Never Too Old To Play™

Resident Evil fans can be generally split into two groups: players who enjoy and embrace the action-oriented third-person game play style of Resident Evil 4 and 5 and those who prefer the old school puzzle solving with a more moderate dose of zombie killing action.

Desperate Escape, the second piece of downloadable content for Resident Evil 5, is clearly geared more towards the action fans in contrast to Lost In Nightmares which, while offering a lot of cleverly crafted nostalgia to gamers who grew up with the earlier entries in the series in the 90′s, feels like a completely separate entity instead of an expansion on the main game.

In Desperate Escape, the player takes control of recently saved Jill Valentine (or can use Sheva Alomar’s comrade Josh Stone after beating the episode once) on a side journey that details just how Jill and Josh ended up in the helicopter during the final cut scene of Resident Evil 5.

Whereas gamers who have no history with the Resident Evil franchise may get thrown by the drastically different game play style of Lost In Nightmares, they’ll easily transition to Desperate Escape which uses characters, enemies and environments from the main game. The episode fits perfectly into the world, and the very basic story complements the campaign proper which makes for a better, more seamless experience.

Desperate Escape is basically more of everything players loved (or hated) about Resident Evil 5 so the gamer knows exactly what they’re getting when they plunk down the $5 for the download (the content is also available as part of the Resident Evil 5: Gold Edition package for those players who were late to the game).

I think both pieces of downloadable content are worth playing for long time fans of the Resident Evil series, but if I had to choose one to recommend I would suggest Desperate Escape in a heartbeat since it’s a much more exciting experience that is truer to Resident Evil 5′s heartbeat.

Final score: 4 out of 5

Parent to parent

Like I said in my review, Desperate Escape is more of everything that was great in Resident Evil 5 which includes the gore and the violence. I wouldn’t recommend the main game to young children, and I certainly wouldn’t recommend this expansion.

Experience this for yourself!

• Resident Evil 5: Desperate Escape (Xbox Live Marketplace)
• Resident Evil 5: Gold Edition (Xbox 360) (Amazon)
• Resident Evil 5: Gold Edition (PlayStation 3) (Amazon)

I know I’m not alone in wishing for a remake of the first (and second for that matter) Resident Evil games using the new perspective and game play style employed by Resident Evil 5. That may be a pipe dream, but for now players wishing to take a stroll down memory lane can do so by playing Lost In Nightmares, a downloadable episode available on Xbox Live (or as part of the Resident Evil: Gold Edition available for both Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3).

Lost In Nightmares is the playable version of the flashback in Resident Evil 5 where series protagonist Chris Redfield recounts his mission with ex-partner Jill Valentine searching the European mansion of Umbrella Corporation chairman Ozwell E. Spencer.

The setting is deliberately reminiscent of the Arklay Mountains mansion in which the first Resident Evil game takes place. In fact, the entire chapter is essentially a throwback to that first game with tons of tiny little homages to the one that started it all. For instance, when you open doors in Lost In Nightmares, the view switches to a head-on perspective of the slowly opening door just like in the original game. There are also little winks and nods involving shattering windows, ceiling traps and Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata.

The only problem is that for the most part the episode is really quite boring. While it’s nice to see puzzles that are very similar to the ones gamers enjoyed back in the 90′s when the first game came out, the near utter lack of action sequences is quite jarring after having played the action heavy Resident Evil 5 main campaign. It’s true that Resident Evil didn’t boast non-stop gun fights, but Capcom seems to have swung to the completely opposite end of the spectrum with this DLC.

This isn’t to say that there’s no action anywhere in the entire mission, but what little there is seems somewhat mundane. Gamers meet a brand new enemy about halfway through the episode, but aside from the final boss fight that new enemy is the only type you encounter.

There are no zombies, no infected dogs, no Majini, etc. so there’s really no traditional combat sequences because the new enemy is one of those “very dangerous but very slow” types that you can almost always avoid fighting altogether.

Just about the only part of Lost In Nightmares that feels like it’s part of Resident Evil 5 at all is the final boss battle in which you face an enemy you battled in the full game by using the same strategies and techniques. It’s very frustrating for me personally that this is the tie-in since the game play style for this particular boss was my least favorite in Resident Evil 5.

Despite all of the issues I had with Lost In Nightmares, I still recommend it to die hard fans of the series (or at least the first game) since there are a lot of little Easter egg type details that fans should enjoy. I’m torn on this download myself because while I enjoyed the nostalgic aspects, I found myself incredibly bored with a good portion of the episode. Perhaps I need to recognize that my tastes have changed and to stop wishing for what Resident Evil was so I can focus 100% on my enjoyment of what Resident Evil has become.

