Game Reviews

Everything is True. Nothing is Permitted.

HIGH Swimming around a pier, climbing a ship, and using a rope dart to hang a target from a yardarm.

LOW As I walk past two men on a bench, I get notified that I have my first pursuer. The whisper noise starts just as one of them gets up and stabs me for 700 points.

WTF Approaching a fort, I found I could no longer hide in shrubs even though I wasn't observed. When I reached the captain, I found only an indicator hanging in the air, without a body to stab beneath it.

Don't Lose the Beat

HIGH When everything comes together, it's transcendent.

LOW Struggling to find the beat in Stage 10's godawful boss track.

WTF An experimental game like this should cost less...

Duckwalk Supreme

HIGH A handful of missions have the genuine "Hitman" feel.

LOW The ill-conceived "Shaving Lenny" level.

WTF What numerically-impaired person numbered these chapters?

Splat!

HIGH Ooh, a fish! Ooh, so not a fish!

LOW Fumbling in the darkness of the forest.

WTF A talking hippo?

Make Mine a Double

HIGH The sense of style is pitch perfect throughout.

LOW No online co-op.

WTF There's no way in hell that Skullmageddon earned his helicopter pilot's license.

In general, I'm not a big fan of video game novelizations. Most titles I play through satisfy my curiosity about their stories and characters via the normal cut-scenes and dialogue, but once in a while I want to know more. With its unorthodox mixture of high-tech, magic, and a fetish for impossible armor, the Infinity Blade series produced by Epic Games and ChAIR is one such property.

The End

HIGH The walkie-talkie resolution wasn't a total disaster.

LOW The conflict in the final scene felt too staged.

WTF Where's the obvious dialogue option in the alley?

Bad Girls

HIGH "Time to find allies... The story of my life."

LOW Coming back to Mass Effect 3 for pre-ending DLC felt more than strange.

WTF Where the hell was Aria's couch?

A Year in the Life of Horny, Magical Teenagers

HIGH The Mystery Gang mocking their own corny "Persona!" cries while plastered.

LOW Cut-and-paste dungeons.

WTF Marie's "poetry."

How to Lose with a Straight Flush

HIGH The gameplay is solid for a portable FPS.

LOW Finishing the single-player modes in less than an hour.

WTF This could have been good, had everything not gone horribly wrong