The product of 1995’s singleplayer-only Warhawk on the original PlayStation and 2007’s multiplayer-only Warhawk on the PlayStation 3, Starhawk has undergone many transformations over the years. Like the legendary tale of the phoenix, the Hawk series hasn’t made many appearances since its debut and like the development studio behind the series and the Hawks themselves, Starhawk has risen from the ashes after said transformations to emerge as one of the best multiplayer games of all time by merging together elements of other wildly successful franchises such as Halo and StarCraft... Read More »

Like Hollywood, the gaming industry has a trend of releasing similar competing games around the same time. One of the most recent and biggest gaming showdowns after Call of Duty and Battlefield is the epic battle between Prototype and Infamous -- both good games, both involving superheroes in open-world cities, and both debuting in the summer of 2009. Although Infamous seemed to be the overall favorite amongst gamers and critics, I’ve always considered it a bit overrated and preferred the more fast-paced and chaotic open-world environment of the Prototype series. This time arou... Read More »

With Resident Evil 5 failing to improve upon anything from Resident Evil 4 and the Dead Space series perfecting the survival horror genre, Capcom needed to make some improvements to the Resident Evil series to win back some of their fans. In a move that nobody saw coming, the developers behind almost completely killing the SOCOM series before Zipper somehow made it even worse, Slant Six, were hired to shake things up a bit by revamping RE's gameplay and shifting the focus to a faster paced multiplayer tactical shooter. An idea that will make Resident Evil purists cry blasphemy as the... Read More »

Promising the sun, moon, and stars in the form of a game featuring a fully alive universe with a story driven by the choices of a player, BioWare's original Mass Effect seemed like an idea that could no way would live up to the hype. But after its amazing debut in 2007 and even better sequel in 2010, nobody was left questioning what BioWare could achieve in their Mass Effect games. Many epic gaming trilogies have come and gone in recent years, but none as unique and memorable as the Mass Effect series with its third and final chapter being the culmination of not only one of the great... Read More »

With yearly installments to slower-paced modern day shooters, it’s a damn shame that the once dominant arena twitch shooter genre is now becoming extinct. Being a huge fan of both Unreal Tournament and Quake, like many others I've been dying for a new fast-paced futuristic shooter ever since playing 2008's Unreal Tournament III to death with friends on the Xbox 360 and PS3. Enter Nexuiz, a downloadable remake of a popular fan-made free Quake mod and a throwback to a generation of hyper speed arena shooters using one of the most powerful and best looking graphics engines ever, CryEn... Read More »

It’s been a while since the riders of SSX have seen fresh powder. Not counting 2007’s Wii exclusive, the latest in the series, simply titled SSX (formerly SSX: Deadly Descents), is the first real sequel to debut on current generation consoles after EA Sports’ BIG line of games ceased production. Now with a revival of over-the-top sports games, Electronic Arts has brought the beloved franchise back with some big changes but sans the BIG theme, which has been replaced with a more serious tone that ruins the fun. The Good Beautiful visuals with mesmerizing over-the-top trick ... Read More »

Yet another classic franchise that's jumping genres and switching into the first person perspective is Syndicate, a futuristic cyber-punk FPS that's being revived after almost two full decades since the original was released as a real-time tactical game. Now the same studio behind breakout hits like The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena and The Darkness, Starbreeze Studios, has taken over the series with a completely revamped approach. So is Starbreeze's reboot of Syndicate worthy of a comeback for a series that most gamers are probably too young to remember, or is Syn... Read More »

It's been over a decade since we've last seen Sweet Tooth and the rest of the Twisted gang on a major console. After releasing one of the best and most mature games on the PlayStation 2, the Eat Sleep Play team behind the best games of the Twisted franchise has finally returned, and they're serving up a sequel with everyone's favorite killer clown taking the spotlight. Twisted Metal is officially back and better than ever on the PlayStation 3 with new modes and features that revive the car combat genre and make gameplay feel fresh when competing against today's new generation of ... Read More »

