Gamesugar

August 30, 2012

Review – They Bleed Pixels

Review They Bleed Pixels
From the jagged teeth of buzzsaws to the spiked walls and floors beneath and above every slim bit of ground players will grasp in the search for some small space to breathe, They Bleed Pixels. Toronto developer Spooky Squid has crafted a platformer without pity, where the typical spiky pitfalls of the past are only the opening to a world of malevolently placed enemies and obstacles guarded by blades of precise timing – eager to spill the blood of opponents and players alike in gathering an offering for whatever dark Gods of old are in league with the design of its stages.

But this isn’t a game that’s hard for the sake of being so, nor some attempt to simply join other recent titles that wear difficulty as the primary incentive and reward to be bragged about at some They Bleed Pixels survivors meeting later this year.

They Bleed Pixels examines the space of traditional platformers, and knowing the habits of those that have grown up playing them, challenges players to make more of the wasted space around said platform. It does this by often providing very little solid ground to stand on, but also forces a new perspective on old habits by offering new spaces to cling to.

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March 21, 2012

Review – Sine Mora

Review Sine Mora
Time is the fire in which we burn, and pilots seeking to survive the hazardous skies of Sine Mora will want to cling to every fading ember for the chance to learn why the flame that burns half as long also burns twice as bright.

The joint 2D side-scrolling shooter from Digital Reality and Grasshopper Manufacture places the emphasis entirely on that flickering flame, with a time clock often reserved for boss battles in other shooters continually ticking down throughout the entirety of this game.

Make no mistake, every second within Sine Mora counts, because allowing time to slip away is the only way to die.

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October 19, 2011

Review – Aliens: Infestation

Filed under: Reviews — Tags: , , , , , , , , , , — Jamie Love @ 1:44 pm

Aliens Infestation Review
The U.S.S. Sulaco drifts silently through space, short on a flight crew but freshly infested with those iconic monsters that mostly come at night.

Mostly.

Without Ellen Ripley to save the day, the task of investigating and once again attempting to exterminate the alien menace falls on a new squad of marines – four to be exact. The initial lineup of characters offers the typical bravado, and includes an obligatory “Vasquez” character. And that initial tip of the hat is only one of the many ways Infestation illustrates a profound love for the James Cameron film. From an early cat cameo to an additional mini-game that challenges players to stab the DS stylus like a knife between on-screen fingers, this is the Aliens game that never arrived when 2D was the norm and not the occasional throwback treat.

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September 11, 2011

Review – BloodRayne: Betrayal

Review BloodRayne Betrayal
I am fail.

While that conclusion will come as no surprise to some, the suspicion was finally confirmed for me after clearing the first of Betrayal’s stages, wherein I was awarded an “F” grade, and the designation of “wormfood”. That the same reward awaited me at the end of every stage would seemingly suggest that WayForward’s resurrection of Majesco’s dhampir vixen is a difficult affair. And while plenty of voices across the Internet support this argument, it’s simply not accurate.

The near infinite supply of health, unlimited lives, consistently well placed checkpoints, wide-sweeping attacks, and even a laser cannon that spreads across the entire screen, make it ridiculous to suggest that Rayne’s 2D debut reaches anywhere close to the difficulty of nostalgic side-scrolling titles that kept gamers grinding their teeth and stores selling a steady supply of replacement controllers back in the day.

Betrayal does liberally sprinkle stages with cheap trickery however, situations that depend as much on luck as a mastery of the controls – split evenly between platforming sections that unleash floating projectiles while requiring precision jumping, and arena areas where waves of enemies work to drain the blood with the advantage of restricted space.

The real difficulty of Betrayal is in reconciling the shortfalls that leave a promising release far less the experience it could have been, delivering a digital title where every element that makes it excel also directly causes it to disappoint – where the high point of Betrayal causes direct gameplay hiccups that undermine the effort and expose the under-developed nature of the entire game.

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June 14, 2011

Review – Arcana Heart 3

Filed under: Reviews — Tags: , , , , , , — Nathan White @ 12:39 pm

Review Arcana Heart 3
Button-mashing has come a long way. Over the years I’ve button-mashed my way through the best of them; why just two weeks ago I button-mashed my way to several near victories on a Marvel Super Heroes Vs. Street Fighter cabinet at a local arcade. I’ve also recently purchased the HD version of Marvel Vs. Capcom 2 for my PS3, and still occasionally pick it up and aimlessly thrash at the controller until my wrists get tired.

Being a casual veteran of the Arcana Heart series (Atlus’ PlayStation 2 port, anyway) I somewhat knew what to expect coming into the recently released 3rd entry in the fighting series; lots of cute anime girls based on a vast array of moe archetypes, all wearing skimpy and/or adorable outfits, and devastating each other with seizure inducing color bursts, which ignite the screen like cotton candy fireworks.

Is this what I got when I sat down to play Arcana Heart 3? Yes.

Is that a bad thing? Well, it is and it isn’t.

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February 11, 2011

Review – Hard Corps: Uprising

hard corps uprising contra review
The jury may be out on whether an alias allows a rose to ditch its sickly scent, but I can confirm that Konami’s anime-styled breakaway from the Contra brand doesn’t sacrifice the bullet-points that have come to define the franchise. This uprising begins with heavy guitars and vibrant explosions to paint a scene of idealistic resistance against the forces of old and evil, with characters cut from a familiar cloth of eighties anime memories and mournful war-zones – but Contra’s principles of play are ever present, remixed once again to provide a war opera worthy of the twitching that stirs in fingers left unsatisfied by many modern releases.

The lush palette softens the traditionally gritty edges of Contra’s battlefield, but a merciless spirit wears the pop-shifted aesthetic, and veterans can rest assured that Hard Corps: Uprising is fucking metal.

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