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Took me more than a day to finally convince myself to get this game. The main reason is because the game consists of only 12 levels and second reason is I’m a cheap gamer. In the end its the combination of sci-fi theme plus the fact that I’m a semi-hardcore fan of tower defense strategy games that made me make the purchase. I was a bit skeptical at first but after playing the first 4 levels, I must say this game offers a lot of content for the price I paid.

The goal of the game is simple, defend the mining operation from swamps of deadly alien insects called Insectocytes. The first 3 levels are basically tutorials, although you can switch off in the Options menu if you decide to replay those levels and I’m pretty sure you will. Just like any other tower defense strategy games, you will always start with the basic towers, just like PixelJunk Monsters, but instead of an arrow tower, your first tower will be a machine gun tower. By killing of waves and waves of enemies which gradually grow stronger than the previous waves, you will earn money to research new towers as well as upgrade your existing towers (up to level 5). You can als earn more money by advancing the enemy waves, if you feel that you can handle more without preparations.

Unlike PixelJunk Monsters where different types of enemies only take away one life from the total (one villager), different enemies take away different amount of health in Savage Moon. The stronger the enemy the more health or damage it will deal to your mining operation’s overall health.

As I mentioned before that this game offers more than what you are paying for, at least in my opinion. There are a couple of features that are not in PixelJunk Monsters – Command system, new types of towers that can be researched and you can rotate/zoom in and out of the map as well as camera mode from a particular tower.

Another difference between this game and PixelJunk Monsters is that you can only build a limited number of towers based on the available drop pods, even if you have the resources to build more. This makes the game more challenging as you need to plan carefully where you want to place the towers. A very nice feature. But don’t worry, the number will refill itself after each wave.

The command system has three aspects – more money per kill, stronger tower attacks and defense. At one time you can only have up to two of the three prioritized and sacrificing the third aspect. Or you can choose to have all three balanced. Early on you will pick more money per kill plus more fire power so that you can build up more, upgrade existing towers and research new ones.

There are also new types of towers to defend your mining operation such as the Repair Tower that will constantly repair nearby towers and Amp Tower that will make your nearby towers stronger as well as the very useful Block Tower that will allow you to block a path (not all paths can be blocked) by building multiple of these towers beside each other. Other towers can also be built on top of these Block Towers. There are more powerful ones as you progress through the game, I haven’t finished the game yet but I know there are more just by looking at different loading screens. I can’t wait til I get my hands on the Orbital Tower!

One negative comment I have for this game is the lack of multiplayer support (co-op) but I am sure a simple patch can change that?

Overall this game isn’t easy, except for the first 3 levels. The 4th level on Duergar on Xipe took me a few tries before figuring out what’s the best to deal with those pain-in-the-ass giant Insectocytes. This level is the first challenging level that will sure frustrates a lot of people playing for the first time. For those that are stuck on this level, just build a lot of Mortar Towers and you should be fine, at first I thought the Laser Towers would take them out quicker but I was wrong. And don’t forget to upgrade them as much as possible.

Most of the time you will use your money for researching, upgrading and building towers but occasionally you will want to use the Repair Base option to repair your damaged base.

PixelJunk Monsters has a relaxing and cartoonish feel to it, on the other hand Savage Moon has a totally different theme that takes place in space. Graphics are obviously more realistic, I am not criticizing PixelJunk Monsters’ graphics though because it was meant to be cartoonish and unrealistic. While its not Metal Gear Solid or Call of Duty quality, the graphics are more than enough to justify the price you pay.

I think the audio is what stands out the most besides the game play. When you kill waves after waves of enemies, you will constantly hear death screams which are very, very satisfying. I also love the sound each tower makes when it fires as well as when it upgrades and transforms into a stronger tower (great animation too!).

I highly recommend this little downloadable game on PlayStation Network for 9.99+tax. Fans of the sci-fi Tower Defense genre will not be disappointed with its refreshing style of game play. If I was to pick between PixelJunk Monsters and Savage Moon, I think I will pick Savage Moon over Monsters because there are just more things to do and the battles are much more intensive. Let’s hope there will be add-ons for this game in the future.

