Review: Bird Mania 3D (eShop)

Bird Mania 3D is significant in a few ways. Firstly, it’s the first Nintendo eShop game to be retailed at $2 USD. The game also signifies developer Teyon’s entrance into the eShop marketplace. However, the more interesting event that the game signifies is that it’s the 3DS’s first game that anyone could pick-up-and-play without any previous knowledge and still enjoy.

New tidbits on Super Meat Boy's iPhone outing

Team Meat's Edmund McMillen revealed some new nuggets of info today regarding Super Meat Boy: The Game's new iPhone game. Though still very early in development, he made it clear that this is intended to be a "game" through and through, with high difficulty and no easy way out.

Review: Mario Kart 64 (Wii Virtual Console)

Mario Kart is easily the biggest of Nintendo’s Mario spin-off games - for good reason. The first title on the Super Nintendo popularized a subgenre of racing; one that would give way to many clones over the years. The same praise can’t be said for its first sequel, but it’s still worth a look.

If you’ve never played Mario Kart before today, here’s the quick lowdown. Races take place on various character-themed tracks, divided into three laps. You’re free to pick a character according to his or her handling, weight class, and acceleration. Handling and acceleration are pretty self-explanatory, but your weight class determines whether or not you can pound your opponents or get pounded during a collision. Once in the competition, you’ll hop into your “kart” and duke it out against the other racers by collecting and using items on the track. It’s a lot simpler than it sounds, but there’s a reason the formula has been around for 20 years.

In terms of general kart control, 64 offers neither the user-friendly control of Mario Kart 7 nor the intense, twitch-heavy action from Super Circuit. It initially feels like a missing link. It can be hard to adjust at first (especially to the strange drifting) but the controls become solid with time.

Potential control troubles aside, it warrants mentioning that this is quite likely the easiest game in the entire series. Unlike the more recent titles, you can often dominate the schizophrenic computer opponents without being pestered by an overabundance of blue shells. You’re also able to get your fair share of good items, even while in better positions. If the course is lengthy enough, you can still come in first despite a total lack of drifting and still afford to bump into some obstacles along the way.

Sadly, there’s not much content to be found in the single player campaign. The game packs 16 well designed stages divided into four cups. These cups are then further separated into 50cc, 100cc, 150cc, and Mirror (ranked in order of top kart speed and computer difficulty). The game’s lowly difficulty comes back to haunt the longevity, in that a dedicated hour or two could have you completing everything offered by the single player mode.

To complement the Grand Prix mode is Time Trials; a mode that allows you to play through any course of your choosing and head for the fastest time. Given the reasonable track selection, you should get a kick out of this for a bit. This Virtual Console edition suffers from the inability to save ghost data, so you’ll either have to write down your times or simply use it as a training mode of sorts.

Last of the modes is Battle, which has you driving around large open areas in an attempt to pop all of your opponent’s balloons. This can be done by bumping them off the edge (an accidental suicide works well too), firing shells, and through various other malicious actions. You’ve got a solid selection of four courses to pick from, all of which play very differently from one another. Block Fort in particular is the stuff of legends. Disappointingly, battle mode is also exclusive to multiplayer (you can’t choose to practice against computer players), so unless you’ve got a dummy controller to plug in, you won’t be able to even try the mode by yourself.

Another glaring omission is the lack of a free race mode. Should you want to practice, say, Kalamari Desert with computer players, you’ll have to play through three other courses first. Why this was restricted to multiplayer is beyond me.

   

The main reason you’ll want to consider Mario Kart 64 a viable purchase is the multiplayer mode. If you’re not into the whole online experience offered by the more recent entries, you’ll find a very competent package here. Given the 16 courses and excellent battle mode, you could easily justify this purchase if you’ve got some friends or your young ‘uns around.

The visuals hold up reasonably well, although you can tell the game was released in the earlier part of the Nintendo 64’s lifespan. The characters and maps are as fantastical as ever, but appear somewhat washed out. Nevertheless, it’s a very good looking game in terms of both glamour and aesthetic practicality.

