Virtual Dork: My most memorable Grand Theft Auto missions

I recently spent a pleasurable few weeks reading David Kushner's love letter to the Doom generation and its two mastermind's Kleenex-like level of influence on the video game world. The nonfiction work was littered with anachronisms like modems, Usenet groups and "freeware," but perhaps the most glaring and oft-repeated outdated reference to this reader was the use of the word "levels" to refer to chunks of gameplay. Today's gamers simply don't think in terms of levels as they used to in the days of coin-op and the gameplay design that put Johns Carmack and Romero on the map in the mid-1990s.

The prevailing theory would be that the prevalence of narrative-based gaming, console hard drives and solid-state memory devices (remember those 8MB memory cards for your PS2?) has blended the experience of playing a triple-A title to the point where we think little of gameplay chunks when we jump into an immersive game world. In other words, our experiences are defined by the time between when we, the gamer, push the "on" and "off" buttons on our gaming devices, not pre-determined periods of time decided by a developer.

While this has turned the notion of playing a video game on its head immeasurably since the late 1990s (personally, I'll blame the advent of anytime saving in Half-Life and checkpoint saving first available - to my knowledge - in Halo: Combat Evolved on the original Xbox), there's something to be said for relishing the work video game developers put into crafting a perfect mini-experience into a more cohesive whole.

In no game does that passion for mission design continue so unabated as in the games of the revolutionaries of free-form mission design, the folks at Rockstar Games. It's defining franchise, Grand Theft Auto, features three console generations (and soon to be a fourth) of unforgettable experiences through its timeless missions. Below are a list of my ten absolute favorite, as I prepare to double-dip with the gorgeous-looking PS4 update to Grand Theft Auto V. Enjoy.

10. "The Exchange"
Game: Grand Theft Auto 3 (2001)
Mission Given By: Catalina
Rewards: A cool $1 million, a Rhino tank available at Phil's gun shop, and you get to shut Maria up



The capstone of Rockstar's "mafioso masterpiece," as it was proclaimed on the in-game poster shipped with my Playstation 2 copy of Grand Theft Auto 3, "The Exchange" saw Claude Speed rushing to enact revenge against Catalina, who was flying away from the Shoreside Vale dam with a kidnapped Maria awaiting her rescue. You had to fight your way through Catalina's goons armed with an extensive array of automatic weaponry in enough time to fire a few well-timed blasts with your rocket launcher at the fleeing heli, all with that damn clock running. As the credits then rolled, you were treated to Claude shutting up a nattering Maria with a shotgun blast. Bliss.

9. "Rub Out"
Game: Grand Theft Auto: Vice City (2002)
Mission Given By: Lance Vance
Rewards: $50K, Ricardo Diaz's mansion becomes your own personal playground


In retrospect, Ricardo Diaz (voiced by Luis Guzman) would have been a much cooler sidekick than Lance Vance (Philip Michael Thomas), who is in fact a backstabbing, murderous traitor who you will later have to off along with Sonny Forelli (Tom Sizemore). Oops. Spoilers. Rub Out is a much more satisfying (and in fact carbon copy) of Vice City's final mission. You have to fight your way through Diaz's goons, eventually popping a cap in the fat man himself, all the while making sure Lance doesn't turn into Swiss cheese. Bonus points for that final view from Diaz down the barrel of your guns. "Good NIGHT, Mr. Diaz!"

8. "The Green Sabre"
Game: Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas (2004)
Mission Given By: Sweet
Rewards: That dick Tenpenny takes your weapons, imprisons your brother and leaves you in the middle-of-nowhere


Sure, you could make a case San Andreas' final "Training Day"-inspired mission, End of the Line, was one of the most involved and cinematic in the GTA series up until that point. But "The Green Sabre" gave us a common enemy, beside those bustas the Ballers, and turned the narrative of San Andreas on its head. Fighting alongside a mortally wounded Sweet for Grove Street could have served as a nice crescendo for the final act of a Los Santos GTA adventure. As it was, we were just getting started.

Rockstar found the source material so compelling it repeated the theme in GTAV's "Hood Safari."

7. I Scream, You Scream
Game: Grand Theft Auto 3 (2001)
Mission Given By: El Burro
Rewards: $6,000, mafia goons flambéed



Rumor has it, this mission was so controversial it got overhauled in the 9/11 edit of GTA3 that delayed its release for several months. Originally, Darkel was supposed to call Claude and have him take out random passersby with explosives secreted in an ice cream truck. Instead, El Burro wants you to target mafia members who are cutting in on his business, which if his banter is to be believed involves selling burritos and fiendishly difficult to collect pornographic videotapes. Jingle jangle, KABOOM! Proving that GTA hadn't left its sophomoric streak of violence and humor in the 2D generation, I Scream, You Scream reminded us why it was good to be bad. And it wasn't the first time violence and junkfood mixed in the series, as we'll see later...

6. Boomshine Saigon
Game: Grand Theft Auto: Vice City (2002)
Mission Given By: Phil Cassidy
Rewards: $4,000; ability to buy weapons from Phil; seeing Gary Busey in his natural element in video game form


Vice City gamers would remember Phil Cassidy as that mysterious one-armed man who hawked weapons in north Staunton Island. For its prequel, it would take that character, add a mullet, Gary Busey and some illegal liquor, and convince us Phil was actually a nutjob out to dismantle the U.S. government. It does a great deal of that exposition in Boomshine Saigon, which explains the disappearance of Cassidy's arm in the 2001-set Grand Theft Auto 3. As Tommy Vercetti (Ray Liotta), you have to drive Phil to the hospital before he bleeds out. Of course, you've sniffed some of the intoxicating fumes of...whatever the hell Phil was cooking, sending you careening into other cars as the timer ticks down. This mission would be higher if it didn't introduce that hazy screen and wonky controls that would make another appearance in San Andreas' Are You Going to San Fierro? and to much more annoying effect in GTAIV and V after a night of drinking.

5. Hot Dog Homicide
Game: Grand Theft Auto 2 (1999)
Mission Given By: Russians
Rewards: $40,000, respect, and a copy of Upton Sinclair's The Jungle

The brilliance of GTA's mission design is not confined to the 3D era. Hot Dog Homicide is another of the inexplicable reasons GTA2 received a "Teen" rating, as you play Claude Speed once again. This time, you're picking up fresh meat for a diner by stopping for passengers at various bus stops. That's not a mistype. You then herd the unsuspecting masses into a meat grinder and drive a hot dog van to the dropoff. Mission complete. But yeah, you probably shouldn't let your middle-schooler read Catcher in the Rye.

4. Vertical Bird
Game: Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas (2004)
Mission Given By: Mike Toreno
Rewards: $50K, respect, a Hydra at your hideout and James Woods' undying love


Mike Toreno (James Wood) has Carl Johnson (Young Maylay) do some ridiculous things in San Andreas. Perhaps the most ridiculous is infiltrate a government warship to steal a high-powered, futuristic jet fighter. "Vertical Bird" had everything that made San Andreas bigger, better and more involved than the gameplay of its predecessors. There was even the opportunity for a bit of stealth as you stalked the Hydra on the off-limits real estate of the San Fierro military base. Some will say they prefer the assault on Area 69, Black Project, is their favorite San Andreas mission because it yields the game-changing jetpack. But Vertical Bird combines all the elements that make the game so fun.

3. Three Leaf Clover
Game: Grand Theft Auto IV (2008)
Mission Given By: Packie McReary
Rewards: $250K, achievement, your roommate feeding you Verbal Kint references


Three Leaf Clover provided the groundwork for GTAV's heist missions, and it was the first (and arguably only) glimpse of what the next generation of hardware could do to amp up the intensity of the GTA mission structure. Packie McReary provided a nice, light-hearted (but still deadly) counterpoint to brooding Niko Bellic, and it was nice to see Rockstar open up its mission structure to provide for some spirited gunplay and a truly impressive bank heist that has its routes as early as Vice City.

