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Emergency procedures initiated.

Stand by.

  You know the ... fucking score, right mate? Look at me. You know what I'm here for, don't you? What we're here for. I mean you know...? That's why you called me, eh?

  Well then.

  But I'm here to talk to you about it anyway y'know, because...maaate...

  What the b'uck is up with you?

  You are not going to get past this. You don't know a way through those double saws. You just don't. You've been trying. God knows you've been trying.

  I mean, look at you. Ha! Have you seen the state of you? Look at yourself. You're like a junky needing a fix. Just one more go. Just one more go. You are sweating. Your palms are sweaty. Your eyes are acting all funny, all bloodshot. People will think you've been on class A's the whole weekend man!

  Put it down.

  Look at you. Your thumbs ache. You've got that nasty twitch under your right shoulder again, haven't you? Your knees ache to the bone man. Why are you sitting like that? When was the last time you had a nicotine hit? Why are you even putting yourself through this? Put it down. Why did you even bring me here if you aren't going to listen?

  H E L L O ? !

  Hello. When was the last time you ate? When was the last time you cared? When was the last. ... b'ucking time you even looked at anything else in this room? Apart from the TV or your hands? When was the last time you did anything else with your hands? Are you paying attention? You asked for this...Jesus...

  Look, just do one thing for me, huh? Can you do that? For me? Old friend? Compadre? Amigo? Hello? Just do this one little m-i-n-u-t-e thing. Huh? Huh pal? Huh buddy? Just this one little God-damn thing. Huh? Good. Good lad.

  Just...look at the clock. The clock. Y'know...the clock. Just look at it. Once for me, huh? Just one little glance.

  That's all I ask Johnny. Jooohnny. JoooooooooooooohnnNNYY!! Hello? That's all I ask. Look at it. Look...look...yes...look...

  Yes. You see now. Thank you. Thank the Lord.

  Yes that's right, imbecile. There is no Bandage Girl to rescue I'm afraid...yep, yep, look at the daylight. It's happening outside. You remember outside, yeah? Yeah, of course you do. What am I thinking? I don't have dumb friends. Why did I think you were dumb?

  Now take it in. There IS NO Super Meatboy. It's an excellent value game. On Xbox Live. But...and you are not him.

  Oh jeez. I'm so glad you remember. We thought we'd lost you for a while. How long has been since we lost regular contact, fellas? Six, seven hours? Jeeez, we thought we'd lost you. That level really got to you, huh? Trying to capture that bandage and live? Ha ha. Jeez, we thought we'd lost you.

  That's right fella. It six forty five am and you forgot to wake your girlfriend for work. That's right. You better get on it.

  Now don't you worry about a thing, she's just a little grumpy because she just woke up and can't appreciate your circumstance. Look at it this way - girls want guys to have an almost telepathic understanding of them, but at this point in time she simply cannot comprehend how important grabbing that bandage was for you, to collect at that time. If this was the other way around, you'd be getting told that you were uncaring, lack understanding, that you lack empathy. Woman. Pfff. She doesn't even understand THIS. It felt like a military mission. It felt like an order. It felt like a divine commandment. We understand, don't we boys? This is no blue hedgehog, fellas. It messes with your mind. You love her. But jeeeez...this was important.

  She'll be fine. Her woman brain will work it out when you show her the level which defeated you. When she gets home from work. She will appreciate that. She will understand. Yes. She will witness you dying. She will witness you failing...Look, you are a man. I know you don't want to show the love of your life any of your failures but you will not succeed at this time. You will fail. For seven hours this game has simply consumed you.

  You are working tomorrow, yes. You can maybe nab a quick game or two before then and beat those saws, yes. So maybe failure isn't an option. You still have time to champion that level. Then you can show her how glorious you are. How victorious you are naturally. Try again before work. That's a great idea! After rest. When you are 100% again. You WILL triumph. Despite the sheer perfection of its controls, your thumbs are weak now. Your reactions are slow, your brain is mush and they both have to be sharp as a tack, soldier. It has drained you. You must rest now. That's an order soldier! Operation 26 is green tomorrow. Operation shut eye starts now. Rest. Rest. Rest.

  You love this game. She loves you. She'll understand you love this game. Just not now. She's angry because you forgot to wake her and now she can't wash her hair before work. Show her later. She'll appreciate it more and you can still be a winner in her eyes. It's for the best.

  Don't think about that now though. It's futile. It's late. Stop thinking. Just rest your head on that there pillow and think about sleeping. That's right. Get the impression you are tired. You are feeling sleepy. Your eyes are heavy. Listen to your breathing. Relax.

  I'll be heading off now but I'm going to pass you to a friend of ours you are quite well acquainted with.

  Hi Johnny. Remember me?

  Hey hey...sshh sshh ssshhhh! Don't worry.

  I was just wanting to discuss with you all your remaining friends. Where are they? When did you start feeling so lonely...? 

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This movie tie in game of the movie of the same name, now available on Android for absolutely free gets the once over by yours truly.

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BURNING THE ASPHALT

THE ASPHALT RACE GAMES SERIES, BY DEVELOPERS GAMELOFT, IS MUCH DERIDED. HERE, DIGITAL RACE ADDICT JOHNNY ORGAN LOOKS OVER THESE GAMES AND ASKS IF THE NEGATIVE PRESS IS JUSTIFIED.

