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Review Archives (All Reviews)

You are currently looking through all reviews for games that are available on every platform the site currently covers. Below, you will find reviews written by drella and sorted according to date of submission, with the newest content displaying first. As many as 20 results will display per page. If you would like to try a search with different parameters, specify them below and submit a new search.

Available Reviews
Final Fantasy IV: The After Years (Wii)

Final Fantasy IV: The After Years review (WII)

Reviewed on June 22, 2009

When a game is described as fan service, it seems reasonable to question just how the fan is being serviced. Patronage should be rewarded; the Final Fantasy series was built on our backs, us fate-deciding gamers, who saw potential in a poorly translated but ever-engrossing title called Final Fantasy II, which, we were later told, was the fourth game in the series. Two titles in between the NES journeys of a generic bunch of heroes and the plight-plagued saga of Dark Knight Cecil were left over...
Guardians/Denjin Makai II (Arcade)

Guardians/Denjin Makai II review (ARC)

Reviewed on December 24, 2008

Picture yourself as a buxom beauty, your long blonde hair flowing in a ponytail as you sprint across the scorched desert sands of an oil field, your thigh-high white heeled boots kicking up puffs of silt and debris. Generic, gray uniformed enforcers decorated in visors and body armors of red and blue confront with fists drawn. You’re Kurokishi, trusted guardian of peace and love. They’re up to no good. In this genre, those circumstances suffice.
Dynowarz: The Destruction of Spondylus (NES)

Dynowarz: The Destruction of Spondylus review (NES)

Reviewed on December 23, 2008

And after seven sequences of this, it all abruptly ends. No more muted, garish colors. No more laughable showdowns. No more trying to hit a miniature velociraptor with a stupid arcing bomb because the power-up literally blocked your path on the opposite side of a gorge, forcing you to die or collect it.
Lot Lot (NES)

Lot Lot review (NES)

Reviewed on December 23, 2008

If this sounds a bit more like a drawn-out chore than an actual puzzle, it is. You’re merely switching contents around and waiting for membranes to give way as you keep one square completely cleared to avoid losing. Keep swinging contents further from the bottom left toward the top right, or toward gaps that lead to scoring channels and rid the problem with immediacy. Worse, this is all done at an agonizingly slow pace. Like most any puzzle game, lather-rinse-repeat applies.
Hot Pinball (Arcade)

Hot Pinball review (ARC)

Reviewed on December 15, 2008

The theme of each board? Health class diagrams of the female reproductive system!
Kaboom! (Atari 2600)

Kaboom! review (A2600)

Reviewed on December 14, 2008

Notorious serial bomber Baron von Blitzkrieg is astir once more, perched against an entirely gray background atop a solid olive green wall, awaiting his cue to strike. Still adorned in the black-and-white striped jailbird outfit he broke out of the big house in – the ensemble accessorized by the black mask with cutout eyeholes stretched across the width of his face – the criminal mastermind holds his soon to be unleashed explosive in the palms of his hands, a scowl perpetually across his face, only fleeting for the few brief seconds when victory is his. The crew-cut culprit stands motionless, emotionless, daring us to dare him.
Boxing (Atari 2600)

Boxing review (A2600)

Reviewed on December 14, 2008

Despite its rudimentary appearance, fundamental match rules, and the fact the only sound effect present is the ungraceful grunt of worn leather connecting with human hide, Boxing still manages to present an engaging experience, albeit for a short period of time, due to its scoring system. Landed punches by either Floyd or Samuel will be tallied as either one or two points, depending on the accuracy and impact of the blow, with the total scores posted at the top of the screen. And this is where strategy starts to come into play.
Super Mario Land (Game Boy)

Super Mario Land review (GB)

Reviewed on December 14, 2008

Two levels amongst the dozen total stand out; the conclusion of the second world forces Mario into a missile-armed submarine for some side-scrolling shmup action while in the finale he becomes a red baron and takes to the skies to battle bird menace Biokinton and final boss Tatanga in a similar manner. Never before, and never since, has Mario strayed into this genre, and though relatively easy forays, the best reason to play Super Mario Land is for these novelties. The simple departures from the formulaic platforming are endearing; there's an unuttered joy in bursting blocks and collecting coins far from the established series manner. And if you'd rather be bopping enemies on the head, these levels hardly overstay their welcome. More likely you'll be wanting more.
Super Text Twist (PC)

Super Text Twist review (PC)

Reviewed on November 28, 2008

Feel free to eat all the cod you want, but koi is not on the menu. Pay for your fish craving with yen, but smaller denominations such as ren are not accepted here. You can bring your sis but not your bro. You can be an ace or a con, but not a pro. Bod, bio, ern, ave, mot and eek will be refused. Sic, tun, roc, pus, dun and bur will all eke by. Maybe you think this is a gyp. The game won't hear that either.
Hatris (TurboGrafx-16)

Hatris review (TG16)

