6,557 reviews · showing 2,461–2,480
Reader PC HG exclusive
Before Sam, Max and Guybrush, Zak McKracken saved the world from stupidity in LucasArts's first PC/SCUMM engine point-and-click farce. The rough edges are evident, but so are the laughs, and Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders (ZM)…
aschultz · December 30, 2009
Reader PlayStation 3 HG exclusive
Tragedy makes simple people do strange things. Sean, a once prominent mechanic and talented race car driver, had what seemed to be a normal life. But in 1940s Europe, life for anyone was far from normal. Tension was inescapable, fear was…
True · December 30, 2009
Reader PlayStation 3
Originally, “interactive movies” described games like Dragon’s Lair: literal movies where you pressed a button at the right time to keep watching the movie. In the late 90s, the concept of an “interactive movie” morphed into a hybrid…
phediuk · December 29, 2009
Reader Apple II HG exclusive
Wrath of Denethenor seems to be Sierra's attempt to do Ultima II right the second time. Dying's tougher, and instead of time periods, your lone character moves from one world to the next. Unforunately, the formula's apparent: talk to king…
aschultz · December 29, 2009
Reader Sega CD HG exclusive
While you can only venture as far as the plot will allow, you never really feel restricted because of the ramped up difficulty in each new area. For example, you can’t pass through Danek-infested Fort Gilan without Pottle to reveal the…
wolfqueen001 · December 28, 2009
Reader DS
The world is doomed. That’s it. Done. Show’s over, folks. Nothing more to see here. Biblical stories predict how everything will be scoured by fire, and how it will be cleansed and purged in holy flames. They reveal how mankind will be…
disco · December 28, 2009
Reader NES HG exclusive
Quattro Arcade, being a compilation, was one of those games nobody wanted to finish for the NES FAQ Completion Project. In attempting to give something of everything, compilation carts invariably serve up one game that just stinks. Too…
aschultz · December 27, 2009
Reader Commodore 64 HG exclusive
In Xyphus--part hexagonal board game, part RPG--four character tokens move across six lands in succession. Finally, they kill the demon Xyphus with his own heart, behind an invisible maze. Strategy rules: forget towns, separate combat…
aschultz · December 27, 2009
Reader PC HG exclusive
The problem with many text adventures is that you can only solve them once. Even the creative geniuses at Infocom could only fit in so many alternate solutions, in-jokes and Easter Eggs. 221B Baker Street offers thirty such adventures…
aschultz · December 27, 2009
Reader NES HG exclusive
The Noid is surely the dorkiest hero I've controlled in a while. He's Matt Groening's Bongo the Rabbit in red with a goofy buck-toothed smile, flinging his yo-you at equally odd enemies. Unlike his commercial counterpart, he prefers eating…
aschultz · December 27, 2009
Reader DS
So I was engaged in rare event: purchasing a new game that I might actually play. I looked upon the shelf, next to the sloppily produced Dragon Warrior Monsters (oh god, not another one of these) laid a lone copy of Final Fantasy IV (FF II…
Sclem · December 26, 2009
Reader NES HG exclusive
Times of Lore for the NES is an example of addition by subtraction in a port. The PC/Apple versions took too long to get between towns, and monsters were too lethal and numerous. Futzing with the admittedly innovative interface was a…
aschultz · December 24, 2009
Reader NES HG exclusive
At 200 levels, Flappy lasts far too long, but it's decent enough that I wound up playing in longer stretches than I'd planned. It's a simple enough puzzler: push squarish boulders in half-width increments, possibly balancing them on the…
aschultz · December 24, 2009
Reader Genesis
Playing the original Sonic the Hedgehog is a lot like revisiting your old elementary school: you know your way around, and you’ve got some good memories, but the place just isn’t as big as you remember it. Sonic 1 feels like a footnote in…
phediuk · December 22, 2009
Reader PlayStation 3
"Shooter", or PixelJunk 1-4, looks like an arcade shooter. You control a small ship in a sliced two-dimensional view of a cave. In the cave, any sense of depth in the picture is added by hand-drawn multiplane animation, or intricately…
fleinn · December 18, 2009
Reader PlayStation 2
Metal Gear Solid 2 is the point of the series where it it’s not just a game anymore. It was here that Hideo Kojima was convinced he was making History’s Next Great Epic. This was to be the Homer’s Odyssey of the video game era. The half…
phediuk · December 17, 2009
Reader PlayStation 2 HG exclusive
Most games are meant to entertain. Some are also meant to help us relax. Games like golf, for instance, are said to be amazing stress relievers. Supposedly it has something to do with hitting little balls while wearing baggy pants in the…
zippdementia · December 15, 2009
Reader Xbox 360
There's a special feature on the LOST - Season 3 DVD that looks at the concept and creation of the video game. It's really nothing more than four minutes of hype and promises, which makes LOST: Via Domus sound really awesome. The writers…
jerec · December 14, 2009
Reader Wii
When Resident Evil: Umbrella Chronicles came out, there were several glaring omissions from the level selection. What happened to Resident Evil 2? Or Code Veronica? It was pretty obvious that Capcom left them out on purpose. Perhaps they…
Probester · December 14, 2009
Reader Wii
Silent Hill: Shattered Memories is much like the feared movie adaptation of a popular video game. Although there is a real Silent Hill movie in existence, the movie is probably much closer to the canon story of the video game series than…
Probester · December 13, 2009
