• Format: PS3 (version tested), Xbox 360
• Unleashed: Out Now
• Publisher: Ubisoft
• Developer: Ubisoft Montreal
• Players: 1 (plus multiplayer)
• Site: http://www.ubi.com/UK/default.aspx

Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood has been waited on with baited breath this year; some have been saying they expect it to be AC 2.1 with mutiplayer tacked on, but thankfully this is not the case. ACBH picks up exactly where we left AC2, but with Ezio seeing off an attack from the Borgia at his home, which sets this AC’s story in motion and sees us travelling to Rome. Rome is a huge sprawl of rooftops, waterways, tiny lanes and roaming countryside. Because of its size, there’s the option to ride your horse within the city walls. Although not the most graceful or low-key form of travel for an assassin in a pedestrian heavy street, it is still quite liberating being able to bustle plebeians out of your way by riding straight through them. You can also summon your horse at any time wherever you like, with the exception (obviously) of rooftops, flagpole tips, cliff faces etc. We’re told horseshoes don’t have the best grip for scaling towers. Ah yes, towers! There are now “control towers” dotted around the landscape that keep the Borgia influence right in the face of the population. These can be destroyed and reclaimed first by finding the main general of the tower and dispatching him, then climbing and burning the tower to complete the conversion. This adds an extra dimension of strategy, where conversions of these towers will make later missions easier to handle. In fact, strategy plays a large part in almost every aspect of ACBH. The new addition of recruiting assassins to your cause and having them at your beck and call at almost any time means you never have to murder anyone again, but then, where’s the fun in that!?

Having assassins at your command however comes with responsibilities; firstly you need to train them up, and this involves using carrier pigeons to deliver contracts to each member. The missions they go on are hand picked by you, who will have considered their current abilities, strengths and weaknesses and so on, building them up through the ranks until they reach Assassin. You will also manage their equipment, giving them better weapons and armour – even deciding the colours they wear. Then there’s the combat side of things. Bringing them into fights with you that you can’t handle alone is very useful, but only if they are able to handle it themselves. If you’re up against five or six elite guards and you call in a low level assassin, he/she’s not likely to even last the fight and with their death you’ll be set back to finding and recruiting a new member, and building them up all over again. You can also take on assassin missions yourself if you’re feeling particularly bloodthirsty. Not only this, but there are other guilds to manage with their own missions to sink your blades into.

The Thieves Guild will have you trailing and killing executioners, intercepting passing information or proving your worth in checkpoint races. Then there are the Courtesan Guild missions and a fight club where bare fist fights are done for money. Each of these have certain sub-requirements to meet like “pick 225 pockets” so there’s no shortage of things to do in each guild. There’s also the “Building Rome” meta game which involves restoring and investing in the blacksmiths, art merchants, doctors, tailors, banks, stables and Guild buildings once the Borgia influence has been dealt with. If you still have cash left over from buying shops, armour, weapons, art or poisons you’ll be glad to know you can also purchase large landmarks like the Pantheon or the Colosseum. There are Leonardo missions too, which have been sectioned into parts where the objective is to destroy his war machines in each mission. These will see you dishing out hot cannonball mayhem in a circular tank or bombing Borgia strongholds via flying contraptions of death! There are virtual training modes to hone your skills with, and medals to obtain from each. All of this, on top of the main storyline (and DLC missions) makes the complaint the AC games before “didn’t have much to do in them” sound like a childish whine and we haven’t started talking about the new multiplayer aspect yet!

The fighting mechanics have had another overhaul too; this time Ezio can be much more aggressive. Instead of waiting for a counter-move to present itself you can build up a chain of kills, so by pulling off a couple of counter moves you can then start attacking with one-hit-kills which leads to you being able to flawlessly take out any number of high ranking guards within minutes. In short, there is no aspect of this game that hasn’t been improved since the last effort, and the results are nothing short of overwhelming; AC 2.1 indeed…

As for the multiplayer there are various modes including Play Now, Ranked and Private Matches. Wanted Mode (6-8 players) sees you killing Templar targets for high scores; Alliance Mode has you grouped into teams of two for rounds where you kill as many on the opposite side as possible within a time limit. Targets are identified via a small picture in the corner of the screen, and you’re given a compass that shows their direction and distance from you. Red markers show pursuers, and blue markers show secondary targets like other team members. There are 17 playable characters (some unlockable) and additional perks (12 in total) and abilities (8 thereof) to unlock with XP such as better speed, better blending or faster climbing – two of which can be used at a time. There’s a good selection of maps that include places like Firenze, Forli, Roma and Venice, as well as varied custom options for Profile and Personas to (we’re not sure why) stand out from the crowd. If anything Ubisoft Montreal have listened to feedback and given their fans exactly what they’ve asked for, and as a result have infinitely improved AC. Now if only every developer could do that!

