msteryx's GameSpot Friend's Reviews msteryx's GameSpot Friend's Reviews msteryx's GameSpot Friend's Reviews en-us Copyright (c)1995-2013 CBS Interactive. All rights reserved. http://www.gamespot.com 20 Wed, 19 Jun 2013 17:34:19 -0700 GameSpot msteryx's GameSpot Friend's Reviews http://img.gamespot.com/gamespot/shared/promos/misc/gs_logo.gif http://www.gamespot.com 135 40 Sun, 20 Feb 2011 14:49:48 -0800 coylenintendo reviewed Call of Duty: Black Ops for the Xbox 360... http://www.gamespot.com/call-of-duty-black-ops/user-reviews/756129/platform/xbox360/ ...and gave it a 9.5!

okay well, Call Of Duty: Black Ops isn't the best game of all time but it's definitely one of the best in recent years. as far as the Campaign goes, I beat it once and don't remember much about it. but it's pretty much what you would expect. there's a war going on and you get to live through it, doing many different objectives such as killing someone, blowing up something, sneaking into places, etc. overall, it was a pretty decent Campaign. just a little short.
but as everyone knows, what makes Black Ops a big seller is that it's one of those games that you can sit and play online for a while. you have Zombie Mode back in this one. it's a pretty simple mode where you team up with 1-3 other people. you can play it with a friend, online or both. you basically try to kill as many zombies, as well as other enemies, as you can for points. eventually you can use these points to buy more ammo, a different gun, traps for the enemies, open new doors, etc. the game keeps going on until everyone on your team dies but it'll get harder each round and you'll see a couple new enemies. once a player gets too hurt by an enemy, they'll fall to the ground and starting dying but they have a few moments for another player to revive them. the game is over once all players have died, even if the last player just got knocked down.
then there's multiplayer mode, definitely the best part of the game. you can also play this online and have a friend join you. you can play many different modes such as Free For All which is simply killing as many people as you can. Team Deathmatch is the same idea but you have teammates. then there's others such as Capture The Flag which requires you to capture a flag and bring it back to your base. Domination is one of the better modes where you also have to capture flags but the flags are more like bases that you have to capture and defend. there's 3 flags and you gradually get points, 1 for each flag. so if you own all 3 flags, you'll keep getting 3 points while the other team gets nothing.
there's a few other modes but it'd take a while to explain them all. another great thing about multiplayer is that there's so many customization options. you can create different classes, put a main gun for each, a secondary weapon such as a launcher or pistol, a type of bomb, nova gas, a motion sensor, different perks in order to make your player faster or not be affected by bombs as much and so much more. there's also a leveling up system. the better you do, the faster you will level up. killing other players, completely objectives or challenges and even doing something simple like blowing up cars will give yo XP points. once you complete level 50, you can prestige which is where you start over but can unlock even more things next time.
you can even customize your gun, the lens for it and even more.
another cool thing is the contracts which allow you to spend what are called COD points. these points are won from matches and leveling them up. you can use them to buy new weapons and stuff but also use them to buy contracts. if you complete what the contract tells you to do and in the amount of time that they give you, you'll be awarded even more COD points and sometimes XP points. but if you don't complete it in time, you won't get your COD points back.
Killstreak awards are another thing that make multiplayer awesome. you can choose 3 different awards which are for getting so many kills. like 3 kills can get you an RC-XD which is a small car armed with bombs that you can drive around to kill someone with it. a Napalm Strike can be directed towards a part of the map of your choice and basically have a line of fire across it. there's others such as an Attack Chopper, Attack Dogs and a Gun Ship but you'll have to work for those. there's a good amount of maps, most of them are fun as well as the new maps that came with the DLC.
sorry if you have to miss out on Nuketown though. it was a fun little level that cry babies demanded to play less. also watch out for the people that sit and play the game 24/7! they'll be hard to beat. enjoy the game though, it's seriously a lot of fun. just don't take it too seriously, remember that it is just a video game :P

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"coylenintendo reviewed Call of Duty: Black Ops for the Xbox 360..." was posted by coylenintendo on Sun, 20 Feb 2011 14:49:48 -0800
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/call-of-duty-black-ops/user-reviews/756129/platform/xbox360/ Sun, 26 Dec 2010 12:24:50 -0800 chopperlink reviewed Golden Sun for the Game Boy Advance... http://www.gamespot.com/golden-sun/user-reviews/749741/platform/gba/ ...and gave it a 10.0!!!

Pros: Lots of secrets, pretty long game, great GBA graphics, good music!

Cons: What cons :D

Golden Sun was a game I picked up while I was down south visiting my relatives! It was one of the best RPG games I've ever played! The characters were likable, lots of great secrets to be discovered. The battle system could be sped up a lot so battles wouldn't be too slow. There are a lot of Djinn to be discovered so that you could power up your party even more, but it too effort to look for them! The boss battles are pretty neat, and the summons are bad-ass!! Also there is a lot of depth in this RPG system than in most RPG games. There are lots of ways to take down your enemies. I can't really find any flaws with this game, though only small complaint I have is that the graphics sometimes make it hard to see certain things, but no biggie! Honestly though, I can't think of a better RPG than this one, except for Paper Mario though :P

This is one of the greatest GBA and RPG video games I've ever played!! You need to play this game and its sequels!!! GET IT NOUGH!! :D

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"chopperlink reviewed Golden Sun for the Game Boy Advance..." was posted by chopperlink on Sun, 26 Dec 2010 12:24:50 -0800
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/golden-sun/user-reviews/749741/platform/gba/ Sun, 26 Dec 2010 12:08:11 -0800 chopperlink reviewed Dark Cloud 2 for the PlayStation 2... http://www.gamespot.com/dark-cloud-2/user-reviews/749738/platform/ps2/ ...and gave it a 10.0!!!

Pros: Beautiful graphics, awesome combat and town building, pretty neat story, very fresh! Good music

Cons: Voice acting is a little gay(As with most JRPG games), but you get over it :D

Dark Cloud 2 is a game where you explore various randomly generated dungeons to help get materials and ideas how to build the towns in the game and fix the future! Now I wouldn't think I would still be into this game, with its B-rated voice acting (typical of anime) and very compound building town components (Need lots of different materials to build stuff), but I fell instantly in love with it (Not in the weird way :P) .

Anywho , you play as Max, a sheltered boy who really knows a lot about mechanics and such, who ends up being chased out of town by some f-ed up clown who wants to still this jewel (That his mother gave him) that Max has. Afterwards, he meets Monica, who says she is from the future(100 years). Turns out that Monica has the same type of jewel as Max, and it turns out that the jewels can actually transport back and forth to the future 100 years(You only have 2 time periods to deal with). Some villain is screwing up Max's time that effects Monica's and you have to figure it all out. You build your own towns to fix the future so that you can reach the antagonist of the game!! I don't want to reveal too much, so I suggest you play the game! You can get it pretty cheap now since it's a PS2 game!

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"chopperlink reviewed Dark Cloud 2 for the PlayStation 2..." was posted by chopperlink on Sun, 26 Dec 2010 12:08:11 -0800
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/dark-cloud-2/user-reviews/749738/platform/ps2/ Wed, 01 Dec 2010 20:29:23 -0800 coylenintendo reviewed Alan Wake for the Xbox 360... http://www.gamespot.com/alan-wake/user-reviews/747154/platform/xbox360/ ...and gave it a 9.0!

I honestly don't think I heard of Alan Wake until I bought my 250GB Slim Xbox 360 holiday bundle, it was a free download of the game along with Forza Motorsport 3. I will warn you that this is a game that will leave you very confused sometimes but it's basically about an author named Alan Wake. he's the main character and the one you'll use throughout the entire game. from the beginning, it seems that he's been having writers block and just can't write anymore. so he goes on vacation to a small town with his wife to stay in a cabin on a lake. but unfortunately a horror story that he didn't finish comes back to haunt him and cause terror for the little town that he visits. it also takes away his wife and everyone around him thinks Alan has become crazy and has something to do with the events around the town.
the game is a fairly simple game as far as knowing what to do. you'll usually only have one thing to do at a time such as saving someone, battling monsters or traveling to the next area. there isn't any darkness in the day time (obviously) but once night comes around, the darkness comes back and will constantly unleash monsters known as the Taken to attack you. they're basically just humans that have been turned into dark shadows and they carry weapons. they'll either toss them at you or try to close in on you and hit you. they'll sometimes be different like for example, you might come across one that can move as fast as Sonic or huge ones that can take you out quickly and take a while to kill. there aren't too many enemies but you'll come across random flying objects like cars or barrels that have been possessed that you'll have to kill with your flashlight. random trees fall and stuff break once in a while too.
the main combat system is simple. you have a flashlight to shine on enemies to weaken them and then you use a gun to kill them. you can carry a revolver, a shotgun or hunting rifle, a flare gun and flares/flashbangs. revolvers are the basic gun in this game and have the most ammo so it's best to conserve shotgun or rifle ammo for larger enemies. flare guns are good for hitting enemies like birds that are far away or just simply using them in a tight spot. flares can weaken all enemies and flashbangs will take them out.
but back on to reviewing.. this combat system is simple but decent, very easy to get used to. you'll get help from other characters and many different objects sometimes.
the graphics for the game are pretty much amazing, the characters, the special effects and your surroundings. the game is pretty creepy at times but it does get a little repetitive so that creepy feeling goes away a little later.
the game is narrated by Alan Wake himself and it definitely feels like a movie or even a TV series with how the game is separated into episodes.
I guarantee Alan Wake is unlike a lot of games you've played, there's so much to tell about this game. it might not be the game of the year or anything but it's definitely one to check out and will probably make you want a sequel.

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"coylenintendo reviewed Alan Wake for the Xbox 360..." was posted by coylenintendo on Wed, 01 Dec 2010 20:29:23 -0800
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/alan-wake/user-reviews/747154/platform/xbox360/ Sat, 04 Sep 2010 16:20:08 -0700 chopperlink reviewed Marble Blast Ultra for the Xbox 360... http://www.gamespot.com/marble-blast-ultra/user-reviews/735953/platform/xbox360/ ...and gave it a 9.5!

The Good: Fun gameplay, great multiplayer games, easy to pick up, nice graphics!, only $5!

