No one would release a new game on the same week as Christmas, right? Or maybe that’s just what EA wants you to think! This week is the official launch of Star Wars: The Old Republic, which is great for folks who like business as usual in their MMOs. But, you know, with lightsabers.
Our podcast, should you choose to accept it, covers Mission Impossible Ghost Protocol. At the 57-minute mark, this week’s 3×3 is about our favorite examples of movies breaking the “show, don’t tell” rule. This podcast will self-destruct in five seconds if you don’t rate it on iTunes.
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My favorite table in Zen Studio’s new Virtue and Vengeance Marvel comics add-on for Pinball FX 2 is Moon Knight. In fact, it’s one of my favorite tables in the entire catalogue, along with Paranormal, Secrets of the Deep, and Earth Defense. Add Moon Knight to that list. I know what you’re thinking. “Who?” You and me both, brother. That’s part of why this is among my favorite tables. I don’t get the feeling that it was made for you comic book dorks who own issue #1 of The Marvelous X-Men or The Amazing Superman or The Watchmen or whatever. I suspect you guys are just as bewildered as I am when you hear Moon Knight’s signature line, “Let’s pack some punch into the whirlybird, Frenchie!”
After the jump, putting the “moo” in Moon Knight Continue reading →
Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious card of Ascension lore,
While I was drawing, nearly losing, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of someone gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
`’Tis some Great-Omen Raven tapping at my chamber door –
Only this, and nothing more.’
Guess what’s after the jump Continue reading →
I’m having a hard time warming up to the X-Men table. It’s clean, sleek, and open. But I don’t know why the Marvel Vengenace and Virtue bundle has an X-Men table. We already have an X-Men table. It’s called Wolverine.
I guess this table is about the rest of the X-Men. Having seen all three movies, plus the latest Teen X-Men movie, I thought I was an authority on these guys. However, this table taught me that there’s an X-Man named Hank. Hank the X-Man. You light up the four letters of his name. If there were X-Men named Earl, Otis, Dick, Carl, Chet, or Opie, they would also qualify for this feature. I’m not sure what Hank’s mutant superpower is, but it’s sure not thinking up cool superhero names like Phoenix, Dark Phoenix, or Jean Grey. By the way, because this is an E-rated game, they can’t say the full name of Juggernautbitch.
I question the basic premise of this table, which is the X-Men fighting Magneto. I’m not convinced of the wisdom of using a steel ball to go up against a guy whose mutant superpower is telekinetic magnetism. But there’s Magneto, front and center, doing archvillain stuff like grabbing your balls. Speaking of balls, my favorite thing about this table is the waterslide. There’s a really awesome waterslide running down the right side of the table. Splash Mountain has nothing on the X-Men lair.
Suffice to say, X-Men is no Fantastic Four. When it comes to team-based tables, I’d just as soon hang out with Rock Hulk, Stretchman, Invisible Girl, and whoever the fourth guy is — Doc, I think — shooting the ball up the Wayne Tower to unlock missions.
3 stars
Xbox 360
Thor is what a pinball table would look like if the designer was getting paid by the color. It’s got ice, and mountains, and lava, and a green ramp, and a dragon, and a golden city. It’s like a D&D campaign colored by some kid who insists on using every crayon in the box.
Unlike the real Thor from the movie, this Thor is very florid, enthusiastic, and encouraging. He refuses to sit still. He jumps around a lot. He frequently makes observations like “mighty!”, “fantastic!”, “awesome!”, “amazing!”, and “fabulous!”. He’s the kind of guy you want as a workout partner. However, he’s constantly talking about how great Asgard is. “Among all nine worlds, Asgard reins supreme!” “Asgard, the golden realm!” “Behold the beauty of Asgard!” He sounds like a spokesperson for the Asgard Chamber of Commerce. “Asgard has affordable housing, quality schools, and a vibrant nightlife!”
But comic book silliness aside, I really like this table. It’s got a lot going on, but unlike something with a steep learning curve like Paranormal, you can very easily figure out some high scoring basics. Knock three times to open the city gates, shoot the ball up the rainbow bridge, and pick a battle. Thor jumps around and beats stuff up. Points ensue. Fabulous!
4 stars
Xbox 360
Gorph. Sorry about that. I just took a big gulp of coke.
It’s feeding time after the jump Continue reading →
The Ghost Rider table for Pinball FX 2, now available as part of the Marvel Vengeance and Virtue collection, features Tim Curry from Legend squatting in the middle of everything. It also features a plaque that reads “Lucifer’s stinkhole summons a villain when lit”. At least that’s what I keep reading when I see it out of the corner of my eye. It’s written in that unreadable gothic heavy metal font that usually says “black sabbath”, “dio”, or “schutzstaffel”.
