Game Reviews

In a city where information is heavily monitored, agile couriers called Runners transport sensitive data away from prying eyes. In this seemingly utopian paradise, a crime has been committed and now you are being hunted. You are a Runner called Faith - and this innovative first-person action-adventure is your story.

This is not exactly a review, but rather a ramble. I'm about to give thumbs up for this game anyway As a Swede I'm of course not shy of bashing our gaming industry , if you can call some 1000(?) people an industry. Swedish gaming industry is quite bleh, pumping out over engineered, technically advanced but alas no fun games (contrary to Swedish indies, with Nifflas and Cactus as examples).

The crown jewel of Sweden's game development industry have been DICE for the last eon or so... I first encountered DICE in their wonderful pinball games that I played like a madman. However, slowly but surely, the soul disappeared from their games and as many other Swedish made games they tasted of dust and mud. I've always been a candy man myself

That's until Mirror's Edge! I've only briefly tried the XBox360 demo version, but hooraaah, finally a GAME from DICE! I think it's great that they have been able to break free from the Battlefield franchise and make something that actually stands out both in terms of game play, and art direction.

The game has got some critique for being too linear, and I think they could have made the ingame graphics even more stylized. But hell, finally something that resembles a game!

Thumbs up for this one DICE!

P.S.
If/When I play the PC version I'll get back with a real review

Inide game developer Rake in Grass have done it again! This small crew based in Prague, Czech Republic have released a new top notch game; the platformer puzzle Archibald's Adventures.

Just take a look at this game play video and tell me you don't love this game!

To get back on track with the review, Archibald's Adventure is mostly a puzzle game disguised as a platform game. The goal of each level is to guide the hero Archibald to the exit. To do this Archibald must operate various switches, teleporters, and such, all while avoiding acid drops, mutated monsters, stompers and many other deadly perils. Archibald moves about using his skateboard, but using a number of special abilities he can also remotely explore a level, move crates, climb the walls and even fly. This variation makes for some really interesting and cool puzzles!

Graphics are on the happy side, coloful and cheery, and quite an opposite of the graphics in Larva Mortus. As a side note Rake in Grass displays an amazing breadth in their current game portfolio.

If there is anything to complain about in this game it could possibly be that I'd like the controls to be a bit tighter, also personally I'd like the game to be a bit more focused on platforming action. The game is also possibly a bit on the easy side...

Archibald's Adventure is definitely a new classic casual game and I hope it will be a big hit for the great team of Rake in Grass.

The game is available for both windows pc and OsX (there is even an IPhone version in the pipe), and you can of course download a generous demo. Now go and try it out!

I'm a big fan of casual pc games. I just love the type of game you can just drone off into and spend 10-20 minutes and it does not have to be so serious. One of my all time favorites is Pop Cap Games Bejeweled. I even downloaded it to my mobile phone. I guess all the match three gaming is the cause for my little navigation stick being so wonky.

This was probably one of the games that started the whole wave of casual pc games, and the series has been sold in a whopping 25 000 000 copies worldwide. That is what I call success!

Bejeweled was also one of the inspirations for our own match three puzzle game with the added twist of using clues to navigate your pirate ship.

Speaking of twists the newest installment of Bejeweled is just released! It's called Bejeweled Twist. I immediately downloaded and got it up and running. I was really expecting much of this game, and sure enough it delivered. At least in the department of graphics, sound, music and that sort of smoothness you have come to expect from a top notch casual game.

The change from the classic Bejeweled games are that you this time spin four jewels clockwise to make matches. You are free to spin any four jewels at any time, that is your spin does not have to make a match.

This new mechanic has one big advantage, the game as a whole becomes much less random. You can always make a move, and you can line up your matches as you like. This is a very very big advantage as one of the biggest problems in classic match three games are that you can run out of moves and the whole game becomes quite random. Bejeweled Twist definitely brings the need for skill into the match three games.

The drawback is that it takes a bit of time to get used to. It is definitely not as intuitive as the normal match three, and it might have a harder time attracting the hardcore casual player... I don't think that Bejeweled Twist will bring new players into the causal games arena, rather it is a top notch game that is made for current casual players.

And now for the big anti climax...
Bejeweled Twist seem to have some sort of freeze bug in it. Seemingly randomly when playing a level I get unexpected freezes. The game stops, stalls and just won't respond. Gaaaah! I don't know if it is just om my computer, but I have restarted the game several times, and after playing one or two levels. FREEEEZEHTH. I have quite a good and new laptop computer running Vista so there is nothing strange in that department... other games seem to work just fine.

I really expected this game to work flawlessly. Especially considering the time and budget Pop Cap has, but I guess even the big guys have a hard time testing. Especially if you can opt for spending time and money on a big extravagant release party...

Hmmm what should I do today... Test the game some more... or test different champagnes for the release party.... hmmm This testing business is so hard...

Maybe if they had developed games iteratively they would not have this problem.

I have downloaded My Aquarium for Nintendo Wii, it is a virtual aquarium available for only 500 Wii points. You build your own aquarium and place objects and fish in it. I actually find it quite relaxing to use the TV as a aquarium. It is not really a game but at least it does not smell of fish!

Larva Mortus by Rake in Grass is a top down, horror arena shooter. I found the game to have great atmosphere, nice controls and great music.

In Larva Mortus you are an agent of the Agency finishing of the dark forces in a number of missions. There are both free missions and quest missions. The quest missions driving a simple story and beeing somewhat bigger often ending with a boss fight. The free missions are much there for collecting score and ammo.

The game mechanics are clear and simple and basically consists of you running around killing off monsters in rooms forming a level. If you clear a room the monsters will not respawn if you reenter the room at a later point. In the rooms are also various crates, coffins etc that you can destroy for additional goodies, such as extra ammo and time limited bonus abilities like extra damage, or berserk.

You have a nice arsenal of weapons ranging from the broadsword, the mandatory shotgun to more advanced weapons.

In some levels you need to clear all rooms, rescue hostages, find an artifact or kill the boss monster.

There is also some rpg-ish things that i did not get a good understanding of (i.e. level up) and that part seemed more or less glued on.

There are some potential problems in the game design that does not serve the game any good.

The monster respawn thingy could be exploited by a stubborn player to get a high score (= high level). I did not try this and there could potentially be some protection against this.

You regain your health by just idling (I think this is a rather poor game mechanic in general) making the pace of the game slower as you can simply opt to idle in a cleared room to get full health. There is no drawback to idling exept that the game gets boring.

The game quickly becomes a matter of preserving ammo, this is also something that annoys me in a shooter. After clearing a room, you revert to the broadsword to get the crates. It would at least have been nice to be able to stock up on ammo between missions.

The game is a bit on the easy side. I could mostly clear a mission using only the broadsword running around.

Graphics are nice, nothing exceptional but it does the job and sets the mood. At some points it gets a bit cluttered up. There are plenty of graphics and animations for differently damaged enemies, and a headless zombie wandering around without a clue is good fun.

The music is superb and sound effects does the job, though I miss a walking sound for the hero.

All in all I liked Larva Mortus, mostly for the atmosphere and music. There are some design issues that kind of breaks the game for me and I would prefer some more open spaced rooms and faster game play. I think you should try this game.

So yesterday I spent around 45 minutes on my Wii fit balance board. Maybe half of the time I spent on the balance games and the other half on the workout games.

I bought the Wii balance board yesterday and I have play for a few hours, it is a neat toy and I really got good vibes from it.