Eurogamer Expo 2010

Eurogamer Expo 2010 Oct 1-3, Earl's Court - London.

Despite only going for a few games, this year's Eurogamer was actually fun, had a lot of games for people to play and things to do.
So, let's start on the games we went and watched and/or played.

First up, is Marvel vs Capcom 3.  (Estimated Release Date: April 2011)
This was the one game I was really excited seeing, luckily enough when we got there, there was only around 6 people waiting to play it, so we had a chance to play very quickly.



On the first round, I had chosen Dante, Chun Li and Chris Redfield.
Dante feels very, well, a mash friendly character, I managed to do so much damage just by simply hitting Quarter Circle forward motion and changing between L, M and occasionally H buttons. Though whether this changes before the final build is something else. Especially because his damage output is fairly high.
Chun Li, needless to say, just feels like her Tatsunoko vs Capcom self, so she was still fairly simple, do a jump-in H, then just a few Light taps and then her spinning bird kick which in this game. All of her other moves, are quarter circle motions (Despite her being a charge character in other Street Fighter games, she retains her crossover game characteristics where things turn into quarter motions).
Then there was Chris Redfield. Just like Trish, I think he is going to be a fairly difficult character to master. His moves feel fairly weak and he feels very hard to actually control, lacking the speed that Dante and Chun had previously, I found it difficult to adjust.

Another player, using Deadpool, said that he felt like an absolute pain to use, but couldn't tell if it was just because no-one knew the moves for him, or if he really is just that difficult.

A lot of other characters were played and it has been mentioned that Doctor Doom has a divekick loop. So unless it is removed before the final rendition of the game, it's going to make things interesting.

From what I got to play of the game, despite Dante being fairly high powered, it otherwise feels very balanced (Which is something that cannot really be said for the previous games in the MvC series).
The design is very nice, there's plenty of action going on in the backgrounds, but not so much that it's distracting. The characters were rendered very well and so be honest, the attention to detail was astounding, for example, when playing Chun Li, I noticed that you can just see her fingers flittering back and fourth while she's in her idle stance. It's a nice touch because the characters don't look so stiff.
The comical effects of the wording on the screen "Such as 'X hit combo', 'Advancing Guard', even the 'KO!', fits in with the theme, and that's something I think the game needed. To make it feel like it's a crossover with comics. Something to show that the comics are still made note of and they're just not using the Marvel name because the characters 'Look cool'.

 Anyway, we went to go back to play another game later, however, by then, there was a queue of a good 50+ people standing and waiting to play. So, maybe next time!

Castlevania: Lords of Shadow -  (Release Date - Oct.5th 2010 [US] / Oct.8th 2010 [Europe])



Now the second game, that I was jittering in my seat about the night before, trying hard not to voice my excitement (and it happened anyway) was Castlevania, Lords of Shadow. (Release date: October 5th 2010 [US], October 8th [Europe])
I have a bit of a mixed impression of this one, as happy as I am with the game.
The guy watching over the games decided to put me on the boss that "No-body that weekend had figured out how to actually beat." So it was up to me to do it.
Oddly enough, it was very very easy, you run away, wait for a rock to be thrown, grab and fling it back at him, run behind it, climb up, hit a few markers out. Then grab a shard to end it.
Sounds easy? It really is.
I'm waiting for when I get the game, for the bosses to be harder, least that's the one thing I remember about Castlevania games (and a friend of mine firmly demonstrated this by doing playthroughs of various Castlevania games this week and streaming them) is that the bosses, were far from easy.
The graphics are nice, the gameplay is smooth. You have plenty of tools at your disposal. Now! The one major complaint I have of this game. Is that is really does feel and at some points look like a ripoff of Shadow of the Colossus, but unfortunately, a lot of platformers seem to have taken this route over the years (God of War, Dante's Inferno. Just to name some). Though on another hand, you could say they were trying to take a few roots from Castlevania: Lament of Innocence in how it is set out.
Regardless of that fact, it's still a game I will be buying and I will enjoy and will put a review up when I am done.

Assassin's Creed 2: Brotherhood



The last one that I watched someone play, was Assassin's Creed 2: Brotherhood. I must say, this was something that looked very repetitive and unless you were playing as the girl, you really weren't going to win.
It was simply a case of: Jump up somewhere, look around, find your target, hope you kill them before someone else kills you, rinse repeat.
You can say, the other Assassin's Creed games had this, but you actually had a reason for assassinating the people you were sent after. In this, it just seems like you're just killing randomers just because they looked at you funny.
I'll still give it a go, maybe my opinion will change, maybe not.

The event itself, I found was fairly well organized except maybe one or two booths. I found that people were able to take advantage of the fact that there was nobody there to usher them along at some points and this made it a lot harder for some people to get in a play of a game.
I wish I had time to go to some of the developer sessions, especially Yuji Naka. However the line was absolutely huge! I think we would have been waiting hours, so we shrugged our shoulders and said "Maybe next year."


Well, as short as this report was, there isn't much left I can mention aside going back to Picadilly and kicking a few people's faces in at Street Fighter IV and Capcom vs SNK 2.

Hope you enjoyed the read. Next up, Welsh Coast Warzone IV, Tag Team Super Street Fighter IV!