• Format: iPhone, iPod Touch
• Unleashed: Out Now
• Publisher: Bulkypix
• Developer: Pastagames
• Players: 1
• Site: http://pixnlovepublishing.com/topic/index.html
  

Anyone here remember green-screens? Okay, how about the Game & Watch series? Gameboys, Tetris!? Ah, right, okay now I’ve got your attention. Well, honestly if you can’t remember these then half this game will be wasted on you! Pix n’ Love Rush is a game from nowhere, and its roots are actually publishers of books on gaming history. Starting in France three years ago, they became a well known source for the archaeology of games and have recently decided to go international. One of their “check-mate” moves for global recognition has been to release an iPhone game bearing their name, Pix n’Love (Rush).

Pix n’ Love Rush has an instant feel of quality at the intro screen and as most gamers with an iPhone will know that quality feel is hard to come by, most of the time. The infinite mode here is inaccessible off the bat, and the only option open is ’5min play’, which serves as a tutorial and a goal of skill to reach before hitting the full-on infinite mode. It’s laid out like a scrolling platformer and as such, the controls are as simple as an Old Skool game should be; run right, run left, jump and shoot. Though you can only shoot up, the projectiles come back down at an angle and this lends itself to more tactful progression as you’ll quickly have to learn. You can also hurt yourself with your own shots, so they need to be well timed and if you miss, pay attention for their return or you will ruin your own combo-streak. Be warned, this is gaming from yesteryear where you will be punished for incompetence!

There are many phases that Pix n’ Love Rush will run through as you progress which are determined by your combo-counter. Obviously the better you do the higher your combo rises but this is where the magic is; each time you hit a new combo ‘block’ (x2, x5 and then x10) the graphics take a turn to a new era of gaming history. The effect is really second to none, as you score your way through the years of Red L.E.D, Green-screens, 8-Bit and L.C.D displays with a transition that rarely puts you off your stride. Smiles will dawn on faces as homage is paid to certain games that stood above all others in their heyday, and gritted teeth and frowns will stretch the facial features as the unrelenting pace and demand for pixel perfect jumps are coaxed from the player. Underpinning all this is a clever little programme that randomises each level, so you’ll be continually tested. The music too is more than worthy of praise; joyful chip-tunes that hark back to a lost era of computer made music are fitted perfectly into Pix n’Love’s ambience.

Sadly, as usual the iPhone’s touch controls are what let this fantastic little game down the most. Why the Left and Right ‘buttons’ aren’t further away from each other is a little confusing, more so is why the jump and fire buttons are so far apart! These two oddities lead to silly mistakes being made frequently and continually detract from that “Perfect” score at the end of each level, as do falling down holes and running into enemies that are covered by your thumbs, which all can be blamed on the iPhone as a platform itself. What Pix n’ Love Rush does do well though is pay its respects to gaming’s history, and it does so with love, class and affection.

4/5

• Format: PSP
• Unleashed: Out Now
• Publisher: Sony Computer Entertainment
• Developer: Studio Cambridge
• Players: 1
• Site: http://www.littlebigplanet.com/

When LittleBigPlanet was in development a lot of people laughed at it; people said it would fail, tragically. Why would you want to have to make your own levels? How could a side scrolling platformer survive in this world of CoDs, GTAs and Drake’s Fortunes? Well, now that it’s had time to root itself into the PlayStation community what we see today tells a different story, one where LBP has amassed a ton of fans and if two million or so levels won’t convince you of its popularity then we’re lost on how to persuade you of it.

