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April 2, 2010 –
PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 owners won’t need to worry about stretching before playing Spider-Man: Shattered Dimensions. Activision confirmed the game will not support either the PlayStation Move controller or Microsoft’s Project Natal motion camera, both due out this fall.

Activision explained that while developer Beenox Studios explored the possibly of adding motion support to both versions, the team ultimately decided it was simply too late in the development cycle to add them effectively.

The publisher did say, however, that both Project Natal and PlayStation Move may be considered for future Spider-Man games. Activision noted the Wii version will utilize the Wii motion controller but did not give examples of how it will be worked into the game.

Spider-Man: Shattered Dimensions is currently set for release this September.

April 1, 2010 –
Hey everyone, Sparkster is back! What do you mean “Who the hell is Sparkster?” He’s only the greatest ass-kicking opossum to hit the Sega Genesis in the early to mid ’90s and now he’s coming back for Xbox Live Arcade and Playstation network!

Back in the day every company on the block was making its own version of Sonic the Hedgehog and Sparkster was Konami’s. He’s got a sword, and a jetpack, and he likes to kill tons of wolves. He hasn’t been seen much since 1994, aside from some guest appearances in games like New International Track and Field.

Rocket Knight is actually the third game in the series and picks up where the Genesis games left off. Sparkster is enjoying the quiet life with his family, but when huge airships full of murderous wolf pirates invade, he dons the armor and becomes a rocket knight again.

More Rocket Knight News & PreviewsThere are 14 levels in the game and I’ve played seven of them so far. It’s a pretty standard platformer, feeling very similar to the original Genesis games, only in 2.5D this time (3D characters but sidescrolling gameplay). Sparkster has all the same moves as before like his jet pack dash, as well as a few new moves. Sparkster can shoot fireballs, break through walls, and hover, thanks to his jet pack.

One of my favorite parts of the game (the one thing that made it sort of stand out among all the Sonic clones of the day) was Sparkster’s ability to ricochet off of walls when he was boosting. That’s still in here and used pretty frequently. Powerups and collectibles will be scattered around in patterns that require the player to bounce between walls to get them. Sometimes there will be moving platforms that players have to time ricochets off of to reach higher areas.

Further grounding the game within the continuity is the return of Axel, Sparkster’s arch nemesis. He looks just like Sparkster, only dressed in red armor. Somehow Axel has become a “hero” to the city, but we know he’s totally a jerk and Sparkster is about to kick his marsupial ass when a giant robot built by the wolf army busts in, leading into a boss battle that was actually pretty intense and required well timed attacks. The wolf robot had huge blades for hands and would take out the platforms I was trying to stand on. He also shot missiles and dynamite. He’s totally badass, but no match for Sparkster. It was a pretty cool boss battle that used a lot of the moves I had just learned from the tutorial.

The other level I’ve played so far was an ice world. Due to the frigid temperatures, Sparkster’s fuel wasn’t refilling, requiring him to find fuel cells or get near sporadically placed flames. The level became a lot more strategic when I could blast around like a hyperactive child.

And of course there are the flying levels. every so often Sparkster will take to the air and the game switches from platformer to 2D shooter. The attack becomes a projectile fireball that can be charged up into a wicked laser beam. Along the way floating mines and flying wolves try to knock you out of the sky.

It’s weird for me to say I wish levels were harder, but there’s not a lot going on in the first couple flying levels. It looks cool with the wolves in hangliders flying in from the background to the foreground and trying to ram Sparkster. and in one level I got to take down one of the wolves’ airships by shooting out its turrets, so hopefully we get some more boss battles like that.

Rocket Knight is shaping up to be a cool little old school title. I’m hoping some of the later levels have more going on, since the first few tutorial levels were good, but not all that impressive. We’ve got a trailer for you to check out, and we’ll have the review for you when the game comes out in a few weeks.

March 24, 2010 –
Electronic Arts and Sweden-based game developer Starbreeze have announced the cancellation of one of two of its current, unannounced projects.

Starbreeze has been working on a licensed game based off the Jason Bourne character from author Robert Ludlum, which publisher EA secured the rights to last year. The studio was also focusing on Project RedLime, which was said to be a “reinventing” of an old EA franchise.

“We will continue to focus only on big productions together with EA,” said Starbreeze CEO Johan Kristiansson in a statement. “Our relationship with EA is stronger than ever, and the aim now is to spend more resources on the game that demonstrated the greatest potential. This game is already in full production.”

