Whoever Wins, We Lose

So I haven't blogged in a few days.

Sue me.

Cleaning your entire house for a BBQ where you get insulted by your friend doesn't do itself. I also watched a load of 24. More on that later.

This is going to be pretty quick fire because I want to play some Bionic Commando as I need to review it at the weekend.

Speaking of Bionic Commando, I have an issue with a lot of modern videogame music. Most of it is insipid orchestral rubbish or the most derivative guitar/techno silliness ever committed to a DVD. There are four exceptions; Halo, Clamato Fever from SSF2HDR, anything by Jesper Kydd and anything associated with Bionic Commando and Bionic Commando Rearmed.

When Grin did Rearmed they enlisted their composer, Simon Viklund, to redo the NES soundtrack and bring it back up to date. I don't use the word perfect a lot (other to describe anything I do) but Viklund's work is perfect. There is no other way to describe it. You can't write a normal review of it because it would be one word long.

Perfect.

Anyone that says otherwise is lying.

Simon Viklund has also done the soundtrack to Grin's Bionic Commando that just came out. Again he has taken the soundtrack and had another crack at it.

Guess what?

Perfect.

The main theme has been given a hauntingly beautiful piano treatment on the frontend and last night I had the most amazing fight with some pumping battle music. In the latter quarter of the game you are put into a hall with two levels, a big ceiling, lots of cover, grenades and rafters to swing on. By that time you have mastered the swinging and combat mechanics and the enemies that stream in are just toys to play with. I was swinging everywhere, dropping grenades on fools and chaining zip combos into dudes while the most awesome music ever plays.

Go buy either of the Bionic Commando games, grab a few beers, crank your surround sound and soak it in. When your angry suburban neighbour comes round and mouths off about it being too loud, don't knock that fool out like usual. Put your arm round him and make him sit with you as you play. Give him a beer. Be there for him as he cries with joy. Then listen to him through the wall as he goes home and beats his wife because nothing she has ever done was as life defining as what he just experienced.

Speaking of Grin, Terminator Salvation drops this week (in the UK) and despite the terrible reviews, I am excited for it. The fastest way to my heart outside of Corona is a game with a cover mechanic. I have worked on three games with a cover mechanic and I love me some blind fire. I'm not going anywhere with this, I'm just excited s'all.

Next up, IGN just put up a super positive preview of Aliens vs. Predator. Let us gather around and read it together. Tell your partner that you'll be back later, you need to soak this in.

Back to 24.

If Jack Bauer or Keifer Sutherland are reading this, I will make your game for you. I understand that twenty minute sequences in grey corridors is not what you are about. I understand that the game will need about 50 different mechanics and each level will be no longer than 5 minutes. I get it.

24 is a difficult game to make. It is completely unlike any normal game. Levels would not last half an hour and Jack would shoot a maximum of 20 dudes in the entire game. Not in the first five minutes. You would need to create good torture and interrogation mechanics. And driving. And some kind of RTS interface as you play Bill Buchanan directing field ops.

I have spent a lot of time thinking about this recently as I have been binging on 24. It is one of the reasons I lie awake at night not sleeping.

Anyway, I'm done. Bionic Commando time.