Month: June 2007

First of all I really like the game.  The developers have created a solid game with that all important “fun factor” by keeping the physics believable to the point that you think you are driving a F1 car, but at the same time the physics are forgiving enough to allow most gamers to enjoy the game.  I think if anyone ever put a console F1 game on the market that had ultra realistic features; it would die on arrival, with only a handful of dedicated gamers making a purchase.  That sort of game would get ripped by the mainstream gaming press as unapproachable to most gamers.

F1CE overcomes this challenge by including a solid physics engine, and a whole host of driving aids.  You can really set the options to your individual preferences.  For example, my oldest son keeps all aids on, and damage off.  I normally have all aids off with the exception of stability, which I currently have set to weak to give me a little help with throttle controls, especially out of most turns.  Of course playing with damage on has shot my race completion percentage to hell and back.  I think I currently failing to complete 15% of the races I enter, and I am only scoring around 1.8 points per race.  Ouch!  I get a sick feeling in my stomach when I crash from P6 on the last lap of a 10 lap race.

So far I have spent most of my time in the Quick Race and Time Trail modes, but I starting to move to the Grand Prix mode which has a couple of really nice features – saves and a new “evolution” tuning/setup process.  If you do not have enough time to practice, qualify, and race in one sitting, you can save and pick up where you left off.  I have not tried to save in-race; I have not run long enough races to see if this is something you do on the track or in the pits.  I will have to play around with it to see exactly when it is available.  The “Race Car Evolution” process gets you to run a series of laps during a race weekend’s practice session to help setup your car based on your performance with different fuel loads and tires (new vs. wear).  I honestly have not played around with this feature enough to get my money’s worth, but not for lack of trying.  I usually crash several times during a practice session and have to start over.  With each crash, you lose 10 minutes from the 60 allotted for practice, so going balls out and crashing is not really encouraged.  The “evolution” concept is nice; will write more about it later after I can keep it together enough to get some value out of the feature.

So far the racing action is pretty solid, without the perception of cheating catch-up type logic.  If I mess up, I will probably not catch up with the front runners, but I may be able to regain a few spots, assuming I am running at a faster clip than the back-markers (fairly common).  The fun part is trying to push the limit in order to catch up, but this usually ends up with me in a wall.  It would be nice to have varying degrees of damage (all or nothing is fairly rough).  The SIXAXIS controller works pretty well with this game, but right now I am not coordinated enough to make it happen; need more practice with this and I am surprised that I have not read more about the feature.

If you turn on most of the driving aids, and turn off damage, running the default 3-lap Quick Race is fairly close to what most gamers would consider arcade style racing.  I have only won a couple of races, both at Indy, with damage off.  I think I would do better (maybe not great) with damage on and more laps, but 3-lap races causes me to push harder and do more stupid tactics, often resulting in crashes, because I feel like I have to do something shady in order to go from 22nd to 1st with a limited number of laps.

The knockout qualifying format is a blast, and for this gamer, qualifying well actually matters.  Bad things tend to happen when I am at the back of the pack, but I feel a little calmer (I can make things happen without going crazy) if I am closer to the front.

I could probably write a lot more, but Montreal qualifying just started (real life, not F1CE).  I suppose next steps are for me to actually get better and maybe compare some lap times to the actual 2006 results.  All in all, I still highly recommend this game to simulation fans looking for a good console F1 racing experience.

Sometime this weekend, Akismet, our wonderful little spam filter, will hit the 5000 mark for number of spam comments blocked from the Recycle Bin. As of this morning, we are sitting on 4,899. Oh the thrill and horror of it all! Exciting times, no?

I had a long day yesterday, with an early morning production build to support at work. You would think that would translate into a great night of sleep, but nope, I have been up for a while now. Too bad, because I am exhausted. I guess four nights in a row of beer will do that to someone on the bad side of 35.

I watched a little of the Cavs/Spurs game last night; only because it was in HD, but the game did not seem that interesting. I do not know what the NBA is going to do to get back the casual fan. They need something compelling to happen soon, specifically in the finals, but longer term, the league needs go do something because the LeBron factor did not suck me into the game last night. If it were not for HD, I would not have watched any of the game.

I wonder if the search of Vick’s house turned up a regular pet cemetery. I cannot believe how silent the league and the Falcons have been on the issue. I know they cannot be judge and jury (that is the job of the media and us blog writers), but smoke equals fire.

