Gamehotblog.com

Shouting "NO Inverted Camera" in Silent Hill
I just want to warn all potential buyers that if you play your games with the "inverted" camera option "on," there is no such thing in this game. You may in for a frustrating experience. I tried to play this game for almost an hour only to be left extremely frustrated (and disappointed). I personally am going to return this if they don't issue a patch within the next few days. I am not passing any judgment on this title at this point, as I am unable to experience it how it was intended. I just want to give fair warning to other gamers. If you already bought the game, and wish to voice your request for an inverted camera or complain, you can do so here: http://www.konami-data.com/support/

Silent Hill Homecoming....eh, its okay.
Okay, after playing this game clear through I realize that it is entirely way too short, granted there are alternate endings but those endings are dependant on 3 simple choices you make during the game and not at all worth playing it 5 times for. The second thing I noticed is that the controls are kind of clunky and they really aren't up to par so that makes fighting a boss really irritating. Thirdly, if you die there is usually a 30-60 second cut scene prior to the boss fight which for some reason can sometimes be skipped and other times not and for another really odd reason the dialogue before the third boss cannot be skipped which makes it really irritating when you have to keep watching 60 seconds of dialogue before you can fight the boss again. Fourth, the base storyline is really weak and way too straight foreward. There wasn't one moment that I had to stop and wonder what I had to do. It was laid out for me. Fifth, the weapons are lame and boring. How many times can you stab a nurse before it gets boring? There are upgrades to the pistol and shotgun but they come late in the game when you don't need them anymore as well as the addition of the rifle. They all come in way too late and there isn't enough ammo to make them really useful, granted I don't want a FPS out of it but I do think a little more ammo would suffice.

Now for the good things. The music and effects are really eerie and the story has some great psychological twists. The game really gets into the mind of the player and has some interesting although extremely easy puzzles. The story starts off slow but it does pick up fast and it does draw you into it. My complaints about the game are somewhat minor but I think they should have been fixed before the game was released. It's simple mistakes like these that ruin the experience of a game. I would have given it 5 stars if not for the mistakes.

Bottom line: I would not buy this game but what I would do is rent it or wait until the price comes down. This game is not worth 60 bucks.

A new "homecoming" to Silent Hill
I'll keep my review brief and too the point.

Positives:
1. Engaging story. I thought it was really good.
2. The change the environment makes from the "real" world to the "nightmare" world.
3. Graphics are phenominal.
4. "Over the Shoulder" view has it's advantages of eliminating bad camera angles that plagued the other games.

Negatives:
1. Save points - They are few and far between. Especially at the beginning of the game when you arrive in Shepherd's Glen. It took me over 45 minutes to find a save point after I reached Alex's home. Here's a hint. Go to the Town Hall. There is a save point in one of the back rooms. Do this to save aggrivation!!!
2. Combat - I really had a hard time understanding the dynamics of the new combat system. You CANNOT just go toe-to-toe with a lot of the bad guys, they will cut you up! You have to make use of the "Evade" option to duck around an attack. There are several enemies you can go toe-to-toe with if you use the combat knife (which I used pretty much the whole game). You must use combos though, Here's another hint: Tap A, A, A, then X. This will stun the enemy and you can do it again. Here's another. When you run into the enemy "SMOG" - RUN! You do not need to fight him unless you are trying to get the acheivement.
3. Lack of Health Items - Shepherd's Glen has very few health items. And the few I did find, I ended up using due to being attacked all the time. By the time I had a boss battle, I had no heath items and was at half health. AAUGH!
4. Boss Fights - These are EXTREMELY DIFFICULT unless you master the combat system of evading, countering, and attacking. In fact, you don't even know how to defeat the bosses unless you've been killed a few time and see a "hint" appear while the game is re-loading. Don't be surprised if you have to re-load a few times or more.

All in all, I liked the game. I liked the characters and story, but like I said, combat is tough. You cannot run from some bad guys like Feral and the Spider-like creature. Pyramid Head shows up at some points, but you do not fight him like in SH2. You can also infer from a conversation with Wheeler the deputy, that Cybil, from SH1 probably died during the first game. Also, about 3/4 of the game is in Shepherd's Glen and the last 1/4 is in Silent Hill. Kinda wierd considering the title of the game, but you can overlook that.

