REVIEW: Castlevania: Lords of Shadow - Reverie DLC

The title logo looks like a last minute add in. Foreshadowing?

After some initial hesitance, my romp through Castlevania: Lords of Shadow ended up being a relieving bit of fun. Sure the game had its flaws, but it was an enjoyable addition to the hallowed Castlevania series. When Konami announced two downloadable content packs for Lords of Shadow, I was happy to have reason to brandish the combat cross through some new content. The first of the DLC, Reverie, was released a week earlier than I expected, with no warning other than 'it's here!' That was all I needed to buy it, but was it a justified purchase?

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Fez Teaches Perception is Reality, and Reality is Subjective

In one of the corners of the PAX East show floor lie Fez, a game I've been salivating over for some months now, and what could end up being one of 2011's best platformers. You who are not concerned with ingenuity and thoughtful gaming can stop reading right now. Though for those brave enough to explore the tenets of "reality is perception," and "perception is subjective," please read on.

The lovely world of Fez is composed primarily of trixels; 3D pixels which lend a decidedly 8-bit feel to the old 3D model formula that has been the norm since the mid to late 90s. Fans of the PS3 exclusive 3D Dot Game Heroes will feel right at home in Fez's town of Villageville.

The real beauty however, comes after the protagonist, Gomez, speaks to his village elder to discover this is a day of great importance. Gomez receives a Fez in a dream sequence of sorts, and when he wakes on what appears to the the same day, something is different. He can now traverse Villageville in a way which he can rotate the world on an Y-axis, allowing new platforming opportunities to be discovered in the most creative of ways. The mechanic is not the easiest for my non-trixel brain to put to words, but the included PAX East gameplay video should allow you a greater comprehension. The mechanic is quite brilliant.

Once I got the hang of the perspective-altering power of the Fez I tried speed-running. That might not have been the best idea, as I missed a bunch of jumps and fell to my death on multiple occasions. Speed-running may require some experience -- AKA failed jumps -- but I'm sure once your mind is calibrated for world-turning and once you've learned the world itself, it can be done effectively. Perhaps speedruns in Fez are unnecessary, as the beauty of the trixels as well as the gravity of what exactly you're doing (twisting the freaking world) should be enough to keep you entertained for hours. The difficulty isn't as steep as something like Super Meat Boy, but Fez is still a joy to play.

If you don't have your frequency set for Fez already, you should get on that. Polytron Corporation's mind-bending game-changer will release sometime this year, and honestly, I don't think that's soon enough.

REVIEW: Fallout: New Vegas - Dead Money

Written by Brittany Vincent

Fallout: New Vegas certainly isn't without fault, but it did serve as a succinct followup to one of my favorite PC adventures of the past few Christmases, Fallout 3. After choosing to go the way of Steam for that adventure and this one in turn, I found myself engrossed in a world I couldn't quite escape from...until I was met with saving issues and other wonky glitches that desperately needed ironing out. But surviving the wasteland quickly consumes you, and I knew without a doubt I'd be looking forward to the first available DLC. I should have been leery for all intents and purposes once said package, Dead Money, was announced, but as the release date neared and I was given the opportunity to evaluate the latest addition to the Fallout saga, I was ready. But only if Dead Money could transcend the disappointment and feelings of being disenfranchised that Mothership Zeta so readily inspired. And I'm happy to say that it does, if only by a tiny bit. It's not the fantastic "The Pitt" DLC, but it's a start.

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Everything's Fine with El Shaddai: Ascension of the Metatron

I've said it before, I love games that have enough balls to twist and challenge the perception of religion. I'm not talking about the title that mixes bible mini-games such as herding animals into Noah's ark, or quick-time events to part the Red Sea. I'm talking Jesus throwing fireballs at Roman soldiers and performing a miracle that clears the screen of all incoming projectiles, or Pontius Pilate raining MIG 29 vulcan rounds onto the city of Jerusalem. Maybe not to that extent, but El Shaddai: Ascension of the Metratron seems to trail down the course of the latter, while still maintaining enough religious context to be loosely informative.

