Ludus-ing! Remember Me (not me but the game!)

This game is all about that very complex thing, memory... And I can’t remember a fucking thing about this game! Only joking. Remember Me hit the shelves, the PS Store and wherever else you can get games from in July 2013. Interestingly it was available for PS+ subscribers as early as November!

The game is set in a 2084 Paris, or rather ‘Neo-Paris’. I don’t know if the Paris we see in the game is the Paris in 2084 or a different reality Paris. The game focuses on Nilin, initially imprisoned by the games baddies; she gets out of the fortress with help from a mysterious Edge. Following this is a narrative based around Nilin attempting to bring down the pesky baddies and recovering her own memories (trying not to give too much away!).

I got about 15 hours of game play from Remember Me. I am sad to say that I haven’t completed this game. I’ll discuss that after the usual positives and negatives.

One significant issue with the game for me was the combat. The game (despite being set in 2084) is strictly melee combat (with a tiny bit of shooting). The theory is for Nilin to be able to use combos in order to bring down her foes, and the more you progress the bigger the combos get and the general variety changes. A good idea, but it doesn’t work greatly in the game. When surrounded by 6 enemies I’m not too fussed about combos, I just want to hit a few of them. Sadly the initial strikes do not feel very powerful, meaning that you have to spend ages getting rid of the majority of enemies before you finally get the chance to use the combos, by this time however, the enemies are on their last legs and the weak beginning strike is too much for them. This factor makes the latter part of the game near enough impossible on the hard mode.

One good and bad point of the game is the storyline. The narrative feels like it should be immense, but it is not good enough for you to really delve into the game. It feels a little plastic and rushed, as if they created the story in a short time and then went about creating the game. The main point of the storyline is very interesting however, that’s why this is a good and a bad point. It would be a good movie.

Another good and bad point of the game is its familiarity. Remember Me has the feel of a Batman Arkham series game tied in with Uncharted. The combat definitely feels like something out of Arkham City, with the emphasis to move and do combos (thankfully it works on Batman) and the platforming in between feels quite Uncharted-y. Maybe a better comparison is Tomb Raider as Nilin is also a lady. This is good because it doesn’t take long to get stuck in. It’s bad because it takes the basis of what is good in Arkham Asylum and Tomb Raider and doesn’t expand on it like the aforementioned games do to create a working dynamic.

The major plus of this game is the character Nilin. When I gave up on this game I was quite sad to leave Nilin without her memories. Her character is very believable and a joy to play as. Okay the storyline is a bit iffy and the combat is woeful but Nilin makes up for it. She starts off as a broken individual, mentally and physically, and by the time I quit she was a strong individual, fighting for what’s right and generally being a bit of a bad ass. I don’t think she’s a Lara Croft (largely because she is let down by other segments of the game) but she’s well worth remembering. Her narrative is the best thing about Remember Me and why I’m not finding this game a total dud. I’d definitely be interested in a Remember Me movie is the right actor was picked for Nilin as I believe it definitely work (just so long as it isn’t made for teenage girls!)

Another positive of the game is the fact that it looks stunning. The areas look great and feel immersive. It seems as though the creators sunk all their time into this however. I don’t really know what else to add here.

Sadly, the main reason I didn’t complete this game was because of the collectibles. I love it when a game has collectibles. I believe GTA5 nailed the collectibles, some are hard to find, and some are easy; and crucially they amount to an extra dimension of gameplay. They aren’t linked to the main story but are worth your time. In a free roam game it is easy to do, definitely. In a chapter based game Uncharted has a good model, the collectibles aren’t particularly useful, but they look nice and have some nice historical text attached to them. The chapter game that nails the collectible is Mafia 2; as the collectibles are synonymous with the era the game is set in. However Remember Me takes them to another level. You have to actually collect some of the items to add extra HP and extra focus. So going into the end of the game where the boss battles are hard with low health and a reduced chance to use the items that are essential to beating some enemies make the game beyond difficult. I didn’t believe the game was good enough to go through the previous 7 or 8 chapters so that I could beat it. I’d rather move onto a next game or frankly, just watch Eastenders.