Decent, but Silent Hill can do better
Granted, I haven't played through the game completely, but there are some serious weaknesses that should've been addressed. Balancing this are also some vast, vast improvements over previous incarnations.

SH 5 follows Alex Shepard, as he traverses Sheperds Hill, his hometown, and then Silent Hill, searching for his little brother, who seemed to be in trouble in a dream he had. His father has also vanished and his mother is a near catatonic wreck. The story actually bears quite a few similarities to the movie, in the way the main character keeps chasing his brother, only to lose him at the last moment. Sheperds Hill tries to appear normal, but is overrun with smoke breathing zombies and skinless hounds, not to mention the canonical roads that vanish.

The character attempts to be intelligent, planning to find his brother and get the hell out of town, rather than "figure this out," but is bogged down by the limitations of a classical adventure game. He has to break through boarded doors with a fire ax, rather than a hammer that has to be found somewhere among the 436 tool boxes scattered throughout town. The few other players in town taht retain their wits can't bring themselves to flee the godforsaken place, and I hope sincerly that its explained at least to some degree.

Significant Improvements: The combat system is a lot more fluid and beliavable. You can dodge and duck out of the way, and you now have a targeting cursor. Enemies has identifiable weakness and strength to certain weapons, and you can use the terrain to somewhat of an advantage, though most veterans still use the time honored tradition of run the heck away.

Enemies no longer respawn, or spawn far less frequently, and there are fewer corridors of death where you can get boxed in and not be able to fight your way out.

God bless them, but pick up items now glow with a glossy sheen, not a flare in the darkness, but you can now see interactive items, rather than relying on your character turning his head.

Same Ol, Same Ol: Searching for that one piece of inventory, and being unable to kick open or shoulder through a door. One of the few things Condemned nailed perfectly.

Drawbacks: Not enough scary. There are quite a few jumps, and some creepy points, but not enough punch like there was in SH 1 and 2. The writers seem to think that darker=scarier. WRONG. However, they've applied lessons learned, so I can forgive them this.

Overall: Decent though not impressive graphics, a significantly improved h2h combat system, good voice acting, attempts at intelligent main character behavior, and a above average story thats been fleshed out more make this a rent-to-own, though I would rent initially unless you're an achivement or ending hound like myself. Definitely turn the brightness all the way up though, else you'll be walking into walls and corners constantly.

The newest entry into the world of Silent Hill
With the lack of survival horror games on the Xbox360 on the market at the time of release, Silent Hill:Homecoming is a nice addition to the library. While it might not have the polish or hype of such games and Dead Space or Resident Evil 5 it is still a beautifully made game in its own right. If you enjoyed the previous titles you will be able to respect that despite the change in development team that the new installment stays true to the series. While the graphics could have been better,the environments are spectacular, and now include the ability to interact with them. Objects fall off of shelves when ran into, IV stands fall over and overall the entire gameworld has some sort of interactive ability. The combat system is completely redone and in my opinion better than previous installments. You play as a soldier and the combat reflects that. While it may lack the true horror of not being able to deal with the enemies at hand, the new system more than makes up for it in the difficulty that it takes to bring down these enemies. Each creature has its own weaknesses and strength and these are reflected in the combat as not only are you required to dodge attacks but also to come up with specific strategies to deal with the creatures. (some may require fast attack melee weapons, some may require stronger attacks and some may only be weak against firearms.) The environments are as creepy and disturbing as any other game in the series but at times lacks real horror. Don't get me wrong, there are plenty of encounters that left me jumping in the back of my seat, but I never really felt unprepared for a fight. The camera work keeps the grainy feel of the other games while also texturing the environment much further than other games. (you can actually make out buildings in the distance, unlike the previous titles.) The score is of course amazing and helps with the overall horror and despair of both Shepards Glenn and Silent Hill itself. The NPC's are well done and the voice acting is superb. (think the opposite of the original Resident Evil for PS1.) Overall I would have to say this is a strong entry into the survival horror library for the 360 and is worth picking up even if you have already preordered RE5 and Dead Space. Silent Hill: Homecoming brings a familiar yet refreshing feel to the 360 library and brings back the type of survival horror that we used to all know and love.

