The Setting is in the Pokke Village, a snowy mountainous area of monstrous creatures and fantasy. You, play as a Monster Hunter that is in charge of keeping your Village safe from all creatures that give a threat to the people. In this game, expect many, many dinosaur and reptile related monsters. This is basically a hack-and-slash game, but has much detail and declines mindless button-mashing most of the game play. During the game you will have many quests that you must accomplish in order to help out your village. Most Villagers will ask for your help, to either defend them against a certain creature, whish is usually a big boss for you, or fight against a group of monsters attacking the village. Other villagers will ask your assistance in finding herbs and ingredients for them. If villagers seem pretty fine on their own and have no needs of your work, you can always go to the Gathering Hall where quests are posted there. Customization is very complex and simple, allowing you to choose your basic looks (hair, face, etc.) and even your voice sound. You also have your own home where cooking cats create food for you on the spot. There are over 700 weapons in the game in which you can slay your targeted enemies, 250 quests, and 1,400 armor pieces! With all this, Monster Hunter Freedom 2 should keep you occupied just arranging what to bring to battle. This game uses real life physics, and realistic life rules such as, energy and damage. If you go into a cold area with light clothing, you will experience cold bite, or freezing setbacks lowering your energy to attack and run as fast. Same rules apply with hot temperature, wearing too much clothing to a boiling area will be too hot and heavy to attack with your best of your abilities. If this does happen, there are always items to help you out, such as warm food, and cool drinks to gain energy and power back. Another helpful item is the paintball, which you splatter on your enemy when it is low on health, just in case it runs away you can always track it down. After a monster dies, you can gather other items from its corpse such as bones to create weapons with, or use the meat for food or armor.

            The camera in the game is kind of funky, frequently not giving you a focused camera to move around, focusing on other monster besides the main target, and no lock-on, which can add difficulty when attacking a certain monster in a crowd. It isn’t a huge problem though, as the game play is smooth and usually not a big thing to worry about, only a minor downside in the game. Along with one downside, another one is that monsters are much bigger and smarter now. They seem to have their own mind, not just following AI. You might think, what is so bad about that? Well sometimes they are too difficult, too big, and much more clever than you are. If you slash a dinosaur over and over again it will change tactics and quickly out wit you. It is especially harder when tracking down a specific flying monster, once low on health, it can either fly away, or find reinforcements turning your hills into mountains, and although this is a good challenge, the game has many good hard levels, and bad hard levels. You will usually end up dying, reloading and starting your search again, hopefully more prepared than previously. Now if you feel that the game is way too hard, you can always find some backup of your own. Using the Ad-Hoc feature on your PSP you can play together with your friends and team up creating more of ease the next time. As we always hear, two monster hunters are better than one. Finding your monster hunter is very simple. Go into the Gathering Hall, and wait till one of you accepts the request, and then presto! While in the Hall together, you can sit, chat, drink, and exchange your stats. Overall, this game is very deep and action packed. Every PSP user should give this game a try, because it is just simple fun. Not complicated, just a fun run fight hack-and-slash adventure game that many people can enjoy.

