Contributions > Descriptions by Hammerlore (702)

Sword & Poker 2 combines classic Poker game features with RPG elements.

In a magical world based on cards your hero returns home from his battles fought in the predecessor. Soon he is called for battle once more to fight back the dark shadow starting to cover the entire continent.

Through a world map the player chooses a dungeon to go into. Each dungeon consists of several levels with a handful of enemies each. Once facing an enemy the player's goal will be to reduce its hit-points by forming a row of cards you know from the Poker card games. A flush is worth more hit-points than a pair of two cards.

The player will find 3x3 cards in each level. His or her deck of cards will then be used to add two cards per turn on each side of the 3x3 board. One card opposites the second forming five cards in a row.

Defeating enemies earns the player gems that can be spent on new bags (increased hit-points), new weapons (stronger attack rate) or shields.

Defender Chronicles: Legend of The Desert King is in general a tower defense game that adds role playing elements to its gameplay.

You free certain areas of a world map by surviving waves of enemies trying to pass your gate at every level. Your hero protects the last gate of each level, but additional weapons will be needed. You will need to man certain points of each level with swordsmen, archers, mages or halflings. Every unit can be upgraded and you will have to find the balance of units to fight back the waves of enemies. Defeated enemies net you gold that can be spend on new units or upgrades.

Your hero earns experience in every fight, the higher the difficulty (there are 4 levels) the higher the earned experience points. The experience can be spend on your hero's stats. This might enhance the hero's health points and attack rate or his commanding bonus' towards your units which will result in increased health points and attack rates.

In addition to the experience points tokens can be earned at each victory to buy gear for your hero or spell-like items that will aid you in battle, like an additional unit to support your hero in battle.

In Doppelgänger you need to help Frank Blank to remember.

The game is a singleplayer arcade version of the Memory. On each stage identical pairs of cards have to be found. You are given only a certain amount of attempts. Too many misses will cause you to go "game over".

The amount of cards varies between the stages, rising slowly the difficulty. Each level has a specific theme for the graphics on the cards.

Mario returns to the stars as the everlasting villain Bowser has kidnapped Princess Peach once more, this time while she was baking a cake. It's up to Mario once again to fight and defeat Bowser and Bowser Jnr, among numerous new villains and obstacles, to save Princess Peach.

The basic goal of each level is to collect the golden star, either by reaching an end goal, collecting a number of smaller star bits, or defeating an end-level boss. The environment is a mixture of standard Mario stages filled with familiar evil characters and miniature planetoids with their own orbital gravity. Certain levels switch the perspective from 3D to 2D, mimicking the platform origins of the character, while others range from molten lava wastelands, ice caverns, or oceans. Unlike Super Mario Galaxy, Galaxy 2 features a more standardized level system, a number of galaxies split into smaller planetary levels that can only be reached by completing one planet, to open up the path to the next. To reach an end-level boss or open a bonus planet, you need to have discovered enough golden stars to unlock it. The hub world of the original has been replaced with a spaceship, shaped like Mario's head, which can be used to travel between Galaxies, as well as discover hidden 1-Ups.

Galaxy 2 features further improvements in gameplay, with two new suits for Mario and the return of his faithful companion Yoshi. Mario's first new suit is the Cloud Suit, which allows him to create three safe but temporary cloud platforms. The second new suite is the Rock Suit which, while wearing it, allows Mario to roll up into a rock ball, which will be necessary to complete some challenges or defeat certain foes. Yoshi adds an element of speed, can eat most enemies in sight, and can reach higher areas that Mario cannot reach alone. The green dino can also eat certain fruit to bolster his move set, but only for a brief moment of time, such as a speed boost, the ability to float higher into the air or to see invisible platforms, especially handy in a Ghost House.

Like the original Super Mario Galaxy a second player can join the experience by pointing the Wii Remote on the screen to collect coins or fling star bits, however, this time they can also collect items that are out of the reach of Mario or Yoshi, and push back enemies in advance of the hero.

To aid those too young or new to the franchise, a second DVD explains the ins and outs of the control system. Plus, if you get stuck along the way, you can also turn on the Super Guide, which gives control of Mario over to the AI to complete a tricky level for you. However, you don't win a proper star as a reward, only a bronze star. Various 'Hint TVs' are also dotted around certain levels to explain or introduce a new element to the gameplay.

NieR is an action RPG with a touch of Japanese influenced gameplay. The story takes place around 1,000 years ahead of our time in a mysterious world, where the earth as we know it, no longer exists. Nier is also the name of the main character who is seeking for a cure for his dying daughter. Nier is accompanied by a talking book named Grimoire Weiss, also used to shoot projectiles at enemies. Progressing through the game yields new powers and different weapons.

Main and side quests lead the party to various battles, controlled in a hack-and-slash manner using melee and ranged weapons as well as magic spells. Weapons can be upgraded and specialized to deal improved damage against certain enemies. The camera can be controlled throughout most parts of the game. The view switches to isometric or 2D-side scrolling at some locations.

The Japanese version of the game comes in two editions: NieR RepliCant​ (PS3) and NieR Gestalt (Xbox 360). The major differences involve Nier's appearance and his relationship to the character Yonah. All other international releases are based on NieR Gestalt, regardless of the platform.

