other than that, I would be much happier playing my old Super Bomberman II on the SNES.

One of the best aspects about the original Bomberman series on the NES and SNES would be the fact that it didn't take a game guru to master the controls and basic idea of the game. With only 2 non-directional keys, one of which drops a bomb and other takes care of every other action (punch bomb and detonate timer bomb), any idiot could quickly pick up and play any of the Bomberman series without any prior knowledge of the game. The game itself is self-explanatory. Players control one person, or bomberman, each. The goal is blow the other people up with bombs that you drop, without blowing yourself up. As you blow away different pieces of the level to open up more playing space, different power-ups will appear. These power-ups give players different abilities such as bigger bombs, more bombs (to drop at once), punch (to punch a bomb away from you), kick (kicks the bomb away from you), timer-bomb, roller skate (for more speed), and poison. If you pick up a poison item (box with skull on it) you can become infected with such ailments as Molasses, Constipation, or the inability to drop bombs, or the inability to stop dropping bombs. This poison can be given to other players by touching them.

Allowing up to ten players, the multiplayer support is one of the most important features. AI and human player can be mixed and matched to create what can only be described as fun chaos: ten people in one small arena. Thus the enhanced multiplayer support is one of the factors that keeps Atomic Bomberman from totally dying out.

Sounds are probably the most improved aspect since the earlier versions. A number of sounds arise when the player gets power-ups. A bomberman might cry out, "That's mine" when grabbing that extra bomb. Fast-beat techno jams are played constantly in the background.

Unfortunately, Atomic Bomberman just didn't live up to what it was I hoped for. Graphics were disappointingly simple. The game play stayed nearly the same to its predecessors, which basically involved walking around and dropping bombs. The level editing and animation-editing programs aren't even worth mentioning. They are the most non-user-friendly tools I have ever seen shipped with a game. Those who know little about graphics, animations or game design will find these utilities extremely difficult if not impossible to use due to the lack of documentation or support. Another horrible aspect about the game is its size, at full install you are looking at 500+ Megs being taken on your hard drive. My only question is how. How can such a simple game take up so much damn room? Most people would be better off grabbing an emulation of one of the Super Bomberman series that appeared on the SNES a couple years back. Unless you are a huge Bomberman fan, you should save your money for a better game.

NBA Street Homecourt - Xbox360

How to miss a slam dunk.

NBA Street Homecourt is called NBA Street Homecourt because we already have a video game franchise called “Monkey Ball.”

NBA Street Monkey Ball, however, would better describe the most apparent difference between this game and the games of NBA Street past. Whereas super over-the-top dunks have always been Street staples, the dunks in Homecourt up the ante by adding simian-like acrobatics and aggressive hoop-rape that could only be motion-captured in a spider monkey cage.

For those new to NBA Street, the EA Big version of basketball opts for three-on-three basketball with the emphasis on ridiculous dribbling tricks and absurd dunks. The quick paced arcade feel of the original NBA Streets is preserved in Homecourt, and at first the only observable difference between this and its ancestors is the enhanced resolution of the next generation graphics.

Back again is the “game breaker” feature which allows teams to unleash high scoring super moves by building up the game breaker meter. Jukes and trick moves, as well as dunks and steals, increase points towards the gamebreaker. Once used, the game breaking team must again perform tricks to increase the number of points their gamebreaker is worth.

However, in Homecourt, the gamebreaker controls have replaced the right-stick contortions of last year’s installment with . . . nothing. Instead of messing around with the right stick while in the air, in Homecourt, you simply charge up your gamebreaker with more dribbling tricks. While the right-stick wasn’t always intuitive, the removal of it without any new mechanic seems a step backwards.

Not that walking ever happens in the game. Dribbling might be closer. Insane breakdance dribbling is probably the best description. By spamming on the two trick dribble buttons and “modifying” them by holding down either or both of the bumpers, your player will spin and flip around like a gerbil on PCP.

But that’s nothing compared to the new “double-dunk” feature. You charge up a dunk by holding down the dunk button while in the air, and if you release it at the last possible moment, your player will perform a spectacular “double-dunk.” In these, your player catches the ball after the dunk, usually with his feet, and then dunks the ball again while in the air. During double dunks, the players climb all over the backboard and the hoop with chimpanzee-like agility, thrusting the ball through the hoop repeatedly. Of course, for these rule- and rim-bending feats, you are awarded two points.

The new offensive gameplay features, like the double-dunk and a new “jump-off” mechanic which propels your player into the air by using a crouching teammate as a ladder, are more exciting but less game changing than the subtle defensive “shove” move. Big players now have an advantage over small dribblers, and can throw them on the ground with a single shove. Maybe this feature was in the earlier versions, but it didn’t play as much of a role as it does now.

However, for the new slick graphics and the few new additions, this NBA Street is too much like the previous ones in its initial promise and then quick disappointment. The gameplay is quick and easy, but it is also repetitive and frequently boring. Once my baller, Phurry Crocket, was labeled a “steals” master, the opposing teams would rarely be able to get the ball past half court. Phurry would steal and then jack up threes until the game was over, declining even to bother with the time-consuming gamebreakers.

It doesn’t help that the game’s main mode, the Homecourt Challenge, is uninspired. The idea is that Phurry Crocket has to travel to actual NBA stars’s homecourts, win a series of games with different rules, and finally get to defeat the game’s poster boy—Carmelo Anthony—at the fictitious and opportunistic “Jordan Brand Court.” The challenges start repeating themselves after just fifteen minutes of play, and the rewards—some new shoes and outfits—are pretty lame.

The game’s serious and nostalgic A&E Biography-style presentation jars with the absurd on-court antics. These clips are narrated by over-serious voice-over, and visually just show still pictures of the austere, player-free, courts. Their slowness and seriousness seems the exact opposite of the gameplay they frame: which is fast and whimsical.

Other game “modes” are just versions of the basic pick-up game with different rules. Play a game with no gamebreakers! Play a game with only gamebreakers! These aren’t modes, just basic options, and seem disingenuous when marketed as such.

The NBA franchise is marketed well, and most of the league’s best players are well-represented by their onscreen avatars. Unfortunately, you can’t change their attire, and it’s common to have each of your three players wearing three different colors of jersey.

You also can’t do much with your created character. Your baller’s facial appearance is the amalgamation of two actual NBA stars faces. Phurry Crocket was the child of Yao Ming and Steve Nash, and he didn’t look half as bad as that sounds. Beyond that, though, customization options are lacking. Even earlier NBA Streets allowed you to customize your palette of dunks; here you just choose a real NBA player to “play like,” and you’ve got all of that player’s attributes.

Finally, the online game doesn’t survive the test of interest. Control is often laggy, and the game often devolves into the double dunk-a-thon that one would expect. You can’t bring your own player into the game, and ranked matches often feature the same familiar all-star players.

Worst of all, though, is actual physical pain induced by an extraneous button. The turbo button is mapped to the right trigger. Since there is an unlimited supply of turbo, it’s frequently easy to go whole matches with the right trigger depressed. However, by way of anatomical physics too difficult to go into, the combination of holding down the right trigger and furiously mashing the facepad buttons with your right thumb causes some troubling carpal tunnel effects. Right now I’m dictating this review to the trained monkey we keep in the office.

But that monkey is only trained to like good original games, so even though he sees a future for more monkey-like sports simulations, he is going to pan NBA Street Homecourt. The gameplay becomes repetitive quickly and the campaign is over without much fuss. In the end, this fast-paced game falls victim to its own velocity.

Medal of Honor: Allied Assault - Spearhead - PC

Back to the trenches.

Sergeant! Sergeant! Wake your ass up, soldier! If you don't wake up right now, we're all gonna get dead real soon! You sure picked a fine time to go and get knocked on the head. What's that? You don't know what's going on? Aw hell, not again...

Here's some water, son. Drink up and pay attention. You are Sergeant Jack Barnes and we are the 501st Parachute Infantry Regiment, currently in France. We just dropped into Jerry's backyard to lead the Spearhead for the Allied Assault. The Nazis are out to get us and we've got a quick nine missions to complete before this damn war will end.

What are our mission goals? Why, to shoot every guy that's shootin' back at us, of course! You still remember how to fire that weapon, don't you? We've also got average artillery to blow up, a few supply lines to raid and the usual hit to put on some high ranking Nazi officers. Got all that, Sarge? Well then, let's get to it.

