Green Day: Rock Band
MTV Games, Harmonix
Available for Xbox 360, Nintendo Wii and Playstation 3
Another day, another band inspired music game. It began with Guitar Hero Aerosmith and ever since band inspired music games keep hitting the market whether we like it or not. Green Day is the newest band to have game dedicated to their long and successful career by the developers at Harmonix. Green Day: Rock Band allows you to rock out to the boys’ career from the Dookie album all the way to the 21th Century Breakdown album.
The game has 47 songs from several Green Day albums, Dookie, Nimrod, Insomiac, American Idiot, Warning and 21th Century Breakdown. You can also purchase a few downloadable songs from 21th Century Breakdown album that weren’t included on the disc. There are no songs from Green Day’s first two albums, Kerplunk and 39/Smooth and I have heard of no plans to make downloadable packs for them either. Overall the selection of songs is excellent and the level of difficulty is perfect for a skilled Rock Band or Guitar Hero player. I was playing the hardest songs right of the bat with only a few missed notes here and there.
The gameplay of Green Day: Rock Band is your standard Rock Band game with a career mode, both offline and online with the option to play with up to 4 players. You also have a quick play mode with 4 players, both online and offline. You can play guitar, bass, drums or sing. There are also 4 part harmonies just like Beatles Rock Band, even though Green Day only has 3 members. There are three venues and three incarnations of the band you can plan during career and quick play mode. These venues and band fashion statements are from various points in Green Day’s career.
As you play through career mode, you gain cred points based on your star performance rating during a song. Those cred points can be used to unlock a song challenge and eventually, bonus materials about the band like interviews, photos and more. If you are a massive fan of the band, this is where the real goodies come in. There are also the standard achievement/trophy challenges in game that have been toned down to a more achievable level this time as opposed to the ones in Beatles Rock Band.
After playing through a hour of the career mode, I was disappointed to see a lack of real creativity in this game. For a band that inspired a rock musical, you think they could have come up with better song background then just the band jumping around on stage. Beatles Rock Band setup each song as almost a mini history music video with cool references to the song’s moment in the band’s career. Octopus’ Garden had the band change from playing in a sound studio to playing underwater in the ocean, while St. Pepper/With a Little Help from My Friends had the band in a garden playing in their St. Pepper costumes like the album cover. Green Day: Rock Band seems to lack any real imagination in this department and it made me wonder why even bother making a game dedicated to this band.
What also surprised me is the fact that this game even got made in the first place. Now don’t get me wrong, Green Day is the perfect band to rock out to but for a band that is so controversial and against censorship how could they ever agree to make a mainstream game that censors their lyrics? Guess even rebels have a price at which they’re willing to sell-out.
As far as Rock Band games go, Green Day: Rock Band isn’t offering up anything more than series of downloadable album packs that got some Green Day band avatars and few extras slapped on for show. When compared to Beatles Rock Band, this game should feel ashamed to even call itself a band inspired music game. But if you really want to purchase this game, do it cause you really love Green Day and not because you feel the need to add another Rock Band game to your collection – how else will these game companies learn when enough is enough?
Final Fantasy XIII
Square Enix
Available for Playstation 3 and Xbox 360
I have been a long time fan of Square Enix products since the early days when they were known as Squaresoft and produced amazing games like Final Fantasy VI, Secret of Mana and Chrono Trigger. However lately I have felt like the magical goose that once laid the golden eggs has since dried up and can barely produce a normal egg let alone a golden one anymore. I use to anticipate every game that came out of Square Enix’s roster but now I find their games feel broken and rushed.
The best example would be this week’s review game, Final Fantasy XIII, the newest installment in a once amazing franchise which now feels like an once proud show dog which has been over breed and cross breed with any dog that would sleep with it in order to produce various new Final Fantasy prequels, sequels, off-shoots and re-makes. Ultimately though Square Enix has just ended up with a bunch of sick and retarded puppies that no one wants like Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles or the new Final Fantasy XIII which they revamped into some strange, overly JRPG tale that barely resembles the FF games we know and love. As the saying goes, ff it ain’t broken then don’t fix it and Final Fantasy X and XII weren’t broken, so why on God’s Green Earth did you stray from the winning formula and come up with this piece of crap?
Basically Final Fantasy XIII (try to keep up with this plot) has you following both Lightening and Sazh who are rushing to save Serah, Lightening’s sister from the fal’Cie who have turned her into an I’Cie. I’Cie are people who are marked with a focus; a vague task they must complete and if they do not complete this task within a certain amount of time, they will turn into crystal statues. Along the way, they pick up various team members, Snow, Vanille and Hope; people will similar ideals who all join in the fight against the fal’Cie. Unfortunately in their fight against the fal’Cie, the team becomes I’Cie too, and must figure out and complete their focus before it is too late. Meanwhile there is also a purge going on of all the local people which is adding to the fun of your surroundings.
If you manage to follow along with the storyline and not get confused beyond belief, then get ready for more boring fun. While past Final Fantasy games tend to give you at least a sense of freedom with an open world map, this game will never show you anything more than one long map to keep running through. You will never find a town to explore full of quaint little people that say the same thing over and over again or find a cute little airship to take over and explore your world. NOTHING, NADA! You are stuck following linear maps for most of the game and if you want to level up in order to handle new higher level enemies then you have to back track to do so. There are some side quests that pop up later on in the game but by this point, you are so use to 2 walls on either side, you really don’t care.
The characters will eventually have to you bashing your head into a wall with their annoying attitudes and even more annoying dialogs. I personally wanted to stab Hope through the eye with a pencil as he whines more than my youngest nephew and he’s a baby – he’s suppose to cry. I found it incredibly hard to believe that this little mommy’s boy was going to help save the world from the fal’cie because he can barely function without his dead Mother. I think the only character I liked was Sazh and his little Chocobo which lives in his afro but he seems the most out of place amongst all these people. He was too normal and too cool to be hanging out in a JRPG story. Overall everything character besides Sazh was either too depressed, angry or upbeat which made the game comparable to a bad anime movie.
Unlike previous Final Fantasy games, you have little control over your team members during battle which makes strategy and preparation very important. Instead of choosing your battle commands before each round during battle, you instead pick battle roles for yourself and team members and then your team members will automatically pick the most proper command for that moment from their list of techniques. Roles include a fighter type, magic type, effects type, protector type and healer type. You will have control over your main character at all times but you will only have access to their current role commands as well as your general item selection and role switch command which is why multiple role combos is important. If you diversify your roles throughout your battle, your party will live longer and kill faster with the use of effects and protector roles.
Each role type has various commands and status upgrades you can unlock with CP points you gain during battle. Upgrades are done through the Crystarium which is very much like the Sphere Grid from Final Fantasy X except that each role for each character has a different Crystarium. You can also upgrade items like weapons and accessories with random item parts you find during battle. You don’t find this out until the 4th Chapter and I had sold most of my parts by this point because the game doesn’t give you a lot of gold. I was mad to find this out so late in the game because parts are hard to find. Maybe if monsters actually dropped gold like in previous games I wouldn’t have sold the parts though.
