Rocksmith Review

The Good

• The technology works very well  
• Tons of learning tools for beginners  
• Great song selection  
• Difficulty scales to your ability.

The Bad

• Presentation and campaign are weak  
• Intimidating at first for newcomers.

With the oversaturated and ailing rhythm game genre in a state of decline, it seems ill-timed to launch a new guitar-focused music franchise. But Ubisoft has pulled one out of left field with Rocksmith--a guitar game that successfully bridges the gap between musical gaming and actual rocking. It's advanced enough to give seasoned guitar players a more realistic challenge than Rock Band or Guitar Hero, yet accessible enough to teach inexperienced guitarists the ropes of rock and roll.
There are a few minor hurdles to get through before you get rocking. Rocksmith requires you to own an actual six-string electric guitar and won't work with any old plastic peripherals you have lying around. It's a great excuse to dust off the old axe if you have one, but the high cost of picking up the Epiphone bundle or a separate guitar will be prohibitive for some players. That said, wielding an honest-to-goodness instrument of rock is what makes this game so fun. Once you have the requisite guitar in hand, you plug it into your system using the included 1/4-inch adapter cable, but it takes some fiddling to get a comfortable response time between the visual and audio lag. Running the sound out via analog audio cables into a stereo offers the best performance, though there are a few different options to explore. Once you get that mess sorted out, it's time to melt faces. Well, eventually.

Rocksmith adapts your skill level on the fly.

Rocksmith's light campaign mode eases you into tunes by having you practice small groups of songs to get a feel for them before playing the more advanced versions back-to-back in concert at packed venues. It starts you off at the ground floor with simple licks, single notes, and slow pacing to get you accustomed to the basics of guitar playing and how to decipher the elaborate note runway. Each guitar string is associated with a different color, and the numbered fretboard onscreen indicates the corresponding location you're supposed to play on the guitar. The gameplay is reasonably lenient, since you can't "fail" mid-song for performing poorly. You may have to replay a tune if you don't reach a certain minimum point score by the end, but repetition is required for learning, and it's a common theme across much of Rocksmith. You're good to go as long as you hit the right notes or chords when prompted when they come down the runway. What's awesome is that you're not docked points for noodling. For folks who already have some level of guitar skill, this is one element that Rock Band and Guitar Hero sorely lacked. Even better: the game scales to your playing ability automatically. If you start nailing power chords instead of single notes, you'll level up the phrasing and soon start seeing chords coming down the screen at you. The reverse happens if you mess up too much, giving you a chance to recover if things get too busy for you. It's a very cool, dynamic system that's forgiving without gutting the challenge.
Earning rock points with each performance unlocks more venues, songs, and bonus content. As you increase your rank and playing skills, the game gradually ramps up in complexity to add in full chords, solos, and eventually, note-for-note phrasing. There's a great mix of songs, and most of the 50-plus tunes have several different versions that feature single notes, full chords, and the more advanced combo arrangements. While the track listing is geared more toward jams with familiar licks and catchy hooks than current top-40 popularity, there's a solid spread here. You'll find classic rock hits from Cream, The Rolling Stones, and Tom Petty, alongside Nirvana, The Cure, The Black Keys, and more recent groups. New tunes also introduce more advanced guitar-playing techniques, which are accompanied by detailed video explanations, practice challenges, and tutorial help. The extra level of handholding is optional, but it's there if you need the support or the additional practice. Arcade-style minigames present a really fun option for continuing to hone specific skills while taking a break from the straight-up rocking, and the way Rocksmith goes above and beyond to offer you so many different ways to learn new guitar tricks and improve your ability is impressive. Some activities are more enjoyable than others, yet there's a broad toolbox to draw from for players learning the guitar for the first time.
Every note, chord, pick scrape, or sound you make is played through the game in real time, and it's amazing how Rocksmith essentially turns your TV or stereo into an amplifier. Thankfully, there's a built-in tuner you can access from the menu, and you're prompted to check your tuning between songs. Reverb and distortion are added to your guitar's sound on a song-by-song basis too, but you also unlock different amps, effects pedals, and guitars to fiddle around with in the game's absorbing sandbox-style amp mode. Here you can customize your guitar sound with tons of different layers of tones and effects. It's easy to spend hours testing all the sounds out and free-form jamming through the TV.

Chords can get a little crazy at high speed.

For everything Rocksmith does right in terms of delivering an authentic guitar-playing experience married with enjoyable gameplay, it's still lacking in some areas. Compared to other rhythm games, the presentation is far less flashy or interesting. While that makes sense, given the focus is on playing a real guitar instead of hitting just a few colored buttons, it could have used a more upbeat, engaging way to draw you into the experience. Venues are dark, drab spots populated small seas of realistic-looking fans who are equally lacking in personality. The campaign structure itself feels pretty weak too. There are a lot of tunes to rock through and some great content to unlock, yet there's precious little about the experience that makes you feel like you're rocking out onstage or making real progress through your virtual career.
There's definitely room for improvement down the road, but Rocksmith's debut has one thing going for it above all else: it's the real deal. This ambitious guitar game delivers on its promise of intense rhythm gaming action tied to the act of actual guitar playing. It has something to offer players of all skill levels, whether you're picking up and learning the guitar for the first time or have been playing for ages. After years of Guitar Hero, Rock Band, and a slew of imitators, it's refreshing to see someone finally make the big leap and succeed.

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PixelJunk SideScroller Review

The Good

• Gorgeous neon art style  
• Creative stage designs  
• Impressive boss fights.

The Bad

• Short length and limited replay  
• Weapon button mapping is awkward  
• Multiplayer co-op isn't well implemented.

From the hypnotic neon landscape and constant barrage of spraying bullets to the way the playing field bends around at the edges of the screen to replicate the look of an old arcade cabinet monitor, everything about the latest entry in the ever-creative PixelJunk series from Q-Games seems designed to push your nostalgia button. That's not a bad thing, but looking past the allure of the dazzling visual design reveals a short, minimalistic arcade shooter with a few faults that almost outweigh the fun. PixelJunk SideScroller's twitchy gameplay evokes fond memories of playing games like Life Force and Gradius, but it feels weak when compared to the PixelJunk Shooter games that preceded it in the series.

The luminous chaos ramps up as you progress.

Because it's based on an unlockable secret stage found in the previous PixelJunk game, it's not surprising that SideScroller cannibalizes the exact same spacecraft, some of the same foes, and a few other hazards from PixelJunk Shooter 2. Familiar environmental elements like flammable gas, water, ice, and lava also make a return. Taking damage once overheats your craft, and you can restore your two-hit health meter by flying through water to cool down as in the past two PixelJunk entries. But whereas the two Shooter games are geared more toward exploration and puzzle work, SideScroller is all about the straight-up action. Like the old-school classics that the game pays homage to, you pilot your small ship through forced scrolling stages while battling waves of enemy fighters, bullet-spewing sentry cannons, and more elaborate boss encounters. The chaotic dodge-and-shoot gameplay is enjoyable yet straightforward; it's kill or be killed. Unfortunately, some design elements make it hard to do your job.
Your ship's three main weapons options--machine guns, lasers, and bombs--offer a limited means of cutting through the swarms of baddies that come your way. Each can be upgraded independently up to five times to boost its power and reach. Sadly, none of the weapons are totally effective against every foe you face, and switching between them in the heat of combat is unwieldy at best. Instead of triggering each attack with a different button press, you're stuck with cycling through them one at a time using a single button. To make matters worse, every switch is accompanied by an irritating female robot voice whose grating nature further encourages you to pick a favorite and stick with it through much of the game. There's also a chargeable ramming attack, but it's more effective at accidentally getting you killed than taking down foes. The game's checkpoint system sometimes works against you as well. Running out of lives toward the tail end of a stage lets you restart from the last checkpoint infinitely, but it robs you of all your power-ups and makes it tough to progress without starting over. While these limitations do get in the way, it's not that difficult to look past them and still have fun.