I hope you still remember our first mission, because it sure was a doozy. Damn near lost half the squad. Do you remember the gunfire, Sarge? It was like some kind of crazy space light show. A few of the boys got blasted before we got ground side and I think poor Jenkins' chute never opened.

Now that you seem to be getting your memory back, let me brief you on what's new since the last Assault. HQ sent us a bunch of fresh arms for our mission, but none of the guns are really all that different from what we're used to using. There are some grenades, a Brit Webley pistol and a Lee Entfield rifle, plus a handful of new machine guns. It's nice that HQ was thinking about us, but the new toys operate just like the old ones. As long as they still kill the bad guys, it's all the same to me.

The brass has also changed the rules of engagement by allowing us to play with a little melee combat. When using those less fragile weapons (i.e. the ones without an alternate fire), we are now authorized to beat any enemy soldiers we encounter into submission. I personally would have preferred a nice combat knife, but I guess this is war, not hunting...or is it?

We've picked up some new Intel indicating that some strange things have happened to the German army. The word going around says that they're not as quick as they used to be - something in the water, maybe. This has made it a little easier for our boys to go up and whack 'em without getting filled with lead. Their snipers have also been caught drinking on duty, which has made them a lot less lethal then before. I guess they've found out that you've come to play, eh Sarge? Hehe...

As in previous engagements, the brass wants us to stick to the straight and narrow path, which doesn't leave a whole lot of room for exploration on our missions. They say as long as we keep going the way we're supposed to, things will just happen like it's some kind of movie script. Bah, does this look like Hollywood to you? I don't think so.

Besides, all I see are fields, trees and burnt out buildings. It's no vacation spot, but these places don't look half-bad, considering how tragic war can be. That shouldn't come as a surprise since this battle is built on the same engine as the last one.

It also sounds about the same, so remember the golden rule - DO NOT REMOVE YOUR HELMET TO HEAR THE GREAT SOUNDS. You don't want to take a stray slug to the temple and wind up like old Ferguson, eating your next meal out of a straw.

Now son, you know that I hate war. You know I want to be back with the wife and kids just as bad as you do. But boy, this conflict seems too short. Word has it that the fighting was practically over by the time we started and all we're really left with is a three-hour mop-up tour. I was hoping to see more action than that. I can't help feeling that we should have gotten a little more out of this latest battle.

Oh, and one more thing. HQ just sent down 12 new maps for the next engagement, Codename: Multiplayer, whatever that means. There's also some info on a new type of warfare they're calling 'Tug of War'. Basically, the two armies battle each other in order to complete up to five objectives all at once. I hear it's kind of like what's happening over on the Battlefield, but with the ability to knock out an enemy's reinforcement center (or as the Krauts call it, "Spawn Point.")

Crap! Look at the time. Sarge, it's time to move out and get this Spearhead going. It's gonna be a short battle, so let's try to have a little fun before it's over. This Assault isn't much different from the other one, so just keep your finger on the trigger and we'll all get out of this mess alive. Move out!

Supreme Commander - PC

He's got the whole world...in his sights.

I have very little patience for stupidity. For that reason I was never really able to get into The Sims. I grew frustrated by how constantly idiotic they were, and I always wanted the game to operate more like a fishtank. I wanted to be able to wander away and let my Sims have their heads just to see what they’d be up to when I got back. Would Steve get a promotion and buy a fancy new computer? Would he cheat on his wife? What’s up with their slacker kid?

Unfortunately, if you leave your Sims alone for the day, invariably you’ll find they’ve all lost their jobs and are just standing in the corner peeing their pants. Your average Sim neighborhood makes the Special Olympics look like a Mensa Convention.

Real time strategy games generally fare little better. I find it infuriating in Warcraft III that my peasants just stand there, watching their own hut burn and not doing anything about it unless I smack them upside the head and order them to fix the hut, dammit!

Which is part of the reason I love Supreme Commander. Your army of robots can actually do smart things - repair each other when injured, support other units in combat, stage coordinated attacks, automatically airlift whole groups one by one, and even fix the damn robo-hut without waiting to be told. Which, true to the title, leaves you free to focus on being the Commander without having to run around making sure everyone is wiping their metal butts.

The distant future, it seems, is smart. It’s also an unfortunately fractured intergalactic civilization. The UEF rose from the remains of the Earth government, and seeks to reunite all of mankind…by any means necessary. The Cybrans are cybernetically enhanced humans that were originally programmed to be mindlessly loyal to the UEF. Now, their creator and his android army seek to free their still enslaved brothers. Finally, the Aeon see themselves as the disciples of an extinct alien race and fanatically seek to spread their religion of peace, or “The Way”, across the galaxy like armed Scientologists.

There are three separate campaigns, one for each faction, and interestingly, each one paints themselves as the good guy. There is no “good” or “evil” side. Each campaign consists of about a half-dozen missions, but don’t let that fool you. Each map doubles in size when you reach certain goals, exposing new enemies and new objectives. Then it doubles a second time. So a single map will actually take you several hours to complete. Don’t forget to save your game because restarting can be a bitch.

Managing your resources is easy however, as long as you keep an eye on the supply and demand. Thanks to nanotechnology, mass and energy can build anything you need. Energy is easy enough with power plants, but mass must be harvested from the planet’s core which can only be done from specific locations, leading to some local power struggles among the three races.

All three sides are well balanced because, other than graphically speaking, there aren’t very many differences. Every unit essentially has a near-identical analog for every race. There are, however, a huge number of land, air and sea robots and structures in three “tech levels”. It can take a long time to upgrade and produce those more powerful units which lends another strategic element – deciding where to focus. Leaving your base more loosely defended can get you to tech 3 more quickly, but at what risk? Alternatively, you could spend massive resources to build just one experimental behemoth. These giant robots, flying saucers and others have special abilities more unique to each race, but they all share one thing in common – they are juggernauts of destruction.

You can also upgrade your own personal giant robot ACU with more powerful weapons, teleporting abilities and other bling, but this is so inordinately expensive it seems like more of an endgame gambit, and not particularly useful even then.

The huge scope of the battles, as well as the ability to pull out the camera to take in the entire eighty kilometer square battlefield, is the other hallmark of Supreme Commander. You need that tactical view to really hone your strategy, because on maps this huge you might need fully twenty minutes just to move troops into position. This makes the intelligence provided by radar or sonar much more important than in most strategy games.

In spite of this, the path to defeating the A.I. is fairly straightforward. You build a self-repairing (remember those smart units?) porcupine base for the computer to suicide itself on, then build up a monster army in safety and unleash it at your leisure. Skirmish mode features some much more interesting Commander A.I. and you won’t find yourself winning so easily. But as usual, it’s the eight-player online play where you’ll get the most challenging and interesting opponents.

That’s if they don’t lag out. With enormous maps and colossal battles featuring hundreds of combatants, flying debris, explosions, missiles, and other robot detritus, Supreme Commander can defeat just about any PC you play it on. I was lucky enough to have just built a monster rig for this very purpose, and thanks to all that raw power, the chaotic battles are simply beautiful. However, most people are going to find themselves with plenty of slowdown when the hot robot-on-robot action gets intense.

The sound, on the other hand, seems strangely muted until you realize that’s because you’re normally surveying the scene from a kilometer high in the sky. If you zoom down into a less helpful, but more intense altitude, the sounds of gunfire, missiles, rumbling motors and clanking metal feet come to life. The music is pretty smart and actually changes tempo when exciting events are unfolding. Smart yet again.

While heavy on the system requirements, Supreme Commander is simply a terrific, well designed game, and no wonder. Chris Taylor, the lead designer also made the awesome predecessor to this game years ago when it was called Total Annihilation. It may have a different name under a different publisher, but make no mistake fans, this is the T.A. sequel you’ve been waiting for. If you’ve got the horsepower to run it, you’d be stupid not to go pick it up.

Age of Mythology: The Titans - PC

Like father, like son.

First a lesson in mythology. Get out your pens and paper.

Ten years ago, Arkantos left Atlantis and led his armies across the known world on a mission of utmost importance: to keep the gates of Tartarus closed and prevent the escape of the Titans. His reward earned, Arkantos ascended to the heavens to join the gods and left the mortal world behind. Thousands died to keep the Titans imprisoned, but was it a worthy cause? Who exactly are the Titans?