The Bad: Only one music track (Use your MP3 player if you get sick of the music), Could of used a deathmatch mode in multiplayer, kinda wish they made single player DLC

Marble Blast Ultra was one of the many game demos I played when I first got the Xbox 360. I got so into it, I decided to buy it along side Braid! The game isn't bad at all. Most of the single player levels require you to reach the finish, or grab all the gems and then reach the finish. Very basic, but really fun in the process.

The Multiplayer contains numerous maps (and you can buy more) that you battle other players for gems on. It's not overly complicated, but can be a blast when you try to figure out how to get to a set of gems before (LOL I'm punny!)!

The game isn't anything too amazing, but it is a nice arcade gem to go along with you Xbox. For $5, there is almost nothing to lose! Hopefully there will be more games like this to come!

Get the full article at GameSpot

"chopperlink reviewed Marble Blast Ultra for the Xbox 360..." was posted by chopperlink on Sat, 04 Sep 2010 16:20:08 -0700
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/marble-blast-ultra/user-reviews/735953/platform/xbox360/ Sat, 26 Jun 2010 15:17:25 -0700 gamerhenry reviewed Wii Sports Resort for the Wii... http://www.gamespot.com/wii-sports-resort/user-reviews/726252/platform/wii/ ...and gave it a 9.0!

Anyone who owns a Wii and their mother is no stranger to the original Wii Sports and its revolutionary use of motion controls that had us begging for more. Well folks... More is now here, and more has never been better :)

Anything we wanted done better in the first installment is now all taken care of with the introduction of the WiiMotion Plus. Tracking is smoother, more accurate, and wayyy more fun with the help of this little device. But lets get into the game shall we.

As expected, Wii sports resort comes with more games than before and with more variety of styles. Instead of mostly swinging motions like in the original with golf, baseball, tennis, etc.. resort now has more interesting games that involve pulling back a bow string... shooting a basketball... rowing a boat and much more. This is all made possible of course by the improved tracking of motion plus. I do however have to admit that golf is still my favorite :) this being said, improvements have also been made to classics such as golf. Now it detects twists in the club as you swing resulting in slices and hooks which adds a nice added dificulty to the game while also adding some additional tools at your desposel. If your good enough that is ;)

Graphics wise, the game feels exactly like before if maybe a bit refined, but overall, the cartoony style is to be expected and loved. nothing too remarkable about music or sound but if your anything like me, you dont expect it with a title like Wii sports.

If I was to critisize anything about resort it would have to be the removal of the mini challenges that were in the original Wii Sports. I would have liked to try to hit the bullseye with a drive into heavy winds with the new golf mechanics. Overall though, amazing game/sequel and I hope to see Nintendo continue to impress :)

THE GOOD:
Amazing controls
More/ variety of games
Intro of stamps and rankings (although could have more depth)
Excellent replay value
Surperb muliplayer (obviously)

THE BAD:
Removal of mini challenges
No online play (typical)...

Conclusion.... GET IT :P

Get the full article at GameSpot

"gamerhenry reviewed Wii Sports Resort for the Wii..." was posted by gamerhenry on Sat, 26 Jun 2010 15:17:25 -0700
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/wii-sports-resort/user-reviews/726252/platform/wii/ Sun, 25 Apr 2010 19:53:25 -0700 allmybase reviewed Deadly Premonition for the Xbox 360... http://www.gamespot.com/deadly-premonition/user-reviews/718399/platform/xbox360/ ...and gave it a 7.0.

For a game with a development cycle as long as Deadly Premonition's, it doesn't necessarily have a lot of excuses for being what it is. Jankiness in most every department is typically the name of the game and in the few fleeting moments where it does actually shine for legitimate reasons, its problems quickly humble it and bring it back down to Earth. Deadly Premonition is therefore not a perfect game by any stretch of the imagination. A quick glance at its box art and $20 price tag in the US is probably indicative enough of that reality. Yet the game still has heart and perhaps since a lot of that heart does come from the fact it never tries to disguise its faults, Deadly Premonition is a game that ultimately comes across as charming and endearing. It won't stop you from yelling at it when it fumbles, but it will help make the experience a forgivable and worthwhile one nonetheless.

Deadly Premonition's plot has you playing the role of FBI criminal profiler Francis York Morgan. An eccentric man who seemingly has nothing against talking to omnipresent, yet invisible imaginary friends, Agent York, as he prefers to be called, is sent to the small town of Greenvale to resolve a gruesome murder. Odd though it may appear odd at first for the FBI to intervene in a local matter, it quickly becomes apparent that the case is much more involved, requiring York to solve a number of initially loosely related tangents in order to finish his job thoroughly. Tagging along for the ride are Greenvale's townspeople and police force, a group of often times equally eccentric people trying to get by amidst the shock of having such a gruesome crime occur in their idyllic hometown. Surprisingly, these are deep people with interesting life stories and motivations. When all else fails, they are what ultimately hold up the plot and keep it interesting. The dynamics in play between everyone always makes for an interesting watch and, more often than not, they're even relatable, making it easy to like and get attached to the characters and their portrayals.

While the storyline is indeed appropriately macabre and sobering at times, it nonetheless does a good job of motivating you to get from one point to the next. It's still not perfectly written and the execution can definitely be awkward at times, even acquiring a sort of unfortunate Indigo Prophecy-like sensation with its logic towards the end, but it still comes out compelling and even appropriately poignant. Having said that, Deadly Premonition is hardly a game that is always meant to be taken seriously. Its wonderfully zany cast and the situations they get put in make sure that the game is a really humorous one, too. The developers seemed to be aware that Deadly Premonition will probably never be considered a high-tier AAA game and as such do a great job at having the game be absurd and poke fun at itself when it should be doing so. A lot of those moments come from York and his almost deliberately anti-social personality, but virtually everyone else in the game has their moments, too, whether it be from the gun dealer who's actually way into trading cards, the hardcore metal rocker running the convenience store, the lady obsessed with her companion the cooking pot, or anyone else in-between. The humor never feels awkwardly placed and it does a lot to ease the pains from issues that often crop up from the game.

The actual gameplay itself in Deadly Premonition is largely split between combat and GTA-style overworld exploration. Neither porition is particularly good. To say that nothing is outright broken is probably the highest praise I can honestly latch onto the game. The combat is very reminiscent of Resident Evil 4 by having you decimate waves of zombies while you attack them from an over-the-shoulder camera angle, but it's never anywhere near as engaging as the source material. Aside from going for headshots to get more money, there is virtually nothing in the way of strategy. You point, shoot, and do that until everything is dead. There are some extra mechanics such as holding your breath that let you stealthily sneak around some of the enemies, but at the end of the day, you're still accomplishing the same sorts of things at the end of the game as your are at its beginning and continue to do so in the exact same manner. This becomes even truer should you come upon weapons that have infinite ammo, as they give even less incentive to actually think and further make the game's difficulty a joke.

The only time the combat segments ever significantly change is when quick time events appear and usually the generous timing in conjunction with consistent button presses mean they're not all that difficult. If you do screw them up, York will usually end up dying, but you always have the option to restart the sequence or go to your previous save point, should circumstances dictate that you do so. If you die at all during the game, it is likely to happen during the quick time events, since the regular zombies themselves do a very pitiful job of actually posing a threat to you.

Usually the combat parts of the game are justified under the guise of having York search and investigate for clues pointing towards the murderer. While this sounds as though it should introduce new mechanics, all it really means is that you walk to specific portions of the map, solve the occasional puzzle to access evidence, and then have York piece everything together automatically so he can tell you what went down at the scene. It contributes to the narrative and helps establish that York really is an elite profiler, but from a gameplay standpoint, they do little to validate you as a player and make you feel like you're actually contributing to the all-encompassing solution.

The overworld exploration Deadly Premonition has tends to offer more interesting opportunities than the fighting ever does. Despite the fact that it's confined to long stretches of dull driving and roaming around that play as though GTA III never came out, the times when you're out and about running more comparitively regular errands are when you best get to know the game's characters. When York is either alone or with other people while driving, for example, optional conversations can happen that never fail to be entertaining and/or entertainingly ludicrous. In addition, with the assistance of a day-night system, everybody in the town has schedules and that means the people you can encounter and their current circumstances change as a result. It's in these routines that a lot of the game's side quests appear, since talking to the right people at the right places and at the right times are usually how you end up killing free time when you're not on a story mission, which happens quite a lot. Doing so means getting to learn personal details about the characters and their lives that aren't discussed in the main plotline, allowing them flesh out and become more attachable the more you spend time with them. By no means is it as fleshed out as, say, the Persona series' Social Links system, but it gets the job done and makes the cast all the more consistently interesting.

There are also a lot of other smaller issues that should be mentioned, as they consistently nag you throughout the game. To begin with, the dialog boxes don't seem to have gotten a lot of proofreading, as there are spelling issues abound on really simple words, although thankfully the voice acting doesn't adhere to those errors. Those same boxes also tend to have somewhat poor syncing in cutscenes, where voiced lines will start before the corresponding text even remotely thinks about rendering itself on the screen. The map you use to navigate around the game, while perfectly functional otherwise, arbitrarily turns in the same direction that York does, making it really hard to orient yourself for the first few hours of the game. Deadly Premonition's inventory system is also wonky, as it never really explains its also Resident Evil-looking organization systems and almost never indicates on the field when you're running at full capacity for an item you attempt to grab. This wouldn't be all that much of a problem if enemy zombies still didn't move towards you and attack while those sorts of error messages appear on the screen with York mindlessly standing around. There are also sleep and hunger meters for York meant to make you manage your time efficiently, except that both get depleted so rarely and are resolved with regular items so quickly that they might as well not be a part of the game in the first place.

Despite the fact that the combat nor the driving is particularly great or memorable, the combination of the two still comes across as weirdly compelling and rewarding. Together they create an odd cohesion and reality within Deadly Premonition that make the gameplay palpable. Part of that comes from knowing that you're usually going to be rewarded by the story pretty handsomely at the end for tolerating it, but the game's constant self-awareness also plays a role there, as well. It never tries to be something that it isn't. It doesn't deny that it is a mishmash of both uninspired Resident Evil 4-style fighting and GTA-esque driving and exploration and that earnestness somehow makes it possible to come to terms with and accept all of the game's many, many blemishes in those areas. It certainly could have been a better game had circumstances been different, but the way in that it at least recongizes that and manages however it can to keep going ensures that the motivation to finish the game doesn't disappear. The gameplay is just as morbidly integral to the game's proceedings as everything else at the end of the day.