Co-op is more frustrating than rewarding.

SideScroller's biggest redeeming quality is its creative, colorful presentation. Each captivating little area is simply beautiful. The initial simplicity of the glowing geometric stage designs soon melts away into complex networks that spread throughout the foreground and background. There's a lot to soak in, even if you have precious little time for sightseeing with all of the flying bullets and other dangers to plow through. Levels feature a good blend of natural and mechanical obstacles, like crushing pistons, jets of flame, falling rocks, and combustible gas. The boss battles waiting at the end of each run of stages ramp up the clever level designs in intense, multifaceted encounters that are truly impressive. What's disappointing is it takes so little time to cut a path to the final credits. SideScroller's three main stages feature four short levels apiece, and there's an unlockable final boss battle stage too. Tougher difficulty settings featuring crazy visual filters that change the look of the gameworld and frustrating multiplayer co-op that has you sharing limited lives don't offer much in the way of replay incentive.
As visually stimulating as it may be, PixelJunk SideScroller's supershort length and bare-bones arcade shooter gameplay drag down its retro charm a few notches. While fleshing out the bonus stage from PixelJunk Shooter 2 into a stand-alone game wasn't a bad idea, this brief download flounders under clunky implementation. It doesn't hold up well next to its more robust brethren.

The Good

• Gorgeous neon art style  
• Creative stage designs  
• Impressive boss fights.

The Bad

• Short length and limited replay  
• Weapon button mapping is awkward  
• Multiplayer co-op isn't well implemented.

From the hypnotic neon landscape and constant barrage of spraying bullets to the way the playing field bends around at the edges of the screen to replicate the look of an old arcade cabinet monitor, everything about the latest entry in the ever-creative PixelJunk series from Q-Games seems designed to push your nostalgia button. That's not a bad thing, but looking past the allure of the dazzling visual design reveals a short, minimalistic arcade shooter with a few faults that almost outweigh the fun. PixelJunk SideScroller's twitchy gameplay evokes fond memories of playing games like Life Force and Gradius, but it feels weak when compared to the PixelJunk Shooter games that preceded it in the series.

The luminous chaos ramps up as you progress.

Because it's based on an unlockable secret stage found in the previous PixelJunk game, it's not surprising that SideScroller cannibalizes the exact same spacecraft, some of the same foes, and a few other hazards from PixelJunk Shooter 2. Familiar environmental elements like flammable gas, water, ice, and lava also make a return. Taking damage once overheats your craft, and you can restore your two-hit health meter by flying through water to cool down as in the past two PixelJunk entries. But whereas the two Shooter games are geared more toward exploration and puzzle work, SideScroller is all about the straight-up action. Like the old-school classics that the game pays homage to, you pilot your small ship through forced scrolling stages while battling waves of enemy fighters, bullet-spewing sentry cannons, and more elaborate boss encounters. The chaotic dodge-and-shoot gameplay is enjoyable yet straightforward; it's kill or be killed. Unfortunately, some design elements make it hard to do your job.
Your ship's three main weapons options--machine guns, lasers, and bombs--offer a limited means of cutting through the swarms of baddies that come your way. Each can be upgraded independently up to five times to boost its power and reach. Sadly, none of the weapons are totally effective against every foe you face, and switching between them in the heat of combat is unwieldy at best. Instead of triggering each attack with a different button press, you're stuck with cycling through them one at a time using a single button. To make matters worse, every switch is accompanied by an irritating female robot voice whose grating nature further encourages you to pick a favorite and stick with it through much of the game. There's also a chargeable ramming attack, but it's more effective at accidentally getting you killed than taking down foes. The game's checkpoint system sometimes works against you as well. Running out of lives toward the tail end of a stage lets you restart from the last checkpoint infinitely, but it robs you of all your power-ups and makes it tough to progress without starting over. While these limitations do get in the way, it's not that difficult to look past them and still have fun.

Co-op is more frustrating than rewarding.

SideScroller's biggest redeeming quality is its creative, colorful presentation. Each captivating little area is simply beautiful. The initial simplicity of the glowing geometric stage designs soon melts away into complex networks that spread throughout the foreground and background. There's a lot to soak in, even if you have precious little time for sightseeing with all of the flying bullets and other dangers to plow through. Levels feature a good blend of natural and mechanical obstacles, like crushing pistons, jets of flame, falling rocks, and combustible gas. The boss battles waiting at the end of each run of stages ramp up the clever level designs in intense, multifaceted encounters that are truly impressive. What's disappointing is it takes so little time to cut a path to the final credits. SideScroller's three main stages feature four short levels apiece, and there's an unlockable final boss battle stage too. Tougher difficulty settings featuring crazy visual filters that change the look of the gameworld and frustrating multiplayer co-op that has you sharing limited lives don't offer much in the way of replay incentive.
As visually stimulating as it may be, PixelJunk SideScroller's supershort length and bare-bones arcade shooter gameplay drag down its retro charm a few notches. While fleshing out the bonus stage from PixelJunk Shooter 2 into a stand-alone game wasn't a bad idea, this brief download flounders under clunky implementation. It doesn't hold up well next to its more robust brethren.

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Volition Siapkan Saints Row 4

Kesuksesan yang berhasil diraih oleh Saints Row – The Third boleh dikatakan “menyelamatkan” THQ yang saat ini berada di ujung tanduk. Sebagai salah satu game yang paling menguntungkan, THQ tentu saja terus menarik Volition untuk mempertahankan momentum dengan merilis lebih banyak seri Saints Row di masa depan. Tidak cukup menghadirkan “Enter The Dominatrix” yang akan dirilis sebagai sebuah game terpisah, Volition juga dikabarkan sudah mempersiapkan seri keempat dari franchise ini. Benar sekali, selamat datang Saints Row 4!
Dari informasi yang didapatkan dari profile pekerja Volition di LinkedIn, informasi ini didapatkan. Volition dipercaya sedang dalam proses mengembangkan tidak hanya satu, tetapi tiga game baru dari franchise Saints Row. Menariknya lagi, proyek masif ini juga ditujukan untuk konsol generasi selanjutnya yang masih misterius, di samping perilisan untuk PS3, XBOX 360, dan PC. Kehadiran seri keempat ini sendiri bukan lagi sebuah kejutan mengingat boss THQ sempat mengutarakan bahwa Saints  Row 4 sudah berada dalam tahap pengembangan ketika seri ketiganya dirilis. Sayangnya belum ada screenshot dan trailer baru untuk seri ini.

Seri keempat dari Saints Row ini tentu saja akan menjadi sebuah game yang layak untuk diantisipasi. Mengapa? Karena Volition boleh terhitung sebagai developer yang penuh “kejutan” dan tidak takut untuk mengambil langkah-langkah ekstrim untuk membuat seri terbarunya semakin menarik. Salah satunya adalah konsep Saints Row 3 yang melompat ke masa depan. Konsep seperti apa yang akan dihadirkan Volition untuk seri keempat ini? Masa depan? Masa lalu? Alternate universe? Kita tunggu saja.

