Hydrophobia, I Just Love Water!

I hate the concept of drowning. It's terrible. It's awful. It's a morbid demise. My teeth clench, skin slithers, and every moment spent around water as it fills an entire room to the brim are agonizing. My hand shakes. My breath shortens. I can feel my lungs collapse. Oh how I hate drowning…. Is what the main character must be thinking! (Did you like that?)

Hydrophobia is a game centered on a sinking ship named Titanic, and the protagonists Jack and Rose.... No wait. Oh my goodness, no! The ship's name is Queen of the World, and the protagonists are Kate and Scoot. How silly of me, but oddly enough they hail from the same United Kingdom as the Titanic (coincidence?). The first game for Dark Energy Digital, and available for XBLA, PSN, and PC.

The premise is that the world has gone to Hell, and the ocean has engulfed all known land mass, forcing people to live on boats. The Queen of the World is a city-sized ship refuging thousands of citizens from Mother Nature (score one more for humanity!) so people can continue to toil in their daily lives. At least until terrorist who call themselves the Malthusians attempt to hijack said boat and begin to slaughter everyone. They proclaim: in order to save the world some people must die so others may live, hence their motto, "Save the World, Kill Yourself".

Kate works as an engineer, and Scoot is her boss. One day she receives a call from Scoot saying there is a malfunction on the lower decks. Innocently skipping all the way there, she checks on the situation… and that’s when shit escalates! Malthusians! Lots of them! EXPLOSION! “Scoot! What’s happening?” “I don’t know! I just work here!” EXPLOSION! “Water everywhere? How could this happen?” “Do I look like Miss Cleo?!” “Let it go Scoot! Miss Cleo wasn’t psychic!” Well, something like that. Kate is thrust into a situation where in order to survive she must halt the hijacking. Scoot plays the part of control center and assists Kate via radio. Together they reluctantly uncover the Malthusians’ plot, and attempt to thwart them.

Game play is cover based third person shooter type of deal with a heap of platforming. One weapon is used throughout the campaign with a variety of ammo pick-ups, five in all: sonic, gel, semi auto, energy, and rapid fire rounds- look for them in specially marked cereals!- and a  cool compact hacking mechanism called a MAVI that can decrypt encoded systems, or hack far away consoles. The game starts you bare (No, not like that you sickos! Bare as in no weapons, and no MAVI!), and pick-ups are introduced as Kate progresses. The hacking mechanism becomes more elaborate with distorted frequencies, or encryption keys hidden in wall panels only the MAVI can detect, and near the end of the game Kate is trying to hack doors underwater!

Combat is diversified by having Kate fighting underwater, or shooting panels off the walls to surge baddies with water, or shooting combustibles to burn baddies, or shooting electrical systems to fry baddies (would you like your baddie braised, barbequed, or smoked?). The five ammo pick-ups work well, and can even be chained to cause major damage. I ran through the game using only the initial Sonic Rounds, totally missing the point of the four other ammo types, but that’s why developers must hate me so much! I got lost many a time trying to run through a corridor to avoid being drowned, but it would always happen. Then I’d have to sit through Scoot yelling, “NOOOOOOOOOO!” in his terrible voice, and repeat the process.

The acting isn’t all too great (especially Scoot, sorry!), and was pretty short (only three acts with three chapters), and I didn’t experience the “mastery of water” (some magic mumbo jumbo where Kate can manipulate water), and the ending was sad (not as in teary-eyed, but pitiful), the overall game was surprisingly an okay experience. Although the game boasted its Hydroengine superiority of water mechanics, I failed to see what was so awesome about the flowing water, or the ripples it made. It did, however, piss me the hell off every time I broke a panel to flood an area so I could get the achievement to knock three baddies with water, and the water would only lightly dampen the baddies, but would knock my character off her ass instead! (Deep breaths… remember your Karma.) B. Not a C. No, that would dissatisfy all those who worked hard on this title, and are still working to perfect it! So if ya’ll would excuse me… I need to see a therapist, because I have a phobia… of spiders.

Crimson Alliance Review: Get Your Swords Sharpened

Crimson Alliance is a top view dungeon crawler RPG made by Certain Affinity. Yes, Certain Affinity, the same people that made the Halo: Reach Defiant Map Pack and the Xbox Live arcade game Age of Booty. You may have gotten Crimson Alliance for free if you got all the Summer of Arcade Titles. If not, you can pick up one character for 800 points ($10) or buy all classes for 1200 points ($15). Either way, this is a fun experience for you and your friends.