Love Love is a puzzle game in the style of Tetris and Dr. Mario. Blocks of two pieces moving from the top of the screen to the bottom and have to be combined with other blocks matching at least for of the same color to make the disappear. Removing more than one group of blocks will enable combos to ramp up the score.

The game features a colorful graphic and almost hypnotic ambient sounds.

N.O.V.A. (Near Orbital Vanguard Alliance) is a first person shooter in a Sci-Fi universe where mankind had to construct huge satellites for people to live on as the earth was no longer able to sustain life. The game's style and scenario reminds of the Halo games.

The player takes control of the actions of Kal Wardin who has to stop an alien invasion threatening the very existence of mankind's new home. The game uses a horizontal orientation where the left thumb controls the players movement and the right thumb controls the weapons.

The single player campaign offers 13 levels at various settings such as jungle, snow, spaceship, bunker and an alien city. The multiplayer part offers 5 maps with up to 4 players over Wi-Fi or 2 players over Bluetooth.While most of the gameplay offers standard 1st person shooting material, there are some mini games involved in the game as well.

Scrap Metal is a top-down car-combat game in the vein of Death Rally with intensive use of weapons. It features a story-mode (with 60 missions) including boss fights as well as local multiplayer and Xbox Live online matches for up to 4 players. Additional cars and weapons can be unlocked throughout the story mode by wrecking opponents. This adds their cars to the player's junkyard. From there the player can select up to four cars to put in a car pool. Cars can be customized aesthetically, but also technically through upgrades paid for with points earned throughout the races. Cars are divided in different classes based on their statistics and sometimes a specific class of car needs to be used for a race. It is possible to put a car back in the junkyard and exchange it for another one previously collected.

Tracks feature shortcuts and jumps, and power-ups such as nitro boosts, health, repairs, and extreme firepower. All of the cars have a standard weapon, such as a machinegun, rocket launcher, shotgun or energy ray, as well as melee weapons such as blades or weapons used to push other cars out of the way. There are 20 different vehicles to choose from. The different types of missions include regular races, elimination races, derbies, and small arenas similar to those of Destruction Derby. There are also tracks where the player needs to escort another vehicle or target a specific enemy in a race.

The game offers two ways of controlling the cars. First, a directional steering sending the car in the very direction the analog stick is pointed at, and secondly a traditional left/right steering as one can find it in regular racing games.

Alan Wake is an intense cinematic action game with strong survival horror elements, told in successive episodes. The player controls the actions of the eponymous Alan Wake, a popular detective writer who tries to escape the pressure of creative expectations in a fictional town called Bright Falls. Pretty soon, however, Alan's wife disappears and he will be facing weird happenings forcing him to pick up a weapon and a flashlight. While Alan tries to uncover the mystery he just got pulled into, the story is told in six episodes, each ending with a title screen and starting with a recap of the recent happenings - just like a TV episode.

The key element in the game is light. During the game's daylight passages Alan explores and discovers Bright Falls with its town life and woods, including an in-game radio station and different TV channels. The game's dramatic and action-oriented elements start at nightfall. People and animals in the game turn into the most harmful beings at night. They are engulfed by a darkness that transforms them. Called Taken, they are extremely vulnerable when exposed to light and that is how to fight them. Alan's main tools for survival are a gun and a flashlight. Throughout the game, both tools vary and Alan will find better weapons and stronger flashlights. Flashlights require batteries and these can be drained, especially when he focuses the light into a stronger beam to remove the dark influence surrounding people and creatures quicker. Enemies can only be shot after the veil of darkness surrounding them has been removed with light.

In-game Alan is controlled from a third-person perspective and although he carries a gun the game does not use cross-hairs. The main focus in combat is the use of light and therefore Alan points at enemies with his flashlight while the game provides aim assistance at the very target. He can pick up additional ammo and batteries and there are also a few puzzle elements where he needs to interact with the environment to restore electricity for instance. Healing is done automatically by not taking damage for a while and there are also locations with lots of light where the creatures cannot enter, called safe-havens. Their health is restored even more quickly. Many of the story elements are told in different, scattered pieces from a general timeline. The player will for instance return to an apartment prior to the departure to learn more about his wife's phobia of the dark. Much of the time is spent exploring and there are also a few driving sequences. Other parts of the story are gathered through pages of a book's manuscript Alan has yet to write. These are stored and often provide more information about past and upcoming events. There are also many cinematic, scripted events and conversations with the townspeople. Similar camera angles are provided when shooting or dodging, with slowed-down time for cinematic effect.

The successor to geoDefense alters the way of playing this tower defense game. While the player was able to place towers on any free spot to stop enemies following a static path in the first game, it is now only possible to place towers on a field of hexagons to stop enemies rushing from A to B using the shortest path.

Two new type of towers add some variety to the game-play. Also new are the endless levels with unlimited waves of enemies for your personal high-score chase.

Angry Birds is a strategy game similar to titles such as Crush the Castle where it is the player's job to help the angry birds retrieve their eggs that have been stolen by nasty green pigs. Throughout the 105 levels the player controls a catapult loaded with one of several different species of birds to crash them into the fortified buildings with the pigs inside. To complete a level, all pigs must have been smashed through either the birds directly or pieces of the collapsing building.