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Braid
Publisher: Microsoft
Developer: Jonathan Blow
Genre: Platformer/Puzzler
Players: 1
MSRP: 1200 MS point ($14.99, £10.20, €13.96)
Platform: Xbox 360

Are games art? It's a broad question which has been asked and answered, and re-asked and re-answered many times. Especially in recent years, where technical and graphical limitations have become less prevalent, and programmers and artists alike are free to create new ways of using current generation hardware. Many games are a clear argument against games being art, with their unoriginal concepts and gimmicky game play and art styles. Braid is proof that some games, only some, can be artistic masterpieces.

I played the XBox Live Arcade version of Braid. Very few games on the Arcade have piqued my interest over the years. Worms, N+ and Castlevania, to name but a few were all, in my opinion, genuinely worth the money spent. I can say that Braid, although hefty in it's pricing, is worth the money.


The only way to review this game without getting as complicated as some of the levels can be, is to take it's individual elements one at a time. First of all the graphics. I've never been terribly impressed by games using alternative art styles, like cell shaded games, or retro style brightly coloured shooters. Braid's hand painted wonderland feels like somebody spent a hell of a lot of time on it, and that you're playing something that has been lovingly crafted especially for you, and not just put in the graphical style of the month. Not many games ever make you feel like that. The music is also masterfully composed and whilst, you won't be humming any of it in the shower, it is pleasant on the ears all the way through.

The story is probably something you will make your own mind up on. Initially it seems like a 'save the princess, get to castle, she's in another castle' affair. Which is a deep as you need to get in a platform game. However, dig deeper and look at the intro story for each level, the character's motivation for playing, and even the design of some of the levels, and the pictures made from the collectible jigsaw pieces, and you will wonder, is this a story derived from the classic platform plot, twisted into something plausible? Or is this a very personal tale of lost love and regret? Has the author suffered some deep heartbreak that makes him wish he could rewind time and fix his old mistakes, or it is better to learn to live with them and learn from them, or how about having knowledge of what mistakes you will make, and then making them anyway, knowing it will lead to ultimate success? That entire last sentence is a thinker for sure, but it's also how you need to think to complete some of the game's puzzles, and this fact in itself is simply genius.

Playing the game is simple, you move around, jump on heads to kill enemies, and flick switches. You also have the x button to rewind time, right back to the start of the level if you need to (you often will). It's the characteristics of each area that make these simple elements go beyond simple and become brain taxingly complex.


Later on, new levels bring new features, such as your shadow self, levels where moving right moves time forward, moving left moves it back, and standing still, well, you get the idea, at least, you'll think you do until you realise the problems that come with such a situation. When you combine these and more features even further into the game, things get very difficult, and some puzzles will leave you saying only one word; 'impossible', even with your timeless advantage. But when you finally figure out the puzzle, and there are often multiple solutions, you'll feel so damn satisfied and well chuffed with yourself.

You'll notice that sometimes you have to think not only outside the box, but you'll have to forget there ever was a box in the first place. You'll often be going out of your way to save enemies instead of killing them, to get them to wander into a certain position where jumping on their heads will help you get to something previously unreachable. The game is full of concepts like this, where you go out of your way to do something which seems detrimental to progress, to achieve more.

So when we combine all these elements into one game, we've got a beautifully painted landscape, with delightfully composed music, a casual or incredibly deep storyline depending on how you look at it, and amazing use of time control for puzzle solving in an environment where the only other controls are move, jump and hit switch.


We have a winner here, and if you only ever download occasionally from XBox Live Arcade, as I do, this is one of those few games actually worth the money.

Reading over this review I realize I have my tongue firmly up it's asshole, and although I'm usually quite critical, there's very little to dislike about this game. I don't often play any puzzle or retro or platform games. But the charm of everything about this game has me enthralled from the start, and it's hard to say negative things about something which is exactly where we want games to go.

Like Portal, it's possible to complete in one sitting of around 5 or 6 hours. This didn't bother me, because, also like Portal, this is a highly original and enjoyable piece of art that is both played and experienced. It's just the right length, has just the right blend of aesthetic and aural beauty, mixed with innovative and enjoyable game play. You probably won't play it twice, but it's such a special feeling to play something which has clearly had so much personal effort put into it.

