Slice Zombies for Kinect

Cost
$9.99
Format
Digital
Size
211.84 MB
Available On
Xbox ONE [Reviewed]

Release Date
5/8/15
Developer
MADE
Publisher
MADE
Modes
Single Player

Slice Zombies is a Kinect only game developed and published by Made for the Xbox ONE. Think Fruit Ninja and replace the fruit with zombies and you know what Slice Zombie is all about.

Slice Zombies contains one game mode. You have to survive 1:10 slicing zombies, zombie hands and coins while avoiding bombs. You start with 3 lives and you lose one for every bomb you slice or zombie you miss. Zombie hands give a point bonus when sliced and the coins are used to buy power-ups you gain access to while you level up. You can change basic things like the background or the trail of your slicing. There are also actually helpful powerups like an extra life or activating new zombie hands to slice that do everything from spawning more coins to healing back a lost life. There are quite a few things to unlock in the game’s 21 levels of play and you almost level up too fast. It seems after every other game there is a new zombie or something else to buy and you unlock things a lot faster than you are going to earn the coins you need to buy them.

The art is comical and highly detailed and Slice Zombie’s music has a nice carnival type theme to it. There are quite a few different zombies you will be hacking at with several different launch patterns which adds some nice variety to the game. Later in the game you unlock stunt zombies that float up on balloon to pop. There is a fat zombies that you can earn extra points by hitting multiple times. Getting to the 1:10 mark is not a simple task in the beginning. There are typically a LOT of bombs on the screen at once and it takes some getting used to to start learning the varies patterns you are going to see. As you level up you’ll unlock permanent powerups like starting with an Extra Life and things like high value coins.

Since it’s a single player game you need to get pretty close to the Kinect for you to be able to cover the whole screen. The game does a good job of giving you a straight down the middle line to base yourself on before every game and the tracking of your hands is above average. Issues arose in navigating the menus. It’s seems to be on a whole different tracking scheme. A quick email to the developer and MADE let me know I needed to hold my hand still and kind of off to the side and it would typically pop up for control pretty quick. Most Kinect games you can utilize the controller in menus which frankly with how Kinect works as a whole is a option I ALWAYS use but for Slice Zombie the controller is only good for dashboarding. MADE also pointed out that you can use the Xbox voice controls for “xbox play” and “xbox back”.

I usually don’t talk too much about achievements in a game because that’s a narrower target audience and I try to play games that I will like, not games I can 1000. But for those of you who are achievement hunters Slice Zombie is a very good price to time invested ratio. The full 1000 is easily obtainable in a single day and the list is mostly slice this many hands or heads. The longest achievement is for

Including a tutorial on Kinect tracking for Slice Zombies would of really helped the learning curve but once I figured out the secret to getting tracked properly I never had another issue. I’ll be honest that I’d hoped there would be more than one game mode to play and some form of multiplayer, be it at the same time or a back and forth mode to spice up the offering. Slice Zombies has all the guts of a nice, fun little Kinect game but it falls short do the lacking of any real long term playability.

• FINAL VERDICT

Slender: The Arrival

Cost
$9.99
Format
Digital
Size
1.37 GB
Available On
Xbox ONE [Reviewed], PS4, PS3, Xbox 360, PC

Release Date
March 26, 2013(PC)March 25, 2015(XboxOne)
Developer
Blue Isle Studios
Publisher
Blue Isle Studios
Modes
Single Player

In 2012 a little indie horror game called Slender took the internet by storm. The first person survival scare-fest was based on a folklore known as “The Slender Man”. Slender Man is a tall skinny faceless man who haunts the woods and has serious stalker issues. In the original, the goal was to find all eight pages without Slender Man finding you. As the player collects each page, the intensity revs up and the game gets harder. The design was simple, but it caught on and became a huge cult hit. Slender: The Arrival is the sequel to the 2012 hit. With a much bigger premise, story elements, more attention to detail, and a deeper experience, can The Arrival take the original’s small scale ideas and multiply them into a full-scale scare?

First off you must know that to play a game like Slender you have to go into it with the right mindset. In fact even right as the game starts the developer put in a little message that talks about this. Basically, if you go into The Arrival trying to be unimpressed and not scared, then you most likely won’t be scared at all. But if you go into the game really kind of putting yourself in the mind of the in game character and in that world, and if you pump yourself up in a way that you really do want to get creeped out and frightened, then Slender: The Arrival has all the tools to so. Is it a horrifying game? No. But if you turn the lights off and blast the speakers, then The Arrival can be downright eerie and creepy. It’s more about the tone and setting of a world that always puts you on edge, then being game that has gross jump scares and terrifying monsters.

Slender: The Arrival is split up into different levels that really diversify the game. And honestly this is a major strength. In the first level you just roam and investigate a large area, you get a few glimpses of Slender Man in the distance. This first level has notes and story elements hidden about, and without going over the top it just creates an uncanny and supernatural feel. The level culminates with a creepy burned down house and it starts to open up a number of mysteries that need to be resolved. The second level is classic Slender. You must find the eight pages hidden in a small wooded area and at every turn it seems like Slender Man is staring you down. It’s very fun and reminded me of how great the simple gameplay was from the original. The game continues on with some levels of traversal nature and other levels more like the original Eight Pages. There’s a level in a mine, where you must turn on generators to power an elevator to your escape, this level was the hardest for me, with Slender Man being more annoying than scary and these strange marathon running zombie like creatures in hoodies tackling me to the floor. Another level takes place on an old farm with the sun setting in the distance, again creating a very “on-edge” tone. Overall the levels each feel very distinct, and while they aren’t all home-runs, it keeps the game feeling fresh throughout the 3-5 hour campaign.

