Review: Unreal Tournament III

Unreal Tournament III
Midway, Epic Games
Available for the Xbox 360, PS3 and PC

This week I had to step up and finally play with the big boys to review this first person shooter. No hiding in the safety of the easy campaign mode because in Unreal Tournament III by Epic Games, you either play multiplayer or you don’t play at all. Sure there is a single player mode, but the Unreal Tournament franchise has always been about the multiplayer frag fest and if I can’t spend several days reviewing that portion of the game, then I may as well not review it all.

Unreal Tournament III is the next instalment in the Unreal series after Unreal Tournament 2004 and it runs on the famous Unreal Engine 3. Though the game does sport a single player campaign mode and co-op campaign mode where you follow a Ronin mercenary named Reaper who is out for revenge after his home planet is attacked, those storyline modes are really only exercises in preparation for the real draw of the game, the multiplayer mode.

The multiplayer mode gives you the chance to create your own character from several different teams like the Ronin, the Necris, Thunder Clash, etc. which each have their own special abilities. From those teams, you can choose from several different members, male or female to play as. Once you choose your character, you then get to choose your game type: deathmatch, team deathmatch, capture the flag, duel, warfare, and vehicle capture the flag and how to want to seek out players: ranked match or player match. Most of these multiplayer matches are won by gaining the most kills before the other team, but capture the flag and warfare offer variations on the kill point wins.



As I’ve stated many times before I am not a good FPS player and tend to get dizzy after playing for more than an hour, but this game I actually fared well in. I admit I played the single player campaign on easy to avoid spending several months trying to finish this game, but when I jumped into the multiplayer games; I actually walked away with 7 to 14 kills each time in “50 points to win” games. I surprised even myself.

I have to give credit to Epic games to creating a game with easy to use controls. Previous games like Call of Duty 3, I always found myself dying before I could even get my weapon aim at my enemy, but Unreal has me dodging and aiming like a mofo. I love it.

The weapon selection is wicked with a grand arsenal of futuristic weapons to blow your enemies to chunks of man meat. I especially like the bio rifle because you could carpet an area with its neon green slime balls, plus it reminded me of the mutagen from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

The both single and multiplayer also allow players to jump into vehicles like hoverboards, tanks, ATVs, etc, but they tend to you vulnerable when riding around in them. I preferred walking around on foot.

I was very impressed with the response time in multiplayer and with the quality of the game play and graphics. Everything ran smoothly and not once did I get kicked from a game or have it freeze on me mid-play. I was disappointed to see there was no voice feature in the game. I tend not to chat with non-friends online anyway, but I never once heard anyone talking when I was playing or sitting in the lobby waiting for a game to start.



Being that this game comes from the same studio as Gears of War, I expected amazing graphics and that’s exactly what I got. This game is visually stunning from the first cinematic where you watch your character die to every little piece of man meat that goes flying during the in-game battles. Did I mention this game is mature rated? The characters are strikingly similar to those from Gears of War which I did find a bit silly. Is Epic becoming like Square Enix now and making all their characters look like cousins?

Character acting is the game was solid with a great cast to voice all the players in the campaign storyline as well as all the banter during game play. The music, sound effects though are your standard epic battle sounds with mass bombing noises and grand musical overtures.

Now I got to review the Xbox 360 version of UT III and this version came packed with 5 new maps, a two player split screen mode, some new characters and a new trailer download for Gears of War 2. Not sure if that makes a different in a purchase for some people, but I figured I better throw that fact in there if it did.

This is probably one of the few first person shooters that I actually liked playing and can easily recommend it as a great game for any gamer to play, even the newbies like me.

Rating 8 out of 10
Buy it!

The Gamer Sickness: I've Got It and You Don't Want It

I have been a gamer for a long time and back in the days of the Nintendo NES system, Sega Master System, etc; I could spend hours on end playing video games and I would too. I would have marathon days of gaming that started Friday after school when I hopped my backyard fence to go to the local video store to pick up a new game for rent and would end on Sunday when I racked up two days worth of late fees and enough pop and chips to feed a small army.

Sadly my days of marathon gaming ended when gaming evolved beyond the 2D side scrollers and overhead worlds we had known for so long. See I like probably many other get a reverse motion sickness when I play any game that is set in a 3D world with a first person view or even sometimes a first person view with really fast game play.

Basically what scientists believe happens to me while I’m playing these games is that while my eyes are seeing rapid movements on the computer or TV screen, my body isn’t moving at all, so there’s an inner conflict within my brain as to what’s really going on. Since my the eyes and body disagree as to what is happen, my brain sides with my body and responds the way a brain should when a person is seeing things that aren’t suppose to be there - it throws up to remove any poisons that may be causing the hallucinations.

For anybody who’s never experienced this type of problem, believe me it sucks. I can’t play any first person shooter longer than a few of hours or less depending on the position of the planet Venus or how many games the Red Socks are winning. Honestly I don’t know why some days are better than other, but they just are. Other games like Elder Scrolls: Oblivion or Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess with their first person views will still get me after a while too because of all their rapid movements still confuse the f*ck out of my brain I guess.


My condition is worst because I get the fun addition of headaches on top of the nausea, so either I’m singing to the Porcelain Gods for 5 minutes or spending a few hours in bed doped up on pain meds all because I wanted to get in a couple of hours of Unreal Tournament III.

I remember the first time I got sick from playing videogames too. I had just rented a Nintendo 64 and Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time for the weekend from Roger Video and after playing for an hour or two I got so sick. I couldn’t figure out why either but I did remember my eyes beginning to hurt, then my head and finally my stomach. It was the beginning of a new generation of gaming and the beginning of a new form of hell for a game addict like me.

