Gamebytes: Ghost Reacon Advanced Warfighter 2 for the Playstation3

By Jeremy HohmanFriday, October 26, 2007 10:25 AM CDT
The year is 2014, you and your team, strapped with the most advanced technology available, are heading into Mexico to stop a civil war. Not very complicated, huh? There is a very nice plot, but do you honestly care? I don’t. Let’s blow stuff up!The equipment itself in this game is very revolutionary to the tactical-shooter niche.The UAV3 is a special camera drone that acts as your eye in the sky. By pressing the ‘select’ button and pulling up your map, you will be able to send your camera-drone by placing the cursor over a designated area and pressing up on the direction pad. Once overhead a target you can lower the camera to spot enemies. A new ability that has been added to GRAW 2 is CFV mode. By pressing the R2 button you will be in first person view of your teammate’s positions. By pressing up on the direction pad you can send them to a specific area or regroup by pressing down on the D-pad. Another piece of equipment is the M.U.L.E—simply put a mobile weapons shop. A shop that you will drive and run down your enemies; on the outside, there is a first person gun camera that allows you to attack enemies without compromising your position. Not to forget and leave out the basics: assault rifles, sniper rifles, smoke grenades, satchel charges, turrets, night vision, and everything you could possibly need to take out a nation of bad guys.On the other side of the spectrum, GRAW 2 can infect players with game burn-out. Gameplay can get a little slow at times by fighting opponents that don’t offer you any challenge, running for periods of time without any action, and dealing with teammates that you can’t put into position without them being seen. Learning the controls of the game will take some practice. What makes them a challenge is in this game they utilize every button; therefore, memorizing what each button does and applying that in the heat of battle can be a little tricky. Using the first person view to control your teammates is cool, but useless. For one you are limited to what you see by not being able to control the camera. Although you can switch between teammates, this still does not help because they will still stand wherever, usually in the open. Using the UAV3 camera is helpful when pin-pointing your target, but be careful. If your UAV is spotted it can be shot out of the sky; once you locate your target, regroup it by pressing down on the d-pad.Six Axis Controls stink! To use them, one must move the base of the controller up or down to move forwards or backwards, tilt the controller right or left to turn in these respected directions. Don’t attempt to use this feature; turn it off in the options screen. Trying to maneuver the M.U.L.E with this is a pain and not very accurate. You’ll wind up getting frustrated and lose the excitement of what you’re supposed to be doing.There is some staggering in frame rate in certain scenes, but nothing too crazy.The audio for the game is not bad, but not the best: speaker distortion was common throughout the game.The graphics for the PS3 are similar if not better than those on the 360.Multiplayer mode offers 32 maps spanning from night to day scenes and lots of options that aren’t available in single player mode. If an online battle is what you’re looking for than this should satisfy your appetite for destruction.Despite some issues, GRAW 2 succeeds in giving you a real feeling of being part of an elite US team. All in all, if you were a fan of the Socom series for the PS2 and looking for a decent multiplayer mode for the PS3, you have found it.Ghost Reacon Advanced Warfighter 2 gets a B-Jeremy Hohman is the writer, producer and host of GameBytes a 30 minute weekly game news and review show. To see Jeremy’s latest pod cast or to rent & play the game reviewed simply go to; http://www.gnfgames.com/

Halo 3 Tips

Tips for easy kills in Halo 3 . . .
For anyone just starting out or for the experienced player what I’ve found are useful are the assault riffle and melee combo. Spray your opponent for 1 to 1.5 seconds and then press the B button to kill your opponent.
Another thing that I’ve found is running with a long to medium range weapon like the assault riffle, battle riffle, or the sniper riffle and a short range weapon like the shot gun or the plasma sword.
The new and improved niddler is another effective way to dispose of your opponent’s. If your lucky enough to pick up the Spartan laser . . . this is the best way to take out any opposing vehicles, as long as you can stay alive long enough to use it . . . because it take about 2 seconds for the thing to charge up.
Picking up some of the new equipment now assigned to the X button is an easy way to stay alive or to take a life. The new bubble shield is great for fending off opponents, but it also can’t be shot though . . . so don’t throw a grenade while inside. If you do this you’ll find yourself dead from your on hand, because the grenade will bounce back in your face.
The power drain is great for throwing in a crowd of people for multiple kills. Then just stick with the basics, head shots and grenade’s and you should fare pretty well at finishing the fight.
This entry was posted on Monday, October 22nd, 2007 at 1:38 pm and is filed under

Gamebytes: Halo3

By Jeremy Hohman with Brandon Poole, Friday, October 19, 2007 2:09 PM CDT

The old adage “good things come to those who wait” is most definitely true. After months of patiently waiting Halo 3 continues to exceed expectations.

