Just before breaking into the 2010 Summer of Arcade event on Xbox LIVE, the service scored an exclusive that had a little bit of hype behind it. Whether or not this was based on the pedigree of the television series it is based on or just the fact you could make ninjas fight pirates to the death, we’re still not so sure, but it meant Xbox gamers could snag a fighting game built exclusively for the system for a mere $10. For fans of said television series, Pipeworks makes some decent use out of the source material to pit eight combatants from the annals of time against each other in a fighting engine I like to consider heavily inspired by Bushido Blade, sprinkled with some of the shock elements found in Time Killers. In the end, it feels familiar, yet, even among a number of technical snafus, it works well, especially among groups of local players.

Setting up Deadliest Warrior, there is no story to speak of in the title, but, at the same time, it really isn’t necessary if you understand the source material. The television show revolves around a group that includes a simulations programmer, a biomedical scientist and a medical consult, among other technicians, that pull warriors from different eras of time to see who is the … well, Deadliest Warrior. These claims are made by featuring experts that have researched these warriors and using weaponry used by these combatants to conduct a number of tests. This data is crunched into a simulation program that performs 100 combat simulations to determine who would most likely survive an encounter between the two types of warrior.

The game bypasses all of this data crunching to put the control into the hands of the player, with the selectable warriors mostly representing what the television show featured in its first four episodes – an Apache warrior, a Viking, a samurai, a ninja, a Spartan warrior, a pirate, a Medieval knight and a Roman Centurion. On the Xbox 360, the experience gets a little more of a fantasy treatment, creating four landscapes that reflect various periods of time and locations, along with an unlockable locale that pits combatants against each other in the data studio of the show (aside from the name, this is truly the only other nod to the television production). Players are able to tackle all eight warrior types in an arcade mode, play multiplayer locally or online, participate in single battles against the computer, use a practice mode and extended play eventually unlocks survival options. None of these will dramatically change the way the player plays the game (aside from the survival mode where all hits dismember or decapitate, which is admittedly pretty fun), but the options give some nice depth depending on whether the player wants a quick game session or one that has a little more substance to it.

Looking at the gameplay itself, the controls are simplistic, yet the gameplay is very complex, successfully recreating the uncertainties and random nature surrounding a fight. Unlike other fighters where a normal match lasts 60 or so seconds and contains a number of strikes, a fight in Deadliest Warrior can end in a single blow, which is the reason many are comparing the title to Bushido Blade. While this is certainly realistic, it may put off some gamers that claim some unfair results and, understandably, it is a bit frustrating to lose one second into the match because a Viking pinned your head to the wall using a spear. It’s a game rage gamers may want to steer clear from, but this spontaneity is what really separates Deadliest Warrior from the rest of the crowd and makes it so enjoyable amongst a group of friends.

Each warrior receives a close-range, mid-range and long-range weapon – a player can simply launch a projectile with the press of B and both the close- and mid-range weapons have their own commands and combo sets. Using A, X or Y, players can strike low, middle and high respectively and the combo strings only rely on four button presses at most. Players can also block, parry and execute a few special moves, but very few maneuvers require more than one button press to execute, making the title very beginner friendly. The combo stringing can seem a little stiff at times; however, given the nature of the game, strategy and adaptation is what will get players further than others.

What is most impressive about Deadliest Warrior’s gameplay is its dynamic nature. Not only can a warrior be felled in a single blow, but there are other status effects that drastically change the gameplay. In realistic fashion, most warriors can only sustain five blows at most in a round, and, on top of that, warriors can also be crippled and dismembered through the course of battle. If this happens to the upper body, the combatant won’t be able to support a shield, leaving them wide open, and they will not be able to operate long-range weapons or a few other attacks. When the lower body is damaged, the warrior will move with a dramatically slower limp and they will not be able to execute some moves that involve spins or kicks, for example. Lobbing off the arm or leg completely results in the same results, but also a blood loss that rapidly drains the warrior’s health and, of course, if the head comes off, it’s all over for that round. These effects not only make sense and freshen up fighters on the Xbox, but these really intensify multiplayer gameplay as they are most definitely “sharks sensing blood in the water” moments.

That being said, the gameplay isn’t perfect, though. The control gives each warrior free movement through the environment, which does result in some moments of awkward positioning, especially when the camera pans around, which creates some frustrating moments when the camera is at your back and your opponent is running straight toward you. Also, while it does its job, the gameplay might be too simple for some players, as there isn’t exactly a large list of actions and combos to perform – it might be shallow, but it works, especially in this $10 title. Regardless, even with a list of minor complaints, the gameplay and control still shine as one of the highlights of this title.

Fans of the show and history will get a lot of mileage out of the title, as each warrior and piece of equipment comes packed with a short, historical detail and the loading screens will also pull forth a number of factoids based on the typical life and times of the warriors, adding a nice touch to the game. There is also a fair number of unlockables to keep players coming back and the arcade mode allows players to unlock a new weapon of each type and a new armor for each warrior to provide some limited customization and expanded strategies. Most of the replayability comes with how much fun the player has in ripping apart the fighters, but anyone with a group of friends willing to try the title will get some extended play out of Deadliest Warrior.

The gore factor should also keep players glued to the screen as lobbing off extremities and executing the game’s “fatality” cutscenes never seems to get old, as it provides something a little more different as opposed to the Japanese-developed 2-D fighters from Capcom and SNK-Playmore on Xbox LIVE Arcade. This further ties into the game’s appeal as well. Deadliest Warrior has a lot going for it on paper: It is a one-on-one fighter, it contains a wide variety of fighters throughout time (and ninjas), it is based on a popular television show and it is a bit more mature than other titles on the service. At only $10, this should further entice gamers and, thankfully, there is a competent game holding up these attractions.

While the title is fun to play and it has a number of unique factors, though, the presentation doesn’t always hold up in the title. The character models are quite serviceable and each one looks just like a person would imagine them. Unfortunately, the animation doesn’t quite hold up as well, some of the blood flow looks a tad ridiculous and some more detail would have been nice to see. The visuals are further complicated by a framerate that isn’t always steady (I encountered brief freezes on numerous occasions) and the environments are average at best, which I could account to, again, a lack of detail. I also encountered some really weird physics, but these occurred after a match and didn’t effect gameplay. The sound and music is quite forgettable for the most part, but the trademark battle jingle and a few of the crippling sound effects really standing out. Otherwise, most of the music and effects are just there. They do their job and in no way are they awful, but very little in the sound department really shines.

In the end, though, the gameplay really comes through to make Deadliest Warrior an enjoyable title. While it borrows concepts from other gaming titles, they are concepts we haven’t seen in quite some time and many of today’s gamers weren’t around during those heydays (and it’s not like I would shame anyone that hasn’t played Time Killers). This is a simple, yet deep title that is worth your 800 Microsoft Points, especially if you are looking for a solid one-on-one fighter that breaks the typical Capcom or SNK conventions.

The Scores
Story/Modes: ENJOYABLE
Graphics: ENJOYABLE
Sound: ABOVE AVERAGE
Control and Gameplay: VERY GOOD
Replayability: GOOD
Balance: VERY GOOD
Originality: GOOD
Addictiveness: GREAT
Appeal Factor: INCREDIBLE
Miscellaneous: VERY GOOD
FINAL SCORE: ENJOYABLE GAME

Short Attention Span Summary
Deadliest Warrior is perhaps the first game that does pirates versus ninjas a little bit of justice. While there some technical hiccups in the framerate mixed in with some lacking presentation, the title definitely fits the bill as an enjoyable fighter on the Xbox LIVE service. The controls are simple, but thanks to the crippling/dismemberment system and limited customization, the gameplay is also just as deep and strategic. The $10 price is just right for what you get and the multiplayer mileage you can get out of the title makes the deal even sweeter. It’s a game you can pick up and play in quick bursts and get some gory enjoyment, but don’t expect it to be perfect. Even so, Deadliest Warrior is a package where the pros definitely outweigh the cons.
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Announced at this year’s San Diego Comic Con, Street Fighter and Tekken will go head-to-head in this new 2-D fighter developed by Capcom for the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3. The title will use the same elements as Super/Street Fighter IV, placing 3-D visuals on a 2-D playfield and will include Tekken staples such as Kazuya and Nina Williams.

While nothing has been publicly made available, Yoshinori Ono of Capcom held a panel at Comic Con, where this title was announced, and suggested Namco-Bandai is simultaneously producing a Tekken X Street Fighter title, which would presumably place the Street Fighter cast into the Tekken engine.

March of 2007 came and went innocently enough, but that was the same month where Puzzle Quest: Challenge of the Warlords fell into my lap (well, more specifically, my Nintendo DS). It didn’t seem like too many outlets or gamers were too focused on the release, but after a few weeks on the market, it quickly picked up steam and fast became an under-the-radar hit that satisfied both casual (thanks to being Bejeweled) and diehard (thanks to the adventure, quest, and RPG mechanics) gamers. The success led to the game being ported to everything imaginable, but jumping ahead three full years, we’re finally seeing the first direct sequel (although 2009 did see a space-themed version, which was reviewed by Aaron Sirois). With many puzzle games since imitating the puzzle/RPG hybrid, Infinite Interactive and D3 had really stumbled upon something novel, but is this sequel too little, too late, or does it pin the series up as the returning champion of the genre?

Given its RPG influences, players might expect a grand story tucked within Puzzle Quest 2, but you just don’t get that with this installment. Basically, the village of Verloren has gone down the crapper thanks to a demon force and the title has the player, either as a male or female hero of one of four character classes, cleaning up the village and then descending into a tower to make sure this evil doesn’t return. While extremely straightforward, this journey would be made interesting through well-developed characters, but I found very few of these throughout my play of the title. Most of the title has players running into characters that send them to either beat a specific enemy or retrieve an item … that is retrieved by beating a specific enemy. On the plus side, certain encounters do display slightly flavorful descriptive text like one would expect to find in a Dungeons & Dragons campaign and, periodically, the player will be treated to short art stills with voiceovers to nudge the story along.

With such a flat story, Puzzle Quest 2 is grossly saved by the sheer amount of content it offers. While players will be bouncing along environments, they can also partake in side quests for extra loot and experience points and along the way, there will also be a number of optional enemies to fight (with most guarding treasure chests). Character customization gets pretty in-depth between spells (learned through level progression, learning from enemy characters, and befriending specific characters), equipment, stats and more, and dedicated players have four different character classes to tool with. Even extending beyond the standard quest mode, players can tackle a quick solo battle, partake in any mini-games that have popped up in the quest mode at any time, go toe-to-toe with another player locally, and log on to Xbox LIVE and partake in versus modes. Exclusive to the home versions of the title, players also get a tournament mode that allows them to select four monster characters to control in a team-based mode. For its price, Puzzle Quest 2 is offering a bevy of options and content, so if it gets its hooks into you, you might not be able to escape for a while – and this comes at half the price of the portable version!

Visually, Puzzle Quest 2 is a bit more involved over its predecessor, ditching the “overworld” feel to zoom in on the environments and allowing players to navigate terrain in “point-and-click” fashion. The new setup gives the title a bit of a dungeon crawling vibe and all of the environments are suitably brooding, but these segments don’t really push the graphical envelope. Most of the TLC in the title comes in the character portraits that feature well-done fantasy artwork. Even though the HUD gets scrunched just a little bit due to all of the necessary information, the playfield really pops out due to bright colors of the mana gems and the light trails and flashes left by matches is a treat for the eyes. Graphically, Puzzle Quest 2 does its job with above average to great results, but its major con lies in the repetition of these assets. Players will continually run into the same types of enemies and a great majority of the game will have them staring at colored gems. A little more variety would have been welcomed, but it in no way ruins the game.

Repetition really comes into play with most of the game’s elements, but this is most notable in the field of sound effects and music. What we are given with Puzzle Quest 2 is very well done with both soft and more intense orchestral scores to match the situation, respectable voiceovers, and the expected effects of magic and the popping of the matches from the playfield. Players will be hearing these same effects constantly, but given the addictive nature of the title and its replayability, the repetition of the visuals, audio, and gameplay will most likely not affect most players, moreover fans of puzzle or RPG games.

Getting into the gameplay, what really makes Puzzle Quest work is the fact it is so simple. The control boils down to puzzle game convention of moving a cursor with the analog stick/d-pad and using a single button to manipulate the board. While this may be a con for diehard fans of the original title, Infinite Interactive made the mechanics of the title even more simple. Gold and experience gems are now completely removed from the playfield, being replaced only by “action points,” represented by gauntlet icons. These icons allow the player to execute simple actions, but this extends the customization and options available to the player. In Puzzle Quest 2, equipment is no longer just for passive bonuses, as action points can be spent to do straight damage with a weapon to the opponent, bolster your defenses with shields (high defense leads to frequent blocks that reduce damage by half), or even add more mana and health through potions. While these simplify actions to pressing a mere button instead of skillfully matching gems, it does add more strategy and encourages experimentation.

