Category Archives: Reviews

Is it good? Is it bad? Will it make me want to beat someone with my controller? This is the place to find out.

Dust: An Elysian Tail Review


How many men does it take to make a good game? Well, lately the answer has often been dozens, or just one. Dean Dodrill has just released his game Dust: An Elysian Tail, and I have to say that I, for one, am impressed.

The first thing I noticed when starting Dust: An Elysian Tail is how beautiful and detailed the world looks. Everything you’ll find here has been hand drawn; character sprites/ animations, enemies, environments and even cut-scenes (both of them). This might just be one of the best looking games I’ve ever played. The environments you travel through include forests, underground caves and snow covered mountains, each with their own look and feel, and each as stunning as the last. Character animations are inspired as well, and even if there aren’t many, I never grew tired of looking at them.

These visuals help portray one of the best stories I have ever witnessed in a video game. You play as Dust, a rabbit-like creature who has been woken by a talking sword, called Ahrah, and its guardian, a nimbat called Fidget. Dust doesn’t know who he is, where he came from, or what he is supposed to do with the sword. Ahrah explains that he was summoned by Dust and the trio set off to figure out who Dust is and why he summoned Ahrah. Throughout your journey you will experience happy moments, to incredibly sad moments, to funny moments, to sad moments and then of course happy once again, in a story that will be one to remember (and experience again on one of the game’s four difficulties). Dust’s story will bring out all your emotions and continually expresses that it’s not what you are that define you, it’s your actions that define you (and yes, there is a chance you will shed a tear).

The chemistry between the three main characters is wonderful to listen to. This is thanks to great writing and exceptional voice acting. The world of Dust: An Elysian Tail is populated by some very unique characters, all based off of some form of animal. These characters range from a Koala with an Australian accent to a strange creature with a hill-billy accent. Most characters are either part of the main story or offer side quests. The side quests all feel relevant and all have their own short stories that further add to the believability of the world.

Accompanying the voice acting is a phenomenal musical score that does an excellent job of setting the mood of the environments. Guitar riffs are often heard during combat, soothing orchestral pieces are used during exploration, to complement the amazing visuals, and the game even featured some eerie music while in a haunted mansion. Although music pieces will be heard more than once, I never thought, “Aww, man! That amazing guitar riff is playing again while I’m shredding (maybe pun intended) through enemies!”

OK, so with incredible visuals and a heartfelt story, does the gameplay complete the trifold of greatness for this game? Simply put, yes, yes it does. Although simple to learn, once you fully master Dust’s moves you will feel like a powerhouse! Sure it’s possible to button mash your way through most of the fights, but once you get towards the end of the game, it’s time to start using different strategies to take out some of the enemies. Combat pretty much involves killing enemies by using your sword or by using Fidgets projectiles that you can make extra powerful by combining them with one of your own skills. You will have to be on alert during fights though because, believe it or not, enemies attack back! You can either parry or dodge their attack, which ends up being a necessity later in the game. Something interesting to mention is the fact that characters in the game sort of acknowledge that you are playing a game. The first time you meet a monster, Ahrah tells you to practice everything you have learned, while Fidget yells, “Mash the buttons! Mash the buttons!”

There are a few boss battles in Dust: An Elysian Tail, but some of them don’t really feel like boss battles. Most of them only have one attack and it can be really repetitive to kill them. If you knew what I knew, though, the easiness of the boss battles can be justified. I do offer much praise for the final boss battle but, once again, talking about anything to do with it would probably spoil the plot.

Exploration in Dust can go both ways. Firstly, there are so many hidden secrets and treasures that usually require small puzzle solving skills to unlock. It’s also worthy to add that a lot of the hidden treasures are located in inaccessible areas that you will have to go back to once you have unlocked the required abilities. These abilities are unlocked by progressing through the main story. Dust’s pacing is great too because you spend just the right amount of time in each area before a new area is opened up. Dodrill got Dust’s movements just right, they don’t feel stiff but they don’t feel floaty either. This makes platforming and combat fun to do.