The Asphalt games are an easy target for much derision and for very good reason. For a start, they are developed and published by Gameloft, a company who are currently worth over 100 million Euros, who operate 28 studios and who employ over 5000 staff producing games mostly for the mobile phone market. Games that essentially rip off other companies games.

  For every Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 on your Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 or PC, you’ll find they make Modern Combat 3: Fallen Nation for your mobile phone. For every Guitar Hero, there is Guitar Legend. For every True Crime: Streets Of L.A., you’ll find Gangster: Crime City.

  The artwork will look similar. The genre will be intact. It’ll be a watered down version of a doppelgänger that squeezes on to your hand-held device.

  Yet this simplifies things, especially more recently. They do produce genuine licensed games such as The Dark Knight Rises, Prince Of Persia, Rayman or Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six Vegas games. More often than not though, when they can’t get those licences, they just rip them off.

  Asphalt Urban GT was a launch game for both the ill-fated Nokia N-Gage and the not-so-ill-fated Nintendo DS back in 2004. It wasn’t a great game and yet it was far from terrible. It just didn’t stand out from the crowd. It just didn’t do anything particularly special.

  Yes, it had some nice licensed cars (around 30 if I recall correctly) including big Aston Martins and Lamborghini’s but the 9 tracks you raced around weren’t as distinctive or flashy. Neither was the sound. And the collision detection was suspect at times. The other cars didn’t always feel…solid. It’s a series of games that came from humble beginnings and mediocre success and yet refused to give up. Refused to stop trying. Refused to give up the chase.

Very few gaming experiences have excited me more than my at mum’s house as an ageing teenager. I had a glorious gaming set up. A 25 inch Nicam Stereo TV connected to a 500 Watt P.A. system, a PlayStation, an arcade steering wheel, big comfy swivel chair and a copy of Ridge Racer.

  The adrenaline and thrill of belting along with your face at the bumper of the car, two inches from the ground, power sliding at breakneck speed as you slammed your foot on the accelerator pedal on the way out of corners, straightening up the back end of your car, trying to perfect that racing line to shave the slightest millisecond off your current best time, the deep bass of the music pounding off your chest, the sweat of your palms on the wheel, the announcer reminding you how great you were … I lived in that game. I breathed the air of that gaming world. I was the master of that universe.

  My dinner got cold a lot.

  I had the game most kids would pump pound coin after pound coin into. I had it in the palm of my hands. I could not believe how good it looked. How great it sounded. How joyous it was to play. How lucky I was. I could not fathom how that little grey box underneath my television could produce such wonders. I had an arcade machine in my bedroom.

  Asphalt 6: Heat astounded me in all the very same ways as those heady days. Only this time it was in the palm of my hands. That same sensation of bedazzlement. That same rush of excitement. It was an emotion I hadn’t felt in a very long time. A thrill I never thought I’d feel again. It made me look at the hardware in awe. Instead of a phone, I have a current gen console within a mystical box wrapped around a 4.2 inch viewing screen. I have an arcade machine I can take on the bus.

  Released on Android in January 2011 (iOS a month earlier, Blackberry a little later) a lot has changed about the game since 2004. It’s basically stolen a lot of the great ideas from some of the best arcade racers of its home console counterparts. Mostly from Criterion’s best games, The Burnouts and Need For Speeds. It’s Gameloft doing what they do best. What they get stick for.

  And this time I couldn’t give a fuck.

  There are a few control methods. I prefer touching the left and right side of the screen to turn as opposed to using the gyroscope turn-the-screen-as-a-steering-wheel method. I find it easier to power slide that way. At the bottom of each side of the screen are brake buttons. There’s also a boost (or nitro if you prefer) button. Custom controls mean you can place that anywhere on the screen you want. I like it just above the brake on the right hand side.

  Launching a nitro is more like hitting warp drive. The whole screen screams into neon blue and you become pretty much invincible. The traffic and other racers become take-down fodder. It’s a euphoric, tingling experience, especially when you make a jump and go careering through the sky.

  You normally race against 5 opponents but there are different race types including Duel (one vs one). Their A.I. is rather good. Not as dim-witted as Ridge Racer‘s but certainly not as aggressive as Need For Speed‘s cop cars. They seem to do different things in each race. No pre-determined routes and their aggression seems to also differ from race to race. They seem almost human at times.

  There are 14 tracks in total (there’s exclusive tracks on each version, Android has the most) and a selection of 42 cars to race with. These range from the Nissan 3702 to the Bugatti Veyron. You need two things to unlock the more tantalising cars – cash and stars.

  Each race can win you three stars. One star is usually won by meeting the original contest of the race (coming first in a normal race, managing to take out the required amount of cars in Take Down mode). The second and third stars are unlocked by meeting the extra challenges offered in each race.

  These vary from having to perform a certain distance of power sliding, beating the track by a set time, or simply ramming more cars off the road, amongst other things. At first these extra stars are easily conquerable (indeed at first the game seems a little easy) but as the game progresses these stars do become more challenging and add significant replay value. By simply winning matches you can advance through the different leagues with ease but soon you will realise that you’ll need all these stars to get the best cars and upgrades which will be essential to win the later on races. Your car will simply be too slow or not heavy or slippy enough to complete the game.

