Game Reviews

I won't argue that this Trilogy is by far the best in early Star Wars games

The only thing is the game requires a joystick, unlike the previous versions that didn't. Which is alright, no problem. I got one, you got one, if not then there are a slew of wonderful little sticks out there that will sufice.

All of these games are classics, from Xwing until the end... each is among the best there is to offer in the Star Wars gaming. Of course the Xwing and Tiefirhgter are older than Windows... But you can get around that can't you? Here's the lowdown.

Genre: All are Flight Simulation, Space Fighters... meaning that there is no simulation for atmosphereic flight (all 360x360 directions with no gravity... no real sense of up). Which can get annoying if you are just that type of person.

Controls: In exception to your Joystick... not a lot is customizable. Alliance is a more recent game can do a little. They are easy to learn and not complicated by any means, and each program has in in-flight key guide.

Gameplay... Superb. I love them all. I've owned just about every version of Tie-Fighter and find that his game is the better game... though Alliance's better graphics and general quality is newer and better, they are all still the greatest (In comparison to some of the most recent multiplatform fighter games... these are a nice breath of nostalgia.

Xwing is by far the oldest and comes with both extra campaigns, Imperial Pursuit and B-wing. Tie-fighter comes with it's extra add on and Alliance is a full package. This box set gives you everything the individuals have: updated graphics and compatibilities. It's really worth the price when compared to the individual price of each three of these games. ... .

I recommend this for anyone who played the games in their older versions. You'll be surprised to see what's changed and how well they are now. I still find myself playing around with them. And the best thing to do is to play around with their mission editors (not included) and make your own missions. Tie-fighter is especially easy to make a mission for. I wouldn't recommend these for younger gamers, since they quality of these games were at their prime in the early 90's, and anything in the computer world that is more than 5 years old is considered antique... but the are collectors.

When I bought X-Wing, I noticed the graphics weren't the best, but when my A-Wing's blasters blew a TIE into space dust, I knew I loved this game.

I've been an Ogre Battle fan for around 4 years. It took a while, but i got Ogre Battle 64 on clearance in '98. I loved it! Then, just a year ago, i got FFT. (GREAT GAME) While on the internet
looking for help on FFT, i saw many references to a game called Tactics Ogre. After many months, I got this of Ebay for 50 bucks. (Which is actually a VERY good price for this game w/ all inserts.)
Now, on to the review. This game (In terms of plot and class amounts) Is TONS better than FFT. The plot revolves around government, betrayel, and war. There are 3 different paths to take, and it took me around 50 hours to go through one of them. Sure, the graphics are fairly bad, but i figure if you can tell what everything is, your fine.
If you are lucky enough to find this game and you like it, I suggest you get Final Fantasy Tactics, which has a great job system and is now only 20 bucks. Thanks for taking your time to read this.

I must confess, I bought this game only because I had played Final Fantasy Tactics and loved it. Desperate for a strategy/RPG fix, I got TO because many of FFT's creators had worked on it. But just because it preceded FFT does not mean it's not as good...on the contrary, it actually is more fun and absorbing than its slickly polished descendant.

Let's start with the bad news. Tactics Ogre was originally released for the Super NES, and it shows. With small, blocky sprites and the inability to rotate a camera (because the background is also 2D), TO won't be winning any graphics awards anytime soon. The in-game speech portraits are nice, though.

Tactics Ogre can also occasionally get monotonous - the most common culprit being the constant need for training. There's also a special 100-floor (!) dungeon that is not for the faint of heart.

Now the good news: The story is absorbing. TO takes place in the island nations of Valeria; you play Denim Powell, a young member of the Walstanian ethnic group. He, his sister Kachua, and his friend Vice are determined to lead Walsta out from under the oppressive hand of the ruling Gargastan. They're helped in this aim by a group of exiled warriors from Zenobia: the heroes of the first game in the Ogre Battle Saga. Eventually the scope of the conflict widens to include the rest of Valeria, and culminates in a bitter struggle for the High King's throne and for the power of an incredibly powerful magical artifact. TO's story would be its strongest point...except for one thing.

The gameplay.