The simplicity lets any type of gamer jump in, but has the depth for veterans of the genre. It has simple controls for all three of characters: X is a standard attack, Y is a Stun Attack, B is a Defensive strike, and A is a Dash move. Even though it sounds simple, the controls can get tricky to master.

Co-op is a big deal in Crimson Alliance. The four-player co-op, either on the same system or over Xbox Live, allows you to always have someone to play with. There are some secret passages that require more than one person to get past and some doors that only open to a certain class, but the game can be completed in single player. You will want one of each class playing just so you don’t miss out on any secrets.

Sharing is caring in this game. You don’t have to fight your teammates for gold. Any gold one player picks up, everyone gets. The gold is important to upgrade your character. You don’t level up or get stronger in this game. It’s all about the weapons. You buy new weapons and clothing to make your moves stronger and give yourself more health. Some weapons have added abilities like lighting strikes or extra damage to certain enemies.

Crimson Alliance isn’t perfect for all. It does have some issues that are hard to overlook: camera is way too far out, all characters must stay in the same area, it’s hard to target enemies with ranged attacks, and without a real level up system, it is hard to feel the progression of your character. But, as a gamer who doesn’t play many dungeon crawlers, I do feel this game had what I was looking for in a social environment. I was playing with friends and it wasn’t so easy I felt like I was playing a child’s game.

Also, there is a new level that will bring new missions that are perfect for co-op. It will add new loot, new enemies, and new challenges.  It is coming out October 12th for only 240 points ($3).

Trenched Review

Trenched is just the game XBLA needs. With very few tower defense games on the service, Microsoft grabbed themselves an exclusive on Tim Scafer’s latest title. As anyone would expect from a game in this genre, you will get to fight the enemy in waves as they try harder and harder to get through the defenses you have built. The game has a few twists on the classic tower defense concept and presents a solid experience that any tower defense fan would enjoy.

Trenched doesn’t work quite like every other game in its category. Instead of building defenses from a top down view, you get to join the fight alongside your turrets to play a more direct role in your victory. You control a mech called a Trench and pack copious amounts of guns and ammo allowing you to blast the enemy away 3rd person shooter style. Unfortunately, because you’re on the ground at all times, setting up your defenses isn’t quite as easy as top down versions of the genre. Every emplacement and upgrade requires you to run to the desired location to deploy. You won’t find any streamlined management of your defenses here.

However, being on the ground does have some advantages. Your Trench is fully upgradable with a healthy selection of weapons and emplacements you can choose before every mission. Any enemy you kill earns you XP and helps you gain levels. This unlocks new equipment and makes certain enemies easier to deal with. The end of every mission awards you with a nice wad of cash to be spent on all those fancy weapons you just unlocked. You can even eventually upgrade your Trench’s legs to make running all over the battle field a little less inconvenient. With the benefit of XP grinding, you can replay old levels to gain more money and experience to make later levels a little easier.

Trenched doesn’t have much of a story to tell. An evil scientist of some sort wants to destroy the U.S. army so he can use his advanced radio creatures to broadcast his message of… evil. This isn’t too much of a disadvantage because this kind of game doesn’t really need much more than that. The gameplay is where it counts.

Defend structures. Get money. Buy weapons. Defend more structures. This formula is fun but does get slightly repetitive. New enemies and defenses are constantly being introduced to prevent all the levels from blending together, but it only goes so far before you feel like doing something else. Luckily, Trenched doesn’t exploit this flaw. As soon as you’re done with it, it’s done with you. Not too long and plenty of fun, but you can’t help but think you should have gotten a little more for $15.

Out of all three of Schafer’s recent downloadable games (Costume Quest, Stacking, Trenched) this is probably my least favorite. However, it is still very entertaining and I enjoyed every minute I played. It even reminds me of how the brutal legend RTS sequences should have been (another game genre typically played top down, but retooled in a 3rd person view). If you had trouble with those levels, don’t worry, the 3rd person angle is a much better fit for tower defense. If you’re a fan of the genre and want to play something new but familiar, buy it. If not, you can survive waiting until it falls in price a little.