A few of the menus can be a tad clunky and map navigation can be irritating due to the cursor liberally snapping to points of interest, but, overall, it is a breeze to pick up and play the title. Really, the title is Bejeweled with RPG elements, so it is natural Puzzle Quest 2 can be as addictive as its origin and there were a few nights where “just a few more enemies” led to me staying up until 3 a.m. It’s hardly an original premise (being a sequel based off an existing game), but it still works now, even after three years, and it works for Puzzle Quest 2 better than any of the imitations we’ve seen on the market (which includes two not-so-hot installments from Infinite Interactive itself – Puzzle Kingdoms and Puzzle Chronicles).

Yeah, you’ll still get the inclination sometimes that the computer is a cheating whore conveniently having three skulls drop from the top right next to each other or getting a first turn on a playfield with a buffet of extra turn opportunities, but it hardly makes the game impossible. Playing the game on normal, I encountered occasional instances where the CPU passed up on the best possible move, so, perhaps we’ve been given a bit of a break for the sequel. The enemies will also scale in level and ability as the player levels up, keeping a somewhat even playing field as the player progresses through the game. In the grand scheme of things, Puzzle Quest is kept fun and is the definition of “easy to learn, difficult to master.”

The Scores
Story/Modes: GREAT
Graphics: VERY GOOD
Sound: GOOD
Control and Gameplay: AMAZING
Replayability: UNPARALLELED
Balance: GREAT
Originality: BAD
Addictiveness: AMAZING
Appeal Factor: GREAT
Miscellaneous: GOOD
FINAL SCORE: GREAT GAME

Short Attention Span Summary
If you’re expecting big things for the sequel to Puzzle Quest, odds are high you won’t be disappointed in this effort. Instead of straying from the formula, Infinite Interactive went back to what originally worked and pumped it up with content. For $15 you get a full quest mode filled with side quests, online multiplayer, a new team-based mode where you can command the game’s monsters, and more on top of the mass of customizable classes, items and spells. Puzzle Quest 2 gets quite repetitive and the story is hardly a winning effort, but the puzzle action and RPG elements are so engrossing, it’s hard to notice. Even though the title is hardly a technical masterpiece, it has the gameplay, addictiveness and replayability to please puzzle fans. There are some changes made to the heart of the title, but most fans shouldn’t mind and players should find the title to be even more accessible than before. I might possibly recommend Gyromancer more than Puzzle Quest 2 to a select group of gamers, but, for the money, Puzzle Quest 2 has more appeal, customization ,and game modes and is easier for a larger audience to get into to.
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We’ve all been around this block before and with the music gaming genre, the old adage “same dance, different tune” is becoming more and more apt as time goes on. Personally, I would lay this burden more on Activision’s exorbitant raping of the genre last year than punish Harmonix for doing its thing a couple times a year, but after popping in Green Day: Rock Band, I can honestly say the world is beyond ready for this stale genre to move forward with the upcoming Rock Band 3, Power Gig: Rise of the Six String, et al. There is by far plenty to like on the disc and it stays in tune with the quality that overflows the cup that is Rock Band. That being said, though, the title falls into all of the cons one would normally attribute to a solo act game disc and, at the end of the day, Green Day: Rock Band feels like it should have really been a track pack akin to AC/DC Live as opposed to a full-fledged The Beatles follow-up.

Let’s be honest here: The addition of Green Day themes, likenesses and songs is the sole ounce of originality in this title as the core mechanics are hammered into the game straight from the heart of The Beatles: Rock Band. I could just say “if you like Green Day and/or Rock Band, this game might be for you,” but that just doesn’t seem fair or proper. On that same token, this title is virtually identical to the numerous entries in the series I’ve detailed before, so this won’t be a drawn-out review, either.

To kick off our checklist, players shouldn’t expect anything too deep from the mode offerings. Surprisingly, Green Day: Rock Band does virtually nothing to document the band, which does, thankfully, allow us to eschew the painfully tired cliché of working the band up from unknown to platinum status. However, which such a license on hand, Harmonix does very little to take advantage of the fact. The developer does sprinkle photos and rare video footage throughout the title to reward extended play, but this does little to motivate players that aren’t enamored with Billie Jo Armstrong or enlighten Rock Band players that come in knowing little about the band. Green Day: Rock Band copies and pastes the modes and progression straight from The Beatles: Rock Band, meaning there is very little difference between the mode offerings and, once again, the replaybility is forced through menial challenges that only test the players’ willingness to endure set lists. Summing it up, what Green Day: Rock Band offers is serviceable, but there is little difference to be seen through the modes and we’ve seen it all before, plus more, in titles such as Rock Band 2.

The presentation and gameplay have been straight grafted onto this title from any other Rock Band entry. It looks, sounds and plays just like any console Rock Band title you’ve ever played before and there are absolutely no surprises to be found here. The sound bellows through in great quality, putting players into the performance, and while the gameplay offers nothing new, it is still gratifying, well done and fantastic for multiplayer sessions. Given the source material, Green Day seems more suited to this genre of games, throwing out a number of high-energy tunes from the duration of the band’s career. You do get some instances where a song will be lopsided among the instruments (songs where the bass guitar and drums do not kick in until at least half way through the song), but, for the most part, the music lends itself well to the gameplay and there is some definite challenge in some of the instruments compared to The Beatles’ laid-back charting.

Graphically, the title still looks solid, although the fuzziness, focus and repeated crowd members still stick out to me, but given the motion capturing sessions with the band and solid gameplay, it’s easy to overlook these very minor complaints. Harmonix didn’t go all out with the band like it did with The Beatles, so there is the unfortunate setback of a lack of variety in venues (there are only three in the game) and chunks of the animation. What we are given in Green Day: Rock Band works great, but it also gets repeated quite frequently.

The title does get a shot of appeal among Green Day fans, but most other players are left sitting on the fence for this one. Everyone does get the solid Harmonix quality in the title, but given the sparse variety among the game modes and the lack of emphasis of the band off the stage, it’s hard to consider Green Day: Rock Band anything more than another track pack. Even Green Day fans bemoan to me the lack of song implementation between the albums Dookie and American Idiot, leaving many to question why one song or another wasn’t included when Harmonix felt the need to include everything from the band’s last two albums. Regardless of your taste in the music, though, some gaps were left in between some of the albums and the language editing might get on the nerves of some fans (and, at least to me, it also just plain sounds weird). With only 44 selectable tracks – although a few of the game’s tracks meld multiple songs together – the $60 value does come into question, though, no matter how big of a fan of Rock Band or Green Day you are. When you consider Rock Band 3 is on the horizon and will most likely deliver at least 80 songs on the disc, again, Green Day: Rock Band is far better suited as a track pack at a lower price.

None of this is to say this specific entry is void of fun and solid mechanics, but given the repetitiveness and lack of new things to do in the title, $60 might be hard for a gamer to swallow, leaving the title to be a must-buy only for those that can’t get enough of both Green Day and Rock Band. With the linear progression, I found it hard to get drawn into the “career” and playing my favorite Green Day songs is mostly the sole innovation in going back to the game. However, with the ability to load the songs over into Rock Band 2 (or even the upcoming Rock Band 3), I’d wager most Rock Band players will opt for one of those titles over popping Green Day back in.

The Scores
Story/Modes: ABOVE AVERAGE
Graphics: GREAT
Sound: UNPARALLELED
Control and Gameplay: CLASSIC
Replayability: ENJOYABLE
Balance: GOOD
Originality: AWFUL
Addictiveness: ABOVE AVERAGE
Appeal Factor: GOOD
Miscellaneous: ENJOYABLE
FINAL SCORE: ENJOYABLE GAME

Short Attention Span Summary
Repeating the obvious, this is a Rock Band title made entirely of Green Day tracks, which makes it easy to recommend to gamers that are fans of both. Fans of one, the other or neither, would probably be better suited renting or waiting for the price to fall on this one, though. The “career” is just as linear and the mode offerings are just as thin as it was in The Beatles, but Harmonix doesn’t push the license as far. The presentation and gameplay is as spot-on as always, but its focus on a single act will turn away a lot of potential players and with some of the omissions, even diehard fans of the bad may have some complaints to air. Standing on its own, Green Day: Rock Band does put up some challenging instrument parts and the punk-pop style lends itself to the gameplay a little bit better, but with what is presented, it’s hard to justify a $60 value when compared to other music game offerings, especially, when you have to pay extra to import tracks and download more tracks to complete the most recent album.
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Mortal Kombat returns to its 2-D roots with its new installment now under the Warner Bros. name. Mortal Kombat co-creator and Midway mainstain Ed Boon is once again at the helm of development, now operating under the studio name Netherealm Studios.

The trailer reveals a number of returning characters including Shao Kahn, Raiden, Reptile, Nightwolf, Sektor, Mileena, Sub-Zero Kung Lao and Johnny Cage. According to Boon, the studio is looking to take the series back to be visceral, claiming this will be the most brutal Mortal Kombat game ever. Also promised is a “deep” story mode and a number of multplayer options including tag battles that feature a co-op arcade mode, four players locally or a mixture of players through online play.

After a bit of a delay in development, Zeno Clash has finally hit the Xbox 360 in its Ultimate Edition glory. Even though the title original release turned a lot of heads in the PC community, including our own Guy Desmarais, partnering with Atlus for its U.S. console release, developer ACE Team has been able to get the word out about Zeno Clash to gaming audiences much more quickly. Both companies gave Diehard GameFAN a live preview of the title back in February and after three months, Zeno Clash is released and available for purchase on Xbox LIVE Arcade. The original title weighed in as a nominee for 2009 fighting game of the year on our site so does lightning strike twice with this revamped effort?

If you’ve already tackled the title on PC, you’ll be sad to know nothing has been changed for the game’s story (aside from subtleties such as a change in voice actress for Deadra). Still, the bizarre nature of the title and its mashing of fantasy and punk styling are most likely worth a revisit and it will no doubt raise an eyebrow or two for those completely new to the experience. To put it bluntly: This game is freakin’ weird. For someone such as myself, this is a positive comment, but there will no doubt be others that will be swayed in the opposite direction. Nonetheless, this approach creates unique environments and characters that are extremely memorable.

In a nutshell, Zeno Clash details the journey of Ghat, a member of a tribe inhabiting the world of Zenozoik. The player is thrust in medias res as Ghat regains consciousness after a crippling battle with Father-Mother, a towering creature of hermaphroditic nature that serves as the universal parental figure for all members of the tribe. Leaving Father-Mother for dead, Ghat soon has a legion of pissed off brothers and sisters on his trail. The only member of tribe willing to aid Ghat, Deadra, tags along with him as he escapes his pursuers, leading both on a fugitive journey that allows Ghat to revisit his past and reveal to the player what exactly happened in the events that led up to the death of Father-Mother.

What then pans out in Zeno Clash is an alternation of past and present that sees the pair fleeing from the tribe and battling the wilderness while Ghat reminisces about the slaying when they have time to rest. The player will no doubt be slightly puzzled by the story in the beginning as they have little clue as to what Ghat’s motives are, but the flashbacks not only give a unique way to tell the story, but also act as tutorials sprinkled among the various encounters. The progression allows for players to ease into a game at a steady pace and allows players to get a feel for the contents of the game. As the story continues on, Ghat will run into a number of crazy characters, but the story fails to evolve much beyond the secret of Father-Mother. The ending is extremely anti-climatic, following a re-hashed boss battle that provides little falling action, slamming players into a brick wall after the climax. Everything in Zeno Clash is so unique and mysterious, players will most likely be glued to the story until the end, but their interpretation of the ending will definitely vary and the constant back-and-forth nature of the delivery may lose a few players.

The story mode will take most players around five to six hours to tackle, but the Ultimate Edition pipes in some more content, even beyond that of the PC version, to extend the gameplay. Exclusive to the Ultimate Edition, a second player can pick up an Xbox 360 controller for split-screen or online connectivity to help clear out hoards of enemies in the tower and pit modes. The tower mode gives players a choice of five different towers to climb in wave-based progression, while three pits exclusive to the Xbox 360 version has players climbing down a pit toward a goal while avoiding plummeting to their death and battling enemies. This particular version also adds in a Zeno Rush mode where players tackle select scenarios in time attack fashion, complete with a brand new hammer-style weapon that reduces the player’s overall time with use. The various side modes also have leaderboards, giving players a lot to do for their $15 and making the deal a little sweeter for those that have already played through the original title. Perhaps the only thing missing here is a true versus mode to take advantage of the addition of a second player and add in some unpredictability and maybe a two-player story segment, but what players ultimately get goes above and beyond most revamped titles.

