Draw Something... ya dick

Screw WWE. DrawSomething is awesome and here's why. It's a fun IOS game you can play with your friends. It's basically like pictionary. You are given a word and you draw that word and your opponent has to guess the word. Coins are then awarded accordingly. It's great! The game is also free (currently) and AD FREE (for the moment) AND THE BEST PART..... IT WASN'T MADE BY ZYNGA!!!! HOORAAYYYY!!

Get this game.

Pros:
Fun game to play with friends
You get to draw silly picturers terribly
You get to see your friends' terrible drawings
It's free
No ads
Works with Facebook
Zynga was not involved!! :D

Cons:
You may need an IOS5 to play but I'm not entirely sure

UPDATE:
this game is developing some bugs due to so many people downloading and playing it in such a short period of time. I'm also finding it that it isn't always free. I got it for free. So yeah, when it works, it's great! But there may be some problems with games not loading or just being removed all together, but honestly, the point system is just for fun anyway, so none of that really matters.

UPDATE 2!!!!!:
Zynga has purchased this company. NO LONGER BUY OR PLAY THIS GAME!! Show Zynga no support as they are an overbearing EVIL in the game world! Buy Connectrode for IOS instead. That is a game made buy a guy who quit OMGPOP after Zynga purchased them. THAT MAN and his games are what people should be supporting. Fuck Zynga. Fuck their shit. They have never made a single original game in their existence. I used to think that Farmville was originally, but I soon learned that even THAT was ripped off from a Chinese game developer. Zynga are a bunch of uncreative fucking fucks. Give them NO MONEY EVER!

thank you

WWE12 - Bad, Badder, Baddest

I’ve been planning this review for a while now, but I have held off in order genuinely think everything through before I say it.

First of all, I want to mention that I have bought and played every WWE title since Here Comes the Pain on the PS2. I am a big fan of the series. But with just about everything we love, we find things to hate. WWE12 has a lot of things to hate. However, I will also be talking about this games production, what has gone wrong, and what they can do to fix it.

Fans of the WWE games will enjoy this game. I want to throw that out there before anything. This year, like every year, there is a slight learning curve. THQ has changed the buttons around (again) and the matches have become more difficult because of it. It’s not THAT much harder than it used to be, but it is a step up.

The AI is still very cheap though. Two new things they added this year is the “comeback moment” and an updated “finisher reversal”. Basically, when you beat your opponent down enough, they have the option of a “comeback” which will start a chain of moves that result from button presses. If you complete them all, you get a finisher. This sucks when you are facing a really strong opponent and you get them weak enough to pin, hit your finisher, and they comeback only to hit a finisher on you and win. You do have the opportunity to break their comeback combos at least, but you have to be quick about it. Quicker than your opponent at least. You can also reverse a finisher and then automatically receive a finisher of your own. This can also get annoying when you work for a while to finally build one up and your opponent reverses it and uses it on you. Finishers can be VERY difficult to reverse, but the computer seems to be able to do it quite flawlessly. Whenever I play, the AI player will always reverse the first finisher I throw at it, but succumb to the second, so I literally have to build up 2 finishers, have them reverse the first, and hit them with my second one before they can use the one they stole. It’s just kind of dumb that it’s THAT predictable.

A feature they added they I actually love is the wake-up taunts. When a player has a finisher built up and the opponent is on the ground, you can hit a taunt and the player will groggily rise into position for your finisher. As nice as it is though, it’s only cool when it works. It can often times be annoying when an opponent uses it on you and you fail to reverse their finisher. It’s also a pain when you get them to stand up and they reverse your finisher, hit you with it, and win.

