MINI GAMES REVIEW BLOG

Looking for Hit the big Cash

2011-11-01T06:37:00.000-07:00

People are always looking for opportunity to hit the big time, either in number or card games. They incessantly try their luck by playing until a perfect match to win the game and win the other players. This is not entirely surprising, because just like poker, you can even win $ 10 000, when you play poker online. It is a huge amount of extra money into the game.

Poker is a very popular game that has gone mainstream, especially in America. So how do you play poker online? If you know the basic rules of playing poker, online poker would not be difficult to adjust. However, you must understand that there are certain differences between casino poker and online poker.

You can not cheat if you play poker online. Play takes place only in the virtual table, which means you can not face to face with them to play a physical reaction to the reading. Do you have more options on how much to play and where to play, because many of the poker rooms are open for play. But of course you can not let you bet on the table by playing poker online. So what happens is you make a deposit to the poker software checkout, your choice of chips to the game, but unlike a real poker room or casino poker, where you can store the actual cashier. Do you want to finish the game, you can always remove the chip. Recordings, check out the most common.

In addition to these mentioned differences, the rules, hands, and the whole game is similar to the regular poker room. Still, if you're playing online poker, there are instructions to remember. Like when you want to bluff the other player, facial expressions, is typical of a real poker room, but online poker, it makes sense to bluff and show your bets. If you have a high commitment to the card, the other online players know, you have good cards, and ready to strike him down.

You should also remind yourself that only time will stand as a reputable online poker . Since online gaming is a business, the players rotate as often as they like so this will give you and other players more opportunities to play with many players both hold for all playing styles.

Well, as in any race for that matter, to create a personality and style of the game is always a long journey for all. You can win or lose, then lose again. That's what the game is about anyway. If you happen to have a soft heart on competition and the patience to put your name one activity, so you can play online poker or gambling related.

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2011-09-17T23:05:00.000-07:00

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Toy Soldiers: Cold War Review

2011-08-26T17:16:00.000-07:00

Toy Soldiers: Cold War is an action-packed tower defense game that improves upon its predecessor at almost every opportunity.

The Good

Loads of replay value
Good number of competitive and cooperative options for two players
Barrage abilities are a great addition
Makes numerous improvements and tweaks to the Toy Soldiers formula.

The Bad

Frame rate can't always keep up with the action
Versus mode leaderboards are easy to game.

History tells us that in the 40-plus years of the Cold War, forces from the United States and Soviet Union never actually faced each other in a major battle. The story is very different in the Toy Soldiers universe, though, where the opposing superpowers go head-to-head on battlefield dioramas across the world. Like its predecessor, Toy Soldiers: Cold War is a tower defense game in which quick reflexes are often as important as strategic thinking. You defend your toy box base not only by setting up gun emplacements, but also by manning said emplacements and, where they're available, taking direct control of vehicles and commando units that are powerful enough to turn the tide of a battle. Commando action figures are a great addition to the original Toy Soldiers formula, and Cold War makes plenty of smart improvements elsewhere as well; new kill combos offer significant gameplay rewards, minigames let you hone important skills outside of battle, a new rewind feature lets you correct costly mistakes during campaign missions, and cooperative play (online or split-screen) is now an option in both the Campaign and Survival modes. You get a formidable arsenal of toys to play with for your 1200 Microsoft points, and you won't want to put them away until long after you've ensured victory for the US.

Welcome to the jungle.

Where the original Toy Soldiers campaign afforded you an opportunity to play through World War I from the perspectives of both the Allies and the Central Powers, in Cold War you play only as the US. The 11 missions typically take 20 to 30 minutes each to play through, but that certainly doesn't mean that you can expect to be done with the game in five hours. For starters, you're unlikely to beat all of the missions on your first attempt; the default difficulty setting isn't overly challenging, but you unlock new turrets and vehicles (and face new enemies) as you progress, and it can take a while to figure out their respective strengths and weaknesses. You're also likely to play through missions more than once, and not only because you want to improve your scores on the leaderboards.

When you finish a level, you're awarded medals based on how many enemies made it past your defenses, how much money you finished the level with, and how much time you saved by manually triggering enemy waves prematurely. Score three gold medals, and you earn yourself a platinum grade, which is no mean feat. Furthermore, there are two decorations to unlock in each level that encourage you to mix up your play style. You might be required to destroy fast-moving ATVs using artillery, kill 100 units while using a helicopter's night vision, or torch infantry by dropping napalm on them from your F-14 Tomcat. Replaying levels in Cold War is never dull because there are so many different ways to approach them. There are also five difficulty levels to choose from, which, in addition to the requisite easy, normal, and hard settings, include two that change the gameplay significantly. Elite mode, which is carried over from the first game, prevents your defensive emplacements from firing automatically, so the game almost turns into a turret-based shooter. The new General mode does the opposite: emplacements can't be commandeered, so after positioning them on the map, you're at the mercy of the mostly smart AI soldiers that are manning them. Both are a lot of fun and pose a significant challenge.

Turrets can be significantly more effective when you man them yourself.

Regardless of which difficulty level you choose, your goal in Cold War is always the same: to prevent enemy units that attack in distinct waves from reaching your toy box. You do this by building defensive emplacements in predetermined locations that come in two sizes. Small build points can only accommodate machine guns, antitank guns, mortars, and "makeshift" weapons that include flamethrowers fashioned from upturned aerosol cans and the like. Large build points can also accommodate heavy artillery and antiair guns. All of these defenses and their respective upgrades cost money, and the only way to earn money is to kill enemies. At all times you can see which units the next couple of enemy waves are going to be composed of, so the challenge is to prepare for impending threats while dealing with current ones. Build too many machine guns when confronted by a massive wave of infantry, and you might struggle to deal with the tanks that arrive 30 seconds later. Place powerful artillery cannons on both of your large build points to combat enemy tanks, and the next wave's aircraft are going to fly into your toy box largely unchallenged. You always have the option to sell off emplacements that are no longer useful, but you get back only a fraction of the money that you spent building and upgrading them.

Upgrades are interesting in Toy Soldiers: Cold War because while they invariably make your defenses more powerful, they don't always make them better for your current situation. For example, when you upgrade a level 1 antitank gun to level 2, its rate of fire increases dramatically, but when you man the gun yourself, you no longer have the option to take control of the projectiles and steer them around obstacles toward targets. And when you upgrade a level 1 antiair gun, its rate of fire decreases but it gains the ability to lock onto targets, which is vital when you're being attacked by speedy MiG fighters but might not be up to the task if you have an armada of Mi-24 Hind helicopter gunships hovering above. Less-than-ideal emplacements can be made to work if you man them yourself (your AI soldiers let enemies get relatively close before attacking and certainly aren't creative enough to, say, use antitank rounds against a helicopter), but there's only so much that you can do manning one turret on a battlefield, and while you're focusing on that, you're not managing upgrades and repairs elsewhere.