A spokesperson for Electronic Arts re-confirmed the project’s cancellation to IGN, but would not specify which of the two titles has been canned.

“This is correct. EA is focusing resource on fewer, bigger titles,” the company said. “We’re working with the team at Starbreeze to make a great game. We have nothing title-specific to announce today.”

March 31, 2010 –
Dreamworks has made some awesome animated movies — Shrek, Kung Fu Panda, Over the Hedge, etc. — and now How to Train Your Dragon is in theaters and getting some good reviews. To accompany the motion picture, Activision is bringing How to Train Your Dragon to consoles around the world, but the results fall far short of the movie playing on the silver screen.

How to Train Your Dragon is lame in just about every way imaginable. It’s this mix of Pokemon, role-playing, and dragons that’s just too simple for its own good.

You’ll play as either Hiccup or Astrid and be dropped into the Viking world where you own dragons and take them into battle — battles that are one on one, fighting game-inspired bouts. By the end of the game, you’ll have a stable of four dragons that you’ll fight with and use in tournaments, but there’s a hefty bit of RPG-ness here. When you take a dragon into the game’s training modes, you earn experience points that go toward the dragon’s individual experience level. Bringing up a dragon’s experience level makes him tougher and more capable of dominating in the one-on-one fights.

This is how we do it.All of that might be interesting if it wasn’t for a couple of things. First, training is boring. It’s teaching you a few combos and making you repeat them over and over again on an opponent who rarely fights back. For some reason, there are timing issues with these combos as well. I fudged up these combo lessons a bunch of times because the game wasn’t reading my second button tap in a four-button move. Once I got my first dragon beefed up, I dreaded having to take one of my younger pups back to the dojo to repeat the same brain dead lessons.

Sadly, that lack of interest carries over to the real fights as well. You take your dragon into an arena, there’s another dragon across from you, and you brawl. I found that just mashing one button relentlessly won most fights for me, but it’s a slow and boring process. The opponents block a lot, so there are plenty of times where you’re just wailing on shielded opponents and waiting for them to open up and let your attacks land. When you do knock an opponent down, the opposing dragon cannot be hurt as it struggles back to its feet.

After each one of these tournaments, you’ll be kicked back to the Viking village and you get to wander around as your human character for a while. You can talk to people, but they all say meaningless stuff unless it’s time for a side quest. When you do get a side quest, it’s often times just the next step in getting to the next fight — stuff like finding all of the tools a worker needs to finish the bridge so you can get across to get some stuff for a different dude who lets you fight in the next competition.

You can collect chickens, plants, and more to feed to your dragon before fights to boost the beast’s stats — food, mood, trust and more — that act as its health in battle, and personalize the look of your animal. There are also mini-games such as using your dragon’s fire breath to carve ice sculptures as well as a two-player fighting mode, but they aren’t noteworthy. Well, you can assign attribute points and mess with your dragon’s talents in the local two-player fighting mode, which is kind of cool, but it’s the same ho-hum brawling.

Make him happy.As with many movie games, How to Train Your Dragon does little to explain what the hell is going on in this world and doesn’t really recap the movie. If you haven’t seen the flick, you won’t know what’s happening.

On a technical level, the loads seem to take just a bit too long and your character has a really ugly animation for jogging around the Viking town. Spin the camera, and you can see the framerate drop. When the dragon fights are going on, it’s like there’s this invisible barrier between the competitors. You’ll swing at an opponent and hit it, but there’s never really any contact. With one of the dragons with a really long neck, I was walking into its face without it reacting or even really appearing to touch it.

Closing Comments
I know that I’m not the target audience for this game. I know it’s meant for kids, but How to Train Your Dragon is just so “bleh.” You can make a fun game for kids, but this isn’t one of them.

The fights are robotic and lack any impact, the third-person wandering is boring, and so on. It’s rare for a videogame to feel like a chore, but capturing 40 chickens and going through the same training missions again and again did it for me.

IGN Ratings for How to Train Your Dragon (X360)

out of 10
click here for ratings guide

5.5
Presentation
The loads are too long and the menus lack polish.

5.0
Graphics
When standing still things look OK, but in motion you have wonky animations, framerate dips, and collision issues.

