Thursday 30 December 2010

The Conduit - First Person Shoot 'em Up On The Nintendo Wii




Right on the front of the box is a quote from IGN claiming that this is "the best shooting game on the Wii" so I had no choice but to buy it and give it a go!  Two and a half hours later and I was still playing it so I guess they could be right!


You take the role of Agent Michael Ford, working for a Government Department known as The Trust.  Your in a bunker and your fellow Agents seem to have been taken over by some sort of Alien technology so you have no choice but to kill them with the weapons and munitions you find around the underground bunker.


I've played games such as Call of Duty on the Wii (I still own one of them) but to be honest, for me their too realistic as the wars they are set in are still in 'recent' history so I find them a little bit disrespectful/distasteful and that puts me off playing them.

The Conduit reminds of the good old days before such COD type games existed and you have missions to go on that involve blowing the brains out of aliens and such like as you progress through the many different levels - a 'Doom Style' game (as I call them) and it's absolutely fantastic!  The graphics and gameplay are brilliant and there's plenty of different weapons to get to grips with, but be careful if you have an itch as when I scratched my head with my hand that had the nun-chuck in a inadvertently threw a grenade and blew myself up!



Wii Mans Game Rating

Fun Factor: 8/10 – First person shoot 'em ups don't come much finer than this!
Playability: 9/10 – Wii Controller & Nun-chuck required - don't scratch you head else you might throw a grenade though...
Gameplay: 8/10 – The first time I put in the disk I spent hours playing this game so it must be good!
Graphics: 6/10 – The graphics are just as good as any other Wii game out there with nothing outstanding to give it a higher rating
Sound/Music: 8/10 – Atmospheric sound(s) in this game increase the overall gaming experience and help make this game fantastic!

All-in-all a great game, but there's still something missing that I cant quite put my finger on as yet that would make this game so much better.

Overall 39/50




Sunday 5 December 2010

Apple iPhone 4 on Vodafone

ip4v
I am now the proud new owner of Apple's iPhone 4 and I have to say it's the best gadget I have ever brought!  Not sure how it rates as a phone as make/recieving phone calls is a bit redundant for a lot of people these days as text messages and social networking on Twitter and Facebook are becoming more commonplace.
A lot of people who get an iPhone or iPad moan about having to use iTunes to copy files to their device but once you get used to it, it's actually a very good idea as it's actually quite a simple program to use and takes the pain out of having to manually delete things from your device to make room for other things you want to put on it - a simple tick in a box means it gets copied across and an un-ticking of a box means it gets removed.

One of the best features of the iPhone (and iPad I suppose) is the App Store where you can get games, utilities and all sorts of other programs to either keep you occupied or help you through the day.  There are thousands of free Apps so it's not necessarily going to cost you an arm and a leg to get any Apps on your device but it wont be long before you're tempted to purchase the odd one or two at 59p each - just remember they soon add up to quite a lot so be careful you don't get trigger happy and buy too many!

After wandering around my local High Street and shopping centre comparing prices, I found all but one to be pretty much the same prices.  The one that differed in price was Phones4U where they were £70 cheaper on the handset on an 18month contract on the Vodafone network than the Vodafone shop itself!

I dont get a particularly brilliant Vodafone signal where I live (I knew this before I purchased the phone) I get a good phone signal but only get an Edge connection for internet browsing etc. but as I have WiFi I wasn't concerned about that.  I went with Vodafone for the simple reason that the handset price on the package I was after was significantly cheaper than all the other networks.