Overall I believe this game is the perfect metaphor of the PS3. It’s good but should have been so much better. The game lacks on some of the basic items needed to be a really good game. I get the feeling that if the idea of this game was muted around 2004 then by 2006 there would be a great Playstation 2 game on the market that we would still mention now. Sadly the game feels rushed, instead of broadening the storyline and making a longer game it has gone for a short and quick blast with pretty visuals and lack of substance.

Would I play this game again? One day perhaps. I wouldn’t count on it though.

(Someone make it a movie! And don’t add a shitty love strand of a storyline and turn it into Hunger Games!)

Peace.

SJ.

Guitar Wishlist! - The Loar LH300

Jazz box time! (Is it a jazz box? Suppose that might arouse some debate). The Loar LH300 is an American designed, China built archtop guitar. It’s basically a copy of some of those old Gibson guitars that were around before the Second World War, with The Loar attempting to recreate the look (and spirit) of the L5. It is essentially an acoustic guitar with F-holes as opposed to a sound hole.

There are a number of things that I like about this guitar. However, I think it’s important to start off by explaining something. It may shock a lot of people but I don’t discriminate against cheaper guitars. The price doesn’t really fuss me about a guitar. I love the £100 Squier Bullet Strat and I love the £2500 Gibson J200s. I’m not really in a position to be a snob about particular guitars. Put simply, if they play okay and sound okay I’d like it!

The Loar LH300 is about £400/$500. It is cheap and I love it.

One of the reasons I really like this guitar is because of the body shape and style. I love that shape and style, they are so evocative of a time when guitar was really coming out of the starting blocks. It wasn’t a particularly well known instrument but this style was there. It wouldn’t surprise me if Bert Weedon had something of a similar shape when he was being quizzed in East Ham market about what the thing was in the late 20s or 30s! There are some guitar shapes and styles that everyone must have some knowledge about purely because of how important they were. I’d couple this with something like the Fender Stratocaster in importance of getting these pieces of wood with metal wires into people’s hands.

My experiences with this guitar are very limited. By this it means that aside from a few things I know nothing about it. There seem to be a lot of youtube videos, and I’ve watched nearly all of them. There seems to be a chap in America who sells them, he plays it in standard as well as DADGAD and he makes it sound great. He does some chops and does lead-y type stuff and I’m very pleased with how it sounds. Of course it isn’t going to be bob on that Gibson L5 tone, but it does what I’d expect that sort of shape and price to do which is what you want really. The reviews are good, with the largest complaint being that some of the detailing could be better, but it’s something from China and that seems a common aspect of these guitars, I can sort most the things people have complained about. Again, I don’t mind dodgy bits on cheap guitars; if they where to come out the factory totally 100% pristine with regards to attention to detail they wouldn’t be as cheap as they are, some people forget this.

And lastly, I can’t write one of these things without referring to a famous player. Unfortunately I don’t know of a famous LH300 user. I’m sure there is a really decent musician using this on stages around the world and I can’t wait to hear them. However I will go on about someone who got me on to these types of guitars. That man is Jack White and his use of his Kay. His Kay is like a silver-y archtop with a pickup in the neck. He plays his threw an amp usually, and I loved the sound of it but was more interested in the unplugged side of it. I loved the essence of these guitars, put simply. The bluesy sound was impeccable. With a bit of research I found the LH300 and have loved it ever since. The good news is if I was to buy the LH300 and loved it so much, I could go and buy a LH309 which has a p90 style pick up in the neck!

Sadly, the only problem I have encountered with The Loar LH300, as well as all other The Loar guitars (as I love the LH200 too) is that hardly anywhere in England stocks them. They seem to pop up on eBay and sometimes a random shop in York or Somerset has one or two but it looks like the best place to get these would be Europe (Thomann have stocked a few as well).

Peace.

SJ.