Following in the original LBP’s footsteps comes the PSP version, and from the moment you switch it on and hear Mr. Fry’s voice, you know it’s going to be fun. The first level from the main selection is sure to make you smile, as the similarity to its bigger brother is uncanny. What you see on-screen is as close to the PS3 version as the PSP could possibly muster and that is a very good thing. As you traverse the levels, you’ll find them to be a little trickier than what you might be used to and the omission of a third ‘plain’ will become obvious within the first twenty minutes to those who have played this on PS3. Not that this is a terrible problem, but what it means is that the developers have had to come up with some devilishly cunning level design to compensate.

PSP LBP certainly carries the same charm and warmth as its predecessor and you’ll soon find yourself leaping, grabbing and pulling switches quite merrily like there’s no such thing as a PS3. No doubt on your journey you’ll be left looking at the screen with a quizzical expression resembling the old Cat Vs Balloon conundrum while wondering how to obtain those out-of-reach prize bubbles from time to time, but you’ll be safe in the knowledge that you can return for them later. Themes within the levels are similar to the first game but diverge with things such as Egyptian, Australian and Hollywood themes, all of which encompass varying degrees of fun stuff ranging from construction sites, camel and dragon rides, theme parks, giant robots and even Mission Impossible parody levels. These are stuffed with tricky platforms (but never too tricky) and silly humour that will keep you playing right through to the end.

The level creator is where you’ll likely be heading to straight after (or even before) you complete the other pre-made levels. Now before we go any further, we’d like to point out that we’re not saying the level creator is broken exactly, just a little under par with what we’re used to. There are the perfectionists amongst us and nowhere is that more obvious than in the PS3 LBP online community levels, if you feel you’re one of them then you’d better listen up: First off copying and pasting objects with ease is out! You’ll have to capture it, poppit, select it, then paste it, no more L3-ing for you! Also, once you’ve made that object – that’s it stuck at that size. If you want a smaller version then you’ll have to make it all over again. Stickers will only go on the front of objects, they won’t wrap around them and they won’t stick to score bubbles, entrances or continue doors. Our biggest problem with the level creator; you can’t draw shapes! You can’t draw or make something just by moving the nub around and holding ‘X’, to make a unique shape you’ll have to draw out the basic outline with a small square or circle attached to a locked grid then use the corner editor to mould the basic shape into what you want. If the shape is too complex (which is often the case) the Line Re-shaper tool can get a little confused, not only making it difficult to make natural looking shapes, but changing them with any precision can be frustrating. Really we only found other small limitations concerning the creation aspect, things like not being able to change the size of the score or prize bubbles, and it seemed we could only put our own creations in prize bubbles too. Our other gripe was not being able to skip the tutorials; luckily we find Stephen Fry to be rather amusing, so we didn’t complain too much! With all that said, the ‘Static’ and ‘Dynamic’ selections are a welcome change. Choosing the Static option will allow any material to hover/float like dark matter from the PS3 game which we found rather useful.

If you stick with it all of the above can be forgiveable (it just makes the creation aspect of LBP a little longer and more fiddly than it should be) but once you re-programme your brain to compensate, creating unique and fun levels will glean the same pride and sense of accomplishment as it once did before, or if you’re new to LBP and don’t have a PS3, ignore everything we’ve said in the last few minutes and just get creating! If you get bored of that, or if creating isn’t your thing, then there’s a load of other pre-created levels to download made by other people too. Failing that, there’s a whole bunch of other stuff to download from the PSP network including costumes, level kits and other stuff.

What all this amounts to is one of the most expansive games available for the PSP, and at a general price of £25 you really can’t go wrong with it.

If we were to take what the general media say as gospel about computer games, then we’d all be goths and emos with an unhealthy fascination with guns, death and grievous bodily harm. The fear of games and the incentives they carry has been around since their creation and as all parents “know”, their children are unable to make informed choices, are easily influenced by anything as long as it’s on a TV screen of some kind and are generally pretty dumb. At least that’s the message I get from the majority of parents when they’re asked about computer games and their kids. In the mid 80′s and 90′s the biggest complaint a parent could have about their child playing games was how “antisocial” they were. While it’s true that a lot of my childhood was spent in a dark bedroom figuring out pokes for games (if you think I’m being dirty, ask a gamer over 30), perfecting SF2 moves or finding all the warp pipes in Mario, there was a fair amount of time spent round at friends’ houses swapping games, playing against each other, or helping each other with difficult bits. Going further back in my life, the arcades were always a place of vibrant chitter-chatter and were abundant with people of varying ages, though we (me and my friends) always stuck around each other and kind of swarmed about different arcades like manic bees full of sugar, we met loads of other kids near our ages too. The idea of games being an antisocial thing was so far from my mind at that stage I’d have laughed right in your face if you even suggested such a notion to me.

