Category: Gaming

Runescape Clans – The History of Collision

PART 1

TOL – It starts

It all started in the summer of 2003 when Albus1234567 came up to Broken_22 when they were both training on Lesser demons in Karamja valcano. They started the clan and had some events. It was pking if you want to call it that. Most of TOL’s members were around lvl 80 with the exception of Jed Averill , who was a mighty lvl 106. When Albus became to inactive to lead anymore Furioust “AKA Matty” took over TOL. In early 2004 Matty made TOL is first official forums and under his leadership Tha Outlaws became a strong pking clan that wasn’t afraid to take on almost anyone. With his famous afro crown he lead Tha Outlaws to many victory’s. Everyone loved and respected his leadership.

Tha Outriders – Tha first merge

In the summer time of 2004 Tha Outlaws merged with The dragonriders (TDR). Because of issues Matty had with them over wanting them to wear full rune and not to telly. (Yes using tellaport runes was a major issue back in those days.) The first PK was chaos. Later that day TDR’s leader tried to ban Matty from his own forums so the merge broke down after just two days. Tol’s leadership decided that merges just were for us and time marched on.

Expounder and Owz600 – Genesis begins

Expounder and Owz600 decided to start there own clan called Genesis. Owz and Expo agreed an on almost everything. Once this clan started Owz and Expounder started to have a little success.Both Expo and Owz told all of Tha Outlaws members to stay with TOL. But alot of them didn’t listen. With around 40% of TOL joining GSS they won many battles. They never got ranked in the top 25, but they were able to beat many clan there own size and never had many defeats. The clan never showed signs of slowing down but continued to grow. However Owz and Expounder started to miss TOL ( Tha Outlaws). They heard how they were hurting and were getting picked on by clans like Anarchy and Exer. Expounder told Owz one day how much he miss TOL and he wished to rejoin TOL. Owz agreed and both leaders agreed to help TOL by sending GSS (Genesis) members back to TOL. Once this happened TOL would never be the same.

Alliances – One strong beginning, one weak ending

On Oct 20 2005, at 04:11 pm Sakabatou59 posted on TOL’s furoms asking for a alliance. Sakabatou was second in command of Clan Overdose under there leader Geometrical. There was alot of hype going around that there was going to be a alliance because our two clans got along very well and had very many successful PK trips together.
On Dec 11, 2005 TOL also allied for a while with a clan called Lethel Blades. The alliance broke down shortly after because there style of pking and TOL’s wasn’t the same. Plus TOL already had a strong relationship with OD and that’s all we wanted or needed.

Furioust and TOL – Defeat TUF

Tol agreed to a war with The Forsaken
TOL started with 150 opts vrs 165 -170 opts with TUF. Tol ended with around 110 – 105 opts. Being that TUF was ranked at the time. They tried to say that TOL cheated.( with no grounds, they tried to say TOL had 1 -2 players that wasn’t suppost to be there.) However TOL won so convincingly that RSC/ the clan world agreed that TOL won. TUF was ranked to 25 and TOL took there spot. This help TOL to grow alot. This was Furioust’s first Major victory.

Furioust goes inactive – The rise of Jedaverill & Expounder

Furioust had just got himself a new girlfriend and the clan was seeing less and less of him around. Jedaverill was doing the bulk of the leadership work but didn’t have enough time to do alot of the things that needed to be done. Being more into the Pking aspect of the job, Jed himself didn’t really enjoy leading but did it for the good of the clan. Someone posted and asked Furioust to make a temporary leader. Several people on the post asked for Expounder by name and Furioust agreed. Expounder came online later in the day and saw the post. After talking with Furioust, Expounder agreed to take the job until Furioust returned. On Jan 13 2006 Furioust made Expounder into a temp leader. Later Furioust liked the job Expounder was doing and made him into a full leader to serve along side Jedaverill forever.

Expounders First War – TOL learns a thing or two

On Jan 15 2006 The Death Squad (TDS) declared war on TOL. TDS had about 121 Registered members compared to TOL’s 70 or so. The fight took place at the ruins. TDS rushed in with almost 300 opts and TOL had a little less then half of that. TOL had been running drills for a while and was able to hold TDS off for a long time. However the numbers became to great and TOL went down. TOL may have lost but we saw something we hadn’t seen before. We realized that even tough we were greatly outnumbered we could still hold our own (which was a fairly new thing in those days). TOL came away from that fight a new clan with a new since of how to fight in the wild. After this fight TOL started to be ranked for the first time in it’s history and won many battles afterwares.

David802291’s Rise
The first of many responsibilities this guy would have
With one of TOL’s council members stepping down. David was given his first role in the leadership. On Mar 6 2006, Expounder posted these words.

[I] “As we know Aaron can not be active and he asked that David take his spot.
David is a loyal member that as been here a long time and has never left to my knowledge. He always makes people feel at home here and never flames. He is active and really cares about this clan. In my eyes Aaron made a great choice.
So Gratz to David everyone!!!!
You deserve it”

Expounder couldn’t have agreed with Arron more and none of us had any idea how great role David would play in the future. Had we only known then what we know now he would have been promoted along time ago. He would do many great things for TOL/COL. But that is later on in history, as you will read shortly.

The Idea – What would become Collision

One day Expounder logged on and found out that Furioust, Geometrical, and Sakabatou59 were talking. Geo, Fury, and Saka started talking of a merge between the two clans. Furioust told Expounder to see if the clan agreed and to set it up if TOL did. Expounder agreed but only if 70 Plus % of TOL agreed also. Geometrical taught this was a good idea and said that 70% of The Overdose must agree. So the first polls where set up.

The polls were set up and both clans agreed. ON Feb 12 2006, 01:58 AM a poll was set up once again on TOL site. A 88% approval rated was given from TOL as follows:

yes [ 47 ] [88.68%]
no [ 6 ] [11.32%]

Overdose also had a poll and agreed with over 88% that TOL and OD should merge.

Once both clans approved Geo and Expo began making a contract on the rules that Collision would follow. Below is what they agreed on.

TOL + OD Merge Contract

Official Clan Colors

BLUE
GOLD/YELLOW
WHITE
Sara Cape Prefered

War

Leaders declare on clans by choice.
This means that declaring war with other clans excluding our allies is decided by only leaders alone.

If we are declared on by another clan including our allies, we will hold a poll on if we should accept.

PK Trips

PK times
(temp pk times until we see what works best)
– 5:00pm eastern at Wednesdays
-7:30pm eastern at Fridays,
-4:00pm eastern at Saturdays

Cape Color:
Blue capes–(Can be can be obtained in champs guild)
***Wear Saradomin Cape if you can.

*You must attend at least one pk trip a week.
-If NOT, you need to post the consequences on why you cannot attend such trip/event.

Strikes

One week of not attending a PK trip/event= One strike
Two weeks of forum or in game in activeness and not attending a PK trip/event =
Account deletion and Character/Account kick; with the consent of the high ruler(s) [Leaders].

“***Maximum of 3 Strikes before Account Deletion and Character/ Account Kick
“***Strikes last one month.

RANKS

Leaders

geo
expounder

co leaders

hios
mata
Saka
Jbird
Broken
Elite

Council

rags
pant
glad
zue
rus
romeo
mista
Hurly

warlords

phil
tiger
jed
Volts

All master below keep there rank as of now. Unless as stated above Volts doesn’t want it anymore. If that is the case someone well be voted Gen for TOL side along with JED.

Choosing a name

With both clans finally agreeing to a merge the next thing in order was to find a name for the clan. Again a poll was set up. First suggestions on the new name were asked from both TOL and OD’s members. The names just couldn’t be any made up old name, they had to have meaning. They was narrowed down to these three.

Name: Genesis
Why: It means a new beginning. This would be good for both clans.

Name: Collision
Why: Two forces colliding with each other.
Plus we could have a banner with TOL on one side
and OD on the other side. (Geo’s idea)

Name: Tha Overlords
Why: Been Suggested somewhere before. Combines both
names and to me it doesn’t sound bad at all.

Name: SWAT
Why: I have no idea…lol

So once again a new poll was sat up to vote on the name.
Collision [ 20 ] [40.82%]
Tha Overlords [ 2 ] [4.08%]
SWAT [ 5 ] [10.20%]
Genesis [ 17 ] [34.69%]
I’ll write my vote in [ 5 ] [10.20%]

Both OD and TOL agreed on the name Collision so everything was set in place but the work.

Making Collision

Both Geo and Expo agreed that this shouldn’t be anything that we rushed into. In fact at one point after the name was picked the merge almost didn’t happen. Because Geo didn’t like how Expounder allowed TOL members talk above lvl 30 wilderness and Geo wasn’t sure all the TOL members liked him for a bit. But things worked out after Expo posted about it with the following post. (I think both sides were alittle nerves about the merge anyway)

Geo’s post: Posted: Mar 1 2006, 09:08 AM

“hey guys, im postponing the merge for a week or 2. One reason why im doing this is because on the last few pk trips i’ve gone with you guys. Alot of members are still talking after the pk leader says be quiet. Also members are still chasin pass charlie and passing dwarfs. If we’re goin to b a successful clan, we neeed to stop this . IF A MEMBER SCREAMS HES TEAM. DONT ATTACK. The pk leaders should b alot more strict in this pk trips because once we merge.Alot of tol members got upset like that one time i lead a tol pk trip because I gave out strikes and members decided to “freak IT” and leave. During OD pk trips, we’re very strict in pking. We might not b able to max out opts or max out levels. but we do noe how to listen when a leader says shut up, and fall in.”

so lets start getting serious because i noe alot of tol hate me and my rules. so i just want everyone used to the rules b4 the merge and a reminder of them.

( this is not a flame topic )

Expounder’s reply to Geo

“I have nothing but respect for OD . But I’ve been having second thoughts also. I mean we are doing pretty good as one clan. The people putting forth effort are doing a super goodjob. We worked along time for Tha Outlaws name to get out there. Latly TOL has only gotten better. With a few road bumps on the way. It’s just scary to me that we might lose that or the whole clan. The fact is most merges don’t work. Like the upper 70% fall apart in under three months time. From what I’ve seen on the furoms we are two very diffrent clans.

Please don’t get me wrong. I’ll still go along with the merge if thats what everyone wants. OD is still our best friends and we would do anything for you guys. But I’m just uncertain about the future if we do merge.

As for the talking thing. There is a place for it and there is a place not to talk. For example when we are almost at the GD’s. People should shut up. Talking could get us all killed. Basically any place a clan could be. But in other places it’s ok as long as your not spamming. When your in the wild it should be all business. Chasing is a different matter. I can see some strikes coming to people that are deserting there clan just to chase a runner down 30 lvls.

P.S. Geo, I’m fairly sure TOL member’s don’t hate you. Your great buddy.”

Afterward Geo and Expo settled things and the merge was back on. Expo went to work on making the new forums and Geo helped prep both clans for the merge.

Collision is Born

On Mar 19, 2006 at the stroke of midnight Expounder posted the link to COl’s first forums on both OD’s and COL forums. Also a Post was prepared for RSC by both Expo and Geo on the matter.

PART 2

THE BEGINNING

Once upon a time, there were 6 friends that decided to make a crew which would soon turn out to become one of the greatest clans in runescape history. These 6 friends were Geometrical, Sakabatou59, Phillyphil, Eewerd, Zone Wolf, and Ace Hykari. Around level 50, these friends made a crew called the coyotes lead by Eewerd. Why were we called the coyotes? This remains a mystery. We started figuring out the “mysteries” in wildy as we wander endlessly around, killing noobs and getting killed ourselves. Back then our armor (so to say) was mainly MITH, every time we pk, we would wear mith. After this experience, the 6 friends found themselves in a tight decision to keep the crew going on or to train. The reason for this was because of going onto vacation. It was only right to take a break

THE BALANCE

Then after this experience, the 6 friends found themselves in a tight decision to keep the crew going on or to train. The reason for this was because of going onto vacation. It was only right to take a break so they did. One by one at different times, each left to take a brake, but as they did brake off from the game combat levels went off beat from each other, competition, and the creation of enemies between the friends grew. There was no more balance…

K.U.I (Killing. Under. The Influence.)

After the long tedious training and competing among each other. Zone Wolf couldn’t take it anymore and decided to leave the crew and clan. Because of this lost, Eewerd and the rest of the crew decided to make an official clan known as K.U.I ( Killing Under the Influence). There we met our elder members of COD which were V eye E tee, Hios, Matamorph, Zxztigerzzxz, and Koenma2005. With the help of these members, K.U.I became a great force to be dealt with in wildy.