Seeing as Zeno Clash: Ultimate Edition weighs in at more than a gigabyte, I was expecting some serious presentation behind the title and I definitely wasn’t disappointed. While the PC version has a bit of a graphical edge, the Xbox 360 version is certainly no slouch in its visuals, which come in at 720p. Very few titles on Xbox LIVE Arcade reach the level of almost comparing to disc-based games, but Zeno Clash reaches this level with detailed, eerie characters that get right in your face thanks to the first-person viewpoint and dreamscape-style environments that really draw on the imagination. If you get really close to some of the environment objects will appear a bit blocky, but when the entire picture is viewed as a whole, everything blends together and really catches the eye.

The characters really steal the show in Zeno Clash, though. Ghat will face off against other humans, but he will also encounter a number of “alien” opponents, some modeled after animal-human hybrids. While the enemies will eventually repeat themselves, the steady addition of adversaries such as the Corwid of the Free and the hunter will ensure players get some variation. All of the characters animate extremely well also, and the first-person view accurately holds up, even while Ghat is being mercilessly pummeled (which will no doubt illicit some ill feelings for motion-sensitive players). Even though players will see a few hiccups such as squirrel bombs getting stuck in mid-air animations, a few nice touches to detail such as damage, facial expressions and the detail of the world’s makeshift weapons round out the experience.

While the audio isn’t equally impressive, it still holds up very well. The music does get repetitive with its very few samples, but each fits the mood perfectly, such as the journey down the river in chapter 12, for example. There isn’t much to the sound effects, either, but the first-person view allows for the effects to be a lot more up-close and personal. Landing a blow on an opponent is satisfying thanks to the over-exaggerated combat sound effects and any blow delivered to Ghat is exaggerated even more to accent the first-person perspective. The voice acting in Zeno Clash is also serviceable at best. None of the voice acting is horrible, but most of the human characters come across without emotion. The “alien” characters have distinct voice traits that make them stand out much more than the main characters and these voice samples also spill over into the gameplay as enemies taunt, shout and yell during battle.

Obviously, the real question many interested gamers have about first-person titles is “how does it control?” In the case of Zeno Clash, ACE Team didn’t sweat the transition at all, carefully mapping the entire PC version controls comfortably onto the Xbox 360 controller. Surely, there are still players that find a keyboard and mouse layout more comfortable, but the conversion here is spot on, resulting in responsive controls with the controller. The triggers take the place of the left and right mouse buttons and the dual-stick controls make for a natural fit to the console. Players can use commands to lock-on to enemies, making control during one-on-one combat a painless process. While a few of the commands, such as kicking and stringing combos, make take some time adjusting to, the controls hold up extremely well and quickly become second nature.

First-person titles are certainly nothing new as gamers have enjoyed FPS titles for years and entries such as Breakdown, Sudeki and Mirror’s Edge attempted to take other genres into first person. While the attempt isn’t entirely original, Zeno Clash does quite enough to separate it from other titles while still nailing the fundamentals that make the title fun to play. The hand-to-hand combat is definitely Zeno Clash’s bread and butter and where the game shines the most. Again, the experience allows players the in-your-face feel of a fistfight and the range of offensive and defensive moves gives players a lot to respond with. Players won’t get very far hammering down on the right trigger to punch endlessly as enemies will definitely block and the player’s stamina bar will prevent Ghat from doing much of anything once it is depleted. Zeno Clash allows players dodge and counter like Little Mac, sprint at enemies with guard-breaking attacks or even deflect attacks with timed blocks to access another set of counterattacks.

Thanks to the easy controls, this process is painless and the fist fighting easily becomes the highlight of the game. Zeno Clash does attempt to sprinkle in some variety with firearms and a unique weapon known as the torch. While the torches break up the gameplay with more of a defensive focus, the shooting aspects don’t always hold up so well. The title features a handful of very unique weaponry, often constructed from bones and other natural resources. Certainly, these rudimentary weapons couldn’t be considered to be as powerful or accurate as something a player would find in Modern Warfare, but the low power and constant need to reload these weapons frequently isn’t as fun or effective as using your fists. Even so, most of the enemies fall for the same tactics over and over, leaving most of the difficulty merely in the number of enemies the player encounters at one time. The earlier levels do allow players to ease into the game as the enemies “wait their turns,” but toward the end of the game, their patience is gone and enemies are more than happy to blindside you or camp on the sideline with a projectile weapon.

Much like any brawler game, though, Zeno Clash will get a little repetitive. Ghat and Deadra will wander a little; something will impede their progress, Ghat fights and the pair moves on. This formula is repeated quite often with a few changes in the characters here and there, but players will find themselves repeating the same process through most of the 19 chapters in the game. Still, players that can deal with the endless brawling will have a lot to go back to with the multiple modes and leaderboards and there is a bit of an addictive nature tied to Zeno Clash thanks to its mystique and visceral combat, but few will probably come back to the story mode that answers very few questions and piles on a thousand more.

As a comparison to the PC, if players are debating, I would some up the decision as such: If you are looking for better performance, sharper graphics and like using a keyboard and mouse, go for the PC version. If you would like slightly better controls, patched gameplay, more features, multiplayer and better accessibility, go with the Xbox 360 versions. Despite a few flaws, both entries are very solid games that are chock full of weirdness and originality, but due to the long download time and slightly poorer performance, fans of the PC format will most likely want to stick with the original.

The Scores
Story/Modes: VERY GOOD
Graphics: CLASSIC
Sound: GREAT
Gameplay/Control: VERY GOOD
Replayability: ENJOYABLE
Balance: GOOD
Originality: GREAT
Addictiveness: GOOD
Appeal Factor: VERY GOOD
Miscellaneous: GREAT
FINAL SCORE: VERY GOOD GAME

Short Attention Span Summary
Zeno Clash: Ultimate Edition is a worthy revamp of an already capable title. The experience is one-of-a-kind, the first-person perspective is handled well and there is a lot of new content to be seen in this new version. There are of course some fallbacks such as repetition, mechanics that fail to break up the gameplay in an entertaining manner, a hard-to-follow story and a very unsatisfying conclusion that do hold the title back from being top-notch. If you dig brawlers, you’ll get a lot of mileage out of Zeno Clash and the content is tweaked especially for the Xbox 360 format. With great presentation and such a bizarre game world, Zeno Clash is a definite attention grabber.
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Even though the formerly white-hot rhythm game genre is cooling down in the U.S., some companies are still making earnest efforts to produce music-based titles that set themselves apart from the army of guitar clones that have backed-up the digital highway since Guitar Hero became a phenomenon. The latest of these releases is Beat City, courtesy of Universomo. Even though Beat City is the first non-mobile title developed by the company, the studio has taken its knowledge to the Nintendo DS platform without a hitch and perhaps it is due to this experience that Beat City is a vivid and fun music game that can enjoyed in bite-sized pieces while the player is on the go.

Beat City, at its essence, is a very simplistic game, but it still features a full story that unfolds as players progress through the title. The story finds Beat City being overrun by Dame Isolde Minor, CEO of the company Cacophony (yeah, you’re going to find a lot of music/sound overtones in this one). As a failed opera singer, Minor has sucked out all of the city’s rhythm, color and livelihood, leaving a dull, depressing, black and white world in its stead. In response, Groovy Whale, a small, flying whale that sports headphones, has descended upon the city from a far-away planet, searching for a citizen with a unique sense of rhythm. He finds this person and embeds a speaker into his head to transform him into Synchronizer, giving him the ability to embody “Beat” to bring back life and rhythm to the city.

The story unfolds in short, comic panel-style fashion, which could have been heightened with some voice samples or even some text to provide more of a story. Even so, the player will be able to understand what is going on in the story as it begins to add in other characters including your duck-shaped-hammer-wielding ally Beatrice and members of Cacophony. The annoying loading screens in between each story segment get old after a while, though, especially after players return to specific challenges at a higher level just to see the same panels repeat themselves. Nonetheless, the story contains the same graphical splendour as the main game and the wackiness is sure to get a grin or chuckle out of most players.

Beat City is a bit short on mode offerings; however, the short nature of each rhythm challenge will no doubt encourage players to re-play the game’s segments. While the player can revisit any location in the story mode at any time, a “mini-game” mode is available to allow the player to dive straight into a select number of the challenges at any difficulty at any point. Story progression will unlock a small handful of different challenges in the mini-game mode as well as character profiles of some of the wacky beings the player encounters during gameplay. Other than that, there are no further options, unfortunately, with further omissions to any types of multiplayer modes that could have taken Beat City an extra stanza further.

One of the first things players will no doubt notice in Beat City is its unique visuals. Most of the environment is simplistic, utilizing nothing but basic shapes for its design. The characters are a bit more involved but it is the urban-inspired tones and vivid colors that really pop everything off the screen. When the player begins a challenge, most of the environments are extremely simplistic and lack much color. However, as the player liberates that section of the city, not only will more color start flowing into the environment, but animations become more lively and more of the city’s citizens, vegetation and animals will join the fray to keep the screen jumping with animations. Players will also notice various elements of background pulsating to the beat, so the animations are not only just for looks, but they aid the player as well, which is a great tool for rhythm gamers. A little more detail couldn’t have hurt the title and perhaps the expanding animations can be more distracting than anything else; however, Beat City is still very attractive to the eyes and the visuals are amongst the highlights of the title.

Rounding out the presentation, Beat City thankfully has appeasing sound to go along with the action and visuals. The game’s music drives the gameplay as it should and while a few of the tunes are pretty basic fare, the songs that are derive based on chiptune influences are well done and greatly memorable. As the challenges begin to repeat, these tunes will as well and the story boards only feature one song to accompany it, so there is some repetition the player will experience, and it left me wanting more of a variety. Even so, everything here is well done and considering the on-screen action’s sound effect are rhythmically implemented, they work hand in hand to create some catchy audio. Sure, there are no licensed songs and other music games have provided more memorable tunes, but what’s provided in Beat City fits well.

It surely knocks down the originality of the title but the easiest way to describe Beat City is by saying it is exactly like Rhythm Heaven. The title uses the vertical orientation of the Nintendo DS, is entirely touch screen and uses three different touch commands – tap, hold and slide – to perform in-game actions. Pound for pound this is exactly Rhythm Heaven in a nutshell. Still, Beat City has enough spirit in its presentation and execution to keep from being a mere clone and its $20 price tag should be more appealing to the general player, especially considering the title is much more accessible than Rhythm Heaven.

The touch screen mechanics work effortlessly in Beat City and through my hours of gameplay with the title, I would consider myself robbed of an input maybe three times. While Rhythm Heaven was chock-full of charm, it was also extremely challenging and final judging for each stage was so strict, the player often wondered what they had to do to actually pass a stage. In Beat City, it is virtually impossible to fail and through my gameplay (just keep in mind I have nearly 13 years’ experience with these types of games under my belt), I only received less than 90% performance twice in the entire game. Much like Rhythm Heaven, though, the player is rewarded for performance beyond 100% (the max on each stage is 110% and players only need 30% to pass the stage), giving them a four-star rating. The Groovy Whale uses stars earned in gameplay to build a staircase (starcase?) back to its home and assembling this full climb is what will keep players coming back until it is completed.

Not only do loading screens break up the action but each challenge has a tutorial. My main complaint with the tutorials is it is sometimes not immediately clear what the player is supposed to do. If the player does not nail the commands in the tutorial, it is restarted, leaving a player frustrated when the process isn’t crystal clear. There is no text in each tutorial, instead, commands play out very similar as they will in the main game and the player will have to play “Simon Says” in an attempt to understand the concepts. In the long haul, players will be able to figure out what to do in each stage; however, there were times where I spent more time than I wanted to in the tutorials trying to nail down timings.

With just three commands, though, the gameplay is simplistic, yet fun, lending itself to the more casual crowd of the Nintendo DS. The three commands will allow players to do anything from shooting ice cream out of an elephant’s trunk to summoning a gigantic ape to distract an old man. The tasks between the handful of different challenges actually varies quite well, it’s just too bad they begin repeating themselves in short order. Even though this repetition comes with progressing difficulties, the story mode recycles some of the challenges way too soon, with some even coming in back-to-back stages. There’s nothing at all wrong with the gameplay and control in Beat City, it just gets really repetitive, especially considering there are very few unique unlockables like the ones featured in Rhythm Heaven.

Outside of the borrowed concepts and repetitive nature of the game, Beat City builds a great formula. The challenges are quick and simple, which, even though most players accustomed to the genre will clear it in a couple hours, creates a perfect fit for the portable format. Going for perfect scores or working on getting the building a staircase for the Groovy Whale will keep players coming back and the characters are charming enough that most players will actually care about unlocking the profiles. The stages build appropriately but, still, there is nothing too difficult in the game. For $20, this title is a good recommendation for anyone interested in the rhythm genre, especially those intimidated by difficulty.