The game being in short length is one of the issues. In the world of video games, it’s known that horror games are better taken in smaller chunks. If the game is horrifying, it’s not fun to be scared for hours and hours straight, the player will want to quit. Meanwhile if the game is more eerie than scary, then the player will be desensitized and it just won’t be fun. So, a 20 hour campaign for a scary game is probably too long. But 8-10 hours might have been a bit better.

Some of the scares in Slender: The Arrival certainly fall flat. The crying child in the burning house definitely made my spine tingle. And the strange man in the cellar of the farm was heart-stopping at first glance. But the mine level wasn’t really frightening at all. And the man in the cellar that seriously scared me at first quickly became amusing instead, as I noticed he would just stand there awkwardly until I got a certain distance away from him before he would run off. There were a few game design decisions, or more like short-comings, which made the game feel less scary and more silly. In the end, Slender Man himself is beyond creepy and he far surpasses any other scares in the game.

Slender: The Arrival is a pretty game. Is it the best looking horror game out there? Certainly not. But for a small scale indie-scare, it certainly does the job. The lighting and colors are vibrant by day, and the shadows are eerie by night. The biggest problem is when the game was just too dark. Instead of being dark and hard to see, it felt more like there was just a cloud of dark in front of me, and the flash light I carried really didn’t do much. I know the game is supposed to be scariest when its pitch black, but I’ve seen much better attempts at this. Meanwhile when you look at characters and some textures up close the game is sometimes downright ugly. For an Xbox One or PS4 game, The Arrival definitely isn’t as good looking as it could be. Vistas, fields, trees in the wind, and sunlight are all appealing. But close ups and dark rooms are not.
Overall Slender: The Arrival is a fine game. It is by no means the scariest, prettiest, or deepest horror experience. But it’s a solid few hours of fun and the eerie tone is great. Some scares fall short and some game mechanics just feel off. But the classic Slender Man gameplay is still great and the paranormal mysteries and ominous atmosphere make for a solid game.

• FINAL VERDICT

Wolfenstein: Old Blood

Cost
$19.99
Format
Digital
Size
37.14 GB
Available On
Xbox ONE [Reviewed], PS4

Release Date
5/5/15
Developer
MachineGames
Publisher
Bethesda
Modes
Single Player

Let’s start this off with a simple question and answer session. Did you play New Order? If YES, then, Did you love it? If YES, open store.microsoft.com and buy Old Blood. If you were any type of fan of New Order than Old Blood is going to be right up your alley. Like all the way up your alley. Old Blood has all the glorious guts of New Order with some extra amazing things jammed in there. I know what you are saying person who loved New Order, where oh where did they find room to cram more goodness? MachineGames seems to be masters of cramming goodness because they found space.

New Double Shotties

So if you did play New Order than story wise Old Blood is a prequel and will fill in the time right because the reboot started. If you didn’t play New Order than this is going to take you right into the main story with a much easier to swallow $20 price tag. The campaign is 8 full missions broken down into 2 sections with a quick prologue to get you going. It’s a good 4 to 7 hours and you can definitely stretch that out even further if you really explore every nock and cranny. If you’re going to play it on the “Can I play Daddy?” (Easy) then yes you can blast through it even faster but you are really doing yourself a disservice doing so.

One of the questions I thought right when I saw Old Blood is should this of been DLC for New Order and I would say no. If you look at the length of what people are putting out DLC wise for the price, this being on $20 is an amazing deal in my opinion on MachineGames part. To me Old Blood does not have $5 tacked on to be a full release. This is well worth $20 and making it standalone creates a much cheaper entry into this rebooted Wolfenstein franchise.

Speaking of the Wolfenstein franchise we now have the entire Episode 1 of the original classic. One floor per level. There are big improvements to the Nightmare system (which is what they call entering these Wolf 3D levels mid-game) because now you can leave at any time and you are allowed to re-enter whenever you want. The let down for me is that these are perfectly recreated with all the secrets and loot but there is no scoring system. So I can pick up all the Old Silver I want but it has no meaning inside the game. It would of been nice to see the old final scoreboard along with a leaderboard. They took the idea 95 yards but just didn’t quite put it in the end zone.

Wolf 3D Nightmare Level

CHECK OUT OUR FULL GUDE TO THE NIGHTMARE LEVELS ON YOUTUBE HERE

One of the best gameplay features of the new Wolfenstein franchise is the fact that they have stealth and combat options but you are never penalized for the choices you make. There are no auto-lose forced stealth sections that seem to be all the rage nowawday. The game does start on a weird stealth section with huge hulking Nazis attached to powerlines. And although you can power these guys down by sneaking around and shutting off the control terminals one at a time there is nothing stopping you from just taking down one and then using its heavy machine gun and just going to town on the rest.

Stealthing it up with double silenced pistols

The graphics are definitely next gen. The enemies look great and there was next to no clipping problems. The story is your typical shooter story. It’s mostly present at the end and start of levels but there are a few critical scene that play out in game engine during your playthrough. The voice acting is amazing. The shooting is limb removing, head blowing up crazy action. The stealth takedown system only includes a few different animations but you can exectute it with mulitple weapons.

Along with the main campaign there is a series of challenges which are re-creations of battles from the campaign that unlock as you as you finish them in the main story. These are scored and have their own leaderboards. You can select any of the main difficulties but you are restricted as to how high you can score if you play on the easier settings. It’s a nice addition to give it a little more replayability.

Old Blood takes New Order and just adds to overall package. MachineGames is doing some amazing things with a classic franchise and I can’t wait to see what they do next.

