227 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.
Oh Uncharted 2, how hard you try. Uncharted 2 feels like that one insecure kid at school that puts too much effort into fitting in. He buys the most expensive pre-torn jeans and matching Rocawear shirts, and totes the newest IPhone (he’s in Grade 5 by the way) so that he can post more text in Twitter updates per day than this review’s length. However, the fear of being rejected by his peers is mortifying and the…
The female orgasm and gaming have by and large been kept two separate entities for decades. While its easy for male gamers whom have never known a kiss beyond their mother to seek arousal from a blocky Playstation-era Lara Croft and her triangular cleavage, women tend to need a bit more. The onset of force-feedback controllers and in particular that Rez vibrator thingy have given grrl gamers too ashamed to buy a…
Here’s where you cross your fingers and hope that your good friend doesn’t read your internet reviews. There is no greater way to devalue the birthday present that you’re fixing to give someone than for them to learn that you’ve slagged their present-to-be. And really, what kind of person buries the very gift they’re about to wrap and hand over? I don’t know. I don’t know. As long as I don’t get smashed at the party…
Bowser is heartless indeed. Seriously, I’ve been exploring his insides and he doesn’t seem to have a heart. There are an assortment of nodes, cavities and assorted “regions” but during my entire time spelunking King Koopa, I’ve been unable to find a heart. Or much of a brain either, though Nintendo may have intended that to be the joke. There aren’t any kidneys or bladder, though, so I wonder how Boswer disposes of…
There is something powerfully ironic about Tim Shaffer’s Brutal Legend, a game designed to be a love letter to heavy metal…a letter which would likely include a parcel containing a still-beating human heart. After all, it got published by the biggest third party developer and subsequently sued over by the second-biggest company over publishing rights. Maybe it’s that “selling out” is the anti-thesis of…
Kingdom Hearts is a lot like that daughter of yours that started life so cute and innocent, but progressively grew more rebellious and spiteful of you and authority. Her pink dresses turned to black leather, her pink hairbands turned to spiked collars with matching wrist scars and your conversations turned from “I wuv my dadday” to “YOU DON’T UNDERSTAND ME!” The first Kingdom Hearts was a fun, innocent piece of fan…
I halfway feel bad for underground illegal street racers, for their culture has stagnated in the eyes of the world. After a couple dozen Fast and Furious movies, a couple dozen more bad spinoffs (who remembers “Torque”?) and far too many wave-riding video games with matching trip-hop soundtracks and badly-voiced characters whom wouldn’t know machismo if it bit them in the nuts, (and Nick Hogan’s little jaunt) people…
I’ve only sparingly heard of this before. But apparently, there are Singstar parties happening all around the nation. People from far and wide gather in groups to huddle around their Playstation to sing, dance, remember that they’re not scored on dancing and get back to singing. I’ve only known one Singstarian in the past and she was from the Land Down Under, so I dismissed this as an international fad in a country…
First and foremost, Singstar: Queen and all Singstar games must be imminently docked in points for breaking “the truce.” By “the truce”, I mean the unofficial agreement that Harmonix, Activision and whomever else that is making music games obey in making all of their games compatible with all major instrument controller adaptors. I can play a Guitar Hero game with a Rock Band drumset, a Rock Band game with…
Nauts-based video games have made something of an impact on our gaming culture. Tim Shafer’s Psychonauts is a universally praised platformer and work of genius the likes of which will always feel like a perennially-underrated underdog, regardless of how much adoration it may receive. Hideo Kojima released a game called Policenauts about…well I don’t know what exactly Policenauts is, but the Metal Gear Solid games…
Previously in my Super Metroid review , I had made numerous petty swipes at the critically acclaimed Shadow Complex for imitating the master but missing the point. When I wrote that petty cheapshot disguised as a review for an all-time classic, I was but two-thirds of the way finished playing Chair’s downloadable Xbox Live Arcade release. And now that I’ve finished the game, I’m proud to report that I was wrong.…
For almost two years now, I’ve been refusing to buy Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune on account of the game’s $70 asking price on the free market. While some of the praise lent to the game by friends of mine tantalized me into making the plunge, I could never bring myself to invest money in the archetypical “next-generation game.” By that term, I mean that Uncharted has cutting-edge technology, “Hollywood-esque” story and…
