With Street Fighter IV & King of Fighters XII rejuvenating the fighting genre, it was time for the Tekken series to step into the ring and show other fighting games how it’s done.  With the largest character roster in Tekken history, HD graphics, and competitive online modes, is Tekken 6 the best fighting game our current generation of consoles has to offer?

When you first fire up Tekken 6, one of the first things you’ll notice is the huge list of playable characters.  Unlike most fighting games, Tekken 6 wants players to get into the action as quickly and as painlessly as possible.  There are no boxes with question marks in them that require players to spend hours upon hours to unlock.  The complete 40 character roster is playable from the get-go.

Tekken 6 is split into 3 main game modes: Scenario, Online Modes, and Offline Modes.  Online Mode allows you to play others in either Ranked or Player Match modes.  Online play was surprisingly very quick, although every so often, a laggy game would pop up.  Offline Mode comprises of the traditional Arcade Mode, VS Mode, Ghost Mode, and Training.  Each character has their own distinct fighting style and unique moves.  The action is fast and very rewarding.  Tekken veterans will appreciate a deep, fighting experience, while newcomers will still be able to button-mash their way to victory (while pissing off veteran players in the process).

Scenario Mode attempts to put a story behind all of the fighting goodness that’s the main focus of Tekken, but it fails miserably.  One positive from the scenario mode is the opening cinematic, which reminds us what the overall story was for the previous Tekken titles.  The Tekken 6 scenario has poor voice acting, poor combat, and a hard to follow story.  Also, for some reason during cut-scenes, everyone can speak in their native language and yet completely understand one another.  I applaud Namco-Bandai for attempting to offer something more than just a fighting game, but I wish they would have delivered as much quality in the Scenario Mode as they did the one-on-one fighting modes.

The amount of character customization offered in Tekken 6 is incredible.  Players unfortunately can’t create their own fighters, but they can customize the aesthetics of all of the characters.  Items for characters are unlocked by the amount of gold players accumulate across all of the game modes in Tekken 6.  My one complaint is the amount of gold each item costs.  I would like to customize my characters, but in order to get a new hair-do, I need to shell out 1,000,000 gold.

Tekken 6 is a definite feast for the eyes.  All of the characters animations are smooth and highly detailed.  Every kick, punch, and throw has an equivalent reaction from both characters.  If you thought the facial animations were good in SFIV, then you’re going to love some of the reactions from the Tekken 6 characters.  Stages also offer a good amount of variety in fighting locations.  Some even have destructible environments that will allow players to crash their way into another part of the level to complete the battle.

FINAL THOUGHT: Tekken 6, without a doubt, is the best Tekken game yet.  It does so much right, but the Scenario Mode is one of the few wrongs on the disc.  If you’ve ever enjoyed any Tekken game, then you owe it to yourself to play the best version of the series to date.

8.0/10

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We as humans have always had a fascination with the undead.  The undead have been discussed in books, danced in music videos, and murdered in video games on a regular basis.  In Tecmo’s Undead Knights, the undead take center stage.  This time, one of the main focuses is to create undead minions from sacrificing your enemies during battle.  Can raising the undead to fight for you really be that fun?

Undead Knights has you playing as one of the three members of the Blood family.  The Blood family were murdered for speaking ill of the king’s new wife, but were brought back from the grave and given the power to create their own undead minions.  The Blood family seeks revenge on the king and thus that’s how our story begins.

Missions don’t offer a wide-variety of objectives.  For the most part you either need to storm a castle, or kill a specific enemy in order to progress to storming a castle.  The combat is also bland and limited in the amount of combos you can perform against enemies.  Speaking of combat, you’ll be doing a lot of combating with enemies if you decide to bring down their health to zero instead of just turning them into an undead minion.  As powerful as my characters were, I would spend a minute just trying to kill one foot soldier.  And yet, if I decided to turn him into an undead minion, that could take 5-10 seconds of combat. I felt I was being forced into turning anything and everything into an undead minion instead of trying to kill them.  Enemies for the most part are just regular knights with a couple of tweaks to them.  Mid-bosses and boss battles take a little bit of strategy to take them down and will actually test your skill of the game’s challenging controls.

