Reviews

Trace Memory: Worth the Effort

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After reading some of the reviews for Cing’s DS adventure game, I was a little hesitant about picking it up. I love adventure games, but the puzzles were cited as being a pain in the ass. So, I did the next best thing. I put it on my GameFly Game Q.

Having finished it, I’ve to come to the realization that reviewers have no idea what makes a game good. This was a great adventure game, and I easily recommend trying it. It is very short (it only took me 5 hours to beat), but for the low price of $15 at GameStop, you make out on the deal.

I won’t divulge any of the story, only because that’s the main reason for playing adventure games, and I won’t be the bad guy and spoil it for you. Just know the story and localization are very good, and you’ll enjoy it while it lasts.

Also, Cing uses the DS in ways I’ve never seen before. →  NiGHTS into REaDS

Review – Resident Evil Remake

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The Resident Evil Remake taught me a few important lessons, some about the series itself, and some about gaming in general. Let’s not waste any time and get right down to it.

First off, Resident Evil doesn’t actually suck. People love making fun of the pre-RE4 formula for Resident Evil games. They’ll complain about the cheesy zombies, the tank-like controls, and the obtuse puzzles. And yet none of these things could keep me from enjoying the REmake. I enjoyed having a good brainteaser to solve. I enjoyed blasting away at zombies with a well placed shotgun shell fired in a fairly realistic manner. I like the slow, plodding pace of the game, where survival is the only thing that needs to be on your mind, not time or points or action. And while there may not be an excuse for poor control, it doesn’t take that much practice to get used to steering your character around. In fact, after enough play you shouldn’t be running into zombies at all. →  You reading at me?

Review – Trauma Center: Second Opinion

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After their small splash in the DS world with last year’s Under the Knife, Atlus has rolled out the operating table once again with Wii’s Trauma Center: Second Opinion. Atlus showed us a great way to use the touch-screened handheld with Under the Knife, but have they done the same for the Wii and its innovative wii-mote? Even without a medical license, I can easily prescribe Second Opinion.

If you’ve ever played the board game Operation, then you have a small inkling of what to expect from Trauma Center. You play as Derek Stiles, a rookie doctor that has just finished his residency at Hope Hospital, in fictitious Angeles Bay. At the beginning of the game, Derek acts a little lazy when dealing with the other doctors. He’s still young and in need of guidance. Luckily for him, he’s got some experienced assistants in the form of Greg Kasal (your mentor) and Angie Thompson (your nursing assistant). After many trials and tribulations, Derek soon becomes a crack doctor, saving people left and right. →  I’ll get a job later, for now I’m going to read this

Review – Advent Rising

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This is one of those times I’m sorry I listened to the reviews on a game and passed it up. I had been following Advent Rising mostly because its story was written by Orson Scott Card (author of the Ender’s Game series) and it was originally supposed to be an epic, three-part sci-fi adventure. From the screenshots and scraps of gameplay videos I saw, it looked quite promising.

However, upon its release Advent Rising got anywhere from mediocre to downright insulting reviews. Most complained of crippling bugs and game engine problems, making the game virtually unplayable. Others said the story was boring and then made worse by bad voice acting talent. I have no idea what game these people were playing.

You see this glowing orb of destruction … yeah, not many people can do this.

This is in no way a perfect game. I did experience some slow down in the more graphically intense parts, but it was minimal. The story is very well told and held my interest throughout and I thought the voice acting was top notch. →  Sounds mildly entertaining, I guess.

Review – Final Fantasy XII

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Chris says:

I took my time getting through Final Fantasy XII, and I’d like to think my view of it is relatively balanced. I couldn’t shake the feeling that there is both good and bad in several aspects of the game. The good, however, tends to outweigh the bad and this is my favorite Final Fantasy game in several years.

One of the bad parts is the main character, Vaan. He looks like a girl, wears a vest that is cursory at best and, despite being the main character, plays only a minor role in much of the game. His most memorable moment is probably when he is claiming to be somebody else. Thankfully, he is not as whiny as previous Final Fantasy leads have been. Also, many of the other characters are more memorable, and the game does not force you to have Vaan in your party except very early on.

The detailing on her cod piece is exceptional.

The high points of the plot are also quite derivative; there is an exiled princess who is symbolic leader of a rebellion, a mercenary and his non-human partner, a ruthless empire… However, this gives the game a rich background, and many of the sub-plots are more interesting and original. →  Speak softly and carry a big post.

