In a change to your regular feature, this week Luke Mears takes the reins of the Thoroughly Underrated Games You Should Probably Play to bring you a look at an oft overlooked gem on the Xbox 360.

Anyone that has ever listened to The Newb Review Podcast, or read any of The Newb Review Shop Bargain articles Luke has written, will probably have an idea of what his selection of criminally underrated titles are. Ok, enough stalling; without further ado, let’s take a trip to Piñata Island in Viva Piñata: Trouble in Paradise.

Never let it be said that there is no heart in modern gaming. Sure, the biggest blockbuster game of all time is all about shooting foreign people in the face, and the Xbox 360’s flagship exclusive titles are all about blowing aliens in to a fine paste.

But if you were to venture into your local games retailer and wade through all the games about burley space marines soaked in lashings of blood, if you’re really lucky then you might just find one of the best family friendly games available on any console.

Made by legendary British developers Rare (makers of Goldeneye, Banjo Kazooie, and Perfect Dark on the N64) the Viva Piñata series represents a concerted effort on Microsoft’s part to establish a kid-friendly franchise.

The original game was launched alongside an animated TV show, that in all fairness was actually quite good for what it was, but never really managed to capture the imagination of the mass market.

While most of the creatures are based on real life animals, there are a few mythical beasties in the mix too.

The premise of the game is simple; you are a new occupant of a patch of scrubland on Piñata Island. Piñata Island is a very special place where various types of living Piñata roam in the wild. As the caretaker of the land it is up to you to clear out the land and grow crops in order to attract different species of Piñata.

Each species is based on an actual animal (although there are a few fictional animals hidden away in there too) and is made out of colourful strips of paper, and filled with sweets. Because of their sweet nature the creatures have names that are puns based on sweet foods, such as the Profitamole and the Fudgehog.

As well as having amusing names, the Piñatas are exceptionally well designed by the team at Rare. While the Piñata cannot speak, they each have their own distinctive grunt, which makes identifying them at a distance very easy.

While it has a very strong kid friendly aesthetic, you would be wrong to think that Viva Piñata is a game exclusively for kids. The work involved in maintaining and expanding your garden can be quite complicated, especially considering that you can only put a certain amount of stuff in your garden.

As you progress you unlock more and more types of Piñata and much like any ecosystem, each Piñata has a role to play. For instance, the first Piñata you unlock is a Whirlm, a bright orange worm.

In order to unlock the next Piñata, the Sparrowmint (a sparrow), you need to amass a certain number of worms for your Sparrowmints to eat. However, once you have two members of the same species, the only way to increase their numbers is through breeding.

Even Sasgorillas need love

Don’t worry, there’s nothing smutty about the breeding in Viva Piñata. By matching certain criteria, such as giving your Piñata a specific outfit, or growing the right crop, you can make your Piñata get in the mood for romance.

Once a heart shaped icon is above their head, simply lead on Piñata to the other. This will initiate a maze based mini game in which you take control of your Piñata and steer them towards their partner, collecting love hearts along the way.

Once the pair are reunited, they retire to a secluded spot and perform a romance dance. This is not a euphemism by the way. Each species has their own unique dance, such as line dancing and tap dancing.

While the first game was moderately aimless (beyond the whole “catch as many as you can!” angle) the sequel, Viva Piñata: Trouble in Paradise, introduced a number of brilliant new features to the game, including an actual purpose behind your Piñata hunting.

You see, Professor Pester, the Big Bad in the series, attempted to steal all of the Piñata information from the Piñata island database, but somehow managed to delete all of the data. So it’s up to you, the newest resident on the island, to capture all of the Piñata and send them to parties all around the world in order to repair the database.

The character designs are exceptionally cute and charismatic

A new challenge mode was added to the game which required specific Piñata, such as a Horstachio wearing a pirate hat. These challenges added an extra sense of structure to the game and really gave the player something to work towards.

Viva Piñata has always had a small but passionate fan base, and a focus on the community was introduced in Trouble in Paradise. Players could take photographs of their Piñata and upload them to the Viva Piñata website for other players to admire and covet.

In a feature that was designed to accommodate the more charitable players in the Viva Piñata community, you can even upload your Piñata to the website for other players to download through a print out card based system.

Here I offer my own Sasgorilla, based on Hercule Poirot, for any reader to use as they please.

The basic premise of this feature is that the Piñata’s basic information is translated into a barcode, which can then be printed out and scanned using the Xbox Live Vision Camera (and presumably the soon to launch Project Natal, or whatever they’re calling it these days).

While this obviously offers an unparalleled possibility for cheating, it is a brilliant feature for those that perhaps do not have the skill and abilities to unlock certain Piñata.

The game features 2 player local co-op (perfect for parents to help their children with tending to their garden, or for couples to find a new reason to argue with each other) and up to 4 player online co-op, so if your child or partner is struggling then there really is no excuse for not diving in and giving them a hand.

The only problem I had with Trouble in Paradise is that it felt very much the same as the original game for the first few hours. It’s not until the new areas of Piñata Island, the Pintarctic and the Dessert Desert, are unlocked along with the dozen or so new Piñata, that this begins to feel like an entirely new game.

However, if you’re entirely new to the series then there really is no better place to start thanks to a ton of new features, tweaked controls, and a new found structure that the original game was sorely missing.

You can dress your Pinata up in a number of amusing outfits.

Viva Piñata: Trouble in Paradise is one of those rare sequels (excuse the pun) that takes the original game, one that we all felt was magnificent, and improve on it in every way imaginable. The real sticking point for me is that as much as I loved the original Viva Piñata, I simply cannot play it anymore thanks to the advances that Rare have made in Trouble in Paradise. I don’t think there’s a better compliment that you can give a game than that.

Viva Piñata Trouble in Paradise was released on the Xbox 360 in late 2008. It is available to buy from The Newb Review Store for a mere £5.65 as of writing this article. Do yourself a favour and pick up a copy.

–Luke Mears–

While video game adaptations of prime time television quiz shows have been around for almost as long as video gaming itself, it was the way 1 vs 100 presented itself that marked it apart from a sea of similar titles. Taking its cues from Sony’s popular Buzz games, 1 vs 100 turned a television quiz show into a social experience.

Unlike Buzz, it didn’t just allow friends and families to play together in a single living room; it opened the game up to the entire country – even the whole continent – and went against popular thinking that video games are there to fill up the player’s spare time by requiring participants to sit at their Xbox 360 at a set time on a set night.

The odds of this surviving are a hundred to - oh.

Like a television programme, it followed a strict broadcast schedule. Indeed, with the increasing interactivity of TV quizzes; with phone-in questions, websites and red button functionality, 1 vs 100 seemed like the joint future of television and gaming; where the two had been spliced together into something more than just the sum of its parts. Winners took home prizes – not just Microsoft points and XBLA game codes, but expensive home electronics and holidays. The show even had a live presenter commentating on the events of each of the weekly ‘prime time’ episodes to give it an authentic TV quiz show feel. The only real difference between the 1 vs 100 on the National Lottery show and 1 vs 100 on your Xbox was that, unlike the BBC show, you could join in and win.

So what went wrong? Why was 1 vs 100 killed while its particular brand of hybrid entertainment was still in its nascence? With Kinect taking up so much of Microsoft’s focus, maybe it didn’t have the money to keep funding the show. Maybe participation figures weren’t great, or reliant upon a shrinking base of hardcore week-in, week-out quiz fanatics. Or maybe at the moment the kind of audience that would have been perfect for 1 vs 100 isn’t the kind of audience that would buy a video games console on which to play it.

We don't pump our gas, we pump our fists.

Consider this: experts talk about social gaming, about Zynga and Farmville, and how iPhones and Facebook will get people who currently have no interest in games playing with the rest of us. Right now these non-gaming gamers spend real money on virtual crop seed and worship the latest apps in the Apple app store. They spend the kind of money gamers would reserve for games consoles on mobile phones; mobile phones able to play games, mobile phones that are so flexible and functional, they’re starting to make the traditional games console look antiquated. They’re also the kind of people who make daily or weekly appointments to watch Eastenders, Doctor Who, The X-Factor and yes, the National Lottery. And when 1 vs 100 – or A Question of Sport, or The Weakest Link – comes on, they yell their answers at the screen and laugh when they get them wrong, celebrate when they get them right.

Only time will tell whether 1 vs 100 was ahead of the curve or not. Judging by the Mob, I’d say it was.

– Campfire Burning

Game:

Microsoft’s Summer of Arcade rolls on and the second title in the annual game series is upon us. Hydro Thunder Hurricane is the sequel to the popular arcade title released in 1999. This powerboat racer seems to emit fun from its every pore and really evokes a feeling of nostalgia for anyone familiar with the arcades of old.

Arguably the most important aspect of a racing title is the gameplay. Thankfully Hurricane is both instantly accessible and eminently challenging in equal measure. It’s clear that the developers have taken note of the game’s arcade routes, because within thirty seconds of first powering up the game you can be in a race.

Tutorials take the form of a few screens telling you exactly what you need to know; right trigger accelerates, you can gather boost power that is used by pressing ‘A’ and ‘X’ causes your vehicle to jump.

Boost canisters are littered throughout each track

However the simplicity of the controls belies the complexity of mastering this game. Using higher level vehicles in the form of powerboats that sacrifice handling for speed and acceleration, it becomes a real challenge to beat each track and gain the gold trophy. If that’s not enough to keep you busy, the inclusion of online leaderboards might; the time of your next closest rival is displayed in the top right of the screen so that you always have a new challenge to overcome long after you’ve bested the game.

Even when racing the lower level vehicles, the sense of speed is tangible and provides a really immersive experience. There are three difficulty settings, each marked by the quality of the powerboat rather than a menu setting. This helps the game feel more dynamic in that primary gameplay mechanics are drawn into the game itself, rather than placed within a menu.

Each vehicle handles in a vastly different way, with a totally different aesthetic to boot.

To compliment Hurricane’s three difficulty levels, there are four racing modes to choose from. Race sees you compete in a traditional flat-out event against fifteen computer controlled opponents. Ring Master sees you competing against the clock to race through hoops all the way to the finish line, with a miss on any ring resulting in a time penalty and a loss of boost power. Gauntlet sees you race through a solo run through tracks littered with explosive barrels. Finally, Championship provides a mixture of the other events, with points awarded for each win.

Whilst the racing is perhaps traditional at times, the level design is anything but. Somewhat reminiscent of Wave Race on the N64, after each lap of there is a high chance that something will change. A thing to note is that realism was really thrown out of the window with Hurricane; one track in particular sees a giant Norse god reaching over the level and smashing ice cliffs with his axe to create additional obstacles. There are also power-ups dotted around the tracks that will augment things for you; invariably drawing up a ramp that leads to an extra power up or shortcut.

Yes, that's a giant Norse god and he's here to cause a big wave.

Graphically the game is competent without ever blowing you away. When boost is earned, the ships transform to reveal booster engines, providing a nice little aesthetic touch. Water effects are probably the most impressive, with water hitting and running down the screen as you race. There are a few instances of scenery glitches to be found, but these only really occur if you veer way off the track.

Perhaps the weakest aspect of the game is the soundtrack. The music is pretty indiscernible from any other sound in the game. In isolation, the in-game music is also pretty uninspiring. Engine noises are also fairly wonky; at times being a little grating.

Review Round-Up

Graphics: 3/5 Competent, but not impressive. The graphics do the job amicably and there are nice little touches like the splashes on the screen as you race.

Sound: 1/5 The music is generic and completely drowned out by the engine sounds. The engines are also hit or miss at times. Commentary during the race is humourous and is probably amongst the best audio in the game.

Story: 0/5 There is no story, this is a pure arcade racer.

Gameplay: 4/5 Each vehicle has distinctive handling and speed. The physics of the game also affects different shaped vehicles in different ways. Level design is outlandish and fun. A Viking Longboat chases you past a giant Norse god as he tries to batter you with his hammer, if that sounds like fun then this is for you.

Longevity: 3/5 There are a lot of events to complete, and once you’ve bested every track with a gold trophy there’s the leaderboards to contend with. There’s definitely enough here to keep you busy. Perhaps a few more tracks would have resulted in a higher score.

Overall: 3 Special boosts out of 5 – This game isn’t for everyone, but if jumping powerboats whilst a giant crocodile leaps out of the water next to you sounds like your thing, I’d urge you to download the trial and give it a go.

At 1200 MSP, perhaps Hydro Thunder Hurricane is a little on the expensive side; if it were priced at 800 MSP then it definitely would be a must buy.

- Tom Wallis

Your tolerance for Naughty Bear is likely to extend exactly as far as your amusement at the prospect of chasing cuddly-wuddly widdle bears around a candy-coloured village and beating their stupid bear faces in with a baseball bat while all the other bears run around sobbing and howling in grief and horror.

On a mechanical and artistic level, Naughty Bear is content to stop at merely functional, or sometimes not even that. Naughty himself is a fairly graceless object, lumbering around the levels with the arcing speed and nimble elegance of a bath mounted on rollerskates, and the camera hovers awkwardly as if trying to remember why it came here in the first place. Though the unwary may be tempted to view Naughty Bear as an action game, it is really nothing of the sort; instead being a sort of puzzle-game constructed around the simple core mechanic of spreading fear and distress.

Every antisocial action performed will earn you points, and successive actions will build up a score multiplier. By chaining together “naughty” actions both small (smashing a picnic table) and large (disemboweling a weeping bear with a machete) you try to build up as many points as possible before killing the bears living in each area. The longer you keep them alive and suffering, the more points you acquire. Eventually a bear will snap under the strain and go insane. At this point they will begin to wander aimlessly around, staring into space and babbling to himself. He’ll be lost in a lonely dream world where he’s happy and everything is all right and he’s not about to get his head staved in by a psychotic pervert teddy bear on a torture-rampage. Frighten an insane bear one more time and he will commit suicide.

The repetitive nature of these screenshots should give you some idea of the limited range of the game itself

The game therefore comes down to a balancing act between keeping the bears alive and in terror and keeping the multiplier as high as possible. Each of these levels can then be replayed under challenge mode conditions, which include having to drive all bears insane, or complete the level without using a weapon. There is a certain, limited, pleasure to this in short bursts. There’s also some moderately amusing touches to be discovered, but it fails to compel at any length, especially given the limited variety of weapons and environments involved (the box cover threatens us with further downloadable content).

The repetitive nature of these screenshots should give you some idea of the limited range of the game itself

Additional multiplayer modes are included; seemingly more out of a sense of obligation than anything else. But in their necessary shifting of emphasis onto the game’s creaky combat mechanics, they undermine the only particularly appealing aspect of the whole package. Modes like Cakewalk (carry a delicious cake to the goal while under assault from a rival team) and Golden Oozy (one bear has a devastating submachine gun and must fend off hordes of attackers) all-too-quickly devolve into a frenzied bundle of running round in random circles desperately jabbing the attack button in the hope of killing something.

The whole lacklustre business of attempting to compete against other people vigorously underlines one stark, simple fact: Naughty Bear is a game constructed around a single joke, and it’s not one that bears much repetition. In its best moments it manages to be faintly reminiscent of Rockstar’s tremendous, grubby, killsploitation title Manhunt, but without that game’s mechanical delicacy, pervasive sense of dread or wry satirical bite. As Manhunt showed, there’s nothing essentially wrong with being a one-trick pony, but it had better be a pretty great trick.

Review Round-Up

Graphics 2/5 – Adequate to the task, but lacking in any real flourish or vision in its art design.

Sound 3/5 – Sound effects are uninteresting and music unmemorable. The children’s television-style narrator is faintly amusing (I enjoyed his cry of “You nutter!” upon earning a platinum medal) and wisely not over-used.

Story 1/5 – No, not really.

Gameplay 2/5 – Repetitive and unimaginative with a turgid camera and clumsy main character, yet somehow oddly compelling in short bursts. Some of the death animations are amusing the first time you see them. Online multiplayer is, of course, arbitrarily included, but it’s rubbish. Mention must also be made of the fact that the game in its current form suffers from frequent game-crashing glitches that should shame whoever was supposed to be responsible for QA.

Longevity 2 /5 - Little incentive to carry on with it beyond manic completion-ism or achievement hunting. After the first level, you’ve effectively seen everything this has to offer.

Overall 2 Ruined Parties out of 5 – You know how magistrates and tabloid columnists talk about videogames as morally-reprehensible murder simulators? They were dead wrong until this came out. It is, however, too clumsily implemented and frankly too boring to be described as any kind of moral menace. It achieves a borderline competence as a score-attack game, but you’re frankly better off with the sublime Manhunt or even Swordfish studios’ underrated The Club, both of which pull off the dystopian spree-killer genre with the kind of grisly panache that this clumsy effort probably couldn’t even spell.

- Elliot Mears

Game:

In the wild days of 2007, a little game named Crackdown was released on Xbox 360. This open world third person action game cast you in the role of a genetically enhanced super cop, out to clean the mean streets of Pacific City. Developed by Realtime Worlds, founded by the creator of Grand Theft Auto; Dave Jones, the game was padded up with exclusive access to the downloadable Halo 3 Multiplayer Beta, which boosted sales considerably.

Unfortunately some people only bought the game for the aforementioned Beta access and didn’t even bother playing the game itself. I say that it’s unfortunate because the original Crackdown was a real gem that deserved more respect than it got. At E3 2009 Microsoft made the surprise announcement that a Crackdown sequel was coming, made by a different team and without any Halo Beta to prop it up.

First, to set the scene. As part of an elite police force, The Agency, you take the role of a genetically enhanced super cop out to clean up the streets once more. Ten years have passed since the events of the first Crackdown; after clearing out the three major gangs, the Agency accidentally exposed the city to a virus that mutates the majority of the population into monsters known as The Freaks.

A number of the more rebellious citizens have banded together to form an anti-government gang called The Cell. The Cell, armed with military weapons, defend the streets during the day while the Freaks swarm the streets at night, attacking both The Agency and The Cell. Your mission is to defeat The Cell, destroy The Freaks, and bring the city back under Agency control.

In order to retake control of the city you must achieve two objectives; firstly you must take down Cell’s strongholds, which is achieved by storming in and killing everyone in the surrounding area then summoning a helicopter to secure the area; secondly you must activate generators, which are usually near Cell strongholds, in order to power Ultra violet light bombs that need to be detonated inside of Freak nests below the city. In both instances you generally have to stand your ground against increasingly stronger waves of enemies.

To complete the main campaign you need to detonate 9 UV Bombs that are spread out over the three main islands that make up Pacific City. While clearing out all 27 Cell strongholds is not required, it does make activating the generators that power the bombs a whole lot easier. Some may criticise the game for being too repetitive, but I genuinely feel that they are missing the point. The story and the missions are not important in this game – the whole point of Crackdown 2 is to become a super powered bully and trample those that get in your way.

While you have a licence to kill criminals, the Agency frowns on the murder of innocent civilians. If you should kill an excessive amount of civilians then the Agency will turn on you for a short while, or at least until they kill you. Accidentally killing civilians is an issue that existed with the first game, particularly when you became more powerful and unlocked more abilities.

Each agent has five key skills that will upgrade as you progress through the game; Agility, Strength, Shooting, Explosive, and Driving. As you level up your appearance changes; more powered up characters become larger and more muscular, with more threatening looking armour. All of these skills, apart from agility, can be increased simply by performing their corresponding action – so for instance, killing an enemy by shooting them will boost your shooting experience, while punching them to death will boost your strength. In order to boost your agility skill, which determines how high you jump and how fast you can run, you need to collect glowing green orbs that are located all around the city.

Orb collection was a key gameplay component in the original Crackdown, and it returns bigger and better than before. As well as the 500 green agility orbs, and 300 blue hidden orbs, there are 15 purple driving orbs that you have to chase down in your car, and 30 renegade agility orbs that run away from you. The 500 green orbs are pretty much all in plain sight, but most of them are out of your reach and can only be collected periodically once you level up.

Each skill technically has six levels to fill up, although you stop unlocking new abilities once you reach the fifth level. When you level up you unlock new abilities and weapons, each more deadlier than the last. Of special note is the glide suit, which is unlocked at reaching level 5 agility, that allows you to glide when jumping from great heights. Although the controls are poorly explained, after some practice it is easy enough to pick up.

As someone that spent a lot of time playing the first Crackdown, the sequel feels very familiar. On the most superficial level the game takes place in the same city with only a few minor aesthetic changes, such as demolished buildings that had once been gang strongholds. Obviously this makes complete sense when you consider the story, but it may give some people the feeling that this is little more than Crackdown 1.5 rather than a full blown sequel.

This feeling of familiarity is compounded by the fact that the way in which you progress through the game, namely the collection of orbs and killing wave after wave of nameless foes, is exactly the same. Not that there is anything wrong with that, because the orb hunting in Crackdown was brilliant fun; it was genuinely rewarding to level up and increase the outlandish stunts you would be able to perform, and the prospect of getting bigger, faster, and stronger was all the incentive I ever needed.

In terms of story, the sequel has a more detailed story than the original, although that really is not saying much. Events are fleshed out in 52 collectible audio diaries that are located around the city, and the game actually features an opening cut scene, and ending cut scene. The original Crackdown actually had no story whatsoever beyond ‘the streets are in control of the gangs, go take them out agent!’; rather than having a set in stone story, the gameplay experience was more fluid; after being given a list of targets, it was up to you to decide who to take out first.

Each gang lieutenant was responsible for certain aspects of their own gang, be it recruitment, combat training, or vehicles. By killing a lieutenant you would remove that ability from the gang, thusly weakening the gang as well as boosting your own skills, until you were in a position to take out the head of the gang. It was a great feature in the original, a real innovation, but unfortunately it does not return in the sequel.

While you can choose to take our your targets, and detonate your bombs, in any order you please, the enemies you face in the locations furthest from your starting point are so difficult – often armed with homing missile launchers that obliterate you in seconds – that you will need to level up a great deal before even thinking about taking them on.

As well as the orbs, audio diaries, Cell strongholds, and UV bombs, there are a number of side missions to occupy your time. Road races and rooftop races (the former taking place on the streets in cars while the latter takes place on foot) return along with Freak Breaches and sky diving missions. Freak Breaches, as the name suggests, has an army of Freaks breaking through the surface for you to fight off until back up turns up to bomb the hell out of them. Sky diving missions can be a little frustrating, if only because the controls are very sensitive, but offer up huge agility experience as a reward for completing them.

As fun as playing the game solo is, the best bit about Crackdown 2 is the drop in/drop out 4 player online mutliplayer. Players can choose to work together to take out The Cell and The Freaks, collect orbs (including mutliplayer orbs that are only available online), race, or simply raise hell around the city. In a slightly disappointing move, if you join another player’s game and capture a stronghold, that stronghold will only be marked as captured in the host’s game.

As with every new 360 game these days, Crackdown 2 has a host of unlockable Avatar items, including an Agent Uniform, as well as generic things like a baseball cap. Several avatar items on the list tease two future packs of downloadable content, so you know that the game is going to get some new content after awhile.

Where the first Crackdown excelled was its creative use of achievements, frequently dishing them out for tasks that took a lot of grinding, as well as simpler tasks. Crackdown 2 continues this trend, with some genuinely creative achievements that task you with doing things that you would not normally do, such as driving an agency vehicle off a ramp and in to the path of an agency helicopter, which is exactly what an achievement should be.

Amusingly the Agency handler will announce that you have unlocked your achievement, commenting on how great a feat it was. At least, it is amusing the first few times you hear him say it. After the 10^th time of hearing him say “that was an excellent achievement” I kind of wished that he would stop just shut up and leave me alone.

Review Round-Up

Graphics: 4/5 Crackdown’s signature cell shaded visual style returns, and while some of the characters lack appear to detail, the game features one of the most impressive looking and far reaching skylines in any game I have ever played. When standing on top of the Agency Tower you can literally see every part of the three islands.

Sound: 3/5 There is really only one voice actor in this game – the Agency Handler who is constantly giving you tips for success. The citizens only scream, while the Freaks roar, and the Cell yell incoherently whenever they see you. While the game features licensed tracks to listen to on your car radio none of them are particularly memorable.

Story: 2/5 In comparison to the original Crackdown this game has an epic storyline. However, when compared to other games the story could be called minimal at best. Beyond a short opening and closing cut scene, the only other story elements are relayed through 52 collectible audio diaries that fill in some of the back story.

Gameplay: 4/5 There is a wealth of gameplay types in this game, from racing,to running and gunning, to sky diving. However, the best part of the game is the orb collection, which is more like a platforming puzzle game than anything else. While some orbs are very easy to reach, some are incredibly difficult to reach but offer up big rewards. Chuck in 4 player online multiplayer and this game has pretty much everything you could want in terms of gameplay.

Longevity: 4/5 If you rush through the story missions, avoiding orb collection, stronghold capturing, multiplayer, and side missions then it will probably take you about 8 or so hours to complete the game. However, if you plan on doing that then you are a mental that hates fun. Getting online with 3 other friends is a blast (literally) and could keep the game in your disk tray for a long time to come.

Overall: 4 Renegade Agility Orbs out of 5

Crackdown 2 is a worthy successor to one of the most original and interesting games on the Xbox 360. While some could criticise it for sticking to the formula too much, it offers up several new gameplay modes and an addictive bombastic multiplayer mode. If you loved the first Crackdown then there is really no reason not to pick up the sequel.

- Luke Mears

And his enthusiasm rubbed off on us. So impressed were we here at Newb Review Towers that we decided to do a few videos looking at what you can expect from this title.

So what are you waiting for?

Remember, all these videos and more can be found on our official Youtube feed at www.youtube.com/thenewbreview

Make sure you subscribe to our videos, because we’ve got a whole lot of material in the works!

Single Player

Multiplayer

Kane and Lynch 2: Dog days will be released on August 27th in the USA and August 30th in the United Kingdom. Frankly, we can’t wait!

