Jigsaw hc's Rants and Reviews

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Lost in Overlord
2007-09-13 01:26:00
Sorry for the lack of posts recently. Nothing has been worth reviewing on XBLA and I've been playing Overlord and Shadowrun mostly. Now that I've completed Overlord though look for new reviews of the games I play next coming shortly.
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Duels Review
2007-09-06 18:50:00
I started playing Duel s about a week ago and I think I'm addicted. I'm still enjoying WeeWar, but it has taken a back burner to Duels. Duels defines itself as follows:Duels is a Player vs. Player (PVP) Strategy Game: Advance your duelist by battling others in the arena. Collect and trade thousands of items. Customize your avatar's appearance and attributes. I think what makes Duels so addicting is that you don't control the actual fight so you don't have to worry about if they are faster at button mashing thank you. You just equip your character with your weapons, armor, and items. Then challenge an opponent and pick what skills and scrolls/spells to use. Then if they accept the challenge they do th same and the system automates the fight. You then get to watch the result of the fight. In addition to challenging opponents you can skirmish with them. Skirmish don't effect your win-loss ranking, but they also don't give you as much experience or gold. As you gain ...
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The Fountain Review
2007-09-04 22:38:00
*** Spoiler Alert ***I watch The Fountain this weekend. Has anyone else seen it? I don't think any of my close friends have because if they had I think they would have warned me about it. It was not a bad movie, but it was a very weird movie. The movie is about Tommy (Hugh Jackman) and Izzi (Rachel Weisz). Tommy is a doctor researching new drugs to cure cancer. Izzi, his wife, is dying of brain cancer. In the process of looking for a cure for cancer Tommy finds the Tree of Life/Fountain of Youth. Unfortunately, he does not find it soon enough to save Izzi's life. The plot is actually pretty complex because it cuts be current time where Izzi is dying and he is looking for the cure for cancer, the future where Izzi is dead and he is presumable 100s of years old sill mourning her loss. The movie is about learning to deal with death, both your own and the ones you love. To further make the plot more complex there is also a third part of the story line which is a book that Iz...
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Lots of Demos This Week
2007-08-31 22:13:00
I finally got a chance to catch up on the demos I've been downloading for the last week or so. I did not even bother with the sports games I know I'll not play, like the new NHL game. I just played the demos for games I thought I might be interested in. Medal of Honor AirborneI like the concept that you can start a level anywhere on the map by parachuting in, but I found that if I did not start in a safe zone I was toast. Beyond that just another WWII shooter as far as I can tell. Nothing to spectacular about it. I found that the enemies did not seem to damage me as much as I expected. I did not bother using any cover I would just go running into a room and blast everyone in there as my squad mates tried to keep up.Blazing Angels 2This is not really my style of game, but demo was more fun that I expected. I'm not that good at flying games, but the Arcade controls helped a lot. I don't see a big difference between this first Blazing Angels and this one, but there were a...
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Overlord Review
2007-08-29 18:53:00
I started playing Overlord last week and I've found it really addictive. Whenever I was not playing the CoD4 Beta I was playing Overlord this weekend. I think for me it is so addictive because it is so funny. You control minions who run around, kill, and gather items for you. However, they are no very bright so when they pick up items they use them even if they are not helpful. For example, after killing some little guys with skull helmets then proceeded to use their skull helmets. The same with pumpkins, kitchen knives, sticks or whatever else you run into. My favorite so far was when they found the beer and got drunk. It was hilarious watching them wander around with bubbles around them. The game itself is a typical adventure game with some fighting and some puzzles. So far the puzzles have been pretty strait forward where you kill a guy to get a key type object. What makes this better than most adventure games is the humor. It is fun being an evil overlord.The one thi...
