It’s a bit odd that I’m writing this review, but I guess that’s just because I’ve listened to Joe go on about how terrible modern football games are for the umpteenth time. He does have a point, though – they’re bloated with unnecessary features and complex control systems that don’t really add to the overall experience. But at the same time, I think he forgets that there’s been a lot of improvement since then. So…
Disclaimer: This article doesn’t focus solely on Crash 4: It’s About Time. As we all know by now, it’s meant to set up my review of Crash 4, so there will be some major spoilers for the entire Crash Bandicoot timeline. Crash Bandicoot has always felt like the PlayStation mascot. Growing up in America, Crash was everywhere. Orange boxes, toy stores, comic books, cereal cards; he was omnipresent. But I wasn’t American. I grew up…
I was sixteen years old and had roughly $12 to my name. During my free time I found myself spending quite an excessive amount of time lurking around the electronics department of our local Toys R Us. Think back to what video game stores used to look like — everything was locked-up behind glass or you had to take those flimsy little paper ticket thingies. But they always had a demo unit tucked-away somewhere in…
When I started playing city-building games I didn’t take them too seriously. I’m used to the idea of games teaching me something, but playing SimCity was the first time I truly experienced educational games. I had played many games before picking up SimCity, but never had a game mirrored my career as closely as this. I’ve worked as a construction manager for over a decade. Managing construction crews is all about deadlines, resources, balancing budgets,…
Let’s just get this out of the way: I never played Banjo-Kazooie upon its release back in 1998. I know, blasphemy, right? So there I was rocking my Amiga 1200 like it was going out of style and thinking console gamers were all nerds with pricey toys who refused to use “real computers.” Yeah, Nintendo had been releasing N64 games for years at this point, and I’m sure I was quite the asshole about it.…
Everything changed for me that summer in 1991. I was fourteen years old and incredibly awkward like all teenagers are and my friend Mike got a Sega Genesis. I had been playing Nintendo since Christmas of 1985 when my folks got me that NES. It was in my blood at that point. But Mike kept inviting me over to play this “system he got” and told me to “trust me man, it’s different.” Trust me…
The first time video game music made me cry was listening to the ending of Final Fantasy VI on my Genesis. Okay, Final Fantasy VI was only on SNES and this was my American imported Genesis, but you get the point. I believe I was 16 years old. It was 3 am on a school night, and I had finally finished the beast of a game that was 70 hours long. As the credits played…