Would You Kindly Pick Up That Shortwave Radio?

Abra Macabra 9 by ~betteo

This past weekend, I suddenly found myself with a plethora of free time, as the Heather Monster was running amok in Mexico and we had a sudden, unexpected snowfall (not a substantial snowfall - this is the Pacific Northwest, after all - but enough of one that nobody, myself included, felt like venturing out of their cozy little abodes.) So I decided that I would do something I'd never gotten around to doing in the past: finally finish BioShock.

(Please note that this entry will not shy away from spoilers, so if you don't want any of the major plot points of BioShock ruined for you, you may want to skip it.  I repeat: only click through to read the rest of this post if you have either finished BioShock already, or you plan never to do so.  Consider yourself warned.)

Alice: Madness Returns

The original American McGee's Alice was, in my opinion, an underrated cult classic, a dark revisionist take on Lewis Carroll's Wonderland novels with phenomenal character design and a grim and clever sense of humour. Although it received a fair amount of criticism for its poor controls, the outdated (though striking) graphics, and the fairly straightforward game structure, it had a kind of indie dark-horse charm to it, featured an absolutely haunting soundtrack by Chris Vrenna (of Nine Inch Nails and Marilyn Manson), a well-thought-out world map, and one of the best weapons rosters of all time, including a Blunderbuss, a Croquet Mallet, and Jacks. I played the hell out of it, and loved every second of it.

It looks like American McGee is at it again with the forthcoming sequel, Alice: Madness Returns, slated for a June 14th, 2011 release, and based on the below gameplay trailer, it looks like a return to form. I couldn't be more excited about this game if I tried. Previously, I'd been a bit wary, as everything McGee's done in the interim has been - to put it kindly - underdeveloped at best, but the video highlights what looks to be a definite improvement in both visuals and controls, and I'm now counting down the days until June 14th.

Of course, I got this unreasonably excited about Epic Mickey too, and look how that turned out.  Oh well.  Fingers crossed!

The GAF Collection

The GAF Collection, Collected has compiled roughly 400 videogame covers created by the members of the NeoGAF forums, done in the style of the Criterion Collection. Like Criterion covers, they're classy, artful, and often very clever.

Below are a few of my favourites, and just a sampling of the hundreds to be found over at TGAFC,C.

Shadow of the Colossus (PS2), Katamari Damacy (PS2)

Two of my favourite games for the PlayStation 2. In both games, you control a positively tiny protagonist and the overall theme is one of largeness. Each of these covers emphasises this by offsetting your character against a backdrop of a massive Colossus\Katamari of which only a portion is shown. Both Colossus and Katamari seem overwhelming to the point of being nearly insurmountable.

201 Mega Men: A Sampling

~captainslam has created a massive compilation of 201 videogame protagonists done up in the style of MegaMan, and it's a thing of beauty to behold. Above you'll find a few of my personal favorites, which is only a tiny sampling of the overall piece. Lookit that little PipBoy!  Adorable.  And DEADLY.  Radiation deadly!

Click on the image to be taken to the full-sized (6948x4032) images.

One-Line Wonders: Ah! MADNESS.

Oh, right -- I have a blog. Huh. Forgot about that.

Actually, no I didn't. I just haven't had time over the last few months to keep it updated as regularly as I'd like, despite my best intentions. I could go into all the extremely boring real-life, grown-up things that have been taking my attention away from Apocalypse POW!, but you'd find them extremely boring. So instead, let's focus on a topic that is relevant to everyone's interests: the games I've been playing, instead of updating here. That's right, it's time for another installment of One-Line Wonders.

Transformers: War For Cybertron (PC, Wii, PS3, 360, DS)

Graphics: 7/10
Sound: 8/10
Gameplay: 7.5/10
Design: 7/10
Semi Truck Trailers Vanishing Post-Transformation: 0
Peter Cullens: 1

If the whole point of Transformers is that they're robots IN DISGUISE, TF:WFC seriously drops the energon ball -- despite some fairly solid squad-based gameplay, I'm not really that interested in Bumblebee and Ratchet transforming into Cybertron-style vehicles and zipping along overwrought, Michael-Bay-ish purple Cyber-avenues.

Optimus, pre-Prime. So young and fancy-free.

