2007 Eegm 07

GTA IV RESIDENT EVIL 4
8 pages of Liberty City

vs. New York City for Wii REVIEWED!
THE No.1 VIDEOGAME MAGAZINE
INSIDE:
NEED FOR SPEED:
PRO STREET
NINJA GAIDEN
SIGMA REVIEWED
ALONE IN THE
DARK
ARMY MEN...
SUCK!
XBOX 360: 8-PAGE EXCLUSIVE PREVIEW
BIOSHOCK
This underwater adventure is one of the most
amazing games we’ve ever seen. See why inside
NEXT-GEN
AWARDS
Best grass? Best sweat?
Best boobs? We award
the best of next-gen
ISSUE 217
$5.99 U.S. / $7.99 Canada
Display Until July 2
SPLINTER CELL, IRAQ?

JULY 2007
REINVENTED AFGHANISTAN?
Sam Fisher’s next assign- Why are videogames
ment is unlike anything avoiding real-life war
you’ve ever played before zones? We investigate
®
COMING SOON TO THE PLAYSTATION 3
COMPUTER ENTERTAINMENT SYSTEM
Las Vegas, Nevada. It used to be

America’s playground. Now it’s a battleground.
Use tactical planning to compete in

split-screen or online multiplayer matches.
*SCORES PERTAIN TO XBOX 360TM VERSION
WWW.RAINBOWSIXGAME.COM
Available for the PSP® (PlayStation®Portable)

system and coming soon for the PLAYSTATION®3
computer entertainment system
© 2006-2007 Ubisoft Entertainment. All Rights Reserved. Ubisoft, Ubi.com, the Ubisoft logo, and the Soldier icon are trademarks of Ubisoft Entertainment in the U.S. and/or other countries. Rainbow Six, Red Storm, and the Red Storm logo are trademarks of Red Storm
Entertainment in the U.S. and/or other countries. Red Storm Entertainment, Inc. is a Ubisoft Entertainment company. “PlayStation”, “PLAYSTATION”, “PS” Family logo, and “PSP” are registered trademarks of Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. Memory Stick Duo™ may
be required (sold separately). Microsoft, Xbox, Xbox 360, Xbox LIVE, and the Xbox logos are trademarks of the Microsoft group of companies. Software platform logo (TM and ©) EMA 2006.
O W N T H E B I R T H O F A G E N E R AT I O N .
Two classic epics that launched the most

popular RPG series in the world make their way
to the PSP® (Playstation® portable) system.
Enhanced graphics, a stunning new widescreen
presentation and unexplored dungeons await.
There is no better time to experience the finest
presentation of FINAL FANTASY yet.
© 1987, 1988, 2007 SQUARE ENIX CO., LTD. All Rights Reserved. ILLUSTRATION: © 2007 YOSHITAKA AMANO. FINAL FANTASY, SQUARE ENIX, and the SQUARE ENIX logo are registered
trademarks or trademarks of Square Enix Co., Ltd. “PlayStation”, “PS” Family logo, and “PSP” are registered trademarks of Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. Memory Stick Duo™ may be
required (sold separately). The ratings icon is a trademark of the Entertainment Software Association.
Alcohol Reference
Mild Language
Mild Violence
Game Experience May Change

During Online Play
CONTENTS
> issue 217 • July 2007
66
No War in
16 Iraq? Why?
Cover Story: BioShock Splinter

Plunge deep into this postapocalyptic abyss to discover
previously unknown powers, gadgets, and story details
24 Cell:
Conviction
> LETTERS 44 Online Scene 84 Ninja Gaiden Sigma
12 You should see our paper cuts.... 86 Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End
46 Preview: Alone in the Dark
The grandpappy of the survival-horror genre 88 Spider-Man 3
> PRESS START
returns from the dead
16 Lost in Battle 89 WarTech: Senko no Ronde
Why are we still fighting in World War II?
48 Preview: No More Heroes 90 Tomb Raider: Anniversary
The twisted mind behind Killer 7 explains
22 Foreign Object 92 GrimGrimoire
what not to expect from his new Wii effort
92 Odin Sphere
24 Preview: Splinter Cell: Conviction
52 Rumor Mill
Stealth, reinvented 93 SimCity DS
Q-Mann breaks the silence on Silent Hill 5
94 Pokémon Diamond/Pearl
34 Take This Job
54 Coming Soon
Animation directors make faces for a living 95 Final Fantasy
The summer gaming drought approaches
96 PQ2: Practical Intelligence Quotient
36 The Big Ones
> REVIEWS
Halo 3, Resident Evil 5, and then some 97 Innocent Life: A Futuristic
80 Reviews Intro Harvest Moon
38 Preview: Need for Speed: Pro Street
82 Resident Evil 4: Wii Edition 98 Reviews Wrap-Up
Making street racing legit
83 Escape From Bug Island
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8 • ELECTRONIC GAMING MONTHLY • www.1UP.com

> EDITORIAL
CONTENTS (CONT.)
Full Disclosure
I RECENTLY HAD A CHAT WITH ONE

of the editors over at gaming-journalism
watchdog site Video Game Media Watch
(www.vgmwatch.com). While outlining
the ethical standards that we abide by
here at the 1UP Network (which includes
EGM, Games for Windows: The Official
NFS: Pro
38 Street
Magazine, 1UP.com, and more), I realized
that I should just lay out everything for all
our readers. It’s only right....
Game companies are always trying to
send us free stuff. What are we allowed to
BEST keep? We do not accept any gifts—such
as video iPods, World Series tickets,
cash (in the form of contest prizes)...all of
which were actually offered to us at one
point. But we are allowed to keep cheap,
promotional items, so you’ll see game
posters or XXXXXXXL T-shirts around
GORE our offices. We also keep the games that
the companies send us, but EGM’s rule
is to put one away for the office library
copy, and the rest get evenly distributed
56 Grand Theft Auto IV:

106Next-Gen
to staffers who will actually play them
(absolutely no trading them in or eBaying
New York’s new rival Awards them for profit or gain of any sort).
We do not accept flights or hotel rooms
from the publishers, either—we pay for
> GAME OVER those out of our own budgets. And even
if we do fly out to see a game, we never
100 Seanbaby’s Rest of the Crap
> THIS MONTH'S EGM EXTRAS promise any coverage. We will accept
Ripping apart the Army Men games
meals (say, for a business lunch or dinner),
is more fun than playing them
102 Retro: Retro Resources EGM.1UP.COM but we often pick up the tab too, to keep
it fair. For example, during a recent Grand
Tips on how to own the classics Theft Auto IV demo, we paid for dinner
BioShock
104 Grudge Match between Rockstar and us, since Rockstar
Video footage, user-submitted Q&A, and more!
paid for dinner the last time we met up.
106 Next-Gen Awards
Need for Speed: Pro Street All of this must seem pretty obvious to
108 Final Word Check out exclusive footage of EA’s new racer. you, huh? After all, how can a magazine
109 Next Month Spider-Man 3 and Pokémon SuperGuides or website editor be totally objective if
a company just flew him out to see their
110 Hsu & Chan Summer games got you down? Check out these two
game? But you’d be surprised.
guides to get a leg-up on the competition.
Help keep the industry honest. Read
VGM Watch (we told them to keep an eye
And check out our podcast on us, too...because we have to be as
on EGMLive.1UP.com and accountable as everyone else), or better
our message boards at yet, ask your favorite magazine or website
EGMboards.1UP.com. what their policies are. The more you
know, the more you know whom to trust.
—Dan “Shoe” Hsu, Editor-in-Chief
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LETTERS
> violence, decapitated rhinos, and rock ’n’ roll
> TRIVIAL Letter of the Month

