Life In The Third Person

Hidden Gem Hunting will accompany me as I search charity shops, car-boot sales & discount stores for cheap video games. I will report my findings back here, once a week. Please bear in mind that these are my first impressions on these games, and are definitely subject to change once I have played them. If it turns out that a hidden gem or a heap of shit is among these, you’ll see a review pop up in the near future and I’ll link it here.

Dark Void (PS3) £0.80

Wikipedia calls Dark Void a ‘third person flight combat shooter’. Its got to be the only game i’ve ever heard of with a vertical cover system. It received mainly mediocre reviews, but the mechanics sound so appealing that I can’t bring myself to pass it up. Brad Pitt was slated to star in a feature film drawn from the game’s lore, but there’s been no news of this since early 2010. The idea of jetpack fighting is going to be a brand new thing to me, unless you count Wormz, and boy am I excited!

Freedom Fighters (Xbox) £0.80

Another third-person shooter, but this time it comes from the developers of Hitman who went on to create the Kane & Lynch games. Freedom Fighters has a Metacritic score of 81/100, which is a higher score than 6 out of 7 Hitman games. The game features a Tom Clancy-esque squad control system, similar to the Rainbow Six Vegas series.  I’ve never felt like Che Guevara in a video game, and I hope this game can change that.

Psi-Ops: The Mindgate Conspiracy (Xbox) £0.80

Featured in the book ‘1001 Video Games You Must Play Before You Die’, Psi-ops: The Mindgate Conspiracy is a game with a lot of potential. A blend between psychic powers and third person shooter mechanics make this game sound extremely engaging. The psychic powers in Psi-Ops consist of abilities such as mind control, telekinesis, pyrokinesis and many more. I can’t wait to try them all and this will be one of the first games I play this week.

Singularity (PS3) £1.50

Created by the developers behind 2009’s Wolfenstein reboot, Singularity is just the kind of time-manipulating monster hunting I love in a video game. The game has a time-travel storyline with added Russians making it sound like an 80s B-movie, which I can’t get enough of. It’s a survival horror at heart and I believe I’ll be able to draw a lot of comparisons from the Dead Space games, which is never a bad thing. This is my pick of the week as it just looks so refined and fantastic.

Ridge Racer: Unbounded (PS3) £4.50

The thirteenth and final game in the Ridge Racer franchise, Ridge Racer: Unbounded changed the creative direction of the series and crashed and burned. I’ve heard that this game can be really unforgiving, more than most racing titles. Ridge Racer: Unbounded takes the previous focus on drifting and moves it over to boosting through buildings and walls, taking down your opponents and destroying everything in your wake, it sounds like a perfect mix between Burnout and Split/Second, with elements of Need For Speed’s customisation. I’m just praying this doesn’t feel like a mush of different ideas, and more like a true homage to it’s inspirations.

Total Spent: £8.40

Pick of the Week: Singularity (PS3)

Sleeper: Psi-Ops: The Mindgate Conspiracy (Xbox)

Most Likely to Suck: Dark Void (PS3)

Be sure to keep an eye out for reviews of these games to see if they were worth a second look, or worth retracting the first look everyone gave them. Check back next week for five more possibilities.

Sam Marshall

Sam Marshall delves deeper into the darkest depths than any man who dared to tread before him. Some people enjoy a little mind-crushing torture. He is one of them.