I’m going to be honest – I’ve never played a Tim Schafer game through entirely. They were fun, but too wordy and story driven for my tastes. But that’s just my preference because that style of gaming is popular. I mean, heck, I don’t even like RPGs. But Brutal Legend stood out because of the setting. Metal. My favorite bands are Judas Priest and Iron Maiden (sadly absent from the game), and I even play drums/guitar while Sean and I are working on a metal album. So it was very easy to get me hooked.

Watching previews and playing the demo, the game looked to be a 3rd person action/adventure title. Now that I have the full game, I’ll call it a 3rd person real-time action/adventure/strategy. The RTS elements in the game are pretty badass. But because there is emphasis on the hand to hand combat, it’s not a full-blown RTS, and commanding of the units is pretty easy. You never have to send them out separately. You are more or less babying a group of fighters to go along with you. You have the option of using double-team abilities with all the units that will only help you in battle, and you can play solos that help out to, by either killing enemies or strengthening your troops.

The main singleplayer campaign is an open world game that have stage-battle missions that then bring in the RTS elements. Other than that, you are exploring to expand on the story, finding items throughout the world, and doing side-missions. The story is great as it is about metal, and features some of the coolest voices of the genre, specifically, Rob Halford. I would have hoped for some Maiden, but my belief is since Maiden and Osbourne have some issues, Maiden didn’t want to be part of a project that featured Ozzy as a big character. On a personal level, and as huge Maiden fan, the Ozzy camp have been real pricks, so I can understand in a way why the Maiden camp just steers clear. But unfortunately by doing so, Maiden is turning their backs on their fans. The official maiden boards even include a video games forum! …and no one is even talking about the game. Fortunately though, Tim went as far as naming the main character Eddie Riggs. A big time nod to Maiden fans.

So with the story, all elements of the metal culture are given some sort of explanation, which plays out both awesome and humorously. It makes sense. But I have to wonder, will you get it if you don’t care for metal? Well, as a 3rd person brawler, the fighting is pretty goof, but I feel the controls could be tighter. The idea of busting out your guitar for rhythm-game style solos is an awesome addition. And having a car to drive around and blow up shit is also entertaining. As you explore, there are many things to activate/collect/find which gives you points you can use to upgrade almost every aspect of the game. Guitar, axe, gun, and car. And as far as the RTS elements, I’m sure RTS fans would have fun with the multiplayer. I’m sure if the game was marketed as an RTS and you expected that, you might possibly still be impressed, but the elitists would cry.

As for graphics, things here are pretty simple but ooze with style. Again, it’s all based around the metal culture and makes sense. I personally love the style of the baddies. They are the black/death metal style, as you can hear that music in the background. Their look is really just terrifying to me. Traveling around in their part of the world gave me the chills, so I went back to make sure I was fully upgraded first. The main villain, Doviculus, just looks fucking awesome. I want an action figure STAT! But to go back on the negative points, this does look like something you can play on the PS2. Even though graphics aren’t everything, people still complain.

With the sound, you got some fun voice acting to go along with the characters. It’s much more cartoony than realistic, and jack Black delivers as Eddie. The soundtrack is brutal. Not a lot of metal that I like, but the Priest choices are spot-on, and hearing 3 Inches of Blood in a game like this works. As Priest is a favorite band of mine, I like metal in the style of Liege Lord or Attacker. Both are similar to Priest/Maiden. Check them out.

Shortly after the game was released, Tim posted some strategies on Double Fine’s site:

Some people find it hard to split up the army and give individual orders to individual troops. This is kinda true, mostly because you shouldn’t be doing it! That’s how you play an RTS game, not how you should play Brütal Legend. True, there are times where you might want to split your army, but it’s not common. I play complete Stage Battles most of the time without issuing a single Individual order. Your army is most effective when it’s together. The AI automatically groups your warriors into battle formations where the troops support each other. Many of the units buff or heal each other. When they are together they can all be enhanced with a single Battle Cry (or other buffing) solo. And when they are all together and you are in the middle of them, that is when you have the greatest number of options for Double Team attacks.