ISSUE Jackassery
This month’s Staying true to form, immediately fol-
EGM question:
lowing the Virginia Tech shootings,
BioShock is the dim-witted, hard-line gameophobe
spiritual successor to
what PC series?
[attorney] Jack Thompson asserted
that videogames in general, and
E-mail the answer to
EGM@ziffdavis.com
Counter-Strike in particular, were the
(subject head: impetus behind Seung-Hui Cho’s mer-
Trivia: EGM #217) ciless attacks (a speculation that was
for a chance to win soon proven dubious by testimony
something potentially
awesome.
from Cho’s former roommate).
Knee-jerk ideologues of all stripes
swarm around tragedies like this ■ Cooking Mama says: “Remember, kids, don’t try to cook in real life!”
one because it allows them to warp
the event to further their agenda:
The antigun lobby blames guns, gun One sad rocker nology makes it impossible to prop-
nuts blame the victims’ lack of guns, I recently purchased Guitar Hero and erly pass the special functions of
[antigay Kansas minister] Fred Phelps a wireless guitar. Having sold my PS2 the guitar controller to the PS3 with
blames homosexuality, and Thompson because I got a PS3 for Christmas, I its existing protocol. We will not
blames Bill Gates. thought that after I bought an adaptor produce a product if it falls short of
What many of these simplistic, for PS2 controllers, Guitar Hero would those expectations.” Luckily, recent
hair-trigger reactionaries forget is work. So I plugged in the adapter and PS3 firmware updates are slowly
an ancient truism of the sciences: the receiver and started the game, but edging toward full functionality with
Correlation does not imply causation. it didn’t work! I was confused, so I all PS2 controllers: As of the April
Even if Cho played videogames con- went online and saw that I had bought update to version 1.7, the system
stantly—violent ones, at that—to my the wrong adapter! I needed the Nyko at least recognizes the existence of
knowledge, there is no hard evidence Play Adapter. You said in EGM #213, the guitar when you plug it in. Hey,
that doing so could or would stimu- on page 97, that you could find it in baby steps, right?
late him into acting out something in stores, but I looked on Nyko’s web-
the real world that he’d experienced site, and it wasn’t scheduled to come Believe!
virtually. (I wonder—if Cooking Mama out until Q2 2007! Please help! I read about Zephyr in the “Moore’s
becomes very popular, will kids start —Name withheld Law 2” article (EGM #214), so I
whipping up soufflés and paella?) researched it. The so-called “leak”
Millions of people play videogames, It gets worse: Nyko’s Play Adapter about the future 360 is a five-sentence
yet the extreme majority never come has now been put on indefinite paragraph with no credibility and a
close to behaving violently. That hold. In a statement to gaming site Photoshopped picture of the back of
seems evidence enough to let video- Kotaku, Nyko said, “Current tech- a 360 with a black area where the new
games off the hook.
—Timothy R. Graham
Well put. > FAREWELL, FABIO
To each his own...but you’re Ask an EGM cover model...

still wrong After spending the last six months answering reader questions
about love, life, and post-workout shakes, former EGM cover
I have recently bought Castlevania
model Fabio, we figure, has done enough good. So we’re
Double Pack for the GBA. I read all of
sending him off with a final reader question that has long
the good reviews in your magazine, so deserved answering....
I decided, “What the heck?” Overall, I
was very disappointed. I was wonder- Dear Fabio: How the hell did you wind up on the cover of
ing if I am missing something, or is the Ironsword and, consequently, EGM 19 years ago? —Scott
game really a cheap Metroid rip-off?
—David Brubaker Fabio responds: At that time, videogames featured mostly cartoon charac-
ters or primitive drawings. My agency was Ford Modeling Agency, and they
For writing this sent me to this casting where they were choosing two people to be on the
month’s winning Apparently, you are missing some-
cover of a game. One was me. The other was wrestler Hulk Hogan.
letter, Timothy gets thing: taste. Sure, Metroid served
a copy of Manhunt. as a source of inspiration for recent
Unless we don’t have Starting next month, we want to hear about your biggest gaming mistakes. Did you buy an
Castlevanias (series producer Koji expensive racing chair that’s now collecting dust? Did you get Vexx tattooed on your pri-
one handy, in which
case he gets Igarashi even admitted as much vates? Send your story and a pic to EGM@ziffdavis.com, subject: “My Biggest Mistake.”
something else. himself), but a rip-off? You’re crazy.

