Tuesday, April 29, 2014

TL;DR Game Reviews (February-April 2014)

Here's a quick rundown of the games I've played between February to now. Some of these games I didn't finish.

Dyad



It's hard to describe this game if you haven't played predecessors like Rez, Frequency and Amplitude and Audiosurf. It's a music and rhythm game that have you matching enemy pairs on screen. The objectives get progressively harder with musical elements involved. The first one I encountered include matching enemy pairs of the same musical note. You have to differentiate two notes along with the game's background ambient music and sound effects. It's a puzzle game at it's core, evident among the achievement segments per stage. I got it for free thanks to Playstation Plus.

Lone Survivor: The Director's Cut



No. It's not that Mark Wahlberg movie. It's a 2D survival horror game. It reminds me of Silent Hill more than Resident Evil, but the game is too self-aware as an homage. You don't really see it as its own entity. I didn't stick around to finish it. It's 2D graphics in the 8-bit sense. Playing it on your flat screen has it's moments, but the novelty wears off.

Castle of Illusion: Starring Mickey Mouse



This isn't just a simple remake. It's a 3D remake (well, 2.5D) of the original Sega Genesis game. The controls are still the same, but the visuals and puzzles leapt into the 3rd dimensions. The witch living in the Castle of Illusion kidnaps Minnie Mouse. Mickey fights through enemies which are illusions themselves. It's a throwback to old platformers before the Playstation 2/Gamecube/Xbox era. Don't expect God of War level of gameplay, though.

Hitman: Absolution



This is the first Hitman game I've played in the long-standing franchise. Square Enix has turned this game and Tomb Raider around after acquiring it. Agent 47, the bald suited protagonist, takes out his last and final victim from The Agency before abandoning his mission and saving a teenage girl whom others would kill for.

Like any Hitman game, you have multiple ways of dispatching your targets. It depends on whether you care about accolades (achievements or trophies) or just having fun and playing the game. I tried to do all the objectives in each missions. It would take me 2-3 hours per mission, killing only my target without disguising myself. At some point I got tired and just silently took out all the other enemies before approaching my main target. Then all hell broke lose when the enemy took over an orphanage, killing the priests and nuns. That's not cool at all. So I took out all the gunmen. Sorry, not sorry.

Wizorb



If you like the old Pong/Space Invader hybrid games like Breakout and Arkanoid, you'll like Wizorb. Wizorb is an Arkanoid game wrapped in an RPG-like story. That's about it.

I'm done.

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