Hello you lovely people, I realise that it's been a while. Well, whatever, I've been busy. Ish. Of anyone doesn't know, I quit retail back in November to work as content manager for a social media marketing start-up, Social Heroes. It's been damn hard work, but it's been a lot of fun. I have various places nice enough to host some of my work, so this page has fallen by the wayside a little. I might still have a use for it, I'll have to see what happens.

A completely timely and not at all late Bioshock Infinite review.

[I wrote this review a little after Infinite came out. The format was tailored for a site that I was hoping to write for at the time.]

Bioshock Infinite

Release date: Out now

Developer: Irrational Games

Publisher: 2K Games

Platforms: PS3 (tested), Xbox 360, PC

Gameplay: 8.5

Replay Value: 8

Visuals: 9

Positives:

+A wonderful, detailed world to explore

+Explores fascinating themes

+Fun combat

Negatives:

-Can drag a little in the middle portion

-Ends

Bottom line: One of the best games ever made.

Total score: 9.5

Bioshock Infinite arrives in the twilight of the current console generation. Its predecessor, Bioshock, arrived early in the Xbox 360’s life and set a benchmark of quality for the following years. A beautiful underwater dystopia, filled with meaning and horror. Following up such a masterpiece would be no mean feat. Further exploration of Rapture was left to a different development team, as Ken Levine and co sought to create a game and a setting every bit as captivating as that of Bioshock. And they damn well did.  

As with Bioshock, Infinite’s setting is integral to the experience. Columbia is beautifully realised. As trite as it is to describe a setting as a character in its own right, here, it really is.  After an opening act as stunning as anything you will see in videogaming, the idea of a fully functioning, floating city dwelling in the clouds become quite believable. Aesthetically, the game is absolutely stunning. At times, most of the city is visible in gorgeous vistas that play backdrop to your adventure. On consoles, the game lacks a little sharpness compared to high end PC versions. This is no real barrier to enjoyment, though. The imagination of the design masks any (comparatively) rough edges.

The relationship between protagonist Booker DeWitt and Elizabeth is central to the game. Arriving in Rapture tasked only to “bring us the girl and wipe away the debt”, things soon spiral out of control. Elizabeth is a wonderfully realised character, initially full of childlike wonder. Almost immediately after entering the city, Booker cuts through opposition with horrifically brutal efficiency, with melee takedowns particularly gruesome. Normally one accepts this as part of any FPS, but it is fascinating to see the revulsion your actions cause in Elizabeth. One begins to wonder just how necessary the slaughter is. This is indicative of the introspection Infinite provokes throughout. As with Bioshock, there is a game changing plot twist towards the end. We won’t spoil it for you, but the finale of Infinite is every bit as thrilling and revelatory as anything else in gaming.

Gameplay is fairly similar Infinite’s forebears. Booker has access to the standard FPS fare of pistols, machine guns and suchlike, but you also get vigors to play with. Similar in function to the plasmids of Rapture, each vigor you acquire bestows a different power, allowing you to throw fireballs, weaken enemies with a flock of crows and other pretty badass effects. For a slightly bigger salt charge (effectively magic points), Booker can lay a trap with a vigor, adding a layer of tactical flexibility. Vending machines allow vigors and guns to be upgraded, adding potency to your preferred combinations of bullets and powers. Speaking of tactics, early trailers for Bioshock Infinite made great show of the Skyline and the ability to jump on and off of it at will using the grappling hook. This adds the option of rapid relocation and the potential to gain a bead on enemies from above. And rest assured, there are plenty of enemies.

The standard forces are fun to combat. They too are fully aware of the benefits of using the Skyline, and use it in a pleasingly intelligent way. They’ll pop up behind you, and pursue you if you seek higher ground. In addition, you have rocket troopers, the giant Handymen and a collection of bizarre locals we’ll let you discover for yourself. As far as Elizabeth goes, she can take care of herself in a scrap. Booker will attract a great deal of bullets, but fortunately Elizabeth hides when things get aggressive, reappearing only to supply you with ammo, health packs and salts. More interestingly, as the game progresses, it emerges that Elizabeth is capable of manipulating holes is time. Central to the plot, in gameplay terms this allows Booker to command her to open tears in combat. Grainy cover, ammo and automated weaponry appear around the city, flickering and fuzzy. Do you erect some cover in the distance and approach your enemies aggressively, or summon a Mosquito miniature gunship to distract your foes whilst you flank them? Added to the healthy assortment of guns and vigors, the game allows you to react fluidly to battles, tailoring them to the way you want to play. Occasionally, especially in the middle portion of the game, the pace of the game drags in comparison to the rest of the game. Whilst no means a short game, Infinite could perhaps be a little tauter, but it is hard to grumble at any time spent in such a well realised setting as Columbia.

