Andy Laub

My parents were in town to get the oil changed in my dad’s car, and so I met up with them and they gave me some mail.

Mixed in with the three Motor Trend magazines and various university-related stuff (”give us more money!”) were not one but two demo discs for the PS2. One was a standalone demo of a game I’ve been meaning to try, Shadow of the Colossus, and the other was a mix-tape of sorts, with some of Sony’s newest sequels and other junk. I wasn’t to sure about the former after playing it. I’m sure I’d like it as I got more used to the controls but I just couldn’t push through it today.

The sampler was rather nice. It had some givens on there like Jak X, Ratchet: Deadlocked, Sly 3, etc. But like last year’s, the game that I figured I wouldn’t care much for (previously it was Star Wars Battlefronts) turned out to possibly be my favorite of the disc. This time around it was Heroes of the Pacific, a WWII-era flight sim. The gameplay is decent and the in-game graphics are pretty good as well, but what really blew me away was how nice the menus looked. It was a cross between a comic book and the standard WWII propaganda look from back then. They mixed it together so incredibly well that I wanted to buy the game just so I could see more of the navigation. It makes me wish I’d been hired to build their site - the design is that beautiful and gives that much to work with.

All this, plus a coupon for $5 off any PSP or PS2 game? Thanks Sony!