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toolzz360's Reviews
Toolzz360
dead space is scary
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Battle of the Bands is a different take on the music rhythm game genre that is full of guitar hero's and sing stars. With that said the game may be interesting to you at first but after you start the second song the game will become very boring. The formula used in the gameplay is good, but honestly how fun can moving the WII remote left, right, and down be. The answer is that it cannot be much fun at all.
The concept behind Battle of The Bands was what I expressed earlier. The player moves the WII remote in a certain way to the beat of the music. The notes scroll up rather than down like most music games. There are also not a lot of notes even on the hard difficulty, and this game was definitely made with the casual gamer in mind. There are 30 songs in the game, which exceeded my expectations, but the choice of songs is horrible. You start the game by picking one of the handful of bands in the game. Each band has a different style, and there are rock bands, marching bands, rap groups, classical groups, and funk bands. These different playable styles are the highlights of the game. The game progress through the songs from there in a linear fashion and the game will only last about 4 hours. Besides bad gameplay the game also has bad graphics. That is expected at this point for wii shovelware so im not going to mark the game down for that. Im glad I rented this instead of buying it, and I cannot recommend it to anyone. 
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Compliments: -Funnest Sports game to play -Awesome graphics and commentary -Hundreds of hours of depth and gameplay -Every playable team you could imagine Complaints: -Sometimes spotty AI especially with goalies Fifa 08 is a fantastic entry in the series and is as close as you can get to a perfect soccer game. There was a point when Winning Eleven owned the soccer video game genre, but once the current generation hit Fifa has passed Winning Eleven as the best soccer franchise. Fifa 08 is the first true fifa game for the 360, and it lives up to all the hype. The first reason why I love this game is because it is downright fun. This is the most fun I have had playing nearly any game of all genres. I have spent countless hours playing fifa 08, and there was not a dull moment. You can easily play this game for 500 hours if you wanted to. There are many features in the game that make it a great title. The biggest draw is the incredibly deep manager mode where you can play as your favorite team or select a bad team and rebuild them to a powerhouse. On the management side there is a lot to do from scouting to managing finances and players As your team gains experience on the pitch you can upgrade the stats of your players. Fifa 08 also has a great online component with ranked matches, interactive leagues, and even be a pro mode. Be a Pro mode is when you only control one player while keeping the right positioning on the pitch. This mode is fun to play and truly tests your footy skills. The only disappointing game modes are the online leagues in which it is almost impossible to set up and find a player for a league game. The graphics and commentary in Fifa 08 are outstanding and can not be beat by any other sports game. The player models are outstanding and there are no graphical hiccups to be found anywhere in the game. The same can be said for the commentary as Andy Grey and Martin Taylor provide great voice work. The game also features a wide variety of music tracks for load screens and menu navigation. Overall Fifa 08 is one of my favorite games. I could easily play this over and over again and it never gets boring. Pick it up now, and look out for fifa 09 in October.
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Compliments: -Looks great -Good for hardcore KH fans -Combat system works Complaints: -Grinding to find the right cards is horrible -Same game done again -Very short I was expecting a lot more out of Kingdom Hearts Chain of Memories, but as the game progressed the more i grew to hate it. KH Chain of Memories takes the 1st version of the game for the PS2 and remakes it using a different combat system and a different story surrounding memories from the first game. All the same characters and levels return, but the levels are scaled downed to GBA size. The levels look very good, but they are very small and are easy to pass through. The biggest flaw with the game involved with level design is that each door opens with a card with a certain number on it. For example, the door to advance to the next room will only open if you have a card with a 2 or less of value. The flaw here is that as you advance you will never have the cards you need and you will have to grind through boring battles for hours in order to find the ones you need. After every battle you get a card that can be used to open doors. I hated this part of the game and really brought down my fun with the game. The story here revolves around a castle where Sora and his allies enter in order to restore their memories of the events from the first PS2 game. Other than the memory twist the story is the same as the ps2 version just scaled down to one tenth the size. The story was serviceable, but long text dialog will take up most of your time playing in the game. Battles are fought in this game also using a card system, and you must build your decks a la yu-gi-oh or other games of that nature. The combat works, but eventually you will get bored with it. The graphics and music in the game are both great. The music is authentic to the first game, and the graphics are vibrant and bright, even though the levels look like cardboard cutouts. Overall I really enjoyed this game in the beginning, but as I progressed I grew to hate this game. I would only recommend it to true Kingdom Hearts fans.