Call the King of Fighters a precursor to emo culture if you will. A bunch of pale, teenage, sometimes-effeminate male fighters (and masculine-female fighters that are at least a bit more gender-obvious, if just because of their big boobs) flinging fire, ice, crystal or blood-attacks with either the greatest of ease or angst. In a way, the King of Fighters series is like the many “underground” emo bands my friend…
A little while back, a pre-Mickey Mouse Marvel Comics made a bit of noise with the Civil War storyline that pitted heroes against heroes over government legislation. It was intriguing in its parlaying of real-life events and made for an eventful time to be a comic book fan…or at least eventful enough to mark the one time in history I consistently read a comic book series as it happened. So now we have a video game,…
The Beatles: Rock Band is a mighty collaboration between numerous video game and music companies of which I cannot possibly be made to list. If anything, I can imagine a behind-the-scenes war between Apple Corps and Harmonix over the order of titling with one side refusing the title of “Rock Band: The Beatles” or “Rock Band Beatles Track Pack.” But in any event, money will be paid, royalties will be traded left and…
Have you ever eaten a dish so extraordinary, one that provided such an overwhelming sensation on your taste buds, that “ordinary” suddenly tastes like arse? Like go to , have an exquisite chicken capellini with the rarest spices, designed by a passionate singing chef with more than five syllables in his last name…then go home and eat a frozen dinner. That sums up my predicament at the moment. I’ve been so completely…
“The MotionPlus is here! The MotionPlus is here! The Wii is saved! We now have full one-to-one controls! The MotionPlus is the future of gaming! All rejoice! Run, don’t walk, to your nearest Walmart and buy four MotionPluses with matching jackets and gather around the sensation of the summer, Wii Sports Resort, as the Wii once again revolutionizes gaming!” …is what I may have said if Wii Sports Resort was my first…
The world has changed in the three years between Fight Nights Round 3 and 4. We have gained a black president and lost a white Michael Jackson. Mixed Martial Arts has risen to prosperity as the hippest trend amongst $50 skull-design-shirted males aged 15-young enough to be with it. On the other hand, boxing’s overall popularity has further waned, with few possible new stars capturing the public’s imagination, and…
I always envisioned that the ideal Batman game would be encapsulated in a sandbox. Imagine it now; patrolling the streets of in the Batmobile, beating up thugs and keeping the citizens safe from crime and itself. Unfortunately, recent sandbox games, both with real superheroes (Spiderman: Web of Shadows, Superman Returns) and imitation heroes (Infamous, Prototype) have taught me better. All of those games featured…
Before I begin to describe the video game Fat Princess, let me state firstly that it executes a vile sin in gaming. Terms like “pwned” and “noobs” and general internet leet-speak are meant to be used by the gamers of PC games like Starcraft and Quake, as part of their…unique gaming subculture. Also keep in mind that Starcraft and Quake became popular in the LAST millennium. Fat Princess features a British storybook…
I hate myself for finishing Prototype. I really do. Here was a game that was begging not to be played, in spite of the time (presumably) normal people spent designing the game’s dozens and dozens of incoherent video cutscenes, recording hours of voice work and crafting numerous story-specific missions. No, I think the people at Radical Entertainment mock anyone that makes an attempt at completing Prototype’s…
The original Marvel: Ultimate was released in 2006, a simpler time for superheroes. Back then, superheroes weren’t at war with each other over some kind of ambiguous superhero registration act and the comics weren’t trying to reflect reality with a social commentary…or at least they weren’t as obvious. Ultimate took place back when Captain was Steve Rogers and not the three or four people that have since tried to…
So video games have now officially adopted the womanly ritual that is “the makeover”. Just as girl friends from Malibu are prone to freak out with joy at the prospect of getting their hair, nails, toe nails and facials done with the most exotic-yet-excessive of lotion treatments (for my friend reading this, that line was for you!) so too will nostalgic geeks salivate over the prospect of an old game getting its…
If you follow your magical map across the Everglazed forest, over the strawberry hill and into the mystical cave, you’ll find the dangerous sugar-breathing dragon. Once you slay the dragon using the legendary Sword of Caramelot, you’ll have claimed the right to gasp at a treasure chest containing one of gaming’s more obscure sub-genres, the niche of niches, the SNK fighting game. A small but dedicated group of…
