Driver: Parallel Lines Review - A classic revenge tale.

By Sam Coles:

The Driver series has people split down the middle, some people love it while others seem to despise it, are they bad games? No not at all but they do seem to have a steep learning curve when it comes to its gameplay and mechanics. Driver: Parallel Lines is a game that a lot of people seem to hate and I don’t understand why because I really enjoyed for its great but clichéd revenge plot which stretches through 40 years of the main character’s life. It’s not perfect mind you like Driver 3 it has a few bugs, but it is still a blast to play today.

The game starts off in 1978 where you play as a young 18 year old named TK, who is a wheel man for people who are robbing shops etc. He is a cocky young man who likes to take money off of people with his superior driving skills in races. He gets involved with higher ups in the criminal underworld, where they plan a daring heist, however everything goes wrong and they use TK as the fall guy and he is put in prison for 40 years. The year is 2006 when TK is released from prison and the world has changed, he plans on taking down every single person that is responsible for putting him in prison not matter the cost. The game’s story is a classic revenge tale, but the voice acting and performances are excellent which will have you playing from start to finish.

Driver Parallel Lines is an open world game in the same vein as Grand Theft Auto, but rather taking place in fictional city it takes place in a recreation of New York City in 1978 and 2006, it’s not a complete recreation as this game was released on the PS2 and Xbox. You complete missions to progress the story which is mostly driving (obviously), but there are times where you are tasked with murdering people with a gun and the shooting is far better than Driver 3 with the simple addition of a lock on feature. This makes the on foot missions less of a chore because TK when running doesn’t feel stiff like Tanner did in Driver 3 and makes messing around with the arsenal of weapons fun.

You can get involved in side quests which can earn extra money to customise your personal vehicle. These can range from collecting money for a loan shark, racing or getting into trouble and survive a car chase. Yes, you can customise your car these are standard fare with paint, wheels and glass. However you do get access to more over the top stuff like bullet proof glass, tyres and nitro which gives extra speed. It’s a lot of fun to customise cars as you can make already fast cars extremely fast it’s absolutely ridiculous as they become extremely hard to control.

The game’s visuals are okay, they’re not bad or great they sit on the line of acceptable, but I can understand with all the cars and explosions on screen. Cars look decent and accurate to both time periods with the cool and angular cars of the 1970’s to the more curvaceous modern cars of 2006.

Driver: Parallel Lines is a decent open world game, with a fun concept of jumping from one time period to another, it gives you good sense of progression. It fixes everything from Driver 3 such as making the on foot missions more playable and fun, so you’ll feel more inclined to go on a murderous rampage like GTA. Pick this game up you can find it on a variety of platforms such as PS2, Xbox, Wii and PC.

Super Mario 64 Review - A landmark title, but it has aged terribly.

By Sam Coles:

Nintendo in the past have been known to release some fantastic games when they launch a console featuring the portly plumber Mario, with titles such as Super Mario Bros., Super Mario World and Super Mario 64. Super Mario 64 is regarded as one of the best Mario games and is touted to be a game that has aged well, although I disagree with that statement I understand what it did for 3D platformers at the time. However it has aged poorly with terrible camera angles and awkward platforming compared to today’s standards. Is it a bad game? Yes and no.

Super Mario 64 was one of the first 3D platfomers of the time and it really shows within the graphical and gameplay department, now I understand the game is old but I don’t understand how people can say that this game still holds up. How the game works is that you start off in a hub world which is Princess Peach’s castle, where you have various doors you can go through that is if you have enough power stars.

In each door there is a painting you can jump through where you then start the game and play through a level, before you start the level you have to choose what power star you want to collect. However you don’t have to go for that start because Super Mario 64 is fairly open to what approach you want to take, so if you don’t want to fight King Thwomp you don’t have to and instead go collect the 8 red coins.

Mario controls were tuned to suit a 3D plain, so he is a lot more acrobatic compared to the other games, but I expect they took notes from the Donkey Kong game that was released on the Game Boy back in 1994. There is no longer a run button like there was in older Mario titles, but instead he builds up momentum over time gradually getting faster. He can jump higher if you perform a succession of jumps with the final jump resulting in a back flip; this is great if you want to get around faster in larger areas. He can also perform the long jump which is extremely fun to use as well as a great way to traverse large gaps.