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Compliments:
-Four Games In One -Fantastic Visuals -Almost Perfect Difficulty Level -Possibly The Best Multiplayer Game Complaints: -Hefty Price Tag -Some Hardware Issues -Band World Tour Can Get Insanely Repetitive Rock band developed by Harmonix and published by EA is the best music game to date. The now long running Guitar Hero franchise taught us that basics of rocking, but rock band ascends that and gives players a whole band experience. Rock band not only features guitar, but also bass guitar, drums, and vocals. Essentially 4 games in one when playing rock band you are sure to find something you like. The main mode of play in rock band is the band world tour. Here you and up to 4 other friends can rock out over a career that surpasses 30+ hours of gameplay. Your band travels around the world completing gigs that sometimes can contain 13 songs or more per gig, sometimes resulting in rock band marathon sessions. There is also an endless setlist to complete but beware it will equal 6 hours of playing straight without saving, and in all likelihood causing headaches and seizures. There are hundreds of songs to play in band world tour, but this is the problem with it. You will no doubt play "Say It Ain't So" and "In Bloom" at least 25-50 times each along with many other songs. Getting near the end of band world tour felt like a grind and took some fun out of the game. Besides the band world tour there are solo tours for each of the instruments except bass. The tours are similar to that of guitar hero, and you just play every song broken up into tiers. With four difficulties and 4 instruments combined with the band world tour there is a lot of depth here, but beware the game will get boring. Two other problems with the game are faulty hardware and a hefty price tag. When I first bought rock band I had to return it to the store that same day due to a broken guitar and microphone. The second package I got has been much better and all of the instruments still play great to this day, but they surly are not built with durability in mind. The second complaint is that the game will put a hefty dent in your wallet due to a retail price of 169.99$. You can buy the game and instruments separate, but it is cheaper to just get the packaged deal. Overall Rock Band is my favorite music game and will keep you occupied for a long time thanks to a lot of depth and download content.
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Compliments: - Very cool concept and design - Sometimes good graphics Complaints: -Horrible Control Scheme -Very Short game made terribly longer by bad boss fights and some extremely difficult sections -Only a handful of the 50 mini games are even worth attempting Super Monkey Ball Banana Blitz offered a little fun at first but from the first minute you play the quality will spiral downhill until you can not take it anymore. Super Monkey Ball is often hailed as being a game that uses the wii controller to its fullest potential, but I could not understand how someone would even think that after playing the game. It seems like the wii remote would be a good fit for this type of game, but it simply does not have enough precision to accurately guide your monkey across the courses. You will find yourself moving the wii remote crazily just to keep your monkey on a somewhat straight path. You will also find that the controls often times cause you to fall off the course or miss hitting a boss. The single player portion of the game has the player going through 8 stages with 8 levels and a boss fight and each stage. This at first may seem like a solid length for a game but each level in a stage will only take you a max of 2 minutes to complete. The overall length for all of the stages is about 4-6 hours depending how good you are, but a few tough stages and boss fights will take up most of that time and it feels like the game should be 2-3 hours in length. The concept and some of the level designs are good but the stages are very difficult made even harder by wonky controls. The second aspect of the game is the multiplayer mode which consists of 50 party games(the wii is the king of party games). Some of the games are very good such as monkey disc golf and paper sumo fighter but a good 40 out of the 50 games are just terrible and also have horrible control options. The graphics and sound offer nothing extraordinary, but some of the stages look very cool. Overall I cannot recommend buying this game at all.
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Elite Beat Agents is a blast to play but there are a few things that really bothered me in this game and really took down the game. The game overall is fairly simple to play. The player taps along with the beat using the stylus on the touch screen and there are only three types of notes to perform. The note you will see the most is just taping a small numbered circle when the bigger outer circle makes contact with it. In a series of notes they will be the same color and hitting them all perfectly in the right order creates a nice combo. The second type of note is the rolling ball note where you must first tap the note and then keep the stylus on a rolling ball that will be laid out in a track. It is kinda like the long notes in a guitar hero game. The last type of note is just a wheel you must spin as fast as possible using the stylus. More note variety would have improved the game a little. Since this is a music rhythm game I would expect there would actually be more tracks and better quality tracks. Some of the songs are great such as Skater Boi(yes I am a big Avril fan) and Jumpin Jack Flash, but overall the soundtrack could have been 10 times better. What really sucks is that there is only 19 tracks in all which is really lame for a music game even if it is for the ds. The audio quality was great but I was still disappointed in the music. The biggest complaint I had about this game was the random ending difficulty and the shortness of the game. I was able to completely beat the game in 4 and a half hours, but the last song took me three of those hours, and the rest of the game only took and hour and a half. I passed every song with flying colors until the last song which took me a good 50 tries or so. What a cheap way to make an extremely short game longer by making an incredibly hard ending song or boss fight. I hate games that do that and in all honesty this game should have only been 2 hours long which is ridiculous. The different stories told in the game are in cool anime cut scenes but the actual stories are horrible. Overall the gameplay is fun but the game is shallow and at times insanely difficult.
