Street Fighter: Alpha Anthology
Throughout my life, I've seen arcades crumble and fall. There was a time when you knew the local arcade as well as you knew the local comic book shop. It was a place of unending din, where you would go completely insane if you were over a certain age and not completely absorbed in a game. Over the years, as home consoles grew in popularity, arcade traffic waned, until they became a hangout for drug dealers and child molesters with a pocket full of quarters. The local arcade became the Chuck E Cheese, the Pizza Hut, and the AMC. Their selection was poor at best, but because of the sheer rarity of an arcade, you played the shit out of the Simpsons game, even if you always got stuck with Marge and her freaking vacuum.

One series always dominated every arcade installation: Street Fighter. I loved the character design, the beautiful sprites, and the sheer fun of the fighting system. Everybody played different; you had the "Hadouken Whores", the jumpers that always played as Chun Li and never stayed still, the blockers who kept their joystick in a constant sate of back, and the button mashing kiddies who usually greased the controls up with their messy little kid fingers. Pizza grease + sticky soda/candy + arcade cabinets = bring a freaking wet-nap or you'll get hepatitis.

The Alphas, next to Marvel vs Capcom had by far the best cast of characters. I always picked Cammy, and to this day I play as her or any other lanky character with a powerful pair of stems (that means you, Elena). Alpha Anthology brings a flawless translation of the arcade classics to the Playstation 2, and completely succeeds in its purpose. I'm not going to be a big queen like other reviewers and knock it for not having online play (on PS2, ugh), I'm simply scoring it based on its contribution to the PS2 library. Finally we have all the Alphas on one disc, along with the surprisingly good chibi Gem Fighter, with no frame rate drops or ugliness (unlike PSP's Alpha Max). Although the PS2's d pad is extremely uncomfortable for fighting games, the joystick is perfect. It's almost better than the original cabinet's. Anthology has the choice of Alpha, Alpha 2, Alpha 2 Gold, Alpha 3 and Super Gem Fighter to satisfy Street Fighter fans. It's more than worth a purchase, seeing as how you can get it for $30 just about anywhere. With its great cast of characters, gorgeous sprites, fighting system complexity and nostalgia factor, this game is a must for your collection.

Niche: 2D Fighter
Gameplay: 9.5
Graphics: 8.5
Art: 9.0
Sound: 7.5
Music: 6.0
Replay Value: 9.5
Verdict: 9.0; You like Street Fighter? Buy it.


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Point Blank DS
Moving a light gun game to the touch screen was a risky decision, but after playing PBDS, it's only natural. I bought the original Point Blank for the PS1, rented the sequels, and changed my freinds' minds about it. The beauty of the series (over the games you bought the light gun for) is the addictive pick up and play value; like going to a carnival, without the smelly carnies and giant tweety birds. After taking too many shots in Time Crisis for the umpteenth time, not yet ready to ditch the gun, Point Blank was a welcome diversion. It also introduced my parents to the Playstation; instead of blowing away terrorists or zombies, they shot at targets, clay pigeons, and other friendly, familiar inanimate objects. The screaming of generic enemies is never as inviting as a metallic "ping."

I rented Point Blank DS via Gamefly, and after playing it for three days, I'm ready to buy it. It's a worthy addition to any DS library. The game responds remarkably well to the touchscreen' s commands, making it the easiest controlling point blank yet. Instead of aiming at inch high targets from across the room, most of the time your stylus is a millimeter away. In response to this, Bandai upped the ante. This is easily the most challenging Point Blank yet: I dare you to get an "A" in Insane mode. --Speaking of modes, PBDS has them aplenty. Arcade mode is pretty standard: you choose a difficulty, one of 4-8 stages, and try to complete them in a limited amount of time. The games range from shooting cardboard cutout bad guys to whacking plastic crocodiles. Other features include single cart multiplayer and a neat brain training mode designed to sharpen your reflexes and improve your attention span. It works, too.

The more I play Point Blank DS, the more I want there to be more light gun ports on this platform. Hopefully we'll see Time Crisis: Double Shooters (with WiFi co-op), Silent Scope: Dueling Snipers (with WiFi multiplayer) or House of the Dead: Death Strike (what, you think we haven't figured out your naming conventions?).

