Home Blog Page 5885

Karaoke Revolution Glee: Volume 3 Review

Jessica Barabas-Bui
-
0
Karaoke Revolution Glee: Volume 3 Review


Karaoke Revolution GLEE: Volume 3
Developer: Hijinx Studios
Publisher: Konami Digital
Platforms: Wii
Release Date: November 22, 2011
Price: $59.95 Standalone – Available Here OR $79.95 with Microphone – Available Here

Overview
Whenever something is up to its third release there is always a pretty strong bet that either it’s an awesome game, or it simply has a ridiculous following. Glee, obviously, has one of the most intense, rabid, meme-creating, followings out there so they’ve got the second option done and dusted but what about the first point?

Gameplay
Karaoke Revolution Glee: Volume 3 is based on songs from Season 2 of the insanely popular TV show where you get to sing along to the scenes from the show and release that inner (or outer) Gleek.

Now I’m not great at Karaoke. And some of these songs require the ridiculously talented voices of the actors on the show, but that’s okay, that’s what ‘easy’ mode is for. First off, they don’t do the thing I hate and have just instrumentals. Especially for some of the songs where I was a little less familiar with them, I needed the anchor of the actual vocals to keep me in place. That being said you can also turn them off if you think that your voice is just way more awesome than theirs. You can adjust the volume for the music, the mics, and the sound effects (which I will go into later).

Of course one flaw of the Karaoke system is that, like Singstar, you can cheat by humming around. So even if you do know the song better than your opponent, even if you spend every day singing it in your car and belting out those notes, you can still be beaten by somebody who has never seen the show, has never heard the original, and is just lame. Sorry, competitive side coming out.

When you perform well the game rewards you quite obviously, declaring your victories and if you have a good streak going then dancers will pop up in the background and your following will get bigger over time. However once you break that streak they all lose interest and go elsewhere.

There are 35 songs in total, with three of them being unlockable and requiring you to put a little extra effort. There are also a bunch of achievements to collect along the way, which you’ll get when (after you’ve finished a song) one of the characters will give you a call. I had Rachel give me a call after a particularly excellent rendition of Friday, and Sue call me when I slaughtered Back to Black. When I say call, I mean just a phone popping up with their face, not actual call. Overall there is a good selection, even though there were a few songs I would have love to seen included, I thought the range they had was pretty good.

There are also a few different modes and these will affect whether you can have multiple players or just the one. They’re not really explained, and if you’re singing on your own you can pretty much do whatever you like. There are quick play, shooting star and yearbook modes, each which can unlock different things.

So how does the multiplayer play? Well, there are solo/versus modes, co-op where you sing the same thing ad try to win as a team, and duet where you either sing lead or backup. These will differ depending on the song of course, although duet is the only mode that is really picky.

There is a career section, which sounds a lot more exciting than it actually is. Instead of being a mode where you progress and rack up all your points, it basically just recounts all of your achievements, including unlockable photos, goals, high scores and stats of all the points and songs you’ve sang.

Something I actually quite appreciated was that if you spend fifteen seconds on initial menu without doing anything it’ll burst into one of the songs, so instead of just repeating the little acapella tune until you go insane it’ll break it up with a random song selection. So never fear! You can leave this game to its own devices and it will not cause you to snap!

Visuals
The actual show scene that the song is from is shown, and if the scene itself isn’t as long as the entire song version they’ll fill it in with some more clips from other scenes. And if you’re a true Gleek you’ll know from where. So even if you lose the singing part of the competition you can protest and say that you win the general knowledge part.

I really do like the fact that they’ve kept it all legitimate and very Glee-y. This will definitely make us Gleeks quite happy. Although, it did make me miss Sam a little bit…

Audio
In terms of the accompanying soundtrack there are a few things that happen during the game. For example, when you wreck a streak a glass will break in the background. It isn’t terribly obvious but once you notice it you will get increasingly more annoyed with it.

You’ll get boos if you’re failing, they kind of sound like ghosts whimpering in the background but there’s no failing out, the game will let you keep going until the end of the song. So I guess you can use this way to just listen to the song if you’re cool with having whimpering ghosts in the background.

Conversely, if you’re doing well the game will shout ‘Glee!’ at you every so often. Which can also get annoying, but hey, maybe it will make you a bit more gleeful.

Overall
Karaoke Revolution Glee: Volume 3 is a game that not everyone is going to like. But they’ve either got a terrible singing voice or way too much pride, because at the end of the day it is a ton of fun. Multiplayer mode lets you hang out, sing your guts out, and possibly fall about laughing with each other. This is a definite must buy for Gleeks everywhere.