2. Caida Libre (or "Freefall")
Game: Grand Theft Auto V (2013)
Mission Given By: Martin Madrazo
Rewards: Achievement, the stunning brilliance of GTAV on full display


As the most recent iteration in the GTA franchise, V suffers from what I'll call "mission envelopment." The story arcs in GTA have become more grandiose through the years, with the game's narrative often supplanting the simple tasks at hand in recent versions of the game. In V, you're always working toward a bigger score, or a heist, or a hit, so that when you do finally achieve your ultimate goal, it feels more of a process than one long, extended chunk of gameplay.

Not so in "Caida Libre," which is a self-contained masterpiece showcasing the best of what GTAV had to offer - character switching, larger-than-life stakes and a trip through the sprawling dustlands of north Los Santos. Shooting aircraft out of the sky has been a feature of GTA since the aforementioned "The Exchange" in GTA3. But whereas all other versions were falling with style, "Caida Libre" showed just how far the series had come.

1. Bomb da Base
Game: Grand Theft Auto 3 (2001)
Mission Given By: 8-Ball
Rewards: $150K, Staunton Island, and 13 subsequent years of GTA gaming



"Alright, let's do this thing." 8-Ball was ready, and so were you, Claude Speed, for the mission that would define the next decade of GTA gaming. Armed with a sniper rifle, you were tasked with protecting 8-Ball as the AI-controlled character moved his way through a heavily guarded tanker to place a bomb. His hands were still pretty messed up, so you had to drive and take that adrenaline pill to slow time down long enough to stop the goons' automatic weapons from riddling your bomb-making friend.

When Rockstar began working on the sequels to GTA3, this was the mission they used as their guide. For good reason. Bomb da Base served as a bombastic (no pun intended) end to the Portland saga, and would have been a fitting end to the GTA3 story. But you had much crime ahead of you, none of which captured those sweaty palms of trying to pull off a headshot before 8-Ball bit the dust.

Virtual Dork: An IGN revision, the Top 20 Games of this Generation

I was dragged, kicking and screaming, into the latest generation of game consoles. I adored my Playstation 2, so much so that parting ways with it placed me in an existential funk it took me an entire playthrough of the original Gears of War to shake. I bought an Xbox 360 in 2007, awaiting the May 2008 release of Grand Theft Auto IV. Really, that was the only reason.


Seven years later, the damn thing is still sitting on the top of my dresser, and gets about as much (if not more) love than my tubby tabby cat.


IGN recently released its list of the top 100 games of this generation, as we move forward to some AAA titles releasing on next-generation hardware, perhaps none bigger so far than Ubisoft's Watch Dogs offering set to drop next week. While I tend to think picking on another person's (or publication's) best of lists is a fool's errand, I was supremely unimpressed by the final order of IGN's top games.


While I came into my gaming self during the SNES and original Playstation days, I've felt no closer to a generation of games than the one we're about to leave in the rear-view mirror. So, while I know I did a top games of the 00's list just a few years ago, I feel inclined to answer IGN with a new list centered specifically on the last eight years of gaming.


A word of caution before we begin: I was an Xbox gamer. I understand the Uncharted games are excellent and there are many other PS3 exclusives that are probably missing. But, not having played them, I can't say with any authority which is better than the other. I did have access to a Nintendo Wii for a while during the past generation, however, and I feel well informed to include some of those titles among the ones listed below.

20. Gears of War 3 (Xbox 360, released 2011)

If Gears of War proved the cover-based shooter could survive on consoles and Gears of War 2 gave us the oft-emulated “Horde mode,” Gears of War 3 tied those elements together in a cinematic package that couldn't be beat. Campaign co-op was a blast and the addition of mech suits gave the usually plodding pace a bit more zip. A lot was made of the story element to the final game, sending off Dom and resolving the plotline between Marcus Fenix and his father. I couldn't care less. The shotty was satisfying and the chainsaw revved once more. Gears 3 was the best of the series, hands down.

19. You Don't Know Jack (multi, released 2011)

To the untrained eye, the 2011 release of You Don't Know Jack on current generations of consoles was merely an extension of the console and PC classic from the mid-to-late 90s. However, Jellyvision crafted a much more focused experience with episode-based content that enabled you to play for hours without repeating a question. The introduction of new theme-based questions (Nocturnal Admissions with Cookie Masterson is my personal favorite) and the strategic element of the “Wrong Answer of the Game” makes the most recent console outing the best in a long line of full retail releases. Episode packs ended when Jelllyvision moved to supporting its Facebook app game and other titles, but there's still enough fun here for multiple wasted afternoons with friends, either online or on the couch next to you.

18. Assassin's Creed 3 (multi, released 2012)

The American colonies proved a perfect fit for Assassin's Creed gameplay, and while the first two numbered entries in the now-prolific series set the narrative tone for subsequent games, it is the third title that explores history and offers player freedom in a way that hadn't yet been experienced. Some will say they prefer Assassin's Creed 2's Ezio and his bubbly persona to the ceaselessly pissed Connor. I found his relationship with Kenway much more interesting than any of Desmond's exploits so far or his ancestors. The sea battles, hunting and pirate coves were a welcome diversion from the rinse-and-repeat gameplay of climbing towers, shoving your way through streets and slipping into haybales to avoid detection. Ubisoft hit a high point with Assassin's Creed 3 they'll have to work hard to overcome in the next generation.

17. Borderlands 2 (multi, released 2012)

Borderlands 2 took everything that was great with the original's formula (including Claptrap) and kicked it up a notch in the sequel. The gunplay is satisfying, the villain actually has some personality and the infectious looting is given an adrenaline shot in the arm. While the cel-shaded graphics still aren't my favorite thing in the world, they work in the world of Pandora, which still feels fresh in the game's second installment. It appears as though the creators are going in the story-telling direction with Telltale Games' Tales from the Borderlands releasing sometime in the next year, but let's hope the next generation of consoles gives us brand new settings, equally compelling characters and the same addictive gunplay and collecting we've come to expect from the series.

16. Grand Theft Auto IV (multi, released 2008)

The story of Niko Bellic is what stands out as GTAIV's crowning achievement. The add-ons, while fun, are forgettable and given the technical achievement that is GTAV, Liberty City just doesn't feel as fun as it used to when this game released. Still, Rockstar is to be commended for bringing their flagship franchise into the high-definition era with style, and giving us a grown-up story to match the brilliant open-world gameplay. GTAIV provided the stepping stone that gave us (spoiler) the best game of this generation, and it deserves to be counted among the generation's best because of it.

15. Donkey Kong County Returns (Nintendo Wii, released 2010)

The return of the 2D platformer is a legacy this generation of consoles should be proud in promoting. None stood taller than Retro Studios' Donkey Kong Country Returns, which traded the Kremlings for Tikis and the standard controller for some motion-based antics. The game was fast, fun and with the addition of simultaneous co-op (pioneered in New Super Mario Bros. Wii) took a legacy formula and made it the ultimate party game. It was also gorgeous, throwing Donkey and Diddy into the background and foreground as well as casting them in vibrant silhouettes that kept gamers on their toes.

14. Red Dead Redemption (multi, released 2010)

Reviving the series Rockstar took over from Capcom in the PS2-era, Red Dead Redemption casts its (anti)hero as John Marston, and gives us one of the last generation's greatest stories. The gunplay is leaps and bounds ahead of GTAIV's, and the horse mechanics gel brilliantly with Rockstar's brand of open-world gameplay. The seeds for GTAV's infectious online mode are laid in RDR's open-world multiplayer extravaganza, and the single player experience is chock full of things to do in what seems a barren environment. Red Dead is an achievement that we can only hope will be built upon in the next round of hardware.

13. Bioshock (originally Xbox exclusive, then multi, released 2007)

What if you made a spiritual successor to System Shock 2, that kept its ambiguous morality but made its gunplay infinitely more approachable and threw on a sheen of Randian objectivism? You get Bioshock, a mindbending journey under the sea that made the phrase “Would you kindly?” spine-tinglingly sinister. Long after the smoke from your pistol dissipated, you'd be thinking about what your actions meant, a theme only enhanced by the brilliant follow-up Bioshock: Infinite.

