I’m afraid the moment I’ve not-so-casually alluded to will finally, almost, nearly arrive in 23 more hours: the moment my stint at ButtonSmasher ends, and with it, possibly even the blog itself. It’s been nice knowing you, dear readers–or at least imagining you, as I more often have, as you read and wondered, “why does this writer wait to make her first post on the last day of the month?” and, “isn’t there some other, more worthwhile torture I could enact on my brain?” Though the likelihood of your existence was never high, I’ve continued to write for you, and for my money, for just one month short of a year now, about games that were sometimes better known to me than the language of Swahili. I think my enthusiasm lit up the place like a dim bulb, in the end, and it failed to impress. I’m sorry to everyone.

Well, amidst any tearful departure, there’s always a craving for some good news. My Xbox 360 has mysteriously regained its ability to work, just in time for me to have no further posts to write. And I can’t use it to play Broken Sword: The Sleeping Dragon, an original Xbox port of a swell throwback/update to the PC adventure genre, that, true to form, comes full of sass and pith and novel goings-on. And just look at that box art, an artistic abomination only a child of the 80’s could love. All is as it should be, I am in my happy place. Anyone want a 360 that can never die?

Samba de Amigo finally hits the Wii–geez, that only took as long as a Spanish holiday, or the saying I’m actually looking for. I’m not even too late on this one either, as it’s been only 3 days or so since the release; for once, the game should still be available. Official maraca mods not on the horizon.

Another one hot off the presses is Harvest Moon: Tree of Tranquility, which hadn’t been raking in the best rankings pre-release, but I’m betting it’s not the shovel-full that is a typical Wii game, either. I love Harvest Moon; I’ll always love its quaint, Chibi-headed painting of a simple country life, surrounded by good-hearted folk and too-cute, smell-less, immortal animals, told over and over with as few modifcations as possible. Harvest Moon is one of the warmest gaming fuzzies imaginable and I’ll maim any reviewer who says otherwise.

What else… well, whatever Myth Makers: Orbs of Doom might be besides a game, ‘orbs’ and ‘doom’ figure prominently in the title and that’s reason enough for me to recommend it. Final lesson: the less time and resources spent marketing, the more extravagantly stupid the title, means the more chance the game might actually be good.

I don’t really know what else is new and shaking in this industry, so the time is probably ripe that I left it. Or at least took a break.

See you somewhere on the flipside, perhaps. Keep on your happy button-smashing.

A couple summers ago, Capcom joined photojournalism and zombie-slaying in eviscerating matrimony, and Dead Rising became one of the early-ish Xbox 360 titles to be the darling of critics and consumers alike. With this year marking its re-release on Wii, those of you who missed the original (if any) should check it out. You play Frank West, the world’s only photographer with less brains than the mall full of zombies into which he descends for his deathly-exclusive scoop. You have (initially) 72 game hours to uncover the cause of the outbreak, but you’ll more quickly uncover the fact that every zombie is hungry for a Frankfurter. To prevent your own death, you need to take pictures, kill zombies, and complete missions by saving the few (un)lucky surviving mall-rats. You’ll earn Prestige Points and go up levels, learning new moves and generally bettering your chances of not dying. Pick up all the mass-produced crap a mall can offer and use it to kill an endless supply of zombies, be it home hardware, medieval weaponry, lawn mowers, bicycles, benches, even food (which you can also cook and eat).Dead Rising might not– well, let’s be honest. It WILL not look as good on the Wii as it did on the Box, which had splendid model detail, great animations, and vibrant lighting that will be lost. But it will add motion controls… you’ll have to wait and see how it stacks up. There never was, and may never be more to do in any other video game. Capcom does a great honor to source material Dawn of the Dead and its ilk, surpassing the entertainment value of them all.

Ever so often, a game from Japan that you’d think would be perfect for Western audiences never gets picked up for localization. Like, a game that harkens back to 50’s B-movie horror (in this context, referring more to the unintended scariness of such films’ very existence). Now that special effects are no longer the obstacle they then were–on the contrary, they are often used to and sometimes actually can salvage an abysmal production–why aren’t there more digital likenesses of The Blob that Ate Everyone, or Attack of the Killer Tomatoes, or especially Japan’s own movie-monster speciality, Godzilla?

That is, why not more games like EDF, a.k.a. Earth Defense Force 2017?

Part of a cheapo label in Japan called Simple 2000, EDF stormed the import scene on the PS2 a few years back, and someone took notice. (That would be D3 Publisher, I guess.) So they made a pseudo-sequel on the Xbox 360, and the alien bug-blasting adventure was, finally and happily, playable by the monolingually anglophone. (Admit it, importers: other than blowing up a Big Ben that was crawling with space ants, you had no idea what you were doing half the time.) Basic reading ability is a great boon in navigating the menus and for matching the plethora of weapons to the appropriate missions, but what you really need is your best trigger finger, and a small side of brains, for getting out of–and into–harm’s way.

