Graphics: The colors are pretty vibrant on my Nintendo DSi and it seems that Nickelodeon made an effort to make it into very distinct color schemes due to the fact that there are some color and shape mini-games in the story mode. No special cell-shading here, but let’s be honest now, it’s perfect for the target audience.

Sound: Not much to say here. Not like I play early childhood video games games as a habit, but I assume they used the same voice actors as the cartoon and had them do sound bytes. This was pretty cute, as an educational type game but I wouldn’t want to hear it over and over again as an adult. But the game is for pre-schoolers, and for them, it’s fantastic.

Dynamics: My favorite section of reviews: I thought the overall gameplay to be very linear — not a bad thing for younger minds. The mini-games go from one to the next and don’t really stop for anything. Also interesting is that neither the directional pad or A,B,X,Y keys work. And I’m pretty sure that this was by design; you figure that as a young child, you’ll probably be using the stylus more than anything, so all of the controls are built into the touchpad. From that perspective, I think that it was a brilliant move, although I’m curious as to what age group does actually start to tinker with the keys.

My one single black mark — only like a semi-gray one, really — is probably when Kai-Lan asks you to say something. At first I was trying to say the words but on a offhand thought, I decided to blow in the microphone instead. What’s strange is that it also worked and took it. Now, this isn’t necessarily something that 2K Play can control, but I don’t know how sensitive a DSi can detect actual word patterns. It’d be curious to do some testing in this fashion, but that’s for another day.

Overall: 2K Play is the division of 2K that creates games for this age group. So if you have a little one, love this game, and am looking for similar titles, go there first to find more information. Kai-Lan is a cute series that delves into the Chinese culture and I think that it’s great that we’re starting to see this beginning to pop up even in mainstream gaming.

Now, admittedly, the entire historical aspect of the game is fascinating. The sequel to the hit Assassin’s Creed has amazing graphics, and it’s not as dreary as the first one with the right amount of things to do and sub-storylines that allow it to function altogether very well. Even the latest Battle at Forli DLC was worth more than the money you pay since it gives another chapter of the story arc and explains some more things that are going on.

So you’re kind of built up….. then it’s like… poof. Uhh. What?

The end boss is a cake walk. You don’t have to do anything pretty much to beat the historical version of the game which is strange since end of games are usually a lot more difficult. Not a huge deal although for those looking for a challenge, be sorely disappointed. The credits that roll that show you as the character Desmond, is a playable end which leaves the storyline open for another one. Great, ACIII coming soon to your PS3.

But here’s the kicker. The part where it connects Ezio’s life with Desmond’s? After beating the last guy to a pulp? You’re kind of left going, what the hell?!!? Total cheese factor. I mean, there are few games or television shows that can get away with this type of story arc and if you watch Stargate SG-1, you’ll understand what I’m saying if you get to the end, but it just wasn’t executed very well in my opinion. Almost like those movies where the end seems cut short because they ran out of money and had to end it quick. You’re just left hanging with… what’s going on? Why was it like that? And is that part of it going to be developed even further?

Overall, the game play was very smooth and I would have to say that the overall experience saved the game from a kind of bitter-sweet end. It was great to see the end of the game, but on the flip side, you just can’t help thinking back going…. what the hell were they thinking when they wrote that part in. Even the tie into Ubisoft’s new UPlay was pretty interesting since you could unlock more things and expand on a very good game. The entire concept was well thought out… except that one part and I have to say that this year’s going to be tough when it comes to action adventure games. There so far has been a high bar that’s set by last year’s GOTY and and ACII doesn’t quite get there although it was fantastic overall.

And boy, I have to say that the entire experience is amazing. Nintendo really outdid themselves here.

For the most part, the entire game play is smooth just like its predecessors. But there are a few things that make this game worth every penny. The only one that you absolutely have to go into mentioning is the one about multiplayer through the game mode.

Most games try to scroll you through the game and drag along all of the players. New Super Mario Bros. Wii however, uses the player that runs to the farthest edge of the screen as the one that drags the game. This means that you technically could kill your teammate if you move too far and they haven’t caught up. You can also screw them up by jumping on top of them and so on, which makes it absolutely frantic when you’re playing on an ice level with ledges.

But in the same instance, it makes the entire game fantastic. You can bust through a level with multiple people trying to achieve the same goal. Before, this was only reserved for FPS shooter types or capture the flag. Not even close for scroller games. But now, it’s a seamless play where gamers are immersed in the same screen (no splitting) and are looking for the same things like coins and such. Team effort at its finest, which is actually a whole new level of game play.

I have to say that I haven’t had a chance to touch the Super Guide mode yet, but this definitely has a lot of replay value. Even my wife, whom usually just watches me play the review titles had to pick up a controller and couldn’t put it down.

