Website Reviews

These are the 4 websites i picked to evaluate which all have a similar game theme.

You can view these reviews by reading down for the html version or by clicking HERE for them in a flash based website(will load in new page, may need maximising)

1. Unreal Tournament 3

http://www.unrealtournament3.com

Web page intro starts with 7 language choices making it easily accessible to a variety of people. Once language is selected a large flash intro begins, very nice looking but may slow down on very old computers. The site itself is all made in flash which is very graphically appealing but each page has its own loading screen before new content is loading which may be a problem for users on dial up or other slow internet service.

7/10 for Technical aspect (would be more but have to take into account slower computers, a less demanding option?)

Visually very appealing, there is constantly something moving on the screen or flashing and there's some in game video footage playing down one side of the site as well as lots of information about the game with screenshots of weapons/characters etc. All the in game footage is very large and high quality really showing off the games visualizations.

9/10 for Visuals.

Navigation is easy with a bar at the top, each link loads a new flash animation while the bar remains in sight, all arrows and pointers for clicking somewhere are very easily noticeable due to some sort of animation when you hover over them.

9/10 for Navigation

Finally content, it's a first person shooter so there isn't much to show but each character is selectable from the in game story where you can see a detailed screenshot of them and even audio clips of there voices, all weapons and vehicles also have large images, there is plenty of screenshots and some trailers to show in game footage, personally I don't think they could have added much more content.

9/10 for Content

Overall 8.5/10

2. Crysis

http://www.ea.com/crysis/

From a technical view it, like Unreal seems to be all one flash site, when you enter it starts asking you for your age which is a nice feature due to some violence through the game but doesnt really stop anyone from lying about there age. Once you progress into the site a small animation loads and then you are free to roam around, it looks a really well made site and it doesnt take aslong to load as UT3 so id say its better for a majority of PCs

Technical 8.5/10

Visually its quite appealing to the eye, it has a nice shot of the ingame character you play throughout the game and the text is fairly easy to read being grey/white on a black background, also a nice interactive feature to play around with on the homepage, i dont think its as appealing as the UT one but its still nice to view. However im marking it down because it has an annoying banner at the top of the site which is something you would expect from the likes of geocities not EA.

Visual 6.5/10

Fairly easy to use navigation when you hover over a link the word lights up and you get a red line above it so you know what your hovering over, it is also lit up with the red line to indicate what page you are currently on. Navigation remains on the screen at all times no matter what page i go to so its always easy to get back to the start if i need to, personally i have no problems with this, nice layout.

Navigation 9/10

As for content the interactive section on the home page is really clever you are able to hover over different parts of the suit you wear in game and it loads small clips showing some in game footage of whatever your checking, also has features about the game, the background story, information about the technical side (engine/mods etc) and ofcourse some screenshots, pretty much everything you would expect from a first person shooter, i dont see anything lacking.

Content 9/10

Overall 8/10

3.Call of Duty 4

http://www.callofduty.com/

From a technical aspect i think this is a brilliant site, there is quite a long loading time to get into the site as its all in flash with info and small videos all over and its very interactive looking, bars drop down when u click on something and theres music that really fits the game in the background (which your able to disable which i like) but even when your waiting for the site to load the small animation playing is quite nice to watch instead of just "LOADING" its all really interactive and looks well designed.

Technical 9/10 (maybe too good for older computers)

Visual, again i think its brilliant all the images uses for the background and the textures on the windows really fits the game, there is a radar always moving in the background and small trailers play when you hover over something down the side menu, even the scroll bars are really fitting to the whole war design.

Visual 9.5/10 (maybe a little hard to read some of the text due to size)

Navigation is straight forward enough, ive never visited this site before but i found everything simple enough, links down the bottom to take you to the older games in the series and the navigation bar always remains on the screen somewhere whatever you go on so your never able to get stuck on a page i also knew immediatly what every page should contain from the title and it was exactly right.

Navigation 9/10

Content is as you would expect, theres screenshots and movie clips of in game footage, all the lastest news on the main page which is nice if you just want to quickly check up on any developments theres a lot of technical information and stuff you would want to know for this particular game, such as the sort of weapons you will find and what sort of multiplayer game there is. also with all Call of Dutys linked on this site you can find out about all the game in the series just through this one "portal" which i think is really good if your interested in all the games.

Content 9/10

Overall 9/10

4.Gears of War

http://gearsofwar.com/

Althought not a proper FPS like the other 3 i thought id pick one with a slightly different site, the other 3 were totally flash while this has a flash header but then just seems to be CSS further down its a nice enough looking site but the first flash animation for the main screen took me quite a lot longer to load than any of the other site ive reviewed i also dont like how the main page just keeps adding news at the top pushing the older things down and making the page take about 20 seconds just to scroll to the bottom instead of just having new pages.

Technical - 6.5/10 ( i really dont like how i have to scroll so much)

Visually the site looks good when it loads, im not sure why its taken my so long to load the top header, maybe its a problem at there end because when it finally does it doesnt seem that demanding. it has a nice enough background and a border keeping everything neatly within and i dont really see any major problems i can still read the white/red text over the background and it all seems to suit the theme nicely.

Visual 7.5/10

Navigation like all the other sites ive reviewed is easy enough when you hover over a link the words light up so you know what your on, they also stay on the main page wherever you are in the site so you can always just click wherever you are to go to anywhere else. nothing else to really say about this site i dont think its as good a site as the others in this aspect but you cant exactly get lost and all links seem to work.

Navigation 7/10

Content is yet again what you would expect from this sort of game's site, you have a background story and screenshots of ingame footage as well as a trailer, however there seems to be some sort of special access to some hidden things in this site that asks you to verify your age but some reason it said i wasnt old enough yet i put my age as 52 so im not sure if this even works nor can i even try it to see what other sort of content there is. i think theres an appropriate amount for the type of game however.

Content 8/10

Overall 7/10

 

NAvigation

 

Copyright John Ezard - Venom 2008