Antiair turrets not up to the task at hand? There's more than one way to deal with an enemy chopper armada.

There's very little downtime during battles, and what's great is that even at times when you could conceivably catch your breath and let your turrets do the work, you're encouraged to get involved. Destroy an enemy unit with a manually guided projectile at high speed, and you can earn extra money in the form of a "thrill ride" bonus, and if you manage to string together a combo of at least 40 kills or take down an enemy with a red star icon above it, you gain access to a randomly selected "barrage" ability.

From Dust Review

2011-08-26T16:40:00.000-07:00

From Dust provides a rich world full of engaging challenges, though there are some frustrations even a god must suffer.

The Good

Rich interplay of movable elements and natural forces
Attractive environmental design
Surprisingly competition-friendly Challenge mode.

The Bad

Problematic AI pathfinding
Controls not suited for fine manipulation
Not optimized for the PC.

What if you had the powers of a god? The earth would shift at your whim and the seas would tremble at your touch. You could raise mountains, divert rivers, and transform dry deserts into lush forests. From Dust grants you these powers and more, and it's satisfying to wield them as you try to safely usher a small tribe of humans through a perilous world. Yet, for all your world-molding abilities, you are not omnipotent. Like the villagers you shelter, you must contend with the inexorable power of nature. From the subtle influence of gravity and erosion to the devastating forces of volcanoes and tsunamis, nature compels you to adapt to survive. This task can get difficult, especially when imperfect controls, finicky pathfinding, and unforeseeable disasters conspire against you. Joining these in-game problems are a number of PC-specific shortcomings, including limited visual options and an Internet connectivity requirement. Despite these unwelcome elements, the challenge of being a lesser god is an engaging one, and From Dust makes it even more enticing with appealing visuals and evocative music.

You learn early on that your villagers are accustomed to a certain standard of living.

Before you begin to bend nature to your will, you must first secure an Internet connection. This is not only necessary to download the game from Steam, but also required each and every time you play the game. From Dust syncs with Ubisoft's uPlay service and won't launch if you can't connect. Once you are connected, it's best to let the game load to the menu screen before trying to use any in-game Steam functions because any activity may cause the game to freeze or prevent the menu from loading properly. Alt-tabbing out of the game also caused a visual glitch when we resumed playing. And speaking of visuals, don't expect a full suite of options to help you maximize performance; screen resolution, display mode, refresh rate, and adapter version are all you get. These issues don't spoil the experience, but they do make it feel like you aren't playing the best version. The PC version does boast sharper visuals than its Xbox 360 counterpart, however, and it allows multiple save files to better accommodate multiple users.

You slither around the world of From Dust as a small wormlike cursor called the Breath. Your basic ability lets you gather substances into a hovering ball, move them wherever you please, and then release them. You begin with simple applications of your skill, like gathering soil and building a land bridge across shallow water or sucking up water and dousing a fire. The Breath acts as a holding tank, but once you release a substance, it conforms to the laws of nature. Water flows, soil settles, and lava hardens into implacable rock. In addition to exhibiting these natural tendencies, the three substances interact with each other in important ways. Flowing water can wash away soil, and lava evaporates water even as the water cools it more quickly. Understanding these elements and the underlying rules of the physical world is crucial to success in From Dust, and Story mode introduces them to you at a manageable pace.

Watching your early attempts to manipulate the landscape get balanced out by natural order is not only instructive, but also visually pleasing. Water sluices down hillsides, resisting your control, and deposited soil spreads out, diminishing your earthen works. Lava is a particular highlight. It oozes and flows, changing density and temperature, and watching its mottled glow cool into shiny rock is a delight. These natural processes are accompanied by rich sound effects that punctuate your every action. Grinding and sucking noises give your substance-gathering efforts some weight, while an outburst of birds cawing and flapping signals that disaster is imminent. If you toggle your view in closer to the action, you can hear fire crackling, villagers singing, and the creaking, burbling flow of lava. The sights and sounds make the world of From Dust look lively, and the interplay between substances and natural laws make it feel alive.

While there is joy in simply wielding your powers and experiencing the effects, your goal is to safely usher a tribe of people through each level. In Story mode, you must guide them to all of the tall ivory totems in each level so they can build villages and then send them through a stone passageway to complete the level. Making the villages accessible and keeping them safe are your two primary endeavors. Sometimes this can be accomplished simply by manipulating substances, but more often than not, you need more than just your basic abilities to ensure safe passage. Many totems, once settled, grant you temporary powers that are crucial to success. Being able to evaporate water or put out fire can save your villages from annihilation, while jellifying water enables you to carve out a biblical seabed passage for your people. As it expands your abilities, From Dust also makes things more challenging, ensuring that you have to make good use of your full repertoire.
In addition to the power of breath, there are a few other helpful elements. Stones grant villages the ability to repel fire, lava, and water, and sending a villager to retrieve this knowledge from a stone is often your best hope for survival, especially when tsunamis roll in and volcanoes erupt. Unfortunately, this is also where you can run into problems with From Dust's pathfinding logic. You can only set destinations for the humans; it's up to them to get there. Though they are generally good at finding any bridges you have built, they are sometimes stymied by a puddle of water or a small hitch in the terrain. These obstacles can sometimes be tough to identify, especially given the (admittedly realistic) translucence of water. Traveling villagers do recalculate routes in an effort to take the quickest path, and though they are often successful, they also take some baffling walkabouts. Furthermore, because the game automatically determines a knowledge bearer's return path, you might watch him run right by a village that is threatened by lava to first deliver the protective knowledge to another, safer village. Depending on your current situation, these pathfinding problems might merely irk you, or they might derail your plans with disastrous consequences. It's one thing to deal with the capriciousness of nature; it's another to suffer from the flaws of man.

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2011-07-04T10:03:00.000-07:00

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International Cricket Captain 2011 Review

2011-03-26T16:27:00.000-07:00

International Cricket Captain 2011 doesn't break any new ground, but a wealth of real-life statistics married to a solid management sim makes it worth the investment for any budding cricket captains.

The Good

Good statistical realism
Well-balanced difficulty.

The Bad

For diehards only
Flat graphical presentation.