Dear God, the gameplay. It's like a sundae smothered in hot fudge, chocolate sprinkles, whipped cream, and with a cherry on top: wonderful, but occasionally overkill. TO's gameplay is definitely deep; while it doesn't have the huge list of jobs and abilities that its descendant, Final Fantasy Tactics, does, I can't help but feel it's without a doubt more complex in terms of strategy. With over a dozen sidequests, not to mention three distinct paths through the game (each of which has its own special characters to get), there's no question that TO has even more replay value than FFT. And that's really saying something!

Tactics Ogre is definitely a game not to be missed. While Atlus is no longer making the game, if you can buy a used copy, do!

Tactics Ogre is all about the hardcore experience. Not only are the graphics nothing special, they border on offensive. Looking at this game, you'd wonder how anybody could give it a high rating. That's where our little friend, Gameplay, comes in. He suggests that graphics don't matter, that he can offer a much more fulfilling experience. He introduces you to his brother, Storyline, and tells about how deep and involving Storyline's personality is. Storyline is quite the plotter; he can tread on the feet of kings and peasants without losing a beat. He propagates destructive forces (ghouls, necromancers, chaos knights, etc.) while staying true to human emotion (people die, people are sad, people revenge). He does all this through the medium of plastic, namely the disc entitled Tactics Ogre.

The storyline and gameplay (containing a job system that was FFT's predecessor, though not matching its depth enjoyable nonetheless) are quite well done. If you can look past the surface (don't stare at that ugly brother!) then there is much to love about Tactics Ogre.

P.S. This game has a 100 (that's not a typo) level dungeon that focuses entirely on fighting and item finding. You must traverse it twice to obtain an extremely valuable item. Talk about hardcore!

We've had a copy of Tall Tales in our van for months now and have grown accostomed to hearing random questions about Bigfoot or the Loch Ness Monster flying from the back seat. Not only does it keep the kids (and us) entertained and relatively quiet, it gives them the chance to stretch their creativity when they're stuck in the seatbelts. It's also nice to be able to duck in and out of the game as attention to the road demands. I'm sure it would be great fun to play with a group indoors as well, but ours literally never made it out of the car. Best of all, you can lose a few cards to spilled milkshakes and the occasional gust of wind and the game still works. Try that with travel chess.

A great fun game with loads of creative characters. And it comes in a handy size. Fun.

We laughed so hard, I wet my pants!

A few years ago PCGAMER made a list of the greatest PC games of all time and suprise, suprise guess what game topped the list? X-Com UFO Defense, and it well deserved it.

The game, even when played today still shows it's greatness. I've logged probably more then 1000 hours of gametime playing X-Com and it's many sequels over the years since it first released and the gameplay still amazes me.

If you love strategy games and for some reason haven't tried X-Com - find a copy of it. (The PC version is WAY easier to get a hold of then the PS1 version and is a better port of the game anyway) If you loved games like Final Fantasy Tactics, C&C, Warcraft or less recognizable classics such as Dune 2 and the more recent Disgaea Hour of Darkness then you owe it to yourself to see what you've been missing.

As with the details the other reviews do a great job so i'll just leave you with this - I've played just nearly every tactical combat/rpg ever made and X-Com is by far the best.

RTS games did not exist when X-COM was released (or least I have never heard of one from that era) and good stratagey games were even harder to find (I could be corrected by a MOOR fan). When it was released, X-COM became the reason I invested so much in video gamming. The computer AI was nothing special, but the other little touches like surprise fire from windows and "Fog of War" (to name only a few) overcame the AI's weakness and forced you think about who to put with who and where on every mission. Fire teams, fire teams, fire teams. If you want to live through a mission, deploy in fire teams of no less than two with mixed weapons and always have someone under good cover, ready replace fallen members. If you just can't get out of the 80's and 90's when it comes to video games, and you long for those old, great strategey games, then this one for you.

I can and can't recommend this game. It takes hours of dedication, but once you really get into it you will surely dedicate thousands of hours of your life to it.

You fight about 6 different hostile alien races: the famous Zeta Reticuli race is here (called "Sectoids" in the game); there are reptilian aliens ("Snakemen"); creepy death look-alikes with awesome mental powers ("Ethereals"); and tough jock-types ("Mutons").

