[joomongj]

Quote:

COD Black Ops - Only a few levels in, and the wave after wave of hallways with ever-spawning enemies has already shut me off. 

I don't disagree. 5 Missions in so far but I feel MW2 did way better w/ the campaign let alone the score of BO feels mediocre at best. I miss Hans Zimmer...no game sucks me in more than those w/ catchy scores that pump my heartbeat.

 

[Blisse]

Black Ops. 1 out of 5. Terrible graphics, flashing lights that could give me a seizure, endless enemy waves, ridiculous guns, bad story. I could go on.
 
Medal of Honor. 2 out of 5. Exactly the same as Black Ops, but my eyes aren't burning from the flashing lights, and the graphics are decent.
 
Just Cause 2. 3.5 out of 5. Great concept, great design. Sadly, I'm stuck on a part and the game does not show me how to get past, so I've given up. I enjoy free roaming, but the bullets run out too quickly, and the shooting system is not the best.
 

 

[dirkpitt45]

Black Ops- (Single player, pc) Terrible. Oh there's 20 guys shooting at me, too bad they all can't aim and they like to stand out in the open. And that sums up the campaign. The only times I died (on hardened) were when I was caught in a crossfire or had a grenade blow me up. I don't think I ever died from an AI that actually shot at me. Worst out of all the newer Call of duty games. Completely repetitive, nothing interesting, sounds terrible (they made the AK sound like its shooting 22s...), graphics are mediocre, and it runs like crap on my phenom II 940@3.6ghz with a 5870, even installed on a SSD it stutters and laggs randomly.
 
Black Ops (Online, xbox 360) Terrible, you can't play with friends. If you try to get a lobby going with a few friends, good luck. You had a better of chance of getting in a game of Gears of War 2 when it first came out. Feels like MW2 with more crap, and mw2 already felt like cod4 with more crap so meh.  
 
Black Ops get a big fat 2/10 from me, the only reason it didn't get a 0/10 was because zombie mode is hilarious. 
 
 
I also finished Lost Planet 2 last week. Great game, tons of fun online in co-op, and single player is enjoyable enough (though don't try anything above normal difficulty, the AI makes Black Ops' AI's look like geniuses). Pretty looking graphics, tons of customization (though is random and annoying), some giany boss battles, neat mechs and passable story. I'd say a solid 7.5/10  

 

[arnesto]

I just bought Call of Duty Black Ops yesterday for my PS3.
 
I have been burned out of FPS for a long time. Last FPS that I liked was Metal Gear.
Maybe that isn't a FPS, more like a role playing game.
 
Anyhow, this is not the typical FPS, there is a lot of action. You have to sit and duck and there are about 20 other guys running around you fulling unloading there clips. It really feels like you are in a big battle and there is a certain amount of chaos and you feel like you are really not in control. Just trying to stay alive and you can stand up for a few seconds and burst and few rounds and duck again.
 
Yes, it is still a first person shooter and I have been really tired of the same old run around and shoot everyone. People come out and shoot them too. But this game is pretty intense and the environment is so developed, it doesn't feel boring at all.
 
The graphics are really good, much better than most games out there. The Call of Duty series has really had a lot of time to evolve, and I think they must have perfected the formula now.
 
They also have an option to change your listening preferences to TV speaker, Multi-speaker surround, or headphones. I changed my option to headphones and I've playing it with the HD800. Basically you just hear a bunch of gun shots, doesn't sound as big as a real gun, it's a toned down computer gun. But it is cool to listen to like 20 different people rapid firing all at the same time.
 
I give this game a must have, 10 out of 10.
 

 

[dirkpitt45]

The graphics are terribad on pc and 360 lol... 

 

[kingtz]

Nimbus.
 
This is a small (~80MB), physics-based, puzzle-solving game. Basically, you fly your spaceship around based on your momentum, all the while trying to trigger various environmental cues, as well as trying to avoid environmental traps such as boulders, lasers and spikes.
 
