Gauntlet

Platform: PC

Genre: Action RPG

Release Date: September 23rd, 2014

Date Reviewed: September 29th, 2014

      Finally a new Gauntlet game. Well....it's a remake of the original Gauntlet. It feels and looks new. Gauntlet is back, better than ever for PC only. You can get this game for $19.99! Gauntlet plays just like the original. You start off with 4 classes (like in every Gauntlet) and you can choose between a Warrior, a Wizard, a Valkyrie, and a Ranger. Each class are unique and have their own strengths and weaknesses. when you start the game there is a mini tutorial that lets you try a quick demo of each class to get a feel for them. After you complete the tutorial you are able to choose what class you want to play as. After you choose the class it will give you an option to play with mouse and keyboard or a gamepad. The mouse and keyboard work well for the Ranger, Warrior and Valkyrie. However, the Wizard is a bit more complicated and is easiest with the gamepad. You start off in the Gauntlet and if you complete that Gauntlet you will be rewarded with piles and piles of gold and riches. However, as you play through that doesn't seem to be the case at all...

      A lot of people compare this game as a Diablo clone. They are all false. Gauntlet is it's own style and has it's own very unique gameplay. Gauntlet has never been a Diablo clone, it has been out for a long time and was always a different style of gameplay. Gauntlet is however an action RPG but there are no levels, no experience, no loot, just lots and lots of gold. In this version of Gauntlet you go through each dungeon to get the shard which lies at the very end. There are three zones, and each zone has 4 levels. Each level has 3 levels of it's own where the final area in each zone is always a big boss battle. Gauntlet is very challenging especially on the higher difficulties. With this Gauntlet you earn gold, you use this gold to buy items which you can equip two at a time with your "Q" and "E" keys. Each relic does something to help you out. It could be summon clones of yourself or create a crystal that taunts enemies and blowing up after it is damaged enough. You can also use the gold to upgrade these relic to make them more powerful.

The Mastery System.

       As I said earlier there is no loot. As a reward for completing certain difficulties you can unlock and purchase cosmetic armor for each class with gold. Each class also has a mastery tree. Every time you complete a mastery like "Kill 12,000 Monsters" you will earn a buff for that class. Each mastery starts off as bronze and goes to gold. One buff can increase your damage by 10%, others will give you more gold from breaking crates or vases. With Gauntlet there isn't ALOT of replay value but there is some. After you have completed the 4 hour game you can go back with different classes, play a higher difficulty to get more cosmetic armor, or even complete all of your masteries. Do not forget there is also co-op mode which is way more fun and frustrating playing with your friends.

       There is nothing really visually amazing about Gauntlet. If your PC can run it on Max setting which should not be a big problem for most PC's running this game then it will look pretty good. The visual effects are nice, the level designs are repetitive but look good. Each level is not randomized, it is always the same design which is okay but this day in age a lot of games are taking advantage of that technology. The music is fantastic as well as the audio effects. Has a classic Gauntlet sound to it which I think people who've played the original Gauntlet will enjoy immensely. Even when you pick up items it still used the classic sounds from the original game.

Big Bosses.

       Overall it is a good game, nothing spectacular but a great nostalgia trip and is much more greater with your friends to experience Gauntlet. Playing on normal you will complete it in about 4 hours. Play on hard or Unfair mode and it will take you much, much longer. Overall I give gauntlet......

GOOD GAME

7.5/10



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Mario Kart 8.

Console: Nintendo Wii U

Genre: Kart Racing

Release Date: May 30th, 2014

Date Reviewed: June 20th, 2014

I’ve been a big fan of the entire Mario Kart series since the very first one on the SNES. I have played and owned all of them at some point. I even enjoyed Mario Kart: Double Dash immensely for the Nintendo Gamecube. I just recently bought a Wii U to add to my collection and decided to buy the Mario Kart 8 Deluxe Edition. I to this day love my new Wii U and the games I have for it. Enjoy the review!

Gameplay:

Mario Kart 8 (MK8) is a breath of fresh air to the series. The very first Mario Kart game to be HD on the big screen! MK8 plays like any other Mario Kart game. There is a great new mechanic in MK8 that adds a “WOW” factor to the races. The new mechanic is anti-gravity. With this mechanic you can basically race in any direction! You drive upside down, around in loops, etc… This adds new dynamic to the Mario Kart. With this new mechanic they can create new and refreshing courses to future Mario Kart games. Even with Mario Kart 8, these courses are really enjoyable. MK8 also offers some new items to use against other racers. One of these new items is the boomerang. Using this item allows you to, you guessed it, throw a boomerang ahead or behind you and it comes right back to you. You can throw the boomerang up to 3 times in front of you or behind you. When you throw it, the boomerang will go ahead and then circle back to you allowing you to throw it again. Very handy item if you have the accuracy to use it like the green shell. Another new item added to the game is the “8” item. When you use this you will get 8 items that circle around you. Some of these items include a star, a bomb omb, a banana and a green shell. Whichever item is in front of you circling, you will use that item first.

Anti Gravity is the new Mechanic.

