Month: July 2016

Hidden Gems – Alice: The Madness Returns

Genre:  Platformer
Platform:  XBox 360

This game probably can’t be considered “hidden” anymore, but I happened to stumble upon it by accident on Gamefly.  I didn’t know what to expect, but I was quite pleasantly surprised as to the quality of this one.

You play as Alice as she returns to Wonderland.  However, this isn’t your mother’s Wonderland.  Things have taken a dystopian turn for the worse.  There’s a lot of blood and gore here, so it’s definitely not for the kiddos.  This game is a platformer, so you’re making your way through the world trying to get to the next point to update the story.  I did find the story engaging as well.  I have to admit that I didn’t end up finishing it, though.  It’s on my Amazon wish list as I would like to get it and finish it out.

The levels are original and fun.  It has many of the typical platforming elements – bouncy things, moving platforms and targets, minions abound, secret things to find, boss battles and so much more.  The graphics are decent, but maybe not as crisp as they could be.  The soundtrack added to the game and gave it a creepy vibe.  Many of your favorite Wonderland characters are here as well, but certainly not as you might remember them.

This game reminded me a bit of American McGee’s Alice, which was a popular PC game in the 2000’s.  It was a bit of a cult hit and was also very dystopian.  I would recommend playing that one, too, although the graphics are very outdated at this point.

Anyway, if you haven’t played this one and it sounds like something you would like, check it out!  You’re probably looking at 20 hours to play through tops.

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Oldies but Goodies – Jezzball/Qix

Genre:  Puzzle
Platform:  PC (Windows 3.1)/Arcade

Jezzball was a wonderful time waster which came bundled with Windows 3.1.  As a kid, I spent a lot of time playing this one late into the night.  Your goal was to section off as much of the screen as you could by avoiding the balls on the screen.  You drew a line that went out in opposite directions from the place you clicked on.  If one of the balls hit your line, you lost a life.  It sounds simple, and it was, but it required precise timing.

Jezzball was actually inspired by the game Qix for the arcades and later NES and Gameboy color.  It was the same premise.  There weren’t a lot of frills about either game, but they were both very entertaining to my math-inclined mind.  I don’t really have a lot else to say about these, but if you never had the pleasure, I’m sure you can find Jezzball for free online somewhere.

 

 

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Chey’s Top 25 – #12 – Tetris

Genre:  Puzzle
Platform:  All

This was the game that started it all, folks.  Video games had been fun, leisurely things to help pass the time up until this one.  It’s Tetris, the first uber-addictive game, at least in my world.  I was in sixth or seventh grade when we rented this one for the NES.  I remember distinctively because my cousin Nikki was spending the night, which was normally a really big and fun deal.  This game made me all but ignore her.  My mom tried to pry me away without much luck.  It was the first time I remember feeling addicted to something.

The game is really simple and I don’t have too much to say about it.  You line up the pieces and complete lines to clear them.  The more you clear at once, the higher your score.  Your goal is to keep playing for as long as you can.  It’s been done on every platform since its birth in 1984.  It was developed by two Russians, and I would argue it’s the best thing to ever come from that country (including the space program!).  The individual pieces are called Tetriminos.  You can find all sorts of Tetris-inspired memorabilia.  I have a board game called Tetris link and Matt made me Tetrimino shelves:

Tetris Shelves

My favorite version will always be the NES version, simply because it was the first one to get me hooked.  I have played many, many different versions of it, but this one is still one of the best.  Not to brag, but I’m pretty good at it.  If you have somehow never played it, just do a Google search for it and you’ll find a version free online.

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Genre:  Simulation/Builder
Platform:  PC, XBone

I have been playing Prison Architect on either the PC or XBone for a long time now.  I was an early adopter of the game and it’s been neat to see the changes as it neared its release.  The game has finally been officially released to both PC (Steam) and XBone.  I’ve played both versions and I’ll discuss the differences.  If this game has staying power, it may very well find its way on to my top 25.

In this game, you are the designer of a prison.  The game now has a few different modes.  I just finished story mode last night and it’s well worth the play through.  The game doesn’t hold punches on issues such as death row and the philosophies behind solitary confinement.  There were a couple of times that it actually stirred some emotion in me.  That’s good writing.

There is also Prison Warden mode, where you play pre-made prisons and clean them up.  I will be starting on this mode today, so I can’t comment on it much.  There’s World of Wardens, which allows you to download and play prisons made by other players.  I find most of these to be ridiculous and not fun.  I could do without this mode.  For me, the heart of the game is Prison Architect mode.

In this mode, you just design and build.  There are objectives you can meet if you choose to, and they give you the funding necessary to build bigger and better.  After you are satisfied with your prison, you can sell it and start a new one.  You get to keep the cash from your sale and go even bigger.

This game is not for kids, though.  The story mode is graphic and there’s quite a bit of blood and violence in the game.  The game has a surprising amount of depth, however.  You can schedule every hour of your prisoner’s day and there is a tech tree of sorts.  You hire your staff and decide how many and what types of prisoners come in each day.

Prison Architect 2

I preferred playing the game on PC.  The mouse makes it a lot easier than trying to play with a controller.  It’s also hard to read some things on my TV versus my monitor.  The PC version has a workshop on Steam, where other players made modifications to the game and you can easily download them.  I found some good ones there such as a garden.  I would recommend playing on both, however.  In fact, if you like building games, you are probably going to love this game.