Well, in the beginning there was only the heavens, Ouranos (aka Uranus), and the earth, Gaia. When they mated, they produced some fearful offspring: the horrid Cyclopes, the three monstrous Hecatonchires, and the twelve Titans. Ouranos hated his ugly children and hid them deep in the underworld Tartarus. This pained Gaia, so she plotted with her youngest son, the Titan Kronos, and gave him a very sharp sickle. That night when Ouranos came to lay with Gaia, Kronos leapt out and cut off his father's genitals. Ouch.

Unmanned and powerless, Ouranos tells Kronos that just as he has deposed his own father, so too will one of Kronos' children depose him. Kronos takes his father's… ahem…severed member and throws it in the ocean, and the goddess Aphrodite is born from the sea "foam." I am not making this up.

Kronos is now the king of the gods, but he remembers his father's final words. When he marries his sister, the Titan Rhea, he is frightened of what their children might do. So he eats them as soon as they are born.

Rhea would really rather her children were not eaten, so when her sixth child is born, she fools Kronos by substituting a large stone which Kronos quickly swallows. The real child, Zeus, is raised in secret on the island of Crete by the magic goat Amaltheia. I am really not making this up.

When Zeus grows up, he hides out in his father's favorite hunting ground. Kronos arrives to hunt and Zeus ambushes him, leaping out and kicking his dad so hard in the stomach, he barfs up Zeus' five older brothers and sisters: Demeter, Hades, Hestia, Hera and Poseidon. They are, for some reason, just fine.

And so it was that Zeus married his sister became king of the gods and confined all the Titans back under the earth in Tartarus.

Now, considering all the violent baby eating and castration and whatnot that the Titans were so fond of, it's no wonder Arkantos wanted to keep them away from the mortal world. However, in a supreme act of teenage rebellion, Kastor, the son of Arkantos, decides to flush all his father's hard work down the Atlantean toilet and make a deal with the Titans to free them from their prison. Hey, at least he didn't cut off his dad's johnson.

Well, that was a longer lesson in Greek Mythology than I intended (did you take good notes? There will be a short quiz after the review.) but it's a perfect introduction to Age of Mythology: The Titans, the first expansion to Microsoft's excellent Age of Mythology.

The Titans is exactly what you would expect from a well-made expansion. It includes a new playable side: the Atlanteans, a new single player campaign in the adventures of the ungrateful son Kastor, and some new really, really big units: the Titans. Add in a few well thought out game tweaks and you have a title that AoM fans should definitely pick up.

The Atlanteans are a surprising new side in that they are actually the simplest to play. Perhaps in response to the arcane methods of resource gathering and building of the Vikings and the Egyptians, the Atlanteans are straightforward. Their resource-gatherers are faster and more powerful than any other race, and they don't even need to drop their resources off. Individual units tend to be more powerful than those of the other races, structures are more basic and upgrades are more centralized.

The price for all this simplicity and power is, well, price. Everything in Atlantis is more expensive, from the lowly peon to the mightiest warrior; it's just like living in Manhattan. One of the biggest dangers of playing as the profligate Atlanteans is simply running out of resources.

Of course, you don't just choose a side in AoM, and there is a new selection of gods to worship as well. Progenitors like Ouranos and Gaia are ready to serve with their godly powers, as well as Titans like Kronos and Oceanus. Prometheus, one of my favorites, is actually the son of a Titan. Atlanteans can use their gods' powers a bit more lavishly, because unlike the other races, they often get more than one shot.

The army of Atlantis boasts all the regular grunts, swordsmen and archers and the like, as well as some fanciful new mythological units. Satyrs can throw handfuls of spears at a time, Prometheans split into more Prometheans when they're killed, and Automatons are clockwork suits of armor that can repair each other.

But the big new units are the Titans and every side gets one. These massive brutes are game-enders, sort of the violent version of building a Wonder, because it takes a huge opposing force (or another Titan) to stop one, so when a player starts constructing the "gate" necessary to summon a Titan, all other players are alerted.

While each side gets a different Titan like the huge Viking troll or the Egyptian incarnation of Horus, they're all identical under the skin: devastating, nearly unstoppable behemoths.

Kastor's Ungrateful Adventure is well done, but a bit short. The missions often have multiple ingenious solutions, not just "destroy the enemy base," which is great. The in-game cut-scenes are equally good and flesh out the plot. But the 12 mission campaign probably won't take you more than about 12 hours, so get ready for some multiplayer skirmishes.

Everything else about The Titans - graphics, sound, interface, etc. - is exactly the same as the original, which is how expansions usually work. There are a few useful gameplay tweaks, however. Some AI's have been improved (and some still feel too stupid), you can set your buildings to auto-produce units infinitely, leaving you free to do other things, and the racial balance has been improved with a number of small changes in unit power.

While not innovative in any way, AOM: The Titans is everything you should expect from a quality expansion. Plenty of new stuff, but also gameplay refinements and the attention to detail that shows the developers cared about their product. Mythology fans planning to cripple their fathers should postpone and pick up The Titans instead. At least for a while…

Half-Life 2: Episode One - PC

Where no Freeman has gone before.
Gordon Freeman embodies mankind’s ultimate evolution, single-handedly fighting and defeating hordes of alien invaders with just a crowbar. He’s a scientist in the loosest of definitions, as his focus of study appears to be “kicking ass.” He wears one outfit for years, but somehow no one comments on the smell. Rambo Shmambo – Gordon is the world’s greatest action hero.

Which I suppose fits the new episodic nature of his life. Like Magnum P.I. or the A-Team, Gordon’s upcoming adventures will be distributed in smaller episodes instead of full-length movies. If Half-Life 2: Episode One (previously called Aftermath) is any indication, Half-Life 2: The Series looks to be well scripted and voice-acted, but offers very little that you haven’t seen before.

Episode One picks up at the exact moment that Half-Life 2 ended. Those who played through the entirety of that game will know that the ending was a bit of a dramatic letdown, as one is forced to assume that most of the major characters died. Well, with a little help from some aliens and, presumably, magic, all the cast members you knew and loved continue to live. Sorry for the spoiler, but that’s all explained in the first 30 seconds of the game.

The rest of the new story follows the now-continuing adventures of Gordon and his attractive sidekick, Alyx, who must escape City 17 before everything explodes. This conveniently leads them back into the belly of the enemy headquarters and out into the ruins of the city, all of which you’ve seen in the original game. With all the voice-actors returning to reprise their roles and the terrific scripting setting the gold standard for video game plot development, Episode One is delivered well, a treat for those who desperately want to know as much as they can about the world of Half-Life. It feels just as cinematic and downright cool to watch as its predecessors.

But this isn’t a movie or TV show - this is a video game, and there’s just not that much new in its gameplay. With no new weapons, abilities or environments, Episode One is lacking in compelling enhancements. The one new enemy, a head crab infested combine soldier, seems like kind of a cop out. It’s a bad guy wearing a crab hat. Big wow.

Speaking of cops, Alyx turns out to be tougher to kill than Freeman, thanks to unlimited ammo and incredible aim. Sexy and deadly, she’s the perfect action sidekick. Action-oriented FPS fans might have a problem with this, though, as often you have to depend on Alyx to destroy the aliens while you solve the puzzle aspects of the levels. You wind up using the gravity gun for much of the game, and while that’s still fun, it’s just not very new anymore.

Nor are the graphics, but they still rock. The folks at Valve even took advantage of some of the new features found in the top of the line graphics cards, with plenty of groovy new lighting effects. Older cards that ran the original Half-Life 2 still work fine, so don’t freak out if you haven’t upgraded recently.

The real question with Episode One is whether or not the content justifies the $20 price. Though short (with total gameplay running around 4-8 hours), the story is really told well and should adequately entertain fans. But the meat of any expansion - new environments, new weapons, and new enemies – is painfully thin. I suppose that’s why this is called an episode instead of an expansion, but rather than take issue with this new world of incremental updates, I’ll just go on record recommending Episode One. While I’d rather have a full game and I still hate the Steam download service with a passion, this is a worthwhile purchase for anyone interested in the further adventures of the toughest scientist this side of Buckaroo Banzai.

Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas - PC

Born to ill.Although PC gamers have to deal with all sorts of headaches foreign to console gamers (tech-support, compatibility, outrageous video card costs, etc.), they have historically slept well knowing their platform offered the best that gaming had to offer. At least, they did until Grand Theft Auto 3 hit the PS2 in 2001. Even though the first two GTAs appeared on the PC, neither could hold a candle to GTA 3, one of the most revolutionary titles of all time. Is it any wonder PC gamers seemed so bitter?
Hardly, considering GTA 3 was quickly surpassed by GTA Vice City, which was then one-upped by last year's San Andreas. But while PS2 gamers again got first crack at this hood rat, it's now available for both PC and Xbox owners. While the PC version of San Andreas is not necessarily better than the others, it is definitely the best looking and benefits from the keyboard and mouse control scheme.
Set on an island off the West Coast in the 1990's, San Andreas follows the hard-knock life of Carl "CJ' Johnson and his travels through Los Santos (L.A.), San Fiero (San Francisco), and Las Venturas (Las Vegas). After moving to Liberty City (see GTA 3) for five years in an attempt to escape the gangster lifestyle, Carl returns home upon learning that his mom has been gunned down by a mysterious assassin. Vowing to avenge his mother's death and restore glory to his neighborhood gang, the Grove Street Families, Carl and his crew battle rival gangs, drug dealers, cops and mountain militiamen until everyone bad and good is dead, including your mother's killer.
The PC version is pretty much a direct port of the PS2 game, containing all of the data, missions, features and story of the original. You jack cars, shoot everyone, kick ass and take no names. Bicycles, food, clothing, hairstyles, the gym, turf wars - it's all here. Rather than re-explain the massive list of features, I implore you to read the original San Andreas review. Seriously, get to it. We don't have all day to rewrite things.
Back so soon? Then you're clearly wondering what's new in the PC version. The answer is a few things, actually. While driving in the GTA games has always been ghetto-fabulous, it's even better now thanks to the ability to check out your surroundings with the mouse. Couple this with much greater draw distances and resolutions and you'll spot short-cuts like a pro and dodge oncoming traffic with ease. OG GTA nuts can hook up a gamepad to make it feel more old-school, but frankly, the mouse-keyboard is pretty darn comfy.
Out of your car, you'll be able to pick off pesky cops, thugs and civilians with greater accuracy than PS2 or Xbox gamers could dream of. Auto-aim has been completely excluded, so taking aim for head-shots is far easier. CJ's enhanced aim is a double-edged, uh, gun, due to the fact that the enemies aren't smart or lethal enough to cope with somebody who can regularly shoot them in the head. They don't ever seem to exhibit much intelligent behavior, and picking them off becomes more of a sadistic pleasure than a challenge. Still, sadistic pleasures are why people play the GTA games in the first place.
As before, the numerous, varied and largely exciting missions make up the bulk of the game, but can still get on a playa's nerves. Many are long and difficult, and getting back on track once you screw up can take forever, especially if the mission has you traveling out into the boondocks. Although checkpoints wouldn't do anything for the game's awesome sense of realism, reloading every five minutes doesn't do much, either. This hasn't been fixed in the PC version.
But that's okay, because the PC version has the best, albeit most difficult to find and use, replay feature of the bunch. With the F1, F2 and F3 keys you can watch, save and load replays of CJ's greatest hits. By pressing F1, you'll be treated to a replay of the thirty seconds of game time immediately prior to your pressing F1. After the replay ends, you can press F2 to save it, and then you can press F3 anytime to watch it again. While it's too bad that you can only store one replay, that's more than can be said for the PS2 and Xbox versions.
To go with its best replay feature, the PC version also has the best graphics. Though San Andreas's visuals won't impress fans of Half-Life 2, the adjustable draw-distance, better textures and overall improved look exceeds the console versions significantly. The hood has never looked so good.
And the sounds are still unrivaled. San Andreas' level of audio detail is overwhelming. Tractor motors sputter and stall, guns pop-pop-pop in the distance, and sirens blare to add ambience. The radio stations provide a schizophrenic soundtrack for your adventures in pandemonium, and the fantastic voice-acting makes the PC move without any sort of hiccup.
While PC gamers have every right to be bitter about the fact that one of their favorite franchises left them for the consoles, they should rejoice in its return. Sure, the instant replay feature was left out, but this is a mostly untouched Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, one of the best games ever made, and now a version of it can be played on the PC with the best controls and graphics available. Clearly, PC gamers aren't the only ones who should be bitter.

Microsoft CFS - PC

"Microsoft's Return Of The Violent Flight Sim!"
Any of you remember the original Flight Simulator from back in the early eighties? Are you with me? It had a little WW2 flight game built in. Using FS 1's rudimentary graphics you could fly around a little area, supposedly a WW2 battleground, and shoot a few other planes or bomb your enemy's hangars and bunkers. It was very, very basic. In fact, the only thing that separated the two sides was a little line, symbolizing a river, drawn right down the middle.
Well, now we have the sequel to that component of Flight Sim 1.0, and predictably it's called Microsoft Combat Flight Simulator. Flight Simulator has always enjoyed an odd popularity. For some reason, its bad graphics and lack of any real focus or plot never detracted heavily from its sales numbers. Probably, it was one of those games that was just far enough from being a "real game" (READ: Violent, Needlessly Violent, Unrealistic, Juvenile, and More Fun Than Sex) so that middle aged yuppies could play it without thinking they were wasting their time with less than intellectual pursuits.
It's similar to the difference between those who fly planes in their spare time and those who jump out of planes in their spare time. So here we have a WW2 Flight sim designed mainly for the same crowd. Before the combat aspects of this game are even taken into consideration, most Microsoft Flight Simulator fans are going to like this one simply because it's basically a graphical update and a new scenery pack for Flight Simulator 98.
In the game you are presented with four ways to fly, Free Flight, Instant Combat, Single Mission, and Campaign. Free Flight is the mode that most MSFS fans will be familiar with: pick any plane, any place, and aimlessly fly around. Instant Combat is similar, except that you fly against enemy planes that come at you in arcade like waves (major loss of realism). Single Mission is where you fly any one mission from any of the campaigns in any of the planes (including a few from WW1, why?). Finally Campaign is just your regular pre-scripted campaign where you may fly for either the USAF (Which actually didn't exist at the time, back in WW2 it was called the US Army Air Corps, USAAC), the British Royal Air Force (RAF), or the German Luftwaffe.
One of the game's major flaws is that the campaign mode is about as stale and non-immersive as you can get. Basically all you have is a bunch of strung together missions with minimal continuity and only text briefings to flesh things out. This does next to nothing to draw the player into the game. Considering the immense narrative depth that any decent writer can achieve using the dramatic backdrop of WW2, this sort of stale experience is a puzzling letdown.
Now, the graphics are very nice. MSCFS leaps ahead of Flight Simulator 98 like an Olympic long jumper on steroids. The textures on the ground are near photorealistic, even though they are tile based, almost looking as good as those found in Flight Unlimited 2. Furthermore they look decent at anywhere from 500 feet up which is fairly impressive. The terrain is simply much better than previous Flight Simulator titles.
The buildings in the cities are nicely done, those that are tall enough to be modeled that is. The planes are very sharp and detailed, they even lose shrapnel when you shoot 'em. One complaint I do have is that in the cities only the tallest buildings and monuments are modeled in 3D. I don't know about all of you, but to me, flying over a flat texture with only the Le Tour Eiffel and L'Arc de Triumph popping up is not a convincing simulation of flying over Paris.
On the other hand, one nice thing about all of this is that MSCFS will run well on any decently equipped PC and supports almost all D3D compatible accelerator cards.
As far as the actual gameplay goes, MSCFS is fairly bland and uninspiring. The first time I hopped into a North American P51-D and took to the skies in 'Instant Combat' I must have downed at least 25 Messerchmitts, which is far to easy and non-dramatic. The main problem is with the enemy AI, as soon as you get on their tails they basically fly in a straight line until you pump their asses full of hot lead.
The flight modeling is also not as realistic as Flight Simulator patrons have come to expect from their beloved series. Roll rate and Pitch rate are fairly lax and the defining elements of any simulation, like say… landings, are a tad bit too easy.
Now, since this is a Flight Simulator game, Microsoft has left the plug in architecture found in their previous efforts. In fact, you can take any plane from MSFS 98 or any add on, and pop 'em in the game. MSCFS automatically straps a pair of machine guns to 'em and lets you go off and kill in a Cessna 172 or an Extra ES 300, for instance. While occasionally fun, this shreds the last feeling of historical accuracy the game has.
Multiplayer is decent, basically it's the same combat, just with opponents who don't seem to be so eager for rear entry. Multiplayer is supported over the modem to modem, serial cable, modem to modem, IPX, TCP/IP, and over Microsoft's The Zone internet gaming service.
To lay it down straight, if you really, really like the Flight Simulator series then you'll probably want to run out to the store like a lemming and drop $50 on it. However, with the impending releases of such innovative titles as Jane's WW2 and PARSOFT's Fight Squadron: Screaming Demons Over Europe, you'll probably do better to hold off on this one and wait for the big boys to land.