Coins make their way back into MK8 as well. These coins will help you unlock new karts, wheels, and parasails. There are a lot to unlock with these coins so make sure you collect them. You can collect up to 10 per race. Drift boosting also makes a return to MK8 but it is much easier to do this time around. Simply press and hold the right of left trigger to drift and continue to hold it to get a boost when you let go of it. There are also many different characters that you can unlock in MK8. Unlocking characters is extremely easy. By completing courses and earning cups you will always unlock a random character. Some of these characters include Rosalina, Toadette, and all of the Koopa Kids. The Wii U tablet can be used as a controller or can be used as a secondary screen which displays the race track and all of the racers. The same modes are back as well including Grand Prix, Versus, Time Trials, and Battle. All of these can be played online while Time Trials gives you uploaded ghost data to race against.

Online racing in MK8 is fantastic. The Wii version had a lot of lag issues while racing online. MK8 puts you up against 11 other people per race and I have not experienced any lagging or hiccups in my connection while racing. If you need something to do besides earning trophies in Grand Prix then give the online modes a try. It is great if you are racing competitively or just for fun. You start off with 1000 points and depending how well you do you will earn a certain amount of points. But if you’re coming in 10^th, 11^th, or 12^th all of the time then you will slowly start to lose points. It’s a good system especially if you are very good at the game. What I mean by that is Nintendo tries to promote “just have fun” feel online instead of “you have 18 losses and 2 wins, you suck”. This way people don’t really care and race to have fun. At the time of this review my score is at 1600.

Awesome character Roster.

Overall reaction for MK8 has been very positive for me. I am still having a lot of fun with the game just by racing online and with communities I know and enjoy playing with. I am very happy that you are able to join communities to play with your friends, live streamers, youtubers, etc… MK8 is very fun, beautiful, fast paced and cheerful as it always has been. This is a great edition to the series and probably one of the best since Mario Kart: 64.

Graphics/Visuals:

MK8 is the first Mario Kart game to enter the HD market with Wii U being able to do so now. The characters look so good; all of them have received a major HD upgrade. The character animations are very good as well. The biggest thing you will notice when playing MK8 are the environments of the courses. I have caught myself multiple times not paying attention to the races themselves because I was just amazed by the environment. They are very colorful, detailed and look outstanding.  The visual effects are extremely well done and the game runs incredibly smooth. No lag, no frame drops, just smooth gameplay all the way through.

Soundtrack/Music:

The second you load up MK8 the music starts up. The menu music is fast paced and sounds great. Gets your adrenaline going. The menu music has a nice rock feeling to it with small sections with an electric guitar. Compared to MK7, the music in MK8 is much much better. The new courses are no remixed versions of older tracks. All music in the new tracks is brand new editions to the series. The music in the older tracks from previous games are the same obviously but sound so much better and updated to today’s standards.

Menu music is sooooooooooo good.

Final Thoughts:

MK8 is a breath of fresh air. Yes it remains to be basically the same as the previous games but the game has been amped up to HD quality with a brand new anti-gravity mechanic that adds a lot to the game itself. With the amazing quality, to great online play MK8 is definitely a breath of fresh air. You will enjoy this game immensely with endless game play. I highly recommend this game to everyone.

Overall Rating: 9.5/10

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Divine Comedy 2 Review First Look

Hey guys, here is a long post - introduction or a first look / review of the China Wartune 2 called now Divine Comedy 2 by Cookie:

OK. Here we go. Let’s see whats new and different on the Sq.7road.com server in China.

Firstly, the name of the game. It used to be Divine Comedy, but now it’s Divine Comedy 2, so they obviously think they’ve changed it enough to make it a “sequel”.

They have a helpful sidebar with links to different tools etc. One of them showed this which I thought was of interest.

You can now battle other players in the wild.

Right, into the game itself. Started as mage (probably shouldn't have as I've never gone a mage before so I don’t know what’s different).

This is the 2nd battle within the opening story. Big guy appears out of nowhere to help (yes, I’m the little one on the far left). No idea what’s going on? All “commentary” is in Chinese obviously.

Intro has you in this “camp” before you fly to your city (see screenshot later)

First intro “campaign” (controllable). Part of intro story but you can see it’s a campaign map. Notice the new quest list look(very nice). New monsters. New music. New animations for attacks. All seems to be little touches to improve the look and feel of the game.

I opened the inventory and it looks the same. Let’s look at the skill tree :

Mage skill tree (is this the same?), but notice 8 more slots grayed out off to the right. Hmmm. I thought it might be for the runes, but there are still the 3 tabs on the left side (unless there’s something else coming)

Blacksmith looks similar but clicking the tabs shows the level you need to be to access them. Tabs 2 and 3 (probably socket and synthesize) open at lvl 15. Tabs 4,5 and 6 (probably refine, recycle and convert) open at lvl 19. But there’s a 7th tab not in our version. Opens at lvl 80! Please can someone translate :)

OK. Now for a screenshot from another part of the intro story. I’m going to start clicking the icons in the top right and see what they are :

1st icon – looks like crystals.
No idea. Guessing it’s a buy some sort of crystals for Balens window.

