Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (MS-DOS)

Developer:

Lucasfilm Games

|

Release Date:

1989

|

Systems:

Amiga, Atari ST, CDTV, DOS, FM Towns, Macintosh, Windows

---

This week on Super Adventures, I'm having a quick look at another one of those Lucasfilm/LucasArts adventures. It wasn't really part of my masterplan to play a pair of Sam & Max games in July then follow them up with a pair of Monkey Islands in September, but seeing as that happened I might as well finish the trilogy with a duology of Indiana Joneses. Uh, bit of a spoiler for the next game there, sorry.

The difference this time though is that I've never played this and I've got no idea what it's like. I don't even know if it's considered to be any good. But one thing I do know is that its full title is Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade: The Graphic Adventure, as Lucasfilm also developed a multi-platform Last Crusade platformer in the same year called The Action Game and they didn't want gamers to get them confused. That's good responsible labelling, I applaud them.

Weirdly another developer called Software Creations went and made a third Last Crusade game a couple of years later, exclusive to the NES. Which means the console got two entirely different Last Crusade action games. Later Indiana Jones' Greatest Adventures and LEGO Indiana Jones: The Original Adventures would revisit the movie as well. Not a whole lot of Kingdom of the Crystal Skull games out there though, you'll be shocked to learn.
Read on »

Developer:

Lucasfilm Games

|

Release Date:

1989

|

Systems:

Amiga, Atari ST, CDTV, DOS, FM Towns, Macintosh, Windows

---

This week on Super Adventures, I'm having a quick look at another one of those Lucasfilm/LucasArts adventures. It wasn't really part of my masterplan to play a pair of Sam & Max games in July then follow them up with a pair of Monkey Islands in September, but seeing as that happened I might as well finish the trilogy with a duology of Indiana Joneses. Uh, bit of a spoiler for the next game there, sorry.

The difference this time though is that I've never played this and I've got no idea what it's like. I don't even know if it's considered to be any good. But one thing I do know is that its full title is Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade: The Graphic Adventure, as Lucasfilm also developed a multi-platform Last Crusade platformer in the same year called The Action Game and they didn't want gamers to get them confused. That's good responsible labelling, I applaud them.

Weirdly another developer called Software Creations went and made a third Last Crusade game a couple of years later, exclusive to the NES. Which means the console got two entirely different Last Crusade action games. Later Indiana Jones' Greatest Adventures and LEGO Indiana Jones: The Original Adventures would revisit the movie as well. Not a whole lot of Kingdom of the Crystal Skull games out there though, you'll be shocked to learn.
Read on »

Developer:

Lucasfilm Games

|

Release Date:

1989

|

Systems:

Amiga, Atari ST, CDTV, DOS, FM Towns, Macintosh, Windows

---

This week on Super Adventures, I'm having a quick look at another one of those Lucasfilm/LucasArts adventures. It wasn't really part of my masterplan to play a pair of Sam & Max games in July then follow them up with a pair of Monkey Islands in September, but seeing as that happened I might as well finish the trilogy with a duology of Indiana Joneses. Uh, bit of a spoiler for the next game there, sorry.

The difference this time though is that I've never played this and I've got no idea what it's like. I don't even know if it's considered to be any good. But one thing I do know is that its full title is Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade: The Graphic Adventure, as Lucasfilm also developed a multi-platform Last Crusade platformer in the same year called The Action Game and they didn't want gamers to get them confused. That's good responsible labelling, I applaud them.

Weirdly another developer called Software Creations went and made a third Last Crusade game a couple of years later, exclusive to the NES. Which means the console got two entirely different Last Crusade action games. Later Indiana Jones' Greatest Adventures and LEGO Indiana Jones: The Original Adventures would revisit the movie as well. Not a whole lot of Kingdom of the Crystal Skull games out there though, you'll be shocked to learn.
Read on »

Developer:

Lucasfilm Games

|

Release Date:

1989

|

Systems:

Amiga, Atari ST, CDTV, DOS, FM Towns, Macintosh, Windows

---

This week on Super Adventures, I'm having a quick look at another one of those Lucasfilm/LucasArts adventures. It wasn't really part of my masterplan to play a pair of Sam & Max games in July then follow them up with a pair of Monkey Islands in September, but seeing as that happened I might as well finish the trilogy with a duology of Indiana Joneses. Uh, bit of a spoiler for the next game there, sorry.

