Complimentary Polearm
Hey all you Geekkateers!
Have you ever wanted to see your work published online? Have you ever wanted to share your opinions about video games with more than just your hamster and little sister? Have you ever wanted to help out with the most awesome website and podcast ever?
Well now you can!
Here at The Weekly Geek, we are starting a new Freelance Review system. What it boils down to is this: You submit a game review to me, I check it out and edit any of your horrible little spelling and grammer errors, and then I post it on The Weekly Geek website for all the world to see.
We have a few guidelines for you to follow for submission. First, we'd like you to follow our basic video game review format. The way we review games is 4 main categories:
Overview, which gives a basic rundown of the game, the plot, the goals, and what you're supposed to do.
Shininess, which looks at how "shiny" the game is. Basically, the asthetics of the game. This covers graphics, music, animation, etc.
Funness, which is how fun the game is to play. This covers gameplay, replay value, controls, etc.
And finally, Worthiness, which is used to determine what the game is worth to a gamer. No silly "7 out of 10!" crap. That doesn't mean anything to anyone. We generally use this category to talk about if the game is worth buying, renting, trying out at a friend's house, avoiding altogether, etc. It's like the other bookend that the Overview started.
Check out a good sample review from our very own Frodo to get a general idea of how it works.
I will run some basic proofreading on your review and make sure it's decent enough for the site. No "omg this game is teh sux" here. I also may change a word or two to make it flow better or whatever. I will not change the content of your review.
It's also pretty much first come, first serve. If you're the first to submit a review for a game and it passes inspection, your review will be the one that goes up. If you didn't get it first but think your review is WAY better, then do a new review for a different game and make it just as good as your other one! Also, if it's a game that one of our site staff was planning to review, then we get first dibs.
So if you'd like to write an awesome review for the site, just shoot it over in an email to me and I'll check it out! Oh, and make sure you give me the name you'd like the review posted under. It can be your real name or a pseudonym.
To start us off, we've got a review of Dead Rising for the Xbox 360 from DoubleHawk. Click the jump to check it out!
Overview:
Dead Rising for the XBOX 360 takes sandbox type games to a whole new level. If you can pick it up in-game, chances are you can use it as a weapon against the zombie horde. The game certainly isn’t without its faults, but overall Dead Rising is a game that no 360 owner should miss. In it, you play as Frank West, a small-time photojournalist out to get his first big story. When he arrives in Willamette, Colorado he can tell that something’s not quite right. It’s not long until he finds out about the undead situation and is dropped right into the action.
Shininess:
If you think custom soundtracks would go great with this game, you’re right. Dead Rising’s own soundtrack sets the mood well, but it’s best to kick it with your own tunes. Just remember that the audio for a cut scene is muted if you have a custom soundtrack playing. This isn’t such a big deal if you’ve already played through the game once. To save time you’ll probably skip them all. Don’t be afraid to put down the controller and watch if it’s your first time though. The voice actors for all the main characters are good. However, when it comes to the hapless survivors you come across it’s hit or miss.
HDTV sets help make the game’s splendid graphics really shine. Having an SDTV won’t detract too much from the look of the game, but the larger the television you have the harder it will be to read the text onscreen. There won’t be any fixes released for this problem, even if Capcom is responsible for not testing the game on big SDTV sets. As far as Art Direction goes, it’s all top-notch. In the mall there aren’t any stores plucked from real life, but much of what you come across is believable. It really looks like a mall, albeit one infested with the undead.
The surviving humans move and look like people, and the zombies look and move like, well, you get the point. The animation and choreography in the cut scenes is top notch as well.
Funness:
Frank starts off weak at the beginning of the game. You gain Prestige Points by taking pictures, killing zombies, and saving survivors. It won’t be long before you’re learning moves like the Jump Kick and Double Lariat, both of which are useful for taking out zombies when you don’t have a weapon handy. In addition to new moves you’ll gain health, speed, attack, and throw points. It’s very similar to an RPG in this respect. Once you reach Level 50, you’ve learned all the moves and topped out everything, but this isn’t a bad thing. Around Level 30 you become a nigh-unstoppable man tank fueled by orange juice, pies, and smoothies. You can even stop using weapons and start taking on zombies with your bare hands. This won’t work for the psychopaths (the bosses of the game), however. With them you really have two options: pump them full of lead or slash away with your favorite bladed weapon. The first option certainly seems easier, but the latter can actually be more effective. Two cutlery stores in the mall provide more than enough katanas, long-swords, and battle axes to get the job done. But the arsenal you have available to you doesn’t stop there. Sports stores, toy shops, hardware stores and restaurants provide plenty of colorful weapons to use to release your bottled up rage. Of course, to make sure you don’t just use one weapon throughout the whole game, they’ll all eventually break or run out of ammo. This is where the book system comes in handy. You can hop into a bookstore and grab a magazine or novel that increases the longevity of certain types of weapons. That’s not the only affect books have, but its best just to experiment and try them all out. Some of them affect the picture taking system, which makes sense considering that your character is a photojournalist. In the 72 Hour Mode you have 6 real time hours to both get your scoop and follow the strict case system -or- to screw around. Side missions are made available to you either way you decide to use your time, but keep in mind that most of them are escort missions where you’ll have to cope with the game’s poor survivor AI. This game does not take advantage of XBOX LIVE for multiplayer, though it does have a leader-board so you can see how many people are doing better than you. When you think about it co-op or multiplayer of any sort would be difficult since the game is built to render upwards of 700 zombies onscreen at a time for one player only. Of course there are the required achievements, some of them which have to do with the Overtime and Survival modes. You unlock the Overtime Mode by completing the case system in the 72 Hour Mode successfully. It essentially continues the game’s plot for an in-game day. Once you finish that you’ll unlock the Survival Mode, where your health counts down one point every few minutes. With psychopaths scattered about the mall amongst the zombies, limited healing items and no save points, going for the achievement that requires to you survive for 14 real time hours can be quite tedious. Point whores will love Dead Rising, but might not feel up to getting the full 1,000. Let’s talk core concepts, however; this is a game where you kill zombies. It’s hard to get tired of that, especially with the simple controls Dead Rising offers you. A pick up and play game for the 360 if there ever was one.
Worthiness:
Dead Rising for the 360 is a great title from Capcom and it shows in sales of both the game and of 360 units (I bought mine for it!). The game definitely puts itself in the position for a sequel, so don’t be surprised to see one. But spare yourself the wait for it, and buy the game now before you go over to a friend’s house and beat yourself up for not having bought it sooner (unless you hate fun).
What say you?!