Reviews & Articles

Third-party peripherals can be a tough sell for the discriminating gamer. Uncomfortable grips, superfluous functions and misshapen buttons have long been the calling card of off-brand controllers — which is why I found Performance Designed Products’ E3 spread especially refreshing.

You have to give good old Sonic some credit. He never gives up. Sega is hard at work on two new games starring everyone’s favorite hedgehog, and one of them is for the Wii: Sonic Colors.

I like strategy games. However, I am just not any good at them. I don’t know what it is. Perhaps I just build too many structures. Maybe I just do not know how to effectively use my units. Or maybe it is because I take too darn long completing a mission. But there is one strategy game I am rather excited about: Valkyria Chronicles II for the PSP.

When I first heard of Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light, I confess I was not impressed. The series Miss Croft is associated with is well-known for its exploration, gunplay and platforming. Creating a game that would be downloadable didn’t seem practical to me due to the nature of the gameplay. I didn’t expect to get so excited after playing the demo at E3.

How do you feel about storybooks? I suspect that I’m like most people: It is something geared for children. It is meant to be didactic. Xseed is hard at work to prove that maybe, just maybe, everyone should pay a little more attention to that style of storytelling. Welcome to the world of Ivy the Kiwi? for the Wii and DS.

I am a pretty picky guy. I admit it. However, being picky is a good thing. It has allowed me to cull items that are worth mine and other people’s time. I was fortunate enough to meet with Alex Verrey, a public relations representative of Mad Catz. He was excited to show me some of the products his co-workers are working hard on. This article previews upcoming peripherals for your favorite systems, Rock Band 3 and the upcoming Call of Duty: Black Ops.

I do not remember the exact day the original Final Fantasy game was released. I was only 3 years old at the time. I was only aware of Mario’s romp on top of mushrooms and Link’s journey through the countryside. Storytelling during that time was basic at best and nonexistent at worst. But it wasn’t the games’ fault: Cartridges back then had only so much memory available to store all of the information. It is not like today; a single CD has well over 800 MB available. Well, Square-Enix is working hard to take us back to the “good ol’ days” of gaming when it was all about games being light-hearted adventures. That’s what I thought of when I saw Final Fantasy: The 4 Heroes of Light for the Nintendo DS.

A good pair of headphones can be hard to find. Luckily, NOX Audio was at E3 to show off two pairs of headphones specially designed to deliver clear, crisp audio for Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and any mobile device you’d care to name.

Did you know that the majority of people have a “sense” of rhythm? This is seen every day in the fluidity of our speech and general movement. It is not just limited to music and dance. It is a part of our everyday lives. With this in mind, let me introduce you to Gabrielle's Ghostly Groove for the Nintendo DS.

How would you feel about a visit to the jungle? Would you be happy or sad or angry? City Interactive was excited to show us gameplay of its first-person-shooter, Sniper: Ghost Warrior for the Xbox 360.

I was lucky enough to grab a seat for the E3 demo of Call of Duty: Black Ops. And just like its predecessors, it does the job of putting you in control of the action from start to finish. As I funneled into the small room to view the demo, I was eager to see something spectacular.

Hearing the title Harvest Moon usually puts a massive grin on my face. It takes me back to my Super Nintendo days. When most games focused on and continue to focus on violence, Harvest Moon was a breath of fresh air. It taught gamers about the joy of gardening and chilling out. Years later, I got my hands on Rune Factory: Frontier. It was a blast. Now, Natsume is trying to outdo itself with its upcoming DS game: Rune Factory 3: A Fantasy Harvest Moon.

Many will admit Sonic the Hedgehog didn’t make the transition to the third dimension as gracefully as he could have and that his oeuvre of subsequent starring titles has been of inconsistent quality at best. However, Sonic Colors, his latest next-gen adventure, presents itself as a potent collage of what has inarguably worked for the blue blur over these past 12 years.

I defy anyone who says the Wii cannot handle a traditional first-person-shooter. It is unfair to judge a genre on a console that does not have many games for it. Thankfully, the creators of The Conduit are hard at work on a sequel that seems to outshine the original in every shape and form.

Mentor Interactive is a small publisher looking to make its mark on the learning games part of the gaming industry. So far it seems to be doing very well. Most of the titles, such as My Virtual Tutor, are all built for the DS platform, which is good for parents actually concerned with what their child is playing.