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Mario and Sonic at the Olympics was a pleasant surprise for me and the game is vastly underrated. In the game you will play as one of 16 characters from the Mario and Sonic universe traversing throughout a number of different real life Olympic events. Some of the events the game features are 100m dash, 400m hurdles, Javelin Throw, swimming and diving, fencing, basketball, and many more events. In total there are around 20 or so events including a few dream events. The dream events are altered versions of the Olympic Games which hold suit with Mario and Sonic. In one event Dream Long Jump the game has your character jumping off of a cliff and soaring through the air and then landing on an Island. The variety in the events is very good, but I did not like the dream events too much. Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Games shines in the control department as the games are fun and for the most part easy to pick up and play. Some of the games such as Long Jump and Vaulting will take some time to get use to but for the most part the controls are right on. In the running events you just rub the stylus on the screen as fast as you can to run the coarse. The same basic controls apply to swimming. In the diving event you must enter button combinations to perform tricks and must hit the water at the perfect angle using the 4 face buttons on the ds. In shooting events you use the stylus to aim your shot, and in some events you use the L or R buttons to fire or you simply use the stylus. Most of the other events use the stylus controls and before you play each event the game shows you the controls making each game a little easier to pick up and play. The graphics and sound in the game are both pretty good but there is nothing really outstanding. Some of the character models while playing table tennis looked blotchy and rough, mainly since you are looking right at the top of their head, but other then that the graphics are serviceable. The music in the game isn't outstanding either but there are some good sound effects while the events are being played. Overall Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Games surpassed my expectations and was a fun game to play. There is a chance you could find this game near bargain bins so I would advice to pick the game up and give it a shot for around 20$. You will find that there is a staggering amount of depth to be offered in the form of the different events and hundreds of unlockables.
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Metal Gear Solid was Hideo Kojima's first shot at the metal gear franchise, and his first attempt was a masterpiece.
Metal Gear Solid takes place on a terrorist military base where a super nuclear weapon, metal gear, is being held by the terrorists. It is up to Solid Snake to shake off the many plot twists along the way and save the world. The story in MGS is possibly one of the best ever written for a video game, especially a playstation 1 game. The cut scenes in the game are pretty lengthy, and the voice work is perfect making for a movie like experience. The gameplay in MGS involves sneaking past genome soldiers and upgrading snake's keycard to access higher security doors. Along the way are some tricky boss fights, which are all memorable and some of the best in any game. All the encounters in the game with bosses and regular soldiers are tense and will keep the player on the edge of their seat. One of the few problems I had with the game was the somewhat suspect control scheme. The square button is used to fire weapons, and I plainly was just not use to that(never owned a ps1). The circle button as the action button was a little confusing also, and it felt awkward using the control pad to move. The biggest complaint I had was the difficulty of aiming the guns so they actually hit someone. The sometimes frustrating difficulty of the game was my only other complaint. The graphics in the game are good, but they are not great. At some points I felt like I was playing a ps2 game, but at other points I felt like I was indeed playing a ps1 game. The background and area graphics are great with rich textures, but the character models are horrible, even for a ps1 game. Because of the quality of teh game the suspect graphics dont even play a part in scoring the game. As mentioned earlier the sound in the game is A+, mostly led by superb voice acting and sound effects. Overall I really enjoyed playing MGS, and I will go back and play it again. I got this as part of the essentials collection, which may possibly be the best gaming deal ever. If you do not own the collection go out and get it now!!
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Dragon Quest Heroes Rocket Slime is just one of the few rip-offs of the
Dragon Quest Series. You play as Rocket Slime who is in charge of
saving the city of Slimania after the Plob invades. The player, while
battling the plob, will have to save 100 residents of the city.
