P.S. Of course I’m going to get it! I’m a crazy House fan, its what we do!

Hand held gaming has had its ups and downs. For me it started on a high. Hours and hours playing Pokemon Red and Blue. The game didn’t look or sound amazing but the concept was astounding. That is the target all hand held games should have in their sights. However in the last few years, it has become a little trickier to find the gems that lay in the seas of the hand held gaming market. The PSP is a good console, with amazing graphics for the platform. The DS created a new range of portable games, and with the addition of the 3DS it just got more unique. However some of the games released have become complex. The detailed graphics for PSP or the utilisation of the two screens in the DS mean some games don’t have the much needed “Pick up and play” quality. Its not all but some. I don’t use either of them as much as I could.

But last year, portable gaming hit another high! (Well, for me anyway). I got my hands on an iPhone 3G. The iPhone as a gaming platform is an interesting concept. I started off with the popular games at the time like Darts and Paper Toss which I reviewed before. They are games you can pick up, play for ten minutes on the bus and then just put away. It was perfect. Even the slightly more advanced games like Fieldrunners, which takes a while to play a full level, still has that pick up and play quality I require in portable games. However, when Team17 released Worms for the iPhone and Rockstar released GTA I felt like we were on the way down again. Games taking forever to load and too intensive to pick up and play.

But this did not happen, well not really. The 3G wasn’t as powerful as the 3GS and now the iPhone 4 also. So some of the bigger titles didn’t play properly, especially on iOS4. But thats besides the point. The games loaded in the reasonable time and didn’t effect the battery all that badly. So we had a viable gaming platform. I loved it, easy to pick up and play and rather addictive (as you Plants Vs Zombies and Angry Birds players will know!). The iPad released HD versions of the more popular iPhone games. Angry birds running on HD with the A4 chip handled amazingly! I had so much fun with the extended view. Even the racing games are more playable on the the larger screen. Then why did I not do this post before you ask? Because of the iPhone 4!

The iPhone 4 (which I queued for 4 hours to get btw!) with the A4 chip, the gyroscope  and multitasking make for one hell of a console. For the last week I have been playing Plants Vs Zombies, Fragger and Nin-Jump all at the same time. With the multitasking I can literally just leave mid game then come back to it at any time (with instantaneous speed!) to the exact same spot. No delay, no loading, just instant gameplay regardless of its intensity or complexity. Even the GTA-esque Gangstar: West Coast Hustle lets you jump in and out of stealing cars and running over peoples in an instant. It is the ultimate in portable gaming speed.

So that is my reasoning for this post. I am addicted to games on the iPhone 4 and with some of the bigger games I’ll throw an aul review up here. For the moment I want to ask you this one question:

Would you drop your PSP or DS for an iPhone?

Question: Did you get much training in today?

Rory: I did a little bit yeah, I woke up at half five and was practicing about half seven. Early start but I got a lot of good work in, got to see the golf course. Yeah I mean its a pretty straight forward golf course and I’m looking forward to getting out there and playing in the tournament.

Question: How does it feel to be on the cover with Tiger?

Rory: Yeah I mean its sorta, if you said to me five years ago “You will be on the cover of the game with Tiger Woods” I would have said nahhh! Yeah its amazing, I think my first Tiger Woods game was PGA Tour 99. Its amazing that I get to be on the cover and I was in the game last year. To be on the cover next to the man himself, its a pretty cool feeling.

Question: Is this going to be a regular occurrence with EA?

Rory: I’m not sure, its just for this year but we will see if they want to keep me or not!

Question: Has Tiger said anything about sharing the cover?

Rory: Not really, I havent really talked to him about it. I’ve met him a couple of times this year but I think he has more important things on his mind!

Question: A major new feature of the game is the inclusion of the Ryder Cup. What are your thoughts on how the European team is shaping up.

Rory: I think its shaping up very very nicely. I think its going to be one of the strongest European teams we have had in a long time. I’m really please I’m going to be a part of that team. And I know if we go to Wales and play the way we know we can, we have a great chance of winning.

Question: Do you think we will see yourself and Graham McDowell teeing up this Friday?

Rory: I’m sure theres a good chance of that yeah!

Question: How much of an inspiration was it to see Graham win the US Open?