I honestly think the only reason I kept playing this game is to find out if the storyline gets any better because I wasn’t happy with anything in this game beside the usual amazing graphics and sound. Square Enix does always make pretty games and I was blown away with the great use of contrast with Cocoon’s perfect crystal world and Pulse’s junky and grungy surface world. The characters continue to look more and more like real human beings with every new game.
Created by Masashi Hamauzu who also scored Dirge of Cereberus, Final Fantasy XIII soundtrack features a song from Leona Lewis, “My Hands” and it is quite beautiful. I don’t think anything will be quite as cool as the Final Fantasy X-2 soundtrack which I still groove in my car to but I think overall this soundtrack is tranquil and franchise worthy.
2 years is a long time to wait for a disappointment and now all I can think about is Kingdom Hearts 3 and how they could screw that up too. Considering what a bastard child Kingdom Heart: 358/2 days was it is a possibly. I hate to be cruel to a company whom I loved and relied on for so long for awesome games but they just have to learn to stop messing around with their bread and butter franchises. Final Fantasy wasn’t broken so why in God’s name did you try change it? I want my good game company back!
Jak and Daxter: The Lost Frontier
Sony Computer Entertainment, High Impact Games
Available for PSP and Playstation 2
Jak and Daxter are back and on a mission to save their world from the brink of destruction due to Eco shortages. Along with Jak’s girlfriend, Keira, they speed to the end of the world to search for a new Eco source and happen upon new characters, locations and a whole new adventure.
The Lost Frontier lives up to the successful Jak and Daxter franchise with tons of fun platforming levels, new vehicles to ride around in and more. There are lots of new power-ups to explore but you won’t be able to switch back and forth between Dark Jak and normal Jak like the previous game. Dark Jak does make an appearance once in a while though.
This makes a great holiday buy either on the PSP or PS2 and I know fans of the series will be impressed with the new instalment.
Rating: 8 out of 10
Buy it!
Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars
Rockstar Games, Rockstar Leeds
Available for PSP and Nintendo DS
Now I’ve reviewed at Chinatown Wars before on the Nintendo DS, but now there’s a version for the PSP and I know Sony fans want to know if the game is worth the coin. The game still focuses on Huang Lee and his quest to return his stolen father’s sword and seek revenge on the people who took it. You will join up with the Triads and do all the usual car stealing and gun shooting missions you find in GTA games but in this version, the screen is wider, the radio station selection is bigger and there are more missions to complete.
The controls don’t exactly translate well over from the Nintendo DS version to the PSP and the multi-player mode only allows for 2 players on the PSP but overall, this is still a fun game. Fans of the GTA genre will find the same excellent Rockstar flare and humour here as the big console games.
Rating: 7 out of 10
Rent it!
Little King’s Story
Xseed Games, Cing & Town Factory
Available for the Nintendo Wii
Little King’s Story puts you in the role of a young boy, Corobo who is the newly crowned King of a whole kingdom. You must return your new kingdom to its former glory by training your subjects and defending your borders. Taking a page from the book of Pikmin, you must control your groups of soldiers, builders and more by pointing them towards their tasks.
Don’t let Little King’s Story’s childish exterior fool you into thinking this is a kid’s game because this title will have you massively frustrated after the second boss or so. Remember to save often and expect to die a lot. Achieving upgrades and exploring new areas will have you addicting to this title in no time.
Rating: 8 out of 10
Buy it!
Rabbids Go Home
Ubisoft, Ubisoft Montpellier
Available for the Nintendo Wii and Nintendo DS
The rabbids have finally tired of their party life and want to go home. Believing they live in the moon, they begin to steal tons of junk from around the world to build a tower that reaches their home. You need to help the rabbids race their shopping carts around and collect all the junk needed to complete their tower.
Moving away from the normal rabbids mini game genre, Rabbids Go Home has you racing through levels collecting items on a list and scaring humans in the typical rabbids’ humour. There isn’t much of a story here but the need to help the rabbids collect their items and complete their mission will keep you on your goofy path.
Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box
Nintendo, Level- 5
Available for Nintendo DS
Professor Layton and his assistant, Luke are back in Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box, the sequel to the highly successful adventure puzzle game, Professor Layton and the Curious Village. After a close friend of the Professor is killed by apparently the curse of the mysterious Elysian Box, the dynamic duo board a train in order to solve the murder and prove the box’s curse is not behind it.
Full of grand new puzzles and tons of new locations to explore, Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box not only matches the fun and challenge of the first game, it surpasses it. I will note this is a fairly challenging game and though it’s age rating 10 and up, its harder puzzles might be too difficult for anyone below a high school level. Puzzle and adventure genre fans will love this series and I highly recommend picking up this title and the first if you haven’t already.
Rating: 9 out of 10
Buy it!
Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days
Square Enix, Disney Interactive Studios
Available for the Nintendo DS
Fans have been waiting a long time for a Kingdom Hearts II sequel and well, they just have to keep waiting because the newest title in the series, Kingdom Hearts 358/2 days is an inter-sequel, a game which takes place between the events of Kingdom Hearts: Chains of Memories and Kingdom Hearts II. This time the game focuses on Roxas and all his time spend with the organization leading up to the starting events of Kingdom Hearts II.
Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days’ control system is easy to use – no silly stylus controls to confuse things and the story line really gives you a chance to discover more background info on Roxas and the organization. While I would prefer to see Kingdom Hearts III out on store shelves, as long as Square Enix is shipping some sort of Kingdom Heart title, I guess I can’t complain. Overall, this isn’t the most action packed Kingdom Hearts game in the series but this game is better than no game.
Rating: 7 out of 10
Rent it!
Scribblenauts
Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment, 5th Cell
Available for Nintendo DS
Most games are what the developers make it but with the newest title from 5th Cell and Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment, Scribblenauts is what you make it. Imagine being able to write any word down and having that object appear – well, that’s the concept behind Scribblenauts. Each puzzle in the game gives you an endless stream of possibilities on how to solve them and all from just writing a single word.
The entertainment value alone comes from the endless fun you can have from seeing what objects you can find in the game’s built-in dictionary but the game itself needs some work before it can live up to its original design promise. The controls were a bit off and the instructions in some of the puzzles were a bit unclear making puzzle completion impossible. Overall, this game’s unique concept had huge potential but certain failed elements need to be fixed before this game can truly be successful.
Rating: 5 out of 10
Pass on it!
Mario & Luigi: Bowser’s Inside Story
Nintendo, AlphaDream
Available for the Nintendo DS
In Mario & Luigi: Bowser’s Inside Story, the Mushroom Kingdom is in trouble again and only the Mario Brothers can bring peace back to the Kingdom with the help of Bowser ... wait, what? Yep, that’s right. After a Fawful, the new bad guy in the Mushroom Kingdom infects the inhabitants with a horrible disease and causes Bowser to swallow the Mario Brothers, the Princess and their friends whole, it’s up to Bowser and the Brothers to work together to stop Fawful from taking over the entire kingdom.