12. Team Fortress 2 (multi, released 2007)

While free-to-play is now ubiquitous, who would have known its greatest title would be a follow-up to a modification of the original Half-Life released more than 15 years ago? Team Fortress 2 is a social experience that gets an online community to work together, something the countless clones of Call of Duty seem to have proven impossible. Its cartoonish style only adds to its charm, and no matter what device you play the game on it's a great way to lose yourself in a simplistic world for several hours. That it remains one of the top-played games on Steam only shows the brilliance of its simple design.

11. Halo 4 (Xbox 360, released 2012)

Halo 3 brought the Master Chief into the high-definition era, but what 343 Industries did with the next numbered entry in the series gave the Spartan his definitive experience on the last generation of consoles. A campaign that introduced a new threat (albeit with somewhat of a cinematic and chintzy final boss), new weapons and switched the mechanics up just enough to allow 343 to make the game its own are just some of the reasons Halo 4 outshined the previous iterations of the series on the 360. The biggest leap forward for me, though, was the introduction of Spartan Ops, a somewhat hit-and-miss episodic adventure that kept me (and my buddies) coming back long after the credits rolled.

10. Portal 2 (multi, released 2011)

It could be the introduction of new witty enemy Wheatley, or the stronger attempt at narrative, or perhaps the goo-themed mind-bending puzzles that built upon the original Portal that ratcheted its successor onto my list of favorite games of the past generation. But the biggest reason was its local co-op functionality that radically changed how you played the first-person puzzler. Shots needed to be timed, portals opened and closed in the wink of an eye, but none of the solutions ever felt cheap, even with two players tackling the challenges. The return of GLADoS was, forgive me, icing on the cake.

9. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (multi, released 2009)

Yes, yes, Call of Duty 4 modernized the genre and provided the first glimpse of innovations that have become genre staples. And the hideous lack of an open beta made MW2's multiplayer frustratingly broken early in its lifecycle (Javelin glitch, anyone?). But as patches were released, and the furor over the game's “No Russian” mission subsided, what emerged is one hell of a game that I, personally, have poured more than a month into in game time. That's not a misprint, I have the stats in my Barracks to prove it. Modern Warfare 2 also holds claim to the greatest shotgun (the game's version of the Spas-12) in the history of first-person shooters. Don't dispute it.

8. Mario Kart Wii (Nintendo Wii, released 2008)

Forget that dumb plastic wheel peripheral. Yeah, it was innovative at the time, but the real reason you kept coming back to Mario Kart Wii was the beautiful tracks, the thrill of hitting that power slide juuuusst right and – above all else – smearing your friend's face in defeat. Mario Kart Wii allowed four players to crowd around the TV and link up with would-be racers around the world for the first time. While it didn't always work perfectly, it was always a lot of damn fun. Many an epithet was shouted at the 117 in Nashville as that blue shell closed in on each and every one of us.

7. Batman: Arkham Aslyum (multi, released 2009)

I can't remember a gaming world before Arkham Asylum, and I certainly don't want to remember Batman on consoles before it. Rocksteady got the Dark Knight, and it did so at a perfect time following the massive success of Christopher Nolan's film. Introducing an unforgettable rogue gallery headed by the Joker, but also including lesser-known and more outlandish foes like Killer Croc and Victor Zsasz. The asylum itself, a longstanding destination of evil in the comics, comes to life in ways that wouldn't have been possible on the hardware that came before the Xbox 360. Rocksteady launched a franchise to be reckoned with in Arkham Asylum, which seems to be headed for an explosive finale with the much-anticipated Arkham Knight.

6. Telltale Games Presents: The Walking Dead (multi, released 2012)

Telltale Games took us on perhaps the most emotional journey of the past generation in the midst of an apocalyptic nightmare. Taking its visual cues from the comic book series, the slightly cel-shaded look of The Walking Dead belies a deep and mature story about love, loss and responsibility. Lee Everett is a complex protagonist whose relationship with Clementine evolves in an episodic manner, right up to the heart-wrenching finale. Like no other game this side of X-Com, your choices have painfully real consequences in Telltale Games' masterpiece that proved episodic gaming wasn't just a ploy by developers delivering DLC cash-grabs.

5. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim (multi, released 2011)

Bethesda, the king of massive gameplay worlds, sends you into a Nordic fantasyland full of dastardly characters, demonic dungeons and heroic battles in the fifth installment of its Elder Scrolls series. One could get lost in the lore bound in tomes of a castle's library for hours, should they choose, or instead punch the village drunk in the face and start widespread chaos – until you take an arrow to the knee. Magnificent Scandinavian voice acting gives Skyrim a unique feel, and the unique character progression allows players to level without grinding, should they choose. This is as close to a perfect console RPG as you're going to get, unless your name is …

4. Fallout 3 (multi, released 2008

Immediately destroying its moniker as “Elder Scrolls with guns,” Bethesda took an established turn-based franchise and turned it on its first-person head, allowing you to see through the eyes of a Vault Dweller for the first time in perhaps gaming's most famous post-apocalyptic wasteland. This time, in fact, you found yourself in the Capital Wastes, searching for your father in the most personal story contained within a Fallout game to date. The Deathclaws, wry humor and Super Mutants were all along for the ride, which stretched to easily more than 70 hours of gameplay if you scoured for every last bottle of Nuka-Cola. And what a way (and place) to spend it.

3. Super Mario Galaxy 2 (Nintendo Wii, 2010)

There will be swearing. Those damn green stars are going to make your head spin. Super Mario Galaxy 2 builds in every way upon its revolutionary predecessor, which took Mario to the skies in search of saving Princess Peach from the clutches of Bowser (duh). Super Mario Galaxy 2 is beautiful. The soundtrack is spot on. Yoshi's appearance in the 3D world is a breath of fresh air. But most importantly, the second entry in the Galaxy series allowed Nintendo to play with the concept of planets, creating stunning challenges that pushed the boundaries of the hardware and, in the process, platforming. More than 25 years after emerging from his first green pipe, Mario showed he still had chops this generation.

2. Bioshock: Infinite (multi, released 2013)

What's to say about a game built upon a premise in the clouds that shows us the depths of human behavior? Zachary Hale Comstock improves upon the dastardly clout of Andrew Ryan and Frank Fontaine in the first Bioshock title. His patriots and other heavy hitters deal just as much punishment and fear as the Big Daddies that populated Rapture. But the true achievement of Bioshock: Infinite is the relationship between Elizabeth and Booker, and how the player realizes that something is amiss about the tears, memories and alternate realities that Irrational Games guides you through in the pair's adventure. The last 20 minutes, mostly achieved through cutscenes, are some of the most powerful moments of video gaming in this or any generation. The two stellar episodic follow-ups, which tie the trilogy together, only add to the prestige of this astounding achievement.

1. Grand Theft Auto V (multi, released 2013)

How do you take one of the biggest gaming franchises and make it better? Add back in the insanity and over-the-top gameplay that put you on the map, split the narrative between three characters and offer a persistent online world for players with the kind of gameplay options one would expect from the king of open-world games. GTAV pushes the current generation to its limit, building a living, breathing San Andreas that makes all other open world attempts, including 2008's Liberty City, pale in comparison. The story may not be as focused as Niko Bellic's, but it more than makes up for it in offering us three deeply troubled characters shaped by – and willing to try to change – their surroundings. While other games of this generation took conventions we were accustomed to and ratcheted them up in terms of their visual fidelity and presentation, GTAV did things (branching mission paths, multiple characters who can be changed on the fly, a persistent online world with its own economies and constantly changing dynamics) that literally changed the way we played. And for that, it's the greatest game of the past eight years.

Virtual Dork: Infamous Second Son Review

While I've owned a PS4 for the better part of three months now, I've used it mostly to watch Blu-Rays and play free downloadable titles. With the launch of any console comes that inevitable dead period that can last anywhere from a few months to half-a-year in which software is at a premium and exclusives are almost unheard of.