Rory: It was a huge inspiration for me because it made me realize winning a major wasn’t as far away as I thought it was. I thought in a couple years time I might be able to win a major but seeing a good friend like that go and win one, win a huge event it gives you a lot of belief. I mean I have played a lot of golf, I know at any given day if he plays his best and I play my best then there isn’t a lot between us. So yeah it gives me a lot of  confidence to see if he can do it, I can do it too.

Question: Whats it like going from picking players in the older games to picking yourself on the virtual golf courses?

Rory: Thats the thing, the graphics since the first one have gotten so much better. Its amazing when you play a golf course now on the game and how realistic it is, its so precise. I remember before the players championship, which is played at Sawgrass, I played Sawgrass hundreds of times in the game, but you sorta go back to it and try and refresh your memory. It can benefit you.

Question: Did EA get much detail from you while making your character in the game?

Rory: Yeah a little bit, they suited me up in lycra and put loads of little shiny balls on me and let me swing away! So I think the swing in the game is very similar to the swing in real life.

Question: Do you usually pick yourself in the game when you play?

Rory: *laughs* Well yeah most of the time. Sometimes I make my own character to see if I can beat myself!

Question: Do you play games much yourself?

Rory: I would when I’m at home yeah. A few of the guys actually carry their Xboxs around with them and travel with them. Ross fisher does a lot. When I’m at home and have a little down time I’ll play. I’m big into just sports games like FIFA, NBA and Madden. I’m not really into any others, a few of my friends play Call of Duty but I havent really gotten into it.

Question: One thing I really like about your career is that this really is only the beginning. You have so much further to go. Do you hope in the future to have your own name on the game?

Yeah we will see how it goes and how Tiger plays in the next few years. It might be tough to dislodge him from the front. But yeah it would be something I would like to have!

After which we got a few photos as you can see above. It was such a surreal experience to talk to someone with his amazing talent yet he is so down to earth. There were queues of kids outside as he left looking just to shake hands with him (which he had no problem doing,  he had so much respect for his fans). Then he left and drove off in an unbelievable Audi R8 Spyder which he got a couple weeks ago. I said to one of the other interviewers “Ya know for a car like that I might take up golf!”. One second thought, I think I’ll stick to the day job!

The questions above were mainly related to the game, some other sports related questions were also asked. If you want me to post them up too just drop me a comment bellow.

Tiger Woods PGA Tour 11 is out now with Rory on the cover and I would recommend everyone to get it (Its even Move compatible on the PS3). These games are something I have always loved, even as far back as Microsoft Golf back on my windows 98 machine!

And finally, I would like to thank Rory for his time and wish him the best of luck playing in the Irish Open this week!

There is a storyline, two opposing men, one a bird looking thing and the other a spider looking thing, want to woo the new woman thats in the area. The good bird guy sings sweet symphonies while the evil spider sings heavy metal! Surprisingly she chooses the good guy (terrible decision I know) and they serenade each other. In a rage of jealousy, the evil spider concocts a poison that steals all the music from the world. You, as good Mr Bird guy, have to get it all back!

So lets jump into the game play. You have to collect items that are spread out through each level. You do so by running along a variety of strings. As you run along, you can strum from top to bottom to jump up and strum from bottom to top to fall onto a lower level. Each item generates a sound to go along with the song belonging to that level. This is the easy part. Throughout the levels there are strings that you have to hit at a specific time! This is done in sync with the level music. These generate a sound also.

The early levels are easy enough. Each level is some classical music. You start off playing Beethoven’s 5th Symphony which is awesome to say the least. But as the levels progress, you get more difficult additions. Spiders (the percussion section of the symphony) jump at you. Just as they begin to fly towards the screen, you have to hit them. This is a lot harder than it sounds! You have to make sure to do everything in sync!

Every bridge of difficulty is met with a boss fight. The evil spider dude plays a beat with his minions that you have to match perfectly to hurt him. This was my favorite level of the game to be honest. It was the same with Guitar hero boss fights (VS Tom Morello in GH3).  As you win, you gain followers and a crown! If you lose, you get angry red notes that overwhelm you if you do too badly.

