12 public written reviews
The views here are this user’s only and are not representative of Giant Bomb's thoughts and opinions on the discussed video game. GB's official reviews reside at giantbomb.com/reviews.
First thing I've learned from this game: graphics options menus have to stop giving me meaningless choices. Give me a slider bar that adjusts everything to a "Low" preset for my $600 refurb computer and stop acting like I've taken a class in CPU Cycle Maximization 201. Specifically, what the gabenewell is "anisotropy," and what happens if I uncheck the box to turn it off? Second thing I've learned: control is really…
Most of this blog's pageviews still come from my Facebook friends, so I'll admit taking some modest pride in seeing "Recommended by 10 of 11 users" where I reposted my review of Proteus to another gaming site. Other people's opinions of that artsy game usually fall into two camps - either they think it was really beautiful and deep and meaningful and advanced the artform of gaming, or they were all-caps screaming…
Proteus launches, and I am standing in the ocean, looking at an island in the distance. Everything I can see is constructed out of blocky, Atari-2600-ish pixels. Not knowing my purpose in this world, I slowly tread water to the beach. I find a cluster of small white creatures there bobbing their heads and chatting with each other in honks and blorts, looking like something from a cross of Princess Mononoke and Tron.…
When last I had time away from work, I spent a few hours with an overly artsy game that dropped me in the middle of nowhere and gave me no more to do than walk around and look at things. I've now been dropped into a game in a stark, no-intro-necessary, black-and-white, sciency tech lab where the walls aren't painted and nothing makes any noise. The screenshots on the game's storepage look like something out of a…
Once more, little guys doing the games that the big publishers aren't touching anymore. When I was young and unable to afford a gamer's PC, my totally spoiled best friend was hooked on Descent 2. Descent played as a cross between Doom and WIng Commander - the player could fly and shoot in every direction, but the game took place in underground mines and laboratories rather than in open darkness. This gameplay felt…
Question for you: when was the last time you and your friends all bought the new big triple-A title that had just come out, and you all talked it up and made plans to play together online? You got that game with the big multiplayer component and assumed it would mean lots of hours happily mucking about with people you know and love, right? How much of that game did you actually spend playing with your friends? If…
Good reader, I am told you like games with a challenge! Therefore, I shall issue one to you! I suggest to you that you shall play... Super Mario Bros.! Wait, this be not a true challenge. The stakes need be raised. I must also demand that you shall play the game while your youngest daughter is grabbing the controller out of your hands, the dog is kicking the television over, and your spouse is leaned up against your…
Time for another genre that I haven't been much exposed to - the spaceflight sim. I know that when I was young and had an NES and not much else that other kids had fancy PCs with Wing Commander and X-Wing and other first-person games with black backgrounds. Strike Suit Zero appears to be designed on the concept that we haven't had many of those games lately and deserve a new one. Long hours at work stopped me from…
I actually wasn't sure if I would bother with this review, on account that most of us with Apple devices already played through this while waiting on hold for tech support. But I figured I'd give the Steam edition a try while waiting for other indie games to come out (and as a truck driver by vocation, I wasn't sure I wanted to spend the time and money reviewing Euro Truck SImulator 2). 10,000,000 looks familiar to…
I actually haven't played much tower defense, have I? I beat Plants vs. Zombies, which was a lovely, easy little game. I messed around with variations of the genre in Dungeon Defenders and Anomaly Warzone Earth. But I've never played Kingdom Rush or Desktop Tower Defense or whichever the popular ones are. The genre hasn't called out to me for one reason or another. And I've also never played Fieldrunners, even…
Read the full review Dean Cleans Off His Steam List - Fieldrunners 2
(This game was re-released on Steam on January 9, 2013.) My initial thought for Droid Assault was something like, "Okay, Steam, really? The first two games of the year are both twin-stick-style action games? If this one is just as bad as the first, then I'm breaking up with you." My initial thought that actually had something to do with the game was, "This isn't so bad. I guess you don't have to give me back my…
The first thing I figure out about Primal Fears is that it controls like a twin-stick shooter - move one direction, shoot in another. Then I start the first level, and there are a number of tiny bug-like zombie things dancing around but not yet acknowledging me. Is this actually a survival horror title? Do I need to think about conserving ammo? Is there a way around these things without killing them? I spend a few…
