The War Of The Worlds Review (XBLA)

Game Review: The War of the Worlds (XBLA)
Release: October 21, 2011
Genre: Side Scroller
Developer: Other Ocean
Available Platforms: Xbox 360 (Ps3 later)
Players: 1
MSRP: 800 MS points ($10 US)
ESRB Rating: E10+ (Everyone 10 and up)
Website: www.waroftheworldsgame.com

It is only appropriate that our review of “The War of the Worlds” should post at Halloween time, the anniversary of the historic 1938 radio broadcast, which like this game, was an adaptation of the 1898 H. G. Wells book of the same name. This re-imagining is quite different from the radio broadcast or the popular movies, all set in New Jersey or California. Staying far truer to the book, this telling is set in London. For those who are unfamiliar, the story is about an invasion of Earth by Martians who are hell-bent on eradicating the human species.

“The War of the Worlds is a dark and breathtaking new vision of the classic H.G. Wells novel, retold as a single player side-scrolling action-adventure, narrated by the acclaimed and distinguished actor, Patrick Stewart. Set in London, the gameplay narrative parallels the timeline and events from the 1953 movie adaptation, but introduces a new story arc, characters, locations, and sub-plots. With gameplay paying homage to classic cinematic platformers such as Flashback, Out of This World and Prince of Persia, the game follows the exploits of an unknown everyman struggling to escape the Martian invasion of London and rescue his family. Forced to think through insurmountable odds, players will outsmart an army of alien tripods, spiders and drones as they make their way through a landscape of total devastation.” – Other Ocean

The game focuses on the survival efforts of Arthur Clarke as he searches for his family while the World crashes down around him. Our first glimpse of the invasion is in the background at he rides on a passenger train during the opening title sequence. Brightly lit meteors streak down from the sky, one finding the tracks ahead, derailing the train, and so our journey begins as we climb from the wreckage.

Even though the overall arc of the game is to find Clarke‘s family, the main focus is on trying to survive from moment to moment. You will leap from car to car, hide behind walls, dodge heat rays and outsmart alien probes in traditional side-scroller style. What is not so traditional is the level of difficulty that this game quickly ramps up to, and sustains after the first few chapters. As the story progresses it is obvious that our protagonist is not nearly as agile as the level designers had hoped, making him feel heavy, clumsy, and slow to respond.

One could not hope for a better narrator than Patrick Stewart whose theatre trained voice breathes life into the classic words of this tale. The story is told over top of the action as it happens, much like an audio book in sync with the events of the game. The artwork is dark and dreary composed of mainly black and white artwork with colored highlights. At first glance the game looks and feels much like Limbo due to the layered animation with out of focus action in the foreground, but the game mechanics set it far apart from the accessible likes of Limbo.

With such a widely loved intellectual property such as The War of the Worlds combined with the worldly voice talent of Patrick Stewart, it would seem that this game should be aimed at a rather broad audience. Unfortunately, poor controls and highly frustrating level design that calls for more accuracy than the main character can provide breaks this game completely. Add to this a useless checkpoint system that causes you to repeat long sequences of tedious maneuvers over and over again and you have a potential candidate for worst game of the year.

Be aware, downloading and playing the demo will give you a sense of the beautiful artwork in the game but fails to expose you to the any of the difficulty since the first couple chapters are there to establish the story and acclimate you to the controls. Just past the end of the demo the difficulty scales up ruthlessly.

Although The War of the Worlds is seductive; It’s wonderful to listen to and beautiful to look at, and the demo seems completely reasonable, this game is not fun at all. Casual gamers should steer completely clear of this game which must have been forged in the pits of hell for only the most masochistic of gamers with a consuming need to achieve the impossible. For the few extreme hardcore gamers that like this sort of thing, this game will provide you with hours of joy and mental anguish. For the rest of you, do yourself a favor; satisfy your craving for The War of the Worlds with the free book from Project Gutenburg  or the public domain audio book at LibraVox.

• Classy artistic presentation
• Perfect narration by Patrick Stewart
• Impossibly difficult chapters
• Frustrating lack of checkpoints
• Sluggish controls
• Satan approved – 100% fun free

Final Score: 2 out of 10

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Blackwell Deception Review (PC)

Game Review: Blackwell Deception
Release: October 12, 2011
Genre: Retro Adventure
Developer: Wadjet Eye Games
Available Platforms: PC
Players: 1
MSRP: $14.99
ESRB Rating: Not Rated
Website: www.wadjeteyegames.com/blackwell-deception.html

Wadjet Eye Games brings us another retro Sierra Online styled adventure game. You might recall, I took a look at Gemini Rue some time ago, and took issue with some of the user interface choices as well as the pricing. The opportunity has come along to review another Wadjet Eye game, and am I glad I did.