UK REVIEW--Few genres cater so directly to a specific crowd as the management sim. Incredibly dense minutiae are a sim's lifeblood, and International Cricket Captain 2011 serves up plenty of jargon and numerical complexities to please the number-crunching managerial mind. However, anyone looking for a more casual take on the gentleman's game need not apply.

The aim of your managerial career is to accrue a skilled team of players to reign over a host of international series and national club league fixtures. All of these feature up-to-date player rosters and attributes for each real-world licensed country and squad. Whether you choose to take control of the English first-class county team or the Zimbabwe international squad in a One Day World Cup, you're bound to find something that suits your tastes. Signing on new players and maintaining current ones midseason requires a balancing act that you constantly need to perform to be successful. Properly grasping the strengths and weaknesses of your players' respective roles in a realistic statistical context can be rather demanding, especially when you're also responsible for budgeting all incoming and outgoing finances. While this is germane to the standard management sim, a strong familiarity with the sport is pivotal to your understanding and enjoyment of the game. Delegating contract agreements and physio treatments for your players is required for managing your team efficiently, while knowing how to develop their talents without exhausting them is critical to your success or failure.

Whatever aspect of management you're best suited for, living with the consequences of your decisions--both good and bad--is the strongest appeal of ICC 2011. Whether you're at the top of the league table or you find yourself plummeting into financial disaster, finding ways to deal with the trials and tribulations of your managerial career is the main highlight. Thankfully, each difficulty mode is tweaked with enough realism to keep those crucial moments of decision making from becoming too easy to predict. Your most healthy players suddenly fall victim to injury at the most inopportune times; and the A.I. often makes strategic choices that you won't be able to anticipate. Granted, some squads are easier to read than others, but there’s still enough variety to keep you on your toes.

Management sims tend to lack visual flair, and that testament rings true for ICC 2011. The menus are plain and flat in design; you sometimes feel like you're preparing a PowerPoint presentation with all the bar charts and graphs that appear. You also get to see your chosen plays represented in a novel, if unnecessary, match engine, which looks extremely rough in just about every way. However, the simplified look works: information is clearly defined, and the subtle use of colour and straightforward imagery help to convey key stats and such without being overbearing. In other words, it accomplishes the necessary ease of use that all management sims should aspire to, as well as provide navigation that is both fast and functional. Plus, the game will run on just about any computer hardware, regardless of whether you have a powerhouse PC or a standard laptop to play on.

Though it doesn't have the prettiest of interfaces, ICC 2011 features everything an aspiring cricket captain needs.

Though its implementation is rather basic, you can also take your saved single-player squads over to compete in mostly lag-free online matches with other players. You find and challenge available players to one-on-one matches through an online ladder, and you have the option to change variables such as the match length before you both start. Multiplayer stats can also be tracked through the ladder, and invites from other players can be received as you soldier through single-player, which is a nice touch. Unfortunately, one of the more interesting components of ICC 2011 is not yet available--the ability to save your games via the cloud and play them separately on an iOS device. The idea sounds promising on paper, so it's a real shame that it won't be available until sometime later in the year.

International Cricket Captain 2011 is strictly for those who enjoy both the sport and the management sim genre. If terms like "howzat" and "wickets" fly right over your head, then the game definitely won't sway your opinion of the sport--and it makes no bones about it. It's a love letter to a sport that works considerably well under the guise of a management sim, and the nuanced strategy combined with reams of comprehensive statistical information will put a smile on your face if you're already smitten with the sport of cricket.

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2011-03-16T23:57:00.000-07:00

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Zumba Fitness: Join the Party Review

2011-02-26T16:44:00.000-08:00

Flaky detection and awkward menus seriously hamper this dance fitness game.

The Good

High-energy workouts
Jazzy neon visuals.

The Bad

Inconsistent movement detection
Awkward menu interface
Unreliable online play.

It's a no-brainer: dance-fitness craze Zumba is good exercise. Try not working up a sweat mimicking the up-tempo jigging of a Zumba instructor, successfully or otherwise, and so much the better if you enjoy the cheesy tunes. But what makes Zumba a vigorous aerobic workout also makes it an imperfect match for the Kinect in this game. More often than not, the quick steps and booty wiggling on which Zumba Fitness: Join the Party is based defy detection by the Kinect sensor. Alongside iffy detection, there's a clumsy menu interface to contend with, plus a lack of specific in-game dance instruction, even in the training mode. The jazzy neon visuals count in the game's favour, and there's a goodly number of authentic Zumba workouts, but between the accuracy issues and uninspired game-like elements (that is, a basic point-scoring system), there's not much to recommend this over a DVD of Zumba classes.

Let's get ready to rumba.

The game is based on 30 routines, each 20 or 45 minutes long, split among beginner, intermediate, and expert difficulties. The routines are composed of four- or five-minute segments set to Latin music, such that a set might contain samba, merengue, and cumbia, with some calypso-inspired grooves and belly dancing thrown in for good measure. Some are newly devised for the game, but most will be familiar to Zumba disciples, and they are led by Zumba grandmasters Tanya, Beto, and Gina. You mirror one of these instructors through a routine, and their neon-hued figures change colour according to how well the Kinect thinks you're doing, in theory turning like traffic lights from green (spot on) to red (way off). In practice, the detection is only consistently capable with simple steps. At higher tempos and with more complicated grooving, the system often comes up short; from time to time it registers as green a move entirely unlike the one onscreen, though more often it comes off as frustratingly over-finicky, ruling as red decent approximations of onscreen actions.
In the absence of reliable detection, Zumba Fitness can at least count the sheer quantity of routines as a positive, and these are good exercise because they require long spells of energetic movement. They are also good fun because they feel like perky dance sessions rather than robotic, repetitive aerobic drills. But these qualities would equally belong to a Zumba class or a set of DVDs. What's more, either of the latter two might offer more specific dance instructions. Here, vocal or text instruction is minimal, even in the Learn the Steps training mode. In the training mode, lessons are divided into small sets of moves in a particular dance style. In the basic calypso tutorial, for example, your instructor builds from a slow, simplified version of a staple calypso step, gradually adding speed, energy, arm movements, and general pizzazz as you go. The nonspecific comments and encouragement he or she shouts ("Just have fun!" or "You're doing fine!") are coupled with slightly less vague text feedback ("Nice leg moves!" or "Nice hip motion!"). In the absence of step-specific instructions, though, it's trickier than it should be for Zumba newbies to mimic the instructor. Similarly, in a full dance routine, it would be useful for the next move to be called out or otherwise indicated onscreen.