Tim is right (well, he made the game…). You can go about as if it’s not an RTS, and it’s much easier. By thinking of it as an RTS, I did lose some battles. Once I understood it’s really about fighting with your army, it became clear. You don’t send guys out to different locations, you don’t sit back and plan where to put what. You get a good amount of dudes, send them out, and then jump in, taking advantage of the many abilities provided. By doing this, I tore up a stage battle that made my previous attempt look very, very sad.

Tycho from Penny-Arcade then posted this:

This is a statement I honestly don’t understand. Much of the game (and the entirety of the multiplayer) is self-evidently an RTS, and one must engage in real-time strategy battles in order to progress though the body of the campaign. The fact that the game is also many other things, perhaps too many things simultaneously, doesn’t alter the fact. And you can’t really blame people for playing the game as an RTS when that’s explicitly how you taught them to play it.

I see where Tycho is coming from because he is a hardcore gamer who has played many RTS’s in the past. As a console game with a wide market appeal, many, many non-hardcore gamers will play this. Most, have not played an RTS. They go into battle going by what the game tells them and without a background knowledge of what to do in an RTS, and they will do a lot better.

I love rhythm games, but I don’t want to play a rhythm game while I’m playing an RTS while I’m playing a third person action game. In the middle of RTS battles, some basic commands require wyldde soloz to be rocked via a timing mechanism, which serves Brutal Legend’s theme but not its gameplay, and that’s the problem here in general. Brutal Legend is like a spoiled child, afforded every luxury, but grown wild in in the absence of discipline.

Again, he misses the point. Doing a solo is just another way to perform an ability of some sort among your army. By doing the solo wrong, you don’t activate that ability. This is no different than a button combo that will activate an attack or spell. Plus…it’s simple and adds to the setting.

I can see if you don’t care for metal and love RTS’s, you might have a hard time with this. But with my love for metal, I was able to overlook what seemed to be an RTS sneak-attack, and was able to play the game for what it is. If you love metal, play this game asap. It’s worth the $60 if you can swing it. If you don’t care for metal, you might just want to try it out. And if not now, some time soon. It doesn’t do anything amazing for those not into metal, but the stage battles are a little different and may interest those who want a little bit of strategy in their brawling.

I bought the PS3 originally for Uncharted, and it did not disappoint. I still consider it the best game of this gaming generation. I guess you can say that would be hard to beat a second time around, wouldn’t you say? Uncharted 2 lives up to the hype, but if you can be as awesome as possible, it’s hard to be any awesomer. That’s Uncharted 2. Oh, and minor spoilers below. Nothing drastic though, because as you will find out, there’s not much to spoil.

The graphics are still as good as the first Uncharted, which is saying a lot. I do believe Batman: Arkham Asylum now holds that title though. One thing though that I notice on PS3 games are rough edges. Most people (including Sean) call me crazy, but look at both Killzone 2 and Uncharted 2, and while the graphics are fucking incredible, there’s no anti-aliasing (or something else that creates that blurred/rough edge look)! This can be debated for some time, but bottom line is I can tell if a game is a PS3 game because of this. And while it’s present here in Uncharted, Uncharted still looks great. The colors are what really stand out for me.

The gameplay is another unchanged element. You have your platforming, shooting, and mele combat. Nothing more to see here. I think now you have more stealth moves than the original, which is actually fun to use if you want to get by all the enemies without them noticing you. The sound is top-notch too. DTS has never sounded better, especially with character chatter going on around you. The character dialog is great; voice-acting is superb and the story is wonderful. Though, as good as the story is, it’s not as good as the first, and not as exciting. I guess I let myself down by hoping for a twist, but IMO, there’s not much of a twist here. It’s more like, ‘we’re going to do this’, ‘ok we’re here’, ’stop bad guys’, ‘ok we’re done’. Yeah.