In The Blackwell Deception, the fourth installment in the Blackwell series, you can play as either Rosangela Blackwell, a young, quirky psychic that can see and talk to ghosts, or you can play as Joey, her ghostly partner. Each have their own set of abilities (or lack thereof) . Rosa (or Red as Joey calls her because of her hair) has access to a smart-phone with a note pad to store all of you clues, internet access so you can use the Oogle search engine, e-mail and of course, make phone calls. Rosaalso can carry inventory items where Joey cannot. In fact, being a ghost, Joey can’t touch anything, or talk to anyone except Rosa and other ghosts. The controls have been reduced to left clicking to interact with something and right clicking to look at something which makes for a very intuitive interface to find your way through the locations looking for clues and solving puzzles.

Together, this unlikely pair help ghosts to “cross over” by aiding them in letting go of life and accepting that they have died. It’s all a bit “Nancy Drew” – in a good, whodunit kind of way. The story doesn’t get bogged down in forensic details or the like, instead, the focus is on the relationships between the characters and what the ghosts are holding on to in this world, keeping them here.

The Blackwell Deception has the retro graphics, animation, and simplified controls to put it into the commercial class of retro games. There is nothing amateur here. The jazzy noire vibe of the music is perfect for the game and complements Joey’s dated, Rat-Pack attitude nicely. With full character voicing combined with seasoned writing, the characters are lively and believable. Even though the subject matter deals with murder and drug abuse, the game is mild enough for teens without worry. The spiritual content is not preachy and the death is not gory; instead, the star of this game is the story and its characters.

All of the conversations are also point and click, making dialog nicely guided to keep you on track. Following all of the threads often pays off in either info gained or a funny remark. If you ever loose track of what you need to do next, just having Rosa talk to Joey to “plan their next move” will point you in the right direction. I found this to be rather nice in cases where I had missed a clue when examining a location.

The only issue I had with the game was getting my computer to support the antiquated 640 x 480 resolution required for the game; my video drivers just did not support it.  I did have a laptop that supported the correct resolution, so all was fine. If you are already into retro games, you are familiar with issues like this and their work-a-rounds. Just be aware that you may need to tweak your video drivers to run this. Just download the demo and try that first to be sure you are ready to run.

Overall, The Blackwell Deception makes me want to play all three of the previous Blackwell titles also. If you can get in on the pre-order that goes through October 16, 2011, you can order a DVD with all four Blackwell games on it for $24.99 – A great deal, otherwise, you can grab Blackwell Deception for $14.99 and get The Blackwell Convergence for free. If you missed the “pre-order DVD, there is a Blackwell pack with the earlier three Blackwell games for $19.99. With all of these purchasing deals and options, there’s no reason to avoid getting the free demo and checking out this game.

• Excellent Voice acting was terrible
• Characters Well Developed
• Enjoyable and Compelling Story
• Perfect User Interface
• Possible Video Driver Issues

Final Score: 9 out of 10

You can follow Wadjet Eye Games on Twitter and Facebook.

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RAGE Review (Xbox 360)

Game Review: RAGE (Xbox 360)
Release: October 4, 2011
Genre: Action FPS / RPG Hybrid
Developer: id / Bethesda
Available Platforms: Xbox 360, PS3, PC
Players: 1-2 Local / 2-4 Online
MSRP: $59.99 US
ESRB Rating: M for Mature
Website: www.rage.com

RAGE is first person shooter pioneer, id software’s, latest entry into the gaming market place. This is their first game developed completely in-house since DOOM 3.  Let’s see how id did in meeting fan’s high expectations.

“After an asteroid impacts Earth, humanity attempts to rebuild. Sheltered in cryogenic lifeboats, survivors emerge years after impact to a devastated planet where some of mankind survived in struggling settlements or murderous bandit clans, while horrific mutants roam the dead cities. And a mysterious tyrannical government is on the hunt… for you.”

The game opens with a gorgeous cinematic of an asteroid approaching and striking the Earth. The next thing you know, your arc has opened, you awake from suspension, and you are the only survivor aboard your ark. You exit the arc and step into the post-apocalyptic steam-punkish Wasteland of RAGE.