The first thing you MUST notice about El Shaddai, is the incredible visual style it employs. In the time I spent raining holy hell down onto my enemies, I heard many a PAX Easter look at the game and make a positive remark about the visuals. If you're some sort of recreational drug-user, El Shaddai will probably bring you to a state of inebriated nirvana. Even if you're the straightest edge in the congregation, you're still going to love the detached, ethereal backgrounds. And though the actual graphics may be lacking -- the PS3 demo I play looked almost like it could be run on a Wii -- I didn't care, because the style was enough to simultaneously capture and blow me away.

The control scheme is so basic, I'm sure even the Pope could pick up the controller and start chaining combos. One button for attack, one for jump, one for block, one for purification. Different attacks are executed by keeping the button held or timing your button presses, for instance, tap tap tap performed a light hitting chain of attacks, whereas tap, pause, tap brought out a more devastating attack. The intuitive control scheme makes it easy enough while discouraging button mashing. Purification -- the act strengthening a weapon by ridding it of it's defiling essence -- can be performed on a downed enemy, treating you to a slick disarm animation. Each of the games 3 primary weapons has it's own disarm sequence, and different enemy types allow you to perform a different purification.

I worried this game would be a little too much for devout Christians. Though Shane Bettenhausen, UTV Ignition Director of New Business Development, pleasant dude, and lover of all things El Shaddai, informed me that the hardcore religious who played it the demo at PAX East for the first time were not only cool with it, they enjoyed it. Total plot twist!

El Shaddai: Ascension of the Metatron will be available in North America this summer, with the PAX demo available on Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 shortly before release. Until then, stay tuned.

Investigate and Interrogate in L.A. Noire

I'm getting such a kick out of Heroes' Matt Parkman featured as a character in L.A. Noire. If you're unfamiliar with Heroes, Matt Parkman (who I hated, by the way) was a police detective with the power to read and later control minds. He also had a rocky relationship with his wife. So in L.A. Noire, the likeness of Mr. Parkman is just a normal dude with the tables turned on the situations I was most used to seeing him in when Heroes was on TV and not terrible. He's clearly uncomfortable being interrogated about possibly having an affair. Where yo' powers at now, sucka?!

With that out of the way, we can talk about the actual game, which is looking more interesting. The interrogation scenes appear to be a neat -- and integral -- part of gameplay. This is good, it's something to set it aside from being just another Grand Theft Auto clone. With more situations of investigation and interrogation, and less GTA-styled running, gunning, driving, and relationship jobs shoe-horned in, L.A. Noire stands a better chance. At least in my eyes. 

The only problem I see with the path Team Bondi and Rockstar is taking, is that players will be alienated. As overdone as the GTA style is, I suppose it's what people want. After all, look how incredibly successful Red Dead Redemption was, being pretty much a reskinned Grand Theft Auto IV. L.A. Noire is trying to blur the line between movies and games, in Heavy Rain fashion, although perhaps less obviously. Today's gamer is immature and uncultured. There was no middle ground for Heavy Rain, the public either loved it or hated it. People don't want a movie experience in their game, they want blood, headshots, and nuclear explosions. Amirite? 

Is the average gamer ready for investigation and interrogation? We'll find out when L.A. Noire ships in North America on May 17th. 

Watch Chimeras Bubble Up in this Resistance 3 Multiplayer Footage

It may not be the most compelling competitive multiplayer we've seen but it's still early. I'm sure Insomniac will figure out some unique game modes to throw in to make the multiplayer in Resistance 3 feel like something special. Unfortunately they've already gotten off on the wrong hoof, announcing at last week's GDC that 60-player will be scrapped in favor for the more traditional 16-player matches. Weak!

Though the game mode in this footage is vanilla, some of the weapons -- and their resulting effects -- look pretty damn sweet, I must say. Resistance 3 is due out for PS3 on September 6 in North America, with a multiplayer demo sometime before then.

More of Ace Combat: Assault Horizon's Instruments of Destruction

The latest trailer for Ace Combat: Assault Horizon is supposedly about the 108th Task Force, who are probably the crew of people you work with while you pilot dozens of flying machines built with the specific intent of blowing the shit out of other flying machines. Not saying that the video doesn't accomplish its mission, but after watching it, I really don't care any more for my partners in cinematic modern-air-warfare. 

