When Crackdown was released in the summer of 2007 a large majority of gamers purchased the game solely for the Halo 3 beta, a chance to play one of the 360′s most anticipated games early was a carrot that a lot of people just couldn’t pass up. But when they opened the game and played they found themselves introduced into an open world of super powered Agents, deadly terrorist games and one of the most addicting collectathons in recent gaming memory: Orbs. Ah orbs – for months after the game was released my dreams were haunted by the echoing “ring-ring-ring” of a close by orb and the sudden “DING” that sounded when my Agent finally grabbed it. I spent much of my summer that year playing and replaying Crackdown, not only to collect all the orbs I could, but also to share in the experience with a co-op friend – and to blow said friend out of the sky with a nice dose of rocket launcher goodness.

To say that a sequel was desired is obvious. The developers at Real Time Worlds had hit on something special, a magic violent quality that at the time a majority of gamers didn’t know they were missing. When one of the original designers for Grand Theft Auto 3 left to make his own open world super hero game, it almost seems odd that most people bought the game for a beta of a totally different game. But after the release, Microsoft didn’t want to go right onto a sequel so Real Time Worlds moved on to develop the MMO A.P.B., which seemed like a bleak prognosis for a sequel to ever see the light of day. Thankfully in mid 2009 some of the team reformed into a new studio called Ruffian Games and announced that their first game would be the anticipated follow up to the surprise hit. Crackdown 2 was a reality. For the next few months the world was teased with images of new agents with new powers, fighting against a zombie-like enemy called “Freaks”.

And now, finally, Crackdown 2 is out. And if you were a fan of the superhuman fuelled jumping platforming and orb collecting from the first game, than this is the game for you. If you are a fan of good stories, interesting plots, boss battles and a cohesive game structure, well then you may just want to look elsewhere.

The events of Crackdown 2 take place 10 years after the first, after your Agent cleaned the streets of Pacific City of all the gangs and allowed the Agency to basically take over the town. Oh yeah – your agent also sorta let out a plague that turned innocent citizens into blood thirsty Freaks every time the sun went down. So now, 10 years later, the city is in ruins. Buildings have crumbled, streets are barricaded, and the general citizenry is afraid. There is also a new terroristic threat in town who call themselves “Cell”, and they’ve taken hold of the city. In order to take control of the situation the Agency has created a new “Agent 2.0″ who the gamer gets to take control of. This Agent’s mission is simple – go forth into the city and activate these new “solar beacons” that have the ability to kill Freaks in their own lairs and also take back the city from Cell. Sounds simple right? Well in execution its that simplicity that drags the game into mediocrity.

Crackdown 1 was criticized for its boss battle structure. The three gangs that had run the city all had distinct looks and districts that were all run by a number of bosses. The game tasked the player to head to each boss location and then kill the boss, thereby taking control of that part of the city. The problem with that structure was that each boss fight turned into the tedium of running past a bunch of enemies to just launch rockets at the bosses until they died. The concept was perfect in theory but was just flawed in its execution. And with over a dozen different bosses it became extremely repetitive.

The developers at Ruffian Games heard the complaints of gamers and decided instead of trying to fix the fault, they would remove it entirely. But by doing so they also removed any semblance of structure from the game. Instead they replaced the boss battles with four main mission types:

A: Cell Strongholds. You basically go to a certain area on the map and request a helicopter drop of Peacekeepers (the game’s version of police officers). Before the peacekeepers can arrive you have to defeat a certain number of Cell opponents. You have various weapons at your disposal, from uzis to shotguns to machine guns, all the way up to rocket launchers and grenades. Just kill the required Cell and you’ve won that stronghold.

B: Freak Breaches. The Breaches as essentially the same as their Cell counterparts, only instead of human resistance you fight against Freaks – basically zombies – who attack you physically with melee attacks or by spitting acid. You call in a chopper, then kill the required number of Freaks – boom. Freak breach sealed.

C and D: Absorption Units and Beacons. Beacons are the UV devices that can kill Freaks instantly, but in order to place a Beacon you first have to activate a set of Absorption Units to do so. Each Beacon requires 3 AU’s to open up. The Absorption Units are as simple as going to a marked location on the map, killing the THREE Cell soliders guarding it and then standing on a certain spot until you’ve “activated” the unit – Battlefield style. Activate the 3 units and a new location shows up on your map, leading you to an underground Freak lair. Then it becomes another repeat of the Stronghold missions. Only this time when you call in a helicopter drop you have to actually defend a UV Beacon until it fully powers up by killing everything around you.

And that in a nutshell is the entire mission of Crackdown 2. That’s it. There isn’t even a plot told while doing these missions, no the plot is told strictly through small “audio logs” that you have to find strewn throughout the city. Otherwise all you hear is the ever present Announcer telling you to move on or how great a job you are doing. This voice in your head must have some sort of mental problem, because he can’t seem to remain silent for more than a minute as he is CONSTANTLY talking to you. And as far as I could see there wasn’t any way to mute the bastard.

Of course that isn’t all there is to do in Crackdown 2, there are a wide variety of side tasks that you can do to waste your time. There are rooftop races to test your jumping and ability as well as car races that test your driving ability. In truth these “races” are more “get to the next checkpoint” than actual races against other people, but they are still a fun diversion and actually give you a sense of accomplishment for completing them. There are also Car Jump Rings strewn throughout the city that you can jump various vehicles through. The real fun in those is trying to figure out the best way to get through them. New to the game, and tied to one of the new abilities of your Agent, are the “Glide Suit Rings” that are similar to car jumps – only you have to use your Glide suit to freefall through the rings in order to complete. But you only earn the Glide suit by almost fully maxing out your Agent’s ability rating, and the suit itself feels broken as its not the easiest thing to control and never does what you want it to do.

