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Review: Darksiders (Xbox 360)

Words by

Derek McEwan

Posted on February 1, 2010

War, what it good for? Well in this case he is good for an amazing game.

Darksiders has a rather unusual concept for a story, the game starts out just as the apocalypse has been brought about. Meteors fall to the earth and demons and angels are battling for supremacy whilst mankind watches on in abject terror. However there was a mistake, for the apocalypse was not scheduled for this time and the council (strange skull like beings who govern all three realities) are incredibly angry at this turn of events. Fortunately, there is a scapegoat to be had in the form of War, the first horseman of the apocalypse. War however has no idea why this has happened and why his fellow horsemen weren’t called along with him, so the council gives him a chance to redeem himself. They strip him of his powers and force him to accept the symbiotic watcher into his body. The watcher was created to govern the horsemen and has the power to destroy them if need be. Now powerless and plagued by the watcher (voiced brilliantly by Mark Hamill) War has to go forth into the mortal world and try to clear his name before the Destroyer (the big bad of the story) manages to amass enough power to tip the balance in hells favour. And that is where you come in.

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Review: Matt Hazard: Blood Bath and Beyond (Xbox 360)

Words by

Ed Guy

Posted on January 29, 2010

Review: Matt Hazard: Blood Bath and Beyond (Xbox 360)

For over 25 years, Matt Hazard has bombarded the games industry with his shameless parodies of popular gaming franchises. Bar a few poorly judged spin-offs such as Haz-Matt Carts (no, really) the games have always been ‘run & gun’ titles. To many veteran players Hazard is somewhat of a cult figure, but I shall not hesitate in suggesting that the majority of casual players will never have heard of him.

Bearing in mind how terrifying the wrath of a destruction-hungry ‘hardcore gamer’ can be, developers Vicious Cycle were wise to ensure this latest instalment sticks to its roots; just a dash of ‘next-gen’ sheen has been added to the aged formula. The result is a ‘2.5d’ shooter completely saturated with dodgy ‘rag-doll’ physics and incalculable numbers of exploding objects. “Blood Bath and Beyond” sums the experience up fairly well actually…perhaps a semi-colon and then the line “jokes are funny” should follow. Yes, that would provide an accurate description of what to expect from the game.

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Review: Alien Breed Evolution: Episode 1 (Xbox 360)

Words by

Billy Withers

Posted on January 29, 2010

Review: Alien Breed Evolution: Episode 1 (Xbox 360)

I’ve always been a fan of Team 17. For those not old enough to remember as far back as the Amiga, these guys were up there with the likes of Psygnosis, the Bitmap Brothers and Sensible Software in terms of what they produced on the Commodore home computer. Body Blows, Project-X, Superfrog and of course, Worms were all hits back in the 16-bit era.

The title that brought them into the limelight was Alien Breed, which was a Gauntlet style sci-fi shooter with smooth graphics, easy to pick up gameplay and a high quality level throughout. Now, after a long and almost unforgivable absence, the franchise is back in the form of Evolution. The story itself has been split into 3 episodic parts, which will be released separately throughout the year, but the initial synopsis involves Conrad, a chief engineer for the Leopold spacecraft and a cyborg Lieutenant named MIA, trying to save the rest of the crew and important guests after they are pulled into a gravitational field and crash into a strange object.

The Unreal Engine seems to be the weapon of choice in most games at the minute and Alien Breed is no exception. It bears a slight resemblance to Shadow Complex in style, with some lovely lighting and rendering done; bearing in mind this is an 800 point arcade title and not a £40 commercial job. Sirens, explosions and everything else in-between are all done with a beauty that belies the price tag, with the ship having a really nice sci-fi feel to it, with really dark, metallic corridors frantically trying to digest any light from your torch as you battle to save everyone from the alien horde. The alien design does have a slight hint on occasion to the H. R. Giger creations, especially the crawling face-hugger style creatures at the start, but that’s not really a bad thing. Some of the other designs are pretty creepy and as you progress become ever more deadly, especially the nasty regeneration ones, who bring back fallen foes to life again, just to shrink your ammo supplies even more.

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Review: Puzzlegeddon (Xbox 360)

Words by

Tom Battey

Posted on January 27, 2010

To suggest Puzzlegeddon is confusing would be understating the meaning of ‘confusing’. Your first hour with the game is likely to leave you utterly bewildered, and ultimately frustrated. It’s a bizarre combination of genres that aims to be something unique and exciting, but just ends up being not much fun.

To get the point across, I’ll describe the gameplay of Puzzlegeddon. Puzzlegeddon is a puzzle/strategy hybrid game. Battles take place on a spherical planet with contenders dotted around the outside. You have to complete a Bejewelled-esque match-five puzzle in the middle of the screen in order to amass resources, which you can use to attack other players, reinforce your base, and deflect attacks to lower an opponent’s defences. While you are doing this, each of your opponents are also amassing resources and throwing out attacks at each other or at you.

All of this happens in real-time, with no pauses, all on one screen. It’s enough to make you want to weep at the overwhelming onslaught of stuff that’s happening. You’ll be trying to complete the puzzle fast enough to amass enough resources to deflect the two missiles flying at you whilst also trying to weaken an opponent in order to launch an attack of your own whilst trying to clear a black hole someone placed over your head and dealing with a move restriction someone else put on you.

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Review: Assassin’s Creed (Xbox 360)

Words by

Derek McEwan

Posted on January 26, 2010

I know that Assassin’s Creed 2 has been out for a little while now, but lets not forget where it all began.

Initially my reaction when I first saw this game advertised on a popular gadget related show on TV was one of scepticism. It looked like a rip off of the popular Prince of Persia games which had been making a rocky re-entry into the gaming world and I decided against purchasing it as I had seen it all before….or so I thought.

When I eventually made the decision to purchase the game my mind was instantly changed for the better. From the very beginning when you are placed into the initial training mode section, to the very end (which I will not spoil for those of you yet to play this game) the story flowed as easily as any Hollywood blockbuster. You play the role of a bartender called Desmond Miles who is captured by a scientific organisation to test out their new machine, the Animus. The Animus is integral to the plot of the game as it allows Desmond to visit and control one of his past lives through his genetic memory. The past self known as Altair is the character you will be playing as throughout most of the game with Desmonds sections being little more than plot filler. It is when you step into the past that the game really hits its high. Altair is a trained assassin with some formidable skills at his disposal, at least to start with. He displeases his clan and has to earn the right to use his weapons again and through this allows you as the player to learn the finer points of the control system.

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