Author - Judgeman

Warlock: Master of the Arcane – A Preview (PC)

2012/05/07

It seems like I have been spending quite a bit of time in the lands of Ardania lately. First, with the Defenders of Ardania on the XBLA and now with our preview of Paradox Interactive’s new turn based strategy game, Warlock: Master of the Arcane. I got my hands on a preview copy of Warlock: Master of the Arcane during its beta testing phase, so this preview will focus on what I liked about the game and the mechanics, while saving the negative critique until we have an actual release copy that is complete.

The preview copy did not have much of a story that I can go into, except for what I could gather from the press release and game play. You play as a Great Mage within the lands of Ardania. The player is giving a choice as to the looks of his or her mage, which affects the look of the mage’s army. There is some customization here, which is nice. You can change the color of the mage’s army and even change out the warlock’s starting spells.

Once you have decided on the look and feel of your mage, then your quest to become the most powerful arcane user in Ardania begins. Through the pure might of your army, or the use of skilled diplomacy, you need to conquer the other potential mages that surround your city to become the clear number one and ascend to the title of Warlock.

The actual game play of Warlock: Master of the Arcane is very much like any other turn based strategy game out on the market. You start off with your city, with its set of given resources and a small standing army. As you progress through the game, you will research different buildings that will give you benefits and allow you to recruit other soldiers for your military. You can also research spells that serve many purposes, from healing your troops in the heat of battle to blasting your foes with lightning. Some troops are unable to strike at certain foes and these researched spells really come in handy. For instance, my set of warriors could not strike at the flying monsters that appeared outside my city. I had to use my researched lightning bolt spell to defeat these enemies.

During your march across Ardania, the game will give you quests to complete for resources. These quests mostly seem to center around building certain structures or recruiting a set of soldiers. You can also gain resources by capturing and looting features that can be found on the land and sea, such as shipwrecks or silver mines. To make the simplest comparison of the gameplay found in Warlock: Master of the Arcane, one need only look at Civilization V. Warlock: Master of the Arcane borrows heavily from Civilization V, but does not quite get it right, at least in this beta copy of the game.

I am not a fan of turn based strategy games, mostly because I don’t like to micromanage my troops and resources. Warlock: Master of the Arcane does feel like it has simplified this process for the individuals like me, but fans of the genre may find this approach a little light for them, especially in comparing this game to other big turn based strategy games out there, like Civilization V. Overall, Warlock: Master of the Arcane is shaping up to be a decent entry into the turn based strategy game that will appeal to some out there, but may not reach everyone once it releases.

Skullgirls – A Review (XBLA)

2012/04/25

Judgeman

News, Reviews

With this last generation of fighting games, developers have stepped away from the three dimensional arena and game play style and headed back to the world of two dimensions. Fighting game veterans, like Street Fighter, Mortal Kombat and the Marvel vs. Capcom series, have all reverted to the good ole days of the 2D fighter. Since the fans have shown a renewed interest in this old 2D fighting style, Reverge Labs have released Skullgirls to contend with the big boys. While Skullgirls does lack some serious options and even a move list in game, it makes up for it by being a gorgeous fighting game that is well balanced and just downright fun to play. Skullgirls may not be a perfect 2D fighting game, but it is a massive step in the right direction for Reverge Labs.

Story:

Skullgirls is set in a world that has been decorated by Andrew Ryan and populated by anime characters straight from Japan. Within this world is a relic called the Skull Heart that will grant a woman any wish her heart desires. The trick is that the wish must be selfless and pure, otherwise the woman will turn into the Skullgirl and become a slave to the Skull Heart. Eight women are now connected to the fate of the Skull Heart and are battling to have their will to be the one that comes out on top.

The story does the job by putting the game into some sort of narrative, instead of just a string of senseless bouts. What makes the story special to me is the way it is told and the world that it exists in. Skullgirls is designed in the art deco style and populated by anime characters straight from Japan. This mixture of styles truly brings out a very unique looking game.

The characters, all women, range from a 15 year old lab experiment designed to kill the current Skullgirl to a 25 year old leader of a nation that battles using an umbrella. Each character is created to be a unique play style from the other characters on the roster, so finding a character to match your play style should be easy to do.

Gameplay:

Skullgirls has the typical game play features that many of its counterparts have, such as story mode, arcade mode and online mode. Unfortunately for Skullgirls, that’s all it has. There is a serious lack of features for the game and that can limit the amount of time that you may play this game.

The good news here is that the actual game play of Skullgirls is solid. The game plays beautifully over the internet and is balanced extremely well between different types of characters. I never felt I was at a disadvantage just for picking one character over another, and that is huge when talking about a game that is looking to become a future tournament game for competitions such as Evo.

Characters have the standard three punch and three kick buttons with various different moves using button and stick combinations. The characters have a health bar and an energy bar, with allows for super moves that use up either one bar or three bars, depending on the move. The dash, the cancel, and other genre standard moves are within Skullgirls as well.

