The Significance of Sports Games

There are many types of games, and many types of gamers -- a fact of life that a fair share of the more "hardcore" veteran gaming audience may not be one-hundred percent willing to accept. Over the past few years, in what could be referred to as the Wii Expansion Era of the videogame industry, this simple truth has become more and more evident via a continuous influx of an increasing number of "casual" gaming hobbyists. But this isn't the first time the inhabitants of the gaming world have had to cope with mass immigration, so to speak. Sports gamers, too, were at one time the new kids on the block, but have since transitioned into a position of mainstream gaming acceptance. This maturation, then, begs the question, "what is the significance of sports games to the industry as a whole?"

While they have existed since the industry's infancy (more on that later), it wasn't until the mid-90s and the 16-bit era that sports games really began to flourish. This growth ushered in a brand new crowd of gamers who might have never picked up a controller before, expanding the gaming population much like the Wii has done in more recent years. One franchise in particular can be credited for more than a fair share of the genre's early success, and although it has existed since 1989, the Madden series took virtual football to the next level in 1993 by securing official NFL licenses, which in turn drew in a large number of existing NFL fans. Not coincidentally, 1993 was also the year that EA Sports was formed, and it is to this period that the roots of many existing sports franchises -- and sports gamers -- can be traced.

Since their introduction, sports games have always functioned as catalysts for the growth of the videogame industry. In fact, some of the very first games were designed to mimic real-life sports. Tennis for Two in 1958 and the notorious Pong in 1972 sparked the videogame boom, making the sports genre one of the oldest in gaming. Even if this genre wasn't immediately a mega-popular mainstay for enthusiasts, these pioneering titles laid the foundation for everything to follow. Nearly as relevant to the current state of gaming is how instrumental the sports genre has been in promoting multiplayer/competitive gaming. Sports games have always been about playing together with friends, either cooperatively or competitively, and it's no secret that as time goes on, a greater percentage of the gaming population and a greater percentage of games are either connecting online or locally. The standard, taken-for-granted, 4-controller-port design of modern consoles stems from the multitap, an 8-bit-era invention that increased the number of ports on home consoles to accommodate more players at one time. These devices were of course supported primarily by sports titles, which allowed many players to participate in games simultaneously. More recently, the Xbox LIVE and PlayStation Network phenomena have become so important to the modern social gaming climate that the absence of online components actually decreases a game's value in the eyes of many critics.

Speaking in simple dollars and cents -- no small matters in the high-risk, high-reward business that the modern videogame industry has become -- the sports genre is immensely important. Dorm-room managers and other sports game consumers make up a huge market sector, and pump money into the industry year-in and year-out. While the oft-criticized yearly updates to sports game franchises may only incrementally improve (or not) with each passing year, fans still gobble up these yearly editions by the millions in order to stay up to date with their sport(s) of choice. The major downside to this trend is that the "sequelitis" development strategy has been implemented in genres where the caliber of titles is more heavily affected by novelty and originality... or lack thereof. This practice has not only helped game companies to realize their goals of increased production and revenue, but has also unfortunately served to dilute the quality of games in those categories, as well.

Beyond the hard numbers, sports games also carry social significance in a number of ways. These games are educational tools for players seeking to learn the rules, strategies, and other intricacies of a given sport. Playing a sports videogame is essentially a form of practice on a virtual field. Players may not be training themselves physically, but their mental game can be sharpened as they continually run through each game's proceedings via what are, in part, interactive instructional guides. Similarly, virtual participation within videogames may be the only opportunity for some people to enjoy sports at all, on more than just a passive level. Physical impairment, age, time constraints, lack of athleticism, etc. are all obstacles that can be leveled on the virtual playing field, giving these individuals the chance to enjoy something that would otherwise be out of reach.

Finally, to complete the answer to our initial question, we must understand the importance of sports outside of gaming -- real-life sports. Since time immemorial, people have organized together and in opposition to compete in physical contests whose outcomes would inevitably distinguish clear winners and losers. War is the most obvious form of human conflict to arise under normal conditions, from the individual duel, to tribal skirmishes, to large-scale campaigns. Many early sports were created by adapting war training exercises, such as spear throwing, in order to hone the skills required for more deadly activities. This behavior was an adaptive survival strategy, and still remains a part of what it means to be human. So, as an extension of this inherent competitive human nature, sports, games, and the subsequent marriage of the two -- sports games -- are important outlets for our universal "survival of the fittest" instinct. Yes, sports games are theoretically good for us from an socio-evolutionary perspective.

Sports games, like "casual" titles, may not be first-round draft picks for the so-called "hardcore" gaming crowd, but that does not mean that they are simply unimportant augmentations to the industry's catalog of games. The sports genre has been economically, socially, and developmentally significant to the videogame industry throughout its history, and will continue to be well into the future.

Polished Familiarity -- Crimson Gem Saga Review

It can be a bit of a grind and won't wow players with its originality, but Crimson Gem Saga from IronNos and Atlus is a fine traditional RPG experience that's easy to play and features an excellent user interface and attractive presentation.

Unlike the majority of traditional RPGs, Crimson Gem Saga is only partly serious. It features witty dialogue, colorful characters, and jokes that poke fun at games, pop-culture, itself, etc. The game's plot (one involving the return of a world-threatening power from a forgotten empire via a number of magical artifacts) is fairly generic as a whole, but its constituent parts -- individual scenes, character interactions -- make it enjoyable.

Character voice-overs are well done, and convey feelings of both conflict and chemistry between characters, and the overall musical backdrop is varied, appropriate, and catchy, ranging from militaristic marches to more foreboding tunes. Attentive RPG fans will hear heavy influences from prior games in the genre, which can be either a good or a bad thing.

Crimson Gem Saga's visual stylings match the the game's lighthearted nature. Backgrounds look like a mix of pencil and watercolor, and do a very good job of describing space in the game world. In some areas, though, there is a fair amount of graphical repetition. Sprites are small, but are still detailed and well-animated. Better are the overlayed character portraits, whose heavy outlines and soft, refined look illustrate the characters perfectly. Unfortunately, there is only one piece of artwork per character, and none are animated.

This turn-based RPG is very simple in terms of gameplay. Players will talk to non-player characters and watch cutscenes to figure out what to do next. These objectives are given as quests, which are organized into a list that is more of a do-this-next reminder than a collection of options to choose from. After adding a new quest, it's then out into the field to battle enemies on the way to each successive destination. Battles are menu-driven, each character having the option to attack, defend, use items, use skills, and try to escape the fight on their individual turns. Although enemies are visible in the field, eliminating random encounters, they are still difficult to avoid, and the player is encouraged to engage each as quickly as possible to gain the upper hand in combat. Skipping battles would leave player characters ill-prepared for future challenges anyway, so free choice is really just an illusion in this regard.