Final score: 3 out of 5

Parent to parent

While this is an expansion for a game that I would not recommend for children, the significant lack of combat almost allows me to offer an opinion that the episode is child-safe. However, what the new enemy does to your character if it manages to get a hold of them is easily as gory as anything you’ll find in Resident Evil 5. Further, you would need to purchase the main game in order to play this expansion so there really isn’t any reason a child should ever be playing Lost In Nightmares.

Experience this for yourself!

• Resident Evil 5: Lost In Nightmares (Xbox Live Marketplace)
• Resident Evil 5: Gold Edition (Xbox 360) (Amazon)
• Resident Evil 5: Gold Edition (PlayStation 3) (Amazon)

The Signal is the first of two downloadable episodes for the magnificent Xbox 360 exclusive psychological horror thriller Alan Wake. People who purchased the original game brand new received an insert in the package with an Xbox Live code to download the content absolutely free, which is an awesome bonus to a superb gaming experience. Unfortunately, The Signal doesn’t quite live up to the expectations set by the main game despite using the same game engine, the same game play elements (with a clever new twist) and the same lovingly crafted world. Maybe it’s because of some of those things that the episode shines less brightly.

After loading up The Signal, you find yourself once again in control of Mr. Wake essentially right after the events of the main game. However, the action in this episode takes place entirely within the mind of our titular hero, who is experiencing a mental breakdown thanks to everything he endured at the hands of the Dark Presence. Thus while you find yourself navigating the town of Bright Falls in which the game proper took place it’s not exactly the same Bright Falls but rather a mental representation of it, nor are the enemies you face or the items you discover anything more than figments of Alan’s demented imagination. In fact, there are no standard item drops at all but rather Alan’s typed words floating in the air waiting to be realized with the shine of the flashlight and an explosion of light and typewriter sounds. It’s a creative departure from the “real world” and really effective in conveying the idea of the nightmare existence Alan is stuck in.

The problem is that it really seems like you’re just backtracking through environments you’ve seen (in some cases many times) before. Because of the nature of the scenario, the designers are able to speed you from location to location without a lot of the more rudimentary exploration aspects from the original game (which would be pointless in the episode since as I said before you’re not really discovering much of anything new) so the action sequences seem much more frequent, but that doesn’t leave much room for plot development which is one of the things that really makes the main game so great.

People who thought that Alan Wake didn’t have enough action or maybe had too much “downtime” in between combat encounters will probably enjoy The Signal very much. I’m not one of those people, though – the wonderfully disturbing story and the way the plot progressed are core reasons I enjoyed the game so much, and by the time the episode is complete you’re essentially right back where you started. The Signal is a fun few hours for sure, but it’s really pointless fun.

Final score: 3 out of 5

Parent to parent

This is just an expansion of Alan Wake, so my recommendation is no different than it was for the main game. This is not a game for young children.

Experience this for yourself!

• Alan Wake: The Signal (Xbox Live Marketplace)

Let me start off by stating emphatically that Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell: Conviction is not a game for hardcore Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell games. By this I mean that if you’re looking for the same rigid, trial and error, “one mistake and you’re gone” type of stealth game play that the earlier Splinter Cell games on the previous generation of video game consoles are famous for, you should just keep moving on.

If you’re one of the die hard fans who was married to that overly restrictive, old school kind of game play, you really should have taken this title off your radar the first time Ubisoft officially announced the game in May 2007. That original version of Conviction eschewed the series’ traditional game play style in favor of an alternate kind of stealth more in line with Eidos’s critically acclaimed Hitman series with Sam Fisher losing the advanced Third Echelon gear and dark hallways to instead disappear in broad daylight by blending in with crowds.

Don’t get me wrong: I love the game play style of the earlier entries in the Splinter Cell franchise. Those games were amongst my favorites of that generation, and that Microsoft’s Xbox console got the first game before any other platform did really cemented it as my system of choice.

I’m also a bit miffed like many of the Splinter Cell devotees that the game play style is seemingly missing in action in this generation so far, but I’m holding out hope that Ubisoft sees the value in perhaps branching off the franchise – or creating an entirely new one – to utilize traditional style. Until that announcement, fans at least have the rumored Thief sequel to pine after.

