Posted in: Game Reviews by Michael Durr on July 14th, 2012
Looking over my video game collection, there is certainly a feel of games that are either set in the past or set in the future with the exception of sports games and a couple of driving titles. In particular, I do not look at a shooter and think that I want to play something that takes place now. I am a sucker for fantasy and sci/fi shooters primarily. But today, I have just the opposite, a very realistic present day third-person shooter in the name of Spec Ops: The Line. Let us see how it plays.
Posted in: 1 - 8 players, 2k Games, First Person Shooter, News and Opinions, Random Fun, Xbox 360 by Michael Durr on October 29th, 2010
Hopefully most of you enjoyed my experience of the first Bioshock game a couple of weeks back. Truth is, I’m still playing the first Bioshock, it is getting regular rotation with NBA 2k11 and Lego Rock Band. But, in an attempt to completely confuse myself, I decided to go ahead and tackle the sequel with only paper knowledge of the ending. This should go over as well as my first marriage. With only slightly less bloodshed.
Posted in: Game Reviews by Michael Durr on November 9th, 2009
The last time I had played a WWE wrestling game was way back in 2007. Triple H was on the cover looking more menacing than usual and I had played the game for a few solid months. But to be honest, I was burnt out and frustrated with the grappling system and spent the last few years messing with older wrestling titles and Fire Pro Wrestling Returns for the Playstation 2. Fast forward to late 2009 and I suddenly find myself excited for a WWE wrestling game once again. Hopefully clever marketing wasn’t the only reason.
Posted in: Game Reviews by Michael Durr on December 9th, 2007
Wrestling games are near and dear to my heart. From the first time I played Pro Wrestling for Nintendo or WWF Wrestlefest at the arcade, I knew I would be playing wrestling games as long as my fingers could mash the buttons. I've played some of the greatest wrestling games (Smackdown 2, Touken Retsuden 3) and some of the worst (WCW Nitro, ECW Hardcore Revolution). The Fire Pro series I've had a long relationship with. It's been love/hate mostly. I want to love it but I find myself more often than not hating the interface and struggling to play it. I've bought all three import games for the Turbo Graphix 16 system and the Fire Pro (6 man scramble) game that was released for Sega Saturn. However, when Agetec announced that they would be releasing it for the stateside Playstation 2, I was very interested. Maybe since I didn't have to import it, I would finally be able to see the menus in English and figure out the difficult interface. Every wrestling fanboy would tell me that it was the greatest thing ever. But what would I think?
Posted in: Game Reviews by Michael Durr on November 26th, 2007
Some of my most enjoyable gaming experiences have been with gaming compilations. "More bang for your buck" is the familiar slogan used to describe these games. Traditionally, these compilations show up late in console's life cycle in order to re-sell old titles that couldn't probably sell on their own. So needless to say the Orange Box surprised me on a couple of fronts. The 360 isn't an ancient or dying system by any means. Furthermore, by combining Half Life 2, the two sequels, Portal and Team Fortress 2 you bring together a package that from initial glance looks to be five great games in one. However, are these five games as vast as one would hope or instead are these five games that should have stayed on the pc to collect dust and be riddled about in debates about the best pc shooter to date?
Posted in: Game Reviews by Michael Durr on September 23rd, 2007
Bomberman has long been a friend of mine. I spent most of the early to mid 90's playing either the original Bomberman or Bomberman '93 for the Turbo Graphix 16 System. I played each until their eventual conclusion and then wouldn't touch them for years. So when there was word that a Bomberman game would come to Xbox Live I was very excited. But at the same time I was very skeptical. So skeptical, it took me about two months to download it and the accompanying first expansion pack. However, what came out of it was quite possibly the best multiplayer Xbox Live Arcade game of all time and one of the best reasons to own an Xbox 360 that doesn't involve a first person shooter.
Posted in: Game Reviews by Archive Authors on January 7th, 2007
Gameplay
Hype. Hype is a piece of the media that we never want to admit to ourselves, or anyone for that matter, we let get the best of us. After all, how many times has the hype for something become so huge that it turned out to be a real bummer once you finally played it? When message boards started rambling in 2005 about a game coming from Microsoft Studios (made by Epic) entitled Gears of War, a small look into Microsoft’s history of product release, would easily entail a game that would ...
Posted in: Game Reviews by Michael Durr on November 28th, 2006
Opening
Promotional games have come and gone. Typically they involve some movie or tv show, kid or blockbuster related. Once in a while, they center on food such as the M&M's game for Playstation 1 or perhaps the 2 or 3 McDonalds games. Burger King decided that their king character which was a cartoon character onto himself deserved not one video game about him but three. Better also make that for one of the top systems today. The XBOX 360. What will we charge, just $3.99 with a value me...
Posted in: Game Reviews by Archive Authors on January 5th, 2004
When the PS2 and Xbox were released both promised to be full home entertainment units. No questions that they both shined with the cutting edge graphics and sound as well as performing admirably as DVD players with both Dolby Digital and DTS decoders built in. This year both systems have tried to push another venue into home entertainment : Karaoke. Love it or hate it Karaoke looks like it’s here to stay. Earlier this year, X-Box had the X-Box Music Mixer which provided karaoke features – with mixed results. Could th...
Posted in: Game Reviews by Archive Authors on January 3rd, 2004
X-Box’s first venture into the racing genre gave us Project Gotham. A great looking title with its own unique charms but also had a fair number of shortcomings. Would the sequel address these shortcomings and live up to the hype? In a word: YES.
Graphics
The graphics are outstanding. The attention to detail is noticeable – it’s neat to watch the driver in the cars accurately turn the wheel and shift gears. It has been done before in other games but it is always a welcome inclusion. There is...
