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
	Disney/Pixar Ratatouille review (PS2) Reviewed on July 02, 2007 You just never know what a mission will involve until you accept it. Some have you completing mini-games, others have you sliding down huge slides and collecting stars, others have you rushing to the highest points of an area and still others ask you to run toward through cluttered environments while an enemy chases you. If you don’t feel like completing a mission at the moment, you don’t have to.	4.5/5
	Final Fantasy review (PSP) Reviewed on June 28, 2007 In the original Final Fantasy, frequent encounters meant that players had to carefully execute each dungeon assault. Preparations sometimes required an hour or so of play time, just because each labyrinthine complex posed such a risk. On the PSP, the frequency of those battles has been toned down by something like 50%. You’ll still find moments where your avatar leaves one battle behind and takes only two or three steps before finding another, but such instances are infrequent.	4/5
	Puzzle Scape review (PSP) Reviewed on June 26, 2007 It’s neat that you can move pieces around at will, but the fact that vertical movement isn’t possible really stinks. Sometimes, you’ll see a killer move but you can’t execute it because there’s nothing available on your row. Other times, everything is moving quickly as the stage is about to wind down, and the only block you can use to finish your combination is on the opposite side of the screen.	2.5/5
	GrimGrimoire review (PS2) Reviewed on June 22, 2007 Plot plays a large role in GrimGrimoire. You’re either viewing the story or you’re fighting a battle. There’s no character customization in between, since you learn skills as you go, at set points in the narrative. That’s all there is to it. Every time you win a battle, you’re rewarded with a few more pages’ worth of information.	4/5
	Hot Brain review (PSP) Reviewed on June 21, 2007 That’s the hook to Hot Brain: you have to do everything as if your pants were on fire. When you’re in high school and looking at a series of pictures in a test booklet, you aren’t cramped for time. You start to think “Wow, I could be out at recess or checking out the cutie in row three.” When you’re holding a PSP and a timer is ticking down and your performance will have instant results, the activity you formerly may have found tiresome suddenly becomes interesting.	2.5/5
	Dawn of Mana review (PS2) Reviewed on June 12, 2007 A boulder is as likely to bounce as not. A pumpkin could very well float like a balloon. Worse, anything you try to toss could inexplicably head to a nearby wall, bounce off it and into Keldy, then send him plummeting to a ledge below and into the midst of a bunch of enemies. Taking your chances with object interaction is a bit like sticking your hand into a bowl of piranhas and hoping they aren’t hungry.	2/5
	Mad Tracks review (X360) Reviewed on June 12, 2007 One odd mechanic that definitely will affect how you play is the acceleration feature. You press the right trigger to accelerate, but as you do there’s a gauge on the bottom of the screen that reflects a dwindling supply of energy. Thus, simply holding the trigger for a race’s duration is going to come back to bite you at the worst possible moment. Strategy is necessary.	3.5/5
	Pac-Man: Championship Edition review (X360) Reviewed on June 11, 2007 The more pellets you eat, the stranger things become. You’ll grab a piece of fruit and instead of simply causing some pellets to appear, it’ll shift half the board. The arena glows and morphs until you have a new environment to explore. The seamless change prevents you from easily memorizing a pattern and keeps you on your toes.	4.5/5
	Tamagotchi Party On! review (WII) Reviewed on June 10, 2007 The mini-games in Tamagotchi: Party On! are entertaining at first, but quickly grow tiresome because of the frequency with which they are repeated. You might play the same one three or four times in a single round of default length, which certainly isn’t optimal.	3/5
	Mortal Kombat: Armageddon review (WII) Reviewed on June 08, 2007 One woman with bright purple spandex starts to feel pretty much like the next, with only the moves defining the two. Switching between fighting styles doesn’t feel as remarkable as it did when it debuted in Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance, either. Nothing seems distinct, not even battle arenas.	3.5/5