There happen to be a couple of things that annoyed me when it came to exploration. The first one was the save points. If you die while venturing through the areas, unless you have a revival stone, you will have to load your last save. I did not die that often, playing on normal, but when I did, I had to go back about three squares. I’ve worked out that this was roughly five to ten minutes of travelling to get back to where I was (where I nearly died a second time). Another problem I have with the save points is that sometimes they were in places that were out of the way. I suppose the moral of that story is to not die or make sure you have revival stones. I have to note that you will probably be doing a fair bit of back tracking through environments if you want to find the hidden treasures (luckily, they are marked out for you on the map).

My final, tiny, problem with the game involved one of Fidget’s projectiles. You start with an air projectile, unlock a lightning projectile by beating a boss and find a fire projectile during your exploration. This fire projectile is needed for a late game puzzle but I never found it on my first run through the area. After running around for ages, I went back to one of the earlier areas and finally found it. I just think I should have been prevented from going any further earlier in the game until I found it..

There are some light RPG elements in Dust: An Elysian Tail. You earn experience by killing monsters and building combos. The higher the combo, the more bonus experience you get (one of the most rewarding achievements I’ve ever received came from this game. The achievement is to get a combo of 1000+, and it’s no easy feat). With this experience, you can choose to upgrade your health, attack, defence or the power of fidget’s projectiles. Along with levelling up, there is a small crafting system, and shops that sell food and armour.

Final Comments:

Words cannot be used to describe Dust: An Elysian Tail. I urge you all to go and find some gameplay videos, or just go and buy the game to see how amazing Dust looks, sounds and plays. There is no definitive thing that makes Dust: An Elysian Tail a standout, they all contribute to create one of the best experiences I’ve ever had! With four difficulty levels, the last of which is actually quite challenging, and some challenge arenas hidden around the world, Dust: An Elysian Tail is a great buy that you won’t be able to put down. The pacing is brilliant and the story is one of the best I’ve ever played in a game. It took me roughly 12 hours to finish the game on normal difficulty. I hope we can see more from Dean Dodrill in the future!

Rating: 9.5/10

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Gotta Conquer ‘Em All – Pokemon Conquest


If you enjoy Strategy Role-Playing Games (SRPGs), Pokemon or need to kill a lot of time, you will love this game. Pokemon Conquest is brought to us by Nintendo, developed by Tecmo Koei. The new series is essentially a cross-over between Pokemon and Nobunaga’s Ambition, Koei’s original SRPG series. Upon first glance this game might strike the hardcore fans of either series as a pretty odd combination, and while it may look that way, it’s definitely far from it. For only $30 I went into this game with somewhat standard expectations seeing as it is still a Pokemon title and I was definitely blown away with the quality.

Male and Female heroes with an Eevee

You start the game like most Pokemon games, choosing the gender and name of your hero. The plot follows your own hero (or heroine) and their Eevee through the journey across a brand new continent known as Ransei as you try to conquer each of the 17 kingdoms, dethroning their warlords along the way. You’re accompanied by another Warlord known as Oichi who uses a Jigglypuff in battle. Together you will build up your army by recruiting warlords and warriors, expanding your army and evolving your Pokemon much like the main series. The simplest way to explain it would be comparing warlords to gym leaders and warriors to trainers, but they’re recruitable for you to use at your disposal.

One of the most intriguing things about this game is linking with other Pokemon. There are approximately 200 in the game for you to discover, but certain warlords and warriors link more effectively with different Pokemon. For example, the main hero of the game “perfect links” with Eevee; so keeping him and his evolutions around as your partners would be ideal. Approximately 200 warriors can also be found as well, so the combinations are nearly endless, so get out there and start befriending people and Pokemon.

Linking with Tepig!