Home beta for the Playstation 3 is currently out and being tested by several users. But what is Home? It’s actually quite simple: Home is a base where all PS3 players can interact with other players using an online system and invite other players to play in co-op multiplayer online games, such as Resistance: Fall of Man, or MotorStorm. Home will also be a big part in the upcoming: “LittleBigPlanet”.   You will have your own space, which is known as your “apartment” where you can purchase and place your own furniture such as televisions, couches and such. Basically you can almost compare it to a PS3 version of Second Life, another simulator in which you can interact with other players online as well. While in Home, you can chat, with other characters in Home using a keyboard, or a simple tray, which you chose the letters with your controller. Bluetooth headsets are also supported with Home. Simply hold R2 on the controller to speak, and with the headset you can hear other people speaking around you also. So far there are 4 areas where you can go. First, your own apartment, where you can invite other players to come over, or simply play games with you. Second, The Movie Theatre which is an area with 10 rooms where large screens are placed and play various movie and game trailers and teasers. Third is the Game Room, where users come to play with other players in pool, bowling, and in arcades. Last is the Lobby, which is a very large area about the size of a football field. This is where you can sit and chill out on various relaxing areas and chat with other characters. Inside are many televisions playing an assortment of videos to add a great vibe for chat. Along with the Game Room, the Lobby is the most popular spot and the “home” of Home. Creating an avatar (your character) is very easy, but detailed as well.  Face creation is very in depth in choosing the symmetry, eyes, nose, and so on. There are about 20 sliders to change and design your face. One slider is for the Body as well. As stated before, you have your own apartment, which you can customize to your choosing. You can enter your apartment yourself, but you must be invited by another user to enter their apartments. Overall, Home seems like an interesting, but new and fun way to meet people and possibly friends to hang out with or if you just need someone to play with. Currently Beta is already released, but we can expect full Home system for the public on October the 10^th.

Sony Computer Entertainment Europe told the world back at this year’s E3 that it was saving up all its big announcements for Leipzig, where it promised a whole host of surprises, including something special for European PlayStation Portable owners.

Tonight, the company did not disappoint at its event in and around its booth in Hall 2 at the Leipziger Messe. Close to 700 people crowded around the stage to watch SCEE CEO David Reeves deliver his hour-long presentation. Unfortunately overlooking the portable chairs included in the long, heavy bags they were given at the event’s entrance, some attendees sat on chairs at the front of the venue, while others spilled onto beanbags at the side. Still others sat on a row of (nonworking) toilets installed in part of the ‘This Is Living‘ booth.

The lights dimmed, and after a countdown from 10 and a short video, David Reeves took to the stage, where he introduced the event to the crowd. He said, “GC is even more important and influential than before this year, as E3 is moving to be more regional.” The executive then showed off his (fairly decent) German by repeating his introduction in that language, before apologising to the crowd that because it would take too long to speak in both languages, he would continue only in English.

Reeves then said that since it was “tradition” to start Sony events with a torrent of statistics and sales figures, that is what he would be doing. He lambasted criticism of sales of the PS3, by stating that the console had “actually enjoyed a faster curve than the PS2 did in the first few months.” He called the launch “stunning” and revealed that 13 million units had been sold across Europe. First-party titles Resistance: Fall of Man and MotorStorm to date in Europe have sold 535,000 and 469,000 copies, respectively.

The PS3 would be getting 65 more first-party titles in Europe by Christmas, Reeves said, and it currently has a 2.6-to-1 tie ratio, which means 2.6 games have been sold per console. He then talked about the PS2, which is still going strong, and now has an installed base in PAL regions of 44 million. He also pointed out that it was tripling sales of the Xbox 360.

The PlayStation Portable now has an 8.6 million installed base, with a 4-to-1 tie ratio, and saw a 40 percent uplift in sales in the 10 weeks following the price drop.

Next up were some figures for the PlayStation Network, which has had 7.6 million downloads so far spread among its 645,000 registered users. The most popular title is Tekken 5: Dark Resurrection, which has been downloaded 103,000 times, followed by flOw with 47,000 downloads.

Sales figures thus dispensed with, Reeves announced “a service that will revolutionize how the PS3 is portrayed as an entertainment hub.” The service is Play TV, and gamers can use it to turn their PS3s into video recorders.

Play TV will launch in the UK, Germany, Italy, Spain, and France in 2008, and in Scandinavia shortly thereafter.

Reeves said there are 275 titles, including third-party releases, that are scheduled for release in the run-up to Christmas. He dated Heavenly Sword in the UK to September 19, and Ratchet and Clank Future: Tools of Destruction to autumn. Reeves also talked about a new Buzz! quiz game, Buzz! Quiz TV, which will be coming out on the PS3 next year.