Game: Kane and Lynch 2: Dog Days
Format: Xbox 360
Developer: IO Interactive
Publisher: Eidos Interactive

It’s probably worth mentioning that I have not played the original Kane and Lynch game. Since current gen consoles became more affordable and commonplace in most households, “frag style” shooters that forgo finesse and storyline in favour of perseverance and a more chaotic, crimson splattered roller-coaster of a ride have truly ruled the day.

You know the sort I’m sure. The kind of games that have your character seemingly outmatched and facing dozens of enemies at a time with your best friend being the cover system. Frankly, I find it boring, especially when these games demand that ¾ of your gun’s clip must be emptied into just one of your targets in order for them to fall.

The tedium is enhanced by the story lines, which are often sparse and unimaginative. Frustration saturates my very senses as I recover from one monotonous death after another, with seemingly no end to the enemies.

In Kane and Lynch 2: Dog Days, you make the realisation that Mr Lynch’s beloved wench is in trouble. All hell breaks loose after you make a rendez-vous with the other protagonist, Kane, and slaughter your way through a sea of blood, noodles and policemen/some kind of black ops task force to rescue aforementioned damsel. Simple right?

One of the most striking things about the game is its visual style. The game focuses on a news footage/youtube video style of realism. You might think that this would get in the way of things, or obscure the image, but it works surprisingly well.  In fact the first thing I said upon starting the game was “wow!”.

The visual style mimics amateur hand held camera footage you might see on the news

Do not get me wrong, I love to blow things up and lay my digital enemies to waste, but it’s the little details that make one game truly unique from all the other cover based third person shooters out there. The demo build of Kane and Lynch 2: Dog Days definitely intrigues me by presenting itself as a unique third person action shooter.

The controls and cover system are both intuitive and really quite sensitive. When you are reloading your weapon behind cover, the game does not pander to mindless drones by having the cross-hair constantly visible. Thus, you are prevented from aiming behind cover and simply popping out for ‘instant kills-a-plenty’. Little things like this demand just a little bit more focus from players and add a greater sense of realism and immersion into the game.

There's a really dirty look to this game, without it being all grey and brown

The general lighting is subtle and extremely effective. It complements the dank urban playground of death you are frolicking around. The whole atmosphere of the demo is indeed seedy. The character’s appear to be dirty, sweaty and an assured part of the Asian, neon sparkled ghetto you are fleeing through. Parts of the environment prove to be destructible, particularly the furniture and internal support structure of the restaurant and shanty town you ballistically molest. Shards and chunks of wood splintering away in satisfactory chunks as you wear down the cover of nearby peons.

Cover breaks apart and splinters whenever it is hit by bullets

The enemy AI forces NPCs to take cover regularly without leaving themselves open as stationary targets. Members of the enemy team also routinely flank you from any side. The AI of your partner, Kane, has him as a worthy comrade / psycho in arms. He’s certainly competent at picking up the crumbs you let tumble from your banquet table of cadavers, or for the more inexperienced: fighting tooth and nail to pick up the slack in the body count.

The graphics are pleasing and the ambiance of the game does a great job of making you feel like a ruthless, sociopathic, skullet-toting mercenary, wishing to rescue his lady friend. The environments, while linear, give a few routes to experiment with in order to flank your foes. These range from rooftop vantage points to ushering through shops, avoiding the open high-street road. However, this game is in the developmental stage and still has problems concerning lighting glitches with street lamps. Also breakable parts of the environment either fragment before your eyes or simply disappear.

The story of the game is presented in a concise but mysterious way that has indeed caught my attention. The characters themselves are also charismatic and appealing in their desperate fight for survival and moral depravity.

The physics are relatively good but could be improved on. When slain, enemies literally collapse to the ground as if their strings have simply been severed. I would expect that, when someone is the recipient for a 12 gauge to the face at close range, the point of force with their centre of gravity acting as a fulcrum would inevitably have their body thrown backwards violently. This combined with Lynch casually firing his shotgun like he’s operating an airsoft pistol with the recoil akin to something like a baby’s flatulence. Maybe he has fantastic technique, maybe this adds a balance to help compose the player in battle… I’ll let you decide.

Despite the problems mentioned so far, I have faith they will be resolved upon the game’s release. As mentioned at the beginning, I don’t play games for the sake of simply shooting things, and I feel this game elevates beyond weak action shooters.

If you want some substance to your mayhem, judging from this demo, Kane and Lynch: Dog Days looks like a title to watch. Kane and Lynch 2: Dog Days will be available for the PC, PS3, and Xbox 360 on 27th August 2010.

- Ian Young

Stay tuned to The Newb Review for further coverage of this game.

This week your regular host, Tom Wallis, is joined by site editor Kieran Roycroft, mental misfit Adam Radcliffe, and special guest Elmo from Joypod. Topics under discussion this week: The iPhone 4G, E3 rumours, and Adam’s plans to visit Adam Ant in the mental hospital, as well as all the features you’ve come to expect.

As ever, don’t forget to leave us an iTunes review; you could be in with a chance of winning the game of your choice.

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Game: Red Dead Redemption
Format: Xbox 360
Developer: Rockstar San Diego and Rockstar North
Publisher: Games

The sales juggernaut that is Red Dead Redemption is finally in our hands and available to play by all. From the Grand Theft Auto studios, it is no surprise that this game has managed to set fire to sales charts all over the world.

Everything Rockstar touches seems to turn to gold these days, no matter how tedious it is (see our Massively Overrated Games article on GTA4 and our review for The Ballad of Gay Tony). But the question is: how does this new game fair under the scrutiny of The Newb Review?

To say that Red Dead Redemption took us by surprise is an understatement. Perhaps it is because the hype engine behind this game didn’t really get into full swing until a month or so before the game came out.

Sure, we had seen a bunch of trailers over the past year or so and the game was looking technically very nice, but the Red Dead label really had not established a strong reputation. After all, this is only the second game in the series and the gaming press was full of news about the game’s troubled development. Frankly, we were half expecting this game to be a perfectly competent Grand Theft Auto clone.

Yet, to call Red Dead Redemption ‘Grand Theft Horses’ cheapens the game slightly. In terms of gameplay the series has moved away from it’s arena based combat roots to a massive open world, non-linear action game.

Very few things are carried over from the first Red Dead game. The main leftover is the ‘Dead Eye’ shooting mechanic. Here time goes into slow motion, allowing you to line up individual targets, then blow them all away in quick succession.

Duels are one of the few things that return from the original game.

In terms of story, you play as John Marsden, a former gang member, whose family has been taken hostage by the federal government. In exchange for their freedom you must hunt down your former gang members and execute them in order to bring order to the last days of the Wild West. To say that the game’s opening was slow and methodical would be an understatement. Following an unsuccessful attempt at killing his old friends, Marsden is wounded and left for dead in the desert.

Marsden’s wounded body is discovered by ranchers who tend to his wounds, and conveniently serve as your guide to the world of Red Dead Redemption. A well as teaching you the basic controls for walking and shooting, the ranchers teach you everything you need to know about being a genuine cowboy.

Your main mode of transportation, the horse, comes in multiple forms; each with differing levels of stamina. The horses’ really feel like living, breathing creatures and they can only be worked so hard before they buck you off their backs. The key to travelling by horseback is to maintain a steady pace and not push the horse too hard.

The vistas in the game are breath taking.

Soon after mounting my first horse I managed to accidentally shoot it in the head while hunting coyotes thanks to the game’s default auto lock-on feature. This auto lock-on can be made stronger or weaker depending on your preference; although once I got to grips with how aiming worked in the game I found it was a fairly useful feature.

At the ranch you are given a number of side tasks. These range from horse shoe tossing, breaking in wild horses, night watch and cattle herding. These side missions serve as nice distractions but once you’ve completed each of them there really isn’t any need to visit them again; unless you become desperate for cash. Before long, you expand out of the ranch and venture in to the nearest town; Armadillo. Gradually  you venture further and further from your starting point in attempt to gather allies for your mission.

There is a real joy to be found in exploring Red Dead Redemption. Despite most of the world being empty, each area has its own distinctive look and character. Along the way you will encounter random people in need of help. These random tasks range from retrieving a stolen wagon to stopping a lynching and everything inbetween.

The Grizzly Bear is one of the toughest creatures in the game

As well as these random missions there are a number of collection based ambient missions. These serve as a decent replacement for the tired old ‘collect X amount of hidden packages’ or ‘shoot 100 pigeons’ in GTA4.

These challenges are broken up into 4 categories; the survivalist challenges require you to find flowers, treasure hunter challenges have you hunting for hidden treasure, sharpshooter challenges revolve around performing skilful shots, and the master hunter challenges have you hunting wild animals; from harmless rabbits to more deadly creatures like grizzly bears. Challenges can be completed in any order at any time and offer up a fun way to pass the time between missions.

The game is well written, with the usual great voice acting. Most of the characters are fairly decent multifaceted human beings, although there are still a few over the top characters. Some people will like these characters and find their inclusion humorous, but personally I found myself preferring the more realistic characters.

When hunting criminals you can take them in either dead or alive

As enjoyable as the game is, there are a few niggling issues. The game goes to great lengths to explain how every feature in the game works… except for the Dead Eye aiming centric duels to the death. I often found myself losing a duel simply because I had pressed the aim button a second or two too soon.

The sooner you press the aim button, the sooner you will pull our your gun. However this comes at a cost of your accuracy. At least, that is what I have been able to piece together so far. I’m still not 100% on those damned duels.

Weapon selection in the heat of the moment can be cumbersome at best; while holding the left bumper down you move the right analogue stick to select your weapon from a weapon wheel. However the icons for each weapon are entirely see through, which makes determining which weapon you are picking very difficult.

As cinematic and well written as the script is, the cinematography in the cut scenes is at best unusual and at worst sloppy. The camera cuts between characters at odd moments, sometimes mid sentence, and other times the camera will not cut for a long time after a character has stopped speaking, leaving them gawking at the screen. I would not normally mention it, but in this case it does not appear to serve any purpose other than irritate the film graduate in me.

Multiplayer is well represented in this game in the form of the free play mode. In essence this is the entire single player world, but with up to 16 other human players running around the place. You can from a posse of up to eight players and ride together, taking on general combat missions which have you storming bandit strongholds. Alternatively you can just run around shooting at the other players, being as much of a nuisance as possible.

Other death match and flag capturing multiplayer game modes are also available, but to be frank the best fun in the game is had teaming up with friends and tearing around on horses causing as much mayhem as possible. There have been some issues reported by players finding they are unable to join public free roam games. I have not experienced it myself, but the problem is wide spread enough for Rockstar to promise a patch to fix the issue.

Much like every other multiplayer on the face of the planet, there is a progressive levelling up system. Experience is awarded for killing bandits and other human players. Each level unlocks new weapons, character skins, and animals to ride on. Hilariously, every character starts with a worn out old donkey to ride; it’s a real joy seeing your team mate trundle into town on the back of a decrepit old mule, guns blazing.

Review Round-Up:

Graphics: 4/5 While some of the facial animation, particularly the lip syncing, is a bit patchy, you can tell a lot of love and effort has gone in to the character and environment designs. Individual people in the towns are recognisable, and each region of the game has its own look at feel, without coming across as unbelievably distinctive.

Sound: 5/5 The voice acting, as you would expect, is superb. Aside from a few over the top characters, most performances are subtle and subdued. The general sound effects for animals and weapons are believable and contribute towards creating a believable world.

Story: 4/5 Red Dead Redemption’s script resembles a movie more than a video game, with fairly unusual pacing; Marsden’s mission remains a secret to the player (unless they read the back of the box) for a good hour or so, and the end few missions of the game feel more like a traditional training mission more than anything else. It is not a bad thing by any means, merely unusual.

Gameplay: 4/5 Controlling John Marsden feels a lot smoother than previous characters in Rockstar games. The Dead Eye slow motion aiming is a great feature that can help you out in tough situations. The single player is full of numerous missions of various types, such as fetch quests, escort missions (that are actually fun!) or missions that revolve around taking control of huge mounted guns.

Longevity: 5/5 With a lengthy story mode, numerous side missions and other activities, Red Dead Redemption will easily keep you busy for hours on end. And that is before you even try the multiplayer.

Overall 4.5 Extinct Buffalo out of 5. Red Dead Redemption is perhaps the ideal sequel; it took everything that was less than spectacular from Red Dead Revolver and cast it aside. Crossing the distinctive western aesthetic with the open world style of Grand Theft Auto, Rockstar have managed to produce a cinematic new blockbuster franchise, complete with compelling co-operative multiplayer, and oozing replayability.

And Another Thing…

Tom Wallis writes:

I fired up this game straight into multiplayer with a couple of friends, giddy with excitement as to the possibilities contained within. Certainly, the first few hours I wasn’t disappointed and we had great fun completing the gang hideout missions and causing havoc for other posses in the world.

The problems arise after the initial few hours: there just isn’t enough to do. The frustration with the multiplayer comes with the fact that you can see, and indeed you’ve been given, the tools to do a lot of things in the world of Red Dead, but there just aren’t enough missions for you to fully enjoy them.

Another problem is with the player versus player challenges, in the form of grab the bag and shootout. Generally the aiming in the game is competent, but auto-aiming is far too effective and switching this off becomes far too hard.

Inside player versus player games I’ve also encountered problems with the match making. Players within my posse have been split between different teams, which defeats the purpose of allowing us to posse up in the first place.

Finally, opposing players have large indicators above their heads. This irritatingly highlights the player and means there is almost no skill involved in winning.

Generally the multiplayer has been a disappointment considering the high quality of the single player campaign. Hopefully future DLC will both address some of the issues as well introducing some much needed variety to create the superb overall package we were all hoping for.

We’ve had some gigantic titles already released in 2010, Mass Effect 2, Battlefield: Bad Company 2, God of War 3 and Bioshock 2 to name but a few. However, it’s probably safe to say that the 1^st quarter of this year has only truly belonged to one game, Square Enix’s latest offering of the Final Fantasy series, Final Fantasy 13.

Everywhere you went, from the sides of buses to billboards, from full page adverts in magazines to advertisements on that little (or big) box we call a television, Final Fantasy 13 was there. In fact, I heard that Square Enix had pumped so much money into the marketing campaign of Final Fantasy 13, they actually tried to make it an international law that every person over the age of 16 had to buy at least 10 copies. One copy to play, nine just to sit on your shelf or something like that.

Despite it's age, Lost Odyssey still looks incredible

The wait for Final Fantasy 13 was a long one, and between Final Fantasy 12 and 13 Microsoft Game Studios released the great, and often forgotten about, Lost Odyssey. This game is much in the same vein as the Final Fantasy series, not surprising considering it was even produced by the creator of the Final Fantasy franchise, Hironobu Sakaguchi (pronounced He-Row-Know-Boo Sack-A-Gooch-Ee, I do believe).

Forgotten about? Well yes, because it seems only 0.1% of the gaming population actually know this game exists. It’s a crying shame considering it boasts some of the key elements of what makes a truly brilliant RPG.

Despite it’s age, Lost Odyssey still looks beautiful (the cutscenes in particular are nothing short of breathtaking), it also has fully realised and interesting characters (although the character of Jansen does grate on you at times, the annoying f*ck!). Most importantly, it has an engaging and emotive story. Story really is the element that means an RPG either lives or dies.

On a more personal note, the story of Lost Odyssey has reignited my love for RPG’s. Well, that and the Mass Effect franchise.

Lost Odyssey’s tale centres around the exploits of Kaim Argonar; quite possibly one of the sulkiest characters to ever grace a game. Kaim is entitled to be a bit sulky as he is immortal and is suffering from a spot of amnesia.

Mr Moody Pants..

Of course, with this being an RPG there is a whole cast of characters to join Kaim on his quest. They range from mortals and children such as Jansen and Cooke, to other immortals such as Gongora and Queen Ming. Each character is supported with some superbly believable voice acting, which helps immerse the player within the Lost Odyssey story.

With smatterings of war, sorrow, betrayal and rebellion, it all sounds very much like your average Japanese RPG. You’re right, Lost Odyssey plays out like your average JRPG, which some people may find, well…quite frankly boring. It’s fairly outdated, turn based combat system, in randomly generated battles and the games insanely long load times being the biggest offenders of boredom, and at times it all feels perhaps a bit too old school, if also frustrating.

Lining up and taking turns to attack feels far too old fashioned these days

Whilst Lost Odyssey may lack originality in some areas it is incredibly innovative in others. Case in point, the “Thousand Years of Dreams” mini stories/dreams allow the player to read some of the tales accrued through Kaim’s thousand year life time. Anything from the hugely significant to the littlest of detail can spark a memory within Kaim. The player is then able to read the relating tale any time they want.

This system allows for a real connection between the player and the character. Kaim at first seems to be very cold and soulless, but these stories mean he warms on you and slowly comes to life.

These stories are especially interesting and moving because they are beautifully written. Although they were written by award-winning Japanese short story writer, Kiyoshi Shigeematsu (pronounced Key-Yosh-Eee She-Jee-Mat-Soo, I hope), so they were destined to be well written.

The soundtrack to the game is of equal beauty. The emotively written score really adds to an already engaging story to create a truly thrilling experience. The music heightens the emotional climaxes of the story, whether it be through making the intense moments far more tense or the sad moments positively tearful. All in all, the score is the perfect companion to a heart wrenching story.

All credit to Microsoft, in an attempt to try and win over the Asian market they really went to town on Lost Odyssey. Not only did they draft in incredible talent to ensure the game was well written, they also allowed players to extend the experience of Lost Odyssey beyond the four discs with the addition of DLC. New items, dungeons, bosses, dreams, skills and achievements are all there to download and earn; further expanding what already was a complete experience.

In fact, the phrase “complete experience” is probably the best way to summarise Lost Odyssey. This is a game far from flawless or perfect, however if you are willing to forgive and look passed the many flaws, there is still a very engaging, enjoyable experience to be had. It’s just such a shame that this is an experience that seems to have been forgotten.

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If you’d like the show notes, click the more button.

[H:MM:SS] – Show Notes
——————–
Opening Song (Poseidon’s Wrath – God of War 3 OST)

[0:00:30] – Introductions

[0:06:52] – Jason’s Now Playing
-MLB 2010: The Show (PS3)
-Red Dead Redemption (Xbox 360)
-Alan Wake (Xbox 360)

[0:54:00] – Steven’s Now Playing
-Red Dead Redemption (Xbox 360)
-Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (Xbox 360)
-Prototype (Xbox 360)
-Magic: The Gathering – Duels of the Planeswalkers (Xbox Live Arcade)
-Hotel Dusk: Room 215 (DS)
-Just Cause 2 (Xbox 360) DEMO

[0:59:43] – News
-Microsoft game president Bach retires
-Halo: Reach Dropping In September
-Alan Wake’s Second Episode is “The Writer”?
-Fable III’s Kingly Collector’s Edition Is Xbox 360 Only
-Magic The Gathering Gets Steam-Powered
-First Killzone 3 Official Details
-HBO Comes To The PlayStation 3
-Top Gun kicking tires, lighting fires this summer
-A Second Helping Of Phantasy Star Portable Headed Stateside
-Sega’s Big Sonic 4 News: It’s Delayed
-Sonic Colors bleeding onto Wii, DS
-Insomniac goes multiplatform with EA Partners
-Madden  Taps Gus Johnson for Video Games’ Top Play-by-Play Job
-NHL 11 and the Canadian Hockey League Make It Official
-Rock Band 3 Is The Piano Man
-Google’s Pac-Man Front Sapped 4.8 Million Hours of Productivity

[1:41:43] – Coming Soon For June 2010

[2:02:01] – Wrap Up

[2:06:10] – End

Movie fans with a gaming habit will have noticed that a certain adaptation is scheduled for release in a few days; Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time. Based on the 2003 film of the same name, it’s being hyped as a video game adaptation that will actually be good.

Back to the game though, at the time of release this multi-platform title was praised for its graphics and fantastic time control mechanisms as well as the strong character building of both the Prince and Farah. For many at the time it was game of the year and is still one of the highest ranking games for the Xbox, Playstation 2 and GameCube.

Since then, there have been three more releases: The Warrior Within, The Two Thrones and, more recently, the 2008 title simply called Prince of Persia. So now we have Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands, but where does it fit into the franchise?

Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands is very much the spiritual successor to The Sands of Time over the rather divisive 2008 release. Of course, this is also a movie tie-in that, whilst not directly related to the Jerry Bruckheimer film, is Ubisoft’s first foray into the movie tie-in since the rather sub-par Avatar games.

Those amongst us that have experienced The Sands of Time will know what to expect: jungle-gym-esque rooms full of mazes with obstacles to vault, jump, swing and wall-run over, punctuated with the occasional sword-swinging battle against the resident enemies of the game. So how does this hold up against the much-loved original?

Once you get the hang of controls you can become a master acrobat.

The opening is impressive, sweeping over the vast landscapes of the desert city to reveal the place where you’ll predominantly be for the rest of the game. Graphics are as polished as one would expect them to be, conveying scale and the grand atmosphere to come. I have to be honest though, the first twenty minutes or so is a complete slog.

The controls feel heavy, the jumps delayed and the Prince felt more akin to controlling a block of stone than the lithe acrobat I expected. Personally, I thought the Prince was a little too on the boxy side for my liking also, a complete contrast for me against the well spoken voice of Yuri Lowenthal, but that’s just me.

The game was a complete slog until the realisation that this was, in almost every aspect, The Sands of Time. After a quick revision of the original, that I thankfully still own, the controls of this title made a little more sense. The controls are an emulation of a title released some seven years ago. After this epiphany, oddly enough the game opened up a little more.

Some moments of the game look visually stunning.

Nearly every aspect of this game can be compared closely to The Sands of Time, but for the sake of the review I’ll put aside the comparisons as much as I can. Firstly, let’s deal with combat. In any previous game in the franchise, combat hasn’t been the most praise worthy gameplay aspect. In a similar fashion, I doubt anyone is going to be singing the praises of this system too much. It is, on the whole, very simplistic. You essentially hit things with your sword… who could want more?

Occasionally you have to kick someone with a shield before damage can be done, cinematic aerial slashes can be performed by jumping on the enemies and on occasion, one can throw minions over balconies and banisters to their doom. It may not be complex, but it is fulfilling as the game will throw a multitude of enemies at you. Slashing down swathes of sand-creatures in one swipe couldn’t be more satisfying.

Kicking an enemy off the side of a building = satisfying out of ten

An inescapable comparison is the Prince’s control over time. As a spiritual successor, the Prince once again can stop and rewind time to prevent his demise. This may be a welcome addition for the nay-sayers of the 2008 ‘death-defying’ game in which it was impossible for you to commit suicide. Instead, you have a certain amount of chances to rewind time should you fall into trouble, but once those chances are gone, the Prince will die.

This chance to rewind time is combined with other special powers gained throughout the game that must be activated in order to navigate the levels. The most prominent of which is the ability to freeze water. This new ability is used to freeze sheets of water to create suitable areas for wall-running. You can also freeze jets of water that act as substitutes for the traditional flag-pole style objects that the Prince regularly swings from.

How he grips on to either of these, I’ll never know; perhaps a good pair of gloves and some spiked boots? All of this combines to make a game far more challenging but rewarding in some sense than the 2008 title.

Be prepared for some icy moments after gaining power over water.

Level design overlaps somewhat with the 2008 title. Yet, despite this the differences in the game’s difficulty as well as in the design of the Prince himself lend the game a completely different feel. This is the area in which Prince of Persia excels. The level design flows and increases in difficulty as the game develops, always seeming to keep the right side of challenging.

When you get into the ‘zone’ and manage to string together segments of traversing the obstacles flawlessly without having to resort to rewinding, the feeling of mastery leaves you speechless. That said, the game will always keep you on your toes; just when you think things are becoming too easy, it will throw something your way that will make you stop and consider the level a little longer.

Some enemies are a little bigger than your regular sand-minions.

That said, not all is rosy within The Forgotten Sands. Should players have fallen in love with Sands of Time or even the 2008 storyline, this game may come as a little bit of a disappointment. Sure, this title may emulate the Sands of Time in everything from combat to level design but it falls flat in character development. The interplay between the Prince and Farah and even the 2008’s Prince and Elika is entirely missing from this game.

Without the stunning interplay between the Prince and a companion, this game can come across as little more than a soulless movie tie-in. The gameplay is important, of course, but when this is a follow up to such a successful game, and in light of a big screen release, such faults could be crippling for a Prince of Persia fan.

It is relatively easy yet satisfying to massacre enemies from the sky.

The auto-saves too, need mentioning. Whilst I myself had few problems, with only a couple of irritating restart points after dying, others online have noted more troublesome glitches. As the game only has one slot which is continually auto-updated as you progress, should anything go wrong there is no opportunity for the player to reload from a personal save.

Having a personal save alongside an auto-save would have easily got around this. Even offering a choice of previous auto-saves would have been nice. Unfortunately, should the game auto-save when you are dying, the results can be irritating, forcing the player to restart the whole game.

Review Round-Up

Graphics: 4/5 The graphics in this game can’t really be faulted too much. Everything looks nice with cinematic attacks working well within the combat system. There is a great gradual addition of colour as the game progresses; the Prince initially starts out in Gears of War brown settings, graduating into lush green gardens later into the game. All in all, it is what you would have expected.

Sound: 3.5/5 The sound is atmospheric and works within the game, however it lacks any sort of mesmerising qualities. You won’t be humming any of the tunes after playing this, but for general atmosphere it works. Voice acting is well done, with a welcome return from Yuri, but his voice doesn’t suit his new bulky appearance.

Gameplay: 3.5/5 Combat is satisfying as a frustration reliever and when you can flow combinations of jumps, swings and wall-runs you’ll be shouting about how awesome you are. But be prepared for the traditional throwing of the controller when things don’t go so smoothly.

Longevity: 3/5 Once this game is completed there is little in the way of replayability outside of completing the game on a higher difficulty or grabbing those last niggling achievements. Extras offered aren’t too much of a bonus unless you love Ubisoft’s staple Ezio enough to see his behind swinging around instead of the Prince’s.

Overall: 3.5 rewinds out of 5

Whilst it starts out as quite a disappointment, Forgotten Sands picks up as the game progresses. People who have a long-standing love affair with Sands of Time might not be as forgiving, however.