Characters level up frequently, fully restoring hit points and magic points, and curing all status ailments with every level. This allows players to stay in the field longer without draining resources, but also acts as an excuse for players to endure some fairly heavy grinding. In addition to the automated improvement of character stats with each level, players are also rewarded with skill points after every battle. These are pooled for the party and then used to unlock new in- and out-of-battle abilities via individual characters' skill trees. This helps to balance the hands-off feeling of the more traditional leveling-system. The downside to the skill trees is that they force players to first spend points to reveal skills and then again to learn them. It can be quite annoying.

Otherwise, the game's user interface is clear and easy to use, from battle options, to shops, to equipment, to the main menu. Nearly everything loads at a decent rate, although there are a few disappointing disc-read stutters at seemingly unnecessary junctures, such as adding points to character skills.

Crimson Gem Saga is a solid RPG that will appeal to traditional JRPG fans with its clean look and smooth gameplay, even if the story is a bit generic and leveling can be a chore. Those looking for something that pushes boundaries won't find it here, but it's still worth a look.

A City Of Strong Foundations -- Assassin's Creed II Preview

Assassin's Creed was an excellent game, but it did have its problems... have its problems... have its problems... you get the idea. The lack of variety in the game's missions was the number one complaint from gamers and critics alike when it was released in late 2007. Ubisoft was on hand at E3 with a brand new in-game demo of the sequel, and I had a chance to sit down for a closer look at Altair's successor. From what I saw, Assassin's Creed II seems to fix everything that was wrong with the first game and make a more complete and enjoyable experience for gamers in 2009.

The game picks up right where AC left off. Desmond, a descendant of the Assassin clan, is being held against his will by a "doctor" who is trying to use a machine to access the memories of Desmond's ancestors that persist in his DNA via a machine called the animus. It's a little far-fetched, of course, but we suspend disbelief. This time, players dive into the life of Ezio, a Venetian who lived during the time of the Italian renaissance.

Little about the story was revealed, aside from the fact that Ezio is not a trained assassin from the beginning, but learns his "craft" as the game progresses. This will be a revenge story, to give it a more personal feeling, but revenge on whom and for what has not yet been divulged.

Both fans and critics of the first game will be glad to find that the developers have been paying close attention to criticism, and will be improving the sequel's mission structure. Assassin's Creed II will feature a number of new mission types, and many of them will span multiple locations -- from city to city and through the two distinct countryside areas. These areas will no longer act as hubs from which to access isolated cities where the action takes place exclusively, but will be a cohesive world with smaller sections housed within it.

Ezio will also have a number of new moves at his disposal, such as dual-bladed assassinations that take out two guards at once, leaping strikes from high above his targets, mid-climb attacks, and even the ability to drag guards into hiding places for the kill. He'll also have new toys to play with, like Leonardo Da Vinci's famous Flying Machine. Da Vinci himself lends the invention to Ezio, and he's not the only real-life personality to show up in the story.

With all this help for the player, the enemies in ACII needed a boost, too. In this game, guards will specialize in order to counter the assassin's skills. The three "archetype" enemies are the brute, who is adept at close-quarters combat, the agile, who can run Ezio down regardless of his monkey-like free-running and climbing, and the seeker, who can detect Ezio in the formerly impervious hiding spots that dot the cities.

Ubisoft Montreal has also improved upon the better aspects of the original game, and have once again produced a stunning visual feast, with sprawling cities, country vistas, and lifelike character models. They've also added over 30 new weapons to Ezio's arsenal, each with its own set of beautifully choreographed animations. These will mostly be acquired by stripping them from enemies and immediately putting them to use, after which Ezio can choose to drop them or take them along for the next fight. Additionally, tools like smoke bombs will help Ezio to make clean escapes, and can be purchased with the newly introduced monetary system.

Assassin's Creed II was one of the most impressive games on display at this year's E3, and I can't wait to get my hands on the final build. The game is scheduled to hit store shelves on November 17th of this year for the PC, PS3, and Xbox 360.

Skill Trees & Sniper Rifles -- Borderlands Preview

Creativity and innovation are growing themes in today's videogames industry. Gearbox Software and 2K Games' Borderlands is yet another genre-bending gaming experience that looks to offer plenty of both. Dubbed an RPS, or role-playing shooter, Borderlands draws just as much, if not more influence from massively multiplayer RPGs than from team-based shooters.

Players choose from four classes -- the tank, the hunter (a sniper class), the siren (a magical class), and the standard, well-rounded soldier -- before jumping into a large, open environment to accept, complete, and report on missions from various non-player characters throughout the game world. Operating alone or in a group of up to four cooperative players (split-screen, local area network, or online), players will gain experience points and level up, improving skills via a three-track tree that is different for each class.

The primary quest track will take roughly 20 hours to finish, while completionists will be able to spend over 100 hours completing side missions, fighting procedurally generated enemies, and collecting massive amounts of loot and weaponry. The game will also feature a dueling system and arena battles for more competitive players.

One of the most interesting aspects of Borderlands is the way it dynamically builds all of the players' enemies and each of the game's "millions" of guns out of the smaller parts that make them up. For example, a certain family of enemies may consist of many individuals, each modified with specific player-killing physical characteristics -- blades, guns, acid spit, flame breath, etc. -- as well as elite, supercharged versions know as "bad asses." Weaponry is composed in much the same way, out of the component parts of each gun. In this case, though, attributes such as firepower, accuracy, capacity, range, and others are also assigned at the time of weapon generation. For grenades alone, there are over 100 possible types. Because of the vast range of possible weapon configurations, a color-coded rarity system quickly alerts players to the relative value and efficiency of each one.

Also quite evident when first looking at Borderlands is its visual style, colorful animated art reminiscent of the comic-influenced XIII or the more recent Prince of Persia. Heavy, inked outlines and bright, caricatured models give the game a striking look, and the real-time day/night cycle displays the world in a wide range of light conditions during play.

Borderlands is scheduled for release this October on the PC, PS3, and Xbox 360.

If I Could Turn Back Time -- Singularity Preview

Singularity is an upcoming first-person shooter from Activision and Raven Software, featuring an original sci-fi storyline and interesting, atypical time-manipulating gameplay mechanics. From what I could see in the E3 demonstration, Singularity is somewhat reminiscent of another great fps, BioShock. That's never a bad thing.

Singularity centers around a small island off the Russian coastline called Katorga-12. During the Stalin era, this island was a place of arms experimentation and the site of a massive elemental catastrophe. It was quarantined for more than half a century, and forgotten. In 2010, however, the U.S. military has discovered the long-hidden island and has sent in a unit on a reconnaissance mission.

