But I love it.   Since this is a spoiler-free zone I am forbidden from saying more.   But what I will say are a few words of my impressions of Mega Man 10 after spending around three hours with it today and beating all eight robot masters.  In no particular order:   Love the new enemy ideas, such as: The Mettaurs which shoot the sticky goo crap at you in Pump Man’s level ...[Read More]

Because I love buying more games than I have time to play, here’s what’s on my calender:   Final Fantasy XIII March 9th (PS3 – 360) Mainline Final Fantasy games, despite always being overwrought with inane complexity, always manage to penetrate the mainstream market. People who would otherwise, especially in the current game climate, never touch a Japanese RPG are going to pick t...[Read More]

I left the original Metroid Prime highly confident I would never revisit Retro’s take on the franchise, but, since I couldn’t justify only using 1/3 of the Trilogy disc, I decided to give the sequel a shot. Much to my surprise, after about ten minutes, I was really into it. The familiarity earned with the prequel, both in regards to gameplay mechanics and the basic control scheme, came...[Read More]

{hwdvs-player}1022{/hwdvs-player}  

My anticipation level for Heavy Rain is hovering somewhere around the level of mindless hype last experienced when I saw Mario 3 in The Wizard. I loved it at E3, and I loved it at CES. I want this game badly, and my irrationally thinking brain has already elevated its arrival to second-coming status. I’m hype-drunk, and I’ve convinced myself that Heavy Rain has the capability to right ...[Read More]

I know, I know. It sounds crazy. The possibility of a successful system that is embedded in millions and millions of houses actually hurting an industry that is depending on it.    That’s the rub, though. The industry right now is depending on the 360 and the system isn’t living up to its end.    Now, before we get into it, this has nothing to do with the large amou...[Read More]

I love Sega’s Yakuza games.   Japanophiles should share a similar admiration. Most Japanese-developed videogames feature otherworldly, highly stylized art direction not often present its their Western counterparts.  That’s fantastic for fantasy environments, but doesn’t often (aside from something like Okami) offer insight into the minutia of Japanese culture. Yakuza ga...[Read More]

I am of two minds about Platinum Game’s Bayonetta. On one hand I can’t believe how a videogame with so many forehead slapping design choices aced both Edge and Famitsu. The oddities associated (and lambasted) in Japanese game design are widely prevalent; a lengthy narrative presented as essential yet constructed of absolute nonsense, autosaves that force the player to either watch a cu...[Read More]

I was holding off on this video so that PR didn’t think we were out of our minds.   Okay, so we are.  But regardless, wouldn’t you have done the same thing?   This is how we deal with the hooker pushers in Vegas: Smash Bros. BONUS: Which one of our responses did not come from Smash Bros? {hwdvs-player}977{/hwdvs-player}   Yes, we are professional. SUPER PROFESSIONAL AND SERIOUS.

Sometime last summer Ubisoft held some sort of press event that entailed flying a bunch of game writers over the Atlantic and into Venice. The purported goal of the trip, aside from the typical schmoozing the press, was to boast about the historical allegiance of Assassin’s Creed 2’s architecture. I thought it was stupid and pretentious (though I will admit the obvious envy of our site...[Read More]