Also returning to Crackdown 2, much to the chagrin of recovering addicts everywhere are the Agility and Hidden Orbs. As gamers will remember from the first game Agility orbs are the glowing green balls that seem to be on top of every building in Pacific City, you must jump and climb your way to the top of these buildings to grab the orbs – doing so will earn you points to help level up your agents jumping ability, the higher the level the higher you can jump and the more orbs you can reach.

Hidden Orbs are blue balls that when found grant points in all of your abilities. But these are not as out in the open as Agility Orbs, hence the name “Hidden”. You are to look in every corner and crevice to find these gems – and thankfully the developers made this chore easier in Crackdown 2 with a new sonar ability. Just hit “Up” on the d-pad and your mini-map will briefly show you every orb in your immediate vicinity. Its extremely helpful for all those players out there who have to catch them all.

The developers have even added a trinity of new orbs to find and collect. Renegade orbs come in two flavors – Agility and Driving. These orbs actually move away from your Agent and you must chase them down, since they actually require more skill to grab they reward you a greater amount of points for each selective skill – either driving or agility. There are also Online Orbs. These are orbs that only show up if you are playing a co-op game and once caught they reward all skills similar to the Hidden Orbs. With all these orbs put together and the audio logs there is nearly 1000 collectable items around in Pacific City this time around, which is quite a lot.

And speaking of Co-op, Ruffian Games has doubled the amount of co-op players from 2 to 4, so if you can find three friends with the game you can have 4 super powered agents running through town causing havoc. The only caveat to this is that only the host is able to record game progress. What this means is the 4 players are playing in the host’s world – whatever missions are completed are only recorded in the hosts file, so if you do a bunch of strongholds and Freak breaches in a co-op game that you aren’t the host of, when you go back to your own single player game you’ll have to do those missions all over again. A nice bonus though is that no matter who the host is – your own orbs will be visible, so each player only sees the orbs they need to obtain and whatever they collect is reflected in their own game so you don’t have to do any backtracking in the single player game to re-find orbs you may have gotten online.

There are also a few multiplayer games that support up to 16 players, but these are mostly deathmatch games that, while fun, certainly aren’t going to hold anyone’s attention for very long. The extremely fun “Rocket Tag” mode returns that outfits every agent with a rocket launcher for some explosion-y fun, but as I said its merely a diversion.

Crackdown 2 had a lot of potential to be the open world game to beat. Super powers complete with insane leaping ability could have led to a great game. If the developers had the foresight to add a great story with maybe a new location I would’ve been able to recommend the game without a second thought. But instead they created a game that seems like a copy of a copy of the original – it looks the same and sorta feels the same, but there is fraying around the edges and the color is faded. The orb collecting and leveling up are just as fun as they always were, and you can never get enough of the great explosions you can make – but without a solid backbone of plot and progression those things just don’t make a great game.

If you really want to just waste away a couple of afternoons finding all the collectibles then I’d say its well worth a rental. But if you’re looking for an actual game, you’d be better served looking elsewhere.

Kratos has a lot of history.  He’s been in the service of the gods for tens of years, he’s tired, he’s upset, he wants something very specific, something the gods aren’t inclined to give him – peace, solace, respite.  Things any average guy might want, Kratos has to do without, because the gods, well, they just have other plans at the moment.

But so does Kratos.

God of War started simply enough – Kratos was tasked by the gods to kill the god of war, Ares.  He did, but was still denied his reward.  In God of War II Kratos finally realized what bastards the rulers of Olympus were and decided the whole house of cards just had to come down, and enlisted the help of the mighty titans.  In what has to be the one of the most blue-balling climax in history we see Kratos, at the end of God of War II, scaling the cliffs of Olympus to exact his revenge, titans in tow.  This is where God of War III begins.

Kratos has the backing of the titans, he has the power of Olympus in his hands, Zeus is scared to death of his titan son, and here comes the destruction of the very gods who rule the world.   The titans, specifically Gaia, however, had a different plan in mind.  Kratos is cast from the battle, discarded as the pawn the gods and titans always believed him to be, and now it’s up to him to prove to them how very, very wrong they were.

Kratos begins the siege against Olympus with the aid of Gaia, who soon enough allows him to fall to the depths of Hades.  Kratos doesn’t mind, because he needed to stop by anyway.  Why?  To kill a god, of course.  That’s what God of War III is all about, and the game wastes no time getting you to the heart of the matter.  Hades, Poseidon, Helios, you almost have to guess who ISN’T in Kratos’s wake as he slogs through hostile terrain to exact his revenge.

In the process, Kratos will of course lose all his might.  It’s a staple of the series, and a notable detraction in God of War III (how many times can the mightiest being in all Olympus lose everything he has!?).  Soon enough, however, he’s about his business, busting out of Hades and on his way to a showdown with the man himself.  Before he gets there, however, he’ll have to accumulate some hardware.

One sore point of every previous God of War game has been the tools Kratos has at his disposal.  In God of War, you got the Artemis Blade, and in God of War II, you got the Spear of Destiny.  Both were fun, but neither were practical.  In God of War II you will acquire three specific weapons that not only have practical applications to certain situations, but are also fun as hell to use.  The Claws of Hades (guess who you get those from) can rip souls from enemies and turn them on your foes. The Nemean Cestus packs a Herculean punch worthy of its previous owner’s namesake.  The real treat, however, the payoff, is the Nemesis Whip.  It is the first cancellable weapon in the God of War series, and the first that allows constant combos strings.  Learn to use it, and nothing, not even Olympus, is beyond your destructive power.  You’ll have to use all these weapons to meet your goal, but for the first time in the God of War franchise, you’ll actually WANT to use something besides your normal blades.  God of War III is a game that encourages experimentation and makes it easy with quick, real time switching even in combat.