What I like about this table is that it proves that you don’t need Nicolas Cage to make Ghost Rider ridiculous. He does that on his own just fine. He’s a flaming skull. Who rides a motorcycles. That’s about all I know. When I lose the ball and some woman tells me her grandfather would not be pleased, I have no idea what she’s going on about. Oh yeah, lady? Well why doesn’t he come down here and play the damn ball himself?
The press materials from Zen Studios claim that Ghost Rider is the ideal table for beginning players. I think that must be some kind of diabolical joke. On the left side of the table, Ghost Rider has not one, but two lanes that drain the ball. Sometimes Tim Curry actually picks up the ball, teases me with it, and the chucks it right down the middle. Furthermore, a big fat center ramp loves to make me think, “Hey, easy ramp shot!”, only to roll the ball back down the center of the table and right between my flippers. In fact, I like to call that ramp “Lucifer’s stinkhole”. Welcome to hell.
2 stars
Xbox 360
That’s the Hectic Scribe up there. I hate that guy. As per his flavor text:
They are nimble with the quill — fast enough to keep pace with history as it unfolds.
I’m going to talk about a different card every day for the next week. Wait, don’t go! Maybe you don’t play Ascension. That’s cool. I’ll try to make it interesting for you, too.
Ascension is a deck building game, where you and your opponent start with ten cards and gradually use them to buy more cards, which help you buy more cards. It’s all about making choices for what to buy for your deck, and then the luck of the draw for what cards show up in your hand every turn. It’s a bit mathy, but with oodles of atmosphere, thanks to designer Justin Gary and artist Eric Sabee. The folks at Incinerator Studios have done a superlative port to the iPhone, which just added the Return of the Fallen expansion as a $3 add-on.
After the jump, send the kids to bed, because things get sexy and I got the pics to prove it Continue reading →
Dogs playing poker is one thing. But this week’s guest, Jamie Madigan, apparently envisions dogs (pictured) assassinating Templars! Join us for a bit of Assassin’s Creed: Revelations, a bit of Star Wars: the Old Republic, a bit of Serious Sam 3, and even some non-derisive Tony Hawk talk. Plus a contest in which you could win a free game. Also, Ezio up there wants you to rate us on iTunes. Just look at him. How can you refuse a face like that?
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2011 turned out really well. And in some entirely unexpected places! Bodycount had some of the year’s best straight-up no-nonsense gunplay, but in terms of the overall package, Fear 3 was a real stand-out. For multiplayer gunplay, three other threes deserve mention: Battlefield 3, Killzone 3, and Modern Warfare 3 all shine online. Payday: The Heist deserves recognition for its shrewd variation on the Left 4 Dead theme. Virtua Tennis 4 comfortably fit classic Virtua Tennis into a turn-based boardgame campaign. Distant Worlds with its two expansions is a fantastic strategy game in a year with too few strategy games. The Sims: Medieval breathed as much new life into the Sims series as Sims 2 and Sims 3. Little Big Planet 2 managed to be more than just a kit for user-generated content and instead shipped with a great platformer in the box. In a year with some great platformers, deBlob 2 was one of the best. Ascension: Chronicles of the Godslayer and Tiny Wings on the iPhone deserve special mention.
But let’s talk top ten. Toy Soldiers: Cold War, Dungeon Defenders, Driver: San Francisco, Renegade Ops, and Skyrim very nearly made the list. If this had been a top 15, I would have just counted us down to number ten!
After the jump, on to the top ten of 2011 Continue reading →
I used to think Colin Farrell was mainly good at playing dopes like his characters in Cassandra’s Dream and In Brugge. But after this year’s Fright Night remake and his role as a repentant gangster just out of prison (yeah, I rolled my eyes at that, too) in London Boulevard, I’m coming around to appreciating him as a badass.
For the most part, London Boulevard is a typical British gangster movie, complete with dialects incomprehensible to some of us who actually speak English. It was directed by American screenwriter William Monahan, whose main claim to fame is the script for Scorcese’s remake of Infernal Affairs, The Departed. The less said about that, the better. But in London Boulevard, Monahan does an intriguing job of putting Hollywood into a movie that’s thousands of miles from Hollywood.
As a director, he’s sometimes too “stylish” for his own good, but at least Monahan has a screenwriter’s attention to characters. When Farrell produces a formidable looking revolver and asks David Thewlis, who plays a burned-out actor, how he feels about guns, savor the perfection of this response as Thewlis gingerly but confidently takes up the gun:
My dear boy, I am a trained actor. I can feel anything about anything.