Xbox 360 Glow Stand with Fan
The xbox 360 glow stand with fan is a great accessory. The fan pushes out the hot air from the bottom of the stand. This works excellently with the built-in fan from the xbox itself. Another great feature is that the glow stand fan plugs into any standard outlet, it does not generate its power from the xbox console. The green light from the stand is a nice feature and lets you know the fan is on. The stand looks sleek with the xbox console. My son plays Madden football all day and the xbox did not overheat. Although it is recommended that you take breaks after a few hours to let your machine cool down, this fan allowed my son to play for three straight hours before I told him to take a break.

A great buy!

its very nice!
overall the fan is pretty sweet. i'v gone though few cooler fans and this is the only cooler fan that WILL NOT hurt my xbox. my box has red ringed like 2 times because of my old cooler fans. this one DOES NOT plug into your box so you dont have to worry about shorten something out and redringing. overall i say its worth getting.

An adequate fan to keep you gaming longer.
The Intec fan is a must have for those who want a comprehensive cooling solution to your 360 but don't want to void the warranty with water cooling or whisper fans. When paired with a rear fan such as the Intercooler (I say stay away due to hardware failures but some say this isn't a problem anymore) or the Evercool (A+ recommend) the Intec does a great job of reducing ambient heat in your 360. This will reduce disc read errors and other crashes that happen when gaming too long.

Not Cool
I ordered the Glow Stand w/fans as a cooling device for my Xbox 360. It's a really nice stand, with memory card holders, and real neat lighting. However, if your looking for a cooling device you HAVE to look elsewhere. I don't have technical measuring tools but I can tell you that the fans would NOT hold a post'it note to my hand at two inches. The two small fans (appox two inches square each, 12 volt, 11 fan blades each) don't move much air and with very little speed.

More technical: The included plugin mini power-pack is 9 volt, like a cell phone charger. I did try running the 12 volt rated fans at 12 volts, still not much air flow. Power supply or case fans are two thick to fit in as replacement fans, so don't think you can easily mod it that way. If you just want a stand or like the lights then it's OK.

One star rating is my rating as a cooling device, given only because zero stars is not an available option.

Cool!
Want to give your Xbox 360 with a very cool look?
Want to cool your Xbox 360's processor?
Take this. After 4 hours of play, the console was as hot as the TV set. In Florida's hot spring!

Like an Updated Rock Band
Rock Band 2 easily follows closely to it's predecessor. Much like the first game the menus and venues are relatively the same. Given some new songs, and some slightly enhanced visuals and modes, one wont have a hard time switching over.

Infact RB2 is a pinch easier on the timing window for hammer ons and pull offs. If this turns one away the difficulty has been raised to offer more a challenge, songs like Judas Preist's "Painkiller" and Metallica's "Battery" are quite the uproar. Luckily their still is a handfull of easy songs, and of slight difficulty.

RB2 versatile rocking track list feels a little blue. Many awesome songs, but so many filler alt rock bands that don't really live up to a Rock Band feeling swarm the game. It's not even so much the songs are bad, they just really don't fit the experience all too well. Atleast one has the option to transfer all RB1 songs to their HDD for use in RB2. As good as a boat load of new tracks smell it has a slightly offending odor to it. One must pay a light fee, and a few tracks aren't available. This is due to a licensing issue.

Rock out at a party with this stellar title, play at home and crank the speakers, download some tracks and invest some time in good qaulity music. Rock Band 2 is finally here.

This version lacks the 'gear' to immersivley play, but one should already of had access previously if purchasing this variant. Inside the booklet of the game contains a code which allows access to 20 free songs from the Rock Band site, as of now the songs have still yet to appear. Rock Band 2
features a strong online community and an even strong dowloadable content (DLC) basis. Every Tuesday songs are released, upon paying for them you can have access to entire albums! Harmonix has also allowed for single players to play World Tour mode, this is much like the multiplayr aspect of the previous game. 'Touring' locations all over the world unlocking new songs and venues as one progresses, you can even join up with your band to continue.

Overall Rock Band 2 is great, only main issue is unlocking every song is a bit tedious. The equalizers on certain songs sound poorly mixed.

