When it was released as a small bonus section to The Orange Box collection of Half-Life 2 and Team Fortress 2, Portal received such critical acclaim that many gamers bought the release primarily to give this new game a try. Based around the use of a portal gun that can generate two linked openings in any wall, allowing free passage between them, Portal remains one of the most unique games of the past decade, in a genre that can best be described as puzzle-first-person-shooter. Portal received such high praise that it spawned numerous discussions of the debate of quality over quantity among video games. Some worried that the stand-alone sequel, Portal 2 – which recently released, would not stand up to comparison to the dark humor-laden, but short original. However, the new Portal 2 does not disappoint. Containing much more content than the original, at least as mind-stumping puzzles, and perhaps even more humorous material, Portal 2 is a recommended purchase for nearly any video gamer.
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Tags: Game Reviews

Last time we left Marty and Doc in the Back to the Future point and click adventure from TellTale, they had just returned to 1986 after beating gangster “Kid” Tannen back in 1931. Only something happened in the timeline to make their present Hill Valley a police state, with Doc Brown in control. Now Marty has to escape the new Hill Valley and return to 1931 to prevent Emmett Brown from marrying Edna Strickland, the cause of the bad future. But it won’t be easy, as the time circuits in the DeLorean are malfunctioning and end up sending Marty into the past two months too late! Will he run out of time?

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Tags: Game Reviews

We get games here and they stack up fast. What to do with them after I’ve cracked the shrink wrap and checked out the content. I’ve also sent M-rated games to Military charities and kids games to www.GetWellGamers.com. I’ve sold some and directed the money to childsplay.org. But I’ve been lazy since my health took a nosedive and three years of games E-M piled up. Also, several Rock Band/Guitar Hero guitars, drums, and microphones. Some Leap Frog stuff , a steering wheel controller, and loads of DS games. Roughly 200 games in total. That’s a lot to ship to a charity. Then, at a McDonalds (I didn’t order anything) I saw the Ronald McDonald House charity and BOOM I knew what to do. See, this charity provides free accommodations to families with a loved one in the hospital. Often these families have children – kids in need of as much distraction as possible. I learned that first hand with my heart attack. Without distractions from family, my kids would have been a lot more traumatized and had my wife not been able to visit daily – I may have gone insane. Those kids need their families nearby and those families need comfort. So, yesterday, my family and I donated ALL of it to the local house

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Tags: GamerDad Press

Final Fantasy IV wasn’t my first RPG. Sure I played the original Final Fantasy and Dragon Warrior on the NES back in the day, but it was at a friend’s house. And while I had fun playing those early RPGs over there, I never felt compelled to buy them myself. But then, early into the Super Nintendo’s life, I played Final Fantasy IV (called FF II back then). I was totally enthralled with the story, characters, and gameplay. So even though FFIV wasn’t my first RPG, it was certainly the first one that got me into RPGs in the 16-bit days. Now you can relive or discover that special game with Final Fantasy IV: The Complete Collection on PSP. It includes the original game, The After Years follow-up, improved graphics and sound, and more extra goodies than you can shake a Chocobo at!

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Tags: Game Reviews

How long has it been since you’ve played a brand spanking new Pac-Man arcade machine? Well, that’s too long! Recently I FINALLY got to play the new multiplayer Pac-Man Battle Royale tabletop arcade game (thanks to my friends), so here’s a short picture blog and review of it.

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Since I love game collections and enjoy writing blogs about them, here’s one about the Sega Dreamcast Collection for Xbox 360. It’s not the best collection in the world, and I certainly would not pay full price for it. But I found it recently on Amazon for 15 bucks, so I decided to snag it then. So here are all the games on it!

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Tags: Game Reviews

There’s a new downloadable Pinball FX 2 table about to blast off onto your Xbox 360! “Mars” has a space motif, with a futuristic mission to Mars theme complete with spaceships, ancient Mars civilizations, and cute little ball-saving robots!

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Ninjago is a new LEGO toy line that includes playsets, cards, and spinners so your little ninja LEGO dudes can spin into battle. There are similarities between it and collectible card games and battle top games like BeyBlade. Now ninja fans can enjoy hours and hours of battles on their DS with LEGO Battles: Ninjago. It’s a Real Time Strategy game (RTS) featuring LEGO ninjas as they try to stop the Skeleton Army from acquiring legendary weapons of power!

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Squinkies is a popular toy line for girls, which includes cutesy collectible miniature critters that are soft and squishy. They come with playsets and other goodies, and now they have their own video game on the Nintendo DS. Choose to be one of three Squinkies princesses as you rescue your hidden Squinkie friends.

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Tags: Game Reviews

In less than a week as of this writing, one of the most highly anticipated sequels of this game generation will be released. And while I’m looking forward to the creative puzzle action gameplay of Portal 2, honestly what I can’t wait to see and hear is the hilarious shenanigans of Portal’s antagonist: the evil computer GlaDOS. GlaDOS quickly became one of my favorite video game villains after playing the first Portal, and that got me to thinking about other great video game bad guys. So in this blog, I’m going to list my favorite video game villains.

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Tags: Misc