One complaint I had in the game had to do with movement. For some reason all of this only became an issue during the second half of the game, but it was frustrating. Jumping around to find ledges, what looked like ledges weren’t. But, they were if you were supposed to use it. This made the game too linear when it gave the impression of not being. Even if it didn’t get me to somewhere in the end, I would have liked to be able to climb around. One time I saw a treasure piece on the side of a wall that was against a lake. Now, this lake is dangerous and one touch takes away the ability to swim. I had two options, from what I could see: Climb up the wall from the back side, or drop down onto the hanging ledge above the water. Because too many times in the game I grabbed ledges when I was really trying to jump down. So, I decide to drop, but that section did not allow me to grab the edge, so I fall into the magical water. That kind of ruined the immersion of the world for me. Also be sure to stay away from your invincible AI buddies. Since they know they are immortal, they kind of forgot you’re not. So when a grenade gets thrown at you and you try to dodge away, you’ll run into their immortal wall-hard bodies and get blowed up. They then scream as if they are shocked you died from a grenade blast.

Those complaints made the end half feel a bit unpolished. I didn’t remember having this problem with the first game, and that along with the weak story makes this just as awesome as the first, but not better. Maybe it’s hard to make a better game? They added some fun multiplayer, which consists of capture-the-treasure or deathmatch. With the controls and platforming, it really does become a lot of fun. You are awarded with cash along the way to buy upgrades which adds some re-playability to the game.

In the end, this game is a must-play. Immediately. The multiplayer is good enough to consider this a purchase, but if not, rent or borrow now.

The following reviews are from the 360 version of the game.

Adam:

This is a fun Dual Review to do with my older brother Chad. We did a lot of PC gaming back in the day especially Wolfenstein 3D. Now, FPS’s can be considered generic if it isn’t for some gameplay variant to spice things up. Although, fighting Nazis doesn’t really get old, especially throwing in the whole sci-fi steam-punk atmosphere to it. Wolfenstein is really that: Nazis, Sci-Fi, with a little twist on gameplay.

I don’t know how long it took me to complete the game, but I did get an achievement for completing it for under 12 hours. I also started on Hard, as I tend to do this to try and get the most out of a game. Sometimes it can be so hard that it’s not worth it, but we’ll get back to that later. The basic gameplay of Wolf revolves around your normal FPS’s action, but set in a hub-world filled with various levels to complete. A usual level is completed by going through it, then back to the city. It’s pretty neat to travel through a level like that, as most FPS’s don’t do it, and it requires the gameplay to be fun even in the other direction. It also screams co-op, but that’s another point I’ll get to later.

Along with the level design, which is great by the way, is the added veil gameplay. You get a medallion that allows you to activate a veil, which then allows you to view another dimension (doorways, secrets, etc). This medallion also allows the player to enable greater damage, a shield, or time manipulation, which I found to be useful the whole way through. You can also upgrade your weapons in the black market, which is a fun way to keep weapons fresh. Although, I didn’t come across too many during my first play-through, and when I needed to get back, I came across many difficult enemies in the hub world.

Back to the level design; each level is unique in look and gameplay. It keeps things interesting, especially when most require you to trek back to the beginning to get to the city. This is where co-op would be excellent. Flanking of enemies could certainly be achieved, as well as each player using certain weapons/abilities to get tasks done much more efficiently. Also there are many hidden items in the game, and splitting up to find this would be fun. I guess I can’t knock the game for not including it, but it would be a real co-op experience rather than what most people consider fun ‘co-op’ – point A to B; boring in my opinion.

Also, playing on Hard, the difficulty ramped up quite a bit. Especially at the end, the last boss was a pain. I did change to normal in order to beat him, although it warned me I wouldn’t get the Hard/Uber achievement. But fortunately for me, after dying again, I never switched back to Normal, so I did complete the last boss on Hard. While I said it was a pain, the last boss was fun as hell! I really don’t want to spoil too much about it, but there’s a lot to it and you take advantage of all gameplay elements.

A favorite part of the game I want to share was when I entered a room that was filled with many, many enemies. I pulled out my fully upgraded tesla gun, and just ran around shocking the heck out of everyone. Now, if I didn’t fully upgrade my tesla gun, how would I have done it then? That’s what is cool about this game, as upgrading paths can lead to different gameplay experiences.

As for graphics, they were decent. Nothing incredible at all, but oddly, I played the PC version at QuakeCon and found the graphics to be awesome. So I’m guessing the more recent hardware capabilities combined with higher resolutions really show how this game looks on PC.