The controls are great in open areas; however when you get the later stages of the game it decides to throw you in cramped environments and this can get very aggravating with the controls and the camera, oh lord the camera. The camera is a nightmare in this game especially when you’re in enclosed spaces as it refuses to move in the direction you want it to go some times and it will be positioned where your screen is filled with a blurry brick wall texture. I don’t understand how Nintendo fan boys can completely disregard this terrible camera system and still say that this game holds up, the camera ultimately holds the game back and Nintendo themselves fixed it in the next Mario game Sunshine.

Visually the game looks awful, most games on the N64 have not aged well in the graphical department they tend to be a blurry and muddy mess. Although Mario 64 is brighter it doesn’t have the muddy textures like some games on the system, but the textures are flat and polygonal and Mario looks like an inflatable doll that has been deflated and inflated several times. There is nothing appealing about the presentation in this game.

Super Mario 64 is a game that has aged poorly it’s like the cheap wine of the video game world, the older it gets the more like vinegar it will taste like compared to other games from the 90’s that are like a fine vintage wine. The controls and camera get very frustrating in the later levels in the tight and enclosed spaces coupled with the horrendous presentation, there are better Mario games out there on the NES, SNES, GameCube  and Wii. 

Star Wars Battlefront II (PS2) Review - It has aged a fair bit.

By Sam Coles:

With the recent announcement of Star Wars Battlefront II from EA games and DICE I thought I would look back on the original Battlefront II that was released all the way back in 2005 on the PS2, Xbox and PC. People have said that this game is superior to the new game that came out in 2015 and yes that is true in some regards but honestly it has aged poorly in some areas and no I’m not just talking about the graphics. Let’s get into it.

Star Wars Battlefront has a campaign but it’s not as good as people like to make it out to be not to say the story is not interesting it’s in its execution where it falls short. The game is about a platoon of clone soldiers who are a part of the 501^st legion where you see them progress from the Clone Wars to the Galactic Civil War that is an interesting concept. However it is how it plays out that is the disappointment which is what a lot of people forget, the campaign missions are glorified bot matches and nothing else except cutscenes bookending each chapter and people forget that that’s all the Battlefront campaigns were, bot matches.

There is a lot in this game I’m not saying it’s a bad game but I’m just trying to address the fact the campaign was not as great as people like to make it out to be. You have instant action which is a lot of fun it’s like a virtual version of playing with your Star Wars toys where you can play in the prequel trilogy and the original trilogy so you can play as Stormtroopers, Clone Troopers and even Darth Maul which is a lot of fun.

You have Galactic Conquest where you fight over several planets to dominate the galaxy, what is unique about this mode is that every planet you take over you gain a perk for your army which give you the upper hand in the next battle. This mode is a lot of fun with a friend as it becomes a virtual game of tug of war and it can get incredibly tense with huge battles.

My favourite game mode in this game is the hero battles where you throw all strategy out the window for all out chaos with different heroes and villains with lightning, lightsabres and lasers flying everywhere and it is stupid fun.

Visually the game has not aged well with horrendous frame rate issues on the PS2 version which I do believe the frame rate is more stable on the Original Xbox version, but if you really want the most stable frame rate grab the PC version. However there are some levels that look great like the city of Theed and Endor.  The character models look polygonal with choppy animation, maybe I’m being a bit harsh on a game on the PS2 from 2005 but Resident Evil 4 and God of War came out the same year with excellent graphics and animation.

Can I recommend the original Battlefront II? On the PS2 no as it has a lot of technical issues. how about on the PC? Maybe but the campaign is repetitive and lacklustre because the missions are glorified bot matches and are not that interesting. You can still play this game online on PC as far I’m aware so jump in if you want to play some Star Wars battles online.

Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Review - "Say hello to my little friend"

By Sam Coles:

Grand Theft Auto now there is a title that is known for better or worse, better if you’re an avid gamer as it shaped a structure of how open world games are supposed to be made or worse if you’re a worried parent or right winged nutter. Grand Theft Auto is very influential in the gaming industry and if you owned a PS2 or still have a PS2 you probably own GTA III to San Andreas. I’m here to talk about Vice City my favourite game in the series and before you call me a twat in the comments it’s my opinion so don’t let it keep you up at night.

Grand Theft Auto Vice City starts with a big drug deal as Tommy Vercetti played by Ray Liotta hands over two cases of cocaine, however the deal was an ambush and Tommy’s colleagues are gun down in cold blood with the coke and 4 million dollars are stolen so Tommy comes out with nothing. Tommy phones his boss Sonny which to no surprise is not pleased with this report and has a bit of a tantrum. So Tommy must go on a quest across the neon lit streets of Vice City and rub shoulders with scum bags to help find his money to make sure he doesn’t end up in the bottom of the river. I love the story in this game as it is set in the 80’s so it’s a mixture of Scarface and Miami Vice so it’s cheesy and over the top which I love!

The gameplay wasn’t a massive leap from GTA III, but they took the foundations of that game and they tweaked them with better mobility and gunplay with more weapons to cause chaos with. They added new vehicle types like motorbikes, helicopters and a plane that flies like a plane and doesn’t glide like it did in GTA III. The missions had more variety as well and it wasn’t simply pick this person up or kill that person, you had certain stipulations in some missions like having a bomb rigged to your car etc. They added property which you could buy and save in different locations, but some of buildings can be used as a front where you can accumulate money over time and they have side missions tide to them to add few more hours of gameplay.

Presentation is nailed with the 1980’s setting and the game still looks pretty good considering that it came out 15 years ago, but the character models look a bit polygonal and not very good. The environment still looks decent with the neon signs, the beaches on a hot day and the blue teal water glimmering in sunshine as you skim a speedboat across the waters of Vice City. The game has a great selection of licenced music from the era from Slayer to Michael Jackson, it has something for everyone.

Grand Theft Auto: Vice City is a blast to play with the over the top action, interesting characters and a killer soundtrack. If you haven’t played this A. where have you been the last 15 years and B. go get it! It’s super cheap on the PS2 I picked it up for 50p in a charity shop or you can get on iOS or Android devices or you can pick it up on the PSN store on PS3 and PS4.

Trilogy Retrospective: Halo.

By Sam Coles:

The original Halo trilogy has its own space in the video game hall of history as it set the bar of how a first person shooter should be made for a console like Goldeneye did back in1998. It also set the standard for online multiplayer on consoles as well which Sony didn’t really grasp until the PS3.

Halo Combat Evolved (2001):

Halo was originally announced as a Macintosh exclusive during the late 90’s at an Apple event, but it wasn’t the game that it is now. The game was being developed by Bungie who were known for making Marathon which was the Mac’s answer to Doom which was dominating the Windows platform at the time.

Halo was actually conceptualised as a real time strategy game like their game Myth, but something happened Microsoft bought Bungie to secure for their launch title for the Xbox. Bungie started see what would it be like to take control of a soldier in the first person so they decided to make it an FPS, they wouldn’t revisit the RTS genre until Halo Wars.

Halo was launched with the Xbox in late 2001 and no one expect this game to be hit but it was a smash with its great singleplayer campaign and classic local multiplayer and yes local this was before Xbox Live.

Halo is a science fiction FPS where take control of a super soldier known as a Spartan called Master Chief. Chief has been in cryogenic sleep for a while, then he is awaken as they are boarded by the alien enemy called the Covenant. The Covenant have been at war with the human military called UNSC as they are fleeing from one of their colonies called Reach which has been destroyed. They then crash land on a mysterious ring called Halo which seems like a strange planet, but they find out that it is one of many rings which act as super weapons to wipe life on a galactic scale.

The campaign was interesting with different characters with big and varied environments which you’ll shoot you way through, it does take things from other science fiction sources such as Aliens and Stargate etc.