From the reviews I've been reading, my rating is comparitively pretty low, but I'm wary of the fact that, this was a hefty price to pay for an arcade game, and although the experience is wonderful, it's also short, and I would have enjoyed hundreds more time travel based puzzles for 1200 MS Points, when you consider how many levels N+ had. Granted, Braid has a graphical style which is very important to the game overall, and perhaps quantity would have affected quality if we had a longer game. But who knows, maybe we'll see some reasonably priced (or free?!) DLC in the future?

Overall:

My first Review, thanks for reading,

The Bratman.

Published by: Namco Bandai
Developed by: Namco
Genre: Fast Paced Shooter
Players: 1
Price: 800ms points/$10
Platform: Xbox 360
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OVERVIEW: After 27 years, the arcade title "Galaga" is finally getting a sequel, was it worth the wait? find out in my review.

Gameplay: if you have played galaga on the arcade, or in any other console that it has also been released on (XBLA, Gamecube, ect) you will come to find your self familiar, yet notice some big upgrades, for starters, you have a 2 new weapons at your disposal, they are two satellites that are controlled with the right joystick, you can aim up, down, left, or right, and they will continuously fire in that direction and stay in that place until you call them back with the"LB" button kind of like mines that you can drop, except they fire.

Much like Geometry Wars Retro Evolved, enemies will come from all corners of the screen, this is where you pull out your handy dandy satellites and tell them to shoot beside, and behind you since you can only shoot forward, at times, you will find yourself moving in circles dodging big crowds of enemies as you let your satellites do the dirty work.

If you are expecting a challenge, then look no further, this game is sooooo hard, it (insert comical statement here) you will often be overwhelmed by big crowds of enemies, and your satellites may not be strong enough to handle them, that is when you have to think quick and place them in places where they will be of more use.

Since there are only five levels, you can take a different approach to the game by memorizing when, and where enemies are coming from, this is not a very hard thing to do, but it bases on the trial and error system, try this out, die, go back, try another thing, and if it works, then stick with it and proceed to the next wave of enemies, and if you do this with great precision, the outcome will be enemies dying before they can even show up on the screen, and an amazing scene of control for the time being.

The game may at times also ask for a quick and small burst of strategy, showing you the pre-made paths of the enemies so you can place your satellites towards them and get them out of the screen before they can even get close to you.


Graphics: The first thing you will notice is that this game looks alot like geometry wars and pac-man championship edition, which is not a bad thing at all, it constantly adds beautiful explosions and its a great choice for this type of game.

You will normally find yourself in a dark blue, green, or red background, and every monster that comes at you will complement it with bright flashing lights, you will feel like you are in a rave, the background looks like something taken from a DDR game, and twitched a bit to further fit the game.


Sound: the game off course features some great and emerging techno beats which greatly fits into the game, it is at perfect volume and does not get repetitive or in the way of the sound effects, and even tho they are not songs you would put in you'r i-pod, it is still nice to stop for a second to appreciate the good quality of it.

Replay Value This game has a great replay value as expected of any arcade like title, but this is ALSO a game that you can only enjoy in short bursts (about 20 minutes a day)otherwise, it will get very repetitive very soon, specially since this game ONLY has five levels! which is not alot for an 800ms point price tag, tho each level IS about 10 minutes long.

There is no continue button so you can keep playing, and once you die, you have to start over from the first level which gets annoying, specially since it cuts you off from such great fun, you are going to be sad not because you lost, but because you were taken away from the game.

Difficulty: This game (like most arcade games) was made to give any veteran gamer a good spank in the butt, so don't expect to jump in and beat the game in your first or second try, many ships come from many places at once, and you WILL be overwhelmed, specially since you pretty much stick with the same weapon the whole time, except for when you deploy a black whole that rarely pops up and get a special upgrade which even tho it is very destructive and helps you out a great deal, only lasts for so long depending on your skill level, or until you die.