2nd icon – purple gift.
Er...get presents for something that levels up (through Balens probably).

3rd icon – treasure chest.
Looks like the special offer window. Same as ours – get free stuff if you spend, spend, spend.

4th icon – blue gift.
No idea what this is looks like events but that’s the 5th icon?!

5th icon – Hot Events.
Guessing by same icon it’s the events window. It looks similar. The first tab shown here is different though, looks like “Hot” tab from shop. The other pages are the same as ours.

Back at the camp I reached level 10 and was awarded with a VIP token (the one you can dodge if you refresh the page, but I just used it). So, let’s have a look at the VIP window on 7Road.

Looks like you get 3 levels of VIP tokens. The one you get forced to use at lvl 10 is the purple one (the expensive one, interestingly). There is a list with 14 entries below. 2 highlighted on the cheap one (blue), 3 highlighted on the middle one (red) and 4 highlighted on the expensive one (purple). It is probably things that are “free” when you use that VIP token.

I’m guessing they are the things listed in our VIP screen under VIP benefits/level comparison. We have 19 things listed though so I wonder if they have merged some or removed them.

Maybe you can buy into our VIP levels rather than earn them through time as on our servers. Who knows?!

VIP Wheel looks pretty much the same (big button is spin once, bottom left button is spin all and bottom right button is refresh). I refreshed it about 10 times to see if there was anything new. It looks like there isn’t. I span a couple of times (with the limited tokens I had) on the 20K, 60K, 500K gold setup (shown as 2W, 6W and 50W in China) and the 20K came in on the 2nd spin. So looks like the same “fixed” spins as now. 20K on 1st or 2nd spin, 60K on 4th or 5th spin and 500K on 7th or 8th spin. Rubbish in between. (Obviously I’m presuming a lot here from 2 spins).

OK. Almost at the end of the intro story stuff. You get on some sort of flying beast and off you go...

Flying into my city (yes that’s me in the middle)!

OK. This is the first proper campaign map. Strangely similar. They’ve gone back to the original quest look, even though it changed for the intro story. Plus it’s the same monsters again. Sigh. I think they will change it throughout in later patches though.

In the middle of the screen is the new player online bonus window (2nd icon in at the top right – looks like a chalice). It looks like they get better stuff than we do, surprise, surprise. Have a look at all those sweet Balens! (And another VIP token!)

There’s nothing new to note in the campaign, except maybe the lack of AFK. I can’t remember if that comes in later.

But, on the 2nd campaign I went into a lair to see if you still get the troops card that I find useless and always sell. Not any more, I got a card that looked like a character (rather than a monster), so I used it, went to troops and there weren’t any new ones spawned, but . . . back in the campaign, my character was now glowing blue and flashing on the screen. It must be a buff of some sort. Maybe the Pandora’s’ box has gone and you need to do the lairs to get a free buff (although it stayed with me AFTER the campaign) and showed up as an icon in the buff icon section next to your character in the top left. Buff lasted for an hour.
OK. Back to the city, some more buildings have opened up so let’s run through them.

Here’s the city when I’m at level 13.

All new graphics, but what else has changed (when clicked)? Top is the town hall, then sweeping from left to right is Forgotten Catacombs (same), Warehouse (same), Cottage (same), Barracks (same, and same troops :(  ) and Tree of Ancients (differences shown in next screen shot).

The first new icon at top right of screen is, I believe, the new guild battle info screen. It’s been updated, but I’m not bothering with a screenshot as it’s all in Chinese and mostly writing.

There’s also a shield with arrows sticking out of it just above the quest list (and they’ve move the full screen icon there too). The shield icon appears to be a shortcut to jump to campaign, barracks, guild, etc. Not sure, but that’s what happens when you click on things in the popup window.

Farm now has a large plot at the end. Interested to see what that’s for.

Here’s the shop. Apart from the ridiculously low prices (50 Balens for a socket rod :(  ) there's no new layout or anything (they've still got the bug on the clothing tab where all the tabs move to the left), but . . .

What are those numbered scrolls? Sigh, 30 Balens instead of 295 for Lvl 7 gem transposer, although they don’t have levels 8 and 9 for some reason :(.
And...

10 pages of sylph skills! Going by the skill colours on the scrolls (blue for Iris, green for Pan, etc), I think there is 6 different sylphs in China.

OK. Well thats my run down of the start of “Divine Comedy 2”, the NEW(ish) Wartune on the 7 Road servers in China. More to come if I get time.

Hope you found it interesting.

