Rating: Summary: Fun for about an hour Review: I bought this game after reading all the reviews/hype. At first glance it appeared promising, but after about 4 or 5 hours of game play it started to feel more like work instead of fun. The navigation is very tedious as well. Also they market the game as if you can be evil or good and it won't matter. That is not true at all. You pretty much have to do the "right" thing in order to proceed along the quest. You can sit around and rape and pillage but it won't move the story along. All in all I find the game to be very boring. Basically you spend all your time trying to get food and wood for your people and trying to fufill every little whim they have. The beasts are pretty lame as well. You have to like carry him around on a leash and "teach" him stuff. Then the beast is constantly hungry or tired so you have to feed him as well, on top of worrying about the villagers and at the same time trying to complete the scrolls. Like I said, it feels more like work that actual fun. To me it's like they tried to make you responsible for too much of the minor details instead of worrying solely about the big picture. If that's your idea of fun then go for it. To me it's just plain boring. I'm off to play Undying! Now that's my idead of FUN!!!
Rating: Summary: A Flawed but Fantastic Game Review: Black and White is a role-playing game in which you play one of several competing gods of Eden. You make several decisions of whether you'll go the evil way, which tends to be the easiest, or if you have a kind heart, you choose the good way. These decisions are based on suggestions by your consience, or two little figures floating around your screen. One is you evil side, the other is your good side. They have several names: Good and Evil, Black and White, Yin and Yang. It is good to make several files of which each takes a different path. On the in game screen, you have one hand that is used as the cursor. You use the hand to drag you around the world of Eden. You use it to transport goods to other towns, to train your creature(all gods have a creature, you may raise it according to your personality), to cast spells and, if necessary, to chuck your people here and there. The overall gameplay concept was very unique, and even more entertaining. The graphics are quite good, yet average in the category of small details, like faces on people and terrain. Black and White is not as addictive as other games, yet even some amazingly good games are not as addictive as others(Mario and Pokemon are examples). There are a few bugs that need fixing, such as whenever you(or at least I) try to quick save outside my temple, it never actually does. This gets annoying later in the game, as so many important things are happening that you just don't have time(or want to) be in your temple to save a game. This game is worth your time and money, even iff some of the bugs can be quite nagging. If you are planning to buy this game, take consideration into what kind of games you like. This game may not appeal to all of you. Congrats to ... on one great game!
Rating: Summary: This is beyond cool Review: This game is astonishing not only to look at, but to play as well. The gameplay is a little off, otherwise giving it a Five-Star rating, but the rest is soon to be history. I am an avid gamer with many interests in different genres, but this is one of the most remarkable of them all. In this sims-esque type of game, you have several creatures to choose from and a few towns for it to take care of. You can punish the people and have them give human sacrifices in your sake, or you can be a gentle god and provide and prosper for them. Once you get into it, you really can't stop. Now there is just one thing I need to get off of my chest, and that is negative reviews of this game. Now all opinions I respect, but for some people, this just isn't their kind of game. Just take David Smith for instance. He absolutely loathes the gameplay, and that's fine, but you can tell that this is just not his kind of game. He says that he's played nearly every type of game and like all of them, but does he like sim games? No. Is he the kind of person that would waste an entire weekend playing The Sims? No! This game just isn't for some people, but people should know their interests before they buy ANY game at all. If all of David's negatory was sparked just because David could't navigate the game, then you can bet that he doesn't like the controls for Vigilante 8, either. You should always research anything you buy, whether it be a Dreamcast game, or a new toaster, it doesn't matter! You need to find out before you buy. No offense to you, Dave, but just check stuff out before you waste money on things you don't need or like. I believe that this game is for all the sims lovers and beyond, and I hope that if you don't think this game doesn't sound the most intriguing to you, that you don't buy it, but it is completely up to you.
Rating: Summary: I..... AM...... GOD!!!! Review: When I heard about this game i immediatly got curious and waited in anticipation for the final release, I read every article and downloaded any and all video clips i could find on it so i could learn more. Now that I have it I love it and can't stay away from the computer. Now,YOU HAVE TWO OPTIONS! MOUSE OR KEYBOARD, or a combination of both. It only took me about 20 minutes to get adjusted to it. after that it was smooth sailing. I have a Pentium III 700mhz and it ran well enough although the autosave was a bit slow at times but that was it. The tutorial at the beginning is informative but it would've been nice to turn it off afterwards. The game itself is awesome, the graphics are the best i've seen, and the creature AI is excellent. I left my creature alone for about 5 minutes and when i came back my entire town was in flames! The creature can learn on it's own or you can teach it yourself. Want to teach it a spell, cast it either on or beside him, eat livestock, or eat live humans it's all up to you if you want it to be evil or be nice or a little of both. You can notice the physical changes of your creature through the way you bring him up. and with every year that passes it grows a little more untill it about the size of a mountain, although there are a couple spells that make that happen automatically for a short period of time. There so much you can do you don't necessarily have to finish the game either just roam about creating havoc with other villages, fight other monsters, and teach new creatures. There's lots of gaming here if you put the time into it unlike some people who played this game.
Rating: Summary: Moving around is like walking through water Review: Good Game, lots of interaction with your subjects and wonderful graphics. Interface is hard to get used to.
Rating: Summary: Better get ready to really upgrade. Review: This game may be fun, I wouldn't know. So far I have added more RAM and a new video card. The game now runs but no sound. Tech support is lousy. My computer is only 2 years old and should be able to run this without a problem. If you are getting this for your kids you may want to install it before you tell them and it doesn't work. BIG disappointment.