The first minute playing this game left two impressions with me. The first was the amazing visuals.  RAGE is absolutely stunning visually.  The eye-candy is endless and in every polished detail.  The second was the glassy smooth movement controls. Everything is responsive and natural, the kind of integration that makes the controller vanish and puts you right in the game. Even the vehicle handling is excellent. The only drawback here, all racing in RAGE is third person with no ability to change your view.

Weapon selection is more along the lines of traditional FPS games, with just one of each type of weapon you will need.  Certain weapons can only be crafted from parts, such as sentry-bots and advanced wing-sticks (think smart boomerang made of three razor-sharp blades used to silently lop the heads off of enemies).  The inventory system is elegant and simple as it groups like items automatically and just shows you a total count or total value.

Geographically, there is one small settlement and two larger cities in RAGE. The settlement serves as a primer to introduce you to weapons, vehicles and the way missions and economics work in the game. Very soon you move on to the first real city, Wellspring, which serves as the central game hub for the first disc. Here is where most of the NPCs reside to provide missions and supplies, a vehicle garage and a race track. Subway Town provides basically the same resources for disc two.

In each city there are several gambling mini-games to be played in order to win (or lose) money:

• RAGE Frenzy - This is a Pokémon style card game.
• Five Finger Filet - This is a pattern / timing game.
• Tombstone - This is a pure game of chance using dice.
• Strum - This is a musical pattern game.

In addition to the mini games:

• Racing - Each the cities has a race track where you can compete in a variety of racing events.
• Mutant Bash TV - You are put into an arena and must survive waves of enemies.

Do not confuse the RAGE Wasteland with the Fallout Wasteland. RAGE is touted as an “open world” game, but it is not very open at all. The connections from the cities to the mission sites are called the Wasteland and it serves as roads and a small battleground for vehicular combat. Outside of the mission sites and the cities there just isn’t anything to explore. Even the mission levels are linear with no room to wander. Granted this is firstly a first person shooter, but the RPG elements of the game leave you wanting more as there are far fewer destinations and missions than in Fallout 3, New Vegas or Borderlands

The multi-player player portion of the game is a completely separate experience from the main campaign, meaning there is no multi-player campaign. Instead, there are separate stories called Wasteland Legends. These are separate storylines from the campaign and are based on some of the tall tales told in the wasteland. This is the only part of the game that supports split-screen play.  Why no split-screen racing?

Overall, there really is a ton of stuff to do in RAGE, and all of it controls as good as it looks, however, the RPG fan in me says there should have been more.  More story.  More locations.  More missions.  And this brings me back to where I started; expectations.  I expected the “open world” to be like Fallout and Borderlands, big and sprawling.  RAGE isn’t.

The story feels like a pilot episode to a much bigger story.  RAGE is clearly meant to be a franchise starter leaving a lot of places for the story go.  The multi-player part of RAGE is fun, but completely separated from the campaign portion of the game.  Even the multi-player racing feels tacked on, like an after-thought.

Taking into consideration these minor disappointments, RAGE is a fantastically made game that is a pleasure to play, nearly bug-less on consoles (there are video driver issues on PCs that AMD and Nvidia are working to resolve), and completely immersive.  My biggest problem with RAGE is wanting more.

• Visually Stunning
• Glassy Smooth Controls
• Even The Driving Is Excellent
• Detached Multi-player Experience
• Story Falls Short

Final Score: 9 out of 10

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SkyDrift Review (XBLA)

Game Review: SkyDrift (XBLA)
Release: September 7, 2011 (PC TBA)
Genre: Arcade Racing / Flight Simulation
Developer: Digital Reality
Available Platforms:  Xbox 360, PS3, PC
Players: 1 – 8 Online Multiplayer
MSRP: 1200 MS Points / $14.99 US
ESRB Rating:  E (10+)
Website: www.SkyDriftGame.com

Racing fans that are tired of driving cars will be thrilled with this new plane racing experience.  Ever wanted to fly an X-wing fighter through the trenches of the Death Star?  This is the next best thing.  SkyDrift puts you in control of 8 distinctively different racing planes to fly in thirty-three different racing events where you will race through industrial structures, caves and valleys in some of the fastest and smoothest flying machines I’ve ever controlled.

The game begins with a single plane available to you; additional planes are unlocked by completing events.  Each plane also has its own distinct characteristics for speed, agility and armor as well as four paint schemes to unlock, similar to the boats in Hydro Thunder.

SkyDrift’s racing events fall into three categories: Speed Races, Power Races and Survivor Races.

