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Editorial – Top Ten PC Games of 2009

Cosmo — Sun, 27 Dec 2009 12:58:42 +0000

2009 was a full year, and we’ve had quite a few nice games. What gaming ‘blagh’ would this be without a top ten list of gaming’s brightest stars of 2009? So by popular demand, i present to you, “The List”. Keep in mind Cosmo’s Reviews is a PC-centric gaming site, and as such, this list will be just of games launched this year on PC.

#10 – F.E.A.R. 2: Project Origins

FEAR 2 was a game that we can call a true successor. It relied on the same tried and proven awesome scares that got our juiced pumping in the first FEAR and ofcourse the same level of slow-motion-bullet-spraying-headshot-making-kick-to-the-face action that we grew to love. Sadly the scares were a bit few and far between, and the cliffhanger was a major turnoff… literally. Still, compared to the rest of the games launched this year, it deserves tenth place.

#9 – Killling Floor

Killing Floor initially started as a mod for Unreal Tournament 2004, but quickly made its way full-sized and commercially available on Steam. Saying this is a mod is like saying Counter Strike is “just” a mod. Killing Floor is a game on its own, featuring great survival action and co-op gameplay that really focuses on being co-op and dynamic. Having to run half the map away to the next trader/safehouse while monsters are nabbing at your feet can be quite nerve-wracking. While a great achievement from a small team, it could use some polish and maybe some updated graphics to put the punch back in the game. Killing Floor receives a well-deserved ninth place.

#8 – Cryostasis

This is a title you might not have heard of. It’s a russian FPS featuring a very novelesque storyline that really rewards the player for thinking through it, and not just spraying bullets randomly. Most russian games have a unique strenght and crippling flaw.. they have great ideas but poor application of them. Oddly, Cryostasis pushes away the crippling flaw and delivers a very polished gameplay experience, with great visuals and an intriguing storyline to boot. Sadly, the story is so deep and complex, that it may be possible for you to finish the game and then wonder what the hell just happened since while it does a great job of telling the story, sometimes it just feels like it’s outside the player’s grasp. Eighth place goes to Cryostasis.

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News Roundup 09/11/2009 – Starcraft 2 beta delayed for next year!

Cosmo — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 22:07:52 +0000

Starcraft 2 beta delayed till 2010, Two Worlds 2 new trailer up, Modern Warfare 2 coming out tommorow, Borderlands Zombie Island DLC release date announced, Star Trek Online release date out.

Starcraft 2 beta delayed till 2010

After being delayed three times already, almost a year later, we’ve still no SC2, or no beta. And considering they want to make a trilogy out of this, then i think we’ll have the ‘full’ Starcraft 2 experience in 2016 or something. I think the limit where we just don’t care anymore was passed a few months back. Not even some hype to tide us over during these dry-starcraftless months.

Two Worlds 2 ingame trailer up

Personally i think Two Worlds Two is just tad too gimpy for me. Personally i was not terribly impressed by the first game and this one just seems to fallow in the same footsteps. The trailer is supposed to be all kinds of crafted awesome that gives the ideea of what the game strives for, a feeling, an goal.. here, we have shoddy animation with some shaky camera features and model clipping with people bitchslapping other people. Just no. All i want of Two Worlds 2 is to atleast try and fix the performance issues.

Modern Warfare 2 “tommorow”

MW2 has had it’s street date broken multiple times in the past week, and i don’t doubt atleast a couple thousand people are playing it at the moment. For the rest of us, the official launch is tommorow, 10th november. Or 12 if you’re on Steam. Donno, ask Steam, that’s what it says on my list. >.<

Borderlands DLC coming November 24th

Zombie killing in Borderlands can commence on Nov 24th, so ask your buddies to reinstall it since that level 36 hunter won’t level-up itself.

Star Trek Online dated February 2nd in North America and February 5th for Europe

Sadly i did not get to dip my nose in the beta, but i’m pretty sure i’ll be the first one to check it out. As most of you probably noticed, i’m a big fan of this game, and hope to have it atleast meagerly capture the space battles in their tactical form that we had in Bridge Commander. I couldn’t care less about the ground exploring. ;p

News Roundup 31/10/09 – Jedi Knight class revealed in The Old Republic!

Cosmo — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 01:01:35 +0000

Star Wars: The Old Republic presents the Jedi Knight, Black Prophecy interview, The Void Trailer, Borderlands gets patched on consoles, Just Cause 2 trailer.