The evolution of a platform
The prime difference between what the folks at Harmonix and the people at Neversoft/RedOctane are doing with their perspective games comes down to very important semantics. Neversoft's Guitar Hero series is a franchise. Harmonix's Rock Band is a platform. It's a huge distinction and the truth is that Rock Band's method benefits the consumers a lot more.

So when you're purchasing Rock Band 2, you'll getting a lot more value than you can imagine. Sure there's the 84 song (all master cuts) list and the 20 additional free bonus songs coming really soon, but what's important to note is the promise that Harmonix is keeping with: Rock Band is a platform, meaning every song under the Rock Band umbrella (with a few unfortunate nixes) will work with their games. So not only do all the songs you've been downloading for a year work, but also all but three songs in Rock Band 1 can be ripped to your hard drive (for a nominal for licensing fees). This is a phenomenal value that values the customer more than paying for individual "expansion" packs that have no connectivity to one another. Platform versus franchise.

Alright, so there's a huge value here. But once you dig into the actual game, there's some good and some blah. Harmonix revamped the touring mode so that, regardless of playing single or multi, you have one World Tour. Previously, songs unlocked in solo play would show up in the multiplayer; here, though, regardless of whether you're playing by yourself or with friends, you're unlocking songs as you travel throughout the world. It's a lot more fun and emphasizes group play.

One of the issues I've run into is that the people I play Rock Band with aren't the best of players. We do it for fun and we'd invariably run into a brick wall in the tour where they'd have to move up to the next difficulty and couldn't. So far, we haven't run into that situation and have gotten a lot more out of touring that we used to. I hope this continues as this is the most exciting and fun aspect of the game.

Other game types have been included, as well. Your band can do the "Tour Challenge," which basically throws various set lists at you to get through. These set lists can be songs from a specific band or songs difficult on a certain instrument or songs of a certain theme, etc. A second game type is "Battle of the Bands" and puts your band against another band virtually, with a leaderboard to track your progress.

If you're looking for more character customization options, you'll probably be disappointed. There's a few more new hair types and a couple more faces, but for the most part it feels like the first Rock Band. This is a common thread throughout Rock Band 2: it feels a lot like the first Rock Band. It's more of a slow evolution. By far the best changes are ones that should have been in place the first time around, namely the fact you don't need a band leader and that you can have one character play any of the instruments. This is probably my favorite part of the new game (minus the songs).

But the songs are the real showcase. There's a lot of diversity here with a lot of new bands, some oldies and everything in between. But most of the songs are a ton of fun to play, which is the most important part. If you have Rock Band, this is a no brainer as the gameplay modes are more fun and you're not losing songs. If you're new, this is a terrific place to start. Many many hours have been logged so far and I can't wait for more.

Let There Be Rock
This game is beautiful. Literally and figuratively. I find myself admiring the menu screens because the color and artwork is so well put together.

The songs are good, for the most part. I suppose part of it comes down to personal preference, but the songs by Testament and Metallica I could have done without, as well as Drain You by Nirvana and the Beastie Boys track.

However, those are rather small annoyances in the context of the overall game. Stuff like Lazy Eye by Silversun Pickups alone make it worth having. Before this game was released I was planning to buy both it and Guitar Hero: World Tour. And I still may, but now I just am wondering what the point would be? There's no way GH: WT's tracks are going to match Rock Band's.

Anyways, back to the review. The game intelligence is fantastic. It reads if you have downloaded songs, and then uses them for some of the song sets. New the game are Challenges, which is basically just a tiered set of song sets. But it's cleverly done. For instance, I have downloaded quite a few Who songs, some by Oasis, and The Smashing Pumpkins, so when I reached a certain tier, there were four new Challenges to play, the Oasis challenge, the Smashing Pumpkins Challege, a Who's Next Challenge, and a Who's Live At Leeds challenge.

Also, it's much more fun now that you can play Tour mode with just one person. I have probably logged over 20 hours of total play so far and I still haven't unlocked all of the songs. There are a LOT.

And the promise of 20 more within the next couple of months will be fantastic.

WTF Amazon?
What is the point of ordering something on time or pre-ordering if Amazon is going to pull the BS of offering 1600 points a week later? Shouldn't this fall under price guarantee?