Fans of the brothers will love this cute throwback to the old RPG Mario series with fabulous new graphics, hilarious voice-overs and tons of sweet Mario action. You’ll be able to take control of both the Brothers and Bowser in a neat duel screen system and explore the inner workings of one of gaming history’s most famous villains, Bowser. Trust me when I say Super Mario Bros. Wii won’t be the only Mario game selling like hotcakes this Holiday season.
[I know I'm posting this late on my own website but these reviews actually did run in the Pulse Niagara before the Holidays, so I'm not completely behind. Besides it cold enough outside in St. Catharines right now that it could damn well snow, so consider this a good list of games to snuggle up with right now until the real summer weather kicks in.]
Assassin’s Creed 2
Ubisoft, Ubisoft Montreal
Available for Xbox 360, Playstation 3 and PC
The time has come for Desmond Miles to return to the animus and jump into the memories of a new assassin, Ezio Auditore da Firenze, in Italy during the Renaissance era. Experience the gripping story behind the murder of Ezio’s family and his journey to uncover the conspiracy behind it.
Ubisoft has raised the bar with an amazing new combat system which evolves with each new weapon, improved enemy A.I and a whole new in-game economy system for easy money making. The running through the recreation of Italy is almost as good as visiting the city in real life and the game has some of the best voice-over work I’ve heard in long time.
If you want to feel the thrill of the chase from your couch, then grab a copy of Assassin’s Creed 2 today.
Rating: 10 out of 10
Buy this!
Ratchet and Clank: A Crack in Time
Sony Computer Entertainment, Insomniac Games
Available for Playstation 3
Ratchet & Clank: A Crack in Time continues the story from Ratchet & Clank: Quest for Booty with Clank being kidnapped by Doctor Nefarious and Ratchet & Qwark continuing to search the galaxy for any clues to Clank and Dr. Nefarious’ location. Both our favourite heroes will learn more about their past then they possible could have ever imagined in this fantastic new adventure from Insomniac Games.
New elements in the game include the ability to fly between planets and complete mini games and seek out hidden objects in order to upgrade your abilities and ship. Also the game has new constructo weapons that allow you to customize various elements and it includes a special time pad puzzle system which records multiple holographic images of Clank and then plays them back.
With tons of mini challenges and an exciting story line, this makes a great game to spend all those long, cold winter nights with.
Rating: 9 out of 10
Buy this!
Borderlands
2K Games, Gearbox Software
Available for Xbox 360, Playstation 3 and PC
Borderlands is like the Fallout 3 for people with not a lot of time to play videogames but a lot of friends to play them with. Part RPG, part FPS, Borderlands puts you on the planet of Pandora where the last remains of a society once there to mine has all but disappeared. You and the few inhabitants that still remain scavenge for what you can and cling to the legend of the vault which apparently holds a vast alien treasure. You and your team plan to find the vault though under the instruction of a guardian angel – a mysterious woman who only talks to you.
Choose from 4 playable character types and explore the world of Pandora via the main quest and various side missions. You can choose to play solo or join up with 3 other friends at anytime during your campaign for co-op play. Choose to play in your world or theirs. The world of Pandora holds a vast amount of cool weaponry and gadgets to aid you in your mission and you even get to hop into a cool vehicle or two.
The Holidays are time to get together with friends and family and what better way to spend time with your favourite people then riding around in tanks and blowing up skags.
Rating: 9 out of 10
Buy this!
Left4Dead2
EA, Valve Corporation
Available for Xbox 360 and PC
The outbreak has happened again and this time you are following 4 new survivors in the Southern United States as they fight their way through hordes of zombies in order to make their way to safety. The game is broken down into chapters which can be played solo with A.I team members or with up to 3 other players with co-op mode. You do also have the option to play 4 vs. 4 multiplayer in various maps.
Fans of the Resident Evil series will be out of their element here as zombies move faster and tend to attack in packs. Even on easy I had trouble surviving this game but thankfully your A.I. teammates are great shots, so if you learn to take backseat to the action, you’ll survive to see the next level. This is definitely a nice change to the normal zombie game though and I enjoyed the movie like cinematic scenes and story line.
Left4Dead2 definitely brings new life to the zombie horror survival genre and this is one game you can’t live or unlive without this Holiday season.
God of War III
SCEA, Santa Monica Studio
Available for Playstation 3
Perhaps I’m just getting older and more sensitive but God of War III has to be the most violent game I’ve played in a long time. So violent in fact that I actually spent most of the game looking for alternative puzzle solutions because the obvious ones always ended in some poor person’s death. Don’t get me wrong – I like death and blood in my games as much as the next person but when you get to crush a person’s eyes out by pushing in the analog buttons, the line between reality and game gets just a little too thin for this gamer’s soul to bare.
God of War III continues the long and brutal journey of Kratos, the Ghost of Sparta as he seeks revenge against the Gods for the killing of his family. You start the game right where God of War II left off with Kratos on the back of the titan, Gaia as they climb the side of Mount Olympus in the middle of a great battle with the Olympian Gods. Kratos and the Titans are out for the blood of Zeus and won’t stop until he is dead.
The first 30 minutes of this game is epic which should automatically tell you just how great the rest of the game is. In those 30 minutes, you will have to fight a water horse creature, Poseidon, various minions of the Gods and more, all while you climb the side of Mount Olympus and throughout the body of Gaia. I’ve never seen so much action packed into the beginning of a game let alone the background of an environment. As Kratos battles his way towards Zeus, you see Titans fighting monsters, enemies and Gods in the background on such a grand scale that they make Kratos look like an ant.
I got a chance to play the demo for this game back a few months ago and I was surprised that it didn’t show off more of the advancements made in the series since the God of War II. I was half expecting to play the same old God of War franchise with updated graphics but was pleasantly surprised to find a ton of new elements that they didn’t even hint at in the demo like the new over the top combat moves and the combination of boss battles and level platforming.
The game is stuffed full of challenging puzzles, enemy combat, level platforming, flying mini games and even our favourite, the sex mini game. To say God of War III is full of variety is an understatement as every level is its own incredible experience full of epic boss battles, gorgeous environments and challenging puzzles. I barely finished this game and I played it on easy, so expect a grand challenge on normal game play and a torture fest on the hard difficulty. There’s even a harder mode that you unlock once you finish the game on any of its difficulty settings.
The controls were easy to pick up if you are okay with plain button mashing your way through the game but if you actually like learning combos, then plan on memorizing a lot of moves because this game has 4 weapons, each with their own list of deathly moves. The only move I couldn’t seem to master was the jump and glide move which sent me to my death more than any enemy did. The button just didn’t seem to react on time and I would plunge to my death before my wings would emerge.