The gameplay was incredible it blew what Goldeneye did for consoles out of the water and the main reason was the fact the Xbox had a second analogue stick so you could turn and strafe with ease. It kept traditional FPS tropes like health kits which people seem to forget and said Halo CE had regenerating health, but it was the shield that regenerated and not your health. It also included vehicles to help you traverse the more wide open spaces and they controlled well for the time, but they do feel slippery now.

Halo had a great multiplayer and I have so many memories of getting loads of friends together and playing 16 player multiplayer in one room, yes Halo had a great LAN community it was an expensive thing to do at the time but worth it. It had big scale battles for the time with complete chaos with game modes such as Capture the Flag or the classic Slayer with twists such as shotguns only, pistols only which is the most powerful weapon in the game and Rockets. Let’s just say that the multiplayer is still fun to boot up now when you have a group of friends to play with.

It would be another 3 years until we see a sequel for this game, but it did change the front for multiplayer and how games are played with friends today.

Halo 2 (2004):

Halo 2 up the ante in every aspect such as graphics, sound, music and multiplayer it was a huge game for the time and the first in the series to have online multiplayer and was still played online until they closed the servers in 2010.

Halo 2 takes place after the events of the original Halo and this time the game begins a cutscene from the Covenant point of view as you follow an Elite soldier who is in court due to the destruction of the Halo ring. He is then branded a traitor then later on becomes the Arbiter which is a sort of prophet that goes on suicide missions to takedown heretics. Yes for the first time in the series you played as two protagonists so you see the war from both sides which gives you a perspective and how the Covenant start to fight each other and split off. It was an interesting campaign despite its cliff hanger ending which would continue until 2007.

The graphics were the best graphics on the market for the time aspects that were improved was the details on Master Chief because you can see the engraving and blemishes on his armour and it made him look as if he was a battle scared hero. The vehicles and environments were given a much needed boost in details from ancient ruins to the Covenant homeworld.

Multiplayer was a big due to the new Xbox Live service at the time and defines how we play games online today on consoles; it was the most played game on the service for years to come until Halo 3 came out. It had the same game modes from the first one, but it had events some weeks and weekends with altered versions of current game modes something that would become standard in later Halo games.

Halo 2 was one of the best games of 2004 and Bungie were tooling up for a new generation of consoles and we wouldn’t see anything about until 2006.

Halo 3 (2007):

Halo 3 came out on Microsoft’s Xbox 360 and like Halo 2 added more content for fans to get stuck into.

Halo 3’s campaign starts from where Halo 2’s campaign ended with Master Chief plummeting to the Earth. It doesn’t look good for Chief as long-time friend Sargent Johnson examines his stiff and battered body from his fall and is ready to give up. Chief fortunately wakes up and everyone rejoices, but what Chief is not made aware of is that the Arbiter is working with them and gets into an altercation with him. Your objective is to takedown the prophet of truth and destroy the Covenant to end the war. This game was meant to be the conclusion for the series, but it cleary isn’t as the series is still going with 343 making the games now while Bungie work on Destiny.

Halo 3’s graphics were beautiful for the time as it was Master Chief’s jump to HD the first level in particular with its lush and vibrant jungle environment were stunning and honestly I would say that the environments still hold up. I can’t say that for the character models as they look very polygonal, but they served their purpose for the time.

Multiplayer was the main reason why many players logged so many hours for years on Xbox Live, with a higher player count and more game modes and events for players to take part. There were new and bigger maps for more chaotic battles my favourite being the map Valhalla with two bases with jump pads to throw you straight into the middle.

Halo 3 was the best game in the series in terms of its gameplay it’s the tightest of the series although they did tone down some of the weapon damage on some of the game’s most iconic weapons one of them being the Magnum which had no scope and the fire rate was slowed down by a lot. Overall the gameplay was fun and tight.

Halo 3 was a great conclusion to a trilogy well until Halo 4 came out, but that wasn’t handled by Bungie.

So where is Halo now? Well Bungie worked on a prequel called Reach which told the story of the events before Halo Combat Evolved which was fantastc. 343 Industries took the reins and started a second trilogy with the latest one being Halo 5 which was good but nothing compared to the original three games. Whatever you think of Halo you know it had an impact with how games are played today.