The player is a member of that unit, and must explore this temporally unstable place that hangs in constant flux between 1950 and 2010. What begins as a simple observation quickly turns into a quest to unshroud the island's history and an attempt to right the wrongs of the past.

Players will be able to toy with time in a number of ways. The time manipulation device, or TMD, is able to shift objects (even entire buildings!) and enemies back and forth between their conditions in 1950 and 2010, which is useful in puzzle-solving as well as combat (zapping a 1950s guard and watching him turn to bone looks very satisfying). Echo events set the mood and advance the plot by occasionally presenting the player with scenes from before the meltdown, played in constant loops via holographic imagery in the present day, and time waves periodically sweep the island, placing everything in an in-between existence called the null-zone. Elements from both time periods coexist and interact in this space, and upgrades to the TMD allow players to reach through from 2010 to grab null-zone objects.

Like BioShock, the game appears to focus heavily on storytelling, and puts players in a situation where they must uncover the secrets of a bygone era in a mysterious setting that doesn't obey the laws of reality as they know it. Combining first-person shooting with the almost magical TMD in the protagonist's off-hand will potentially provide a gameplay balance similar to those in games such as BioShock and Half-Life 2, and the various time mechanics promise a unique experience overall.

Singularity will arrive late in 2009 on the PC, PlayStation 3, and Xbox 360.

Center Of The Action -- Homefront Preview

Although they have pervaded the market, many gamers are no longer content with simple war shooters and mindless combat, but require unique gameplay mechanics and deep storytelling in their fps games. Homefront is an upcoming game from THQ and Kaos Studios that aims to cater to both of those needs.

Homefront boldly brings the fight home to American soil -- something videogame storytellers have tended to shy away from until now. Apocalypse Now and Red Dawn author John Milius is no stranger to this sort of theme, however, and is responsible for penning Homefront's script, as well. The game is set in a North Korean-occupied United States (or shambles of what once was) after a global energy crisis, 20 years in the future. The formal U.S. military has been effectively disabled, and citizens are either imprisoned, working for the enemy, or aiding in the resistance. That's where the player comes in.

The game's protagonist becomes the newest member of the resistance upon his arrival at one of the many safehouses that dot the U.S. countryside. These walled-off, self-sufficient communities are the last asylum for free Americans, and are the headquarters from which the resistance operates, although constant pressure from outside military forces keeps them constantly on the move.

In addition to the game's narrative, which clearly highlights a seasoned author's touch judging from the dialogue and scripting seen in the presentation at E3, a brand new and original game engine will help to set Homefront apart from other games in the genre. The appropriately named Drama Engine has been created to bring all of the action much closer to the player than in an average action title. The game limits its use of cutscenes, instead opting to use environmental narrative and scripted events to drive the story. Unlike most other games that use this strategy, however, Homefront will activate these events only once a player is focused in the proper direction, making sure as little as possible escapes their view eyes. In this way, the narrative can be both cinematic and dynamic with very little sacrifice on either end of the spectrum.

The gameplay demo at E3 was indeed very cinematic, and showed attendees a safehouse invasion where the player had to quickly take up arms with his fellow citizens and fight off the attack. One very special weapon that Homefront introduces is the Goliath tank, an unmanned, remote-controlled all-terrain vehicle with a deadly cannon. Players will be able to call upon this machine in the game and mark targets during firefights. The Goliath will then find the quickest way to obliterate said target. In the demo, these were mostly heavily armored trucks and military vehicles. It was like the fourth of July in a way.

Another unique feature of the Drama Engine is the way it "magnetizes" the protagonist, so that players always feel like they are at the center of the action, and keep a steady flow of adrenaline pumping. A good example of this in the E3 demo was when the Kaos representative shot and blew up a fast-moving truck, causing it to swerve and flip out of control. In this situation, the truck will always be drawn to the player, forcing him or her to quickly dodge out of the way; there is no set path.

The last thing mentioned at the show was that Homefront will feature a competitive multiplayer mode, with heavy vehicle use. Multiplayer details are very limited at this time, but when I asked about the way it will fit into the main storyline, the Kaos people said that there will be an interesting explanation for that, to be revealed at a later date.

Homefront is still a long way off, and will be released on the PC, PS3, and Xbox 360 sometime after 2009. As of right now, though, it looks to be coming along very nicely.

How's This For Modern Warfare? -- Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine Preview

At this year's E3, I had the opportunity to sit down with THQ and Relic Entertainment for a look at the newest application of their Warhammer license, Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine. Announced just five days prior to the event, Space Marine is a new, action-RPG take on the brand, and will appeal to Warhammer fans differently than the existing strategy titles from Relic. Members of the press were only treated to a short video and Q & A session about the game, but a fair amount of information was divulged at the show.

The game appears to play similarly to large-scale battlefield action games such as Dynasty Warriors or Spartan: Total Warrior, and will allow players to control a single marine in the midst of massive conflicts between rival armies, mowing through enemies in a festival of chainsaw blades and machine guns. Although the team emphasized that players will play as just one space marine, they are making their best efforts to remain true to the source material, where marines operate in groups of five or ten. Players will work in AI-controlled squads of those sizes, or join other players in the game's cooperative online multiplayer mode.

Through battle, which will include both melee and ranged combat, players will gain experience and level-up their characters over time. As in the tabletop games, this character development is a big focus in Space Marine, and players will have the opportunity to upgrade weaponry, armor, attributes, and abilities throughout the course of the game.

Relic is working closely with Games Workshop to develop the storyline in Space Marine, using the company's existing lore to create a narrative that is heavy enough to drive the experience, but light enough to keep players focused on the action taking place on the battlefield. The main idea here is that the Adeptus Astartes (Space Marines) are at war, defending humanity against the Orks and quite possibly other races in the Warhammer fiction, although Relic has only announced the inclusion of the two initial armies.

Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine is still "years away," but already looks very solid, as the action footage at E3 was running entirely on the in-game engine. More coverage as the game draws nearer to release.

Play A Story -- Heavy Rain: The Origami Killer Preview

Heavy Rain, from Indigo Prophecy (aka Fahrenheit) developer Quantic Dream, was one of the most unusual games on display at E3 2009 in Los Angeles, but is also one of the most interesting.

According to director David Cage, the main premise behind Heavy Rain is to "play a story," which is quite an apt description, considering the nature of the gameplay. Technically an adventure game, Heavy Rain is controlled entirely by moving the protagonist through 3D environments with the left analog stick, then pressing buttons, making motions with the right stick, or shaking the controller in order to perform character actions when faced with context-sensitive on-screen commands. The player never takes direct control outside of general movement, but participates in an interesting blend of quick time events and choose-your-own adventure menus.