Review – Taito Memories

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Why hello there Taito Memories. Fancy seeing you here for ten dollars. I think I just might take you home with me. I’ve always been really curious about what you’re all about. After all, you’re not quite like your other cousins. Last generation saw tons of you classic compilations being released, on PS2 and just about everywhere else.

Namco, Capcom, Sega, Atari, even Activision and Midway tried their hand at it. Seems they sold pretty well too, though gamers also learned that they could never guess what to expect from you compilations. They might get all the classics, and they might not. They may get 20 games, or fewer than ten. There could be tons of bonus content and great emulation, or sparse features and horrible recreations of each game. The only guarantee was that if you bought something from Sega, you were going to get more than a few recycled games.

Tip for pilots: Do not attempt to land your helicopter on crumbling buildings.

 →  Can you read me now?

Review – Super Star Soldier on the Virtual Console

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Originally released in 1991 for the NEC TurboGrafx-16, Super Star Soldier is an old-school shooter that really pushes your buttons.

If you kids want to see how bad we old geezer gamers had it back in the day, then you need to play Super Star Soldier. There are no save points, and forget about unlimited continues. To beat this game, you need…nope, forget it, you won’t beat this game. It’s just too hard for you.

If you’ve played any of the recently released shooters like Treasure’s Ikaruga, then you’ll probably be disappointed with SSS. It doesn’t have any unique health system or gameplay mechanic. SSS is very much by the books. The early 90’s shooter books, anyway. Basically, all bullets are bad bullets, and it only takes one to take you down.

One thing that really hurts me inside is that, if you die at a boss, you have to start the entire level over again. Sadly, this will also mean playing the mid-level boss again. →  When one person suffers from a delusion, it is called insanity. When many people suffer from a delusion it is called a game.

Review – Marvel: Ultimate Alliance (Wii)

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Marvel: Ultimate Alliance is a great game … just not for the Wii. I originally played it about a month ago on an XBox 360 and was quite impressed, and then I noticed that it was launching with the Wii. Something told me to lay off the knee-jerk purchase and use good ol’ Game Fly once again to test the waters with minimal cost. I sent the game back in four days.

The X-Men: Legends series is fantastic. Four-player (later over XBox Live) superhero, beat-em-up RPG. You just can’t go wrong. I played both versions through about three times trying to level up the thirty-some-odd unlockable characters, loving every minute of it. So when I heard that Marvel was teaming up with the same developer to make a game with over 150 playable superheroes spanning the entire Marvel universe I could barely wait. I decided to wait once I saw it in action on a 360, and in the meantime I had read some strange things about the Wii version and the game eventually made its way to the top of my rental queue. →  Words are the towns and cities of letters.

Review – Red Steel

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If you’ve paid attention to some of the reviews Red Steel has gotten, you probably have no idea what the game is really like. The scores are all over the place, and reviewers just can’t seem to agree on what is good or bad about the game. Some love the sword fighting, some don’t. Some hate the gun controls so much that they barely touch upon the rest of game. The best advice for you is to just forget about those losers and their reviews. This is the only one you need to worry about.

Let’s hit each one of the major problems first, just to cleanse you of all the garbage you may still have in your head. First, the controls are a little hard to grasp, at least initially. Ubisoft has implemented an aiming/turning control scheme that is going to feel very foreign to everyone. I will say that it took me about 2-3 hours to fully grasp the aiming and turning mechanics. →  Professor Layton and the Diabolical Post

Review – Gears Of War

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With a game that has so much hype grabbing onto to its heels and biting violently, it’s difficult to even know where to begin with such a review. I feel I should be writing an equally monumental review to represent the game: a 3,000 page mini encyclopaedia describing every minute detail that would no doubt spoil the game when you eventually pick it up, and lead to you sending me brown stuff in paper bags through my letterbox. Seeing as though I don’t want large amounts of waste dropping on my doorstep, I’ll refrain. So, where in the hell should I start?

He’s a man’s man (but still straight).

Let’s start at the obvious place — the graphics. I doubt you need me to tell you how pretty this game is, because we’ve all seen the screenshots. Needless to say, Gears looks just as good as we all hoped it would. From the way that Marcus runs down the street, to the noise his gun makes clattering on his back, to even smaller details like the gears logo on his chest, and lush green swaying trees. →  Your right post comes off?