Two weeks ago, I would be 100% willing to tell you that Batman: Arkham Asylum would be my Game of the Year. Arkham Asylum was a game I came into with little or no expectations of, and was quite simply blown away. No matter what else came out this year, nothing would affect me in quite the way Batman managed to.

And then I had to go and get a PS3.

I always knew Uncharted 2: Among Thieves was probably a better game than Arkham Asylum. And it undoubtably is. Which is my favorite game is an issue I’m still wrestling with, which is to take nothing away from Uncharted, which is quite simply stunning from beginning to end. The way it integrates combat, stealth, melee combat, platforming and urban climbing together so seamlessly is a feat to behold, and with the perfect wrapping of this Indiana Jones influenced narrative structure, it is without a doubt one of the most impressive games I’ve played in years.

First and foremost, Uncharted 2 is a technical feat. I’m not just talking about the graphics, either. Make no mistake: Uncharted 2 is gorgeous. The massive locals rendered by the game are breathtaking in their scope and detail, and the characters (Who I’ll discuss further later) are incredibly emotive. Beyond the graphics engine, however, is the way that the many different types of gameplay in Uncharted fit into each other so naturally. Essentially, you could boil the game down to Gears of War-style shooting, Assassin’s Creed/Tomb Raider climbing and platforming, thrown together with aspects of stealth, melee combat, and puzzle solving. Not only are stealth and melee combat encouraged, but you’ll find yourself wanting to do them as much as possible to give yourself an edge in a hectic firefight. And the climbing aspects of Uncharted are just as integral to the combat experience. In one, I was having difficulty with a certain firefight where I was surrounded by snipers on the roof. Before the fight began, I climbed up some ruins onto the roofs, and stealthily took out all of the snipers, allowing me to complete the firefight with ease.

The environments in Uncharted 2 are built for these sorts of improvisational situations, and are far more dynamic than the typical Gears of War “Hide behind this piece of cover shooting until everyone falls down dead” scenario. In addition to this, the levels are far more dynamic and interesting. This game basically throws you into one setpiece after another, each more exciting than the last. You’ll get to climb up the remains of a train hanging precariously off a cliff in Nepal, break into a heavily guarded Turkish museum, and go tomb raiding in the jungles of Borneo, and that’s LITERALLY just the first three missions. I honestly don’t even want to spoil the rest of them for you, because when you finally see them, your mouth inevitably hangs open in shock.

The amazing gameplay is backed up by some of the most believable characters you’ll ever see in any game. Their interactions all feel incredibly real, and the occasional quips and one liners they make never feel forced or contrived. The story is a relatively standard Indiana Jones “Rescue this precious mystical long-lost artifact!” setup, but the ways in which you interact with the story are truly impressive. The term “Interactive movie” is now a long cliched concept, but Uncharted 2 fulfills that prophecy better than any game before it.

Now, before I go too far into hyperbolic praise, I will say that Uncharted 2 is not perfect. My complaints with the game are mostly minor, and you could probably call them nit-picky if you wanted to. For one, the voice cast is nearly perfect throughout the game, which makes the character of Elena Fisher, one of Drake’s love interests, that much worse in comparison. She never felt like she was emoting enough to me, and in the scenes she shared with Chloe, your other love interest, her lack of emotion and chemistry with Drake was all the more apparent. Also, during some of the platforming sequences, it’s not always apparent where you’re supposed to go next. You’ll occasionally find yourself wandering around trying to find the next thing to do, waiting for a helpful hint to pop up and tell you where to go next. Again, these are negligible complaints in the long run, and when compared to all the things the game succeeds at, they might as well not be there.

I’m still wrestling with the notion of what will be my Game of the Year, but there is one thing that I can say with some confidence: Uncharted 2 is a must-have for anyone who owns a PS3. Even if you don’t have a PS3, this should be one of those games that will sell you a PS3 (as it was for me). It’s a game experience unlike anything I’ve ever seen, and certainly one of the most compelling games I’ve played in years.

9.5/10

I’d make a witty quip here, but I don’t feel like it. Just read the damn pictures.

Don’t skip to the bottom of this post, as I want you to understand the reasoning behind my madness.

As I mentioned with my last music article, Borderlands is rather difficult to find at the moment here in Calgary. By difficult, I of course mean impossible. Last week, most of the retailers I asked said they would have in copies by Monday or Tuesday. So here I am, Tuesday afternoon, on my day off at the university, at my local EB Games. When I ask for a XBox 360 copy of Borderlands, the retail clerk tells me that they don’t have any. Yes, it seems the game is still sold out. In my desperate hope that this was a limited case, I go to the EB in my local mall to find the same thing. In fact, the clerk says he doesn’t expect any copies in for several weeks.

Picture my gradual frustration. To further paint you a picture, I don’t drive yet. I’ve been busing myself around to various retailers, in the hopes of finding one solitary copy of a game that’s been out for a week, met with failure at every turn. By the time I got to that final EB, I was looking for something, anything, to consume my time. And that’s when it happened.