8.5/10

[Update]: If you are looking for Savage Moon walkthrough, there isn’t any so far, not even in gamefaq.com. But I have found video walkthrough from PSU’s Savage Moon Walkthrough

Image source: PlayStation.Blog @ Flickr

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The original F.E.A.R was such a great game because it combined first person shooter with horror, perfect for survival horror game fan like me. And I am not talking about cheap scare, the original game did in fact make me jump a few times and so did F.E.A.R. 2: Project Origin. I can assure you all the Japanese horror movies I have watched have trained me to the point where I am pretty immune to scary moments.

  

F.E.A.R. 2: Project Origin, is the sequel of the original F.E.A.R, once again puts you as one of the members of the F.E.A.R team and the demo starts you off outside of a school right after a helicopter crash. The controls are a bit different than Call of Duty which took me a while to get used to. There were a few annoying moments when I mixed up the controls such as pressing down by accident and wasting medic kits (which you can only carry three at any time) or throwing grenades instead of firing the gun because the functions for R1 and R2 are different for COD and F.E.A.R. Then again its not the game’s fault, its just me, just wanted to rant.

You can carry up to four weapons and four different types of grenades at a time. The demo lets you experience with quite a few weapons. The weapons are the usual sub machine gun, assault rifle, rocket launcher, sniper, shotgun and laser gun. Which is not a bad thing really. Again you can carry up to three medic kits with you at a time. One thing I like and haven’t seen before is the option to kick down a table or open a car door for some extra cover. The AIs are actually pretty fast and smart (or maybe I just getting old and slow), but nothing too hard to take out. Another neat feature is the slow motion, while its not anything new, its been around since the Max Payne time. It never gets old blowing up enemies up close and personal while in slow mo!

  

I’m sure most of you have seen trailers of the ass-kicking Elite Powered Armor Suits in action. And guess what? The last part of the demo lets you pilot this ass-kicking suit and you get to spray some machine gun bullets (the twin gun overheat if you spray non-stop!) plus firing four missiles together which will self reload. I don’t like the fact that you have to fire all four at the same time instead of one at a time. Other than that, the suit fight is the most enjoyable part of the entire demo.

The game also managed to give me a few scared jumps, which is a good sign because that means the game is pretty scary. Like I said I don’t get scared easily.

In the graphics department, compare to Dead Space, which is another great horror shooter (third person), in my opinion, Dead Space has better textures. The lighting is pretty nicely rendered though.

I actually want to point out the special effects are impressive. One that impressed me the most was when you are walking along the school’s hallway, all of a sudden all light bulbs pop and lockers flapping violently. The effects really help create a scary atmosphere. And Alma, well, she’s back and doing a good job scaring us when we least expect!

Overall I think the game is decent, I can’t say its good enough that is worth buying as soon as it comes out. For those haven’t tried the demo, go get it and see for yourself.

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I was going to get the Super Stardust HD for the PlayStation 3 on PSN but I didn’t because I had so many games to play and so little time at that moment. A month ago, PSN released the PSP version called Super Stardust Portable and I finally gave in. In my opinion this game is better than another shooter called Everyday Shooter where the object destruction is turned into part of the background music. Don’t get me wrong, Everyday Shooter is one great and innovative game but I just prefer Super Stardust Portable’s style of play.

Game play
The concept is pretty much the same as any other classic arcade shooter but Super Stardust Portable pushes a few notches up with extremely fast paced game and amazing graphics (I apologize for not having any of my own images because the game is just too fast paced I can’t take anything worth looking, you can check out the ones at IGN).

Your objective for this game is simple, shoot everything in your sight. Mostly asteroids but there are also others like green worm looking enemies and red bombs that will chase you until they or you are destroyed. You are given three types of main weapons which you can gradually power up and cause even more destruction. The three main weapons are – Ice Splitter, Rock Crusher and Gold Melter. You can also spread out the shots by tapping the button but I hardly use it.

Since this is a classic arcade shooter, it cannot be “classic” without the special bombs. These bombs will blow up everything surrounding you. Finally you also get to use the Impact Boost which is pretty much acts like a shield that will boost towards one direction and destroy anything in the way. The boost can be recharged in time and you should always have it ready because there will be a lot of times where there are just too many asteroids and other things on the screen you will have no time to shoot them all. The boost allows you to rush your way out of the mess while cleaning some of that mess. Occasionally you will also get to replenish your bombs as well as having a shield to protect you from one hit, if you have a shield already the shield item will act like a bomb, clearing the space surrounding you.