The soundtrack is probably the most alluring prospect of the single player mode. The game is littered with more catchy and cheerful melodies than I care to remember. If you’ve played this one as a child, your heart strings will be pleasantly caressed. Having character voices is a nice touch as well. There is an occasional problem where the music slows down (may be exclusive to the Virtual Console port), but the issue doesn’t often pop up unless there are many racers on the screen at once.

Mario Kart 64 isn’t quite as compelling as it once was. The single player mode is a breeze, the track selection is half of most of its sequels, and a few key options are absent. With that said, it still plays perfectly well. This is absolutely worth picking up if you have even one friend around willing to play. The sheer excitement offered by a multiplayer battle on Block Fort makes Mario Kart 64 worth thinking twice about.

-Clark A

Our Scoring Policy

Review: Dark Scavenger (PC)

Well, it's not every day you see an RPG mix it with a point-and-click adventure game. That's what's happened here, but as odd as the mix is, this indie title gets it right... most of the time.

Gameloft has spectacular first quarter

Smartphone and tablet developer and publisher, Gameloft, has announced a spectacular first quarter for 2012.

Game localisation is not all fun and games: An interview with Nyu Media founder, Seon King

Nyu Media is one of the exciting new startups in the games industry. It’s a localisation company that has already given us the rather excellent eXceed Collection and Cherry Tree High Comedy Club. It specialises in Doujin games (games created by hobbyists), and has a real eye for quality.

I sat down to have a chat with the founder and owner of Nyu Media, Seon King, about what it takes to be a startup in this industry of ours, and some of the trials and tribulations behind localising games.

Also, if you’re reading this Konami, please hire these guys to localise Love Plus for you. They’d do a spectacular job, and the West needs to see that dating games can be good quality.

Stop casting Yogs into my cave: Yogscave free DLC added to Sanctum, Sanctum gets free weekend

Released over a year ago, Sanctum is still a hard game to describe to a normal video game player without getting a weird look; A combination of a first-person shooter and a tower-defense game that allows four players to create and destroy their own structures on the same map at the same time?

Elder Scrolls MMO? Way to kill your brand, Bethesda

The big news in the gaming industry this week has been, of course, the unveiling that the next Elder Scrolls game will be an online MMO.

Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing gets updated on iOS

Sonic and All-Stars Racing Transformed may be on the horizon, but that hasn't stopped Sega from updating a current version of the game.

Retro Review: Mario Golf (Wii Virtual Console)

Mario is quite the athlete. He goes kart racing, plays tennis, and has even gone to the Olympics. The quality of his adaptations varies depending on the game, but at least Mario Golf is one of the very best.

Enter the Dominatrix with Saints Row

Aliens? A simulated world? The Third Street Saints? Yup, this is one big bad expansion pack.

The Nintendo Download has an amoeba

Normally something that a living, multi-cellular, entity might want to avoid; this amoeba actually looks like it might be a pretty good time.

The Elder Scrolls is officially going online

Bethesda today announced that the much rumored MMO version of its popular Elder Scrolls series of RPG's is a reality.

The Xbox Live Update is heroically awesome

The newest version of Fable, Fable: Heroes, levels up XBLA today along with Awesomenauts and one DiRTy demo.

Review: Eternal Quest (PS2 Classics on PS3)

I’m a big fan of roguelike games. There’s something mesmerising about wandering through randomly-generated dungeons, focusing on nothing more than a simple but elegant combat system. There’s been a lot of good roguelikes through the years, and I suspect there will be many more to come.

Some interesting tid-bits about Call Of Duty: Black Ops 2

If you were internet-starved for about 48 hours, here's the big story; Call Of Duty: Black Ops 2 was announced with a reveal trailer that was played during the US NBA Playoffs. While the trailer did suggest robots being a central enemy, there wasn't much else shown that hasn't been done in other Call Of Duty games. However, after the media fallout of the game, some interesting bits of information have emerged:

Five Warriors games we'd love to see

Tecmo Koei’s Warriors formula is really hitting its stride now. The games are earning new fans thanks to some spectacular gameplay, and the quality of outside franchises such as One Piece and Gundam are encouraging fans of those properties to look into some of the other games in the series.

