Also releasing in Europe on the same day (February 13), here is the European The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask 3D commercial. I don't usually post multiple versions of commercials, but this one is so good that I couldn't help myself!
Monday, February 2, 2015
The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask 3D (3DS) North American Commercial
Nintendo of America has published to its YouTube channel the North American commercial for The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask 3D for the Nintendo 3DS. The game launches with the "New Nintendo 3DS XL" in North America on February 13.
SuperPhillip Central's Favorite VGMs - That Rat Bastard Groundhog Edition
Today is Groundhog Day, and apparently Punxsutawney Phil saw his shadow. Therefore, there will be six more weeks of winter. Well, this Phil says that groundhog is a rat bastard. That said, his "weather report" is hardly going to ruin this week's edition of SuperPhillip Central's Favorite VGMs. Instead, I have great tunes for you guys this week, including themes from Parasite Eve, Boom Blox, and Mario Kart: Super Circuit! I see my own shadow, but that's because I'm standing in front of a lamp right now. Anyway, let's get to the cool tunes!
v806. Parasite Eve (PS1) - Primal Eyes
Yoko Shimomura to me is the female equivalent of Nobuo Uematsu. Her composing skills and compositions for the video games she works on are out of this world. She is on a totally different level, just like Uematsu. Her work on Parasite Eve is also fantastic, offering tense, melodramatic, and spacey themes all in one soundtrack.
v807. Boom Blox (Wii) - Blockland
Let's shift gears completely from sci-fi horror to wacky puzzle goodness with Boom Blox. It was part of a supposed three game deal with Hollywood director Steven Spielberg and Electronic Arts. At least Boom Blox made it out, and I'm grateful, as the game is a ton of party goodness fun. The soundtrack was composed by Mark Mothersbaugh, whose music I was first introduced to with his Rugrats cartoon score.
v808. Golden Sun: Dark Dawn (DS) - Weyard
Golden Sun: Dark Dawn was set 30 years after the events of The Lost Age. It saw the children of the heroes from the first game embark on their own adventure. Motoi Sakuraba was brought on board to compose the music for this third Golden Sun game, as he is known to be Camelot Software Planning's go-to composer. While the soundtrack isn't his best work, it still features plenty of excellent tracks, including this world map theme.
v809. Shadow the Hedgehog (PS2, GCN, XBX) - GUN Fortress
We go from a heroic theme to something relaxing and chill with the GUN Fortress level theme from Shadow the Hedgehog. Laced with guitar and percussive beats, GUN Fortress does not have nearly the amount of edge as the other themes in the game. It is a welcome change, as GUN Fortress itself as a level is a much slower paced one.
v810. Mario Kart: Super Circuit (GBA) - Cheese Land
To finish off this edition of SuperPhillip Central's Favorite VGMs, we go to a place where the streets are paved with cheese. No, this isn't "An American Tail", this is Mario Kart: Super Circuit's Cheese Land, a ridiculously zany track concept for even Mario Kart! The song is suitably catchy and will have almost anyone finding the theme bopping around in their heads as they race on this cheesy track.
v806. Parasite Eve (PS1) - Primal Eyes
Yoko Shimomura to me is the female equivalent of Nobuo Uematsu. Her composing skills and compositions for the video games she works on are out of this world. She is on a totally different level, just like Uematsu. Her work on Parasite Eve is also fantastic, offering tense, melodramatic, and spacey themes all in one soundtrack.
v807. Boom Blox (Wii) - Blockland
Let's shift gears completely from sci-fi horror to wacky puzzle goodness with Boom Blox. It was part of a supposed three game deal with Hollywood director Steven Spielberg and Electronic Arts. At least Boom Blox made it out, and I'm grateful, as the game is a ton of party goodness fun. The soundtrack was composed by Mark Mothersbaugh, whose music I was first introduced to with his Rugrats cartoon score.
v808. Golden Sun: Dark Dawn (DS) - Weyard
Golden Sun: Dark Dawn was set 30 years after the events of The Lost Age. It saw the children of the heroes from the first game embark on their own adventure. Motoi Sakuraba was brought on board to compose the music for this third Golden Sun game, as he is known to be Camelot Software Planning's go-to composer. While the soundtrack isn't his best work, it still features plenty of excellent tracks, including this world map theme.