When you look at it, what you have here is a sequel that might find tough times being released as a dreaded movie tie-in. Had this been a stand-alone release it might not have felt quite so soulless. That said, if what you want is a more up to date version of Sands of Time sans the romance, this will be the game you’ve been waiting for.

You can pick up a copy of this game from our Amazon store or any of our affiliate links.

If this were the practice in any other industry, there would be a number of lawsuits flying about the place, but not in our industry. As such, The Newb Review thought it was time to honour five titles that have contributed the most to the realm of videogames over the past decade.

So, in no particular order, let’s get this party started.

Halo: Combat Evolved

Game: Halo: Combat Evolved
Format: Xbox, PC
Developer: Bungie Studios
Publisher: Microsoft Games Studios

When Microsoft’s first foray in to console gaming; The Xbox, was released, there was only one title that made the machine worth getting at launch. That game was Halo: Combat Evolved (or just plain Halo to the kids). But what exactly was so revolutionary about this first person shooter?

Those of us that are old enough can cast our minds back to the early days of console first person shooters, with titles such as Goldeneye, Medal of Honour, or the various ports of Doom or Duke Nukem. As great as they were, they do not exactly stand the test of time.

Halo, however is still infinitely replayable, as it has effectively defined the console first person shooting experience.

A revolution... Vehicle Combat that is actually fun!

Major innovations:

 Gigantic open levels: While the opening act of the game featured typical corridor based shooting, the game completely changed once the ship crashed on the Halo world. Remember the exhilaration of venturing out of the escape pod and finding a massive world for you to explore? It was mind blowing.

 Vehicle combat: Sure, plenty of games had vehicle sections in them, but more often than not these seemed like an afterthought. Where Halo differed is that the vehicular combat actually felt like an integral part of the game. The smooth controls you associate with first person shooters were successfully transferred over to the vehicles, which made coming across an abandoned Warthog something to look forward to, rather than dread.

 Recharging health: Before Halo if you were unfortunate enough to get shot then the only way you could recover was by using health packs. Not only did Halo introduce the recharging shield, but they also introduced the idea of recharging health. You know the drill. Shot up? Crouch behind cover and wait for your health to come back. It was, and still is, an empowering thing of beauty.

 Intelligent enemies: Gone were the days of enemies simply charging at you down a corridor. No, the artificial intelligence was astounding; enemies would regroup together, hide behind cover and even discuss tactics with each other.

 Incidental character dialogue: Every character that you came across, be they friend or foe, had their own voice and dialogue. Sure a lot of the time it would just be generic military jargon related to the mission, but compare that to the dialogue in previous first person shooters. Perfect Dark’s infamous “why… me?” springs to mind.

Game: Grand Theft Auto 3
Format: Playstation 2, PC, Xbox
Developer: DMA Design (Now Rockstar North)
Publisher: Rockstar Games

It is hard to believe that the Grand Theft Auto series was anything but a 3D open world game. Yet it wasn’t until the fifth game in the series, GTA: 3, that we saw the arrival of the ultimate 3D open world game. A sprawling environment full of people in which you could do anything you wanted. Is it any wonder so many other titles took inspiration from it?

The epitomy of freedom.

Without GTA:3 it is likely that we would never have seen games such as Saints Row, The Incredible Hulk: Ultimate Destruction, The Godfather, Spiderman 2, or Crackdown.

Major Innovations:

 Absolute Freedom: Playing as the nameless and voiceless thug who escapes from Prison after being set up by his girlfriend on a bank job, you could do almost whatever you wanted. You did not have to do the missions, you could just wander the streets taking in the atmosphere. Or, you know, you could just fire off a ton of rockets at passing traffic.

 Celebrity Voice Acting: While subsequent games have had big names such as Sam Jackson and Dennis Hopper lending their vocal talent, GTA 3 started the trend by hiring actual actors, such as Michael Madsen, to bring the characters to life. What a difference it made.

 Unmatched Atmosphere: Liberty City actually felt like a real breathing city. The streets were populated with people, and there were always cars on the streets, even late at night. Every street in town had its own feel, and after a few hours driving around it became easy to navigate your way around town.

 Licensed Music: GTA:3 featured an unprecedented number of real world songs on the in-game radio station, which was pretty much unheard of at the time. I’ll never forget getting in to my first car and being treated to Paul Engemann’s “Push it to the limit” from the movie Scarface. Pure. Genius.

Game: Shenmue
Format: Dreamcast
Developer: Sega AM2
Publisher: Sega

Technically, Shenmue was originally released in Japan in 1999, so it is slightly outside our time frame. However, the European version of the game did not appear until December 2000, so we’ll let it slide.

Playing as Ryo Hazuki, you were on a quest to discover the identity of your father’s murderer, and to get revenge. The game itself revolved around walking through town and asking the residents questions. If GTA:3 is the representation of western inner city life, then Shenmue is the embodiment of a quiet sleepy Japanese town; slow and dreary for some, but a real gem to others.

Press A to jump, or alternatively you can just watch Ryo stymble over the boxes.

Major Innovations:

 Quick Time Events: Love them or hate them, without Shenmue we would not have the quick time event. A symbol flashes on screen, giving you a few moments to press the corresponding button or face disaster.

 A real working town: The town of Yokosuka was populated with dozens of characters, each with their own voices. Sure, some would brush you off if you tried talking to them, but they all felt like real people. They even had their own schedule that they stuck to, so you wouldn’t come across kids playing baseball in the streets at 2am for instance.

 Life as we know it: Ryo felt like a real living person. He had to eat, sleep, and even get a job. To some, this was a headache that got in the way of the quest, but to me it really made me believe that Ryo was an actual person.

Game: Gears of War
Format: Xbox 360, PC
Developer: Epic Games
Publisher: Microsoft Games Studios

Another flagship Xbox title, although this time a flagship title for the second Xbox, the Xbox 360. Taking on the role of Marcus Fenix, a grizzled rectangular pile of man meat, you must fight against the underground menace of the Locust; an equally burley, pale race of beasties that are trying to wipe out humanity. So far so generic, but what Gears of War lacks in terms of narrative it makes up for with some truly influential gameplay.

Meet generic space grunt 1, 2, 3, and 4.

Major Innovations:

 Cover: Do I need to say anything more than duck and cover? Sure, Gears of War did not invent the idea of a cover system, whereby the character you control ducks behind an object and uses it to shield from enemy fire, but it certainly popularised it.

 Burly Space Marines: It seems every game these days has burley space marines covered from head to toe in generic looking armour. Thanks Gears. Thank you very much.

 Co-op: As our consoles have become more and more complicated it seems developers have favoured leaving out a once mandatory feature: split-screen and local co-operative play. Not Gears of War; as well has having two player split-screen co-op throughout the entire game, you could also team up with a friend over Xbox live. Before Gears it was rare, now it is an industry standard.

Game: Resident Evil 4
Format: Gamecube, Wii, PC
Developer: Capcom Studio 4
Publisher: Capcom

Capcom’s fifth console Resident Evil game (The Resident Evil Survivor series don’t count, thank you very much) Resident Evil 4 saw the franchise getting a major overhaul in terms of gameplay. Gone were the static camera angles, rigid controls, and ammunition conservation and in came a new over the shoulder camera angle, and a plethora of amply supplied weapons.

This was a good thing too because we no longer had the shambling zombies of days gone by. In their stead we were given Los Ganados; frantic, deadly and all too human. Not only did Resident Evil 4 breathe new life in to the flagging series, it also reinvented the third person shooter.

Shooting the heads off of the Spanish has never been so easy

Major Innovations:

 Over the Shoulder: Before Resident Evil 4, the camera angle in third person games tended to be squarely behind the protagonist’s head, which often made fast paced combat situations difficult to say the least. Now, with this shifted camera angle, combat could become more manageable.

 Wii Motion Controls: When Resident Evil 4 was re-released on the Nintendo Wii and came with all new motion controls. Before this point the Wii did not have a decent third person shooter, and some speculated that it was impossible. Resident Evil 4 not only demonstrated that motion controls worked perfectly well in an action game, but may very well make the gameplay even better.

And there we have it, our pick for the Five Most Influential Games of the Past Decade. Of course, with any such subject there are bound to be a few titles that we felt were incredibly influential but just did not quite manage to make it past the finish line in time.

Let us present our Runners Up:

Game: Jet Set Radio
Format: Dreamcast
Developer: SmileBit
Publisher: Sega

This game inspired the likes of XIII, Borderlands… Wacky Races. Ok, so it wasn’t exactly revolutionary, but the first cel-shaded game certainly caused quite a stir and goes down as one of the greatest Dreamcast titles of all time.

The game follows a gang of “rudies”; young people who skate around town spraying graffiti as a form of self-expression. Along the way, you can bolster the ranks of your gang with new members by completing skating challenges against them and ultimately uncover a plot involving a mystical vinyl record with the power to summon demons.

The life of a street punk is a glamourous one

I know it sounds crazy; kids on roller skates graffiti-ing up the place whilst being chased by cops and gangsters, but that’s exactly the point. This is charming, Japanese fantasy, superbly implemented and incredibly fun.

Rumours of an XBLA release have caused quite a storm on the forums and especially amongst the staff here at The Newb Review. If this doesn’t get the re-release we all want it to, I strongly recommend you pick up a second hand Dreamcast and a copy. You can thank me later.

- Tom “tom01255″ Wallis

Game: Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare
Format: Xbox 360, PS3, PC, Wii
Developer: Infinity Ward
Publisher: Activision

Modern Warfare presented the culmination of a growing relationship between the once loved publisher and Infinity Ward. Seemingly grasping the Holy Grail of simultaneous critical acclaim and astronomic sales, it was clear that this game was something special.

Infinity Ward’s legacy seems to be entwined with this title; whenever anyone mentions the COD series, it’s inevitably the Modern Warfare franchise they talk about over any of the World War II based outings.

One of the most successful (and imitated) games of all time.

The story was short, but epic; placing you in the shoes of several different operatives involved in a war against Russian terrorists. The narrative also managed to shock on an emotional level; invoking a strange feeling of grief when a playable character witnesses a nuclear explosion and kicks the bucket.

However, it was the multiplayer where the game really shined. Still a fantastically popular title online, Modern Warfare tapped into a need for all gamers to feel as though they were bettering themselves; by having unlockable guns and attachments, the game enticed gamers to spend hour upon hour improving their account and reaching that 10th prestige level.

With Modern Warfare, Infinity Ward built an empire. It’s just a shame Modern Warfare 2 couldn’t amaze us in the same way.

- Tom “tom01255″ Wallis

Game: God of War
Format: Playstation 2
Developer: SCE Studios Santa Monica
Publisher: Sony

It’s hard to believe that there have only been four God of War games over the past decade. I say that because there has been a seemingly endless number of games that have taken inspiration from this brilliant series of games.

Just take a look at EA’s recent release Dante’s Inferno; would that even exist without God of War? It could be argued that God of War almost singlehandedly revitalised the hack and slash genre (although some credit must be given to Capcom’s Devil May Cry series too).

The format is simple: A burley man (in this case Kratos) runs around fairly large yet linear levels, armed with a plethora of bladed weapons, and cuts a sea of mythical enemies into mince meat.

Chuck in some light logic-based puzzles, usually involving cranks and pullies, and have the player search off the beaten path for collectables that upgrade your abilities and there we have it, the epitome of the hack and slash genre.

Kratos is pretty tasty.

The God of War series is also known for its epic boss battles, which always culminate in the Quick Time Event finale, complete with suitably gory conclusion. And don’t forget the health dosage of quick time sex mini games and an ample showing of breasts.

Actually when put that way, you can completely see why so many game developers have reacted the way they have to God of War. It is the ultimate teenage boy fantasy game. And God (of war) bless it.

Red Dead Revolver was released on the Playstation 2 and the original Xbox in early 2004 to some mixed reviews and fairly decent sales. This week sees the high profile release of the sequel, Red Dead Redemption, which so far has received mostly stellar reviews. So what better time to shamelessly cash in and take a trip back in time to look at how it began?

Created by Rockstar San Diego, the studio behind the Midnight Club racing games, and published by Rockstar Games, the powerhouses behind the Grand Theft Auto series, Red Dead Revolver was a interesting third person shooter simply because it exuded style from every pore.

Meet Red. He's the protagonist... That means hero.

The game featured a fantastic sound track by Western Legend Ennio Morricone, composer of The Good the Bad and the Ugly, which really contributes towards the authentic western feel.

Like any good Western, Red Dead Revolver put you in the role of a man out for vengeance; Red, the bounty hunting son of gold prospectors. As a child, his parents were murdered by a greedy Mexican general, out to steal their substantial amount of gold.

How did this General learn of his family’s recent find? A trusted friend betrayed them in exchange for saving his own worthless hide. Once Red grows up and becomes a bona fide Bounty Hunter, he sets out to take revenge on both the heartless general and the gutless traitor.

As well as the main protagonist there were several other playable characters at various points in the game. However, they all handle exactly the same as Red, and only really served as a way of emphasising what a bland character Red was.

Shooting fatties as they waddle towards you has never been such fun

Characters like the English sharp shooter Jack Swift, for instance, were far more charismatic. At times these side levels served as little more than distractions from the main quest. Each character was playable in the multiplayer mode, which offered up various death match games; although overall it felt a little tacked on.

The real meat of this game came in the single player story mode. The world of Red Dead Revolver was far smaller than you might expect, what with it coming from the people behind Grand Theft Auto. If any comparison can be made to another existing Rockstar game, it would probably have to be Manhunt. Each level is broken up into small arenas populated with a number of enemies. In order to progress you must defeat every enemy, and defeat the more powerful boss character at the end of the level.

There were a lot of tools at your disposal, ranging from the generic pistols, revolvers, to riffles, and dynamite. The best feature in Red Dead Revolver came in the form of the deadeye mechanic. Basically, deadeye is the equivalent of the slow motion bullet time found in games such as Max Payne and Stranglehold.

When deadeye was activated you could aim at up to six targets, be they six individual targets or just separate body parts, and fill them full of hot lead. Deadeye was also implemented in quick draws at regular intervals in the game. These quick draw moments proved to be some of the most memorable, and genuinely satisfying, moments in the game.

Deadeye aiming is a brilliant feature

Like a lot of Rockstar games, at times the controls could be a bit fiddly, particularly the movement controls. Your character could duck behind cover, roll out of the way of fire, and perform hand to hand combat, but overall you really fighting up close with your enemies was a bad idea. The game was at its best when standing at one end of a deserted ghost town, firing off shot after shot at enemies standing at the other end of the street.

As well as gun fights, you would be right in expecting other Western staples, such as train robberies, saloon fights, and horse riding. For the most part the big set pieces, such as the attack on the train, were exhilarating, although a little clunkily put together.

That is probably the best thing you could say about Red Dead Revolver; it was a neat game with a ton of good ideas. The only problem being that the execution was a little off. It’s probably safe to say that Rockstar are aware of the game’s faults, as the sequel Red Dead Redemption shares little in common with the original. In fact the only links between Red Dead Revolver and Red Dead Redemption are the inclusion of the Deadeye mechanic and fact that it has a protagonist that rides a horse.

There are a number of thrilling set pieces, including this attack on a train

Red Dead Revolver is available for both the Playstation 2 and the Original Xbox and should be available at a fairly low price online. It is one of the original Xbox titles that will work on your Xbox 360, and if you are lucky enough to own an old 60GB model of PS3 then you should be able to play it on that too.

Stay tuned to The Newb Review for the ultimate Red Dead Redemption review.

Aren’t you just sick of all the brain teasing, brain training titles that clutter up the local game stores? I know I am. We have everything from brain training to spelling training, from Big Brain Academy to bloody Brain Age: Arts & Letters, what’s next? Osama Bin Laden’s Terrorist Training? Now that’s a game I’d personally like to see.

So, in a genre heavily stagnated with titles, step right up Blitz Arcade’s Encleverment Experiment, a brain teaser game that attempts to dispel all of your preconceptions by taking the genre and trying to making it fun and enjoyable!  In fact Encleverment Experiment isn’t so much a mind melting, knowledge tester, but more a fun, wacky games show in video game form, or at least it tries to be.

Don’t get me wrong though, the similarities between the game and others in the quiz show style genre, such as Buzz! And 1 vs 100, are few and far between. The core gameplay is chock full of what you’ve come to expect from a brain training game, you’ve got memory exercises, mathematical problems, word games and maze solvers.

Mathematical based problems involving edible pie? A touch of pure genius...

Similarities between this and titles such as Buzz! and 1 vs 100 don’t end there. Upon loading the game it’s obvious to anyone that Blitz Arcade have really put a lot of time and effort into how the game looks. The wacky, zany, animated art style is perfect for adding some much needed humour, fun and enjoyment into the mix. The voice acting for the main character, Professor Ivor, is also brilliantly realised.

Unfortunately however, this seems to be a case of style over substance. While it looks and sounds great (the game’s soundtrack is the perfect compliment to it’s crazy, zany stylistics), it just doesn’t make up for the fact that, although trying its hardest, the game just isn’t very fun.

The graphical style does its best to hide the mundanities that are commonly associated with the genre, but it just isn’t enough. The single player, whilst offering some cool features such as making your own set of puzzles and exercises, leaves a relatively boring experience overall, and playing a brain training game on your own or against a computer AI is seemingly pointless. The variety of exercises is far too small, the game boasts only 19 tests in total, and going through the game it’s clear that some of the tests are the essentially the same as ones you’ve taken before with a different graphical slant. The chief example is the fraction based games involving pies and broken vinyl records; essentially the same test using different items to display fractions.

It’s not all doom and gloom though. The online multiplayer component is surprisingly a lot of fun. However, it suffers from the curse that plagues most XBLA titles that have online modes. After the first week of release, everyone moves on to the next game and the online community dies. This means that the chances of actually playing the online modes are extremely slim.

The inclusion of mascots is a clear attempt to set the game apart from others in the genre. The idea is nice and some of the designs are genuinely very funny, but the whole mascot system seems a little bit tacked on. There’s no real incentive to play the game and collect all the mascots because they just don’t do anything except sit there..and stare at you…as if you’re an idiot….or is that just me?

My personal favourite is the KISS inspired teddy bear...

Ultimately though, Encleverment Experiment is a case of repackaging something that has been sold to us time and time again. You’ve got to applaud the efforts of Blitz Arcade, because they have obviously tried hard to inject some genuine enjoyment into the brain training genre through Encleverment Experiment’s unique graphical style, but the lack of variety and excitement means that at 800 Microsoft points, the game feels overpriced. This would have been easier to recommend at 400 points instead.

Review Round Up

Graphics: 4/5 – The graphical style is zany, wacky and utterly unique.

Sound: 4/5 – Voice acting for Professor Ivor is spot on, and the soundtrack does a good job of complimenting the game’s art.

Gameplay: 2/5 – Lack of fun and unique tests means that the overall gameplay is not just limited, but it’s also not that enjoyable.

Longevity: 2/5 – The game lacks not only variety in it’s tests, but also the number of tests is very small. With an online multiplayer seemingly useless as no one plays it online, there’s not that much time to spend playing here, unless you like taking the same tests over and over again.

Overall: Encleverment Experiment gets 2 and a half puzzle induced brain haemorrhages out of 5. The graphical style shows signs of an interesting, unique game within a stale genre, but once you look past that graphical style, you realise the game just isn’t what you’d hoped.

Game:

It’s safe to say many have been waiting for Alan Wake… for a long time. With a hefty five year development, it promised to bring us a ‘riveting plot’ with ‘multilayered character interactions’. But have Remedy Entertainment, creators of Max Payne managed to pull their half a decade promises out of the bag? Enki from The Newb Review managed to step into the footsteps of Alan Wake, following him into Bright Falls to see what this game was all about…

It’s immediately apparent that this game has had multiple influences, all culminating in the feel of this title. Silent Hill, David Lynch’s Twin Peaks and multiple references to various literary authors; Stephen King most frequently, gives you an idea of what to expect.

The concept of the game is certainly of interest. The idea of a small town in which darkness is given life, in which every shadow exudes danger, is one that a player immediately feels uneasy in. The opening of the Nightmare sequence that Wake describes is an immersive tutorial, feeling more like an interactive nightmare than getting to grips with the games mechanics.

Light and Dark contrast brilliantly giving the game great aesthetics

You soon learn that there is more to fear than the darkness itself. From the shadows, creatures called “The Taken” regularly stalk the author. These are townsfolk fallen foul of the evil in the town, shrouded in a swirling darkness that one must evaporate with the use of Wake’s flashlight before more conventional weapons can be used to rid them entirely.

Of course, the light aspect of the game draws comparisons to Alone in the Dark, yet this game makes the mechanic its own. Not only is the light used to take care of enemies, it is a literal haven, a save point and a welcome sight after running through seemingly endless dark forests. The feeling of seeing a working streetlamp in the distance has never evoked more relief in a survival horror before.

The use of both light and conventional weapons brings about an interesting duality to your conservation of items. Not only are you keeping an eye on ammunition, but the batteries and strength of the flashlight you carry. Later in the game these weapons merge in the form of the indispensable flare gun; in many ways the rocket launcher of this series, as well as flares and flash-bangs; life-savers in more than one situation.

The flashlight will be both a comfort and weapon in the darkness

This game is genuinely frightening at times, with even the most hardened of survival horror fans likely to get caught by at least one of the moments throughout the game. Darkness is a fear inherent in all humans at one stage in life at least, and this game certainly plays on that.

This is a game that begs you to play in the dark and the scares are interesting in that they come when you least expect it. The joy comes in that scares come when you least expect them. No matter how on guard you are, at one point or another, Alan Wake will catch you by surprise.

Alan Wake comes in six bite-sized episodes, typically lasting around 1-2 hours each depending on the level of exploration. This also works within the game itself. Similar to Left 4 Dead, each episode has its own goals, over-arching story and purpose. The regular checkpoints also make this game a joy to play in even ten minute segments; giving you the feeling of progress with even the shortest of sessions.

The moments in light are far and few between, but the beautiful scenery offer a brief respite

The story of Alan Wake is gripping. Sure, it isn’t the most original, especially for a huge horror film fan such as myself. But this is exactly what’s so endearing about the plot. The pages you find throughout the game do a brilliant job of foreshadowing what will occur next and the building anticipation of what you’ve just read works wonders.

The only problem in terms of story comes with the ending, that may be a little too ambiguous for some, a little too much food for thought for some.

This game played brilliantly, but moreover, I felt the same kind of emotional attachment usually reserved for a good movie or book. When found in a game this is something wonderful. As each episode came to a close I couldn’t wait to progress to the next section to find out what happens after each inevitable cliff-hanger.

This game is also a veritable treasure trove of references to those in the know. The first being the obvious A.Wake, more Stephen King references than you could shake a stick at, not to mention the FBI agent that revels in calling Wake every other author name under the sun.

Alan Wake is full of imagery to be interpreted, much like the episodes of Twin Peaks it so lovingly re-appropriates elements from. It offers a new level of replayability, not one based solely on trying to gain those missed achievements, but on understanding the game on a new level. Five minutes into replaying the opening, I was already inwardly cheering as I spotted Night Springs on a sign. Speaking of which…

The darkness can seem deserted and quiet... that all soon disappears

Night Springs is a reason to buy this game on its own. Alan Wake is littered with radios and TV’s with which Wake can interact, also offering a welcome respite to the terror of the night. The most interesting of these asides by far is the episodes of Night Springs. Sure, listening to the town’s night radio station is great, but the pseudo-Twilight Zone black and white shorts are stunning. Each mini-tale is not only brilliant viewing in the heat of the moment, but increasingly relates to Wake’s story.

All this without mentioning the music. Ah, the music. Each piece of music is used with great aplomb in the course of the story, especially the song intrinsically tied to the story of Wake himself. Also, Poets of the Fall’s track “War” is especially moving when it appears, a real-life song placed in the games world with such skill, I was nearly speechless. Not to mention the Rock stage showdown… I’ll say no more.

Flares are not only a life-saver, but look stunning against the darkness

Of course, there are always downsides, and I feel I am nit-picking a little with this since I did enjoy the game so immensely. One has to be the facial animations. You would have thought that after half a decade’s development it would be a little smoother. Still, there seems to be a patch in the works for this so it might not be an issue for too much longer.

Another issue might be the feeling that, throughout the course of the story you actually feel more in touch with all the other characters in the story than Wake and his Wife. Barry, his agent, steals the lime-light, almost making you want him to be a constant companion for his hilarious asides.

Review Round Up

Graphics: 3/5 The graphics of Alan Wake are stylish if a little outdated. The difference between the lighter gameplay and the more Film Noir-esque cutscenes can be a little jarring at first, but they each work in their own respect. The character animations are slightly off, too. That said, as previously noted, the facial animations might be getting a patch overhaul, rendering that a null point.

Sound: 5/5 I cannot stress how much I personally fell in love with the soundtrack to this game. Each track is so brilliantly slotted into the story that it becomes a part of the experience. I understand that it might not be to everyone’s cup of tea, but I honestly feel it adds to the aesthetics of the game.

Story: 4/5 A huge crux of the title. One that, especially from a horror fan, works really well. Again, it might not be world-shatteringly original, but I genuinely think the story is gripping enough to warrant many a replay.

Gameplay: 4/5 The gameplay for me is as uncomplicated as you could wish it to be. Despite the various weapons on offer, the duality of weapons and flashlight, flow very well. The dodge mechanic might take a while to master, but once you understand the timing the cinematic angles you are rewarded with are well worth it.

Longevity: 3.5/5 I’ve never been one for replayability but even I can understand this game has quite a bit. Of course, the main story will be the same, with the only thing changeable being the difficulty. Yet, for some, the references they missed the first time will be more than enough for at least another play through or two.