It’s a great thing that the game allows you to plow through enemies in new and exciting ways, because the overall mechanics of God of War III, even with the new weapons, remains largely unchanged.  There’s still a large focus on crowd control combat as you have several enemies as once looking to make you lunch; therefore, it’s a damn good thing you have so many ways to serve them up on their own platter.  The varied ways in which you can dispatch your enemies more than makes up for the fact that they’re still basically the same enemies you fought in the first two games.

Where God of War III really distinguishes itself is the presentation.  Yes, it’s a known fact that the franchise stakes itself on cutting edge presentation, but no game presents itself like this.  No other game presents you with the totality of what you’ve done so much as God of War III. You’ll directly see the effects of your destruction, you’ll be presented at every turn with just how much you have done/undone as you wreck the entire world you once loved.

You won’t care, though, because God of War III drives home, more than any other game ever made, just what you are doing and why.  You will revel in the absolute destruction you create, not because you are a supreme vandal but because, dammit, the world deserves it.  The gods have forsaken you, humanity cannot appease you and the titans are non-players in your tragedy.  The world is yours to destroy, and it WILL be destroyed by your hand, and goddamn is it pretty when you do.

No other game world moves and breathes like God of War III.  Sony Santa Monica once promised ‘an oil painting brought to life’ and for the first time I can remember, such a claim becomes an understatement.  The world of Kratos is so richly created that even the most grizzled gamer might find themselves a bit queasy when Kratos rips out the eye of a Cyclops, or eviscerates a minotaur.  The visuals in the game are only surpassed by the motions that bring them to life, and when it comes to either, God of War III is as brilliant and graphic as it gets.

Where God of War III really makes its mark, for better or worse, however, is the story.  People don’t like Kratos, he is a brutal, unsympathetic man.  He is, in many people’s eyes, a monster.  He is singular in his cruelty.  He has a single, violent purpose that he will fulfill, one that he has had since the original God of War.  Many will find Kratos too much to bear in this game, they will find him unsympathetic, vicious, even psychotic and delusional.  Others, by the end, will empathize, and will relate to his suffering.  Either way, the ending of God of War III is not a grey area for most people, but that’s what makes it so great; was it worth it for what Kratos wrought?  Was he really a villain all along?  Can Kratos find redemption?

The game, knowing why people play God of War in the first place, smartly leaves those questions for the player alone to decide.

Right off the bat, it’s clear that there’s been a lot of thought given to the production values of this game – it looks outstanding. Everything is highly detailed, and each sprite looks sharply drawn and inked, and it all results in some outstanding visual quality.

The game features Jax, a soccer ball-wielding young man who’s out to save his city from the zombie apocalypse. By tapping and holding the screen, players can charge up Jax’s kick, from a regular old kick to fierce blast, great for punishing zombie hordes. While it starts out as a almost too-simple tower-defense kind of game, it evolves with special powers and even some side-scrolling shooter mechanisms as the levels progress.

Each of the zombies behave differently too, adding for lots of variety. Some are nimble and quick, others take their sweet time in getting to you. Some of them require a few shots to defeat, or a single charged shot – others can take what would be an instant-kill headshot and keep coming, others burrow through the ground to sneak up on you. Yet other zombies are immune to every attack Jax can muster, even charged up headshots, except for a well-placed “nutshot.” Yes gentlemen, you’re correct to wince in sympathy pain. The game’s sense of humor doesn’t hesitate to reach for that low-hanging fruit, if you will.

There are 20 levels in the game, spread out across 8 different zones. And while the gameplay can get a little repetitive, the plot and level mechanics will mix it up from time to time. Early on there is a level devoted solely to Jax’s piercing kick attack, giving players a brief respite and an amusing shower of zombie red and limbs. After finishing the game, players can also unlock a hardcore ode and a survival mode, to extend player’s time in the game.

The game also intgrates with Crystal, another online social gaming platform similar to OpenFeint and the like, enabling access to achievements and friend lists, scoreboards and other features.

Ultimately, it’d be nice if the game was a little longer, or if it was a little more fully-featured, but for what it is, Pro Zombie Soccer is a great diversion and a gorgeous looking game, absolutely worthy of an addition into your iPhone gaming portfolio.

Special: During the 2010 World Cup, the game is on sale for 99 cents, or 66% off, so grab it now while the grabbing’s good!

After ten years between Street Fighter 3: Third Strike and Street Fighter IV, digital pugilists the world over have only had to wait a mere 13 months for an update to the franchise. Older gamers remember the outright milking of the second installment to the game, having culminated only a couple years ago with Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix. It’s unclear whether a similar situation will arise with Street Fighter IV, but in the meantime, there’s certainly a lot to say about this iteration of the venerable fighting series.

Of course, it’s important to note immediately that the most high-profile addition to the game are the characters. Super Street Fighter IV adds seven new characters to the roster, namely Cody and Guy from Final Fight and Street Fighter Alpha fame; Ibuki, Makoto and Dudley from Street Fighter 3; and newcomers Hakan and Juri. Each of these new characters adds a new dimension and balance to the game, and had they been the only addition to the formula, it would still have been a solid new game. Of course, fighting game scholars will be able to provide a more nuanced analysis of the characters, but we can at least say that if nothing else, they’re fun.

However, Capcom has made a point of adding value to this new release, to ensure players don’t feel shortchanged by having bought the original release only a year ago. Other new additions include new, selectable Ultra techniques, akin to the method in Street Fighter 3, several new online modes and even the return of the bonus stage.