As for multiplayer deathmatch, I didn’t try it. I really don’t care. I played Wolfenstein for the singleplayer, and really enjoyed it. I can say this game is worth buying. If you’re on a budget, rent it or borrow it now. If on GameFly, put it at the top of your GameQ. Even though Raven did a great job, it’s interesting to see how the next title will fare being developed internally at id Software.

Chad:

Hello everyone. This is my first official review for Blue Gamer. I will be reviewing Wolfenstein, and I will add I’m writing this review, just hours after receiving an email from raptr.com saying my brother Adam now has more achievement points than me for this game. At this point I wish there was a medal or award saying “I beat it first….nanananana boo boo”. Besides that I’m happy to let everyone know my thoughts on this Nazi killing frenzy of a game.

First and foremost, thank you for making this game! I loved killing Nazis since the first Wolfenstein and I’m glad to do it again. I’m not sure but I don’t think any gamers encountered a Wolfenstein game since Return to Castle Wolfestein on the original XBOX. Someone tell me if I’m wrong. Although I played that game I have no recollection of it what so ever. So I was super excited for this new adventure. I must say my first impressions were not so good. I didn’t like my slow clunky gun I started with and I was even unsure of the look of the game. Lucky for me these impressions took a complete 180 about the second or so level. What was good about the game was when I finished that first beginners’ level I got to the main city, which sort of becomes your hub or base. In this city you meet people with a similar cause and they end up selling you upgrades for your weapons and giving you missions to complete. Once I started upgrading my weapons I learned why my gun seemed a little slow and clunky. My machine guns quickly became the perfect weapons to turn these Hitler hungry doo dahs into swiss cheese.

Now besides all the weapons you are armed to the teeth with (including rocket launchers and some sort of futuristic kill everything in the area weapons), you have something called the Veil. This is an artifact the Nazi’s and your allies are either after or already have. Now you slowly upgrade this four function device into a little helper that you will sometimes rely on to beat the game. One function slows down time, another helps you find secrets, one gives you a shield, and the other makes your weapons pierce shields and other cover/armor. Now although this artifact kind of follows along with the story, I found it to be rather pointless and wished they would have thought of something else to twist up the game play.

As far as cons, besides the artifact, the awesome little central hub of a city can be quite torturous at times. I had a problem locating all of the black market upgrade areas. I was forced to return to the first one I discovered, which was sometimes a painful task to complete. One reason is this city does have baddies scattered about, and as you progress through the game, the enemies here become bigger badder and tougher. I found myself dying sometimes in the supposed home base of operations. Also I wished to play the multiplayer, but since I reside in South Korea and the times are opposite here, I never found any games. Note that I only tried it once and I was impatient. The only first person shooter Koreans play, are games like Sudden Attack on the PC.

My final thoughts are if you either enjoy FPS or you are a fan of the Wolfenstein series…PLAY THIS GAME. You could buy it, Game Fly it, borrow it, but whatever you do you should play through it. Me personally…I would buy it. And I would have if I wasn’t magically blessed by the gaming gods already. You will enjoy the level design, guns, Nazi screams, boss battles and if you enjoy 2nd playthroughs there are tons of things hidden throughout the game. My score out of 10, 10 being the highest is……just forget numbers and PLAY IT!

Dual Review is a new feature here at BlueGamer.net. What Dual Review does is get you in on Adam’s take of a particular game, followed by Sean’s in-dept analysis. There’s something for everyone.

Adam:

I wrote my thoughts down recently about Sonic going from 2D to 3D, and how it worked – or didn’t. Very few games can transition into that realm. Mario did it only because it transitioned being revolutionary in 2D to 3D. Bionic Commando is a Nintendo game from the 80’s that I barely even remember playing (got my refresher course from Grin’s ‘Rearmed’, which totally rocked). The announcement of a 3D version from Grin just made me think ’shoot-em-up’. What else would they do? I figure I’d play it because I like the idea of grappling around and shooting. Grappling hooks rock. Right next to zombies and jet-packs.

Right away, Bionic Commando felt just like it should in 3D. You’re pretty much on a linear path you follow through in short sections with enemies in specific places. Incorporating the grapple and small health bar really gave the game a challenge reminiscent of those 8-bit and 16-bit games. You almost have to memorize sections so when you go back, you can dominate efficiently and feel rewarded for it. This is pretty much a description of the gameplay. But what do I think about it?