other information to get people system is covered. Until you get the
interested in dropping some quar- problem fixed, make sure you keep
ters into the machine. The tradition the machine horizontal; it’s slightly
carried over to console games; more stable that way and may not
you’ll notice if you boot up pretty scratch your discs.
much any game and leave it sitting As for what to do with the
LETTERS
for a while, it will tend to move into damaged discs? You might be
a similar demo mode. Designers able to salvage them. Maybe. A
still include this function to avoid company called Digital Innovations
screen burn-in. So you press Start (www.digitalinnovations.com)
to interrupt the demo and get into makes a product called GameDR
the real game. Now someone cue that actually does repair scratches
the “The More You Know” music. to discs. We’ve had success in
the past, but if your scratches are
Sit! Roll over! Decapitate! particularly deep, you may be out of
Why do some of the best games luck; you’ve got a couple of lovely,
made have to be rated Mature? I have shiny, $60 coasters on your hands.
been looking forward to Lair since
the second it was announced, under We demand convenience!
the hope that when it was released, it In EGM #215, someone in the Letters
would be rated Teen. All of a sudden, section griped about the loss of back-
my hopes were snuffed out in the form ward compatibility in the PS3. Look at
■ The Xbox 360 Elite—not so mythical after all. of a decapitated rhino in the latest the facts: Everyone and their brother/
trailer. I know the ESRB will give Lair sister/mother/toaster/walrus has a
a Mature rating now, but why? How PS2! If you just keep your PS2, you
ports would be. It doesn’t look real at is a teenager going to gain access to can play all the games without fuss!
all, and people are believing it to be enough genetic technology to create Oh, boo-hoo, you may have to change
true. I’m sorry, my poor 360 brethren, a dragon, let alone teach it to rip off a wires and AV inputs every once in a
but please don’t believe everything rhino’s head? —John Keaney while. If people weren’t so lazy, they’d
you hear. —Khris Dickover realize that taking out backward com-
You may be surprised to learn that patibility will lower the price. If you’re
Man, do we love printing letters like training a dragon really isn’t as dif- too lethargic to care, then you need to
this. Where to begin the mocking? ficult as it sounds. All it requires is grow a brain and get off the couch.
Should we just reply with a picture patience, some very large snack —Chris Woodiel
of the 360 Elite page at xbox.com? treats, a rolled-up newspaper, and
Go the sarcastic route by saying asbestos underwear. And since But getting up is hard.
something like, “Apparently, there dragons are natural-born decapita-
are folks out there with such mad tors, the whole rhino thing ends up Feel the burn
Photoshop skills that they’ve man- being just the work of an afternoon. How much do you have to play to
aged to make us believe we actu- Now, teaching them to use the litter get carpal tunnel? I play about 20 to
ally have a 360 Elite in our office box? That’s a challenge. 30 hours a week. I’ve been playing
right now”? Or take the lowbrow games since I was 10, and I’m going
approach and just make fun of this Scratching post to keep playing till I’m 80. Are my
guy’s name? So many options! I recently received an Xbox 360 as hands gonna become useless?
a Christmas gift. After two weeks of —Ricardo Cuellar
Don’t let’s start owning Oblivion, the 360 managed to
Why do we always “press Start” at the give it a deep scratch that ringed the This is kinda like “How many licks
title screen of games? Pretty much entire disc, making it impossible to does it take to get to the center
every game you play has you press play. I had to keep playing Oblivion, of a Tootsie Pop?” The world may
Start or “press any button” to start the so I bought another one. One day, never know. But we assume there’s
game. I’ve asked around, and nobody the 360 told me there was an error a reason for all that info in the front
knows why this is. Is it a technical rea- reading the disc. To my horror, I found of any game manual about taking
> OOPS! son, so the game doesn’t have to load another ringed scratch. Please, for the frequent breaks and so on. Tell you
Since it might not
more info than it has to before you love of 100-plus-hour gameplay, tell what, why don’t you keep playing
have been obvious in
last month’s preview start actually playing? Is it so gamers me what the heck I am doing wrong, and write back to us when you’re
of God of War: Chains don’t screw things up by accidentally and advise me on what to do with my 80? If you can still type, that is. P
of Olympus, we want- hitting random buttons when they’re scratched discs. —Rob
ed to clarify that Cory
doing who knows what? It’s such a
Barlog (below) is now
the creative director standard thing in gaming I just have to You’re going to want to have that
of the God of War know! —“Swinger 913” looked at, Rob. Microsoft hasn’t > CONTACT EGM
franchise as a whole. confirmed any specific defects
Ru Weerasuriya is E-mail: EGM@ziffdavis.com
Deep thoughts, Swinger. Deep with the device, but widespread
the game director of Snail mail:
Chains of Olympus. thoughts indeed. But we actually anecdotal evidence indicates that
EGM Letters
have an answer for you: The tradi- some 360s produced in December 101 2nd Street, 8th Floor
tion of pressing Start dates back of 2006 were missing a part that San Francisco, CA 94105
to the dawn of arcade machines, prevents the disc from coming Subscription help:
which have what’s called an “attract into contact with the lens. Check Web: www.zdmcirc.com
mode.” This mode cycles segments out www.xbox.com/support or call Phone: (800) 779-1174
of gameplay, the title screen, and 1-800-4-MY-XBOX to see if your

©2007 P&G
Get noticed.
PRESS START
> features, previews, flamboyant personal trainers, and other stuff
Photograph by R. Dodson/SFMisfits, Inc

> FRONTIN' LINES
Lost in BATTLE
With shooters deploying players everywhere except Iraq
and Afghanistan, we investigate why gamemakers
are so afraid of real-world war By Robert Ashley
Marching orders: MEXICO? BEEN THERE. VEGAS? Vegas. “Our guns are the real guns. “Politics,” in the gaming industry, is
When you’re done SAVED THAT. But with all the We have their real sounds in 5.1 a naughty word. Consider this: Last
with this story,
deploy to page 100
elements of realism—real firearms [surround sound]. They even reload year’s Splinter Cell: Double Agent
for Seanbaby’s take used by real soldiers, Humvees and properly.” Why, then, do the game’s broke with the series’ usual affinity for
on the one soldierin’ tanks straight off the battlefield, official counterterrorism squads fight not in implausible international intrigue and
series worse than military seals of approval—trumpeted Fallujah or Kabul, but in Las Vegas? exotic locales by dropping famous
real war.
on the back of game boxes, why do sneak Sam Fisher into a live war zone
most war games retreat from modern P-whipped in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic
theaters of U.S. military involvement? One reason, it seems, is that game of the Congo, a region engulfed in a
While much of the world is developers and publishers fear the real-life civil war. You might assume
embroiled in conflict, games have prickly and divisive politics of war. this was an attempt to bring relevance
largely avoided depicting this reality,
setting their battles in the unlikeliest
of locations. Take the Sin City setting > People are dying out there, and it’s
of the latest in the Tom Clancy series
Rainbow Six. “I think Rainbow is not fun. I don’t want to make a game
one of the most realistic games out
there,” says Maxime Béland, creative
that reminds people of [that].
director of last year’s Rainbow Six: —Rainbow Six: Vegas Creative Director Maxime Béland

Visit http://avaxhome.ru/blogs/vietmagz for more..
PAGE PAGE PAGE
24 38 46
Preview: Preview: Preview:
Sneaking Requirement Another
around for velocity lonely night
and realism to the series. But Double in Mexico City. “We try to avoid it as a sign of respect for our military.
Agent coproducer Julian Gerighty situations where Americans have What they do is different. We try to
says Kinshasa was just an interesting boots on the ground,” says Christian present an authentic experience, but
playground for hide-and-seek. “We’re Allen, creative director for both games we also present the fun parts.”
creating entertainment, not a political and himself a former Marine and But in presenting only the heroic
statement,” he says. “It’s not meant to National Guardsman. “I’ve got [friends action (with infinite continues to boot),
raise awareness of conflict in Africa. and] relatives in the military. There’s do games glamorize their subject to
It’s hard to have a political message always a concern that if you make an audience of ripe potential recruits?
within your game experience that a game portraying those situations, “That’s an old issue that goes back
people will not flat-out reject.” you might be making light of them. to way before videogames,” says
Nevertheless, it’s also hard to You don’t want a kid whose dad is Ed Halter. “People were worried
make a game about war—whether deployed somewhere to see this game about this with toy soldiers and boys’
all-out battlefield combat or behind- portraying what their dad is doing and literature. There’s this old fear that,
the-scenes espionage like in Splinter have a really negative experience.” because children—especially boys—
Cell—without at least accidentally Rainbow Six’s Béland agrees: “We tend to think of war as a fun scenario
commenting on the subject matter. don’t want to be where there are to make games or play out of, that
“War is a political act by definition,” actual issues right now because we it’s trivializing war. That assumption
says Ed Halter, professor in the don’t want to have that bad-taste-in- is kind of difficult with videogames,
department of Film and Electronic your-mouth feeling. People are dying because anyone who plays games
Arts at Bard College in New York and out there, and it’s not fun. I don’t want is obviously tapped into all sorts of
author of the book From Sun Tzu to to make a game that reminds people other media. They’re getting other
Xbox: War and Video Games. “So to of a friend or a brother who died. It information about war all the time. It
say, ‘We’re making an apolitical view would be a lot easier to just pick from assumes this dumb subject who plays
of war’ is itself a political statement. the headlines and make a game out of games and does nothing else in life, so
It expresses the desire that you can it. But I think it would be tasteless.” I don’t really buy that.”
take the politics out of war and just Indeed, the few games that have
leave this fun experience.” But that’s tried to depict relevant conflicts have An emotional deficit
exactly what many developers strive left a bad taste in the mouths of some. Maybe games aren’t yet equipped
for. Games, more than movies or The Ghost Recon series, not always to deal with a subject as complex as
television, are dedicated to the virtues so removed from current events, once war. It’s telling that World War II is
of pure, unadulterated fluff. We’re here tackled a real hot spot. “In Ghost a hugely popular subject matter for
to have fun, right? “With Splinter Cell,” Recon 2, we set the game in North both games and film, yet games have
says Gerighty, “what we’ve always Korea,” says Allen. “We had a lot thus far managed only to capture the
wanted to do was create a parallel to of issues.... We pissed off the North bombastic action of the genre (Saving
big-budget Hollywood entertainment Korean government and ended up Private Ryan) and none of the quiet
movies—movies that are thrilling, getting banned in South Korea, which nuance (The Thin Red Line).
movies that are believable, but not wasn’t our intent.” The experience Thomas Coles, creative director
necessarily out to change the world.” helped push GRAW in its current, less- for the in-development stealth-action
And like Hollywood, the gaming realistic direction. “It’s partly playing it game Cipher Complex, doesn’t think
industry doesn’t take unnecessary safe,” he says. “But I’ve always seen it’s a fair comparison. “In a movie, >
risks with its hard-earned money.
Anything that might cause a fuss
gets left on the cutting-room floor. “It
takes so much money and manpower
to create games now that they don’t
want to invest in something that might
offend,” says Halter. “They want that
paradoxical goal that Hollywood
wants: the totally original, [yet]
completely predictable hit. It gravitates
toward conformity because there’s so
much money at stake.”
Bad taste
But the almighty dollar isn’t the only
arbiter here. Consider last year’s
Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter
and its recent sequel, which cast
■ Conflict: Desert Storm II (top left) took players to the first Gulf War, and the hokey Fugitive Hunter (top right) had
an authentic war experience over a
them bagging bin Laden. But most games stick with safer settings like World War II or even phony countries.
far-flung scenario: a military coup
ELECTRONIC GAMING MONTHLY • www.1UP.com • 17

