The Tom & Oll Show

3D Dot Game Heroes Official Trailer

2010-03-25T22:09:00.000Z

Take a look at the upcoming 3D Dot Game Heroes for the PS3, taking retro 2D action games into the 3D world - currently dated for May 14th...

Sonic 4 gets more pictures!

2010-03-25T21:59:00.001Z

The upcoming reboot of the franchise, Sonic 4, got some groovy looking new screenshots today showing off the hedgehog's new HD graphics. Based on these pics the game is looking great so far and I can't wait for the release this summer. Hit the jump for the rest of the pictures!

Axis: Bold as Love on Rock Band this week!

2010-03-25T21:32:00.003Z

Yes, Hendrix lovers rejoice as the full Axis: Bold As Love album comes to the Rock Band Music Store this Tuesday! All tracks except 'EXP' will be available to download, as well as future albums and a Jimi Hendrix avatar teased for the future... Hit the jump for more info, and click the link for the full Rolling Stone article.

Jimi Hendrix Coming to "Rock Band" With Full "Axis" Album, More Exclusives to Follow [Rolling Stone]

Jimi Hendrix Coming to “Rock Band” With Full “Axis” Album, More Exclusives to Follow : Rolling Stone : Rock and Roll Daily
Jimi Hendrix is the greatest guitarist of all time and current Rolling Stone cover star, and now RS can reveal that his legendary albums are coming exclusively to Rock Band with a wave of downloadable content thanks to Harmonix, MTV Games and Experience Hendrix. The guitarist’s entire second LP Axis: Bold as Love will be unleashed as DLC starting March 30th, along with the unearthed Jimi single “Valleys of Neptune” from the new disc of the same name.

Axis: Bold As Love hits XBox 360 and Nintendo Wii on March 30th, with the PlayStation 3 release following on April 1st. The songs — only the musique concrete opener “EXP” is excised from the track list — will be available both as an album and standalone tracks. Check out the first slate of Hendrix tracks coming to Rock Band (and LEGO Rock Band, with the exception of “Up From the Skies” and “Valleys of Neptune”):

“Up From the Skies”
“Spanish Castle Magic”
“Wait Until Tomorrow”
“Ain’t No Telling”
“Little Wing”
“If 6 Was 9″
“You Got Me Floatin’”
“Castles Made of Sand”
“She’s So Fine”
“One Rainy Wish”
“Little Miss Lover”
“Bold As Love”
“Valleys of Neptune”

Review: Heavy Rain

2010-03-11T19:44:00.005Z

Wow, get ready for some reviewing right inside your head! That’s right, this website does reviews now. Why? Why not. Anyway, read ‘em and weep...

Heavy Rain has been billed by director David Cage as an “interactive movie” rather than a game, where through quick time events and moving the right stick precisely, you can hope to find out who the Origami Killer is. So how is it? Click the jump to find out...

Heavy Rain (PS3)
Developer: Quantic Dream
Publisher: Sony Computer Entertainment
Released: 24^th February 2010

Heavy Rain features four main characters, who in their own ways are all linked to the story of the Origami Killer, a serial killer who abducts children. There’s Ethan Mars, who’s trying to save his son from being the killer’s next victim, Norman Jayden, an FBI agent with fancy technology and a drug addiction, Madison Page, an investigative journalist, and Scott Shelby, a private investigator.

Anyone who played Quantic Dream’s previous game Fahrenheit (Indigo Prophecy in some countries) will see the evolution of the gameplay functions where most of the controls are context sensitive. In Heavy Rain, you’ll turn your character with the left stick as you’d expect, but propel them forward with R2 which takes a bit of getting used to but surprisingly becomes very comfortable. You’ll also use the right stick by moving it in certain ways according to on-screen prompts to do most of a character’s actions, and moving it slowly when the situation demands it. Other situations will require you to follow the prompts and hold down certain buttons, and depending on the difficulty of the situation, you’ll start playing twister with your fingers, facing difficulty and frustration as your character is. Scenes where Norman is fighting his drug addiction (should you want to fight it) are the best examples of these sequences, where your vision is blurred, and you can’t fully control your own actions.