A. The Betrayal

Chewy67 was a player to depend on in the beginning because he helped us in a way to build up K.U.I, but we didn’t know what was in store for us later. As the days passed, Eewerd gets hacked. Eewerd gets into a fight with Chewy67 so Eewerd accuses him of hacking. Note that Chewy67 was met through Runescape not IRL. The reason Eewerd accused Chewy67 because he would always say that he hacked Eewerd to other people and so he left the clan…

K.U.I (Continued)

We started to grow slowly but, one day, an omen came down upon K.U.I. That day, after a pk trip, our leader Eewerd gave us an announcement. He announced that he will leave K.U.I and Runescape to follow Zone Wolf. Geometrical knew what to do, being as he was the 3rd member out of the 6 to play Runescape. He stepped up and took position as leader. With the leadership of Geometrical, KUI sprouted up and made its way to the top clans. With the help of V eye E tee, KUI made an Alliance with Green Dragons. They soon fell apart, and a few members joined KUI. This was the start of a beautiful beginning for Geometrical and the clan.

Long Lived K.U.I ?

K.U.I have fought vigorously through the wilderness and grew slowly. After 2 months, K.U.I had it’s usual meeting, but this meeting changed everything. In the meeting, a member named Vietguy666 started to be very obnoxious and were making arguments with other clan members. This caused a separation between the clan members. Looking at this, Geo had no more hope in K.U.I and it broke apart due to this separation.

TOL and then 13 Devils

After the separation of K.U.I few of the members went to TOL because they knew a lot of members in there. Then Geometrical met up with Kil Jaeden, a close friend, and he said that he was going to make 13 Devils live again. So the members left TOL and started 13 Devils. 13 Devils didn’t last to long due to the “giveaway” of ranks. It seemed that everyone in the clan had some kind of high positions and everyone wanted it so 13 Devils broke apart…

Overdosing on that Ownage Pill

After the departure of 13 devils, our 3 friends, Geometrical, Sakabatou59, Phillyphil, went to train but still kept in touch. They thought that they should re-make K.U.I again because old K.U.I members wanted it to come back. After a few weeks, Phillyphil thought of a name for a new clan, Clan Overdose. Then lived Clan Overdose, with our Leader Geometrical and Co Leaders Sakabatou59 and Phillyphil. With lots of pk experience, knowledge, and organization, these 3 friends pulled it together and made this clan, Clan Overdose.

The Future

The future is still uncertain, but the 3 friends know one thing, that they will try their best for this clan to work out and knowing that one day, Clan Overdose will grow and rise to the top above all in Runescape. . .

By: Geometrical, Sakabatou59, and Eewerd

A Look Back

Let’s take a moment and look back. That was the History leading up to Overdose. Now, I guess it’s my turn to talk about the leading up to Collision since I’m the only remaining of the 3 Friends. What should I start with? Ah yes, let’s start with some embarrassing moments of some of our current members:

A. Some of Bl4z1ng’s Post

“strange plant…Feb 14 2006”
i wasnt payin attention while trainin.. and when i look, i saw a strange plant attackin me…. (im new to being a member) wat does it drop if u do kill it… it has ridiculous high def or is it immune to melee?

“wooohooo…Feb 3 2006”
woohooo i got my first kill in today’s pk trip laugh.gif forgot to take screen shot of the drops but i shared wit ppl

we coulda gotten more kills, me and smack was chasing a lvl 122? or 123? but the mage foloed us and didnt try to bind until he was 2 step away from single………

Aha, there is more from other members but yeah thought I put some of Bl4z1ng’s posts as he was mad noob.

Overdose Officials Before the Merge

Alright so, I would like to get some statistics out of the way before going into the story. But before the Merge, here were the Officials:

Leader: Geometrical
Co-Leaders: Sakabatou59 and Phillyphil
Master Warlords: Hios and Matamorph
High Council: Hurly Star, Mistasize16, and Romeo In Luv

These guys were the backbone of Overdose. Took care of everything. But you know as time went by they had to retire. So far the current members that are active in Collision are Matamorph and me (Sakabatou59)

The History Continues: Time Passes By

As time passed by, Overdose had its Pk Trips and fought many clans in Wildy. One clan that was big for that I remember beating was THOR (The Hobbits of Runescape). Went out to wildy and basically took them out. Other clans that we had beef with was KO (Knights of Order). But the beef mainly involved the 3 Friends and the new additions – Hios and Matamorph. It seems that Overdose was running well. Although there were some drama at times, there was nothing ridiculous that took the clan apart. In order to continue our prosperity, we sought out clans that shared our common interests. This clan happened to be TOL. Sakabatou59 and Geometrical approached their Officials to become Allies.

OD and TOL

Because the 3 friends were once a part of TOL, they decided to let some TOL members join OD PK Trips. The most active of the TOL members that came to the PK Trips were Avenger Yo K and Darkreaper70. OD had become very fond with these 2 members and the idea struck that OD and TOL should be allies. However, before being allies both clans made sure that both knew each others members. After some discussion and the great debate of Teleing, the two clans became Allies but both had no idea that they would soon become Collision.

From here, I’m sure that everyone else got a glimpse of how things would become from Expounder’s Part. There are some details but I don’t think its necessary for the History. Have fun. Bl4z1ng/David has Part 3!

PART 3

Once Collision was merged from TOL and OD. We had alot of clans doubting us, calling us fail clan and we were going to die soon. But we were determined to prove all of them wrong. Shortly after our merge, Collision started to show our potential of becoming a great clan. Thus we attracted alot of attentions from other stronger clans. Collision was challenged by The Death Squad shortly after, and our first OFFICIAL War. We were the underdog in this war as everybody think Collision would lose and get own. Collision were pump up, we trained and preped for the war, and pulled 220+ opts! and slaughtered TDS.

With the win over TDS, our morale were high and more people joining. We got cocky as hell. One week later, Moriquendi challenged us to another full our war. Moriquendi was rank top 20 around the time and capable of pulling 250+ opts. Once again we were deem the underdog, with everybody expecting us to lose and the win over TDS was a fluke. We were once again determined to prove them wrong by defeating Mori.

After our Mori war, Collision was getting alot of attention in the clan world as the new and upcoming clan of the year. With great success also come with great problems. We were getting hunted by alot of top 5-10 clans that were trying to kill us and clans having spies in Collision. EOS started hunting us almost every pk trip, and they would find us easily due to the spy. Our morale was killed as a clan. We were scared to go out. But we did not stop, we continue pking and fighting EOS. We always lose to EOS at that time, but everytime we fought EOS, we would last a little longer. Then finally one day we were able to fight EOS neck to neck on the verge of beating them, but Corruption crashed our fight.

After we prove to EOS that we are able to fight them neck to neck, they got off of us. But Corruption started hunting us, and it was like a repeat of EOS. But then DF started helping us due to the friendship between Expounder and Lego from DF.

At this time, Collision have a 140s member ML, and we were fucking cocky as ever. Talk shit to almost every clan we think we can beat.

One day we encountered Anarchy in the wilderness, and we raped them in a pkri. Anarchy was so mad losing to a top 15 clan and them being a top 10 clan. They immediately make a Official Declaration on RSC to punk us out. But we accepted!!! Once again we were the underdog….. Every mother fucking clans out there think we are going to lose. Reason being Anarchy is a 3 years old clan compare to us less than 1 year old. This is the most pumped full out official war in Collision History, as losing was not an option. Anarchy talk so much shit about us being sissy. So for our war, all Collision were asked to changed their character to Female. Just like our previous wars, we were again determined to win.

After the Anarchy war, we fought The Titans in a full out mini war. And we won. [The only win vs TT] This fight make us somewhat cool with each other, and we were interested in forming an alliance together. At this time, Collision offered a multiple combined clans vs THE. With one week prep, Collision set up alot of practice fight in preparation to fight the monster The Clan with 250+ members.
In the end it become to be Col+TT+Mori+Deathrow vs The. Both side started with 399+++++++. The entire was member gate area was lagging, when The charged with 399++++ opts, the CTMD weren’t able to see them after 10 seconds and then we realized they had charged. We better piling and transition, the CTMD came out victorious. With the victory, there is also a reward, Collision and The Titans decided to be an official allies. Our Alliance still stand till this day as one of the strongest alliance out there.

As every clan have their up and down, Collision hit our first slump and after our inactive sweep, we were down to 90ish member from our 140s member list. Summer hit us the hardest worst than any other clan have ever done so. During our slump, for some reason, we started beefing with a Dutch clan. Red Devil Clan. There were alot of flame toward both clan. So we wanted to settle it in a good old fashion official war, but it was decline several time. But RDC was still flaming us saying they are better, because they have higher combat average, older clan and more members than us. After numerous taunting from both side, a 10 days prep war was settle between both side. This war is special, a 5 hybrid cap rule was set, but as neither side had experience fighting in a war with hybrid. We trained and drilled, after all our hard work, we destroyed RDC in this fullout.

At this time, we have become a top 10 clan pull 200ish opts to all our pk/pkri. Also at the same time a new clan was merged, Hostile and Awaken to form Violent Resolution. Everybody think Vr was going to die within a couple months because of the leadership. Collision and Violent Resolution have alot of history, they crashed our fights, and put spies in our clan. So we basically fight each other every time we pk just like we did with Eos. After a couple months, both clans slumped and we eventually moved on.

Alot has changed in Collision since then, we hit our usual summer slump but we knew we were going to come out of this stronger. And we were. We were once again a power house around October/November. During December 6, 2007, one of our dearest member Sir Nemesis [Peter] passed away due to cancer. Peter had a dream while he was alive and that was to beat Damage Inc. who were ranked around top 3 at the time, but DI had fallen to top 8 or so. As our farewell gift to Peter, we challenged Eternal Honour who were ranked top 5 instead of DI. We dedicated this fight to our friend Peter who were kicking in heaven, and losing was not an option no matter what the costs may be. After 14ish hours of fighting, Collision had won the fight vs EH and setting the longest pkri in the history of RS in the name of Peter.

After our win versus EH, Collision didn’t have many fight after that. Soon after summer hit us once again. But this time we were more stabilize and knew what to do. Collision started to rise once again at a slow pace. Our leader Geometrical decided to retire due to RL. But David[David802291] step up and did a fantastic job leading along side with Expounder.

During late December of 2007 and Early 2008, Expounder went MIA, and David become less active. Then comes the terrible news of wilderness being taken out and replace with Bounty Hunters. We lost some members due to that. Not wanting to waste time in moaning and bitching. Collision adapted to the new battle field and started going strong once again pull 180-200 opts with 80ish members.

During the Bh Era, Collision was going strong. We pked almost daily. Our warlord Hios[Matt] and Council Bl4z1ng set up to pk every day in Bh, and thus attracted alot of people to join us. By the end of BH, Collision was undoubtedly top 5 in Pking wise.

By April, BH was made single, and a new arena was given to the clan war. A clan war arena. CWA lasted for half a year until Wildnerss was given back. Plus with the approaching summer, and our slump time. Collision hit the hardest slump in years. With us losing so many CWA fight due to us not taking it seriously. Soon our members started leaving and we were struggling to pull 50 people to our prep fight. By the end of CWA ERA, we started to take it more seriously and gotten stronger from it.

Around October 2008, Jagex released a new Arena, Dangerous Free for all Portal. This time not wanting to wait or not taking it seriously, we wanted to adapt and we did. But it was nothing like the wilderness, and alot of clan hated it. After 2 months or so, Jagex re released wilderness back to us. Around this time we barely have a 60ish members ML. We have alot of up and down in this couple months time. Alot of official leaving. Collision stuck through it and promoted bl4z1ng to our new leader. With the help and the hard works of the members and official. Collision were once strong and kicking pulling 180-200 opts. But our new found success was short lived due to members retiring to RL and other reasons. We lost about 15 members in 2 weeks. From pulling 200 opts in mid March, were started to pull 130-150 in the end of March.

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Runescape – Pyramid Plunder Speed Guide


Quick thing: I suggest you don’t start this way, do a few hours of plunder first to get used to how it works.

Maybe check out the beginners guide first!

Ok, so you’re wondering if there’s a faster way to plunder right? I mean..it’s not fast enough already 😛


1. The items you’ll need


Preferably, take more stone seals rather than monks. To clear things up, the staff is a Pharaoh’s Sceptre. MAKE SURE IT’S FULL. (examine it it’ll say it’s fully charged) (it’s the bottom one bought at GE)

Pyramid Plunder Items
Pyramid Plunder Items


2. Inventory


Your inventory should look something like this (I personally like monks because monks are cheap and it doesn’t take 2 bites like pizzas do)

Pyramid Plunder Inventory


Pyramid Plunder Inventory


3. Equipped Items


For the cape, hood, gloves, boots, those are all optional, can wear whatever you want. Fully charged pharaoh’s sceptre equipped, FULLY CHARGED GLORY (that is VERY important). 3rd stage f2p ring (for the run energy)

Pyramid Plunder Equipt Items

Pyramid Plunder Equipt Items


4. Getting There


To use the sceptre, it’s the TOP TELE, Jalsavrah, it tellies you straight to the mummy to start the run.

