Street Fighter IV gamepads no longer available at Gamestop

I went yesterday to reserve my copy of Street fighter IV and a special Street Fighter IV Gamepad. I was told that all Street Fighter IV gamepads have already been reserved and Gamestop Nationwide will not be receiving anymore shipments for now. i live in Columbia, MO USA and don’t know if this is the same everywhere else. Also I donot know whether the joysticks are still available or not at Gamestop. I know for sure that they are not available at Gamestops anywhere in Columbia, MO and nationwide they will not be receiving any new shipments, according to a manager at one of the gamestops.

2009 Year of Hack and slash action adventure games

This years seems to have the kickass-iest entree of Hack and Slash action adventure games to have embraced our appetite for such games.

Starting of with the Big Daddy of them all, God of War III. The first two games made Kratos the Clint Eastwood, Sylvester Stallone, Bruce Willis, Arnold Schwarzenegger fusion star of video gaming. The chained sword brutal 100+ hit combos, gallons of blood, the most intricate and bloody executions, ridiculous strength and the nasty “kill everything and accidentally getting your questions answered” attitude of the game makes it the top pick for this year. However, Sony are really testing the nerves of all God of War fans with these really ridicuous, bare bone, clips that redifine the meaning of “tease.” It is like a slutty-hot high school slut fooling a dork into thinking he has a chance. Why SONY WHY!!!!!!!!?

Next up is my personal favorite and the one game that i believe is going to be a close contender for title of Best Action Adventure for God of War III, Darksider; Wrath of war. It is my banner and i already believe that War looks a hundred times more kickass than Kratos, with the big sword and a massive gauntlet that looks like the powerfist from Warhammer 40k. I was sold when i heard the phrase that you get to play as one of the Horsemen of Apocalypse. After that i did not need videos or kickass kill scenes, the superb concept art and the most badass looking mofo of a protagonist in a game yet. But to those who have no idea what this game is here is taste.

The apocalypse has come early and the horsemen get blamed for doing it. Now the horseman war has to prove himself innocent by pretty much killing everything that doesn’t want to talk to him. And being a horsemen of the Freaking apocalypse, he is pretty good at it. You got swords, you got fists, you got Death’s Scythe, you got a horse and more guns and ammo than Duke Nukem. How can this game possibly go wrong. Here enjoy another video.

On the lighter side of hack n slash (or as light as an action adventure gets). There is Brutal Legend, a cartoon style comical yet brutal hack n slash game which primary attraction is the fact that Jack Black. The game can only be described as a dream a Rock n Roll star had after night of alcohol, speed, acid, meth, shrooms and most important of all weed. Nevermind, it can also be described as a rock n roll video on cocaine. Meh… what else can you expect when Jack Black is working on any rock n’ roll related projects. Here is what i mean:

What else makes me think that this is the year of the Hack n Slash. The fact that even Nintendo is getting in on the action. A Wii exclusive Title Madworld has become my one and only regret for not owning a Wii. Most titles for the Wii tend to stay from excessive gore on most occasions but this game makes up for all the family friendliness sins of Wii. The best way to describe this game is that it is what would come out if God of War and Mortal Kombat were to get together and have a baby:

These are all fine games and i am thinking there are more out there and i shall dedicate my entire week to find more examples of these glorious source of entertainment.

On the side note Dawn of War 2 HAS A FREAKIN RELEASE DATE HURRAY. Its Feb 18, 2009 I am off to gamestop to pre order Street Fighter IV, Dawn of War 2 and a Street Fighter IV special edition gamepad. THANK YOU SCHOLARSHIP!!!!!

OMG!!!! Warhammer 40k: Space Marine HACK AND SLASH

This is like a dream come true. I am a hardcore fan of Warhammer 40k and this game just looks kickass. There is a God and he heard my prayers. The savagery, the brutality and the bloodied chainsword, oh joy. I feel like a 12 year old on christmas morning. This is the video and its only first couple of months in development:

Soul Calibur IV comic

A real cool comic i found that rings SO true about online SC IV players.

More tips on SC4 Ivy; includes tips against online mistu and seigfred

Couple things i have now found – well more like i can now do since i have left the ranking of a beginner – that greatly improve my game play.

