June 28 - July 2

Section: 

I really didn't care much about Singularity until I realized it was being developed by Raven, and that just kind of changed everything. I imagine if you've had your fill of first person shooters with occult trapping in general, then Singluarity will definitely not be for you. If you're looking for a game that redefines the first person shooter experience and offers a complex play experience, then Singularity will not be for you. However, if you're looking for a dense, tight and distilled action game that is executed cleanly and by a company that just seems to fundamentally understand how to build an action game, then Raven's track record is one that provides a lot of encouragement.

Meanwhile, a game for which I really don't seem able to generate any enthusiasm is Lego: Harry Potter, which is kinda tragic because Potter seems exactly like the kind of game where Traveller's Tales would excel. After two Star Wars and Indiana Jones games I've just about exhausted my interest in running little bricks around clever environments. I have the sneaking suspicion that if I just played it, I'd be happy, but I don't even want to get to that place. Stubborn and bull-headed as it may seem, I don't even want to have my mind changed on the matter.

So, for today Singularity gets my nod for Game of the Week, and if at some point down the line you hear me chirping about Harry Potter, know that there is a part of me lying deep inside and dormant that is very disappointed about that. Also of some note this week is N3II: Ninety Nine Nights and Naughty Bear.

PC
- All Points Bulletin
- ARMA 2: Operation Arrowhead
- LEGO Harry Potter: Years 1-4
- Singularity
- Sniper: Ghost Warrior

Xbox 360
- Deathsmiles
- LEGO Harry Potter: Years 1-4
- N3II: Ninety-Nine Nights
- Naughty Bear
- Singularity
- Sniper: Ghost Warrior

PS3
- LEGO Harry Potter: Years 1-4
- Naughty Bear
- Singularity
- Trinity Universe

Wii
- 10 Minute Solution
- LEGO Harry Potter: Years 1-4
- Sin and Punishment: Star Successor
- The Last Airbender

DS
- Junior Classic Books & Fairy Tales
- Just Sing!
- LEGO Harry Potter: Years 1-4
- The Last Airbender
- Vampire Legends: Power of Three

PSP
- Hot Shots Tennis: Get a Grip
- LEGO Harry Potter: Years 1-4

Coming Soon -
- Crackdown 2 : July 6
- Starcraft 2 : July 27
- Mafia 2 (PC, 360, PS3) : August 24
- Metroid Other M : August 31
- Halo Reach : September 14
- Civilization V : September 21

Comments

However, if you're looking for a dense, tight and distilled action game that is executed cleanly and by a company that just seems to fundamentally understand how to build an action game

Sometimes that's all you need.

Hmm, I'm kind of surprised that Naughty Bear is a full game on a disc. I had kind of assumed that it was a downloadable thing. In any case, I am going to have to check it out, I have laughed too hard at stories I heard from people's playthroughs of it to ignore it.

Hot Shots Tennis is prolly a given (especially at that price point) and the Potter LEGO game will be worth a playthrough after a few months too. Does anyone have any early feedback on the Wii's 'n and Punishment' shooter?

Switchbreak wrote:

Hmm, I'm kind of surprised that Naughty Bear is a full game on a disc. I had kind of assumed that it was a downloadable thing. In any case, I am going to have to check it out, I have laughed too hard at stories I heard from people's playthroughs of it to ignore it.

Ah bummer, not being downloadable means I will probably not venture into the evil clutches of a retail store in order to purchase it

Traded in a bunch of dust-collectors yesterday for War For Cybertron. Next purchase will likely be Crackdown 2, if it's discounted anywhere before the fall hits.

I have never heard of Hot Shots Tennis, but I loves me some HSG 1 & 2 PSP.

$19.99 seems pretty darn tempting too. I'll have to look further into this one.

Side note: Is Naughty Bear also from Raven? Because it sounds like it might be an autobiographical bit by Manveer Heir.

Fyedaddy wrote:

. Does anyone have any early feedback on the Wii's 'n and Punishment' shooter?

Not sure. Just reading the Amazon page, the fact that you can use Wiimote, Classic, or Gamecube controller intrigues me.