Rating: Summary: Great idea! Review: The AI in this game far surpasses that of any game I've ever encountered. However, Since the game only has 5 levels, one of which is for training, I can only assume that they forgot to include the rest of the game with the box. I was extremely dissapointed to find out that all my hard work was for nothing. DON'T WASTE YOUR MONEY!
Rating: Summary: Over hyped & over priced Review: The game was shipped too early. This, apparently, is known as fact. EA forced Lionhead to ship before the game was ready to make the current financial quarter and hence it is riddled with bugs. Some minor but also some MAJOR bugs, such as corrupted saves, "runblack has caused error in runblack.exe" meaning having to restart the game from scratch. Also, you should be warned that you need a serious computer to play this game. I have a P3 700mHz, 128MB RAM but it still judders and skips.Black and White was also hyped at being the gaming equivalent of Wilde's 'The Picture of Dorian Gray'. It's not. I help my villagers; give them food and wood (which they ALWAYS want), take over other villages by impressing them and not frightening them, but because I've sacrificed a few people my temple and hand have morphed to 'evil'. According to the advertising the land would become blackened and scorched and the nights would become longer. It hasn't and they're not. The whole theme of being good and evil and everything in between is a joke. It is simply a tally of very good deeds and very evil deeds. If you are sometimes evil and sometimes nice you are neutral, if you are always nice you are good if you are always evil you are evil. Very simple. So the alignment is simply an aesthetic way to show you what you already know. And if I am so 'evil' why does my creature think I am 'good'? Your creature was advertised as being the centre of the game: it's not. Micromanaging your villages is. They always want food, and as soon as you start expanding they always want wood. If you give them food and wood then they want children. When they have children they want more food and wood in an endless, maddening cycle. If you like micromanaging then that's fine, but if you do then your creature gets neglected. The creature AI isn't so spectacular either. You can get your creature to do anything you ask it to: just tell/show it enough times. Not really groundbreaking or a challenge to teach him. Sure its nice the first time but eventually it comes down to *shrugs* so what? Example: your creature dances. My Ape danced a sort of Brakedance, he also did a moonwalk. This was funny but what if I wanted to teach him to Cossack dance or a lambada? Can I make him dance a waltz arm in arm with one of the people from the village? It's impossible... The 'dance' you see is just a pre-rendered animation file... your creature doesn't understand what dancing actually means, it's only an action that is triggered when certain variables have the right values - just like every other game. What it is is a very pretty tamagotci. In a game that was publicised for its openness and freedom you actually have very few choices: how can you take over a village, for example? Attack it with one of about 5 techniques (monster, fireball, rocks, lightening, throw people), be nice to it with one of about 5 techniques (give it food, wood, have monster be nice to it, put artefacts in it, send traders). Granted there are a lot of really cool things in this game but it's more like a tech demo than a real game. Yes the physics rock, yes the creature is somewhat intriguing but in my book that does not constitute as gameplay.
Rating: Summary: Don't listen to David Smith!!! Review: He's just not good in the game, you DONT need to micromanage your villagers like he said, he just made them lazy. Leave them alone for a few minutes and they'll start solving their own problems. I'm already at level 4 and this game still impresses me. There are lot's of great features like the ability to choose a Creature (ape, tiger, cow, horse, leopard, gorilla, mandrill, wolf, lion, rhinoceros, ogre, sheep, zebra, etc) with an amazing A.I., which you can reward him (stroke him) for doing things you want or punish him by hitting him. You are able to do lot's of miracles (like 30, I think) and even teach them to your creature! You'll even laugh sometimes at things your creature does! It can even dance with the villagers. Each time, It will grow stronger and bigger depending on how you train him. And the biggest ability of all, you can be good or evil! The atmosphere will change depending on how you are, if you're evil you'll have bats near your temple! Buy this game, it's worth every cent!
Rating: Summary: Revolutionary Game Review: This game has captivated me from the beginning, not only because of the eye-popping graphics, but because of the huge numbers of possibilities available inside. I have owned this game for a week, and can barely keep away from it. It's a God game, in which you take care of followers and cast miracles to fight against other Gods and gain more followers. There are many different events and challenges which you can accomplish in many different ways, whether you want to be good or evil. For instance, in one challenge in the tutorial beginning a women asks you to help her sick brother who has wandered off. In return she offers something that you need which is in her house. You can accomplish this task in many ways, including taking a rock and smashing open her house to take what you want. One of the most inventive features is that of the creature. You get a pet that you can train to help out and fight other Gods' creatures. Some people have described it as being just a big Tomagochi, but I've never had a Tomagochi get frustrated with me and throw one of my followers out into the ocean before. I've tried out several of the creatures already, including some of the unlocked ones, and each time I've seen a different personality develop. Though the creature can be frusterating, (especially when you have to teach it simple things) in the end it's a very rewarding experience. Admittedly I had some doubts and dissatisfaction that many of the people who didn't like this game touched upon: at first the game can be really frustrating with controls, micromanagements, etc. However, there are ways around it which you can find posted on boards all over the place, including at bwgame.com. Some may call these cheats, but they reduce the micromanagements frustrations immensely. The controls get much better with time as well. This game has provided more fun for me than any other game in recent history. I have not noticed any of the bugs that some people have faced, which is probably because I have a brand new Pentium 4 system. For those of you who are worried about it I recommend you wait until they finish and release the patch.
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