Dark Sector: Another Letdown for Legacy Players in ‘08

Available Control Options: Default & Southpaw. We’ve briefly touched on this game before, so we’ll consider this to be a more in depth follow-up report now that I’ve gotten my hands on this one. And let’s get something out of the way first and foremost: Dark Sector is a pretty good game. It’s getting mixed reviews around the net and on TV, but I think it’s a fairly solid title. Even without support for Legacy, I still had some fun tooling around with this one.

You’re not going to remember Dark Sector as a landmark game in this generation of consoles. No, it doesn’t rank up there with the big guys like Gears of War, Halo 3 or Call of Duty 4. But it’s still a decent title for shooter fans out there, and offers some unique game play elements, in spite of the crummy AI.

Visually, the game is very similar to Gears of War, and sports some gritty, detailed environments that look pretty sharp. The characters also look fantastic and the music/sound effects are excellent. Dark Sector borrows some of the control elements from Gears of War as well, since it’s a third person shooter with FPS-style aiming. You’re also required to use the ‘A’ button for taking cover, rolling and sprinting, as seen in Gears. Fans of Marcus Fenix and his crew are going to enjoy this game, despite the fact that it is not quite as refined as the top-notch title it has obviously drawn inspiration from.

There are, however, a few features that set Dark Sector apart from Gears, the main being the use of your Bladed Glaive. This is a cool weapon that your character (Hayden) can spawn from his arm to throw at enemies. After a few practice rounds, you’ll soon be decapitating your foes with ease. All the practice over the years in honing your head shot skills in various shooters will pay off quickly. Read the rest…

Best of 2007 for the Rest of Us!

Better late than never I guess, but the editors of Alt-Controls.com have finally gotten together and decided to pay tribute to the best games of 2007.

This past year in gaming was incredible. For the first time in my gaming life, I was not able to keep up with trying all the class-A titles that just kept coming and coming. 2008 has a lot to live up to, and I’m not sure if we’re going to see another year like ’07 for some time.

2007 was also filled with many ups and downs for alt-control players. We got to play a ton of great games including Halo 3 and Call of Duty 4, but there were also a number of disappointments as well, such as BioShock and Mass Effect.

In any case, the games we that did get to take part in and enjoy are being honored with what we are calling the prestigious “Alties” (SAKY coined that one..!) and we hope to make this an annual tradition here at Alt-Controls.com. To be eligible to win, the game simply has to offer at least one alternative control option. There are some exceptions, as you’ll see below, but without further delay, here they are: Read the rest…

LEGACY PLAYERS CAN’T JOIN ‘THE CLUB’

Supported control schemes:

-Default
-Southpaw

The Club is a shooter’s shooter. You won’t find an interesting or epic story, hell there is practically no story at all. So why would you play the club? You like shooting stuff and lots of it. SEGA’s latest outing is as straight forward a shooter as you can find. What separates The Club from the glut of shooters is the way the game utilizes the, all but forgotten, gaming tradition known as the High Score. This is the primary focus of The Club and score is determined by several familiar factors such enemy difficulty, accuracy, and speed. Killing consecutive enemies, in swift fashion, gives a player “multipliers” which is a key to racking up those big numbers.

As you see, it’s really simple, better you do the higher your score. So in this aspect the club’s driving motivation is similar to the games played in arcades so many years ago. Honestly it really warms my old gaming heart. The game plays pretty well, a combination of 3rd and first person perspectives works out well. The 180 degree turn also adds a somewhat fresh element which is one of the elements that rewards proficiency. You’ll have to be pretty good at the common skills like hip firing, melee, the ol’ COD “aiming down the site”, and all of the common shooter skill you have honed over the years. The Club takes all of common shooter elements and rates you based on your shooter skills; it’s simple, unique, and smart game from SEGA. Veteran and dedicated players alike will find all the challenge they need in the “Hard” and “Real” modes of the game. Read the rest…

HALO 3: “HEROIC MAP PACK” FREE, LEGENDARY…SOON

Now here is something we can all play. I’m late posting this and I’m sure many of you are getting your free map on as I write this. Just a heads up for all of you that are unaware, yes, the Heroic Map Pack is now free for download on the XBOX LIVE Marketplace.

