As my first foray into the Eat My Bomb ‘hood I wanted to make a splash. I wanted something more exciting than the run-of-the-mill FPS or Diablo clone. But where to find such a game?

so I went to The Source:

It seems that nestled within each and every Windows machine there is the origin of all gaming - yes, the devilish MineSweeper. Given my fair amount of gaming experience I believed this game would be unable to withstand my mad CounterStrike twitch skills. And it all started well enough - the game’s main interface is clean and well thought out. There is no HUD to speak of, and a friendly companion avatar helps beginners guide thier progress (more on this demonspawn later).

“He doesnt look so tough…”

Quickly, however, I realized this was no average game . As fast as it had began, it was over - in a single click my best laid plans were laid to waste. Here is the most glaringly frustrating part of the game for users - there seemed to be no logical way to plan my attack. Underneath each apparently identical square lays one of a possible SIX tiles. My calculus skills not being what they used to, I was forced to retreat to Excel to determine the possible permutations and script my next moves. The second try proved as good as the first; at which point the glaring lack of save points becomes noticeable.

wipe that face off your head, Smiley…

After about a dozen restarts (at least the load times are reasonable) I began to see a pattern emerge. Every time a tile is selected to be revealed, the little smiley face cheers to show its approval. While I looked for a way to turn off this spoiler so that I could enjoy the game as it was meant to be played - I was shocked to find that HE LIED! What I thought was an in game aid was actually an evil NPC trying to trick the user. Needless to say, I would not fall prey to the useless emoticon again.

Sadly, after hours of play I was left with nothing to show for my hard work. Many times the user comes close to finishing the first quest, only to be thwarted by a broken scripting error that forces a restart. As such, I can not gauge the replayability of the game at this time - but based on my experience, total gameplay for this one would be about 1-68 hours

The absence of well written documentation and a limited choice of only one character class makes me think this game was only half baked when they took it out of the oven. A new version of this game is due out in 2006 - here’s hoping the folks at Redmond listen up to my criticism if they want to keep thier customers coming back. At $99, with no multiplayer options in sight - I’d recommend you leave this one in the bargin bin.

Secret Satan has chosen to smite me with the terrifyingly horrific Mary-Kate and Ashley Sweet 16 Licensed to Drive, with the tag line, “Real Games for Real Girls”. Even though the mail carrier forced the package into my hands quite a long time ago, it’s taken me awhile to acknowledge its existence and post the arrival on EMB. Sorry for the delay; I think I’ve been in denial.

So, you may ask yourself, “What has Steve done to deserve this?”. I ask myself that every time the game’s case stares at me tauntingly, daring me to get in touch with the 16-year-old girl in me. Oh, the agony! If any of you know the reason I should receive (not to mention play) this unjust “gift”, please let me know before I suffocate on my own digestive fluids.

Though it can’t be all bad…it has 30 mini-games. I like mini-games. Yes, I do. I shall play it, and post about every detail of the experience. Now where did I put the Pepto?

P.S. I must say the last few game reviews on EMB have been really good. Certainly on par or better than many gaming magazines. It makes me feel like I’m not matching the quality when I post about choking on my own barf.

Domo Arigato Doctor Loboto

Jess and I both fed the bomb to Psychonauts this weekend. She beat me by a day, but I collected everything!

What a great game. I’ve read some reviews that claim that Psychonauts does not reinvent the platformer. Well I’m here to tell you that it does. I’ve never played a platforming game with this much character development, emotional depth, and adventure gaming goodness. Sure, it has it’s share of frustrating, seat-of-your-pants platforming, but the majority of the game is spent solving puzzles and interacting with its large cast of colorful characters.

What really sticks with you in this game are the dark and serious emotional elements you uncover in the mental environments when you open each persons memory vaults. Their memories are displayed like a ViewMaster with each click revealing another piece of the host’s pride, love, sadness, loss, etc. Some of these include scenes of suicide, the death of a parent, lost love, and childhood trauma. The most affecting for me was a memory found in Milla’s Dance Party. The level is one giant disco party with dancing spectators, colored lights, and bubble machines, but tucked away in a small hidden room is the memory of a horrible tragedy in her life (I won’t spoil it here).

My one complaint is that there comes a point in the game where you can no longer go back to the campground. This means any cards, challenge markers, or scavenger hunt items you haven’t found yet are gone forever. This can really infuriate someone trying to reach the level 100 goal. It can also be extremely frustrating to find all the mental figments that are floating around. Each level has around 150 - 200 of them and though they help you level up, it isn’t necessary to find all of them in order to beat the game. I think Jess was around level 60 when she beat it. I ended up collecting all of them, but it really dulled the gaming experience in my mind after meticulously combing each level in search of those last few figments. My advice is to collect the ones you come across and not worry about the hidden ones. It takes away some of the magic of these fantastic levels to scour them over and over again. I would recommend finding all the scavenger hunt items as you advance 8 levels after you collect all 16 of them. Some of the higher level power upgrades are pretty sweet too like the ability to use your levitation ball as a weapon, health regeneration, infinite ammo, and a shield upgrade that causes damage when melee attacked. All you get for reaching level 100 is a mediocre bonus video and since there is a rank 100 cheat code, you won’t be missing anything.

With every Tim Schafer game I’ve played no matter how long it takes you’re always left wanting more; and Psychonauts is no exception. It takes around 20 - 25 hours to complete, but I’m already praying for a sequel. Now that Schafer has his own company Double Fine I hope he can pump a title out at least every two years. He is one of the most innovative and creative forces in video games and is a beacon of hope in the these dark days of adventure gaming.

I fed the bomb to God of War last night and I’m happy to report the game is everything it’s cracked up to be. God of War is one of those games that you play for a lot of different reasons; it has a good storyline, the levels are cleverly designed, combat is unapologetically brutal, and the mini-games appear at odd yet pleasing moments (like the rip-the-head-off-Medusa game), but what really sets this game apart is that it’s just fun to watch. They’ve done a spectacular job with the visuals in this game and everything from combat to the cut-scenes is worth ogling. I can’t say enough about the graphics of the game and I’d rank this particular game right up with my PC for graphic appeal.

Watch that first step.

The game plays very well and should have appeal for beginners as well as experts at console gaming. It’s a little easy at first, but combat is entertaining enough that it never gets boring as you’ll continually discover new and gory ways of dispatching your foes. I’m not a big fan of studying the art of fighting combos, but by the end of the game I was working out long combo strings up into the 20 to 30 hit range just for fun. And that’s what a game should be.

BAD DOG!

I did find the game to be frustrating at times - it’s suffers from “easy level, impossible boss” syndrome - but I learned eventually that some bosses just require a particular strategy to beat. Patience is the key in a lot of situations, and that’s strange given how insane the general combat is. Strangely enough I found that the game was easier to beat with the original PS2 controller than with my 3rd party controller - something about the button action just made the mini-games more responsive. The longer the game goes on the more important this becomes. I should also warn you that this is definitely a mature-rated game. Apparently not only were the ancient Greeks terribly violent, but they hadn’t yet invented the woman’s shirt. It was breastacular.

Kratos is also the Dental Hygienist of War

You should definitely play this game if you own a PS2. I’ve always complained that the title selection is better for the PS2 but that the X-Box owns the “must have” franchises, but this game breaks that mold in a big way. I put this one down in 10 hours of game time, and maybe 15-20 hours of real time, but it’s got good replay value because the more times you beat it, the more special features you unlock.

If you have a PS2, play this game; if not, go to Jeff’s and don’t leave till he lets you play or unleashes the hounds on you.