The only thing that isn’t in Skullgirls when it comes to moves is an actual move list. Until recently, you had only to guess at what each character was capable of. Now, you can download a move list off of the Skullgirls website, but not having one in game hampers the overall quality of the game itself.

Skullgirls also has a tag mode in the game, with allows up to three versus three combat. The game will automatically balance smaller teams to fight the larger ones, so you can change up the challenge.

Aesthetics:

With a solid game play and a half decent story line, Skullgirls is made that much more special due to its aesthetics. As I have previously said, it combines the art deco style of the 20’s and 30’s with the Japanese anime style character, then presented in a film format. I am a huge fan of how aesthetics really make a good game great, and this is where Skullgirls truly steps into the limelight for me.

Each character is dripping with, for the lack of a better word, character. The women have snappy one liners that they rattle of, nice puns that work well with the world that Reverge Labs created, and are visually unique and interesting that it’s hard to take your eyes off of them. Of course, the visuals of the skimpy outfits and some of the ladies ample physical traits doesn’t hurt either.

The music is another hit for me with Skullgirls. The introduction with the snappy double bass line just made me smile before I even started the game. Then the music just gets better from there, adding more and more of a vibe to the game that is missing in most 2D fighting games.

Final Thoughts:

While Skullgirls isn’t perfect, it is a fantastic entry into the 2D fighting genre that, if Reverge Labs learns from their few mistakes, will lead into a fantastic new series of games for years to come. The gameplay is extremely balanced and well thought out and the aesthetics of the game are just fantastic and are really nice to look and and enjoy. Skullgirls does skimp on the modes that the other premium fighting games have, and there is absolutely no move list in game, you must download it and print it from the web site. The online play for Skullgirls was also top notch with little or no lag, but the AI during story mode could be brutal and unforgiving, especially to newer players to the genre. Overall, this game is a must buy for any fan of the 2D fighting genre, especially for those that like over the top character design. Skullgirls is available now through Xbox Live Arcade.

Anomaly Warzone Earth – A Review (XBLA)

2012/04/13

Judgeman

News, Reviews

11 Bit Studio has finally brought the popular PC and mobile device hit game Anomaly Warzone Earth to Xbox Live Arcade. What can only be described as a “reverse tower defense” game, Anomaly Warzone Earth pits your convoy versus a series of stationary alien defense towers that will try to prevent you from your goal on each map. While Anomaly Warzone Earth does nothing to really push its generic story, the gameplay and action of the game really help to set it apart from its competitors. We already know that Anomaly Warzone Earth is a great game based on its appearance on other platforms, but how does it translate on a console?

Story:

The story of Anomaly Warzone Earth can pretty much be described as a cliched alien invasion plot. The game is set in a future city of Baghdad, with an alien craft crashing within the city. The aliens then begin to bubble off areas of the city, and it is your job as commander of the 14th Platoon to investigate than eradicate the alien threat.

There is little here to push the narrative and really capture the player into the world of Anomaly Warzone Earth. This is where the game really feels like a mobile device port, because it feels like it is supposed to be played in between stops during your day of errand running. The voice acting and music do nothing to help this problem, and we will hit more on that later.

Game Play:

Anomaly Warzone Earth plays just like a reverse tower defence game. You command a column of heavy APCs, lightly armored missile launchers, and shield generators. When the level begins, you are able to plan your route and decide which direction your column will take at each intersection. You can plan to take the most direct route, which usually takes you through the most heavily defended areas of the city, or you can choose to avoid much of the conflict by moving your column to the back streets, but you will miss the opportunity to collect more money.

As you proceed through the level, you earn cash to upgrade and buy more units. Upgrades help keep your units alive longer and make them hit harder, while buying more units helps you reach the goal for that map. The types of units and upgrades that you can purchase change as you move through the game, but are pretty generic types of units. You also earn special equipment as the commander to use during the map. The first couple of items are equipment, the healing aura and smokescreen, really help throughout the game. These items are then airlifted to you throughout the level, which is great because you will need them as the levels get harder.

I was very worried that the controls for Anomaly Warzone Earth was going to be bad, being that this is a mobile device and a PC port. Surprisingly, 11 Bit Studio got the controls down right. I never once felt that the controls were awkward in any way or that they felt rushed. The best way to describe the control scheme for Anomaly Warzone Earth is “natural”. It just felt right.
Aesthetics:

Visually, Anomaly Warzone Earth is nice looking. It has all the right features in the right places to do the job on the Xbox 360, while not being the best looking game on Live Arcade. The visuals are from a top-down angle, like most tower defence games out there. I never noticed any type of frame rate dip during the action, which is great.

The voice acting, again, fits in the “serviceable” category. I had heard the voice acting described as a “bad Jason Statham movie”, and that I believe is the best way to describe it. It serves the job, but just barely. It’s funny how I have gotten two games in a row with bad United Kingdom voice acting. Seems fairly popular to use these voice actors in gaming right now.

