Where should I begin? Well, let’s start with the story. You play (put the first name here) Shepard, who is a US Navy Alliance officer and tries to work his or her rank up the galactic ladder. A Turian named Saren tries to unleash a supposed extinct alien race that’s older than time itself. Can you stop him in time while uncovering the past? With that out of the way, let’s start with the presentation. Mass Effect has some of the best graphics, sound, voice acting, and production values of any game I’ve ever seen next to Gears of War (courtesy of Microsoft’s bank account). The game is packed with tons of extremely detailed textures and models, remarkable never-before-seen character animations, and BioWare’s next-gen dialog engine.
Just like any BioWare game (KotOR, Jade Empire), you decide the fate of the game through your interactions with people. You can intimidate them, charm them, or just plain use force. With the dozens of alien races and characters you’ll encounter, there are limitless possibilities. The game has third-person gunplay mixed with role-playing elements. You can upgrade your character through an easy-to-use upgrade menu, where you can upgrade tons of stats and attributes. You also have powers that you can use. Along with you are two other squad members of your choosing, and you can give them simple orders. You can hack objects to obtain new weapon upgrades, different types of ammo, and even more armor. There are even a few vehicle sessions as well, and this helps mix up the gameplay.
You travel around by using the mass effect relay system, which can shoot you throughout the galaxy. You can travel to different worlds to collect different types of resources, complete side missions, and more. While all this is wonderful, the game does have some major issues. The frame rate can never keep up. It’s always skipping and chugging, and there’s a constant texture pop-up as well. There are also random load times every so often. The game is also very short for BioWare standards, ending in about 15-20 hours, and with all side missions (about a dozen), maybe 25–30. While there is no co-op or online play, the game is still fun, very cinematic, and a wonderful masterpiece.
Have you upgraded your graphics card? Need a new CPU? How about some more RAM? You’re going to need it with the revolutionary CryEngine 3 that powers Crysis 3. Graphics are the first thing that people think of when a new Crysis game comes out, and will their rig run it? Note to console gamers: The PS3 and 360 versions don’t even come close to the maxed-out DirectX 11 version on PC. It looks great on consoles, pushes them to the max, but looks like crap compared.
You are Prophet, or Lawrence Barnes. The story picks up right after Crysis 2, where the Alpha Ceph is trying to harvest and annihilate all of mankind. It’s up to your and the ex-nano suit-wearing Psycho to stop them. You have the help of the rag-tag rebel resistance, which is all but helpless without you. The first thing that Crysis 3 fixes is the linearity and confinement of the city. It’s a mix of both here. It’s not as open as Crysis 1, but you have large open areas where you can decide if you want to go stealth or shoot everyone up. You can use your visor to tag enemies, which is one of the best tactical elements you have in the game. This time around, you can upgrade your nanosuit by giving yourself longer cloaking time, dampening bullets, increasing stealth kill damage, and various other things. You can still customize your weapons, and there are quite a few of them.
The best addition to Crysis 3 is the tech bow. This thing is just awesome and lets you kill people without reducing your energy for cloaking. You can choose your draw strength and ammo type. Each arrow is an instant kill and feels satisfying. You can also hack this time around, so an enemy turret can wipe out a small force for you while you hide. These small things make Crysis much more enjoyable than the near bore-fest of Crysis 2. The game was solid but lacking in gameplay elements. The hacking, tech bow, and upgraded tactical visor really make the game more intense and fun. The AI is also improved, and the game is much harder. Towards the end of the game, I was dying left and right. The new Ceph enemies are tough as nails, but by the end, you get to feel the ultimate power of the nano suit. By the end of the game, you can supercharge your nanosuit and become invincible for short periods of time. Don’t think this is cheating, it feels great after sneaking around and feeling vulnerable all the time.
When it comes to the story, you will be completely lost if you haven’t been following along; even people who have will be a bit lost. The story doesn’t really add anything or make it more interesting. Honestly, I had no idea what was happening half the time, and I played all the games. The story has a lot of potential but just isn’t fleshed out like it could have been. At least there are some more scripted cinematic events that are part of why Crysis 2 was boring. There still isn’t enough, though. After a while, you feel like you are just trudging through wave after wave of Ceph and Cell troops.