The game only comes with one difficulty mode, and it would have been nice to have had the regular three options (easy, medium, hard) specially with all the new unskilled casual gamers starting to jump in the gaming world, they may be discouraged to play more games after playing this one due to the fact that they will often be destroyed, this may lead to frustration, a broken controller, and an out of breath casual gamer from screaming at the t.v.

Achievements: Much like the game, these achievements will gladly take your butt, and deep fry it (which is very unhealthy) then they will chew it up, and spit it on your face burning it, they are ridiculously hard and funny at the same time because it is hilarious how they think that those achievements give us a challenge what so ever like they are suppose to, instead of a challenge, they give us an unreachable goal, and they are laughing at us for it, you have a better chance at defeating a Chinese judo master at the Olympics then getting all of the achievements for this game.

In conclusion, you will be discouraged to try out these achievements due to the lack of forgiveness, now don't give me wrong, achievements are SUPPOSE to be hard, but what this game asks for is something that only few will achieve, so good luck clearing an entire area without loosing a single life.

Conclusion: This game would have been alot better if it had co-op or multilayer in any form, still, it is a great single player game, and the last game you play is recorded so you can watch yourself play and learn from any noticed mistakes, on the down side, it only records the LAST game you played, so if you did something cool and want to show it to your friends, you won't be able to play until they get there.

Also, 800ms points for a five level game seems a bit too high, in my opinion, five more levels would have been nice, and would have assured a much higher score.

Gameplay: 4.5/5
Graphics: 4/5
Sound: 4/5
Replay Value: 4.5/5
Achievements: 3/5
Difficulty: 4/5

Final Score:
.:Great Game!:.

Game Review Survey

Ninja Gaiden II
Publisher: Microsoft
Developer: Team Ninja
Player: 1
Genre: Action Adventure

The famed Ninja that makes Kratos look like a teletubbie is back.

In Ninja Gaiden II, you are once again Ryu Hayabusa, the fastest, most badass Ninja killing machine ever to walk the earth. You are called one last time by CIA agent Sonia to put a stop to the archfiend's plot to rid the world of humans forever. With a host of melee and ranged weapons, as well as magic ninpo attacks, you set out to save the world yet again.

Story? Are you ****ing joking?
First things first: I'm not even sure there IS a story here. Actually a better way to describe what I mean is I'm not sure there is a story in this that is better then one in the Ninja Gaiden 2 for the NES. While the story makes sense and is technically a very average story (for an 8-bit game), the story never goes beyond a paper-thin make up of the original Ninja gaiden story. That basically explains it. The story is there, but is fit for, at most, a lame N64 game. Character development exists only in your imagination. The characters don't change at all, either in personality or anything else you can think of. The only possible "change" would be of Muramasa the shopkeeper, when he enters a room and mows down tons of spider ninjas. So beyond the WTF factor of that scene, Muramasa, like all other characters, is the same persona throughout the game. Although, the wacky plot does have some benefits to it. The plot actually successfully justifies the constant travel to cool and unusual places in the game. It takes you anywhere from a futuristic Tokyo to Venice to Hell. Interesting stuff there. Bland, generic, interesting stuff.

Damn Ninjas can look pretty good
Starting with characters. Character models are extremely detailed, from the top of their face plate to the bottom of their feet. Ryu Hayabusa is one of the best main character models of any game, anywhere. Sub-characters are spared no detail either. Everything about the characters is fantastic. Art direction looks like it came out of a 1960's comic book, but the game IS based on a rather old game after all. Take Genshin for example. Claws, pointy masks, electric swords--he's straight out of a Marvel comic book. The same goes with most of the enemies (and some allies, i.e. Sonia). Most all the bosses look like enemies that Superman would fight. That said, none of that is bad. They are so well designed and animated, 1960's or not, they look great. Fiends and common enemies aren't overlooked either. I defy you find an enemy that doesn't look great in the game. Onto animations. Each and every character's animations are easily the best graphical part of Ninja Gaiden 2. Extremely fluid animation for Ryu hayabusa, considering he has well over hundreds of different attacks. The care taken with each and ever attack is astounding; and it doesn't end with Ryu. Every enemy, every attack, every fireball they shoot looks extremely natural. if you want comparison, this beats Euphoria by a mile. Shying away from foregrounds now. Backgrounds are skillfully created, with a great deal of futuristic direction to most of the levels. Even the Dragon's castle level looks futuristic, despite being rather old. Now not everything is glorious with the backgrounds. Interaction with the backgrounds is non-existent. No blowing up walls, no breaking in doors, not even denting the walls. The only thing you can do to the background is smear blood all over it. Not noticeable unless your really looking, since Ninja Gaiden isn't about interaction of the backgrounds. Another problem is the framerate. later in the game when you fight possibly 30 ninjas at once, the framerate crawls, rendering the fight almost impossible to finish. However, for the most part the framerat holds up well. All in all it is a very nice looking game.


