Joes Video Game Reviews

[Joe]

Copied from GameFAQs in case I lose them because of the hacking.

Perfect Dark

"Perfect is An Understatement"

Perfect Dark is the Spiritual Sequel to the classic FPS Goldeneye [it shares some things as the past game but the story is different] created by our British friends over at Rare. And to everyone who thought Goldeneye was the best FPS ever made, Perfect Dark surpassed Goldeneye and proved that the N64 can still pump out good games.

Now before I start this review, let me set up something so you can understand how much I like the game. Back in May of 2000 my dad told me about this Game, so I decided to get it. And after I played it I thought that it was the greatest game ever made. Fast forward seven years later and I still play this game daily. I have also logged on over 17 DAYS on the Multiplayer mode, I have almost gotten the "Perfect" rank on there as well, and I am close to beating all of the levels. Well let's light this candle.

Story: 8

I will try to do this without revealing too much. If you read the Background [there is a LONG background and Plot Overview in the game] it says that everything that happens is because of a Cetan Warship that plunged into the Ocean millions of years ago, and the war loving Skedar were trying to find it to use as a weapon, and the Maians are trying to stop them.

Going back into the Present time of the game: the year is 2023 and the Carrington Institute operative Joanna Dark is sent into dataDyne to extract an insider from dataDyne, and she winds up in the middle of a war with dataDyne and their "allies" with the help of some friends of the Institute and her Co-Operatives at the Institute and trying to stop the uncovering of the Cetan Mega weapon [it basically makes the atomic molecules come apart and can destroy planets]. Hopefully I did this without revealing too much, because I left some stuff out that you would need to find out for yourself, or read the Forums.

Also, the character that you play in this game is one of the best heroines I have ever seen in a video game. Even though her character got worse in the Prequel that is out on the Xbox 360, the books and the comics have done a great job establishing Joanna's character that should be used in all of the subsequent games.

Gameplay: 10

Anyone who played Goldeneye should be able to realize just how special that game was. Instead of roaming through levels blowing up everything in sight, you had several objectives and items to collect. Well Perfect Dark continued that and you feel like you are really doing something while you play Perfect Dark, it is so much more than other games, like Halo. No disrespect to the Halo fans [hell I play the game too] but all you do in Halo is run to the next point while killing aliens or protecting somebody, in Perfect Dark a lot is going on at once.

The first time I played this game, the first thing I thought was just how much more is in this game than in Goldeneye. For example, the enemy in Goldeneye could not fire over rails, but in Perfect Dark they would fire at you as soon as they could see you and they would use more strategy, like calling for help, rolling out of the way, or swapping weapons if you disarm them. Yes, you can now disarm opponents in Perfect Dark, and you also have over 40 weapons which all have a secondary function. So you have 80 weapons if you want to call it that.

Also, all of the levels are huge in Perfect Dark; the architecture is more complex than in Goldeneye, although that may just be what I think. There is also [and this is incredible to me] a "training level" that you can roam in between missions, you are able to go into the Carrington Institute and practice with the weapons, gadgets and read up on the Story, and it also helps getting to know the Institute for a mission that you do later. And you are also able to unlock several of cheat codes by completing levels or by doing them in some specific time limit that is quite hard to do for most of them. You are also capable of playing levels with your friends with them either helping you, or playing multiple characters that are against you [hard to explain].

As for the main campaign itself, it is fun, but it is just not as good as Goldeneye was. All of the new stuff works very well, and the espionage style gameplay in Perfect Dark and Goldeneye is capable of making you think. But I just thought that even though the levels were fun it did not live up to the amazing campaign that Goldeneye had. Although, if you are not comparing it to Goldeneye it is still very good, and there is a mind blowing amount of stuff in the Campaign, for the time this game came out.

Unfortunately all of this comes at a price; you NEED to buy the Expansion Pack for the N64 to make most of this stuff work. If you don't have one you only get 35% of the game, and that is because that Perfect Dark sucked so much out of the N64 that it needs more power to run everything. But I promise you if you get it is worth it.

Challenge: 9

Like many games out there, if you just want to beat the game on easy mode and quit, it won't be very hard. But if you decide to do everything, prepare to sweat. There are three main difficulty modes in Perfect Dark, Agent, Secret Agent, and Perfect Agent. Agent is simple enough and should not require too much effort to beat because most of the enemy's are pansies, but if you decide to go to the higher levels you will need to think to kill them before they fire a bullet through your head. You are also given far more objectives in the higher difficulties, which is another good way of making the game tougher [like Goldeneye did]. You will also need to work hard to unlock everything there is in the game, some of the cheat codes you need to unlock by beating a level under a certain time, and for most of them this is hard as hell to do.

You will also need to beat all of the Challenges in the Combat Simulator [multiplayer mode] to unlock everything, while the early ones are easy, once you start fighting the Perfect Sims and Dark Sims you will need to pray to win so you can get all of the multiplayer levels and skins for the Simulants. So to put al of this in the simplest terms I can, if you just want to beat the game on Agent so you can say you beat it, that's easy enough. But if you decide to get everything, well let me say it this way... I have been playing for seven years and I still don't have all of it.

Controls: 10

Like I said, Perfect Dark is a sequel of Goldeneye, and Goldeneye had the greatest control scheme of its time for a Console FPS in my mind; in fact Goldeneye paved the way for Console FPS games. Well Perfect Dark found ways to improve on what Goldeneye had. You can aim the weapons with ease in PD, but that seems hard with only one Control Stick, but it was done by using the Stick and the C-Buttons [or other buttons since you can change them] in conjunction to pinpoint your cross hairs on your targets forehead and then pulling the trigger to put them out of their misery. You are also capable of holding down the R-Trigger to bring up cross-hairs and manually aiming at a target by using the control stick [although it is a little hard to aim if your stick is as abused as mine is]. You can also duck down to use cover, and strife and run, it all feels very fluid and simple to perform everything. And most of the actions are preformed by pressing the B button, elevators, doors, computers, gadgets, secondary function, reloading: it is great that they did that so you don't have to memorize complex controls to activate everything.

Anyone who remembers how hard it was to swap weapons in a firefight in Goldeneye, that was fixed as well, you just hold down a button and all of the weapons/ gadgets you have pop up on the screen and you move the control stick to select one of them. Simply put, Perfect Dark is proof that a FPS can work on a Home Console.

Graphics: 9

As I said you need an Expansion Pack for the game to get all of the good stuff Rare gave you to work. And luckily for you also get some of the most gorgeous graphics that the Nintendo 64 had to offer and it also gave a little screw you to the Playstation owners. All of the levels look stunning, and have a great futuristic feel to them. And the AI also looks much better, there is less Polygonal Tearing and they look very realistic [remember this is the Nintendo 64]. It is very impressive what Rare is capable of doing with the Hardware that they are given. And seeing all of the different impact points of the weapons and the blood that will splatter when you shoot someone adds to the realism of Perfect Dark. The Weapons are all beautifully designed, and look exactly how they should, and unlike Goldeneye you can also see the Weapons RELOAD instead of seeing them drop below the screen and pop back up. Each weapon has its own distinctive reload animation, and they all look great.

Hell let me just say that everything looks great in Perfect Dark, and the ability to change the screen size and make it High Res which for its time was incredible is all great. But one of the low points is that there is so much being sucked out of the Nintendo 64 that if there is too much going on at one time everything will slow down to a speed slower than a snail in molasses.

Simply put, Perfect Dark gives you possibly the greatest Graphics ever seen on the Nintendo 64, and for some hardware that was showing its age it was nice to see something that looks better than a couple PS2 games I have seen out there. But the cost of those amazing graphics is that the Nintendo 64 has to do so much to make the game look great that the frame rate will drop really low a lot.

Sound: 9

The sound on Perfect Dark also delivers. One of the first things you will notice is that there IS voice acting, and there is a lot of it [remember the N64 is VERY limited in that market]. Every character [well the major ones] have their own voices. The enemy AI also talks like the enemy in more modern FPS games, they call for help, they make death throes, they will scream in shock, and really how much fun is it to kill someone and hear them call you a b****. Also, if you leave them alone you can hear them having conversations with each other sometimes.

The Music is also breathtaking, and there is also an "X" version, which is a sped up pumped up version of the Techno-Metal of Perfect Dark, and it all sounds great for a System with limited sound capacities. You are also hearing the sound effects of the bullets plinking off of the walls, and your boots crunching on the snow or tapping on the metal walkways or concrete. And the weapons, oh god they all sound the exact way that they should sound, and hearing their bullets ripping into the enemy's flesh and splattering their blood on the wall is equally satisfying. Really, just think of how limited the N64 Cartridges are, and compare them to CD's and DVD's, it is very impressive how much these geniuses at Rare were capable of cramming in there.

Atmosphere: 9

Perfect Dark sets up the atmosphere very well. The levels make you feel like you're sneaking around, the music you hear also helps out with that, when the music changes and gets faster you get more excited and stuff like that. But for me the most immersing thing is all of the little details that there are, the sparks of the bullets pelting the walls, the screams of the enemy when you fire a bullet through their throat, the lighting and all of the other effects on the levels, which can change how it looks. Perfect Dark really does suck you in.

Multiplayer: 10

This is the Holy Grail of Perfect Dark, and the greatest Non-Online Multiplayer ever for a game in my opinion. Anyone who has played Goldeneye on Multiplayer, take that fun and multiply it by 10, and you have Perfect Dark's Combat Simulator. The massive amount of things you can do is mind boggling, you can create different Mission Modes like Capture the case, Pop a Cap, Hold the Case, Hacker and basic kill everybody, with Teams or Battle Royal. And you can also chose the weapons in each of the levels out of the 40 you are given, and that is very nice since you can set up levels to your hearts content. And there are also up to 8 AI in each level, and you can order the ones around on your team and they can fight like humans except they cant use some weapons [Remote Mines].

You are also able to adjust their difficulty, and their behavior since there are some special settings you can give them, like Speed-Sim, which moves very fast, and so many others it gives you an even bigger feeling of customization. And you are also able to select the appearance of the AI in the mode, and there are at least 50 different bodies and hundreds of heads, so that is impressive as well. And you can set up the music from all of the songs you have heard in the game, but since I don't care I leave it on "play all songs". And the game records all of your stats, and it makes you think of just how much time you spent on the game when you look at it. The only problem is the slow down when you have 8 Simulants and 4 Humans blowing lead at each other.

But as simply as I can put it, Perfect Dark is the God of N64 Multiplayer games. And, Rare has put things in a game made over 7 years ago, and its Multiplayer still has not been eclipsed in just how much you can do with it.

Replayability: 10

Lets see... the Cheats, the adjustable difficulty, the amazing Multiplayer, and it was made by Rare, if I could I would hook it up to my brain and play ALL DAY LONG until I die.

Pros:
Great Graphics, sound, multiplayer, AI... great everything! Joanna is a great character.

Cons:
Slowdown, levels aren't as good as in Goldeneye [although they look better], need an expansion pack.

Should you get it:
You must buy this game right now; Perfect Dark is the best FPS game on the N64, and possibly one of the best FPS games of all time.

I would also recommend getting the prequel Perfect Dark Zero [even though it is not as good], Goldeneye, and any of the games made by the people at Free Radical because that company is made up of people who worked on this game.

Overall:

Yet again Rare has created a Gem, and it is sad that they can't make em like this anymore, hell it's a shame that so many Modern FPS games have not come close to being as good as Goldeneye and Perfect Dark were. And Perfect Dark is a very hard game on Single Player mode, which will take up plenty of time getting everything, and easily worth your time. This game is one of the many examples of how Rare kept Nintendo alive during the Nintendo 64 years.

Although, if you only like the newer FPS games I doubt that you would like Perfect Dark because a lot of modern FPS games are just run and gun. But you might like Perfect Dark Zero, because even though it has plenty of espionage in it, there are still some Halo-esqe firefights.

10

Reviewer's Score: 10/10, Originally Posted: 07/17/07, Updated 03/24/08

Game Release: Perfect Dark (Player's Choice) (US, 2001)

Goldeneye

"Rare redefined the FPS Genre"

In 1995 the first Bond movie with Pierce Brosnan titled "Goldeneye" was released. Two years later, Rare became a household name when they redefined the FPS genre, and became one of the few developers who made a game based on a movie that did not suck. Most people cannot think of FPS games without thinking of this game, and I am certain that Goldeneye was the Halo of its generation.

Story: 8

Goldeneye has almost the same exact story as the movie [as most movie-games do], but that does not stop it from being good.

Everything starts off in the mid 1980's as you [playing as James Bond of course] are infiltrating a Dam to find the weapons facility hidden inside, and you have help from fellow MI6 agent Alec Trevelyan as you try to destroy the facility. But as you prepare to destroy it, you are ambushed and Colonel Ourumov kills Alec, and you have to escape by flying a plane out.

For the rest of the game, you wind up working with Natalya, one of the people who worked in Severnaya, Russia as a satellite controller. And you wind up going against the criminal syndicate Janus, and your goal is to stop them from using Goldeneye.

Now, I just covered small things because I do not want to reveal the entire story in case there is anyone reading this who has not played the game. But the story is really good, and it feels like you are in the movie.

Gameplay: 9

What a difference this is from Doom, Quake, and Dark Forces, instead of the run-and-gun kill everything style gameplay those three games employed, Goldeneye employs stealth based gameplay. Sure, in the easier modes you can go into an area filled with enemies and land headshot after headshot and be on your way, but in the tougher difficulties you need to find discreet ways to kill them, or you are dead. There are also things like bullets that can penetrate doors, scopes, and silencers on several weapons to assist you in this.

The missions are also objective based; you are usually given several tasks that you need to complete before you finish the level. And the amount of tasks that you have to do is increased as a way of making the game more challenging.

I also think that the Campaign is one of the best I have ever seen in a video game, and few games are able to pull off something like this. Sure, Call of Duty 4, and Halo are good games, but you are just going from one point to another shooting whatever is in your way. But in Goldeneye even though it is a similar format to the other games, you are still doing something besides going from point A to point B. Besides, this is one of the few times where a movie has been realistically adapted into a video game that was actually good. And I actually enjoyed the campaign more than the movie.

There is also one other good feature in this game; you care capable of doing levels in a certain time limit/difficulty in order to unlock a cheat code that can change the game around. You can get weapons, change the graphics around, or make everything faster/slower. It is a good way to increase replay value, I'll give them that.

Challenge: 9

I will say the same thing I said about Perfect Dark for this section. If you want to just beat the game on easy and go into Multiplayer then you won't have to work very hard. But if you intend to get everything then its gonna take a while. On the "easy" difficulty, the AI is really easy to take down, and there aren't many objectives. But you bump up the difficulty and the AI gets a better aim, you have less ammo, and you have more work to do. I think that qualifies as a damn good challenge, especially to someone who would not be used to the stealthy gameplay.

Controls: 10

One of the tough things about making a good console FPS is that the controls are vastly inferior to the mouse and keyboard setup you have on the Computer, but Rare showed everyone just how you are supposed to do it on the Nintendo 64.

There are several different controls, but I found that the one where the C buttons let you move, and the Control Stick lets you aim was the most efficient [and because I am used to the dual control stick method of the newer games], and the easiest to use. And moving Bond around is easy enough, you can aim really well with the controls [and if you suck there is auto aim], and if you can find a N64 Gamepad where the stick is not screwed up like mine is, you should have no problem with the controls.

Graphics: 9

Goldeneye had some of the best graphics that I have ever seen at the time it came out. The environments from the movie, and several of the characters were recreated very well, and their faces look like they were applied by taking a picture and mapping it over the head polygons like you can in the first Sims game. I was amazed at how well almost everything from the movie was recreated, and expanded upon in this game. I myself have spent a lot of time just looking at the little details that were put into some of these levels to make them look even more realistic. The weapons were also very well designed, and closely resembled their real life counterparts.

The only problem with the graphics in my mind is that there are some glitches that can screw with the graphics, and the frame rate can go down a lot sometimes.

Sound: 8

Like most games made by Rare this one sounds really good. The weapons sound good , and the score is brilliantly done.

Unfortunately, there is very little voice over work done, even though some other games like Star Fox 64 had this. I am certain that it was not included because Goldeneye was a big game, but I just wish that I could of heard more than Bond, or the other people you are shooting at grunting and screaming as they are shot.

Atmosphere: 9

As I said above, this game recreates the movie very well, and you feel like you really are James Bond. The stealthy style of the game works, and the music sets the tone for the levels whenever you hear it.

Multiplayer: 10

This is why people still play the game. Even though this was added late into the game, it became the standard for split-screen Multiplayer.

You are capable of selecting several of the characters from the game, and going into different levels that have several different modes and weapon setups that you can play with.

I have spent so much time just playing in the multiplayer mode of this game. I learned the levels, the weapon spawn points, and the best places that I could snipe from. And even though I have played brilliant games like Call of Duty 4, and Halo 3 online, I still come back to this because of how fun it is to just get 4 people on a couch and start blowing the hell out of each other.

Replayability: 10

Beating all of the difficulties, cheat codes, multiplayer. What the hell isn't in this game to keep you from replaying it?

Pros:
One of the few good adaptions of a movie to a game, brilliant single player and multiplayer modes, incredible graphics, redefined the FPS genre and continues to influence games today.

Cons:
Completely archaic by todays standards, slow frame rate, no voice overs.

Should you get it:
I would highly advise you to buy this game if you can find a copy of it just so you can experience the game that redefined the entire FPS genre.

I would also recommend checking out the spiritual sequel to this game Perfect Dark that improved on Goldeneye in almost every way, and its prequel Perfect Dark Zero on the Xbox 360. Also, people who worked on Goldeneye are also at Free Radical now, and you should check out their TimeSplitters series.

Overall:

Goldeneye redefined the genre, and helped Rare become the legendary developer that they are today, and I still believe that it is because of them that the Nintendo 64 survived against the Playstation as long as it did. Almost everyone who has played Goldeneye loved it, and I think that the only people now who would hate it are the people who only want to play games where you go across a set path blowing up whatever is in your way.

9

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 03/24/08

Game Release: GoldenEye 007 (US, 08/25/97)

Perfect Dark Zero

"If it ain't broken, don't fix it..."

Now, before I begin, I would like to delve into the development of the game a little bit, but it will have a point in the review so don't worry about it. The game was being made for the Nintendo GameCube in 2000 and it was previewed at Spaceworld 2000. But in 2002 Microsoft bought out Rare so the production shifted to the Xbox, and after some promotional images of Joanna popped up with her looking... disturbingly anime-ish they had to start over because frankly a lot of people were p***** off by it. Then it shifted over to the Xbox 360 about a year before it was done and was released in 2005 for the 360 Launch. So Perfect Dark Zero spanned 3 consoles, 2 companies and 5 years. Now lets get back to the game.

Story: 7

Perfect Dark Zero is the "Prequel" to the N64 Classic Perfect Dark, and it is about how everybody's favorite red haired ass kicking Brit joined the Carrington Institute. Also it is set in the year 2020 [3 years before Perfect Dark] and Jo is working with her Dad, Jack Dark an Ex Marine, Cop and current Bounty Hunter and her friend Chandra.

And on a mission Joanna gets caught up in a war between the Hyper corps [basically companies with enough money to make Bill Gates look like M.C. Hammer] dataDyne and the Carrington Institute. And after dataDyne hurt Joanna she joins the Institute in their war.

Now personally, I found the story to be a little bit weak, it was not terrible but it just did not fit right in the Perfect Dark universe. There were some inconsistencies, like how Jo was going on Missions for the Institute when she just finished training in Perfect Dark, and her meeting Jonathan in this game when she barley knew him in the first game, or better yet how Jo lost her British Accent. I also was not a fan of how Joanna acted in this game, in Perfect Dark she was a smart competent agent, who could kick your ass before you knew what happened, but now she seems like a little kid. Well I don't want to reveal too much else so I will move on now.

Gameplay: 7

Perfect Dark Zero has a very futuristic feel too it [hell, it feels more futuristic than the first one in some places]. But the story is you playing through 14 Missions either by yourself, or with one of your buddies on Xbox Live, or with an extra controller, you also have multiple difficulties and unlockable weapons that you can chose if you play through levels again. And the weapons systems feels like Halo does, except they revised it a little, you can carry up to 4 weapons at one time, for example a Pistol takes up one slot while larger more powerful weapons take up more space, so you have to think about what you want to carry. There are also several dual wieldable weapons, mainly the pistols and some of the SMG's. And the weapon you are carrying also changes your speed, although I thought that just a Pistol slowed you down too much, I don't think they are THAT heavy.

You are also capable of using a cover function which works good enough if you decide to use it, and there is a dodge function which works better than jumping, because some things like hopping across the level with Shotgun in Halo is really annoying. I also like the Health system, after you are hit and you go a few seconds without being shot your health jumps back up but it also decreases your maximum health so you need to think about what you do. But I do think that something like what was in the first game would of worked better, or maybe the style that Call of Duty uses.

There are also some vehicles, but you don't really get to use them very long although they are fun to play with. Though I have a little problem with the AI, they are VERY accurate, they do a good job moving around and there are enough in most places to keep you busy. But the bad part in my mind was that they behaved too much like they did on the N64, but that is what you get with the constant console shifting Perfect Dark Zero had. For instance, on the Outpost Rescue level, sometimes when I was on the balcony and I shot at the AI, the damn things did not respond, they just pointed their guns at the wall. I also thought that the AI's movements got kind of screwy at times, it seems like some of them move really slow even though it looks like they are running. Add that to the fact that some of the levels just weren't that good. But Perfect Dark Zero is fun although there were a couple little gripes for me.

The biggest problem that I am noticing now is that even though how the first Perfect Dark [or Goldeneye for that matter] worked very well, this game seemed like it was trying to emulate Halo in a few places. I think that the game would of been so much better if they just left what worked in the first game alone, or refined what worked so it would seem like it was better. But for gods sake don't change everything around so much.

Challenge: 7

This is where Perfect Dark Zero shows how outdated in some spots it is, the AI is terrible in some places, and you are constantly guided through the levels so you don't really need to bother exploring. As I said with the last game, if you're going to blow through the single player mode and drop the game, prepare for a cakewalk.

But if you want to find everything it will take you a while to do that. You can do four different difficulties which like the other game, give you more objectives and make your Enemies tougher. On the hard modes, prey because from the videos I have seen, and the levels I have tried on Perfect Agent [hard], it will take you a long time to do them. There are also a lot of achievements [look in the "Cheats & Secrets" section] that should take you a real long time to do. It's not too hard, but it will test your patience trying to get 1000 headshots.

Controls: 8

I will keep this short since I really don't have much to say about the Controls here. So I will just mention my biggest complaint first, it is also hard to get used to aiming with the guns, but after you get used to it, you will be a better shot on everything else. But other than that everything does work very well in my opinion, even though it feels a little clunky at first. I like the pressure sensitive aiming and after I got used to everything it worked quite well.

Graphics: 7

I felt a little bit mixed on the Graphics, they are not bad, but it is not what I would expect from a 360 game either. First some of the Levels in the beginning look a outdated although in the latter half the environments looks beautiful. Another problem I had was that the Characters look ugly up close, and how some of the environments look very realistic although the characters kept kind of an Anime-ish look like they did in the beginning of development with a mix of realism, although I felt that they looked like characters on Xbox. The characters looked like they were made of Plastic sometimes, and that does not fit with the gritty, realistic world that Perfect Dark is really set in. I also thought that Joanna looked really different in this game She was much more of a sex-bomb in this game, and I do like her new look. But she still looked too much like those old Anime drawings of her that made everyone so mad. It kinda reminds me of how in Metroid Prime 1 how Samus looked Realistic, but in Metroid Prime 2 and 3 she looked like an Anime character. Although, if the Sequel ever gets done, I would like to see a realistic version of that design.

But where the good stuff graphically comes out is in the texturing, some new special tools like parallax mapping are used to make the textures look 3D, think of the massive bullet holes you could create in F.E.A.R. and you have what was done with some of the textures in here. And the weapons are all gorgeous, and the look close to their real-life counterparts. The glint of the metal of the guns and seeing the blood spurt out of the enemy's head when you fire a bullet through their skull is very well done [but where are the blood stains!] and all of the muzzle flares are well done, you can see that Rare puts a lot of attention to detail. The only problem is that some things looked very glossy that should not have looked like that.

One more gripe, why do the people sometimes begin pin-balling [also known as Havok Explosions, which are frequent in the game Robot Arena 2: Design and Destroy] if you kill them sometimes, tell me that because it is very amusing but this is the 21st century and stuff still does this? Hell, a lot of the death animations you see make the deaths in Goldeneye look good. Oh well, the fact of the matter is Perfect Dark Zero is a pretty game, although I feel like it could be done on the first Xbox, or the Wii if Nintendo still owned Rare, and the graphics just don't seem right in some places.

Sound: 7

Well like always Rare shows that they have some of the best composers in the business. The music is good and it does help pump you up for the more exciting levels. The music sounds right for the levels you are in. Although, it is not of the same high quality as the music in the previous game. And the sound effects are great, most of them sound very realistic, especially the guns.

But my problem is the voice-overs are... well most of them are terrible, I felt like there was a complete lack of emotion in the voice-overs. And some of voices just did not sound as good as previous Rare games did. One of the most vivid memories I have when I think of the first game is how well done the voices were, but now that quality seems to have declined. I think that Joanna, Jack, and Jonathan should of sounded much different than they do in this game. Joanna Dark sounds like a little brat, Jonathan does not sound like the tough guy that was in the Army [as the books say], and neither does Jack Dark for that matter.

Also I think that someone should jam a sock into Chandra and the Multiplayer Announcers mouth to shut them up! God I hate that damn announcer... But other than that Perfect Dark Zero sounds great and you should buy the Soundtrack as well if you enjoyed the music.

Multiplayer: 8

This is the best part of Perfect Dark Zero, and this is where you will spend your time on the game. There are several different modes that you can play with. Mainly, there is Death Match which gives you the standard stuff like Team Deathmatche's, Capture the Flag, King of the Hill, and so on. There is also Dark Ops, which is round based modes where you are either trying to kill the other team before they kill you, survive in a base while the other team attacks you, or fighting against the other Infected team who can mutate your guys onto their team once they kill them. All of this works very well, despite a relatively slow pace in some parts.

there is a 32-player support if you play online. There are also several map-packs you can download on Xbox Live [including the Temple and the Facility from Goldeneye and Perfect Dark]. And like I said before you can play the Single Player missions with your buddies like in Perfect Dark, and that makes them so much more fun too me, that is really the only way you should play the game in my mind.

Perfect Dark has one of the best Multiplayer modes I have seen and it made up for what I found to be a sub-par single player mode. Although, compared to what you can see now in Call of Duty 4, and Halo 3. Perfect Dark Zero just does not stack up, although it is fun the Bots still seem like they are the ones from the first game. And the movement is too slow in some parts to really be exciting. One of the things that I also noticed was that while the health system worked well in the Campaign, in the Multiplayer it too too many shots to kill something.

Just kill the announcer, hearing him screaming "Killtastic!" and "Killegal!" makes my ears hurt. It was funny at first when you hear those stupid things, then it gets really annoying. The worst part is that you can't turn the ******* off.

So overall, the Multiplayer is really fun, but it just does not stack up to what is out now. Although I would recommend playing against the Bots on here if you ever have problems getting Xbox Live working.

Atmosphere: 7

While the graphics and the sound do help immerse you a lot, I found the story and some of the voice acting to be very distracting while I was playing the game. And the AI felt like it was too dumb for a next generation game; these things bothered me enough to warrant detracting a few points.

Replayability: 7

You can play through the levels again with your new weapons, you can try to beat all four difficulties, you can play a very fun Multiplayer mode, and if you feel like it get the achievements.

Pros:
The guns look beautiful, fun Multiplayer, great sound effects and Music, I like the new look for Joanna.

Cons:
Single Player mode story is weak, graphics feel a little bit underpowered and out of place sometimes, wonky physics, AI seems outdated, bad voice work.

Should you get it:
Buy it because although it is not as good as the first Perfect Dark, it is still a very fun game. And you can find it for 9 bucks used ad most of the game stores now.

Overall:

Now, those of you who see me on the Message Boards for this game know that I have defended the game, I have said that it is not as bad as people say it is. But really, Rare could of done so much better on this game, especially if they made it more like the first game. Although a lot of the problems could be blamed on the delays, and the 5 years it took to finish the game. Hopefully if the Sequel ever gets done, it will refine the things that this game done right, fix the things that were done poorly so that they work, and bring back the oodles of features that the first game had.

Overall, you will either like this game, or you will hate it.

7

Also, check out the two books that are currently out "Initial Vector" and "Second Front" as well as the Comic "Janus Tears" [the third book will be out soon] because they all help advance the story, and they are very well done. There have also been rumors of a Sequel to the first game back in April 07 so keep an eye out for that, hopefully it will be amazing, like Rare's old games were.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 07/19/07, Updated 03/28/08

Game Release: Perfect Dark Zero (Limited Edition) (US, 11/22/05)

Perfect Dark XBLA

"Perfection gets even better"

As someone who has owned the original Perfect Dark since it was released by Rare 10 years ago, and played the hell out of it [over 20 days logged into the game], being able to go through it again in this updated port of the game is something that I have been awaiting ever since it was announced that Rare and 4J Studios were doing this remake. Perfect Dark is my favorite game, and this remake lived up to my expectations. So, lets get this thing started.

Story: 8

Perfect Dark has a pretty good story, although the first half is more interesting to me.

Basically, a long time ago an alien warship crashed in the ocean and an alien race called the Skedar are now looking for it, and another group of aliens called the Maians are trying to stop them.

Fast forward to 2023 and you play as an agent for the Carrington Institute named Joanna Dark, and you are sent to dataDyne to extract Dr. Carrol, an AI built by dataDyne help find and use the weapon on the warship. Then you get involved in a little war with dataDyne, the Skedar, and some corrupt people in the Government.

Although it isn't as impressive as the stories in some modern games, I'm not comparing Perfect Dark to them so I won't use that as a knock against it. There is also a full backstory and overview of the plot in the game that you can find in the menus, and unlike Goldeneye in Perfect Dark you get cut scenes that are fully voiced between missions that are quite well done considering that they were made over 10 years ago and they still look decent today.

The story does change from basic espionage to sci-fi stuff with aliens around the halfway point of the game and it may be a little jarring at first, but the story is still interesting enough to keep you attention, and it has the typical Rareware charm that we all grew to love.

Gameplay: 10

Perfect Dark was fun to play 10 years ago, and it has aged well when you compare it to modern FPS games.

Unlike most newer games where your hand is held throughout the game and they have little arrows and maps telling you where to go, Perfect Dark puts you into a level with some objectives that give you hints on what you have to do, but thats it. Then you have to do all of the objectives [and you get more of them depending on the difficulty setting you choose] which can also require you go out guns blazing or sneaking around the level.

The levels are also well designed, although because your hand isn't held throughout the game some places like halfway through the game when you are in Alaska after a plane crash have so many different paths that you can easily get lost if it is your first time playing the game [hell I still get lost in there sometimes], and I have heard people on these forums who are trying the game out for the first time saying that the first level took them over 10 minutes to beat on Agent because they got lost looking around the building when people like myself who have been playing the game for a long time can beat it in under a minute. But I don't see this as a flaw, just an example of how coddled gamers have been in recent years when they get lost because there isn't an arrow telling them to go or levels that are completely linear so you just wind up going down the path shooting whatever is in your way. Perfect Dark is different, there are a lot of different paths and things to do in every level, and it is nice to see how expansive the levels are.

The AI is really the only thing that has aged poorly in the campaign, some of them won't see you right away and you can make them miss you when they start shooting by just strafing out of the way since they can't leave an animation [doing barrel rolls, extending their arm out so they can shoot at you] when it starts up. But given the games age the AI is still pretty good.

You also get a ton of weapons that each have their own secondary functions. And since this is a game set in the future with aliens, there is some creative stuff like a gun that can transform into a sentry gun, to a gun with a scope that can see through walls and shoot through them as well. Add that to all of the gadgets like a little floating orb you can control and tranquilize people with and there are a lot of ways to play the game. And unlike most modern games where you can only carry two weapons at a time, you can carry as much stuff as you can find around the levels giving you way more options to complete the levels.

There is also something unique to Perfect Dark, when you aren't doing missions or playing in the Combat Simulator doing challenges against the AI or playing with your friends you can hang out in the Carrington Institute and do training missions that teach you how to use the gadgets or the controls, and you can go into a firing range where you can test your accuracy with the multitude of weapons in the game.

Perfect Dark has a good campaign, filled with different ways to play the levels and it is still as fun to play as it always was.

Challenge: 9

Like most games, there is an easy difficulty mode, but the standard mode provides a good challenge and it can get even harder. Along with the high probability of getting lost when you start off on the game, there is also no rechargeable health like in Halo or Call of Duty although you can find shields that give you another health bar until they are shot enough to run out. So unlike most modern games you have to be more careful because you can't just run out in the open and get hit sometimes because that health won't come back. Some of the later levels can get really tough because of this, especially on higher difficulty modes where you can't find shields.

Controls: 8

Perfect Dark has adjusted to the Xbox controller quite well. Along with the normal controls you also get some settings that are based on Halo and Call of Duty for the people that are more used to those controls. The sensitivity when you aim will take a little bit of getting used to, but the game still has the auto aim that was necessary on the N64 controller at times especially when your stick was broken down from overuse like mine was, and the only real flaw with the controls is that aiming with the L-Trigger doesn't work very well with the sensitivity of the new controls, although I never used that much anyway. Other than that the controls work well, and I got used to them quickly.

Although, it does bear mentioning that some people are upset about the lack of legacy and southpaw controls. I'm sure that most of you know that southpaw is left handed controls, and the legacy controls are basically having the sticks work like the stick and c buttons did with the 1.1 settings in Goldeneye and Perfect Dark. This wasn't really a big deal to me, but I would like to see it patched so that these can be added to the game.

Graphics: 8

Although by current standards the graphics aren't that great, 4J did a great job updating everything. To keep the explanation simple, they basically kept the same environments and added some new textures to them, redid all of the sky boxes, and they also updated the polygon counts for the vehicles, characters, and guns along with some new textures, but they made sure that even with the higher polygon count it still looked similar to how everything looked in the N64 version of the game,

I was very impressed when I saw the new graphics for the first time, you can just look at the first level and seeing how much detail is in all of the building near the dataDyne skyscraper along with how much better the sky looks was amazing. The developers clearly put a lot of work into making the game look better, but other than that everything is still the same. The animations weren't changed, and the levels are still exactly the same, this is just a new coat of paint but it makes a big difference.

The best change with the graphics is that the game now runs at a solid 60 frames per second. Anyone who has played Goldeneye or Perfect Dark would know that those games used up a lot of the power from the N64s hardware, and the game would slow to a crawl, especially when there was a lot of action on the screen. But from the time I have spent on this game, I haven't seen any real slowdown and being able to play Perfect Dark without the screen getting choppy is enough for me. The only thing that would have made the graphics better is if there was an option to switch to the original N64 graphics along with the new ones.

Sound: 9

Like with the graphics, they are the same, just slightly enhanced.

Although it isn't as noticeable as the new graphics, I did notice that the music and the sound effects sounded like the quality was higher, and I believe that is because the sound files did not have to be compressed as much.

The voice acting although it is a little cheesy [You can't make accusations like that without evidence, I ashume you have some?] that isn't a bad thing. A lot of the voices were done by people that work at Rare and I thought that the voices they did were good enough. Along with that the sound effects fit the locations pretty well, and an echo was also added to some areas, the weapons all have a nice and distinctive noise when they fire, and the music is filled with memorable tracks that fit the mood of the level.

Atmosphere: 9

Perfect Dark still does a good job immersing you into the environment even though the game is pretty old. The music can set the mood pretty well, and the music can change to a faster paced version of the song when the action starts to heat up near the end of the level. There are also so many little things like graffiti on the wall, or shooting a guy in the leg and seeing him limp around as the blood trail drips from it as he walks away [by the way, more games should do that].

Multiplayer: 10

The best part of Perfect Dark is still amazing, even 10 years after it was released. You can see how ahead of its time this game was when you consider that some games don't have the customization or the features as a game that came out 10 years ago. I believe that most modern FPS games haven't lived up to how good Goldeneye and Perfect Dark were.

Lets start with Co-Op, Perfect Dark had it, and now you can play it online, you can also use AI buddies to go through the levels but they aren't as useful. There is also Counter-Op, a really interesting mode that I haven't seen anywhere since this game came out. One person plays as Joanna, and the other gets to take over an endless army of the enemies on the level and they have to try to keep Joanna from completing the level.

Then, you move on to the real Multiplayer mode, which allows you to do 30 challenges which you needed to unlock stuff for the multiplayer mode in the original game, but now a lot of stuff is unlocked for you so it isn't as important. And, you also have a ton of maps where you can customize where all of the weapons spawn, the rule sets for the game, and the time limit along with the score. You can also use 8 bots [another thing most games don't even have in their multiplayer modes anymore] with difficulty settings ranging from Meat Sim [basically a walking piece of meat, very stupid AI] to Dark Sim [those damn things cheat] and you can also give them different personalities that make them like explosives, run around disarming people, go after the worst/best player, or only use their fists. You can also create your own character out of a bunch of different bodies and heads that are used throughout the game, and all of your stats are tracked by the game. Again, this game came out ten years ago and it still has more features than many NEW games. Along with all of that goodness, you also have three maps from Goldeneye, and the classic weapons you could unlock for the campaign by getting gold medals on the firing range can now be used in the multiplayer mode.

When you go to playing the multiplayer mode itself, its just fun to play. Its not about getting a good Kill/Death ratio like Call of Duty and Halo are now, there are plenty of unbalanced weapons like the Farsight XR-20 [that gun that can fire through walls I mentioned earlier] and it is the most fun when you have four people on a couch that are just trying to have fun.

The only problems with the multiplayer are the occasional lag problems that all games get now, the people who camp in a corner with the Farsight or deploy mines/sentry guns near the spawn points, or just people who wait near spawn points and kill people after they come back to life [it was an unwritten rule with me and my friends not to attack people who are unarmed unless they come at you first, but that all goes out the window online]. But those are all just minor things that can be dealt with. Perfect Dark still has one of the best multiplayer modes of any game ever made.

Replayability: 10

Endlessly customizable multiplayer mode, you can unlock cheat codes in the campaign, the firing range, throwing knives and shooting arrows into the guy outside the firing range's head, and a ton of other stuff will keep you coming back to Perfect Dark for a long time.

Pros:
Amazing multiplayer mode, endless customization, fun campaign, creative objectives, good weapons, the new coat of paint looks great, choppy framerate is gone, still the same amazing game it was 10 years ago.

Cons:
AI shows its age, people who are new to Perfect Dark may get lost a lot and they might be frustrated by the lack of recharging health, that guy camping with the Farsight, being unable to play as a Skedar in the multiplayer mode.

Should you get it:
If you have an Xbox 360, you should own this game. Nothing more needs to be said. Hell, get the N64 cartridge too.

Overall

Perfect Dark was an amazing game 10 years ago, and it still is today. It was a last hurrah for the Nintendo 64 and an example of how amazing some of the stuff Rare was making during those days really was. Now, a new generation is able to experience what all of us saw back then, and they can get it for 10 dollars. Really, you have no excuse not to buy this game, and love it.

10

Reviewer's Score: 10/10, Originally Posted: 03/22/10, Updated 03/25/10

Game Release: Perfect Dark (US, 03/17/10)

[Joe]

Star Wars KOTOR PC

"Light Side or Dark Side"

Star Wars: Knights of The Old Republic [or KotOR] is an RPG made by the incredible developers Bioware set 4000 years before the events of Episode IV it is also one of the best Star Wars games I have played, so lets light this candle.

Story: 8

Like I said, KotOR is set 4000 years before "A New Hope". And the main plot of the game is a search for an item called the "Star Forge".

You play an unknown Republic Soldier who is discovered to be force sensitive after some su(You Racist Bastard)ious events and was surprisingly quickly trained into being a Jedi [you will see why if you play the game]. And the Jedi put you on a quest to find the "Star Maps" and the aforementioned Star Forge. Your main enemy in this game is the Sith Lord Darth Malak who killed his old master Darth Revan.

You and some friends you find such as Carth, the Republic pilot, Bastila the Jedi who "killed" Darth Revan [remember, Malak did it], HK-47, the insane homicidal assassin droid [who I always bring with me in the game] and Canderous the Mandalorian. And there are also many more party members you can use.

Anyway the story is quite good, there are a few twists and turns, but if you really want to know everything just check the Forum and you can find out all of the little secrets.

Gameplay: 8

KotOR is an RPG that uses real time battle sequences [IE: it is not turn based like in Final Fantasy, you fight in real time] and this is also done with the Dungeons and Dragons system. All of the battles are done by some kind of virtual dice roll that determines if your attack hits and how much damage you can do. You can also choose several different character classes [normal classes, and the Jedi ones once you are trained]. You also learn different Feats [abilities], Force Powers and you can upgrade your class skills [like hacking computers, repair or healing] and your own physical stats [your defense, strength, constitution]. And you are able to choose a male or female character, which does change some things. You also have several different Weapons, equipment and Armor, and most of them can be upgraded with parts you find.

You play by going through the levels, trying to advance the story by finding an item, talking to someone and getting some information, killing people etc. Most of the time you are told where to go, like in Taris [the first level], you are given an objective by someone, and it is stored in your Datapad until you do it, so when you are told to find Mission Vao, you go around asking people about her until you find out where she is, and you go there, simple as that. It sounds boring, but remember, you also have to kill a lot of people along the way to gain experience and level up.

One of my problems is that sometimes the game glitches and freezes up, and sometimes you can't order your team around as well as you would like and you need to constantly watch them. But the game is very fun to play nonetheless.

Challenge: 7

If you want to have a challenge at KotOR, play on one of the harder modes because otherwise it won't be that hard to beat the game. KotOR is a very easy game if you know how to play RPG's, if you know how to customize your character and use your gear you will be fine, if not you will get killed quickly once you get off Taris. The real challenge in KotOR is finishing all of the quests you can do, and beating the game on both Light Side and Dark Side for both of the endings. There is no real big reward for doing everything, but having the patience to do all of the quests, which will add to your time, is the real challenge of this game.

Controls: 8

I don't really know how to describe the controls for KotOR. When I play everything is done with the keyboard, and the buttons are easy enough to remember, you can also click on things with your mouse to do the actions. I found everything to work good enough for me when I played it, so I am happy with it.

Graphics: 7

I found this to be a little bit weak, the game was made for the Xbox and I found it to be underpowered [look at Halo, compare it to this]. The weapons look a little fakey to me. But the Character models do look nice, although the face animation looks a little weird, it is also nice to see that the NPC's do move around, you can look at them and see them looking around where you are, nice little detail. I also found some things to be too shiny, like the Armor and sometimes the people themselves [Quarrens have a nice little blinding glint coming off of their face].

I have also found that some video cards can make the game get really screwy, and sometimes my character warps around [Dantooine is a big offender for this] and you will have to turn stuff down to make the game go off of 1 Frame Per Second. But other than that the environments are well done and have good detail in them, and the game itself is massive.

Sound: 9

How could you get a Star Wars game without good sound? You will notice that there are 4 CD's when you buy this game, and I think that a couple of them were used just to hold all of the voice over data in this game.

There is a massive amount of voice acting in here. And all of the main characters have their own voice acting, and it all fits their personality, but HK-47 is the funniest one to listen to with his rants on "meat bags" and his love of killing stuff. The voice work is top notch, although ALL of the Aliens repeat the same voice over and over and over and over, it gets really annoying hearing the same twi lek voice on every alien in the game. Also, your character never talks, you do select what he/she says but it would be nice to hear what you select.

And with the music, it is all very well done since Star Wars is known for its incredible score, and Bioware did a great job on it. The game really sounds great and it makes up for some of the faults with the visuals.

Atmosphere: 8

KotOR is a very atmospheric game, you do feel like you are whatever you named your Jedi at some times cutting through hoards of Sith with a light saber. The most immersive part for me was all of the Dialogue, which felt very realistic and well acted [except for my character, because he/she is mute]. The graphics were good enough to convey what was going on in all of the levels, such as when you were in Mannan on the Sea Floor where the base was destroyed, it set up the mood quite well. All in all, the game is about a mission where you are isolated and you need to find some objects, and that is what the game feels like.

Replayability: 7

I have played the game several times and that was to do all of the side quests you are given to do, and to get both of the endings you can get [one if you stayed to the light, one if you fell to the dark], and sometimes you will play just to hear HK-47. But after that there is not much left unless you enjoy the game.

Pros:
Great sound, well developed story, funny characters and HK-47, 40 Hour game if you do everything

Cons:
Graphics are a little weak, glitches, not as much fun after multiple play throughs.

Should you get it:
Buy it for a great Star Wars game that expands the story well.

Overall:

Bioware made one of the best RPG's and Star Wars games I have ever played. And I fully recommend that you buy the game and play it, you will not regret it.

9

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 07/19/07, Updated 05/30/08

Game Release: Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic (US, 11/18/03)

KOTOR II PC

"A Good Game Made in A Short Time"

Before I start this review, I would like to thank Wookieepedia for helping me keep some of my facts straight in this little review: mainly for the next Paragraph.

[Skip this paragraph if you don't care about the game history]

Now First I want to talk about something about the game, to explain some things to the people who won't know. This game was made in a short time [released on December 6th 2004 while KotOR I came out on July 15th 2003] and you can tell that some stuff feels unfinished. A lot of dialog was cut out, and the ending, which included several characters dying, were cut out so that the game would be complete in time for Christmas. In fact Obsidian the developers for this game wanted there to be a patch that RESTORED the cut content, but Lucas Arts declined it. Luckily Team Giza is making the Restoration Patch that will bring back as much of the cut content as possible. So like I said you could tell the game is unfinished, but it still is a good game.

Now back on track...

Story: 8

KotoR II: TSL takes place 5 years after the events of the first very successful game, and you play as the Jedi Exile [she is canonically female, so I will refer to her as such] who is believed to be the last of the Jedi and is being hunted by the Sith Triumvirate [that is the name given on Wookieepedia]. And after the destruction of Peragus II by the Sith the Exile finds out that the remaining Jedi Masters [who exiled her] are still alive and hiding on planets, so she goes on a search to find them, as well as the Sith Lords: Darth Sion, Nihilus and Traya.

Now personally I found the story to be VERY well done, and better than the first game was, and I can see why Obsidian got to make the game. The story was also much darker than the first one and there were bigger twists. But the ending was very disappointing because most of it WAS cut out, and there were some much more interesting things in the ending that I have found by looking through the files than there were when I played the game. But still the Story was very well crafted and also continued on KotOR I and reveals a lot about Darth Revan [play the first game] and why he did some of the things that he did after the Mandalorian Wars. Other than the cut content [which took off a point], a very well done story.

Gameplay: 8

Like the last game, you play by going through levels doing your objectives, and talking to people. You still get the choice to choose your responses when you talk to people, and you still get to travel around planets,

The game works very much like the first one did... with a few improvements. It uses the same D&D Dice Battle system that relies on "combat rolls" and such. You also get to level up [but this time you can go up to Level 50 instead of 20] and learn new moves, force powers and increase your skills and your characters own strength. This time you also begin AS a Jedi, you choose from the 3 Jedi Classes in the first game, and after you reach level 15 you can choose a "Prestige Class" which augments your current class. You can also learn "Saber Forms", use MORE force powers and feats, and even train several of your own party members as Jedi [or Sith].

One of my favorites though is the ability to have 2 different sets of equipped weapons at one time making it faster to switch from a blaster into a sword if the enemy is dumb enough to get to close to you. It's just a little thing but it is so good to have because I hated swapping weapons in the old game. Obsidian did a good job making things more efficient.

The game itself is mainly traveling from planet to planet in a search for the Jedi Masters. And you are just given the freedom to explore the Planet, and you have to complete quests to advance the story to the next point. One of the things that I like is that you were given the freedom to do almost anything you want, you can travel to the planets in whatever order you want, and during the conversations you can be as good or as evil as you want. You can help out a person who is being robbed by giving the robbers money, or you can use Force Persuade to make them jump off of a railing so they will fall a long way onto the planets surface.

There are several glitches that can screw with your save files, sometimes the voice goes away, sometimes NPC's don't disappear [on the Refugee Platform in Nar Shaddah Mira sometimes stays in one of the spots where she is at in a Cinematic scene for me] in the game, and the game can get very laggy, but all of this is a result of the short development time. But still fun as hell although the game is a tad too easy [play it on Difficult mode].

Challenge: 7

The main game is much easier than KotOR was, the enemies are easier to defeat and if you know how to level yourself up, and choose the right classes [say... Guardian and Weapon Master] you can be un-killable, especially now that you can level up to level 50, you get really tough to kill around the end. Like last time, the hardest part is finishing all of the quests and getting all of the endings, which should be enough to extend your game for a while though.

But I must say, if you have played KotOR before and this is your first time playing TSL, please play on Hard mode, it is too easy the other way.

Controls: 8

Everything works the same way; you do everything by either pressing simple keys on the keyboard, or clicking on stuff. That isn't really much to discuss but it is quite effective and works quite well for a port of a Xbox game.

Graphics: 6

This game was made using the same engine as KotOR I, and if you read my review of the first game I found it to be a little underpowered. And the game is showing its age because some of the environments are reused and you can see that it looks worse in some parts than the ones Obsidian made. But one part I like is that the Characters look better than they did in KotOR 1, the hair is done better and the particles do move [most of the characters in the first game had static hair], it feels like there is more variety in the faces you see somehow. And like a Star Wars game should, the Light Sabers look pretty, and really that is all that some people care about in these games, hacking people up with those things and it was nice to see some more animations for the saber combat than in KotOR 1, all looks well done. But the glitches can screw with you a lot; you might have to turn stuff down to make it run.


Sound: 9

Like always with a Star Wars game, the sound does not disappoint. There is a lot of voice work done in the game [there are 4 CD's filled with sound, and some that is unused if you can look through the files good enough *wink wink*]. And the voice acting is well done, although it does not feel as professional at times, and sometimes it feels emotionless. But luckily you do have some returning voices like HK-47, Canderous, Bastila and Carth [all offering a little insight into Revan]. Also the music is splendid, but the score is also moodier than it was in the previous game [but it is a darker story, you can see why]. In short the music, the voice and the weapons do sound good, although some characters [T3-M4] are mute at times.

Atmosphere:

Obsidian did a great job setting up this game, and it does feel much darker than KotOR did because it is a darker story. You do feel alone; you do feel like your being hunted, the music is moody enough to make you feel these things as well. The game should be able to immerse you enough.

Replayability: 7

Like I said last time, you can play to do all of the side quests, and get both endings, hell I still don't have all of the movies in the game. But just play on hard mode if you do keep playing, it's more fun.

Pros:
Great Story, revelations on Darth Revan, good characters, great sound.

Cons:
Weak graphics, unfinished, too easy.

Should you get it:
Buy it; even with its flaws and obvious lack of completion, there is a great story and an experience that avid Star Wars fans should enjoy.

Overall:

For a game that is unfinished, and had its story visibly hacked apart in some places, it is a good game. But some of the glitches hinder the gameplay and it would be more worthwhile to play the PC version and wait for the Restoration Mod to come out.

8

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 07/20/07, Updated 05/30/08

Game Release: Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords (US, 02/08/05)

KOTOR Xbox

"The Xbox's Best RPG"

Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic is an RPG created by BioWare [one of the best RPG Developers out there], that was later ported to the PC. I should also say that this review is based on the time I have spent with the game over the last week that I have played it on the Xbox 360 since I bought it . So, lets light this candle.

Story: 9

KotOR is set 4000 years before the events of the first movie "A New Hope", and the story is quite good.

You are a soldier who was on the Republic Cruiser the Endar Spire, and when a Sith Fleet attacks that is trying to capture or kill Bastila Shan, one of the Jedi who was with the strike team who killed the former leader of the Sith Fleet, Darth Revan.

You soon wind up on the planet Taris, and the new Dark Lord of the Sith, Darth Malak [Revan's apprentice] is trying to find Bastila. You have to fight your way off the planet, and then it is found that your character has Force Sensitivity, and can be trained as a Jedi. You are then sent on a mission with Bastila to find the Star Forge which Revan and Malak previously found by using the "Star Maps" on 5 different planets.

That was just a small part of the story, I will leave the rest of the story to you to discover. And I will guarantee you, there are some excellent plot twists in the story, and I liked the entire plot of this game better than I liked the entire Prequel Trilogy.

Kudos BioWare.

Gameplay: 7

KotOR is an RPG that uses the same kind of system as Dungeons and Dragons for combat, and leveling up your characters. The combat is partially in real time, and you use weapons, force powers, and items in combat. The effect is also determined by a virtual dice roll [you have to look in the FAQ's on this site if you want a good explanation, because it is very confusing], and the stats of your characters, and everything they have equipped to themselves.

How to use the items in this game is deserving of its own FAQ. There are plenty of weapons, Armor, and other things that you can equip your characters with. You can also use a workbench to upgrade them with specific parts that you can find, which will make them a lot more efficient . Leveling up your character is also something that you need to learn how to do efficiently, there are 6 different classes you can choose from, the first one is what kind of normal soldier you are; Scout, Soldier, or Scoundrel [all of them have different stats], and then the three Jedi classes; Sentinel, Guardian, or Consular. All six of these are different, and you should pick a Jedi class that corresponds with what class you chose first [such as someone who chose the Soldier Class should be a Jedi Guardian], expert players can also find ways to make their character unstoppable. I [and several other players] have found that while the other 4 classes require you to think about what you assign them, with their Basic Stats [Strength, Constitution, Dexterity], Feats [abilities], Force Powers, and Skills, the Soldier/Guardian can become almost unstoppable with Melee weapons if you apply some things correctly.

