Reviews

Review – Phoenix Wright: Trials and Tribulations

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I recently went through some effort to prove that most games are entirely about play mechanics and that story and characters are mere dressing. This concept is echoed by some great designers. In On Game Design, Chris Crawford describes interaction as the key to all games — more, deeper interactions make for a better game. Judging by his designs, Miyamoto agrees.
Don’t look at this picture. Too many spoilers.

With this in mind I face a problem. The Phoenix Wright trilogy stands among my favorite games despite their being little more than books on DS carts. And not even Choose Your Own Adventure books that create the illusion of control; there is only one correct thing to do at all points in Ace Attorney, and often you will be forced to run through all items in your inventory in hopes of showing the right someone the right something. Still, the game is compelling and probably would be if there were no interaction at all. →  Sly 3: Honor Among Reads

Review – Crysis

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Taking First Person Shooters to a New Level of Suck

After a long day of working, it’s nice to come home, jump on my computer, and blow the living daylights out of people, monsters, hookers, you name it. For me, playing an FPS after a day of work is akin to getting an Oreo Cookie Blizzard on a hot day; it just feels right. I don’t have to think, I don’t have to care about hurting people, I just shoot and all of my stress melts away. As blood sprays across the digital walls and bodies drop, mangled and lifeless to the floor, I grin and become new again. When I heard the news that Crysis was in development, I was happy. FarCry, while not a perfect game, was an ok shooter so I figured Crysis would follow suit. I was regrettably wrong.

At some point in the Crysis development cycle, I am guessing there was a conversation that went something like this:

“Oh, hey Franz, did Adolph’s team finish the AI algorithm for the new game?” →  I’d rather die than not read this article!

Review – Etrian Odyssey

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There is nothing more depressing than wasted potential, and, somewhat ironically, nothing more pleasurable than wasting potential. As I lay on my couch playing Etrian Odyssey instead of washing the dishes, helping the homeless or learning to read, my mind struggled to cope with conflicting emotions. I was enjoying that I was wasting my time, but not enjoying the time wasted. Is it hypocritical to be upset that Atlus squandered this game’s potential?

Etrian Odyssey starts off nice and difficult. I died on the first level and there’s a good chance you will, too. This high difficulty forces the player to engage in some old school level grinding, but I’ve always welcomed work in my time wasting, as long as society doesn’t benefit in any way. Besides being difficult, the first boss required some actual strategy to beat. I tried simply launching every offensive spell and skill at him, entirely ignoring the typically useless status augmentation abilities, only to die before his mighty tendril (note: boss may or may not have actually had a tendril; if he did, it may or may not have actually been mighty). →  Readbot Chronicles

Review – Sam & Max Season 2, Episode 1: Ice Station Santa

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One thing I have noticed since I was young is that every new season of television shows creates a new trend or two. In the last 15 years it seems we have seen everything, from a flood of cartoons, themed sitcoms, non-themed sitcoms (thanks, Seinfeld), sci-fi shows, crime dramas, and more. There are two common patterns; either a network hits gold and cranks out dozens of similar shows to cash in (see how The Learning Channel nearly destroyed itself thanks to Trading Spaces), or two networks create almost identical pieces of shit in hopes that theirs will stick.

Perhaps not so coincidentally, we have seen both of these trends as the games industry has tried to tackle episodic gaming. On one hand, we had Telltale Games working on episodes for Bone and Sam and Max, while Valve and Ritual made their own serialized installments of Half Life and Sin via Steam and the Source engine. Two competitors (if we lump Valve and Ritual), multiple products from each. →  Welcome to read zone!

Review – Half-Life Episode 2

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Half Life 2 Episode 1 was much like the Opposing Force expansion to the original Half Life. Both games were largely similar, but each offered a distinct twist that helped it along. In Opposing Force, it was the concept of playing as a soldier hunting down Gordon Freeman, and the benefits of having a troop of specialized AI soldiers to help you along the way.

In Episode 1, it was the impressive AI of Alyx Vance, which helped you bond with her character as well as giving Valve a chance to create some interesting scenarios for her and Gordon to tackle. Both games also benefited from their incredible set pieces that improved upon most of the things we experienced in the original games. It says a lot when your two expansion packs contain some of the best single player content of the year.

Still, Episode 1 was never intended to be very groundbreaking. Rather it was a distillation of Half Life 2. →  May God smite me if I stop reading here!

