PSP

Innocent Life: A Futuristic Harvest Moon

July 5, 2007

PSP / Reviews / by Chris Massey Make a comment! / Tweet it!

For the past ten years, the Harvest Moon series has somehow managed to make the chore-like nature of planting tomatoes and cutting grass seem fun. How it has achieved this sorcery is a pure mystery. Regardless, it seems that the creators have decided to give the series a futuristic facelift in Innocent Life: A Futuristic Harvest Moon. Unfortunately, while most other titles in the series give off a distinctive and quaint charm, Innocent Life seems completely out of place with other Harvest Moon titles. It could be the generic futuristic setting, or it could be the dull-as-dirt pacing and little to do, but in the end, Innocent Life is painfully forgettable, even for the biggest Harvest Moon fan.

Innocent Life takes place in the far-off and totally futuristic year of 2022. On the Island of Heartflame, which coincidentally looks like a big heart, most of the old agricultural practices have been outdated by automated processes, which have led to a pretty easy life. Unfortunately, this has also angered the spirits of the island, who have punished humanity by locking off land and threatening to erupt the nearby volcano. In a last ditch effort, the sickeningly named Dr. Hope creates you, a robot boy, to tend to the farmlands and bring back the old farming methods. That’s right, he’s solving the problem by making robots do the work instead. That’s progress.

Unlike most other Harvest Moon titles, instead of working on the usual farm, all of the farmland resides on top of a set of ancient ruins. It’s a different feeling, although for the most part, the mechanics are mostly the same. What is different is that you only have access to a small bit of the actual ruins at first, with the rest being unlocked as you complete your robotly tasks. These tasks will eventually unlock a lot more content than you’re originally given at the start, which is great if you can tread through to get to it all. The keyword here is A

Pocket Pool

July 5, 2007

PSP / Reviews / by Graham Russell Make a comment! / Tweet it!

In Pocket Pool, a PSP title from Eidos and developer Hyper-Devbox, players take on opponents in various games of pool in order to unlock racy pictures and videos. Sure, there are a lot of ways to customize the experience: many rooms, tables, balls and cues can be unlocked, but it doesn’t affect anything with the gameplay. This is sad, because there was some room for improvement.

The A.I. starts out grossly incompetent, but skips all reasonable skill levels and goes straight to nearly-invincible. Players are given the choice of different camera angles, but in all but one the cue position and angle makes it difficult to hit anything, and the last is an overhead view that makes aiming the simple task of lining up a circle.

The obvious focus of this game was the inclusion of pictures and videos of scantily-clad models. While this certainly fits the PSP’s demographic of young men, it still doesn’t make it enough to sell a game. The number of images and clips isn’t overwhelming, nor is the quality. It’s sad that this game exists, really. Eidos obviously thought there were people out there so desperate for this content that they’d pay for and play through a bad billiards title, and even if there were, those sad souls have most likely discovered the Internet.

Pocket Pool, as a product, makes no sense. It aims for pool fans, but ones that don’t care about accurate physics or taking the game seriously. It appeals to sad, perverted teenagers, but only those with extra cash and no access to the Internet. Finally, the title was for those who want an entertaining game, yet don’t mind bad controls and cameras. Who fits into all these categories?

Winx Club: Join The Club

July 2, 2007

PSP / Reviews / by Graham Russell Make a comment! / Tweet it!

Do little girls own PSPs? Konami apparently thinks so, and with the release of Winx Club: Join the Club, they’re trying to capitalize on it. Trying, but failing miserably.

The title’s overly simple and easy minigames appeal to no one, since it takes more skill to turn on and hold a PSP than do the various tasks in the game. They vary in subject, from an avoid-the-obstacles racer to a memory game involving plants. None of it makes real sense, and none of it is fun.