Endless Mode plays like the arcade matches of old, where groups of players gather in a lobby and fight battle after battle, winner stays, loser walks. It’ll be a great platform for serious Street Fighter players, and the development of bragging rights. In Team Battle, teams of up to four duke it out in a round robin tournament. As for the bonus stages, well, if you played any of Capcom’s games in the 90s, you’ll remember the car-busting, barrel-breaking minigames of yesteryear. They’re just like you remember.

And like the original release, Super Street Fighter IV also has an upcoming mode to be downloaded when it’s ready, a bracket-based Tournament Mode.

Super Street Fighter IV easily has enough features and additions to make it a full-priced release. Certainly Capcom has no compunctions against that, as history has shown us. But this release? It retails at $39.99. At that price, it’s an absolute steal. Any fighting game fan would be well-served to pick it up as soon as they can.

tldr; Buy this game!

When I was a just a wee lad, my parents didn’t care much for videogames, but of course at the time videogames seemed more like magic than technology, at least to my folks, so ultimately I had to make do with about three NES games for most of my early days.  One of them was Afterburner II and it, along with cinematic classics such as Top Gun, is probably why I get a hard on every time I see an F-14 fire a missile at what we can only (and always) assume is a commie, because terrorists don’t own jet fighters.  Yet.

Those are the only two groups of bad people in the world, right?

Well Afterburner Climax doesn’t concern itself with the vagaries of international conflict, it just gives you a an assload of generic cannon and missile fodder, and a serious dose of 80s arcade nostalgia combined with a fine layer of modern day polish. The end result is probably the most pure (and purely fun) arcade style action you’ll get on XBLA or PSN this year.

Climax’s basic gameplay concept isn’t far removed from Afterburner II.  You’ll face off against hundreds of enemy aircraft flying directly at or past you, and you’ll have to utilize your speed, evasive ability and way more missiles than currently exist in the world to take them down.  Stages are broken up into bite sized, challenging bits, and the game as a whole is broken down into three larger segments consisting of multiple stages.  You can use your Vulcan cannon to take down enemies at close range, but enemies at a distance will require you to lock on and blast away with a bank of steadily recharging missiles.

What is different about Afterburner Climax, however, is what makes it worth the 800 Microsoft Points.  Climax is not simply a retread of an old franchise, it’s a straight port of the 2006 arcade release, replete with everything but a servo-chair, with some notable additions for the home market, the least of which is a nice HD sheen on everything.  From the very start you will have access to 3 of the US military’s greatest fighter craft of the 1990s, including the F-14D Super Tomact, the F-15E Strike Eagle and the F/A 18E Super Hornet.  The differences between the craft are entirely graphical, and it would have been nice to see some kind of disparity between the three, especially since a significant portion of the achievements/trophies you’ll earn are dependent on your completing the arcade mode with each aircraft.  Each aircraft does have several different skins, so you do have a bit of completely inconsequential customization (if you’re feeling FABULOUS go for the Super Hornet’s

The core gameplay is also pretty much identical to the Afterburner games of old, but the new Climax Mode puts a nice aftertouch on the gameplay.  As you rack up kills, you build up a Climax Meter, and when full you can activate it to slow down time and use a super huge targeting reticule to target all enemies on screen.  It is the ability to utilize this special attack that is the key to racking up the points or saving your hide.

It all sounds simple, doesn’t it?  Well it is, until you start unlocking combat modifiers, or Ex Options as they’re known in the game.  You can unlock these modifiers by accomplishing a number of in-game tasks, ranging from very easy such as getting a Game Over screen, to very hard such as securing the elusive Ending A.  Ex Options allow you to modify the game in a number of ways, from increasing gun damage to decreasing enemy damage, increasing the targeting reticule, recharging missiles faster, even slowing or increasing the default speed of your fighter.  Turn on the right ones and rack up the points like you’re Maverick before Goose took a spill in the ocean.  Turn on the more difficult ones to make the arcade mode truly challenging.  Think you’re good?  How long can you survive with 1% armor, no recharging missiles, no targeting reticule, and your aircraft’s engines gimped?

Of course arcade style games are all about competition amongst friends, because what’s the point of playing if you can’t put your initials at the top of that leaderboard and laugh in your friends’ faces?  Besides, there have to be hundreds of people with the initials “ASS”, it’s not like you’re sending a big F U to your buddies, right?  Of course not.  Liar.

That’s where Score Attack comes into play.  Score Attack is your way to compete with friends and the rest of the world to show just how much you belong at the Navy’s Fighter Weapons School.  You’ll have unlimited lives, sure, but you’ll have none of those combat modifiers to give you an edge; if you’re gonna best your friends, you have to do it the old fashioned way (no, not by drawing penises on them while they’re passed out drunk).

The game looks great in HD, and it sounds even better (did I mention you can use the classic Afterburner II soundtrack while playing? No?  Well you can use the classic Afterburner II soundtrack, how awesome is that?), but mostly it FEELS great, because it really captures the attitude of late 90s arcade games in terms of presentation.  If you’ve been missing that sort of classic arcade feel with most of your XBLA or PSN games, this is the game to revive that sense of pumping in quarters at the bowling alley while you’re friends are outside bumming smokes off the local drunkard.

Afterburner Climax isn’t going to occupy your time the way some downloadable games do, because it’s not as fleshed out as games like Shadow Complex, but then again it’s not trying to be.  What it’s trying to do is revive that old school arcade feeling while giving you some new school fun, and in that it succeeds despite its few flaws.  There are very few games these days that concern themselves with nothing but visceral arcade thrills built on breakneck speed and reflex.  Climax is one of those games, and if that’s what you’ve been longing for lately, go get your gun off in a Super Tomcat old-school style with Afterburner Climax.