I was eager, then, to get my hands on Sucker Punch's Infamous: Second Son. While I was an Xbox guy in the last generation and, admittedly, haven't played any of the series' titles to date, I'm a sucker (no pun intended) for a good open-world title that gives my character the power to wreak havoc on a massive scale.

What Sucker Punch does well in Second Son, it does as well (if not better) than anyone in the business. Sadly, however, Second Son is little more than a graphical and storytelling step-up from a number of other games already available in the current generation.

The story sucks you in immediately. You're Delsin Rowe, a member of the Akomish tribe whose past is clearly checkered. The player is immediately introduced to the spray-tagging mechanic, a nice use of the DualShock 4's motion sensing and built-in sound system. While I still think motion detection and the controller's touchpad are nothing more than gimmicks, they're used to good effect in Second Son, immersing you further into the game world without becoming too much of a hindrance.

From there, you're off on the grandest of the game's many fetch-quests, to attain cement-altering powers from the game's main antagonist: Brooke Augustine, leader of the Department of Unified Protection who has captured all of the element-controlling superheroes known as "Conduits" (or Bio-Terrorists) in the game world. She's made Seattle her base of operations and you'll have a blast shredding it to pieces with smoke, neon and video powers, each with its own set of visual and combat goodies.

Along the way, you'll make choices about whom to save or who to throw to the wolves; whether you'll use nonlethal force and blast away the bad guys and innocent civilians alike; and learn more about the D.U.P. from an intriguing alternative-reality game (ARG) that takes place in the Seattle game world and on your browser. Infamous: Paper Trail may be the most unique thing the game does and it extends the life of an otherwise repetitive series of missions that never truly opens the sandbox entirely to your will.

Seattle looks gorgeous, Delsin's character is incredibly detailed (down to the buttons on his denim jacket) and you'll want to stop on a rooftop all Batman-like and watch the Seattleites go about their day in a society on the brink of dystopia. In particular, Delsin's relationship with his sheriff's deputy brother, Reggie, is a high point in the game. These guys feel like brothers, and when the weight of the narrative gets too heavy, they're bantering always brings it back to a lighthearted spot.

The cutscenes, which are in some cases artistically rendered as panels in a comic book per the series' stylistic motif, are really the only reason to slog through what quickly becomes a repetitive series of missions that only alter slightly as the game progresses. You'll be doing the same thing on the game's second island as you did on the first - tracking down secret DUP agents by their mug shots, chasing hovering security cameras for their shards that act as the game's currency for upgrading your powers and occasionally choosing whether to decimate a crowd of drug dealers or subdue them and smash their goods. The only thing that changes is how much punishing the enemies can take and the presence of Augustine's cement fortifications. That's it.

Meanwhile, you become much more powerful as the game progresses. In open-world games, I like to knock out all the sidequests so I can be sure my character has an entire arsenal at his disposal in the end game. Because of this, I unlocked the neon karmic streak ability (a devastating attack that slows the game to a crawl and you blast neon juice out of your arms, subduing all enemies in a 2-block radius) rather early on. I also earned the ability to blast at weak subdue points on enemies in bullet-time that made wrapping them up a breeze.

As a result, every combat situation turned in to the same rinse and repeat, subdue enough guys to earn the karmic streak then take everyone else down checklist. Combat became a chore that was as simple as lifting a pinkie, no matter the abilities or resistance of the enemies I faced.

The game rushes to an inevitable showdown with Augustine that does pack a whallup and ingeniously includes the "learning a new power" schtick in the final boss battle that made me feel like a badass. Getting there, however, was another story. You have to climb the tallest tower in the game, and with two allies in tow and hundreds of enemies firing at you, an errant missile is bound to send you plummeting over the edge, which is an instant MISSION FAILED screen. Sure, you respawn rather close to where you were, but in a game that pushes how much of a badass you are falling 10 feet equating to a game over is a ridiculous conceit that pulls you out of the game world.

Infamous: Second Son is the first truly exclusive, next-gen game on the PS4. For that reason alone, I recommend playing the title. But it isn't the huge leap forward in terms of gameplay you'd expect from a next-gen game. It's a better-than-average open world game designed with the last generation in mind that looks simply stunning and is written by people who get storytelling in games.

I recommend a bargain-bin purchase.

Verdict: 3/5 stars.

Virtual Dork: Bioshock Infinite Review

"The only true voyage of discovery, the only fountain of Eternal Youth, would be not to visit strange lands but to possess other eyes, to behold the universe through the eyes of another, of a hundred others, to behold the hundred universes that each of them beholds, that each of them is."
-Marcel Proust, In Search of Lost Time

Reviewing Bioshock Infinite as a game is more than a little difficult for me. The feeling of not merely playing, but experiencing, the first Bioshock is much stronger in this spiritual sequel. There is a well-polished, brilliantly conceived and balanced shooter at the core of the Bioshock Infinite experience. But to simply dwell upon the game's genius mechanics would be a disservice to the beautiful piece of art (that's right, Roger Ebert, art) that Irrational Games has created.

Infinite begins with a very familiar scene for franchise devotees. You're in a boat, rowing toward a lighthouse. All you know is contained in a box of effects: your name: Booker DeWitt, a pistol, a photograph of a girl, a key and a few handwritten notes. On one of them: Bring us the girl, wipe away the debt. Devilish in its simplicity, the note kicks off a journey into the clouds that mimics the bathysphere spectacle that kicked off the original Bioshock.

Look familiar?

From those few opening moments, Infinite becomes an increasingly unnerving exploration of that city — Columbia — and an early 1900s xenophobic patriotism morphed by Christian values that struck me as much more interesting than Andrew Ryan's Ayn Randian utilitarian Rapture. From the opening moments, as you're baptized among cloaked devotees in a brilliantly lit sequence initiating you into the city, to the final revelation of Zachary Comstock's (the zealot and main antagonist — or so it seems — of this installment in the series) perversion of religion to suit his lofty, utopian aims, Booker's journey through Columbia is one with horrifying and unsettling cruelty toward man under the guise of ideology and zealotry that never really lets go.

Your charge, as Booker, is to find Elizabeth, the girl locked in the tower. You do so early in the game, after inadvertently alerting the entire city —which wants to protect Elizabeth — to your presence. This is where the fighting comes in. Not only will you battle citizens of Columbia, who are not intoxicated by powers like they were in Bioshock but rather sane human beings driven by devotion either for or against Comstock, but also giant machine enemies known as Heavies and Elizabeth's protector, a massive mechanical bird controlled by Comstock himself.

The resulting escape mission will take you through many heart-pumping sequences throughout Columbia. Gameplay is cosmetically similar to Bioshock, though the names of the powers and perks have changed. Instead of plasmids, you have vigors, which range from being able to fire a flock of murderous crows from your hands to traditional electric charges and fireballs. I found Bucking Bronco, a new vigor that allows you to throw your enemies into a daze mid-air, extremely effective with conventional weaponry, particularly the shotgun. Once Elizabeth joins your side, you have access to things called "tears," in which she opens up portals to other dimensions to bring offensive and defensive objects into battle.

It's all very familiar territory, despite the changes. The aerial aspects of combat are improved greatly by the presence of a Skyline, a device that allows you to travel around Columbia on steel pathways that crisscross the city. There are also freight hooks throughout that you can attach to with your Sky Hook, granting you access to higher ground for strategic combat situations and secret areas where money, ammo and other secret goodies await. The Sky Hook also enables gruesome melee kills. This is not a game for youngsters.

The difficulty of Bioshock Infinite is also alleviated by Elizabeth's ability to revive you throughout. Once you've beaten the game, the devilishly difficult "1999" mode becomes available, in which respawns are limited and ammo is harder to come by. I haven't had a chance to fire it up yet, but the game ratchets up in difficulty significantly in the second act even on Medium. It will be an interesting challenge that I'm impatiently looking forward to.