All of the AI problems can be solved however if you play against human players, which leads me to my next point: online servers. I’ve played the WWE games mostly on Xbox over the years, but this is the first one I bought for the PS3 with the sole purpose to take advantage of Playstation’s free online. I was sick of having to pay for Xbox’s live service but I really wanted to play online matches. PS3 is great for that!! And all the better, THQ announced that WWE12 would be running on their own personal, brand new servers which would theoretically get rid of all the lagging server problems of the past. The problem is, THQ was completely unprepared for this kind of deal. It has been months since the games release and their servers are still constantly down. The matches I did get to play online actually played fairly lag-less for the most part, but only if I played a 1 on 1 match up. 4 or 6 player brawls lagged so bad I could barely move. The shittiness of the online experience after all of the hype from THQ is something I will get into more later.

Other things I like about the game is as follows: The gameplay is still fun, basically because it’s the same gameplay as it’s always been. The roster is decently large and has just about everyone on their roster. The amount of DLC this year was also pretty sizable. Create an Arena is a nice touch. Being able to string together names for your custom characters to be called as they come to the ring is awesome (my college professor Ricardo Washington actually has his name in the game! :D) The overall graphic design and look of the menus is also very nice as compared to previous years. And of course there is Universe Mode which has improved from its amazing debut last year. This time around feuds actually build and carry over from week to week and can actually be pretty exciting.

Now lets get to the bad stuff! This game can be glitchy as hell. I’ve always seen horrifying glitches from WWE games in the past, but I’ve never really experienced anything that bad when I’ve played. I honestly think they are worse on the PS3 for some reason. Probably because the games are made for the 360 and are ported over to the Playstation. However this can be chalked up to the amount of time THQ has to make these games, which is less than a year. That’s fucking ridiculous for a videogame and is mainly the reason why these games come out so unpolished every year. I don’t usually play sports titles, but I can only assume all sports games end up like this, which is dumb.

Good, polished games can take years to produce. THQ and Yukes get not even a single year to produce these WWE titles EVERY SINGLE YEAR! I want to tell WWE to just stop and release a game once every other year, that way they can actually go through and fix the bugs and release a title that actually works. The problem with that plan though is that the fans are so blinded by whatever it is they are blinded by, that they go gaga over these games and simply overlook these glaring problems. I don’t know about you, but if I’m going to pay 60 bucks for a game, I want it to work! If I bought a piece of electronics for 60 bucks and it didn’t work, I could return it and get one that would. Why should I put up with this kind of shit in a video game?

The time constraints and budget also result in models and animations getting over used year after year after year. Some characters get revamped while other brand new characters get made very quickly. Sin Cara was added to this year’s game at the last second. His model looks like trash but his finisher looks good and his entrance is spot on amazing! But if they can make Sin Cara so quickly, why can’t they do that with everything else? How come Santino has the same entrance and model from 5 years ago? How come goddamn Chris Jericho isn’t in the game at all even though he was in last years game!?

A lot of these problems is a result of time and budget and frankly a bunch of miscommunication between THQ and WWE. There are a couple things that I think are just pure laziness on the part of the production team. Two of by biggest gripes this year are art related. First of all, JR is a downloadable character. Great! Awesome! But there’s one thing: his sleeves. I know this is a small problem, but it’s proof of the laziness I am suspecting here. In JR’s profile image, he is wearing a long sleeved, white shirt with a red football jersey over top of it. His in game model however has the sleeves modeled, but they are the same red as the jersey! Does anyone else not think that just looks weird? It looks bad! It looks like someone didn’t finish the fucking texture job! I could go in and drop in some white on those sleeves in literally 10 seconds, but NOOOOO! That’s just too much work for THQ. “Just ship it as is! Fuck it! No one will even care.” I paid money for this game’s DLC and I get unfinished character models. Great!

The second art related mishap is Booker fucking T! They ROYALLY fucked up this time. JR got off easy with his untextured sleeves. At least he LOOKED like fucking JR! Booker T looks NOTHING like himself!!! WHAT!? You are going to seriously add a character into this game, a character that hasn’t been in a WWE title in a number of years; you’re going to make a big deal about him and have a big reveal only to have his model look like utter shit!?

………………………………............................................