The game itself does come with a pretty thick manual, and if you’ve never played any of the Marios before, I would probably suggest you familiarize yourself with at least the concept. I personally prefer to play it with a controller instead of the nunchuks being of the old school Mario play. Would be interesting to see it actually work with the classic controller too, but obviously that wouldn’t work with some of the movements you need for this game. Either way? I’m looking forward to waking my wife up bright and early this weekend to finish beating this sucker. And I’m sure that anyone that has that old Mario nostalgia would entirely understand.

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These codes expire at the end of 2009 and are available for one-time use only (meaning, first come, first serve). I don’t believe you can combine them with other codes, and it doesn’t work for other promotional items. In any case, a little pre-holiday savings from yours truly.

First off, this patch proves one thing. What the community calls “glitching” with the villager up the side of cliffs and such, was indeed not a “glitch”. Why anyone came up with that term to begin with is beyond me since this patch proves the fact that surfaces were made for different types of jumping abilities and such.

Class changes:
Second, with the new warrior speed improvements, and more health, it’s too bad that if the guy falls into water, he doesn’t drown. I mean, come on. The new class balancing basically made the worst class into the best, and downgraded some classes that didn’t need to be downgraded (specifically, I’d say the Ranger and Worker). Priest is still a great class to play regardless of the range and power drops and Mage wasn’t touched.

Maps:
New map wise, the New Pork map is completely crazy vast. I think this map actually could take on 64 players itself if the P2P servers could handle it. It would be great to have some way to sell or develop new maps by the community.

Bugs:
Voice chat is still bugged. This is where depending on how you join the game, or switch teams, you might be on one team but can hear the entire other team’s conversation. New bug where mining for metal, had the metal disappearing. Couldn’t recreate but I didn’t look too hard at it.

Scoring:
With the new scoring, it’s been basically tweaked down so that you basically suck at scoring. Which probably was an effect of keeping the title, but it does make it sort of… bleh.

Host system:
While the host now cannot kick or ban players, it also becomes an incredible annoyance. Mainly because with the several clans that I usually hang with (Broccoli Crew, Mr. Ts, Rockstars), these individuals usually are pretty fair with kicking the people that try to mess up the game. Namely, tkpanda148888. This guy just goes around and tries to sabotage games entirely which while apparently gives him great pleasure, it creates a terrible gaming environment. There are others, but known throughout the community, this guy is one serious jerk.

Thus, there should be a voting system. Perhaps if you can vote throughout the system and have to register at least a percentage of votes to kick or ban someone. With the new patch, I also found that there are hosts out there that I used to be able to connect to and now cannot. Sounds like some changes on the server side.

Synopsis:
Overall, the feel of the new patch is pretty good. I’m not really enthusiastic with the class changes, but overall it shows that the developers are always watching the scene and taking notes from the community. That makes it all the more worthwhile to support them in any sort of paid endeavors that they release. Outside of that? Get your Cakey ON!

It seems like 2DBoy, the makers of World of Goo, have extended their birthday celebration of “pay what you think it’s worth” experiment until October 25. The usual $20USD game is now… on average… $2.03USD. But even more interesting is that they put out a little survey to see why the average was at what it was and they came up with the conclusion that the largest percentage of people could only afford what they had paid.

And with the economy as it is currently, it’s amazing that fifty-seven thousand people put up even a little bit. Inside of a week. I think that goes to show that either gamers are holding out for the big things that roll sixty dollars for your console and not buying extraneous impulse buys, or that impulse buying of third party developers are getting hit hard by this economy. Either way, it sucks royally and I’m glad that 2DBoy provided an opportunity for those that wanted to contribute to do so.

That makes it all the more worthwhile.

If you do a break-down of the cost by percentages in a rough scale, you would image that:

Development Studio: 50%
Publisher: 25%
Operations: 10%
Retailer: 5-15% (including discount)
Discount: 10%

Here is where it’s strange. In both Operations and Retailer, Sony basically absorbs most of the cost here since bandwidth is cheaper than creating packaging and distribution. Not to mention that you basically cut out the retailer altogether which means there’s at least a 5% savings. So why is it that downloadables never see this particular savings being passed on? Let’s be frank here, if you look at music CDs that you buy through iTunes, generally they’re about ten or eleven dollars compared to the retail thirteen or fourteen when they come out. That markup is what is being cut out.

With Sony’s PSN, it doesn’t seem to be the case until after the item is out for a long time, which means not only do they shoot themselves in the foot for adoption rate, but the actual break down shows that they’re basically taking out the retailer and taking that chunk too. Nice. Doesn’t make you want to go buy anything online, now does it. For me? If you’re going to make me buy it for the same price, I’ll take the pretty box and booklet any day of the week.