v809. Shadow the Hedgehog (PS2, GCN, XBX) - GUN Fortress
We go from a heroic theme to something relaxing and chill with the GUN Fortress level theme from Shadow the Hedgehog. Laced with guitar and percussive beats, GUN Fortress does not have nearly the amount of edge as the other themes in the game. It is a welcome change, as GUN Fortress itself as a level is a much slower paced one.
v810. Mario Kart: Super Circuit (GBA) - Cheese Land
To finish off this edition of SuperPhillip Central's Favorite VGMs, we go to a place where the streets are paved with cheese. No, this isn't "An American Tail", this is Mario Kart: Super Circuit's Cheese Land, a ridiculously zany track concept for even Mario Kart! The song is suitably catchy and will have almost anyone finding the theme bopping around in their heads as they race on this cheesy track.
Sunday, February 1, 2015
Gunman Clive 2 (3DS eShop) Review
It's already time for the first review of February, and as stated last week, SuperPhillip Central is now on a new grading scale system. My first game using this new letter grade review system is Gunman Clive 2 for the Nintendo 3DS eShop. Grab your six-shooter, pardner, and get ready for a good time!
Gunman Clive was an unexpected hit and success story on the Nintendo 3DS eShop, one of the most prolific victories for the marketplace yet. It outsold the release on mobile devices and did well for the developer. What makes the story even more fascinating is that the game, other than the music, was created by one person, Bertil Hörberg. Rather than just resting on his laurels, Hörberg returns us to the world of Gunman Clive with a full-fledged sequel with amazing additions and spruced up mechanics, making Gunman Clive 2 a must-own for action fans.
Gunman Clive 2 contains the similar formula of the original. It is a retro-styled shooter and platform along the likes of games like Mega Man, only set in a Wild West world. Clive can shoot (picking up power-ups that can expand his firepower), jump, and crouch through the 25 levels in the game that contain a myriad of trials and challenges for him to overcome. From a castle with its own areas of directional gravity, sending Clive walking on walls and ceilings, to a Donkey Kong Country-inspired trek aboard a mine cart, riding through hazardous sections of track, Gunman Clive 2 offers plenty of level variety. They display a grand amount of evolution compared to the original.
This evolution continues into the boss encounters as well, showing off more complicated bosses, attack patterns, and means to defeat them. Whether it's a massive Tyrannosaurus Rex that chases our hero or a distinguished gentleman with requisite top hat and monocle, utilizing the game's gravity mechanic to dodge and defeat him, these bosses are definitely a step up from what we saw in the original Gunman Clive. Heck, the final boss is not only a great encounter, but it's also one of the more creative battles in years in how you scale the robotic beast to beat him.
Outside of standard 2D run-and-gun left-to-right affairs, Gunman Clive 2 splits up the action with special levels. For instance, one has Clive on an aircraft with a behind-the-back view as he shoots down enemy balloons and flies through rocky archways. Another level features Clive on horseback, riding through along a desert road, dodging boulders, dealing with fellow horseback riders, and leaping over obstructions in the road.
Gunman Clive 2 offers three difficulties, which alter how much health you are given to work with. There is no lives system in the game. When you die, you start from the beginning of the current stage. As levels are mostly short, death isn't that huge of a penalty. It's only later levels that are more lengthy that this can become annoying, especially levels with several "gotcha" moments, where you'll die simply because of a lack of reaction and response time to a specific obstacle. One such case is a falling platform that drops into the abyss. You have to have the reaction time of Sonic the Hedgehog to leap to the necessary platform in order to survive. There are more moments like this than I would have liked, but once they have been learned, the levels become easier to complete.
There are four playable characters in Gunman Clive 2. The titular hero is the first, with Ms. Johnson being the second. Her Princess Peach-like ability to float in midair temporarily makes otherwise very challenging jumps more plausible. Then there is Chieftain Bob, who is the most difficult character to play as, as he can only utilize melee attacks via his spear. This takes learning enemy attack patterns a must in order to get close enough to take the appropriate number of shots on a given foe. The final character needs to be unlocked, and those who played and enjoyed the original Gunman Clive can probably guess who the character is and how much it changes up how Gunman Clive 2 is played.