• FINAL VERDICT

State of Decay: Year One Survival Edition

Cost
$29.99
Format
Digital
Size
3.91 GB
Available On
Xbox ONE [Reviewed]

Release Date
4/28/15
Developer
Undead Labs
Publisher
Microsoft
Modes
Single Player

State of Decay is a 3rd Person Zombie Survival game developed by Undead Labs and published by Microsoft. It was first released on the 360 in 2013 and this re-release on the ONE adds both DLCs and some next gen improvements which include the typical visual upgrades (draw distance has been greatly improved), a new character, and weapon add-ons.

This game is more than just basic individual survival. You are in charge of a whole group of survivors. You pick where the group will live. You decide between updating the medical facilities versus creating more beds for survivors. You send them out on mini missions to gather supplies and you are constantly working to make sure the base is secure from zombie attacks.

These decisions are huge in the opening part of the game where you are just trying to maintain order and keep people alive. As things progress, and you provide better weapons and facilities, the base tends to run itself pretty well. By the end game I just completely ignored all requests. Oh no, Billy is sad? Well its the zombie apocalypse so let’s just man up Billy. Oh you think you might want to leave my heavily guarded base with its top notch medical equipment and comfy beds to go sleep in an abandoned gas station? Don’t let our nice protective fence hit you in the butt on your way out.

Setting up a new base

This complete lack of empathy on my part for Billy’s cry baby attitude isn’t the game’s fault. It’s actually the opposite. If I hadn’t worked my hard creating this zombie free oasis then I’d be a slave to every little request or risk losing it all. But I built something nice in a sea of despair so I have a lot of leeway in my choices now and Billy can man up or get out.

On the zombie realism scale State of Decay is firmly on the realistic side. You know, for a game involving zombies. You won’t be taking your double ended chainsaw into a sea of 600 zombies and coming out on top. In State of Decay you’re going to be taking your Wooden Table Leg at 2 zombies and even then you’ll be worried. If it turns into a pack and I made some bad decisions regarding transportation and weapon selection well then I might just be dead. And in State of Decay death is permanent. That character you spent hours getting to top level. DEAD. No reload save, he’s just dead. Time to move on to another character. You are allowed to switch between survivors but I’ve always preferred to have one super amazing zombie destroyer character than 3 or 4 average joes. So keeping that one amazing guy alive is priority number one.

Survivor 1 – Zombie 0

In order to promote you using a larger selection of characters, as you use your main guy for an extended length of time he will start to get tired. He’ll temporarily lose Stamina. And let me tell you, Stamina is everything in State of Decay. It determines how far you can run and how many swings of that Wooden Table Leg you get before you’ll just be standing there gasping for air while zombies eat your face. When your character gets tired you have a few options; drugs will give you a temp boost to keep you going, you can switch to another survivor or as I like to do, it’s time to take a break. The game continues even when you are not playing. People will still go out looking for supplies, things continue without you. Your characters will heal, your vehicles will get repaired (as long as you have Parking Spots and a Workshop that is). I’ve never had anyone killed or leave while I wasn’t playing but it is a possibility.

There is a overall story. It’s not the best but it’s definitely serviceable. There are a few intertwining story lines. Different groups of survivors that you need to help or ignore. The army is in there doing things too, some good, some bad. The story just seems incomplete though. For example there is a story line with a guy who says he can get things and do things and you help him once and then there just isn’t anything more to it. It just peters out. There are a group of survivors that are definitely the bad guys. That story line just kind of ends also. If you decide they are evil your only option is to just ignore them. There’s no way to retaliate or really get any closure. The voice acting is top notch and what there is of story is put together very well it’s just that they could of done so much more.

My biggest issue with State of Decay is that in the 2 years since it’s launch on the 360 they don’t seem to have fixed a whole lot. The worst offenders are the fact that your car will launch about 100 feet into the air if you even touch a small rock, which in turn sends you on a orbit that closely resembles that of a small satellite. This series of tragic events seems to always land me in some small crevice that my buff survivor has no way of getting out of. He can wall climb a cliff that is 3 feet taller than him but a small incline is just pure death. You lack any real calf definition apparently. Poor workout decisions.

Vehicles aka the best weapon

When I was nearing the end of the game you open up a new area. I wasn’t in the mood to move the whole clan over so I found a nice truck and loaded it with supplies (adding vehicle storage was one of the ONE improvements), took a few hits but I loaded up for a long winter. Saw a helicopter with some supplies and the coast looked clear so I drove near AND BAM caught permanently under a helicopter propeller. Dashboard and try again.

The other main distraction is the fun little game of hide and seek I seem to always be playing with the last zed in an area. They are worse than rats as they worm their way into the geometry of the house and just sit there hissing at me mocking my inability to hit them in the face with my Fire Axe. This didn’t show up very often, but when it did my most successful option was to dashboard and come back and try again.

The DLC consists of a completely separate campaign (Lifeline) which is about half the size of the main game putting it at like 5 hours or so. And then there is Breakdown. Breakdown is Groundhog Day for Zombies. You work through challenges and getting survivors to a RV and then PFFT! you are right back where you started only the difficulty ramps up.

Overall State of Decay is a great game where the pluses far outweigh the minuses. The simming aspect of creating and maintaining the base adds a lot of interesting choices and the perma-death scare keeps you on your toes. I’m not a stacker type of player so if you’ve played the 360 version I don’t think there is enough new and changed to warrant the price tag unless State of Decay is one of your top games of all time and if that’s the case you probably aren’t bothering to read this review, you’re playing State of Decay right now.