The purpose of creating undead minions is to help in fighting enemies by allowing them to aimlessly attack enemies, throw them at , even being able to order them to attack a specific target.  Doing this puts all of your undead focus on one target, but it also leaves you open to attacks as you can’t see your immediate surroundings when you order your zombies to attack.  A handy mini-map can help in this situation as it highlights who your enemies and allys are.  The undead minions also are used to destroy barricades, solve puzzles, and even build bridges.  For being mindless followers, they can be quite helpful.

As you progress through missions, you’re given souls, which can be used to upgrade your three characters.  Each character plays very similar, with only their combos being unique.  I personally kept to upgrading a single character as the more I put into that one character, the more I’d benefit from playing as that character through missions.  There are also “Records of Revenge” which act as the game’s achievements / trophy system.  This can add a bit of replayability if you’re the type who needs to unlock achievements / trophies in every game you play.

If you’re the type to play your PSP with headphones or connecting it to a stereo system, I would highly recommend you don’t do that with Undead Knights.  The game has a soundtrack that would make hardcore metal heads cringe in agony.  The worst part of the overly metal soundtrack is that it’s the same song throughout the entire game, including the main menu!  It was so bad I had to turn the background music down to zero just so I can play through the game without ending up with a serious headache.

FINAL THOUGHT:

There was a lot of potential with Undead Knights.  The premise sounded like it could be an interesting game, but playing hour after hour of the same repetitive missions, uninspired enemies, and puzzles that are easily solved, Undead Knights falls flat of its awesome sounding concept.  In the end, I felt like I was just another mindless undead minion.

4/10

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We all remember Buzz! Quiz TV.  It was our party game of choice on the PS3.  With the possibility of Downloadable content (DLC) your questions never get old.  If there’s a couple of good things that came out of this years Tokyo Game Show (TGS) Buzz! Quiz World is definitely it.  The PS3 game will add 5,000 new questions and will provide an “enhanced” online mode with new game modes.  Expect a Wheel of Fortune type of game, where the letters will appear slowly to make out a word.

The PS exclusive title will be coming to a PS3 and PSP near you in November ‘09.  So get you Buzzers ready, and don’t forget to start entering your questions now on www.mybuzzquiz.com.  Check out my Quiz on National Lampoons Vacation… careful it’s tricky!

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Back in February, Sony said they would be making an Assassin’s Creed PSP bundle available later this year.  It looks like the details for the PSP pack finally emerged today.  Here’s what the bundle comes with:

• White PSP-3000 system
• Assassin’s Creed: Bloodlines PSP game
• UMD Movie (to be announced shortly!)
• 2GB Memory Stick PRO Duo

With the PSPgo coming out around the same time, I’m curious to see how well this pack does against simply buying a PSPgo and Assassin’s Creed: Bloodlines separately.

Make sure to check out some screens and a video of Assassin’s Creed: Bloodlines after the break.

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Harmonix is a developer that has been working on music games since the early 2000s.  Titles like Frequency and Amplitude weren’t as widely known as most other PS2 titles, but they paved the way for Harmonix’s more successful later titles which include the original Guitar Hero I & II, Rock Band, and their upcoming The Beatles: Rock Band.

Rock Band Unplugged is Harmonix’s fray into the handheld gaming market.  The art style, graphics, and tunes are reminiscent of a full fledged Rock Band game, but the concern of most gamers were how the controls would work on the PSP.  Do music-based games only succeed if you have a plastic guitar in your hand, or could they possibly work with a more traditional control scheme?

When you first turn on Rock Band Unplugged, players will be amazed by how well Harmonix adapted the Rock Band experience onto the PSP.  The sights and sounds we all come to love from Rock Band are all there.  In fact, the game seems like it’s more of an adaptation to Rock Band 2 than the original Rock Band.  This would seem like the more logical choice as Rock Band 2 offered a number of improvements over the original title, one example would be the listing of individual difficulties to their respective instruments when selecting a song.

In the console versions of Rock Band, you would create your own character and have them perform with whatever instrument you’d like.  Even though your character was part of a band, the player’s focus for new clothes, instruments, and style was only prioritized to your character.  In Rock Band Unplugged, since the gameplay has you playing through all of the individual instruments, you create a band and upgrade them whenever you think they need a new look.  The amount of customization is nearly identical to the console version.  Hair, clothes, and instruments can all be upgraded in Rock Band Unplugged.

