Review No. 73 Tomb Raider - PC (18+)

Strong points: 

Great graphics

Amazing animation

Nicely paced story

Lots of customisation and upgrades

Lots of collectibles

Quick time events are nicely spaced and needed

Good, likeable characters

Brilliant voice acting

The development of Lara's character is great

Big open world

Weak points:

Some weapons are more situational than others

The second half of story is much better than the first

Quick time events and animations, may stop you doing something if it's in-line with the story

Confusing storyline

The death sequences are quite gruesome and unnecessary

The tombs are quite simple
Emotional story and player's own actions don't quite match up

Some crashes and bugs

First Impressions: Half-Life

This is one of those games that I decided to start playing for a little while before doing something else. I then played it for two hours straight (and would have kept playing if I hadn't gotten stuck on what I was meant to do).

Review No. 72 Mario Kart 8 - Wii U (7+)

Strong Points:
Lots of items
Lots of racers
Lots of customization options
Graphics are phenomenal
Music is great
Tracks are brilliant
Bikes are back and are more balanced with the karts
Online mode is the best it's ever been
Mario Kart TV is a great addition

Weak Points:
Battle mode is bad
Some characters could have been different (*Cough* Rose Gold Peach *Cough*)
Anti-gravity could have been used in better ways (i.e. loop-de-loops)
Two player separate screen racing (the GamePad is here now, so there is no excuse)

First Impressions: Nosgoth

In a world where vampires and humans fight in arenas beautifully crafted out of stone and blood comes the tale of a gamer who only got the game because of the free weekend on Steam. Delve into a world of regenerative health, third person perspectives and no jumping. And it is brilliant.

First Impressions: Robocraft

I think I'll start this First Impressions with how the trailer described the game to me, just before I bought it. "It's Minecraft combined with World of Tanks," it said. And, I think that is quite an accurate description.

App Review No. 61 Zombie Tsunami

Strong Points:
Good, 3D graphics
Nice change to the regular endless runner gameplay
Lots of varied powerups
Lots of missions
Lots of hats
Changing backgrounds makes the game seem more alive

Weak Points:
Powerup upgrades get very expensive, very quickly
The hats don't do anything except change the aesthetics slightly
Animations aren't as good as the graphics
There is no measurement of how far you've gone

App Review No. 60 Don't Touch the Spikes

Strong Points:
Clean graphics
Good music/sound effects
Different gameplay (lack of side-scrolling)
Lots of birds to collect
Lots of modes
Modes have variety while still sticking to the core gameplay
Addictive


Weak Points:
Frustrating
Records the amount of times you've played
Birds get very expensive, very quickly
Difficulty spikes (get it?)

App Review No. 59 Timberman

Strong Points:
Addictive
Easy to play
Lots of characters
Nice retro graphics and sound
Good level of challenge

Weak Points:
Repetitive
Not much to do
Long loading times starting up
Leaderboards are full of hackers with impossible scores

App Review No. 58 Galaxy on Fire: Alliances

Strong Points:
Good, strategic gameplay
Just enough base resources (3)
Not enough advanced resources (2)
Lots of planets
A variety of planets and species
A variety of buildings
A variety of ships
Amazing graphics
Good sound
The alliance system is good
Three servers
The premium currency is easy to get without paying
(Mostly) Good community
Lots of in-alliance ranks

Weak Points:
Lots of overpowered players
Not much to do
An active alliance is needed
Lots of inactives
The planet limit is too small
The ship limit is also too small
Later levels become boring
No story driven quests beyond the tutorial
The game is not quite taken far enough
Server strength can be weak

Video Game Character of the Month - August 2014 - Link - The Legend of Zelda

Video Game Character of the Month

August 2014

Link
The Legend of Zelda

Overview:

Link, The Hero of 'Insert Power Here'. This will be an interesting VGCOTM as, really, I should be doing about 17ish versions, due to the Link in these games not really being the same Link in each game. Anyway, here we go.

A quick bit of info on Link: