Rule #1: Cardio

It's not very often I talk about mobile games, mostly because I only play a baby handful and not very often, they have a tendency to drain a battery very quickly. I don't like having to recharge my phone, like ever. However, once in a while I go looking for something new and get pleasantly surprised.

Yes, it's another zombie game. Personally, I like zombies, but with the genre drowning the market for the last few years, if zombies were candy then I'd be an overweight diabetic about to lose both legs. Now that's not a pretty sight, but moving on.

It's good to something original, especially within the constraints of a mobile device. I use a Samsung galaxy S3 so controls range from a touchpad to none, but Into the Dead does very well. It's a running game where you simply move your character left and right to avoid the zombies or be eaten. As you run, the terrain changes between open fields to dense forests and those dreaded cornfields. Hit a tree or other obstacle, and you're going to glance off it or jump over it which can toss you around and throw you off track, or straight into a zombie. You can glance off zombies too if you can just scrape by them, but if you get tossed around too much, trying to keep your momentum can be difficult.

The game includes weapons, which you can pick up from flare-lit crates as you run. The load-out is random, but you only get a pistol until you unlock weapons later in the game. Firing is a simple tap on the screen and the auto-aim is very well done. Range effectiveness depends on the weapon, but the weapons feel very satisfying. Ammo is limited though, so don't go all shoot-em-up.

The game looks great with misty fields and a low sun backdrop, the zombies appear as nothing more than dark silhouettes in the background and blood soaked monsters as they get into your face. The sound is one of the best parts of the game with only the eerie sounds of nature, the moans of the undead, your panting breath and the grass crunching under your feet.

There are alternative modes to unlock by reaching certain challenges, I've yet to get all the way there and try them out, but one mode's goal is to kill as many zombies as possible while the third is a mysterious 'Hardcore' mode.

You progress by completing challenges, such as kill a zombie or run 2500m. As you complete challenges, you'll unlock more weapons. Micro-transactions are present, but like all my favourite games, not essential to the game. You earn coins depending how good your run is, and you can use them to buy everything from perks, unlock weapons early, skip challenges you're having difficulty with. The game also doesn't bombard you with ads to the point of insanity, though keep in mind that may change, it is a FREE game after all. If I get an awesome game for free, I don't mind the odd ad or two.

You can download it for iOS and Android. Did I mention it's free?

Not So Serious

Serious Sam

Not one of the most revered action heroes, nor one of the well known. Serious Sam is one of those guys with a little niche that only a handful of people get, it's a real shame he's not just a little more serious.

And that is where Serious Sam goes wrong, the humour is cheap and often just gives us a shallow chuckle. If only he actually was a little more serious then maybe we'd like him a little more, but at least for him, the game doesn't take itself seriously either.

A FPS tribute to a bygone era of monsters, monsters, and guns that shoot forever until you release the trigger or run out of ammo, whichever comes first. With over 50 enemies onscreen you may wish to consider firing that minigun for a solid minute just to put a dent in the oncoming hoard that is heading your way.

Enemies vary from the cyborg twisted humans to the undead Kleer skeletons. Enjoy facing 30ft high demons throwing balls of blazing magic and lumbering blobs that fire more rockets than a New Year's fireworks display. Aside from killing everything you see, the other half of the game is dodging the mass wall of projectiles heading your way.

Serious Sam tries to be fun, and it really can be, as long as you don't rely on plot and conherancy. I loved the series, it's a simple game with a rough difficulty curve. Right now on Steam it's $40, but if you email me at hlifehotdog.at.gmail.dot.com, you can receive a voucher for 75% off! That's bonus monies!

Offer valid until 1/5/2013.

P.S. Aplologies for the late update, was Lanning all weekend and it was awesome.

Farcry 3 Review

I've had a thing with the Farcry series. I've tried to love it on many occasions and I've always felt it can't quite reach its greatness. For the first Farcry, it was amazing when it wasn't killing my poor laptop. The feeling of running through a jungle and being able to choose how you assault the enemy. I say assault because stealth was more or less impossible with enemies seeing you from miles away through jungle, but that was the limits of AI back then.

Farcry 2 became so much prettier, despite having nothing to do with the first title, like a brother disowning you because you ain't cool enough. They definitely improved graphic and story-wise, but suffered in gameplay. With mediocre character development and wash-rinse-repeat gameplay, it became more of a challenge to avoid guard posts just so you didn't have to fight respawning guys every...single...time you came within half a mile. I was still happy when my best friend in the world died saving me, just so I didn't have to kill him at the end of the game. (Spoilers)

But all of this doesn't matter! Forget everything you've read because Farcry 3 doesn't have anything to do with those loser brothers! You, your two brothers and four other friends go skydiving over a pirate infested island and you all promptly get kidnapped and held to ransom by the psycho Vaas and his merry pirates. You manage to escape, and set out on a quest to rescue your friends that quickly turns into a personal vendetta to go all batshit crazy on everyone's ass.

Storywise, Farcry 3 is cliché and forgettable, but some of the characters are very well fleshed out. My favourite part of the story was Buck, it did such a great job of making me really, really want to kill him. The story has it's moments of greatness, but there's too much bland to really make you want to remember much of it. There are side missions, which have some humour, and you can always explore the huge free-roaming island for the WWII letters, memory cards and lost relics. I will argue that the relics weren't really 'lost', and in fact were placed there deliberately for tourists like me to find them. it felt really cheap looking for all 120 of those things and there isn't even any reward for doing so, not even an achievement. I was very sad.

The island itself is a joy to get around. It varies from deep jungle to mountain ranges and open waters with beautiful beaches. The vehicles handle well and are placed around so you won't have to walk too far on foot to find a new one when you drive the last one over a cliff. Yeah, I did that a lot. The second island was pale compared to the first, making the last half of the game less fun to play, but it can keep you hooked just long enough to finish it off, just.

The ideas for crafting were very well thought out, but poorly implemented. Crafting larger wallets, bandoliers and various other equipment is pretty easy and can be done in the first few hours of the game with the exception of the 'Extended' versions which need rare skins only unlocked through hunting side-quests. Syringe crafting was clever, but I never needed to craft most of them. Even the powerful 'Special' syringes that allow you to one-shot kill everything and 30 seconds of invulnerability I never used. I was playing on Hard and never found the need. I only ever made medical syringes and the ones that let you see animal though everything, just so I could get the drop on those pesky tigers.

It does feature a Co-op mode for up to four people, which I'm playing in split screen at the moment with my girlfriend. It's very run-of-the-mill and aside from the occasional competitive section, it's just a linear storyline, no free roaming. I haven't tried multiplayer either, but from videos I've seen it's fairly solid.

If someone would ask me to recommend Farcry 3, I would. It's not the cream of the crop, but it does get a lot of thing right. It's ever reaching closer to glory; maybe it will get there some day. Also keep an eye out for the Blood Dragon DLC coming out early next month, it's insane.

As a side note, I know this blog has been dead for a while, but I thought I'll try to do this thing weekly. I know I've said this before, but let's see how we go!