The same can be said for the Deadly Preomonition's technical elements. This is especially true with the graphics. Although the character models are usually decent and presentable, most everything else is mediocre at best. The environments are artistically and technoligically poor, with really rough textures, geometry, and pop-in abound. The frame rate also isn't all that stable during combat and gets especially bad when rendering multiple cameras' viewpoints simultaneously. The sound design, meanwhile, while still flawed, is markedly better. Sound effects are modest, but typically appropriate. The voice acting is also usually competent, making the lines feel convincing enough, yet somewhat hammy at times to be a reminder of what was likely a low budget development history for Deadly Premonition. Regardless, the actors do a sufficient job to make all of their characters and associated quirks shine vividly, making it difficult to be all that harsh with it. The music, surprisingly, is the game's best non-storyline-related asset and doesn't feel cheaply written at all. Beautifully composed and used to appropriately accent different parts of the story, the soundtrack is usually excellent. Unfortunately, Deadly Premonition does have a habit of suddenly switching songs without warning to accommodate changing moods, which is always jarring, even if the plot transitions themselves aren't awkward.

Harsh criticisms and Deadly Premonition can and should go hand-in-hand. The game doesn't do a lot of things very well at all and when it royally screws up, it noticeably hampers things. The combat is so simple to the extent that it's condescending and the driving and exploration are only ever interesting if you have filler conversation going on or finally get to your destination to actually accomplish something. Deadly Premonition definitely has no right to be called a perfect game by any account. Yet despite all that, despite the fact that it seems to be purposefully trying at times to derail your enjoyment, it's still a good success in its own right. The story and the characters are all highly thoughtful and engaging and the bad parts, as it turns out, are an interesting garnish that help define the game and make it distinct. It's not the way that most games should stand out, but Deadly Premonition handles itself well with its own brand of composure and awkward grace that the ride to be had on it is a good one, through and through. It's campiness done right in a video game and for that, it's $20 well spent.

Get the full article at GameSpot

"allmybase reviewed Deadly Premonition for the Xbox 360..." was posted by allmybase on Sun, 25 Apr 2010 19:53:25 -0700
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/deadly-premonition/user-reviews/718399/platform/xbox360/ Sat, 17 Apr 2010 19:22:27 -0700 chopperlink reviewed Lumines II for the PSP... http://www.gamespot.com/lumines-ii/user-reviews/717436/platform/psp/ ...and gave it a 10.0!!!

The Good: Great music, challenging gameplay, beautiful visuals!

The Bad: You have to play a long time to get the best skins. But no biggie.

Anywho I first downloaded a demo of this game. It was pretty good. I decided to buy it about a month ago. BEST DECISION EVAR!

The game has a lot of diversity in its music and there is a skin for everyone to listen to while you play hours upon hours on end! The purpose of the game is to put each colored block into a 4x4 square (Or more) and make as many as you can before the never ending timeline erases them. The more cubes you make in one lap of the time line, the higher the score. There are other modes such as vs. CPU, puzzle mode (Where you clear all the blocks in 1 or 2 moves), vs. 2P, and a sequencer where you can make your own music! (Saria's Song anyone?).

Well I can rave on about how great this game is. Just buy it (it's pretty cheap now) and you'll see what I mean!

Get the full article at GameSpot

"chopperlink reviewed Lumines II for the PSP..." was posted by chopperlink on Sat, 17 Apr 2010 19:22:27 -0700
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/lumines-ii/user-reviews/717436/platform/psp/ Wed, 24 Mar 2010 09:52:16 -0700 Links24 reviewed Ninja Gaiden for the Xbox... http://www.gamespot.com/ninja-gaiden-2004/user-reviews/713977/platform/xbox/ ...and gave it a 7.5.

so i loved the old school ninja gaiden games and i loved the challenge of the enemies but this game the challenge isnt in the enemies as much as it is in the control and camera. ive heard so much about this game being hard but i mostly die because of the stupid camera changing in mid-combo making Ryu attack the wrong direction and get hit. Or ill try to do a move and he would do the opposite and go flying into lava. which brings the lack of control over in question .why make a game with a ninja that feels like hes always on a set path and not very agile or fluent in any matter. but besides those the game isnt that bad. Ryu looks like he can take down armies ,even though you prob cant cause the camera would prob mess up or you do the wrong move, and looks awesome in his new suit but i do like the old school one better which is also current in this game. the graphics are pretty awesome with pieces of screen tearing here and there which didnt bother me that much. some of the bosses are also really awesome looking but as much as you want to love the bosses they do have there set of cheap tactics and moves that kill you in 2 hits which makes me wonder "whats the point of a health bar if you die in a couple hits?" its pretty stupid they should have kept the couple hits die thing cause thats what its sorta doing here.

So if you are looking for a solid hack n slash game and can handle a lack of control over a ninja and crappy camera yea pick this 1 up or the black version as if has more unlockables but no classic ninja gaiden game in it. it will be challenging but it will keep asking you to come back for more and not give up cause you would probably want to many many many many times.

Get the full article at GameSpot

"Links24 reviewed Ninja Gaiden for the Xbox..." was posted by Links24 on Wed, 24 Mar 2010 09:52:16 -0700
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/ninja-gaiden-2004/user-reviews/713977/platform/xbox/ Wed, 24 Feb 2010 21:53:39 -0800 shatgan2222 reviewed Heavy Rain for the PlayStation 3... http://www.gamespot.com/heavy-rain/user-reviews/709175/platform/ps3/ ...and gave it a 10.0!!!

First of all, I've been waiting for this game for soo long, and finally I got my hands on it to find out that it is a very cool game!

My points in this review:

STORY:
It's awesome, very entertaining, it actually made my heart beat faster in some suspense times lol. It really feels like a good movie.
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GRAPHICS:
Seriously the BEST looking faces in a video game eveer, very realistic face textures. Nice lighting, gives you the feeling as if you are watching a movie. Very detailed surroundings and buildings. Clothing looks most of the time very good. Some items look really good, and some are seriously very bad looking, such as a napkins or paper.
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SOUND:
Superb voice acting!.
Very nice, orchestral music, it really helps giving you the mood depending on the situation.
(not that I actually payed any attention to the music lol)

alsoo something that I really liked is that the game gives you the option to choose the language and subtitles you want it on.
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ANIMATION:
Characters faces and bodies move realisticly thanks to motion caption, though hands seem to be a bit off sometimes, a good example is like when people clap. (seriously looks very crappy lol). Ohh also I noticed and I'm sure other players did also, that clothing movement looks very odd, when a character is wearing it looks very good, but not when they are moving it such when they change their clothes.
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EXTRAS:
There really aren't many extras in this game (well atleast not in the US version). You have some clips to watch and a few drawings, and that's about it.
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CONTROLS:
I really liked the quick time event thing, but I have to say that the game developers really screw up in how they made the characters to move, you have to use your annalog stick to choose were you want to move, but you need to press R2 to actually start moving. Infact that isn't that bad until you are in a small space or with a bad camera angle and your character starts to move like stupid.
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DIFFICULTY
Super easy, I never died even though I used the hardest mode.
And I actually suck at playing games lol.

In this game you will never get lost, or get to a point were you don't know what to do next. It's kinda linnear gameplay, but you choose the path you want to take.
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GAME DURATION:
Seriously, this was a huge dissapointment for me, such a greaat gamee with awesome story, but supeer short!
It is the only game I've ever finished on the ps3, and I finished in only ONE day, I mean come oon, all this time wating for this game to come out to finish it in only one day u_u.
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TECHNICAL ISSUES:
I noticed a few bugs during gameplay such as sound being clipped or being offsync sometimes. Two times the game froze completely and had to hard reset my ps3. A few save issues, that when I continued a saved file it wouldn't start, or it would leave my character out of the map literally forcing me to restart the game.
Probably they will make patches later on; well, atleast that's what I hope so..
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REPLAY VALUE:
It is pretty high, well only if you want to get the platinum trophy.
-------------------------------------------------------
CONCLUSION:
I really liked this game, most of it because of the story which sucks you in. If you like great story telling like me, then you should GET THIS GAME. If you hate short games DO NOT GET THIS GAME lol cause it will piss you off when you finish the game under 12 hours even though you didn't rushed through the game and you interacted with every single thing you could in the game.

It really is a movie...or game whatever.. I rate it 9.1 :)

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"shatgan2222 reviewed Heavy Rain for the PlayStation 3..." was posted by shatgan2222 on Wed, 24 Feb 2010 21:53:39 -0800
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/heavy-rain/user-reviews/709175/platform/ps3/ Mon, 01 Feb 2010 00:20:16 -0800 allmybase reviewed No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle for the Wii... http://www.gamespot.com/no-more-heroes-2-desperate-struggle/user-reviews/705150/platform/wii/ ...and gave it a 7.0.

No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle is an odd sequel to an already odd game. The original game was one that was simultaneously charming and gruesome, humorous and unflinching, but also one with quirks both deliberate and unintentional. Enjoying it was a matter of coming to terms with that and, like with most Grasshopper Manufacture games, being able to appreciate it on its own terms. Desperate Struggle is therefore a game with opportunities a plenty to improve upon an interesting foundation and on a mechanical front, it usually accomplishes that mission well. But in other areas, there are still caveats to put up with, both old and new, and while none break Desperate Struggle on their own, they are persistent enough to force an air of caution about purchasing it. No More Heroes' second series of massacres still makes for a fun game, but nevertheless is one with blemishes to boot.

Desperate Struggle once again inserts you into the life of Travis Touchdown, a man who became the top assassin for sex and glory, only to put it all behind him and move on with his life. Taking place three years after the original game's conclusion, Travis is brought back into action because of the brutal murder of Bishop, a friend of his from the first game. As a result, he's made to climb through the ranks through a new batch of assassins that have replaced him with the hope that he'll ultimately reach number one again so he can exact vengeance on Bishop's killer. While it's a flimsy rationale for returning series players since Bishop played very minor roles in the original game, it's still ultimately enough to compel you to slay waves bosses and minions for a second consecutive game. There's an interesting, if deeply convoluted story behind it all, but Desperate Struggle's main concern is, first and foremost, that you're always up for cutting some guys, as is par for the course for a game of its genre.