Again, I am going to explain use the numpad keys as form of a representation of directions on the controller. Therefore, 3A stand for lower right plus the horizontal attack.

First of all i found remapping the keys helps out exceptionally. I use PS3 so i map A+G to L1, B+G to L2, A+K to R1 and B+K to R2. This make moves a lot easier and does wonders with Ivy. The reason is 90 percent of ivy moves allow for change of stance when instead of inputting the command A or B you place A+K or B+K.

This leads to a whole new level of possibilities as you will realise there are some unlisted moves that occur because of switch in command. Example would be the Whip 6AA attack, where swings the whip and barrels forward with whip flaying everywhere. Another way to perform this attack is in coiled stance. simple press 6A,A+K, which will not only perform the move but also leave you in whip stance. It also makes for a great opener.

IGN rating Prince of Persia before release

Hoho that makes me jealous that those lucky son of a guns got their hands on the new prince of persia before me and ALREADY have the dang thing rated a week before its release. It achieve pretty good ratings, considering they completely revamp the game and threw the whole Persian theme and aspect of the game into its own tiny yet negligible. They even took out the Sand of Time that we have all come to love and adore specially when missed that dang super hard jump, wall-walk, jump grab rope, jump, swing on almost broken crossbeam again and again, jump, vertical wall-walk, jump flip and land on the floor 12 feet above you. It seemed stupid but Damn! did it look good. The acrobatics have been improved in this and the killing large masses has been transformed into a large number of highly stylized and unique one-on-one fights, which is what i am looking forward too that most.

The only thing that bugged me about the game was that they actually made the acrobatics part easier, which to me ruins the challenge and the edge of the game. Hopefully the combat will more than enough to cover this minute flaw.

Anyway here is the video, you may decide for yourself.

SC4, Quick easy tip on how to perform Ivy’s Calamity Symphony and Summon Suffering grapples

The Calamity Symphony and Summon Suffering are by far the most difficult and awe inspiring move in Soul Calibur IV. This is because of the new restrictions on buffering moves, while performing other moves, that have been placed in thise version. If you don’t know which two moves i am talking about here is a video of them:

I have been practicing them in training mode for a week straight and I was only able to pull of summon suffering (The whip mode super grapple) 1 out of 12 times. As for CS i was never able to pull that off even once. That is, until i came across a neat tip on Gamespot forums.

I am going to use Summon Suffering and the Numpad numbers as directions, for my example; the basic way to perform this move is 1236173+(B+G) where the last direction 3 and B+G need to be pressed together in whip state. From 1236 it easy, but breaking your momentum to do the the last three commands almost always screws up the move.

I found it much easier to spin the joystick in a 180 degree motion instead of 1236 part and a  360+ 180 or 40 degrees (both work) in the other direction. so in numpad numbers summon suffering would look like 41236 then 32147896321 or 321478963 +(B+G). It is much easier to pull two circular motions swiftly than to do the crazy joystick boogie dance. Using this technique I went from pulling of SS 1-out-of-12 times to 1-out-of-5 times and went from never being able to pull off CS to being able todo it 3 times in a row. I even manage to pull off CS in a fight once. Oh one more thing! You have to be really fast at doing the spins from my experience.

For those of you who think that this a pointless grapple, you have no idea what you are talking about. Not only does it do a lot of damage it also psyches the other guy out. Everyone knows the difficulty level of pulling these moves off and when they became a victim of one, the sound of them going “Oh damn!” just soothes your soul and leaves your opponent awed just long enough that you can pull off a second cheap one.

This is an excellent technique, however, I don’t know why but the technique is easier to pull off if you are Player 2. The original post also said the same thing. Its weird but true.

Beginner Soul Calibur IV ( SC4 ) Ivy’s tips; a beginners prespective

Ok i have not played soul calibur since SC2 came out and so pretty much sucked at it when i picked up my copy of SC4. Nevertheless, in an attempt to get better i scoured the internet for quick tips, combo list and whatever else I can find. I found a Shit-ton of stuff and when i say SHIT-ton, I mean that 80% of the stuff i found was exactly that; Shit and there was tons of it. Most of these articles, tips and advises were written by pros or vets who have long forgotten what it is like to be a rookie, coming into a new game. In this article i will try to share with my fellow beginners what I have learned over this time.