At an E3 inundated with alternative control interfaces, one of the most potentially groundbreaking pieces of technology wasn’t even on the show floor. I met with NeuroSky’s Vice President of Marketing and Business Development David Westendorf, in a crowded café at the Los Angeles Convention Center. David had something in his bag he wanted to show me.

Is it too bold of me to assume that you have already played the original Puzzle Quest to death? It is a very popular game due to the fusion of matching jewels and light role-playing elements. In fact, I bought it for my sister for her birthday two years ago. She still plays it to this day. Now the story continues with Puzzle Quest 2, which is available for the Nintendo DS and Xbox Live Arcade. I was fortunate enough to play a bit of the XBLA version at E3 before it launched.

Konami practically perfected the side-scrolling action game with the release of Castlevania: Symphony of the Night for the original PlayStation. Since then, they’ve tweaked and added to the formula with several portable titles for the GameBoy Advance and Nintendo DS. Now, Castlevania: Harmony of Despair takes all that and combines it into one tempting package.

In my visit to E3, the highlight of the show, for me, was without question Firaxis and 2K Games Sid Meier’s Civilization V. From the ground up, they’ve created an experience that is once again going to be unprecedented in its genre of videogame. The graphics are bonny, and the gameplay is smooth with stellar animations and water effects. From what I’ve seen, it looks like they’ve bested themselves and made a great game better. And no, it’s not all due to those hexagonal tiles, though they aren’t to be overlooked!

XCOM is a first-person shooter with a story that will compel the player through the fear of the unknown. It takes place in 1950s America. This was a post-war era in which the majority of the country had a trust in the government. XCOM is an organization created to fight an unknown alien threat.

Monster hunting ... what is it that appeals to me? When others are disturbed, I can easily press forward. Plus, I can easily scare a congregation by mentioning how important it is to hunt vampires (have you seen Phelps’ teeth?). With this is mind, I present to you Castlevania: Lord of Shadows for Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.

It would be easy to suggest Lara Croft is looking for a fresh start with the upcoming PlayStation Network/Xbox Live Arcade title, Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light, but as creative director Dan Neuberger is quick to point out, “This is not Tomb Raider.” It’s something completely different.

Spellbound Entertainment really has something unique going for it in the development of Arcania: Gothic 4. There are no other role-playing games that are quite able to mimic its endearing flair for adventure, exploration, combat and accomplishment. Gothic’s open, realistic environments have lured me time and again to load up the game and explore deeper and deeper into its vast virtual world. Arcania: Gothic 4 looks to take all the great things I loved about previous Gothic games and makes them better and more accessible.

Harmonix and MTV games have pulled it off yet again, folks. I had a hands-on demo of Rock Band 3 with all the bells and whistles (yes, even the keyboard and the pro controller). All I can say is “wow.” The tech featured in that new pro guitar is amazing, and it will definitely spawn the next generation of great guitar players.

Shooters hold, on some level, an important place in a gamer’s heart. It was one of the first genres that smoothly made the transition from the arcade to the home. It is also one of the first genres that most gamers — especially those my age — played. Platinum Games now introduces Vanquish for the PlayStation 3.

Zombies really are the best videogame enemies, aren’t they? They can be bashed, sliced, shot and blown up — all without the slightest twinge of guilt. No one knows this better than Capcom, who presented the sequel to their ultraviolent zombie game, Dead Rising 2.

For years, the music rhythm genre has been dominated by two names: Guitar Hero and Rock Band. At E3, the new game on the block made a grand entrance, hoping to make a name for itself, and that name is Power Gig: Rise of the SixString.

For those “in the know,” Falcom is a very well-known publisher. It has created a series that is still popular in Japan. It is a company that could be considered to have “fathered” the Japanese role-playing genre. XSeed Games is excited to introduce the seventh installment in that series: Ys Seven for the PSP.

So, I was at the Activision booth at E3 2010 looking at the all-new, upcoming Spider-Man game Spider-Man: Shattered Dimensions. I must say, this game has the most appealing art style of every other Spider-Man game I have ever played or looked at. Not only that, the creators of the game have FINALLY decided to put other realms of the series into play — my favorite being the Spider-Man Noir universe.

TERA is a fantasy massively multiplayer online role-playing game that begins millennia ago. Players will fight to protect an alliance of the world’s surface regions known as the Valkyon Federation. At first glance TERA appears to be a typical fantasy MMO steeped in gorgeous visuals, but the rules here have drastically changed from your run-of-the-mill online RPG.