As a sequel, Desperate Struggles' gameplay changes range from minor improvements to fairly drastic overhauls and, for the most part, Suda 51 and company were right in determining which parts needed the most attention and which could largely remain intact. On the lower end of the alteration spectrum is the combat, which sees the fewest real changes. The system already in place in the original, after all, was one of the things that helped define it and to that end, such is also the case with Desperate Struggle. You're still positioning the Wii remote for high and low attacks, still hitting the A button a lot for actual strikes, and still only using motion controls for finishing blows and wrestling moves. Slot machine bonuses still show up after every kill, but pay out less frequently and you're still ultimately going from point A to B to C until you reach one of the game's distinctive boss battles that never fail to spice up how you're made to fight. The main changes to the combat come in the form of multiple equippable katanas that you can switch on the fly to account for different situations, as well as more enemy types and improved enemy AI that does a better job at flanking and avoiding you, as well as knowing when to still attack when Travis is on the ground. Beyond that, the fighting is overall the same in pacing and structure as in the original No More Heroes and it by and large retains the systems that make it recognizable as such. It's therefore still a very fun way of battling on the Wii, since its visceral nature never really takes a break, but it's also one who novelty has acquired some wear and tear now that the ideas behind it aren't all that fresh by the series' own standards. Desperate Struggle is bound to be a very familiar game to those who have prior experience with the first game.

The more major alterations, however, come predominantly in the form of revamped navigation and money-making. Santa Destroy is no longer traversed on foot or by Travis' motorcycle in a quasi-sandbox environment, but rather through a modest menu that let's you instantly travel to points of interests on the map, such as missions for ranking advancement, equipment and clothing purchases, and jobs. Aside from loading times, Desperate Struggle thusly lacks the imposed downtime that some players found contentious, as you can move from one activity to the next without being made to take a breather. As for the work Travis can take up to make an income, instead of polygonal minigames like those used in the original game, all but one of them now play, look, and sound like NES games. The tasks they have you do vary wildly, ranging from picking up falling garbage in space to cooking meat to bug eradication and more. Some take a little while to get a feel for them, meaning that you won't necessarily rake in a lot of money immediately, but they are rewarding once you master them and also have a nice charm for being so adamantly 8-bit. The money you accrue this time, however, does not go towards paying for the next boss fight, though; unlike the original No More Heroes, Desperate Struggle makes every fight free, letting you use your money instead for optional purchases and status upgrades, the latter of which also involves more 8-bit gameplay, albeit of a more difficult variety compared to the part-time work.

With the good often comes the bad, though, and unfortunately for Desperate Struggle, it, too, has its share of issues. One of the most glaring ones of all is how the improvements actually have a habit of backfiring in obtuse ways. On paper, the things that either now work well or have continued to do so since the first game should make Desperate Struggle the superior game over its prequel. Taken on their own, this might be true, but when examined together, Desperate Struggle's gameplay loses a lot of cohesion that the original game had. Things that should fit well just don't do so quite as much as you would expect. While the previous game might have had its own fair share of issues, the experience it created nonetheless had a sort of consistency that went a long way to define it. Most everything in that game had some sort of context behind it and a reason for why they worked the way in which they did, so while you might not have always liked what it was trying to do, at least its intentions were always clear and you had the motivation to move forward.

The components that make up Desperate Struggle's gameplay by and large lack that sort of unity, leaving you to figure out why exactly you should take advantage of some of the features in the first place. Combat is a particularly vivid example, where you have more swords to choose from this time around instead of just constantly upgrading one sword or replacing it with a better one entirely like in the first No More Heroes game. Each sword is supposed to be used for different situations and the swing mechanics change between accordingly them to accommodate that. It's a seemingly good way to bring strategy into a game without making it unnecessarily cerebral. The problem is that when the end goal is always to just keep slashing your way to the boss and every sword is ultimately just as effective as the others with the right timing and damage considerations, there's little reason to actually explore the different swords. This especially apparent at times since the game never actually throws any enemies at you that explicitly force you to change swords.

Such is the sort of problem that permeates much of the game, extending to plenty of areas outside of combat, too. The lack of context for most of the features goes a long way to negate the improvements, since the streamlined mentality of the game gives just as much justification to explore the new features as it does to outright ignore them. The working minigames are another major example of this problem. You can and probably will try to take up some of the side jobs, but without needing to use them to actually pay to advance the game, now that you can just advance to the next level at any time, it's very possible to lose the willpower to actually do the jobs very quickly once you run out of entirely optional things you want to buy. It's a sort of tone about the game that never ceases to linger, either, leaving a bitter aftertaste for the goodwill that the game does legitimately draw up, too.

There are more concrete issues that further hamper the experience in Desperate Struggle, though. The storyline, as mentioned earlier, is convoluted and often times incoherent, and the disjointed structure it often employs by sifting through different points in time back and forth certainly don't help. While this anarchy is not entirely unsurprising, given that it's a product of Suda 51's mind, it still makes the story hard to follow and character motivations eventually become downright incomprehensible. This is especially true of the bosses who, unlike the previous game's bunch, seem to lack much in the way of any real characterization outside of the unique attacks they cycle through during the actual fighting. The way they try to present themselves before and after their fights just doesn't always do a good job at eliciting anything other than apathy. Some of them still manage to be memorable, but by and large, they're typically more easily forgettable and the storyline overall struggles to hold your attention. By the end of the game, the feeling that you're taking Travis from one place to another without any real understanding of the proceedings is more common than it ought to be.

Desperate Struggle also implements a camera that, for the majority of the time, cannot be controlled manually outside of Ocarina of Time-style re-centering. This isn't usually a problem in the moments leading up to boss fights, but once those showdowns commence, the crazy nature of the antics at hand can be too much for the camera to handle and can get it stuck in bad spots. Usually it isn't debilitating, but when considering that the previous game actually had manual camera control that worked well despite its d-pad trappings, it feels as though the development team was trying to address an issue that never really was present in the first place.

Additionally, the game also has a few levels that require sometimes liberal amounts platforming. These segments are often nothing short of just being utterly broken. Desperate Struggle runs on an engine that blatantly isn't designed for that sort of gameplay and it shows; platform collision is highly spotty and tends to nastily push you to the ground when it shouldn't right when you're trying to reconnect with solid ground. Couple this with a camera that really could use manual control for those sorts of situations and you have an entire facet of the game that really should have been scrapped before release. Bringing variety into any action game bound to otherwise have lots of repetition is appreciated, but only when it's done correctly, and the platforming is hardly one of them. Thankfully they only take up a small fraction of the game, but the fact that they still take up any time in the game in the first place is still irksome.

Although the gameplay may not always be up to snuff, the technical elements that make up Desperate Struggle are usually well-done. The graphics are once again done in a cel-shaded style similar to the first game, although the texture quality has been upped and the game as a whole has a grittier look to accompany its darker tone. Frame rate problems do crop up, but they're most frequent during cutscenes and when they actually do show up in the gameplay, they don't last nearly long enough to substantially derail the gameplay. This can usually be attributed to the game's vast amount of particle effects such as blood spray, which are otherwise well-crafted. The sound design is respectable, as well, and the voice actors also turn in good work, even if the regular enemies' phrases do get repetitive over time. The music is probably Desperate Struggles' strongest suit technologically, since it typically compliments the action really well. From the MIDI-sounding tunes that emphasize the simplicity of Travis' side jobs to the themes for the actual bosses themselves that compliment the respective situations, Desperate Struggle is often a great game musically and makes for very enjoyable listening. A good soundtrack for a game knows how to compliment the action on the screen well and this one doesn't have a hard time at all in accomplishing that.

I won't say that No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle is a bad game because I still think that it isn't. The combat is still really fun and knows just how to use the Wii's motion controls to make a really visceral experience. The game as a whole is darker, but it still has a lot of the trademark humor and even manages to be touching in a few spots. Mechanically, the game definitely has noticeable improvements over the original one and, when taken on their own, certainly work better in execution. To be honest, that alone is probably enough to compel people to purchase the game, as they should if they want to. But I still have my reservations about the game as a whole. Improvements to a game's core only make the whole product better if they're cohesively implemented, which is where Desperate Struggle falters a lot. When just one aspect of the game is doing its thing on its own, everything goes smoothly and the experience is really great, but when made to work as a cog in a larger machine, it doesn't integrate as well with the rest of the game as one might expect. Such is really the overarching characteristic of Desperate Struggle. It's a game that has good intentions and genuinely tries to improve the formula set forth in the first No More Heroes game, but comes away with a handful of both accomplishments and drawbacks. If you can get still behind that, it's a fun game worth the purchase price, but if you can't, don't try to betray your cynicism. It's more likely than not steering you in the right direction.

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"allmybase reviewed No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle for the Wii..." was posted by allmybase on Mon, 01 Feb 2010 00:20:16 -0800
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/no-more-heroes-2-desperate-struggle/user-reviews/705150/platform/wii/ Sat, 30 Jan 2010 11:40:20 -0800 coylenintendo reviewed Jak and Daxter: The Precursor Legacy for the PlayStation 2... http://www.gamespot.com/jak-and-daxter-the-precursor-legacy/user-reviews/704884/platform/ps2/ ...and gave it a 9.0!

Jak and Daxter was one of the earliest titles for the PS2 and one of the best. the game starts out with Jak and his buddy Daxter but Daxter gets turned into a small animal.. can't even remember the name of it lol but this happens while they're exposed to stuff known as dark eco. the game is similar to a Mario game when it comes to what you have to do. you have to visit different areas and collect Power Cells. you have to get a certain number of those to advance to a new area. each area has different levels. these levels require you to defeat something, collect something, play a special kind of game, help someone out, etc. doing these things will get you Power Cells. in each area, there's Scout Flies and Precursor Orbs. Scout Flies are an invention by one of Jak's female friends and you'll receive a Power Cell by collecting all of them. Precursor Orbs are mainly used to buy Power Cells from certain characters. This is basically how most of the game is with an occasional boss here and there. you don't have to collect everything to beat the game but you do have to get enough Power Cells to advance further and you can collect things that you forgot after you beat the final boss.
Jak's main attacks are a spinning type of move and I don't know how to describe the other one, it's sort of like a quick punch. these moves can help out a lot. you'll also get to use different eco powers throughout the game. you'll find small amounts of eco or fountain type of thing that gives you a full amount until it runs out. the blue eco speeds Jak up and breaks open boxes around him as well as making scout flies and precursor orbs go to him. this will also help out with advancing farther because the blue eco activates certain things. red eco powers Jak up so he does more damage. yellow eco gives Jak the power to shoot powerful blasts which is really helpful when fighting a lot of enemies at once or harder enemies. it'll also help when you need to hit things that are farther away.
this is definitely one of those games that'll keep making you mad but the game isn't incredibly hard if you're used to playing this type of game. there's also many funny parts to the game so it isn't boring.
this game should definitely be considered a PS2 classic by now and for anyone that hasn't tried the series, it's worth playing. Jak is only 5 bucks at places like Gamestop so it's worth owning. as frustrating as Jak 2 and 3 are, they're worth playing after this one.