You have armored vehicles at your disposal (but--so do the aliens), and even though you start with puny Earth-weapons; as you shoot down, recover, and research alien technology your engineers will be able to build base facilities, aircraft, tanks, weapons, body armor, grenades, EXTREMELY high-explosive missile launchers--and even equipment for MIND CONTROL--based on alien technology.

At the end of each month, you're given a progress report. Nations decide if they should increase your funding, decrease it, leave it the same, or pull out of the alliance all together and try to strike a deal with the alien races.

The ground battles themselves are played in a chess-like state. However, you can only see the areas of the map your troops have explored. Everything else is shrouded black. During the computer's turn, the screen only shows the blinking words "Hidden Movement," unless a soldier spots an alien or is fired upon. The "board" is divided into (I think) 124x124 squares; each one square taking 4 "Time Units" to cross.

Each group of 25(?) squares is given it's own unique attributes such as barnhouses, hills, cropfields, etc., so you'll NEVER--I, in 6 years of playing, have not--come across the exact same map twice. The aliens are also positioned randomly through the map, so check your flanks!

The average soldier starts with 50 TU's. However, shooting takes between 15 & 45 TU's (depending on weapons used & type of shot--aimed, auto, snap etc.). Basically, everything--reloading, throwing stuff, turning your soldier's head--takes TU's. But, as your soldiers see more combat, they can get as many as 81 TU's, which is quite helpful. They also gain health units, stamina, strength, bravery, etc--BUT keeping a soldier from the first mission to the final assault on the main ET base where the alien's collective mind, "the Brain," is kept (in the Cydonia region of Mars) is pretty much impossible. You're fighting a well-trained opponent!

What's more, you battle not only alien occupants of ships you have shot down, but aliens that land in major cities to terrorise the population, alien bases scattered around Earth, and even aliens that locate & attack YOUR base. It's not all fought on farm land in Idaho!

The musical score is a well-crafter combination of military marches and techno-beats; the creepy musical score playing while you fight ground missions is by far the most fitting for such a scenario.

There are a few videos in this game. The two outstanding ones are when you win the game and when you lose. When you win, no indication is given of Earth's future state. Do we acheive peace on Earth? Do we forget all that we've been through & return to our old ways? Unknown. You are shown the Mars base exploding, and your brave soldiers flying back to Earth cheering. Then you are returned to the main menu. Did the designers intend to create such a profound "happy" ending?

The video when you lose is more straight-forward, but still goose-bumpy: Three alien battle-ships hover over the UN building. Inside, the floor is bare of representatives except for a few humans sitting at a table across from two "Ethereals" and a "Sectoid" commander. There is no talking, but the message is chillingly beautiful in it's clarity: most of the world has given in, and it looks like the last fighting nation is following. As the humans & aliens communicate telepathically, several aliens burst through the door, place a plasma rifle to the head of the human leader, and pull the trigger. The "Sectoid" across from him is next seen splattered in the man's blood. Proof that the aliens do not make deals--deals in the sense that we know them--and a taste of what the aliens have always had in store for us: extermination.

This game is no longer in print, apparently because most people saw it as "too intelligent." If you happen to find a copy online...CONSIDER buying it. _I make no promises that you'll like it_. It's called a boring & tedious game by the few critics it has. I consider it an highly challenging work of art; one that shaped my teen years. You won't look at the world the same way after playing this enough hours. I would be another person were it not for the day my best friend John was playing X-Com on Playstation, I looked over, and said "Hey, that game looks kinda cool. What is it?"

I only have the demo and I love it! I am surprised everytime I play it and it's to bad it has been removed from the market as it is the coolest pinball game I have played. You never really play the same game twice. Although the demo has point or time limits it does play over and over but after so many points cuts you off but still worth a try till you get the real thing which is what I am getting ready to do.

and stuff it into your computer. This game is really creepy for those of yall wicked people out there. I am a real pinball fan and I now have the ability to have arcade fun in my own home. So what are you gonna do? Take the arcade into your home!