Reviewed on November 26, 2008

You are Alexey Pajitnov. Perhaps the name rings a bell. You've just created Tetris, the mega-hit puzzle game that has sparked legal battles across the globe over licensing rights and taken both eastern and western audiences by storm. Atari wants you. Nintendo wants you. But luckily for you, you haven't had to worry yourself with any of that trouble; your government has it all under control. Phew! I bet the check is in the mail already. Regardless, your career has skyrocketed overnight. One minute you're an unheard of computer engineer toiling away in the Soviet Union. The next you're being mentioned in the same breath as Miyamoto and Bushnell as a who's who in the video game world... as you toil away in the Soviet Union.
Pokemon Red (Game Boy)

Pokemon Red review (GB)

Reviewed on November 26, 2008

But it doesn't have to be Mankey; it could be Ratatta. It could be Nidoran. It could be Pidgey, or Pikachu, or Geodude. There is a tendency for the Pokemon you start with to become one of your strongest, but it's not a necessity, and any Pokemon can eventually be beneficial to your six member team. Moreover, you can have well over six Pokemon; you can only carry six with you to use in battle, while the others are stored remotely and recalled from the Pokemon Centers.
Space Invaders (Nintendo 64)

Space Invaders review (N64)

Reviewed on November 26, 2008

No shooter formula is more archaic. No shooter formula holds such nostalgia either. Space Invaders has been a simple concept since its first appearance in the arcades of the late 1970s, a classic dance with death from above. The aliens descend with uniformity and precision, swaying to surface level as a trained squadron with no intention to deviate from the plan. It will work. They believe. Down below dissonance breaks their harmonious, synchronized descent; one lone Earth pilot desperately fires blasts skywards from his roving craft, shifting left and right with the pack, dodging sporadic projectiles and wreaking havoc on their ranks. Will it be enough?
Violent Storm (Arcade)

Violent Storm review (ARC)

Reviewed on October 19, 2008

Playing this game was all too bizarre for me, like watching the adapted version of your favorite show or movie for a foreign audience. Only the version your watching is an adapted version of an adapted version of an adapted version… it’s at least three levels removed from the original source material. This is Final Fight for some remote portion of Siberia, some culture that just couldn’t comprehend the mean streets of Metro City ruled by crooked cop EDI E. Some culture that wanted guys named DRIGGER and MR. JULIUS and men dressed in garbage can lids.
Undercover Cops (Arcade)

Undercover Cops review (ARC)

Reviewed on September 13, 2008

In a dimly lit room of political power, town officials plot how to take care of the recent crime outbreak...
The Sporting News Baseball (SNES)

The Sporting News Baseball review (SNES)

Reviewed on September 08, 2008

I spent so many summer days slugging the hell out of the ball, the cornfield always my sanctuary. I’d run every top slugger of the time (1993) out there, 100 pitches each, and afterward record their totals in spreadsheets. I’d be surprised by results, and forced to test them again. Could Greg Vaughn really have more raw power than Danny Tartabull? Was Darryl Strawberry better than Bobby Bonillia? I had to know.
Packaging Man (PC)

Packaging Man review (PC)

Reviewed on August 07, 2008

"Packaging Man" is no more worth playing than any of the other hundred or so shitty Pac-Man clones built and distributed via Flash. It's noteworthy in that it comes packed with a bleeding heart Dogwood Alliance spiel denouncing fast food companies for utilizing cheap paper. The root of Dogwood Alliance's cause should be 1) attacking the actual companies producing, not buying, the product and 2) lobbying the government for intervention to regulate the producers. But large,...
P.O.W.: Prisoners of War (Arcade)

P.O.W.: Prisoners of War review (ARC)

Reviewed on June 16, 2008

I refuse to mince words. P.O.W. Prisoners of War is a game so fucking awful even the genre’s staunchest supporter cannot point to a redeeming snippet. Double Dragon 3 had some kitsch. Mug Smashers had some unintended humor. Even Street Smart – unsurprisingly, another SNK disaster – wasn’t this much of a miserable abomination; it at least had the courtesy to not drag out for this long.
Super Mario Bros. 3 (NES)

Super Mario Bros. 3 review (NES)

Reviewed on June 02, 2008

There are big fish to fry in the waters of world three and even bigger brothers walk the landscape of four. In five, a spiral palace ominously leads high up into the clouds, but you won’t want to rush to get there; you’re a shoe in anyway. Six is where obstacles get downright frigid, but a sharp mind and some nifty tricks will keep Mario hammering away. It’ll take more than a pipe dream to sink the brain twisting, precision demanding puzzles of world seven. And as for eight, the final stomping grounds and home of the nefarious King of the Koopas, this author is going to have to leave you in the dark.
NBA Showtime: NBA on NBC (Nintendo 64)

NBA Showtime: NBA on NBC review (N64)

Reviewed on April 06, 2008

I missed a memo.
Mario Golf (Nintendo 64)

Mario Golf review (N64)

Reviewed on September 12, 2007

Seamlessly meshing the country club atmosphere, the intricacies of the classic sport and a cast of characters hailing from the Mushroom Kingdom we grew up dreaming of, Camelot's Mario Golf is devoid of the excessive gimmick and glitz we might expect from a title combining two very different themes. Unlike its inferior GameCube sequel Toadstool Tour, we won't find newly invented "fast greens" where the ball skirts off as if it were on ice and poorly designed courses over brewing lav...

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