LOST IN BATTLE (cont.)
every split second has been carefully

PRESS START
tailored to tweak emotions,” he says.

“They’ve done multiple takes with a
professional actor. Their level of fidelity
and refinement on the subtle level
of storytelling is finely tuned. That’s
something on the game side that we’re
only now starting to address.”
Cipher Complex is part a new crop ■ Stronger than fiction: Despite their alien-invasion and stealthy-kill trappings, BlackSite: Area 51 and Cipher
of games that, at some level, attempts Complex deal with Abu Ghraib–style prisons and Iraqi WMDs—topics that more realistic games retreat from.
to connect to current events. “I look
at the intrigue, the lies, and the stories
that come out of [real war] and think, is a radical departure. Named for of politics but says that BlackSite
‘Holy crap! Why do we need to make secret overseas CIA prisons currently will strive to leave the experience
up a story?’” says Coles. Beginning in operated for the purposes of, let’s open to interpretation. “I don’t want
northern Iraq, Cipher Complex centers say, “rough interrogation” in the War to force [my personal politics] down
on weapons of mass destruction on Terror, BlackSite is set partially in anyone’s throat. We won’t come to
stolen from the country before the U.S. Iraq and directed by a guy who says any conclusions for you.”
invasion (so that’s where they went!). things like this: “[BlackSite] is kind A 14-year game-industry vet, Smith
“We’re trying to do something that’s of an allegory for jihad. You say that has seen firsthand the reaction to
a little more socially relevant,” he in a meeting, and all the marketing ideas that venture outside the world of
says. “If we’re going to go through the people get really uncomfortable.” Meet fluff. “I know a lot of people,” he says,
exercise of creating a story, having it Harvey Smith, creative director. “and a lot of them have trouble. They
be a complete fabrication without any Dealt the unenviable task of just get shut down, or they’re told: ‘No,
real relevance would be demoralizing.” breathing life into an old franchise, no, no.... You’re going to be working
Cipher also dives into the world Smith searched for ways to make on Transformers instead.”
of private military contractors—the the game relevant. “It was always a Until gamers demand more,
likes of which the U.S. employs en struggle for me to get motivated,” he Transformers is what we’ll get. Or
masse in Iraq—with a critical eye. It’s says. “So I began asking, ‘What are we maybe not. Activision’s just-announced
a hot topic, one that’s worked its way afraid of today?’ We’re afraid someone Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare looks
into Army of Two, a buddy shooter might drag us into a secret facility to have a few of its missions set in
due this fall. “We’re not afraid to go with no oversight, strip us of our the Middle East. If players respond
into that subject in any way,” says citizenship—even our basic human favorably, more war games could join
Reid Schneider, the game’s senior dignity—and do horrible things to us.” it at the front lines, leaving Siegfried
producer. “We want to expose people Smith doesn’t blink at the mention and Roy to fend for themselves. P
to the idea that these companies are
out there. [U.S. Vice President] Dick
Cheney is a former CEO of Halliburton
[and a current stockholder], and GONE BUT
you know there’s a reason the U.S.
government is putting hundreds of
NOT FORGOTTEN
millions of dollars’ worth of contracts David Jaffe’s canned Heartland would have
into Halliburton. If Army of Two causes
people to do some digging about the been the most politically charged game ever
world of private military corporations It was to have America standing in as the occupied Iraq and commanding officers
and how large a role mercenaries ordering players to slaughter innocents (you could pull the trigger if you wanted).
are playing in the global conflicts of So is really a surprise that Heartland—a PSP game from God of War creator David
today, then I think that’s pretty cool.” Jaffe—got nuked in development? But Jaffe, a liberal who wanted Heartland to haul
Army of Two has levels in Afghanistan on heartstrings and make a statement about America’s involvement in the Middle
and Iraq, and Schneider talks tough East, insists that he gave his game the heave-ho because he didn’t have the resources
and outspoken about making a and time to do it justice. Heartland’s cancellation, he says, had nothing to do with
its politically potent content. “There was
game relevant to world events—but
certainly awareness that, if this thing kept
like everyone else, he’s quick with a
going, we were going to have to convince
political disclaimer: “Our goal with a lot of people up the chain of command
Army of Two isn’t to make a strong at Sony that this was a good idea,” he
political statement.” tells us, “but Sony’s always been great
at believing in our products...as artistic
From arcade to Abu Ghraib endeavors.”
The best example of an upcoming Still, we’ve got to wonder if Sony
would’ve believed in a game with
game that deals with real life and real
scenes like this: “There were these sequences where you would find a room in the
war also happens to feature...an alien
underground headquarters of the resistance,” Jaffe says, “and there was this video
invasion. Go figure. BlackSite: Area 51 camera and a blood spot on the wall. It wasn’t until you chose during gameplay to go
is a direct descendant of the garish old up and put your eye up to the viewfinder and watch what was on the videotape that
arcade shooter Area 51, now found you realized the Americans had captured a Chinese soldier and had beheaded him. It
lurking in dingy corners of disused was very much like what [is] happening in Iraq.”
bars and laundromats. But the sequel

