Review By: Wycked

DDR MAX 2 – Couldn’t tell you. I’m not gonna play it, I’m not giving it to that stupid STUPID Dance Dance Revolution crap. People, you look retarded doing it. And I read once in the campus newspaper here an interview with a kid from the DDR Club. He said he even uses moves he gets from the game when he goes out to clubs to dance. People, if you see him or anyone like him, kill them. KILL!!!

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles – I was really hoping this game would be better. I mean what red-blooded American in their early 20’s doesn’t dig the Ninja Turtles? The losers, that’s who. And I’ll fucking kill them. TMNT is back in old-school arcade brawler form. This game looks REALLY good. This is probably some of the best cel-shading I’ve seen since Wind Waker, and it all captures the look of the show well. But that’s it. There’s virtually no fighting system, it’s been reduced to incessant button mashing. The dialogue is maddening, the same stupid stupid lines repeated with every swing and kick. Every single one. I almost had a stroke the 30th time in a row I heard “slice and DICE!” or “time to SPLIT!”And there were like 3 different types of enemies total. 2 kinds of thugs and Mousers. And the Mousers didn’t even attack me, they just exploded like bombs after I killed ‘em. On the plus side, the map arrangement was good. It moved down streets and through alleys, and around corners. Lots better than the original left-to-right-only design of the first two arcade games. With a better fighting system, and decent dialogue from the original voice actors, this would be a great 4-player party game. The demo lets you play through level 2 with Leonardo only.

Ratchet & Clank 2: Going Commando – I already have the full game, so this one might have let out a few spoilers for me. It lets you play in three modes: Space Combat, Megacorp Testing Facility (normal on-foot mode) and Giant Clank Battle. Space Combat lets you play through the initial attack on the Thugs-4-Less base in the asteroid field. Megacorp Testing Facility sends you off through that level with a few weapons and items, to get the feel of the normal game, which is a fun action robot killing free-for-all, along with heaping helpings of adventure elements and sweetass weapons. My favorite is the Blitz Gun, which is basically a big futuristic pump-action shotgun. The most fun of the three, Giant Clank Battle, puts you on the back of Clank in his gigantic battle-mode, where you stomp round one of the spherical levels (think Tetrisphere) fighting with fists and projectiles against another guy in a big robot suit. The planetoid is covered in skyscrapers and buildings, all destructible, and little attack choppers buzz around and shoot at you to pester you. It’s like something out of Godzilla or some shit. The R&C games also stand out to me in the audio department, boasting excellent BGMs with a techno/beat/orchestral mix thing going. Very good stuff.

Whiplash – I’m not sure what to say about this one. On one hand, it’s just another platformer. But on the other, you play as a weasel that uses a rabbit on a chain as a weapon, to beat things with. The two are trying to escape from an animal testing facility, and free other animals in the process. This consists of running around beating the bad guys with the rabbit, as well as just beating the ever loving crap out of everything else. Repetitive, but kinda funny. Demo’s one level.

Need For Speed Underground – Underground… sewers are underground. Sewers contain crap… hey, this game is crap! The Need For Speed games never cut it for me to begin with, with slow framerates, a total lack of a crash engine, and a bland upgrade system. In fact, the only reason I ever played Hot Pursuit or High Stakes was for the police chase mode. Once I started playing games like Burnout and Grand Theft Auto 3,, I had absolutely no need for it anymore. But what really shocks me about Need For Speed is, even on a PS2 it’s slow and choppy, there’s absolutely no crash engine, and the upgrade system is still worthless. Add to that formula Underground’s needlessly blurry graphics (on everything but the cars), and it’s just not a fun game. The only thing people buy NFS games for anymore is the brand names all over it. You can get better “Fast and the Furious” action out of Midnight Club 2 or Burnout 2. This demo lets you drive the upgraded godawful orange Mitsubishi Eclipse through one race.

Downhill Domination – This one I liked. It’s like Road Rash meets downhill BMX. You pick some weird hip teen rider and set out down a mountain on a race to the bottom, doing tricks and winning by any means necessary. Career mode lets you pick sponsors, and doing tricks and winning obviously earn money, for new clothing, bikes, equipment, and landing you new sponsors. Weapons available via attack-upgrade pickups include physical attacks, large sticks, homing water-bottles, and the like. The course is all over the place, rocks and trees and paths and cliffs everywhere, littered with ramps, bystanders, animals, and various weather effects. It’s not realistic, but neither was Road Rash. If you liked it, you’ll like this. The demo lets you play all three modes of one level with two different riders.

Finding Nemo – Childish and simple, but it is for kids. Swim around, collect shells, move colored chunks of something or other to colored spots on the ground, avoid bad guys, infinite lives, etc. I did however like the second and third parts of the level. In the second, you’re swimming up an anchor chain heading towards a boat, avoiding random fish as obstacles. The simple effect of everything disappearing into the dark blue murkiness of the water, along with little white particles to let you know yours and the currents direction is effective enough, and revived my fear of deep water. Yeah I’m scared, but it takes a big man to admit he’s scared!!! The third part, after you reach the boat a diver comes up out of nowhere, and the camera angle switches around in front of you, with the huge diver swimming after you taking swipes with his hands. It’s actually cooler than it sounds, except for the diver only swiping in one area. The demo lets you play through one level.

Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time – You’ve seen those previews where it alternates between simple shots of text and videos the whole time, right? Well this demo follows that formula, but you play the video parts. I’m not too big on the game itself though. The originals were platformers, but different. Y’know? It became a style in itself. Blackthorne, Out of This World, Flashback, descriptions of these always include the phrase “like Prince of Persia.” This one loses that 2D element in favor of 3D, and it becomes just another platformer. Unremarkable, I really have nothing else to say about it. Demo lets you play through small chunks of various levels. Oh yeah, and the combat engine sucks. Button mashing, button mashing, button mashing.

EyeToy (video)– Seeing each game in action makes me want it even more. Ever seen those games in the mall where you’re up on a TV waving your hands around at shit, and it does it on the TV? It’s like that, like blue screen kinda stuff. Except the extra stuff is on top of your image. The camera has a motion sensor, so it knows what you’re flailing at. Parlor games really, but it still looks fun enough for kids, or as a party game thing. And the video messaging is a good idea too, I could see that catching on with the Network Adaptor.

NCAA Gamebreaker 2004 – What can I say about 989 Sports that hasn’t been said already? They suck. Come back when you got something that can even begin to compare to EA Sports. I don’t even like sports and I dig their shit. Fuck you, 989 Sports.

NFL GameDay 2004 – See previous. And as a sidenote, why do there need to be separate titles for college and pro sports? Honestly. It’s the same damn thing, just merge it all and use different sets of teams and stadiums for college or pro games. I mean, shit!

So in the end, cameras are cool, platformers still suck, NFS is still a racing series for bitchass poseurs, and 989 can kiss my ass.