5.0
Sound
There wasn’t that much dialogue recorded, so get ready for repetition.

4.5
Gameplay
You’re just mashing buttons or running around town to get to dragon fights.

5.0
Lasting Appeal
The arcade mode sounds neat with its skill trees, but it’s not awesome in practice so I doubt you’ll stick around.

4.6
Poor
OVERALL
(out of 10)

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March 31, 2010 –
No, it’s not a game about the alchemical transmutation of metals. Instead, Fatshark’s latest effort is a frantic third-person multiplayer shooter set in the Old West. The two elements feature prominently in the game — lead in the form of bullets, and gold in the form of coins. We’ve been playing around with this game for a few days now in anticipation of next week’s release and we’re encouraged by the Battlefield Heroes style simplicity and the appeal of the Wild West setting.

It’s true that the game is missing some of the setting stereotypes — there are no natives, no horses and no smallpox, for instance — but it does a good job of recasting the multiplayer shooter mechanics in this less familiar framework. Four standard classes and six familiar modes gives players a chance to jump into the game without much of a learning curve.

You can tell by his coal-dusted clothes and mining helmet that the Blaster normally works in the cramped confines of the mines. As such, he’s ideally suited for close combat. Armed with a coach gun (that’s a double-barrel shotgun to you), he can drop any target with a mere two shots, provided they’re standing within just a few feet. Of course, getting that close can be problematic, but many of the levels have enough confined spaces that the Blaster can really find ways to force the enemy to fight up close. For large groups, the Blaster can also toss out the dynamite that he normally carries as part of his profession.

The game modes might be familiar but the setting is a nice change of pace.The Gunslinger is another close-combat class, but he works a bit better at slightly longer ranges. His Negotiator pistol has a high rate of fire, so accuracy isn’t a particularly great problem. Throw in a fast reload and the Gunslinger is able to keep more bullets in the air than any other class in the game. For true volume of fire, however, the Gunslinger can activate a special fan shot that quickly shoots several bullets in a wide spread. It can be great both for taking down large groups at short range or simply chewing through a single enemy who’s made the mistake of getting too close.

My favorite class is the Deputy. Armed with a repeater carbine, he’s able to fight at the middle ranges that the levels seem to favor. His shots are very accurate and very damaging but his greatest asset is the carbine’s large magazine. Not having to reload as much as the other guy can definitely be the decisive factor in a firefight. His special ability allows him to tag enemy players and reveal their position to every other player in the match.

The Trapper is the typical sniper. Armed with a Buffalo Rifle and a saucy coonskin cap, she’s best positioned near some handy cover with a wide field of view. One lucky shot with the rifle will take down most players but she’s not able to make much use of the rifle in close quarters. To help protect herself, and her team’s objectives, she can lay traps that briefly incapacitate enemies.

When you carry the sack, you can’t shoot back.The classes also have unique synergies, which are powers and buffs that can be shared with nearby players. The Blaster, for example, will give a small defensive bonus to his allies, while the Gunslinger will boost all friendly accuracy. Since only one of any type of boost can be active at a time, it’s a nice way to encourage players of different classes to work together. If you combine the Trapper’s increased critical hit chance with the Deputy’s increased damage, you’ll be able to make short work of your enemies.

Right now, players level up during each match, but it’s not clear that there’s a persistent element to your character. So you gain XP regularly through the course of the match, and even level up from time to time, but there’s no way to track this across an entire career like you can in other online shooters.

Two of the modes, Robbery and Greed, require players to pick up sacks of gold and turn them in to score points. The cool thing about these modes is that players who are carrying the sacks of gold can’t run or shoot while holding them. So it’s up to the other players to make sure they’re safe while transporting money to the drop off point. Even if the other players aren’t particularly helpful, the carrier can always temporarily drop the load to fire off a few shots at any nearby attackers.

The same is true of the Powderkeg mode. In this mode, players have to use kegs of gunpowder to blow up certain objectives or open up new keg spawns closer to the action. The kegs work just like gold in that they prevent players from running or shooting while they’re being carried. The big difference is, if you set a keg down, other players can make it explode by shooting it, so you’ll need to be especially careful if you’re drawn into a firefight while carrying one of these.

One of the best ways to practice all this is to load up a Gold Fever match. This is essentially a Robbery mode for one or two players against waves of AI bots. You’ll learn the ins and outs of the classes in a slightly less intimidating environment and get a good feel for the basics of stealing gold and using powder kegs.