The difference this time though is that I've never played this and I've got no idea what it's like. I don't even know if it's considered to be any good. But one thing I do know is that its full title is Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade: The Graphic Adventure, as Lucasfilm also developed a multi-platform Last Crusade platformer in the same year called The Action Game and they didn't want gamers to get them confused. That's good responsible labelling, I applaud them.

Weirdly another developer called Software Creations went and made a third Last Crusade game a couple of years later, exclusive to the NES. Which means the console got two entirely different Last Crusade action games. Later Indiana Jones' Greatest Adventures and LEGO Indiana Jones: The Original Adventures would revisit the movie as well. Not a whole lot of Kingdom of the Crystal Skull games out there though, you'll be shocked to learn.
Read on »

Developer:

Lucasfilm Games

|

Release Date:

1989

|

Systems:

Amiga, Atari ST, CDTV, DOS, FM Towns, Macintosh, Windows

---

This week on Super Adventures, I'm having a quick look at another one of those Lucasfilm/LucasArts adventures. It wasn't really part of my masterplan to play a pair of Sam & Max games in July then follow them up with a pair of Monkey Islands in September, but seeing as that happened I might as well finish the trilogy with a duology of Indiana Joneses. Uh, bit of a spoiler for the next game there, sorry.

The difference this time though is that I've never played this and I've got no idea what it's like. I don't even know if it's considered to be any good. But one thing I do know is that its full title is Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade: The Graphic Adventure, as Lucasfilm also developed a multi-platform Last Crusade platformer in the same year called The Action Game and they didn't want gamers to get them confused. That's good responsible labelling, I applaud them.

Weirdly another developer called Software Creations went and made a third Last Crusade game a couple of years later, exclusive to the NES. Which means the console got two entirely different Last Crusade action games. Later Indiana Jones' Greatest Adventures and LEGO Indiana Jones: The Original Adventures would revisit the movie as well. Not a whole lot of Kingdom of the Crystal Skull games out there though, you'll be shocked to learn.
Read on »

Continue

Super Back to the Future, Part II (SNES)

Developer:

Daft

|

Release Date:

1993

|

Systems:

Super Nintendo

---

This week on Super Adventures, I've got a 'Back to the Future' game loaded up and it's playing the actual theme from the movie! It's funny how few of them do that.

It's Back to the Future Day today! We've finally reached Wednesday October 21th 2015, the day that Doc Brown and Marty McFly visit in the second movie, and that makes this the perfect time for me to take a look at Super Back to the Future, Part II for the SNES. Other good dates would’ve been November 12th 1955 and October 27th 1985, but I’ve already missed them, so I'm basically on my last chance here.

Weirdly there was never a Super Back to the Future or Super Back to the Future, Part III, despite the fact that SBTTF,PII came out long after the movie trilogy concluded in 1990. There were plenty of other 'Back to the Future' games released for other systems, but this is all the Super Nintendo ever got, and it got it 3 years late. Sorry I mean the Super Famicom, as the game was only ever released in Japan (presumably because it's not very good).

Oh right, I should put a warning here that the game's based on the film, so I'll be spoiling part of the movie's storyline along with the game's. Assuming that the game even has a storyline.
Read on »

Developer:

Daft

|

Release Date:

1993

|

Systems:

Super Nintendo

---

This week on Super Adventures, I've got a 'Back to the Future' game loaded up and it's playing the actual theme from the movie! It's funny how few of them do that.

