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Wii Review by zzt
LostWinds
(Avalible on Wii shop channel under WiiWare)

Publisher: Frontier Developments
Developer: Frontier Developments
Genre: Adventure
# of Players: 1
Price: 1000 Wii points ($10)

Overview:
In LostWinds you play as Toku, a young boy who finds a piece of the Spirit Stone that contains the spirit of wind Enril, and the two set off on a quest to seal off an ancient evil that has invaded the island of Mistralis.

Gameplay:
In this game the player uses the wiimote/nunchuck combo.The nunchuck is mainly used to control Toku, the little boy. He climbs and reacts automatically. The most you have to do is push Z make him pick up objects. Then comes the main reason this game is so great, the Wind. The Wiimote is used to control the on screen cursor (the spirit Enril) to put the power of wind in your hands. Just move the cursor, and a sudden breeze wisks by anything nearby. This in itself is very amusing as people react, trees sway, and the grass and flowers flow at the mere signs of the wind. Then the A and B buttons come into play. Holding A creates a gust of wind, letting one do a number of things, the first and formost of which is letting Toku jump. Just draw a gust of wind under Toku and he is wisked upwards. Later you can draw what is known as a "slipstream" with B to create a wind current, of which I will let you discover its uses. As one of the first Wiiware games, I just have to say this kind of gameplay is so refreshing. There WILL be moments that you think to yourself " that is just amazing..." when you discover the true power of the wind.


Graphics:
There are some games that have good gameplay but poor graphics, and vice versa. This game on the other hand lets you have your cake and eat it too. What I mean is that while the gameplay goes above and beyond, the graphics are PHENOMENAL! The pictures almost speak for themselves. The game takes place on a 2D plane with 3D graphics with maybe a bit of cellshading. The style seems to be a mix of Native American/Aztec. The closes thing it resemebles to me is LittleBig Planet, a PS3 game for crying out loud! Seriously though, there are many games on the Wii that cost 5 times this much and do not look anywhere near this good. I can only hope other developers take a que from this and start taking advantage of the Wii as such.

Sound:
Another one of my favorites. The sound also takes a que from the Aztec/Native American style as it consists of drums and flutes. There seems to be only this one song through the main parts of the game but it is so beautiful and calming you will not mind. Battles do have a small melody that comes into play when enemies are in the area.

Replay Value:
Alas, every rose must have its thorn. If there was one issue with this game, it is its length. The game time clocks in at about two and a half to three hours, maybe four if you find all the secrets. Do not, I repeat, DO NOT let this turn you off, as this is really only a quality over quantity issue. The time you spend with this game is one of a great experience. Not since Okami has a game inspired me this much. Also remember that the game is only $10. You will more than likely want to play this one again from time to time, so take that into consideration.

Conclusion:
What a game. After playing this, I cannot wait to see what else can be done with the Wii and its WiiWare. The graphics and gameplay are great, the sound is wonderful, and the only reason not to get this game is if you are looking for a high energy, bloody, gory, action intense game. Even if you did somehow mistake this game for one, you would still have a great time.

Score:
I wish there was a way to give a score with only a quarter of a point off (like a 4.75) but I have to work with what I have. Due to the relative short length of the game, which is only a small complaint, mind you, I give this game a:



IMAGES COURTASY OF IGN ...

This stuff:
Publisher: Rockstar
Developer: Rockstar
genre: Action Adventure
Players: 1
Online: 1-16
System: Xbox 360, also on PS3

Who knew crime could pay so well?

Yes...so it has arrived. GTA, possibly the single most controversial (no way! Really?) game series to ever exist adds its fourth entry to its amazingly long list of GTA titles. 4 years in development, it has suffered delays, bans, controversy, and annoying 40 year old who can't get a girlfriend so they have to bash videogames (Jackie T.) Enjoy.

Ahem....

GTA IV has you follow the anti-hero Niko after being called to America by your cousin Roman. Fresh off the boat, Niko soon learns that his cousin's claims to a life of leisure are all but lies. What does the American dream mean to newcomers now days? For this Russian its a life of crime, deception and drugs. Lots of drugs(warehouses full). Niko's dream of getting a fresh turns sour as he learns that you can't escape your past so easily....

Lets get to it then. The story is absolutely awesome. As you play it, the story gets deeper and deeper and ends up being almost movie quality. the story is rich, and each character has so much life and story to them that its truly some the greatest character development I've seen since TF2(lol.) The realism is astounding, which is actually my biggest problem with the game. Rest assures, I won't lower the score because of this, I just despise the uber-realistic gameplay issues. Driving a car is harder then in real life, so I really wouldn't call that realistic, so much as simply annoying. Other then that, characters almost never say the same line twice, and never look the same. Animations are spot on realistic (Thanks Euphoria) and the atmosphere feels just like a big city world.
As for online connections and menus, I have had a bit of trouble joining ranked matches(go figure) and our game rooms are constantly united with other rooms at random points while playing. Frustrating, yes, but just wait till I get to multiplayer...ahem. The cell phone is basically the only menu you use. While innovative, its not exactly cool or fascinating.(Its more boring then Wolfenstein 3Ds menus.) but it works perfectly fine. Which is good....ish.