All in all I really liked the game, it was a simple concept but leads to a challenging layout. Playing classical music is a plus for me. Games will always appeal to me if they are a bit more unique than the norm. Like the appeal of the GH/Rock Band games you feel more involved with a game when you feel you are playing the music. An enormous amount of portable games cannot pull off the attention grabbing addiction that you need to succeed on a portable platform. I feel Maestro! Green Groove does. Word of advice, play with earphones. Enhances the experience. Keep up the good work guys! Hope to see more additions of the game.

I will give it a decent 4/5 because it managed to fully grasp my attention. It is a good game for the platform I felt.

So EA are having an event at the Irish Open next week. I’m gonna be there to ask Rory Mc Ilroy a few questions and get a few pictures! So I thought I would pop up a post and ask what would you like me to ask?

Cheers guys!

Gary

The latest addition to the Rockband series is punk rock band Green Day. I always found a huge amount of energy in Green Days songs and so thought it would fit perfectly into the average gamer/wannabe rock stars arsenal.

There were a few issues I could see. If Harmonix decided that certain Green Day songs were not suitable for the game, they would simply be left out. Now as Green Day fans can tell you, American Idiot is an album that has to be listened to in its entirety. So what did Harmonix decide? You got it, full albums (well some of them anyway)!

Here is the song list from the Official Rock Band Forum:

The Warehouse: A fictional venue that captures the feel of early Green Day shows and performances.

Dookie (1994)

“Burnout”
“Having a Blast”
“Chump”
“Longview”
“Welcome to Paradise”
“Pulling Teeth”
“Basket Case”
“She”
“Sassafrass Roots”
“When I Come Around”
“Coming Clean”
“Emenius Sleepus”
“In the End”
“F.O.D.”

Milton Keynes: The UK concert made famous by Green Day’s 2005 movie for “Bullet in a Bible”.

American Idiot (2004)

“American Idiot”
“Jesus of Suburbia”
“Holiday”
“Boulevard of Broken Dreams”
“Are We the Waiting?
“St. Jimmy”
“Give Me Novacaine”
“She’s a Rebel”
“Extraordinary Girl”
“Letterbomb”
“Wake Me Up When September Ends”
“Homecoming”
“Whatsername”

Warning (2000)

“Minority”
“Warning”

Nimrod (1997)

“Hitchin’ a Ride”
“Good Riddance (Time of Your Life)”
“Nice Guys Finish Last”

Insomniac (1995)

“Brain Stew” / “Jaded”
“Geek Stink Breath”

The Fox Theater, Oakland: The place where Green Day performed an intimate show for the band’s most recent album.

21st Century Breakdown (2009)

“Song of the Century”
“21st Century Breakdown”
“Before the Lobotomy”
“Last Night on Earth”
“Peacemaker”
“Murder City”
“¿Viva La Gloria? (Little Girl)”
“Restless Heart Syndrome”
“Horseshoes and Handgrenades”
“The Static Age”
“American Eulogy”
“See the Light”

The following tracks are already available in the Rock Band Music Library of downloadable content giving players the chance to complete the full 21st Century Breakdown album, view unique performances and venue visuals, and unlock exclusive collectible content!

Downloadable Content

“21 Guns”
“Know Your Enemy”
“East Jesus Nowhere”
“Last of the American Girls”
“¡Viva La Gloria!”
“Christian’s Inferno”

Now lets not get over excited, this has led to a problem. Its really only noticeable to the vocalist of your pseudo punk rock band. Swearing is prohibited and so you find gaps in the songs. I found myself singing along to St Jimmy and then losing complete track of where I was because the vocals just cut out! I’m not much of a singer so I dunno if it was the same in any other Rock Band, but I found it very off putting.

As for the game itself, LOVE IT. I never realised how much I actually like Green Day until I found myself dancing around like a deranged cat in my room. It really sucks you into the game when you get to play the full album. I find myself getting bored of some of the random sets you play in the other Guitar Hero and Rockband games. Green Day leave them all in their dust!

I wont go into a huge amount of detail with the game play as I am sure you all know enough already. But I will admit I found that the vocals were a good bit easier than expected. Guitar and drums vary in difficulty as normal.