The rest of the game when you are not thinking of how to level up your character is mainly going through some of the planets, and doing quests that are mostly just talking to people, finding stuff, or killing stuff. And sometimes this takes place very slowly, which may be a negative for some people, but I actually enjoyed the slower pacing because it just let me explore more, and I did not have to focus on just getting from point A to point B.

Unfortunately, there are some flaws. On the Xbox 360, there is a lot of lag in some places, mostly in combat. There are also a few sequences where the sound goes to hell, mostly when you are talking to people, or random times where almost all of the sound just vanishes. I have found Manaan to be the worst planet for this . The game is just very buggy, and at least the PC version can have more patches put on it so you don't have these problems as much.

At least everything else worked out very well.

Challenge: 7

KotOR is not a very hard game, unless you play on the tougher difficulties, or if you are an advanced player who tries one of the tougher builds on Hard more. I also said above that Jedi Guardians are the class that can easily mow through the game by butchering everything in their path. The best way to make the game harder is just to go through the ENTIRE game, and do everything you can do. It makes the game a lot more fun than it would be if you were just going from Star Map to Star Map.

Take the time to learn about your party members, do the romance side quest, and just help [or kill] the people you encounter. Just do what the game lets you do, and it will help provide a more enjoyable challenge to the game... if you enjoy that sort of stuff.

Controls: 8

I liked the controls for this game a lot, which surprised me since I thought the PC version would of controlled better. But luckily the menu on the bottom of the screen that you use to do almost all of the actions is really easy to use, and I liked having everything in one place [which the PC version did not have]. The only problem is that some things in the other menu are a little bit slower than the PC version, but other than that everything was done very well.

Graphics: 8

I thought the PC version looked mediocre in some places when I wrote my review for it [although that is probably just because my PC is an outdated hunk of crap], but on the Xbox I thought that this game looked really good.

The character models are well detailed, most of the planets look great [except for how boring looking Taris was], the animation was good, and the lighting was excellent. Although KotOR was not the best looking game for the Xbox at its time, it still looked good enough to make me happy.

The only problems were some of the graphical glitches I mentioned above, that most of the people looked exactly the same, and that some of the things do not look very realistic compared to other things.

Sound: 8

This game deserves a good score just for the massive amount of Voice-over work inside of that little DVD.

All of the main characters have their own voices, and some of them are worth listening to just because of how well everything they say was written, such as your homicidal Droid HK-47, and his love of slaughtering Meatbags, or just random comments from Jolee Bindo. You really should listen to everyone when they talk because most of the voices are very good.

As for the effects, and the Music.

The weapons sound good, Lightsabers sound exactly as they should, the clanking of the swords sounds good, and the lasers firing from all of the Blasters sounds good. But the music is on a whole other level, there are some tunes from John Williams in this game, but the music that BioWare's people did is good in its own right. The music fits where it is, just like it does in the movies.

The only problems I had were the sound gaffes I mentioned above, and most of the Aliens having the same damned voice.

Atmosphere: 8

The things that I have mentioned above go along with how atmospheric this game is, but there are some other things that help as well. The game lets you make your own choices on most of what happens during that play through, but it only really matters because it decides if you are a Jedi, or a Sith at the end of the game. Everything that happens leads up to when you have to make the choice of what side of the force you want to follow, good or bad. And how the game allows you to be as good or as bad as you want to be by the choices you choose to make [mostly through conversations] chooses what path you will follow. But in no way is KotOR a game where everything is completely your choice, they just give you some paths to follow, and you choose which one you want. Everything is not as open ended as Fable is.

As for the levels, their design sets up the atmosphere well, as does the musical score that accompanies it. For example, in Taris how things are better on the higher levels, than the decrepit lower levels is accurately conveyed, as is how badly the underwater base in the Hrakert Rift of Manaan was damaged before you arrived.

In short, the game feels very Cinematic, and does a good job immersing you.

Replayability: 7

The only real reason to redo the game is to get the Light Side or Dark Side endings, other than that you would probably just play the game if you liked it enough .

Pros
Great sound, well-developed story, funny characters, HK-47, 40 Hour game if you do everything.

Cons
Very annoying glitches, Manaan, not as much fun after multiple play throughs.

Should you get it:

I would probably recommend getting this game for the Xbox instead of the 360 if you have to get the Xbox version. But if you want the best version of this game buy the PC version, which is modable and has communities that provide Mods for the game.

I found the Platinum Edition of this game used for 9 bucks, and if you can find a copy of the game like that then forget the glitches and get it.

Overall:

This is probably the best RPG on the Xbox, but the only problem is that there are some glitches in it [and I covered all of the ones I found while I played on the 360]. But nonetheless it is a great game, which is almost as good as the original Star Wars trilogy. But you need to be a person who enjoys more story oriented games to like this one.

And since it is that good, I have a message to George Lucas, make a movie or a cartoon out of the Knights of the Old Republic games instead what you're doing now. Or at least get someone to make a sequel to the second game so the fans of the series can figure out what happened!

8

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 03/03/08

Game Release: Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic (Platinum Hits) (US, 2004)

KOTOR II Xbox

"A Great Game Hindered by Glitches, and Incompleteness"

Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords is a great game that continues the story of the incredible first game that Bioware made in 2003. But, this time Obsidian was given the recommendation to continue the series and they made some great improvements on the first game. But, sadly because Lucasarts wanted more money the game was rushed out for a Christmas release when everything wasn't finished and there were plenty of glitches... but how does the game do with these very apparent problems, well lets light this candle and find out.

Story: 8

KotoR II: TSL takes place 5 years after the events of the first very successful game, and you play as the Jedi Exile [she is canonically female, so I will refer to her as such] who is believed to be the last of the Jedi and is being hunted by the Sith Triumvirate [that is the name given on Wookieepedia]. And after the destruction of Peragus II by the Sith the Exile finds out that the remaining Jedi Masters who exiled her are still alive and hiding on planets, so she goes on a search to find them, as well as the Sith Lords: Darth Sion, Nihilus and Traya.

Now personally I found the story to be VERY well done, and better than the first game was, and I can see why Obsidian got to make the game. The story was also much darker than the first one and there were bigger twists. But the ending was very disappointing because most of it WAS cut out, and there were some much more interesting things in the ending that I have found by looking through the files than there were when I played the game. But still the Story was very well crafted and also continued on KotOR I and reveals a lot about Darth Revan [play the first game] and why he did some of the things that he did after the Mandalorian Wars. Other than the cut content [which took off a point], a very well done story.

Gameplay: 7

Like the last game, you play by going through levels doing your objectives, and talking to people. You still get the choice to choose your responses when you talk to people, and you still get to travel around planets,

The game works very much like the first one did... with a few improvements. It uses the same D&D Dice Battle system that relies on "combat rolls" and such. You also get to level up [but this time you can go up to Level 50 instead of 20] and learn new moves, force powers and increase your skills and your characters own strength. This time you also begin AS a Jedi, you choose from the 3 Jedi Classes in the first game, and after you reach level 15 you can choose a "Prestige Class" which augments your current class. You can also learn "Saber Forms", use MORE force powers and feats, and even train several of your own party members as Jedi [or Sith].

One of my favorites though is the ability to have 2 different sets of equipped weapons at one time making it faster to switch from a blaster into a sword if the enemy is dumb enough to get to close to you. It's just a little thing but it is so good to have because I hated swapping weapons in the old game. Obsidian did a good job making things more efficient.

The game itself is mainly traveling from planet to planet in a search for the Jedi Masters. And you are just given the freedom to explore the Planet, and you have to complete quests to advance the story to the next point. One of the things that I like is that you were given the freedom to do almost anything you want, you can travel to the planets in whatever order you want, and during the conversations you can be as good or as evil as you want. You can help out a person who is being robbed by giving the robbers money, or you can use Force Persuade to make them jump off of a railing so they will fall a long way onto the planets surface.

There are several glitches that can screw with your save files, sometimes the voice goes away, sometimes NPC's don't disappear [on the Refugee Platform in Nar Shaddah Mira sometimes stays in one of the spots where she is at in a Cinematic scene for me] in the game, and there can be a lot of lag when there is a a big fight going on, this is a result of the short development time. This is also even more apparent on the Xbox version than the PC one because you were able to download a patch for the PC one, but the Xbox one doesn't have squat that you can put on it. And playing on the 360 like I do just makes it worse. But still fun as hell although the game is a tad too easy [play it on Difficult mode].

Challenge: 7

The main game is much easier than KotOR was, the enemies are easier to defeat and if you know how to level yourself up, and choose the right classes [say... Guardian and Weapon Master] you can be un-killable, especially now that you can level up to level 50, you get really tough to kill around the end. Like last time, the hardest part is finishing all of the quests and getting all of the endings, which should be enough to extend your game for a while though. Although, it is already a 30/40 hour game if you do everything, so just keep it going as long as you can.

But I must say, if you have played KotOR before and this is your first time playing TSL, please play on Hard mode, it is too easy the other way.

Controls: 8

I liked the controls for this game a lot, which surprised me since I thought the PC version would of controlled better. But luckily the menu on the bottom of the screen that you use to do almost all of the actions is really easy to use, and I liked having everything in one place [which the PC version did not have]. The only problem is that some things in the other menu are a little bit slower than the PC version, but other than that everything was done very well.

Graphics: 6

This game was made using the same engine as KotOR I, and if you read my review of the first game I found the first game to be a little underpowered. And the game is showing its age because some of the environments are reused and you can see that the reused areas look worse than the new ones Obsidian made. But one part I like is that the Characters look better than they did in KotOR 1, the hair is done better and the particles do move [most of the characters in the first game had static hair], it feels like there is more variety in the faces you see somehow. And like a Star Wars game should, the Light Sabers look pretty, and really that is all that some people care about in these games, hacking people up with those things and it was nice to see some more animations for the saber combat than in KotOR 1, all looks well done. But the glitches can screw with you a lot; I already get a lot of Lag when I play on the 360.


Sound: 9

Like always with a Star Wars game, the sound does not disappoint. There is a lot of voice work done in the game [there are 4 CD's filled with sound, and some that is unused if you can look through the files good enough *wink wink*]. And the voice acting is well done, although it does not feel as professional at times, and sometimes it feels emotionless. But luckily you do have some returning voices like HK-47, Canderous, Bastila and Carth [all offering a little insight into Revan]. Also the music is splendid, but the score is also moodier than it was in the previous game [but it is a darker story, you can see why]. In short the music, the voice and the weapons do sound good, although some characters [T3-M4] are mute at times.

Atmosphere: 8

Obsidian did a great job setting up this game, and it does feel much darker than KotOR did because it is a darker story. You do feel alone; you do feel like your being hunted, the music is moody enough to make you feel these things as well. The game should be able to immerse you enough.

Replayability: 7

Like I said last time, you can play to do all of the side quests, and get both endings, hell I still don't have all of the movies in the game. But just play on hard mode if you do keep playing, it's more fun.

Pros:
Great Story, revelations on Darth Revan, good characters, great sound.

Cons:
Weak graphics, unfinished, too easy.

Should you get it:
Buy it; even with its flaws and obvious lack of completion, there is a great story and an experience that avid Star Wars fans should enjoy.

Overall:

For a game that is unfinished, and had its story visibly hacked apart in some places near the end, it is a good game. But some of the glitches hinder the gameplay and it would be more worthwhile to play the PC version and wait for the Restoration Mod to come out.

7

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 05/30/08

Game Release: Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords (US, 12/06/04)

Star Wars The Force Unleashed 360

"X-Play was wrong, Star Wars: The Force Unleashed is a great game."

As I said in the tagline, X-Play, and many other reviews gave this game a lower score than it deserved because of some things that were just minor flaws.

Anyway, Star Wars: The Force Unleashed is the new game made by the people at Lucas Arts that we have been hearing so much about for a long time, which lets you "kick ass with the force". The game was also meant to fill the gaps between episodes III and IV, and it did a very good job at that... so, lets light this candle.

Story: 9

As I said before, The Force Unleashed is meant to fill the holes that were left between episodes III and IV.

As the game starts off, you are Darth Vader, and you have just landed on the Wookie Homeworld of Kashyyyk, and you are searching for one of the last of the Jedi. You fight your way through the Wookies, and you find the Jedi, after he is beaten you discover his son, who was able to pull Vader's lightsaber from his hands. Vader sees how powerful he could become, and kills all of the Imperials around him, then he leaves with takes the boy.

The boy, who was codenamed "Starkiller" was trained by Darth Vader as a "Secret Apprentice" [only Vader knows who he is] in the ways of the Sith, and he is preparing Starkiller to help him kill the Emperor. So, Starkiller is sent out to kill the remaining Jedi.

I'll stop here, mainly because this is the start of the game, and I don't want to ruin too much of the story for everyone that does not have the game [that hasn't read it on the Forums yet]. But I will say that the story was told very well, and The Force Unleashed would of been a better movie than "The Clone Wars" was [which was alright, but it was just a damn disappointment considering what it could of been]. I also think that the story in this game was better than it was in most of the Prequel trilogy. The plot unfolds very well, the game makes you like Starkiller and his pilot Juno Eclipse, as well as the rest of the main characters. I have no real problem with the story, at all. I only had really minor nitpicks with some things that did not make too much sense, but none of those things were too bad.

Gameplay: 8

Luckily, The Force Unleashed did not wind up like many games that had a great story but mediocre gameplay. Even though a lot of the reviewers criticized the game play, I had a great time during the game.

The main thing you are doing is going through levels while using your overpowered force powers, and your lightsabers to kill anything that gets in your way. You can also feel your powers getting stronger as you go through the levels, and you see just how much more damage your powers and Saber combos will do to something, but some of the stronger enemies [like the Purge Troopers] that you will see a lot negate some of these feelings. You will also level up when you kill enough enemies, and you can use the points you get to level up your attributes, force powers, and combos.

There are also some great boss battles, where you will fight some powerful Jedi or something like a Rancor or an AT-ST where you can use a QTE [Quick Time Event] to bring them down after you have whittled their health down enough. Some people did not like this very much, but I thought that they did a good job at showing how powerful you were.

But of course, there are some flaws. I already mentioned that some of the more powerful enemies could negate the feeling of being able to wave your finger and make someone explode that the Developers made it seem like you would have. The main problem is that the game is a little bit glitchy, I have not had too many problems with this, but I have fallen through elevators a few times, and the camera gets stuck in some places. The game is also very short, I beat the game on Sith Warrior mode [the 2nd out of the four difficulties] in six hours. Even though I have beaten a lot of games on the first day I have gotten them, but this is just way too short.

But, the game is still very fun to play.

Challenge: 7

The Force Unleashed is not an incredibly hard game; I already said how quickly I beat it on my first play through. But playing through it on Sith Lord is a good enough challenge [still working on beating it] if you want to try that out first.

But, there is one thing that is just too much of a pain in the ass not to mention. Ripping the Star Destroyer from the sky. All I'll say is that you have to pull a Star Destroyer into the ground while being attacked by Tie Fighters, and you have to keep repositioning it until you get the signal to yank it down. I also have to mention that the cues on the screen don't do anything, when you get there just turn it however you want until the nose is pointed at your head.

Controls: 7

The controls in The Force Unleashed are alright, besides the camera, which can screw up sometimes. Force Powers and Lightsaber attacks are easy to use, and the controls are responsive enough to make the platforming sections of the game easy.

But, there is a problem with the lock on system. It can be tough for the game to auto lock onto the target you want, and switching targets when you are locked on is also tough. It can also be hard to throw something at the enemy because that what you are throwing locked onto something else. But, this is not what happens all the time, usually it works, but it screws up enough to be noticeable.

Luckily, most of the time you won't have any real problems with the controls.

Graphics: 8

The Force Unleashed did a great job at capturing the look and the feel of the Star Wars universe, everything in here looks like it could be in one of the movies. There are also some new physics engines, which allow the AI to have a different reaction to everything that is going on around them, and allow metal, glass, and wood to react like it really would. But I did not really see these very much, I was hoping for a completely interactive environment where you could throw a Storm Trooper into ANY wall and it would leave a dent, but in the walls where I could do that it looked good.

Sound: 10

If there is anything that you need to have in a game as story driven as this, it is good sound, and they did an amazing job with it. You get to hear a lot of the old John Williams scores from the movies, and the person who did the music for KotOR II also did some of the music for this game. He also did a great job at it, every song fits where it is used, and I don't think there was any song that I hated.

The voice over work was also very well done, and I have to single out the praise for Sam Witwer who did the voice for Starkiller. The story would not have been as good as it was without his performance, and he deserves an award for how well he did in this game. The rest of the cast also did a good job.

As for the rest of the sound effects, you can hear the thumps when you throw someone into a wall, and the standard sound effects that you hear in Star Wars are present and very well done .

Atmosphere: 9

The excellent story, mixed with how well the voice-overs were done, and how likable the main characters were made me get interested in the story. And the powers that you had made you feel like you were a Jedi.

Replayability: 6

Unfortunately, the game is very short so I don't know how long you will want to keep playing. I enjoy the game so I will keep playing it for a while. You can try beating the game on Sith Lord and Sith Master, or you can try collecting all of the Jedi Holocrons, but I don't know what else there is to do.

Pros:
Great story, likable and well developed characters, great music, makes you feel like an incredibly powerful Jedi, shows what happened between episodes III and IV.

Cons:
Underutilized the Euphoria and DMM engines, glitches, the Star Destroyer scene is a pain in the ass, short game, lock-on problems.

Should you get it:
I would recommend this game to anyone who likes Star Wars, and I also have to say that you should ignore some of what the professional reviews said because they overblown all of the negative points.

Overall:

Star Wars: The Force Unleashed is what I expected it to be, a fun game with a great story. Just don't let all of the criticism get to you, this is a great game, and most of the people here on GameFAQs liked it from what I have seen.

If you are a Star Wars fan like I am, there is a good chance that you will like the game, or at leas the book that came out a couple days ago.

Also, this is my 50th review... hope you liked it.

8

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 09/25/08

Game Release: Star Wars: The Force Unleashed (US, 09/16/08)

The Force Unleashed Wii

"Fun, But Not as Good as the 360/PS3 Version"

Since I have done a Review for the 360 version, I might as well do one of the Wii version that I got so I could see how the two games compared.

Star Wars: The Force Unleashed is the new multimedia project that is being put out to fill in the gaps between Episode III and IV. The Wii version [along with the PS2, PSP, and DS] was made by the people at Krome Studios instead of Lucas Arts. And even though some things were changed, you still get the same basic gameplay. So, lets light this candle.

Story: 9

As I said before, The Force Unleashed is meant to fill the holes that were left between episodes III and IV.

As the game starts off, you are Darth Vader, and you have just landed on the Wookie Homeworld of Kashyyyk, and you are searching for one of the last of the Jedi. You fight your way through the Wookies, and you find the Jedi, after he is beaten you discover his son, who was able to pull Vader's Lightsaber from his hands. Vader sees how powerful he could become, and kills all of the Imperials around him, then he leaves with takes the boy.

The boy, who was codenamed "Starkiller" was trained by Darth Vader as a "Secret Apprentice" [only Vader knows who he is] in the ways of the Sith, and he is preparing Starkiller to help him kill the Emperor. So, Starkiller is sent out to kill the remaining Jedi.

I'll stop here, mainly because this is the start of the game, and I don't want to ruin too much of the story for everyone that does not have the game [that hasn't read it on the Forums yet]. But I will say that the story was told very well, and The Force Unleashed would of been a better movie than "The Clone Wars" was [which was alright, but it was just a damn disappointment considering what it could of been]. I also think that the story in this game was better than it was in most of the Prequel trilogy. The plot unfolds very well, the game makes you like Starkiller and his pilot Juno Eclipse, as well as the rest of the main characters. I have no real problem with the story, at all. I only had really minor nitpicks with some things that did not make too much sense, but none of those things were too bad.

Gameplay: 7

The Wii version plays a lot like the 360 version did, you are still going through the levels and using your overpowered Force Powers and your Lightsaber to hack through everything in your path. And you can also notice your powers getting stronger as you level them up and go through the levels.

Overall, the game is fun. But if you are comparing it to the 360 version, it just does not live up. Mostly because the levels are much smaller, and the rooms you are in are much smaller than the ones in the 360 version, and some minor things like having to pick up health packs instead of healing when you kill someone like you did in the 360 version.

But other than that, you still have the same basic game, and there are even a couple new levels that weren't in the 360 version [even though every level is completely different since a different Developer made it]. You will also have more fun if you try not to compare the games like I did.

Challenge: 6

The Force Unleashed is not an incredibly hard game; I beat it in 6 hours on my first play through.

But the Wii version was actually easier than the 360 version. I could not find a way to change the difficulty, so I guess that the levels just have more baddies thrown in there as you go on. But it only really gets hard near the end when you have to fight Storm Troopers that have stronger blasters than the normal Storm Troopers.

The game is also made easier by the BioShock respawn system, which revives you at full health, and the basic enemy is unhealed, but the bosses get a little bit of their power back.

Controls: 6

I was curious about how well the Wiimote would work with this game, and at times I was impressed, but I also felt like they tried to cram too much in there.

The main things, like moving around, and hacking away at people with your Lightsaber [which is now held in the normal way, instead of Starkillers reverse grip style] is easy to do, and you can chain together a lot of really fast slashes. Some of the force powers also work really well.

But some things require really awkward movements of the Wiimote, so I just stuck with force grip, lightning, and force push, even though I had so many more powerful techniques at my disposal. It's like in Red Steel, they gave you a few powerful combos but you could never really pull them off, so when you were in a sword fight you just did a bunch of random slashes and hoped that you hit something. The Camera is also worse than it is in the 360 version, I got the Camera stuck in some really bad angles during Boss Battles, which was a real pain in the ass.

Graphics: 7

The graphics in this version of The Force Unleashed are a mixed bag for me. Occasionally things looked really good, but you also had to see some horrendous pop up where you could see plants growing in levels like Felucia, and the game even looked like it was made for the Dreamcast in a few areas.

But most of the character models are good, you have some highly destructible environments, and the look and feel of the Star Wars universe was still captured.

Sound: 9

If there is anything that you need to have in a game as story driven as this, it is good sound, and they did an amazing job with it. You get to hear a lot of the old John Williams scores from the movies, and the person who did the music for KotOR II also did some of the music for this game. He also did a great job at it, every song fits where it is used, and I don't think there was any song that I hated.

The voice over work was also very well done, and I have to single out the praise for Sam Witwer who did the voice for Starkiller. The story would not have been as good as it was without his performance, and he deserves an award for how well he did in this game. The rest of the cast also did a good job.

As for the rest of the sound effects, you can hear the thumps when you throw someone into a wall, and the standard sound effects that you hear in Star Wars are present and very well done.

Atmosphere: 8

The excellent story, mixed with how well the voice-overs were done, and how likable the main characters were made me get interested in the story. And the powers that you had made you feel like you were a Jedi.

Multiplayer: 7

Luckily for us Wii Owners, we get the first Star Wars fighting game [kinda] since the multiplayer mode in the Episode III game, or Masters of Teräs Käsi.

As you play through the main game, you unlock over 20 characters [although most of them are just the different costumes Starkiller had] that each have their own power level for force powers, and Lightsaber skill. And you can go into one of the arenas with a friend and fight them. You can also collect powerups that give you "reinforcements" [Storm Troopers that shoot at who you are fighting], infinite health, or infinite force powers for a short amount of time.

Unfortunately, none of the characters have any real difference except for their skill with certain force powers or Lightsaber combat. Even the episode III game had different moves for every character, why can't this one?

But other than that, this is a fun little diversion from the main game. You should take some time to try it out.

Replayability: 7

This version is actually more replayable because of the Multiplayer mode, which should be a decent way for you to spend some time on this game after you have beaten everything.

Pros:
Great story, likable and well developed characters, great music, makes you feel like an incredibly powerful Jedi, shows what happened between episodes III and IV.

Cons:
The levels are different, easy, short, mediocre graphics, some frustrating Wiimote controls.

Should you get it:
I would recommend this game if you have a Wii, but if you have a PS3 or a 360 I would suggest getting that version instead.

Overall:

Star Wars: The Force Unleashed is a good game on the Wii, and even though it is not as good as the 360 version, it is still a game that is fun to play.

If you are a Star Wars fan like I am, there is a good chance that you will like the game, or at least get the book that came out a few days ago.

7

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 09/30/08

Game Release: Star Wars: The Force Unleashed (US, 09/16/08)

Republic Commando

""Come out, come out so I can kill you all...""

Star Wars: Republic Commando is a game made by the people at Lucas Arts that allows you do play through some missions of The Clone Wars as part of a squad of elite Clone Soldiers, and it is a damn good game. So, lets light this candle.

Story: 8

As I said in the intro, this game takes place during the Clone Wars, and you go through a couple of the battles that took place between the Battle of Geonosis, and the Battle of Kashyyyk.

The game starts off with you in the cloning facilities on Kamino as you are going through your training, and you are introduced to the other three clones that are in Delta Squad with you.

Then you are sent to the first battle with the Clones on Geonosis as a test to see how well the clones will do in battle. And as anyone who has seen Episode II would know, the Clones kicked some ass.

I don't really want to spoil any more of the game, so if you want to know how the rest of the Campaign goes, just play it for yourself. But I did find that Delta Squad had very well developed characters, and you will like them. And the story is told very well.

Gameplay: 8

Most of the reviews I have seen compared the gameplay to a mixture of Halo, Metroid Prime, and Rainbow Six. Republic Commando is basically a squad-based shooter [Rainbow Six] with elements of Metroid Prime [the HUD] and Halo [most of the Combat] so I will just stick with that description.

You have to advance through the levels like most FPS games, and you are capable of telling your squadmates to do things like taking a sniping position, hacking a computer, or breaching a door. And Delta Squad does a good job at helping you most of the time, they make the basic Clone Troopers you encounter at some points of the game look like a kid trying to use a gun for the first time.

The enemy AI is also smart [excluding the first level where you can stand in front of a battle droid and it still can't shoot you]. You get to fight a lot of aliens and droids from the Star Wars universe, like the CIS Droid Army, Trandoshians, and General Grevious' Magna Guards. Most of them are fun to fight, but some of them [like the Magna Guards] are really overpowered.

The respawn feature is also one that I thought was well done. When you, or one of your squadmates runs out of health, you don't die you just collapse. So someone will have to use a portable Bacta injector that will heal 1/3rd of their Health. So the game will only end if all four members of Delta Squad are killed.

The levels you play through are also well designed. It is tough to get lost, and you can find some conveniently placed Bacta Tanks, which are used to recover health.

Overall, Republic Commando is a well-designed game that is fun to play.

Challenge: 7

Overall, Republic Commando isn't too tough. The game is relatively short, and some of the enemies provide a good challenge, but it is nothing that you can't handle. Although there are a few really tough parts, like the bridge on Kashyyyk.

Controls: 8

Republic Commando has customizable controls, and they work very well. But some of the controls are tough to remember at first because there is a lot that you can do. After you learn the controls you can do everything quickly, ordering your squad mates around is easy, and shooting stuff is accurate. So there is no real problem for me.

Graphics: 8

I will admit that my PC is so crappy this is one of the few "new" games I have gotten to run at full power on it. But regardless of that, Republic Commando is a great looking game.

The environments look like they are from the movies, and they do a good job at capturing the feeling of a "used universe" that the movies portrayed. The character models are also very well done; except for the fact that some of the enemies like the Battle Droids have a different design than they do in the movies.

The other special effects are well done. The HUD looks like something you would see on a High Tech visor, and the "Night Vision" visor has a cool effect that makes everything look like a black and white TV with some static, but it works very well for dark levels. There are also some good blood effects where the blood from Geonosians, Droids, and Trandoshians will have their blood sprayed on your visor when you kill them at close range, and then it gets wiped off.

Overall, for a game released in 2005 Republic Commando looks great. Simple as that.

Sound: 10

Simply put, Republic Commando has some of the best sound I have ever heard in a Star Wars game.

The voice-overs for Delta Squad are very well done specifically for Sev who is the sadist of the group [and my favorite character], and Scorch who also had some funny lines, and was voiced by Raphael Sbarge who played Carth Onasi in Knights of the Old Republic. Temuera Morrison who played Jango Fett in the movies also did a great job playing your character.

There are also great sound effects, and a lot of them were done by Foley Artists [shown in one of the extras you unlock as you play the game] and they really help the game become more immersive. Everything sounds how it should.

But the best part was the music. There were some songs that John WIlliams did, but there were also some "Mandalorian War Hymn's" that played at certain parts of the game, and they were perfect for a game like this. If you haven't played the game yet, I highly recommend just listening to those songs if you can find them.

The sound in this game was just amazingly done.

Atmosphere: 9

The developers of this game did an amazing job at making you feel like you were part of an elite squad of soldiers as you were going through the levels. Military Advisers were hired to authenticate the experience, and the Mandalorian music seems like real song that would be played at a military base during the drills.

Republic Commando makes you feel like you are in the game. That's all I really have left to say for this section.

Multiplayer: NA

I was never able to play the Multiplayer because I had Dial Up for most of the time I have owned this game, but it seems like around the same time I finally got High Speed Internet the Gamespy lobby for this game went down.

But from what I have read in the other reviews, all you got was Deathmatch and Capture the flag. They also weren't very good, compared to what could have been done.

If I manage to play this online sometime, I'll update this section, but for now I'll just say from what I have heard it wasn't good.

Replayability: 6

Republic Commando is a fun game, but there isn't really much left to do after you beat the game. The Multiplayer is down, and the game is really short. But if you like it enough you will probably keep playing the Campaign.

Pros:
Great Campaign, likable characters, great music, good graphics, good story, good squad based action.

Cons:
Short, multiplayer is down.

Should you get it:
You can find this game for less than 10 dollars used now, so go ahead and get it.

Overall:

Star Wars: Republic Commando is a great game, and sadly there hasn't been a sequel yet [except for a damn phone game], so please Lucas Arts, announce the damned sequel already.

And please give us KotOR III while you're at it!

8

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 10/10/08

Game Release: Star Wars Republic Commando (US, 03/01/05)

[Joe]

Metroid

"Bring a Map"

The original Metroid is a very special game, because at the time most of what was out there was linear side scrolling games. But, Metroid, [much like The Legend of Zelda] put you into a completely non linear environment where you had to look into every nook and cranny of where you were in order to complete the game, which was almost impossible if you did not draw a map of every room you went through. So, lets light this candle.

Story: 8

Storytelling wasn't very frequent in games back in the NES days and all we got was a backstory in the manuals. So I'll just go by whats in there.

In the year 2003 C.C [Cosmic Calendar] the leaders of several planets came together to create the Galactic Federation which also allowed the people who lived there to meet and their technology vastly improved, beckoning a new era of prosperity. Earth also came into contact with the Galactic Federation at this time and everything was good.

But, the Space Pirates came about and started attacking the ships, and looting them. The Federation then created the Galactic Police, but even they could not defeat the Space Pirates.

Now, it is the year 20X5 C.C. and the Space Pirates have stolen canisters containing the Metroids from the planet SR388 which will multiply if exposed to beta rays. Which the Pirates subsequently do, so the Federation sends search teams to the Pirate stronghold inside of the planet Zebes but they are too weak to stop them.

So, the first lady of gaming Samus Aran [who in the manual was a male cyborg with superpowers] is sent into Zebes to obliterate the Space Pirates, their leader Mother Brain, and the Metroids.

You really don't get stuff like this in the manuals anymore.

Gameplay: 8

I mentioned above how linear the game is and any Metroid player will tell you, you can do the game in pretty much any order you want.

The main object of the game is to explore the planet and find the powerups that can make you even stronger, and you have to kill some mini-bosses. You also don't really know where the hell you are most of the time, you just have to look everywhere until you find the way you are supposed to go. So, you can probably think of Metroid like a 2D Zelda, except Metroid doesn't have a map.

The powerups you find are things like Energy Tanks which give you 100 more hit points [although it is a pain in the ass that you only have 30 whenever you start the game], and Missile Tanks which add 5 more Missiles to your inventory. You also get to find more unorthodox things like boots that make you jump really high, the morph ball which turns you into a ball and allows you to drop little energy bombs, the screw attack which turns your jumps into some kind of energy buzz saw, an attachment for your armor which makes it more durable, and able to withstand high temperatures, and different energy beam add ons like the Wave Beam [penetrates walls] and the Ice Beam [freezes things, and is necessary to kill the Metroids], you also have to find the Long Beam which allows you to hit things that are farther away than six feet away from you.

The enemy's you fight are simple things, they mostly just bounce around, crawl around, or shoot things at you. But going by the time this game was made, they are quite advanced.

As for the levels you are in, they are big maze like areas filled with long corridors that go up or down and are filled with small areas which usually have a Missile Tank or an Energy Tank in them.

All of this is well and good, but the problems are simple things that could of been changed to make everything better, like Samus being unable to duck down or aim in angles to hit things, only starting with 30 hit points whenever you load a game which will run out very quickly if you don't find health fast, and the lack of a map which means that if you want to know where you are going, draw a map.

Challenge: 9

One of the things you have to remember about old games is that they are hard, and Metroid is no exception. And that is basically for the reasons I have already mentioned. You have no map, so you have to look through every inch of every room to find everything, and if you want to remember where the hell you are going, you need to have some kind of map to find it.

Everything in here is much tougher than the newer games like Hunters, Fusion, Zero Mission, and the Prime series because they held your hand most of the time. In this game, you just get dropped into a huge maze and you have to find your way though everything without any help.

If you were able to beat this game without using a map when it came out, I salute you.

Controls: 6

While by today's standards Metroid would be horrible in this section, for its time it was quite good.

It is easy enough to move Samus around but jumping can be a pain sometimes in some of the vertical corridors where it is easy to miss and fall back down to the bottom. I also mentioned being unable to crouch down to fire at enemies close to you, which was only doable by jumping in the air, aiming down, and hammering on the fire button. And the inability to aim in other angles besides up, down, and forward is a pain.

Most of these things would be acceptable in 1986 [when the game came out] because of the limitations of the NES controller, but nowadays, the game would be shunned. Luckily, the GBA remake of this game [Zero Mission] does a good job at fixing these problems.

Graphics: 8

Although for the NES all that had to be done for the score to be high here was making everything look real enough, Metroid looked really good for its time. You can tell what everything is, and the levels you are in look good enough, from the creepy cave like areas to the lava bubbling in Norfair, and the well designed enemies.

There isn't really much to be said except that the areas are well designed, the enemies look good, and the colors look good.

Sound: 9

Considering that all of the music and sound effects at the time were digitally synthesized bleeps and bloops, the developers of Metroid did an amazing job.

Most of the music like the Brinstar and Norfair themes are catchy and were good enough to be remixed into the newer games. The sound effects are also good, Samus' attacks sound distinctive enough, and even the sound of Samus running sounds good.

Atmosphere: 9

As I have said, the levels are creepy, you always feel like you are lost and on your own, and you are given free reign to explore Zeebes. Metroid does a good job of immersing you into this adventure Samus is on.

Replayability: 7

The main reason people keep playing Metroid is Speed Running and Sequence Breaking. If you look around you can find some websites where people have beaten this game in half an hour and posted the video of it online. While I am not very good at speed running, the people who are can keep playing so they can get the best record which I think is currently 18 minutes.

Pros:
Massive areas to explore, great sound effects, Samus is one of the first female heroes in a video game, the beginning of one of Nintendo's best franchises [and my favorite Nintendo Franchise].

Cons:
Does not stand the test of time very well, clumsy controls by today's standards, damned tough if you don't know what you're doing.

Should you get it:
I would recommend this to anyone who still owns a NES, and if you don't at least try getting Metroid: Zero Mission which is a great remake of the game, or download it on the Wii's Virtual Console.

Overall:

Metroid began one of Nintendo's best franchises very well, and proved that women could be just as badass as men were in video games. And although Metroid does not stand the test of time very well, it is still an excellent game if you can handle the differences between this one to other Metroid games like Metroid: Fusion and Metroid Prime 3: Corruption which came out around 20 years after this game was released.

8

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 06/23/08

Game Release: Metroid (US, August 1986)

Super Metroid

"As One of Our Favorite South Park Characters Would Say: "It's Super"!"

Well, as I start off here, Super Metroid made by Nintendo is known as one of, if not the best Metroid Games of all time. It is also known as one of the best Adventure games of all time, and for its time in 1994, this was amazing. So like I always say: Lets light this candle.

Story: 8

Super Metroid is the third game in the series, and it takes place a short time after the events of Metroid II: Return of Samus. And our favorite little ass kicking girl in an orange metal suit has just killed all of the Metrioids, but she also found one that thinks she is the Metroids mother. So it followed her out, and Samus presented it to the Ceres Space Colony so the Galactic Federation can research it. And they discover that the power of Metriods can be "harnessed for the benefit of mankind".

So Samus leaves the station, but shortly thereafter Ridley one of the leaders of the Space Pirates arrives and steals the Baby Metrioid and returns to Zebes, the planet with a Space Pirate Base that Samus previously destroyed, but was now rebuilt. So Samus goes through the planet to find the Baby Metroid, while killing the Space Pirates, and their leaders on Zebes. In the end it all works out quite well, and although Metroid is not known for its plot, still a good enough story.

Gameplay: 10

I will start this off simply; this is what Metroid is supposed to be. Now... Super Metriod was on a 24 Megabit Cartridge, the biggest at its time, and looking at how much they did in here it shows. You are given a massive world to explore with tons of hidden areas. Everything is also very open ended, you get to go where ever you want, as long as you have the right items, and you can follow your own path to accomplish your goals, and collect the new weapons. And as I said, there are a lot of hidden areas, and there are also hidden items you can find as well. You also upgrade your beams with stackable upgrades that you can turn on and off [only Metroid Game you can do that in], and there are also several items that remain to this day like the Power Bombs, or moves like the Wall Jump.

Everything about Super Metroid was implemented so perfectly. And if you play, I need to tell you not to use a guide, it is so much more fun to explore everything yourself, unlike in the newer games where they hold your hand the entire way. In Super Metroid, they let you lose to explore Zebes to your hearts content, and the style of Game play of Super Metroid has been adapted for many 2D adventure/action games such as Castlevania. And you are also able to "Speed Run" the game, that means you try and do the game as fast as you can, the current record for a 100% Speed run [that I found] is 55 minutes, very impressive to the people who do this. Super Metroid, IS perfection. And it is a VERY hard game to beat [with all of the Exploration and whatnot], but it is so worth it.

Challenge: 10

Super Metroid is one of the hardest games I have ever played from the old age of gaming when they were made to challenge you. Unless you have a lot of free time, it is almost impossible for you to find every thing in this game, all of the weapons, all of the missile packs, energy tanks and all of the hidden powers you can use. It is a good enough challenge to go through the game on your way to kill Mother Brain, but finding every single item is going to require a map.

Controls: 10

On the SNES, you gained more buttons to perform more maneuvers, and everything works SO well in the game. You can now Aim in almost every direction, and you can crouch down, you can run, you can do so much and it makes the first Metroid feel so archaic when you compare it to this. It actually controls better to me than any of the other Metroid games I have ever played [Prime 3 may overtake it though]. The SNES Game pad works perfectly for this game, and it is easy to do everything. For a 2D game, everything controls so fluidly and you just need to try everything out in here.

Graphics: 10

Let me just start off by saying "wow wow wow wow WOW!” like I said before, Super Metroid is on a 24 Megabit Cartridge, which was the biggest for its time on ANY home console, and you can tell that Nintendo really worked their asses off to make the game look as beautiful as it does. Zebes has an excellent atmosphere, and every level looks exactly as it should, and you can spend a lot of time looking around at everything. I also found myself being amazed at how great Samus looked in this game, the Armor looked great, and with the upgrades you added to it changed [and if you only have the Gravity Suit on, and remove the Vaira suit it removes the bumps, but keeps it purple, great detail from Nintendo].

There is amazing attention to detail on everything, you can see Samus breathing, and you can see the enemies flinching around, and you can see the backgrounds being animated and the lighting changing sometimes. It all looks beautiful, well beautiful for a game that came out 13 years ago. And all of the massive bosses in here, like Kraid who had a growth spurt and suddenly takes up 2 screens, or Crocomire who turns into a pile of bones and collapses before your eyes, or Ridley who is just so cool looking he deserves a spot, or Mother Brain who is so big and has so many different attack animations the game slows down for me sometimes.

So why don't you just look at the screen shots for this game, they are all nice to gaze into them for a few minutes, just make sure a KiHunter doesn't find you and blow you away, because you might not notice it because you are staring at such a beautiful game it distracts you too much. And let me just say this too, the Hyper Beam will BLIND you, but the colors are so pretty. Hell all of this game is pretty. Even the PS3 fan boys would like this game, it is just that good, and it is some of the best 2D graphics of all time.

Sound: 10

Yet again the Composers at Nintendo prove why they are some of the best out there. Super Metroid has some of the best music I have heard in a game, EVER. But it is also not too catchy since that would distract you, but it does help add to the atmosphere that the beautiful graphics already created. But like always the Boss Battle music gets you pumped up for the fight, I always love the music for fighting against Ridley and Mother Brain. But the best song on the game has to be the Escape theme, very exciting to listen to.

And there are also the normal sound effects... there are footsteps that you hear as Samus runs across Zebes, you can hear so many sound effects for each of the items, like the speed booster which gives you a nice little whoosh that you hear. And there are the sounds of the beams, which sound great, and it is not annoying to hear them, and that is good since you will keep pounding on the weapon buttons for most of the game. But like I said, the sound is very fitting, the music is superb [check out "Metroid Metal" as well], and the items sound great, hell everything sounds great.

Atmosphere: 9

Super Metroid sets up everything very well for a game with exploration that feels like Sidescroller Zelda. When you play the game, you want to explore Zebes, the music really sucks you into the places you are at. It is actually very hard to explain, just play and you will want to explore for a while, that is all I really need to say.

Replayability: 10

There are so many places to explore in Super Metroid, there is so much that you can do, there are so many bosses to kill, there are so many items and missile packs and power bomb upgrades and energy tanks and special items to collect, there are so many endings you can obtain, there are so many records to beat... need I go on? This is one of the best games of all time and it never gets old PLAY DAMN IT!!!

Pros:

Great sound/graphics, a lot to do in the game, lot of items, open ended to explore the planet, incredible feel to everything.

Cons:

Hard to beat, exploration may be hard for some people, it ends.

Should you get it:

Have you been reading this thing?! Buy the game! Download it to the Wii Virtual Console when it comes out! Marry the cartridge! Just get the game! There is no way you can regret buying this game, and if you do not have a SNES buy one of those too, hell you should buy extra copies for your friends to play. Just get the game; I cannot make myself clearer than this!

Overall:

Super Metroid is one of the best games of all time with incredible exploration and it is the best Metroid game that I have ever played [before playing Corruption]. It is also the Metroid game that did the most with the fewest flaws, and that alone should be enough to buy it. But as I said before, if you play do not use a guide, it makes it more worthwhile beating the game if you did it all by yourself without your hand being held throughout the entire game.

10

Reviewer's Score: 10/10, Originally Posted: 07/26/07, Updated 10/10/07

Game Release: Super Metroid (US, 04/18/94)

Metroid Fusion

"Hurry up with the Sequel!"

Metroid Fusion, along with Metroid Prime in 2002 ended the eight year Metroid drought that took place between their releases. This made Metroid fans happy, after the insanely long wait we finally had two new Metroid games to explore, and we were glad that one of Nintendo's best franchises would not be forgotten.

Story: 8

Along with Metroid Prime, Fusion showed how Metroid games were getting more of a plot, and Fusion had a story that was good enough to keep you interested.

The game takes place after the events of Super Metroid, and everything starts off with you, playing as Samus, the first lady of gaming in the neon orange Chozo suit. You are escorting a group of researchers from the Galactic Federation in retrieving bioforms from SR388 so that they could be brought to the BSL Space Station for research.

While you are there, you encounter the X parasite which then infects your suit. Samus thought nothing was wrong, but when she left in her ship she passed out and the ship collided with an asteroid field, and Samus was ejected in time to safe her life. The Federation recovers her and finds out that the X Parasite has infected her central nervous system, and the only way they are able to save her is by making a Vaccine from the DNA of the Metroid that Samus brought to them for research after the events of Metroid II. Since the Metroid is a predator of the X, its DNA allows Samus to absorb the X and use them for energy. The Metroid DNA also changes the appearance of the remaining parts of Samus' Armor, most of which has been removed during the surgery.

Samus is then sent to the BSL station to investigate an explosion, and she discovers that the X have gotten into the station and infected almost every living thing inside of it, and the removed components of Samus' Power Suit have turned into an X Parasite version of her, that has all of her weapons, while Samus lost almost all of her weapons and is somewhere around 10% of what her former strength was.

So, with the help of the AI in her ship which she named Adam, has to investigate the station, and eradicate the X.

I'll stop this section here, since I just covered the beginning. I will say that if you have not played the game, there is a much higher emphasis on the story in this game than previous Metroids, and there are a few good plot twists.

Gameplay: 8

Most of us know how Metroid plays, you are basically in a mixture of the platforming from Mario games, mixed with the item collection in Zelda. And you are given large areas to explore and collect the items that are necessary to move on to the next area, and you have to fight some of the coolest bosses in gaming history.

But, what is new, and what works in Metroid Fusion?

Well, like I said before, Samus was changed by the Vaccine and the loss of her suit, so she takes much more damage from enemies, but she is also able to move a little bit faster. You can now cling from edges without having to get the powerup that allows you to do that, and there are a few new items like the Ice Missiles, which were made to replace your Ice Beam because that the Vaccine made you vulnerable to cold temperatures, you also pick up the Diffusion Missiles which lets you charge the missiles and spread the freezing attack of the missiles across the screen. The Jump Ball and the High Jump were combines, and Missiles and Beams now stack [instead of being able to switch what Beams you have on, and choose different missiles].

You get around in this game with the help of Adam, and you have to explore the BSL Station to find rooms that allow you to open up different security level doors, and you have to find the Data Stations which have the date from your old weapons, that was supplied by the Federation, and these let you restore capabilities of your Suit. You also have to battle massive bosses, and the Core X that is inside, which often contains a new item, or an upgrade to a existing one.

The story driven nature of this game also made everything much more linear. Instead of being able to explore as much as you want, or sequence break, you now have to follow a set path. I will say that some of the hardcore Metroid fanatics hated this, but it wasn't really that bad. I liked how Fusion played, even though I could not explore as much. The detail to the story made up for it.

Challenge: 7

As I mentioned above, the game is much more linear now which makes everything easier. But the challenge was increased by making your health deplete much more when you are hit, and there are still some areas which are really tough to get through. But no matter how easy a Metroid game gets, it will still be a challenge to do 100% completion, which I have yet to do.

Controls: 8

Everything controls really well, the controls are comparable to how fluidly you could move in Super Metroid. The only problem I have is that there weren't 4 main buttons like on the SNES controller on the GBA, which would of made some of the controls slightly easier, and wall jumping is a little bit harder than it was in Super Metroid.

Graphics: 8

Although the preview that was shown when "Metroid IV" was announced looked terrible, when Metroid Fusion came out it was one of the best looking GBA games at that time. The sprites are incredibly well detailed and the backgrounds look gorgeous, and each environmental area of the station has its own distinctive look to it that was very well done. But I did notice that the colors were a little bit brighter than the dark and gloomy look that the previous games had, but that wasn't much of a problem.

Sound: 8

We all know how good most of the Metroid games sound so it is no surprise that this gets a high mark. Music is very important to the atmosphere of a Metroid game and although the soundtrack isn't as good as the one from Super Metroid, the music is catchy, and it fits with the different type of game that this is. The sound effects are also very well done, the weapons, the movement, and the creatures are not annoying to listen to and some of them sound creepy enough to make the atmosphere better.

Atmosphere: 7

I already mentioned what fits for the atmosphere in this game, you feel like you are fighting for your survival against these parasites, and besides the Federation you are on your own, and near the end you are almost completely on your own.

Pros:
Great story, new additions work well, well designed levels, great bosses, good soundtrack.

Cons:
It took 8 years to come out, too linear for some people.

Should you get it:
If you are a Metroid fan, buy this game. Its as simple as that.

Overall:

Metroid Fusion is a great game that finally whetted the appetite of all of the Metroid fans that were getting sick and tired of waiting for the sequel to Super Metroid to come out, and this along with Metroid Prime which were simultaneously released 6 years ago were worth the wait.

8

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 07/14/08

Game Release: Metroid Fusion (US, 11/17/02)

Metroid Prime

"Well Worth The Eight Year Wait!"

Metroid Prime is the first game made by Texan Retro Studios for the Nintendo GameCube, and it was one of the first games to show off just what that little cube could really do. It was also the first Metroid game in eight years after it came out [the last one was the incredible Super Metroid for the SNES], and it damn well made up for the long wait. As we all should know, Metroid Prime is about the Chozo [aliens in the game] raised bounty hunter Samus Aran. Well... let's get started.

Story: 7

Metroid Prime takes place after the original Metroid where Samus fought Mother Brain and the Metroids that were on Zebes, and she is sent to investigate a vessel that is near the planet Tallon IV. After she gets on board the Frigate Samus discovers the results of a Space Pirate experiment to mutate parasites, and those parasites got lose and killed a lot of the Pirates. So she goes through the ship and kills one of the surviving Parasite Queens, which falls into a reactor and destroys the ship.

On her way out Samus finds Ridley the "Space Dragon" who is one of the Space Pirate leaders escapes the ship, and Samus chases him onto Tallon IV. A former Chozo home world ravaged by a meteor which hit a long time ago and spread the scourge of Phazon that wiped out the Chozo that were on the planet and forced them to leave.

Samus also discovers that the Space Pirates [if you don't know, Space Pirates are a species of intergalactic terrorists... only way I can describe it] are on Tallon IV trying to mine the Phazon and use it to alter their own soldiers into the massive "Omega Pirates" and use it to make themselves more powerful, and to alter other creatures. So as you would expect, Samus has to kill the Pirates.

There is also "Lore" that you can scan which reveals more about Phazon and "Metroid Prime" [where do you think the name came from!]. The Lore that you can find is from the Chozo who told about their lives on Tallon IV, and what happened after the Meteor hit, and there is lore for the Space Pirates who explain what Phazon can do and the experiments that they were working on in Tallon IV.

I won't ruin any more of it for you, but everything you find out will be from the Lore you download, so if you want to know what this game is about, just scan the Lore and read it.

Gameplay: 9

To anyone who has played a Metroid game before, you should know what all of this is about. Prime follows the standard formula of Metroid Games, you are on a Planet, and you need to explore it and find items to integrate into your Power Suit, do some puzzles, and kill some challenging bosses. The only real new addition is being able to scan things to get information about whatever you're scanning, either the weakness of some enemy or some Lore for your Logbook.

But the real important thing on here is just how well Metroid transitioned into 3D… it did it very well. You still have the overworld connected by Elevators, you still have the tunnels that you need to traverse with the Morph Ball, and you still have the challenging [sometimes] tasks and puzzles that you need to do to get into new areas or find power-ups. The blocks in the old games that could only be destroyed by some specific weapon were even replicated quite well, and firing a missile into some block feels exactly like it did back in Super Metroid.

Like you always do in Metroid, there are a lot of Aliens that you need to fight, it starts off easy with some weak Bug's and creatures that just crawl around after you land on Tallon IV, but after a while you begin fighting Aliens that make you work. You wind up having to dodge attacks by dashing around and firing your cannon at whatever gets in your way. They also give you several different weapons, you have four different beams for your cannon, and a missile launcher as well as some visors like the X-Ray Visor which must be utilized to beat some enemy's, this was all done quite well although some Space Pirates who make you keep switching your beam to hurt them get very annoying after a while [the end boss does this as well]. Other than that you got a lot of Metroid-esqe aliens to smear across the walls, I can did that. But in case that is not enough for you, there are a lot of huge bosses who you have to beat the hell out of for a while before they go down, having to fight Ridley [the previously mentioned dragon] pelting you with plasma beams and dashing across the platform you are on while you need to hit him in the chest. It is very exciting and a good addition to the exploration of Prime.

But one thing should be mentioned, Prime is more linear than the past games which you could sequence break [bypassing certain points in the game, getting items early], but in Prime everything is in a set path that you need to follow throughout most of the game. Other than that there is no problem, Prime gives you a world to explore, and you will enjoy it.

Challenge: 8

I'll be simple with this, if all you're doing is playing the main game without trying to find everything, the game won't be very difficult because it is easy to find where you need to go. But if you're trying to find all of the items, scan all of the creatures and the lore, as well as unlocking every image gallery. The game will be tough for you because unless you have a guide you should be ready to explore the hell out of Tallon IV to find everything. As I said, the main game is not very hard if you know what you're doing, someone who knows how to play Metroid games should blow through the bosses without too much of a challenge. Somebody who is new to the Metroid games should have a hard time though.

Controls: 7

Being 3D, Prime controls a lot differently than the past games, and while to some people it sounded like a nightmare everything worked out very well. You use the Control Stick to move around and you press A to fire the cannon, you press B to jump, and those are the basics about the game. But to Aim at things, you must hold down one of the shoulder buttons to aim, and while you're doing that you're unable to move. But this is rectified by allowing you to lock onto anything [that is lock-on-able] with the other shoulder button, and that makes it easier for some people. But all you really need to know besides that is that Prime controls fluidly, and it will be quick to learn. But tit does seem very unusual and that may take longer to get uses to than the controls themselves.