The game started off rather easy, but now the levels are getting rather difficult. Nothing ever feels downright impossible, as even after a few deaths you'll start to understand where you're supposed to go and what to trigger. But the challenge is definitely there, and it gets pretty hard, which is a refreshing change from the current trend of videogames in general to make things as easy as possible so as to be enjoyable by even the lowest common denominator of both intelligence and dexterity.
 
 
Overall, I give this game a solid 7.5/10.
As mentioned, it's a very light game that most computers should be able to run, so I would recommend this to everyone except, perhaps, the most uncoordinated or inept of gamers.

 

[Bina]

COD Black OPS:
Single player is just too fast, Cod isnt FPS game anymore, it is just stupid point and shoot action. Also Grapic is quite bad, also MW2 which use same engine works with much higher frame rate. 
 

 

[sebastian589]

Seems many here feel the same way about Black ops. Single player campaign is a waste (thankfully you dont have to finish the campaign to play multiplayer. Unfortunately multiplayer is garbage. Boring maps, bunch of compartmentalized repetitive maps that require little more than mindlessly running around and shooting moving targets

 

[Pianist]

Mirror's Edge: 7.5/10 - Very good.
 
Pros: Fantastic graphics with very realistic lighting; runs very smooth even on budget hardware as long as physx option is off; innovative gameplay with a great sense of immersion thanks to attention to little detials like making your hands and feet visible and realistically interactive with the environment; great for developing a sense of rhythm; fun time trials and speed runs with high replay value; great music, especially at the menu.

 
Cons: The single player campaign is waayy too short IMO, the storyline lacks depth and characters are poorly developed; very difficult, frustrating gameplay on the first attempt due to lack of tips on when and where to apply which moves - I literally almost broke my mouse and keyboard a few times due to the extreme frustration of having to restart the same checkpoint tenth of times before finally learning just what the hell I was supposed to do

; bad performance with random stuttering with physx on.
 
Crysis: 6/10 - Mediocre.
 
Pros: Awesome graphics with amazing attention to detials; fun to just walk around and stare at all the beautiful scenery; the nanosuit is really cool; good sound effects.
 
Cons: Horrible, dumb storyline with no character development; horrible performance - optimized for only two cpu cores resulting in VERY annoying constant fps drops into the 20s and even the teens during heavy action and even when just looking at a scenery with many objects in it

; unimpressive and sometimes downright stupid AI; countless bugs.
 
My gaming system:
 
Phenom X4 9850 @2.75 Ghz
4 Gb Value RAM
60 Gb OCZ Vertex 2 SSD + 400 Gb Seagate HDD
Sapphire HD6850 1 Gb DDR5 @ 950/1140 (stock voltage)
Cooler Master Extreme Power 500W PSU
Viewsonic VX2250vm 22" 1080p LED
Generic case, keyboard, mouse

 

[Katun]

Call of Duty: Black Ops = 7/10
 
Not really an ideal FPS in my opinion. More of a "run-and-gun" than anything, but still fun none the less.
 
Battlefield: Bad Company 2 = 10/10
 
Best FPS ever made. In fact, this my favorite game of all time. Skip the campaign and go straight for multiplayer!

 

[Aynjell]

Quake Live. It's actually an improved and free version of Quake. I can't complain.
 
At least it seems improved, I'm sure some hardcore people may not like it but it plays like Quake 3, but with more maps, easier matchups, and a ladder... all things that are very useful for competitive gaming.

 

[Roger Strummer]

Black Ops: 6/10 -  (I'm not comparing it to Halo Reach, it would be like comparing burnout to Gran Turismo or Forza or something like that).  Another Treyarch crap skin job over the last IW's CoD. Funnily the story is the decent part of the game (although cheesy in a lot of moments). The campaign took all that was bad of the MW2 campaign (like being way too scripted and trying to like a movie, which I pretty much hate), did it more, and put Treyarch's trademark stamp: it is freaking frustrating. Meanwhile the MW's in Veteran are actually fun, and particularly CoD4 is hard as hell but fun, meanwhile Treyarch's CoD's are full of frustrating moments, and this is no exception, black ops is frustrating as hell in Veteran, overall personally I think the campaign is crap. The multiplayer is better than Modern Exploitware 2, but I have never liked a CoD multiplayer (never found the fun in it), but if someone is into CoD's multiplayer, this is not bad, although as imbalanced as always, and the dogs also are absolute crap, I hate them. The lack of Spec Ops, which was the only part of MW2 that I really liked, really was a dealbreaker for me buying it.
 