The great thing about the Warriors formula is that it could work with conceivably any property that is big on the action and has a large cast of characters/ heroes. So with that in mind, here’s five games that we would just love to see turned into Warriors games, either by Tecmo Koei itself or licensed out to a third party:

Dracula's castle reappears in the PSN Update

Big, big week for PS Plus subscribers with some pretty awesome freebies.

Max Payne 3 soundtrack has HEALTH

HEALTH being a band. Don't worry about ol' Max, he's still as unhealthy as always.

Get Steamy anywhere: Steam announced for Linux, beta update features remote downloads

It seems that every year Steam is getting a bit better. Whether it's expanding the library of games or adding great, useful features such as Steam Guard or the Steam Workshop, Valve is on a roll to making sure Steam is the best digital distribution service it can be. There's only been one problem; not everybody can fully experience the service whenever they want without jumping through some hoops. Two future updates are attempting to resolve this issue.

The first update is remote game downloads, which will allow any Steam user to download games and update others. Currently in the Beta version of Steam, the feature allows a user to sign into the website, navigate to their games list on their community profile, and click an "Install" button, which will automatically start downloading the game onto the computer that has the Steam client logged in with the Steam account. While technically not a confirmed feature of a new Steam update, almost all of the features in Steam Betas have made their way in some form to the main client, so it is expected that this feature will follow suit.

The bigger update is that somewhere down the line, Steam, along with the Source Engine, will officially be ported to the Linux operating system. The first game of Valve's to be ported is Left 4 Dead 2, as it is currently Valve's most up-to-date game that doesn't need any patching or is updated regularly with new content. As for why Valve has decided to port Steam and the Source Engine to Linux? In an article done by Phoronix, one of the biggest media companies dedicated to Linux-specific news, it's mentioned that Valve managing director and head Gabe Newell has many negative things to say about Microsoft's upcoming Windows 8 and that his knowledge and interest in Linux is outstanding. Although considering that Gabe Newell used to work for Microsoft, his comments may just be old grudges finding their way through the woodwork.

Review: Naval War: Arctic Circle (PC)

If there's one skill you need in order to be a great submarine captain, it's the ability to hold your breath. I say this because every sub-based war film I've ever watched - and I’ve seen at least three, so I'm clearly an expert - has involved a significant amount of purple-faced respiratory suspension.

Get JAM-ming this May

The rhythm genre continues it's comeback in downloadable form with Zivix' JAM Live Music Arcade.

Ash II chapter 2 now available on the App Store

The second installment of Konami's old school RPG sequel is questing on over to the App store for your iDevice of choice.

MGS HD hits PS Vita in June

Konami has released a few new screens along with a date for its upcoming tactical (and portable) espionage action collection.

Get in the game with 007 Legends

Ever want to be a Bond villain? 007 Legends is giving fans a shot at getting caught in the famed agent's sights.

Review: Bullistic Unleashed (iPhone)

Whenever I walk into a store with some expensive items, I’m always afraid that I’ll knock everything over with my broad shoulders. Luckily, I’m able to exert all my shopping destructive desires in Bullistic Unleashed (dude, you’ve got problems – ed).

Hey everyone, get your Vita Warioware knockoff, Frobisher Says, for free!

Well, kinda free, anyway. Sony is offering its cheap-and-ok take on Warioware for free to everyone with a Vita.

Assassinate these new screens from Dishonored

Bethesda and Arkane Studios' newest FPS Dishonored steampunks it up in today's new batch of screenshots.

Trailer: Call Of Duty: Black Ops 2 is a thing

If you've been living under a rock for the past 7 years, here's the short story; remember that Call of Duty game? You know, the World War II shooter that was ever-so-slightly like Half Life, only with clearly defined levels that weren't a straight, 100 per cent continuations of each other? Imagine 7 more of those games being made every following year since 2006, only add quasi-RPG elements to the multiplayer mode and Russian/ al-Qaeda-like villains from the fourth iteration up and you've basically got the annual Call-Of-Duty party where Activision throws another billion dollars into its football field of money.

