PS3 Fanboy

Let's get this started with a bang; if you're a fan of video games, then you will absolutely love The Club. And after playing through everything the game had to offer, I was left with one all-important question that I still can't answer, "Why the hell did it take a developer this long to make this game?"

Let's face it, many of today's games try to do so many things at once that they're often their own worst enemy. Thankfully, the guys and gals at Bizarre Creations didn't let themselves get bogged down with superfluous storytelling or any of the other myriad of problems that plague many of today's games.

Instead, they traveled back in time to the Golden Age of gaming when points reigned king and everything else was a mere afterthought. Those were truly the good ol' days because gaming was all about skill then, and that's exactly what you'll need if you plan on being any good at The Club.

In our hands-on with The Club's PlayStation Network demo, we weren't too entirely impressed. However, we plan to wash our hands of that experience when we finally get a chance to play the full game. In the mean time, though, several of the key players responsible for The Club's creation want to tell you what sets the game apart from every other third-person shooter on the market.

Bizarre Creations is banking on the fact that gamer's natural drive for competition will help The Club sell as the game's focus isn't on level progression or story development, but rather chaining kills together to score the most points possible.

Whether it succeeds in that goal or not, one thing's for sure, Bizarre Creations is most certainly living up to its name with such an original take on an otherwise increasingly stale genre.

While Europeans have been enjoying being members of The Club since the end of December, this Thursday it's America's turn to get their membership cards officially stamped. A demo of the game will be released this Thursday on the American PSN Store, just in case those of you who are really anticipating the game (all six of you!) haven't downloaded it already from the EU Store.

The demo gives you a taste of the bizarre gameplay modes included in The Club. This very arcadey shooter has a variety of influences (such as kart racing, perhaps?). Which might sound interesting, but we suspect there's a reason it hasn't been done before. Soon, you'll be able to give Bizarre Creation's latest a go and see what you think.

[Via press release]

After playing through the newly released demo of The Club, we have to admit we're not completely blown away. From what we've gathered, the game feels pretty much like any generic third-person shooter with a tacked-on point system. Additionally, we never really got the feeling of excitement of the supposed fast-paced action that we were promised.

Also, we're a bit dismayed by the confusing button layout. Who ever thought it'd be a good idea to map the sprint and shoot actions to the R1 and R2 button, respectively? On the plus side, there are a variety of interesting looking characters, a few of whom are a bit cliche, but they appear to have some decent background stories that we can only hope Bizarre Creations delves a bit in to.

In the end, though, the game's saving grace might be its multiplayer, which pits several players against each other as they run through the level trying to rack up the most combos and gain the most points to win. Bizarre and Sega have until February to hopefully rectify some of these issues before The Club is released.

Sega has released an updated release schedule that goes to the end of the fiscal year and if they're serious about these dates, we'll have two fairly anticipated games to enjoy come February by Sega alone (we'll also be diving into Devil May Cry 4 around that time).

First off, Sega will be bringing The Club to us, courtesy of Bizarre Creations, on February 8th. Soon after that, scheduled for the month of February but given no specific day, is Condemned 2. It looks like February is going to be another month where we find our money flying out the window, much like how November has been. If you're unsure what either game is, the former is a mish-mash of genre, and the latter is a pretty intense horror/action game.