Over the years, EA Sports provided the best Hockey game to play on your respected platform. With little competition from2K Sports, as the NHL 2k series is taking a break to reinvigorate the franchise. So once again EA Sports has returned to hit the ice in NHL 12. The bar was already set high for this year’s version. So does it live up to expectations?
With Epic Games’ Gears of War 3 right around the corner,
it’s now a good time to look back at where it all began, with Gears of War, originally released in
November of 2006. This is the game where Marcus Fenix and the Locust plight were
first introduced to the world, and the success this game achieved is
undeniable.
But why has this
franchise become as popular as it is today? If you’ve played Gears of War, you will know immediately
why. If you’ve somehow never played, or never even heard of Gears of War, then this review is for
you. Gears fans, consider this review
a helpful refresher course as you prepare for the launch of Gears of War 3.
The
Warhammer and Warhammer 40K franchises have been around for longer than a lot
of people realise, and Warhammer 40K in particular really pioneered the idea of
gritty, dark science fiction with a medieval twist and the idea of the
“Space Marine”- a larger-than-life, armoured superhuman, equipped
with a gun bigger than most regular humans and a chainsword capable of ripping
through several layers of armor plating.
Let me start by saying that I’m a big fan of Ugly Americans the television show. I’ve seen every episode from both seasons, and I absolutely love its quirky and often dark humor. While the video game adaptation Ugly Americans: Apocalypsegeddoncertainly has some of what makes the show so enjoyable, the lack of polish takes away from the experience.
Sometimes the most difficult task to keep in mind when writing a review is to criticize the thing being reviewed for what it is and not for what it isn’t. This is especially true when it comes to Indie games, as they’re always low budget and not meant to emulate or compete with blockbuster titles. For a game like Battle High: San Bruno, comparing it to industry established fighters like Mortal Kombat or Street Fighter IV is both pointless and unfair. Battle High: San Bruno is a competent 2D fighter that has a distinctly classic feel both in terms of its visuals and sounds.
Here’s a quick disclaimer before this
review gets under way; I am not a train enthusiast, and a videogame train
simulation sounds like my personal idea of hell. With expectations duly lowered, let’s take a
look at Train Frontier Express, which is available on Xbox Live as part
of the Indie Games Summer Uprising for
240 Microsoft points.
It’s difficult to call Train Frontier Express a
game when it doesn’t really present itself as one. Upon hitting “New Game,” you aren’t given any
kind of introduction to the game you’re about to play. No instructions, no intro cinematic, no
information of any kind to give you a clue about what you’re actually supposed
to do – just a big, green, empty map and a nagging feeling that you
need to do something train-related.
Sometimes you discover a game which can be
summed up in just one sentence. Grand
Theft Auto is one popular example – it’s (fundamentally) about stealing
cars and committing crime. Grand
Theft Auto. Simple. Cute Things Dying Violently is a
good example of this kind of naming convention, except in this case it’s a
little more straightforward – the game is about cute things, dying violently.
Available on Xbox Live for a mere 80
Microsoft points, Cute Things Dying Violently sees you taking on the role of
omniscient god-being, shepherding and protecting hordes of small blue dots with
legs and arms (“critters”) through simple one-screen levels filled with traps
and hazards. The gameplay is simple: you
can flick critters by pulling back the right thumbstick and letting loose, or
drag them into position for a flicking by holding the left trigger. However, you can only move your crosshair
horizontally and not vertically, which adds a greater challenge and
stops you from dragging critters all over the level to make it easier for
yourself.
When attempting to visualize Phoenix Game Studio’s T.E.C. 3001, think Sonic the Hedgehog meets The Terminator. That was my first impression of the game upon starting, and it stayed with me for the entire time.
Why this mash-up, you ask? For starters, the android that you control, called a T.E.C. (Tesla Energy Collector), looks eerily similar to the T-800s from the Terminator series. From the metallic sliver finish of the android to its human form, comparisons to the T-800 can be easily made.
My Adam Jensen is cooler than your Adam Jensen. My Adam is silent, fast and invisible. He can run past you without you knowing he was there at all. If he feels like killing you, his pistol is so silent that you’ll never hear it even as your friends start dropping all around you. If you’re wearing a lot of armor, that’s not a problem for his revolver. It isn’t silenced, but it’ll be the last thing you ever hear.
As I put the game in and reached the main menu, it already
began to win my attention with the dazzling background and mesmerizing music. El
Shaddai from the very beginning is a game which contains a marvelous mixture of
colors, but the colors are not the only good thing about the game.
You start off as the main
character Enoch, a human scribe who has been allowed to stay in heaven while
still alive as a result of his righteousness. Now the story is based on the
defiance of a group of angels named Azazel, Ezekiel, and Sariel who are known as the Watchers.
The angels were so fascinated with the way humans lived on earth that they
decided to leave heaven to go live on earth. As a result of their actions, the
elders of heaven make the decision of flooding earth, but Enoch with his pure
heart objected. Enoch was given the mission of going down to earth and bringing
back the fallen angels to be imprisoned in heaven, in order to prevent the
elders from flooding the earth. This is where your journey begins.
