Review Archives (Staff Reviews)

You are currently looking through staff reviews for games that are available on every platform the site currently covers. Below, you will find reviews written by all eligible authors 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
	The Cursed Crusade review (X360) Reviewed on November 11, 2011 This game finds a way to turn exciting-sounding historical events, such as the siege of the Croatian city Zara, into linear marches through static environments cluttered with a bunch of melee battles that all play out the same. This might not be the appropriate game for the quote "WHAT A HORRIBLE NIGHT TO HAVE A CURSE", but it fits.
	Saints Row: The Third review (X360) Reviewed on November 10, 2011 It is immaculately paced because it loves you. Most games can be insensitive clods with occasional rough patches. You get stuck for a while, or it's slow to start, or you cruise through some filler, or certain design choices are clunky, or the characters are flat and you don't care about them, or you know exactly what's going to happen next and therefore when it happens you don't care. None of this happens in Saints Row 3, which is a textbook example of how to keep me into a game from beginning to open-ended end.
	Final Fantasy: The 4 Heroes of Light review (DS) Reviewed on November 10, 2011 Customizing your characters has seldom been simpler in an RPG. Any hero in your merry band can be anything you like. It all comes down to the crowns with which you equip everyone. As you progress through the game and defeat powerful monsters, a magical crystal will bestow upon your party the gift of a new crown or two. A character who starts with the ability to just barely wield a sword can eventually grow into a battle-hardened Fighter, or perhaps a Black Mage or even something as frivolous as a Bard.
	Super Mario 3D Land review (3DS) Reviewed on November 09, 2011 Super Mario 3D Land is clearly ready to have a love affair with your nostalgic side. You can make a game out of recognizing musical compositions, enemies and even platform types that you recall from elsewhere. Given the raccoon tail, the airships, the mushroom houses and a variety of other returning elements, it’s clear from the start that Super Mario Bros. 3 was the development team’s primary source of inspiration.
	Disney Epic Mickey review (WII) Reviewed on November 08, 2011 The themes in Disney Epic Mickey are more complex than you might expect from a children’s game, but they’re handled in the best way possible: through gameplay. The developers didn’t simply give the player dialog choices and consider that sufficient. Instead, they presented Mickey with a more fundamental means of making his choices. As Mickey works his way through Wasteland, he’ll need to decide whether to rely on paint or thinner.
	Sonic Colors review (WII) Reviewed on November 07, 2011 Tails makes an appearance, but he’s a plot device and the role he plays is almost completely non-annoying. As you complete the various stages, you’ll rely on the franchise’s true star, not second-rate bit players who a part of you wishes would die horrible deaths. It feels almost like you're getting away with something that you shouldn't as you play through the game’s 36 main stages and don't hate the bulk of them.
	Battlefield 3 review (PC) Reviewed on November 06, 2011 More than any other graphics engine today, it's a complete package, featuring scale, scope, spectacle, on-foot detail and in-airplane elbow room, multiplayer, meaningful destruction, and absurdly good animation. Absurdly good. The animation is so good you probably won't even notice it. Of course the characters move this way because that's how real dudes move. What's the big deal? You almost have to go back to another game with the usual animation to appreciate what Battlefield 3 does.
	Tropico 4 review (X360) Reviewed on November 06, 2011 Remember how back when you first got your PC and you played Sim City for hours on end without really understanding why? Welcome to the 2011 version of that phenomenon. Say goodbye to large chunks of your time.
	GoldenEye 007: Reloaded review (X360) Reviewed on November 05, 2011 Stages may feel generic, but they now flow in a more natural fashion and enemy placement was more carefully considered to provide interesting challenges. It’s clear that you’re going through the same motions you always did, but now those motions are more enjoyable. Late in the game, I was delighted to find that I actually enjoyed protecting Natalya when the need arose.
	Front Mission Evolved review (X360) Reviewed on November 04, 2011 With Front Mission Evolved, Square-Enix and Double Helix take virtually all of the strategy out of the title and leave us with a clunky third-person shooter with an uninspired terrorism plot featuring shallow, one-dimensional characters.