Graphics – 9.5
Sound – 10
Gameplay – 9
Replay – 8
Controls – 10

As one of the first games to grace Apple’s new iPad, Harbor Master HD has the task of introducing gaming to the device. Fortunately, Harbor Master and its developers Imangi Studios have the experience built up from the game’s littler cousin, the original Harbor Master. It also shares a bit with Firemint’s Flight Control.

Indeed, the game has a lot in common with Flight Control, in which players guide craft via a drawn line to their respective docking stations without crashing into other inbound or outbound craft. Flight Control being about planes, Harbor Master being, appropriately, about boats.

In any event, the game is great fun. Its simple design but increasingly complex execution gives it that “just one more” feel, and its controls are intuitive and forgiving enough that anybody can sit down and play it.

The other great thing about Harbor Master HD, is its price: Free. You can’t beat that.

You do get what you pay for, though, and in this case there’s only one level. But for a fun little diversion, Harbor Master HD delivers.

A few days off with only a few things to do couldn’t have come at a better time as I got to plow through Heavy Rain. I didn’t play through it so quick just to do it, once the story started rolling I wanted to see it to it’s end. As mentioned in the title I will be keeping this relatively spoiler free. The few things I may mention occur early in the game and is fairly harmless for you to read. I actually did not read what others had to say until I finished it.

Word of advice? Do exactly the same. On a lot of other sites people are being rather inconsiderate or in some cases flat out ignorant and rude by posting critical plot points. You’ve been warned.

So lets talk about the game piece by piece.

Graphics: (+) The character models have been discussed ever since the game was first released, and rightfully so. A vast amount of detail has gone into making the characters look organic. Appearances boast wonderful detail showing age, fatigue, scars, facial hair and even skin imperfections such as moles. When characters speak not only do you hear their emotions coming through, but their faces and gestures emote their feelings very well. The environments also hold up very well: a lot of buildings have nice detail, the rain effects are impressive, and the city just feels alive. From a style standpoint it almost feels like you are in the movie Seven. Everything feels rather dark and grungy, and it just feels like a somber world. The detail really helps to immerse you in the game.

(-)On the bad side, while the game can be very immersive there is an occasional framerate hiccup that can jerk you out of the experience, and there have been cases of backgrounds that don’t load up right, breaking the flow. This did not happen to me so I can’t really comment on it, and while the framerate issue did appear the number of times it did I can count on one hand and really didn’t affect my experience.

Sound/Music:(+) You are essentialy playing a crime drama, and most entertainment mediums have a style of music that fits with the theme. The music for this game is a perfect fit: it’s subtle and foreboding, with an increase in intensity at the appropriate times. Sound effects are also spot on: footsteps on different surfaces sound appropriate, fight scenes with fist flying sound exactly as they should, and the ambient noise while it is mostly rain is spot on. The voice acting for the most part is right on the money with every character acting as they should given the situations, and some of the situations are very tense and emotional. To pull it off is a very commendable achievement.

(-) If you noticed with the voice acting I did say “for the most part”. Some of the dialogue did feel forced and some emotions were not done very well. This in particular is true at the beginning of the game. It’s almost as if the first few chapters the actors and actresses involved were getting a feel for what they were supposed to do and got better at it as they progressed, but everyone forgot to go back and edit the beginning. It’s gets so much better(dare I say great) as you progress, but the first hour or so of the game would probably have you worried for a bit. Also while the music is spot on, the timing sometimes is not. There were a few occasions(again near the beginning) where the music was cut off or started noticably late, or just restarted too soon. None of the matters are dealbreakers and as I said most of the issues only occur early on.

Gameplay: (+) Another issue brought up especially after the demo were the controls. The controls while a bit odd become pretty comfortable by the time you’ve finished the first few chapters. Most items you need or can interact with involve a particular motion of the right analog stick. Again this becomes second nature pretty early in. As for action scenes, your characters actions(or inactions in some cases) revolve around quick time events(which I will be referring to from now on as QTE’s because I am feeling lazy). QTE’s are nothing new, as there are many actioned themed games that use this feature. The catch there is in most action games most times they feel unnecessary or in some cases tacked on. This is not the case here. In fact given the style of the game and how it’s controlled it feels like a natural fit for this genre. Even better is despite the simplicity of it, it does make those scenes more tense as a lot of these scenes feel like(and a lot of cases are) a fight for survival, so a mistake can make you nervous or even put you in a slight state of panic. In short it helps to, again, immerse you in the experience.

(-) While the controls you do get used to, there is a time or two that you feel like the biggest enemy against you are the controls themselves. This really does only happen on one or two occasions, but they are enough to frustrate you. Also there are a very times where manipulating an object requires(depending on your difficulty settings) you to tilt the controller. While objectives that use this motion can be completed, it often feels a bit off. There may be a few occasions where you may have to repeat the action because the game feels you didn’t do it right.

Story: (+) Given that this game is basically an interactive movie, it is impairative that it has a solid, compelling story. The good news? It does. While I did enjoy Indigo Prophecy, the story fell apart about 75-80 percent in. This is not the case here. The story starts out slow and ramps up nicely, making you want to see the next scene. The story….as you can read on the back of the game box so I’d hardly call it a spoiler involves trying to uncover who the origami killer is. This will take place through the event of four different people you will play, each with their own motivation. As you play these chapters out it is easy to develop a connection to one or even all of the characters involved. The game’s story can proceed in many different ways, depending on the choices you make. Some of the choices are very subtle, and some can take the game in completely different direction. Yes it is true that the choices you make can determine the outcome of not only your character, but other side characters as well. Even better is that not all these choices are black and white. There are times you will be faced with a tough decision and only have a few moments to make your choice, and sometimes(as it did happen to me) you don’t feel good about the choice you made given the aftermath. The game can be completed in about ten hours, however since there are over 3 dozen endings, there is plenty of replay value here.

