-
Reviews
White Knight Chronicles Review: Workin’ On Our Knight Moves
White Knight Chronicles: International Edition presents the classic coming-of-age tale of a teenager learning what it truly means to be a thirty foot-tall killer robot. Dark Cloud developer Level-5’s first foray onto the PlayStation 3, White Knight Chronicles tells the tale of a teenaged orphan named Leonard, who through a series of unfortunate circumstances makes…
By Mike Fahey Published February 8, 2010 -
Reviews
BioShock 2 Review: In Case Of Rapture
Welcome back to the beautiful city of Rapture, the dystopian underworld introduced in 2007’s BioShock, a failed experiment all but destroyed by its inhabitants, a world less mysterious than when you last left it. BioShock 2 puts players in the suit of Subject Delta, a hulking Big Daddy prototype who longs to reunite with his…
By Michael McWhertor Published February 8, 2010 -
Reviews
Doodle Jump Micro-Review: Boing!
Doodle Jump: simple title, simple game. Players are what looks like a green Snork-like creature. It’s a doodle-drawing platforming test of endurance in which players try to bounce as high as they can. But does simple mean satisfying? By tilting the iPod/iPhone, the character bounces right or left onto the platforms. Some of the platforms…
By Brian Ashcraft Published February 6, 2010 -
Reviews
Trenches Micro-Review: An Interesting Take on Tower Defense
I don’t know about you, but I’m getting tired of waiting for the perpetually delayed Plants Vs. Zombies to make its way onto the iPhone. Fortunately, Trenches has been satisfying my itch for side-scrolling tower defense gaming. Trenches drops you smack dab on top of enemy lines during World War I’s gas, artillery… and yes,…
By Brian Crecente Published February 5, 2010 -
Reviews
Starship Defense Micro-Review: The Most HD DS Game
What was the promise of playing games in high-definition again? A sharper resolution was part of it, more details on the screen. In that respect, Starship Defense, a new game with a superb pedigree is the most HD DS game. Starship Defense is the latest download-only tower defense game from Q-Games, which, for fans of…
By Stephen Totilo Published February 4, 2010 -
Reviews
Crush The Castle Micro-Review: Fun With Trebuchets
The lords and ladies of Arcturia have had it far too good for far too long, with their fancy castles and fancy clothes. It’s time to bring in a medieval siege weapon and do some crushing. The App Store on iTunes is packed with physics-based games that have you tossing, flicking and shooting one object…
By Brian Crecente Published February 4, 2010 -
Reviews
KrissX Micro-Review: Fun With a Purpose
I keep wanting to pronounce this game “Chris-Ex” but I’m reminded it’s “Kriss-Kross.” Whatever the case, it’s a set of brain-teasing acrostics with goals and rewards that shrewdly incentivize their completion. It’s just a little young for most tastes. Loved Smart Words: KrissX draws on a strong vocabulary any mother would be glad to hear…
By Owen Good Published February 3, 2010 -
Reviews
Blood Bowl Review: No Fun League
Nearly 25 years old as a board game, Blood Bowl has a strong history among fantasy gamers for presenting quasi-football in a turn-based, strategy framework set in the Warhammer universe. But does any of that translate well to a console? Short answer: No. Loved The Release Date: The fact Blood Bowl came out a month…
By Owen Good Published February 3, 2010 -
Reviews
Glory of Heracles Review: A Forgetful Adventure
Ancient Greece’s immortal amnesiacs want answers, damn it, and they intend to get them in Nintendo’s role-playing game Glory of Heracles for the Nintendo DS. Nintendo gives North American gamers their first taste of the long-running Glory of Heracles series with the franchise’s DS debut. The traditional, perhaps to a fault, Japanese RPG follows the…
By Michael McWhertor Published February 2, 2010 -
Reviews
MAG Review: World of Shadow Warcraft
It’s the year 2025 and a mandated world peace gives rise to three Private Military Corporations. The rise of the PMC also gives birth to the shadow war, a raging worldwide battle fought for profit and power rather than political ideologies. The backdrop of PlayStation 3 exclusive MAG isn’t weighed down with things like plot…
By Brian Crecente Published February 2, 2010 -
Reviews