Medal of Honor: Pacific Assault - PC

Soldiering on.Nearly three years ago, Electronic Arts brought us Medal of Honor: Allied Assault, effectively ushering in a new era of WWII first-person shooters. Intense battle sequences, great gameplay and an inspiring soundtrack were just a few of its hallmark features, helping it become a very serious player in the crowded PC FPS arena.
Since then, though, the competition has grown considerably thanks to the likes of EA's own Battlefield franchise, Joint Ops: Typhoon Rising and, most specifically, Activision's stellar Call of Duty. We haven't forgotten about MoH, but truth be told, the series is fighting an uphill battle to recapture the glory it enjoyed when Allied Assault blasted on to the scene. And like a determined soldier, EA has come back firing with Medal of Honor: Pacific Assault.
Pacific Assault takes a step back from the European theater of operations and into the Pacific. You play as Private Tom Conlin, a soldier with the U.S. Marine force at Tawara Atoll. Vaguely reminiscent of Allied Assault's Omaha Beach level, the action starts off hard and fast as you hit the beach running with enemy fire from all directions, pushing your way into enemy territory with the standard assortment of rifles, guns and grenades. From there, you'll flash all the way back to boot camp and the events of your tour leading up to that moment.
The game follows the same formula as past editions of the MoH series with plenty of linear run and gun first-person shooting peppered with scripted events. Enemies pop in and press a relentless attack against you while you do your best to beat them off with your boom sticks. A few changes have been made for Pacific Assault, but for the most part, it follows in the boot prints of its predecessors.
Boot Camp serves as an introduction to the game's controls. MoH vets will fly through this tutorial with only a few new concepts to master. In keeping with the times, Pacific Assault has added a stance control. Players are now able to drop from a standing position to kneeling and all the way down to prone to help with accuracy. You're also able to pick up injured comrades and drop them off at the nearest medic for some much-needed first aid. No real big changes here.
One interesting nuance of Pacific Assault is that you'll no longer be scooping up health packs, instead relying on the A.I.-controlled corpsman to patch you up. If you're injured, you just need to call in your medic, who will run to your side and sew you back together. It's a good thing he can't be killed or you'd be in some serious trouble.
Speaking of squadmates, you'll often have a few along for the ride (none of them can die, oddly enough). You can issue a few basic commands such as "advance," "cover fire" and "fall back" for a little support in the field, but you shouldn't rely on them too heavily because they're mostly just there for support. You're the hero of the story, after all.
Incidentally, the storytelling is the game's strongest suit. Rather than just dumping you into a one-man Rambo rampage, Pacific Assault sets an interesting, dramatic stage for Private Conlin's experience in the war. You'll hear from your fellow recruits and squadmates as you fight to survive against hordes of enemy forces. Scripted events help greatly in this regard, leading to some very intense, cinematic moments. One of them greets you as you enter Pearl Harbor for the first time. One minute you're being escorted on to the base, and the next, there are explosions everywhere and you're dodging fire from enemy Zeroes. The officer who was just escorting you quickly becomes a victim of enemy fire and you're left to fend for yourself. The shocking, lonely nature of war is captured wonderfully.
It is unfortunate, then, that the reality set up by the story is interrupted by some hideously unreal events. Like Allied Assault, Pacific Assault has a nasty case of the pop-ups. Enemy soldiers will unexpectedly spawn in at the strangest times, making you wonder if you're fighting grunts or ghosts. This phenomenon is probably due to the game's scripted events, but knowing that won't make you feel any better after being smoked by some enemy soldiers triggered to appear when you crossed some imaginary line.
On the other hand, Pacific Assault does a great job of breaking up the action and keeping it interesting. Instead of trudging through the entire campaign on foot just shooting at pop-up people, you'll also take control of stationary guns, hop aboard a boat to gun down Zeroes and even fly a plane. These provide some of the most harrowing, chaotic gameplay bits and control well. As your drill instructor said, you'll be a Marine of land, sea and air.
Medal of Honor: Pacific Assault boasts a slick new proprietary engine that holds up well against other of its ilk. The environments are lush and believable, the faces of both allies and enemies look great and the myriad effects are well done and interesting. Naturally, you'll need a pretty hefty rig to crank up the visual settings, but if you're a fan of first-person shooters, you already knew that.
Unfortunately, Pacific Assault has a tendency to keep you waiting. The load times are pretty long; even the fastest processors on the planet won't help as you stare blankly at a load screen.
At least your ears will be happy, though, thanks to Pacific Assault's excellent audio. In keeping with tradition, the game chimes in with perfect voice acting, booming special effects and a musical score worthy of a Hollywood film. It serves as a reminder that great audio is under appreciated.
Pacific Assault's multiplayer game is split up into three modes. You can of course play Free For All and Team Deathmatch - no surprises there - but a new mode called Invader is the true heart of the multiplayer. Here, you'll pick from one of four soldier classes (infantry, medic, demolitions and ammo tech) and head into battle on one of eight maps. You'll need to accomplish a set of objectives to achieve victory, such as blowing up a target and then securing an area, while the other team is trying to stop you. It's not quite as engaging as the larger scale tug-of-war battles found in other online WWII shooters, but is interesting enough to keep you coming back.
There are two versions of Pacific Assault: the standard version and the fancy DVD-only Director's Edition, which has a few exclusive extras. Featurettes like an interactive WWII timeline and propaganda gallery teach you more than you ever wanted to know about the war (unless you're a big history buff).
In keeping with the time-honored traditions of the series, Medal of Honor: Pacific Assault puts on a good show. Pulse-pounding scripted events and great presentation create a nice backdrop for the Pacific theater of operations, but small annoyances such as enemy pop-up and lengthy load times stifle the package. Nonetheless, this warrior deserves its decorations.

King's Quest: Mask of Eternity - PC

It's good to be the King.One of my most volatile rants recently focused on the lack of coherent plots in many new games. It seems that the adventure and role-playing markets have been inundated with a slew of nonsensical scripts, usually involving a complex and contrived family tree gone wrong, a good dragon, a high tech paramilitary group, and a bad dragon. Then inevitably a young farmer comes along, realizes he's related to one of the dragons, saves the world by destroying it, and along the way meets up with a trusty sidekick named Zeppo or Poofie (which is often a flying monkey/rat/dragon).
For this reason, King's Quest: Mask of Eternity is more to me than just another game, it's the reminder that games haven't always been so . . . silly. It also marks the simultaneous return and coup de grace of a legend in this business, game designer and famed storyteller Roberta Williams. I'll admit right here that I'm a huge fan of the woman, and expected another masterpiece. Frankly, I was little let down.
Those of you familiar with King's Quest will find solace in the fact that the game's strongest elements are the same as ever: a good, natural storyline and compelling puzzles. You take on the role of Connor, a resident of the Kingdom of Daventry. A strange storm has overtaken the land and turned your village-mates into stone. It has also unleashed more than a few monsters (of course). You were spared because you happened to be holding a piece of a sacred Mask, which fell from the sky into your hands right as the tempest hit. Now it's up to you to get to the bottom of things and heal the land.
The biggest difference between Mask of Eternity and others in the heralded King's Quest series is the move from 2D to 3D, and quite a move it is. The game is entirely 3 dimensional, incorporating a real-time 3D world with fully polygonal and articulated characters. This is a far cry from the sprites of yesteryear, and, while the graphic overhaul is much needed, it isn't free of faults.
Mask of Eternity is primarily played as a third-person adventure, though a first-person mode is included (only useful for up-close inspections). While the detail of the characters is excellent, the overall graphics are remarkably dull and uninspired. I ran the game on a pretty high-end machine (PII 333 w/Voodoo2) and still found it sluggish at times.
The move to 3D is further hampered by the fact that you can only see about 20 yards in any direction before it fades to blackness; there are little to no background details (mountain ranges, sky effects, etc.) to flesh out each world. However, the up-close detail is very high. Mouths move to actually match what's being said, textures are believable, and the sheer size of some of the levels is just downright impressive.
The third-person perspective means you have to worry about camera problems. In Mask of Eternity, you control Connor with the keyboard and the camera with the mouse. This allows you total freedom to select different angles to view the adventure. A nice touch, but still not enough to overcome the occasional object obstruction issue.
The gameplay is quite similar to older King's Quest games: explore and solve increasingly complex puzzles to further the storyline. Many of the puzzles are inventory based and lead into each other. You'll have to open one door to find an item required to open a second door, through which lies a third door, only opened by using an item found 20 minutes earlier. This sort of thing gets a bit monotonous, but they mix it up enough with some truly difficult deductive reasoning puzzles so that things stay fresh.
New to the series is real-time combat, which is sadly the weakest part of the game. As you encounter monsters, you just use a simple point-and-click system to whack at them with a weapon, while using mushrooms and other healing items to keep your health meter up. In the meantime, they're whacking at you. All of this whacking really just amounts to boredom (doesn't it always?). You can just tell that the people who made this game weren't familiar with any decent combat engines.
The sound and voice acting is top notch. Sweeping orchestral numbers set the tone for a lengthy adventure, while a well-placed harp solo helps to capture the more serene moments. The voices are straight out of the Renaissance Faire, and this is not a bad thing; it's impressive seeing such proper use of 'ye' and 'thou.' It's just a very authentic sounding game.
Perhaps the best thing about Mask of Eternity is what Roberta herself brings to the game - a plot that flows in a successful fantasy world. You won't find a million ridiculous plot twists or a mess of unexplained facts (What, no cats with megaphones? - Ed.). Roberta Williams still has a knack for telling a good story, and could teach a lesson or two to younger game designers.
Frankly, taking the genre into the third dimension was a nice idea, but it just doesn't make much of a difference. If you like adventure games and the earlier King's Quests, than this one's a good choice. But, those of you looking for a little more oomph in your gaming will tire of the same old gameplay. Good effort, Roberta, but it seems your best days are behind you...