It's Back to the Future Day today! We've finally reached Wednesday October 21th 2015, the day that Doc Brown and Marty McFly visit in the second movie, and that makes this the perfect time for me to take a look at Super Back to the Future, Part II for the SNES. Other good dates would’ve been November 12th 1955 and October 27th 1985, but I’ve already missed them, so I'm basically on my last chance here.

Weirdly there was never a Super Back to the Future or Super Back to the Future, Part III, despite the fact that SBTTF,PII came out long after the movie trilogy concluded in 1990. There were plenty of other 'Back to the Future' games released for other systems, but this is all the Super Nintendo ever got, and it got it 3 years late. Sorry I mean the Super Famicom, as the game was only ever released in Japan (presumably because it's not very good).

Oh right, I should put a warning here that the game's based on the film, so I'll be spoiling part of the movie's storyline along with the game's. Assuming that the game even has a storyline.
Read on »

Developer:

Daft

|

Release Date:

1993

|

Systems:

Super Nintendo

---

This week on Super Adventures, I've got a 'Back to the Future' game loaded up and it's playing the actual theme from the movie! It's funny how few of them do that.

It's Back to the Future Day today! We've finally reached Wednesday October 21th 2015, the day that Doc Brown and Marty McFly visit in the second movie, and that makes this the perfect time for me to take a look at Super Back to the Future, Part II for the SNES. Other good dates would’ve been November 12th 1955 and October 27th 1985, but I’ve already missed them, so I'm basically on my last chance here.

Weirdly there was never a Super Back to the Future or Super Back to the Future, Part III, despite the fact that SBTTF,PII came out long after the movie trilogy concluded in 1990. There were plenty of other 'Back to the Future' games released for other systems, but this is all the Super Nintendo ever got, and it got it 3 years late. Sorry I mean the Super Famicom, as the game was only ever released in Japan (presumably because it's not very good).

Oh right, I should put a warning here that the game's based on the film, so I'll be spoiling part of the movie's storyline along with the game's. Assuming that the game even has a storyline.
Read on »

Developer:

Daft

|

Release Date:

1993

|

Systems:

Super Nintendo

---

This week on Super Adventures, I've got a 'Back to the Future' game loaded up and it's playing the actual theme from the movie! It's funny how few of them do that.

It's Back to the Future Day today! We've finally reached Wednesday October 21th 2015, the day that Doc Brown and Marty McFly visit in the second movie, and that makes this the perfect time for me to take a look at Super Back to the Future, Part II for the SNES. Other good dates would’ve been November 12th 1955 and October 27th 1985, but I’ve already missed them, so I'm basically on my last chance here.

Weirdly there was never a Super Back to the Future or Super Back to the Future, Part III, despite the fact that SBTTF,PII came out long after the movie trilogy concluded in 1990. There were plenty of other 'Back to the Future' games released for other systems, but this is all the Super Nintendo ever got, and it got it 3 years late. Sorry I mean the Super Famicom, as the game was only ever released in Japan (presumably because it's not very good).

Oh right, I should put a warning here that the game's based on the film, so I'll be spoiling part of the movie's storyline along with the game's. Assuming that the game even has a storyline.
Read on »

Developer:

Daft

|

Release Date:

1993

|

Systems:

Super Nintendo

---

This week on Super Adventures, I've got a 'Back to the Future' game loaded up and it's playing the actual theme from the movie! It's funny how few of them do that.

It's Back to the Future Day today! We've finally reached Wednesday October 21th 2015, the day that Doc Brown and Marty McFly visit in the second movie, and that makes this the perfect time for me to take a look at Super Back to the Future, Part II for the SNES. Other good dates would’ve been November 12th 1955 and October 27th 1985, but I’ve already missed them, so I'm basically on my last chance here.

Weirdly there was never a Super Back to the Future or Super Back to the Future, Part III, despite the fact that SBTTF,PII came out long after the movie trilogy concluded in 1990. There were plenty of other 'Back to the Future' games released for other systems, but this is all the Super Nintendo ever got, and it got it 3 years late. Sorry I mean the Super Famicom, as the game was only ever released in Japan (presumably because it's not very good).

