5 Catch Phrases to Yell at Video Games

For all my knowledge and critical analysis powers, I actually have a different skill that I am much more adept at. And that is yelling at video games. Some of you casuals and novices don't grasp this yet. Hell, you probably think it's awkward and embarrassing. Well, friend, this is what it means to be a master. So take note and remember these; try 'em on. I guarantee you'll be 100% better at video games once you do, and then your ability will sky rocket as it grows on you.

Here are just five examples you can take home with you. You'll want to develop your own, but just take these for starters.

(On a side note, I'm tired of running image searches. Can you tell?)

5. "It's the only way!"

This one can actually either be sarcastic or a war cry. Surrounded by Banshees on a gold map in Mass Effect 3? Use the rocket launcher consumable, it's the only way! More often, though, I'll see someone use the same valuable resource to get rid of the last Atlas on a bronze wave, "It was the only way, I guess" I'll tell myself.

It can also be both at the same time! It's great to shout this in Call of Duty while cooking a grenade in your hands, charging into an enemy to blow both of you up. Some will say you could have, like, just used a machine gun, you know, like the one in your hands. But what fun would that be?

4. "Do what I am telling you to do!" 

or "No one said to do that!"

When button presses don't equate to the things those buttons are assigned to, there is always anger. There are a lot of things that can cause this: lag, having several different actions assigned to one button, clunky animations,  games that recall press sequence, or just bugs in the way the game receives input from your controller or keyboard.

But sometimes one starts to think the game is just being disobedient. When that happens, you gotta tell 'em to knock that crap off! Stupid game!

3. "Son of a bitchin' son of a bitch!"

I consider this to be the most philosophical of the bunch: a declaration of acknowledgement of the unending cycle of problems that is the human condition, stemming from our own flaws and insecurities.

Or maybe I'm just stuttering from frustration when I say this. I prefer the former.

2. "Hiya!" (release your chi!)

Eeeyah! I-yah! Hoo, ha! Ho weeeeeeyagh!

In martial arts, some teachers will tell you to shout out as you exert force in your strikes. To put it more poetically, this is called releasing your chi. It sounds silly (literrally, hearing people do this makes me chuckle) but it actually works. Personally, I think it's the act of letting go of the super ego and giving in to one's id so that destruction will be wrought without remorse. As humans, holding back is required to co-operate with the rest of society so it becomes ingrained in our minds.

But the old teachings claim that there is some kind of spiritual energy that everyone can tap into to become stronger. If that's the case, then it definitely works in video games, too! Try it sometime! Especially if you're doing something like rolling dice in a table top game or something in public. You will do more damage!

1. "Come on, game!"

At first glance this one is just too simple. But the pure mileage this one runs earns its reputation for being the best and horribly infectious. It applies to anything that happens in a game that doesn't agree to your tastes, regardless of the situation: disconnects, bad rolls, lag, choppy frame rate, enemies with one hit point left, insta-death, bugs, clearing an entire level then dying to some random land mine... you name it.

I probably say this one at least a couple times a session, regardless of what's going on. And I've been told by at least one person that he found himself saying it after he heard me. Honestly, I didn't even realize I said it that much until I thought about it. Especially as I play this Avengers Alliance game. There are a million random factors that can either go my way or for the enemy! It can't be helped!

Hitman: Blood Money

Rating: 2 out of 3 Stars (why only 3 possible stars?)

Genre: Stealth; Sub-Genre: Point and Click Adventure

ESRB: M (Blood from shooting and stabbing, lots of partial nudity)

Estimated hours of gameplay (thorough play/quick play): 20/12

Developer: IO Interactive 

Wiki page

Yep, you get to dress like a clown in this one!

To clarify, this is the predecessor to the game Hitman: Absolution that I recently reviewed. This is the fourth game in the series, and Absolution is the fifth. But this game didn't come out 2 or 3 years before Absolution. It actually came out SIX years before. That means it was almost a launch title for XBox 360, and it also came out on PS2 and the original XBox. So I knew I had to take some things with leniency. The graphics are the first thing on that list. There's a sharp contrast when looking at this game compared to Absolution. But that actually didn't bother me at all. The lower resolution textures were still clean enough to fully flesh out the world, and the lack of over-used gritty lighting motifs meant I got a nice break for my eyes. I daresay this game is more pleasant on the eyes overall because of that, but it's too noticeable to fully redeem it. Then again, the bright colors feel appropriate with the tone of the game. So after a while I actually liked it.

The premise of this game just can't help but be humorous.