Emerging from the darkness after being released during the early days of the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, The Darkness series is finally back with a new developer, new features, and a brand new look. Just like its predecessor, The Darkness II will hook you right from the start with a very brutal and memorable action-packed sequence of events, only to slow things down midway through the game with a massive new plot twist that will blow your mind and have you dying to know what’s going to happen next. Pros Unique quad-wielding unlike anything in other FPS games Mind-blowing twi... Read More »

Games these days... they’re all the same. Take, for example, Rebellion’s latest, NeverDead, a game in which you play as a wisecracking human named Bryce, who was cursed with immortality five hundred years ago, and now in modern times hunts demons for money and revenge with the power to regenerate lost limbs. Sound familiar? Maybe a little bit of a Hellboy vibe… but other than that, NeverDead is a fresh and innovative concept that’s never been done before in the gaming world with a memorable protagonist who doesn’t always need his legs to kick ass. Good Unique gameplay ... Read More »

Apart from the Duke Nukem series, no other gaming franchise better sums up the late '90s / early '00s than NFL Blitz. It was a time when steroids were running rampant amongst all of professional sports and fans could care less (because this is America, damn it!) and the bigger the athletes and plays, the better. While American football wasn't that much different than it is today, Midway's NFL Blitz catered to a generation that wanted more excitement than what the more realistic Madden football games from EA Games had to offer and surely exceeded beyond what anyone ever thought it cou... Read More »

Announced back in 2008, Star Wars: The Old Republic is the second take on a MMORPG based on the most popular sci-fi series of all time. 2003's Star Wars Galaxies was a complete disaster, and once MMO juggernaut World of Warcraft came around a year later in 2004, there hasn't been a single PC game that has been able to come close to its success, with over 10 million copies sold in the past seven years. BioWare's latest is one of the most ambitious development projects of all time, with a fully voiced world, 12 full-time writers, more content than all of BioWare's other games combi... Read More »

Shown behind closed doors with no playable version just six months ago at E3, it’s surprising that Bethesda is already releasing their latest dragon-slaying, dungeon-crawling RPG. With an entirely new engine and tons of improvements, Bethesda is going all out with the latest installment in the popular Elder Scrolls franchise. So is Bethesda’s latest not only their best, but the best RPG ever made, making this the Year of the Dragon-born, or is this another case of a great game made by Bethesda almost ruined by bugs and glitches? Pros A fully alive, massive open world unlike ... Read More »

Another year, another Battlefield and Call of Duty. War. War never changes. Or does it? It's been six years since Battlefield 2 hit store shelves and we've seen a new version or expansion to the series released every year since 2005. Electronic Arts' latest Battlefield game looks to shake things up a bit in the gaming industry by making some big improvements to its graphics engine in an effort to dethrone the current king of entertainment, Call of Duty. But does Battlefield 3 actually go "above and beyond the call" of Modern Warfare 3 like it claims in its $100 million advertising ca... Read More »

Welcome to a fanboy's review of Activision's latest record-breaking blockbuster, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3. First, let me introduce myself. I used to be a huge gamer, dipping into video game testing at my peak and still occasionally achievement whoring. But as I've had less and less time to enjoy the many facets of entertainment, movies is ultimately my true passion. It's a big reason why when I do have time for gaming, I love the cinematic experiences that the CoD campaigns immerse you in. And I eat that shit up. Night vision goggles? Check. RC camera car? Guilty. Limited editi... Read More »

Jack of all trades and master of none. It's a saying that Naughty Dog clearly doesn't believe in because they're back and once again trying to do it all with the latest installment in the now iconic Uncharted series that seems to do just about everything right. Naughty Dog has some big shoes to fill after 2009's Game of the Year, Uncharted 2, blew everyone away. With all eyes on them and shouldering tons of pressure, the team at Naughty Dog have made some pretty big changes to the franchise and have taken some risks that might not turn out to be worth the reward. So the real question... Read More »