Armored Core V is the fifth main installment of From Software’s Armored Core mech game series. Despite the Roman numeral, Armored Core V is apparently not a sequel to Armored Core 4 (2007) or Armored Core: For Answer (2008). The game starts off with a whole new storyline, making knowledge of the narrative details of previous installments unnecessary. The plot is not exactly easy to make sense of, however. You’re playing on the side of the Resistance, up against some sort of shadowy, militaristic corporation. Basically it seems to amount to good robots versus bad robots. If there’s significantly more nuance to it than that, it was simply lost on me....more

If there’s one thing I’ve learned from eating at one greasy spoon diner after another, it’s that not all chefs are created equal — and that’s something anyone who dives into SuperVillain’s Order Up!! are bound to learn. The popular 2008 Wii title has been broadened to audiences worldwide via a PlayStation 3 (and Nintendo 3DS) release, and has given me the opportunity to experience this cooking simulation game for myself in High-Definition resolution. And I have to say, I have found this menu item to be more than suitable to my particularly picky palate....more

Included with Spirit Camera is an augmented reality book, splattered with ink, unnerving photographs, and illegible text. Despite this, the creator took the time to avoid the bottom corners on each page, ensuring they are (clearly) sequentially numbered. It's either a sign the demons the book spawns appreciate their artistic endeavors or have too much time on their hands....more

Most Silent Hill fans are very different from their Resident Evil counterparts.  They are easily more particular and in many ways could be considered purists. So, it is no surprise that when Konami announced that due to licensing problems, they were redoing the voices for Silent Hill 2 and 3 many were very upset.  It didn’t even matter that the replacement voice for James Sunderland in Silent Hill 2 is Troy Baker.  Troy is a primary voice in a large number of the biggest hits at last years’ E3 Expo in Los Angeles including; Catherine, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, Diablo 3, and Bioshock: Infinite to name a few....more

Since its release in May of 2010, Blur has, hands down, been my favorite arcade racer.  Oh sure, you have people who like Split/Second better and in my heart, Nail'd has been a close second to Blur, but there's something about the Activision release which just does it for me.  However, with the release of Ridge Racer Unbounded, Blur may have lost the top spot....more

The names Tekken and Street Fighter are legends in the fighting game world. Street Fighter is by far the more prolific and popular of the two franchises but Tekken was (and is) an outstanding series. The games share only the fact that they are fighting games with a large roster in common, Tekken has always been 3D, while Street Fighter stayed (mostly) true to its 2D roots. Street Fighter uses six buttons which correspond to the strength of attacks where Tekken uses four (one for each limb). When Street Fighter X Tekken was announced and would be modeled after the art style introduced for Street Fighter IV there was a great mix of trepidation and anticipation. How would the moves work? Would there be compromises? How thin will the story be to get these universes together? Will it be awesome?...more

There’s an old adage in the film industry that goes somewhat along the lines of “Sequels aren’t equals.” The same applies to the world of video games — even to ones that have been around since the early days of non-8-bit game consoles. Now, you would speculate that an enterprise such as Capcom, who have been the developers and publishers of the Resident Evil series — a legacy that, mind you, has spawned several (equally) popular live-action and animated films as well as comic books, novelizations, action figures and more over the years — would try to make each entry in their seemingly endless franchise just slightly cooler than the last....more

Last year I said some rather unkind things about Tiger Woods PGA Tour 12:  The Masters.  For those not interested in clicking the link, I argued that EA Sports had sacrificed so much of what made Tiger Woods great as a golf simulation in order to include a single (albeit important) tournament.  I closed the review by saying that most people should probably just wait for Tiger Woods 13 to roll around because, hopefully, EA had been forced to focus heavily on The Masters for one year and then could simply include it as a course in the future....more

Imagine what might happen if a group of software developers got together to reboot a once-popular PC game franchise. Much like with the re-imaginings that take place all-too often in the world of motion pictures, said game makers would have to perform a major overhaul on just about every aspect of the original — giving their project such a giant face-lift that very little of the new title’s source material remained. Now picture that our company of video game architects — whom we’ll just go ahead and call Starbreeze Studios from hereon in — made the same mistake the people in Hollywood tend to make, and became so obsessed with making their title so modern and niche, that they completely neglected to make it interesting in the process. ...more

The first place I saw Silent Hill: Downpour was at the Konami’s booth at the annual E3 Expo in Los Angeles, last year, it was playable and it looked pretty good.  As many longtime fans of series and after some serious departures from the original formula, I was of course skeptical of how the final product would turn out.  In many ways, I am pleasantly surprised....more