Jedi Knight class revealed in Star Wars: The Old Republic

It was obvious we’d be getting a Jedi sooner or later, and ofcourse he’s the beacon of hope and democracy in the whole galaxy. Just three more classes up for grabs. One is definetly a Mandalorian, the other possibily a droid or something and the last one… a twi’lek dancer? >.>

Black Prophecy interview with Timo Krahl

Black Prophecy is probably an MMORPG that you haven’t heard of. It’s a space sim designed around a mission-core with optional PvP aspects. It includes powerful ship customization and the focus on action-orientated combat rather then gear or strategy. What kept me interested in the game was the fact that it looked like something i would really play if Jumpgate Evolution failed. Check out the interview, it covers a bit on what the game is about and it’s background.

The Void trailer

A year later, and we finally get an english version of this game. This is a game made by the same guys that did Pathologic and in the same ‘weird’ vein. Btw, the video is a bit NSFW as is the game, so don’t watch this/play this at work. I have it and as soon as i finish up with Torchlight, will try it out.

Borderlands patched on consoles

All fine and dandy, but in the fix-list i fail to see the crippling “if you join a game you MIGHT loose all your skill points permanently” bug. We’ll just hope they’re working on it since it’s major compared to the other things on the list.

Just Cause 2 trailer features grappling hook action

I totally broke out laughing at the end. Seems like we’ll get a bit of fun out of the grappling hook. If it’s as much fun as the hammer/destruction gimmick in Red Faction Guerilla, i think i’ll very much enjoy it. The key is flexibility.

Also, i quote a guy from the comments on Joystiq “Rico Rodriguez? Seriously? Is the villain Razor Ramon?”.

Review – Borderlands

Cosmo — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 22:28:58 +0000

Some games pride themselves on storyline. Some game pride themselves on great visuals. Some even pride themselves on being new and unique. Borderlands prides itself on delivering, pure, raw, unadulterated fun mixed in with a healthy dose of loot. Lots of loot. Tons of loot. Did i also mention gore? And laughter-inducing death animations? This game stands in a category i like to call “Awesome” simply because it strives to be that way, without falling in the “Lame Awesome” category. The only way it could be more awesome is if it had a gun that ’shoots shurikens and lighting’ as Yahtzee might say. Wait.. On second thought, it might have one.

Welcome to the desert wasteland. This is your car, that's the rocket launcher on top, have fun.

Borderlands is a first-person-role-playing-sandbox-shooter made by Gearbox Software that introduces the player to the world of Pandora, and it’s many secrets and dangers, in order to find an ancient Vault that it’s said to contain everything a man could want. Gearbox Software is mostly noted for it’s success with the Brothers in Arms series, and less so with contributing and making ports of Valve games, especially in the Half-Life series. So when we get hit with a triple A title like this, it kinda makes you wonder what the guys there have been doing until now. There was a lot of media and hype around the game during it’s ‘hype up cycle’ a couple of months before the game launched. They were quirky and ‘in your face’ types of videos and really presented Borderlands as being an unique game, with a ‘chip on its shoulder’ attitude and semi-cell-shaded-graphics. And in the most part, they weren’t wrong. The game somewhat delivers on that promise and offers humorous with-attitude gameplay and gets its point across. But there are problems.

Let’s take it from the top shall we? The game’s storyline circles around a mysterious Vault on Pandora, and the people hunting it, named Treasure Hunters. You get to play as one of the four Treasure Hunters, the four classes of the game, helped by a shady blue figure of a woman helping you towards your goal. That’s all you get to start, and very few things change along the way. Seeing how most of the game you’ll just get vague references to it, and the ending coming off as a slight rush to the finish line, the storyline does the core of what it’s supposed to do. Push you onwards to more areas with more quests and with more creatures to kill. The problem isn’t with the story itself, but with the way it is presented to the player. Early on you are told to kill a guy, which leads you to killing another guy which has something you need. Then for the next 10-20 hours of game, you’ll literally be left to your own devices, only towards the end of the game picking up and really diving into the matters that you’ve been sidestepping for most of the game. It doesn’t help that even the sidequests, are generally one-sided and dull. At one point in the game a character died, and i really wanted to find out who did it and to avenge him. Oddly, the game denied me that pleasure and continued on without saying another word.

This shotgun is so tacticool that i have a scope for my scope.

The four characters you get to choose to play as are Mordecai the Hunter, Lilith the Siren, Roland the Soldier, and Brick.. the brick. All four character classes focus on a specific type of playing the game and have unique Action Skills. Mordecai is the sniper, and can use his pet, an eagle named BloodWing, to attack his foes. Lilith is a Siren, a being that can go into a Phasewalk meaning she’ll be invisibile and move faster during it, that focuses on SMGs. Roland plays a combat/support role, being able to deploy a turret that can also heal and regenerate bullets for your team-mates. And finally Brick is a tank/rocket launcher type of dude, which has an action skill named Berserk, that has him laughing maniacally and going into a punching frenzy. The classes all behave and play out differently but besides that screen where you choose the character, there are no other references made to them in the game ever. No special quests or mentions by the NPCs.