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EX Troopers: Spin-off Lost Planet Bergaya Anime

Hampir semua gamer yang menggemari game action dengan monster-monster berukuran masif dan garang tentu saja mengenal franchise Lost Planets dari Capcom. Setelah sempat mengumumkan kehadiran Lost Planets 3 yang dikabarkan akan mengusung gaya permainan yang berbeda, Capcom ternyata juga menyimpan kejutan yang lain. Lupakan tentang visualisasi realistis dan kondisi lingkungan ekstrim yang sudah menjadi ciri khas franchise ini dan sambutlah sebuah seri spin-off yang lebih “bersahabat” – EX Troopers.
Selain menghadirkan setting permainan yang sama, EX Troopers boleh dikatakan memuat berbagai macam elemen yang tidak menggambarkan ciri khas Lost Planet sama sekali, contohnya adalah gaya visualisasinya yang kini lebih bercorak anime. Anda akan berperan sebagai Bren Turner, seorang pelajar dari sebuah akademi di planet EDN-3^rd. Untuk alasan tertentu, Anda akan bergabung dengan para Snow Pirates untuk melawan ras alien menyebalkan – Akrid. Anda juga akan bertemu dengan banyak karakter lain yang memiliki kemampuan uniknya masing-masing. Sang otak di balik seri ini – Shintaro Kojima berharap agar para fans melihat EX Troopers sebagai sebuah seri baru tanpa ekspektasi bahwa ia akan mewakili banyak hal dari Lost Planets.

Hey bro, have you heard? They want to recreate us with anime-style..

Dengan proses pengembangan yang sudah berjalan sekitar 60%, Capcom berharap dapat merilis seri untuk Nintendo 3DS dan Playstation 3 ini di tahun 2012. Pasar Jepang tentu saja menjadi target pertama dengan tanpa kepastian translasi di masa depan. Untuk memberikan sedikit gambaran tentang game yang satu ini, Capcom sendiri sudah mempersiapkan playable demo nya minggu depan. Jadi, Lost Planets dengan gaya anime? Ada yang tertarik? I will prefer the original..

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Stronghold 3 Review

The Good

• Atmospheric music  
• Patches are gradually stomping bugs and adding in needed game features.

The Bad

• Slow-paced, repetitive scenarios  
• Terrible tutorial leaves many key game concepts unexplained  
• Buggy and prone to crashes  
• Shallow combat and sieges.

Noted poet Thomas Earl Petty once told us that the waiting is the hardest part, a lesson that is painfully taught once again in Stronghold 3. The Firefly Studios game of medieval micromanagement may have been a long time coming, since Stronghold 2 was released back in 2005, but despite the years since and the opportunity to do something different, Stronghold 3 sticks close to its predecessor's template, offering up more slow-moving gameplay that sees you doing more waiting and watching than constructing a Middle Ages empire. What could have been a good city builder has been buried under this design flaw, not to mention other serious issues with bugs, mission repetition, a tutorial that doesn't do much tutoring, and simplistic combat.

A barely there tutorial and incredibly slow-paced scenarios make it very tough to get into Stronghold 3's micromanagement.

Like its predecessors, Stronghold 3 is a real-time strategy game where you play as a lord attempting to build a happy little hamlet in the Middle Ages. It's all about the peasants, who need to be lured in with things like fair tax rates and then kept happy with jobs gathering and processing resources, reasonably plentiful food like apples and bread, and a half-decent standard of living without too much plague killing everybody off and blighting crops. The basic structure of the game mirrors traditional city builders going right back to the Caesar and Pharaoh franchises that developer Impressions created back in the '90s. The story recalls the original Stronghold, with the game picking up the tale of a boy battling traitors to seek revenge for the overthrow of his father, the previous king. Apparently impalement did not rid the world of the archvillain, the Wolf, at the end of the first game in the franchise, so he returns a decade later looking to even the score.
The modes of play have been broken up into two semi-linked single-player campaigns, one that focuses primarily on the economy in getting a kingdom rolling again (although you do have to battle a few menaces) and a more military-centered one that places war against the Wolf and his troops on the front burner, while still forcing you to keep the economy rolling back at home. Historical one-off scenarios are also on offer, featuring a handful of brutally unfair (and quick) castle sieges where you take on spectacular numbers of enemy troops whether you are attacking or defending. Free Build is a sandbox option where you build the medieval shantytown of your dreams without any goals or guidelines. Deathmatch and King of the Hill multiplayer games are available as well, although nobody seems to be playing online, and the game currently lacks popular options from previous Stronghold games, such as Kingmaker and Skirmish.

It's the Middle Ages. Can't we get all medieval on these peasants dragging their feet?

Gameplay is problematic across the board. For starters, bugs show up early and often. The game seems to have a serious problem with graphics-switching hardware on laptops. It refused to start on our test Dell system with both onboard visuals and a high-powered video card that more than matched the system requirements, providing nothing but a "Failed to initialize the engine" error on every launch attempt. Only manually adding a command to a config file got the game running, and then only in a window that occasionally started up with a mouse cursor issue that made it impossible to accurately point at anything. Crashes also take place on a regular basis. The game has a habit of fainting to the desktop out of the blue, particularly after you have been playing a mission for a considerable amount of time (save early, save often). All of these problems come with little in the way of reward. Nothing pushes the envelope when it comes to graphics or sound. Visuals are muddy and bland, with few details on the constricted maps. Story cutscenes are dressed up with black-and-white drawings that look more like rough storyboards than finished artwork. Sound is unmemorable save for a striking musical score that includes minstrel odes with a singer who comes off a bit like '70s-era Gordon Lightfoot. These tunes will linger long after you've forgotten the game.
Even when Stronghold 3 runs properly, it doesn't run well. The first problem you encounter is the lack of a thorough tutorial. While there is an interactive tutorial, it stops abruptly after just a few minutes, leaving virtually all of the game's core features and building functions completely unexplained. As a result, you go into the campaigns with no knowledge of how the game's economics function. So you often need to call up the in-game help for advice on why stone quarries aren't functioning or how to deal with pesky apple crop blight. Granted, there isn't anything completely out of left field, but some tips would be much appreciated, especially regarding the production line for resources. Because there are multiple steps for everything--making bread, for instance, requires a stop at a farm, storehouse, windmill, bakery, and granary--you need some help, especially when it comes to keeping all of your buildings close together to avoid lengthy production delays.

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BurgerTime: World Tour Review

The Good

• Lots of content for the $10 price tag  
• Fast-paced levels.

The Bad

• Confusing 3D level design  
• Issues with controls and collision detection  
• Overly cluttered visuals.

BurgerTime never gets its just desserts. This '80s arcade classic from Data East was a big hit back in the glory days of the quarter gobbler, but the game never seems to hit many top 10 lists and has been all but ignored in the rush to port everything from Pac-Man to Time Pilot to contemporary consoles. But burger-tromping (and likely health department-violating) chef Peter Pepper finally makes his return in BurgerTime: World Tour as an Xbox Live Arcade effort from developer MonkeyPaw Games. Unfortunately, once you get past the nostalgia evoked by battling sinister foodstuffs and listening to the memorable musical score from 1982, the game turns into a frustrating muddle.

Peter Pepper is now pretty handy with a spatula.

