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March 9, 2011

Review – Phantom Brave: The Hermuda Triangle

Filed under: Reviews — Tags: , , , , , , — Mister Raroo @ 11:41 am

Review Phantom Brave the Hermuda Triangle
Phantom Brave has been trying to get me to play it for years. I actually purchased a copy of the game for PS2 back when it was released in 2004, but for whatever reason I never got around to playing it. It sat on my shelf, sad and lonely, until it eventually was sold on eBay during a crazed period in which I auctioned off a number of my games to free up some cash. I always felt guilty about that. So guilty, in fact, that I planned to buy the game when it was released for the Wii in 2009. I even had a copy in my hands and walked to the register at Best Buy before I weighed my options and realized having gas money was more important than having Phantom Brave.   

So, here we are, almost seven years after the game was originally released, and I’ve finally given in and played it. Was it worth the long wait? Well, playing the game wasn’t an earth-shattering experience, but I still found it worthwhile, if a little overwhelming.

Phantom Brave: The Hermuda Triangle proves that sometimes giving players freedom isn’t always such a good thing, as the depth of the game and variety of options is almost too much to wrangle. At the same time, it’s a deep game and offers hours upon hours of gamplay, so strategy RPG fanatics will likely enjoy it.

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March 8, 2011

Review – Killzone 3

Filed under: Reviews — Tags: , , , , , , , , — Brad Johnson @ 7:59 am

Killzone 3
Killzone 3 is a true example of franchise mentality; the entire affair is constructed with that distinct “Triple A Franchise” shine, the whole nine yards players have seen on titles like Gears of War and Halo. This is a product with significant resources at its disposal, all the way down to a high profile voice cast.

Though the core game is deserving, the concept is simply not the equal of this treatment. From the opening cinematic to the grim, atmospheric music in the menus, the player is primed for a dark, compelling tale of war, but as the campaign begins it becomes immediately apparent that this will simply not materialize.

The unfortunate reality is that the Killzone universe is simply not interesting, or at least unexplored in an interesting way. No amount of pomp or franchise expense can elevate what is distinctly lacking conceptually.

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March 5, 2011

Review – Dead Space 2: Severed

Dead Space 2: Severed
This week saw the release of Severed, the first true DLC (save weapon and items packs) for the Dead Space series. Thus, I will again jump at the opportunity to discuss the merits of annihilating zombies in space, a subject very near and dear to my heart.

Severed features Gabe Weller, one of the protagonists from Dead Space: Extraction. The two-chapter campaign sees Weller battle his way from the government sector of the Sprawl to the psych ward in the civilian sector, in an effort to find his wife and get her off the station. This has the player literally playing the campaign backwards, revisiting many of the areas originally seen while traversing the station in the opposite direction, as Isaac.

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February 28, 2011

Review – Acceleration of Suguri X Edition

Review Acceleration of Sugari X Edition
One of my favorite periods of Sega Dreamcast game releases came after the system’s “death,” when there was a slow but steady trickle of fighting games and shoot-em-ups released in Japan. I was feverish about importing almost all of these games, and my Dreamcast was happily spinning the likes of Ikaruga, Border Down, Psyvariar 2, The King of Fighters 2002, Karous, and Under Defeat. It was like my home was transformed into a neat little Japanese arcade.

Playing Acceleration of Suguri X Edition (let’s just call it Suguri X for short) immediately made me feel like it was 2002 all over again and I had just popped an awesome new game into my Dreamcast. Suguri X is a frantic, bright, and fun one-on-one arena fighter that had me exclaiming “This is so cool!” over and over again until my wife finally told me to be quiet because I was making our dogs bark with my excitement. At first I was afraid my excitement for Suguri X was overinflated, but here we are days later and I’m still giddy about the game – I love it.

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February 24, 2011

Review – Gemini Rue

Filed under: Reviews — Tags: , , , , , , , — Jamie Love @ 12:54 pm

Review Gemini Rue
Prior to technology enabling us to connect with the world while ignoring everything immediately around us, the blinking lights of evolving machinery offered means for introspection – specifically a fresh perspective on a very old worry keeping us up late into a long night called existence.

Theoretical speculation on ideas of artificial intelligence and memory constructs allowed us the chance to chew on the question of human identity with fresh vigor, externalizing that oldest of mysteries to question who we are as individual grains caught up in the dust-storm of civilization.

Pro-tip – if you tend to worry about your identity while feeling that society marches around in circles with no particular direction in mind, you’re probably a replicant.

However, since Gemini Rue isn’t about a tortoise laying on its back in need of your help while its belly bakes in the hot sun, we should probably move along.

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February 16, 2011

Review – Explodemon

Filed under: Reviews — Tags: , , , , , — Brad Johnson @ 6:16 pm

explodemon review
I was perhaps too young to fully appreciate classic platformers like Mega Man during their heyday; I certainly played and enjoyed them, but that was a time when I didn’t have the coordination to excel (or even succeed) at them. For me, the resurgence of these games in the market marks a second opportunity to explore that classic style of game and more fully appreciate those offerings.

Explodemon, like Shadow Complex before it, seeks to revisit that place with a contemporary twist and a unique property. The player controls the eponymous Explodemon, the unstable robot creation of Dr. Light Dr. Nitrous, afflicted in such a way as to spontaneously explode at regular intervals. Sealed away to protect the world, Explodemon is accidentally freed during an alien invasion, and sets out to defeat the invaders in the way you’d expect from an exploding anime robot: by exploding them.

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February 12, 2011

Review – Stacking

stacking review
Stacking is one of those games that could only exist in the current generation of consoles—a labor of love the digital market allows for that, six or seven years ago, would have never seen release. In the vein of LittleBigPlanet, it often feels more like someone’s cute arts and crafts project than it does a videogame, characterized by sharp art and a carefully designed gameworld—however, in this instance the art unfortunately overwhelms the game, leaving the experience ultimately unengaging.

The player controls Charlie Blackmore, the youngest child in a family of chimney sweepers. The game begins as Charlie’s brothers and sisters are drafted as child laborers to pay the family debts; Charlie, too small to be of any use in such endeavors, is left behind, and embarks on a journey to reclaim his lost family. The story is told through silent-film style interludes, and the design here is impressively genuine—though the animation in these films largely consists of dolls shaking (to indicate speech), which becomes tiresome as the game progresses.

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