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News Roundup 30/10/09 – Interplay releases Fallout MMO concept art!

Cosmo — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 23:34:47 +0000

Interplay releases Fallout MMO concept art, Star Trek Online closed beta signup, Borderlands launch trailer, MechScape cancelled, Left 4 Dead 2 Realism Mode detailed, sort of.

Interplay releases Fallout MMO concept art

With the court-case of Bethesda vs Interplay still running, seems Interplay really wants to prove they are working on something. Nothing much i can say on the matter, since i’m not familiar with the legal mumbo-jump they usually spin, but i do know that the franchise, what’s left of it anyway, is in good hands at Interplay.

Star Trek Online closed beta signup is up

Feel free to check it out, me personally, i’m struggling at the “Are you a memeber of the press?” checkbox. 1K users per month is not exactly big, but not tiny either. >.>

Borderlands Launch trailer

This comes at a funny time, since i’ve just finished it half an hour ago. The trailer lacks the ‘punch’ that expected but it’s good stuff anyways.

MechScape cancelled

It takes a strong CEO to back down on a project that might go nowhere. The fact that they’re self-funded does help the matter but as he puts it, “tens of milions of pounds” down the drain. MechScape was supposed to be a futuristic MMO with some pretty interesting concepts, making it more akin to Darkfall Online or Guild Wars, made by Runescape developer, Jagex. Sadly, it seems it’s not so, but the resources are getting moved to an unnanounced upcoming project.

Left 4 Dead 2 realism mode “detailed“

I wish i could have written ‘detailed’ without the quotes but it’s a video made by G4TV, and i just stopped and closed the tab mid-stream. There is no real information or bulletpoints listed, it’s just a bad gameplay video. Feel free to watch, and leave info in the comments if the chick actually managed to say something interesting/important about the mode.

Damned ‘deFRIBulator’.

News Roundup 29/10/09 – More Modern Warfare 2 controversy!

Cosmo — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 23:32:16 +0000

Leaked Modern Warfare 2 video raises controversy again, Aliens vs Predator server support, Dragon Age Origins trailers, Torchlight launch trailer, World of Warcraft updates, Borderland multiplayer bug across all platforms, Warhammer 40k: Space Marines on PC?!

Modern Warfare 2 features civilian massacre, people in uproar

If you missed a few days, a guy uploaded a leaked video of a sequence in Modern Warfare 2 in which the player gets to kill a hoarde of unarmed civilians in an airport. Reactions came now soon after, most of them the usual “OMGHOWCANTHEYDOTHIS!” type. I’m seriously trying not to rage here, but i find it just impossible with people saying stuff like “Mass murder of unarmed, unsuspecting, innocent men, women, children…. you call that fun? Entertaining?” or “this “game” is really just about exploiting socially unstable or psychotic people for money”.

I cannot believe the shit that people say and believe nowadays. Some ’games’ should receive a new name, since the original definition of game seems to not work in this new day and age. Let’s call them “Interactive Video Books”. In ‘Interactive Video Books’ what matters is not what happens on screen, but what is transmitted and the ideea and story that the IVB wants to present. So if MW2 were an IVB, you would not see crowds of civilians being mowed down by armed gunmen, but a reminder of how horribile such an act is, which in the IVB is used as a narrative. People generally approach games as a Tetris or a Pong, making every action appear fun and entertaining. They don’t think of them as a medium. A way to influence and make the receiver experience something. That’s the whole point of why we have people commiting suicide after seeing The Matrix and why we generally have close to zero confirmed cases of adult people killing someone ‘because they saw it in a game and it looked fun’. So in that respect, very few games actually entered the ‘medium’ and made the user feel and react in a true fashion. Modern Warfare 2, from what i’ve seen, tries to do that, and ofcourse, it’s getting a lot of flak for it.

We need more games to push the bounderies, to excel to impress and engage the receiver.. to act more like a medium. Sure, we would still have games, interactive media made purely for entertaiment without any wish to influence the player, and we would also have these Interactive Video Books. I just wish people would start to make a difference between them, and realise that ‘game’ is just term. Sadly, the world lives on specific terms and stereotypes.