The Scores
Story/Modes: VERY GOOD
Graphics: INCREDIBLE
Sound: GREAT
Control/Gameplay: CLASSIC
Replayability: GOOD
Balance: VERY GOOD
Originality: ABOVE AVERAGE
Addictiveness: ENJOYABLE
Appeal Factor: GREAT
Miscellaneous: GOOD
FINAL SCORE: VERY GOOD GAME

Short Attention Span Summary

If you thought Rhythm Heaven was too challenging for its price tag, then Beat City is the perfect substitute. Beat City offers up rhythm action contained within wacky situations and is fleshed out thanks to its superb visuals and sound. The simplicity of the title makes it a great portable title and it does offer a few perks to keep players coming back. While the repetitive nature of the title and lack of multiplayer will make it seem like there is less to do in the game, players can easily get a handful of hours of action out of the simple setup. The bottom line is, this rhythm title looks and sounds great and its accessibility makes it suitable for a wide range of gamers.
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A Lost Planet 2 T-Shirt
Lost Planet 2 Stickers
A T-ENG branded aluminum sports bottle
Two (2) Lost Planet posters

If you’re interested, entering is simple. Since Lost Planet 2 has a number of character skins to allow players to play as iconic characters such as Resident Evil’s Albert Wesker or Gears of War’s Dom, if you could play as any game character of your choosing in Lost Planet 2, what would it be? Leave your answer as a comment in this post and make sure you use a valid e-mail in the appropriate field so we can contact you if you win. The exact answers of your post will have no bearing on how the winners will be chosen, as all qualifying comments will be entered into a random drawing. Through the regulations of our prize drawing, the prizes can only be distributed within the continental United States. All entries must be received by 11:59 p.m. EST on Tuesday, May 18 to be considered valid for the drawing and winners will be announced during the same week.

While you’re waiting for us to announce our winners, don’t forget to check out Lost Planet 2 for the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3, available in stores now. If you need a little convincing, check out three gameplay trailers for the title below and keep an eye out for our review of the title coming real soon.

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Xbox LIVE Arcade – Rocket Knight, Things on Wheels
Sparkster makes his long-awaited return after making his action platforming mark on the 16-bit era with Rocket Knight, now available on Xbox LIVE. Players control this armored, jet-pack-wearing opposum through 2D levels in this new installment developed to take advantage of the current hardware. Apparantely, not only has the game series been absent for about 15 years, the game’s story has Sparkster returning home after an extended absence to find the kingdom of Zephyrus being invaded by an army of wolves. It sounds like Sparkster still has all of his old tricks up his sleeves, including the sword-based projectiles and being able to hang from select platforms by his tail. This slice of classic material, courtesy of Konami, will cost players 1,200 Microsoft Points.

On the other side of Arcade releases this week, Focus Home Interactive is rolling out a remote-controlled car racing game, Things on Wheels, for 800 Microsoft Points. Of course, the races will be livened up with power-up and weapon-based items and the game’s tracks are touted as being “completely insane.” The title will give players a bit of versitility in the vehicles, offering models such as vintage, muscle, and sports cars. While Rocket Knight will satisfy the solo player this week, Things on Wheels offers gameplay for up to four players locally and online.

Game Add-ons – BioShock 2, Forza Motorsport 3
After a small absence on our feature, game add-ons have returned with two expansions to extend your games.

BioShock 2: Rapture Metro is now available for 800 Microsoft Points and adds six new maps to multiplayer, with some being influenced by locations in the single-player mode. The expansion also adds three new achievements as well as a “rebirth” feature. Rebirth allows players at level 50 to drop all the way down to level 1 in exchange for receiving a new, very special mask. Also on the Marketplace, a character pack has been added for the price of 160 Microsoft Points and all players can download a free game mode known as Kill ‘em Kindly, a melee mode where all blunt objects are golf clubs.

For 400 Microsoft Points, fans of Forza Motorsport 3 can now enjoy exotic cars thanks to a fifth car pack. The pack adds in 10 new cars: 2010 Gumpert Apollo S, 2010 Spyker C8 Laviolette LM85, 2010 SSC Ultimate Aero, 2010 Devon GTX, 2010 Rossion Q1, 2010 Joss JT1, 2010 Mosler MT900S, 2010 Radical SR8 Supersport, 2010 Wiesmann GT MF5, and 2010 Spada Vetture Sport Codatronca TS. To use these cars in season play, though, keep in mind you’ll need credits to purchase them.

Xbox LIVE Deal of the Week – The Ballad of Gay Tony is now 1,200 Microsoft Points
Grand Theft Auto IV’s second expansion is now at 25 percent off, giving players looking for more to do in the GTA universe a bit of a cost break. If you need to enlighten yourself on the expansions, you can catch up with Diehard GameFAN’s review of Grand Theft Auto: Episodes from Liberty City.

Game Demos – UFC Undisputed 2010, Iron Man 2
Players can now get a taste of UFC’s new installment with a four-fighter demo that utilizes new mechanics such as swaying, submission transitions, and cage positioning. In the mean time, you can get up to speed with UFC 2010 by visiting our Undisputed coverage page. Also, players can jump into the Iron Man suit with a demo that launched soon after the full retail game.

Games on Demand – EndWar, Battlestations, Raiden Fighters
Xbox LIVE’s newest digital offerings serve up Tom Clancy’s EndWar and Battlestations Pacific for $29.99 and Raiden Fighters Aces for $19.99. If you want to know what Raiden Fighters Aces is all about, you can check out Diehard GameFAN’s review of the title.

Xbox LIVE Avatar Marketplace – Army of Two, A World of Keflings
Major Nelson has again placed Army of Two in a slot for Avatar items (which should mean some cool masks), but joining the offerings will be A World of Keflings, which is an upcoming sequel to Kingdom for Keflings.

Music Marketplace
With many music game titles receiving expansion content on a weekly basis, it may start to become hard to follow, especially with these updates usually covering up the entire line of recent updates on the Xbox Dashboard. This week, new updates unfold for our usual lineup of titles:

Rock Band
Judas Priest Live Pack
“Breaking the Law (Live)”
“Rapid Fire (Live)”
“Metal Gods (Live)”
“Grinder (Live)”
“United (Live)”
“Living After Midnight (Live)”
“You Don’t Have to Be Old to Be Wise (Live)”
“The Rage (Live)”
“Steeler (Live)”

Guitar Hero
Alternative Pop Rock Track Pack
Alpha Rev – “Face Down”
Capra – “Low Day”
Snow Patrol – “You’re All I Have”

Lips
Miley Cyrus Bonus Song Pack
“7 Things”
“See You Again”
“The Climb”
“Fly On the Wall”

Barrett Strong – “Money (That’s What I Want)”
Dazz Band – “Let It Whip”
Jimmy Ruffin – “What Becomes of the Brokenhearted”
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Although some publisher complications held Prison Break: The Conspiracy back a bit, the title was able to finally see the light of day last month thanks to Deep Silver. Prison Break’s appearance on the Xbox 360 attempts to tap into the “good ol’ times” at Fox River State Penitentiary, as the game’s source material has been under lock and key since the TV show’s final episode aired in 2009. Harking back to the original blockbuster season, developer Zootfly lends its talent to sparking the same cinematic magic with an original sidestory, however, it only gets the formula half correct, leaving gamers with a lopsided effort that will endear some gamers while completely turning away most.

Prison Break’s story follows the premise of the first season to a T: Lincoln Burrows is sentenced to death for the murder of the vice president’s brother. The catch is, he was framed by a top-secret organization known as The Company. Once Burrow’s brother, Michael Scofield, becomes convinced of the wrong-doing, he decides to use his brilliant mind and career of structural engineering to bust his bro out before he hits the chair. In Prison Break: The Conspiracy, the story branches out a bit further as The Company deems Scofield’s act of armed robbery and landing in the same prison as his brother is a little too coincidental for its tastes. Sensing something is up, The Company sends in agent Tom Paxton to go undercover and find out what Scofield is planning and ensure by any means necessary that Burrows is executed.

As the player steps into the prison garb of Paxton, the usual prison cliche hijinx ensue and, aside from the initial introduction, the linear nature of the game and the developer’s choice to send Paxton on about six hours of fetch quests does little to allow the story to fully formulate. Fans of the show will no doubt recognize and enjoy the chance to talk tough to a handful of the show’s major characters, but most of this conversation just amounts to the characters telling Paxton what they need from him in exchange for whatever it is he needs to progress. Most of the fleshed out conversation are, oddly, ones Paxton has with himself, and players that soak in the ambiance of the prison will catch a handful of humorous conversations and situations that occur when guards and staff are unaware they are being watched. Unfortunately, these instances arguably make the random no-name characters more interesting than the recognizable likenesses fans of the series should already have a connection with.

Throughout the story, a number of circumstances become hard to believe, such as the fact no one has an issue with Paxton having a voice recorder on him at all times, which he blatantly uses out in the open. The same goes for any time Paxton uses prison yard phones to publicly dial up The Company and chat with his boss, Jack Mannix. Regardless of the bits of absurdity, Prison Break: The Conspiracy doesn’t do much to give the player a lot meaty story in between the beginning and end, and even so, if you’ve seen the first season of the show, you know how this story ultimately ends. Even though you get to experience it through the perspective of Paxton, knowing the ending will nerf the plotline twist (even though it’s hardly shocking if you don’t know the ending) and absolutely nothing will surprise you the whole way through.

The game banks pretty heavily on the single-player story, but with no secrets, collectibles or rewards to find, the replayability of the title really takes a blow. I would imagine few people would play this more than once other than to pick up a few more achievements or attempt the game on a harder difficulty if they truly enjoyed it the first time around. The game also offers up a versus mode that allows one or two players to pick fights in the arena as a number of the game’s cast, but this too is ultimately shallow in the long run.

If Prison Break: The Conspiracy is consistent with one technical aspect, it would definitely be in its respectable visuals. The character models are well done, for the most part, especially nailing down the physical features of the key series characters. Although the player sees the environments recycled, each has fairly unique features that sets apart areas such as the boiler room from the cell block and the cafeteria area from the asylum. While there tends to be a bit of a blurry focus on the visuals, the title does attempt some highlight use of lighting and particle effects. These effects could definitely be more crisp, but seeing a hallway with dust flittering around in the sparse beams of light inside the prison liven up the environments a bit more.

The sound is a bit more mixed, with the notable strike for fans of the series being the absence of a few of the original voices of the key characters. While this isn’t a huge blow to someone that hasn’t seen the series before (a category which I honestly fall in), fans will likely be bothered by the inconsistency. Overall, though, the voice work is serviceable and the title was able to feature seven original cast members, so there should be at least an air of familiarity for fans. Most of the sound, though, relies on ambiance to carry to load. There are a few jingles presented in fan service moments, but otherwise, music is fairly scarce, letting the sound effects give the player clues as to what is going on around them as they sneak around. Considering most of the game is sneaking around, however, even though the sound is well done, the effects no doubt miss a lot of the pop other games have with explosions, gunfire, etc. Prison Break gets this a little bit with roars of rioting cons and crushing fisticuff blows, and while the quiet nature of the title is understandable in context, the player is left with few memorable audible instances.

Anyone interested in the title should know up front that Prison Break: The Conspiracy is at least ninety percent stealth – trigger happy FPS fans and Metal Gear Solid commandos will need to check their hunger for action at the door. That’s not to say there aren’t action bits in the title, but these come in bite-sized pieces. As I pointed out earlier, a majority of the game consists of 1) Paxton needing something, 2) Paxton talking to someone that can help him get that certain something, 3) Paxton being told the certain someone won’t do squat for him until he does something in return and 4) Paxton sneaking around in places he shouldn’t be in order to carry out this “transaction.” Unlike Metal Gear or Splinter Cell, though, there is no fight or flight if Paxton is discovered. If he is discovered in any way, the player’s game is finito right on the spot.

Obviously, in a prison, someone undercover can’t be killing guards that are just doing their job and putting their hands on staff, and being discovered in acts of espionage would jeopardize Paxton’s mission, so the mechanic has its merit. Regardless, this will no doubt infuriate any player who is used to being able to snap necks and duck under cardboard boxes, especially in the cases where the player will feel they were unfairly discovered (which will happen at least a few times, I guarantee it). What unfolds is a system of jumping from cover to cover to take advantage of some less than stellar AI, following predetermined routes, and going through actions such as unscrewing grates or power boxes and picking locks over and over again. While the beginning of the title unfolds all of the mechanics out in a satisfying progression within the first few chapters, the player will just see them repeated over and over again with nothing new to see gameplay wise for most of the game’s second half. Prison Break also liberally sprinkles in a gamut of quick-time events, and while the associated cinematics keep things tense, the overuse of the mechanic will likely have the player sick of it by the end of the game.

