I download the iPhone free games of the day through Open Feint and Free App of the Day and sometimes don't get to sit down and play all of them that day. Today during lunch I ran through a bunch of them that I had been sitting on and here's a little mini review of each:
Castle Conflict - Reminds me of Fat Princess, but 2D. Quick and fun to play, will be keeping around
Dragon Slaughter - Tower defense game with the little time that I spent with it, very little variety. Will give it another try, but so far I think Sentinel is a superior game.
Scribattle - Missle command type game. Tough to get the aiming down just right, think the enemies move too fast for the speed that shots are fired, will give another try to see if it stays or not.
Ascent - Climb the level by swinging from bomb to bomb. Quick and fun, maybe a little too critical on how fast the bombs you attach to explode, since you can't really see them under your finger and have to base it off of a red circle that appears a moment before you would go. Played several times before I really got the hang of it. Will be keeping it around.
Fastball - Like Funkyball, but you don't need to tilt your iPhone to make it work, and uses a simple tap to jump over obstacles. Good stuff.
Robocalypse - Reminds me very much of Warcraft 3, which is a pretty good thing. Looking forward to spending some more time with it.
UniWar - Initial impression is that I'm going to need some more time with it to understand what is even going on, this is not a pick up and already know how to play it type of game, and I couldn't find any kind of tutorial right off the bat.
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
FF13 - 26 hours in / DSiXL Non-Hands On Impressions
A mere hour off of the given mark, I have landed on Gran Pulse, where I now get side missions and the ability to run around and look for things. The story has really come together, and I look forward to seeing what is next for me. I've only gotten about half of the "secret achivements", so I would say I'm about half way done with the game. I'll post more about that as I get to it.
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I saw the DSiXL on Xplay and wasn't impressed much at all by it. The point of a portable unit is to be portable, and making it bigger doesn't seem to really do that. I understand the concept that they have that they want to make it a social experience on the go, but if I'm going to be with other people, I'm either going to have a TV and console near by, or we're going to be doing something else like eating dinner, or bowling, or whatever other things people with free time go to do with other people with free time. My point is that I've owned just about every GameBoy since the original brick, and the last two haven't joined my collection because they didn't improve on what the system did somehow. The next Gameboy to own is going to be their 3d offering that they will be hopefully announcing at E3.
On the other hand, maybe Sony will finally scrap their PSP and put out a new system with two nubs to play games with. You get that and a better way to handle games (PSP Go's market system was a great idea, it just needs a NEW system to be coupled with!) that could actually give Nintendo a run for their money.
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I saw the DSiXL on Xplay and wasn't impressed much at all by it. The point of a portable unit is to be portable, and making it bigger doesn't seem to really do that. I understand the concept that they have that they want to make it a social experience on the go, but if I'm going to be with other people, I'm either going to have a TV and console near by, or we're going to be doing something else like eating dinner, or bowling, or whatever other things people with free time go to do with other people with free time. My point is that I've owned just about every GameBoy since the original brick, and the last two haven't joined my collection because they didn't improve on what the system did somehow. The next Gameboy to own is going to be their 3d offering that they will be hopefully announcing at E3.
On the other hand, maybe Sony will finally scrap their PSP and put out a new system with two nubs to play games with. You get that and a better way to handle games (PSP Go's market system was a great idea, it just needs a NEW system to be coupled with!) that could actually give Nintendo a run for their money.
Saturday, March 27, 2010
Final Fantasy 13 - 23 hours in / Xbox Game Room
At long last after 23 hours of play, I am able to customize my party. They are doing heroic things now, launching assaults, saving their friends, and there's hardly any crying anymore. There's been a few moments where something happened in a cut scene that made me keep playing after I was planning on taking a break because I wanted to see what happens next. Finally, I'm in the best part of playing Final Fantasy.
I've just beaten the last boss of disc 2, and I've popped in disc 3, but haven't started it yet. Have to take care of a few things around the house before I dive back into some more ;).
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I downloaded the Xbox Live Game Room this morning and messed around with it a little bit. These are the games from my childhood, yes, but am I missing something? I spent some time playing Yar's Revenge, and wouldn't mind going back to play some Adventure, but it doesn't look all that awesome. It looks like they're trying to sell me Atari and Intellivision games instead of classic arcade games. Where's games like Gauntlet, or Tron, or Star Wars?
Maybe I'm expecting too much. Then again, they're asking me to pay to customize my own game room. If anyone is playing in the game room, share your experiences with it in the comments below!
I've just beaten the last boss of disc 2, and I've popped in disc 3, but haven't started it yet. Have to take care of a few things around the house before I dive back into some more ;).
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I downloaded the Xbox Live Game Room this morning and messed around with it a little bit. These are the games from my childhood, yes, but am I missing something? I spent some time playing Yar's Revenge, and wouldn't mind going back to play some Adventure, but it doesn't look all that awesome. It looks like they're trying to sell me Atari and Intellivision games instead of classic arcade games. Where's games like Gauntlet, or Tron, or Star Wars?