How the arcades should be

With all that said however, there was the 90′s. When games started to get bigger and more involving than just a simple display of button memory skill, a new breed of gamers began to emerge. When games like Zelda and Final Fantasy really got into their stride, gamers (though the term ‘Gamer’ wasn’t even really coined back then) began to find true fascination in these massive, new virtual playgrounds they had been given the gate keys to. The truth is though, that the whole world had become obsessed with the idea of living with virtual reality and what computers were now capable of doing for us. TV shows and films depicting VR began to spring up everywhere, things like The Lawnmower Man and the Matrix made us believe that VR was a thing to be feared (yet undeniably cool) while TV shows such as Cyberworld or Knightmare and to some extent GamesMaster, showed us that there was a lot of fun to be had with it.

"With this new telescope, I can see up alien's bottoms" said Patrick Moore; probably

Yet still the dreary teenager sat alone (as he always has) playing with his joystick in a dark room away from prying eyes. It would be fairly safe to say that it was the 90′s that singlehandedly cattle branded gaming as a solitary and selfish fulfilment, but just around the corner online multiplayer lay in wait.

The question is, WHAT IS THAT MAN PLAYING WITH???

By the time the space year 2000 arrived we (gamers) had become connected and in doing so, it quickly became the most social hobby available. If you know anyone that scoffs at you because you’re into gaming just ask them if they’re on Facebook/Myspace/Twitter and if they deny that then ask them if they’ve ever sent a text message, because all of these are lesser versions of how gamers communicate with each other all the time (only we do it with a bit more sophistication). If they tell you they’ve never sent a text then you might as well be talking to an antique vase.

Our Connected World

Gaming has connected so many people across the globe that I’d dare say it’s responsible for thousands (if not millions) of friendships, relationships and even marriages. It’s one of the fastest moving industries today and makes a considerable amount more money than the behemoth that is the film industry. From things like Second Life and PSN Home to games like LittleBigPlanet, ModNation Racers and Spore (let’s not forget the massive PC modding community) it can bring out the imaginative side of us and makes us want to share our creations with each other, though it can bring out the ugly side of humanity (I’m looking at you, racist foul-mouthed online T-Baggers) but most of all; it enriches us, keeping us together having fun. Sure, it was harder to admit you were a gamer in the 80′s and meeting those of the same frame of mind was difficult, and we had a little hiccup with our more solitary bedroom antics of the 90′s, but now look at us all! Have we not become a deeply entwined worldwide community of individuals that get together just to be in each other’s company? I for one can’t wait to see what this gaming empire will bring to the social side of humanity in the future.

• Format : PSP (version reviewed), PS3, iPhone
• Unleashed : Out Now
• Publisher : StormBASIC
• Developer : StormBASIC
• Players : 1
• Site : http://www.stormbasic.com/

Sony’s answer to the iPhone/Touch has been a strange and twisted “yelp”, like a griffin getting his foot jammed in a doorway. Instead of releasing a new all-singing all-dancing PSP, they took the current one they had and ripped bits out of it. Then they flattened it with a steamroller (or maybe even a rolling pin, the jury’s still out on that) and sold it for even more than the one with its bits still attached! The PSPGo’s apparent saving grace and Sony’s answer to the games in the iTunes store is the minis series. It’s here that you will find Tehra Dark Warrior.

Dragons; no fantasy adventure would be complete without them

The opening story reads much like an old text adventure which seems rather strange, unless you’re under 25 and think a ‘text adventure’ is something you do with your latest lover. As the game opens up it becomes instantly reminiscent of the N64 era in its lighting, colours and shadow which (for a mini) is quite a pleasant surprise. What you get on-screen are fairly chunky and solid looking graphics; a tad too ugly for the big screen but rather pleasant on the PSP and let’s be fair, that’s where you’re going to be playing it. Less of a surprise is Tehra herself, a tattooed warrior-goddess type who thought the most suitable armour to fight hoards of Orcs in would be the string from her morning mail package delivery. The music, it must be said, is done with panache and sets the tone for the huge undertaking of Tehra’s job, to destroy the dark forces; you know the deal. Crescendos of orchestral magnitude conjure the feeling of battles that belong in Lord of the Rings, and when combined with some of the artwork within the storytelling text screens it really makes you want to kick some medieval fantasy ass. That, sadly, is where the promise ends because once you start playing there will be a shadow of darkness so big that no sheepskin-G-string can turn your attention away from it.