The multiplayer is a little more fun, but not something you will come back to a year from now. Multiplayer is solid, but it isn’t much different from the second game. Honestly, after Crytek pretty much abandoned Crysis 2 shortly after its release, I really don’t want to devote much time to multiplayer. At least the game only had a few bugs and has more graphics settings, unlike the second game. The graphics are freaking amazing, with water tessellation, ambient occlusion, SSAA, and various other DX11 effects. Even with everything set to low, it still looks pretty damn good. There is no DX9 mode, though; it is strictly DX11 on PC, so make sure you have a GPU that supports it.
Overall, Crysis 3 adds just enough to make it feel really solid and go out with a bang. There are a few fun scripted moments, the tech bow is awesome, and the graphics will blow you away, but in the end, it doesn’t do a whole lot different from Crysis 2.
World War II shooters were everywhere, but Ubisoft and Gearbox took a dangerous risk and released one so late in the game. 2005 was a year when WWII shooters were at their peak and when gamers hated them the most. Brothers in Arms proved to be a more authentic and smarter shooter and won fans of the genre over.
Gearbox painstakingly recreated Carentan and many parts of France, where the 101st Airborne Division landed on D-Day. The game also uses squad tactics and realism, unlike any other WWII shooter out there. You will notice when you play how well the guns feel when you shoot them and how you can’t nail an enemy from 100 feet away with a Thompson. You have to flank the enemy, or you die. It’s that simple and that difficult. Red circles will appear above enemy squads. You can issue commands to your squads to suppress them. Their circle will turn gray, and then it is safe to move up and find cover around the area to flank them. It sounds simple, but it’s not. Your squadmates can die, and so can you if you aren’t careful. You have to watch out for MG fire, which will kill you in an instant, and sometimes even tanks.
This realism and authenticity can’t be done without good AI, and BiA delivers and is even more impressive today. The only issue I had with AI was with tanks. Sometimes they wouldn’t go around each other or go the other way to follow a command. The game also requires a lot of patience. Sometimes even trial and error. You can’t just rush every enemy, like in Call of Duty, and save the day. You can order squads to rush and attack while your other squad suppresses, and then you can charge in with them to kill them all. You can also order squads and set positions that you want, so you have total control. It feels good and is a key part of the game. Without mastering this, you won’t get very far.
You also can’t just use an M1 Garand and snipe an enemy’s head while he’s in cover. It just doesn’t work that way; you also can’t kill an MG unless you flank them. This isn’t a Medal of Honor. This gave a great feeling of realism, but it was also very difficult. I died quite often because I chose the wrong tactic or flanked the wrong way. Sometimes my impatience got in the way as well. I even found different weapons to help in certain situations. When I finally got the Springfield sniper rifle, it was a weapon from God. After all the inaccurate weapons that couldn’t hit crap, this thing made life easier, but only for a few levels at the end.
When it comes to looks, BiA looks great, even to this day. The lighting looks real, the grass flows, and the models and textures are pretty high-res (for back then). You will be impressed. The game holds up and is still better than a lot of shooters today. My main concern is that the game feels the same throughout. I just went around killing everything and maybe planting a few charges. I could mount an MG sometimes and ride the back of a tank, but overall there wasn’t much variety in the game, which I find the biggest issue.
What’s here is one of the most authentic shooters around, and fans of the genre won’t be disappointed at all. The game looks great, has smart AI, and tells the sad story of Baker Company and the 101st Airborne.
All those World War II shooters we endured for an entire decade felt like a war on its own. Shooter after endless shooter bombarded our systems, and then there were the really bad ones in between the Call of Duty and Medal of Honor yearly releases. Call of Duty 2 was highly anticipated because it was the actual sequel to the award-winning original. Does it stand out like the first game did? Is it full of cinematic finesse and finely nuanced mechanics? Not really.
