Game: Chime
Publisher: One Big Game
Developer: Zoë Mode
Genre: Puzzle
Pro: Relaxing play style, Great Music, nice twist on the usual Tetris/Lumines style puzzle, Charity = Good feeling
Con: Not much meat, takes a bit to get used to

How often do you get to purchase a game AND get to feel good about the money you spent? Not very often, I am guessing. Fortunately, with Chime you can slap down your money and know that you are actually paying for something good. For the 400msp (or$5) that will you spend for this game, you are also helping less fortunate children around the world. As One Big Game’s motto goes, “Play, so others can.” You can not only feel good about spending the $5 for the game, but you have an excuse to tell your significant other/parent/guardian that you aren’t just buying a game, you are giving to charity. It’s really a win win situation.

So, what are you getting for your charitable donation of $5? For one, you are getting a new and interesting spin on the time-tested Tetris/Lumines formula. Chime is a block puzzle game, to be sure, but not what you may be used to. It combines just about every relative puzzler out there and meshes them into a very relaxing time in front of your TV. As the description for Chime goes, “Place blocks, build quads, get coverage, make music” and it’s really just that simple.

The gameplay board is mostly set up like any other puzzler, consisting of a wide open grid, ready for you to drop your block and make “quads.” There are many different pieces of varying length and shapes for you to fill the space. Right off the bat the first thing you may notice is that pieces don’t “drop” in the style of Tetris or Lumines. You can hold a piece in one spot indefinitely, then take your time and think out your course of action. Once blocks are placed on the board, you will notice that as the “beat line” (a la Lumines) passes over the block you just placed, it plays a certain musical riff. For each block you place, you get more and more music. As you build your blocks into quads, you will also be building a song. The more the board is covered the more the songs really start to come alive and it’s almost as though you literally are making the music.

Speaking of Music, all of the songs contained in the game from artists Moby, Philip Glass, Paul Hartnoll, and Fred Deakin. Every track was donated toward this very worthy cause. Everything about this game is charitable. The soundtrack is very mellow and creates more of a feeling of relaxation than the usual tension found in other puzzle games.

The thing that took me the longest to get used to was the fact that once your “quads” are built and the beat line sweeps them away so to speak, you can place more blocks in the same place. For example, a beatline moves across the grid in time with the music, playing different musical riffs as it goes. Quads are created by laying pieces in blocks of 3×3 or more. When a quad is completed and the beat line passes over it, different musical samples are played depending on the quads shape. The bigger the quad, the higher the score, with multipliers being achieved by having several quads on the screen at once. Once the beatline passes over a completed quad, it is swept away, leaving only a kind of shadow on the  grid, and earning the player coverage.  This took a second for me to grasp, as I kept trying not to get blocks in the same places, thinking that would some how end my game. Once I grasped the fact that it didn’t matter, I really was able to get the point of the game. It’s all about coverage. You need to make as many quads as possible, in order to cover the board. The more coverage, the more points, and really the only way to move along in the game from stage to stage.

There are two different game modes that are both fairly self explanatory: a “Timed Mode” and “Free Mode.” The only way to unlock the different levels/songs in Free Mode is to complete the challenge in Timed Mode. Not all that hard of a task really, which is kinda nice considering how some puzzle games (and other game types for that matter) have a way of being stingy with their unlocks.

All in all, the game is a little light on the content, but given the fact it’s for a good cause, I think it can be easily overlooked. Should the developer support this game for a while, it would be very easy to keep offering DLC. All you would really need is couple a songs, maybe a few new backgrounds. It really wouldn’t be all that hard. I for one, hope they keep them coming. I enjoy playing this game simply because in “Free Mode” there is no pressure, just sit back and enjoy the game on your own time. Not many games out there offer that kind of interaction.