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Call of Duty 4 Beta Impressions
2007-08-28 00:14:00
So, I admit, I'm new to the Call of Duty series. I played a little of Call of Duty 2 and 3 with some friends, but not enough to be able to compare it to the Call of Duty 4 Beta . However, since I got into the CoD4 beta I'll give you my impressions of it without any bias based on the previous CoD games. First off, I'm not use to a faster paced shooter. It seems faster to me than GRAW2 or RS:V, and it seems faster than my stubby little dwarf in Shadowrun. Once I got use to the speed though I was doing ok. Not as well as people who were use to the CoD control scheme and were playing the Beta nonstop all day, but still pretty good.I really like all of the unlockable items. At first I thought it would give people who played longer an advantage, and maybe it does, but I was still getting my share of kills so I'm no longer worried about it. I really enjoy playing a couple matches and then getting new weapons, attachments, and perks to play with. My favorite so far has to he th...
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Skate Demo Impressions
2007-08-23 23:43:00
Being a long time fan of the Tony Hawk series I was interested to see how Skate looks and plays. I spent some time with the demo for Skate today and I'm still not sold on it. It does look good and controls work for some stuff, but in other areas it is a nightmare. I had no trouble getting through the tutorial and learning to do basic tricks. I was rolling along ok until I had to grind. Doing a grind is pretty easy. Lining it up so you land on the rail is hard. The camera is very low, and it sits behind you and a little to the side. Because of this you can't see very well directly ahead of you. Especially, since there is not way to adjust the camera angle. This makes it very hard to know when to jump so you land on something to grind. After a while I got the hang of grinding enough to move on in the game. Hopefully they will allow you to adjust the camera angle at least in a way similar to how racing games do where there are 4 or 5 preset spots you can put the camera. Afte...
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Call of Duty 4 Beta Participant
2007-08-23 18:26:00
A quick update. I made it into the Call of Duty 4 beta and downloaded it last night. Hopefully this evening I'll have time to play for a while. I checked out both of the XBLA games released this week and was not impressed with either. Is anyone liking them that I should give them a second try?
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Hexic 2 Review
2007-08-20 20:04:00
I played Hexic 2 for a while this weekend and I'm still not sure if I like it or not. There are some really fun things about it, like the multiplayer mode, but other things about it are really lame. Lets start with the good stuff. First, the new battle game mode is pretty fun. There is a decent amount of strategy involved as well as speed. I played a few matches and lost the first one to the AI, but won the matches after that by a small margin. I also like the new special pieces they added. I don't use them very efficiently yet, but it is nice you're not just stuck with stars and pearls. In addition to having more special pieces you also can blow up the special pieces. This is great is you want to clear out an area that has a lot of random pieces. At least for me all of these combined to make Hexic 2 a little easier than the original. Especially in the Puzzle mode. There are a one main thing I don't like. The graphics don't look as good as the original. They are not ...
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BioShock Demo Impressions
2007-08-16 17:46:00
I know I'm about to get flamed for this, but I'll not be getting BioShock . Before trying the demo I was not planning on playing it and now that I have tried it I'm still not planning to play it. Don't get me wrong, I think it looks beautiful. It is some of the best look water and lighting I've seen in a video game. My issue with it is with the game play. I'm not really into the whole dark, hope when you go around a corner you don't get hit in the back before you can respond, shooter. I like both run-n-gun shooters and tactical, strategy based shooters. This is neither. I was not even going to bother with the demo because I did not think I would like the game, but everyone was raving about how great it was so I gave it a try. I will say if you're looking for a shooter that is different than most of the stuff out there then BioShock is worth a look. Just be ready for a dark gritty game.
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The Bourne Ultimatum Review
2007-08-15 19:14:00
*** Spoiler Alert ***I saw The Bourne Ultimatum last weekend and I have to say right off I really enjoyed it. The whole movie is pretty much non-stop action with just enough dialog to keep things moving along nicely. I'm not going to bother with a long plot recap so here is the quick version. Jason Bourne was a Black-Ops CIA Agent who can't remember who he was and is trying to find out. The thing I like about this movie is that they expect the audience to be smart. There are a ton of little things that tie in the first two Bourne movies with this one. Obviously the story line continues where it left of, but there are other cool things like Bourne quoting people from the first movie that tie it all together. Even if you don't remember the tie-ins specifically the movie is still good, but if you remember all the little things from the first two movies then it makes this one even better. Because of this I'd recommend watching the first two Bourne movies before seeing the t...