At first, however, this new BurgerTime comes off a bit like the old BurgerTime. You take on the role of mustachioed chef Peter Pepper (or your Xbox avatar) in a surreal world. Burgers are put together by running around floating scaffolding and stomping on patties, cheese, tomatoes, buns, and other fixings that were probably damn delicious before Pete got his size-10 loafers all over them. Every time you run across one of these items, it falls a floor down and is one step closer to its final destination on a big plate at the bottom of the level. Of course, making burgers in this rather athletic fashion isn't as easy as it sounds. Enemy foods like eggs, hot dogs, and pickles aren't too happy about Peter's love of red meat, so you have to dodge them, crush them by dropping ingredients on them, or send them on a ride down when you run over the burger fixing of your choice. With one touch from baddies, you die, so it's fortunate that you can stun them with the blasts of pepper that were your one weapon back in 1982. Or you can take advantage of new features like the ability to jump and employ power-ups that include a whirlwind spatula attack and rockets that boost you to upper levels without the use of ladders.
The above recipe could have made for a welcome BurgerTime update, but developer MonkeyPaw Games pushed things a little too far and turned the game into a complete reenvisioning of the original. The biggest issue here is 3D level design and an odd camera perspective. Instead of playing against a flat Donkey Kong-style arrangement of ladders and girders as in the original game, you express your love of artery-clogging treats in kind of a theater-in-the-round setting where the camera revolves around the whole map. This concept is totally unnecessary and confusing, so much so that the developers had to add an arrow pointing you to the next burger to be stomped. Even with this navigational tool, the circular perspective and busy level design lead to a lot of frustration. You get lost a lot and inevitably run straight into unseen enemies coming around the curvature of the maps. Giant scowling hot dogs just shouldn't be able to sneak up on you as they do.
Controls and collision detection are also off. Peter slides around on burger patties and tomatoes like a sports car on black ice, and he can even careen off of plain-old platforms. Because the game requires a lot of precisely timed jumps around collapsing and flipping floors, the lack of fine control leads to many untimely deaths. Even when you don't die, it's too easy to miss jumping targets and wind up falling down to the start of levels like you were on a bad streak in a game of Snakes and Ladders.

The best way to lose weight with burgers? Run around while making them.

For what it's worth, there is a lot of content here. There are dozens of levels in the game spread out among campaigns set on the city streets of New York, Paris, Tokyo, and Mexico. Everything looks pretty good, too, although the cartoony attractiveness of the settings is offset by all of the detail. The backgrounds are as cluttered up as an episode of Hoarders. So it's easy to lose sight of enemies and even run into a corner with a pack of hot dogs in hot pursuit because you didn't notice a wall. Sound effects are updated with a nod to the old game, with a remastered version of the original score that's pretty catchy, along with cute additions like growling eggs. The challenge factor is high right from the beginning, with lots of fast-paced levels strewn with enemies, condiment-blasting cannons, giant impaling screws, loads of soaring platforms, and huge burgers you can stack. So you'll likely need a good six or seven hours to plow through the entire single-player experience, which is pretty good value for an 800-point ($10) XBLA game. Split-screen and online multiplayer let you duke it out with rival chefs in timed burger battles, but neither is very playable. It's difficult to get into a quick match because almost nobody is playing, and split-screen local play scrunches the maps so much that it's hard to see what's happening.
Stick with the original. BurgerTime: World Tour has its heart in the right place and evokes fond memories of a nearly 30-year-old classic arcade game, but the 3D perspective, control problems, and too many ill-advised additions to the basic formula make this one hard burger to get down.

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Review Sniper Elite V2: Bidik, Tembak, Hancurkan!

Gamer penggemar FPS mana yang tidak menyukai peran sebagai seorang penembak jitu ketika memainkan franchise-franchise kesayangan mereka? Mengendap dan bersembunyi bagaikan hantu yang tidak terlihat, menyamar dan menyatu dengan lingkungan, dan memastikan setiap peluru yang keluar dari moncong senjata laras panjang mereka mengklaim sebuah kepala atau jantung musuh menjadi alasan mengapa para penembak jitu ini dicintai oleh para gamer.Sebagai mimpi buruk bagi pasukan infantri manapun, sniper mulai menjelma menjadi sebuah definisi “mesin pembunuh” yang paling efektif di pertempuran. Sensasi konstan inilah yang akan Anda rasakan di Sniper Elite V2.
Apakah nama Sniper Elite tidak terdengar asing bagi Anda? Benar sekali, Sniper Elite sendiri merupakan sebuah game third person shooter yang berfokus pada sepak terjang seorang penembak jitu di zaman Perang Dunia ke-II. Sempat dirilis di tahun 2005 silam dan mendapatkan respon yang cukup positif di kala itu, sang developer Rebellion Development akhirnya memutuskan untuk mengembangkan “versi kedua”nya – Sniper Elite V2 yang baru saja dirilis secara multi-platform. Sebuah game yang akan memungkinkan Anda menyelami peran sebagai seorang sniper? Anda akan lebih mendapatkan kesan sebagai seorang “One-Man Army” ala Rambo.
Lantas bagaimana performa game ini secara keseluruhan? Mampukan Sniper elite V2 menghadirkan keunikan dan kualitas yang membuatnya berbeda dibandingkan game third person shooter lainnya?

Plot

Anda akan berperan sebagai prajurit dalam samaran - Karl Fairburne

Persenjataan militer Jerman yang maju membuat banyak negara tertarik untuk menguasainya

Perang Dunia II bukanlah sekedar gempuran peluru dan ledakan artileri yang menghantam kota-kota besar dan mengklaim ratusan ribu nyawa di dataran Eropa dan Asia, ia lebih dari itu. Semua kekuatan besar yang berusaha mengakhiri kejahatan kemanusiaan ini ternyata juga menyimpan segudang rahasia, salah satunya menyelimuti hidup karakter utama Anda – Karl Fairburne. Menyamar sebagai bagian dari pasukan elite Jerman, Fairburne mendapatkan satu misi utama dari negaranya – Amerika Serikat, yakni mendapatkan teknologi perang Jerman yang memang terhitung paling maju saat itu. Tidak hanya mendapatkan salinan teknologi yang ada, ia juga diperkenankan untuk menangkap atau membunuh para ilmuwan yang bekerja di balik layar pengembangan senjata-senjata ini. Fokus utamanya adalah rudal V-2 yang fenomenal.
Sebagai pasukan militer rahasia, Fairburne tidak memiliki ally sama sekali. Daripada seorang penembak jitu, Fairburne lebih cocok dikatakan sebagai “One-Man Army” yang dilemparkan ke daerah konflik dan dituntut untuk berpikir bebas. Tidak hanya berhadapan dengan pasukan Nazi, Anda juga harus menyerang diam-diam pasukan Russia yang juga berbagi kepentingan yang sama – keinginan untuk menguasai teknologi Jerman. Masuk dan menginfiltrasi daerah musuh tentu bukan pekerjaan yang mudah karena Anda harus berhadapan dengan segudang pasukan infantri bersenjata lengkap. Lebih buruknya lagi? Mereka juga akan dipersenjatai dengan senjata berat dan tank.

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L.A. Noire: The Complete Edition Review

The Good

• Authentic and outstanding 1940's style and atmosphere  
• Solid performances and good use of motion capture  
• Compelling investigation and interrogation mechanics  
• Memorable noir story  
• Some great shoot-outs and action sequences that make use of real LA locations.

The Bad

• Early investigations are very limited  
• Disconnection between cases leads to jarring moments  
• Some restrictions during pursuits and shoot-outs feel artificial.

What awaits Cole Phelps at the next crime scene? Will it be a couple of hopheads who overdosed on morphine and are now on the midnight train to nowhere? Or maybe a young lady whose dreams of Hollywood stardom were chewed up and spit out by the studios and who now lies naked in a park, the victim of a brutal murder? L.A. Noire confronts you with these sad situations and many more. Inspired by film noir classics and hardboiled crime fiction, this tale of a complicated and troubled cop in postwar Los Angeles makes the business of detective work absorbing and rewarding, and it's drenched in so much authentic late-'40s style that you'll practically be able to smell the acrid mix of glamour and corruption in the air. This PC release comes complete with the five cases that were released as downloadable content on consoles, making it the best version of L.A. Noire you can buy.

Billboards and neon signs are just a few of the details that help create L.A. Noire's authentic period atmosphere.

