Mario Kart 7 is the latest in the series of Mario Kart, and provides crisp 3D graphics on the Nintendo 3DS system.

Mario Kart seems to come in threes. Super Mario Kart, Mario Kart Advance, and Mario Kart 64, all ran along the same lines. I’m not sure where to fit Mario Kart: Double Dash, but Mario Kart DS, Mario Kart Wii, and Mario Kart 7 also seem to be spiritual sequels of each other.

I feel that Mario Kart 7 is by far the best of the three in which it is found similar. Mario Kart Wii took what was good from the Mario Kart DS, and Mario Kart 7 takes the best from the Wii version.

This is also the down-side of having sequels for a ‘sports’ game. There’s not really a whole lot one can add to a kart racing game to make it vastly different. Mario Kart 7 adds hang gliders, Spot Pass functionality, and I personally feel that the vehicles handle much better.

There also seems to be much more to unlock, and it isn’t ridiculous things that I could never do in the past.

Mario Kart 7 brings back the coins from Mario Kart Advance and Super Mario Kart. Picking them up gives you a short boost, and collecting them allows you to unlock new gear for your karts.

So far, it seems to be the most well-built Mario Kart I’ve played. They’ve expounded upon features from past games, and even took the time to make the spiked blue turtle shell item pop up far less. That’s the item that damages whoever is in first place, no matter what. In previous titles, its frequency of showing up was ridiculous. Now, it’s not so bad.

If you’ve ever played Mario Kart DS or Mario Kart Wii, I highly suggest you pick this one up. You’ll be glad you did. I can’t seem to put this game down.

I’ve been a fan of Sonic since my childhood. The promises of a Sonic game that finally mixed old with the new in a successful way enthralled me.

The story is of the nonsensical variety in which some evil creature is stealing all the color from the worlds. Somehow in all of this, new and old Sonic keep overlapping. For instance, new Sonic explains that he’ll, “be right back”. Then, old Sonic comes in right after he leaves, leaving Tails doing a double-take.

Like most modern Sonic games, it is quite a throwaway concept. Unlike the old games, which did not even have a concept. I suppose one could not complain too much.

I picked up the 3DS version, much to my dismay. I forgot that I hate DIMPS. I forgot how annoying the rails, boosting, and how easy it is to fall in a pit or get hit by an enemy they made their games to be.

I just don’t sit well with DIMPS. The old Sonic levels with old style game play was not too terribly bad. However, when modern levels play just like Sonic Advance I think there’s a problem.

There was too much going on in the screen, and it just didn’t work.

I traded in the 3DS version, and picked up a copy of the game on the computer gaming platform Steam.

It was much, much, better.

The modern Sonic levels still maintained the Sonic Advance game play. I still have problems running into enemies on accident. Maybe I’m a poor game player. It’s always possible.

I need to convey the concept that you must avoid the 3DS version.

I argued that it was still a good fighter, but overpriced for such an underwhelming fighter. I still enjoyed playing it. I brushed off the fact that I got ripped off for buying such an incomplete product.

Somewhere deep down, I figured it had to be a cash grab. Reading about the financial strains that 2D work put on companies. Thinking about stress tests for new hardware like The King of Fighters Neowave was. I assumed that The King of Fighters XII was most likely in a similar situation. It met most of the criteria for being a stopgap for something better. Not to mention a few extra characters included in the art book, and extra characters found on the discs data.

Most of those hidden characters have made appearances in The King of Fighters XIII. Many of the staples of this series make a return in this installment.

So what’s the deal with the new one? I really enjoy it. The multiplayer still isn’t the best, and I don’t think SNK will ever learn how to do it properly. There’s tons of characters, a focus on teams, story mode, time attack, survival, a bigger gallery, and new fighting mechanics such as Neo Max Desperation Moves which are not unlike fatalities.

They don’t kill you automatically, but they require all your bars at the bottom of the screen (more on that later) to be filled up. I suppose it’s more like Marvel vs Capcom’s supers except all your pals don’t come out on screen.

You can fill your gauges at the bottom by doing simple tasks. On part of the screen it will say something like, “Do a drive cancel,” “Jump 3 times,” or “Do a special move” and you’ll get 50% stock each time you complete a task. It doesn’t make much sense to me that some of the tasks require stock from your gauge in order to complete, but not everything is meant to make sense.

Above the yellow gauge, there is a blue gauge. The blue gauge will put you into hyper drive mode. While in hyper drive mode, you can do different special moves and use different techniques.

The fighting seems more fast-paced than before. It is still very similar in nature, but less slow and clunky. There’s no zooming, so you won’t get disoriented in the middle of a battle.