In order to keep the game from being ten chapters full of hide and seek, there are a number of chapter-based and voluntary arena fights to take part in. The prison yard even gives the player a bit of diversion in lifting weights and punching a heavy bag to bolster their fighting strength. Unfortunately, the arena fights are ultimately just a diversion, offering little to the gameplay aside from achievements and earning money, which is only spent on… tattoos? I thought the movies always showed us cons really wanted cigarettes and dirty magazines, but I digress.

On the positive side, there are a couple of chapters with some heavy hit and run fighting strings that really accelerate the pace of the title and the game could have definitely used one or two more of these to break up the linear monotony of the game overall. Engaging in a fight swings the camera into a view that is slightly awkward at first, leaving the player to flail about with a fast and heavy punch. Paxton does have access to reversals by pressing a block button at the point of enemy contact, but once the player learns the timing on this, all of the fights in the game are laughably easy. Overall, the fighting is a far cry from being a technical masterpiece, but it easily saves the game’s pacing and keeps Prison Break from being a complete fetch quest chore.

Although there isn’t much to the game’s controls, they do respond very well for the most part. The fighting is quite responsive and controlling the game is easy given the number of contextual options that continually remind players how they can interact with items and the environment. Players can press the B button to make Paxton stick to any cover and the ability to press X or Y to swing 90 degrees to another right angle cover or jump and stick to another cover point, respectively, makes things simple and affective. Any time I spent fighting the controls were in instances where context points were overly sensitive or occasionally in trying to disengage from a cover point, but these didn’t happen to the point where I felt the controls were frustrating.

In a nutshell, players learn all they need to learn within the first handful of chapters, and while the difficulty is balanced nicely around the chapter progression, the repetitive nature of the game and lack of features really kill Prison Break’s replayability and addictiveness. Baring the Prison Break license, though, the title is sure to bring in a flock of fans and fans of the stealth genre of games will no doubt have their heads turned by the presence of the title on store shelves. Don’t get me wrong – it’s not impossible to enjoy time spent with Prison Break: The Conspiracy. However, the title has a lot working against it, and even though the prison environment is a new spin on the genre, you won’t find anything that breaks new ground for stealth games, instead borrowing a lot of ideas from similar games and its source material. Fans of the show will no doubt want to get in on this sidestory to take in the full canon, which is its greatest selling point, and most of the game’s achievements will reward players with natural progression and fuel their progress. There are a few glowing points to be found in the title, it’s just unfortunate the player will have to trudge through a ton of repetition to enjoy Prison Break’s tastiest parts.

THE SCORES
Story/Modes: DECENT
Graphics: VERY GOOD
Sound: GOOD
Control/Gameplay: ABOVE AVERAGE
Replayability: BAD
Balance: DECENT
Originality: PRETTY POOR
Addiciveness: DECENT
Appeal Factor: GOOD
Miscellaneous: MEDIOCRE
FINAL SCORE: DECENT GAME

Short Attention Span Summary:

Springing out of the joint and reliving Prison Break’s first season will no doubt be attractive to many gamers but Prison Break doesn’t do quite enough to capture this thrill. There are some highlights to see, especially if you are fan, and select gamers will actually have fun with the title, but this fun is buried under a ton of linearity, repetitiveness and groan-inducing levels of fetch questing. Respectable presentation and interesting story bits are dragged down by sluggish pacing, saved only by a couple of action-packed levels that fail to flesh out much of the story outside of the beginning and end. While players looking for action will want to steer clear, stealth fans and followers of the show may be able to get into the game, but they shouldn’t expect a wide selection of modes or much replayability for their money.
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A demo has been made publicly available for gamers to check out this new twist on the racing genre, but for those that haven’t been able to download the trial, Split/Second details a fictional reality show where some of the greatest stunt drivers compete in a season of races to determine the greatest. In video game fashion, the races are much more than jogs around a track, though. Littered throughout the course are “power plays,” with which the player can trigger rigged explosives littered around each course to wreck opponents, create shortcuts or even completely change the current route of the track. As Baynes describes the premise of Split/Second, “Just imagine a Hollywood movie director was given control of NASCAR for a weekend.”

Black Rock Studios is no stranger to the racing genre, formerly being known as Climax Racing and developing titles such as ATV Off Road Fury, Hot Wheels Stunt Track Challenge and the ’06 and ’07 versions of Moto GP, prior to being picked up by Disney Interactive in 2006. Baynes even indicated some members of the team had worked on racers prior to Climax, so it was noted the studio has a lot of expertise in the genre. Following the acquisition by Disney Interactive, Black Rock Studios began work on more projects, with the first being Pure, an offroad racer that was well-received.

Baynes indicated Split/Second’s development was started around the same time as Pure, with the projects dating back as far back as almost five years ago when the studio began judging what it could do with the current generation of hardware.

“We judged what we couldn’t do on the Playstation 2 and Xbox,” recalled Baynes. “Many of those games had customization and car damge … all of the innovation (in that generation) was based on vehicles. We saw an untouched potential in driving around a dynamically changing track.”

Before settling on the power plays, Black Rock Studios had some brainstorming sessions to decide how it would implement the dynamic element. Baynes threw out a few concepts that came up including severe weather conditions and even futuristic tracks with hydraulic lifts underneath them.

Black Rock Studios is now well known for its dedication to the racing genre and Baynes stated the studio isn’t worried about being “typecast” into future games in the genre.

“The goal is to stay experts and stay within the realm of racing,” he explained. “We don’t want to stand still and do the same thing. We thought Pure pushed what we wanted to do with that concept and we wanted to do street racing with Split/Second. We’re always looking at new, innovative ways to bring fun, new exciting gameplay to racing games. We are proud of the games we make and we have love for the games we make.”

The unpredictable nature of the game’s racing is complimented by the reality television show concept, which gives the premise some legs to stand on.

“With the TV show, we wanted to go larger than life the player is constantly blown away by the scale of the reality a little bit further,” Baynes detailed. “The presentation point-of-view provides a nice look and feel that you may not have seen before.”

Likening the setup to hit shows such as Lost and 24, Baynes also explained why the reality show setup will keep players coming back for more.

“There are tracks and hidden content waiting to be triggered,” he noted. “Players will go through the season mode, unlock a new episode, new tracks and game modes. Like Lost and 24, there is a concept of cliffhangers with teasers at the end of episodes where players get a ‘next-time’ trailer and they will want to carry on and see what happens in the next episode.”

Each episode in the season will have qualifying events. As players progress through the races, points are awarded based on performance and the player will need to have a target number of points across these races to join in on the final elite race in the episode. The top three racers in the elite race are invited back for the next episode and there are unlockable vehicles, tracks, modes and more to earn through the course of the game. Outside of the reality show season, players can come back to the game to enjoy modes such as survival (where players try to survive a storm drain run, inspired by films like Transporter and Terminator 2, where trucks throw explosive barrels at your vehicle), elimination, a detonator time trail mode and even another survival-based mode where a helicopter chases the players and rains down missiles at them.

Breaking down the gameplay and development of Split/Second, the first thing players may notice is the lack of a screen-topping HUD, which is predominant in nearly any racing game on the market. Instead of packing the top of the screen with text, Split/Second places a small HUD directly beneath the player’s vehicle. While this may seem out-of-place, Baynes fully defended the decision, asserting the positioning lends itself to the presentation.

“We’re not doing things for the sake if it,” Baynes began in explaining the HUD. “In racing games, it does seem there are certain aspects implemented because others do it. Many racing games have a lot of uncessary information on the screen like the best lap, current lap, spreads and more. We looked at what was needed for the player to play the game and this game is all about the environment. It seemed crazy to cover this up. We had the idea of putting it behind the car to free the screen up for the player. It was one of those things that once it went in, it was really popular with players.”

Even though Baynes stated the ideas and concepts of Split/Second were amazingly consistant throughout development, he did note some challenges and difficulties. With the unique premise of the title, he noted the development of the tracks became a larger process as opposed to going from conception to layout to scenery. Including power plays meant involvement from other teams in the studio, such as animation, and found the tracks being bounced around in a longer process. Baynes also commented on crafting a title that will please racing enthusiasts while still drawing in other types of gamers.

“We have a deep physics model so the hardcore racer can paly and all of the subtlties are there,” he explained, “but we have layered enough on top for pick-up and playability. We kept the power plays down to a couple of buttons and didn’t add in reticules or aiming. The speed works well with the concpet as well. We tried to keep it open to more people, not just racing fans, but also people that like action. We don’t want to alienate those players.”

The greatest difficulty in piecing together a racing title, according to Baynes, was in develping the AI of opponents.

“The very nature of the race is pitting you versus opponents,” he said. “You want to win, but you still want the AI to give you a challenge. Making the race believable is a real challenge and is the most difficult thing.”

Of course, the real star of the show in Split/Second is in the power plays and Black Rock Studios spent a great amount of time developing these features. In order to trigger these attacks on the other racers, players will build up a meter by drifting, drafting, jumping and performing other extreme feats. The studio has taken time to balance the gameplay to allow players behind first place to catch up without the experience of any “blue shell moments” while not allowing first place racers to trigger and waste power plays.

“Some of the tracks and environments lent themselves better to power plays than others,” Baynes recalled in developing tracks and their associated power plays. “Coming up with the ideas wasn’t hard, but doing it in a way that was fun … that was tricky. Sometimes it’s easy to say, ‘let’s have a wrecking ball fly in and smash all of the cars across the road,’ but timing that and making sure it’s balanced is where the challenge is.”

At the same time, the team also had to have some restraint to keep things from getting too crazy.

“When you come up with these ideas, we want to push it further and further, but you can’t push it too far,” Baynes stated.

A specific example came in a casino, Vegas-style environment that was eventually axed from the game because, as Baynes explained, “from a gameplay point of view, it didn’t offer anything new.” The enviornment spurred an idea of having a giant, one-armed bandit slot machine that released a mass of explosive barrels when triggered.

While these features didn’t make it into the final game, the casino enviornment did influence some of the features players will see in the Downtrack track, which players can experience themselves when Split/Second releases on May 18. The final game will allow for two-player splitscreen local play and up to eight players in various modes online. Through the course of the title, players will be able to control around 25 different vehicles after all are unlocked through progression and milestones. Split/Second may be another racing game on the shelf, but Baynes indicated players won’t find the action of this new racing title in any other game in the genre.

“It’s the intensity of the experience,” he said. “Sometimes you have races where it doesn’t let up from start to finish. It’s an adrenaline-filled experience. In a lot of other racing games, you do get that, but it comes in bite-sized pieces. Players haven’t experienced any other racing game as action-packed as Split/Second.”
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We’re known to not ignore the Xbox LIVE Indies service when we can and today’s quick look comes in the form of Prodigy’s Lewjmele, a vertical shmup that hit the service recently. The chosen genre pits Lewjmele against some classic shmup titles on Xbox LIVE Arcade such as Ikaruga, Triggerheart Exlica and 1942, and even other Indie efforts such as Shoot 1Up. Against these titles, Prodigy gives the genre an honest go but, in the end, some much-needed polish is needed to make Lewjmele a contender.

The game’s $5 price point puts it in a better position to appeal to gamers over most of the titles on the Arcade service. As such, though, the title doesn’t come packed with a large amount of features, leaving players with a story mode and a score attack mode. The story mode does offer players the choice of experiencing a cycle of five stages from the unique perspectives of three different characters, which extends the playability of the title a little bit. Otherwise, the score attack mode merely allows the player to choose a specific stage and go for broke. Both modes provide three different difficulty levels, though, so bullet hell veterans can pump up the challenge if they wish. Finally, while character-driven shmups can be acceptable single-player endeavors, it would have been nice to allow a local buddy jump in to add more value to the game modes.

Even though the title is a shmup, Lewjmele actually makes somewhat of an effort to tell a story, which is contrary to many titles in the genre. An ancient weapon “Lewjmele” was discovered by civilization and, over time, it was discovered it could give people the power of necromancy. The weapon was hidden because people began to abuse its powers and, in typical gaming fashion, this weapon gets into the wrong hands once again. As the struggle for power tears the land apart, three heroes from differing nations depart to bring peace to the land. Each character has his or her own story that accompanies the story mode at the beginning of each chapter. Unfortunately, while this should make the game’s characters and world interesting, some of the text is awkwardly translated and it disappears from the screen far too fast for most people to actually read it.

