Call me crazy, but it's become apparent that some of the games I've recently been dealing with have acctually some secret hidden left wing ideas in them (being a marxist, I pick up on these things)

First of all, Red faction Guerilla, politically red usually stands for communist, and as the aim of the game is to control mars, I was instantly lead to think your a socialist or communist faction,- so, the title really shouts out to me, communism- the name red faction is very similar to the red army faction, which was a german COMMUNIST group who used guerilla tactics, it even says on the wikipedia page.

Supposed to be a wallpaper for the game, which seems a lot like propaganda

Red faction is definetely communist influenced (or at least has heavy communist undertones) you even get to use a hammer as a weapon, the hammer is one of the signs on the communist flag (the other being a sickle)

Ok, this ones probably a bit less obvious, but it's acctually Advanced wars, those who have played it may have realised the red (sometimes yellow) star on your armies equipment, the red star is also a well known symbol of communism.

it's not as strong as guerilla red faction, but the RED ARMY (considering all your army is bassically covered in red) was also the shortened name for the army of the Soviet Union

If you think about it, all your tanks are red, your symbol is a star (which is often red or yellow, both communist colours) they also have counter imperialist plots, like in Dual Strike, the 'black hole army' are going around exploiting the land for their own good, this also represents the capitalist system..

There are a few more games I could probably point out, but this blog is looking quite big at the moment, I know my sisters got me Red faction for christmas So I'm looking forward to playing it

Hey guys- you've probably noticed my recent absence.. i haven't been that well and I've just had two big coursework deadlines- although i did promise a major update to my union I think that will have to wait until tuesday night when we finally break up from school- I still have yet to do my history and english coursework which are due in monday, shouldn't be hard though..

I took the afternoon off yesterday and this morning saturday school off, over this winter break I have to study for all my exams.. but I'm probably gunna be around, it's probably likely I'll be around more since I'm at home..

Been playing a bit of Tony Hawk Pro Skater 3 on PS1 (on my PSP) - and since I'm at my Dads this weekend I've been on the Xbox a bit as well.. the usual, Cod4, L4D as well as the L4D Demo.. since there isn't much purpose to this blog I'll do a quick review of my thoughts on the L4D2 demo.

- Three short levels

- New and crazy melee weapons like the frying pan and the guitar

- New weapons and special items make a nice change

- New boss infected like the jockey and the charger

- Daylight makes a nice change to the first game

In a short conclusion your given more choices as to where to go and what items to use, however I found myself sometimes getting lost and going around in circles during the short 3 stage demo, it's definitely a huge improvement on the previous game- I'm probably going to wait for it to go down in price and hopefully get it in the new year.

I'm going to my Dads for christmas this year, so I will be gaming, hopefully tuesday afternoon.. I will be as active as ever, see you guys then.. I'll try be around as much as I can until then.. but.. if I'm not, forgive me.

Ok.. I'm sure I'm not alone here- but today whilst I was working hard at school my mum decided to have a bit of a clean up in my room and ended up throwing out all my old game boy colour and game boy advanced games and consoles.. and she didn't say a word about it- I just went in, and they wern't anywhere to be seen.

It turned out she'd sent them to the charity shop.. yeah, this includes the original game boy colour, pokemon yellow, red, saphirre and pinball.. as well as a gameboy advanced...she then has a go at me saying 'You never play them!'

It maybe true.. I haven't touched any of them in about a year, but it's the principal of just assuming that it would be ok to throw them out, I have googled some of the prices and in all it seems she's just discarded about 40 pounds worth of games and consoles.. fantastic.. and that could have bought me a couple of new Xbox games..

However, they also had some sentimental value to me, it's not like I would've sold them, let alone throw them away... so has this ever happened to you?

It seems she sarcasitcally said that she'd go back and get them from the store.. however she's just drove of now.. so she might have been being serious.. err.. the pain

~Gormo

So.. Assassins Creed bloodlines, here's my blog on it, it's yet another game which has been scored down due to being on the PSP console, as Star Wars: the force unleashed was also victimised, in my opinion.