The story mode is interesting, giving insight into the goings on of The King of Fighters universe, but it feels poorly planned. You start it up, and you go through a scattered mess of choices and a few fights. When you get a game over, you go back to the story mode screen where you are greeted with what appears to be something reminiscent of the gallery.

Empty spaces from scenes you didn’t see, and filled spaces with scenes you did see. There are a few different paths to take, and you don’t always have to start over from the beginning. For instance, if I click on the scene icon for a scene after I’ve made a choice, it seems like the game gets mad at me and gives me the bad ending fairly quick. If you start relatively near the beginning (before choices) and make all the choices you can advance further.

If you’re curious, yes, this game finished up the Ash Crimson saga started in The King of Fighters 2003. Yeah, that was seven years ago. I wish they still did them every year. I’m going to miss Ash, his whole saga was rather interesting.

Other than this slight annoyance (with no real reward) The King of Fighters XIII is a solid fighter. I’ve always found SNK fighting games to be loads of fun. While they are vastly different from the other popular fighters like Street Fighter, BlazBlue, Arcana Heart, Soul series, and Tekken I feel they are pretty easy to get into. If you’re unfamiliar the game has some simple tutorials that any novice can manage.

I picked up this game because I needed another shooter game. I was hungry for something I didn’t have to import, and wasn’t from Cave for once.

I’m not 15 anymore, and the promise of cute anime heroines doesn’t ring insta-buy in my head. I had heard that Otomedius Gorgeous wasn’t very fun, so I had held off interest for a while. Eventually, they announced that instead of bringing over Gorgeous they were bringing over Otomedius Excellent.

They had also said the release date was in July. The release date was pushed back to Nov. 8 and I recently got my copy in of the special edition.

The special edition comes with an amazing pillowcase, a fancy artbook, and a CD chock full of BGM tracks.

Such a happy pillowcase

After installing the disc, I decided to play a few rounds run-thrus of the game. I haven’t played a whole lot of Parodius or Gradius, so I was in for a definite change from the shooters I had been playing lately.

Each character has an array of weapons to choose from. There is a level one, two, and three slot for you to pick 10+ weapons to equip. While you play, these weapons level up. On the next play through they will be a little bit more powerful.

You obviously don’t get all of your weapons right away, but once you do you are a fairly formidable pretty princess of the sky shooting at bad guys. Once it gets harder, it seems more difficult to get back your weapons to the level they were at. I’m sitting here thinking, “Ok, how long can I stay this beastly?”

Not for long, because I’m really not that great at my favorite genre of games. This is alleviated as you level up your weapons on multiple runs of the game.

I’ve been playing it on the hardest difficulty just to see what it throws at me. Some of it is pretty ridiculous, and fills the screen up with bullets and enemies (just the way I like it!) One thing that really irks me is that not only do item boxes hurt you if you don’t shoot them to get the item, but there are also fake item boxes that will come up from behind you and in front of you randomly during certain parts of the game.

It’s not fair, but it makes things more interesting and I like that.

The bosses are fairly interesting, but there is nothing too remarkable to say about them. I’ve been having trouble defeating them before the invisible time clock runs out. Almost all the bosses walk out on me because I’m too slow at figuring out the weaknesses.

That being said, I think a person would get maximum enjoyment playing this with three people at once.

The game is only $29.99 which I think is a decent price for the standard edition. I only paid $49.99 for the special edition and felt like it was worth it. It’s difficult enough to where you’ll get plenty of replay value out of it, and also want to play through it with different characters in order to collect all the art.

Ever played Rez? Child of Eden is like that, but less wireframe and more beautiful.

In fact, Child of Eden doesn’t seem to do a whole lot differently than Rez. Sure, it’s pretty, but it feels like a Genki Rockets music video. I think that’s on purpose though. The girl character is named Lumi, and looks just like the singer. Coincidentally, they have a new album coming out 9/7/2011

Aside from me nitpicking the fact that the game focuses more on improved looks instead of improved gameplay, there’s not much else to complain about. The gameplay from the creator’s previous game, Rez, wasn’t even that bad. Tunnel shooters are few and far between, I appreciate a game that knows when not to change too much.

I’d wager it’s a bit tougher than its predecessor, but games regarded as ‘niche’ by the industry are allowed to be tough. You know, there used to be a time when tough was a good thing.

However, its difficulty changes quite a bit when you use your Xbox Kinect Official Microsoft Computer Entertainment Software System Official Hands-Free Accessory of The Forever. The nature of the game is to shoot things on screen while traveling through a tunnel (for the most part). Sometimes you get out of the tunnel and have to shoot things else where, but it’s mostly indoors. With Kinect, the game becomes a little easier.