Niche: Variety/Mini games
Gameplay: 9.5
Graphics: 8.0
Art: 7.0
Sound: 5.5
Music: 3.0
Replay Value: 8.5
Verdict: 7.5; Find a good deal and go for it.

Singstar for Playstation3: Sony Brings It
Leave it to Sony to have one game that makes you buy shit for it, then keep meta-buying until you're broker than an MMORPG addict with a Mastercard. Singstar looks like alot of fun, until you factor in the $600+ you spend to get the PS3, the $80 you spend on the game with a microphone, the 30 you spend for the extra (because the game's no fun if you don't pretend you and your buddies are the hipsters advertising this game), the $50 you spend on the camera and the 99 cent+ karaoke videos that you could get for free if you watch enough MTV (to the point they actually air a music video). The other bitch is that since this is just another gimmick game to them, there will probably be more firmware updates to keep their DRM shit in check than actual content updates. Just look at what happened to the PSP, what had the potential to completely rock Nintendo's shit. It had better graphics than DS, had movies you could watch on its big beautiful screen, and all kinds of customizable goodness. What content did we get after that? A bunch of UMD movies and a scant catalog of decent games. No movie trailers (with Wifi they could have delivered it straight to the PSP), no music videos, nothing. We got stiffed with nothing but a big rubbery one in the ear, and annoying ad campaigns and commercials in the other.

Good part of this little trailer is the extra glimpse we get at the spiffy GUI. I'll probably still buy it (can't rent it without a mic) and sing Queen and Duran Duran way too much for a healthy heterosexual male my age. No matter what I say, I'm still buying the PS3 for the same reason I bought the 360, the same reason I am going to buy the Wii, and the same reason I write for the AFB: I love games.

Tony Hawk's Project 8
Recently we were blessed with the first actual gameplay footage of Tony Hawk's Project 8. Two days before, I previewed it at Activision; let's just say they have plenty of work left. When the teaser trailer hit Xbox Live during E3, the animation and improved graphics certainly wowed even the stiffest of upper lipped individuals. The well synced music (c/o Kasabian) certainly helped. The fact is, that's just not the game; it's motion capture. As I played the game, I immediately became aware of the new focus feature. With a simple flick of the analogue stick in focus mode, you kick the board from every conceivable direction... sort of like Fight Night. The biggest issue I found is that no matter how good that teaser looked, the game still has that canned animation feel. The player doesn't react realistically to physics or gravity, they still just float a millimeter off the ground. No matter what animations you capture Neversoft, you still have to have decent physics. The other beef I had with the build I played was the way-too-bullet-time approach to focus mode. The camera spins around to the same boring angle and you stay up way too long kicking the board around. While cool, it doesn't look cool in the least bit. I much prefer the casual low camera angles and speed moderation from the E3 teaser. Other issues are bad frame rates in areas, the still manic speed of gameplay (making every action a reaction) and the occasionally blinding bloom lighting. It's still a long time off from release, but they should keep those glaring issues in mind. It's still shaping up to be the best Tony Hawk yet.

Introducing AFB Streaming, our new method of delivering streaming video on the front page without the cost of large amounts of bandwidth. It has better compression than YouTube, lower bandwidth cost than Quicktime or Windows Media, and allows for embedding in flash movies. Why introduce this feature on the front page? Anyone with enough memory to watch a video on YouTube can sure as shit watch these videos. I am also a firm believer that video proof is always better than textual recollections. I like sharing game videos with my friends, and you, dear readers, are my new freinds, so I present to you videos! I troll the usual places every day for game videos, and if I find one that intrigues me, I'll make sure to share it with you.

Oh, and Half Life 2: Episode 2 looks fantastically better than Episode 1. Gordon in the woods? Ass-kicking Vortigaunts? New, awesome looking enemies? Count me in.

Behemoth studios brings us Castle Crashers; yet another Tom Fulp 2D sidescroller, this one along the lines of the cult classic "Little Fighter". It's being released on the Xbox Live Arcade. Alien Hominid, his other console game, hits the Arcade this fall.

Long awaited sequel to the Half Life multiplayer mod Team Fortress Classic now coming to the 360 and PC, with groovy sixties themed characters, etc. Can't express how psyched I am about this.