First of all- I enjoyed the first Assassins Creed, I gave it a 7.0, but imagine having a portable version of this game with slightly lower graphics- most hardcore gamers would think it's a great idea, that's exactly what Bloodlines is, a pirtable version of the original Assassins creed, with slightly less impressive visuals.

The visuals maybe scaled down- but they're still pretty good

All the gameplay is nearly the same- you go to the Assassins bureau, collect your mission and move in, carrying out investegations and assassinations using your smooth stealth skills- you get given throwing knives, a shortsword, fists and a stab knife.

It's also a direct sequel- Altair continues his quest and you'll find yourself in ****c desert territory, aswell as being taken to a port, the water dosen't look great, but it gives the game some variation of landscape- which the first game missed.

In this part of the game you have to break into the ship and steal a manifesto

Overall the game is just as good as it's original console version- but improves on it in many ways giving us varied enviroments and a deeper insight into Altair, what makes me further 'lol' is that they gave the original game a 9.0 score... which puzzles me.

I might later do some blogs on my faviroute weapons of gaming- but for now enjoy this pretty image of Bloodlines

~Gormo

Ok, I haven't really done a normal blog in a while, so here's what's going on in my life at the minute... I'm currently at school for the next 4 weeks, then we split up and have the Christmas break.

I plan to do a mix of gaming and studying during the Christmas break- since I'm hoping to get Batman Arkham Asylum as well as Dragon Age Origins, however in January I have my 'mock exams' - they're like big tests before the real exams and will probably influence what subjects I'll take next year.

I have picked up exclusive copies of Jak and Daxter: the lost frontier- and Assassins Creed Bloodlines both on PSP- their official releases are on the 20th November, but I'll do a preview blog after play testing over this weekend.

I have exclusive access to bloodlines- a week early!

Yuna (Final Fantasy X)

Yuna is the main female character in the epic Final Fantasy X, she is a summoner from the small island of Besaid who must go on a pilgrimage to Zanarkand whilst collecting aeons to be able to beat Sin, a punishment sent by the Gods to eternally punish people for the misuse of machin, or so we think

She builds a relationship with the main male character Tidus through out the story as she looks after him when he's believed to be effected by toxin when one day he appears washed up on a beach in Besaid island and joins Yuna on her pilgrimage.

She is brave as well as compassionate throughout her journey , I can't tell you to much without giving any spoilers, but you really need to play this game if you haven't done so already- there is also a sequel to the game in which Yuna takes the main role as she hunts for spheres.

Heroine rating 4/5

Yuna is a really kind and compassionate character on the whole and really provides a lot of emotion into Final Fantasy X, overall she's definetely one of the biggest female characters in the RPG genre.

First of all, I was mentioned in this weeks weekly report for my series of blogs I've just started I'm pleased with that, appreciete all the comments on my blog and I'm just really happy to have been mentioned

Lara Croft (Tomb Raider)

Really it would be insane not to mention Lara who has featured in 9 tomb raider games which we see her adventure all over the world, from Thailand, South America and even the Antartic, her survival skills are top notch and she's not bad when using weapons as well.

Through out the series she uses pistols, shotguns, SMG's, grenades and even flamethrowers, despite the fact she is extremely rich and has a mansion here in the UK- she seeks pleasure through adventuring and solving ancient mysterys and why not if you have the money?

In Tomb Raider underworld she heads north to Norway and enters Valhalla, the ancient Viking heaven to solve a mystery thousands of years old- it dosen't end there, she's also had 2 movies based on her in which she was played by Angelina Jolie not bad!

Heroine rating 5/5

In the end Lara is a strong contender for the ultimate gaming heroine, she's the original independant woman of gaming who was had some epic adventures and is certain to have some more.

Hey guys, you probably have noticed I haven't been here for a couple of days, altough I expected to have internet acess while at my Dads we did a bit of a detour and went to stay up north, so I couldn't really be online much, however we did hit the big city of Birmingham, you might know it.

