First Encounter Assault Recon

Title: F.E.A.R.
Studio: Day 1 Studios (360, PS3), Monolith Studios (PC),
Publisher: Vivendi Universal
Genre: FPS horror
Platform: PC, 360, PS3

Premise
You are the new member of a special forces team dealing in the paranormal, trying to take down a platoon of soldiers controlled by a psychic commander.

Character
You play a rookie F.E.A.R. commando who has been given his first mission with the F.E.A.R. squad. He is one of the many video game main characters with no lines, so there is not that much character development for him. He is mainly controlled by the player however, there are some cutscenes that you cannot control him.

Engagement
The game has a very well designed and scary environment, riddled with mystery and horror,

Story
There is a psychic locked up in a military prison, who goes into a murderous rampage and takes control of a psychically controlled group of soldiers. It is your task to help the F.E.A.R. soldiers take the psychic soldiers and the main leader down. Throughout your mission you see various hallucinations of ghosts, a little girl, corpses and blood. You eventually succeed in taking down the psychic leader.

Resources
Your resources include the different types of weapons, bullet time, health, armor, and flashlight battery.

Challenge
The game is challenging in the way that the enemies weapons are very powerful, and their melee attacks are even more so. This forces the player to stay at a distance from them, and use bullet time often. The game gets more and more challenging as it goes on as more and more enemies show up, and they get stronger and stronger.

Half Life

Title: Half Life
Studio: Valve
Publisher: Sierra Studios, Electronic Arts
Genre: FPS
Platform: PC

Premise
You are a physicist in an underground lab when aliens start appearing everywhere, and you have to do you best to survive and escape.

Character
You play as Gordon Freeman, one of Black Mesa's leading physicists. Gordon is the strong silent type, for he doesn't talk at all during the game. He is completely controlled by the player, with no self control whatsoever.

Engagement
The game is very engaging. The levels are expansive and detailed, drawing the player into the game. The enemies are creative and scary. The difficulty curve is very well balanced, with a good rate of increasing difficulty.

Story
You are Gordon Freeman, and on the day of the game, you are attempting to create a resonance cascade, which you are successful in. The bad news, is that it opened a portal to another world, and lets a whole plethora of alien enemies in. You are tasked with finding a way out, and killing as many enemies and help as many people on the way as possible.

Resources
Your Resources include various weapons you find, grenades, HEV suit power, Health, and ammunition.

Challenge
The game offers a very good challenge for both fans of FPSs and people who enjoy puzzles, as there are spectacular battles, as well as very challenging puzzles.

Metal Gear Solild

Title: Metal Gear Solid
Studio: Konami Computer Entertainment, Japan, Digital Dialect
Publisher: Konami, Microsoft
Genre: 3rd Person Stealth Shooter
Platform: PsOne

Premise
You are a secret agent attempting to infiltrate a terrorist base and take out their main weapon.

Character
The main character is Solid Snake, who is the player character. He is a legendary secret agent and has been pulled out of retirement. He uses all manner of gadgets from remote controlled missiles to cardboard boxes. Other characters include Colonel Campbell, who gives general advice and tells snake necessary information about his surroundings. Naomi Hunter calls snake to offer medical advice, Snakes old master Miller, and Mei Ling, who gives technological advice. Meryl joins you later inside the base, and she helps you get past some of the more difficult security measures.

Engagement
The game is very engaging. Right from the start you are put into the action, having to stealth your way to the elevator to progress. The game gets slightly less engaging as you progress, because of constant calls from the Colonel and the others, and regularly occuring cutscenes.

Story
Solid snake is attempting to infiltrate the hijacked FOXHOUND base and take down the terrorist hijackers main weapon: a nuclear launch enabled walking tank. Snake goes through the base, avoiding or destroying the resistance. Eventually he meets Meryl, who helps him on his way. With Meryl's help, Snake eventually takes down the terrorists weapon, and ends the threats being put on the White House.

Resources
Your resources include various weapons, ammo for weapons, different types of grenades, a cardboard box, different scopes, and various keycards.

Challenge
The game starts out fairly simple, but as it progresses, the game gets more and more difficult, requiring more help from the colonel and other supporting characters. The game tends to have a very steep difficulty curve, requiring the player to know what they are doing very early into the game.

Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards

Title: Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards
Studio: HAL Laboratories
Publisher: Nintendo
Genre: 2.5d Side Scroller
Platform: Nintendo 64

Premise
An evil force has broken the great crystal and kirby is tasked with recovering all of the missing shards.

Character
The character that the player controls is Kirby. Kirby is a small round creature who can suck up any number of objects and enemies, stealing the enemies or objects properties. Kirby is not entirely controlled by the player though, there are cutscenes wherein he acts by himself.

Engagement
Using exceptional gameplay and an origional story, this game succeeds in engaging the player to a great degree.