Available for the PLAYSTATION®3
computer entertainment system,
the PlayStation®2 computer
®
entertainment system and the PSP
(PlayStation®Portable) system
WWW.ATWORLDSENDGAME.COM
©2007 Disney. Microsoft, Xbox, Xbox 360, Xbox LIVE, and the Xbox logos are trademarks of
the Microsoft group of companies. ™, ®, Nintendo DS, and the Wii logo are trademarks of
Nintendo. © 2006 “Playstation”, "PlayStation", "PLAYSTATION", "PS" Family logo and "PSP"
are registered trademarks of Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. PSP® system - Memory Stick
Duo™ may be required sold separately. The ratings icon is a registered trademark of the
Entertainment Software Association. All other trademarks and trade names are the properties
of their respective owners.
> BIZ, NATCH
Let’s Get Digital

By Scott Steinberg
PRESS START
They say every dollar spent is a vote,

but I think it’s more of a steel-toed
boot up the ass of corporate America.
And if the success of digital distribu-
tion platforms like Xbox Live Arcade,
the Wii’s Virtual Console, and the
PlayStation Store is any indication,
thousands are voting to give the tra-
ditional game-buying experience one
rawhide-scented enema.
■ Calling All Cars
Certainly, it’s a blessing for you,

the gaming enthusiast. Copping clas-
sics like Castlevania: Symphony of
the Night and Punch Out!!—not to
mention original outings like critically > FOREIGN OBJECT/JAPAN
acclaimed designer David Jaffe’s
Calling All Cars—for five or 10 bucks
is its own reward. But more exciting
are the implications. Specifically, in
three to five years, it’s not unthinkable
to expect that the gaming industry
Duke Saraie’s
HEALTHY
might finally get its equivalent of
Hollywood’s independent, straight-to-
DVD-style distribution channel.
WALKING
Forget titles costing $15 million
and requiring teams of 100+ people.
Games designed for electronic distri-
NAVI
bution can be built for under $150,000
by six guys sitting in a garage. This
means: A) Developers/publishers can
finally afford to take more risks; B)
Originality does not have to bow to Can’t see your toes? Get this
marketability; and C) Amusements
needn’t be all-consuming.
Soon, you could see the following: a Platform: My Dance Dance Revolution diet voice coaching you on in Japanese.
shift to innovative concepts. The rise Nintendo DS didn’t work! Then Duke Saraie is Everything’s divided into gradual
of more indie development houses. Likelihood your answer. A sort of Japanese steps, and the game keeps full
Games sold in bite-sized compo- it’ll come Richard Simmons minus the crotch- track of your weight progress and
nents. Digital diversions targeted at here:
Americans
high track shorts, the fiftysome- problem areas, so even if you’re
others besides 18-to-34-year-old thing ex-model is the man behind a pudgy little dork who hasn’t left
could use
males. Not to mention a market-wide more exercise, the “Dukeswalk,” a mix of aerobics the TV room in five weeks, you can
renaissance, where manufacturers yes, but it’s and walking exercises that has soon become a light and nimble
are forced to acknowledge the truth: doubtful we’ll
listen to a guy
taken his country by storm over the nerd with just a little physical effort.
It’s not about technology; gamers just last couple years. It’s big in Japan, “I’ve made several DVDs in the
with freaky
want fun products at prices that aren’t facial hair in other words—and these days past,” Duke said at an April press
on par with black-market kidneys. you can’t be big in Japan unless conference to announce the game,
Until then, do us all a favor and you have a Nintendo DS game with “but you can only watch DVDs
keep oiling up those Doc Martens. your face plastered all over it. inside. With a DS, you can carry
it anywhere.” The real question,
Scott Steinberg is manag- Help me, Duke! Healthy Walking though: Would you want to have
ing director of game industry Navi contains 30 different exercises a leery guy in a beret in your palm
consulting firm Embassy to follow, all with video explana- while power walking around the
Multimedia Consultants
tions and all with Duke’s wacky neighborhood?
(www.embassymulti.com) and the author
of Videogame Marketing and PR
(www.sellmorevideogames.com).

PRESS START
> PREVIEW: EXCLUSIVE SCREENS AND INFO
Splinter Cell:
CONVICTION
Reinventing Sam Fisher (no, for real this time) By Shoe
Platform: THE FAMILIAR SLEEK BLACK Cell: Double Agent didn’t deliver on So Double Agent, despite still being
XB360
CATSUIT and all-purpose vision that unspoken promise. Sure, Fisher a great game, ended up being more
Publisher: headgear (with the famous, iconic spent some time in jail in that fourth of the same: more hiding in the dark,
Ubisoft
three glowing green circles) were chapter of the stealthy series, but it more climbing up pipes, and more
Developer: nowhere to be seen, replaced by was only for one half-baked level (as sneaking up on no-do-gooders from
Ubisoft Montreal
a Creamsicle-orange prison jump- a “prisoner,” he still had some of his behind and putting them down for an
Release date: suit and 5 o’clock (plus overtime) high-tech gadgets, for chrissakes). extended naptime.
December 2007
shadow—Sam Fisher seemed to be
in for a franchise reinvention. After
all, you don’t show our favorite gov- For the first time since the original,
ernment secret agent in a mug shot
unless you’re planning on flipping we’re changing the core mechanics.
the script inside out. But Splinter —Conviction Senior Producer Mathieu Ferland

SPLINTER CELL: CONVICTION (cont.)
Conviction, however, is running

with the idea of a “franchise reinven-
PRESS START
tion” so fast that you may not even

recognize it as a Splinter Cell game.
Let’s look at this new game from the
developer’s perspective and from a
gameplay point of view...then we’ll
let you know what we think.
The developers say:

“We realized that with the previ-
ous Splinter Cells...there was a lack
of emotional attachment with the
characters,” says Senior Producer
Mathieu Ferland. “You were given
orders, you were told what to do—it
was a very cool experience, but
this has created a lack of differ-
entiation between each game. We
thought that the gameplay was a bit
repetitive over time. We decided to
change, to renew the brand. For the
first time since the original Splinter
Cell, we’re changing the core
mechanics, the core gameplay.”
But from a fiction point of view, > CROWD CONTROL
you can’t just muck up the gameplay You’ll have an easier time deal- you’re buddies (thus, eliminating booth (wait, people still use
without good reason. Otherwise, ing with enemy A.I....if you can you as that “single male sus- those things?) or reading a sign
it’ll seem forced—or, perhaps, feel work the civilian A.I. You can pect” the cops are looking for). on the wall. “Mimicking [civilian
like a whole new, different game. always blend in with a crowd, But stick with Joe too long, and behaviors] will be key to keep-
“The high-level story after Double but it’s not necessarily as simple he might get a little freaked out, ing a low profile,” says Senior
Agent,” says Ferland, “is two years as walking nonchalantly inside of blowing your cover. Or you can Producer Mathieu Ferland, “but
have passed, and there’s something one. You might try trotting along- try other ways of blending in, that’s if you want to play low
side a random Joe to look like such as making a call at a phone profile, of course.”
that goes wrong with an old friend
of Sam’s, and he decides to go back
to Third Echelon [Splinter Cell’s top-
secret arm of the National Security
Agency]. He discovers that every-
thing is dysfunctional—it’s not work-
ing as it used to—and at some point,
Sam will have to do something that
will be perceived as very bad, even
if it’s not. So he’ll turn to a fugitive,
and he’ll be hunted by those who
have been betraying him for all these
years. At some point, Sam will dis-
cover who’s chasing him and why—
and at this point, he will reverse the
situation and be the predator and not
the prey.”
Well, maybe it is, for all intents
■ A day of shopping for deli meats goes horribly wrong. Notice: The crowd has dispersed, and individual objects in the environment are strewn about or broken.