I have played other pinball games but after awhile they get boring. I play this game for hours and still don't want to quit. The only thing that would make it better for me anyway, would be to find a joystick or gamepad to use with it. I type all day and would love to be able to sit back and play without the keyboard.[...] But with or without it is a great game. shellady

My wife and I love this game. We own an older version of the same, and it is able to IR link with annother to play head to head. However, the geniuses who designed the game ran one of the circuits directly under the pivot for the directional control, thereby DESIGNING it to fail. Ours has worn through the circuit plating, and just bit hard. If they can re-design it, I will buy at least six, so my friends can all play, too.

I loved this game, until it stopped working after about 8 hours of playing with it. It wasn't the batteries! It was the game.

I had to laugh when I read the above editorial review of Tetris because it's as if the reviewer took words from my mouth. I must be one of the few people who didn't know of the game's existence until this past Christmas 2003 when my sister got me this pocket version, and it has seriously consumed hours of my life. For the first few weeks of playing it, I would also see the shapes in my head all the time when I was trying to sleep or work or whatever. It's crazy how this thing can take over.
Anyhow, it's lots of fun, and though I thought I'd never improve, I have gotten much better since those first few days. I seem to have plateaued at this point however.

I'm a newbie to the Type R game series.
Nevertheless, the game itself is very easy to pick up, and more importantly, is very fun to play. The gameplay hearkens back to the early '90's side -scroller space shooters. But this game is fully up-to-date. Colored lighting, support weapons, speed settings, and weapons charging, this game is truly the one of the best space shooters I have ever played.

The nifty things about the game for me are:
-Speed settings. You adjust the speed of your ship on the fly. Proper speed settings are critical to some boss fights.
-101 fighter chassis's to use. You start with 3, but as you fight & advance more chassis's are unlocked.
-Customization of Fighters: Being able to select the missile types, support bit types, and even the color of your fighter is very addictive. Getting stomped by a end level boss? Switch your support bits, or missiles. Or change your ship color to stand out on the screen more.
-AI battles. You setup AI preferences & fighters, and kick off battles. It's cool to see how different fighters fight, and how different tactics work.
-The Bydo Museum: Gameplay history, enemy library, vechile hanger, tutorials. All well implemented & greatly add to the game.

Try the game out. Trust me, you'll be addicted to gameplay very fast. There's nothing like fighting in a pimplike bright purple fighter unleashing hell on your enemies. It truly has to be seen to be fully appreciated.

A challenging game with hundred of ships, several hidden bonus levels, several endings, several levels of difficulty, a new versus mode, great gameplay, excellent graphics, and a decent soundtrack. This one is a worthy sequel to R-Type Delta for the PS1, and it also holds its own against Square's classic Einhander.

R-Type Final goes to show that as gamers we have gotten soft in recent years. My reflexes are slow, my hand-eye coordination is out of alignment, my eyes get sore after forgetting to blink after a couple of hours, and I forgot how much fun you can have actually playing a game.

This game is difficult. If you play Platform games all day long, steer clear. If you're a real gamer, get R-Type Final.

In late 1995, Capcom released Street Fighter Alpha. Surprisingly, the prequel to the Street Fighter II series managed to be the best game in the series to date. And many people say it's hard to improve on perfection. But not long after releasing the original game, Capcom released a follow-up - Street Fighter Alpha II. Read on for my review of this game.

PROS:
-There are some graphical improvements over the first game.
-The game has many characters from the classic Street Fighter II series, such as Ryu and Chun Li.
-Many characters from the original Alpha game also return, including Rose, Adon, and Birdie.
-There are three Final Fight characters in this game as well - Guy, Rolento, and Sodom.
-The three secret characters from the old game are readily available for choosing in this game. They are M. Bison, Dan, and Akuma.
-The game introduces a new character - Sakura.
-There are a number of "hidden" versions of characters, as well as some alternative. "classic Street Fighter II" versions of some characters.

CONS:
-This is the STANDARD version of the game, not the special GOLD edition which is only available on the Playstation as part of the Street Fighter collection. The gold version has some special tweaks that the normal version doesn't including Cammy as a secret character.

