When you see a stately owl perched on a cragged branch, its dignified demeanor brings to mind intelligence and good grace. Author Kathryn Lasky explored the secret lives of these feathered folk in her Guardians of Ga’Hoole series, which proved popular enough to spawn an upcoming animated film called Legend of [...]
F1 2010 is a fun and faithful re-creation of the most challenging series in motorsports, and while it has some minor issues, it’s a good start for Codemasters’ new franchise. The racing is appropriately challenging, the sense of speed is impressive, and both the cars and the circuits that they race [...]
Castlevania: Lords of Shadow is a game of contradictions. Its lead character, Gabriel Belmont, finds himself equipped with great combat abilities and more than enough special skills to combat the forces of evil and avenge the death of his love. But for the player, it’s almost overkill–a good portion of Belmont’s [...]
This is how the world will look after the war. The buildings still stand, but they are in a state of ruin. Walls, ceilings, and floors have crumbled away, and the healthy foliage that covers every surface gives the appearance of a thriving ecosystem, though no humans are around to enjoy [...]
Hot Pursuit is a Need for Speed game in name only. This blisteringly fast racer has more in common with developer Criterion Games’ own Burnout series than it does with any previous Need for Speed offering, despite lacking a number of features that are commonly associated with Burnout games. This isn’t [...]
For the greater part of a century, Monopoly has done just fine for itself as a game of abstractions, skillfully avoiding any questions of how a thimble and a howitzer can lead to rubbing shoulders with John D. Rockefeller and Andrew Carnegie. Even its Atlantic City locales have long eluded easy [...]
Though video games have encouraged players to get up in front of their televisions and dance for many years now, the arrival of the Kinect heralds a new controller-free era of movement. And while DanceMasters (titled DanceEvolution in the UK) doesn’t quite take full advantage of the Kinect’s full-body tracking capabilities, [...]
Exploration, combat, and unit progression have been the gameplay pillars of the Disciples series since its debut in 1999, enticing players into a rewarding rhythm of turn-based satisfaction. Disciples III: Renaissance is founded on these same solid elements and, thanks to the creative and sumptuous visuals, makes an appealing first impression [...]
Some sequels radically reinvent what has come before; others simply buff up a formula that already soars. To suggest that Starcraft II: Wings of Liberty does only the latter and not the former would be to sell short the fresh ideas and exciting gameplay that makes this superb real-time strategy sequel [...]
Games that mold themselves to your personal music collection seem all the rage these days, and Turba is the latest in this import-your-own-tunes craze. This isn’t the prettiest puzzle game you’ve ever seen, but it’s breezy entertainment, the kind that might keep you occupied for a few hours on a rainy [...]