As you pull off more successful moves in a routine, you fill a points bar through numbered stages. As you progress through stages, you are rewarded with additions to the instructor's backdrop: more silhouetted backup dancers, for instance, and, in the nightclub venue, a fancier light show. The other, less glamorous venues--a factory, a rooftop, a stadium--are unlocked as you complete routines. You can also pick the colour of your silhouette, as seen by the Kinect camera and shown onscreen--though it's there more for decoration than visual feedback, only partially displayed and placed in the background.

Selecting items in the main menu is a less-than-slick experience with the Kinect (and there's no option to use the Xbox 360 controller instead). There's a button on a slider at the bottom of the screen; to operate it, you must hover and hold over the button to grab it, swipe left or right to scroll through the menu options, and then hover and hold again over the item you want to select. It's too much work for a menu based on motion control, and the job is not made more fun by the too-short loop of Zumba music endlessly repeated in the menu screen.

Local multiplayer lets two players dance side-by-side or compete in Zumba Attack mode, in which each player is given a bar to fill by busting successful moves. Two teams of two can also compete by taking turns. If the movement recognition were more competent, the local multiplayer modes would be a fun addition for social, competitive workouts. But again, the Kinect functionality falls short of what's needed to make it a significant, interactive upgrade on an exercise video. Online, up to eight players can work out together--again, in theory. The reality is less impressive; on multiple occasions the game failed to place us in a match with anyone, whether with us as host or with us searching for a quick match or a custom match. With three million copies of the game sold, albeit across all platforms, it's hard to imagine there's not a single Xbox-based Zumba player out there looking for a match.

The workout calendar is functional if basic, prescribing a weekly schedule of routines according to your selection of workout course. These range from gentle programs composed of occasional beginner routines, to the full-on "Zumba glow," for a calendar packed with daily expert classes. Though you can also customise a program with your choice of routines, the calendar is still a fairly shallow stab at making a full fitness regime from a set of fun dance routines, and it lacks, for instance, the tracking of calories burned.

Where other dance games have created better experiences by tailoring their choreography for motion control, Zumba's moves were already established and embraced globally (12 million people taking weekly classes, claims the official site) before this game came along. It's a shame those moves couldn't have been worked into a better fitness game; flaky detection and the awkward menu interface in particular give it a cheap feel that no amount of perky Latin rhythms and neon window dressing can offset.

El Shaddai: Ascension of the Metatron Review

2011-02-26T16:32:00.000-08:00

El Shaddai: Ascension of the Metatron combines gorgeous artistic design with enticing combat to create a memorable adventure.

The Good

Incredible, abstract visual design
Streamlined combat is smooth and challenging
Three unique and satisfying weapons
Varied soundtrack deftly enhances the experience
Playing on harder difficulties reveals impressive combat depth.

The Bad

Camera makes navigating 3D platforms unnecessarily tricky
Combat on normal difficulty gets predictable.

Beauty can be a dangerous thing. The promise of exploring a world rich with the fruits of artistic expression can lure the unsuspecting into a visually impressive but fundamentally lacking wasteland. And on the surface, El Shaddai: The Ascension of the Metatron gives off a strong "look but don't touch" vibe. Evocative landscapes grab your attention, but the rudimentary combat system built around one measly attack button makes it seem as if this religious adventure is all style and no substance. Fortunately, this is no button masher. Slicing down foes with your array of celestial weapons takes skill and precision, though the depth doesn't fully reveal itself until you unlock the harder difficulty settings. But even when you're playing on normal difficulty, the smooth rhythm of combat serves as a wonderful complement to the expressive aesthetics. El Shaddai: The Ascension of the Metatron uses its beauty as just one part of the experience, not as a crutch propping up a shallow facade, resulting in an enticing adventure that satisfies on many fronts.

Demons have an obvious weakness: a punch to the head.

Enoch the scrivener doesn't mind getting his hands dirty. Originally chosen to document the deeds of the elders, this courageous human is cast down to Earth to round up fallen angels before God washes away their sins (and the lives of countless humans) in a devastating flood. That's no small task for a man who's far more comfortable with a quill in his hand. This intriguing setup is based on apocryphal tales from ancient Judeo-Christian texts, and those unfamiliar with the source material may find it difficult to follow along. Characters are introduced and then forgotten without much fleshing out, so absorbing details can be tricky. Although you might not understand everything being laid before you, the manner of storytelling is intriguing. Plot details are conveyed in a number of unique ways, which goes a long way toward keeping you invested. Animated cutscenes alongside still shots sprinkled with expository text make up the bulk of the narrative. But the more interesting story elements are woven into the gameplay. There are times when you run through simple 2D canvases with dialogue filling in important pieces, and the integration of story within the action gives added weight to the experience.

While it's true that you may not grasp the esoteric story, you'll be hard pressed to tear your eyes from the screen thanks to the extraordinary visual design. El Shaddai takes place in an incredible-looking world that is an absolute pleasure to stare at. The abstractly-rendered environments defy description, exhibiting a wealth of imagination. Landscapes use a blend of flat textured surfaces with sharp colors to create a realm that is easy to lose yourself in. In one area, crosshatched black plains close in, suffocating you with their bleakness, and this confining sequence clashes wonderfully with the icy brightness of a serene outdoor vista. In another level, obsidian-black platforms encircled by an orange ring hover above a fiery red backdrop that conjures images of burning hellstone. In the distance, pastel fireworks dot the sky. Tribal chants interposed between psychedelic trance beats create an atmosphere that's difficult to shake out of your mind. The music enhances every step of your journey. Religious hymns, pulsing rock anthems, and calming guitar riffs cue up in key moments to temper your mood and keep you invested.

Underneath this abstract and ambitious surface, you find that El Shaddai is a straightforward action adventure that blends combat and platforming in both 3D and 2D settings. Although gorgeous, the various stages you inhabit are mostly linear, allowing only slight steps off the beaten path for the rare hidden item. This confinement does limit your chance to shake free of the shackles and stretch your legs in this pristine world, but this design choice is not without benefits. What El Shaddai lacks in freedom it makes up for in razor-sharp focus. There is a strong push to move forward at all times, and you find yourself running into fights, leaping between platforms, and sprinting across magnificent lands without a moment's hesitation. The visual and audio design do a great job of keeping you excited to push on ahead. New landmarks spring into view every few steps, calling you onward, and the varied soundtrack shifts between songs to ensure your ears are just as happy as your eyes.

