Anarchy Reigns Review

Platforms Available: Xbox 360, PS3

Prior to this being assigned to me, I had no idea what Anarchy Reigns was. After a bit of research, I discovered that it was a sequel to MadWorld where you hack-and-slash your way to victory. I remember MadWorld getting a lot of praise when it came out so was pretty eager to get my dirty little mits on this game, but after fifteen minutes of playing, I regretted that thought

Like any reasonable gamer I jumped into the campaign rather than the multiplayer. Soon after, I realised that PlatinumGames had focused heavily on an online brawling game and once that was finished they noticed they had two weeks left until their deadline, so haphazardly put together something very lightly matching a campaign mode.

You can play as either one of two characters in the campaign, Jack Cayman (black side) who is the returning protagonist from MadWorld wielding a mounted chainsaw gun on his arm and the death of his daughter in his heart, or Leo Victorion (white side), an agent of the Bureau’s Strike One Unit, who has charged plasma blades on his elbows and a fresh clump of fibre putty in his hair. Both sides are looking to find Max Caxton, who killed Jack’s daughter and was Leo’s mentor.

This is about as much of the story as I understood because that’sall you’re really given. Whichever side you pick, you then go out and start fighting thugs and mutants and God knows what else happens to be on the streets of this apparently “open-world story-driven campaign”. I say apparently, because it soon becomes obvious that it’s not all that open and is heavily driven by mutilating enemies to gain points to unlock missions to mutilate more enemies.

The combat is average. It’s by no means Batman: Arkham series level, but it’s all the game has going for it. You use two of the face buttons for heavy and light attacks and hold down a shoulder button to modify these into special versions of each. The other two face buttons are reserved for blocking/dodging oncoming attacks, and grabbing enemies/ picking up objects. I would like to say that getting the right balance of using all of these is a must in Anarchy Reigns but in reality, I was just using heavy and light attacks over and over, occasionally throwing a dodge in.

As you defeat enemies, you build up ‘rampage’ which, when the meter is full, you can unleash allowing you to take down much larger enemies or larger groups of enemies faster for about twenty seconds or so. Entering a rampage can swing a boss match in your favor quite quickly if, for whatever reason, you’re losing.

Whilst the visuals look different if you choose to play as Jack rather than Leo, they feel more or less the same. It doesn’t feel like there’s any weight to the characters attacks because enemies just crumble when you hit them. Even with the big beasties or bosses, it didn’t really feel like there was any “push-back” from them when I hit them. This also carried over to the multiplayer scene where you get an array of characters to choose from.

You may be thinking “Okay, the fighting is okay and the story is cringeworthy, but surely it’s good to look at in this day and age? Right?!” but alas, it’s not. The graphics seem dated and low resolution, and I only know this because of the few times my camera didn’t decide to throw itself behind a wall, blocking everything. To match this, you’re made to sit through badly out-of-sync voice segments where you have two torsos and heads talking trash to each other about how they are going to do so much damage to one another. It wasn’t only embarrassing but unskippable.

Onto the multiplayer and this is where I thought Anarchy Reigns would really come into it is own. Like I said previously, it seems that the campaign of Anarchy Reigns was just an extra to the multiplayer so I had some hope for it yet. I played online for a few hours and in that time, came into contact with no more than a dozen players. There were two higher level players (33-ish) and the rest of us were all level 1.

This meant that, not only was I getting obliterated in an online grab-fest in which I couldn’t move for more than a few seconds without being pinned to another player whilst they performed their grab move on me or being kicked into the air, but I couldn’t get any experience to level my character any higher to greater defend myself from this onslaught. I can appreciate that it’s supposed to be anarchic but this was just off the scale and not a fun experience. I did have a bad run with multiplayer due to the lack of people online but I can see that there’s potential in it, should players actually decide to populate the servers and give some varying degree to the levels.

You can choose from a variety of characters from the game’s campaign mode to play with, starting off with eight but expanding to more than double that. Luckily you don’t have to sit through the campaign to unlock more characters; they can all be unlocked through multiplayer progression or campaign play.

There’s a few different gameplay modes including a 16-player Battle Royale mode and an american football styled mode alongside the traditional deathmatches and capture the flag. You also have some co-op if, like me, you don’t like getting your face smooshed in; Survival and Mad Survival - a horde type mode where enemies continuously spawn and attack you. The only difference between survival and mad survival is that the latter consists of the game’s campaign bosses attacking you. All in all, I can’t say that Anarchy Reigns is exactly my cup o’ tea. The campaign is pants, featuring cheesy cut scenes, dated-graphics and clunky controls but the multiplayer is promising if you like mad brawling and low server counts. I think Anarchy Reigns main pitfall is that it’s appealing to a niche in the market, but not having anything for those who aren’t fans of a nostalgic street brawler.