The score for Anomaly Warzone Earth is just as forgettable as the voice acting. I honestly cannot remember a single note from the game, and I’ve played it all week. The music just serves as background noise and fails to bring the action to life for the player or help to promote the story in any way.

Final Thoughts:

Reading through this review, it may seem like I didn’t enjoy my time with Anomaly Warzone Earth, but that couldn’t be farther from the truth. Sure, I picked on the voice acting and the music, but the gameplay truly shines and the controls feel natural. The only time Anomaly Warzone Earth feels like a port is with the depth of the story, which makes the game feel like it needs to be played in small chunks, like any good mobile device game. Anomaly Warzone Earth is a unique game experience in the tower defense genre and 11 Bit Studios did a very good job in porting this game to the Xbox 360. I really recommend Anomaly Warzone Earth for any fan of the tower defense genre, and for anyone who is looking for a unique game experience.

Defenders of Ardania – A Review (XBLA)

2012/03/28

Judgeman

News, Reviews

Paradox Interactive has released a new tower defense game set in the world of Majesty entitled Defenders of Ardania. While tower defense games are becoming more and more popular, Paradox Interactive tries to change up the formula by adding in an offensive component to Defenders of Ardania. While this was a neat idea in theory, in practice this creates a lengthy and tedious game experience that is best avoided.

Story:

Defenders of Ardania is set in the world of Majesty, which was the center of many of Paradox Interactive’s other real time strategy games. People who are familiar with the world of Majesty will be happy to see the connection, but Defenders of Ardania does nothing to really introduce new players, like me, to the existing world.

The game immediately starts you off by having you defend your castle against a former ally with no introduction to the world that the game is set in. You get brief flashes of what is going on through the talking heads that tell you the story during game play, but it doesn’t really do anything to help push the narrative along.

Defenders of Ardania’s narrative feels like a missed opportunity. I feel that the world of Majesty could have been a rich and wonderful place to explore and learn about, but Defenders of Ardania does nothing to bring this world to you, especially if you are a new player to this franchise.

Gameplay:

Defenders of Ardania uses the same gameplay elements as most tower defense games use. Your job is to build up your defense by using towers to prevent the enemy from destroying your castle. What Defenders of Ardania does differently is that it adds an offensive component to the game as well. During the match, you must send out troops to destroy the opposing castle, while defending your castle using towers.

As I said earlier, this idea is great in theory, but it really drags out the game by adding this offensive component. What would normally be a round of surviving wave after wave of enemies, then becomes a battle against tedium as you build your defenses, send out wave after wave of troops towards your enemy, and slowly watch your opponent’s health tick down to zero.

What really killed this game for me was the surprise boss battles that would be thrown at you. These battles were all or nothing and unless you were prepared for them, would destroy your castle in one shot. I successfully defended my castle and defeated my opponent, when the enemy sent out the boss. My defenses were adequate enough to defeat the enemies that were being sent before, but ended up being woefully underdeveloped to kill the boss. The boss reached my castle, which was at full health, and destroyed it in one go.

Multiplayer games were even worse than the single player campaign, for one reason only, and that is the ability to heal your castle. When each player can heal their own castle at crucial times, and since magic regenerates as you play, it makes it almost impossible to win a multiplayer game in Defenders of Ardania. I hate quitting games that I have started, but every time I start a game online, it would take so long that I would either get bored or would have to get up and do something, like eat.

Other than the lengthy battles that is Defenders of Ardania, the gameplay is standard fare for a tower defense game. You earn different types of towers and troop types as you proceed through the game. Each tower and troop type has different sets of bonuses and prices. You are able to purchase upgrades as the game continues, and you are even able to heal your castle if you take too much damage. What could have been a fairly standard tower defense game, turned out to be a tedious experience.

Aesthetics:

Defenders of Ardania is not a stellar aesthetic experience, to say the least. The voice acting is almost painfully stereotypical and extremely hard to listen too. Why, oh why does every individual in a game that is remotely medieval in nature has to have a Scottish accent? Just once, I would like to hear a French or German accent. Developers do know that the French and Germans had castles too, right? Right? Oh, to be cursed with a history background when playing these types of games.

The visuals of Defenders of Ardania are sub par at best. The only way to differentiate between the troop types is to see how fast the troop is moving. I could not tell the difference between a warrior or rogue visually, since they both looked like brown blobs moving through the level. The settings looked decent, if standard for an XBLA title. Overall, I just wasn’t impressed with the look or feel of Defenders of Ardania.

Final Thoughts:

Defenders of Ardania is, ultimately, a good idea gone horribly wrong. The idea of taking a typical tower defense game and adding an offensive component seemed like a good idea, but what it did in the end was drag out each game into the realm of unreasonability. Then adding the ability to heal your castle during a multiplayer game, pushed Defenders of Ardania into the category of being absolutely unplayable. The voice acting is tired and predictable, the visuals are decent when you talk about the scenery, but the troops are just ugly blobs of brown with varying speeds. The tower defense genre sees many new games each month being released, and like the first person shooter genre, only a few are actually worth playing. Defenders of Ardania by Paradox Interactive is not one of them.