Trailer: Portal 2 level editor to be released May 8th

Remember Portal 2? Not only did it receive more than 15 perfect scores (including one from our own Matt Sainsbury), but it also won numerous Game-Of-The-Year awards from an enormous amount of sites. While universally praised for its characters and story, the puzzles in the single-player campaign were the arguably the weakest part of the game. Valve, the creators of the Portal 2, want to alleviate this problem with a free update that will be released for Steam on May 8th.

Max Payne DLC plans are pure multiplayer

Rockstar's highly anticipated sequel to Max Payne has been getting some seriously good word of mouth about it's multiplayer mode, so it's no surprise then that it'll be getting some dlc.

Retro Review: Sonic Spinball (Wii Virtual Console)

Remember those days when Sonic was everywhere? Not just in the usual advertisements or in your Happy Meal, but featured in as many games as Sega could put him in. Kart racing, slow labyrinths, and (drum roll) pinball.

Pinball was actually nothing new to Sonic at Spinball’s time of release, having been featured as a mid-level gimmick in at least three prior games. What makes the combination feel original here is the execution, namely new mechanics and reduced emphasis on platforming.

Sonic is moved around a pinball “table” by hitting him with the flippers, but you need to actually explore the stage in order to win. Exploration can be done by breaking roadblocks, hitting switches, going up tubes, fighting enemies, and more. Each map is expansive enough to warrant many screens, so there are different sets of flippers placed throughout the stage to accommodate your ever changing location. Should you slip between a pair of flippers (which is decidedly easy, considering the large gap between them), you may or may not have an opportunity to recover by jumping up. Otherwise, you’ll lose one of your precious lives (and believe me, they are precious). Your goal is to gather all of the Chaos Emeralds in the level then head to a showdown with a Dr. Robotnik boss.

While you’re bouncing around these labyrinth-like stages, messages also appear at the top of the screen to offer advice and inform you of score bonuses stages. These communications are a mixed bag, really. Some offer genuinely helpful insight and give you an idea of what you’re supposed to be doing, whereas others only add to your potential confusion.

Truth be told, you could probably beat the game in twenty minutes if you knew where to find all the emeralds and how to properly manoeuvre the blue blur. There are only four levels, with a brief bonus stage popping up after each. What makes the game take hours to beat is the need to memorize map designs and trap locations to make any real sort of progress.

To make matters worse, should you die three times, the game is over entirely. Yes, that means no opportunities to earn a continue option like in the main series Genesis games. Coming up with a high enough score to earn extra balls can be quite a daunting task as the game is very stingy when it comes to rewards. You’ll spend most of your time replaying that dreaded first level as you attempt to memorize the second and so on.

Is the game fun enough to warrant that? If you come into the game expecting the standard pinball affair, you’ll no doubt be disappointed. Spinball fails to emulate the experience or physics present in the real game of pinball, granting you much more control and influence over Sonic’s direction than in a “true” simulation. Still, when the game works, it’s actually reasonably gratifying action. The problem is that these moments are too far between.

The environments aren’t quite as striking as Sonic’s other outings, but there is a bit of charm there if you keep an eye out. Sonic himself seems washed out and his sprite looks wrong somehow. The biggest complaint in all of this is the frame rate, which can fluctuate too much for comfort and really should have been fixed before release. 

The soundtrack isn’t totally up to snuff either, but that opening jingle when you turn on the game is ridiculously catchy. It almost makes those 800 Wii points seem worth it...briefly. 

Sonic Spinball isn’t downright dreadful, but it’s clear that the game was rushed to the market to capitalize on the speedster’s budding reputation. The concept was fine, but had more time been devoted to polishing the experience, this could have been a sleeper hit. It’s alright to make a challenging game, but if it’s rarely engaging or rewarding, why bother?

