76 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.
Saints Row IV hyped me in a way that few games do. About two weeks before the game came out, I started going nuts waiting to play it. The next several days featured several failed game sessions as I couldn’t sate my desire for the game I most wanted to play. I didn’t end up getting much done in those two weeks for this reason. On the night of its release, I eagerly sat up until it unlocked on Steam and played for…
Summer of Arcade has brought the gaming populace many great downloadable games over the last few years. It stands to reason that these games would still have existed in some form or another without the promotion, but Microsoft’s focus on getting the best of the best in its summer lineup of Arcade games has landed them some truly fantastic products and highlighted many superb games that absolutely deserved. Being the…
Few games incite as must cult fervor as the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. series. Made by several of the people who eventually moved on to the Metro games, this three-game series will instantly spark an enthused discussion and fond remembrance if you mentioned on a message board or to a group of gamers. Anyone with a remote liking of open-world games will inevitably give one a try at some point. I’ve owned the first S.T.A.L.K.E.R.…
This year in games has been absolutely fantastic. There have been some great games that are fun to play and appeal to a wide audience, sure, but 2013 has also brought some unmatched examples of why indie games are the future of the medium. Indie developers are willing to take a concept or idea that might not be widely accepted, something new or exciting in a way that we haven’t seen before, and risk a year or two of…
Tower-defense is a rather divisive genre. Some people find it boring and refuse to touch it at all, while others can’t get enough of it. I am not the biggest fan of the genre, but I can appreciate a well-designed example when it comes along. Sang-Froid - Tales of Werewolves may not immediately strike you as one of these shining gems of the genre, but you will likely be as surprised as I was when you dig into its…
Tower-defense is a rather divisive genre. Some people find it boring and refuse to touch it at all, while others can’t get enough of it. I am not the biggest fan of the genre, but I can appreciate a well-designed example when it comes along. Sang-Froid - Tales of Werewolves may not immediately strike you as one of these shining gems of the genre, but you will likely be as surprised as I was when you dig into its…
The world of Metro: Last Light is a horrifying one. It takes place after a nuclear apocalypse has rendered the surface uninhabitable, due to radiation and mutant creatures who have made it their home. All the remaining humans, at least the ones in Russia where the game takes place, live in the underground Metro system, using the tunnels to cross between various outposts scattered throughout the old rail lines.…
The Swapper is an indie puzzle game with light platforming elements and a unique visual artstyle. Don’t roll your eyes; I know you want to. While I have to admit that this particular kind of game has become a bit tired over the last few years, I still think The Swapper is a fantastic product, one worth your time if you're willing to give it a look. As a puzzle game, The Swapper is mostly about its puzzles. There is…
Story in video games is quite often terrible. It is a medium littered with trope-laden characters, plots more focused on pushing gameplay forward then making sense, and unfulfilling endings meant to drive fan fervor for a multitude of sequels and spin-offs. Few games have stories worth paying attention to; even fewer have stories that are as memorable as a great book or movie. Naughty Dog has managed to deliver a…
I love cyberpunk. Seeing the ways that futuristic tech affects the real world is a fascinating subject that I feel not enough games take advantage of, especially with the fast-moving nature of technology today. Therefore, whenever a game decides to give this style a try, I’m almost immediately on board. This was definitely the case with Remember Me. My first exposure to it instantly put it on my radar, particularly…
999: Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors was one of my favorite games on the original DS. It was unlike anything I had ever played before it and one of my first exposures to a visual novel game. It seemed boring and strange at first but quickly became next to impossible to put down. The puzzle rooms were fun to solve, if not maybe a bit repetitive, and the story was fascinating, keeping me hooked until the final…
I am a tremendous fan of the original three Donkey Kong Country games on the Super Nintendo. I spent dozens, if not hundreds, of hours playing those games over and over again. I loved the art style, the variety of stages, the tightness of the platforming, and the timeless music. When it was announced that another Donkey Kong Country game was being made, I was ecstatic. Retro being the studio to craft this new…
The Dead Space franchise is one of my favorite new franchises from this generation. The first game was a modern survival horror game done right, taking place in an interesting and well-realized space setting with some clever creature design and tight combat. The second game built upon everything that was great in the first game, creating a sequel that was actually better than the original. Dead Space 2 was a bit…
The history of Metal Gear Rising makes for a potentially suspect final product. It was shown at E3 2010 to modest praise and then was promptly forgotten about (by both Konami and fans) for years. When it was announced that Platinum was taking over development, some people were worried about the strength of the product. Platinum’s track record is quite good, but how would they handle this game that was…