Going on dates with Tehra was always difficult

Tehra’s little trick throughout the game is being able to turn herself into a demon which means a nastier, meaner and more unpleasant version of herself (and also blue-er!). What this boils down to is a few seconds of unblockable attacks and almost invincibility by pressing the left shoulder button. Sounds good? Well, apart from those mentioned above there aren’t any other up-shots. No extra moves or magic, just the same basic slash, slash, slashing that you do as-per-normal and believe us; there’s a lot of slashing. There are a few set moves for her slashfest which are: up high slashing, down low slashing, and a general in-your-face slashing. There is magic to try and mix it up a bit and although the fire/electric magic moves are upgradeable, they still feel underwhelming and even unresponsive to use.

Keep slashing, keep slashing, keep slashing....

Unresponsive; that’s really the best word for the controls on the whole, as you’ll notice when trying to block incoming attacks. The timing window you have to deflect attacks is so minimal you’re best off putting your hope into your dodge button. If only that worked. The camera puts itself in such awkward places that when faced with multiple enemies, just seeing who’s attacking can be hard, let alone dodging projectile attacks at the same time as fighting. Tehra Dark Warrior has a lot of nice ideas, even if they are mostly found in every other fantasy RPG. Its biggest shortcomings though are in its fight mechanics. Clunky and slow controls combined with awkward camera moments really let this down, lord knows how this plays on the iPhone!

2/5

Kennn! You said you knew a FUN place to fight!

I recently had a little look at the American PSN Home spaces, and I have to say that I was shocked at what I saw; In fact I was more than shocked, disgusted even. The amount of stuff on offer to the Americans far and away out-weighs what our collective countries get. Lets just remind ourselves which countries make up the European slice of Sony’s market shall we…

Germany, France, U.K, Italy, Spain, Netherlands, Belgium, Sweden, Switzerland, Poland, Norway, Austria, Greece, Ireland, Finland, Portugal, Romania, Hungary, Croatia, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Latvia, Iceland…

I could go on (I’m sure there are about 44 countries) but I think you’re seeing my point here. I know that America’s a big place and I know they have a lot of disposable income, but do we Europeans really spend that much less than them on DLC in comparison? Just to clear things up here, I’m not sore because I can’t buy a fancy non-existent sofa for my non-existent flat so that my non-existent-self can be more comfortable. I’m sore because ever since I was a child I’ve looked on in envy at our foreign brothers and sisters who seem to get a bigger, tastier slice of gaming goodness and at cheaper prices too. Still going with the PSN Home thing, most furnishings in the American shops cost around the $0.99 mark (that’s about 60p to us Brits), whereas the same things cost us around £1.59. Also, those ‘cubes’ we were all seeing in Home’s shops that seemed to do nothing, they’re ‘value packs’ and they’ve been taken away from the European Home spaces presumably because all Europeans live in mud huts and still trade with chickens or various bits of flotsam they’ve found floating around near their house (sorry, hut) and therefore don’t deserve them. The American Home mall also has all its shop spaces filled with things like the LucasArts shop, Loot shop, Exclusives shop and an E.A shop; whereas ours is more reminiscent of a forgotten Glaswegian high street with its windows boarded up. They also have The Gamer’s Lounge, where you can do a Q&A session with various game developers from time to time and I’m sure we’ve all heard of the more advanced Namco Museum area they have in comparison to us. Actually, instead of just giving us the Namco Museum as a free space like America we’ve been given it as a separate download for the cheap, cheap price of £7.99. As for private Home spaces they get yachts, villas and beach resorts all with a tonne of extra stuff like the ‘value packs’ full of clothes and furnishings for each space at a much, much cheaper price than us. They get wall-hangings and pictures, rugs and carpets, appliances and even TV studios. While the E.U spaces and shops are as barren and empty as a hooker’s pocket in comparison.