The City of Angels is one of the stars of L.A. Noire, and it gets the red-carpet treatment here. The game re-creates a vast swath of the city circa 1947; though it's by no means accurate down to the tiniest detail, those who know Los Angeles will appreciate the tremendous amount of research that clearly went into designing this version of it. (You expect to see the historic Egyptian Theatre in its proper place on Hollywood Boulevard, for instance, but seeing the Pig 'N Whistle right next to it, which has been there since 1927, is impressive.) Your journey takes you from filthy flophouses and hobo camps to elegant mansions and the sleek, modern offices of a company that's shaping the development of postwar Los Angeles. The architecture, which includes cookie-cutter housing developments that are springing up in droves to capitalize on the return of soldiers from the war, as well as jazz clubs where cops and gangsters alike relax after night falls, is authentic and makes this Los Angeles an absorbing and immersive place.
And it's not just these big things that the game gets right. As a detective, your work investigating crime scenes is often about the smallest details, and the richness of these details in L.A. Noire makes rummaging around grisly crime scenes and perusing the personal effects of victims a compelling process. The homes of murder victims feel lived in as a result of pictures on the walls, notes pinned on refrigerators, and clothing tossed on the floor and forgotten. Pick up an official document while rummaging through some files and you'll see that it looks genuine right down to the fine print. This attention to detail makes the often unsavory business of being a detective deeply absorbing. On top of this, the period fashions, actual automobiles, and music of the era--along with a score that evokes the style of some of the great composers of film noir--weave an intoxicating spell that's sure to stir the heart of anyone with a fondness for 1940's style. The art direction that pervades every aspect of L.A. Noire is simply outstanding, and it's a huge part of what makes this game such a memorable experience. And if you want the game to look more like Out of the Past than Chinatown, there's an option to play in crystal-clear black and white.

In a moment, that criminal's blood will be painting the pillar behind him.

But all that attention to detail wouldn't amount to much if it weren't in the service of a game that was worthy of it. Thankfully, L.A. Noire is worthy. You play as Cole Phelps, a young veteran of World War II who enlists in the L.A.P.D. in 1947. Phelps is played by Aaron Staton, best known for his role on Mad Men, and thanks to L.A. Noire's use of an impressive motion capture technology, his performance goes far beyond voice acting. Phelps' face is Staton's face, and while motion scanning doesn't quite capture all the soul of an actor's performance, it nonetheless allows for a great deal of the subtlety of that performance to come through. It may take a bit of adjustment, seeing almost-but-not-quite-real faces on these characters, and there's sometimes a bit of a blurriness around the lips that can be distracting. But for the most part, it's very effective, allowing for rich and nuanced performances that seem to fully inhabit the world of the game. And this isn't just for show. The story of L.A. Noire hits harder because its characters look and sound so believable. Phelps' commanding officer Captain Donnelly has a passion for swift, merciless justice and a preacher's gift for oratory, while the weathered face of Herschel Biggs, one of many partners you have throughout the game, speaks volumes about his years on the force. The performances have a concrete impact on gameplay, too. When you're interrogating a suspect or questioning a witness, it's the facial expressions of a real person that you're reading when determining what approach to take.
You start out playing Phelps as a newly recruited uniformed officer. When a call comes in over the radio that a few homicide detectives need some assistance, you make your way to the crime scene and get your first crack at investigation. While investigating, you move Phelps around the environment and look for clues. Of course, not everything in any given location is going to be relevant to your investigation, and at first, the process can feel a bit silly. You might pick up empty beer bottles, hairbrushes, rolling pins, and other meaningless stuff, making Phelps move them around in his hand as if they might conceal vast significance while he mutters to himself (and to you) that these particular items have no bearing on the case. But as you progress, you develop a sharper eye for what things in an environment might be relevant. By default, the game indicates that you're near something you can examine with chimes (and controller vibration, if you're using a gamepad), but with this option turned on, investigations often boil down to just walking Phelps over every inch of an area, waiting for those indicators to go off. Turning these off makes investigation far more involving and encourages you to carefully study the environment looking for anything that might give you insight into the case. You still know when you've found everything important in a given location because the investigation music fades out, though if you like, you can also turn this indicator off.
Phelps goes above and beyond the call of duty to close this first case himself, but it's not out of a selfless wish to protect and serve. He has a cold ambition to rise up the ranks in the department, and it's not long before his drive pays off politically. This determination also isolates him from his fellow cops and makes him a bit hard to root for initially, but this only makes him a better noir protagonist. He's a deeply flawed hero, and as the game progresses, you learn more about the experiences that turned him into the man he is today, and he develops in some fascinating ways as the narrative approaches its powerful conclusion. It takes quite a while for the story to build up steam, but the excitement of the later chapters makes the more deliberate pace of what came before well worth it. And you don't need to be a fan of film noir and hardboiled crime fiction to appreciate this tale, but if you are, you may take particular pleasure in the inspiration L.A. Noire takes from many terrific sources. (James Ellroy's bloody epic L.A. Confidential is a particularly clear influence.)

Another poor sap meets a violent end in the City of Angels.

As Phelps makes a name for himself in the department, he's called upon to start heading investigations himself, and that means questioning witnesses and interrogating suspects. During interrogations, you select something to question the witness or suspect about from a list in your notebook. (This is partly why thorough investigation of a crime scene is important; if you miss an important clue, you won't be able to ask people about it, which may prevent you from getting vital information.) Once the person responds to your question, you have three choices. If you believe the person is being honest and forthright with you, you can select Truth, which results in Phelps responding positively to the witness or suspect and coaxing more information out of him or her. If you think a person is being less than entirely honest, you can select Doubt, which often translates into "press the witness or suspect harder," and if your instincts are correct, this generally results in the suspect giving up something useful. But if your instincts are wrong and the person was cooperating, this approach results in him or her reacting negatively, which gives you nothing. Finally, if you think the person is lying to you and you have a piece of evidence that proves it, you can select Lie. In this case, you have to back up what you're saying with evidence. For instance, if you ask a suspect what shoe size he wears and he tells you he wears a size 9, you can use the size 8 work boots you found in his home to prove that he's lying.

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The Adventures of Tintin: The Game Review

The Good

• Solid voice acting  
• Good animation that captures the Tintin vibe.

The Bad

• Repetitive missions  
• Platforming lacks challenge  
• Puzzles are too easy to solve  
• Erratic motion controls.

UK REVIEW--Between the staring blankly at a screen for hours in the name of research, energy-drink-fuelled writing marathons to meet deadlines, and the knowledge that your editor can (and will) drop a story on you last thing on a Friday, journalism isn't always the most glamorous of professions. But for intrepid reporter Tintin, it's a far more adventurous pursuit. The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn sees him sailing over stormy seas, piloting planes through treacherous caverns, and uncovering ancient artefacts while being pursued by legions of bad guys--all in the name of a good story. Sadly, the underlying platforming game is the antithesis of these exciting events: dull, repetitive, and far too easy. The solid voice acting and appealing narrative might entice Tintin fans and kids, but for everyone else there are far better platformers to sink your teeth into.
The Adventures of Tintin follows the events of the corresponding film, in turn based on stories from the original comic books. You play as Tintin, a young reporter who's always on the hunt for a good story, no matter how much trouble it gets him into. On a whim he buys a model ship named Unicorn, but he soon discovers there's more to it than meets the eye. It's your job to unravel the mystery behind the ship and fend off bad guys along the way. Most of the game plays like a 2D platformer, interspersed with short vehicular and third-person sections to break things up. The action takes place in mansions, in underground caverns, and deep within the bowels of a ship, meaning you spend a lot of time crawling through vents and avoiding bottomless pits of doom.
Tintin's abilities let you navigate these environments with ease--too much ease, in fact. Running, jumping, climbing, and wall-jumping over obstacles such as spikes, moving platforms, and steam vents are smooth enough, but it never seems like there's any real skill involved in doing so. Your movements are partly automated, which makes the game simple for kids to pick up, but also easy to breeze through several sections without breaking a sweat. That applies to combat too. A single attack button lets you hammer your way through most enemies with little difficulty, but there are enemies that wield umbrellas as shields, so you have to use underground passages to sneak up behind them. Others wear armour, so you have to throw nearby banana skins to make them slide into walls and shatter their protection. The game also shakes things up with puzzles, but they're on the simple side. They include finding levers to open doorways, pushing blocks to reach higher platforms, or using weights to balance seesaw mechanisms.

