Women's Murder Club: A Darker Shade of Grey

The casual game market is really growing. There are all sorts of games for all sorts of players, from adventure, simulation, arcade, board and card, hidden object and many more. Women’s Murder Club: A Darker Shade of Grey, is a type of hidden object game, but one that blends in other genres, as well. There are micro mini-games, hidden object searches, logic puzzles, and even adventure game style dialogues. The result is a pleasing casual game experience.

A Darker Shade of Grey is the second computer game based on James Patterson’s Women’s Murder Club series, following Death in Scarlet. James Patterson collaborated with Jane Jenson (Gabriel Knight and King’s Quest game designer) to design this game. Jane Jenson co-founded Oberon Media, which is a producer of many casual games.

The books feature a group of women who work together on murder cases in a professional setting. A detective, a medical examiner, a reporter and a district attorney are the main members of the club. I haven’t read the books (I have read other Patterson mysteries), but from the descriptions, they appear to focus mainly on Police Detective Lindsay Boxer’s investigations, with the other club members contributing according to their fields of expertise. The computer versions follow this same format. Read more

City of Heroes Architect Edition

One of the biggest challenges that developers face when going live with a massively multiplayer online game is keeping the game fresh enough to keep players involved. What that generally means is content expansions and upgrades.

With NCsoft’s City of Heroes franchise, part of that equation has been solved. After all, the CoX (referring to the City of Heroes and City of Villains co-joined product lines) games are not exactly strangers to charting a new course and giving players something that no one else has. When the game launched, the character creation was the most ambitious seen in an MMO. Well, NCsoft has done it again and in the process, has raised the bar in the MMO genre.

While the dev team will continue to work on expansions for new zones, storylines and content, the team has – with the release of the City of Heroes Architect Edition – put a huge chunk of the creation of new missions and storylines into the hands of the players.

Simply put, the Architect Edition allows players to create their own storylines, create their own enemies for the mission, and design the mission parameters from goals, side rewards up to the placement of the enemy units. It is ambitious, yes, but the dev team has pulled it off. Read more

Resident Evil 5

Certainly one of the most popular and highly-revered franchise in Capcom’s stable, Resident Evil has long been an incredibly successful series for several console generations now. Now, the series is in its fifth official iteration (there have been several spin-offs and side stories), with Resident Evil 5 launching on PS3 and Xbox 360. While it does feature many of the familiar game elements that the series has become known for, RE5 also takes some steps to modernize the series a bit as far as the third-person action game genre is concerned. While there are still a couple of minor missteps here and there, Resident Evil 5 is still an intense and engaging entry to the franchise, and one that stands nicely with other coveted games in the series.

Resident Evil 5 follows series regular Chris Redfield as he embarks on a quest to an “Autonomous Zone” called Kijuju, an area in Africa that seems to be heavily inspired aesthetically by areas like Mogadishu. Chris is searching for a man by the name of Irving, who works for a mysterious corporation known as Tricell and was recently discovered to be dealing in the same type of B.O.W.s (Biological Organic Weapons) that have been making Chris’s (and others) life a living hell since the inception of the series. Additionally, once Chris convenes with another agent, Sheva Almovar, the situation in Kijuju gets from bad to worse once the inhabitants start exhibiting symptoms of the Las Plagas virus from RE4, causing Chris and Sheva to take up arms and fight their way through the situation. Read more

UFC 2009 Undisputed

At a time when the fighting game genre lacks variety, innovation, or anything fresh, you wouldn’t think that a real-world license could help turn things around. In most cases, a license is something you slap on the front of the box. It does not dictate how a game is developed, how it should play, or the kinds of people it should entertain.

UFC 2009 Undisputed might be the one exception to all three of those rules. First and foremost, it was made to attract as many UFC enthusiasts as possible. But in trying to produce a game that lives up to the expectations of those fans, Yuke’s and THQ have created one of the best and most original fighting games of the PS3/360 generation. Read more

Monsters vs. Aliens

Following in the tradition of blockbuster movies, particular those aimed at younger audiences, gamers can take on the roles of their favorite characters in the film-to-game adaptation of Monsters vs. Aliens. Several characters are available, and each utilizes their unique constitution and special abilities throughout the game. Some of the gameplay mechanics are genuinely fun – for the first few minutes. It isn’t terribly long before each character’s repetitive move set loses its luster, and the lack of novelty is something that even younger players are liable to find boring after a while. Read more

The Godfather II

It’s a tale of two cities … make that three cities … with recurring themes and characters, but at the heart of it all, you are the ‘Don’ out to carve an empire in the name of the Corleone family.

The Godfather II is the franchise sequel to the 2006 EA title, but rather than mirror the events of the initial movie, in Godfather II, you run an alternate course that will have you carving out your own territory, building up your own family and becoming the don that Michael Corleone needs to clear out his enemies. The role is not exactly from the films, but it is an attempt to allow players to feel more part of the story. Read more

The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena

The original Chronicles of Riddick did what many considered unimaginable – it took a film franchise, and converted it into a good video game. Riddick’s first outing, Escape from Butcher Bay, was considered one of the best games of its genre on nearly all fronts, and some would even contend that it failed to receive the attention it truly deserved, despite its cinematic origins. Those who may have missed out on Riddick’s previous exploits have received a second chance in the form of Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena. Aside from a revamped version of the original game, Dark Athena is equipped with a brand new game developed for current-generation hardware, as well as multiplayer gameplay. Read more

Empire: Total War

Anyone who plays real-time strategy games knows of the Total War franchise. This latest and most successful outing, Empire: Total War, takes players into 17th- and 18th-century warfare, complete with battles on the ground and high seas. In addition to managing the military, players will be responsible for the economic and cultural expansion of their respective empire, everything from negotiating trades to quelling rebellions. Players unfamiliar with Total War’s basic mechanics can get their bearings in the game’s tutorial modes, the first one being focused on ground combat, while the naval combat tutorial serves as an excellent introductory showcase for Empire’s landmark new feature. The camera can be controlled in every way imaginable using either the keyboard or mouse, and the command interface is clean and easy to use without sacrificing depth or control. Within two seconds, I can double click on a unit’s icon to quickly jump to their position on the battlefield, switch them into “fire at will” mode, then descend the camera to immerse myself in the explosive pops and pounding cannons of colonial combat. Read more