Physically the game looks great. You get a good representation of the lads and the drums are acted out with relative accuracy. Good enough to bring you into the moment!

The career is similar to the one in the other band specific game, The Beatles Rockband except you have your choice of songs. It adds a good deal more interest to the game I found. Now me, having the attention span of a small rodent, needs something like this to enhance my interest in the game.

And so, I will award Green Day Rockband a much deserved 4/5. Not just because it is a Rockband/Guitar Hero style game (which you will know from my previous reviews) that I am a huge fan of, but because it has less choice of songs but executed perfectly!

So go on and get it!!

playedDestruction Derby? Ever played Need For Speed? Well mash all of them together into one mangled car wreck of pure awesomeness.

I tend to go for the games that I can just drop in a play without having to pay attention to story lines and the like, so this suited me to the ground. So lets start from the beginning.

The game has a number of game modes, each more violent than the last. The standard race is a number of cars doing laps around a track from a top down view. You have a certain amount of boost to help you slam your opponents  into walls or in my case, go up a ramp and slam myself into the wall (I was never any good at top down games).

While you are running around the track you have a weapon attached to your vehicle. Some have guns, some have flames and some have chainsaws! You can also pick up extra boost or special weapons to help you explode your enemies. Last one standing is the only rule you need to know!

Another game mode (and my favorite to be honest) is the demolition derby mode. This brings back all the good memories of playing Destruction Derby as a kid. There are no laps and no rules except to destroy everyone! You can smash them, shoot them, cut them, burn them whatever you want! Once you are the last one alive thats all that matters. You get extra weapons every now and then like bombs and oil slicks.

The game is linear much like the story in NFS or a beat em up game. Each track has associated missions that you must complete ending in a boss battle. You have to do elimination races, were after each lap whoever is last is lost! There are last man standing races were you have 99 laps to win a race, but (as hinted by the title) if you can destroy your opponents before then, YOU WIN!

The boss battles are set by laps but not in the conventional sense. You have to hunt down and destroy the boss before he completes all the laps. If you do, you get the pink slip! And thats really the aim of the game, win races, destroy people and collect menacing vehicles on the way.

When you get a car you can customize and upgrade them to your liking. Making them faster, better and much more deadly. All in all I loved this game. Its something I would sit down and play after a stressful work day! And its a mix of all of my favourite Playstation games. Very interesting concoction that I will give a whopping  4/5! *BEEP BEEP*

I had the luxury of playing one of my favorite classic games albeit on a different platform, Socom. I remember having the time of my life being the leader of a Squad of navy SEALs with headset and all on the PS2. This time I am playing it on the PSP. And the rules have changed slightly.

This game is a follow on to the previous Fireteam games on the PSP. However you don’t need to fully be aware of the previous story to play it, its explained enough that you can jump straight into the action. The story is interesting and keeps your mind involve. But for the moment lets judge the game on its standalone attributes.

Visually the game looks the part. The video sequences in between the gameplay are great for a PSP game and the gameplay itself looks decent. One problem I always had with first or third person shooter games on portable platforms was visibility. They are usually very poor but with Socom on the PSP I can see rather well! The enemies look the part and are distinguishable from your teammates (which in my eyes is normally a good thing).

Lets get to the good part, the gameplay itself. The training mission takes very little time but gets you up to speed enough to easily take the first few levels. Controls are fairly self explanatory and the use of the weapons is intuitive and well designed. There was one feature however (and this goes for all games to be honest) that I did not like at all, the auto-aim. As always it is something that will never be perfected. A lot of the time I found it rather slow trying to turn to shoot enemies and the auto aim would grab whoever is near the cross hair and not whoever is near you. So I was shooting a guy on a balcony while another was shooting me right in the face. This isn’t a huge inconvenience but the game presents a very real feeling to life. The more you get shot, the less you see and staying alive at times can be difficult. So when you call on your auto-aim, you kinda want it to work first time round and not have to cycle through people.

The AI for your teammates is great. They can command themselves for the most part but respond to your commands as needed. The computers AI isn’t quite as good and I sometime found myself getting into a gunfight with three enemies firing back and another oblivious to anything going on around him.