Oh right, I should put a warning here that the game's based on the film, so I'll be spoiling part of the movie's storyline along with the game's. Assuming that the game even has a storyline.
Read on »

Continue

The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay (PC) - Part 1

Developer:

Starbreeze

|

Release Date:

2004

|

Systems:

Xbox, Windows

---

Today on Super Adventures I'll be taking a brief look at the first few hours of sci-fi movie spin-off The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay - Developer's Cut. I've played through the game before and I remember liking it well enough back then, but then I remember liking a lot of things and my fuzzy memories don't always match up to the truth.

The game was originally released for the Xbox (and later PC) back in 2004, but it received one of those HD makeover type of things three years later to port it across to the shiny new Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. They enhanced the visuals, tweaked the AI, added multiplayer, included a sequel campaign, and called it Assault on Dark Athena. But I'm not playing that one.  

The Dark Athena version may have the big advantage of having way more content and actually being sold online, but it seems to be built on the Xbox original, skipping the PC port's improvements like quicksaves and developer's commentary. Which is a bit of a deal breaker for me as I happen to like quicksaves and developer's commentary!

The original version does have one problem though and that's that it flat out refuses to start up on my PC. Well, it didn't until PC Gaming Wiki saved me yet again. It turns out that Nvidia owners can fix the game by "downloading Nvidia Inspector and setting the Extension Limit to 0x00001B58". This also reactivates Shader Mode 2.0++, so I can pretend I've got a GeForce 6800 Ultra in my case and push the graphics to max.

(Click the screenshots to view them at their original 1280x720 resolution.)
Read on »

Developer:

Starbreeze

|

Release Date:

2004

|

Systems:

Xbox, Windows

---

Today on Super Adventures I'll be taking a brief look at the first few hours of sci-fi movie spin-off The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay - Developer's Cut. I've played through the game before and I remember liking it well enough back then, but then I remember liking a lot of things and my fuzzy memories don't always match up to the truth.

The game was originally released for the Xbox (and later PC) back in 2004, but it received one of those HD makeover type of things three years later to port it across to the shiny new Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. They enhanced the visuals, tweaked the AI, added multiplayer, included a sequel campaign, and called it Assault on Dark Athena. But I'm not playing that one.  

The Dark Athena version may have the big advantage of having way more content and actually being sold online, but it seems to be built on the Xbox original, skipping the PC port's improvements like quicksaves and developer's commentary. Which is a bit of a deal breaker for me as I happen to like quicksaves and developer's commentary!

The original version does have one problem though and that's that it flat out refuses to start up on my PC. Well, it didn't until PC Gaming Wiki saved me yet again. It turns out that Nvidia owners can fix the game by "downloading Nvidia Inspector and setting the Extension Limit to 0x00001B58". This also reactivates Shader Mode 2.0++, so I can pretend I've got a GeForce 6800 Ultra in my case and push the graphics to max.

(Click the screenshots to view them at their original 1280x720 resolution.)
Read on »

Developer:

Starbreeze

|

Release Date:

2004

|

Systems:

Xbox, Windows

---

Today on Super Adventures I'll be taking a brief look at the first few hours of sci-fi movie spin-off The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay - Developer's Cut. I've played through the game before and I remember liking it well enough back then, but then I remember liking a lot of things and my fuzzy memories don't always match up to the truth.

The game was originally released for the Xbox (and later PC) back in 2004, but it received one of those HD makeover type of things three years later to port it across to the shiny new Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. They enhanced the visuals, tweaked the AI, added multiplayer, included a sequel campaign, and called it Assault on Dark Athena. But I'm not playing that one.  

The Dark Athena version may have the big advantage of having way more content and actually being sold online, but it seems to be built on the Xbox original, skipping the PC port's improvements like quicksaves and developer's commentary. Which is a bit of a deal breaker for me as I happen to like quicksaves and developer's commentary!