• FINAL VERDICT

Aaru’s Awakening

Cost
$14.99/£11.99
Format
Digital
Size
2.01 GB
Available On
Xbox ONE [Reviewed], PS4, Steam

Release Date
04/22/2015
Developer
Lumenox
Publisher
Lumenox
Modes
Single Player

• FINAL VERDICT

Infinity Runner

Cost
$6.99 / £5.59
Format
Xbox One
Size
1.76GB
Available On
Xbox ONE [Reviewed], PS4 & Wii U (release date TBC)

Release Date
4/22/15
Developer
Wales Interactive
Publisher
Wales Interactive
Modes
Single Player

Endless runners have become quite popular over the last few years, especially in the mobile gaming airspace and rightfully so. They are nearly always easy to pick up and play and you often find yourself having one more go. Does Infinity Runner translate to next-gen consoles?

First off, it isn’t actually an endless runner in the sense that the story mode has a clear beginning and end to each ‘sector’, but there is an Infinite mode where you can endlessly run to your hearts content, more on that in a bit.

Infinity Runner is a first person runner that puts you in the shoes of an unnamed prisoner trying to escape from the ship ‘Infinity’ with the help of a woman called Riley. She explains very little and gets you running through the ship looking for a way out, fighting through enemies and avoiding obstacles whilst running to your objective.

You use the right stick to turn around corners, the left stick to move from side to side to avoid obstacles and collect data packets and LT and RT to slide and jump respectively. For some reason, the controls took a lot of getting used to, especially jumping and sliding. Unfortunately there are no options to change the default controller layout.

When running through the levels you will come across enemies which can only be defeated by following the QTE’s. If you are too slow or you press the wrong button you die. This can get particularly frustrating towards the end of the story mode due to a large QTE on the final level. The QTE’s just seem unnecessary and mess with the flow of the runner gameplay. If you lose all of your lives you need to restart the level.

There are two main modes in Infinity Runner, Story and Arcade. The story really did not interest me at all. I really tried to engage but it was just too bland. You, the prisoner are being helped by some woman you don’t know called Riley who is very reluctant to give you any other info other than to run. She does spoon feed you bits of info about your special ability but it can all be worked out from what is happening on screen anyway. In this mode you run through fixed levels, which you will need to know inside out if you want to grab all the achievements.

After playing through the story and being very underwhelmed, I decided to give Infinity a shot which is the main Arcade mode, and I thoroughly enjoyed myself. I spent about an hour just playing infinity mode getting my total distance and score up for the related achievements and the time flew by. Another great addition to Arcade modes is you can turn off the fights which I would highly recommend doing, unless you enjoy QTE’s.

During my time running through corridor after corridor and needlessly entering QTE’s whilst playing through the story mode, I found myself becoming increasingly frustrated by some of the obstacles put in front of me. There are several that just don’t give you a clear path under or over, so you inevitably choose wrong and lose a life which can be very frustrating.

The level designs are pretty detailed although they do suffer from the sci-fi effect of being a bit dull and dark due to the nature of the game which at first you don’t really notice, but the more you play, the more you see the same grey corridor…

Haven’t I seen this place before?

Infinity Runner does a great job at increasing the difficulty of the levels. As an example on easy you have moving arrows showing you which way the corridor is turning, on medium such luxuries do not exist. Also, during certain areas of some levels the lights will be knocked off and you just have the emergency lines on the walls to find your way.

Regarding the achievements, there is quite a mixed bag. You’ll obtain the majority of them just by running through the story mode and others will come with more invested time like running for 400,000 metres. The real killer in the list is for getting the Maximum Wolf Level. To do so you need to finish the story mode on Hard without dying on any of the levels. This is not one for the faint hearted I can assure you.

All in all, Infinity Runner is a decent outing for Wales Interactive on the Xbox One. Although it does have its glaring faults, I think there is enough fun to be had with this title to warrant a purchase, and the asking price for it is spot on.

• FINAL VERDICT

Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker

Cost
$39.99
Format
Retail and Digital
Size
1.9 GB
Available On
Wii U

Release Date
12/5/2014
Developer
Nintendo EAD Tokyo Group#2, 1-Up Studio
Publisher
Nintendo
Modes
Single Player

Captain Toad is a character initially introduced in Mario Galaxy for the Wii. He’s the leader of the Toad Brigade, a group dedicated to helping Mario with his epic journey by giving him stars, 1-ups, and more. He carries a backpack and a headlamp and often gets in over his head. Along with helping in the Galaxy games, Captain Toad became a playable character in Super Mario 3D World in small bonus special levels. These levels were perhaps the most innovative and fun part about the entire game, and Nintendo saw something special in Captain Toad’s side adventures. Nintendo unveiled the game, Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker for the Wii U in early 2014 and the game launched on December 5th in the same year. Treasure Tracker is a simple yet fun game that is bursting with life and charm. It’s a testament to Nintendo’s unparalleled ability of creating inventive and enjoyable games with its massive roster of characters. Nintendo needs to make more spin-offs, for more reasons than one. To allow itself to not flood the market with the same games, like the New Super Mario franchise or the Mario 3D Land/World franchise over and over. And instead make those games at a reasonable pace and appetizer the gamers with great side content like Toad’s escapades in Treasure Tracker.