Once challenged to a duel, you need to shift your focus from the atmospheric wonders to the demonic monsters closing in. Because your repertoire of moves is limited, combat is based more on positioning and timing than on trying to figure out which attack you should use. Every attack makes use of just one button. You perform different moves based on how you hit it (tap versus hold), if you use a modifier (which launches enemies in the air), or whether you're jumping or standing firmly on the ground. Block and jump buttons make up your defensive maneuvers, and you can dodge as well. It sounds simple, and it is easy to pick up, but there's more complexity than you might initially realize. Like all sentient beings, your enemies don't like being attacked. If you rush at them with rage in your eyes, they can just turtle, before countering with a flourish once you tire yourself out. But if you tap your attack in a slowed-down rhythm, you initiate a special move that knocks away their shields. Mastering this attack is a key to success. Combat feels like a violent dance in which you must keep perfect time if you want to excel. Tap too aggressively, and you might as well be swinging at a rock; tap too slowly, and you leave yourself vulnerable.

With each successful strike, you visibly damage your maniacal foes. El Shaddai is played without a HUD (you do unlock an option to use one once you finish the game), though the expertly designed visuals ensure you're aware of all the information you need. Both you and your enemies wear armor that gets destroyed as you take damage. When you land a particularly powerful attack, you can see the effects of your anger displayed on their ravaged bodies. It's an empowering feeling to knock your well-armored opponents silly until they're just running around in their skivvies. That almighty feeling goes both ways. Enoch loses his precious protection as fights wear on, too, and there's no better feeling than when you win a fight after digging in your heels when you're at your end. If you do fall in battle, you can revive yourself if your fingers are quick. Slamming on the shoulder or face buttons brings you back to life, though each successive attempt is harder than the last. Waking up at the last possible second and then tearing your stunned opponent to shreds is absolutely exhilarating.

The Opportunity to Have Sex With an Attractive Woman

2011-01-27T09:08:00.000-08:00

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Edge Review

2011-01-26T16:30:00.000-08:00

Snappy aesthetics and a novel hero make Edge a nifty platformer.

The Good

Maneuvering the cube is a fun challenge
Soundtrack livens things up
Some clever design elements.

The Bad

Controls can be imprecise
Simplicity leads to repetitiveness.

After decades of playing the supporting role, the unsung hero of the platforming genre finally gets its time in the spotlight. Years of being pushed around, trod upon, and smashed to pieces have paid off, and now the stalwart cube takes center stage. In Edge, you maneuver the six-sided star of the show around environments composed entirely of its blocky brethren, collecting prisms and trying not to plummet into starry oblivion. The clever level design presents some interesting tests of your limited moveset, while the minimalist visuals and retro soundtrack make the experience more atmospheric than a bunch of blocks floating in space has any right to be. Edge is not a complex game--it focuses on movement rather than puzzle-solving and there are times when the controls don't feel as sharp as they should. But the price of entry is relatively cheap at about seven dollars, and the few hours you spend conducting your cube in Edge are pleasant ones.

Cubes pass down their knowledge to the next generation through tiny glowing question marks.

The goal in Edge is straightforward: move your cube from the start point of each level to the end point. Levels are composed entirely of other cubes and squares, creating a three-dimensional grid that you must navigate. You view the action from an isometric angle, and the grid is arranged diagonally. You can move your cube in only four directions, but pressing up does not actually make your cube move toward the top of your screen. Instead, you move diagonally up to the right, and pressing down moves you diagonally down to the left. Because of this orientation, using the WASD or the arrow keys requires a mental recalibration that can be disorienting. Fortunately, you can avoid this issue by using the corner numbers on the number pad (1, 3, 7, 9) or the analog stick on an Xbox 360 controller. No matter which control scheme you use, movement in Edge has a vague clumsiness to it. Part of this is because you are trying to "roll" a block around, but your momentum can be awkward at times. When you move to an adjacent square, you reach a tipping point when your cube turns over. If you push at this point, or linger slightly too long, you might tumble an extra square or two by accident. This could be no big deal, or it could lead to is an extra death or two. Fortunately, death is not punished harshly in Edge, so it's not a big frustration, and for the most part you feel comfortable moving through this cubic world.

The primary challenge is to maneuver through each level safely. Your cube can move along flat surfaces and climb on top of single blocks, but if you come up against anything taller, you know it's time to find another route. Aside from rolling and climbing, your only other ability is grabbing edge time. Edge time is a mid-climb stall accomplished by tapping the key or feathering the stick to balance precariously between one level and another. This allows you to cling to a single edge for as long as you can keep your balance. If you grab edge time on a moving block, it can transport you to a new area. Or if you do it on a wall, you can hang over an abyss as one platform moves out from underneath you and another comes to pick you up. These maneuvers, along with situations that require precision timing, are about as tricky as Edge gets. You'll likely die more than a few times as you get the hang of edge time, but with a little perseverance (and some help from the generous checkpoints), you should be able to proceed without too much trouble.

Edge is more a test of reflexes than a test of brainpower. It's almost always clear what direction you need to roll in, and it's not very hard to figure out how to surmount obstacles. Hazards like moving blocks, brittle tiles, bumpers, shrink squares, and who-knows-what-this-will-do buttons are as likely to help as to hinder you, and Edge combines these various elements with thoughtful level design to create some clever paths for you to follow. The touchy momentum can be bothersome as things get trickier, and there is some wiggle room when maneuvering on to moving blocks that can result in sliding to your death when you thought you landed squarely. It's not enough imprecision to spoil the fun, but it does dampen the experience somewhat.

In addition to simply getting to the exit, you can collect prisms along the way, and later levels use tricky prism placement to create opportunities for light puzzle-solving. It's not always clear how to get every prism, so you have to use all your locomotive skills (and the helpful minimap) to hunt them down. Collecting every prism on each level unlocks some bonus levels, as does beating all the levels, bringing the total level count north of 55. At the end of each level, you receive a letter grade and a score based on your time. Any edge time you earn is subtracted from your end time, but the clock is always ticking, so if you can simply sprint to the end, that's the best way to earn a good score. Grabbing edge time while waiting for a moving platform or thinking about your next move helps keep your time down, but this is worth doing only if you're striving for a place on the online leaderboards.

All of this polygonal action is aesthetically pleasing, thanks to the simple lines and colorful contrast of the visuals. The rainbow colors of prisms and moving platforms stand out nicely against the gray levels, and the ever-shifting hues of your cube are an enjoyable sight. The electronic soundtrack adds a dynamic element to the relatively static levels as it moves from peppy and adventurous to moody and atmospheric, perking things up and staving off sameness. There is a certain repetitiveness to Edge born of its simplicity, but to its credit the game manages to entertain for the few hours it takes to complete all the levels. The novel fun of moving around as a box holds up despite some control awkwardness, and there is a good amount of content here for the asking price. Edge may not herald the coming of a new platforming hero, but it may give you a new appreciation for the powers of a humble cube.

