The App-sideration bonanza - featuring a play about hills.

After another unwarranted pay rise at the taxpayer’s expense. (Thanks ladies and gents of the North, keep reaching for that rainbow.)  I decided to invest in an “I Telephone Device” as I had heard that they can do all sorts of wonderful things. It turns out what they can actually do is sell you ropey flash games for 69p each. You might not think 69p is a lot of money but if you saved up all the 69p’s you would eventually have enough pennies to fill a sack with that you could use to someone over the head.

Of course not everyone owns a sack so here are my reviews so far.

Street Fighter IV:
Imagine if Street Fighter looked like Killer Instinct and you could only control it by hitting the joy pad with a broom. This is the experience of playing Street Fighter on the Iphone only instead of a broom you are using fingers and the touch screen doesn’t work properly. (Unless you have broom fingers)

Overall I give it a Mark of Dignity but not necessarily one that would scar thy DNA.

Cut the Rope

This game involves “cutting ropes” however it also involves rubbish bits where you have to razz a balloon. Notice how this game isn’t called “Razz the balloon” because the bits where you have to do that are irritating and no one would buy it. Personally I think it should have been called “F33d t2e Monst3R” because then Vin Diesel could have played the monster and instead of eating sweets he would have stolen a car full of sweets. Then the trailer would have been the rock saying “Don’t let them get near a car full of sweets” even though that’s exactly what had happened. Maybe people should pay more attention to what the rock says or they could end up like the man from the end of the Scorpion King. (Wrestled to death by a man wearing a loin cloth)

Overall this game gets a People’s Elbow out of rope.
 

Tiny Wings

Tiny Wings is a game about causing a bird to fly by throwing it down hills. My brother once threw a dog down some stairs but I don’t know if he intended it to fly. Either way this game is irresponsible both in it’s depiction of birds and how it implies that all hills are curvy. I for one have seen many jagged hills and this problem is not addressed in the game. That is why I have put together a small play about the dangers of hills.

The Hilling Joke

Scene 1: Matthew is sitting at a desk

Matthew: Sometimes I feel like nobody understands me, everyone tells me what to do…

Teacher: Get that work done boy or it’s a bleak tomorrow.

Parent: You’ll never amount to anything if you don’t put your ear to the grinder.

Friend: Everybody else is doing it; you don’t want to be Johnny Bagshaw.

Matthew: But all I really care about is…hills. I think about them all the time, sometimes I worry that it’s not natural. Barry Burns says that thinking about Hills turns you gay. But I just love them so much.

A knock at the door. Matthew gets up to answer it.

Matthew: Who are you!?

Stranger: I’m Richard Hill-man and I’m here to tell you the facts about hills!

Matthew: Mister, I’m worried that I’m spending too much time thinking about hills, do you think I’m abnormal?

Richard Hill-man: Of course not Matthew, it’s just a natural part of growing up. You’ll probably grow out of it eventually just remember to stay safe in the mean time.

Matthew: Safe? But Hills aren’t dangerous are they mister?

Richard Hill-Man: For the most part Hills are harmless but theirs always a bad apple waiting to spoil everybody’s hill related fun. Why any hill could have spikes at the bottom or even a troll living in it. Then the hills really would have eyes.

Matthew: Gosh Mister! I don’t think I could stand to go near a hill again what with all the risks involved.

Richard Hill-Man: Wo! Don’t be so hasty. We can all enjoy hills so long as we remember the seven steps of safe hill enjoyment.

1. ALWAYS wear stout hill boots or Gum shoes accredited by the National Hill Association. You can check what brands are endorsed by the NHA at NHA.com or just check the box for the golden hill of quality.

2. Ideally you should always visit a hill with a friend but if your friends have no interest in hills you should at least let someone know which hill you are visiting in case you get in trouble.

3. NEVER attempt to tumble down a hill.

4. NEVER get into the car of a stranger who offers to take you to see a new hill.

5. NEVER attempt to take a sample of the hill home with you. We all enjoy hills but if everyone tried to take the hills home with them there wouldn’t be any hills left to enjoy. Even worse a hill kept in captivity can easily turn evil out of boredom.

6. ALWAYS remember to bring your anti-troll dousing rod with you. It is rare that a hill will be inhabited by a troll in this day and age but you can never be too careful. A good dousing rod will cost you under £20 and you can’t put a price on safety.

7. NEVER point a hill at another person or animal.

Matthew: Wowsers, thanks Mister. Now I feel clued up on hills.

Richard Hill-Man: That’s right Matthew. Hills are cool but Hill safety is even cooler.

Matthew: Radical!


Fin

For these reasons I’m giving Tiny Wings a Hill out of Hillary Banks.



Cut Him Up!