The original version does have one problem though and that's that it flat out refuses to start up on my PC. Well, it didn't until PC Gaming Wiki saved me yet again. It turns out that Nvidia owners can fix the game by "downloading Nvidia Inspector and setting the Extension Limit to 0x00001B58". This also reactivates Shader Mode 2.0++, so I can pretend I've got a GeForce 6800 Ultra in my case and push the graphics to max.

(Click the screenshots to view them at their original 1280x720 resolution.)
Read on »

Developer:

Starbreeze

|

Release Date:

2004

|

Systems:

Xbox, Windows

---

Today on Super Adventures I'll be taking a brief look at the first few hours of sci-fi movie spin-off The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay - Developer's Cut. I've played through the game before and I remember liking it well enough back then, but then I remember liking a lot of things and my fuzzy memories don't always match up to the truth.

The game was originally released for the Xbox (and later PC) back in 2004, but it received one of those HD makeover type of things three years later to port it across to the shiny new Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. They enhanced the visuals, tweaked the AI, added multiplayer, included a sequel campaign, and called it Assault on Dark Athena. But I'm not playing that one.  

The Dark Athena version may have the big advantage of having way more content and actually being sold online, but it seems to be built on the Xbox original, skipping the PC port's improvements like quicksaves and developer's commentary. Which is a bit of a deal breaker for me as I happen to like quicksaves and developer's commentary!

The original version does have one problem though and that's that it flat out refuses to start up on my PC. Well, it didn't until PC Gaming Wiki saved me yet again. It turns out that Nvidia owners can fix the game by "downloading Nvidia Inspector and setting the Extension Limit to 0x00001B58". This also reactivates Shader Mode 2.0++, so I can pretend I've got a GeForce 6800 Ultra in my case and push the graphics to max.

(Click the screenshots to view them at their original 1280x720 resolution.)
Read on »

Developer:

Starbreeze

|

Release Date:

2004

|

Systems:

Xbox, Windows

---

Today on Super Adventures I'll be taking a brief look at the first few hours of sci-fi movie spin-off The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay - Developer's Cut. I've played through the game before and I remember liking it well enough back then, but then I remember liking a lot of things and my fuzzy memories don't always match up to the truth.

The game was originally released for the Xbox (and later PC) back in 2004, but it received one of those HD makeover type of things three years later to port it across to the shiny new Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. They enhanced the visuals, tweaked the AI, added multiplayer, included a sequel campaign, and called it Assault on Dark Athena. But I'm not playing that one.  

The Dark Athena version may have the big advantage of having way more content and actually being sold online, but it seems to be built on the Xbox original, skipping the PC port's improvements like quicksaves and developer's commentary. Which is a bit of a deal breaker for me as I happen to like quicksaves and developer's commentary!

The original version does have one problem though and that's that it flat out refuses to start up on my PC. Well, it didn't until PC Gaming Wiki saved me yet again. It turns out that Nvidia owners can fix the game by "downloading Nvidia Inspector and setting the Extension Limit to 0x00001B58". This also reactivates Shader Mode 2.0++, so I can pretend I've got a GeForce 6800 Ultra in my case and push the graphics to max.

(Click the screenshots to view them at their original 1280x720 resolution.)
Read on »

Continue

The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay (PC) - Part 2

The chronicle of my epic prison break concludes!

Click this link to return to Riddick's cell: Part one.
Read on »

The chronicle of my epic prison break concludes!

Click this link to return to Riddick's cell: Part one.
Read on »

The chronicle of my epic prison break concludes!

Click this link to return to Riddick's cell: Part one.
Read on »

The chronicle of my epic prison break concludes!

Click this link to return to Riddick's cell: Part one.
Read on »

The chronicle of my epic prison break concludes!

