The Game Seers Podcast

Finally, another great success for the Wii!  While Wii titles that are genuinely all around good seemingly come far too infrequently, Wario Land: Shake It! was well worth the wait!  Immediately when you pop the game into your Wii you’ll be stepping into the time machine and will feel like you’re back in the golden days of Nintendo.  Wario Land: Shake It (from here on out WLSI) builds upon the great successes of past Nintendo titles without distorting it beyond recognition or fun by excessive use of the Wii’s features.  What I mean by this is that the controls will feel extremely intuitive.  Everything works exactly as you think it would – if you play any Wii games at all you know that this is becoming less and less common.  You hold the Wiimote sideways and use the buttons like a simple NES title.  While there is some waggle involved it isn’t to the point where it is over done.  For instance, to get the coins out of a bag of money you shake the Wiimote until the bag is empty.  A quick downward flick of the Wiimote will make Wario blast at the ground which is necessary throughout the game to solve the puzzles of each stage and find the treasures hidden within.

While the game is of course not in HD – it still will look great on an HDTV with the Nintendo component cables.  The actual artwork and graphics of the game are quite impressive!  The cartoonish style images are colorful, fun, and pretty straight forward.  The game looks and feels a lot like Super Mario Land 3: Wario Land for the original Game Boy.  Wario will use familiar moves like jumping up and smashing the ground or charging into enemies and breakable bricks.  What the game does not have are the various power up hats, which really doesn’t detract from the game experience as every power Wario does have is all you’ll need.  Each level has 3 treasures hidden within — trying to find them all is a rewarding experience alone.  You’ll need to think on your feet to solve puzzles while meanwhile trying to make it to the end of the level before time runs out.  The game features a Super Mario Land 3 (NES) map system with a boss at the end of each world.  Each level also has challenges built in such as collecting X amount of gold coins, avoid falling into water, so on and so forth – which continues to add into the reply factor.  While the game is not very hard, to actually get the full extent you will need to put time and thought into it.

Like any Nintendo game, an outstanding sound track will play you along in your journey as Wario to accumulate mass wealth and treasure.  Not only does the music really add to the game but simple sound effects are pretty good too – while they may not be the most inventive, they fit.

Overall, Wario Land: Shake It! is most definitely worth the buy for the upcoming holiday season, it is bound to please everyone who owns a Wii!

The basic premise of World of Goo is simple; your goal is to get a certain number of goo balls to an exit pipe, while using those same goo balls to build the structure that delivers the balls to the pipe. When you begin a level there will be a base structure to build off of. The standard goo ball can be attached to two nearby points to form a triangle. With enough goo balls you can build almost anything. The game has a very advanced physics engine, so these structures will react realistically to the forces of gravity. The shapes are solid, but by no means rigid. Since they are made of goo, the forms will bend and sway as gravity takes hold. If a single joint in the structure is put under too much pressure, it will eventually crumble. It becomes a literal balancing act between the architectural integrity and weight of your goo structure. All the while you must keep in mind the number of goo balls you have to work with and how many have to be delivered safely to the exit pipe in order to complete the stage.

Throughout the game you’ll be introduced to many different “species” of goo, many of which have special attributes. Some can be taken apart and reassembled. Others can stick to walls or touch dangerous surfaces. Some burn, some explode, some hang limp, some float like balloons. You’ll have to use the specialty of each type of goo to get through the level and achieve your goal. Every type of goo is used in imaginative ways that only get more ingenious as the game progresses. As soon as you think you’ve got it all figured out, the game throws something at you that will force you to use a type of goo in a way you never thought of before. You’ll be using new techniques right up until the last stage.

The game has incredible style. The art direction is somewhere between Dr. Seuss and Tim Burton. Every chapter has an overarching visual theme, and every stage is unique enough that you will never feel like you’re in the same place twice. There are times where you will be amazed that you are playing a WiiWare game. It would be nice to see these graphics in HD, but in all honesty, you will not notice unless you make a point to. There are certain levels in the game that are stunningly beautiful, not just in a graphical sense, but as a genuine piece of art. The visuals are crisp, clean, and colorful, and it works perfectly with this type of game.

The music in World of Goo is just as impressive. There are a lot of different styles represented here. Some tracks remind me of epic movie scores, while others seem to take another page out of the Tim Burton library. The main theme is very reminiscent of Beatlejuice. Certain areas, the windmill stage for example, work incredibly well as a combination of music and visual art. It really is amazing. Sometimes you have to take a second to soak it all in. Like the levels themselves, there is so much variety in the music. You will never get sick of these themes.

Though this game is mostly about puzzle solving, there are bits and pieces of a story that ties the whole thing together. These little details are delivered through signs located around the stages. They consist mostly of the observations and insights of the unnamed sign painter, and they often add a touch of humor to the game. They’ve even snuck a few geeky jokes in there that are sure to get a chuckle for those in the know. They have no reservations about breaking the 4th wall either. On one occasion the sign painter even pokes fun at the fact that the game doesn’t run in HD. On another sign he mentions how life seems to be nothing more than a big physics demo. It all helps add to the charm of the world, making the game build up it’s own personality that sets it apart from the competition.

