Here is the best cosplay I saw at New York ComicCon 2015 and in only 90 seconds!
Tag Archive: brainiac
Holy Lego Bat-Trilogy!
Batman, as a character, has been a part of my life for as far back as I can remember. Growing up, I had Batman bedsheets, a Batman lunchbox, and I’d watch the syndicated reruns of the 1960s Batman during dinner with my mom and go absolutely bonkers each episode, shouting out each onomatopoeia as it flashed on screen with joyful enthusiasm. So, it was with a near-equal childlike glee when I found out that Adam West and the ‘60s TV show would be getting a pretty fair-sized tribute in Lego Batman 3: Beyond Gotham. Working one of my all-time favorite TV shows into a series that’s already established itself as a great jaunt for Bat-fans of all ages? Sign me up!
Lego Batman 3: Beyond Gotham picks up right where the last game in the series left off. After his failed team-up with the Joker in Lego Batman 2: DC Superheroes, Lex Luthor is still trying to become President of the United States, but he knows he’ll have to knock off the Justice League if he has any hopes of following through with the misdeeds he’d have to commit to get there. Enlisting the aid of other DC villains to his cause like the Joker again as well as Cheetah, Firefly, Killer Croc, and Solomon Grundy, Luthor sneaks into the Hall of Justice—and, from there, teleports his team of rogues to the Justice League’s orbital space station, the Watchtower.
Unbeknownst to the heroes and villains as they clash high above the Earth, though, is that a new villain, Brainiac, an android obsessed with collecting slices of various civilizations and preserving them in his personal macabre museum, has been up to mischief of his own. He’s gathering the seven spectrums of light in order to power up his shrink ray, and he plans to make Earth doll-sized and add it to his species-preserving collection. Only through the heroes and villains coming together to tackle Brainiac as a team—and visiting the homeworlds of each Lantern Corps—does Earth have a hope of surviving the unstoppable android.
What TT Games is able to accomplish here with this, their third Lego Batman, is nothing short of impressive. Sure, the gameplay’s mostly the same as it ever was: Go around smashing pieces of Lego bricks around the world to open up new pathways, collect a variety of items, or rebuild them into something useful to take on the bad guys. Along the way, you collect “studs,” the series’ form of in-game currency, to unlock extra characters and other goodies.
But the scale of this Lego Batman compared to the previous entries is what blew me away. There may only be 15 story levels, the same number as all other Lego games, but each one’s far larger and more intricate than before. What’s more, they offer myriad new puzzles that really put you to the test in Free Play mode if you want to 100-percent the game.
And the story itself is yet again one that Bat-fans of all ages will appreciate. It starts off pretty slow, not really hitting its stride until about the seventh level, but it’s chock-full of the simple-but-enjoyable slapstick humor we’ve come to expect from the Lego series of games. It also stays very true to the source material, so you’ll be hard pressed not to relish the twists and turns of this latest adventure.
Besides the story, though, the game also offers nearly another 15 levels just to run around in and find a variety of DC or Lego themed collectibles. Whether it’s the Legion of Doom headquarters, the Moon, or each and every homeworld for each respective Lantern Corps, you’ll be blown away by just how much you can explore—and how much detail went into each area. From the lava rivers of Ysmault to the emerald fields of Oa, or the exotic forests of Odym to the prisons of Nok, Free Play mode will suck up your time as you undertake sidequests and hunt for the 250 gold bricks scattered about the DC Universe.
There’s also a special post-credits level. Not only can you rescue Adam West 30 times in the game (much like you had to with Stan Lee in Lego Marvel), but you can play as him, too. The post-credits level is a tribute to the 1960s Batman, with Adam West as the narrator. You can (briefly) drive the ‘60s Batmobile and then take on the Joker—redesigned to look like Cesar Romero. He even has a little Lego mustache poking through his white facepaint. It’s an epic showdown worthy of the Batusi!
Beyond all the extra story content, there are also 150 different characters to collect and play with. You’ll find variations on the main characters, like Batman of Zur-En-Arrh and lesser-known villains like Music Meister—even the reality-altering fifth-dimension inhabitants Bat-Mite and Mister Mxyzptlk. If they were ever a part of DC lore, chances are they might be here. Beyond Adam West, a few other random celebrities make an appearance, like Smodcast host and legendary Bat-fan Kevin Smith, the Looney Tunes’ version of the Green Lantern, the Green Loontern (Daffy Duck dressed as Green Lantern), and Conan O’Brien. With the first two, I can at least see some loose connection to the DC Universe, but have no idea why Conan was there, and he proved to be extremely annoying while serving as the guide for many of the hub worlds. He’d often repeat himself to the point where I almost muted the TV when he was around.
But, as the narrator of the 1960s Batman TV Show used to say at the start of each second episode of the two-part stories: The worst is yet to come. For as much as TT Games was able to cram into Lego Batman 3: Beyond Gotham, there are a lot more technical issues than normal. You’ll see framerate drops on almost every other level, and they often crop up at the worst times. I can’t remember experiencing this with a Lego game before, so it was really jarring for the issues to pop up as often as it did here. It’s also still a little mind-boggling that TT Games hasn’t instituted online co-op into their games yet. I understand that local co-op probably works better for a game like this, given its chaotic nature, but I think offering players the option would be nice.