Click this link to return to Riddick's cell: Part one.
Read on »

Continue

Aliens: Colonial Marines (PC) - Part 2

Click the highlighted text to return to the horror of part one.
Read on »

Click the highlighted text to return to the horror of part one.
Read on »

Click the highlighted text to return to the horror of part one.
Read on »

Click the highlighted text to return to the horror of part one.
Read on »

Click the highlighted text to return to the horror of part one.
Read on »

Continue

Aliens: Colonial Marines (PC) - Part 1

Developer:

Gearbox, TimeGate, Nerve

|

Release Date:

2013

|

Systems:

Windows, PS3, Xbox 360

---

Last year on Super Adventures I decided that April 1st would be the perfect day to give a critically mauled Duke Nukem Forever a fighting chance to win me over. Because if I ended up liking it I could always pass my opinions off as being a joke and escape with my reputation intact. So today I’m going to pull the same trick with the hated Aliens: Colonial Marines and see if I can find the good in it too.

Like DNF, this is a first person shooter famous for taking ages to make and impressing absolutely no one by the time it finally came out, though it wasn't in the oven for quite as long before it got rushed out and served undercooked. It started late 2006 and finished early 2013, with folks saying that it spent 4 years at Gearbox, then around 18 months outsourced to TimeGate, and then 9 more months at Gearbox. Apparently huge chunks were reworked each time it swapped over, which left Sega agreeing to pay out $1.25 million to settle a class-action suit when people discovered to their dismay that the demos they'd been shown were demonstrating content and visuals that hadn't survived to the final product.

Anyway I'm playing the PC version here, which I've heard is the least crap of them. I usually only play games for an hour or two to get an impression of what kind of game they are, but this time I’m going to keep playing the single player campaign until either I start liking it or I really can’t take any more. I even watched both 'Alien' and 'Aliens' in preparation so I can nitpick about every tiny thing it gets wrong! I could end up spoiling elements of any of the films in the series though (plus a decent amount of this game, obviously), so if that's an issue you should get out now while you're still safe.

(Click screenshots to view them slightly bigger.)
Read on »

Developer:

Gearbox, TimeGate, Nerve

|

Release Date:

2013

|

Systems:

Windows, PS3, Xbox 360

---

Last year on Super Adventures I decided that April 1st would be the perfect day to give a critically mauled Duke Nukem Forever a fighting chance to win me over. Because if I ended up liking it I could always pass my opinions off as being a joke and escape with my reputation intact. So today I’m going to pull the same trick with the hated Aliens: Colonial Marines and see if I can find the good in it too.

Like DNF, this is a first person shooter famous for taking ages to make and impressing absolutely no one by the time it finally came out, though it wasn't in the oven for quite as long before it got rushed out and served undercooked. It started late 2006 and finished early 2013, with folks saying that it spent 4 years at Gearbox, then around 18 months outsourced to TimeGate, and then 9 more months at Gearbox. Apparently huge chunks were reworked each time it swapped over, which left Sega agreeing to pay out $1.25 million to settle a class-action suit when people discovered to their dismay that the demos they'd been shown were demonstrating content and visuals that hadn't survived to the final product.

Anyway I'm playing the PC version here, which I've heard is the least crap of them. I usually only play games for an hour or two to get an impression of what kind of game they are, but this time I’m going to keep playing the single player campaign until either I start liking it or I really can’t take any more. I even watched both 'Alien' and 'Aliens' in preparation so I can nitpick about every tiny thing it gets wrong! I could end up spoiling elements of any of the films in the series though (plus a decent amount of this game, obviously), so if that's an issue you should get out now while you're still safe.

(Click screenshots to view them slightly bigger.)
Read on »

Developer:

Gearbox, TimeGate, Nerve

|

Release Date:

2013

|

Systems:

Windows, PS3, Xbox 360

---

Last year on Super Adventures I decided that April 1st would be the perfect day to give a critically mauled Duke Nukem Forever a fighting chance to win me over. Because if I ended up liking it I could always pass my opinions off as being a joke and escape with my reputation intact. So today I’m going to pull the same trick with the hated Aliens: Colonial Marines and see if I can find the good in it too.