Our Preview of Confrontation (PC)

2012/03/22

Judgeman

News, Previews

1 Comment

Video games based on tabletop miniature games isn’t anything new. With the success of the Dawn of War series from THQ, which brings the Warhammer universe to real time strategy, other game developers have been looking to pick up other miniature game titles. Heroclix Online is currently being developed, Blood Bowl has also seen a release, and now Cyanide Studios is looking to bring the Rackham Miniatures classic table top game, Confrontation, to the PC. Unlike Warhammer, Confrontation focuses on a smaller scale of battle, with a small group of heroes instead of a large scale army. To be honest, I found Cyanide Studios decision to bring Confrontation to the PC an interesting one, since Confrontation has been out of print for four years and Rackham itself has been in liquidation since 2010. My time with the Confrontation preview has proven that I am very glad this decision has been made.

Confrontation takes place during the Age of Rag’narok in the land of Aarklash. Four factions are battling for control of Aarklash: the Orcs, the Wolfen, the Humans of the Order of Griffon, and the evil creature of the Scorpion. The setting is mostly sword and magic based, like that of Warcraft, but Confrontation also has a sprinkling of technology, including guns and tech based creatures. It is a world that is original and interesting to play in. Where Confrontation really shines though is in the squad based game play.

At it’s core, Confrontation plays exactly like any other real time strategy game on the market. You move through the map, killing foes and reaching objectives, by using the tried and true point and click method. Your characters will level up as they move through the map, allowing the player to open up character sheets to increase skills, character talents, and gear.

Confrontation differs from the other real time strategy games in that it is squad based, not army based. Dawn of War, which really is Confrontation’s closest comparable game, focuses on large scale armies and conflict, with resource gathering and making the player build structures. In Confrontation, you are in charge of a small squad of heroes that you can level up and put into specific roles during game play. Before each mission, you will have to choose which squad member to take to complete the objective. This decision can be critical, since you cannot build more troops during game play, nor can you change out squad members. If a member is killed during a battle, you can heal them and get them back on their feet after the fight. I really like Confrontation’s smaller scale and squad based strategies instead of the larger scale fights that I’ve played in the past. This game is much easier for me to keep track of my characters and successfully complete the objective then the larger scale real time strategy games that I’ve played in the past.

Confrontation by Cyanide Studios is shaping up to be a fantastic game. For me personally, the smaller squad based game play really fits with my play style and made for a much more fun game then the larger scale real time strategies. If you are a fan of these types of games, you must do yourself a favor and give Confrontation a look when it releases later this quarter.

Sol: Exodus – A Review (PC)

2012/03/08

Judgeman

News, Reviews

I have missed the old space shooter games of my past. Games like Tie Fighter and Wing Commander still bring a nostalgic tear to my eye when I remember how much I loved them. So when Sol: Exodus came down the pipe, I was very excited to revisit this genre. I had hoped that this game would help to reignite the space shooter genre. What Sol: Exodus did do was make me rethink the games of my past and question whether those games were just as dull and boring as how this game turned out. To me, Seamless Entertainment missed a huge opportunity to make Sol: Exodus a huge hit for people like me that wanted to play an engaging space shooter.

Story:

The story of Sol: Exodus is pretty much stripped straight from Battlestar Galactica. You are a military pilot that is attached to a space expedition that is searching for a new planet to inhabit, since the Earth is doomed to be destroyed by our Sun. Once you finally find a suitable planet, your expedition is attacked by a religious faction of humans that believe it is God’s will that the Earth is to be destroyed and that finding a new home is in direct opposition of what God wants. The subsequent attack leaves only your battle cruiser intact to carry out the mission.

Sol: Exodus promises so much in the beginning, but fails to deliver on an engaging story through the six hours that it will take you to finish the game. The story could have focused on the feelings of hopelessness of being the only ship left or focused on the religious crusade to prevent you from completing your mission, but in the end the story just fails to be interesting at all. The potential was here for Seamless Entertainment to deliver a fantastic story, but the actual delivery was much to short to make Sol: Exodus anything but another science fiction retread.

Game Play:

Game play for Sol: Exodus is bare bones space shooter. You have your targeting reticule that can switch between targets by pressing a button. Your ship is armed with blasters and missiles to shoot down your targets, and you have the ability to change your speed by using your thrusters. The HUD helps you navigate to your checkpoint or points the way to your next target, but other then that doesn’t really do anything extra. The game play of Sol: Exodus really falls into the “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” realm. Seamless Entertainment didn’t do anything here to push the genre into something new or exciting.