Well, it works. It’s also very refreshing. I don’t feel like I’m playing any ordinary 3rd person shooter here. There are a few weapons in the game with very limited ammo. The game makes you think about when you use what, and how. With the bionic arm, you have the option of hand-to-hand or throwing items at enemies – or enemies at enemies. There’s a wide variety of combat here which is each limited on when and how you can use it. This is what adds the simple depth that current games ignore. The swinging mechanic is very fun. As it’s difficult to master yet rewarding when pulled off. There are a few times though when frustration sets in. The game isn’t forgiving, so timing with the swinging has to be spot on. Trust me, you’ll say ‘fuck’ just like most of the characters in the game.

The story here is good, as is the dialog – even as cheesy as it is. I think they were trying to pull of the cheesiness found in the 80’s version, and, well, they nailed it. The story wasn’t shoved down your throat and you could simply ignore it if you wanted to. But I enjoyed what was there. The music in this game is great. Rocking when it needs to be, or dramatic when it’s called for. The sound effects themselves weren’t anything spectacular, but they did their job.

The graphics here are good. Early screenshots looked better, but as I’ve said before: consoles don’t have the resolutions found in screenshots. The character models and designs are good, as are the backgrounds; make sure to stop and look into the distance. But don’t train your eyes on explosions. They are the weak link to the visuals.

Multi-player. Unfortunately I have not touched online play on the retail copy. I did though play the online demo, which was an absolute blast. It’s nothing that will replace Battlefield or Call of Duty, but I guarentee I will purchase the game if I see it in the bargain bin. But, wait – does that mean the game is not worth it now?

Conclusion: Bionic Commando is worth playing right now. If you have the funds, you might as well buy. Replaying it for collectibles and achievements will only be fun. If funds aren’t free-flowing for you, rent it. And it just might be your kind of multiplayer.

Sean:

Bionic Commando is a very short game. It took me five hours to finish it on hard and it wasn’t hard. The graphics are good. Swinging around is fun and easy. My favorite move is swinging your arm around and killing everyone near you. I killed eight people while doing that, it was awesome. The best part of the game is:

Born in 1983, the biggest thing for me that I can remember was Ghostbusters. I remember renting the movie at a video store next to a 7-11 which no longer exists, and the stipulation was that if I was scared, I couldn’t watch it anymore. I’m not sure how old I was but I was young. It did scare me. I remember watching it and getting close to the library scene. At that point I go upstairs to my Mom’s office. She asks me if I’m up here because I’m scared. I told her no, that I just wanted to be up there with her. Lies.

Once the 90’s hit, Ghostbusters slowed down, but it always had a place in my heart. Back in 2006, developer Zootfly showed off an awesome video of their Ghostbusters prototype. That video started some major hype and before long, we hear Terminal Reality was to develop a Ghostbusters game. Before I move on to my next thought, Zootfly is using that prototype to create an original game titled TimeO.

I will start by saying while this game is fun, I’m not too sure if that has to do with the fact that I grew up with these guys; the game is pure fan-service. My brother, Sean, didn’t grow up with the Ghostbusters. After playing the demo he told me he found it ‘meh’. A lot of this has to do with the story and presentation. From the get-go, everything is familiar, including the soundtrack. It’s great to hear the Ghostbusters soundtrack in the menu and at any point in-game. Between missions you get to walk around the Ghostbusters facility and even examine Echo-1 in detail. You can even slide down the pole, which I recommend doing. As you go through the game you are constantly watching cutscenes that fill you in on the story, which is pretty good. The story doesn’t work as you would think, but it takes the first two movies and slaps them together as a sequel that you get to be a part of. So as a game, it works.

In regards to the cutscenes and environment, everything looks great. What are really impressive are the character models. Not only do they look spot-on, but the animations work great too. It’s almost as good as watching a CGI Ghostbusters movie. The environments look great as well; almost perfectly detailed to what you’ve seen in the movies.