Getting To Pyramid Plunder

Getting To Pyramid Plunder


5. You should already know how the next bit works, run through this garbage.

6. Go to the room BEFORE your max room until the timer reaches about here, then go to your max room.

Going To Your Max Lvl Room

Going To Your Max Lvl Room


7. Do NOT pick from the chests or the coffin, waste of time and valuable exp. BUT! I do pick from the chest right before i leave my room before max and max.

8. If you do open up the chest and the scarab things come out in a room you’re staying in, flick on protect from melee and keep thieving, they do nothing.

9. MAKE SURE YOU HAVE 1 CHARGE LEFT from the sceptre. So you used up 1 full sceptre, and 2 charges from the other 1. Glory to edge and withdraw 24 stone peices, and use your last tele back to the mummy, left click talk to him, recharge your sceptres. Edge tele, restock, do it again.

10. Doing this my way I made a minimum of 180k exp per hour and got as high as 240k.

11. I hope this helps.

12. What’re you doing still reading? get stealin’!

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Uncharted 2 – What is the purpose of the store?

What does the store do on Uncharted 2 – Amongst thieves?

The various medals you can earn while playing single player Uncharted 2 give you some dollars to spend in the single player store. Most players get a bit annoyed when they buy unlimited ammo, for example, and then find it don’t work. Let me explain how it works – The stuff you purchase in the store can only be used after you have completed the mission on a particular difficulty.

So as an example –
You play through the entire game on normal difficulty. You can then go back on any level on normal difficulty and use the things you have purchased in the store. If you were to try a level on hard difficulty then you wouldn’t be able to use your store items until you had completed that level on hard first. Basically the store is like a cheat mode and obviously they want you to complete it without cheating first!

Where are the online boosters and When do I get boosters while playing online?

ANSWER: You have to buy them from the store. Press R1 at the menu after connecting to multiplayer. You get different boosters at different levels so will gradually unlock all of them as you work your way up.

Uncharted 2: Among Thieves Review 04/01/2010


Many have given it the accolade, “game of the year”, and it certainly makes a strong case for such a title.

I feel like in the two years I have been playing my PS3 that I have spent 95% of that time playing first person shooter action games. Many are of course very good, such as Killzone 2 and the mighty Modern Warfare, and all are proper balls out unrelenting action games. This is why it was a bit of a relief and a huge pleasure to get my hands on Uncharted 2, which, although inevitably action packed, offers something a bit different. I didn’t know much about Naughty Dog’s action adventure title having never played the first one, “Uncharted: Drakes fortune”, as it seemed to slip under my radar amongst all the other launch titles for the PS3. However, many have said it is not only the best title at launch, but still one of the best experiences available on the system, coupled with the fact that the sequel has won a quite a few “game of the year 2009” awards from several highly rated sources, means that my expectations are high. So how good can it be? You play, in a third person perspective, a professional thief called Nathan “Nate” Drake, who is hired, along with his mate Harry Flynn and a new comer Chloe Frazer, to steal a Mongolian oil lamp from an Istanbul museum. Although initially sceptical, he is convinced to take the job when he is told that this lamp could reveal a way to find the lost treasures of Marco Polo’s doomed fleet in its final voyage. In a nutshell: Marco Polo, who lived around 1292, spent 20 years in Mongolia with Emperor Kublai Khan, and then decided to pack up all 18 of his ships and 600 crew and leave for Persia bringing with them a rare mysterious treasure that supposedly makes it’s wielder immensely powerful. Only Polo reached his destination however, a year and a half later, with only one ship, just a fraction of his crew left and he never revealed what had happened to his fleet or what the mysterious treasure was. After stealing the lamp, Drake then goes on a vast adventure across all sorts of countries, such as Nepal, Borneo and the Himalayas hunting down this artefact, looting ancient temples and underground tombs to find all the clues that will lead him to Marco Polo’s treasure. This may not sound too hard or that great, however not only does he have to tackle what ever devious booby traps await him at every temple he finds, plus he has to be wary of characters he meets along the way who are more than willing to double cross him for this prize, but he is in a race against time to find the stone before the particularly ruthless and unpleasant Zoran Lazarevic finds it first. Zoran is not only a war criminal, that most believe to be dead, but he is more than willing to kill and blow up all and everything in his way using his own personal army of heavily armed soldiers. He only wants the treasure for his own gain and for the rumoured power it bestows upon he who claims it.


What’s good?

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The gameplay is the best thing here. Uncharted 2 has a various array of gaming formats/elements, all of which are executed very well indeed. It has a mixture of lots of fast paced action and gun fire, like Call of Duty or Killzone 2, stealth elements and skills, similar to the king of stealth games: Metal Gear Solid or Assassin’s Creed and lots of exploring, climbing and puzzle solving, very much on a par with tomb raider, God of War or Assassin’s Creed, again. None of these three really stand out above all else, for example its not a far better shooter than it is a stealth game, as you really have to embrace the whole experience and become a pretty decent player at all three to fully enjoy and appreciate:



Firstly the action – Predominantly this game has mostly action and gun fire at its heart and there are a lot of guns to fire, soldiers and beasts to kill, tanks and helicopters to destroy and a lot of varying weapons to use in order to do it. This is made really good fun by the excellent cover system when under fire, which by the simple use of the circle button makes Drake snap to literally any surface in the level, pop out and fire. He can also jump between cover and pick up/swap any weapon dropped by a vanquished foe. Although you can only carry two guns at a time and very little ammo, so don’t bother holding on to a favourite gun, there is a surprising amount of fire power here. There’s an array of machine guns, AK47’s for example, but also different hand guns with varying power, like 9mm pistols and Desert Eagle 5.0’s, shot guns, sniper rifles, grenades, grenade launchers, RPG’s and at various points you will use massive mini guns and gun turrets. You will need to use all of these at one point or another as often there are situations you can’t sneak around and you will have to blast your way through. The action set pieces are pretty spectacular as well, a truck chase through the mountains was a highlight, as you have to jump from truck to truck whilst under fire and teetering on the edge of a snowy cliff face, as is the mission on a train where you will have to get to the front carriage, killing soldiers and avoiding being blown up by attack helicopters. There is not really a level or action set piece that doesn’t stand out and all are hugely good fun and exhilarating to play, with explosions, car chases and gun fire aplenty.



The stealth and sneaking – There is a large stealth element to this game as well and often you are far better off sneaking and skulking around taking down enemies silently, rather than opening fire immediately. You are often far better off doing so if you can help it as well, especially on the harder difficulties. Generally you will enter an area unnoticed and there will be a group of soldiers patrolling around, often looking for Drake. You have to use the terrain and blind spots to take cover behind things and use the square button to take enemies by surprise and silently finish them off. You have to have your wits about you at all times and keep lots of eyes on all the patrols, their movement patterns and choose your moment to strike very carefully. This is always entertaining as you pull them or push them off ledges or cliff faces, smack their heads off a wall or boulder they may be sitting on/leaning against, simply land a decent punch in their face or on their neck and, mainly, a quick grapple and snap of the neck (you cant necessarily choose these actions, but the game applies the most appropriate at the time). The noise it makes when you do sever a spinal chord is excruciating. It is gruesome. It’s quite difficult at stages but it adds a really entertaining tactical element to the action and gives you an alternative in how you play the game. Plus if you ball’s it up, with the exception of the first mission, you can just whack out your machine gun, start blasting and hope that your gun slinging skills are adequate.



The exploring and puzzle solving – There is a lot of exploration to be done in this game. Although essentially the game is very linear, as there is always one and only one way in and out of area, it always makes you feel like you figured out the method of advancing. In order to explore you have to climb, jump and swing round the most vast levels and Drake demonstrates that he has the free climbing abilities of the most skilled glue handed spider monkey. He will climb walls, rocky mountain cliffs, snowy chasms, collapsing bridges and moving trains. There is nothing he can’t climb. Climbing is one of the most fun aspects of the game and doesn’t require any additional knowledge or extra skill. Like in Assassin’s Creed you just have to point in the right direction and use the X button accordingly and Drake does the rest. The clever part is that it never feels like it’s doing everything for you, even though it so very obviously is. Whenever you swing across a bottomless chasm, or escape a train carriage hanging over a cliff or generally climb something where one slip would lead to your certain death, you feel like you did it and it was your skill that overcame that particular peril. It is brilliant. The puzzles are also pretty good fun. Often when in a tomb or trying to find clues to the next piece of the quest you will have to solve a puzzle. This generally involves pushing the correct things on buttons, turning specific switches in certain ways and aligning symbols in the correct way to unlock doors. There won’t be anything unexpected to anyone that’s played such games before. You will often have to consult Drakes Journal for information and although some will seem quite hard, you should eventually figure them out without too much trouble.



The story is really good and Drake is an immensely likeable chap. The plot on Uncharted would put most Hollywood dross to shame. There’s lots of action, betrayal, love, excitement and unexpected moments, with a bit of the paranormal thrown in for good measure. It’s not weak or quickly put together and all details have been thought of. The characters are all brilliantly executed, necessary and none come across as annoying or pointless (unlike 90% of the cast of Transformers 2). Zoran, for example, may as well have a top hat, twiddle a moustache and tie women to rail way tracks due to his “big bad guy” persona, but his merciless nature and savage actions overcome any stereotyping and he never comes across as comical or ludicrous, just a proper bastard who is there to be hated. Drake on the other hand is one of the most likeable characters in gaming. He manages to be funny and cocky without being annoying or arrogant, acts bravely all the time but always showing he has compassion and generally manages to be a top notch good guy throughout. He often comes out with little comments and quotes whilst playing some action set pieces, such as when a giant heavily armed helicopter starts firing missiles at him on a train, he shouts “how am I supposed to take out a helicopter!” It really made me laugh as how are you supposed to take out a helicopter single handed? He shouts with fear whenever traversing a terrifying gorge or cliff, which of course you would, or says stuff like “what now!” or “give me a break” whenever a heavily armoured soldier comes into view with a giant mini gun and generally comes across as the reluctant but brave and ultimately human hero. It’s a pleasure playing as him.



The graphics push the boundaries of “unbelievable” further still. It seems every time I pick up a game these days it has the sharpest, most colourful vibrant visuals I have seen so far, but Uncharted 2 has advanced my expectations even further still. I was taken a back by the visuals in Resident Evil 5, which are amazing, but Naughty Dog has blown my mind with this epically beautiful title. It is unbelievably good, especially in HD. Everything is so detailed and so vibrant with colour and no matter how large a tomb is, how populated a small town is or how vast an icy canyon is, it doesn’t miss a beat. It never slows, or lags either, at any point and the load times are very few and short. I know bluray’s can hold a lot of information but I’m still flummoxed as to how they fit this on one little disc. All the cut scenes look cinema ready as well and even the snow moves realistically when you walk through it. It has to be one of, if not the best looking game I have ever played.


What’s bad?

The cover system does not always work perfectly and is a bit “clunky”. In order to hide behind things you have to use the analog stick in the right direction and press the circle button. Then to switch to different cover you have to hold the analog stick in the direction you wish to go (towards the cover you wish to jump to), press the circle button and he leaps to this different covering position. But if you don’t get it 100% right Drake will do some stupid things. For example, he will jump to the other side of a wall and stick their like discarded gum and be hiding in full view of the heavily armed enemy, who will inevitably blast you into biscuit crumbs, the whole time you’re trying to get him to unglue himself from a totally uncovered position. To perform a roll whilst running you simply press the circle button on its own, but if you don’t get the directional buttons quite right he will simply leap out from behind cover and roll out in to the open, and inevitably get blasted into atoms once more. It does not happen constantly but often enough, and it is very infuriating to have to concentrate on so much stuff firing at you, avoid grenades, and ending up jumping in front of a giant gun turret even though you so clearly don’t want to do that. I know its human error but the system, although easy to use, relies on you getting your directional input spot on and sometimes you can get very disorientated, which of course mucks it up. You also have to press circle to stop hiding behind cover, and move normally to avoid a grenade for example, but sometimes he will simply take cover somewhere else very close by if you try and input the controls too quickly and you get blown up. As you hammer the circle button in panic he simply cements himself to other nearby walls or general cover and gets blown up by the grenade regardless. The controls are just a bit clunky and all actions have to be done really distinguishably from each other or errors will inevitably occur and on the harder difficulties this results in swift death. I appreciate that this system would be hard, bordering impossible, to make flawless by it doesn’t stop the fact that you will get infuriated at various points with it.



