This is the only AAA (read:overpriced) title I’m looking forward to this year. It sort of reminds me of Crackdown. That is a Good Thing.TM
Archives for March 2009
Eating My Own Butt
About 2 weeks ago, a little experiment was unleashed upon the PSN by the creator of Katamari Damacy called Noby Noby Boy.
There’s not a lot to the game, but it is oddly compelling in its own special way. You are BOY, you stretch by moving both ends of your body in opposite directions and eating things which let you stretch further. That’s about it. There is also a meta game where you report your length to GIRL, who aggregates all of the lengths of all of the BOYs playing Noby Noby Boy on the PSN and that length tallies up as she stretches from Earth to the Moon and beyond.
Which is all well and good, but what I’m here to show you is the best part of the game. If BOY is stretched too far too fast or gets run over by one of the strange, strange denizens of whatever random level he’s spawned upon, he can snap in half. How does BOY go back to his own stretchy self?
He eats his own butt.
Behold.
Did I mention that NNB lets you record your games and upload them directly to Youtube! It also has the best homepage URL in the history of the internet (after BM, of course…)
If you’ve got $5, a PS3 and a connection to the internet, I implore you to show that creativity can thrive and grab a copy of the game!
March Releases
It’s the monthly releases, yay hurray! Just a couple days late.
Week of March 2nd
Halo Wars – I haven’t tried out the demo yet, but I think I’ll be waiting until the price drops on this one. I love Ensemble, so I’m sure they’ve done a great job with this one, but I’m in no rush.
Major League Baseball 2K9
Tom Clancy’s HAWX
Week of March 9th
Resident Evil 5– I’m going to think long and hard before I pick this up on release day.
Trivial Pursuit
Week of March 16th
Wheelman
Week of March 23rd
WWE Legends of WrestleMania– If it’s got Big Boss Man, I’m sold.
Sacred 2: Fallen Angel– We’ll be reviewing this one here on the site.
Raiden Fighter Aces
Dynasty Warriors: Gundam 2– How many of these games can they get away with?
Pop Cap Arcade Hits Vol. 2
Stormrise
Week of March 30th
Guitar Hero Metallica
Wet– Don’t know much about this one, but looks interesting.
Highlander
Just Cause 2– I wasn’t a big fan of the first one, but it appears it sold well enough to warrant a sequel.
Week of March 2nd
Sonic and the Black Knight
Major League Baseball 2K9
Week of March 9th
MadWorld– The more I watch videos and see screen shots, the more I am drawn in.
New Play Control! Mario Power Tennis– Never let anyone say Nintendo doesn’t know how to milk its assets. Over and over again.
New Play Control! Pikmin– Ahem.
Trivial Pursuit
Samurai Shodown Anthology
Week of March 16th
Ready 2 Rumble: Revolution– Another game we’ll be reviewing here.
Marble Saga Kororinpa
PES 2009 Pro-Evolution Soccer
Rune Factory: Frontier
Week of March 23rd
Cate West the Vanishing Files
MotoGP 08
Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: Echoes of Time
Burger Island– An Island of hamburgers? It’s like my dreams have come true!
Week of March 30th
Guitar Hero Metallica
Dance Dance Revolution Disney Grooves Includes Two Dance Mats
Gravity
Secret Files: Tunguska
Week of March 2nd
Peggle Dual Shot
MLB 2K9 Fantasy All Stars
Week of March 9th
Avalon Code
Black Sigil: Blade of the Exiled
Docomodake BOING!– With a name like that, it has to be good.
ZUBO
Week of March 16th
Suikoden Tierkreis
Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars– This is going to be a tough one to resist. Must finish TLAD first.
Valkyrie Profile: Covenant of the Plume
TrackMania DS
Monster Band
Week of March 23rd
Pokemon Platinum
Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: Echoes of Time
Lux Pain– Another future review. We’re very excited about this one.
Touch Mechanic
Pimp My Ride: Street Racing– Yo, dawg, we heard you liked touch screens, so we put a touch screen in your DS you can tap while you tap.
Week of March 30th
Di-Gata Defenders
Gravity
Gardening Mama– How is mama gonna fix things in the fricken garden!?