Comanche 4 - PC

Yeah, but can it beat Airwolf?

Be one of the first to fly the U.S. Army's most sophisticated assault helicopter, the RAH-66 Reconnaissance and Attack Helicopter. Although it doesn't go into full production until 2006, the Army has commissioned a half dozen to be made in 2001 for testing and other preliminary work.

But if what I've seen in Novalogic's new chopper game Comanche 4 is any indication, then this is truly a craft to be proud of. The Comanche is quiet as a church mouse, faster than Speedy Gonzales and more heavily armed than the gun-toting mice from Max Payne.

Where a game like Max Payne is rich with intricate plot lines, Comanche 4 is devoid of any story to connect your missions. Instead, the missions are splintered into six campaigns with five missions each, for a total of 30 missions.

Each campaign has a certain scene - desert, cityscapes, snow setting and so on. But this is all that connects the missions to one another. While this does make the game seem a bit disjointed, it also allows you to run the missions in any order within a given campaign. It's built just like the original Delta Force, another Novalogic title. Call me old-fashioned, but ultimately I prefer a cohesive plot of some sort to really polish off the gameplay.

And trust me, this game could use a little polish because the gameplay can get a little monotonous. You get to shoot at all kinds of enemies - infantry, armored ground units, other copters, airplanes, boats, UPCs, tanks and others. Unfortunately, all you really do is shoot at stuff.

In trying to make this game more accessible to casual gamers, Novalogic has left out a good deal of substance. It would have been nice if they added a bit more depth, like helicopter customization or some other game modes. The result is predictable gameplay that doesn't leave much reason to be replayed once the missions have been completed.

The missions themselves cover a range of objectives and will keep you on your toes. You'll be ordered to escort, covertly follow enemy aircraft, perform area defense, dog fight and more. But often the objectives will change suddenly, and before you know it, anti-aircraft guns, Hokums, Hinds and other deadly enemy ordinances have surrounded you...and their aim is anything but inaccurate. Better get used to those controls quick.

Luckily, learning to breathe is probably the only thing easier than Comanche's control. It reminds me of the intuitive gameplay we found in the popular Crimson Skies and the not-so-popular Echelon. It's a blessing for the financially deprived gamer, as there is absolutely no need for extra peripherals like flight sticks or gamepads. I have the awesome Saitek X36 and I used it exactly once, just long enough for me to realize I didn't want to waste time mapping all of the controls.

Anyone familiar with first-person shooters will quickly get the hang of flying low and strafing around trees, one-button targeting and using the mouse wheel (providing you have one) to cycle through weapons. The game offers three preset altitudes for your flying convenience, with the added option of full control via the Shift and Ctrl keys. These buttons allow you to manually control your altitude for more precision. You even get a "pop-up" button (Spacebar) that permits you to quickly pop up and lay down some sweet offense on any unsuspecting passersby. Release the pop-up to return to your previous altitude. The control is really intuitive and is responsible for much of the game's success.

A couple other interesting features include issuing commands to wingmen and the mechanics behind operating your landing gear and bay door. The former is incredibly simple. When you have wingmen you press the 7 key to bring down a list of six commands. They are few, but effective. Command them to defend or attack your target, follow and engage, follow only and a couple others. Very nice.

Make sure you raise your landing gear and close your bay doors when not in use, as it helps reduce your signature on radar by concealing one of the Comanche's main heat sources. That's at least what the manual states. Honestly, they seem to find me just fine whether my doors are open or not. Still, it's fun to hide on the ground out of sight and then suddenly pop up for an ambush while raising your landing gear and opening your bay doors to fire off a series of heat-seeking devilry.

Speaking of weapons, the Comanche is packing more heat than mid-June. When the bay doors are closed, the only weapon you'll see is the menacing three-barreled cannon known as the 20MM Turreted Gun System (TGS). This little monster is linked to the pilot's helmet and can swivel a full 240 degrees, enabling the TGS to hit anything the pilot can see from the cockpit.

The uninitiated may underestimate the Comanche until those bay doors drop, armed with air-to-air Stinger missiles, laser-guided Hellfire missiles and Hydra rockets. In addition to all that firepower, you can call in an artillery strike. Once you target a location, high-explosive artillery rains down like the sky is falling. It's a cool weapon, but lacks punch due to the game's limited graphics.

Indeed, this is one area that could use some retooling, as Comanche 4's aesthetic appeal is merely decent but not very impressive. Novalogic has dispensed with the voxel graphics thing and has upgraded to a fully polygonal engine. The result is obviously restricting. Some textures look like they have been bump-mapped, while others are flat and unflattering. The Comanche is modeled well, but the lack of detail stands out when pitted against other contemporary games. Ground enemies appear very tiny, even when you fly low to the ground. I should also mention that the game sometimes takes a framerate dip when there is a lot on screen.

At least you'll find some nice little details, like when the rush of air caused by the spinning blades visibly affects trees and water. The graphics work, but they just aren't going to turn any heads.

Once you get tired of the single player, which I guarantee you will, you can test your piloting ability on Novaworld, Novalogic's online network. You can choose from Deathmatch, Team Deathmatch and Co-op, which is just like the single player only with your buddies helping out. This helps the replay value.

But in the end, Comanche 4's ease of use and genuinely fun gameplay don't overcome its general shortcomings as a game. By making the game more accessible to general consumers, they also took out some of the much needed depth. What it does, it does fine, but it doesn't do too much.

Battlefield 1942 - PC

War is heaven.

First-person shooting has all but dominated online gaming over the past few years. Though massively multiplayer role-playing has been catching up, it doesn't come anywhere close to matching the success of the online fragfest. Counterstrike, Return to Castle Wolfenstein, Quake III, Unreal Tournament, Tribes 2...the list goes on for days.

But despite their subtle (and not so subtle) differences, nearly every first-person shooter out there plays the same way. You start off sucking, then you learn the maps and the weaponry, then you dominate. And without fail, all of these games take place largely on the ground.

The fact is, very few confrontations in real war are so one dimensional, yet EA's Battlefield 1942 is really the first game that seems to recognize this (Digital Illusions, the folks behind the game, came close with an earlier title, Codename Eagle). Say goodbye to terra firma and hello to the Y-axis - this is a whole new level of online first-person fragging, and though it's not without its missteps, it's about as close to the front lines as you're gonna get while staring at your monitor.

As the name suggests, the game is set against the backdrop of World War II. Allied and Axis forces are engaged in different theaters all over the globe. BF 1942 focuses on the pivotal battles in the different regions, such as the Battle of Midway, Iwo Jima, and even the infamous Omaha Beach.

You play a soldier for one of five sides: America, Japan, Germany, Britain or Russia. Not a bigwig General or fancy Lieutenant; just a regular Joe thrown into the fray doing what you're trained to do - kill the other guys, especially the ones with the biggest guns.

