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Rainier's Articles


PS3/X360/PC Preview - 'Prince of Persia Prodigy'

by Rainier on Jan. 1, 2006 @ 1:30 a.m. PST | Filed under E3 - Post - E3 2008

Genre: Action/Adventure
Publisher: Ubisoft
Developer: Ubisoft Montreal
Release Date: Q4 2008

As a kid, one of my favorite games was the PC classic, Prince of Persia. It was a crushingly hard and deeply unforgiving game that nonetheless manages to be addicting enough that I memorized every pixel of it. A variety of sequels have ranged from fun to terrible, but few could ever match the enjoyment of the original Prince of Persia. When they announced Prince of Persia: Sands of Time, I wasn't expecting much and found myself blown away by some of the finest action-puzzle gameplay

XBLA/PC Preview - 'The Secret of Monkey Island: Special Edition'

by Rainier on Jan. 1, 2006 @ 1:30 a.m. PST | Filed under E3 - Post - E3 2009

Genre: Adventure
Publisher: Lucastarts
Developer: Lucasarts
Release Date: Q3 2009

Adventure games are a bit of a niche genre. Compared to many other games, they focus on crafting an interesting and enjoyable story and don't require a tremendous amount of natural skill to play. Some adventure games take themselves incredibly seriously, such as the classic CD-ROM title, Myst, but the titles that are most fondly remembered by gamers are ones that had a sense of humor, such as Grim Fandango and Sam & Max, which are infinitely quotable and fun to replay. The Secret of Monkey Island was

NDS Preview - 'Chronicles of Mystery: Curse of the Ancient Temple'

by Rainier on Jan. 1, 2006 @ 1:30 a.m. PST | Filed under E3 - Post - E3 2009

Genre: Adventure
Publisher: City Interactive
Developer: City Interactive
Release: Sept. 2009

City Interactive is a relatively new publisher, especially in North America. While they have been doing PC games since 2002, this is the first year that they've started on consoles with a few games for the Nintendo platforms. Among the games that they demoed at E3 was a DS iteration of their recently established adventure game series, Chronicles of Mystery. The game showed off just enough to potentially be a fun romp through a genre that has earned its resurrection on the Nintendo platforms.

Chronicles of Mystery: Curse

Wii Preview - 'Naruto Shippuden: Clash of Ninja Revolution 3'

by Rainier on Jan. 1, 2006 @ 1:30 a.m. PST | Filed under E3 - Post - E3 2009

Naruto Shippuden: Clash of Ninja Revolution 3 is a classic 3D fighting game featuring new and improved gameplay mechanics and multiple gameplay modes, 40 3D environments to choose from, including nine completely new stages, over 30 characters, and for the first time, includes Wi-Fi multiplayer capabilities.

NDS Preview - 'Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood'

by Rainier on Jan. 1, 2006 @ 1:30 a.m. PST | Filed under E3 - Post - E3 2008

Genre: Role-Playing
Publisher: Sega
Developer: Bioware
Release Date: Q4 2008

When Mario first stepped into the RPG genre, it by all rights should have been a terrible idea. Taking a character like Mario, who is known for his jumping and platforming skills, and placing him in a turn-based combat system? Why? Nintendo proved us wrong by giving the creation of the game over to Square-Enix (then just Squaresoft), who provided us with Mario RPG, not only one of the most enjoyable RPGs on the Super Nintendo, but a flat-out fantastic Mario game. History has a way

PS3/X360/PC Preview - 'Assassin's Creed II'

by Rainier on Jan. 1, 2006 @ 1:30 a.m. PST | Filed under E3 - Post - E3 2009

Genre: Action/Adventure
Publisher: Ubisoft
Developer: Ubisoft Montreal
Release Date: November 17, 2009

The first Assassin's Creed left me a bit cold. It was a visually stunning game with silky-smooth controls and lots of interesting ideas, but it also had enough flaws to be solidly average at best and tedious at worst. I was understandably hesitant when I went to see Assassin's Creed 2 during E3. Fortunately, Assassin's Creed 2 appears to have been designed entirely to counter every almost every criticism leveled against the original game. From the moment the demo began, I found that every

PS3/X360/PC Preview - 'BioShock 2'

by Rainier on Jan. 1, 2006 @ 1:30 a.m. PST | Filed under E3 - Post - E3 2009

BioShock was one of the more interesting games to hit in the past few years. A pseudo-sequel to the cult PC hit System Shock, it combined survival horror and first-person shooter elements in an interesting and exciting way.

PS3/X360 Preview - 'Marvel: Ultimate Alliance 2'

by Rainier on Jan. 1, 2006 @ 1:30 a.m. PST | Filed under E3 - Post - E3 2009

Genre: Action Role-Playing
Publisher: Activision
Developer: Vicarious Visions
Release Date: September 15, 2009

It's hard to make a good superhero game but nearly impossible to make a good superhero team game. Characters like Superman, Spider-Man or The Hulk are hard enough to make work when the entire game is focused on them, but trying to put a bunch of heroes into a single game usually leads to iffy results, such as the lackluster Justice League games. The one notable exception to this has been the Activision superhero titles, X-Men: Legends and Marvel: Ultimate Alliance. The two games

'Jumpgate Evolution' - New Screens

by Rainier on Jan. 1, 2006 @ 1:30 a.m. PST | Filed under E3 - E3 2008 - July 16th

The concept behind Evolution is to give MMO fans the experience of being a space pilot in a visually stunning Sci-fi environment with newly enhanced gameplay and advanced AI. In Evolution, players carve their own space hero experience representing one of three nations: Solrain, Quantar or Octavius. Players advance by engaging in combat, mining, missions, exploration and trade.

Evolution’s universe is large and versatile; allowing for both comprehensive PvE and PvP experiences. As player actions impact the economy and faction relationships, fresh and unexpected challenges are generated from the dynamically changing universe. Evolution provides players with a variety of

PS3/X360/PC Preview - 'Just Cause 2'

by Rainier on Jan. 1, 2006 @ 1:30 a.m. PST | Filed under E3 - Post - E3 2009

Genre: Action/Adventure
Publisher: Eidos Interactive
Developer: Avalanche Studios
Release Date: TBA 2010

The original Just Cause had some big ideas. It thrust gamers into a gigantic tropical sandbox and invited them to tinker with some interesting gameplay mechanics. Unfortunately, glitches and an overall lack of variety kept the game from being anything above mediocre. There was the potential for a truly unique game, but it was buried under the repetitive gameplay. Fortunately, Just Cause 2 looks to be anything but repetitive. In our brief demo at E3, we got a glimpse of a handful of the game's