Tokyo Beat Down
Week of March 2nd
Tom Clancy’s HAWX
Empire: Total War
Week of March 9th
Shellshock 2
Codename: Panzers
Week of March 16th
Wheelman
Week of March 23rd
Stormrise
Grand Ages: Rome
Week of March 30th
Gun Metal
Peggle Nights
Sherlock Holmes Chronicles
Week of March 2nd
Major League Baseball 2K9
Tom Clancy’s HAWX
MLB ’09
Week of March 9th
Resident Evil 5
Week of March 16th
Wheelman
Week of March 23rd
WWE Legends of WrestleMania
Sacred 2: Fallen Angel
Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3
Dynasty Warriors: Gundam 2
Stormrise
Week of March 30th
Guitar Hero Metallica
The Last Remnant
Wet
Week of March 2nd
Phantasy Star Portable
MLB ’09
Week of March 9th
Air Conflicts
Mana Khemia: Student Alliance
Samurai Shodown Anthology
Week of March 16th
Resistance: Retribution
March looks fairly loaded with new games. What’s on your wishlist? Is the recession going to affect your purchases?
Netflix Watch
We took advantage of Netflix on the 360 to watch a couple movies over the weekend. We luckily have enough bandwidth to get movies in HD, so we’ve been working our way through those offerings. I hope they start making more HD content available, but for now there’s enough to keep us busy.
Confessions of a Superhero– Confessions of a Superhero is a fascinating documentary that looks at the stories of four people who dress up as superheroes and walk up and down Hollywood Boulevard, posing for pictures with tourists (hoping for tips). That might sound boring, but don’t be fooled. You won’t be able to stop watching.
The film takes most of its time following around the earnest Christopher Dennis (Superman) and splits the rest of the time between the guys who play Batman and The incredible Hulk and Jennifer Wenger, who dresses up as Wonder Woman.
They’re all “aspiring” actors (not sure at what age you go from being aspiring to sad, but a couple of these guys are bumping up against that line) who pose with tourists for tips. It’s compelling to watch these people’s lives and see what level their willing to reach to chase a dream while making ends meet. It’s sad, hopeful and touching all at the same time.
I strongly recommend it.
Primer– I’d say this review has spoilers, but honestly, I don’t know if that’s true or not, because I’m not really sure what I actually saw as I watched this movie.
The nutshell is this: two guys inadvertently build a time machine. As all red-blooded males would, they use the it to get chicks game the stock market. Things don’t go according to plan. Things get confusing. Movie ends.
I had read/heard a ton of recommendations for this movie, so I had to check it out. We couldn’t stop watching, but we didn’t really understand what the heck was going on. I think this one will take multiple viewings to really understand what’s going on. If you’ve seen it and can make sense of it, do tell.
I recommend this with reservations.
Gaming in the Eyes of a Six-Year-Old
My oldest son has enjoyed my hobby over the last two years. In the last six months he was ordered by his eye doctor to play games for 30 minutes a day while wearing a patch. (How cool of a doctor is that? Prescribing games.) As he’s gotten older we have begun to play games together. Our Wii’s been dormant for a while and he’s been enjoying games on the PS3 and 360.
We usually have good discussions on games and I figured I’d try and share some of them. Of course, he clams up when I pull out the recorder. I’ve tried to transcribe his grammatical pauses and fluctuations for emphasis. It’s all over the place, but here was our first “interview”:
So, Jack, do you like to play video games?
Yes
Yeah? What video game systems do we have?
Umm…Xbox and Wii and umm…the DVD one.
Playstation?
Yeah
Infinite Interactive Shame on You
UPDATE: I am totally done with this game. It has got some SERIOUS random balance issues. I know some people are enjoying it, and that’s great for them, but I feel like I paid $50 for a pile of frustration. There are just too many other games out there now I’d like to play and have fun while playing. I cannot unload on my Steam copy, but it looks as if I’m getting rid of the DS version.
In regards to Puzzle Quest: Galactrix, shame on you for taking almost two years to develop a game…
- that does not solve the early game/end game overpowering problems.
- for still using AI-favored bonus drops (I counted over four gameplay sessions and averaged it. I figured it at ~70% in the AI’s favor).
- for not allowing said bonus drops to work in the hacked gate successions.
- for having the ship follow the mouse (moving back to the gate after hacking is annoying).
- for with all the mentioned problems being the only game ever that frustrates me immensely but compels me to keep playing. (I don’t normally play games that frustrate me)
Oh, and the DS version is a leap back in presentation and control. The PC version seems to have gotten the love this time around.