We’ve been having a lot of fun with the beta version these past few days, so look for our review after the game is released late next week.

March 29, 2010 –
505 Games today announced that the upcoming action-packed sci-fi third-person shooter MorphX, formerly titled The Swarm, will be available nationwide on June 1, 2010 for Xbox 360. In MorphX, players emerge from an underground shelter to find their planet devastated following a hostile alien invasion. Outgunned and overpowered, it appears all efforts to fight the vicious aliens are futile. Players soon discover that the only way to defeat their enemies may be to become mutants themselves by absorbing alien DNA. As players morph into alien-human hybrids, their new powers give them advantages to battle the alien infestation.

While searching for an antidote to cure their allies, players have a variety of weapons-including firearms, clubs, plasma projectors and grenades — for melee or ranged combat against enemies. Additionally, players will solve mini-games and puzzles, allowing for the option to absorb new abilities that make them more adept at fighting tougher enemies. Players can then build and morph alien DNA chains to improve different abilities like an increased regeneration rate, or enhanced vision.

While on a mission to rescue their allies, the question remains: what is left of humanity to save?

MorphX is set to swarm shelves on June 1 for Xbox 360.

About 505 Games

Based in Los Angeles, CA, 505 Games (U.S.) is the North American division of 505 Games, a global videogame publisher. The U.S. operations launched in May, 2008 to bring quality interactive entertainment to North America on all game platforms including Microsoft Xbox 360, Sony PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3, PSP, Nintendo Wii and DS, as well as PC, online, and mobile. The company’s management team hails from the leaders in global entertainment including major motion picture studios, videogame publishers and leading game development studios. With the company’s deep experience and proven success in interactive entertainment worldwide, 505 Games is looking to drive the industry forward with innovative game experiences that integrate next generation game play, immersive stories and integrated brands that can take the business to a new level. The company offers a broad selection of videogame titles in all genres for players of all ages.

April 28, 2009 –
I don’t know why I play videogames anymore. When I was growing up it was a quasi-addiction. As a kid, I remember putting quarter after quarter into an old DataEast Kung-Fu Master cabinet in a tourist shop in San Francisco’s Chinatown. I reveled in the sounds, the propulsive music, the moving puzzle patterns of enemies as they swarmed towards me with high and low attacks, the staticky audio cues for success or failure. It was a hypnosis that flooded my young brain with an urge to experiment with an abstract world that responded to my presence.

Last month, Konami unveiled Six Days in Fallujah, a third person shooter intended to dramatize 2004’s military assault on the titular Iraqi town in the language of videogames. The sensory flood of music, visuals, level design, and enemy patterns were to be assembled into an interactive recreation of one of the most violent weeks in recent American military history. Families of soldiers who were killed in Fallujah are still alive. They aren’t the aged faces from generations past. They’re young and active, and their brothers, sisters, husbands, wives, sons, and daughters were killed four and a half years ago in a town few Americans knew existed at the start of the decade.

Soldiers who survived the fight are still with us. They returned as amputees, college students, heroes or neighbors quietly going about the rest of their lives after the roar of media fanfare died down. Six Days in Fallujah was intended to tell the story of what these Americans experienced during combat. “Our goal is to give people that insight, of what it’s like to be a Marine during that event, what it’s like to be a civilian in the city and what it’ like to be an insurgent,” said Peter Tamte, president of Atomic Games.

Yesterday, Konami announced that it would not release Six Days in Fallujah, less than a month after it was first unveiled, due to public outcry. Their decision is a collective step backwards for the medium.

This week publisher Konami dropped the controversial game Six Days in Fallujah.

The war in Iraq has been examined in every other medium imaginable. Film, radio, theater, prose, television, fiction, non-fiction, journalists, and polemicists have all had a turn at trying to put the on-going conflict into a meaningful context. Apparently, videogames do not have a place in that ongoing social conversation. To see the battle in Fallujah interpreted as a videogame would be to marginalize it, to turn into an adolescent entertainment.

This idea is a holdover from the old prejudice that games are toys, pastimes rather than creative expressions. If this is true, Six Days in Fallujah must be as crass and disjunctive as a G.I. Joe Concentration Camp toy. If Fallujah is meant to be only a toy-like entertainment, then it is unnecessary to invoke a real world incident for its theme and backdrop.

