Game Diary

PC Game Review: Civilization V

Welcome back to the revenge of the sequels! The fall gaming season is always filled up with a myriad of games seeking to repeat the success of earlier franchise entries. Civilization V is definitely in line with that trend, attempting to capture sales based on the commercial and critical success of 2005’s Civilization IV while also taking the franchise in some new directions. So how did they do? Read on and find out! The Hype: Sid Meier’s Civilization V is the fifth offering in the multi-award winning Civilization turn-based PC strategy game series. As with earlier installments in the series,…


iPad Game Review: Virtual City HD

A couple of months ago I reviewed the iPhone version of Virtual City, noting that my only real complaint was the lack of a sandbox mode. The game already took advantage of the high resolution Retina display, so my assumption was that there would be a minimal difference in the move to the iPad. Turns out I was right … and wrong. Read on to find out what I mean. The Hype: Build a city of your dream – a residential paradise or an industrial center. Build dwelling houses and industrial buildings. Produce goods and deliver them to the shopping…


Fruit Ninja for iPhone/Touch Review

I have developed a few preferences while gaming on my iPhone.  First, the games have to obviously be fun, but also something I can play in short spurts.  My life has become much too busy to sit around and work through levels and play for long periods of time.  About all the time available now is a minute here or two minutes there.  The IOS as a gaming platform is perfect for these types of games.  Another preference is that the games utilize Game Center.  A group of my football players have began competing pretty heavily with our Game Center…


How Much Gaming Should $1 Get You?

I recently did a review of a series of $1 iPhone Apps, and in that article I struggled a bit with assessing the value proposition of those games. After all, over the last decade iTunes has successfully trained us that $1 is pretty much a throw-away in terms of value. You are lucky to find a song for that much at iTunes or Amazon, most stuff in the vending machines at my work costs more, and forget about getting a cup of even basic coffee for $1 anymore! But still I was concerned … just what is fair to expect…


PC/XBOX360 Game Review: ArcaniA: Gothic 4

If you read my ‘impressions’ of the demo version of ArcaniA, you know that even though I pre-ordered the game I had several hesitations about the potential for the game to be any good, and even more reservations about it being a ‘good Gothic game’. Having now completed the game as both a mage and a warrior, I’m ready to render my verdict on both counts … The Hype: Arcania is a Fantasy Action game set in a rich world that invites the player to explore all of its innumerable attractions and details. Different climate zones, abundant flora and fauna,…


Catapult Madness for iPhone/Touch Review

A strange thing often happens with IOS games.  Sometimes a simple, seemingly boring game can become completely addicting bringing joy, frustration and waste lots of time.  I recently found Catapult Madness at the top of the games list and it was on sale for free so I thought I would give it a try.  I was mildly amused at first, but kept wanting to extend the distance I threw the peasants so I kept playing.  That mild amusement turned into straight addiction as I kept upgrading and getting further and further.  The addition of GameCenter compatibility has created more of…


Gear Games Reviews: A Foursome of ‘Bite Sized’ Casual iPhone Games

BUT WHAT ABOUT VIDEO GAMES? So … where do iPhone games fall in regards to what you should do at a ‘dollar store’? That is always a tough call – $1 seems like so little, but pretty soon you find you’ve spent as much as a full-size game! And hopefully you have actually gotten many hours of gameplay from those dollar games, but just as likely you have played most for about five minutes and never touched them again. Anyway, for my next set of micro-reviews I am looking at four recently released $1 games – some are good, some…


PC/XBOX360/PS3 Game Review: ‘Meh’dal of Honor

I would assume that the expression ‘meh’ as something average or unimpressive is widely enough known to anyone with internet experience that it is fair to say that I have ‘tipped my hand’ as far as my opinion goes. So you can leave now knowing I thought Medal of Honor was a mediocre and very skippable experience, or you can read on and find out WHY I felt that way … and also discover that aside from ‘meh’ my favorite word to describe this game is ‘unfortunate’. The Hype: Operating directly under the National Command Authority, a relatively unknown entity…


iPad / iPhone Game Review: Review: Knights of the Phantom Castle

If you look back to the first year following the release of the Nintendo DS, most of the games released were little more than GameBoy Advance games re-purposed to use the second screen with perhaps some touch controls thrown on for good measure. Similarly, in my first six months with the Apple iPad I have witnessed many iPad games that are little more than up-scaled iPhone games. I would definitely put Knights of the Phantom Castle in that category. That doesn’t make it a bad game, as you will see – it just tells you something about what to expect….


PC Game Review: Mount & Blade: Warband

When I reviewed Mount & Blade at the end of 2008, I said “the target audience for Mount & Blade is rather small, but for that group of gamers it scratches an itch that has been around for years, and does so in a very satisfying way. The game provides hours of fun, and an experience that doesn’t get stale.” Fast forward 18 months to the stand-alone expansion Warband, and we find that everything has been improved yet the overall experience is diminished. How does THAT work? Read on and find out! The Hype: Mount & Blade: Warband is the…


PC/XBOX360/PS3 Game Review: Alpha Protocol

What the HECK took me so long to get my review of Alpha Protocol done? Didn’t I mention months ago having finished the game? Didn’t I later say I was going back and replaying again … and haven’t some months ensued since THAT as well? It is all true, and since then I have gone back again, looking to reduce the ‘two minds’ I have about so much of this game into a coherent review … you’ll have to read on to find out how I did! The Hype: The year is 2009. Worldwide political tensions are at a breaking…


Nintendo DS Game Review: Etrian Odyssey III: The Drowned City

There are some who would have you believe that all of the games for the Nintendo DS are either casual puzzle games, shovelware (bad licensed games) or licensed products such as Pokemon (i.e good shovelware). Since I like neither or those game types and have played and reviewed more than a couple hundred DS games over the last five years, and have a library of over 100 DS games I love to play, it is safe to assume the platform has more to offer. From excellent adventures such as Hotel Dusk to grand strategy games like Advance Wars to the…


Is Gaming REALLY Cheaper Than Ever?