Hole in the Wall Review

2010-08-26T16:19:00.000-07:00

It seems like a great fit for the Kinect, but Hole in the Wall doesn't quite line up.

The Good

Striking poses is silly fun
Two-versus-two competition makes it even sillier.

The Bad

Body tracking is inconsistent
Feedback is unclear
Lame presentation.

As a game show that challenges contestants to strike and hold a variety of strange poses, Hole in the Wall seems like it would be right at home on the Kinect. In the game, as in the show, a series of walls advance on the player, each with a shape cut out of it that the player must match. These shapes include human figures, abstract blobs, and simple polygons, and scrambling to position your body to line up with each shape creates some goofy fun. Trying to make your shadow look like an arrow or a cowboy can be amusing, especially for any spectators nearby, but there are some bothersome technical shortcomings that keep Hole in the Wall from maintaining that appeal. Furthermore, the silhouette feedback mechanism isn't always reliable, leaving you to wonder why your seemingly spot-on pose isn't scoring you points. Though these problems don't plague every round of Hole in the Wall and you can still enjoy some silly living room shenanigans, the flaws in the core mechanics make it hard to recommend.

Well, yes, that's technically true, but 'Holes in the Wall' just sounds weird.

There are only two modes in Hole in the Wall; you can face an unending series of walls and see how many you can clear consecutively, or you can play a show. Shows are themed contests that consist of three normal rounds and a final round. Normal rounds present you with a set of about 10 walls and allow you to miss up to two; if you get three strikes in one round, you fail the show. When you make it to the final round, you are often met with a slight variation on a normal round. The lights may be dimmed, making it tougher to see the hole in the wall, or the walls may come faster than usual. You earn points for every wall you clear in a show (faster clears earn bigger bonuses), and at the end of the show, your score is posted to online leaderboards.
So how do you actually clear a wall? It's as simple as positioning your body to match the cut-out hole. If you see a tall rectangle, you stand straight with your arms at your sides. If there's something that looks like a dog, you get down on all fours. And if you see a cowboy with arms akimbo and his foot up on a hay bale, well, you'd better hope you can raise your leg off the ground long enough to match the shape. As your silhouette gets closer to matching up with the hole, your image turns from red to orange to yellow to green, with the latter color indicating that you've reached the optimal position. The better your pose, the faster the clear meter fills up and the quicker you clear the wall. The walls come in fairly quick succession, so you might strike a baseball player pose, have to look like a big cactus, and then shrink down to the floor to fit into a box shape. The parade of poses is naturally silly and can generate a good amount of fun for those inclined to enjoy this mildly aerobic, utterly ridiculous endeavor.

The first few shows are relatively easy, but as you progress, you begin to encounter trickier poses that some players will find difficult. Holding your leg aloft at varying heights for seconds at a time presents a challenge to your strength and balance, so make sure you have heeded the Kinect's warnings and moved your furniture a good distance away. Harder poses can also be fun because they require more skillful maneuvering to successfully execute, but they also run afoul of Hole in the Wall's technical problems more frequently. The game is fine when you have to pose with arms and legs splayed out like a starfish, but the closer your limbs get to your body, the more problems you encounter. Slight elbow bends are problematic, and minor squats can be finicky as well.

Sometimes you can get your pose to register properly with slight adjustments, but such attempts are not always successful. The visual feedback only indicates that you are doing it wrong; there is no limb-specific feedback to say, "Just move your leg a little to the left!" You should be able to adjust by trying to fill the hole more fully with your silhouette, but it's unclear how Hole in the Wall detects your body. Bigger individuals might get away with simply making themselves loom large (the Hole in the Wall equivalent of brute force), but on another similar wall, this technique might fail. Sometimes your silhouette can line up almost perfectly and still register as red, but other times, you can be off by an entire limb or two and still earn green. Detection is particularly spotty when you have to get down on the floor. These issues force you to try to learn how to game the game, rather than follow the simple and intuitive rules. It's possible to play entire shows without encountering these problems, but the threat of inconsistency looms over every session.

Hole in the Wall is neither technically flawless nor visually appealing. The walls themselves often feature crude line drawings meant to give context to the shape of the hole, but they are simplistic at best, indecipherable at worst. The meager stage and braying audio are thankfully deemphasized during actual gameplay. In addition to competing against the walls, you can challenge another player or team (up to two versus two) to see who is the best poser, and getting more people in the mix can increase your likelihood of having fun in spite of the technical shortcomings. Unlocking and beating the 10 shows is likely to take you a few hours, and the poses get trickier and faster as you progress. The challenge of contorting yourself into mildly awkward positions is pretty amusing, but having your performance derailed by spotty detection is frustrating. Though it does have some entertainment value, Hole in the Wall is still a tough sell at 800 Microsoft points ($10).

Deus Ex: Human Revolution Review

2010-02-26T16:21:00.000-08:00

Deus Ex: Human Revolution is an engrossing and atmospheric adventure that keeps you guessing.

The Good

Varied mechanics allow you to accomplish missions the way you want
Evocative futuristic atmosphere
Engrossing story with themes that resonate
A long adventure that invites replay.

The Bad

Poor boss fights remove the element of choice
Long load times, dated facial animations, and other technical drawbacks
Weak AI detracts from both the shooting and the stealth.

Choice. Many games provide the illusion of it; fewer deliver it in any meaningful way. Deus Ex: Human Revolution is one of those few: a first-person shooter/stealth/espionage/role-playing hybrid that allows you to overcome obstacles as you see fit. Let's say you require access to a guarded apartment building. You can shoot your way past the patrolling sentries. But maybe you'd rather sneak past them unnoticed, silently knocking them out as you go; hack an electronic lock on a side entrance; or find a hidden vent and shimmy your way inside. Play the way you want: It's up to you. In Human Revolution, this kind of flexibility can be awe inspiring, but like with many ambitious games, the individual parts and pieces aren't always satisfying on their own terms. Neither the shooting nor the stealth is best in class, and a number of flaws disrupt your suspension of disbelief. But even if the details don't stand up to scrutiny, taken as a whole, Human Revolution is an excellent game with an unsettling vision of the future we face.

David Sarif is worried more about profitability than ethics.

