Gaming off the Beaten Path

  It's always crazy to look at deep cuts and early efforts from some of the more celebrated developers and publishers in the industry. When we think of Nintendo, franchises like Mario, Zelda and Metroid come to mind almost immediately. But does anyone remember Excitebike? Not going to lie, those of us of a certain age probably do, but it's not really top of mind as a Nintendo franchise. At this point, isn't F-Zero considered a deep cut Nintendo Franchise? I mean, more than 20 years without a new game, right? Maybe it's time for a new one? Anyway, every gaming company had to start somewhere. It's not like Nintendo just popped up one day and started cranking out Mario games, they actually made Hanfuda playing cards for almost a century before they started cranking out light guns for Magnivox and creating consoles like the Color TV Game. But we won't be talking about the Big N today. We are going much further into the alphabet to the big R, everyone's favorite ...

  It's been a long road full of damage and destruction, but we've finally reached the end. We've been through the highs and the lows, the good and the bad, but we've arrived at the end of the Twisted Metal franchise. It's crazy, it's been 10 years since we've last had a new Twisted Metal game (at least an original one, remasters and compilations don't count), which is crazy to think about in a lot of ways. Remember, this used to be one of Sony's banner franchises, one gamers looked forward to with each new console generation. Even after a few lackluster entries early on, the series rebooted with Twisted Metal: Black to much critical acclaim and continued with a well crafted entry in Head-On. Sure, it was frustrating to hear about all of those cancelled games and  lost half finished ideas, but the series was very much still top of mind for PlayStation owners throughout the life of the PS1 and PS2. But those of us that were able to decipher a secret me...

  Thus far, our Twisted Metal marathon has taken us through the series, highs, lows and reboots. Now it's time to revisit what may be the series' most underrated title. Twisted Metal: Head-On rarely gets any love from the gaming populace at large and is often just forgotten when discussing the series as a whole. I myself didn't even know it existed until several years after its release, when I started buying up cheap PS2 games that Gamestop was liquidating towards the end of the system's life cycle. Initially released for the PlayStation Portable in 2005, the game was ported to the PS2 as the "Extra Twisted" edition in 2008 with added content. Full disclosure, that is the version I played for the review. I do actually have the PSP original, but I lack a functioning PSP, so playing that would have been a slight issue. The port was handled by Eat Sleep Play studios. Wait, another new developer for TM? What happened this time? Well, the PSP port was indeed develo...

  We've talked a ton about first series' first games over the past few weeks, but now it's time to shift gears a little bit. It's time to talk about reboots. I really hope it came through just how great I think Twisted Metal 2 is. I know I'm not the only one who feels that way, reviews and sales numbers back my conclusion that it's absolutely a game worth playing. The first game put the series on the map, but the second took it to the top of the world. TM had become one of Sony's flagship franchises and it looked like it was going to become a huge cash cow, turning out game after game like a well oiled machine. That was, of course, until the machine broke down. But it wasn't an explosive ice cream cone or a barrage of patriot missiles that did it in. No, it was something much less interesting. A contract dispute between developer SingleTrac and Sony caused the gaming giant to shift development duties to one of their in-house teams, 989 Studios. But tha...

  Consider your wish...granted. In the past few weeks, we've talked a lot about series' first games and how their predecessors improved upon the foundations they laid. I decided it was fitting to continue that trend with our next 10's game, one of the truly great sequels of all time and a game that's truly special to me. I reviewed the original Twisted Metal a few months ago and I talked a lot about how transformational it was. I also talked about how flawed it was, which, as we've seen the past few weeks, was common. You have to experiment and try different things, how are you going to know what gamers like and don't like if you don't try different things? This was especially true of early generation games, which the original Twisted Metal was, where developers were still trying to figure out what the new hardware could do and what users wanted from it. But not everyone takes to heart the feedback they receive from critics and gamers. Some developers aren...

  I've been looking forward to this one for a long time. I've skirted around it before, I talked about it extensively in my Warhawk review, I referenced it on my 10's list, but this is the first time I've ever done a full review of a Twisted Metal game. I touched on this in the Warhawk review, but I think you can safely classify Twisted Metal in the "off the beaten path" category. No new games since 2009, 12 years. The most recent release in the franchise came six years ago, with the re-release of Twisted Metal: Black on the Playstation network. It's kind of sad really. There was a time when Twisted Metal was a really, really big deal. Whenever one of these games came out, it was a big deal. Some were classic (I will eventually cover Twisted Metal 2 as part of my 10's) others were disappointing (TM3 is really, really bad) but there was always a lot of hype surrounding them. Then, it just wasn't. I have always chalked it up to the decline in popula...

 Sometimes, combinations just don't work out, even if that combination involves two things that are independently awesome. Think about it like this: peanut butter is awesome and so are tacos. I really like both of those things individually. But if you mix those two things together, you are going to create a disgusting, mismatched monstrosity. They might even pair well with other things, but not with each other. Peanut butter is great on its own or with chocolate, tacos are great on their own, but mixing them together is a terrible idea (unless you are talking about choco-tacos, in which case, mix away!). Star Wars Demolition should be one of those winning combinations. Vehicular combat games are cool and so is Star Wars. Vehicular combat games were popular when it was released in 2000 for the Dreamcast and PS1, with titles like Vigilante 8 and Twisted Metal leading the charge, while Star Wars had vaulted back into the cultural Zeitgeist with the 1999 release of "Episode 1: The...

After last week’s review, I found myself in the mood for a vehicular combat game.  I thought a lot about playing one of the Twisted Metal titles I own, but decided I would save them for later.  They aren’t that far out of the ordinary anyway. Instead, I turned a game that’s very near and dear to my heart, Vigilante 8.  The genre is almost extinct now, but in the late 90’s/early 00’s, vehicular combat games were everywhere.  The genre, at least in its 3D form, was essentially created by Twisted Metal and most of the games that followed it tried to one up the early PS1 title.  TM was filled with crazy cars, bizarre characters and cartoonish stages, so others tried to compete by trying to get crazier, weirder and more “out there,” usually to mixed results. Vigilante 8, on the other hand, went in the opposite direction.  Set in the Southwestern United States in the 1970’s, V8 ditched the demonic ice cream trucks and guys stuck ...