  It’s a system I loved and it doesn’t feel cheap. Of course this being a mobile game produced by Gameloft, you can take the easy route and buy these stars with real money through the Google Play store.

  And if you want to race online via Wi-Fi against other opponents straight away then it’s probably the option you will have to take as most cheaters -sorry- gamers on there seem to only want to race in their overly souped-up Bugatti’s.

  So your partially customised Lamborghini will be no challenge to the majority. Though I have to say, I’ve battled some fairly honest racers on there too. The online mode is fantastically simple and seems packed to the gills with ready opponents. I’ve had many a great race on my night shift at 3am.

  Asphalt 7: Adrenaline, its sequel, has better online options closely resembling EA’s Auto-log system. However Asphalt 7 was broken in an unfathomable way – its widely reported frame rate bugs which I have experienced first-hand. There was no slow down as such but there were moments in the game where your car disappeared for split seconds or suddenly jumped to another part of the road. An update has solved a lot of stability and graphics issues. It's now running more smoothly than ever, on my phone at least.

  The update before that (seemingly to help compatibility and graphic issues on the Nexus 7) made my version unplayable for a while. That is, the game would crash when starting up a new game.

I'm pleased to report that this latest update seems to have fixed most of the gremlins that hampered my version for 6 months.

  There have been some changes to the game too. The star system is replaced by a new tier system, allowing you to only race certain cars in certain leagues and it’s just not as much fun as replaying and replaying that particular race, desperately trying to capture that third elusive star.

    But I think both games are essential purchases, and what makes them special is their soundtracks. I absolutely love them. NFS‘s EA Trax bollocks has always irritated me. I’d much rather have this. A strange hybrid of Daft Punk, Justice, Calvin Harris and Hot Chip influences are perfect fodder for this type of racer and are worth the download price alone. 69p for Asphalt 6 or 7. Mind-bogglingly good value no matter which way you look at it. And such an easy recommendation. It’s my favourite, most surprising gaming experience in the past few years. Yes, it rips off almost every arcade racer on the consoles that came before it but it’s better than most. Graphically equal. And it’s far cheaper too.

  And what of the series future? Asphalt 8: Infinity. It seems it is just around the corner although no specific release date has been mentioned. It's rumoured to be out this summer but will it capture that same magic? Will it keep the essence of the game's beauty? Not aesthetics, of course the game will look prettier. Will it do that by slapping on even more neon-drenched, nitro boosted dramatics?

  Wouldn't that push it towards being more of a Dave Bowman life-force transference simulator? Well it might if they keep hold of the simple arcade controls. Yet a developer's video, leaked on YouTube, reveals they are concentrating on more realistic physics. Does that mean more realistic handling?  Is that what made 6 and 7 great games? The way the car bounced off hillocks on the road? Watching the wheels realistically turn? Not from my perspective. I was too busy trying to watch for oncoming traffic or prevent fellow racers trying to ram me off the road.

    Do you see my dilemma? And the developers? Where do they go from there? 7 barely changed 6 but it had bells and whistles on and that was okay. But this sequel, you sense, needs to change course. At least slightly. But a step in which direction will keep most fans, like me, happy? 

  I don't know. I don't know what I want from the sequel. I don't know what the hell I want and I'm 35 years old now. I expect no matter what they do, I'll grudge any change whatsoever at first.

  “Why are they ruining the game, Pam? My game? The game I recommend to everyone, even if they don't listen to me and instead play Temple Run or Angry Birds?” I'll no doubt wail this out to my girlfriend whilst firing up my second game as she does the dishes in spite of me.

  “Shut up. You said the exact same thing about 7 because they changed the star thing and then a week later you wouldn't shut up about how great a game that was. It'll be just like that. Give it a chance” she'll say.

  And do you know what? She's right. Yet formidability is not a formality in this series. Not yet.

  I sure hope she's right.

{EXPECT A REVIEW OF THE LATEST ASPHALT GAME IN PIXEL.TIPS}

[pixeltips]

Some wrestlers and entrances I put together in WWE'13, based on myself and some friends. I've had a LOT of fun with the game.

[pixeltips]

In Praise Of...WWE'13

Johnny Organ explains his passion and love for the malleable and excitement filled Smackdown games and WWE’13 

The Creation Of Vktory Kid

Let me take you back. The year is 1999. The two major pro-wrestling companies – WWE and WCW – are at the peak of their rivalry. The Monday Night Wars are in full effect and a clique of my friends and myself have fallen in love with pro wrestling all over again.

Like most fans, we lost a lot of faith in wrestling in the mid-nineties. We’d grown up and moved on when wrestling clearly hadn’t done the same. We still respected it though. The dedication it can take to become a top star, the amount of physical abuse the performers can endure for our entertainment and all that jazz.

We still caught the main Pay Per View events now and then but until ’98/’99, wrestling seemed to be out of touch with the audience. With us, to be more precise. The Monday Night Wars and Attitude Era forced the company to get edgier, raunchier and more dangerous. And it worked. We lapped it up. Every Monday night was event T.V.