Thewlis snaps it open, takes out the bullets, and stands them on the table like a row of soldiers.
You took it from a passing philosopher, I imagine?
Whatever London Boulevard’s failings, it’s a cast of solid actors playing memorable characters with smart dialogue, including Thewlis, Ray Winstone, and Keira Knightly doing what they do best: basically, their usual roles. Props to Kiera Knightly for playing herself here, as a wigged out celebrity trying to retreat from her own celebrity. She has a scene in which she talks about how awful women’s parts are in movies, and you can’t help but suspect that’s what she’s doing here. Or is it? Ben Chaplin, who normally plays buttoned up English types, is deliciously unkempt and unctuous. And it takes a great cast to leave next to nothing for Eddie Marsan and Stephen Graham to do.
Also, what a fabulous soundtrack, including vintage Brit-rock and a retro/Radiohead hybrid group called Kasabian that I’ve since fallen in love with. The Kasabian song that plays over the conclusion of London Boulevard makes it one of my favorite movie endings of the year.
London Boulevard is currently available for VOD on Amazon and iTunes.
At the end of Mario Kart 7 — well, when you’ve finished all of the grand prix events for the first time, which is hardly the “end” — the credits roll. Fair enough. I liked the game enough that I’ll let them roll for a few names. But not the entire thing. I will watch your credits in proportion to how much I liked your game. I’ll sit through the entirety of the credits for an Arkham City, Bioshock, Far Cry 2, Brutal Legend, or Bastion. I’ll check out the first few names after a Fear 3, Red Dead Redemption, Splatterhouse, or Brink. I’m out of there as soon as an Uncharted 3, Gears 3, or Modern Warfare 3 is over.
Plus, my 3DS isn’t plugged in, so I’m on borrowed time here and I’d like to run a few more races. So I press A to skip the credits. No? B? No. Y? No. X? No. Start? No. Select? No. Left shoulder button or right shoulder button? No. Left shoulder button and right shoulder button? No. Some combination of two buttons? No. Four buttons? Whoa, wait, isn’t there some four-button combo that formats the cart?
As near as I can tell after my rigorous scientific inquiry, there is no way to skip the credits in Mario Kart 7. Which I can kind of understand. These people made the game and they demand recognition. But that should be my prerogative.
Wait, what does this have to do with Ratchet & Clank: All 4 One?
Afer the jump, glad you asked! Continue reading →
I couldn’t begin to tell you which are the worst games of 2011. Hopefully, I didn’t play them. But I can tell you which games most disappointed me. Note that some of these aren’t necessarily bad. I just felt they should be better.
After the jump, the most disappointing games of 2011 Continue reading →
I love when that little red number appears on my iPhone’s App Store icon. It means updates! Sometimes these are just bug fixes. Sometimes these are new features. Sometimes they’re even new content. Best case scenario, these are the new expansion for Ascension: Chronicle of the Godslayer, an amazingly thorough iPhone port of one of my favorite tabletop card games.
Ascension: Return of the Fallen, based on the expansion to the tabletop game, adds an entirely new set of cards, including some that introduce new rules. Cards eat other cards. Monsters invade your deck. You can reach into oblivion. Crazy fate rules mean you can get some action even when it isn’t your turn. Now when you play Ascension, you either decide to use the basic cards, use the new cards, or shuffle them both together into a crazy big new deck.
A new turn timer limits how long players can take for their turns in multiplayer games, which means unresponsive players will automatically forfeit after a while. Given that I flaked on several games a few months ago, I’m glad to see a mechanism that doesn’t force my friends to disconnect me. That can’t be easy. I say that as someone who has also had several friends flake on their Ascension games. It’s just the nature of asynchronous multiplayer. I’m scared to boot up UniWar these days, which isn’t so much a cool turn-based tactical game on my iPhone as it’s a repository of shame, guilt, and shattered dreams.
Speaking of shattered dreams, I’m glad to see Ascension now tracks my total games played, and wins and losses. It was apparently paying attention before the feature was even implemented, as I show 55 games with 28 wins and 27 losses. But why can’t I see that stuff on my friends? Let’s make this stuff public. Information wants to be free! Well, it does as soon as I get another victory and tip the balance from losses to wins.
Unfortunately, the expansion has also broken my copy of the game. I can only select the first and second cards in the row, and I can only select the second card by actually selecting the fourth card, which selects the second card instead. Cards three, four, five, and six are out of luck. As am I until the game is fixed.
Update: I just heard from Incinerator Studios that a fix for this issue, which seems to affect iPod Touch 2Gs, has been submitted to Apple.
Updated update: Fixed!