Quantic Dream was showing off the first real gameplay segments from Heavy Rain at this year's E3, and I got the chance to observe a scene centering around the second of four main characters in the game (one more will be revealed at Games Con, and the last at the Tokyo Game Show), the insomniac Madison Paige. The team wanted to make the characters flawed in particular ways to bring a more human element to each of them. Madison's handicap effects gameplay by making her feel fatigued and less stable, and the only way for players to give her a good night's rest is by getting a motel room -- the only place she CAN sleep.

In the E3 2009 demo, Madison is out looking for a man named Paco in a nightclub. He happens to be the owner, she hears from the bartender, and is sitting in the back. She moves through the crowd, carefully avoiding bumping into other people (and walking with a sort of handicapped, sideways limbo posture), until reaching a bouncer to talk to with the X button. She can't get through to see the big shot, so players have to figure things out. By leaning on a nearby table, she watches as the chauvinistic club owner calls a girl dancing on a different table over to sit with him. This represents one way to gather information in Heavy Rain, given nothing to go on. Players can expect to observe and explore the world around them before making progress in the story.

Madison tries to dance on the table to catch Paco's eye, and the player must complete a QTE segment to do so successfully. Unfortunately, it doesn't work, and she must think of a new solution. When players are searching for ways to proceed, Heavy Rain will often allow them to dive into the protagonists' thoughts via a number of button prompts that float in the space around their heads. By using what is known about the situation, this process can reveal the logical next step. If the character is nervous, scared, or otherwise unstable at the moment, these prompts will be jittery, flashing, or even partially blurred out, making it more difficult for the player to act expediently when fast action may be necessary for the character's well-being.

In this case, the plan is to be a little bit sexier for the club boss, so into the bathroom Madison goes. Standing at the mirror, the player sees a few different options, and another example of Heavy Rain's gameplay. By pressing up on the analog stick, Madison might change her hair, while pressing left or right will make her unbutton her blouse or reach for some extra makeup in her purse. Pressing down will make her shorten her skirt with a few quick rips well above her knees. Each of these actions features another light gameplay element, such as slowly motioning in a semi-circle with the analog stick to apply heavier eyeliner or jerking the motion-sensitive PS3 controller sideways to tear away the fabric of the skirt.

Madison can then make a second attempt at table-dancing, and after another small Simon says session, Paco takes notice of her newly sluttified performance and calls her over. During the conversation, more on-screen prompts guide the conversation as the player sees fit, and up to a private room the two go, Madison with a purse-bound pistol, hoping to get the information she wants.

The demo continued to the end of the scene, but I will stop there to avoid spoiling too much, as the game's appeal is primarily the unraveling of its multi-faceted storyline, with variants of the above-mentioned gameplay governing its direction. Mr. Cage explained to the crowd that many of the game's 60 scenes, which come to about ten hours of gameplay, are optional, and dependent on player choices and even whether or not a particular character even lives to see each portion of the game. In this way, no two play-throughs will be identical, and the game will continue to deliver fresh content to the player the second and third time around.

Heavy Rain looks very promising, and will help to expand the definition of videogames in a way that is very much unlike the growing casual shift and Nintendo vision. PlayStation 3 owners can look forward to seeing Heavy Rain in Q4 2009.

Black & White & Red All Over -- The Saboteur Preview

"This is our most epic game yet," said chief production manager Greg Borrund about Pandemic Studios' stealth-action sandbox title, The Saboteur. After watching the game in action, I can say that "epic" looks great.

The Saboteur takes a brand new approach to depicting the World War II era in videogames; no longer will players be shooting on the front lines or manning bombers, but instead will be exploring the open-world setting of Nazi-occupied France, defying the Germans and bringing the "will to fight" back to the citizens of Paris and surrounding area.

Through the use of color, The Saboteur represents the relative strength of German influence and occupation in the many neighborhoods of the city, as well as the general sentiment of the French people regarding the fight to repel the Nazi takeover. Areas with little will to fight are desaturated, save for the occasional Nazi flag, environmental objective, or splatter of blood. As the situation improves via the player's actions, color will return and hopelessness will abate.

While it maintains a fully open-world feel with the option to explore the city and complete "ambient" side missions to improve the state of the nation, the game is at the same time story-driven, with a 15-hour main campaign. The primary objective is to carry out "acts of defiance," which normally entail locating, accessing, and destroying key components (weapons, buildings, etc.) of the German occupation. Each neighborhood will house one major target for story missions and a number of smaller ones that can be dealt with at the player's leisure.

The game's protagonist, Shawn, can traverse the city in a number of ways. Like in Assassin's Creed, he is able to scale any surface or structure that offers proper hand and foot holds, the only concern being where to go, and not how to make it there. Shawn can also hijack a car and take a joyride to wherever he needs to be, or simply walk the city streets, which will approximate Paris's true layout. Because remaining inconspicuous in the more heavily big-brothered areas is pivotal, however, players will have to be more careful when hoofing it to avoid detection.

Once in the nest of the enemy, performing stealth kills will allow Shawn to move closer to his objectives. After incapacitating a guard, he can assume his victim's identity by stealing the clothing off his back and proceeding cautiously forward. Getting too close to other enemies or acting suspiciously will expose him, as will finally completing the task, at which point he will have to "loud out" -- aka run and gun out of there.

Safehouses dot the city, and as long as the player can reach one undetected, Shawn will be safe from his pursuers, and can resume his anti-Nazi activities in peace. Alternatively, the ex- race car river can hop in a car and drive out into the countryside and coastal region to lose the tail. The expansive game world includes parts of Germany, as well, but driving in that direction to find shelter would probably be counter-productive.

The Saboteur promises a refreshing look at the seemingly unavoidable World War II subject matter, and will present players with great freedom to explore the game's open world and experience the story as they please. The highly stylized visual style and "will to fight" premise is very appealing, as well, giving The Saboteur a truly unique identity in the deluge of upcoming titles. Players can look for The Saboteur in Q4 2009.

S.M.A.R.T. Shooter -- Brink Preview

Who'd be interested in a squad-based first-person shooter from the developers of Quake Wars that borrows and streamlines concepts from Mirror's Edge, blurs the lines between single-player, co-op, and multiplayer, and dynamically updates objectives for you and your party based on your team's makeup and current situation in every mission? After Splash Damage's presentation of Brink, published by Bethesda Softworks, I would.

Brink takes place in the year 2035 on The Ark, a massive floating city on an Earth that has been flooded by arctic melting and plagued by civil war. The island itself looks as one might expect from a makeshift continent, patched together like a giant salvage yard or flotsam erector set, and is a very interesting overall environment to explore.

The game operates around a few core concepts, the first of which is unifying players' online and offline experiences. Whether playing solo, cooperatively, or in competitive multiplayer, successfully completing objectives and killing enemies earns XP that can be used to develop a player's created character. Points are used to learn new skills, purchase and upgrade weapons, and unlock non-gameplay items such as outfits, accessories, tattoos, and other character customizations.