Omerta - City of Gangsters Review

Platforms Available: PC, Xbox 360

So, wise guy, you’re fresh off the boat from the old country and looking to make a name for yourself in Atlantic City - the shining beacon of excess on the grey backdrop of an America in the grips of Prohibition. Do you have what it takes to build your very own Boardwalk Empire, or will you be just another Mickey Blue Eyes?

Developers Haemimont Games have taken a break from sunny Cold War era Tropico for the altogether grittier setting of New Jersey in the early 1920’s. Gone also is the traditional city building mechanic; in its place is a reportedly authentic district-by-district recreation of Atlantic City, complete with a plethora of buildings ready to be rented for a variety of purposes. Anyone hoping for an all action title in the vein of the Mafia series may be left disappointed, Omerta: City of Gangsters sets itself up as for a more strategic approach in the style of Gangsters: Organized Crime.

The main story campaign follows your wannabe mobster from fresh-faced Sicilian immigrant all the way up the criminal hierarchy, accumulating gang members and lackeys along the way. An initial series of questions helps determine the starting statistics of your main character, however these only seem to apply to the tactical combat sections as opposed to having a bearing on your overall play style. The bulk of gameplay takes place on the city screen; your ultimate goal, besides completinglevel specific objectives, inevitably boils down to amassing money. With this being Prohibition, and the nature of business being often less than strictly legal, the money in question comes in two forms - Dirty and Clean. Find yourself running low on Dirty money and folks will be more than happy to take some Clean money off your hands in its place; but be careful, they’re not so accommodating if you’re short on the Clean stuff.

Money (Dirty or otherwise) doesn’t just grow on trees, which is where the aforementioned property portfolio comes into play. Once rented (or built in the case of construction sites that become available in the second half of the game) properties can be assigned one of a number of roles; some generate resources (beer, liquor or firearms), others consume said resources for money, whilst the remainder work to improve the performance of surrounding buildings.

It’s not just the real estate that earns you the cold hard cash; there are a number of locals who regularly give you the opportunity to buy or sell resources, or exchange Dirty money for Clean (or vice versa). Unlike story objectives, these jobs are entirely optional; if you wish, you could ignore them completely or even rely on them as your sole, albeit slower, source of income.

As it is, time is very much on your side. Whilst most levels contain a number of independent businesses that can be worked with or run out of town, or rival gangs as part of the story, there is never any real sense of ongoing competition. It’s entirely possible to set up a brewery or distillery to produce beer or liquor respectively and a speakeasy (an illegal bar) to sell it on, before going off for your dinner, safe in the knowledge that the city you return to will be exactly the same as when you left it.

This uninterrupted progress does contain one exception in the shape of the occasional random combat encounter. For combat situations, be it a chance attack by rival thugs, a supply job gone wrong or a predetermined story event, gameplay switches from the real-time city map to a turn-based mode; viewed at the building level. Specific objectives depend on the nature of the encounter, however, when all else fails just kill all of the enemies.

When the time comes to trade lead and punches, players can choose up to four gang members to form their party, with a fifth available to be assigned a ‘support’ role, giving a chance to swing the fight in your favour. Lose a gang member during an encounter and thankfully there’s no perma-death as seen recently in XCOM; rather they’ll sustain an injury that’ll make them less effective in combat until it has had a chance to heal.

Combat itself should instantly be familiar to any aficionados of turn-based tactical strategy games, but is still easy enough to be picked up by newcomers. Each character is allotted a number of Movement Points (MP) and Action Points (AP) which can be spent during their turn. AP can be used for one of three attacks which vary depending on the equipped weapon, in addition to up to three abilities that are gained as the character levels up. Be careful though, as the majority of the actions will expend any remaining MP in the process, so it’s best to make sure you’re in cover before taking aim.

The chances of scoring a hit on your enemy (or likewise, them hitting you) is affected by lineof- sight, distance and cover, and is presented as a percentage when you select your target; find yourself with a particularly tricky shot and you can spend an extra AP to improve your aim. Whilst boxes and barrels frequently litter the battlefields, be careful when hiding behind them, as some cover can be destroyed. All it takes is one wide spread from a shotgun to turn your safe haven into a pile of splinters, leaving you stranded and exposed.

In addition to having a health bar, characters also have a Courage meter; taking damage or losing teammates causes the Courage bar to dwindle, potentially to the level where the character becomes Panicked, significantly reducing MP and AP. Other status effects such as Concussion are also likely to ruin your day, so if you see an enemy coming at you with a baseball bat, you might want to take him down before he goes nine innings on your compadres.

