NO MAJOR NEW RETAIL RELEASES THIS WEEK
Merry Christmas, you filthy animals.
OOOHHHH: ON THE DLC TIP
BACK TO THE FUTURE: THE GAME – IT’S ABOUT TIME
Telltale Games
PC, Mac
12/22 PC/Mac, TBA PS3 and IPad
$24.95 5-episode pre-order
If it was my millions upon millions of dollars to blow, I’d have handed this property to Rockstar, made it open world, with three different Hill Valleys, accurate to the last stone, and let those guys and Bob Gale go to town. But, alas, these phantom dollars were not mine, and we’re getting a point and click adventure, which could still be damn amazing, considering this is pretty much the ONLY company making point-and-click adventures in this day and age, and the three major players (Bob Gale, Chris Lloyd, and Michael J. Fox, lending his image but not voice) are heavily involved. If anything, I’m a bit concerned about tone, and how cartoony they’ve already gone with the design extending to the gameplay. But then, I’m that asshole whose favorite film in the trilogy is Part II, so, feel free to ignore me.
STRONG BAD’S COOL GAME FOR ATTRACTIVE PEOPLE
TellTale Games
Playstation Network
12/21
$14.99
Homestar Runner‘s always been a hit or miss kind of deal for me, where I’ll laugh my ass off when it’s on, and want to burn the nerd contingent of the internet and watch the lot of them die screaming the next. Still, I hold the little universe in some regard if only for bringing me Trogdor, Coach Z, and the Strong Bad Sings album. Enough regard where the game’s worth $15? Considering all 5 episodes are in this package (and yep, that’s cheaper than the PC episodes put together), I’d gonna give the thumbs up. It’s quirky, and fun, and the wait for the next Back To The Future episode is LONG.
NEO GEO STATION
Playstation Network
12/21 (only Fatal Fury and Metal Slug available for PSP on this date)
$8.99 Per title; $6.99 on PSP
So, basically, SNK’s releasing all their heavy hitters to the PSN this week. Namely, Fatal Fury, Metal Slug, Art of Fighting, Magician Lord, King of Fighters ’94, Super Sidekicks, and Baseball Stars. In theory this is all well and good for most players, especially since there’s online multiplayer for all of these now. However, there’s a perfectly good SNK compilation for PS2 and PSP out there that, while it occasionally suffers from an imperfect emulation, is still all these games in one place for the cost of buying just one through the PSN, if you look in the right place. There’s even a fairly amazing Samurai Shodown collection for those same two systems. That said, the emulation is arcade perfect for these downloadable versions, so its not like there’s no reason for these. Still, if you have the systems and means, choose wisely. And as for SNK, give us the put the PS1/Saturn versions of KOF ’95 through ’98, and maybe Mark of the Wolves on my PSP, and I’ll love you forever. You could release all the bullshit 3D Samurai Shodowns you want after that.
A WORLD OF KELFLINGS
NinjaBee
Xbox Live Arcade
12/22
800 MS pts
The first game felt like Microsoft’s answer to Pikmin, but with a medieval bent. Cute, but it felt small in a way a game like this, dedicated to world building, shouldn’t be. There’s a list of improvements for the sequel a mile long, though, all of which are huge plusses in its favor, save the fact that Avatars can bring their props into the game. Because if you think you’re not gonna see entire kingdoms laid waste by some dickhead with an 80 MS pt lightsaber, you haven’t been playing nearly long enough.
ROCK BAND TUESDAY
John & Yoko/The Plastic Ono Band – Happy Xmas (War is Over)
Anais – Peut-Etre une Angine
BB Brunes – Dis-Moi X
BAP – Verdamp Lang Her
Wir sind Helden – Nur ein Wort
Linea 77 – Fantasma
Litfiba – Proibito
Caesars – Jerk It Out X
$1.99/160 MS pts per track
X-Pro Guitar and Pro Bass expansion available for 99 cents/80 MS pts
I’d have appreciated the Happy XMas track if they did what they did for All You Need Is Love in Beatles Rock Band and sold that single for charity. As it is, it’s an expected, but not unwelcome addition to the library, if only that song didn’t get run into the ground by December 15 most years. Could be worse. Could be fucking Christmas Wrapping.
The rest is all European singles. The video for Proibito is fucking hilarious, the Caesars track is inseparable from my happy memories of SSX 3, but nothing else of note in the list. It’s almost entirely generic pop-rock.