Tiger Woods has returned. Nothing much has happened in the real life of Tiger Woods since the release of Tiger Woods 10, honest. Last year’s outing was a solid experience and little has changed apart from a few additions which I’ll focus on. The biggest change from Tiger Woods 10 to Tiger Woods 11 is the True-Aim feature. True-Aim is supposed to make the experience more realistic and it achieves this, sort of. It’s more realistic in that the camera no longer follows your ball as it flies through the air. It’s also more realistic in that pressing the B button for the overhead view no longer shows an aiming circle.

However, the GPS view, which replaces the aiming circle, is not more realistic at all. Pressing B for the overhead view will now display distance and elevation markers on the course. I hardly call this realistic unless your golfer happens to be The Terminator or Robocop and can see mathematical representations of the world around. The GPS view becomes all the more strange when you’re close to the green and instead of seeing the pin one of the distance markers is yellow, not white like the rest, which indicates where the pin is situated.

Read the rest of this entry »

To the best of my knowledge the Nintendo Wii isn’t blessed with many fighting games. Off the top of my head I can think of Smash Bros and a couple of boxing games. There may be a few others but the genre certainly isn’t overflowing on the system. For that reason I was looking forward to this title. Before reviewing a game I tend to steer clear of other people’s views and this was no exception. I went into this with an open mind but after playing the game for a while I sort of wished I’d been better prepared.

The characters range from one obnoxious idiot, Marcus who comments on how beautiful he is, to another obnoxious idiot, Bast who comments on how rich she is, with a variety of obnoxious idiots between the two. Each battle is split into Acts, you know, like one of those theatre play things. This is a nice idea and it would work well apart from the fact this is a fighting game. I’m not aware of any plays, or books for that matter, which solely consist of two opponents beating the crap out of each other for the entire duration, with a lame put-down thrown in at the end.

Read the rest of this entry »

Crackdown provided one of the biggest surprises in this generation of consoles. Going on the screenshots and videos prior to release the game looked like it would be fun but that wasn’t the reason behind the huge number of pre-orders it garnered. In a stroke of genius the Crackdown disc included the beta for one of the most anticipated titles in gaming history, Halo 3. It wasn’t surprising how many copies of the game were sold on its release, the Halo 3 beta explains that. The real surprise was in how great that little title from Realtime Worlds turned out to be. Crackdown continued to sell long after the Halo 3 beta novelty wore off and is still regarded by many as one of the most entertaining games on the Xbox 360. This sequel from Ruffian Games, headed by a couple of guys who worked on the original title, has a great deal to live up to.

Read the rest of this entry »

This is quite unlike any game I have ever played. I have played many action RPGs. I have also played many games with a fantasy setting. But I can say without a shadow of a doubt that I have never played a game which frustrated me so much yet had me going back for more. Demon’s Souls is one of the most rewarding games I have played but this could so easily have been a very different review.

I like to think I have quite a few good qualities but unfortunately patience has never been one of them. As I started the game one of the first things I noticed is a nice selection of character classes to choose from which goes a little beyond the usual Warrior, Ranger, and Mage format. The ten available classes are Knight, Priest, Thief, Magician, Temple Knight, Soldier, Wanderer, Barbarian, Royalty, and Hunter.

Read the rest of this entry »

During my teenage years Green Day were one of my favourite bands, Dookie was one of my favourite albums, and Tre Cool was one of my favourite drummers. It pains me to admit those teenage years were quite a while ago. On the plus side, Green Day: Rock Band may be the perfect excuse to sing and drum along to their songs once more, and of course play air-guitar, except with a plastic guitar instead of air.

Green Day: Rock Band follows the successful release of The Beatles: Rock Band. Even the most hardcore fans of Green Day would have to admit this seems like an odd choice. I wouldn’t describe Green Day as a small band but they’re a great distance from The Beatles who were one of the biggest and most successful bands the world has ever seen. It would have been more suitable to follow The Beatles with bands who could sell-out a tour of major stadiums around the globe. Bands such as The Rolling Stones, U2, Queen, Guns N Roses, and Metallica. I see Green Day in the same category as bands with a few solid tracks on Rock Band and Guitar Hero, such as Jimmy Eat World and All American Rejects, who would also seem an odd choice for this type of celebratory special edition.

Read the rest of this entry »

I really like the Sherlock Holmes character. Forget Poirot, Columbo, and the chimney sweep who goes about on skates when he should be tending to patients, Holmes is the ultimate detective. It may seem a little odd, considering how much I like the character, that I’m not a big fan of the movies. I enjoyed watching The Hound of the Baskervilles as a kid but I was fascinated more by the idea than the move itself. There are apparently 24 movie versions of Hound of the Baskervilles so perhaps the couple I remember watching weren’t the best examples. There have been over 200 Sherlock Holmes movies and easily my favourite is Young Sherlock Holmes.

That Spielberg produced action adventure was much more to my liking than the more common dialogue heavy examples. Young Sherlock Holmes is worth mentioning as while watching this version from Guy Ritchie I noticed a few similarities between the two. The team of three people consisting of Sherlock Holmes, his best friend Watson, and a love interest of Holmes. The supernatural black magic theme. The clever and timely reveal of a well-known adversary to Holmes. Most important similarity of all is a focus on fun.

Read the rest of this entry »

I have been a dedicated Tony Hawk man for quite some time. I even own a Tony Hawk VHS tape in which he shows off some of his tricks. Admittedly, that VHS tape is still in its plastic wrapping, but I do own it. I used to sit and play the Tony Hawk games for hours on end. When it comes to business EA are pretty smart and their policy over the years, especially with sport titles, is that if something is popular they should do it themselves. Skate burst on to the scene a few years back and, in true EA sports style, had a flashier appearance than its competition.

Read the rest of this entry »

Petz Fantasy is the latest in a long line of Tamagotchi inspired games on the DS. The game is filled to the brim with bright colours and very cute big-eyed fantasy animals. Warning: If you don’t like cute games you should stay well away from Petz Fantasy. The music lacks variety but that’s par for the course in this type of game. Young children will no doubt like the creatures but I don’t feel the structure of this game leads itself to longevity.

Read the rest of this entry »

As a young kid I spent a silly amount of money on arcade games. Going on holiday was extra exciting as it was a chance to experience new amusement arcades. The same games but in a slightly different arrangement. No matter where I was there were a handful of arcade cabinets which always caught my attention. One of those games was the World War II shoot ‘em up, 1943. In many ways Airstrike: Eagles of World War II feels like a fully 3d version of 1943.

Read the rest of this entry »

I’m a big fan of MMA, especially the UFC which is home to the best group of fighters in the world, and I was happy with Undisputed’s first outing in 2009. That’s not to say I didn’t have any issues with last year’s outing. Submissions were a personal gripe. To be more specific I hated how difficult it was to get out of them once they were locked in, which happened very quickly. Unfortunately, this issue has not been addressed in 2010 and I hope they re-evaluate this next year. Until that time UFC Undisputed 2010 has some new additions and a great deal to offer fans.

In career mode you begin as an amateur and once you feel you’re ready to turn pro you’re given a contract to fight in the World Fighting Alliance. My created fighter was a Light Heavyweight. I have a bad habit of not reading manuals and because of that I didn’t fully understand how the fatigue system worked. I went into my first pro fight with 100% fatigue, for some reason I assumed that was good like a full health bar, that really wasn’t good. I gassed very early into the fight and was smothered to death by an over-excited wrestler. I learned from that harsh lesson and went on to win my next six pro fights in a row. This prompted Dana White to come calling and I accepted his contract offer to fight in the UFC. This was it, the big time.

Read the rest of this entry »