PixlBit

Did a franchise started as a Mario rip-off surpass its “inspiration”? No. No, it did not.

Somewhere during the creation of a game, there seems to be a point where the design team must ask itself, “Should we make our game longer?” Sometimes this might result in the addition of compelling new content, but so often it results in revisiting the same places you’ve already been to collect more thingamabobs.  This very decision is what ruins Giana Sisters: Twisted Dreams. Your forward progress in what could be a wonderful game is stymied until you can perfect your collection of MacGuffins without dying in levels you’ve already completed. It’s a real shame too, because without this unnecessary padding I wouldn’t have noticed the game’s glitches or gotten as frustrated with its inconsistent responses. Most importantly, I wouldn’t have gotten so sick of playing it.

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Just add water. And worms.

My introduction to Worms came with Worms Armageddon for the Nintendo 64. I was working in gaming retail at the time, and that game took our store by storm. We’d spend hours after closing playing that game, and those are some of my most cherished multiplayer memories. Since then, I’ve been chasing that feeling, only to come up short every time. The first Worms on XBLA felt stripped down, and I couldn’t find anyone to play Worms Armageddon 2 with me. So here I am, playing Worms Revolution for review, and trying desperately to recapture that magic I felt huddled around an N64 with three of my friends. Even though Revolution is an enjoyable game, it seems that my quest continues.

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Team Sora acquires a huge partner.

Since its premature announcement last E3, fans have been curious about the fate of the next iteration in the extremely popular Super Smash Brothers series. During Thursday’s Nintendo Direct presentation, Smash fans were spoon fed a little more information. Namco Bandai, the company behind a wealth of series like Tekken, SoulCalibur, and Tales will be partnering up with Team Sora to bring fans the latest in the series.

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Insert Top Gun reference here.

City Interactive is delivering some arcade-style shoot-em-up goodness later this year in the form of Dogfight 1942. Originally titled Combat Wings: The Great Battles of World War II, the game had been intended as a retail game. However, along with the name change, the game will now be a downloadable only title that will be available on Xbox Live Arcade, PlayStation Network and Steam when it's released.

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Just don't expect it to work on a new computer.

If you like free games, there’s a pretty easy way to score Midnight Club II on your Steam account through the weekend.  Simply join the Rockstar Steam community before 10 AM PDT on May 15 and a free, non-giftable copy of the game will arrive in your account sometime before May 29. Just be aware that this version of the game won’t run on Windows 7 or Vista.  This probably limits the audience for the game considerably, but for those still rocking Windows XP on an aging rig might finally have a new game to boot up on their systems.

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