At the same time, Sony had done similar things with video gaming and the Playstation console. Now, I’ve ALWAYS owned consoles and played games, but by 1999 it seemed everyone had a Playstation. All my mates did. That was a complete first for me. Video gaming was cool.

Playstation had a few wrestling games, my favourite up until that point was WWF Attitude: Get It by Acclaim. It was very decent but…well, a little empty feeling. Despite solid game play mechanics, it was leaden paced and almost silent. It lacked the buzz of an audience and the thrills of an exciting match. In 2000, the official WWE (Then WWF) games changed developer to Yuke’s and publisher THQ. And WWF Smackdown was their first crack at the whip.

It was okay. It was faster paced than the older games. You could create your own character, but it was very basic. It was a lot of fun and a group of us spent many hours hitting each other with virtual chairs over our polygon heads. Most importantly, it was the game that spawned The Vktory Kid v.1. A lightweight, lightning speed dude in black tracksuit and Jason Voorhees/hockey mask.

  The Rise Of Vktory Kid

Less than 7 months later it’s sequel, WWF Smackdown: Know Your Role was released (Yes, SEVEN MONTHS. Not even EA would have the audacity to do that). And it was…a revelation. In truth it was the same game with bells and whistles on top. But what beautiful bells and delightful whistles they were. It’s only real flaw was the dreadful loading times. But it made the now almost decrepit Playstation console sing like a psiren. By the time you achieved ALL the extra modes and unlockables via the Season Mode, this game was filled to the brim with pro wrestling fan’s wet dream wishes.

Ladder matches? Check. Tables, Ladder and Chairs matches? Check. Backstage Brawls? Check. Casket Matches? Check. Totally customisable created characters including facial features, hair and clothes? Check. Create your own entrances? Check. A huge roster of playable characters distinctive from each other? Check. It was MASSIVE.

The Vktory Kid had found a wonderful place to dwell, and dwell he did. I distinctly remember one whole, long weekend where myself and two friends spent it’s entirety eating processed foods, drinking alcohol, growing beards, getting smelly and playing Smackdown 2 religiously. We only stopped for bathroom breaks, food and watering (well, beer-ing and Jack D-ing). After this weekend, I WAS the Vktory Kid. My vest top of red and black stripes with accompanying neon green elbow pads were established for the first time. I knew the character, my traits, my finishing moves, the type of wrestling stables I would be part of…I loved this character so much that shortly after, when I moved into my new flat, the (neon green) nameplate on my front door didn’t say my real name. It read “The Vktory Kid”. That confused the hell out of the local children.

Despite not adorning their front doors with their character names, my two friends had established equally enduring wrestling names and traits that we still call each other today. “The Hustler” and “Superstar T” would become my arch nemeses/stable members in equal parts over the years. A few other friends came and went. “The Freakshow”, “Pope Dope”, “Wild Thing” and “Neat Meat” to name a few. But none were as creative or as ingrained as those three that spent that fateful weekend together.

The Vktory Kid v.13 – Bono on acid

The emancipation and fall of Vktory Kid

The Smackdown games moved onto the more powerful Playstation 2 consoles and so did we. Between Smackdown: Here Comes The Pain and Smackdown vs Raw 2008 our characters developed and matured like we did. By 2008, Vktory Kid had seen many incarnations and developments and merchandising slogans.

My finishing moves were now established as the The Vktory Vice (a spinning Rock Bottom/Samba Suplex manoeuvre now a Pedigree variation) and the Vktorecktaknee (The Shining Wizard). My main stable was always called The Vice Squad. Many members would come and go, be replaced or retired over the years. I was the Ric Flair and The Vice Squad were my Four Horsemen.

Virtual T-shirts, banners and merch included the nicknames and slogans “Hail To The Kid”, “Notorious Victorious”, “The Fantastic Bedroom Gymnastic”, “The FBG”, “The Red Road Rocket”, “VK1”, “VKPD Vice Squad” and “The Inadequate Radical”. I had more potential t-shirts than Chris Jericho. I even had my own rap song to wind up my opponents…

Kick, Punch, he got the funky flow

Notorious Vk1 is the main show

Vktorectaknee, 1,2,3

Laying down the laws for all the wannabes

Wickety wickety WHACK

Vktory Vice your ass

He controls the rhythm, he controls the tempo

The Fabulous B and G from the movie scenes and all your dreams will soon be going mental...etc etc.

We’d created our own Pay Per View events within the game. We battled for ratings in the General Manager Modes. We poured a lot creativity and humour into the games. Hundreds of hours between us creating and developing ideas and characters.

As the years progressed however, the games began to wane. The truth was the Smackdown games had been running on the same game engine for years. As talented as the programmers were, the annual updates gave them little time to improve on it’s ageing engine. And when they did try to overhaul the engine’s limitations, the more buggy the games were or features from previous games were left out purely through time constraints. The Season Modes would change every year, but never really improved upon. They just removed features and/or added new ones. Or messed around with the control system. Adding features such as having to unlock the moves my character had established in previous games via the new Season Modes infuriated me. Why couldn’t I carry my saves from the previous games? Why was there no Samba Suplex now (meaning I’d have to change my finisher)?