Worlf of Goo will take you between four to six hours to complete on your first attempt, but that’s not to say you couldn’t sink many more hours into the title. After you finish the main game, you can go back and try to finish the special “OCD” challenge in each level. These include collecting a certain number of goos in a given level or finishing in under a certain amount of time. These challenges will certainly have you scratching your head, and maybe even pulling out your hair on occasion. They’re extremely difficult, and will keep you busy for a very long time. At the end of the game there is also a special area unlocked where you can go and try to build the tallest possible tower of goo. You can see the top scores of other individuals around the world and try to beat their records. You use the extra goo you rescued from the entirety of the game here, which gives you more incentive to go back and try to finish every stage as efficiently as possible. It’s amazing what you can build when you have several hundred goo balls at your disposal. It is a shame though that there is almost no information given about the record holders around the world. The only thing you know about these individuals is their country of origin. This kind of takes some of the thrill out of going for the world record, knowing that no one will ever know it was you. This is most likely a result of Nintendo’s limited online functionality, so it‘s hard to hold this against the game. In the end it’s still a welcome addition.

All of this adds up to an amazing package that’s a steal at only $15. World Of Goo is not only the best WiiWare game to date, it’s one of the best Wii games period. Its simple, addictive gameplay design may be hard to describe, but by the time you finish the first stage, you‘ll realize what all the fuss was about. You owe it to yourself to play this game, even if it means hooking up your Wii for the first time in months. Just do it — you’ll be happy you did.

I’ve been playing THQ’s new title De Blob for a while now over the past few days and feel its about time to  write a fair and descriptive review of the game that perhaps is a little less biased than some of the other reviews out there.  To clarify that statement, it seemed to me that many other reviews were written by people who were somewhat close to the game – or people who really wanted this to be an amazing game.

The Story:  Essentially you’re a blob whose objective is to save the black and white city that lost all of its color to the evil INKT Corporation.  Playing as De Blob, you must make your way through the city returning color and saving the Greylings by coloring their apartments and then adding color to them, destroying INKT propoganda devices, and there are some other challengs too.  That’s really about it.

The Premises:  As stated before you’re playing as De Blob whose mission it is to return color to the black and white city.  How you do this is to attack these monster things that have colored ink in them (which you can also blend multiple colors) and just touch everything to turn it that color.  Basically the game is a big puzzle.

The Controls:  This is De Blob’s number one problem.  The controls are awful.  To jump it requires you to flick the wii mote and then you have to haphazardly guide yourself in air with the nunchuck’s analog stick all the while battling the less than perfect camera system.  De Blob has a Kirby-esque feel when he goes airborne but has far less control which can add a lot of frustration when you’re trying to scale some buildings and meeting tons of Resistance.  Not because the game is hard but simply because it seems to be a serious design flaw.

Thoughts:  Overall De Blob is moderately fun in spite of the horrid controls.  The premises is neat enough and the animations are pretty pleasing to look at.  Yes, it can be fun at times to go around acting as a giant paint bucket but this alone does not seem to justify the $49.99 USD Price tag.  Realistically the game is worth about $29.99.  I feel the game got hyped up unjustifiably and that is why so many people have written such praising reviews.  The music is quite nice to listen to and does add to the environment but if you’re anything like me – which you may or may not be – you will see it hard to justify having to flick the wiimote to jump when a simple button press would have sufficed.  Perhaps I’m being to knit picky but to me I am greatly disillusioned in just how the game feels.  Great concept, not so great execution.  Overall I’d say the game is a 7.1 and that’s pushing it.  If you’re really into this type of game pick it up, otherwise rent it or wait for a price drop.

The Breakdown
Graphics – 8.5
Controls – 5
Music – 9
Replay – 5
Concept / Story – 8

OVERALL SCORE: 7.1

When reviewing a Star Wars game, it is very difficult to review being completely unbiased. By that I mean – depending on how true a game is to the Star Wars franchise it is easy to inflate the rating, or conversely – if the game is a bit too far fetched for the Star Wars universe it is almost without a second of after thought that it is fed to the sharks and put completely out of mind. That being said, my initial reaction to playing Star Wars: The Force Unleashed (on Xbox 360) was inflate – I have to say the story is very genuine and doesn’t feel like a poorly manufactured tale was woven together just trying to make bank on the Star Wars cash cow. However, even at only 30 minutes into the game I began to see some pretty unfortunate flaws. Right away you’ll notice how easy the game is (I beat the game on Sith Warrior difficulty) – the automatic deflecting of laser bolts feels a little cheap though admittedly I really don’t see many other ways to correct that on the 360. You’ll also notice that your light saber will make quick work of any droid slicing them in half like butter – however, when dealing with actual life forms your light saber functions more like a light baseball bat and you really just are beating the hell out of your enemies until they eventually die, perhaps out of boredom. The cut scene boss battles leave you feeling a bit cheated as with the simple push of a button you are delivering the ‘coup de grace’ to your enemy that you had to senselessly bash your way through entire drones of light saber immune bastards just to get there. SWTFU is however an awesome display of power for the 360, the game is rendered amazingly in full 1080P HD, I cannot even imagine sacrificing the resolution to play it on the Wii (I will try to play this on Wii though to be fair) – what the game does absolutely right is tell a great story that fits in with the current 6 films in between episode 3 and 4 and also explains how some Jedi managed to escape the dreaded clone attacks. For what it’s worth the Force Unleashed is pretty decent game. It won’t be in my list for game of the year 2008 but certainly will not get too dusty in the collection. I definitely recommend renting it for everyone, and for the die hard Star Wars; fans dive into your pockets and fork over the money – it looks like Georgie Boy didn’t get his hands into this one to ruin it.  When you get to the end you get to make a decision on dark side or light side – either choice effects the outcome of the story.  (Check youtube for spoilers for the opposite of your decision unless you want to play through again, which unless you’re a achievement point junky you probably will not do)

Rating Scale 1 being bad 10 being perfect.

Graphics: (8.5)
Story: (8.5)
Game Play: (7)
Music/Sound: (8.5)
Replay Factor: (6)
Overall Rating: (7.5)