Review – Guitar Hero 3

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Guitar Hero 3 does a lot to make me question game reviews. Or should I say, it brings to light many of their problems.

As I expected, it loses out with much of the standard, value driven review sites. While it stays afloat in many reviewer’s minds by adding online multiplayer and more tracks, it has also been grilled for things such as lack of create a character (a criticism I actually agree with, if for no other reason than developer Neversoft has been doing this since 2000) or online co-op play. Once a good game becomes a franchise, the stakes become continuously higher, and nothing short of a disc filled to the brim with their checklist of standard game features will make a reviewer happy. It also makes me question how every tacky addition to each year’s Madden avoids getting clobbered the same way.

I only dream of being this metal.

The gaming public isn’t any easier on Guitar Hero 3. →  Some say the world will end in fire, some say in read more

Review – Wild Arms 5

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Let me start off this review by telling a little story I think everyone here knows.

There’s this kid, see – well, maybe I should call him a young man, he’s around 15 or 16. He lives in a small village far from civilization, where he lives on his own (his parents are dead or missing). He is brought up with good values, like honesty, kindness, independence, and obliviousness. Soon after we are introduced to him, an incredible event occurs that sends him on the path to solving many of the problems in the world (almost all of them, if you like sidequests).

Along the way he finds a few plucky characters to join him and his pair of love interests on their quest. As he progresses, he confronts the underlings of evil, finding them variously misguided, ignorant, insane, or all three. He sets the good ones free of their delusions or ignorance, and brings happiness wherever he goes.

I see some space that doesn’t have an overlay on it yet.

 →  This better not be as bad as everything else here.

Review – Portal

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Portal is a fantastic little game that really compliments Valve’s Orange Box compilation. If it were just a Half-Life collection with Team Fortress thrown in (as it pretty much always was with the PC versions of the franchise) then the Orange Box would still be a steal at $60, but Portal adds some great new game play and some interesting story elements to the Half-Life universe. The only problem I have with the game is that it’s too short, which isn’t the worst problem you could have.

Starting with a tech demo called Narbacular Drop, the student developers at DigiPen caught the attention of the Valve team and it’s easy to see why. I haven’t played an FPS or adventure game in a long time that had me scratching my head like some of the puzzles Portal throws at you. Giving your player the ability to alter almost every surface of a level seems like a programming nightmare, but they pulled it off and it’s a blast to play. →  Oops, I did it again.

Review – Halo 3 multiplayer

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Don’s review of the Halo campaign mode made a lot of points about the difference between PC and console FPS. Namely, one is for those who are strong like the Ukraine, while the other is for metrosexuals and males who have yet to have their balls drop. Such strong words despite a fair review. With the task of reviewing Halo 3 multiplayer upon me, I looked at it as a challenge. You see, I was once part of that cult as well; the masochistic, PC hardware and shooter junkies were once the tribe I called my own. But I left them a long time ago, and Halo 3 multiplayer is the best proof yet as to why I did.

Let us begin with a story. Once upon a time, I was addicted to Unreal Tournament 2004. I thought it was the best you could get, that no shooter could be this robust, this complete. This was because in many ways, it was true. →  In all ages, hypocrites, called producers, have put crowns upon the heads of thieves, called publishers.

Review – Magical Starsign

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Gummy frogs! Gummy worms! Pirate Otters! Saving Miss Madeline, our beloved teacher! The Book of the Darned!

The only thing missing from this game is puppy dogs and rainbows, and since I haven’t beaten it yet, I’m assuming there is a puppy dog and rainbow planet. Welcome to Magical Starsign, an RPG for the Nintendo DS made by developer Brownie Brown. Reading Tyson’s recent Heroes of Mana review, he mentioned Brownie Brown is a renegade group that broke off from Square. My guess is that Square rounded up all the people who they thought should be teaching preschool instead of making video games and fired them, but I digress.

The setting for Magical Starsign is the Will o’ Wisp Academy, where a group of students overhear their headmaster talking to their favorite teacher. Apparently one of the Academy’s students, a former dorky kid, has turned into quite the evil badass and is up to no good. I suppose that is the problem with magical academies, instead of getting high paying programming jobs and hiring hookers, the kids who got stuffed in lockers instead turn to gratuitous evil. →  Do the math.