Does Homefront keep you at home playing?

You wake up one morning. It’s a day just like any other. You look out your window and view a humvee as it rumbles down your street. You see the overgrown vegetation that took over you local sports store. Suddenly a knock at your door draws your attention. You reach for the knob then….

BAM! It dawns on you: “Home is where the war is”.

Homefront grabs the player and thrusts them into a world most would rather leave unexplored. From the opening scene the message is sent that this is a battle worth fighting. The game exposes the atrocities of a totalitarian occupation as well as the adaptation of a nation changed for the worse. Nothing is more emotionally engaging than fighting on your own soil, and that’s Homefront’s greatest strength.

The game play is playable but uninspired. Seldom were there any innovations. Most of the time you moved at a snail’s pace because your allies got their feelings hurt if you tried going on alone. It often felt that any innovations in the game were just something the developer thought was cool at the time. For example towards the end of the game the player is given control of a C-130 gunship. This lasts less than a minute… Another example is around the halfway mark you are given control of a “Little Bird” helicopter. However, for being the climax of the game it is uninspired and is annoying to play.

Homefront’s multiplayer is fun, but gets old. Yes it’s fun to defend a position until you’re out of ammo. However the game is plagued by snipers. It suffers from sudden death almost immediately after spawn and causes major problems for the player.

Homefront’s story is amazing. The settings, and the sound, all prove themselves. Homefront’s focus was misplaced and that’s its greatest weakness.

Boys volleyball dreams of regionals

Currently, the word that is being thrown around by the RB varsity volleyball team is “regionals”. The team’s main goal is to finally win a regional title. It would be the first in school history and would be a landmark for RB.

Boys’ varsity volleyball is being coached by Mr. Bonarigo while sophomores are being coached by Jonathon Gorny. Both teams have promising futures, Varsity being lead by Juan Gomez and Elliot Louthen and Sophomores Richie Green and Joe Sauer.

Right side hitter for the varsity team, Junior Ben Bergstrom,  hopes to beat Morton, who has been a “consistent competitor and has beaten us several times.” He also hopes the team works hard because “We have a chance at competing with every team in our conference.” he commented “I think we have a real chance at conference and regional’s this year.”

While on the sophomore front, team leader Richie Green has set his goals as “To improve and become a better player for varsity.” Coach Jonathon Gorny especially wants the sophomore front to become some-what of a training ground for soon-to-be varsity players.

“My hope does not lie in wins and losses but in the player’s potential.” said Gorny.

Sophomore player, Kyle Perfect, has said that he wants to have an above 500 team, which if the team rallies together is more than possible.

The Bulldogs do not exactly have an easy season ahead of them but with all the hard work and practice they are receiving they definitely are going to put up a fight. Senior and team captain Juan Gomez says “Go Bulldogs!”

Borderlands – the unknown Game of the Year

With Call of Duty, Modern Warfare 2, and Left for Dead 2 scheduled for November release dates, many other first person shooters aren’t getting much press. Every year, a few staggeringly good games get overshadowed by more popular games that receive almost all of the press coverage. Borderlands, Gearbox’s new RPS (Role Playing Shooter) is an incredible game that has been overlooked by many players in lieu of many other highly anticipated shooters. Borderlands is available on the PC, Xbox 360, and PlayStation 3.

Borderlands is an incredibly unique experience that combines a first person shooter and a role playing game. Although many comparisons have been made to Fallout 3, Borderlands fully captures the essence of both genres.

The graphics were not engineered to look realistic, but have an almost cartoonish effect. The graphics make use of a technique called cell shading and fit with the presentation of the game. Although they definitely don’t look spectacular in screenshots, they are quite impressive on an actual TV.

Players follow one of four characters, all with different strengths, who are treasure hunters searching for alien loot in the desert wasteland of Pandora. As the story progresses, the characters delve deeper into the wasteland in search of “the vault,” a location said to house legendary alien treasure. Although there is a main story line, with quests that eventually lead to the conclusion of the story, the world of Pandora is entirely open and players can explore as they see fit.

The world of Pandora houses many creatures and enemies that are trying to keep you from progressing towards the treasure. As a shooter, the game incorporates a typical screen layout and the standard shooter controls. However what sets Borderlands apart from other shooters is the diversity in weaponry. There are over seventeen million different guns in the game. Yes, you read that right, 17,000,000. Granted, the guns are randomized from different parts, but the developers took special care into making every weapon model unique. It is incredibly unlikely that players will ever see the same gun twice.

