AiAi and his monkey crew are preparing to make their debut on the 3DS’ launch date, and Sega has now released a new trailer to show off gamers a bit of what can be expected from Super Monkey Ball 3D. In my opinion, trailers for 3DS titles don’t show off the full aspect of 3D games due to the 2D presentation, but this new one for Super Monkey Ball certainly places us in a colorful world with some crisp visuals that really make this title seem like it will be a standout release on the system’s launch.
This new adventure will let players use either the gyroscope or circle pad controls to guide the monkey of your choosing through the hectic and colorful landscape, gathering bananas as you go. It has been quite a while since I have played a Monkey Ball title personally, but I did have quite a bit of fun playing the older titles on the Gamecube a few years back and this version certainly will be a must buy to get me caught up with the rolling madness I have been missing. As I mentioned though, players will be able to get to try this game in all of it’s 3D glory when it releases March 27th. Check out the new trailer below for yourself and let us know what you think as well in the comment section.
Platform: Xbox 360 (Reviewed), PlayStation 3, PC Publisher: Activision Developer: Gaijin Entertainment Genre: Action/Flight Simulator Release Date: November 16, 2010 Price: $69.97 (AU) BUY NOW $47.99 (US) BUY NOW
Apache: Air Assault puts the player in the seat of an Apache AH-64, the most lethal attack helicopter this military has to date, blowing up evil terrorists, villainous pirates and all-round bad guys. Activision’s latest title aims for realism and excels in it in most aspects, and while playing it, gamers should keep in mind it is a flight simulator and flying a helicopter isn’t as simple as holding one button and turning like most games these days. Combat involves multitasking and isn’t aimed towards the casual gamer. With this in mind however, Apache: Air Assault does hold its own, and while not all will appreciate the game for what it is, it’s worth checking out if flight simulation games tickle your fancy.
Gameplay
The gameplay on the most part will vary on the player. Controls can feel awkward, since it requires two control sticks to move the vehicle, so it has a big learning curve and will take a while to get used to the controls.While the game does have a lengthy tutorial, it doesn’t really teach much, as afterwards you still feel uncomfortable with the controls most of the time. Combat is only half the challenge, as keeping the Apache AH-64 in the air is a challenge as well. Flying in a straight line can be mastered with ease, combat can be a struggle and often feels unrewarding which is disappointing. Finding enemies can also be an issue at times, although admittedly its not a big one. What does help however is the machine gun has a black and white camera attached that can zoom in, and thermal vision as well. The gameplay does have a lot of room to improve, but the basic system is actually pretty solid. If you can master the controls you can have a good time playing it, you just need a lot of patience. Perhaps these days gamers are just used to simple, easy, pick up and play games. What’s done here is pretty admirable, the developers went out of their way to make a game for the hardcore lovers of flight simulation and the technical depth of the controls itself really shows it off. Furthermore, it must be said that the feel of the copters is very realistic. It feels like a helicopter should, from it’s weight to the way it turns, it has a very realistic feel to it which gives an extra layer of authenticity to it all. Sadly, mission objectives are not always clear, but they’re usually either ‘go here’ or ‘blow this up’. Extra modes such as single screen co op are added as well, where one player can move the helicopter while the other player fires the weapons. It really requires co operation, which is great to see as well.
Graphics & Audio
Apache: Air Assault is very visually pleasing on the most part. The helicopters looks great and animation is fluid. The interior of the helicopters is remarkable, detailing every aspect of an Apache AH-64, downright to the pilot moving the control stick around. Elemental effects are done very well, and the game displays hundreds of trees and other scenic aspects at a time with no apparent frame rate issues. However it can be touch in go in some parts, as while some things will look great from a distance, up close they may appear burly, and some textures will seem more plain and simplistic, but not often. Oh yeah, and explosions look great, which is a must-have in a game like this. Audio does what it can, with a very patriotic styled theme to the soundtrack and sound effects are what they can be. The guns, explosions, missiles…everything sounds like it should and are done well. The voice acting is also great, although the dialogue isn’t spectacular. Much like the rest of the game, it won’t blow you away, but you won’t hate it either.