The game itself is broken up into eight missions, all pretty much the same thing. You shoot things, defend things, and fly to certain points that the game tells you. The repetition factor here really shows through during your time with the game. The game also does not have an auto save feature with no way to save mid-mission, so if you fail a mission you will have to restart from the very beginning of that mission. I had a hard time wanting to finish some of this missions once, let alone twice because I failed at the end.

Then there are the bugs. Sol: Exodus feels like it was rushed to be released and is filled with game ending bugs. I had a couple of missions that were failed due to my ship clipping into an object and not being able to free myself. With the lack of a save feature mid-mission, this would send me into a frustrated string of well aimed curses, just prior to me walking away from the game. Sol: Exodus just feels unfinished and not ready for release with these bugs. I know that Seamless Entertainment is working on these items, since they are very active on the Steam forums, but this game is just not fun to play.

Aesthetics:

Sol: Exodus is not a very pretty game, but for some reason runs absolutely terrible on my machine. For a game that is set with lower graphics requirements, I was surprised at how bad it would chug and look during certain game play elements. Other then that, the art direction of the game is very generic. The ships look like other space ships that I’ve seen in other science fictions movies and games, the planets are pretty much look the same, and the graphics of the individuals talking to you are not animated.

The voice acting is decent, but with a generic science fiction story, just does nothing to help bring the player into the world of Sol: Exodus and just doesn’t save the game from being a forgettable game.

Final Thoughts:

Seamless Entertainment really could have hit a home run with Sol: Exodus. The space shooter genre hasn’t had a good game in years and there is a market of people, like me, that remember the good ole days of Tie Fighter. The problems with Sol: Exodus are numerous, from a generic storyline to buggy game play and a complete lack of mid-mission saves. But what Sol: Exodus truly fails to be is fun. I just did not have any fun playing this game due to the many issues with the story and game play that I ran into. When it all comes down to it, if the game isn’t fun to play, then the developers really failed in their purpose.

Warp – A Review (XBLA)

2012/03/01

Judgeman

News, Reviews

Some genres of video games get a bad reputation because of some really bad examples, and I feel that the stealth game genre is the prime example of this. If done right, the stealth game is a fun and exciting way to go through many hours of game play, but if done wrong, it’s just a frustrating mess that most people just don’t have the patience for. Splinter Cell and Tenchu Stealth Assassins are some examples of great stealth games while Velvet Assassin being a good example of a bad stealth game. So that brings me to my review of Warp from developer Trapdoor, a science fiction stealth game that puts you in the role of a captured alien trying to sneak out of a underwater science facility. Where does Warp fit into my hierarchy of stealth games? Let’s take a deeper look at Warp and find out.

Story:

The story of Warp is fairly basic and straightforward, but really helps explain the game play choices that the developers made during production. Your space ship crashes on Earth and you are captured by a secret scientific research group and taken to their underwater laboratory. Your equipment has been taken away and you are kept in a weakened state while the scientists run tests on you, including the dreaded “maze” test that all scientists seem to love. By eating grubs that the scientists feed you, you slowly gain your strength back enough to earn your first power up, teleport. This allows you to escape the laboratory and begin making your trek to the surface and to freedom.

As stories go, Warp’s story is a great example on how story writing can make the game play choices that was made for the game make sense. The alien is weak at first and must find more power ups in order to escape the lab, all due to the tests that the scientists ran on him (or her, it’s not all that clear). The story even takes place in an underwater facility, which helps explain why the alien just doesn’t teleport himself outside to escape.

Game play:

Warp’s game play is a combination of top down classic stealth, like the original Metal Gear, with puzzle solving and a sly sense of humor. You use your gained abilities to escape the laboratory by solving the puzzle obstacles in your way and by not being caught by the lab’s security force.

The puzzles and obstacles that you face in Warp can be overcome by many different solutions, which really allow the player the choice and flexibility to play the game as they see fit. For example, the player can choose to hide in canisters and teleport from canister to canister to avoid a security force, or they can choose to teleport into a security officer and erupt their insides, or can even cause the other officer’s to kill their own comrade. Warp also has a talent system, like most role-playing games out on the market, that allows you to boost certain abilities to make solving the puzzles much easier.

One knock on stealth games is the constant restarting of an area if you are caught. Warp does have a steep penalty for mistakes, your alien creature is not very durable and will be killed in one shot if seen, but the checkpoints for Warp are conveniently placed so that death feels much more like a small bother then a catastrophe.

The games play flows through Warp without many issues, though some of the boss fights I found terribly annoying, especially the last one. These issues aside, I felt that Warp was a very solid and good example of what the stealth genre can be.

Aesthetics:

This is where developer Trapdoor cut some corners, in the area of aesthetics. The graphics won’t win any awards, but help make the game moody and gives it that underwater claustrophobic feel, which is much needed. However, the scientists all run around with masks on, saving the developers money in actually having to create separate models for each person. The one person that does not wear a mask isn’t animated to speak at all, so that his mouth stays still while he is speaking.