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]]> http://www.gamespot.com/jak-and-daxter-the-precursor-legacy/user-reviews/704884/platform/ps2/ Sun, 17 Jan 2010 10:59:47 -0800 horgen123 reviewed Bayonetta for the Xbox 360... http://www.gamespot.com/bayonetta/user-reviews/702925/platform/xbox360/ ...and gave it a 9.5!

Bayonetta at first may seem like a Devil May Cry rip off with a female protagonist and it's angelic enemies. However from the moment the Prologue unfolds, it's clear that this is something else, and a much better beast. Beneath the deep combat system, it's over-the-top moments, absurd and violent deaths of angels, is a coherent story with it moments of sweetness. But the story isn't this game's main attraction, it's combat experience is.

A 500 year slumber is enough for a world to change entirely, memories to become lost and clouded, which is the case here. The game begins 20 years after Bayonetta's awakening. A tip from her informant leads her to the city of Vigrid. Vigrid seems to be closer to the angelic world than any other place on earth and angelic enemies do appear at almost every corner in the city. Bayonetta's fight through Vigrid teaches her about her past, the downfall of her clan, The Umbran Witches and their counterpart The Lumen Sages and awaken her lost memories. The bottom of the story is the traditional fight between light and darkness, The Lumen Sages with the God of Paradiso control power of light while the Umbran Witches with the demons from Inferno watched over the darkness. Both clans had deep respect for each other, but a tragic event caused the clans to go into war. At the end, only an Umbran Witch remained, Bayonetta, locked in a coffin at the bottom of a lake.

The main attraction in the game is its deep and nearly flawless combat system. Even from the beginning you can pull of incredible combos and chain them together with bullets from her many guns. One in each hand and one hooked to each of her high (incredibly high) heels. Apart from the combos you can perform right away, new attacks are available to buy through Rodin, the demonic barkeep/smith. However nifty combos aren't all you get when you want to finish of enemies. Bayonetta has a number of stylish special attacks to finish off her enemies. From summoning guillotines out of thin air to chainsawing them into pieces. Finishing off bosses has their own special attack, and monsters summoned from Bayonetta's hair. The only down side with all this? Performing advanced combos is a bit of a challenge. Luckily the game lets you practice during the loading which is cleverly disguised as a combo practice.

What fuels this fluid combat system is your ability to dodge incoming attacks. Avoiding these attacks will be life saving as enemies often deal lots of damage and rarely drop bonus health. Learning when to dodge will also reward you in another way as well. Dodging an attack at the last possible moment enables witch time (comparable to bullet time in other games). A powerful ability that reduces enemy movement to a crawling pace and lets you deal deadly attacks and drops their sometimes strong defenses.

The combat system however wouldn't do much good if the control system was not up to the task. It's fluid, fast and responsive. A reaction the instant you push a button, all the time. The game also features a well working auto lock-on, so your break dancing (literally) combos goes towards the enemy, and not open space. Throughout the game you will unlock new weapons available to buy through Rodin. And since the game lets you set up two arsenals of weapons that you can easily change during combat and even mid com-combos, getting other weapons certainly adds to the experience. This gives you a chance to easily and quickly deal with very different enemies, where different weapons may be the best way to go.

The game's biggest problem comes with the levels not following the traditional styIe. Some places you have to ride a motorbike or a rocket, and while it is not a bad experience, it's definitely not on par with the rest of the game. Dodging enemy assault being the weak point in this case, instead of its strong one.

Visually the game is very nice. While most of the focus is on the characters, there is never a problem telling what everything on the screen is. The game runs smooth at 60 FPS, even during the most chaotic events. Camera issues are close to nonexistent.

The soundtrack does somehow fit the game, with it's catchy pop and retro arcade synth. Most noticeable is "Fly me to the Moon" which is used throughout the entire game. Together with the soundtrack is an all-star voice cast, with Bayonetta, naturally, being the top one.

Even on normal the lesser enemies can be fatal, there are two harder difficulties to unlock for the skilled player. If you're completely new to this kind of game, there is also Easy and Very Easy available right from the start. Also the game rates how well you do it in each of the 16 chapters, and each chapter split up into verses, where each verse get its own rating. Aiming for the pure platinum is both challenging and rewarding.

With the fluidity and flexibility of it's fighting engine, responsive controller and good use of Witch Time, the game feels just about right almost all the time. And not a sister game to other fighting oriented action games, but more than capable of standing on its own two feet. Along with it's many memorable moments, many of them being silly, Bayonetta doesn't leave your mind when you put down the controller. This is an action game you definitely shouldn't miss.

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"horgen123 reviewed Bayonetta for the Xbox 360..." was posted by horgen123 on Sun, 17 Jan 2010 10:59:47 -0800
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/bayonetta/user-reviews/702925/platform/xbox360/ Fri, 08 Jan 2010 01:38:25 -0800 allmybase reviewed Trine for the PC... http://www.gamespot.com/trine/user-reviews/701455/platform/pc/ ...and gave it a 9.0!

Right from the get-go, Trine is the sort of game that knows what it is and isn't. It is a (predominantly) downloadable game, with a modest scope and healthy, but not particularly lengthy run time. In that regard, it's not particularly different from its contemporaries on services like Steam and XBLA. What it is not, however, is a game that should be scoffed at in most any regard whatsoever. While Trine is a game with a very specific mission in mind, one devoted to delivering satisfying combat and environmental puzzles, it is nevertheless one it accomplishes brilliantly. From the level design to the accessibly nuanced gameplay and physics mechanics, Trine is an intellectually stimulating ride whose intrinsic traits easily justify the cost and hard drive space without much reservation whatsoever. If you're in need of a more wallet-friendly game that doesn't sacrifice integrity or quality, Trine is definitely a game worth investigating.

Trine's story premise is probably the least developed aspect of the entire package, but what's there is sufficient enough to contextualize your antics and drive you from one level to the next. You play as three nameless characters, a wizard, a thief, and a knight, who are more or less forced to inhabit the same body because of a bond they have with the titular artifact the Trine. Their journey is one that seeks separation, searching for a way in which they can all regain their own bodies and move on with their lives. The plot never gets much deeper than that, although the deliberately medieval campiness brought to life by Shakespearian-like voice actors do keep things lighthearted and entertaining for the entire game.

Although all three characters are permanently bonded together for the time, one can always be active to access their abilities, with the other two being promptly available with a quick key press. The wizard, for example, is able to summon platforms and manipulate objects to cross chasms, while the thief is acrobatic with her trusty grappling hook and the knight is combat-focused. Even early on in the game, this creates a really great team dynamic, as no one character is suitable for every conceivable situation a level presents. Within a few minutes, for example, you might need to fight some skeletons as the knight, cross ravines as the thief, and create bridges as the wizard. Every character is made to be flexible in their abilities and it's all balanced to such an extent that everybody gets pretty equal amounts of exposure. No one character is ever made to be used for long stretches because of that. Soon enough in the game, you'll find yourself switching characters out quickly and using their abilities in tandem simultaneously to conquer the levels, which consistently creates a great feeling of satisfaction when everything works as you planned.

This is greatly complimented with Trine's level designs, which present a slew of thoughtful puzzles that are often open-ended enough to support multiple solutions. This is especially true in the later levels, when things become more ambiguous and the game leaves it up to you to decide the best path for going forward without providing any explicit hints. While some puzzles do show up multiple times and are somewhat exploitable, they tend to be easy obstacles that aren't meant to take up much of your time anyway. The main ones unique to each level, however, are really well-developed, as they force you to stop and evaluate the area momentarily, but are rarely frustrating to the extent of requiring a trip to GameFAQs. More often than not, such solutions are also simpler than what you may original think, making it a testament to the eloquence of Trine's underlying gameplay designs.

Given that the puzzles also physics-oriented, an extra layer of depth is thankfully added since things such as gravity, weight, and momentum often come into play. Different characters' abilities affect the environment in their own ways and the game always does a good job at making sure you take that into account while pursuing a solution. The physics thusly adds more variables to the thinking process without being convoluted and since they compliment and influence the puzzles quite nicely, they're really an integral and appreciated part of Trine.

A good number of other environmental puzzles, however, are optional, but still highly worthwhile. This is because they yield either treasure that the different characters can equip interchangeably or vials of experience used to level up the characters and abilities. Some of them are put in obvious places that don't require much effort, but a lot of them are located in fairly obtuse areas. Once you find their locations, it's sometimes not particularly apparent how you're supposed to go about accessing them. The nature of the loot, however, does a good job at motivating you to explore and persevering with the puzzles, as you're always rewarded for going to the trouble of veering off the otherwise linear beaten path.

Combat, however, also plays a surprisingly major role in the gameplay, as both the thief and the knight have explicit fighting capabilities. Although the fundamentals of this aspect of the gameplay are also simple, they're also as engaging as the puzzles in their own right. The easy execution of attack and defense maneuvers, dependent on whether you opt for the long-range thief or in-your-face knight, is done in such a way that combat rarely becomes tiresome or tedious. Coupled with the fact that experience is also tied into it, as well, there is incentive a plenty to get into skirmishes. While the enemy designs are unfortunately lacking in overall variety, the types do change up consistently enough to make you adapt your strategies accordingly. This is ultimately for the better anyway, for while the combat is really great fun, if typically on the somewhat easy side, the puzzles never cease to be the real stars of Trine, either. The fighting therefore has its place in the overall scheme and it knows that, being a welcomed facet without ever becoming overbearing.

