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Pinball FX2 fans rejoice, there is another tournament going on. This time it will feature everybody’s favorite wall crawler, Spider-Man. From July 29 – August 12 players will be …
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First person shooters typically use the right trigger to fire; for various styles of attacks, beat ’em ups often use X, Y and B; Radiant Silvergun has different weapons mapped to A, B, X, Y, left and right bumper and right trigger. In short, its heavy on the guns. Radiant Silvergun, developed by Treasure, will be joining Guardian Heroes (also developed by Treasure) in the Saturn-to-XBLA port ship. Much like Guardian Heroes, Radiant Silvergun also has some older mechanics that work surprisingly well despite being difficult to acclimate to.

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Worms and Worms 2 Armageddon have both been well received on XBLA, so naturally Team 17 had to bring their only true departure from the traditional Worms formula to the XBLA, …
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Those looking to change their gamertag but not willing to shell out the 800MSP are in luck. Next week (8/2 – 8/8) there will be a discount for the …
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Originally thought to be a PC/PSN only title, we are now getting word that All Zombies Must Die will be coming to XBLA at a later date. Developer Doublesix …
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Many young players will see Guardian Heroes and have no idea it’s actually a port from the Sega Saturn. This anime-styled brawler supports three 2D planes rather than a fully traversable 3D plane, tons of characters to play and unlock, a branching story arc with several different endings and encounters which, if opted out of to go down a different path, will never be experienced. This fast-paced HD-ified port brings some old mechanics into the present. The good news? It doesn’t feel a bit dated.

The controls are fairly intuitive, with X standing in for light attacks, Y for heavy, and A for a quick dodge back. B is reserved for special abilities—in the case of our Mage demo, that was magic. Those straightforward controls were balanced by a unique addition: the left bumper and left trigger, which jump planes toward and away from the player. Navigating planes takes a little getting used to, but it soon becomes second nature. (Though the adjustment period is a little more extensive when you’re trying to do this in the heat of combat.

In the interest of time, we skipped through the dialogue of the story—we were in a bit of a rush to see the meat of the gameplay. The story was told in pretty typical old-school fashion though: portraits of the characters would pop up on the screen and the camera would shift to them. It certainly feels very retro; it’s not necessarily a bad thing, but gamers that have gotten used to rich cinematics and other “modern” accoutrements may feel a bit estranged.

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It’s no secret that we loved Double Fine’s hybrid action/tower defense title Trenched. After E3, we sold all our stock in Mayo producing companies and went all in on …
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We know it’s what you’ve all been waiting for–the ability to start up a talk show with your avatars. Okay, so we secretly admit it’s kinda cool too. That …
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Long gone are the days of the original Dungeons & Dragons, long gone are the arcade antics of Gauntlet, but verily they are not forgotten! Crimson Alliance brings us back to the old days of having only a fighter, a wizard and a rogue (well, an assassin, but close enough!), an isometric camera, and four buddies ripping up baddies. However, Certain Affinity knows what assumptions come with that isometric camera and that fantasy theme and strives to take the gameplay above and beyond the genre’s conventions. In our interview with Mike McCarthy, game designer for Crimson Alliance, he called their game “The thinking man’s pick-up-and-play hack ‘n’ slash”—and we would most definitely agree.

Crimson Alliance is very heavy on the action and very focused on providing a balanced experience for all three characters. Better still, gameplay doesn’t require much setup time so players can get straight to the action. A wizard, fighter and assassin will be playable in the full game, but the Comic Con demo only had the wizard and fighter; we chose the wizard to test how well he would do solo. As it turned out, the wizard felt incredibly capable: very offensive and full of awesome multitasking greatness rather than simply a robed supporter.

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Two friends are on an adventure, one finds a gem and one finds a hat. But Hatty wants the gem, so his unnamed friend gives it to him and Hatty starts to cry. Everyone wonders why. The confusion is interrupted by giant cat guards that arrive to send the unnamed friend to prison. Oh, and we’re in a theater. On an island. That’s the setup for Behemoth’s upcoming game, Battleblock Theater.

Battleblock Theater will be a 2D platform puzzle action game, otherwise known as a plactuzzleformer, featuring four player couch and online co-op as well as an online arena for adversarial play. Players can also play solo, but the game is definitely intended as a co-op experience. Levels scale to fit the amount of players to ensure that the difficulty is always appropriate as you advance the story. On the multiplayer side, there will be plenty of different gametypes, ranging from the casual to the hardcore (five have been announced and there are more to come).

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