All of this discussion of Infinite as a game is extremely difficult for me, though, as I said at the outset of this review. Because, to be perfectly honest, the gameplay isn't what stuck with me. This is a better-than-average shooter with an extremely high amount of polish, don't get me wrong. But the gun and vigor play wasn't what kept me riveted to the screen, it was the relationship between Booker and Elizabeth, and the little clues that something is amiss in the world you're seeing that kept my fingers from powering down the Xbox.

Without giving too much away, the final 20 minutes or so of the "game" will take you back to Rapture and cause you to question your motives throughout. One reviewer noted Infinite has no "Would you kindly?" moment, as the original Bioshock did. But the reason for that is complicated. The existence of multiple realities, and an unreliable narrator who knows just as much as you do, makes that scenario — groundbreaking in videogames just 5 years ago — seem obsolete. By the time the credits roll on Infinite, you'll have realized you were never playing the game you thought you were. And that makes another playthrough seem cheap, despite how fun the game is to play and the promise of missed achievements.

The game, in other words, is secondary to story. Some people will play Infinite simply because it is one of the prettiest and most functional shooters out there. Indeed, the thrill of landing a perfect headshot on a Skyline, then zooming down to light some fools on fire and stick a Sky Hook in their cranium is one that will continuously take your breath away. But the story crafted by Ken Levine and Irrational is something that transcends simply one kind of media, and quite frankly renders the intricate plot of the original Bioshock, which earned universal praise just a few short years ago, obsolete and trite by comparison.

Which is the only real criticism I can come up with for the game — I honestly have no idea how you can top, in terms of storytelling, the final act of Infinite (of course, I thought the same after Andrew Ryan got the golf club to the skull in the first Bioshock). It will make you question why you've become so complacent with video games as a medium. As mature gamers, we should be demanding experiences that challenge us and the traditional roles they play in our lives — escapism, mindless cathartic release and sensory stimulation. Infinite turns all those tropes on their heads, in a brilliant story distilling great works of fiction in all mediums.

Do not miss this experience. And stay for the gameplay.

Rating: 5/5 stars

Virtual Dork- Gaming's Top 10 Opening Moments

Good Old Games recently released the original Fallout, first on the market in 1997, for free download from its website. As a Fallout fan initiated on 2008's superb third installment in the series, I was naturally curious to see the roots of a title I previously hailed as the 3rd greatest title of the decade 2000-2010. I downloaded the 500 mb (!) file, loaded into onto my five-year-old PC, and got ready for a night sipping Miller Lite in my pajamas and blasting pixelated ghouls.

And a funny thing happened.

I was immediately and hopelessly engrossed by a FMV sequence that looked like a poorly designed episode of Reboot (oh yeah, I went there). From the opening strains of "Maybe" by the Ink Spots to the wonderful 1950s faux aesthetic the series is known for, the roughly 2-minute clip had me begging for the Start Game screen to appear while simultaneously making me pine for the intro to never end.

Gaming opening sequences are arguably not as important as those in film. By the time you've plopped down $50 or more (or, you've downloaded a classic title for free from the Internet), usually you've put in the time and effort to know you're going to enjoy the gameplay and narrative goodness that awaits you. But when a title does it right, and gives you an opening sequence you don't want to mash the start button until it ends, it's a pleasant surprise.

In that vain, here are some of my favorite flourishes to begin the interactive digital entertainment we all know and love. They may not signal wonderful gaming experiences (though, in the case of almost every title listed below, the care with which the developer introduces the narrative displays the quality of the game as a whole), but they do grab us by our analog sticks and force us to pay attention. And for that, we thank you.

10. Grand Theft Auto 3 (Rockstar Games, 2001)



GTA3 was a big step up for Rockstar. It ushered in the jump to 3D and a dedication to gangster storytelling that has only evolved in the 11 years since GTA3's release. The opening to the game that started the franchise as an international superhit is a jazzy, stylized presentation of Liberty City in all its dazzling, morally decrepit splendor. Teasing us for the treat that would propel video games into a new generation, this opening sequence will likely never leave its permanent occupation in my brain.

9. Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (Infinity Ward, 2007)



From the announcement that the shooting franchise would be leaving World War II in the past and bringing us to the contemporary theater, gamers knew Call of Duty 4 was going to be something special. Drawing upon the trail blazed by interactive opening sequences in Half-Life and other titles, Call of Duty 4 cast us in a helpless position as the credits rolled, a new narrative technique that built in tension and showed off the gorgeous, 60 fps engine developed by the folks at Infinity Ward. When the bullet left the chamber, it started a roller-coaster thrill ride of a narrative that never let you go.

8. Portal 2 (Valve, 2011)



The original Portal was an addition to Valve's Orange Box package. It told the story of Chell, a "test" subject at Aperture Labs who used a gun that created temporal passages to solve puzzles and defeat the evil GLADoS. What the original Portal achieved in simply dropping you into the story, its full-fledged sequel trumped in spades through the introduction of personality and humor immediately. Wheatley, in particular, shines through in this introduction, creating a relationship that sees, ahem, some ups and downs during the course of the title.

7. Metal Gear Solid (Konami, 1998)



Its blocky visuals may look dated today, but you can't deny the pure cinematic feel of the opening to Metal Gear Solid, which immediately casts you as an action hero cut off from any kind of support. The opening is a perfect summation of a narrative that will twist and turn throughout dozens of hours of gameplay, and gives you that wonderful sensation of a badass with the weight of the world's survival on your shoulders - a video game narrative trope that feels genuine in this tension-filled opening sequence.

6. Bioshock (2K Boston, 2007)



Eloquent in its brevity, the opening to the spiritual successor of System Shock plops you down immediately into the shoes of protagonist "Jack," with only a wallet photo for identification. Seconds later, panicked screams play behind the soaked logo of the game, and you gain control of the character after a horrific plane crash. Gee, that lighthouse sure looks inviting...

5. Silent Hill 2 (Konami, 2001)



Some messed up things are going to happen to you in Silent Hill 2. The opening sequence, where protagonist James Sunderland is pondering the creepy occurrences that have brought him to the quiet town of Silent Hill, assures you of that. Sunderland's voice over reminds us, as he makes his way out of a rest stop bathroom, that "a dead person can't write a letter." But we, like Sunderland, have no choice but to search.

4. Fallout (Interplay, 1997)



The look is dated, but the pan from a television screen to a nuclear-ravaged wasteland as Ron Pearlman's iconic voice-over: "War. War never changes" introduces us to a rich world teeming with genetically mutated activity. Series staples, including morbid humor, robotics and that cool 1950s aesthetic are all on display here, catching us up on 300 years of alternative history and establishing a world simultaneously without hope and full of possibility.

3. Batman: Arkham Asylum (Rocksteady, 2009)



If you didn't share Bruce Wayne's misgivings about how easy it was to catch the Joker as the first few moments of Rocksteady's surprising smash hit ticked by, the extended opening sequence featuring Mark Hamill's undeniably creepy portrayal of the Clown Prince of Crime surely made you a believer. Rocksteady took the player and forced them into the cowl as the credits rolled, and when things finally do go wrong, it's impossible not to share the Dark Knight's conviction to clean up Arkham.

2. Medal of Honor: Allied Assault (2015, Inc., 2002)



We'd witnessed the horrors of Normandy in Steven Spielberg's unapologetic film "Saving Private Ryan" and in stock footage of the attack, but never before had we as gamers been put in the uncomfortable boots of the soldiers storming the beach. Despite the limited technology available, this third installment in the World War II shooter series thrust us immediately into the herculean effort of securing a beach under heavy machine-gun fire, producing an authentically horrifying experience in the game's first few moments through dialogue, sound effects and atmosphere.

1. Half-Life (Valve, 1998)



It's hard to remember now, but interactive opening sequences weren't par for the course when Valve's groundbreaking first-person shooter appeared in 1998. The sequence gave you control of protagonist Gordon Freeman, a scientist on his commute to work at the Black Mesa Research Facility on a day that would turn out to be anything but routine. Putting you in Freeman's shoes from the outset, you get a sense of the scale of the game world you will be traversing as the title moves forward, and forces the player to develop a relationship with the character that has nothing to do with seeing their face on the screen.