Going into Absolution, it was the developers' goal to make the game more story-driven. That ended up being both terribly done and taking away from the game. After all, he wasn't actually a damn Hitman for any of that game. In this one, though, each mission is a contract. Agent 47 is given details for his objectives in a briefing and receives payment for completion. The thing is, though, that there IS a backing story to the game. Just a little something to give the game stakes and to lead into the final level. As meager as it is, it works much much better than the "story-driven" sequel. I do still wish the game worked more like the tutorial level, though. That one starts with a pre-rendered cutscene vignette about the target you are taking out. This gives you both insight into why someone wants him dead and gives him a rather flushed out story of who he is and his troubles. The rest of the time you are simply told who the target is. That's not as involved. Maybe they can figure this out for Hitman 6 to make it "story-driven" in a more appropriate fashion.

And I love these newspapers that give you a direct sense of how your choices affect the world.

Gameplay is something of a mixed bag here, and is ultimately why I ended up going with a two instead of a three. For all the good this game does, it ONLY functions as a stealth game and is remarkably clunky in unforgivable ways. If this game wasn't 6 (almost 7) years old, it would be laughable. Unfortunately I can't travel back in time to 2006 to tell you how I feel about its clunkiness then, but it feels like it came out in 2000 or earlier to me. Maybe I could be lenient knowing this started out as a PC game and is likely treated as a port for consoles, but this is not the first console game they've churned out. IO should have figured this crap out already! First and most obvious is the button layout. I can sum up this crap with one example: clicking down the left stick (and holding it down) is how you throw an object. What sense does that make! Then design choices like the funeral level were a great concept, but it didn't make sense for either a stealth player or shooter player to have a level with the enemy layout like that (trying to avoid spoilers) with zero upgrades and zero chance of sneaking (I don't count dual wield as an upgrade because it is a disadvantage). The "last boss" plays out in an extremely frustrating manner, offering no sense of an encounter or epic fight but rather just messing up your progress in the level. The melee and fiberwire are the worst offenders in clunkiness. The latter in particular since it's a pretty damn important tool for an assassin. Agent 47's death animation has some kind of "second wind" mechanic, but 9 out of 10 times it just makes you 30 seconds and locks out the main menu before you can retry. One last note: for some reason each difficulty is locked to a parallel path in your career. This means if you played on Expert, as I did, you can't replay a later level on Rookie just for fun as you would need to unlock it on Rookie mode first. Oh, and the achievements in this game are similarly wonky. I'm not going to ding a game for having terrible achievement design, but that's worth noting for achievement hunters (especially since older games are generally considered to be easy points). In the end, though, the game is really great. I know it doesn't sound that way as I describe all this, but if you really love stealth and/or can be forgiving of these missteps then this is a much more enjoyable game than Absolution. The level layouts are staggering in their openness. And the sheer number of different paths and answers to solving a level come out as testing the player's creativeness and ability to solve them like a puzzle. I did say it only works as a stealth game back there, but there is a lot in place to let you go guns blazing. There is a way to enter first person view to help with fighting in tight spaces and before each level Agent 47 is allowed to pick his load out. More importantly, there are upgrades that can beef up his offensive capabilities. But the bottom line is that the AI and level design is so tuned to being a stealth game that it doesn't play as a shooter. It just makes it funny to be the world's sloppiest assassin.

I swear some cops/guards are telepathic.

Before I leave off on a conclusion, I did find through playing this game that the controversial sexy nuns from Absolution to be completely in line with the tone of Hitman (at least in this section of the franchise). The tutorial level has bikini clad women working in a drug factory and most levels have an overly shapely woman here and there with an average bust size of "permanent back pain." I'll put a picture at the bottom of this to give an example of the silly clothing they wear, too. At the same time, most men in this universe are extremely buff and about 6'2". You can tell because that's what Agent 47 looks like, too, and ALL CLOTHES FIT HIM. So if you're offended by how the women are portrayed, then I'm offended by how the men are portrayed. So there!

Conclusion:

If you have a love of stealth games, this may be required playing for you as this apparently is the best in the series. Even if you are not, just take a healthy dose of patience with you and you will enjoy a thoroughly entertaining game.

Not realism. Fantasy. Don't worry about it. It's fine.

Avengers Alliance

Rating: 3 out of 3 Stars (why only 3 possible stars?)

Genre: RPG; Sub-Genre: Party-based, Turn-based, Social Game

ESRB: N/A (mild violence and shapely women, I'd give it an E10+)

Estimated hours of gameplay (thorough play/quick play): Infinite/40?

