Exclusives Put PS3 Ahead This Week: Portal 2, Mortal Kombat, SOCOM 4

Posted April 21, 2011 - By Guest Writer

Exclusives put PS3 ahead this week: Portal 2, Mortal Kombat, SOCOM 4

Gamers who own both a PS3 and an Xbox 360 normally have a tough decision to make when buying multiplatform videogames each Tuesday. But from first access to Call of Duty: Black Ops DLC to an exclusive Homefront map, Xbox 360 has been lining up the perks for its core gamers and making the decision a one-way street. Not this week, however. PlayStation 3 has swept this atypical Tuesday with exclusive features, exclusive content and an exclusive game.

NEWS: Portal 2 Merchandise: In Game Hats, Real Life T-shirts

Exclusive Features: Portal 2

Gabe Newell once called PS3 "a total disaster on so many levels." So it was surprising to see Valve's co-founder take the stage at Sony's E3 2010 press conference to announce that Portal 2 was coming to the PS3 and that it would be the only console to support Steamworks. The news was exciting, even though the features remained a mystery for several months. Valve finally put an end to the speculation in February, revealing cross-platform multiplayer between PS3 and computer players, auto-updates and Steam Cloud saves.

Even better, the PS3 version of Portal 2 comes with a redeemable code for a free PC or Mac OS X download of the game. Linking your PSN and Steam accounts isn't just a small price to pay for the privilege of owning the game on both platforms - it's no price to pay at all. With the value of Steamworks, the PS3 version of Portal 2 really takes the "cake."

Exclusives put PS3 ahead this week: Portal 2, Mortal Kombat, SOCOM 4

Exclusive Content: Mortal Kombat

Co-creator of Mortal Kombat Ed Boon wanted an Xbox 360-exclusive character in his newly released fighting game, but for some inexplicable reason, that didn't happen. He is quoted as saying, "I'm not allowed to talk too much about it, but I can tell you we certainly wanted to do an exclusive for 360, but that's all I can say."

Why Mortal Kombat's co-creator couldn't make it happen is a mystery that has us curious. The speculation as to who the character would've been is even more intriguing. In the end, there remains one exclusive fighter and one exclusive system: Kratos from God of War on PS3. The Ghost of Sparta is a fighting videogame natural, having already appeared in Namco Bandai's Soul Calibur: Broken Destiny for PSP. In this game, he's armed with the Blades of Olympus, Bow of Apollo and Head of Helios to name a few of the character-specific weapons he brings to his Mortal Kombat debut.

Kratos' video game crossover lends new abilities to his brutal repertoire in the way of Fatalities. These epic finishing moves allow him to end fights better than he ended the story to his own series. Speaking of the ending to God of War 3, if you finished it, you'll recognize Kratos' Mortal Kombat stage as one of the final levels in the trilogy. Back in 2010, we felt as if this environment made the Kratos vs. Zeus battle feel like a fighting game and, apparently, Ed Boon agreed.

We can’t help but dream about the Fatalities that Halo's Master Chief or Gears of War's Marcus Fenix may have brought to the table. However, Mortal Kombat is solid on either platform, so Xbox 360 version owners should reserve those thoughts for the ten seconds between continues and simply focus on the great and gruesome game at hand.

DETAILS: Mortal Kombat Krypt Walkthrough

Exclusives put PS3 ahead this week: Portal 2, Mortal Kombat, SOCOM 4

Exclusive Game: SOCOM 4: U.S. Navy SEALs

We fondly remember picking up the first SOCOM game alongside the now-ancient PS2 Network Adapter and screwing the brick-shaped device into the back of the console’s expansion slot. Online gaming has come such a long way, and so have the capabilities of SOCOM 4, a Sony-published shooter and therefore PS3-exclusive title. The single-player’s squad-based AI should be the envy of other developers and its 32-player multiplayer pairs down the often too-chaotic 256-player battles that developer Zipper Interactive attempted in MAG. The result is more controlled and strategic gameplay that harkens back to the four PS2 SOCOM games. Yes, this is technically the fifth Zipper Interactive-developed SOCOM console game and no, that doesn’t include the Zipper-less, bug-filled SOCOM : Confrontation.

SOCOM 4 is reminiscent of the old PS2 titles, but the game takes advantage of technology that is exclusive to the PS3 and this generation. Move support, for example, brings motion controls to the tactical shooter genre for the first time, while Sony’s Sharp Shooter attachment takes the series’ authentic gameplay to a new level. Granted, if you didn’t favor using motion controls in Killzone 3, you’re not going to find a different experience here, but it’s nice to have the option in the game. 3D support for 3D televisions is also built in, which is quickly becoming another staple for Sony-published games. Unless you’re playing Crysis 2, the Xbox 360 and most PC games lack support for this emerging technology trend.

The value-added Steamworks in Portal 2, the inclusion of Kratos in Mortal Kombat and the return of a Zipper Interactive-developed SOCOM represent a positive week for gamers who own a PS3. Of course, that won’t force us to eschew our Xbox Live Gamerscore in favor of strictly focusing on PS3 trophies anytime soon. Microsoft will have us contemplating our multiplatform decisions in a few weeks in this never-ending volley of exclusives. The timed-exclusive Call of Duty: Black Ops Escalation map pack guarantees that, and the ongoing Gears of War 3 beta ensures that the Xbox 360 isn’t going to become a permanent dust-collecting Wii anytime soon - just this week.