PS3/X360 Preview - 'Batman: Arkham Asylum'
by Rainier on Jan. 1, 2006 @ 1:30 a.m. PST | Filed under E3 - Post - E3 2009
Genre: Action/Adventure
Publisher: Eidos/Warner Bros. Interactive
Developer: Rocksteady Studios
Release Date: August 25, 2009
)
Superhero games are a weird genre. On the surface, it seems like it shouldn't be too difficult to come up with a good game, but they have some of the worst records as far as licenses go. Even games that are based on extremely popular characters like Superman or Iron Man tend to be mediocre at very best, but perhaps the greatest surprise here is Batman, whose failure record easily dwarfs his successes. For the last good Batman games, we have to
If there is one game that we have to thank for first-person shooters, it is Wolfenstein 3D. Despite being by any modern standards an extremely archaic game, it is the first FPS of any note, and it introduced a lot of the staples of the genre in some form or another, from secret rooms to the never-ending fun of fighting supernatural Nazi creations. While the franchise never quite reached the same popularity as Doom, the original Wolfenstein 3D is still a fondly remembered game.
It's not often that you see an MMORPG being played on three monitors. It's rarer still that you see it being played on three monitors for very good reason, as NetDevil's upcoming MMO, JumpGate Evolution, proved during E3. The developers were in more than a mild sense of panic as I stepped into their booth for my appointment. Their demo machines had been connected to the game's live server during the current friends and family beta test, but I can attest that E3's wireless is only remotely stable in
A little while ago, Splinter Cell: Conviction vanished off the radar. It was originally supposed to come out in 2007, and there were even screenshots and videos of the game, which starred a long-haired, hobo-esque Sam Fisher who seemed to be very similar to Jason Bourne. However, sometime before the release, the game was quietly put on hold, and all info about it seemed to vanish. Earlier this year, Ubisoft revealed that the game was alive and well but had been completely reimagined. At E3 this
Nintendo's The Legend of Zelda franchise is among the most highly praised in the video game industry. Even the worst titles (barring the non-Nintendo produced CD-I exclusives) are among some of the top-rated games, and Legend of Zelda: The Ocarina of Time is still the best-rated title of all time. For some reason, there aren't many attempts to copy The Legend of Zelda's success. The games that follow the Zelda mold are few and far between, and the only really notable one in the last few years
It's tough being a fan of Sonic the Hedgehog, particularly an older one. You've had to see a series you love slide into craziness. Broken cameras, unoptimized code, unnecessary characters, loss of vision and principle, angst and motorcycles … the list of missteps goes on and on.
)
Prince of Persia's revival on the console market was nothing short of fantastic. Some might argue that Ubisoft's gem of a game reinvented the 3-D action platformer, and they wouldn't be entirely wrong in that regard. It's difficult to think of many titles that haven't borrowed at least some of Prince of Persia's ideas, and the Sands of Time trilogy was among some of the best titles in the last generation. Yet what a lot of people forgot is that Prince of Persia's reboot also included a
)
Golden Axe: Beast Rider is an odd beast because it both does and does not feel like a Golden Axe game. Initially, it's difficult to spot the elements that are related to Golden Axe but noticeably easier to spot the omissions. A single playable character and no multiplayer component could make some Golden Axe faithful scream in rage, but while some of the series' iconic gameplay has changed, much of the world setting has remained the same. Familiar monsters, both friendly and hostile, populate the
)
)