There’s not much of a story here because it’s based on WWII. Black and white footage with a dull narrator telling you about different theaters of the war, then there’s the typical journal entry during the load screen, nothing interesting at all, and even when the game came out, I was sick of these WWII shooters. What does Call of Duty 2 build on? Nothing; it’s just more of the same, but at least it has high production values and does the same stuff right. The game has you following three different soldiers from the Russian, British, and American sides. One thing I liked was that you get to play on a different side of Normandy Beach, and that’s the Rangers. They climbed up the cliffside, trying to shut down the German pillboxes and various artillery, so our troops stopped getting slaughtered on the beachhead. Call of Duty 2 tries to tell the smaller stories of the war, which is a nice change of pace.
The same weapons are here that you have shot a million times. Lee Enfield, M1 Garand, MP40, MP44, Sten, and various others. Of course, not all WWII weapons are here, but I wanted to see some of the more obscure ones, like the Browning or BAR. At this point in time, it was just about better graphics and who’s weapon textures looked the most realistic. Call of Duty 2 delivers the visuals and was a benchmarker much like Crysis is now back in 2005/2006. It was one of the first games to support SLI, really pushed PCs, and made you get those $500 graphics cards. It was a must-have for PC owners and was also a GPU seller. With that aside, the textures look great even today, and the visuals really pop. The sound is great as well, with gunfire chattering in the distance and soldiers yelling all around you. It may seem dated today, but you can really see how much the Call of Duty series hasn’t evolved. There are striking similarities to the Modern Warfare series because it’s all the same: shoot anything that moves.
The game can be pretty easy at times; I could just rush into a building and blow everyone away with one clip and survive. I still find it painful to know that grenade physics are still really bad and bounce around like rubber balls. There are various things I just really can’t stand about these shooters, and that’s the lack of realism. When I shoot enemies, blood doesn’t even come out. Where’s the gore and violence? Brothers in Arms was the first WWII shooter to use this violence in the genre, but Call of Duty just feels like some sort of censored theme park ride.
CoD2 had a huge multiplayer following, but sadly, no one’s online anymore. Even so, it’s just a typical online shooter and isn’t anything special. I was really disappointed to find that CoD2 wasn’t as cinematic as it could have been and just felt the same throughout the whole game. Blow up this door, defend this position, destroy that mortar nest, and kill this Flak 88 crew. It’s the same stuff we play in every single WWII shooter, and nothing ever changes. Sure, it was mindless fun, but I have come to realize why I was so glad everyone moved on.
I’m not really a plane combat fan, but Ace Combat has always been pretty fun. I checked out the Enhanced Edition, thinking it fixed issues from the console version, but not really. The game is a step back from other entries in the series, and I found it pretty boring towards the end.
The story is about one of the worst offenders. It’s complete nonsense that you just won’t care about. You play as three different members of a US air force squad and are trying to stop a Russian coup. Yawn, boring. Let’s go to sleep. How many of these boring military stories have been told? 100 is too many. It doesn’t help that the characters lack any personality and are just as boring to listen to. The developers also put in some awkward dialog that was probably due to the voice actors. One guy will crack a joke, and the other will try to add to it, leading to fake awkward laughter, and you’re just sitting there shaking your head.
At least the dogfights are somewhat fun. You can choose from a myriad of planes, like the F-22 Raptor, B1 Bomber, and all those other planes. Hey, I’m not an expert. One mission even has you using an AC-130 ripped straight out of Modern Warfare 2. Helicopter missions were added, and two missions involve you mounting a door gun on a helicopter. This is a nice change of pace, but I wanted more cinematic action or something in these fights. All 17 missions ended up feeling the same. You just chase around planes, shooting them down, and that’s it. When you get a plane in your sights long enough, your reticle will turn red, and you can fire missiles. If you follow it long enough, a green circle will flash, and this will trigger DFM, or Dog Fight Mode. This is probably the most cinematic the game will get. You will automatically follow the plane, and all you have to do is keep it in your sights. Once the big circle turns red, you can fire your missiles, and machine-gun fire doesn’t hurt either. Sometimes the enemy can fly over you and come up from behind; this time you are the victim. Slow down enough until a green triangle flashes, and you can turn back on the enemy.