Graphics: 9

Back in 2002 when this game came out, the Cube did not really have much out there that showed off that graphical oomph that people were waiting for, but Prime delivered. When you start off on the Frigate everything does not really look very good, but it is very atmospheric and you can see that the ship has been trashed. But after you land on Tallon IV you see a gorgeous forest patch that you land in where rain is dripping onto your visor, and then you travel through the standards for a video game nowadays, the Desert/Temple level, the Lava level, the Ice level. But they all look incredible, the Chozo Temple has several layers in the design and there are several areas where parts of the temple are falling apart, Magmoor Depths is filled with fire and you can almost feel the heat although the Lava looks really fake. But the best one out of these four [in my opinion] is Phendrana Drifts which is filled with beautiful ice and snow, and there are so many little details to everything in there. Throughout the game everything looks beautiful, but there are signs of how empty the game is sometimes with how some parts of levels are corroded, most of the Chozo sites in the game look like they are falling apart, the levels are just beautifully designed and Retro had some incredible artistic direction.

Onto the Aliens you need to kill, most of them look good as well, there are unique designs for most of them, but the real impressive thing is the hulking bosses. The first impressive one is the giant poison flower whose name is impossible to spell [read the FAQ], it is like I said a giant flower which looks horribly mutated and tries to slash at you with its claws, moving on there is a Golem made from floating Phazon infected rocks, there is Ridley the Metallic Space Dragon, and there are so many other things. The enemy's like the levels are mostly beautifully designed.

Sound: 8

There are mainly two things that are to be covered in this section, the sound effects, and the Music. The effects are mostly done well, the beams sound good and have their own distinct sound and you can hear Samus' footsteps plinking on several of the surfaces, there are several things that you can hear that immerse you very well. But the Music is incredible in some places, there are some remixed tunes such as the Magmoor theme which is mainly the Norfair theme remixed with a more orchestral sound, and there is Ridley's theme which like always gets you excited for one of Metroid's best bosses. But Retro's original songs are brilliant; they really sound great compared to the remixes of Mr. Tanaka's songs. Sadly there is no voice work, which is unusual at the time, but the only voices you will hear are Samus' cries of pain and the roars of what you're trying to kill. I will put this in the simplest terms I can muster; you should like how the game sounds.

Atmosphere: 8

As I said above, Prime really draws you in; there are incredible graphics and some incredible songs that set the mood for where you are. Sometimes you really feel like you are on a dying world, and you can see the results of Phazon on Tallon IV. But the thing that adds to this the most is the amazing artistic design where everything just feels so right about where you are.

Replayability: 7

The only big things to keep playing for are finding all of the Missiles and Logbook scans. But there are also some image galleries that can be unlocked as well as a harder difficulty. But a lot of people do play through the game trying to get Speedruns [how fast you can beat the game], so if you are up for a challenge give that a try.

Pros:
Excellent graphics, great music, great transition from 2D too 3D, innovative gameplay that was different than what was out there.

Cons:
No voice over work, controls seem weird at first, it took 8 years to get it.

Should you get it:
Metroid Prime is an excellent game that you can find cheaply now; you should get it for your GameCube or Wii [if you have one].

Overall:

Metroid Prime is what the fans have been waiting to get for eight years, and also drew some new people to the game. And the traditional Metroid exploration was exceptionally altered into 3D. Retro Studios did an excellent job on this game, and it is deserving of its praise.

9

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 09/13/07, Updated 08/25/08

Game Release: Metroid Prime (Player's Choice) (US, 09/25/03)

Metroid Prime Echoes

"Insert "Echo" Pun here..."

I will say this, Metroid Prime 2: Echoes is a great game, and one of the best for the Game Cube, Retro Studios showed their talent with Echoes but it did not deliver in the way I expected it to. While Prime was amazing and had some of the best exploration and most incredible bosses I have ever fought, mixed with some gorgeous environments. Echoes seemed to be slightly more tedious and bland although it was still fun to play.

Story: 7

This is done better than it was in the first game, as you should know you are Samus and you were sent on a mission to investigate the disappearance of a Galactic Federation ship that was investigating Space Pirate presence over the Planet Aether.

Soon after you crash onto the planet from a storm in the atmosphere you discover that the troops were killed and the Ing, a race of parasitic black semi-liquid creatures that can possess most life forms, possessed several of them. She also discovers Dark Samus, who is Metroid Prime [from game 1] inhabiting her old Phazon Suit, and finally Samus discovers the Luminoth who are fighting a war against the Ing.

The Luminoth tell Samus that a meteor hit Aether and split it into two dimensions, the dark one created the evil Ing, and the Luminoth have almost been completely killed off by the Ing, and the Luminoth send Samus off to collect the "planetary energy" for their dimensions that is currently on the Dark half so the Luminoth can restore their world.

Like the last game the story is mainly told through Scanning things that you find, but now you are told a little bit more about what happens through the cut scenes. The story is well fleshed out and you should dig it.

Gameplay: 7

Like the last game, you are given a big world to explore while you look through every room to find the weapons and expansions and blow away the bosses that you get to fight. I am guessing that if you are reading this review you already know how Metroid works so I'll cover how everything felt to me in the game.

Like last time you get a great assortment of aliens and big bosses to blow to hell, but the problem with that is that some of them seem like model changes of the old ones from Prime [Sheegoth = Grenchler!], and some of them can get really frustrating because Retro made them to be the quintessential pain in the ass [Dark Pirate Commando's]. And the bosses, while some of them like Quadraxis were incredible... some of them were an ungodly pain to fight, and there are two who top this list; Boost Guardian, and Spider Guardian. The Boost Guardian would be able to kill you before you knew it because you were stuck in a small room where you health was constantly decreasing while it was zipping around the room and draining a huge chunk of power on each hit. And the Spider ******* Guardian [as Metroid Database called it] had you do an annoying as hell puzzle just so you could take a few points off of its health bar and you would have to keep replaying that boss so many times you want to slam your controller through the TV screen [as someone who has broken a few Keyboards and Game Pads that is something I really got close to doing].

You also get to go into the Dark world, and while it felt scary in the beginning because you were fighting in a bubble on a world where the air was poison against some shadow creatures, after a while it just got boring and turned into a purple retextured version of the "light World".

The weapons, were the exact same thing we had last time and they felt really rushed, it felt like Light Beam = Plasma Beam, Dark Beam = Ice Beam, and Annihilator Beam = Wave Beam [slightly] with an annoying ammo system, at first you only have 50 rounds which is nothing in the beginning, it does get frustrating to have to manage your ammo like this game does.

While Echoes does do the Metroid formula very well, even though I have no problem with what was kept the same as the last game, what was new felt poorly implemented in some places.

Challenge:8

As you all should know, Prime games give you a big world to explore and find all of the items, that alone is a difficult task but Echoes upped the ante with some things that I just need to cover.

I already mentioned some of the bosses who irked me a lot, but there are two more things that infuriated me. First was the tedious backtracking through the Light and Dark worlds you had to keep going around in there and it started to get really confusing. But there is something that was much worse that that...

The final Key Hunt, basically to get into the last part of the game, you had to find 9 keys to get inside, and that would not be so bad if they gave you a good hint or at least had a few in the open. In Prime, a lot of the Chozo Artifacts were given to you, and the others were relatively easy to find. In Corruption, you only needed 5 of the Energy Cells, and they were really easy to find, but in Echoes you had to find an invisible box floating in the air and blow it up to get the key. Now, if you knew how to read the hints it was easy enough, basically what you had to do was go to the Dark World version of a room where you found a dead Luminoth who was searching for the key, but if you did not know that you were basically running around the Dark World using the Echo Visor [one of the items you find] and shooting at anything that looks like the Cache it was in. This is just way too hard for the casual Metroid players.

Controls: 7

It works the same way as Prime, you move around with the control stick and you have to use the shoulder buttons to lock on and free aim. You can swap visors, beams and do everything easily although aiming is still tough to get used to.

Graphics: 9

Yet again Retro showed their talents at making beautiful looking games, this time even with how bland looking some of the environments are you can still see how much detail went into everything. Everything looks gorgeous, and as I said some levels look really bland [Dark World, Agon Wastes] but they still look beautiful in their own way, there is so much detail in most of the things you will find and incredible architecture in some of the levels you can see how much time went into into creating everything.

Onto the enemies, they are filled with polygons and they have some distinctive look to em that is very cool looking. Although some of them are reskins of old enemies there are a lot of beautiful looking ones out there, especially the Bosses like Quadraxis. That thing is so huge and it looks so metallic fitting in with the "Sanctuary" level you are in while you fight it. The artistry of some of the enemies is just amazing.

Kudos to Retro for having some of the best artists in the business.

Sound: 9

Again, the composing of new original tunes and some of the classics from the old games are done so well. I'll be simple with this, the music is incredible like always in Metroid games, everything sounds like it should, and the small amount of voice work does its job.

What you will really be noticing is the sounds of the weapons, and the roars of the creatures on Aether, and you should not be disappointed.

For me, the best part of the sound was hearing the Escape Song, which along with Ridley's Theme [although it was not in this game] is the best song in Metroid.

Atmosphere: 7

You do get drawn in and like the last game you feel like you are in a dying world. There are beautiful graphics and the sound really fits everything in here. Only problem is that the Dark World, which is supposed to scare you turns into a gimmick after a while and you get bored of going through the portals so, you can go into the Dark World.

Multiplayer: 7

I think of the Multiplayer as a little diversion, because that's all it really is. They give you a split screen where you can fight against other players and you can pick up all of the weapons that you use in the game. The Multiplayer is a fun little diversion, and that is all it deserves to be called.

Replayability: 7

Like last time, you can find the items and the scans so you can unlock all of the bonuses, and you can play the Multiplayer. But if the Spider ******* Guardian left a bad taste in your mouth you might not want to come back.

Pros:
Great graphics and sound, a large world to explore in traditional Metroid fashion, some awesome bosses, good sequel.

Cons:
Did not meet expectations, some levels were bland, Dark World got boring, The final Key Hunt, Spider ******* Guardian! I H-A-T-E the Spider Guardian!

Should you get it:
You should get Echoes; it is a great sequel to the original game and has a great story. It should be cheap now so get it for the Wii and use it to help get into Prime 3

Overall:

Although Prime was one of the best Game Cube games I have ever played, and Echoes was a great game on its own merit, it just felt like Retro did not do as good of a job as the fans wanted. There was a sour taste left in my mouth by some things in here, but that alone does not warrant not getting the game. You are still getting a great Metroid game, and the flaws that I listed were mostly minor things that would not get in the way too much.

8

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 10/12/07, Updated 08/25/08

Game Release: Metroid Prime 2: Echoes (US, 11/15/04)

Metroid Prime 3 Corruption

"Beautiful Corruption"

First off, I would just like to mention the Game Spot review... ya know the infamous one with the lines: "Streamlined controls make things a little too easy and a little less adventurous". Now the one who posted this review won't be mentioned, but I will just say that it deserved far more than the 8.5 they gave it, Metroid Prime 3: Corruption is worthy of the praise it got from the other sites that we Nintendo-fan boys love so much [Wii-60... but I am still mainly Nintendo]. And Corruption is probably the best game currently available on the Nintendo Wii.

For those of you who don't know, Corruption is only the 3rd game made by the Texas based Retro Studios, and the final game in the Prime series which flawlessly inserted Samus into the world of 3D gaming beginning in 2002. And the third is undoubtedly the best one, so lets light this candle.

Story: 8

Metroid Prime never had much of a real story, in Prime you were investigating the Phazon on Tallon IV, and killing Space Pirates, in Echoes you were killing Ing to rid a planet of an evil dimension [well, it was better than Prime 1 was]. But in Corruption even though it was still kind of generic, still an improvement over the last two.

Like always you are Samus, and you along with 3 other Bounty Hunters [Rundas; the ice generating badass (and my personal favorite), Ghor; the as Nintendo Power called him "badass mech", and Gandraya; the shape shifter] are on a mission to check out an infection in these Aurora Units, a giant organic computer [kind of like Mother Brain *wink wink*]. Along the way you and the other hunters are infected with Phazon by Dark Samus, and you are then equipped with a new suit called the P.E.D., which allows you to use the Phazon inside of you as a weapon, but soon you are corrupted, and the other hunters are taken over by Dark Samus [you have to fight them].

You are also investigating Phazon Seeds, which infected a few planets; there is also a lot of dialog to move the story along. I thought that this was much better than the last two, so I will give it a good score for that, and for like always providing interesting scans and some cool tie ins to the old games.

Gameplay: 10

To those of you who have played Prime and Echoes, just intensify that and you have this. Even though Corruption is more Linear and some would say "Halo-like" . Like always you are given some nice locales to explore, items to collect, and aliens to kill. But the Wii-Mote makes it so much better, you can interact with so many different things in here, you can press switches that actually work quite well, you can collect a lot of items, and the new use for the grapple beam was quite good.

But the real gem of the game were the epic Boss Battles, one of the first ones is falling down a Generator Shaft with Ridley trying to blast him in the mouth and take him down before you splatter all over the ground. The AI has also been improved, now you have so many different enemies out there [even though most of the Space Pirates are the exact same thing], and most of them have a lot of different attacks and different ways to kill them. And like always, there are things that you can scan so that you can learn about the characters, the environments, and the story of the game.

You can also unlock bonuses with tokens, although one little gripe. Drop the frickin' Friend Vouchers because some of us don't have our Wii hooked up to the Internet, and that is because we can't make it work. I wanted to get everything but... that will be hard as hell with that to work around. All in all, Corruption has been an exceptional game, and even the linearity should not bother the diehard Metroid fanatics too much.

Challenge: 7

Corruption is not very hard, especially if you played it on Normal mode [or "Easy" as we call it here], the only really difficult thing is finding all of the items and that is ameliorated by the ability to download the locations of almost every item in the "Chozo Observatory" room. If you want a real challenge, just play on Hyper mode, because that will make you work hard for a while. But the hardest thing is finding ALL of the tokens, especially if you have Dial-Up Internet *sob*.

Controls: 9

Now that Corruption is done with the Wii-Mote, Prime and Echoes feel downright archaic playing now [and those are two of my favorite games]. You are now able to aim while running, and with the Advanced Setting on the remote... screw the other two setting this is how aiming on the Wii should be done. It may take a while to get used too, but after you have it down this is how Wii gaming should be done, no less would be adequate now that Retro has shown how you do it.

Even the gesture controls work better than I expected, except for the jump ball, which did not respond very well sometimes. But what it all comes down too is how well you are able to aim with the remote and scan stuff... or shoot stuff. And Corruption does not disappoint you in that field, it shows exactly what we were waiting for back when the Wii was announced and we were wondering just how well FPS games could be done. My only gripe is the responsiveness for some of the motions is a little iffy.

Graphics: 10

Back in 2002, when Prime came out it was one of the most gorgeous games of its time [and the Cube was thought to be underpowered at that time if I remember correctly], but Corruption blows it out of the water. Now technically, Corruption isn't winning any beauty contests against the 360 and PS3 games out there [yes like BioShock...], but artistically it can compete and hold its own with any of the newer games. It is hard to believe that Retro which is a small company could create such beautiful environments, especially with the limitations on the Wii that won't let you get in everything you want like the other two consoles have.

Still Corruption is a good step above Prime and Echoes, the architecture is done very well, and there are some incredible effects, including some very nice liquid animation and the beautiful lighting. There are also incredible designs for all of the characters, like Ghor and Rundas who are very well designed, and have something interesting to them. Even the humans look nice, albeit unrealistic. But everything has its own design that works for it, and Corruption is a visual masterpiece for the Wii, which has sadly been smothered with bile that could probably be done on the 64 [lets be realistic only Corruption and Super Mario Galaxy show just what the Wii can really do].

Kudos to the people at Retro, for actually putting a ******* effort into a Wii game.

Sound: 9

Corruption finally has some good sound added to the Prime series. This must be because of the additional space on the Wii Optical Discs but it was a nice little treat. Like always Retro shows their impressive composing work with some great songs [the Pirate Music is one of the best songs I have heard in a game], and great sound effects, like a beam charging, a missile flying into a Space Pirate blowing its armor off, the roars of the aliens, and so on... But now we got some real voice over for the first time in Metroid [not counting Super Metroid because that was only 10 seconds]. The Hunters have voices that fit them well, the Marines have the cool gruff voices, the Admiral has that ever so popular Captain Keyes voice, and sadly Sammy doesn't get much except for some new pain yelps. But what is in there is very good, and makes this just so much more of an excellent experience.

Atmosphere: 9

Corruption sucks you in a lot, you really enjoy what you are given to do, and so many things are more fun to do now. I remember Echoes and how I sometimes hated going into the Dark Aether, I hated searching for the Keys, but I have found everything in Corruption to be enjoyable, Hypermode is even fun because it makes you more powerful, but it could also kill you. But it also was not as bad as going into Dark Aether, because Hypermode actually had benefits. And you were even able to change your strategy around for Hypermode to fight different enemies. But it really makes you feel like Samus, and Retro's attention to detail was the most impressive part of the game.

Replayability: 8

You have a crap load of tokens to get, 100 Items, 3 difficulties and some of the most bad-ass boss battles Samus has ever had on one awesome game. You will probably keep playing just to unlock all of the extras.

Pros:
Great graphics and sound, well done voice over work, Wii-Controls done very well, INCREDIBLE boss battles.

Cons:
Wii-controls sometimes don't work right, too linear for some people, not much different than Prime and Echoes.

Should you get it:

Corruption is currently the best game for the Wii in my mind, and will be one of the best games that finally showed just what the Wii could do. And Sammys final outing in the Prime series is one worth checking out. If you are a fan of Metroid buy it, and if you liked Halo but not the GCN Prime's, then you should dig this one as well.

Overall:

Corruption is an excellent end to the Prime sub series of Metriod, and showed that the Wii wasn't just cooking sims and mini-games; it could deliver a hardcore game with the best of them. It also left an opening for a Sequel [just read the Forums...], but hopefully we can get back to the 2D Metroids we know and love while we have this incredible game to bring Samus to the Wii.

9

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 08/30/07, Updated 02/13/08

Game Release: Metroid Prime 3: Corruption (US, 08/27/07)

[Joe]

Metroid Prime Trilogy

"One of the best Compilations ever made"

When was the last time Nintendo ever gave us a deal like this? Instead of releasing Prime and Echoes in the "New Play Control" Wii port thing for they are doing, we get all 3 of the Metroid Prime games on one disc, for 50 dollars in a beautiful metal box with an art booklet when the New Play Control games are 30 dollars. Even though I already own these games, this was just too good of a deal for me to pass up because of my love for the Metroid Franchise. Now, lets see why every Wii owner should have this.

First off, because I already have reviews for the 3 Metroid Prime games on here [Prime 9/10, Echoes 8/10, Corruption 9/10] so if you want to see an in depth explanation of why I love those games are great click on my name and read the reviews because if I had to go over everything from the three games it would take way too long.

For those of you who don't know what the Prime games are about, they tell the story of what Samus Aran did between the first and second Metroid games.

In Prime you go to Tallon IV after decimating the Pirate base on Zebes in Metroid 1, and you have to deal with some of the remaining Space Pirates who discovered a substance called Phazon and are using it to bolster their army, along with Metroid Prime, the guardian of the Leviathan that struck Tallon IV and infected it with Phazon.

Prime 2 takes place shortly after the first game, and it deals with the Leviathan that struck Aether and created alternate dimensions inhabited by the Luminoth on the original Light half, and creating the corrosive Dark half along with the evil Ing. Dark Samus, a mixture of Samus' DNA and Metroid Prime after it absorbed part of her suit in the last game also appears and tries to kill you while you try to restore the planetary energy to the good half of Aether and destroy the Ing. There are also some Space Pirates hunting more Phazon.

Prime 3 is also a short time after the previous game, and its plot involves the discovery of what the Leviathans [which were given a name in this game when they were just meteors before] are, and where Phazon came from. Dark Samus also comes back after being defeated in the last game, she brainwashed the Space Pirates, corrupted some of your bounty hunter allies, and is trying to launch Leviathans at other planets to infect them with Phazon. Your goal, with the aid of the Galactic Federation is to stop her.

The story is pretty simple, it is told mostly by scanning stuff in the first two games but there are still a few cut scenes, the story is more detailed in the third game. Overall it was an interesting story.

The new controls are excellent, and they vastly improved the first two games. Although Prime 3 has the best controls because it was built with the Wiimote in mind, all 3 of the games have aiming that feels more precise now than it did with the GameCube controllers on the first two games, you can also flick the Wiimote while using the Morphball to hop in all 3 games, and everything just feels more precise, less clunky, and easier to do. Although switching Visors and Beams can take some getting used to at first.

The graphics were improved in the first two games, even though Prime and Echoes are from 2002 and 2004 they still look better than the majority of the games on the Wii, which is a testament to the talent of the people at Retro Studios, or a sad confirmation of the fact that most of the Developers who make games on the Wii don't seem to give a damn about putting effort into their games when they could make some incredible looking games even with technologically inferior hardware compared to the 360 and the PS3.

Although Corruption doesn't have a lot that was changed, Prime and Echoes have some improved textures and better lighting. Although Prime had some coding errors that made Retro remove some of the arm cannon effects because they were 2D and that would look bad with the new Cannon that moves when you point at the screen instead of almost always being in the same place. The water animations in the first game also weren't compatible with the liquid rendering engine in Corruption. The load times are also better with some coding fixes they did, and Widescreen compatibility has been added to Prime and Echoes. Other than the nitpicks, these are still beautiful games with well-designed characters and environments that are technically and artistically stunning.

Some stuff that was in Prime 3 was also added, you can now get tokens by doing things in Prime and Echoes although it is more simplified in those two games because you just get them for collecting Artifacts/Keys and killing bosses instead of almost everything like in Prime 3. Although the ****** ******* Friend Tokens are in there, so you still have to trade them with a friend in order to get everything you can purchase in the unlockables menu…. Who the hell thought that was a good idea? You can also continue your campaign in all 3 games with all of your logbook scans instead of having to find all of them again, and the three difficulties from Corruption were included. The Normal difficulty is considered to be “Candy-Ass mode” on the message boards, Veteran is the normal difficulty from the first two games, and Hypermode is the hard mode from the first two games.

Overall, you are getting three of the best games from the GameCube and the Wii, the multiplayer mode from Echoes, a shiny metal box, an art booklet with the entire plot overview, and you only have to pay 50 dollars for THREE great games when Nintendo could have just released them as the New Play Control games they are releasing for 30 dollars each. You are getting them for half of what they would have been, along with Corruption which is still around the same price it was when it came out since the last time I checked. This is an amazing deal, and it is one of the best compilations ever released, I'd say it is pretty close to being as good of a deal as The Orange Box is. What else really has to be said? Anyone with a Wii should get this game right now, even if they already have all 3 of the Metroid Prime games, it will be worth it.

9/10

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 09/29/09

Game Release: Metroid Prime Trilogy (US, 08/24/09)

24 The Game

"Great Story, Underwhelming Gameplay"

Most of the people reading this review should know what "24" is. For those of you who don't know, it is a show that has aired for 6 Seasons on the Fox Network [and we have to wait an extra year for Season Seven... damn Writers Strike] and is very popular. And like everything that is popular now, someone decided to suck as much money out of everyones wallets as possible by creating a Video Game. But, unlike most of the crappy Moviegames that come out, this one received some real hype and was anticipated by fans of the Show. But in the end, it was not very well received, so lets finish up this opening and light this candle.

Story: 9

If you are a fan of "24" you know what to expect here. One of the things that the show is known for is constantly killing off characters, and having some of the most complex, twist filled, and fast paced story lines in any TV show that is currently on the air. The game tells everything similarly to the show, everything that goes on takes place over one day of Jack Bauers life. And for those of you don't know, Jack Bauer is an agent for the LA Counter Terrorist Unit offices, who is seemingly unkillable, and often has to break the rules to save the world when his bosses are twiddling their thumbs.

As for the game, it takes place between Day Two and Day Three, six months after the finale of Season Two where President Palmer was poisoned by Mandy [an assassin]. and two and a half years before Season Three which deals with a Biological Attack being used on the United States. The main plot holes that are filled are things like how President Palmer recovered from the assassination attempt, how the people who planned the assassination were taken down, and how some of the people who worked in CTU like Chloe, Chase, and Jack's daughter Kim started working there.

The main game itself covers 3 plots [like most of the Seasons do]. The first one involves a plot to assassinate Vice President James Prescott, number two is about an attack on CTU, and the final one is about the terrorists who tried to kill Palmer in Season 2 bombing several Fault Lines and trying to get Nuclear Weapons.

Now, there is nothing as surprising as some of the revelations in the show, like Nina being the real mole in Season One, or President Logan being behind everything that happened in Season Five, but the plot in this game is a damn good one that any fan of "24" would enjoy.

Gameplay: 6

Unfortunately, so much work went into crafting the story the the game suffered. Its not that the game is bad, it is just that some of the things were not done very well.

Most of the levels are 3rd Person Shooter sequences, and they would of been much better if it wasn't for the poor camera and how awkward it was to target enemies. The AI was also pathetic, and having very little artificial intelligence unless you were right in front their face. But other than that the levels are fun enough to play.

The Vehicles Sequences were even more painful. Driving felt like you were skidding on ice, and the enemy AI drove around like it was suicidal. It also took a long time to get up to speed compared to a real car.

The Minigames were the worst part. The majority of them were so ridiculously simple that a monkey could do them. The only one that was really fun was the Interrogation Minigame where you had to make dialog choices [Threaten, or Calm] in order to get someone to break and spill their guts to you.

If more time was spent resolving these problems, then this score would of gone up. But it is apparent that the Developers tried to do much more than they had to, and that just degraded the quality of what could of been a great game.

Challenge: 6

Well... given what I said in the last section what else could you expect.

The AI is idiotic, and most of the puzzles are mind numbingly easy. But there are some tough sequences like having to move Kim through CTU by being stealthy. It is usually the stealth levels that were the most annoying for me to do. But I did have a hard time with a few of the levels with a small time limit, and the ones where there are a lot of enemies.

The game also won't take you very long to finish. For most players it will probably take 7 or 8 hours.

Just remember these words. The game is easy most of the time, but there are some tough sequences.

Controls: 6

Most of the controls are good, but like I said above the Camera and aiming can be frustrating, getting behind cover does not work very well [you also can't move around like you can in Rainbow Six Vegas, or you will pop back out of cover] and using the same button to search a body and whack someone with your gun was a dumb idea.

But other than that everything works good enough.

Graphics: 7

What were getting here is good but not incredible.

All of the characters have been recreated very well into polygonal form, and everything very closely resembles the "24" universe. The levels you are in look good, and most of the textures are well done. Most of the cutscenes look like something you would see in the show, and you get to see some things that are seen in the show like multiple split screens and the ticking clock.

The main flaws I had were a slow frame rate when there was a lot going on [explosions], clipping errors, and poorly done animations.

Sound: 9

Luckily, the sound fared much better than most of what was in the game.

Most of the actors like Kiefer Sutherland, Elisha Cuthbert, Dennis Haysbert, and Carlos Bernard [to name a few] recorded some very well done dialog for their characters, and I found almost no faults with how it was done. The composer from the show Sean Callery also did an excellent job with the soundtrack which sounds better than some of the music in the show sometimes. The rest of the sound effects like weapons, and background noises were also well done.

Like with the show, all of the sounds and the music fit where they should, and they help enhance everything to make it better.

Atmosphere: 8

What I have been saying about the plot and the sound applies here. It really helps draw you into the game and make you feel like you are in the game. Unfortunately, the apparent gameplay flaws draw this down.

Replayability: 6

The main things to keep coming back to the game are unlockable character models and videos that can be gotten by getting over a 90% rating when the mission is finished. But other than that, there isn't much to keep playing for unless you enjoyed the story.

Pros:
Excellent story, good soundtrack, character voices were well done, decent missions, the Interrogation Minigame.

Cons:
Disappointing gameplay, horrible Driving levels, too many minigames, bad camera, Aiming problems, too many eggs in one basket.

Should you get it:
I would only recommend this game to a "24" fan. But if you are not one I would suggest this as a rental, and if you like it go ahead and get it.

Overall:

24: The Game is not bad, it is just not as good as it could of been. There was a lot of promise, but it was left unfulfilled. Even though the story and the sound were some of the best on the PS2, the gameplay was not up to the level that everyone was expecting and that lowered the scores. But the blame can be put on the Developers for trying to do to much with this game, and if some of the bad parts were just toned down, the game would of been much better. But most of the "24" fans on this website should enjoy parts of it.

7

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 06/12/08, Updated 03/23/09

Game Release: 24: The Game (US, 02/28/06)

Robot Arena

"I'm confused... where is the Realistic Robotic Combat?"

Okay I will just start off by saying this, this game is severely disappointing, and fans of Robotic Combat shows like "Battle Bots", and "Robot Wars" and whatever else is out there DESERVE better [by the way, those two shows are dead now, but there are still some competitions out there, and the first one I mentioned is actually coming back in November]. Before I start the review I will say this, this game is nothing but a disappointment for all of the fans of Robotic Combat who bought this game.

Story: 1

Basically, there is no real story. In the simplest way of explaining it, you are in a tournament to fight against robots, and after that you're done.

Gameplay: 4

This is why the game failed, pure and simple. Now when I saw it I bought it because at that time I was watching "Battle Bots" a lot, and I installed it I thought everything was good. So I got into a battle, like the other review on here said I made a simple robot, it was a box with spikes, and I went into the practice level and I had my ass kicked. Then I put some batteries in, and I changed the weapon into a saw blade and I put better wheels on and I blew through the entire game in a few minutes, and after that the only thing to do is play the Exhibition Mode for more money. This game is incredibly easy because the AI is TERRIBLE. Most of the time the opposing Robots almost never move around, and you can drive behind them with ease and blow them apart. You are also incapable of shoving the other robot; if you run into the other robot you STOP. And personally I am a fan of the launch bots like Toro, and you can't make any of them, all you are capable of doing is slapping on some weapons and driving into the other robot until the other robot explodes. Another thing I despise is the complete lack of customization of the robots, you have attach points for everything on the shells you can chose from, and that is it. And you can only put weapons on those little spots. They could of at least given you a little bit more freedom with everything.

Challenge: 1

There is no challenge at all when I played. The AI will sit there like I said, and they will let you slice them up. You will only lose if you charge into their blades because the only time the AI moves most of the time is when they sometimes inch forward. Absolutely pathetic.

Controls: 7

You are able to customize the controls for your robot, and this as all well and good but there is still a problem. The complete lack of a physics engine means that if you are pined between another robot and the wall, or just stuck in anything... you cannot move!

Graphics: 7

This is the only good part. The Robots looked good for a 2001 game, and the Arenas looked like the ones you saw in most of the Robotic Combat shows. But the game feels like the Graphics are done in 2D because everything never leaves the ground, it feels a little bit weird for 2001.

I also found the impact marks to look nice, except for some of the weapons where it will make a mark past where the weapon ends [mainly on the Saw Blades]. And sometimes the game runs slow for me. I also have a little question about the explosions, after you defeat the enemy robot in battle it will explode, that seems a little bit weird because there is nothing capable of doing that much damage in this game. Other than that I got nothing to say about the Graphics.

Sound: 3

Lets see... There are some nice Rock Songs in the game, but it feels to me like a constant loop of a small track, I think that they could of at least put more effort into creating the music for the game. There are also sounds for the wheels, some of the electronics and the collisions, but they all sound exactly the same, there is no real variety in the noises at all. I got a little question now Infogrames, the company that made this game also worked on Unreal Tournament with Epic Games, and that game was filled with sound effects, and it is from 1998. This game was made in 2001 and there is inside of this game, it feels like the sound was put together in one day.

Atmosphere: 3

There is nothing to really immerse you, it would be nice to have some realistic Robotic Combat but that is nowhere to be seen. The speed is nowhere near realistic [if a glorified RC car could go over 100 miles per hour... and it felt like 15 mph in the game... totally fake], and there are no physics at all. What else do I really need to say here.

Replayability: 1

Well... you may want to play exhibition mode to earn more money after beating the tournaments, other than that there is no reason to continue playing after you beat the main mode.

Pros:
You can build Robots, The graphics are good enough.

Cons:
AI is terrible, unable to make a "unique" robot, almost no diversity in sound effects and music.

Should you get it:
If you are addicted to Robotic Combat give this game a gander, but I don't think you can find one anymore, at least it will be cheap.

Overall:

I am still confused by how Infogrames thought this was a good game, at least the Sequel improved over this mess. And like I said in the Sound portion, this game feels like it was made in one day, isn't it possible to do a little more work on a game because us Robotic Combat fans are starved for some destruction.

4

Reviewer's Score: 4/10, Originally Posted: 07/09/07, Updated 06/20/08

Game Release: Robot Arena (US, 04/01/01)

Robot Arena Design and Destroy

"Finally Robotic Combat Done Right."

Robot Arena 2: Design and Destroy by Infogrames and Atari is a great game for people who like watching "Battle Bots" or "Robot Wars" and people who are tired of using RC cars with a hack saw on top of it. It also has a lot of patches you can download for it but I'll get to that later.

Story: 3

Basically, you are a competitor in a Robotic Combat competition, and you have to design your own robots and win Tournaments. They did not give you a real story for the game.

Gameplay: 8

There are some glitches like if you play to long it locks up or the Havok physics engine can make your Robot fly into the air [AKA: Havok Explosions]. It almost constantly does that sometimes, and when I drive into an axle for a motor sometimes it causes one of those Havok Explosions.

The patches I mentioned earlier make up for it there are several of patches for Weapons and Arenas you also can import other peoples robots. But best of all there are AI packs made for the game, which can make it feel like a new game I recommend the Starcore, and DSL packs which are both on my computer. But the DSL pack is a total conversion that lets you use robots from "Battlebots" and "Robot Wars", which is something that is possible if you have the right tools. Since the DSL pack changes the ENTIRE game into something much better than the original was. You can have those AI packs without losing all of your stuff by copying the game in the windows explorer thing and downloading the packs to it.

But in the tournaments it is kind of boring, the AI is a little bit wimpy [except for a few of the bots] and their weapons can't do any real damage to you most of the time. A lot of them are really weak, and you can rip them off really easily. But it is still fun to beat up on them.

You can also play the game online, but not very many people bother going on there anymore, Robot Arena only has a small cult fan base so its easy to understand why nobody is ever there.

Challenge: 4

Most of the time, the AI [besides EMERGENCY] is exquisitely pathetic. After you learn how to build the bots it is simple to completely own everything in the game. But once you start off and you are first learning how to build the bots, even the wimpy ones probably will kill you. The biggest problem with the AI is that it is so easy to get under some of them, flip them over and knock them out, or you can rip off their wheels and kill them too fast to provide a real challenge. And, sometimes they will drive into a hazard; sometimes they really suck at driving [Sentinel].

The challenge here is really non-existent.

Controls: 8

You make your own controls in the game, which is awesome since you can use the robots any damn way you want. I've seen Joystick and Keyboard ones but I'm not sure if a controller will work on it. You can use any button to control your weapons or to drive depending on your control style. Although when you start it is hard to figure out, but you should get the hang of it after a while.

Graphics: 7

The graphics in Robot Arena 2: Design and Destroy are simplistic. I suppose that is so that anyone can play it. You are able to design robots and they look decent for low polygonal models, and the wheels and weapons weapons are kind of blocky at times. You are also capable of adding decals and paint to your robot, and you can do custom paint jobs on them with MS Paint. The opposing robots are quite well done with nice paint jobs and some custom weapons, but they are still blocky. And the arenas also look nice but the textures are low-res in some levels.

Sound: 7

The sound is okay in Robot Arena 2, there is some music that plays in the menus and in the arenas, there are some collision noises for the weapons, and when you slam into the wall, and there is a dorky announcer who you wish you could mute but that's it. But you are also capable of making your own sounds for it and downloading sound packs for the game. So that makes up for it.

Atmosphere: 8

Unlike most Robotic Combat games, "Design and Destroy" makes you feel like you are in a competition for once. You get too design the robots, and set up their weapons which makes you feel like the builders. The control for the robots feels like it does when you watch the TV shows, except it does not feel as reckless [watch the shows, they are all over the place] and it looks like the shows. The physics are also good enough to immerse you, finally you are able to wedge under a robot and drive it into the wall. The problem here is that it is too tough to make a really realistic game of this type, but so far RA2 created the most realistic simulation.

Multiplayer: 7

It is much better being able to play against real people than the wimpy AI in RA2. You can play online against the small group of people who play online, but if you use custom parts it can screw up the game. If you need to imagine how multiplayer works on here… imagine playing the normal game against someone who knows how to drive and you have it. There is also much more of a challenge now that there are people who have loaded their robot with weapons that can kill you in one hit.

If you want to play online, you have to find some of the Robot Arena 2 fansites and figure out when a Tournament is going on.

Replayability: 9

You can play online, you can create custom components, arenas, sound and AI, and you get to destroy some robots, that's enough for me.

Pros:
Close to realistic robotic combat, able to mod the game, much more variety than in Robot Arena 1.

Cons:
Weak Graphics and Sound, God-awful AI [unless you create AI of download AI packs], small fan base, not many people in the Multiplayer mode, glitches.

Should you get it:
You should get it, Robot Arena 2: Design and Destroy is probably the only Robotic Combat game that is any good. It is also very cheap and won't take up much room on your PC.

Overall:

This is an great game and a massive improvement over the first game. Anyone who is a fan of Robotic Combat should pick up this game, even though you will probably have to go on Amazon to find it.

8

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 08/29/05, Updated 06/20/08

Game Release: Robot Arena: Design & Destroy (US, 02/18/03)

YuGiOh Online

"Not as good as I hoped"

Okay I bought this game since I wanted to play Yu-Gi-Oh against other people that I have not beaten, and might be challenged. And thanks to Konami who pumps out Yu-Gi-Oh games like a Rabbit birthing its bunnies during mating season, this game does do that, but there were some flaws I experienced. And this game is painful if you bought it late, well read on for why it does.

Story: 4

There is no real story; you are just playing Yu-Gi-Oh online.

Gameplay: 6

I found myself to be quite disappointed by this. Basically it is like the Power of Chaos games, except you play against real people. You should know the Yu-Gi-Oh rules if you are reading this review. You and a opponent have 8000 "life points", and you have to use the the monster cards in your deck combined with your spell and trap cards to obliterate your opponent. Each monster has its own attack and defense points, you can have them attack or defend, some of them have effects... yadda yadda yadda you should get it by now. There are a lot of strategies, and there are so many different deck types out there like in every other strategy-card-game out there.

This is done by going online, creating an account and challenging players to win cards to improve your deck. But you also need "Duel Points" to pay for the matches online, now personally I thought that Konami would have deep enough pockets to pay for this, hell Star Craft is free, and a huge number of people play that why isn't this one free as well. That really irked me about the game. And you also have to download patches for the newer cards in the game, and that is why I stopped playing. You see I have a dial-Up connection, so it is brutally slow trying to download the patches, when it would of wound up taking hours to download the patches . There was also an ability to buy cards with points [though I never got to use that] and you could send Emails and Trade cards with people. But as I am updating this review I looked on Wikipedia and I saw that there was a large update called "Duel Evolution" created for it, it redesigned the game and allowed the exploration of areas from the Cartoon, but since I have never used that I have nothing to say about it.

Challenge: 8

You will often wind up battling people who are better than you unless you have some buddies who are around your skill level, and the entire game is about luck of the draw. Sometimes you will get screwed on the draw and your buddy will get all of the good cards and kill you, and vice versa. The biggest challenge though is enduring the annoying people who play; it is like playing Halo against the 10 year old who curses at you throughout the game sometimes. You also need to be really luck to get the good cards in the packs unless someone is willing to trade to you.

Simply put, the challenge is around the same as it should be if you really play the game.

Graphics: 5

The cards are quite well done; they look like the real ones do. But there haven't been any 3D cards, and that is what people are waiting for, although it would be hard to create thousands of 3D cards for the game. And the "Duel Tables" look nice for 2D, but to be fair this is the 21st Century, people are expecting more although this is a card game you play online. And I believe that the graphics were updated with the Update, but again I do not have that, so I will offer no opinion on that.

Sound: 6

There was only music and some battle effects. But I will say thanks for not having the Voice Overs like in Power of Chaos, because those marvels of bad cheesy acting were painful for to listen to.

Atmosphere: 8

You want to know why I gave it a good score for the atmosphere.

It is easy to get frustrated by drawing bad cards, and getting screwed when you open the packs, there are some good players, and some who are just annoying as hell. People always seem to have better cards than you do, and you sometimes start wondering why the hell it is all so expensive.

That is exactly how the real game is, congrats to Konami for capturing that [not kidding]!

Multiplayer: 7

This is the only real good part of it, since that is all the game is. It is fun to play against real people. Although if you are a beginner, you WILL lose. You have to have some experience at the game because there are so many people who are so good at this game they can win in a couple turns before you have any idea what the hell happened. And it is also a little bit slow waiting for people to make their move.

Finally, watch out for the cheaters, or the people who are clueless about how to play the game. I've played them before, and anyone who plays even the weakest cards in attack mode [against one of my good cards] is just annoying after a while.

Replay Value: 6

They release a lot of patches and there is a updated version, and you are also capable of worldwide dueling now. But you should of been an early buyer, or have a High Speed connection if you do own the game. And if you do have Dial-up, I hope you bought it the first day and go on often enough to download the patches because otherwise you will quit. But the only real reason to keep playing it to duel online.

Pros:
Can play online, Lot of cards, Being updated now.

Cons:
Slow as hell for us Dial-up users, Need to pay to play, hard to play if you're a newbie.

Should you get it:

If you can stomach downloading the patches buy it if not then screw the game find some friends and play the old fashioned way.

Overall:

Basically, it is Power of Chaos except you play online against other people, and although it was a good idea Konami really screwed up on it. All I can really say.

6

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 04/03/06, Updated 10/10/07

Game Release: Yu-Gi-Oh! Online (US, 04/11/05)

Pokemon Red/Blue

"The Game That Started The Phenomenon"

In 1998, Pokemon Red landed on American shores and brainwashed millions of kids into buying them, children all across the Continent amassed a large collection of Pokemon goodies very quickly, draining the wallets of the parents of the children who hopped aboard this fad. Well, honestly, how many of us on here who were born in the early 90's did not become obsessed with Pokemon, I know I was for a few years until the Anime started to get immensely repetitive. But this game, created by Satoshi Tajiri and the people over at Game Freak created a phenomenon, and even the haters cannot deny that.

Story: 6

The story of the first Pokemon games is relatively simple, you start off as Ash Ketchum [or "Red" as his default name was in the game], and you want to become a Pokemon Master, which is done by collecting all 151 Pokemon, defeating the 8 Gym Leaders, and whomping The Elite Four. You also have to deal with your rival Gary [or "Blue"... I swear to god they really named the characters that], and the evil Team Rocket, who are some kind of pseudo-gangsters who just want to steal Pokemon. Yes, the story is not really "epic" for an RPG, but I don't think that the Developers really intended for Pokemon to become as big as it did. The entire game was just about collecting little monsters anyway.

Gameplay: 8

As I said before the entire game is about collecting Pokemon, and defeating the many other trainers you will find in the game. The majority of the game will have you exploring the typical 8-Bit Overworld you would have in most RPG's back them, and you have to go into patches of grass [or other areas, like caves, or water] to find Pokemon, that you are supposed to weaken and catch with a Pokeball. Although you need to remember this, you can't find all 150 [151 counting Mew] on one game, you need to trade between Red and Blue for all of them, there will be more on that later. You also have to battle the trainers who can have up to 6 different Pokemon [as can you], and you have to beat them after you encounter them to win money.

The training of the Pokemon you have is also a big part of the game, as I said you can have 6 Pokemon at one time [the rest are stored in a "PC" where you can swap your current ones for the ones in there], and you have to battle so they can level up, and evolve into more powerful forms, and learn more attacks so you can battle better.

The battle system is simple, you have four different attacks, and you can use items in battle to restore health, or fix status ailments, revive a "fainted" Pokemon, or capture wild Pokemon. Like in most RPG's, you take turns either attacking your opponent, or using some of the items you have. You also need to know how to use your Pokemon, some types have advantages over other ones; i.e. Charizard is a fire type, Venusaur is a Grass type, Charizard has a type advantage because Fire attacks do more damage to Grass types, there are also resistances, such as Pikachu's electric attacks not doing any damage to the rock type Geodude. You also need to be smart with the moves your Pokemon knows, you can use weak attacks that have a lot of Power Points, or strong ones that don't have a lot of PP, such as; Psychic which is powerful, but only has 10 PP, while Ember which is weak has 25 PP. You can't overload your Pokemon with brutal attacks, otherwise you could run out of moves and you would only be able to "struggle" .

It sounds complicated at first, but it is easy to get used to. The entire system of these games worked well, except the fact that you need to trade between two different games to find all of the Pokemon, and some of the menus are frustrating to navigate.

Challenge: 7

The campaign in Pokemon is quite simple, it should not be very hard to beat everyone if you know what you're doing, I know that the Pokemon I had often outleveled my opponents by a good sized margin, and the AI is pathetic enough to be blown by fast enough [think of the guy with 6 Magikarps that only know "Splash", and how even your weaklings can own them]. The real challenges are some of the Gym Leaders and the Elite Four, and having the patience to collect all of the Pokemon in the game and complete your "Pokedex", which will require two Game Boy's, a Link Cable, and a copy of Pokemon Red and Blue, or a friend with the Game that you can link up with. But if you don't want to do everything, the game can be blown through in about 10/15 hours on a first try [for me at least].

Controls: 7

The controls are basic stuff [the Game Boy only has 3 main buttons!], so everything was simple enough to do, but the problem I had was that sometimes the menus were slow to navigate, and some things [such as browsing through the "Boxes" in the "PC" took a long time to do unless you knew what you were looking for. Other than that, nothing really irked me.

Graphics: 8

For a Game Boy game, Pokemon Red looked good. The game is monochromatic [unless you play on one of the newer Game Boy models] which means there is no color, but the art was done quite well in most of the game. The Overworld was simple looking, and it just conveyed where you were, nothing else really, and all of the character Sprites on the Overworld were relatively simple looking. But in battles, there was a well-done generic character Sprite, and the Pokemon were all well done, most of them looked great [NOTE: some of the Pokemon look different than the Anime, but this game first came out in 1996 in Japan, the Anime began a year after that, some of the designs were changed]. If you like sprites, the graphics should look good you, but if you only play 3D games you won't like them.

Sound: 8

Pokemon Red sounds pretty good.

The music is good most of the time, I did not like some of the overworld songs, but I like most of them. But almost all of the music that plays during a battle is good, and they usually get better when you are playing against a tougher trainer [Gym Leader, Rival, Elite Four].

The sound effects are basic stuff, but the Game Boy makes them sound cooler in some way. With some attacks like the Hyper Beam, the way they sound on here is better than how they sound on the newer games. And it is nice to see that all of the Pokemon got a different voice.

Atmosphere: 7

I never felt really immersed by this game, you did feel like you were training Pokemon sometimes, and the battles got you into the game, but honestly that is enough for me. A game like this does not need an incredibly immersive story.

Multiplayer: 8

The Multiplayer was simple enough, all you need is a friend with a Game Boy and a Link Cable and you can fight against a trainer who knows how to use actual strategy [you know... fighting back instead of using Growl the entire time], it makes the game a lot more fun. And you can trade Pokemon, one of the good things about it is that some Pokemon will evolve when they are traded... well its good for your buddy unless you re-trade for it. Everything works well except for having to save before you start, and the inconvenience of the Link Cable, thank god for Wi-Fi huh?

Replayability: 8

For me the main reason to keep playing these games is to get my party powered up as high as I can, then having a Marathon butt-whomping of the Elite Four, but you may want to try collecting all of the Pokemon, and if you do good luck because it will really test your patience doing that.

Pros:
Good graphics, well done battle system, addictive, beats the hell out of the Anime.

Cons:
Wimpy AI, you need to buy two games to collect all of the Pokemon... unless you have a friend who will trade with you, bad menu.

Should you get it: You should get it, this is probably one of the best games for the Game Boy, and it can be found easily at used game stores.

Overall:

The people at Game Freak spent five years on this game , but I bet that even they did not know what a cultural phenomenon they had unleashed on the world with this game, and although it is downright archaic by today's standards, this is still an incredible game that was probably the first of its kind. Pokemon is probably THE reason to own the old Game Boy.

8

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 03/13/09

Game Release: Pokemon Red Version (US, 09/30/98)

Pokemon Gold/Silver

"The Best Game in The Series"

In 1998, Pokemon Red and Blue along with the Anime series came to the United States, and the first games became some of the best selling video games of all time. So, we all knew that Game Freak and Nintendo would release a new game soon, but I don't think any of us expected Pokemon Silver to be as good as it was. But it was good, and if you look around on here people [including myself] consider this to be the best Pokemon game.

Story: 7

The story isn't really that different. You are now in a region called Kanto, and you play as a kid in New Bark Town who gets a Pokemon, and is sent on a quest by Professor Oak and Professor Elm to find all 251 Pokemon in the Pokedex [there are 100 new Pokemon], and to beat all 8 of the Gym Leaders so he can try to beat the Elite Four and become the Pokemon Champion.

Along the way, you have to fight Team Rocket, and in this game they try to take over a Radio Station, and they attempt to make all of the Magikarp in evolve early with Radio Waves so they can be used as a weapon.

It is better than what was in Red and Blue, but Pokemon doesn't really need a deep story anyway. You are just collecting little monsters anyway.

Gameplay: 9

Most of the game still plays like Red and Blue, but almost everything was improved.

Like in all of the Pokemon games, there is an overworld you have to explore so that you can go to all of the different towns, and search all of the different areas to find new Pokemon to catch. You also have to battle the Pokemon trainers you encounter, and the Wild Pokemon that you find when you are in areas with tall grass, or if you are in a cave or the water.

Training still works the same way, you can hold 6 Pokemon at one time, and when you catch Wild Pokemon after weakening them during a battle they will go into a PC to be stored until you swap out another Pokemon for it. Battling also still has the same turn based format it had in the first game. The Pokemon can still learn four moves that they can use in battle to damage the opponent or lower their stats. You also need to learn how to use Type advantages, like how a Fire Pokemon like Cyndaquil has the advantage over a Grass type like Chikorita, or how the Water type Totodile has the advantage over Cyndaquil. And you need to learn how to teach the right moves to your Pokemon, and you need to make sure that your Pokemon's moves have enough PP [power points] to keep attacking for a while in a long battle, or that you have accurate attacks that can still do a lot of damage, and you have to use the right types of moves for the type of Pokemon to be more effective.

But the new additions make the game work even better than it did before. The main improvements are things like making the bag that you carry items in bigger, and there are categories so the items are more organized, there is now a time system where the environments look different during the day and the night, there are also different Pokemon that can be caught during different times. There are also new Pokemon types [Steel and Dark], along with Pokemon Breeding, allowing Pokemon to hold items, a bar that shows how much experience your Pokemon has during a battle, Berries, new specialized Pokemon items, the Pokegear , and some of the best Legendary Pokemon in the entire series, which are some great new features that were implemented in the games that came out after Gold.

But one of the biggest things in my opinion was how you are allowed to go back to Kanto [from Red and Blue] and defeat the other 8 Gym Leaders in that region. For the Game Boy Color, this was a huge game with features that vastly improved upon the previous game.

Challenge: 7

The AI is not very good, the Wild Pokemon are idiots, and besides the Gym Leaders and the Elite Four the Trainers you encounter are wimps compared to what a human player is capable of doing. But catching all 251 Pokemon, including the ones that can only be caught in some special events [Celebi and Mew] will take a lot of work.

Luckily the game is very addictive, so you might not notice how long it takes to do everything you can do in this game.

Controls: 7

Navigating the overworld and battles are still easy to control, and navigating the menu has been improved and it is more organized. But some things still take too long to do, like having to save when you change a Pokemon Box in the PC.

Graphics: 8

Because the Game Boy Color has color now, while the old Game Boy didn't, the graphics look much better than they did in the previous games. The areas are now vibrantly colored, and the Pokemon/Characters are not black and white anymore like they were in the first games. That is all I can really think of that needs to be said, the overworld is well designed, the graphics are colorful, and the Pokemon look good.

Sound: 9

Pokemon Silver features my favorite music from the entire series.

The overworld music is alright, but the battle music is very well done, and the music that plays when you battle Elite Four, and when you meet the main character from Red and Blue [toughest battle in the series by the way] is some of the best MDI music I have ever heard. And the sound effects still have the simple but awesome quality they had in the previous game.

Atmosphere: 8

Silver immerses you more than the previous games did because there is so much more you can do now. All of the new features make you feel more like a Pokemon Trainer, and the game is better because of it.

Multiplayer: 8

To play against someone else, you need a Link Cable and a friend who has a Game Boy and a copy of the game. You can fight with a friend, or you can trade Pokemon with them, which is necessary to complete to Pokedex because there are some Pokemon that aren't in Gold but they are in Silver.

The only thing I don't like is how you need a Link Cable. At least the DS ones have Wi-Fi which makes everything so much easier.

Replayability: 8

All of the new features, and new Pokemon to catch extend the play time a lot, and playing with a friend is still as fun and addictive as it was when this game came out over 8 years ago.

Pros:
Great graphics, great music, improved in almost every way from the previous game, addictive, great battle system, new Pokemon are good.

Cons:
Wimpy AI, takes a long time to get everything, slow menu navigation.

Should you get it:
Pokemon Silver is in my opinion, the best Pokemon game ever made. Get it now, you can probably find a copy for 10 dollars.

Overall:

Pokemon Silver improved everything from Red and Blue, and it helped make Pokemon one of the best selling game series's if all time. Even the current games have a hard time living up to how good this game was.