As if it weren’t enough for the game to be excruciatingly painful to play, it makes you wait a while too. Skipping through the menus as fast as possible, it takes over 8 minutes to get to the first bit of gameplay. While it makes for a convenient time to make a sandwich or two, no one needs a meal every five minutes. It’s a mystery what it’s loading…menus and games hardly push the PSP’s limits, and the videos that load are barely decent quality-wise. It seems lazy for the developers to vertically letterbox videos instead of formatting them for the PSP, but then again, everything else here seems lazy too.

Players can use any of the characters from the show, a Saturday morning cartoon of the same name, though it only makes a cosmetic difference, and only in the menu screens. Unlockables include clothing and possessions that basically just sit there when acquired and are ultimately useless.

Winx Club: Join the Club is sure to make little girls, not to mention game reviewers, cry. Avoid it like the plague.

Chili Con Carnage

July 2, 2007

PSP / Reviews / by Graham Russell Make a comment! / Tweet it!

Chili Con Carnage isn’t the traditional model of a good game. With somewhat restrictive controls, little in the way of extra modes, and a storyline that’s more offensive than intriguing, this PSP title from Eidos sets itself up much like many sub-par games. Somehow, though, it comes through in the area that matters the most: it’s fun.

Carnage‘s protagonist, Ramiro Cruz, is out to avenge his father’s death against Mexican crime lords. Wait, make that very, very stereotypical Mexican crime lords. In this third-person shooter, developer Deadline Games places players against large old chicken ladies, guys in sombreros with shovels, and big men in skeleton suits. There’s no doubt that this game will offend some people.

Those who can get by that will enjoy the pure craziness of the storyline. Carnage doesn’t take itself seriously, and it makes for bizarre fun. The game rewards crazy combos, with jumping in the air, nailing some headshots, rolling, and getting to the enemies’ hats before they hit the ground. Some levels have players run vehicles into structures, and jumping off in slow motion is a cool experience.

The controls aren’t the best. The lock-on feature works well for most levels, though it is mostly disabled in boss fights when it would be most useful. There’s no camera control, and the automatic camera can be confused a bit after some crazy maneuvers. This is normal for a game like this, but Carnage rewards stunts like these, so it should have been covered in testing.

The soundtrack has some cool Latin hip-hop tunes that become more intense when the action gets frantic, making for an immersive experience. The cutscenes are laughably bad, but it seems to be on purpose, and it ends up being entertaining enough. The menus and graphics, while not stellar, are solid and polished and do the job well. What is most amazing about this game is the short loading time between menus and levels, usually only about four or five seconds.

The extra modes are fairly mediocre. A

UEFA Champions League 2006-2007

June 5, 2007

PSP / Reviews / by Graham Russell Make a comment! / Tweet it!

UEFA isn’t FIFA. Americans tend to be mostly ignorant of this fact, but the Europe-only league has its own feel. While national teams have lots of talent and little chemistry, these clubs work together much better and compensate for their relatively low skill level.

UEFA Champions League is little more than an adaptation of its FIFA series. Despite that, there are some attempts to make this game unique, like a Treble Mode that tries to faithfully recreates the entire UEFA process, and a Quiz Mode for hardcore UEFA fans. This may seem like a niche entry, but honestly, the differences between this title and FIFA are really geared toward niche fans.

As a standalone title, UEFA doesn’t disappoint too much. The graphics look great on the PSP’s small screen and the controls are solid. The commentary is as detailed as FIFA, and there are even some UEFA-specific comments occasionally. Everything you can do gameplay-wise in FIFA is here, and unlike some of the other EA Sports games, there’s no using last year’s engine and graphics for secondary titles.

Since EA’s PS2 and PSP entries are usually almost identical, a new feature in UEFA seems like a no-brainer. Players can connect their PSP to their PS2 via USB and transfer their Treble mode progress to the portable. This allows for playing on the go or on the big screen, and it’s a nice addition.

UEFA is deep, solid and well-done, just like most EA titles. It’s flashy, polished and will hold your attention for hours. Unfortunately, it gets outclassed by its big brother, FIFA. Hardcore fans might pick up both, but the casual gamer just needs one soccer game.

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