Archive for March, 2008

Guitar Hero 3 Allows You to Drink and Fight on St. Patty’s Day Monday, March 10th, 2008

Recent word from Activision is that a FREE 3 pack of songs is coming for St. Patrick’s day to get the Guiness and haggis flowing in your veins. Celtic rockers Dropkick Murphys are making their GH debut with a strong showing including “Famous for Nothing,” “(F)lannigan’s Ball,” and “Johnny, I Hardly Knew Ya.”

Grab your shamrocks and drink your green beer, delicious green beer.

Lemon Drop: Boom Boom Rocket for XBL Arcade Friday, March 7th, 2008

Boom Boom Rocket
Like DDR? Hate getting off your lazy ass to move your feet around the living room? Have we got a game for you!

Presenting Boom Boom Rocket for the Xbox Live Arcade. Now I know what you’re thinking: “Zig,” (it’s okay, you can call me Zig), “you’re into sports and shooters and stuff. What’s with a rhythm game all of a sudden?” Well, my fellow gamers, sometimes I like to rock to the beat like anyone else, and when I’m too poor to buy Guitar Hero, I go for the tiny doses of awesomeness that is Boom Boom Rocket.

For the measly price of 800 Microsoft Points (which I think works out to be around 16 trillion Yen), you can start exploding fireworks to techno-tastic updates of some classical music faves. All these flashing lights and bright colors are sure to make you feel more cheerful after a long day at work. And if not, just pretend that instead of fireworks, you’re exploding some annoying customer’s head. Works like a charm. Of course, you could always just go sit at a bar and drown your sorrows in a pint or four, but again, we’re going for cheap and not much movement here, so indulge me.

As the headline up there implies, this is a Dance-Dance-Revolution style mini-game without the deformed power pad. Instead of shakin’ your groove thing on the dance floor, you simply press the A, B, X, or Y buttons in time with the similarly colored arrows (or letters, if you choose) on the screen as they approach the boom line. Then sit back and be amazed at all the pretty colors.

Don’t get too relaxed, though. This game has some challenge. The accuracy rating is a bit unforgiving - you really have to nail the button-press just right to get a perfect - but the score multipliers you get for racking up streaks definitely feed your competitive side. With online leaderboards and wonderful achievements like the Johnny Three-Fingers award, there’s plenty to keep you busy in this game. If your poor little fingers get tired, you can put the game in Visualization mode and watch as it explodes fireworks for you in time to your favorite blowing-shit-up music (My choice? Any variation of the Halo theme. Feel free to experiment, though).

There’s even split screen multiplayer, only when the developers were creating that part, they must’ve forgotten that split-screen game types usually have some sort of delineation between one side of the screen and the other. It’s quite easy to get confused as to whose firework is going where and mess up the timing a bit, but it’s easy enough to take in stride since it’s really a simple game overall.

In short, if you’re a music fan, a firework fan, or a lazy DDR fan (and hopefully not epileptic), you’re sure to get a kick out of this game.

Grade: 8.8

Boo Freakin’ Hoo Thursday, March 6th, 2008

So it seems as though the folks at Spark aren’t too fond of the lackluster reviews of Turning Point: Fall of Liberty. Actually, according to them, we all just don’t “get it,” as they point out in this little slice of heaven.

Here’s a thought from one of us media types who doesn’t “get it”: next time try making a game that doesn’t suck. Nobody wants to pay $60 for your “concept piece.”

Farewell, Good Sir Knight Tuesday, March 4th, 2008

News is coming down that Gary Gygax, co-creator of D&D, has died. The announcement was made on the Troll Lord Games Forums earlier today. Many blessings upon you Gary, may you cross over into the realm where all dice are 20-sided.

The Whiny Ones Always Get Their Way Tuesday, March 4th, 2008

If you’ve been keeping up with the Jones’ lately you’ve likely heard of the kid whose Xbox 360 got scrubbed. Well, now word is coming that Bungie has something special for the affronted gamer. Here’s hoping it’s a donkey punch from Master Chief himself for being such an uber-dork.

Do You Like Free Stuff? Saturday, March 1st, 2008

Our friends over at The Game Reviews are giving away a free copy of Turok for the Xbox 360, and all you have to do is win the caption contest. I know, we kind of thought it was kind of a crap game, but things like this are more fun when they’re free! Haven’t you seen the eBay “It’s better when you win it” commercials? eBay Wouldn’t lie to you would they? Anyway, head on over and prove that Game Lemon readers are the funniest folks out there. I’ve been bragging about you guys, so don’t make a liar out of me.