It’s sad that the videogame industry continues to have to defend itself against such an inaccurate stereotype. Games are not toy-like entertainments. Gameplay is an expressive language in the same way that lighting, editing, angle, and composition formed the underlying alphabet for film a century ago. Games do more than entertain. They move us. They involve us. They require us to complete them.

Looking back over all the reported backlash of insensitivity in Six Days in Fallujah, it’s clear the uproar was conceptual and defensive. No one had any specific offenses to lay at the feet of Fallujah, it was all hypothetical. “Considering the enormous loss of life in the Iraq War, glorifying it in a video game demonstrates very poor judgment and bad taste,” Reg Key, the father of a British Red Cap killed in Fallujah, told The Daily Mail. Key later suggested that the game “trivialized” the horrors of Fallujah for the sake of “thrill-seekers.”

Are games entertainment or art? Or are they the only medium not allowed to be both?

These arguments are laden with ignorance and inconsistency. How can something both glorify and trivialize an event? How can a player experience a digital simulacrum of a historical event without understanding that there are some fundamental truths missing from the experience? From that point of view, artistic expression is no more than a pamphlet that the audience blindly accepts as truth without any self-reflection. In this line of thinking cars can turn into four-story robots, people can fly, and Vin Diesel can sprint through a haze of gunfire unscathed because only he can save the day.

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Six Days in Fallujah is not a worthwhile game to make because it might serve as a commemoration of a brutal act of military violence. It is not a historical creation but an experiential work. Games, like film, literature, and theater before them, are not well suited to convey fact. They convey empathy, and human experience. The journalist can tell us what happened when and where. The artist uses these details to intimate what it might have felt like. She can tell us why it is worth remembering an event in human terms, not just historical ones.

In this light, using videogames to explore contemporary events is not crass but essential. They cannot replicate the truth of an experience, but they can conjure empathy by placing us in someone else’s position. Is it crass to imagine what it might have been like, what it must have felt like in Fallujah?

Art is dangerous because facts are secondary to feelings. All the normal levers of understanding what is “right” and “wrong” are subverted. “What interested us were the soldiers’ stories,” said Anthony Crouts, Konami’s vice president of marketing. “Some of these soldiers came right out of high school. They went from boys to men in the span of two weeks.” That does not sound like a toy-like exploitation of a recent event for the sake of titillation.

So why has Konami suddenly decided to abandon a game they’ve nurtured through development for so long? If there is an experience worth having in Six Days in Fallujah, why has the company that spent millions of dollars investing in that experience suddenly lost faith?

It’s easy to say that videogames are more than children’s entertainment, but it’s a difficult thing to prove. While the medium may be filled with nascent power to communicate complex experiences, the business is still bogged down in marginal trifles. “Realistic” shooters cannot bear to inconvenience players with long-term consequences for their choices, so a magically regenerating health bar has become standard. Nintendo has created a behemoth industry out of a sterile Disney-aesthetic where all the filth and fallibility of human experience can be made invisible.

It has become rote to talk about finding an analog for “Citizen Kane” in videogames. When we look back on that film, we see a technical masterpiece whose historical achievements are irrefutable nearly seventy years later. What we miss is the original spirit of the movie. Citizen Kane was a fantastic act of empathy. It told an epic story about a detestable protagonist. The strength of the film was its proof of a common human vulnerability shared between all people, even the tragically arrogant Charles Foster Kane.

Is Six Days in Fallujah destined to wander through the fog of war?

Orson Welles allowed us to loathe the central character, to vent all of our private resentments against privilege and stereotype on him before forcing us to reconcile with the fact that he was just as frail and wounded as anyone else in the world. Citizen Kane told us that we all share the same scars.

Does Mario tell us that? Does Master Chief tell us that? Does Kratos tell us that?

I haven’t played Six Days in Fallujah, but based on what Konami and Atomic Games said about the game, it sounds like it aimed towards that same kind of empathy. It might have failed. Odds are good that it wouldn’t have been as thoughtful and humanistic as its developers suggested. But what does it say about our industry when we’re unwilling to try? What does it say about the corporations financing today’s most recognizable games when they are unwilling to stand behind their creative teams and defend their rights to take risks?

The saddest part of this debacle is that no one has gained anything. Konami has lost millions. Atomic has lost the time and labor of its staff. Those who might have been offended by Six Days in Fallujah must still endure the pain of their losses. Those who might have come to Fallujah for titillation and competition are not wanting for new titles with which to amuse their competitive egos.

