Tournament of Legends
First up, Tournament of Legends is a mythologically-themed fighting game, in which players compete to come out of top among legendary figures from various ancient cultures, ultimately getting revenge on Thanatos for past wrongs. Each character has multiple weapon sets and costumes and lots of moves to master, using the Wii motion controls. Battle arenas will be guarded by monsters who may interrupt the fight and increase the challenge for the players. Icrontic has the video, and more details about the release here.
Despicable Me
We’re also getting Despicable Me: The Game. This movie tie-in uses the characters from the movie to create puzzles and challenges, in which the player has to use things like freeze rays and grappling hooks to navigate and alter the level by building stairs and bridges with minions. There are also lots of special abilities. The DS companion game, Minion Mayhem is also an action puzzle game, except focused much more tightly on the minions themselves rather than the protagonist. Either way, the player must help the mad scientist from the movie steal the components he needs for his evil invention. As usual, I don’t expect much from movie tie-in games, but one can occasionally be surprised. The original Disney’s Aladdin tie-in game, for example, was great.
Crackdown 2
Crackdown 2 is the sequel to the 2007 cult hit. In this new iteration, players will have deeper control over character advancement, and will play through a sprawling open environment in single or multi-player modes. Safe zones have been removed from the environment in an attempt to create a more action-oriented game, and many more options have been added for transportation above or below ground. Crackdown 2 claims to be a revolution in multi-player sandbox experiences, but has so far been called out as unfaithful to the Crackdown name. If you loved the first Crackdown, chances are you’ll be disappointed by this one.
The Silver Lining—Episode 1
This week’s Icrontic Spotlight points out The Silver Lining—Episode 1: What is Decreed Must Be. This game is interesting because it is the video game equivalent of fan fiction, someting rarely seen in the medium. I’m not talking about clone games, here. Of those there are many. I mean how many clones of Bejeweled have there been? How many Pac-Mans? How many Tetrises? (Tetri?). That’s not what The Silver Lining is. This new series of games is being developed by fans of the old King’s Quest series by Roberta Williams, which ended with Mask of Eternity in 1998, and contained a total of 8 games, not including multiple versions and remakes. The King’s Quest franchise belongs to Activision, and unlike literary fiction, fans are not allowed to use names and likenesses of the characters from the original video games as fair use properties, which is why so many “fangames” fail before completion. However, the all-volunteer team convinced Activision to allow them to complete and release the project without the King’s Quest name. The Silver Lining series will be available for free on their website, with the first episode being released later this week. The graphics aren’t very pretty, which can likely be mostly attributed to the length of time the project has been under production (nearly ten years), but it’s a new King’s Quest game, and for lots of fans, that will be enough to at least give it a look. As long as they’ve stuck faithfully to the original writing style, the games may even develop a following.
Following is a list of this week’s announced North American Releases:
Windows
- Monkey Island 2 Special Edition: Lechuck’s Revenge
- Rise of Flight: Iron Cross Edition
- Sniper: Ghost Warrior
- The Silver Lining—Episode 1: What is Decreed Must Be
Wii
- 2-for-1 Power Pack: Winter Blast/Summer Sports 2
- Despicable Me: The Game
- Furry Legends
- Pearl Harbor Trilogy – 1941: Red Sun Rising
- The Cages: Pro Style Batting Practice
- Tournament of Legends
DS
- 101 Shark Pets
- Despicable Me: The Game
- Mahjong: Journey Quest for Tikal
- Nursery Mania
Xbox 360
- Crackdown 2
- Monkey Island 2 Special Edition: Lechuck’s Revenge
PS3
- Hello Flowerz
- Monkey Island 2 Special Edition: Lechuck’s Revenge
- The Mystery of the Crystal Portal
PSP
- Despicable Me: The Game
- Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3 Portable
- The Mystery of the Crystal Portal
- Widgets Odyssey
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