It’s so hard and unclear to figure out what you’re supposed to do a lot of the time. When your not unloading bullet after bullet you will generally be in an area that requires you to find a way out of it, because a door is locked, or something has collapsed and blocked your path. You really have to have an eagle eye in these scenarios, and they are frequent, as there will always be a slightly jutting out brick, or bent girder or one little thing that Drake can climb up like a chimp and move on. This is relatively fun most of the time, a bit of a brain teaser, but about 30 – 40% of the time these things are too hard to spot, especially the sticking out bricks as they look just like a normal wall. For example, on one level you are completely trapped in a market square with no way out and you are expected to know that you have to climb the sign in the middle of the area, a slightly skew whiff wooden lamppost with knackered looking advertisements hanging on it. It doesn’t look in anyway like it could be scaled, when compared to the stuff you normally look out for, so how are you supposed to know that? Some of the things that can be climbed are so subtle and indistinguishable from things that can’t that practically everything looks like it can be climbed. If it can’t, however, Drake simply doesn’t hang on. So if you think a cliff face on the other side of a bottomless gorge can be latched on to, the only way to tell is to jump across and if Drake plummets to his death, you thought wrong. Naughty Dog are clearly aware of this problem as if you spend a long amount of time in one area, basically showing that your stumped, a “helpful hint” pops up and tells you what to do or where to try and get to. It is of course good that it lets you know, but I was annoyed that I didn’t/couldn’t figure it out for myself, plus isn’t that just rectifying a problem they created? It does seem a little pointless and it can be irritating as you are constantly wondering where the hell to go next.



There’s an enemy in this game that is far too hard and tough and they will drive you mad on your first encounter. When you get fairly far into the game you will come natives of the secret city of Shambala. I won’t go into details about who they are or why they are in the game, as it will spoil the story, but they are big, fast moving and absolutely lethal. On the harder difficulties they will kill you with one or two hits, which they do have to dish out in hand to hand combat, but they are so fast it doesn’t take them long to get you, rugby tackle you to the floor and, if you get the on screen prompts wrong, kill you with one blow. This may sound hard, but its far worse still than that. They are also armed with the best weapon in the game, a golden double crossbow that can kill in one direct hit, that also has an unlimited supply of ammo (but you wont when you pick it up) and, trust me when I say, they are very good shots. Even worse still they are incredibly tough and able to take a huge amount of damage. You will unload magazine after magazine, shot gun shell after shot gun shell, bullet after bullet and an untold amount of grenades into their faces, at point blank range, before they eventually fall. It’s ridiculous and they are so superior to poor mortal Drake that you really do wish they had some sort of flaw to give you the slightest break or chance. Of course they can be defeated, and the key is to “run and gun”, which is running in one direction and using the analog to shoot in another (but it is quite inaccurate), and basically never stop moving or take cover. You just end up running in circles every time you encounter one, which is fine in terms of a method of defeating them, but it just looks stupid. It’s really hard though and even though you wont have to kill them all the time, as sometimes you simply have to survive a certain amount of time, these guys, especially on your first play through, will test your patience and your skills.



There are not a lot of reasons to play again and again. A minor gripe would be that, despite the huge length of the single player campaign, there is not a lot to keep you coming back to it. The game is enjoyable enough so that you will have a few goes at it, but there is nothing in terms of any customising, weapon purchasing and upgrading or anything like that. There are a lot of guns to fire here but the game really try’s to discourage you from holding on to a favourite weapon, or having a weapon at all. You can hardly carry any ammo at all and often, even if you ended an action set piece with a good gun, it will remove it from you after the cut scene. In Resident Evil 5, you collect weapons throughout and all are customisable and upgradable, so when you tackle the game for a second time you have all this marvellous weaponry at your disposal, making earlier levels hugely fun, and the more times you play through the more money you can get for upgrades, such as unlimited ammo or more powerful weapons. I felt like Uncharted 2 really needs something like that and there does not appear to be any reason why it couldn’t be incorporated. There are treasures to find, 100 of them scattered throughout the game, but it is really only worth finding them all if you are a trophy collecting junky or wish to play online. The online stuff is pretty good, and you can play through levels with two friends, helping each other shoot and climb through the level, or fight against them, but it is online only and not a split screen two player. But as far as the single player campaign goes, which is the games main appeal; there is not a lot to keep you coming back again and again other than the joy of the gameplay. I appreciate I am being maybe overly harsh; however I feel it’s harsh but fair. Once the intrigue of the story had gone I only played it a couple more times to test my abilities on harder difficulties but then I tired of it.


Conclusion:

There is not really much to dislike with Uncharted 2. It does so many things so well and I loved the combination of action set pieces, stealth/sneaking and exploring and climbing. Some of the scenes in this game are utterly brilliant, particularly the train ride, truck chase, helicopter chase in Nepal and every tomb you uncover. The puzzles are all good fun, if a little obvious, and the death defying free climbing that Drake does will have you on the edge of your seat. The story is really interesting, with lots of intrigue and entertainment and all the characters work well, especially Drake who is one of the most likeable and funny hero’s in any game. Plus the graphics are outstanding. The cover system works well most of the time, but it can sometimes trip over its own feet. Your also going to have tough time trying to fathom where the hell to go or what to climb quite a lot, although on screen help generally dissolves this in the best way it can. There are also a few enemies that are overly tough to take down which will get frustrating, but none of these minor gripes spoil the experience. It is a hugely fun and well executed title and you are quite a blithering howling mad buffoon if you don’t stick this in your PS3 at some point. Game of the year? Well the competition is tough, with the likes of Modern Warfare 2 in the market, but it is easily in the top 3 and a “must buy” for PS3 owners. CA.


Summary:


Is it user-friendly/easy to get into? – 9.5

Very easy to pick and play, and despite the shooting, covering and free climbing looking complicated it really isn’t, and you will be leaping over canyons, climbing vertical cliffs and blowing up soldiers in no time.


Is the story any good? – 8.5

It is a little cheesy in places, some lines are a bit cliché, and it’s a little predictable, but generally it is all you would expect from an adventure story line. Action, humour, intrigue, intensity, twists, love and betrayal. You will enjoy it.


How does it look? – 10.0

Amazing, awesome, brilliant etc. The best I have seen on the PS3 (until the next game I’m sure).


How does it sound? – 9.0

You don’t really notice the background music to be honest, but all voice acting is excellent as are all sound effects.


Is it good to play? – 8.5

Mixes several gaming styles and they all work very well together. The cover and firing system works well, although it is a little clunky. Climbing is very thrilling and very easy to do, but it’s hard to figure where the hell to go a lot of the time, and if you don’t get it right, the majority of the time, you plummet to your death.


When will I get bored? – 8.0

The single player game will take a long time to complete as it’s massive. The re-play-ability of the single player campaign is a bit thin, as once the story is unveiled the intrigue has gone and there is no customising, upgrading or weapon purchasing, for example, to be done at all. Trophy collecting and treasure finding addicts are the only ones that will get huge amounts of game time from the single player. The online stuff saves it to an extent, as its good fun to play with online friends, but it’s not a lot different to the single player campaign.


OVERALL – 9.0

Review created by C. Armstrong.

Runescape – Thanksgiving Cryptic Clues 2009

Clue Number 1:

Letter: Dear candidates,

If you wish to join our group, you will need to pass a series of logic tests. This induction is expected to take four days to complete and you will get a new clue each day. We do not look favourably on cheaters or those who give away the answers! Only those smart enough will reap the reward!

The exercise works like this: Each stage of this task has two clues – one clue points to one of our contacts each day, the other to some specific ‘code items’. In order for our contacts to talk to you, you will need to have (in amongst your other inventory items) that very particular set of code items, all in the right quantities! You can find the clues about which items you need in our daily news letter. Our trusted contacts will then give you a new clue on who to speak to next. Here are your first two clues to point you to the right person with the right code items…

“To a sponger of Lumbridge is to whom you must speak, He asks folks for money, week after week.”

Know who that is? Good. We thought we’d start you off with an easy one. Talking to our contact is all well and good, but don’t forget the code items in order to give him the all clear to talk to you!

Here I have a selection of items in a grid, along with some letters. Use the clues below to point you to some secret words. Building these words will give you the coordinates for the right items on the table. The words begin with the letters down the left. Simple, isn’t it? Don’t worry; things will get much tougher later on!

Bold = Person this week
Person: Lumbridge Sage

Key Code for clues:
Cake – Rope
Cane – Shrimp (Cooked)
Cate – Bronze Med. Helm
Care – Lobster (raw)

Bake – Iron Dagger
Bane – Pot (Possibly unfired I can’t tell)
Bate – Tin ore
Bare – Bucket

Rake – Potatoe
Rane – Logs (Normal or possibly oak)
Rate – Banana
Rare – Cowhide

Word for Item 1: “Hardly nutritious, but it can be frosted even during summer!”

Word for Item 2: “Oh my, sounds like a naked grizzly!”

Word for Item 3: “A judgement of quality you pass on things and people. Sometimes you do it highly, sometimes rather poorly.”

Know what those three items are? You’ll want to carry three of the first, two of the second and five of the third, so he knows you’re not just a lucky guesser!

Go and find our contact for today – he will tell you who the next contact is to be. Then read tomorrow’s edition of the newsletter for clues on the next set of code items. Fair well, hopefuls…

Clue Number 1 Solution:

The contact is Lachtopher in Lumbridge.

The items are
3 rope
2 buckets
5 bananas

Clue Number 2:

Dear candidates,

I see you’ve made contact with our first link in the chain – this is good. He should have given you a clue regarding whom you’ll need to see next. See if you can figure out what code items you’ll need in order to get him to speak to you, then go and speak to him with those items in your inventory. Cast your gaze on the text below:

For this clue, you will need to have a great deal of insight, for there are many things in this world that are not always as they appear. Can you rise to the challenge?

Highlight: When baking a cake, there’s a bucket of one ingredient you’ll need. Carry two of these.

It is a world full of mystery and magic, after all. You may need to cast your lines to the farthest reaches of Gielinor in order to obtain all you need.

Highlight: You’d never catch Herring with empty line, so carry seven of this item to catch your contact.

Lumbridge, Draynor, Falador, Varrock, Edgeville, Al-Kharid; who knows where your adventures will take you? What treasures you will discover!

Highlight: Ever heard of Roman numerals? You’ll need to carry CCXXVII gold coins!

I’m afraid I’ve told you all I can – you must now strike while the iron is hot! With wisdom comes the ability to read between the lines, so don’t let us down!

Highlight: The final item is a tool used in creating your dwellings and protecting your body from attack. Hit the nail on the head with four of these.

Clue Number 2 Solution:

The contact is Wildy Bartender, by the sawmill north of Varrock.

The items are
227 gp
2 buckets of milk
7 fishing bait
4 Hammers

Clue Number 3:

Candidates!

We must congratulate you on making it this far. It’s day three of your trial and you’re doing well. Hopefully, you’ll have the details of the third contact you will need to speak to. As always, we have a series of code items you’ll need to have with you in order to persuade our contact to speak.

The next batch of bewildering brain-teasers comes from the most fiendish annals of Varrock Museum. See if you can solve these age-old puzzles:

Puzzle 1

A tailor is making a new coat. He needs half the amount of threads that are in the hem for the collar. The sleeves need four times as many threads as the collar. The trim, which is the same as the hem, requires ten threads. The sides need five times less than the sleeves. If the tailor buys 55 threads, how many does he have left over once he’s made his coat?

The number of threads he has left is the same number of Red Spiders’ Eggs you’ll need.

Puzzle 2

Fred the Farmer and his brother, Geoff the Gardener, have acquired a ten-acre plot of land between them. They split the rights to the land evenly and go to work at planting seeds and crops on their half of the farmland.

Farmer Fred starts from the west, while Geoff the Gardener starts from the east. Fred plants seeds at twice the rate Geoff does, but Geoff ploughs an acre every ten minutes while Fred takes twenty-five minutes.

Selling all of their produce results in 400 gold coins between them.

How much of that wage is Fred entitled to? You will need to be carrying that same amount of gold coins.

Puzzle 3

My first is in jungle but not in rectangular,
My second is in blunder but not blender,
My third is in gallant but not in talent.

To this you will need to add the following:
My first is in dwarf but not in farced,
My second is in battle but not in mettle,
My third is in monster but not in ransomed,
My fourth is in mention but not in notion,
My fifth is in thread but not in death.

What am I? You’ll need to carry three!

Clue Number 3 Solution:

The contact is Gem Seller in West Falador.

The items are:
6 red spider eggs
200 gold coins
3 jug of water

Clue Number 4:

Candidates,

You’re nearly there! You have the details of the final contact you’ll need to speak to. All you need are the code items to give him the go-ahead to share his knowledge with you. Get your cryptic-crunching craniums around this clue and you’ll be all set.

For your next brain-training endeavour, we asked our good friend Sir Tiffy Cashien to come up with a complex conundrum for you to contemplate.

“On one of my many journeys about Gielinor, I encountered the strange beast known as the Chaos Elemental. When I came across this swirling vortex of randomness it was holding a rather mundane looking chest.

“What items do you have in that chest?” I asked it.

The creature responded: “Its no Mirasol all Gentle cats can tilt red Romulans rear crease bulbs salt gate”

Thoroughly confused, I told him I didn’t understand. Again, the bizarre monster responded: “43 – 35 – 27 – 19 – 11… Use what follows to skip over the answer.”