Captain Toad’s movements are very constrained, especially when compared to the Mario’s acrobatics. He can move and run, he can climb ladders, and he can pluck and throw objects. On top of that there are level specific things he can do like ride a mine-cart or control a cannon. Overall the levels are designed to create fun gameplay within the games restrictions. Many games not today are all about giving the player the ability to run, jump, and shoot, any way he or she wants. Games like these are all the rage, just look at Sunset Overdrive or every online shooter as of late; everyone can run off walls and practically fly through the air. These games can be fun, but they can also lose focus. Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker is a puzzle game. The goal is very simple, get to the star. But on the way there are three jewels that can be collected and a side mission as well. The levels are almost like floating puzzle boxes in the air; you can control Toad but also can control the camera to manipulate the angle of the world. Often there are hidden items or passage ways can only be seen once the world is rotated to the perfect spot. In this way the game really feels like a treasure hunt. There are hidden items all over, and even when the jewels or final star is right out in the open, it’s a puzzle to just find out how to get there. With each level only taking a few minutes, the replayablity is great. It’s a blast to find all the jewels and reach the finish. And after you complete the level, there will be an added side mission that becomes visible. Sometimes that mission was already completed without you even noticing. These side objectives are fun and can range from finding the hidden gold mushroom, to collecting at least 75 coins, to taking down every enemy.

Speaking of enemies, Goombas and Boos have never been more dangerous. Since we don’t play as Mario or Luigi, the challenge of the game isn’t about simply demolishing each enemy you see, it’s more about trying to avoid them while trying to figure out how to destroy them. Just like every enemy of the Mushroom kingdom, simply landing on their head is their mortal weakness. Since Toad can’t jump, this has to be done in different ways. There are times when Toad can drop down on the enemies head from a higher position. Other times Toad can plug a turnip from the ground and chuck it at them. And other times still there can be level specific things like environmentally killing them or finding a super powered pick-axe to wipe them out. Again, the formula of limited the player actually creates a dynamic where it’s more fun to kill the enemies because it takes thought process and execution.

The level diversity is very good. Some levels take place under water, where movement is slowed and fish swim about. Other levels are in jungles with more secrets than normal and giant piranha plants. There’s a level on a train in the middle of a blizzard, levels in caves on mine carts, inside haunted houses with mischievous Boos, and more. The challenge of each level is usually varied as well. One level may be very puzzle heavy, with switches and secrets that make the player think. Then the very next level may be filled with enemies and Toad needs to take them all out. There’s a level where Toad rides a raft across poisonous waters, another where platforms are invisible and can only be seen when a button is pressed. The biggest complaint with diversity is with the bosses. Sadly, the game uses the same bosses multiple times with just small variations. I personally hate this trend in gaming. There’s nothing fun about playing the same boss over and over with small changes. Unless it’s a game like Mario 64 or Mario Galaxy, where meeting and fighting Bowser three times feels like an accomplishment and an epic journey. But when the boss is just a fat bird who hordes jewelry or a giant lizard in lava that Toad fights over and over it becomes repetitive and boring.

The visuals in the game are very pretty; of course they won’t win any graphics of the year awards but they are nice nonetheless. There’s a lot of color, brightness, and flare in every level. The characters movements and the little touches in every aspect of the game are fantastic. Nintendo knows how to make a good looking game, that’s a fact. The music is sub-par when compared to Nintendo’s standards. There are some nice little tunes, but nothing that really jumps out and sticks in your head for months the way that Nintendo music so often does.

Nintendo has done a great job with Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker. The game is pretty, replayable, and most importantly, fun. Nintendo just knows how to make fun games. Maybe they don’t have the hubge explosions or deep dramatic stories, but Nintendo games are straight up fun. The game gets a bit repetitive when it comes to the bosses, and this is no Mario Galaxy 3. But in my opinion it’s the most fun Mario game since Mario Galaxy 2. In the case of Super Mario 3D World, the game chooses to limit itself, with singular objectives and a boxed in world. It becomes the opposite of the grand beautiful ambitious efforts of the Galaxy series. And in many respects Captain Toad is the same as 3D World, with a small scale and simple mechanics. But that’s fine. We expect Mario to push the limits and be flying around and saving the world. Meanwhile Captain Toad is narrowly escaping a room with a couple Shyguys, but I wouldn’t have it any other way.
Nintendo please keep making spin-offs. Let Mario Galaxy be epic. Let the Zelda games blow our minds. Save the simplistic great fun for small scale games like Captain Toad or Hyrule Warriors.

• FINAL VERDICT

Funk of Titans

Cost
$12.49
Format
Digital
Size
1.71 GB
Available On
Xbox ONE [Reviewed]

Release Date
1/9/2015
Developer
A Crowd of Monsters
Publisher
A Crowd of Monsters
Modes
Single Player

Funk of Titans tells the story of Perseus, son of Zeus, and his quest to retake the heavens in the name of Funk music. Yes, Perseus’ epic quest is to take back the heavens from the likes of Pop, Rap and Rock so that the god’s funkiness can rise again. I don’t know if this is pre- or post- Medusa as the game is pretty light on “story” but I can assure you that Perseus is up for the task. Funk of Titans is a platformer with the gameplay mechanic where your character is always being pushed forward. There is some directional play but for the most part your job is to either Jump or Swing your weapon. Everyone seems to be going hardcore with platformers today; 1001 Spikes, Volgarr, it’s nice to have a game that makes it’s mark with fun rather than frustrating memorization and twitch responses. Funk of Titans is fairly forgiving with a kind of “I know you really meant to jump 1 second later, so you made it!” feel. The question is did they dumb it down too much?

Each level has 3 gold awards you can earn. One for taking no damage, one for getting all 100 vinyls in the level and one for getting the Pegasus Idol. Once you succeed at one it’s permanently completed so you can do these one at a time, but once you get a feel for the game getting all 3 at once will be the norm. The game does introduce a few new wrinkles in each world with updated puzzles and mechanics. The 100 vinyls is a perfect run and although a few will be found in large jars (in fact every jar has a vinyl so always destroy every single one of them) the most important thing is to always look for the vinyls to show you where to head next. If you come to a choice and one path has a lovely bouquet of roses and the other is a shear cliff covered in poison tipped spikes but the cliff has a vinyl; then just jump, that’s the correct way to go.