(-)The story is solid and will keep you playing….once you get past the first hour or so. Maybe it was just me but the game got off to a very slow start. A game like this shouldn’t start sprinting right out of the gate, but the beginning of the game just didn’t feel all that interesting. Also there are certain things that were brought up that were never explained. One thing in particular seemed like a major factor, but as the game progressed it just simply disappeared. Given the nature of the event you’d think there would be some explaination, but one is never given.

Overall: A great game? Check. Worth $60? Yes…but not to everyone. This is more of an interactive movie than an actual game, and the pacing will simply not suit everyone. If you are a fast paced gamer who enjoys full control of a character and all his actions, you may have a hard time getting into this. Having said that I do really think this is one of the best narratives to ever grace gaming, and should be experienced by even those who may not frequent this genre. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going play it again.

Side note: There is one thing I would want to impress as well, and that is the rating. A lot of games that get the M rating usually get it due to extreme violence, course language, graphic gory material, or crass, perverse humor. This usually isn’t enough to stop younger kids from getting their hands on a game…as anyone with Xbox live is well aware of. While I am not keen on 10 year olds playing MW2, GTA, or Halo I have developed a grudging tolerance for it.

Why do I bring up the rating? Simple: this game is NOT FOR KIDS. This is one game where the rating should be taken very seriously and should be enforced, and for once I feel the rating is very significant. This IS a mature title. The material that is provided is done so in a very serious manner, from child murders, drug abuse, alcoholism, sexuality….the way this is handled is appropriate for the setting, but it is not for young children to see. Given the content and what you can see in this game, I am honestly surprised that an AO rating wasn’t considered. The fact that Heavy Rain was just given an M rating does give me hope in regards to the ESRB, as they may be starting to understand the significance of this medium and when done correctly genuine “mature” titles may see the light of day.

In short if you have wee ones, don’t let them play it and don’t play it in front of them.

Executive summary: We give Chime a ‘buy‘.

The story behind the recent Xbox Live Arcade puzzler Chime is a pretty good one. OneBigGame, its publisher, is a new non-profit that releases games for charity. The goal is to get well-known developers to produce games for free and then pass the proceeds on various children’s charities around the world.

Zöe Mode is the first developer in this new partnership, and they’ve turned out Chime as the first release for this initiative, with all their royalties going to Save the Children and the Starlight Children’s foundation.

It’s somewhat evocative of Lumines memories, though not nearly as poslished as that. However, while it’s not the best looking game out there, it’s not bad and it is, at least, fun.

The goal is to place various shapes that differ in each level onto a grid, covering as much of it as possible before the song ends. Regions can be permanently covered by creating “quads,” squares that are at least three units tall by three units wide. You can’t lock yourself out, eventually pieces disappear – at the cost of your score multiplier – and you can keep laying down pieces. Covering at least 50% of the board unlocks the next song, and the game continues.

Speaking of the songs, they’re all pretty fantastic, if a bit repetitive. They are all generally electronic type tunes, from some well known artists like Orbital, Moby and Philip Glass. Each song also comes with its own level, which is laid out differently from the rest, forcing players to work around various obstacles and blockages.

Ultimately, the game is an easy purchase. For five dollars, you can get a fun game and donate to charity at the same time. It also has us looking forward to what else OneBigGame will put out in the future. If they build on a foundation like this, we are looking toward a future full of games we can all feel good buying.

Before I get into the gist of the review I feel it is worth mentioning that I am an unabashed Science Fiction nut. Be it films, books or videogames, I enjoy a genre piece more than any other. So when game developer BioWare announced that their first Xbox 360 RPG would not only be a space faring story full of aliens and lasers, but also a trilogy of games, I was in Geek Heaven. The wait between the console launch and the first game was months of tracking down tidbits, screenshots, videos, anything I could find. And when I was finally able to play the game it was easy to look beyond whatever faults it may have had and enjoy what has become one of my all time favorite RPGs.

With all that in mind one could probably imagine me waiting for the sequel with baited breath and sweaty anticipation. But to be quite honest I actually forgot the sequel was coming until last E3 when the first images and videos began to come out of the secretive folks at BioWare. Then I started getting excited.

Now that the game has come out, could it possibly live up to the lofty expectations that I had started to attach to it? In a word – Yes.

While the first game took what BioWare created for Star Wars Knights of The Old Republic and refined it into an original universe with it’s own history and politics, Mass Effect 2 takes that game and ramps everything up into a new level that breaks what I’ve come to expect from Role Playing Games.

For those needing a brief refresher course on the Mass Effect universe I’ll break it down. Players take on the role of Commander Shepard, a member of the Alliance, the military arm of Humanity’s space exploration force. After trying to save a human colony, Shepard unwillingly becomes involved in a plot that if unchecked could end all life in the galaxy. Shepard becomes a Spectre, a sort of mercenary type investigator for the center of intergalactic politics, the Citadel, tasked with hunting down a rogue Spectre named Saren.

Cut to two years later and this is where the events of Mass Effect 2 pick up. It seems that soon after stopping Saren, Commander Shepard has gone missing. In the Commanders absence a new threat has emerged from the back reaches of space. A mysterious race of insect like beings, known only as the “Collectors”, have started kidnapping entire Human colonies on the edge of occupied space. The Alliance and the Citadel, too busy rebuilding after Saren, don’t have the resources to investigate. In comes Cerberus, a Human Rights organization / suspected terrorist cell. With a seemingly infinite flow of resources, Cerberus – led by the “Illusive Man” – finds Shepard and tasks the Commander with what looks like a suicide mission: Infiltrate the Collectors’ space and find the missing Human colonists. But the Human Spectre won’t be in it alone, the Commander must recruit a team of dangerous and deadly agents in order to have a chance of surviving.