Other times the controls become annoying, like when you’ve got to apply mascara as slowly as possible, feed a baby and put it into a pram as slowly as possible, set the table as slowly as possible, and other confusing and pointless things. Even a slight increase in speed in these scenes will see you jab yourself in the eye, choke a baby then hurl it into a pram, and crash the plates on the table which I left until last because if Ethan’s aggressive wife is to be believed it’s the worst thing anyone can EVER do.

The various situations the game asks you to find your way out of can become confusing too, because when you need to repeatedly tap a button, the symbol shakes, but if your character is nervous or scared, the whole box shakes, so there are points in the game where you’ve got no clue whether the game wants you to tap the button or just press it down.

The game starts off slowly, with you playing as Ethan where you have to get up, shower, get dressed, and do work, all the while being able to press a button and hear his thoughts, and there are lots of other scenes like that, most of which seem strange and unnecessary like looking after a baby.

That’s not to say that the game is slow – scenes like that are often balanced out by a much more fast-paced demanding level, often involving fights, where you have to respond to quick time events in order to keep your character out of harm’s way. This is where the game is interesting, as depending on how well you perform in these sequences, you’ll get a different immediate outcome. For example, the first scene with Scott involves a fight, and he can escape unscathed, get some bruises, or be bleeding with a broken nose – all resulting in different character dialogue. As the game goes on the characters get into real danger, and the pacing of these sequences brings out a great thrill from playing them.

Sadly, as great as the choices and outcomes seem at the time, they make no difference at all to how the game goes on. A character can get shot and in the next scene it won’t even be an issue. There are bigger plot points that will completely change how the game turns out , and there’s a lot of trickery to make it look like your input always matters, but a lot of the time it doesn’t and even putting the controller down during dialogue choices or quick time events will still see the game plodding along by itself.

Calling Heavy Rain an interactive movie is a huge mistake. The features I’ve described above make playing the game a really exciting and enjoyable experience for a lot of the scenes, but there are parts of the game that can’t be ignored. First, the voice acting – the characters look incrediblel, but it’s a real shame that it doesn’t carry on into their voices which are mostly emotionless and dull. In addition to their voices, the characters don’t have much substance and go through no real change over the whole experience if you discount the horrible forced relationship between Ethan and Madison.

A bigger problem I had with the game is the story. If it’s to be called a movie – and a dramatic one at that – the story is key. The premise is unusual and very interesting, but there are chunks of the story that just get forgotten as soon as they become inconvenient, and glaring plot holes (it’s impossible to be specific without spoilers) and red herrings. There’s also a huge twist in the story that above anything else reveals that the game has been lying to you for hours and lots of scenes are retconned to accommodate for an unnecessary plot twist. A similar plot twist mistake happened halfway through Fahrenheit, and it’s a shame to see that they didn’t learn from their last mistake (although at least Heavy Rain doesn’t take a ridiculous paranormal leap).

The idea of the interactive movie is an interesting one, and it’s great to see Quantic Dream pushing forward with the genre. The gameplay is definitely engaging and exciting at times (and boring as hell at other times – feeding a baby, drinking orange juice, applying mascara) and a lot of great elements are there, but the voice acting lets a lot of the scenes down, and as the game is trying to build a great story up it completely demolishes everything with a horrible twist. I had a great time playing Heavy Rain, and there are times when it’ll have you on the edge of your seat, but to make the game more enjoyable you have to ignore a lot of the plot and in a story based game that isn’t a good thing.

7 - Good (There could be a few roadblocks, but the overall game will be enjoyable. Maybe not keepers or ones to replay, but definitely worth a try)

REVIEWS! We do them.

