Archive for the ‘PC/Mac’ Category
Review: Abobo’s Big Adventure (PC/Mac/Flash)
There have been a lot of games, especially in the indie scene, that harken back to the days of 8-bit and 16-bit systems. Some do an incredible job of capturing that retro feel, developer Way Forward should be commended for work on titles like Contra 4, and other efforts like Capcom’s Dark Void Zero attempt to take modern game design and give it that retro flair. Those are major companies, though, the small team indie developers are much more miss than hit, so you go into a title like Abobo’s Big Adventure with the overused term “cautiously optimistic”. Fortunately the teams of I-Mockery (design/sound/story), Pestoforce (programming) and Pox Box (art/animation) have created exactly what was advertised: the ultimate tribute to the NES.
Review: Quake 4
Console: Xbox 360
Released: 2005
Developer: Raven Software, id
Publisher: Activision
Value: $4.99 (360) $4.44 (PC) $10.19 (Mac) (pricecharting.com)
Price: $5.99 starting (ebay) $4.99 (GameStop used) $19.99 (GS Digital)
Also Available On: PC (recommended), Mac
Watch For: Copies on PC that have the bonus DVD of content and copies on 360 that have a bonus DVD containing the same content as well as Quake 2.
Round IV
The Quake series is quite an interesting one, especially when you consider its legacy and creation. Developer id, of the Wolfenstein and Doom series and bascially responsible for the first person shooter (FPS) genre, finally created a true 3D FPS with the original Quake. Unlike games before it, the engine didn’t ignore things like height and depth when calculating shots or movement, Quake understood the 3D plane. As the series progressed in Quake II marine Matthew Kane was introduced as a strong protagonist to help fight off the alien race known as the Strogg. I don’t want to discredit the plot completely, but there are striking similarities to the Quake series and Doom series in every way. Continuing that similar trend, Quake III was an arena-only shooter that took the online PC gaming community by storm whereas the plot-heavy game belonged to none other than the revamped demonic classic Doom 3. It is for this reason that Quake 4 marks an interesting place in the id universe given its continuation of Kane’s story from Quake II and drastic visual similarity to Doom 3.
Gaming History 101 