What do you think of the list? Did I miss any heavy-hitters? Is one of these titles not worthy of its position? Sound off in the comments below! And, as always, thanks for reading/playing!

Virtual Dork-Top Video Games of the 00s

Here's a list I compiled for Facebook a few years back that I'm unearthing for the Shallow End. I've included a few games from the past couple of years to make the post a bit more current. These titles will likely show up somewhere on the inevitable 2010s list that will follow sometime in my late 20s and early 30s, which would put my nerd-dom level between "hopelessly desperate" and Val Kilmer in "Real Genius." You've been warned.

If there's one thing I love more than movies, it's sitting in a darkened room by myself on Saturday nights screaming obscenities at ten year olds on Xbox Live. At least, in the past ten years, the medium has become a bit more socially acceptable, stereotypes furthered in Grandma's Boy notwithstanding. While no game will ever dethrone Galaga's place in my heart, here are the titles from the 2000s that attempted that feat.

Honorable Mention: Grand Theft Auto: Vice City (2002), Manhunt (2004), Guitar Hero (2005), Star Wars: Battlefront 2 (2005), Gears of War (2006)

20. Black (PS2, 2006)
Predating the Xbox 360/PS3 generation by only a couple of months, this drop-dead gorgeous FPS for the PS2 and original 'Box was gun porn, eye candy, and frustratingly sparse narrative action all rolled into one. The game only lasted a few hours even on the hardest difficulty setting, and the story (I use the term loosely) wasn't anything to write home about, but damn if it didn't look simply stunning, and continues to inspire awe visually today. The lack of a sequel due to what I have to believe were sour sales (I didn't buy the thing, even the draw of fighting with gold-plated weapons couldn't convince me to shell out fifty bucks for a few hours of entertainment) is a crime against humanity.

19. Shadow of the Colossus (PS2, 2006)
Another late classic for the PS2, Shadow of the Colossus was the spiritual successor to the excellent Ico. Where Ico bucked the traditional action/adventure/platformer trend, Colossus went all tabula rasa and rewrote the rules of design-specifically, that you needed an environment filled with enemies. Instead, in this game you only fight a handful of foes-all of which occupy an area about 3,000 times that of your character. The developers did an astounding job of making you care about the characters and introducing moral quandaries to gameplay years before Bioshock did it most famously.

18. Borderlands (360, 2009)
I put this game on the list despite the fact that I've only played it for about three hours now, that's how damn good it is. Gearbox has managed to take a formula that has paid dividends in the past few years-mixing RPG elements with FPS action-and introduced a looting system in a beautiful, post-apocalyptic cel-shaded environment that arrests your attention both while playing and otherwise. There are definitely some minor kinks in hit detection, and the complete lack of narrative is a bit troubling, but these are quibbles for an open-world, loot-heavy RPG shooter that promises hours of fun during several thrilling playthroughs.
Note: I completed the game about two weeks after posting this list originally, and it's payoff more than made up for the potential on display in its first several hours. This game is so hopelessly deep and addictive that I was afraid the cable repair van down the street had bugged my room.

17. Timesplitters: Future Perfect (PS2, 2005)
As I, using the character model shaped most recognizably like the Hamburger Helper mitt, swung a baseball bat into a crowd of zombie monkeys in a beat-crazy disco while chased by several other human-controlled characters online for the seventh time in an hour, I realized just how incredible this particular iteration of Timesplitters was. To be sure, the Timesplitters franchise has hit the mark every single time with a shooter experience that is both responsive, fun, and downright hilarious. Future Perfect added online multiplayer to the mix, and it was pure heaven. Here's hoping Crytek gets down to making a worthy successor to Future Perfect very soon.

16. Psychonauts (PS2, 2005)
Tim Schafer's look into the minds of several troubled individuals at a summer camp for children with psychic abilities was disturbing, hilarious, and perfect platforming action all rolled into one. Though the gaming public at large overlooked this gem, I look back with fond memories on this title. I wasted most of my own summer trying to clear censors from the minds of the troubled inhabitants of Camp Whispering Rock.

15. Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne (PS2, 2003)
I'm not a huge of film noir, or pinot noir for that matter. However, the insane gunplay of the Max Payne series drew me into the first game. In the second, the formula is perfected as the gamer plunges deeper into the perturbed mind of Max Payne with flurries of bullets, action reloads involving flowing leather jackets, and deeply reflective (to the point of nausea) inner monologues. I knew Max would end up with Mona, but I can't wait to see what's happened to him in the meantime when Max Payne 3 releases this year.

14. The Warriors (PS2, 2005)
Rockstar brought back the visceral thril of beat 'em ups like River City Ransom with this adaptation of the cult classic film. The look and feel of the game is identical to that of the iconic movie as Rockstar showcases its ability to set a mood through storytelling for seemingly the 90th time of the decade. I loved the flashback sequences that allowed you to garner some real emotional attachment to each of the members of the titular gang, and then replay the escape sequence from the film in the second half of the title. The fact that the backwards compatibility of the 360 has not extended to include the original Xbox version of this game is a crime against humanity.

13. Freedom Fighters (PS2, 2003)
From the guys who would eventually bring us the underwhelming Kane and Lynch: Dead Men came what amounted to an imagining of the plot of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 six years earlier. The Soviets, who dropped an atomic bomb on Berlin before the Americans could do so in the Pacific, eventually invade the Americas in the early 20th Century. You play an unlikely hero, Chris Stone, a plumber (aren't all video game heroes?) who starts out trying to save his brother from the invading Ruskies but ends up liberating most of New England from the Commie threat. The squad-based shooting mechanics were fantastic for a PS2-era game, and the story had some real weight to it. An unacknowledged gem.

12. New Super Mario Bros. Wii (Wii, 2009)
Take a classic 2D platforming formula, thrown in simultaneous four-player support and some motion controls, and you've got yourself a fantastic throwback title. NSMBWii will make you hate all of your roommates for bumping you off a platform while trying to grab some coins, even though you both are seemingly attempting to save the princess, who's been kidnapped again. Who cares that we've seen it all before? The fresh coat of paint both graphically and gameplay-wise make this an incredible, can't miss nostalgic title.

11. Bully (PS2, 2006)
Take Grand Theft Auto, throw in equal parts schoolyard charm and adolescent mischief, and you've got yourself a very impressive and focused open-world title. Jimmy Hopkins is both a sympathetic and fiendish protagonist, emotions Rockstar is used to fostering with its main characters. The highlight for me, of course, was the Halloween night pranking, but the whole game-which spans one school year at a strict New England boarding school, is entertaining from start to finish. Think interactive "Wonder Years."

10. Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas (PS2, 2004)
Quite possibly my most anticipated game of the decade, I still remember driving to the store after cross country practice to pick this game up. Gamestop was having a cookout and giving away tons of free shit, but I went in, grabbed, the game, and got the hell out of Dodge, because I knew what was waiting for me. Over 100 hours of pure, unbridled open-world crime goodness. I played the hell out of this thing well into 2005 (I had to get all of the graffiti tags in Los Santos, right?) and the only complaint I have to this day is that the focus of the narrative was lost in the sheer vastness of the world in which the game took place. But can that really be considered a complaint?

9. Bioshock (360, 2007)
There are so many images from this game that will never, EVER leave my head. One involving a putter comes to mind immediately. The team behind the incredible System Shock 2 (which missed topping this list by about 4 months) brought that gameplay into the 21st Century with a gut-wrenching morality play you participated in. The atmosphere, the gunplay, the RPG elements...it all blended beautifully to create a truly breathtaking experience.

8. Batman: Arkham Asylum (360, 2009)
You know the Joker is going to break out. That's about the only thing you can expect in this incredible game adaptation of the Batman universe. There's a focused story here, incredible stealth elements, and a truly maniacal Joker voiced by Mark "I Almost Had Sex with My Ficitional Sister" Hamill. Oh, did I mention the game looks absolutely beautiful? The combat mechanics are inspired and the inclusion of hidden messages from all of Batman's most sought-after villains makes this a nerd's (like myself) paradise.

