Just another one of those blogs where I do brief snippets of the GamerDad.com games I’ve been reviewing lately. Prepare for takeoff.

Ace Combat 6
My little brothers LOVE the Ace Combat games, so I made sure to not pass up on the offer to review this game. A lot of times when I review games for GamerDad, I make sure to have my little brothers or other kids play the games, too. GamerDad.com wouldn’t be ‘Gaming With Children” if I didn’t do that, right? Luckily, some of my little brothers are in the teenage range now (which makes me feel OLD), so they can play this game, too, since it’s rated T for Teen. I always try and get their feedback when I write the review, and they’ve all given Ace Combat 6 big thumbs up, so once I finish writing the review, it’ll be a rather favorable one.

Of course, since Ace Combat games are from Namco, and me being a big Namco fan, my favorite thing to do in Ace Combat 6 is try and find all the classic Namco game references that I can. Ace Combat 6 has quite a few. One of the flight squadrons is named Sky Kid, which was a really fun old Namco arcade game. There are also tank squadrons in the game, too, and one is named the Quox squad. Quox was the dragon in the Tower of Druaga game. Another tank squad is called the Dragon Busters. Dragon Buster was another old Namco fantasy themed arcade game.

Another Namco game reference comes in the form of downloadable content from Xbox Live. There’s one plane you can buy with Live Points that has a character from THE IDOLM@STER on it. So what is THE IDOLM@STER, you ask? Well, it’s…ah, well, you know what? I don’t feel like telling you what it is. You can just find out on your own. Besides, it’s too stupid anyway. THE IDOLM@STER will never come to the US, thank goodness. However, I’m a little ashamed to admit it, but I actually bought that plane. Why, you may ask? Well, for one, flying around a fearsome fighter jet with a dumb anime girl on it sounded kind of amusing to me, in a silly way. Plus, it was worth the cost just to see the expression on brother Jeff’s face when he walked in, turned on the game, went to the hangar, saw that plane, and turned around to me and said, “Cary? What did you DO?!?” Hee hee hee. And then I made him fly a mission with that plane. Aren’t I mean? Jeff says that plane is actually pretty good because it holds a lot of missiles, but one disadvantage is that the missiles leave behind a bright green smoke trail, making it hard to see. Oh, and by the way, did you know there’s an IDOLM@STER song in Beautiful Katamari? Can you guess which song it is? I’ll give you a hint: it’s the most annoying one!

Games like Ace Combat 6, Halo 3, and Call of Duty aren’t really my cup of tea, but my little brothers love to play games like that now. They’re old enough to play them now, and in a way, I’m glad they have different tastes in games than what I do. It shows that they are growing up and developing their own preferences as individuals, and I’m proud of them for that. But in a way, it’s also a double edged sword because I kind of miss the days when they were younger and had less control over their gaming choices. So they played more of the games with me that I liked to play. So if you have kids or siblings who enjoy playing games with you, cherish as much of that gaming time as you can because it may not last forever!

Donkey Kong Barrel Blast
This is a racing game that was originally supposed to come out on the GameCube and use the DK bongo controllers to steer. But it got moved to the Wii. No bongo support, just wave the Wii remotes around like ‘air bongos.’ A lot of reviewers were bashing this game before I got a hold of it. But I wanted to try it anyway. I like the Donkey Kong characters, plus I was feeling optimistic and thinking maybe DK Barrel Blast wouldn’t be THAT bad. Boy was I wrong! This game is AWFUL! We’re talking Sonic Riders bad. Play control is horrendous. You’ll jump for no apparent reason. And you’re arms get really tired quickly from waving the remote around. Plus the computer players are brutal. I couldn’t get past the first easy Grand Prix cup! So stay away from this game. I’m glad I didn’t pay any money for this!

One of the reasons why I like the Donkey Kong characters is that one of my little brother’s, Jeff’s, first words was ‘Donkey Kong.’ When Jeff was very young and could barely talk (he could only say ‘mama,’ ‘da-da,’ ‘cookie,’ and ‘no.’ ). I came over to visit and brought my Super Nintendo with me. I put in Donkey Kong Country to show Jeff, and I don’t think he had seen a video game like that before. He just stared at it for a long time, and when his mom came into the room, he looked at her, pointed at the TV, and just started babbling excitedly 90 miles an hour! It look him only a few days to learn to say “Donkey Kong” so he could communicate with me that he wanted me to play it with him!

The Legend of Spyro: The Eternal Night (Wii)
Speaking of awful Wii games, here’s another one. Spyro’s newest is yet another bland 3-D platformer. It’s a shame that his games have gone down the tubes because I like Spyro WAY better than his usual counterpart: Crash Bandicoot. But the only good 3-D Spyro games are the first three done by Insomniac, and now they’re off doing the wonderful Ratchet and Clank games. Speaking of Ratchet & Clank, I played the PS3 one over at a friend’s house. It’s great, but not worth getting a PS3 over.

OK, back to Spyro. The main reason why this sucks on the Wii is play control is so bad. Double jumps don’t always work, and there are these special fury attacks that require you to wave the nunchuck and remote up or down. Never works. Plus it’s just rather bland and mediocre. Why play this when you could be playing Mario Galaxy? One thing that did shock me though was the production values of the voice cast. They used celebrities and voice actors like Elijah Wood, Billy West, and Gary Oldman. But even they can’t save the game. Did you know that Spyro’s voice in the old games was done by the same guy who was the voice of the Taco Bell dog? And the music in the old Spyro games was done by Stewart Copeland of The Police. See, I know a lot about Spyro. Has anyone ever been to EPCOT Center? Don’t you think Spyro looks like Figment? Do they even use Figment at EPCOT anymore? I don’t think they do.