I would say that if you’re taking a break from all the RPGs and action/fighting games, this is one of those great in-between ones that seems to have a decent story arc and the graphics are very much cartoonish which lends itself to the younger generation. Personally, I found most of the gameplay to be satisfying although the switching between players and weapons was somewhat annoying every time you were trying to adjust things in the middle of combat. Outside of that, it was pretty smooth and had a 3D feel.

The demo itself for the PS3 is rather long compared to much of what you can download and was surprising to me for as much as I played. Just exploring the entire level and area took probably somewhere around forty five minutes to an hour, but that was going slow. You could probably race through it pretty quickly if you knew where you were going instead of picking up everything and fighting everyone you could.

The only thing I dislike about this game is the voice acting. It’s not that it’s bad voice acting, but somehow the fact that it’s in English but subtitled just throws me off. Either do the entire story in Japanese and subtitle it, or do it all in English with the option of subtitling. Having it in English with a fake Asian accent and subtitling sort of deters from the game itself, but it could just be me considering I watch a lot of imports and foreign films.

Due to the different ports of this game, I’m rather curious as to how the handheld versions will fare since it’s going to every next-gen system along with the PC which means that the graphics will probably be the thing to suffer the most and controls will be awkward.

Overall, I found that this game was very enjoyable and probably will look forward in getting a copy when it comes out. After my list of RPGs and such for the holidays that is…

The amazing thing is that this game is entirely cute with brilliant music, and a great narrator, but it just screams of my generation when it comes to the blood, gore, and humor. Let’s be honest, the credits rolling with Sir Mixalot? Come on… Baby Got Back is not only a classic from my time but it’s also fitting to the game itself.

I will say that the delay for single player was okay at best. The narration is good, and it’s a good way to learn how to play the game itself. But it’s rather short for all the time that they took to delay it. I would probably wish there was a little more to the story line chapter front. There also are different ways to play such as the Gladiator mode which will pit you against waves of combatants. From the trophies side, it seems like it takes about twelve levels to clear but I didn’t take too long with it.

The greatest part of this game is the multiplayer. There are some quirks that I hope Titan clears out later on, but the entire thing is very smooth for game play and load times. Ping time effects death toll count very much so be careful as with any multiplayer game where ping is king. If you’re going to host a game, FP will detect what your bandwidth can manage which is nice, since your upload speed determines it all and some people just don’t have the pipe to support all 32 players. Wish I did, but I don’t.

There are a few bugs, and user interface things that are kind of crucial. For example, after hours of play I realized that one of the princesses in multiplayer was stuck because a player had stuck themselves against her and you couldn’t grab the princess. Interesting bug, and it came after hours of play so I thought it was rather unusual. The AIs are okay during match play, but for the most part are rather fun to play against. Not entirely dimwitted but also not crazy hard. I do wish that there was a game selection mode though. When you join up with a game, it just scans for new games instead of giving a list. There also is no way of quitting out of a game join once you’ve started the process so you have to wait for the time-out before starting it again. That’s rather annoying with no cancel feature.

Overall, this game was worth every penny as long as there are new maps coming out. Super cute, and hours of fun. Definitely worthwhile to shell out for this one if you’re into multiplayer capture-the-flag type action in a 2D scrolling setting.

In case you want to play… look me up.

In fact, if you read the entire thing, it’s filled with a bunch of marketing gibberish that never goes towards answering why the block is there in the first place:

“Everything we do is with an eye toward achieving our long-term goal of maximizing the content you can access as conveniently as possible in a way that ‘works’ for the content owner,” reads the response I received from customer service. “In the short-term that may require us to make some tough decisions, but we only do so when we believe it improves our long-term prospects to build a more enduring, legal solution to that same problem.”

There’s also a lengthy description about the distribution model on how shows and movies are distributed, not that it actually means anything (considering the fact that it’s the content owners that approve the release of the content to Hulu, and browser whether or not on the PC or PS3 is still the same medium). There’s also some discussion about the rise of the web and how it changes the distribution model which is more public relations speak for “we’re not answering this question but we feel like we should act like we are and see if we can fool people into believing it.”

Really, Hulu. You would have been better off keeping silent. The only thing that anyone can gather out of this is that someone at Hulu has no sense of how advertisement mediums work (I actually have looked at a couple things since seeing advertisements on Hulu via my PS3) or someone is in contention with Sony itself. I personally would say that the latter might be the case and perhaps this is some sort of indirect retaliation for Sony not putting up one of the major shareholder’s content on the PSN network or something. Who knows.

Either way? The entire official answer is a joke. Halfsies just doesn’t cut it with the online world. Either become transparent from the public relations standpoint, or take the “no comment” route. From my end, I’d rather know why. At the very least, it creates good will with your viewers which in the end are the people that actually generate your revenue stream.