Been busy playing Crisis Core and MGS4 lately, but I've been rushing through them, so I can't, in all good consciousness, give a full review of either game, I will say this though...

Crisis Core: Probably a game best left to FFVII fans, it dwells way too much in fan-dom and cycling through familiar faces, trying to tie up loose ends. On a story level, anyone not familar with the FFVII world will be quite confused. On a gameplay level, it's a solid action RPG game with a good combat system, could be better, but it's not bad...

MGS4: What can I say, this is a great game! the MGS stealth system has been uprooted and upgraded, taking out the bad, but leaving the good. Story is typical MGS, over-the-top, verbose, and slightly pretenious, but it's something that only Kojima can get a way with. Let this be said, It's the first game in a while that I couldn't put down for the life of me!

I've rambled enough, go check these games out and deicide for yourself!

II made a commitment to update the blog portion of the site more often. Usually I through a sketch or drawing in and call it a day, but I figured I should try typing something, who knows, maybe someone reading might connect and say “Hey, he’s not as crazy as I thought”.

This weekend I was really in the mood to watch some movies, one of which was a movie I had heard about called ‘Sunshine’. I was directed by the guy who made ‘28 Days Later’, plus it was about space, so I figured, no brainer!

The plot is real basic, sun is about to die, crew goes to ignite sun with bomb, something goes wrong, drama ensues. It’s very predictable, and in some cases, implausible, but it’s one of those movies where you just need to turn your brain off and watch, you may actually enjoy yourself. Which I did. The movie was a freaky kinda cool that leaves an odd, yet addictive taste in your mouth. You catch yourself wanting to watch it again right away for some reason.

Anyways, too much rambling, If you like space movies, go rent/buy it, if not, I don’t know what to tell ya.

I know, I know, very childish, but this man pisses me off so much, I couldn't help it! I was originally going to post some character sketches this week, but I came of with this idea, driving home yesterday. With all this hullabaloo going on with the upcoming election I thought it would be funny to make a political sketch relevant to gamers. I tried to make it a shirt, but, cafepress.com sucks, so the color of the shirt didn't match the color of the image, and I'm not about to release something I personally wouldn't wear.

This drawing is also available as a shirt @ the store.

I have officially given up on Lost Odyssey, I got to the 3rd disk, but that game just can't keep my interest, I'm sorry. It's not that it's a bad game, it's just that I found myself just playing it to get through it. I had to stop myself and ask 'why?'

So I was quite excited to hear about a new Bob Dylan movie, he's probably my favorite song writer (even if he was recently in a lame car commercial). There are quite a few people portraying him, and I'm anxious to see how they all do it. Cate Blanchett was the biggest surprise, but from what I've seen, she's not too bad. Anyways I can't say whether or not this will be a good movie, only that I'm excited.

In personal news, I finally got off my ass and made a shirt design, check it out.

Boy was I excited for this game...

I'm a big fan of any stealth/sneak game. MGS/Splinter Cell/Sly Cooper, I love them all! Assassin's Creeds had the makings of what could of been a great game, it just fell a little short...

The opening scenes are incredible, it pans into this beautifully rendered city, then jumps into an awesome movie involving an assassination (go figure.) Well actually, it would of been incredible, if I hadn't seen it already on the four million commercials playing for the past month...

That's where the game fools you. You don't actually play as an assassin during the Crusades, you play as his descendant, trying unlock his memory for a creepy, pedophile scientist and his assistant. That's right, you are actually a bartender named Desmond dreaming about an assassin... Cool huh? I won't completely ruin the story for you, but the game plays like this: You climb into a machine to view your ancestors memories, which work sort of like 'levels' or 'missions'. You can't go to far ahead in memories until you have lived the earlier memories. There are other things the memory machine, or the Animus, can do, such as fast forward through boring or repetitive parts (i.e. warping), changing camera view during 'glitches', or blocking areas you're not advanced enough to goto. The game tries to be clever by doing this, but it comes off as distracting. The constant warping back to the future and data screens flashing back and forth really take a way from the feel of being in Jerusalem during the Crusades, it's like I was playing an ever lamer version of some Matrix game.

The game itself is beautiful, the graphics are amazing, I did catch a few glitches and lag time, but not enough to really take away from the game. The actual game-play gets a little mixed, you play as Al-Retard or something, a renegade assassin you doesn't take much stock in the 'creed' or what people think about him (make sure you note that, he only says it a hundred times.) The first portion of the game is more of a tutorial to walk you through the controls and how the game works, which is fine... until they show you FOUR times, I get it already, let me play! After that you begin the real game, which is accepting missions and killing people, should be a no-brainer, right? Every mission involves the exact same thing; Goto city, talk to local Bureau, climb towers to look for investigations, do said investigations, get enough to them to show the Bureau you know what you're doing, then go kill target.

Rinse, lather, and repeat.

The 'investigations' are broken up into three things; pick-pocketing (walking behind someone and pushing a button), interrogation (listening to someone on a podium, following, and beating the hell out of them), and eavesdropping (sitting on a bench). The investigations rarely change, and you just walk around until you have enough of them to please the Bureau. After that you go and assassinate the target (sort of like a boss battle), these vary but they all end the same, with the victim going emo and telling you why he's not so bad, and then dying, all in some weird data screen... lame. After that you report back to base and get a new weapon or ability. At first this is a very cool experience, riding to a city, collecting info on a mark, and ending his life... But then you do the same thing, over, and over, and over, and over again.

Enough of the bad stuff, let's get to the one thing this game has going for it, the crazy acrobatics. Assassin's Creed follows the basic "you see it, you can be there", which works most of the time. It can be annoying when you're trying to flee guards by climbing up a ladder and instead crash into an apple cart. I've thrown my controller in anger a few times. When you do have to fight, you're lucky enough to have various assassin weapons at your disposal, too bad they all suck. I'm sorry, the one button attack got very old, very fast!

Listen I've ranted too much, this game is a great play for the first couple hours, but quickly loses momentum, I suggest a rental before you buy...

Overall Rating: Three (3) Stinky Apples

If you want to discuss the game with me, I'm always up to hear your views.

hawkeyehayes@hayescomics.com

I realize I just kicked off this Turnip Empire series, and this isn't the best time, but I'll be taking a couple days of for Thanksgiving. Here's a Mario sketch to ease your pain! Have a happy holiday!

I've been working on a multi-strip story called 'The Turnip Empire'. It takes place in a post WWII Europe-type setting, in which Hawkeye and Mark are newspapermen caught up in a rebellion against the evil Turnip Empire. It'll be along the lines of the 'Aliem Invasion' series, and should be in production soon... until then, here are some concept sketches. Enjoy!