Overall: 4.5 batteries out of 5. I’ve nailed the reason for me liking this title so much down to one of two reasons. One, as stated, I’m a huge horror fan and as such am a little more forgiving of generic tropes. Two, I didn’t follow this for five years like a lot of people. Whether it is one of these reasons or I’m completely off the mark, I can safely say without reservation that this game, to me, is stunning. It is more than worth the purchase and I’ll be playing it through again just to see all the extra references I missed. One thing’s for sure, after playing Alan Wake, I’m not sure I’ll look at the darkness the same again for a very long time…

[podcast]http://realmworx.hipcast.com/deluge/5ee8ab5d-7c69-fedd-bb5d-d8765bdd66bd.mp3[/podcast]

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MP3 Link / RSS Feed

If you’d like the show notes, click the more button.

[H:MM:SS] – Show Notes
——————–
Opening Song (Poseidon’s Wrath – God of War 3 OST)

[0:00:30] – Introductions

[0:01:35] – Jason’s Now Playing
-MLB 2010: The Show (PS3)
-Monopoly (PSP Mini)
-Super Street Fighter IV (Xbox 360)
-Temo Bowl Throwback (Xbox Live Arcade)
-UFC 2010 Undisputed (Xbox 360) DEMO
-Halo: Reach (Xbox 360) BETA

[0:32:46] – Steven’s Now Playing
-Halo: Reach (Xbox 360) BETA
-Super Street Fighter IV (Xbox 360)
-Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (Xbox 360)
-Prototype (Xbox 360)
-Hotel Dusk: Room 215 (DS)

[0:46:21] – News
-Call of Duty: Black Ops deploying November 9
-Infinity Ward staying open despite 35 defections
-Starcraft II launches July 27
-360 Singularity purchase earns free Prototype
-Tony Hawk officially Shred-ding
-EA’s Fight Against Used Game Sales Passes To Tiger Woods
-Medal of Honor deploys in October
-Battlefield Bad Company 2 Owners Get Medal of Honor Sniper Rifle Early
-APB booked for June 29 in US, July 2 in UK
-Monopoly Streets rolling the dice on 360, PS3, Wii
-Sega arcade shooters compiled for Wii
-Yakuza expanding turf to PSP
-God of War returning to PSP
-Syphon Filter: Logan’s Shadow heading to PS2
-Little Big Planet 2 confirmed
-Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood confirmed for fall
-HAWX 2 hunting this fall
-Red Dead Redemption getting free co-op DLC
-Sid Meier’s Pirates! charts Wii course in fall
-Wiis bundled with Wii MotionPlus, Wii Sports Resort starting May 9
-Nintendo throwing Wii Party, 160 million Miis made
-Two Worlds II arises Sept. 14
-Backbreaker tackles stores June 1
-Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II due Oct. 26
-First Alan Wake DLC free with new purchase
-Marvel vs Capcom 3: Four New Challengers Enter
-SyFy making Red Faction movie, co-producing games
-InstantAction debuts browser-game embedding platform
-Walmart Takes Another Shot at Used Game Sales

[2:05:36] – Wrap Up

[2:09:18] – End

First, I can’t help but put a personal note apologising for my absence recently. Crunch times in real life sure do take their toll on writing. Especially when those deadlines involve writing.  Not to mention, this is a little old now, but it’s still good right?… Right?… Ehem.

Anywho, onto Super Street Fighter IV. For those who have been locked in a cupboard for a while, the original game, Street Fighter IV was released last year to critical acclaim; winning multiple awards for its graphics and gameplay. It was generally thought to have revived the series by combining old and new with aplomb. A year later and Capcom has revised this title,throwing a a few little tweaks into the mix.

Street Fighter IV was undoubtedly a reinvention for the series. Combining 2D and 3D into a stylistic package, it brought back many an ‘old school’ fighting fans back into the ring. Whilst Super Street Fighter IV certainly doesn’t revolutionise in the same way, it does bring around quite a few welcome changes.

On the face of it, ten new additional characters have been added, most from previous games with the exception of two entirely new faces. It also adds a few new modes to the original along with a couple of tweaks to the online mode. However, at the price tag for a completely new title, is it really worth splashing out?

Juri is the Tai Kwon Do artist with the funky eyeball

Certainly, the addition of ten new characters, bringing the roster up to 35, is a plus, especially for fans of the franchise. Juri and Hakan are stunning brand new characters to mess around with. Juri is a Tai Kwon Do expert with the interesting ability to unleash a charged fireball at any point upon the unsuspecting enemy. Hakan couldn’t be more different, a Turkish wrestler who must oil himself up in order to perform his jaw-dropping Ultras and Supers.

Both provide a welcome change to the usual suspects of Ryu and Ken users online for those willing enough to give them a shot.  Classic characters such as T Hawk and Dee Jay also show their ugly faces, along with some Final Fight guys… like Guy, and Cody. Another potential boon for those with little time for unlocking is the fact that all 35 characters are playable right from the start, unlike Street Fighter IV. No need to grind a little in order to unlock your fave fighter.

Other tweaks are a little smaller. Bonus stages are dotted between matches, each one might be recognised by those more familiar with previous entries into the series. Both offer an enjoyable time out between fights in Arcade mode. A lot of damage balancing for moves has also gone on; this is perhaps of no interest to the regular joe who might enjoy a game or two with friends, but to die-hard fans it means a lot.

The game also offers a little more longevity as each character, including those from the original, now has at least two Ultras to chose from. Some time set aside to re-master your choice fighter is a must before heading online.

Speaking of online, a lot of changes are staged here. A new spectator mode is available, making waiting for some matches online infinitely more fulfilling. Or terrifying, if the person you’re waiting to match up against is a beast. A step on from this is the new replay mode, in which you, well… replay previous matches. The Replay Channel offers a variety of different replays put forward from players across the globe, all for your viewing pleasure. Some of the extras involve being able to save your favourites for later viewing and even being able to invite friends to watch them with you.

Once successfully oiled up, Hakan is ready to unleash pain

One of the best additions to the online play is the potential to create and host Team Battles of between four to eight players. Once you have everyone together, the game automatically shuffles you into two teams  to battle it out in a straight elimination contest until one team is no more. This mixes with the aforementioned spectator mode so you can watch how each team mate is faring, discussing, cussing or praising all the while over chat.

Whilst it isn’t exactly the authentic Street Fighter arcade experience, as someone who has sat at those cabinets, I can say it comes very close. New updates are also on the way on June 15^th to add a tournament manager, allowing the creation of online tournaments in the same style as the current Team Battles. Good times.

Of course, there are always downsides, and with any game which is predominantly sold for online play, there is one problem that will vex many gamers. Lag. Lag is inescapable is seems, even if you are fairly certain you have the best internet connection in your county (which I don’t).  On the whole, despite my internet connection being far from stellar, the lag wasn’t too bad. That said, when it did lag it was debilitating to the point of ruining the match for both competitors. Since this was fairly soon after release, however, as with any online game it may balance out after a while.

Cammy and Chunners. For some the ONLY match up allowed.

Finally we come to the issue of cost. As noted, this game certainly isn’t a budget title; as it’s still being priced at full new release cost in most stockists. Is it worth the extra money? The answer for me, personally is a resounding yes… if you don’t own the original.

If you do happen to have a copy of Street Fighter IV on your shelf, the answer becomes a little more difficult. If this is the case, you have to weigh up all the previously noted pros and cons. Should you be a fan of the various other Street Fighter titles, it might also be a yes. This is all up to personal preference, I’m afraid. What it does well, it does very well. If you’re satisfied with the original however, is £40 really worth it?

Review Round-Up

Graphics: 4/5 - It would be hard to give it anything different. The original game looked gorgeous and this one doesn’t disappoint either. If anything, this mark goes to the new character models, each of which looking like an amazing representation of the 2D originals. Juri and Hakan are a bit of alright, too.

Sound: 2/5 – This game seems predominantly sound effects for me. Whilst this is good, there isn’t much of a soundtrack to mark. The title song of ‘Indestructible’ which provoked a love/hate reaction from most (I loved it, personally) is missing. Boo.

Story: 3/5 - Obviously this is a fighting game and so there isn’t much story floating around. The openings and endings in Arcade mode are brilliantly animated and fun for fans who know the canon surrounding the series. Newcomers might be a little puzzled, however.

Gameplay: 4/5 - What Super Street Fighter IV does well, it does very well. The original brought around a new fighting style for newcomers and veterans alike and this instalment only tightens this up further. There is a fighter to suit everyone and each can be picked up easily.

Longevity: 4/5 - This is one of those games that might sit around on the shelf for a while, but will always be guaranteed a replay intermittently. Each fighter can take an age to master if you really want to complete all the tutorials and learn every single combo down pat. Online battles make this game even more of a keeper.

Overall: 4 Shoryukens out of 5. Super Street Fighter IV might cost a hefty sum if you already own the original, but it has more than enough for fans to drool over. The cost is really the main issue when it comes to this title; so for those with enough patience to wait for the price to drop, this will become a must own for a lot of people. Make a place on your shelf already, you know you want to.

A boy and his dog; just saying it conjures up images of long hot summers spent in fields or woods, playing fetch or just running around having fun, right? Now imagine that this boy is a fully grown, roided up Cop, and that his dog is a gigantic Husky/Wolf type thing. And those fields? They’re needle littered alleyways populated by hobos and Triads. Instead of fetching a ball, your dog rips the jugular out of those punk Triads and brings you a blood soaked mound of throat meat upon its return. That pretty much sums up Dead to Rights: Retribution; One Man and His Dog… on steroids.

Playing as Jack Slate, super cop, and his life partner Shadow the Dog as they clean up the mean streets of Grant City, Dead to rights is, in terms of narrative, a fairly generic experience. In recent weeks, gang related violence has been on the increase in Slate’s once fair city, and following the murder of his father (also a cop) while investigating the Triads, Slate charges in head first to avenge his father. On the way he will uncover “a shocking conspiracy” that will shake his world to its very core.

Of course the “shocking” secrets in the game are utterly obvious from the outset, but overall that does not detract too much from the game. The character of Jack Slate is your typical hard boiled, tough talking, fist fighting cop. In the opening scene Slate displays his singular character trait by arguing with his superior over the handling of a hostage situation, handing over his badge and gun as a result of disobeying his boss and charging in waving his fists around, vowing to sort the mess out. The voice actor portraying Jack manages to maintain a very gritty performance without showing any real character. In fact, Jack Slate is so entirely without character that he manages to transcend awfulness, and actually comes across as being quite cool… in a sort of rubbish way.

Despite being a bit clumsy, the combat is fairly deep.

The game is a lot like a cross between the duck-and-cover antics of the Gears of War/Uncharted series and Batman Arkham Asylum, with a little bit of Army of Two chucked in for good measure. As this is a third person action shooter game, you can duck behind cover and perform blind fire shooting as you would expect. What sets this game apart is that as well as the shooting, there is a fairly deep melee combat system that revolves around performing combos and blocking/reversing attacks, and grappling your enemies.

Once you have an enemy in your grasp you can do one of two things: firstly, you can throw your enemies, which is particularly useful if you are in an exceptionally high location, and secondly you can take the poor sap hostage. When you have a hostage you can use him to deter your enemies from shooting at you, or if in an extreme situation, you can literally use your hostage as a mobile piece of cover, making him your personal bullet sponge.

The fist combat itself is a little clumsy, but there is some depth to it. Pressing the Y button performs a quick attack, while the B button performs heavy attacks. You can chain these buttons together to perform different combo types, but in general I found pressing Y,Y,Y,B,Y,Y,Y worked best in pretty much every situation. Once you have pummeled your opponent enough you are prompted to press A to perform a Takedown quick kill. These little animated kills can be pretty visceral, but there aren’t many of them; seeing Slate break a guy’s arm and then snapping his neck gets kind of old around the 30th time you have seen him do it.

Holding X allows you to block, and if you tap X just before someone hits you then you can counter their attack. Enemies are also able to block, so pressing both Y and B together will perform a block breaking move, and pressing A and X together executes a grab. However, as Slate is only human, he cannot take too much fire, so charging at heavily armed enemies with the intention of punching their brains out the back of their skull is rarely a wise course of action. Should you find yourself within close proximity of an armed opponent, pressing the A button has you disarming your foe and using their gun against them, with the cross hairs lining up automatically with their head. This can lead to some satisfying executions if you are quick enough to fire a few shots.

Headshots are the order of the day

When it comes to the shooting, the game is fairly competent. Holding the left trigger will allow you to aim and ideally you will want to go for one-hit-kill headshots. This is primarily down to the fact that there tend to be a lot of enemies, wearing a lot of armour, and you do not have an abundance of ammunition. In fact, I would probably go as far as to say there is a severe ammo drought in Grant City. You will rarely have more than about a dozen bullets at a time, despite having a uniform with dozens of pouches and pockets. Even when killing enemies, they will rarely have more than a few bullets on them.

You can only hold two guns at a time; a pistol and a larger gun, be it a shotgun, a machine gun, or a rocket launcher, and a set of grenades. Although it is something of a disadvantage, there are a number of in-game features that help level out the playing field. Performing headshots, grabbing enemies, countering attacks and performing take downs all fill up a metre on the left of the screen called the Focus Metre. The Focus Metre can be activated at any time by pressing the left bumper, and puts the game into Focus Mode (basically slow motion) allowing you to get a slight advantage over your foes. It is particularly useful, for instance, to activate the Focus Mode when faced by a large group of enemies, which will let you take your time lining up headshot after headshot. The Focus mode is undeniably useful, and quite good fun, but it has been done many times before – including in previous Dead to Rights games.

Something that is quite original is the implementation of Shadow himself. At the start of the game you take control of Shadow and must protect a wounded Slate from angry triads. The controls are simple enough. Pressing A will make Shadow kill enemies and holding the right trigger will make Shadow sprint. Later sections of the game have you stealthily controlling Shadow as he hunts for keys, or disables generators, in order to help Slate out of a jam. Holding down the left trigger makes Shadow sneak which also activates what I can only describe as his Dog senses. While sneaking, Shadow can see the outline of enemies through walls, as well as clues as to where he has to go. It is a nice enough distraction and breaks up some of the monotony of playing as Slate, but on occasion can be very frustrating due to the Dog’s low level of health.

Shadow has a penchant for chewing on groins

When playing as Slate you can issue simple commands to Shadow; pressing up on the digital pad while pointing at an enemy will make Shadow attack that specific enemy, and pressing up while pointing at a gun will have Shadow fetch it for you. If you find you are being overwhelmed by enemies, or just want Shadow to retreat, simply press down. It is very clear that the developers have put a lot of work into making Shadow look as good as possible and have done a good job making sicking a gigantic slavering dog on your enemies a fun experience.

When Shadow eventually catches a target, he tends to go for the throat (or the groin) which causes gigantic showers of blood to come spraying out. Of course Shadow is only a dog, and not made of Kevlar, so after absorbing a few shots he can be taken down. Fortunately Shadow will eventually recover, or you can walk over to him and revive him yourself.

There are about a dozen missions to fight your way through with various objectives, such as hunting down a specific target, destroying vehicles, or disarming bombs. Yet, in the end, all it really comes down to is hiding behind a bit of cover and trying to line up headshot after headshot. As much as there is to do, it is all quite samey.

That is not the only problem with this game. Mission length is especially uneven, with several missions being way too long. There is also an issue with irritating check points, where the check point occurs before an unskipable section of dialogue, which is an unforgivable gaming sin.

Review Round-Up

Graphics: 4/5 Most of the character models are fairly generic looking, including Jack Slate himself, with fairly standard looking character animations. However, a lot of work has been put into making Shadow look as realistic as possible, and it really pays off. The Grant City environments are mostly dark, rainy, grim and gritty (like another famous fictional City that begins with a G), with a fairly decent selection of colours on display.

Sound: 3/5 The voice acting, in general, is competent at best. Having said that, there are a few scenes that stick out as featuring good performances. The lead actor manages to maintain a grim and gritty delivery throughout the game without ever showing much personality.

Story: 3/5 The story holds together well, although pretty much every surprising secret can be seen coming from a mile off. It is a fairly generic B movie plot, but there’s nothing really wrong with that.

Gameplay: 4/5 Despite being a bit clumsy, the melee combat has a decent amount of depth to it, and being able to disarm enemies or take them hostage is a fun feature. Stealthily playing as Shadow starts out as a decent alternative to the run-and-gun hi jinks, but becomes tiresome towards the end. Implementing Shadow in fire fights works well, as it is always amusing to see a heavily armed foe legging it across the battlefield being pursued by a massive dog.

Longevity: 2/5 This is a single player only game, with about a dozen missions in it, and will take about 8 or so hours to complete on the regular difficulty. There are three difficulties to choose from, with an abundance of easy achievements, and Avatar awards, such as a suit of armour and t shirts on the Xbox 360 version.

Overall 3 Punctured Testicles out of 5. Dead to Rights: Retribution is a solid action game with some very interesting features such as Shadow the Dog and the close quarter melee combat. While there are a number of minor issues that hamper the overall experience, including overlong levels, random difficulty spikes, and some bad check pointing, that does not stop it from succeeding at being a decent popcorn action game. It comes across as feeling a bit old fashioned and can be very frustrating in parts, but overall it’s pretty good fun.

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[H:MM:SS] – Show Notes
——————–
Opening Song (Poseidon’s Wrath – God of War 3 OST)

[0:00:30] – Introductions

[0:03:33] – Jason’s Now Playing
-PlayOn Update
-MLB 2010: The Show (PS3)
-Splinter Cell: Conviction (Xbox 360)
-Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (Xbox 360)
-Game Room (Xbox Live Arcade)
-Final Fight: Double Impact (Xbox Live Arcade)

[0:26:46] – Steven’s Now Playing
-Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (Xbox 360)
-Final Fight: Double Impact (Xbox Live Arcade)
-Sonic’s Ultimate Genesis Collection (Xbox 360)
-Chime (Xbox Live Arcade)
-Left 4 Dead 2 (Xbox 360)

[0:42:17] – News
-Marvel vs. Capcom 3 due Q2 2011 on PS3, 360
-Dead Rising 2 Lets You Play Through With a Buddy
-Dead Rising 2 Case Zero is a Prologue with a Purpose
-Super Street Fighter 4 Comes With A Tournament Manager, Special Trophies
-Okamiden stylizing DS in 2011
-Bionic Commando Rearmed again in 2011
-Tecmo Bowl Throwback on Xbox Live Next Week; on PSN ‘Soon’
-Splatterhouse reboot features unlockable original titles
-XCOM FPS invading 360s, PCs
-Claptrap being immortalized in toy form
-River Rush revealed, Natal boxing, football games en route
-Singularity warps to June 29
-Thursday Is A Bad Day To Be A Left 4 Dead 2 Infected
-Uncharted 2 DLC begins Siege this week
-PSN update moving to Tuesdays in May
-Ubisoft’s eco initiative ditches paper manuals

[1:30:28] – March 2010 NPD’s

[1:48:09] – Wrap Up

[1:52:51] – End

It is probably safe to say that by now we all know Splinter Cell Conviction has been in development for a long time. The Xbox 360 exclusive title (so long as you do not count the PC release that is due out in a few weeks) originally started out very differently, resembling Ubisoft’s Assassin’s Creed games more than anything else. However, rumour has it that the release of the first Assassin’s Creed, and how technically superior it was, led to Splinter Cell Conviction returning to the drawing board, and disappearing from the public eye for years.

Gaming’s history with titles that have been completely overhauled mid-production is spotty to say the best. It is not necessarily a bad thing (for instance Resident Evil 4 was reportedly restarted several times) but in general, the reason a game is started from scratch is because there are fundamental issues that can only be fixed by starting over. It probably wouldn’t be unfair to say that in terms of quality, for every Resident Evil 4 there are about ten Too Humans. So where does Splinter Cell Conviction lie? Is it a Resident Evil 4 or is it a bit Too Human?

Taking place a few years after the events of Splinter Cell Double Agent, Senior Citizen Super Spy Sam Fisher is not a happy man. After his daughter was killed by a drunk driver, and his best friend was killed during his last mission, Sam has quit working for the Government Agency Third Echelon. Instead, spending some time away from it all brooding in a Café in Malta. While sipping on his umpteenth Espresso, a waiter hands Sam a mobile phone telling him he has an urgent call. His former handler, Anna “Grim” Grimsdóttír, is on the line and informs Sam that a group of armed men are heading his way. With this information, we begin the obligatory basic tutorial mission.

When being stealthy the controls are, for the most part, very slick and intuitive. Holding the left trigger will make Sam pop behind any available cover, and pressing A will allow Sam to slide gracefully between and over objects. The game handles much like any third person shooter with the right trigger firing weapons, the B button performing mêlée attacks, clicking the right stick zooms in, and left bumper reloads.

Sam has a number of stealth kills in his arsenal

Much like the other big Tom Clancy series, Rainbow Six, you can mark enemies by pressing the right bumper. Marking enemies allows you to keep track of where your enemies are, and is also a necessary part of one of the game’s new features. After performing a stealthy mêlée kill, Sam earns the ability to perform the mark and execute maneuver. Once your targets are marked you simply press the Y button and Sam will fire off head shots in order to quickly and quietly take his targets down. Sam can also mark environmental hazards, such as chandeliers, causing them to fall onto unsuspecting foes below. To begin with, you can only mark and execute two enemies at a time, but this ability can be upgraded further on in the game.

In-game mission updates are made in a strikingly visual way. Relevant information appears on the walls around you, as if it were being fed through a projector. It works in such a way that you are always aware of what you need to be doing, without cluttering the screen, which is a very welcome feature.

Mission updates are projected on to your surroundings

At the end of the first mission you take part in the first of numerous interrogation scenes. After grabbing the target you can press B to hit them in order to procure more information. The environments are interactive, so for instance in this first section, which takes place in a public toilet, if you press B next to a sink Sam will smash his enemy’s head through the sink. Once you have interrogated your target, the relevant information that they give you will flash up on the walls. This serves as a decent visual aid for your next mission.

In terms of gameplay, much like Batman Arkham Asylum, sticking to the shadows as much as possible is the best tactic; when in the shadows Sam becomes essentially invisible. If no-one can see you then the screen turns black and white; the only colours on screen being your enemies. It looks very stylish and works as a good way of cutting down unnecessary clutter on the screen, such as the visibility meters and radars that so many other stealth games have had in the past. If you are unfortunate enough to wander into the sight of an enemy, a small arrow appears on screen to indicate where the enemy is. The longer you stay in that enemy’s line of sight, the smaller the arrow becomes. If the arrow completely disappears then your opponent can see you and you will either have to fight or flee.

Mark and Execute kills are pretty stylish

The second new feature in the game is the last known position feature. This comes into effect when you have been spotted, but manage to break free from your enemy’s line of sight. Doing this will cause a ghostly outline of you to appear in the last place your enemies saw you, and where they will subsequently be focusing their attention. With this knowledge you can reposition yourself to regain the advantage.

Being discovered brings the game’s limitations to light. While the controls work really well in methodical stealth-based scenarios, when you are forced to fight off a dozen enemies that have managed to surround you, the controls feel clumsy. You could argue that the game is punishing you for not being stealthy, or that you are playing the game incorrectly by going hell-for-leather, but that does not change the fact that, at times, the controls are awkward. With this revelation, it becomes clear that Splinter Cell Conviction is less of a third person shooter, and more of a third person puzzle game with shooting elements. More often than not if you find yourself in a situation where you feel that the only option available is to go in guns blazing, then you have not looked around enough for other alternatives.

While the single player is fairly short; I completed it in about 6 hours, the game offers up a lot of additional game modes and additional features to keep completionists playing for a long time to come. The in-game currency used for purchasing upgrades for your equipment is earned through completing challenges, called P.E.C Challenges. There are a number of different challenge types to complete, ranging from simple things like performing X number of head shots, to more challenging tasks such as completing a level without being spotted, without dying, and without restarting at any point. These challenges are applied to not only the single player, but all of the multiplayer modes as well. So you are constantly rewarded for playing, no matter what game mode you choose.

Split Screen Co-op is a VERY welcome feature

In a welcome move, there is a split screen co-op mode that acts as a prequel to the main game’s storyline. This mode pits one player as a USA operative and the other as a Russian agent. You must work together over four levels, with all the same abilities and equipment made available to Sam Fisher throughout the single player. The co-op story mode can also be played online with friends or strangers if you’re into online-only snobbery.

Outside the co-op story there are a number of single level based challenges, similar to the challenge maps in Batman Arkham Asylum. Objectives range from defeating every enemy on the map, to protecting an EMP generator from wave after wave of attacking foes. Arguably, the best multiplayer mode is the 2-on-2 mode, in which one team attempts to take out another live human team of two. As well as your living opponents, the maps are populated with computer controlled enemies that are hostile towards both you and your enemy team, which can create wonderfully tense matches.

Like Assassin’s Creed 2, Splinter Cell Conviction is supported by Ubisoft’s UPLAY system, which allows you to download additional content for free after meeting certain in game objectives. Completing these objectives, such as beating the first level, earns you UPLAY points which can then be redeemed for either a Splinter Cell Conviction theme for your Xbox dashboard, a new machine gun, a new costume for multiplayer, and the Infiltration multiplayer mode. As good of an idea as it sounds, these items appear to already be on the disk, and really could have just been traditional unlocks rewarded for meeting certain objectives. In order to access the UPLAY content you must create an account with Ubisoft, giving them your email address. Perhaps I am being cynical when I suggest this, but I suspect that it is a crafty way of Ubisoft compiling data about the people that play their games.

Review Round-Up

Graphics: 4/5 While the character animations and lip synching in particular can be a little patchy, the game has a wonderful visual style, ranging from the black and white stealth sections to the projection of mission information on walls around you. While not being the best looking game ever, it oozes with style.

Sound: 3/5 Michael Ironside returns as Sam Fisher, although he often sounds as if he has had a few too many drinks before beginning his recording session. Additional voice work is competent at best. The sound effects and music are strong.

Story: 3/5 This is your typical Tom Clancy affair full of military jargon – EMP bombs, conspiracies, private military corporations, and plots to kill the President; thrilling for some, tedious for others no doubt. Enemy dialogue is, in general, pretty bad, with lines such as “you’re not the only bad ass here Fisher!” or “You little girl! Show your ass!” sticking out as some of the worst.