Unlike other FPS games that merit individual accomplishment over group success, Battlefield 1942 takes the Tribes route and is built for team play. Each side starts out with a certain number of 'tickets.' Every death costs your team one ticket, so staying alive and keeping your team in one piece is key. The other way to deplete your enemy's reserve of tickets is to capture key points on each game map, denoted by either Allied, Axis, or gray neutral flags. When one team controls a majority of these points, the other team starts losing tickets at a steady rate until they recapture a point and even it up again. Thus, the game is like one big king of the hill tug of war.

Battlefield 1942 understands that a good army is a balanced one. There are five types of soldier to choose from: Scout, Assault, Anti-Tank, Medic, and Engineer. Each has different equipment and can perform certain functions that the others cannot. The medic can heal, the engineer can repair vehicles and lay mines, the scout can snipe and call in airstrikes, the anti-tank soldier hefts a bazooka, and the assault soldier is an all-purpose grunt with a payload of grenades.

You can switch your specialty while you are dead and waiting to respawn, which comes in handy. For instance, if you were a scout that just got run over by a tank, you could respawn in as an anti-tank guy and try to exact revenge. Because of this there is no one prevailing soldier type - all five come in handy.

However, once you're behind the wheel of one of the game's 35 vehicles, your class becomes less important than your driving/piloting/navigation skills. Tanks, jeeps, and half-tracks dominate land, battleships, submarines and aircraft carriers patrol the seas, and fighters and bombers rule the skies. Everything is drawn to scale - you can actually get lost just walking around on the aircraft carrier.

It's here where BF 1942 really earns its stripes. The transition between on-foot and vehicular combat is seamless. You can hop into a jeep, zip out to a contested control point, hop out of the jeep and hurl some grenades at a few enemies, then grab an empty tank to hold your position. Next, you might want to hop out of the tank and man an AA gun to take out one of the fighters flying overhead, or make your way to an airfield and nab a plane for some dogfighting, or maybe even respawn on an aircraft carrier and DRIVE it. The possibilities are really quite endless.

This is all made possible by an impressive new game engine (dubbed the 'Refractor 2') that places functionality and enormity over detailed precision. It's not as flashy as the Unreal Tournaments of the world, but it does its duty with decent explosion effects, realistic vehicles and functional animations. The 16 maps are really, really big - some are so big that they almost require you to use a jeep or a plane just to cover ground. The maps are all modeled after real-world battles, which gives the action an unparalleled sense of realism. Omaha Beach, for example, is an incredibly intense, immersive experience from either side.

This is particularly true when you're playing BF 1942 the way it was meant to be played: online. The game supports up to 64 total players at once, though the most I ever played with was about 20 per side - which, by the way, was totally chaotic. I can hardly imagine what 32 would be like.

There are three multiplayer games - Conquest, Team Deathmatch and Capture the Flag. Conquest is the main game mode, focusing on the need to secure control points while minimizing casualties. Team Deathmatch and Capture the Flag are somewhat self-explanatory and also somewhat extraneous, as the Conquest mode is clearly the most fun of the three.

Regardless of the mode, BF 1942 is simply a great multiplayer game. Whether you're storming an outpost with your teammates, holding a control point against an enemy push or even just running around like a crazy Rambo, the sense of war has never before been so palpable.

The game oozes with authenticity, thanks in part to the sound. The language changes depending on which country you're fighting for. Bullets scream past your head as you're running for cover and engines roar as planes streak by overhead. Though there isn't much ambient noise, there's enough going on in here that the few moments of silence are actually sort of pleasant.

You'll marvel at the way the game engine manages to hold up regardless of your particular situation. I was once flying a plane on the Iwo Jima map, sending a flurry of bullets into the enemy base. As I swooped away, I was shot to ribbons by an AA gun. I managed to eject before my smoking wreck landed in the ocean, which is also where I ended up. So there I am, suddenly surrounded by a LOT of water and no transportation. My only option? Swim back to land. Which is exactly what I did, and though it took a good 3 minutes to make it, it was just long enough to make the enemy who shot me down forget that I might not have died with the plane. I crawled back up to dry land, spotted my enemy and lobbed a grenade at his feet.

The poor guy didn't know what hit him... but he knew who did it. You just don't get that kind of satisfaction out of yet-another-ion-cannon-kill in those other shooters.

However, this all comes at a price. BF 1942 is a burly game and requires serious power. Lower-end systems will function but won't look good. It's also not the most stable PC game I've ever played, and pre-patched has a tendency to crash out occasionally. Of course, it's primarily an online game, so patching is sort of part of the equation inherently.

While the game balance is pretty good, the learning curve goes through the roof when trying to fly the planes. It becomes clear very quickly that being a good pilot is the key to really racking up the kills, and it takes time to master the touchy flight options (you can opt for mouse/keyboard, keyboard alone or even a joystick). You can easily wipe out a whole gang of enemies with one decent carpet-bombing or just thrash foot soldiers with low flying fighters. You'll need to practice in the single-player.

Yep, that's right - there is a single-player mode. Unfortunately, it leaves a lot to be desired and was obviously designed as an afterthought. You can romp through a campaign spanning all 16 maps, but there's very little tying it all together aside from minor text briefings.

The big problem here is the weak enemy AI. Though the game allows you to distribute more or less of your system's processing power to AI (a nice touch), it doesn't make much of a difference. The game has no scripting at all, which makes for a much more varied, free-form experience, but also means that enemy AI often just runs about with little rhyme or reason. They're really easy to kill and are not creative in the way they approach the game. Think of the single-player as little more than training for multiplayer and it makes more sense.

Besides, once you've gotten sucked into the incredibly fluid, dynamic experience that is BF 1942 online, you won't care much about the single-player letdowns. Instead, you'll be sucking down pints of coffee to keep you awake as you test out more strategies late into the night. This is a very, very compelling game and shouldn't be missed by those with good rigs and plenty of time to kill.

Battlefield Vietnam - PC

ow everyone can love the smell of napalm in the morning.

Few events are more polarizing to a population than war, and when it comes to the shady conflict in South Vietnam dating from 1965-1973, tempers run white-hot. Why were we really there? How many did we leave behind? What was the extent of U.S. war crimes (i.e. the My Lai Massacre) in Vietnam? Did the U.S. truly suffer approx. 57,000 casualties or were losses grossly understated to assuage the massive public dissension for the war? Some 30 years after the fact, it's still a thorny subject.

So it's no wonder that, until recently, even the most edgy video game developers have steered clear of the Vietnam debacle and all it represents, opting instead to build on the unquestionable evil of Hitler and his brainwashed denizens. But for whatever reason, the floodgates are now open and we're starting to see more games willing to dive into this hornet's nest of a war.

And if they all turn out like Battlefield: Vietnam, gamers are in for a treat. Deftly and tastefully delving where few have dared tread, EA and Dice's next entry in their incredibly popular Battlefield franchise is a grand multiplayer first-person shooter endeavor. The graphics engine is a bit more polished than Battlefield: 1942, the weapons are more modern and the gameplay is still riveting, though the war feels awfully familiar.

As before, up to 64 players (2 teams of 32) can play as the U.S. forces and related allies or the North Vietnamese and Vietcong allies on a variety of maps that restage famous battles from the war. The same unit classes are back - Scout, Assault, Anti-Tank, Medic, and Engineer - and each has a specific set of weapons and equipment. The goal is to secure strategic points for as long as possible, making for a gigantic, frenetic game of tug of war…literally.

The battles are fought over land, sea and air, essentially the same way they were in real-life. You can get airlifted directly into battle via various choppers. You can fire your gun or mounted ordinances while in flight to lay down heavy suppressive fire. You can call for a buddy to airlift your butt out of an area that has grown too hot to handle (good luck with that one, though). You can pilot various jets and napalm the hell out of dozens of poor saps. And yes, you can accidentally shoot one of your own; friendly-fire is as much an issue here as it was back in the day.

New to the franchise is the ability to actually airlift vehicles into the fray as well as small structures that act as spawn points. This gives the game a new dynamic as it allows for handy surprise attacks behind enemy lines. A well-organized team can plan some rewarding strategies, making smart teamwork even more important than before.

