Where have the real co-op games gone?

With the recent release of Capcom's brilliant fighter Street Fighter IV, it has made me contemplate what has happened to the games of today. Street Fighter is a standard staple in any gamer's history for one of the best competitive gaming experiences. Back in the day, you sat on the couch, pressed in front of the television vying for the chance to thwart your buddy and remain there with controller in hand while the next challenger appears. The same happened in arcades around the world where strangers battled for supremecy while stacks of quarters lined the sides of screens of each new hopeful trying to gain their position in the coveted top slot. Games of today have lost that spirit and have gone the way of the dinosaur.

I'm not saying that the games of today are bad, but it seems that with the advent of Xbox Live and PSN, we've accepted our fate that we no longer can have that brilliant side by side co-op or competitive spirit. We've digressed to the point of allowing ourselves to be badgered by foul mouthed thirteen year old pre-pubescent children who feel the best way to communicate their skills are through negative remarks about your father's sexual preferences. I'm talking of course about the mulitplayer experience. It seems that one of gaming's greatest achievements in community building has isolated each and every one of us to a group of strangers who often only know each other through random text and headset chatter. While some great relationships can be forged through these encounters and some epic gaming events can be waged, I still cant help but feel that we're missing a vital part of gaming as a whole.

Several games have paid hommage to this style such as the latest Gears of War 2. It has a fantastic co-op, I've mentioned Street Fighter IV which in my opinion re-invigorates the stale and dead next generation fighting genre. Army of Two, although it had problems, had an undeniable co-op reliability and although these could be done co-op online, they also include the ability to go old school and sit right next to the person you're playing with. Valve's Left 4 Dead is quite possibly the best example of the co-op experience and even does a brilliant job at managing the split screen options as well.

I know many of you will bock at the idea of split screen when today's games are filled with amazing graphics and visuals, but the only other option for this level of personal gaming interaction is through the console link. While this is a great option, its a very expensive option. Two copies of everything are needed for this to work. Keep in mind, I'm a fan of LAN parties on the PC, but dragging a large TV with you is beyond ridiculous. So as a result, we've all accepted our fate and put up with the oft racially charged antics of the online multiplayer experience.

I'm not asking for a revolution in gaming, just that consideration for the "couch co-op" be taken into consideration in future gaming revisions. Are we such a reculsive society that we cant deal with face to face competition anymore or have we just become a product of what the gaming industry has decided what is best for us?

Epic launches Phase 3 of $1 million mod contest

Having already completed 2 of the 4 phases they set out to find the best modder out there for Unreal Tournament 3, Epic has announced it will begin accepting applications for the third phase of their million dollar giveaway for the modder who can give them the best modification to the game source. Maps, vehicles, conversions... anything goes. Placing ranges from Best overall mod to best custom character.

Entry into the Phase 3 portion of the contest does not require any previous phase entries and they begin accepting applications in April of this year. Entries will have to be submitted by May 15th of this year to be eligable to win. Think of what you could do with $1 million. They've even said that past winners of similar contests have even gone on to produce their own commercially sold games.

In the all-new $1 Million Intel Make Something Unreal Contet, aspiring game developers create modifications (“mods”) for the PC version of Unreal Tournament 3 in a range of categories including levels, characters, weapons, game types, tools, vehicles and more. Winnings exceed over $1 million in value, consisting of one coveted Unreal Engine 3 license as a grand prize in addition to other cash awards and prizes. The new “$1 Million Intel Make Something Unreal Contest” will be judged in four preliminary phases and a grand final. Judging began in June 2008 and will conclude, with the grand final prizes being awarded, in late 2009. For more information on the contest, visit www.makesomethingunreal.com.

Get your SDKs out and get to coding. Make your own stimulus package.

Hideo Kojima gets nod for Lifetime Achievement

This year's Game Developers Convention (GDC) is looking to honor the world renowned Hideo Kojima, founder and creator of the Metal Gear series with a Lifetime Achievement Award. Well placed I might add. The man has given us some incredible "mind fuck" type gaming moments and knows how to create epic games that gamers enjoy. If I were giving my nominatoins, it'd have to be between Kojima-sama and Final Fantasy creator, Hironobu Sakaguchi.

Here are details of the latest press release covering Kojima's nomination:

SAN FRANCISCO — Feb. 17, 2009 —Think Services Game Group’s 2009 Game Developers Choice Awards, the highest honors in game development acknowledging excellence in game creation, will honor Hideo Kojima with a Lifetime Achievement Award at this year’s ceremony taking place at the Game Developers Conference (GDC).

Kojima is Corporate Officer, Executive Producer and Director of Kojima Productions and creator of the seminal Metal Gear series. The Lifetime Achievement Award recognizes the career and achievements of developers who have made an indelible impact on the craft of game development, as Kojima has with over twenty years of work on Metal Gear and other notable franchises.

Renowned as one of the world’s most influential contemporary game developers, Hideo Kojima first decided to get involved in the game development business while studying economics. Driven by the hardware limitations of the MSX personal computer, he pursued a fresh approach to the action game genre – and thus the stealth genre was born with 1987's Metal Gear for Konami.

After creating the cult Snatcher and Policenauts franchises, the global breakthrough for Kojima’s career took place in 1998 when Konami's Metal Gear Solid was released on Sony’s PlayStation platform. This seminal title has been followed by a host of important sequels and franchise additions, including the critically acclaimed Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater, and 2008's multi-million selling Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots.

Kojima also produced the well-received mech action Zone of the Enders series, and also created Boktai: The Sun in your Hand, a Game Boy Advance game which contained a photometric sunlight sensor in the cartridge that charged a vampire’s solar weapon, another example of the designer's signature disruption of traditional gaming mechanics.

“For years, Hideo Kojima’s contributions to game development have broken new ground and inspired the community to think about creating games in never-before-imagined ways,” said Meggan Scavio, event director of the Game Developers Conference. “From giving birth to the stealth action game genre to showing game makers how to interact with their players by breaking the ‘fourth wall,’ Kojima’s achievements make him an obvious choice for an award that in previous years has gone to luminaries including Sid Meier, Shigeru Miyamoto, Richard Garriott, Eugene Jarvis, Mark Cerny, Gunpei Yokoi, Yuji Naka and Will Wright.”

Hands-on Preview of Capcom's Dark Void

Pretend for a moment that you’re a pilot flying along the Atlantic seaboard on a routine operation through the Bermuda Triangle and the unthinkable happens. You find yourself transported to an alternate universe being overrun by robotic aliens and you only have your wits, your guns and quite possibly the world’s best jetpack about you.