If I were to pick only one thing that made this game so epic, it would be the graphics. Just play through the first 30 minutes of the game to complete the Battle of Olympus, so you can see all the spectacular battle scenes and background animations that made my mouth hang open in amazement. As you climb the side of Mount Olympus, you can see the epic battles in the background between monsters, Gods and titans that is just so mind-blowing that you just have to stop and watch. Of course, this is just the animation in the background, so imagine how beautiful the actual cut scenes are! Overall if you compare the graphics between God of War II on the PS3 collection disc to this game, the difference is light years away and especially when it comes to the characters. They were the most realistic looking this time around. Santa Monica Studios should be proud of how amazing this game turned out.
The voice acting was also stellar this time around with the usual voice talents of T.C. Carson as Kratos and Linda Hunt as Gaia but they also brought some new actors like Clancy Brown as Hades, Kevin Sorbo as Hercules, Rip Torn as Hephaestus, Adrienne Barbeau as Hera and Malcolm McDowell as Daedalus. Talk about one epic cast for one epic video game. The music was also phenomenal as usual with the traditional God of War soundtrack – beautiful music to crush heads to.
Overall, God of War III has tons of variety to keep you interested and lots of challenge to keep you busy but really any game that lets you kill Gods and lots of them will always make my top ten play list. I look forward to see what Santa Monica Studios comes up with for God of War IV which looks like a possibility. I guess you just can’t keep a vengeful Spartan down.
Cabela’s Big Game Hunter 2010 – Top Shot Pack Activision, Cauldron Available for the Nintendo Wii
For the hunter in the family, there’s Cabela’s Big Game Hunter 2010 Top Shot Pack which includes the game and a Wii remote peripheral shaped like a shotgun. The peripheral has a spot to place both the Wii remote and nunchuk and once the game is switched to the top shot control scheme you can use the shotgun peripheral to shoot almost like a real gun.
The Wii version of Big Game Hunter 2010 gives you 12 story missions and 13 shooting gallery challenges to work your way through, each with various animal life to hunt.
Nyko Charge Base IC for the Nintendo Wii Holds two Wii Remotes or Nyko Wands
One of the biggest problems facing gamers right now is controller battery life and Nyko is serving up various solutions for all consoles. The Nyko Charge Base IC for the Nintendo Wii is probably the prettiest and most functional of all the chargers I’ve come across. The magnetic grips allow you to stick your remotes onto the charger without removing the rubber sleeves and the blue LED lights on the charge base turn green when the charge completes. The charger comes with two battery packs to insert into your Wii remotes and also includes a USB port on the back should you choose to charge another device like your iPod.
Charge times range from 8 hours with a rubber sleeve on to 4 hours without the rubber sleeve. I suggest taken a minute to remove your rubber sleeves before each charge. The base’s magnetic grip also improves with the sleeve off.
Nyko Charge Base 360 for Xbox 360 Holds two Xbox 360 Controllers
Also available from Nyko to help you with your charging issues is the Nyko Charge Base 360 which charges up to 2 Xbox 360 controllers. I love this charging kit because my regular Xbox battery won’t last more than a few hours lately and the Nyko NiHM battery lasted the full 25 hours it claimed in the manual. One controller takes 2 hours to charge and two controllers take 4 hours. The base has an indicator on the front which glows red when the controllers are charging and green when they are done. The controllers sit perfectly in the cream coloured cradle.
The only downside to this kit is that you can’t charge the batteries on their own without the controller being attached which I would love because I only have one controller that takes a battery pack but I read on CNET.com that you can charge the batteries separate by placing a book on top on them. I haven’t tried this method yet, so don’t blame me if a fire breaks out.
Sony Playstation 3 Wireless Keypad
If you’re like me and you talk to your friends a lot online during gameplay but don’t have a headset, then you have to use the basic controller to type in all your messages which can take forever. Luckily I discovered the solution to my messaging problems with the Sony Wireless Keypad for the Playstation 3. This small keypad device plugs into the top port of your Playstation SIXAXIS or Dualshock 3 controller and fits perfectly over the top portion of your controller. The keypad has its own separate power source, so you’ll have to charge it via the USB cord that plugs into your Playstation 3.
The QWERTY style keyboard features Bluetooth functionality and a few dedicated buttons that allow you to jump to preset features on the XMB like your message box or friends list. There’s even a touch pad button that allows you to use the entire surface of the keypad like a touch pad simply by moving your finger over it which is very useful for moving the pointer while using the web browser.
Nyko Wand Action Pack for Nintendo Wii
If you’re looking for the perfect solution for the over-priced Nintendo Wii controller problem, then look no further then the Nyko Action Pack which contains a Nyko Wand (Wii remote alternative), a Pistol Grip which allows you to enjoy accurate light gun action during all your favourite Wii games and a rubber sleeve to protect your Nyko wand.
The Pistol Grip has a trigger and a button on the back of the handle which can be assigned to either the B or A buttons on the Nyko Wand which respond digitally to the Pistol Grip via its trans-port technology. Putting the wand into the Pistol Grip can be difficult as the directions don’t tell you to pull the trigger away from the wand when installing it, so please be careful or you could break the thing. Ultimately this is a great alternative to buying another Wii remote as it is cheaper and you get more.
Your Shape Featuring Jenny McCarthy Ubisoft Available for the Nintendo Wii
Generally I am the last person to promote exercise as I am the last person to get off my butt and game, but the toned body of Jenny McCarthy has found her way into the home of my sister along with a Nintendo Wii and I’m all for anything that will get my sister gaming again. Ms. McCarthy helps lovely ladies find their waist line again with her innovative exercise program that utilizes a Wii camera tracking system. This is a far easier system than holding the Wii remote and nunchuk in your hands or strapping them to your legs like in other Wii programs. You’ll be sweating to some general disco sounding tunes while taking instructions from Jenny and viewing yourself on screen via camera.
This is pretty much an aerobics based program which features jumping jacks, walking & running in place, etc. I suggest you alternate this program with another weight based game or a game with sports in it in order to mix it up a bit.
New Super Mario Bros. Wii
Nintendo
Available for Nintendo Wii
If you’ve never played a 2D Mario game from the early days of Nintendo, then you probably won’t understand the huge draw for retro gamers to the newest Mario Bros. game on the Nintendo Wii. While Mario’s 3D adventures have been satisfying they never held the same pleasures and challenges that the old 2D side-scrollers did on the NES and SNES. Jumping into the New Super Mario Bros. Wii is like curling up on the couch with your favourite author’s newest book after they stopped writing for 10 years – nothing could be more surprising and comforting at the same time.
If you do know what I’m talking about, then imagine if you took the best elements from Super Mario World and Super Mario Bros. 3, added in some new Wii graphics, controls and a few additional power-ups, and then threw them into a blender to mix - the final product would be the New Super Mario Bros. Wii. Since the days of the SNES, Mario’s adventures just haven’t been the same and thought we’ve had the New Super Mario Bros. on the Nintendo DS to tide us 2D lovers over, having Mario on the big screen moving left to right again is so old school, I could bust out the neon leg warms and the New Kids on the Block tapes.