9-5-capsules-out-of-10

New Developer Diary for Animal Crossing 3DS emerges..

Dustin Spencer
-
0

It seems there are two types of 3DS owners at the moment. You are either content with all of the offerings we have seen this year, or you are counting down the days until some of the more unique releases come out in 2012. I have been in the latter for a while now, as Luigi’s Mansion 2, Paper Mario, and Animal Crossing are all expected to drop sometime during the year. Thankfully, Animal Crossing’s 3DS debut seems to be one of the next big first-party titles for the handheld and a new and quite large developer diary has been released to detail what this little town sim will offer.

The first thing most are curious about is the general customization we will see this time around. According to the developers, both male and female characters will be able to choose their own top and bottom. This means that boys can sport skirts (or a kilt, if you will), and girls can comfortably explore the village in pants. A large introduction for the series is the role you as the player will have as the town’s mayor. This feature should make the experience much deeper and players will finally have more of a purpose to keep playing the game other than fishing or bug catching. An in-game assistant has also been added in to help you manage all the tasks of the townsfolk.

Other than those details, nothing too substantial was said within the diary. Nook is a Real Estate agent now, there is a mall within the village, and you can add in environmental objects such as benches and light posts, allowing for a lot more customization options this time around. Check out the video in full down below and once more news is released on Animal Crossing, we will be sure to bring you an update.

Oh wait…one more thing. If you happen to fill out a Club Nintendo survey, make sure you detail your comments. This diary proves that the feedback received is actually used to establish and fine tune features. Just something to keep in mind for the future.

Katamari Damacy Vita To Get DLC

Joshua Spudic
-
0

It seems Namco Bandai is gearing up for more downloadable content for its games. This time, the Playstation Vita launch title Karamari Damacy Novita (known as Touch My Katamari in the West) will be getting post launch downloadable in the form of missions and song packs. This was revealed in the latest issue of Famitsu magazine.

The way to obtain DLC for Katamari is interesting to say the least. It involves collecting Fan Sprites, which are little pink people with hearts on their heads. If you don’t mind a little hard work, then you can obtain ten throughout the levels and use them for free DLC. If that is too much work for you, then you can purchase Fan Sprites in one (¥50), three (¥130) and five packs (¥200).

Famitsu has also revealed two of those missions. Snowman will involve the player building a four meter snow ball. This mission will be available at launch. The second mission is Shopping. On this mission involves picking out very expensive items for your Katamari within five minutes. This mission has yet to receive a date.

Outside of DLC, the magazine also looks at the Near functionality. Using Near, players can obtain records from friends. There is an incentive to beating the scores. Beating the scores will win candy for the player, which they can trade in for new costumes.

Capcom Ships 420,000 Copies Of Monster Hunter 3G

Joshua Spudic
-
0

On December 10, Japan will witness the release of the next Monster Hunter game: Monster Hunter 3G. With Capcom setting a sales target of at least 1.2 million units, one should expect a plethora of copies around the country. Now, the retailer blog Sinobi has revealed the amount of copies which will hit retailers around Japan when Monster Hunter 3G is finally released on the Nintendo 3DS.

According to the retail blog, Capcom is setting aside 420,000 copies of the game for retailers everywhere. Sinobi has also broken down the figure as in what form the copy will maintain. 300,000 copies will be standard versions of the game. 100,000 copies will be bundled with the infamous Circle Pad. 20,000 copies will be bundled with a Nintendo 3DS.

On the blog, it was noted that Capcom would have the sales of Monster Hunter 3 in mind. That sold like hotcakes within its first two days, selling 540,000 copies. However, Sinobi believes that the number is too low when it considers the recent surge of 3DS sales and the first week sales of Super Mario 3D Land.

The Walking Dead Season 2 – A Slow Moving Zombie, Without Focus

Luke Halliday
-
18

The Walking Dead, is a series that takes it’s title seriously. Not only is it one of the slowest paced Zombie shows ever created, but it is also one that lacks the focus it strongly needs to ever be more than just ‘good’.

The first season featured a total of 6 episodes, so it is needless to say that it had no excuse for taking things slowly. However it did take things very slowly, with a self-assured swagger even. It’s self-assurance was ultimately earned by unprecedented ratings. But for viewers looking for a cohesive story told in a reasonable amount of time, some couldn’t help but be left with a bad taste in their mouths following the conclusion to the first season of the series.

That brought us to the second season The Walking Dead which begun back in October this year, has been spinning it’s wheels for 7 episodes now, with a story-line that was actually not part of the original source material. While episode 7 does send us into hiatus with that story-line concluded, it was certainly hell on earth, watching episode after episode of nothing note worthy happening.