The battle system in this game is highly addictive and enjoyable for fans of this type of turn-based strategy gameplay. It’s comparable to that of Fire Emblem in the sense that you select your party and equipment before heading into battle. Once you’re on the battlefield your team of 6 Pokemon act as your battle units. They all have different stats such as Attack, Defense and Range as well as Pokemon and warrior-specific abilities. In Fire Emblem you have the weapon and magic triangle, and of course in Pokemon Conquest you have type-advantages (each type represented by 1 of the 17 kingdoms throughout Ransei). There’s nothing more satisfying than composing a team of fire Pokemon and trouncing the Grass type-oriented kingdom with ease. Everything such as evolutions and leveling up make their appearance in this game as well; leveling is represented by a Pokemon’s link percentage with their warrior, which will increase after doing battle, mining for gold, etc.

After completing the main story, which should only take you about 5-7 hours, you are able to continue playing with the other Warlords as your main characters, starting a new story from their point of view. Some of them take place directly after the main story, and some of them are just new stories altogether. They’re called “Special Episodes” and in total there are 34 of them. After completing the main story and only around 9 special episodes my play time was clocked in around 45 hours. Surely that proves that this game is well worth the cheap price tag as you’ll be playing for hours upon hours. Collecting everything and evolving all the warriors and warlords perfect link Pokemon in this game is insanely time consuming but well worth it once you have multiple powerhouse final-stage evolution Pokemon roaming your army. Legendaries also make their appearances in Pokemon Conquest and are triggered from various things such as Wi-Fi events, to special in-game requirements. It’s no easy task to catch ‘em all in this one!

All in all it’s a very enjoyable experience and will keep you hooked for hours. I’d definitely recommend picking this one up if you have a DS.

Max Payne 3: A Pain Free Review


“This was like Baghdad with g-strings.”

The cynical but humorous alcoholic hero Max Payne is back in action after 9 years of waiting.  With Rockstar’s ”biggest and boldest marketing effort thus far,” standards and hopes were high for the game. After  multiple release delays since 2009, the wait has well paid off.

Max Payne 3 is a third person shooter with a large emphasis on cinematic and film noire elements. The series after all, is credited with being the pioneer of “bullet time.” The developer Rockstar, is known for notable titles such as the Grand Theft Auto series, Red Dead series, and L.A Noire. True to form, Rockstar delivered an incredible title.

Display: The game’s cinematics are rendered from the actual gameplay engine, making the transition between gameplay and cinematic seamless. Being that the game is cut scene heavy, the style of the cinematics is not a strain on the player.

The in house developed RAGE engine is absolutely gorgeous, and complements the cinematics extremely well. Characters are completely realistic with normal looking facial and body movements. In fact, Rockstar used motion capture technology on the voice actor for Max Payne, James McCaffery to make him look the most realistic. Action sequences are fluid, and bullet time makes each gunshot and wound look pretty epic. My only criticism of the graphics would be the environments.  Despite the themed variety, all of them appear quite generic and foreboding. At least the environments match Max’s generally poor disposition.

Storyline: The point of the game. Max Payne 3 puts a massive emphasis on storyline when compared to most other shooters to date. The main character is frequently making internal monologues, and long cut scenes to show his drug addled sufferings and problems. The plot itself is enticing with many turns and twists. One really gets a feel for the main character and the other characters he encounters. Again, this is the film noire style of the game showing itself in prime.

Rockstar’s co-founder and president Sam Houser said of Max Payne  ”This is Max as we’ve never seen him before, a few years older, more world-weary and cynical than ever.” This is certainly true in the actual game. He is a dynamic, believable, sympathetic but sometimes overbearing character. In the era of AAA blockbuster first person shooters and broad audience titles, it is refreshing to see an actually good character as part of a game. Max Payne can get on ones nerves after a while though.

Without spoiling the plot however, I will make mention there is one major plot hole that hurts the story to a marginal degree. In fact, it’s so large that Ben Croshaw (known as Yahtzee from his Zero Puncuation series) says that “one could drive a glacier through it.” If you’ve gotten at least halfway through the game, you will know exactly what I am talking about.