The developers also hired only one voice actor for every person in the game, and that is fairly obvious from the beginning. It isn’t a game breaker, but it does become annoying hearing the same guy over and over again throughout the game. I understand that this is an Xbox Live title and not a production with a huge budget, but these items are what keep Warp from being truly great, instead it’s just good.

Final Thoughts:

Warp is a good game that would have been great if it had much more money for production. The story makes perfect sense when combined with game play elements, and has that sense of humor, which is needed in games like this. The game play allows the player to solve the obstacles and puzzles their own way and allows you to build up your alien according to the way you want to play the game. Warp auto saves your progress in the right places, so that you never feel like death is a massive punishment that makes you redo an entire section of the game over again. The downside to Warp is that the developers did not have a lot of production money to create this game and it shows in the aesthetics. None of the models show their faces and the one character that does is not animated in the mouth area, so that he speaks without moving his lips. There is only one voice actor for every human in the game, which did save the developers money, but makes the enemies feel flat and have no character to me.

Overall, Warp is a very good stealth game, definitely the best stealth game out right now for the Xbox Live Arcade, but it’s low production costs prevent it from being truly great by giving us some questionable aesthetic choices.

Shank 2 – A Review (XBLA)

2012/02/21

Judgeman

News, Reviews

Developer Klei has brought its bloody 2D brawler back to Xbox Live Arcade with the release of Shank 2. Sequels are always in a funny position with me, be it video game sequels or movie sequels. You always hope that the sequel is better then the original, but more often then not, the sequel just let’s you down and can’t deliver on what the original brought. Will Shank 2 deliver a better experience then the original Shank, or are we looking at just another effort to get your money out of your wallet? Let’s find out with my full review of Shank 2 for the Xbox 360.

Story:

Ok, let’s get this out of the way first; it’s Shank so the story is going to take a back seat to the bloody 2D side scrolling action and game play. I knew this before diving into the game for my review, but I still want to discuss how much or little the story of Shank 2 impacts your experience.

The story picks up with Shank taking a South American holiday, where he runs afoul with the local militia. Shank then starts killing said militia for no other reason then the fact that one of them knocked his whiskey bottle out of his hands. Shank fights his way to the local bar, finds another whiskey bottle, then discovers that the militia is still pissed about Shank killing so many of their number that they took one of his estranged friends hostage. Shank once again starts his bloody killing spree in order to rescue his friend and destroy the militia in the process.

The story of Shank 2 doesn’t make much sense, nor does it have to. The story, or lack thereof, did not impede on my enjoyment of eviscerating my way through to the end of the game. The story is there just to give you some context as to why Shank is in South America in the first place and why he’s gutting hundreds of hapless militiamen and women. The story is definitely the weakest link in Shank 2’s armor, but playing Shank 2 for it’s enthralling story line is like playing Minecraft for it’s stunning graphics, you’re just doing it wrong.

Game play:

Shank 2’s game play is much improved over the original. The controls feel much more fluid and gives you much more of a feeling of being in complete control over Shank’s actions. Switching up weapons during a combo is very easy and leads to many more satisfying kills, and even countering the enemy’s attacks has been made easier with the addition of a flashing exclamation point whenever the enemy is ready to attack.

Dodging in Shank 2 is also much improved. With just a flick of the right stick, Shank will now roll out of the way of an incoming attack gracefully, then will get right back up to continue his murder spree. Klei also improved on how Shank heals himself, by mapping the heal items to a different button then the attack buttons. It’s much easier to pick up a bottle of booze to heal yourself without accidentally attacking, which would prevent you from healing yourself.

Local co-op for the campaign has been killed this time around, and it’s really a good thing. The campaign is fairly short and easy to beat alone, so with a friend you would blow through it way to quickly. Instead, Klei has come up with co-op survival mode that can be played locally or over Xbox Live. Survival mode is a nice way to try to keep the life in Shank 2 well after the campaign has been finished, but for me it gets stale fairly quickly.

Overall, the game play of Shank 2 is vastly superior and improved to the original game play of Shank. Klei really listened to the criticism and complaints that came up during reviews of Shank and set out to improve what was wrong. The downside to this is that Shank 2 just feels like an improved version of Shank, without really being a sequel or adding anything more then just patching up the original’s issues.

Aesthetics:

The visuals and voice acting for Shank 2 are almost identical to what they were in the original Shank. Visuals are still cell shaded to give the violence in Shank 2 that cartoon feeling while still being violent and bloody as the original. The voice acting still does the job in Shank 2 as well, not being Oscar worthy, but definitely not the worst voice acting that I’ve heard either.

Overall:

When it all comes down to it, Shank 2 feels vastly improved and plays better then the original Shank in regards to game play. However, what you really get is just more of the same. If you liked Shank, then that’s not a bad thing at all. It is an improvement over the original in regards to Klei fixing the problems that people had with the first game, but other then that Klei really didn’t put much more work into the sequel. I would recommend it highly if you liked the first one or if you missed the original, especially for the price tag of $10, but if you are looking for a bigger experience then what the original gave you, you might be disappointed.