In that future, human augmentation has changed the way we live. Augmentation technology makes the more fortunate among us stronger, faster, and hardier--for a cost, of course. It's the year 2027, and the world is divided. Some believe that augmentation is the next step in evolution; others think it strips us of our humanity. Sarif Industries is one of several companies that research and manufacture such technology, and you play as Adam Jensen, Sarif's security expert. Scientists are on the verge of a mysterious breakthrough when high-tech soldiers ransack Sarif's headquarters, making off with important info, murdering scientists and leaving Adam for dead. Sarif rehabilitates Adam with the help of augmentations, turning Adam into both man and machine: something beyond human. As Adam, you set off to discover who was behind the attack and what, exactly, they were trying to find.

As it turns out, you uncover more than you expected. You explore Shanghai and your home city of Detroit, along with other locales, to piece together clues. Some of them illuminate plot elements; others flesh out the world as a whole; while still others provide unexpected personal data and set the stage for a surprising turn of events. In this grim vision of the future, anti-aug demonstrators hang on their prophet's every word; sexual deviants seek augmented prostitutes for extra thrills. Human Revolution explores the symbiotic relationships binding the press, the government, and big business--a modern, relevant theme that gives the story an air of disturbing authenticity. If you played the original Deus Ex, you will appreciate seeing the origins of the turmoil to come, before nanotechnology further revolutionized the human condition. Electronic books you stumble upon hint at the coming innovation; newspapers document increasing social tensions (and, cleverly, refer to how you completed your most recent mission); and emails and PDAs provide insight into the minds of the game's key figures.

The visual design does a great job of setting the stage for those tensions. Human Revolution's color palette makes frequent use of gold and black, which results in eye-catching visual contrasts. Take, for example, a nightclub in Shanghai called The Hive. The honeycomb design stretching across its neon yellow exterior is not only striking, but also similar to interface elements associated with augmentations. This kind of thematic and visual consistency is common and makes for a cohesive atmosphere even when trotting across the globe. Human Revolution takes great pains to be believable and immerse you in its world, which makes its technical deficiencies all the more noticeable. The city districts you explore are good sized but not enormous, which makes the extended loading times between them seem drastic. You spend minutes at a time in lengthy conversations, staring at the dated, mechanical facial animations. On the Xbox 360 in particular, the frame rate can take a hit as you pan the camera around--a distraction in any case and a greater annoyance during firefights. On consoles, it feels like developer Eidos Montreal tried to squeeze a bit more out of its graphics engine than it could handle. On the PC, the game performs adequately but still looks slightly dated. But this is a case in which good art design overcomes the technology that renders it. The game is as much about places as it is about people, and it does an excellent job of giving its environments character and grit.

And so you perform story missions and side quests in these cities, where hobos huddle around flaming barrels for warmth and private security firms intimidate the locals. You find answers for a grieving mother, publicly humiliate a cowardly murderer, and seek a dangerous hacker. And in most cases, how you accomplish your tasks depends on how you wish to play. Let's say you must make your way through a heavily guarded facility. If you prefer the direct approach, you could shoot your way through. During the course of the game, you find or purchase pistols, revolvers, combat rifles, shotguns, and more--and you gain access to augmentations that further support your violent tendencies. As you play, you earn experience; in turn, you then earn praxis points used to unlock new skills and enhancements. Players into bloodshed should appreciate the dermal augmentations that increase your armor, reduce weapon recoil, increase inventory space, and improve resistance to concussion grenades. From the action-packed perspective, Human Revolution plays like a cover shooter. When you snap behind cover, the camera pulls into a third-person view, and you peek out or pop up to load your enemies with lead.

The shooting mechanics are fine but not outstanding. The cover system works well, but even with dermal upgrades, you are still fragile enough to feel in danger when you engage the enemy. And ammo is scarce enough (though not frustratingly so) that you'll want to make every shot count. Unfortunately, the none-too-smart AI frequently diminishes that sense of danger. It isn't uncommon for enemies to empty clip after clip shooting at the wall you are hiding behind, refuse to shoot back even when you're pumping bullets into them, or jump en masse into a grenade rather than away from it. Actually, it isn't just enemies that act in unconvincing ways. In many cases, you can tap away at people's computers right in front of them, saunter into a shopkeeper's storeroom to steal credit chips and ammo, and emerge from air ducts right in front of fellow Sarif employees. For what it's worth, the previous Deus Ex games also featured such illusion-breaking details. And like before, those details stand out because the game otherwise works so hard to create a believable cyberpunk world.

You don't have to shoot anyone on your way through that aforementioned facility, however. There are good reasons to take the nonlethal route. One is that you earn extra experience for leaving your foes alive; another is that it's more satisfying to sneak than to shoot. That isn't because the AI magically improves when you go stealthy; while you are crouched, a guard might walk up to you, his crotch in your face, yet not notice you. But patrol patterns make it challenging--though hardly impossible--to elude notice. If you played Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Conviction, the stealth gameplay will feel familiar. You can tumble from cover spot to cover spot or press against walls and obstacles to remain out of view. And again, the right augmentations can complement this play style. In this case, they take Human Revolution from plain-Jane sneaker into fully featured stealth game. Eventually, you can observe enemy figures through walls, see their cones of sight on your minimap, or mark them with pips to make them easier to track. But even while sneaking, you can feed your hunger for violence with a melee attack. If you're feeling generous, you can clobber your enemy but leave him alive and earn a few extra experience points for your kindness. Or, you can forfeit the extra experience but get the rush of a vicious assassination.

Driver: San Francisco Review

2010-01-26T16:10:00.000-08:00

Driver: San Francisco's inspired shift mechanic and wealth of action-packed content make it an absolute blast that revives the franchise.

The Good

Shift keeps the action fast paced and exciting
Huge open-world city to explore
Masses of content to play through
Fun online modes.

The Bad

Ridiculous storyline
Frame rate issues with split-screen
Missions get repetitive toward the end.

Chasing down crooks in high-speed chases, performing death-defying feats of driving, or bringing down entire criminal organisations might be a bit much for your average cop, but Driver: San Francisco's John Tanner takes it in his stride. As you take control of him and begin your beat on the mean streets of San Francisco, the reason why becomes clear: Tanner's uncanny ability to "shift" into the body of citizens lets you do things other cops can't, such as instantly drive any vehicle in the city, coax case clues from criminal passengers, or use cars as battering rams, to name but a few. While the premise behind this ability is ludicrous, it all makes sense as you soar over the living, breathing city for the first time, instantly transporting yourself to new missions and swiftly jumping between cars to take down criminals. Shifting is Driver's coup de grace; the feature that puts memories of the mediocre Driver 3 to rest and reinvigorates the franchise.

Chasing checkpoints is a lot more fun in the city of San Francisco.