9

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 03/13/09

Game Release: Pokemon Silver Version (US, 10/14/00)

Perfect Dark GBA

"Imperfect Dark"

As most of the people who know me on the Forums know, I am a big Perfect Dark fan. I own the books, I own the comics, and I have all of the games. So, a short time after I bought the original Perfect Dark for the Nintendo 64, and played the hell out of it, I found out that there was a version of it on the Game Boy. Naturally considering how much I enjoyed the first game, and knowing how talented Rare is I had to get it too. But, even though there is some good stuff here, I just wound up being disappointed. So, lets light this candle.

Story: 7

The plot in Perfect Dark is like a prequel to the N64 version of the game. You start off with some training missions to show how Joanna got started at the Carrington Institute, then she is sent off on her first mission to destroy some dataDyne Cyborg facilities.

There are also some cut scenes [although it is the Game Boy Color, so its not anything like what we have in games today], and there is some voice acting.

Overall, the story was decent, and it helped set up how Joanna got to where she is.

Gameplay: 6

Perfect Dark is a stealth shooting game with an overhead view like the Metal Gear Soild game that came out on the GBC a couple months before this one. There are also a lot of different sequences where you get to go into an FPS view along with a few other vehicle segments and puzzles.

The main game is decent, but the amount of time that it can take to complete them, mixed with how frustrating some of the enemies are to kill makes Perfect Dark less fun than it could have been. The stealth mechanics also don't work very well because even when you sneak up on someone they will usually still hear you, then they will turn around and start shooting at you. The bosses are also frustratingly hard to kill.

Overall, the game is just frustrating to play. Although there are a few segments that were fun to play, the level designs aren't very good, and the enemy AI is a pain in the ass to fight against.

Challenge: 10

The original Perfect Dark was a very hard game when you weren't playing on the easy difficulties. This version is just downright sadistic.

The training levels are easy enough to get you accustomed to the game. But once the "real" missions start, you will constantly get killed. And it doesn't help that you can go a long time without finding health, and that you can only get hit 5 times while most of the enemies can only take 3 shots so you need to kill them before they can get some shots off. The bosses and some of the Vehicle/FPS segments are even tougher than the rest of the game is.

The difficulty made the game less fun than it would have been if things were toned down a little bit. And the levels also seemed to drag on more because of how much you died and how long it could take to beat them.

Controls: 6

The controls are decent in this game considering that it is on the Game Boy.

You fire with the A button, you reload with the B button, you can walk with the D-pad, and you can run by double tapping it. But the problem is that sometimes you can run when you want to walk, and like many games designed like this it can be tough to shoot the guards, and it seems like they can shoot in more directions than you can.

The lack of buttons on the Game Boy does hinder the controls on a lot of games, but the Developers did a good job with them considering that.

Graphics: 8

This is one of the few high points of the game.

The levels, although poorly designed, still look appealing to the eye. The character sprites, and the cut scenes are also well done. There are also some parts of the game, like the scenes where you have the FPS view, or when you are investigating a corpse's body for ammo or health packs are very detailed. Everything is just very colorful, and it isn't as bland as a lot of the games I have seen on the Game Boy.

For a Game Boy Color game, which is a little bit more powerful than the NES, there is a lot of detail put into the environments, the characters, and all of the other little tings in this game. But, Rare is filled with people who know how to get the most out of the console they are making a game for [the N64 version of Perfect Dark is probably the best looking game on the system] so you can't really expect any less from them.

Sound: 7

The sound is also pretty impressive for a Game Boy game.

Although there is not a lot of music [which disappointed me], the main theme from the N64 version got a decent 8-bit remix. The sounds for the guns, footsteps, grunts, and explosions are all easily discernible. There is also some voice acting, which doesn't sound too bad considering how compressed it has to be on these cartridges.

Overall, the sound is good, but the lack of music in the levels made everything too quiet. And Rare has some great composers so they probably could have come with something.

Atmosphere: 7

Although I did not like how quiet the levels were, it does make things feel more realistic. But even though there was a decent story with some impressive graphics and good sound effects in this game, the insane difficulty level caused me to be less immersed into the game because of how frustrated I got while I was playing it.

Multiplayer: No Score

There is a multiplayer mode in this game, although I never got to play it because I don't know anybody else who has this game. I heard from some of the other reviews of this game I found that it was fun, and less frustrating than the single player game, so I'll just take their word for it.

Replayability: 4

Even though there is a multiplayer mode, some fun minigames, and a bunch of extra features like unlocking "secrets", printable [using the GBC Printer] character portraits, and you can use the N64 transfer pack to unlock some of the time trial cheat codes for the N64 version if you plug this into it. There is also a built in rumble pack but it doesn't rumble enough enhance the game. Overall, there isn't much that is worth doing after you beat the game because of how frustrating it is.

Pros:
Great graphics, good sound effects, decent story, filled with extra features, compatibility with the N64 version.

Cons:
Very frustratingly high difficulty level, not much music, levels can drag on, poor level designs, rumble pack doesn't work very well.

Should you get it:
I would not recommend getting this game unless you are a big fan of the Perfect Dark series like I am. But, I can find it for 10 dollars used so if you want to try it out it isn't very expensive now anyway.

Overall:

Although there are some good features in the Game Boy Color version of Perfect Dark, the frustrating levels and the painfully high difficulty level kill the fun of what would have otherwise been a 7/10 game. I even think that how much I like the series kept the score from being lower.

5

Reviewer's Score: 5/10, Originally Posted: 06/15/09

Game Release: Perfect Dark (US, August 2000)

[Joe]

Halo PC

"Halo: Corrupted Emulation"

Before I start off, let me say this. I already have a review for Halo on the Xbox, but this is a different review for a different system, so readers don't regard this one as a cut and paste of the old one.

So lets start with the introduction... Halo is a game that everybody and their grandmother should know about. It is the story of Master Chief blowing up Aliens on some kooky ring world. And somewhere along the way, it became known as "the best game of all time" for some people. And because it was going to be on the PC as well as the Xbox, it was only natural for Microsoft and Bungie to do something after a while. So in late 2003 Gearbox Software developed a Port of the game to whet the appetites of the five people who did not already buy an Xbox for the game. Lets see how they did shall we?

Story: 7

Notice that I dropped the score in this one from the Xbox review; I had already beaten Halo with a friend a few times so the story really did not do much for me.

Well, as it starts off you are Master Chief escaping Reach after a Covenant [evil aliens] attack inside of a Ship called The Pillar of Autumn. The Covenant finds you and board the ship, so you have to escape with Cortana [the ships AI]. After you escape you are on a Ring-Planet known as Halo, which is filled with Covenant, and you have to find the surviving Marines of the UNSC.

So you go through a few levels, and you have to rescue the Captain of your squad, then you have to find a computer underground that shows you where a Control Room is... you go there and you find it. Then you go to some cache, and all hell breaks loose when the Parasites known as The Flood are unleashed, and they kill all of your buddies. So you have to go through the Ring and kill them too.

I'll stop this section now so I don't ruin the game for the few people who haven't played the game yet.

Gameplay: 6

Like I said before, you get a few guns like the Shotgun or the Needler and you get some Grenades [the Stickies and the Frags], you can also only carry two guns at one time which does make you think. Although some weapons are so good that you will only carry them and leave the other ones alone until the situation calls for it . You also have some vehicles, I don't really feel like going over them but just think of the normal vehicles in a Sci-Fi Military game and you should be fine [that is if you are one of the few people who never played the game].

The AI behaves well, your Marine allys are smart enough to fight but not stupid enough to run in front of you whenever you try to shoot something. And the enemy AI's all have their own personalities, the Grunts run around like cowards, the Elites will use cover and try to bash your skull in, the Jackals use their shields for cover and try to blast you in the head with a charged plasma bolt, and the Hunters will bash your head in if you get close enough. They are different enough to make it interesting and not boring.

There are also checkpoints where you get revived after you die, which is easier than having to trod through some of the levels over and over again. It also does not change anything so don't worry about this being "BioShock" respawning.

The vehicles work good enough in here. Some of them also let you ride on with other people, like the Warthog which lets a person get in the side seat [and fire their gun], and someone can go in the back and fire a Chaingun.

Now onto the things that irked me. This game, even though it was first made in 2001 runs ungodly slow on some computers. This is a true story, I have "Star Wars: Republic Commando, and I can get it to run with every thing turned on full with my computer with little to no slowdown, but in Halo I need to turn the Graphics down a lot on some levels to make it run at a speed that does not feel like walking through molasses. It is so frustrating to play a game where you need to turn down things to make the game run at a good speed, and even that does not help sometimes. This game was so badly coded that a lot of Computers will go really slow. And the same problem I had before, the last half of the game had levels that were like carbon copies of the first half. And some of them [I'm looking at you Library and 343 Guilty Spark!] were so confusing and you kept getting lost because everything looked the same.

If it wasn't for that, I would of given this a good friggin score.

Challenge: 8

Halo does offer a good challenge to you, the AI is good enough to make you think even on the normal difficulty, and the harder modes will make you cry if you're not prepared to have to go through a bunch of revivals just to get past one spot of the game. But the biggest pain in the *** is when the game slows down, that ups the challenge so much when you are trying to blow up some Covenant baddie and the game goes down to 10 FPS while it runs up to you and bashes your skull in. Playing the game on Legendary will make you cry, the lag will make you pray. It's simple as that.

Controls: 6

This is what happens when you port Console games... Master Chief feels like he moves a lot slower than he did on the Xbox, and although the WASD setup was used it does not feel right trying to use it when I play Halo. But you can change the mapping so you should experiment with that and see if you can find something that works for you.

Graphics: 6

I swear to god, there is no difference between the graphics on here, and on the Xbox one. It even looks worse in some spots for me.

Although some things like the Aliens, the Marines, the Vehicles and the levels look good, there is no change at all that is really noticeable. You still do have the blood stains that spurt out whenever anything gets shot [and a few different colors for the Aliens], you can still see a nice glint off of the metal for your Armor, and the Vehicles. Don't get me wrong it does look good, but it looked good in 2001, this game came out in 2003, the standards are different and Gearbox could of at least made it look better.

And like I said above, horrible slowdown corrupts this game, you will need to turn down a lot of stuff if your Computer was not up to date enough to run this game. And remember, if your Computer is weak, you will lose A LOT of the special stuff just to make it run, no more blood, no more bullet holes, no more marks on the ice from crashing a banshee into it. Nothing. Also, all of the textures will go down to PS1 level.

Sound: 10

At least something did not get mutilated in the Port. Everything still sounds as good as it did on the Xbox.

There is still great voice work, and most of the levels are filled with comments from the Marines and the Aliens that you will encounter, you get to hear objectives being told to you. But I am glad that everything that is said sounds how it should.

And the effects are still great, from the burst of fire from the muzzle of an Assault Rifle to the clanking of a Hunter's footsteps charging at you from across the room.

But the best part like I said before is the Music. Halo still has that Epic sounding orchestral music which really sets up the mood for wherever you are. Kudos to Bungie for the great job they did with the soundtrack.

Atmosphere: 6

Like I said before, everything does have its own way of drawing you in. But the slowdown sucks you right back out, how immersive is it when you are playing through a level blowing away Covenants when suddenly the game becomes jerky as hell, I know that I mega-loathe that. But other than that you do feel like you're on that Ring killing aliens.

Multiplayer: 4

I was really expecting more from this, Halo finally having online Multiplayer; count me in! But everything is so bloody laggy that it feels like the coders did this in a couple hours after a weekend of binge drinking. Everything moves so slowly that it feels like Dantooine on "Star Wars: Knights of The Old Republic", and sometimes your weapons get really wonky. Anyone who has read Yoh_of_Izumo's review, he hit the nail on the head, the Sniper Rifle can fire, hit someone and then they will die 15 seconds later. A few times, I have fired a weapon at an enemy and the bullets did nothing, sometimes it does not fire and I find out that I was shot in the head by a sniper a few seconds ago.

The only thing that kept me from tanking this score was the Mods which let you play around with the game, I remember playing a game with eight Banshees, Ghosts, Warthogs and Tanks and it was so freaking fun... although so laggy. There is also a little bonus for the Multiplayer levels, two new weapons, you can use a Flamethrower, and the Hunter cannon in Multiplayer on Halo now, there is also a Warthog with a Rocker Launcher on the back of it instead of a machine gun.

So, if you decide to play Halo online, please find a good connection because if you don't it makes you want to kill yourself, and ignore all of the annoying people typing the most idiotic things in the chat room during the game.

Replayability: 5

You can keep going to finish every level on all four difficulties [hard as hell!], or you can keep playing on the Multiplayer. But I would recommend replaying the game on the Xbox instead because it is much better there.

Pros:

Its Halo on the computer, sound is still good, if you can get everything working right its almost as good as the Xbox version.

Cons:

Botched port, terrible multiplayer coding, need to turn some things down if your PC won't handle it, laaaaaaaaggggggggggg!

Should you get it:

If you really want Halo for the PC, or you don't have an Xbox [that's why I have it], then buy it. If not, then don't even bother.

Overall:

Even though there was a lot of promise in putting Halo on the Computer, Gearbox dropped the ball and screwed up really bad. Halo is a great game but this laggy, glitch filled mess does not do it justice.

6

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 10/01/07, Updated 10/08/07

Game Release: Halo: Combat Evolved (US, 09/30/03)

Halo

"A Game That is Massively Overrated... But is Still Damn Good."

As I write this review, it is 3:25 PM, on September 25th 2007. Today is the release of Halo 3 so I have decided to write a review for Halo, hope ya dig it.

First off, Halo when it came out was the reason to buy an Xbox when it came out. This game literally sold Xboxes and quickly became known as the best game of the Xbox launch, and one of the best shooters of all time. This game also made Bungie the household name that they are today. But that is not all without criticism. The way I see it there are 3 different factions here, the people who think Halo is the best game of all time, the people who hate it with a vitriolic passion, and the people who simply think it's a good game. I am the third one, so lets see what this game is about [like anyone doesn't know]

Story: 9

The first time I played Halo, I thought that it would have just been a standard FPS story where you were killing anything that gets in your way, but I was wrong. The story for Halo is deeper than it looks. You start off as Master Chief in stasis as the Covenant [the evil aliens in this game] tries to invade the ship. You have to escape with Cortana [to UNSC's AI] and you land on the Ring known as Halo.

You soon discover that something is hidden on the planet, but soon it is unleashed by the Covenant. Parasites known as "The Flood" that infect living beings are found, and I'll let you discover the rest for yourself.

Let me just say this for the end of this section, some people don't really like the Story of Halo but it is quite good, although it really slowed down around the middle. But you really should check out the Books, they really advance the story.

Gameplay: 7

Before I start this section let me say this, much like with BioShock I really enjoyed this game, but there were some flaws in the Gameplay that kept me from fully enjoying the game.

Like a standard FPS you are given some guns, as a nice twist to the normal way of playing you can only carry two weapons at one time [Perfect Dark or Doom and all the stuff you could have in there] which does make you think about what you will carry. But because of the horrible balancing on some guns [Shotgun is to powerful] you will only carry certain weapons at times and only drop them when you need to. You also have Grenades, the normal Frag Grenades, and the Covenant sticky Plasma Grenades [ever tried to throw one of those on an Elite or a Banshee and just watch the fun, I have.], which are both useful at times. You can throw the Plasma's onto an enemy and they might run into a group of enemies and blow them up [or run at you], and you can bounce Frag's off of objects and into some group of enemies.

The AI is also very good. Your Marine ally's are smart enough to fight back, but not dumb enough to slow you down too much. The Covenant also fight well, especially the Elites, who will charge at you and bash you with their gun, or cloak and stab you with an energy sword, or wing Grenades at you, and so on. All of the AI's are smart enough to use cover, and run around when they need to which is nice because I was used to Goldeneye AI that stood there and let you plug them with a bullet to the brain.

One thing that I should mention is that in the levels there are "Checkpoints" where the game saves, you will be revived there if you die, and you can quit the game and continue from that spot. Luckily it does not ruin the gameplay, it just puts you back how you were when you saved the game, and nothing is changed. This was implemented very well and it does make some levels easier where you can just keep reviving until you kill everything instead of having to start over, very helpful on Legendary mode.

Now onto the major flaws for me, while some Levels were great, around the middle it began getting really repetitive. At that time the story seemed to slow down to me while you were running around killing the Flood and blowing stuff up while in the beginning it felt much more epic like a war game. Also, several of the levels looked like mere copies of the old levels after the Flood was unleashed. It felt like they got lazy at the end of the game and that disappointed me. Next, the vehicles, while some were fun [the Ghosts] a couple of them controlled really bad. The Warthog was the biggest example for me, it just skidded around too much and it got really frustrating to control some of the vehicles.

Now, while those things may not seem like much to you, it did bother me. But all that really matters is that there is a lot of good in Halo's gameplay.

Challenge: 7

The AI in Halo is good, and some of the levels will make you think hard enough to give you a challenge. But other than that there is nothing really hard to do unless you have the patience to keep playing to beat all four modes of the game. But the hardest part of Halo is keeping your sanity on some of the levels, which look exactly the same [looking at you Library!]

Controls: 8

The Xbox gamepad is very well made for FPS games, and you were able to do a lot. You had some extras like the lights on your guns that you could control. And you were able to easily control Master Chief. Although I do have two complaints, jumping feels awkward sometimes, and like I said above some of the Vehicles control really bad.

Graphics: 9

The first time I played Halo, I was amazed by it. Bungie really knew how to make the Xbox's hardware sing and you could see it in some of the little things they put in there. You could see the blood spurt out of the people you shot [also, a lot of things had different colored blood]; you could see bullet holes in the walls [and the spent bullets lying on the ground], the Aliens looked creepy enough [except for the Grunts... which were just funny to look at], and the Marines looked like Marines.

The levels also have great design, the first one did not do much for me, but when I landed on the Ring which was some kind of Jungle where I was looked gorgeous and it looked like the developers spent a lot of time making great looking levels for the game.

One more thing that I liked, the ice [and some other things] will get affected up when you drive a Warthog or something else over them. On the ice you can see the tire tracks in the Ice breaking it up, or you can fly a Banshee into it and see the impact point. That was impressive for 2001.

Sound: 10

Halo sounds amazing. Throughout the game there is some excellent voice work that gives personality to the characters, and the aliens your killing [the Flood sounds really creepy, Grunts sound wimpy, the Hunters sound like a Bull when they rush at you, etc...].

But the effects are the best part, the guns sound great as you fire them, you can hear the sound of Warthog tires grinding up the dirt or the ice that you are traversing. And the Music really sets up the mood for the level you are in. The score sounds really epic, and helps you get the feel for everything.

I'll just close this thing up simply, look at the 10 I gave the sound, that's no lie it really did sound that good when I played.

Atmosphere: 9

Everything here is set up really well, the sound can draw you in and the voices sometimes make you feel like you're part of a team invading an alien planet. And when you're alone you really do feel alone [besides Cortana giving you orders]. But the above problem I had with the levels applies here, sometimes I felt lost in the levels, and I got confused by how some of them looked so similar. It really detracts from the feeling sometimes when you are going through another similar room [like in the level's "Guilty Spark" and "The Library"] and you start wondering, "when the hell am I going to get there!". Other than that Halo does a good job at keeping you immersed.

Multiplayer: 6

This is a low score, but I do have a good reason. While some games did a lot for Multiplayer [like Perfect Dark], Halo did not seem to do very much. Although it was going to be on Xbox Live, that wasn't finished in time, so it wasn't implemented. There are some good levels like Blood Gulch, but all Halo feels like is playing Split Screen Goldeneye games. Although you can play with 16 players, that does require too much work to be worth doing in my mind.

Replayability: 7

You can keep going to beat the four difficulty modes [that is tough], and you can play Multiplayer with 16 people but otherwise there isn't much to do after you finish the game.

Pros:

The game to buy for Xbox, great graphics and sound, good story, great AI.

Cons:

Overhyped, some of the fan boys are crazy, lackluster multiplayer, repetitive levels after the middle, some weapons are unbalanced.

Should you get it:

Even though Halo is overrated, if you own the old Xbox [or a 360], you should pick this game up because it is totally worth it.

Overall:

Halo, although an overrated and repetitive [at times] game is still very fun and is one of the best FPS games I have played.

8

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 09/26/07, Updated 10/08/07

Game Release: Halo: Combat Evolved (US, 11/14/01)

Halo 2

""It’s not a new plan. But we know it’ll work.""

Ah, Halo 2. After the release of the first game, and all of the people who bought an Xbox just for that game, Bungie became a household name. But the question was this: could they do it again? I have said before that I think the first game is overrated [its a great game, but not the gift from god everyone thinks it is], but this one just did not seem like enough was really done to make it a great game. Although the Multiplayer mode is great [and one of the best on Xbox 1], the Campaign was terrible in some spots. So, lets light this candle.

Story: 8

The story for Halo 2 seems like it was much deeper than the first game, and it takes place almost immediately after the first ring is obliterated.

Master Chief is back at Earth on one of the space stations around it with Sergeant Johnson [don't ask how he got back... its classified], and suddenly a small Covie fleet attacks you, and you have to fight your way back onto to earth to kill more of these ugly things. You are then sent to another Halo Ring while you chase down the Prophet of Regret [one of the Covenant leaders].

You also get to play as the Arbiter, one of the leaders of the Elites is being punished for being unable to stop Chief for destroying the first Halo, instead of being put to death he is given the role of killing a "heretic" who is saying that the Prophets are wrong and that the great journey [firing Halo's Rings] will just kill everything.

There is also a Covenant Civil War when the Brutes take over the Elites role, and the Flood is still alive and devouring people.

Have fun.

Gameplay: 7

Like the previous game, you are just going through missions using whatever the hell you can find to bash your enemy's skull in. There are even more weapons now, but I found the human weapons to be almost useless on the higher difficulty levels, unless I was fighting the flood because that Plasma rifle would not hurt them at all [and sadly that was the only damn thing I could find on most of the Flood levels that had any ammo in it]. You are also capable of dual wielding guns now, I haven't really tried this much but I heard that the Needler and the Plasma Rifle are a good combo for it, and the only real drawbacks are worse accuracy, and being unable to use the butt of your gun to whack someone, or use grenades, but the higher rate of projectiles digging into the aliens makes up for it enough.

You are also playing as two characters, the Master Chief, and the Arbiter. The only differences between them are that Master Chief has a flashlight, and the Arbiter has a 5 second cloak. Basically, Master Chief is going through some levels with the Marines [if any are available] and killing bad guys, and the Arbiter does the same thing with some of the Covenant so its not too much of a difference.

There is also a new HUD, the Shield has been moved above the radar [stupid decision in my mind], and there is no health bar but now it is just a shield, which recharges much faster than in the first game.

The enemy AI is also improved, for example the Hunters will now be tougher to beat because that they aren't just shooting their cannons and trying to charge at you with their big metal thingies now. They do try whacking behind them now, and it does seem like they are smarter [and their cannon now fires a stream instead of a big ball], your allies can also hold their own but they still need to be babysat sometimes to keep themselves from dying, and I have seen them get stuck on a wall until you help them out.

As for the levels, there are still checkpoints that save at a certain point of the level [good in the tougher levels because you will die a lot], my only problem is that the game freezes for a second to save the game... it takes you out of the moment. As for using the Chief and the Arbiter, the levels with the Arbiter seemed really long and monotonous sometimes, I found myself saying "Oh hurry up and end damn it!" [and several other expletives in the level "Quarantine Zone"], I also hated The Flood while using the arbiter because his levels mainly had Covenant weapons, and those suck against the Flood [which seems like it got much tougher to kill now], I was also annoyed by how boring the Brutes were to fight, because all they did was charge at you and start punching you. There is also another new brood in the Covenant fleet, the Drones, which are just annoying bugs that fly around and annoy you. At least in Halo: Comabat Evolved, some of the annoying enemies like The Flood were at least entertaining to fight, but in Halo 2 it seems like they just made them even more of a pain in the ass.

Finally, for the levels, there are 14 of them but it seems like they went by really fast, because on my first play through I beat this game in around the same amount of time I beat Halo 3. Once I checked and I think I was on level 9]. Also, I played this game on my 360, and there was some lag in a few points of the game, I am not sure if this was in the game when you play it on Xbox 1 so I won't detract anything for it.

Challenge: 7

Halo 2 isn't too much more difficult than Halo: CE, the only real change is getting used to some of the nerfed weapons. And, as I said above some of the enemies like The Flood became even more of a pain in the ass. Much like the first game, the biggest challenge is staying sane in some of the levels, because they replaced the repetitiveness from the first game with just making the levels annoying to do.

Controls: 8

Things aren't really changed much from the first game, you can customize some things and everything moves fluidly enough in my mind.

Graphics: 9

Say what you want about Halo, but you gotta admit that these games do look gorgeous. Halo 2 has a very high amount of advanced texture mapping which makes this game almost look as good as a launch game for the 360, everything looks a lot better in Halo 2 than in Halo: CE, except for the Flood, they don't look like popcorn anymore, but they look too veiny.

You still get a pretty spurt of blood from shooting the bad guys, and now you are also capable of blowing up vehicles in more detail than the first game, you can blow off chunks of the Ghosts and Banshees by hitting them with something hard enough [Tank missiles were the most fun for me].

The only problem I had is that there is a popup issue with some of the textures, in some Cinematic scenes the textures takes a second to appear, the same thing also happened with a lot of things in the Campaign.

Sound: 10

Halo games also have incredible sound, the score [even though a lot of the songs were in the first game] is really good, the weapons sound like weapons should, and the chatter you hear from the Marines, and the Covies is entertaining, the voice over work is also very well done and it seems much more professional than the first game.

Atmosphere: 8

I have been mentioning several things about how the game looks and sounds in the above sections, and that does help with the atmosphere. And most of the levels do a great job depicting what they need to show to immerse you. its just that as I said above, some levels won't really immerse you, they will just annoy you.

Mulitplayer: 8

First off, I need to admit that I haven't spent much time on the Multiplayer mode, infact I have played multiplayer a couple times with a friend at his house before I got my 360, and I have only played a couple rounds on the Multiplayer mode. But I fully intend to update this once I get a reliable Modem to play on Live with.

[people who know me will know this, I have Dial-Up, and I have to bring my 360 to a neighbors house to use their connection.]

You can do Co-Op, death match, team death match, capture the flag, assault [attacking and defending a base], and many other modes you can play online. There are not as many people playing this one online now, but hopefully you can find some people who play on the old Xbox to play against. The online service is great, and the only problem is when the little kids start cursing at you, and when you get tea-bagged.

Replayability: 8

Halo 2 is more playable than the first game, even though the Campaign is worse the Multiplayer lasted until everyone moved on to Halo 3.

Pros:
Good AI, good story, great graphics and sound, great Multiplayer.

Cons:
Human weapons suck, The Flood and The Brutes, weak Campaign.

Should you get it:

If you just like Halo for the Multiplayer, get Halo 3 because everyone is playing that now, but if you like Halo games then go ahead and get it because even though there are some problems with the Campaign the story is good enough.

Overall:

Halo 2 was not as good as the first game, and the only thing it does better is the Multiplayer, but it is still a fun game that any Halo fan should have in their collection.

7

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 02/04/08, Updated 02/06/08

Game Release: Halo 2 (US, 11/09/04)

Halo 3

""Send me out... with a bang...""

As some of you may know, I have said that the Halo Series published by the [now household name] company; Bungie, is not the gift from god it is considered to be, nor is it a crappy game, it was just a fun game. But Halo 3 changed my views on the series, this IS an incredible game, this IS the best one in the series, and it is just an all around incredible game that was a great conclusion to the trilogy. So, as I always say, lets light this candle.

Story: 9

Halo 3 takes place almost immediately after the previous game, and the comic Halo: Uprising. The Chief lands in Africa, and the Arbiter along with the rest of the Elites have allied with the UNSC after the civil war they were having with the rest of the Covenant.

Your goal is to kick the ass of the Prophet; Truth, and stop him from firing the Halo Rings, which were primed to fire after the emergency shutdown of a previous ring by the Arbiter, Sergeant Major Johnson, and Commander Keyes during Halo 2 [and the death of the Brute leader Tartarus].

Cortana has also been imprisoned by The Gravemind, the leader of The Flood , and the Flood returns, they also wind up on Earth.

Finally, you have found The Ark, and you need to shut down the Halo Rings.

Have fun, everything is done very well, and Halo 3 is certainly the most epic game in the trilogy [story wise]. And remember, if there were any questions they will be answered here.

Gameplay: 8

As always in Halo Games, you are traversing Earth, and these Forerunner worlds, trying to kick the ass of The Flood and the Prophet Truth.

The weapons you were given seemed like they were balanced much more now, I usually found myself using the Assault Rifle, and the Brute Spiker as my weapons of choice, and it seems like a lot of the weapons are much more effective against The Flood now. The Plasma Rifle quickly chopped down Floddies in Halo 3 while in Halo 2 it would barley wound them, and Meleeing Flood Combat Forms can now break them apart faster [yes, in this game Flood Combat Forms can completely fall apart] which makes them much less of a pain to fight , and sometimes I did not even waste my ammo on them, I would just bash them with the Spiker. There are also two new Grenades, the Spike Grenade which is a Brute weapon that digs into something and explodes, filling what it strikes with spikes, and there is a Fire Grenade which will light whatever it hits on fire [very entertaining to watch]. Finally, there are several items you can pick up, you can get a grav lift [self explanatory], a bubble shield , a regenerator [heals you], and energy drain [hurts them]. These all add a new element to the combat in Halo.

Another new thing is the occasional interruption vision from Cortana while she is trapped on High Charity; you also get some from the Gravemind after he comes out. I found these to be very annoying because it took you out of the action, and it stopped the game while you were listening to their babbling. They could of at least made it like a normal communication.

The AI is also improved; the Brutes work very well in a pack, as do all of the other enemies that you will fight against. I was pleased that the Wizard finally provided the Brutes with a brain, instead of being big stupid apes that do nothing but charge at you and pummel you until you die, they act like a more barbaric version of the Elites. Except for the Drones, who still suck... a lot. And your allies seem a little bit smarter now, although they still can get stuck on a wall, and they can still drive off a ******* cliff. But all you have to do is play Halo: CE to see just how much the AI has advanced in this game.

Finally, I'm going to talk about the levels the levels. I was pleased the most by what was provided in this game out of the trilogy, the levels were mostly well paced and fun, and you had to use some strategy to play. My only gripe is much like "The Library" of Halo: Combat Evolved, and the "Quarantine Zone" of Halo 2, there just had to be one sucky level in Halo 3. That level was "Cortana", which had you in the now fully Flood infested former Covenant holy city; High Charity, which was monotonous, and everything looked so similar that I got lost a few times. The other pain was the constant assault from Floddies, luckily they are now more fun to fight, or I would of thrown my controller through my TV. Also, there are 8 levels, but they are short as hell so this will be a quickly beaten game.

Challenge: 8

Halo 3 is a little bit tougher than the other two games, mainly because the AI has improved and will use more advanced tactics on you. Also, on higher difficulty levels you should be thankful that there are checkpoints or you would never beat this game.

Controls: 8

The controls have been changed around a little bit for the 360 controller, but if you like how Halo 1 and 2 play on the 360 controller you can use that as well. Personally I like the new one enough to use that. Bungie gave us a few different schemes to play around with. The game itself does control very well, and you should be pleased by how it works, it just took me a while to get used to reloading with the shoulder buttons.

Graphics: 8

Halo 3 does not have that jaw dropping graphics engine that other 360 games like Gears of War have, but it still does look damn impressive. The levels have excellent designs, and all of the people like Master Chief and the Arbiter, along with those Covies and The Flood look great [look at how the skin on Flood Combat Forms throbs like a beating heart]. And most of the textures look incredible; the water is also very realistic. There is also an amazingly long draw distance of 12 miles.

The pop-up issue from Halo 2 has also been fixed, the physics engine is very realistic [except for when a melee attack will send a Jackal flying 100 feet], and the destructible vehicles also look even more realistic.

The only problem I had was that some of the humans have faces that look like they are still using Halo 2's engine. But comparing it to the first Halo really makes you think of how much the Graphics have evolved.

Sound: 10

Again, Bungie has proved their talents with sound quality. The score for this game is just how I like em... epic as hell, but that is not a real suprise because Halo games have always had a great soundtrack. There is also plenty of voice over work to entertain you, sadly some people like David Cross [from the cult classic "Arrested Development", and HBO's "Mr. Show"] were not in this game, but we got some cameos from "Red Vs Blue's" talented team of actors, and John DiMaggio [Bender from "Futurama"] is also a Brute Chieftain. The rest of the Aliens also sound excellent.

The weapons, also sound almost exactly how they should, the "almost" is directed at how weak the Assault Rifle sounds now. But the rest of it sounds great; I especially love the sound that the new Plasma Grenade has.

Atmosphere: 8

Several things I have mentioned above contribute to the excellent atmosphere, the engrossing story, the smart AI, the gorgeous levels. Sadly the cryptic visions from Cortana detracted a point, because they just annoyed me.

Multiplayer: 8

You can play online in several different modes in the normal multiplayer levels, or you could go online through the Campaign [or split-screen for both of these] with a couple of your buddies. There is also a matchmaking service that puts you against people according to your skill level which appears next to your overall ranking.

You can customize you appearance from a selection of Armor from either the Spartans, or the Elites that is unlocked in the campaign, or the multiplayer mode through achievements, or multiplayer awards. You can also create an emblem, and give your guy a color scheme.

I have spent most of my time playing on the Team Slayer mode, which is basically, Team Deathmatch. I have not tried the other modes but this is plenty for me because there is more than enough fast paced fragging in that mode for me to be entertained. And even though I am nowhere near the best player at this game , I still have a lot of fun online in this game.

There are only 3 big problems I have experienced: First is the lag that makes everything run really slow. Next up are the cowardly teammates who quit the game and leave you to fight against a superior team without any reinforcement. And third is winding up on a team of newer people, against people who have way more experience than you, and will proceed to slaughter your team..

Believe me, all 3 of these things can happen, but it mostly depends on how lucky you are. For me, the unbalanced team one happens the most, and my team gets their ass handed to them...

I do have one piece of advice, if you find people you like playing with add them to your friends list and play with them any time you can. Anything is better than the immature 10-year-old twit who decides to tea-bag your corpse. And if you use the Mic, make sure it is in a team mode where you're playing with your buddies, because potty mouthed little kids, and bigots is really annoying.

Other than that, while Perfect Dark set the standard for split screen FPS Multiplayer, Halo 3 set the standard for online FPS Multiplayer, end of story.

Replayability: 10

Insert my comments on the Multiplayer section here, and you have the reason I gave this part a 10.

Pros:
Great AI, great story, great sound, epic Soundtrack, great graphics, epic score, The Flood is more fun to fight, incredible Multiplayer, brilliant conclusion to the Halo Trilogy.

Cons:
Drones, tea-bagging/cussing 10-year-old kids, unbalance of teams in multiplayer, the Level "Cortana", the visions that will stop the game in the Campaign.

Should you get it:

Buy Halo 3 now, you will not regret it. Just make sure you have Xbox Live GOLD.

Overall:

Halo 3 was an excellent conclusion to this trilogy, and the best of the three games. Sure, the campaign was short as hell, but the incredible multiplayer more than made up for it.

8

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 02/11/08, Updated 06/08/09

Game Release: Halo 3 (US, 09/25/07)

BioShock

"Would you kindly read this review?"

BioShock is a very well received game made by 2K Games about a man who got stuck in a underwater paradise turned into a hellhole. It is also one of the games that shows just what the 360 can really do. Lets light this candle.

Story: 9

I do not really want to reveal too much, so I will be careful in how I do this.

BioShock takes place during the 1960's in an underwater city called Rapture. And Rapture was created in 1949 by a man named Andrew Ryan as a place where the great would be free to create whatever they want, without the bounds of morality, and the whiny Government. Although this is a good enough idea on its own, so many great advances could be made if people were free to create, but like all good things the wrong people wind up being there and they screw it all up. Soon after a law was passed that banned contact with the outside world, crime increased and a war began with the followers of Andrew Ryan, and Frank Fontaine which ended with Fontaine being killed and a new leader named Atlas taking control. And soon, the denizens of Rapture went insane from all of the Plasmids they had taken, and Ryan lost all of his old ideals during the war.

Back to the game... you are on a plane, which crashes near a Lighthouse the leads to Rapture. After arriving in Rapture you find that what was once a utopia where people would be free to create without being oppressed has been turned into a desolate underwater hellhole that seems like it is about to fall apart.

You then meet Atlas, and he gives you a mission to help him rescue his family. And Andrew Ryan who believes you are a Government Agent that was sent to kill him uses his mind control techniques on the Splicers [the citizens who went nuts] to try and have them kill you.

After that, a lot of stuff happens but I'm gonna leave the rest of it out of this review so you can experience it for yourself. I will say that BioShock is one of the few games I have played which had a deeply immersive movie like story that captivated me for almost the entire time I spent playing it.

BioShock has a smart, provocative story that really makes you think, and it is also one of the few games I have seen that was able to pull off a morality based storyline. And there are also a lot of influences from people like Ayn Rand

Gameplay: 7 [9 without the problem]

With BioShock, I felt that the Gameplay was a little mixed for my tastes. On the positive note, I liked all of the RPG customization that was in the game. The Plazmids and the Tonics and all of the extra powers they could give you, and all of the items you could collect. I liked some of the little things like being able to make Drones turn onto your side by hacking them [after knocking them out with the electricity Plazmid]. I liked how you could spend points [called ADAM and EVE] to make yourself more powerful, and all of the vending machines where you could upgrade your weapons, or buy new gear, Plazmids, and food.

I also felt that the AI in the game was brilliant, the Splicers, Little Sisters, Big Daddies and the Drones/Turrets were fun enough to fight, as were all of the different little environmental effects that could also be used while fighting, such as shocking a Splicer in the water with the Electricity Plazmid to instantly kill them. The combat itself felt great, and this is truly what next gen is about.

But now onto the burning negatives, when you die, you are revived at half health in a revival chamber near the spot you were in, and nothing is done to whatever you were fighting. Like the other reviewer who gave this a 5 I felt that this was just too bad considering how well this game was made, and it definitely knocked out a few points. If you are fighting something tough, and you almost have it dead when you die, you can just go back in there and finish it off when you still have plenty of health. That is just too much of a disappointment for me. But if that is not counted, then this game does have GoTY quality Gameplay. But you really do need to look past these things to enjoy the game as it was intended to be.

Challenge: 6

While the main game itself is a decent challenge, and it will take some time to get all of the endings going through the different paths you can take. The respawn really hurts the game, it is like in Halo where if you get killed you are brought back to the past save point, almost exactly how you were before, and although that one was done well with Halo, in BioShock you are just brought back to life with half your health in the closest revival tube near you died. Even a sucky player can beat the game if they just keep doing that. And that is really sad, because a game as great as this one should not be this easy to beat.

Controls: 8

I don't really want to go over the controls too much, but if anyone knows FPS games on the 360, they should get used to this pretty fast. Simply put, BioShock offers a very simple control setup that is very tight and easy to get used to. You should not be screwing up very easily on this game.

Graphics: 9

If anyone wants to know why you should buy a Next Gen game for Graphics, BioShock is that game. Everything is so beautiful in here if you have the right TV that it is mind-boggling. The thing that impressed me the most is the water, in fact Ken Levine [one of the people working on the game] said "We've hired a water programmer and water artist, just for this game, and they're kicking ass and you've never seen water like this." Well you know what, he was not selling you a fools gold, even the advertisement that they had on TV makes you think that it is real life. Hell some of the Plazmids can even disfigure you, the fact that the Developers even bothered to do that just shows you how much work went into the game.

The only problem I have seen in the graphics is that sometimes the textures did not load right away, almost exactly like the big problem Halo 2 and several other graphical powerhouses on the 360 have shown. But when I look at how great everything looks otherwise, I can forgive it.

Sound: 10

This is another example of just how much is being done with the 360. And if you have a good sound system, you should be impressed. The music, the voice work, the guns, all of the effects, they will blow you away. You can even hear the direction things are coming from, and to me that is something special. You can really tell just how much effort was put into creating all of the beautiful sound for this game. And really what else do I need to say; I summed it all up very simply.

But words cannot sum up the brilliance of the sound; you have to really experience it to understand it. All you need to know is that BioShock has an amazing soundtrack filled with atmospheric scratchy sounding 60's music, and creepy singing. There is also some of the best voiceover work I have ever heard in a game, and some of the best sound effects I have heard in a 360 game.

Atmosphere: 9

BioShock is one of those games that you can really get immersed into. Everything just feels so real it is easy to get lost in all of it. Simply put, you really feel like you are in Rapture surrounded by all of these infected freaks. BioShock really gets you into its story, and you do start wondering what in the hell happened to Rapture. BioShock provides movie-like levels of immersion, and I am glad it did because I like games which can give you a real story.

BioShock is like a good book, you just want to find out what happens next.

Replayability: 6

The game is only around 10 hours, and there is no Multiplayer so that will suck for some people. But there are multiple endings that require you to play differently to get them [since BioShock is very open ended], and well it is just an awesome game that should captivate you enough to replay it.

Pros:
The Sound, Graphics, immersive, INCREDIBLE writing, open ended story, proves that Video Games are an art form.

Cons:
Short, lack of Multiplayer [mainly for the hardcore FPSers], cheap ass respawn.

Should you get it:

Hell yes you should, even with one big flaw BioShock is a brilliant game. And this is coming from one of the "Nintendo Fan Boys" [even though I am Wii-360] who wanted Metroid Prime 3 more than this game, but that does not mean that it is not a good game. BioShock is one of the best games of 2007 that set new standards for storytelling. You really should get it if you have a 360, or a PC that can handle it.

Overall:

BioShock is an excellent game, and will be a contender for Game of The Year. There is a brilliant atmosphere and the Graphics, Sound, AI are top notch, and the Story is also very captivating, it is one of the best I have ever seen in a video game. The only "big" flaw was the cheap respawn [if we could use decimals in these Reviews, I would of given this game an 8.5] feature that was in the game... at least Halo used checkpoints instead of that. Just remember, although there is one part that really annoyed me, this is still a great game that is well worth the purchase.

Honestly, anyone with an Xbox, and anyone who likes a good captivating story should check this game out.

9

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 08/27/07, Updated 09/01/08

Game Release: BioShock (US, 08/21/07)

Eat Lead: The Return of Matt Hazard

""Why do you guys do that? How much time do players waste clicking past stupid ellipses?""

Eat Lead: The Return of Matt Hazard is a Parody game made by Vicious Cycle that is based on action games like Duke Nukem, and is filled with satire of the gaming industry. Now, I was hoping that this would have been a great game, but it turned out to be a decent game with some great satire that made it more than the forgettable 3rd Person shooter it would have been otherwise. So, lets light this candle.

Story: 8

As I said before, Eat Lead is a parody of action games and their one liner spouting protagonists [Duke Nukem who is "here to kick ass and chew bubblegum, and I'm all out of bubblegum"], along with all of the cliches from the gaming industry.

The main plot is that Matt Hazard is basically an alternate universes version of Duke Nukem, in 1983 he was in a game called The Adventures of Matt in Hazard Land which was very bloody and very popular, and then he just went on to star in a lot of great games, and the company that his games were made for [Marathon Gaming] signed him to a lifetime game publishing deal. Then, Matt wanted to branch out, so in the mid 90's he wound up turning into what Nintendo has done to Mario; whoring his character out into every type of game genre imaginable, instead of sticking with the types of games the franchise was known for that everyone loved. All of those games flopped, and people stopped caring about Matt.

Then, the new owner of Marathon [now Marathon Megasoft] Wallace Wellesley offered to give Matt his comeback in the company's first Next-Gen game.

So, the game started, but at the end of the first level some guy named Sting Sniperscope who was a parody of Arnold Schwarzenegger came to kill him, but then someone who called themselves QA hacked into the game, and paused it, then they told Matt that the "saves were erased" so he would die if he was killed in the game. Then you find out that Wally planned to have Matt killed and replaced, because he is still butt-hurt about the Matt Hazard games being the only ones that were too hard for him to beat when he was a kid.

So, Matt now has to beat the game so he can get out of it.

Overall, the story is good, the made up history for Matt Hazard was pretty entertaining. And I enjoyed most of the scenes with Matt, Wally was decent but I thought that the parts with Matt were better. And there were some great parody's of the cliched gaming levels, Space Marines, overblown boss speeches, load times, and my two favorites were the Wolfenstien 3D's Nazi soldiers, and the entire parody of Cloud Strife from Final Fantasy VII near the end of the game [the quote in my tagline is from the Cloud parody] which required Matt to press a button on the screen to go through all of the Cloud parody's text boxes.

Although there were a few boring parodies, overall Eat Lead had a decent story, and the parodies of several other video games were very entertaining.

Gameplay: 7

Although the game was meant to be satire, that does not excuse some of the more noticeable flaws of the game.

Eat Lead is basically one of the 3rd Person Shooter Gears of War clones that have become more prevalent lately. And the game is essentially a linear trek through all of the levels as you, in the words of one of the mission objectives, "shoot everything that moves".

While the combat is satisfying, and the cover mode is easy to use, and it is very easy to pop in and out of cover, the biggest problem with the game is that the AI is very stupid, although it is very easy to die if you get out of cover for too long. And the enemies which are "hacked" into the game results in a very frustrating spawn pattern where an enemy can spawn directly behind you and kill you without you having any idea what happened. And there were a few boss battles that were just a pain in the ass to do, like the Tentacle Monster battle near the middle of the game.

Other than that, there are no major flaws. The guns are effective, although they look wimpy compared to the giant Chain Guns on the cover of the game. You can use Fire and Ice powerups that recharge as you kill more people, there are Invulnerability and Damage Increasing powerups you can pick up, and there is destructible cover [which De-Rezes as it is shot at], and you have the same rechargeable health system from almost every game that is out there now.

The game is still fun to play, but some of the flaws I mentioned just detracted from the fun. And I did have the game lock up on me a few times, but I don't think most of the other copies of the game did that.

Challenge: 8

I actually already mentioned they things I was going to comment on here. The AI is not very smart but if you are out in the open for too long, you will die really fast. The way that all of the baddies spawn into the levels seems cheap, and there are just some sequences and bosses [Tentacle Monster] that are just a pain in the ass to beat. Even on the easy mode, some parts of the game can be tough to beat.

Controls: 7

The controls are effective enough. Aiming and popping in and out of cover works pretty well, and there are a few QTE's for melee attacks [although those look awkward] and a couple of the boss battles. The only problems I had were how Matt seems to skid around when he stops running, and sometimes I mixed up a couple of the buttons. But other than that there should be no problems with the controls for anyone here.

Graphics: 7

I feel a little bit mixed on the graphics.

The character models, and some of the graphical effects look really good, like how the dead bodies and destroyed cover fades out of the level, and the blue text code that spurts out of someone instead of blood when you shoot them. But, some of the levels are bland and they feel empty.

Just because they are doing a parody of a Warehouse level doesn't mean that they need to do it twice as an excuse to spend less time making the levels look good. And I know that if the developers spent more time on the levels they could of look really good, I liked the design of the final bosses stage when the ground was glowing and it felt like some kind of unfinished computer program. I liked how that level looked. But then there are just some bland levels that are boring compared to how well designed some of the characters and the parody signs/posters are.

If there was some more time spent fine-tuning the levels, I probably would of given this a better score.

Sound: 8

Most of the sound effects are just basic stuff that doesn't really need to be mentioned. But I thought the voice overs and the entire soundtrack for this game were excellent.

The main characters, Matt Hazard and Wally Wellesley were voiced by Will Arnett [who was on one of my favorite TV shows, "Arrested Development"] and Neil Patrick Harris. Will Arnett did a great job playing Matt Hazard, but honestly Will Arnett is good in everything he does. And Neil Patrick Harris also did a good job making Wally feel like a whiny nerd who was upset that things didn't go his way. The rest of the characters were also voiced pretty well.

And the music, particularly the main song that plays during most of the battles is great, and there are also a few songs based off of music from games like Halo and Final Fantasy.

Overall, the sound was really good in this game, but that is what you get when Eat Lead was more of a game that was meant to make people laugh.

Atmosphere: 8

Overall, the game is about an action hero is stuck in a Video Game where someone is trying to kill him. And it is filled with satire, Matt constantly breaks the 4th wall, there are some good one-liners, and the game doesn't take itself seriously at all. The game is enjoyable because that it is fun, but also because of how entertaining the satire is. Its like how you would feel if you were watching the "[insert noun/verb/adjective here] Movie's" that Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer made if those movies were actually any good [seriously, don't watch them].

Replayability: 5

There isn't really much left to do after you beat the game. It takes around 8 hours to beat the game, there is no multiplayer feature [which is made fun of in one of the achievements], and most of the Achievement hunters will be able to get around 850/900 points on their first playthrough.

Pros:
Will Arnett, very funny satirical game, decent graphics, good voice acting, great soundtrack, could be the start of a great franchise.

Cons:
Short, dull levels, too linear, cheap spawn points, frustrating bosses, bad melee animation.

Should you get it:
Because of how short the game is, and because there is no multiplayer mode, I would suggest either renting this game, or buying it when the price goes down. And I would recommend this game to anyone who wants a fun game with some easy achievements.

Overall:

Eat Lead: The Return of Matt Hazard is a fun game that has some moments that are really funny, and some that fall flat. It is also a fun game, but some noticeable flaws detract from the fun. But it is in no way a bad game; it is just a fun game with a few flaws.

7

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 05/11/09, Updated 05/12/09

Game Release: Eat Lead: The Return of Matt Hazard (US, 02/26/09)

[Joe]

Gears of War

"Gorgeous Graphics, Fast paced action, but almost no detail to the story..."

Gears of War was one of the first games made by the legendary company Epic Games, and Cliffy B to showcase the Unreal III engine, and it became one of the best selling and most popular games on the Xbox 360 when it was released in 2006. So, lets get started...

Story: 4

Now, as you can see I gave the Story a very low score, but why did I do that? If you look at the plot overviews on websites like Wikipedia, or if you have the booklet that comes with the Limited Edition version of this game it does give you a very detailed backstory of the game. But my problem is that IN the game, so many things were very poorly explained, but I'll get to that later. First, lets see just what the story is [if you have not played the game yet]

Everything starts off on Sera, a planet that the Coalition of Ordered Governments [or COG] is currently controlling, and which contains a very valuable substance known as Imulsion. Then "Emergence Day" occurred when the Locust Horde came out of the ground and struck many vital areas of Sera. So, after most of the planet is taken over by the Locust, the COG has to hide on the Jacinto Plateau which is a place that the Locust are unable to burrow into, but the Locust still continue their assault on the Coalition, and cause their numbers to dwindle.

After that, we move into where the game starts off [that last section was just the backstory, which was untold in the game]. 14 years after Emergence Day, your character Marcus Fenix is taken out of the prison that he was incarcerated in for "breaking orders", and the basic goal is to find the "Resonator" which would map the Locust tunnels that are underground, and allow the COG to fire some missiles that would obliterate the Locust.

Now, most people would think that is a decent story, and although there are plenty of things explained in booklets that come with the game, during the game itself very few things are well explained. I don't think I heard one mention in the game about WHY Marcus was in Prison [except for "his trial was a sham"], I never heard much about where the Resonator came from, I never heard about why there was a laboratory in Marcus' old house, I never heard who in the hell that female Locust whose voice was heard a couple times in the game was! I am almost certain that if I did not look this stuff up on Wikipedia after I beat the game, I would have had no idea what the hell the story was about.

Well, if you are a fan of the games that Epic puts out this should not matter to much anyway. Besides nobody bought Unreal Tournament for the story, they bought it for the fast paced bloody action. But hopefully, in the next two games [since I heard that this would be a Trilogy, and the next one comes out in November] they do a much better job on the Story because there is a decent one in here if they just learn how to tell it.

Gameplay: 8

The first thing you should notice about this game is that it is not like your normal FPS game, in fact I felt that it controlled a lot like what a faster paced Resident Evil 4 would of been, along with the cover feature from Perfect Dark Zero.

The basic difference in how this game plays from most FPS games is that the camera is behind you [making it a 3rd Person Shooter], and you have to make extensive use of cover or you will just get slaughtered by the Locust, even on the lower difficulty levels. You also have to know how to use your weapons for the task you are given [you get Grenades, a Pistol, and 2 slots which can hold either a Sniper Rifle, an Explosive Bow, a Shotgun, Rifles, or a Laser Pointer that pinpoints a area of land for a big laser to hit it. You also have to manage your your three squad mates because they do help you out in several areas, the big problem with them is that if they die, you have to run out and revive them so you don't get overpowered. So basically, this is a more tactical shooter than most people would be used to, so you have to adjust to it relatively quickly if you want to survive.

The levels themselves are fun enough, sure there are a few stinkers like when you have to use the UV Turret to fight off the Kryll [basically, some bat like thing that hates light], and some boss fights that are way too easy [I'm looking at you Corpser], and there are some parts of the game that are just pure hell to complete on the tougher modes. But the Campaign is still fun enough to do, even though it is not the amazing revolutionary game that it was touted as.

Challenge: 9

One thing you should know before you start playing this game is that it is tough. As I said before, you need to learn to use cover right away or even the wimpy enemies will decimate you during the campaign, and you need to know how to fight some of the enemies [I.E. DON'T melee the Dark Wretches], and if you don't then you will not make it past the first chapter on the easiest difficulty. And, if you decide to bump up the difficulty then you will have to be really good at this game because that even some of the parts of the game on Casual can be tough to do, just imagine how tough it will be on the two higher modes.

