GameOnYou UK

Is it that time again already? What? It’s been that time more than once over the past couple of months? Whatever. Shut Up.

September is going to be another best month of the year, so you’d better secure lots of overtime at work, or you’re going to have to sacrifice eating on Tuesdays. There are that many great games coming out, I’m sorry but it’s true. I’m going to have to do it… again. That’s correct. This month gets another (much coveted) GoY Seal Of Approval™.

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That’s right, on Thursday 21st of August, the Star Wars: The Force Unleashed demo will hit both the Xbox Live marketplace and the Playstation Network.

The demo will feature one of the earlier levels where, as “The Apprentice”, you must take on a Jedi General who is trying to destroy a TIE construction factory.

Along with this great news, we are also happy to announce that “The Force Unleashed” graphic novel will also be on sale this week.

Published by Dark Horse Comics, the graphic novel has been scripted by the game’s author, Hayden Blackman, in which he  reveals more about the origins of “The Apprentice”, the graphic novel will also act as a companion to the game rather than a direct adaptation.

Check back soon for our impressions of the demo.

Unreal Tournament 3 is of course the latest installment of the Unreal series for Epic Games. Leading up to it’s release, the game generated a lot of hype, mostly down to so many other titles utilising the Unreal engine with mostly impressive results and, we are happy to announce that UT3 lives up to the hype in spectacular fashion.

Unlike most shooters, UT3 hasn’t changed much at all over the years, it is still the extremely fast paced, no holds barred, fragfest that we’ve all came to know and love. Of course the graphics look amazing and the old weapons have been re-designed, slightly but are still instantly recognisable to Unreal veterans.

The single player campaign is a series of matches as you would find during online play varying from deathmatch to capture the flag, The story takes a back seat, only being told through short cut-scenes at the beginning of each chapter and text briefings before each mission. During the campaign you will take control of Reaper, (a Dom and Baird hybrid from Gears of War), along with his team of “Ronin”, Jester the sarcastic sister of Reaper, Othello the Cole Train of UT3 and Bishop an self proclaimed crusader of god, all of which can be commanded to great effect during missions.

Along with single player, you can play the campaign in co-op, play Instant Action, basically a custom bot match or Multi-player, either way your guaranteed to have a good time, especially with the addition of vehicles, hoverboards, some crazy power-ups, mutators and a hell of a lot of maps.

The only real problems we had, at least with the console version, was the “push to speak” system. which was not really thought out. In order to speak to your team you must push right on the d-pad and hold it throughout your sentence. This posed problems as, for example in CTF, if you capture the flag, the enemy will converge on you, in order to shout at your team for help with covering fire you must either come to a complete stop as movement is controlled by the stick above the d-pad, or fumble about with the controller until you can speak and move forward and back but not turn. This is also complicated by the ability to “feign death” by pressing down on the d-pad, meaning any movement of your thumb while speaking can cause you to collapse to the ground, dropping the flag in the process.

Despite that minor flaw, UT3 is still fantastic game to play both online and off. Easily rated at 9 out of 10, it is a must buy for all shooter fans.

The first o f the big three, and arguably the best conference was delivered by Microsoft this year. They not only made a reasonably beefy number of announcements but also covered a lot of highly anticipated games and gave us a deeper look into them.

They also introduced the new dashboard design, along with their infamous new Avatars which are due to hit Xboxes worldwide come Autumn (delivered via the mandatory Autumn update). Don’t worry if you bought any themes before the upcoming new dashboard… Microsoft assures that they will be compatible with the new dashboard, and Gamerpics are rumoured to follow suit.

Follow us for our comprehensive coverage of the Microsoft E3 Press Conference…

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Many questions arise from these gameplay shorts: Will there be any wacky super-powers this time around? Who’s this lady-type? Who keeps leaving that sand lying around in slopy areas?

One thing we’re sure of though is that Prince of Persia looks ruddy gorgeous - and it takes a lot for us to say ‘ruddy’.

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Got a full day in which to sit and absorb the main events from E3? Well guess what, you can do so right here. With thanks to Gamespot, who actually live in America, rendering it much easier for them to actually be there. Obviously.

Ahem, the videos!

Mini-review: Watch the last 2 minutes, it’s the only bit of decent news in the whole show…

Mini-review: Nintendo in self-indulgent stories about their own families shocker!

All in all, not particularly exciting, strangely. We’ll be bringing you any videos from the show floor that catch our eye as we dig through the flood of content hitting the intertubes right now.

Have a fun day with that! I’ll just be here in the corner if you need me.

Like any self-respecting British male who resists the nipple-toting allure of the red-tops and opts for The Guardian or Telegraph instead, we class ourselves as highly intelligent beings here at GoY Towers. Except that we read Ultimate X-Men.

To this end, we like to think we’re clever enough to outsmart even the wiliest of AI foe, and take great satisfaction in doing so. All GoYers have almost certainly set themselves personal targets whilst scouring the interwebs for E3 goodness, and I’m no different. My aim is to bring any games that look like they might command just as brain as brawn to your attention.

Enter Far Cry 2, galloping gloriously into our gaze like the proverbial gazelle which we’ll undoubtedly be able to shoot throughout the game:

I’ll be adding more to this post throughout the conference, and using my weblord powers to drag it kicking and screaming to your attention, should any updates occur. Not that I’m guaranteeing they will - maybe FC2 is the only decent thinking man’s game coming out in the foreseeable future? Hopefully Operation Flashpoint 2 might have something to say about that… we eagerly await Codemasters…

E3 has only just begun; but you can already cross one highly saught after release off your Christmas lists.

As Microsoft’s slot picks up pace, one of the early confirmed releases comes in the form of Resident Evil 5, which is set to be shipped 13th March 2009 here in the UK, too the dissapointment of many fans. The popular francise, which is this time set in Africa, had been rumoured to be releasing this year, although it was always unlikely.

The game will ship simultaneously for both XBOX 360 and PS3. I’m personally a bit peeved at the lack of a PC version, but a port may be on the horizon.

With another 9 months until release, there is plenty of time to gaze longingly at the video trailers.

Microsoft has announced new titles heading their way to the Xbox Live Arcade in the coming months.

These will be -

Geometry Wars 2.

Portal: Still Alive.

The original Banjo Kazooie.

South Park.

and Galaga Legions.

More news as we get it.

For everyone that missed it, yes there is in fact a Too Human demo on the Xbox Live Marketplace right now. With all the hype surrounding this game, everyone expected a huge demo to really show us why we should buy this game, unfortunately we were left slightly dissapointed with a fairly short taster.

The demo is single player, and only one of five player classes can be used. After a short video sequence you find yourself in a ancient temple where no-one has set foot for years, at least no-one human. After a little exploring you will move into the next room where you encounter the enemy, a robotic based lifeform. That is about as much of the story you will see in the demo, as the rest is dedicated to showing you how combat works while flashing through various scenes that show off the graphical quality you will also find various weapons and armour for you to play around with to get a taste of the customisation options.

The only problem we had was getting use to the control system, you use a single stick movement control, while the other stick contols you melee attacks and triggers controlling your ranged weapons, which can get frustrating at times, epecially when you try to move the camera and end up cutting open one of your soldiers. The only control you do have over the camera is the distance from the character you want from the pre-sets.

All in all, the demo does really wet the appetite for what is to come, albiet surprisingly short. But we are still very much looking forward to this title and suggest you download the demo and try it as soon as possible.