Brink's second major defining characteristic is that mission objectives change dynamically based on a player's class and location, the current makeup and actions of the entire squad, and the general situation on the battlefield. Players have the option at the game session's onset to select from classes such as soldier or engineer, among others, each of which has a unique set of skills, a handful of pre-defined weapon load-outs, and its own special and important function in the mission. No player is limited to a single class. In fact, objectives may ask characters to change class at "command posts" scattered across the map in order to accomplish certain goals during play. In this way, the flow of the game is constantly changing.

Kinesthetic flow is the final concept that shapes Brink's gameplay. Dubbed smooth movement across random terrain, or S.M.A.R.T., players will be able to navigate their surroundings with nearly the same agility and grace of Mirror's Edge's parkour-practitioner, Faith, but with much less complex controller manipulation. By simply holding a button and focusing in the general direction they want to go, players will quickly jump, slide, vault, mantle, etc. over, under, around, or through environmental obstacles. Unlike Mirror's Edge, however, Brink doesn't neglect shooting mechanics in favor of platforming, and the experience seems to be completely cohesive despite the variety of gameplay options.

Splash Damage and Bethesda really look to be onto something with Brink, and in spring 2010, PC, PS3, and Xbox 360 owners will find out for sure.

Into The Octagon -- UFC 2009: Undisputed Review

To represent the complexities of mixed martial arts in videogame format is no easy task, and successful translations of realistic fighting have mostly evaded developers, despite their best efforts. With UFC 2009: Undisputed, however, developer Yuke's has leapt into the Octagon with care, resolve, and attention to detail, and has come away with a winner.

The game is very thorough. Yuke's has put together a complex and comprehensive fighting system featuring multiple ranges of combat for striking, clinching, and grappling, both standing and on the mat. Players use the face buttons for simple strikes, modifying their attacks with the left analog stick, left trigger, and left bumper for strong, low, and technical blows, respectively. Combos are possible, though players will find the pace of matches to be much more deliberate and not as smooth-flowing as arcade fighters such as Street Fighter or Virtua Fighter. UFC 09 feels more like a boxing sim than anything else.

Unlike a boxing game, however, combatants in UFC 09 each fight using two separate disciplines -- one for striking and one for grappling. Grappling is controlled almost entirely with the right analog stick; players move the stick in specific patterns in order to clinch, throw, shoot for takedowns, and change positions during grapples, as well as to defend against these techniques. Fights are over when a fighter is knocked out, submits, or is rocked to the point of defenselessness and is pummeled by his opponent. The game's tutorial is indispensable for getting one's bearings as a novice, especially for the less familiar mat grappling part of competition.

The combinations of martial arts skills vary by fighter. While this variety is a welcome feature, future games would benefit from expanding beyond the current set of six styles. In UFC 09, only boxing, kickboxing, and muay thai are available for striking, and wrestling, judo, and Brazilian jiu-jistu are available for grappling. I would have liked to have access to more options, particularly in the career and create-a-fighter modes.

Career mode is the bread and butter of UFC 09, where players create a fighter and work their way up the ranks toward championship and eventual retirement. Fighters train, spar, and sign up for fights on their personal calendar, and then earn "cred," sponsorships, equipment, trophies, and new trainers for their performance. They can also participate in photo shoots and attend special events between fights and training. Progressing through a fighter's career, winning fights, and improving skills and attributes ends up having a "just one more round" effect on players, making it difficult to stop at will. In this case, that's a good thing.

Players can create fighters either as part of a career or for use in exhibition and online matches. Physical features, fighting styles, and biographical information -- the usual -- are included, but there isn't a particularly astounding wealth of options here. Additionally, the process is very slow, as is the entire UFC 09 menu system, with much saving and loading eating away at potential time in the ring.

To make the process slightly more bearable, audio clips from past UFC events are played during menu navigation. These keep the UFC mood intact, but after hearing the same clips repeatedly, they do begin to lose their appeal. Worse than that, though, are the commentators, who constantly repeat phrases during matches. And rounding out the general audio theme is a high-energy, licensed rock soundtrack, which again fits the UFC perfectly, but also consists of very few songs.

The game features a "classic fights" mode, where players can attempt to recreate historic UFC matches by winning under specific condition. Each match is prefaced by an introduction and promotional montage (which really just made me want to watch the real thing instead of playing), and followed (if conditions are met) by a highlight reel of the fight in question. For UFC fans, classic fights mode is sure to be an immensely enjoyable part of Undisputed.

For the less devout, exhibition and Xbox Live matches are a quick way to jump into the action, barring the fact that Live forces players to watch the long but well-orchestrated fighter introductions by UFC announcer Bruce Buffer. In these modes, one simply selects a weight class and combatant and jumps in the ring.

UFC 2009: Undisputed certainly has flaws -- painstaking menu navigation, limited fighting disciplines, and audio woes top the list -- but overall it is a fine fighting game that has carved out its own place in the genre with a mixed martial arts control system that is almost as well-rounded as the modern day warriors it emulates. For UFC fans, this is a must-buy, and for everyone else, it's definitely recommended.

Back In MY Day... -- The Dark Spire Review

When a reviewer's best (and only) analogies for a game come from 1980s classics, one can be certain that the title is decidedly niche. Such is the case with The Dark Spire, a dungeon-crawling first-person role-playing game from Atlus and Success, which frustrates, delights, and disappoints all at the same time.

The Dark Spire is most similar to early Wizardry titles, and makes no effort to try to be anything more, adhering more closely to genre conventions than anything gamers have seen in years. Still, the game manages to fall short of the classics in some ways, while surpassing them in others.

Players begin by custom-tailoring a party of four adventurers, rolling base stats with a slot-machine style number generator, and choosing spells (if applicable) from a short list. After receiving beginners' equipment and playing through a brief training session as an introduction to the menu-driven gameplay and unforgiving turn-based combat, the party is thrust into the titular Dark Spire, and for the most part, to their doom.

Many gamers will loathe this game; in order to play and enjoy The Dark Spire, one must possess incredible patience, unwavering resolve, and an understanding that the greater journey is comprised of many smaller steps. Anyone expecting to blow through each floor of the tower at attention-deficit speeds will find the game's pace to be laboriously slow, while those who appreciate the methodical exploration of dark, disorienting rooms and corridors will revel in the challenge. It is an exercise in trial and error much of the time; many dead ends make for a fair amount of backtracking, and the frequently encountered and very dangerous enemies will kill off party members left and right.

Better than many horror games, the Dark Spire instills real fear in the gamer -- fear that the party's next step may be their last. This fear is partially allayed by the game's save-anywhere system, a necessity for any handheld rpg. However, players relying too heavily on this feature and not enough on careful preparation may end up sapping the life out of the experience.