Quarrel – A Review (XBLA)

2012/02/06

Judgeman

News, Reviews

It’s been a while since my last review, thanks to the holiday hangover in regards to game releases, but today I get back into the saddle with my review of Quarrel for the Xbox Live Arcade. Quarrel was originally released for the iOS market a few months ago from developer Denki, due to the fact that they couldn’t find a publisher to release the game for any other system, until now. The XBLA version of Quarrel is far superior to the iOS version in almost every way, with online multiplayer and more game content, such as additional game modes. This version may have more bells and whistles the last version to be released, but is Quarrel any good? Let’s get into the game and find out.

Gameplay:

The premise behind Quarrel reminds me a lot of the old Reece’s Peanut Butter Cup commercials, where you had two great things that somehow got mixed together to make an even better thing. With Quarrel, you have a game that essentially is like what if Risk and Scrabble had an illegitimate love child that got sold to Microsoft and put onto the Live Arcade.

The game of Quarrel is set on a tropical island map that is divided up into sectors that belong to one of the players. Each turn, the player in command has two options, either reinforce his sectors by moving troops or by attacking one of his or her opponents. After each turn, the game will give the player reinforcements automatically to help the player shore up the defenses of his or her sectors prior to the next player’s turn. This section of the game play for Quarrel very much feels like Risk, but the game completely changes once combat begins between two players.

When the players enter combat, they are given an anagram of a word. For those that are less inclined to remember your old English class days, an anagram is a word that has been created from another word. With this anagram, you have to create the word that is worth the highest value that also fits into your slot available. The slots that are available for your word is based on how many people you have defending or attacking in your sector. For example, if I have five ninjas invading my opponent, who only has three pirates defending, when combat begins I have five slots for my word while he has only three for his word. Then each letter that you use has a different value to it, just like Scrabble. Sure, you can use RAIN in a four-letter word, but WOW will be worth much more, even though it is one letter less in length.

The winner of combat gets to either keep his or her land or invades and takes over the other sector, depending on what role the winner had as attacker or defender. If the defender successfully wins while having less people then the attacker, the defender gets to take prisoners, and this really helps build up your defense when you are running low on people. I personally thought this was a really neat concept, since it rewards those that create a higher value word with less spaces, but it also looks funny when the prisoner is redressed into your character’s clothing while still keeping their own unique head graphic, but more on the aesthetics of this game later.

Quarrel has a ton of different game types to play that the original iOS release did not get. Since it is on XBLA, Quarrel is fully online supported for up to four players in both ranked and casual matches. The only issue I had with the online game play was finding people to play against. What is nice here is that Quarrel will put you into a single player game if no matches can be found, so at least your playing soon either way instead of looking at a loading screen for an hour. Quarrel also had a challenge mode that pits the player against certain situations, and a domination mode where the single player goes through a variety of maps and opponents to dominate the chain of islands in Quarrel.

My only negative in regards to the game play of Quarrel is that there is no local multiplayer, which I can understand why but it is still a shame. The game would be a blast to play with friends and family as everyone is sitting on the couch, but it would be very difficult to hide one player’s word from another. It would be like playing Call of Duty via split screen and not looking at your opponent’s side of the television to see where they are camping. It’s an understandable decision by Denki, but I would still love to play this with my family in the same room.

Overall, the game play of Quarrel was top notch and worked perfectly. With the minor gripe of missing local multiplayer support, everything else about Quarrel on the Xbox 360 is far superior then the original release for the iOS.

Aesthetics and Sound:

The aesthetics of Quarrel is what makes the fun game a joy to play. The game is a very brightly colored world that uses primary colors to delineate the player sectors from each other. The design of each player’s army is where the game gets most of its personality, though. Each player is assigned a random army of Soldiers, Pirates, Ninjas, Robots, or even Mimes. There are other armies out there, but these seemed to be the predominate armies that I ran into. As your army moves across the board or enter into combat, you can hear tiny little voice bits that give your army a voice. For instance, when the Pirate army moves to invade another sector, you will hear tiny little voices saying “yar!” as they move into combat. For any of my guild mates in World of Warcraft, you already understand how funny that was to me.

Quarrel is an excellent example of how simple graphics does not automatically mean an ugly game. Quarrel uses a fun and silly aesthetic design and a bright primary color palate to make the world of Quarrel an enjoyable and fun place to spend some time.

Final Thoughts:

Quarrel is a great blend of Risk and Scrabble that makes sense. Using the map idea and movement of armies from Risk, Quarrel then throws you into a contest of vocabulary to win that battle, just like Scrabble. The aesthetics of the game are simple, fun and bright and works very well with the game design. The small amounts of voice acting that is found in this game also worked very well and made me smile more times then naught. My only gripe is that the developers couldn’t quite make local multiplayer work, but I understand how hard that would have been for this type of game, so the gripe is only a minor one. Quarrel is a fun strategy/word play game that is a steal for only 400 Microsoft Points and is available now.