And those, like me, who looked forward to experiencing a game that broached some difficult and uncomfortable questions about humanity in extreme circumstances are left with the tired old fables of yesterday. Go watch Citizen Kane again. Go play Super Mario Galaxy one more time. Go read Huckleberry Finn. The only thing that’s been accomplished is that a small group of people have been spared the uncomfortable experience of being offended; of having their presuppositions challenged.

Too soon?

We can debate the merits of any creative expression once it’s been released and we have all experienced it. From Lady Chatterly to Larry Clark’s Kids, history has taught us that the idea we should protect one another from art is absurd. Criticism of Six Days in Fallujah is warranted, especially coming from those who had personal ties to the real event. But the fact that something can be criticized does not mean that it should not exist. Quite often the games that are trying to do the most with the medium are the ones most vulnerable to criticism.

Six Days in Fallujah might not have been a perfect entertainment, but it deserved the chance to provoke its audience. Its critics deserved the opportunity to grapple with its attempt to convey an empathetic experience without a fantasy intermediary. Instead we have proved our critics right.

Games are nothing more than toys. They are the gratuitous backwater for immature thrill-seekers. To see them grapple with any deeper human truth is offensive and intolerable. Like the closing of Kubrick’s Full Metal Jacket, let us be a generation of game fans marching through the flaming ruins singing Mickey Mouse to one another, mercifully spared any of the harder questions. What happened? And why? Let’s not try and reckon with the harder questions, let’s just agree never to ask them.

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March 25, 2010 –
A lawsuit filed earlier this week against retailer GameStop says the company is “deceptively misleading” its customers into believing a used game purchased from the store comes with all packaged downloadable content advertised on the box. This content, however, is only made available for free to those who purchase the game new, as the code to access the content can be only used one time.

The situation began back in January when plaintiff James Collins purchased a used copy of Dragon Age: Origins from a GameStop store in Hayward, California. Collins paid $54.99 plus tax for the game, $5 less than a brand new copy.

Collins states he purchased the game in part because of the box cover, which advertised that additional character and quest content could be downloaded for free upon purchasing the game. Collins discovered weeks later, however, he would have to pay an additional $15 to access the downloadable content, ultimately paying $10 more than the cost of a brand new copy with the same content.

When Collins tried to return the game for a refund, the GameStop manager at the store said he could not because the seven-day return window had passed.

“GameStop, who makes more than 20% of its revenue and nearly $2 billion from the sale of used video games, is aware of this issue, and continues to fail to alert customers that this content is not available on used games,” the suit states. “As a result, GameStop tricks consumers into paying more for a used game than they would if they purchased the same game and content new.”

Collins is seeking restitution, punitive damages for fraud, and numerous other compensatory damages.

A GameStop representatve told IGN the company is unable to comment on pending litigation.

The lawsuit in PDF form can be viewed here.

July 24, 2009 –
Earlier today, Microsoft Game Studio’s Ryan Crosby told IGN that the company was, “still looking into it,” in regards to the Peter Jackson Halo Chronicles episodic videogame. Crosby continued to say that the game is, “being discussed.”

Apparently those discussions don’t involve Peter Jackson himself.

Jackson told Joystiq that, “The Halo project is no longer happening, it sort of collapsed when the movie didn’t end up happening.”

If Halo Chronicles does ever materialize — and at this point it would seem prudent not to get your hopes up — the much ballyhooed director that was originally announced to be working on the project back in 2006 will not be a part of it.

Daily Fix Video

July 24th, 2009

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Australia, May 22, 2007 –
Like a bright shiny apple, there’s little doubt that Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End looks appetising. In terms of its visual production values it’s a new high water mark for licensed gaming, but unfortunately if you take a bite you’ll discover it’s rotten to the core. Or at the very least bland to the core. An unkind way to begin a review certainly, but I don’t want you to be under any illusions about this game. It’s poorly designed, frustrating in places and very little fun.

In many ways Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End is the very definition of why licensed games tend to be so reviled by gamers. Despite the epic scope of the tale it purports to tell, this is paint by numbers game design that funnels the gamer along an entirely linear path and gives them next to nothing that’s interesting to do. It’s as predictable as it is depressing.