Scott 3SMOVRadio.com

Electronic Arts has announced the all-new Exotic Racing Series pack for Need for Speed SHIFT. On March 18th, gamers will have access to seven phenomenal new cars and an amazing new track in the game. Highlighting this exclusive pack of cars are the McLaren MP4-12C and the legendary BMW M1. Players won’t find more brilliance, innovation, or drama than in these magnificent machines, where each is a potent mix of race car and road car. The Exotic Racing Series pack will be available worldwide on the PlayStation®3 computer entertainment system for $10.00 or the Xbox 360® video game and entertainment system for $10.00 or 800 Microsoft Points*.

The Exotic Racing Series pack cars include the Alfa Romeo 8C Competizione, BMW M1 Procar, and Maserati GranTurismo S, among others.  Over 50 exciting new events have also been created specifically for these cars including time challenges, endurance and sprint races. The challenging and spectacular new Riviera track boasts four unique layouts, each with daring corners, multiple blazing straight-aways and a few hairpins that will push these cars to the limit. Players that complete the package will receive an additional 125 Microsoft gamerpoints or 5 PlayStation Trophies as a reward for undertaking various exciting challenges.

Need for Speed SHIFT features an intense first-person crash dynamic and a signature cockpit view that delivers a true driver’s experience. The game further personalizes the experience through the all-new driver profile – a unique persona based on the driving skill and style of each player. With a perfect ‘10’ score from GameSpy.com and G4TV.com, and 90+ scores from IGN.com, Official Xbox Magazine, PlayStation: The Official Magazine, Team Xbox.com, Game Daily.com, Gametrailers.com and more, Need for Speed SHIFT is the highest rated Need for Speed game in years.

2k Games has taken up a partnership of the ages.  Good ‘ol Hugh has granted the people working on Mafia II fifty vintage Playboy covers to be used in the game.  These covers will be from the same timeline that Mafia II is based.  Don’t get overly excited to see the wrestler known as China sitting on the coffee table next to the scotch.

We will assume that these will all be PG-13 type covers.  No matter, this is a huge win in the realm of making the game that much more authentic.  We are that much more excited to sink our teeth into this sequel!

It can be argued that there is a lot riding on the success of this latest Final Fantasy game will help determine the future of Japanese RPG’s in western gaming. This generation has not been good to the genre as Japanese developers have struggled to find their place in an HD world. The days of menu driven combat and endless random battles are numbered in a world where fast faced shooters are king. Despite such obstacles,  the core Final Fantasy franchise has always seemed to break through and find its place in the west. This first iteration in the current generation looks to be no different.

FFXIII gives you the control of 6 unlikely heroes, brought together by fate as a war breaks out between the worlds of Pulse and Cocoon. Sounds pretty standard for a Final Fantasy game, but that isn’t necessarily bad. You can be sure that the story will draw you in and tug at your heartstrings. The downside is that the game is more linear then something you would see in a Bioware game. Depending on how you like your RPGs this could be disappointing, but the good news is that you won’t be bogged down by side quests and the story continues to progress.

While a solid adventure can be taken for granted, the combat system may cause some to worry. While combat first appears to be nothing more but a cascade of menu driven options, it still appears to keep you engaged. Rather then manually controlling the actions of your entire party, your focus stays with one character. You must manage the other two be selecting which role they are to fill, such as medic or commando. Changing your party’s roles while managing your main character will keep combat interesting  without getting too tedious.

It is about time we see a Final Fantasy game this generation. Re-releases and spin offs have flooded PSN and handhelds for far too long. If you enjoy JRPGs, then this is probably the one to get. If you have a choice between the PS3 and the 360 versions of the game, stick to the PS3. The 360 version is compressed on three DVDs and runs at 576p versus the PS3’s native 720p. Regardless of your console of choice, Final Fantasy XIII is sure to be an adventure that you won’t soon forget.

Check out our Final Fantasy XIII vitals here.

2K Czech has graced us with a nice new trailer for Mafia II.

This might just make up for the extra long wait for the game which should now be out sometime in the third quarter of this year.