As I briefly mentioned earlier, Rock Band Unplugged has you playing guitar, bass, drums and vocals all at once.  This might sound overwhelming to most people, but the way Haromix handled it will keep your sanity in check.  The game has you playing particular phrases of a song.  When you complete a phrase, the entire track will auto-play for a certain amount of time.  This allows you to switch to another track using the R/L shoulder buttons to complete another phrase from another instrument.  As you’re playing, you can hear instruments going in and out from the song, which is a reminder that you need to switch over to that track to try to finish the phrase.  If one of your instruments fails, the section of that song will be completely removed from the track until you can either save the instrument by using star power or finish the song.

During gameplay, players will notice the music focusing on particular instrument tracks you’re currently playing (ex: when you are playing the vocal track, that track will be louder than the rest).  I found this to be helpful as singling out your track from the rest can really help you follow along to the rhythm, which is vital to being able to play it amidst all of the other tracks.  The controls are also pretty easy to get a grasp of, although it might take most people a couple of play sessions to get a feel for the button layout for each required note.  Once you pass the learning curve, you might shock yourself on how quickly you can play the notes.

I was surprised to find that Rock Band Unplugged doesn’t include any multiplayer whatsoever.  Rock Band & Rock Band 2 are party focused titles, so I would have assumed Unplugged would have allowed for some kind of multiplayer, if not online, then at least locally.  The exclusion of multiplayer by no means makes this a less than worthy game.  I just feel it really would have been the icing that is already a quite impressive cake.

Harmonix did include an extra game mode called “Band Survival”.  In this gametype, you play all of the tracks to a song at the same time.  Completing a phrase to auto-play a track is completely removed in this mode, so the player needs to balance all of the tracks at the same time.  This can be quite a challenge as it forces you to constantly keep an eye on the fail-meter located at the top-left of the screen to keep all of your tracks within a safe level of play.

FINAL THOUGHT: Rock Band Unplugged might be as addictive, or even more addictive than its console counterparts. With it’s easy to grasp gameplay mechanics and great choice of fun song titles to play to, it deserves as much attention as any other music game out on the market.  The only thing that felt like it was missing was multiplayer, but it’s still a solid title without it.

8/10

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Have you ever wished you could pull out your PSP (or soon, PSPgo) and have a number of classic Capcom arcade titles right there without going through the headache of having to modify it in anyway?  Starting tomorrow, you can get your Capcom arcade classic fix when Capcom Classic Collection is released on the Playstation Network.  The Capcom Classic Collection has a a pretty fair number of good Capcom titles, including Final Fight, Bionic Commando, and Street Fighter (yes, the original!).  The title will be made available tomorrow and will be playable on the PSP.

Additionally, Capcom also announced classic PSone titles will be making their way to the PSN.  Which titles you may ask?  Well, hit the jump and your question will be answered. (hint: a Resident Evil game is one of them)

• Capcom Classics Collection Remixed (UMD Legacy)
• Mega Man Powered Up (UMD Legacy)
• Dino Crisis (PlayStation Legacy)
• Power Stone Collection (UMD Legacy)
• Mega Man Maverick Hunter X (UMD Legacy)
• Resident Evil 2 (PlayStation Legacy)
• Darkstalkers (UMD Legacy)
• Street Fighter Alpha 3 Max (UMD Legacy)
• Resident Evil 3: Nemesis (PlayStation Legacy)
• Capcom Classics Collection Reloaded (UMD Legacy)

This seems like another tick in the ‘UMD-based PSP going under’ column.  As much as Sony states they won’t stop supporting the PSPs with UMD drives, it seems like more and more developers are jumping aboard the digital distribution train.  It’s an obvious choice to support digital downloads as it will probably save developers and publishers a ton of money as they won’t need to ship numerous game boxes to retailers.  I personally love the idea of having another reason never to go to another retail store to buy games.  But, this idea might make me much poorer than I would like as it’s a lot more tempting when a game is available to download rather than in a store.  Click on a simple “BUY NOW” button takes a lot less thought than visiting a game store.