Metal Gear Solid 3 Snake Eater - The Birth of Big Boss.

By Sam Coles:

After the somewhat disappointing outcome with Metal Gear Solid V I’ve been going back and playing the older MGS games so I’m starting with Metal Gear Solid 3 Snake Eater which is my favourite in the series. So does it still hold up well after eleven years? In short yes.

Metal Gear Solid 3 takes place in year 1964 during the height of the Cold War; you play as Naked Snake a new soldier who eventually becomes the legendary soldier Big Boss and you witness the origin of how he obtain that title. It’s a great story with fantastic characters with twists and turns and over the top antics, my favourite cutscenes are the ones when a young Ocelot shows up and him and Snake get into a scrap every time. The story is entertaining it will make you laugh and it will make you cry which will keep you hooked from beginning to end.

The gameplay is like any other Metal Gear Solid game where you sneak around and infiltrate to free prisoners or gain intelligence on the latest Metal Gear. However it takes a different and realistic approach because instead of starting in the base you’re dropped in the middle of nowhere and you must find your way there.

Survival is the key word in this game because you have to manage your stamina by eating food and how you gain food is by hunting the flora and fauna which will gain back some of you stamina. How much stamina you gain back depends on what you eat so a snake might give you lots and a mushroom will give you very little, but don’t live your food because it will go rotten. You have to camouflage yourself as you’re in the middle of the jungle, you have a small indicator in the top right corner which will display a percentage and the higher the number the more you blend in with the environment, I like this because it makes you analyse the area and plan what strategies you can use to slip by undetected.

The graphics have actually aged very well in terms of the environments, but the graphics on the character models can look a bit polygonal which I can’t fault it too much as the game is eleven years old and that’s was what they could do at the time. Also the lip syncing with the dialogue is terrible in this game and I’m sure someone will say that’s what they could do, but that’s not the case look at Silent Hill 2 that has spot on lip syncing most of the time and that came out in 2001. The environments are good and varied from the starting jungles, massive military bases to the side of a mountain.

Metal Gear Solid 3 Snake Eater is an entertaining romp which still holds up eleven years later with its fantastic stealth gameplay and entertaining narrative so pick this game up it’s easy to find on PS2 or you can get it in the HD collection on Xbox 360 and PS3 so there are many ways to experience this game.   

Metal Gear Solid - The Birth of Cinematic Gaming.

By Sam Coles:

Metal Gear Solid is a series that I absolutely adore I’m a huge fan and this was the game that really kicked off the cinematic story telling that we all know today with professional cinematography and extensive cutscenes with top notch voice acting.

Metal Gear Solid is actually the third game in Hideo Kojima’s Metal Gear series except this time more people knew about it because it was on the Sony Playstation rather than the obscure Japanese home computer known as the MSX 2. It was renowned for pushing the Playstation’s hardware to its limit because it was the first game to render everything in 3D and it was the technical achievement.

The story of Metal Gear Solid is very gripping and complex and I would be here all week if I were to go in depth so I’ll try and give you a basic gist. You play as an agent code named “Solid Snake” and you’ve been tasked to take down a terrorist group who were former members of the next generation special forces called Fox Hound, but they have gone rouge and are demanding for a large cash some and are asking for the remains of Big Boss the legendary Soldier that Snake was cloned from. I would say spoilers but this game is over 15 years old you’ve had plenty of time to play it. If their demands aren’t met in 18 hours they’ll launch a nuke from the mobile tank known as Metal Gear Rex.

You’ll be facing a colourful selection of bosses within the Fox Hound unit you have Revolver Ocelot a master with his Colt Single Action Armies, Psycho Mantis an ex-Soviet Psychic who reads your every move, Vulcan Raven a Native American Shaman with a minigun, Sniper Wolf a seductive sniper that sometimes falls in love with her target and finally you have Liquid Snake Solid’s brother. Each of these bosses are unique and require different strategies to defeat them for example you have to plug your controller in the second port in order to beat Mantis so he can’t read your mind.