The only thing I really have to say is be patient, even though this game is really tough to beat on the higher difficulties, it is not impossible. And if you keep screwing up at one part then learn what you are doing wrong and correct it, because that is exactly what I am doing now. I have just reccently beaten the game on Casual, and I am trying to beat the game again on Hardcore and Insane now, and it is damn hard to do.

Controls: 7

The controls did feel a little bit awkward to me at first because I was not used to playing games like this, but after I got the hang of it I did better. Aiming is easy enough [although I wish that blind firing had some kind of crosshair], the A and X buttons worked well enough as the "do everything" button, and using cover became almost a natural instinct after I got used to it.

Some people may find the controls to be overly complicated, but after a while you should be able to get used to it.

Graphics: 9

If there is one thing that Epic does well, it is churning out graphics that are leaps and bounds above most of what else is out there, much like Rare was doing when the released Donkey Kong Country for the SNES, and Conkers Bad Fur Day for the Nintendo 64, which were just a huge level above almost everything else on those consoles at the time.

I also believe that the graphics were the most hyped thing about this game, since it was the first real proof for me of just what these new systems could do when I saw the first pictures of this game in action.

Basically, you will be seeing some desolate war torn environments, which is a testament to the talent of a Developer when they can make crap look good. You will also see some gruesome monsters that belong to the Locust Horde, and the steroid pumping COG soldiers that are bigger than most Football players. You will also see some of the most gorgeous use of mapping effects that I have seen in a 360 game so far. There are also some absolutely gorgeous lighting effects, and some of the best looking blood showers I have ever seen, especially when you get to see it covering your screen.

So, as the last sentence said, there is a hell of a lot of blood in this game, so if you are squeamish do not play it. You can make blood pour out of the enemies, you can blow them up, or you can decapitate them with a Sniper Rifle which provides a grotesque look at all of the gunk leaking from their brains, and showing just what the 360 can do. Although things may be overly gorey at times, you should know by now if you played Epic's other games like Unreal you should know that they are known for spraying blood and body parts all over the walls of every room you enter in those games.

But all of this beauty does come at a price, at times the fancily mapped textures don't load right away so you basically see none of the things like the detail in Marcus' Armor during some of the cut-scenes and other moments during the gameplay. It is basically the same problem that Halo 2 had, but not as abundant, I also experienced this a few times in BioShock.

So, overall this section would of gotten a 10 if it wasn't for the problems I had with the textures loading, but it may just be the fact that my TV is a few years old, and by todays standards anything that does not have HD support is crap.

Sound: 10

As I said above, when you buy a game that the people at Epic made, it will certainly sound good.

Throughout the game there is plenty of voice acting for all of the main characters, and it is done superbly for almost all of them [although Cole Train does get annoying after a while]. In my mind the highlight of the voice actors in this game is John DiMaggio [or as I know him, Bender from one of my favorite shows "Futurama"] who provides the voice for Marcus Fenix. The background noises and sound effects that you will hear are good as well, from the sounds of birds in the sky, to the sound of a Wretch and its disgusting roar, and the sound of the chainsaw of a Lancer revving up and ripping a Drone in half are very well done.

But when I play Gears of War, the thing I noticed the most was the music. I loved the soundtrack for other games made by Epic that I have played like the Unreal Tournament games, but this game had a great soundtrack that felt like music you would hear in a very good War movie, and it fit wherever it was.

So overall, the dialog is great [mostly], the sound effects are great, and the music is great.

Multiplayer: 7

Gears of War has a decent Multiplayer mode, but I felt that it was not as fun as the older Unreal Tournament games.

First, is the different kinds of Multiplayer matches that have become standard, there are three different variations of Deathmatch where the only real difference I saw was that in one of them you have to kill a team leader, and in the other one you have to get up close to execute someone with a curb stomp [or any other execution move]. Then there is a King of the Hill which is self explanatory, and Annex which just moves the hill around.

These games are fun, but it is not as good as some of Epic's other games. There is also some lag and that can make it tougher to play since the party leader usually seems to be exempt from this.

As for doing the Campaign with a friend, all I'll say is that it is much better than playing it by yourself. And the tougher levels can be much easier with a friend than your AI partners.

Atmosphere: 7

As I have been saying, the voice acting is very well done and the levels are presented in a way that makes it feel like you are about to be swarmed by these monsters at any second. But the problems I had with the story knocked a few points off of the score. Although, other than that GoW works very well as a tactical shooter with a little bit of a horror element in it.

Replayability: 8

There is a Multiplayer mode, you can go through levels on Co-Op, or you can just hunt down the COG Tags to get the 60 gamerscore points that the achievements for doing so will give you. Everything that was provided should be enough until the sequel comes out.

Pros
Amazing graphics, great sound, challenging campaign, John DiMaggio.

Cons
Texture loading problems, Challenge can be too much for some people, not as "revolutonary" as it was said to be, undeveloped story, multiplayer does not live up to the old Unreal Tournament games.

Should you get it:
Even though I had a few problems with how the story was presented, I would highly recommend getting this game to any 360 owners.

Overall:

Gears is one of the best games on the Xbox 360, but the only real problem is that it does seem like most of the work went into showing off the new Unreal III engine, and none of it went into telling the story that could of been told with what we were given as a backstory. But other than that there should be no real disappointments from Gears.

8

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 04/14/08, Updated 05/28/08

Game Release: Gears of War (US, 11/07/06)

Gears of War 2

""Bigger, Better, and more bad***""

Gears of War 2 was hyped up by CliffyB to be bigger, better, and more badass than the first game, and even though that was a bold thing to say at the time, he was right. Almost everything in Gears of War 2 was improved, and the people at Epic Games did an incredible job on the game that will probably take home most of the GotY awards this year. So, lets light this candle.

Story: 7

Those of you who read my review for the first Gears of War will know that I had to go on Wikipedia to find out some of the things that happened in the story because it was so poorly told that I had no idea what was going on sometimes. Luckily, this game doesn't have that problem.

Gears 2 takes place 6 months after the Lightmass Bomb was used to obliterate most of the Locust. The few remaining Humans on Serra are now suffering from a disease known as Rust Lung because of how most of the Imulsion [Serras fuel] was evaporated by the Bomb. The Locust have come back and they are now sinking entire cities, and the formerly impenetrable stronghold on Jacinto will sink if the Locust are able to keep doing what they are doing.

So, the game starts off with you playing as Marcus Fenix from the first game, along with Dom and the rest of Delta Squad [and a couple of other people in the COG army]. And the game is mainly about getting into the locust Stronghold and trying to stop them from sinking Jacinto, and that story is told pretty well.

There are also some more "emotional" plotlines in this game to make everything deeper and darker, and they work well, even though this is a game where you have a Chainsaw Bayonet. The main secondary plot is about Doms wife Maria, and some things that happened during that were really disturbing, you also get to see more of how the society of the Locust is, and how emotionally damaged some of the soldiers have become from this War.

But overall, the entire story just seems like it is bigger, and there is more going on. The first one just seemed like a little mission, but this one makes you feel like you are in a massive War. The only real problems are that the ending happened too fast and it was very disappointing, and there are some more questions the story makes you ask, like what are the SIres and what happened to Adam Fenix...

But, we are just gonna have to wait for Gears 3 to find out.

Gameplay: 8

Like I said before, everything in Gears 2 just seems like it was refined and improved. When you play through the main game, it still plays like the first game, but there are so many little improvements that make the game more enjoyable to play.

You are still playing through chapters, the game is still a 3rd person shooter, you still need to use cover effectively to play the game, and you still get to use a freaking Chainsaw.

Most of the time, you will be going through a linear path and you will have to pop into cover and shoot at the locust, but there are also some levels that do different things. One of them has you inside of a Giant Worm [it is also the most disgusting level in my opinion] and you have to run through its Digestive teeth, you have to outrun some of what it is digesting, and you have to tear the arteries of its three hearts open... you didn't see anything like that in the first game.

The biggest improvements to me were in the AI and the Cover system. Your squadmates are now much smarter, and you are not letting them get killed and doing everything on your own anymore. They are finally able to hold their own in a fight, and luckily they are also able to revive you if you get knocked down. The Cover system also seems more natural now, and it is easier to move in and out of cover.

You also get a few new things that are fun to use, like planting Grenades on a wall and using them as mines, a Flamethrower, a Chain Gun, and 11 different execution moves that you can use on a Crawling locust.

The only real disappointments to me were the last chapter and the Vehicle levels. Although the level where you got to ride a Brumak was fun, the tank level had awful controls, although the level where you flew the Reaver was alright, you just couldn't move the damn thing around very well. And the last chapter just felt like it went by too fast.

But overall, the game is more fun to play than the first one, and that is what counts.

Challenge: 7

Gears of War 2 seems like it is easier than the first one to me. Maybe because I have played through the first one already, so I knew what I was doing more than I did back then, or maybe Epic made things easier. But all I know is that I beat Gears 2 faster than I did with Gears 1. Even the final Boss was wimpified, it only took me 2 ******* minutes to beat it [even on the highest Difficulty level], but in the first game General RAAM took me 30 or 45 minutes to beat...

Although, you still need to be patient for some of these levels. You can't play Gears of War like most other shooters, you need to stay in cover a lot and you should take your time with killing the enemies so they don't overwhelm you.

Controls: 8

As I have said, everything just feels better in this game.

You just need to know how to stay in cover and shoot accurately and after you get the hang of the controls that is easy to do. And it should not be too hard for you to learn how to use the controls, there are even prompts on the screen when you can do some of the actions like opening doors, picking up weapons, or stomping on someone's head.

The only real problem is that Vehicle Controls still suck. The Tank is a pain in the ass to drive in a straight line.

Graphics: 9

The little improvements to the Unreal III engine have made Gears 2 look so much better than the first one.

The levels look incredible, and there is some amazing architecture in the Human areas where everything looks like it has gone through a real war, and the underground areas where the Locust live really look like creepy alien temples, the inside of the worm looks disgusting [in a good way], and there is an incredible looking Forest level where you just want to look around and see all of the details that went into making this game look so realistic. And there are some incredible looking cut scenes where there are a massive amount of characters on the screen, and everything just looks more epic than it did in the first game.

The character models also look better, the Locust still look ugly as hell, and Delta Squad still looks like the steroid injecting giant badasses that they were in the first game.

The massive amount of gore from the first has also been expanded on. the screen still gets coated with blood, but you can now rip the Locust apart with some guns. You can fire a Chaingun at some of the bigger ones and watch their limbs get ripped off. Even though all of the blood that will wind up being spilt [and in one level, covering your entire body] looks disgusting, there is still some kind of charm in seeing the head of one of these monsters explode when you blast it with a Sniper rifle.

The only problem with the graphics is that the Unreal engine still has a lot of pop up, although they tried to hid it by making the textures fade in instead of just popping up out of nowhere. But that is the only problem with the Graphics, and if that did not happen I would of given this section a 10.

Sound: 10

Luckily the sound stayed at the same high quality it was at in the first game.

The voice acting is good, but it still has the intentionally cheesy feeling that the first game had. That may turn off some people, but you have to remember that this is not a game where you should expect anything too serious. Although the more dramatic parts of the game are done very well, like Chairman Prescott's speech in the beginning of the game. And John DiMaggio [Bender from "Futurama"] still does a great job at playing Marcus Fenix.

The Locust still have those disgusting growling noises for voices [some of them actually sound like the gutturals in most of the songs that new Metal Bands do... interesting comparison to me], and they sound like I would expect some ugly looking monster to sound.

The background noises help you get immersed into the game, and the sound effects like Brumak rockets going past you, the sounds of weapons firing, explosions, and the noise that you hear when someone's head explodes still sound great.

The music was the best part of the sound to me. I love epic sounding choral and orchestra music that sounds like stuff from "Star Wars" or some war movie, and the music in Gears of War 2 really delivers that feel. I liked almost every song I heard in this game, and the battle music made the game seem more exciting during the shootouts.

Overall, the game just sounds great in every possible way.

Multiplayer: 8

The Multiplayer was improved over the first game, but there are still some disappointments to me.

Most of the modes from the first game came back, and they are fun to play, but there are a few new ones like Submission where you have to use the Meat Shield move [picking up someone that is crawling around and using them like a shield] to capture someone and bringing them to some part of the level to capture the flag. Multiplayer in this game is all about working as a team, you have to know how to work with you squad to do well online, because if people are just going out on their own they will get their asses kicked.

I had the most fun on Horde so far. Basically, you are fighting through 50 waves of Locust, and each wave gets harder. So, you have to fight through 50 waves of these things, and you have 4 other people with you.

And this is one of those modes that has to be done as a team, because if you go out there alone you will probably wind up getting killed, and it is really tough trying to fight through half of a wave because the rest of your team decided not to play as one...

The biggest problem with playing online is that it can take a long time to find a match sometimes. I can usually find people in a few seconds on the basic modes, but on ones like Wingman [teams of 2] I just wind up waiting until I give up and try something else.

But, if you can't find people to play with you can still play with the Bots by yourself, although they aren't as much fun as a real human player.

Overall, Multiplayer is more fun to play now, but some people are still going to whine about some of the changes [look in the Forums, people hate how "weak" the Shotgun is now even though it works fine for me]. At least it doesn't seem like something that was put in at the last minute like it was with the first game.

Atmosphere: 9

The enhanced level of depth in the story, along with the beautiful graphics and the incredible sound just help you get more immersed into the story than the first game did. Although some things in the story just make you ask questions, you really feel like you are fighting in this war for humanity's survival, and that is what counts.

Replayability: 8

Multiplayer is fun, you can do the Campaign on Co-Op, there are some easy Achievements, and Horde is a great new mode that is fun to play. There should be enough to keep you busy on this game.

Pros:
Great Campaign, great Graphics and sound, fun Multiplayer, John DiMaggio, some of the bonuses for buying the game new were an entertaining way of screwing with used game stores, epic music, vastly improved storyline.

Cons:
More questions than answers, pathetic final boss, annoying vehicle levels, slow matchmaking on Multiplayer, graphical pop in.

Should you get it:
Gears of War 2 is definitely a game that any Xbox 360 owner should have in their collection.

Overall:

Gears of War 2 is one of the best games I have played on the Xbox 360, and it should be one of the top contenders for Game of the Year 2008. Even though there were some problems that annoyed me, they were mostly minimal things that don't detract from how great this game is.

9

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 11/17/08

Game Release: Gears of War 2 (Limited Edition) (US, 11/07/08)

Frontlines: Fuel of War

"Blood for Oil!"

Frontlines: Fuel of War is a battlefield-esqe war game made by Kaos Studios that intends to answer the question; what would happen if we ran out of Oil. I also need to state that at the time I played this game, it was only a rental and I did not have a high-speed Internet connection at the time so this will just be a single player review.

Story: 7

As I said in the intro, Frontlines answers the question, what would happen if we ran out of Oil, and the answer to that question is World War III.

The basic plot is that the year is 2024, and the world is in the middle of an Energy Crisis. You are playing in the Western Coalition, which is the alliance of the good ol' U.S. of A., and the Europeans that are on our side [France, England, etc]. The enemy is the Red Star Alliance, which consists of the Russians, and the Chinese. Around this time the last dew remaining drops of Oil are getting sucked up, and all of these countries are going to suck up what is left, and doing so causes World War III.

I'll start off with what I liked, the story is a good depiction of what it would be like if we were in a full scale war over Oil, and I liked how they actually put in a time line of all of the events leading up to this game. Thats some nice dedication from a Studio that I doubt many people have heard of.

But, there are also some bad things. As some people might of seen me posting on the message boards recently, I don't think this could happen right away. Mainly because that over here we have so many regulations that are keeping us from sucking up the Oil we have now, so unless WWIII happened over OUR Oil I am really doubting the story. You can also add the fact that we will probably have plenty of alternative fuels for everything, and substitutes for Oil by the time this game happens.

As for things in the game, although the story could of been done very well I never felt any real emotion for the characters. Games like Call of Duty 4 give you a certain kinsmanship for the characters, but in here I did not think the Soldiers were very well developed at all and I did not really care if they lived or died.

So basically, I thought there was a good premise, but it was not very well developed in some parts.

Gameplay: 8

The main thing that was hyped about this game was the "Frontline" battle mechanic which is designed to keep you right in the action at all times and I thought this was very well done. Basically, to advance you have to capture areas by moving into them, and staying near s spot long enough to take control of it, and this is a cool feature even though it is nothing more than a expansion of the Domination game from Unreal Tournament. And I will say that when I played through the Campaign, it just seemed like a different way of doing checkpoints but it does its job, and this could be an interesting feature in some upcoming games if they use it.

Another thing I liked was the crapload of Vehicles, Drones, and Classes you were given in the Campaign.

You were able to pick up drones that were used to Spy, use as a Kamikaze bomb, or just fire a big weapon at stuff. The vehicles were also entertaining to use, but the wonky physics made it tough to drive them around at times. The classes also worked well, but you will probably just use the Heavy Assault one like I did throughout the Campaign. I also have to say that the Sniper Rifle in this game was one of the worst I have ever used in a FPS. When I pointed the sights directly at someones freaking head and fired at them, they would not die! The Sniper Rifle in Frontlines was even worse than the one in the original Perfect Dark.

The Campaign itself is good, but it is nothing great. The Levels are massive and will take some time to complete as you get further into the game, but there is nothing spectacular in them. The AI is able to fight, but they aren't incredibly smart and you will basically just be running around the levels capturing Control Points and blowing crap up.

Challenge: 7

When I played through the Campaign I did it on Normal to earn the Achievements for doing the levels, and all I can tell was that the AI, is able to fight but they are not the brightest bunch I have seen, and the biggest challenge of the Levels was how long they were. But, the limited respawn number that the game gave you kept the whole experience from being simplified like BioShock was. Any BioShock player will tell you that you can beat the entire game on Hard using only the Wrench and some Plazmids if you are patient enough, and Frontlines kept itself from getting the same fate by limiting the number of times you can revive yourself in a Level. Smart move.

Controls: 7

What I found was that the Controls for your character were basic stuff and they were very easy to use, but Vehicles would be a pain sometimes, especially on sloped terrain. Other than that everything works fine with the Controls.

Graphics: 8

Frontlines is a very good looking game.

I can not say this enough, if there is one thing that they got right in this game, it was making stunning desolate Warzones where it looks like everything has been obliterated by missile fire. You just have to admire how great the areas you were in looked, especially the ones where everything has been blown apart and the atmosphere of the hell of war was captured very well.

I also thought that the Vehicles, and the Weapons were exceptionally well designed, and the Weapons really looked like what our guns would probably look like in the next few years.

Although, there are a couple problems. First, the destructible environments had bad physics in some places, and I would often see debris floating in the air or getting stuck in the walls, and compared to everything else the Soldiers looked generic.

Other than that, there isn't anything too bad.

Sound: 7

The sound effects in this game were done very well, and quite often the Weapons sounded even better than they looked, and the Music was also very good most of the time. But the voices did not work very well for me. As I said before, I did not really feel anything for the characters, and it seemed like they were just reading off lines. Also, the attempts at humor that whoever wrote this game tried to put in were not very good.

Atmosphere: 7

As I said above, the Apocalyptic Warzone feeling was captured very well, the story is also very relevant to the times we are in, especially because we are already in dire need for Oil even though we have a ton of it that we won't even touch under our soil, and it does make you think even though I don't think it is too likely that this would happen if we start working on getting alternative energies... back on topic, the other problems with the atmosphere are the lack of emotion in the voice acting. Other than those problems Frontlines: FoW does a good job at immersing you.

Replayability: 7

If you are only in it for the Campaign you probably won't play more than once, but from what I have heard the Multiplayer is very good although I was unable to play it when I had this game.

Pros:
Well-designed environments, great looking weapons, great sound effects and music, good story, interesting concept.

Cons:
Ripoff of Battlefield, lackluster Campaign, poor voiceover work, horrible Sniper Rifle and other weapon balancing issues, screwy vehicle physics.

Should you get it:
I would suggest this as a rental before you buy it, besides we already have CoD 4, Halo 3, and the upcoming GoW 2 for Multiplayer.

Overall:

Frontlines: Fuel of War is a good game, but it does nothing special that would make it a "great" game. Although, it does have some interesting features that should be considered by many of the other Devs out there when they try to increase the already overpopulated War-Sim Genre.

7

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 05/27/08

Game Release: Frontlines: Fuel of War (US, 02/25/08)

Mass Effect

"Another masterpiece from BioWare"

BioShock is the latest RPG from BioWare, who also made Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic [which won 49 Game of The Year Awards], Neverwinter Nights, Baldur's Gate, Jade Empire, and the upcoming Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood.

In my mind the Canadians at BioWare are the western equivalent to Square Enix. Those of you who know about the quality of the games they make won't be surprised by how good this game is.

Also, I wanted to reference Kevin McCullough's comments on the alien sex in Mass Effect, but I decided against it. If you want to see that, go in the Forums.

Story: 9

The main premise of Mass Effect is that it is the year 2183, and 35 years before this game took place Humans discovered Prothean technology that was found on Mars to leave the Milky Way and expand across the universe. And they are currently trying to become a member of the Council, which is the head of the Government that controls Citadel Space.

The game itself starts off with your character, Commander Shepard getting ready to go on a mission on the planet Eden Prime, which was terraformed by the Humans to find a Prothean Beacon, and you are being escorted by a Spectre [Citadel Agents who are "above the law", they can do whatever they have to do to in order to complete the mission] named Nihlus. On the mission, everything goes wrong as an evil synthetic race called The Geth and a rogue Spectre named Saren attack the base, and kill Nihlus.

When you reach the Beacon, you are given a vision about biological races being slaughtered by machines. Then you go to the Citadel and you are trying to get the Council to bring Saren in to face justice, but they don't listen. So, you go and find evidence of him talking about the attack on Eden Prime, the return of The Reapers, and discovering The Conduit.

So, you are sent on a mission to take Saren down. I will leave the rest of the story for you to discover if you haven't played, because I don't want to spoil anything.

Gameplay: 8

Mass Effect plays like a mixture of Star Wars: Knights of the Republic, and Gears of War. You have to go around talking to people in order to advance the story, and when you are in a fight the combat is in a 3rd person view, and you can use four guns [Sniper Rifle, Assault Rifle, Shotgun, Pistol], you can also use the Mass Effect version of Force Powers called Biotics, some of which will result in some very entertaining ragdolling after use, and you have some Technical abilities which hack weapons and technology. You are also capable of adding upgrades to your weapons, and armor to make them more powerful.

You also have to learn how to use them wisely, because there is a recharge time limit on the Biotic and Technical powers, and your weapons can overheat and you will have to recharge them if you keep that trigger held down too long.

Several missions involve getting into an off road vehicle called the Mako that looks like a tank, but this did not turn out very well. Driving around is confusing at first, but even after you get used to it the driving sections are a low point in the fun of the game, as is having to explore some of the planets where you have to drive over some very steep mountains. the Mako sidequest levels were annoying, but everything else in the game is very good.

The main similarities to Knights of the Old Republic are the dialog system, [which has been revised quite well] where you spend a lot of time talking to people, and the choices you make influence how the story turns out, and how you wind up going through a hell of a lot of sidequests if you choose to. You can also change where you are on this karma meter by how you respond to people, being nice gives you Paragon points, and being an ass gives you Renegade points. These also help you charm or intimidate people.

There is not any real problem at all with the game, some of the sidequests can get tedious, driving is annoying, and the menu is not very well designed, and the ******* elevators that are used to hide the game loading the next area gets really annoying. But overall the game is incredibly fun.

Challenge: 7

As I said in my KotOR reviews, the challenge in Mass Effect stems from that stuff that you have to do in order to complete the entire game, in my play through I usually spend a little over 20 hours and I get around 75 percent of the game done, so it will take you a while to do the game if you try hard enough. But, after you get your character leveled up enough you can be so overpowered that you will just be plowing over the Geth, especially since you can start a new game with the items and stats you had in the last play through. But like in most games, the basic difficulties are very easy, and the tougher ones are VERY hard.

Although, I might as well add that like in KotOR, there is a puzzle you have to do that is really out of place, and you need to look up how to do it if you want a chance of beating the game.

Controls: 7

The game is very simple to control, since the controls are like a 3rd person shooter, and the dialog wheel is very easy to use. But the menus are hard to navigate and the Mako can be frustrating to drive so that took off a point.

I have also gotten stuck in the wall a few times, but I think that is just a glitch.

Graphics: 9

There are just so many things that look incredible in this game; there are some of the best looking people and aliens I have ever seen in a video game in Mass Effect. The main planets that you travel to also look incredible, and the water effects are amazing. But, the mini planets in the driving levels don't look as good if we are comparing them. The look like a bunch of mountains with a simple white/brown/green texture implanted over them to save room on the disc.

And like in several other 360 games I have played, the textures sometimes take a couple seconds to load; I'm guessing that it is because of the Bump Mapping. And that is the only real problem I have with the graphics, I think that you can fix it by installing the game to your Hard Drive but I don't have enough room left in mine [20 Gig HDD....] to do that.

Sound: 10

If you have played KotOR or any other BioWare RPG you will know why I gave this a 10, BioWare games always have a massive amount of dialog and Mass Effect is no exception. A problem that was in KotOR was also fixed [constant reusing of the same dialog for the Aliens].

I am amazed that this game was only on one DVD because there is so much dialog for good choices, bad choices, who is in your party, and what gender you are for every conversation. There are also some NPC's who have very well done voices that add to their character [like Garrus and Wrex, my favorite characters in this game].

The music was also very well done, and I liked it enough to vote for Mass Effect in the "best music" category on GPhoria a couple weeks ago. And the sound effects sound great as well, the weapons sound like a futuristic laser weapon would.

Atmosphere: 9

You know you are playing a good RPG when you really get into the story, and Mass Effect did that. You really started to care about the characters, and one of the choices you have to make near the end of the game can be pretty tough to do depending on how well you like Kaidan and Ashley.

Replayability: 6

The main things that make you want to come back are doing the game again while keeping your previous stats, or trying to get the good and evil ending. Otherwise, there isn't much left to do.

Pros:
Immersive, great graphics and sound, great story, likable characters, well done combat.

Cons:
Driving levels, Elevators, The menus, some tedious sidequests.

Should you get it:
Mass Effect has gone down to $19.00 in most of the stores I have seen it at, so that is a good deal for a game as fun as this. Get it now if you like WRPGs.

Overall:

What is left to say that I haven't said already? Mass Effect is a great RPG, and possibly one of the best I have ever played. It was also made by BioWare, a company that has never made a bad game. What are you waiting for get it now!

9

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 09/02/08, Updated 06/08/09

Game Release: Mass Effect (US, 11/20/07)

Madden 10

"A step in the right direction"

Madden 10 is EA Sports' latest version of the often criticized series, but it is one of the best we have seen in quite some time. Although there are still plenty of minor problems, it is in no way a bad game. Also, as a Cardinals fan I have to say that it was great to see him on the cover, and that he did not suffer from the Madden Curse like the other cover guy [Polamalu] did.

So lets see what works and what doesn't.

Story: 6

Although EA took some time trying to improve franchise mode, the storytelling element of it still needs some work. Of course you are going through the season and trying to see if you can win the Super Bowl, but now there is a tv show within the game called "The Extra Point" where they go over all of the games of the weekend and talk about the stats. Its a decent start, but it can still use some work.

Gameplay: 8

There aren't many new modes, Franchise, Superstar, Madden Moments, and all of the other stuff is basically the same as they were before. Superstar mode can be good, the idea of creating your own player and going through his career is good, but it still needs a lot of work. Franchise mode has gotten better with some of the little improvements, although the simulated stats are still screwed up considering how there can be 2 or 3 people going over 2000 yards rushing each season.

The game itself has improved as well, most of the improvements are minor things but they have a big effect on the game. Everything has been slowed down to make everything more realistic, some new ratings like Quarterback Accuracy have been changed. Now instead of just one accuracy rating, you have Short, Mid, Deep, Throw on the Run, along with Throw Power and Playaction so that the Quarterbacks play more like they did in real life. And there is a new physics engine along with new player animations to make things look more realistic.

Now, playing the game is still the same as it always was, you pick the plays [although they don't let you make you own plays anymore, which sucks], and your team acts them out. But now, it is easier on the offensive side of the ball to find the open receiver, find holes to run through, and stand in the pocket instead of running around before you pass on every play like you had to on Madden 09 since defenders got past the offensive line almost immediately. Overall, the game just seems more realistic and more fun than it was before.

Challenge: 7

Some things never change with Madden, the comeback AI is still present especially when you play on the higher difficulties that are necessary if you don't want to play games where you win by 20 points every time. The game still cheats sometimes by having defenders run the wrong way, especially when they are about to sack the Quarterback, and players can still warp across the field to hit you faster.

I have noticed some inconsistencies with the difficulty when I have played. Normally, I don't give up a lot of rushing yards, but with the Quarterbacks I have seen some of the good ones [Manning, Favre] throw 4 interceptions against me with the sliders I use, and then I play against bad Quarterbacks [JaMarcus Russell] or teams using their backup because the starter got hurt using the exact same difficulty and they can torch my defense. It doesn't make much sense when that happens. I have also noticed that it is too easy to return kickoffs for a Touchdown, and I have had games where it happened 3 times, and the other team still has big plays that go for Touchdowns right after I have a long Touchdown drive.

I want to play games that are as realistic, but it is tough to find the right sliders to make the game tough but not unfair [like I said, the game still cheats]. Just try to find what works for you.

Controls: 8

Still basically the same, but a few buttons were moved around. Since it is tough to go really in depth with a game like this I'll try to keep it simple.

The menu where you pick the plays is pretty easy to go through, although I wish there was a way for you to just find all of you favorite plays before the game and save them in a extra playlist so it didn't take as long to find them. Playing as the Quarterbacks is easy enough, you just press the corresponding button for the receiver to throw to them, although with the different ways you can press the button for a certain throw [throw it straight and fast, or lob it and have it go a little slower] can take a little while to get used too. It is tougher to play as the defense, I've had a hard time playing in coverage, so I just control the Defensive Line or one of the other Blitzers. I've also had problems with players running the wrong way after I take them over while I'm trying to tackle someone. There are also plenty of player specific controls like the new avoidance stick for the Quarterbacks [although I don't use it very much], jukes, stiff arms, swim moves, spin moves, jumps, and some other things. Overall, the controls take a little while to get used to, but after you get used to them they work pretty well. The only exception is the main menu, which is awkward to navigate, and it has been that way for the last couple of years.

Graphics: 8

Like most of the game, there are some nice little changes that make it better. I'll just keep this simple too, the players were modeled pretty well, and this time most of them actually look like they do in real life. When you look at the Quarterbacks [especially on the sidelines] you can see that most of them look like they do in real life, even some of the backups [Leinart, Rex Grossman], and some of the other notable players [for the Cardinals, Fitzgerald, Rolle, Boldin, Hightower, and a few others] had a decent replication of their faces done as well. The stadiums also look really close to how they look in real life, another Cardinals example, I have been to University of Phoenix Stadium a few times, and besides the Ring of Honor, and some of the banners that are hanging around [2008 NFC/NFC West Champions] it looks almost exactly the way it did when I was there. Although the crowd and some of the players on the sidelines that look like albino mannequins could still use some work. The animations for the players have also gotten better, and you don't see the exact same animations every time you play the game as much anymore. Along with that, the weather effects have gotten better in stadiums where it can snow or rain, some of the minor details on the stadiums or player models [such as more realistic looking nametags on the back of their jerseys that you can actually read now] and the overall presentation looks better, which was part of EA's “Everything you see on Sunday” tagline for the game.

Sound: 8

I'll start this section off with something that gets talked about a lot, yes there are some problems with the commentary. I think that Tom Hammond does not show a lot of emotion, and he sounds bored reading his lines. Collinsworth is not very well liked around here, but I thought he did a good job. The biggest problem with the commentary is that you can easily tell when names and numbers are being added to the commentary because it sounds out of place, and it would be nice to see some more natural commentary, and there are some mistakes with what they say, like when I heard Collinsworth say “Adrian Peterson [Vikings Halfback] is not a Quarterback that will make many mistakes against the blitz] during a play where he broke a 40 yard run on a blitz. If I was going to give suggestions to the people working on the Commentary, I would just have them bring back Al Michaels since he works with Collinsworth at NBC now.

As for the rest, there is some nice music in the soundtrack this year [even though I took out all of the Rap], but it would be nice to see some more of the NFL Films music like the stuff that plays during the halftime show in this game that you can choose to play in the main menu. In the game itself, you can hear the quarterback calling the plays, the crowd screaming, and all of the big men slamming into each other along with the commentary. Overall, it sounds like watching a game on TV would.

Atmosphere: 9

Like I just mentioned, this version of Madden is close to what it is like watching a real game on TV [there is even a camera angle that looks like the one they use for games on TV]. It sounds like the real game, and it looks pretty damn close to the real game. Even going through the season feels like the real thing, until you play a playoff game in a Dome where you can't open the roof and you see everyone staring at the roof as jets you can't see fly over it [seriously, who the hell missed that screw-up?]. There is still some work to do, but this is about as close as you can get with the games that are currently out there to a video game that is like the real thing.

Multiplayer: 7

First off, I'll say that I didn't do the online franchise since I didn't feel like finding 31 people to play with, and I don't like playing online much because of all of the cheaters on there who only use scrambling Quarterbacks like Vince Young and find all of the cheap plays that always work. But if you can find someone who is good at the game, without using all of the cheesy tactics, it is very fun to play online. If you can find a friend that wants to come over and play the game with you, it is fun. And thats really all that matters, just stay the hell away from all of the little cheaters on Xbox Live.

Replayability: 8

Multiplayer, going through franchise mode for several seasons and rebuilding the bad teams, fiddling with all of the players stats, there is plenty to do that will keep you busy until the next Madden comes out.

Pros:
Several little improvements that make the overall experience better, good graphics, Collinsworths commentary, better presentation, improvements to the ratings system, changes to the controls work well, the new animation system, seeing some of the players looking like they do in real life, the Cardinals finally don't suck in a Madden game.

Cons:
The AI still cheats all the time, tough to find sliders that keep the game from being too easy or too hard, Tom Hammonds commentary, still some issues with the presentation and commentary, the cheaters on Xbox Live, no Create a Play, inconsistent difficulty, too many kickoffs returned for Touchdowns.

Should you get it:
If you enjoy football games, without question you should buy Madden 10.

Overall:

While like most of the Madden games, there are still some problems. Madden 10 is the best one that EA Sports has put out in quite some time. And hopefully it is a step to further improving the franchise if they can keep going in the right direction.

8

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 01/29/10, Updated 02/05/10

Game Release: Madden NFL 10 (US, 08/14/09)

Zelda Collectors Edition

"A Great Compilation of Some of The Greatest Games Ever Made"

The Legend of Zelda: Collectors Edition is a compilation of four Zelda Games and a Demo of "Wind Waker" that was given out for subscribing to Nintendo Power. The included games are The Legend of Zelda and Zelda II: The Adventure of Link for the NES, and The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time and Majoras Mask for the Nintendo 64.

First off, let me say one thing, this will be a short review because I am not writing it based on how good the games that are included are, because we all know that besides Zelda 2: The Adventure of Link that the games in here are Gold from Nintendo. I am going to judge this collection on how well the games were ported, how everything holds up using GameCube controls, and how fun it is to play them. Having said all of that, this was just a little promotion Nintendo Power was using to get subscribers, and it is a damn good one at that.

Port-wise:

As you should all know if you are reading this, Zelda games are filled with puzzles, and you get to explore some vast levels, but I will not cover that anymore because this is a collection, chances are that you have already played through the games.

First off the sound is intact for the games, it still sounds like it did for the old games on my TV, but in either Ocarina of Time or Majoras mask it says that there are some problems with the sound before the game starts up, I have never noticed that but there may be some skipiness with the sound in some places. Other than that everything will sound as it should.

The Graphics look as good as they did before, although there are some problems with the Sprites in Zelda 1 where everything looks like it got stuck, kind of like in Metroid when after you kill something you can still see some of the pixels of it.

The controls can be a little awkward, because the GameCube controller is different than the one the games were made for, if you try playing the first two games using the D-Pad on the controller it is frustrating because of how tiny it is, and on Majoras Mask/Ocarina of Time item-swapping is awkward at first because the X-Y-Z buttons aren't set up like the C buttons on the N64 controller [and using the C-Stick on the GCN controller is a pain in the ass] and the camera can be frustrating sometimes. But other than that there are no problems.

Finally, the performance of the games, which is the most important thing in my mind, was good for a port, but there was some slowdown in some parts. For example, in the final part of Ocarina of Time while you are trying to escape the castle before it collapses there is a lot of lag and there are a few parts in all of the games where it feels slower. I also think that this could of been fixed, the GameCube has better hardware than the N64, I doubt that those games could slow down the GameCube that much.

Other than that there are no real problems with the games.

Replayability:

These are Zelda games; you will want to replay them simple as that.

Pros:

Good port, 4 great games included, Not much changed for the worse-er.

Cons:

Sound problems, Lag in some parts, Awkward controls.

Should you get it:

Yes you should if you do not already have a Wii with these games downloaded to it, this is a good compilation and it will go great amongst your GameCube library.

Overall:

For a port of some games done as a subscription enticer, this was done very well and it was advertised at the time [2003] that you were able to play every Zelda game on the GameCube at that time. Other than a few port issues this game retains everything from the classics that are included inside and you should get it.

8

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 11/12/07

Game Release: The Legend of Zelda Collector's Edition (US, 11/17/03)

[Joe]

Super Smash Bros

"Finally A Chance To Beat The Hell Out Of Pikachu"

I'm sure most of us heard about this game in the same way, we were watching TV and then the commercial of a couple guys in Nintendo Character suits were skipping through a meadow... yawn. then you see the dudes in the suits start beating the crap out of each other, this is a famous commercial now that is regarded by some of us as the best one ever [narrowly beating out the dorks in the Guitar Hero II ad]. Well, I bet that the people at HAL Labs and Masahiro Sakurai never thought the game would of been this big, but judging from the Wii Boards it is. Lets start this review.

Story: 6

I honestly have no idea what the hell is going on in here, they never told a real story. But from the best of what can gather from the opening cinematic, all of the characters in this game were dolls in a Toy Box who were brought to life by a White Glove who puts them on a desk and creates this little world for them to fight on. Then they have to go through a few levels until they can fight Master Hand.

Its a low score because of how they cheaped out on the story by only using an Opening Cinematic.

Gameplay: 8

This game is an intensely simplified fighting game, if you don't like having to memorize all of those commands in the Soul Calibur or Tekken games, then Smash Bros is for you because all of the moves and fighting mechanics are simple enough for most people to learn. First, instead of the "power bar" at the top, there is a percentage marker at the bottom of the screen that shows how much damage you have taken, as it goes up you will get knocked farther by the opponents attacks, and the goal is to knock someone off the stage instead of the standard "knock the power bar to zero".

There are also plenty of characters and stages to choose from, all of them filled with nostalgia of the past games. And there are also some weapons you can choose, like the Beam Sword [like a light Saber] or the Pokeball [releases a Pokemon].

Everything was kept simple, and that is what I like about this game, I enjoy games like Soul Calibur but it is so hard to learn how to do all everything like the million different move combos, or the blocks, but in here the moves are really simple, shielding is simple, and the game is like a 2D sidescroller game. This is a brilliant way to do fighting games.

Challenge: 6

Smash Bros is a very simple game; the AI in here isn't too hard to beat after a while. But the game itself is relatively easy, unlocking all of the characters does not require much of an effort to do. The only real challenge of the game is in Multiplayer when you turn the AI up to the highest Level, but that won't last long you can still pound them really easily. The main game itself will be breezed through, just be glad there is a great Multiplayer mode.

Controls: 9

Again, the controls in this game are really simple to learn, the attacks will require, at the most, tilting the control stick in a direction or pressing the A or B button. As with everything else the controls were kept really simple and you should be able to figure out everything really fast.

Graphics: 8

Everything was presented at some of the highest quality that the Nintendo 64 could muster. The characters look great, the Levels are really reminiscent of the Games they are taken from, and the entire presentation of a cartoony beat-em-up was captured very well. One of the details of the "cartoony beat-em-up" was that there is some kind of action bubbles when you hit the opponent, and most of the attacks have a cartoony feel to them. Even the pixelated things look good.

Also luckily for you, because this game moves so fast, and there is usually so much going on, the game does not slow down at all.

Sound: 8

The game also sounds incredible, the music from so many different games has been remixed and inserted into the nostalgia filled levels of this game, and the rest of the music composed just for this game sounds great. The characters also sound good and the rest of the cartoony sound effects sound great and are perfect for this game. Simply put, the game sounds amazing.

Atmosphere: 7

The atmosphere that was set up for this game was kept simple, the game is very cartoony and the sound effects [the rattling sound you hear when there is a hard impact], or the graphical effects [certain attacks make the skeleton of the character become exposed] really make it feel like that. But for the rest of the games, the nostalgia packed levels make themselves feel like a game in that series.

Multiplayer: 10

This is one of the best multiplayer party games on the Nintendo 64, the main game itself is not very good because of how un-challenging and repetitive it is, but playing against skilled human players keeps things fun and exciting with this game. it is no coincidence that the Smash Bros games are played in Tournaments a lot, they are great multiplayer games that anyone no matter what their skill level can get into and learn how to play quickly. If you like 4 Player games on the N64, but don't like Mario Party or Goldeneye type games, you should give this a try.

Replayability: 8

The reason to keep playing is the Multiplayer, which does not get boring for a long time. The problem is that the Single Player mode won't keep you enthralled for a long time and will probably only be played until you can get all of the characters by most players.

Pros:
Great graphics, great sound, nostalgia filled, one of the best multiplayer games on the N64, very simple fighting mechanics, you can kick Pikachu's ass.

Cons:
Weak single player mode and story.

Should you get it:

As I have been saying, this is a great Multiplayer game and it can be found really cheap at used game stores now so you should get it.

Overall:

Super Smash Bros is one of the greatest multiplayer experiences on the Nintendo 64, and it was filled with nostalgia from some of the best of Nintendo's games to create some "fantasy football" esqe match ups... like who would win: Link or Mario, Samus or Pikachu? Also, we got one of the greatest commercials for any video game when this game came out. Keep your eyes out for the next game in the series, Super Smash Bros: Brawl because it should surpass everything about this game, and if you like this one you will love Brawl.

8

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 11/26/07

Game Release: Super Smash Bros. (US, 04/26/99)

Smash Bros Melee

"A Massive Improvement"

Super Smash Bros. Melee is the much improved Sequel to the surprisingly good N64 hit Super Smash Bros that we got from Masahiro Sakurai from HAL Labs, and the creator of the Kirby games. Now, if there is any way to describe this game, it is Super Smash Bros: on crack, and that is because everything is at a much faster pace in my mind, and this game is just filled with nostalgic Nintendo goodness that puts the first game to shame. So, with all of that said lets light this candle.

Story: 6

As I said for the previous game, there is no real apparent story, but I doubt that you will be paying attention to that. Judging from the opening cinematic [which I feel is the only thing close to a story in this game], the story is just the Master Hand bringing Trophy's to life in a stadium, and having them fight. But, there is also an adventure mode, there isn't any real story here either besides going through some levels to fight Bowser.

Gameplay: 8

As I said above, this game IS fast, you will be fighting at a really fast pace throughout the battlefields you are given in this game. And as I said about the past game, Melee is just a vastly simplified fighting game that doesn't require you to memorize massive commands just to pull off one attack, you are just doing simple quick movements that just require moving the stick in some direction, and hitting the A or B button.

Now, as for the main game, it has gone from a short single player mode that just had you going through some of the stages and beating down the characters on the road to Master Hand [which in Melee, although it is more random], into a Adventure mode which has some special fights, and some courses you need to navigate, 51 "events" that you need to beat by doing some task, a Multiplayer mode with features like "stamina mode", "coin battle", "metal battle", "time battle", "team battle", and many others.

You also have more characters [going from 12, to 25] from some of Nintendo's biggest games, this game may even be responsible for bringing the Fire Emblem games to America by including Roy and Marth as playable characters, more unique stages, more items, and some collectible trophy's just to add more replay value.

As for the fighting itself, as I have been saying, it is much faster paced, and you will be fighting much faster. Even though it is just the same "keep hitting them until the percentage is high enough, then knock them off the stage" style of combat. Some attacks have been made stronger, or weaker, and the grapple attacks have been weakened [well... they were abusable in the first game]. One of the things that I noticed was how many different strategies have been made for the characters by the pros, there are so many that I can't even describe them all here. Just check out some of the great FAQs on this site for proof.

As I have played this game, it just seems like even more work went into it than the previous game to make the combat mechanics even better.

Challenge: 7

The AI is not too tough [unless you go into the tougher difficulty levels on the single player modes, although in multiplayer the AI is still weak on Level 9], and the game is simple enough for most people to beat. But the challenge comes from the tedious requirements to unlock everything in the game. The biggest challenge is fighting good players in the Multiplayer mode, nothing else in this game will make you work that hard.

Controls: 9

As I have said, the controls are simple to learn, and only the advanced techniques and attack chains are tough to pull off. The only real problem I have is that sometimes the game moves too fast, and the controls are hyper responsive, but after some practice that should not bother you.

Graphics: 9

You can really see the advancements over the last game when you play this one, all of the characters and stages look great and there is almost no lag in most of the levels [except for Big Blue and Poke Floats on my copy of the game].

In my mind, the Smash Bros games are like a Museum of Nintendo History, and some of the levels have an amazing attention to detail that show off so many things from these classic games that avid players should recognize. Such as the frame-by-frame movement of Mr. Game and Watch, and one of Captain Falcon's alternate costumes being Blood Falcon [the evil clone of Captain Falcon], one of Peach's costumes is Daisy; Mario can wear Wario's overalls. And the levels can have little things from the games, such as Cranky Kong walking around in one of Donkey Kong's stages. You can also see that the pixelation of some things is much less noticeable, whereas in the first game a lot of objects were pixelated, in Melee it is mostly just the attack effects.

Simply put, everything is beautifully designed, and you can see a lot of little details [like the Denim on Mario's overalls], the levels resemble what they were in the games they originated from, and the game itself just looks great.

Sound: 9

I have the same opinion on the sound as I do with the graphics, many people who play this game should recognize the music from the games they were taken from, and the sound effects are very accurate. The only problem I had was that the "audience" in the game did not sound very excited [unlike the first game where they were really pumped up], and Captain Falcon does not sound manly enough.

Atmosphere: 9

What this game intended to do was bring together a bunch of Nintendo Characters, and just let them duke it out, and that is exactly what it does. It makes you feel some of the history of Nintendo with its levels, and the trophies that give information on some great characters and games. And this is all it really needs to do to immerse me.

Multiplayer: 10

As I said before, Melee is just filled with Multiplayer modes, as well as character and stages to develop your own strategies for. And the Multiplayer mode is the best part of this game because Smash Bros games are just built for a party. The multiplayer is actually so good that there are tournaments for this game, with well-known professional players [there are some on this website]. Just take my word for it, get 3 friends, and start playing.

Replayability: 9
The reason to play this game IS the multiplayer, but unlocking everything and getting the trophies will keep you busy.

Pros:
Incredible graphics, larger character and stage roster, great completive play, filled with nostalgia, FALCON PAUNCH!.

Cons:
Too easy, short single player modes, some characters are frustrating to unlock, sedated audience.

Should you get it:
Yes, this is the best selling GameCube game that is currently out, and that is for a good reason.

Overall:

Super Smash Bros. Melee is filled with Nintendo History, and I have spent just as much time admiring all of that as I have spent owning people in the Multiplayer mode with Captain Falcon and Samus. And I got a little notice to everyone who has been living under a rock on this website, Super Smash Bros. Brawl should be released on March 9th, and it has just received a perfect 40 from the Japanese Gaming Magazine Famitsu [the 7th game to get one], if you like Melee you should get that game for the Wii.

9

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 01/16/08, Updated 06/23/08

Game Release: Super Smash Bros. Melee (US, 12/02/01)

Smash Bros Brawl

"Show me ya moves"

Super Smash Bros. Brawl has been an infamous game here on Gamefaqs, SBAllen has had to limit the amount of crap posts that could be on the Forum, and he basically told some of the people on there to stop whining about every damn thing [and I loved that]. This is probably one of the biggest games that this little website has ever seen. Mr. Sakurai, I commend you for making a game that has such a huge following, did you ever think this would happen 9 years ago when the first one came out?

But, since this is a review, I will stop my praise for Mr. Sakurai for now, and I will get to trying to explain what I thought of the game. Let's light this candle.

Story: 7

The story is a small step above what we got last time, but when I heard about a story mode I was expecting a hell of a lot more than we got. In the Adventure Mode, called "The Subspace Emissary", the basic plot is that the Ancient Minister and his Subspace Army are planting bombs that will warp places into Subspace, so you as random Nintendo Characters have to go through this world and stop that from happening.

The story is mainly told through cut-scenes, but I am usually trying real hard to figure out what the hell is really going on, I had no real idea why some of the things that were going on in the story really happened. Like in the Bomb Factory, you control Zero Suit Samus, and her Suit is locked up somewhere in the factory, but WHY was it there. It was just little things like that that confused me about the story, and around the end where the boss of all of these evil characters came out I just got more confused.

All in all, stopping the Subspace Bombs from destroying the world was a decent plot, but I felt that it wasn't explained very well... but the cut-scenes were nice.

Gameplay: 9

I said that the previous game was like the first Smash Bros on crack, but when I played Brawl for the first few minutes I thought it was slower because that the characters were more floaty. But after a while I did not notice it and the fighting seemed just as fast as it did in the last game.

The main game itself does not differ much from what you got in Melee, but it does feel more refined. Most of the characters are very well balanced, and besides a couple of the 35 characters you can play as in this game there isn't really any terrible character. Honestly, if you were good at the game you could win against someone with almost all of the characters. Although, the Roster is not what I really wanted, I would take out a couple of characters and put some other ones in if I had the choice. There are also more stages, you can unlock 41 levels [including a couple from Melee] to fight on, but although they look good, it isn't really much different than what you got before.

The main modes you have are Classic, Subspace Emissary, and All Star mode. Classic is the same thing it has been before, you go through random fights until you reach Master Hand, and you fight him. My only problem was that although Melee had random fights, Brawl seemed to have some things predetermined, like always fighting a Zelda character first. I would of preferred everything being completely random, like how you almost always fought a random character in Melee. SSE is basically an extended version of the Adventure Mode from the last game, it should take most people 7 hours to beat it and although it is fun, it is not as good as I was hoping it would be. And All Star mode is playing against all 35 of the characters with one life, the only difference is that you now fight the characters according to what series they are from, and I like that better than what it was before.

There are also plenty of collectibles in this game, it seems like there are over 500 Trophies and 500 Stickers [Trophies are 3D statues of things from the game, and the characters universe, Stickers are Concept Art from all of those collective universes], and those will really take up you time hunting them down. There are also CD's, which will give you new songs to play in the stages. And there are Demos of old games like Kid Icarus, or Super Metroid.

But what most people really want to know about is the fighting. As I said above it is slower but I did not really notice it after a while, but you still have the simplified fighting game with an emphasis on knocking characters off the stage, and you still have a wealth of items to do so with. You still have the same unpredictable action of the last game, go and enjoy it.

Unfortunately, there was so much crammed into this game [which is the first Dual Layered Wii Optical Disc game], that it can take a very long time to load some things, and a few Wii's broke...

Challenge: 7

This game is tougher than the last two, but that is mainly since you have to do a lot more work to beat the game on the tougher modes, and the payment you have to make of your in-game coins is much steeper than it was before [although you will earn coins faster now]. The AI is better, and even on the Normal difficulty some of the bosses in the SSE are brutally strong, the final boss has a few one hit KO moves that really annoyed me when I was fighting him.

But, if you are one of those Casuals who just wants to get all of the characters and fight with your friends on here, the SSE or Multiplayer mode is an easy way to unlock the characters, and most of the stages are easy enough to unlock. It's just some of the steep requirements to unlock everything that will drive you up a wall.

Controls: 10

I'll make this simple. There are 4 different controller setups using the Wiimote, Nunchuk, Classic Controller, and GCN Controller that you can customize to your liking in the menus. And the characters are incredibly easy to control; even a newbie to the Smash Bros series can do well at this game unless they just press random buttons.

Graphics: 9

Super Smash Bros. Brawl is an excellent looking game, the characters and most of the levels look very well done, and the background behind the stage usually looks great and compliments the stage very well. You can really tell how this game looks better than Melee in some places.

Like always in this series, I was impressed by the attention to detail, Smash Bros games are always a museum on Nintendo's History, and this one went to Smithsonian levels of chronicling history with all of the things from various games you will see beautifully recreated as you play through the game.

The only problem I have is that while the characters look amazing, some of the other things like Pokemon, and some of the other things in the background look very outdated. For example, compare the Pikmin the follow Olimar to how some of the other things in this game look. Luckily these were mostly little things with a lack of detail, and I bet that if they made them look as good as the rest of the game did that the Optical Disc could not contain it all.

But as good as the game looks; it still is not as good as what we have seen in Metroid Prime 3: Corruption and Super Mario Galaxy, but it is damn close.

Sound: 10

While I was unhappy with some of the sound effects you heard when the moves were preformed [the first game had my favorite sound effects], the characters sound great when you hear them, and the Audience cheering for you sounds much better than the zombie-audience in the last game.

But what I really liked was the music. You can get over 250 songs from tons of old Nintendo Games, and you can have whichever ones you like playing more often on their stage . There are so many songs in this game and although they are not orchestral like Galaxy was, most of them sound amazing.

Atmosphere: 9

There isn't really much to say, this is just a fast paced fighting game where you are some character from a Nintendo game fighting other Nintendo characters, and that is exactly what it feels like, along with the nostalgia factor from everything in this game.