Adrenaline pumping Rock-metalcore-japanese-techno stuff
The muzak in the game is perfectly fitting. Heart pounding rock style music with a hint of Oriental sounds and techno style electric rock are so fitting for a game this over-the-top. However, the music is ALWAYS a mixed bag- its either great, or its terrible. Seems to happen very often with Ninja gaiden, both II and Black. The rock music of Aqua capital is note worthy while the less-then-acceptable style of the music in the Dragon Castle is NOT-worthy(lol.) Beyond music, sound effects and voice acting is all thats left. Neither of them bad, neither really all so good. Sound fx can be argued as being well done, but every ninja dies with a similar grunt, and all the fiends die with the SAME grunt. the slicing and slashing of Ryu's weapons are easy on the ears, but everything else is simply average. not good, not bad. Voice acting is only good if you don't care for terrible lip-sync. Sonia over-acts, and Ryu sometimes has an emo spout about his voice. beyond that, only the wacky dialogue will make you say 'Huh?' as far as the VOs go.


Fast, furious, and full of glitches
gameplay. I'll be honest will you: Gameplay is the only really over-the-top part of this game. Without the insanely fast paced gameplay, no one would play this. But thats why its there. Ninja Gaiden II is the fastest, most brutal, action packed game I have ever seen. As far as shear awesomeness goes when it comes to combat, it blows every other button mashing game clear out of the water. God of War II holds no candles to NGII when it comes to combat. And unlike Ninja Gaiden, every single weapon in NG2 is gold; no weapon is sub-par or boring to use. Even the bow is actually--dare I say it--FUN to use. To put it simply, you could get through the game using any 1 of the many weapons available to you in the game. None of them are slow. But thats necessary--anything slow in the game will be dead within seconds. This game is FAST. Faster then any game that has come before it. You need to know your weapon and know your combos to get through each and every insanely fast-paced fight. But lucky for you, Ryu Hayabusa doesn't know the meaning of slow--he moves in flashes of lightning no matter what weapon he uses. he makes the cast from dynasty warriors look like zombies. Even GoW's Kratos looks like an old man compared to this guy. but let me get one thing straight--this game is not for the kiddies. It is the most violent, brutal, bloodiest and goriest game I've ever played. Every battle is a load of flying limbs and decapitated bodies going every which way across the screen. In fact, its almost so bloody that its actually funny. And for more proof thats its not for your little 6 year old, the games difficulty mode is frustratingly difficult. Even Acolyte is tough, but Mentor is absolutely impossible. Trade in your game after Warrior, theres no possible way to beat the two hardest modes. Now for the not so good points. Glitches RULE this game. I've had to restart my game twice because of glitches. I beat the game four times before it finally didn't freeze during the credits. The glitches are easily enough to make you never want to see this game again, and the bugs are horrendous. I don't know what Team Ninja was smoking when they thought this game was market ready. A combat related annoyance is that they beefed up the amount of cheapshots the enemies take. I've had a beserker spider grab me 3 times in a row, literally disallowing me to get a single shot in before he takes 3/4 of my health down with each grab. Another terrible problem is the crappy camera. 3/4ths of the time you will have no idea what your attacking, and if you do know, you can't see it. If I had to describe Ninja Gaiden II in one word, I would have a problem deciding between 'cheap' and 'bugs'. If you can get past these extreme issues with the game and focus on its award-worthy combat, then you've got to get this game. However, thats about it. Combat IS the game, and if your expecting puzzles like in NGB, your gonna be disappointed. Beyond that gameplay is fun. Just don't expect it to be easy.