I always wondered why I never felt the effects of the gaming sickness on PC FPSs like Duke Nukem and Wolfenstein before the Nintendo 64 came out, but then I remembered the fact my Dad never let me play for hours on end on his computer like my Mom let me play on my game systems. He, unlike my Mom, actually used the computer a lot and I didn’t have a lot of time to play on it when I went over to visit with him on the weekends. That’s when I usually went and played with his old Commodore 64 instead.

I know I’m not the only one to suffering with this horrible affliction and while there are some tricks for us to counteract the effects of videogame dizziness like sitting further away from the screen, changing the contract or resolution on your TV screen to sharpen the picture or trying to look away from the screen every few minutes to ground your eyes, this will always be a huge damper on us hardcore gamers.

It limits your game choices, your time spent playing games, and ultimately makes you a little bitter towards people who don’t get sick playing. I’ve always said I’m not a big first person shooter fan and now you know why … because they really do make me sick.

Cool R-Type Ship Bundled with Game Purchase

Like R-Type? Then you should love this awesome looking R-9 figure. Irem, the creator of the Bydo Empire shooting series, gave Atlus a bunch of the R-9 figures to give away. Canadian gamers can get one when you purchase R-Type at EB games stores (In Store only), but only while supplies last. Amercian gamers can purchase them at Amazon, Gamestop and Game Crazy (Retail Only).

If you really want one of these R-Type ships, then it’s probably a good idea to pre-order the game, otherwise you may not get one.

Review: Resident Evil: Umbrella Chronicles

I've been a fan of the Resident Evil games for a long time. It's the only franchise that I'm willing to sit scared out of my wits through that involves Zombies. I hate Zombies.

I picked up Resident Evil: Umbrella Chronicles on Friday and it was and wasn't what I expected. I love arcade light gun games like House of the Dead and when I heard that Resident Evil Zero through three was getting the light gun treatment, I was excited. I tend to play better with a light gun than a controller, so that's why I love these games.

As I figured the game was like a light gun shooter with the "on the rails" type of camera angle and movement, but little did I know how much like the Resident Evil games this game was. Most RE games provide you with little ammo and health items which is fine because you don't have a horde of zombies and monsters chasing you for the entire game. This allows for a good allocation of your items over time.

In RE:UC, you have the same amount of items as in previous games, but you have hordes of zombies tailing your butt through the entire game. This makes it damn near impossible to survive each level. Thank God for the unlimited hand gun ammo or I'd really be screwed.

The difficulty setting were based on a sharp shooter's capabilities or something, because I died ten times on the first boss on normal difficulty setting, before I started the game over on easy. But even on easy, I'm running through by the skin of my teeth.

The game claims that each enemy has a weak point that will light up red on your cross hairs and if shot, the enemy will fall easier, but that just doesn't seem the case. A head shot to a normal zombie with the hand gun and he still needs another shot to go down. I figure one bullet to the brain should kill anyone, even a zombie.

The game lacks the real creepiness of the original RE games. Zombies don't really jump out at you like they did before and the music that constantly plays during the game, makes everything less on edge. The silence of RE is what helps you freak out at the appropriate times. Nothing like a zombie dog jumping through a glass window to break the silence and cause you to jump in your seat.

The "on rails" movement and view point tend to make it difficult in some areas to pick up items. You can only hope that the camera turns back to that area, if you miss a item that runs by your view point too quickly. It really sucks to miss key files, ammo or health, especially when you are about to die.

I like the whole new information aspect of the game. Not that I've gotta that far yet, but I'm looking forward to learning the secrets of the umbrella corporation later in the stages. Wesker narrates the story from a third person view which is really cool and I can't wait to play him as a character later on.

Every level has a small cinematic from the original RE games to help move the story long, but the in game mode has you stuck to the path of the mission. You can't go back, you can only go forward, unless the camera decides to turn you around. You can slightly look around, but not behind you; only to the left and right of your view.

Each stage gives you a character or two to pick from to play and their starting weapons. You can even modify each weapons after each stage completion. You can do this with points you gain from your level grades. The grades are like previous RE games.

The game controls are pretty easy. I had trouble with grenade throwing at first, but figured it out finally when I tried the easy level. You can use the remote for shooting, knife defense and throwing grenades and the nunchuk for switching your weapons and camera angle. Health items are automatic. Herbs are instant and first aid sprays save you after you die.

The graphics are about as good as previous last generation consoles, but considering how nice those were, I can't complain about them. I could but no one would hear me anyway.

All and all, I wouldn't recommend this game as a buy, more as a rental. The game isn't worth the price tag and it doesn't even come with the Wii Zapper which you can play it with. You have to buy it separate with Link's Crossbow Training.

Rating: 6 out of 10

Resident Evil: Umbrella Chronicles Gameplay Footage

I'm not a huge fan of first person shooters as everyone should know by now, but secretly I do love to play arcade shooters like House of the Dead or Carnival King. Give me a light gun and I'll kill monsters from sunrise to sunset. I love using light guns because I can aim much better than I can with a controller.



With Resident Evil: Umbrella Chronicles coming out soon for the Wii, I'm so exciting at having a "House of the Dead" type rail shooter to play. I love the Resident Evil series and the trailers look so good. The bonus will be me being able to play the old Resident Evil 2 & 3 because I never got to before. Looking forward to picking this wicked looking game next Tuesday.