Confused? By Jove, that’s an understatement! I was dumbstruck for a while, but I remembered my lessons in deciphering secret messages and eventually I cracked it! An odd assortment of items, but then the Chaos Elemental is a strange being!

Anyway, you’ll need three of the first item, ten of the second and the number you get if you take the first from the second for the third. Haha!”

If you can solve Sir Tiffy’s little puzzle then you should know what items you will need for this part of your test! Take them to our contact for your final set of clues.

Good luck, as ever.

Clue Number 4 Solution:

The contact is Faruq, the games equpiment salesmen near to the gem seller in al-kharid.

The items are:
3 Small Nets
10 Air Runes
7 Cabbages

Clue Number 5 Solution:

The contact is Roddeck in Lumbridge

The items are:
8 Chisels
3 Eggs
234gp

Congratulations! Have a magnifying glass:

runescapethanksgivingevent
Congratulations! Have a magnifying glass Runescape thanks giving event 2009

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 Review 01/12/2009


It’s too focussed on multiplayer modes for my liking, but, rather expectantly, it is amazing.

Well how do you follow an act like Modern Warfare? It was never going to be easy, especially to myself as I still maintain the first Modern Warfare is the best first person shooter ever made (it is not “Doom” or “Wolfenstein” you rose tinted spectacled fools). Well of course it is rather predictably amazing, how was it ever going to be anything else? In the same way you just know every computer game timed to coincide with a film release will be an appalling shameless quick buck making diseased anus of a game, you just know anything affiliated with the words “Modern” and “Warfare” and done by Infinity Ward will be awesome. However, it does do some odd/different things that some may not be expecting and may not like, and I will of course explain why. It’s pretty similar to the first Modern Warfare, bordering on identical, and picks up pretty much where the first one left off, bar a few years. You will not just fight a load of ultra nationalist Russian terrorists in this game, but also defend a Russian invasion of the United States (yes, you heard that right). In the few years since the events of the first game the terrorist nutters have taken control of Russia and the bastard from the first game, that you killed, Imran Zakhaev, is made a national hero. The “baddie”, initially, is now one of Zakhaev’s generals, Vladimir Makarov, who goes on a terrorism binge across Europe, the last act of which is the massacre of hundreds of unarmed civilians at a Moscow airport (a massacre you will take part in) and frames the Americans for it. With the new ultra nationalist rage bending the ideals of its people, and believing it was an American supported terrorist attack, Russia seeks revenge and invades the US. You spend the whole game switching between seeking evidence that Makarov was the killer and terrorist leader and defending the US against Russian attack, playing various characters in “task force 141” (a special anti-terrorist unit consisting of SAS and US army elite soldiers, including “soap” from the first game) and the US Rangers in these conflicts. The story is ludicrously over the top, but properly action packed and totally unrelenting and intense until it’s done, with several plot twists that not only will baffle you further but also set it up for the third game. Story mode is only a third of the game however as you now have “Spec Ops” mode and the usual online stuff. Spec Ops is a load of missions where you have various challenges such as defending a base, taking out a target and generally lots of proper elite soldier black ops style stuff .


What’s good?

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The absolute best thing about Modern Warfare 2 is that it takes action packed intensity to new levels. The gameplay is practically identical to the first game, but it takes the shooter style action and just goes ballistic in its epic-ness, intensity and action. You will have to literally kill everything that moves, and there is a hell of a lot that moves and needs killing, so you are never at any point allowed to take a breather or slow things down as it will absolutely not let up even for a second the entire time you’re playing. You may have a couple of seconds on a few missions to prepare, but it will be followed shortly by around half an hour of action packed anarchy. There are some stealth missions, of course, sniping etc, but they inevitably descend into total Armageddon as well. Although the incredibly annoying eternally respawning enemies has been got rid of now, they have compensated for it by having a stupidly vast amount of enemy troops. It is ridiculous in places. For example, there is a mission in Brazil and in particular one in Washington that have such an obscene amount of enemies, soldiers, tanks, helicopters etc, and bullets flying absolutely everywhere you really are quite overwhelmed. There have been several additions to the gameplay that make the whole experience a lot more enjoyable, such as when you have to “breach” a room. You place an explosive on a door, stand back, and as it explodes you launch in and in super slow motion you take out every bad guy before they shoot you or before they kill any hostages. It’s proper swing in through windows, gun ho, commando style aspect of the game and really good fun. There is also the infamous mission where you have to take out an airport full of unarmed civilians which is actually quite shocking, dark and unnerving. You don’t have to actually shoot anyone but you do have to watch and it really does add a creepy evil tone to the game. You will also snipe from helicopters, infiltrate oil rigs from submarines, fight through suburban areas of America picking out targets for a “Striker” (a massive 8 wheeled tank thing), gun down hoards of terrorists with mini guns onboard Humvee’s, blast helicopters from the sky with missile launchers, sneak through enemy bases in snowy mountains, launch and detonate a nuclear missile, take back the White House from enemy control before it is carpet bombed, set off an EMP so that fighter jets and attack helicopters rain from the sky (a particularly crazy mission), and generally pull off every military assault and action set piece you can think of. You even get to, briefly, control a NASA astronaut in space. It is unbelievably exhilarating and exciting that if this doesn’t get your heart racing there’s something wrong with you.



The weaponry and technology is very plentiful and good fun to use. Although practically every weapon from the first game has been copied over here, and there is a shit load of them, there are some notable really good additions. The favourites from the first game remain of course, such as the “javelin” missile launcher and you still get to man the mighty C-130 gunship, although it’s a spec ops mission now and not in the main story. The one that stands out the most are the predator drones. These are remote controlled missiles that hover round a target area and upon your command, through a lap top, descend upon the enemy and blow it pieces. You have to control the missile though upon launch, and when it makes an impact you instantly switch back to your character and you can see the explosion, debris, smoke and dust kicked up by it. There’s also a mission in a snow storm where you have to use a heart beat monitor (the one showed in all the previews and demos), as you can’t see a bloody thing, which detects the enemy’s heart beats (obviously) for you too avoid or take down. You also get riot shields, which are bullet proof plastic shields that you can hide behind, but will replace a weapon. It’s really good fun getting your pal to use these shields as you follow them and use them as cover, but the enemy also use them which makes them difficult foes to take down. Using grenades is the key and they generally add an extra tactical element to the abundant fire fights in this game. There is also guns with heat detecting sights, excellent when a level is shrouded in smoke or fog, and you can shoot two smaller guns at the same time now, such as uzi’s or desert eagles, although using double guns makes you hideously inaccurate despite the fun factor. You will use lots of vehicles this time as well, including a mental mission through Afghanistan in the first level where you have a mini gun in a Hummer and have to take out hundreds of extremists whilst being chased through the streets and being shot at, a lot. You also blow up and escape a terrorist mountain base on a couple of snow mobiles, a crazy vehicle chase in an aeroplane scrap yard (reminiscent of the final chase at the end of the first game) and the final boat chase at the end is real fast paced stuff and every scenario has an insane amount of troops permanently trying to blow the crap out of your vehicle, increasing the intensity beyond it’s already very high levels. There is also an obscene amount of guns in general, far more than the previous game, and all enemies’ guns can be picked up and swapped with your own at any time. Considering the amount of enemies you slaughter there will be a biblical amount of guns to choose from. If you love fire power and shooting then this will be your nirvana.



Spec ops mode adds more to the experience. Infinity Ward were clearly aware the main story was a bit on the short side, and a lot of missions that were the most popular in the previous game, such as the sniping mission through Chernobyl and the mission were you use the C-130 gun ship, were not included in the story this time round, not at least in any similar form (which is a shame really). Fear not Modern Warfare fans as they have simply pasted in the new Spec Ops mode, which is a full set of small missions that don’t have any story or relevance tied into them, just simple honest action sequences and soldiery. They generally revolve around defending a stronghold or position while a set amount of enemies attack, evade and sneak through some enemy territory without being seen by enemy patrols and getting through a level as quickly as possible as enemies attack you. They are not particularly complicated, just quick easy scenarios where you can challenge yourself to beet your best time, or, more importantly, take them on with a friend (discussed in a bit). They are not quite as engaging as anything story related, but they are clearly supposed to be “a bit of fun” and add some more challenges and trophies to your game time.



There’s lots and lots of multiplayer gaming. Infinity Ward have put most of their effort into the multiplayer action of this game as clearly lots of market research shows that this is what people wanted the most from the game, which is to be expected in the current market. Firstly, all the spec ops missions can be done as a split screen two player. It’s actually better this way to be honest, as several missions, ie the most fun ones, can only be done in two player form. You can do this either by using two controllers or over the internet with a pal. Two player spec ops missions are a bit easier, so you can try them on harder difficulties, and its really good fun having your friend circling the battlefield in a C-130 over head and your on the ground as a regular soldier, both fighting off the enemy to get through the level. Or one of you has to use predator drones to eliminate enemy vehicles, whilst you cover them with sniper fire, or one is in a minigun armed helicopter circling above as you try to evade militia through a slum town. It certainly demands team work and harmony if nothing else. The online stuff is immense as well, for those who like it. You have the usual team battles, last man standing etc but there is additions such as one team member can man a C-130, but opposing team members can shoot it down with RPG’s. The levels are huge as well and there is kill streak rewards that, if you kill lots of people without dying yourself, allow you to upgrade your soldier to have extra skills, such as being able to take a “last stand” after you have been downed. It adds a little more tactics to the battles and some variation. It’s not really my thing, to be honest (I don’t really like online gaming in general: too elitist, too repetitive, too competitive) but if online or multiplayer is yours, and there is a lot of you out there, there is a lot here to please you.



The graphics and sound are of an incredibly high quality. The graphics in the previous game where pretty spectacular, with the exception of the characters faces and movement being a little wooden. But they have managed to revamp it to even further extremes this time round. It’s not awe inspiring in its epic battle fields or enemies, such as “Resistance 2”, it’s the level of detail that really astounds, especially in the level design. Firstly the characters in the game are now pretty flawless, with very realistic facial movements, winks, head nods, mouth movement etc, and movements in general. In the mountain mission, for example, you can see “Soap’s” beard slightly dusted with frost, not important I know but it just shows the level of detail Infinity Ward has put into it. For another example, whenever you’re in a vehicle or car just have a little glance around and spot the attention to detail. It is outstanding. You will see the keys in the ignition, the air vents, the stitching on the steering wheel, some used drink cans on the floor and all sorts of minute details, that individually make bugger all difference but when put together make one seriously immersive experience. Every town you enter is bustling with people, who scatter at the sound of gun fire, and the missions where you go through various housing developments in the USA defending the Russians attack, are particularly impressive and have all the trade marks of a town that was deserted quickly such as bicycles left on the lawn, broken locks on front doors, burning trees with ash coming off in the wind, little things that make all the difference when trying to add atmosphere, which it has in heaps. Speaking of atmosphere, the sound goes a long way to helping this aspect as well. It’s pretty much loud full on orchestral stuff that intensifies as action comes and goes and it goes bananas whenever a scene of epic proportions is encountered. It’s very much like a John Woo film. The battle scenes in Washington, with the wrecked White House in the back ground, will emphasise this. All character voices are excellent as are all noises of gun fire, explosions, vehicles, everything. It does not miss a beat.



The control scheme is 100% perfect. I have mentioned this in previous Call of Duty games, so I won’t go on, but the control scheme is absolutely perfect. It has not changed at all from the first Modern Warfare, or “World at War” for that matter, and I’m glad to see they haven’t felt the need to change it here either. If it ain’t broke etc. Everything is just so easy and instinctual to use, and even if you have never played a FPS before you will not need any instructions. They are that good. You would be surprised how easy it can be to not get control schemes quite right, Killzone 2 for example, an awesome game, but it tried to fiddle with the controls and it doesn’t work as well as Call of Duty.


What’s bad?