I quickly found myself relating to Guybrush Threepwood’s voyage into the mysterious and deadly . I was also venturing to a strange and foreign land, that being the forsaken territory of the point and click adventure genre. I’ve always preferred the dry lands of the consoles over the PC’s treacherous waters and torrential system requirements. So this review for Secret of Monkey Island: Special Edition may come off as…
Splosion Man is the kind of character that needs to appear on a cereal box. The character of “Splosion Man” is a hyperactive, flamboyant acid-freak with no attention span or a long-term memory that extends beyond 3 seconds; I found myself waiting for him to proclaim that he goes coo-coo for Coa Coa Puffs. I know I shouldn’t expect character depth in a downloaded Xbox Live game, but I was completely annoyed by how…
Is there really anything too self-serving about 50 Cent making an action game starring himself, in the role of himself? Is this any different than any given game designer fulfilling his own macho fantasies through the likes of their bodybuilder protagonist? Marcus Fenix, Kratos, Master Chief and especially Riddick, these are all some scrawny programmer or programmers’ living vicariously through their main character…
I now know why Metal Gear Solid was considered an Earth-shattering breakthrough in gaming. It wasn’t because of some kind of original “tactical espionage action” gameplay mechanic, or that it had incredibly lengthy cutscenes or enough recorded speech to intimidate presidents. It certainly wasn’t the exclamation marks that appeared on top of the guards’ heads when they spotted something moving within their…
Do ‘ya wanna know what I hate the most about Mega Man 7? The opening cutscene. Not the one that precedes the title screen. Mind you, that series of flat-coloured still images is very uninspiring, and the revelation of four hidden robots designed in the event of Dr Wily’s capture is about as basic a plot as a Mega Man game can get (and should get…) but that Title Screen cutscene has one very, very, very important…
And presenting the sixth and FINAL Mega Man game on the NES, or at least if we’re going with the impression that 9 is the wannabe NES game that walks around with Goomba shirts listening to 80s one-hit wonders on his IPod, wishing he was born in the 80s. Capcom had this wretched mentality with sequels back in the day of “keep making them until the general public sees your little trick and moves on to something kind…
Remember the movie Wild Things? It featured Denise Richards and Neve Campbell back when they were young, chic and interesting enough to be considered sex symbols, playing the role of two crazy whores who swim in pools and sleep with guys, themselves and other objects a lot. While I’m sure that’s not what the movie was about, it’s what people remember the most and therefore the film was something of a success at the…
When you’ve got a story that’s in need of an evil villain, its good (and a bit racist) to know that you can always turn to the Russians. Whether it’s evil athletes, evil soldiers, evil terrorists or just evil women in leather, it seems like the former is the epicenter for all that is antagonistic. Or at least as long as the film was not made in . Forget about Ronald Reagan, it was Rocky Balboa that won the Cold War…
A diving slide is when a human being, running with full force, lowers his upper body to the floor and allows the built-up momentum to drag his or her form across the floor, feet first. For decades, great people have been risking high wedgies and ounces of detergent, sliding across pants-ruining terrain in the name of survival and scoring runs. The slide is a viable technique for stealing bases in baseball, narrowly…
Guilty Gear X was a wonderful anomaly. It’s an unlikely combination of hundreds of 80s metal references that went over the heads of 95% of its audience with an oversexed anime style that would make Goku feel uncomfortable. The scantily-clad, blue haired, exposed abdomen male model with a pool cue as a weapon would zip across the screen like a gnat, throwing pool balls of death to the scythe-sporting, cross-dressed…
So there’s a long-standing debate amongst fanboys that care too much (like me) over which of Mega Man game stands at the top of the class of identical Mega Man games. The two forerunners include 1989’s Mega Man 2 and 1990’s Mega Man 3; two games from two entirely different decades; one representing the Reagan era, one representing Bush Sr’s tyranny. Now, there’s not much of a point in glorifying this battle of games…
I dislike Saint’s Row. I also dislike Saint’s Row 2. And generally speaking, I dislike every “gangster” game I’ve played so far that wasn’t Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. No matter how hard any of them try to be “satirical” or “crass” or “offensive”, I can never shake the feeling that this supposed tale of life on the ghetto was designed by a group of Silicon Valley dweebs who based their vision of the hood from…