Like DNF, this is a first person shooter famous for taking ages to make and impressing absolutely no one by the time it finally came out, though it wasn't in the oven for quite as long before it got rushed out and served undercooked. It started late 2006 and finished early 2013, with folks saying that it spent 4 years at Gearbox, then around 18 months outsourced to TimeGate, and then 9 more months at Gearbox. Apparently huge chunks were reworked each time it swapped over, which left Sega agreeing to pay out $1.25 million to settle a class-action suit when people discovered to their dismay that the demos they'd been shown were demonstrating content and visuals that hadn't survived to the final product.

Anyway I'm playing the PC version here, which I've heard is the least crap of them. I usually only play games for an hour or two to get an impression of what kind of game they are, but this time I’m going to keep playing the single player campaign until either I start liking it or I really can’t take any more. I even watched both 'Alien' and 'Aliens' in preparation so I can nitpick about every tiny thing it gets wrong! I could end up spoiling elements of any of the films in the series though (plus a decent amount of this game, obviously), so if that's an issue you should get out now while you're still safe.

(Click screenshots to view them slightly bigger.)
Read on »

Developer:

Gearbox, TimeGate, Nerve

|

Release Date:

2013

|

Systems:

Windows, PS3, Xbox 360

---

Last year on Super Adventures I decided that April 1st would be the perfect day to give a critically mauled Duke Nukem Forever a fighting chance to win me over. Because if I ended up liking it I could always pass my opinions off as being a joke and escape with my reputation intact. So today I’m going to pull the same trick with the hated Aliens: Colonial Marines and see if I can find the good in it too.

Like DNF, this is a first person shooter famous for taking ages to make and impressing absolutely no one by the time it finally came out, though it wasn't in the oven for quite as long before it got rushed out and served undercooked. It started late 2006 and finished early 2013, with folks saying that it spent 4 years at Gearbox, then around 18 months outsourced to TimeGate, and then 9 more months at Gearbox. Apparently huge chunks were reworked each time it swapped over, which left Sega agreeing to pay out $1.25 million to settle a class-action suit when people discovered to their dismay that the demos they'd been shown were demonstrating content and visuals that hadn't survived to the final product.

Anyway I'm playing the PC version here, which I've heard is the least crap of them. I usually only play games for an hour or two to get an impression of what kind of game they are, but this time I’m going to keep playing the single player campaign until either I start liking it or I really can’t take any more. I even watched both 'Alien' and 'Aliens' in preparation so I can nitpick about every tiny thing it gets wrong! I could end up spoiling elements of any of the films in the series though (plus a decent amount of this game, obviously), so if that's an issue you should get out now while you're still safe.

(Click screenshots to view them slightly bigger.)
Read on »

Developer:

Gearbox, TimeGate, Nerve

|

Release Date:

2013

|

Systems:

Windows, PS3, Xbox 360

---

Last year on Super Adventures I decided that April 1st would be the perfect day to give a critically mauled Duke Nukem Forever a fighting chance to win me over. Because if I ended up liking it I could always pass my opinions off as being a joke and escape with my reputation intact. So today I’m going to pull the same trick with the hated Aliens: Colonial Marines and see if I can find the good in it too.

Like DNF, this is a first person shooter famous for taking ages to make and impressing absolutely no one by the time it finally came out, though it wasn't in the oven for quite as long before it got rushed out and served undercooked. It started late 2006 and finished early 2013, with folks saying that it spent 4 years at Gearbox, then around 18 months outsourced to TimeGate, and then 9 more months at Gearbox. Apparently huge chunks were reworked each time it swapped over, which left Sega agreeing to pay out $1.25 million to settle a class-action suit when people discovered to their dismay that the demos they'd been shown were demonstrating content and visuals that hadn't survived to the final product.