Giant ants, jumping tarantulas, and walkers straight out of War of the Worlds–the end of the freaking world never made better interactive entertainment fodder. Such all-out poly-pushing worked the poor PS2’s legacy innards a little too hard, but looks a lot better on the more capable hardware; one can see the sacrifices, such as ripping the flying female character out of 2-player mode, more than made up for within a single 360 screenie. Moreover, 2-player mode shouldn’t slow this version to a crawl, meaning fun EDF before should be really fun this time.

Today we cover the official digital facsimile of the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, the aptly-entitled Beijing Olympics 2008 from SEGA. Related in name and make only to a certain sports-themed mascot mash-up, this outing is the full-blooded trustee in preserving the memory of the athletes and events of the world’s largest amateur sports meet–a lot of responsibility. But is it a lot of fun?

From the sounds of the more favorable reviews–which I will trust, because I like their sounds more–the game harkens back to Decathlete on Sega Saturn, which was as fine an exercise in button-mashing as was ever conceived. This is the control scheme that best simulates (or simulates as closely as is possible with a manually-operated input device) the act of running, peddling, swimming, or hurdle-hopping your legs off. Repetitive strain injuries to your finger muscles will put you in the shoes of any Olympian–but if you can withstand the current crop of Guitar Hero-like dexterity drills, this should be cake. While the older game featured–obviously–a mere ten events and few more athletes, things have come a long way since 1996: of the 30+ events in Beijing Olympics 2008, only a few are duds, depending who you want to believe (1Up.com in my case). And, while online play is declared lag-fully flawed, it’s just as in the real Olympics–there are those pendulous, precious metallic incentives for solo play. For some, such a simulation might be better left to the Wiimote-waggling of Mario and Sonic–but for those with a taste for real venues and real personalities, not to mention all other penchants for realism, this may be the way to go.

Just one of the infinite possible round-table discussions between Lucasfilm and Namco that brought Darth Vader and Yoda back in time to the 16th century in Soul Calibur IV, newly released to a hungry, fighter-playing public. It was either this, or Street Fighter IV–not that it would have been any stranger a candidate for the cameo appearances. Ultimately, Namco isn’t alone–the orbit of the Mortal Kombat universe will, somehow, soon eclipse that of DC Comics, rending holes in the very fabric of logic itself.

It’s all a little hard to take.. but may I proceed to admit that the fans will love it? The culmination in a quartet renowned for its flash (and flesh), SoulCalibur IV (if you’re lucky enough to get what I like to call the “Special Tin Edition”) includes memorabilia like a comic book and wet-erase tournament leaderboard to commemorate the occasion of its release. And it’s a good game, too–I’ve seen it first-hand, and SoulCalibur, being at least 50% about looks, and about 50% of that being how good the characters look, delivers again on both counts. On PS3, from the time you boot to the crazily cinematic intro, to the time you create a character in the enormously-expanded Creation Mode, to the time you take them into battle, everything is stylish and smooth.

If you’ve liked it so far, you’re going to like it again.

Let’s make no mistake, here–ever since their move from collapsed arcade scene to consumer electronics, Midway has been much maligned, more or less worldwide, and in every conceivable way. Whether it was children’s protection agencies lobbying congress to ban Mortal Kombat or the unanimous panning of their every new release by the critical pen, not to mention the scorn of the entire nation of Japan, it’s kind of a wonder that Midway is still faring reasonably well. Personally, I never had a gripe with them, but it’s pretty bad when a company fires one of their own for discussing the bugs in one of their games. C’mon, it’s not as if the rest of us are too stupid to notice game-crashing bugs and sloppy programming.

That said, once in a long, long while, someone gets sick of it and decides to do something about it. Like esteemed action director John Woo, who descended upon Midway with guns blazing and doves flapping–and from the wreckage of clipped polygons and frozen screens, there would emerge an appealing third-person shooter, rife with theft from Max Payne but still distinctly Hong Kong, Chow Yun Fat, and fun: Stranglehold. For those with no action-film background whatsoever, the PS3 Collector’s Edition of Stranglehold, seen here, includes a full copy of Hard Boiled, the movie to which the game acts as spiritual sequel. The Xbox 360 version omits the movie in favor of behind-the-scenes ‘Making Of’ footage, taken straight from the voice acting floor. (The movie kicks ass, by the way).

In summary: Inspector Tequila. Cop killers. Lots of diving, dodging and log-rolling. Some competent graphic artistry one moment, some really stiff pouring of stiff drinks the next. That’s Midway for you, but Stranglehold is still true to its name in how it will hook you.