For now, however, fans of the Splinter Cell universe who aren’t so focused on old game play styles should revel in the new and improved Sam Fisher complete with emotional baggage and a more fiery personality. He may not do splits halfway up a narrow corridor or perform upside down neck breakers, but he doesn’t have to now that he can give Jack Bauer, Jason Bourne and Daniel Craig’s James Bond a run for their money in the marksmanship department.

Indeed, the new Sam Fisher feels a lot more bad ass with the new “Mark and Execute” feature by which the player can “tag” up to four enemies (the actual number depends on the equipped weapon and its level of upgrades) to instantly kill in very “secret agent” like ways with the press of a button. I’ve read posts by many fans complaining that the game is too easy when you can just auto-kill enemies left and right, but the fact of the matter is that you can’t even activate this ability until you’ve taken out at least one enemy in hand-to-hand combat and you have to earn it again each time you use it.

I can understand the viewpoint that Ubisoft should have used this in another intellectual property – perhaps an adaptation of or homage to 24, the Bourne series or the James Bond universe – but then what could they have done with the Splinter Cell series, which was clearly struggling at the market due to the gaming market shifting predominantly towards heavily action oriented, “run and gun” shooters?

Another new game play feature is the “Last Known Position” mechanic in which enemies focus on where they last saw Fisher should he escape quickly enough. This is realized on screen by a “ghostly” silhouette of Fisher in that location, giving the player the opportunity to circle around and take out the misinformed goons.  In some cases, this can help in escaping a sticky situation, but I’ve always used it to just set up more creative executions.

It’s this ability to mix things up between more stealthy tactics and cinematic action that makes Splinter Cell: Conviction a winner in my book. It’s still stealth, but it’s a more mainstream and more palatable type of stealth that doesn’t make this entry in the series any better or worse than the others. I, for one, would like Ubisoft to continue with what they’ve done in Conviction while also considering some sort of return to the series’ roots so that there’s something for everyone in this really cool universe that they’ve created.

Final score: 4 out of 5

Parent to parent

Sam Fisher does some pretty violent things in this game. In earlier Splinter Cell games the player could avoid killing anybody 99.99% of the time, but in Conviction the body count just keeps piling up. Fisher is a man on a mission, and he’s willing to take out anyone who stands in his way, which is probably not a great lesson to teach the youngsters. I cannot in good conscience recommend this game for anyone who isn’t at least in high school.

Experience this for yourself!

• Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell: Conviction (Xbox 360) (Amazon)
• Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell: Conviction (Windows) (Amazon)
• Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell: Conviction Collector’s Edition (Xbox 360) (Amazon)
• Xbox 360 250GB Elite Splinter Cell: Conviction Bundle (Amazon)

Originally intended as an Xbox 360 launch title when it was announced at the Electronic Entertainment Expo in 2005, Alan Wake finally arrived in May of this year to hordes of anxious fans. Okay… well… not hordes of fans, or even very many at all (less than 750,000 copies of the title have been sold worldwide in nearly 5 months on the market).

However, just because the general gaming public didn’t take to the game doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t… depending on the type of gamer you are. While Alan Wake employs a fair amount of combat, it’s not really an action game at its core. The game has a more psychological feel to it with a rather eerie atmosphere, much more reminiscent of Silent Hill (another game series that hasn’t done very well at retail) than the blockbuster Resident Evil series.

In Alan Wake, you take on the role of the titular character who is a former best selling novelist looking for some inspiration to get past his two year writer’s block in the quaint Pacific Northwest town of Bright Falls, Washington. As expected, Alan’s life is turned upside down when his wife, Alice, disappears from the remote lake island cabin they rented and he is blamed. Strange, nightmarish things start happening, leading Alan to believe that there’s much more going on than a simple kidnapping, and he must work with his agent and the local sheriff to stop an evil from engulfing the whole town.

It’s an interesting premise that is superbly realized on the screen by a combination of clever writing and beautiful art direction as well as some engaging game play elements that fit perfectly with the game’s decidedly dark atmosphere.

Unfortunately, the more cerebral nature of the plot probably dooms the game to a lifetime of abstinence from the more trigger happy segment of the gaming market looking only for the next Call of Duty or Gears of War title to grace store shelves. It’s understandable that they would be turned off by the more slow paced game play and fantastical elements of the story when all they really want to do is frag their buddies in online deathmatches.