OVERALL:
Overall this is a GREAT game. However, I strongly recommend that you get the Street Fighter Collection on the Playstation, so that you can get the Gold version of the game - it's the only truly perfect version of the game out there. But if you're having trouble hunting down the Collection, this would be a good bet.

The original Street Fighter 2 was a massive hit on the SNES. It was quite easily the biggest beat 'em up on the 16-bit consoles. Not only did it sell by the bucket load, but it was also re-released a number of times with gradual improvements. First of all we got a 'turbo' version with a faster play option, then we got another version with some new characters, and so on. It got a bit silly after a while but the SNES owning public continued to shell out for the games so who am I to quibble? Playstation owners haven't had a decent version of Street Fighter 2 yet. The dreadful Street Fighter The Movie game was very quickly forgotten. Darkstalkers turned up recently and proved to be an entertaining variation on the Street Fighter game engine but it wasn't a 'real' Street Fighter game. However, Street Fighter Alpha 2 (what a mouthful!) has finally arrived and looks set to be not only a decent version of Street Fighter 2 but also the ultimate version of Street Fighter 2. All those gradual improvements in the SNES series of Street Fighter 2 can be found in Street Fighter Alpha 2 (SFA2 forthwith in order to prevent me picking up a horrible case of repetitive strain injury.) You want a turbo mode? How about EIGHT variations of turbo mode. You want a decent bunch of characters? How about EIGHTEEN? You want more moves? How about EIGHTY-MILLION? (A slight exaggeration.) SFA2 has just about everything in it that you could ever want to attempt to cram into a Street Fighter game. I have to admit that I've totally lost track of which characters have turned up in the various Street Fighter 2 games. However, I do know that Chun Li, Dhalsim, Ken, M.Bison, Ryu, Sagat, and Zangief have all managed to survive from the original incarnation of the game. They're joined by a whole host of characters which cover just about every sort of individual you could ever hope to find in a beat 'em up. There are small females, massive thugs, rejects from the military, and, of course, an army of blokes in karate get-ups. There's not a lot of point in me slogging through descriptions of all the characters, but let's just say that the variation is great and there has to be at least one character in there that will appeal to you. The inclusion of 18 fighters adds a lot of replay value to the game and puts it ahead of most other beat 'em ups. I defy anyone to find all the moves for all the characters in this game. It's unbelievable. The control system is the usual Street Fighter 2 affair with six buttons used. This allows a variety of 'standard' punches, kicks and throws which can be used to perform a vast range of combos (a series of blows that basically thrashes your opponent into the ground.) There's also the usual special moves including various projectiles, teleports, unfeasible martial arts moves and even choking someone with a chain (not one for the kids!) On top of all these controls there's a 'super combo gauge' at the bottom of the screen. As you perform 'normal' moves, this builds up. Once it's charged you get to perform super combos, custom combos and alpha combos. This is serious beat 'em up territory. Anyone who isn't familiar with the mechanics of Street Fighter 2 will find their minds totally boggled. However, once you get the hang of it you'll find yourself pounding the opposition into the ground. The game compensates for gamers of all skills by including eight difficulty levels and you'll definitely find a long term challenge in learning all the moves and beating the computer on it's harder levels. Of course there's a training mode and the usual two player options. Blimey! This is one massive beat 'em up. SFA2 uses 2D, sprite-based graphics rather than 3D polygon models. This means it loses out when compared to visual tour de forces such as Tekken 2 which use 3D to boggle their players. However, the 2D graphics are nicely done. The animation is fairly fluid (although a few extra frames wouldn't have gone amiss) and the backgrounds are usually very well detailed with plenty of animation. It's a lot better than SNES games, but it's never really going to stand up all that well against top 3D efforts. The vast array of characters and backdrops is very impressive. Variation really helps to spice the game up. For example, one of the levels has a harrier jump jet floating around in the background, while another takes place on a moving elevator. There's a lot more to see than in Capcom's own Star Gladiator but the 2D style prevents the game from looking really 'next generation'. Darkstalkers had ropey music, Star Gladiator had its atmosphere largely spoiled by its wholly inappropriate tunes, and now Capcom have done it again with SFA2. The music is only really average at the best of times and plain annoying in some stages. It might just be that western tastes in music differ from their Japanese contemporaries, but SFA2 really fails to create any atmosphere with the music included with it. This is a shame since you'd have thought that the Playstation's CD medium would have made it very easy to add some new music. The sound-effects are pretty average. The usual grunts and groans are in there along with the bizarre snatches of speech, but the general quality of sound wouldn't be out of place on a SNES. It just seems that Capcom can't get the audio side of their games quite right at the moment. Do we really want another Street Fighter 2 game? One of my first reactions to SFA2 was, 'oh no, not again! Hasn't the world had enough of Street Fighter?' However, after playing the game for a while it becomes apparent that rather than being just another re-hash of an old game, SFA2 is actually one of the best 2D beat 'em ups ever written. It's got loads of options, loads of moves, and will definitely appeal to hardcore beat 'em up fans. However, it does have some problems. The sound is poor, there are quite long loading times to be endured, and the 2D graphics look rather dated. If you're not a die-hard Street Fighter 2 fan then you might be better off checking out Tekken 2.

