Back in May of 2006 I wrote a review of Rockstar’s Table Tennis. The game came out just as the Wii hype was taking place, and people immediately said - “Why isn’t this coming out on the Wii?” Fast forward to today when the game finally makes an appearance on Nintendo little white console. But is it the game people hoped it would be? Not quite.

For the most part the game remains completely unchanged in terms of content. There’s still the same characters, courts and outfits to unlock. In fact the entire single player campaign is identical to the Xbox 360 counterpart. Where the game differs is the online multi player component, namely there isn’t one on the Wii. Read the rest of this entry »

There’s a show on TV right now called Pushing Daisies in which the main character talks to dead people to help solve the mysteries surrounding their deaths. Folklore follows a similar premise by having you visit the netherworld to unravel a mystery in the village of Doolin. In Folklore you follow the story and play as two different characters with intertwining paths. Ellen is a distressed young woman drawn to the Village of Doolin by a mysterious letter from her dead mother.

Keats is a reporter at a sci-fi magazine who receives a frantic phone call from a woman at the Village of Doolin. Both arrive to find a woman dead on the cliffs of the town, and murder is in the air. It’s their job to get to the bottom of the crime as well as discover what exactly happened in the village 17 years ago in the Village’s past.

The game itself is broken up into two parts. The first has your character walking around town, talking to townsfolk and looking for clues. The second has your character transported to the land of the dead to talk to a character from village who has since been deceased to fill in a piece of the puzzle. Each one of these sections make up a chapter of the game, and each chapter is played by each character. Cut scenes are played out in a pseudo comic book style look with a mix of frames and real rendered 3d graphics with popup text. This was sort of a disappointment to me as there are a few cut scenes that are actually rendered really well with complete voice overs, while the graphic novel style cut scenes seemed more low budget. With all the touts of Blu-Ray and the space it provides, not having the voice overs in these other cut scenes seems sort of silly. Especially when a huge epic RPG like Mass Effect or even Oblivion has every line of dialog voiced.
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What would have happened if during the height of the Cold War in the 80’s the Russians had decided to invade America. With our forces spread thin around the globe fighting other battles, would we have been able to protect our own soil? That question is asked and answered in World in Conflict, the latest RTS game from Massive Entertainment, the creators of the Ground Control series.

From the first mission of WiC you can tell this game is going to have A LOT of explosions in it. With the Russians choosing Seattle as their landing zone, and all hell breaking loose in the city, it’s your job to try to salvage what you can. Before you know it highways are collapsing and the Seattle Dome is being turned into rubble. You’re character, Lieutenant Parker, is set in charge of small units of infantry, tanks, artillery and air craft. What sets WiC apart from other RTS titles is there is the way you add units to your army. You gain the ability to airdrop units in and call in fire support by killing other units and surviving. Amass enough resource points, choose your drop location, and units and bring in the reinforcements. Amass enough Victory Points and you’ll be able to call in air strikes, artillery and even laser guided missiles. There’s no resource gathering, no base building, no worrying about unit upgrades. This lets you concentrate on one thing: blowing up Russians.
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With Lair somewhat of a disappointment, and Warhawk a multi player only title, PlayStation 3 owners have been hungry for a solid AAA single player experience. Hopes and expectations have been high for Heavenly Sword, and some are hoping it will help justify there $600 investment. While I don’t think any one title is capable of that kind of justification, Heavenly Sword isdefinitely a piece of that puzzle.

Heavenly Sword is the tale of an ancient sword sent from the skies to help conquer evil in the world. Ironically, those who wield the sword are corrupted by it’s power becoming evil themselves, and killing all those in its path. Heavenly Sword puts you in the shoes (or sandals) of Nariko, a fiery red head who needs to wield the Heavenly Sword to protect her clan on the brink of destruction from an evil king.

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Well this will end my E3 coverage here on the Blog. I had a really great time, met some really awesome people and played a ton of incredible games.

To help ease the pain of wading through all the coverage I’ve compiled a huge list of all the games I played as well as a sentence or two of impressions with a final recommendation for the game.

The full list is available after the break.

Also, I wanted to point out this link to all the audio recordings I did during E3. There are lots of goodies there including an interview with Peter Moore and a demo of Mass Effect.

You can also hear my radio interviews Post-E3 with In-Game Chat as well as Evil Avatar Radio Episode 65 (once it’s posted).
Next up on the ol’ ba-schedule is PAX in Seattle at the end of August. I’m not sure how much I’m going to “work the show” but I’ll still be posting stuff about it. I mean, how much can a game change in 6 weeks?

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