Gameplay: 4/5 Overall the stealth mechanic works really well and creates a genuine sense of empowerment when picking off your enemies. Even when you are spotted you are not brutally punished (apart from in one level) so long as you can escape their line of sight. The Multiplayer modes, particularly the co-op story mode and 2 on 2 team battles are brilliant. The only real downside is that the shooting controls can become rather clumsy when you are discovered and forced to fight.

Longevity: 4/5 While the single player is quite short, the inclusion of the P.E.C challenges offers a decent incentive to play through the game again on higher difficulties in order to upgrade your weapons and equipment. The multiplayer modes are compelling, well designed, and well worth your attention. In a very wise move, Splinter Cell Conviction features Split Screen co-op, so even if the game does not maintain a lengthy online life, you can still keep playing long after the servers are shut down.

Overall 4.5 Marked Targets out of 5: Splinter Cell Conviction is a game that, overall, is better than the sum of its parts. Despite having a few short comings, Splinter Cell Conviction comes close to being a truly great game thanks to the strong stealth gameplay that empowers the player, and numerous multiplayer modes. Splinter Cell Conviction deserves to be in your disk tray for a long time to come.

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If you’d like the show notes, click the more button.

Show Rundown [H:MM:SS]
—————
Opening Song (Poseidon’s Wrath – God of War 3 OST)

Introductions [0:00:30]

Jason’s Now Playing [0:01:52]
-Mass Effect 2 (Xbox 360) DLC
-The Video Review Jason Talked About
-Grand Theft Auto 4 (Xbox 360)
-Marvel VS Capcom 2 (Xbox Live Arcade)
-Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix (Xbox Live Arcade)
-Street Fighter IV (Xbox 360)
-Tech Problems
-Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (Xbox 360)
-Splinter Cell: Conviction (Xbox 360)
-MLB 2010: The Show (PS3)

Steven’s Now Playing [0:38:25]
-Street Fighter IV (Xbox 360)
-Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (Xbox 360)
-Hotel Dusk: Room 215 (DS)
-Magic: The Gathering – Duels of the Planeswalkers (Xbox Live Arcade)
-Chime (Xbox Live Arcade)
-Blur (Xbox 360) DEMO
-The Maw (Xbox Live Arcade)

News [0:57:12]
-Activision countersues ex-Infinity Ward execs
-The Great Modern Warfare Developer Bailout
-Ex-Infinity Ward heads, EA announce deal
-Modern Warfare 2 DLC stimulating PS3, PC May 4
-Four-player Gears of War 3 co-op campaign confirmed
-Bulletstorm raining on 360, PS3, PC
-Splinter Cell: Conviction CE cheapened by defective USB drives
-Microsoft Points are now being sold more reasonably
-Serious Sam back for more on XBLA, PC
-Pokemon Black/White coloring Japan this fall
-F.E.A.R. 3 spooking 360, PS3, PC this fall
-War for Cybertron erupts June 22
-Konami Day Event
-No More PSP for NCAA Football
-Dark Void Zero blasting off on PC, iPhone
-Doctor Who Time Lord-ing over PC, Mac
-Starcraft II gets $100 Collector’s Edition
-Gilbert departs Hothead, DeathSpank done

Wrap Up [1:59:08]

End [2:04:20]

Before talking about this downloadable add-on, it would probably be worth reading our review for the retail release Army of Two: The 40th Day. For those that would rather skip all that, here is a brief summary: taking place in Shanghai, Army of Two: The 40th Day revolves around homoerotic-mercenaries-for-hire Salem and Rios shooting an army of nameless foes. In the opening of the game the duo have been hired to plant beacons all around Shanghai. Once they complete their assignment, a barrage of missiles hit the city as a paramilitary force descends on the street. Suspecting that they may have unwittingly had a hand in Shanghai’s destruction, Salem and Rios try to clean up the town.

Utilising a morality system, much like every game seems to do these days, you could choose to be a good mercenary (saving as many people as you can, tying up your enemies, and so on) or being an utter bastard, shooting your way through not only the enemy forces, but any hapless sap that got in the way of your bullets. However, where this morality system got interesting was in the cut scenes. During certain cut scenes you could decide to help someone or not.

For instance, you come across an elderly guard looking after a cache of weapons; you can choose to take the weapons for yourself, or leave the underpowered man with this huge arsenal. So far nothing particularly note worthy. However, making the good choice would reveal that later on this helpless old man would go on to sell the weapons he was guarding to your enemies. Likewise, if you chose to take the weapons for yourself, during the struggle the guard winds up accidentally being shot dead.

Cover based shooting is the name of the game in The 40th Day

With that being said, this first piece of downloadable content for The 40th Day, Chapters of Deceit, pretty much ignores the moral choice system with the exception of one instance. Instead, it focuses on throwing hundreds of enemies at you to stop you from reaching your objectives. Occasionally you will be asked to try to rescue hostages, but there is no real need to. Even if you kill the hostages yourself the only penalty is that people will think you are a “prick” (the game’s words, not mine). Every now and then you will fight larger, tougher, enemies such as the Gatling Gun solider, and have to defend unarmed allies, but for the most part it is a simple shoot fest.

Chapters of Deceit adds two new story chapters, which is roughly one third of the original game. It is not entirely clear when these two new chapters are supposed to have taken place, thanks mainly to some garbled storytelling. Playing as Salem and Rios you discover some information that might lead to you taking down Jonah, the man behind the terrorist attack on Shanghai. In the opening Chapter (called Chapter 8, despite these events seemingly taking part before chapter 6) Salem and Rios have split up in an office complex while searching for a wounded ally.

While you can choose to save the hostages, you aren't penalised if you kill them

The most interesting part of this chapter is that at the start of the level Salem has to act as a spy, running ahead and tagging targets for Rios to shoot from the opposite side of the destroyed building. It’s not clear why, but Salem can’t shoot anyone himself as his guns have been taken away. All Salem can do is mark targets for execution and hope that Rios is good enough to take the enemy out before they realise where he is.

Salem marks targets for Rios to take out

The rest of the chapter is standard Army of Two fare; Salem and Rios regroup with all of their weapons intact and stomp around through floor after floor of the ruined building, looking for their ally. Once he is found, the two are tasked with defending him against dozens of enemies. As with the main game, the focus on cover and building aggro to divert enemy attention is key to survival. The aggro system worked well in the main game, and continues to do so in this expansion.

The second chapter revolves around hunting down a traitor to the resistance. What you decide to do with her is your choice, but there does not seem to be any real consequence behind any of the choices that you make. Once the traitor is out of the way, the resistance needs you to blow up some support pillars on a bridge in order to flatten the invaders. Completing this mission will complete the expansion, with some predictably unintended consequences.

Review Round-Up

Graphics: 2/5 Exactly the same as the main game. The level design is competent considering each level is supposed to be a generic office, or ruined street.

Sound: 3/5 Am I the only one that is fed up of Nolan North voicing a character in every game? Other than that the voice work, sound effects and music are perfectly adequate, if a little generic.

Gameplay 3/5 Aside from the fairly interesting opening segment in which Salem and Rios are separated, which requires Salem to stealthily mark targets for his partner to kill, this plays exactly the same way as the rest of the game. Hundreds of enemies will attempt to stop you from reaching your objectives by running head first into your bullets. It is perfectly playable in single player mode, but there is more fun to be had in co-op with a live human partner; preferably one you know.

Longevity 2/5 There are two missions, each lasting from 30 to 45 minutes. Essentially you are getting a third of the main game again, but once you beat it there is little motivation to play again.

Overall: 3 Bromantic Gestures out of 5. If you liked Army of Two: The 40th Day and fancy the prospect of adding two more missions to the game, then perhaps this is for you. After a fairly interesting opening, Chapters of Deceit quickly descends into more generic Army of Two gameplay. However, considering the price: 800 MS Points (about £6.80) and £7.99 on Playstation Network, some may question how much bang they will get for their digital buck.

So, the blight of the Darkspawn has been dealt with and the Archdemon slain in one of a variety of ways. Yet, no more than six months after the Darkspawn army dispersed from Ferelden, another threat arises to challenge the Grey Wardens. This comes in the form of the Dragon Age: Origins Awakenings DLC/Expansion pack.

You have the choice of either importing your beloved hero from a previous save on Dragon Age: Origins, or creating a new character in the form of an Orlesian Warden.  Of course, should you import a character the content fits around this, your character being renowned and respected for near single-handedly saving Ferelden. Taking the new character route offers different challenges, the Orlesian Warden being treated with distain at first, what with the history of conflict between the two nations. You also get the option of a few more classes for your characters and three new skills.

Vigil's Keep serves as a rather impressive new base of operations.

What is important to note at this stage is that Awakenings isn’t your average DLC. It is on average a 15-20 hour expansion on the original game. For me, this feels rather odd. It certainly isn’t Dragon Age 2, but at the same time it is far lengthier and detailed than most DLC available on the market. Although, you’d probably expect that considering the £20 plus price tag (Or alternatively, 3200 of your Microsoft points) you’d have to lay down.

The content is on the whole a brilliant expansion on the previous game, adding new depths to an already established character or giving you a break to explore a new one. Whatever beginning you choose, you are placed in charge of Vigil’s Keep, which was awarded to the Grey Wardens at the end of Origins. This serves as your new base of operations; a drier, swishier looking base camp if you will. From here you not only get to know the new characters you meet in this pack, but rule the land of Ameranthine as part of the keep as their new Arl.

Anders, the wise-cracking escapee mage is just one of the new companions you'll meet.

The new characters on the whole are a good bunch. Particular favourites being the cat-loving Anders, a mage escaped from The Circle numerous times and Nathaniel Howe; the son of Arl Rendon Howe, who players from the Origins may remember killing not too long ago.

Whilst they may not be your old, beloved characters from Origins, they each add a new personality to the game that you’ll hopefully grow to love. If not, there’s always Oghren, who returns as… well, Oghren.

On the whole the new storyline, now featuring Darkspawn with the gift of speech, are both interesting and motivating. Awakenings offers just as many optional side-quests and companion based missions as you’re willing to take. For me, the moments when I’d return to Vigil’s Keep only to be asked to make decisions as the Arl were especially poignant. To decide whether to cosy up to the loyal nobles of the previous Arl or to aid the more common folk each had pros and cons and neither felt like I’d be particularly safe on my ‘throne’.

What would Dragon Age be without a dragon, eh?

The only dampener for me was just what was Awakenings? It was too expansive to be DLC and yet it certainly wasn’t a full blown sequel. Upon completing it I was left wondering whether I’d bother going back with my other characters from Dragon Age: Origins just to see an extra 15 or so hours of gameplay. It felt like, say, expecting someone to propose to you. You have a wonderful date, a nice dinner and the stars are shining in the sky… then they inform you they’ve called for a taxi home. Brilliant.

Review Round-Up

Graphics: 5/5 The graphics look just as good as Origins, as would be expected for something released so soon after. The new areas to explore range from lush woodland expanses, to the awe of clearing out Vigil’s Keep of Darkspawn in the opening moments.

Sound: 3/5 This gets an extra point added because of the voice acting. I’ve never had too much of a problem with the voice acting in Origins, and the characters in Awakenings are still well voiced; with a special mention to Anders for his dialogue with ‘Sir Pounce-a-lot’. The music however, is quite forgettable on the whole.

Gameplay: 4/5 The gameplay is still as brilliant as Origins. If you loved it before, you’ll love it again. Especially with the new classes allowing for that extra depth in combat.

Longevity: 2/5 This is where it slips a bit. The strange straddling of DLC and full on expansion can lead to confusion over the worth of playing this more than once. Still, if you liked creating new characters in Origins this may not be a problem.

Overall: 3 dragon pups out of 5. If you loved Origins, but can’t be bothered to fork out that much for just an expansion I’d recommend waiting for the price to drop a little. It makes for a brilliant and quite lengthy add-on to the original story, however its identity crisis could be a negative point. It is worth it, however, if you’re a fan; it’s all just dependent on how much expendable cash you’re ok to part with.

Dragon Age Origins Awakening is available to buy in stores and online from prices ranging from £20 upwards for Xbox only. It’s also available for download on Xbox Live for 3200 Microsoft points (£25-ish) or on the Playstation Network for £31

[podcast]http://realmworx.hipcast.com/deluge/63180973-e1b7-b95b-a228-cf4f227dee72.mp3[/podcast]

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Show Rundown [H:MM:SS]
—————
Opening Song (Poseidon’s Wrath – God of War 3 OST)

Introductions [0:00:30]

Jason’s Now Playing [0:03:18]
-Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (Xbox 360)
-Battlefield: Bad Company 2 (Xbox 360)
-Splinter Cell: Conviction (Xbox 360) DEMO
-Magic: The Gathering – Duels of the Planeswalkers (Xbox Live Arcade)
-South Park Let’s Go Tower Defense Play! (Xbox Live Arcade)
-Defense Grid (Xbox Live Arcade) DEMO
-Age of Booty (Xbox Live Arcade) DEMO
-Mad Tracks (Xbox Live Arcade) DEMO
-Rocket Riot (Xbox Live Arcade) DEMO
-Schizoid (Xbox Live Arcade) DEMO
-Wallace & Gromit Episode 1: Fright of the Bumblebees (Xbox Live Arcade) DEMO
-Trine (PS3) DEMO

Steven’s Now Playing [0:39:49]
-Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (Xbox 360)
-Splinter Cell: Conviction (Xbox 360) DEMO
-Left 4 Dead 2 (Xbox 360)
-Hotel Dusk: Room 215 (DS)

News [0:43:39]
-Nintendo reveals 3DS
-Infinity Ward loses two more leads
-Modern Warfare 2 Stimulus Package has rocky launch
-Blur 360 beta open to all
-Sega postpones Tournament of Legends
-Sega reopening Conduit this fall
-Sega scrapping Iron Man 2 developer
-Nintendo, Google team up for Wii search game
-Majesco forming Diamond Trust of London
-Hydro Thunder Hurricane forecast for XBLA
-After Burner Climax takes off in April
-Lost Planet 2 moved up a week
-Disgaea, Atelier crossover for PS3 headed to US, Europe
-Final Fantasy IX confirmed for PSN in Japan
-PS3 update locks out Linux
-EA shelved Starbreeze’s Bourne – Report
-Darksiders falls on PC
-The Witcher 2 hexing PCs early 2011
-Game pioneer Baer enters Inventor’s Hall of Fame

Wrap Up [1:31:53]

End [1:34:59]

Visceral Games’ choice of source material, Dante Alighieri’s Divine Comedy, seemed like an odd choice for an action game to me. A lengthy poem that focused on a Poet wandering through the multiple layers of hell, lead by a dead Roman poet, chronicling all the terrible things he witnessed did not sound like the sort of thing that would seem appropriate for a hack slash adventure game. Maybe I was just lacking imagination. Even now, after playing through the game, I am still left wondering just how suitable the poem is as source material for a video game.

The game itself wound up being criticised for it’s similarities to Sony’s God of War series. It’s one thing to be influenced by someone else’s work, but another thing entirely to copy wholesale. Having said that, this was not my only issue with the game. A reliance on cheap deaths, often dying simply because the game provided no hint that a one hit death was coming your way as well as awkward platforming, hampered my experience with the game considerably.

After playing through Dark Forest, I am reconsidering my stance on Dante’s Inferno’s awful platforming sections because, as annoying as they could be, they added considerable length to the game. The simple act of dying multiple times on the same acrobatic puzzle, or simply falling to your death because the ground beneath your feet collapsed without even the vaguest hint that it would happen, actually kept me playing the game. But what does this have to do with Dark Forest? Simply put, there are no jumping sections, there are no cheap deaths. Subsequently it lasts anything from 5 to 10 minutes on the standard difficulty, and at 400 Microsoft Points (about £3.40 or so), it does not exactly scream value for money.

IT WAS A METAPHOR!

The premise of this DLC is taken from a direct quotation from the poem:

“At the midpoint of the journey of life I found myself in a dark forest where the clear path was lost”

While the original text is clearly metaphorical, the designers have literally placed Dante in the middle of a dark forest with no idea where to go. I do not mean to sound snobbish, and I probably will, but this blatant disregard for the source material gets on my nerves a little. I’m sure that Visceral Games understand the metaphor, but the whole time I played through this add-on I could not help but think “it’s not supposed to be a literal forest, it is supposed to be despair!”.

Having said that it would make a rather poor action adventure game if this expansion had a middle aged Dante sitting around in his pants feeling sorry for himself, and it’s not like the actual game has a long history of being faithful to the source material either.

You spend much of your time pursuing a mysterious figure

Ignoring that minor gripe, in terms of gameplay Dark Forest is pretty much exactly the same as the disk game. It takes place after the introduction level, but before Dante makes it home to find Beatrice Murdered. If you have already completed the game then some of the mysteries in this expansion will seem pointless to you, seeing as you have already beaten it and know what’s going to happen. Enemies are mostly reskinned versions of enemies from the main game, and the path you follow through the forest is entirely linear. There are two major puzzles in this expansion, both requiring that you to be familiar with the points on a compass in order to navigate your way through a labyrinthine of portals as you pursue a mysterious figure. If you accidentally go through the wrong portal you are transported back to the start and must try again.

Enemies have received a new look

At first the puzzles seem a little obtuse, with a vague hint as to what you have to do. However, once you figure it out – particularly at the final section – it becomes incredibly easy. Between puzzles you fight off hordes of enemies which rarely prove to be much of a challenge. It is worth noting that I maxed out my character during my play through, and as such I was able to access all of my upgraded abilities from the start of this add-on. I assume that those of you that have not fully upgraded Dante will be able to use the experience gained from this DLC to boost his abilities.

And that is it. Once the short puzzles are solved, and the mystery figure is caught up with, it’s all over. You can play through the chapter again at any point in time directly from the main menu on different difficulties, but there is no real incentive to play again, save for an achievement that you are awarded if you make it through the dark forest without getting lost.

If Luke Cage Power Man and John Travolta had a baby, he would be Disco Dante.

Also included in this piece of DLC is a new costume for Dante, called Disco Inferno, which appears to blend John Travolta from Saturday Night Fever with Marvel Comics’ Luke Cage Power Man. It is an amusing enough distraction, but that’s all it is; a distraction, and seems a little out of place considering the serious tone of the rest of the game.

Review Round-Up

Graphics: 4/5 The graphics are in exactly the same style as the main game. The design of the dark forest itself is linear and, as the title suggests, dark. This is not exactly a problem, but it’s also not exactly ambitious.

Sound: 4/5 There are a number of cut scenes in this add-on with new dialogue included. The quality of voice acting is on par with the main game. The same can be said of the sound effects and music.

Gameplay: 3/5 While I had previously thought that Dante’s Inferno would have been a better game without the irritating platforming sections, and the numerous cheap deaths, it actually just leaves a fairly generic action game. Kudos should be given for the compass based light puzzles, which are enjoyable enough and don’t stick around to outstay their welcome.

Longevity: 1/5 Considering that Capcom recently released two large expansions for Resident Evil 5, Lost in Nightmares and Desperate Escape, with each of them costing the same price as The Dark Forest, I can’t really recommend this DLC. My first play through took 20 or so minutes, as I struggled to figure out what was required of me with the final section of the game. Once I had figured that out, I went straight into my second play through and completed it within 5 minutes.

Overall: 2 deadly sins out of 5. While the expansion is competent, and provides an experience in line with what we expected of the main game, it is incredibly short considering the price. When compared to what some other studios are doing for a similar price: i.e. Capcom, it becomes difficult to justify purchasing this add on.

Buy Dante’s Inferno from one of these suppliers and you’ll be helping this site:

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Show Rundown [H:MM:SS]
—————
Opening Song (Poseidon’s Wrath – God of War 3 OST)

Introductions [0:00:30]

Jason’s Now Playing [0:02:56]
-Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (Xbox 360)
-Battlefield: Bad Company 2 (Xbox 360)
-Mass Effect 2 (Xbox 360)
-Puzzle Quest: Challenge of the Warlords (PSP)
-Prinny: Can I Really Be the Hero? (PSP)

Steven’s Now Playing [0:17:38]
-Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (Xbox 360)
-Left 4 Dead 2 (Xbox 360)
-Hotel Dusk: Room 215 (DS)

PAX East 2010
-Friday [0:30:15]
-Saturday [1:07:02]
-Sunday [1:43:33]
-http://kotaku.com/5505341/suspected-game-code-thief-on-the-lam-%5Bupdate%5D

Wrap Up [2:17:05]

End [2:18:44]

With a potential Final Fantasy 7 remake, Little Big Planet 2, Killzone 3 and a stand-alone 250gb XBox 360 the guys have plenty of news for you to digest.  Of course, we have the return of the world famous voice over feature; Get Rich or Dialogue tryin’.

We have a couple of competitions – a Blur Beta key giveaway and a fantastic Command and Conquer 4 bonanza.

1st Prize is a copy of Command and Conquer 4 on the PC and a signed photo of Joe Kucan who plays Kane in the series.

Runners up get limited edition t-shirts and more signed photos.  To find out how to win, just listen to the show!

Don’t forget you can get in touch with the show – podcast@newbreview.com

[podcast]http://realmworx.hipcast.com/deluge/e96b8530-28fb-5585-9c67-7d8650f5b4d9.mp3[/podcast]

MP3 Download / iTunes / RSS Feed

For an MP3 copy of the show, right click the link and choose Save As.

MP3 Link / RSS Feed

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Show Rundown [H:MM:SS]
—————
Opening Song (Poseidon’s Wrath – God of War 3 OST)

Introductions [0:00:31]

Jason’s Now Playing [0:03:02]
-Perfect Dark (Xbox Live Arcade)
-Battlefield: Bad Company 2 (Xbox 360)
-MLB 2010: The Show (PS3)
-http://www.youtube.com/msuhitman
-God of War 3 (PS3)

Steven’s Now Playing [0:22:08]
-Perfect Dark (Xbox Live Arcade) DEMO
-Dark Void (Xbox 360) DEMO
-Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (Xbox 360)
-Borderlands (Xbox 360)
-Left 4 Dead 2 (Xbox 360)

News [0:31:30]
-Mass Effect 2′s ‘Firewalker’ DLC rolling out on Tuesday
-Mass Effect 2 DLC Adds 90 Minutes, More Earth Teases
-One Left 4 Dead character will die in the upcoming DLC
-Command & Conquer 4 requires constant online connection
-Skate 3 rolling out May 11
-PixelJunk Racers 2nd Lap due this spring, Monsters on UMD
-MAG getting free DLC next week
-Final Fight: Double Impact priced and dated
-BlazBlue: Continuum Shift is headed to consoles
-Samurai Warriors 3 slicing US Wiis
-World map, airships confirmed for FF Versus XIII
-Kane & Lynch’s Dog Days begin August 24
-DC Comics drawing Nier
-Batman: Arkham Asylum Game Of The Year Edition Hops On 3D Bandwagon
-Lord of the Rings co-opting new action RPG

Coming Soon for April [1:13:16]

Wrap Up [1:24:18]

End [1:30:30]

Simply copy and paste one of the two following codes into www.blurthegame.com/beta and they will email you a code to download the online multiplayer beta straight to your Xbox 360 harddrive. We only have four codes right now, and they’re only available on a first come first served basis. So good luck, and get downloading. Here they are:

G79R-KVE4-NQZZ-T9EM
RGWJ-JKRV-33CP-6A9K
G7QE-7QQE-ZZDP-RMDK
RHKZ-QWTE-4QGQ-4VRW

Good luck, and don’t forget to post a comment at the bottom to say that you’ve got one.

There's more to this game than just pretty looking cars.

For those not in the know, Blur is made by Bizarre Creations, makers of the Project Gotham series. After having expressed boredom with “realistic” driving games, Bizarre have gone down a different path to breathe life into the racing genre. Rather than focusing on pure realism, Bizarre have instead created a game that blends real world cars with fast paced arcadey controls, chucking bright neon coloured powerups into the mix.

"You absolute SHUNT!"

Stay tuned to The Newb Review over the coming days for our coverage on this great new racing game.

Like what you see? How about preordering the game, due out on 28th May 2010, from The Newb Review store?

For Xbox 360 click here, for PS3 click here and for PC click here.

For an MP3 copy of the show, right click the link and choose Save As.

MP3 Link / RSS Feed

If you’d like the show notes, click the more button.

Show Rundown [H:MM:SS]
—————
Opening Song (The Normandy Reborn – Mass Effect 2 OST)

Introductions [0:00:54]

Jason’s Now Playing [0:03:17]

-Resident Evil 5 (Xbox 360)
-Battlefield: Bad Company 2 (Xbox 360)
-http://www.giantbomb.com/battlefield-bad-company-2-hates-grenade-spam-too/17-2184/
-MLB 2010: The Show (PS3)
-God of War 3 (PS3)

Steven’s Now Playing [0:37:10]
-Resident Evil 5 (Xbox 360)
-Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (Xbox 360)
-Magic: The Gathering – Duels of the Planeswalkers (Xbox Live Arcade)
-BioShock 2 (Xbox 360)
-Borderlands (Xbox 360)

News [0:49:08]
-$15 Modern Warfare 2 map pack detailed
-Sony’s Motion Controller Is The PlayStation Move
-SOCOM 4 On The Move
-PlayStation Move Gets Its First Wii Port
-PS3 motion-controlling Tiger Woods PGA Tour 11
-ModNation Racers dated for May 25
-Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker delayed to June 8, PSP Pack unveiled
-Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep waking this summer
-Rock Band news and dates
-38 Studios, EA in Big Huge RPG deal
-Need for Speed World beta revs up
-Monkey Island 2 SE takes LeChuck’s Revenge on consoles, PC this summer
-Ghost Recon mini-movie being made by directors of Oscar-winning short
-OnLive launching June 17, CEO Perlman interview inside
-Capcom bags Monster Hunter Freedom 3
-Crackdown 2 drops July 6

February NPDs [1:39:17]

Wrap Up [1:58:07]

End [2:06:11]

Despite being about one year old, Capcom have recently released two large downloadable add-ons for Resident Evil 5. The first add on, Resident Evil 5: Lost in Nightmares, was a fantastic blend of old school Resident Evil survival horror with the more modern fast paced action and focus on the co-operative gameplay of Resident Evil 5. A mere two weeks later, Capcom have released Desperate Escape, which takes place towards the end of the main story of Resident Evil 5. Those that are outraged by spoilers may wish to skip over the next paragraph.

