It seemed like such a nice town. A gorgeous lake, an amusement park, a four star hotel. All the perks of a great vacation spot. It also had the added benefit of some good old fashioned small town businesses, a top hospital, and a great school system. Who wouldn’t want to visit?

Until the fog rolls in, anyway. At that point you best grab the nearest broken radio, a lead pipe, and a flashlight. Trust me, you’re going to need all of them. And while you wander blindly through the inky darkness, you’d best take note of that low, pulse-like throbbing coming from somewhere beneath you. It’s almost as if this town is alive. Clutch that radio tightly; it’s your only warning. Stumbling through the abandoned streets, you spot a wall splattered with what could be blood. Smeared through the plasma is an ominous message: “Welcome to Silent Hill.”

(more…)

Left 4 Dead. I’ve been following it for over a year, and I can tell you it is going to be good. Great, even. Something about zombies and Valve generally speaks favorably in my mind. It’s a pairing as epic as Romeo and Juliet or Hamlet and Ophelia. There’s really nothing to complain about here–except for the delays.

Instead of talking about that, though, let’s talk about the game. The brains behind it, the blood it promises, and the Molotov cocktails it’s going to bring this November.

Let’s talk about why you should be talking about it now.

(more…)

I have a scenario in my head. Turning to my friend I say, “I want to be an engineer like Bulma, that way I can just generally be useless and need to be rescued all the time. Then eventually I’ll somehow have a kid with a guy who seems totally clueless to anything besides standing around going, ‘HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA’.”

He laughs and says, “No, what we need to do is be namekians. You can be Flute, I’ll be Bassoon, and we can form the infamous ‘Woodwind Trio’ with someone else.”

Does this scenario confuse you? Do you feel like you’ve just stepped into a bad anime fanfiction site? What does this have to do with games? Well, I’ll tell you. Dragon Ball. Online. No, I’m not kidding. Just like Hello Kitty, game makers are looking to cash in on another big name anime.

To answer your first question, no you can’t play a Saiyan. QQ.

(more…)

There’s a certain sense of inevitability waiting at the end of the corridor. The young man’s parade boots echo sternly on the grated floor as he strides purposefully toward the blast doors. After a theatrical pause, the blast doors fly open and the snap-hiss of a lightsaber ignites the air with a sharp tang of ozone. With a nod, the TIE fighters in the hangar swerve into motion and systematically crush the scrambling stormtroopers clinging to each other for dear life. I’ve dreamed of this before.

Since early childhood I’ve been compelled by the darting lasers of interstellar battle juxtaposed with the serene mysticism of the Force–and I’m certainly not the only one. LucasArts has created a veritable empire, no pun intended, from the interest garnered from a simple desert farm boy’s destiny. Obviously the screaming TIE fighters, Mandalorian armor, wookiees, wry robots and promise of planetary destruction helped too, but since the spawn of Star Wars in the late seventies, we’ve seen three more (admittedly lukewarm) movies, PEZ dispensers, action figures, bed sheets, lunch boxes, over a hundred books, Legos and, more pertinent to this discussion, over seventy five video game titles.

(more…)

As Spring approaches I grow more anxious about the impending release of Aion: Tower of Eternity for the PC. This game has been on my “Oh God, OH GOD I want this game” list since one of my good friends sent me a few links to the videos of it from E3. It’s been in development for a good while, while the company making it has released tantalizing details sporadically so as to keep the drooling public (me) hooked and on the edge of our seats until it does come out.

I’m not going to compare Aion to any other MMORPGs on the market because doing so would be foolish and detrimental to all MMOs out there. Each online game, as far as I’ve seen, has brought something wholly unique to the gaming table as a whole, and comparing them in a bizarre contest just does them a huge disservice. Some people like World of Warcraft, others like Guild Wars. Saying any one is better than others based on any criteria (be it number of players, graphical capabilities, etc.) just doesn’t work. Surely there is a standard that all MMORPGs aspire to reach, but if they were all carbon copies of each other. Well. That would be pretty damn boring.

(more…)

Ah Smash Brothers, the pinnacle of success every nintendo character aspires to. Where the best of the best can meet, greet, and beat the ever-loving snot out of each other. I love the series so much because it’s such a free-form way to play all my favorite characters. And most of them get serious upgrades in terms of the graphic quality I’m used to seeing them in. I also love it because the designers don’t monopolize the success of the series. They actually approached fans about which characters we would want in brawl and listened to other game directors who wanted a spotlight on their characters. Thus, Sonic and Solid Snake were born…to the world of smash brothers.

Speculation about the game abounded until it was released on the 31st in Japan. Since then I’ve been trying to get my grubby little hands on all the information and videos I can. I’m one of those people who wants to know everything about it, including what characters will be playable, even if I can’t yet play the game. Some of their character choices are, well, unfortunate, but others make me giddy in anticipation of being able to play them for myself.

(more…)