and purposes, a whole new game:

“As a fugitive, Sam is losing all this
PRESS START
comfort,” says Ferland. “He has to

find new ways of mastering this new
situation by himself, to find new gad-
gets, find new contacts and such.
He’s always on his toes, watching his
back. This is a major difference from
previous Splinter Cells, where you
could wait in the dark forever and
be in a safe zone. Now, you need to
move—you need to be more reactive
to the environment.”
To demonstrate what they’re
shooting for, the developers showed
us a mashup video containing
various clips they use as inspira-
■ Grab a chair and swing it, throw it, do-si-do with
tion for Conviction’s development: it, or toss it behind yourself to slow down pursuers.
The Bourne Identity, Die Hard, The
Fugitive, 24...pretty good source
material, if you ask us.
The gameplay says: > THE MULTIPLAYER CROWD

So how does all that translate into
The excellent spies vs. merce- experience,” says Ferland. “We dressed as crowd members....
something you can play with a con- naries multiplayer game from always felt that the discrepancy I am pretty sure you can get
troller? (Right now, Conviction is an Splinter Cell: Pandora Tomorrow in terms of controls and game- where this could lead us—gam-
exclusive deal for the 360 and PC... got more hardcore in Chaos play between the single and ers should prepare some para-
no plans for a Wii or PS3 version.) Theory, less hardcore in Double multi in previous Splinter Cells noia pills.”
The developers show us some dem- Agent, and is now gone com- was a strength for some and a Will we ever see a return to
onstration target and tech-demo vid- pletely. We’re awfully sad to see problem for others.” the spies vs. mercs online game-
eos of how the gameplay will work: it go, but the game of guns vs. We’re not sure yet how play? “If we realize someday
gadgets and force vs. stealth Conviction’s multiplayer will that there is still a lot of fun in
We see Fisher in civilian clothing
doesn’t really fit in Conviction’s work, but Ferland hints, “All creating classic light-and-shad-
in a restaurant’s restroom, with a
world. “We are going to use as we can say for now is that ow stealth and its multiplayer
police officer behind him yelling for much as possible from what was Conviction will have an online format, we could [revisit it],”
him to put his hands on his head. As developed for the single-player crowd, and players will be says Ferland.
the cop tries to cuff Fisher’s raised
arms, Fisher pulls a Jason Bourne
and deftly flips around and disarms
his would-be captor. A short Casino
Royale–style bathroom brawl ensues,
with stall doors, mirrors, and sinks
meeting the policeman’s head at
some point, eventually knocking him
out. Fisher takes the cuffs, pistol,
and radio and leaves the bathroom.
Outside, he notices another cop
walking toward him, so he quickly
pushes another door open to draw
attention to it, then hides underneath
a table. Then, as the cop walks
past the hiding spot to check out
the open door (which leads to a
descending stairwell), Fisher sneaks
up behind him, cuffs his right wrist
■ Messy tables apparently make for good cover...but watch out—enemies are smart enough to use furniture to their advantage, too.

Available at all Borders Locations.
© 2007 Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. and GH One LLC. All Rights Reserved.
For additional rating information, Ghost Rider Character TM & © 2007 Marvel Characters, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
FOR HORROR VIOLENCE AND DISTURBING IMAGES go to www.filmratings.com www.sonypictures.com © 2007 Layout and Design Sony Pictures Home Entertainment Inc. All Rights Reserved.
[Sam] has to find new ways of mastering

this new situation by himself, to find new
gadgets, find new contacts and such.
—Conviction Senior Producer Mathieu Ferland
to the handrail, slams his hand down to surroundings. It’s a very different formula
make him let go of his gun, then pushes from past Splinter Cells—it’s no longer
him down the stairs, knocking him out. about hiding in the dark and sneaking past
Fisher charges through another door to (or up to and knocking out) guards. Now,
tackle yet another officer to the floor, then you’re in real-life civilian situations—and
gives him a lights-out with a right hook. wits, not gadgets and guns, will get you
Before more policemen can join the fray, out of trouble.
Fisher pushes a heavy serving station in
front of a doorway to block entry. We say:
Fisher then exits the restaurant and Let’s face it: Most Tom Clancy games
is in the middle of a busy street market. aren’t known for their brainy A.I., so this
Civilians and merchant tents keep him leaves us a little skeptical about how well
obscured from the half-dozen armed cops Conviction will come together. After all, the
looking for him. He’s surrounded, but he game’s all about improvising in realistic
finds a quiet area where he pulls out the situations, and that realism will only be
pistol he swiped earlier and fires a couple there if all non-player characters (NPCs)
How to play: d
of harmless shots into some boxes, just to are behaving...well, realistically. But if that ecially marke
Look inside sp
spook the shoppers—and more specifi- A.I. performs like the developers promise, ll Park Franks
®
cally, to get a hot dog vendor to run away and the NPCs are more human than robot- packages of Ba
from his stand. Fisher then shoots at the ic, then damn, this could be one incredible for entry code entry
n code allows
hot dog cart’s propane tanks, causing an game. The paranoia of being a fugitive with Each promotio otion periods
ur prom
explosion that disperses the crowd. As no one to back you up, having to think into two one-ho o DS™
latest Nintend
people scream and run away, Fisher pulls on your feet the whole time, a world that Check out the de at
es and enter co
his hoodie up over his head and blends in reacts to what you’re doing—on paper, systems & gam
with the chaos, escaping capture.... Conviction sounds amazing. Unless every-
Even though everything we just thing we’ve seen so far is only a small,
described came from a prerendered, insignificant part of the game as a whole
scripted video, it’s supposed to represent (see again: the prison stuff from Double BALL PARK INSTANT WIN PROMOTION CONDENSED RULES
NO PURCHASE NECESSARY. Promotion code, and Internet access as of
© 2007 Ball Park® & © 2007 Nintendo DS™
Conviction’s gameplay, which is to be Agent ), this really is a radically different 5/4/07, required to enter. Open to legal residents of the 50 United
completely unscripted. The fights, the style for the series. That’s fine by us—we States/D.C., ages 13 and older. If you are considered a minor in your state
of residence, you must have your parent or legal guardian’s permission to
cops looking for clues (and checking out were kinda itching to get out of Fisher’s enter. Void where prohibited. Begins 12:00:00 a.m. CT on 5/23/07; ends
the opened doorway), the civilian reac- supertight black suit and try something 11:59:59 p.m. CT on 9/7/07. To obtain promotion code without purchase,
go to www.ballparkprizes.com (Internet requests must be received by
tions, blending in with the crowd...every- new anyway.... P 11:59:59 p.m. CT on 6/23/07), or hand-print your name, birth date, email
thing will happen on the fly, according to address and complete postal mailing address on a 3" x 5" card and mail in
an envelope, along with a self addressed stamped return envelope (VT
what the player’s doing at the moment and For more gameplay info and video residents omit return postage), to: Ball Park Franks Promotion Code
how the artificial intelligence (both enemy footage of Splinter Cell: Conviction, Request, P.O. Box 224, 1235A N. Clybourn, Chicago, IL 60610. Mail-in
requests must be postmarked by 8/24/07
and neutral) is evaluating the situation and set your browser to EGM.1UP.com. and received by 8/31/07. Subject to Official
Rules which include additional restrictions
at www.ballparkprizes.com. Sponsor: Sara
Lee Corporation, 3500 Lacey Road,
Downers Grove, IL.
> THAT'S COOL
PRESS START
New content cracking down