That seems fun and all, but when you do it on the 100th plane, you will die of boredom. The helicopter sections aren’t much different because you just fly around, killing everything on the ground and occasionally an Apache or HIND. The game controls really well, but I felt it had bare bones. The change in plane types was a breath of fresh air, but the best ones weren’t used often enough. It also doesn’t help that missions drag on practically forever. I would shoot 30–40 planes in just one mission, and it would still carry on; it drove me nuts. It doesn’t help that the dialog is boring and grating with the same military mumbo-jumbo over and over again. The game is just dry and dull after the first few missions. I was surprised I finished the game.
You may think co-op and online play help, but it doesn’t because no one is playing online. Think of this as a single-player game. I was also disappointed in the lack of weapons you could choose from. There were maybe 4 or 5 planes to choose from throughout the whole game, and most planes felt useless. Why pick a lesser plane when I can just stick with the best one through the whole game? Challenge maybe? I guess it’s for plane aficionados.
My biggest disappointment would be the graphics. Sure, they get a nice upgrade with slightly higher resolution textures and some better lighting, but the ground textures are just awful. When you get close to the ground, there’s nothing there. Just flat textures of grass and dirt. Sometimes a few buildings will pop up, but it looks like an unresolved Google map. I also thought the explosions lacked oomph and just looked like strange glitches in the physics rather than explosions or planes falling apart. Missile cams are dull because of this as well.
Overall, Assault Horizon is a step back for the series and lacks any potential moments you would remember. The story is dull, the characters are boring, and the only fun feature is the dogfight mode, which you will get tired of quickly. Only hardcore Ace fans should play this, or anyone desperate for a flight game in this rarely approached genre.
Super Hexagon is a game where I can say it’s barely that; in fact, it’s a game you might quit in less than one minute. I don’t know what the designers were thinking, but this game is so hard that it becomes no fun in less than 5 minutes. You are just a triangle rotating around a circle, trying to find your way through gaps in a giant hexagon that closes in on you. I couldn’t get past 28 seconds of survival, and that was after I memorized every stage and died about 50 times.
That’s really all I can say about this game, because it’s hardly a game at all. The graphics are so simple, with just basic colors and shapes; the only praise I can give this game is the awesome 8-bit soundtrack. The game requires memorization and super-fast-twitch reflexes to win. It doesn’t help that there are only hard difficulties; there is nothing easy to start out with. It doesn’t help that the visuals will give you a headache in less than 10 minutes, and it just hurts your eyes. I like the fact that the game is trying to be challenging, but I’m glad I didn’t pay much for this game.
With that said, I really can’t recommend this to many people unless you are seriously hardcore, but the majority of players will uninstall it in less than 5 minutes. Why play a game that takes over 20 minutes of practice just to advance past the 30-second mark? I honestly don’t understand why this game was even made or what audience it was supposed to be for. I really can’t say much else about this game because there just isn’t anything there to say; it’s hardly a game as it is.
While everyone is playing Black Ops II and Battlefield 3, there is a little multiplayer game called Chivalry: Medieval Warfare. This knight-in-shining-armor online-only game pits players against each other and lets them have at it with deadly swords, crossbows, flaming pots, shields, and various other Camelot-era weapons. This is a different multiplayer game and will keep you hooked for dozens of hours.
There’s no story here at all, so don’t worry about that; this game doesn’t need a story. You open up the game, and you are greeted with a server list. There’s a tutorial that shows you the ropes of this game. There’s a bit more to it than just swinging around weapons. Each one has range, damage, and speed that you have to think about. In a small arena, you probably want a short and fast weapon, while on the more open maps, you should use a javelin and a giant polearm. There are three basic attacks: overhead, side-by-side, and jab swings. You can feint attacks as well to trick your opponent, which is a key move you have to learn to master. You block, but you have to time it, and you can’t just block aimlessly. You have to be looking at the weapon, or the block won’t really connect. This is really a knight simulator, and the game is just so much fun.