The game stores are much bigger, I was lucky enough to play a minute of Forza 3 on the Xbox 360, and I watched some guy playing DJ Hero in one store.

DJ Hero looked slow and sounded mainstream

DJ Hero isn't looking great, from what I saw gameplay was slow and the tracklist isn't really appealing that much to me, it's all mainstream remixes which is a shame.

ANother game for my wishlist is Fallout3, there's so many games I want to get, it seems I'll have to wait for christmas though, which is just around the corner, I'm back to school next monday and I have a hell of a lot of coursework to do by then, but I'll still be around

Thanks for reading...

~Gormo

Alyx (Half-Life 2)

Alyx is in her mid 20's and is a close freind of Gordon Freeman, she's definetely the main female character in the Half-Life series.

She is a skilled computer hacker, she helps the rebels by hacking into combine security and computers, she's also quite athletic, she effortlessly jumps through obstacles that Freeman can't handle.

Without Alyx Freeman would have been in a lot of trouble, she has saved him a lot of times, at the start of Half-Life 2 episode 1 her robot 'Dog' helps find Freeman when he's trapped in some ruins.

Check out this if your not easily offended, it's a mod for Half-Life 2, pretty sweet right?

Heroine rating 4/5

Alyx has some skills and is a highly capable and independant women and you have to admire her for that.

Zoey (Left 4 dead)

In my first of a series to find an awesome game heroine (female game hero) is Zoey, the only female character in the original Left 4 dead, she's 19 and likes watching horror movies, so when the zombie apocolypse comes she's ready.

The weapon she uses in the cut scenes and trailers are the dual pistols or SMGs'- however in game you can choose what ever weapon takes your pick.

Being the only female character has consoquences- there are a number of explicit mods for the PC version- check it out here if your not easily offended I'd just thought I'd mention it, her personality is suprisingly strong and is a good team player.

Bassically when she joins Francais, Bill and Louis on a quest to survive the zombie apocolypse they make a choice to either head to the hospital, the harbour, the farm or the airport... does Zoe survive? It's up to you!

Heroine rating 2/5

She's a cool character but never the less due to the open story and limited background she can't really be called a true heroine of gaming.

Ok, so for the past month there's been loads of games that I've been wanting to buy.. I've got quite a big list mounting up, hopefully I'll acctually get around to buying some of them soon.. they are in order of how much I want to get them

loved the demo and can not wait to play it after hearing the feedback- I'm going to buy it as soon as I can

I enjoyed the demo of the original on Xbox LIVE and according to my laptops specs it should be able to run on low settings

I think another modern warfare is a great idea, I'll probably wait until the price drops though

Should be a lot better than the original (which was great) I'm probably going to wait for the price to drop again though

Those are the main games I'm looking forward to buying.. obviously there's some PSP/DS games coming out soon, but we all know the dark arts serve me well there

I've also looked at borderlands which looks great with 4 player co-op and a lot of customisation like an RPG.

Thanks for reading!

~Gormo

Yes- it's been a few days since Gordon Freeman beat Mario by at least 15% of the votes and here are the reasons I think that Freeman deserved his eic victories.. not just against Mario but Link as well.

Skills

An important factor in my choice of character, Freeman is clever and inteligent, he's also strong in the sense for half of Half-Life he uses a crowbar, he has many qualifications in Pysics and knows how to drive, shoot and loads of cool scientific nerdy stuff- manages to fight offacist goverment members and vicious aliens throughout the Half-Life series.

Mario can jump over mushrooms and run through magical landscapes, he's brave in the face of giant hedge-hogs.

I personally conclude Freeman has a wide range of realisitc skills, he's strong and inteligent often in very bad situations.

Freeman wins

Popularity

Gordon has been in Half-Life and Half-Life 2 which are some of the most popular games by Valve, Half-Life 2 scored 9.2 on Gamespot.

Mario is in a variety of games, from sports games to racing games, including the ****c super Mario brothers, overall he's probably sold more copies on the whole and is more well known because of that

Mario wins

Personality

Freeman is an inteligent man and unfortunately gets him self in a lot of trouble in a short amount of time, his daring courage manages to pull him through it though.