Choppers and jets are not your only modes of transportation. You'll find APCs, a few different tank types, jeeps, trucks, a scooter for speedy recon missions and many more. Like BF: 1942, the transition from infantry to air or sea battles is virtually seamless, though it still takes a great deal of practice before you'll be proficient at piloting aircraft. A third-person camera view helps a bit, but essentially trial and error rules the day for the virtual pilot.

What takes significantly less time is efficiently operating the game's 30+ weapons. Accurate automatic M16's and Soviet-issued Kalashnikovs are a fresh alternative to the ordinances of WWII. Each side uses arching mortar fire and stationary 88mm cannons, and you can take down jets and choppers with various RPG's and M72 LAW rocket launchers. You'll find mines (some which shoot up waist-high before exploding) and terrain specific booby traps at your disposal as well - I've been trampled by a couple of rolling logs covered in sharp spikes more than once. Vietnam was anything but neat and tidy, and BF: Vietnam really does a good job capturing the chaos of war.

This is made possible by the increased level of detail afforded by the tweaked game engine. The areas are replete with jungles and thick foliage, leading to a wealth of stealth tactics as enemies lie prone in perfect camouflage. While the aesthetics are not groundbreaking, especially when standing side by side with games like Far Cry and UT 2004, they look better than BF: 1942 and certainly get the job done. The textures are sharp and detailed and hold up surprisingly well up close.

However, the price of running BF: Vietnam is high; namely, a burly gaming rig with oodles of system resources. Forget the minimum system requirements, because anything close to those just won't look good at all. Raise those graphical settings too high and the framerate will dip in a heartbeat, and the load times can be rough with even a sweet system. It's also important to note that Radeon users need to make some necessary setting tweaks from the get-go, so be prepared to upgrade if you want to see this puppy fully loaded.

The demanding requirements are most noticeable when playing the lackluster single player mode. Yes, it has returned, albeit slightly more fine-tuned than in BF: 1942. The bot A.I. has improved for enemy and friendly NPCs, but without an incredible rig, you will need to severely roll back the number of bots in a game, lest your framerate and your sanity as a whole will suffer. Once again, the single-player is a pale shadow of the online component and presumably exists as just a training ground. It's too bad that more attention wasn't given here.

That attention was likely diverted to the audio, though, which really brings the game alive. Pumped through chopper radios and speakers littered across various U.S. bases, you'll hear "War" by Edwin Starr, "The Letter" by The Box Tops, "The Psychotic Reaction" by Count Five, "I Fought The Law" by Bobby Fuller Four, "On the Road Again" by Canned Heat and more from the likes of Jefferson Airplane, CCR and others. Heard on the other side of the fence is a lot of chatting and songs in Vietnamese and a morbid, heavy accented voice spouting things like "G.I., you cannot win this war!", "G.I. Joe, your government does not care about you!", "Your pilots cannot see you G.I.; they will napalm you!" Propaganda or truth - you make the call!

Battlefield: Vietnam follows in the footsteps of its predecessor as a fun, engrossing online experience, but those who have played BF 1942 might be a little miffed that Vietnam is so similar. The gameplay that was amazing a year and a half ago is not as shockingly new, leading to a battle that many of you will feel you've already fought. Still, the seamless inclusion of land, sea and air combat coupled with the intensity of jungle warfare wins it a medal of honor.

Age of Empires III - PC

The age of antiquity.

With more interesting takes than a Stanley Kubrick movie, last year's RTS crop was the most exciting thing in PC gaming. This year, publishers are capitalizing on those innovations with Barbarian Invasions and Winter Assaults, making it the perfect time for a really amazing, unique RTS to swoop in and wipe everyone else's expansion pieces off the game board.

We were hoping that would be Ensemble's Age of Empires III; after all, it's got pretty much the best cred in the business. But aside from a new card-based system that allows players to really deck out their forces, not much is new. You can still spend hours battling through three single-player campaigns, engaging the computer in skirmishes, or waging war online, but most of this is the same as it was in Age of Empires II.

The plot actually got worse. Age of Empires III goes to the trouble of setting itself in actual time and space - colonial America - but avoids all the interesting and prickly issues like genocide, epidemics and slavery, instead subbing in a wimpy tale of a family destined to protect the Holy Grail from a Satanic Cult.

We understand that dealing with real issues plaguing colonial America, like slavery and genocide, doesn't make for a very, uh, marketable game, but this weird fantasy plot isn't a good alternative. Europeans weren't over there to protect a sacred relic from Satan - they were there to escape their oppressors and eradicate the indigenous folk. (Now that's the stuff good video games are made of.) In any case, the single-player campaign tells a wimpy story and doesn't let you do any of the awful things you might be yearning to do under the pretext of harmless entertainment.

Instead, it lets you do all kinds of things you've pretty much done before. You still make peons, tell them to gather and build stuff, then pump out the troops and place them in groups before sending them to battle. You cannot, however, set formations or behaviors for your troops " formations are handled for you, and commands like telling your troops to act defensively or aggressively are not in the game. For the most part, you just group your troops and right click on whatever you want attacked.

So let's right-click on the game modes. The main campaign presents you with the same RTS objectives you've been completing for years " defend this base for five minutes, destroy that base, deliver this cargo across this map, etc., etc. If the plot had been edgy and the objectives taboo ("Moctezuma must die!"), this would be worth a run through, but as it stands, you're better off jumping straight into Skirmishes and Online battles.

But these modes aren't flawless, they just manage to avoid telling some Mickey Mouse tale of bravery and virtue. The problem with the skirmishes, online and off, is the fact that there is only one victory condition " kill "em all. There are no command points to control, no flags to capture, and no innocent populations to spare or slaughter. The two modes " Supremacy and Deathmatch " are only distinguishable by the resources you begin the match with. In Supremacy, everyone starts with nothing but a few peasants and must build their forces from the ground up. In Deathmatch, everyone starts with 20,000 of everything (Gold, Food, Timber), so players can build big cities and armies as fast as their fingers will let them.

Deathmatches are almost always preferable due to an Age of Empires III peculiarity " never-ending resources. You can build mills and one factory, and between the two receive an infinite stream of resources. This obviously makes turtling (building walls and heavy defenses while training tons of units) a choice strategy in Supremacy matches, where Zerg rushes aren't a large concern. However, once all the players on a map become nice and fortified, bringing them down is nigh impossible without leaving your city open to conquest. As a result, everyone just sits there soaking up resources in a stalemate.

While Supremacy matches can literally go on forever, Deathmatches see players build up the biggest armies they can in almost no time at all and clash immediately. These matches are usually good, quick fun, although we wish there were more ways to enjoy the game than just this one.

The core of AOE III is so surprisingly familiar, you'll start to wonder exactly what Ensemble has been up to in the past few years. The answer is the Home City, the best new feature in the game. Every nation has a Home City, from which players can periodically choose gifts to augment their war efforts. These gifts are basically cards that players can build into a deck of twenty, although they may have hundreds to choose from.

When you begin a new Home City, you'll have fifteen cards. As you gain experience in battle, your city will level up and you'll be allowed to choose a couple new ones, adding them to your deck. Ultimately, the idea is to build a deck that complements your nation's natural attributes, hopefully allowing you to build a big force faster than your opponents. This is an exciting addition to the strategy, because it means serious players will have their own custom nations, making battles far less predictable. But while a well-balanced card system can be a thing of beauty, it's not really the only thing you look for in a sequel that's been coming for six years.

We also wish it were more fun to look at. Age of Empires III is certainly prettier than Ages past with its new 3D models and nifty effects, not to mention its fancy new physics. Hurl a cannonball at some pesky natives and watch it literally roll over them. However, the game uses the same camera system as Age of Empires II. You can't rotate or angle it; you can only slightly zoom in and out. As a result, the game ends up looking a lot like Age of Empires II in spite of the significant graphical upgrade.

If the camera man needs to be fired, the fight choreographer needs to be fired twice. Age of Empires III is geared for huge, insane battles, but not very pretty ones ones. If you've played or seen a Rome: Total War game, you know what awesome battles look like, and given the state of Age of Empires III's ugly, static clusters, I'd say someone should mail Ensemble a copy.

At least they got the audio right. The ambient sounds, music and voice work all suit the colonial theme, and the sound effects are by far the most interesting elements of any battle.

But no one buys strategy games for the sound effects - they buy them to agonize over tactics and statistics and this is why Age of Empires III is still a recommendable RTS. The steps it has taken in the gameplay department since Age of Empires II are negligible, but at least the new card-based bonus system adds an element of customization and depth to the genre. This result is as detailed as a history book, and about as much fun.