At its core there are only two gameplay mechanics to the game. The first part is on foot combat and platforming. It is here where you will find most of the slimes the player needs to rescue. The combat consists of power bashing into enemies and boxes which in turn hold the slimes that need to be rescued. The parts of the game when on foot were the funnest part of the game, and collecting 100 slimes isn't nearly as bad of a task as it sounds. The second part of the gameplay consist of tank battles. For the battles all the player does is collect ammo from around your tank and throw them into cannons to shoot at enemy tanks. Once a tank is defeated the player has to get out of their tank and bust the heart open of the defeated tank. It might sound cool, but the tank battles where the worst part of the game, and believe me, you will run into plenty of them along the way. The tank the player uses can be upgraded and supplied with better ammo, and even helpers can join in battle. Rocket Slime really shines in the graphical and sound departments. The graphics are very good for the nintendo ds, and the colors are very bright and vibrant. This helps create a world in which the player can immerse themselves in. The quirky music will also grab your attention, and that only problem with that is the music will eventually eat out your ears. Overall I found Rocket Slime to be good and worthy of a play through, but the game is not deep at all and can be finished within 10 hours. I got the game for 10$ and I would say it is definitively worth a shot at that price.
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Gameplay-
The game on the court plays okay. The a.i is pretty good and their are many difficulty levels to experience. One thing I did not like was the layup system. I couldn't drive to the hoop to often as when contact was made with a opposing player you just stop and loose all momentum. The players cannot also do a simple layup they try to make flashy shots which often doesn't work. The legacy mode is fantastic and has many options. It is one of the best modes in any sports game. You can either start with a low level team or jump right into a big time school. The game also has the other common sports game modes. 7/10 Graphics- The graphics are fairly good, and are very good for an early 360 title. The player models, crowds, and coaches are all done well. 8/10 Sound- The sound is just like any sports game. The commentary is good but it is not the best. 7/10 Value- I rented this game nut it does offer a ton of replayability with the immense legacy mode. I would say it is worth a buy for under 10 dollars since it is an older game. This game made me decide to purchase 2k7 so I guess it is still worth a buy if you dont want to spend the extra few bucks for 2K7. 9/10 Tilt- This game has both good moments and bad moments. 7/10 Score 7.6 rounded down to 7.5
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Gameplay:
Blazing Angels is a good flying/air combat game. The single player campaign is good. It will take about 15 hours to finish, but it does get repetitive. The other modes are arcade, ace duel, and multiplayer. The arcade and ace duel modes are pretty boring. The game is repetative, but I liked what the gameplay was that it didn't bother me too much. You will be shooting down planes, bombing ground locations, and doing some other stuff like taking photos. The achievments for are pretty tough. 8/10 Graphics: I loved the graphics for this game. The areas are vast and you can see a lot in the distance. I thought that the graphics were really stunning on my hdtv, and they were also pretty good on a standard tv. The planes all looked great. 9/10 Sound; The sound in this game is horrible. The voice acting is terrible and your fellow pilots always say the same couple corny catchphrases. The fighting and the planes sound pretty good. 4/10 Value: I rented this game and I probally wouldn't buy if it was 30 dollars. I would only buy this if it was under 15 bucks. Their really isn't any replay value. 6/10 Tilt: Overall I had a good time with this game and I played for like 25 hours. I got all of the achievments and that pleases me. I think it is the best air combat game out for the 360. 7/10 Score=6.8 rounded to 7.0
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Top Spin 2 published by 2K is a tennis game which features many of today's top tennis professionals.