Maybe I'm expecting too much. Then again, they're asking me to pay to customize my own game room. If anyone is playing in the game room, share your experiences with it in the comments below!
Thursday, March 25, 2010
15 hours into Final Fantasy 13
I've been putting a couple hours into Final Fantasy 13 every night, and managed to make it to the second disc. These heroes really need to find their happy place. Every cut scene is "it's all my fault" and "they really hate us" and the crying, oh jeeze the crying. I'm all for setting the characters in a darker light to let them reach out and grow into what they will become, but I've been watching them be emo for 15 hours now and it's about time for them to start acting more heroic.
The upgrade system doesn't seem to work right. I'm still on my basic weapons but I've upgraded them to level 4 which is better than the weapons that I'm picking up. I'm seriously hoping that I'm not wasting components upgrading what will be worthless items.
Also, 15 hours in is too long to be in tutorial mode. I just last night got back to a three party system, and I seriously question how long that will last at this point. I don't need to continue to be paired up with groups of two so I can see how they interact with each other. Let me learn on my own at this point.
Finally, the crystal sphere grid method is much more linear than I thought it to be. Every time I'm just about to finish off getting everything available, it expands out another level, but so far I've had no trouble in keeping up with it.
Those complains aside, I am really enjoying the story and combat system, the two hallmarks to the franchise. If I do something wrong and it wipes my party, I can go back and try again. I'm interested in (most) of the characters and want to see what happens to them and when they awaken their powers more. I also really like the recap that the game gives me when I load up a save, it's pointed out a few things that I didn't really catch on which has added to the story and made the next scene make more sense.
Onward to the next great boss battle!
The upgrade system doesn't seem to work right. I'm still on my basic weapons but I've upgraded them to level 4 which is better than the weapons that I'm picking up. I'm seriously hoping that I'm not wasting components upgrading what will be worthless items.
Also, 15 hours in is too long to be in tutorial mode. I just last night got back to a three party system, and I seriously question how long that will last at this point. I don't need to continue to be paired up with groups of two so I can see how they interact with each other. Let me learn on my own at this point.
Finally, the crystal sphere grid method is much more linear than I thought it to be. Every time I'm just about to finish off getting everything available, it expands out another level, but so far I've had no trouble in keeping up with it.
Those complains aside, I am really enjoying the story and combat system, the two hallmarks to the franchise. If I do something wrong and it wipes my party, I can go back and try again. I'm interested in (most) of the characters and want to see what happens to them and when they awaken their powers more. I also really like the recap that the game gives me when I load up a save, it's pointed out a few things that I didn't really catch on which has added to the story and made the next scene make more sense.
Onward to the next great boss battle!
Monday, March 22, 2010
Being 30 has its Perks, Too...
It's not all bad being a(n almost) 30 year old gamer. Sometimes you can go out and get yourself something that you really want, be it a new game, console, or high end HDTV. In this case, the Mrs and I got back a nice tax refund, which we used to go out and find a nice 7.1 surround sound system.
Before this weekend, I had a 10 year old receiver that I bought shortly after moving out on my own, which I was never able to get to work the way it should. Sometimes I would get two speakers to work, sometimes I could get four, once in awhile I could get the sub woofer to work, but it never seemed right. Having experienced the difference, it was clear that I had no clue what I was doing before, and needed an all in one solution.
We spent Saturday running around to a few different stores before deciding to go with a all in one box set from Fry's. I wanted to make sure that it had HDMI ports going in and out, and wireless rear speakers, unfortunately I was going to be stuck with a Blu-Ray player with this setup, but other than that, I'm extremely happy with how it's all working.
While I haven't gotten to experience the full surround sound gaming experience yet (I haven't fully set up the XBox or Wii to make use of the surround sound), movies sound fantastic, and I've caught myself wondering where a noise was coming from to only have it be something that was happening in the background of a TV show.
Looking forward to playing God of War 3 on this once I finish off FF13.
Before this weekend, I had a 10 year old receiver that I bought shortly after moving out on my own, which I was never able to get to work the way it should. Sometimes I would get two speakers to work, sometimes I could get four, once in awhile I could get the sub woofer to work, but it never seemed right. Having experienced the difference, it was clear that I had no clue what I was doing before, and needed an all in one solution.
We spent Saturday running around to a few different stores before deciding to go with a all in one box set from Fry's. I wanted to make sure that it had HDMI ports going in and out, and wireless rear speakers, unfortunately I was going to be stuck with a Blu-Ray player with this setup, but other than that, I'm extremely happy with how it's all working.
While I haven't gotten to experience the full surround sound gaming experience yet (I haven't fully set up the XBox or Wii to make use of the surround sound), movies sound fantastic, and I've caught myself wondering where a noise was coming from to only have it be something that was happening in the background of a TV show.
Looking forward to playing God of War 3 on this once I finish off FF13.
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