When you get a Pegasus Idol in a level, and complete the level, you are taken to a bonus stage for a chance to get some extra vinyls. This bonus level is the closest you will probably ever come to playing Flappy Bird on the ONE. There is only one level that you will play again and again and again but at least the order you take on obstacles is randomly generated. You are pretty much playing Flappy Bird in this bizarre combination of Ipod Nanos and food items. I am to this day baffled by the level design. I get iPods are music but am I missing some Funk connection with cupcakes and french fries? For me this was a huge letdown. This section is about the only part of the game that takes any real skill and the biggest reward is more vinyls, which you will be swimming in in no time. There is no option to skip these Pegasus levels so by world 2 I was just letting Perseus plummet to his death as fast as I could to get on with the actual game.

There are three worlds; Pop, Rap and Rock. Each of these have two boss battles. These are some of the easiest QTE (Quick Time Events) you have ever played. It’s actually one of the biggest disappointments in the game. The first in each world is a mid-boss grunt. You have three rounds of simply pressing the four buttons as they come up. Easy. The final boss of each level, a Titan, is the same exact QTE only the boss goes first and you have to beat their score. You would have to go out of your way to lose any of these battles. The Grunt battles are 100% exactly the same in each world. Same animations, everything. In fact the entire game has only 3 enemies. A guy with a pointy hat (kill), a guy with a round hat (jump on his head most of the time) and the round hat guy behind a spiked chariot (always jump). For 40+ levels. The design of the levels themselves is superb with some of the pathing and timing being a thing of beauty.

These battles highlight one of the downfalls of the game which is the sound. They developed a game around a battle between Funk and other music genres and the background music is just generic. At the very least I was expecting a little funk vs pop/rap/rock music for the boss battles. There is always the argument that you get what you pay for on indie titles but when you base your story on music, it’s nice to have the music at least match the levels.

All those vinyls you are collecting are the game’s currency. There is a large store with different weapons and helmets covering all kinds of pop culture references from Star Wars to Friday the 13th. A nice touch is these items are used in the in-game challenges and also are required to open up magic doors protecting some of the more rare Pegasus Idols.

Funk of Titan plays very smooth and the mechanics behind the game are very solid. The problem is you are going to get distracted from this by pointless and subpar boss battles and a flappy bird clone that seemed misplaced and tacked on. I would of preferred they either had dropped the Pegasus angle all together or make the rewards for playing that level more appealing.

• FINAL VERDICT

Super Smash Bros Wii U

Cost
$59.99
Format
Retail and Digital
Size
15.6 GB
Available On
Wii U

Release Date
11/21/2014
Developer
Sora. LTD
Publisher
Nintendo
Modes
Single and Multi-player

While the PS4 and Xbox One continue to sell like diamond studded hot cakes, the Wii U has quietly been putting together a much more impressive array of first party software. Both the PS4 and Xbox One have been lacking in exclusive games, with only a few between themselves. The Xbox has games like Sunset Overdrive and Titanfall. The PS4 has games like Little Big Planet 3 and Infamous Second Sun. Each of the big three have also depended on remakes like The Last of Us on the PS4, Halo: Master Chief Collection on the Xbox One, and Zelda: The Wind Waker on the Wii U. But other than just a few small hits, the exclusive games on the PS4 and Xbox One have been lacking. They make up for this with a massive amount of third party content, something the Nintendo Wii U is weak with. However the first party games on the Wii U are above and beyond what the other two consoles have to offer. Mario Kart 8, Super Mario 3D World, Pikmin 3, Donkey Kong Tropical Freeze, Wonderful 101, and New Super Mario Bros Wii U highlight an impressive library of exclusive games that have been received very well. But anyone who’s a hardcore Nintendo gamer will tell you that they purchased the Wii U for two games.—the new Zelda and Super Smash Bros. In just three games for three different consoles, the Smash Bros franchise has sold nearly 13 million copies. Nintendo has doubled down on this franchise to boost the sales of their console and also remind us Nintendo fanboy freaks why we love the big N so much. And let me tell you, they didn’t just double down on Super Smash Bros for the Wii U, the centupled down! (That would be 100 times for those of us who don’t know)The sheer amount of things to do in this game could go toe-to-toe with any game I’ve ever seen and win. There is so much content, so much verity, so much FUN in this iteration of Nintendo’s competitive and party fighting masterpiece. Nearly flawless in every way, Nintendo, and more specifically Masahiro Sakurai, who is the developer of the game and franchise, has outdone itself and created one of the best games of the generation and the best game the series has seen.

There is just so much packed into this game it’s hard to even know how to cover it all. Let’s start with just the pure fighting, Smash mode. There are 49 playable characters in the game and the majority of them have their own unique feel. There are semi “clone” characters like Lucina, Toon Link and Dr. Mario. But everyone else really plays their own way and each of them is fun to master. Some characters like Captain Falcon and Kirby are easy to pick up and have some success with; meanwhile they still can be mastered to be able to crush the competition. Other characters like Olimar and Ness are hard to use at first, but extremely satisfying to play through the growing pains and come out a smash expert with. There are fast characters, strong characters, strategic characters, defensive characters, and more. Some characters use weapons like guns or swords but still play completely different. Marth and Shulk both use swords but they are about as similar as a porcupine and a doorknob. Samus and Fox both use guns but the fighting styles are night and day. It’s so much fun just to use these characters and pick favorites and master them. The roster is across dozens of Nintendo classics and even some very new games like Xenoblade. There are also characters from non-Nintendo games, with Sonic returning and Megaman and Pacman being wonderful additions. You can also now play as your Mii. You can create your character to be a gunner, swordman, or brawler. Then you can select the moveset accordingly. Many fighting games struggle with character diversity; not Smash Bros. Some characters feel unbalanced at first, but with time each character can be countered and outmatched. Every character looks, feels, sounds, jumps, moves, and plays differently—and THIS is the core reason for Smash Bros success.