The Misadventures of P.B. Winterbottom is a game that I have been enchanted with from the outset. Everything from the character design to the art style seem fully realized in a way that most games, especially downloadable indie games, often lack. Alongside the game mechanics that find a man obsessed with pie breaking the time/space continuum, lies the fantastic soundtrack which not only compliments the rest of the action but also contributes greatly to the final polish of the game. I was lucky enough to get a hold of the Winterbottom’s composer, David Stanton, and find out a bit more about the soundtrack and the design philosophies of the game.

Eric: Since P.B. Winterbottom was originally conceived as a thesis project at USC, how and when (As in, how far along was the title in development when you were brought aboard) did you become involved with the project?

David: That year I was a student at USC’s Scoring for Motion Picture and Television Program (SMPTV). I didn’t know much about the interactive media department or the Game Lab but I knew I wanted to write for video games. One of our professors sent a cattle call to all of us [composers] in the program; the game makers wanted Danny Elfman meets silent film and ragtime piano. You get a lot of blanket calls for student projects while in the SMPTV, but this one was different and very cool. I liked the vision so I sat down and wrote a little demo, which became the base sound palette and direction for everything I did afterward.

Eric: Both the audio and visual direction of P.B. Winterbottom are unlike anything currently out on the market today, did the visual style dictate the musical direction you ultimately went with, or did you try other styles before finding what ended up in the game?

David: Yes, the visuals go a great deal to set the scene, style, and tone of the piece. I hadn’t seen a frame of art before I wrote the first track but from every successive level on I was given art clips and backgrounds from which to work. It struck me that the game itself is a variation on the central theme—the mechanic of being unstuck in time—and so the music likewise needed to have a strong central motif from which to branch out: Theme and Variation.

My initial demo track became the music for level one, but every successive level was scored. For example, the second level you are essential climbing a clock tower so the music is a weaving of PB’s theme and the grandfather clock sound that everyone knows. The third stage is bakery on fire so I used multiple instruments to sort of ape the Doppler effect of a fire truck in addition to the persistent sound of delicious delicious pies being burnt. I tried to capture the whimsy of every level in different ways. Not that the user will catch all the allusions, ironies, and quotes—I wouldn’t—but hopefully it all ads together to make a really immersive and fun experience.

Main Theme from ‘The Misadventures of P.B. Winterbottom’

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Eric: What are the specific themes or motifs that are employed in Winterbottom’s score?

David: There are two primary themes that appear throughout. First is PB’s Main theme. It’s in a minor mode but jaunty nonetheless, not unlike PB himself. The second theme is of Winterbottom’s foil throughout the game: the huge Chrononberry Pie. As these two characters are intrinsically linked, so too are their themes. The first half of the Chrononberry theme is staid and sad, but can be made appropriately menacing by dropping the octave and tripling the speed. The second piece of the theme is actually the Winterbottom motif in a major key. Like us all, deliciousness and tragedy are baked into the very crust of us. The Chrononberry Pie is the force which unsticks PB in time, but it is this very unsticking that gives PB clones enough to ultimately eat the epic pastry. It is the Insatiable Appetite meets the Unfinishable Dessert. The Odd Gentlemen are Philosophers, really.

Eric: What was the composition process like – How closely did you work with the developers, How long did the composition process last, Anything you would have liked to add or change but due to time constraints were forced to abandon?

David: The XBLA game took about a year and we worked closely throughout. Our initial idea was to have a piano only version that would be coterminous with the orchestrated track. As the player would record himself to clone, the music would have gone back and forth between the two tracks. We ultimately abandoned it for space and logistical reasons but the prototypes were very cool and I would have loved to see it work.

Launch Trailer Music from ‘The Misadventures of P.B. Winterbottom’

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Eric: Have you played the final build of Winterbottom-? If So, What are your thoughts on it?

