Guitar Hero 3

This game is a tricky one to evaluate. Starting off on easy, things quickly progress - and you feel like you're doing pretty well. Well you would do unless you're that hook handed bloke with the dodgy eye. After wowing yourself with an easy run through of Through the Fire and the Flames while the end credits are on, you crank the difficulty up to 'medium'.

This is where the proper fun begins. Now you're using all four fingers on your left hand. Now it starts throwing chords at you. And now it starts making your hand and eye co-ordination feel grossly inadequate.

Throw in some battles against guitar playing legends such as Slash and medium level should take the average player a couple of weeks to get through.

Ok. You've having completed medium, it's the same story as easy really. You feel a sense of achievement when you finish the last song (The Devil Went Down to Georgia), and you beat the last guitar legend. Move on to hard....

Bloody hell - it's a different game altogether! Now you have five keys to press, and only four fingers to press them with which means you can no longer just sit with your fingers firmly on the correct buttons. You now have to move you hand to cover the fifth button. Then move it back to cover the first button. Lights fly down the screen and if you blink you miss them. Look at your hand to see where the keys are and you miss them. If you miss them, you lose your place. You lose your place and take a second or two to recover. A second or two later and you're being booed off stage.

I have completed easy and got 5 stars for each song, many I have gotten 100% and gold starred them. On medium I persevered and finally got 5 stars for each song. I might even gold star a couple with a bit more practice. On hard, I think I have one or two songs that I have scraped 4 stars on, the rest I am lucky to get 3 stars - the crowd are throwing boos and bottles at me by the end. I have maybe 6 more songs to do and that's the Hard level cracked.

So, here I am around 50 days after I received this game and I have played it on almost every game session I have had. That's gotta count for something! There is still EXPERT level to play, but as I am getting on a bit, I don't think I'll be doing that level any time soon...

Rez HD

The latest game to enter the 360 live arcade is an old 'on-rails' shooter going by the name of Rez HD. If you haven't heard of Rez, that's not a problem, as the countless copies being sold on eBay for the Dreamcast or PS2 at any time are always marked '@@@@@LOOOK RARE@@@@@' or something like that. Well it's not rare anymore - it's available as a download onto the 360.

So, another on rails shooter?

What makes Rez so different is in it's delivery. The graphics are nothing to get excited about, although they fit the game perfectly. What Rez does so brilliantly is merge sound, graphics and feeling all in one package. The music plays along with the game. You fire a shot, it is played into the music. The music pumps its bass - your controller pulses with the music. Before you know it you are staring trance-like at the screen, watching, hearing and feeling the game.


The original game had a 'vibration pack' that you could buy seperately, in Japan only I think. There are websites showing these vibro-packs being put to some rather naughty uses which I will not go into here! The pack would be attached to the player or the player's chair to give even more immersion into the game. The 360 doesn't need such an attachment - just plug in some more controllers and the game will quite happily vibrate them in time. Be careful not to over-do it, as fillings can come out!

There are many hidden modes and levels for when you have completed the first four, and an online scoreboard will keep you competitive if that's your beef. Sadly, only 200GS is on offer for all you gamescore whores out there, but I bet some of them are still tricky to get.

This game is definitely going to keep me playing.

Introduction

I guess starting a blog is easy for some people. This first paragraph has gone through a lot of changes, and all I am trying to do is introduce myself. I suppose I should start by telling you something about me and what this blog is about? Well, my name is Harry, online I go by the name of Hakk - a name that goes back a long way in video games. I didn't like to put "HAR" when I got my name on a game when high score tables limited you to 3 letters. I don't know why I didn't like it, but it just didn't look right. So I went with "HAK", again I must have had a reason, but hey I was like 8 years old or something. Later I expanded the name when more letters became available and it stuck.

This blog is Yet Another Videogame Blog. I am often victim to waking up in the sitting room, possibly with a keyboard pressed into my forehead. I often get wrong off my girlfriend for not coming to bed when I said I would. I always tell myself, "Just One More Go then I'll switch it off." But do I?

So I thought as I spend (some would say waste) a lot of time on these games, I thought I would share my thoughts about them - especially ones that cause me to lose precious sleep.