This game is one of the most greatest and most fun game that was made in the series of street fighter.It has great graphics, it is easy to play but there is one thing that tops all of those things THE GAME ACTUALLY MAKES YOU FEEL THAT YOUR THE FIGHTER.On my recomendations it is number 1.

I have an older set of Tri-Ominos. This is an elaborate version of dominoes, with the pieces being triangular. The triangle shape results in complex configurations and occasional chances to score bonus points by completing hexagons or bridging one section to another. The game is fun and, with each round taking 15 to 40 minutes, the pace is fairly quick. There is some strategy and planning involved, but it's mainly a game of chance. My older version is very sturdy, but the version sold here appears to be different, and I do not know about its durability.

We have the original game and the playing pieces are much more durable. I was very disappointed in the quality of the playing pieces in this addition. I could not give this as a gift as planned.

Like Dominoes?Go triangular and play it with Tri-Ominoes! This fun new shape offers more possibilties than the standard rectangle dominoes. Now we haven't tried lining them up and watching them fall yet, but this is great for learning math skills and matching the numbers in the correct places.Great for the whole family!

I was introduced to Yahtzee through Hoyle Board Games. This version is fun and exciting. It includes five different versious of the game. It works well in single or multiple player mode. The instructions were a little vague for some of the versions, but once you play them for a while you get the gist. The colors are great as well as the action. I recommend this for the whole family. Just remember, unlike the Hoyle Board Games program, you will need the CD in the drive to play all the games, except the classic.

This is a great game that I enjoy very much. Howerever, since it is compatible with only Windows 95 & 98, I have been unable to update my software if I want to keep playing it. I would appreciate it sooooooooooo much if you would acquire an updated version so that I can bring my system into the 21st century! I have tried to install it on a computer with a newer operating system and it does not work. Thanks for a great game. I hope I can continue to play it.

For those who have not played Yahtzee:
The goal is simple a player rolls 5 dice (three consecutive times) to develop a "hand" based on poker rules. For instance, three 6's = 18 points or 1,2,3,4,5 = Full Straight. In each attempt you get to choose which dice to keep or put back in the cup for another roll. The wonderful thing about Yahtzee is that even though it is a game of playing the odds, luck plays an enormous part in this game, thus even a new person can destroy an experienced player with just a little luck.

For those who have played Yahtzee:
You will love this game because it is more than you have ever played before. There is the original game, plus 4 modifications.
Yahtzee - the classic version
Triple Yahtzee - Essentially 3 cards of Yahtzee on one card, with multipliers (1x, 2x, 3x)
Painted Yahtzee - A mix of colors and numbers are used here.
Battle Yahtzee - After your rolls, your opponent gets to roll INTO your dice!!!

This game has been an absolutely wonderful addition to my collection of games (nearly 100 and counting!). My wife and I play it whenever we travel...and sometimes just to be able to sit back and be a little competitive.

The sounds are excellent, the music is not terribly annoying, and the 5 different types of play keep things fresh, so you don't get burnt out too soon.

This is one of the very best values out there, period.