SambaL

"hey, you know what, let's take Saints Row 3, add some Crackdown and Prototype gameplay to it and overpower the layer so you don't have to use cheats anymore!" - "But.. sir.. why still have the vehicles to drive and have vehicle customization if you can run faster and jump over buildings and water?" - "That's not what people want Jenkins! People want all kinds of weapons and wrestling moves and super powers to play around with." - "That what i was saying sir, why still have it in there. Why still call i Saints Row at all?" - "Jenkins?" - "Yes.. sir?" - "You're fired!!!"

Very challenging and original little strategy game. It might look simple on the outside but once you've played a few rounds you'll start seeing that it's quite strategic and that you'll have to think your moves out before doing them to be able to win.

Very well remade 8-bit classic. Nice looking 2D world with 3D graphics tons of extra content, and still very challenging gameplay. The only thing that really bugged me though are the frustrating swing controls. Running, shooting, it all works fine as far as platformers go, but swinging with the bionic can be very frustrating at times. Sure it takes a bit of practice to get the hang of it but even then it's quite easy to make a mistake, a fatal mistake most of the time as you will most likely fall in a hole or on spikes. There are just too many ways of swinging to bind it to just one single button and a thumbstick. But even though frustrating at times it's still a quality platformer that is capable of giving you a good fun and a good challange.

Enjoyable though not very challenging puzzle game. Most of the puzzles, though not very intuitive and some even being quite repetitive, are easy to solve with a bit of common sense. A few puzzles however are a bit trickier but this is mostly to blame on vague instructions. Hints will help you further in these occasions but it will cost you points. The story is a bit difficult to follow at times but i was still able to like it due to the quirky characters and atmosphere. The design of it all is quite likable. Is it enough to save the game? Barely. In the end it looks like it tried to be like the Professor Layton series but it doesn't even come close due to not having it's originality in puzzles. A shame. But as i said, i still enjoyed myself enough not to hate it. I even enjoyed it a little more than the first Puzzel Agent.

I loved this game back in the day on the the PS2 and spend many hours playing around in this virtual playground. The story was good, the acting great, the music and vibe brilliant, it basicly took an already awesome GTA3 and perfected it. Now, so many years later, i thought i'd revisit this digital Miami on my netbook and i have to say it still holds up pretty well. Sure the graphics are outdated and the gameplay can feel a bit clunky but it is still acceptable seeing it's such a great classic, while this time round i would be able to be a lot more accurate aiming and shooting with a mouse. But unfortunately the controls are more or less a disaster. The game is just as i remembered it but even though i'm playing it on the PC now it still feels like i'm playing it on the PS2. That can't be right. In other words, a bad port. Aiming with the mouse for instance doesn't feel as smooth as you would expect, and to make matters even worse the vertical sensitivity of the mouse is not affected when adjusting the overall mouse sensitivity so that while panning from side to side will work as you set it, looking up and down will throw your view all over the place with the slightest movement of your mouse. And I understood it's been like that for years too and Rockstar has not even bothered fixing it. What a fail. Same goes for the widescreen option by the way. Yes, there is a widescreen option this time round but they even managed to screw that one up. The gameworld itself adjusts to the widescreen ratio fine but the HUD on the other hand does not and just gets stretched. Not only that, aiming is affected by it as well. To be able to hit your target with widescreen mode on you'll have to aim at his/her feet and slightly to the right of him/her. Only way to fix it is to turn widescreen off again. So when it comes down to it a great game gets a mediocre port to a platform where it should've shined even more. It is pathetic honestly. Don't get me wrong, i can still take pleasure out of GTA Vice City, but not as much as i'd hoped. Very disappointing Rockstar.