Fable 3: 5/10 - I find Fable 2 greatly overrated, and it is better than its successor, so that tells you how I feel about this game. The gameplay is boring, and overall almost all the aspects of the game are pretty meh... and add the bugs to that and I think this is a game not worth buying, maybe renting it since it is not a bad game either, just far from what the promises were.
 
Vanquish: 8/10 - I wasn't expecting much of this, but it is actually a pretty good, if short, game. The gameplay is very fun (I hope Gears of War was anywhere near this fun) and the graphics are quite good. The bad part is the story, uninteresting and pretty much sucks, but there are quite a few places that are like cutscenes mixed with  gameplay moments that I love in games. The hardest difficulty is frustrating, but the rest are pretty fun (and the second hardest, isn't easy at all). I don't know it its worth $60 since it isn't very long, but its worth at least renting it.

 

[oqvist]

HALO 3: Reach
 
Borrowed on the library the only reason I play yet another HALO title. Not really a Halo fan but I was positively surprised. The gameplay is a bit old and it´s not exactly Crysis in term of tactics but this is the first Halo title that doesn´t have segments where you don´t understand how it made the cut into the final game. It was fun through it´s short campaign. Wish they would have made a bigger deals of the jetpacks though. In every single fps games that has had jetpacks I have enjoyed them. I have appreciated some of the space opera they had previously but all of this was gone in Reach. I can for my life not understand why some praise Reach for it´s story but that´s just me. There is no characters in Reach I would say.
 
Fallout: New Vegas.
 
65 hours in and have pretty much done it all... You would think but no still run into new settlements despite having over 75 found without the explorer perk. So much to find! I didn´t think this would work a second time around. Okay it´s not wildly different from Morrowind or Oblivion so you could say fourth time around but still. It´s the exact same gaming mechanics as in Fallout 3 and it somehow felt fresh anyway. Hardcore mode make things a bit harder but it´s not really hardcore. I also don´t care much about the micromanagement making your own items require. It´s not really necessary as long as you are handy with a gun and have decent stamina. Anyway except for not heavy into micromanagement I am a packrat so no way I could deal with ammo making me heavier so I sticked with very hard. I really like the difficult curve this gave me. Quite difficult in the beginning and you certainly can´t go anywhere. You waste a lot of the caps you get in. However at the end game you are as badass you have to be and only have to look out for death claws pretty much. If you don´t feel bad about spamming stim packs.
 
Only thing I don´t like with adventure rpgs is how addictive they are. Very similar to Civilization there is always something you have to do before quitting. They way to measure these is how long they can fool you to do fetch quests before you get cynical. If they do it over 50h it´s a given 10/10

 

[Blisse]

Nimbus: 8/10. Amazing little puzzle slash physics game. Feels like TrackMania, if only they'd let us make custom maps. Seriously, custom maps would make this game even better than it already is. There's a lot of things you can do now, and I can't imagine what some creative people could do with it if a time trial type mode with custom maps was added. Play it if you're bored, or just to kill time. It's definitely worth the $10, which I'm sure anyone in Head-Fi can afford.

 

[g_hause]

Quote:

Mirror's Edge: 7.5/10 - Very good...

I thought Mirror's edge was great. It was so refreshing to see a new idea in first person gaming. I'm tempted to go out and pick up a used copy just because you reminded me of it. 
 
This latest round of FPS games have been such a dissapointment, MOH, COD, Battlefield... 
 
Where is the next Killzone or MWF2? The next few months look pretty bleak. Hopefully GT5 with its 1000 outdated cars will be decent; not just kids who aim for your back wheels in the corners.