This is exactly the premise for Capcom’s new IP entitled Dark Void. I got an exclusive in depth look at the game and play-by-play by Associate Director Shana Bryant at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. Capcom went all out as they showcased their upcoming games and although most were sequels, Dark Void looked to be just as, if not more exciting than the established titles Capcom publishes.

Dark Void mixes a cover based third person shooter with fancy aerial combat systems flawlessly. On foot, you progress through levels that take you from cover point to cover point as the aliens present in the Void want nothing more than to see you vaporized into fiery particles from their handheld cannons. Go deeper into certain levels and you’ll find yourself experiencing a true 360 degree combat unlike anything you’ve ever seen before. Dangle from the underside of a ledge while droves of enemies flood down from above and use your unique jetpack to navigate towards your objective. Should things get too hairy for you inside then all you need to do is ignite your jetpack and take to the air. Aerial combat is flawless and handles exactly as you’d expect flying an airplane or jet should be on your controller. This comes as no surprise as the same developers of the hit game Crimson Skies put their efforts into the controls of Dark Void.

Controls are something that need their own recognition. When in flight mode, you control the displaced pilot Will through feverish aerial maneuvers using both the control sticks. Standard aviation controls on a console are at play here and should come as no surprise to anyone. The only thing that can lead to either frustration or laughs depending on your stress level during combat is the sudden change of controls from third person shooter to in-flight control. While it doesn’t take much to get used to, it will make for some awkward moments where you send Will careening off into the side of a building. Once used to the controls however, you’ll realize just how brilliant they are. Pressing both sticks in also gives you the options for additional moves while in aerial flight. With both sticks pressed; pressing the left stick up and the right stick down will produce quite possible the best flight animation in the game. As the camera pans around your hero, Will crunches his body, spins and kicks off just as the jetpack bursts you 180 degrees in the opposite direction. Fantastic for those dogfight moments when you have to either surprise your enemy or retreat from them. Alternatively, pushing them both to the left or right will produce a barrel roll and pulling them both back will produce your standard loop de loop.

I was shocked to learn that the game was in a pre-alpha phase judging by how tight the graphics and animations were throughout the game. At one point, Shana had commented that there was a bug in the game that she noticed during my playthrough but quite honestly I didn’t detect it as there was nothing that impaired me from playing the game at all other than my own abilities. That just goes to show how concerned they are with the fit and finish of this title. The environments weren’t as lush as I may have liked and seemed a bit stark, but that can also be attributed to the current state of the build.

Details of the gameplay itself were sparse but the demo that I was allowed to play starts off with Will in what appears to be a hanger and it is up to you to move your way out and take flight. Flying becomes instantly recognizable to anyone who’s played any flight sim game. From the hanger, off in the distance on the ground is a base of some sort covered by a force field which appears to powered by a floating platform in the distance. Navigating to this platform will take you into your first bit of real combat. Taking cover behind obstacles quickly becomes part of your forte as you try and make your way deeper into the control center. Hiding behind storage containers or hovering with your jetpack allow for multiple ways to trick and dispatch your foes as you head towards your goal. Tackling this part of the control center proves to be tricky but once you get to the center, you’re informed that there is another platform on the bottom of the structure that provides access to the main control board powering the force field. Here is where you get your first taste of vertical combat. Clinching onto the bottoms of platforms while the alien forces are descending down from above you is an experience that doesn’t happen in many games. This inclusion was a very cool feature indeed as jumping and jetpacking from platform to platform all while firing in a true 360 degree field of vision was remarkable and surprisingly fluid. Disable the control center and its time to take flight against the alien airships. Another inclusion in the game that I felt was worth its weight were the UFOs. Flying behind them with your jetpack, you can choose to shoot them out of the air or fly close enough to hop on board, wrestle the pilot out and commandeer it for your own use. Other games allow you to carjack. None allow you to skyjack. Pure gold.

Should you make it through all of this; you’ll inevitably unleash the demo’s boss. The sheer size of this robotic salamander shaped monstrosity cant be put into mere words. The scale that the game gives it is fantastic. From the air, the boss doesn’t appear to be all that formidable. Get up close and you’ll find that you’re in for a supersized treat. I was informed however that this goliath is in fact the smallest boss in the game and others that would not be shown that day make the boss I was playing look like nothing more than a child. Taking down the giant takes a mix of aerial shooting and grappling as you land on its back and make your way to several weak spots situated on the monster’s back.

While the demo only showed one level, it was enough to show that the game has solid potential. I can say that during the entire Capcom event which featured many of their upcoming titles, Dark Void was the one that kept me thinking about it long after I left their hotel suite. Amidst all of their other great titles on display, Dark Void stood out to me, and that speaks volumes up against the likes of Resident Evil 5 and Street Fighter 4. Although we’re still at least a season or two away from release, if the game keeps up at the pace it’s at now, it will definitely be an IP to keep an eye out for. In a market full of sequels, its nice to see a fresh and formidable face amongst the crowds. Keep an eye out for this title and keep your eyes peeled here as we cover more of its development when the information is available.

Review: Afro Samurai (X360)

Get your groove on and pick up that sword because its time to spill some blood. Namco-Bandai’s adaptation of the popular anime series Afro Samurai pulls no punches as it delivers a fast paced high impact slasher that pleases and frustrates at the exact same time. Feverish button mashing mixed with detailed sword techniques lead to body parts flying, but an unforgiving camera and strange pacing within the game may turn some gamers off.

Gameplay

From the very first time you pop the disk in your tray, you’re greeted with the hip-hop style of Afro Samurai. The opening sequence has Samuel L. Jackson voicing the general prologue of what you’re about to encounter. There is no doubt from the start that this will be a game that uses its M rating to its extent. You quickly find that the game’s story follows along a basic retelling of the main story delivered in the anime. Some plot points are told from slightly different angles, but the meat of the story is there. Young Afro witnesses his father get killed for his Number One Headband by a gunslinging warrior named Justice. Revenge is best served cold and so Afro Samurai sets out to take back what was stolen from his family.

The game progresses through linear levels that are setup very stylish. Instead of looking at a boring loading screen, you’re treated to flashback sequences between Jinno and Otsuru; two characters with deep emotional impact from Afro’s past. The unfortunate part about the game version of the story is if you haven’t seen the anime, the impact of these flashbacks wont carry the same feeling. After the stage is loaded, and Afro is done dreaming, he’s awoken by his trusty imaginary sidekick Ninja Ninja yelling out his name. It’s a stylish loading screen that more developers should exploit. If the gamer has to stare at a loading screen, at least make it worth our while.

