Driver: San Francisco

Here’s a blast from the past – remember Driver? Well, Reflections (now owned by Ubisoft) have announced that the legendary driving franchise shall return later this year on PC, PS3, Xbox 360, Mac and possibly the Wii at this year’s E3.

I’ve been waiting for this game for just over 4 years and judging from this trailer, it’s going to be a hoot.

But there’s more – gameplay!

From that video, it’s obvious that Driver is officially back. And by Driver I mean the two original PS1 titles, not the God-awful PS2 titles (GTA clones, which is ironic as GTA wouldn’t exist if it weren’t were Driver). I’m not sure about the whole “Tanner-being-in-a-coma-and-having-supernatural-powers-that-allow-him-to-teleport-to-different-vehicles” thing. To be honest I think it’s shit and belongs to Science Fiction version of Pursuit Force, not Driver. But hey, San Francisco is practically a reboot of the franchise so I guess it needs something new and interesting. Lets just hope it doesn’t turn out as shit as it looks/sounds.

So no more GTA knock-offs. San Francisco will take the franchise back to its routes. Which if you ask me, has been a long time coming.

Dante’s Inferno

Another year, another rip-off. We’ve already had a Devil May Cry rip-off, now it’s time for a God Of War rip-off.

I can safely tell you that this game is a complete copy of God Of War. Not a slight copy, but a complete copy. It is EXACTLY the same. The controls are identical, all the way down to how the buttons are mapped on the controller. You use the same ranged weapon, navigate the same menus, collect the same orbs after killing enemies with the same combos and regain your health using the same green health orbs. Hell, even the bosses and quick time events are taken straight out of GOW. And don’t even get me started on the blatantly stolen animations and the bastardization of the script.
God Of War is a much better game and you’re better off just replaying it until GOW3 comes out and not bother with Dante’s Inferno. It’s a waste of the developer’s time and your money.

How a game like this even made it to store shelves is beyond me. I let Bayonetta slide because it was made by the same director as the original Devil May Cry, whereas Dante’s Inferno is made by entirely different people to God Of War. So that’s simply unacceptable.

I guess it makes a change to all the countless Grand Theft Auto rip-offs out there, even if it is all Driver 2‘s fault. But seriously, what’s the next copy of a game going to be like? Are Ubisoft going to make a new Mirror’s Edge? Perhaps Valve are planning their own version of F.E.A.R.? Who knows?

Splinter Cell – How it all started, and how it all ended.

Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell, an action-adventure stealth game developed by Ubisoft Montreal released in 2002. It defined the stealth/action genre and it was awesome. If you haven’t heard of it, then you should be locked away.

The game offered fantastic and groundbreaking lighting effects, a great story and a great cast. Not to mention the engaging gameplay – hiding in the shadows, eliminating enemies silently and remaining undetected. But it wasn’t without its problems. The cutscenes weren’t up to par with the rest of the graphics and the entire game was plagued with trial and error – you get spotted by a guard and are then forced to start again. And the terrible AI didn’t exactly help with that issue.

Then came Pandora Tomorrow.

Developed by Ubisoft Shanghai. A good game, despite the weaker storyline. It used the same gameplay mechanics (sticking to the shadows, etc), but took it to a new level. The first game’s levels were basically all indoors. Pandora Tomorrow introduced, wait for it… outdoor levels! Jungles, a train and an airport. Unfortunately, almost all of the problems from the first game were still there – trial and error, bad AI, etc. So there wasn’t really anything new to enjoy.

At this stage, Splinter Cell didn’t look like it was going anywhere. But that’s when Ubisoft Montreal saved the franchise and returned with Chaos Theory.

This game was, in a word, perfect. EVERY problem was the first two games were fixed, the graphics were improved tremendously, the story was great and it was just genuinely fun to play. Oh, and did I mention the fucking soundtrack!?

At this point, Splinter Cell was at it’s highest peak. But all that was ruined with the next instalment – Double Agent.

Forget all the things that you loved about Splinter Cell. Forget lurking in the shadows, eliminating guards silently, hiding bodies and remaining undetected. Practically all of the levels took place during the day, meaning no places to hide, and you were free to go guns blazing and kill everybody Max Payne style. The story was retarded, the cast was terrible, Lambert fucking DIES, the witty banter between Sam & Grim was gone, I could go on forever. The series started on a wing and a prayer, but then the wing was on fire and the prayer was answered. By Satan. Okay, maybe it wasn’t that bad, but it certainly wasn’t what we were used to.

Lets just hope the series can redeem itself with Conviction when it’s released on February 26th.

Splinter Cell: Convictiion – Krav Maga

I’m very pleased that Krav Maga is now a part of the game. It played a big part in the Splinter Cell books (I’ve read them all, btw) and it just makes sense for the game to have it too.

Splinter Cell: Conviction – Collector’s Edition

An Australian retailer JB Hi-Fi have a listing for a Collector’s Edition of Conviction on their website. It includes a “Making Of” DVD, a Sam Fisher figurine, a comic, a free download of Chaos Theory for 360 owners and other exclusive in-game content.

Sound pretty cool, I just hope that the free download for Chaos Theory will also be available to PC users. Because everyone deserves to play that game, it’s the best in the franchise. And Ubisoft knows this. Why else would they include it in the Collector’s Edition? If all this is true that is.

Splinter Cell: Conviction

It’s finally got a release date – February 23rd 2010. I thought it would get pushed back til June or something, so that’s great news.

A release trailer has also been shown at the 2009 Tokyo Game Show:

Judging from this trailer, Conviction is going to be very from the previous games. It doesn’t even look like Splinter Cell anymore. And as a veteran of the first game, I am rather disappointed by this. Looking at the trailer and other footage from around the web, it seems that the trademark night vision goggles are practically gone and the entire concept of stealth has done a Metal Gear Solid on us. i.e. It’s optional and not as fun as busting up heads.

To be honest, the game looks an awful lot like 24. It follows the same basic storyline as the show’s first series – in 24, Jack Bauer’s daughter Kim was kidnapped by terrorists and he hunted down everyone involved in order to get her back. (Actually now that I think about it, that’s the exact same storyline from the first Splinter Cell book!) In Conviction, Sam is hunting down the man that ran down his daughter Sarah with a car, making his way through all the people that work for him in order to track him down.

In my opinion, and no doubt quite a lot of other people’s opinions, Chaos Theory was the best Splinter Cell. The trial and error mechanics were removed, it was a true sequel to the original game, the graphics were amazing, the online multiplayer was vastly improved from Pandora Tomorrow’s and the game just flowed beautifully. From animations to how the story unfolded. But then all of that was taken away from us with Double Agent, leaving us with a bland, unfinished mess. Lets hope Conviction doesn’t turn out like that. But from what I’ve seen, I don’t think it will because there doesn’t seem to be that much left of Splinter Cell for it to screw up.

Oh and that “Mark & Execute” mechanic, it’s taken straight out of Rainbow Six.