Before we really put the boot in, however, basic introductions are in order, just in case you haven’t been following IGN’s coverage of the title. Here goes. Gamers, meet At World’s End. Ol’ Atty (as well call him) is an action adventure romp that can take you all the way through the second and third Pirates films, from Jack in prison to the surprise ending where all the characters ride flying unicorns into the sunset. He likes pina coladas (for the rum), long walks on the beach (looking for a big X) and lots of fighting, with a side of platforming. He loves collecting pointless trinkets and often gives you multiple characters to control, and when we first met him we thought he had a stack of potential. He was jaw-droppingly pretty, to start with (okay, right about now I’m wishing that I’d made this game female for the purposes of the analogy), and he had a number of potentially endearing traits. Chiefly, the tongue in cheek action and great character likenesses boded well – this could be a friend who would sweep us into the world of Pirates. Sadly, despite his good looks we think you’re going to find him deathly dull to hang out with.

Everyone was a “wigger” back in the day. Groan.


Good ol’ Atty. Okay, so there was a bit of boot-putting-in there but honestly, it’s hard to avoid. Pirates is just so lacklustre. Right from the off this is a ‘look but don’t touch’ world. Take Port Royal as an example. The water glistens in the bay, the sun beams down from a gorgeous blue sky, the boardwalks and ramshackle buildings are well realised, and the town is bustling with activity. Unfortunately, as soon as you step onto land the leash is attached and invisible walls go up in every direction. The world is broken up into numerous small areas, each connected by doorways and each discouraging any exploration beyond climbing the odd rope. You can’t interact with anything – you can’t kick chickens, smash barrels or talk to the people wandering the streets. Sure, they may make a comment in your direction occasionally, but then they’ll keep walking towards a wall before fading into thin air, further illustrating the artifice of the world. You’re given basic, boring tasks with no wit or sparkle. Somehow I don’t see the real Jack Sparrow wandering about a town taking down all the wanted posters of Will. More infuriating, since I’d played the preview code I knew I’d have to do this, but do you think the game would let me start collecting them when I first landed on the dock? Not a chance – wait until the quest is triggered naughty boy. This continues throughout the game – everything in its right order. That door that was inaccessible a minute ago? Oh, now you can open it. No exploring – beyond finding treasure chests filled with the most disappointing treasure ever – and no interacting; just blindly follow the compass to your next port of call. And don’t jump in the water. I’ve never seen someone drown so fast in two feet of water.

Okay, so maybe I’m being a little unfair. This game is, after all, mostly about the action. And you know what? If the action was really compelling we could probably forgive some of the game’s other failings. Sadly, it’s not. Combat mostly takes the form of sword fights against multiple opponents, although there’s unarmed combat and one-on-one duels as well. We’ll get to them in a sec. Combat tries to tie in a whole host of different elements but never comes together in a particularly satisfying or varied way. A very quick tour of the basics – you have a button for your sword, a punch button and a grapple button. You can mix and match these for very basic combos. Fill up your ’swordsmanship metre’ through combat and you can finish off opponents with style. Sadly, these prompts tend to flash up pretty quickly and you’re usually better off just finishing an enemy with a basic swipe. Or a punch to the kidney… unless they’re one of the many enemies that can only be defeated using a finishing move. Again, we’ll get to that in a sec.

Not pictured: a treasure chest containing – gasp – a periwig! All my Christmases have come at once!


While there’s – bizarrely – no block button, there is a counter system. When an enemy is about to attack, a red circle appears at his feet. Press A and move the left analogue stick in the direction of the enemy and you’ll counter. The enemy may charge, for instance, and you’ll step aside like a bullfighter and slash him to the ground. Problem is, the action entirely freezes to make room for these little encounters, and more often than not you’re surrounded by enemies and can’t see their feet anyway. Nothing like failing to block an attack from off-screen. What else is there? Let’s see. You have a flintlock and can carry three bearings at once. Find some space and you can draw and shoot with a button press. You can pick up and use items in the environment, such as throwing knives, bottles and grenados. This is really clumsy and rarely worth doing – you have to position yourself exactly over the item to pick it up (easier said than done given the movement controls – once more, we’ll get to that in a sec) then try to lock on to an enemy who’s usually off-screen. Joy. Oh, and then there’s the whole shrunken head system – collect three of these and you can unleash an area of effect attack, then go on an instant kill rampage for a short time afterwards. The shrunken heads are also used to open ’special’ green treasure chests. So yeah, a lot of different mechanics, very few of which work all that well. Oh for a block button and some interesting combos!