Conceptually, Trine sounds as though it might be a budget indie title that emphasizes its gameplay over its technology, but in this instance, that conclusion would be wrong. In addition to being a thoughtful game with clever puzzles, it's also one that uses its graphics and physics engines to great effect. The visuals make each level look enjoyably colorful and distinctive without being particularly taxing on the hardware; there are settings you can certainly crank up if you have the resources available, but if you have to be more modest, the game's beauty still shines through anyway without taking a huge toll on the computer. Likewise, Trine's use of the PhysX engine does a good job of complimenting the gameplay well, forcing you to take realistic concepts from physics into account as you solve the puzzles and go from point A to point B. The physics themselves are exaggerated in some areas, but it's never to the extent that it stops being plausible. The music is also nicely composed and fits in with each level well, including a few particularly standout pieces along the way. Additionally, the sound design, while not outstanding in either the voice acting or general effects, are competently done with no real complaints whatsoever.

Clocking in at around eight to ten hours, Trine isn't a particularly long game and can be finished within a few sittings. That's perfectly fine, though, as what's there from the beginning to the conclusion is superbly constructed. Trine's greatness truly comes from how it takes the character dynamics, the level designs, and the combat and creates a cohesive, dynamic package out of them that shines brightly. Everything is so well-balanced that it's hard to not find equal enjoyment out of each predominant facet of the gameplay. It's a game that knows how to hold your attention the entire way through, often presenting new challenges without ever having them feel jarring or foreign. Admittedly there are a few puzzles that can be irksome and time-consuming, but again, that's largely resolved thanks to the flexibility that Trine offers you. Otherwise, as a whole, Trine is an incredibly solid game with few real flaws, making it easy to recommend that you go out and download it. Its scope may not compare to other recent games, but it knows what it's doing and it almost always plays wonderfully to its numerous strengths as a result.

Get the full article at GameSpot

"allmybase reviewed Trine for the PC..." was posted by allmybase on Fri, 08 Jan 2010 01:38:25 -0800
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/trine/user-reviews/701455/platform/pc/ Sun, 20 Dec 2009 21:03:23 -0800 allmybase reviewed Silent Hill: Shattered Memories for the Wii... http://www.gamespot.com/silent-hill-shattered-memories/user-reviews/698350/platform/wii/ ...and gave it a 8.5.

In its own idiosyncratic ways, I see Silent Hill: Shattered Memories as doing something similar for its respective series like what Resident Evil 4 did nearly six years ago as well. I'm doubtful that it'll trigger as widespread of a revolution outside its franchise as the GameCube action-horror managed, but just look at a screenshot or watch a video and it becomes pretty apparent that it's taking the series in a direction that's certainly new for it, but not without also being prone to trigger some controversy. That's more or less an inevitability, especially with a series that was perceivably staying truer to its roots, for better or for worse, compared to Capcom's last couple of outings with their own one. But if you're looking for a Silent Hill game with a different take on the formula, one that actually seems to make a very good first push towards redefining survival horror, then Shattered Memories is certainly worth your time. It has a few marring flaws to its name, but by and large, it's an intriguing and scarily fun joy to play through all the way up to its surprising finale.

Much like in the original PlayStation 1 game, Shattered Memories places you in the shoes of Harry Mason, an average guy looking for his beloved daughter after getting into a car crash. Beyond that, though, things unfold pretty differently and it's due in no small part to how the game contextualizes its proceedings. Instead of just going from point A to point B, you're actually taking part in a therapy session at a psychiatric office, which make appearances in the game's intermissions. During these sessions, you'll be having jovial chats with a grizzled psychiatrist who pulls all the stops to figure out what makes you tick. From questionnaires about your sex life to idyllic coloring books to ink blots and a lot more, he constantly profiles you and your antics. You almost never know whether you're doing anything right or wrong, but that's also not the point so much as it is to see where your (possibly) honest responses will take you.

The game, in turn, takes your responses to these exercises and tailors the actual levels accordingly. Sometimes the effects are subtle and sometimes they're blatant, going so far as to outright alter character personalities, level layouts, and puzzles, but you often get the impression that the larger forces at work in Silent Hill are at least partially because of your responses, which constantly keeps you on the lookout for what sort of resulting curve ball the game will throw at you. Usually you can't guess it right and that's a good thing on its part; as a survival horror game, its job is to make sure you never know what to expect from the unexpected.

In fact, that's the general philosophy of Shattered Memories' story in general, a job it succeeds at very, very well. This is because the game is as much one about its characters as it is the very town of Silent Hill itself. The snowy little hamlet is really another character you get to know throughout your entire journey. With combat completely nonexistent, Shattered Memories instead prioritizes exploration and uses this to great effect. As you walk around and solve the occasional puzzle, you'll likely be very compelled to check out a lot of the odds and ends of the different environments. The game motivates you to do this primarily in the form of messages both disturbing and innocent you receive on your cell phone as you find objects and places that have deep emotional attachments to them. Checking out these messages is a very enlightening exercise on the lives of the ordinary people living there and while they usually don't directly help you find Harry's daughter, they do help make the place feel real and alive. It's a place with history and the game makes sure you never stop feeling that. You'll also encounter a large number of phone numbers on things like posters that Harry can call and get actual responses from and there's also a camera to unearth even more secrets, both of which further enhance the atmosphere of a place once brimming with life. It's hard to really define the atmosphere the game creates from all this, but it's nothing short of sensational on various levels.

The portions of the plot where you actually interact with other characters are still really well-done, though. Harry meets a couple of other people on the path to finding his daughter who also happen to be in Silent Hill as well. They're a deliberately ambiguous bunch, with Shattered Memories giving you just enough details to get to know them a bit, but they're all well done and play a role in helping Harry figure out his situation and the resolution it needs. Save for a scant few instances where he's actually following someone, though, these meetings are confined to somewhat occasional cutscenes, giving the game time a plenty to nevertheless instill a due sense of isolation as you go wandering around Silent Hill.

Shattered Memories' gameplay is largely executed very well and the self-motivated exploration sequences are so well done that they make the package very worthwhile, but if there is one area that can be a source of frustration, it's in the game's chase sequences. In these portions, Harry encounters iconic, but seemingly hallucinatory monsters and has to run away from them while heading towards a specific check point. The only real line of defense Harry has at his disposal is a well-executed shoving maneuver done with the Wii remote that affect objects he can use to obstruct paths, as well as any monsters that may have latched onto him. Beyond that, since Harry has no other way of fighting back now, the idea is to just make it alive in one piece.

On paper, this all works brilliantly since it creates a constant sense of tension and sheer survival. It works well the first couple of times when the level layouts are fairly linear and conclude at a quick pace, but once things start getting very curvy and spacious, they can quickly become very tedious and anger-inducing. Harry's phone has a map function that also lets you draw a path to the checkpoint, but since you can't bring it up without slowing him down to a very slow walking pace, what often ends up happening is that you become lost and if you don't find the exit by sheer chance, you'll probably get to restart the sequence multiple times once you're unable to fend off the monsters any longer. Things get even worse upon reaching areas with repeating corridors that end up making that map function useless even when you do find time to get a breather. It's unfortunate, since the chase sequences are an idea that has a lot of really wonderful potential in the Silent Hill universe, but thankfully they don't appear often enough to completely dominate and overwhelm the otherwise very positive experiences Shattered Memories has in store.

On a technical level, Shattered Memories is typically a very great Wii game. The graphics are among the best the system has on offer, offering really good models and high resolution textures, both of which do a really, really good job at making the exploration really enjoyable. The environments in particular tend to be so well detailed that it's hard to not naturally explore every nook and cranny just to see what's lying around, both hidden and in plain sight. The frame rate is also very steady, not giving way even during the intense chases. The shadows that objects cast do, unfortunately, often look awkward upon close inspection, as the power of Harry's trusty flashlight seems to make them render in really weird ways. They seem to often appear to be duplicate models of the objects that the game tries to distort, instead of operating as something more akin to a texture changing in real-time. This is an issue that only applies to light coming from your flashlight, though; the ambient lighting and shadows from the environments themselves are thankfully pristine and are never problematic. Beyond that blemish, though, Shattered Memories is one of the best-looking Wii games produced yet and the shadows aren't awkward enough to constantly distract you away from the haunting beauty the game otherwise has to display.

The other areas of Shattered Memories are also well-produced, too. The sound direction naturally does its job of creating fear in even the tamest gameplay situations and the soundtrack, while subdued, constantly sets the right tone for the game's various levels. The game's voice acting also does a good job at making the characters fit right into the story and no lines stick out like sore thumbs. The psychiatrist is particularly well-done, as the vocal talents behind him go very far to create an eccentric man who's ultimately there to help you, but not without being devilish along the way, too. Likewise, the motion controls, while a bit touchy, overall work really well and make the puzzle-solving a tactile experience. Additionally, being able to use it to control the flashlight makes the exploration even more compelling. You have to train yourself not to make sweeping gestures that throw off the Wii's sensor bar, but other than that, the motion controls always work and feel like a natural part of the game. It's ironically best done in the chase sequences, as shaking monsters off of you never ceases to be a visceral experience even amidst the other issues present during those times. It should also be noted that outside of transitions to indoors or outdoors, the game has almost nothing in the way of load times at all. The times where they do show up are so brief that they're virtually over already before you see them, ensuring that Shattered Memories' pacing is never sabotaged.

Let's not beat around the bush about it; Silent Hill: Shattered Memories does have problems. The chase sequences don't work as well as they should and for a game that emphasizes its graphics so much to create the right aura, it's sad to see that shadows cast from your flashlight are pretty wonky to see. But at its core, Shattered Memories is a really great game that's hopefully the start of a series of reboots that make further refinements. Plus, while the game itself may be short and clocks in at around six to eight hours, it has one of the best stories in recent memory, containing multiple mind-screwing endings that will probably make you want to do a few runs through the game again to change up the experiences along the way. It may very well be 2009's last real hurrah, but this is a reboot that's well worth supporting, flaws and all, since it takes many, many steps in the right direction towards redefining the survival-horror genre for the better.

Get the full article at GameSpot

"allmybase reviewed Silent Hill: Shattered Memories for the Wii..." was posted by allmybase on Sun, 20 Dec 2009 21:03:23 -0800
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/silent-hill-shattered-memories/user-reviews/698350/platform/wii/ Tue, 15 Dec 2009 13:33:10 -0800 chopperlink reviewed Pokemon Rumble for the Wii... http://www.gamespot.com/pokemon-rumble/user-reviews/697579/platform/wii/ ...and gave it a 8.5.