David: You work on a project pouring yourself into it, and in the process lose the ability to tell if it’s good or not. I always thought that this would be a game that I would ultimately enjoy playing, but I was not prepared for just how fun I find the final product to be.

Eric: Was this kind of a one off project or would you consider doing additional video game soundtracks?

David: It would make very happy to score games for the rest of my days, but as they say, “the work is getting the work.”

Eric: Can you tell me a little about how you came to become a composer and what first got you interested in pursuing a career in music?

David: Looking back, I have always been fixated with music and games and social justice. The dream is to make a living doing them. I have found a way to merge two of the three, one day—the trifecta!!

Eric: Do you have any favorite bands or musicians (Composers are fine too) that you look to for inspiration?

David: Not having breadth or listening widely is an occupational hazard. I really try to listen with open ears and take in everything I can. But I don’t want to dodge the question, here’s who currently comes to mind: Bach, Ravel, Prokofiev, Bartok, Copland, Bernstein (both), J. Williams, J. Goldsmith, J. Powell, Elfman, the Newmans (All), Radiohead, the Beatles, Café Tacuba, Sufjan Stevens, M. Maher, Israel Houghton, Bell Biv DeVoe.

Eric: Are there any Video Game soundtracks that you find particular engaging? What do you think are the keys to making a successful video game soundtrack?

David: I think there’s a lot of good stuff out there. I’m partial to the Halo Series, God of War, Mass Effect 2, flOw! I think the second question is one of immersion. The success of the soundtrack is determined by its ability to usher the user into the overall experience, whether it be cartoony, maudlin, severe, or pie themed.

The Wall of Sound Playlist

Main Theme from ‘The Misadventures of P.B. Winterbottom’
Launch Trailer Music from ‘The Misadventures of P.B. Winterbottom’

Bulkypix and Press Start Studio’s gorgeous 2D hack ‘n slash zombie killing game, Twin Blades, has a huge update in the pipeline for the game. Adding story cutscenes, boss fights, new abilities, and more, this update should add a lot of depth to an otherwise basic initial release. The update is planned to release in late March, and will be cheap as free on both the App Store and Xbox Live Arcade Indie Games versions. Check out the trailer for the update below.

When you are talking about a franchise like Halo, it is hard not to get excited.  Fresh of the the successful release of Halo 3: ODST, the brilliant minds over and Bungie decided to go back to the drawing board and make one final entry into the “Halosphere”, before moving on to bigger and better things.  The result: a completely retooled engine and a much improved graphical fidelity.

In preparation for May 3rd’s launch of the Halo: Reach multiplayer beta, we have been graced with a multiplayer centric new trailer, guaranteed to kick your frag’dar into overdrive.  Just be sure to watch out for the jetpacks. Yes, that’s right… I SAID JETPACKS!

So what do you think?  Is this this going to be a fitting end to Bungie’s involvement in the Halo Universe?  I know I am excited!  Now be a good boy and run out to pick up a copy of Halo: ODST, because that is the only way I can frag your ass once May 3rd rolls around.

It was one of the most eagerly awaited games of last year and this year and now it has slipped to next September but what is Just Cause 2 really all about?

Just Cause was a massive GTA-alike following the adventures of CIA agent Rico Rodriguez in his efforts to effect regime change on a small group of fictional Carribean Islands not too dissimilar to Cuba. Crafted carefully by Scandinavian developer Avalanche Studios, the game was a haven for those looking for some chaotic action and driving stunt hi-jinks.

The game was inspired by everything that made late nineties Bruckheimer movies so successful – huge stunts and explosions and loads of bad guys to shoot. Now Just Cause 2 is hoping to offer all of this and more… This time around, Rico has been dispatched to a small group of islands in the South Pacific to track down his old mentor from the Agency who has gone rogue. It may be a story that is as old as the hills but it never gets old; Avalanche has a few tricks up their sleeve to make sure that this cliche does not get boring.