Here’s the thing: THQ is going out of business. Their stock is plummeting. It’s bad news. But frankly, I hope they lose WWE. I think they currently have a contract with them through 2014, so they’ll probably have to go out of business in order for this to happen, but so be it. As much as I hate to say so, EA might be able to do a better job with this franchise than THQ. EA at least has teams of fucking amazing artists who would actually be able to bust out exact depictions of all the wrestlers, as well as not be ok with releasing half-assed animations and gameplay glitches. Of course, WWE would probably have to pay a little more money to make this happen, but I think if anyone could talk them into it, it would be EA. WWE hasn’t a clue what it takes to make these games! EA makes nothing BUT these kinds of games.

The only thing THQ still has going for it is their marketing team, which I will admit, is golden. These guys can feed you shit and make you like it like nobody else. They tagged WWE12 with the tag line: “BIGGER! BADDER! BETTER!!!” Whoo! That’s great! They built up the hype so strong! They admitted that past years have been iffy but this year, OH! This year would be different. This year is the betterment of “core gameplay”. Revamping the whole structure to make the best experience ever.

Then the game is released.

THQ goes silent.

THQ quietly apologizes for the bad servers.

THQ somberly releases its DLC.

And then……. WRESTLEFEST on the iphone!! Hey everyone! Look over here! New WWE game for IOS!! Look at this! It’s a throw back to wrestling games of old! Best experience ever!!

Hey! What about WWE12!? You guys aren’t going to do anything about this?

No THQ. No. Fuck you. Fuck all of your and your shit. Fuck. Your. Shit.

THQ: You may have thousands of other people fooled, but you haven’t fooled me. You can expect to keep taking money from those thousands of other people, but you aren’t getting anymore money from me. I’m publicly announcing in this blog that I am not buying another WWE game from THQ. As much as I loved AllStars and as much as I will probably continue to play WWE12, enough is enough. It’s seriously bullshit.

Pros:
The game is still enjoyable, especially if you are a fan of the franchise
AI is more competitive than previous years
Couple added perks as well as updated Universe mode

Cons:
Stupid, lazy mistakes
Still glitchy
Booker T is ruined (I can’t even play as him because I’m so disgusted, so it’s as if he isn’t even in the game)
The relationship between THQ and WWE is a complete failure

"Octodad" gets stuck on you

Octodad is an indi title that was released for download at Octodadgame.com. I honestly am not sure if the group that made it has a name, because I didn't dig that far, but let it be known that everyone reading this should head over to Octodadgame.com and download this free game! It is fun, goofy, and at times: kinda difficult.

Basically, you play as an octopus that is posing as a father, except in doing so, he actually "is" a father. He loves his family so much and they love him and because of this, I don't really see why there needs to be a "suspicion meter" that goes up whenever you do something a "dad" wouldn't do in real life. Granted it's funny and granted I'm probably delving too deep into something that really doesn't need to be delved into, but I digress.

This game isn't the greatest thing in the world, but it sure has charm. This game made me laugh on a number of different levels, and although it is short, people can find themselves playing it over and over just to see how far they can push the limits and what whacky stuff they can pull off.

The biggest selling factor for this game is its control scheme. It's difficult, but purposefully so (i hope) You have 2 buttons that control the cameras rotation around you, and then you control Octodad entirely with your mouse. The space bar or middle click buttons switch from arm mode to feet mode. When in feet mode, the right click controls the right foot and the left click controls the left. In arm mode, you take control of the right arm only, the right click them controls the height in which you have the tentacle, and the left click controls grabbing onto objects (gee I hope I didn't get any of that mixed up) Regardless! The best part is the Octodad's animations as you fumble around a room. His body parts can get all mixed up as things start sticking to you. I laughed my ass off when I tried to wade through all of the junk in a closet. Just seeing a large octopus throwing boxes and toys around a small, dark room is hilarious!

Once again, this game is fun and funny. It's not a super polished, AAA title, but it doesn't have to be. Indipendent games is "where it's at" right now and this game is just another example. It's definitely worth playing, and the group that made it also has a kickstarter account on their site for those who would like to donate a little cash their way. I'd suggest it so that we can see more of Octodad in the future.