Now for the graphics portion of the review. Cough....ahem. GTA IV may not sport some of the best graphics around (a la Gears of War) but it certainly sports some of the most spectacular. Explosions from cars and RPGs are simply stunning to watch, as well and the flame effects from the molotovs. The lighting is brilliant; reflections are perfect and the whole engine runs perfectly smooth with practically no framerate issues whatsoever. Well, almost none. Euphoria seems a little less then expected to my end(my friend told me it was so much more realistic then it is), but its still amazing. When you shoot somebody in whatever body part, they react to it perfectly. The problems I found with it are that animations for getting hit by a car are simply terrible. I did a cartwhell through the air and somehow [gracefully] fell with my neck somewhere by my foot with my arm twisted over my back Peter Griffin style. Then my foot was suddenly where it was supposed to be while getting up. beyond Euphoria glitches, animation is spectacular.

The sound is...I'll spare you small talk. it works, great. 200 songs on the radio(even if they all suck, come on? Its 200 REAL songs!) talk shows, comedy clubs, and the voice acting is the best I've heard since Mass Effect. Lip syncing isn't perfect, but with this much dialogue, it would be close to impossible. The crunches of cars, the booms of RPGs, the police sirens(annoying as hell--realistic, no?) all sound effects are great. The little quotes your person can say in multiplayer may fall flat (haha, didn't know you could do that eh? You can. Left Bumper.) but thats about all that does. Little Jacob is so perfectly undiscernable that even the characters in the game can't understand him.

Gameplay. Meh.(kidding, kidding,don't stone me...) Gameplay works very close to how other GTA games before it works. They have autoaim that simply locks on to targets, or a new free look aiming system. (Guess which one sucks?) Glitches are obviously present with the Autoaim, such as it targeting dead enemies instead of living or people 50 yards away rather then 5 feet away. Gunplay itself is great. the western style duels between Niko and thugs or what may come are some of the best moments in the game. Melee combat....hah. Kill me for this, but its extremely unresponsive. (Ok, block when he attacks to dodge...block--WTF?) Maybe thats why Rockstar basically threw that out the window when it comes to multiplayer. For good reason. The environment plays a huge part in most combat, greatly too. In car battles, the cars around you and everything else is absolutely important.
other ...

The world ends with who... me... not uh.... Really?


Information about the game: The World Ends With you is a Single player Nintendo DS Role-Playing Game published by Square Enix and Developed by the Kingdom Hearts Team and Square Enix, Jupiter. Single player Game

Plot Synopsis:You take on the role of Neku Sakuraba as he wakes up with little memory, to find he is a part of a mysterious game constructed by a group known as the Reapers.

Overview: In this game, you are basically thrown into a strange world, with nothing left to do except fight. To beat the game, you have to survive all 7 days with your partner, Shiki Misaki, and do whatever it takes to not get"erased" (there form of getting killed). The Combat system in this game is very unique in the fact that you are controlling 2 characters at once (One character for each screen) And may seem to be overwhelming at first, but in time you seem to get used to it. On The top screen, you got a Dance Dance Revolution style game-play to attack, while on the bottom, you get to slash away "noise" (or enemies) with your stylus. Another interesting feature is the pin system. The pin system is where you collect all types of pins that give you diffrent types of attacks, but you can only have a certain amount working at once. I like the idea, and it is fun to collect all the pins. The Game seems to me like a more modern Kingdom Hearts on the edge. In this game it will cuss and the main character seems to be a little dark himself.

Graphics: Graphics in this game are a little So-So. Character design and just the art in the game is really well done, but when you control the character on the streets, it is VERY pixalated. The thing is, while in combat the game looks like a solid DS game. Nevertheless, Do not buy the game if you are looking for Crazy High-Def amazing graphics, cause you are not going to find it here.

Sound: Well, other then the fact that the music is annoying Japanese songs that will play over and over and OVER again, Sound is good. The SFX are pretty superb in battle.

Replay Value: On a bored weekend and I am craving RPG goodness, I will give it another play through. The game itself is addicting.

Overall: The Game is fun, addicting and new, which will give RPG gamers a new look at what they have seen in RPG's so far. The new combat system makes the game unique by itself, if you guys don't count the Edgy-ness of the game unique too. Though Sound and graphics are sub-par, you will come to look over these things for a solid game with a great story and great gameplay. Despite the few problems in the game, I would say go ahead and buy it!

Story 5/5
Sound 3.5/5
Graphics 3/5
Gameplay 5/5



...

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If you're looking for games to review, check out Goozex. Goozex is the new innovative system developed and tested by video-gamers for video-gamers. Goozex provides a unique trading platform that allows peer-to-multi- peer trading of physical goods.

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...

My current game of play has been CSI:Crime Scene Investigation (Dark Motives)....

After thorough game playing I would personally give I high recommendation on this particular game.

