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 Jason Venter 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
	Skylanders: Spyro's Adventure review (X360) Reviewed on January 08, 2012 Levels feature lots of loot and they all contain special areas that are locked behind gates. To enter gates, you must have a character with the matching affinity. As long as you have such a character and he hasn’t been disabled for that stage, you can simply pull the current character off the pedestal and replace it with a new one. The whole process takes mere seconds and it lets you feel like you’re actively involved in the adventure.	4/5
	Defense Grid: The Awakening review (PC) Reviewed on January 04, 2012 Missions include special objectives that switch things up. Your options change depending on the scenario. In one case, you might be able to try a familiar stage with 99 waves instead of the usual 25 or 30. Elsewhere, you might be able to start with 20,000 resources but defeated enemies won’t drop any additional resources.	4.5/5
	Comic Jumper review (X360) Reviewed on December 22, 2011 Each stage is preceded by banter between Captain Smiley, Star (the character on his chest) and assorted other guests that include a wad of paper masquerading as a hero and a tattooed concubine who wears lovely fur garments. The dialog in this game is genuinely funny most of the time, and voiced to perfection. A few of the jokes do seem the slightest bit forced, but even the worst of the humor is so bad it's good.	4/5
	Tropico 3 review (X360) Reviewed on December 22, 2011 Sometimes, the amount of control that you have over your island is overwhelming. Tropico 3 was released first as a PC game, where sorting all of the available options and information must have felt quite natural, but the Xbox 360 controller has fewer buttons at its disposal. Face buttons bring up menus, which you can then further navigate using the bumper buttons.	3.5/5
	Super Scribblenauts review (DS) Reviewed on December 22, 2011 If a puzzle gives you too much trouble, the game has a hint system in place. You can pay virtual currency to unlock new tips that supply varying degrees of assistance. Sometimes, the best hints will flat out give you the answer, which may disappoint some. It's not a big deal, though, because most stages can be repeated. The only way to get a gold crown for such stages is to play through it three consecutive times while using different phrases on every attempt.	4/5
	Sports Champions review (PS3) Reviewed on December 22, 2011 Sports Champions features six games: disc golf, beach volleyball, archery, table tennis, gladiator duel and bocce. Each included option offers depth and precision. You'll have to work harder to get everything out of these offerings than you would if you were playing Wii Sports, but each one is more substantial than Nintendo's entire package. None of the activities are particularly imposing, either.	4.5/5
	Scott Pilgrim vs. The World review (X360) Reviewed on December 22, 2011 Perhaps it shouldn't come as a surprise, then, that the levels in Scott Pilgrim vs. The World often feel like they were borrowed from classic fare such as Final Fight, Double Dragon and River City Ransom. There is a gratuitous number of cracked sidewalks, fire hydrants that spray water when you punch them, trash cans, park benches and bus stops. The attention to detail here is delightful.	4/5
	Rock Band 3 review (X360) Reviewed on December 22, 2011 Rock Band 3 adopts a more complicated approach. You can start playing in a "Quick Play" mode, or you can go to a "Career" mode. Performance in one mode affects the options that you have in the other mode. Each song you play can earn you fans, and having enough fans allows you to increase the range of your tours, which eventually leads to more fame, more fans and more gear for your custom band.	4.5/5
	NBA Jam review (WII) Reviewed on December 22, 2011 When you play the new NBA Jam, the first thing you're likely to notice is that very little has changed. The team names aren't all the same, of course. There have been additions, removals and modifications that reflect the most recent activity in the league. There are no Seattle Supersonics now, for instance. The Charlotte Hornets have moved to New Orleans.	4/5
	Mario Sports Mix review (WII) Reviewed on December 22, 2011 You start fresh in each sport and you have to unlock every character and arena in each event. That means either playing 60 matches within that sport, which takes a lot of time, or it means playing through challenging hidden paths where the difficulty level is ratcheted up to an eventually absurd level that is made entirely too frustrating for most players within the game’s target audience because it’s so cheap.	3/5
	Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light review (X360) Reviewed on December 22, 2011 Besides puzzles, the game also offers a nearly perfect combat system. As Lara explores the fourteen stages in which her adventure unfolds, she'll do battle with all manner of monsters: gators, spiders, magicians, demons, skeletons and dinosaurs. She carries around a giant spear that she can toss repeatedly at her foes, her signature handguns and a whole arsenal of special weapons that she can acquire along the way.	4.5/5
	Green Day: Rock Band review (PS3) Reviewed on December 14, 2011 Some of that personality is censored, unfortunately (or fortunately, if you're of the proper mind). When Harmonix released The Beatles: Rock Band, the company had the luxury of working with musical selections that the Vatican itself has endorsed. Green Day, in contrast, is comprised of three band members who like to talk about procreation in its most vulgar terms and who frequently protest organized religion and politics.	3.5/5
	Mario Kart 7 review (3DS) Reviewed on December 09, 2011 Mario Kart games have been headed in a cheap direction for awhile now, but the issue has been easy enough to ignore that its impact on the overall experience remained relatively minor. This is the first time that players have been forced to face it head-on if they want to get the most out of their brand new game. Mario Kart 7 is a good purchase for action racing fans, but it could have been one of the finest in the series if the development teams would have just realized that losing to a cheating game isn’t fun.	3.5/5
	The King of Fighters XIII review (X360) Reviewed on November 28, 2011 There are slow and powerful bruisers, tiny and agile schoolgirl types and everything in between. If you decide to spend the time that is required to master even a small portion of the more than 30 fighters, you’ll be busy for many hours. Some characters are less obviously gifted than others, but none of them seem to be useless. Even the diminutive Chin Gentsai, who employs the drunken master fighting style, is deceptively powerful once you learn how to put his hypnotic movements to use.	3.5/5
	Otomedius Excellent review (X360) Reviewed on November 26, 2011 Environments include vast and empty space (aside from enemy ships, of course), futuristic and very gray cities built on the side of cliffs overlooking waterfalls, the heart of a volcano and eventually caverns and a fleet of battleships. Settings are rendered competently but only occasionally with any originality. If you were to strip away the scantily-clad girls, Otomedius Excellent would be nearly indistinguishable from almost any generic horizontal shooter you might care to name.	2.5/5
	Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 review (X360) Reviewed on November 11, 2011 This final chapter in the trilogy provides what is unquestionably the purest adrenaline rush that the series has yet seen. I’m left imagining someone on the development team turning a giant crank until it rests at ‘11’ and then just leaving it there. Explosions are huge. Planes crash. Buildings collapse. There are moments that feel like they were torn out of the previous games, except here the ante has been upped.	4/5
	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.	3.5/5
	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.	4.5/5
	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.	4/5
	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.	4/5

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