Even Tintin's not adverse to nutting someone.

There are also vehicle sections to play through, but much like the puzzles and platforming, they're very easy. One has you pilot a plane through a storm, in which you have to avoid tornadoes and attacking planes. Making it through the tornadoes just requires a quick press of the boost button, while destroying attackers is as easy as holding down the fire button and aiming vaguely in their direction. A later section on a bike is made a little more exciting by the inclusion of ramps to jump off, but there's still no challenge to it because it's so easy to get your bike around corners or target pursuing bikes with your slingshot. Whichever part of the game you're playing, it's not long before you get a distinct feeling of deja vu. Puzzles and platforming sections are repeated often, so you end up solving the same thing over and over again. And let's hope you're not claustrophobic, because if you're not a fan of crouching through tunnels every single level, you're out of luck. Likewise, the vehicular sections are repeated, so you quickly grow tired of them.
Except for a few collectible golden crabs, there's little reason to replay the story mode once you've completed it, but the game's Tintin and Haddock offline cooperative mode fares a little better. It takes place within the dreams of Captain Haddock, meaning there's little rhyme or reason to what's going on. But being freed from the shackles of the movie storyline makes the mode a little more interesting. There are numerous levels to play through, all accessed via doors in a hub world. Each platforming level has similar challenges to those in the single-player adventure, but there are additional considerations, such as using Tintin's harpoon to access hidden areas or Haddock's brute strength to bash through walls and discover new paths. You can switch between the two characters at any time using the D-pad, or a friend can jump in and play through a level with you. There are also coins to collect, which you can use to buy new costumes for Tintin and Haddock. There's even a somewhat satisfying boss to fight at the end of it all, though you end up doing it three times.

Ready, aim, fire!

If you're after more of a quick Tintin fix, a challenge mode lets you play through some of the vehicle sections again, only with time limits for making it around the course or shooting a certain number of enemies. You can even play them with the PlayStation Move, but the motion controls are erratic, making it difficult to keep control of your vehicle. It's not all bad for Tintin, though, particularly if you're a fan of the comics or cartoon series. The voice acting is great, while the music and animation exude a Tintin vibe that fits nicely with the narrative, even if this isn't the prettiest game out there. There are lots of familiar characters throughout, including faithful companion Snowy and a cameo from bumbling police officers Thomson and Thompson.
If you're not a fan of the fiction, though, or you don't have younger children who might appreciate simplicity, there's little incentive to play The Adventures of Tintin. It's boring. You can sit back and coast through it without even thinking, and the somewhat interesting story is little compensation. Repetitive levels and overly simple puzzles just add to the game's troubles. The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn is another game to add to the pile of movie tie-in games that missed that mark, and it's a failed opportunity to do something great with a well-loved character.

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Ragnarok Odyssey Selesai Ditranslasikan?

Ragnarok memang harus diakui merupakan game MMORPG yang tidak tergantikan di hati para penggemar MMORPG di Indonesia. Kemunculannya beberapa tahun yang lalu sempat menghasilkan gelombang adiksi yang membuat banyak gamer menjadikan warnet sebagai “rumah kedua” mereka. Memanfaatkan popularitas seri ini yang begitu besar, sebuah seri baru berjudul Ragnarok Odyssey yang lebih berfokus pada mekanisme gameplay ala Monster Hunter diluncurkan untuk Playstation Vita di pasar Jepang. Dengan kemampuan untuk melakukan multiplayer secara local dan online, Ragnarok Odyssey tentu saja menarik perhatian banyak gamer di luar pasar Jepang. Jika Anda termasuk yang ingin memainkan game ini namun terkendala bahasa, Anda akan bergembira menyambut berita yang satu ini.
Setelah penantian yang cukup lama, proses translasi Ragnarok Odyssey akhirnya mencapai tahap akhir. Xseed Games yang bertanggung jawab atas distribusi game ini untuk pasar di luar Jepang meyakinkan bahwa proses ini akan rampung pada musim panas mendatang. Hal ini juga dikonfirmasi oleh pihak Sony Entertainment yang sudah menetapkan tanggal rilis Ragnarok Odyssey versi translasi ini pada tanggal 12 Juli 2012 dan akan langsung tersedia untuk pasar Hongkong dan Singapura.

Finally, I can speak English!

Jika Anda termasuk gamer yang kebetulan memiliki PS Vita, pastikan Anda tidak melewatkan tanggal rilis di atas. Walaupun seringkali dituduh sebagai “rip-off” dari Monster Hunter, Ragnarok Odyssey harus diakui menjadi salah satu game yang membuat PS Vita tampak menarik saat ini, di tengah kurangnya dukungan piranti lunak yang mampu menggerakkan rasa penasaran gamer. Selamat bermain!

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Cave Story 3D Review

The Good

• Excellent platforming and shooting  
• Lovely 3D visuals  
• Quirky, mysterious story.

The Bad

• Depth and darkness can obscure level details  
• Little extra content over the original.

Cave Story 3D is a side-scrolling adventure with verve and charm. It is also a remake of a PC game that has been available since 2004, when Cave Story's lone hobbyist developer, Daisuke "Pixel" Amaya, first gave it away on the Internet. The original was and is a sparkling indie gem, and its strength is both blessing and burden for this 3DS version; a tweaked, prettified adaptation of a great game is still a great game, but what is there to recommend it over the freeware original?

Cave Story 3D gameplay in Story Mode and Classic Mode.

The action, akin to that of 2D Metroid games, is still zesty, retro fun. You play an amnesiac hero who wakes in a cave world inhabited by the Mimiga: bunny-like folk who live in fear of the doctor, who has been kidnapping them for use in some evil scheme. To save the Mimiga, discover your identity, and escape the cave world, you must navigate cavernous levels, hopping between platforms and blasting a goodly variety of enemy creatures.
The layouts of the caves, linked by teleporters and hub levels, are mostly unchanged from the smart, varied designs of the 2D PC game. There's more diversity than you might expect of a subterranean cave network, encompassing grasslands, desert ruins, and science facilities, each populated with diverse enemy types (hopping blobs, ghostly gravestones, cockroach men) and dotted with precious safe rooms.
Your arsenal is as excellent as ever, coupled with the likewise excellent three-tier weapon leveling system. The fireball starts out as a puny thing, but by level three shoots bouncy orbs of blue flame. At level three, the kickback from the basic machine gun lets you hover by firing downwards--a gratifying perk for negotiating lofty platforms and deadly pitfalls. You improve weapons by collecting the energy crystals that shower from defeated baddies, and upgrades come quickly, but they are lost even faster than that; when you are hit, you shed both health and weapon level points. The upshot is a nifty, dynamic set of weapons whose power surges when you're playing well and drains when you get reckless.

Weapon upgrades can be won (and lost) in moments.