Levelling up characters is somewhat arbitrary; there is no apparent experience indicator to show that characters are close to gaining a level, it just occasionally happens after combat. A character’s stats don’t directly increase as they ascend the ranks, however with each new level you get to choose a Perk, ranging from increasing a stat to bonuses such as improved aim when firing from cover. As mentioned, at levels 4 and 8 characters unlock a new skill, however these are preset. Any characters not in the player’s party also level up at the same time (their Perks are chosen for them), so there’s no need to keep changing the party around to ensure everyone levels up; depending on your personal preference, this could either be seen as good or bad.

Combat AI is generally good; enemies are neither clueless or unfeasibly lucky, whilst friendly AI that appears in some encounters manages to get the job done without getting in the way. The main frustration for many players is likely to be the camera; whilst it is rotatable and zoom able as one would expect, it’s not possible to zoom out far enough to get a proper overview of the situation.

The camera issue persists into the city view as well, and when coupled with the fact that the thumbnail view in the corner only represents businesses with dots rather than distinct icons means that you frequently find yourself repeatedly panning the camera back and forth as you try to remember which buildings are available at any given time. Conversely, there is rarely any reason to justify zooming in either; despite being able to get in quite close, there is insufficient detail in the environments to warrant doing so. As it is, the majority of the game will be played at the furthest zoom that is never quite far enough.

Mention should probably be made to the multiplayer component, however the lack of players online whilst we had the game in our hands meant we were unable to give it a once over. What is included, for the handful of players that will try it, is a small sampling of combat encounters, available to be played cooperatively or competitively – anyone hoping to pit their wits against their friends on the city map will be left disappointed.

On the whole, what’s left boils down to a series of “what could have been”s - had the city been more dynamic, with rival factions expanding rather than merely occupying predetermined buildings; or multiplayer extending to the full city, then the end product may have been something truly worth recommending.

We may get our wish and see these features added in a sequel, but as it is, Omerta will probably find itself cursed to inhabit the void that is “average”; it doesn’t do anything particularly wrong or badly, but it never really shines. It seems a shame to end on such a negative note as the game was ultimately enjoyable; it’s just when stopping to analyze Omerta that the flaws start to appear.

Sonic & All-Star Racing Transformed Review

Platforms Available: PC, Xbox 360, PS3, Wii

 Racing games aren’t exactly few and far between these days; it was only a few months ago that we saw F1 Race Stars, which was heavily compared to Mario Kart, and now we have Sonic & All- Stars Racing Transformed, the second game where Sonic and the bunch have donned their driving gloves and buckled their seatbelts but can this game live up to it’s predecessor?

The main selling point of this title, and I think the thing that really sold it for me, is the transformation. During a relatively normal race, the track can fall out from under your wheels and be replaced with either air or water. Luckily the guys over at Sumo Digital have been bright enough to not leave you high and dry with a car floating in the drink, so instead, you car will seemingly metamorphose into either a plane or a boat. Not only is this a different surface to race on, but your vehicle will now control and feel quite different. It can completely turn a race on it’s head and allow some of the players who are lagging behind shoot out in front.

No Time To Explain Review

Platforms Available: PC

Normally we wouldn’t review older games, but No Time to Explain has just been released on Steam, which is why we decided to pick it up and review it.

I’d love to give a longer introduction but there’s NO TIME!!!

Yes, before I start, I should probably say there’s going to be some time jokes. No Time To Explain is a game about time travel, big monsters, and ribs in your eyes. Not your eyes, but future you’s eyes… forget it! Oh, I forgot a delicious dancing muffin.

The main way of getting around in the game is by using the ‘beam gun’ which propels you about the game’s 2D environments as if it were a jetpack. It can also be used as a weapon against the many bosses in the game as well as in some levels having a bigger purpose than just shooting things and propelling yourself with, which willbe explained later (if there’s time).

Nothing really makes much sense in this game, but that doesn’t change the fact that it’s awesome. It contains dinosaurs riding on other dinosaurs, one with a rocket launcher - oh, and the other one is psychic. There’s also a massive drill-squirrel… thing, a massive flying shark, you from the future as well as several other versions of you from other futures, but most important, you from the EVIL FUTURE!!! That’s why it’s awesome. Any game that includes these can’t be insulted; it must be made against the law, or something.

No Time To Explain followed in Team Fortress 2’s footsteps with adding loads of hats; loads and loads of hats! The hats are there because they are, they don’t do anything, but that isn’t a bad thing because collecting them adds a little extra to do after beating the story. Plus they look awesome; who doesn’t love to have a hamburger as a head?