Gameplay: At its core tennis is a slow paced game, and it can be hard for non tennis fans to play tennis video games because of this. Therefore, if you have any interest in tennis or want to know more about the sport this game is for you. The controls for the game are simple, simple to the point where almost anybody can pick up and play. I found myself perfect with the controls even after not playing for a month. Easy controls are a plus in my book because it introduces gaming to non-gamers, but I like tough games and controls. Different shots are mapped to the face buttons: Y is a lob, B is topspin, X is a slice, and A is a safe shot. The Left and right triggers can be pulled to perform risk or specials shots, and for the most part they are challenging and rewarding when one is successfully pulled off. Serving also uses the same buttons. The on the court action is a perfect representation of the game of tennis. Any tennis fan and gamer would love this game. Personally it is the best tennis game on the market, but I have yet to play virtua tennis. The game features a number of pro tennis players including Sharapova, Roddick, Federer, and Henman. The modes in the game are exhibition, career, and xbox live play. The exhibition mode is where you can customize match settings and play against the computer or friends. The meat of the game is the career mode. You start off by creating a player using a good player creation system, and you also get to dress your character. Before you start playing you also need to sign a sponsor. The career consists of 5 years of play, and each year covers many months of the season. Each week you have three options. You can train your player, play in a tournament, or play in a special event. When you start out your career the only options are to train your player. The training system is terrific. You can choose what skills to work on and you play fun minigames to build up those skills. Your skill progression is based on stars, and you can get bronze, silver, and gold stars. After a few weeks of training you will be able to participate in minor tournaments. There are four types of tournaments: minors, majors, masters, and slams. You have to progress your ranking from minor tournaments in order to compete in the other tournaments. The career progression is fun and very rewarding as you can easily see how much your player has developed. By winning tournaments you increase your rank, win cash, and strive towards the goal of becoming the number one player. It took me a little over 28 hours to progress through the career. Xbox live is ok, but not many people are playing because this is an older game. A lot of the people playing are highly skilled and the average player would get crushed. There is enough game here where you don't have to play online at all. Some complaints I have about the gameplay are that the game is too easy, and it can get extremely boring. The game only has one difficulty in the career mode and I found it very easy. Near the end of the career I was pounding even the best players and sometimes not even allowing them to score one point. The game can also get extremely boring as I feel the career mode can drag on at some points and the competition is weak. This really brings the game down for me. I am a tennis fan(I follow the big tournaments) yet I still found it overly boring. I can take it for what it is because tennis is generally boring. Gameplay: 6 out of 10 Graphics Simply put the graphics are stunning. I couldn't believe how this game looked in HD and it is still pretty good in SD. The environments and colors are so vibrant; it is simply amazing to look at. Granted there isn't much going on but it is still an accomplishment. From what I played there really weren't any issues with clipping or collision detection. The player animations are very smooth and it really looks like you are watching a tennis game. This game is worth checking out just for the graphics. Graphics: 9 out of 10 Presentation The presentation is great in this game. This is mainly due to the fact that it is very authentic. The only voice you hear is the PA announcer calling out the score during the match. There are no commentators at all which is a good thing. The in game menus are also good, and the career is presented very well. Presentation: 8 out of 10 Sound The sound in the game is good. There isn't much going on besides sound effects on the court and from the PA. Sound: 7 out of 10 Lasting Appeal/Value Because of the long career mode there is a lot of value to this game. Also the game now comes free with some 360's. The only thing which might shorten the value and did for me was the boringness of the game. I would recommend picking this game up if you can afford to spend 25$ for. I got mine free with my 360. LA/Value: 7 out of 10 Overall: 7.6 out of 10: rounded to 7.5
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The simpsons game published by EA at its core can be a fun a game.
Gameplay The single player campaign is pretty good. The story in the game is top notch and really displays the work of great writers working behind the scene. Not only is it origional simpsons material, but it is also geniunly funny. One of the greates quotes in any game appears in the simpsons game "Flava Flav whats up with the clock. The controls for the game are also simple which is a good thing. Each of the charecters have different abilities which use different controls, but the buttons you will be using the most are X...B...and The Right Trigger. Overall the control sceme is good. What disapoints me about this game is that the gameplay itself is quite bad. The camera control is horrible and really gets in the way of the game. Some of the overal mechanics such as jumping, combat, and each charecters special abilities can be frustrating and you will find yourself doing basic things over and over again when your charecter doesnt want to move or jump right. On the first playthrough of the game you will probally not really notice these flaws too much because of the strong storyline. On my 2nd playthrough the flaws became very apparent and I could barely finish it again. The game is also insanely easy with the last boss fight being a joke. Besides the basic story there are also a few othe rthings to do. The actual campaign will last 6-8 hours depending on how good you are. The extras that come with teh game do add replayability and are somewhat enjoyable. In every level there are different things to collect for each charecter which unlocks trophies. getting every collectable and video game cliche can be very tedious, especially in springfield where there are 75 collectables for each charecter to get. I did mange to find everyone. You can also replay the missions in time trial form, and these are both fun and rewarding alon with soem being very difficult. There Is no xboxlive for this game, and coop story should have been on xbl. The achievment difficulty is a 8/10 for me because some are really tough. Gameplay: 6/10 Graphics: The graphics and art style is very good, and it does a great job of capturing the simpsons atmosphere. All of this is steady as there are no technical issues such as framerate drops or graphical glitches. I really enjoyed teh style this game had to offer. Graphics 9/10 Presentation: The Presentation is also very slick and easily manuverable menues. This kind of goes hand in hand with graphics. The HUD when playing is very good but is standard fare Presentation 7/10 Sound: The sound is excellent. The origional simpson charecter voices are all here, and soem of the background voices such as in the Muesuem level are downright hilarious. The sound really helps create an atmosphere around the game. This cannot be said for many games. Sound 9/10 Lasting Appeal Like I said teh core game will only take about 7 hours, but I ended up acculmilating 23 Hours just by doing teh time trials and collecting everything. I rented this form gamefly, and I would say to definetly rent the game with a buy only if you could get it for 19.99 somewhere down the road. LA 6/10 Overal if the story hadnt been as good as it was this game would get a 5-6...but teh story does save it 7.4 rounded to 7.5
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Mario Party 8 published by Nintendo for the WII is a game which offers fun while it lasts.