Driver: San Francisco picks up where Driv3r left off; it continues the story of Tanner and criminal mastermind Jericho. After escaping from Istanbul, Jericho takes refuge in San Francisco, only to be tracked down and imprisoned. However, a routine prison transfer gives him the opportunity to escape. Tanner gives chase and--after an explosion-filled action scene of Michael Bay proportions--catches up with the criminal, only to be run down and left in a coma. It's in Tanner's coma-induced dreams that Driver takes place; the battle against his coma manifests itself as the hunt for Jericho and real-life news reports on the TV in his hospital room influence his actions. While the narrative is completely implausible and at times downright confusing, it allows Driver to free itself from the shackles of the real world and introduce the unique shift mechanic that underpins the entire game.

Shifting allows you to take control of any vehicle with just a few buttons presses. Activating shift lets you float above the city, from varying levels of zoom that allow for up-close views of roads all the way to a bird's-eye view. You can highlight any car you like, and with another button press, you're in the driver's seat, ready to take on the criminal horde. With a city the size of San Francisco, the gameworld is huge, and there are hundreds of miles of road for you to drive on and explore. Fortunately, any worries about laborious driving to reach missions are laid to rest with shift. Zooming out to a bird's-eye view allows you to see all of the missions on the map, which are marked by clear icons that, when hovered over, detail the content. You can zip from a mission on one side of the city to another in seconds, minimizing downtime and letting you get straight into the action.

Nothing beats taking a Ford GT out for a spin.

There are a huge number of missions available, with a wealth of types from which to choose. Even for something as simple as racing, there are multiple types, such as checkpoint racing, with marked and unmarked routes; smash racing, where you have to smash objects along the route to gain time; and team racing, where you have to shift between two competitors to ensure that they finish in first and second place. Then, there are the police missions in which you have to chase down criminals by using your boost ability to ram them off the road or shift into oncoming traffic to ram them head-on, with replays letting you view the carnage in glorious slow motion. The stunt missions are the most fun: You have to perform feats of daring driving, such as drifts, handbrake turns, and huge jumps over moving vehicles.

Each of the main missions has a story attached to it. Sometimes they relate back to the main narrative, while others involve ordinary citizens who've gotten themselves into a spot of trouble, such as parents whose child has been kidnapped or irresponsible teens who have entered street races. These stories aren't especially engaging, thanks to corny dialogue and merely passable voice acting, but references to kitsch '70s cop shows and past Driver games let you know the game never takes itself too seriously. To progress, you have to complete most of the story-based missions to unlock Tanner missions, which reveal more about his history with Jericho and his current condition. In addition, there are heaps of optional missions scattered around the city. Completing them awards you with will power points, which are also given to you for daring driving such as overtaking in the wrong lane or big drifts.

Red Faction: Armageddon - Path to War Review

2009-03-26T16:42:00.000-07:00

With only four uneven missions of downloadable destruction, Path to War offers too little and costs too much.

The Good

Shard gun fuels some destructive fun.

The Bad

It's only an hour long
Vehicle sections blunt the explosive excitement
Can't use new guns in other modes.

Given Red Faction: Armageddon's extensive destructibility and delightfully devastating arsenal, the prospect of fresh opportunities for wreaking havoc on Mars is an appealing one. Path to War struggles to capitalize on this potential, delivering four new campaign missions that give you a glimpse of the events that preceded the original game. Two of the missions are vehicle-based, and though that ups the destructive ante, vehicle handling isn't Armageddon's strong suit. The two on-foot missions fare better, arming you with two mildly amusing new weapons and delivering the exciting action you've come to expect. Unfortunately, the whole thing is over in about an hour, and there's nothing else to do but play it all again. Even with some entertaining moments, Path to War doesn't justify its seven dollar (540 Microsoft points) purchase price.

Flying debris is one of the leading causes of death on Mars.

Even though Armageddon didn't have a very interesting story, Path to War starts out with an intriguing twist. In the first mission, you play as one of Adam Hale's top lieutenants and blast your way through scores of Red Faction soldiers while sabotaging their defenses. It's too bad that this mission takes place in an aerial vehicle and you aren't given the chance to play the role of a villain in a more up-close and personal way. Instead, you hover slowly through constricted passageways, blowing up all kinds of stuff with your missile attack and gunning down tiny soldiers. The explosions are pretty enough, but the vehicle isn't fun to pilot. The floaty controls do little to impart the sense that you are in a powerful weapon of war, so the whole mission feels flat. The same is true of the next mission, in which you drive an awkward tank with reversible (and disorienting) treads. Again, you pack a big punch, but because the camera is zoomed out to encompass your large vehicle, the destruction isn't as impressive or satisfying as it is when you're on foot.

Fortunately, the second half of Path to War puts you back on the ground as Darius Mason, wielding familiar weapons as you fight through industrial areas, outposts, and caves thick with cultist enemies. Though you start off with only part of your full arsenal, you are almost immediately granted one of the two new weapons featured in this add-on: the shard gun. This repurposed cleanup gizmo gathers up a hovering ball of nearby debris and then shoots it wherever you choose. Clobbering enemies with a tangle of building materials is definitely amusing, especially when the junk you kill them with used to be the bridge they were standing on. Playing around with the shard gun can be fun for a while, though it's likely to make you long for the creative mayhem fueled by the magnet gun, which you get to use during only one of the four missions.
The other new gun is less exciting, but more deadly. The sharpshooter is a powerful bolt gun that impales your target to any surface behind it. Sticking an enemy to a wall is good for a chuckle, and when you use this gun in conjunction with your shockwave ability, you can send a foe flying lazily across the map. You don't get to watch them fly for very long, however, because the sharpshooter is so powerful that it kills human enemies with one hit and they dissolve soon after being pinned. Larger enemies won't be propelled by the sharpshooter's bolts, and this limits the amount of nasty foe-pinning fun you can have. Also, you get to use the sharpshooter only on the fourth and final level of Path to War, and you can't use either new gun in Infestation or Ruin mode.

Path to War also comes with a handful of new achievements, but it's easy to get them all on your first and only playthrough. Completing the four missions and exhausting everything this add-on has to offer takes only about an hour, and it's a shame that so much of it is dedicated to lackluster vehicle sequences rather than the explosive core action. The new weapons provide some entertainment, but like everything else in Path to War, it's short-lived. Folks hungry for more Red Faction: Armageddon are likely to get more enjoyment out of a New Game Plus than this brief excursion, which asks too much and gives too little.

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2002-08-13T12:55:00.000-07:00

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