Sadly I can’t claim to have coined that nickname for Dead or Alive myself, but I did read it around the release of the third game in a magazine interview with a member of Tecmo’s notoriously naughty Team Ninja. Though his name may be lost to me, the pejorative stuck through the years, over which time I’ve peppered it into every mention of the worldwide CG pin-up girl sparring pageant I could. It might seem holier-than-thou …but in reality, maybe it’s to deflect my own self-criticism for actually liking the over-the-top-heavy, cheap-thrill-filled game. This may sum up the fixation (and a guilty selling point) to some, but assuredly not all DoA players neglect to notice the fairly-robust moves engine and considerable AI lurking beneath the tawdry exterior.

If since the launch of the Xbox360 that was partly carried by DoA4 you HAVE ignored it, but are any kind of fighting game fan, please give it a chance. The characters animate fairly diverse fighting personalities (if not diverse facial features or body types), and to become skilled with them all is not as simple as gawking from a poolside–refuge of those for whom fighting pixies is too hard and who had to trade it in for a volleyball game, uwaaah waah. Unfortunately, where DoA2 made some attempt at a plot, in DoA4 we’re constantly reminded that the characters are sexy-cool first and foremost and that their relatability is secondary. It may be hard to consider DoA4 a respectable work, but fighting amongst dinosaurs that respond to your disturbing the many million years’ ecological order by fighting back, and playing tiddly-winks with your opponent’s limp frame in oncoming traffic? FUN.

Portal, Valve’s experiment of player-turned-guinea-pig and infinite loops you can walk through, has produced favourable results among its subjects and generated significant interest in the gaming community. I now know why. I just played the PS3 Orange Box, and for Portal alone, I beseech you to do the same. Phrases like ‘pioneering new directions in imagination’ and ‘the simplest forms of genius’ don’t begin to describe this game, but that’s all I’ve got coming to me. You won’t know what hit you–seriously, you’re thrown without explanation into successive exercises in interdimensional interior design at the Aperture Labs Enrichment Program, and are expected to take the controls of a vortex-spouting gun like it comes naturally. But because the design is flawless, it is as natural as you ever imagined walking through a thousand mirrored mirrors to be. The asylum theme provides much amusement, and also your character’s constant companion in the form of a not-so-slightly unstable robotic voice. All things in Portal are in perfect proportion to respect your intelligence and to entice you to experiment for the sheer fun of falling through the ceiling at terminal velocity forever.

Sometimes, an even bigger fuss really is warranted. Also available on PC (not pictured because there’s another blog where that might happen).

Kay, so it’s been a while since this one came out. I scooped up my copy after playing the demo, wherein, with unparalleled technical ferocity, the game first showed me perfectly maurading hordes of insanely high-poly goblins numbering in the thousands. Chased me clear out of my house and to the store, they did… after I was finished stylishly and effortlessly racking up a staggering body count of my own.

Ninety-Nine Nights had its an unexpected origins in the mind of Tetsuya Mizuguchi, of music- and rhythm-game fame. It’s much more like Dynasty Warriors than the typical sort produced by his company, Q! Entertainment, however. Think of it as reality-defying Dynasty Warriors, with added razzle-dazzle, longer combos, and, with the right character, the ability to play leapfrog on opponents heads. It’s simpler in a lot of ways, having a tale not so much to be told as to be ignored in view of the much more entertaining prospects of “beating ‘em up”, but even that gets a little stale after a while. However, for the Ninety-Nine Nights which so aptly give the game its name, you may really find yourself enjoying this one. And if not, at least it has attained bargain bin status!

Because you can get infinitely more accurate, serious, and finally, more playable sports simulations when they DON’T feature flying and/or speaking animals, you have to make your fantasy sports game really stand out some other way. Sega has observed this from Nintendo’s repeated example, and our result is Sega Superstars Tennis, newly available for Wii and Xbox360. When you realize that it’s all about the characters, venues, and adaptations of old Sega games to a ball and a racket, you have a reason to be playing tennis in VIDEO form.

Superstars is not just a good tennis game, but a good VIDEO game because the makers followed some basic principles. First, you must include your flagship character. DUH. So in this case, we have Sonic the Hedgehog, plus three members of his immediate entourage. Next, draw on recent releases - NiGHTs should do nicely. Then, dust off those old favourites, like the rival news anchors from Space Channel 5, and capitalize on more recent memory with some Super Monkey Ball. You know that crazy fun game that almost single-handedly started the whole cel-shading craze, but that didn’t smash any sales records? Represent with Beat and Gum from Jet Grind Radio. Obscure references are the last official requirement; those can stay a surprise.

Suffice to say that Virtua Cop fans will really enjoy the missions that put you in a mock-up of the Wharf level, shooting cardboard standees, and getting Justice Shots with… a tennis ball. Puyo Pop and puzzle fans in general will get a kick out of clearing away the falling beans, trying for big combos, with… a tennis ball. The variety is reminiscent of the minigames in Mario Power Tennis, possibly the best part of that game, and so are the Superstar powers akin to Power Shots, adding a substantial “What the?” factor to any match.

While Superstars may not match Mario in terms of overall production value and quality, it sure is kinda fun.