There are 46 levels in Super Smash Bros Wii U. Some of them are not as strong as other but again the diversity is impressive. There are fewer levels than ever that end up feeling like throw-away levels. Most of them are fun and competitive. Sakurai made dozens of brilliant design decisions in the game. One of the best decisions was to create the ability to have a “Final Destination form” of every level in the game. Final Destination has been the long-standing favorite level for Smash Bros fans. It’s just a simple stage with no platforms and no nonsense, just mano y mano. So usually after messing around with every level, smash fans will simply play on Final Destination over and over and possibly have a few more they mess around with from time to time. So, instead of feeling forced to play just a few levels only over and over, you can select a level and play the Final Destination form of that level; this creates one simple platform to play on, the same size and shape of the one on Final Destination, but still keeps the look, sound, and background of whichever level you selected.

Another huge design decision that turns out to be amazing is adding 8 player smash to the game. The old limit was 4 characters at once, either humans or computer. However now you can play with up to 8. Not all of the levels are available for this mode, since they would be too small, but you can still play on a good amount of them and there is still a final destination form of nearly every level again for this. There are so many possibilities for pure fun with 8 players. You can play 4vs4 with all humans. You can go 4vs4 with humans vs. computers at level 9. It can be extremely hectic, but in the laugh-out-loud-what-the-heck-just-happened good way. There are an insane amount of items that do massively diverse amount of things. These items can be worthless or completely game changing. Yes, some of them feel over powered or unfair, but that is part of the fun of Smash Bros. And of course, you can go to the options section before a match and simply turn items to high, medium, low or off completely. You can also go into detail and select specific items you do or don’t want. So if you’re sick and tired of that god-forsaken Drill, then just turn it off. Many of the items are a whole lot of fun, and the new additions are great too like the Bullet Bill and Spiny Shell. All the items are from the massive catalog of Nintendo games throughout the years.

Almost everything you do in Smash Bros Wii U give you rewards. Trophies return, as the mainstay collectable in Smash and an awesome memorabilia of Nintendo history. Stickers are thankfully axed, there was no reason for them, trophies are much better. Music in the Smash series has been incredible throughout the years; you can collect more CDs for more songs. Equipment is a new addition. Each character can be edited in the character customization section. You can edit each characters special moves when you unlock new ones. For example imagine Link and his bow. You can have the standard bow OR you can switch to a quick fire bow that can fire through multiple opponents but doesn’t launch the enemy OR you can switch to a power bow that takes a long time to charge up but has immense power. You can also unlock equipment that can make your character quicker, stronger, or better on defense. Pikachu is a very fast character, maybe you want to give him a bit more defense and be okay with dropping the speed a bit. Some equipment gives special features, like starting with a beam sword at the beginning of each life or giving 1.15% more damage with in air attacks. But no matter what there’s always a fair trade off. The character customization addition is awesome and allows for editing your favorite characters to play exactly how you want them too. There are also coins that will be rewarded for various things, more on that in a second. Overall Smash Bros Wii U does a great job of keeping the action going by rewarding you for everything you do.

Brawling it up in Smash mode with friends presents endless hours of fun; even smashing it up alone with the computer is a blast and a great way to hone your skills. But Smash mode is just the start. There are so many other things to do in Smash Bros Wii U. Classic mode returns, but with a welcome twist, you can select between multiple different opponents that give different rewards. After six matches you play versus the multi-man Mii team and then a final showdown against the Master Hand. The great thing about that final battle is how much it varies depending on the difficulty. Master Hand is the only opponent at the easiest difficulty, and then it ramps up with Crazy Hand. It really does get crazy with the “master core”, a shadowy like creature that transforms into different forms and even climaxes by turning into an actual platforming level with enemies and pitfalls. If you’d like to play the tougher difficulties, you must gamble coins. The harder the challenge the more coins you gotta give up, but your rewards will be much larger. All-star mode returns. You fight your way through opponents from different eras in video game history and the damage you take carries over from round to round. There are also master orders and crazy orders. Master orders give you three random challenges at three different levels of difficulty. The harder the challenge the more coins you need to spend but the reward will be greater. The challenges could be anything from beating an enemy 1-on-1 when he has the metal powerup to hitting at least 1,000 feet in a homerun contest. It’s a lot of fun and a quick way to earn rewards as you can see the category and type of reward you will get if you complete the challenge. Crazy orders are similar but with more at stake. To join in you need either a pass, a reward sometimes given in the game, or 5,000 coins. High stakes yes, but the rewards can be great. Just like master orders you can select from three different challenges with an assortment of prizes. Each time you complete an order you can keep going and going for as long as you’d like, but if you die in a challenge you will lose some of your rewards. Meanwhile your damage carries over from challenge to challenge, but 25% of that is lowered. So if you ended with 100% you will start the next order with 75%. And when you want to finally finish and lock up all of your rewards, you have to do one final showdown with Crazy Hand himself.