LUDUS-ing! Saints Row: The Third.

The first free game I got as part of my PS+ subscription.  It came out as part of the August 2013 PS+ update but originally came out in November 2011. The Saints Row series is one which has been around for a good few years (a fourth instalment is around these days, I believe) but I had never played one before downloading this. My sandbox/free-roaming obsessed friend had this a year or so before I got it and he said he enjoyed the game, so I was looking forward to giving it a go. On reflection, as long as you don’t have to do missions and can go mad with a weapon then he will enjoy it.

The game gave me around 15 hours of gameplay. Quite poor considering it is a free roaming game with what looks like a lot to do. I’ll expand upon this later. The game is basically centred about ‘The Saints’, and their struggle after attempted change and then failure. You make your own character, sculpting him or her with their own voice, tattoos and clothes. The Saints are a gang who have expanded into the media (creating things like merchandise, if you can believe it) and then embark upon a challenge of fighting a variety of factions from around Steelport.

I’ll start off with the bad aspects of this game. Sadly there are a lot of them (I do aim to end with the good at the end!). First of all let’s talk about the mechanics of the game. They suck. I shall expand on that by saying the shooting mechanic feels slow, and slightly dim-witted. I try not to use any auto-aim throughout shooting games as but felt that I needed to put it on, I’m an okay shooter but watching your character trying to spin around coming out of L1 aim mode and then going back into it (as that’s usually quicker) felt horrible. Next – the driving mechanics. I believe that it be an absolute must for any  free-roam game to have at least okay driving mechanics, seeing as you spent a lot of time travelling between objectives. I’m a big Gran Turismo fan so I’m not expecting anything of that level, but it just feels terrible. It feels horribly unresponsive, there is a brake but it just stops you. Both the accelerator and brake feel like a switch, you seemingly cannot use 50% throttle or go to 50% breaking on this game, meaning driving around becomes a hopeful ‘please-don’t-let-me-hit-anything’ mini-game. I want to drive and get to the next objective or fun thing to do, but no, I just spend the time weaving in and out of traffic then losing control. I ended up walking most places, or just using a helicopter!

Second of all, the storyline seems horribly boring. I never got drawn into the game which meant that I never felt the need to go and do the added side quests, I was just playing it in the hope that it got good. I got two missions away from the end of the game thinking it was going to pick up. It just simply never got going. With that, I found the missions quite limited. Sometimes it felt as if the main point of the mission was to walk into a room, blow shit up, and then leave. Great fun!.. But not when it’s the only things you have done. Even the boss battles are boring, repetitive and hardly a challenge. The boss battles don’t seem to get that much harder either, though I feel that if I was to play the game on hard I’d get screwed over in the same way I would in normal difficulty, just more often. I would happily blame my own average gaming standard but it’s hard to argue that when the mechanics of the game are so bad.

Despite all of that, there are some aspects of the game I enjoyed. I can fully appreciate the side missions and quests and like the fact that everytime you do something you get rewarded and you’re told how much of that particular area you have influence over. Sadly the shoddy mechanics meant that I could not fully explore this. Another positive about this game is that it has the Black Keys and Run D.M.C on the soundtrack! (Okay, clutching at straws now)

The best thing about Saints Row 3 is the moments in it that can only be described as bat-shit mental. Some parts of the game just have you sat there in bewilderment as to what has just happened. These can be anything from the missions to just random speech you get from your character. There is a mission in this game involving a tiger that had me laughing all the way through, I won’t spoil what the mission is about, but the randomness of it coupled with your characters reaction make it absolutely hilarious. I am happy to say that this is a regular occurrence in the game. Another thing I liked about the game was the character building section.