For an Indie title, Lewjmele actually sports some solid presentation. The attempted anime stylings should appeal to those interested in the artform and while a lot of character models aren’t too detailed and can be too small for comfort, they are certainly colorful. The game’s projectiles are also fairly vivid, which allows them to play into Lewjmele’s gem mechanic, which I will detail in just a bit. While the characters are 2-D, they are placed over a generally well-done 3-D background. These backgrounds sport some fair detail and the scrolling is spot on, making transitions such as traversing down a hollow spire in stage five memorable.

Lewjmele’s sound gets the job done without being spectacular. The game’s music provides some energy and drives most of the stages along well enough, but many of the title’s sound effects are meek and it seems certain situations such as boss explosions demand a lot more effects. The title does have some Japanese voiceovers to give the sound its biggest punch, but it could have definitely used some more effects to flesh out the audible experience.

Unfortunately, the gameplay in Lewjmele, doesn’t hold up as well. That’s not to say the title is downright horrible, but some nagging issues, steep difficulty and lack of gameplay explanations really show the title needed some more polish before being unleashed.

Lewjmele shows some innovation in its gem slot mechanic, allowing players to capture gem pieces in one of three slots to dictate the style of their firepower. If the player captures three of the same-colored gem, their aura then turns that color, making them impervious to enemy fire of that color. It’s an intriguing concept that is used fairly well in-game, but this is explained nowhere in the game and it took two to three playthroughs before I understood what exactly the gems did outside of increasing the number of projectiles I shot.

Outside of that mechanic, Lewjmele brings nothing new to the table for the genre, which isn’t exactly bad news for those that love the genre, but you’ll get a share of game issues in tow. The hit detection in some instances, especially for bosses, seemed a tad spotty and there were a number of instances where I felt I shouldn’t have taken a hit, which, coupled with occasional lag, made for a frustrating experience. The bosses also have a number of uninspired bullet patterns, with some cheap ones keeping you from attacking it thanks to the extremely narrow range of your character’s projectiles. The decision to frame the playfield is confusing as there is no arcade monitor aspect ratio to obtain and this results in a very narrow playfield with a lot of wasted space. Lastly, nothing really interesting seems to happen outside of the boss battles, which is a shame, especially considering how short each level is.

With these issues, it’s hard to call Lewjmele addictive and if it weren’t for the roster of different character stories, there would essentially be zero replayability in the title, sans leaderboards. The difficult nature of the title (filling the screen as soon as the first stage, even on easy) won’t do much for casual players and, unfortunately, the options of playing better shmup titles doesn’t bode well for appeal from fans of the genre. There are some options to change factors such as health to your advantage, but given the game gives the player no direction whatsoever, it shouldn’t be a surprise to see someone move on quickly after they fail to grasp some of the game’s mechanics. Ultimately, while the title does have some noticeable high points, it’s hard to say it gives the player value, even at $5.

The Scores
Story/Modes: MEDIOCRE
Graphics: VERY GOOD
Sound: ENJOYABLE
Control/Gameplay: DECENT
Replayabiity: POOR
Balance: BAD
Originality: BELOW AVERAGE
Addictiveness: PRETTY POOR
Appeal Factor: POOR
Miscellaneous: POOR
FINAL SCORE: BELOW AVERAGE GAME

Short Attention Span Summary
Lewjmele is far from the worst game I’ve ever played, but it is disappointing to see its flaws, considering, with a little more polish, it could have been a great addition to a shmup fan’s library. The title has favorable presentation, it actually attempts to give a player a full story and there are some unique stylings to its gameplay. However, its lack of interesting game modes, uninspired stage design, poor hit detection and more really dampen the title’s gameplay and replayability. When you stack the difficulty on top of these issues, the appeal really starts to wane and gamers will most likely move on with their $5. With a solid foundation, though, if Prodigy can move on and remedy these issues, a Lewjmele sequel would likely deliver a lot more value to the player.
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Xbox LIVE Arcade – Zeno Clash, Raystorm HD, Game Room

First, in what is being billed as the most feature-packed Xbox LIVE Arcade title to date, Atlus is bringing Ace Team’s Zeno Clash to the 360 with a brand new Ultimate Edition. The first-person action title was original unleashed on the PC and if you are to believe Guy Desmarais’ review of the title, the standard version alone was an experience that earned it a nomination for 2009 fighting game of the year from Diehard GameFAN.

Thanks to both Atlus and Ace Team, we were able to get a fairly sizable look at the Ultimate Edition back in February and after a brief delay, the game finally hits the service with expanded features. Make sure you check out that detailed preview and if you are interested in Zeno Clash: Ultimate Edition, you can download the title for 1,200 Microsoft Points.

In another title receiving a content bump, Square-Enix is re-launching the classic shooter Raystorm with a new HD version. Not only are the graphics overhauled, but Square-Enix is advertising new mode options and a brand-new spacecraft developed for the version. If you were a fan of the original entry, Raystorm HD might be right up your alley for the price of 1,200 Microsoft Points.

Lastly, Game Room Pack 3 is now available. Downloading the pack will add the following titles to the Game Room store, where you can pick them up for 240 Microsoft Points a piece:
Super Breakout (Arcade)
Pitfall (Atari)
Megamania (Atari)
Night Stalker (Intellivision)
Rack ‘Em Up (Arcade)
Realsports Volleyball (Intellivision)
Realsports Basketball (Intellivision)

Xbox LIVE Deal of the Week – Zombie Apocalypse is now 400 Microsoft Points
Konami’s zombie-infused arena shooter is a great title for those that enjoy the shoot first, ask questions later, type of game and this week gamers can pick up the experience at 50% off. I like to think of Zombie Apocalypse as a Smash TV with zombies, but if you need a second opinion, you can read Diehard GameFAN’s review of Zombie Apocalypse.

While it’s no longer valid, Microsoft sprung a surprise on me last Thursday, introducing a “Thrifty Thursday” sale. The sale saw the fantastic Trials HD go for 800 Microsoft Points. Will Microsoft keep up with this Thrifty Thursday one-day-only sale? We’ll find out today, so keep your eyes peeled for it.

Game Demo – Lost Planet 2 Multiplayer
Capcom has made the multiplayer demo for Lost Planet 2 available publicly now for all to enjoy. If you haven’t been keeping up with the title, you can check out our most recent videos on the title, courtesy of Capcom. Our videos showcase gameplay in Amaruba Jungle and Central City (below). The title releases May 11, so keep checking back for more coverage on the title.

Games on Demand – Prince of Persia, Skate 2, Brothers in Arms
This week adds both Prince of Persia and Skate 2 for the price of $19.99 along with Brothers in Arms for $29.99. You can get a quick opinion in Diehard GameFAN’s review of Prince of Persia and Brothers in Arms: Hell’s Highway. We don’t have anything for Skate 2 on the site, but perhaps you could download the demo of Skate 3 that was added last week and see what you think.

Avatar Marketplace – Final Fantasy XIII, Game Room
According to Major Nelson, today’s Avatar Marketplace updates will contain goodies from the Final Fantasy XIII and Game Room franchises.

Music Marketplace
With many music game titles receiving expansion content on a weekly basis, it may start to become hard to follow, especially with these updates usually covering up the entire line of recent updates on the Xbox Dashboard. This week, new updates unfold for our usual lineup of titles:

Rock Band
No Doubt Tragic Kingdom Album
“Different People”
“End It on This”
“Happy Now?”
“Hey You”
“Sixteen”
“The Climb”
“Tragic Kingdom”
“World Go ‘Round”
“You Can Do It”

Orianthi – “According to You”
Picture Me Broken – “Dearest (I’m So Sorry)”

Guitar Hero
Classic Rock 3 Track Pack
Foreigner – “Juke Box Hero”
Lynyrd Skynyrd – “Sweet Home Alabama”
Steve Miller Band – “Take the Money and Run”

Lips
The Go-Go’s Song Pack
“We Got the Beat”
“Our Lips are Sealed”
“Head Over Heels”

Joan Jett and the Blackhearts – “Bad Reputation”
Human League – “Don’t You Want Me”
LL Cool J – “Going Back to Cali”
Dexys Midnight Runners – “Come On Eileen”
David Bowie – “Let’s Dance”

Last, but not least, you’re probably doing this as we speak instead of reading the Xbox LIVE Wrap-Up, but owners of the Halo 3 ODST disc have had access to a special multplayer beta of Halo: Reach since May 3. If you haven’t done so yet, you may want to check out the beta before it expires. Enjoy this week’s additions for now as we’ll be back next week with another page full of Xbox LIVE updates.
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After a stellar 2009, the PSP’s library has dried up a tad, but it is still running strong thanks to the launch of PSP Minis and the handheld’s digital delivery platform. As such, it’s still refreshing when we see Sony roll out with a new original company-exclusive series that displays the uniqueness of its freshman portable effort. Tomorrow sees the release of Titan Studio’s Fat Princess on the PSP, under the subtitle Fistful of Cake, this time re-developed by SuperVillian Studios. A few slices had to be taken from this cake in order to accommodate the jump from the Playstation 3, however, the premise and extra content hold up well in the transition, even though there are some annoying caveats to keep in mind if you have an eye on this treat.

Much like the original version, Fistful of Cake oversees two armies – one blue and one red – duking it out in blood-soaked medieval-style combat. The premise is one of capture the flag, however, Fat Princess obviously substitutes a fair damsel in place of a flag. Carrying out your mission could be as simple as running straight through the opposition’s defenses and hiking back to your castle with the princess in tow, however, in video game fashion, of course, there is more to the premise. The princesses can be fattened up with magical cake, temporarily making them much harder to carry. In the meantime, the rest of the map unfolds with strategic warfare that sees players donning hats that assign them classes such as warriors, archers and mages, along with critical workers that gather up wood and stone materials to build barricades, ladders and catapults while also being able to upgrade the various hat machines for more powerful and versatile classes.

Fistful of Cake introduces a single-player “The Legend of the Fat Princess” mode that lays down an overall story. The princesses of the two warring factions used to meet up in gatherings, but upon discovering the magical cake in the forest, their craving for the cake creates a difficult situation for both kingdoms. Not too far into the mode, it is discovered that the craving curse can only be cured by the kiss of a prince and when it is declared Prince Albert (ugh …) will be in the area in the near future, the war between the two kingdoms becomes serious business as each king does everything in his power to make sure their daughter is the one that secures the prince’s affections. The story is hardly amazing, but it does a fair job in a genre that probably in most cases wouldn’t even attempt to craft an expanded narrative. Fortunately, Tom Kane (most notable recently for his work as Mr. Herriman on Foster’s Home for Imaginary Friends) provides narration and commentary during the game, and his gruff, gentlemanly voice is a perfect fit for the fairy tale nature of the game, bumping the story’s appeal up quite a bit.

Thankfully, the title gives players quite a few modes to fall back on. Not only can the story mode be played on multiple difficulty settings, but the player can tackle a battle in free mode that allows for a healthy selection of modes that include four modes original to the PSP version. A survival-type mode also allows players to enter an arena and forsake the strategy elements of the main game to fend off enemies for as long as they can stay alive. Ad-Hoc and infrastructure modes allow for multiplayer, although the PSP version cuts the number of players allowed in a game. With features that allow a player to customize their avatars, extra maps and other exclusives, and a large number of different modifiers, there is actually a lot to do and see in Fistful of Cake, definitely giving players their money’s worth.

Even though the game is making a move to the PSP, the title doesn’t suffer too much in its presentation. The audio is still in the player’s face with satisfying combat sound effects and gruesome weapon blows that spill buckets of blood, and each tune is appropriate to the situation or stage, which really drives the action. Tom Kane’s commentary can be repetitive, but not only do the phrases alert players to happenings in the battle, hearing the various internet memes in his voice is sure to give most players a good chuckle.

Visually, the game makes great use of vivid colors, which really bring the environments to life. The menus and storybook sections feature cute-style handrawn art that is quite unique and humorous, and the menus are clean and filled with humorous descriptors of each option. The characters, on the other hand, suffer a little due to the zoomed-out nature of the maps. The soldiers are fairly jaggy around the edges and it is hard to discern much detail in the model or animations, which can really put players’ eyes to the test when groups of soliders meet in combat. In all, though, Fistful of Cake’s presentation really comes through to provide quality visuals and audio for the player to soak in.

The gameplay in Fistful of Cake is pretty straightforward, offering up very responsive controls. Characters control fluidly and most of the time respond as the player would like them to. Occasionally, there will some issues in picking up items, and it is at times a chore to reach up to the d-pad to attempt to control any CPU teammates in the area, but otherwise, the control is scheme is comfortable and makes sense. Likewise, the gameplay is just as straightforward, as while there are numerous modes of play, each one has a simple concept and the player is given a lot of freedom in accomplishing most of the goals.

