Friday 8 February, 2008

GAMEPLAY (Session 2):
UT3 is really fun to play. It feels like the classic UT games, but with better graphics and some familiar weapons from the past games. It is a first person shooter, so it does have some similarities with other games of that genre, but the weapons differ from other games. The weapons are almost the same as in the previous versions, but have been upgraded for next-gen systems. The developer, Epic Games, kept the familiar weapons from the series, as well as bringing back former favorites from the first game. If you have played the previous games, this is going to be familiar, but in a good way. The vehicles are still really good and they even included a Hoverboard, which is pretty fun to ride on.

I have played the previous games so when I started to play this, it felt familiar. Once I got into the gameplay, I didn’t look away from the screen. It kept me interested because the enemy AI is really good and they can sneak up behind you and kill you. The new maps and new rules also gave the game something new to keep in fresh, but familiar. Some of the maps are small, which gets you into combat really quick, and others are really big, requiring vehicles to move across the maps. Also, adding orbs to capture enemy nodes makes you think of strategies to keep the enemy from capturing you nodes with their orbs.

DESIGN:
Although sometimes weird, the AI in the game is pretty good. The enemies fight together to capture a flag or to capture a node. The same thing goes with your team AI. They keep the game interesting because they don’t do the same thing over and over. They think of ways to pass the enemy to get into their base. I even got surprised as to how smart the enemies are when I was playing Capture the Flag. They had a diversion with two of their teammates and the other two went to the base to steal my flag. It wasn’t until I heard “the enemy has taken your flag!” that I thought, “Whoa, when did they get into my base?” Moments like these keeps in the game to see if it will happen again.

From the maps that the campaign put me in, the levels seem pretty different, but a little the same. The maps have different structures in them in different places on the map. Although they do look mostly similar, the way the graphics look for the entire game make the maps have some similarities in the shading and textures. The levels are both big and small, depending on whether you want many or few players. The variety in maps lets the player choose where to play and what map will be their favorite. In CTF, the bases are on either side of the map, with the center area open for long range combat with no vehicles (usually). With capturing nodes, the nodes are really far apart so the vehicles help to get there faster than the enemy. Really well built levels with variety in size, and vehicles that make it more fun. Good game for the PC.

This is fine, and about what we're looking for, though more in-depth analysis of the design would be appreciated. The gameplay sections are all right, though you seem to assume a bit that everyone's played previous UT games. Other than that and the previously mentioned analysis, this is perfectly acceptable.

Amy Leek (grader)