Voltron: Defender of the Universe – A Review (XBLA)

2011/12/13

Judgeman

News, Reviews

THQ and Behavior Interactive have brought to the Xbox Live Arcade a game that I would have killed for as a kid during the 1980’s with Voltron: Defender of the Universe. Unfortunately, nostalgia alone could not make this title the huge hit that I wanted it to be. With repetitive game play, quick time boss battles, and bad quality control in the voice acting, Voltron: Defender of the Universe falls short of a good game and ends up directly into the mediocre pile of XBLA titles.

Story:

The story for Voltron: Defender of the Universe is where the game really shines, but still has some problems with the line up that it wants to have in regards of characters. The game follows four old episodes of the original Voltron cartoon from the 80’s. Each episode begins with a cut scene from the original television show to give you a brief glimpse of the story line. The attempt to make the game feel like the television show really worked for me – you even get Peter Cullen giving us the commercial break messages any time you press pause.

The player gets to select one of the five lions to play as, with the original pilots in each lion. That’s right, in the beginning Princess Allura does not pilot the blue lion, but Sven does. Then, during episode two’s cut scene, the Princess appears to pilot the blue lion while Sven continues to do the voice acting as you play the game.

The main plot follows King Zarkon’s invasion of the planet Arus, accompanied by his son Lotor and the witch, Haggar. Voltron successfully repels the invasion and follows up with a rescue mission helping out another planet invaded by Zarkon, ultimately chasing down Zarkon to his home planet and defeating him as a robeast.

Overall, the story is the best thing since it closely follows four of the original story lines from the old television show. Voltron: Defender of the Universe really falters heavily though in the areas of game play and aesthetics.

Game Play:

Voltron: Defender of the Universe focuses its game play solely around the twin stick game play of games such as Robotron. One stick moves the lion around and the other stick shoots the lion’s top gun. You also have one button to jump and one button to do a melee attack, but the majority of your moves center on the two-stick control scheme. For me, this control scheme worked well enough. I never once had any control issues in any of the levels and found that the game play actually worked for the game at hand. It was the rest of the game play that I took issue with.

The game ultimately becomes a grind fest through the levels. Each level consists of moving to a waypoint, defeating enemy units, then moving to another waypoint to defeat some more enemy units. Sometimes, the game will change it up with a defend section where you need to defend a castle or a dreaded escort quest, helping citizens escape the area. After a couple of levels of this, you begin to realize that this is the entirety of the game play for Voltron: Defender of the Universe, and that’s not a good thing.

At the end of each episode, you get to form Voltron with your lion. This is where the game really disappointed me, since the entire robeast battle is done using quicktime events. The cartoon sequence that was shown in every episode starts to play and you must move the sticks in concert with the symbols on the screen. If you fail, you just don’t get the points for that movement. There isn’t any consequence in this stage for failing to hit the right sequence. Once you finally form Voltron, then you get to select one of four attacks, then must time the button press right in order to successfully cast the attack. Oh, and don’t worry if you miss it, because when the robeast attacks, you’ll get the chance to counter his attack and do damage. You can conceivably just use the counter attack method and still defeat the robeast.

Multiplayer is fun to play in Voltron, maybe even more fun then just the single player campaign since you get to blaze through the levels quicker with more lions. I experienced no lag at all over Xbox Live, but this could not save the overall experience of the game.

Aesthetics:

Remember quite a few years ago, developers discovered cell shaded graphics and thought that this was the greatest thing since sliced bread? Well, Behavior Interactive thought so too and used cell-shaded graphics for Voltron: Defender of the Universe. Normally, I wouldn’t be so against it for this type of game, since cell shaded graphics really do have a place in the comic book or the cartoon genres, but with Voltron, it just looks like it was done very cheaply and without polish.

The lions in the game also never seem all that impressive. The game’s visuals is done in the standard three-quarter view, but the lions look more like small toys then the giant mechs that they are. Behavior Interactive really had a hard time here with getting the size right on all things concerned.

The sound of Voltron: Defender of the Universe was more then adequate for the job at hand. The voice-overs sounded almost perfect, if not exact to the original actors of the television show. The music was good but in the long run, forgettable.

Final Thoughts:

Voltron: Defender of the Universe was the game that my inner child really wanted to like, but in the end the video gamer in me really had to take apart piece by piece. The graphics felt cheap overall and not done well, while the game play was much more of a grind then needed and really did nothing to excite me at all. The story line was decent, but then again it followed the original television show’s episodes, so you really couldn’t mess that up, while the voice acting was very close to the original source material. In the end, Voltron: Defender of the Universe is a passable and mediocre game that would be fun for one play through by an old fan, and nothing more.