Guacamelee places you in the shoes of Juan, a humble farmer. Soon after the game starts, his village is attacked and he races to rescue his love, the local president’s daughter. He finds her in the hands of an undead skeleton named Calaca and tries to save her. This, inevitably, leads to his death. All is not lost, however; in the land of the dead, he finds a magical luchador mask that brings him back to life to…
Dante’s Inferno places you in the shoes of Dante, reimagined as a warrior from the Crusades instead of the author of the Divine Comedy (why they didn’t just rename the character...?) on which the game is loosely based. He commits several sins in his while he is out fighting with the others, chief among them the act of adultery. This mistake causes his wife Beatrice to be killed, and her soul to be condemned to Hell.…
Bioshock Infinite has some massively large shoes to fill. When the original Bioshock came out, it was talked about for months afterward. People fell in love with Rapture and the meticulous level of detail found within. It contained one of the coolest twists in a game to date (even though it was pretty much identical to the one from System Shock 2…). The gameplay elements weren’t as sharp as they could have been, but…
The Tomb Raider franchise has been all over the place in the decade and a half since it began. The first three games were quite loved, but soon the quality started to decline and followers began to drop off. A reboot, Angel of Darkness, was meant to start a new trilogy but failed to entice customers. Crystal Dynamics was passed the torch, and they began a new trilogy. These games were well-received, but Crystal…
Silent Hill is one of the granddaddies of horror gaming. It created a now-infamous town that brings out the worst side of people; a place where the true horrors are the psychological ones, not the creatures that wander the foggy streets. Many will cite the second game in the series as their favorite survival-horror game of all time, a true masterpiece of psychological horror. In more recent years, the Silent Hill…
This really isn’t a review of Persona 4 Golden. I’m not going to talk about the gameplay systems or the story or any of that. It’s been done before, by writers much more skilled than me. Instead, what I wanted to do was mention some of the new features in Golden, and why they make the game so much better, as a HUGE fan of the series. It may not be much of a review, but I still feel it is worth writing about.…
Team Silent was the devleoper behind Silent Hill 1-4. They created some of the most memorable horror experiences for the Playstation 2 era. Silent Hill 2, in particular, is seen a masterpiece by many fans of horror gaming. This is why it seemed particularly odd when Konami decided to have a Western studio, Double Helix, create the next game in the franchise. It wasn’t the first, preceded by Silent Hill: Origins on…
Gravity Rush was the exclusive Vita game I was most excited about for when I inevitably picked mine up. All the screenshots looked absolutely gorgeous and the gravity-shifiting mechanics sounded really cool. It wasn’t quite enough to get me to buy a system, but it was close. It was one of the first games I picked up and played (through Playstation Plus, graciously from Sony), and my interest level going in was much…
Uncharted was the clear-cut “best new franchise” winner on the Playstation 3, so it isn’t very surprising that Sony wanted a version of the game to frontline its new Vita handheld system. The worries for such a game were quite large. Could it match the spectacle of the full-fledged console games? Would the new console be able to replicate the shooting experience? Is the frame rate going to be complete shit? Sony…
Read the full review Plays Great but Doesn't Quite Match the Spectacle
Halo 4 has a hard job. It has to convince us that a new trilogy of games is worth it. It also has to make us want to play yet another Halo game on the Xbox 360 hardware, even though waiting probably would have been a better idea. Most importantly, it has to convince us that 343 Industries is a worthy successor to the mantle that Bungie passed onto them. Not only did they manage to make a game that feels…
A soldier named Big Bo. A French speaking robot. Robots that look like humans that don’t actually know they are robots. These are a few of the crazy things you can find in Binary Domain. It’s a Japanese take on the Western third-person shooter that actually manages to play well while keeping that insanity we love. You take control of a US soldier named Dan Marshall. He is part of a Rust Crew, task forces employed to…
The first Saints Row game was seen by many as a blatant rip-off of the Grand Theft Auto series. Volition took the open-world format that was made popular by the PS2 Grand Theft Autos and created a fairly decent clone. Sure, it was heavily inspired by the series but it played well enough to satisfy gamers waiting for the next GTA game. Grand Theft Auto IV and Saints Row 2 came out in the same year and it was at this…
Suda51 is fucking crazy. If you’ve played any one of his games, you know that he comes up with the most random but creative gameplay scenarios in video games today. Unfortunately, those creative ideas usually come with a bit of iffy gameplay, proving that you can’t be a jack of all trades in the gaming industry. When he announced Shadows of the Damned a few years ago and said that Shinji Mikami would be onboard as…
Alice: Madness Returns poses an interesting question – what if the titular character from Alice in Wonderland had mental problems and those mental problems warped the very essence of what Wonderland was? Would such a fantastical place retain its original form or would it be warped into something barely recognizable? Of course, this very question is answered in both this game and the original from 2000, showing a…