Gameplay: Mario Party 8 is based on the same premise as previous titles in the series. The player takes control of one of the popular characters from the Mario universe and plays through board game levels full of mini games and surprises. Similar to previous titles Mario Party 8 offers the most fun when played with others, and there are numerous ways to do just that. The main mode of play is battle mode where up to four human controlled players can partake in board game antics. The rest of the open spots are filled in with computer controlled AI. The goal for each board is to collect the most stars. Stars are collected differently on each of the six boards, and bonus stars are also awarded at the end of the game. The second multiplayer option are the duel boards which take the same boards and shorten them. There are no computer controlled players, and this is my preferred mode of play. The only downside is that mini games are only triggered when landing on a designated space, and it is possible to play a round without a mini game. Other multiplayer options include games based on tic tac toe and tile control using min game performance for awarding players. A major flaw in the multiplayer aspect of the game is that there is no online play, but Nintendo can be forgiven because the WII is still in its early stages. The single player experience pit's the player against an opponent on each duel board, and in order to advance the player must defeat them. This mode will provide the player with a few hour of fun since that is how long it lasts. The strategic player can get through it easily in 3-4 hours. The game tries to reward players for playing often in the form of carnival cards which can be redeemed for unlikable. The only things noteworthy of being unlocked are the harder difficulty and the mini games. Other than that collecting the cards is a complete waste of time. The single player experience really falls short. The meat of the gameplay are the mini games. There are a lot of them and some will still not be discovered after hours of playing. The games really shine when the WII motion controls are put to use, but not every game uses them. Only a select number of games take advantage of the motion controls which is disappointing. There is a lot of variety in the games, but Nintendo still could have spent a little more effort with them. Gameplay: 6 out of 10 Graphics: One of the areas of the game which really surprised me was the graphics. Some of the graphics have been horrible for WII games, but I was surprised to see the graphics in Mario Party 8 were good. There isn't much to display, but what is displayed looks good. There are no bugs or glitches in the game which is great since many games released come with loads of them. The game doesn't support widescreen which isn't a big issue but could get annoying. Graphics: 8 out of 10 Presentation: Similar to the graphics department the presentation in Mario Party 8 is very good. The menu design is slick and the mechanics of the game are very good. This is one of the best presented WII games. Presentation: 8 out of 10 Sound: The sound in the game is also good, but some of the music gets repetitive and boring over time. Each of the characters make their unique sounds, and the music holds true with the party aspect of the game. Sound: 7 out of 10 Lasting Appeal/Value The major component of a game I look for is a great single player experience, with online multiplayer my second option. Mario Party 8 offers virtually none of that which knocks it down a few notches. The multiplayer is very good and will last a while, but that alone could not sell me this game. The game retails for 49.99$ and can be found used for 39.99$. I wouldn't purchase this game unless it was under 25$ or if you really want a good party game. LA/Value: 6 out of 10 Overall: 6.6 out of 10 rounded to 6.5
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Audiosurf developed by Best Game Ever Studios and found on the Steam
download service is a visually enthralling game that will send your
mind into chaos. Audiosurf combines rhythm and puzzle games into a
hybrid that is fun and addicting. The premise is to pilot one of many
spaceships' and crash into colored blocks to make color combos. The
more blocks you can string together the bigger the combo and more
points will be accumulated. Audiosurf takes any music track on your
computer and analyzes it into a set track where the environment changes
with the beats of the music. It sounds simple and for the most part it
is simple. The game takes your selected song and turns it into a set
roller coaster path, and if the song is intense enough the track will
twist and turn all over the place. The first time this happened I sat
there and said out loud, "Holy **** Audiosurf gives the player hundreds
of options from different characters to different variations of play.
