PAX Impressions- quick on iPhone

[Dyne]

Loved:

Uncharted 2. Super fresh gameplay. Run n gun is amazing.

Scribblenauts. Lateral thinking to the extreme. Butterfly level - one guy used a flower to lure it, instead I used three boulders to climb to get it. So awesome.

PSP Go. Fantastic device, same size as Iphone. Seriously considering it now.

No More Heroes II. fantastic, more of the awesome same. Also, the toilet paper in the convention center bathrooms had NMHII designs - my girlfriend stole a roll for me!

Dante's Inferno - very smooth experience. You thought Dead Space was fucked up, wait until you see these guys' visions of hell.

Miles Edgeworth Ace Attorney: Miles is such a douchebag. This is also a great upcoming DS game.

Resident Evil 5 in NVIDIA 3D: Holy crap! Future of gaming.

Need for Speed Nitro: solid game experience, really fun!



Meh:

Left 4 Dead 2. More of the same.

Brutal Legend. It was alright, I'm kind of disappointed.

Forza 3. You can "replay" anything you screw up in-game. What a design copout.

[gekko]

Forza 3? Copout? The biggest problem with racing games has always been if one thing goes wrong, you blow the entire race. Shame on Turn 10 for trying to make a racing game that is fun and accessible to all.

The rewind feature is awesome for casual races, and we have no idea on how it actually affects progress through the career mode. Besides, even if you can use it on every race, if you prefer the challenge, don't use it. Better yet, go race online. What's next? Do you want to complain about game saves? Rewinding a race is no different than restarting from the last checkpoint.

ODST was my favorite game of the show, since Modern Warfare 2 wasn't there. Surprised? Not me! Played Firefight 3 times now, and played the new Heretic map. Mad I didn't play Citadel, but oh well.

Scribblenauts was a pleasant surprise, as was Wii Sports Resort and New Super Mario Bros. I think Wii Sports Resort is out, I just never played it. Mario Bros. was a bit hectic with 4 players, but with 2 I don't think you would have quite the issues of running the other players off screen, or knocking them off platforms.

Thought it was cool that they handed out PAX 09 and Beatles Rock Band shirts for your avatar. Just wish they would release that Sounders FC jersey which is only available to Microsoft employees I also don't understand why I can't download the ladies version of these shirts. Yes, my avatar is male, but last time I checked, DLC is licensed to all users on that console (which could have female accounts), and I could always switch my avatar gender. Might as well at least let me download it. It's a stupid code, I have it, I'm not paying for anything!

[Dyne]

It seems weird. If they don't race the course over and over from the beginning, they're not going to become that great at it. How good is the gameplay if Turn 10 has to implement a feature that keeps you in the race and not in the dust? I would be more excited to learn how to pick AND tune a car that doesn't handle so poorly on certain corners. It's not supposed to be that serious of a comment, but putting it into perspective really helps.

Need for Speed is doing it right, I think. Shift is for the hardcore sim fans, like they've said, and Nitro is for the casual fans. Nitro is actually an engaging hardcore arcade racer that manages to introduce even the most fun Mario Kart-esque features without having to worry about if you're still in the running or not. I also love the personalized graffiti that pops up everywhere when you're in the lead.

The Driver Profile in NFS Shift really disciplines you for screwing up a corner instead of giving you an easy out. I did enjoy the 3-screen setup that Forza has, and the physics are pretty awesome. I also like how when you brake with the Subaru Impreza, you brake straight no matter what, and it's not influenced by your wheel at any given point. But the Driver Profile in NFS Shift is enough of a reason to consider Shift over Forza this round.