Aliens vs Predator dedicated server ’still to be determined’

The fact that we did not get a straight answer should rattle our cage, but true enough, it’s a bit too early in to effectively gauge if and what will be possibile. We will see what the PC multiplayer community has in store.

Torchlight launch trailer is up

I got my hands on a copy, will review after i finish Borderlands and Torchlight itself. From early reports it’s 80-90% like Fate.

World of Warcraft rewards random PUG-ing

While i’m not a WoW player myself, i recognize that WoW is the leading ‘research’ and improvement of the grindcore MMO genre. Which is a good thing, no sarcasm ment. This latest update wants to make the ability to play an instance without waiting hours for your alliance to set it up, a reality. Also, the ability to insta-travel to the dungeons. They finally got the ideea that as awesome as having a free-world is, sometimes you just bloody don’t want to press “W” for 30 minutes. I’d say this even goes a bit into Guild Wars ideology, but if it helps make a better game, i’m all for it.

Bad Borderlands multi-platform bug

I’ve had this happen to a friend on my server aswell. The ideea is that joining a game, and having something happen in that game, like desynching, net connection loss and so on and so forth has the probability to totally reset the player’s skill points, artifacts and some other stats, making the game virtually unplayable with that character. The bug is multiplatform, so it happens on both PC and Xbox. While on the PC you can copy/paste your directory in My Documents/My Games/Borderlands, it’s a bit trickier on the Xbox, and the fact alone that you have to do that means trouble. I can only imagine a guy with a level 50 character losing all it’s functionality after just wanting to play with a few friends. It sucks. Glad me ad my friend took precautions since we knew about it before hand. Not many people have this luxury.

Also, yeah, will review after i finish, currently level 30 Hunter/Scavanger so i think i’m almost done.

Warhammer 40.000: Space Marines on PC? GET!

Sign now or die in a terribile accident. Still, ‘if we continue to see a strong desire for a pc version, who knows what might happen’ is translated as ‘we talked with our publisher and they said they’ll think about it if the numbers match’. Not getting my hopes up one bit, since online petitions rarely help.

News Roundup 15/10/09 – Killing Floor free weekend!

Cosmo — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 22:45:25 +0000

Killing Floor DLC&free weekend, Stargate Worlds still in freefall, L4D2 Demo and the boycott is dismissed, Torchlight launch date announced, Alpha protocol delay confirmed, CryEngine 3 trailer and a quick 32 minute gameplay vid of Borderlands.

Killing Floor free weekend 22-25 October + DLC

In case you missed it, or got put off by more-painkiller-then-zombies gameplay or purely bad reviews, you get a chance to try it out next week for free on Steam. Ofcourse, no free weekend comes alone, so we’ll be joined by a fresh new DLC for it, “Level Up”. Free co-op shooter?! I’M SO IN!

Stargate Worlds is getting further and further away

This is not really news just a reconfirmation that they’re pretty much screwed financially. To be honest, i tried it a bit back, when it was pretending to be a “closed beta”, and while i can’t divulge much due to the NDA, all i can say is that i was unimpressed. I’m sure they made progress by now, but i doubt this will ever see the light of day. Sad story, not so much for the game, but for the people that worked on it so hard, and with a couple of months without pay on top.

Left 4 Dead 2 boycott campaign abandoned

L4D2’s quick announce after the first installment got a lot of people rattled. Not long after, a Steam group named “L4D2 Boycott” was made, and got to over 50k users as far as i remeber. Still, after getting the two founding members to Valve HQ and giving them a behind the scenes look at it, they came around and decided the campaign reached it’s goal. To assure that L4D1 will still get some love even after it’s .. upgrade.. reaches the scene. For the people that still hold a grudge, check the next news below:

L4D2 Demo details revealed

If you preordered the game, you’ll get to start popping zombies and achieving achievements as soon as October 27′th, if you still think L4D2 is the coming of Satan then feel free to check the world-wide-free-demo on November 3′rd. That’s unless you have a normal Xbox Live account and get to play it on Novemeber 10th, but on this blagh, i decide to totally ignore the fact that consoles exist. So, sorry.. ;p

Torchlight launch date revealed

October 27th’s the day, and ofcourse, on Steam. Seems october-november’s the hotspot this year, last year all bunching up in september. Anyhows, it’s going to be up, competing with Borderlands at a day distance for the heart of action-RPG fans. Which one will you choose? Both? SOLD!

Alpha Protocol delay will happen

We’ve had a newspost a while back hinting to a possibile delay of Alpha Protocol. Now it’s official.. And also, the reason is “best commercial release window possible”. What? Sure, bunch it up with a number of hard-hitters such as Assassin’s Creed and Splinter Cell Conviction, that’ll SURELY increase the chances of selling your game. Don’t launch it in December/January when it’s pretty clear. We’ve proved publishers times and times again, that they SUCK when connecting with the gamer mentality… here’s another ball for the bin.