You have to remember how to change weapons and other various gestures. A shooting game becomes a little easier when you just have to point at things to shoot at them. I’ve always found that a cursor traveling across the screen to shoot something was always a little awkward.

It takes some getting used to, like most Kinect games, but it’s still pretty fun if you play it with a controller. I prefer to play it with a controller.

Child of Eden has a fair amount of replay value, collecting extra items and getting 100% to unlock more things. I feel that this is sometimes used as a ploy to get gamers to play the same thing over and over again instead of making more content. The difficulty of this game lays that theory to rest. If something’s hard, I don’t mind being rewarded for my performance instead of just “Good job! You get a star!”

Child of Eden is out on Xbox 360 and will be out soon on Playstation 3.

People who have played Shin Megami Tensei: Persona series should be familiar with how Catherine operates. No, there’s no demon-collecting, dungeons, friendship-o-meters, or any of that nonsense.

Instead it goes back to that old style Shin Megami Tensei of Chaos, Neutral, and Light paths. Almost anything you say or do can effect this, and can effect your ending.

You are Vincent, and you are dating a girl named Katherine. It seems like a decent relationship until you wake up next to a blonde-hair girl named Catherine after a drunken night at the Stray Sheep bar. This bar, and this relationship dynamic is the focal point of the game.

The bar acts as a hub to where you can chat with different people and effect your ending path ever-so-slightly. Sometimes you will receive text messages and you can answer them.

What a cool game! You can send messages and meet up with girls. If only I had this game in high school I wouldn’t have been so lonely!

That’s not actually the bulk of the game. The best parts of the game is after Vincent goes to sleep. In the story, you find out that there’s some unknown force (whose liason sounds too similar to Teddy from Persona 4) is killing men who are unfaithful.

Being that this is an Atlus game, the killing couldn’t just be by means of any normal way could it? In Catherine, when you fall asleep Vincent goes to a world where everyone is a sheep trying to escape falling platforms of blocks.

I forgot to mention this was a puzzle game didn’t I? This is the meat of the game. You are climbing a giant tower of blocks, and if you linger… you die! It very much reminds me of TALL: Infinity for PSone mixed with classic elements of decision making from the Persona and MegaTen series.

The only difference is that Catherine is hard. It’s so hard that even Japanese gamers complained that it was too difficult even on easy mode (and they are known to like it rough).

Catherine sort of blurs the line between platformer and puzzle. In a platformer, you’re a character running around solving puzzles. In a puzzle game it’s all puzzles. Maybe that’s extraneous but it’s worth noting that you are actually trying to climb up all these blocks with Vincent.

There are also special boss stages where the manifestation of his fears comes to life and chases him in his dream. If you can escape, you wake up and start a new day.

Aside from the challenging puzzles, this game really impresses me with the stunning animation quality and amazing cutscenes animated by Studio 4°C. It should be noted that I am really biased on this aesthetically pleasing aspect of the game. This studio happens to anime some of my favorite animated movies and short films such as Mind Game, Genius Party, and Detroit Metal City.

Pick up Catherine, and pick up a challenge.

It has enough RPG elements to keep me engaged, and enough puzzle play to keep my fist raised to the air in anger. It’s very solid, and very worthy to be Atlus’s first in-house game this generation of console’s. It’s unique and interesting, and if it wasn’t so joyously difficult I would have finished it by now.

Similar in nature to how King of Fighters R1 and R1 had console counterparts.

Mobile games that attempt to be like console or arcade games rarely hit the mark. In fact, most people I know have a predisposition towards phone and tablet gaming in the first place.

Let me say this again, I don’t play these on a phone. I play these on a tablet. I have more space to finger the screen. Sometimes this is a good thing, and sometimes it makes things a little awkward.

In comparison to other fighting games for i-Devices I’d say that King of Fighters-i fares pretty well. Granted, I’ve been playing on easy mode so I am not obligated to memorize or attempt joystick commands while my iPad is sitting on my lap. I took the easy way out, and I’ll admit that.

Still, I had a lot of fun with this. I appreciate that it is made in mind for people on the go. You can even play against other people via a Bluetooth connection!

As you battle, you gain coins you can spend in a virtual shop. You can buy useless images, and unlock soundtracks as you play through the game more. It also supports Game Center, so that adds a decent amount of replayability.

Usually, you don’t have to play a tutorial in a fighting game. You can just pick it up and play. Not in the case of King of Fighters-i. Because it’s all touch-based, there are some special things it takes advantage of that you wouldn’t otherwise have known about. Bear with it, because KOF-i still tries to keep its complexity even though it’s on a touch screen.