Of course that’s just the outside synopsis of a game that has a lot more going on than just a typical A to B story. During the course of Shepard’s adventure you’ll cure a deadly disease that is infecting an alien population, you may help a former ally fall down the path of revenge, you will even have the chance to reunite a family that has been torn apart by a manipulative father. Your morality will be tested more and more as Shepard gets closer to divining the mystery of the Collectors and their seeming connection to the events of the past.

Upon launch gamers will notice that in the intervening years since the release of the first game, the developers at BioWare have improved nearly every aspect of the game. From gunplay to conversations to graphics, there isn’t a single aspect of this game that hasn’t been improved upon.

Front and center in the improvements is the basic core of the game, the combat. In Mass Effect 1 players where treated to a game that seemed to be a third person shooter, but it was actually a clever Dungeons & Dragons style dice roll system. When players pulled the trigger a series of number shuffles, or dice rolls, were performed behind the scenes to see if the bullets hit their targets. It didn’t matter how well you were able to aim, as the outcome was all based on the numbers and player’s stats. While it worked fine for that game, the developers wanted to take it to a new level for the sequel.

Getting rid of the D&D scheme for shooting, BioWare has embraced a true third person shooter engine for Mass Effect 2. What this means is that the accuracy and aim is entirely left up to the players’ skills. If you aim for the head, you end up with a head shot, same with body shots and so forth. Instead of being up front the dice roll has now been moved to the back end, determining the damage dealt to the opponent. The game takes all the stats – from gun used to players experience earned skills – and uses that for damage. What this translates to is a combat scheme that feels more visceral and real than anything in the first game. While it isn’t quite Gears of War, Mass Effect 2 has combat that could compete with the very best in the genre.

In addition to a combat engine overhaul, BioWare has also tweaked the inventory and damage aspects of the sequel as well. Adopting a more modern “healing” shield damage system seen in such games as Modern Warfare 2 and Halo 3, players will take damage losing shields and eventually health, but it will all regenerate to full if the player is able to hide in cover for a while. Taking criticisms of the past game to heart they’ve tossed the inventory system out the window too. In Mass Effect 1 players were able to find new armor and weapons, along with multiple armor and weapon upgrades. This, on top of a confusing inventory system, caused many players to gripe about the antiquated system. In Mass Effect 2 there is no inventory at all. In fact the only thing players really need to worry about holding are health packs to heal fallen teammates and ammunition for weapons. Otherwise all upgrades that are found, whether for armor or ammo are all sent directly to the “hub” ship area for player to research. And once “researched” the upgrades will apply to ALL members of the team. Say you find a data pad that contains a “10% Shield Increase”, after you complete whatever mission you are on, just head to the ship, spend the elements and minerals needed to unlock it, and from that point on everyone will have 10% more shields. While the upgrades aren’t everywhere and under every rock, they are still plentiful and finding them all will help your team survive the suicide mission of taking down the Collectors.

Mentioning the “elements and minerals” means I do have to go into the one part of the game that doesn’t live up to expectations – and that is the finding of said items. In Mass Effect 1 BioWare gave players an entire universe to explore, with multiple galaxies and multiple planets in each galaxy. Players were able to highlight each planet and simply hit the “Y” button to scan for minerals – but aside from a minor quest the minerals weren’t used for anything. Lots of gamers lamented on the fact that it really didn’t seem that they were exploring. For the sequel BioWare decided that this was another area that could use a little “sprucing up”.

Every upgrade in the game, from Armor enhancements to starship armor, uses minerals and elements that need to be found or mined throughout the universe. And instead of just heading to planets and hitting a simple button to find the resources, there is now a mini-game involved. Players fly their ship (now fully controllable when jetting from planet to planet and system to system) to a planet or asteroid and enter into orbit. As they enter orbit they are given a description of the celestial body along with a rating from “Poor” to “Rich”. Using these categories as a guide players hit “Y” to enter scan mode. A grid appears on the planet and then you hold down the left trigger to start scanning the planet grid by grid, when the controller starts to vibrate and the E.K.G.-ish scanner shows a mineral deposit you hit the right trigger to fire a probe. Once the probe lands and finds the minerals you continue the search. Most planets have at least 15 mining points, but the “Rich” planets can have 30 or more. While all this sounds nice on paper, in practice it is anything but. The scanner moves slowly, like stuck in goo slow. And you only have a set amount of probes that you can carry (30 – though you can increase that amount with an upgrade later, along with the scanner speed). So as you go through your collection of probes you have to fly your ship to the nearest fuel depot to buy more, but flying your ship around also consumes fuel, so you have to buy that as well. It can be a VERY time consuming and expensive distraction from the rest of the game, and if it was just for exploration I would be okay with it as an unneeded sidequest. But since the minerals are so closely tied to the upgrades and you NEED those upgrades to survive the later part of the game that means you also need to play through this part of the game. If you spread it out through the game I suppose it would merely be a nuisance, but if you are like me and have an OCD-like need to explore everything – it gets highly annoying very quick. It truly is the one aspect of the game that drags it down.