Speaking of the Falcons, I noticed that they picked up my draft post, but I doubt you will see them pick up any of my comments about Vick. Seriously, he is toast.

I hope to have some more time to game this weekend. I have not touched the PS3 as much as I would have liked to this week, I have not spent any time with WoW, and I have not picked up the latest PSP firmware (I think it is out now). I really need to figure out this media streaming thing from my laptop to the PS3 and over to the PSP. I think I am going to be in the UK again the early part of July, and it would be awesome to access some content from my PS3 and PC.

Happy Friday!

I spent some more time with Resistance tonight, and let me tell you that it was not pretty.  Oil and water is pretty much the best description of me with FPS.  I am just not coordinated enough to handle the controls.  Of course a belly full of beer probably does not help; at least that has been my excuse the last few nights.

I did manage to do a little better with the game once I figured out that I need to slow things down, use the sniper zoom function, and make general use of the crouch button.  I am having a hell of a time with the controls; moving with the left analog and looking around with the right analog stick is sucking the life out of me.  I guess I need to keep working at it, look at a strategy guide, and maybe see if I can find a lock on cheat.

Slowing things down does help, but when three or more Chimera coming at me (or holding back waiting to gun me down), it has been pretty damn hard to not get blown away.  More health pickups are needed; they could be there, I just do not know how to find them.

Second impressions?  I still love the alternative history.  The graphics are impressive; lots of detail and the environments are pretty convincing.  I find the game plenty difficult, even on the easy level, but my inability to master the controls is a contributing factor to my struggles with the game.  I am not a FPS expert, but the AI seems sound.  The Chimera do their part to hide, take cover, yet still be aggressive.

The question for me is one of fun vs. work.  Should I have to “work” so much just to play the game?  I assume the game will get harder as I progress (if I progress), so I may hit a point of diminishing returns pretty quickly.  I have a feeling that this is no way that I can get $60 of value from this game, but I will probably keep at it through the weekend to see if I can get down the controls.

Last night was drink with the boss night, tonight was drink with a lot of other people night, and tomorrow is drink with some other guys night. Lots of drinking means not much PS3’ing (or WoW’ing). Maybe I will get in some late night (or early morning gaming), but for now, lets just call it a night and see if we can get some new content on Thursday. Terrapin Rye Pale Ale is a very naughty mistress.

Last night I download the GT HD demo; free is good, right?  I was not sure what to expect because I have not read any reviews, comments, or anything about the demo other than it was free.  Apparently at one point in time it was going to be a regular GT game in HD, with downloadable content (pay as you go or for the options, tracks, cars that you want).

The download took a good three hours.  I started at 8:30PM and at 11:30PM the download manager indicated that the download was 98% finished.  However I was done for the night, so I went to bed.  I am using a standard g-band wireless setup; have not calculated if three hours was on target or not.  This is a little off topic, but the system gets pretty hot if you leave it on all night.  I have my PS3 in an entertainment center, but there is plenty of space around the PS3.

Back to the game.  It takes 3-5 minutes to install, and then you are ready to play.  The game automatically connects you to the network (presumably to record lap times).  The game is pretty barebones, which is to be expected with a demo.  You start with a single track in Time Trail mode.  Your initial car is a less than impressive Suzuki cappuccino ’95.  As you meet time objectives (I think for each car) you open up additional cars, a drift trail mode, and a reverse version of the regular track.

I only ran one time trail, and completed the lap around 1:45′, which was good for 900 or so in the rankings.  I have no idea out of how many, and I assume the game used some sort of PS3 step or network id for my user info because the game did not prompt me for one.  Coming in under the 2 minute objective opened a Mazda Eunos Roadster ’89, but it is time to get back to work.

The only other comment at this point is that the game looks beautiful in 1080p.

At this point there is not much to write, but I wanted to get something down before I called it a night.  First, the background story is fairly compelling; the alternate history seems reasonable to me.  Second, the graphics in 720p are outstanding.  Third, I am too damn old, slow, and uncoordinated to play this sort of game.

I spent about 15 minutes with this game and just could not get the controls.  I cannot get the look around with the right analog stick system down.  I got slaughtered a handful of times before I made it to the second area.  It was really more of the same with the second area, so I called it a night.  All that on easy level.