Gameplay takes an overhead viewpoint like the first two Metal Gear Games from the MSX 2 which stuck with the series until Metal Gear Solid 3 Subsistence. These days it does feel incredibly awkward to control, but at the time it gave you a sense of tension because you couldn’t see what was a head, yeah you had a first person view but you could move in that mode and yeah you have radar but it gets jammed easily which makes you very venerable.

When you start your mission you’ll have no weapons and barely any items you have 1 ration, cigarettes and a pair of binoculars you have secure all you weapons and equipment on site all you have are your fists. Even when you’re armed to the teeth you’ll always lose because when you get hit by a bullet it does major damage and when you start the game your health bar is the size of a tadpole. The way you increase your life bar is by defeating bosses and this doesn’t only increase your life bar it increase the amount of ammo, rations and grenades you can carry which becomes very useful in later stages of the game. You gain access to a vast array of weapons and gadgets such as your generic fire arms such as the Socom pistol, Famas to the cool gadgets like the thermal goggles and the remote control rocket launcher called the Nikita.

The things that have dated with this game are the visuals obviously because this game came out in 1998 and the controls can be a bit clunky and stiff when your moving snake around, it feels like he moves grid by grid.

Metal Gear Solid is a great game and if you’re looking to get ready for Metal Gear Solid V The Phantom Pain I would recommend playing this game. It’s really easy to find and it’s not too expensive you can find on the PS1, PS3 on the Metal Gear Solid Legacy Collection or on the PSN store. I would recommend getting the Legacy Collection.

  

Retro Sundays: Sonic the Hedgehog 2.

By Sam Coles:

Sonic the Hedgehog made his debut in 1990 on the 16 bit system known as the Sega Megadrive or Genesis if you are from the US. It was different to what we have seen compared to Nes at the time because the Snes wasn’t out at the time. Sonic had attitude and could speed around the level with his lightning fast running through the colourful worlds. It’s sequel in 1992 Sonic the Hedgehog 2 added a sidekick called Tails the two tailed fox.

Like all the Sonic games you are trying to stop Doctor Robotnik from taking over the world and turning all the animals into robots of war. You’ll traverse lots of worlds and zones as you collect rings and chaos emeralds. 

What I love immediately with this game are the graphics they’re really beautiful and considering that this game came out 22 years ago it still holds up today with the colourful plains Emeralds Hill zone to the flashing lights of Casino Night zone. The levels are all varied and it never gets boring when you’re playing through the game because it’s different in each zone with new obstacles. 

Through out your sprint through the levels you’ll be collecting rings, like Mario when you get 100 you’ll gain an extra life, but unlike Mario it doesn’t reset to zero because you need a certain amount to access the bonus stages at the checkpoints. Bonus stages will transport you in a 3D style view from behind Sonic and Tails where you have several rounds to collect rings and if you are successful you’ll collect a chaos emerald which if you collect them all you can turn into “Super Sonic” where you turn yellow and you can run at ridiculous speeds.

The only problem that I have with this game is the boss battles with Robotnik because they’re not very exciting because he is very predictable with his attacks and you’ll get the pattern in about a second.

Overall Sonic the Hedgehog 2 is a fun game and will give you something to do if you want to burn sometime very quickly. This game is very cheap today and is very easy to find on the Sega Megadrive, The Sonic Mega Collection on PS2 and the Megadrive collection Xbox 360 and PS3.

Retro Sundays: Grand Theft Auto Vice City Stories (PS2).

By Sam Coles:

I’m starting a new segment called “Retro Sundays”. Why Sunday you ask? Honestly it’s because I use to play all sorts of games on a Sunday especially on a rainy one, from old to new because I have the time to relax and play games for a long period.

Let’s start with a game that I don’t think gets enough appreciation and that’s probably because it was on the ill-fated PSP originally and I’m of course talking about Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories.

You step in the shoes of Victor Vance you may recognise the surname of this character if you played the original Vice City back in 2002 and that’s because he is the older brother of Lance Vance. What I like about this character is that when you start off he is not a criminal he is an honest man trying to start a career in the army until he gets involved with a corrupt sergeant who is delves in drugs and illegal fire arms trades.

 

The gameplay is very similar to the original Vice City game, but also borrows elements from San Andreas such as being to recruit followers if you have taken over a business and also your followers can do drive bys out the window of the car. The only problem I have with the game is the aiming is unpredictable in a gunfight and you’ll end up aiming at a random pedestrian rather than the person who is trying to kill you.

 

Unlike some games in the series you must take over businesses from enemy gangs to help you gain income, how you do this is that you must start some commotion by blowing up their cars or killing their fellow gang members outside and you‘ll start an attack. What you have to do is that you must defeat all the members outside the business and then enter the premises and take out the remaining members.

 

After you have cleared up the place you can then shape what you want your racket to be from drugs to prostitution, but be careful the enemy gangs will fight back and attack your rackets and try and take them back, so you must defend them. This feature kind of reminds me of the Godfather games where you had to do the same thing by intimidating shop keepers for money. Each racket adds to your weekly income that you accumulate from business and this happens every in game week.

 

Graphically its looks pretty good for something that was ported from the PSP and yeah it does look dated but what do you expect for a game that was released on the PSP and then PS2 so it’s understandable. It still looks nice with the little details from the sun setting over the blue sea on Washington Beach as you cruise along with some 80’s metal, to the reflections on your car and on the road when it rains which is really impressive for the hardware.   

Overall Grand Theft Auto Vice City Stories is still an enjoyable game and I would recommend if you have a PS2 or PSP if you are willing to look past the frame rate issues on the handheld. It’s very cheap and easy to find these days so if you have a bit of change in your pocket I would recommend buying it I picked it up for £3.99 in my independent video game shop.

Retro Review: Super Mario Land.

 

 

By Sam Coles:

We’ve entered the season known as “bugger all is coming out” where the gaming industry takes a back seat with news and releases of games so it gives us gaming reviewers and journalists a time to rest and indulge ourselves of games from the past or review games that we didn’t get to review this time round.

The game in question in this retro review takes us back to the year 1989, this marked the release date of the Nintendo Gameboy and it was the first commercially successful portable gaming system by Nintendo. I know you’re all going to say that it wasn’t the first portable gaming system and bring up the Game and Watch, but this system really broke into the casual market with people who don’t usually play video games, with titles such as Tetris that helped.

The launch title I’m here to review is Super Mario Land it was released alongside the Gameboy in 1989 and was the first Mario game not to be created by the legendary Shigeru Miyamoto, but was instead headed and directed by the creator of the Gameboy and the producer of the Metroid series Gunpei Yokoi. So we had a new Mario game that was trusted to someone else.

 

 

So if you have been living under a rock or something you should know how a standard Mario game works with running and jumping keeping up a good speed to get through a level with careful platforming, but with some new enemies that we haven’t seen since this game debuted, from weird flies to sphinx’s that spit fire at you.

The locales aren’t your standard Mario setting either because instead of the familiar Mushroom Kingdom you have various locations from the different continents and countries around the world. These could be an Egyptian temple to an Easter Island style cave with the statues displaying in the background.

 

As well as the standard running and jumping in this game they added different segments to split up and add variety to gameplay such as having Mario piloting a submarine to get through those annoying water levels quickly while shooting everything in your way or fly in a plane and again shoot everything that moves. When you finish each level there will be two exits, the bottom one will let you finish as usual and the top one will grant you a bonus mini game where you have to determine which platform Mario goes on to score an extra life or power up such as a fireflower.

My only nitpicks with this game and it’s mainly due to the hardware limitations of lack colour is the fact you can’t tell when Mario has a fireflower and they did fix this situation with Super Mario Land 2 by having a feather in his cap, but it’s a bit irritating in this one. Another slight annoyance is that Mario does have any momentum when he jumps he feels incredibly floaty and sometimes you can’t judge where he is going to land when you go for long distance jumps.

Overall Super Mario Land is still a great game and is good to burn some time when you have nothing to do due to its short length and that’s not a bad thing. You can pick it up for fairly cheap because it’s not a particularly rare game, so if you want to relive some nostalgia or want to play it for the first time then pick up your Gameboy, Gameboy Colour or Gameboy Advanced. There is no shortage of systems to play this on.