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Stinkers – Mahjong CUB3D

Genre:  Puzzle
Platform:  Nintendo 3DS

I was really excited to get this game.  I like Mahjong games.  And this looked similar to Picross 3D so how could I lose?  This game has one fatal flaw and I will never understand what the developers were thinking, other than taking the easy way out and destroying their game in the process.

In this game, you are given 3D shapes covered in Mahjong tiles.  In typical Mahjong (which is actually the Chinese game Shanghai, not Mahjong) style, you match tiles to clear the play space.  It’s a very simple matching game, with just a smidge of strategy thrown in.  You need to know enough to clear outside tiles first.  That’s about it.  This game is the same in concept.  It’s the game play that wrecks this game.  Take a look at the picture below.  Do you see the problem?

Mahjong CUB3D play

You probably need to understand the 3DS to see the problem.  The top screen is a display screen.  The bottom is a touch screen which allows you to use a stylus to interact with the game.  However, this game uses the buttons to play.  That is the stupidest idea for a game like this.  It could have been as fun as I expected by using the touch screen.  But no, they had to go and use the buttons and D-pad.  Because of this critical flaw, this game is forever doomed to my stinkers list.

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Oldies but Goodies – 3D World Runner

Genre:  Arcade
Platform:  NES

We had this game when I was a kid.  It was a really quirky game which had you running.  That was the premise, as far as I knew.  You were running through a world.  Toward what, I don’t know and never did find out.  Here’s what Wikipedia says:

“In the game, the player assumes the role of Jack the WorldRunner, a wild “space cowboy” on a mission to save various planets overrun by serpent-like beasts. The game takes place in Solar System #517, which is being overrun by a race of aliens known as Serpentbeasts, who are led by the evil Grax.  As WorldRunner, the player must battle through eight planets to destroy Grax.”

Yeah, the game never mentions a word of this when you’re playing.  As far as I know, you were just a kid late for school or something.  You don’t control when the runner runs – he does that automatically.  You do control his direction.  There are barriers you need to run through and mobs to avoid.  There are power ups to collect and you can jump as well.  You can jump pretty high.  In fact, there are parts of the levels that require careful timing of your jumps to pass.

This was a commonly played game in our house.  As soon as I heard the music in the video below, I smiled and immediately started humming along. It’s pretty catchy. We would never really get farther than maybe the fifth level, but we sure tried.  Check it out if you get the chance.

 

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Chey’s Top 25 – #13 – Donkey Kong Country

Genre:  Platformer
Platform:  Super Nintendo

My siblings rented a Super Nintendo (SNES) way back when and had rented this game along with it.  I happened to be at the house that night and played a bit of it.  The next day, I went out and bought a SNES and this game just so I could play it more.  This game is absolutely amazing and defined the SNES for me.

The graphics, for the time, were jaw-dropping.  I had never seen anything like it.  The water level (shown above) was the best thing I’d seen.  Add in a gorgeous soundtrack and perfect gameplay and you’ve got yourself a hit.

You play as either Donkey Kong or his sidekick, Diddy Kong.  You could switch between them at will, which was necessary in many levels as each had their own strengths.  Diddy couldn’t kill certain mobs and DK couldn’t reach some spots that Diddy could.  It made for a new level of gameplay.  There were also save points throughout the levels, which were absolutely necessary.  The game features the top-down view of a map between levels and you could go back and play previous games.

There were collectibles in the game as well besides your simple coins (bananas in this case).  In every level, there were level-up balloons scattered about.  There were hidden areas to each level.  You could also find animals to ride (ostrich, shark, rhino, frog) which all added to the gameplay.  There were also letters that spelled out KONG and gave free life if you found them all.

There were some very memorable levels in this game.  Besides the aforementioned water levels, my favorite was the mine cart level.  In it, you rode in a mine cart and had to jump your way through broken tracks and obstacles to make it to the end.  I played this level over and over because it was so fun.

DKC play

If you have never had the pleasure of playing this game, you need to find it.  I still have it for my SNES and do play it from time to time.  I have it on the GCW Zero as well, but there’s something special about playing it on its original hardware.  There was also a Donkey Kong Country 2 and 3, and each were fun in their own right.  Nintendo came out with a couple of reboots – for the 3DS and Wii.  I may cover those at a different time.  This was the game, however, that really launched Donkey Kong into modern Nintendo fame.

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Fireworks game! Boom Boom Rocket

Genre:  Rhythm
Platform:  XBox 360

Independence Day is tomorrow here in the US, so in honor of one of the staples of the holiday, I’ve picked a game involving fireworks to discuss.  This is Boom Boom Rocket, available on the XBox 360 Arcade.  It’s a wonderful rhythm game which is fairly easy at the lesser difficulties, but is really hard to master.

Once you select your song and difficulty, the music starts and multi-colored arrows are thrown up from the bottom of the screen.  The colors represent the different colors of your buttons, or you can use the d-pad with the corresponding direction arrows.  Once the arrow reaches the purple line at the top, you press that button.  If you are successful, you will be rewarded with a firework.

Once you build up your multiplier meter enough, you can trigger your super ability, which gives you 24X points or something crazy like that.  This is how you climb the leaderboards, but I always forget to do it.  I tend to concentrate more on perfecting the game than getting a high score.

Fortunately, you can play this game less visually and more audibly.  The music is really your cue.  You just need to know which button to press.  It’s similar to Guitar Hero or Rock Band in that respect.  The graphics are absolutely beautiful and the music is wonderful as well.  It’s all classical music, which I really enjoy.  If you like rhythm games and classical music, I would check this one out.  It’s currently only available on the 360 and hasn’t been added to the XBone backwards compatibility list yet.

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