Next he talked about the PlayStation Network, and said that there would be a “strong line-up” between now and Christmas, including Gran Turismo 5: Prologue, which will be coming to SCEE territories before the end of the year.

The new, improved, slimmer PlayStation Portable was also dated for the region, set to debut September 5. In Europe, the handheld will be coming out in white, silver, and piano black, along with two special bundled theme packs: a Simpsons theme in yellow, and a Spider-Man theme with the front in red and the back in black.

But Reeves wasn’t done yet; he introduced Go!Messenger and Go!Explore, follow-ups in a series that began with the Go!Cam back in May. Go!Messenger will allow for text, video, and voice-over IP messaging between PSPs connected to the Internet. Go!Explore adds GPS-aided navigation for driving to the handheld. However, to use the feature, PSP owners must buy a universal media disc (UMD) with maps of the region they’re driving in.

The final announcement on the list was that of the FIFA Interactive World Cup 2008, a joint initiative between Sony and Electronic Arts to “find the world’s best virtual athlete.” Registrations are now open at www.fifa.com/fiwc.

Reeves finished by handing the stage over to a Sony Germany executive, who welcomed the popular German band Die Toten Hosen (translation: “The Dead Trousers”) on stage to sing a song from the new SingStar game, Die Toten Hosen Sing Party.

In the single player mode, you have the choice to pick your path that will basically control what happens in the story. You can choose Career, Hardcore, and Rigger. You can either pick to specialize in one path, or mix and match to be an all rounded skater, but in the end you must choose one main style. The paths you choose will trigger different contests and events such as if you choose to be a rigger, you will get to create a skate park at the Air and Space Museum in Washington DC, but you wont get the big challenge in Baltimore that you would get with a Career.

Careers are the professionals, the skaters who do what they do for a living. You will be the famous sport acts on TV, and on the cereal boxes and all about the trophies. In this area you will meet Tony Hawk and Bob Burnquist. The hardcore paths are the guys that do all the crazy tricks just for the heck of it. The crazy skating daredevils of skateboard history that attempt all the wild stunts and usually end up badly injured. Skating is your life in this path, and you are open to big challenges and death defying feats. The last skater path you can choose is the Rigger. The Rigger basically is the creator of skateboards and skate parks. As a Rigger you will be able to create your own skate-topia as you desire. Designing a skate park is just as it has been in previous Tony Hawk games. You choose your area, and then simply place the objects such as ramps or rails on the location of your liking. You can also edit the items you place such as, change the size, or even connect them just as you would connect rails to make a rail roller coaster. Only thirty objects can be placed on the park. The path you choose as a skater also affects your style, skills and appearance. For example, if you are a hardcore skater and often go for the killer moves, usually your character would end up scratched up, scabbed, but also more muscular and buffed out.

Just like in previous Tony Hawk games, there will always be an opportunity open at any given point and you can always go to that spot challenge to try any time you like. There will also be challenges that are only open at a certain time in the story, but nevertheless they will all be simple challenges such as a time challenge or a super high jump distance that you must achieve.

Along your skating journey you will run into little arcade stands where you can play little mini-games such as a remake of pacman with you trying to pick up as many orbs as you can. Each orb is a different color that can only be grabbed while in a certain state, such as white orbs can only be grabbed while grinding. There is also a new version of H.O.R.S.E. where players play against each other for high scores on different things in the map.

Another interesting aspect of the game is you can set up video cameras on your Skate Park and record your super sweet moves for you to watch and show your friends. The video cameras are not always rolling though, so when you want to record a video, you have to start the video yourself before recording your attempted tricks.

After a long day of hard skating or if you just feel like relaxing you can always go and chill out at your Skate Lounge, which is basically your home that you can set up and decorate yourself. There are different themes you can choose, like a Chinese dojo and such. The items you place in your Skate Lounge will be special things you have unlocked, or bought yourself

EA definitely has added some new things and also kept some traditional aspects from previous games as well. We can all be expecting Proving Grounds soon this fall.