I also like the fact that you can make him or her look however you want, it is a bit limited on things like face shape and stuff like that; but the ability to give him or her new clothes, and tattoos, as well as being able to upgrade your character (things like health and etc.) are a real nice touch and can feel the slightest bit immersive. The best bit about this customisation is the fact that you can change the voice. It isn’t simply stolen off of The Sims where you slightly change pitch and timbre of your voice but you’re able to select three different voices per gender. The voice also has a personality, so picking a different voice to your friend will mean you get to see different profiles. I picked the voice that sounded a tiny bit like Jason Statham, hearing him shout “get out of the way love!” after you inevitably crash into some poor sod harshens the blow slightly (until he says it for the millionth time... but I am trying to be positive).

All in all I feel that Saints Row: The Third was a game built on a good premise but ultimately let down because of woeful game play mechanics. The seemingly lack of story didn’t help either.

I’m glad I didn’t pay for the game. I started playing it in August and it took me until February to complete it simply because I never felt it was a good enough game for me to go back and play. I decided to beat it as it was already on my PS3 harddrive as I’m trying to make space for games I haven’t already played. I can’t say that I am not let down and won’t be venturing onto Saints Row: The Third again.

Anyway, I'm off to try and finish Remember Me now. 

SJ.

Guitar Wishlist! - Fender Bronco.

The Fender Bronco. No not the guitar amp. No not the bass amp either. No not the short-scale Squier bass!

The Fender Bronco is the reverse of the Fender Musicmaster. Essentially a stripped down Mustang. It has one pick up, near the bridge. One volume. One tone. And then a tremolo bar can be added.

This guitar is incredibly rare. For a Fender guitar, the wikipedia entry is short, and there is about 8 videos on youtube (with varying sound quality). It's regarded as 'affordable vintage' and I think that's because not many people have heard of them!

The guitars were made between 1967 and 1981. It was built to go into a student package with the aforementioned Fender Bronco Amp. It has a solid Alder body and a Rosewood finger board. Originally coming in Dakota Red, the Bronco eventually came out in Black, Vintage White and Midnight Wine as well as Dakota Red.

The only notable player (I think, please correct me if I'm wrong!) is Alex Turner. Which is probably the main reason I know about this guitar.

The last point leads me nicely onto the next point. I'm a sucker for wanting guitars that my heroes have played. Though there a few reasons I want the Fender Bronco. Despite some of the frankly strange youtube videos (seriously, find the one by the French guy who keeps swapping between a Bronco and a Musicmaster) I really love the sound of this guitar. Having been a massive Arctics fan I've been exposed to the sound quite a bit. The distinct sound of that one single coil pick-up tearing through a variety of Arctic Monkeys tune sends me wild.

This is a point to pick up one. I never thought about acquiring a Bronco. Alex Turner uses one instead of a American and Mexican standard Stratocaster. So it's obviously going to be a lot of money right? No chance I'll get near one of them. Wrong. The guitar sells second hand for around £500-£700. That is a lot of money for a guitar; but with the chance of owning a guitar from the 60s or 70s, for £700? That blew my mind; and this is why I want one. A chance to own a rare piece of guitar history for not much money is great. I think I'd rather own a Bronco, Musicmaster, and a Mexican Stratocaster rather than buying a American standard one!

The last reason I'd like the Bronco is the fact that I have a thing for single pick up guitars. I love owning a VM Jaguar, an Epiphone Les Paul and Sheraton but now and then you just wanna pick up a guitar and just rock the fuck out. A single pup axe allows that. Just plug it in and blast away. I love to mess around with the blend on my Les Paul and there is a certain excitement about getting confused about a Jaguar but I think sometimes an individual needs two knows and a pick up.

The Bronco was discontinued in 1981, and hasn't been bought out again. I would suggest that the Bronco and the Musicmaster would be great additions to the Fender Modernplayer series; but I think it should be around the £280 mark. I think the Modern Player series is a confused series, most instruments being around the £350-£400 mark, with more glamorous models being £700-odd. A one pick up model should go the other way, with the option of buying a Fender amp for £90 more (just rename the Mustang a Bronco with a few different amp models would be ideal). A simple addition of a humbucker in a single-coil shape, with a coil-tap/coil-split and I'll sell my own sister (and yours too!) to own one.

Inabit.
SJ.