Some may say this is The Walking Dead building up to the big reveal, I call it stalling. It is evident to me that the people working on the series have spent the past few episodes trying to pad out the season with what amounts to nothing more than filler. Thankfully the mid-season finale ended in a way that atleast gives me hope that things we get back on track soon.

What The Walking Dead needs to do more than anything is to refocus on the story it is trying to tell and find a pacing that works for this series, because the current pacing just does not work for the type of story it tells. We need things to actually happen. Not waste 3 episodes until something substantial takes place.

I have faith in this series and know that if it looks long and hard at itself, it can reevaluate its direction and create something truly brilliant. So I emplore you Walking Dead, become the Running Dead when you make your return, you will be a better series for it.

AR Combat Digi Q: Friend Tank Battalion Free At Launch

Joshua Spudic
-
0

AR Combat Digi Q: Friend Tank Battalion is one of Konami’s Playstation Vita launch titles. It is also a downloadable only title. It will use the Smart AR technology (meaning that you can play battles anywhere you want using AR) and it is based on Konami’s Digi Q infrared mini vehicle series. The game will be comprised of forty stages, which will be offered in bites. Although most stages will be at a price, the initial offering will be free.

Stages one to five will be offered at no price at all to give players a taste of the game. The first stage pack will consist of stages six to thirty and will be offered at ¥800. However, Konami will offer that pack at a discounted price of ¥500 from launch day to January 16. Stages 31 to 40 will be offered in two packs of five stages at ¥200 each. Now that is quite a bargain.

AR Combat Digi Q: Friend Tank Battalion will be available only on the Playstation Vita on December 17.

Vita Browser Unusable During Gameplay

Joshua Spudic
-
0

The Playstation Vita will boast multifunction capabilities when it launches on December 17 in Japan. This means that a player can interrupt the game and access some of the features of the handheld console. They could listen to music, use the social applications and look at your friends list. However, if you want to browse the internet on its web browser, then bad luck, as the browser will be unusable during gameplay.

According to Andriasang, this came from a correction from the Impress Watch Random Tracking feature, which looks at the Vita’s multimedia features. The original story had said that the web browser would be available while you were playing your Vita/PSP game. However, Sony has corrected that statement, telling Impress Watch that the web browser would not be able to run simultaneously with a game initially, meaning that, in order to use the browser, the player would need to exit the game altogether.

Their correction did include the word initially, which would mean that an update to allow the web browser to run simultaneously with games could be considered in the near future.

Another Action RPG From Square Enix Being Developed

Joshua Spudic
-
0

Square Enix has revealed that there will be a second action RPG in development, straight out of the 1st Production Department. They do have experience with the genre, having been the team behind the Kingdom Hearts series. The new action RPG will target both the Playstation 3 and Playstation Vita, according to Andriasang.

What is interesting is that this action RPG will also use another Western developed game engine. It will not be the Unreal Engine (which means this is a completely different action RPG). Instead they will be using the Unity Engine from Unity Technologies. The technology has been quite popular, with over 750,000 registered users.

A couple of job listings have appeared as well and brings some insight into what one can expect in the game. One of those listings requires the planner to implement a character growth system, job properties, ability properties and a customisation system. Another listing requires the planner to develop a 3D game field with development of airships and gameplay elements for within the airship.

Why Is Videogame Wildlife So Hostile?

Benjamin Webb
-
0

For as long as videogames have been around, gamers everywhere have been tasked with the eradication of many evils. Some are invaders from space, while others are soldiers from within our realm. Why is it then that the wildlife in many games are all so very vicious?

Maybe it’s because, as gamers, we have been hunting them for so long. Imagine that your own kind were being endlessly prosecuted each day, for little more than their pelts, or often times, less. Would you not be vicious towards those coming into your domain, especially while it’s been proven that they’re often hostile themselves?

Take any game, such as Skyrim, where players are given the freedom to engage with nearly every living being. Have they not often taken a path that has lead them to engage with the precious wildlife? I mean, those wolves would have to have a reason to be so vile, right? I postulate that this is the revenge of gaming animals, retribution for those who came before and this can be seen from as far back as Duck Hunt. What did those ducks do to deserve such a hunting? It was all the mastermind dogs doing, or so many gamers believe.

So in short, the wildlife in videogames are vicious, simply because, we as gamers, hunt them. And have been for quite some time.


The future of wildlife everywhere in videogame land.

 

1...5,8845,8855,886...6,944Page 5,885 of 6,944