The last time got a new Pokémon game was when I was around 11-12 years old and we got Pokémon Gold and Silver. We eventually outgrew the series. We recently downloaded the demos off of the Wii Shop Channel and played the Pokémon Rumble demo for the hell of it. OMG it was the best!!

The game was so good that we decided why not! We bought the full version and had a great time with it. The game is about battling toy Pokémon that do not level up or evolve. The game starts with only the first 151, so if you haven’t played the series in years, then you can get back into it with this game. It also makes it rather nostalgic for people like me who used to be obsessed with these things. Soon when you beat your way through the game, you get to use the Diamond and Pearl Pokémon.

Gameplay – The game is pretty much a beat-em-up similar to the arcade game Smash TV. You go around beating up other Pokémon and even catching some (Which is random) to play as. Your Pokémon only have 1-2 moves to use over and over while you kill waves upon waves of other Pokémon. You can play up to four players (Which is a blast) and try to catch all those little bastards with your friends. Your Pokémon do not level up or evolve, which is a bummer. You instead try to capture stronger Pokémon for use in the battle arena so you can progress the game. Eventually you can beat the game and go for a harder mode. It’s great, but the game could have used a multiplayer versus mode.

Graphics – It has pretty decent graphics for a WiiWare game. The environments could have been a lot better though.

Fun Factor – the game gets addictive and fun when you are trying to catch all of the Pokémon. It’s also great to play with friends!

It is a really solid WiiWare game and probably the best game for WiiWare at the moment. Even if haven’t played the games in years like I have, get the game! You might actually start liking the little guys again!

Get the full article at GameSpot

"chopperlink reviewed Pokemon Rumble for the Wii..." was posted by chopperlink on Tue, 15 Dec 2009 13:33:10 -0800
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/pokemon-rumble/user-reviews/697579/platform/wii/ Sun, 13 Dec 2009 16:16:47 -0800 allmybase reviewed Shin Megami Tensei Online: Imagine for the PC... http://www.gamespot.com/shin-megami-tensei-online-imagine/user-reviews/697309/platform/pc/ ...and gave it a 5.0.

I think there's, hypothetically speaking, potential for an MMO set in the universe of Shin Megami Tensei. The venerated RPG series has more than enough distinct features and characteristics that, with the right attention and development team, could make for a really interesting game, especially in a genre for which people tend to cry out more variety. Atlus has repeatedly shown that it's very capable of providing things like moving stories and is more than willing to experiment with large overhauls to series mechanics. Shin Megami Tensei: Imagine is none of those things, however. It's a functional, free-to-play MMO, and you can do much worse, but it's hard to not get the feeling that Atlus just arbitrarily phoned this one in, especially since it was hallowed top-down shooter studio Cave, of all companies, taking the development reins on this one.

Imagine takes place in-between the first and second installments in the main Shin Megami Tensei series itself, placing it all before the events of Nocturne. Tokyo has undergone a rather unfortunate apocalypse, rendering a number of its iconic special wards unrecognizable, as well as naturally making it a breeding ground for all things demon-related. It's more or less up to do to take up your share of the burden, handle the demons yourself, and make the world a slightly better place. Like most Megami Tensei games, religious themes, too, play prominent roles later on, but the execution of the storytelling itself is very consistently bland nonetheless. There's no voice acting in the cut scenes whatsoever to bring whatever little life there might be in an already dull cast (Snakeman is more or less the most creative name the entire game has), but even if those weren't problems, the events depicted in those scenes tend to be so anticlimactic that it's usually more worthwhile to just hit the enter key to skip it and move on with the game's proceedings. Imagine's story is one that isn't likely to be engaging to even people willing to forgive it and it's because of that the game already loses one of its prime motivators to keep grinding and moving forward as a Megami Tensei game.

Once the gameplay actually kicks in, that's when Imagine truly starts slowly, but persistently going downhill. As a free-to-play MMO, Imagine naturally has an economy dictated by those who play for free and those who pay for extra content with real money. For all intents and purposes, though, the game limits the payable items to fancy costumes and high-end weapons and items that are more or less just as competent as anything else you could find for free. The fact that this more or less puts free and paid players on equal footing is probably the highest compliment I have on offer for the gameplay, as the rest of it never really goes beyond mediocrity.

Take the combat, for example. As a player, you can set yourself up for a few predictable classes, be they gunner, melee, or spellcaster. The interface with which you attack, defend, and counterattack are very similar to games like World of Warcraft, where you'll select a command from a task bar, watch it execute in real time, and then deal with any timers that might affect how often you can choose a particular option. None of it is broken, but it's more often than not very boring to fight most anything, bosses included, and considering Imagine's genre, there's a lot of combat to had. There's no real variety to be had; the same tactics tend to work for the same situations and if you do run into a bit of a rut, you often have to change your style only very slightly before you regress back to the usual antics. The same way you fight a boss is the same way you fight the enemies leading up to it, which, in turn, is essentially the same way you fight your very first enemies. Evolution on any front is not one of Imagine's main concerns and it shows in every battle.

Player classes and enemies do, however, need some more balance tweaking. People who play as gunners will find that they'll probably have an easier time with the game than anyone, since their reload times aren't as dramatic as a mage's spell cooldowns or swordsman's swing timing. The fact that their shots also often push enemies away from them for high damage even early on just makes it frustrating for people trying to develop characters of other classes. Enemies are also inconsistent in the difficulty curve they have on offer, possessing both an AI that may or may not arbitrarily attack you at any time even without you targeting it and raw power that kill you swiftly and infuriatingly, thanks to experience penalties you take for dying and reviving elsewhere. In one early mission, for example, you have to take down a larger version of a fairly common enemy. But doing that means going through hordes of other enemies that more or less attack very aggressively on sight with lightning magic and since you have very little at your disposal to easily counter it at that stage in the game, you're bound to die numerous times just so you can take down one enemy that isn't even nearly as difficult. You never quite know when it's coming and it's because of that quality that it's hard to ever really get a sense of confidence in your own fighting abilities over the course of the game.

In fact, the levelling system in the game is just as aggravatingly plodding. As an MMO, it's natural to expect that you won't level up as fast as in conventional RPGs; it's how the game is meant to keep you attached to the world for longer stretches. The real problem becomes apparent pretty quickly when you see that the game will outright cut off the main single-player quests until you reach a certain far-off level. You'd think this would be at least somewhat resolved through the game's dungeons, but those have difficulty curve issues of their own that, in turn, mean that you'll likely be excessively repeating the same few instances you can actually bear consistently if you go that route. The only remotely viable route beyond that is to party up with friends as they do earlier story quests that hand out hundreds of thousands of bonus experience, but even that route is only possible if you find people willing to put up with just as much repetition as the dungeon. Throw in the expertise system, which is like your abilities' own levelling system done purely by mashing the corresponding key over and over in battle, and you get the impression that Imagine deliberately tries to bore its player populace. When you finally do reach that elusive level that lets you progress in the storyline, you get a sense far more of relief than of accomplishment, only to have it shot down quickly enough with another halt in the quests until you reach a levelling goal again.

Perhaps most unfortunate of all is Imagine's very poor use of a Shin Megami Tensei standby: the demons themselves. As you run around Tokyo, you'll be able to recruit demons who can then fight by your side. On a combat level, they operate just like your actual player character does and you can even manipulate their movement control manually with a very shoddy camera if necessary. Fusion is also present in the game and works pretty much like what you would expect, although you have no say in what abilities the new demon inherits by default and what they'll get through experience. Having said that, more or less everything else related to the demons that you would expect from a Megami Tensei game is poorly implemented.

The recruitment process is especially depressing, since it lacks any sort of finesse one might expect from other games in the series that use it. It really boils down to trying out one of several different talk commands on a demon repeatedly and then praying that they'll agree to join you, which is a rarity in and of itself. The expertise system allows you to unlock more talk commands as time goes on, but that element of sheer randomness never disappears, depriving the system of any real strategy whatsoever like other implementations of it in other games. Once you do recruit a demon, that's not even the end of it, as it costs magnetite, a demonic currency, to even summon them, which really discourages having variety in your attack patterns and strategies very often. Those who are accustomed to just switching demons on the fly without consequence in games like Persona will probably find this feature very jarring, and rightly so, since there's no real justifiable reason provided by the game, storyline or otherwise, to limit how often you're able to pull out and call in demons. As a result, you end up with pretty large levelling discrepancies between the back-up demons and your mainstay that render the neglected ones useless anyway.

On more technical fronts, Imagine is admittedly serviceable. The graphics don't do an especially artistic job at rendering a ruined Tokyo, but it's low-end enough to also allow the game to run on most computers today. The sound is also fine, although the lack of voice acting is, again, disappointing. As befitting an MMO, the game also comes with the requisite community features of parties, clans, and bazaars, all of which are pretty bare-bones, but functional without any real complaints. Thankfully the people you'll probably be playing alongside are both friendly and knowledgeable about the game, but that's not a technical merit so much as it is just luck of the draw with the game's marketing. The game is also patched pretty consistently to provide bits and pieces of new content and glitch resolutions.

When it's all said and done, Shin Megami Tensei: Imagine just lacks heart as both a Megami Tensei game and as an MMO. It's natural to conclude that the game probably won't revolutionize anything to begin with, especially since its free-to-play model isn't conducive to funding a development team that can afford the time and money to revamp the gameplay whenever it's needed. Plus, the fact that Atlus has little real credit for it beyond licensing the series' name hardly helps. But it's still sad to see the game as it is fall so short of the legacy provided by both its previous and subsequent installments in the series. It feels almost as generic as an MMO can get and the elements from the Megami Tensei series that are there feel phoned in and don't integrate all that well with the rest of the game. There's definitely room for an MMO uniquely done Megami Tensei-style, but Imagine isn't it. You can do much worse than play this free game, but it's still not really a game worth even the most hardcore series fan's time. It's best to just ignore Imagine and remember that Megami Tensei name has been done justice far, far better elsewhere.

Get the full article at GameSpot

"allmybase reviewed Shin Megami Tensei Online: Imagine for the PC..." was posted by allmybase on Sun, 13 Dec 2009 16:16:47 -0800
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/shin-megami-tensei-online-imagine/user-reviews/697309/platform/pc/ Thu, 26 Nov 2009 10:34:50 -0800 coylenintendo reviewed Crash Tag Team Racing for the Xbox... http://www.gamespot.com/crash-tag-team-racing/user-reviews/694740/platform/xbox/ ...and gave it a 8.0.