After Chris and Sheva rescued Jill Valentine, heroine of Resident Evil and Resident Evil Nemesis, from the mind controlling device used by Albert Wesker, Jill sends Chris and Sheva on their way, before promptly passing out. After a short time she is found and revived by Josh Stone, Sheva’s mentor and only survivor of the BSA team that helped Chris and Sheva. After some mildly inappropriate flirting Josh and Jill decide to work together in order to escape Wesker’s facility and reunite with Sheva and Chris.

With the spoilery bits out of the way, on to the gameplay. To say that Desperate Escape feels like a bit of a step backwards is an understatement. It is hard not to compare it to Lost in Nightmares, with the releases being so close to each other. Where Lost in Nightmares had Chris and Jill working together through the dimly lit corridors and dank under passages of the Spencer Mansion to solve one fiendish puzzle after another, Desperate Escape instead prefers to return to the realm of fast paced hoardes of enemies, and big explosion after big explosion.

Combat is the focus of this expansion.

The main set pieces of this add-on comprise of a canyon covered by numerous rocket launchers and a timed rooftop battle against an endless stream of enemies, much like the Mercenaries mode, as you wait for a helicopter rescue. In order to navigate the canyon you need to zigzag through the canyon taking out the turret controllers and using the turrets to destroy impassable objects. The rooftop battle merely requires you to stand your ground and defeat all the enemies that come at you for about 10 minutes or so.

There is a Mercenaries-esque section at the end of this add on that has different enemies depending on the difficulty

Much like Lost in Nightmares, this add-on is independent of the single player campaign. As such you cannot import any of your character’s weapons from your main save. In fact, you cannot save your progress at any point, which is a bit of a let down, particularly as the canyon navigation gets to be tedious after a while. Your characters have very limited resources in terms of health and weaponry but you do discover other weapons as you progress. Also, the sheer number of enemies means that upon defeating them, your foes tend to drop a lot of ammo for your default pistol or machine gun.

While you start out with little equipment, you soon pick up a lot of stuff.

Also included in the pack are two more characters for the Mercenaries Reunion mode. For those that did not read the review for Lost in Nightmares and are unaware of what Mercenaries Reunion mode is, Mercenaries Reunion is a score based time attack mode in which you run around small arenas fighting off the endless hordes of Majini. While there was a Mercenaries mode included in the retail version of Resident Evil 5, Mercenaries Reunion features new characters and slightly reworked levels and enemies. New characters included in Lost in Nightmares were Excella Gionne and Barry Burton.

Josh Stone and Rebecca Chambers are the final additions to Mercenaries Reunion

This time Josh Stone is added to the action, armed with a high powered pistol, a shotgun, and a rocket launcher. The final new character is Rebecca Chambers from Resident Evil 0, armed with a shotgun and a machine gun. Despite appearing to be one of the weaker characters in the game, I was actually able to achieve an S Rank with her without any real problems. Also available as a separate download – and an additional cost – are a new version of Chris and Sheva, both with new weapons in Mercenaries Reunion, and both playable in the main game.

Review Round-Up

Graphics: 5/5 The same graphical style from Resident Evil 5 remains intact. While the art style in the main mission is a little drab; mostly stone environments, coloured with dark blues and greys, the explosions look as spectacular as ever.

Sound: 4/5 The same actors that voiced the main characters return and perform in a way that is consistent with the rest of the Resident Evil 5.

Gameplay: 2/5 While the gameplay itself is not bad, it seems like a bit of a step backwards when compared to the recent release of Lost in Nightmares. Favouring the action side of Resident Evil, it isn’t exactly deep. Having said that, there are no real flaws with the gameplay, aside from the tedium generated by zigzagging between rocket launching turrets.

Longevity: 2/5 The story mission lasts about 45 minutes or so, but does not really offer much in terms of an incentive to keep playing. The new characters in Mercenaries Reunion offer a little extra replay value, but only if you particularly care about playing through each level with the new characters or achieving as high a score as possible.

Overall: 3 headless Majini out of 5 While there is nothing particularly wrong with this add-on, being released just two weeks after the excellent Lost in Nightmares makes this title seem a bit weak in comparison. If you found Lost in Nightmares to be too slow paced, then perhaps Desperate Escape will be more to your liking.

Desperate Escape is available to download on Xbox live for 400 Microsoft Points (£3.40 ish) and £3.99 on the Playstation Network.

If you were not aware, we have a little Amazon store here at Newbreview.com (link at the top of the page) which we use to try and raise a little cash that we can put toward prize giveaways and so on.  Good old Mightyles has been scouring the store to find some real bargains that you might be interested in.  Check out these prices and if you want to help support the site, click the links below and spend a few quid in the store. 

Halo ODST (360) £17.73
  
Batman Arkham Asylum (360) £17.99
 
DeadSpace £8.15 (PS3)
 
Lego Batman (wii) £10.98
 
Little Big Planet (PS3) £14.73
 
Brutal Legend (ps3) £14.99
 
Sega Megadrive Collection (ps3) £12.84
 
Super Smash Brothers Brawl (wii) £16.95 
 
Gears of War 2 Game of the Year edition (360) £14.95 
 
DeadSpace extraction (wii) £11.65
 
Viva Pinata Trouble In paradise (360) £5.95!!!!!!!
 
Burnout Paradise The Ultimate Box (PS3) £14.99
 
The Orange Box (360) £12.99
 
House of the Dead: Overkill (wii) £11.29
 
Mirror’s Edge (360) £8.24
 
Madworld (wii) £3.91
 
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Smash Up (wii) £7.99
 
Resident Evil 0 (wii) £12.73

Game: Assassin’s Creed 2: The Battle of Forli & Bonfire of the Vanities & Secret Locations
Format: 360, PS3
Developer: Ubisoft Montreal
Publisher: Ubisoft

The Newb Review has something of a love/hate relationship with Ubisoft’s Assassin’s Creed series. We weren’t the only ones who, to put it quite mildly, didn’t like the first instalment (for the full review click here) as despite huge sales, every games critic under the sun gave it the good, hard bashing it rightfully deserved.

It was to our surprise then that last year Assassin’s Creed 2 released and not only did it garner huge sales, but this time it was good. Very, VERY good in fact, a gargantuan improvement on its predecessor and subsequently it ended up being Crofterz personal vote for game of the year (although he was outvoted for The Newb Review Game of The Year Award, by about a quadrillion to one).

So naturally, since he enjoyed the game so much The Newb Review has sent him out to splash some cash on the 2 brand new(ish) DLC packs. Namely, sequence 12, The Battle of Forli and sequence 13, Bonfire of the Vanities & Secret Locations. Are they worth the money? Well, hold on… We’re getting to that bit now.

The Battle of Forli

The Battle of Forli is the first bit of DLC for Assassin’s Creed 2 and I said new(ish) before because well, it’s been out for a while now. It also caused a bit of an uproar because anyone who has played Assassin’s Creed 2 will know of the huge gap in the story between sequences 11 (where you acquire a piece of Eden) and 14 (where you go to the Vatican). In the story it says something about sequence 12 being corrupt!?

Well The Battle of Forli is that such memory. It has caused such a big outrage because, well, according to some (and I totally agree)… it should have been in the game in the first place! The time it takes to download the DLC is a clear indicator that the memory is already on the disc, so why not give it to us for free? Well they’ve got to make money some way right? Although this does seem like a cheap trick.

Is the DLC any good? Well it’s rather short for a start. Containing only 6 new missions, including another mission where you use Da Vinci’s flying machine. So for those who didn’t get the achievement for kicking people in mid-flight, you now have a second chance.

However, at 320 Microsoft moon points (and around £3 on PSN) I would’ve liked to have seen a little bit more bang for my buck. In fact, the only thing that warrants the 320 point/£3 price tag is that it fills in and completes the Assassin’s Creed 2 story. But again, the plot hole really shouldn’t have been there in the first place.

Even though there are painfully few of them, there is a nice variety of missions on offer. This is more of the same, but the inclusion of more assassinations, more target locating and more out and out fighting makes for a nice balance. The DLC is definitely more action orientated rather than stealthy (i.e. there’s lots of fighting) and all in all it does a really nice job of filling in the large gap in story. You get some interesting cut scenes that carry the story through well, the same great voice acting you’ve come to expect from Assassin’s Creed 2 and even a few new characters in the mix, as well as exploring a few characters that had seemingly minor roles in the original release.

Unfortunately, it all ends far too quickly and abruptly and the inclusion of the flying machine feels really tacked on. Labelled as a special memory on the map, the flying machine mission isn’t really a mission at all. Ezio seems to fly through the air, without any mission or objective to achieve, and leaves a large question mark over the choice to include it at all.

So let me get this straight, Ezio gets in the flying machine just to marvel at the breathtaking sights?

Review Round Up

Graphics: 4/5 – Nothing has changed graphically from the original game but the inclusion of a few more cut scenes really helps to drive the story.

Sound: 4/5 – Battle of Forli is full of the same great voice acting we’ve come to expect from Assassin’s Creed 2, it’s all very much more of the same.

Gameplay: 3/5 – Nothing new from what we’ve seen in the original game. There’s a nice variety of missions. however the fact that there is very few of them is a big killer.

Longevity: 2/5 – You’ll have finished this DLC in just about an hour, enough said.

Overall: 3/5 – 3 pointless flying machine set pieces out of 5. Overall The Battle of Forli does a good job of filling in the some of the plot holes in the original game. However, at 320 points or around £3 for PS3 owners, I can see why some would expect a little more for their money.

The Bonfire of the Vanities & Secret Locations

The Bonfire of the Vanities is the second pack of DLC released for Assassin’s Creed 2 and it’s the last missing sequence (sequence 13) in the Assassin’s Creed 2 story. Following on from where The Battle of Forli suddenly ended, The Bonfire of the Vanities has had something of a confusing release. So, let’s clear it all up once and for all (read this carefully, it may save you a few bob)… The Bonfire of the Vanities has been released in two editions, one that costs 320 Microsoft moon points (£3.19 on PSN) and one that costs a bit more, at 520 MSP (that’s £5.49 for PS3 owners). The first contains the Bonfire of the Vanities DLC, whilst the latter (the one that I bought, and shall be reviewing) comes with the DLC as well as the added bonus of some extra Templar lairs that previously only buyers of the black and white special editions of the game had access to.

Anyway with all that price juggling b*llocks out of the way, is the DLC any good?

Well, it’s certainly longer than Battle of Forli (it boasts 10 new missions and 3 Templar lairs), giving you far more content for your money. But the variety between missions is non-existent. In Forli you must eavesdrop, escort and assassinate, Bonfire of the Vanities is just a series of assassination missions. Of course, stabbing people in the neck is fun, but personally I wanted a little bit more variety. After all… it’s the spice of life.

In fact you could say Bonfire of the Vanities is the exact opposite of Battle of Forli. It’s certainly worth the price. It’s longer, has less variety and whereas Battle of Forli is all about action, Bonfire of the Vanities takes a more stealthy, relaxed approach as you plan the assassination and then execute.

The same great voice acting and cut scenes you have come to expect from Assassin’s Creed 2 are all present and correct, even if used a little more sparsely than in Battle of Forli. And of course the DLC pack, just like the previous, does a very nice job of filling in and completing the Assassin’s Creed 2 story arc.

Despite it’s lack of variety, the assassination missions themselves are still a lot of fun. You can easily avoid any monotony setting in by visiting the 5 or 6 new viewpoints and the 3 Templar lairs, which really made the DLC worth it for me.

Although the lairs offer little in terms of a reward past simple monetary gains, they act as a brilliant change of pace. The lairs are essentially  the same as the assassin’s crypts in the original release, which inherently means there’s nothing completely new, but coupled with the assassination missions, this makes for a nice overall package.

Unfortunately there is a catch. To fully sync Desmond with Ezio you must complete all DLC packs and the Templar lairs as well as all the other bonus objectives in the original title (such as those stupid pointless feathers). This is a very cheap and dirty move on Ubisofts part – the filthy, rotten b*stards! But then again, at 520 points/£5.49, you can’t argue with the price.

Killing is Ezio's business and in The Bonfire of the Vanities, business is good.

Review Round Up

Graphics: 4/5 – Like The Battle of Forli DLC, nothing graphically as changed… the game still looks incredible.

Sound: 4/5 – Again nothing has changed much from either the original game or the previous DLC. Great voice acting as per usual.

Gameplay: 3/5 – This time around there’s plenty of content for your buck. It’s just a shame it lacks variety. However the Templar lairs really do help to instil a bit of choice and fend off tedium.

Longevity: 4/5 – For your money you get a lot.

Overall: 4/5 – 4 spices of life (curry powder, paprika, cumin and and nutmeg) out of 5. Plenty of content for a fairly cheap price, just a shame the content had a bit more depth.

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Game: Borderlands: The Secret Armory of General Knoxx
Format: Xbox 360
Developer: Gearbox Software
Publisher: 2K Games

The Newb Review Game of the Year nominee Borderlands received it’s third piece of downloadable content last week, and to cut to the chase, it is brilliant. After the shambolic mess that is Mad Moxxi’s Underdome Riot which cut out all of the fun aspects of Borderlands: exploration of vibrant open areas, looting, and levelling up, we are treated to a lengthy new campaign, complete with expansive environments, new enemies, new weapons, and a further 11 experience levels to unlock.

Taking place directly after the events of the main game story, your character is contacted by Athena, an assassin who has recently quit working for the Crimson Lance and asks for your help bringing them down. Summoning you to T-Bone Junction, an entirely new town that you can access from any fast travel station, you are tasked with destroying the last stronghold of the Crimson Lance, in particular the titular Armory of General Knoxx.

T-Bone Junction and the surrounding area is large. Each area is linked together by Highways that are overrun with Crimson Lance soldiers. Your main objective is to destroy roadblocks in order to gain access to new areas such as a Prison and Deep Fathoms, which is a dried up lake. During your travels you will meet a number of memorable characters, and while the story is not exactly great, the dialogue is as fantastic as ever. General Knoxx in particular shines with his apathetic messages regarding his superior officer who send him taunting orders written in Macaroni and Crayons. As well as excellent new characters, a number of old faces make a return including Scooter and Mad Moxxi, complete with amusing dialogue.

New vehicles and enemies are abundant in this add on

In order to access the new areas you will need to construct new vehicles to break through the Crimson Lance’s road blocks. The three new vehicles comprise of The Racer (a speedy version of your standard car), The Monster (a Jeep armed with machine guns and homing missiles) and The Lancer (A four person tank armed with mines, machine guns, a laser canon, and a pulse blast). Each of these vehicles has their own strengths and weaknesses, such as the Racer being incredibly fast but vulnerable to damage. The vehicles are very useful when facing off against the new enemies that have been added to the game.

As well as the elemental shock troopers; armoured soldiers that have weapons that inflict either shock, explosive, fire, or corrosive damage, there are a number of new bandit types and new creatures called Drifters: towering spider like creatures. On top of the new enemies and environments, a new super rare class of weapons has been added. These Pearlescent weapons (coloured a sort of turquoise blue in your inventory) are incredibly rare and devastatingly powerful.

The enemies you face are very tough

Due to the fact that the main story of this add on takes place after the ending of Borderlands, you cannot access any of the missions until you have completed the main game’s story. Consequently, the enemies that you will fight are pretty tough. It is very clear that this pack has been designed with multiplayer in mind, as there are a large number of enemies on screen at any one time.

There are a number of side missions included in the game, ranging from simple assassination missions to general Fed-Ex quests. One mission in particular “the Super Secret Final Boss”, is actually impossible to beat on your own as the boss is a level 64 character. The level cap has been raised to 61 in this game, which means that even if you completely upgrade your character, this boss is 3 levels stronger than you are. The only way to beat him is to team up with other high levelled characters and work together to take him and his minions down. You will be rewarded with some of the rarest items in the game for beating this boss, but it is no mean feat.

General Knoxx is an apathetic bastard.

As with every other mission in Borderlands, The Secret Armory of General Knoxx can be played through twice by each character; once on playthrough one, and the final time on a second run. The second play through features stronger enemies of a higher experience level, which should keep this add on challenging even for those with exceptionally strong characters.

Review Round-Up

Graphics: 5/5 Brilliant character designs with bold, colourful, expressive graphics. Very stylish overall.

Sound: 4/5 The strong voice acting you would come to expect from a Borderlands game returns. The music remains as strong as ever, and the sound effects are as varied as usual.

Gameplay: 4/5 A wide variety of missions ranging from simple assassination missions, to your typical fetch quests. The three new vehicles shake things up a bit, with each of them having their own strengths and weaknesses. Although it is easier to play this add on with other players, and probably more fun, it is possible to play through it in single player so long as you have a strong enough character.

Longevity: 5/5 The main story missions will last a good few hours, and there are a number of optional side missions. The inclusion of a further 11 experience levels could also provide enough reason to go back and complete more missions in order to get as much experience as possible.

Overall: 4 Pearlescent Shotguns out of 5 It seems Gearbox have listened to the critics of Mad Moxxi’s Underdome Riot and delivered an incredibly strong add on that builds on all of the original game’s strengths. Exploring a large open world populated with memorable characters and a ton of new equipment has brought new life to Borderlands.

The Secret Armory of General Knoxx is available for download now on PC, PS3, and Xbox 360.

UK based developer Rebellion are no strangers to the Aliens Versus Predator (AVP) franchise. One of their first games was AVP for the Atari Jaguar, which is widely considered to be one of the console’s finest games. They returned to the franchise in 1999 to release Aliens Vs. Predator on the PC, another critically lauded title. Yet in 2007 they released Aliens Vs. Predator: Requiem for the PSP, which was generally panned by reviewers. However, no-one can argue that they don’t know the source material.

Rebellion’s latest offering to the AVP franchise is something of an uneven experience. With a fairly short single player campaign that is broken up into three modes, the Marine game, the Alien game, and the Predator game. The Marine sections are little more than a painfully generic shooter, while the Alien and Predator sections blend melee combat, stealth, and platforming to create a (mostly) interesting game, even if it is a little short.

In terms of story, the game is a little light. The evil Weyland-Utani corporation has discovered an ancient Predator pyramid, and in their quest to mine it for information, have unleashed an Alien swarm. Hearing their high tech burglar alarm going off, the Predators descend on the planet in order to protect their secrets. Caught in the middle of the Weyland-Utani corporation, the Aliens, and the Predators is a small band of Marines who are stranded on the planet thanks to a surprise attack by the Predators.

Of the three campaigns, the Alien campaign is the most fun, despite being only 5 levels long. As the Alien you have no weapons other than your claws and gigantic tail, so combat is a melee based affair. Pressing the right bumper performs a quick attack, left bumper performs a heavy attack, and holding both bumpers will make your character block, which is only really useful against the Predator whose primary weapons are his wrist blades.

After successfully blocking an attack you can press either of the bumpers to perform a counter attack, which deals massive damage to your foes. If your opponent is attempting to block your attacks then the only way to break their block is to perform a heavy attack. This adds a little depth to the combat, but for the most part the melee combat is a clumsy and imprecise affair.

The Aliens can climb any surface.

The added bonus of playing as the Alien is that you can climb on any surface, Spider-Man style. When facing a wall, or ledge, simply hold the right trigger and you can crawl as much as you like. While the shift in perspective can be a little disorienting at times, overall the climbing works pretty well. Wall climbing and hiding in darkness is key to the Alien campaign, as it is far easier to take out your enemies by sneaking up behind them and performing a quick kill by pressing the X button.

Quick kills are suitably gory, for example the Aliens can impale humans with their tails, or chew through the humans skulls with their mini mouths. If you come across an unarmed human you can tackle them to the ground and prepare them for a face raping at the hands of a lone Face Hugger, which quickly jumps on your victim and deposits the Alien embryo in the victim’s stomach.

The Predator game is a close contender for best campaign, with most of the same controls applying to the Predator, except you are unable to climb surfaces. Instead the Predator can perform a massive jump in order to get in to the perfect position to kill your targets. As with the Alien stealth is your best option. While you do have projectile weapons, in the form of the plasma cannon, the gun has very limited ammo due to the amount of power each shot consumes. The power for your weapons can be refilled by draining human generators of electricity, these generators are few and far between, so more often than not you may find yourself being without your gun for lengthy periods of time. Predators also perform quick kills, and the Predator kills are the most gruesome. You can decapitate humans, or rip their spinal column out. On a visceral level these quick kills are visually impressive and would gross out most people. In a good way of course.

The Marine campaign is by far the most traditional, and it is also the longest. Armed with a pistol and two other guns, either a sniper rifle, machine gun, or shotgun, you traipse your way through one dark corridor after another. For the most part, your primary light source can be compared to the light found in the glove compartment of a mini metro. With the torch light doing little to illuminate your surroundings, it is good news that you can pop off a flare with a simple button press.

While the flares only last a few seconds, they dramatically increase the amount of light available. This lack of light is no omission on the developer’s part; it was clearly intended to increase the tension. There’s no arguing that it can be incredibly tense wandering down a pitch black corridor with only the sound of something scuttling around in the darkness and the recognisable bleep of your motion sensor, but after a while you may find yourself wishing this futuristic colony had an electrician on call.

You sometimes come across another Marine or two to help you out

The Marine campaign is chocked full of cliché characters, with tough talking Latina Marine Tequila (yes, really) being the worst offender of the lot. The other Marines you encounter shout generic military jargon at you when you pass them, and if I ever hear another Mercenary say “I think that’s the last of them!” only to get torn apart moments later, I may well dive head first off the top of a multi-storey car park.

In overall terms the single player is disappointing because the three campaigns altogether only last about 8 or so hours; with each of these campaigns happening at the same time, in the same place. This means that you will find yourself playing the same level two or three times, just from a different perspective. Fortunately the developers give you the choice of which campaign to play, rather than dictating which species you can play as.

The level design, in general, is nothing to write home about. Levels tend to range from dark facilities, to dark jungles, to dark underground temples. Even in the Jungle level, where the sun was clearly visible in the sky, it was exceptionally dark. While the Aliens can see in the dark, and the Predator has three vision modes (regular vision, thermal vision for seeing humans, and Alien spotting vision) the Marine’s reliance on a piddly flash light and short lived flares can make the single player a chore.

Aliens hide in the darkness and spring out at you from nowhere.

So, whilst the single player is a bit meagre, the online multiplayer is quite impressive. Sure, it has the generic deathmatch modes, but there are also some decent game types. Infestation has eight players, with one player randomly cast as the Alien and the other seven as Marines. When the Alien kills a Marine, that Marine becomes an Alien and must work to finish off the rest of the survivors. When there is only one Marine left the Aliens have 30 seconds to kill him, or that surviving Marine wins the game. While each round has a time limit, how long you survive depends on the people you are playing with and how you work together.

Survival mode has four players playing as Marines fighting off wave after wave of Aliens in cramped conditions, surrounded by darkness. Each player’s health bar is displayed on screen, so if one of your team mates wanders off into the darkness, you can see if he is being slaughtered. Couple that with the terrific sound effects, and you have a wonderfully tense game. Most games of Survival that I have played have only lasted a few minutes due to the sheer numbers of Aliens that swarm you all at once, so Survival seems like the perfect game mode for someone that wants a quick game online.

Predators tend to favour their wrist blades in combat over anything else

The other online modes are made up of Deathmatch (all against all), Team Deathmatch (species vs species), Predator Hunt (a team of Marines vs a Predator, with the killer of the Predator earning the right to be the next Predator), and Domination (King of the Hill) are all well put together, but nothing particularly special.

Review Round-Up

Graphics: 4/5 While the character models are particularly good, the levels themselves tend to be overly dark. I understand the darkness is an intentional design choice to heighten tension, but towards the latter part of the Marine campaign especially, they are just ridiculously dark.

Sound: 4/5 There are only a few voice actors in the game, only Lance Henricksen offers a particularly memorable performance as Karl Bishop Weyland, evil CEO of the Weyland-Utani Corporation. The sound effects are particularly good, especially the Marine’s motion sensor, machine gun, and the Alien’s screeches.

Gameplay: 3/5 The Alien and Predator have interesting abilities, focusing more on stealth and melee combat than anything else. Although they are the shortest of the Campaigns, they could potentially have worn out their welcome if they had been significantly longer. The Marine campaign is more traditional and becomes more and more tedious as it progresses. Online multiplayer has two brilliant modes, Infestation and Survival, and the other more traditional game modes are competent.

Longevity: 2/5 The three single player campaigns will last about 8 hours, and each campaign has a number of collectables: audio diaries for the Marines, Royal Jelly Canisters for the Aliens and Trophy Belts for the Predators. However, these will likely only appeal to the most obsessive compulsive gamers out there. The online modes will probably keep you coming back, so long as there are enough players still playing.

Overall: 3 Surprise Face Huggings out of 5. A short single player experience that offers little replay value is propped up by a decent online multiplayer mode. While there are no major flaws with the game, there are a number of minor issues that all mount up to decrease the overall quality of the game.

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As an avid comic book reader, the name Joe Madureira (or Joe Mad as he likes to be called) is a familiar one. Rising to prominence in the mid 1990s as the artist on Uncanny X-Men, Joe Mad built up enough of a following to branch off on his own and create his own book called Battle Chasers.

With a clear influence from Japanese artists, and a fondness for hulking bodies with improbably large swords, Battle Chasers was a top selling book until Joe Mad decided to quit comics and work on another great love of his life, video games. After a number of false starts, Joe Mad’s first game as creative director, Darksiders, has arrived. But is it any good? Read on to find out…

Darksiders puts you in the role of War, one of the Horsemen of the Apocalypse, who is summoned to earth to adjudicate the battle between heaven and hell. The problem is that when War arrives he finds that he is alone, and the ongoing battle should not be happening quite yet. War is quickly accused of being in cahoots with whoever is behind the premature battle, and in order to clear his name he must find and punish those responsible. Simple enough, right?