Controls

While controlling Afro takes nothing more than a dexterous thumb or two; keeping track of Afro is an exercise in extreme patience. Basic move sets amount to one button for swift attacks, one for hard attacks, a kick and jump button. The triggers are relegated to blocking duties and entering Focus mode which I’ll get to later. Button mashing in different combinations between swift, hard and kick will unleash brutal body part lobbing combos and is really all you need at the intro of the game. There is a moves list that you can access, but you’ll find yourself button mashing like the best of them without ever paying attention to the basic moves list. Normally I despise button mashing games as they don’t take much skill, but Afro Samurai has a way of bringing out the fun in it. This is more than likely due to the visceral feeling of slicing a foe in half with your latest combo.

Dangling neatly behind you is Afro’s pendant. This is one of the only means in which you can tell that anything is going on with your character. If the pendant is glowing with a black aura, it’s idle and nothing can be gained from it. If it glows read, you’ve gained experience from the enemy and if it begins to glow white, you’ll have access to Focus mode. Focus essentially slows time and allows you to setup devastating vertical and horizontal sword slashes. Additionally, you can split or reflect bullets from the few gun toting enemies scattered throughout the game. There’s even a boss fight where you’re required to split his missiles in order to progress any further. Focus mode is where the meat of the controls are. You’ll have the most destructive force when you utilize your Force time wisely. A reflection from your blade will tell you where your hit will land and this allows you to select which body part you care to dispatch and quite nicely also sets up the game’s mini-game named Body Part Poker.

This leads to the abomination of the game: the camera. With a permanently inverted X axis on the camera and a poor AI to follow the focus of your samurai, you’ll find that the camera is the single most frustrating aspect of the game. One boss fight in particular, it becomes imperative to watch his moves. With a camera that is too stupid to follow your movements and in the heat of battle, turning left to look right and vice versa adds up to a lot of death in-game. What could have been incredibly fluid ends up feeling tacked on and out of place.

Graphics

The art style of the anime comes through quite well and the cel shading fits the mood and tone. It truly feels like you’re playing a 3D version of the anime. Paying homage to its M rating, Afro Samurai uses generous amounts of blood and violence effectively and even splashes on the screen when you’re getting carried away with your mayhem. The problem however is slowdown in parts that it shouldn’t matter. At certain times in the game, there will be moments where the screen will split and show you what’s going on in a different portion of the map. At this time, the graphics take a hit and slow down considerably and take you out of the immersion. A game that has no HUD to speak of is all about immersion and when you cant make it flow fluidly on the screen, it’ll break you out of that and remind you that you’re playing a videogame.

Sound

The sounds in the game are a mixed bag. On one hand you have nice beats inspired by The Rza and excellent voice acting. Then on the other hand you have dead silence when it comes to interacting with the numerous repeated enemies they throw at you. It’d be nice if they had included when you slice off an enemy’s leg that the appropriate scream of pain follows; but there’s nothing. With that being said, Samuel L. Jackson and Ron Pearlman lend their excellent voice acting skills to this game and it shines. The story telling comes through with the exact detail they used in the anime to full effect. From a music standpoint, although the game features some nice beats, there aren’t many and they often repeat.

Overall

Afro Samurai presents a well rounded hack and slash game with no HUD and interesting sword play, but some broken in-game mechanics with the platforming aspects and horrible camera controls take huge points on what could have been a game that is full of win. I’m not saying the game isn’t fun because it really is. There’s a certain primal need that is satisfied when you hack off multiple people’s heads at once that cant be matched in many other games. If you’re looking for a cool story, nice music and mindless violence, it’s definitely a game to look for on your radar. Don’t expect perfection because its not here, but don’t discount the game entirely as it’s worth a play.

Review: Left 4 Dead (X360)

It’s the zombie apocalypse and I’m not sure you have what it takes to survive. Do you think you can? Walk outside of your safe room with three other complete strangers and get assaulted by waves of mindless zombies hellbent on nothing more than draining your sweet life blood. Fending them off shouldn’t be too much of a problem but fend them off while trying not to get ensnared by a Smoker or belched on by a Boomer or even ripped to shreds by the feared Hunter. If you make it this far, you’ll have to face the likes of the Tank or God forbid a Witch. These elements, a fantastic multiplayer and the inclusion of a brilliant AI Director add up to just three of the many reasons why Left 4 Dead should be included in your library of games.

Gameplay

You can take control of one of the four survivors in any part of any campaign straight from the first load. It doesn’t matter which one you choose because they’ll all be slightly different each time. Starting from the beginning of "No Mercy", the first campaign in the story will lead you from the top of an apartment and eventually into a finale pitting you up against endless waves of zombies while you wait 10 minutes for the rescue helicopter to show up. What makes this beautiful is that the rush of zombies or the special zombies you encounter the first time through may or may not be there the second or third times through. The AI Director built into this game mixes up spawn locations and horde pushes to keep every corner a potential choke point as you try to journey to safety.

The game offers several difficulty levels but honestly the true potential of this game isn’t realized unless you play on Advanced or Expert. The other two lesser difficulty settings don’t offer enough of a challenge to truly bring the survival element into your gameplay. When playing, you’ll have to deal with massive rushes of regular zombies who surround you from all angles forcing you to melee them to keep them at bay. Be warned though, these ambushes are often just camouflage for one of the aforementioned Special Infected to come in and mess up your entire night. Most prevalent seem to be Boomers and Hunters. Boomers are giant zombies filled with bile and vomit. You can hear them sloshing towards you ready to purge their ambush inducing filth all over you. If you’re hit, you’re instantly blinded and become a beacon for even more hideous horde swarms. Hunters on the other hand are fast and deadly. Often crouched within a group of zombies, out of sight, Hunters will spring forward towards you with amazing speed and pin you to the ground. Their attack leaves you helpless until one of your teammates can break free and get them off of you. If no one comes to your aid, the Hunter will continue ripping you apart until you are no more. The other Special Infected in this group is the Smoker. Smokers ensnare you with their freakishly long tongues and allow other zombies to beat you while you helplessly writhe in their grip until freed by a partner.

This brings us to the two boss type characters in the game. At certain points in the game, you’ll see and feel the building shake and intense growling feverishly heading your way as the Tank comes in to finish off the floppers. This oversized muscle-bound monster takes collaboration from all four survivors to bring down. Armed with nothing more than his sheer brute strength, he’ll make quick work of any survivor if he’s allowed to get too close. Alternatively, at random points in the game you’ll hear the soft whimper of a woman. Perhaps a damsel in distress or another survivor who needs aid? Don’t be fooled by these cries as they are merely the siren song of the Witch. Easily startled by lights or loud noises, the Witch sleeps in precarious places locked in her own internal turmoil. Do not flash your light on her or fire your weapon in her direction or you will truly know the meaning of Hell. Once startled, the Witch takes off at lightning speed towards whoever disturbed her slumber and instantly incapacitates her foe with one swipe. Once she’s done there, she’ll continue to fight whoever antagonizes her until she’s either brought down or no one is left standing.

