If there’s one thing you’ll hear gamers complain about a lot, especially more retro-style gamers such as myself, is that the gaming industry in the last 5-6 years has been drowned by First-Person Shooters, and none of them are particularly good other than the online component (if that interests you at all). The only exception, to me at least, has been Borderlands, which is more like a “What if Diablo was an FPS?” kinda thing. And there’s Bioshock, but to me it was good more because of the awesome visuals than the actual gameplay.

Bulletstorm comes in as a game that, while it mimics the crappy grey-brown look of modern games, seems like it might be a lot more fun. But, as I always do, I was incredibly skeptical about this, since every FPS I sort of got excited for ended up being total shit, like Singularity. And, the title… Bulletstorm? Yeah, lots of thought went into THAT one (that was sarcasm, by the way). So I didn’t hype myself up too much, but I still kept a close eye on it.

So I played the Bulletstorm demo yesterday… Read on and see if it might be that one good FPS this generation!
Read more…

jobocan Console, demo, Games, impressions, PC, ps3, xbox 360

Well that’s a game I was not hyped for. Which is sad since I love the Castlevania franchise. I mean, I even beat Simon’s Quest. Other than a few crappy games in the series, such as… most of the 3D games (I haven’t played the ones on PS2… though I haven’t heard much good about them) and Encore of the Night, Castlevania has been one of the most solid series in the history of gaming, with incredible super-challenging side-scrolling platformers on the NES, SNES, Genesis and Turbo CD, to more exploration-based platformers on the Playstation and portable systems.

When I saw that this one was rebooting the franchise, and going for a more God of War style of combat, I couldn’t help but be very skeptical about it. The gameplay videos I’ve seen, as well as various previews/impressions have done nothing to convince me that this was not much more than a God of War game with Castlevania elements tacked-on to it.

Well, the European PSN just got a demo of the game, and I had to check it out, see if it would prove me right about what I thought the game might be like, or if it would actually prove to be awesome.

Usually, for demo impressions, I usually name what I liked about the demo and what I didn’t, but here’s I’ll go for a more standard style.

So, read on!
Read more…

jobocan Console, demo, Games, impressions, ps3, xbox 360

Heavy Rain looked awesome the first few times we saw it displayed at shows and event.  It’s been a long road for a game that’s days away from release now.

I must say I wasn’t really looking forward to it.  It looked intriguing, but was too low a priority to even take time to try the full game, with everything that’s coming out in 2010.  Mostly because it looked more like an interactive movie and not much of a game, and it was filled with QTEs, one of gaming’s deadly sins.

After playing the demo, I must say that my original impressions from previews were almost completely off.  While what looked  awesome graphically on display, looked more on par with the average PS3 game.  Though it’s probably due to the console’s current limitations.  The rain effects must be taxing a lot of resources.  Then came the actual game, playing with a controller in my hands, it was closer to a game than a bunch of interactive cutscenes, which was definitely a good point for me.

Disclaimer: I do know about Indigo Prophecy and Farenheit, but I never played those, so I’m a first timer with these developers.

Read more…

David A. demo, impressions, ps3

The first game just won our award for one of the best PSP games of the year. And now a demo just came out for its sequel.

So I gave it a try… and it seems like it’s gonna be a lot better than the first!

Read and see what I liked about it! (just a short post)
Read more…

jobocan demo, Games, Handheld, impressions, psp

Today, September 10th 2009, a few demos came out on the PS3/PSP, all of which I thought might be at least mildly interesting to check out: TMNT: TITRS, Katamari Forever, Star Wars The Clone Wars: Republic Heroes and, for the PSP, Half-minute Hero.

TMNT:TITRS was one of my anticipated games this summer, yet I never checked out the 360 version, Katamari always intrigued me because of its popularity, Star Wars… well, it’s Star Wars…. and Half-Minute Hero has an interesting concept.

So, which of those fail, and which of those should we buy? Read my impressions for each of them and see! (I’ll make this short)
Read more…

jobocan Console, demo, Games, Handheld, impressions, Lulz, ps3, psp

2 demos that interested me just came out on the PSN.

WET, which is available on the European store, and Mini Ninjas, which is available just about everywhere.

So I played them both a few times, so here are my impressions!

Read on!
Read more…

jobocan Console, demo, Games, impressions, Preview, ps3, sexy, xbox 360

Originally developed by pretty much unknown developer Ride On, Nippon Ichi America brings us Yuusha no Kuse ni Namaikida, which was renamed “Holy Invasion of Privacy, Badman! What did I do to deserve this?”. The fun 8-bit-looking graphics and the random title reminiscent of oldschool Batman reeled me in, and the possibly fun gameplay and concept (being the bad guy trying to kill heroes) made me quite interested.

This is Ride On’s third game. The first was a Darius port on GBA, and the other was a Beat ‘em Up featuring maids with guns(from the Simple 2000 series). Their track record is short and not very inspiring, but Yuusha no Kuse ni Namaikida definitely looks interesting.

So with an english demo out (there was a demo before on the japanese PSN), we can see if it’s actually any good.

Read on!
Read more…

jobocan demo, Games, Handheld, impressions, Preview, psp

Well, the idea of Rock Band without instruments pretty much put this off of my radar completely. The demo coming surprised me, so I took a gander.

Can a dumbed-down version without instruments still be any good? Well, you might be surprised by the answer!

Read on!
Read more…

jobocan demo, Games, Handheld, impressions, Preview, psp