If you look closely, you can see tumble-weed

Forgive me for focusing on Home as an example but it’s here that the contrast is obvious, I could mention games that have no rightful place in grotty European hands such as Afrika or Aquanaut’s Holiday but that would probably get a ‘so what’ reaction from most U.K gamers, as the PS3 has no region lock and can be bought online. Most Brits that have had any interaction with PSN Home generally shrug their shoulders in reaction to it, and say it’s as useful as a dried pile of bat vomit if asked what they think. Maybe if we were given the same volume of content as our gaming siblings across the pond we’d be a bit more enthusiastic about it. I used to welcome this new, always-connected-with-the-rest-of-the-world vision where my gaming was concerned, because it was supposed to mean we (as Brits at least) would finally get our sweet slice of game-pie that the others allow themselves, and yet it seems we’re still getting a raw deal regardless of how easy it is to distribute DLC across the globe.

Yachts for USA, sweet FA for EU

Now some of you might say that the language barrier is still a problem for games and while this is understandable, I still can’t get my head around why we (the EU) have less films, mini games or game add-ons in our online stores that don’t need any interpretation (save subtitles). Certainly in Home’s case a bunch of hats or T-shirts wouldn’t require much in the way of reiteration for a few different languages, surely? I’ve always supported PSN’s Home because it can bring awareness about games, films and events to the masses, but more importantly it can bring gamers together in a familiar environment and allow them to discuss their favourite past-time. However, after looking to see how much greener the grass on the other side actually is, I’ve been reminded that we are still treated as separate entities because of our global positioning. So it begs the question, why does our brave new world of connectivity still impose these old-fashioned barriers on our gaming community?

Answers on a postcard please.

• Format: PSP
• Unleashed: Out Now
• Publisher: Hudson (PSN, as reviewed)/Konami (retail)
  
• Developer: Hudson
• Players: 1 – 4

Well, well. Where do we start? Rengoku (Tower of Purgatory) is about a robot called A.D.A.M (they must’ve been awake all night thinking up that one) that starts to question why he’s around and much like Hal from 2001 Space Odyssey, he feels the need to kill anything that stands in the way of the answer to this question. Unlike Bicentennial Man however, his acting is rubbish and so is the script. In fact, if you took a bunch of geckos and stuck teeny tiny pencils to their feet and let them run all over a bouncy castle while a fat man bounced around in the middle, you’d probably get a better script than the rubbish that’s spouted from this game. We all know that even the best of the PSP collection can have trouble with the control layout and Rengoku’s controls are nothing short of fiddly (yet not so much that finger strain is an issue) but they’re not exactly honed either. This the least of Rengoku’s problems though, because it’s the mechanics of the game that lets it down entirely. Any kind of decent advancement means bashing your way through enemy after enemy after enemy. In the first stages this is a relatively simple procedure – use your macho-mechanical arms to punch the castor oil out of anything that happens to look like another robot, and job’s a good un’. As you go you’ll pick stuff up that they drop and here’s the ‘fun’ bit: acquiring other bits of robot allows you to add them to your body. So guns, swords, hammers and crossbows (yep, robotic crossbows) among other things can all be attached via stop-gap stations between levels after you’ve cleared the rooms. This is where the menu systems come into play, and as menus go it’s all fairly normal stuff. There’s the bit where you add or remove bits and bobs and a nice little rotatable avatar that allows you to see your robot’s upgrades.

Hrmm, I swear I've seen that box before

It soon becomes obvious though that this is all just an elaborate way of making the player stat-bash, and that’s the whole game in a nutshell. You’re not going to stat-bash so you can be an all powerful beast to the nasties around you, you’ll be stat-bashing because that’s how you progress. Every new level you enter will be filled with bad tempered dustbins that happen to carry fire-power that’s just a bit better than yours and it’s your job to jab at buttons till they drop their bits. There are no other redeeming features to Rengoku. The playing fields or ‘floors’ are bland grey/blue interiors filled with boxes, dull boxes. Imagine if you were lost in a hospital, and imagine if it had no windows. Now imagine that you can only see five feet in front of yourself, got it? Good, because that’s what every level in Rengoku looks like; every level. There is no imagination in this game, everything from the level layout to the upgrades are just regurgitated junk-parts from substandard games.