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As we reported a while back, the sales for the title weren’t as ground-breaking as Rockstar Games would have hoped.  With that in mind, Rockstar Games officially announced today that GTA Chinatown Wars will be heading to the PSP this fall, but there’s a definite benefit to this version over the Nintendo DS’.

The benefit being that not only will the game be released on UMD, as the majority of PSP titles as of now are released, but Rockstar will also be releasing the title on the Playstation Store, offering the title as a digital download for PSP & PSPgo owners.  The title will also receive a slight graphical upgrade to allow for a widescreen perspective, enhanced lighting and animations, and new story missions.

source

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If you’re a current PSP owner, I’m sure you’ve been asking the same question over and over again.  “If I buy the PSP Go, what will happen to all of my old UMD games?”  It looks like our unified question has finally been answered.

In an interview with Gizmodo, Director of Hardware Marketing for Sony John Koller states a ‘good-will-program’ will soon be announced to consumers who are thinking of trading up from their current PSP system to the PSP Go.

We’re in the midst of putting together a good will program. We’ll be unveiling that soon [because] we actually think there’s a significant group that will be upgrading from the 1000…In the past, we’ve seen a 20-25% trade-up factor, and I assume that’s going to be the case here. We’ve modeled that. So we’re looking at a good-will program—a short term good-will program that would continue for years afterward.”

As a PSP-1000 owner, I cannot begin to tell you how relieved I am to hear this news.  I definitely would like to grab a PSP Go when it’s released, but I’d hate to think that I’d have to keep my old PSP in order to play my older UMD games.  If what John says is true, there are going to be a lot of relieved future PSP Go owners letting out a sigh of relief.

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For the first time on the PSP, a Resident Evil game is being made specifically for the system.  Resident Evil Portable is currently in development by Capcom and is expected to be released next year.

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Let’s see.  Rock Band Unplugged is only a couple of weeks away from being released.  If past experiences with any music based game has taught me anything, it’s that we should be given the complete setlist for the game right…about…NOW!

2000s

AFI – “Miss Murder” *
All-American Rejects – “Move Along”
Audioslave – “Gasoline” *
Black Tide – “Show Me the Way” *
Freezepop – “Less Talk More Rokk” *
Jimmy Eat World – “The Middle”
The Killers – “Mr. Brightside”

Lacuna Coil – “Our Truth”
Lamb of God – “Laid to Rest”
Modest Mouse – “Float On”
Queens of the Stone Age – “3’s and 7’s”
System of a Down – “Chop Suey!”
Tenacious D – “Rock Your Socks” *

1990s

3 Doors Down – “Kryptonite” *
Alice in Chains – “Would?” *
Blink 182 – “What’s My Age Again” *
Foo Fighters – “Everlong”
Judas Priest – “Painkiller”
Lit – “My Own Worst Enemy”
Lush – “De-Luxe”
Mighty Mighty Bosstones – “Where’d You Go?”
Nine Inch Nails – “The Perfect Drug”

Nirvana – “Drain You”
The Offspring – “Come Out and Play (Keep ‘em Separated)”
Pearl Jam – “Alive”
Smashing Pumpkins – “Today”
Social Distortion – “I Was Wrong”
Soundgarden – “Spoonman”
Weezer – “Buddy Holly”

1980s

Billy Idol – “White Wedding Part 1″
Bon Jovi – “Livin’ on a Prayer”
Dead Kennedys – “Holiday in Cambodia”

Motörhead – “Ace of Spades”
The Police – “Message in a Bottle”
Siouxsie & the Banshees – “The Killing Jar”

1970s

Boston – “More Than a Feeling”
Jackson 5 – “ABC” *
Jethro Tull – “Aqualung”

Kansas – “Carry on Wayward Son
Rush – “The Trees”

1960s

The Who – “Pinball Wizard”

As for the DLC, here’s the first 10 tracks you can expect to download on June 9th when Rock Band Unplugged is released:

• 30 Seconds to Mars “The Kill”
• Belly “Feed the Tree”
• Disturbed “Inside the Fire”
• Lynyrd Skynyrd “Gimme Three Steps”
• Muse “Hysteria”
• Mute Math “Typical”
• No Doubt “Just a Girl”
• Oasis “Wonderwall”
• Paramore “Crushcrushcrush”
• Red Hot Chili Peppers “Under the Bridge”

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