Need For Speed: The Run opens, paradoxically, inside a closing car crusher. Within the next five minutes wheelman hero Jack has escaped from the squashy clutches of metallic cube death, stolen an Audi from his Mafioso captors and, after being followed by them at harrowingly close range and pelleted with gunfire, edges the closest of encounters with a high-speed freight train. It’s a scenario seldom seen in the franchise, and the story it lends itself to aims to create a constant sense of danger, tension and spectacle. However, weighty car handling and the occasional presentational bullseye can’t save the game from its paper-thin story and obsessive desire to adhere to the script. (more…)

It’s easy to hold the usual bias against any franchise that releases a product year on year but the bottom line is that Call Of Duty games, EA Sports games and Assassin’s Creeds of the gaming world are handled that way because they’re successful, and they’re successful because they’re consistently good at what they do. Assassin’s Creed Revelations takes what its two incredible predecessors did absolutely right and carries those aspects into this new iteration. Unfortunately, excessive and ultimately unnecessary side-content is also included, and I’m not referring to multiplayer. (more…)

Krelith, MightyMutt, Yamster & Pillowfort talk arrow ladies, murderous canines and flying mammoths. Come, watch us Ramble!  (more…)

Ever ready to please the droves of dead-eyed parents pushed for time and ideas this Holiday season, Medieval Moves (subtitled Deadmund’s Quest in the States) is a new PlayStation Move title from San Diego Studio and Zindagi Games, they of Sports Champions fame. Priced affordably and adorned with kid-friendly smiley skeletons and comedy giant swords, Medieval Moves sets itself up promisingly but ultimately turns into a mediocre slog designed to keep the younger ones busy on Christmas morning.

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I’ve been up and down on RAGE.  On one hand, the gameplay aspects, mainly driving and shooting, are pretty solid; however, on the other, the game itself is about as common as you can get for a first-person shooter. (more…)

You could say that Skyrim is just what you expected out of an Elder Scrolls game, and surely, Bethesda hopes you feel that way. However, there is something that rattles you right down to your core when you look over your shoulder at your Housecarl, Lydia, to see she’s staring up at the sky with concern etching her brow. Why? Because there’s a massive dragon that’s been circling you for about five minutes, letting out a few limb-rattling roars that threaten to rip you in half if you don’t find shelter. What does Lydia do? She merely stares up at the sky and then peels her eyes away to give you a questioning glance. Now what?

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Hurry! Hurry! Hurry! Step right this way for all of the fun of the fair! Okay … without candy floss or toffee apples … but other than that – all the fun of the fair I tell you! Alright, alright you can’t win a goldfish or a giant teddy bear … but other than the lack of toffee apples, candy floss, goldfish or giant teddy bears, it’s all the fun of the … huh? Okay, okay! It’s just SOME of the fun of the fair, but at least it doesn’t have any of the untrustworthy unwashed dodgy nomads and their nailing-coconuts-to-their-stand style shenanigans.

Come find out if you’re a Carnivore …

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7.5; seven and a half out of ten; seventy five percent. In the United Kingdom, it equates to achieving an A grade in any standardised school test, which would suggest that the work was made up of content that was at least three quarters excellence. Which seems pretty fair. With that in mind, why is the internet up in arms over a review of The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword by GameSpot, which has awarded the game an overall score of, you guessed it, 7.5?

The answer lies in our general attitude to review scores and our expectations of what constitutes a “good” rating – and how we’ve been spoiled on 10/10s.

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This being my first foray into a Saints Row game, I wasn’t exactly sure what to expect. Sure I fooled around with the second game a bit, but apart from creating a sumo wrestler with a Latina’s voice, I didn’t delve into the craziness that surrounds the series. What was ahead of me was a world so insane, that I dare not spoil it for you. This is something you must experience for yourself. And I’m pretty sure there’s something funny in the water over at Volition HQ.

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I’ve debated whether there’s any point writing this. If you’re even vaguely familiar with the series, then you know what kind of content a Call of Duty contains. It may not come as much of a shock that, in this continuation of the world’s biggest “shoot dudes” gaming brand, there’s very little variation from the norm.

That’s not necessarily bad. The game still achieves things that are genuinely amazing; it’s just that you’ve probably already been amazed by them two years ago.

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