Developer: Playdom 

Wiki page

It's about time I review this game. Hell, I've been playing it for almost a year now. I've been putting it off for two reasons: firstly that I always want to complete a thorough play-through before I form an opinion. This game doesn't have an ending, but I'm level 200 and have 5-starred every single mission (except on chapter 11, which was released this week). The second is that it is a Facebook game and I generally don't consider those to be "games." That might sound like strange logic to some, but you can't compare your average Angry Birds to something like Mass Effect; that'd be like comparing apples to a seven course meal. The sheer quality and amount of content of this game makes me willing to consider it a full-blooded game so that's what makes me willing to review it. Don't be mistaken, though. This game still has all the normal pitfalls of a social game that runs on microtransactions. In that sense, it is EXACTLY as terrible as any other crappy Facebook or mobile game.

See that? $200! Just so you know, 1040 gold is definitely not infinite money.
Nor does it remove the energy or ISO limitations on play time.

At first I thought gold was just going to be something that allowed you to speed up the game. For example, you can use it to buy command points so you can unlock new heroes faster. But then there's a bunch of ultra powerful items and PvP bonuses that can only be purchased with gold. To be specific, you earn gold from leveling up and getting a 4th star on a mission. But the best items usually cost 64 gold.  That's either 64 levels or 64 four-star's saved up to buy one thing! And these items are generally only available for a week which makes it impossible to ever save up for something specific. Also, the sheer number of things that can be sped up with excessive amounts of gold is staggering. You WILL meet people who have clearly spent hundreds or thousands of dollars on this game if you try out the PvP, too. After my experience with MMO's and the never-ending war that is dealing with gold sellers, I can honestly say that I am now perfectly fine with a developer selling gold themselves. But to so blatantly exploit your own in-game economy and take it to such absurd extremes in terms of buying progression and power? It makes me dread the future. Let me get this off my mind by moving on to gameplay.

I would talk about the story, but honestly I've been skipping over it. I feel like I'm a teenager again skipping all these cutscenes... ugh. But it's just a bunch of name dropping of various Marvel characters while you fight through hordes of trash mob's before a major villain appears as a boss. The player character is actually a non-Marvel character. Rather, he or she is a personalized S.H.I.E.L.D Agent rookie. There's some crap about this substance called ISO-8 making all these petty thugs walking the streets into super villains or something. Whatever. The gameplay, on the other hand, is quite well done. It's an old-fashioned RPG where no one can move and each side just flings crap at the people in front of them (like the old Final Fantasy games and such). What makes it stand out from those terrible, terrible JRPG's is that you have actual variety and tactics to your abilities. Not only that, but there is no default attack and the game actually presents something of a challenge (especially when you are under-geared) so you almost never waltz your way through a fight by hitting the same attack button over and over again. The class system is a simple "rock, paper, scissors" design, but the unique abilities each hero has is what defines them anyway. And a lot of the heroes are pretty clever; they fight like they do in the comics using both active and passive abilities that fit their personality and backstory. Although some of them are remarkably bad, both power-wise and being completely off character in terms of what their move-sets are (Luke Cage and Gambit, for example). And I'm not convinced that Playdom has ANY idea on how to properly balance a character, but it is very clear they are at least trying to be creative, faithful, and make each character useful... well, the newer ones anyway. Ahem, CAPTAIN BRITAIN.

Regardless of whose turn it actually is, it is Captain Britain's turn. Don't ask questions.

The real deal with this game is the PvP, though. I was actually considering trying to cut this game out of my life because I felt I simply had enough. But then PvP got an upgrade and now I'm more stuck than ever before! Originally, the PvP was simply a way for players to goof around and have little exhibitions just for fun. And it isn't even real PvP because the player on defense is controlled by the computer. That made it seem even more frivolous. But then they started having tournaments and having prizes for placing anywhere from "participant" to "top 0.5%" (originally it was the top 1000 players). It still utilizes the computer to control players on defense, though. I could see how many would find just that element to make the game silly, non-competitive, and down-right cheap. But I'm very fine with it because I've played turn-based games with PvP before and it's always awkward as hell. Also, this means the game can retain what makes it fun by not having to worry about your opponent's connection issues or wait for them to take their turn. HOWEVER, as I pointed out earlier, you can cheat like crazy by simply throwing all your real world money away. I've competed in every tournament thus far, and have been as high as top 0.6% (sooo close to top prize, agh!). I do have a fair amount of gold-purchased items, but it's really modest. The point is, if you're willing to take the game seriously you probably should consider spending at least a few bucks on it. I mean, if you really LIKE a game then the developers deserve a little cash, don't they? So if you turn your RPG diligence up as far as it can go and shell out a few bucks you can enjoy yourself a little competition. Just try not to get too frustrated with these people who don't value their cash... or their lives.