(If you like this please click Google+ or share on Facebook, inside the Wartune game, on your guild websites/forums, etc)

Grand Theft Auto V

Console: Xbox 360, PS3

Genre: Third-Person Action

Release Date: September 17th, 2013

Date Reviewed: November 10th, 2013

Gameplay:

Grand Theft Auto V is the fifth instalment for the GTA series. GTA V is the biggest video game launch of all time, shattering records. Within three days of the game being available, they made $1 billion in sales. GTA is a series that is very popular and strikes a lot of controversy with parents. GTA V takes place in the city of Los Santos, where the player controls three unique characters. Each character has their own story and own mission you can unlock in order to progress their story. Each character is easily switched to on the fly. What I did like about this feature is whenever you switched to one of the character you controlled, they can be in the middle of the most random events. You could be playing with Michael and decide you want to switch over to Trevor to do some of his missions. When you switch to Trevor he could be laying on a train track in his underwear, hung over. It is always different when you switch too one of the three. The city of Los Santos is huge. There are a lot of mission, side missions, events, clothing stores, jobs to earn money, sports, etc.... to do within the city. The possibilities never end it seems, there is always something to do which I do give credit GTA V for. GTA V, personally was a let down. The last two GTA titles have been very boring to me, with IV being the worse of the two. Yes, there is a lot of things to do but it gets repetitive, boring, and uneventful. I admit when I first put in this game I was excited to play it. I thought that Rockstar would finally fix their mistakes from the fourth GTA. At first I was having fun doing the missions, side missions, races, and exploration. I did everything I possibly could before completing the mane game. I was wrong.

The Los Santos Map.

I feel as they lost their roots. My all time favourite was GTA III and San Andreas. I loved those two games a lot. Every since the fourth game I have been very disappointed in the series. Yes, there are a couple of things I did enjoy about the game. GTA V has a lot of humour as it always has. Each character has a unique story to them and you feel as you can relate to them or feel apart of their story. GTA V does a lot of things to make you feel attached to the characters. After the first few missions in the main campaign it feels very bland and repetitive. I was excited to do my first heist and plan it out. I could either go in smart, or loud and dumb. I wish they gave you more options for each big heist. You pick how you want to execute it and then you hire a few people to help you out. The better that character is you hire the more of the cut they get resulting in less money for you overall. I tried to find something in GTA V that would suck me and and hopefully change my opinion of the game. You can customise your character with tons of clothing, accessories and tatoos. You can fully customise your cars, buy a garage, and even properties. You can play darts, golf or even arm wrestle. If that is not your cup of tea then go do some racing. It can be on the streets of Los Santos, dirt biking or quading in the outdoors or even race on Sea-doos. You can even do a triathlon where you race on foot, on a bike, or do both!

Graphics:

The graphics in this game are outstanding. Each character is very unique with their own style. The animations for all characters, even the thousands of NPC's are very well done. There are a few very unrealistic animations when you get hit or die in the game. They look for cheesy and lame. Another thing I appreciate is the fact that most of the NPC's look different. Considering there are thousands of NPC's just walking around in the game amazes me. The weather effects are outstanding, weather it be raining, storming, or even sunny. The weather system is very realistic and well done. When you are near the ocean the tide rises and lowers as well. The night time visuals are colorful and full of life. The physics are unrealistic in the game but that's what you can expect from any GTA game in the series. There are also a few graphical errors in the game as well but you can expect that because of how big the game is. Overall, it is a beautiful game and should be taken notice.

Beautiful outdoors.

Sound:

The soundtrack in GTA V is huge. Like in previous titles you have a choice to choose between several radio stations while driving around in Los Santos. I was disappointed that there was no metal radio station in the game. I personally am a huge fan of metal. There is almost every other genre of music, even 90's pop which was exciting and my personal favourite. The voice acting is top notch. Like I said earlier, each character has their own unique feel to them and the voice acting makes it much more true of a statement. Every possible sound in the game is the real thing. From swimming, walking on the beach, running, biking, racing, and especially the cars all sound incredible. You can tell a lot of time was put into this area as well as the graphics. When I was playing the game I very rarely found some sound glitches like skipping while driving. This was very rare and again is expected in this type of game. Overall, great sound.

Los Santos.

Conclusion:

My conclusion for this game is overall I did not like the gameplay. I enjoyed and appreciated the sound and the graphics with the game. I even enjoyed the story telling and how each character felt unique. I even grew attached to Trevor. He is a psycho path but hilarious at the same time. I know they spent $270 million to make this a great experience for everybody, and you can tell. I just think it had the same problem with GTA IV. It felt to repetitive, boring, and bland in some cases. Some of the main missions I hated doing with a passion and it really annoyed me that is was part of the main missions because I wasn't able to skip it like most of them. If you're a fan of the GTA series then you will enjoy this game. I am a fan of the series but the last two were both let downs. It is over hyped and the review scores are way to high. If possible try to rent or borrow the game before dropping $60 on this game. 

