PC

Magicka: Vietnam

April 19, 2011

PC / Reviews / by Graham Russell Make a comment! / Tweet it!

You’ve ventured across Midgard, slaying robe-hating goblins and taking down evil masterminds instead of talking out the issue. What’s a wizard to do now? Clearly the answer is head to Vietnam.

The joke DLC for a joke game, Magicka: Vietnam adds a story mission, an extra survival mode, a spell or two and an extra robe to wear. We won’t talk too much about the rest of the DLC, since there’s not much to say other than they’re amusing, but the main draw here is the Vietnam Rescue Mission. 

In the mission, which takes less than an hour as long as you don’t keep dying, you run into Vietnam, take out towers, rescue prisoners, blow up weapons caches and escape on your helicopter. Yes, it’s really short for DLC, but it’s designed as a challenge map, where you complete as many objectives as possible and escape quickly for a higher score. To mitigate the length, you can play online with friends, and only one of you needs the DLC to play it. (It’s an honorable move. Kudos, Arrowhead.)

The mission plays a lot differently from the fantasy campaign. For starters, there are guns everywhere; in fact, unless you pick a base robe that includes a sword or something, there are only guns. They range from smaller guns to automatic rifles to rocket launchers, and many are more useful than the sword ever was. The Vietnam robe also includes a staff that throws grenades, which are useful for getting behind walls and cover. (You can use this robe in the base game, which does add some variety to that, but we wish there were more elements that could cross over.)

Of course, it wouldn’t be Magicka without pop culture references. It leans heavily on Rambo and Tropic Thunder, but you find the occasional other joke, and there are a few bonus “mea culpa” jokes poking fun at the base game’s glitch-filled launch. Fans of the original campaign will enjoy appearances by Vlad, who has somehow become a captain at some point.

Magicka: Vietnam isn’t the kind of DLC that feels like a whole extra game. For those who enjoyed Magicka and wanted more, though, Vietnam hits the spot. We look forward to the next release, and cross our fingers that we at least get a 3-level campaign or something in that one. For now, though, this is definitely five bucks worth of fun.

Pros: Fans will love it, which is the idea of DLC

Cons: Actual mission’s a bit short 

 

Back to the Future: Citizen Brown

April 6, 2011

PC / Reviews / by Graham Russell Make a comment! / Tweet it!

“Okay, Doc, let’s see what kind of nightmare alternate timeline I’ve landed in this time.”

That, one of the opening lines of Back to the Future: The Game‘s third episode, basically sums up the plot arc of this installment. 

Note: we’ll try not to spoil the plot of the third installment, but don’t read further unless you’ve played the first two. Rest assured, it’s not a good jumping-in point and there’s no reason to play it before the initial episodes.

Marty has crash-landed in this alternate 1986, into a world where Edna Strickland changed Doc’s life from that of an eccentric scientist to one full of, in true Strickland tradition, discipline. He’s the man behind the curtain, and you spend most of the installment trying to gain an audience with him in this locked-down police state.

If you’re looking for technical observations like visuals, controls or structure, this is the wrong place. It’s clearly just another chapter of the game, so we won’t cover all that again. 

In Citizen Brown, the writing team seems to be transitioning from the earlier episodes’ awkward placement of movie quotes and new character dialogue to a more cohesive flow of lines that are variations on themes from the films. The alternate timeline has wiped out Marty and Doc’s film adventures, so there are a lot of items reminiscent of the world found at the beginning of the first film. That’s interesting, as while we still find the first episode’s immersion to be more fun, it could only reference the altered world with successful McFlys and such.

In reviews of previous episodes, we had talked about the awkward inclusion of original characters, particularly Edna. While this one makes the others no less awkward, you can see where they were going with the inclusion, and that’s helpful.

