Looking Through The Rain: A Sneak Peak At “Heavy Rain”
We recently got a chance to meet with Guillaume de Fondaumiere, CEO of Quantic Dream and executive producer of Heavy Rain, who showed off two scenes from the game, spoke about its development and gave us the opportunity to play through one of these scenes. The experience left us adding Heavy Rain to the calendar and eager to see more.
Everybody Was Kung Fu Fighting - Street Fighter IV
Ever wanted to visit the early 90s, but found yourself lacking a Delorian and a flux capacitor? Well, Capcom have managed to compress the whole experience onto a little disc, and have called it Street Fighter IV.
Just in case you’re too young to remember, the Street Fighter series (well, let’s be honest, it was mainly Street Fighter II and all its different forms, like Alpha, EX, EX Alpha, Alpha XX…y’know what I mean) was the staple of arcade games in the early 90s. If you wanted realistic motion capture, super-powerful characters beating on others that never stood a chance, and a hell of a lot of blood, you played Mortal Kombat II; if you didn’t, it was Street Fighter II. SFIV manages to capture everything that made the original the success it was, completely updating it for the modern gamer and consoles, never quite losing its touch.
Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe (2008)
Mortal Kombat? Batman? Superman? Fighting? In a video game? What’s not to like?”
At this point, expect a slap across the face to calm yourself down.
Fallout 3 (2008)
The world of role-playing games is a curious one: games following an RPG-model are a dime a dozen these days, a new release coming nearly every other month that tries to capture the feeling. Few games, though, are as immersive as they need to be to be to work, and there are a lot fewer ‘good’ games out there than ‘bad.’
Fallout 3, thankfully, fits into the ‘good’ category, sitting comfortably far from the borders of mediocrity. Gamers may already be familiar with Bethesda for their other recent RPG hit, Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, a sword-and-sorcery style RPG that made many critics’ lists for one of the best games of 2006. Fallout 3 takes what worked for Oblivion and updates them into an RPG of the future (despite some very retro looks and feels.)
Spider-Man: Web Of Shadows (2008)
Just as comic-book based movies have proven uber-popular (though not always good or successful) over the past decade or so, so too have video-games based on the characters and worlds of comics, with Marvel and DC comics in particular leasing out their characters for both original games and marketing tie-ins. Some are successful with fans, critics and general sales alike (generally the original games); some, not so much.
Spider-Man: Web of Shadows falls somewhere squarely between the two: while not a direct sequel to the Spider-Man movies and their tie-in games, there’s enough similarities to make this an unofficial Spider-Man 4, while enough content to make the game relevant and help it stand on its own.
Super Duper - Super Smash Bros Brawl (2008)
Anyone who remembers the early 1990s will probably remember the various different feuds that were going on at the time: we had Oasis versus Blur, we had Pogs versus Monsters In My Pocket and, of course, we had Nintendo versus Sega. Now, in 2008, those feuds have long since been and gone, but in case there’s some part of you that always wanted to know who would win if Nintendo’s Mario went toe-to-toe with Sega’s Sonic, then Super Smash Bros. Brawl is the game for you.
Mario Kart Wii (2008)
Do you know those people who have a tendency to lean to one side when playing a video game, as if it will urge their character around a corner faster? Well Mario Kart Wii was probably designed with people like this in mind. The latest outing from Nintendo’s speed-demon racing franchise comes hand-in-hand with their attempts to appeal to a market of gamers and non-gamers alike, effectively trying to be all things to everyone at the same time. The funny thing is that it actually works.
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