In real life a lot of our favourite superstars got old, moved on or retired from wrestling and it affected the game’s roster too. There were far less superstars. The occasional Hulk Hogan or Stone Cold in the Legends section but the mid carders pushed to the top of the WWE deck really sucked. Almost ten years of playing the same game began to take it’s toll. I lost faith in the product. I never bought a single WWE game for my Xbox 360.  I borrowed Smackdown vs Raw 2011 for a day and it still had the same flaws. I created the usual suspects but I wasn’t interested in it. I didn’t waste any time with it. I had fallen out of love with the Vktory.

All that changed a few months ago.

I buy WWE’13.

I know exactly why I did it. It had been five years since I bought a WWE game. My games collection was lacking something and a WWE was a niche not covered (despite owning a PS2 and all the WWE games I mentioned for it). The Attitude Era Mode was heavily advertised. The game would feature all those wrestlers that made me fall in love with pro wrestling all over again. The game mode allows you to re-live certain moments that were already burnt into my memory. Moments that changed the course of Sports Entertainment. The Hell In A Cell Match with Undertaker and Mankind. The Inferno Match. Rock vs Austin at Wrestlemania XVII. I salivated at the prospect. I bought into it all hook, line and sinker.

The game does exactly as it promised. No longer was there only a Season Mode were your only objective was to win, win, win. There’s the WWE Universe Mode to do that in (more on that later). But the Attitude Era mode is different. During the matches, you have to obtain certain “OMG Moments” such as throwing Mrs Foley’s baby boy from the top of the Cell with Undertaker or setting fire to Kane after jumping over the flames during the Inferno Match. The truth is, these are relatively simple to do or just downright confusing. I remember one match I had to put someone through a table as part of the three objectives, yet I simply couldn’t manage it no matter how hard I tried. I could do it during normal quick matches but not in A.E. Mode. I eventually gave up and Googled the answer and to say you’d have to be incredibly lucky to work it out for yourself is a massive understatement.

Achieving these objectives not only lets you see the digital recreation of these moments and give you short blasts of wonderful nostalgia but they are also the foundation of unlocking all the extras in the game including characters, arenas, move sets and additional matches and match types. It’s pretty brilliant actually. That’s all I can say. Apart from the odd “WTF do I do here?!” quibble, it’s pretty fucking brilliant. An absolute joy to play through.

In WWE’13 you can even play as ear eating rapist Mike Tyson. Hurray!

But it’s the create modes that has truly and utterly, without question of a doubt, blew my fucking mind. The Create A Superstar mode was always the highlight of the games for me. Creating Vktory and Hustler and the Superstar. It’s always been very flexible and fun to use but I always had one major gripe – the load times. It took ages in the older games. WWE’13‘s hasn’t changed that much but the load times are delightfully zippier.

Each character now has two finishing moves and a signature move. All of these can be created with the Create A Finisher mode. I can make my Vktory Vice exactly how I want it. I can speed it up, slow it down, add a wave to the crowd, a boot to the stomach, make the characters rotate or flip or roll…It’s all very impressive and reasonably easy to do if you want to dedicate your time doing it, along with creating the entrances and finally the factions (stables). It’s wonderfully in depth and easy to master.

But that is only scratching the surface of WWE’13 malleability. The Create-A-Story mode is exhaustive and quite simply awe-inspiring. Allowing you to be as creative as you want. And then you can upload these characters, story lines and arenas (yes, you can create your own arenas too) on line for your fellow WWE’13 fanatics to play as, play through, play in.

You can literally set up where scenes are set, which characters are involved, input the dialogue, input the commentary and make up the matches in the build up to Wrestlemania, 4 weeks before Royal Rumble. That’s an 8 week story progression to your main event at Wrestlemania.

I found putting the dialogue in to be a complete chore via the joy-pad however. It made the process slow. Then, on a loading screen, the game informs me that if I have a generic usb keyboard, I can use that to input the text. Are you fucking SHITTING ME? No way, dude. No frigging way.

Way.

The ring announcer even announces my name now.

The Paragon of Vktory

WWE Champion CM Punk stands in the ring at the beginning of Monday Night Raw. The “Best In The World” is bragging about being exactly that, having held the main belt in the company for over a year. He claims he may as well retire since he has defeated every single challenger the WWE has had to offer. The Vktory Kid’s music interrupts him. Nine Inch Nails track “Pilgrimage”.

Walking down the ramp, with The Hustler by his side, VK1 reminds Punk he has not defeated him EVER. Punk looks a little worried, in fear that he may be about to get attacked by both these handsome men. Kid tells Punk that he and The Hustler have formed an alliance, they will be known from now on as “The Odds On Favourites” and they intend to dominate the WWE even more-so than he ever even managed. And come this Royal Rumble, the WWE title will belong to him. Then they leave. Punk looks concerned.

Smackdown, “The Odds On Favourites” attack World Heavyweight Champion The Undertaker, attacking his famously injured knee and hip before The Hustler holds his belt aloft in defiance of the Dead Man. Both main events of The Royal Rumble have been set.