One of my complaints about the Wii is games that force you to use Wiimote or "waggle" controls when it isn't actually necessary or better. There are some games that are just fine with the classic dual-analog controller. Smash Bros being the most popular I guess. I'm all for more Wii games that are just games.

Stele wrote:
Fyedaddy wrote:

. Does anyone have any early feedback on the Wii's 'n and Punishment' shooter?

Not sure. Just reading the Amazon page, the fact that you can use Wiimote, Classic, or Gamecube controller intrigues me.

One of my complaints about the Wii is games that force you to use Wiimote or "waggle" controls when it isn't actually necessary or better. There are some games that are just fine with the classic dual-analog controller. Smash Bros being the most popular I guess. I'm all for more Wii games that are just games.

A bit of history on the new Sin and Punishment: It was initially going to be non-wiimote only, but they implemented the wiimote pointer and then Nintendo came back to them and said the game was too easy and they needed to make it harder.

I'll be renting Sin and Punishment through Gamefly and trying it out - the original is great, but short, and I'm not sure I'll want to play through it enough times to warrant a full price purchase. If you're curious about it and have a Wii, though, the original is on Virtual Console for $12 and well worth that price.

Certainly I expect to get a completely insane action game out of it, whatever the length / replayability.

Ravenlock wrote:

I'll be renting Sin N' Punishment through Gamefly and trying it out - the original is great, but short, and I'm not sure I'll want to play through it enough times to warrant a full price purchase. If you're curious about it and have a Wii, though, the original is on Virtual Console for $12 and well worth that price.

Certainly I expect to get a completely insane action game out of it, whatever the length / replayability.

Exactly. I don't currently have any rental service going, but if I did, I would have it as priority #1 to get.

Xbox 360
- N3II: Ninety-Nine Nights

I saw N3II: Ninety Nine Nights at the game store and I honestly didn't realize it was a sequel, much less to that. I played the first one and it had it's good points. But they were well hidden, that's for sure.

I'll probably end up with it at some point, but it certainly isn't happening soon.

Pre-ordered Deathsmiles a while back. It's been too long since I've played a shmup! Pew pew pew!

I'm really quite enjoying Lego Potter I have to say - MUCH better than that last Indy Game ( I really didn't like the way they made the open-world hub areas in that one).

It is, of course, pretty much more of the same, but the licence is perfect for it.

stevenmack wrote:

I'm really quite enjoying Lego Potter I have to say - MUCH better than that last Indy Game ( I really didn't like the way they made the open-world hub areas in that one).

It is, of course, pretty much more of the same, but the licence is perfect for it.

I'm hoping our copy arrives today. This is a series that seems fit for Legos. Plus in all the early reviews I've read, it sounds like it is HUGE compared to the older Lego games. My son and I are both excited to get our hands on it, but we skipped the repeat Indiana Jones game -- maybe that's why we're not burned out on the series.

sheared wrote:
stevenmack wrote:

I'm really quite enjoying Lego Potter I have to say - MUCH better than that last Indy Game ( I really didn't like the way they made the open-world hub areas in that one).

It is, of course, pretty much more of the same, but the licence is perfect for it.

I'm hoping our copy arrives today. This is a series that seems fit for Legos. Plus in all the early reviews I've read, it sounds like it is HUGE compared to the older Lego games. My son and I are both excited to get our hands on it, but we skipped the repeat Indiana Jones game -- maybe that's why we're not burned out on the series.

In my opinion, I think it's probably the best of the games since the Star Wars ones. There's a ton of stuff to do in it (I think it also has the map editor tools that Indy 2 had, but I haven't had a proper look at that yet).

One interesting thig worth noting - there aren't any of the fixed vehicle sections that popped up in earlier lego games (at least not as part of the main story missions).

This is a BIG plus in my opinion...those sections never felt very fun to me. Actually it's slightly surprising - I would have figured there would have been at least one Quidditch level in there.

Lego Potter is a day one purchase here if I want to stay married. My wife has absolutely not had enough of the square bricks. Throw in my daughter's obsession with HP (she's attending a Twilight premiere tonight where they are showing all three movies, but dressed as Harry Potter characters because of some feud between their fans that I don't understand), and it is the perfect storm of a game. And really, it's another franchise that seems like it will provide some fun and new gameplay elements with cute memorable characters.