It doesn’t stop there, though; there are some projectiles. The bow is great to use and has an arrow cam that helps you adjust your aim. There’s also a crossbow, but reloading is very slow, and you can’t see around you when reloading. Larger classes get axes to throw, while smaller ones get knives and daggers. I found a strategy where I’d use up my projectiles and try to get some kills that way before going in. There are 4 classes: man-at-arms, knight, vanguard, and archer. The Vanguard is the biggest class and can kill in just a couple of hits, but it is extremely slow. He and the Man-at-Arms have a charging attack that will devastate anyone in its path. If you use a kite shield with these classes, it protects you from rear attacks, which is actually how I died the most. I would be battling an enemy, and I’d get creamed by two guys coming up from behind that I couldn’t see or hear.
Some levels have traps in them that you can activate to help your team or whittle down someone’s health before going in for the kill. Each class is a lot of fun to play, and I found myself constantly switching between them, unlike other multiplayer games. I just wish there were more classes. Four isn’t all that much, and there aren’t enough maps. Torn Banner is putting out free content, but it’s been slow coming since the release last year. However, I still find myself coming back and playing a few rounds at least once a week; the game is very addictive.
The game modes are also lacking. There’s just Team Deathmatch, Free-for-All (Deathmatch), Capture the Flag, and Dueling, which is 1v1. There are a couple more, but these are typical modes found in other games. One mode that is unique to this game is a siege-type mode where you use battering rams, trebuchets, and various other long-range siege weapons to break into the enemy’s fortress and take it over. That is probably the most fun. On one map, my team was trying to push a battering ram through a small village. We were trying to fight off the other team, and it was a constant back and forth. Once we got to the front doors, their archers made easy work of the battering team because their moat didn’t allow us to surround the team and defend them. We just had to do archery battles or hang back and wait for people to come out.
As it stands, Chivalry has proven to be a very popular and well-made multiplayer game. The graphics are fantastic, and everything looks superb. Hopefully, Torn Banner can continue to dole out new content to make players happy and continue playing.
Sniper: Ghost Warrior was a game trying to be different, a sniper simulator similar to Sniper Elite but much worse. Ghost Warrior 2 improves upon the predecessor a lot but is still not worth the price of admission. I actually wanted to be interested in the story; it kept trying to pull me in, but it just fell flat in the end. The voice acting is actually pretty decent, if cheesy sometimes. I don’t know why you’re on these missions; it never explains. All I know is that you’re hunting a guy named Marinov or something like that and trying to stop the sale of bioweapons. It was a typical present-day military story, but the plot twists actually had me interested, almost.
The game is actually a lot of fun, but all the gameplay mechanics are half-baked and fall flat. The game is supposed to be a sniper simulator, but it holds your hand through every scenario. It marks who to shoot in what order, how far away they are, and even gives you a red dot to accommodate for which way the wind is blowing. With the sniper rifles rendered in such high detail, why not let us figure it out for ourselves? Well, the average 15-year-old Call of Duty player wouldn’t like that, that’s why. The shooting feels fine, but all the sniper rifles feel exactly the same—all three. There is a serious lack of weapons; to begin with, your only other weapon is a silenced pistol. That’s it. I understand you’re a sniper, but why not a silenced sub-machine gun or something?
The other major issue is that every single gameplay mechanic is broken in some way. The game tries to implement stealth, but it doesn’t work. I was able to just walk around without being detected and even run. Stealth kills don’t work right and are unsatisfying because the animations are terrible, and the death kills aren’t very gruesome. Even the bullet cam shots stink; it’s nothing like Sniper Elite V2. On top of all this, the AI is dumb as dirt. In one mission, I alerted everyone but stepped into a bush, and not a single enemy saw me even after I stepped out again. I was able to kill everyone, and none of them even looked for me. Sometimes I died during scripted events without knowing why. Having your core gameplay elements break is not fun.