Pros

• hilarious
• charming
• something new
• FREE

Cons

• short
• controls may be frustrating to some

“Super Brothers: Sword and Sworcery EP" is the charmingest video-game of all time

I am writing this review of Superbrothers Sword and Sworcery EP while listening to Sword & Sworcery LP The Ballad of the Space Babies. The first thing that you will need to know about S&S is that upon completion of this lovingly constructed video-game, you will be greeted by the name Jim Guthrie. Jim Guthrie is a musician. S&S is a game about music. Music is the sorcery of S&S. Sorcery reveals to you and the Scythian that you are instruments and that the world that you traverse is an instrument. It reveals that all of the instruments together create the music that is this far away world. If you hold your finger on the Scythian, she kneels and raises her arms, and you guide a blue light about the world to sing a song of sorcery. Trees, animals and light itself all contribute to your song. Everything responds to this music, even you. This music is none other than that of Jim Guthrie. His music fills every second of this game and is the gravity of S&S. Without it, the pixels would surely dissipate and disappear off of the screen, and you would be left staring into the white void that is your touch device. This is a metaphor, but not an exaggeration. It draws you in, invites you to rest, drives you to go on, pauses you in your tracks, instills dread, ushers triumph and elicits both joy and sorrow simultaneously.

To say that S&S is the charmingest video-game of all time is neither an understatement nor an overstatement, it is just a statement. It is truth. It is a game that magically extracts every pleasant memory of the first video-games that you ever played and combines it with the pure and simple joy of your most amazing childhood achievements (like jumping off of that really big rock in the woods). The most obvious source of the initial rush of nostalgia that will pour over you is the visual design. S&S is how your brain remembers the video-games of yore to look, rather than how they actually do. This game shows more with less. Each pixel is meticulously placed and animated to create a moving world. The Scythian’s every movement is mesmerizing, from the first time she sheathes her sword to every step afterwards, it is impossible to pull your eyes from S&S while it moves and it really needs to be seen. One of my favorite animations involves sitting in front of a fire. Never before have I believed a bunch of numbers running through a calculator to be so real. In fact, not once while playing S&S did I think of how the game was built, which is a wonderful and rare thing.
But you didn’t buy S&S solely to absorb graphical prowess through your eyeballs, you purchased S&S because you’re an adventurer. At some point in your life, probably multiple times, you pretended to have a sword in your hands, even when there was nothing in your hands. This is the genius of S&S, you don’t play as an adventurer, but as yourself guiding an adventurer. You play the role of a being peering into a mystifying universe through a tiny window. You are watching over and guiding the young adventurer that you once were, and with every fiber of your being, you want that young adventurer to succeed.

You also probably bought S&S because you like to play games. Which is good. S&S consists of pointing. Not with a cursor or any sort of tool. You just point, and that is where the Scythian will go. If you want the Scythian to talk to someone, you double tap on the character or object or whatever, and you will be greeted by a line of text that will put a grin of some sort on your face. If you forget what someone said, you can consult a magical tome and revisit every line of text in the game, so you won’t ever be too lost. The touch screen lends itself perfectly to the function of exploring S&S and feels completely natural. However, this is a game about adventuring, and as every adventurer knows, this means that this game has a lot of walking in it. Adventurers walk. They don’t run because they might exhaust their energy for the rest of the adventure, or they might overlook a small yet tremendous detail, such as a hidden path that can change the course of time itself. The Scythian walks a lot and you watch the Scythian walk a lot. And this is a good thing, because the walk animation is gorgeous, and the world that the Scythian traverses is gorgeous, and the music is gorgeous. This game is fucking gorgeous. But still, you will watch a lot of walking. There are also some puzzle type elements, but they’re pretty obvious most of the time. When they aren’t obvious, you usually just end up massaging the screen with your fingertips until you hear a distinctive sound, but there are a couple of these puzzles that end pretty spectacularly.