There are a host of new weapons each so much more fun than the last. Maintaining stealth is always an objective for a SEAL but when someone hands you a shotgun you have to run around shooting anything that moves. Its like an unwritten rule of video games. The levels are well designed and can be tricky to navigate at times. This just adds to the realistic feel in the end and makes the game more enthralling. However I found navigation somewhat temperamental at times. Going down a stairs in a building was difficult as you cant see down without stopping completely and changing your view. I will put this down to the platform rather than the design but still.

The sound effects are amazing  and the music really gives you an adrenaline rush. Ever watch 24 or Flashpoint? Exactly like that! Sound can bring a lot to a game and I am glad to see the guys at Socom did this one well.

In conclusion, this is one of the few portable shooting games that I actually like. I find that controls on these types of games are rather clumsy and with the “squad command” part of the Socom games I thought it would be just too much for a portable platform to do. However this game does it beautifully. The game has a great flow where you can just jump right in and you barely even notice you are playing it on a PSP. So I will award this game a 3.5/5! At ease soldiers!

a match every now and then. However I never thought I would be interested in the management side of the game, but TIFM makes it rather easy to get into.

You start of by picking your “Premier League” football team. I (of course) picked the Manchester Reds. You are presented with a really glossy and clean looking interface. Choices and controls are easy to pick up and I must say, for a game that has very little graphics in it, it looks great.

Now that I have my team I jumped straight into the action with a friendly against Ewood rovers. You have the choice of watching a play by play of the match, which is quite similar to the live scoreboard on SkySports.com, or you can skip directly to the results. The animations and sounds watching the play by play are simple (I love simple, works well in portable games) and work really well for the game type.

During each match you have the opportunity to change your team around and augment your team in various ways. Rather simplistic approach again but I found a couple of the menus confusing to navigate through. The main game menu however is very nice. You can see everything from new sponsor deals to transfers and contract signings in the news tab. The stats tab will show you how you have done and what money you have made.

Like every PSP Minis game this suits the “games on the go” category. You dont need to sit down for hours trying to get into the game, you can pick up and play a few minutes a time whenever you get a chance. So, from a football outsiders point of view, the game reacts and looks clean cut. If you need a game thats easy to pick up and stress free, this game does it well.

So I’ll give it a 3/5

People sometimes forget that Take That have been around since 1989! Well the game really brings their entire career to life. Starting with songs that I honestly never heard before (Promises is one of them) and going up to their newest hits (which I love BTW).  I wont go into huge detail with the Sing Star game type as it has been done to death so here it goes.

Lets take a look at the song list:

* “A Million Love Songs”
* “Babe”
* “Back For Good”
* “Beautiful World”
* “Could It Be Magic”
* “Do What U Like”
* “Everything Changes”
* “Greatest Day”
* “Hold Up A Light
* “I’d Wait for Life”
* “It Only Takes a Minute”
* “Love Ain’t Here Anymore”
* “Never Forget”
* “Once You’ve Tasted Love”
* “Patience”
* “Pray”
* “Promises”
* “Reach Out”
* “Relight My Fire”
* “Rule the World”
* “Said It All”
* “Shine”
* “Sure”
* “Up All Night”
* “Why Can’t I Wake Up With You”

Some of them you will know and some of them will be from the GIANT blond hair and dungarees days of Take That we never know existed. Some of the videos they play while you sing are truly terrifying! Like this!

So I had my eye on a song and I gave it a go. I mean you really can’t help but start feeling yourself and doing pelvic thrusts when singing “Relight my Fire”.  I was having a great time altogether but I don’t think the neighbors/pets/family/cars/aliens/anyone did! Well what can ya do that’s pretty much the basis of Sing Star.

So as far as Karaoke games go this fits nicely into the genre. Take That have always had and always will have catchy songs. Its great fun singing the classics like “A Million Love Songs” but is seriously nice singing the new songs. I mean I sing “Greatest Day” without even having a scoring system in front of me!

Ok this review is a tad difficult for me. I can tell you how fun it was singing and all but you have no idea. You need to either experience it yourself or (God forbid) let me sing it to you! So here it is, if I get enough requests via comments, Twitter, Facebook or emails I will……….sing. That’s right I will upload a Youtube video for your enjoyment (a.k.a my embarrassment)! I look forward to hearing your requests!