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Band of Bugs Red Kingdom Expansion Review
2007-08-13 18:41:00
I downloaded the expansion for Band of Bugs Friday and beat it yesterday, but it was well worth the 250 points. It adds 10 new levels, a couple new unit types, and a couple of achievements. The new units are cavalry and artillery. The cavalry features a bug riding another one with a lance that you can attack from two spots away. The artillery is a cool little snail with a catapult on it back. Its attack hits a really large area, but does only 8 or 10 damage. It is great for knocking down large groups so the rest of your army can finish them off. Both are a lot of fun to play with and the 10 new levels feature them a lot. Even though I beat the new levels pretty quickly they were a lot of fun. Plus, now I can use the new units in multiplayer matches and in new maps I create. If you liked Band of Bugs I would recommend checking out the the expansion pack. It costs about $3 and has some really fun battles.
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All-Pro Football 2K8 Review
2007-08-09 22:41:00
Now that I'm back into my regular schedule of work and gaming, after a couple weeks traveling, I've been spending some time with All-Pro Foot ball 2K8. I was a big fan of the 2K5 football with its online leagues and seasons, and it is nice to have the similar game play again. I've been playing Madden since then, but I prefer the 2K football games because I think the running plays are more realistic. In Madden it always feels like I'm playing pinball bouncing of everyone, but in APF 2K8 the runners actually get tackled if they bump into someone. There are a few things I think Madden does better, like using a trigger for the turbo instead of tapping A. It is hard to get your turbo charged up and then do a big dive or shoulder charge in APF 2K8, but then it is probably more realistic that way too.I really like the way teams are created in APF 2K8. Since 2K can't use real NFL teams they have they got over 200 players that have retired from the NFL that were great back when the...
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Shooter Review
2007-08-06 23:36:00
*** Spoiler Alert ***I saw Shoot er over the weekend. Shooter is set in the USA in the present day. The main character, Bob Lee Swagger, is played by Mark Wahlberg. He was a sniper in the army until he was left for dead. He is able to escape, but now doesn't trust anyone and he lives out in the mountains alone with his dog. Three years after being left for dead Government agents come and ask him to help protect the president. They need him to help them stop a sniper who is going to shoot the president from over a mile away. Since he is one of the 3 or 4 people in the world who can make the shot they need his help to stop the would be assassin. He reluctantly agrees to help them and proceeds to survey the potential target areas and find the most likely one. On the day of the potential attack he agrees to go along and help watch since he knows what to look for. However, instead of stopping the attack the government officials shot the man standing next to the president. He wa...
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Fatal Inertia Demo
2007-08-06 18:50:00
Did anyone else try out the Fatal Inertia demo? I ask because the controls did not seem to follow what the pre-game picture showed them to be. For example the picture shows the A button was thrust and the RT was strafe right, but when I hit the right trigger it was my accelerator. Anyone else have this? After spending some time and figuring out most of the controls I still had a lot of trouble with Fatal Inertia. I was thinking there would be a lot more attacking going on, but really it is a racing game with a few attacking options throw in. I was thinking it would be more on the lines of Full Auto. I spent a little while trying it out, but ultimately I could not keep the vehicle on the track and wrecked myself enough times to blow up. Once that happened I gave up and wen ton to other things.