There is a reason that you had a sword when you went on your adventures, and that is to fight monsters that stood in your way. S&S features combat, but the combat is not the focus of the game. It is not even the secondary, or maybe even third most important element of the game, but it is worth mentioning due to the fact that it is in the game and that it is implemented well. Combat is, in essence, a series of quick-time events. But it is critical to note that this is well hidden, meaning you won’t have a big blue X appear on the screen with the word “LIVE” on it. You enter combat by rotating the device that you are using to a vertical position, and you proceed to engage the enemy in a series of carefully timed blocks and strikes. The mechanics on their own are not impressive, but the presentation and pacing are. There are only a handful of fights to be had in S&S, and each is a pulse pounding affair as a result of their scarcity. The low number of battles reinforces that fact that the Scythian is not a knight in shining armor, but an adventurer on a woeful errand. When she raises her sword in the midst of a warrior beating his shield like a war drum, it’s difficult not to have some sense of worry and dread for her. Technically, the combat is a little repetitive, but it is short, sweet, and effective. There is also a nice twist in combat as you progress through S&S, which some casual players may not appreciate as much as I do, in which your total health decreases as you go on. This makes absolute sense within the context of S&S, and I wish more video-games would follow this example.

A masterful soundtrack, exceptional sound design, brilliant visuals and a familiar yet quirky story (there is a story by the way) all work in harmony to deliver a monolithic video-game experience. There’s also a pretty neat real-time connection in S&S that coordinates with certain events in the universe that we actually walk around in, which is pretty awesome.

Go play this game.

"Limbo" sets the bar high

Limbo is an Xbox Live Arcade game from Playdead Studios. It is a side scrolling, puzzle game with platforming elements, a fantastic art style, and gameplay that not only looks fluid, but feels fluid. The movement of the main character and the transitions between animations really make this game flow. It's simplistic controls make it easy to play, but still challenging to beat.

Before I talk about its difficulty, I want to say that I am a fan of easier type games. Really hard games are frustrating to me and in my opinion, can take away from the "fun". I know many gamers really enjoy tough challenges, but I'm not really like that. So if I say something is really hard, it may not be as difficult to those who thrive on challenges and can breeze through puzzles quickly. That being said, I usually judge a game's difficulty by whether or not I have to consult the internet to figure something out. With Limbo I had to consult the internet one time. I'm told however (by friends who happen to love extremely hard games) that this one instance in Limbo is kind of stupid hard in the sense that it's just really easy to over-look (they also had to look online for this one). In conclusion, other than one or two instances, the game is comfortably difficult for me. It was hard and challenging to the point where I could figure things out after some thought with only a few moments of literally being stuck.

Moving on! This game is special because of its art style. Its look and its world are something fresh and new. Creepy as it may look, the game is quite charming and cute; although the deaths are pretty harsh and gory at times. At one moment it can be cheerful and other times horrifying, but never actually "scary". I'm not one for "jump out and scare you" moments, and you can rest assured that this game really doesn't have anything like that. The music also helps to propel the game's overall mood and all around it was just very well done.

The game is somewhat short, and can probably be completed in one sitting if you're really invested in it; but that's to be expected with an arcade game. Re-playability is questionable. I know people that have played through it a number of times just because it's so much fun, but some people might just play though once and stop considering it's the same game with the same puzzles each time.

Story wise I was a little disappointed because the game holds a lot of mystery but nothing really pans out. You don't really learn anything about what is going on. It's still a very intriguing world and, to a point, it leaves you with a sense of closure, but I was left wanting more from the story. Other people are ok with this however. They enjoy having things left open ended. It's all in how you look at it.

All in all, this game is pretty amazing. I'd say it's one of, if not my favorite xbla game so far. I definitely recommend it to everyone (unless you're a little kid).