The camera also remains a greater threat than anything the Legion of Doom could hope to throw at you: quest-givers hidden away behind the scenery, your hero falling off an edge because the field of view doesn’t follow them into a blind corner, or just trying to keep all the action onscreen as you take projectile damage from enemies you can’t even see.
The technical shortcomings don’t sabotage the overall package, though. With dozens of hours of post-story content to keep players coming back for more, plenty of new worlds ready to explore, and a story that somehow finds a way to entertainingly tie it all together, Lego Batman 3: Beyond Gotham remains as reliable and enjoyable for fans as Bat-Shark repellent.
| Developer: TT Games • Publisher: Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment • ESRB: E10+ – Everyone 10 and up • Release Date: 11.11.14 | |
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8.5
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Despite some technical shortcomings, Lego Batman 3: Beyond Gotham does a fine job of continuing to build on what the series has established while also hitting all the right notes to keep pleasing Bat-fans of all ages.
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| The Good | Massive universe to explore. ADAM WEST! |
| The Bad | Camera is a nuisance more than ever; surprising amount of framerate drops. |
| The Ugly | Just how much I know about a TV show that originally aired 20 years before I was born. |
| Lego Batman 3: Beyond Gotham is available on Xbox One, PS4, Xbox 360, PS3, PC, OS X, iOS, Wii U, 3DS, and PS Vita. Primary version reviewed was for Xbox One. Review code was provided by Warner Bros. for the benefit of this review. | |
Originally Published: February 27, 2011, on my StrongProtector account on GiantBomb.com
Growing up, I always dreamed of being a superhero. I wore a blue blanket around my neck as a cape and ran around the house vanquishing invisible enemies with what I perceived as martial arts, but that my parents probably thought might be closer to some kind of interpretive dance (I’ve always been a very uncoordinated individual). So, it makes some sense that the only MMORPGs I ever had any real interest in were the ones that let me make my own superhero.
Great MMORPGs are supposed to be able to suck you in and make you want to keep playing and building up your character and keep influencing the universe you find yourself in (and keep paying the monthly subscription fee), but I got bored with City of Heroes after a while and the same happened with Champions Online.
DC Universe Online was supposed to be different though. Over the four-plus years of development and delays we had to endure, we kept being told how it was going to change the world of MMORPGs, how it was going to be different, and how it was going to appeal more to people like me who weren’t into collecting rat pelts and beating up on smaller foes constantly in order to just level up once in the hopes of advancing past the next mission.
Well, after weeks of near non-stop research, where I sacrificed contact with the outside world, and also with my razor (see picture), I have come to this conclusion: DCU Online is easily the most fun, engrossing, and enjoyable superhero MMORPG I’ve ever played. But after playing it non-stop for a month, I don’t see any reason to extend my subscription beyond the free 30 days the game comes with.
The game opens with Brainiac putting into motion his master plan, his end game that will finally eradicate the heroes and villains who have always stood in his way and that will give him absolute control of the Earth. And he will succeed. Furious over missing the threat right under his nose and letting his obsession with Superman get the best of him, Lex Luthor from the future builds a time machine that allows him to temporarily travel back to the Justice League Watchtower before Brainiac launches his attack. Future Luthor has brought back with him Exobytes, little nanobots that Brainiac used to download the DNA and powers of Earth’s heroes and upload into his robot army for the final push of his conquest. Luthor releases these Exobytes into the atmosphere, thus creating millions of new heroes in the hopes it can change his present and our future as he is ripped back to his own time.
It is here that you can then create your own hero or villain. First, you have to choose a server offered and I normally wouldn’t even mention this, but as a comic book fan, I took a little extra joy in seeing each one named after a classic DC storyline, whether “The Killing Joke”, “Final Crisis”, “Justice” or the many others. Now, if you want to jump right into the action after this, you can choose from one of 15 hero/villain presets, but if you’re like me and want a more personal touch, then you can choose from hundreds of various combinations, with more that you can earn over the course of your playing time.
Either way, you can choose from one of six “mentor” types who will influence your safe house and mission layout. If you choose to be a hero that follows Batman, for example, you’ll face more of his villains like Scarecrow and Bane. On the other side of the coin, if you choose to be a villain that follows the Joker, you’ll face off mostly against the Bat Family.
I created one hero and one villain to start. The hero I made is a tech-ninja who sports a sweet black mage hat named Strong Protector and who is a dedicated brawler. The villain I created is a dual-pistol wielding army reject named Ray Rage. Someone is now going to use this information to probably lay out a psych profile for me. Anyway, I stuck with the more realistic hero powers, but ice, nature, fire, psychic, and dark magic abilities are all at your disposal as well when creating your own personal characters.
The instant appeal of DCU Online doesn’t lie in the fact that you can create your own hero or villain though because it’s been done before. The appeal lies in the fact that you are playing in an established universe with over 70 years of history to it. You’re jumping right into Gotham’s East End to cause havoc with the Joker for the GCPD and stop Huntress from putting pressure on your mob allies or maybe you’d rather jump into Metropolis’ Chinatown with Superman and need to stop the Hive from stealing mystical artifacts.