Multiplayer: 9

This is the real reason to play this game.

Basically, you have a ton of different modes that you can use, and you have a massive amount of stages [even ones you can create], and you can just get 3 friends and play to your hearts content on this game, which rivals the original Perfect Dark in how many different ways you can play the game.

For the first time in Smash Brows history, you can actually fight against excellent players without having to enter a tournament. The basic things you can do is play with people that you have added to your friend roster, or you can play against random people. But, I felt that we got shafted in some parts.

First, there is considerable lag sometimes when you play online, but it depends on the connection that everyone is using for that to happen. The mode where you play against random people was also poorly done. First, it takes a long time to find someone to play with, and even if you do find someone it takes even longer to find FOUR people [if there are not enough real people, you also have to fight some of the bots]. You only have two minutes in either Team Battle, or Free for All, and you are unable to add people you play with to your friend roster [which is limited to 64 people].

The main reason that this happened in my mind is because that Nintendo finally embraced online gaming recently, while Sony and Microsoft already knew how to get a decent online service. And compared to those two, the Wii's online is crap, but at least its free.

Hopefully, if we get another Smash Bros game, the online will resemble how well some of my Xbox 360 games play online.

Replayability: 10

Online multiplayer, tons of things to collect, stage builder, and being able to customize how you play the game in so many ways. This game is always different, and I bet people will be playing this even after the Wii is dead.

Pros:
Great Graphics, massive soundtrack, plenty of characters and stages, well balanced characters, amazing multiplayer, great CGI.

Cons:
Weak story, lack of graphical detail in some places, prroly done online service, not too much different than Melee, brutal loading time.

Should you get it:
Yes, this is one of the Big 3 in my mind of Wii games [the other two are Metroid Prime 3: Corruption, and Super Mario Galaxy], and every Wii owner should have it.

Overall:

This is an amazing game, it is filled with Nintendo History, and there is a massive character roster. Even if you don't like the games you have to acknowledge that a hell of a lot of work went into creating this game, and it is so big that it has screwed up some of the Wii's out there. And as I said above, this game will be played for a long time, and I won't be surprised if it sells more copies than Halo 3.

9

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 03/17/08, Updated 04/25/08

Game Release: Super Smash Bros. Brawl (US, 03/09/08)

The Conduit

"The kind of Wii game we have been waiting for"

I, like many other Wii owners have been seriously disappointed by the games we have been getting. Instead of a mixture of games made specifically for the Wii to innovate old genres with the Wiimote, and stuff to ease non-gamers into gaming in order to get them to play the tougher stuff, we have been forced to suffer through the last 3 years with crappy minigame compilations, shovelware, lazy PS2 ports, and the few good games that were made by Nintendo and the other companies who were trying to support the Wii and the gamers who owned it. But, thanks to High Voltage Software and SEGA, Hardcore Wii owners finally have something that fulfills the promise of how a classic genre can be innovated and improved with the Wiimote. So, lets light this candle and find out how good The Conduit really is.

Story: 7

The Conduit takes place in the near future, and you play as Michael Ford, a Secret Service agent who is inducted into a secret Government Agency called The Trust after stopping an assassination attempt on President Thompson that was carried out by his own Secret Service agents. Washington D.C. has also been infected with a flu like virus, the Washington Monument was attacked by terrorists, and a Presidential Candidate was assassinated.

The story is told with cutscenes before each of the missions.

When the game starts off, you are sent into Reagan International Airport by Mr. Adams, the leader of The Trust in order to recover a prototype device called the ASE from a terrorist called Prometheus, but when you get there Trust Agents have turned against you, and you have to fight through them in order to recover the ASE on the D.C. Metro. Mr. Ford is then sent to a Bunker Prometheus had taken control of, and has to use the ASE which is a "universal cipher" in order to download all of the information on Prometheus' computers, and he also had to destroy the Neuro-Toxin that was being used to control the minds of the Trust Agents you have fought so far.

But after all of that is done, Mr. Adams betrays you because you have gotten the information that he wanted, and he had no further use for you. Then The Drudge, an insect like alien at the Jefferson Memorial, attacks you. Then you are contacted by Prometheus who is really the good guy, and after you kill all of the Drudge and destroy the portals that they used to get inside the Jefferson Memorial he sends a helicopter to get you out of there.

Prometheus then reveals that he was a member of The Trust who became disillusioned with what they were trying to do and recruited some people from inside the organization to fight against it and steal the ASE. And you agree to help him stop The Trust.

I won't reveal any more, I will say that although the story is a generic Government Conspiracy/Alien Invasion thing that we have all seen before, it is not bad in any way. And, like in Metroid Prime the story gets better if you explore all of the levels instead of blowing through them as fast as you can. You can find Radios where you can hear the Military, Rush Limbaugh parodies, George Noory parodies, hippies who want to befriend the Drudge, and the survivors of the invasion. Listening to these also helps you understand the story better, and knowing about some of the Conspiracy Theories that are mentioned also helps. There are also a few plot twists near the end, and the story did end on an annoying Halo 2 esqe cliffhanger, but that just made me want to play the Sequel even more.

Gameplay: 8

The Conduit seems more like an homage to classic FPS games like Goldeneye and Perfect Dark than some of the newer ones. Most of what you do is run and gun blowing the crap out of Aliens and Trust agents. Most of the levels are corridors, or streets in part of Washinton D.C., and you get to fight in places like the White House, The Pentagon, the Jefferson Memorial, and Trust bases.

Like in Call of Duty games you get through most of the levels by fighting through the Drudge and Trust agents in order to reach the area where they respawn and destroy the portal or egg sacks that the Drudge come from. And there is usually one big battle in each level, or once major objective like saving the Presidents life in the White House level.

You also have to use the ASE to solve puzzles by finding nodes on the wall in some rooms and scanning them in order to open a locked door. And some levels have ghost mines that you need to scan to blow them up or they will explode when you walk into them. The ghost mines are more annoying than the nodes, but only when there are a lot of enemies coming at you while you are trying to scan it, but overall none of these are too much of a hindrance to be annoying.

The weapons are very well done. There are basic human weapons like the MP5, a pistol, the SCAR, and a Shotgun. But the Drudge and the Trust have some cool weapons. Drudge weapons look very organic and they shoot some kind of bio-mass energy. The Strike Rifle was the best weapon they had when I played through the game, it is a semi automatic rifle with a scope that can also be charged up to fire a shot that will disintegrate almost anything it hits. The Trust used more futuristic energy weapons. The weapon they had that I liked the most was the Deatomizer, which is a gun that fires normal rounds like the Strike Rifle, but it can be charged up to fire a couple rounds that will explode and it can be used to kill enemies hidden behind cover.

The enemy AI is pretty good. Sometimes they will just stand out in the open, but they are smart enough to use cover, and they will charge at you if you are reloading, and they will try to gang up on you if there is a big group of enemies, but they will run away if they are alone.

Overall, the singleplayer campaign is very short [5 or 6 hours if you don't try to find everything, not counting the time where you were killed in a level], and it doesn't try to do anything new. But, it is a solid campaign that is fun enough to play.

Challenge: 8

The Conduit isn't too hard, but on the normal difficulty the enemies put up enough of a fight to keep the game from getting boring. Although a few parts of the game like the ambush at the Jefferson Memorial and the last two levels are pretty tough to beat. And there are 5 difficulty levels, like in most games the highest level will be really tough to get through, and I still have to beat it. But, you are able to beat levels with a one shot kill and endless ammo cheat so if you leave those on it won't be very hard.

Controls: 10

Finally, a Wii game that uses the Wiimote the way it was supposed to be used.

The Conduit has fully customizable controls, and you can also adjust the dead zone [where you will turn while moving the Wiimote cursor around], how fast you can move, you can move everything on your HUD around, and you can basically customize the controls as much as you want until you find something that works right for you.

Aiming is easy to do, and you can also lock on to an enemy like you could in Metroid Prime 3 but you still need to be able to hit them. There are also motions for throwing Grenades and Melee attacks that work pretty well.

These are some of the best controls for an FPS I have ever seen, and I hope every Wii FPS will allow you to do customize everything soon. The only way the controls will be bad is if you screw up with the settings [and it you do then you can change them during the game, and you can adjust the dead zone in real time], or if you are too lazy to hold your arm up.

Graphics: 8

For the Wii, The Conduit looks incredible. And it is nice to see a 3rd party developer put an effort into making a Wii game look good.

The detail of the guns, your hands, the ASE, and all of the soldiers and Aliens you are killing surpasses almost everything on the Wii. Although the environments don't have the same high quality, don't get me wrong they still look good, but the texture quality is not as high as the character models are. The engine that the developers created allowed them to do some pretty advanced particle effects, lighting, and bump mapping that I haven't seen in very many Wii games, and I commend them for that.

The artistic quality of the graphics isn't that high, but that isn't necessarily a bad thing because technically it looks incredible for the Wii. The environments do look dilapidated, and everything looks different enough depending on where you are so I'm happy.

The only thing that looked bad to me was the backdrop for some of the levels, although that was only in places like the Library of Congress or the White House where when you looked out the windows the backdrop was very close to you.

The framerate also stays at 30 frames per second most of the time, and if the framerate does drop it isn't anything too serious.

Overall, The Conduit is one of the best-looking games on the Wii although it does not look as good as Metroid Prime 3 or Super Mario Galaxy. I would consider it to be the 3rd best looking game on the system, and its graphics are slightly above Halo 2, which I thought was the best looking game on the Xbox [besides how long it took the textures to load].

Sound: 9

I was very impressed with the audio quality in this game.

It was hyped before the release of this game that Mark Sheppard [Ivan Erwich from season 5 of 24, and Badger from Firefly], his father William Sheppard, and Kevin Sorbo [Hercules] were voicing Mr. Ford, Mr. Adams, and Prometheus. And all of them did a great job with their roles; although I thought that Mr. Ford sounded too raspy sometimes but that's just a minor nitpick. I was impressed the most by Kevin Sorbo's performance during the game. The rest of the voiceovers are pretty good, the stuff that you hear on the radios was well done, and the Drudge sound like they were ripped from Halo but they still sound alien like.

I was also very impressed by the soundtrack for the game. The menu theme was one of the best main menu songs I have ever heard in a video game, and the composers [including Rick Nielson from Cheap Trick] did a great job with the soundtrack.

The rest of the sound effects were pretty good, the noises that come out of the guns sound good, explosions sound like explosions, and everything just fits very well.

Atmosphere: 8

This game does a good job at setting up the standard conspiracy atmosphere, and like in Fallout 3 the developers did a good job creating something that looks like a destroyed Washington D.C. [although not to the same degree as it was in Fallout].

Multiplayer: 9

Although the singleplayer probably won't keep you playing for a long time, this certainly will.

Basically, there are 7 levels based on levels from the game, and 13 modes [although some are copies of each other] and you can play in the Team Deathmatch, free for all, or Objective game categories. The Deathmatch games pretty simple to understand so I won't go over much of that, and there is a Capture the Flag [with the ASE] mode along with Oddball [again, with the ASE]. Bounty Hunter is the most unique, each player has a target and they can only kill that person to gain points, if they kill anyone else they lose points and it is a pretty fun game to play online. I normally play the Team Deathmatch games online because I prefer games like that.

Connecting to a match is easy; it normally takes a few seconds to connect to a match, although sometimes you have to wait a while for the game to load. You can also join matches while they are in progress. Before a match starts, everyone in the lobby is also able to vote for the gametype [the ones you can vote for depend on the category you are playing on], weapon set, and map that they want to play on and the game plays on whichever one got the most votes. The matches have also generally been very lag free for me, and it seems like the only people who have had lag were the ones who have a crappy connection.

I have had a couple glitches, one of them is where the match starts and I have a black screen with a quarter circle, and I have also spawned outside the map and I could not move around at all in both of those. And the entire game has frozen when I started a multiplayer match and the Wii started buzzing. But, those glitches have been rare for me so far, and I assume that they are just server glitches that will be fixed soon.

Overall, The Conduit is the best multiplayer game on the Wii, although considering some of the lag fests on the Wii that isn't saying much. I just wish that they would have had split screen but that might be in the sequel.

Replayability: 9

The singleplayer campaign is very short, but there are achievements, you can unlock cheat codes, you can find all of the Data Discs and Conspiracy Messages that are hidden in most of the levels, and of course you have the incredible multiplayer mode that is almost as good as some of the best multiplayer games on the 360. The Conduit will probably wind up being one of the most played games by anyone with a Wii, especially if it is the only console they own.

Pros:
Great graphics, great soundtrack, decent campaign, best multiplayer on the Wii, finally an effort from a 3rd party Developer, cool weapons, excellent voiceovers, fully customizable controls.

Cons:
Short campaign, no local multiplayer, minor glitches online, environment graphics not as good as character models, Halo 2 ending.

Should you get it:
Anyone with a Wii, especially if it is the only console they own, should buy a copy of The Conduit.

Overall:

The Conduit is one of the best games on the Wii, and although the campaign doesn't do anything new, it does it right, and it does it well enough to be fun, the Quantam 3 engine provided some of the best graphics on the Wii, and High Voltage Software will only continue improving it with games like The Grinder, Gladiator A.D., and the inevitable sequel for The Conduit. The controls show how good an FPS on the Wii can really be, and the multiplayer is the best on the Wii. Overall, The Conduit is an excellent game that should restore the faith of the hardcore gamer in what the Wii is capable of. And other Developers should learn from High Voltage Software and take the time to listen to their fans so they can make their games better.

Also, I would just like to say in case anyone is wondering why some of the flaws I had with the game still merited a 9 that I spent a while trying to decide how major some of the problems I had with the game were, and if I should give it an 8 or a 9. But overall, going by a point scale like the one at IGN I decided that The Conduit was closer to a High 8 [8.6/8.9], so I just gave it a 9.

9

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 06/29/09, Updated 07/01/09

Game Release: The Conduit (US, 06/23/09)

MadWorld

""Put the kids to bed Because you DO NOT want them to see this!""

MadWorld is one of the games that me and my fellow Wii owners have been waiting for, after months of being barraged by shovelware. But, this over the top gore fest from Platinum Games almost makes me forget about how long I have been waiting for some real games to come out on the Wii again. So, lets light this candle.

Story: 8

Surprisingly, MadWorld actually had a good story.

The game takes place in Varrigan City [part of Jefferson Island] which has been attacked by terrorists [called The Organizers], who then cut off all of the escape routes and severed all of the lines of communication with the outside world in the City. Then they released a virus that would kill everyone in the City in 24 hours, and they would only get the vaccine if they killed someone.

After this, the Game Show "Death Watch" comes to Varrigan City, and the rest of the people in the City become contestants, along with some of the other competitors from "Death Watch".

Then, Jack Cayman [your character] comes to Varrigan City and becomes a contestant in "Death Watch".

I won't go over the rest of it, but I will say that everything is part of a conspiracy, and the story is told very well with what looks like animated comic book panels between the levels.

Gameplay: 8

MadWorlds gameplay is pretty simple, you are just going through the levels trying to kill people in order to get enough points to reach the boss of the area [who is one of the ranked contestants].

Jack's main moves are punches, grabbing people so you can throw them, or using a chainsaw on your prosthetic arm.

The levels are all filled with enemies, and you are capable of picking up weapons like a spiked baseball bat or a spear that you can carry around. And you can use parts of the level as weapons, like impaling signs and candle sticks into someones head, or using some of the hazards in the level to kill your opponents [flaming barrels, dumpsters, saw blades, spiked walls, falling spiked ceilings, etc]. And all of this gets very bloody, the entire object of the game in the main parts of the levels is to kill people as brutally as possible [using the environment to administer the most pain as you possibly can] so you are just allowed to be as sadistic as you want to be while you are beating the crap out of everything in sight.

There are also minigames called BloodBath Challenges where you are trying to do something like Man Darts [self explanatory] or trying to knock as may people as possible into some object before the time runs out. Some of them like Man Darts are really fun, but some of them like Money Shot were just frustrating to me.

After you get enough points, you get to do a Boss Battle, and these are really fun. They are all about learning the patterns of your opponent, and knowing when to initiate a Power Struggle which basically makes you shake the Wii-mote in the direction indicated on the screen to do a lot of damage to the Boss.

Overall, the game is really fun to play, but it is just really short which knocked the score down a little bit. And some parts of the game are frustrating.

Challenge: 6

MadWorld is not very hard to beat on your first play through, I beat the game in 5 or 6 hours without having to look anything up. The only real challenges are the Bosses and some of the Mini Bosses. Other than that the game is just a cakewalk where you will be covering the levels in blood.

But, once you beat the game you unlock a harder difficulty mode which will make the game a lot tougher to beat.

Controls: 8

The Wii Remotes motion controls are used very well in MadWorld.

Jack is easy to control, and it is easy to learn how to fight with the Wii-mote.

The motion gestures are used for finishing moves, some of the attacks, and the Power Struggles. Although they work well like I said above, your hand will probably get tired after a while from shaking the Wii-mote a lot.

The only real problem I have with the controls is that the camera isn't that great, and it takes too long to lock onto someone.

Graphics: 8

Although MadWorld won't win any awards for technical graphics, since some of the polygons are pretty blocky. But artistically, MadWorld is one of the best looking games I have ever played.

Everything is presented in Black and White, except for some yellow for action bubbles like in Comic Books, and she showers of Red [and some Blue] blood. And this makes MadWorld look similar to Frank Miller movies like "Sin City" and "The Spirit". And although some people were not sure how well having everything in Black and White would work out, it is effective and it is still easy to tell what everything is.

The massive amounts of gore are also handled well, and everything looks so over the top that you won't be disgusted by it, even when you are brutally slaughtering everything around you.

Overall, everything is well animated, the levels are well designed, and all of the characters are also well designed. There are also some great looking cut scenes that look like panels from a Comic Book.

Sound: 9

The sound is one of the best parts of MadWorld.

The main thing that I thought was done the best here was the voiceovers for the Announcers played by John DiMaggio [Kreese Kreeley, a former "Death Watch" contestant] from "Futurama" and Gears of War, and Greg Proops [Howard Holmes, a perverted announcer guy] from "Whose Line is it Anyway". They both did a great job voicing the vulgar commentators who made the game so much more entertaining to play through. The rest of the people who voiced the main characters also did a great job.

The sound effects were also well done, and they made it much more satisfying to shove a sign through someones head when you can hear the sound of blood pouring out of them. And the speakers on the Wii-mote play the sound of Jacks Chainsaw when you swing it.

The music was also surprisingly good, even though I normally hate Rap, I did not mind the music in this game.

The only problem is that sometimes it gets hard to hear everything because the sound effects, the announcers, and the music often wind up playing over each other and you can't hear them very well unless you turn some stuff down.

Atmosphere: 8

Overall, MadWorld is just an ultra violent game show, and that is exactly what the game makes you feel like you are in. And the story is told well enough to keep you interested throughout the game.

Multplayer: 6

The only Multiplayer in the game is being able to do all of the BloodBath Challenges with a friend of yours. But I don't think many of the people here ill play that for very long.

Replayability: 6

Unfortunately, MadWorld is just a very short beat-em-up, so there isn't much to do after you beat the game. You can do the Multiplayer mode, or you can do the hard mode, but other than that there isn't much in the game to keep you playing after you beat it.

Pros:
Exactly what most of the Wii owners on here have been waiting for, hilarious commentators, good story, great stylistic graphics, good controls, fun to play, fun boss battles.

Cons:
Short, wrists will hurt after a while, bare-boned Multiplayer mode, overloaded with sound.

Should you get it:
I would recommend buying MadWorld, but it is a very short game so you might be better off renting it.

But, as many people as possible should buy MadWorld to show the rest of the Developers that Wii owners aren't just the elderly, people under 10, and parents. They are gamers just like the people who own a PS3 or an Xbox 360, and we want more games like what they get.

Overall:

MadWorld is an over the top, violent, hilarious game. And it is currently one of the best games on the Wii. Hopefully, we will be getting more fun stuff like this because there is a drought on good Wii games right now.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 03/23/09

Game Release: MadWorld (US, 03/10/09)

SoulCalibur

"The Dreamcast Classic, Now Available on the Xbox 360"

Most of you should know about the original Soul Calibur game that was on the Sega Dreamcast, although many of us never got to play it [including me] because of how the PS2 caused the Dreamcast to go down in flames. Luckily, the good people at Namco are allowing a new generation of gamers to finally experience this game by porting it to the Xbox 360 Arcade.

Story: 6

Unfortunately there is no real story in this game, mainly because the story mode had to be taken out so the game would be small enough to get past the 150 Megabyte limit on XBLA games. But from what you see, the game is basically about the two swords called Soul Edge [evil] and Soul Calibur [good]. Soul Edge is being wielded by Nightmare, who is the quintessential evil ******* in this game, so you have to beat him.

You can also look at the Character Profiles to get a look at their story, but I haven't checked all of them yet. It also isn't really delved into during this game, but everything takes place in 1587.

Gameplay: 7

Comparing everything in this game to Soul Calibur III [or IV which will be out in a couple weeks] will show you just how much has advanced in the series, but Soul Calibur is still an excellent game with very well balanced characters.

As I said above, the Story Mode was taken out because of the limitations on size for Xbox Live Arcade games, even though those limitations were removed recently [but just a little too late for Soul Calibur]. But you still have the Arcade mode, which is exactly what it sounds like, a fight through 8 characters. Its nothing special but it is fun. You also have some things like Survival or Team Battle, which are also exactly what they sound like.

All 19 characters also come unlocked with the game [as does every other bonus in the game] without you having to do any work. And as I said before, they are very well balanced and fun to play as.

Challenge: 6

All you have to do is beat Arcade Mode with every character to consider it finished, the AI's difficulty also varies on what level you set them on, but no matter what you will do everything there is to do very quickly.

Controls: 8

Thankfully, the 360 Controller is similar enough to the Dreamcast one that you can control the characters very fluidly. As soon as you memorize how to do all of the combos [which will take a while], you should be able to easily pull them off.

Graphics: 9

Back in 1999 when this game first came out, it was hailed as a Graphical marvel, and proof of just how much Graphics could advance. And it still looks great today, even though some people are whining about "no Wide Screen support".... boo-hoo.

The characters and the levels all look great and there is a lot of detail to everything. And Soul Calibur is also one of the best looking games on the Xbox Live Arcade from what I have seen.

Sound: 7

I don't know what the sound was like on the original version, but this port defiantly takes a hit here.

The sound effects, and the Music are great, but the problem is that there are no English Voiceovers for the characters [everything else is]. I have looked in all of the menus and I could not find a way to take them off of Japanese. I have no idea why English was not put in, it just sounds like laziness too me.

Atmosphere: 8

The story is nonexistent in this game, but the complex fighting is enough to immerse you.

Multiplayer: 8

Soul Calibur gets even better when you an play with a friend, but unfortunately you are unable to play online so everything ha to be local. If you can get a friend over to play with you [which may be tough now, since everyone loves going online so much] you should have fun.

Replayability: 6

After you have done everything there isn't much left to do except play Multiplayer. And as I said before, everything comes unlocked with the game and Story Mode was removed so that took out a few hours of time that could be spent with the game.

Pros:
Lets more people experience the classic game, well balanced characters, great graphics.

Cons:
Removal of Story Mode, Starting game with everything unlocked decreases replay value, lack of English voice overs, no online multiplayer.

Should you get it:
You only have to pay 800 MS Points for this game so if you have never played the first one, or just want to have something to help get ready for Soul Calibur IV in a couple weeks go ahead. But if you have a Dreamcast, then stick with that version.

Overall:

Soul Calibur is often thought of as the greatest fighting game of all time, and while this port of the classic Dreamcast game does not live up to that, it is still a great game. And if Namco was able to get everything into this game, and include Online Multiplayer, I would of definitely bumped up the score to a 9.

7

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 07/07/08

Game Release: SoulCalibur (US, 07/02/08)

[Joe]

No More Heroes

"The Kiddy Image of the Wii has just been assassinated"

No More Heroes is the latest game from our favorite Japanese madman, Suda51 from the company Grasshopper Manufacture. Like most of his games, there is some hilarious writing, and buckets of blood.

Now, this game is a great change of pace from the recent shower of crap that Wii owners like myself have had to wade through like Carnival Games [or basically ANY Minigame Compilation on the system], it is great that we are finally getting some "real" games that actually have a plot, but sadly No More Heroes has a few problems that keep it from being as great as it could be. Lets light this candle.

Story: 8

Personally, I loved the story because I knew before I bought that game that Suda's games were absolutely bizarre, twisted stuff. I am saying this because if you do not know that, and if you cannot deal with that then you will not really like this game very much.

The basic premise of No More Heroes is that you are an Otaku named Travis Touchdown who is obsessed with wrestling, video games, porn, and Anime/Manga. At the beginning of the game he gets a Beam Katana on some kind of Ebay site [basically, a Lightsaber with a little bar on the side to make it seem more realistic], and takes on an assassination job to kill Helter Skelter. Having done so, he becomes the 11th ranked assassin in the UAA [United Assassins Association], and begins rising the ranks to become #1 now that he has become a target.

One of the things that I loved about the story was just how bloodthirsty Travis was, he would even say things like "there is nothing more exciting than hunting your fellow man", along with the freaky people you wound up fighting. I found almost every single person I met that was a main character to be deliciously insane, along with the dialog you would hear that is some of the most entertainingly vulgar stuff I have ever heard. You will even see plenty of things in the story that are satirizing several things in the gaming industry itself.

Now, I will leave the rest of what I did not reveal for you to find out, it is so much more entertaining if you can experience it yourself without me blabbing it to you.

Gameplay: 7

I was not sure how to score this part, once you begin playing the game you will notice that almost everything you do is highly reminiscent of the old 80's Arcade beat-em-ups, and so many things seem like they were intentionally bad. But I'll cover that later.

What you will be doing for most of the game is running around Santa Destroy doing odd Jobs, or Assassination gigs to earn enough money to enter the next ranking battle. Personally, I thought that a lot of the Jobs were boring and I would just do the Assassination levels where you could earn a lot of money at once so I could make a lot of money really fast.

There are also plenty of things to collect, you can buy clothes, videos that contain Wrestling moves [more on that later], training to make you more powerful, collectible Cards, and upgrades for your Beam Katana's.

The combat in this game is simple enough. You are mostly using your Beam Katana, and some Melee moves [including the Wrestling moves] in order to kill whomever you are fighting. After you have their health lowered enough, you get the Wiimote signal to swing it in some direction and get a gorey finishing move. You can also enter "Dark Side" mode if the slots on the bottom of the screen line up, which makes you really powerful.

The basic thing you want to do in this game is get into the Ranked Matches, and those are really worth the 50 bucks you will wind up shelling out for this game. Basically, you are in some part of the City with whoever the freak you are fighting is [my personal favorite was the guy in the superhero suit with a Crotch Laser], and you really have to think to take them down.

Unfortunately, even though there are some amazing boss battles in this game, the rest is not much that is too exciting. After you begin the quest to get to the next ranked match, you will often have to traverse through a bunch of cookie-cutter Arcade-esqe baddies and slash them up until the door opens, and you can move on to the next area. This is not really much fun, most of them are really easy to kill, and you are just fighting the same damn thing over and over again. Another problem is the City, when you get do drive around in it there is just not much out there that is too exciting to do, and you can't even do much in the City so id does not seem like it was worth including in some parts.

But make no mistake, even though there were some damned monotonous parts in this game, the Boss Battles were exciting, and all of the references of the old Arcade Games were entertaining to see.

Challenge: 7

There is not too much of a challenge in this game. If you know how to make money fast then you will get to the ranked matches soon enough, and the only enemies that will give most of the people on this website a challenge are the Bosses. Luckily, there are some tougher difficulties that will be enough of a workout to complete.

Controls: 8

No More Heroes is a good example of how Wiimote controls should be done. Moving around is easy enough, and there is not too much of a strain on your wrist because the only real time you will have to swing the remote around is when you have to give the finishing blow, or when you use a wrestling move. One of the more entertaining things about the controls for me was the animation you saw when Travis was recharging the Beam Katana by shaking it, you just have to see it for yourself.

Graphics: 7

Unfortunately, this game is not a visual masterpiece for the Wii .

As I said, you will see some boring areas throughout the city, and most of the cookie cutter enemies you fight look almost exactly the same.

But, there is also a great art style to keep the game from looking horrible. Most of the main characters are very well designed, the clothes that you can buy look great, the Beam Katana has a nice Lightsaberey glow effect, and the shower of blood you will see when someone is hacked in half is just so damn entertaining to watch. But, there are also some very well done Arcade-esqe menus in this game that look like they were ripped directly from the Atari 2600, almost everything is done in Pixels, and the green frame really reminds me of battlefield.

The only serious problem I had with the graphics is that there is a horrible frame rate, and there are many pop up issues when you are driving around the City.

Don't let these flaws bother you too much, there is a great artistic direction, and the stylized blood that will cover the entire screen when you are really hacking away at people is just part of the charm of this game.

Sound: 9

Thankfully, the sound in this game was good enough to keep me entertained.

The main things that I liked were how well most of the characters were voiced, so many things in this game just made me laugh out loud the first time I heard them. Also, you should keep in mind that this is a very twisted game, and like with the blood there is also a torrent of expletives that you should not allow younger people [or your parents/grandparents] to hear unless you know that they can handle it. The sound effects are also well done, although what I heard the most was the sound of the Beam Katana

Unfortunately, everything else was kind of bland. But the high quality of everything else made up for it.

Atmosphere: 7

The story is decent, and all that will really immerse you is all of the crazy things you will hear people saying during the cutscenes. Other than that there isn't much to captivate you unless you just like hacking up people.

Replayability: 7

After you have beaten the game it is not as much fun as the first go through. All I would recommend is to get the "real" ending, beat the tougher difficulties, and try to collect all of the items.

Pros:
Hilarious writing, great artistic style, great boss battles, excellent voice-overs.

Cons:
Poor graphics, horrible frame rate, repetitive, boring City.

Should you get it:

I would advise any Wii owner who is sick of all of the shovelware we have had to deal with to get this game. Although, if you want a serious game then stay away.

Overall:

No More Heroes is a great game that had a few problems. Luckily, part of the charm of this game is just how absurd everything you will see in it is, and how much this game is basically a parody of old Arcade games in the way parts of it play out. Anyone who has not tried this game should buy it as a way to hold himself or herself over until the next real Wii game that actually has a damn story in it comes out.

8

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 04/15/08

Game Release: No More Heroes (US, 01/22/08)

Modern Warfare Reflex

"A good [but rushed] port of a great game."

So, two years after Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare comes out and the Wii finally gets its version of the game? I got an Xbox and its version of CoD 4 back in 2008 so I got to play it, but I was curious about how different the Wii port would be and luckily the original game is still intact, although it is obvious that the game really had to be tuned down so it would work on the Wii. So, lets see how it stands up compared to the original and some of the other Wii FPS games.

Story: 9

The story has never been a real issue for Call of Duty games; you were basically recreating certain missions from the Allied Forces campaign against Nazi Germany. But other than a memo/log-entry before the level starts, and some cut scenes there was never a real story.

But Call of Duty 4 has finally provided an in depth story, which was good enough for a movie. Everything starts off with you playing as Sergeant "Soap" MacTavish, an operative of the British S.A.S. infiltrating a cargo carrier to look for a "package" when the ship is sunk be enemy Jets and you have to escape. You play as "Soap" for the majority of the game, and most of his missions are in Russia. You also play Sergeant Paul Jackson of the Marine 1st Force Recon for part of the game, and you play as him for the part of the game that takes place in the Middle East.

The main plot of this game is to stop the leader of the Russian Ultra-nationalists Imran Zakhaev and his ally Khaled Al-Asad who is a leader of some of the revolutionary forces in the Middle East from launching Nuclear Warheads at the United States as revenge for the "fall from glory" after the Cold War which obliterated what was then the Soviet Union.

What I said above is basically all you need to know, and I'll let you figure the rest out on your own. But unlike the other games there was an intense story in Call of Duty 4, which was very well written, and parallels what is going on in the world today.


Gameplay: 9

As always in the Call of Duty series, Call of Duty 4 provides an immersive cinematic experience, and an epic campaign. And even though I assumed that since this was a Wii port the gameplay would be dumbed down, but almost everything was intact.

As I said in the brief plot outline, you are mainly playing as a SGT. in the Marines, or the S.A.S., but there are some exceptions. In one level you play as the gunner on an AC-130 Gunship, and you get to play as Captain Price [Lieutenant. Price in the S.A.S. campaign] in two levels set 15 years ago in Chernobyl.

The Weapons have been changed now that we are in a more modern setting, and like the previous games you are using real weapons that are currently being used today, such as the AK-47, M4A1 Carbine, M16, Uzi, and the P90. There are also C4 explosives, RPG's, Homing Rocket Launchers, and many more weapons, but other than some cosmetic things like some guns having Grenade Launchers and Laser Scopes, it still feels exactly as good and realistic as the previous games' weapons did. You are also capable of firing through some materials now such as wood, and thin metal to make the game seem even more realistic. The engine is capable of judging certain things about the material and the weapon that was used to damage whoever was behind it.

The AI is also exceptional, your allies can protect you but you still should not rely on them, and the people you are fighting effectively use cover and make you think when you fight them. When you are moving through a level you really need to think about where you need to go, and what path will provide the most cover.

And finally, the Campaign itself is excellent. The epic storyline, and the brutal combat make the levels exciting to play through, as well as the different levels, such as firing out of the AC-130 Gunship, or sneaking through Chernobyl in a Ghillie suit on an assassination mission. The levels are also more dramatic than the past games where you were constantly pelted by bullets, they spend a little more time telling the story now and it makes the campaign feel really cinematic. The only problem is that it is way too short, but considering how Infinity Ward trys to make every level good instead of using filler missions to make the game longer it isn't as bad.

Challenge: 8

The challenge for this game is pretty much the standard for Call of Duty games, there are 4 modes, and the challenge is somewhere between easy and frustratingly hard depending on which you choose. I would probably recommend playing on Hardened mode over Veteran, because Hardened is tough, but Veteran is downright sadistic. I did not spend too much time on the campaign while I rented this game but I did manage to beat 3 levels on Veteran, and "Charlie Don't Surf" [the first "real" level] is brutal on that mode. Also, try to kill the dogs in some levels before they leap on you and give you a tracheotomy, especially on the higher difficulties because it can be tough to time the Melee attack you need to kill them.

If you play on the tougher levels, sure it is REALLY difficult, but it can be done. All I can really say is that the easy mode is more cinematic, but when you play on Veteran it is as close as you can get to experiencing a real war. Just try hard and do it. It will also really give you an appreciation for what the brave men and women are doing overseas because they do have battles like this.

Controls: 7

The controls are mostly the same as the ones from the World at War port, but the framerate issues can make it tougher to get an accurate shot on someone. When the game doesn't get choppy you can easily target people and there are several different settings that change the sensitivity of the Wiimote depending on how well you can use a Wiimote in FPS games.

The only thing that I did not like was how you select the Grenade Launchers, C4, Night Vision Goggles, etc. You have to hit left on the D-Pad and move the control stick on the Nunchuck to select them, and it is a little awkward to do, especially when you are being shot at.

Overall, when the framerate doesn't slow down, the controls work as well as any other good Wii FPS. But when they don't, an already tough game gets even harder.

Graphics: 7

We all knew that something had to go when this port was announced, and it was pretty obvious that the Graphics would take the biggest hit. Although it looks better than the first screenshots we saw [which looked like an early PS2 game at the best to be honest] and I thought the graphics were good, there are just some performance issues that made this score lower than it would have been.

For a Wii game, what they were able to do with this port is very impressive. Besides some fog to keep the polygon count down and less detail to the sky The levels weren't scaled down a lot. And it is obvious that the polygon count along with the texture detail for everything would go down but even with that this is still one of the better looking ports on the Wii.

Now we get to the problems with the graphics.

As I already mentioned, the framerate has a tendency to tank below 30 frames per second when there is a lot going on, and it can also make your aim less precise. And the part that annoys me the most is that I don't remember this happening with the World at War port, it seemed like they had people working on it long enough to work out all of the bugs, but this CoD 4 port seems like someone just decided to get Call of Duty 4 and rip the minimum settings from the PC version and add the Wiimote controls from World at War to it.

If they took more time to work on the game and fix up the framerate, I would have probably given the graphics a 9, and the game itself would have a higher rating. But this laziness just hurts the consumer because we wind up paying 50 dollars for something that Activision seemingly only spent a couple months on so they could get a quick buck without doing any work.

Like I said, this is a good looking Wii game, the levels, characters, weapons, and particle effects look good. But the apparent lack of time spent fixing the bugs causes the framerate to dip a lot and it hurts my overall impression of the graphics.

Sound: 9

One of the most important things in a War game is if it sounds good, graphical issues can be overlooked sometimes, but if it does not sound right it won't be as good of a game. Luckily they nailed the sound in this game, and it would be nowhere as good if the sound were not at the high quality that we were given.

There are plenty of voice-overs that you will hear, and none of them sound really bad, like always there are good actors doing the dialog for the characters and it sounds good enough to be in a real War movie. There are also plenty of realistic sound effects. The guns, the explosions, and basically all of the sound effects sound very realistic and believable.

The real impressive thing is the epic score that like every other game in the series, Call of Duty 4 has. Some of the things in this game would be nowhere near as good, like the final battle in "Return of the Jed" [or any of the really good scenes in "Star Wars"]; it just would not be the same without the great music. The only bad thing was the rap at the end of the game, but that seemed like it was intentionally bad when I listened to it.

The only flaw with the audio is that it sounds like the files were compressed although I was under the assumption that Wii games could handle the same audio quality as a 360 game. But as we all know these Developers always find ways to get lazy with their Wii ports…

Atmosphere: 7

The plot is good, the graphics are good for a Wii game, and there is a great soundtrack. But the framerate issues that also affect the controls were frustrating enough to keep me from getting immersed into the game like I was with the original version of CoD 4.

Multiplayer: 9

Most of us probably know about the multiplayer for Call of Duty 4 so I won't go into as much detail here as I normally would.

Basically, you still have all of the modes and levels from Call of Duty 4, and you can still level up so you can unlock new weapons and complete challenges to unlock some attachments and camouflage for them along with new perks.

Although you still have to use the damn Friend Codes for Private Matches and you can only play with 10 people online there isn't any considerable lag but the problem with hit detection with some weapons [especially ones without a fast fire rate] from the World at War port is still around.

Besides a couple of minor problems, this is the same thing you got on the 360 and PS3 versions, except you don't get to hear any of the freaks that play online with those systems because Wii Speak isn't used with this port [to the best of my knowledge].

Replayability: 9

The Multiplayer has everything from the 360 version, and you can still go through the game on Veteran mode or try to find all of the Laptops so you can get some cheat codes. If all you have is a Wii and you need some FPS games to play online, you will play this one for a long time.

Pros:
Its still Call of Duty 4, good campaign and multiplayer, not the typical dumbed down Wii port.

Cons:
Short campaign, Veteran difficulty is sadistically hard, not enough USMC missions, choppy framerate that can also hinder the controls, graphics and audio are obviously downgraded, appears to be another rushed Wii port that didn't have all of the bugs worked out.

Should you get it:
If you don't have an Xbox 360 or PS3, you should get this game. If not, you're better off just renting this to see how everything works on the Wii.

Overall:
Although the developers seemingly rushed this port out so they could cash in on Modern Warfare 2 coming out, this is still a good port that any Wii only owner should try out. Considering how a lot of Developers can't port some of their good games onto the Wii, this one is good enough to take up the time of any Wii owner even though there are some blatant flaws.

7

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 11/23/09

Game Release: Call of Duty: Modern Warfare: Reflex Edition (US, 11/10/09)

Call of Duty 3 Wii

"Another Botched Wii Port..."

Over the last few years one of the most frequently seen genres was the WWII Shooter, and while most of them have been crap, back in 2003 when Infinity Ward released the first Call of Duty which went on to win a Game of the Year award, we knew somebody got the formula down. Fast forward to 2006, Treyarch who also did CoD 2: Big Red One has taken the reigns of Call of Duty for the odd numbered games in the series and made a version of the game for almost every system that exists now, but was it as good as what Infinity Ward does? Well lets light this candle and find out...

Story: 6

We all know that WWII games aren't really known for their story, because they are mostly just reproducing real battles as realistically as they can. Although the entire story of World War II is a great one [and I recommend that anyone who does not know it checks it out], most of the games based on it don't really tell the story very well.

So, what was done with this game to rectify that was a attempt at making us like the characters... but that fell flat too. Mainly because their stories are not interesting at all. Compare this to... the next game in the series Call of Duty 4 where almost all of the main characters were very likable, and if one of them died then you would probably feel sorry for them.

Now, as for what the main story was... Everything takes place after the Normandy Breakout, and the story is based on the liberation of France by the Allied Forces. You also play as an American, British, Canadian, and Polish soldier which helps give you a feel of just how much manpower we needed to pry Hitlers grip off of France.

So, as I said, you are going through the time it took to liberate France, you are playing as soldiers from four Countries, but the story is poorly told even though the fighting is damned authentic.

Gameplay: 7

Call of Duty 3 plays like most war games, but they put in a couple new things that I thought hurt the game more than it helped it.

As I said, you are basically reenacting the liberation of Paris, and the massive firefights are very well done, I will give credit to that, and I will acknowledge that the AI is impressive and when you crank up the difficulty you really feel like you are fighting a War. The basic gameplay is the same as all of the Call of Duty games, fighting hordes of endlessly respawing baddies until you can press forward into their territory.

But, the problem is all of the extra crap that was put in, most of the mini-games that are required to do things like setting a bomb on something just are not very fun, the levels where you drive a Jeep were not very fun because the Jeep controlled horribly, and close quarters combat was just freakin' annoying.

Other than that, if you want a campaign that is filled with some of the most intense firefights that have been seen in a recent WWII game, you damn well got it.

Challenge: 8

I have pretty much the same feeling with the challenge of all of the Call of Duty games, when you play on the easy mode it won't take you very long to finish the game. But if you are playing on the tougher modes you are in for a real fight that will take a lot of patience, luck, and skill to finish.

That is all you really have to know, and I think I have to tell you that trying to complete the Veteran mode of a Call of Duty game is one of the toughest things I have ever tried to do with modern games.

Controls: 4

While the 360 version has great controls, the Wii version shows just why the Developers should know what the hell they are doing before they decide to make a Wii game.

The controls when you are on foot are decent, although they are confusing at first because that the tutorial does a horrible job explaining how to do some of the things. The biggest problem I had was remembering how to Reload and I often wound up just emptying my clip or accidentally hitting the control pad and throwing a grenade, I also found that the Nunchuk Reload method was not very responsive. Hell, most of the gestures you used to do something did not work very well.

Another problem was with driving, which was just too damn confusing using the Wiimote and Nunchuk as a steering wheel instead of just the Wiimote.

But the most annoying was the close quarters combat controls. While pressing buttons was easy enough on the 360... using the Wiimote was horribly unresponsive and after I often wound up dying and having to repeat the sequence my arms were tired and I had to take a break.

So, Treyarch, next time just let the people at Retro Studios do the controls for you because they are the only company that has gotten FPS controls right so far.

Graphics: 7

One of the things that Call of Duty has always been known for was an attention to detail with almost everything in the environment, and the fact that the look incredible. And Call of Duty 3 is no exception to that rule.

While the Wii version does not have the graphical horsepower of the 360, and this is quite evident when you are comparing how the game looks normally to the Cinematics and the Intro Trailer which looks like the 360 version. It still looks quite good

The basic things that you should notice is that the environments have been recreated very well, the guns look a lot like their real life counterparts, the Soldiers look great, and the vast scale of all of the battles, war torn environments, and some of the best environmental/particle effects I have ever seen capture the feeling of war, and all of the more advanced visual effects that can be done now that help draw you into the battle even more.

The only flaws that I noticed is that the partially destructible environments were not animated very well, because like always when this is done, everything just breaks apart in the same way every time and it only looks good the first time... hopefully what we will see in Star Wars: The Force Unleashed in September will change that. And that some of the textures are kinda muddy, and up close the Nazi soldiers look like aliens.

Sound: 8

The rule that I mentioned above also applies to the sound, and I cannot stress this enough; the sound for a war game is one of the most important things, and if it is done wrong then the entire game suffers.

So what can I say? The sound effects are amazing on a basic sound system, but they are phenomenal on Surround Sound, the chatter of the AI is well done, and the Orchestral Score is beautifully done.

Hell, if you have Surround Sound you can hear where all of the voices, and bullets are coming from in the game, thats impressive.

The only fault that I can find in the sound was that some of the jokey dialog was not very good.

Atmosphere: 9

If you were paying attention to what I said above you already know what I am going to say. Everything is incredibly realistic, the graphics look amazing, and the sound is some of the best I have ever heard in a video game. This is almost as close as you can get to experiencing WWII, thats all I can really say about how immersive it is.

Replayability: 6

All you can do on the Wii version play the missions, but they are not as fun as the ones in the other games although they still fun enough to do. Unfortunately, Nintendo did not have Wi-Fi up yet for the Wii so they did not bother with putting any form of Multiplayer in this game, but hopefully Call of Duty 5 [if it does get released on the Wii like I heard it might] will rectify this.

Pros:
Amazing graphics and sound, very realistic, fun campaign, challenging.

Cons:
Horrible controls, boring minigames, tough controls for vehicles, lack of features compared to 360 version, campaign is good but does not live up to the standards Infinity Ward set.

Should you get it:
The Wii version was hit hard by the horrible controls, and not having any multiplayer mode compared to the one that is in the PS3 and Xbox 360 version. I would only recommend getting this version if all you have is the Wii like I did when I got it, luckilly I have a 360 now and I also own the version on that one [got it for free] so I can play that one if I want to play CoD 3 again.

Overall:

Call of Duty 3 is a fun game, but the fact that the controls were horribly done and the lack of features compared to the 360 and PS3 version substantially harm the quality of this version. But Call of Duty 3 also helps give you appreciation for what our Soldiers are doing, so if you meet a Veteran shake their hand!

6

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 05/29/08

Game Release: Call of Duty 3 (US, 11/14/06)

World at War Wii

"One of the Best FPS Games on the Wii"

I have to apologize to the people at Treyarch, in my Call of Duty 3 review [the Wii version, not the 360 one] I mocked them for how badly the controls were done, and I said that they should just let the people at Retro Studios do the controls because they are the only ones who can get them right. Well, luckily Treyarch proved that they could make a great game when they have the time to work on it and Call of Duty: World at War turned out to be more than a PS2 port with some waggle. So, lets light this candle.

Story: 9

I don't think that most War games tell the story of what is going on very well, because you are just going through the battles. But Call of Duty: World at War did a great job with two of the bloodiest campaigns in World War II.

You are playing as the Americans and the Soviets this time, the American campaign takes place during the war in Japan which provided the Call of Duty series with some enemies that tried different strategies for once... and the Soviet Campaign went through Germany all the way to when the Allied Forces captured the Reichstag.

There are also only 4 characters that you will really want to pay attention to, your characters for the two campaigns; Private Miller in the American Campaign, and Private Dimitri Petrenko of the Red Army. The other two main characters are your Sergeants, Sergent Roebuck and Sergent Reznov [voiced by Kiefer Sutherland from "24" and Gary Oldman]. I also think that Rezonv has a guy crush on your character in the Soviet Campaign... just listen to some of the things he says.

The two Sergent's turned out to be much better characters than the people in Call of Duty 3 who tried to get some emotion from me but failed.

The game also does a good job at capturing the emotions of both of the armies. In the beautiful cinematic's that are played before the Missions, and the dialog in the game you get a sense of how desperate the Americans were to win the war and how much they hate the Japanese, and the Soviets want to wipe the Germans out for what they did to Russia.

The game is also darker than the previous game [Call of Duty 4], everything starts of with you playing as Private Miller being tortured by the Japanese before you are rescued, and the Soviet campaign begins with the Germans executing members of the Red Army who are barley alive after an attack.

The game makes you want to get revenge on the Germans and the Japanese, and the entire story is told very well.

Gameplay: 8

You know that Call of Duty games are very well done when they can just keep doing the same thing in every game and it is still so much fun to play.

Basically, you are in areas that are recreations of battles from World War II, and you are fighting endless waves of Nazi's and Japanese soldiers as you are trying to push your way through the linear levels until you complete the level. Basic sounding stuff, but the quality of the AI, and how fun the game is to play override that.

The enemy AI differs for the Japanese and the Germans, the Germans still play they same way they have been for the last 5 years. But the Japanese are different enough to provide a decent challenge. The Japanese hide underground, in trees, and some of them will rush at you and try to stab you with a sword or a bayonet. But the ones that try to stab you are just human versions of the dogs in Call of Duty 4, and like with the dogs you can stab them in the neck if they get close enough to kill you.

The weapons are also fun to use, you get the standard Bolt Action Rifles, Submachine Guns, and the rest of the WWII staples that have worked so well in the last 7 or 8 games. But there are some new things that I enjoyed using, like the Molotov Cocktails and the Flamethrower. Even with the limitations of the Wii's hardware you can still light a good portion of the level on fire.

The only real problems I have had with the game was that sometimes the AI can seem like it is pretty stupid, I have seen Germans that kept jumping up and down behind cover, and the fact that you have to move to a certain point before your allies will press forward. I also had a hard time with the Tank Level because the fog that is used in so many games made it hard to see enemy tanks, and of course there is the cheapness of the really high difficulty levels where 10 Grenades will be thrown at the spot you are standing in.

But overall, Call of Duty: World at War plays very well.

Challenge: 9

This is probably one of the toughest games in the series.

If you are playing on the right difficulty level then things won't be too bad, but when you play on the tougher levels then you are just going to get yourself killed a lot. I already mentioned the Grenades, and to be honest in the higher difficulty levels you have to memorize how to move throughout the levels because getting shot 3 or 4 times will kill you.

The Japanese levels will also be tough if you can't stop the Banzai's from running up to you because if you don't have perfect timing with the button/remote waggle that lets you stab them in the neck once they knock you down, you're screwed.

But you have to keep in mind that all of the higher difficulty levels in Call of Duty games are downright sadistic.

Controls: 8

Giving this a high score made me very happy because I like seeing Wii games that use the Wiimote effectively for once.

You use the Wiimote to Aim, and you move around with the Nunchuck. The rest of the buttons and some Wiimote wiggling perform everything else.

Luckily, compared to Call of Duty 3, everything is more responsive, and you are also able to adjust the sensitivity of the Wiimote so it is more or less responsive, or so it will move slower. There are so many ways you can adjust the aiming to fit your style, even the configurations in Metroid Prime 3 were surpassed. I would also recommend that since most of us know how to aim pretty well with the Wiimote, make it as sensitive as you can, and make the little "bounding box" thing as small as possible so you can turn around faster.

Graphics: 8

I am still impressed at how well the Call of Duty 4 engine has worked on the Wii. Obviously the Wii version doesn't look as good as the 360 one [which I still need to get], but this is still damn impressive for a console where most of the Developers don't even put any damn effort into their games.

The guns and the areas you are in, like war torn German and Russian cities, Japanese forests, and Castles look great. The flamethrower also produces some of the best looking fire that I have seen on the Wii. Overall, it is how great the environments look that makes the Wii version of Call of Duty: World at War look good.

Sadly, the Character Models don't look as good as the levels do, they aren't really changed much from how they looked in Call of Duty 3. But you won't really be up close with them enough to notice, and the only time that they look really bad is when a Banzai trooper is in your face.

Overall, even though the Wii hardware is outdated, it still looks good enough to make you feel like you are really in the places you are fighting at.

Sound: 8

Yet again, a Call of Duty game has had some of the best sound effects I have heard in a Video Game.

The voice-overs were well done, especially the ones by Gary Oldman and Kiefer Sutherland. But the Germans still have the same screams they have had since the first game... maybe it is time to hire some new people to scream in German.

The sound effects were great; there is the constant sound of bullets going by you and explosions in most parts of the game. But it felt like most of the weapons sounded really puny compared to what they sounded like before, it sounds like they just didn't make their noise loud enough.

The music is also great, in the areas where you hear it the music really fits. And I just have to single out the Russian choral music that played near the end of the last level, that was just an incredible song and everyone here should turn up their TV during that part.

Overall, the sound was great as well.

Atmosphere: 9

What can I say that I haven't already said? Call of Duty games always make you feel like you are a part of the War, and this one is no exception.

Multiplayer: 8

I am glad that I got to play this one online because it is the first FPS I have played online with my Wii. And it turned out better than I expected.

You get to go into a level with 7 other people playing as one of the 4 factions in the game depending on what level you are in. And the features from Call of Duty 4's multiplayer that made it so much fun are still intact.

You get to level up like you did in the previous game, and as you level up you unlock more Weapons, attachments for them [like a Silencer, or a Bayonet for the Rifles], and you unlock Perks that give you special abilities, like doing more damage, dropping a Grenade when you die, or having more health. The kill bonuses are also in the game, you can get a Recon Plane, a Bombardment, and you can release Attack Dogs when you reach a certain number of kills. Although the Dogs are more of a pain in the ass than the Helicopter was in Call of Duty 4.

It is also entertaining to hear Kiefer Sutherland saying "Out-*******-Standing" when you win a match as the Americans.

The only disappointment that I had was that I had a hard time shooting some people. I know that my crosshair was on them, but the bullets didn't hit them. Although I'm guessing that it was just an occasional connection problem. But other than that, this is a fun game to play online and I am hoping that The Conduit [can't wait for that game to come out] can improve on that next year.

Replayability: 7

Some of the features that are in the 360 version aren't in this one, but the Multiplayer should be enough to keep the few people that have this game on the Wii [compared to the others] coming back.