Great product, buy if from a company that still has dignity. If you can find one.

If you like Rock Band then you have to buy this game.
Let me start by saying the game playing is the same (as far as I can tell). So far the song selection is really good but to me the most important thing is....
All the songs I bought in the original Rock Band I can play in this version.

I'm not a huge gamer but I have never bought extra's for a game and they have worked in the next version of the game. I'm sure there maybe some games where this exists but let me say I probably bought 30 songs for the first game and I can play them all so why not upgrade!

Mega Man 9.... Nuff said..... (okay, Bionic Commando!)
Great product, great price!

Buy Mega Man 9 and Bionic Commando today!!

Easy to use, and these games are great!

Good deal if You buy from Amazon Direct
I have bought a few of these before at Target, for 14.99 onsale, but buying on Amazon directly from them is the best deal as long as you go for two or something else with them to get the free shipping. Depending on what state you are in there is no tax. So if that's the case it's a straight shot at 15.97 which is a nice deal. So many great games have come out on XBL lately you really are missing out on gems if you don't buy some of these AAA + arcade titles like Braid, Castle Crashers, Bionic Commando Rearmed, Geometry Wars 2. Plus a bunch more coming soon, and others if you have never bought any from the past.

The Xbox Live Arcade is a big part of the 360 experience, if you are not taking advantage of it you are missing out on a lot of the best original games to ever come out anywhere. Plus so many great remakes and updates to old classic games. Don't miss out on XBLA, if you have never bought points before it's not a big deal, just don't do anything foolish, like scratching off your code by rubbing too hard. Also buy these from Amazon or true retailers, not from Amazon Market place. To avoid some of the not so funny horror stories I have read here. If you follow those simple rules you will be fine, and will be enjoying a new way to get great original games you can't find anywhere else.

Essential for anybody using Xbox Live
Microsoft "points" are essential to anybody using Xbox Live. Points are needed to download Xbox Live Arcade titles, Xbox Originals titles, add-on map packs, movies, videos, and music. Gamers connected to Xbox Live will eventually want to purchase additional content, so points will be required.

The 1600 Points card makes it easy to add points to any Xbox Live Gamertag account. Simply enter the 25-digit code on the console or on the website, and the points are added to the user's account, ready for immediate use. No credit cards or other information is required.

Points cards make excellent gifts for Xbox 360 gamers. They also make it easy for parents to budget points allocation and spending over a period of time. Points will also expand the functionality of the console, by allowing the gamer access to more content.

Unlike the plastic cards of the past, the newer cards are completely cardboard, with a tear-away strip that exposes the 25-digit number. Once used, instead of tossing away the plastic card, the cardboard card can now be recycled. Unfortunately, the plastic packaging seems excessive, which is my only major citicism of this item.

The Wonder of Xbox Live
XBox Live is wonderful! I'm going to get more of these bad boys and get a 4000 points card or two.

Any way, XBox Live Arcade had a ton of great games I wanna download and a lot of content I want to try on my disc games!

DONT BOTHER WAITING FOR SHIPPING OR PAYING FOR THIS
just go to my site and register, follow the instructions. and we mail the codes right to your email same day. its not worth waiting to get or paying for. just do what i do and you can get points like crazy. i got about 30000 points the past month and a half. save yourself some cash and aggravation. register and if you dont believe me, read the testimonals. this is legit. you dont even need a credit card or even need to fill out your address.

http://www.prizerebel.com/index.php?r=510865

Shoddy craftsmanship, but a good price
I wouldn't say the Xbox 360 is a piece of crap, but it IS rather shoddy in terms of how it's constructed. I bought one 2 days ago, finally. The first thing I noticed was how cheap the casing is on the console. Second, the disc tray feels extremely flimsy and unstable. Functionally, the dashboard interface is messy and loud (granted, they're fixing this issue with the new dashboard so we'll see what it's like). The console seems to be optimized for 480i or 480p output and the HD portion of it feels like an afterthought. The fact that after 3 years Microsoft has yet to include built-in WiFi is rather shocking. Oh, and lest we forget the extremely LOUD whirr the DVD drive makes!

