The Socket

Hello you people out there, and welcome to the very first post on my new debut blog, The Socket! I've been thinking about writing a blog for a while now, but I figured I might as well give it a shot. I'll be writing pretty much about whatever is keeping me interested at the moment, whether it be gaming, the Internet or something else entirely. Anyways, enough of that, and onto today's post.

---

I only yesterday purchased Killzone 2 and the Sega Mega Drive Ultimate Collection (the Genesis for you US lot I believe). The Collection because I dig both retro gaming and the Mega Drive, and Killzone 2 because it was finally at a price I could stomach. I've given them both a bit of a go in the last 24 hours or so, and I must say I'm really impressed with Killzone 2.



I played the demo however many months ago it was released, and thought the graphics were great. This feeling doesn't fade while you're playing; the mere spectacle of it all is enchanting. The way the blood splatters as you shoot people, the shades and colours, just how it's all constructed is an aesthetic feast. The game itself doesn't handle too bad either; I had immense fun clipping down countless Helghast baddies down. It's all just very well put together. I haven't given online a go (which I'll be itching to, being a regular CS:Source and TF2 player) but if it's on the same level as the single-player experience is, I think I will enjoy this game very much. At the time of writing, I have played just shy of 2 hours and downed 17% of the single player game, killing 283 Helghast, 80 headshots, 115 helmets popped and 153 manual reloads. Yes, I'm a compulsive reloader. :p

The Mega Drive Collection has also been interesting. I've been going on a bit of a nostalgic run at the moment, pulling out my original Demo One disc I got with the first PlayStation (first played 11 years ago!) and this was a great experience. Playing the likes of Sonic, Altered Beast (ha) and other classics that I missed out on because of my age at the time like Golden Axe has been a great experience. I think that while games from then have evolved in many respects, particularly visually, I think we're not as far as we'd like to think in terms of gameplay innovation. I mean yes, we have the advent of online gaming and far superior graphics in our games, but core gameplay is something that never really changes too much.




Of course, there are always the games that stretch at that, and those are the ones that stand the test of times. I played the Abe's Oddysee demo on Demo One and I am still impressed (probably more so now) with just how innovative a control scheme and platformer it was. It's something you don't quite see nowadays often enough, true innovation. But alas, we move on.

That's enough for the first; I'll post whenever (probably when I'm procrastinating about university work such as right at the moment ;) ) and if you enjoyed it, please tell people about it. Comments and constructive criticism are also welcomed.

Anyways, I'm off to play some more Killzone 2 and I'll be posting soon I hope. :)