Pros:
Great controls for a Wii game, great campaign, great sound and graphics, well done voice-overs by Kiefer Sutherland and Gary Oldman, fun Multiplayer, burning people with a flamethrower is fun.

Cons:
Cheapness of AI on higher difficulty levels, wimpy sounding weapons, hit detection problems online sometimes, still the same thing that we have been doing for 5 years.

Should you get it:
Most of the time a Wii port of a game is just one that you should get if you don't have the other console, but I would get Call of Duty: World at War to go with the 360 version.

Overall:

Treyarch did a great job on this game, and they have proved that people can actually put effort into a Wii game. I enjoyed Call of Duty: World at War on the Wii, but now I have to do it again on the 360.

8

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 12/01/08

Game Release: Call of Duty: World at War (US, 11/10/08)

Madden 10 Wii

"This is what fun looks like?"

Madden 10 is EA Tiburon's latest entry into the Madden Series, but because this one the the Wii port and EA is simplifying all of their Wii games things got really different here. First off, let me just say that I loved the 360 version of Madden 10, and I rented this one to see how good it was compared to the "real" version, but although there were some things I liked I was just disappointed by it. So, lets get into this review and see what works and what doesn't.

Story: 3

The only story in this game is the Franchise mode where you play through the season to make it to the Superbowl with your favorite team. But, the complete lack of any real presentation in this game made the franchise mode made it feel like I was just doing a bunch of exhibition games. You also have to unlock the Franchise mode and the Superstar modes [which are still about as barebones as you can get in the Wii version] so that makes it even worse. But there is still the Road to the Superbowl mode, which also doesn't have any story to it, it feels even more like an exhibition game, mainly because you can't manage your team, you just go through the games to earn points. I like to see some presentation that makes me feel like I'm going through the season, but I got squat. What else do I have to say?

Gameplay: 7

Madden 10 is fun, but I was unhappy with how bastardized the entire game was so that it could "appeal" to more people who most likely, only bought their Wii for Wii Sports and Wii Fit.

I already mentioned a couple of the modes. Superstar is what it always was, making your own player and going through your career with him trying to make it big, but it still needs a lot of work to be really good. Franchise is the same as it has always been too, just go through the season and manage your favorite team through the regular season, and the offseason. But like with Superstar mode, it is a pretty lackluster effort on here while its big brothers on the 360 and PS3 are a lot more impressive. Then there is some stuff like Road to the Superbowl, Huddle Up Mode, Madden Showdown, and 5 on 5 games along with the usual 11 on 11 games. Overall, these games aren't that great, 5 on 5 is basically a simplified version of the game for the non-gamers who can't handle 11 on 11, and they feel like EA was just trying to get more people to play at one time. Thats all well and good, but when these games are so simple that the people who want a deep, advanced football simulator that is as close as the real game as possible are left behind it just feels like EA is judging all Wii owners as people who have never played a video game before they got their Wii, and they need something as simple as possible, and that kind of mentality just annoys the hell out of me.

So overall, is it fun; yes, if you are playing with other people. But it is also so simple that a lot of the fun from the "full" versions of Madden was negated.

Challenge: 4

Like I already said, the game is so simple a toddler could probably win a match against the AI. While turning up the difficulty does help make the game tougher, and the AI isn't bad, everything just feels like it is too easy to do.

Controls: 7

The controls actually had a few things that I liked, but the useless waggle curse of Wii games was still present.

Now, I only used the "new" controls, the ones from All-Play [last years game] were still in the game but I didn't care for them last time so I did not try it out in here. But I like the pointer controls a lot in this game, while you can still pass by hitting the corresponding part of the D-pad and shaking the Wii-mote, using the pointer to highlight a receiver and pass it to him works very well in this game. And selecting a player by clicking on them with the pointer is also better than hammering down on a button in the 360 version until you get the one you want.

Now, what I did not like were all of the Waggle QTE's where you were basically prompted to shake the Wiimote a certain way to break tackles or break through the offensive line, mainly because they were too easy. In the 360 version, you can still do these things, but they don't work anywhere near as well as they do for you in this game. Basically skill doesn't matter very much in this game, you can always just waggle like a madman and win the game.

I also did not like the speed that you moved at. While the other versions of the game slowed down the game to make it feel more realistic, it still felt like you were moving fast enough. But in this version I think I can probably walk faster than these guys can run because of how freaking slowly they move.

The menus are also frustrating to navigate with the controls, although Madden has always had confusing menus.

So, the controls do some things right, but its on the Wii so they still get lazy and make you wiggle the damn thing around enough to make your wrist get sore.

Graphics: 6

First off, I'll say that although some of the new character models in this version look good, there are some very nice lighting effects and the players look good while they are moving but the animations are still a little stiff [its nothing like the Pro-Tak engine in the other versions of the game]. But, they also do not look like anything that belongs in a Football game. This is part of what I got mad about, while games like ESPN Football 2k5 can have graphics almost on par with the 360 Madden games, and they did that on the original Xbox, the Wii is a more powerful system than the Xbox, the Developers still can't make a game that looks realistic on here. And I assume that it is easier for them to just be lazy and make the entire crowd into sprites, make the stadiums look like cheap knockoffs of the real versions, and giving all of the characters a bizarre cartoony looking makeover in order to appeal to a bigger audience of people who think that the other versions of Madden are too hard, and little kids.

Yes, the character models look good, and yes the football bouncing on the field looks better than it did last year, but a Football game should not look like this, if you are going to make a Football game on the Wii at least show some respect to the audience by trying to make it like the other versions instead of dumbing it down because "its on the Wii" and then spouting that arrogant "this is what fun looks like" message over and over again.

Well, that mini-rant is over, lets move on to the next section.

Sound: 7

While the soundtrack is as good as it was in the other versions, the commentary sounds like the voice files were compressed more than they were on the Nintendo 64 versions of Madden. And the Commentary still has problems, Cris Collinsworth does a good job and he is interesting enough to listen too, but Tom Hammond just sounds like he is bored and the compression makes him sound even more like a zombie.

The sound effects on the field are decent enough, the players make the sounds that they should when they hit each other, and the Wii-mote's speaker warns you when you are about to get sacked, or when one of your receivers is open. But I swear that I heard some of the sound effects from one of the N64 versions of Madden a couple times, I know I recognized when they say "hut" in the huddle from Madden 2001 but how much else was recycled like that?

Overall, the audio in this game is decent but not great, just like most of the other stuff in the game.

Atmosphere: 4

While the other versions of Madden spent a lot of time improving the presentation, this one did almost nothing and even took a few steps backward at making it feel like a football game. Franchise mode makes you feel like you are running a football team, but that about all it has going for this game presentation wise, and the casualization of the game just decreases what was left of the immersion for me.

Multiplayer: 7

One of the few things I really liked about this game is that it was fun to play with other people. EA made it very easy to get into a game with a couple of your friends, and the entire point of the game was to get people who would never play Madden because it was too tough for them to finally get into a game, and on that notion they succeeded. Most of the modes I already mentioned are playable in multiplayer, and you can play online too, but the community is small and it isn't much different than playing against a better version of the AI.

Replayability: 6

Unless you can get some friends to keep playing with you there isn't much of a reason to keep playing. But at least you can download the roster updates online as the season goes on.

Pros:
Good character models/character lighting, good multiplayer, Collinsworth, decent controls.

Cons:
Too much waggle, too simplified, bizarre new graphical direction doesn't fit the game, Hammond, audio compression, lack of challenge.

Should you get it:
I would not recommend buying this game unless you only have a Wii, but then I would only rent it.

Overall:

Madden 10 on the Wii is just another example of a game being hindered not improved by trying to appeal to the children, non-gamers, Wii Fit owners, and grandparents that the perceived audience of the Wii is, instead of catering the the hardcore sports game players who typically buy Madden games. I saw signs of Madden 10 trying to appeal to both of them, and it just hurt the entire game because you can't do both of those very well, especially with a game like this. Overall, while Madden 10 on the 360 and PS3 had some serious innovations that helped the franchise, the Wii version just too several steps back and knocked the image of the Wii for the hardcore gamers on this site even further down the pit of death.

6

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 08/31/09, Updated 02/05/10

Game Release: Madden NFL 10 (US, 08/14/09)

[Joe]

Call of Duty 3 360

"Infinity Wards baby brother provides a decent WWII Game"

Over the last few years one of the most frequently seen genres was the WWII Shooter, and while most of them have been crap, back in 2003 when Infinity Ward released the first Call of Duty which went on to win a Game of the Year award, we knew somebody got the formula down. Fastforward to 2006, Treyarch who also did CoD 2: Big Red One has taken the reigns of Call of Duty for the odd numbered games and made a version of the game for almost every system that exists now, but was it as good as what Infinity Ward does? Well lets light this candle and find out...

Story: 6

We all know that WWII games aren't really known for their story, because they are mostly just reproducing real battles as realistically as they can. Although the entire story of World War II is a great one [and I recommend that anyone who does not know it checks it out], most of the games based on it don't really tell the story very well.

So, what was done with this game to rectify that was a attempt at making us like the characters... but that fell flat too. Mainly because their stories are not interesting at all. Compare this to... the next game in the series Call of Duty 4 where almost all of the main characters were very likable, and if one of them died then you would probably feel sorry for them.

Now, as for what the main story was... Everything takes place after the Normandy Breakout, and the story is based on the liberation of France by the Allied Forces. You also play as an American, British, Canadian, and Polish soldier which helps give you a feel of just how much manpower we needed to pry Hitlers grip off of France.

So, as I said, you are going through the time it took to liberate France, you are playing as soldiers from four Countries, but the story is poorly told even though the fighting is damned authentic.

Gameplay: 7

Call of Duty 3 plays like most war games, but they put in a couple new things that I thought hurt the game more than it helped it.

As I said, you are basically reenacting the liberation of Paris, and the massive firefights are very well done, I will give credit to that, and I will acknowledge that the AI is impressive and when you crank up the difficulty you really feel like you are fighting a War. The basic gameplay is the same as all of the Call of Duty games, fighting hordes of endlessly respawing baddies until you can press forward into their territory.

But, the problem is all of the extra crap that was put in, most of the mini-games that are required to do things like setting a bomb on something just are not very fun, the levels where you drive a Jeep were not very fun because the Jeep controlled horribly, and close quarters combat was just freakin' annoying.

Other than that, if you want a campaign that is filled with some of the most intense firefights that have been seen in a recent WWII game, you damn well got it.

Challenge: 8

I have pretty much the same feeling with the challenge of all of the Call of Duty games, when you play on the easy mode it won't take you very long to finish the game. But if you are playing on the tougher modes you are in for a real fight that will take a lot of patience, luck, and skill to finish.

That is all you really have to know, and I think I have to tell you that trying to complete the Veteran mode of a Call of Duty game is one of the toughest things I have ever tried to do with modern games.

Controls: 7

Basically, you're getting the same thing you always get in a Call of Duty Xbox 360 game, it all works fine and you probably won't complain much about it. Although some of the Vehicles and mini-games are a pain in the ass to do.

Graphics: 8

One of the things that Call of Duty has always been known for was an attention to detail with almost everything in the environment, and the fact that the look incredible. And Call of Duty 3 is no exception to that rule.

The skill that has been gained in making games look good on the Xbox 360 has been vastly increased, and this is evident when you compare this game with Call of Duty 2 which was a launch title for the 360 back in 2006.

The basic things that you should notice is that the environments have been recreated very well, the guns look a lot like their real life counterparts, the Soldiers look great, and the vast scale of all of the battles, war torn environments, and some of the best environmental/particle effects I have ever seen capture the feeling of war that could not have been done this well on the previous consoles because of all of the more advanced visual effects that can be done now that help draw you into the battle even more.

The only flaw that I noticed is that the partially destructible environments were not animated very well, because like always when this is done, everything just breaks apart in the same way every time and it only looks good the first time... hopefully what we will see in Star Wars: The Force Unleashed in September will change that.

Sound: 9

The rule that I mentioned above also applies to the sound, and I cannot stress this enough; the sound for a war game is one of the most important things, and if it is done wrong then the entire game suffers.

So what can I say? The sound effects are amazing on a basic sound system, but they are phenomenal on Surround Sound, the chatter of the AI is well done, and the Orchestral Score is beautifully done.

Hell, if you have Surround Sound you can hear where all of the voices, and bullets are coming from in the game, thats impressive.

The only fault that I can find in the sound was that some of the jokey dialog was not very good.

Atmosphere: 9

If you were paying attention to what I said above you already know what I am going to say. Everything is incredibly realistic, the graphics look amazing, and the sound is some of the best I have ever heard in a video game. This is almost as close as you can get to experiencing WWII, thats all I can really say about how immersive it is.

Replayability: 7

The only reason to play this game over is the Multiplayer mode, but I never played that because I got this game a long time after Call of Duty 4 came out, and the community is probably very small now . You could play the missions, but they are not as fun as the ones in the other games although they still fun enough to do.

Pros:
Amazing graphics and sound, very realistic, fun campaign, challenging.

Cons:
Boring minigames, tough controls for vehicles, campaign is good, but does not live up to the standards Infinity Ward set.

Should you get it:
Now that Call of Duty 4 is out I would only recommend this game to hardcore CoD fans and WWII aficionados.

Overall:

Call of Duty 3 is a fun game, but the fact that it was developed by a lesser developer than Infinity Ward who has perfected the War game made it seem like a worse game than it is, but in no way does that make it bad. It also helps give you appreciation for what our Soldiers are doing, so if you meet a Veteran shake their hand!

8

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 05/29/08

Game Release: Call of Duty 3 (US, 11/07/06)

Modern Warfare

"They Raised the Bar Even Higher...."

Call of Duty 4 is the latest war game from the award winning developers at Infinity Ward, and they have set the bar for realism, authenticity, and the sheer brutality of war than they already have with their previous Call of Duty games. And they have raised the bar to almost insurmountable heights for the other developers who choose to make games based on any kind of War. So, lets light this candle...

Story: 9

The story has never been a real issue for Call of Duty games; you were basically recreating certain missions from the Allied Forces campaign against Nazi Germany. But other than a memo/log-entry before the level starts, and some cut scenes there was never a real story.

But Call of Duty 4 has finally provided an in depth story, which was good enough for a movie. Everything starts off with you playing as Sergeant "Soap" MacTavish, an operative of the British S.A.S. infiltrating a cargo carrier to look for a "package" when the ship is sunk be enemy Jets and you have to escape. You play as "Soap" for the majority of the game, and most of his missions are in Russia. You also play Sergeant Paul Jackson of the Marine 1st Force Recon for part of the game, and you play as him for the part of the game that takes place in the Middle East.

The main plot of this game is to stop the leader of the Russian Ultra-nationalists Imran Zakhaev and his ally Khaled Al-Asad who is a leader of some of the revolutionary forces in the Middle East from launching Nuclear Warheads at the United States as revenge for the "fall from glory" after the Cold War which obliterated what was then the Soviet Union.

What I said above is basically all you need to know, and I'll let you figure the rest out on your own. But unlike the other games there was an intense story in Call of Duty 4, which was very well written, and parallels what is going on in the world today.

Gameplay: 9

As always in the Call of Duty series, Call of Duty 4 provides an immersive cinematic experience, and an epic campaign.

As I said in the brief plot outline, you are mainly playing as a SGT. in the Marines, or the S.A.S., but there are some exceptions. In one level you play as the gunner on an AC-130 Gunship, and you get to play as Captain Price [Lieutenant. Price in the S.A.S. campaign] in two levels set 15 years ago in Chernobyl.

The Weapons have been changed now that we are in a more modern setting, and like the previous games you are using real weapons that are currently being used today, such as the AK-47, M4A1 Carbine, M16, Uzi, and the P90. There are also C4 explosives, RPG's, Homing Rocket Launchers, and many more weapons, but other than some cosmetic things like some guns having Grenade Launchers and Laser Scopes, it still feels exactly as good and realistic as the previous games' weapons did. You are also capable of firing through some materials now such as wood, and thin metal to make the game seem even more realistic. The engine is capable of judging certain things about the material and the weapon that was used to damage whoever was behind it.

The AI is also exceptional, your allies can cover your ass but you still should not rely on them, and the people you are fighting effectively use cover and make you think when you fight them. When you are moving through a level you really need to think about where you need to go, and what path will provide the most cover.

And finally, the Campaign itself is excellent. The epic storyline, and the brutal combat make the levels exciting to do, as well as the different levels, such as firing out of the AC-130 Gunship, or sneaking through Chernobyl in a Ghillie suit on an assassination mission. The levels are also more dramatic than the past games where you were constantly pelted by bullets, they spend a little more time telling the story now and it makes the campaign feel really cinematic. The only problem is that it is way too short. On my first run-through I played on Recruit so I could just go through the levels and be better prepared for my Veteran run, and it took me 4 or 5 hours [of almost non-stop playing] to do the all levels. I know most FPS games are short but come on...

Challenge: 8

The challenge for this game is pretty much the standard for Call of Duty games, there are 4 modes, and the challenge is somewhere between easy and frustratingly hard depending on which you choose. I would probably recommend playing on Hardened mode over Veteran, because Hardened is tough, but Veteran is downright sadistic. I did not spend too much time on the campaign while I rented this game but I did manage to beat 3 levels on Veteran, and "Charlie Don't Surf" [the first "real" level] is brutal on that mode... thank god you get a lot of Achievement Points for the Veteran levels. Also, try to kill the dogs in some levels before they leap on you and give you a tracheotomy, especially on the higher difficulties because it can be tough to time the Melee attack you need to kill them.

If you play on the tougher levels, sure it is REALLY difficult, but it can be done. All I can really say is that the easy mode is more cinematic, but when you play on Veteran it is as close as you can get to experiencing a real war. Just try hard and do it. It will also really give you an appreciation for what the brave men and women are doing overseas because they do have battles like this.

There is also one other thing you can do if you want to up the challenge, look for the 30 Intel Laptops scattered throughout some of the levels, you will get 2 Achievements if you find all of them, and some cheat codes when you reach a certain number of Laptops.

Controls: 8

As I have said many times, the 360 Controller is well made for FPS games, you move fluidly and everything is done very well. The only thing I did not really like was that with the standard controls I had to press down the left stick to use my Knife, because I am used to crouching with that. I would recommend that everyone here use the "Tactical" controls.

Graphics: 9

I have to commend Infinity Ward for their ability to create some of the most realistic looking war torn environments in any video game.

The most gorgeous part of this game is just how realistic the levels looked, I was playing on a Standard Definition TV and I still thought that it looked amazing, and since Video Games look a lot better on HD-TV's I can only imagine that it looks a lot better than it did when I played. There are also incredible weather effects, such as the rain you see in the level "Crew Expendable" The Missile Silos, the dark Russian Fields, the fog covered Chernobyl, the virtually obliterated Middle Eastern cities, and the rest of the environments looked amazing, and I really have to commend the Developers for that.

But the characters are no slouch in this department either, their uniforms look incredibly realistic, their animation is very well done, and they just look really lifelike.

Simply put, Call of Duty 4 looks amazing, simple as that, you really have to see it for yourself.

Sound: 10

One of the most important things in a War game is if it sounds good, graphical issues can be overlooked sometimes, but if it does not sound right it won't be as good of a game. Luckily they nailed the sound in this game, and it would be nowhere as good if the sound were not at the high quality that we were given.

There are plenty of voice-overs that you will hear, and none of them sound really bad, like always there are good actors doing the dialog for the characters and it sounds good enough to be in a movie like "Platoon", "Saving Private Ryan" or "Full Metal Jacket". There are also plenty of realistic sound effects. The guns, the explosions, and basically all of the sound effects sound very realistic and believable.

But the real impressive thing is the epic score that like every other game in the series, Call of Duty 4 has. Some of the things in this game would be nowhere near as good, like the final battle in "Return of the Jedi" [or any of the really good scenes in "Star Wars"]; it just would not be the same without the great music. The only bad thing was the rap at the end of the game, but that seemed like it was intentionally bad when I listened to it.

In short, it is the same thing as I said above, you need to hear the game yourself to understand why the sound is so good.

Atmosphere: 10

As with almost any other war game, Atmosphere is of utmost importance. Luckily Infinity Ward has shown a dedication to making the Call of Duty series as realistic and believable [for a video game] as possible. You can just insert some of the things I said in the above sections into here as well for the reason I gave this category a 10; great story, great graphics, great AI, and great sound. As I said in the intro, the bar has been raised yet again for realism in this Genre.

Multiplayer: 10

This is one of the reasons that Call of Duty 4 has become more successful than I ever expected it to do, the Multiplayer surpasses that of Halo 3, and they pushed the expectations for future Multiplayer kill-fests even higher than Halo did a short time ago.

The main aspect that I like about the multiplayer is has customizable it is, as you level up you gain more weapons, you also can do challenges by doing specific things to get more experience so you can level up again, and you can unlock add-ons for your weapons, and camouflage for your weapons. The things you unlock are things like Grips to make you more accurate with some weapons, Laser sights, Silencers, and long range Scopes, and the Camo ranges from urban colors, to the Golden Gun. You also unlock "Perks", and you can only use 3 of them from 3 different categories at one time, such as Martyrdom [drops a live Grenade when you die], Juggernaut [more health], Stopping Power [more power], Double Tap [higher rate of fire], and many more things that help you. You can also come up with some really cheap combos [Martyrdom and Sonic Boom] to make people mad.

There are also several different modes, as I said I spent most of my time on Death Match which is basically what it says: kill everything that is trying to kill you. There are also some variations like Hardcore , and Old School which is more like Goldeneye where you have to find the weapons and Perks instead of starting off with exactly what you set your character up with.

The Matchmaking system is also even better than Halo's, because in Halo you got a random gametype according to the Playlist you chose, but in Call of Duty 4 you can choose the gametype you want, and you will get put in with some random match. Unfortunately there can be some very poor team balancing in some games, much like in Halo 3 sometimes you get on the Team that just obliterates the other team, and sometimes you are the one getting pwned. I just hoped I wound up on an evenly matched fight, because it is more fun when you have to think.

I also think that Call of Duty requires more strategy than Halo does online, whereas in Halo you have a Shield, and can fight in the open, in Call of Duty you need to use Cover a lot and if you stay out in the open you will get killed by a Sniper really fast, or an enemy Air strike/Chopper could hit you.

But like with most Multiplayer games, the biggest problem is the immature little kids, bigots, and other slime bags that you have to listen to if your Mic is plugged in. So mute the annoyances, and try to play with your buddies as much as possible.

In short, Call of Duty has a massively customizable Multiplayer that is one of the best currently on the Xbox 360, and it really makes you think. I just hope you have good reflexes or you are getting the crap kicked out of you by the veterans of this game.

Replayability: 9

There is a great multiplayer, but there is no Co-Op in the Campaign, which is a disappointment. But I am certain that people will be playing this game online until the next big game comes out and they all flood over to that.

Pros
AMAZING atmosphere, excellent Graphics and Sound, high quality multiplayer, epic campaign

Cons
Short campaign, Veteran difficulty is sadistically hard, not enough USMC missions.

Should you get it:
Yes you should, and if you're one of those people who only plays this one and has never tried the older Call of Duty games, just get them now, you won't regret it.

Overall:

Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare is an excellent game, and it has possibly perfected the war genre. These games that Infinity Ward has created will be the standard by which all other games of its kind will be judged, I am certain of it.

Also, this game should give everyone a lot of respect for all of the brave men and women fighting in the War on Terror, risking their lives to protect our freedoms. You must remember, what they do is a lot like what Sgt. "Soap" was doing in this game, and whenever you meet a veteran just think of what they had to do and give them a handshake to thank them for what they did. They damn well deserve it.

9

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 03/10/08, Updated 06/08/09

Game Release: Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (US, 11/05/07)

World at War 360

"Call of Duty 4.... With World War II Makeup."

Although a lot of people were mad that Treyarch decided to bring the sequel to the amazing Call of Duty 4 [developed by Infinity Ward, the best War game developers in the business] back to World War II, and that fact that a lot of people did not like Treyarch's previous Call of Duty game [CoD3]. World at War turned out very well, but it could not live up to how good CoD4 was. Lets light this candle.

Story: 9

I don't think that most War games tell the story of what is going on very well, because you are just going through the battles. But Call of Duty: World at War did a great job with two of the bloodiest campaigns in World War II.

You are playing as the Americans and the Soviets this time, the American campaign takes place during the war in Japan which provided the Call of Duty series with some enemies that tried different strategies for once... and the Soviet Campaign went through Germany all the way to when the Allied Forces captured the Reichstag.

There are also only 4 characters that you will really want to pay attention to, your characters for the two campaigns; Private Miller in the American Campaign, and Private Dimitri Petrenko of the Red Army. The other two main characters are your Sergeants, Sergent Roebuck and Sergent Reznov [voiced by Kiefer Sutherland from "24" and Gary Oldman]. I also think that Rezonv has a guy crush on your character in the Soviet Campaign... just listen to some of the things he says.

The two Sergent's turned out to be much better characters than the people in Call of Duty 3 who tried to get some emotion from me but failed.

The game also does a good job at capturing the emotions of both of the armies. In the beautiful cinematic's that are played before the Missions, and the dialog in the game you get a sense of how desperate the Americans were to win the war and how much they hate the Japanese, and why the Soviets want to wipe the Germans out for what they did to Russia.

The game is also darker than the previous game [Call of Duty 4], everything starts of with you playing as Private Miller being tortured by the Japanese before you are rescued, and the Soviet campaign begins with the Germans executing members of the Red Army who are barley alive after an attack.

The game makes you want to get revenge on the Germans and the Japanese, and the entire story is told very well.

Gameplay: 8

You know that Call of Duty games are very well done when they can just keep doing the same thing in every game and it is still so much fun to play.

Basically, you are in areas that are recreations of battles from World War II, and you are fighting endless waves of Nazi's and Japanese soldiers as you are trying to push your way through the linear levels until you complete the level. Basic sounding stuff, but the quality of the AI, and how fun the game is to play override that.

The enemy AI differs for the Japanese and the Germans, the Germans still play they same way they have been for the last 5 years. But the Japanese are different enough to provide a decent challenge. The Japanese hide underground, in trees, and some of them will rush at you and try to stab you with a sword or a bayonet. But the ones that try to stab you are just human versions of the dogs in Call of Duty 4, and like with the dogs you can stab them in the neck if they get close enough to kill you.

The weapons are also fun to use, you get the standard Bolt Action Rifles, Submachine Guns, and the rest of the WWII staples that have worked so well in the last 7 or 8 games. But there are some new things that I enjoyed using, like the Molotov Cocktails and the Flamethrower, which is capable of lighting some parts of the level on fire, and burning the hell out of Japanese Soldiers.

The only real problems I have had with the game was that sometimes the AI can seem like it is pretty stupid, I have seen Germans that kept jumping up and down behind cover, and the fact that you have to move to a certain point before your allies will press forward. And of course there is the cheapness of the really high difficulty levels where 10 Grenades will be thrown at the spot you are standing in.

But overall, Call of Duty: World at War plays very well. Although it does feel like you are just playing a Call of Duty 4 mod that takes everything back to World War II

Challenge: 9

This is probably the toughest game in the series.

If you are playing on the right difficulty level then things won't be too bad, but when you play on the tougher levels then you are just going to get yourself killed a lot. I already mentioned the Grenades, and to be honest in the higher difficulty levels you have to memorize how to move throughout the levels because getting shot 3 or 4 times will kill you.

The Japanese levels will also be tough if you can't stop the Banzai's from running up to you because if you don't have perfect timing with the button/remote waggle that lets you stab them in the neck once they knock you down, you're screwed.

But I just need to mention the Grenades again. No matter where you are, they are still able to lob two or three of the damn things at you, so you just have to keep running around constantly or you are going to get blown up. Unfortunately, this usually means that you are going to be out of cover, and visible to insanely accurate AI... then you are dead anyway.

But you have to keep in mind that all of the higher difficulty levels in Call of Duty games are downright sadistic.

Controls: 8

Call of Duty: World at War uses the same control setup that the previous games have used, and it still works very well. It is still easy to aim, and the precise controls have a couple of customizable settings so that everyone can find something that works.

Graphics: 9

Call of Duty: World at War uses the same engine as CoD4, and it is utilized very well. World at War is an incredible looking game that surpasses how good the previous game looked.

The environments are gorgeous, you get to reenact battles in Japanese forests, castles, and the typical war torn German and Russian cities. But they are all very well designed, and they make you feel like you are really fighting in World War II.

The character models also look good, and the new feature that lets you blow off part of their arms, legs, or head makes the game seem even more realistic. And even though I have seen the guts of a Japanese Soldier hanging out after I shot them with a machine gun, it never got too gratuitous. The only difference between that, and a normal death is that there is more blood spurting out, and you can see some extra chunks of meat hanging out of their body.

The special effect look great as well, Smoke Grenades create a realistic looking smoke screen, the lighting is good, rain looks good, and the fire from your Flamethrower looks real, and it is also capable of burning down some of the trees and the grass in the Japanese Levels which makes it easier to play some of them, since you can remove their cover.

Overall, everything looks very realistic in Call of Duty: World at War.

Sound: 9

Yet again, a Call of Duty game has had some of the best sound effects I have heard in a Video Game.

The voice-overs were well done, especially the ones by Gary Oldman and Kiefer Sutherland. But the Germans still have the same screams they have had since the first game... maybe it is time to hire some new people to scream in German.

The sound effects were great; there is the constant sound of bullets going by you and explosions in most parts of the game. And most of the weapons sounded similar to their real world counterparts.

The music is also great, in the areas where you hear it the music really fits. And I just have to single out the Russian choral music that played near the end of the last level, that was just an incredible song and everyone here should turn up their TV during that part.

Overall, the sound was great as well.

Atmosphere: 9

What can I say that I haven't already said? Call of Duty games always make you feel like you are a part of the War, and this one is no exception.

Multiplayer: 8

Call of Duty: World at War is pretty fun online, and it takes everything that gave Call of Duty 4 the best multiplayer set-up of this Generation, and applied it to a World War II game. But it isn't as much fun as the original was.

The matchmaking system works very well, connecting to a match happens very quickly [you could learn something from this Epic Games, fix GoW 2's multiplayer damn it!] and you usually get a random level [that you can veto].

You get to level up like you did in the previous game, and as you level up you unlock more Weapons, attachments for them [like a Silencer, or a Bayonet for the Rifles], and you unlock Perks that give you special abilities, like doing more damage, dropping a Grenade when you die, or having more health. The kill bonuses are also in the game, you can get a Recon Plane, a Bombardment, and you can release Attack Dogs when you reach a certain number of kills. Although the Dogs are more of a pain in the ass than the Helicopter was in Call of Duty 4.

There are also tanks now, and while this isn't too bad, the game would be better without them. They are easy to destroy, and I don't think that driving them helps out very much. Halo 3 had some good vehicles in the Multiplayer mode, but they just don't work very well in Call of Duty.

It is also entertaining to hear Kiefer Sutherland saying "Out-*******-Standing" when you win a match as the Americans.

Overall, the Multiplayer is good, and you still need to play strategically like you did in CoD4 because if you screw up you will die pretty quickly. But CoD4 had the better Multiplayer.

You also got to do some Co-Op and Nazi Zombies.

Co-Op lets you do the campaign with 4 friends, and you can also make it a competitive match where you compete to get the most points. You can also use "Death Cards" that you pick up during the game to activate cheats that do things like making someone explode if you get them with a head shot.

Nazi Zombies is something where you have to repel endless waves of Nazi Zombies, and you get points for each one you kill, or repairing the windows. And you use those points to buy new weapons, or opening up new areas of the building you are in. Its a fun survival mode, but it is tough.

Replayability: 8

Fun Multiplayer, Co-Op, Nazi Zombies. You have plenty to do after you beat the game.

Pros:
Great campaign, great sound and graphics, well done voice-overs by Kiefer Sutherland and Gary Oldman, fun Multiplayer, Nazi Zombies, burning people with a flamethrower is entertaining.

Cons:
Cheapness of AI on higher difficulty levels, vehicles aren't very useful in Multiplayer, still the same thing that we have been doing for 5 years.

Should you get it:
If you are a fan of Call of Duty games, or just someone who enjoys a good FPS, then get this game.

Overall:

Although Treyarch did a great job on this game, it could not live up to how high my expectations were after CoD4: Modern Warfare. But that does not mean that it is a bad game, although, it is very similar to Call of Duty 4.

8

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 01/07/09

Game Release: Call of Duty: World at War (US, 11/10/08)

Hey You Pikachu!

"Why Won't You LISTEN!!!!!!"

This is just another example of the shower of Pokemon Games that were plopping out while it was at its peak popularity, the Pokemon Franchise was multiplying like a pair of Rabbits with a bottle of pheromones poured in their cage. Sadly, I fell for the promises of this game and how you could "talk" to Pikachu. Several other people did and they wound up paying 90 dollars for this game when it came out
This game was developed by Ambrella

Story: 2

I'll go over the entire story here because... there is nothing worth being spoiled at all.

You are a kid who goes into a forest after Professor Oak gives you a device that lets you talk to Pokemon, you then find a Pikachu and it goes to live with you. You then have to go through three hundred sixty five days with it [not real time], doing some activities in the woods to beat the game. After that Pikachu leaves, but when the credits end, it comes back like nothing ever happened.

I'm confused... is this really a story?

Gameplay: 3

While it would be fun being able to talk to Pikachu, and having your own Pokemon, which this game tried to replicate in some vague way. It fell flat on its face...

As I said, you have to go through different activities with Pikachu every day. What happens is, the wild Pikachu you found comes to your house and wakes you up, and you can either; play in your room, look around in the back yard of your house, or go on some adventure. Al of this COULD be fun, if it was done correctly. Sadly, the entire game is completely monotonous and repetitive, you are just doing the same damn thing over and over again you aren't even having any real fun.

An example of what you have to do is finding some Vegetables for Bulbasaur to put in some stew, so you go into the woods to find them. Pikachu tells you what to look for by poorly drawing it on some paper, and when it is found... Pikachu holds it up and you have to say either "ok", or "no". Sadly, the Microphone sucks and Pikachu has no idea what the hell you are talking about, and Pikachu will most likely wind up eating the vegetable, and you have lost the level because there is only one of each of the Vegetables.

Frustrated yet? Well I was too because it is almost impossible to make Pikachu do what you want him to do. The way I saw this game, it was like having a Dog, except Pikachu was even less capable of listening and comprehending English than the dog was.

Challenge: 10

It is so hard to do anything in this game... I want to give a Million dollars to anyone who had the patience to last all 365 days with this game.

Controls: 2

You aren't really capable of doing much with the controller besides walking, most of the game is done by talking to Pikachu with the included VRU [Nintendo 64 Voice Recognition Unit], and this would not be too bad if that VRU could work.

So, how well does the VRU work in this game... Pikachu only knows 200 words, the voices of little kids may not be heard by the VRU, and it says on the box that the game is intended for people over 12 years old, and it is only calibrated to higher pitched voices. This game also is also completely unplayable without the VRU so you are screwed if you buy the game but you don't have it.

But, as I have been saying... the voice recognition software is god awful in this game, and you will probably wind up selling it.

Graphics: 7

The game does look alright visually, I have not played the game since I sold it but I do remember a decent amount of detail in here, the Pokemon looked like they did in Stadium, and the levels looked realistic enough, although some parts of the game were blatantly 2D.

Sound: 5

The constant chattering of Pikachu repeating "pika pika pika" at you does get annoying after a while, as does some of the music which is too simplistic for a Pokemon game, seeing as there was already some good music for Pokemon that could fit this game. Some things did sound alright in this game, although I was too distracted by yelling at Pikachu to notice most of it.

Atmosphere: 2

In case you have not heard what I said about this game, it was supposed to replicate an adventure through a forest with Pikachu, going through life and having fun. Instead it turned into screaming into a microphone trying to get the game to understand what you are saying. NOT very atmospheric in my mind because the only emotion that was brought out for me was burning white hot rage.

Replayability: 1

There isn't really anything worth replaying this game for, unless you can figure out how to play the game and you found it to be fun.

Pros:
Good graphics, you can talk to Pikachu.

Cons:
VRU is terrible, the game is frustrating as hell, VERY expensive when it came out.

Should you get it:
The only good thing now is that if you find it used it is really cheap. If you need a laugh, or you want to give this to someone as a gift go ahead. But if you are expecting a good game look somewhere else.

Overall:

This game is just terrible, and it is sad that Nintendo publicized a bad game as much as this one; there was even a Pikachu themed Nintendo 64 that came with this game. This could have been a good game but the developers really dropped the ball and created a frustrating mess that is near impossible to play.

2

Reviewer's Score: 2/10, Originally Posted: 12/10/07, Updated 08/25/08

Game Release: Hey You, Pikachu! (US, 11/05/00)

Star Fox 64

"Can't We Kill The Frog?"

Star Fox 64 is a graphically reimagined remake of the original game for the SNES [thats what Wiki said] made by Nintendo. It is also one of the first good games for the Nintendo 64, and I believe that it earns an award for cramming so much sound inside of that Cartridge so early on.

Story: 6

The story is pretty much the old game but redone a little bit. It starts off with an overview of what happened before the game, Andross the evil scientist was exiled to Venom for crimes against humanity, he was found to be doing more experiments, so the Star Fox team was sent to investigate. While they were there James and Peppy were betrayed by Pigma, James died and Peppy had to escape. Moving on to now you are Fox, James' son and you lead the team, you need to kill Andross to help the Cornerians stop a war against him. Basic stuff but this made it sound kinda interesting, albeit using some bare-boned descriptions.

Gameplay: 8

This is a big improvement over numero uno. The game is very non-linear and you can choose your own pathway to Venom from the levels that they give you by the choices you make in levels, such as saving your wing mates from the enemies that they are too stupid to kill themselves. You also earn points for everything that you kill, which goes to earning medals, and those open up a "Hard Mode" and some stuff for the Multiplayer mode. I do like how you can save your allies, and how they can change the levels [opening up different paths, giving hints, killing stuff for you], but one problem I had with them was that well... other than the scripted stuff they are useless. Sometimes I just wound up shooting them down so I did not have to listen to their incessant whining.

On to the enemy, they were well designed and some of them provided a decent challenge before I became good enough to get around 1700 points without a Game Shark. But the thing I like the most is the sheer number of differing paths you can take in the game to get to Venom, you can do specific things like flying through warp rings, shooting some switches or blasting gates open to go a different way. All in all the game plays very well, although it is too easy [the only hard thing about "Expert Mode" is flying without breaking a wing off], any game where you can beat it with 20 lives is too easy for me.

Challenge: 6

The only thing that provides a huge challenge in Star Fox is trying to fly in Expert mode without your wings getting blown off. The game itself is very easy to beat, and it is not very hard to get all of the medals by killing a certain amount of enemy's, it is not very hard to go through the levels and do every thing if you know how to play games. When I got this game back in 1998 I was not very good, but now I can blow through the levels.

Once you know how everything works, you can breeze through the game. But Slippy is still painful to endure.


Controls: 8

With the Nintendo 64 Gamepad everything works very fluidly, although it does get tiring hammering down on the a button to fire after a while, and if you have a bad stick it gets hard to turn. As simplistically as I can put it, it will be easy enough for you to do everything you need to do because the game is set up very well. And if you can find a Controller with a rapid fire function that does not break after a week, get that it helps.

Graphics: 8

Star Fox is a great looking game for 1997, the ships are very well designed, and they give you a satisfying explosion when you wipe them out. But the environments are a little bit blander, you can tell that most of the work went into the Ships but the Nintendo 64 is terrible with large textures. Still this is very impressive for the time it was made in, and that alone does deserve some recognition.

Sound: 6

Ohhhhhhhhhh.... that Frog. Yes anyone who has played this game knows about the ear piercing voice overs that were done, and the most piercing of them all was Slippy who sounds like if it is a he, had all of the Y Chromosomes sucked out of his body. And some of the things that they say just get so annoying, how many times can you hear "DO A BARREL ROLL!" without wanting to rip your hair out. If you want a laugh, just listen to how campy some of the dialog is.

There are also some good sound effects, you get to hear ships explode, you hear engines, you hear the pulsating blast of a laser exiting your cannons, so that is nice. Finally, there is some music in every level as well, some of them sound good and kinda like classical music turned into MDI's but some are terrible. And you are capable of unlocking a "Music Library" thing so you can listen to every song, at least it's cheaper than downloading them off the internet.

All in all, some good sound is voided by Slippy who makes you cringe and hope your ear drums pop.

Atmosphere: 7

The levels are well designed and some of them give a feeling of the war that is going on, and the music also sets up the feeling for action, exploration, danger and everything else. And the action feels very war like although after you play as many times as people like me have [its been out for 10 years!] it is all very predictable.

Multiplayer: 8

You can go into a four player battle with your buddies in either an Arwing, Landmaster or on foot with some kind of rapid fire energy bazooka. One problem is that even with 2 people there are 4 screens so it is hard to see everything if you have a small TV, and compared to Goldeneye [the pinnacle of Multiplayer at this time], Star Fox 64 has nothing. But if you are just looking for a way to kill some time, this does work very well.

Replayability: 6

You can keep going to earn all of the medals or to see how high of a score you can get [mine is around 1700/1800 points], and there is a simple multiplayer. Other than that it is a very short, easy game so there is not much left to do.

Pros:
Good graphics, non-linear gameplay, Slippy is fun to kill.

Cons:
SLIPPY EXISTS, too easy to beat, useless wing mates.

Should you get it:
Star Fox 64 is a great old game for the Nintendo 64, there is also a port of it on the Nintendo Wii that works very well, you should pick it up and add it to your collection.

Overall:

Star Fox 64 although it has a few flaws is a good game for the Nintendo 64 and an improvement over the old one. It is also a good example of just what the 64 could do early in it's lifespan.

8

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 09/10/07, Updated 05/12/08

Game Release: Star Fox 64 (Player's Choice) (US, 1998)

Mario 64

"Mario at His Finest"

Well, Super Mario Galaxy has just been released little over a week ago, the Nintendo Wii is flying off the shelves, and Nintendo has proven that they can still throw out the 600 pound gorillas when they want too. So I decided to take a look back at one of their greatest accomplishments for this review; Super Mario 64.

In 1996, Nintendo changed the way everyone would play games with the Nintendo 64, the first true 64 Bit console with 3D graphics, and this game; Super Mario 64. I got my Nintendo 64 around the same time it came out when I was five, and this was my first game for it, and for someone who like me spend their early gaming years on a NES [not the SNES]... lets just say this game would have made your jaw literally drop to the ground like the cartoon dog when it smelled the biscuit. When it came out, it looked like Nintendo had made a masterpiece, and that their market dominance would continue, sadly that was not to be [at least for the 10 years after the 64 came out], luckily we still got a helluva game like this. Lets light this candle.

Story: 7

You all know the standard Mario story, Peach was abducted and Mario has to go and rescue her. This time, Bowser went into her Castle, and trapped everyone inside of the Castle Walls, and hid the Power Stars of the castle inside of magical painting worlds. Mario just came there because he was invited by Peach to have some cake, but then he had to go through the castle, get back the Stars, save all of the people inside of the walls, and trounce Bowser.

It doesn't sound like much [and Mario isn't really known for an epic story], but at least Bowser had some of his bad-ass-ness in this game, unlike his role in Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door.

Gameplay: 9

Mario Platforming successfully transitioned into the world of 3D gaming, and almost perfected the way you should do a 3D platformer.

You are given some vibrantly colored, massive [for the Nintendo 64] levels to explore, while collecting coins, jumping on Goombas heads, and finding the Power Stars that are hidden throughout the level, either by exploring the level, whomping some Boss character, or doing specific challenges in the Level. The levels themselves are very big, and give you plenty of room to explore every nook and cranny of them, and that may be all you want to do. I know that when I first got the game all I wanted to do for the first half hour was climb the Trees outside of the Castle.

I honestly did not expect the 3D platforming to be better than the NES games were, but I was surprised by how similar everything was, the Bowser levels even feel like how the NES games would be if they were 3D.

There are some really fun challenges in here too, such as the Ice Slide where you are racing a giant Penguin, and unique Levels like Lethal Lava Land where you can go inside of a Volcano, or Rainbow Ride where you get to float around on a Magic Carpet for most of the level.

One more thing you should know, Mario Games have been filled with power-ups that either make you bigger, let you shoot fire out of your glove, turn you into a raccoon [anyone else wondering how a bloody leaf can turn you into a raccoon?], well that wasn't in here this time but there are some magical hats in this game [hear me out, its not as ridiculous as it sounds!]. First, there is the Wing Cap which is a hat with wings, it lets you fly, then there is an Invisibility Cap... turns you invisible, finally there is the Metal Cap... I hope you get the idea by now.

Overall, everything works very well in this game.

Challenge: 7

Compared to the previous Mario games, this one is downright simplistic, and adequate proof of how games were simplified for mass audiences [I.E. I was never really good at the old Mario games; I am great at this one]. It won't be hard to beat the game because all you need to get to the final Bowser battle is 70 Stars [out of 120], and most of the Stars are easy enough to get, some are a pain in the ass though.

As I have been saying with most of the games I have reviewed, if you are just going to beat the game with as little as possible, this game will be easy for you, hell, even the Bowser battles aren't even that hard. But getting all 120 stars will take you a while.

Controls: 9

Lets just put it this way, the Nintendo 64 Game Pad was made with this game in mind, everything controlled beautifully and the first time I played this game I was amazed by how much I could do. The controls were so much more precise than anything from the past was, and Mario was so easy to control. I just hope the Analog Stick on your controller does not break because I have snapped off a few of them with this game.

Graphics: 10

It may not look like much now, but for 1996 this was as good as you could get. Pretty much every level is vibrantly and brightly colored, and is incredibly well designed. And, as I said this was a huge step up from the NES games I was playing at the time [imagine going from only having PS1 Graphics, into PS3 graphics and that is how I felt]. As I was saying, pretty much everything was beautifully done, and everything was translated into 3D quite nicely.

The only problem for some people would be that there were a lot of Sprites used in the game for things like Trees, but those were still done very well so I did not have much of a problem with it.

Sound: 9

Again, this was better than almost everything else at the time, some of the best music from games I have ever heard was in this game [the Bowser Level theme, and the Dire Dire Docks theme], most of the Music and the sound effects are incredible, the only flaw is that some of the music gets repetitive after a while, and some of the sounds get annoying after a while [like the Goomba's making whatever the hell that beeping noise is before they run at you].

There is also very little voice over work, but you can blame that on the limited capacity of the N64 Cartridge.

Atmosphere: 8

The best part of the atmosphere in this game is the incredible design of the environmental levels, which closely [for a N64 game] resemble what they are depicting. The music also captures the feel of most of the levels [the Water levels have calming music]. Other than that there is nothing to really immerse you into the platforming action of this game, but it is enough to do immerse you anyway.

Replayability: 8

The main reason to keep replaying this game is by doing speed runs, and to see how well you can exploit the game and beat the game in the fastest time possible , but I have just been replaying the Bowser levels a lot to prepare for when I get Super Mario Galaxy on Christmas.

There are also plenty of good levels in this game that are still fun 11 years later that you can play.

Pros:
Great graphics and sound for its time, changed the way you play games, finally a good 3D platformer, Controls were very well done.

Cons:
Abusive on the analog stick, not as long as it was intended to be [there were 30 levels planned], too easy.

Should you get it:

Mario 64 changed the way games would be played, and is deserving of a spot in any Game Library. Buy it used or download it onto your Nintendo Wii, you will not regret it.

Overall:

This game was just another one of the nuggets of gold that drip from Shigeru Miyamoto's mind, and it was almost a perfect game. Nintendo changed the way games were played 11 years ago, and this game is still influencing Developers today.

9

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 11/26/07, Updated 01/22/08

Game Release: Super Mario 64 (US, 09/26/96)

[Joe]

Mario Kart 64

"The Best Mario Kart"

This is a very memorable game for me, back when I got my Nintendo 64 this was one of the first games I ever got, and all of the time I have spent playing the game that spawned Nintendo's insane amount of Mario spin offs that are rapidly declining in quality, I remember how much fun I had with this game and how much better the Nintendo 64's graphics were than the NES I had at that time.

Story: 5

Like all of the other games in the series [and all other Mario spin offs], this game is just about Mario taking a break from rescuing the Princess and just racing their Go Karts

Gameplay: 8

Mario Kart is a fun, and simple game.

The main mode is the Grand Prix, which has four difficulty modes, and the first three bump up the difficulty of the AI, and the Speed, while the "Extra" mode lets you race in mirrored tracks on the middle difficulty setting. And you are racing in four of the sixteen levels to earn points and win the cup for that challenge.

You are also able to do Time Trials which is trying to set the best time on a level, and even after you get bored with the Grand Prix, trying to beat your old times is still fun.

But, there is one thing that a Mario Kart game would not be complete without, and that is all of the crazy items. Everything wasn't as overpowered back then as it is now [remembers being hit by Blue Shells and Lightning Bolts almost constantly in Mario Kart Wii], and the AI only got some of the weaker items. But you still have things like the mushrooms [speed booster], Shells [projectiles], Bananas [something like an oil slick], bombs, lightning [shrinks everyone else on the track] and stars [makes you invulnerable]. They are still fun, and they work very well at screwing with the other racers.

Challenge: 4

This may be because I have spent so much time playing this game, but the AI in this game is pathetic.

As I mentioned above the only items that the AI will get is; lightning, stars, bananas, bombs, and ghosts, which is around half of the item roster. But the challenge comes from the rubber band AI, which simply put is something like, the farther away you get from them, the more a rubber band is stretched, and then it snaps giving them a boost of speed allowing them to catch up. They also get back on the track instantly if they fall off the track, but when you fall off it takes 5 seconds to get back up.

Simply put, the AI is pathetic.

Controls: 8

The Nintendo 64 controller works very well for this game, everything controls sharply, and you can aim the weapons very well. You can also learn how to do advanced tactics easily which will make you much better than the AI which constantly cheats to no avail.

Graphics: 8

The graphics in Mario Kart are an excellent mix of 3D levels, and pixelated characters and other things on the course to reduce polygon counts, and look better than the polygons would of. The characters look excellent, and in some ways I like their look in this game better than in the newer Mario Kart games.

The courses themselves are all very well designed, and they are filled with bright colors that are pleasing to the eye. Although there are some darker levels [banshee boardwalk, Bowsers castle], but their look is fitting with the game as well.

Mario Kart 64 shows off how much stronger the N64 is than the previous consoles.

Sound: 7

The sound effects are good, the music is very catchy [mostly] cheerful stuff that fits the level you are in. But some of the voices for the characters you will hear sometimes are hard to hear, and some of them sound really confusing. For example, I have heard Toad saying something that sounds like "Oh ****" when he gets hit, and Peach saying "Pichu!" when she uses an item. Although, Mario's voice in this game sounds much better than the current one which sounds a little bit higher pitched, why can't Mr. Martinet go back to that voice?

Multiplayer: 9

Mario Kart is extremely fun in Multiplayer, and is still one of the best party games on the Nintendo 64, even after Super Smash Bros and Perfect Dark/Goldeneye were released.

You can do the Grand Prix with a buddy, and you can either compete for a higher score, or work as a team to beat the AI even badly that you can on your own [which I do]. doing it that way makes the single player mode much better.

You can also race with four of your friends on any of the tracks [which now have Bomb Obs rolling around] and compete to see who can win the most. And do a battle mode where you have 3 balloons and each time you get hit one falls off, the last man standing is the winner. One of the players can also get turned into a Bomb Ob Kart if there are 3 or 4 people in the match, and use it as a kamikaze to take out one of the other players.

Playing with friends makes this game so much better, but you better have a big TV if you have four players because those screens can get really small and you won't know what you're doing.

Atmosphere: 7

The music is catchy, and it fits the levels which have a distinctive theme, and the controls are close enough to a Go Kart. So it should be immersive enough.

Replayability: 8

Even though I now own an Xbox 360 and a Wii, I still come back to this game because it is so much fun to play with friends, and it is one of the few games I own that my dad is good at.

Pros:
Fast paced racing, great items, great graphics, fun multiplayer.

Cons:
Horrible AI, badly compressed audio, small TV's + 4 player splitscreen = no no.

Should you get it:

I would recommend this game to anyone who has a Nintendo 64, and if you have a Wii go ahead and download the VC port.

Overall:

Mario Kart 64 is my favorite game in the series, I have spent countless hours on it and it was the last Mario Kart that I played before the Items got so overpowered that you would get hit by something every 10 seconds. If you have a Nintendo 64, buy this excellent party game.

8

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 07/21/08

Game Release: Mario Kart 64 (US, 02/10/97)

Mario Kart Wii

"Fun Racing... Frustrating Items"

Mario Kart Wii is the latest iteration in Nintendo's classic Kart Racing series that created a genre that many people have tried to rip off over the last 17 years. While some things were done very well, there are just a few things that kept me from fully enjoying the game.

Story: 5

You race Karts against other characters in the Mario universe, nothing else. I'll leave this out of my final evaluation of the score.

Gameplay: 8

There is no denying that MK Wii is a very fun game. Most of the new tracks are very well designed, and the new features work good enough.

The main things that have been introduced are tricks, and bikes. First off, you can use the Wii Wheel to perform jumps while you are in the air to get a speed boost, which adds an element of finding the best places to make those jumps a vital part of the game if you wish to win. The Bikes are mainly lighter versions of the Karts that accelerate faster, and turn sharper. They are good but I prefer using the Karts.