The life of a ninja is long and hard
There is no online modes in this game. That said there is still a huge amount of things to do in this game. The story mode will take you 15-20 hours to finish, and Tests of Valor will have you back again a few more times. You'll also probably go through it again on Warrior for the achievement, and TRY to to do it on Mentor (only to fail). Leaderboards are there for the 20 of you who have friends who actually have this game. However, beyond achievements theres nothing to keep you coming back for more. Still, thats at least a good 50 hours or so.

Major Selling Points:

◄ Insanely fast paced Action
◄ Difficult, but extremely rewarding
◄ Tons of weapons and combos
◄ Easy achievements and leaderboards
◄ Travel to many different greatly designed areas

Major Breaking Points

◄ Too difficult in the later modes
◄ Enemies are constantly more powerful then you
◄ So many glitches it'll make your head spin
◄ Terrible camera system

Now then:

Story: 2/5
While it makes sense, its stupid. And no one likes a stupid story.

Sound: 4/5
Music is hit or miss and voice acting is decent. Sound effects are pretty great though.

Graphics: 4.5/5
Amazing character models and some of the best animations anywhere. Awesome backgrounds.

Gameplay: 4/5
Insanely fast combat makes for the best I've ever seen. Pity that glitches and bugs hurt the whole thing so badly.

Replayability: 4/5
2 times through, tests of Valor and a few achievements and your done.

Overall:

Graphics, combat, and sound make up for lousy glitches. The gameplay is ultra-fast and amazing, graphics are uber-great, but glitches tear holes in it. Still, a great game and any action fan should already have it.

Game Review: Stepmania (PC, Xbox, PSP)
Publisher: MIT
Developer: MIT
Genre: Rythm video game
Players: Up to 2

We've all heard of the Konami Arcade game Dance Dance Revolution, and it’s numerous sequels and ports.
A lot of us have it on our home consoles, breaking it out during parties or even using it for exercising. I’m here to review a homebrew PC clone of DDR. This clone is called Stepmania.


The Default Stepmania Menu

Now some of you have probably heard of Stepmania. It isn’t at all new, in fact it was first released in November of 2005!
But it’s free and open-source, with I-Pod, PSP, and Xbox ports, and is guaranteed to entertain.
Now my Stepmania experience is on the Xbox, with StepmaniaX. It was relatively easy to set up too. The downside that I can think of is that you have to go and find songs, announcers, background animations, etc, to get it working properly.

It immediately worked with the DDR PS2-GC-Xbox Dance Pad and plays/feels exactly like the real thing, with the only problem being that if you are using the Dance Pad, it can be a tad bit annoying setting up the controls at first. However, once you’re finished setting the controls up, it works great!


Doesn’t it look exactly like DDR?

Stepmania is also very customizable. From background animations to arrows to songs, you can make it what you feel is best, and if you don’t like what’s available on the internet, you can learn how to make your own content and custom songs!

Overall, Stepmania is free, (unless you want the optional but recommended dance pad, which is only $20) and will keep you entertained with the thousands of songs you can add to it, I recommend you check it out. With that said, I definitely recommend the PC and Xbox versions, with the only cons being the way you have to setup the game itself and the controls, making it a lot more difficult to work with at first compared to DDR. The PSP and iPod versions however, I really dont care for myself. Even though these ports are very similar to the original PC version, you must keep in mind that it IS a dancing game, that you should be using a dance pad for. Honestly, what’s the point of playing a dancing game if you’re going using a d-pad or a click wheel?

So, to wrap this up:
PC and Xbox -

PSP and iPod -

1942: Joint Strike
Publisher: Capcom
Developer: Backbone Entertainment
Genre: Flight Shooter
Players: 1-2
Price: $10
Platforms: XBLA (Version reviewed), PSN

Namco's recreation of the classic 1942 is less then perfect.