I feel as though I can count the number of Western-themed games with the fingers on my hand. And that I can count the number of noteworthy Western games made over the years with my genitals. While I’m glad that this shooter sub-genre doesn’t get as overpopulated as the country of muscular space marines, it’d also be nice to get one truly great Western shooter that doesn’t feel like it’s merely hiding behind its…
So I’m undertaking the questionable but personal challenge of writing the lengthiest, most elaborate reviews possible for the entire Mega Man ennealogy. An “ennealogy” refers to a series of nine, according to random strangers on Yahoo Answers. My motivations for bothering with such a primitive series that makes so few changes from installment to installment? Because each game is short enough to beat in a few hours…
Assassin’s Creed is a third-person, Third Crusades-inspired, conspiracy-laden, sandbox-styled, stealth-oriented, action-filled, anti-religious, virtual reality simulating, preachy adventure game. As far as I can tell, Assassin’s Creed is the first third-person, Third Crusades-inspired, conspiracy-laden, sandbox-styled, stealth-oriented, action-filled, anti-religious, virtual reality simulating, preachy adventure…
Big summer blockbuster films have been on a tear this year. And by “on a tear”, I mean “tearing apart my sanity through sheer incompetence.” And in a surprise reversal of fortune, the normally terrible video game adaptations of big movies have wound up being surprisingly good, or at least better than their silver screen inspiration. The three hours of compressed fan service-misfired that was the Watchmen movie…
Imagine a vocal Communist living in America. He burns flags, speaks the virtues of a Marxist economy and preaches on his porch with megaphone in mouth extolling the evils of President Obama. Yet he refuses to heed his neighbours coarse advice of “love it, or leave it!” because he’s gotten too used to this whole “freedom of speech” business that Americans are granted. That’s my relationship with the Wii in a…
Whether its Tony Montana not dying in his mansion and thus given the chance for revenge over the comeuppance he never got, or Don Corleone asking a nameless grunt to engage in blockbuster-style gun shootouts with rival gangs, there’s something undisputedly unholy about video games based on old movies. The original filmmakers always seem to scold the damage done to their “art”, the original actors put no effort…
So there’s a discernable and almost concerning difference in mentality between and the games industry regarding violence. Within the film world, big budget films need be toned down lest they earn the dreaded R rating and restrain kids from seeing the movie and buying the action figures. As a result, we have the goreless Terminator, as well as an action movie where the main protagonist and antagonist are murderers…
Wii Sports, Wii Sports, you rue my life How you have plagued these days with smite Into the abyss I should throw This damn broken motion controls When I bring the Wii to parties Other games I bring just get teased No More Heroes gets sold short And Monkey Ball passed for Wii Sports Wii Sports, Wii Sports, makes parties lame When we take turns on the bowling game These fake gutterballs make no sense When a real alley…
One of my psychological pet peeves in all of gaming is a gimmicked title. Few things repel my wallet from a game store like seeing a game with a title that plays with improper punctuation (Punch-out!!!), numbers in place of letters (Left 4 Dead), or deranged capitalization (inFAMOUS.) So in spite of appearing to be the kind of clever, original game concept that would need all the financial support one could lend it…
Why not? You know you’ve written too many reviews in your lifetime when you lie in bed at night and the words for a review for a random game begin to materialize in your head. The problem with this scenario is that once the flow of text starts to leak into your consciousness, then your night of sleep is lost, and the cogs in your brain spiral with one line after another, despite the knowledge that going to sleep…
If the numerous smug little kids walking around today’s streets with frizzed-out afro hair and gray shirts with NES controller artwork or Super Mario Bros 1 sprites are to be believed, then retro is hip. Flannel seems to be making a comeback and every other rapper on the radio is searching for the next big smash hit by remixing 80s songs with Auto-Tune torture. I feel as though Nintendo shouldn’t be encouraged to…
Certain comic book storylines have been around long enough that few people bother to question their logic…provided they remain within their original fiction holding cell. People won’t question the science that allows a radioactive spider bite to grant one superpowers, let alone what exactly constitutes a “radioactive spider.” Most of us read these ludicrous but imaginative comics as kids, and the stories that have…