Conclusion
I imagine when brainstorming for new, unique games, Activision thought: ‘A Helicopter game! No one does that!’ And it’s true, their not very common. Usually for a flight simulator, you could expect some form of an airplane. Their fast, cool-looking, and can blow stuff up! Helicopters on the other hand are big and slow, but hey-they can also make things go bang. Apache: Air Assault is a worthy attempt at a Helicopter based title though, and a decent game. What doesn’t pull through in in this title though, is that other than the fact that you play as a helicopter, there’s almost nothing to make it stand out against other titles or to make it memorable or special. Sure it aimed for realism and succeeded in many aspects, but sometimes it feels over done, so instead of feeling like a fast-paced action game, you feel like a solider doing his job so he can pay the bills at home. It’s still worth a rent if your a bored and need something to play if you have a lot of patience, or if your a hardcore helicopter fantastic it’s a must buy due it’s impressive realism, but that’s it really. There is a lot of room for improvement, not to fix anything, but rather make it more enjoyable. It’s a game tailored towards a very niche market, and while it’s a good game, sadly Im sure many would not appreciate it as much as it should be. Apache: Air Assault is a very realistic game and that’s what makes it so impressive. Unfortunately, it’s just so realistic it gets in the way of being fun.
With Duke Nukem Forever’s impeding release in May, it renders thoughts of the real action heroes Nukem is modelled after and how often they are swarmed by women.
Video games wouldn’t be what they are today without the tough, aggressive beefcake, welding multiple weapons and breaking hearts. Duke Nukem, a favourite among his fans, is a chauvinistic, hyper masculine tough guy with a penitence for violence and buxom women. He is often caught in the arms of his female admirers, smoking his infamous cigar and chewing out smartass remarks. If Duke was real, you would find him partying with the likes of Charlie Sheen, hands full of women and sex. Men like Duke are regularly seen with little self esteem and self worth. Some could say they are suffering from ‘small man’s syndrome.’
The action hero is often seen as an immortal, womanizing god but lately there have been some worthy participants jeopardizing the rank of the King.
Commander Shepard from the Mass Effect series is a strong, reliable leader with a weakness for beautiful women. In multiple paths the player can choose often ends with Shepard in bed with one of his staff. He sent fans and critics into overdrive when he bedded half alien, half woman Liara T’Soni.
The controversial Jack Carver from Far Cry didn’t earn himself a strong fan base with his treatment of women. In Far Cry Predator, Jack meets a mysterious woman Kade who promises to give him whatever he wants if he helps her with her request. When she fulfils it, he asks if they can ‘go again.’
Snake from Metal Gear Solid is a man not seen far from a beautiful woman, caught a few times with his pants down. Niko Bellic of Grand Theft Auto fame seems to be rolling in sex, booze and drugs and Geralt from The Witcher is known throughout the land for his expertise under the sheets, bedding at least 30 women in the first game.
A special mention must be made to Grayson Hunt of Bulletstorm. The hunky space pirate admits continuously throughout the game as a self confessed ladies man but he never seems to make any successes with Trishka, his 18 year old team mate.
It doesn’t matter how many women they bed, or how many bad guys they kill, the quintessential action hero is all that matters.
Game Name: Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood – The Da Vinci Disappearance DLC Platforms: Xbox 360 Publisher(s): Ubisoft Developer(s): Ubisoft Montreal Genre(s): Action & Adventure Release Date: 3/10/2011 ESRB Rating: M (Mature) Price: 800MSP ($10)
Story Sadly, one of the most interesting characters in Assassin’s Creed 2 was completely cut in brotherhood and given a lesser role. Anyone who has played Brotherhood knows that Leonardo Da Vinci was used solely to sell Ezio new items; sure he dropped a few bits of insight on what Ezio should do but he wasn’t the aww inspiring inventor that we saw from the second one. Many people had high hopes that this DLC will put some more light onto the story and give Leonardo a larger role; however, this did not happen. Leonardo appears shortly in the beginning of the DLC’s missions just to be kidnapped shortly later by an underground cult.
Singleplayer Additions The DLC shows up on the map as “Recovered Memories,” and as far as I can tell can pretty much be done whenever you want. A majority of the download comes from the new areas and the locations to explore. Most of the missions require stealth based approach with instant fails if you are caught; however, since the missions can be done whenever a player wants to do them, they needed a way to balance the DLC between the veteran players and the new players. By making a majority of the missions require stealthy approaches, even the weakest of players can beat them with time.
