Immediately after closing the book on Crackdown 2 I fired up Prince of Persia. After playing for only a little while I began to laugh at the irony that once again I was traversing a cell shaded land, bounding to and fro, and collecting orbs - though in Prince of Persia they were refereed to as Light Seeds.

While Crackdown 2 and Prince of Persia have those three traits in common, the games are as different as night and day. I found Prince of Persia to be a decent, at times inventive, ‘no-fault’ platformer which was somewhat enjoyable yet not entirely memorable.

The game did have it’s moments, such as when the platforming was at it’s best. In some instances getting from A to B consisted of a beautiful, flowing ballet of movements taking advantage of your special abilities and pushing you towards the edge of your seat. Sadly, these sequences were only fully realized a handful...

I could go on about Crackdown 2’s shortcomings and disappointments, but despite all the issues hampering the game I still managed to have a great time with it. That has to count for something, right?

Although Crackdown 2’s controls felt clunky & dated, the missions repetitive & shallow, the map unnecessarily frustrating, and the nagging ‘been there, done that’ feeling I still stuck with the game for hours upon hours just having... well, fun. Crackdown 2 is a sandbox game where it’s an absolute joy to just jump in feet first and kick the sand around for a while.

New additions like the wingsuit & the helicopter as well as more orbs than you can stuff in your agency armor kept me in the game long after I completed the (and I use this term loosely) main story. Crackdown 2 is an achievement hunter’s kind of game, with plenty of orbs to chase down, and goals to complete....

I’m not going to lie, I hated Red Dead Redemption when I first started playing it. I thought the game was slow, boring and that people in the west talked way too much. My plan was to blow through the single player campaign as quickly as possible and then dump the game as soon as I was finished. Somewhere along the way though, out in the Wild West, things changed for me.

I think it was a combination of getting comfortable with the controls (horse riding was awkward at first), the stellar voice acting, and getting hooked on the story that drew me in. Or maybe it was the incredible scenery and vistas I was traversing. Or perhaps it was the ambiance and nuances of the old west that kept me in the saddle for the long run. Whatever the case, all of these elements add up to a fantastic & engaging game that may have started with a fizzle, but ended in a bang.

Red Dead...

I'm having a hard time pegging down my impressions of Alan Wake. I certainly liked the game, and enjoyed playing it but I didn't love it quite as much as others have (looking at you CheapyD & Shipwreck).

Alan wake does a lot of things extremely well. It has interesting characters, great voice acting, fantastic writing, and a unique delivery of a truly twisted story. All of this is delivered in an episodic format with some extremely eerie ambiance ripped right out of a Hollywood thriller.

In fact, the game touts itself as a 'Psychological Action Thriller', and that description couldn't be any more on the money. There is action, there are thrills, and there is plenty of head-scratching, WTF moments to keep you glued to your TV. There are even a few startles mixed in for good measure.

Alan Wake however is not a passive experience, it's a game...

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