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Now, back to all those WGTTIAS (a.k.a. “we’ll get to that in a sec”). During unarmed combat there’s no way to block or counter, and these sequences are kind of pointless considering Jack has his cutlass in his pants in each encounter. He’s a pirate for god’s sake. Wouldn’t he just draw his sword? The one on one duels on the other hand, use completely different mechanics to the rest of the combat. You block your opponent’s attacks using a low, medium and high system, then try and counter attack when you have an opening. These are actually okay… the first few times.

Next on the agenda – the enemies you can only kill using finishing moves. Man, these encounters are annoying. You have to fill up your swordsmanship metre at least partway before the finishing move prompts will pop up on screen, which means that other than the lieutenant, all the other enemies will keep respawning after you kill them so that you always have an opportunity to build up the metre. Only thing is, it becomes very hard to actually target the lieutenant when you’re surrounded by grunts – many of whom are attacking you from off-screen. Then you need to take into account the fact that you can lose your entire swordsmanship metre by doing a finishing move on one of the grunts, which is easier than it sounds as the prompts are constantly popping up for everyone but the guy you actually want them on. I could go on, but instead I’ll just say – this is bad game design. And you know what? While this review is aimed at people who know games, as opposed to the casual players that are inevitably going to make up the vast majority of its sales, there’s no doubt that design like this will be completely frustrating for them too. It’s one thing to make a bland, paint by numbers licensed game, it’s another to do it badly.

Why there’s a Don Burke look-alike in this game I have no idea. Did he win a contest or something?


The final WGTTIAS – the movement controls. Now, while Jack may in fact be a drunk pirate, there’s no need for him to control like one. If you’re moving at anything more than a slow walk, Jack takes another full step after you release the analogue stick. This makes positioning him accurately fiddly and harks back to the bad old days where animations have to run their course before you can do anything else. Sigh.

Let’s talk about something more positive shall we? This is a great looking game. The models for the Black Pearl and the Flying Dutchman are based on the actual 3D models created by ILM, so look spot on. The environments – while artificially constrained, are richly detailed, and all the next-gen bells and whistles – HDR lighting, normal mapping et al are nicely integrated. Special mention must also go to the excellent rain effects. In the opening prison level the mood is set well by a dense downpour, and the look as it trickles down surfaces (while a little shiny) is well realised. The character models are also similarly impressive. Jack Sparrow is the spitting image of Johnny Depp, as is Will and Davey Jones.

You put your right foot in, you take your right foot out, you put your right foot in and you shake it all about.


Unfortunately, good visuals will only get you so far, and there are numerous missed opportunities to help bring gamers into this world. One would think, for instance, that using a sound-alike for Johnny Depp (and a very good one at that) would allow the dev team to incorporate stacks of dialogue for Jack. Not so. Aside from cutscenes, Jack is strangely silent throughout much of the game. There are numerous scenes where Jack looks like a half-witted mime (is that an oxymoron?), acting out his feelings, when a simple quip and smaller movement would have been far more appropriate. Instead, much of Jack’s personality is left to be conveyed through movement, but this really feels like an exaggerated caricature of the character – at times laughably so, especially when he’s so quiet.

Closing Comments
I could keep going on, detailing the woeful sections where you swap between multiple characters, but it would be too soul destroying. Instead, it¿s time to wrap it up. This is not a good game ¿ it looks great, but it¿s bland and jam packed with average to poor game design. Even die-hard Pirates fans should probably steer clear of this one. I¿ll put it this way. Do you really want to play a game where you¿re collecting tins of paprika? Or periwigs? I thought not.

Want to have your say? Rock on over to the Aussie forums.

IGN AU Ratings for Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End (X360)

out of 10
click here for ratings guide

7.0
Presentation
No great swashbuckling flourishes in the menus. Pretty basic and unexciting actually.

8.5
Graphics
The best aspect of the game by far ¿ great environments and character models, nice lighting and effects. You can look – just don¿t touch.

7.5
Sound
Some good orchestral tunes. The sound-alikes are good too, although more incidental dialogue is much needed.

4.5
Gameplay
We can¿t even recommend this to casual players. Bland and frustrating in equal measure.

5.5
Lasting Appeal
Two films to play through, notoriety to earn, multiplayer to try and an incredibly dull set of achievements to unlock.

4.9
Poor
OVERALL
(out of 10 / not an average)

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