As far as gameplay goes, it feels like a Gears of War rip-off. I don’t think it’s really a good thing, but it is the one thing that would hold this game back if it wasn’t Ghostbusters. When an enemy attacks, you have an option to dodge, which felt too clunky and I only used it 10% of the time. There’s also a run button that seems almost absolutely unnecessary. And too many times it feels like a shooter rather than a Ghost-catching sim. Because the parts with ghost that you actually have to trap is absolutely fun. You have to get the Ghost’s ‘health’ to a certain point in which you then capture them and force them into the trap you throw out. The whole thing is fun and done right. But as I said, anything outside of that is just kind of boring. The constant dialog and story helps it move along though.

I also have some other gripes with the gameplay, and this has to do with the revival system. If you get downed, your teammates have to revive you. But if they are also down, game over. And more times than not, you’ll be reviving the rest of the crew quite a bit. During the entire game, there were two parts that frustrated me to no end. One involved a huge boss running around everywhere. The two other ‘Busters with me were needing to be revived way too often; the fact being I need them in order to stay alive. I spent more time running around reviving them than actually fighting this boss. During that time we took turns being knocked down, and I had to repeat the section more times than I’d like.

The problem with that is it was too ‘random’. Either I’d get knocked on my ass right off the bat, or the enemy would avoid me. And reviving required a whole animation that set you up for failure as soon as you were no longer ‘invincible’. It was frustrating enough to point out, but luckily it kept me playing.

In the end, the game is fun for a person like me. If you never got into Ghostbusters, this may seem lacking to you. Because while the gameplay did seem pretty boring, it’s the game as a whole that kept me playing for six hours and eight minutes. Yeah, kind of short, but there are items you can go back and collect as well as all the achievements to earn.

Conclusion: It’s definitely worth a play for anyone that liked Ghostbusters. But if you were never a fan, it may be a bit boring.

My first thought was, ‘would this be dumbed-down for consoles?’. I still don’t know the answer, but even if it is, does it matter? Battlefield 1943 is the next iteration of the non-single player focused, point-capping, multiplayer frag-fest from Dice and EA. I personally got in on the franchise with 1942. And while I enjoyed it, I was never really a fan of the movement of controls. It might be just a personal preference, but it didn’t stop me. After that, I bought Vietnam, 2, 2142, and Modern Combat on 360. As the games released, they got better. The one element added in that made the games addicting were unlocks. I was more excited about getting an unlock than just kicking ass, which might not have been a good thing.

EA announced 1943 as an XBLA/PSN digital download. Seemed kind of odd, especially at $15. But does it hold up? I mean, only 24 players, 3 maps, consoles first, and $15? Well, let me get into that.

I don’t think this game is dumbed-down for consoles. I think it’s dumbed-down for fun. With less players on a map, the action isn’t as frantic. There are only three classes to choose from which makes it pretty simple, and there are no unlocks to be seen. The weapons and items stay the same throughout your career. You do get promoted through the ranks, but that’s it. Although, there is a form of unlocking. If the community gets a certain number of kills (I think about 40 million) a new map is unlocked for the community. But that’s it. Is there enough here to keep this game going? Well, that’s where the actual gameplay comes in.

This is your standard FPS. If you’ve played the other battlefield games, then you’ll get it. If not, I guarantee you’ve played Call of Duty, and it is very similar. To break it down even further, there are two sides, USMC and IJN, up to 24 players, and you run around and cap points which you spawn from. You can even use tanks, jeeps, airplanes, and boats. The game also uses a unique ammo system where all ammo is unlimited. After your cache of special weapon ammo runs out, a timer appears in which notifies you when the cache has been replenished. It makes sense and allows the players to focus on combat rather than worry about ammunition. I have no complaints with this. Once the ‘death bar’ at the top runs out, that team loses. People focus on flags, but it’s the kills that matter. Depending on the teams tactic, capturing points will only help or hurt you. Pretty simple, yet fun.