The game features more than 12 characters divided into three levels of
play: beginner, pro, and elite. There is also an ironmode that ramps up
the difficulty even further. The game can be as easy or difficult as
the player wants, but even when the levels are difficult the game
remains a blast to play. With different characters come different types
of play. The mono characters have to crash into the color blocks while
avoiding the grey blocks. The other characters have to match different
colors together to match three or more blocks. The mono characters were
the most fun to play because of their simplicity; the other characters
can become frustrating due to trying to match three of the same color.
As you get into elite and ironmode the number of colors increase from 3
possible matches to 6 different colors. The game grades your
performance and you can achieve bronze, silver, and gold medals. Also
after every song the score the player gets is uploaded and you can
instantly see how you stack up against players from the world, your
country, and even your state. Audiosurf is one of the best looking
games of the year. The crazy colors and the way the backgrounds pulsate
will cause your eyes to go numb from pure pleasure. Even on my crappy
laptop computer the visuals were stunning and breathtaking. I cannot
stress enough how visually pleasing Audiosurf is, and it is a new way
to listen to your favorite music. Audiosurf automatically imports all
of the music files on your computer and in five seconds you can have
your song selected and ready to go. The user interface is easy to use
and the load times are nothing even though the engine analyzes the song
to create the track. With all of the modes of play, unique characters,
and depending on the amount of music you have on your computer you
could be playing Audiosurf for months if not years. The game also comes
with the complete Orange Box soundtrack by Valve and the songs on the
soundtrack are all great to play with Audiosurf, especially "Still
Alive" from Portal. WOW! Audiosurf only costs 9.95$ and comes with a
soundtrack that could easily retail for 30$. Audiosurf is a fantastic
buy and its low price and high levels of stimulation and replayability
will keep any consumer happy. Stop reading this and go buy this game
NOW! (It can be bought off of Steam).
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The Club is a fast paced shooter that provides much needed variety to a
sometimes old shooting genre. Developed by Bizarre Creations (Project
Gotham Racing) The Club is an arcade shooter with elements of a racing
game molded into one package. The Club itself is a secret organization
that buys abandoned buildings and structures to set up a gauntlet
competition for its members to compete in. That's it for the story;
that's how deep it gets, but in this case no story is a good thing. The
single player structure has the player take one of eight cool
characters through eight tournaments with each being in a different
location. For each tournament there are six to eight levels that only
span a few minutes each. There are a few different event variations
including sprint (just getting to the end of a level), time attack
(completing laps around a course), and survival (staying in a zone and
holding off the enemies). The single player can be completed in 3-4
hours, but The Club encourages replayability. Some may find playing
through the tournaments multiple times as boring or tedious, but most
players including myself have discovered a lot of depth by replaying
levels. There are four difficulties, and the two highest difficulties
are very hard and are meant for the hardcore gamer. On the other hand
the easiest, casual, is really easy and doesn't offer too much of a
challenge but is still great for noobs. Upon first impression the
single player structure turned me off a little, but it turned out to be
a lot of fun. The characters in The Club also provide depth as they are
all fun to play as and have some differences in terms of skills and
stats. The characters are graded in stats such as strength, stamina,
and speed. The differences are not vast, but they offer enough depth to
play as each one. The controls are also very tight and very easy to
use. Fire is controlled by pressing the right trigger, the player can
use precise aim by holding the left trigger, and the player can spring
by pressing the right bumper. These are the controls that will be used
most often.