The Legend of Spyro: The Eternal Night (GBA)
Here’s the big surprise. You know when most games are ported to multiple systems, the GBA version gets the short end of the stick and is the crappiest version? Well not so in this case. In fact, the GBA version of Spyro Eternal Night is the best one! It’s a 2-D platform game with a REALLY fun fighting combo system and fantastic graphics with fluid animation and even lighting effects. It looks like a good 2-D DS game, and some parts even look as good as say, Odin Sphere! I do wish it was a bit more modern Castlevania-like or Metroid-ish, it’s a bit straightforward. But fans of 2-D games, you definitely want to check out the GBA version of Spyro Eternal Night. Shocking, huh?

Crash of the Titans (Wii)
Here’s yet another surprise. Normally I HATE Crash Bandicoot and his games. He’s such an ugly, uncharming character, and his games are an excersize in frustration with one-hit cheap deaths and too basic gameplay. The only Crash game I like is the racing one. However, Crash of the Titans is the best regular Crash game I’ve played. You don’t die in one hit here, it plays more like a beat-em-up and you can even ride giant animals for extra punch, and the Wii specific controls work really well. I was worried that it was just me and my problem when I couldn’t get them to work right in Spyro. Another neat thing about Crash of the Titans is the dialogue is really funny. When you approach enemies, they’ll be carrying conversations along with each other, and if they don’t see you they’ll keep talking, and it’s fun to hear what they say. But once you run towards them, they come after you saying, “Hey, there’s Crash!” So yeah, I was surprised that this turned out to be good since I was expecting it to be bad like other Crash games.

Nicktoons: Attack of the Toybots (PS2)
I’ve reviewed a game like this before. It’s a beat-em-up game with Nicktoons characters like SpongeBob, Jimmy Neutron, Fairly Oddparents, etc. It’s not too bad, but not super great either. They should’ve given it the LEGO Star Wars treatment with full two player support. Only one person can go through most levels, but they have you pick another character that follows you that you can switch to. It makes no sense! One cool thing, though, is you can unlock playable Nicktoons from older shows, like Rocko from Rocko’s Modern Life. You can also unlock GIR from Invader ZIM. I love that cartoon and GIR is awesome!

Avatar: The Burning Earth (Wii)
I don’t really know much about the Avatar cartoon. I know it’s a fantasy action cartoon that’s popular on Nick. I hear it’s actually pretty decent, and it’s cool they have a fantasy adventure cartoon like that in a sea of cartoons with stupid and annoying kinds of humor (like SpongeBob or Oddparents). When I was a kid, adventure cartoons were popular because of toys like He-Man. Anyway, this Avatar game is a beat-em-up. It’s not too bad, really. Fans of the show will like it.

Avatar: The Burning Earth (GBA)
This is basically the same game, but in 2-D viewed in a top down fashion. And it uses passwords to save your game, which I hate in portable titles, so it’s not quite as good as other versions.

SpongeBob’s Atlantis Squarepantis (PS2)
I was worried this would be another generic collect-a-thon 3-D platformer game with SpongeBob, but it’s actually a collection of mildy entertaining mini games, so that was a surprise. One of the games reminds me of the quirky Japanese game Photography Boy because you have to take as many pictures of interesting things in a museum. You know, I don’t really care much for the SpongeBob cartoon, but I have to admit there’s one character on it I really like. It’s Patrick the starfish, SpongeBob’s friend. If they would make a show with just Patrick and nothing else, I’d actually watch it. I only know about SpongeBob because I’m around kids a lot.

SpongeBob’s Atlantis Squarepantis (GBA)
This one’s a 2-D platformer. Not very innovative, but it’s still fun for kids and the graphics are really great. That’s kind of the norm with most THQ kids games I play. They’re really not bad games at all. Nothing really groundbreaking or anything, but certainly not deserving of the slamming that a lot of reviewer punks give these THQ kid games. Of course, granted, some of these games really ARE bad (Zoey 101, I’m looking at you). But a lot of their other Nick games are perfectly fine for kids.

Link’s Crossbow Training
And that’s all I’ve got going for GamerDad.com right now. When I’m not doing those reviews, I’m still playing Super Mario Galaxy. It’s great. I could beat Bowser and save the princess now, but I keep finding new stars and worlds to tromp around in. Sorry Peach, you’ll have to wait a little longer while me and Mario keep on playing the game.

I also picked up Link’s Crossbow Training real cheap. It comes with a plastic holder to put your Wii remote in to make it hold more like a gun, but it’s kinda cheap and you really don’t need it. But I got it mainly for the game. It was only 20 bucks, so I figured, what the heck. It’s basically a Point Blank game with Zelda characters and settings, It’s pretty fun, I like it. One little nitpicky thing, though. I wish you could be other characters shooting besides Link. There’s no story involved so it doesn’t really matter here. Why can’t you shoot arrows as Princess Zelda? She’s awesome, especially in Twilight Princess. Or you could be the toddler kid who owns a shop, or Tingle (thought I don’t think he was in Wii Zelda). Or better yet, it would be cool if you could play as my favorite Twilight Princess character: Princess Agatha. You turn in the shiny bugs you find to her for money. She’s such an insane freak. But she’s still awesome.

And that’s about all I’ve been playing lately. Make sure to read the full reviews of these and other games at www.gamerdad.com. Please return your tray tables and chairs to their upright positions, and thank you for flying with us today.

Tags: Misc