Beyond it's very daunting barrier to entry, The Dark Spire is indeed an engrossing and rewarding videogame. Amid the high-contrast ink style of the tower's stark halls, the mobs of graphic-novel-rendered enemies, and the synthesized, polyphonic acoustic atmosphere, players will find well-written, detailed descriptions of certain aspects of their surroundings, secondary characters, puzzles, and other objects scattered sparingly throughout. The game, though encased in a claustrophobic shell, reveals itself as an open environment to explore and discover. Without excessive guidance, the player's own adventurousness becomes the way forward.

For all it achieves, however, The Dark Spire leaves much to be desired. Party options are severely limited, offering the initial choice of only four races and four classes -- numbers that were eclipsed in this genre more than two decades ago. There are many skills available to each character, each of which finds some obscure and clever use later on, but including only four starting classes is underwhelming. The weapon system is difficult to wrap one's head around, as the game is never clear what distinguishes one from another in terms of damage, though this could also be considered part of the game's "work-for-it" appeal. More frustrating, however, are the delayed text response when activating or examining objects, and the menu setup, where players are asked to dance a ballet of d-pad and shoulder buttons in order to equip their party, cast spells, use items, etc.

The Dark Spire is an undoubtedly niche, uncompromising title that will earn the ire of the many players who aren't interested in the classic gameplay found within, but put smiles on the faces of those who are. With a fitting audio/visual presentation, intense challenge, and do-it-yourself design, this is a throwback to a bygone era, and a good one, at that.

Where's The Rest? -- Company of Heroes: Tales of Valor

GamerNode - The Company of Heroes franchise is not the typical real-time strategy experience that many gamers are familiar with. Relic's latest standalone expansion, Tales of Valor, takes the gameplay standard set forth in the first two entries in the series and runs with it, though not exactly in the same direction as the originals, but still a unique one.

Tales of Valor adds three new single-player campaigns and three new multiplayer modes, along with new unit types and maps to do battle on. As expected, the content is all of standard CoH caliber, but compared to the two additional armies (each with full campaigns of their own) that the Opposing Fronts expansion introduced, ToV feels quite small, especially as a standalone product.

For those unfamiliar with the Company of Heroes style of RTS gameplay, a primer: Company of Heroes differs from the by-the-numbers RTS formula primarily in the way players acquire the resources necessary to fuel their war machine. Rather than setting up and relying on continuous, semi-passive background harvesting and generation, players must actively capture supply points scattered throughout the map to boost the three resources -- manpower, munitions, and fuel -- that are required for building new structures and producing additional units. This system makes players have to work to improve their army alongside their combat efforts, and feels like a more realistic match for the game's setting than in many other RTS games.

As a result of the less exploitable resource system, unit production is also toned down a bit; players won't be leading thousands of units across the battlefield in a tsunami of camouflage, but will have to be a bit more selective and strategic in their efforts to put together an effective force. HQs, barracks, motor pools, and other analogs to what one would expect to find in an RTS exist in CoH, but the speed at which the gears of war turn is less rapid than some may be used to.

Unlike earlier CoH games and multiplayer, however, the new single-player missions in Tales of Valor do not ask much of the player in terms of base-building and unit management at all, save for the final campaign, which only lightly dabbles in the more traditional type of RTS gameplay. The expansion instead chooses to focus on the exploits of small groups of units through the heavily -- and impressively -- narrated campaigns, mostly without the luxury of any sort of home base to fall back on. Players are given more direct and fine-tuned control over a wealth of specific squad actions, including the new, aptly-named direct fire ability, which is available for some unit types.

ToV's stories of a German Tiger tank's efforts to stop the British advance on a French village, the U.S. paratroopers' D-day attempt to take a German-controlled causeway, and the German defense of the Falaise Pocket are all woven seamlessly into the action via voice-overed radio communications, scripted battle sequences, and finely hand-painted cutscenes, which makes for a very intense experience that drives home the unpredictable and mostly uncontrollable nature of the war from the soldiers' perspectives. The game can, however, be a jarring departure from what fans of the series have grown accustomed to, as it takes on more of an action flavor than previous titles. And though they are quite engaging, players will find that the nine new missions are over very quickly, leaving multiplayer matches as the only remaining option for novel engagements.

Multiplayer, too, takes a detour from the norm in Tales of Valor. Like the first of the new single-player campaigns, Operation Panzerkrieg puts players in control of a single tank, but this time in a victory point match (capture and hold strategic points across the map) against other players. This may seem very bland, but with the variety of tanks and commander skills available, things still remain interesting.

Operation Assault, while the least involved, is arguably the most enjoyable of the new modes. It casts up to six players as individual hero units on either side of a large-scale battle over open ground, the goal being to have enough influence over the deeply entrenched AI forces to sway the outcome of the war. As a sniper, commando, medic, engineer, etc., players can affect the proceedings of the engagement in a variety of ways, leveling up abilities as they successfully defeat enemies and complete objectives. After falling at the hands of the enemy, players respawn as a new hero of any desired type. It's like a fast-paced RTS version of the Battlefield series, except that the majority of the soldiers involved are relatively weak and expendable, and the player characters are undeniably badass.

Lastly, Operation Stonewall is basically a co-op skirmish match against the CPU, in which players must work together to build their forces and manage resources as they defend a small town from the attacking German soldiers. Although these new operations offer a good change of pace from CoH's existing multiplayer, they suffer from the fact that each is limited to only one map, so get used to them.

Tales of Valor may not be what longtime Company of Heroes fans were expecting from Relic's expansion, but the game still delivers a great experience from start to finish. The problem with that, though, is that "start to finish" is not a very long time, because ToV is comparatively light on content, overall. It's a great game, but at $30, gamers should expect more.

The Ship Is Thy Shepard -- Flock! Review

GamerNode - Flock! is an interesting and novel puzzle game from Capcom and Proper Games, in which players must use a small flying saucer to herd a variety of farm animals across vibrant, elaborate, and hazard-ridden landscapes toward the Mother Flocker mothership to be abducted for who knows what otherworldly reasons... and points.

These hapless creatures flee from the Flocker's ever-shining cone of light, no matter what pits, predators, or other obstacles may be waiting in the opposite direction. The key to meeting the abductee quota in each of Flock!'s 50+ levels is to carefully avoid these things. This won't be easy, however, as the animals aren't exactly organized, and often end up either scattering wildly or getting stuck on whatever it is that the player is trying to avoid. At times, the critters' degree of responsiveness feels almost equivalent to the marbles in those old, tilt-controlled wooden labyrinths.