Mario has an unusual voice that often annoys some, he's determined in constantly saving Princess Peach whenever she gets in trouble.

Personally- I prefer Freeman, he has a lot more depth to his personality comapred to what we see of Mario

Freeman wins

Overall

Overall it appears (in my opinion) since Mario is more well known he's often seen as the 'better' character, but when we look deep into hoe Valve wanted Gordon to be they've acctually made a suprisingly good character for a shooter.

Freeman wins overall for me!

This is only MY opinion, I expect some will disagree.. but that's the way it is, each to their own if I had more time I would've compared gadgets and so on.. but yeh.. thanks for reading!

~Gormo

So- as you may know I've been working on using Source SDK to mod the Orange box (Portal/HL2/TF2) for weeks I've just been using a programme called 'hammer to practise making mutliplayer maps for TF2.

Suddenly- I realised the capabilities of making maps with Half Life 2- I remember a discussion I had with some friends last week about what we would do if zombies attacked the school.. so my idea is to build a replica map of OUR school and fill it with zombies!

My only in game screenshot so far :/

Bassically- in this map I need to add lighting- but you get the idea, the plot is you've been there for 4 hours and it's getting dark, your working late with a few freinds (conveniently Gordon Freeman and Alyx) lol then you hear strange noises outside and you have to survive 21 days (in game)

Bassically- you get food from near by shops/dining room/medical centre and you may know our school also does militairy stuff (if you've read my blog for a long time) so there'll be some weapons and stuff in there.

At the moment I'm calling it 'full life' but it will probably change to '21' just because that's the number of days you have to stay alive.

Yes... inspired by a crazy conversation, game design ftw!

I'll also be doing custom music using fruity loops 7 which is lots of fun to use

Thanks for reading!

~Gormo

Mah boi Riou tagged me, so here are 10 random facts about myself!

- I live in the UK

- I am an anarchist and have socialist/marxist beliefs

- I watch One Piece, Bleach and Naruto

- My fave game of all time is Final Fantasy 10

- The first game I ever owned properly was Pokemon Red on GB

- I'm an atheist

- I admire eastern/asian culture

- I own a pair of nunchucks

- My fave music is trance/rave/club music, I also used to like metal

- I could be compared to a vampire ocassionally

I tag- Meelkud, Coolon and Pakhair!!

rmember- u must tag 3 people!

In the words of the terminator 'Ill be back' - I have field day tommorow night and I shall be back in two days!

We're going surfing down south so it should be pretty fun, it's almost half term as well, I could do with a break from school, so see you guys in a couple days, it's only one night.

Sorry to leave at such a critical time I'll be back with fire though, I'll probably think of a million ideas for union updates and so on.. since it'll be a long journey.

Hasta la vista amigos!

Well, here's my opinion on the PSP Go.. and a bit of information if you haven't heard of it already, personally I don't really like it... it came out today here in the UK..

Price (brand new)- 220 GBP

16gb Inbuilt memory

Wifi and bluetooth

Space for a micro SD card (maximun 16gb)

Total maximun storage of 32gb worth of videos, music and images

No UMD's- all games downloaded from the PSN

Old UMD's will not be able to get converted in any way.

You won't be able to move the battery (this means less piracy) bad for some of us..

Smaller screen than the PSP 3000

Higher quality image than the PSP 3000?

Still only one analog stick

The PSP Go in all its glory

The verdict- it's just a slimmer and lighter PSP but now you have to download all your games (what a pain!) plus it won't be good for erm.. the dark arts... the price is also VERY high, for an extra 30 GBP you can go and buy a PS3 Slim! :O

My Rating - 2/5

My next couple of blogs will be exclusive previews on games I have access to such as the new Naruto game for PSP, I'll also ge getting my hands on Dirt 2 and Motorstorm for PSP..