Graphics

While it can be argued that the graphics in Left 4 Dead aren’t the most pristine that you’ll see on a next gen console or PC, it can’t be argued just how much the game allows to happen on the screen at one time without a hint of slowdown. Everything moves fluidly and you’ll literally see hundreds of zombies on the screen at one time, along with the environments all serving as eye candy. I personally played this game on the Xbox 360 and found that there were only minor areas where the entire level wasn’t completely detailed when you got there. Only every now and again, did I notice some spots hadn’t quite finished loading in their texture when I came in view, but otherwise everything is very slick. The FPS visuals are all enticing. Vomit from the Boomers produce a sloppy green runny bile that drips down your screen and eventually clears with time. Getting slashed by zombies produces drops of blood to appear on the corners of your screen and slowly fade. If you’ve been revived too many times and are literally on your last leg, the screen will turn black and white as you are literally about to die at any minute. Even the slight blur effect of taking a bottle of pain pills comes off with nice effect.

Sound

The sounds in Left 4 Dead are another area where the game excels. Gurgling from the Boomer’s stomach or a howl from a Hunter sound haunting and just as you’d imagine them to be. The music ramps up at just the right moments when all Hell is about to break loose. Gunshots are equally as pleasing and some of the splatter effects of dismantling your foes sounds eerily real.

Multiplayer

This is where the game shines. Grab four of your friends and go zombie hunting and watch the hours melt off the clock. Nothing beats having to figure out the best strategy for given situations and each person doing their role; something that AI can never do effectively. In co-op, you and your friends can work your way through the campaigns and communicate what each person needs through the headsets to perfection. Setting up a game is very easy and on the Xbox 360 version, the game will even tell you when you have friends playing the game currently. Alternatively, you can go into Versus mode where you alternate between taking the role of the Survivors or the Infected. As the Survivors, you have to make it from one safe room to another without dying and as the Infected, your job is to become the Boomer, Smoker or Hunter and try and stop them before they achieve their goal.

Controls

Controls for the Xbox 360 version of the game are standard FPS flare. If you’ve played just about any console shooter, you’ll fall right into the controls. Switching between medpacks, weapons, flashlight and pain pills is as easy as tapping the appropriate direction on the D-pad. Everything with the controls are smooth and accurate.

Conclusion

Can you survive the zombie apocalypse? If you pick up Left 4 Dead and let yourself get involved with the many aspects of this game that are done right, you wont give up until you do survive. There are a few aspects of the game that come off as repetitive, but the AI Director and tougher difficulties go well beyond making up for those things. If you haven’t tried this game by now, you’re doing yourself an injustice. Granted, the appeal is mostly in the multiplayer, so if you’re a solo player, you may want to rent at best. As a multiplayer gamer myself, I’ve already used this game well past the asking price of admission.

Review: Rubik's World (Wii)

What happens when you mix an instantly recognizable hand-held puzzle icon and a team of developers known for making imaginative puzzles? You get a product like Rubik’s World for the Nintendo Wii and DS. Two Tribes, in association with Game Factory have put out a new puzzler on the Wii that should garner nice attention this holiday season. While veteran puzzle players may shy away from the sometimes overly simplistic design, Two Tribes has successfully melded a challenging puzzle game that can appeal to a younger audience who may not be as hardcore of puzzle solvers.

Gameplay

Rubik’s World isn’t without its challenge and difficulty. Offering several different areas to explore giving you the ability to solve complex stacking puzzles, shoot similar blocks without hitting off colored blocks and even creation mode where you can use your imagination to create just about anything out of the many colored cubes. Speaking of creation, one of the areas you explore in Rubik’s World is strictly for creation of objects in your game world. The puzzle will give you an area in which to insert blocks in a 3D environment and tell you to create a tree or a cloud. There really is no right or wrong answer here because what you soon find out is that the items you’re creating populate your once grayish “world” in which you navigate through the different puzzle sections. The clouds you create will move slowly across your virtual sky and your attempt at making a tree will sprout from different areas of the game world. This immersion into the game lends itself well to what initially seems like a rather bland presentation.

The puzzles themselves have varying difficulty levels that really seem to ramp up as you go through them. They all start out relatively simple to give you an idea of what to expect from that puzzle area, but quickly start adding challenge and difficulty to the equation to keep you on your toes. One of my favorite sections pits you against a timer where you have to stack cubes in a certain pattern to fit through the inevitable hole in the wall that makes its way towards you. You’re tasked with flattening or stretching out the blocks to suit your needs and make sure they all make it through the hole in tact.

Graphics

It would be unfair to say that the graphics appear a bit blocky since the game is about stacking and assembling blocks into shapes. With that, the game starts off rather mundane graphically and the world in which you’re exploring shows nothing but uninviting tones of grey. As you delve deeper into the game and develop your own landscapes, the world is quickly populated with custom colorful block shapes to give it life. The puzzles themselves are clear and easy on the eyes.

Sound

Ambient sounds are all around in this game from the fitting music to the sound of the blocks colliding with one another; nothing seems out of place or obtrusive. There is a board where you have to flatten out blocks in order for them to fit in a certain shape and even those sounds are fitting and pleasurable to the ear.

Controls

Navigating through the 3D environments to specifically place the blocks can be a tad difficult with the Wii remote, but its not really a fault of the game, so much as the inaccuracy of the remote and the person pointing it. A few times I noticed that when trying to place a block in a specific place, that place would change to one position over when it was time to pull the trigger. A little compensating and concentration on my part overcame this, but it still took longer than it should have. The team did a fine job mapping the controls to the Wii remote, but sometimes a delicate hand is needed and that’s where the controls fall flat. Again, I’m not sure this is so much a fault of the game as much a fault of the controller.

Conclusion

While the game does have a few faults, its nothing that will hurt this game from catching people’s attention this holiday season. With enough puzzles to keep new puzzlers and veterans entertained, its not hard to see that this title should sell well. Hardcore puzzlers may be more interested in Two Tribes’ other offerings, but younger crowds will find this game as a pleasant introduction to the genre.