2010-03-11T19:30:00.001Z

Yes, this site will soon be full of game reviews as well as the rest of the stuff we'll try to keep posting. Here's just a quick guide...

As for a guide to how the header images are chosen, your guess is as good as mine

At the bottom of the article is a list of the scores on a scale of 1 to 10, just so you know they're not randomly placed at the end of the article and they mean something. The scores are assigned based on what the game sets out to do, and how well it achieves it. Also, it's not a ranking system. Just because one game is a 7 and the other is an 8 it doesn't mean that the 8 is a better game - mainly because a lot of the time it's hard to directly compare games unless they're in the same close genre like Final Fantasy and Lost Odyssey or Bad Company 2 and Modern Warfare 2. Anyway, here's that list:

10 -- Incredible (As close to perfect as you can get. An orgasm of gaming brilliance.)

9 -- Fantastic (Brilliant games. The problems are small and are far outweighed by the rest of the brilliance of the game. Just go and get it. Now. I’ll wait.)

8 -- Great (Impressive games that are definitely worth trying. There might be a few things holding them back, but overall will be a great experience.)

7 -- Good (There could be a few roadblocks, but the overall game will be enjoyable. Maybe not keepers or ones to replay, but definitely worth a try)

6 -- Alright (Above average, but there’s still enough there to put you off. Fans of the genre will be interested, but most will continue meh-ing.)

5 – Average. Just Average. (As much good as there is bad. Meh meh meh meh meh.)

4 -- Below Average (They wouldn’t be at the tip of your tongue when recommending games, but they’re not all bad. They’re not that good either, obviously.)

3 -- Poor (They might tease you with a good idea or some redeeming features, but they’re stuck in the quicksand of the rest of the game.)

2 -- Bad (Very poor indeed. Whether it’s down to bad design, bugs/glitches, or a combination of bad elements, these games are being dragged down, but there’s a tiny silver lining somewhere.)

1 – Terrible (Just wrong. You will get nothing from playing these games other than complete despair. No redeeming features at all.)

Deadly Premonition - YOU WANT IT

2010-03-08T13:02:00.002Z

If this video doesn't convince you that you need Deadly Premonition in your life, then I don't have much hope for you.

Seriously, you need some F K in your Xbox...

Get Involved! Cream Wolf, Just Cause 2, Toy Soldiers, Bad Company 2, Heavy Rain

2010-03-05T13:31:00.005Z

Want to get involved in Monday's show? Of course you do, why wouldn't you? Well as far as our talking about games on Monday (together with the usual random stuff and wrestling talk) we're gonna talk about these games, so if you've had a go, or even if you couldn't care less about any of them, leave a comment and tell us about your gaming lives this week...

Read about the games after the jump!

Cream Wolf (PC) - Free to play online
The less I say about this, the better. Just click the link and get playing - the less you know the more fun it'll be

Just Cause 2 [Demo] (Xbox 360) - Free

As of today, a completely open 30 minute demo of Just Cause 2 is up on Xbox Live to download for free - you can basically do anything you want in those 30 minutes, ignoring the main features and missions completely whilst realising that freefalling and seeing how long you can wait until you pull your parachute is the best thing that's ever happened. Probably.

Toy Soldiers (Xbox Live Arcade) - 1200MS Points

A great looking tower defence game mixed with great looking action and strategy elements - part of the House Party promotion - get online with it and play some multiplayer too!

Battlefield: Bad Company 2 (Xbox 360/PS3/PC)

We've had this for a couple of days now and it's fantastic. Not much to say about the single player yet since we haven't had a go, but the multiplayer is fantastic - great fun, great gameplay, great helicopters. Out Friday 5th March

Heavy Rain (PS3)

Although this came out last week, we didn't get a chance to talk about it on the last show, so get ready for some talking about it this week! There's probably going to be some spoilers if you haven't played it yet. It's supposed to be more of an interactive movie than a game, with realistic characters who have cold dead eyes and voices to match. What do you think??