The shooting action in The Club is not for the faint of heart. This is the most action packed shooter I have played on next-gen consoles and any action fan will greatly appreciate this game. It is insanely thrilling to chain head shots together and make enemies beg for mercy. Each kill acts as a combo multiplayer and the overall outcome of the level is based on how many points the player scores using these combos. The guns in the game are average at best and they do not have names. They are just the basic pistol, shotgun, rifle, and sub-machine guns. The guns do sound pretty good, and are all fun to use when racking up kills. The online portion of the game is pretty broken and only provides minimal fun. Some of the team modes such as team fox hunt and team siege are cool ideas, but the overall mechanics are tough to grasp. First off, it takes many shots to take down someone else online, or if you land a headshot one shot. This just doesn't make sense. If you are playing someone good you can pound them with bullets and still die from one lucky headshot. Other modes of play include the standard deathmatch and team deathmatch. I would not buy this game for multiplayer, and the single player is easily twice as good as the multiplayer. The graphics and sound are good, but they definitely are not the best the 360 or Ps3 can do. The characters look much better than the environments. The characters are very colorful and distinct, while the environments are pretty basic and bland looking. The enemies look pretty good. The character models often times pop up over and over again, but the player can barely notice due to the quickness of the game. As stated earlier the guns sound good, but other than that there aren't many sounds in the game. What is very cool is the beginning of each level where the typical Sega arcade narrator yells FIGHT! Overall The Club is a pretty good game especially if you are looking for non stop action and can live with the possibility the game might get a little boring. I personally haven't experienced the boredom with the game but time will tell. The game can be found for about 30$ used, but I would wait to purchase until the game drops in price to 20-25$, which will happen because this game is flying under the radar. The game might even be a full 60$ purchase for those who love fast paced shooting games. As a not for achievement hoars the game will offer a fairly easy 500-650 points, but after that the rest are very difficult to achieve. A good 500 points can be obtained in 6 hours or so.
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This is a quick review of Fight Night Round 3 Published by EA and Developed by EA Chicago.
Gameplay: Fight Night Round 3 at first glance appears to be a very sim like boxing game but the game ended up being kind of easy. I was playing on the medium difficulty and ran into a few difficult bouts but I breezed by the career mode in about 8 hours of play, also unlocking all 1000 ach. points. There is a lack of customization and options in the career. You basically train then fight then do it all over again. I couldn't find much depth in the game and it got pretty boring and repetitive near the end of the career. The controls in the game are the best part of the gameplay, with almost all of the punching done with the right control stick. I found it pretty awkward doing this at first but it is easy to get use to. Despite this i ended up pounding the a button most often to keep delivering special strong punches. Graphics/Sound: FNRD3 really shines in the graphical department and still offers one of the best graphical experiences to this day. The sound is also very good with great music, good commentary, and most importantly great sound effects especially when punching hard. I was disappointed with this game. I was expecting great graphics and gameplay, but the graphics were the only part that lived up to that expectation. I would only recommend buying this game after a rental or only spending 15-20$ or so on it. I rented the game and dont plan on buying it anytime soon.
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The Bigs developed and published by 2k sports continues the trend of 2k
delivering high quality sports games. The Bigs is a different game than
anything else that 2k has published, and they did a fantastic job.
The overall gameplay is both arcade style and sim style. The game is fairly easy which adds to its arcade appeal, and the player can hop right into the game and have a fun time. The game is classified as arcade due to a few gameplay differences than a mlb 2k game. First is that after every good play a power meter fills up and when full the player can unleash a devastating home run power blast or a super fastball. The player can also make wall climbing catches and barrel into home plate based on their performance in short button mashing mini-games. The game is also part sim due to the precision of making a perfect pitch and hitting the ball with the right timing. The main career mode in the game is known as rookie challenge. Here you will create a player and customize his abilities. After creating a player you must pass a few spring training challenges. After that the players team will travel across the united states playing other teams and also completing certain objectives in games. For instance a three game series against lets say the St Louis Cardinals would consist of three objectives: Game 1: Beat the Cardinals in a 5 inning game Game 2: Hit 2 HomeRuns with your rookie in a 9 inning game Game 3: Throw 5 strikeouts with your team in a 5 inning game I was surprised at the depth and length the career had to offer with one playthrough lasting about 18 hours. The graphics in the Bigs are very good, but I do not think they are as good as the regular mlb 2k games. The big draw here is the amazing lighting effects during daytime games and some neat ball effects( when making a perfect pitch ect.) The sound is also good in the game with cool sound effects such as the one heard when a runner and a defender collide. The commentary is only ok, as again 2k has put out better. The game also offers a few other modes such as home run derby and home run pinball. Home run pinball is pretty cool, as you try to smash objects and building in time square. The Home Run Pinball is both addicting yet frustrating due to its difficulty. Just as a note for achievement lovers the bigs will offer a fairly easy 600 points in about 20 hours, but in order to get the rest you have to be outstanding at the game. Difficulty 7/10 Overall I had a great time with the Bigs and am currently on my 2nd play through to get more achievements. Personally this is the best arcade baseball game I have played.
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