-Clark A

Our Scoring Policy

Is 2012 already the best year ever for games?

We’re not even halfway through the year, but this is the traditional “lull period” right that happens as everyone ramps up for E3. As I’ve looked back on some of the reviews we’ve done, I’ve come to realise that 2012 has been one of the very best years for gaming, if not the best. From the ‘casual’ experiences on iPhone and iPad through to some great work on the 3DS, an incredible new piece of hardware on the Vita and some superb work being done on the three home consoles (and let’s not forget the PC!), there really is something for everyone.

God of War: Ascension multiplayer? God no!

Edit: Changed the headline to prevent confusion between God of War 4 and... God of War 4. I mean, really, does anyone think that Ascension is anything but God of War 4? But yes, we must be accurate in this business.

So, the newest casualty of the games industry obsession with cramming multiplayer into everything is God of War 4. Once again I’m left shaking my head, disappointed that the developers are being forced to crap square blocks into circular holes.

La-Mulana officially canned on WiiWare

One of the last games we were looking forward to seeing hit Nintendo's first attempt at a console digital distribution service, La-Mulana, has officially been cancelled.

Review: Disgaea 3: Absence of Detention (Vita)

Oh wow do I hate Disgaea 3. It’s like a disease it crawls under the skin, tearing apart the organs and laughing off any attempt to shake it away. It’ll hold you prisoner at home, unable to come out as you grapple with it, trying to fight it off, but inevitably giving in and letting it dominate your life. Note: I don’t hate Disgaea 3 at all, I actually adore it, it’s just painfully, wonderfully addictive.

Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed announced

Sega has unveiled the heavily rumored latest entry in the All-Stars series, Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed.

The "transformed" part of the title refers to a new mechanic in the game, which allows the racers to temporarily transform their cars into boats and planes at certain points in each stage. As you might expect, the handling of the cars drastically changes with the environment.

Many characters from the previous game are making their returns such as Ai Ai and Knuckles, but new racers include Skies of Arcadia's Vyse and likely several other unannounced faces.

Other new additions include an enhanced online mode, battle arenas, and even a new weapon system that allows you to block or dodge incoming attacks from your fellow racers.

See the trailer below to get a sense of the action:

The game will be available on multiple platforms, which currently includes PS3, PS Vita, 3DS, Xbox 360, and PC. We quite enjoyed the last game on the iPad, so here's hoping this one is as good or better. Expect to go racing with Sonic and friends at some point later this year. 

Review: Cherry Tree High Comedy Club (PC)

Cherry Tree High Comedy Club is a tiny little game that no one ever deemed worth localising. That is, before startup Nyu Media took a crack at it, and roped Capcom USA into publishing it on the major PC download platforms. The game suffers in the sense that it would be better off on the iPhone, iPad or a handheld console, but it’s still a heck of an experience, and a great localisation effort of a tricky game.

Indie Gala Bundle 4: so, what's in it?

The Indie Gala Bundle packs have proven to be very, very popular, offering gamers a change to play a whole bunch of games cheaply - often including games they might never have looked at outside the pack.

The Indie Gala Bundle 4 pack is yet another awesome collection of games. So what's in this one?

Review: Prinny: Can I Really Be the Hero? (PSP)

With the recent remake of Disgaea 3 fresh in our minds, it might be a good time to revisit some of Nippon Ichi’s other gems. Perhaps the best candidate is the overlooked 2D platformer, Prinny: Can I Really Be The Hero?. It may not be the best on the PSP, but it’s a solid first effort worth playing today.

Hey doods! We have an awesome new reviews database

Fun fact you might not have known about Digitally Downloaded: we now have over 500 reviews on our site. 535 to be exact.

Review: eXceed Collection (PC)

Bullet-hell shooters aren’t exactly huge outside of Japan. It’s tough to find a decent selection on most console download services, let alone ones in English. With that in mind, it’s good news that Nyu Media has bundled three of the finest games in the genre together and even translated two of them.