There are a range of different characters you can play as in No Time To Explain, from the default beam guy, to a character with a high knockback shotgun to shoot himself about, a scene where you are in a straightjacket and have to whip yourself around and a level involving a failed experiment where you have to catapult yourself around, which is quite hard.

As well as the game not making much sense, neither do the characters. They aren’t very logical, and can’t prioritise at all. I don’t mean bad AI or anything, it’s just the characters personalities. For instance, they need to get into a giant, walking castle thing, but it’s too high for them to just beam up so they all come up with ludicrous ideas, such as building a time machine (even though they already have…), making a helicopter (great idea!) and filling it with lava… (what? No!), or going back in time to warn themselves about this, when you make the obvious point of using two guns. If they can’t reach it, justbeam up with two guns and everyone’s reaction is: Yeah! We’ll just fuse two people together! Ummmmm, yeah. Doesn’t go well.

The levels are well designed and all have their uniqueness. One stage you have to set yourself on fire, burn wood planks, and douse the flames with water before you burn to death, in another, you have to eat cakes and destroy walls by becoming fat, and one where the game is art, everything is invisible and you have to use the beam gun to ‘paint’ the area out.

The bosses are pretty good too, but unfortunately not that challenging. The only really challenging bosses are the end boss on both seasons (the game comes in two parts). The bosses involved things like giant crabs, massive flying sharks, Psychic, military dinosaurs and massive drillsquirrel… thing. Just one boss let it down. Just one.

The soundtrack to No Time To Explain is pretty good, but not perfect. Most of the tracks played throughout the game are great, but there are a few that just don’t quite hit the spot. However, while not every track is musically brilliant they do all seem to ‘fit’ with the themes of the game’s levels, which is achievement enough. A lot of the music created for the game was scrapped because it didn’t fit, which shows they really did try with the music and deserves to be applauded.

Overall, No Time To Explain is a funny, enjoyable platform game that has unique ideas in each level, rarely get boring, it’s cheap, has a good soundtrack, doesn’t fail to amuse and is overall fun.

Ni No Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch Review

Platforms Available: PS3

There is certainly a lot of talent involved in the creation of Ni no Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch, with prestigious JRPG developer, Level 5 (Dragon Quest IX, White Knight Chronicles), working alongside the award-winning anime creator, Studio Ghibli (Howl’s Moving Castle, My Neighbor Totoro). Add the internationally acclaimed composer and regular Ghibli collaborator, Joe Hisaishi, into the mix and you have the icing on an already delicious cake. Ni no Kuni is the story of Oliver, a young boy from the fictitious town of Motorville who, as any fan of the JRPG genre will be unsurprised to find out, is destined to save the world. However, the manner in which Oliver finds himself in this situation is a little more emotional than often seen in a typical JRPG opening.

At the beginning of his adventure, our young hero loses his mother, Alicia, who falls ill while rescuing him from a childhood adventure gone wrong. Afterwards, the young boy’s grief awakens a certain Mr Drippy, a creature from another world who was cursed and imprisoned inside one of Oliver’s toys. When the tears of the young boy break the spell, his adventure begins in earnest.

As can be expected from the talent behind Studio Ghibli, the story is a well written and emotional piece in which the player will become quickly invested. It’s also extremely fun and intelligent, with a brilliant sense of humour that will keep you laughing all the way through; although the silliness never detracts from the deep themes of loss, hope and redemption. While you will meet many interesting and unusual individuals during the course of your adventure, the character of Mr Drippy, Lord High Lord of the Fairies (no typo there, ‘Lord High Lord’), is the undoubted highlight of the show. Drippy is consistently hilarious throughout the adventure with his enthusiastic attitude, amusing quips and strangely appropriate broad Welsh accent. Even his nonspoken, text-based dialogue is written with the twang of an accent. He also says “tidy” a lot.

Upon his awakening Drippy reveals Oliver’s destiny as the potential savour of his world, Ni no Kuni, which exists in another dimension from mundane reality. He also reveals that people in the mundane world have another version of themselves in the parallel realm and that an alternative version of Oliver’s mother exists in this other dimension. As these ‘soul mates’ are inextricably linked between the worlds, Oliver agrees to take the quest in the hope that by rescuing his mother’s other half, the sage Alicia, this may bring his mother back in his own world.

Of course, Ni no Kuni is a dangerous place and a young boy would have little chance of defeating the evil that besets the land without a little assistance. With that in mind, Drippy gifts Oliver with a copy of a 340+ page book called The Wizard’s Companion and uses it to teach him a few magic spells. Our fledgling wizard is now ready to take on whatever gets in his way on his quest.