I thought this might be a sequel to Cut the Rope. Actually I didn’t think that at all I just said it as a hilarious joke. Imagine my disappointment when it turned out to be a prequel to Cut the Rope! The main differences between this and Cut the Rope is that instead of cutting the rope it is a scrolling beat-em-up with madworld type graphics. i.e all in black and white except the blood. Does this make the game look more stylish or does it make the game look like the man that made it couldn’t be bothered to do any colouring in? It’s a pretty rubbish game so I would say it’s the second thing, Not only did I manage to finish this game in an afternoon I also managed to make my man walk up a wall and witness that there were only  three different enemies. The only thing getting cut up in this game is my wallet and maybe the man that made it because I am going to find him and cut him up to get my 69p back. (presuming that he swallows all the money he earns.)

This game is more Up! Than Cut up classic so its only getting 7 surgeons out of a last boss who looks a bit like Bane.


Streets of Rage

Streets of Rage 2 is the best streets of Rage but it also costs £2 (£1.99) whereas the original is a paltry 69p. If only I had remembered that the original is awful I would probably retain that 69p alas it has been wasted on a game where Blaze wears a coat and moving with any precision is impossible. Even Cut Him Up! Had better controls than this and as previously established that game was utter bobbins. Even the music on the original Streets of Rage is annoying. The whole experience made me want to cry.

For these reasons I’m giving Streets of Rage a Skate out of Adam.


Robot Unicorn Attack

Already an internet meme but no less excellent for it. Keep chasing those dreams Mr Unicorn.

(In the interests of fairness I should mention that I have always had a soft spot for Unicorns as I too have a mysterious horn sticking out of my forehead. The doctor identified it as “Mysterious mass of bone.” Thanks medical science!)

10/10


Hunters ep.1

Essentially Space Crusade for the iPhone. Stupidly addictive and when you kill people they make a satisfying “graak” noise. May or may not be related to Hunter: the Reckoning.

I give it a hunt out of hunt.

I have been playing Warriors Orochi

Oda Nobugana appears to be a sort of Japanese version of Rasputin. That is to say an actual bearded historical figure who is constantly defamed in popular media by being cast as a villain and /or the actual devil.  I say “appears to be” because my entire knowledge of east-asian history comes from scan reading a copy of  “Orientialism”  for a book review eight years ago.

Most of that book review was just this hilarious joke anyway
Man 1:“Edward Said”
Man 2:  “What did he say”
Man 1: “No Edward Said!”
Man 2: “ I know he said something but WHAT did he say?”
Man 1: “Why I oughta, you’re richer than the Coney Island special and that’s twice I’ve said that!”
Man 2: “That’s easy for you to say wise guy!”
Man 1: “Yaeh but whatta it mean to me?”
Man 2: “Whatta-ever you want! Homana homana homana!”
Man 1: “So James Watt”
Man 2: “I don’t know what and don’t call me James!”

The point is that I got a 2:1 for that review despite only looking at the pictures in the book, the other point is that I have spent the week playing Warriors Orochi  as Nobunaga. From this I learned that Nobunaga likes hitting men with a giant glowing sword and also that I’m glad the tuition at Sheffield University is so Eurocentric because all people in the east ever did was hit men with swords over and over again. He also liked to say “Its just that simple” but try asking him what he meant and you were likely to find yourself hit with his sword, just another number in the calculator of history!

It wouldn’t be so bad if when you hit the men they made a satisfying noise like “grghh” or “arghh” but all that happens is you kind of wave your weapons at them until they fall over like a fly slowly succumbing to the effects of Raid. Devil Kings is much better because at least you have more than three attacks but then fans of Asian history are probably going to go for Warriors Orochi because it has all the official names whereas in Devil Kings Nobunaga is just called “Devil King”  and Nobunaga’s cousin is called “Eyepatch man”.  This is a bit like how EA have all the proper teams in Fifa kicking wheras Konami have to have “Brian Priggs” and “Wazza”. Maybe they should team up with Koei and have Nobunaga as team captain? He would certainly “score” (hit) “some goals” (some men)! Then he would go to the restaurant called Nobu and kill everyone there so he could change the name to Nobu – Nobunaga edition.

Overall I award Warriors Orochi a Nobunaga’s Ambition out of fatal Fury: Wild Ambition.

I have been playing Ghost Rider.

I have no recollection of buying Ghost Rider for the PS2. This is definitely for the best because it means that it probably didn’t cost very much and it also means that I have blanked out any abuse that might have been directed at me by the staff when I bought it.  It’s a terrible game so at the very least I would have expected them to say “Here’s your game Chain-boy agnew” or “Don’t bring this back and pretend it’s broken, we have many copies GARGOYLE FACE.” If I could remember where I had bought it from I would fling the disc at high speed into the faces of those staff members. Sadly I am stuck with it and the memories of killing a thousand gargoyles with a chain.

If you really hate Gargoyles you will probably like this game because you get to kill so many of them or you might dislike it because of the appearance of gargoyles at all. It all depends on how tolerant you are of gargoyles. It’s not all Gargoyle slaying though! It’s actually only 95% gargoyle slaying because you also fight clowns, zombies with poles and a genetically altered shark monster.
There are also motorbike sections where you have to avoid big gaps in the road while whipping gargoyles riding garg-bikes. These sections are a little big like Road Rash but instead of being on the megadrive they feature gargoyles.