Overal Score:

6/10

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Project X Zone

Console: Nintendo 3DS

Genre: Tactical RPG

Release Date: June 25th, 2013

Date Reviewed: August 18th, 2013

Gameplay:

Project X Zone is a tactical RPG for the Nintendo 3DS developed by Bandai Namco. The games story is played through chapters. In total there are 42 chapters in the game. After chapter 10 each mission is about and hour or so long. Overall it is a pretty long game especially if you take your time going through it. After you beat he story mode you unlock new game+ which allows you to keep all of your items but the monsters are a lot stronger and you gain exp a lot slower so levelling will be much more difficult. If you want the challenge then go for it. When you start the game you start off with very few characters but after almost every chapter you gain new companies to help you out. Each of your companions have their own move sets you can master to perform powerful combos. In total you get about 50 characters to control. Each of you're companions also get their own solo units as well. Solo units are additional units that you do not control. You call them in to do some extra damage and add on to you're combo. The higher you're combo the more xp you get. Xp is not the term for experience points. In Project X Zone xp is almost like mana. Every time you do some damage this bar gets increased. If you get it to 100% you can use a characters special attack. The xp bar also allows you to use you're companions skills which can increase your stats, or even an increased walking range. Solo units also provide your companions with extra skills which are useful.

Battle Screen.

When you gain a level you get a stat increase like with any RPG. But when you gain levels you also unlock new move sets for your companions. Levelling is a key part of your adventures. You need these to be able to unlock more moves and more attack opportunities. You also learn skills by levelling. During the campaign you also get items and weapons from bosses and treasure chests which can be used to make your characters a lot more powerful by increasing their stats. The four stats that your characters have are HP which increases your health points, attack which increases how much damage you do, defence to take less damage, and tec which launches your enemies higher into the air to perform more combos on your enemies. Overall I really enjoyed the game play of this game. There are a couple of downfalls though. For example most of the levels you do are very repetitive and can be frustrating when you think you are almost done the chapter when out of no where 30 more enemies appear on the screen. This game also needed a lot more customization options, more moves and items to use or even a shop.

Graphics:

The graphics are decent. It is a tactical RPG so the character models are very small and do not have a whole lot of detail on them. What I do like about the graphics is that when each character performs their special attack they each have their own special little animations, some are 3D and some are 2D but overall they are great. The graphics during combat is crazy like with most cross over fighting style games. When you're doing the combos there is so much happening on the screen at one time especially when you call in support units and solo units to do cross over combos to increase your xp bar. There are no cut scenes in the game it is all mainly dialogue. 

Movement Screen.

The 3D on the 3DS is good, not great but good. When the combat sequence begins the 3D can really hurt your eyes due to the fact that there is so much happening on the screen at one time. The 3D while you are moving your units around isn't anything to interesting. The only time you see the 3D effect well is when each of your character do their special attacks. When some of the characters do their specials some of them have 3D models so the 3D works really well with that. 

Audio:

This is one of my favorite parts of this game is the audio. When you buy the game or pre order the game when the first batches come out you will get the limited edition box which includes a poster, art book, and the soundtrack. The soundtrack is the best part of the package because it has all of the music from the game itself. The music in the game is fantastic and goes very well with the game, and battle scenes. The audio overall from the game is crisp, sounds great and works very well with the game. 

Limited Edition Bundle.

Conclusion:

Project X Zone is a really fun and enjoyable game. When you buy the first initial batch of the game you get the limited edition for the same price of $40. This is a fantastic offer because it includes an art book, a poster and the fantastic soundtrack. The gameplay is solid but is a bit repetitive and can drive you nuts a few times due to the fact that some chapters it seems like the enemies never stop appearing. Project X Zone is a fantastic cross over game, has a lot to offer and is an extremely long game. I personally put 49 hours into the game before I actually beat it. f you are a fan of fighting games, tactical RPG's, and cross over games then I highly recommend trying this game out.

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New Super Mario Bros. 2

Console: Nintendo 3DS

Genre: Platformer

Release Date: August 19, 2012

Date Reviewed: Feb. 1st, 2013

Gameplay:

New Super Mario Bros 2 is the second game for New Super Mario Bros. The original game debuted on the Nintendo DS hand helds. This one however is now on the Nintendo 3DS. The original NSMB was a huge hit on the DS because it was Mario, but Mario remade. It's basically Super Mario Bros. Remade onto the hand held systems. Everyone loved it. Now we have NSMB Wii and NSMB WiiU. The game play is your basic Mario plat former. You go through worlds, each world has a castle with a boss and when you beat the boss you move onto the next world. Not really much to explain more about the game play. However I had a few issues with it. Now it is a fun game don't get me wrong. But this game is missing a lot. The point in this game is to collect as many coins as possible. This is a nice new twist on a Super Mario game. They also introduced a coin rush mode into the game where you play a few levels that have a lot of coins to collect and a short time limit. The other nice thing about this one is it has DLC. The DLC content are new coin rush maps, one they included for free. When you get your one million coin goal all that happens is you get a new background on the game menu, that's it. Not really much of an award.

The Tanooki Suit is back!

The issues I have with this game is it is so plain. The backgrounds, the level designs, and the overall game play lasts only a couple of hours. Sure if your a perfectionist like me then you want to try and unlock all the levels and the star coins. But while your playing through the worlds or even navigating each world to your next level it's just so plain compared to NSMB for the Wii or even the WiiU. The environment in the Wii and WiiU titles are fun, interactive, and adds some life to the game. Compared to the first one on the DS, they really didn't change anything at all besides collecting coins. This I found was very disappointing. It's like they didn't care all to much about this game because they wanted to boost sales on the 3DS system because it is a Mario game. Maria game = sells a lot of consoles.