Cave Story stops pulling punches with boss battles early, escalating from warm-up confrontations with the endearingly inept Balrog, one of the doctor's minions, to hectic scraps with bigger and badder monsters. These stern but worthy challenges demand lightning-quick dodges and, for the toughest encounters, humbling quantities of retries.
The controls have translated nicely to the 3DS's circle pad and face buttons, reproducing the slightly slippy, steerable jump that worked so well in the PC original. When the precision platforming occasionally feels trickier, the fault is not that of the controls but of the screen size: narrow, single-block ledges that were a thumb's width on a PC display are tiny on the 3DS's petite upper screen. The touch screen, meanwhile, is dedicated to your inventory and a helpful map view.
The new visuals elaborate beautifully on the pixel-art environments of Cave Story, transforming its 8-bit levels with depth and detail. The characters have been similarly converted into solid little 3D avatars, though if you prefer the old look, there's the compromise of Classic mode, which drops familiarly retro sprites into the new 3D environments. The makeover is not completely without cost. The rich, moody new look doesn't have the same clarity as the flat cave levels in the PC game. And in a few specific spots, the darker colours and new depth can make it hard to tell what is platform and what is foreground or background set dressing.
There's a mysterious story, in sharp contrast to the cutesy cast, and it reveals itself one expositional scrap at a time. Nothing is laid out at the beginning, making you as initially clueless as the memory-free protagonist, with the plot's gravity and complexity building as you go. Here, especially, you sense Cave Story is the work of just one man, its idiosyncratic and surprisingly ruthless tale spun over five years from the vision of a single creator.

Classic Mode pops 2D sprites into the 3D levels.

Besides the 3D makeover and new music (lightly remixed versions of the perky original tunes), not a great deal has been added to this version of Cave Story. There are a few extra areas to explore, though these aren't substantial additions, and an unlockable Time Attack mode for a certain portion of the game. Cave Story fans might crave extra material, but newcomers won't find there's too little to do; there are several hours of play in your first pass.
It's not possible to recommend this version of Cave Story over all others, but it is a worthy, good-looking adaptation of a wonderful game all the same. If the WiiWare and DSiWare versions passed you by, and you'd rather do your platforming with an analogue pad than a keyboard, Cave Story 3D is a great way to discover a game that well deserves your attention.

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Tekken Hybrid Review

The Good

• Tekken Tag Tournament is a fun game.

The Bad

• Lacks online support  
• Unimpressive visual overhaul  
• Tag HD lacks any original content  
• The demo and movie add little value to the package.

Tekken Hybrid looks impressive at first blush. This three-part collection includes Tekken Tag Tournament HD, Tekken Tag Tournament 2 Prologue, and the movie Tekken: Blood Vengeance. But spend a little time with it and you find a disappointing trio of products that make this frail collection fall flat.

Bryan Fury kicks a lot of Wang in this match from Tekken Hybrid.

The first, and most substantial, inclusion is Tekken Tag Tournament HD. This rerelease of a PlayStation 2 favorite slaps on a high-resolution texture update and calls it a day. For better or worse, nothing else has changed. The classic gameplay is still intact and holds up surprisingly well after 11 years. Naturally, some characters lack the tricks their modern versions have, but it's still interesting to see your favorite fighters' early years and appreciate what they have gained (or lost) since. You can duke it out in Arcade, Survival, or Time Trial mode, but the most unique is still Tekken Bowl.
This goofy minigame takes the fighters out of the ring and into a bowling alley. Instead of throwing punches, Tag's stylish scrappers throw crystal bowling balls into golden pins molded to the likeness of Heihachi Mishima. Each character has his or her own bowling style, which is reflected in the behavior of the power meters.
However, even with a new coat of paint, the game's visuals haven't aged well. The character models shine with a waxy, inhuman sheen and seem to be lit by a static spotlight pointed right on top of them. There's also a recurring graphical issue from the original that persists here. It has to do with the way the arena is rendered against the background. To give the illusion of distance, the foreground area rotates at a faster rate than the background. You can see this split between the two occur, which makes it look as if you fighting on a dirt-colored disk.
Compared to the improvements seen in Street Fighter III: Third Strike Online Edition--which had online support and additional practice modes--Tag HD is a disappointment. Online support of any kind is absent, as are any additional modes or content. It's a shallow release and is not the sort of treatment this great game deserves. And as Tekken Hybrid's anchor, its bare-bones delivery doesn't bode well for the rest of the package.

Playing as Eddie can get a little crazy if you're not careful.

Next is Tekken Tag Tournament 2 Prologue. In the same vein as Gran Turismo 5 Prologue, this game is a demo for the upcoming fighter of the same name. It brings together four of the primary characters seen in the Tekken: Blood Vengeance movie--Xiaoyu, Alisa, Devil Jin, and Kazuya (also in devil form)--and gives you a painfully limited taste of what's to come. The game feels every bit as quick as its predecessor and even includes a few new tricks you can perform with your tag partner. But while the lack of other modes is expected, the lack of a character move list adds unnecessary confusion.
Tekken: Blood Vengeance is the third and final item on the Tekken Hybrid pile. Unlike Hybrid's other two offerings, this is a CG movie set within the Tekken universe. And in keeping with the bar set by Resident Evil: Degeneration and Final Fantasy VII Advent Children, it's completely terrible. As you may recall, the Tekken universe has a slick, cyberpunk style centered on corporate warfare and a global fighting tournament. The movie spends most of its time fleeing from these elements and instead follows schoolgirls Xiaoyu and Alisa as they become best friends and talk about cute boys.
A conspiracy plot involving an immortal teenager and the infamous Mishima family skirts around the edges of the film but is never fully developed. That is, until the film's climax, when a massive battle royal breaks out between several characters we've hardly seen and care nothing about. From a technical aspect, it looks stunning and makes us excited for the cinematic quality of Tag 2. But as a movie, it's flashy and shallow, and is a thin excuse to throw a bunch of fantasy kung fu on the screen.

Prologue also includes a model viewer if you'd like to spend some quality time with Alisa.

Tekken Hybrid is a weak offering that attempts to mask three shallow items under the veil of value by rolling them all into one release. Tekken Tag Tournament HD is the only real inclusion of note, but its sloppy graphical overhaul and complete lack of online support hardly make it worth a downloadable release, let alone a $40 retail product. If you simply need a Tag fix before the sequel's release, you're better off dusting off your PlayStation 2 and picking up a used copy of the original Tekken Tag Tournament.

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Tanggal Rilis Devil May Cry Reboot Dipastikan!

Melahirkan kembali sosok Dante yang begitu fenomenal ke dalam desain karakter dan dunia yang baru memang bukan pekerjaan yang mudah. Dengan dalih untuk menghadirkan sebuah seri yang lebih “segar” untuk para penggemar franchise ini, Capcom memutuskan untuk menggandeng developer Barat – Ninja Theory untuk sebuah proyek dengan resiko yang tinggi – sebuah reboot. Sempat dikritik dan dicibir karena dianggap tidak lagi mengandung esensi DMC yang selama ini dicintai oleh para gamer, Ninja Theory secara perlahan berhasil merebut hati gamer kembali lewat trailer dan screenshot terbaru yang justru menampilkan hal yang sebaliknya. Permasalahannya kini, kapan kita akan dapat benar-benar menikmatinya?
Diperkenalkan sejak tahun 2010 silam, Capcom sendiri sempat berencana untuk merilis Devil May Cry versi Reboot ini untuk tahun 2012. Namun kenyataannya, proses pengembangan yang belum rampung membuat perilisannya harus tertunda. Jika Anda termasuk gamer yang begitu menantikan game ini di tahun 2012, Anda tampaknya harus sedikit lagi bersabar. Tanggal rilis resmi yang dirilis oleh Capcom dan Ninja Theory mengindikasikan bahwa Devil May Cry baru akan menyapa para penggemarnya (gamer konsol khususnya) pada awal tahun 2013 mendatang. Berita baiknya? Capcom juga sudah mempersiapkan versi PC yang akan dirilis beberapa bulan setelah versi konsolnya. Ini berarti “ekstra kesabaran” untuk para gamer PC.