Also in the works is the Legendary Map Pack, which will include remakes of Classic Halo 1 & 2 maps Sidewinder and Lockout and one new map called Ghost Town. The Legendary pack will be released April 15th and will set you back 800 MS points. Keep in mind, if FREE sounds more appealing, the Legendary pack will be free to download in a few months time.

Happy Gaming!

Bummed Out About the Battlefield Beta?

It’s no secret at this point - The Beta for DICE’s upcoming Battlefield: Bad Company does not support alternate control schemes (no Southpaw or Legacy). I have to admit that I’m not surprised at all. Not that I’m trying to throw salt on the wound by any means, nor am I trying to say “I told you so.” However, based on the available controls in Battlefield 2: Modern Combat for the Xbox 360, this game (at least the Beta) has exactly what I expected for controls. Battlefield 2: Modern Combat sold incredibly well. In fact, it’s a Platinum Hit if I remember correctly.

And the fact of the matter is that many games still sell in spite of their omission of alternate or customizable controls. So here we have an example of a game that did just fine by leaving us all out in the cold, and of course the follow-up game offers the same control styles. Don’t fix it if it ain’t broke… right?

If this doesn’t illustrate to you, my fellow alt-control players, that we really are the minority in the gaming industry, then nothing will. So, what can you do now as a consumer? You just want to play games that you’re looking forward to, just like everyone one else, right? You don’t mean the gaming industry or development companies harm, do you? No, of course not. That’s not what this community is all about.

So while the Beta is out already, I still encourage all of you to contact DICE and have your say. Don’t yell and scream. Don’t swear at them. Voice your concerns as their consumer logically, and professionally. Read the rest…

BULLY Shares GTA Style of Controls and…well everything but setting

I picked up Bully last week, among a few other titles, and wouldn’t you know it the game plays exactly like it’s Rockstar brethren Grand Theft Auto. The game isn’t nearly as deep as it’s GTA counterparts but you can’t blame Rockstar for wanting to cash in on the game engine once more before it releases GTA4. So if you want an idea of what Bully is like just think of a smaller GTA set in a school, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing.
Read the rest…

Update: Frontlines ‘Legacy’ Issue

A number of you were rightfully disappointed with the Legacy control setting in Frontlines: Fuel of War. As everyone is aware, the Legacy option in this game only swapped the triggers, and did not change the mapping of the thumb sticks at all.

We’re happy to share with you all today that Kaos has at least received the message and is looking into the matter. SAKY sent this interesting information to me yesterday evening, so you should all check out the Official Frontlines: Fuel of War Status Blog. Of particular interest to us is this point:

* Controls: Investigating mis-mappings with the Legacy control scheme.

Whether this means that actual changes will be made, we don’t know yet. But at least Kaos is looking into the matter and has not just ignored the concerns of the alt-control community. Alt-Controls.com will continue to watch as this story unfolds and keep you all posted.

Battlefield: Bad Company (Beta) - Bad News

Southpaw, Legacy and Customization are not available (for soldier)

Setup for Soldier
Setup for Helicopter
Setup for Vehicles

Rainbow Six: Vegas 2

Thanks for the warm welcome post and comments. I have not played the game yet myself but I have very reliable information that says that alt control schemes are well catered for like in the first game. Nice one UbiSoft.

BioShock 2 Petition: 4 Standard Stick Layouts and Customization!

With the highly anticipated BioShock 2 on the way, we here at Alt-Controls.com thought it was time to roll out another petition. The game is currently scheduled for a Q4 release in 2009 as SAKY mentioned. That means that we have a decent amount of time to compile a good number of signatures.

At this moment, there is no set deadline. For our GTA IV petition, we had very limited time, but this one can run a bit longer. At the same time though, we don’t want to wait to send this out until Q3 2009, because then it will be too late.

Also, there really is nowhere to send this petition at the moment. The website of the newly formed development company, 2K Marin currently leads to a holding page. Thus we have no available contact information. I think for now we will run the petition indefinitely, and perhaps when the website launches will be a good time to clamp down and set a deadline.

If you signed the GTA IV petition, then there is no need to resubmit your signature and I’ll just include you again. For those of you who did not sign our first petition or for new readers of the site, please send us a quick email and I’ll add you. Read the rest…