This guy had Hank Pym recruited on just the second day of his Spec Ops. Just throwing gold away, huh?

I should point out that if you do start playing and plan on doing PvP that you will have a LONG road ahead of you. I'd bet about 40 gameplay hours will be required before you have any kind of gear, heroes, and proper strategies in your head. And then even if you do all that you will be missing TONS of limited edition characters and items that other players earned months ago. The lower level brackets are much more forgiving, though. Most of these badasses exist around level 150+. And there are some really good heroes and items you can get that are not limited edition (like Captain Britain and the generalist uniform, respectively).

Conclusion:

If you love RPG's and comics, this game is amazing. You can take it casually and play completely for free just by having a Facebook account. Don't spend any money on it unless you really want to take it seriously. You will also need an iron gut to stomach all the crappy "Social game" aspects.

As far as I've seen, this is the best Facebook game out there because it's actually a damn game. Shut up, Farmville and Angry Birds. Just shut up.

Hitman: Absolution

Rating: 2 out of 3 Stars (why only 3 possible stars?)

Genre: Stealth; Sub-Genre: Point and Click Adventure

ESRB: M (Blood from shooting and stabbing, tons of profanity, sexual innuendos with lots of partial nudity)

Estimated hours of gameplay (thorough play/quick play): 20/12

Developer: IO Interactive 

Wiki page

Ah, if only.

To reiterate, I'm not a big fan of stealth games. Not terribly, anyway. I did play both Oblivion and Skyrim as a stealth guy, along with a few other RPG's. I did enjoy both Deus Ex one and three but I didn't entirely stealth my way around. Fortunately I have a friend who both played the whole game and is a fan of the series (Hey, buddy!) and he does a pretty good job dealing with the stealth. He said to give it two stars, by the way. So I figured I both had a good base and an excuse to play the game using no stealth at all. This does turn the game into a "realistic" third person shooter but with wacky weapons and other silliness thrown in.

Melee weapons and funny costumes; I approve of anything to spice up a real shooter.

The game functions just about perfectly as a third person shooter. There are cover features and the shooting controls are solid. One can still use the enemy's Stealth game AI to take advantage of a situation by flanking and hiding to easily confuse them. Which is fine because the level designs don't support this gameplay as much as a straight-forward shooter would. It's not as bad as Max Payne 3, though, and Agent 47 (the player character) can still use the terrain to put up a good fight. I put the game on a harder difficulty because I knew that this style of play would break the game and I ended up with a moderately challenging game in the end. There was a level towards the end of the game where I was forced to use stealth and I didn't appreciate that. Other than that, it worked!

This is how I stealth.

How does the whole sexy nun fighting story come together? In a word: poorly. I'm familiar with the controversy caused by the trailer that featured the unnecessary sexism, but that made no sense. The franchise has always had a rather silly side to it, and this is far from the first time a video game has portrayed women in such a light. Regardless, they have no relevance to the story. I wanted to bring that up because that's how I felt about the whole thing. Agent 47 goes rogue against his super powerful government agency. Not the worst premise, no, and only cliche in the sense that it's been done before. But what motivation does this emotionless sod have? I can never understand why he's doing things and how he even gets there. Then there's the villains. It makes sense that the Agency becomes a villain in a "going rogue" story, but who is this cowboy guy? If he's so rich, why is he so concerned over stealing $10 million from people with a lot of guns? And why is he willing to lose likely over $10 million doing so? The dialogue and personalities of the characters are awkward. Add it all up, and I would describe it all as kind of offensive. Sure, that was the goal in throwing around a bunch of F-bombs coming from unscrupulous people. But, more specifically, I wanted to skip some cutscenes to get the unpleasantness done. 

How come a 6-foot-plus buff guy can't steal this costume? That's sexist!

There's no multiplayer, just a "Contracts" mode. This lets players change the targets around on existing levels and determine what methods must be used to kill them. This sounds cool in concept, but I didn't find the kind of depth I wanted from it. And considering the replay of this game involves simply doing the same levels over and over again and finding all the clickable objects and trying to figure out how to get a higher score, it doesn't create nearly enough newness to interest me. There's also an upgrade system in the game, but it doesn't seem to reflect on the single player... I think. There's no interaction with it during the story, so I have no idea what it's for. The Contracts mode, I would assume.

Conclusion:

If you like stealth games and want an odd combination of silliness and grit, this game is for you. It's nothing that stands out as remarkable, but it is solid in what it needs to be.

Important note: you can NOT dress up as a clown in this sequel.