Image courtesy of ArsTechnica Many times I have mentioned that games today are relatively cheap – especially in light of my memory of paying $60 for a Sega Genesis game for my brother-in-law nearly 25 years ago! And that is exactly the point of a new article at ArsTechnica, which calls it an ‘inconvenient truth’ that game prices have actually fallen over time. From the article: During one of our discussions on the issue of game pricing, we tracked down a press release putting the suggested retail price of both Mario 64 and Pilotwings 64 at $69.99. Halpin says that…


iPhone Game Review: Virtual City

The game SimCity came out in 1989, but its presence is still felt in every corner of the gaming industry. From new incarnations on consoles and PDAs and phones to new versions for PC and other platforms to influenced games for a variety of platforms, it is clear that Will Wright had SOMETHING right! The iPhone and iPad have been home to a number of games in this style, and I have just found my new favorite – Virtual City from G5 Entertainment! The Hype: Build a city of your dream – a residential paradise or an industrial center. Build…


Lord of the Rings Online Doubles User Base, Revenue With ‘Free to Play’ Model

I have written about Lord of the Rings Online when it was announced that it would be free-to-play, when it actually launched, and included it in a review round-up as well. It is an excellent MMORPG … and apparently it has done extremely well in the transition from subscription to free-to-play. Turbine, the developer, noted at GDC Online that the game has doubled both the subscriber base and revenue since the game became free to play. The game’s Executive Producer, Kate Paiz, noted that the revenue had doubled in spite of removing the subscription fee. But there is even more…


Gear Games Reviews: Freemium Fever! LotR Online, D&D Online, Quake Live

Image courtesy of the freemium blog I have had such great feedback from my ‘quickie’ music reviews that I thought – wouldn’t it make sense on occasion to apply the same logic to video games? I mean, I will give a full review to Civilization V, but not everything needs such an extensive treatment, and sometimes games can easily be grouped together in a theme. With that thought I turned my attention to the so-called ‘freemium’ business model. I think the image at the top sums up Freemium pretty well – your product combines a Free segment with Premium content….


ArcaniA: Gothic 4 Demo Impressions

I have written about ArcaniA: Gothic 4 before here, here, here and here … and with each new notice I am feeling more and more positive. From the ashes of the awful Forsaken Gods expansion to Gothic 3 in the wake of its separation from Gothic developer Piranha Bytes, publisher Jowood and new developer Spellbound seem to have been shaping a reasonably worth while successor. Late last week I got to put that to the test in the form of a demo. Since I have had such ‘trust issues’ with Jowood since the Gothic 3 debacle, I wanted to give…


Online Game Review: Star Wars: Clone Wars Adventures

Is it fair to say I’m a sucker for just about any game with a Star Wars label slapped on it? Yeah, I’d say so! So when I wrote about the upcoming Clone Wars Adventures ‘freemium’ game, I signed up for info and joined as soon as it launched! Now I’ve had a week to tinker around with the service – how does it play? Read on and find out! The Hype: * Extend the Fantasy: Kids no longer have to wait until the next exciting episode of Star Wars: The Clone Wars animated TV series to continue exploring and…


OnLive – Are You Ready for Full Price Rentals?

A while back the OnLive gaming service launched, and I posted my first impressions, and proceeded to spend much of my free time playing free demos of the various games available on the service. Now after a few months of hands-on experience I am ready to deliver my thoughts on this start-up video game-over network service. How does it work? Read on and find out! The Hype: OnLive is the pioneer of on-demand, instant-play video game services, delivering real-time interactive experiences and rich media through the Internet. With groundbreaking, patent-pending video compression technology, OnLive harnesses cloud computing to provide the…


iPad Game Review: Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars

Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars (GTA:CW from now on) has had an interesting history – it was originally released in arch 2009 for the Nintendo DS, got excellent reviews and was praised by older gamers who had complained that there were too few ‘mature’ DS games … yet it didn’t sell very well. For me,it remains one of the best games for the DS. Later that year it was ported to the Sony PSP, with better graphics and audio and reworked mini-games to deal with the lack of touch control. Once again great reviews … and once again lousy sales!…


PC/XBOX360/PS3 Game Review: Dragon Age: Origins – Witch Hunt DLC

Last month I reviewed the Golems of Amgarrek DLC, the month before that I reviewed the Leliana’s Song DLC, and the month before that I reviewed the Darkspawn Chronicles DLC with each one representing very different types of gaming experiences within the context of the Dragon Age universe: one was combat driven and narrow, one was a character study that got us behind the scenes with one of the main characters from the main game, and the most recent one was a high-level combat-centric module. I also noted that the final DLC was coming, called Witch Hunt, which was supposed…