Hey guys, I've made a change in my gamespot philosophy.. unfortunately I don't have enough time during the week to get around and comment on everybodies blogs

So.. pretty soon I'm afraid I'm gunna untrack all the people I'm not really close to, by this I mean they're not in any joint unions and they don't comment on my blog... it's a pain when you comment on someones blog but they don't comment on yours back isn't it?

So.. this way I'll be able to keep track of purely my freind (yes, you guys reading this blog right now most likely)

I'll also keep track of some old freinds.. especially if I know they're really busy aswell or they don't come online much anymore.. cos my philosophy will probably change back as soon as we get to half term break!

Thanks for reading-

~Gormo

Scribblenauts is bassically a game were you can summon/create any item/creature/person you want to use it to solve problems, there are over 200 different levels to play through.

This is an example of what levels are about, the hint at the start says 'dig up the coffin' which as you can see is guarded by a vampire.. so what would you do?

This puzzle must be solved without killing the vampire- combat isn't the games strong point and it makes it a lot more interesting.

Just one of around 200 levels of Scribblenauts

Well you could create some garlic to scare of the vampire so he leaves you alone.

Or you could create a wall between the coffin and the vampire so he can't interupt you opening it.

How do you dig the hole to get to the coffin? well, there's the spade or the jackhammer I've used to far, once you've found a way to keep the vampire at bay you can then open the coffin and retrieve the 'starite' to end the level.

You can spawn people as well as items in Scribblenauts

Last blog I gave the game a 6.5... it does have it's weak points, combat is unfair and is just based on who can hit who the most in a certain amount of time..

Some puzzles are bizzare or require a certain piece of knowledge (eg- the fact silver turns werewolves back into real men) some people wouldn't know this and are bound to get stuck..

There are also a lot of levels that involve dragging things to places.. for example 'take the lamb back to its shepheard' - just get a rope.. attatch it to the lamb.. get in a helicopter and fly him back, there's to many levels like this in my opinion!

The replay value however is good, to properly finish a level you have to do it 3 times in a row using ALL different items, for some levels this is nearly impossible, for others it's great fun..

Despite being designed for Kids, everyone can enjoy it.

You also collect 'merits' which are like trophies or achievments, you get merits for doing particular things throughout the game, like..

Marine Biologist- Create 2 or more sea creatures during one level

No weapons- Complete a level without using any weapons

These 'merits' add a lot of replay value, Ive done probably over half of the levels now, in about 6 hours gameplay, so it's a fairly long game and I'm enjoying it now despite its flaws.

Score: 8.0

Thanks for reading!

~Gormo

Today I bought Jade Empire and Civilization IV, both on PC, here are my first impressions of them as well as Scribblenauts which I have an exclusive copy of.

Jade empire

Gamespot score: 7.8

My score: 8

+ Looks beautiful

+ Controls aren't as bad as they say

- I had trouble setting it up, needed to reinstall Direct X

Civilization IV

Gamespot score: 9.4

My score: 7.0

- Not very well presented

- Steep learning curve

+ I'll probably enjoy it when I get the hang of it

Scribblenauts

Gamespot score: N/A

My score: 6.5

+ There are realy tons of items to play with

- You don't need that many items the game offers

- To easy to use the same items over and over again

- Some levels are to similar

Yeah, some people will be surpised by the score I gave to Scribblenauts, it's not that I don't like it, it's an incredible idea and fantastically made, it's just a majoirty of levels feel the same.. more on it soon though.

Thanks for reading, see ya later guys!

Yes, I have a copy of scribblenauts.. it's awesome.. I will post more as soon as I can, just don't ask any questions

For those of you who don't know what scribblenauts is, shame on you! jokes! simply it's a game in which you solve puzzles and challenges on the DS and you can spawn any item you want by typing it in as a command.

The animations and grapics are sweet and the range of items is huge! my first word was 'pool' and yes, I got a swimming pool next was hammer.. and so on..

Spawn any item you need to solve the issue!

You can also call cars, planes, boats, people, tools and much much more, it's a lot of fun 10minutes in.. but I'm going to have to play more yet

Thanks for reading

~Gormo