Gameplay: The game is a third person shooter with emphasis on use of cover and bullet time. Bullet time is where the player executes a slow motion action (such as diving or rolling) in order to gain a slight advantage over his foes…and look totally badass while doing it. At first glance, the idea of bullet time would seem either overpowered or too much like a quicktime event. In Max Payne 3, it is in fact neither. Bullet time has a very limited use time, and if you don’t execute it correctly, you can easily find yourself dead. It takes skill and timing to maximize kills using this mechanic.

The weapons doing the shooting in this third person shooter, known as guns seemed disappointing to me. Choices are essentially limited to assault rifle, shotgun, pistol or dual wield pistols. Even though there were apparently numerous different guns, they all felt generic and basically the same to me.

The singleplayer campaign does get progressively difficult as it moves on. A few mini boss fights appear in the form of a helmeted mercenary wielding a seemingly infinite ammo machine gun. Mainly though, the firefights just become more complex and filled with more enemies to kill.

Bottom Line: A top-notch quality title that is one of the few currently on the market that I would say is worth the $60 price tag. If you can endure some of Max’s more annoying moments, and find your own reconciliation with the plot hole, I promise you will enjoy this title. I have not played such a quality third person shooter since Deus Ex: Human Revolution. The game is a rare modern example of how a big blockbuster title and franchise can be made with high quality.

“When had I ever needed to invite trouble in? It always found me, no matter where I hid.”

Diablo III: A Comprehensive Review

diablo

Most of the time when one tells you to “go to hell,” its not considered to be the nicest thing to hear. In this instance however, I would not only tell all of you to go to hell, but that you must go to hell.

The Diablo franchise is one of the biggest fantasy RPG franchises out there rivaled only by The Elder Scrolls Series. The last title, Diablo II was a massive success and really set the bar high for the sequal Diablo III. So did Diablo III hit the mark?

Definitely. Not only did the title live up to the spirit of its predecessor, it exceeded it in many ways. The visuals are excellent, the action amazing, and the overall presentation of the game is exquisite.

Storyline: 

With a significant back-story to work on, Diablo III throws in to the world of Sanctuary, and again centers around the unlucky town of Tristram. The game starts out with a “fallen star” that lands square on the cathedral of Tristam. The character you play comes to investigate the strange object. Without revealing plot details I can tell you this: I found the story line good, but slightly disappointing and convoluted.

If you don’t know anything about the back-story to the Diablo series at all, I would highly recommend doing some reading before playing. It is hard to catch up on all the different “Lords of Hell,” Angels and others. That being said, I still found the story to be not as good as it really could of been. It wasn’t predictable but the plot twists weren’t as surprising as I thought they would be. Also, it didn’t vary much from the “kill this evil lord dude in this location.” Great story-line but could have been handled a lot better.

Visuals:

The visuals are excellent for a third person RPG with an isometric viewpoint. The interaction with the environment is a nice addition, and your characters look awesome as they acquire gear and levels. Ability graphics are extremely well made. When I drop a meteor on a demon’s head, it really looks like a huge sphere of fire and brimstone is raining death upon the land. Blizzard’s in-house graphics engine does justice to Diablo III. The enviroments have a great appearnce as well.

The game’s four acts take you from haunted countryside, to desert, to castle under siege and a trip to hell, to heaven itself. The monsters and feel of each act is definitely distinctive. When I am in the Hell part of Act 3, i feel like i’m in hell. The same applies to all of the other environments as well. An epic feel accompanies the areas of the game especially Heaven and Hell.

Overall, I would say the visuals of Diablo III are excellent. Most people criticise the game for its similar look and feel to Diablo II, but that’s the point. Blizzard obviously would never diverge from the model of isometric hack-and-slash. To ask anything else from them would ruin the franchise outright.

Gameplay:

Diablo III stayed true to being a hack-and-slash RPG. Much left mouse button mashing is to be had while playing this game. Diablo III includes 5 distinct classes just like Diablo II but with some key differences.

Firstly, each class in Diablo III has a unique resource instead of the traditional mana. For example, The Barbarian uses fury which is generated in combat and degenerates over time if not used.