Along with all the modes already mentioned there are quick pick up and play modes called Stadium games. Home run contest has been around a long time. To play you beat up a punching bag as much as you can, pick up the home run bat, and launch it as far as possible. Target blast is like angry birds but Smash style. Hit the bomb at the perfect spot and blow up as much as you can, you get two shots and the second bomb is larger than the first. Multi-man pits a massive amount of enemies against you; the enemies are extremely weak and can be launched with the slightest attack. There is 10-man smash, 3-minute smash, endless smash and more. All of these game modes are a blast. There is even Trophy Rush, a mini-game that has blocks falling from the sky that you must destroy. After demolishing a certain amount, coins and trophies and more fall down and can be collected. One of the big new game modes is Smash Run. Smash Run is a board game style competition in which players collect equipment, items, and characters to fight with. The game is very complex but fun. There’s a lot going on and at first it seems overwhelming, but once you get a handle for it, it can be a fun diversion from regular Smash. Events Mode makes a return from Melee and Brawl. There’s an “rpg tree” like mission structure that can be tackled level by level. Beat level one and a branch starts out in each direction, now you can continue with these events that always have fun miscellaneous challenges. For example on the Duck Hunt level you need to jump up and hit the ducks that fly by, just like the real game, all while fighting off enemies at the same time. Another event asks you to demolish the Wrecking Crew level’s building before the team of Warios takes you down.

Of all the game modes mentioned, almost every single one of them can be done in co-op. Smash, Smash Run, Home Run Contest and more are competitive. While modes like co-op events, classic, Smash and All-star mode can be played as a team.

Challenges bring all of these things together in one awesome screen. Basically the challenges are like a huge achievement section; except you are rewarded with new CDs/Music, trophies, coins, movesets, etc. The challenges ask you to play in all the different game-modes, use all the different characters, try to get high scores, and it shows you just how deep this game is. Some challenges ask you to play as Greninja and play at least 12 rounds in Crazy Orders. Or another challenge tasks you with killing 110 enemies or more in 3-minute smash while playing as Bowser. Some challenges are pretty easy like the one that asks you to just beat Classic mode once. But others like getting 8 kills in Cruel Smash are truly difficult. Challenges are a brilliant design decision and just a blast to play, especially for completionist like myself.

The online functionality is a giant step-up from Brawl, but still not where it needs to be. But I blame that less on Sakurai and Smash and more on the Wii U itself. If this game was on the Xbox One I could just jump in a party with friends, talk for a few minutes, decide what we want to do, and the entire game would be open for me and my buddies to play—whether that’s Target Blast or All-Star Mode or straight up Smash. But the Wii U just doesn’t have that functionality built in, so Smash Bros Wii U is limited in that aspect. What you can do in online play does work well. I only encountered lag a few times and that was based entirely on the opponent having bad connection. The online modes are simple, there’s for fun mode and for glory. For fun has items, all the levels, and total chaos. For glory mode has no items at all and only takes place on the final smash variations of the levels. For glory mode is also ranked and you can see all your stats and positioning on the leaderboards. All of this can be done with couch co-op or online co-op.

Speaking of stats, even the options and records section of Smash Bros Wii U goes beyond anything any other games have to offer. You can check everything in the stats section. Players can create their own nickname to use while playing the game, all of your stats will then be saved. You can see the characters or the players kill death ratios, launch distance, how much damage was given, how many times you idiotically self destructed, and so much more. It’s sometimes just a lot of fun to see all of these stats in one place and observe who the best player really is.

The graphics in Smash Bros Wii U are stunning. The amount of action on screen between all the fighers, items, and the level itself always looks crystal clear and never dips under a solid 60 frames per second. The attention to detail for the character animations and the effects are phenomenal and unmatched in any fighting game I’ve ever seen. Everything pops visually. Everything looks so fluid. And everything maintains the feel that those original characters and items had in their original games but still have a distinct “Smash Bros” feel. It’s obvious that so much care and love went into this game by the way it plays and looks alone, let alone everything else. And the music, oh my gosh the music! I’m a sucker for a great soundtrack in a game, and Smash Bros for the Wii U has perhaps the best soundtrack in video game history. Now it does sort of cheat, because it’s taking music from generations of Nintendo classics. But the selections chosen are amazing and the remixes brought back from Melee and Brawl are top notch and the brand new remixes are beautiful. I spent hours and hours just filing through the music section of the game. You can listen to any track you unlock and you can select how often you’d like that song to be played while fighting it up on those stages. If there are songs you don’t like, just tone down the dial so it doesn’t ever get played. If there are songs you love, make sure they get played as frequently as you’d like. This customization is amazing and just the pure amount of high quality beautiful powerful amazing songs from the Nintendo universe are enough to make a Nintendo fanboy’s heart melt with pure nostalgic joy.

Super Smash Bros for the Wii U is THE reason to own a Wii U. Not only is it the best game in the fantastic franchise, it’s pure solo and multiplayer fun and replayability make it one of the best games of the generation. If I was banished to an island for a year and I could take a generator, TV, and one game to play I would pick Smash Bros Wii U. And that’s WITHOUT all the added fun you get when you have at least one buddy sitting by your side, let alone a total of eight! The graphics and music make it the prettiest and most audibly erotic game of its genre and top notch when compared to anything the PS4 or Xbox One have to offer. The couch co-op and competitive fun is virtually endless. And the solo madness is unending and always rewarding. The online is good, but it would be nice if it could take all the couch co-op aspects of the game and carry that over for online play, as opposed to just plain Smash. But that one blemish aside, the game is flawless in every way and Sakurai should be applauded for creating such a masterpiece. Super Smash Bros for Wii U is a Nintendo museum come to life. It’s a time machine of Nintendo nostalgia and it’s packed with more fanfare than anyone can imagine. The industry should look at Smash Bros Wii U and be jealous. Jealous that a company can have so much rich history and so much wide-ranging success—and jealous that somehow all of that found its way into one phenomenal, beautiful, amazing, infinitely fun-filled game.

• FINAL VERDICT