And really, if you you've played a couple of Lego games already and aren't interested, its safe to say that you really are over it. It might make a neat game in the future when it is $20. But my wife has nailed down 1000 points in Lego Batman, and 900+ in Lego IJ. It scratches here perfect gaming itch.

Personally, I'm in a holding pattern until NCAA 11 drops. The demo really grabbed me and I'm looking forward to putting some serious time into a college football game for the first time. It should be a nice change of pace.

So has there been another LEGO franchise game announced? How long until LEGO Lord of the Rings? I've only played the Star Wars and some of the Batman one and I'm sure I'd have been burnt out if I played every game all the way through.

Lego Star Wars Clone Wars, based off the Cartoon Network TV series, is in development

mrtomaytohead wrote:

So has there been another LEGO franchise game announced? How long until LEGO Lord of the Rings? I've only played the Star Wars and some of the Batman one and I'm sure I'd have been burnt out if I played every game all the way through.

I would imagine the next one would be Harry Potter years 5-7 (this one just goes up to Goblet of Fire). After that...dunno...

Prince of persia just got a range of real world lego models.....but a lego PoP based on the movie based on the game based on the older game might just cause the universe to collapse in on itself.

Irongut wrote:

Lego Star Wars Clone Wars, based off the Cartoon Network TV series, is in development

Doh! Yes, quite forgot about that one.

Irongut wrote:

Lego Star Wars Clone Wars, based off the Cartoon Network TV series, is in development

More Clone Wars crap? Really? Ugh, let it die already.

If it wasn't in the Clone Wars movie then it clearly wasn't important enough to the galactic narrative to bother with... so why do they keep screwing around in a time that clearly isn't important? Argh!

There must be some backroom negotiations around the possibility of doing a Lego Toy Story game. It's a big brand, and LEGO has already released both a Toy Story 1/2 and now Toy Story 3 line of Legos. Seems ripe for the picking.

There is probably always some potential for a LEGO Spongebob. It's another one with a big fan base, but LEGO themselves would probably need a reason to jumpstart the product line again.

While the innovative split screen of Lego Indiana Jones made co-op play a lot better, Lego Batman is still the high point of the series, in the expert opinion of my wife. The Batman gadgets and assortment of villains and characters made for really interesting puzzles and other gameplay.

I think Lego Harry Potter could really up the ante a bit, since the use of magical powers could make for some interesting puzzles, which is what the Lego games are really all about, once you get over smashing your partner to smithereens over and over.

What they do so well is layer some really fun puzzles into a whimsical retelling of the stories we already know. It is pretty amazing what they can accomplish without dialogue.

So much for Deathsmiles, for some reason it's not even on Amazon anymore.

MaxShrek wrote:

So much for Deathsmiles, for some reason it's not even on Amazon anymore.

Amazon has been messed up all day. Some games couldn't be added to the cart, had no prices or weren't mysteriously unavailable for a while. Deathsmiles isn't showing up when I search but I found it through Google.

That being said, I am angry. I pre-ordered through Amazon and it seems like it won't ship for another week or so. Way to drop the ball, Amazon.

EDIT:

There isn't a GameStop within 100 miles that has one in stock. However, GameStop.com has them available online with taxes and free shipping. *sigh*

GiantBomb has a Quick Look for Sin & Punishment: Star Successor. It looks frantic but like a lot of fun. It's definitely going on my list of games to purchase.

Mystic Violet wrote:

There isn't a GameStop within 100 miles that has one in stock. However, GameStop.com has them available online with taxes and free shipping. *sigh*

Around here I would probably have to go into Manhattan (NYC) if I didn't get it through Amazon. I have to say, Deathsmiles is completely bizarre and weird, but looks great and plays perfect for a shmup. Plus I have to switch out my faceplate, as I had to get rid of my faceplate for The Outfit when I traded in my oldBox for my newBox.

It looks like Cave is also going to be getting Guwange (!!!) ready forXBLA/PSN later this year. Raystorm, Otomedius Excellent, Triggerheart Exelica, and Omega 5 are some great shooters on XBLA.

It's also cool to see that Microsoft had another Shooter Festival back in February.