NBA Jam‘s 2010 revival was long-awaited for fans of the venerable arcade basketball series. Though there had been a few somewhat-successful attempts at over-the-top gameplay in Showtime and Street, no one had really captured that playable quality. The new Jam was a lot of fun, but some said it relied too much on nostalgia, and others had a poor taste in their mouths from the NBA Elite debacle that gave it an unexpected retail appearance on 360 and PS3. READ MORE
Last year, as part of my Halloween-themed columns, I discussed Fury of Dracula, a cat-and-mouse deduction game that featured four heroes chasing the elusive vampire across Europe in a race against time. While I enjoy Fury when I have the chance (and time) to play it, the combat mechanics and certain event cards occasionally detract from the experience and cause the game to run much longer than necessary. Letters from Whitechapel (published in the US by Nexus) takes the same hidden-movement concept of Fury and streamlines it, allowing for quicker — and more strategic — play. READ MORE
Batman: Arkham City came out this week, and gamers everywhere have retreated into their own caves to finish the game before Kotaku can spoil anything else about its plot. I was running the midnight launch at GamePorium, so I couldn’t help but give in to the hype and bring it home that night to put in a couple hours before passing out. So far it’s about what I expected, but I haven’t been blown away by it. If you’ve played the first game, you know exactly what you’re in for. What I want to see is some game companies shaking things up with comic games. READ MORE
To die-hard FPS fanatics, id software is a name everyone can agree upon helped revolutionize the genre through such games as Doom and Quake. Now, after a short hiatus, they are back with Rage, a game that attempts to up the ante again in an extremely competitive arena. With all the media surrounding the company and the game itself, only one question remains: does it live up to all the hype? READ MORE
Solatorobo is definitely an oddball of a game to decipher. If you picked the box up at a game store and looked right at it, there are probably a couple things that go through your mind: “This game has furries.” “Aw sweet, it comes with a soundtrack.” “How in the world do you even pronounce this title?”
Most that we’ve mentioned this game to seemed to be turned off by that whole furry thing, and decided to just dismiss the game. StarFox had a cast of similarly anthropomorphic animals, though, and that seemed to go over pretty well, don’t you think? READ MORE