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Beautiful Katamari Demo Review
2007-08-03 17:51:00
I got my copy on the September issue, #74, of Official Xbox Magazine last night and on this month's disc there is an exclusive demo of Beautiful Katamari . I've never played Katamari before so this was all new to me. At first I was not really impressed with a game where all you do is roll around and try to pick up larger and large objects, but once I got large enough to pick up a cow it got pretty funny. I can see how the simple gameplay could get really addictive as you try to get a larger and lager each time you play. The graphics had the artsy pastel style I expected from the videos and screen shots I've seen. The demo is only 3 minutes long, but you can play it over and over again if you want to. Personally, I think this might be a game that is better on a larger screen than on something small like the PSP since you can see more of what is around you to try and roll over. I was able to get my Katamari up to about 4 and a half meters which I realize is not super large, b...
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Dynasty Warriors: Gundam Demo Review
2007-08-03 00:11:00
I've been out of town for a couple weeks so I finally got around to trying out the Dynasty Warriors : Gundam demo today. It is a pretty strait forward hack-n-slash with a sci-fi setting. The graphics were ok, but nothing special. Personally, if I was looking to play a hack-n-slash I'd rather stick with Ninety Nine Nights. It has better graphics, more combos, and better camera control. The only thing that really bugged my about Dynasty Warriors : Gundam was the camera controls. I was continually struggling to keep the camera looking the direction I was fighting. At least with Ninety Nine Nights I could zoom the camera out far enough that I could see all around me. In Dynasty Warriors: Gundam I felt like I could only see a very limit section of the area around me. The demo was a good length and I had fun beating down wave after wave of enemy. I especially like the gun attack option. It is a nice addition to the normal attacks which in this game are pretty basic. I like a g...
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WeeWar.com Review
2007-07-30 15:57:00
Since I've been traveling the last couple weeks I've been looking for something to fulfill my gaming itch. I stumbled across WeeWar.com and it has been holding me over quite nicely. WeeWar.com is an online turn base multiplayer strategy game. Both you and up to 5 opponents battle to destroy each other's armies. Turns have no real time limit and you get an email updating you when it is your turn. After 24 hours the other players can vote to kick you from the game for taking too long, but generally I've found that most people get their turn in within a couple hours. The game has simple, but clean graphics. The are only about 8 unit types to fight with and each has its own strengths and weaknesses. Part of each units stats are based on the terrain it is on and the type of unit it is attacking. There is a nice variety of maps that range in size from 1v1 to 6 player maps. The game is still in Beta and as such the site goes down for an hour or so every few days for upgrades, ...
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Free Month of GameFly.com
2007-07-24 17:34:00
I received the below email today from GameFly.com.For a limited time, we're giving you a special opportunity to send your friends and family an entire month of GameFly service for FREE. That's three times the length of our regular free trial, and a $22.95 value to your friends!This special offer expires 7/31/2007, so forward this e-mail to your friends and family today.-The GameFly Team So, if anyone is interested in checking out GameFly this seems like a great time to do that. Personally, I've had nothing but great services from them. Just follow this link (here) and sign up.After the first month if you decide to stay with GameFly don't forget to check out BrightSpot.tv and save $10 a month on your GameFly membership.
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Pownce Review
2007-07-23 02:14:00
I recently got an invite to Pownce so I thought I'd share my thoughts on it with everyone.According to the site "Pownce is a way to send messages, files, links, and events to your friends. You'll create a network of the people you know and then you can share stuff with all of them, just a few of them, or even just one other person." Basically, Pownce is a lot like an instance messenger but instead of being designed for sending messages Pownce is designed for send files.There are two components to Pownce. The website, Pownce.com, and then the software. The site and software both load very quickly. The web site has a nice amount of customization on it with 4 themes, and a lot of options for privacy and notification settings.The software is based on Adobe's Air. I'm not sure why they did not just use Flash. Since they did not most users are going to have to download and install an extra component, Air. I'm hoping it was for a technical reason, but who knows. Maybe the dev...