It is up to Ezio to decipher paintings from Leonardo and discover where he was taken. The paintings are scattered everywhere due to the destruction of the Villa that once housed the works of art, but finding them comes as second nature to a true Assassin. During the entire search Ezio will run into a bunch of thugs, sneak around a whole bunch more, and run into Leonardo’s secret apprentice.
The singleplayer experience is fun; however, it is sadly short and doesn’t actually add much more to the story as a whole. You learn a bit more back story, get an excuse to run around old locations some more, and gain the ability to kill hoards of enemies once again without having to rile them up first. Other than that, there isn’t much more.
Multiplayer Additions On the multiplayer front there is a brand new map for everyone to play. The map is fashioned after the Alhambra Palace (if you don’t know what that looks like, you aren’t playing enough Assassin’s Creed). Four new characters to play as, and two brand new gamemodes. The characters are essentially just new skins with brand new kill animations. Sadly, a few of them, such as the knight, seem to use old animations (I could’ve sworn I recognized the blacksmith’s swing in that last strike).
The two gamemodes include Assassinate and Escort. In Assassinate players are tasked at tracking down anyone and killing anyone. There are no guidelines to how the game is played and since you can kill anyone, unholy alliances spring up among the players. Depending on how you look at it, this can be either good or bad. Escort on the other hand requires team work; but on the other hand team work is what brings the players down. If you stay too close to the VIP you are guiding the enemy will know who is being protected, but if you stray too far you leave the VIP wide open to being attacked. These two new gamemodes leave plenty of room for new strategies to form and old friendships to be broken as you stab them in the back.
Achievements Ubisoft did a very good job on the DLC’s achievements. Only a few are actually specific to the DLC, the rest add more reasons to play the full game which is a brilliant idea. Cramming all ten achievements into the DLC would’ve created a very easy list, but Ubisoft has made both a challenging and fun list by giving the players a large range of things that they can do whenever they want and within any part of the game. Some of them are still pretty easy and won’t take much time to achieve, but ‘Il Principe’ really takes the cake when it comes to achievements. If you want to 100% this game, get ready to go back to some parts of the game you missed or simply didn’t spend enough time with.
Below is the achievement list:
Strong-Arm – 10 – Throw a Long Weapon, Heavy Weapon, and Smoke bomb more than 10 m at a guard.
High Roller – 20 – Win 10000 florins playing Hazard.
il Principe – 100 – Receive 100% synch in ACB and full synch in all missions of the Da Vinci Disappearance,
Airstrike – 20 – Kill 10 guards with a single arrow storm.
GPS – 20 – Complete the Da Vinci Disappearance.
Clowning Around – 30 – Beat up the 5 thirsty harlequins.
Special Delivery – 20 – Double Assassinate from a parachute.
Grand Theft Dressage – 20 – Steal 5 horses from their riders, while remaining on horseback.
Going Up – 5 – Kill a guard with the bag that drops from a lift.
Easy Come, Easy Go – 5 – Pay 500 florins to an orator, then pickpocket him afterward.
Overview What is provided in the DLC is a handful of additions to both the singleplayer experience and the multiplayer experience but there really isn’t much. The new missions are decently sized with a standalone side story, but the heavy emphasis on sneaking and instant fails makes the missions incredibly annoying. Many people play Assassin’s Creed for the assassinations and sadly the only bit of pure assassinations located in this DLC is within the multiplayer with the additional gamemodes and characters. What is provided in the DLC isn’t amazing, but it isn’t horrible either. There is a bit of additional gameplay, but a heavy dose of additional gameplay comes from the achievements and only people that actually go for achievements will appreciate them. The DLC will take an average player only a few hours to complete the singelplayer aspect; and quite a few more if you are into multiplayer and getting achievements.
I give Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood – The Da Vinci Disappearance DLC
While the whole “video games as art” debate may still be raging in some communities (I’m looking at you, Ebert), the Smithsonian American Art Museum seems convinced. Between March and September of 2012 they will have on display an exhibit titled The Art of Video Games. The exhibit is intended to display 80 games from five different eras over the 40 year course of video game history. The games chosen for the exhibit are those that are “visually spectacular or boast innovative design” and are being selected by popular vote on the exhibit’s website.