The main story is a bit of a let down, as it’s far too short and ludicrously over the top and confusing. My favourite part of the first Modern Warfare was the brilliant story, that gave you a lot of gaming time and generally really satisfied action fans (that mission where the nuclear bomb is detonated is one of the greatest I have played in any game ever). Unfortunately if you’re expecting a similar experience with no. 2 then you are going to be let down, as it is literally over in a few hours and will leave you with many unanswered questions. I completed it for the first time in around 4 to 5 hours, but as it’s so fast paced the time goes quickly and it feels even shorter. The harder difficulties will take a bit longer, “veteran” mode, for example, is unbelievably hard where even the simplest easiest levels will take many attempts, but generally it wont take too much of your time to complete. Don’t get me wrong it’s engaging, and the action is so intense if it were longer it might be too much, but I really felt like I needed a lot more and I was pretty disappointed upon completion. It is also ridiculously over the top and ludicrous as you’re just expected to take for granted that the Russians invade the United States? Do me a favour, how would that ever work? I was slightly confused as to what was happening the first time I played it, as the concept of a Russian invasion seemed way too far fetched. Plus it’s quite hard to ascertain exactly what’s going on as you are not really told much, you just have to rely on random radio transmissions and brief conversations that set up a mission. How did thousands of Russian air craft packed with para-troopers manage to fly un-noticed into American air space, take over the White House and various stupid things like that? It’s apparently down to the Russians using a code from a downed American satellite to make all their other satellites useless, but you cannot ascertain this from the game. It’s like a Michael Bay film with its stupidity: action packed, yes, but mind numbing with it’s brainlessness and style over substance. It really is daft. Saying “you will be disappointed” is probably too harsh, as, despite its briefness, its really good fun, and there is something wrong with you if you don’t fancy having more than one go at it on different difficulty levels. But the game as a whole is clearly much more focussed on multiplayer modes, which I’m sure is what most players will want, but if you, like myself, have the main story down as this games, not only but, biggest appeal then you have very much got the wrong end of the stick.



The spec ops missions are not that great. Don’t get me wrong they are by no means bad, but, firstly, taking on these Spec Ops missions individually is a bit rubbish and, secondly, although your better off taking them on with two players, they are still a bit short lived and unimpressive when compared to the main story. Don’t think for a second either that its like doing a whole new story or set of missions as nearly all the spec ops missions are clones of the missions in the main story, with ever so slightly different objectives. You will have to do things such as kill 40 enemy soldiers in a specific place, get through a level as quickly as you can without being killed or, defuse some bombs scattered around a town and, weirdly, doing the snowmobile mission whilst being timed. Why in the hell would you want to do that? This isn’t a racing game. Trust me, it is not even remotely as exciting if you don’t have enemy helicopters and soldiers blasting away with guns and missiles at you, or without any dramatic background music, which that spec ops mission doesn’t have, so its pretty crap. They are generally light hearted good fun, but most are very short, unrewarding and I didn’t have more than one or two goes on each before I got bored. You might as well play the story as it’s pretty much the same just better, more engaging and dramatic. What annoyed me further still is that the only missions that do stand out, such as a revamp of the Chernobyl sniping mission from the first game, a mission where you man the C-130 gun-ship (the C-130 is included in every aspect of this game except the story, which is really annoying!) or a quick fast battle across a collapsing suspension bridge, could have easily been incorporated into the story bulking that out a lot more which it really needs. Spec Ops is basically just a check list of achievements and trophies, and the only point to them is to try and beat your best times or play with a mate. Taking them on with your friend is the point of them really and in that respect they are pretty good fun, if a bit short lived, but I personally tired of doing them individually very quickly and would have much preferred a longer story and less spec ops stuff, if any at all.



It is way to overwhelming and confusing in places. The intensity of the action is just too much at times and it becomes impossible to figure out where you are supposed to go and what you are supposed to do, especially on your first play through. The fourth mission in the story, in Brazil, suffers from this badly as you have to chase a guy who is a lead to the terrorists through a slum town, and it is just total chaos. There is militia on every roof top, in every building, behind every wall, all shooting the crap out of you (and I know the respawning enemies have gone but it certainly doesn’t feel like it in this mission), whilst this informant legs it and you are expected to chase him through the town which is a ludicrous impossible maze of small houses and dead ends, the whole time your commander is screaming at you to hurry up or the informant will escape (although there is no time limit your certainly not led to believe this). Trying to figure out where the hell to actually go is hard enough, even if the ten thousand militia where not trying to turn you into a colander. Another example is when you have to defend a house later on in the game, and even worse escaping it, which starts off easily enough, but then the enemy swarm the house from every conceivable angle, and there is loads of openings and doors they can infiltrate from, and such a ridiculous amount of flash bang grenades are tossed in every window that they are unavoidable and you will be blind for a good few minutes, whilst the enemy pile in and gun you down. You then have to escape the house and run down a hill, but there is an obscene amount of enemy troops shooting at you, from all angles, nothing to hide behind, whilst the area is being mortared, so you can’t sit still or you are blown to pieces. Avoiding taking shots in these circumstances is unbelievably tough as it is, bordering on impossible on “veteran” mode, let alone not being able to stray too far from the computer you are protecting, as if you do the enemy destroy it very quickly, and the mission is over. A lot of the spec ops missions suffer from this as well, again, particularly when it comes to defending a strong hold, as wave after wave of enemy just gets too much and it is seriously tough to keep cool and stay on top of things, especially when going solo. There is also little stupid things like exploding cars and red barrels, which are often unavoidable and when they explode vaguely in your vicinity you are killed instantly. This game has enough going on already to have to concern your self with the colour of specific barrels, for god’s sake. This is possibly more of an indication of my crapness, or unawareness, but I really fail too see how even the most skilled “switched on” gamer wont be overwhelmed at some point during their time with Modern Warfare 2, and I reckon they should have toned it down a little, not everywhere, just some of the few occasions when it goes a bit overboard.



Shooting from the hip is ludicrously inaccurate. I have never shot a real gun so I’m not sure how hard it is to aim and fire when not looking down the sights (which is called “shooting from the hip”), but I really struggle to see how it can be as ridiculously bad and inaccurate as it is Modern Warfare 2. In the tutorial you are of course told that you should never shoot from the hip and always aim down your sights, especially in order to use the excellent target snapping system, however, there will be various points in the game where you will turn a corner or open a door and there will be a gun wielding bastard ready to unload bullets into your face. There is no way you have time to aim down the sights in such circumstances so you are forced to shoot from the hip, however, I guarantee you, even standing inches from your enemy and aiming at point blank range in his face, you will empty the entire magazine and hit nothing but air and scenery. If you’re on a harder difficulty you will inevitably get your head cored like an apple by a shot gun. It’s even worse on the larger machine guns and I refuse to believe a gun will be that inaccurate at such a close range, and even if it is, I think it’s far too harsh for the game to punish you for it. Realistic or not, it sucks, basically.



The friendly AI is a bit crap and simplistic. This only effects the story mode, as there isn’t any friendly AI in spec ops or online, but I’m surprised this is not something Infinity Ward would have concentrated on a little more, as your AI pals are a bit thick. They are not as intrusive and irritating as they are in “World at War” (although they still can be), where they will stand on your face or leap in to your firing line, they are just not really any help and pretty much act like you are not there. It by no means ruins anything in the game but despite the intended realism you don’t at any point feel like part of the unit. You pretty much have to do everything on your own and they simply don’t really ever help you, have to be led everywhere, otherwise they don’t budge, will promise to “cover you” and stand there doing nothing whilst an enemy shoots you in the back, and generally don’t add a lot to the experience. They are only really good for following to the next action scene. They also occasionally jump in front of you when your aiming down a scope as well, which is particularly annoying, and you inadvertently kill them. This frustrates because, as always, “friendly fire will not be tolerated” and you have to start again. It is very frustrating to get punished for something that is not your fault. It’s by no means awful, but by no means particularly good either.


Conclusion:

Rather expectantly it is of course, as a whole, very very good. The story is far too short and stupid for my liking, but it’s just so engaging, particularly exciting to play, and you will definitely want to have a good few goes at it, let alone on each difficulty. If you want a challenge, “veteran” mode will seriously test the most hardened and sharp gamers. I wouldn’t say you will definitely be disappointed if you buy this game only for the story campaign, as that is a bit harsh, but you probably won’t feel as though you have had your fill or got the most out of this title if you do. However, if you love multiplayer stuff as well then you will get a lot of satisfaction from it. It is a proper bullet ridden balls out hairy chested intensely unrelenting action packed manly experience, that is a bit short on subtlety and intellect, but who cares when you can mow down multiple terrorist scum with a massive machine gun! The spec ops missions are not that great to be honest, but they are something else to do when you get bored of the story, and, most importantly, they are by no means bring the game down. Plus, you can even tackle them with a pal if you so choose, which is good fun and really the point of them. I don’t find the spec ops stuff as engaging as the story, therefore not as good, but the enjoyment and same ludicrous intense action remains. Further still, you have the vast multiplayer online stuff. All this playability is coupled with outstanding graphics and sound, particularly the level design and details, and it makes for one of the best experiences available on a PS3. I wouldn’t say it is better than the original Modern Warfare, it’s just about the same, as it improves on it in several areas but loses out to it in others. But, to be fair, being about as good as possibly one of the best game of the decade is not really a bad thing. It does not really blow the competition away either, as there are lots of high quality titles in the market, past and present, but I cant deny it is definitely a bit taller, fitter, and more muscular, if a bit less intelligent, than the other kids in the playground. CA.


Summary:


Is it user-friendly/easy to get into? – 9.5

Menus are all very simple and very obvious and it’s easy to get straight into whatever or who ever you fancy killing today. Control scheme is perfect and very easy to use and get used to.


Is the story any good? – 8.0

It is a good story, definitely entertaining, dramatic and a little dark, but very ridiculous, very over the top and just a bit stupid. Those of you that have a more cynical and logical outlook on life probably wont be won over very easily.


How does it look? – 9.5

It is a particularly stunning game and the level detail and design is awesome, and everything just generally looks outstanding.


How does it sound? – 9.5

Really dramatic orchestral background music that rises and falls with the intensity and suits the action and gameplay perfectly. All voice acting and sound effects are also superb.


Is it good to play? – 9.0

It can be too overwhelming in places, and too intense, but it is certainly incredibly exhilarating, huge fun and very variable so it takes a long time to get dull, be it playing the story, spec ops or online.


When will I get bored? – 8.0

If you are only interested in the single player campaign, you may not get as much game for your money as you might be expecting. Despite how much fun it is, it is just very short. If you want to do everything though, you have lots and lots of Spec Ops missions that can be done on your own or with a mate, and masses of online multiplayer stuff. So you should potentially not be bored any time soon, depending on your preferences.


OVERALL – 9.0

Review created by C. Armstrong.

Need for Speed: Shift Review 07/10/2009


Not perfect, but (at last) a really decent NFS game.

Now I have been playing Need for Speed games even before the PS2 days of “Underground”, the game of course that made the franchise as well known as it is today, and threw it into the world of customising and tuning. Before that came titles such as “Hot Pursuit”, a game I spent many hours as a young lad on my PC, being the police car and chasing down naughty boy racers. At the time it was awesome! Need for Speed is also the most successful racing franchise ever, would you believe, having been around since the 90’s, however, I wouldn’t say I’m a die-hard fan-boy of the franchise, being that several titles in the franchise have been total crap. Un-flushable turd’s such as NFS “Carbon” and “Undercover” spring to mind which were just so lame, short-lived and shallow. I didn’t even like “Underground 2” as it was too easy and also far too short. These titles are not necessarily awful, but just played like they were designed very quickly, in an EA developer’s lunch break, and put together simply in an effort to make a quick buck, rather than a desire to make a joyful celebration of vehicle, tuning and track. I even abandoned the franchise for the first time when “Undercover” was released and bought Midnight Club: LA, a good game, but not a great one, and it left me wanting for a better racing, customising and tuning game. EA can do good things, as they produced the brilliant original “Underground”, which at the time was unbelievably good, the hugely entertaining “Most Wanted”, which I particularly liked, and the controversial “Pro Street”, which, I must confess, I really enjoyed as well despite the weird handling of the cars. “Shift” is easily the most mature in the franchise as it is a proper track racing and tuning game designed by real enthusiasts, with many cars, many upgrades, many unlockables, many trophies and many tracks. You basically spend the whole game experiencing the career of a pro racing driver, starting from scratch with minimal cash and amateur rides, such as Honda Civic’s and VW Golf’s, on small tracks, to becoming the ultimate pro racer earning millions in sponsorship, racing Pagani Zonda’s and Mclaren F1’s on the worlds most famous and difficult circuits, such as Laguna Seca, Spa and the terrifying Nordschleife. Now there is no story here, like previous NFS titles, and there is no street racing or having the free roam of a city to drive around in. It’s all track based. Here is where I assume the fan boys will pipe up, but if you don’t like the racing, upgrading, customising, tuning and blistering sensation of speed delivered by Shift, simply because it doesn’t have “free roam”, then you really need to ask yourself if you are a racing game fan at all.


What’s good?