The Good: a lot of fun with a few friends, the 1-Player mode involves more than just racing, this game can actually give you a few good laughs, there's unlockables.
The Bad: if you don't have people to play this with you, it'll get pretty boring after you beat it, the game is usually pretty easy, even though the 1-Player mode is fun, it gets kind of repetitive and it can easily be beaten in a couple hours or so.
Overall: this game is worth playing and fun while it lasts. you'll like it if you're into Crash games and racing. just make sure you have people to play it with after you've beaten it.

you might think Crash Tag Team Racing is all about racing but there's a little more than that. the adventure part of the game involves a huge amusement park. basically, you have to go through a few different areas throughout the park. there's the main part that has a few things to do as well as characters from the Crash series, the main area is also how you get to the different areas in the game. each new area requires a special stone from the last area. you can solve puzzles, collect coins, do things for people, etc. you basically have to solve small missions to advance in the game. the characters from the Crash series ask you to do things for them such as give them a few thousand coins, find a costume that they're looking for or collect something for them. then they'll give you a car to use in the races. workers from the amusement park will sell you costumes and crystals. it's pretty simple and you usually know what to do. you don't have to but you can do races, battles and stunt areas to get coins and crystals. the coins and crystals are used for buying things or advancing further in the game. the crystals are needed to get to the special stones. so it's not really an amazing adventure game but it's nice to have it to have something extra to do in the game.
the multiplayer mode has a gift shop where other tracks, cars and costumes have to be unlocked as well as a couple of other things. you can get more coins by playing the different modes.
there's regular races, battles and stunt arenas.
the regular races are similar to games like Mario Kart. there's one kind of race which is driving to the finish line in a certain amount of laps, usually 3. there's 8 racers. you can clash (team up) with another car but you can drive solo if you want to. one person drives while the other shoots. if you clash with a CPU then you can choose which one you want to do. when you clash with someone, you can use both of their weapons. every character has a different type of weapon. some are more powerful than others, some shoot farther and some have more ammo. after you keep destroying people or objects around the tracks, you'll get a rocket on your car which will give you more speed for a short amount of time. there's also items that you'll find throughout the tracks.
the battle arena is pretty simple, everyone has the same kind of weapon (which you can change before the battle) and you take each other down until you get the amount of points that you set. there will always be two drivers to a car in this mode.
the stunt arena is pretty simple too, you use the ramps and hills throughout the arena to pull off stunts. all you have to is use the control sticks to pull off the stunts but you have to make sure you land almost perfectly to make sure you receive points. after getting more points, you'll get a rocket on your car to make you go faster and higher in the air. just get as many points as you can until time runs out.
overall, it's a fun game. it'll keep you entertained but might get kind of boring if you only play it by yourself. it's one of the best Crash games so definitely give it a try if you like Crash or wanna try something similar to Mario Kart. fans of older Crash racing games should like this too.

Get the full article at GameSpot

"coylenintendo reviewed Crash Tag Team Racing for the Xbox..." was posted by coylenintendo on Thu, 26 Nov 2009 10:34:50 -0800
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/crash-tag-team-racing/user-reviews/694740/platform/xbox/ Mon, 23 Nov 2009 00:11:16 -0800 allmybase reviewed PaRappa the Rapper for the PSP... http://www.gamespot.com/parappa-the-rapper/user-reviews/694143/platform/psp/ ...and gave it a 5.5.

Parappa's place in the pantheon of music games can't be denied. It helped launch a wave of beat-centric Japanese games that would come to have pretty prominent places in both homes and arcades for much of the later 90s and it did so with style. It's not everyday, even in these times, that you find a game where you play as a dog and use the power of rap to woo the sunflower of your dreams. But what the game did in the past and what it does now are two very different things and that's where Parappa on the PSP stumbles majorly. It's a functional music game, but one that's really hard to endorse after the genre has gone pretty far beyond it since its halcyon days, even on the portable front. You can simply do better with more relevant games and not miss out on much at all.

At its core, Parappa is extremely fundamental in that you're given a series of button prompts ahead of time and are then made to press that sequence in timing to the beat in order to complete the songs. If you've even just seen how a lot of music games in the past decade operate, you're more or less up to speed on the gameplay entirely. Other than the fact that it's all contextualized within rap beats, there really isn't much else to it. On its own, all of that is fine, since it's ultimately a formula that still works to this day in games such as Dance Dance Revolution, Rock Band, and countless other music game staples. Unless you're looking at games such as Elite Beat Agents that use timing and notes a bit more abstractly, it's basically a formula that has long since been proven to work. It's no different in Parappa's case in that regard.

The main problem is that, like other 90s rhythm games, the timing of the button presses in Parappa is too strict for its own good. You have a scoring meter that uses adjectives such as "Cool," "Good," and "Bad" to describe your competency at the moment. But, that's also the only real feedback you get from the game and it's not enough to consistently help you turn around your performace if it starts to apparently sour. Too many times, I felt as though I was getting the timing down just fine, only to quickly see the game warn me that I was about to drop down a rank and then have it happen moments later. Should you not be at least "Good," the second highest ranking, by the time the song ends, you're made to restart, which happened to me numerous times. There's a Parappa icon that helps you keep track of where you are in the sequence of button presses, but it otherwise does very little to help you with timing. There's also a freestyle mechanic that lets you push buttons in time to the song even if the screen doesn't tell you to do so, but it's so finnicky and jerky-sounding in implementation that it's ultimately a throwaway feature, despite being the only way you can actually reach the "Cool" ranking in the game.

Naturally, a music game's quality is tied very intimately with its soundtrack and that's where Parappa falters the most. The game only has six songs and that will mean, despite any outstanding issues with the timing, you can probably beat the game in about two hours or so. Downloadable content was planned for the game in the form of additional songs, but that apparently never came to fruition. None of that would necessarily be a problem if the songs that were there were good, but Parappa's music is middling at best. The raps are deliberately nonsensical to fit in with the game's style, but the background beats and the lyrics themselves just don't sound all that good. This is especially true when you throw in the fact that Parappa only speaks when you press a button and, more often than not, his words will sound copy and pasted into the song, instead of properly flowing. Contrast this with the fact that Parappa usually has a partner who also participates in the song, but doesn't have that problem and it becomes an even more glaring issue. It's a jarring feeling that never really goes away, even temporarily.

The only real strong points that Parappa still has today is its art direction and story, both of which are pleasantly surreal. While the graphics looks like they've only received some minor upscaling in the process of being ported to the PSP, they still stand out as well as they did back in 1997. Characters walk and move around like pieces of paper and the designs themselves are always distinct. You won't forget that your rapping instructor is a talking onion or that you got Parappa's driving license by learning from a moose in a police uniform. Likewise, the plot, while pretty barebones, still does a humorous job at moving you from one song to the next. Accompanied with some now very campy-looking FMVs that certainly did not get prettier with time, the story is one that could be expected out of NanaOn-Sha and as such, Parappa delivers on that front.

Parappa's main issue is one of relevance. When considering the still relatively short history and life span of modern music games, it's easy to understand why Parappa was such a hit back in the day. It took a musical genre that was seriously hitting its stride and presented it and the gameplay in a way that hadn't really been done before up until that point. But 12 years has been more than enough time for the game to grow archaic. The missteps that persist in the PSP version have long since been corrected by games that came out after the original Parappa on the PlayStation and as such don't make Parappa a very worthwhile game to play today. There's still something to be said for the game's quirkiness and charm, but they don't do nearly enough to compensate for this game's age. Times have changed and while it's unfortunate, Parappa's fervent devotion to living squarely in the past in its PSP rendition is really its ultimate downfall.

Get the full article at GameSpot

"allmybase reviewed PaRappa the Rapper for the PSP..." was posted by allmybase on Mon, 23 Nov 2009 00:11:16 -0800
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/parappa-the-rapper/user-reviews/694143/platform/psp/ Mon, 09 Nov 2009 20:38:46 -0800 3eyedrazorback reviewed FIFA Soccer 10 for the Xbox 360... http://www.gamespot.com/fifa-soccer-10/user-reviews/691293/platform/xbox360/ ...and gave it a 9.0!

I'm not going to hop on the bandwagon and say this is the best game ever!1!!!!1!1!! But I will say that it's a step up from last year's installment, which was the best soccer game to date.

The good: Fluid ball movement, fluid passing, fluid shooting. Most people say it's hard to get through balls, hard to chip shot, hard to get past defenders, yada yada. If you actually play the game more than just one time, you learn to get through the defense and score and make some great goals.
I love the weather physics as well, they are all perfectly done.
The Virtual Pro is a huge hit with me. I love not being able to just spend enormous amounts of experience points on stupid things. I like the fact that you actually have to play the game to unlock your skills. Makes me want to play more. The fact that you can use this player in virtually every game type, just makes it even better.

The weird: I hit the post frequently. Why? Can't I just have a goal please? It rains, snows, and/or is overcast more often than not. But, if you think about it, if you're playing in the Premiership, that's how the weather actually is.

The bad: Mr. Keeper, you are getting paid enormous amounts of money to tend your goal, please do a better job. There are balls that even my sister could block that you let go by. I don't know how many times I've played someone online and the keeper just kinda watches a ball go in...probably thinking, "meh, I don't want to get my shirt dirty, so I'll let this guy score on me."
Some of the "physicality" is just stupid. Your little puny defender cannot push the likes of Drogba, Messi, Rooney, or Kaka off the ball like they so often do. It's to the point of frustration to me.
The horrible referee calls...Goodness, don't get me started on that. You can touch a guy's jersey and it's a foul. But on the other end, he can knock you off the ball and it's like nothing happened. And for crying out loud, give me a call in the box! I get knocked off the ball and fall and the ref just says play-on. You gotta be kidding me! It is impossible to get a call.

Nevertheless, I love this game, with and without its mistakes, it's still one of the best games on the market. I will play this game until the next, and I will love this game. I just thought I would list some things that I love about the game and hate about the game. Many people who have played enough time will realize the same things that I have pointed out in this review.

9/10
Wish I could give it a 10, but it's just not quite worthy of it. Maybe next year.

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"3eyedrazorback reviewed FIFA Soccer 10 for the Xbox 360..." was posted by 3eyedrazorback on Mon, 09 Nov 2009 20:38:46 -0800
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