War wasn't impressed with the demon's morning breath

After the opening, in which War has most of his powers, you are stripped of all of your abilities and must traverse what is left of the planet earth on your quest. At first the combat seems a bit simplistic, the only attack you have is a sword slash which is executed with a press of the X button. As you continue your adventure you eventually unlock more weapons and a number of magical abilities to use in combat. While switching between weapons and spells is not exactly a smooth experience, overall there are plenty of options to choose from in combat.

As well as the magic spells (wrath abilities) there are a number of passive abilities to discover, such as increased damage resistance, that can be switched around as you see fit. New special moves and upgrades to your wrath abilities can be purchased using the in-game currency of souls from Vulgrim, the merchant, who also acts as a fast travel point, enabling you to quickly travel between merchant stores in the different regions you discover.

Vulgrim acts as a merchant and as a fast travel system

In terms of gameplay, Darksiders takes a lot of influence from Nintendo’s more recent Zelda games; you start the game with very few abilities at your disposal, unlock new abilities and equipment in order to overcome puzzles and advance further through the large open world. New abilities continue to be unlocked pretty much until the final boss fight, so you rarely have the opportunity to simply bask in your own amazing abilities.

A number of the items will be very familiar to most gamers. For instance, a boomerang like razor blade used to hit switches that are out of reach seems to have been ripped straight from the aforementioned Zelda series, and the gun that fires two portals, one orange and the other blue, allowing you cross impassable gaps, is clearly a nod to Portal. While they are very familiar, and some may go as far to call it plagiarism, the puzzles that are solved using these familiar items are well designed.

Combat starts out fairly simplistic but quickly becomes more advanced.

A number of critics have slated the game for being too derivative, and made a number of comparisons to Sony’s God of War series. While on a superficial level Darksiders does resemble God of War, it actually draws it’s influences from a far wider variety of games, ranging from Zelda and Portal to Sega’s Panza Dragoon. It is an eclectic mix of influences, but in the end they all mesh together pretty well to form a satisfying experience.

War's enemies stand little chance against him

One area in particular where this game shines is in the boss fights. As you are playing the physical embodiment of War itself you would be forgiven for expecting your opponents to be a complete pushover. While the majority of enemies are fairly easy to defeat, the bosses are almost perfect in terms of challenge. The majority of bosses are gigantic screen filling enemies that require the use of all of your abilities and cunning. The only real criticism that could probably be laid at the boss design’s feet is that on occasion it can be a little unclear what it is that you have to do at first.

The bosses in this game are particularly good.

Level design itself is fairly decent, with a large open world to explore with numerous regions to explore. Each region is visually distinctive and filled with a number of secret items such as runes that will increase your health bar size and the size of your magic metre and passive abilities. There are also pieces of the Apocalyptic Armour to be found which, once completed, dramatically improves your abilities. While there are very few complaints about the overall level design, on occasion, some of the puzzles seem a bit overlong. The portal referenced section of the game in particular could probably have done with being about two thirds as long as it actually was.

One weaker area of the game is the story and voice acting. At first the story comes across as being a bit limp, as if it were written by a 14 year old boy trying to cram in as much cool stuff in as possible. However, towards the latter half of the game the story dramatically improves. The voice acting for War is a little generic, and Mark Hamill’s performance as The Watcher in particular is a bit of a let down considering the fantastic job he did in last year’s Batman Arkham Asylum. The Watcher is constantly at War’s side, providing hints as to what he should be doing within each level. For the most part his performance comes down to growling his lines and making threats towards you should you fail your mission.

Review Round-Up

Graphics: 4/5 The visual style of this game is very striking; characters have massive bodies and even larger weapons. Level design starts off being a little dark and muted at first, but as the game progresses the colour palette becomes more varied. The design of War himself is pretty cool, although his outfit does look a little like he is the sole survivor of an exploding Oxfam.

Sound: 3/5 While the music is suitibly dramatic and grand, some of the voice acting is a little uneven. Liam O’Brien’s performance as War is a little bland, and Mark Hamill’s performance as The Watcher is also disappointing when compared to his previous voice over work.

Gameplay: 4/5 An eclectic mix of hack slash adventure game, puzzle solving and even a short Panza Dragoon style flight section. Taking it’s biggest influence from Nintendo’s Legend of Zelda series, this game comes together pretty well with the only minor complaint being that some sections of the game are perhaps a little too long.

Longevity: 3/5 While there is no multiplayer aspect in this game, the single player game should be more than enough for most people as it clocks in at a good 15 to 20 hours long. That’s without taking the time to hunt for hidden items.Overall: 4 Horsemen of the Apocalypse out of 5. While some may deride the game for being too derivative, I personally found the overall experience to be very pleasing. This game is ideal for those that like adventure games, particularly those that have never played a Zelda game but always wanted to try one without purchasing a Nintendo console.

And another thing…

Joe “Joefeesh” Finn writes:After a great gaming Christmas I was not looking forward to the new year. I didn’t think there were going to be any games for me until at least March. So when I picked up Darksiders, it an excellent surprise for me. As well as being pretty (especially after THQ fixed that annoying tearing), it’s got fun gameplay, even if it is no more than a megamix of different games. But what’s wrong with that? People come up with great remixes to songs all the time in the music industry, pumping new life into them and expanding the market for that style of music.By this, I mean there are a lot of people who didn’t play Zelda because it was all too tame. Nobody can say that of Darksiders. Well they can, but they’d be an idiot for saying it. As one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, War tears his way through this game with a typical careless, bad-ass attitude.

War rides his horse, Ruin, across the wasteland

There’s a lot to love about this game. If you ever wanted to see what a mature Zelda game would be like or hoped for more adventuring and puzzle solving in your action brawler games, it’s all here.One of the main problems is that health pick ups are inconsistent and cost too much from the shop whilst trying to save for upgrades, so I constantly seemed to be doing my best to never get hit. There is also a lot of running back and forth over long distances with very little reason and hot footing through levels is painfully slow, until you finally get your horse ‘Ruin’ back. When you do get Ruin, it is pretty sweet riding on a beast with a flaming trail. Apart from feeling awesome, it also makes your attacks a lot stronger.Overall, I totally agree with Mightyles’ 4 out of 5. I thoroughly enjoyed this game. I look forward to seeing the other Horsemen in the sequels that have been announced.

With the arrival of this generation of consoles and the advent of paid for downloadable content, the life span of your average game has increased dramatically. While most games receive their additional content within a few months of release, Resident Evil 5 owners have been given a new piece of downloadable content nearly a year after the game’s original release.

While Resident Evil 5 had its detractors, I personally enjoyed sharing the intense experience the game had to offer with my friends via the cooperative campaign mode. As a long time fan of the Resident Evil series I was pleased to be playing as Chris Redfield, hero of the original Resident Evil, and found new character Sheva Alomar to be a well rounded addition to the Resident Evil series.

Of course playing through it with the computer controlled second character was not anywhere near as rewarding on account of the AI character being as dense as War and Peace soaked in concrete. While some lamented the evolution of the series from survival horror to intense action game I had come to accept it and loved the game for it’s own merits.

So you can imagine my surprise upon downloading this add on to find that this had more in common with the original Resident Evil games than Resident Evil 5. Gone are the hordes of enemies in large open spaces, and in its place a lonely mansion that oozes tension with it’s darkly lit passageways and tight corridors.

Lost in Nightmares is pure old school Resident Evil

Taking place before the events of Resident Evil 5, you control Chris Redfield and his partner Jill Valentine on the hunt for the founder of the Umbrella Corporation. Tracking him to a remote mansion that will look very familiar to anyone that has played either Resident Evil 1 or Code Veronica, you spend the majority of your time solving puzzles involving crests and cranks in the vein of the classic Resident Evil games. There are a number of nods to the original Resident Evil, including an amusing homage to the pant-wetting dog scene.

The interior of the Mansion will look familiar to long time Resident Evil fans

This isn’t to say that you will not be facing any enemies. About half way through the new content hulking acid-spewing axe wielders crop up, and are a real challenge to kill, especially considering the limited resources at your disposal. Those that complained about having too much ammo in Resident Evil 5 will be happy to hear that things have changed. The combat is far more tense, with really only a pistol and a limited amount of ammo at your disposal.

Your main enemies will be these deformed acid spewing axe men

Adding to the tension further still, the last section of the add on has you losing all of your equipment and having to face off against acidic, tumour-ridden monsters. Here you must use a series of well placed traps in order to gain crest fragments that will allow you to open a locked door. Classic Resident Evil, with a cooperative twist.

Does this look familiar to anyone?

That is not to say that everything about this add on is perfect. The final boss fight is a little cheap, as it requires you to shoot at your enemy until he leaves himself exposed to a punch. However, in order to get to the position to punch him you must engage in a quick time button pressing activity that has an infeasibly short window of opportunity. Sure, you are only ever required to press either A or X, but it soon becomes irritating when you miss out on performing the move because you pressed the button a split second too late.

Also included in the expansion is the Resident Evil Mercenaries Reunion mode. The two base characters that are available with this DLC are Excella Gionne, head of Tricell, and Resident Evil’s own Barry Burton. Rather than just adding Excella and Barry to the existing Mercenaries mode; a score based battle against the clock, Mercenries Reunion has it’s own menu and will require you to earn a B grade on each level in order to access all eight levels.

Excella and Barry make their Mercenaries debut in this expansion

Unfortunately there arn’t any new levels on offer, but each level has been slightly changed. For the most part the large boss enemies on each level are more rare, with more enemies appearing on screen at any one time than before. Also the time bonuses appear to be in different places, which can breathe a bit of life into the game for those of us that have worked out a set pattern for every level.

Review Round-Up

Graphics: 5/5 Anyone that has even looked at Resident Evil 5 knows that it is a good looking game. The character models are detailed, and the environments are suitably dark and foreboding. As an added bonus, without spoiling anything, I compel fans of the original Resident Evil to interact with the mansion’s front door several times in order to unlock a fun bonus.

Sound: 5/5 Menacing cracks of thunder punctuate the chilling music, which creates a wonderful sense of tension. Voice acting can be a little stiff, but for the most part is good.

Gameplay: 5/5 A near perfect blend of old school Resident Evil gameplay, with a focus on puzzle solving and limited resources, crossed with the cooperative focus of Resident Evil 5. The Mercenaries Reunion mode will be familiar to any one that has spent any time playing the original Mercenaries mode, with just enough changes to keep it from feeling stale.

Longevity: 4/5 Clocking in at about an hour long, with multiple difficulty levels and online leaderboards, the story mode is a fun experience that will be worth playing through a few times. The Mercenaries Reunion mode could potentially keep you coming back for hours and hours if you are particularly inclined to try and work your way up the leaderboards.

Overall: 5 shambling undead out of 5. This add on is a fantastic blend of old school Resident Evil mixed with the more modern action adventure co-op gameplay. There’s less of a focus on action and more on puzzle solving, as well as an expansion of the addictive Mercenaries mode, it is hard not to recommend this add on, especially to those that found the series recent shift towards action adventure displeasing.

Resident Evil 5: Lost in Nightmares is available to download now for 400 Microsoft Points on 360 (about £3.50) and £3.99 on the Playstation Store.

Game: Final Fantasy XIII
Format: Playstation 3
Developer: Square Enix PDD1
Publisher: Square Enix

The 13th game in Square-Enix’s long-running franchise arrives amid a heap of fanfare and hype and mixed reviews. So, is it any good? A qualified yes. Final Fantasy XIII is a measured, open and accessible slice of supremely professional JRPG blockbuster storytelling… For the most part. The main problem comes in navigating the faltering first few hours of the game, which are extremely linear and restrictive. This seems to have seen off a substantial number of players who lack the fortitude to struggle through.

The story takes place in a world called Pulse, which is overlooked by a floating crystalline city-state called Cocoon. In this world there exist godlike mechanical beings known as the Fal’Cie, granted magical abilities by crystals. The Fal’Cie mark people for their own mystical purposes with a brand that compells them to complete a mission ordained by the Fal’Cie within a certain time limit. Failure in this task, either through negligence or death results in transformation into a living corpse. Completing the mission offers a reward that isn’t much better: being transformed into a giant crystal.

To add to the trouble, the mission the Fal’Cie have in mind is rarely clearly defined – you just have to, y’know, guess. Understandably, being chosen in this way is not at the top of anyone’s list of “things I want to be when I grow up”. Having been created by a Fal’Cie named Orphan 1,300 years ago as a paradise for humans to shelter in, Cocoon now finds itself governed by a theocratic regime with a morbid terror of the outside world of Pulse, with whom they once fought a victorious holy war. All contact with Pulse has become strictly prohibited and anyone found to have been in contact with it is rounded up by the military police force PSICOM and put on a Purge Train to live in exile.

Against this backdrop the six primary characters find themselves, through various events, marked by the Fal’Cie. Declared enemies of humanity, they grit their teeth, coiffe their fantastic haircuts and prepare to smash the hell out of Cocoon and its bullying, war-mad Sky-Pope.

The transition between cut-scene and gameplay is now all-but seemless.

Superbly crafted, beautiful in visual-design and direction, and (in the Japanese version at least; those of you playing in English have my sympathies) well-acted, FFXIII marks the point where RPG gaming is finally able to craft an all-round experience that matches the majesty of its cutscenes. Overcooked, half-mad nonsense though it may be, it is made with absolute conviction and a winning level of earnest charisma, and even manages to be intermittently quite touching.

Having spent more time than I care to admit watching Japanese TV romance dramas and formulaic cop shows (their remake of Columbo isn’t too bad), this seems to be a precision strike at the mainstream in Square’s home country. Players outside of Japan find themselves in a niche with regard to appreciating this kind of material but make no mistake, this is aimed squarely at the general public and backed up with a variety of tie-ins, including branded coffee that I might buy if I didn’t really fucking hate coffee (it is my kryptonite), and a specially composed power-ballad called Kimi Ga Iru Kara (because you’re here).

I am given to understand that the English version will feature Leona Lewis’s My Hands; once again, I am very sorry. The aforementioned ballad is part of what, overall, is a wonderfully rich and varied soundtrack. Undoubtedly one of the best in gaming so far. On a non-interactive formal level, FFXIII is a romping, glorious triumph, rare and beautiful, like a diamond Sex-Unicorn.

But the cry goes up! “Please, sir, this is not a movie, but rather an interactive telly-game what you play with buttons! What of the playing?” There I am more equivocal. The new Active Time Battle system is generally a pleasure. Taking place in real time, the player controls only one character and dictates the strategy of the others using a system of Roles, which can be saved in various configurations, called Optima, for ease of selection.

The Roles take the form of fairly standard patterns: Attackers deal physical damage, Blasters fire from a distance, Healers do the obvious, Enhancers fortify the party’s attributes, Jammers lower the enemy’s stats, and Defenders soak up damage to protect the rest of the party (these role names are being changed for the English release, but you get the gyst).

Characters queue up their moves to fill a certain number of slots on the time gauge, with more powerful moves using up a greater number of slots. In battle, successive hits landed quickly will fill up the opponent’s Break Meter. Once this is done, all damage inflicted is exponentially multiplied for a limited time. Each enemy also has a number of weaknesses which can be exploited to do extra damage and fill the Break Meter faster.

Role-switching takes place on the fly, allowing you to balance attack and defence according to how well the battle is proceeding.

Meanwhile, character-levelling now takes the form of allotting Command Points to increase the stats and abilities of each character’s various roles in a menu called the Crystarium. This allows you to precisely tailor each character’s strengths and weaknesses as you see fit. Weapons and accessories can also be individually levelled-up in a considerable number of configurations. There is a lot of scope, for those interested in such things, to lose hours on end to this alone.

Initially a rather limited and repetitive affair, the ATB system acquires a considerable level of tactical depth once the characters are sufficiently levelled up. Later fights demand a great deal of role switching to best balance attack and defence. This becomes pretty much essential as the game takes a turn for the monstrously difficult, pitting you against cunning evil bastards with HP meters in the tens of millions.

Thankfully the series’s trusty Summon attacks also make a return, all utterly transfixing in their beauty and many of them with a highly peculiar mecha-battle twist. There are some problems that can only be solved by ramming stuff at 700mph on a giant rocket-powered motorcycle made of ladies.

The Summons return with the addition of a new Drive mode, allowing you to mount your supernatural partner and charge around the battle pelting the enemy with special attacks

The game has been designed to be streamlined and user-friendly, cutting out all the extraneous elements (overworld map, NPC conversations, towns, shops, minigames) with the apparent aim of cutting Final Fantasy down to its sleekest, slimmest possible incarnation. Buying and selling items is now taken care of in a menu accessible from one of the copious save points and hit points fully recharge after every battle, removing the need to go out of your way to find some way to heal a terminally-wounded character.

New abilities are doled out slowly and introduced with fully-featured tutorials. Admirable though the development team’s commitment to making the game accessible may be, it does result in a somewhat overlong period of funnelled hand-holding. The first ten hours or so are spent following a succession of narrow paths and engaging in fairly limited repetitive slugging matches with numerous small groups of enemies, interspersed with frequent cut-scenes.

Those inclined to snap judgements may find themselves parting company with the game at some point here. They’d be missing out, however. Given time, the game blossoms into something altogether broader and grander in scale. Witness the huge, beautiful vistas that rank amongst the most staggering visuals in videogames to date. Exploration will usually turn up one of many optional extra missions.

These are the main source of replayability, since some of them will only be completable after acquiring abilities later in the game. The development team have helpfully included the option to go straight to these uncompleted quests once the game has been finished. There are many of us who don’t feel like sinking another 65 hours into the thing.

After the restrictive early hours of the game, it eventually broadens out into much more open environments

In the end, this is a blockbuster which reaches out to new audiences with one hand and then occasionally decides to punch them in the face with the other. It mixes fantastic production values and many small, considered innovations with a number of stubborn unadventurous design features. This is Final Fantasy, as big and bright, heartfelt and earnest and yes, clunky as ever. But it’s now slicker, more beautiful and lavish than before. A graphical showcase. A consumate piece of crowd-pleasing showmanship. That’ll do for me… For now.

Review Round-up

Graphics: 5/5 – Idiosyncratic character designs apart (I quite like them, myself), the game is realised with a textured, shimmering beauty. Artfully composed and occasionally breathtaking. The transition between cutscene and gameplay is now all but invisible. There are a few minor interface issues; the main problem being an over-busy battle display. In the heat of battle it’s sometimes difficult to discern how much damage is being dealt to whom with all the numbers flying around the screen.

Sound: 4/5 – Beautiful, versatile music. The sound effects are all competently put-together, but fairly traditional and unadventurous. I can’t comment on the English voice-acting, beyond observing that, if previous Final Fantasy games are anything to go by, it will no doubt feature a cast of ex-ninja turtles trying bravely to breathe life into the stilted translation. Therefore a provisional 4, but knock one off (so to speak) if you don’t like Leona Lewis or ponderous English dubbing.

Gameplay: 3/5 – Over-cautious in it’s structure for the first eight to ten hours, and with some punishing, soul-destroying difficulty spikes cropping up from time-to-time thereafter. Stripped down to the essentials, it feels sleeker and more dynamic, but also occasionally a little sparse as a result. The camera has a tendency to whip into slightly inconvenient angles during battles, though it is fully controllable (if a little sluggish). The battle system is deep and nuanced once it gets going. Efficient and with some fine ideas, but a little unambitious on the whole. The Gears Of War of JRPGs in many ways.

Longevity: 3/5 Around 60 hours of the main quest, with the potential to potter about a little on the side, though to a lesser extent than in games gone by. There’s some replay value to be had from going back and mopping up uncompleted quests or Achievement/Trophy hunting. About as replayable as these things get, which is not very. Still, don’t hate the wind because it blows, eh?

Overall: 4/5 – The realisation of all the cinematic potential that always lay dormant and stirring at the heart of the older games, this is a technical triumph. Without its nuanced fighting system, however, I would struggle to find anything to especially laud about it. Square’s desire to avoid scaring-off new players has led them to create a game that initially seems to have entered the race wearing only one shoe. Still, given time it largely overcomes early worries through a combination of charisma and a blossoming, expansive game world. A fine foundation for greater things to come, I hope.

Game:

God of War, Devil May Cry, Bayonetta, Ninja Gaiden… the action based hack-n’-slash genre is rarely associated with original or innovative gameplay and whilst Dante’s Inferno cetainly doesn’t break this trend, EA’s latest offering still manages to deliver a unique and enjoyable experience.

Any readers or listeners of The Newb Review will know that ever since it was announced, Dante’s Inferno has been the game I was most looking forward to. It has fended off stiff competition from the delightfully brilliant Mass Effect 2 and upcoming PS3 exclusive Heavy Rain. However, often when you’re incredibly excited for an upcoming game, expectations are so high that when the final product turns out to be a bit of a disappointment. So with that in mind, how well does Dante’s Inferno meet up to expectations?Well get ready for the oncoming jizz storm folks because I absolutely love this game. In fact, if you really don’t want to read me waffling on about how “this game is great”, “amazing” and how much “I love this game” then I suggest you just sod off now. But then again you’ve made it this far so how about you carry on and watch as I, purely in metaphorical terms of course, vigorously masturbate over my copy Dante’s Inferno?

Dante’s Inferno doesn’t break any new ground. In fact, it borrows heavily from other games in the genre; God of War especially. As soon as the demo had been released, the masses were ready to bash the game for being a “God of War clone”, but unfortunately they’d missed the point completely. I’m all for games being unique and different, but just because a game isn’t entirely new, does not mean it isn’t any good? Look at any sodding World War 2 FPS and you’ll see that they’re all essentially the same, but that doesn’t make them any less fun. The fact is the gameplay on offer in Dante’s Inferno is nothing new, but it’s solid fun and provides a strong base from which the game can build and shine. And boy, does it shine. It shines like a shiny piece of… something shiny.

Dante’s Inferno is far more about the setting and story telling than it is about innovative gameplay. It is these two things that not only set it apart from other peers in it’s genre, but ultimately what makes the game absolutely brilliant. The level of care and thought that has been put into this game is nothing short of staggering. Hell itself feels like a living, breathing character thanks to some absolutely incredible level and character design. The later of these does unfortunately seem to peter out towards the end, thanks to the inclusion of some fairly generic enemy types. However, every circle of Hell looks completely different but equally as grotesque, from the vaginal imagery of the first circle of Hell; Lust, to the bile filled, obesity inspired landscapes of Gluttony. Every circle of Hell has a level of detail that up until now, us gamers have only dreamt of.

You cannot fault the character design

Yes ladies and gents, this game really does go the whole way to earn it’s 18 rating, it’s shocking, disgusting and vile; and some will say needlessly so. But it’s a game set in Hell for god’s sake! What did you expect?!

All of this lovely, grotesque debauchery is available in full detail as well. There are very few games that look as good as Dante’s Inferno; both the actual gameplay sections and various cut scenes are extremely lush. This game looks as good as it is sickening.

Very visually impressive

The inclusion of animated sections are not only seamlessly integrated but also look as equally stunning. Many medieval style games can come off as pretentious and confusing, but the animated sections in Dante’s Inferno not only look beautiful but most importantly aids in illustrating exactly what’s going on within the narrative. This eradicates any pretense or confusion and helps make the story interesting and compelling.

The whole experience Dante’s Inferno offers is perfectly punctuated with it’s use of sound and it’s difficulty. The soundtrack is loud, nightmarish and a perfect fit for the setting. The voice acting is great and the difficulty is HARD, which may put some people off, especially when sometimes progression within the game relies on Dante dishing out some pretty cheap deaths.

In terms of length, Dante’s Inferno has come under attack from other reviewers, but I tend to disagree. It may not be long enough to satisfy the 90 hour RPG loving types, but it’s punishing and unrelenting enough that though statistically short it never feels like it out stays it’s welcome.

My only parting gripe is with the fairly tacked-on-looking multiplayer DLC on the horizon (although I hope to be proved wrong). There also isn’t much incentive for multiple play throughs, which is a crying shame considering how good the game actually is.

Review Round Up

Graphics: 5/5 – Level and character design is pretty much flawless (apart from the appearance of some more generic baddies towards the end of the game). Graphically, everything from the gameplay and cut scenes to the animated sections are absolutely spot on.

Sound: 4/5 – Hellish and loud. Blood curdlingly perfect.

Gameplay: 4/5 – Gameplay doesn’t break any new ground and if you’re familiar with previous action based hack-n-slash titles this will all feel familiar. Combat controls are fluid, allowing combos to feel easy and seamless. The game is set in Hell and the punishing difficulty perfectly compliments that, however the constant need to deal out cheap deaths may put some people off. Oh, and the boss battles are freakin’ epic!

Longevity: 3/5 – The game is brilliant on a first play through, but there’s just not enough incentive for multiple plays (achievements don’t count, you big whores!)

Overall: 4/5 – Overall I give Dante’s Inferno a grotesque 4 out of 5. It’s gameplay may not be original and it may have some faults, but the overall experience of playing Dante’s Inferno feels totally and utterly unique.

And another thing…

Ed “LavaLampBamboo” Johnston writes:

The thing about Dante’s Inferno, despite it’s good points, is that it had been done before. It’d be wrong to call this a God of War imitator; it’s God of War through and through. Similar combat, similar puzzles, both are based on classic literature, hell, Dante even has a very similar character design to Kratos (semi naked, red theme, dead family). I feel tempted to describe Dante’s Inferno as God of War Lite, a way to bridge the gap between now and when GoW3 comes out. It wouldn’t be right to say that DI is a bad game because of this; it has taken a lot of cues from one of the best action-adventure games in recent years, but it would have been nice to see the game bring something new to the table.