Review: Vigilante 8 (XBLA)

Rewind to the 1970s and you’ll find yourself in the midst of funk music, tricked out vans with shag carpeting and an array of people who felt being cool was the most important thing in life. This is the feeling you get from the retro-title Vigilante 8 on the Xbox Live Arcade. A clear remake of the original Playstation title of the same name, this game is treated to a high definition update for the current generation Xbox 360. Unfortunately the era of gaming where vehicular combat is still cool went the way of disco music.

Gameplay

Getting into the game is as simple as selecting a quick match, custom match or quest match. Career is where you’ll go if you want to unlock different versions of the standard cars available. Entering combat will feel instantly familiar to anyone who played the original title on the Sony Playstation. You begin as whatever car you choose armed with nothing more than a machine gun mounted somewhere on the vehicle. It becomes apparent quickly that you must race towards the many mines, mortars and missiles scattered around the playing field. In Quest mode you’ll never be up against three opponents at once which is a bit disheartening as the original game pitted eight opponents on the field at a time causing mass destruction. With three, there are never really those moments where you’re surrounded by utter chaos. For that, you’ll have to launch a custom match.

One aspect of the game that has changed and comes off as refreshing over the original is the addition of salvage points. If you kill your opponent in flashy ways, you earn salvage points which actually add to your current hit points and allow you to purchase add-ons to your vehicles. The unfortunate part is these add-ons seem contrived at best and never make you feel like they’re worth their weight. It is fun, however to completely demolish your opponents and see scads of these iconic nuts and bolts fly from their burning carcass.

I can easily see how the meat of the game is in the multiplayer, it’s just unfortunate that no one on XBLA has this game and makes themselves available for online play. Loading up the multiplayer screen will have you searching endlessly for an opponent.

Graphics

Getting a high definition update is a welcomed improvement over the original graphics and they look sharp. The sparkle effects on the weapons look great and they managed to keep the original look and feel of the game, however the graphics are not perfect. There were quite a few times where I noticed stuttering camera angles as the game tried to right it’s orientation to your position on the map. It doesn’t take away from the look of the game, but it does distract your own immersion when everything seems fine only to be met with stuttering.

Sound

A game set in the 70s wouldn’t be complete without its own funkadelic set of background music tracks. Vigilante 8 doesn’t try and hide its roots by delivering period correct music and keeps the groove going while you’re pounding rockets at a Volkswagen Baja Bug or Panel Van. The music does get a bit repetitive, but its fitting to the overall feel of the game, so its never intrusive. As far as the weapons, they sound as they should. Mortars whistle as they reign down from the heavens, rockets propel with thrust and the machine gun sounds as if it should.

Controls

Driving around the map will leave you with a floating feeling as the cars don’t really handle all that well, which is fine since you’re not technically racing. Selecting weapons are as simple as hitting the appropriate face button which prominently stares you in the face on the screen. Everything flows pretty well control wise if you can get over the feeling of driving on a cushion of air.

Conclusion

Vigilante 8 is a nice throwback to the original game that came out on the Playstation, but ultimately ends up feeling like it should have been left in that era. The time when vehicular combat was king has long since passed and this game should be purchased if you’re looking for an updated nostalgic game. While the single player is fun, it feels half realized and although multiplayer is where the game would shine, finding partners is a test in patience in itself.

Review: Spiderman: Web of Shadows (X360)

Good or Evil. There are perilous choices that are given to every hero as they set out on their quest to save or conquer the world. Activision and Treyarch’s latest hero game has left the choices up to the gamer and given us Spiderman: Web of Shadows. Take the the skies once again as the web slinging hero and battle all your favorites from Mavel past, all the while deciding on whether or not you’ll remain true to your virtue or let the Symbiote take control.

Gameplay:

The game starts out with a post-apocalyptic view on what New York could turn into if the Sybiote that gave birth to Spiderman’s arch-nemesis Venom is allowed to spread. Buildings burning, friends turning against Spiderman, citizens being turned into stark raving symbiotic lunatics that fight him at every corner, utter chaos reigns supreme. After the chilling view of what’s to come, you’re taken a bit back into the past and begin Act I of the game as red suited Spidey. After a few brief tutorial type missions, you’ll be greeted by some familiar faces and eventually given the ability to switch between the fleet footed red suit Spiderman or the brute force brawling Symbiotic black suit Spiderman. This is where the real guts of the game come from. Decisions you make throughout the game, whether they be story related or just in combat will decide how you alter your path throughout the game. Stay true to Spidey’s virtue and you’ll be awarded red points and closer to saving the world. Do acts of cruelty or side with the villains too often and black points will flow your way. Each of your decisions in the game will alter the outcome and how the game shapes up for you.

This time around, Spiderman isn’t asked to take on the world alone. If you manage to fill your specials bar during combat, a simple press of the D-pad will bring out allies who will aide you in your plight for a period of time. Having troubles with a certain group of thugs? Call out Cage and pummel them into submission. As you progress through the game, certain plot points will unlock more allies who each have unique abilities of which you can use when the time is right.

Graphics:

Loading up Spiderman: Web of Shadows finds you in the sandbox world of New York City. Depending on which Act you’re playing, one side or the other of the city will be open to your web slinging needs. Its impressive to have the entire city accessible to swing through with no loading times, but as a result it appears that the textures and distance drawing of the buildings took a slight hit. The city gives off a gritty appearance which works, and the streets are bustling with uniquely disguised scripted activity, but small graphical glitches seem to pop up and take you from reality. Several times while fighting random thugs on the street, entire models that you’re currently fighting will disappear without a trace in mid-fight. On several occasions, I’d swoop in and begin fighting a group of five thugs only to find out that dispatching two will end the result because the other three wound up in another dimension somewhere.

Cutscenes play out nicely without any trace of slowdown but the models wont impress you above anything you haven’t already seen. The details in the heroes and the villains pay homage to the comic book look, but don’t really push the envelope for next generation graphics. I was impressed that in one close-up of Spidey, you were actually able to see the seam where his mask meets the rest of his suit. Nice little detail there.

Sound:

Sitting atop a building and listening to the sounds in the street below you can be breathtaking. You’ll notice sirens of police cars in the distance, clatter of people in the streets, sounds of mischief from random thugs causing havoc on a street corner. Also, swinging through the streets produce satisfying sounds of what you’d expect spider webs to sound like if they were shot out of your wrists and splatted against a high rise building. Diving from high atop a sky scraper will produce whooshing sounds of wind passing your ears and all the while, the background music picks up on action queues to ramp up at the appropriate times when doing your superhero deeds. All in all, I was quite impressed with the sounds in Spiderman, even down to the voice acting which was done quite well.