The main game is the Grand Prix where you are playing in 50cc 100cc or 150cc [as you go up, you get faster and the AI gets meaner], which is racing on 4 of the 32 tracks in this game in order to unlock more of the Grand Prix levels, and other Karts/Characters. You can also play Time Trials where you can try to set the best times and unlock "Expert Ghosts" which are the best of the best in terms of who Nintendo used to make them. One thing I found was that although the Grand Prix is fun enough to do, there are some problems with balance and how the AI is programmed to use them on you every chance it gets, but I'll cover that in the Challenge section.

As I said above, there are 32 tracks, 16 of them are completely new, and the other half comes from the SNES, N64, GCN, and DS games [and I think there is one or two from the GBA]. While the newer tracks are for the most part, very well designed. It seems like the older tracks only got a mild graphical update [with the exception of the N64 ones, which look great] and they play differently because there are not as many places to do tricks on them. But I still like playing on some of my old favorites for Nostalgias sake.

As for the Items... never before has Mario Kart been THIS damned unbalanced. I know that when I played Double Dash I was screaming at the TV a lot because of how Blue Shells continuously hit me, but in this one now that there are 12 racers it is just 4 more chances for the cheap AI to screw me at the last minute like it always does. I have also found that it is more beneficial to stay near the end of the pack until the last lap and then just let loose with all of the overpowered items you get and jump back to first place in a matter of seconds.

Before I end this section I just have something that I need to say about some of the unlockables. There are a lot of characters in this game that you can unlock, but unfortunately it seems like they are not really able to come up with real characters from the Mario universe anymore. Why is that you ask? Well... there are 4 babies, and there are a couple characters that should of been replaced because they do not deserve to be anything more than something Mario stomps on. This did not affect my score but I just felt I had to mention this...

So, in conclusion to this section, the racing is fun but how unbalanced the items are will **** you off more often than not.

Challenge: 8

As I said above, there are so many things about this game that are unbalanced. I remember when I play Mario Kart 64 that it was so damn easy for me to beat it [although, I have played that a lot over the last... 10 years, maybe it was harder at first], but that is mainly because that the AI was held back on the items that they could get, and because the only thing that they had in terms of challenge was their Slingshot AI [the farther away you get, farther that thing gets pulled back, then if fires and they wing by you].

But in recent Mario Kart games the AI has had the ability to get whatever item they want whenever they want, and they will always hit you with it no matter what. I have done races where I was hit by Blue Shells 5 times, and every couple seconds something gets flung at me and then I drop back down to last place and I have to fight my damnedest to catch back up because one mere item is enough to make a huge difference in a close race.

I have also found that being a Lightweight is virtually useless because when you played as one in DD you would get battered around a lot, but now it is just so much worse. If you touch one of the heavies in a LW Kart, you're screwed...

All I have to say is that Items have always been a part of Mario Kart, but I think they really need to get toned down.

Controls: 8

I was pleasantly surprised by the fact that the Wii Wheel actually worked quite well in this game, but unfortunately I found that because this game makes me slam my controller into my leg a lot in anger... the GCN Controller I have let me drive a little bit better.

The only real gripes that I have are that the steering feels a little too loose, and the controls for the controllers should of been customizable. But other than that the Wiimote has been used quite well.

Graphics: 7

Thankfully, the plague upon MK:DD's graphics of having eyes on every single inanimate object has been removed, and MK Wii's graphics look good for a Wii game. The Lighting is well done, some of the textures look as good as they did in Galaxy, but some of them don't look anywhere near as good. Although this is a decent looking game it looks like a minorly upgraded Double Dash in some places, and there are still some problems with blocky characters.

But, this is one of the better-looking games on the Wii. Although you can also contribute that to the fact that a lot of Devs still half-ass their games for it.

Sound: 8

Like I said about the graphics, MK Wii also sounds a lot like its Game Cube predecessor, but that is not really a bad thing.

The same cheerful music is still in most of the levels, and the remixed music for the older levels sounds great. The only problem I have is that some of the voices changed way too much, I think that Charles should go back to voicing Mario and Luigi back like he did in Mario Kart 64 because those were the only ones that sound the way I would imagine them sounding, unlike the insanely high pitched ones we have today.

Multiplayer: 9

If you want a reason to play the game, there isn't anything better than this in it.

Although I did not like the offline mode much because it was basically the same as GP without points, playing online is fun if you are lucky.

First off, anyone here who has read my review for Smash Brothers would know that I was mad about how poorly the lag filled mess of an online multiplayer mode was [someone should fix those servers!]. Luckily, Mario Kart Wii has shown us that Nintendo actually can put in an effort with online gaming!

There is almost no lag, you can also check out records for Tournaments and Time Trials [and gasp at how much higher some peoples records are than yours =(] while you are not in a match.

Now, when you play online you can get up to 12 people, and before the race starts the participants pick what level they want, and the level is randomly picked from those choices. Then, you start racing and you can finally experience a decent online match using the Wii. There is also a battle mode, which you can just think of as a 12 player version of the Battle modes from the old games, with teams of 6 against 6.

Unfortunately, there is still a minor problem although it is not as rampant as in the GP. The horrible unbalance of the items shows and if you are a newbie the items will crush you if you get close to first place. But that is the only problem I have. You also still have to deal with the friend codes, which were a horrible idea... please Nintendo just rip off Xbox Live and use something similar to a damned Gamertag.

I would highly recommend playing this game online if the long waits for a match on Brawl irk you too much.

Atmosphere: 7

Mario Kart Wii looks like a relaxing cartoony game that is just fun to play, and it is if you are good at it. The levels have a very well done Mario-ey feel to them, but the frustration of the constant assault of items from the cheap AI gets in the way of that.

Replayability: 8

There are three reasons to keep playing this game. Great Multiplayer, Unlockables, and Time Trial Records.

Pros:
Wii Wheel works well after some practice, well-designed courses, LAG FREE MULTIPLAYER, Mario Kart Channel, the new features work well.

Cons:
Cheap AI and Items, Friend Codes, Light Weights are useless, get rid of the damned Babies!

Should you get it:
If you are looking for a good game for the Wii, or at least something to hold you over until the 3rd Party Devs actually make a friggin effort on their games..... Pick up Mario Kart Wii. But maybe you should rent it first to see if you like it enough to buy it.

Overall:

Mario Kart Wii is a fun game, but unfortunately the items have become so unbalanced that the game makes you want to pull your hair out sometimes. Also... from seeing some of the new characters I think it is almost time for Nintendo to just rip off Smash Bros and make "Nintendo Kart" because at least then I would not just use a Mii in every round anymore.

7

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 05/12/08

Game Release: Mario Kart Wii (US, 04/27/08)

Super Mario Galaxy

"Why can't more Wii games be like this?"

The people at Nintendo have done something that almost none of the other developers for the Wii are capable of doing; they made a game that is actually playable. Many other people who bought a Wii right after it came out should be disappointed by the half-assed PS2 Ports, terrible gimmick games, and games that make absolutely horrible use of the Wii Remote that we have had to endure. Hell, the only game before this one that showed what the Wii could really do was Metroid Prime 3: Corruption, but in its own way Super Mario Galaxy has shown just what can be done with a little bit of effort. Lets light this candle.

Story: 7

Although Mario games are not really known for their story [that's Zelda's department with Nintendo], but Galaxy actually had a decent one.

The game starts off with you as our super optimistic little Italian Plumber Mario, and you are going to Princess Peach's Castle for the Star Festival when Bowser suddenly attacks the Mushroom Kingdom with his floating Gunships, and he uses a UFO to rip Peach's castle out of the ground [fans of the first Paper Mario should recognize this], and Mario is launched into Space.

Then, you wind up in a Space Observatory with Rosetta [I'm calling her by the Japanese name because I hate the American one] and the Lumas [baby stars]. Your goal is to find the Power Stars that were taken from the Observatory by Bowser, and use them to go to the center of the Universe and kick Bowser's ass so you can rescue Peach.

It was a decent story, and you can see some beautifully drawn storybook scenes that tell Rosetta back-story.

Gameplay: 9

This is just classic Mario Platforming action at its best. Unlike Super Mario Sunshine you are given a wealth of different Galaxies [levels] to go into so you can collect the Power Stars, there are so many different places like a Beach, a giant bedroom, a Haunted Mansion, and many other places you get to go through in this game. And the adventuring is even better than it was in Super Mario 64. Best of all, some levels got back to the roots of Mario Platforming by making the seem like the 2D worlds of the past games, and those were some of the funnest levels in the entire game.

In the levels, you can get hit three times before you die , and you fight by using the Wiimote to launch Star Bits at the enemy, using a spin attack to make them dizzy and then hit them, or just jumping on their skull like Mario used to do. You can also collect powerups like the Fire Flower [shoot fire], Boo Mario [turns you into a ghost], and even weird stuff like Spring and Bee Mario [this should be self explanitory].

And throughout the levels, you are mostly going on a Linear path by running from place to place, or using Pull Stars [you point at them with the Wiimote, and hit a button to have a laser launch you to the star, and you can fly around with them Tarzan style], but it still feels like you get to explore the levels. The levels are all very well designed, and the Boss Battles in some of them are some of the best that a Mario game has ever had.

Challenge: 6

Unfortunately since Mario is more of a cutesy kiddy game [even though it has some challenging platforming aspects that us older gamers can enjoy] that was meant for everyone to play, it was shockingly easy just to get to the final battle. There are 120 stars but you only need 60 of them to get in there, and most of the stars are amazingly easy to get... well the first half are. Luckily the second half has some really tough stars to find, and you can also play through the game again as Luigi after getting all 120 stars, and you have to get 121 stars as Luigi.

There are also some things that alter the levels known as Prankster Comets, which give you a time limit, make things faster, make you die faster, or make you collect 100 Purple Coins.

There are some tough things in this game, but I bet that a lot of the players will only do the first quarter of the game [since there are 241 stars in total, and you only need 60 to "beat" the game, I count it as a quarter of the game], and that is inexcusable in my mind since I wanted to have a real challenge in this game.

Controls: 10

There are three kinds of ways to make controls with the Wiimote, you can cheap out and not really do anything utilizing the Wiimote, you can overdo it and make completely frustrating controls that are overused enough to really tire out your arms, kind of like how bad the controls were in the PS3 game Lair, where you had to use the Sixaxis Tilt to control the game, or you can figure out a good mixture of traditional and motion sensing controls that are easy, and pleasant to use. Thankfully we got the latter for Super Mario Galaxy, the Wiimote is only used where it is necessary, and most of the game is controlled the old fashioned way, but the little things that the Wiimote does make everything so much easier for you to do.

The lazier Devs should take note from Nintendo's example, and figure out good ways to use the Wiimote for once, like this game did.

Graphics: 10

Again, one of the things that has been plaguing the Wii is that a lot of games look like they belong on the PS1, but for once we are seeing a game that rivals game on the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 in technical, and artistic Graphical quality. And it is proof that even though the Wii is underpowered compared to the other systems, if the Developers take the time to make the damn game look good, it sure as hell can look good on the Wii [Metroid Prime 3: Corruption is another good example of this].

First off, there is a wide variety of gorgeous environments that look like something Pixar would make. From traditional things that these mini-planets contain like deserts, forests, and beaches, there are also nontraditional things like a giant bedroom, a battle cruiser, a haunted house, and a beehive. These levels all look amazing, and even the little things like the lighting, which makes a white glow appear on the edge of everything, to the fur on some things like the Queen Bee in the Honeyhive Galaxy.

There is no denying that Super Mario Galaxy looks great, but it is really a game that you have to see in motion to see how good it looks, and even though it is a cartoony looking game, there is still an undeniable huggable charm in this game.

Sound: 9

There is a small amount of voiceover work, and most of it is good, even though it is mostly like the noises you hear when you talk to someone in a Zelda game, and most of the sound effects are good.

But the best part of the sound is the amazing orchestral soundtrack. Yes, instead of digitally made music, we have a full orchestra doing some of the classic songs from Mario games, and some new ones. And after I have beaten the game I still play just to listen to the songs. Another detail that I liked is that the speed of the music can change according to where you are.

Trust me, the only reason the score is not a 10 [for the music alone] is because Mario sounds too much like a hyperactive little kid now, it seems like the voices that Mr. Martinet does just keep getting higher each game, but at least Bowser doesn't sound like a damn pirate again...

Atmosphere: 7

The main part of the atmosphere for this game is how lighthearted everything looks; most of the game is just like a very cheerful adventure through the acid trip that makes up Mario's universe. Simply put, everything just feels fun, but there is not enough of a story to really immerse you as I would of liked.

Multiplayer: 7

The only Multiplayer in this game is having a friend control the pointer, its not much but it does help you pay more attention to the game and let you do some things easier. But I would of preferred having someone else play as Luigi with you like the old games did.

Replayability: 7

The main reason to replay this game is to find all 241 of the stars, but as I said above I think most people [I.E casuals] won't bother doing that. The levels are really fun, but it is not as much fun to keep redoing them.

Pros:
Shows what the Wii can really do, great graphics and music, well designed levels, excellent Wiimote controls, great mixture of old and new Mario Platforming, should light a fire under the ass of the lesser Developers so they will try harder for once.

Cons:
Mario's higher pitched voice, very easy, half-assed multiplayer.

Should you get it:
Along with Metroid Prime 3: Corruption, and Super Smash Brothers: Brawl, this is one of the games that should be in any Wii owners collection.

Overall:

This is a great game, and as I have been saying for the entire review it is one of the few Wii games that seems like any real effort went into it. Kudos to Nintendo for giving a damn and proving that it is not just shovelware on the Wii now.

9

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 03/13/08

Game Release: Super Mario Galaxy (US, 11/12/07)

Wii Sports

"The game that started it all..."

Back in 2006, the Nintendo Wii was released, and nobody knew how well it would do. Everyone assumed that the PS3 would continue its dominance in the Console Wars, and nobody knew how well the Wii would do. Well, now its 2009, and we all know how this thing has turned out. At least 50 million Wiis have been sold [20 million more than the 360, and 30 million more than the PS3], and the sequel to Wii Sports has just been released, and it is all because of this game; Wii Sports. This is the game that most of us tried once we got our Wii, and it showed us what could be done with the Wiimote, unfortunately it is more popular with Nursing Homes and non-gamers who only buy the Wii for Wii Sports and Wii Fit, leaving us to drudge through shovelware and Wii Sports knockoffs to find good games. So, how good is Wii Sports? Lets find out.

Story: 2

Basically the story is non-existent, your Mii's are playing sports, and nothing else happens.

Gameplay: 7

Wii Sports is a fun game, and it does a good job at showing how the WiiMote is supposed to work.

5 games are in Wii Sports: Bowling, Tennis, Baseball, Golf, and Boxing. There are also a couple of training modes that change the normal games around, like Bowling with up to 100 Pins, or Tennis where you have to hit targets on a wall with the tennis ball. There is also a mode where you do three of the training games and the game determines your "Wii Fitness Age". You also have a skill level in each game that increases as you do better in each game, and it makes the enemy AI tougher.

The basic games themselves are fun, although some of them are flawed.

Bowling was my favorite game in the pack, and it is very close to the real sport, and the physics for the pins and the ball are very close to the real thing. Tennis was also good, you can play with up to four people but I would of liked it better if you were able to have 1 on 1 games instead of it always being doubles matches, and I would have liked being able to move around on my own instead of the game moving my Mii around for me.

Golf was decent, you can play on 9 different courses and it was a good start for a Golf game on the Wii. But I thought the Wiimote was too sensitive sometimes, and I can sometimes wind up hitting harder or softer than I want to.

Baseball was very simplified. All you do is swing the bat and hope that you hit the ball, and that the other team doesn't catch the ball while it is in the air. The Miis move without any input from the player, and there are only three innings so the game is much shorter than a real Baseball game.

Boxing was a disappointment. Although using the Nunchuck and the Wiimote as boxing gloves worked pretty well, and you are capable of bobbing and weaving like a real boxer, playing the game can be exhausting, and against another player it can sometimes wind up just being a game of who can swing faster.

Overall, the games are fun, but a couple of them have some flaws.

Challenge: 6

Wii Sports is an easy game to get into, and the games are pretty easy. It only gets tough once you get your skill level near 1000 because the AI is much tougher around that time.

Controls: 8

The controls work pretty well, and they do a good job at showing you the possibilities of the Wiimote, but although you can play the games by doing the real motions like it showed in all of the advertisements, I found that just waggling the Wiimote with my wrist or using short motions worked better and was less tiring than flailing around in my tiny game room.

And like I mentioned earlier in the review, I thought some of the motions were too sensitive, especially in Golf and Baseball where a slight motion can make you swing too early, or when you are putting in golf you can hit the ball too hard even if you only use a tiny wrist motion. But those are the only real problems I had with the controls.

Graphics: 6

Since this is basically a tech demo the graphics don't have to be great, but they aren't bad in Wii Sports either.

Wii Sports has the same bright, simplistic, clean art style as the Miis, and although everything looks pretty basic that doesn't mean it looks bad.

The Golf courses were well designed, and they had some nice water effects, the physics in the Bowling game were pretty well done, and all of the games resembled the real game pretty well. There isn't really much else I can say, it looks like a GameCube game, it looks simplistic, there are not a lot of animations for the games, but it still manages to look decent enough to not hurt your eyes. And for a tech demo that comes with the damn system, thats enough.

Sound: 7

The sound fared better for me than the graphics.

The music shares the simple, clean feeling that the graphics had, and most of it is just soft and happy music, but it is good enough and it keeps the game from being too quiet.

The sound effects are better, I enjoyed the sound of the pins being hit by a bowling ball, most of the other sports also do a good job at capturing the sound of the game, and the crowd reacts to how well, or how poorly you are doing during the game.

There is also an announcer, but I don't really have much to say about him besides that he is not around enough to annoy me.

Overall, the sound is okay but not great, lust like a lot of things in this game. For a cheap tech demo where people are more concerned with how well the Wiimote works, its good enough.

Atmosphere: 8

The controls [when you actually do the real motions] make you feel like you are doing the real thing, and this is pulled off really well in Bowling which was the closest to the real thing in this game from what I have played. And the sound of the crowd also helps with this. Overall, the game does a good job at immersing you into the game, and showing you how the Wiimote can help you feel like you are in the game.

Multiplayer: 8

Although the game is duller if you just play alone, it is very fun if you are able to have some people play with you. Most of the games can be played with four people, and if the room is big enough to keep everyone from hitting each other it is fun to play. Other than that, what else is there to say? This is a game that has to be played with a group to get the full enjoyment out of it.

Replayability: 7

How much you can replay the game depends on how many friends you have who want to play the game. If you do everything alone, you will get bored fast, but I also don't think that most of the people who have this game have a lot of friends who want to play it because the Wii is "too kiddy" for them. If you live with our family, play it with them, and while your at it get them into more advanced games like The Conduit which is also on the Wii.

Pros:
Does a good job at recreating the games, fun with friends/family, innovative, good controls, easy to pick up and play, bowling and tennis, comes with the Wii, AI adapts to your skill level.

Cons:
Simplistic graphics and sound are not as good as they could have been, boxing, boring if you play by yourself, part of the reason there aren't a lot of "real" games on the Wii.

Should you get it:
It comes with the Wii, so if you want a Wii you should take the time to play this after you buy it.

Overall:

Wii Sports is a decent game that was able to revolutionize the gaming industry with its controls, and it was able to get a whole new generation who never played games to pick up a controller and try them out, unfortunately they did not branch out to the kind of games we like and Wii owners like myself have gone through a painful drought of a lack of good games. Nevertheless, Wii Sports is a fun game than comes with the Wii, so you have no reason not to try it out.

But if you play it with your family, get them to play tougher games too.

7

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 07/28/09

Game Release: Wii Sports (US, 11/19/06)

Twilight Princess

"It is Good, But it is Not What it was Hyped Up to Be"

This review is for the Wii version of The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, which was developed by Nintendo, and was consistently delayed from its original release date in 2005, into 2006 so it could be released for the Wii, and the GameCube [as a last hurrah perhaps].

Now I am sure most of you remember the "8.8" controversy with Jeff "Girthmann", and "Baconator" Gerstmann, and the reaction that everyone had to it. "'8.8' is a travesty, this game was perfect!", well I thought that too at first [and I am certain that several of the people here rejoiced after the "Kane and Lynch" fiasco]. But when I replayed this game I realized that Jeff was right, this is a great game, but it is in now way the almighty perfect OoT killer it was hyped to be. Lets light this candle...

Story: 7
As always, you are the mute Link, and you are on a mission to save the kingdom of Hyrule. The game takes place 100 years after OoT, and one of the "descendants" of Link is living in Ordon Village.

One day monsters invade the town, one of Links friends is kidnapped and Link is taken into a black wall that transports you into the "Twilight Realm" is imprisoned inside of a castle... oh and you are transformed into a Wolf. Soon, you find a little Imp named Midna finds you, and you are shown that you are inside of Hyrule Castle, and you find Princess Zelda inside who tells you about Zant, the evil king of the Twili, who is trying to envelop Hyrule in darkness.

You then have to go through Hyrule, and restore the four Light Spirits of Hyrule, and find the 3 pieces of the "Fused Shadows" for Midna.

That is not everything; I'll leave the rest of the plot for you guys to discover yourselves [if you haven't played it]. I will say that the Story is good for a Zelda game, and it is darker than the past games [remember the ending of Wind Waker, Twilight Princess made that look like nothing at the end]. But I did have some problems with how little character development there was [compared to WW and OoT], and some of what they did with making Link look more like an action hero with some of the poses they had him doing throughout the game.

I also thought that even though some of the people who were working on the game said that the ending would be something that nobody would expect.... they were wrong. I thought that some of what was done was very obvious.

Gameplay: 7

This is where my main problem with Twilight Princess was. Although the game itself is really good, there were a couple flaws that just irked me.

As always in traditional Zelda form, you are given a big world to explore, a bunch of items to collect, and a few challenging Dungeons to search through so you can kill the boss. And this is still done very well; there are some great Dungeons in here that really require you to think.

There are also some new things you can do. You can collect two Hookshots now [in this game its called "Clawshot"], and use them to fulfill your Tarzan fantasies in some parts of the game, you get a "Spinner" in one of the Dungeons that lets you travel certain path, and you get some cool items. You also can learn special moves [think of the counter attacks from Wind Waker] from a Skeletal Soldier. In Wolf mode you can also warp across Hyrule, and use Midna's abilities to fight.

If you are looking at this game, and judging it on how well it follows standard Zelda rules, it's great. The problem is the new stuff.

First off, some of the Wolf stages got really annoying before you got the ability to change back into Link [that's over halfway through the game], and the big appeal of the game, which was the Twilight Realm and the Wolf did not really seem like much. We already had transformations in Majoras Mask, and we had a "evil" version of levels in LttP, and Metroid Prime 2: Echoes for that matter. I also was disappointed that some items seemed to be only one time uses, the Spinner is only used a lot inside of the Desert Temple you find it in, and the Dominion Rod is also only widely used in the Temple of Time, after that you can just put them away for most of the remaining game

The game itself started getting tedious in some parts, as I mentioned before I got annoyed with the Wolf stages, and the game seemed to be slower than it should be, and it felt like the game was made too easy [more on that in my next section].

All in all, there were some disappointments in this game, but it still was fun.

Challenge: 6

My main problem with this game, and most of the recent Zelda games is to put it bluntly; how easy it is to beat them even if you only get half of the items.

When I did the final battle of this game, I only had half of the hearts, and I did not bother getting most of what you could find, but I still managed to beat it without dying. And even though most of the bosses looked epic, they would be a breeze to take down.

I see this as a result of the change to 3D, while the 2D games were tough, and I remember playing the final level of the original Zelda NES game, and how many times I died in one room on some parts of that game. But while I am playing this game I am wondering why in the hell most of the monsters can barley hurt me.

I also thought that some of the Dungeons, while they were well designed, were too simple to go through, and there were not enough enemies to kill. For gods sake the "Water Temple" in OoT is one of the toughest Dungeons I have ever done in a Zelda game, hell it might be one of the toughest levels in any game I have ever played, but nothing in here came close to the challenge of that one level. Instead, I found that the game seems to draw things out, and uses tediousness to replace an actual challenge.

The only thing that required a huge amount of work is finding all of the items, and completing the Cave of Ordeals. Also, the game is very long [like most Zelda games], and you will spend plenty of time playing.

Controls: 7

As a launch game for the Wii I was disappointed by how the Wii-mote worked in this game. One of the problems is the same one that plagues Wii games now, the game was designed for a "traditional" controller, not the innovative Wii-mote, and they had to find a way to transfer the controls to the Wii-mote. While it was done better than the shovelware that the some of the 3rd Party Dev's are plopping out, it just doesn't work in some places. Swinging your sword seems slower if you wave the remote than it does when you press the A button, and shoving the Nunchuck forward to do a shield attack is not responsive enough. Although, the special moves are responsive enough and using the Remote to aim the Bow is very precise.

My only problem was that the controls do not seem natural enough because this game was not made for the Wii. It is just a GameCube game where everything was flipped so Link could be right handed.

Graphics: 8

I will not lie; Twilight Princess is an artistically gorgeous game, unfortunately the time delay seemed to make the game look worse compared to newer games at that time. The game was made to be launched in 2005 at first and I think that delaying it so it could be released simultaneously on the Wii and the GameCube made it look worse because it would be pitted against newer games. Back when I first saw the trailer for this game, I thought it was one of the best looking video games I have ever seen, but the delays put it closer to games like Gears of War and that just made some things look worse to me because before that I was not paying much attention to the 360.

In my mind, everything does look great, the creatures are beautifully designed and the levels look incredible. But this game was transitioned from the GameCube onto the Wii, and the Wii has more power than the GameCube. I guess I just thought that some of that power could be used to make this one look a little bit better than the little improvements to the graphics that we got.

Although I will say this; the cinematic scenes are gorgeous, and some of the later levels are amazingly well designed and show some of the best graphics that the GameCube can muster. The only real problem I have is that some of the textures do not look as good as the rest of the game does

Sound: 8

Again, Twilight Princess does sound great, but it just does not have the same epic-ness in some parts as the last games.

Twilight Princess has a great soundtrack. I was pleased that some of the classic songs from OoT were included, and my favorite song was Midna's Lament, a piano song that plays halfway through the game. This was truly one of the best songs ever in a Zelda game in my mind. And the music that plays during the 5 parts of the final boss was some of the best music in the entire series. I do think that the music would of been better if there was an orchestra, but the MDI's were good enough.

Onto the sound effects, they are good but the sound from the Wii-mote's speaker diminished it in my mind because of how crackly it sounded. I wish that they could of had some of those sounds come from the TV, as well as the Wii because that probably would of helped me appreciate it better. And I will not say anything about Link being mute, because it doesn't bother me, although Midna is the only one who has something close to a real voice during her text bubbles, Zelda games have never had voice acting and I don't mind if everyone has no voice acting.

Atmosphere: 8

The game does look great, and each of the levels and the music convey a certain feeling. I mentioned before when Midna was injured, the song you hear as you are stuck in Wolf mode and you are trying to find someone who can heal her, along with how it is dark and raining outside just makes it feel even more immersive. The first time you enter the Twilight Realm, it feels like a dying world and how overly saturated it is, along with the shadow creatures give it a whole different feel than the vibrant and colorful locales of Hyrule.

Its like the Call of Duty games, they would be nowhere as good as they are if there was not an incredible epic score, and war torn environments that you are fighting in. Or two past N64 games, Super Mario 64 and Ocarina of Time, the final bosses both feel more epic than they actually are because of how well the final battle stage is designed, and the incredible music. Twilight Princess does this same thing throughout most of the game.

Sadly the problems with the story I had detracted from the incredible atmosphere that the game had.

Replayability: 6

Even though I have had some problems with this game, which does not mean that it isn't fun. Although one thing I noticed when I replayed the game a second time, as I mentioned earlier, is that it is incredible the first time, the second time it does not have the same incredible "I wanna do this again" feel that games like Ocarina of Time, Link to the Past, and Wind Waker had. But in no way is it not fun, there is plenty to do, it just gets repetitive at times.

Pros:
Good graphics, good music, gorgeous bosses and levels, all around a good Zelda game.

Cons:
Not technically as good as it could of been, even though the Twilight Realm looks great, it can get annoying going there over and over again, some parts are repetitive.

Should you get it:

Even though I have had some problems with this game, it is in no way un-buy-able, if you can look past some of the flaws with the game it is worth the purchase.

Overall:

This game is a casualty of over hype, it was painted to be better than it actually was and it caused me to notice its flaws more when I played it [think of Daikatana, except this game was good]. But it is still a good Zelda game that is fun to play, and the problems I had do not really get in the way of that. Over the last couple of years I have accepted that this is not the "best game ever" like it was hyped up to be, but that does not mean that I can overlook some of the minor flaws that just became much easier to notice because of how much everything was oversold by Nintendo.

This is still a good game, and any Zelda fan that can look past the problems should buy it.

8

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 12/21/07, Updated 06/17/09

Game Release: The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess (US, 11/19/06)

Red Steel

"Highly Underrated"

Red Steel was one of the billion titles Ubisoft made to test the waters of the Nintendo Wii during its launch, a few people thought it sucked, a few people thought it was good. I am one of the ones who thought that many of the reviews [such as the Gamespot one] were unfair on this game. So, lets light this candle.

Story: 7

The basic premise of Red Steel is simple, you are a American named Scott Monroe, you are engaged to Miyu Sato, the daughter of one of the Yakuza [Japanese Mafia] bosses, Isao Sato. You are at a Hotel with Miyu and you are going to meet Isao when some other Gang Members disguised as hotel staff attack you, and Miyu is kidnapped at the end of the attack. Isao dies after that, and your goal is to protect the Katana Giri and rescue Miyu.

There is more to the story than that, you also do some work for other Yakuza members, but I will leave the rest of that to you to find out. Although I will agree with Gamespot here, the story did feel like a typical PG-13-rated, straight-to-DVD action movie. The good thing is that there are a few twists and turns in the story to keep it from getting boring.

Gameplay: 8

There are plenty of good things in here, as most of you should know from the massive hype that followed Red Steel before it came out, this game was supposed to merge fighting with Guns and Swords in a FPS, and that it did. You get a few levels going across Little Tokyo, and Tokyo itself; such as a giant amusement park owned by some freak who has people dressed as Giant Dolls, Godzilla, and Exploding Bunnies [funniest part of the game], or a Geisha House. These levels are fun to traverse while you are blowing away Gangsters with one of the weapons you have.

Onto the weapons, you can only carry two weapons at once, you can also carry some Grenades, you can equip Body Armor, and you have your two Swords [the Katana Giri, and a little sword used to parry attacks, more on that later]. There are also some special abilities Scott has, such as the ability to freeze time and shoot the weapons out of someone's hand [or in their head for an instakill]. The health system was also done simply, along with your Body Armor gauge,, there is also a Health Bar that depletes as you are shot, if you hide behind something and are not shot for a few seconds, you health bar instantly goes back to full power, cheesy huh? Finally, you get "Respect Points" that allow you to learn new attacks by doing honorable things. Such as sparing a swordsman after you break his sword, or letting an enemy surrender to you after you disarm them.

All in all, the game worked out better than most of the people are saying it did.

Challenge: 7

At the start of the game, everything is relatively simple. I was able to get through most of the levels without dying, and without too much of an effort on my part. But the later levels did get harder. For example, the early swordsmen were easy to beat, and I could just keep smashing their blade until it shattered, but around the end it got tougher to fight these people and you had to predict their movements. Also, some of the people in this game are way too accurate, I can be hiding behind something and they will still see me, and shoot the hell out of me until I can find them and shoot them back.

The only problem you will have is when the AI decides to screw with you, I'll just leave it at that.

Controls: 7

For one of the first Wii FPS games, Ubisoft did quite well, but there were some problems that kept me from fully enjoying them.

First off, Aiming was simple enough. All you have to do is point the Remote at the screen and plug away with the Trigger to shoot the baddies, you are also capable of pressing the A button to target someone and zoom in on them, it does not feel as natural with some guns as it could but it does work. Also, you are capable of reloading by shaking the Nunchuck. The only big problem is that Aiming did feel a little too slow at times.

Moving was kept easy as well, all you really need to do is move the Analog Stick on the Nunchuck to move, you are also capable of jumping, ducking, and knocking things over with the Nunchuck to use as cover.

Onto the sword play, I was really disappointed by the Sword parts of this game, you can do some moves with the Nunchuck and the Wii-Mote to do a special attack, but often the only one that would really work is where you slam the blade overhead into the opponents sword until you break it, the rest proved to be too frustrating for me to use, and even the good parts were still really clunky for me. I often wound up slashing randomly with the Wii-mote until I took whomever I was fighting down.

Not the best I've seen, but it is a good first try.

Graphics: 8

I am amazed when people say this game looks bad, Red Steel is one of the best looking games I have seen on the Wii. The style looks good with the game, the people look good enough, the guns look realistic enough, and there are some pretty explosions to keep the pyromaniacs happy [although I did not know pumping bullets into a Forklift would make it explode like that]. Most of the places in the game look great, and the developers did a good job on this game that sadly got a "6" in Graphics from Gamespot.

Sound: 7

The sound in Red Steel is just so campy and bad that it makes you laugh out loud sometimes; it's like the voice acting in Resident Evil games, just some good old cheese. As my friend from the 90's Board TheFFVIGuy said in his review, the Asian Voices are horribly stereotypical, and it sounds a lot like the City Wok guy from South Park [or any of the Asian voices Trey and Matt have done in ANY of the things they made], but that would not bother me if it wasn't for how badly some parts of the game are written, such as the people you're fighting call you a "Murderer" [you have a gun too hypocrite], which makes you appreciate that at least in Perfect Dark, Joanna got called a ***** by most of the people as they died.

I will be completely honest; I hated most of the voice work. But the Music was good, some of it did get you pumped up for the fight you were in, and some of the songs were catchy... some were annoying. But at least it was good.

Finally, the rest of the sound effects. This was the best part, the guns sounded good, swords clanging sounded good, bullets pelting the walls sounded better than a lot of what I have heard before. At least something was done to make up for the "City Wok Guy" dialog.

Atmosphere: 8

This was also done well, the levels look Japanese enough for the game, that's all that really matters to me. But, in the places you go there is plenty of Japenesey looking architecture, and the levels look enough like what they are trying to depict to be believable. The Music also has a Japanese feel, and there are a few actual Japanese songs with Japanese lyrics in them. But as I said, the Story is not the best I have seen, and some of the Dialog can make you laugh out loud [in a bad way] distracting you from the game. But everything was done good enough for me, and one of the most Atmospheric "crazy people" levels I have ever seen in a game was that amusement park I mentioned earlier.

Multiplayer: 7

I'll be honest right here by saying that I only played the Multiplayer mode once, but that is because my dad is the only person that I have played Wii games against, and he did not want to play again. So, I won't really cover all of the modes because I only played Deathmatch, but from what I saw there was a decent 4 Player game in here that feels like the one from Goldeneye.

Replayability: 7

I do not really have much to say about replayability besides the fact that there are some fun missions in the game [that can all be replayed from the menu], and there is a decent Multiplayer that can keep you busy for a little while. And if you love cheese, you will love the voice work.

Pros:
Good graphics, controls are well done for a first try Wii game, good atmosphere, unintentionally funny dialog will crack you up.

Cons:
Weak voice acting, frustrating swordplay.

Should you get it:

Even with the problems I mentioned, Red Steel is a fun FPS game that can keep you busy until some more good Wii games come out.

Overall

Red Steel is best described as a way of showing what is in the Nintendo Wii's future, while this was not the perfect FPS game like some thought it could be, it did prove just how much can be done with the Wii. And after some more work, FPS games on the Wii will surpass this in quality. Even though Red Steel is just an average FPS, imagine how much better Wii FPS games will get in the future as the System ages.

That is how I think of this game, even though it was just a average shooter with a basic plot and nothing big to offer, it is still a fin game that shows what the future holds for the Wii.

7

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 12/03/07

Game Release: Red Steel (US, 11/19/06)

[Joe]

Resident Evil 4

"Halloween Special Review: Resident Evil 4...."

For today's Review, because that Halloween is tomorrow [at the time I am writing this] I am going to do a Review on my favorite Resident Evil Game, number 4. Now as you all should know, Resident Evil is made by the good people at Capcom, and it is about slaughtering the evil zombie's created by the Umbrella Corporation and their Viruses which always wind up infecting something. So, lets light this candle...

Story: 7

Like all Resident Evil stories... there is some hokey dialogue, but the story was crafted quite well.

It all starts off in 2004; you are Leon S. Kennedy [the only good Kennedy...], one of the survivors of the Raccoon City incident 6 years before the events of 4 take place. You were recruited by the Government to be a Secret Agent after that, and your current objective is to go into some European hell-hole Village to rescue the Presidents daughter; Ashley Graham.

After going into the Village, your "escorts" are killed and you discover that the Villagers are, in a word... freaky. They turn out to be a cult called the Los Illuminados who are under control by Osmund Saddler who uses the Las Plaga to control the villagers [or "Ganados" as they were called in the game. That literally means "The Cattle"] and turn them into blood thirsty "smart-zombies".

Now I don't really want to reveal much more so, you go through a Village, a Castle, and a Military Base in your quest to rescue Ashley, kill the Illuminados, and escape the village in a well crafted story with great characters and some clues about Umbrella and what they are currently doing.

Gameplay: 9

This time, Resident Evil has gone from an exploration game to a action game where you will really spew bullets at these Cultists in some exciting, scary, fast paced action.

The AI has gotten much smarter, you won't be fighting slowly crawling zombies now, you will often wind up trying to blow away a swarm of Ganados by plugging them in the head [if they don't duck out of your sight first]. They also carry weapons, you can fight people using Maces, Grim Reaper Scythes, Molotov Cocktails, Pitchforks, and Axes and that is a very nice change of pace from a Zombie grabbing onto your ankles and biting away.

The way you play the game has also taken a pleasant change. The new Laser Sight on your guns allows you to be more precise than you ever could in the old games. You can really take the time to aim your shot directly into the Ganado's head, pull the trigger, and watching the ensuing shower of blood. There is also a new inventory system, in the old games you could only carry a few weapons, but now you have a case where you can carry a massive amount of gear when you fully upgrade it. And that upgrading is done through a "Merchant" where you use the money you acquire to buy new weapons [and upgrade them], health packs, maps and armor.

There are also some "Context Sensitive Controls", which require you to use some button combo to avoid... being eaten by a giant parasite, to stab a giant in the arm, to avoid taking a tentacle through your skull and several other things. Several of these are even in Cinematic sequences, such as a knife fight where you have to press the combos to parry the opponents slashes, and if you miss you die.

There is a lot of action in Resident Evil now, and even though this angered some of the purists, it made a big difference. Besides, you don't go into a load screen for every frickin door now, which should be worth something.

Challenge: 7

Although it is not as hard as the ammo management of the old games, Resident Evil still provides a good challenge.

You will often wind up trying to fend off a swarm of enemies which will be a good button mashing workout to blow their heads off, especially when the "Plaga" comes out of their head which can either; bite your head off, or cut you up. As I was saying with the swarming, you need to be able to maintain your position while attacking, you need to be able to thin the attacking forces, and you need to be quick at stunning whoever gets to close to you.

Resident Evil 4, like the rest of the games, is filled with Puzzles [not as much as the past games], which are a kind of break from the gore fest that makes up the main game. Mostly all they are for is opening a door or collecting some object that you need to move ahead in the game.

But the real challenge in RE4 comes from the HUGE bosses you will encounter. Some of the notables are Del Lago, a giant fish that you need to impale with Harpoons while your boat is attached to it, and it is trying to eat you. The El Gigante... a Giant which will hurl trees at you and try to crush you in any way it can. The Verdugos, which are fast little lizard like creatures that will creep around the area you are in and try to use their spiked tail to impale you. And Salazar, who tries to whip you with tentacles, and eat you with its gaping jaws. That is only a small list of the hulking baddies who you really need to experience in person to understand just how brilliant they are.

Controls: 7

The new setup makes a huge difference. You are able to easily move throughout the Village while you are trying to kill everything in your path before it kills you, and the precise aiming really helps out for that. The Quick Time Events also work pretty well, but then again I am one of the few people on this website who likes them.

Honestly, the only problem with the controls are that your movements are still clunky and tank-like, like they were in the previous games. It is tough to get into the controls if you are used to playing FPS and 3rd Person Shooters more than games that control like this, but after you get the hang of it they aren't too bad. I just wish that you could shoot or use your knife while you are moving.

Graphics: 10

Let me just say this, too anyone who said the GameCube had crappy graphics; YOU WERE DEAD WRONG!

Resident Evil 4 has quite possibly the best graphics I have ever seen on that little Cube, and all of the work that went into creating the gorgeous environments [well... gorgeous for a hell-hole], and the monstrosities you need to blow away is just amazing. I can honestly say that seeing your head get cut off by a chainsaw has NEVER been as beautiful as it was in here.

You get to see so many gruesome sights in this game, there are a lot of disturbing scenes in this game [such as in the beginning where you find a woman stabbed into a wall with a Pitchfork, with blood coating the wall], but I swear you will be immersed by them and you will gaze at them, even when what you are staring at is a man in a black trench coat who just split in half after you peppered it with shotgun shells.

Back to the environments in here, some awe-inspiring texture work done by the people at Capcom mixed with the massive open rooms and some incredible lighting makes a beautiful level. If you want realistic places to roam, this is as close as you will get on the GameCube, or any Last Gen game.

Sound: 9

Like I said above with the Graphics, this is just sheer perfection.

There is plenty of voice over work although it shares the "cheese curse" that plagues so many games now. You will either love them for how cheesy they are, or you will hate them because of it. Although, Resident Evil games don't really need great dialog, horror games like this can get better when the dialog unintentionally makes you laugh.

The people you kill, also very well done. You hear them yelling at you in Spanish as they rush to attack you, you hear the moans as you shoot their head off, you hear everything that happens to them in here.

But lets get on to the music, another thing that was superb and must be done well for a Horror game. A Horror game like this needs good music to set the mood for where you are, and what is going on. And thankfully the suspenseful, moody music in RE4 do the job.

The entire game is a feast for the ears; except for some of the cheesy dialog the cheesy writing.

Atmosphere: 10

If you want a scary game that will make you wet yourself when you turn a corner, this is not for you. But if you do want some heart-pounding adrenaline filled action mixed with Horror, well by god this IS the game for you.

As I have been saying, the Graphics are just perfect for everything and everything has that dilapidated look of a run down village in Europe. There are also some breaths of fresh air that are the castle, and the Military base, the Castle looks gorgeous and has the look of one of those British Castles from the 1500's and is breathtaking. The Military Base also has a look that shows some good technology mixed with the entire run down look of everything else in the game. You also fight the Ganados who are appropriately dressed for the locale, from tattered farm clothes, to cultist robes, and cheap looking Militia Armor; the Ganados fit into the place they are perfectly.

The Music, as I just said above will immerse you even further into this Village, as will the story which is good enough to keep you interest in what you are doing as you are learning about the Illuminados and the Las Plagas. And the sound effects themselves are incredible, the guns all sound like they should, a roar from a Ganado sounds as it should, the blood spurting from a decapitated head sounds as it should.

Really, the game itself should immerse you very well. But unlike the past Resident Evil games, this one intends to scare you with the overwhelming army of Ganados that are thrown at you throughout the game, as well as the grotesquely beautiful bosses.

Replayability: 7

There are some incentives to keep playing after you complete the game, like a game, which challenges you to see how many Ganados you can kill in a certain time limit, and a game which has one of the other characters Ada Wong [also from RE2] collecting some parasites. You also get some new guns, but this is not as good as the other versions which have more content in them that will keep you playing.

Pros:
Beautiful graphics and sound, scary as hell, massive environments, less load screens, incredible looking bosses, breathed some welcome new life into the Resident Evil series by fixing up some of the flaws.

Cons:
Bad writing in some places, Leon moves too slowly for some parts of the game, you can't aim while you run, less unlockable content than the other versions.

Should you get it:
This is probably the best Resident Evil game thus far, you ought to get it since it has been ported so much.

Overall:

This is one of the best games on the GameCube with incredible graphics and control. It will also scare the hell out of you.

9

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 10/31/07, Updated 03/09/09

Game Release: Resident Evil 4 (Player's Choice) (US, 01/31/06)

Resident Evil 5

"Not much more than Resident Evil 4 with a higher Polygon count..."

Before I start this review off, I would like to say that even though I had some serious problems with this game, I still thought that it was really fun, although it isn't much more than Resident Evil 4 with better graphics.

So lets get on with this. Resident Evil 5 is the latest game made by the people at Capcom, and the conclusion to the Resident Evil series [but that doesn't mean they won't make any more spin offs]. So, lets light this candle.

Story: 8

Although the cheesiness factor that is present in all of the Resident Evil games is still present... the story for Resident Evil 5 was done pretty well.

You play as Chris Redfield, a survivor from the previous Resident Evil games who is currently working with the BSAA [Bioterrorism Security Assessment Alliance] who is investigating a terrorist threat in Kijuju, which is a part of the African desert. You are also working with another BSAA agent called Sheva Alomar.

The game starts off with you trying to apprehend a man named Ricardo Irving who is trying to sell viruses to people. But while you are trying to find him you see someone being forced to swallow the Las Plagas virus from Resident Evil 4, which has been improved since the last game. And the entire village has been infected with the virus.

I won't spoil the rest of the story, but I will say that Umbrella is involved, Albert Wesker is back [as you can see if you watch any of the ads for the game], and you get to learn about what happened with Wesker, Chris, and his partner Jill between this game and the other Resident Evil games.

Overall, I thought the story was pretty good, and the final boss fight was satisfying when you finally killed it, but the ending was so anti climatic that it just ruined some of the satisfaction I had right before I saw that scene. And like I said earlier, there is still a problem with cheesiness, and there are a few moments in the game where you just wind up thinking "what the hell just happened". But overall, if you are a Resident Evil fan, you will enjoy the story.

Gameplay: 8

Resident Evil 5 keeps the over the shoulder 3rd person view, and more action oriented gameplay of Resident Evil 4, and there are a couple of new additions to the gameplay. But other than that, there isn't much of an improvement from Resident Evil 4.

The biggest change is that you now have a partner throughout the game. But unlike Ashley from RE4 who was useless for everything except solving puzzles, and was kidnapped more than Kimberly Bauer from "24", Sheva is actually capable of helping you in a fight. Although, her AI isn't as good at fighting the Zombies effectively as a human player is, so you might not want to give her any of your good weapons. I normally just gave her a handgun and the stun rod along with all of my healing items while I was carrying my best weapons. Sheva is also pretty important in some of the boss battles, because you need to work as a team to kill some of the bigger monsters you will have to fight in this game.

The AI is also not really that different than it was in RE4. The Las Plagas infected Africans [or Majini] behave almost the exact same way as the Ganados from the last game. They will occasionally duck out of the way of your gun, but they still just try to run at you with their weapons, or they will throw dynamite at you, or they will try to shoot you with an arrow. Although, some of them near the end have AK-47's and Sniper Rifles, and they provide a decent challenge. Some of the Manjini also will also mutate when they have taken enough damage like they did in RE 4, and the Plagas inside of them will burst out making them tougher to kill.

The Inventory System has also changed again, instead of having the case where you can buy a bigger one that gives you more space, you and your partner now only have 9 slots for items [although some items, like ammo stack], and you also have to access the item menu in real time to pick something else instead of pausing the game like it did before. I don't have a problem with the new inventory, but it can get frustrating to pick a new item when there are a lot of Manjini's attacking you. There are also a lot of new weapons that you can find and upgrade like in the last game, and most of them work pretty well.

The QTE's from RE4 are also back, but they are mostly used for a few sequences in the game, or for dodging attacks.

I also have to mention the claims that the game was racist because you played a white guy who was killing black people. Although I think that those claims are simply not true. There are a few white people in the game, and all of the enemies in the game have been infected with a virus. Although there are some parts where you have to fight the more tribal Africans in a swamp, there is nothing racist about it. And all of the people who complained about this game being racist should find something else to complain about.

Overall, RE5 is not substantially different from RE4, and although that is not a problem I would of liked to see some bigger improvements.

Challenge: 6

I thought that RE5 was a lot easier than the previous games, although that many just be because I am more adjusted to playing like this because of RE4, or because games are just getting easier now.

The puzzles are almost nonexistent now, and the ones that are in the game are really easy to solve. And with a partner in the game it gets a lot easier to kill the Manjini's.

The only parts that I thought were tough were some of the minibosses, like the Chainsaw Manjini, or the one with the Chaingun. And some of the other bosses were tough to beat. But on my playthrough in Normal mode I did not die very much. If you play on the tougher modes it will be a lot tougher to do, especially on Professional mode where you can die in one hit.

Although, it does seem like the controls are set up to make the game tougher. Because you can't move while you are aiming, you often have to run away, aim, shoot, and repeat that process on some of the enemies, which can get frustrating. But that is about as tough as the game gets.

Controls: 6

As much as I enjoyed RE4, the controls [although it was a vast improvement over the previous games] were one of the few weaker points. Although, I accepted it because using both sticks on the GameCube controller would be frustrating because the C-Stick on the GameCube controller is not very good. You still moved in the same tank like fashion as you did in the previous games, but the improvements to the camera made it so much easier to play, and being unable to move while you aimed wasn't a big problem because most of the enemies were slow and stupid.

But, RE5 feels more like an action game that controls like a survival horror game. And although people will probably get mad at me for agreeing with Adam Sessler, I think that the controls don't fit very well for the type of game that this is. And it seems like people claim that you should not be able to move in a Resident Evil game while you are aiming because it makes it tougher and scarier. But I think that something like that is not a good excuse for having flawed controls in a game.

Now, I'll say this again. I did not hate the controls, I actually liked how Dead Space controlled, and the controls in that game are very similar to Resident Evil's. But, Dead Space let you move while you aimed, and it was still a scary game, that was also much more frightening than Resident Evil has been since the first or second game in the series. The biggest problem I have with the controls in RE5 is that they feel like they don't fit in a more fast paced action game like this.

But overall, that was the biggest problem I had with them, other than that, and an awkward cover system near the end of the game, the controls were fine.

Graphics: 9

Although I had a few problems with the game, I cannot deny that Resident Evil 5 is one of the best looking games that you can buy on the Xbox 360.

The enemies [especially when they mutate] are still really gruesome, and the shiny, slimy look of the parasites really sticks out compared to how realistic all of the people look.

The environments are also very well designed, and from the pictures I have seen of Africa, the areas in this game really look like it. The Village you start off in really looks like one of the more poverty stricken areas of Africa, the more tribal village in the swamp [and all of the people in it] look like the tribal villages I have seen. And there are also some really well done water effects. There are also a few modern military bases, a boat, and a creepy temple. But overall, they all look really good.

I don't have any problems with the graphics, everything looks good, everything is animated well, the cutscenes in the game [which I believe are done in real time] look great and they feel like something from a movie.

Sound: 9

Like in the previous game, the sound in RE5 is one of the best things about it.

Although Resident Evil isn't scary anymore, the music, which was done very well and some of the background noises you hear make you feel really tense.

The voice over acting is also very well done, and it isn't affected by the cheesiness curse that almost all of the previous games have had. The voice acting seems professional and believable. Although some of the people just made me start laughing [mainly Irving], but they seemed like they were intentionally meant to be cheesy.

The noises that you hear from the Manjini when they are talking to each other in some tribal language are also well done, and some of the sound effects like the explosions, or hearing the Las Plagas burst out of someone are really well done.

Atmosphere: 10

Like I said before, Resident Evil isn't scary anymore, but it still has a really creepy vibe in all of areas you go into.

All of the parts of Africa you are in look desolate and run down, and you always have a feeling that something bad is about to happen. And the rest of the places you visit look authentic.

There is also a feeling throughout most of the game that you and Sheva are alone, trying to complete the mission without any help.

Overall, this is a really immersive game.

Multiplayer: 6

Although you are capable of doing the entire game, and the Mercenaries minigame in Co-Op, both things that enhance the replay value, and make the game more enjoyable to play. The last minute Multiplayer mode really annoyed me.

Now, I'll admit that I haven't played it [although I have seen videos of it], but that is because I don't want to pay for something that should of been released for free.

The basic problem that I have here is that Capcom basically created a couple different extra modes for the Mercenaries game. One of them is a mode where you and the other people playing in the match have to kill the Manjini, and one of them is one where you have to kill other players while being attacked by the Manjini. There are also team modes for both of them.

But, other than that this is nothing more than taking the Mercenaries game, and creating a couple of online modes for it at the last minute, and making you pay 400 MS points for it if you want to play online.

I would of been fine with this if Capcom just delayed the game a few more weeks to put this in, but this is just more proof that even though some DLC is good, a lot of Developers are releasing unfinished games, and making us pay even more money to have the complete game.

Replayability: 8

You can do the entire game in Co-Op, the Mercenaries game is fun, and there is a multiplayer mode [although you have to pay for it]. So, that should keep you busy. And if you want a real challenge, play on Professional mode.

Pros:
Great graphics and sound effects, voice overs that aren't all cheesy for once, epic boss fights, good story, Co-Op and Mercenaries mode are good additions, finally a partner who isn't useless, everything that was good in 2005 is still good today, not racist.

Cons:
Not much that is upgraded from the last game, controls don't seem like they belong in a game like this, having to pay to get the multiplayer mode.

Should you get it:
Although I had some problems with this game, that still doesn't mean that the main game isn't good. I would recommend buying Resident Evil 5.

Overall:

Resident Evil 5 is a good game, but there were some problems with the game that decreased the amount of joy that I got from an otherwise great game. The Controls seem like they belong in a different game, being forced to pay for Multiplayer, and the lack of improvements over the last game.

But, Resident Evil 5 is still a good game.

7

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 04/20/09

Game Release: Resident Evil 5 (US, 03/13/09)