The “Odds On Favourites” both go on to win the belts at Royal Rumble. As both men stand side-by-side in the ring, holding their new championships above their heads, The Hustler attacks The Kid from behind. The stage is set for a title unification match at Wrestlemania, with the victor becoming the Undisputed Champion…

It’s simplified here. There’s a lot more twists and turns in the full version but that’s what I created. My own scripts, my own way, with the cast of my choosing. IT. IS. BEAUTIFUL. As a wrestling fan, there’s not much more you could ask for really.

But there’s more. The online community is fantastic. You want Jake The Snake on your roster? How about Sabu? Or Austin Aries? No problem. Someone out there has made him for you. All you have to do is download him from the forum and start fighting as him. Gone are the days of painstakingly recreating all your favourite wrestlers. Unless you like doing that kind thing, of course. I used to love it but these days I have to love my girlfriend and daughter more or I’m in trouble.

VK1 official merch – Available from one decent online store.

Flawless Vktory?

The WWE Universe Mode replaces the Story Mode of old and to be completely honest, it’s a bit of a shambles. Or to be more crystal, it doesn’t really explain itself too well. Apparently if you use certain characters and leave the game to it’s own devices, it should unlock certain cut scenes and rivalries. But there’s no guide or help in these matters and it’s far too tempting to fiddle with match types and personnel because fighting singles matches over and over with wrestlers you don’t like becomes a bit of a grind. Vktory Kid still hasn’t officially won a World title because of this. That’s infuriating.

The game uses the Havok physics engine, the same engine used in Grand Theft Auto 4 and many others, which is mostly fantastic but can also go completely bonkers. It’s really hard to define or explain these incidents without sounding like a mad monarch. The results of it’s miscalculations are just downright bizarre and sometimes terrifying. The simple things can be explained. Characters can, sometimes, float into the mat or the ring or the furniture and get stuck. Sometimes they just don’t “sell” moves, getting straight back up on their feet after finishers or major falls or concussion-inducing head shots. When using weapons such as ladders or chairs, sometimes they don’t impact the way they should. Wrestlers can accidentally stretch across entire arenas; bodies can partially implode, crumple and rotate expeditiously; limbs can twist and rotate horribly…it can be amazingly stupid at times. In truth though, these things mostly cause hilarity rather than indignation especially in a multiplayer match. I’ve cried tears of laughter as opposed to throwing my joy pad through the T.V. in despair.

In spite of its flaws, the game never the less is nothing but pure fun. Like Smackdown 2: Just Bring It you can’t help admire the tenacity and heart the game has. It’s so chock full of stuff, it’s really hard to knock it for being a little buggy at times. The controls aren’t always perfect, the physics don’t always work, the (official) music is atrocious and there’s a real lack of fun on the Diva’s side of things. There are still many things broken with this game. It is still far, far from perfect.

But what it lacks in grunt it makes up for with heart and heritage. What it lacks in polish, it makes up for with spunk. The WWE universe is yours to mould and manipulate the way you see fit. It’s there for the taking and the only thing stopping you creating a world class pro-wrestling promotion is yourself and your lack of creativity. Any wrestler, arena, costume or storyline from any era, from any wrestling company, is there for you to concoct and contrive into a wrestling product better than the real things. To even rival the Attitude Era. It’s in your hands.

It’s been an absolute joy to behold and I’ve barely even touched on line play. In all honesty there are only two other people in the world I feel will appreciate this game as much as I do and they are the only two other players in the whole wide world I want to play against. I have no doubts it’ll take us all back to those wonderful times. When we were young. When we had hair. When we could eat or drink whatever we wanted without gaining weight. When wrestling was cool again. When it was more adult than we were. When we and WWE were at the peak of our powers and we all just seemed to be messing around and having a little more fun than we do today.

WWE’13 makes it all come flooding back. It takes me back 13/14 years. It makes me feel young again. And that, dear readers, is priceless. That is the exact reason I videogame. To feel wonder and awe and be amazed, to escape this reality for a time. Become someone else, a better version of me, to feel like a kid again. THE Kid again. The Vktory Kid, in amongst the big boys and true legends of not only the WWE Universe of the present, but an ageless, timeless wrestling universe I can mould, invent, ransack and dominate in any way I choose and be immortalised forever in…

I am The Vktory Kid. I am the destroyer and creator of universes. And this is my world, bitch.

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Football Manager Handheld 2013 - Android Review

How does the handheld version fair against it's PC counterpart? Is this and Android game that's actually worth the cash? Johnny O tells you what he thinks.

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Fallout 3 Retrospective

Johnny Organ gives a deeply personal insight into his love for Fallout 3 and what it means to be a geek.

The term “geek” is thrown around a lot and is actually a cool thing to be these days. It wasn’t always like this. When I was a boy, a geek was a socially inept person. A weirdo. An intelligent, gauche oddity. By the time my teenage years came along, thanks to my love and obsession of computers, comics, alternative comedy, pro wrestling and cult horror, I was regularly regarded as a “geek” by my peers and subordinates simply because I was different and wasn’t one of them.

But was I? Was I really?

Socially inept? I had a HUGE family and social circle who understood me and enjoyed my company. Super intelligent? Hardly. Average exam marks will testify. Creative and inventive mostly. Obsessive collector? Well, let me get to that.