Controls:

Being an Activision/Treyarch Spiderman game, you can’t help but compare it to previous installments. Gone are the days when the beautiful swing mechanics of Spiderman 2 where you could sling multiple lines or web to brilliantly control the acrobatic hero into just about any spot you could think of. Although swinging in Web of Shadows is still fun, its not nearly as complex as it once was in the past and with every iteration, I keep hoping they bring back what once was so great about their previous title. With that, controls don’t seem readily very fluid at first and take a bit of time to get used to. There were a few times when I would be forcibly trying to press against a wall after a web-flight only to find myself slide all the way down to the ground because I didn’t press the awkward RB button. Spidey should stick to just about anything and if I swing 50mph into the side of a building, I should stick there too without the necessity of pressing a button.

Conclusion:

Treyarch and Activision have produced yet another web slinging game that can be fun for fans of the comic. I personally have always had a soft spot in my heart for Spiderman and love taking control of him any chance I get. Web of Shadows has quite a few faults with graphics and controls, but the story is solid and the game is still fun to play. While it may not win itself any medals against the fierce competition out this holiday season, it could still be a sleeper hit for those wanting a Spiderman game to help them through.

Review: MotoGP 08 (X360)

Throwing your leg over a motorcycle and twisting the throttle all the way through the gears down a long straightaway is something that can make the most abstinent drunk from adrenaline. There’s something special about racing motorcycles that no other motorsport can capture. The thrill of two wheeled terrorism through twisted tracks is unmatched by any other experience. Its unfortunate the latest version of MotoGP 08 by Capcom never got the memo on how exciting motorcycle racing can be.

Gameplay:

From the very first thoughtless menu to the very last checkered flag, MotoGP 08 throws mediocrity in your face at every turn. Selecting either a Quick Race of starting off on a Career are both equally as unrewarding as the next. One of the biggest thrills of motorsport racing games is the sense of accomplishment. Whether it be to collect additional vehicles to adorn your virtual garage, gain more cash than Bill Gates himself or obtain the amount of notoriety that would make Donald Trump blush, some time of carrot in front of the horse is needed to spur the gamer on for more. MotoGP 08 starts you off on 125cc bikes and sets you off on your Career. As you progress, you’ll unlock the preview of the next track. You’d better get used to this view because this is only view you’ll be seeing at the end of every single race you enter. No cameras flashing, no agents wanting you to sign with the next big team… nothing.

Choosing between Arcade, Advanced and Simulation offers a bit of spice to your racing style. Arcade gives you very forgiving controls yet still keeps a simulation type feel to the game. There wont be any 200 mile per hour turns at 90 degrees on this mode, but you wont topple over if you find yourself having a hard time controlling the thumb stick either. Advanced takes off your training wheels and riders who prefer a somewhat realistic but not punishing adaptation of life on two wheels will want to select this mode. Simulation is for the masochistic in nature who feel that brutal punishment lies around every turn.

Graphics:

MotoGP 08 falls drastically short on graphics. Not only is the presentation of the entire game lackluster at best, the environments are flat and forgetful. You’ll be riding a beautifully detailed motorcycle with an equally as gorgeous helmet and leather set, but at the end of the day, the visuals you experience wont be all that memorable from one track to the next. Gone are the days where blasting down the Twin Ring Motegi envoke visceral displays of concrete barriers buzzing by or staring down the daunting view of the corkscrew at Leguna Seca mean anything. Replaced are drab backgrounds, cardboard fans in the stands and lifeless menus before and after each race. The redeeming fact is that Capcom has captured the sense of speed and the difference in speed between the three classes.

Sound:

The sounds of the motorcycles are one area where the game shines. You can practically feel the frantic whine of the 250cc bikes topped out. The music throughout the game is entertaining but forgetful. Menu music is filled with that generic techno beat that wont leave any lasting impressions. Music in game is completely forgetful as it should be so you can focus on the frantic speeds in which you’re entering the turns.

Controls:

Controls never miss a beat here as they follow the same tried and true setup as most driving games out there. Slam the right trigger to go and hammer the left trigger to stop. All the while controlling your craft with the analog stick. Precise control over these commands become apparent in Simulation mode as easing onto the gas and brakes during the turns will mean success or failure depending on your mastery.

Conclusion:

What THQ had left when they abandoned the MotoGP series was a motorcycle racing game that was both exciting to play and exciting to look at. It appears that Capcom took the franchise over and pumped something out in time to call it 08 without putting a whole lot of time and effort into making it something great of their own. While MotoGP 08 is fun as a racer, it’s not very rewarding and doesn’t drive that collector instinct that most racers need to achieve. Think of playing Forza 2 without getting any cash or cars in you garage for your efforts. What if Project Gothom Racing 4 just gave you a preview of the next track after you successfully won the race as your prize? That’s the cheated feel you get from MotoGP 08 that ultimately spells its demise. The flat environments and dull menus can all be overlooked if the game itself gave the gamer a sense of fun and accomplishment. This is something that unfortunately fails in this year’s iteration.

Review: Penny Arcade Episode 2 (XBLA)

Just a mere six months after the release of their first Penny Arcade Adventures on the XBLA and PC, Hothead games in cooperation with the web-comic Penny Arcade have released Episode 2 to the masses. Thrust back into the 1920s alter-universe of New Arcadia with two of the most unlikely heroes proves yet again to be another laughter inducing romp which smoothly doesn’t necessarily require you to play the first one to get into it. Hothead and company did was it seems few developers will do. They took the suggestions of their fans and actually implemented them where they could and the efforts are easily noticeable.

Gameplay:

One thing you’ll notice if you’ve played the first Penny Arcade Adventures is that you have the ability to import your old character with the same look and feel that you created before. The same stats will follow over as well. The game takes this into account as it gives you a slight boost in difficulty and experience. It doesn’t take long to get into the action as Tycho and Gabe stumble into your hapless abode and once again call upon you and you gardening appliances to help save the world from the vile robots set upon the lands. Once you begin, you’ll find the same tried and true turn-based RPG setup as the first game, but with a few subtle improvements to make things easier. For instance blocking, which becomes paramount later in the game, is a lot easier to judge as you have to look for the actual word “block” instead of just a flashing health bar as it was in the first game. There are a few upgraded items to find, but overall if you’ve ported anything from the first game, you’ll be all set on items. Support character are back, but I wont spoil fans of the comic as to who plays a role for you.

Graphics:

The visuals remain fairly unchanged from the original as it still gives you that gritty 1920s feel and brilliant flash animation. The bonus is that now there are more flash cutscenes to drive the story forward. Additionally, the first game had players wandering about trying to point at the correct piece of debris on the ground to inspect which at times made it a bit cumbersome. Upon reviewing suggestions by fans, they’ve now included the ability to scroll to whatever objects are near enough to gain your focus. I did notice some framerate slowdown during a scene or two, but it was minor and not anything notable.