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InviteShare.com
2007-07-21 19:44:00
I came across the site InviteShare.com the other day and I'm pretty impressed with it. Basically, if you are a member of a website that only accepts new members by invitation you can trade your invites with other potential members to get invited to sites they are members of. The site uses a scoring system that keeps track of how many invites you have sent. The more invites you have sent the higher you are on the priority list when you request an invite. It is a simple and straightforward concept that works well. After sending a couple Joost invites I requested an invite to Pownce, and I received it in my email within a couple minutes. The site has a nice, clean design and it loads quickly. In addition, it does what it claims it will very quickly. So far they support over 40 different invite only sites including Joost, Pownce, Moola, WeeWar, and Demoid. If you're looking for an invite to any of these sites you should really consider checking them out.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Mini-Review
2007-03-15 19:00:00
For the third week in a row there actually was a release on Xbox Live Arcade. It is a retro game, but I'll try not to hold that against it. I do like the $5 (400 point) price point for this. I tried Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle s 1989 Classic Arcade out and it is exactly like the the original version. The graphics have not been updated like some of the other retro games on XBLA. They are the original arcade version graphics. TMNT is fun for a while, especially if you have fond memories of playing it in an arcade, but after you've played for 20 minutes it gets pretty repetitive. However, it is fun to play with friends and it is pretty easy to control since there are only two buttons. This is the type of game that anyone can play and win. It is literally impossible not to beat this game because there is no limit to your lives. Any time you die you can hit continue and keep going. The addition of co-op over Xbox Live is nice, but after you've beat the game a few times will you really ...
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Entertainment Center Carnival - First Edition
2007-03-15 16:54:00
This is the First Edit ion of the Entertainment Cent er Carnival . This carnival will focus on all things related to an entertainment center; including TVs, DVDs, DVRs, reviews, and setup help. For this first edition we have two entries.First, Praveen presents Branded Interactive Features Coming to DVDs posted at My Simple Trading System. It is a great look at what the future of High Def DVDs holds.Second, Philip presents Flashback 1998: Saehan MPMan posted at fs-studio blog. It is a nice review of the Eiger Labs MPMan F10; the world's first MP3 player.Submit your blog article to the next edition of entertainment center carnival using the carnival submission form. Past posts and future hosts can be found on our blog carnival index page.
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300 Review
2007-03-14 23:34:00
*** Spoiler Alert ***I saw 300 today and I have to say that I really liked it. I'm not a movie critique by any means. As long as there is decent action and effects I probably like it, but 300 goes beyond having just a list of fights stringed together. The movie has a unique graphical style that just works. It is by no means realistic, but at the same time it is not over the top with blatant effects and graphics. The graphics are well balanced. The scenes between the fighting are probably there to move the plot along enough to get to the next fight, but I did not really mind them. Without a few breaks in the fighting this movie could have been very intense. As it is, the fights are intense because they make it clear early on that not everyone is going to live through the movie. In most movies you know the heroes are going to win in the end, but with that idea gone it adds volumes to the suspense. A lot of times movies with large battles jump from person to person very quickly to try...
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Worms Mini-Review
2007-03-13 22:27:00
Before last week I had not played Worm s since I was in high school. Fortunately, an updated version of Worms was released for Xbox Live Arcade last week. The simple, but addictive, gameplay is still there. If you're not familiar with Worms, basically, you take a team of worm soldiers and attack an enemy team. The game combines arcade and strategy elements very smoothly. The updated graphics look good and fit the game's fun goofy style.What really makes the game fun is the weapons. They have the standard guns like the Uzi and Shotgun, but it the unique items that really make Worms fun. If you're use to playing an older version of Worms you will notice some of the weapons have been removed, but for those people who have never played before your ignorance is bliss. The Banana Bomb, Kamikaze, and Homing Missle are still there but others like the Holy Hand Grenade are gone. The weapons that are available are great fun, but anyone old enough to have played past versions is going to ...