When I was a wee boy growing up on the north end of Glasgow, money was a little tight. My father was in and out of work for years and I had two older brothers and a big sister. Don’t get me wrong, I was never starved or wore clothes with holes in them or anything like that. I had a home cooked meal every night even if that was egg, chips and beans twice a week. The house was always warm, my clothes were always clean and most times, most times, we could keep up with the Joneses. By the age of ten, I didn’t really need or want anything more.

I had my tank, some G.I. Joe wannabe, my Transformer which changed into a sports car with holographic sticker, a robot that looked similar to R2-D2, little Ted (my sleeping partner), Huggy bear (my sparring partner), a wind up car with the strength of a Tonka truck and speed of Evil Kineval, my fortnightly Batman and Beano comics and by absolutely no means least – my beloved Atari 800XL home computer. What more could I possibly want or need?

I’m still like that today. Everything I’ve collected over the years I have lost, given away, traded or sold off. I have no need for them. They just end up owning me and my space.

Most geeks are hoarders, collectors, obsessively so. I am nothing like that. After collecting a mass of games or comics or whatever else, I inevitably one day just stand back and see a vast collection of insignificant, unnecessary, unavailing balls and chains. They make me feel trapped. It makes me feel locked down and helpless, breathless. I need to feel I can take a flight of fancy and do whatever is necessary for my creative urges. Little plastic men, a thousand stories of a guy in a cape punching bad men in the face and a sea of hundreds of conquered pixelated universes would only bog down my freedom – I carry them in *here*. I’m a nomad at heart despite never living outside the confines of the city I was born.

But ask me anything about 8-bit processing or sound chips, the Batman universe or how to connect one machine to another and I’m an encyclopedia of knowledge. I could bore you for days about Red Dwarf or how I managed to connect a phone to a TV to watch a football game on line. I’m a huge American Pro Wrestling fan. I’m the unofficial I.T. guy of my extended family and friends. If your PC is broke and I can’t fix it with software solutions, it’s knackered and needs hardware/shop repair. I’m a geek in those terms. And I wear the name with pride on those terms. But in other ways I’m still like that 10 year old boy who appreciates everything he has and needs for nothing more.

  I hear a lot of gamers talk about how they haven’t gotten around to play something in their collection just yet and it irks me. I’ve never understood the concept of owning anything just for the sake of owning it and not experiencing it fully. Many of these fellow game-heads were just like me as a child. They possessed a home computer of some kind and an assortment of games. And despite video games being far more complex and time consuming these days, games have always been something that you dedicate to – time, patience and understanding.

I got my Xbox 360 as a birthday gift from my girlfriend a little over two years ago. It came with four games of my choosing. Bioshock, Soul Calibur 4, Lego Batman and Fallout 3. Bioshock and Fallout were games I had seen some of my favourite games writers salivating over, so they were no brainers really.

Unfortunately Fallout 3 just didn’t grip me when I first played it. After the initial brilliance at the start of the game of being born and rapidly maturing into a young man, picking your appearance, what your stats should start off as, and how you came to leave the large underground vault buried in a cave you had stayed in all your life (or so it would seem) – I was thrown into the bright light and a world decimated by a nuclear war of perhaps centuries ago. A baron, ransacked land. Destroyed, decimated and dreary. Brown and beaten. It wasn’t a very nice place to abide. Armed with a pea shooter and surrounded by rabid dogs, armed savages and massive, armoured crab people, I had no idea where I was going or what to do. I was completely lost, under equipped, overwhelmed and unimpressed. For a few hours I wandered helplessly between decimated buildings to underground shit holes being killed continuously by, what seemed, random, overpowered enemies. In between enemies I was aimlessly scouting around annihilated rooms looking at random cups, tins and boxes I couldn’t unlock. What were these games writers TALKING ABOUT? The game was switched off and sat underneath my entire games collection for a good eight months.

Within that time I consumed many a great and shit game. Then one day I realised I’d pretty much completed all of my collection…except one. I started a new save and went from scratch. Maybe I missed something the first time around? And I had. Nearby the exit of the vault lay a small settlement called Megaton. It was safe and had food and guns and quests. I chatted away to most it’s settlers and completed a few fetch quests, earning a little money and even a decent hand gun. But the over powered enemies were still an overbearing irritation.

One of my first quests outwith the confines of Megaton was given to me by a young boy desperately seeking his father. Determined to be a paragon of hope and justice on this shitty looking landscape I boldly marched into the town of Grayditch in search of his dad, unbeknownst that place was infested with nothing more that massive fire breathing ants. About five minutes into the quest I was out of ammo and health packs and being flamethrowered to death from great distances. Ants, it seems, don’t drop ammo or Stim-packs and could take a massive amount of damage (if you could get close enough without being barbecued) before rewarding you with some f*cking ant meat that barely recovered any health once consumed. I was livid and again the game was shelved.

In truth, the difficulty wasn’t the only thing that bothered me. I’m a Football Manager fan but jeeez, this game had more stats than a conglomerate’s spreadsheet and EVERYTHING was just mean and nasty. Everything had a putrid side to it and hurt you in some way. Eat that – gain health but lose intelligence. Drink that – raise intelligence but too many and you are addicted to it and require medical help. Walk on that – get radiation poisoning. Use any gun or apparel – it deteriorates, it’s fire power or armour getting gradually weaker until it just stops working altogether.