It's a good job robots only see in black and white, we think

Normally we try to find the good points in a game (that’s our job right?) even when we’re given a tedious, life draining, fart-bandit of a game we look hard into its eyes and stare at it until we see just a shimmer of ingenuity. The unfortunate truth is that Rengoku is nothing more than a bad excuse to take money out of your hand; in fact the junkie that asked you for a pound for his “bus fare home” is more worthy of your pennies than this poor excuse for a game.

Stay. Well. Away.

1/5

• Format: PSN
• Unleashed: Out Now
• Publisher: Sony Computer Entertainment
• Developer: ThatGameCompany
• Players: 1
• Site: http://thatgamecompany.com/games/flower/

Flower is not the kind of game you’ll find an alpha-male playing with his mates on a ‘beer and the boys’ night in front of his PS3; maybe when his girlfriend has gone out for the night and he’s all alone he’ll download it like a dirty little secret, and stash it with his other ‘secret’ files, but he’ll never ever tell you about it. Which is an unfortunate thing for Flower because it’s one of the few games out there that can allow the player to connect with their PS3 in a unique way. See, Flower is about controlling the wind, and although that sounds like an idea born from a ‘fun fag’ session it’s actually more of a philosophical point of view than a stoned one.

What ThatGameCompany have created here is something special, and something that’s impossible to be recreated on the other two consoles. First off there’s the control system, and by using the Sixaxis you can separate the player from the feeling of having ‘solid control’ if you will. Controlling wind is not about having a true sense of pitch and yaw, it’s more floaty than that as it can suddenly switch direction or slow down to a halt completely at any given time. The developers have managed to find that intuitive sweet-spot for something that’s not on wheels or wings and deliver the feeling of weightlessness with almost supernatural ease. The other thing is the grass – yeah that’s right we said ‘the grass’!. Each and every blade will bend and move with the wind’s touch (that’s you) as it swoops and glides though it, and all of this is thanks to the PS3′s unique SPU layout. It can render 200,000 blades simultaneously while in motion, and it’s this that gives Flower its beautifully natural look and feel.

The first time you take control a little confusion might set in, but as you glide around the landscape objectives will become clear: gather petals. It sounds ridiculously simple (and it is) but once you become accustomed to the controls and begin to harness the power of what you are, Flower reveals itself as a new experience that’s calming yet stirring at the same time. Each flower you gracefully brush past releases a petal and as it does a note is played, swooping around to the next one does the same and as you gather momentum each note collides in a crescendo of chimes that ring out a unique melody dependent upon your movement. It’s an intoxicating experience just ‘being’ the wind, rushing through the wide open grass planes and projecting yourself off slanted rock formations to gain height, only to swoop back down and abscond hurriedly with more once peaceful petals. All of this serves as an introduction to the controls and the goals of the rest of the game, but boy, what an introduction.

The levels that follow are varied and go from haunting dusky meadows and sunny California inspired wind farms, to the bleak, achromatic city that beseeches you to bring it to life, Flower will take you on a captivating journey of redemption from the festering pit of FPSes, RTSes and film tie-in ‘games’ that have bogged you down for years. Get away from the drudgery of powering up and stat-bashing for once and take a break, try something new. It will induce wonder, captivation, urgency and fun; if you let it.

Truly, this is Flower Power at its peak.

5/5

• Format: PSN
• Unleashed: Out Now
• Publisher: Sony Computer Entertainment
• Developer: ThatGameCompany
• Site: http://thatgamecompany.com/games/flow/

The PSN game flOw has been around for a while now. A long while. It was actually released on the 30^th of March 2007 (UK date) and made a good impression on those who were excited about Sony’s venture into the next-gen gaming scene. So were all the glorious things written about it just Sony excitement or a true summation of it as a game? Well, maybe a bit of both in those days to be fair. Recently we noticed that flOw has had a trophy update and decided that although it’s an old game, it’s one that deserves another mention. We’re sure some of you trophy addicts who want to give yourselves a little booster to improve your PSN ID ‘level’ will be glad we brought this up.