CryEngine 3 trailer

Oh cry me a river. Of pixels. And vertex lighting. And bump mapping. And god-rays. And super-antialiasing. And bloom. And HDR. That’s a damn nice river. Right?

Wrong.

32 minutes of Borderlands gameplay

I honestly am not getting these TONS of HUGE gameplay videos. Really? I can understand trailers to hype you up and all, but just showing half an hour of gameplay? That’s what the guys that leaked production gameplay videos should be doing, and getting fined for it. It’s the whole idea with the cat and the lenght of string. If you dangle it in front of the cat, it’ll be interested to no end. The moment the cat gets the string, it loses value and leaves it there. Same thing with offering these kinds of gameplay videos. Interesting and useful, but bad.

News Roundup 13/10/09 – Jade Empire 2 maybe?

Cosmo — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 23:07:56 +0000

We may see a Jade Empire 2 yet, Borderlands promises 87 bajilion guns, Dragon Age Origins Character Creator up, Left 4 Dead 2 Acheivements and last campaigns revealed.

Jade Empire 2 a possibility

So says Bioware. Sure they have a huge amount of projects on their hands, Dragon Age/ME2/SW:ToR and all.. but it’s nice that we get a very resounding “maybe”. Jade Empire was a favorite among fans, both for it’s setting and for it’s great blend of action and RPG elements. By the looks of things we’ll get a ‘yes’ or ‘no’ by Q2-Q3 next year.

Borderlands trailer says 87 bajilion guns

They keep advertising and pushing on that.. but to be honest, they are just randomly generated items via a loot table. Diablo 2 had a couple trilion items too if you take into account how many could be uniquely generated. Anyhows, that little quirk aside, the game looks fun, it sounds like it has its own particular brand of humor and to top it off, it has 4 player co-op. It’s going to be fun.

Dragon Age Origins Character Creator now up

I tried it out, and i personally expected a bit more. It’s really just a character creator. You do get to see most of the skills in the game and the talents, and settle into what you want to do with it.. but i have two major grudges with it. One, you can’t modify your body, or bodytype, you can’t make a slim character or a fat character, but you can totally customize the face. Unless you make a hefy face, it will look odd on the bulky body. That my main quip with it, the other one relates to the origin stories. They’ve put a TON of pressure on it, and you don’t even get a little video, like the origin trailers they showed a while back, to really get a vibe of what you’re choosing. Sure, the text tells you what you’re going to start off with, but the videos really did get the idea home and differentiated between the origin stories. Overall, could have done more. Also, no neon/electric-blue hair.

Left 4 Dead 2 Achievements online

I’ll highlight the more WTF ones. “Use a bile bomb on a Tank.” “Revive 10 dead Survivors with the defibrillator.” “Deploy an ammo upgrade and have your team use it.”. I’ll let you guys figure out what the hell is up with those. I’ve got my own little theories.

And also, last 2 Left 4 Dead 2 campaigns leaked

Dead Center features a mall, finally, after asking for one for ages and the fan maps dident quite get it right, and Hard Rain mixes it up in a factory. What are our Survivors doing there? No ideea, but it does make for an interesting location. Left 4 Dead 2 is coming out in about a month from now, so we have a bit of time before we go on and start chopping off zombie limbs and griefing random pubers.

News – Today’s Roundup 20/09/09

Cosmo — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 22:13:45 +0000

It’s sunday, and as usual, a slow news day. Just two interviews relating to Diablo 3 and Borderlands and another sad gaming story.

Still waiting Diablo 3, will trade soul for time-travel

I keep seeing interviews, panels and features being released and you can’t helped being hyped. Enjoy getting even hyped’r with this 3-page interview courtesy of Gamasutra. They touch bases on some general aspects of Blizzard and a few upcomings.

Borderlands interview

The game the underwent more then a few changes during development, the shooter/rpg with a chip on it’s shoulder, seems to be looking better and better. I can’t wait to get my shotgun that shoots rockets.

Yes, Elite sequel is 98% vaporware

Another sad story of a former revolutionary game struggling to make a reappearance. Like DNF, it’s most likely to remain just a happy memory of an age gone by.

News – Today’s Roundup 12/09/09

Cosmo — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 15:34:28 +0000

Slow news day… just some petty news regarding Stalker: Call of Pripyat, Borderlands and a new trailer for Just Cause 2.