I’m Cheap, But Games Aren’t. Still, There’s Work To Do…

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Well, I don’t get ALL my games for free*, folks. Had to shell out for Dark Souls, but that’s OK, as it’s one of those games that’s worth paying full price for. Fortunately, I managed to find a copy of Collector’s Edition for the same price as the standard version (as it SHOULD be – it’s vastly overpriced on eBay already!). I also have a copy of Star Odyssey on the way (finally). The game only got a SUPER limited print run of a mere 600 copies and mine was paid for back in July. Some production issues slowed the manufacturing process, but those have been dealt with and hooray, I get to dig out my Sega Genesis after far too long.

By the way, getting a game or anything else for free NEVER guarantees an automatic good review. I’m going to be fair and honest about what I write no matter how I get anything sent my way.

Raving Rabbids: Alive & Kicking Trailer: UbiSoft’s BIG Conspiracy In Action

Posted on November 4, 2011 by geelw

Listen up! Before you start in with the “Awww, cuuute!” stuff, you REALLY shouldn’t let any Rabbids into your home, especially if you have a Kinect. Why not? For starters, they multiply like, well… Rabbids, they’ll eat all your canned food (and probably part of the cabinets they were stored in) and you’ll never get a second of rest once you start chasing them around and stomping them before they can destroy something else! Anyway, that’s my good deed for the day – consider yourselves warned. Fail to heed my words and it’ll be trouble. That lamp that just went flying across the room? That wasn’t YOU swinging your arms and kicking wildly in front of the Kinect that did it. It just looked that way. Those darn Rabbids can fool you into doing all sorts of insane stuff. I think UbiSoft has been overrun by the little buggers, since they created them a few years back and came up with this game to get rid of their infestation! So now, they’re shipping them out all across the globe and actually CHARGING people good money for the privilege of flailing away in front of their TV sets like spastic chimpanzees. Oh, the humanity!

Remember, You have been warned.

Heavy Rain “Director’s Cut” Coming November 8th. Buy It (Even If You Own The Original Already).

Posted on November 4, 2011 by geelw

One of the best and most cinematic games this generation for any console gets another reissue, this time with pretty much everything you were expecting. Almost. It’s not really a Director’s Cut if you try and think of it EXACTLY like a film, but given that David Cage is a great game director (and really needs to make more games), I’ll let this slide a bit. Basically, you’re getting the award-winning dramatic adventure game in it’s Move Edition format plus a bunch of sweet bonuses:

Complete, original game, Heavy Rain
Heavy Rain Chronicles: Episode 1 – “The Taxidermist” DLC
Heavy Rain Original Videogame Score by award-winning film and television composer, Normand Corbeil (16 tracks)
New front-end menu and interface with built-in Move support
A series of 8 “Making of” Bonus Videos
Three Dynamic Themes (Heavy Rain, Heavy Rain ARI Forest, Heavy Rain ARI Mars)
15 additional pieces of new concept art
2 bonus Trailers (Thank You Trailer, Love Trailer)

As a Greatest Hits reissue, that bargain price is sure to get a few more people playing this truly innovative game. And hopefully, it’ll make Quantic Dream a few bucks more as well. As much as I love my indie games, we need developers like QD to save the gaming scene from becoming an all-app, all the time wasteland of a few gems in the rough buried under piles of garbage. Let’s hope we see something from Cage and his team on the Vita at some point as well…

WAVES: Probably The Only Time Squid In A Box Isn’t A Bad Thing…

Posted on November 4, 2011 by geelw

Indie developer Squid In A Box (yes, they even have a nice logo with a squid in a box) has a really cool game called WAVES. Based on the trailer above, it looks amazing, has some great music (As the kids on American Bandstand used to say, “It’s got a good beat and you can dance to it”) and you play with a ball that blows stuff up a lot. The game is also a lot of fun (or else I’d never mention it). Get the demo here. I’m doing that as I type this. If, I’m not mistaken, the full version should drop around November 16. Nice.