Crackdown is shallow, sure, but the
game is still full of fun...especially now
that Microsoft released new down-
loads for the game. The cool new
content is mighty meaty, too—half
of it is free and the rest will set you
back 800 points ($10). While the pen-
niless offerings are nice, obviously all
the awesome stuff is packed into the
premium content: new weapons, vehi-
cles, achievements, and game types.
> PLAYING FAVORITES > TAKE THIS JOB
Boss battle:
God of War 2
When it comes to bosses, God of War
II is tough to beat. And since this epic
Animation
Director
sequel is packed with ’em, we asked
GOW2 director Cory Barlog and an
EGM reader we solicited on our mes-
sage boards to tell us which fantasy
freak is the most fun to fight.
Our monthly look at the jobs you want
Cory Barlog:
“God, this is a By Evan Shamoon
tough question.
I want to go
with the stan-
This month: What’s an animation would-be animators need to know
dard Colossus Geoff
director? how to draw, he believes that the
answer, ’cause Crookes,
animation He or she oversees all the animation best training is that which involves
that boss fight
director created for a game and makes sure life drawing. “Once you have a good
was such a pain in the ass to put
at Digital it fits the overall vision. That means understanding of human anatomy,
together...but that is the expected Extremes
Digital Extremes’ Geoff Crookes you can apply that knowledge to
answer. With that in mind, I would
Experience: spends much of his time animating almost everything you animate.”
have to say Euryale, the sister of
Crookes heroes, enemies, and other lively Salary range: Around $40 grand for
Medusa, because she is one seriously
has spent in-game objects, of course, but he junior animators and up to $90K for
scary chick. A very tense and exciting six years
also works as a liaison between the senior positions.
fight that has a great payoff.” at Digital
Extremes, animation department and the rest of Current level of demand: High.
EGM Reader Cory Grad: where he the team. “In a way,” Crookes says Location of most jobs: West Coast.
“The series worked of the animation process, “you’re
on Unreal
of fights bringing things to life. You make Crookes’ typical day
Tournament
between 2003/2004, them move; you make them live. It’s “Good days for me are days when
the two Unreal about giving character to something. I actually get to animate,” says
Sisters of Champion- In a lot of ways, it’s like acting.” Crookes. “Sometimes I can be stuck
ship, and now
Fate. The in meetings all day.” Crookes works
Dark Sector
pace was (PS3/XB360). Job data very closely with his game director,
incredible, Recommended education: Crookes going through all the characters and
as you is a classically trained 2D animator nailing down the kinds of animations
swung back and forth like a barbaric who learned 3D animation on the they should have, what the player
George of the Jungle— to only then job—although he says most job can- should feel when they interact with
go backward in time to make sure you didates today have an education in them...stuff like that. Then he’ll go to
don’t lose the last boss fight of the 3D modeling. While he doesn’t think his animators and relay these ideas,
first game. That’s like a new scale of
epicness.”

Photography by Paula Tizzard
> THE GAME OF LIVES
5 Lives:
David Jaffe
PRESS START
Chaining down God of War creator
David Jaffe for a chat is a cinch this
month; the loudmouthed industry
vet recently put the finishing touches on his first PS3
downloadable title, Calling All Cars. So since the former
Twisted Metal director is pimping his new ride, we took
the time to grill him with our five random questions.
1. What current emo band has a song enti-

tled “Calling All Cars”?
David Jaffe: I have no f***ing clue. I don’t listen to emo
bands....
EGM: The answer is Senses Fail.
DJ: OK, great. Should I care that I don’t care?
EGM: Nope.
Lives remaining:
2. Put these levels from your first game,

Mickey Mania (SNES/Genesis), in the correct
order: Mickey and the Beanstalk, Moose
Hunters, and Steamboat Willie.
DJ: Well, Steamboat Willie was the first one. Moose
Hunters was next, and then Mickey and the Beanstalk.
EGM: Correct.
Lives remaining:
3. What’s the name of the WWE car-combat

game that ripped off Twisted Metal?
DJ: Right, I know this one...Rush Hour?
■ Xxxxxxxxxxx x xxxxxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx EGM: Incorrect. It’s Crush Hour.
DJ: You know what? It’s actually C for “crap,” then Rush
Hour.
making sure they’re all on the same production, but I always wanted
page. “I’m always working with the to get into games.” He landed an Lives remaining:
A.I. programmers as well,” he says, interview at Digital Extremes, spoke
“since animation and A.I. are tied with the company’s founder, and 4. On your blog you’ve said you dig Kevin
closely together.” by the time he got home had a job
Smith’s talks...so what did a producer force
offer waiting in his inbox. “Most
Smith to put in his axed Superman script?
How’d he get the gig? animation education is directed
“I was really lucky,” says Crookes, toward a film type of career,” says DJ: A spider.
laughing. “I was at school; I had Crookes. “So I feel fortunate that I EGM: Correct.
some job prospects in TV and film got into the game industry.” P
Lives remaining:
5. So Kratos is the god of war, but who is

> TOOLS OF THE TRADE the god of love?
Mirror age of someone doing knows what he’s talking DJ: [Former EGM Editor-in-Chief] Ed Semrad. The maga-
Animators are always them and use that as about,” Crookes says. zine really hasn’t been the same since Ed left, and I think
eyeing themselves for reference material.” he really brought the love to EGM, and [current EGM EIC]
reference in creating Softimage XSI Shoe has just ripped the heart and the love out of the
facial animations. The Animator’s The animation software
magazine [laughs]. That’s a joke, I’m not really serious.
Survival Kit used exclusively at
Video camera This book by Richard Digital Extremes. Game EGM: Correct.
“For any sort of actions Williams is “a must-own studios also make
Lives remaining:
in a game,” Crookes for any animator—great heavy use of Maya and
says, “we just take foot- tips from someone who 3D Studio Max.
Game Over: Glad you did well, Jaffe. ’Cause we were

afraid of what you’d say if we’d called you an idiot.