Story
An evil force comes to dream world and in an attempt to steal the power crystal, it breaks it into many pieces that are scattered across dream world. Kirby finds one of the dream world crystal keepers trying to find the crystal shards. Kirby decides to help her, and they set off. They face many different foes, some of which are holding pieces of the crystal. Throughout the story, you meet 3 different helpers, Waddle Dee, The Painter, and King Dedede. They all help kirby to recover all of the crystal shards and banish the evil force from dream world.

Resources
Resources include the different powers that Kirby can obtain, Health, Crystal Shards, Star points, and lives

Challenge
This game has a very good curve of difficulty. It starts out very very easy, and progressively gets more challenging. It achieves this not only by adding larger and more difficult enemies, it adds puzzles and traps to the mix.

Goldeneye 64

Title: Goldeneye 64
Studio: Rareware
Publisher: Nintendo
Genre: First Person Shooter
Platform: Nintendo 64

Premise
You are a British secret agent trying to stop a criminal organization from attacking the world with a weaponized satellite.

Character
You play as James Bond, the famous secret agent of MI6 of England. He is a smooth and silent killer, and always gets the job done. The character is mostly shown when there is dialogue between Bond and the other characters in game.

Engagement
The game starts out the player in a combat situation, instantly drawing the player in. The levels are expansive and numerous, and the various environments that the player has to play in keeps the player interested throughout the duration of the game.

Story
The game follows the story of the movie almost exactly, with the exception of a tank here and there. Mostly the story is portrayed through the briefings at the beginnings of each mission, and with dialogue from the characters in game.

Resources
The resources in this game include, time (for some levels), health, armor, and ammunition.

Challenge
The game has a very good curve of difficulty. The beginning levels are easy and help the player get used to the controls, and as the game progresses it gets harder and harder, until the player reaches the end levels, which are extremely hard.

Super Mario 64

Title: Super Mario 64
Studio: Nintendo EAD
Publisher: Nintendo
Genre: 3rd Person Platformer
Platform: Nintendo 64

Premise
You are trying to rescue a princess who has been captured (yet again) by an evil king, by recovering power stars from various levels.

Character
You play as Mario, a plumber-turned-hero, who arrives at the castle because of an alluring letter sent by the princess, promising baked goods, only to find that she has been kidnapped by Bowser. Mario is one of the many famous, "silent heroes". A player character who has no speaking part in the game, apart from a few grunts. Other famous ones include Gordon Freeman and link. Even though Mario never talks, he still is in control of what the main goal is in the game.

Engagement
The game is not very engaging from the story point of view, as we get no back story for Mario or princess peach and her whereabouts, but gameplay makes up for this. This game has a very many levels to play though, each one different from the last, and each time you play through a level, you can choose a different objective. This results in a very engaging gameplay.

Story
The story begins when you arrive at the castle via one of Mario's trademark green pipes, and a letter is read by Mario from Princess Peach saying that she has baked Mario a cake, and wishes him to go to the castle to view/eat said cake. Upon entrance of the castle, you learn that Princess Peach has been kidnapped by Bowser and you have to get all the power stars in order to rescue her. From then on, the story is pretty much gone from the game, and your main concern is getting the power stars.

Resources
The resources include, coins, stars, time in some levels, health, and lives.

Challenge
The game starts out at a very manageable level, with an integrated tutorial to help the player along, and then gets steadily difficult, climaxing in a very difficult end boss battle. While the player can choose their mission for each level, in order for them to get the required amount of starts to win the game, they will have to complete most of them, forcing the player to get better at the game.

Oblivion

Title: The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
Studio: Bethesda Softworks
Publisher: 2K games, Bethesda Softworks
Genre: 1st/3rd person RPG
Platform: Xbox, PC

Premise
You are in a fantasy kingdom, trying to close all the gates of oblivion, ridding the kingdom of evil.

Character
In this game the character is mainly controlled by the player. The player chooses the appearance, the characters race, abilities, and class. The player chooses what weapons and armor is equipped and other related items. However, the player is given a limited number of responses when in a conversation with a NPC, which gives the character some personality.

Engagement
From the very beginning of the game, it is very engaging. The story draws the player in to a fantasy world full of colorful characters and stories, and throws him into the thick of it. The engagement is someone lost because from the very beginning, the player can simply warp to any city they desire.

Story
The story is well thought out and very interesting from the beginning, making the player care about the missions, and not just go through the motions, as with many games lacking a good storyline.

Resources
Resources include arrows, weapon health, magicks, fatigue, health, strength, and notoriety.

Challenge
The game has a good difficulty curve. It starts out with a series of integrated tutorials, and from then on the game gets steadily harder, but the player can choose the missions that they want to play, and therefore can choose the difficulty that suits them the most.