While the story finds a rhythm, the game does too, but in a not-so-great way. Each little problem to solve seems like something we’ve done before, whether it’s the “move left or right” action scenes or the “here’s the time when we give you a list of three things to do and let you wander around until you stumble upon a new conversation” structure before the big plot point. The game throws in more dialogue options that do absolutely nothing, but what we really like are the ones that seem like they could help if part of a big chain. That’s what the genre’s for! We’d at least get more movie references stuck in here and there, and it’s a big reason people are playing this. It’s a good thing the story’s compensating for the tedium of progressing through it, but we hope there’s a bit more variation in the last two parts.

Ultimately, people who think Back to the Future Part 2 is the best film in the series will enjoy the story’s turn in Citizen Brown. We say stick it out and keep going. At least for now. 

Pros: Story becoming more cohesive, still the same game

Cons: Gameplay becoming more stagnant, still the same game

 

Revenge of the Titans

April 1, 2011

PC / Reviews / by Michael Walbridge Make a comment! / Tweet it!

Tower defense is a niche genre that wears out its welcome quickly for some, and if that has happened to you, Revenge of the Titans won’t do anything to make you come back. However, if it is a genre you crave, then Revenge of the Titans’ unique options and opportunities for creativity will satiate your thirst. 

In the game, you are defending Earth from Titans, extremely large aliens that seek to destroy humanity. You then take the fight back to them. The commander and researchers will provide amusing, though usually useless, updates on what your research for that level will be and what the new titans will be. The weakest point of the game hinges on this—the descriptions for the research and buildings are often vague. Sometimes the needed building or ability is asked for in one level, but is 3 to 4 levels away in the tech tree. Some towers end up being highly useful in some situations, some are always useful, and some are usually not. At first this is a disappointment, but that really is part of the magic of deciphering the code and mechanics in tower defense.

The real treat is the design of titan paths and level layouts. The maps are more like maps from RTS games, with varying mountains and crystals to mine. Instead of one or two obvious paths, the titans can start from 5 or 8 paths. Some start in the middle. Some can be directed off course by the decoy building or simply by building money-producing refineries in the middle of nowhere. All buildings are placed instantly, and all have limited ammo that must be reloaded. Ammo can be reloaded manually. Powerups also appear in random spots or upon killing some titans. The ability to instantly place mines or barricades can make for some close calls. 

Difficulty and campaign progression is done well also. The first two section are generally easy (though I suspect just about every player underestimates the first mega titan on the tenth level), but the difficulty really starts to ramp as further on. If you have a hard level, you can lower the difficulty just for that level in order to progress and come back to it later. The money is also kept over from each level to the next, as are the powerups, making each level’s performance important, even the easier ones. Levels can also be saved in real time. Making the campaign truly a campaign in the strategy sense rather than have it be level progression is an old trick on a new dog, but it works well.

The other two modes are Survivor and Endless. Endless is a campaign in the classic sense, with shorter levels and even lesser story. In Survivor, you can pick a type of map and a map size and then go as long as you can. The unique element here is again that you can save it in real time–there is a record that goes longer than a day.

There are unique elements and ideas in some of the buildings, too, but nothing here really shines. There is a decent amount of content, the mechanics work well and there is a lot of furious on-the-fly action, but as someone who has played plenty of tower defense games (at least a dozen), there isn’t anything exciting here. If you’ve played plenty and need something new, this will fit the bill, but if you’re new to the genre or looking for something impressive, I would recommend trying Lock’s Quest for the DS or Defense Grid: The Awakening for Xbox 360 or the PC/Mac.

Pros: Real-time save feature, experiments in the genre worth seeing, map layouts, titan-pathing

Cons: Lots of bad buildings, cluttered and confusing tech tree, lacking story (even for this genre), frustrating learning curve

 

Post Apocalyptic Mayhem

March 31, 2011

PC / Reviews / by Mike Clark Make a comment! / Tweet it!

At first glance, Post Apocalyptic Mayhem looks like one takes a racing game like Ridge Racer and fills it with a healthy dose of Twisted Metal. You know, brutal racing where you’ll spend as much time burning enemy rubber as you will your own. But before you even wade out of the shallow end, you’ll find yourself at the end of the pool wondering why you chose to swim in the first place. 