Unfortunately, the biggest slam against Fistful of Cake is made evident when the player doesn’t have any humans to fill in the slots in their army. I’ll use the term “intelligence” loosely when describing the AI, as your CPU companions will do some downright frustrating things to make your mission two hundred percent more difficult than it should be.

In the mode where players are required to drop a bomb off in the opposing throne room, my AI would carry the bomb all the way to the goal. The bomb must set for about five seconds before going off, but at the last second, one of my CPU soldiers would pick up the bomb and kill everyone in the area with the explosion. Whatever. The final straw, though, came when the CPU did this to me three times in a row. You’ll also be constantly fighting against your CPU worker class for resources. In the mission where players must assemble an altar in the middle of the map, your CPU workers will be far more interested in wasting your resources to build ladders and gates and upgrade various hat machines. Even in the most simplistic of missions, I never know what my CPU teammates are doing because they sure aren’t interested in helping me nab the opposing princess, even when I attempt to utilize the feature to command units to tag along with me. In all, the CPU seems to have its own agenda no matter the goal of the current battle and these instances really grate away at an otherwise fun strategy title.

When you can actually click with your army and get things done, Fistful of Cake is actually quite rewarding, providing players with a satisfying blend of action and strategy. The game’s presentation and unique premise, combined with its humor, craft a very appealing title, and even with its downsides, Fat Princess is still a winner. There are six exclusive maps to provide more value and all of the maps feature quite a variety in environments and throw out some tricky terrain to traverse. There is a good variety of modes even for a single player, though the oafish AI might drive down the replay value and addictiveness the title would otherwise have. With a review copy prior to launch, I wasn’t able to test out the multiplayer, but future players can look forward to four versus four matchups. While this would still leave CPU drones on your teams, at least then you could look forward to up to three other (hopefully) competent soldiers to back you up. Fistful of Cake has the makings of a great title; unfortunately, the AI issues are seriously a big enough of a drag to hold the title back a few notches from “must-buy” territory.

While Fistful of Cake is a port of a PS3 title, you won’t really find anything else like it on the system and a number of refreshing changes have been made to provide exclusive content. If you can find a way to shake off the frustration the AI will no doubt dish out to you, Fistful of Cake is worth every penny. It’s got a lot of charm and solid gameplay to back it up, but players won’t get the most out of their time with the game unless they dive into the online or local multiplayer.

The Scores
Story/Modes: VERY GOOD
Graphics: GREAT
Sound: INCREDIBLE
Control and Gameplay: ENJOYABLE
Replayability: ABOVE AVERAGE
Balance: ENJOYABLE
Originality: GREAT
Addictiveness: GOOD
Appeal Factor: GREAT
Miscellaneous: GOOD
FINAL SCORE: GOOD GAME

Short Attention Span Summary
Fistful of Cake is what the PSP really needs right now – Sony-exclusive titles with a ton of charm and appeal. This Fat Princess remake features a ton of solid gameplay, unique strategy elements, great presentation and exclusive game content that provides great variety. There are a few technical issues, but interested gamers will really have to take some narrow-minded AI into account. Your CPU drones will do things that will make you triple facepalm and these instances really drag the game down a bit. Outside of these issues, Fistful of Cake is fantastic game that will give PSP owners a great distraction for only $19.99.
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Fans of the series can also join in to Lost Planet’s official community or check out screenshots of Lost Planet 2 in Diehard GameFAN’s gallery. Lost Planet 2 releases on May 11 in North America for the Microsoft Xbox 360 and Sony Playstation 3.

Recently, Diehard GameFAN was able to get some insight from four the site’s established pros – Ciji “StarSlay3r” Thornton, Robert “Prod1gy X” Paz, Justin Wong (“JWong”) and Alex Valle.

StarSlay3r is most known for her expertise in Guitar Hero and a competitive drive that saw her participating in the inaugural seasons of World Cyber Games’ Ultimate Gamer and The Tester, but she still has plenty of time to wreck faces in a number of popular fighting games such as Street Fighter IV as well. Prod1gy X actually won runner-up honors in the aforementioned WCG Ultimate Gamer show and while he is also a pro at Guitar Hero and DJ Hero, he also likes to partake in first-person shooting competitions including Halo, Gears of War and Call of Duty. Justin Wong can be considered the number one Street Fighter IV player in the U.S., taking top honors at GameStop’s launch tournament of the game and second place in 2009′s EVO 2K tournament, but he also dominates in titles such as Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike (finishing first in the 2v2 tournament at EVO this year) and Marvel Vs. Capcom 2. Alex Valle is also one of the more famous fighting game competitors in major tournaments, receiving very respectable top eight finishes in the Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix and SFIII:3rd Strike 2v2 tournament at EVO this year and formerly holding honors such as the U.S. champion in Street Fighter Alpha 3.

These four pros took the time out of their schedule to describe how they got into gaming, how they prepared for competitive gaming and more:

DHGF: What initially drew you toward the game which you are now a certified pro at?

StarSlay3r: I initially was drawn toward Guitar Hero due to the fact that I had previously been playing a similar rhythm game called Guitar Freaks since 1999. The first time I played Guitar Hero was at a GameStop and I five-starred one of the hardest songs my first try so I knew this was a game I wanted to invest some time into perfecting.

Alex Valle: The popularity of the Street Fighter series has always driven me to compete. With the release of Street Fighter IV, it was only natural for me to display my years of tournament experience to the competitive scene.

DHGF: What made you decide you wanted to become a professional at the title?

StarSlay3r: I competed in a series of video game tournaments known as the Midnight Gaming Championship in Dallas, Tx., in 2006, and during this time, I was competing against some of the best players in the nation, which was an inspiration to do better. After getting to top 16 for Texas state finals I knew that if I tried harder and dedicated more time into learning the game more in depth, I could step my game up to the next level. After making it to National top 10 finals at CPL in Texas for Guitar Hero II and being beat by a top-three nationally-ranked player was when I really started to kick my training into overdrive and compete for the professional gamer title.

Alex Valle: Street Fighter has been my strongest competitive video game ever since the ’90s and it’s about time companies like G4G are taking notice of the talented players. It was only a matter of time before our scene gets noticed and I felt inclined to prove myself on the mainstream as a true professional cyber athlete.

DHGF: What is your training like for your title?

StarSlay3r: Training for Guitar Hero used to be 50-60 hour weeks, which consisted of about three or so hours a week of watching YouTube videos to determine the best star paths and techniques for solos, reading star paths on scorehero.com, practising solos in practice mode, repeatedly playing songs over and over until I full-comboed the song and online versus mode against every opponent that would accept the challenge. Since I had this type of training for two years, I now only have to play about five hours a week or so to maintain my skills.

Alex Valle: Great question. Street Fighter is a game of reaction time, physical execution and strategy. You need to master all of these elements in order to compete with the next player or you won’t stand a chance. In my youth, I used to spend eight to 12 hours daily to develop a unique, aggressive style. Bringing new and exciting elements are needed to win national tournaments. Today, I use my talents to train others worldwide, which is also a good form of training for me.

DHGF: What is your overall opinion on competitive/professional gaming?

StarSlay3r: Competitive and professional gaming is not as easy as it may seem. You must be extremely dedicated and determined to succeed in order to be successful in the field, but I love the challenge. I am happy to see that G4G enables players from all over to come and compete against the top players in this fashion because this is the best way to level up your game and take it to the professional level.

Alex Valle: I believe competitive gaming is the next sports generation.  There are millions of gamers out there that have exceptional skill that not many people in the world can achieve. The main difference from real sports and video games is that you can compete at any age with minimal physical requirements.

DHGF: Is there any advice you would give to anyone looking to play a game competitively?

StarSlay3r: Ensure that you have a lot of spare time on your hands before deciding to tackle a game on the competitive level because being a top player means spending many hours practising and perfecting your skills. Make sure to hunt out players that are better than you and practice with them because playing against the best will help you since you will not only see how your skills compare to a top player’s, but often times, they will give you tips/tricks/advice on your gameplay and can let you know where you went wrong and what you were doing right. Stay dedicated! Pro/competitive gaming is a lot of hard work, but it definitely pays off when you’re taking that top three ranking check to the bank.

Alex Valle: If you feel you deserve recognition for being the best athlete in the world, let your game do the talking!

Now that you know a little bit more about some of G4G’s pros, if you think you have what it takes to beat them, you can head over to G4G’s official page for rules and details.
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Xbox LIVE Arcade – Puzzle Chronicles, After Burner Climax
First out of the gate, we have a fresh, Xbox 360 version of the puzzle-RPG hybrid Puzzle Chronicles. If Puzzle Quest or Gyromancer wasn’t enough for you, Puzzle Chronicles will offer you a new outlet to get your puzzle action on for 800 Microsoft Points. Developed by Infinite Interactive and published by Konami, Puzzle Chronicles comes from the developer that established the genre in the first place, having Puzzle Quest, Puzzle Quest Galactrix, and Puzzle Kingdom under its belt. As such, players can expect a somewhat lengthy quest, active puzzle combat, and a lot of character development through the course of game play. Diehard GameFAN’s Aaron Sirois reviewed the PSP version of Puzzle Chronicles with passable marks back in February, so it will be interesting to see how the Xbox LIVE Arcade version will fare in another market with similar games to digitally choose from.

Secondly, SEGA is back on the Arcade service, serving up After Burner Climax. The title is actually a port of an arcade title released in 2006 and my experience with its deluxe motion cabinet was definitely positive. While the Xbox LIVE Arcade version obviously doesn’t have a hydraulic cockpit for players to jump in, I would imagine the feverish, high-speed arcade shooting is still intact. After Burner Climax still has the spirit of the arcade original, so we’re hoping this one holds up in the transition as I’d imagine not many gamers have up-to-date arcades anymore. If you’re looking for a fast-paced arcade-style title this week, you might want to check out the free demo and if you like what you see, the full game will be 800 Microsoft Points – and as a bonus to the Xbox 360 version, After Burner Climax features an unlockable avatar award. If you want to check out some media based on the game, you can head over to Diehard GameFAN’s After Burner Climax screenshot gallery.

Game Add-Ons – Left 4 Dead 2
Although the Left 4 Dead series hasn’t been in the spotlight as much as it has been in the past, the series still has plenty of players and loyal fans. Starting today, for 560 Microsoft Points, Valve will reward player loyalty with a decently-sized expansion entitled The Passing. The most obvious perk for fans of the series is in getting to see (not play) the surviving members of Left 4 Dead interjected into the sequel, while adding in new single-player, multiplayer, and co-op gameplay. The actual campaign will take place after the events of Dead Center and add in a new uncommon infected, a usable M-60 firearm, and a golf club to be used as a melee weapon. Owners of the DLC will also be able to take part in weekly events known as “mutations,” which provide different game modifiers each week, as well as a new co-op challenge mode and place infected bots for play in versus mode.

Xbox LIVE Deal of the Week – Borderlands: Zombie Island of Dr. Ned is now 400 Points
Borderlands’ Zombie Island is marked down to half price this week, offering players the chance to go toe-to-toe with the undead for only 400 Microsoft Points. While we do not have a review of the expansion on Diehard GameFAN, I would say Zombie Island is my favorite expansion of the three currently available for the game. While the island isn’t as expansive as the General Knoxx expansion and The Underdome features some great perks, blowing off zombie heads for brains never got old to me, the quests and enemies were very satisfying, and you can go to the island safely as soon as level 10. If you’re still playing Borderlands and you haven’t experienced Zombie Island yet, now is probably your best time to do so.

Game Demo – Lost Planet 2 Multiplayer
Here we have another case of a multplayer beta being available to only a few, but now Capcom’s Lost Planet 2 multiplayer mode can be sampled by anyone. If you’re eager to learn how the series has evolved since its initial launch a few years ago, jump on the demo and take a look for yourself.

Games on Demand – Halo 3
With the Halo: Reach beta on the horizon, the Games on Demand service is now offering Halo 3 for $29.99, which is on par with the new Platinum Hits pricing. I’m going to guess everyone interested in the title already owns it, however, if you’re curious about our thoughts, you can read Diehard GameFAN’s review of Halo 3.

If you live outside of North America, though, Saints Row, Sonic the Hedgehog, and Need for Speed Carbon have hit various territories in their digital versions.

Xbox LIVE Avatar Marketplace – Saints Row 2, Gears of War 3
According to Major Nelson, we’re anticipating Saints Row 2 avatar items to hit the marketplace this week. Also, riding the wake of the trailer reveal, Gears of War 3 items are now available.