For the retro gamer, NSMBW brings back sweet elements from Super Mario Bros. 3 like the Mushroom houses, the over-world themed maps, the Koopa Kids and the hidden warp points. We also get elements from Super Mario World like riding Mario’s buddy Yoshi again and collecting special coins from each level. Of course to avoid the same old, same old, new elements have been added into the game like special Wii-mote controls, new power-ups, up-dated graphics and 4 player co-op or versus play. Some of these new elements make the game better while others could have been left on the cutting room floor.
The Wii controls, for example, were a bad idea as the game difficulty only increases as you fumble to shake the remote and hold two buttons down together in order to hold objects and run at the same time. Whatever happened to simple pressing down and pressing one button to hold objects? That was easy – this new control scheme makes me feel like I’m having a damn seizure rather than playing a simple Mario game. This also makes it darn near impossible to save the hidden Toads in each world because you can’t run, hold, shake and jump, all at the same time. Whoever designed this control scheme must have a sixth finger – perhaps he’s the six-fingered man from the Princess Bride and that would explain why he made an impossibly, cruel control setup for us five-fingered people.
The multiplayer mode was a great idea but the character roster choices weren’t as it always leaves two players with the no name Toad characters instead of a cool character like Mario or Luigi. The roster would have been better with Mario, Luigi, Toad and Princess Peach like Super Mario Bros. 2 had, plus Nintendo could have broken the whole “Princess Peach is a helpless girl that can’t stay safe for more than 5 seconds” thing for the second time since the 80s. Its 2010 and the Princess has to learn to kick Bowser’s butt sooner or later.
This is definitely a challenging and fun game. Each level holds tons of nostalgia for the retro gamer but also brings some cool new elements into play like tilting see-saws controlled by the Wii remote and levels completely full of giant flying beasts for Mario to run on top of. Overall, the level design is on par with the original Super Mario Bros. 3 but with better graphics.
The music in this game is so cute and whimsical. The enemies actually bust a move at a key point in the music which is such a great little detail in the game. There are a lot of retro sounds throughout the game and if you managed to hit the end of stage marker at a specific time, you’ll get to hear the original Mario Bros. song play. Some sound effects like 1-ups and voice-overs come through the Wii-remote speaker make the player more aware of events in the game.
The graphics are extremely up-dated in comparison to the old 2D games with new chunky 3D/2D polygonal characters and layered and scrolling backgrounds. The Mario world is bright and colourful, full of life and each world out does the last with such cool themed levels.
I can’t say this isn’t the best Mario game I’ve ever played but I enjoy every minute I played it, and I’m happy to see Nintendo going to back to their roots and giving a little something back to their core gamers especially since we’ve politely suffered through all these fitness games. The New Super Mario Bros. Wii is a clear winner for all Mario fans as it has plenty of challenge and fun for everyone new and old to the series. I highly suggest you grab a copy, if you can find one.
Bayonetta
Sega, Platinum Games
Available for Xbox 360, PS3
Bayonetta is possibly the weirdest game I’ve come across in a long time, though in my defence I don’t import games from Japan, so I’m pretty shielded from the truly weird stuff out there. Created by the director of Viewful Joe and Devil May Cry, Hideki Kamiya from Platinum Games, Bayonetta is action game that focuses on a beautiful witch named Bayonetta who uses guns and magical attacks via her hair to defeat her enemies.
The game centers on Bayonetta’s search for her lost memory as she was revived 20 years early from the bottom of a lake with no memory of her past. Enzo, an informant directs Bayonetta to a person which holds a device called “the Right Eye” which is somehow linked to her past. She must fight her way through angels, witches and other various creatures in order to restore the missing pieces of her past.
This game may as well be a sequel to the Devil May Cry series as opposed a standalone game because it has multiple elements parallel to the DMC series from the game play to the story line. If you’ve played the DMC series though, that isn’t necessarily a bad thing because those are great games to play – hard games but fabulous games.
You will have to fight a lot of the same enemies, mini bosses and main bosses multiple times through the game which just seemed like lazy programming to me. The developers were either trying to lengthen up a short game or they just got lazy and didn’t want to make new enemies in order to finish the game. There are a lot of combos to memorize in order to master the game unless you want to run through the game like me – pushing random buttons and hoping that you kill something.
Ultimately you have to check out this game just to see it for yourself as Bayonetta is one of those characters that you aren’t sure if she was meant to be serious or slightly comical. The girl has guns in her shoes and hair that attacks enemies, so you tell me?
Rating: 7 out of 10
Rent it!
Halo Wars
Microsoft Games Studios, Ensemble Studios
Available for Xbox 360
Halo Wars was my first Halo game ever and probably the reason I decided to give Halo 3: ODST a chance in the first place. While I finished Halo War probably within a few days of receiving it, my review of the game took a back seat of the other games I had to review that the time and then I just plum forgot to review the darn thing. I regret not talking about this great real time strategy game especially since it sparked my interested in the Halo franchise, so today I’m finally going to talk about this title.
Halo Wars was the first non-FPS genre game for the Halo franchise but it didn’t fail to live up to the excellence that usually follows the Halo name (I say usually because I saw Halo Legends a week ago and it was good awful). Taking place before the events of the first Halo game, Halo Wars follows the missions of a UNSC warship called The Spirit of Fire which is commanded by Captain James Cutter. You control through most missions though, a marine named Sergeant John Forge and all units under the UNSC like Spartans, Warthogs and more. Like a RTS, you are given missions with objectives, then various units and building to controls in order to complete those missions. Forge is a hero unit with special abilities which is usually given to you in the beginning and must survive all missions.
The campaign mode follows the missions of the UNSC only but the multiplayer mode lets you play as either the UNSC or Covenant. The Covenant has their own units to play with and it was a darn shame there wasn’t a campaign mode for their side.
While most RTS games played via consoles do not play as well as their PC counterparts, Halo Wars was surprisingly easy to control and felt suited for the Xbox 360. Of course, there wasn’t a PC version to compare it to but I think Ensemble Studios did a great job putting together this game either way.
Besides the Command & Conquer series by EA, I can’t honestly think of any good RTS games made for the console in the last 10 years, so Halo Wars is easily a recommended buy for RTS fans. It has excellent online multiplayer support and a lengthy campaign mode with 3 difficulty settings plus this is probably a budget title by now which will make it cheap to buy.
Rating: 9 out of 10
Buy it!
Fable 2
Microsoft Game Studio, Lionhead Studios
Available for Xbox 360
Believe it or not, Fable 2 was my game of the year in 2009 and I never actually reviewed it – how’s that for procrastination? It was an amazing game though and there was been a lot of coverage lately about the third installation in the series which is slated for release for either this year or the next, which is why I wanted to go back and finally talk about Fable 2 and how amazing this game is.
Fable 2 puts you in the role of an adventurer (male or female, your choice) who witnesses the death of their sister at the hands of the crazed Lord Lucien and now is on a quest to stop the Lord from building a giant magical tower which will destroy the land. You are one of four fabled heroes that destroyed the tower once before and you must find the other 3 in order to complete the group and stop Lord Lucien.