But I do suggest you have a complete read of the instruction manuel before playing, NOT A QUICK SCAN! or you will struggle to progress through the differant stages. I do beleive this game is good in the respect it is has a detailed and fuffiling feel to it, this is no cluedo! On the other hand there are the expected floors, some of the clues are so unobvious and hidden to the naked eye this can almost make certain areas impossible complete, I admit I had to search for a walkthrough to give me hints (not an easy task in it's self so I suggest contacting me if this is an issue). Once i realised all the differant areas of clue detction it was an enjoyable experience, this is why I suggest full manuel reading! There are high quality film sequences, large collection of tools and detection devices, locations and characters which add to that oh so wanted CSI TV SERIES FEEL! I think the game could of been slightly longer but considering the large amount of detail etc and it being a Nintendo Ds game it was satasfactory. This a trully wonderful game to keep going back to, for those of us who like snooping around and solving mysterys! ...

From the WIKI page:
The story is good, but it seems to drag on a little painfully at times. Of course, I'm basing this on a fan translation... Though you can tell that there wouldn't be much difference otherwise.

Most of the back story is "optional". You get to hear more through cutscenes by talking to certain characters. This is good if you want to get straight to the action, but it leaves you a bit unsatisfied if you don't talk to everyone every chance you get.

Where the story shines is in the characters. They each have a distinct personality, which gives you a strong sense of attachment. Matelite and Taicho add some very welcome comic relief, Yoyo is a chick that actually grows on you and Rush really gets you into the action with his upbeat persona.

All and all, it's pretty solid and enjoyable.


The music, oh god the music. If you enjoy the music from Final Fantasy 6, Secret Of Mana etc... Then the music in Bahamut Lagoon is gonna grow on you.

The only problem is, that the same songs get played too often. For the most part you hear one song for the enemy phase and one for the player phase. It gets repetitive pretty quick... But it's enjoyable, so I don't really care.

The actual sound effects are top notch too. Sword attacks sound like sword attacks, fire spells sound like fire spells... And there's a great deal of them to go around.


This is one of those games that make me which they would go back and do some more SNES games. It proves that with the right team, visuals can rival that of PSX games.

Did you think the enemies in Final Fantasy 6 looked awesome? What about the backgrounds? Well, take all of those graphics, add even more polish (doesn't seem possible, but they pulled it off) and animate nearly everything. Yes, I said animate. Probably 95% or so of all the enemies and characters are animated to some degree. You'll take one look at them standing still and say "Holy crap! That looks freakin' sweet!!!". Then once they attack and show off their fluid animation, you'll most likely crap your pants.


It also takes advantage of some awesome MODE7 effects for backdrops during the cutscenes. Probably some of the best I've seen.


The only reason I didn't give the graphics a perfect score, is because some of the animations are a little whacky. If you've fought a chimara, you'd agree that it's hard to tell what the hell is going on with it's legs. This reason, and the fact that Star Ocean/Tales Of Phantasia have it beaten are why it gets a 9.0.


This is gonna be a long one...

Gameplay is what makes this game so enjoyable. It's your standard strategy RPG affair (ala Final Fantasy Tactics), but with a few major twists.

First off, each troop consists of multiple characters. When it's your turn you can move, attack, heal, blah blah blah... The thing is, there's two different ways to do everything.

You can attack/heal on the field as in FFT mentioned above (this is mainly done with long range attacks/spells), or you can go straight up to the enemy and begin a turn based battle. Turn based battles net you more EXP, gold, items and are generally stronger... While field attacks get you fewer of said things, but can't be counter attacked.


Another big twist are the dragons. Each troop get's there own dragon, to which they can issue commands (Go!, Come!, Wait! etc...).

That's not the cool part though... In between each battle, you get the chance to feed your dragons items you've won. Each item has a different effect on it's stats. Fire Rods will give your dragon points in "Fire", "Attack" and "Wisdom". Ice Armor will give it points in "Ice", "Defence" and "HP". You get the picture.

The elements cap out at 100. After it gets one point in any element, it will learn an attack in said element... For each 10 points after that, the level of that attack will raise by one. Changing it's animation and strength.
...

DCEmu Reviews first launched in 2007 as a PSP only review site. It relaunched a couple months later to incorporate Nintendo DS, Wii, Sony PlayStation 3 and Microsoft Xbox 360 reviews and has been a huge success ever since. To help expand the success, DCEmu Reviews and DCEmu Networks is proud to present...DCEmu Games Reviews.

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Here, you'll find the latest deals on games whether it be online or instore. If you find any deals or coupons yourself, feel free to post here and let other PSP owners know!

Legend:

• AR - After Rebate
• B&M - Brick & Motar (store)
• BOGO - Buy One Get One...
• OOS - Out Of Stock
• PM - Price Match
• SHIPPED - Shipping included
• YMMV - Your Mileage May Vary
• **EXPIRED** - Offer no longer available.

To see all the past deals that have expired, visit our Graveyard Game Deals thread. ...

Dead deals here ...