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ESRB: 
Platform: PS3
Category: Miscellaneous
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Graphics 8 |
Sound 8 |
Gameplay 8.5 |
Tilt 8 ||
Overall 8.2
Author: Kirby Y
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Developer: Relentless Software
Publisher: Sony Computer Entertainment
Features
1-8 Players (Offline)
1-4 Player (Online)
Required HDD Space: 2482 KB
Supported HD Output: 720p
PLAYSTATION Network Compatible
Downloadable Content
Trevor H and I had the chance to enjoy a tour of Sony’s E3 demo room in Los Angeles earlier this year. During that time we enjoyed the sights and sounds of so many Sony games, but one that surprisingly caught our attention was Buzz! Quiz TV. This is the next iteration in the long running trivia series, but it finally gets the next-generation makeover on the PS3. We played a few different rounds with one of the developers, as well as with another media person, and we both left the area with a smile on our face stating to each other that we couldn’t wait to try the final version. Well that time has come my friends, and I have to say that Buzz's first trip to the PS3 is a definite winner.
Graphics
Being that the PS3 is such a powerful machine I would expect that Buzz! Quiz TV would amp up the visuals, and in the end they definitely do. The game is very clean looking and the whole atmosphere is very game show like. Buzz has never looked better as he can now take advantage of the added horsepower in the PS3. The game show set really did look like it was a game show on TV from the flashy vides screens behind Buzz to the audience who are barely visible as they are shrouded in the shadows behind the contestants.
The character’s that are available for you to choose from is somewhat small in numbers. I had hoped for some sort of player creation here, be it from pre-generated models or being able to use the PS3’s EyeToy peripheral, however this was not so. You are given a set number of characters, each with a limited amount of outfits to choose from. These characters range from superheroes, sexy ladies, vampire vixens, to an ubergeek and even a mime. What is nice is that each of these characters has their own set of animations as they stand around on the stage. They will also break out into various moves to celebrate their victories or show disappointment in their failure. Bottomline, I would have liked to have seen more choice or options in this area, and I am keeping my fingers crossed for more characters via download, but what is available is pretty good.
I guess if I did have any complaint it would be that given the fact that Buzz! Quiz TV is a first party game, why does it only support 720p? Where is the 1080p that Sony claims is one of the selling features of the PS3? I really don’t understand why they omitted this level of HD support; however the 720p definitely looks sharp, so in the end I don’t think it is that much of a deal breaker making my complaint very minor indeed.
Sound
Sound manages to add to the atmosphere of this trivia based game show. Buzz is voiced by the same guy as previous versions, Jason Donovan. A quick search on the internet indicates that of all things he is an Australian soap opera star...who knew? Anyhow, his voice is suited perfectly for the role of game show host and he has a good selection of lines for you to listen too. Sure, some of them can get repetitive, but overall there is a lot there. Each individual character also has their own voices, but not a lot is done in this department and it really doesn’t make a difference given by how little they actually speak during the game. You also get to choose an individual buzzer sound from a large selection of choices, and although I was somewhat worried that they could get annoying they are actually pretty suitable and make for a bit of individuality given that each character can have a different buzzer sound from the others. Finally, the crowd and music is very active too, and they really do help to pull you into the game show. The crowd will react when you nail a difficult question or incorrectly answer an easy one, all the while the music adds a bit of tension at just the right points as you try to get the correct answer for the question in front of you. All of this is presented in glorious surround sound too. I took the game home to play in my media room and the clarity of everything coming from all my speakers was phenomenal. All in all there isn’t anything too disappointing in the audio area.
Gameplay
Buzz! Quiz TV is a trivia game show that is hosted by none other then Buzz himself. The game show has different types of rounds for up to eight players offline, and four players online, to test their knowledge in. Should you not have any friends to play with at the time you can go solo. You can choose from one of 15 available characters. From what I understand that this is up from an initial number of 11 and is accomplished with a patch that you download when you first start the game up. Once you have your chosen your character, you pick a sound for your buzzer (e.g. clown horn or referee’s whistle); pick a name and away you go.
There are a total of 5,000 questions in various categories and these are separated into five main channels: The LifeStyle Channel, The Sports Channel, The Knowledge Channel, The Movies and TV Channel, and The Music Channel. Within these channels are more distinct groupings such as 80’s Music, 90’s Music, Toons, Blockbusters, Mind and Body or Extreme Sports to name a few. So it is easy to see how they have come up with a whopping 5,000 questions. These categories are played over multiple rounds such as fastest finger, short fuse, pie fight, stop the clock and final countdown. Fastest finger allows those who buzz in fastest and answer the right question to earn the most points. Short fuse is like a game of hot potato where you pass a bomb around, and the only way you can pass it is to answer your question correctly. Pie fight has you throwing a cream pie at your opponent and if you get hit by two pies you are out. Stop the Clock has your answer’s point value determined by how much time is left on the clock when you chose it. Final countdown has your points being converted into time and if you answer correct answers you are given a time bonus, but if you answer wrong you lose time. The winner of the round is the person with the most time remaining. These are only some of the available modes, and there are more. I could go on for quite a bit about them but I think you get my drift, Buzz! Quiz TV has a variety of questions and a lot of ways for you to enjoy the trivia offered.
So what does Buzz! Quiz TV offer on the PS3 that it has not offered in the past? Quite a bit.