More importantly, the traditional skill trees have been removed in favor of skill runes. A skill rune is a specific modifier on an ability. The wizard for example can modify his/her magic missile to slow enemies or hit multiple enemies. It sounds like the options for unique builds has been lessened by the introduction of skill runes but the opposite could not be truer. Each skill has 5 distinct skill runes and each class has a few dozen abilities. The possibilities here are endless. The swapping of skill runes is a breeze as opposed to the old system having to reset entire skill trees. The abilities themselves are incredibly varied as well.

Speaking on difficulty, it widely varies act to act. Act 1 is a breeze, Act 2 is the hardest in my opinion, and in Acts 3 and 4, you feel like an unstoppable badass. When you beat the game first time around it doesn’t just end there as well. You will be around level 30 the first time you beat the game. You can beat it three more times on three more successively difficult modes, Nightmare, Hell and Inferno. The four difficulties greatly increases the replayability of the game. The encounters get more complex as well.

Each game map is randomly generated with random mini bosses (monsters with yellow or purple names), dungeons and mini quests. Each play through feels pretty different from the next but you get a sense of been there done that after a while. Evem singleplayer and multiplayer aspects are totally unique as well.

In Diablo III Bizzard has opted for a holistic approach to the expierences of single and multi player. The constant online connection requirement allows for anyone who is anyone to instantly jump into my solo campaign and help me if I am stuck on a certain part. Most people criticize this aspect of the release but I think its genius, and its great for the player in the long run.

Conclusion: 

Diablo III is an amazing gaming experience loaded with intense action, an interesting storyline, and a classic hack and slash feel while still being modern and up to date. Go to hell. I guarantee you will not regret the experience.

Unable to complete the trifecta, Game of Thrones disappoints.

18499_game_of_thrones

Looks great, right? Well, don’t get too used to it.

In just five days Game of Thrones will be released in North America, and already the reviews are pouring in. Many have gotten their hands on a copy already, and, well, you just might want to cancel that pre-order.

In case you don’t know, Game of Thrones is a highly successful TV show based on the series of books (A Song of Ice and Fire) by George R.R. Martin. It takes place in a fictional world where several high powered lords fight for the power of the iron throne to rule the kingdoms. Personally, I am a huge fan of the series in both forms, and hoped to be a fan of the third. Unfortunately, no matter how much it pains me to say it, I’m utterly disappointed.

In one of the most important aspects of the game, the story, Game of Thrones delivers surprisingly well. Game of Thrones follows two main characters, Mors Westford and Alester Sarwyck, one who has taken the Black (a small army that protects the north of the realm and is made up mostly of criminals and bastards), the other a man returning to his family after abandoning them 15 years ago. The stories twist and turns are quite incredible and much more epic than that of the average RPG. Unfortunately, the presentation of this story does not bode so well.

Game of Thrones has the potential to be a landmark RPG through its engaging story and characters, but almost all of them look and sound horrible, along with the rest of the game. The voice acting is laughable, the graphics usually look like they’re compatible with a Nintendo 64, and every once in a while you’ll find yourself having a conversation with a wall. So even though the story was written beautifully, it would take much dedication to get any enjoyment out of it due to the horrible presentation.

However, there is more to this game than just the story, but I wish there wasn’t. A quick look at the game shows a surprisingly deep combat system with a great number of ways to fight you’re opponents, but in reality it feels more like beating someone with a stick. Of course there are some cool magic powers like walking through walls and occasionally floating into the unknown as you defy gravity, but turns out that isn’t supposed to happen.

After seeing all this game has to offer, I felt like this was a quick game made for marketing purposes by a team of about five over the course of a few months, and I was fine with that. Unfortunately, that isn’t quite how it was made. It was made by a full dedicated team over the course of about 7 years. To be honest, other than the story, I have absolutely no idea how it could have taken more than one.

So, will you enjoy you’re experience in Game of Thrones? Unlikely. Perhaps you’ll be able to enjoy the story if you are that starved for more from A Song of Ice and Fire, but for the rest of us it’s probably best to stick to the books and the show. For anyone else, let this post be as close as you get to the game, unless of course you just need a good laugh.