Dragon Quest IX: Sentinels of the Starry Skies (DS)

Graphics: 8/10
Sound: 6.5/10
Gameplay: 5/10
Design: 7/10
Monsters Fought To Reach Level 25: Roughly Five Billion
Interest In Alchemising New Items: 1.75/10

I'm apparently the sole dissenter on this, but DQIX fails where DQVIII succeeded: instead of offering a compelling, consistent storyline with well-designed NPCs and teammates, it seems to have been designed with the MMO crowd in mind and is far too open-ended and arbitrary, from its multi-player structure to its all-too-frequent non-random monster encounters to its spawned dungeon (or 'grotto') architectures.

Seasaurs: Not Metal Slime Kings.

Dragon Quest Heroes: Rocket Slime (DS)

Graphics: 6/10
Sound: 6/10
Gameplay: 8.5/10
Design: 8.5/10
Objects That Can Be Fired At The Enemy During Tank Battles: Catnip, Chili Peppers, Yourself
Other RPGs Spoofed: Chrono Trigger, Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles, Harvest Moon

Another entry in the Dragon Quest franchise, this one is incredibly fun, humorous, and full of series in-jokes that only a die-hard fan will get (you play a BLUE SLIME, for chrissake; you encounter tanks (TANKS!) based on familiar monsters from the DQ canon; you even rescue Morrie from DQVIII (in slime form, of course) which allows you access to the Tank Masters tournament) and, while aimed at a slightly younger crowd, is a worthy addition to the Dragon Quest universe.

Yes, that tank is a giant Slime. Yes, that's awesome.

Space Invaders Extreme (DS)

Graphics: 9/10
Sound: 8.5/10
Gameplay: 8.5/10
Design: 8/10
Epileptic Attacks Per Second: 2.25
Idea Of What Is Going On Here: None

I picked this game up with a certain amount of jaded cynicism -- I mean, Space Invaders? Really? -- but then I played it for five seconds and my mind was literally blown.

SERIOUSLY WHAT THE EFF IS GOING ON

Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor (DS)

Graphics: 7.5/10
Sound: 6/10
Gameplay: 7.5/10
Design: 7/10
Hipsters and/or Cultists Populating Tokyo: 8,000,000
Number of Games in the Shin Megami Tensei Series I Have Not Played: 23

Like one of my all-time favourite DS games, The World Ends With You, SMT:DS is an unconventional RPG in a contemporary urban setting... But unlike TWEWY, the squad-based combat and "Devil Auction" gets dull in a hurry, and it's fallen out of rotation for me.

Yeah, WENDIGO. We don't like your kind around here.

Singularity (PC, PS3, 360)

Graphics: 8.5/10
Sound: 8.5/10
Gameplay: 8/10
Design: 7.5/10
Timelines Altered: 1 (so far, but it was a doozy)
Freaky Ghost Children Encountered: One Too Many

For every original concept in the FPS genre, there are ten run-of-the-mill entries, but thankfully Singularity is not one of them: the time-shift between 2010 and 1955 concept is artfully executed, and the whole Soviet-environment-with-horrible-monsters thing works surprisingly well.

If Bioshock was inspired by Lenin rather than Rand, and did away with that whole "underwater" gimmick.

3D Dot Game Heroes

3D Dot Game Heroes, from From Software (presumably the software development branch of the Department of Redundancies Department) and Atlus, tickles my novelty bone SO HARD. I'm adding it to my list of reasons to finally buy a PS3 (along with Little Big Planet, Batman: Arkham Asylum, Katamari Forever and the upcoming Final Fantasy XIII) and I DON'T EVEN CARE that it's a complete crib of The Legend of Zelda. You could rip off worse games.

I don't know much about Atlus (although I have their Knights in the Nightmare for my DS, which I hear great things about but have yet to play) and even less about From Software. I firmly believe that they, on the other hand, somehow know ME, because 3D Dot Game Heroes is tailor-made to cater precisely to my videogame demands. If I was ever approached by a game company and asked to make a list of all the things a game would have to include to ensure that I would buy it, 3D Dot Game Heroes would go ten for ten.

That said, I'd be remiss in my responsibilities as videogame blogger if I didn't return to the point mentioned above, namely that 3D Dot Game Heroes is, at heart, an unauthorised clone of The Legend of Zelda. It may be all gussied up in self-aware, ironic new clothes, but the gameplay looks to be pretty much identical to the classic NES title. Personally, I couldn't care less, but others (namely, Nintendo) may have a different take on it.

Gallery and an in-game video clip under the cut.