Speed Races as the name states are all about speed.  Along the race course there are boost rings that give you a speed boost when you fly through them.  The object is to hit as many rings as possible to maintain top speed.

Power Races have the usual group of power-ups scattered throughout the course that include missiles, machine guns, EMP bursts, mines and shields.  A nice touch in SkyDrift is that picking up a second power-up of the same type makes that particular weapon of shield more powerful.  Also, any unwanted power-ups can be converted into boost at any time to give you an extra push when needed.  Boost is also earned by performing stunts and flying low to the ground.  Overall this mode feels much like Blur in airplanes.

Survivor Races are eliminator style races with a timer that ticks down, and when the time runs out, whoever is in last place is eliminated,  All of the features of the Power Races apply here also, so if you can’t pass your opponents, just shoot ‘em down.

The courses are beautifully designed and rendered making them worthy of a slow, losing fly through just to take them all in.  Some events use the same courses, but in reverse, helping to keep the environment familiar but the courses fresh.  Three difficulty levels keep the game accessible to flyers of all ages even though it is rated for 10+; my four-year old loves flying in SkyDrift.

The best thing about SkyDrift is the controls.  They are not standard “flight simulator” controls, as these are simpler and very intuitive, making control of the planes an absolute joy.  The left stick controls up, down, left and right while the right stick controls the orientation of the plane.  For example, to make a sharp right turn, just push both sticks to the right and the plane executes a knife-edge turn through a narrow gap in the canyon.  This keeps the turns fast, exciting and fun to execute.  The third person view from behind the plane, as opposed to a cockpit view, is key to making the controls feel so smooth, because the controls are always relative to your view (the horizon) and not the plane, so up is always up, even if your plane is inverted.

The online multi-player allows up to eight to race at once and I did not notice any lag when compared to playing the single player campaign.  The only difference is that real players are a little easier to beat than the AI racers in the later levels.  My only wish is that it had a local split-screen multi-player mode.

The only thing I found irritating is that when I would stray a little off course, the game would “nudge” me back onto the course as if I were flying in an invisible tunnel.  Many time this would “nudge” me directly into an obstacle I was trying to fly around.  As I got better at following the intended course of each race, this problem went away.

My final word is to go buy this game.  It is a gorgeous, fresh take on the familiar power-up racing genre that is fast and fun without frustration.

• Well designed controls
• Exciting courses and flight paths
• Up to eight players online
• No local co-op

Final Score: 9 out of 10

You can follow SkyDrift here on Facebook and Twitter.

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Dead Island Review (Xbox 360)

Game Review: Dead Island (Xbox 360)
Release: September  6, 2011
Genre: Zombie Action RPG
Developer:  Techland / Deep Silver
Available Platforms:  Xbox 360, PS3, PC
Players: 1 – 4 Online Co-op
MSRP: $59.99 US (Consoles) / $49.99 US (PC)
ESRB Rating: M for Mature
Website:  www.DeadIsland.com

Dead Island takes place on the Island of Banoi, in and around the luxurious Royal Palms Resort.  A mysterious and contagious zombie outbreak sends the entire island into chaos.  Among the guests at the resort, only four are immune to the virus, and they are called upon by all of the other survivors to risk their lives to go find everything from gasoline to Champagne.  The main quest is to escape the island before an approaching monsoon hits.

Playing as one of the immune, you explore the huge open-world island, finding weapons, looting luggage, drinking energy drinks (health packs)… and killing zombies.  Each of the four playable characters has a special skill (guns, blunt weapons, blades and throwing weapons) and just enough back-story to explain why they have their specific skill.

The huge island is divided into areas (resort, city, jungle, etc.) and access to each consecutive area is earned  by completing quests.  Weapons are literally everywhere and degrade with use, so scavenging for money to pay for repairs and supplies to modify your weapons are an important part of the game.  Fortunately there is no karma system in the game, so feel free to loot everyone’s luggage, steal medical supplies and help yourself to whatever you want in the church.

Dead Island is a culmination of some of the best features of many great games.  Imagine a Franken-game created with parts taken from the following:

• Sound design from Dead Space
• Four playable co-op characters from Left 4 Dead
• A huge open world map unlocked a section at a time from Borderlands
• Lots of NPCs with scavenging quests from Fallout 3
• Assorted zombie types from Left 4 Dead
• Skill trees from Borderlands
• Weapon mods from Dead Rising
• Vehicles from Far Cry 2

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