The game incorporates a loot system similar to many RPG’s. Players of games like World of Warcraft and the Diablo series will be right at home with the loot system. Guns are indeed numerous, but Gearbox has made it incredibly easy to compare the guns and quickly select which ones are upgrades to what a player may currently be carrying.

Borderlands interface is set up around quests. Players may progress through the main story line or complete many of the side quests available for extra weapons, cash, or just plain fun. These quests are incredibly fun alone, but even more fun with friends.  Borderlands features two player split screen cooperative play, and four player cooperative online play. Both the split screen and online coop are of a “drop in, drop out,” style meaning that players can leave or join games at any time and the other player’s game is not affected. All loot gained while playing with friends can be taken back to the single player game.

The enemies are vast and are incredibly smart. Gearbox took a lot of time to carefully make every enemy behave in a different way then the rest. The enemies also become more frequent and difficult when more players are present. The difficulty of enemies scales as the player progresses and levels up. Borderlands definitely isn’t a cakewalk, but it isn’t so difficult to the point where it gets frustrating.

Although the story isn’t really anything to speak of, execution is where Borderlands really shines. The game is almost flawless and really feels like a full first person shooter and a full role playing game. I’ve heard that there are some framerate issues on large scale battles on the PS3 and 360, but I have encountered nothing to date. All the weapons feel right, and the controls are neither sluggish, nor too responsive. The unique graphical presentation really fits with the style of the game, and the humorous writing is a nice touch.

Borderlands is a gem of a game, and I would fully recommend this game to anyone that’s a fan of either shooters or RPG’s. It’s a shame such a good game has been mostly unnoticed. I’d give this game a 9.5/10, and although I haven’t finished it yet, I plan on putting many more hours into it. This game really immerses the player into the environment and is a blast to play. Although the game is much more fun with friends, it is a blast single player as well. All in all, Borderlands is really a complete package, and I think it will be able to compete with highly anticipated games such as Modern Warfare 2 for game of the year.

Dragon Rising doesn’t rise to the top

Few PC shooters truly capture the brutality of war. Many have tried but have fallen flat thanks to graphical limitations and complicated controls. Operation Flashpoint Dragon Rising (a multiplatform shooter released on PC, Xbox 360, and PS3) however does not. Operation Flashpoint is set in fictional 2010 where China has invaded the Russian province of Skira (in reality an island off the coast of Alaska named Kiska) in order to obtain the islands coveted oil fields. Russia, which fears all out war on its eastern border, asks the United States to recapture the island on its behalf.

The game gives you that quick back story, along with a history of Skira and then leaves you and your squad to fend for yourselves. This is something that adds subtly to the realism, because real life soldiers do not know why they do what they do only that their objective must be accomplished.

Your only weapons on hand are an assault rifle and a sidearm. These weapons are useless at ranges longer than 40 meters, so a planned assault from a mile away is almost impossible. You do get a pair of binoculars, which are a life saver, enabling you to observe the enemy from greater distances.

Something else you will discover right away is that the map is overwhelmingly large. The island spans 32 kilometers and you don’t have any form of transportation. Your closest objective is two kilometers away; a distance that traveled on foot takes close to forty-five minutes in real time to traverse. The game does do a great job of making these treks extremely intense!

For example, after I destroyed a Surface-to-Air missile launcher I began a 950 meter walk to disable a radar generator. I sprinted gleefully, and confidently, over my triumph thinking that I was unstoppable. The sad reality was that I led my squad to their deaths. As I neared my objective an enemy sniper wounded me. As I bled out screaming “Medic” I was forced to watch as my squad scrambled to try and protect themselves.

As I watched the loading screen, I changed my tactics and eliminated the enemy far more effectively. However some things were very disappointing.

The game concentrates on realism, and the truth is, it’s not executed very well. The rate at which you switch weapons is extremely sluggish; it makes you wonder if your character tethered his weapons to his feet. Another main gripe is the abysmal vehicle controls. Your vehicles perform pathetically and you will indeed crash periodically which will give your position away to the incredibly smart AI). Finally the game ramps up the difficulty at the most inappropriate times. You will periodically see your enemy with more soldiers, weapons and air support. This also takes away from the “realism” when you’re on a “stealthy” recon mission and you are automatically eradicated by a helicopter. This makes the game almost impossible even on easy difficulty. Operation Dragon Rising is an ambitious title with a lot of good things about. Sadly it cannot compare with the more fun titles out there. If you want a military shooter that sticks to real life you should get this.

Overall the concept is amazing; dive into the boots of a marine and fight for your life in a realistic fashion. Trust me; you get a lot of bang for your buck. However, throughout the game you can’t help but feel the developers could’ve worked a little bit harder on the controls, and game play instead of the graphics.

6/10