June 2008 Archives

Platform: PC
Reviewed on PC

Windows System Requirements: 800 MHz processor, 256 MB RAM, nVidia GeForce 4 series video card or equivalent, 1 GB HD space, internet connection, Windows 2000 or XP

Giant fighting robots called "Mechanaughts" meet in sporting arenas or cityscapes to determine who has the biggest gun and the superior pilot by slugging it out with high-powered weaponry and melee weapons the size of small trees.

Platforms: Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3
Reviewed on PlayStation 3

General Ratiev is once again terrorizing the free world, taking hostages and unleashing hordes of minions to fire slow-moving bullets around the landscape. Only a trio of the world's toughest commandos has a hope of freeing the prisoners and putting a stop to Ratiev: Codenames Wolf, Coyote and Fox.

Platform: PC
Official Site: 1cpublishing.eu/game/death-track-resurrection

In the near, dystopian future, much of the world is in wreckage. Conventional, organized sports have fallen by the roadside as a single death-sport has grabbed the popular consciousness: "The Survival Race." This global event pits the drivers of well-armed vehicles against one another as they race and battle through the ruins of ten cities around the globe.

Platform: PC
Official Site kings-bounty.com

As a young hero (a warrior, paladin or recent graduate of the mage's academy), players venture out into a fantasy kingdom in search of wealth, glory and vast armies to lead. Starting with petty tasks performed for the local king, players encounter bandits and an undead local miller before choosing their own paths to lead armies of fantastic creatures in turn-based combat on behalf of allies of the players' choosing.

Platform: Xbox 360, PC
Reviewed on Xbox 360
Official Site: acesofthegalaxy.com/

The frenetic, on-rails space shooter genre has come and gone... and come back again. Sometimes it's a 2D-scroller. Sometimes, it's a 3D (or 3D-ish) fly-by. Regardless of the presentation, these things have always punished their fans. They sucked down your roll of quarters in the '80s and you wouldn't even get halfway through the game. Your thumbs bled, playing the console versions, but you always went back for more. Artech's Aces of the Galaxy is a throwback, next-gen shmup (the currently cool way to say "shoot 'em up," if you're 14). It's a throwback, both honoring and imitating the genre. But it's very next-gen as well, with slick, polished graphics (especially for an Xbox Live Arcade title), an appropriate musical score, and plenty of thumping sound effects. But keep in mind: This is a shmup, and it can be brutally hard.

Platform: PC
Official Site: 1cpublishing.eu/game/cryostasis-sleep-of-reason/

In the year 1968, Alexander Nesterov was to be stationed at "Pole 21," a Russian facility in the deep, northern Arctic. Trained as a meteorologist, Nesterov hardly expected to fall off a transport and awaken near a ship trapped in the ice. The North Wind, a nuclear-powered Russian ice-breaker might be frozen in deep polar ice, but it's still Nesterov's only hope to live longer than the few brief minutes exposure to the harsh Arctic winds and open ice will allow. Unfortunately, the crew of the North Wind is dead. Even worse, they're trying to get Nesterov to join them.

Platform: PC
Official Site: 1cpublishing.eu/game/necrovision

The War to End All Wars is raging, and a young, American soldier has joined the British army to get a taste of the trenches. But the front lines of 1916 are hardly the place for a young man to find himself. They are, however, an excellent place to find enemy Germans, insane allies, vampires and demons. Only by absorbing some of those demonic powers can this young man defeat the evil that lurks beneath the senseless waste of life that sprawls across Europe.

Platforms: Xbox 360 and PC
Official Site 1cpublishing.eu/game/captain-blood

Dr. Peter Blood was a doctor who made the treasonous mistake of treating wounded men who had rebelled against King James in the late seventeenth century. Despite wanting no traffic with the quarrels of kings, Blood was sentenced to death. But his sentence was commuted – instead of a short drop at the gallows, Blood received a long trip across the Atlantic and was made a slave on the island of Barbados. During Blood's unfortunate servitude, Barbados is attacked by Spaniards, leaving Blood and his fellow slaves the remarkable opportunity to steal a Spanish ship and maraud the Caribbean as pirates.

Supreme Ruler 2020 is a strategy game from Battlegoat Studios for the PC in which players take military, economic and political control of a nation, leading that nation to global supremacy. The first iteration of Supreme Ruler was released in 1985, with the most recent release (Supreme Ruler 2010) being in 2005. Read on to learn how to enter:

Platform: PC
Official Site: 1cpublishing.eu/game/men-of-war

Two students, Smirnov and Kuznetov, have found themselves wrenched from the pleasantries of academic life to fight against the invading troops of Hitler's Germany. As they are bloodied and promoted in Men of War, they follow the Soviet campaign resisting the German invasion in a tale that ultimately turns to include German and Allied missions that take players through Russia, North Africa, Europe and the Pacific.

Platform: DS
Reviewed on DS

Neku Sakuraba is a 15-year old boy who enjoys wandering the streets of the trendy Shibuya shopping district in Tokyo and gazing at graffiti. He's not much for human company, though, so he tunes out the crowds by constantly wearing headphones and affecting disinterest in other people. Then one day, he awakens in the middle of Shibuya with no memory, and no one can see him – save a few strange and trendy folks bearing pins or mysterious, tattoo-like wings. A message arrives on his cell phone letting him know that he must complete a series of missions or be erased from existence. Now part of some unknowable game, Neku must learn the rules as he goes and be victorious, just to survive.

Platforms: Xbox 360, PC, Mac, Linux,
Reviewed on Xbox 360

As if trapped in the inexorable grasp of a steam and fruit juice-powered contraption of Herculean proportions, Penny Arcade Adventures: On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness - Episode One (should I call it "Rain Slick"? or "PAAOTRSOD1"? Or perhaps, simply Herbert?) dragged me into an adventure I could not shirk, save for those moments in which I was required to ingest further coffee to fuel my caffeine-addled drive (and the obvious need to occasionally eliminate). Sweeter than treacle to play and more self-indulgent than... well... eating treacle, Rain Slick is like the fulfillment of a prophecy. As if thousands of days ago, a gossamer-clad waifish girl inhaled the fumes of a volcano and proclaimed, "One day there shall be a game, based on the online comic Penny Arcade in which, bearing an anointed rake, you shall battle creatures of metal with a carnal appetite for fresh fruit!" So it came to pass.

Platform: Xbox 360, PC
Reviewed on Xbox 360

"Buku Sudoku takes the pen-and-paper puzzler high-tech with HD graphics, helpful tutorials, single-and multiplayer game modes, multiple grid sizes and the option to display hints, highlight errors, undo moves and even solve puzzles."