Prey

Its been a long time since a good FPS was released on September 08, 2006

Its been so long since a good sci-fi FPS came out since the Halo series and all I have to say about Prey is WOW!

Graphics~ The graphics are amazing a little better on the PC but if you have a 360 and a somewhat good hi-def tv it will work just as fine even if you have a normal old model tv. Back to the graphics they are truly amazing, the enviroments are really neat, real nice hi-tech futuristic alien looking levels, I mean the art to the game is what made the game. I gave the graphics a 10/10

Gameplay~ The gameplay is great with its really amazing ideas like the gravity effects. The thing that really lured me was the warp portals they were really a nice idea to put that into the levels so you can use they for doing various tasks on the storyline missions. The controls have a nice feel to them and if you don't like it you can customize your controls to a certain layout that fits you best. Another feature I like is that there is no HUD its just a mini tommy on the screen that shows you your health and your spirit mode health. The Fighting system is amazing not only can you kill your foes with a wrench and crazy alien weapons of your choice you can switch to a new mode called spirit walk when in spirit walk you leave your body to do various tasks that your human body can not do for example in the game you will see alot off doors sealed off from a force field now you can't go through it unless you use spirit walk to go and then press a button to take down the force field. Or you can kill your foes with it too. I gave the Gameplay a 10/10

Storyline~ I enjoyed the story alot because of the facts that it is not a really complex story but still good as they kept it simple. Its about a man named Tommy and he has a girlfriend who owns a bar and Tommy is a Indian who does not believe in his religion and is always not wanting to believe in it and is cracking jokes to his grandfather about their faith who is pushing him to start believing his faith. So one night at the bar hostile aliens attack earth and while abducting all the humans they take Tommy, Jen (Tommy's girl) and his grandfather on an hugh alien ship where Tommy has to fight to save himself the earth and his two loved ones. I gave the story a 8/10

Online~ Is horrible its always lagging and what not. I gave online a 5/10

So I hope all you gamers out there will enjoy this review as much as I enjoyed Prey and encourag all you people out there who want to buy this game. In just a last few words this game has some nice replay value like once you beat the game on normal mode you get to play over but this time around there is arcade machines in Jen's bar you play game like Blackjack,Poker face,and a Pac-man type game. If you beat this game on normal mode you unlock concept art 1 and if you beat it on hard mode you unlock concept art 2, these concept arts just show you renderings of the game. In my opinion this game is worth the $60.00.
Its a good fun game to pick up and really get into it

Enchanted Arms

A solid RPG just missing some spice on September 08, 2006

Story 7/10
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Without spoiling too much, you play as Atsuma, an Enchanter who is studying at the Academy in Yokohama City. His friends, Makato and Toya are also studying at the school along with Atsuma. Early into the game (assuming you can get past the fact that your friend Makato has the most horrendous voice-acting in any video game, period) chaos ensues and the main goal is to defeat the evil Queen of Ice.

The story in this game presents itself quite nicely, but at times it drags a bit. And, sadly, this story is one that we have seen quite a few times in other games. The voice acting in this game is so-so's, except for Makato's. Atsuma's voice is okay at times, but you must forgive his character for being such a complete idiot sometimes. Thankfully, you can put the game into it's original Japanese voices, so if you do tire of the English voice-overs, you can swap to the Japanese voices at any time.

Gameplay 8/10
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This is a tactical RPG, so you will find yourself battling it out on the game's 6x4 grid system. The main objective is to position your characters so that they can attack the enemy on the other side. Also, whenever you get into a battle, your characters are place randomly around on the grid. I find this both a good and bad decision on the developers. It's good because you will have to change your tactics on almost every battle you encounter, but it's bad because sometimes it can be downright frustrating when you have to wait a whole turn to move your guy from the lower right corner to the upper right corner of the grid.

The game gives you alot of "Golems" (think of Pokemon) to collect, over 100 in all. There are also other various characters that will join your party as the game progresses, and they all have their own skills and whatnot. Another thing I really enjoy about this game is the fact that the level limit is 999, so if you really truly want beefy characters that can annihilate anything, you can do it in this game.

You can play online through XBOX Live, putting your party online to battle other players around the globe. I have not played with this yet, so I cannot say weither this is good or bad. Course it does sound like a good idea so you can show off your awesome characters.

Design 6/10
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This is where the game falls short. The areas you explore in this game are beautiful at points, but they lack life and artistic matter. The game just begs for a bush or a tree or SOMETHING to be put into a grassy pathway that your following. Emptry rooms and dull areas are quite frequent in this game.

The graphics are so-so. It looks more like an XBOX game than a 360 game. You will see lots of "shiny" enviornments as you play, which get annoying very quickly.

When the characters talk, they are put side to side on the screen. This is bad, again noting that this is a game for the 360. I was expecting to see alot of action from the characters in the cut-scenes, and alot of cinematics. Unfortunately,