The Sound of Skyrim Video: Bethesda Shows & Tells, You Get To Bring The Smells…

Posted on November 3, 2011 by geelw

11-11-11. is almost here and I know a lot of folks WON’T be going to the movies to see Immortals, that’s for sure. A good chunk of gamers will no doubt be camping out in their living rooms exploring the wide world of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, not coming out into the real daylight until their relatives send the cops around to check for a strange smell. Of course, after doors are kicked in across the world because of that odor, all the authorities and formerly grieving family members will discover is a few too many smelly, unwashed gamers with headphones on (that why they didn’t hear the banging and ringing), moldy bits of takeout food and perhaps a lingering aroma of a disc drive spinning eternally. Yeah, I’m going to be one of those folks…

Games, Games, Games (& More Games)…

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Just finished Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Impact (not bad for a kid’s game) and am working on that review as well as one for Dragon Ball Z Ultimate Tenkaichi Z (also pretty good). GoldenEye: Reloaded should be completed and posted this weekend and the mystery package Sega sent along that I missed because I stepped out to the post office to pick up MORE games should be boomeranging back in a few hour from UPS. OK, who needs sleep? Not me, folks! Keep the games coming and I’m a happy reviewer. Yeah, the backlog is already hitting, but I’m a multi-tasker! Which reminds me, I need to register for Toy Fair, as well. Too much going on, as usual…

GoldenEye: Reloaded Also Makes My Day…

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A bit of serendipity (of sorts). As I was mooning over the GTA V trailer, my PS3 review copy of GoldenEye: Reloaded shows up. Looks as if the stuff I was planning to post (new Max Payne 3 screens, a quick note on UbiSoft acquiring Red Lynx and some other miscellany) will have to wait a few hours while I strap on my Move and Navigation Controllers for a bit. This should be fun. Back in a bit…

Finally! A NEW Tiny & Big: Grandpa’s Leftovers Trailer!

Posted on November 1, 2011 by geelw

Awesome. One of my favorite in-progress games gets a new video update. Nice, nice. NOW, if only this would come to consoles as well, even more people would see how cool it is. Anyway, go bug the upstanding guys over at Black Pants Game Studios about becoming a beta tester for this one, as it’s shaping up to be a real winner and a truly original, innovative new game.

Review: The Lord of the Rings: War in the North

Posted on November 1, 2011 by geelw

Platform: PS3 (also on Xbox 360, PC)

Developer: Snowblind Studios

Publisher: Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment (WBIE)

# of Players 1 – 3 (online 1 – 3)

ESRB Rating: M (Mature)

Official Site

Score: A-

Attempting to expand upon a revered and well-established canon such as J. R. R. Tolkien’s Middle-Earth saga is indeed tricky business, particularly in the case of The Lord of the Rings trology. Get it wrong and it’s a trip into the bowels of Mount Doom as some poor development team and publisher face the wrath and ruin of legions of longtime fans. Fortunately, The Lord of The Rings: War in the North delivers an epic (and Mature-rated) tale that ties in nicely with the trilogy as well as an addictive hack & slash that’s challenging and highly replayable. It also marks Snowblind Studios’ first current generation title (finally!) and yes, they’ve done a very solid job here. The visual presentation is grand and fitting, the music is perfect and the familiar gameplay is brutal, simple and about as fun as can be for a game of this type. The game is not without its flaws, however. Some chinks in the armor show up in the form of a a weird sound bug in one area, occasional AI stumbles plus a wee bit too much repetition of quest-related dialog. Nevertheless, this is one journey well worth taking whether or not you’re a fan of the books and films. Continue reading →

Snow Day! Well, I’m In For The Weekend Anyway…

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Yeah, it’s snowing in NYC two days before Halloween and it’s sticking. Nice. Good thing I only had a trip to the post office to get done and a bag of rice to buy. I’m in all day after that, folks. Fortunately, I have The Lord of the Rings: War in the North to keep me busy. VERY busy, as the game is pretty darn huge. More on how huge on Tuesday…

Back in a bit. I still have some more post-NYCC Capcom impressions to write up (YES, you should absolutely put Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City on your must have lists) as well as a ton of other things. Maybe even a cool giveaway if you’re good… But that’s for later…