7. Assassin's Creed 2 (360, 2009)
Ubisoft took everything that was wrong with the first game, scrapped it, and left the incredibly intriguing conspiracy story intact to create a historical panorama that the gamer can't help but be sucked into. Combat is still very satisfying and the villas of the Italian Renaissance are truly breathtaking. Bravo to the developers for making a sequel that surpasses the original in almost every single way.

6. Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (360, 2007)
The game that may have given me stomach ulcers. I still know my way around Wetwork blindfolded and I hear shouts of "Tango Down!" in my sleep. Though this year's iteration continued to incite ravenous multiplayer hunger in my mind, it did little to build upon the inspired setup of the first game, which clearly had superior single-player set-pieces and built the foundation for the FPS juggernaut that everyone will have to try to dethrone in the next decade.

5. Super Mario Galaxy (Wii, 2007)
Whereas Mario 64 had everyone's favorite plumber moving to the 3D plane for the first time, this title gave us the first glimpse of the potential of motion controls in a platformer while creating mind-bending gravity puzzles and gameplay that challenge gamers of all persuasions. That must be the reason Galaxy is the first game getting a true sequel since Super Mario World on the SNES. I can't friggin' wait.

4. Halo: Combat Evolved (Xbox, 2001)
I didn't own an Xbox, but thanks to the popularity of LAN parties that didn't stop me from logging probably over 100 hours on this game. I remember hours of CTF games on Chill Out with shotguns the night before high school cross country meets, and the thrills of sticking newbs with grenades and pistol whipping them in the back of the face. Halo also sported the most satisfying weapon-the scoped pistol-in all of gaming. Who didn't love spawning with that thing, watching your opponent's shield disappear with two shots, and then finishing them off, sending their body falling limply to the ground? Did I mention my violent streak began around 2001?

3. Fallout 3 (360, 2008)
The Fallout series was great in its own right in its isometric RPG PC days, but Bethesda took the formula, instituted its Morrowind first person touch, and created an instant genre-bursting classic. What begins as a search for your father becomes a struggle for survival in the irradiated Wasteland created by, what else?, nuclear Armageddon. The final chapter of the game, with a giant Commie-hating robot laying waste to guys you would have no chance of killing in the beginning of the game with your puny 1st-level rank, is up there in terms of all-time satisfying video game moments. Can't wait for the sequel (PLEASE make it an online MMORPG).

2. Half-Life 2: The Orange Box (360, 2007)
Half-Life 2 on its own is an incredible achievement in the first person genre, mixing puzzle, driving, and shooting elements together with a story and characters that have real emotional weight, but you throw in Team Fortress 2, Portal, and the episodic content that continues the Half-Life 2 story and you've got an incredible title that really gets you bang for your buck. Gordon Freeman, world's greatest physicist, awakes from stasis to find that creepy guy with the suitcase needing more help in the near future. As you save mankind, you realize just how fucked up all those Combine bastards really are. The tease at the end of Episode 2 really isn't fair, especially when you consider it's been two years and we still haven't heard anything about Episode 3's release date. Let's finish this fight, please!

1. Grand Theft Auto 3 (PS2, 2001)
I remember popping this game in the PS2 disc tray, the first time I'd played the system, and being completely overwhelmed by the world that surrounded me. I wasted days playing GTA2 on my original Playstation in my late-90s gaming frenzy, but nothing compared to the fully 3D world filled with seemingly endless possibilities that lay before me. Consequently, I wasted months driving around Liberty City as Claude Speed, the mute psychopath who probably killed over 100,000 inhabitants of the city during my reign of terror. There was so much to do...I remember wasting days just trying to get the game's clipped-wing plane to fly around the city, seeing which buildings were solid, which were transparent, and warping myself to different places in the city during my pursuits. When the glitches in a game become sources of entertainment, you know you have a contender for best game of the decade.

The Best of the '10s (so far):

Red Dead Redemption (360, 2010)
As you can probably tell from the list compiled above, I'm a bit of a Rockstar Games fanboy. I divulge this information with no shame whatsoever, when the studio consistently produces titles of stellar quality. RDR was no different, taking gamers through a Wild West adventure that nailed the shooting mechanics in a third-person action game to an unprecedented degree and toyed with notions of storytelling in an industry-revolutionizing way. Seriously, the final two or three hours you spend during the campaign will make you appreciate everything that has come before, and presents a protagonist that pulls at the heartstrings in a way Rockstar just couldn't do with its other big-budget, open world title of this generation (you may have heard of Grand Theft Auto IV). Redemption (in a way its predecessor, Red Dead Revolver, couldn't dream of doing) made the Western a viable platform for an action-packed adventure in the medium, and further proved the stellar pedigree of its publisher.

Donkey Kong Country Returns (Wii, 2010)
As a child of the Donkey Kong Country generation, I watched the first few gameplay videos for DKCR and swooned in anticipation. A stunningly beautiful game that, as a kid who grew up playing the SNES titles can attest to, just feels right as a platformer, DKCR takes the model provided by New Super Mario Bros. and adds pizzazz, speed, and the right amount of nostalgia to create not only one of the greatest re-imaginings in the history of the medium, but perhaps the greatest platform game to date on any system. The drop-in drop-out co-op ensured that my memories of rollicking through the jungle with my dad and brother as a grade-schooler could be relived in the living room of my college home. And that's to say nothing of the ridiculous soundtrack, which manages to both retain the sound of the original while bringing the score up to date for a new generation. Bravo, Retro Studios, bravo.

Virtual Dork-Duke Nukem Forever Review

Read this review on Neoseeker.

All you really need to know about Duke Nukem Forever can be found out during the brief introductory video that precedes the main menu the first time you pop the game into your console. A grainy video featuring the eponymous hero firing stiffly at franchise-staple pig aliens while a generic three-chord power metal song plays in the background invites players into the action. A tint of red bathes all objects on screen, signalling the gory death that will abound during the roughly sixteen hours of gameplay in the single-player campaign. At the end of the CGI sequence, Duke (voiced once again by Jon St. John) brazenly declares, "I'm back, baby!" Is that a good thing?

Not if you read several prominent gaming publications. DNF (as I will refer to the game from now on...those of you lucky enough to compete in a timed sport will understand the irony of the acronym which stands for "DID NOT FINISH" in the results) currently can lay claim to a paltry 50 score (out of 100) on Metacritic. Yesterday, 2K Games (the publisher of DNF) fired the PR firm in charge of handling publicity for the game after its President tweeted a warning to all gaming journalists mocking the title in the press. It's not hard to understand this reaction after playing DNF for five minutes or so. The game takes clear potshots at industry leaders (Halo, Call of Duty, even Mario gets called out at one point), inviting through its arrogance the wrath of gamers and other developers in response to the game's faults.

Of which, even as a huge Duke fan (I'll admit I hobnobbed with the super-geeks early Tuesday morning to pick up the game at midnight), I have to admit there are several. Originally, Duke Nukem games allowed for a high level of interactivity in the main world, either for comic or gameplay-specific effect. This feature finds its way into DNF, though in comparison to games like the recent Fallout titles which boast the ability to manipulate all objects in the game world through the first-person perspective, Duke's interactivity seems mild by comparison. Also, in the first few minutes of the single-player campaign (after a rather interesting and-to a certain extent-refreshing take on the tutorial mode present in most of today's shooters) and in the room of rewards present as a result of accomplishments in online play, the ability to interact the world causes framerate hiccups and stuttering.

Enemy intelligence is another sticking point. Foes will repeatedly rush you aggressively, but rarely work together as a team. Circle strafing can take out most enemies, just as it did back in Nukem 3D back in 1997. The most advanced tactic enemies will use to defeat you (outside of some of the inspired, old-school throwback boss battles that occur frequently to break up the action) is to toss some pipe bombs every now and then. Pacing throughout the game can be hit-or-miss. In addition to the aforementioned boss battles (which are difficult, but not impossible-the way shooter boss fights should be, rather than the scripted sequences seen in games of today if you ask this reviewer), there are turret sequences which are rather straightforward scattered throughout as well as some actually enjoyable platforming and physics puzzle sequences.