Like Gunman Clive, Gunman Clive features a very satisfying art style that is reminiscent of an animated wanted poster, full of squiggling lines on the foreground and background. Unlike the original, however, Gunman Clive 2 isn't relegated to one color scheme. Instead, each level presents a different scheme, showing off an abundance of color used rather than the orange, brown, and beige that the original game only offered. The character models are a sight to behold, and the animations are fantastic as well. The music is also quite impressive, featuring a wealth of engaging music that you can catch yourself humming to. Overall, Gunman Clive 2 is a delight presentation-wise.
Gunman Clive 2 is just wholly a plain delight. The side-scrolling 2D run-and-gun action is executed beautifully, the level and boss designs have evolved to be more interesting from the original, and the presentation is simply put, dazzling. It's astonishing that one person did the lion's share of development for this game. Gunman Clive 2 isn't a perfect game-- it's short and has some frustrating "gotcha" moments in its level design-- but it's a magnificent display of pure action gaming with a wondrous coat of paint.
[SPC Says: B]
Review copy provided by Hörberg Productions.
Yee-Haw!
Gunman Clive was an unexpected hit and success story on the Nintendo 3DS eShop, one of the most prolific victories for the marketplace yet. It outsold the release on mobile devices and did well for the developer. What makes the story even more fascinating is that the game, other than the music, was created by one person, Bertil Hörberg. Rather than just resting on his laurels, Hörberg returns us to the world of Gunman Clive with a full-fledged sequel with amazing additions and spruced up mechanics, making Gunman Clive 2 a must-own for action fans.
Gunman Clive 2 contains the similar formula of the original. It is a retro-styled shooter and platform along the likes of games like Mega Man, only set in a Wild West world. Clive can shoot (picking up power-ups that can expand his firepower), jump, and crouch through the 25 levels in the game that contain a myriad of trials and challenges for him to overcome. From a castle with its own areas of directional gravity, sending Clive walking on walls and ceilings, to a Donkey Kong Country-inspired trek aboard a mine cart, riding through hazardous sections of track, Gunman Clive 2 offers plenty of level variety. They display a grand amount of evolution compared to the original.
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| Those varmints picked the wrong day to mess with Gunman Clive's town. |
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| Open wide for Gunman Clive! |
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| Ah... Sunglasses! I knew I forgot to pack something! |
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| Gunman Clive's adventure takes him all around the world. |
Like Gunman Clive, Gunman Clive features a very satisfying art style that is reminiscent of an animated wanted poster, full of squiggling lines on the foreground and background. Unlike the original, however, Gunman Clive 2 isn't relegated to one color scheme. Instead, each level presents a different scheme, showing off an abundance of color used rather than the orange, brown, and beige that the original game only offered. The character models are a sight to behold, and the animations are fantastic as well. The music is also quite impressive, featuring a wealth of engaging music that you can catch yourself humming to. Overall, Gunman Clive 2 is a delight presentation-wise.
 |
| It's total panda-monium here! |
[SPC Says: B]
Review copy provided by Hörberg Productions.
Review Round-Up - January 2015
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| Embark on a grand adventure with Fantasy Life, SuperPhillip Central's Game of the Month for January 2015. |
Remember that next month SuperPhillip Central's grading scale for reviews changes to a letter-based system. I hope you look forward to the new change!
Oddworld: Munch's Oddysee HD (Vita) - 6.0
Spy Chameleon (Wii U eShop) - 8.25
Chariot (Wii U eShop) - 7.5
Fantasy Life (3DS) - 9.25
Family Tennis SP (Wii U eShop) - 6.75
uWordsmith (Wii U eShop) - 6.0
Sonic Boom: Shattered Crystal (3DS) - 6.0
Breezeblox (Wii U eShop) - 7.0
Ratchet & Clank HD (Vita) - 8.25
Ape Escape: On the Loose (PSP) - 8.0
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| Take on creatures big and small in Fantasy Life. |
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