Forums > Contributor Zone > Review of the Week: 22nd-28th March

Gather around your loved ones and turn off all the lights -- wouldn’t want people a knockin’ on your door and interrupting this moment of greatness -- for, once again, it’s EmP’s fantabulious RotW slot.

Now with extra commas. (,,,)

Despite my insistence that the rules should be changed to the loser being shot out of cannon into the fiery inferno that we call the sun, my radical ideas have been shot down. Instead, we’re back to dismissing staff reviews and only allowing one entry per user validity. I know, it’s all backwards and obsolete. But my hands are tied.

Hear that noise? That’s the noise of your expectations soaring after seeing it’s my week. You lucky bastards, you.

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FIRST: Pickhut: Robitica

Pickhut wins because he clearly shares my love of comma overkill, as his first paragraph shows.

I appreciate Pick’s soldier-like trudge through the Saturn titles of yore because there’s a thousand of them out there that I really wanted to try but never got the chance (the downshot of working in a video games store in the 32 bit generation) and, as one of the four people who have played and enjoyed Krazy Ivan and have at least played Kileak The Blood, I always wondered about Robitica and how it stacked up to these two. The answer, then, is poorly.

You point this out effectively with a walkthrough the game as you played it, which lead brilliantly to the conclusion that trying to stay alive as long as you can and stretch your resources is completely counterproductive compared to just offing yourself every few stages and enjoying the replenished resurrection. It’s an effective way to not only draw the resurrection idea into a harsh light but to describe the game’s smaller flaws without having to spell them out. I could complain that the allusion to the two Mega Drive games might be a little vague to people not already in the know, so I will. The allusion to the two Mega Drive games might be a little vague to people not already in the know. But I have no other complaints. Best review I’ve seen from you in some time.

SECOND: Jerec LEGO Star Wars

It’s still surreal as hell to be commenting on a Jerec review. I half expect Lasty to pop around the corner or Scott step out of the shadows.

Jerec’s effort here is a little ramblely, which brings pros and cons. It lends a conversational feel to the review which lends to its accessibility, but it also feels loose at times, targeting off randomly or spending far to much time on new points or revisits to points already made. The review suffers more from this as it goes on -- look out, here come some examples! You start two consecutive paragraphs the same way and the last few paragraphs feel like things you need to shoehorn into the review, but you’re nearing the end and realise that you’ve not spoken about then yet.

Still, for a game you say is hard to describe into words, you tell me pretty much everything I need to know about the title. I should mark you down a place for lying so fervently in your intro!

THIRD: Fastklr Yaris

I joked about phantom writers resurfacing not one critique ago, but it’s nice to see Fasty around again, even if he did give me three times the work everyone else did. I preferred his Yaris review to his other submission because it was -- and you’ll excuse that lack of clever twists to my reasoning, I hope -- written better. Sometimes, it’s just that simple. Yaris doesn’t give you a lot to talk about, so you don’t waste words trying to find anything. The writing is clear and sometimes clever and I come away with a solid picture of the game you’ve played and why I shouldn’t bother myself. That’s pretty good going for about 500 words.

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My dearest of dear chums, Masters, is up next. He’s not done anything of note in months, the lazy bum, so be sure to work him hard with an avalanche of submissions!

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For us. For them. For you.

Congrats to the winners. Wish I'd subbed something for this week (though not the review I wrote last week >_>), but oh well. Haha.

And wow. This is like the most "fantabulous" RotW topic ever. Like, it's so authentic; even down to the numerous spelling errors in the critiques. Go EmP!

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What espiga does in his free time
[Eating EmP's brain] probably isn't a good idea. I mean... He's British, which means his brain's wired for PAL and your eyes are NTSC. - Will

Mr EmP, I wish to bear your children.

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Cool, first. Thanks for commenting on why you liked the review, I didn't think I would be able to pull off writing my first experience with the game, remembering certain details. But since it was almost the exact same thing for every floor, it wasn't that hard.

What's sad about going through all these Saturn games is that I'm not going out of my way to try and bad mouth them. I'm genuinely curious about how these titles play. Thankfully, I'm getting all these used, so I'm not spending a lot of money on them. However, most of the "good" Saturn titles I've heard about that I want to try sell like crazy some times, so that's why you rarely see me review familiar Saturn games.

Also, congrats to jerec and fastkilr on their placings! Good job.

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I head spaceshit noises

I still can't figure out what the hell your avatar is, EmP. I think you may have even told me once, but it's so obtuse, it continually slips my memory. I think it's probably something boring. Unlike these critiques and this week's reviews. Good job everyone.

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Note to gamers: when someone shoots you in the face, they aren't "gay." They are "psychopathic."

His avatar is the slime from Shining in the Darkness, which both he and I reviewed (though I'd rather not talk about mine *sigh*).

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What espiga does in his free time
[Eating EmP's brain] probably isn't a good idea. I mean... He's British, which means his brain's wired for PAL and your eyes are NTSC. - Will

Too bad Drella isn't still around, otherwise I might've had a chance this week! (Yes, I still think that was funny.)

Good job to those who won and I second EmP's comment about being glad to see Fastkilr back.

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You exist because we allow it. And you will end because we demand it.

Neat. All 3 of my new reviews this year have taken second place. I think. Anyway, thanks for those comments, EmP! The rambling into the submission box might work in the writing phase, but I should probably start editing what I write, too, huh.

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I can avoid death by not having a life.

Yes Jerec, you can't trade on that 'I'm back from the dead!' schtick forever you know!

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Maybe I need another 5 year hiatus.

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I can avoid death by not having a life.

Nah, what you need is a huge run at the Alphamarathon comp. I think you should focus on beating out Genj and Janus.

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For us. For them. For you.