However when you complete the game you unlock Star world. I like the levels in Star World but when you beat the game and didn't really focus on collecting the star coins it's frustrating to try and go through these levels because it costs a butt load of star coins just to even go to the first level in star world. I do like how they added that feature to the game though. They do have a co op mode within the game as well where you can a friend can connect locally and play the game together collecting your coins or just plain and simple beating the game. I am happy they are sticking with the co op route of things even on the DS systems. Overall the game play is fun, just a bit upsetting with the lack of effort put into this game and the boring environments. I would recommend picking up Paper Mario Sticker Star before this game.

Graphics:

The 3DS uses the graphics very well in this game. The textures are crisp and it looks really good. The only problem which was mentioned up above is the plain environments and bad level designs. Almost all of the levels had a plain background and was really fast and easy to run through. Not a whole look of level creativeness in this version of the game at all. The animations on all of the enemies are great. Like in the first one the enemies dance to the beat of the music as they are walking. I still think it's funny when they hop around or swing their arms to the music.

Co op Style!

Audio:

The soundtrack is basically the same one used in the DS title. Most of the levels have a good soundtrack and goes well with the game but it is all just from the original game. All of the audio in the game is what you'd expect from any Mario plat former game.

Conclusion:

Overall the game is fun, just upsetting on the level design and environments. I mean go watch a video on NSMB for WiiU and compare it to the 3DS version. I wish I was playing the WiiU version is all I am saying. I do like the co op mode in the game and how you can also play as luigi. I also enjoyed the Coin Rush mode which you unlock after the first world is beaten. They have also included a free DLC coin rush map pack for free for a limited time to celebrate the anniversary of Mario. This map pack is known as the “classic map pack” because you play re designed levels from the original Mario games. They are also fun. If you are debating between NSMB or Paper Mario Sticker Star I recommend you pick up Sticker Star before this game.

Alien 3

Well I decided to do a review on Alien 3 for the NES. Just recently I had watched the third Alien movie, Alien 3 in the Quadrilogy. The Alien Universe has been a favorite of mine since I was a little guy. I kind of looked up to the marines, because they were so bad*ss. Well in Alien 3, Lt. Ellen Ripley was the main character, as is the same in this game. So now it is time to see how this game lives up to the movie... As we all know movies make bad games, and games make bad movies...

[PS Forgive me for my bad screenshots, I will need to invest in something better than MSPaint]

WOW THIS TITLE SCREEN IS SO WICKED! ITS EPIC AND AWESOME!!
To start off you can see the title screen is a joke... This is gonna be a fun review. 

 Gameplay/Controls:
First off I was kind of confused about how Ripley starts off on the surface of a planet armed with a Pulse Rifle. I love how this game already starts off completely messed up. In the movie Alien 3 Ripley crash lands on the planet Fiorina 'Fury' 161, an old foundry which is used as a prison. I can see how it kind of looks likes a foundry on the first opening scene, but aliens running around on the surface? Come on. This games controls are horrid. Completely garbage, like I mean, you can’t even aim up and shoot the aliens in the ceiling? You can throw grenades which is kind of cool, but you throw them like a handicapped sloth. The grenades, they get tossed about 3 feet in front of you. Last time I checked the shrapnel and the shock would probably kill you at that range.

The other thing that is frustrating about this games gameplay is it’s a race against the clock to save people who were face hugged? Either way you save someone after they have been face hugged their dead anyways. As there is no technology to cryo-freeze them to keep them alive until the embryo of the Alien was removed. Another thing how does Ripley have access to grenades and weapons to begin with? In the movie there were no fire arms, explosives etc. The other thing I have beef with is that, why does this game suck so bad? Well continue reading on.

The controls are horrid like I stated earlier. You jump like your slam dunking a basketball. You fall down when you get hit by an alien, than you teleport back into the standing position. Thats orignial. You can also get knocked down the ladders by the aliens too. In which you lay there, than teleport back into standing position. Also where are all the prisoners in like in the movie to help you kill the hybrid "Runner" alien? So this game is completely wrong!  How is there multiple "Aliens" in this game? The game is called "Alien 3" aka single not plural! In later levels I suppose you fight "Praetorian" or "Warrior" Aliens due to them being bigger and more bad*ss than the smaller ones. Not to mension theres eggs and facehuggers in the game, which would claim there is a queen laying eggs and the drones are doing their job. This game should have been called Aliens because it follows the the second Alien installment, you guessed it, "Aliens".

Like I had stated, the controls are horrible, and the gameplay is the same thing over and over.

Ellen Ripley I knew she was tall. Nice jumping girl, looks like your doing an ad for some nice Nike Air Jordans. This is the famous "jump" I was talking about. SLAM DUNK!!