The three weapons have their own advantages but you can pretty much clear every levels with using just one of them. The Ice Splitter is more powerful (at least that’s what I think) but its more concentrated while the Rock Crusher is slightly less powerful but more spread out. Finally the Gold Melter is basically a line of fire and if you press all 4 buttons it will create a circle of fire and you are pretty much protected from anything, well most of the time. I should also mention the 4 buttons correspond to each direction, so for example the triangle is shooting up and the triangle + square will shoot at the north west direction. I took me a while to get used to this shooting style though.

This game is very fast paced, each level or “phase” as the game calls it, takes an average of two minutes to complete. There are 5 planets for your shooting needs, each planet has 4 phases plus a boss phase. I personally enjoy the non boss phases because they are much more engaging, there is really no time to rest. My right thumb was basically in pain after completing the first planet, it was a lot of work!

Graphics and audio
Graphics are again, nothing short of amazing, specially for the PSP. I can only imagine how much better the graphics will be for the PS3′s HD version. All the special effects, mainly the explosions for the astroids and how they break into smaller pieces is simply stunning. The audi department did a great job too though you will mostly likely be too busy shooting and blowing things up you will not pay too much attention to it.

Final verdict
Overall I highly recommend this game for anyone that likes classic arcade shooters, this is one addictive game with great game play and graphics. I also suggest getting the PSP version, if you have one, over the PS3 version because this is a perfect game to play on the subway or on a bus while communting to/from work.

9/10

Image source: PlayStation.blog

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Previous Gundam related games like Gundam Seed: Rengou vs. Z.A.F.T. Portable, Gundam Battle Royale and Gundam Battle Tactics were all great games, specially Gundam Seed: Rengou vs. Z.A.F.T. Portable that had, at the time, the latest mobile suits from the Gundam Seed series. Now, Gundam vs Gundam, the newest Gundam game has released for the PlayStation Portable in Japan (no date for North American release yet). Is this one worth buying at all? Read on…..

For those that haven’t played the games or even heard of Gundams before, they are basically transformers but only look 100x better. The games mentioned above basically put you in one of the mobile suits, not necessary Gundams because there are different robots in the series. You will be controlling and fighting against one of the other sides, usually two sides each with different mobile suits and mobile armor (these are not necessary robots but can be fighter planes etc). Its really a third person shooter, just replace human/monsters with robots.

  

If I remember correctly, this game was originally from the arcade and it was ported over to the PlayStation 2, then to the PSP. Gundam Seed: Rengou vs. Z.A.F.T. Portable was a great game that offered hours of play time and great replay value because you can upgrade many of your mobile suits’ stats such as how fast the weapon can fire, more ammo, more fire power as well as more health, jump higher and more booster power etc. This is pretty much level grinding though, which I think was necessary in order to pass some of the harder levels.

Game play
Gundam vs Gundam is really just the arcade version ported over to the PSP. At first I thought there was a story mode just like Gundam Seed: Rengou vs. Z.A.F.T. Portable. I should have figured that out from the name of the game, stupid me. The controls are basically the same or really similar to the other games though – jump, boost, shoot, melee, shoot 2, special shot, special melee and special. The three specials are hard to execute because you have to hold triangle, plus either the shoot or melee. The special move is slightly easier and its executed by pressing triangle, square and cross (might as well press your right thumb onto all four buttons)
I have yet to even execute any of them. How did I even figure out how to execute these hard to do moves? They are actually mentioned in one of the game options. I will update once I figure out how to execute them. I have never had such frustration over special moves from previous Gundam games.

[Update: I have finally managed to execute the special attack (only when your special gauge is full) by pressing.....L and R together twice]

  

Aside from the standards, now you can assign orders to your computer teammate, commands like attack, dodge and surprise attack. You can also call in support where an additional mobile suit for a second and throw in a few more shots at your current target, as usual, the calls for support can be recharged with time just like recharging your gun’s ammo. I find the support useful because, if I remember correctly it was able to take the hits for me as well as acting as a decoy for a short time.