Fez is not original, no, it borrows a lot from other games, but what it does it does right. I enjoyed my time exploring all the little worlds, jumping from platform to platform and turning the world around me to solve it's often clever puzzles. I did however find that not a lot is explained. After the intro you're basically thrown into this world and where you go from there you have to find out for yourself. Adds to the mystery of exploration, sure, but a bit more guidance from time to time would have been nice. This especially goes for a lot of the secrets and hidden puzzles. To find and/or solve most of these you have to learn and understand the in-game language. Nowhere in the game is this clearly explained, and If i hadn't come across it in a guide i was looking at i never would have known. Cool that you want to give a game it's own puzzling language that adds to the gameplay, but let the player know about it because i reckon a lot of gamers have looked past it and that is a shame for the extra amount of gameplay it offers.

I play titles like this for the single player experience, multiplayer modes in shooters like F.E.A.R. 2 are just an extra for me. I've got multiplayer shooters like the Battlefield series for that pleasure. That said i won't be giving lower points to the online multiplayer part if it's not that great 'cause i simply don't expect it to be. Having played the first game i can say F.E.A.R. 2 continues the series with good effort, although it's not as good on all points. To start off with the good i will say that the story and the given setting is the best part of the game, even though the plot can be a little difficult to follow sometimes the story and places your visit will keep you interested and make you want to finish the game to see what happens, which won't take you very long, 9 to 10 hours of normal play. But it's long enough in my opinion. **** is too long a game like this can eventually lose your interest in which case you'll most likely never finish it at all. Just Cause 2 being a fine example of this. Gameplay wise not a lot has changed since the original, only improvements on some of the core gameplay mechanics and a few new gameplay elements like iron sighting and the ability to operate a mech suite. In the end nothing shocking really, which can also be said for the gameplay itself, but it's satisfying enough. The graphics never really stand out above other titles in this genre but it's more than adequit to satisfy the ones who love graphics. Design and environments play a mayor part too in this and deserve an extra notice. The levels are well detailed, dynamic, destructable and have a good layout and some nicely placed scripted events too. Most noticable level to back this up would without a doubt be the Elementary School. So what's bad about the game than? Well, it isn't as scary as it used to be for one. Let me put it this way, if F.E.A.R. would be the Japanese horror movie Ringu (which was probably a big inspiration) than F.E.A.R. 2 would be an episode of Ghost hunters. Maybe that's a little exaggerated but you get the point, it's not as scary as you would like and expect it to be in a way the first one was. Next to that the i found the overall sound a bit lacking. In most part this was fine like the music which created some nice tension but i'm talking about the sound effects with the gun sounds in particular. It all sounded a little weak for my taste, especially the shotgun. But these are just small things. In the end there isn't really anything wrong with F.E.A.R. 2 , the problem lies more in what's good. It's just that, good, nothing more. F.E.A.R. 2 never really pops out in any way. So eventually you could say that F.E.A.R. 2 is an above average shooter. Nothing really special, just good. My advise would be that if you liked the original F.E.A.R and it's installments and you digged the story as much as i did or if you're just looking for a good shooter to pass the weekend i'm positive you'll enjoy F.E.A.R. 2. But for those of you who are looking for something new and groundbraking or want a good scare i would recommend to pass on this one, it's not that special.

This game is pretty weird. Now don't get me wrong, i don't mean that in a negative way, it's just a little out there. In other words, it has to be your thing otherwise you'll be playing this no longer than 10 minutes. Especially all the different characters bring the world to life. Character design is great as for the modelling. There is so much variation between all of them. So why did i give this game a 5 than? Because i lost interest quiet fast. Each minute i wanted to just quit even more than the moment before. The first person melee action is okay, even though a bit rusty, but i've seen it all before in Breakdown on the Xbox and i never got to finish that one either. It just isn't my piece of pie. I'd rather break some jaws in 3rd person. Next to that i didn't like the stage fighting all that much. You're not really walking through an open world you're just set against 1 or more opponents in a set stage and you have to duke it out and win so you can continue on to the next level. But worst of all has to be that out of all the awesome characters in the game your character just looks lame. But what's even worse is his voice and the acting that comes with it. Just awfull. Story wise there is something there but the storytelling itself is kinda weak. It didn't hold my attention for long anyways. In the end i've played for an hour or so and then i called it quits but i don't think i'll be starting it up anytime soon. But hey, it only cost me 3 euro's and it's still a very creative piece of work. Props for that.