As good as the plot is - and it is good - it is not the story, but the art direction that really steals the show in Ni no Kuni. Level-5s celshaded graphics blend seamlessly with the hand-drawn animated cinematics created by the Studio Ghibli team. It really crosses the line between videogame and anime movie, blending the two mediums together into a creation that transcends the sum of its parts to become something unique.

From icy tundras to dusty deserts, from swamps to lush forests; the environments throughout the game are deep and detailed. Extremely bright and vivid colours bring the world to life and even though many of the environments offer only limited exploration, the background scenery has an impressive visual sense of depth. Despite being so colourful, the level of detail in the games environments, particularly in the foliage, does create the sense of a realistic, living world; albeit one a more alive than we are used to.

The characters themselves are even more vibrant than the world they inhabit, with large blocks of colour and clean black lines. This really makes them stand out against the backdrops to enjoy their rightful places on centre stage where the action is. Between the vibrant backgrounds and the evenmore vibrant characters in the foreground there is enough colour and candy to make your eyes bleed... in a good way.

All of this is accompanied by an impressive and varied musical score that accompanies the on-screen action perfectly; from ambient background music to epic orchestral pieces, the music of Ni no Kuni is as an integral a part of the artistic creation as the visual eye-candy. Combined with an outstanding cast of voice actors delivering entertaining (and well-translated) dialogue, the sound direction of the game is beyond excellent.

You may have noticed I mentioned a rough page count when referring to Oliver’s copy of The Wizard’s Companion earlier. Well, I know the rough word count because every single one of those pages is lovingly recreated in a digital copy of the book accessible from the pause menu. Inside the book you’ll find details of spells, items, weapons, creatures, areas and more; but you’ll have to work for this information, as various pages are obscured initially and must be uncovered during the course of play. The fact that this has been included serves to give an impression of the sheer attention to detail that has gone into this huge world. Fans of the traditional turn-based structure of JRPG battle systems will likely be thrown at first by the games semi-real time action. During battle the player will control either Oliver or one of his ‘familiars’, small fighting creatures that can be collected, levelled up and evolved (à la Pokémon). Oliver will also meet some companions along the way, who will join the battles along with familiars of their own.

During combat, a character or their controlled familiar can be moved freely around the battlefield, which is useful to aim attacks at an enemy’s weak spot or to pick up the various health or mana orbs that are dropped during the course of the fight. The player can also select between various abilities, the standard being ‘attack’ and ‘defend’, as well as a choice of magic spells, items to use or a familiar’s special move.

Although the combat is sort-of real time, each selected action works on a timer; so it takes a few seconds to initialise an attack and a defensive stance is held for a certain time. Any action can be aborted before it is completed, but quitting an action early triggers a ‘cool down’ time which must be waited out before the ability can be used again.

Oliver can equip up to three familiars at once and switching between them is necessary to avoid exhausting them. His companions also have up to three familiars apiece, so a total of nine can be selected for any single battle. It’s a system outside of the comfort zone of much of its target audience, but fortunately it is gradually introduced, supported by tutorials and kept to a reasonable learning curve.

Another departure from the traditional JRPG staple is the levelling system. While a leveling system is evident in the game, character leveling it is an automatic affair with no player control in terms of stat increases. It’s largely the same when it comes to familiars, although this aspect at least has some player input in the food items that can be fed to your pets to increase certain stats. Of course, choice largely comes down to which of the (many) available familiars a player chooses to rely on, train and evolve.

The game progresses in a largely linear fashion as you move through the story, but players will find a number of side missions available as distractions or can just have fun wandering around on the games large and attractive game map searching for items and battling monsters. There is a lot of game in this package, with the main quest likely to take around 30 hours to complete and even more if you get distracted along the way.

Ni no Kuni is a fantastic achievement and demonstrative of what a collaboration between two distinctly different Japanese media giants can achieve. It dances the fine line between game and art well, although\ arguably it’s artistic credentials slightly outweigh the calibre of its gameplay. Nevertheless, Ni no Kuni should be experienced by all fans of the JRPG genre and anyone who has ever enjoyed a Studio Ghibli movie is bound to find some enjoyment from the well written story and excellent art direction to be found in the title.

Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance Review

Platforms Available: Xbox 360, PS3

Escort missions, fetch quests, wave after wave of enemies – at some point or another, these tired and uninspired gameplay devices have crept into our action-adventure experiences, suffocating both the action and adventure underneath artificial padding and game-lengthening fat. Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance—child of Kojima Productions and PlatinumGames—promptly slices the fat off, leaving behind high-octane, hack and slash action that only the wizards behind Bayonetta and Vanquish could conjure up.