Enough with the controls, the game has three game modes – “normal” mode (I call it the normal mode, was going to say story mode but its not a story) where you fight through 8 stages with the last stage as boss stage, quick play and multiplayer that supports 2 on 2 battles. I think the 2 on 2 is the selling point here, just like the arcade version, the fun is from shooting and slashing other human piloted mobile suits. Once you have selected a mobile suit from the list with 20+ of them and more can be unlocked by completing the “normal” mode. They range from the oldest 0079 series all the way to the newest ones from the Gundam 00 series. The objective of any of these game mode is the same, you and your enemies both have a life bar, you will lose if your side’s life bar reaches 0. When you and/or your teammate dies (same goes for enemies), the amount of life your team loses is based on the mobile suit you picked. The stronger the mobile suit, the higher points its worth, which means when it blows up, your team loses a bigger amount of life. So that means its not always better to pick the strongest from the list. I picked my favorite Freedom Gundam and its worth 3000GP, I lost one of the games once by dying only twice!

  

In “normal” mode, you will fight in random locations and you will have a random computer mobile suit to fight along side with you. There are a total of 8 stages with the last one being the boss stage. The boss is huge, relative to your mobile suit and it took me 2 tries to beat it, I was one hit away from losing the game for the second time! I guess I just need to practice more with the controls, a training mode would be a perfect game mode for this game.

Quick play is no brainer, you pick your mobile suit and pick up to 3 other computer to fight with or against you. You can modify options like how long the match lasts for, how fast your special gauge fills up or different stages/music.

Unfortunately I haven’t had a chance to try out the multiplayer.

  

So as you can see, there isn’t any level grinding here. Although you can still unlock more mobile suits, intro movies, endings and images for the multimedia galleries.

Graphics and audio
Graphics are again, PSP quality, the mobile suits are nicely detailed, environments are plain but the game is so fast paced you won’t have time to appreciate or pay attention to, not that there is anything to appreciate here. Music is actually real sound tracks from the Gundam series, so based on which Gundam series’ stage you are fighting in, you will be listening to that series’ soundtrack. The soundtracks bring back a lot of memories by the way.

Final verdict
Overall I think this game is OK. I still prefer Gundam Seed: Rengou vs. Z.A.F.T. Portable because it has a story mode and level grinding although you can still unlock more mobile suits, maybe its just me. For those that are looking for fast paced arcade style game play, Gundam vs Gundam should suit your needs. Skills really matter in this game since there’s no level grinding where you can easily overpower your enemies by powering up your mobile suits and weapons. If you have lots of Gundam loving friends with PSP, I suggest convincing them to get a copy so up to 4 of you and your friends can fight each other anytime without going to the arcade.

7.0/10

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So finally I got LittleBigPlanet yesterday, it was probably in the mailbox on Monday but I was too busy to check. I wanted to play a bit more before writing this review and the game was just too damn fun to let go of the controller last night. And I’m still trying to figure out how on earth to get my Nariko costume since my game didn’t come with the a card with the promotion code. I’ve sent an email to Futureshop and haven’t received a reply yet.

[update]:Turns out the promo was between Oct 3rd and Oct 9th, I pre-ordered mine on 11th, sigh. There goes my Nariko costume.

  

Story and controls
There isn’t really a solid story for LittleBigPlanet, you will be exploring and venturing out in different places and planets. The controls are straight forward and easy to get used to. Basically you can jump (hold down to jump higher and further) and pull or push objects. There are also these new and interesting actions such as smile, frown, angry and scared, each with 3 levels, so you can smile lightly, bigger smile and a crazy smile all executed using the directional buttons. You can also make your sackboy or sackgirl’s head move based on your SIXAXIS controller as well as making their hands move using L2, R2, L3 and R3. Such innovative features really help bring emotion and expression to the sack people. And one more thing, you can drag your L3 or R3 real fast from left to right or right to left to perform slaps (at people obviously!), which I haven’t got bored of doing yet. Then again, when you are actually going through a level you most likely will be too occupied to even bother playing with the expressions.

  

Gameplay, Graphics and physics
FUN, that’s the word that came to my mind when I played it for the first time. I found it particularly fun because I’ve used to play shoot’em up games for far too long, Call of Duty 4 for example, not that I’m complaining, I will never get bored of that game just that its just nice to play something that’s completely different for a change. Most of the time, this game is relaxing, but, maybe I just suck and/or impatient, I had to play some of the levels a few times before I could pass them in order to unlock the next area(s). I guess I should be glad that the game offers some level of difficulties, I mean after all, it won’t be fun if its too easy right?