Character selection has improved a little bit. Then again, SNK is a company that has too many characters to treat equally. Everybody has a favorite, and nobody is ever pleased completely with the character choices. I will admit, it I do appreciate being able to play as Mai, K’, and Kula Diamond.

It’s a fair amount of fun, and I never noticed any slowdown. There’s also a lot of King of Fighters history and cool bonuses you can unlock.

The King of Fighters-i on the App Store

I was always curious how these would stack up against their console and arcade counterparts. The question that always crossed my mind was, “How could I handle that many bullets on a touch screen!”

It actually works out pretty well. At least for the vertical shooters like ESPgaluda II and Dodonpachi Resurrection. In ESPgaluda II, they’ve added a new mode where you can touche bullets to rack up a new multiplier. Something similar was added in Dodonpachi Resurrection.

There really isn’t a whole lot to say if you are familiar with those two titles. The scoring systems are fairly complicated, but the games are easy to pick up and play.

Deathsmiles is a different story. Cave added a whole new character to the mix, and added a system to wear you can purchase upgrades for your character in a similar way to Trouble Witches! did. There is also an arcade mode in which you can play with the original characters.

Finally, they’ve added a substantial update to one of their games that isn’t just a vague new mode. The character has her own story and everything. However, some may not like it because it’s based way too much off buying stuff so that you have to work your way to using tons of credits to finish the game.

It honestly adds a lot of replay value, and I appreciate that.

Cave giveth, and Cave also taketh away. For all the positives I just mentioned, there is one really glaring negative.

In the original game, you’d push a button to face left or right. In the touch version, you have to push buttons which are all located in one corner. Perhaps it’s because I’m on an iPad but I find that I had a very hard time switching from left to right. The other buttons weren’t used much, or maybe I didn’t use them as much because of the difficulty of dodging lots of things and switching back and forth.

In other words, you may find some difficulty playing it the same way you played it on console. It’s still fun, and adds a whole new element to the game.

You don’t see too many games that treat themselves like Alice treats itself. This game is fantasy, this game is bloody, this game is strange. Madness Returns is a welcome return to the kind of platforming that we had grown accustomed to since the 3D era began.

This game seems to be missing something that other games of this nature just don’t seem to have. It has something special. Perhaps it’s McGee’s special touch? Maybe it’s a return of the Alice in Wonderland mythology? No, I think it’s just fun.

I think the same could be said for a lot of poorly-reviewed games these days. A game might not have polish or the best enemy design, but at least it has fun. That being said, I can’t find anything inherently wrong with it. Some of the chapters drag on, but there’s nothing that makes me want to give it a thumbs down.

As long as you don’t mind the Unreal Engine, Alice: Madness Returns is pretty fun. There’s intense platforming, hacking/slashing, shooting, and all sorts of cool stuff you get to do. If you buy it new, you can get a download code for a free copy of American McGee’s Alice, the original. Now, let me warn you, the first one hasn’t aged too well. However, some people may wish to play it out of some compulsory need to know the whole story.

BlayzBloo for DSiWare flips the traditional premise of BlazBlue on its head.

Instead of technical prowess and hi-res 2D sprites that the series prides itself on, along comes a game that is something you can play on the go without practicing for 20 hours a day.

BlayzBloo is a four-on-four 3D arena fighter in the vein of Power Stone. There are weapons, power-ups, and everything you’d come to expect from a standard fighter of this style.

Each round has a different setting. Some are fights to death, and some are to see who has the most points at the end of a match. While the game only offers a few diverse styles of gameplay and limited character selection, I’d say it’s worth the 500 Nintendo Points. The novelty of playing with cute BlazBlue characters and thwapping them on the head instead of learning combos simply feels right on the handheld.

Arc System Works has released portable iterations of their fighters on handhelds before, and they never really sat well with me. Guilty Gear Dust Strikers was god-awful, and all the Guilty Gear games on the PSP suffered from poor console design which is no fault of Arc System Works.

I can safely say that the developers finally got a four player handheld game right. Instead of trying too hard to be like its counterpart, it did something different. No, not something too different like in Guilty Gear Isuka or Dust Strikers. The game is not nearly as off-putting as those two.

Instead, one can find themselves picking up and playing this game with friends and just having fun. The game brings back the innocence of old arcade brawlers and mixes it with the atmosphere of games like Super Smash Bros. It’s not a serious game. There’s no story and there’s no gimmicks. For anyone looking for a guiltless novelty title with a few of your favorite deformed BlazBlue characters, I definitely recommend you pick this one up.