Ghost Warrior 2 fails to make a sniper simulator like it wants. The game is highly linear and is nearly on rails. The upside is that the game is still mindless and fun. Sometimes when the game does let you go on your own and you have to clear an area, things like killing two enemies with one bullet and clearing the whole area without getting detected feel a bit satisfying. Other than that, the same scenarios were repeated until the game ended. Snipe these enemies, sneak around a bit, scripted event, cutscene, hide, snipe these enemies, rinse, and repeat.
The game actually looks pretty decent but doesn’t use CryEngine 3 like Crysis 2 or 3 does at all. It doesn’t take advantage of the DirectX 11 features at all. The game looks like it has medium-high settings on Crysis 2. It still looks good, but there are some eyesores. Plants that you sneak through a move at a low framerate are literally just flat textures that bend around. The cattails are not even in 3D and look like something from a PS2 game. A huge oversight or just plain lazy? I don’t know. Don’t even ask me about the multiplayer because no one is playing and it’s boring anyway.
Overall, Ghost Warrior 2 is mindless fun but not worth the price of admission. Every core element is broken in some way, and even the graphics are broken in spots. Pick this up when it’s $5 or less; otherwise, pass it up and play Crysis 3 instead.
This is exactly how you do a game series reboot, right? I wish I could end my review with that, but I need to tell you why. Tomb Raider suffered through a few mediocre games during the first run of the series during the late 90’s and early 2000s. The first reboot did well for the series by maturing Lara and giving us better controls and a more cinematic experience. Now comes Tomb Raider (2013), a fantastic game that shows the more human side of Lara. The game starts out with you and a science crew on a ship on the way to an archeological site, but things go awry when Lara decides to head to the Dragon’s Triangle off the coast of Japan. A mysterious storm destroys the boat, and Lara and the team are stranded on this island. There is a mysterious cult trying to sacrifice people to a sun goddess to end these storms. Lara has to deal with this if she wants, of course.
What makes Tomb Raider so memorable is the struggle she goes through while surviving. She is nearly raped, suffers tremendous injuries, and has to cope with herself, dealing with the fact that she has to kill to survive. She is not comfortable with this at first and really struggles to pull the trigger. This adds layers of depth to her character that weren’t seen before. Not only is her personality more memorable, but her looks have changed. No longer is Lara wearing the short shorts and tight shirt with her huge bust. She has been knocked down a few cup sizes and is much younger, straight out of college, in fact. It’s hard to really describe her more than this; you have to play the game to really connect.
The gameplay in Tomb Raider has completely changed, but yes, there is platforming and gunplay. Both are tight and very well crafted. Gunplay consists of using scraps to create a pistol, bow, machine gun, and shotgun. That’s it. As you progress and find salvage in crates and dead bodies, you can upgrade these to look and feel like better weapons. There are many upgrades that increase damage and accuracy, as well as adding new ammo types. Lara’s animations are very well done and realistic, and this falls into combat. She scrambles around and ducks behind cover; the guns feel great to shoot, and you can see how inexperienced Lara is; she’s not a Navy SEAL or commando. Unlike other games like this, her stumbling animations don’t interfere with the game at all. You can still move around, you can dodge, and there’s even some melee thrown in. As you upgrade your skills (done at various campfires throughout the game), you can dodge, and through quick-time events, you can do some pretty gruesome kills.
While gunplay is tight and fun, exploring is just as important. This island is massive, and you can go anywhere; there are no limits. Fast travel via camps really helps, but there’s a reason for moving around everywhere: collecting hidden items. These range from relics, GPS caches, documents, etc. There are hidden tombs found throughout the game that hold area maps for these items. These tombs consist of cleverly made physics puzzles that are really fun to complete. You get rewards like art and 3D models to view. The whole game just has an amazing atmosphere and is so much fun to explore.
