Assassin's Creed Revelations: First impressions

After it had been off for roughly 5 months (mostly related to technical difficulties), I'd like to welcome my readers back to The Americanized Gamer.

Sonic Generations - Demo Impressions

Coming right back from the XBOX360 demo.

The experience itself was quite ... underwhelming, to say the least.

While there isn't much to criticize on the technical side (although there might be on the PS3), the demo itself was rather short and, in general, not that special.

Graphics wise, the game looks extremely appealing. Most of the Green Hill Zone (Sonic fans know this level from several releases. It's the first ever level created for the Sonic franchise)is covered in thick green grasses. Enemies look as good as they ever did and Sonic himself was redesigned in so much that he basically looks like he did way back in the the early 90s.

It's the very Sonic that appeared in several video games and dozens of comic book releases. The old Sonic that we know and love, liberated from the "hipster" looks of newer games.

Controls -- and that's my major grasp with the game -- have, unfortunately, reverted to the standard of the early 90s, as well. It's the very same button layout we know from the first Sonic the Hedgehog on Sega's Genesis (Mega Drive in Europe and Japan), so there's no way to perform a spin-dash.

Dearly missed from the demo is the essential "new-school gameplay".
As the game is promised to be a mixture of classical and modern Sonic games, every level is available in a 2D (or 2.5D) as well as a 3D fashion. The demo, however, limits itself to a single "old-school" level.

Last but not least, the demo is rather short. All in all, it took much less than 5 minutes till completion. And I wasn't going for a speedrun.

Sonic Generations demo now available through XBL and PSN

That really came as a surprise to everyone.

Sega has just released the demo to it's next major title coming to PS3, XBOX 360, PC and 3DS this Fall.
The demo is timely limited and will be taken down in 20 days. So download it right away, if you are interested in the newest adventures of the world's famous blue hedgehog.

Trailer:



Following up: First demo impressions

Kirby TV is coming ... tomorrow.

Listen up, Kirby fans. Listen good.

Tomorrow might be your lucky day, as Nintendo is releasing the Kirby TV channel to European* and Asian-Pacific** Wii gamers.

During the next six months, fans of the world's most famous pink ball of fluff will get to enjoy nearly 50 episodes of cartoon goodness.

Meanwhile, the rest of the world may enjoy The Americanized Gamer's indepth Friday coverage of Nintendo's newest addition to the Wii.





*UK, Germany, France, Ireland, Italy, The Netherlands, Belgium, Switzerland, Austria, Denmark, Sweden, Norway and Finland

** Australia and New Zealand

Little Big Planet 2 – My game of not only 2011

Hi there. This is Mark Bauermeister AKA the Americanized Gamer, ongoing freelance video game journalist. I’m here to present you my favourite game of 2011 so far.

To many it may seem like a rather unlikely choice, considering the nature of today's gaming industry and the FPS centrism of many younger gamers.

Regardless. As I’m a very creative individual, LBP 2 seemed just like the right choice for me. I’d already bought the first one the day it was released and while that one definitely had it's fair share of fun, I always felt like there was something missing. The story mode seemed rather short and gameplay wasn’t that immersive.

Fortunately, all this has changed with LBP 2. Where everything is brighter, smoother and, most importantly, filled with even more imagination and dreams.

Little Sackboy is once again heading out to discover several worlds filled with the imagination and dreams of their inhabitants. This time, though, he has to face a terrible enemy. The evil Negativitron is threatening to suck up the whole Omniverse and only Sackboy can set things straight. Supported by a (semi)-secret organization and their leader Larry Da Vinci, Sackboy has to travel Craftsworld and Avalonia, always on the lookout for that one weapon strong enough to bring down Negativitron.

While this doesn't sound like an overtly imaginative (albeit still levels above the essentially nonexistent ones of LBP and LBP Portable) plot, the gameplay makes more than up for it. Little Big Planet 2 introduces tons of new content and tools. For the first time ever, the players (or rather, creators) are not limited to 2.5D platform style games. Games in a fashion similar to Tetris are just as feasible as an Asteroids clone or any other 2D shooter, for that matter. Even racing games shouldn't be much of a problem.

While the Little Big Planet franchise has always been about imagination, I feel that no part before LBP 2 has been that littered with it.

A lot has changed in the technical department, as well. Graphics are now a lot crisper than they used to be and the game makes full use of the Playstation Move controller, making the creation of new content more accessible than it ever was. Content from the first Little BigPlanet is seamlessly integrated into the new game, setting in motion what can only be described as a "Multiverse of Never-ending Fun"

Overall, this is not only my game of 2011, but my game of "forever".








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