[Trivia Time! In the Director’s cut of Alien 3, a facehugger actually impregnates some sort of bovine creature. Than when the alien is born, it gains some of the DNA structure of its host. Thus replicating a stature, or structure of its host. In most cases we see drones which are usually spawned from human hosts. Minus the one which was born in the way a human gives birth in Alien Resurrection. In other cases such as Alien VS Predator, and AVP 2: Requiem [The Movies] At the end of the first AVP, this theory is proven correct once again, as there is a Hybrid Alien; the Pred-Alien. Also the Theatrical release of Alien 3, the facehugger gets a hold of a dog instead of the bovine.]

As you can see, its that god awful RED again! [Note to those who do not know, I am colorblind, thus making the "red" appear like a shade of orange+pink]

DO A BARREL ROLL!! Ripley as she falls down a bunch of random broken catwalks?

Graphics/Background:

Wow so entertaining, the game looks drier than, well I don’t even know. The screens before each level begins suck too. Well the graphics seem ok for this game. It’s nothing special at all. The flamethrowers flame animation looks like complete garbage. The animation of Ripley tumbling down off of things is well done, but too bad it does nothing to help out the gameplay at all. The aliens look decent for their sprites being like one shade of color, and all the explosion animations look like crap. Nothing much else to say about this other than the background has random black holes in the walls in the first stage. This was over used waaaaay too much. They could have at least used a few different sets of backgrounds instead of the same thing over and over and over again. Not to mension Ripley looks like a employee of a santation department for a city. Aka Garbageman.

The detail on the alien looks ok. This the the screen before a the first level begins...

BGM/SFX:

Well I never thought I would say this, but this games music is ok. Aside from all the other crap, the sounds are somewhat decent. You can tolerate it for the most part. The BGM isn’t that bad, the SFX are ok, and the guns sound something like they should. All in all nothing special at all.

Uniqueness/Creativity:

Like I said before I started this review. Games make bad movies, movies make bad games. It seems this is a true statement. Look at the terminator movies, the games all stunk more than rotten egg farts and beer, same with the movie Doom. The Doom games were way better than the movie. At least the Doom movie had some ideas from the games, mainly the third one but not all of them. This is why Alien 3 on the NES gets its balls busted due to it following nothing from the movie Alien 3.

Closing thoughts/Statements:

All in all this game is bad. Waste of time. I wish I had the 3 hours back that I wasted on this game to review a different game, but this is what I enjoy doing. Saving people from wasting their time on bad games like this. In all of my reviews, I do my best to either beat the game, or get damn near close to it. This game I got fed up with saving people who are doomed anyways. I took one for the team and played this horrid, putrid pile of turds... 

I guess the Aliens won because I did not finish this game. Bow down to them. All our base are belong to them!!

Here goes...

Castlevania 1 (NES)

  

Well here is my first review on what some say is a great installment on some old classic NES games. This is the first installment of three on the NES. To my knowledge you are some dude named Simon Belmont and you have a whip, which later powers up to a flail. Your one bad*ss who enjoys slapping ghouls, ghosts, bats, cats, rats, and whatever else gets in your way. So here we go!

Gameplay/Controls:

I like the idea of power ups being hidden in some blocks, kind of like Mario Brothers. You can break the random candles on the walls for hearts, money bags, and also find certain items. Each item has a unique purpose, at a cost of 1 heart each use. (Nothing is free!) An example of a great weapon on the first boss is the axes. The axes can be lobbed to help you kill the boss, a flying bat. Each item can be utilized in certain areas to help you out, but at other times be completely useless. For a prime example, you get the Blue bottle, (seems like a Molotov cocktail) and you toss it on the ground and it makes a flame. That is extremely useful against flying enemies. (Sarcasm) In that case, the Cross, (acts as a boomerang) would be more useful in that situation. Another one of Simon's power ups look like a flail which you can get to increase your whips damage and range, are quite easy to stumble upon. Without some of these you would be dead meat in some situations.

I like the idea of ascending and descending on the stairs. This is quite a unique function to have for a game of this time (1986 on the Family Computer Disk System in Japan, which was ported to the NES Cartridge in North America in 1987.) Alot of older games were more simple than this game, I can see why for its time it was a favorite among many NES gamers.

The controls seem a bit sluggish, as in when you need to be critical in timing all the time. There seems to be no midair control at all. Those flying horsehead Medusa things that knock you off ledges and downstairs, you need to be critical in hitting those. It almost seems that they will always knock you off a ledge so that you die. One of the flaws I have noticed in the overall gameplay is that, if you proceed up a set of stairs, and get knocked back down them, you die! It’s as if you fall into a bottomless pit and just, well, die. Maybe Simon falls down and cracks his skull open how do we know?

Graphics/Background:

The graphics for this game are not too shabby. They seem to utilize the color red a lot. Then again this game is older than I am by 2 years! Majority of the other backgrounds are well done.The Enemies all have a unique look which is good. They do not seem to recycle the sprites which is good. Many of the older games do this which is a lazy game designer’s way out. I am colorblind so the colors always mess with me. Red/Blue/Greens are the worst for me. So the red backgrounds, as I am told, really mess with my eyes. These older games really rack a toll on my sight after gaming them, but all in all this games Graphics are not too shabby!

The axes, best for slaying this Bloodsucking Rat!

This is the "Red" color I am talking about!

