Xbox 360 – The Buttons of My Mind

Rock Band 3

I was weak and bought RB3 with the keyboard last week. I skipped RB2 as I thought RB had a very dull single-player career path and having played RB2 at Chowny’s thought it was no better.

Pro-keys is awesome n all, playing along to the keyboard parts using actual notes is great fun, despite some songs (e.g. Marilyn Manson’s The Beautiful People) having next to nothing to do.

However, the single-player career is yet again incredibly dull. I’ve still only got two gigs unlocked and I have to endure the terrible animation of my band getting on an underground train over and over again. Random setlists bring up the same songs time and time again and choosing my own songs is pretty pointless as it’s entirely broken. I’ve got a keyboard plugged in, why does the game list songs that don’t have keyboard parts? Scrolling through dozens of songs to find the odd one that does support the keyboard is very frustrating.

Pretty disappointed with the game despite the keyboard being superb. I’m resisting blasting through it on guitar. How it ever got 10/10 on Eurogamer I will never know.

I am the music man and I can play!

Rock Band, just how good is this?

I’ve played all the Guitar Hero games from the very beginning so I’m pretty good at plastic guitar now (still get whooped by my nephew though, boo) and played through Hard difficulty without any problems. Nearly finished Expert level as well now.

The game also comes with plastic drums (oh yes) and I’ve never played drums before, I found it pretty tough going to start with on Easy level! But now I can smack out a beat on Medium pretty good, dead chuffed that I can do it although alternate right hand and right foot beats still confuse my brain! So you can see what the drums are like check out this YouTube video of someone playing Expert level, that’ll be me soon!

I’ll not mention vocals, except I can’t sing!

Rainbow Six: Vegas

I actually completed a Tom Clancy game! My first one ever despite having bought loads of them in the past. I really loved this, glad I played it on normal difficulty as I know I would have got frustrated at the harder level and given up. Ending is OK if a bit lame.

Cracking multiplayer game too.

It’s Grrrrrreat

It’s an EA Sports game so it’s spawn of the devil but it is really good. I wouldn’t have bought this but so many people on my Friend’s List had it that I picked it up from Tesco (£39.96 in store which is pretty good) and I’m very glad I did.

It takes a few rounds to get the hang of it as there is no power meter as in traditional golf games (e.g. Links). You judge your swing based upon the lie, club, wind etc. and pull back the stick accordingly. It gives you fine control over your shots but does initially make putting seem really difficult.

As you play and beat players in the Tiger challenges your player’s skill potential increases and you have to train him/her in training games to fulfill that potential. You can create players in the face morphing option which can create some really freaky looking players.

I gave Colin Montgomerie a good kicking last night, despite him playing pretty well, we were matching each over ball for ball, on the way back in I chipped in and then hit two 40ft putts to pull into an unassailable lead.

Online I’ve played a couple of rounds, the first round was hilarious as we were all over the place, the second was a much more proper affair.

All in all a very good golf game, even if you have to swallow your pride to buy an EA Sports game!

Table Tennis

It’s great! Online tournaments are good, pace is fine, skill is required.

Rockstar Games presents Table Tennis

Rockstar Games Presents Table Tennis, the debut next-generation title from the creators of the Grand Theft Auto and The Midnight Club franchises.

Developed by Rockstar San Diego, Table Tennis harnesses the incredible power of Xbox 360™ through an advanced game engine designed specifically for next-gen console technology. Utilizing the full capabilities of the hardware, Table Tennis is visually stunning, the physics are fluid and natural, and when coupled with the intuitive gameplay, the competition and ferocity found in a live table tennis match is authentically recreated.

Well I was really looking forward to this but now it seems it might not have online play after all which removes virtually all the point of owning the game. Sigh.

Battlefield 2

Peer pressure got to me in the end and I purchased. The online aspects of this game are love it or hate it. I’ve played one ranked match and got sniped by some sniping idiot about 8 times, I gave him -ve feedback.