Whilst Avalanche have changed a significant amount of the game for Just Cause 2, the core of the game remains the same. This time around they have benefitted from  a large amount of feedback from the first game. The features that made Just Cause so great are still there and in many cases refined and improved. Many of the problems with the first game have also been addressed. The first Just Cause was a colossal affair with the map occupying a whopping 250,000 acres of space. This dwarfs even GTA 4 in size but there was not a huge amount of variety in the  tasks that you could carry out.

Side missions were also very sparsely distributed and much of the map was made up of countryside. In some ways this was great. It gave gamers so much scope to experiment with the awesome stunt aspects of the game and many people went to the trouble of paragliding from one corner of the map to the opposite corner – which took a full 30 minutes  I may add. However there was not much variety in game play.

This time around the situation is much different.  Side-missions will now be much more varied and much easier to come across and much more varied. The storyline will also feature a greater variety of missions to keep gamers occupied and will also require you to utilise some of the other new aspects of Just Cause 2 which I will get onto shortly. In a playthrough at Edinburgh Interactive 09, the boys from Avalanche showed off some of the variety as they played through three missions for a packed-out viewings room.

This allows me to talk about the news aspects of the game. If you thought that the stunts were fun in the Just Cause then Just Cause 2 will now your socks off. One of the most popular tools in the  first game was the grappling hook that Rico carried around with him. It allowed him to paraglide from the back of cars and get up to higher ground with great ease.  In Just Cause 2, this has been taken much further. Rico can now use the grapple to propel himself forward whilst paragliding, he can tether himself to airborne helicopters and hijack them mid flight and he can use the grapple to attach things together and that mans pretty much anything in the game.

The penultimate mission of the Edinburgh Interactive playthrough was  the first part rescue mission. Rico had to expedite the escape of one of his informants who had been exposed by his former mentor. He was located in a building perched on the edge of a cliff and it had two  towers linked together by a glass covered bridge — very Kuala Lumpur. Naturally, the informant is pinned down on the glass bridge with no way out. The only way to save him was to hijack a helicoter and fly up to the building, cimb out of the helicopter as it hovers over the buliding and parachute down to the bridge, hook on with the grapple and break in through the windows next to the informant and then base jump out of the open window with the informant safely in hand. Even in this fairly early build of Just Cause 2 this was a pretty spectacular scene to watch unfold. The ease with which you can carry out such a complicated task is amazing and the whole crowd was stunned into silence by the tenseness of the situation.

This wasn’t the only part of the playthrough that demonstrated how much Just Cause 2 has improved on the original. One of the earlier missions demoed was a journey to destroy a fuel dump. On the trip there Rico used his paraglider and grappling hook to soar very quickly to his objective and then drop in unannounced. He ther proceded to cause chaos at the fule dump by shoting up the place and destroying the giant fuel tanks. Rico was running around and shooting everything in sight using a refined version of the targetting system from the original game.

He also demonstrated some of the grapple’s new features by strapping several guards to fuel barrels and shooting them from range to watch them enjoy a fiery death. This agian was an exceptionally impressive display of just how far the new game has developed beyond the original. In the climax of the demo, Rico and his informant have to escape by car across one of teh islands whilst being pursued by the local army. Now Rico can become a passenger in the car and use his expanded range of stuntman moved to shoot down his pursuers. The whole room watched, captivated, as Rico moved from the roof of his own car to the side, shooting out the tyres of the pursuing army vehicles or tethering them to the road with the grapple and watching as they overturn the moment the tether goes tight. He can also move much more easily between moving cars and he can hang off the side of the enemy vehicles, shoot the occupants and then jump to the relative safety of friendly vehicles or unfold his parachute end disappear into the sky.

If Avalanche had wanted to show that Just Cause 2 was going to be a far grander spectacle than Just Cause was they succeeded and then some. If all goes smoothly at Avalanche Studios between now and next September Just Cause 2 will be the action title to watch come its release later on this year.