Thankfully the game has such a well written and rewarding story going for it that it is easy to forgive this small transgression. And if you enjoyed the tale spun in Mass Effect 1, let me just say that Mass Effect 2 takes that story and makes it seem like a Dr. Seuss tale. While I loved the characters from ME1, none of them are as alive and vibrant as the cast of rogues you meet in the sequel. While some familiar faces do show up from time to time, for the large part most of the cast is new. And you will come to care what happens to each person on your team, from human to alien. While in ME1 it seemed that most of the motley cast were thrown at you, in ME2 you actually have to go out and find them – not only that, but every character you recruit to join you on this suicide mission also has a “loyalty” quest. If you can complete these semi-optional missions the team will become increasingly loyal to Shepard, making your chances of surviving the final onslaught that much greater. This gives each character a history and “life” that the first game just couldn’t match, from the Cerberus agent who is with you from the beginning to the tortured and tattooed criminal who wants nothing more than to kill everyone who crosses her path.

Adding to the characters is a morality system that expands on everything the first game set out to do. While in ME1 the choices were pure good or bad, the morality in Mass Effect 2 is less black and white than that. Now it isn’t so much a choice of whether to let an entire species live or die, its more of sometimes letting a criminal go because their family would suffer if they died. While that choice will earn you the “evil” Renegade points – it almost seems to be the right thing to do. It makes each decision that much harder to make. Someone trying to play a pure Paragon, the “good” path, may think they are choosing right, only to find that they’ve earned Renegade points after all. This system wouldn’t work as well if the tale wasn’t so expertly woven.

I’d feel a bit remiss if I didn’t mention the other big selling point of the game, the ability to import your character and save data from Mass Effect 1. When you launch the game you are given the option to bring in your established character, which entails mostly every decision you made in game 1. Doing this gives a starting character a few bonuses like starting at a higher level and a bit more starting cash, but it also personalizes the game far more than even I expected. During my playthrough I hardly visited any location that didn’t have something mentioned from what I did in the first game. If I saved someone on Feros there was a chance I’d run into them on Illium. My decisions about the Council and the Citadel were thrown in my face when I visited a former commanding officer at the aforementioned Citadel. It seems like such a small thing on the surface, but it really made me feel that I have a part in crafting this incredible game. It is utterly unlike anything I have ever experienced in a game before. Sure I’ve played sequels that mentioned events in the previous game, but never in quite the same way this one does. And some of the people I ran into even gave me sidequests. To think, if I had killed that character in the first game, I might not be able to partake in that particular mission. I really do encourage anyone who wants to get into this game to first play through the first, otherwise you are missing out on a major part of the story and emotional impact.

Mass Effect 2 is a game I’ve been anticipating for a while now and it more than lives up to expectations, in fact it goes beyond what I expected in many ways. Aside from the small flaw of the planet scanning mini-game, I whole-heartedly recommend everyone pick this game up. Not just RPG or Sci-Fi fans either, this is a game that really should be experienced by all gamers. A true example of what a story based videogame should be.

Last year, Capcom showed us that 8-bit style 2D wasn’t dead, with its release of Mega Man 9, announcement of Mega Man 10, and Konami reminded us that it could also still be done with fanfare, with their ReBirth series on Wiiware.

So here we have Dark Void Zero, a game that carries with it more fiction than your average title.

On the one hand, the game is the story of Rusty, a jetpack-wearing warrior hoping to stop dimensionally-traveling aliens from invading Earth with the help of Nikola Tesla. On the other hand, the game features the story (and it IS a story, Capcom acknowledges that it is revisionist history) that it’d been a game in development for the original NES as the Super Nintendo was on the verge of release. It’d been canned and lost, only to be found in the hands of Jimmy Fallon – yes, that Jimmy Fallon – who’d won a Capcom contest as a child and received a prototype of the game, and turned it over for the game to be completed to commemorate the release of the deluxe Dark Void title.

The third story, and this is the real one, is that Capcom had the game created to promote the console version of the third-person shooter.

But how does the 8-bit version stack up? Is it worth 500 Nintendo Points for promotional material?

Frankly, if this game had been released in 1987 it would have been a hit. Dark Void Zero would absolutely have done for jetpacks what Bionic Commando did for grappling arms.

The first thing gamers will notice about Dark Void Zero on the DSi however, is all the nods and references, however oblique, to oldschool gaming. Chiefest among these is having to blow on the game (via the DSi’s built-in microphone) to get it to start. For grins I blew across the length of my DSi and it’s amazing how that muscle memory takes over.

It’s immediately apparent that developer Other Ocean Interactive set out to make the best 8-bit game they could. At the title screen and through the opening cinematics, Dark Void Zero’s graphics pop, and once in the game itself everything is crisp and clear. The top screen also, features an easy-to-read map and score information.

Also great is the game’s chiptune soundtrack. Battlestar Galactica composer Bear McCreary composed the music for Dark Void Zero using original 8-bit equipment, and the result is a group of great original tunes that any chiptune fan won’t mind listening to on a loop – which is good, because that’s exactly what’s going to happen for a few hours.

Dark Void Zero controls well also, though some nuances can be throwing at first: You can’t crouch and shoot forward. Firing is done in eight directions, all the time. The jetpack takes a little getting used to – it has two modes, boost and hover. Hover is harder to control, but lets you maintain a consistent altitude, whereas boost rockets Rusty skyward. Despite a couple of unintuitive mechanisms, the game controls are pretty straightforward and easy to get the hang of.

What’s great about Dark Void Zero is its simplicity. You can focus on the gameplay and none of the gimmicks that might plague more modern titles. For older gamers, it harkens back to the earlier days of video games, where it’s more about exploration and pattern recognition than anything.

Ultimately it’s a lot of fun. It’s only true flaw, is its length – it’s only three levels. Granted, the levels are long-ish and there are multiple difficulty levels, but three levels is three levels. That’s small no matter how you slice it. It’s hard to pay 500 Nintendo Points ($5 USD) for three levels, but if you love retrogaming, or if you have 500 Nintendo Points burning a hole in your account, give it a whirl. It won’t be a disappointment.