There is no doubt that there are a lot of questions in this game and given the diversity of such you may not have knowledge of everything. If you find you or any of your opponents struggling on certain categories you can now customize question channels and have them omit specific categories within its realm. Should you be weak on gadgets, oldies (music) or science and technology, you can turn off those specific categories. Personally, I found that I didn’t mind not knowing everything as what I didn’t know was now gained knowledge. That being said, this new customization feature is pretty cool and can make for a less frustrating game should there be areas that you just can’t answer.
Next in the ‘new improvements’ area, you will notice that the familiar looking Buzz controllers are now wireless. This is a great feature as you can now sit wherever you want when you play the game. No longer are you anchored by the necessity of having to play with cabled controllers. The game comes with four controllers and a USB adapter that allows the new controllers to be identified by the PS3. Upon reading the instruction manual I discovered that they are automatically linked to the USB adapter that the come with. So there is no need to ‘sync’ the controllers up. As an added bonus the controllers also work with your PS2 so should you feel a desire to play any of the older games on your PS2, you can use these controllers for those versions as well.
Also new is the addition of trophies. Yep, Buzz! Quiz TV supports Sony’s new “look at me” system of trophies. These are varied and can be the result answering a specific number of questions correctly to playing certain modes a certain number of times. Bottomline, people on your friends list will know you are a trivia junkie by the amount of trophies you may have acquired.
There is also support for Sony’s EyeToy. Here Buzz! Quiz TV will take a picture of you before the gameshow begins and once a victor has been declared you will see said picture on such things as the game show's stage in behind your in-game character doing a celebration dance. For those looking for even more this area, Buzz! Quiz TV also takes any photos that are in the in-game gallery and you can save them to your XMB Photo Library for anyone to view at anytime. Pretty neat little option if you ask me to tell you the truth.
There are three other great additions that are pretty colossal in my opinion, and these are compliments of the PLAYSTATION Network.
The first is the new MyBuzz! Feature. This allows you to download other user created quizzes. When I went online to start this review there were already a whopping 3600 plus categories of questions. I found that there were a huge variety of questions available, and even some that were mature. Should you wish to stay away from the mature ones you can activate a filter that will do such. Buzz! Quiz TV does a great job of allowing you to find specific groups of questions that you may be looking for as well as you can search by category, ones you have already played, or you can choose the random option. I think that MyBuzz! is a great feature as it really does add some uniqueness to the title given that the groups of questions you’ll find are created by other PS3 users just like yourself. Of course you can also create your own set of eight mind-stopping questions should you choose. If you do not want the public to see your questions you can make it so only your PS3 friends can have access to them.
The second new feature is similar to the user generated content, but it is provided by Sony themselves. Buzz! Quiz TV supports downloadable content via the PLAYSTATION store. These are not user created and they are quite substantial in size. Right off the hop there are three downloadable packs available on the PLAYSTATION Store the same week the game was released. These packs add 500 new questions each, so in theory there are 1500 new questions to be added into the game. Two of these are worth $5.99 and they are Sci-Fi and Videogame bundles. The other pack is a little more expensive at $7.99, but it is a National Geographic Safari bundle. Of course Sony plans to continue supporting the downloadable content feature. This is an amazing thing given that you will be able to download themed packs for you and your household to enjoy.
The third feature in the "what's new?" section is the addition of online multiplayer. There has always been a local multiplayer mode in previous versions of Buzz, but this is the first time you can go online with up to three other players in a mode called Sofa vs. Sofa, and it is a pretty smooth experience. You only need to have an existing PSN account and a copy of the game. Once in the game's menu you go to "Play Buzz", press on the online game mode and the game signs you onto the Buzz servers. You then can choose to play against friends or random people. The online portion mirrors the offline to a tee. My time online was problematic at first as my PS3 could not connect to the Buzz! Servers, however after a few tries I was able to connect and my online play was as smooth as that offline. Since that time I have had no issues in connecting to the servers. There were a couple of things that I did not like with the online multiplayer. The first is that it does not support voice chat. I was somewhat mystified on how such a social game could ignore such a feature. That being said, I wonder what it would have been like if my opponents could chat. Would they have been decent or just loudmouthed idiots? Oh well, I guess I will never find out, unless a patch is in the works. The second thing that I was a little disappointed in is that only one person per console can play online, so if you have an empty spot and a friend/partner/spouse sitting beside you, they cannot fill this spot as Buzz! does not allow it. Again, as a social game, I can’t figure this other omission out either.
Overall my time with Buzz! Quiz TV was very enjoyable and I couldn't stop playing. This is a game that I really do see me coming back to on a regular basis, not only for the production values, but for the content as well as it is so large and diverse I will learn many new things that I did not know before. Of course this game is also a great party game as the controls are so simple to use and anyone can play the game as it is a simple experience that does not need much explaining. I really give Relentless Software kudos for the improvements they made in Buzz! and can't wait to see what they offer next.
Conclusion
Buzz! Quiz TV for the PS3 is a solid successor to all the previous incarnations that appeared before it on the PS2. With improved graphics, wireless controls and great integration of the PLAYSTATION Network in so many ways, you will spend many hours testing your knowledge with all the trivia questions offered. The only negatives I can find are the lack of voice chat and the "one person per console" rule when playing online, and if these are the only things to nitpick then you know you’ve got a pretty solid game.
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