In addition to simply chasing the animals around, the Flocker can make use of tractor and depressor beams to alter terrain and manipulate environmental objects. For example, a player may need to pick up a gate and use it to bridge a small gap, send a boulder rolling down a hill to break through a fence, or stuff a bale of hay into a pit to create a path for the animals. Each of the four species behaves in different ways and have different abilities. Cows stampede through fences, chickens fly across gaps, pigs absorb mud, and sheep shrink when wet (wool, get it?). These traits are all useful in their own ways, and must eventually be used together to successfully complete certain levels.

Sometimes the power of love needs to be called upon, as well, making male animal follow females single-file, or bringing a couple together in order to... increase the population. Unfortunately, after extended Flock! sessions, the game begins to feel just a bit empty and slow; despite the differences between the animals and the suite of environmental hazards, a sizable portion of the game feels repetitive and borderline chore-like, and the introduction of new gameplay elements occurs at intervals that are too wide. Perhaps as an XBLA/PSN title, this issue is a lesser concern than in a full retail game (although the caliber of many downloadble titles is fast approaching and even exceeding that of their retail counterparts), but the sort of bite-sized gameplay that players will inevitably partake in with Flock! seems to lend itself far better to a handheld gaming system than to a home console at all.

The monotonous nature of Flock!'s levels is theoretically curtailed by the inclusion of a level editor and the ability to share creations with other players via XBL. Thus far, the pool is fairly shallow there, so the creativity of the Flocking masses has yet to shine through, but the editor itself is very user-friendly and makes it easy to put together nice creations. Players only have access to the items that they've unlocked in the single-player campaign, though, so any budding designers will have to play through that first.

An alternative to the single-player mode is a cooperative multiplayer romp that makes the game more interesting and fun, thanks to that extra human touch. Players can split duties, get in each others' way, or simply go mess around with helpless [animated, PETA-don't-sue-me] creatures and boulder physics.

Much of the fun of Flock! comes from the obviously humorous and playful nature of the game's overall concept and its animal stars... not to mention the animations that accompany their untimely demise at the hands of killer moles, fish, shadow-lurking monsters, and the player's own Flocker beams. The audio/visual presentation as a whole is very appealing; the patchwork landscape, plush toy modeling, and hand-drawn GUI art are all just as quirky as the sci-fi/bluegrass soundtrack, and silly animal sound effects. The only complaint in this department is that players will be listening to the same tunes over and over again, as there are very few songs to accompany the action.

This Lemmings-inspired puzzler is unique and charming, and can be very fun for a short while. As an XBLA title, it is solid, but its lack of depth and gameplay variety prevents it from becoming a heavy hitter. The game needs more, just not more of the same old stuff.

Failing Grade -- Mana Khemia: Student Alliance Review

GamerNode - Mana Khemia: Student Alliance is a game that should have never been. The original Mana Khemia: Alchemists of Al-Revis, developed by Gust, was mediocre to begin with, and the PSP version only serves to degrade what was already a less-than-enrapturing gameplay experience in a nearly direct port that suffers from a myriad of technical issues.

Mana Khemia is an RPG set during the course of an academic year at the Al-Revis Alchemy Academy and both alchemy and school play major roles throughout the game, incorporated into just about every aspect of the player's adventure. The main character, Vayne, finds himself in a very Harry Potter-esque situation, orphaned and sent to this school full of colorful anime characters to find the answers to the many questions surrounding his past.

Student Alliance plays out almost identically to the original PS2 game, aside from a few new characters and craftable items. Players watch story segments to introduce each week of class, attend classes, and complete outside assignments with the help of the group of friends who make up the party. There are also periods of free time that allow players to complete side jobs, synthesize items, and venture off campus to find ingredients and unleash their frustrations on enemies.

And yes, there will be much frustration while playing Student Alliance. Due to a horribly inconsistent frame rate that manages to drop into slide show territory on many occasions, along with more loading than a professional moving company, it is difficult to derive any pleasure from the portions of the game that were actually enjoyable to begin with. Pauses for disc or memory card access accompany almost every action, from cutscene transitions, to enemy encounters, to NPC interaction, to menu selection. It is by no means the definition of fun.

The already adventure-limiting school setting and complex, tedious crafting system become less bearable due to the game's technical issues, and even the once-commendable battle system, which employs pre-encounter on-screen enemy representation, an interesting tag-team "support" system, and a novel "burst" system, is rendered sluggish and inadequate. The hand-drawn art and battle sprites are still nice, but background visuals are a blurry mess. The game's voice acting ranges somewhere between poor and mediocre, and the music is generic and repetitive.

Mana Khemia was a niche title to begin with, dividing players into love-it and hate-it audiences. Mana Khemia: Student Alliance is that same niche title... in a wheelchair... in the mud... with no arms. I would recommend that gamers avoid this one; if school-focused role-playing and item synthesis are exciting to you, please opt for the PlayStation 2 version.

I Want To Be Alone -- Resident Evil 5 Review

GamerNode - Resident Evil 5 has some unquestionably ENORMOUS shoes to fill. Following Resident Evil 4, a game that redefined the Resident Evil series and was widely touted as one of the greatest achievements in game development for its time (still the 12th best game of all time on GameRankings), expectations have been almost unfairly high for the 5th...er...15th entry into the franchise. To say that the game has not lived up to the legacy of its forebears, then, is not so much a letdown as it is an inevitability... and a statement of the simple, nigh unavoidable truth. Regardless of these unattainable expectations, however, RE5 is still a fine gaming experience.

Resident Evil 5 expands upon the more action-oriented and less creep-around-corners gameplay style of RE4, casting players as veteran Chris Redfield, star of RE1, and newcomer Sheva Alomar in a cooperative adventure into the heart of Africa, where they will uncover the origins of the Umbrella Corporation's evil, zombie-producing experiments and plans for world domination. The storyline isn't likely to win any awards for creativity, but Resident Evil fans will enjoy the many references to prior RE games, as well as the inclusion of some very well-known characters.

New to the Resident Evil universe is Sheva, Chris' ever-present partner throughout the game's biologically altered festivities. A second player can take control of Sheva at any time, making RE5 the first non-spinoff title in the series that can be played cooperatively from start to finish, online or locally. It's exactly what fans have been waiting for, and is an immensely enjoyable way to experience the game. Carefully coordinated teamwork, good communication, and trust in one's partner are all vital parts of success during much of the mission, with key moments requiring players to perform special "partner moves" and to take on different roles in order to survive.

Unfortunately, this also means that the solo RE5 player will be plagued by an obviously-less-than-human, AI-controlled, hip-swaying sidekick who all too frequently does her best to ruin the gameplay experience. From charging into the open during a careful sniping session and alerting everyone of the team's presence, to knocking enemies out of the player's sights at the worst possible moments, to picking up all of wrong items, her presence is less a help than a hindrance, and I personally would have preferred to have just left her in the car. What I did instead was strip her of all her weapons and load her up with as many first aid items as possible, thus keeping her out of my way but still putting her to good use. A simpler solution to her frustrating default behavior would have been to set "attack reaction" to "yes," an option that nicely regulates the willful lady's actions.