Anyway I'm playing the PC version here, which I've heard is the least crap of them. I usually only play games for an hour or two to get an impression of what kind of game they are, but this time I’m going to keep playing the single player campaign until either I start liking it or I really can’t take any more. I even watched both 'Alien' and 'Aliens' in preparation so I can nitpick about every tiny thing it gets wrong! I could end up spoiling elements of any of the films in the series though (plus a decent amount of this game, obviously), so if that's an issue you should get out now while you're still safe.

(Click screenshots to view them slightly bigger.)
Read on »

Continue

RoboCop 2 (NES)

Okay, that's how you do a title screen. Shame they had to squash up the title a bit to fit it all in though; that poor letter 'B' has ended up overlapped and mangled.

Today I'm taking a look at RoboCop 2 on the NES, obviously, and I'm amazed that it's taken me this long to get a RoboCop game onto the site. Well okay my associate, mecha-neko, wrote a guest post a few years back about the 2003 PC game, but that thing's more of an eldritch abomination trapped in a crude video game form, and knowing too much more about it could drive you mad.

I've played a couple of the old RoboCop platformers in the past, but I've never seen this one before so it's all going to be new to me. If it's anything like the others I've seen though... we're not going to get on.
Read on »

Okay, that's how you do a title screen. Shame they had to squash up the title a bit to fit it all in though; that poor letter 'B' has ended up overlapped and mangled.

Today I'm taking a look at RoboCop 2 on the NES, obviously, and I'm amazed that it's taken me this long to get a RoboCop game onto the site. Well okay my associate, mecha-neko, wrote a guest post a few years back about the 2003 PC game, but that thing's more of an eldritch abomination trapped in a crude video game form, and knowing too much more about it could drive you mad.

I've played a couple of the old RoboCop platformers in the past, but I've never seen this one before so it's all going to be new to me. If it's anything like the others I've seen though... we're not going to get on.
Read on »

Okay, that's how you do a title screen. Shame they had to squash up the title a bit to fit it all in though; that poor letter 'B' has ended up overlapped and mangled.

Today I'm taking a look at RoboCop 2 on the NES, obviously, and I'm amazed that it's taken me this long to get a RoboCop game onto the site. Well okay my associate, mecha-neko, wrote a guest post a few years back about the 2003 PC game, but that thing's more of an eldritch abomination trapped in a crude video game form, and knowing too much more about it could drive you mad.

I've played a couple of the old RoboCop platformers in the past, but I've never seen this one before so it's all going to be new to me. If it's anything like the others I've seen though... we're not going to get on.
Read on »

Okay, that's how you do a title screen. Shame they had to squash up the title a bit to fit it all in though; that poor letter 'B' has ended up overlapped and mangled.

Today I'm taking a look at RoboCop 2 on the NES, obviously, and I'm amazed that it's taken me this long to get a RoboCop game onto the site. Well okay my associate, mecha-neko, wrote a guest post a few years back about the 2003 PC game, but that thing's more of an eldritch abomination trapped in a crude video game form, and knowing too much more about it could drive you mad.

I've played a couple of the old RoboCop platformers in the past, but I've never seen this one before so it's all going to be new to me. If it's anything like the others I've seen though... we're not going to get on.
Read on »

Okay, that's how you do a title screen. Shame they had to squash up the title a bit to fit it all in though; that poor letter 'B' has ended up overlapped and mangled.

Today I'm taking a look at RoboCop 2 on the NES, obviously, and I'm amazed that it's taken me this long to get a RoboCop game onto the site. Well okay my associate, mecha-neko, wrote a guest post a few years back about the 2003 PC game, but that thing's more of an eldritch abomination trapped in a crude video game form, and knowing too much more about it could drive you mad.

I've played a couple of the old RoboCop platformers in the past, but I've never seen this one before so it's all going to be new to me. If it's anything like the others I've seen though... we're not going to get on.
Read on »

Continue