On top of all the climbing around, you get a climbing axe, which is an important tool for climbing and combat. Your bow is used for shooting ropes across valleys and canyons to pull items to solve puzzles, break doors, and access new areas. The whole exploring ideal in this game is just fantastic and really fun. I did have to think about how to get to new areas and actually try to navigate and experiment with that good game design. There is a Survival Instinct ability that highlights map markers and objectives, and when you unlock the skill, you can see items through walls.
The story itself is a bit confusing; the whole spiritual thing is a bit unbelievable in such a realistic world like this, but that is what Tomb Raider is known for. Lara is the main character here, and what she goes through was the main story for me. I loved every second of the story. The voice acting is awesome, and the graphics look amazing—some of the best on PC yet. The new DirectX 11 features like Tessellation and the new TressFX technology applied to Lara’s hair look nice, but there were a lot of bugs and glitches for Nvidia users during launch (they are now fixed). You will need a monster rig to play this game on the highest settings.
The multiplayer was tacked on late in development and is pretty boring. The combat was designed for cinematic gameplay, not multiplayer. It feels just like it does in the story, but it just doesn’t suit multiplayer well. I played all three rounds and got bored of the game. Some people may like it, but there are better multiplayer shooters out there.
Overall, Tomb Raider is one of my favorite games of all time and is really memorable. The voice acting is solid, and Lara’s new personality makes her more human and more relatable. The graphics are outstanding, and the gunplay and exploring mechanics are fun and very cinematic.
I’m not much of a kart racing fan because the games tend to be too simple and easy, but Transformed really knocks it out of the park. The last Sonic Kart Racer was just okay; it had a slow pace, and it just wasn’t designed very well. This game really surprised me with its excellent graphics, track design, and character selection.
The obvious are Sega mascots such as Sonic, Amy, Shadow, Robotnik, Alex Kidd, and various others. While any of these guys outside of Sonic aren’t well known, it is nice to see them here. PC users get exclusive characters such as Football Manager (I know), Team Fortress, and Shogun (I know… Not exactly amazing characters you would want in a kart racer, but oh well. When you start your first race, you will immediately see how much better this game is. The handling is so much more fluid, and the races just flow. What really sells the game are the tracks that change mid-race and are able to transform into flying and nautical vehicles. Each character has three different vehicles, and it just feels great. They all handle things differently, so it makes you stay on your toes. The track design is amazing. There are hazards everywhere, and the weapons are really cool. The tracks are featured in various games, like Sonic’s Green Hill Zone and Samba De Amigo’s crazy LSD track. These levels are fun, but I just wish there were more.
The weapons vary from iceballs, twisters, remote cars that explode, rockets, blowfish, and various other crazy weapons. You pick up the question-mark capsules to find them, but you will find an All-Stars weapon that will make you really powerful and fast. Your car transforms, and it just looks really cool. Along the way, you can pick up coins that are used in other modes’ load screens in a slot machine to acquire boosts and other items. I just found the game to be very pleasing to play, but not with a single player. Easy was too easy, medium was too hard, and hard was impossible. The AI is really bad, but people play kart racing games for multiplayer anyway, which is where all the fun is to be had in this game. Unlike the last game, PC gamers get online multiplayer.
The graphics are really nice, with bright, vibrant colors, great-looking textures, and some really amazing lighting effects. Of course, the PC gets the best treatment, and it looks way better than the last game. As you play the game, you will eventually find tracks that become your favorites and find which character you prefer. The dynamically changing tracks just add that much more fun to the game. Hitting speed boosts, finding weapons, and avoiding track hazards are so much fun, and the sense of speed is incredible.
I just wish there was a bit more, but while there is more content than in the last game, I feel something is just missing. Maybe if the AI wasn’t so bad, the single-player would be more fun, but I found myself getting bored with it. The only reason to constantly come back is multiplayer. There is a licensed feature that allows you to add up to three stickers that you earned, but I felt this was completely useless and something to put in for little kids. However, as it stands, it doesn’t add anything significantly new to the genre or push it forward, which is what it needs. While it may not reinvent the wheel, it just makes it bigger and louder.
thebinarymessiah.com 
Try multiplayer. A lot of fun !