	Secrets of the Ark: A Broken Sword Game review (PC) Reviewed on June 06, 2007 If it were a movie, Secrets of the Ark would be an “Indiana Jones” picture. It would be a huge success and earn a lot of money at the box office because it wouldn’t interrupt itself with inane puzzles the viewer had to solve. Secrets of the Ark feels like that movie, but you have to put up with sheer torture to watch each scene unfold.	2.5/5
	Doushin: Same Heart review (PC) Reviewed on May 28, 2007 You've probably played games in the past where you made a choice and were greeted by hours of dialogue and suddenly found yourself thinking woefully that somehow, somewhere, you were missing out on an orgy. Not so here! Now you simply click to jump to one of the other sisters. If no one around her seems randy, well, click to the other. Surely, a zipper is dropping somewhere.	2.5/5
	SNK vs. Capcom: Card Fighters DS review (DS) Reviewed on May 24, 2007 Naturally, placing cards isn’t as simple as sorting through all of your options and proving yourself clever. You are instead the victim of chance. Later matches even mostly come down to who draws the best hand from the start. Each round, a new card presents itself. You might find it useless or be stunned by its value.	3/5
	Odin Sphere review (PS2) Reviewed on May 22, 2007 Odin Sphere is frustrating like that. The threat of exertion and the constant need to snack on restorative items exist throughout the entire game. Button mashing seldom leads to victory over even the simplest of adversaries. Instead, you must strike and retreat while dipping frequently into your bag of supplies.	3.5/5
	Jeopardy! Teen Tournament review (GB) Reviewed on May 21, 2007 Having two people there to answer questions instead of three really changes the dynamic, and not for the better. A lot of the strategy is removed. All you must do to win is beat out the one guy. That’s actually not too terribly difficult if you know the answers to a lot of trivia, as I apparently do.	2.5/5
	Spider-Man 3 review (PS3) Reviewed on May 19, 2007 Such moments rock, but they’re counter-balanced by tedious missions. Early on, those revolve around stopping the various gangs that are battling for control of the city. Later, you have to take on super villains. The problem with these missions is that they’re not particularly fun, not when you could be out swinging around the city, riding on top of cars and whatever else interests you.	3/5
	Bust-A-Move Bash! review (WII) Reviewed on May 18, 2007 Rather than press ‘left’ or ‘right’ on the d-pad, you hold the controller toward the screen like a wand and turn it toward the left or right. This causes the launch mechanism at the bottom center of the television screen to shift accordingly. It’s truly a satisfying improvement that brings a new dimension to the game… when it works. The problem is that sometimes things go haywire.	3.5/5
	7 Wonders of the Ancient World review (PSP) Reviewed on May 17, 2007 After all, the 8 levels you get here will probably last you around that many hours before you complete them, and you can then go back and play them for better scores. Really, it all comes down to how the game plays. Thanks to power-ups and cornerstones, it plays pretty well.	3.5/5
	Aegis Wing review (X360) Reviewed on May 16, 2007 As multiple ships soar through space, you’ll find that you can approach an ally and latch onto his ship. Though doing so consigns you to whatever evasive maneuvers your ally feels are appropriate, there’s a tradeoff: you receive boosts to your firepower. Suddenly, those intimidating warships aren’t such a big deal.	3.5/5
	Toon-Doku review (DS) Reviewed on April 23, 2007 Toon-Doku turns things on its head by replacing the familiar digits with non-offensive picture tiles. Not only that, but it throws a whole bunch of them at you and lets you choose which you would like to have in play. It’s a nice touch, but it doesn’t do a thing to change how Sudoku plays. You still do nothing more than line up your characters the same way you have in any of the million rounds of Sudoku that you’ve played before.	3.5/5

Additional Results (20 per page)

[001] [002] [003] [004] [005] [006] [007] [008] [009] [010] [011] [012] [013] [014] [015] [016] [017] [018] [019] [020] [021] [022] [023] [024] [025] [026] [027] [028] [029] [030] [031] [032] [033] [034] [035] [036] [037] [038] [039] [040] [041] [042] [043] [044] [045] [046] [047] [048]

User Help | Contact | Ethics | Sponsor Guide | Links