Enemy AI, and the enemies in general, leave something to be desired, as well. Somehow, the cognizant, semi-intelligent, communicative, and therefore frightening Ganados of RE4 have been replaced by similar, yet far less clever and resourceful waves of a different group of indigenous people, the Majini. The trademark vocalizations of the previous game's enemies have been minimized in RE5, and players will be hard-pressed to see anything more than drone-like advancement on Chris and Sheva in melee combat situations, although gun-toting enemies become more plentiful and strategic as the game progresses. There is a fairly diverse selection of baddies in RE5, ranging from the simple parasite victims wielding a variety of weapons, to mutated bio experiments gone wrong, to outright monsters, although the breadth of this cast doesn't match that of RE4. Especially disappointing are the boss characters, who show a lesser degree of creativity in their design, their characterization, and the way in which players eliminate them (expect far fewer context-sensitive button prompts this time around).

It's hard to critique the game's enemies without simultaneously examining the environments and situations in which players encounter them. While beautifully rendered in some of the most refined visuals on modern consoles, with incredibly detailed textures and realistic dynamic lighting, the game's environmental design is not typically conducive to interesting or unusual enemy confrontations. Many of these places, although visually quite dissimilar, feel very much the same as one another due to the way they are laid out and the way the action unfolds within them. Gamers won't find themselves on the edge of their seats and hanging in suspense in these mildly horrifying locales, despite the moody, orchestrated score providing all the proper ambiance. This is as much (maybe more so) a repercussion of gameplay mechanics as it is of level design.

The game's controls have been improved this time around, featuring four different setups, including a modified version of the more popular dual-stick controls (with strafing, yay!) found in many modern third-person shooters, but the further the franchise slips from its survival horror roots into action territory, the more dated and awkward they feel. A new cover system to help combat the more gun-loving enemies of the later stages works very well, aside from the fact that players cannot move laterally behind their cover of choice, but can only pop out and back from a single position at a time. Still, a cover system in a Resident Evil game at all feels slightly out of place, and along with the game's more hard-driven pacing, is more evidence that this is no longer a "survival horror" franchise.

The inventory system, too, has been updated, allowing each player to carry a maximum of nine weapons or items at a time. Ammo, grenades, and mines take up slots, but are stackable. Chris and Sheva can swap items, so long as they are within arm's reach of one another, but taking a cue from EA's Dead Space, inventory management happens in real time, meaning the action doesn't stop while players trade guns or combine herbs. Of course this change warrants a fast weapon-swapping function, and answering the cries of RE fans, the inventory slots corresponding to the four cardinal directions are now instantly accessible via the d-pad. This is absolutely invaluable when a freshly emptied gun goes *click* in the middle of a firefight, and is a welcome addition to the RE series.

All of these updated and improved controls make fighting non-zombies a smoother experience, especially in the returning Mercenaries minigame, a timed game of survival, set in a number of the game's locations. Mercenaries is playable alone, with a partner, offline, or online, and is an even more action-packed version of the oppressive situations found in the main storyline. Blasting as many enemies as possible nets the team points, and a final ranking at the end of the round. These points can later be used to purchase cool bonuses like new costumes, screen filters, enemy figurines, and unlimited ammo for particular weapons. As in the past, Capcom has given players plenty of reason to keep playing, well after the credits roll. That's good news, because the main game's brevity is a contributing factor to many of the enemy- and environment-based complaints noted above.

Resident Evil 5's biggest flaw is that it immediately succeeds the most historic entry in the series, and although it does a lot to innovate and deliver a great gameplay experience, it doesn't do enough to match the ground-breaking performance of its predecessor. To make an analogy of it, RE5 is to RE4 what Majora's Mask is to Ocarina of Time. Resident Evil 5 does have other flaws, namely some questionable partner and enemy AI, lack of a diverse stable of bosses, and further abandonment of the tempered survival horror gameplay that the franchise was founded upon, but it still remains a shotgun-blasting good time.

Monochrome Emotion -- Inkheart Review

GamerNode - Books and movies don't often translate into magnificent videogames, and Inkheart is no exception. This DS adventure will not be winning any GN Nodie Awards this year, yet still maintains a few redeeming qualities and will appeal to less experienced gamers.

Inkheart is based on the film of the same name, which in turn is based on the best-selling novel by Cornelia Funke. The plot remains relatively true to the other media, although additions and omissions have been made to create a more viable videogame experience. The story revolves around Mo, a book restoration expert with the unique and magical ability to read books into reality, his daughter Meggie, and a few unlikely companions, all of whom are working together to stop some of Mo's most sinister past animations from wreaking even more evil upon the world.

Besides saving the world, the father-daughter tag team aims to rescue Meggie's mother, an early victim of Mo's supernatural gift. Whenever "Silvertongue" (Mo's nickname among fictional characters) reads someone from a book's pages into reality, someone from the real world has to take their place, becoming a permanent resident in what amounts to an alternate dimension. Nobody really wins.

Playing Inkheart is much like reading a choose-your-own-adventure book; the DS is held sideways, there is plenty of reading, and options are fairly limited. Each solution is generally not very difficult to figure out, because players are limited to only a few areas at a time and can only interact with a handful of objects in each location. Even so, the game doesn't feel so easy that it is insulting, just that players are simply going through the motions to reach the next area. The minigames that are sprinkled throughout the game, such as guiding a marten (weasel) over a maze of planks or following a looped and zig-zagged line with the stylus as it scrolls across the screen, break things up a bit, but seem slightly out of place and feel tacked on.

The relative ease of Inkheart is most likely in order to cater to the film's youthful audience, but certain features, such as the stars that indicate which parts of the environment are interactive, also work to remedy other issues from which the game suffers. In the case of the stars, which only appear if the A button is pressed, the problem is the game's visual uniformity, where no objects stand out from the background wash of dull-colored pixels. While this feature does help improve the game's pacing, it also removes much of the sense of exploration that adventure gamers seek. And the graphics are still not very good -- especially the mechanically animated and poorly detailed character models.

The game's audio, on the other hand, is both appealing and varied, making it better to listen to than to look at. There are many different compositions included in Inkheart, and they set the mood well, without becoming tortuously repetitive, as in some other DS adventures. Sound effects, on the other hand, are simplistic and generic, but they'll likely go unnoticed, or will at least be forgotten by the time the DS powers down.

Inkheart is not for the seasoned adventure veteran by any stretch of the imagination, but is instead intended for the same audience that rushed moms and dads to the theater to see the movie. Truly engaging puzzle-solving and high quality presentation are absent from the game, but its accessible control style and somewhat interesting plot make it at least playable.