No one will argue that top down shooters are one of the greatest classic game types ever made. Still no one will argue that they can be fun to play. Take Ikaruga for example; its a top down shooter and uses a classic formula like all the rest. But tweaks and extra stuff make the game much more enjoyable, though its still tough like many 1942-esqe shooters. Nanostray is another example of how the classic can still be good today. 1942, the cult classic that inspired all of this, had you back in WWII fighting off Japanese bombers, and it was a great arcade game back when it first debuted, and an even better Co-op game. So here we are today with Capcom's remake of the classic dubbed as 1942: Joint Strike. As far as classic remakes go this is pretty well done. But Capcom might well have made it a little too faithful to its roots. Read on...

When you start up the game you'll see what may be the most annoying part of the game. The menu screen. Don't get me wrong, the menu screen is fantastic; the effects and old style mission cards are great. However, every move you make in the menu is marked by the absolutely annoying roar of airplanes flying in from the side of the menu, which at first is kinda neat, but after the twenty-seventh time, I've more then heard it enough. And here is the next problem; if you don't have anyone to play local co-op with you like I didn't, then you will miss the best part of the game. After uncountable attempts to find someone over XBL to play, I couldn't even finish the game because the connection timed itself out and made both of us log off. Since that one time I've never been able to find another gamer to play the game out co-op with, and even though I got enough in to write the co-op section of the review, no one is gonna buy this for single player. No one with sense, anyway.


The graphics had a major overhaul, and they are pretty nice.

Co-op is what this game is made for. Hence the name "JOINT" strike. (Which I never actually could do, btw....) As far as co-op goes this game is fairly impressive. 3 ships and 3 special Joint possible attacks add a bit more game time after you've played through the 20 minute campaign mode with a friend. Taking down bosses together is always fun, and if both you and your friend get the dual lasers power-up then you can basically keep a constant blue streak going across every part of the screen, eradicating most enemies before you even see them. No special modes, but 5 difficulty levels and some "decent" achievements. As for the difficulty levels...without a buddy, you almost can't beat campaign mode, period. No continues whatsoever, and you can't save the game at any point. This game can be even more frustrating then Ikaruga, believe it or not. And when you can't beat the game when you don't have a companion, and trying to find a fellow gamer on Xbox LIVE is like trying to find one on Space Giraffe, the games "game" falls flat. Co-op is the saving grace, but thats only even "good". The gameplay itself isn't broken, but this game has just enough problems to ensure that it breaks most of the fun the gameplay can offer.

The graphics aren't really too bad for a remake of an old sprite based game. 3D models for most enemies and environments, and they don't look very bad either. A good color pallete of pastels gives the game a lighter feeling, as opposed to a dark and serious feeling. I unfortunately can't rant on and on about the animations and character models as I would like to since there really aren't any. This is planes we're talking about after all. Screen tearing does occur, and it is a bit noticeable since there is usually not too much variety in the things going on on screen at any one time. The one time I was able to play online the framerate was pretty messy at some points, specifically during the 1st and 4th levels. The weapon effects are bright and neat though, but when you drop a bomb the explosion sometimes clips through the level. Overall though, the revamped graphics aren't too shabby. The old style DANGER screen is pretty cool too. Really though, this a top down shooter. How much more is there to say?


On 2 stars or higher, you will never make it here on singleplayer.

Wow...this is one of my shortest reviews I think I've made in a long time. But really theres not much to say about this game. Except maybe that for the value this game really isn't worth it. $5 maybe, but $10 is just cruel. If you've got a friend whos willing to purge the money with you, it may be worth it, but otherwise its just another shooter, and one thats almost impossible by yourself.

Story: N/A
Its not gonna be added to the score because its not supposed to be about the story.
Graphics: 3.5/5
The graphics had a huge overhaul from the arcade days of 1942, and it really does work. Minor issues are still present though.
Sound: 3/5
The menu airplanes drove me nuts, and all around the music is bland and the sound effects are decent.
Gameplay: 3/5
The game is all about co-op, and quite frankly it does it well. However, single-player is boring and unfair, and there isn't a single soul to play against on XBL.
Replayability: 2.5/5
If it wasn't for being able to go through it many times with a friend the score would be much, much lower. Campaign is only about 20-30 minutes long.
Value: 2.5/5
$5 and we'll talk, but for $10 this game will rip you off. Ikaruga is a much better choice at the same price.
Overall: