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The inclusion of state-of-the-art realism in modern videogames is a tricky topic with many avenues available to development teams keen to push the envelope. Some will burn through millions of dollars ensuring that the latest and greatest shooter to hit the market has the most ultra-realistic environments available. Others will be content with engineering a lopsided museum of modern art and merely encourage...

Probably the highest compliment that can be paid to Monaco: What's Yours Is Mine is the same that could be given to any of the best entries to the stealth/action genre — that the game is as fun in slow, thoughtful moments as it is when all hell breaks loose. Considering that each of Monaco's missions are comprised of delicate heists where a single slip-up will set off alarms...

The Sacred series has always managed to provide gamers with a fairly predictable hack ‘n’ slash roleplaying experience. Hardly “Game of the Year” stuff, but quirky and thoroughly enjoyable nevertheless. The original Sacred, released back in 2004, swiftly gained a captive audience with its meaty mob encounters and off-centre humour. Sacred 2 continued the trend in 2008, although by that time developer Ascaron had reached a little...

It might seem like a cash grab, but remaking old titles with fancy graphics and enhanced features isn’t such a cynical idea. After all, what made a lot of older titles great were the design limitations at play in the first place. If a lack of memory or graphics capability prevented a certain gameplay element from being introduced, clever developers had to find a compromise to produce...

Minecraft launched a thousand "me too" copycats after its inception -- many of which offer the same experience with slight tweaks, and others still that attempt a unique overhaul in every way. Terraria falls into the latter camp, taking obvious inspiration from Notch's sandbox powerhouse and putting a unique side-scrolling spin on the formula. It evokes quite a few genres and it's an exciting alternative to those who feel...

Guacamelee — a game in which a Mexican wrestler can transform into a chicken to reach hidden areas, where he might learn from his mystical goat master how to suplex skeletons in sombreros. Sure, it may sound like someone drank too much tequila out in the hot sun, but it’s also one of the best indie experiences on your Playstation 3 or PS Vita. The creation of...

If you’ve been living in a dark world of Japanese-free gaming, you’ve been sadly missing out on the magic that is Monster Hunter. This franchise has been huge in Japan for years, but has been given only brief moments of North American glory through small PSP and Wii releases. Well all that changes now with a massive blockbuster release of an updated Monster Hunter 3 available on both...

Going into Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm 3, I had next to no experience with the franchise, aside from a couple brief matches with one of the earlier games in the Ultimate Ninja Storm series. I haven’t ever read the manga nor have I seen an episode of the anime. So I went into this game as a complete blank slate Naruto-wise, and that had me a little nervous....

Blizzard, with StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty, brought the popular franchise to a new generation of gamers, keeping the core aspects that made the game great while improving on them in almost every way. Heart of the Swarm offers players more of what made Wings of Liberty so exciting and does it in a robust, well realized package, making it well worth its $40 selling price. The...

First party knockouts like Fire Emblem are something that Nintendo really needs to concentrate on. While we’re drowning in near weekly Nintendo Direct conferences - which promise big and apologise for letdowns - the real answer to Nintendo’s now self-admitted problem is sitting in the 3DS of gamers everywhere. Awakening, like its franchise predecessors, is an example of a game that moves platforms. Not everything is right in the...

Labyrinth Legends is the latest game from Creat Studios, a company that used to produce disc based games in the previous generation. If you’ve played Cuboid, Hamster Ball or their variant on Mahjong you’ll know that this is a budget gaming company that wisely backed away from packaged software and brought their wares to the cheaper, digital side of the market. Labyrinth Legends continues this, although it feels like...

We Do Not Come To Treat With Sauron Defense of the Ancients and League of Legends are not names that the average console player will be familiar with if their world begins and ends with Call of Duty. But in the larger world of competitive gaming, particularly PC gaming where’s Real Actual Money to be made at a professional level, those games are the bread and butter...

I Got A Pocket Full Of Quarters And I’m Headed To The Arcade Compilations are a dime a dozen these days. Compilations of arcade or retro classics even more so. So is there anything that really sets this latest compilation apart from the ones that came before it. If you already have those past compilations, not really. And if you don’t, hey, you’re getting 31 games for...

In Marvel Vs Capcom Origins we receive a gift from a time long past. This combination of Marvel Super Heroes and Marvel Vs. Capcom: Clash of Heroes for only $15.00 CAD, is one slick deal. The enjoyment you’ll get from this title will rest solely on how nostalgic, or tolerant you are of the era of fighting game this represents. Marvel Vs. Capcom Origins is straight out of the...

They Can’t All Be Winners The irony of Edna & Harvey: Harvey’s New Eyes is that I’d recently written a piece about how adventure games had gotten a new lease on life by abandoning the trappings of convention that defined them in the 90s. Then along comes this game that unpleasantly proves my point. Don’t get me wrong, Harvey’s New Eyes isn’t a terrible adventure. But it...

BUY THIS GAME, DAMN YOU Okami is one of those games that makes me lament the state of gaming, or perhaps more accurately, the state of game culture. It was everything that we as hardcore gamers asked for, representing the very best aspirations we have for gaming. Despite that, it was a commercial failure. It was ignored by those who clamour for something different because… well, it...

Yet another year has passed and that means another Need for Speed title hits store shelves. After last year’s foray into racing with Need for Speed: The Run the series left a bad taste in the mouths of many fans. Although it took the series in a new direction, it felt dull, uninspired and overall an unpleasant experience. This year Criterion takes the helm, bringing their signature style, love...

Mists of Pandaria seems to be a bit of a joke at first glance. Earlier expansions to the World of Warcraft had obvious selling points: an alien world, an unstoppable foe, an apocalyptic event. And for this latest entry: kung fu pandas. The whole premise is a pastiche of Asian stereotypes: crane stance, cherry blossom trees, ancient proverbs, fu manchus, bamboo forests, conical rice hats, bonsai trees, the Great...

The Silly Siege Warlords as a premise back in the 80s, was the original, nonsensical tower defense game. Only in this case, instead of defending your towers from the hordes, it was defending your single castle interior from fireballs hurled by up to three other opponents. Mind you, this was back in the time when concepts like “castle” and “fireball” were represented by...

An Urban Fantasy Within An Urban Fantasy The Sims has always been about a wish fulfilment of a more mundane sort, although the franchise has occasionally ventured beyond its comfortable suburban neighborhoods to more fantastic venues. This time The Sims 3 gets its inevitable expansion, timed to release before Halloween. It tackles the worlds of Stephenie Meyer, Jim Butcher and Laurell K. Hamilton and brings a vampy,...