Pros

• fluid feel and fun to play
• clever puzzles
• beautiful and different visual style
• makes you want to play it over again
• right for price

Cons

• mysteries left unsolved
• one spot that's hard to solve because it's easily overlooked

"WWE All Stars" layeths the smacketh down

I am a big time pro-wrestling fan and I've been purchasing WWE Smackdown vs Raw (SvR) games every single year for at least the past 5 years. SvR titles are usually somewhat realistic. They are basically pro-wrestling's version of the Madden games. But this year THQ announced that they would be releasing a NEW title along with this year's SvR, and that is WWE All Stars.

Admittedly, when I first laid my eyes on this game, I was disgusted. All of the wrestlers were physically blown out of proportion and just looked completely goofy. I brushed the game off at that point, but as it came closer and closer to release, it grew more and more intriguing. I'm not sure why or how it caught my eye a second time, but I'm glad it did because this game is utterly awesome!

If you think about it, this game sounds like everything a wrestling game should be, and it is! It has larger than life characters and makes them ridiculously bigger by buffing them up larger than humanly possible. It takes rather simple and uninteresting moves and makes them look phenomenally insane! Let's take Honky Tonk Man's finishing move which is basically a swinging neck breaker (but barley, this move looks terrible when he does it in person). In real life, Honky gets his opponent in a head lock and basically falls over. HOWEVER, the All Stars remastered version of this move has Honky getting his opponent in a head lock and then flinging them some 75 feet in the air before they land brutally to the mat, shattering every bone in their body (ok, maybe it's not that extreme, but it's damn close). In essence, this game takes wrestling to a whole new level and does it in a super fun way.

This also is not technically a "wrestling" game. It is being dubbed by its creators as a "more traditional fighting game" approach to the series, and I can understand why. While it's not a fighting game in the Street Fighter or Mortal Kombat sense, it does have many fighting game aspects. It has quick and strong strikes, quick and strong grabs, blocking, and all that jazz. They take all of this and give you free, 360 motion as well as an interactive arena environment and occasionally weapons (also 2 on 2 or 4 way matches which you can't get in a "traditional" fighter). It's also got more glitches than a regular fighting game, but that is to be expected in a game like this that gives you so much free reign. But the glitches certainly don't take away from the gameplay in the slightest.

I would say this game's biggest shortcoming is its learning curve. All Stars is hard, especially if it's your first time playing it. Any move is reversible but the timing of the reversals is something that you have to master and that takes a LONG time. You also can't button mash or spam buttons to get anywhere (which can be good or bad depending on who you are and how you play) but in my opinion, this is a good way to even the playing field and weed out really annoying gamers. Once you master countering and reversals, the game gets really ridiculous and fun. You can start reversing reversals with crazy, spinning, back and forth animations.

The roster is a little on the small side too, although 30 fighters really isn't really anything to sneeze at. Not to mention more are coming in terms of DLC (although, knowing THQ it could be a while before we see them). I got my game at Gamestop so I could get the Million Dollar DLC pack as a bonus but it says I can't use the code until the end of next month. Kind of weird that I have to wait almost a month in order to redeem my "pre-order" bonus (curse you THQ for making me shop at GameStop!!).

Yes, it can be frustrating at times, but what game isn't? All in all this game is simply a blast! Once you get the hang of the controls you can start flying around the ring, smashing people 20 feet in the air, and chaining 4 to 5 grapple moves together in a row! The finishing move animations are so ridiculous, I never get tired of watching them.

I am so glad I gave this game another chance. It actually reminds me of back when Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker first came out I HATED the look, but upon playing it it turned out to be one of, if not the greatest Zelda games I ever played. Even though WWE All Stars looks... different, it is super enjoyable, and if you are a wrestling fan, you owe it to yourself to at least give this game a shot.

Pros:

• really fun (once you get the hang of it)
• diverse roster
• amazingly over the top animations
• cool video packages before each match in Fantasy Warfare mode
• it's something new in terms of WWE games

Cons:

• can be hard to get the hang of
• roster could be larger (also have to wait a month for pre-order bonus....)
  
• can sometimes be frustrating (especially if just starting out)
• Create a Wrestler mode is not as in-depth as other WWE games (you have to choose from the pre-made movesets of other wrestlers WHICH you must first unlock)