  

This game is point based, meaning you get points by obtaining blue orbs. But that’s not very rewarding isn’t it? You can also obtain outfits, decorations, stickers etc. You can place stickers and decorations pretty much anywhere and sometimes they are used to solve puzzles to unlock more items. I believe one of the biggest selling feature of this game is the amount of outfits you can obtain and customize your sackboys or girls. You have the options to edit each part of your sackboys or girls such as head, face, back, neck, eyes, upper outfit, lower outfit etc. You can even choose to have the system randomly generate a look as well and you can imagine the number of combinations there can be as you obtain more outfits! You can save your look for a quick change as well as deleting them.

  

Graphics are top notch as well, I think the word I would use is, surreal. Its dreamlike and cartoonish but at the same time realistic with great lighting effects, vibrant colors and detailed textures of the surroundings. As mentioned before, the facial expression of your sackboys and girls are eye candies. Although it only supports up to 720p which most of us can probably not tell the difference between 1080p and 720p anyway so its not really an issue.

Aside from the normal beat-the-level kind of game, there are also challenges that you can unlock by obtaining keys. One example of challange will be to continuously jump up and down and get as many blue orbs (for points) as you can while avoiding the fire.

As you can see, this game packs TONS of features and I have yet to discover them all. I’ve had a chance to play a bit online last night and the online feature just makes this game easily worth 10 times more than the $59.99. You can play levels online with others (by the way some areas require others’ help to unlock) or you can play on your own. You can also pick the Quick Play option and you will be joining someone random and play whatever they are playing. The number of levels in LittleBigPlanet is pretty much infinite as long as people keep creating levels and sharing them, there will be new levels to play for as long as this game remains popular, which I am confident it will. You can also “hearted” your favorite levels and your friends on PlayStation Network can see them.

Aside from the graphics, the physics, yes this is my first time having a section, or rather one third of a section, dedicated to game physics. There are many obstacles through out the game, sometimes you will have to push or pull blocks in order to proceed to the next area. On the other hand you can, for example, be pulling a string left and right to shake the blue orbs or items down for you to obtain.

  

Sound
So far I have heard many different types of music, some are up beat, some are spooky and some are down right classical. I also like the commentary that is spoken in English with British accent, just love that accent. There aren’t any other types of sound worth mentioning. Let me know if I’ve missed anything.

Final verdict
I’m pretty sure I have not tapped into everything about LittleBigPlanet, but as you can see, the amount of contents this game has is incredible. The amount of customization of your sack characters is one of the greatest feature this game has to offer, I think personalization is what makes a good game….a good game! With personalization you can have a unique presence instead of looking the same as other people. Unlike some of the games that mainly target specific groups of gamers, LittleBigPlanet suits all types of gamers, even non gamers in my opinion. Finally, the fact that you can create your own levels and share them with everyone else online makes this game even better. This is what I would call a Web 2.0 game, correct me if I’m wrong though.

Finally after Resistance, Heavenly Sword and Metal Gear Solid 4, the PlayStation 3 has another worthy exclusive game.

9.5/10

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As soon as I saw 1942: Joint Strike demo on PSN, I downloaded it immediately. 1942 was and still is one of the most addicting war plane shooter games of all time. Its simply classic. The remake is in 3D and the graphics are just so crisp and sharp. Back then when the plans blow up, it was just a simple blow up image, now the planes actually break into pieces and disappear.

In terms of game play, like I said, its just as addictive as the classic version, it also has stunning graphics. You have more ways of blowing up your enemies now. You have this new shooting mode where you hold the shoot button, it will fire a stronger shot like from the yet another classic plane shooter called R-Type in addition to the classic shooting mode but I didn’t find that new mode effective. Aside from normal shooting, you will have the bombs that will basically wipe out anything on the screen. Missiles is also another new weapon where, if I remember correctly, you get to use them by shooting down enemies. And finally, instead of getting killed in one shot, this version of 1942 features a life bar instead, life bars are nothing new to plane shooters but its a nice addition.

The demo features one quick level, as you can guess, there will be a boss at the end of the level. The memories of playing the classic version just came back to me when I had to dodge all over the place just to not get hit by the many bullets just fly towards you. It was amazingly fun!

I highly recommend this game for those that find plane shooters addictive. With better graphics and game play, 1942: Joint Strike is worth every $9.99USD/CAD that you are going to pay for! I might even get the full version later.

  
 

If you want to look for a copy of the original 1942 on NES, I’ve found some on eBay.

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