You might think that with all this gargoyle talk the last boss would be a giant gargoyle. (And it is) Like all giant bosses the gargoyle will stand next to a small platform and then try to slowly smash you with his hands. By dodging out of the way at the last minute you will be able to punch him on the hand. I am fed up of punching things in the hands on games, especially as if you were hurt by a small thing in real life i.e a wasp you would quickly withdraw your hand – not leave it there for a long time and you certainly wouldn’t put your face near the wasp.

Despite all this Ghostrider is strangely satisfying because it’s like playing Devil May Cry but instead of it being hard its very easy, also instead of cutscenes there is an amazing drawing of the caretaker from the film. Whenever you purchase an upgrade he says “Enjoy” in a cowboy voice and then you think that they probably couldn’t afford to pay anyone else from the film to be in it because there isn’t even a picture of Nicholas Cage. His face is literally ‘off’ the game eh readers!?? It also features a bit where you chase a vampire riding a big Jet Ski (he is riding the Jet Ski, you are riding your bike which has the power of driving on rivers.)  The vampire also has a bit of a gargoyle face, but this game has you seeing gargoyles where there aren’t any.

Other good features of the game include
- A special resident evil style lab where sharks are made into shark-men. Witness the horror of a shark strapped to a table!
- The special attack where Ghost Rider screeches “Look into my eyes” (Yes fans I know this is his Penance Stare)
- A graveyard where zombies wink into existence with a flash of orange light.
- Unicycles
- Gargoyles
- Unlock classic Ghost Rider comics including rise of the midnight sons which haven’t been put out as a trade paperback yet because Marvel hates Morbius. Where is my Morbius collection marvel!?
- Be unable to read the comics due to it being on a television.

Overall I would give Ghost rider a well deserved “own this curse” out of gargoyle.

I have been playing Assasin's Creed II

Uncle  Bisoft had an idea for a game where you had to punch a super Pope in the face until he dropped his pope-stick. The name of this game would be “Dynamic man Pontiff Puncher” and it was conceived as a spiritual sequel to Monkey Puncher only instead of Monkey’s it featured Super Popes. Studio heads liked the idea but the game soon found itself in development hell. (It was sent there by the Pope because punching popes in the face is blasphemous.) Dynamic Man Pontiff Puncher will probably never be released. Assassins’ Creed II was released ages ago and has a sequel, proof that Super Popes do indeed move in mysterious ways.

I’ve probably given the impression that Assassin’s Creed II is mostly about slapping around religious leaders, in reality this makes up at most 5% of the game. You spend the rest of the game wandering around Romeo and Juliet times wondering why anyone thought that adding an open world to Prince of Persia and then filling it with conspiracy theories would be a good idea. Uncle Bisoft says it’s because people don’t really like Italians so it’s easier to sympathise with the main character if he is actually the memories of a man called Desmond. He also says people don’t really like the olden days so it’s better to put in futuristic things like computers, Stargate style god-aliens and Danny Wallace. Perhaps the biggest conspiracy of all is how Danny Wallace manages to have a career because my DW career chart makes no sense.

The real question is “Why don’t any of my friends write a book about betting me they can find lots of people with the same name as them so that I can become successful and appear in Ubisoft games with the electric woman from Heroes?”  I asked Uncle Bisoft about this and he says that it’s because my friends all have unusual names. This is a lie as we both know I have no friends.

Wallace aside it’s important to note that Assassin’s Creed II would probably have been better if they just actually set it in Italy and the plot was that you had to solve a political conspiracy that doesn’t involve magic apples. Most game plots are stupid but very rarely does a game work so hard do bury a fairly original setting under nonsense. I suggested to Uncle Bisoft that he had shot himself in the foot because eventually they would have to finish the story off with an Assassin’s Creed game set in Desmond times which nobody would buy. He shrugged his shoulders and said that if they can make people think Ezio was a likeable character then they can probably make anyone buy anything.

List of likeable attributes about Ezio

* Punches figureheads of major religions.
* Sleeps with prostitutes.
* Hugs people and then stabs them in the stomach with secret knife.
* Didn’t hug Leonardo Da’Vinci when he put his arms out for a cuddle. (Because it was a cut QTE during a cut scene and I had put the pad down to drink some apple juice.)
* Belongs to a secret order that influence events by killing heads of state.
* Runs along people’s rooftops destroying their hard earned masonry.

Likeable main character aside Assassin’s Creed II has problems, the main problem is that all the missions are boring and a lot of them involve following people very slowly so that you can fail to assassinate them until a later mission. They also involve giving you weapons and abilities that you never need to use because all you have to do is keep pressing X until you stab everyone. I took the opportunity to ask Uncle Bisoft how having a giant metal gauntlet with a knife that pops out on a spring is any different to just owning a knife and keeping it in your pocket – he declined to answer.

Overall I award Assasin’s Creed II a lowly Desmond Miles out of a Miles Prowler.