I think I am going to need some sort of auto aim or auto enemy lock feature to succeed with Resistance.  I will have to read the manual tomorrow (when all else fails, right?) or maybe look for some sort of FAQ with some control setup tips.

If there was ever a reason to rent a game, this one screamed “rent me.”  I made the purchase because there is not a whole lot in the PS3 library that I find attractive right now, and because the game received fairly positive reviews.  All that is well and good, but I have never been a fan of FPS, and I am not into online games or military type stuff.  Sounds like I set myself up for failure with this one.  I am not about to judge the game after 15 minutes, but I hope I can get the controls down fairly quickly so I do not feel like I threw $60 + tax down the drain.

No, I have not gone to the dark side and signed up for a subscription based rental service, but I did find an interesting comparison of the most popular services at Gaming Nexus (click here for a direct link to the quoted article). Apparently GPlay is the top service. I just do not see myself paying for one of these rental services any time soon, but then again, I never thought I would pay a monthly fee for WoW.

The nice thing about a Sunday morning without a Grand Prix  race is that I do not have to throw the entire family into sin and disarray by coming up with an excuse to miss church.  Of course I am kidding; well partially.  There are some F1 circuits that I enjoy more than others, but today I do not have to worry about that all important decision.

Prayers for rain have been answered, well sort of answered.  Before yesterday, I am not sure when we last had rain, and while it did not rain much, every little bit helps to get some of the South GA forest fire smoke out of the air.  The Columbus, GA area is about 10 inches behind for the year.  Not very good.

You may have noticed (or maybe not) that I have been writing a lot more over the last 10 or so days.  There are a couple of reasons.  First, I have been feeling like crap of late, which has somehow given me a little more time to write.  Second, getting a PS3 (and the process of lead up to the purchase) has given me a whole host of things to discuss.  PS3 vs. Xbox 360, Blu-Ray vs. HD-DVD, PS3 games, and more.  Longtime readers probably appreciate game related ramblings more than my diatribes on the Braves, Falcons, and Bulldogs.

I plan to put together some more posts on my PS3 impressions, and my game purchases.  As a teaser, Formula One is a ton of fun; the Six Axis controls are interesting with the game.  I have not opened Resistance or Elder Scrolls; M-rated games have to be played after the kids go to be.  I hate that the controllers can only be charged while the PS3 is in use (i.e. while I am playing a game or watching a movie).  I am not sure what to make of PSX and PS2 up converting, and the same goes for DVD movies.

Happy Sunday!

As a counter point to the Blu-Ray post below, today’s Circuit City circular lists a Toshiba HD-DVD player for $299.99 (original price was $399.99), and includes five free HD-DVDs (after a mail in rebate). The Xbox 360 HD-DVD attachment costs $199.99; throw in the price of an Xbox 360 and you are at least $200 over the cost of the Toshiba stand alone unit (really depends on which Xbox 360 system).

Is there a point to the comparison? Probably not, but to me it shows that if you want to go HD-DVD, there is no reason to go with an Xbox 360. If you want to go Blu-Ray, you are better off going with a PS3. This is very similar to how the PS2 helped the DVD format achieve market success. However, there are two key differences. First, the price of a PS3 is a lot different than the price of a PS2. Second, the quality of the PS3 Blu-Ray player is far superior to the quality of the original PS2 DVD player.

Now that I have a PS3, I am more in tune with all things PS3 and Blu-Ray.  Today’s Circuit City circular lists a Sony Blu-Ray player for $799.99 (original price was $999.99) and includes three free Blu-Ray titles.  I have no idea how this unit compares to the player included in the PS3, but the gap between the two is only $200.  Unless the stand alone player is far superior to the PS3, it makes sense for someone that wants a Blu-Ray player to go with a PS3.  Not sure how much longer that will be the case.

I am not ready to make any proclamations about the greatness of this game (or the lack there of) because I have only played the game for a few minutes.  I will say that I picked up this game for three reasons.  First, most reader feedback on various boards seems very positive.  Second, I am always interested in a sold racing simulation.  Finally, there are just not a lot of compelling options in the PS3 library right now.  If you are not a fan of racing simulations, I am not sure why you would bother with this game, much less write a negative review.

With that out of the way, I think this game is very accessible to fans of arcade racing.  Sure, if you are looking for Gran Turismo style racing and a variety of car types, you are going to be disappointed.  After all, this is a fully licensed F1 game.