Anyway, those are the games, have a go of them (or download the demos for free if you're poor or can't be bothered to buy them) and let us know what you think - listen live on Monday at 6pm for the next show!

SUBSCRIBE, BROTHER!

2010-03-05T01:29:00.002Z

The podcast of the show is available in all sorts of places, from this here website to iTunes - to subscribe to it in every way you could possibly want to, follow the link at the bottom of the page and the feed there has got a link for every podcast scheme or program imaginable - and they'll download as soon as they get put up

Subscribe while Tom&OllMania is runnin' wild...

Rock Band Network is up!

2010-03-04T17:45:00.001Z

For everyone that loves loads more music to bash along to, the Rock Band Network is now open! Anyone can put their own songs on there, and as of today there are 120 songs for you to pick from for either 80 or 160 Microsoft points - so get on Rock Band 2 and get downloading!!

[EDIT: Aargh it's US only for the moment, it'll be rolling out to the UK in a few weeks]

[EDIT EDIT: Actually, I'm on it right now, it's definitely available in the UK. I recommend The Main Drag and The Dirty Love Band ;)]

We're BACK!

2010-03-02T12:54:00.001Z

In case you haven't heard yet, the Tom & Oll Show is BACK on www.kuberadio.com every Monday at 6pm - podcasts of the last few weeks will be up as soon as we can get hold of them, and if you've had a listen at any point, leave some comments, have a chat, we're very lovely you know...

Oh, and join us on our facebook group, would you kindly?

Love you bye!!

Podcast 05

2010-01-13T02:24:00.001Z

7th December 2009

EXPERIENCE Tom & Oll taking things in a NEW DIRECTION with the constant barrage of talk about X Factor finalists eating cereal with water which is mentioned at least twice. We may need help with this issue...

Download here

Podcast 04

2010-01-13T02:14:00.000Z

30th November 2009 (49:50)

with no guests because I don't know why....

Witness the start of the obsession with singers eating cereal with water....and a general obsession with cereals altogether. PLUS brilliant music.....that had to be cut out.....but there's plenty of goodness in these little O's, funny little stories, noises, voices, to keep you happy and joyful inside your beautiful mind - because this radio show is made for YOU. No, not you. But YOU.

Download here

Podcast 03

2009-12-18T22:56:00.000Z

23rd November 2009 (40:25)

with special guest Party Animal Steve

This show is PACKED with such things as - Steve attempts to take over the show by being bullying and arrogant, Steve chooses too many songs, Steve offends celebrities, Steve is aggressive to listeners, and Steve demands a bowl of Coco Pops. On the other side of the studio, Tom & Oll handle the funnies! Enjoy it - good, it is!

Download here

Podcast 02

2009-12-18T00:03:00.001Z

16th November 2009 (39:17) - Students and Parties

with NO special guests because they didn't turn up because they're EVIL

Well, this is the show where you can BE AMAZED by such things as - the announcement of Steve's West End debut (well, the west end of Hanley), the lack of ANY discussion on the subject of the show, Steve copyrights things in his head, Steve asks for prizes he doesn't deserve, Steve gets mentioned a lot even though he isn't on the show, and overall the greatness of the episode despite fairweather friends abandoning our plucky hosts, it's very much a modern day Rocky.

Download here

Podcast 01

2009-12-17T22:22:00.001Z

2nd November 2009 (26:34)

with special guest Stevie

THIS is the very first Tom & Oll Show, way back when the station had loads of technical issues! Some have been edited out, and some are still there (some weird volume issues) but it doesn't matter, this is the start of something AMAZING!

Be wowed by a competition nobody wants to enter, criticism of Steve's party habits, criticism of Steve's gaming habits, criticism of Steve's music tastes, criticism of Steve's inquisitive little expressions, and criticism of Steve's nervous hiccups. We're genuinely all-round nice guys.

Download here