That means that each one of you has a say in which video games are represented as the pinnacle of artistic expression in our medium. All you have to do is head on over to The Art of Video Games site and “register” with your email address (seriously the easiest registration ever) and vote! There are four categories within each of the five eras: Target, Adventure, Action, and Combat/Strategy, and each category has four nominees which I suppose were chosen by the folks at the Smithsonian.
There are some great games nominated and this is an excellent opportunity for gamers to share their opinion on what games we love. Remember to vote for the games that you consider the most artistic or innovative and while this may be hard for many of us, try to remain unbiased.
With Homefront’s release coming in only a few short days the good people at THQ have released their final trailer for the game in an effort to try and sway anybody who may be on the fence about Kaos Studios’ action game. There have been many war games but never has one been so close to home considering the fact that the North Koreans have taken over nearly the entire Western United States.
Of course that is where you come in as a member of the resistance. In an effort to overthrow the hostile occupation and eliminate The Great Leader you must work with your fellow resistance members despite the fact that some may sell you down the river as much as help you. Catch the launch trailer below and be sure to take a look at Homefront when it releases on March 15th on the PS3, Xbox 360 and PC.
While I love my Android phone, I find it more useful for its web applications than for the games that are available on the marketplace. There are some quality titles on the Google powered OS, but they tend to be tower defense games or somewhat shallow time killers like Angry Birds and Paper Toss. When the chance arises to download a fun and engrossing game on my Droid arises I jump on it.
Lucky for me (and all Android phone users) HandyGames has released Cyberlords – Arcology to the Anroid marketplace today and have made it available to download for free should you desire. HandyGames describes Cyberlords – Arcology as “squad-based tactical real-time combat in a persistant game world”, and it looks similar to other top down action games with heavy RPG elements like finding new weapons and equipment. Combine all of this with a futuristic cyberpunk storyline and you have an awesome on-the-go experience.
Catch the trailer for Cyberlords – Arcology below and see if it looks like something you need on your phone.
It sounds like there will be a lot of story development occurring id Software’s Rage. So much so that the publisher of the game, Bethesda, has organized a partnership with Dark Horse Comics which will help publish a three issue prequel comic for the events that will occur during the main game. The first issue of the comic will be released in stores on June 22nd.
The comic’s story will be written by Arvid Nelson who has had previous work done by Dark Horse comics in the form of Rex Mundi and will be drawn by Andrea Mutti who also worked on DMZ. The cover that you see below is drawn by Glenn Fabry who has previously drawn cover art for Hellblazer and Preacher. The series will present a new twist on the post-apocalyptic future as one woman finds out that the survival of humankind isn’t the same thing as the survival of humanity.
Katamari Damacy is an amazing, creative and unique game. Those of you who haven’t played one of the games yet or don’t like the franchise, shame on you. Much like my asteroids hack I did a while back, there is now a clever hack floating around that allows you to control your very own Katamari on your webpage, able to roll up anything and everything.
One caveat, you must be using Chrome as your browser. Check out the page for details on how to use this. Basically load up whatever page you want to have fun on, copy the code into the URL and hit enter. It starts out small but eventually grows and is able to pick up larger objects. Pretty fun hack and timewaster. Enjoy.
For quick use, copy this code into the URL field in Chrome and get a rolling.
In an effort to promote the use of the 3DS’ SpotPass system Team Ninja is offering daily downloadable costumes for their upcoming 3DS game Dead or Alive: Dimensions. The system will make use of the 3DS’ connection to a wi-fi signal and will automatically download one of 28 costumes that will be released periodically by Tecmo Koei.
There will be a certain costume that will be “release day only” according to Team Ninja’s Yosuke Hayashi as he spoke with Famitsu. This means that the specific costume will only be available on March 24th when the game releases in Japan but there currently is no set date for a Western release though it is coming. Some of the expected costumes can be seen below courtesy of Andriasang. There has been no mention as to whether or not the SpotPass system will be used in the U.S. to distribute character costumes as well or not but we have contacted Tecmo Koei to find out more.