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Well of course, it’s the racing. The racing is nothing unexpected to anyone that’s played racing games before, but the driving engine is really good, where you will genuinely feel the weight, down force and speed of your vehicle and feel it differ and change between classes and models of cars, and to what extent you tweak and tune them. The cars all handle really realistically but it wont slap you in the face with a giant hand of realism. The different types of vehicle will all feel very different, for example, an M3 BMW will feel tail happy and vastly different to a front wheel drive Ford Focus ST, which is different again to a four wheel drive Nissan GTR, all of which will feel different again the more turbos, nitrous injection or spoilers you add to your vehicle. All have varying gifts of speed or grip/handling until you break into the hugely expensive works converted cars that mesh the two in a ludicrous bundle of speed, cornering g-force and noise. Taking a highly tuned Corvette Z06 to a fairly tough track, like Spa, manages to be challenging yet rewarding, and exciting yet terrifying at the same time. You will have to get breaking distances, oversteer, understeer, cornering speed, everything correct or, generally, you will lose a lot. You will face many opponents in every race as well, up to 20 opponents, which are all intelligent enough to know where you are and have varying degrees of aggression and pace. They also have accidents on their own and are just as willing to fight it out with each other as well as you, giving the full on racing experience. There are varying forms of racing as well, as it will jump between all sorts of events, from your standard track race, time trials, one on one battles, drifting, manufacturer events (where everyone has the same car), race series, invitational events (where your given a car to compete with) and generally never lets the racing become stale. This, coupled to the blistering feel of speed and the full on attack on your ear drums by the sound, makes for one seriously exciting racing game.



There is huge satisfaction derived from your progression through the career mode. There’s something so fundamentally satisfying about starting a racing career with bog all money, buying a beat up car and turning into a full on apex kissing racing machine. This is exactly what you do here, and after a quick intro in a BMW and a few laps round Brands Hatch, you are given some cash and off you go. There are 4 tiers of events, upgrades and cars, each one, predictably, harder, better and faster respectively, but the rewards are higher. 4 tiers may not sound a lot but bare in mind that the tier 2 races, for example, consist of around 10 events, with around 6 to 10 races in each one. Plus I guarantee you, if it’s not set on “easy”, you will have at least 2 or 3 goes at each race before you claim the top podium, and probably a lot more at the higher tier championship events. Each tier of vehicles has around 10-15 vehicles in each list and every one can be customised and tuned to your exact racing style. You will unlock various upgrades, vinyl’s, and cars throughout the game and you will await with eagerness what each unlockable will do to your beloved vehicle. It rewards you for hanging on to a favourite vehicle and adopting a preferred driving style, but has just enough alternative events, such as a European or Japanese manufacturer only race series, in order to make sure you vary your cars and skills. The achievements don’t stop there either, as they have incorporated a point’s and stars reward system that gives you bonuses for the manner in which you overtake, your aggression or precision during the race and generally how well you did, rather than just what place you came. This of course unlocks further cars, upgrades and gives you further cash. There is so much money to win in this game so don’t think for a second you will ever be strapped for cash, or have difficulty buying a favourite vehicle. I only got half way through the tier 2 races, around a quarter of the way through the game, and my bank balance was already in the millions. For anyone that’s a fan of career based racing games will like a lot here.



The sensation of speed in this game is unbelievable. There’s one thing that EA have definitely cracked in this latest NFS title is the thrill of speed. It will feel fairly fast in the tier 1 cars, but as you progress through the different tiers of vehicles the faster they get, and when you hit the more complex tracks, it will blow your mind. Firstly, to truly experience this you have to drive in the perspective of the cock pit, and secondly put yourself in a car with maxed out stats on a tight fast track, such as the Nordschleife. There’s several cars that have a maxed out “speed” stat, like the Bugatti Veyron for example (but it cant go round corners), but the one that delivers the most mind blowing speed sensation is the Pagani Zonda R, simply because of its savagely rapid acceleration, cornering ability and ear bleeding engine note. You hit 6th gear in this V12 beast and the madness starts. The noise of your engine escalates to deafening levels, the roar of the wind as you car carves through it increases, the vibration of the your vehicle starts to become uncontrollable, your vision starts to blur, your palms start sweating, whatever horizon you were once pointing at has rushed to meet you and just before it gets too much and you contemplate pressing your unused trembling left finger hard into the break button, the racing line goes red and its time to slow down, or become one with the crash barrier. “Fast” doesn’t come close to describing what it’s like hitting top speed in a car with maxed out stats. It’s literally a perfect 50/50 blend of the ultimate thrill and sheer unadulterated terror.



The sound is ear scorching and brilliant. The game has little to no music whatsoever. What you get instead is a full on racing car related assault on your ear drums. From the cock pit view the tyres are going to scream in rubber burning agony through every corner you go round and on every straight the engine, especially in the larger engine faster vehicles, such as the Koeniggsegg CCX, is going to bellow, roar and shout in your face the entire time your finger is on the accelerator, and in a supercharged vehicle, such as a works converted Viper SRT10, the wine of the supercharger is relentless and ear piercing. It is without a doubt immersing to say the least and “Slightly Mad Studios” has done an awesome job in capturing and enhancing the attack on your ears whilst driving a highly tuned race car. Even in the menus you don’t get music just sounds of engines at full throttle as they flash past, and tyres at the very limit of a blow out. It’s atmospheric and tense and petrol heads will love it.



There is, of course, a load to customise and tune. The customising and upgrading of your car boils down to several menus, all of which are very obvious, very clear and really easy to access. Firstly, your upgrades: each vehicle has 3 levels of upgrades, which, through one way or another, will make your car faster, accelerate quicker, have more grip, etc. However there are lots and lots of them, and the more you upgrade an aspect of your car, i.e., suspension, gear box etc, the more you can fine tune/fiddle with it in the tuning options. Once you have applied all possible upgrades to your vehicle, you will then have the option of “works converting” your beloved car. You can’t do it to all vehicles, but if you’re struggling to decide which car will serve you best in an upcoming tier, it’s generally a good bet to buy the vehicles with a “W” next to them. (Just so it’s clear) You have to apply all conceivable upgrades to the car first, then it will give you the option of pressing “select” in the upgrades menu, and your car will receive a ludicrous but awesome body kit and have all its stats increased further, often maxed out. It’s very expensive, be warned: you will be spending in the region of $1,000,000, but you will have one seriously tuned, awesome looking and fast car as a result. You then have the visuals menu where you can add an eternal amount of paint jobs, around 50 different rims and lots of vinyl’s, none of which at any point you will have to pay for, so go nuts. The vinyl options are not anything more or better than previous NFS games but there is still enough to satisfy the customising junkies. If you cant be arsed to do your own vinyl’s there are 5 racing paint and vinyl jobs already set up for you, just pick your favourite free of charge. Finally there is the tuning menu where you can adjust tyre pressures, break callipers, suspension stiffness, gear ratios, downforce, the lot. All the menus are very accessible and simple as well so nothing will be overwhelming and all tuning options have a tutorial/description, encase your wondering what the hell camber angles do. For anyone who likes customising and tuning you can spend hours doing it here. It certainly doesn’t add anything that the NFS franchise hasn’t had before, other than the fine tuning, but they have just simplified and made everything easy to use and rewarding to do, when you get it right.



There’s lots of tracks and cars. NFS has gone all grown up with its tracks this time, as instead of racing randomly around an open city, you have actual race tracks such as Laguna Seca, Spa, Brands Hatch, Silverstone, the mighty Nordschleife and all sorts. Each one has been perfectly re-produced and has various colours and backgrounds enhanced to make them a bit more exciting and interesting to behold. There are 18 in total but each one has several smaller versions of the same track plus a few make believe ones such as a circuit through central London and Tokyo. There is a lot to get your head round and you will have to race a hell of a lot to master every one of them. For the cars, although there are some missing favourites/NFS classics which may put fans off slightly (more on that later), but you have to bare in mind that there is still 72 cars to be had here, and each one, especially the works converted or tier 4 cars will take a very long time to build up enough cash to purchase and fully upgrade. Admittedly around a third of these cars can’t be used in career mode, but cars are cars and it does have that many to be fair. The list is enough for any car fan.



The game is as “arcade like” or “driving sim like” as you want and will accommodate any racer of any skill level. The racing is a mixed bag to be honest, in terms of its handling and driving. But fortunately they have managed to be very broad with its appeal, as there is definitely a lot of interest here for the hard core racing and tuning fan, the sort of person who lies awake at night debating the stiffness of his rear suspension and length of his gear ratios, and the casual racer, the sort of chap who goes “which ones the accelerator pedal?”. You don’t have to know anything about cars to play this, unlike, of course, Gran Turismo, as you can set up traction control, steering, braking and tuning assists to help you or turn them all off completely, and become a pure racer. This will remind you though of just how far away you are from a real racing driver. For most it will lean mostly towards the arcade style of racing games as, although you can’t just sling vehicles into corners at any speed (like you can in Midnight Club: LA or previous NFS games), it is forgiving to an extent. It really depends on how hard core or easy you want it, and the game can provide all variations. Bare in mind it is still a long way off Gran Turismo and Forza though, even if you make it as realistic as it allows.



The drifting is really good fun, when you get it right. Slightly Mad Studios have got rid of the various forms of racing that previous NFS gamers may be used to, such as drag racing (but honestly you wont miss it), but drifting has survived. It has also been seriously revamped and made to be a lot more realistic and will feel vastly different to any drifting you may have done before. It is incredibly difficult (more on that in a bit) as you have to be spot on perfect with every aspect of steering, throttle, braking and angle but when you nail it is supremely satisfying and good fun. Plus after lots of practice you will start to get the hang of it. The cash rewards are huge as well considering it can take barely 2 minutes to do a drifting event.


What’s bad?

It’s far too easy to earn money. This game gives you way too much cash and points for your efforts so you very rarely have to do races again for the sake of funds or try too hard to buy a car you particularly want. You can get money, points and stars, for finishing last in some events! As a result there is little incentive to “go the extra mile” to gather enough funds to buy a favourite car, or the best car in the tier. Whenever you get to a new tier or event you will always easily have enough cash for the best car in the tier. For example, I had gained enough stars and unlocked all tiers of races when I had barely started the tier 3 races, which is only about half way through the whole game! Plus I had about $4,000,000 in the bank which can buy the most expensive car in the game twice over. You also get money when in “quick race” which is basically an arcade mode, so the opportunity to make ridiculous sums of cash is overly frequent. I think it should make you work slightly harder, do races more than once, ultimatley making it more satisfying when you do purchase that Mclaren F1, for example. To rub salt in this wound, EA have done this ridiculous thing where you can go online and use your credit or debit card to purchase in-game cash, encase your struggling. I find this so insulting, as who in the hell is going to be so awful, as if it is set on “easy” its really really easy, they don’t earn enough cash in this cash filled game, and stupid enough to use your real money when you have already used your cash to buy the sodding game in the first place! It’s such a pathetic extra money making scheme, showing EA’s money grabbers still have a say in quality games such as this. It’s very underhand and devious, and I don’t like it.



You can’t upgrade the tier 4 cars! It’s seriously disappointing to get as far in the game to warrant the unlocking of the tier 4 races and cars, and finally get enough money to buy a tier 4 car and the consequential upgrades, and, after relinquishing a good $1,000,000 for it, when you go to customise your ultimate ride this message flashes up: “There are no upgrades available for this car”. That’s right, you can’t improve the performance, you can’t add aerodynamic aids/body kits, you can fine tune them, but the options are pretty limited, and you generally can’t make your tier 4 car any better than it is already. You can change the paint job, but that’s where your customising will end. This annoys and disappoints me on several levels: Firstly, this game is predominantly about customising and tuning cars, the tier 4 cars being the ultimate goal (or at least your led to believe that), and they decide to take away that aspect for the most expensive, rewarding and fastest vehicles in the game. Secondly, the majority of the tier 4 cars’ stats, which you cant change/improve, will be worse than several works converted tier 2 and 3 cars. The Corvette, Viper, Nissan GTR, Murcielago, Skyline GTR, BMW M3, Mustang GT500, Mitsubishi Evo X, for example, are all more worthy of your cash, ultimately making the tier 4 cars worse but costing about the same. Thirdly, real life GT racing versions exist for nearly all the tier 4 cars available (with the exception of the Veyron, Reventon and Carrera GT), as I have seen them race with my own eyes, so it is not as if such racing paraphernalia are not applicable to these cars, they are just not applied. Fourthly and finally, you have to go through most of the f*****g game, having these machines as your goal, only then finding out that there is no point in buying them whatsoever, as they will be worse than cars you already own! It really feels like these cars are only in the game so EA can gloat about the car roster on the box and fool people into buying it for their love of the Bugatti Veyron, for example. Maybe I am in a minority, and most players wont care, but it really really f****d me off. They are still pretty fast, don’t get me wrong, but it’s just not the same and it doesn’t feel like it’s your car if you can’t tune and customize it. The Pagani Zonda R is worth buying (but it is the most expensive in the game at $1,200,000), as its stats are maxed out (top speed is not quite maxed out, but close enough) making it one of, if not, the best car in the game, but all the others have a flaw that makes them too tough to drive. This ranges from being incredibly fast but unable to go round corners and needs brake, suspension and aerodynamic upgrades, that you cant add (Veyron, Koeniggsegg), twitchy as hell and needs down force, that you cant add (Mclaren F1, Pagani Zonda F), or just comparatively not that good and needs all upgrades in general, which you cant add (Mercedes Mclaren 722 edition, Lamborghini Reventon, Lexus LF-A, Porsche Carrera GT). Other lower tiered vehicles have such flaws as well, sure, but the difference is you can tune and upgrade these cars to suit your driving style.