That Game Company (no we haven’t forgotten their name, that is the developer’s name) used flOw as their début on the PSN, which was met with applause, and rightly so. As the game starts up and the orchestral music begins, it immediately puts the player into a relaxed state of mind. As you take control of one of the creatures it becomes immediately apparent that the Sixaxis you use to control the creature has been refined to be not just well implemented but intuitive. Starting off as a small and vulnerable ‘little fish’ in a big pond, you begin to munch your way through schools of smaller amoeba sized organisms. As the music takes hold and begins to chime along with your on-screen actions you’ll find yourself sinking into your chair and just letting the visuals and audio suck you into its deep, colourful world.

There is something subconsciously blissful about playing flOw that makes you forget about the time and your surroundings, and an enchanting vacancy will enter your mind, if you let it. As you swim gracefully through this primordial pond this organism you puppeteer will grow and evolve into something much more foreboding to the other things that inhabit its space and the deeper you delve, you’ll find your confidence grow with it. It’s at this point a strange thing happens; an obsession for consuming everything on-screen will take hold of you and in an entranced state, you’ll start to systematically eat your way through the food-chain until there’s nothing left to consume. This is the totality of flOw; Swim, eat, grow and evolve. That might sound a little tedious, but that’s actually the beauty of it as a game, it is simplicity wrapped in radiance.

On the other hand, one could argue that flOw is nothing more than a tech-demo of Sony’s “me too” Sixaxis motion controls and while this assumption would be a fair point there’s no argument that flOw, as a game in its own right, has every reason to be praised for what it is. Even on the PSP without the Sixaxis, the charm of flOw has not been lost. Although it is easier to lose yourself in a 42 inch HD TV hooked up to a surround sound system, the PSP does a good job of re-creating it for the small screen. Simple in design and strangely compelling in its nature, flOw will deliver on its promise of sumptuously bright and beautiful visuals and seductive, soothing melodies. If you haven’t already, we urge you to download this for one of the most soothing and charming experiences on the PSN.

4/5

• Format: iPhone
• Unleashed: Out Now
• Publisher: Studio UFO
• Developer Justnine
• Players: 1

The iPhone as a gaming platform is a strange creature, it (like other handhelds) lends itself well to pick-up-and-play game mechanics; but can also hold its own with larger and more in-depth games. The game in question here though is Hellkid, and this one’s of the pick-up-and-play type. It gives a little bit of a story for the setting, but admittedly you could give any excuse as to why a small child from hell would be running around the place collecting ‘souls’. Maybe he wants to put them in a jar, and roll them down some steps to make them dizzy or possibly as a cooking ingredient for his mother. Whatever the reasons, the setup is simple; run, jump and collect.

Hellkid has an extra mechanic at work within this simple set-up though, and that extra is swinging. Hellkid has an unusually long left arm and he uses this to traverse large gaps by throwing it out and grappling onto posts. This is where we found the game a little temperamental though, at times we found grabbing and swinging fine – but being able to control your swings is a lot easier said than done. We tried various ways of doing the double tap manoeuvre to find its commanding sweet spot, but everything we did seemed to have a random reaction. It’s clear from the patterns of souls on the screen that the grapple is controllable, but we struggled to find the best way of executing it for the best results. Because of this little gripe we found Hellkid to be more frustrating than fun, which is a real shame as it definitely has that ‘just one more go’ appeal to it.

Like many games made for iPhone the word ‘addicting’ (ugh) has been firmly stapled to Hellkid’s forehead and with good reason. After your first go (and failure) you will instantly want to try again, then again, and again and again until you realise that unless you can get to grips (pun intended) with its grappling system you’ll never get very far. The unfortunate truth here though is that you’ll probably never find that controllable sweet spot that would see you soar through its levels with all the ease and grace of a pro-gamer. Instead you’ll be condemned to falling into the fiery pits of hell repeatedly because of your crazy Dhalsim arm that won’t behave itself. On the other hand you could ignore the patterns of the souls and just manage to get over the gaps with minimal point scoring, though this being a game that rates your abilities via your final score, that would seem to be a bit of an odd way of playing.

It will cost you 59p to put Hellkid onto your phone, and considering we’ve seen Mars bars that cost more than that we’d say it’s well worth a look. It’s pretty to look at (some nice mode-7 scrolling) and is simple enough that anyone can understand its goal. For a five minute amusement while waiting on a bus or whatever this will get the job done. Putting it down after getting on said bus is a different story though and as mentioned before, don’t expect to become a master of it quickly. Don’t say we didn’t warn you!

3/5