Our prized protagonist Master Chief is back in a wonderful game that combines all the great aspects of the first two installments into Halo 3, the most anticipated game of the year.When the game begins, we find Master Chief crash-landing on Earth. In this installment, the Arbiter is working with Master Chief and the humans to stop the Covenant (bad guys) from activating the arc., in effect, setting off all the Halos which would result in the destruction of all life in the universe. Whew, that’s quite a load for Master Chief to handle alone with old weapons and vehicles. With all this new drama it is very fortunate that we are given a vast array of new features: new allies, new weapons, and a sub-plot involving Master Chief’s quest to retrieve his resident A.I., Cortana.

As far as the gameplay, in campaign mode, Arbiter assists you in battle, but you must get used to little or no help and the sight of him re-spawning. In the same light, I cannot say much more for your Marines, who possess the strategic driving skills of a four-year-old. They end up getting killed before you even get a chance to do your business. I guess that’s why the fate of the Universe is up to you, because without you those guys are hopeless.Weapons--are they awesome? Answer: Yes. You have the flame thrower which basically sets others on fire—who doesn’t like that? There is a laser gun which will rip a warthog in half, and spikers which can be deadly at close range when using two of them simultaneously. Also, Master Chief and company are given a war hammer that will send a vehicle half-way across the screen. That means when equipped with this hefty hammer, becoming your opponent’s road-kill is not an option.Other notable additions include an advanced campaign mode, allowing four separate consoles to work together on one mission on-line. In the multiplayer mode, the weapon's power settings are tweakable and the game has the option to save videos of gameplay, along with the ability to share videos through the internet (for bragging rights, of course). Something that every avid Halo fan will appreciate is the ability to alter maps and save them (while in multi-player mode).

Custom settings and difficulty level, you say? Well, the user may choose from additional icons that were not present in the second game. There are a few options to customize your very own Master Chief. Customizable maps and weapon energy levels have already been covered. How about those settings? FOR HALO PLAYERS ONLY: the normal setting feel like easy street and the legendary mode feels closer to normal. The controls are slightly different, but easy to get used to.

Last but not least, the graphics - the maps look amazing and the game is HD compatible which allows the 360 in unison with the game to reach their full potential.

Bar-setting A+Jeremy Hohman is the writer, producer and host of GameBytes, a weekly game news and review show. To see Jeremy’s latest pod cast or to rent & play the game reviewed simply go to http://www.gnfgames.com/

Wild Horses in the Wild

MINDEN, Nevada, July 7, 2006 (ENS) - I am disturbed by the distortions of truth put out by enemies of wild horses in the American West. Extreme prejudice distorts their view of the life of horses in the wild. Instead, with closed minds, they disregard the many positive aspects of the natural, free life of horses.

Wild horses naturally disperse their own grazing pressure over large areas within their individual band home ranges, if U.S. government authorities would allow them to do so in their legal herd areas.

Officials in the Bureau of Land Management�s (BLM) Elko District plan to remove 1,700 horses this year from the Buck-and-Bald Complex of legal herd areas, in addition to the 795 horses removed from this complex last year.

We must root out the corruption of favoritism and restore integrity and true caring among our public servants. People who really love the West also love and make sacrifices to preserve its beautiful, free-living horses.

Free Gas From GNFGames.com

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Skate For Xbox360

Gamebytes: Skate for the Xbox 360
By Jeremy Hohman;Friday, October 5, 2007 4:47 PM CDT

I’ve heard a lot of people comparing Skate to the Tony Hawk series, but just because it’s a skate board game, does not mean that it will be the same. I am sure that is why they took a different approach. Skate is a more challenging and realistic game then what we have come to know.In the beginning of the game, you have to choose a number of no-named skaters to climb your way to the top. The hardest part of the game is the control scheme. Learning kick flips and shuvits can be difficult considering the right and left analog stick pretty much do it all. To get going you must hold down the A or X button, once you get moving you can perform ollies by holding down the right analog stick and move it straight up. To perform a kick flip you must push up diagonally. To perform a shuvit it requires a half circle. Performing grab tricks can be tricky as well. The right and left trigger act as your right and left hand and by moving the right analog stick you can utilize different tricks by moving the analog stick in different directions, or by pushing the B button. Because of the nature of the control scheme, you will find yourself sometimes meaning to do one trick but accidentally doing another. The graphics for the game are pretty good but nothing out of the ordinary. The camera angle is not your traditional view, but it’s a new way to view your skater. The soundtrack is made up of pop music and rap music to add to the experience. You will travel around skate parks and city like environments completing goals and objectives to earn cash and fame. The city streets can be brutal, if you don’t get enough speed or time your ollie just right it could lead to an ugly spill. That is why this game takes a lot of getting used to. Skate is for all ages’ game and if you are looking for a realistic and challenging game then you will want to check out Skate.Skate for the Xbox 360 gets a rolling C.

Jeremy Hohman is the writer, producer and host of GameBytes a 30 minute weekly game news and review show. Jeremy is currently traveling across the U.S. hosting gaming competitions for GameZnFlix at the Midnight Gaming Championship 2007.

To see where Jeremy will be next, and to play the games that were reviewed, simply go to http://www.gameznflix.com/