The main concept of the Fable series is creating your own character and story through choices – both good and bad. You have your main quest to complete but also side quests which how they are completed will affect how you look, grow and are seen in the eyes of others. Ultimately though everything in the game affects you from the food you eat to the tattoos you wear. The world is your playground of choices - you can marry anyone you want (anyone), choose your clothes, advance your skills, change your weapons, make money via local jobs and even have sex and make babies. This game tries to give you the full life experience which is something we’ve never seen in a console game before.
A new and cool addition to the game is the dog companion which helps you find treasures and defends you against enemies. The original version of the game gave you only one breed of dog to play with but additional downloadable content packs now available will give you access to potions that will change your dog into different breeds.
Most of the time when I review a game, I play it as least halfway through if not all the way through to the end, time allowing but Fable 2 I actually played twice over plus. I was obsessed with this game to the point I was trying to get all the achievements and that never happens to me with any of my games. If that isn’t a stellar recommendation I don’t know what is.
Also this is probably the best buy out there right now if you haven’t already pick this game up as you have three different ending to play towards which means great replay value and Fable 2 is now a budget title, so it’s easy on the wallet.
Heavy Rain Sony Computer Entertainment, Quantic Dream Available for Playstation 3
I have to say that Heavy Rain is probably the first game I have ever played that I have checked out the demo first and hated it, but ended up loving the final product. Back in fall of 2009, I attended the Sony Holiday Event and managed to check out a floor demo of Heavy Rain which showed off the game’s graphics, game play but nothing of the storyline. It was so dull that I lost all interest in the game but after seeing a few trailers that did show a bit of the actual story line, I decided to give the game a second chance and boy, was I glad I did because this game is gold.
Created by the same development team behind the game, Indigo Prophecy, Heavy Rain is a film noir style adventure game that takes you on an emotional thrill ride. The main story centers on the Origami Killer who is kidnapping little boys and drowning them in rain water. He leaves an orchid and an origami figure on each body and police are baffled about who he is. Though you start the game as Ethan Mars, an architect, you will play as 3 other characters throughout the game: FBI Agent Norman Jayden, a private investigator Scott Shelby and a photographer Madison Page. Each character will play a vital role in finding the Origami Killer.
Instead of facing down supernatural creatures, Heavy Rain has you overcoming obstacles that a normal person could endure and therefore allows players to identify with the main characters so much easier than they could with fantasy characters. The story is full of emotional decisions that aren’t always clearly right or wrong but they are definitely hard to make and as a human being you will feel the pressure to make those decisions, especially with the game’s quick time events in play.
While most adventure games are played with point and click mouse controls, Heavy Rain has adopted a different control scheme that incorporates the SIXAXIS controller. Most of the movements and interactions are controlled with a basic one button push or analog stick movement but there are many quick time events that will have you mashing buttons and moving in various directions quickly or holding down a series of buttons in a certain order. Honestly the control scheme is hard to master but it wouldn’t be if the action symbols were a bit clearer to read in moments of panic.
If you’re lucky you can redo an action sequence multiple times until you get it right, but in some cases you only get one shot and if you fail, you could kill one of your four main characters. Timing is very important, so pay attention especially because the game works on an auto save system which means you can’t replay any events. Once you make your choices, they are set in stone.
The first couple of hours of the game are very slow and you will probably feel like you are playing the Sims or something like it but trust me, just play through it (play it well for the trophies) and you will become addicted to the story further in. Once you get past playing Daddy, that’s when the good stuff comes in like the crime-solving, the fist fights and the trials. The puzzles will get harder and the rewards will get better.
You will have to install this game on your hard drive before you play it but the developers have included an actual origami puzzle to make while you wait. The instructions for the puzzle are shown during the install screen and the piece of paper to make it is included in the game case. I wasn’t impressed with the in-game load screens as they were weird close-up shots of the 4 main characters from the game. It was just too creepy to stare at their nervous looking faces the whole time.
One thing you can definitely say about this game is that is it pretty. From the environments to the rain effects to the character designs, this game is downright stunning to look at – almost like watching a movie. Motion capture was used during the character design and it shows through in their movements which are very life-like. A lot of realistic photos and videos are used in the game as background elements which really stand out against the digital graphics but add a cool note of realism to the world.
There are some frame rate issues during some of the faster paced moments of the game which is a shame because the graphics would be perfect otherwise. You’ll have control over the camera for most of the game which is important to remember as you need to change view angles often or you’ll miss important clues. Some scenes though, the camera changes on its own and gives you this fabulous movie scene effect. There are even some split-screen moments in the game which give you multiple view points for an overall view of the event.
While the movements of the characters and their facial expressions are mint, the voice acting in this game can be massively over the top at times. It’s like watching a decent pilot episode of a cop drama or something – you know the show has potential but the actors need more time to get comfortable with their roles. The music is very Hollywood drama with high tension instrumental scores as well as those heart-breaking tunes that have you almost in tears during various high emotion scenes.
If you can focus on the pretty graphics during the first couple hours of Heavy Rain and not the dull storyline, you’ll find an amazing detective story well worth the time and effort. This game is not only addictive to play but absolute gorgeous to watch. I haven’t played a dark adventure game this good since Phantasmorgia which came out in 1995. I hope to see more adventure games like this come out and less of the crap which keeps coming out developers like Dreamcatcher/The Adventure Company.
BioShock 2
2K Games
Available for Playstation 3, Xbox 360 and PC
“I am Andrew Ryan, and I'm here to ask you a question. Is a man not entitled to the sweat of his brow? 'No!' says the man in Washington, 'It belongs to the poor.' 'No!' says the man in the Vatican, 'It belongs to God.' 'No!' says the man in Moscow, 'It belongs to everyone.' I rejected those answers; instead, I chose something different. I chose the impossible. I chose... Rapture, a city where the artist would not fear the censor, where the scientist would not be bound by petty morality, where the great would not be constrained by the small! And with the sweat of your brow, Rapture can become your city as well."
If you don't know these immortal words, then you need to stop reading this review for BioShock 2, grab a copy of BioShock for the Xbox 360, Playstation 3 or PC and play the hell out of that game because you couldn't possibly understand the epic nature of the world of Rapture without experience it all from the beginning.
If you are amongst the many who have dived beneath the waves and explored the dark world of Rapture, fought the splicers and the Big Daddies, and discovered the grisly meaning behind the words, "Would you kindly?", then by all means, continue to read all the adam filled goodness of this review.
BioShock 2 brings the city of Rapture back to life with a whole new experience through the diver helmet of a Big Daddy. You must venture through the ruined halls, cracked and leaking underwater tunnels, facing hordes of crazed and mutated citizens of the fallen city 10 years after the original BioShock events. This time you are searching for your original little sister - a girl named Eleanor who was ripped away from you by Dr. Sophia Lamb, the newest leader in Rapture who took over the city after Andrew Ryan passed on. You are aided in your journey by a familiar face, Dr. Brigid Tenenbaum who advises you that Lamb has been kidnapping little girls from the surface and turning them into new Little Sisters because the previous ones are now gone or maturing beyond their use. She asks you to find all the new girls and transform them back during your search for Eleanor.