I’m sure the lengthy development process also turned off a lot of gamers who may have been truly excited for the game back when it was first announced or when it was “coming soon” for the first several years of the Xbox 360′s life. The game does look like it was developed earlier in the generation: the art direction is wonderful, but the graphics technology is obviously dated. Great graphics don’t inherently lead to a great game, but it’s entirely understandable that some people have trouble ignoring the visual wonders of titles like Uncharted 2 and Red Dead Redemption when looking at the preview stills from Alan Wake plastered all over gaming websites.

Nevertheless, gamers who decide to pass over this title in favor of the next frag fest or action extravaganza are most certainly doing themselves a disservice as Alan Wake offers a unique game play experience coupled with a disturbing yet enthralling story line all wrapped up in a chilling atmosphere that would make Stephen King proud. Indeed, playing Alan Wake is likely the closest thing to playing a good video game adaptation of a King novel, complete with the accompanying paranoia and week long aversion to walking down into the basement by yourself.

Final score: 5 out of 5

Parent to parent

This is not a game for children. There are some mature themes in play during the course of the game, and the gamer is required to engage in quite a lot of violence against enemies that are essentially representations of the townsfolk they meet early on.  The dark and supernatural aspects of the experience certainly don’t help. Enjoy the game yourself, but spare your kids the nightmares.

Experience this for yourself!

• Alan Wake (Xbox 360) (Amazon)
• Alan Wake: Limited Edition (Xbox 360) (Amazon)

Nelson Tethers: Puzzle Agent is quite a departure from developer Telltale Games’ modus operandi. It seems like the game is just the first episode in an ongoing series, much like many of Telltale’s other projects such as the Sam & Max and Tales of Monkey Island series. However, instead of being a point-and-click adventure game in the vein of such classic titles that pull at many a gamer’s heartstrings like King’s Quest and Leisure Suit Larry, Puzzle Agent is more like the critically acclaimed ongoing puzzle game series Professor Layton, exclusive to the Nintendo DS platform.

Theoretically, this is a good thing, but Telltale’s sincere flattery falls far short with rather rudimentary graphics that have an inconsistent performance, overly simple puzzles that barely bend the mind, and a rather convoluted plot that tries too hard to be witty and smart but ends up being messy and pointless.

Quite a departure indeed.

You play as the sole member of the FBI’s Puzzle Research Division who is sent to Scoggins, Minnesota to determine why the factory that manufactures the erasers the White House uses closed down. The FBI sends you because the only responses to their inquiries have been cryptic puzzles. The further you dig into the mystery surrounding the events at the eraser factory the weirder it gets, but I won’t spoil anything here as the revelation of all the strange plot artifacts is really the only reward you get for solving some of the easiest brain teasers I’ve ever encountered.

The designers of Puzzle Agent clearly tried to take a page out of Level-5′s book in the design of the game’s puzzles. Just like in the Professor Layton series, the puzzles are just straight up traditional mind benders wrapped within a fictional context so the gamer doesn’t feel like they’re being hit with a set of random puzzles. However, these puzzles play second fiddle to Level-5′s in pretty much every way imaginable from the quality of the creative writing used in the contextual preface to the order of magnitude greater ease in the solutions (only two or three puzzles in the entire game gave me any sort of challenge, and one instance was because the instructions weren’t clear).

Really, that’s the core gripe. When it comes to the artistic design or the story, one can easily cite the “eye of the beholder” defense, but there’s really no excuse for the overly simple puzzles that I continually breezed through. Ultimately, I play a game like this or Professor Layton for the puzzles: the extra fluff like plot and presentation are nice extras, but I want to feel like I was challenged when playing a game that is centered around what are essentially brain exercises.

Don’t get me wrong. Nelson Tethers: Puzzle Agent is not a bad game. If you’re a huge fan of puzzlers such that the fact you’re solving puzzles is more important than the quality of the puzzles – and the game surrounding them – then you won’t go wrong with this game. There are plenty of puzzles for gamers to go through. I simply feel that the Professor Layton series on the Nintendo DS is a cut above Puzzle Agent, and that your time would be better spent on those games instead.

Final score: 3 out of 5

Parent to parent

You can safely buy this game for your children to play, and to a degree it could be a helpful game in keeping their minds sharp (although like I said in my review the Professor Layton series would be a much better choice). The cartoony art style might be just up some youngsters’ alley, and the wacky and inconsistent plot might be appealing.

Experience this for yourself!

• Puzzle Agent (Windows/Mac) (Steam)
• Puzzle Agent HD (iPad) (iTunes)
• Puzzle Agent (iPhone) (iTunes)