Comes with Half Life: Episode 2 and Portal. OMG Portal. O-M-F-G. Leave it to Valve to take Prey's concept and improve every aspect of it. Gravity gun + portal generator = too much fun.

Need for Speed: Carbon
Recently I visited EA and checked out the latest build of Need for Speed: Carbon. From what I played, the game is going along swimmingly. First off, it looks gorgeous in HD. The cars are shiny, the pavement is cracked and rough, and the fog looks almost volumetric, although I doubt it is. The first level I played felt less like Need for Speed and more like Initial D. It took place on a winding mountain road at night, presumably somewhere in Japan. I drove a Mitsubishi Lancer Evo in a race against another tuned up import. While the handling has been improved over Most Wanted, it still feels a little like you juiced up an AMC Pacer; it still doesn't feel like you're actually driving a car. This is the one problem I've had with the latest NFS offerings. When you play Project Gotham, the tires grip, they feel like they are actually spinning at top speed over pavement. When I whipped around in Carbon, it still felt like the car was floating. Sure, the background was passing by at the same speed the car was going, but It felt like they just never caught on. What, have they spent all their time ogling Emmanuelle Vaugier and slapping pretty stickers on car models to pay attention to the tires? Bah, they'll probably make it better. The other levels I played felt alot like the first NFS Underground. The tracks were well thought out, gorgeous, and alive. I avoided traffic by inches, toppled various environmental hazards into my opposition (including an exploding gas station), all driving by the light of my high beams. The new HUD is clean and product placement free, the sound is superb, and most importantly, my hour with Carbon was the most fun I've had with a Need for Speed game since the first Underground. We'll see how it turns out in the following months.

It's no secret that Microsoft has wanted to develop an iPod killer for quite some time. The big mystery was when and what. Recently, those questions were answered. Many know it as Argo, but its final title is Zune.

With Microsoft dipping into the iPod's near monopoly in hand held digital music providers, the scales may tip against Apple. The new "Zune" has been the talk of the Internets for quite some time now, and it looks sharp to boot. A large screen, comfortable button positioning, three colors, Xbox Live Anywhere connectivity and a new WiFi file sharing functionality might give it the edge, but the price point (30GB Zune for the price of a 60GB iPod) might hurt their chances of taking the lead over Apple's leviathan.

The other problem Microsoft has when coming in this late in the game is the level of advancement Apple has already achieved with the iPod: moving from Firewire to the Faster USB 2.0, a large variety of disk sizes available, several different models for different budgets and needs, and most importantly, the name they have established in portable mp3 players. An iPod can only become obsolete when Apple releases the next version. That's a huge accomplishment.

Microsoft legally owns the original patents to the iPod, and have a large market share in the company. Releasing a similar product this late in the game doesn't make much sense, but if it brings more features to the table, it's certainly welcome.

New Scoring System!
Game scores are now relative only against other games in their niche market. Shooters against shooters, platformers against platformers, side scrollers against side scrollers, puzzle games against puzzle games, etc. Behold the new scorecard:

• Niche
• Gameplay
• Story (if applicable)
• Graphics
• Art
• Sound
• Music
• Replay Value
• Verdict

Help Needed
We're kind of dead in the water with the redesign (codename: Kill the Queen) until we get a decent CSS coder to program our desired Wordpress Style Sheet. It requires knowledge we do not possess, otherwise you'd be staring at our refferral post right now.

I'm ready, willing and able to provide all the graphic design, most of which I have already made or am in the process of making. The layout and features are done for you, I know exactly what I want and in most cases where I've seen it before. All you have to do is make it all work.


layout preview

In return for your services (since we are flat broke), you get credit in the footer, a full color 140 x 260 px advert in the sponsor sidebar, and a link button in the link sidebar. If you look at the layout mockup above, you can see just where they land. I'll even make the advert and link button for you, if you indeed like my graphic design work.

So that's the offer, that's the request, that's the cry for help. I'll be posting this request in as many forums as I can. If you can do it, or you know someone who can, please contact me: antifanboy@gmail.com.

Sneak Peak
I'll be updating this with little pieces of the redesign, so keep an eye peeled.


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