I do however, care increasingly for getting my sweaty paws on Ace Combat: Assault Horizon so I can ignore all my orders from commanding officers and wingmen and just go blowing shit up while doing barrel rolls, huge loops, and flying 3 yards from the side of a building. That is the proper way to play Ace Combat games, is it not? Choppers, fighters, and bombers, oh my!

Test Your Patience! Mortal Kombat's 300 Challenge Tower Mode

Mortal Kombat, aside from being the grandfather of game gore, will always find a way to add something funny and funky into its games. Friendships, Babalities, kart racing, battle chess, or Reptile and Scorpion talking the parts of Liu Kang and Kung Lao, always something funky I tells ya.

The Tower Mode in the upcoming Mortal Kombat, aside from offering an incredible challenge by way of having to pass 300 freaking challenges, is going to infuse NetherRealm's gorefest with its quota of wackiness. Fight armless, fight headless, fight upside down, throw grenades into a bucket, play the slots or Three Card Monte with severed heads. What haven't Mr. Boon and company thought of? 

If you're a member of the illustrious handful of PSN Plus members, you'll be able to try a demo of Mortal Kombat on March 8. That's tomorrow, bitches! Don't fret, for those of you who aren't plus-rollers, you'll get the demo next week, March 15. 

Sorry Xbox 360 owners, no set date for your demo yet. Suckers!

Call of Juarez: The Cartel is Risky Business

Games like GUN, Red Dead Revolver, and Call of Juarez were the only window gamers had into the old west, leaving fans of the genre stranded in a desert with no water in sight. Before Rockstar and Red Dead Redemption went and made the western game all mainstream, the best we had might have been Sunset Riders. 

Since RDR 'revolutionized' the old west, it seems like not many titles set in the same period will ever measure up to the commercial and critical success John Marston brought to the folks at Rockstar. Kudos then to Call of Juarez  for trying something new, and moving in a different direction. Though it may be on a bit of a touchy subject, you don't win big by playing the same safe hand over and over again.

Call of Juarez: The Cartel continues to bill itself as a western in the vein of the two preceding entries in the series, but the wild west has changed. The cartels are the new outlaws, and cash, drugs, and guns are the new gold. In The Cartel, you can take control of one of three 'bad' cops to take down drug lords from Mexico to Los Angeles. 

The Cartel is said to have three-player online co-op, three unique campaign stories and all that, but really that's not important. What is important, is the bitching and moaning that 'people' (ie. near-sighted journalists and left-wing politicians) are doing in regards to the latest Call of Juarez, seeing as how Mexico is in a bad way right now, thanks in part to the real cartels. 

To any of the detractors, I say find something better to do with your power of state or power of media. Lay off, let games be games, and go fight the problems you have with the latest Call of Juarez game at its source: real life. To developers Techland, and publishers Ubisoft, keep doing what you're doing. Call of Juarez: The Cartel looks like it might have some promise, please don't fuck it up on account of over-sensitive blowhards who attack the games industry to make themselves feel tough. 

Also, please don't turn Call of Juarez: The Cartel into something Kane and Lynch-like. Thanks! 

Extend Your Play Time with User-Created Content for Infamous 2

There's no way around it, Infamous 2 looks like a jolt of fun administered right to your brain in the most unorthodox ways imaginable. Developers Sucker Punch have chosen to omit multiplayer in favor of creating a truly immersive single player tale. Bummer, innit? 

Fear not fans of PlayStation 3 exclusives, Infamous 2 is attempting to win you back and keep you playing with the latest announcement of user created content. While it won't be as deep as Little Big Planet 2's user-creation modes (really though, what is?), it will surely be a great way to extend your hours logged as the shocking Mr. MacGrath.

It looks as if user-creation is 'limited' to creating unique missions in various modes with various goals, such as stealth, defense, search and destroy, races, and so on, but that in itself will give creative gamers plenty to work with. Once you've created your masterpiece, throw it on PSN and let the rest of the world suffer through your impossible user-created mission. Really though, why did you have to make it so difficult?

Amped for Infamous 2? Your day is about to get even better with the news that a limited beta will be available to a few lucky gamers to jump in Cole's stylish shoes and drop a beating on some very well deserving individuals. Check back on March 14 for details.

via PlayStation.Blog