Infinite is a truly great game. Whether it will be held in such reverence years down the line as Bioshock will remain to be seen, but it certainly deserves to be. If this is the last hurrah of the current console generation, I can think of no more fitting send off. 

Lack of Updates.

Yeah, I know. Been working non stop and will continue to do so for a while because I have no money. I am getting Mass Effect 3 Friday, so I'll try and get some thoughts on that posted up here at some point. Thanks for stopping by.

A review of a game I done played.

I have a colossal backlog of games to play. You probably have too. I keep having to force myself to play Saints Row 3, Assassin's Creed: Revelations, Deus Ex HR, Space Marine, etc. It's not like I don't enjoy playing any of them, far from it (well, maybe Deus Ex). It's just that they require my full focus and attention, otherwise I can't enjoy them properly. You can't just dip into 16th century Constantinople and half-heartedly punch beggars. It takes a certain investment of time and concentration, otherwise you simply won't get anything out of what is undoubtedly a wondrous experience.

There is one game I am playing an awful lot of, though. To the the extent that I am constructing my day around it in order to maximise my progress in it. Yep, I am playing the shit out of Tiny Tower.

I hadn't even heard of it or its developer NimbleBit until the furore with Zynga and the alleged copyright infringement. Reading about it, iOS's Tiny Tower looked colourful, fun and seemed interesting enough to check out. Especially as it was free.

The premise is simple. You run a skyscraper, building floors with a shop or apartments on each floor. You get "bitizens" to live in the apartments, and have them work in one of your stores. When you earn enough "coins" from selling wares from your shops and rent from bitizens, you can build another floor. Soon enough you'll have a 30 plus floor skyscraper roaring defiance at the petty efforts of gravity to constrain it to the soil. The addiction comes from the staggered restocking of stores and building more floors. Every store can sell up to 3 items, contingent upon how many staff members the store has. Each item restocks in real time, in proportion to how many coins it costs and how many of the items the store stocks each time. This means that you'll pay to restock the Day Spa with facials, for example. For 900 facials, you'll need to pay 416 coins and you have to wait an hour for them to be available. You also need to tap the item when it's finished loading, meaning you have to keep opening Tiny Tower and maintaining your tower if you want to make any coins.

You can speed this process up with "bux", a form of payment you can use to to instantly restock and item or have construction of a floor finished (as well as move in bitizens to apartments). However, bux are rather sparse, being earnt by the frankly tedious ferrying of people up your tower in the elevator, giving bitizens their dream jobs or fully restocking a store. The more stores you have, the more likely it is that you will have  the dream job of one of your bitizens, getting you 2 bux. This is counteracted by the game demanding more bux to skip the waiting times, but with each floor you build, the longer you have to wait. For example, my 36th floor won't be finished for another 17 hours, which will set me back a whopping 18 bux to skip.

You can, handily, buy bux using the in game purchase system. You can get a paltry 10 for 69p, 100 for £2.99 (which I'm ashamed to admit, I paid), or get 1000 for a ludicrous £20.99. Even the insane £20.99's worth won't sate your bloodthirsty tower. It won't rest until it has bled you of your time, your bux, your sleep and your soul, draining your very life force until you become a bankrupt and broken husk of the human being you once were, a slavering sycophant bound to the anvil of the ever-burning forge that is Tiny Tower.

The result of all this is that I am constantly checking my phone at regular intervals for this game. It appears charming, has a lovely, friendly look to it and have some lovely little humourous touches. The warm, caring personality of the NimbleBit team really shines through. It's just unfortunate that you have to sacrifice your ability to go more than 10 minutes without checking your phone to play it. And your soul, too, I guess that kind of sucks.

8/10

What this is.

As if the internet wasn't already saturated with blogs, here's another one. Right. The purpose of this blog is to get my writing skills back up to some sort of reasonable level. I dropped out of university for fascinatingly dull reasons, and I currently work at a Popular Supermarket Chain. It's fine and whatever, but it's not the career I had in mind for myself. I'm 21, so I should probably work out what I'm doing with my life fairly soon, if only to stop my Nan asking me about it every 5 minutes.

I used to be fairly competent at writing essays, creative writing etc. at school, but I haven't done any kind of serious written work for a few years. I've finally motivated myself to try and stop the intellectual rot, this blog being the first step of that. My ideal career would probably be in gamz jarnalism, so this blog'll aim to focus around that. 

I have no idea whether this will be interesting to any of you guys, but if you do happen upon these spewings, feel free to prod me into updating this thing. Cheers.