Also it violates one of the seven deadly sins of gaming; the game finishes with “To be continued” popping up. Presumably, next year we’ll be seeing Dante’s Purgatorio. Honestly, Visceral, not cool…

By this game from our Amazon store and help support this site:

The kit itself is essentially a standard Rock Band drum kit without the plastic and metal stand. So the pads and kick pedal can move freely, which can cause a few problems. I was actually quite surprised by the overall quality of the hardware itself; for the price I was expecting something very cheap and incredibly flimsy. The pads and kick pedal have a good weight to them, which would suggest they can actually withstand the abuse your drumsticks will assault it with. The kick pedal has a good solid feel to it and the drums actually seem a little quieter than the original Rock Band kit.

As mentioned before there is no stand with this package, and this can cause problems with finding a good place to put the pads. The instructions provided suggest a flat surface like a table, however I find the pads much easier to hit if they are slightly tilted towards you (like they are on the official kit) which lead me to set up an elaborate system of pulleys and levers to find the best playing setup. Also, the pads do have a tendency to move about during play and you are likely to find yourself chasing the kick pedal across the floor.

All of the parts of the controller are wired separately to the navigation panel which has its own USB cable to plug into your console. This means you end up with a lot of wires that are just dying to get tangled up, but these are only minor issues.

Be prepared for wires

In all I found this hardware to be a good cheap alternative to the official kit, which can set you back anywhere upto £60. The small issues it has can start to annoy as you have to constantly rearrange the pads into a comfortable position after every song. The kit does all pack away neatly into a much smaller space than official drums, so if you are living somewhere with limited space then maybe this product is a good idea. For anyone else, if you have the room and the money, by all means opt for the official drums. But if for some reason you can’t get them, perhaps you’re averse to spending so much on plastic peripherals or are just too cheap to pay for it then this is a pretty good package.

Buy this from our Amazon shop and help to support this site:

EA’s 2010/11 lineup,

Sonic 4 and

Microsoft dropping Original Xbox Live support.

All this as well as all the new releases, site updates and e-mails as well as the stunning conclusion to the Bayonetta competition.

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Game

Army of Two: The 40th Day is the sequel to the flawed-but-fun third person shooter released at the beginning of 2008. Salem and Rios, the titular heroes from the original, return to wreak havoc as they attempt to escape Shanghai whilst terrorists attack the city in droves. The over-arching story is less than clear however, as it is unclear why Salem and Rios are in Shanghai or why the city is being attacked at all.

This could all be a clever nod to the fact that in a real terrorist attack, information would be sketchy and you would be unsure as to what exactly was going on. However, I wouldn’t give the writers so much credit, this game neither attempts nor pretends to show any kind of intelligence in terms of narrative or character motivation. If you’re looking for narrative clarity, pick up Bayonetta over this; you might have more of a clue as to the story.

So whilst the narrative is wafer thin at best and character motivations are almost entirely absent, your motivation as a gamer is clear: if it moves, kill it. Weapon customisations have been ramped up to help deal out death in various different ways. Guns can be upgraded to change attributes such as the amount of attention a gun draws, damage, bullet spread and accuracy, which brings a tactical element to an otherwise typically primitive shooter experience.

The aforementioned attention your gun draws, or aggro, is the chief tactic to be employed during play. Basically, the bigger and louder the gun, the more the enemy will focus on the man holding it. Thus, your partner is free to run around, laying down enemies with almost no interference.

With enough aggro your partner will be all but invisible to the enemy

With an AI partner in tow, you have some control over actions; sending him up to be aggressive or hold back in a defensive stance. But the real fun here is the surprisingly in depth tactics of advance and retreat when playing with a human partner. The more intense sections of the game become even more so when you’re relying on the guy sitting next to you or a friend over the internet. This translates into a real sense of teamwork and achievement after you’ve cleared a particularly challenging room.

Further weapon enhancements come with the ability to increase the aggro your gun pulls by painting the gun in a variety of patterns, or going the whole hog and decking it out in gold and silver for maximum effect. Affixing a bayonet to the end is also particularly satisfying; be sure to unleash a close-up mêlée attack for the full effect.

Running in brainlessly is the fastest way to catch bullets in your torso

Added silliness is found in the interactions between your two main characters. Fans of the first game might be perturbed to hear that new actors voice Rios and Salem. However this has only raised the quality as they berate and chide each other from scene to scene. The ability to congratulate or abuse your team mate is also back, and will have an impact on the ending of the game, as the trophy/achievement list shows you can either end as best buds or fractured friends.

Another addition is the opportunity for a quick game of rock – paper – scissors, which seems a little inappropriate when you’re standing over the bloodied corpses of your enemies. This serves no real purpose other than a spot of frivolity, in case you thought the narrative was getting a little heavy.

You're treated to frequent spurts of humour, whether you want them or not

This game is geared towards co-op play; either online or using local split-screen. Playing on your lonesome you certainly lose a lot of what makes this game fun to play; the tactics and camaraderie on screen. Split screen is also a little problematic. The game default is a vertical split that can impede your view at times, especially if playing on a smaller television set. Not letting players choose between vertical or horizontal split is practically criminal in modern gaming. However this problem does ease with time and a little patience. Also, with the press of a button you can make the camera shift across to your other shoulder, which is a vital addition in some of the tighter set pieces and goes some way to rectify the hindered peripheral vision.

Visually the game isn’t fantastic, but it is functional and fun. Buildings will explode in the distance and crumble to the ground and whilst these effects look a little blocky and basic, it only adds to the humour and allows you to detach yourself from any thoughts of the horrific deaths of innocent bystanders. There’s not even a hint of the gravitas you might find in the heavier scenes of Modern Warfare 2, but this is a game that by its very nature knows what it is and exploits it to the max.

And you thought the riot shield from Modern Warfare 2 was fun!

In terms of sound, the game arguably impresses more than with its visuals. Explosions will dazzle your ears more than your eyes and gun fights really immerse you into each battle, if only until Salem or Rios utter something inappropriate to drag you right back out again. The voice acting, especially for the two main characters, is far stronger than in the original title. Using established actors (surprise, surprise Nolan North is in this) who clearly have fun playing these characters has increased the quality substantially.

The multiplayer was seriously lacking in the first Army of Two, and you’ll be happy to hear that EA have gone to great lengths to address this with the sequel. There are now up to ten people per map and several game modes to play with. Co-op death match is present, as you would expect, where teams of two battle it out for supremacy. Control and extraction are also fairly standard, which are essentially ‘hold the base’ and ‘survival’ respectively. The final mode, Warzone, is a breath of fresh air, as teams fight it out with various objectives flashing up during the match. Whilst this final mode is more inventive than the other three, there isn’t really anything here that isn’t done better in other games.

Overall, The 40th day presents an enjoyable package that isn’t revolutionary or even particularly inventive, but impresses with its balls out mentality and shameless superficiality. If you and a friend have been looking for a fun co-op experience, look no further. Army of Two: The 40th Day is available on the PS3 and XBox 360 (and PSP, but we haven’t reviewed that yet). You can pick it up through our amazon shop to help support the site.

Review Round-Up

Graphics: 2/5 – They serve a purpose but not particularly well. The game looks a lot better up-close, as with the character design, than further away. Some of the collapsing buildings in the distance look almost comical.

Sound: 3/5 – The characters are voiced well and the relationship between the protagonists is particularly strong. Explosions and gunfire are convincing. Overall the sound is good, but there isn’t anything here that is outstanding.

Gameplay: 3/5 – The lack of options with local split screen is criminal. Movement and aiming takes a little getting used to, especially if you’re familiar with mainstream FPS titles. There are occasional camera issues, as with most games using the third person perspective.

Longevity: 3/5 – The main campaign will take around 10 hours to complete; less if you rush through on the easiest difficulty. The morality choices add little to the overall experience and won’t have you clambering to play through again as a title such as inFamous would. Multiplayer is a fine distraction but won’t hold your attention for long.

Overall: 3/5 – This is a fun little co-op shooter that I recommend if you want something more than a standard head-to-head experience with a friend.

The epic war of the consoles between Sony and Microsoft (the Wii isn’t made for gamers; see ‘iRate: Wii never play it really’) seems to have descended into a tit-for-tat squabble; each company sinking to new lows by securing the exclusivity of relatively minute amounts of individual titles. Sure, the Joker maps from Batman: Arkham Asylum are only available to PS3 customers, but does Sony really think that this pathetic half-step is going to incense XBox owners into purchasing the rival console?

The PS3 exclusive Joker Maps are no laughing matter for XBox owners

Don’t get me wrong, I use Sony only as an example here; Microsoft is by far the worst offender. Since launch there have been a number of DLC exclusivity deals struck by Microsoft, but here are perhaps the two biggest: Grand Theft Auto IV and Fallout 3.

What makes this worse is the overall quality of this exclusive content. The DLC for Fallout 3 in particular has been met with some mixed reactions. It’s difficult to argue that Mothership Zeta and Operation: Anchorage achieve anything other than detracting from the overall quality of the Fallout experience. Also, our very own Luke ‘Mightyles’ Mears didn’t think much of The Ballad of Gay Tony.

The Ballad of Gay Tony? More like the Ballad of Gypped PS3 Owners!

The word “exclusive” is also something of a misnomer in this context. With the exception of the Joker maps for Batman: Arkham Asylum (although time will tell on that one), almost every piece of exclusive DLC has been a timed exclusive. So after a period of time the DLC is launched on the rival console anyway, usually to the complete disinterest of gamers everywhere. Only the most hardcore fans of Fallout 3, for example, are going to shell out an extra £30 to get their hands on the five packs of new content. The majority will leave it on the shop shelf where it belongs.

Bad DLC in itself isn’t a massive issue, but when the companies we rely on to produce quality products that are worth our time and money begin to shell out large amounts to secure bad content, you know that something is awry. The global gaming industry has become so concerned with rivalry and getting one up (intentional cheeky Mario reference) on each other that it has completely forgotten the people in the middle, the people that really matter, us bloody gamers! And exclusive DLC is living proof of this.

A prime example of timed exclusive DLC not worth the wait

Games developers should be committed to producing titles that deliver the complete experience for anyone that digs into their wallets to purchase a game. It doesn’t matter what format, gamers should be afforded the courtesy of this complete experience.

DLC exclusivity is a corruption of this. Not only are developers selling off parts of the “experience” to the highest bidder, but by doing so they are segregating their audience, causing increasing disillusionment with the developer. We shouldn’t be punished for choosing one console over another. The only kind of exclusivity The Newb Review can endorse is for a full title. Furthermore, by selling off the rights to portions of games through DLC, developers are not only showing a lack of backbone, they are also telling the world that they are driven solely by profit and that they don’t respect the very people to which their products are aimed.

Developers aren’t the only ones at fault though. The tit-for-tat rivalry between Sony and Microsoft, expressed through DLC, is nothing short of childish, playground bullsh*t. If they weren’t so willing to throw away cash carelessly, just to ensure exclusivity rights on the latest and greatest game ad-ons, the thought of exclusive DLC for consoles wouldn’t be so imprinted on the minds of developers, and perhaps us gamers would be treated a little less like mindless sheep.

This is a call to arms: gamers of the world unite. We need to tell the corporations to cease this petty battle for DLC exclusivity. From now on it’s full exclusivity for a title or nothing at all. No more of these petty half-steps to nudge people towards choosing your console.

Hello! And welcome to the long over due second episode of Thoroughly Underrated Games You Probably Should Play, a series of articles from The Newb Review where we recommend some bloody good games that have been far over-shadowed, often by games with lower quality, but higher marketing budgets. Episode 1 (an article on the fabulous game Henry Hatsworth in The Puzzling Adventure, found here: http://rt.nu/9jissu) came out some time ago. However, as something of a new year’s resolution, our very own Crofterz has made it his mission in life to unearth these valuable gems for you, our beloved newbs.

So, it’s 2010… Another few years and it’ll be Back To The Future, but first of all since this is the first T.U.G.Y.P.S.P of the year (even I get tired of typing the full name out sometimes), lets take a quick look back at a few games from last year that might have slipped under your radar. Not only did we have a trillion (scientifically accurate number) great, big budget titles to keep us occupied, but the indie and arcade circuits had a tremendous year too. We were treated to Shadow Complex, Splosion Man, Flower, Flock!, I MAED A GAM3 W1TH Z0MB1ES 1N IT!!!1 and Johnny Platformer’s Biscuit Romp as well as some fabulous remakes, ports and reboots (Trials HD, and Battlefield 1943 anyone?). That’s without even mentioning Alien Breed Evolution, Wolfenstein 3D and The Secret of Monkey Island too.

So it was a great year for arcade titles. And with so many high quality games, there were bound to be some hidden gems that very much went under the radar. LucasArts’ latest arcade offering, Lucidity, is a prime example of this.

So, why should you all go out in your masses and buy Lucidity?

Well to put it quite simply, Lucidity is as good as all the other must buy arcade juggernauts such as Braid (which you’ll hear me mention a lot in this article), Splosion Man, Flower and Castle Crashers. But it has never reached the dizzying heights of acclaim that these four titles have.

For starters, Lucidity is absolutely mesmerising. As soon as its fired up, the game greets you with an awe inspiring, hand crafted, cut-out paper graphical style which not only helps add more mystery to the game but is just beautiful and unique. This game has an art style reminiscent of the Paper Mario games, but this looks better by a country mile. Lucidity is highly polished and full of personality: everything from the cut scenes to the in-game graphics are lush, vibrant and absolutely gorgeous. Each new level is distinct and different from the last, yet just as magical and beautiful. It’s difficult to stop banging on about how brilliant this game looks… but for the sake of this article we should move on to something else that’s great about the game… the music.

The art style is nothing short of amazing

Rarely do I pay attention to the music within a game unless it’s bad (am I the only person who found the music in Braid absolutely infuriating after a while?). But the music in Lucidity, much like its graphical style, is beautiful and full of personality. The game manages this without neglecting subtlety, thus playing the game is a lot more of an enjoyable experience. It makes a nice change to not have loud noises and music constantly tearing at your face like a pack of wolverines. Not only does the music help to keep an aura of mystery around the game, but it never descends into tedium and annoyance, which is something of a godsend nowadays. It’s all so hypnotising, like when you sit down to play a brand new game and end up losing an entire day playing, you despicable little hermit!

This is all well and good, but music and graphics are usually just the icing on a lovely gaming cake. The meat (a meat cake? Now there’s a lovely thought) of a game is the story and gameplay. Thankfully, Lucidity doesn’t disappoint in these departments either. The story is simple and charming, meaning it is not only a game for adults, but your little offspring wouldn’t find it hard to pick up the game and have fun.

The games revolves around the main character, a little girl named Sofi, whose grandmother reads her stories every bed time. The game starts with Sofi just dropping asleep after another bed time fairytale, when she reawakens within a dream world (the whole game is essentially set within her dream). Sofi stumbles across a red firefly, who is then eaten by a frog; who promptly runs off.

The premise of the game is basically the girl chasing the frog from one end of the level to the other to try and get the red firefly back. It sounds absolutely bonkers and it may sound a little bit rubbish, but apparently it’s all a metaphor for Sofi having to deal with the death of her grandmother. Except I don’t actually remember her grandmother dying.

The story, backed with the great graphical style and sound makes for a game that is both hypnotic and addictive. The mix of simplicity and ambiguity roots in a mysterious tone: who is this girl? Where are we? What’s going on? So many questions, yet there isn’t even a whiff of pretentiousness; something I unfortunately cannot say for Braid. In fact, Braid is in many ways quite a close comparison to Lucidity.

The only thing about Lucidity that isn’t utterly unique is the gameplay itself. It  isn’t as original, refreshing or as clever as the gameplay in something like Braid. But this still isn’t the type of gameplay you have the chance to experience very often in the current gaming climate.

As the girl moves from one end of the level to the other she will encounter obstacles and enemies. The basic aim is to use objects to avoid enemies, overcome the obstacles and collecting fireflies, scattered around everywhere, to unlock the next level. It’s all so reminiscent of the good old Lemmings days. Whilst Lucidity is slightly less engaging than Lemmings, it makes for a far more relaxed and casual play experience. Again, this is something of a godsend in a climate where games are desperate to hold your attention at all times.

Gameplay isn't as refreshing or different as the graphics or sound, but this is a hark back to older days; a type of gameplay forgotten in the modern gaming climate.

Lucidity is the perfect example of a game you can pick up and play for as long as you so please. You can play as much or as little as you want. You really feel in control and can play at your leisure. This all makes for an incredibly enjoyable gaming experience.

So there you have it, the first Thoroughly Underrated Game You Probably Should Play of the year. Some people are bound to disagree, but then again some people are bound to be idiots so… I guess that’s life. Yes it may seem a bit a childish game and it is, but isn’t there still a place for a bit of innocent fun nowadays?

Lucidity is available both on PC, through Steam, and Xbox 360, through the Xbox Live Marketplace.

Hello, newblings. You may remember that last month Crofterz wrote a nice, little review on Ubisoft’s Assassin’s Creed.  Actually, said article was the first in a few (and by a few, we mean two) articles in a series that will now be tentatively known as “Games released ages ago that Crofterz has finally played for free”. Here’s the second (and final) instalment, Star Wars: The Force Unleashed. This was kindly lent to him by another friend (the rest of us at The Newb Review office are just as amazed as you; that cynical, miserable b*stard has more than one friend!).

As a bit of a Star Wars nut I’ve grown up with some great Star Wars games (Knights of The Old Republic series etc) and some absolute stinkers (any of the film-game tie ins). So I was a bit dubious as to what The Force Unleashed would offer: a great game, or utterly forgettable? I’m happy to say, The Force Unleashed is actually one of the best.

First of all, what makes the game brilliant is the story. Set between the events of the Revenge of The Sith and the A New Hope films, you assume the role of Darth Vader’s secret apprentice, Starkiller. Discovered as a child after killing his father, Vader trains Starkiller as a Sith. Soon enough Starkiller finds himself travelling across the Universe, hunting down the last remaining members of the Jedi order. You’ve got to hand it to LucasArts, playing about with their universe and it’s characters extensively seems to be paying off (you start the game playing as Darth Vader for god’s sakes! Back in 1997, the ten year old me would die of excitement at the prospect of playing Darth Vader in a game; it’s definitely the most bad ass thing ever).

Playing around with their universe is quite a risk, especially considering how touchy and volatile the hardcore Star Wars fans can be. LucasArts have managed to pull it off really well. I admit, the name Starkiller is a little bit… lame, but the story is true to the Star Wars universe whilst offering a fresh experience from a series that has already been done to death.

Lord Varder PWNS

In fact the only complaints I have about the story are that a) its far too short (There are quite a few plot holes in between levels. I want more goddamn it!) b) “Starkiller” sounds far too nice and namby pamby for a Sith (he should sound like a cold blooded killer, and less like someone who would help you get your cat down from a tree) which sort’ve ruins his character a little bit.

Finally, c) the inclusion of a choice between 2 different endings, a good one and a bad one. This inclusion in particular is irritating as it’s the only part where the story itself falters. Not only is it painfully obvious which ending is the “real” ending, but the other completely screws with the story of the Star Wars films. I’ll try not to spoil anything but let’s just say it completely kills off one its biggest characters, rendering all that’s meant to happen after the game as useless.

The game would be far better with the one, “real” ending; completely ridding us of the opportunity to ruin everything by selecting the obviously fake one.

Anyway, the sound and visuals of the game also help to immerse you within the compelling story. The soundtrack is not unlike the incredible, cinematic sounds found in the Star Wars films themselves. Because of this, the soundtrack itself helps convey the typically epic experience, making the story seem more authentic whilst helping the player connect more with the game. The voice acting is also equally as impressive; each actor giving a brilliant and believable performance. Again, this helps to immerse you within the universe of the game.

I hate to sound like a total graphics whore, but Star Wars: The Force Unleashed looks absolutely gorgeous. As Starkiller travels through a tonne of locations from lush jungles to barren wastelands to the interior of a space base. All of them look stunning. The cut scenes are very reminiscent of the Star Wars films (cinematic and epic; I half expected Ewan McGregor to storm onto the screen, armed with a lightsaber and a hunger for Sith pwning). I hate to sound like a broken record, but this really helps to immerse you within the story and by the end, you will believe that in the over arching Star Wars narrative, this actually occurred.

Perhaps I should stop masturbating over the game and get to the real crook of things to tell you what the game plays like… Well, in terms of gameplay this doesn’t particularly break any new ground (it plays like your typical action game), it’s still very solid and offers a few nice features such as an interesting upgrade system, spectacular force powers (that make you feel like a god), collectables and a combo system that feels achievable and intuitive whilst avoiding the feeling of it being too easy.

The only problem I have is the way in which you have to stop moving all together to deflect lasers back at enemies. This completely breaks up the flow of the combat and quickly starts to become annoying. It also takes a bit of getting used to, making the game quite hard to begin with. I really hope this is rectified in the upcoming sequel.

Force Unleashed is not only a nice way to get in your lightsaber swinging practice before Force Unleashed 2 drops, its also well worth checking out. The game is bound to be fairly cheap now (check out our Amazon shop below!) but it also boasts quite a lot of DLC, which goes a good way to extend the shortness of the story. Check it bloody out!

Review Round Up

Graphics: 4/5 – Graphics aren’t quite 5/5 but the game is still stunning.

Sound: 5/5 – The voice acting is utterly believable and the soundtrack is entirely like the soundtracks of the various Star Wars films, giving you an authentic Star Wars experience.

Gameplay: 3/5 – Gameplay is solid without being revolutionary. Force powers are awesome, however deflecting lasers kills the flow of combat.

Longevity: 4/5 – The story itself is far too short, however a host of DLC helps go some way to rectify this problem.

Overall: 4/5 – A great story and solid gameplay results in a score of 4 Jedi holocrons out of 5.

You can pick this up for a bargain price in our Amazon store and at the same time you will be supporting this site:

Any devoted readers of our site will know how popular last year’s Borderlands was amongst the staff. We must have loved it, because it was one of our nominations for Game of the Year.

The real joy we found in Borderlands came from not only the tight controls and the charismatic characters, but from the compelling loot system. The game boasted the fact that there were millions of different types of gun, each with their own individual statistics. Arguably, it was the search for bigger and better guns that made Borderlands so compelling. You can imagine our disappointment when upon loading up this latest piece of downloadable goodness, we discovered that there is essentially no looting to be had at all.

Moxxi provides commentary during each round... And it gets pretty stale.

To set the scene, Mad Moxxi is a woman looking for love. After three failed marriages – including one to a recognisable character – Moxxi founded the Underdome Riot. This is an arena-based battle to the death, with the hope of possibly finding husband number four along the way. Moxxi herself is a typically charismatic character with well written dialogue.

However, in terms of gameplay, Mad Moxxi’s Underdome is a very dull place. There are three arenas: each based on areas you visited in the main storyline and you are tasked with defending yourself against wave after wave of opponents. The first set of challenges has you fighting against five waves of enemies. However, each wave is made up of five rounds, meaning you have 25 rounds to fight through before completing an arena.

At the end of each round you fight a randomised boss character from the story mode. In a way it is similar to the fire fight mode in Halo ODST: up to four players keep fighting their way through increasingly difficult waves of enemies, with certain waves having unfair advantages, such as being immune to headshots. This is all very well and good, but the real problem with this format is that you gain no experience for each person you kill, and they drop no loot.

The only way to get loot is to defeat the boss round at the end of the wave, and a randomly generated gun will fall out of the sky at your feet. So far I have yet to be given a gun that is actually any better than the ones I had previously found.

The new waving robot had them completely entranced

The second problem with this add-on is that the enemies are often too tough, as they have no set experience level. Instead, they match the experience level of the player that hosts the game. In true Borderlands fashion, if you are unfortunate enough to not at least match the experience level of the host, then you have absolutely no chance against the enemies. They are all just too strong.

You could argue that this is where teamwork comes in, allowing you to strategise with your team mates. But there is little time for strategy as the enemies tend to just come charging towards you. Once you eventually make your way through all 25 waves in each of the three arenas, you unlock the advanced challenges. These place you in the same three arenas, but this time you must fight through 20 waves of enemies in each arena, bringing the total number of rounds to 100. Even completing the 25 five waves of the original set of challenges became tedious, and as of writing I have given up slogging through because it has become so mind numbing.

Having listed the faults it would be unfair not to list the few good points of this DLC. A new bank system is introduced, allowing you to store items that previously you would have to have dropped if you found something new and interesting.

Round 1! By round ten you'll want to scratch your eyes out...

Moxxi herself is a good character, although it is sometimes easy to forget this when you are forced to listen to her repeat her phrases for the 131st time in a row.

Finally, if you can stomach beating the Underdome then you are rewarded with one new skill point, which will please the more hardcore players that have already reached experience level 50, and are looking for some way of advancing their character.

Review Round-Up

GRAPHICS: 3/5 Borderlands’ graphical style remains unchanged. The new environments are made up of parts of levels already experienced in the story mode, which is a little disappointing.

SOUND: 3/5 As usual, all the sound effects remain pretty much unchanged. New music will play in the game when you reach the boss fights and this is suitably fast paced and pleasing to the ear. Moxxi’s voice acting is competent, but after the 200th time of hearing her yell “horde wave!” you may get sick of her.

GAMEPLAY: 1/5 While there is a certain amount of fun to be had playing these challenges in multiplayer, it only lasts so long. This add-on is as tedious as it is long. While I appreciate the inclusion of various handicaps in rounds – such as enemies only being able to be harmed by shotguns – by the time you beat the first three arenas you will probably have seen everything there is to see.

LONGEVITY: 2/5 Each of the first set of arenas will take approximately half an hour to beat. When you move on to the final three arenas, which are four times as long, you can expect to spend a few hours on each map. However, the removal of one of the key elements that made Borderlands fun in the first place (the looting) will likely mean that you won’t bother.

OVERALL: 2 Horde Waves out of 5. It seems the developers have forgotten what made Borderlands fun in the first place. Having chosen to remove all the fun of looting and expansive environments to search, they decided to stick you in a familiar looking set of arenas and force you to shoot at wave after wave of generic enemies.