Wait for me in 2013, demon fellas!

Dengan begitu banyak game-game besar yang “ditendang” mundur ke tahun 2013, tahun depan tampaknya akan menjadi tahun yang sama menariknya untuk para gamer. Menunggu beberapa bulan lagi untuk sebuah seri Devil May Cry Reboot? Hope it’s worth it..

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The Sims 3: Pets Review

The Good

• Extensive customization options for cats, dogs, and horses  
• Horses can enter races or contests for profit  
• New town with new facilities  
• Pets are fully controllable  
• Allows for many low-maintenance pets.

The Bad

• Pets have a limited impact on the world around them  
• Expansion likely to appeal more to existing players than newcomers.

The ownership of pets, we're often told, is one of the secrets to a long life, and that's a secret that Electronic Arts has taken full advantage of in extending the life span of each of its Sims games for the last 11 years. The Sims 3: Pets marks the third pet-based expansion for the franchise, and like the others, it makes its appearance just as the parent title shows signs of losing momentum after the release of multiple expansions. While The Sims 3: Pets doesn't change much of the core gameplay aside from extending many of the properties of human sims to their animal companions, its wealth of customization options and its welcome focus on horses make this expansion a treat for any animal lover.

You can even raise a unicorn, provided you have the patience to find one.

While the console version takes place in a cramped suburban community and requires enduring loading screens every time you want to move behind the immediate cluster of houses, its PC counterpart centers on the spacious expanses of the Appaloosa Plains. It's a nice place to hang around, particularly if you're in the mood to try out the horse content. Not only are there a decent number of ranch-style country homes available to move into, but facilities specifically aimed at improving the lives of your equine friends dot the landscape. Horses can learn how to jump at the equestrian training grounds, for instance, and they can match their skills in racing and jumping against other horses at the equestrian center.
Unsurprisingly, dogs and cats make up a lot of the pet-related content beyond horses, although you can also own low-maintenance pets such as chinchillas, birds, fish, and snakes. Players seeking an overdose of cuteness might balk at the realization that you can't create puppies and kittens--that's an option exclusive to console players--but you can use the extensive customization options to create almost any type of pet imaginable, provided it's at least somewhat based on pets that real people would have in their homes. More than 100 core breeds are available for cats and dogs alone, for instance, and you can customize these according to fur length, traits, and the color and texture of their coats. Later on, if you're of a mind to breed your pets, the physical attributes you chose at the create-a-pet screen sometimes appear in their offspring.
Pets also have skills such as digging and hunting, but they're more grounded in reality than the oddball pet careers that featured prominently in The Sims 2: Pets. That's not to say that they can't bring in money. Dogs, for instance, can occasionally dig up valuable chunks of meteorite worth several thousand simoleans. Meanwhile, cats can exercise their predatory skills on rodents and beetles and even the occasional low-maintenance pet. Best of all, dogs, cats, and horses are all individually controllable, which means that you can focus a lot of your attention on the pets at the expense of your human sims if you're so inclined. This goes a long way toward filling the waiting periods that occur when the pets' owners are at work.
But nothing distinguishes the PC version from its console counterparts quite like the inclusion of horses. Not only can you customize horses with an array of options approaching those allowed for cats and dogs, but you can also train them to run in races or take part in jumping competitions. And since your human sim can learn how to ride as well, it's possible for horse and rider to train together and start raking in masses of simoleans that would have been unheard of in previous expansions. You don't even have to wait to take advantage of this system since The Sims 3: Pets lets you adopt a horse much as you would a dog or a cat. If you don't mind waiting, however, you can also search for stray horses in the wild (not to mention unicorns), many of which reward you with certain skills already prepared. The only drawback is that they take a bit longer to train.
If rewards are what you're after, though, you might be better served by breeding your beloved cats, dogs, or horses and selling them for a profit. Skills play heavily into their worth, so your sims need to teach them how to hunt or race effectively if you expect to benefit from your experiments in genetics. But you shouldn't expect the operation to turn into a digital puppy mill. Pets require a lot of love and attention to their wishes, and horses in particular require specialty chores, such as hoof maintenance and stall cleanup. It's hard work, but it's worth it. If you fulfill enough of your horse's wishes, you gain access to a special lifetime reward that increases the chances of wild animals visiting your home.

The new setting of Appaloosa Plains allows plenty of room for horses to run around.

Beyond that, The Sims 3: Pets does an excellent job of making the pets feel like pets. The animations are masterful, and they provide enough spirit that you could watch a cat hunt or play with his toys for minutes at a time. In addition, pets can grow old and die, which inevitably throws your sims into fits of grief once they discover the tragedy. And most of the time, you won't even have to worry about technical issues marring the presentation. Over a month has passed since the game's initial release, and EA has taken the time to clean up virtually all of the few glitches that appeared at launch.
The Sims 3: Pets is a worthy addition to the franchise's contemporary generation, and it walks a comfortable middle line between the wacky pet careers of The Sims 2: Pets and the disappointing animals found in The Sims: Unleashed. Here, almost everything works as it should, and the pets themselves add a dose of realism that probably should have shipped with the first game in 2009. But it's important to understand that this expansion is primarily aimed at enhancing the experience of your existing sims. Much as with the console versions, the impact the pets have on the world at large is negligible. Take the time to get to know them, however, and you'll find yourself in one of the better expansions for the game. Pets enrich our daily lives, so it's only fitting that they should enrich the lives of our sims as well

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Sekuel Castlevania Dipastikan untuk 3DS!

Konami memang sempat dikabarkan akan merilis sebuah seri sekuel untuk game Lords of Shadow, sebuah seri Castlevania bergaya God of War yang sempat dirilis untuk XBOX 360 dan Playstation 3 dua tahun yang lalu. Dikabarkan akan diumumkan pada ajang E3 2012 yang sebentar lagi akan diselenggarakan, seri terbaru ini tentu saja akan menjadi game yang sangat diantisipasi, terutama untuk para gamer yang pernah memainkan seri pertamanya. Namun untuk Anda yang mengharapan seri ini akan hadir kembali untuk konsol? Bersiaplah untuk kecewa!
Lewat informasi yang didapatkan dari majalah Nintendo Power, Konami dipastikan akan menghadirkan sekuel terbaru untuk Castlevania “tiga dimensi” ini eksklusif untuk Nintendo 3DS. Dengan nama Castlevania: Lords of Shadow – Mirror of Fate, sekuel yang akan menghadirkan karakter baru – Trevor Belmont ini akan tetap mengusung mekanisme gameplay yang serupa. Dengan senjata Combat Cross yang sama dengan yang digunakan oleh Gabriel di seri pertama, Trevor tetap akan berhadapan dengan makhluk-makhluk kegelapan yang bengis. Belum ada kejelasan apakah seri ini akan datang sebagai sebuah sekuel langsung atau sebuah seri terpisah yang hanya mengambil sebuah universe yang sama.

Secara mengejutkan, Konami lebih memilih untuk merilis sekuel ini untuk 3DS. Lantas bagiamana dengan pemilik konsol yang menikmati seri pertamanya? Silakan gigit jari!

Dengan hadirnya game eksklusif seperti ini, popularitas Nintendo 3DS tentu saja akan semakin meningkat, setidaknya cukup untuk menahan “serangan” PS Vita yang kini juga mulai diperkuat dengan franchise-franchise raksasa. Tertarik untuk segera menjajal Mirror of Fate ini? Tunggu saja pengumuman resmi Konami minggu depan. Semoga saja ia tampil semenarik LOS.

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