Over the last month or so, my obsession over the game Uncharted 2: Among Thieves has been growing steadily, to the point of near madness. I don’t own a PS3, so it was heartbreaking to see a game that looks like it was built specifically for me (an Indiana Jones-styled serialized adventure shooter from the makers of the Jak & Daxter series? Awesome!) held just outside my grasps. The fact that the game has pretty much been praised by just about every publication on this earth as the Best Game of 2009 didn’t help me any.

This led me to think about the Playstation 3 in some interesting ways. I finally came to the conclusion that this year, Sony’s first party exclusives FAR oustriped that of Microsoft. Picture it this way: Microsoft’s biggest exclusive this year was a seven hour stand-alone expansion to a game that came out two years ago, with a Horde Mode-style cooperative multiplayer mode tacked on the front (Guess what game I’m talking about). This year, Sony had Uncharted 2, Infamous, Killzone 2, and Ratchet and Clank Future 3, all of which got rave reviews.

By now you’ve all probably guessed where this is going, but basically, the moral of this long and winding story is this:

I Got A PS3. Yeah. More on this to come. I plan to do a review of Uncharted 2 as soon as I bust through it. And no, I regret nothing. I walked into an EB Games looking for a 360 copy of Borderlands, and walked out with a PS3. I’m a traitor. And I’m loving it.

The new expansion to GTA IV comes with new tv programmes that nobody gives a shit about.

But it apparently includes this, stereotype riddled anime show. And it’s fucking hilarious.

(Shit sorry Jeremy, more awesome stuff.)

IGNORE THESE TWO NEW VIDEOS! THERE IS A BRAND NEW FULL LENGTH ARTICLE TWO SPACES DOWN!!

aaaaAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH THIS IS SO AWESOME.

(Sorry to bury you Jeremy, I like your music choice this week by the way.)

Well, it’s been a week, and I’m still here, which means the ninja assassins Mr. Wumpus sent to my house must be lost or something. Rejoice! Normally I’d be posting this later in the day, but due to the fact that not ONE copy of Borderlands could be found in any EB Games/Walmart/Superstore/The Source/HMV/Chinese Food Vendor/Dismembered Corpse in all of Calgary, I had far more free time this weekend than expected, so here you go.

This week, I thought we’d move into something a bit less accessible. That’s right, we are easing slowly into the canon of “heavy music”, which will turn off some of you immediately, and get the rest of you all hot and bothered. Whatever your position on heavy music, Cynic, the band I’m about to discuss, conforms to none of the expectations about metal in general. Even calling Cynic “heavy” is perhaps a misguided statement. Essentially, they’re a progressive metal band, and their latest, Traced in Air, puts the emphasis on the “progressive” side of the equation.

But a bit of backstory is worth discussing. Cynic released their first album, Focus, was released in 1993, and is often considered one of the highwater marks of the progressive metal genre, often described as “jazz metal”. They then disbanded in 1994, and only just reunited in 2007. Traced in Air, their second album, was released last year. Yeah, that’s right. A band that is considered one of the pinnacles of progressive metal has only released two albums, separated by fifteen years.

You’d expect fifteen years of absence to really weaken a band’s songwriting ability. And really, when was the last time a band reunion produced anything worthwhile? The fact that Cynic managed to crank out an even decent album is astounding in it’s own right, and even crazier that it’s probably the best album that came out last year, point blank. “The Space For This” exemplifies everything that’s incredible about Traced in Air. The first ninety seconds are quiet, atmospheric, and almost touching in their beauty. Then the lead riff kicks in, and suddenly all the hype built up around the record makes sense. Throw in an incredible guitar solo, and some of the best progressive songwriting this decade, and you’ve already got a great start to an album. And it only gets better from here.

Cynic are the rare breed of metal band that rarely rely on any of the stereotypes regarding metal. There are no breakdowns, no grunts and very few growls, and the lyrics aren’t about war, sex, alcohol, demons, or any pseudo-macho bullshit that most metal bands resort to. Cynic write songs about the perception of earth, eastern spirituality, and the nature of self. It’s all strangely positive for a band often lumped into the death metal genre.

However, Cynic are a slow burn. Despite how catchy and accessible they may seem for a metal band, there is a surprising amount of subtlety and nuance to their songwriting that is not always immediately apparent after a couple listens. Tracks like “Evolutionary Sleeper” and Integral Birth” are the most immediate and accessible from a casual perspective, so I’d suggest starting there if you want to get into Cynic. Elsewhere, tracks like “The Unknown Guest” and “King Of Those Who Know” continue to push the boundaries of progressive music, and evolve Cynic’s songwriting abilities.

I’ve gone on way too long by now, and most of you are just skimming through this anyways, so I’ll just leave on this note: Cynic are one of the most advanced, beautiful, and highly skilled progressive bands out there, and Traced In Air is likely to go down in history as one of the defining albums of the progressive rock genre. And that’s only 5% hyperbole.