Much like the first BioShock you will be given multiple choices through the game which will affect how the game ends for your character. Depending on how many good or evil choices you make you can apparently end up with up to 6 different ending. The great thing about this game is that the moral choices you make aren't as obvious as you would think. I played through the game thinking I made all good moral choices and apparently didn't.
On a down side, the story line isn't as amazing as the first BioShock and really feels created to fit with the new Big Daddy/Little Sister game play instead of the other way around. There isn't a lot of new information to discover about Rapture at least until the end of the game when you take on the role of a new character and most of the information is thrown at you in audio files which is hard to play between enemies attacking and other characters that talk to you during the game.
Even though you are wandering the city as a Big Daddy now rather than a regular human, you will still have the ability to use plasmids and tonics as well as the new Big Daddy weapons like the drill and rivet gun. This makes the combo still very similar to the original BioShock which allowed you to use gun or melee weapons in combination with the plasmids but now, you don't have to switch between your weapon and plasmid - you can just have both ready to fire at once.
The coolest new weapon in Rapture I thought was the spear gun which when used on enemies would actually stick them to the walls in a gory fashion and if you opted to retrieve your spear gun ammo from their dead bodies, their carcasses would drop from the wall like little bloody rag dolls. Very grim but cool. Weapons upgrade stations and adam upgrades are available again through Rapture and you will be able to use the Little Sisters to obtain adam to buy new tonics and plasmids
Multi-player modes have been added to the series this time around which was a big addition request from the first BioShock, but honestly now that it's been added, it doesn't feel that important to the game. I tried to play some of the online modes and couldn't more than one person to play with. The game had been out for 4 days when I logged onto the lobbies and I figured some people would be playing online by this point but I guessed wrong. There are 7 modes to check out for online like "Survival of the Fittest" which is you against everyone else in a free for all killing spree or "Capture the Flag" which puts you on a 10 person team either defending a Little Sister or trying to kidnap her and put her in a vent on the other side of the map. This online feature has its own story which is set before the days of BioShock when the city of Rapture was experiencing a civil war. You can learn a bit more about this as you level up one of several characters and listen to their unlocked audio files.
The world of Rapture isn't quite as awesome as it was back in 2007 when I first saw it but if you manage to get up close to some of the backgrounds and enemies in the game they still look pretty detailed and creepy especially in the case of the splicers. Problem is with this type of game that most of the environments are so dark that you really can't enjoy the details put into the world by the artists unless you take the time between splicers and Big Daddy attacks to really look at the environments around you up close. I think the only time you really get a good view of the cool environment details on a grand scale is when you venture outside the city for the first time onto the ocean floor and view all the adam infused ocean life. Water effects from the original game were still present with streaming water flows from cracked pipes to blur your vision and water drops appearing on your screen aka diving helmet.
The true darkness of Rapture decay would not be complete without the chilling sounds of creaking steel starting to give under the pressure of the ocean depths or the shrieks of the splicers ready to send you to harvest you for adam. The horrible sounds from the shadows of Rapture are really what make you walk just a little bit slower through the halls of the city. Funny thing is you forget at some points that the heavy footsteps in the dark are your own this time as you wear the giant metal diving suit. A few bits of music are spread out between the levels and the loading screens to remind you of the dangers around you or just to frighten you out. The epic battle music plays will when enemies attack like most video games but BioShock also has a few old time songs that you can hear on jukeboxes found on various levels or on the loading screens. These honestly are probably creepier to listen to then any sound in the game especially the Boogie Man song.
I wanted this game to be amazing especially since it’s been 3 years since we all took that trip down in the bathysphere and saw our first Little Sister and Big Daddy but honestly I think BioShock 2 can never be as awe-inspiring as the first BioShock for anyone because this version can never regain that stunning moment when we were first introduced to Andrew Ryan and his dream, and discovered the true meaning of "Would you kindly?". While there are moments in BioShock 2 that definitely make it worthwhile to return to the city under the sea once more, this journey back just doesn't hold the same enchantment that it did the first time. There are definitely improvements here to the weapons, game controls and more which make it a must buy but don't dive in expecting the same wow factor as your first trip to Rapture.
Dragon Age: Origins
EA, Bioware
Available for Xbox 360, Playstation 3 and PC
If you’ve been an active RPG player over the past 20 years, then you have probably played a Bioware game at some point or another. As the creators of such amazing titles like Baldur’s Gate, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic and Mass Effect, Bioware has been the developing team behind the games that dominate a mass portion of your gaming life and now they have another one for us.
Dragon Age: Origins is new Bioware game that has been dominating my life and probably others for the past few months. This dark fantasy game follows a young recruit of the Grey Wardens into the fight of their life against the Dark Spawn menace that is slowing taking over the land of Ferelden.
You start the game with the task of making your character from scratch: choosing their gender, body types, hair style, etc., as well as their race (dwarf, elf or human) and class type (rogue, mage or warrior). Once you have picked all these details, the game will give you 1 or 2 origin stories to choose from which fits your character type. There are 6 in all to play through, so do check them all out for the fun plus the bonus achievements/trophies. You will also have to add some additional points to your attributes and skills like much like a Dungeons and Dragons character.
Dragon Age is basically an open world which means you are given a set of tasks to perform in order to complete the main quest but you can go anywhere you want once the map is open to you. Of course, if you choose to ignore your main orders, then you must deal with the consequences. Once you get into an area, the game is all dungeon crawler which means you kill everything that attacks and strip it bare for loot, or talk to the village folk for information or to sell your new goodies.
While you’ll start off with one character, the game will introduce you to multiple party members who in some cases, you can choose to add to your party or not. Some party members will only stay for a brief time, while others will actually leave you if you fail to impress them over a certain amount of time. Over all, it’s better to recruit everyone you come across for the achievement/trophy and for the character options in battle.
If you ever played a Bioware game, you’ll know that the developers love to give you mass options in their storylines, rather than have you play out just one linear plot. Usually you have a basic good or evil path, but Dragon Age goes beyond that and really branches out into multiple versions. Depending on how you handle each situation you come into, you can affect how each character in your party reacts to you, how a future situation will play out and ultimately how the game will end. I’ve only played the game through once but I heard several different versions of this game’s story from friends which are pretty darn cool when you think about it.
Same game – several different game play experiences. How often you get that from just one game?
I think what was the probably the coolest part of the game for me was how it made me feel when I turned it off. Believe or not, I actually walked away from this game feeling guilty for the choices I made even though I knew it was just a game.