The concept clearly is enough to get my blood pumping, but how does the game actually stand up once you get into Metropolis, the Watchtower, or various other areas in the DC Universe? The best way to describe it would probably be a mixed bag.
The scope of the world you find yourself fighting in is absolutely massive and obviously being able to support thousands upon thousands of people online at once takes its toll on the aesthetics of the game, but that’s really no excuse for the amount of visual glitches you’ll find in DCUO. Much of the world is very slow loading and there are holes everywhere. Thank goodness there is a warp option in the menu otherwise I’d still be falling through an invisible hole that was in the middle of the Metropolis boardwalk. The graphics do look great though during the story cut scenes or the small comic style vignettes you earn after defeating every hero or villain you face.
The audio is spear-headed by tremendous voice acting from former DC Universe animation veterans like Adam Baldwin and James Marstens (Superman and Lex Luthor from Superman: Doomsday) and of course Kevin Conroy and Mark Hamill (Batman and the Joker from Batman: The Animated Series and countless other DC animation projects), but I was surprised at how generic the music was. It kept sounding like you’d hear the beginnings of Danny Elfman’s Batman theme in Gotham or John Williams’s Superman theme in Metropolis, and then it would just taper off. Would it have been too much to ask to bash heads to the music that many comic book fans have come to associate with their favorite heroes?
Where DC Universe Online really shines is in the simple controls and mechanics. Unlike most other MMORPGs, the action is completely responsive to your button commands like a traditional action-game instead of the random or turn-based styling that is more accustomed to this kind of game. This allows for players to have a much stronger say in what happens in a fight instead of relying on making the right choices when leveling up and hoping for the right digital role of the dice behind the scenes.
The leveling up has also been streamlined compared to most MMORPGs as you only decide on what new powers you can learn or new fighting styles to acquire. Your health, defense, attack power, speed, and other more traditional attributes increase at a fixed pace, which can be augmented via finding various types of gear from fallen foes, with the best goodies obviously being dropped by the super villains you take out.
Also, instead of having to go back and knock out a plethora of weaker enemies as you progress in order to level up, DC Universe Online successfully has eliminated the rat pelt collecting and has you level up at a much more consistent pace no matter what level you may be. You deserve a reward for bringing Doctor Psycho, Giganta, Harley Quinn, or any of the other countless villains in the DCU to justice no matter what your level is so whether you’re Level 5 or Level 25, you’re going up a level if you beat a villain.
The big problem right now with DC Universe Online is that you can actually get through most of everything you can do in the game in the free month that you get with it. Sure, you could stick around to test your mettle against other created characters in the small or large scale PvP Raid and Arena instances or join up in Legends mode and play as your favorite hero and villains in some classic goal oriented multiplayer, but there isn’t enough for you to buy a monthly subscription until the level cap is increased and some new villains and missions are added. Of course, you could just try out other mentors and powers for the main game as well and create a small army of characters if you really fall head over heels for this game.
When all is said and done, DC Universe Online is a solid, but not spectacular MMORPG unless you really love the DC Universe and their characters, like myself. If so, then this game is definitely worth a purchase, just make sure not to start your free 30 days until you know you can get some solid gaming time in, because even the most diehard of DC fans will probably be ready to hang up their cape after a month.
Ratings are based on a scale of 1 to 10 with 10 being the best.
Graphics: 7.0: In it’s defense, you’re going to have a lot of visual glitches in a world the size of what DC Universe is set in. A big knock against it though is this game has been in development for nearly five years when it was finally released so I was pretty ticked when I fell through the middle of Metropolis’ boardwalk for what seemed like forever and I have to SOE out on it.
Audio: 7.0: I loved the voice actors featured in the game and the SFX are something you would expect in any comic book game, but you couldn’t get the rights from Warner Bros. for some licensed music? I want the Danny Elfman theme for a Batman protégé character damnit!
Plot/Plot Development: 10.0: Great original comic book plot that fits perfectly into the DC Universe and just like many of the comics the game is based off of, if done properly, it will never truly end, but continue to evolve along with the game’s community.
Gameplay: 8.0: A bevy of super powers available to you early on and an easy leveling up system that didn’t have you running around collecting rat pelts was a nice change to your standard MMORPG. Despite this, much like the graphics, there were a lot of glitches and slow response times to your command inputs due to lag and it became irritating at times.
Replay Value: 7.0: An engaging and original comic book plot that will always change and evolve is a tremendous concept, but I will never understand the willingness to pay a $15 monthly charge for any video game that costs $60 to begin with. Unless this all you plan on playing for a good long while, you can probably get your entire superhero fix in the free month that comes with the game.
Overall (not an average): 7.5: As much good as there is in this game, there are still a lot of problems that I’m sure will be fixed over time, but as it is now keeps it from being elite and definitely not worth a monthly subscription fee. Find a spot on the calendar when there won’t be a lot of good games coming out, buy this with the free month, and then be done with it until it gets some sweet expansion pack.
RayCarsilloWrites.com 