The CLUB

[Oliath]

Hey guys

I grabbed this on friday cos GAME had a deal where you could get it for £19.99 when purchased with anything else in store.

So i now have The Club and a £1.99 pokemon toy :-)

Anyway.. For £20 this is well worth the price, although i wouldn't have wanted to have spemt more on it.

If you have played the demo then you will have an idea of what its all about... lots of little time trials and circuits in a 1st person style.

My favourite mode is siege where you have to survive for a set amount of time in a coned off area... you can leave the area to grab ammo and health but not for more than five seconds at a time otherwise you explode.

I think this game has great replay value, especially as there are multiple leaderboards for varying levels of skill so you shouldnt find it too hard to climb at least one of them.

Its also very clearly lets you know your friends scores on certain circuits and encourages you to beat them. Currently i only know one other person with this game, but its still fun getting competative over various levels.

Another pleasant surprise was the online play... after a bit of a glitcthy start.. the game play is actually pretty old skool and surprisingly entertaining.

There is a rather fun mode where you have to compete with another team to see who can score the most time in the opposing teams base..

Stamdard deathmatch mode is nothing special... other than the fact that it uses the same mechanics from the single player to score... but i have only played a few small matches... Not played any of the other modes...

I would reccomend it if you can find it cheap and dont have many other games to play at the moment.

[Hendo]

I got far too many games to play at the moment!

I got the demo when it came out, but I still haven't played it yet.

[Oliath]

TELL me about it dude!

I should have got a PS3... at least that way i wouldnt have the problem of having too many great games to play.

I just sold a bunch of older ones, but currently i have and regularly play:

Team Fortress, COD4, K&L, and Burnout

[illdog]

Oliath wrote:

Hey guys

Fag.

Nice to see u back around, allbeit for 10 second spells.

Im gonna pick up Teh Club, thats an awsome game deal.

[Oliath]

COOL

Although i have a horrible feeling it was only on for last friday, and i wouldnt say its worth more than that.

I could be wrong tho.

I think lots of people here will really enjoy it as its all about beating your friends scores.

[hinn888]

its still on i saw it in game today. im still waiting for my game from the FHM subscribtion game tho..

[spatular]

just had my first propper go on this trying to get some half decent scores and it's really good fun, the combos/scoring really adds to the generic fps (well this is 3rd preson but you know what i mean) type game, shame everyone i know with this seems to have awesome scores that make me look useless

[hinn888]

i heard alot of ppl were put off by this coz of the stupid idea of running around keeping a combo. Its more of a play now and then game isnt it? Or does the multiplayer make u keep playing?

[spatular]

i've not played multiplayer, not far into single player either, just enjoyed what i've played so far it does look like you might be right about it being a play now and then game though, depends how competitively you take the scoring i guess.

[Oliath]

Well i have had it for two weekends, and its deffinately a pick up put down sort of game.

I was on it for a good couple of hours last night trying to unlock some more stuff and better some friends scores and so on.

The combo thing is actually the whole point of the game.

You dont HAVE to keep the combo meter up.. it just means that you get more points.

I am still figuring the scoring out, but basically the more each time you get a kill you get a kill multiplier... which ticks down (or bleeds)

The more multipliers you have the faster it bleeds. But also the more you have the more points you get for your next kill.

You can then add to this by doing other types of special moves, like rolling and killing, or crashing through a door, and killing... or ranged kills, headshots.. mele and so on.

There are also 'skullshots' around the levels, which give you bonus points and also add to your multiplier, so the idea is that once you roughly know where enemies are coming from you can rack up a nice multiplier before you do some fancy moves to boost your score.

Also.. the more health you have at the end of the level the more points you get, and also it gives you another multiplier at the final tally up depending on how high your FINAL multiplier was.

I am really loving it though. Its pretty addictive and very very challenging.

Online multiplayer is alright. Nothing to tear you away from all the other fansastic titles though.

It feels a bit oldskool (which is nice) and fast paced... but i still prefer the single player for now.

[hinn888]

Just Some Q & As

Q: Are there any plans to release DLC for The Club? If so, are you able to comment on what types of DLC are being discussed, and if they will come with achievements or without?

A: There are no plans at this time to release DLC for The Club.

Q: The online play is a bit glitchy...specifically, there is a way to glitch the server so that even if you lose, it shows up that you get 600+ million points more than the titular winner, which cheats them out of the actual win. Is Bizarre looking at patching this via a title update to ensure fair game play?

A: Yes both Sega and Bizarre want to provide a "glitch" free product worthy of purchase. Unfortunately not every bug is found until after release and thus a patch is usually in development a few weeks after an online game is released. We hope to have this resolved soon.

Q: With the integration of Xbox Live into Windows, why did Bizarre choose to not add cross-platform play for Vista and Xbox 360 users?

A: Initially the plan was to have cross platform integrated but due to a number of outside influences along with timeline and our target date for release this could not be worked in.

Q: The achievement No, Seriously (Kill 10,0001 people in multiplayer Ranked Matches) is clearly poking fun at Gears of War. Was there any particular reason this achievement was singled out? Also, if putting in an achievement related to such a large number of kills, why is there no in-game counter that lets people track their progress?

A: Many members of BC are raving shooter fans and thus Gear heads. Just a little industry humor between studios I suppose. As for stats and in-game counter, these will be available online at Gamestrata.com as part of a launch agreement. Gamestrata.com will be hosting Club exclusive stats and leaderboards.

Q: Lastly, why are there no female characters?

A: In the concept phase of The Club there was a large amount of characters proposed, including female. But after we completed the market research we found, strangely, that the female character was not a popular choice. Could be the premise of the game, underground blood-sport, didn’t mesh will with a female type. In the end I feel we made the right call and have an exciting cast of gladiators.