No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle Review: Repetitious Rebel
Well, fun was never a given in a game made by Suda 51 anyway. What do you want from a video game? Fun? What if it makes you laugh? And smile? What if it can surprise you? What if it’s a sequel that removes the bad parts from its predecessor and replaces them with…. wait…
By Stephen Totilo Published February 1, 2010 -
Reviews
Assassin’s Creed II: The Battle of Forli Micro-Review: An Un-Machiavellian Plan
Kotaku’s runner-up for 2009 Game of the Year gets its first expansion with the downloadable, playable bonus “memory” of The Battle of Forli. Somehow managing to be essential and unessential, it’s unlikely to be nominated for DLC of the Year. The Battle of Forli is presented in terms understandable to Assassin’s Creed II players as…
By Stephen Totilo Published January 29, 2010 -
Reviews
Matt Hazard: Blood Bath and Beyond Micro-Review: A Bloody Fun Hazard-Time
Matt Hazard, the guns-blazing game-hero parody with a “legendary” status that’s never quite been explained, goes searching for his backstory again in Matt Hazard: Blood Bath and Beyond. Vicious Cycle may have overreached with the predecessor, Eat Lead: The Return of Matt Hazard, a 3D action game panned for derivative level design and rote gameplay.…
By Owen Good Published January 28, 2010 -
Reviews
Muscle March Micro-Review: Flex Crimes
Aliens have stolen Earth’s precious protein powder and it’s up to an international community of bodybuilders (and one polar bear) to safely return that protein to the excessively ripped community. That’s the plot of Namco Bandai’s wacky Muscle March. The WiiWare game’s premise may be as deep as the gameplay, tasking players with chasing down…
By Michael McWhertor Published January 27, 2010 -
Reviews
Alienware Area-51 m15x Laptop Review: It Ain’t Heavy, It’s My Laptop
Alienware has long been one of my favorite computer and laptop makers. It’s purchase by Dell didn’t change that. The computer maker’s latest line of gaming laptops promise to deliver on-the-go gaming in a slick looking new laptop. But can the Area-51 m15x deliver the goods at an affordable price and in a package you’d…
By Brian Crecente Published January 25, 2010 -
Reviews
Serious Sam HD Review: This Time It’s Really Serious
Developer Croteam has ported its 2001 first-person shooter Serious Sam: The First Encounter to Xbox Live Arcade with Serious Sam HD. The game is a time capsule. A really, really shiny one. Covered in bloody body parts. Plot-wise, Serious Sam follows Sam as he travels back in time to save humankind from the evil Mental…
By Brian Ashcraft Published January 22, 2010 -
Reviews
Dark Void Zero Micro-Review: Classic, Focused Fun
Dark Void Zero is built around not one, but two stories. One is a story of a jet pack wearing hero named Rusty trying to stop the invasion of Earth by aliens. The second is the fiction surrounding the game’s creation, a false history that claims the game is a remake of a classic NES-era…
By Brian Crecente Published January 21, 2010 -
Reviews
Dark Void Review: Innovation In A Void
Cargo pilot turned jet-pack jockey William Grey finds himself teaming up with Nikola Tesla to save humanity from aliens and fascism after crashing in the Bermuda Triangle in Capcom’s sci-fi shooter Dark Void. But it’s not the unlikely plot that is the biggest selling point for Capcom’s new franchise, it’s the developer’s game lineage. Dark…
By Brian Crecente Published January 20, 2010 -
Reviews
Pocket God Micro-Review: Heaven or Hell?
You are god. That’s the premise of iPhone app Pocket God from the two-man developer team Bolt Creative. But is it a heavenly experience or a hellish one? In Pocket God, players are a divine hand. As the first sentence of this review explains, you are god. And, as god, you can do pretty much…
By Brian Ashcraft Published January 19, 2010 -
Reviews
Castlevania: The Adventure ReBirth Micro-Review: Something M2 Whipped Up
Konami goes back to Castlevania’s roots with Castlevania: The Adventure ReBirth, as the series joins Gradius and Contra to get the Konami ReBirth treatment. Once again, developer M2 takes a long, hard look at a classic Konami franchise and produces a retro-styled rehash. This time around the game is Castlevania: The Adventure, the 1989 Game…
By Mike Fahey Published January 18, 2010