 |
| Whether it was a big gorilla with Donkey Kong Bananza or big hops with... well, Big Hops, there was a lot of fun 3D platforming to be found this past month! |
The year started off strong on SuperPhillip Central with one heck of a block party in quite the literal sense with LEGO Party!, celebrating its way to a B+. From there, the first of two Sonic the Hedgehog reviews, perfect to do our own kind of celebrating of his 35th anniversary, was Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds, racing around at the speed of sound with an A-.
It went all downhill from there--but that was a good thing--with a perfect winter-themed snowboarding sensation, SSX 3, as a retro review. It slid down the slopes superbly with a B+ grade.
From there, a pair of 3D platformers, one indie and one decidedly NOT-so-indie, took center stage on SPC with Big Hops and Donkey Kong Bananza respectively. The indie effort earned a super respectable B- with some bugs and glitches needing to be ironed out, while Nintendo's big banana of a first-party, single-player game this year scored an A, making it our Game of the Month.
Finally, not all of our games reviewed this month made the grade. Sonic Heroes disappointed me upon a modern look at the game, over 20 years since I last played it. It stumbled a bit in its red and white sneakers with a D+.
It's starting to all come back to me with these Review Round-Ups! Last but not least, I would be amiss if I didn't remind you about the SPC Review Archive where every review posted in this blog's nearly 18 year history resides... for better or worse (some of those early reviews are ROUGH).
I'm surprised by how much I absolutely enjoyed LEGO Party. The developers really did a fantastic job with this party game, offering mostly well-crafted boards with relatively fast paced rounds (not looking at you, Space Zone), a colorful and creative collection of mini-games (some stinkers notwithstanding), and plentiful amounts of charm thrown in as well, with that latter part being expected from a LEGO game. The developers are also listening to feedback within the community, such as adding bonus Golden Bricks at the end of games, something that LEGO Party lacked by the time I finished up the Platinum trophy on the game a month ago. All this, plus a budget price, deliver a party worth having for any kind of player, young/old, casual/hardcore, and so forth.
Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds (Multi) - A-
Overall, the addition of CrossWorlds definitely keeps races feeling fresh and somewhat unpredictable, and I'd love to see more added down the road. SEGA and Sonic Team both seem committed to keeping up with updates and bringing more goodies to the game, which is fantastic to see after Team Sonic Racing. They have an incredibly good thing going here with the base Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds package--plenty to love, some minor frustrations, but mostly all positives. It feels great to control, it gives Sonic fans copious amounts of way past cool callbacks, and it's got a ton of love and energy under its hood.
...this third entry is one hell of a snowboarding package, both overwhelming in positive and negative ways, but well worth playing for any extreme sports enthusiast or just gaming fan who wants a proper challenge and enjoyable snowboarding title to play.
When it comes down to it, Big Hops nails the most important aspect of a 3D platformer--its movement is fast, fluid, fun, and feels right. Everything else is gravy, really, and while some of it fares better than other parts, overall, Hop's first adventure shows a stellar amount of understanding of what makes a modern 3D platformer enjoyable: with its remarkably tight controls, genuinely delightful level design, and mostly impressive presentation.
While minor frame-rate issues and most of the boss battles being rather breezy might make for some modest moaning from myself, those complaints are quickly diminished by the absolute amount of fun that Bananza delivered in banana bunches to me. This 20 hour epic is one that constantly escalates the action, and keeps it going through the finale and beyond. Donkey Kong Bananza delights and delivers a 3D action-platformer that offers enough open-ended design to kick some serious potassium.
Sonic Heroes (PS2, GCN, XBX) - D+
...the positives about Sonic Heroes--the level design, the colorful visuals, and superb soundtrack--greatly are betrayed by the game's poor controls, obnoxious mission design with Team Chaotix, abhorrent boss battles, awful camera, and glitches aplenty. Even despite all of these negatives, I did enjoy rolling around at the speed of sound, flying high, and throwing my weight around with this cast of 12 playable characters. Does that make Sonic Heroes an enjoyable game overall? Absolutely not.
 |
| SPC reminded itself to take the good with the bad, particularly with the Blue Blur this month as we looked at both Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds and Sonic Heroes. |
No comments:
Post a Comment