I chose to play a female city elf on my main play-through and had to play through an origin story where I was taken along with several other female elves to be raped on my wedding day. I managed to help us escape after I brutally slaughtered every human male in the castle but I failed to save my cousin from being raped. After playing through this disturbing situation and downing a bucket of ice cream, I found myself actually wondering if I took too long during the mission and that’s why my cousin was raped. As gamers, we always do what comes naturally which in this case was to kill everyone and loot the castle before I finished saving everyone to end the mission, but I actually wonder if the game was setup to punish me for taking too long. I doubt it did but I couldn’t help but think it.
Later on I had another mission where I had to choose between killing a demon-possessed child and saving the child with the help of a mage. Problem was I released the mage in the dungeon that could help me save him and I hadn’t finished a mission that earned me a mage in my party yet, so I was forced to kill him. This unfortunate turn of events earned me a spot in Alistair’s bad book and also guaranteed that I would never be able to romance his character and earn a special ending. I actually felt mad at myself for this. Could I have left the palace and complete the mage mission in order to save the boy? Did I really do all I could do?
This game was so good I was actually walking around feeling guilty about my choices. Sure, I’ve played moral choice games before but honestly I never felt bad when I was beating a hooker in Grand Theft Auto, so why did I care now? I think it’s because Dragon Age is setup to make us pay for our sins. I knew Alistair wouldn’t forgive me for my choices, and the game actually kept reminding me about my cousin and my delay in saving her. Despite my guilty, I loved this take on the moral path game and I think this is how games should be made - with actually consequences throughout the game for the things we do and not just different prizes or two varied endings based on how good or bad we are.
I’ve laughed, cried and felt a little tingle in my special spot because of video games, but never has a game made me walk away feeling regret or guilt. For this, I salute the developers at Bioware.
On a side note, this game seems to have a lot in common with Lord of the Rings and I’m not talking about the elves and dwarves. Homage to the late J.R.R. Tolkien can be seen everywhere in this game from characters to the cities, but honestly that’s not really a bad thing as I have been waiting for a good RPG Lord of the Rings game for a long time and this is probably the best we fans can hope to get.
The music in this game is pretty sweet especially the opening load screen score which is so epic summer blockbuster. I was a little disappointed that my character didn’t talk especially when you get to choose from a selection of voice tracks in the beginning, but those only cover battle mode sounds. I guess there was just too much dialog to record multiple voices for.
The graphics were pretty impressive especially for such an epic size game. Each character was well modeled, especially Alistair (meow!) and there were enough hair styles, face types and clothing options that you didn’t feel like you were talking to the same 10 villagers over and over again. Your party’s clothes changed with every cut-scene to match what you had put them in which is always a big plus with me and the enemies were quite creepy as were the g-strings people appeared in while nude.
Going out to the movies costs the average person $15 after ticket price and concession stand treats, while a videogame costs $60 on average. This makes purchasing a game all the more difficult because you can’t afford to buy a bad game, especially when resale values are at least half or less. I can honestly say without a doubt that Dragon Age: Origins is not only a great game but it worth the sticker price and more. There are so many choices to this game, you could play it 6 times and still never get the story twice over. If that is not worth $60, then I don’t know what kind of game is.
Fat Princess
SCE, Titan Studios
Available on the Playstation Network
Fat Princess is a 2 team, 16 player online game that is pure cartoon chaos. Two teams must work together to kidnap the other team’s Princess from inside a defended castle, while trying to defend their own Princess. To make things interesting each Princess can be fatten up by each team member with random pieces of cake found on the battle field. The more cake you feed your Princess, the bigger the she gets and the harder she is to kidnap which can help or hinder your team depending on the situation.
Each team member can choose one of 6 character classes like a mage or a warrior which each has their own abilities and weapons. Classes can be changed by grabbing hats from stations inside your castle. In addition to the main “Capture the Princess” mode, Fat Princess has a multiplayer death match mode and two single player modes: a story mode and a survival mode.
While I found this game to be clever and whimsical, overall the game has just too chaotic for me. I never saved the Princess once because I always died before I got to her and I tend to hate games that don’t give me even a fighting chance. I know some people love hard games like Mega Man but to me, this was like trying to ice skate up a hill. It just wasn’t possible.
Pass on it!
Final Fantasy VII
Sony, Square Enix
Available on the Playstation Network
Retro games are all the rage and most game companies are cashing in by placing old titles online for players to purchase and download. Now I personally would rather own the old systems and the games themselves, but sometimes it’s nice to be able to get these games instantly rather than having to hunt for them in flea markets and garage sales.
Square Enix is one of those companies that have taken up the task to re-release old titles from their vault onto services like the Nintendo Wii’s Virtual Console and the Playstation 3’s Playstation Network. While I’m still praying for Final Fantasy VI to show up, I have been thankful for the release of Final Fantasy VII which any fan will tell you is the most loved game in the series.
This online version of FFVI is probably as close as you can get to the actually game without actually buying yourself a hard copy – every side quest, chocobo ride and boss battle is here. So I suggest that if you want to relive the greatest heart breaking moment in gaming history, then download this game now. As for the newcomers to the game, please don’t delay – buy today, so you can finally understand what we FF fans are finally babbling about. Aerith who?
Buy it!
Sam and Max: Beyond Space and Time
Telltale Games
Available on the Xbox Live Marketplace
Sam and Max: Beyond Space and Time aka Sam and Max: Season 2 has finally made its way to the Xbox Live Marketplace. Based on the comic books series by Steve Purcell, this point and click adventure game follows up Season one aka Sam and Max Save the World which is also available on the Xbox Live Marketplace.
The crazy crime fighting duo of Sam and Max bring you five of the weirdest stories for your adventure solving pleasure. Sam and Max will encounter everyone from Abe Lincoln to Santa Claus during these coo-coo adventures and you will need to think outside of the box in order to keep up with them.
Each episode is better than the last and the hilarious dialog will have you rolling on the floor laughing. While I am a fan of the old 2D graphics from Sam and Max: Hit the Road, I do like the updated 3D graphics used by Telltales. Overall, this is a great series and I suggest my readers check out both Season 1 and 2.
Buy it!
Borderloads DLC: The Zombie Island of Dr. Ned
2k Games, Gearbox Software
Available on the Xbox Live Marketplace, Playstation Network and Steam
Considering how huge a game Borderlands is on its itty bitty own, it’s hard to believe anyone would want to purchase additional quests for the game but honestly offer up anything with zombies in it and I will buy. The Zombie Island of Dr. Ned is the first downloadable content for the holiday hit, Borderlands, which brings your team to the creepy island of Jakob’s Cove. There you discover zombies are eating the locals and you need to find away to stop them, starting with seeking helping from Dr. Ned – no relation with Dr. Zed, your health provider in the Arid Badlands.
There are quite a few new quests, items and enemies here for your skag killing enjoyment. The humour in the main story is far more off the wall than anything you’ll find in the main Borderlands game and the new enemies will have you on your toes every minute you traverse these new swamp lands.
Zombie related content is usually better released at Halloween but I’ll take my zombies any way I can get them. Zombie lover or not, I highly suggest Borderland fans check this download out whether you have finished the main game or not. The quests are tailored to your character’s current level, so you can jump in any time.
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