The basic premise behind PAM is to place as high as you can by accumulating points. Two things gain you points: destroying your five enemies and completing laps around the large tracks in the game. You destroy enemies by using your vehicle’s three unique power-ups that can be acquired by grabbing the matching barrel, much in the vein of any Mario Kart game.

That’s where the gameplay and depth flatlines. While large and detailed, PAM contains only three tracks. Three. A far cry from the “numerous compelling and completely unique” tracks the developers claim the game has. They do look nice and are filled with variety in design, but even that doesn’t redeem the fact that you have one less track than a single Mario Kart circuit. And the “unique and powerful” abilities each vehicle has? While different in visual style, many tend to emulate one another, and all follow a major pattern in terms of usefulness: the rear weapons are the ones you would want to spam, the others are more debatable in usefulness.

The biggest offense comes in the game’s “various intense race modes”. Either Arcade Mode, where you race one track, or Apocalyptic Challenge, racing all three tracks back-to-back, are all you get for single-player. Multiplayer expands this a bit with different race criteria to choose from: reach a kill quota, be the first to make a lap, or get as many kills as possible during a normal race. Shallow and simple, this is further confounding when you discover that the goal is not racing, but kill acquisition that determines whether you win. What separates this game from the many Twisted Metal games is that you’re forced into the facade of racing while still focusing on killing your opponents. Combat or not, no racing game should force the player to hover around their enemies for the sake of more points and a higher place.

The visuals of the game do look good, and the music is much what you’d expect from a game in this style: gritty and guitar-laden. It does handle well and carries with it potential. But where all the content in the game can be conquered in an hour, with multiplayer extending this lifespan by a few more potential hours, it begs the question: why bother?

From looking at the achievements, you can assume that more tracks and vehicles are on the way in DLC form. But where the racing portion of PAM seems tacked on to the vehicle combat, it remains flawed and shallow in a position where a Twisted Metal game and a racing game like Ridge Racer could both give what PAM attempts to give a lot better.

Pros: Looks and sounds good, carries a flawed but interesting premise

Cons: Shallow and short gameplay, lacks substantial content, racing seems superfluous

 

Atom Zombie Smasher

March 25, 2011

PC / Reviews / by Mike Clark Make a comment! / Tweet it!

Do you like zombies? I like zombies. We seem to like zombies so much that they permeate a lot of modern gaming. Zombies are everywhere, from dedicated games devoted to shooting them to games where they’ve been added just for sake of having zombies. So many of these games play by the same chord, but not Atom Zombie Smasher. Blendo Games’ take on zombies creates a fresh experience of killing zombies while jumping to a different genre.

Which? Real-time strategy in procedurally-generated cities where you attempt to rescue as many civilians as you can in tandem with killing zombies using a selection of mercenary teams. That’s the core of the game. Each campaign is different from the last, as the territories are always different, mercenary acquisition is always random, and the rules in which you edit each campaign create a constantly-changing and immersive experience.

The definitive “win factor” of each campaign lies in reaching a set number of points on the “victory scale” before the Zed – the zombies – do. Points are gained for how many civilians you rescue or are killed, winning a territory with a higher infestation rate adds a multiplier to your rescue rate, and every territory either side owns will add points after each mission. The player only gets 15 per captured territory, the Zed will get 10 to 40 and they get territory a lot faster than you do.

You’re not without hope, though. In addition to the set of mercenaries given to you over time, there are also two extra offense options that periodically show up: the Elephantbird Cannon and Llama Bombs. The former allows you to go hog-wild and decimate a territory up close and personal, while the latter allow you to eradicate multiple infested territories with one click. 

Along your quest to beat the Zed with your unusual and effective weaponry are a narrative that seems nonsensical and random, and excellent surf guitar music. These make the game feel less like your typical gritty and dark zombie game and more a game that happens to use zombies well.

On top of all this charm, wacky appeal and deviance from an industry standard that culminates into an excellent title, there’s also official mod support and multiplayer with up to three players at one time. Atom Zombie Smasher is packed with replayability and a zesty feel that deviates from common zombie use and does so excellently.

 

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