Many reviewers (including IGN) panned DNF for its decision to include driving, turret, and puzzle/platforming sequences in between the competent shooting mechanics present in the game. I, instead, found these additions to be rather entertaining and certainly enjoyable when used as transitions between fast-paced shooting. We're obviously not talking Half-Life 2 quality mind-benders, but Gearbox does make a point to both introduce interesting challenges within their game world that transcend simply pointing a shotgun or yanking the tusks off a pig-cop close up. During one inspired sequence late in the game, players are treated to a sequence that integrates a lift, a physics puzzle with barrels, and gunplay into five or so minutes of perhaps the most promising DNF gameplay. The physics system in DNF, however, can at times be wonky, and platforming can be frustrating with some unresponsive controls on occasion. Expect to fail and even die a few times making the correct jump.

Which leads to my biggest complaint with DNF. The loading times on the Xbox 360 are unacceptable even by N64-generation standards. I spent more time waiting for the game to reload after dying in a boss battle than I was actually fighting. I got in the habit of leaving a book open so I could at least feel like I was doing something productive with the time I had to wait for the game to catch back up with me. In these days of autosaving and massive game worlds that can be streamed instantaneously with only minimal loading times measurable in seconds, it is absolutely inexcusable that, after learning a strategy to defeat a boss in the first few seconds, I have the time to watch an episode of The Wire, heat up a ham sandwich, and map the human genome before I get back into the action.

This problem could have been alleviated entirely if DNF had simply employed a feature present in many games today of an interactive loading screen. The pinball, air hockey, and crude whack-a-mole (Alien Abortion!) games playable during a strip-club dream sequence in the middle of the narrative would have made nice loading screen distractions. As it stands, we have some stock music that repeats itself every five seconds (we're talking dream-haunting levels of redundancy), a concept art image of the level we are playing, and a few bone-headed text suggestions at the bottom of the screen (these things have to be ironic inclusions by the developers. "When getting shot at, try to avoid bullets" is a "pro tip" that appears frequently during loading screens. Can Gearbox come over to my house and mash up my solid food for me, too?).

This criticism brings up perhaps the central conflict present between the audience and DNF, and fuel for the review conflict that cost that PR firm a client. How do we judge DNF? As a game developed in 2011 with the current shooter audience in mind, or as an homage to a generation of gamers who have evolved themselves, but simply looking for a nostalgic good time? To answer this question, I found myself drawn back to my experience with the Wii version of Goldeneye released late last year. That game was essentially a retelling of a classic title with the trappings of modern shooters. The gameplay was competent, the multiplayer was just as much fun as gamers remembered, and it employed certain features that were sure to bring in a new and younger audience to a game that was a classic of a previous generation.

In many ways, I think DNF tried to do the same thing. There's a competent shooter here, with some fun gunplay (the shotgun, for lack of less punningly-excruciating terms, is a blast to fire at enemies) and the same attitude you remember from back in the day. I believe the reviewers at IGN, who suggested the game would only be funny to a 12 year old, missed the point. Duke Nukem will always be about going over-the-top. In the humor department, that means taking the macho, Hollywood action hero (who may be disappearing, except in revivals like "The Expendables" and therefore no longer as funny to a mainstream, youthful audience) and extending him to his chauvinistic and arrogant limit.

Duke is still Duke (even though some of his quotes will be repeated to the point of nausea by the time you complete the game) and the attitude of the series is still very evident. Several instances in the game let you know the developers are self-aware, and that we shouldn't be taking this too seriously. In a shooter genre where we're forced-with games like Bioshock and Modern Warfare 2-to make ethical choices based on what and whom we're shooting, it's nice to know that we can step into the shoes of a guy who simply wants you to know, "I'm from Las Vegas, and I say KILL 'EM ALL!" That Duke is back, and love him or hate him, DNF at the very least reminds us that such a hero can still exist. With more polish and a focus on its own identity and that of its audience, a sequel to this mediocre title could show us that subsistence in the modern world isn't all the Duke should be looking for.

COME GET SOME!

Verdict: 3.0/5 stars

Virtual Dork-E3 2011

The geek in me has always wanted to attend E3. Getting paid to write about (and let's not forget play!) the upcoming blockbuster titles in the video game industry gets me all hot and bothered like Tony Gwyn on his way to Ryan's Steakhouse. Watching the off-screen videos posted by IGN and other gaming resources across the internet just isn't the same as actually being there and getting your hands on the software. Having said all of that, this year's show by proxy from Missouri has so underwhelmed me that I have decided to, in the vain of Will Ferrell's brilliant James Lipton impression, invent a word to convey my indifference.

Hohumsillery.

I'm going to try to forget in this post that two of my most anticipated games for the future (Half-Life 3 and Grand Theft Auto V) were nowhere to be found. I'm going to try to get out of my mind the haunting faces of those Miis playing Hide and Seek as "revolutionary" for the video game industry. I'm going to try to overlook the fact that the standout titles of the show were games we've already seen in the media hundreds of times. In other words, I'm going to try to be objective.

That's going to be difficult, what with Microsoft's "big reveal" of features for Xbox Live being limited use of Youtube on the console (a feature also of Nintendo's woefully-titled new "WiiU") and the ability to call up my Lady Gaga music videos I purchased off iTunes using my voice. The only exclusive announced for Xbox that even remotely interested me was Minecraft. The Halo 4 CG trailer only shows me that 343 Studios is scared stupid that they actually have to do something with Bungie's brainchild and are worried the gameplay they introduce will split the fanbase over a year and a half before the game is released. So, they rendered a video with countless nods to fanboys to gloss over the fact that they're probably going to butcher one of the most beloved franchises in shooter history. The Halo: CE remake looks like a lot of fun, with online co-op and classic map support, but until I can be assured that I can split some heads old-school Magnum style on Chill Out I'm going to remain cautiously optimistic at most.

As I haven't been a fan of Sony since the PS2 days, I didn't pay a ton of attention to their press conference. If the Vita alone was supposed to distract people from the fact that they couldn't play games online or purchase content for over a month, some marketing executive needs to lose his job. The PSP Go was an unmitigated disaster, and while there are several better-than-decent games that will be available for the Vita at launch, the same was true for the original PSP before the unit eventually began to lose steam. Why should consumers believe anything different will happen in this age of sophisticated smartphones that offer countless sources of gaming-on-the-go distraction? The biggest blunder of the conference, in my estimation, was Sony refusing to include Twisted Metal (perhaps a sleeper for Game of the Year) during their press conference, as it is clearly one of the system's finest exclusives that will be available this Fall.

Today, Nintendo unveiled some 3DS software (some good, some meh) during their press conference and closed with the official unveiling of the "WiiU." It, of course, sounds like perhaps the second least enviable college campus in the world (I'm still making Ohio State jokes). The control pad looks cumbersome, and the obvious emphasis placed upon third-party support for the console at launch only served the purpose of causing me to question why I can't play games like Assassin's Creed and Batman on the system Nintendo released six years ago, like the 360 and PS3? Why do I have to purchase a new console to play games that will almost certainly be ports of games I can play for $60 on my other system? Oh, sure, there will be "controller-connectivity," but I don't play shooters like Call of Duty so I can look down and access my inventory on some screen in front of me. I want a traditional controller without clutter for my hardcore titles, and Nintendo is going to have to do some major convincing if they expect the hardcore crowd to flock back after the Wii essentially shunned the entire community (don't believe me? Look at sales for MadWorld and Manhunt 2).

As a disclaimer, I understand that all of this is speculation, and it's difficult to develop reasoned decisions without the hardware and software in my hands. This is just one passionate gamer's opinions based upon an almost obsessive desire to make it out to California one year to see these games in person.