	Daytona USA review (X360) Reviewed on November 04, 2011 Daytona USA was an experience. And it’s the sort of experience that can never be brought home. Sure, we can search online for seven like-minded old school players to have a go, but that doesn’t come close. What might have come close, would be local multiplayer, so that at least you could invite friends over and split-screen race to your hearts’ content. Guess what? Local multiplayer is not available. Oops.
	Serious Sam: The Random Encounter review (PC) Reviewed on November 03, 2011 The Random Encounter ends almost as fast as it begins, but your five bucks get you a punchy, colorful, and vivid throwback to the heyday of the RPG, mashed up with all the violent insanity of Serious Sam. Fans who need their next fix would do well to check out the previous indie offering Double D in addition to this quickie, simply to serve as a great palate cleanser before jumping right back into the hotbed of ravenous monsters that is the Serious Sam universe. The Random Encounter is short, sweet, and certainly a breath of fresh air for what is quickly becoming a stagnant genre.
	Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception review (PS3) Reviewed on November 01, 2011 Uncharted 3 is mostly filler without gameplay. It's the modern equivalent of those full motion video games folks made back in the 90s when new CD-ROMs afforded all that storage space. So developers shot video footage, grafted it onto various games (usually puzzle collections), and a genre was born. Who cares whether there was an actual game in there?
	Kirby's Return to Dream Land review (WII) Reviewed on November 01, 2011 Levels are built more like playgrounds than obstacles. You’ll hop along hills, dodge slow-moving arrow projectiles and knights who wield swords that could easily have been drawn with Crayons. Kirby’s Return to Dream Land is comfort food for gamers and you won’t want to stop eating anytime soon.
	Dragon Age II review (PC) Reviewed on October 31, 2011 There have been complaints, and will be many more, that Dragon Age II is appealing for a more mainstream audience by removing all the fiddling of its predecessor, but I don’t think this is a fair accusation. There is very little that you could do before which is no longer possible. The difference is that the extraneous elements have been stripped away, giving the action space to breathe.
	Spider-Man: Shattered Dimensions review (X360) Reviewed on October 28, 2011 Each level revolves around its boss, with some of them creating a memorable experience. Sandman's Amazing (and amazing) stage features the villain spending much of the time in the shape of a tornado. For Spider-Man to reach water towers to tip on him, disrupting his powers, you'll have to use your webbing to zip from one piece of flying debris to another.
	Crazy Taxi review (X360) Reviewed on October 28, 2011 While details about the interface have changed, what you'll find once you download the game is that mostly SEGA left things alone. The result is a generally faithful port of the Dreamcast port, with one disappointing exception: the soundtrack is now free from the sounds of The Offspring. In place of that distinct soundtrack, players now are treated to some generic music that sounds sort of like the original tunes, only not quite. Whether you appreciated the music in the original game or not, it was part of the game's identity.
	Deadly Premonition review (X360) Reviewed on October 27, 2011 It’s a game in which you want nothing more than to see what’s thrown at you next, just so you can eagerly ramble about the amazing things that have just happened, and share theories with friends who are also playing. It’s so effective in stirring discussion, in fact, that it took me a while to realise I was enjoying talking about the game a great deal more than I was playing it.
	Blood Stone: 007 review (PS3) Reviewed on October 26, 2011 Bond has landed in a cover-based shooter and he's smart about it. If you put him behind a crate and an enemy is approaching his location, it's easy to creep to the edge, then duck around the side of the crate without standing up and exposing himself. Or if there's cover nearby, it's easy to roll to that cover and keep moving from there. The difference is in how long you hold down the appropriate button once you press it. The whole process quickly becomes second nature and feels a lot more natural than it did in similar titles.
	Batman: Arkham City review (X360) Reviewed on October 25, 2011 Has a virtual place ever been such a canny combination of story backdrop, richly atmospheric graphics, and thrilling playground as this walled off section of Gotham City converted into a prison? Arkham City is densely packed with things to see, things to hear, and things to do. Gliding over the rooftops can be as rewarding as strolling along the streets. Rocksteady's city is a spectacle through and through, even more beautiful than Ubisoft's Assassin's Creeds for how it's so true to its fanciful Gothic tone.

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