Sound:

The audio in the game is fitting for the time period and smacking a mental patient with a garden hoe gives the appropriate thud, but is largely lacking on anything stellar. The music to the game is good, the narrative is improved since the last game in that it comes out for more than just the opening scene, but the omission of voice acting of any kind by the characters may still not sit well with fickle gamers of today. I personally find it fitting to the mood and feel of the game, but others might find it off-putting that any game today doesn’t have some sort of voice acting in it.

Controls:

Getting around on the overworld is fairly straight forward. You control your character through the analog stick and Tycho and Gabe follow along dutifully. Should you find yourself in the wrong area, a simple hit of the button will bring up your map room in which you can change areas with relative ease. Once in combat, the controls can get a little daunting for those who may not have played the first one, but the scheme isn’t anything that takes much to get used to. Players still roll for initiative and the highest initiative goes first. Roll a 20 and your special attack is already lit up and ready to go. During the battle, you’ll cycle through your players as they become ready for attacks and time your blocking by pulling the right trigger on the XBLA version. It’s a relatively simple system, but can add up to some fun combat when multiple enemies appear on the screen.

Conclusion:

The guys at Penny Arcade have moved from a satirical look at gaming to game producers themselves and their passion for their product shows. The mere fact that they took the time to listen to the complaints from their fans on the first game speaks volumes. Even the price point has been lowered as the initial game raised a lot of eyebrows for launching at $20. For a lower price you’ll receive a better product than the first with improved controls, longer story arcs and better overall quality. You don’t need to be a fan of Penny Arcade to enjoy this game, but it’ll make you appreciate the humor so much more. The only thing that this game leaves a gamer wanting is a quick release of Episode Three.

Review: Portal: Still Alive (XBLA)

Valve seems to always be at the forefront of what it takes to make a great shooter. Last year, when The Orange Box was released, fans everywhere marveled at the feat that was Portal and spoke volumes of the greatness in the concept of the game. There were naysayers who had purchased all of the original Half-Life games that didn’t want to shell out $60 for a 2 hour game, a mini-expansion and a multiplayer title. These people can now be comforted that for 1200 Microsoft Points, they too can now play Portal. They shouldn’t feel like they missed anything because Portal: Still Alive on the Xbox Live Arcade is the exact mirror image of what aired on The Orange Box, only with a few small extra maps thrown in as an afterthought.

Gameplay:

You awaken in a cell, not sure where you are and the game instantly takes on the perspective of a First Person Shooter. As you progress through the game, you receive a “gun” that shoots portals on certain surfaces that allow you to teleport yourself from one instance to another. With that, clever puzzles are setup in which you must navigate your way through seemingly impossible situations in order to make it to the end. Its this simple design of mouse-after-cheese maze theory that makes Portal work so well. All the while, you’re being taunted by a digital voice over a loudspeaker that is trying to ultimately make you fail. For the few that may not have played this game, I wont spoil the details of this voice, but know that it plays a prominent role in the game. Multiple obstacles await you as you go through some 19 levels until the end. Seasoned puzzle players may only need about two hours to complete the game and even less if you’ve played the original. The challenge maps that are included offer additional obstacles and make subtle changes to the maps you already know from the Story Mode. For instance, a landing pad that you were used to standing on in one map will be completely gone in the other map, thereby making you have to think of another, more advanced way through the map.

Graphics:

The visuals in the game are crisp, well done, yet forgettable. The textures on the walls offer little variation, the color pallet isn’t very deep, but the details are where it counts. Valve went through great lengths to give the feel of the game a very industrial and even medicinal feel to the environment and it comes off pretty well. I appreciated the details of everything you interact with, but after 19 levels of the same thing, your eyes tend to drown in seas of similarity. Aside from the obstacles, there really isn’t much that discerns one map from another.

Sound:

Audio in the game is where it shines. There is a stark silence throughout the game in that there is no background music and everything feels rather alone. Your only companion in the game is a wise-cracking and often funny robotic guide named GLaDOS. What originally comes off as institutional, ends up having genuine laugh out loud moments from its off-the-wall comments about your progress. The sounds of your equipment is very well done in the fact that, if you were genuinely holding a portal gun, you’d expect those sounds to emanate from it.

Controls:

Everything seems rather fluid with the controls. You’re faced with typical FPS controls in that you navigate your character with both analog sticks and each respective portal is fired by the shoulder trigger buttons. There are ways to interact with things on the screen and these are simply handled by the face buttons. The controls are very accurate, make sense and never a hindrance on gameplay.

Conclusion:

What started out as a surprise runaway pack-in hit from The Orange Box has settled into a regurgitated mirror image of the same thing we’ve already played. There is nothing new in the game other than a few challenge maps that offer a higher degree of difficulty for those who truly enjoy puzzles. The main game is almost like an inclusion to justify the 1200 point cost for some map packs that could have been sold individually at a lesser price point for those who already own The Orange Box. I love the game, but would have loved to see something more original come for those hard earned points.

Review: Galaga Legions (XBLA)

Rewind back to 1981 and ask any gamer which game sticks out in their top 10 favorite arcade titles and you’ll be hard pressed to find someone that doesn’t say Galaga. Namco Bandai has taken it upon themselves to bring fans of the original bug shooter a new and improved game on the Xbox Live Arcade. Gone are the days where horizontal motion and rapid twitch shooting is your only recourse and born are vivid graphics, interesting strategy and wickedly addictive gameplay.

Gameplay

While nothing in the game is all that difficult to pick up, new players may want to take a stroll through the tutorials to introduce themselves to the finer aspects of this game. Turret positioning, entry point prediction and ship maneuvering all enter into your basic strategy elements to guarantee a funfilled game. As you make your way yhrough the galaxy, you’ll be assaulted by many different types of space bugs and this time, they dont just plummet to you from the top of the screen. They’ll come at you from many different angles. This is where some of those skills learned in the tutorial will come into play. You are given turrets at the beginning of the stage in which you can make a choice. Either mount them on your ship and unleash a devistating barrage of firepower, or strategically place them on multiple points of the screen to act as your assistance in the bug assault that will surely find its way to you.

As you begin each level, glowing lines will appear shortly showing the planned course of the Galaga and allows you a breath of space in which to setup your lines. While playing the first few levels, you’ll be given a false sense of security into thinking this game is going to be an easy romp through space. By the fifth level or so, you’ll be wondering what that lightning fast blur was that erradicated your retinas was and how you possibly are expected to shoot it out of the air and survive.