Music Marketplace
With many music game titles receiving expansion content on a weekly basis, it may start to become hard to follow, especially with these updates usually covering up the entire line of recent updates on the Xbox Dashboard. This week, new updates unfold for our usual lineup of titles:

Rock Band
Coheed and Cambria – “Guns of Summer”
Coheed and Cambria – “Here We Are Juggernaut”
Coheed and Cambria – “The Broken”
Siouxsie & The Banshees – “Peek-a-Boo”
Supergrass – “Sun Hits the Sky”
The Violent Femmes – “American Music”

Lips
“Celebration” – Kool & the Gang
“Rapture” – Blondie
“Centerfold” – J. Geils Band
“Mickey” – Toni Basil
“Tainted Love” – Soft Cell
“Obsession” – Animotion
“I Can Dream About You” – Dan Hartman
“I Melt With You” – Modern English

Guitar Hero
Phoenix Track Pack
“Everything is Everything”
“Lisztomania”
“1901″

While that does it for us this week, we might have an interesting week ahead of us, so check back next week to see what’s cooking on Xbox LIVE. Until then, if you need Microsoft Points, let me give you a tip: Through Saturday, Target is selling its 1600 Microsoft Points cards for the reduced price of $17. Chopping off $3 means you get 240 Microsoft Points free, which will definitely come in handy next week. You’ll see why when we return.
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Xbox LIVE Arcade
I suppose the Xbox LIVE Arcade service deserves a break every once in a while, as it isn’t like Nintendo where it seemingly tries to piss off most of the Diehard GameFAN staff by ignoring the Virtual Console. However, yes, I cannot find any evidence of an Xbox LIVE Arcade title this week. Fortunately, we do have a few updates on Xbox LIVE Arcade titles for our readers to take in and enjoy. Next week, we’ll see the return of Capcom with the much-anticipated re-release of Final Fight: Double Impact, which gives players arcade-perfect versions of Final Fight and Magic Sword for 800 Microsoft Points. You can get a look at this brawler-packed blast from the past in Diehard GameFAN’s Final Fight: Double Impact screenshot gallery.

If you missed it on Monday, Christopher Bowen posted a marvelous breakdown of the Game Room service (it’s also pretty hard to not notice Brandon Chowden’s review of the Xbox Indie title Shoot 1UP from the front page), which will again be receiving regular updates later this month. Last week did bring us Mega Man in its 10th iteration in the main series, and I have been able to get a small amount of time in with the game. The great news is this new installment hasn’t lost the classic touch, featuring great sprites, catchy music, and innovative level designs. With my first sit-down, I was able to disassemble the eight robot masters in short order and now the twisted paths of Dr. Wily’s castle lie before me (don’t give me any crap about spoilers; it’s not like it wasn’t blatantly obvious Wily was behind the virus). If I get some free time in the near future, you might be able to see a review of the title, but, for now, this title will lead us into our next Xbox LIVE section …

Game Add-Ons – Mega Man 10
Just as I pointed out in the Xbox LIVE Wrap-Up for April 1st, Mega Man 10 has received the first of its string of game add-ons. Yesterday, Capcom launched an expansion that allows players to play as Bass (or Forte if you roll by Rockman rules). Although Bass’ double jump was removed to accommodate to the 8-bit gameplay, he plays very similar to his Mega Man & Bass appearance, including his ability to shoot in seven directions with rapid fire. Downloading Bass will cost a mere 160 Microsoft Points, and players can also pick up an additional time attack stage with Enker (originally from Mega Man: Dr. Wily’s Revenge) as a boss for 80 Microsoft Points.

Xbox LIVE Deal of the Week – Geometry Wars 2 is now 400 Microsoft Points
Seeing as Geometry Wars was an early staple of the Xbox LIVE Arcade service, it was good to see its sequel pull through and make the experience even more enjoyable. Well, for this week only, you can enjoy the sequel at the same price as its predecessor. I haven’t been able to spend much time on the title, but I thoroughly enjoyed the new modes, the multplayer, and the great soundtrack and flashy visuals. If you want a full breakdown of the title, please check out Matt Yeager’s review of Geometry Wars 2.

Game Demo – Blur Multiplayer
While it was previously only available to select few, Activision’s Blur multiplayer beta is now public for all to enjoy. Blur can be described as a “grown-up Mario Kart,” featuring more realistic street racing aesthetics, while offering a host of crazy power-ups and weapons that have been made synonymous with the kart racing genre. When I dabbled with the beta, I was given two different game types with a moderate amount of options. Players are rewarded through frequent play and passing challenges that gives the player more options, buffers, and content as they level up. This might be one to watch as it goes neck and neck with another promising racer in Split/Second, but with the demo now available, you can give Blur a try and see what you think.

Games on Demand – Fable II, Kung-Fu Panda
That’s quite a contrast of styles, but it brings two more titles to the digital service nonetheless. Fable II comes at Xbox LIVE users at the fair price of $19.99. On the other hand, Kung Fu Panda, ranks in at $29.99. I’m not speaking ill about Kung Fu Panda as it was a semi-enjoyable game and great for the younger crowd and family gameplay, but let’s take a look at this price tag. After being a holiday pack-in title, I seriously have to question the $30 decision – you can easily pick this game up used for less than $10 and you can even score a two-disc set that also features the family-friendly LEGO Indiana Jones for around $10. I’ll green light the Fable II price, but, man, $30 for Kung Fu Panda is about as off as I’ve ever seen on the Games on Demand service.

Music Marketplace
With many music game titles receiving expansion content on a weekly basis, it may start to become hard to follow, especially with these updates usually covering up the entire line of recent updates on the Xbox Dashboard. This week, new updates unfold for our usual lineup of titles:

Rock Band Anberlin – “Feel Good Drag”
Hawk Nelson – “Live Life Loud”
Skillet – “Monster”
Superchick – “Stand in the Rain”
Switchfoot – “Meant to Live”
Thousand Foot Krutch – “Fire It Up”

Guitar Hero
Fall Out Boy Track Pack
“Thnks fr th Mmrs”
“This Ain’t a Scene, It’s an Arms Race”
“The Take Over, The Breaks Over”

Lips
The Four Tops Song Pack
“Baby I Need Your Loving”
“I Can’t Help Myself”
“Reach Out I’ll Be There”

Diehard GameFAN Recognizes (“Original”) Xbox LIVE Titles
To close out this week’s update, we have a special feature in recognition of Xbox LIVE services for the Xbox being shut off permanently on April 15. Although its legacy will live on with the continuation of Xbox LIVE as we currently know it on the Xbox 360, I had some of our staff elect to throw in some of their Xbox favorites on the service that pioneered how we look at online consoles today.

Halo 2
There’s no way this title couldn’t have been on the list. In fact, it was Halo 2’s free trail card to Xbox LIVE that got me launched on to the service and it could be argued that Halo 2 is what catapulted online gaming to where it is right now. Sure, maybe that means Halo 2 is where getting called obscene names by a 10-year-old originated from as well. However, Halo 2 still remains as the Xbox’s most-played game as people still seem to be popping this disc into their Xbox 360. While PC gamers had been experiencing the online battles for some time, Halo 2 definitely set the stage for console gamers to get in on the action and stands as our most influential Xbox LIVE title on the list.

Phantasy Star Online
If there was one thing you could say about the Xbox, it was definitely void of many RPG experiences. Although a handful of MMO titles were planned, nearly all of them ended with the crushing news of being cancelled, including the much-anticipated True Fantasy Live. Although it found its way over from the SEGA Dreamcast, some of our staff still had some fondness in store for Phantasy Star Online Episodes I & II on Xbox LIVE. It was a foreign concept to me – I pay for Internet service, then I pay to be on Xbox LIVE and now I have to pay to play this online game. I loved Phantasy Star Online so much that it was a price I was willing to pay. Even though PSO isn’t massive in its multiplayer online gameplay, the Xbox handled the OG of online console RPGs well, and fighting through Boomas was just as fun as always.

Crimson Skies
Crimson Skies was packed in with initial Xbox LIVE packages giving players a game, a headset, and Xbox LIVE service, just like we still have today. However, I can’t say any game pack-ins have caught my attention much like Crimson Skies. The arcade-style dogfighting was a welcome change of pace during the time of its release, but when you loaded a full multplayer room and cut everyone loose, the true shining nature of Crimson Skies really breaks through. With lots of options, expansive maps, and explosive combat, Crimson Skies was a match made in heaven for the Xbox LIVE service and still holds up very well to this day. I’m sure fans have been holding their breath for a sequel, but, unfortunately, so far there has been no dice on that front.

Star Wars: Battlefront
With two games in the series under its belt on the Xbox, much like Halo 2, this series of Star Wars titles still sees its fair share of online gameplay. The Battlefront series combines two things many people like – Star Wars and the Battlefield series. The result is an epic, large-scale war that intensifies as you add in more players. While Battlefield has moved on to larger audiences and the Battlefront series has slid downhill, the first two entries were easily entertaining, especially for Star Wars fans that got to mow down Storm Troopers. The online playability might not match what we have today with Battlefield, but Battlefront definitely held its own on the Xbox and doesn’t disappoint fans of large-scale battles.

Counterstrike
Surely PC fans scoffed at the thought of playing Counterstrike on the Xbox, but given the number of console gamers that surged through the past few generations of consoles, the system’s online gameplay made the Xbox a sure bet for the title. Being crafted to the Xbox controller and services, Counterstrike didn’t disappoint those willing to overlook the absence of a mouse and keyboard and still ranks among the most-played Xbox games over Xbox LIVE. Even though the format changed, the essence of Counterstrike was still embedded in the Xbox version and it made a lot of trigger-happy FPS gamers happy.

Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory
Although Sam Fisher didn’t exactly stay Xbox exclusive for long, the Xbox LIVE service made his third entry a big deal. Not only could two people team up to take on campaign missions with co-op moves, but players could also enter versus matches that incorporated the same tactics found in the single-player mode. Chaos Theory is, again, another title still seeing frequent play and for good reason. When you are able to take the stealth genre and inject some solid multplayer features into it, you’re bound to have a formula for success on Xbox LIVE.

Steel Battalion: Line of Contact
I can’t say Capcom’s Steel Battalion was played heavily by gamers, but you just can’t ignore that massive control panel that the game was sold with. Although Microsoft had MechAssault, Steel Battalion actually put gamers into the seat of a mech with an intimidating array of switches, panels and buttons. Once players learned the ropes, though, the experience was massively satisfying and the use of Xbox LIVE further perpetuated the experience. Perhaps the only thing that could pull you even further into the game are the interactive mech motion arcade cabinets. SEGA tried to recapture the spirit of Steel Battalion with ChromeHounds, however, it just isn’t the same.

Dead or Alive Ultimate
Dead or Alive wasn’t the only fighting game in town, but given how most of them played while being online, the general fighting game on Xbox LIVE was pretty much unplayable. Although Dead or Alive wasn’t perfect when fighting online, with the backing of Microsoft and the game’s exclusivity, these remakes were probably as good as it got for most fighting game fans. With a further bump up in graphics and content from previous versions, Dead or Alive Ultimate gave fans a new look at Dead or Alive 2 along with the original arcade title. With Microsoft’s heavy marketing, it wasn’t hard to notice the Dead or Alive franchise on the system, which is probably why the title was one of the most popular for its time on the service.

Conker Live & Reloaded
Showing up at the end of the Nintendo 64’s life, a lot of gamers did miss out on Conker’s Bad Fur Day the first time around. During the span of the Xbox and Gamecube, Microsoft notoriously snatched up Rare as Nintendo began to struggle pretty hard in the market and put them to uses that had gamers baffled. One result of the development studio was a re-imagining of Conker that infused Xbox LIVE gameplay for those that couldn’t get enough of the multiplayer battles. I never liked the multiplayer battles in Conker Live & Reloaded, but a lot of people did, making it, once again, another title that still climbs the Xbox charts to this day. Maybe it’s the vulgar content and maybe people just like playing the game. All I know is I won’t step in the way of gamers having a good time.

DanceDanceRevolution Ultramix
In the final spot on our list, I’m going bold and throwing this one in. Not only did the Konami team based out of Hawaii pump out some quality titles that actually changed the interface and stale conventions of the DDR series with Ultramix and inject relevant U.S. dance music into the series, but it launched what could be considered some of the very first digital expansion content in console gaming. Sure, you could play the game online, but these digital transactions helped shape what we current see with Rock Band – Ultramix’s purchased content even flowed into other Ultramix titles. There was a time early in the century where DDR was the untouchable king of music gaming. I don’t know what the hell happened to make these series nose dive into the dirt, but, yes, there was a time where DDR was arguably one of the most innovative titles in gaming history and we saw this even on Xbox LIVE.

Thanks for sticking with us on this slow week. We’ll be back next week with more updates, but, for now, if you have Xbox LIVE memories stemming from Microsoft’s first console, we’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments. Remember, you have until April 15 to play Xbox titles on Xbox LIVE, and don’t forget to do your taxes if you haven’t done so already!
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