BGM/SFX:

 The music for this game is alright. It gets annoying after a while though. The SFX when you collect things is pretty cool; it makes you want to collect more and more items. The sound of the whip is pretty accurate for the age of this game. The noise it makes when enemies die is ok too. Makes kind of like a boom noise. The other thing that is annoying about when you die is it’s almost like the Price is Right jingle they play when you die. It gives you that sense of feeling that you’re a failure, you suck, and you need to end it NOW. Why even keep trying? All in all this games Sound and SFX are pretty solid.

Uniqueness/Creativity:

I might catch some flak here but this game is very much like a typical Dracula/Zombie/Undead killing game. There is some superstition in the background of this game with the crosses and such. This game probably is one of the best side scrolling games for its time. The adventure aspect of it is quite good too. I also give this game thumbs up for the stairs being implemented and being functional. This is why it is set apart from other side scrollers where you can only jump on blocks to ascend or descend.

Closing thoughts/Statements:

All in all I give the first Castlevania credit for being a solid game for its time. It’s not a bad game, it’s just the controls are clunky and sluggish. If the controls were a little more responsive, the game would have been a lot better. I would strongly suggest this game to anyone with a love for sidescrolling good old ghoul bashing madness!

Mario Kart 7 (3DS)

Console: Nintendo 3DS

Genre: Racing
Release Date: December 4, 2011
Reviewed: Feb. 2/12

Gameplay:

Mario Kart 7 is the seventh instalment in the Mario Kart series. This time it is coming to the handheld, the Nintendo 3DS. May I add that it is a fantastic addition to the series. Mario Kart 7 plays like all other Mario Kart games ever released. There are a couple of new additions to the game like parachutes or para sales. These are only activated when driving over a rainbow colored (<----Canadian) boost arrows. When driven over you sore in the air and your parachute is activated and you take the race into the skies for a few seconds anyway. There are other great features added to the game to keep the interest level high. You can use the built in gyro controls within the 3DS system to steer in Mario Kart 7. While your racing in some of the courses you will notice that there are coins scattered everywhere throughout the entire track. You can only get 10 coins per track but these coins to provide a use for the game. When a certain amount of coins are collected you unlock extra vehicle parts to customize your kart. Each unlockable part provides some sort of stat to your vehicle such as speed, handling, weight or even drifting. There are some pretty awesome unlockables like the mushroom wheels. That is not all you can unlock though. In addition to unlocking vehicle parts you can also unlock additional characters, up to eight to be exact. Some of these characters include Metal Mario, and Wario. The other characters are up to you to find out ;). As usual there are 16 new maps added to the game and 16 old maps from previous mario kart games added to the game as well. I was pretty happy to be able to race on Koopa Beach again. With the old maps added they didn't just port over the old maps over they actually added boosts or updated some of there areas on the map. They even added some shortcuts. 

Once you have received all of the trophies in the game and unlocked all of the characters they brought the famous and flawless multiplayer back. With this multiplayer they added features like creating or joining community groups and racing with people in the group. Overall the online experience in Mario Kart 7 is as fun as it's always been with the previous Mario Kart games. There are only a couple of things that annoy me in Mario Kart 7. When your racing on 150cc or Mirror Mode the computers are constantly using Blue Shells which just urks you especially when your right in front of the finish like and you lose due to the shell. Another thing is the shortcut people like to take when your racing with them online in the map Maka Wuhu. You can take a shortcut on this map which skips over half of the course. One other thing is the overall music quality in the game isn't all that impressive compared to the other Mario Kart games. One of the maps "Neo Bowser City" takes a msuci from past games and combines them into one.

Graphics:

The graphics in Mario Kart 7 are great. The game really uses the power of the 3DS to make the game lively and colorful. The graphics are roughly the same as compared to the Wii version but much better than the DS version by far. Of coarse you have your occasional 2D background environments but most of it is all in 3D and looks fantastic. The 3D is something I would not recommend. With the 3D you will be moving your head a lot with the game due to the racing, especially if your using the gyro controls. It will end up giving you a huge headache and hurting your eyes. It's nice to have on once in awhile just to see the 3D but it is not recommended that you keep it on for long especially when your racing. Overall the graphics are great.

Audio:

The Audio in Mario Kart 7 overall is well done. There are some courses where the music just makes no sense and drives you crazy because of the annoyance but overall the music experience is pretty good. One level I mentions above earlier "Neo Bowser City" takes some music from previous games like "Toad's Turnpike" from the N64 version and combines them into one for "Neo Bowser City". The other maps are retro maps so they have the original music from the previous Mario Kart Games. Overall excellent audio.

Conclusion:

Mario Kart 7 is a fantastic addition to the Mario Kart series. As always there is lots to do. Mario Kart 7 will keep you occupied with it's time trials and multiplayer for awhile. I highly recommend this game to anyone, especially the Mario Kart fans. Other then some small minor issues like the shortcut glitch in Maku Wuhu or the endless blue shells of death it is a great experience for anyone. The 3D is not recommended for this game while racing but it is nice to turn on once in awhile to just look at the 3D.