Gone is the ability to launch bombs to wipe out multiple enemies on the screen, but in place of bombs are wonderful little black holes. Black holes can show up and save your hide just in the nick of time when you feel that you cant possibly fight your way out of a situation. Then, when all is almost lost, every enemy gets sucked in and in turn, gets turned into a guided insect that obliterates everything on the screen.

Graphics

Graphically Galaga Legions has to be one of the better looking XBLA titles to date. With polished visuals, vivid
explosions and colorful lighting effects, gamers will be in for a optical treat when loading up this title. From the first streak across the screen to the last explosion, it’ll be hard not to like what is in store. The amount of sheer mayhem going on across the screen is enough to give even the most stable of nervous systems an epileptic episode. This title easily ranks up there with Geometry Wars with the sheer psychedelic pleasure derived from the graphics.

Sound

Sound comes through nicely but leaves a bit to be desired. Tired and forgetful techno tracks permeate through the game, but luckily are left in the background and not obtrusive. Explosions and firing effects could have been done better, but fit the game and nostalgic feel of the universe.

Controls

While the classic game had you moving horizontally, now you can move up or down as well as side to side. This seems like a welcomed advance in the series, until you realize that now the Galaga can come from underneath you as well. This makes positioning the aforementioned turrets all the more important. Thankfully doing so is as easy as flicking the right thumb stick in the direction you’d like it to fire. You can re-attach the turrets to your ship by a simple press of the shoulder bumper, but the pace will become so fevered so quickly, that you’ll hardly have time to think about that.

Conclusion

Taking a trip down memory lane isn’t always what its cracked up to be. Thankfully Namco Bandai has done the predecessor justice in Galaga Legions. This is a feverish and addictive arcade title that pleases on just about every level. The only drawback would have to be the repetition that quickly becomes apparent as you advance in the levels. After you’ve mastered the frenzied pace, it begins to feel like the same old thing.

Review: Spectral Force 3 (X360)

Strategy RPGs usually invoke a certain nostalgia in fans of the genre. Having many years since the game type’s inception to perfect the turn-based gameplay, gamers have come to expect a certain level of polish when it comes to the SRPGs. Since battle systems in the genre don’t really vary from game to game, fans expect a moving story, fun character types and engrossing combat to move them along through the game. Gamers picking up Atlus’s newest SRPG for the Xbox 360, Spectral Force 3, will receive none of that.

As the title suggests, you’ll be prepared to battle ghostly opponents, vampires, goblins, ghouls and other nightly characters ready to dispatch your team at a moment’s notice. The only problem is you won’t care if they do or not. Atlus has delivered a game that’s story is so far removed from the gameplay that gamers will find it hard to find the motivation to keep drudging through battle after battle to advance the story of the epic war waging around you.

Gameplay

Not wanting to mess with a tried and true method of turn-based strategy RPG, Atlus left the way you enter and carry on battle relatively unchanged from most other predecessors of the genre. This is actually a good thing in the genre as it allows fans to immediately jump into the action without a lengthy, boring tutorial. Characters move around a grid just as they do in any SRPG and once they commit to their movement phase, they cannot move again until they either perform an action or pass on their turn. When each of the characters on that team’s turn moves, control is relinquished to the opposing team. Combat is carried out through menu choices mapped to the face buttons on the Xbox 360, making selection of moves simple and easy to execute. Players manage their SP, or Skill Points, in which types of attacks they wish to perform. A degree of points are spent on movement, and physical characters are given the chance to hit light, medium or hard with decreasing amounts of accuracy depending on the strength of the attack. Magic users generally have the same strength and chance to hit so long as the target is within their range.

The game board itself is a bit disappointing because elevation wasn’t taken into effect as accurately as it could have been. If you are trying to attack an opponent and the square you’re standing on is even one elevation point above your target, physical attacks are rendered useless. Not even so much as a glancing blow.

Advancement through the game is all done through a central hub where you can shop, upgrade weapons and speak with your teammates about the goings on during the war. You participate in the war by accepting missions from a mission board that are offered by different factions currently at war. Although this can directly affect how your team interacts with these factions, the act of choosing a mission from a menu while the war wages outside removes the player from the war and ultimately removes the care for why you’re participating in the battles in the first place.

Graphics

It seems like the folks at Atlus wanted to do a game that is a throwback to the games they made on the Playstation 2. Graphics in Spectral Force 3 are nothing to write home about. In this current era for the Xbox 360, developers are unlocking the full potential of the machine and bringing richly detailed graphics with dynamic lighting effects and stunning details. None of these are found in this game. From the poorly drawn anime cutscenes to the super deformed 3D sprites during gameplay, everything just screams last generation. Even during combat when magic or special attacks are issued, the graphics associated do nothing more than bring forth a great yawn from spectators.

Sound

Sound is detailed but nothing spectacular. Every sword swing, magic summon, hit, block and parry sounds as it should, but not as good as it could have been. There are times where you can clearly hear that the sound was done by someone speaking directly into a microphone to make the sound of a bug. Background music isn’t annoying or overbearing, but it does drone on with its incessant MIDI loop. Players will probably find themselves muting the game entirely since the voice acting is quite possibly the most horrendous thing in the sound development. The actors they hired to do the voice acting do nothing to portray the emotion of the characters you’re watching on screen. All of this adds up to a downright dreadful sound experience.

Controls

The controls are nothing difficult to master. Everything you need to know is clearly marked on the screen at all times during the game. Advancement of text during story cutscenes tells you which button to hit, menu selection is all one button and even in battle, you’ll have two HUDs that tell you exactly which button to hit to perform the exact attack you want. It’s not brain surgery, but neither is this game.

You begin a battle by placing your squad in formation. Once done, you begin the battle with a simple button press. You can cycle through which player you would like to activate first by pressing the left and right triggers respectively and simply command them to move and attack by pressing the appropriate button displayed on your HUD menu.

Conclusion

Spectral Force 3 almost blatantly shows gamers that the developers didn’t care about this title. When the game opens and introduces you to an epic war waging between three main super powers in this fantasy world, one armed with the powers to control the dead, you’d expect a great and involved story to ensue. This never happens as the war wages on behind the scenes and your team of mercenaries simply picks missions to decide which faction they would like to favor. Gamers are told the happenings of the world through a dull narrator set on the backdrop of an overworld map. Then, if all of this can be overlooked, gamers have to deal with substandard graphics, offensive sound and voice acting and character development that is just boring and unimaginative. Fans of the genre who just want to pound through endless classic SRPG battle screens and don’t care about the story might find some enjoyment out of this, otherwise it’s hard to find anything redeeming about this title.