The only game I've played on it is Mass Effect. While so far (and I'm only about 20 minutes in) it seems like it's gonna be the epic sci-fi RPG I've been dying to play, I'm disappointed by the graphics on it. They just don't seem up to par. I'm hoping that's only the limitations of the unimpressive Unreal engine, but while I hate to sound fanboyish, PS3 could do it better.

I'm happy with my purchase, seeing as I got the Arcade bundle at half price using a 0 gift card. I like now owning all 3 current generation consoles and having no limitations on what games are available to me. I wasn't happy that I got the Red Ring of Death the second time I booted up the console, and I don't like that you have to coddle this console just to keep it running. My take on it...a second-rate system that just happens to have gotten to the market first. PS3 is more refined.

Solid system, but noisy
I purchased a PS3 roughly 3 months ago. Played a couple of the proprietary games then realized that that I was paying for a system that was too big for my needs. Pretty much all I do is play games on it. I'm not online and I don't have HD. Plus the game selection is limited. So I sold it and picked up this low end 360. Seems like a solid system. The price is right at 0 bucks and it totally meets my needs. I won't be online downloading content, etc. The memory card that comes with the system seems like it will support plenty of saves from multiple games.
But here's the rub. It's really noisy compared to my old PS3. The fan just runs the whole time. I have the console in an open area and it never heats up. I'm wondering if the newer 360's are all like this due to some of the red ring of death issues older versions had? But it's loud. Like I have to turn up the TV a bit to hear over it loud. And when you turn off the console, you notice just how loud it was. I'd still keep my 360 over the PS3 despite this annoyance.

Extra Features?
For what it's worth, here are some extra details on this model:
* Has two memory card slots: comes with a memory card that holds well more than enough for most users. You can upgrade later if you need to (I won't.)
* Has full 1080p HDMI output (you can buy the cable separately for online) (you can verify this on xbox.com... the amazon details were wrong at the time of my purchase.)
* Has an ethernet port on the back. We plugged it in with a wire to our router, and it's extremely fast (much faster than iffy wireless.)
* It plays mp3s, wmas, etc. It has media player built in which is amazing. It organizes your music just as you have it, with directories, playlists, etc. Full-screen visuals blew me away!
* It plays downloaded (smile!) ripped movies natively, divx, xvid, etc. It automatically downloads the divx codec through "xbox live."
* You can watch online TV, HD movies, etc through the Live Marketplace service (I only looked at samples, and was impressed... but don't plan on using this since it's a for-pay feature, at least for now.)
* Netflix is adding xbox support later this year to stream movies direct through their serivce.
* It upscales normal DVDs to full HD 1080p (shockingly good)... so I no longer care about blu-ray discs, hd-dvd, etc. Very nice.
* Has 3 USB ports:
* I can plug my digital camera directly into the usb port and watch an HD slideshow!
* It lets you plug in usb memory drives (with pictures, movies, etc) on them and use with it's media center application.
* It lets you plug in external usb hard drives too (I have a 250 gig drive plugged in loaded with movies, music, and pictures.)
* It's quiet and cool
* "Wow it's so cute!!!"

Very impressive!
My husband and I bought this to play Dance Revolution and some racing games. However, we ended up making it a media center for our television.

The video quality was so good, we have decided to ditch our hd-dvd player (now obsolete.) It upscales DVD's to 1080p and looks amazing... so we decided there's no reason for buying blu-ray. We even found that it would play our collection of ripped divx and xvid movies. Just to see if it would work, we plugged in a usb stick with some movies on it, then it downloaded an update through "xbox live" (a pain to setup) and we were in business.

So next, we copied our whole collection to a 250 gig external drive and the xbox handles it well (all through usb!) So we also got rid of our Philips DVD Divx player (we were shocked to realize that it's video quality was so much worse, in comparison to the xbox.)

This thing is fun, and was a steal for the price. Oh, did I mention it's very good looking, unlike the Sony (though I'm sure it's a good machine too.)

fwiw.. I didn't understand one of the reviews.. it comes with a memory card to save all your stuff (we've used less than 5% of it) and it has an HDMI port on the back (the cable was a few dollars online.)

Enjoy!!!

Got it and love it.
Great system for the price. It's the falcon MB w/65nm chipset. Runs quiet and cool.