Last week, GameStop had a sale of considerable merit. There were quite a few deals to be had, but Darksiders, a gem from THQ that apparently hybridizes Zelda and God of War, was going for $19.99. That’s a steal, especially when it’s still going for mid-$30’s used everywhere else. As a fairly frugal individual who rarely buys new games at full price, a discounted Darksiders was ju...[Read More]

Alan Wake has identity issues. An interpretation of that statement for the game itself or it’s titular protagonist is valid, but in this argument if favors the former. For every legitimate step forward it took toward selling its fiction, there was another step back that reminded me I was on the couch playing a videogame. Such a disconnect isn’t necessarily bad thing, but it did sort of...[Read More]

This is the story of a boy* – not a young boy, but a man-boy, with a beard, three days’ supply worth of natural energy bars and vitamins, and an itch. Here are some short excerpts from his brain one week later.   * this isn’t really a story, it’s more of a random musing guised as a story   The idea that I should be pissing my pants the whole time: I grew up during...[Read More]

The best homage to gaming’s past came in the form of Ubisoft’s Scott Pilgrim vs. the World: The Game, based on the zany action-comedy-romance comic by Bryan Lee O’Malley, set to release around the same time as the upcoming film staring Michael Cera. In his adventure, Scott Pilgrim must defeat the seven evil ex-boyfriends of the one he loves, Ramona. This caught my eye from about forty feet away. A...[Read More]

Killzone 3 is set for a February release and includes a lot of changes that should make it a must have title. The Producer I spoke with couldn’t talk about multiplayer, but I was able to experience some of the single player action, including several of the new gameplay mechanics like jetpacks and brutal melee. So our fourth visit into the universe of Killzone begins right where Killzone 2 le...[Read More]

Lucasarts was showing off Force Unleashed II behind doors at their booth. Frankly, it looks awesome and it was one of my favorite games of the show. I loved the first game and the second game looks to only expand and improve upon the great gameplay that Force Unleashed introduced. Starkiller is once again the main character. If you remember from the end of the first game, that may be surprising (I...[Read More]

Ubisoft was showing off Tom Clancy’s HAWX 2 at E3 this year. I thought the arcade aerial combat game was a lot of fun back in 2008, and it was good to see a sequel coming out this year. HAWX 2 has a new campaign mode that is split between the HAWX, Russians, and British. Players encounter each faction during the course of the campaign and do not get to choose when they play which faction, bu...[Read More]

I played several Playstation Move games at E3 this year. The first was a tech demo of sorts known as The Shoot. This was like playing an old school light gun game — the game moves on rails and is played from the first person perspective. Various old west outlaws pop out, along with some innocents, and it was up to me to move the Move and zap the bad guys while avoiding the good guys. I thoug...[Read More]

I played several Move games at E3 and in this article I will be discussing two of them: Kung Fu Rider and echochrome II. So Kung Fu Rider is a full blown Sony of Japan Studios game that will be available in September on Blu-ray. It features 9-12 hours of gameplay and is all about leading a private detective, or his secretary (your choice), away from a gang by riding down hilly streets in downtown ...[Read More]

I played SOCOM 4 both with and without Move and enjoyed it very much. Zipper uses both the Move and its “nunchuk” controller to fully replace the standard controller. The Move is how you aim, including zoom functionality. You can adjust the sensitivity of it, and if you hold the Move button while turning, you can avoid spinning the screen around whenever you reach the edge of the curre...[Read More]

I attended a twenty minute closed doors session of Gears of War 3 with some folks from Epic. It was primarily Q&A, but we did get a five minute demo of a part of the game. My first impressions were ‘wow — this looks far, far better than the previous Gears,’ which already look very good. Updates to the Unreal3 Engine are what make the new graphical changes possible. We were t...[Read More]