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Creative MuVo TX FM Review
2007-03-12 18:31:00
I've been using the Creative MuVo TX FM for well over a year now. It works very well as a gym MP3 player. It is light weight. It has an optional belt clip, arm band, and a slot to hang on a lanyard. It is flash based so it will be fine getting tossed around during a workout. It supports WMA and MP3 files formats. I think it supports a few other formats, but I don't recall what they are because all my music is already in these formats anyway. It is USB based so you just plug it into your computer and drag the song files over.The built in radio works fine. I use it in the gym to listen to games they have on TV. It allows for assigning presets or scanning through stations so it works well in most areas. It has a built in voice recorder that I've never used. I'm not sure what exactly someone would use it for, but it is there if you need it for something.The screen is small, but the menu system works fine. The only time I look at the screen is when I turn it on. Since it is ...
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Rude Smokers
2007-03-10 23:16:00
I don’t mind when people smoke. I use to spend a few weeks each summer with my Aunt. She smoked and I have grown use to the smell. What I mind is people who blow smoke in your direction when they could easily go the other direction or who ignore No Smoking signs. I don’t go to their designated smoking areas and spray air fresheners. Please don’t come to my non-smoking area and smoke.This is especially annoying at my office because people like to smoke right outside the front door so it is impossible to go in or out without walking through a cloud of smoke made by 4 or 5 smokers. The area clearly states it is non-smoking but there is pretty much always someone smoking there. I'm still trying to think of some good ways to get them back, but I've not thought of any yet. I was thinking of "adjusting" the sprinklers so that they point at that area and then setting them off at random intervals, but that requires I pay attention to when people are out there and I never notice u...
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Flashback Review: Halo 2 Cooperative
2007-03-09 22:48:00
I recently played through Halo 2's co-op mode on Legendary. I realized a couple things while playing. First, while graphics are an essential part of a game they are not the primary factor in what makes a game fun. Despite the fact the game is a few years old now and the graphics are not as nice as newer games like Gears of War or Rainbow Six Vegas I had a lot of fun playing through the story again with one of my co-workers. Second, Legendary is long when the person you are playing with dies a lot.The gameplay stands up to these current releases because it is well designed and balanced. There are a lot of ways to make a game fun. Halo 2 does it by giving the player a combination of enemy strength and intelligence to deal with. The strongest enemies are not the smartest, but they make up for that being only vulnerable on a few spots. On the other side, the smartest enemies are vulnerable to attack everywhere . There is a good balance here. The AI in this game plays fairly smart. Enem...
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Rainbow Six: Vegas Update
2007-03-08 18:45:00
In case you had not noticed an update was released for Rain bow Six: Vega s this week. In it there were about a dozen bug fixes and a few major gameplay changes (full list below). It is nice that Xbox Live allows for games with bugs to get fixed, but really I'd prefer that companies test their games better so updates are not needed. I can understand the need for some updates to combat rampant cheating - like Halo 2 had before the first update. What I don't understand is why they thought it would be a good idea to change the gameplay mechanics. Specifically, why they would change the accuracy of the weapons after the game has been out for months. It is not like they just changed one or two guns either. They changed pretty much all of them. Yes, the shotguns were to accurate at longer ranges, but are easily to combat with grenades. Or, even easier, turn them off in the game setup. Besides the shotguns, the other guns were pretty well balanced. I played a few matches right after the...
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Alien Hominid HD Mini-Review
2007-03-08 01:29:00
Alien Hominid was released for Xbox Live Arcade last Wednesday. I finally stopped playing Crackdown long enough to check it out, but I wish I hadn't. I'm glad to see something getting released on XBLA, and I do like the graphical style of the game. It reminds of the Metal Slug games I played in the past. Other than the graphical style of the game there was not a lot of stuff I liked about the game. I found it very hard and frustrating. The controls themselves are easy enough to pick up, but the lack of any health bar makes it a one-hit-kills play style. This would be ok if you had a way to defend yourself, but you your only defense is to jump, roll, or dig. Basically, the gameplay boils down to shoot as fast as you can and hope you can jump over attacks in time. There are plenty of other games that have this same play style that are fun to play, but the graphical style of Alien Hominid made it hard at times to see the enemy attacks coming at you. I don't know about you, but I can...
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