This game hates you, I thought. If it could beat me to death in front of my daughter and scream “I’M THE DADDY NOW YOU BASTARD!” whilst dancing on my head until I was little more than a bloody pulp on a concrete floor, it would. This wasn’t a game world. It was a massive, open ended decaying prison with no encouragement or pleasure for it’s detainees.

It sapped me of hope. It tore out my heart and darkened my soul. I didn’t have the inner strength or faith to face it’s stark, rustic realities. I had to get out and the power button was the only means of escape.

Yet less than two months later I was sucked into the world of Oblivion. Fallout 3 was from the same makers, it even used the same game engine. It was essentially Oblivion with guns and a post apocalyptic landscape…Yet Oblivion’s world is beautiful and lush and full of charm and complete looneys dwell it’s plains. It seemed to ease you in more gently and allowed you the time to find your feet and understand which stats affected what and who was good and who was evil.

15 months pass before I’m back staring at all the games in my possession. I have a whole weekend on my own (girlfriend visiting her parents). Everything is pretty much played to death bar one game. I refused to trade it in or sell it. Because that’s the type of geek I am. I know deep down that I haven’t really given the game a chance. That wee boy with the handful of Atari 800XL games still resides within me. I don’t need to spend money on new games when there are perfectly good games that I haven’t given the real time of day to. For the third and final time, despite still being haunted by my last experience, I switch on Fallout 3 and start a new game. Again.

Maybe it’s because I understood the mechanics a little more this time around, the way the compass and maps worked thanks to Oblivion or because I’ve experienced the game twice already but everything makes a lot more sense this time around. I learn to read everything, speak to everyone and grasp what I have to. I stop trying to rush through the thing and take my time. It’s only then I start to find optimism and credence in this bleak world and my fellow inhabitants.

What does that do? Oh, I can repair items if I have duplicates. Oh, that armour is heavy and that is why I’m walking slower. Oh, I’m addicted to a substance, I need to get help for that but I’m okay at the minute. This old lady is quite funny! Hey, I don’t need to shoot him, I can talk him down. Man, I can’t believe I freed that settlement of slaves without shooting a single bullet. Hey, look at me! I’ve got my own swanky pad and personal robot! If I get that girl at the gun store to repair my items, she’ll always have money to buy the absolute shite I’ve collected on my adventures and give me more money to repair my items, buy new guns or even buy a health station for my swanky pad.

That weekend I played Fallout 3 for 42 hours over the course of three days and I’d discovered maybe only 33% of the whole gaming map. Months later and I’m still addicted to it.

Sometimes I just sit back in my home at Megaton with all the little things I’ve collected – My mutant friend, my jukebox, my robot with it’s awful sense of humour, my Nuka-Cola dispensing machine, my collection of armour and helmets, my alien lazers – and I sometimes wonder if I really need or want anything more. And then I’ll go for a wee wander around, looking for more troubles and trinkets. Every little thing that clutters my home holds a memory of an adventure. I’ve become an obsessive collector.

When I think back to all those months ago, to that young boy in the vault that barely knew how to sit his G.O.A.T. exam and how much of a warrior I’ve finally become, I get nostalgic. I remember that game I never gave a proper chance at first. That game that sat in my collection for two and a half years. That game, that if I was your regular definition of “geek”, I would probably never have gotten around to. Or maybe I would have got caught up in Fallout: New Vegas, it’s sequel, instead. Yes, I’m behind the rest of the video gaming world who have already most likely moved on from Skyrim, Oblivion‘s sequel.

But who cares? Why should that matter? In the DC Wastelands it doesn’t matter. To young Timmy who lost his father and who found a new home with his loving aunt it doesn’t matter. To the towns folk I salvaged from the hands of a pair of wannabe superheroes it doesn’t matter. To me it doesn’t matter.

Yet to most geeks, it will or would have. Most geeks want the latest, newest, shiniest version of something yesterday instead of devoting the proper time, dedication and patience to the great things they already own. They scream for the latest snapshot of the newest thing and bog the gaming internet sites with unnecessary fluff and PR spin, drowning out insightful, credible critique. Instead they’ll sit a game in their collection, in it’s box, thinking they didn’t like it because they never gave it a second, third or fourth chance. Instead they’ll bitch about it around the internet and pre-order the next great white hope to sit in their collection along with it. Why?

I couldn’t tell you. I’m not your average geek. And I’m certainly not one of them.

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Life Of A Pie

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Android Review - Street Fighter IV

One of gaming's all time classics comes to Android. Kind of. Is it any good? What you asking me for? I don't really like a Street Fighter..

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The Hoosiers - Goodbye Mr. A [8-bit]

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NES Review - 8 Eyes

A long lost classic or forgotten for good reason? Johnny plays through this wee enigma for the first time for your viewing pleasure.

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Double Dragon is an arcade classic. One of the most recognised names in videogaming. But how well did it port over to Sega's 8 bit home console? Johnny Organ investigates.

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PMCEDXP Review

Someone has a confession to make...