I enjoy the gameplay and the controls, yet the controls aren’t as tight as Call of Duty. Flying a plane can be a pain, and I’ll bet you change the controls around. The defaults make no sense. Whether it be lag or just programming, their are a bunch of issues that have popped up. For instance, I shoot my rocket at a tank and strafe away, yet the rocket doesn’t fire until a second after. I then miss. After being on a roll with kills, missing a tank shot will only piss you off. Also dealing with rockets, I once shot a jeep full of players that was sitting at a flag. The rocket hit, the jeep exploded, but all that did was alert the enemy of my location. I died. I call BS. On the turn around, I’ll be in a close range fire-fight kicking some ass, then the douche in-front of me goes Quake 3 style and whips out his rocket, killing me. Close range. Rocket. I die. He lives. Now, this happens in all FPS’s, but in 1943, it’s common. Squads also pose a problem. Sometimes I’ll stay in my squad, and sometimes we’ll be separated. It’s pretty sad, because if my brother is on the opposing team, I know I’m screwed. But all in all, I hope they continue to tweak the code here.

And that brings me to another point: What they will continue to do. For a $15 game, the content is great. So any additional DLC they may bring us screams premium. I don’t mind that too much, but I hope it doesn’t alienate players. I do feel that way with Halo 3 and CoD5. But what would the DLC be? If it’s paid-DLC, I would hope it isn’t more powerful weapons. I’m thinking game modes, classes, etc. But maps make the most sense. And maybe after this next map is unlocked, we’ll receive another after a few more million kills. My number one concern is they’ll need something to keep people playing. And that concern comes from what it will be.

Conclusion: Buy it. At $60, I’d say no. But even with its bugs, $15 is a steal.

A lucky few of you get to be a part of history. My first review. Isn’t that awesome? Well I bought Sonic Rush today for the DS, and I posted my thoughts in a very biblical form.I also bought an Intec case for the DS Lite. I got very anal with the older DS case and PSP sleeve I had. I wanted an effing safe to keep this thing from getting contaminated. I liked this one. You can fit a few games in there and possibly the charger…I didn’t check.

Circuit City is having a big sale for the 4th of July weekend. I’m hoping to get a copy of Metroid Pinball for $9. The sale has kind of started already, and my brother got the last copy of that game. Word is they pulled the games off the shelf…I hope it’s true…

-Adam

Introduction: Today I picked up Sonic Rush for the Nintendo DS. It’s the first and only Sonic game on the DS, following Sonic Advanced 1, 2 and 3. I was willing to pay full price for this, so it wasn’t a budget purchase. Here’s my little rundown on what I think.

Gameplay: Sonic Rush plays just like the original Genesis games. To keep it fresh, there’s a lot of style to it. Gameplay-wise, it stays fast-paced most of the time. Rush makes use of the Dual screens by using both for control of Sonic. You will stay on the top screen until an event forces you to the bottom, at which point the game focuses on the bottom screen allowing you to see what’s going on above you. Each screen moves up and down according to Sonics movement, but there is a threshold that separates the screens, allowing movement between the two. You will see unreachable things on both screens that will make you want to play the level again out of curiosity. This Sonic game, much like the others, include special bonus stages that will let you aquire a chaos emerald. These bonus stages are similar to the ones used in Sonic 2. They are the half-pipes that contain rings. Get the correct amount of rings and you get an emerald. What’s cool about this is that you use the stylus to move Sonic around; obtaining rings and avoiding spikes. This was done very well; I’ll have to give them props for that. The Boss battles add something neat which start at the end of each two act stage. These battles are in full 3-D, where Dr. Eggman moves around all he wants on the screen, moving Sonic in 3-D on a 2-D plane. While a neat little addition, it sometimes takes too long because you have to wait for each attack, just trying to survive. Similar to 8-bit and 16-bit era bosses.

Graphics: The stages are somewhat bland, but you are moving at such a high rate of speed that you don’t even notice it. Sonic is a full 3D polygonal character, making his animations fluid and varied. They did a good job with this. The enemies, though, seem to be hand drawn, and limited on animation…IMO, not as good as the earlier games. If anything, you will be pleased. There’s nothing here to really complain too much about.

Sound: The techno beats fit Sonic well, but I’m more of a fan of the punk sounding tunes. The special effects are all reminiscent of the older games, which gives the game that old-school Sonic feeling. All the characters have voices too. That was pretty unexpected and it adds to the atmosphere.

Final Thought: Good game if you’re a Sonic fan, and a good game if you’re a fan of platformers. I’ve only played through three worlds, but so far I don’t regret paying full price. A little on the difficult side…but I love it like that. You own a DS, you understand the games on the handheld. This is a game to own on it.

Verdict: Buy