By Nelson Schneider - 12/08/12 at 07:17 PM CT
Welcome back to another installment of the MeltedJoystick Review Round-Up. Here’s what our staff has reviewed since last time:
Nelson’s Reviews:
Fall proved to be nearly as dire as the Summer for our co-op reviews. We only ended up playing one fully co-op game (“PixelJunk Eden”), while dabbling in two others (“SoulCalibur 5” and “Nintendo Land”) and starting (but not finishing) another (“Torchlight 2”). Outside of co-op games, I was finally able to put the entirety of my Wii’s library to rest (experiencing games ranging from mediocre to spectacular in the process), clear the rest of the ‘PixelJunk’ out of my backlog, and dig into an incredible Indie RPG.
“The Last Story” – 4.5/5
“Overlord: Dark Legend” – 3.5/5
“Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: My Life as a Darklord” – 3/5
“PixelJunk Eden” – 2.5/5
“Pandora’s Tower” – 5/5
“SoulCalibur 5” – 3/5
“PixelJunk Shooter 2” – 4/5
“Cthulhu Saves the World” – 4.5/5
“Nintendo Land” – 3/5
Chris’ Reviews:
Chris’ attention span was broken this quarter, which kept him from finishing at least one of the games he started. The Steam Autumn Sale didn’t help, sending him into a spiral of tasting every game he bought (or was gifted for Steamsmas). He also liked “SoulCalibur 5” more than everyone else, and his Trophy Whoredom forced him to buy a copy for himself and re-earn all the trophies we had unlocked in our co-op sessions (which were under my PSN account). At least he did get to experience one of the few exceptions that prove the rule about licensed games sucking, as the episodic adventure based on one of his favorite graphic novels and TV shows turned out to be surprisingly great.
“PixelJunk Eden” – 2.5/5
“Nier” – 3/5
“SoulCalibur 5” – 3.5/5
“The Walking Dead” – 4.5/5
Nick’s Reviews:
Nick is STILL playing “Dungeon Defenders,” and we have agreed that he will write a 5000-word review in time for the next Review Round-Up. He’s also working on two video reviews for our new YouTube page, but has discovered that editing video is a lot more difficult than it sounds. Since he lay on the sofa in a torpor while Chris and I played “SoulCalibur 5,” he’s not obligated to review it, and neither of the other guys put as much time into “Nintendo Land” as I did, so he’s off the hook for that game too… for now. So with his lone review of “PixelJunk Eden,” Nick actually managed to stay caught up!
“PixelJunk Eden” – 2.5/5
Featured User Review:
This quarter gives another featured user review win to dbarry_22 for a series of short reviews for individual episodes of “Back to the Future: The Game.” While normally, we here at MeltedJoystick strive in the name of long-form reviews that sometimes go into excruciating detail, when it comes to episodic games, a long-form review can contain more content than the actual game. Thus short, connected reviews that don’t repeat themselves can provide all the necessary information about a complete game on an episode-by-episode basis.
Comments
Chris Kavan - wrote on 12/08/12 at 08:43 PM CT
That's why I did my Walking Dead review on the whole game and didn't break it down by episodes - much easier (though each episode on its own was pretty amazing). I have a feeling these episodic-type games are going to stick around and if they can match the same success and Back to the Future and The Walking Dead, more power to them.