The customising is definitely a step back from previous NFS games. Despite the fact there is still a lot to customise it is noticeably not as detailed or as plentiful as previous games. For those that played Pro Street, you will easily notice the difference especially in terms of your cars vinyls and wheels, as there is considerably less choice on both fronts, and far less choice in terms of what you can customise about them. For example, most wheels will have a set size and if you fancy putting 20 inch rims of a wheel design on instead of 16 inches, then that’s tough luck. You can’t. There’s no more “auto sculpt” anymore, which sucks as I liked fiddling with your cars aerodynamics and visual appeal. The real kick up the arse for me is that there is no option to mirror your cars vinyl’s at all on different sides. This really wound me up as for anal people like myself that want symmetry on their vehicles racing colours, which I firmly believe is not unreasonable to expect, there is no option at all. How could “slightly mad studios” have missed this? It seems such an obvious, simple and vital part of an otherwise good customising system. The fools! Also, you don’t get full control of the view of your vehicle when adding vinyls. You can move the camera but it’s overly sensitive, quite limited and never really makes the view any better, making the necessary DIY vinyl symmetry even more of a pain in the arse. Another irritant, is that you have several options of pre-made racing vinyls that you can apply to your car, which is fine, but you can not make such paint schemes yourself at all, as you simply do not have enough options and resources. For example, you can’t change the colour or, in any way that’s worth it, the size of the manufacturer vinyls, where often the in-game paint jobs will have such vinyls of all different shapes and colours. Your often better off using the predetermined racing colours as you wont be able to make such paint jobs yourself. How hard would it have been for them to allow you to change the colour of the manufacturer vinyls? It’s really annoying. You also have to unlock the vinyl’s as you go but you wont have all of them unlocked until you have nearly completed the game, and its annoying when you want to add simple things such as numbers to your beloved vehicle, and you can’t. There’s a lot to unlock other than vinyl’s so I cant ascertain why they bothered with this in terms of incentive to play. It honestly feels like they have been doing the customising lark for NFS games for so long, that they are just bored of it now and can’t be arsed.



The car list is not as robust as previous NFS games either. Don’t get me wrong, there are plenty of high performance machines here to keep you interested, however it’s not as plentiful as “Undercover” or “Pro Street”, and there is some odd choices in what was introduced this time and what was discarded. There are noticeable missing favourites from the car list, such as the tuners favourite, the Toyota Supra, and all classic muscle cars are gone. No classic Charger, Stingray, GT500, Hemi Cuda or Chevelle at all I’m afraid. In fact the choice for muscle car fans is a bit thin on the whole. The only true muscle cars are the (modern day) Dodge Challenger, Chevrolet Camaro and Ford Mustang GT500. To a lesser extent there is the Corvette Z06, Viper SRT10 and Ford GT but they are more firmly a member of the supercar family, and all have been around in NFS games for ages. There are some strange cars now introduced such as the original 1960’s Nissan Skyline 2000GTR, which, despite the fact it’s the worst car in the game, I don’t particularly have a problem with, but why at the cost of a way more awesome vehicle such as a Dodge Charger or Toyota Supra? Seems a strange choice to me. They also have several iterations of the same vehicle, for example, there are two versions of the new Nissan GTR and three versions of the BMW M3. Of course they have different variations of age, power, speed, etc, but they are not vastly different from each other. The only thing that really separates them is whether they can be works converted or not, but lets be honest, you really want to works convert all your cars anyway. Considering some of the missing NFS favourites, there doesn’t appear to be a particularly good case for the inclusion of some of these vehicles, especially the totally useless tier 4 cars. For those foolish enough to have played “NFS Undercover”, that one game’s perk was the awesome vehicle list, which is just not as good in Shift I’m afraid.



The drifting is really hard. It’s not all simply track racing in Shift as you can still do drift events, the only reprise from track racing mind. Although it is good when you get it right, and there is not many of them, the drifting events are really really tough. The same mechanics of the drifting will be vaguely familiar with NFS veterans, however they have made this a lot more realistic, and just like everything in real life, it’s much harder. The steering and throttle are so insanely delicate and if you put the tiniest amount of either in too much it will spin, instantly. Even going in straight line, even in 4th gear, it’s really tough to keep your vehicle from spinning, and if you are in a high powered vehicle, car control becomes impossible. Your line, angle and speed into the corner also have to spot on perfect or the entire remainder of the course is buggered. You simply cannot make even one mistake and it’s just far too hard to get it 100% perfect, and if it is not your in for a hug with the crash barrier. The tracks don’t help either as some of them are a ludicrous maze of chicanes, tyre walls and hair pin bends. It’s a lot more realistic, yes, but at the cost of having 20 goes at each event and it generally frustrating you into boredom makes you occasionally wish they had simply left this one out. The key is smoothness, throttle control and never ever using a powerful vehicle (seriously, don’t ever upgrade your drifter too much, you wont be able to handle it), despite how tempting it will often be. Fortunately, there are so many points, stars and rewards in general available elsewhere you can simply just not do them at all and still progress through the game just fine. That does kinda defeat the point though and, although it is satisfying despite the extreme difficulty, I did think it could have given you a bit more of an easier time with it.



Several cars are a bit too “twitchy”, “slidey” and “skiddy”. Apologies for using words that don’t exist but its quite frustrating trying to drive some of these cars. It seems like several vehicles, no matter how much you tune them or fiddle with their handling you can never really truly sort them completely. Several cars will still fling the back out wildly or understeer into a wall no matter what you do. The works converted BMW M3 is a good example of this, as it is ludicrously tail happy, constantly, and no matter how much downforce you add, how much you deflate your tyres or how much you stiffen the suspension it will still be a nightmare to drive. It literally feels like it’s constantly driving on sheet ice. Any tuning you do will be futile and furthermore, are works converted racing vehicles not supposed to eliminate such handling difficulty? Isn’t that the point of slick tyres and spoilers? Do you see the grid of the Japanese GT Championship or Le Mans sliding and skidding round every corner? In Shift’s defense this is what modern racing cars are like, as every conceivable tiny aspect has to be working in conjunction with every other part, otherwise it will simply spin off the track. It’s the difference between “Mclaren” and “Force India” in the Formula 1 world championship, but several cars will make your tuning efforts feel so futile. Most vehicles you will probably manage just fine and some feel very planted and predictable, such as the Mitsubishi Evo, Nissan GTR, Dodge SRT10 Viper and Audi R8, but quite a few will drive you mad. For example, the Subaru Impreza has the most appalling brakes and understeers like a b***h, no matter how much you tune it. The Corvette Z06, although one of the best cars in the game, will be ridiculously tail happy until you add loads of downforce, but it will seriously effect the top speed, and the Lamborghini Murcielago has a serious “twitchyness” problem, making it a real handful and tough to keep on bumpy track. Nothing you can tune on any of these cars is going to make much difference to its handling, whilst still being able to use it in a race. It is possibly down to my crapness at tuning, but I know a lot about cars and how they handle, and besides, I have spent hours tweaking and fine tuning every conceivable component for it to make no difference at all. HINT: whenever you works convert a car, don’t ever use the “quick tune” option for your car as it will seriously muck up it’s handling. Always use “detailed tuning”, press “L3” to switch everything to default settings and simply make small adjustments to these settings, if needed at all. On some vehicles, though, you are wasting your time.



There’s no where to practise. The tracks are so variable you really want some practise space before you race, to get used to the track, figure out its tricky corners, its breaking zones or, if you have just been fiddling with your cars set-up, to figure out if it’s all working in conjunction with each other or if it is now uncontrollable. But there is no option to do this. If you want to practise on a track you have to race on it, full on with all opponents, whether you like it or not. It’s kind of irritating especially when tweaking your cars set-up, as you are not really ready to race, that’s the whole point of experimenting with the handling of your vehicle. I fiddled with the stiffness of the suspension on my BMW M3 only to find out in the race that it was far too stiff and the car simply bounced off the track every time it went over bump. I would rather have found this out by practicing, not in a full on race. Shift does compensate for this by having a racing line on the track with breaking zones, and the fact that everything rewards you whether you suck or not, but I reckon having an option to do some warm up laps or something is not to much to ask.



You win cars throughout the career mode, but you can’t use them. Yet another bizarre decision in the way this game rewards you is that while going through your career you will, amongst other things, unlock several cars as prizes. These include a “Falken Mustang GT”, a “Le Mans Audi R8”, a racing “Porsche 911 GTS”, the BMW M3 GT (the car on the box), a “Maserati MC12 GT” and various other high powered exclusive vehicles that you would love to have at your disposal in the career mode. But, as a lot of things in this game, you simply can’t. You can use them in the “quick race” mode but that’s it. Why? Yet again, why would it have been so difficult to allow you the use of these cars in career mode? What’s stopping this? They would be of use to you in career mode. “Quick Race” does not really serve any purpose, other than winning some extra cash, and has nothing to do with the career mode, so why did they have to give you this limitation? What makes it worse is that you can’t works convert an Audi R8, Aston Martin DB9, Porsche 911 or the 2009 BMW M3 in career mode, so it rewards you with works converted versions of these cars that you can not convert or use in career mode. Why could they not allow you to simply works convert these cars in the sodding career mode, rather than rewarding you with something you can’t really use? It is utterly incomprehensible as to why they would do this, almost as though Slightly Mad Studios were being deliberately obtuse. Again, I may be in a minority here as you do get to race them, but I just reckon it’s yet another strange decision in this games production.



You can’t view your vehicle how you want too. This is admittedly a “nit pick”, but I don’t care as it still bugged me. You can’t control the view of your vehicles in your garage, or anywhere at all in fact. If you have just spent hours customising your car with awesome visuals, wheels and body kit etc and want to look at it, your only option is a weird tilted orbit of your vehicle, that shows it through various angles that don’t really show it that well. Why would it have been so difficult to allow you control of the camera view? Another odd decision.


Conclusion:

If you like cars, there is a lot to like here. There is loads of fast paced edge of your seat racing, loads of cars, loads of tuning, lots of customising, lots of tracks and it will deliver a seriously rewarding career mode for those who enjoy the thrill of turning road cars into snarling speed machines. The sound is an assault on the senses and it will deliver the most amazing thrill of speed you will have ever experienced. The game will also accommodate almost any driver of any experience and help you as often as you want it, or don’t want it to. It does a lot of things well, but rather expectantly it does things badly: the vinyls and cars are noticeably more limited than previous games, you cant mirror your vinyl’s, which really is proper stupid and annoying, the drifting borders to finely on “too hard to bother with”, there’s some odd decisions in the car line up, you cant upgrade or tune the best cars in the game (tier 4 cars), several cars are very “twitchy” and “slidey”, no matter how much you tune them and generally some really odd decisions and pointless thought processes that they really should have contemplated a lot more. As a whole though “Slightly Mad Studios” have done the most important parts very well and as a result, have made a really decent NFS game, but with a few cons that stop it being perfect. It will inevitably put off the hardcore fans, as there is no street racing or free roam aspects, but I certainly didn’t care, and I’m confident next years title will return to the streets, as that seems to be EA’s thinking at the moment, one on, one off etc. If you like cars and racing then this is a “must” for purchase at the moment. How does it stack up against the competition? There is not really a lot of competition to be honest, however, it easily better than any previous NFS game and much better than Midnight Club: LA, although they are much older games to be fair. Race Driver: Grid is really good, if slightly simplistic and short, and although Shift is very similar to Grid, it expands on a lot of areas that Grid doesn’t, I suppose, ultimately making it the best racing game available right now. At least until Gran Turismo 5 comes out, that is. CA.


Summary:


Is it user-friendly/easy to get into? – 8.0

Very easy and simple menus throughout. Will accommodate all drivers of all skill levels and technical knowledge. Will underline the joys of the career racing driver. Couple of unclear menu choices and missing customising options though.


Is the story any good? – 0.0

There isn’t one, but it doesn’t need it.


How does it look? – 9.0

Won’t exactly pop your eye balls with visual brilliance (but what racing game can?) but tracks and cars look really good, with lots of details.


How does it sound? – 10.0

No music, but a full on attack on your ears, through roaring engines and screaming tyres, without any SFX ever sounding poor. Any car enthusiast will fully appreciate.


Is it good to play? – 8.5

Exciting and seriously exhilarating. The sensation of speed is mind blowing. Lots to upgrade and customise, but less than previous games, you can’t touch the really fast metal (tier 4 cars) and several cars will be impossible to drive and un-tuneable.


When will I get bored? – 9.0

It gives you far too much reward for your efforts, but if you want to win all races and get all trophies then there’s a hell of a lot of racing here for you. The fact that you won’t have to however, kinda takes away the sense of achievement.


OVERALL – 9.0

Review created by C. Armstrong.