Socom 4: US Navy Seals Beta Review

For the last few days I have been playing the private beta. This review is gonna be more of a FYI then a review since its rather hard to review something that is not in its final state.

There are two maps right now in roatation: Assault and Battery, and Port Authority. The maps are medium in size. Port Authority has a large Vessel in the middle of the map and is surrounded with shipping crate with a structure on its westerly side. Basically its split up in the middle fighting across the Vessel. the vessel itself is accessible to an extent of a few corridors and a middle inner docking type section. Assault and Battery is more of a runes type map also seperated my a middle platform with what looks to be AA Batterys in the middle mounted.(No you cant shoot em ). Assault and Battery has allot foilage and trees to go prone in, and tons of rocks to take cover by. The map in my opinion looks busy.

Their are a few modes in rotation and more types added every day, I am assuming this will also continue when the beta becomes open to PS+ and KZ3 Code users. So for today I have been playing Suppression and a mode called Uplink. Suppression comes in two forms right now and thats normal and classic socom settings. normal is your everday teamdeath match and classic is the same but with no respawns. Uplink how is a mode a bit like Retrieval and Return. The attackers have to download data from 3 different locations on the map. Once downloaded you must head back to your uplink data center and upload the data. What was confusing to me was once you downloaded the intel their was no markings on the mini map as to where the upload location was. I had to follow another soldier to find it, then i was killed uploading it. :(

The layout of the game has changed, there is a mini map and the camera view on your soldier is much closer to his back, so it kinda makes every thing around him view much closer but a slight disoriented feel to it. Their is an aim button which is L1, it is extremely convenient now, also if you ad a reflex or scope with a zoom you have to push l1 then R3 to enter that zoom, good thing about it is if you go outta aim and back into the zoom is still activate, hit R3 again to toggle it off.

They have also took away the feature of push to talk. Which i have some mixed feelings about. Who knows how many times in confrontation I coulda saved lives or been saved cause some arrogant childish mic abuse was going on. Trying to hold in my anger cause I couldnt mic up in the time of need. Well now that is all gone, talk at your will was implemented and my stress level has gone down a bit. But their is a down side to all new things and now you get that average guy with 8 kids standing around him which sounded to me like they were all playing who can make the loudest sounds into daddys mic ear. Luckily they have the trusty mute the single person feature, (hope he never had anything important to say)

The beta is well put together with somethings that need to be polished up, but hey when is a beta perfect. The gameplay seems a little faster then most socoms, but all in all its a good game and will have many good reviews to come.

If you havent gone out and bought the Playstation Move or would like a Second set for your friend or second tv, now is the time to get it. Socom 4 has an awesome Full Deployment pack where you get the playstation eye camera, move motion and navigation controllers, Sharpshooter gun, and the Socom 4 U.S. Navy Seals game for 149.99. saving you almost 70.00.

Reserve it at your local Game store. Release date: April 19 2011



So if you guys have a chance to play the beta, please let me know how you like it.

-Sykogreenpanda

(Temp) Fix your YLOD PS3 with a Hairdryer?

This sounds crazy right?  Well I was skeptical, but decided to try anyways since I already purchased a Slim model and Gamestop was only taking in models that boot up.  I wanted to try and use the transfer utility located in the system settings to transfer my account, saves, data etc to the new unit.  From what I understand this is about the only way to make this happen.   Anyways here is the method and the high pitched video that walked me through it !


Step 1: Basically you place PS3 upside down in box with the rear of the PS3 facing you. (i used the new box from the slim model) I have also seen towels. Basically making an oven of sorts, insulating the system to keep heat in. (seems like the opposite thing to do huh?) Then with hair dryer on high I heated the PS3 for 15 minutes blowing into the rear vents. For a while I even set up the hair dryer to blow on its own so I wouldn't have to hold it for the entire 15 mins. Basically the PS3's case becomes hot to the touch.

Step 2 involves cooling the PS3 back down using a fan for 15 mins. I left the PS3 in the box and used a stand fan to blow on the PS3 to slowly cool down the system. 

Step 3. involves hooking up the necessary cables and trying to turn on the unit. Cross your fingers and hope for the best.

My PS3 actually didn't turn on at first I still had the YLOD as they call it. But my PS3 wasn't fully cooled down as I could still feel a little heat when i plugged it back up. So I started pressing the power button over and over to no avail. I ate dinner and tried again and couldn;t beleive it as the light stayed green and the system stayed on!

I was rushing to get the data transfer setup to get all my data transfered over using a Lan cable. There was no need to hurry because just getting this setup where it would work was ridiculous. I cursed Sony about 100 times trying to get this transfer utility to work. I consider myself very tech savvy and this was ridiculous. Anyways after and hour and a half of messing with the Utility i was finally able to get it to start the transfer process. then that took about 1 hour and a half. But it was finally done. I haven;t had the time to see if my downloaded Killzone 3 map pack is there but hopefully it transfered over. 

Here is the video from this genius (sounds like a 10 year old) that fixed my PS3! LOL This is a 3 part video and they are linked at the end of the video.