So far I have only messed around with the quick race mode, which allows you to easily jump in and start racing.  You get to pick circuits and drivers based on the 2006 season.  You also get to pick a variety of driver aids, AI difficulty, damage, mechanical failures, and probably a few others that I cannot remember to mention.  This should make the game easily accessible to most gamers.

Case in point, I ran a three lap race at Indy as Scott Speed, with all driver aids turned on, and easily came in first after starting from the last position.  This victory opened a classic Ford Lotus (I do not remember the year), which is available for the time trail mode.

Next up, Joshua, my eight year old son, ran the same race as one Michael Schumacher; he managed to finish fifth.

I then changed some of the options; I adjusted some of the driver aids, I turned on damage, enabled fuel and tire use consumption, setting up Scott Speed for an eight lap Indy race.  I rallied from back of the pack to a solid fifth place before my disastrous pit stop half way through the race.  My stop took a slow 18 seconds; I had some wing damage, and I did not quickly respond to the pit sequence (you are presented with a series of buttons to press).  I left pit lane in 15th place, but I managed to pull off a seventh place finish after some, shall we say, overly aggressive driving.  The end result was a lot of fun.

I know some of you are going to think this is strange feature to talk about, but there is a suburb mode that allows you to watch an AI race.  It looks like you can also save a race (or maybe a reply).  I am not sure how to do this, because I could not find a replay option when I looked for it in the middle of one of my races.  The graphics in this mode are just balls out impressive – you can change from driver to driver, and are afforded eight different views including some impressive side-pod views.  The level of graphical detail, which hints at the game’s excellent physics engine, is amazing to watch.  You see drivers heads moving with every bump and turn on the track, and even the reflective visors display what is going on around the driver.  Good stuff.  I doubt I will sit around watching the AI race, but it was a very interesting distraction.

I am not even at the preverbal tip of the iceberg with this one, but from a fun factor standpoint, this one looks promising.

I finally entered the new so-called next generation of gaming by purchasing a PS3 from Circuit City online.  I use their “pick it up” option for major purchases, and Circuit City was running a deal where you get a free Sony Wireless Six Axis controller.  I also ordered a Sony Memory Card Adaptor; figured I would need it to transfer my PS2 saves.  Final tally was $658.03 including tax.

Circuit City had a crap collection of PS3 games; nothing I wanted.  I also could not quickly locate the Blu-Ray movies, so I quickly took my goodies and left the store.  The Circuit City mall complex also features a Toys R Us, an EBGames, and a GameStop.  I figured I would try Toys R Us first, because I hate getting repackaged games from EB and GS.  I left Toys R Us almost $200 poorer with Resistance, Elder Scrolls, and Formula One.

After getting the system home, I disconnected the PS2 and started unpacking the PS3.  My first impressions of the system are great packaging job by Sony, and the system itself is solid as a brick; a super sexy brick.  You may laugh at the packaging comment, but that sort of thing matters to me when I am sending several hundred bucks.  Reassuring?  Maybe.  Thankfully my HDMI cable arrived today from monoprice.com; no idea why Sony ships this system with an old fashion composite cable (cost savings no doubt).

System setup was quick and painless.  There were a few options to setup a user profile, date/time, and screen resolution – the PS3 automatically switched me to 1080i.  Next up was the network setup.  The PS3 easily located my home network, and after entering the connection info (network password), I was connected to the internet.  I was then told that I needed to update my firmware.

This particular system came with 1.51 firmware.  The system told me that 1.80 was available, and I started the update at 8:08PM.  The download was completed at 8:21PM.  Next up was accepting the end user agreement.  Applying the update took 5 minutes.  By 8:28PM, the PS3 was rebooting, ready for me to play some games.

I threw in Formula One Championship Edition, and my oldest son remarked at how nice the graphics looked.  My wife was obviously not that impressed; she said she can “make milk.”

At this point I am not going to comment on the games; that can come later with some more play time.  As it stands now, I have a lot in front of me.  How long does it take to charge the controller?  Does the controller charge while the PS3 is off?  How do I upscale my DVDs?  What sort of adaptor do I have to buy to use PS2 accessories (assuming I need them)?  What sort of DVD/Blu-Ray remote should I purchase?  How do I connect my PSP and what are the advantages of connecting the systems?  How do I transfer other media to the PS3 (i.e. iTunes music library)?  And so on and so forth.

I think I am going to need a drink.