THE BIG ONES
PRESS START
Updating you today on tomorrow’s heavy hitters
Halo 3
XB360 • Microsoft Game Studios • Fall 2007
Some leaked beta footage revealed that the multiplayer

map Zanzibar (from Halo 2) will find its way into Halo 3.
And since we’re sure that won’t be the only one, we
asked EGM readers what other maps they want to see
make the move.
> EGM MESSAGE-BOARD POLL
Which multiplayer maps from Halo 1

and 2 would you like to see remade
for Halo 3?
21%
Sidewinder (H1)
■ Solid Snake sneaks up behind 21%
Link...and gooses the poor elf. Hang ’Em
High/ 11%
Tombstone Ivory
Super Smash Bros. Brawl (H1/H2) Tower (H2)
Wii • Nintendo • Fall 2007
Rumors continue to circulate that Nintendo’s four-way fighter won’t make

it out this year. But if you ask Hideo Kojima, Brawl is ready to go right now. 7%
The Metal Gear series creator recently had a chance to play it (remember, Damnation
Metal Gear’s Solid Snake makes an appearance in this one), and according (H1)
to Kojima Productions’ podcast host Ryan Payton, Kojima said, “The game
already feels very complete and very fun. [Nintendo could] probably put it out
now and sell millions of copies.” 7%
Chill Out (H1)
33%
Lockout (H2)
Metal Gear Solid 4:

Guns of the Patriots
PS3 • Konami • Fall 2007
The MGS4 dev team may have their heads down cranking
Resident Evil 5 away on this game, but David Hayter—who provides the
voice of Snake—already has a few ideas for the plot of No.
PS3/XB360 • Capcom • 2008
5. “You’d see the son, Solid Snake, dealing with things in
Looking at Resident Evil 4 on the Wii (peep our review on pg. 82) reminds the future,” he explained on the Kojima Productions pod-
us how far the series’ graphics have come. Better days are ahead, though, cast, “while Naked Snake is dealing with things in the past.
as our insiders tell us that the visual leap from RE4 to RE5 will just as big as [The game would then] parallel the two.” Hmm, doesn’t
what we saw from RE0 to RE4. Now that’s hot. sound half bad, Snake.... P

AIN’T NO LAW
OUT HERE
EXCEPT THE
ONE YOU MAKE.
Blood
Intense Violence
Language
WWW.CALLOFJUAREZ.COM
Sexual Themes
© 2007 Techland. All Rights Reserved. Published and distributed by Ubisoft Entertainment under license from Techland. Ubisoft, Ubi.com, and the Ubisoft logo are trademarks
of Ubisoft Entertainment in the U.S. and/or other countries. Call of Juarez is a trademark of Techland and is used under license. Microsoft, Xbox, Xbox 360, Xbox LIVE, and the
Xbox logos are trademarks of the Microsoft group of companies. Software platform logo (TM and ©) EMA 2006.
PRESS START
> PREVIEW: EXCLUSIVE FIRST LOOK
Need for Speed:

PRO STREET
EA (finally) chooses a new racing line By John Davison
Platforms: THE NEED FOR SPEED SERIES ant, Senior Producer Mike Mann and the end of this year, and EGM was
PS3/XB360 is one of the most successful in EA’s Producer John Doyle have set about lucky enough to get the first look
Publisher: stable, behind unstoppable forces redefining the game and sending it at it in action. It’s truly a next-gen
EA Games like Madden and The Sims. With four off in a new direction. The result? racer, and the images you see here
Developer: games released in four years, no “It’s all about authentic street rac- are “visual target” screens using the
EA Black Box one is more aware of the potential ing,” Mann declares. “The Fast and game’s engine and are indicative of
Release Date: for franchise fatigue than the devel- the Furious vibe is dated, and the what the team is striving for on the
Late 2007 opment team at EA Black Box in culture has matured. Pro Street is a PS3 and Xbox 360. A Wii version is
Vancouver. Rather than unleash yet reflection of that.” also coming, but it’ll obviously look
another pink-lit street racing vari- The game is headed for release at and play quite differently.
Customization counts
Like Need for Speed: Carbon, Pro
Street offers a lot of customization
options, including the remarkably
full-featured Autosculpt widget
that lets you mold body panels
pretty much any way you’d like.
Whereas in Carbon this was purely
a cosmetic function, in Pro Street
every tweak you make affects the
physics model (and consequently
the performance) of the car, and
an in-game wind-tunnel mechanic
highlights this for you. Unlike in
recent Need for Speeds, you don’t
have to make your car ugly just to
score points; what’s more important
is tweaking its performance. >

NEED FOR SPEED (cont.)
A change of venues
Street racing is no longer the illicit
PRESS START
culture glamorized by Most Wanted

and Underground, and Pro Street
reflects this by focusing on “race
weekends” at tracks and closed
courses around the world. This
screen shows the way that the
Infineon circuit in Sonoma County,
California should look in the final
game, where it will host speed, grip,
drift, and drag racing challenges.
Burning rubber
Senior Producer Mike Mann is keen to
stress that the dirt and grime of racing
is an important part of the vibe that
hasn’t been adequately conveyed in
any games before. “Something you
don’t realize from just playing games
is how much smoke there is,” he tells
us. Pro Street will go a long way to
rectify this by rendering (via some
clever tricks hardly anyone outside of
game development understands) life-
like clouds of noxious tire and exhaust
fumes. The result is something that
looks remarkably realistic, and not like
the painted-on effects we’ve seen in
games like Project Gotham Racing or
Gran Turismo. This stuff dissipates just
like the real thing.
■ At first, we thought the backward decals were a mistake. But EA says that’s the style
these days. Cut us some slack—we still got dice hangin’ from our rearview mirror.
What a wreck
We’re starting to see damage han-
dled in more and more realistic ways
in today’s racing games, but Pro
Street is the most convincing we’ve
seen yet. Rather than make graph-
ics simply change when you crunch
into something, the Black Box team
has built a physics-based procedural
damage system, which means that
cars scrape and crumple based
on what they were hit by and with
what force. Clip another car on a
corner and see a body panel dent or
become detached. Whack something
really hard and the body will deform
just like it should. P
In the middle of June, head to

EGM.1UP.com for more exclusive
info and the first gameplay footage of Need
for Speed: Pro Street.

> NOW SHOWING AT
PRESS START GAMEVIDEOS
We’ve got a custom playlist all set up for

you over at GameVideos.com/EGM.
LOL: WWE Superstar

Challenge 2007
EGM’s own Michael Donahoe inter-
views WWE superstars, with hilarious
results (that even non-wrestling fans > ONLINE SCENE
can appreciate).
Tapping
ZOMG: Left 4 Dead on The
the classics
1UP Show Free play is now, well, free
First hands-on with Left 4 Dead, the
28 Days Later–esque zombie game
By Michael Donahoe
that’s about to top your most-antici-
pated list.
NEW GAMES ARE NICE...if you’ve the first icon to get the makeover
got the dough to throw down on treatment—the cave-raiding cutie
’em. But if you’re broke (and don’t is set to debut in her first episode
mind oldies), a better deal is current- July 3. Along with the new cartoon,
ly playing on a PC near you—online GameTap TV is also running a docu-
Lara is all
game service GameTap (www.gam- mentary on the Tomb Raider series
about the etap.com) now offers a selection of that will feature all the former Lara
remakes— titles for the low, low price of nada Croft models (pictured above).
here is a pic (expect around 30 games ranging GameTap hopes that offering this
of Croft’s new
PWN: Bungie/1UP Halo 2 animated look.
from Metal Slug to Joust). Hold up! free content will entice gamers into
Grudge Match 3 Not everything’s free, but at least getting a subscription. Doing so
Epic Oddball battle decides Bungie it’s opening up some of its massive ain’t that bad of a deal—you’ll not
vs. 1UP/EGM Halo Humpday library to penny-pinchers who don’t only get access to over 850 games,
Challenge rematch. Bungie claims it want to go the monthly subscrip- but you’ll also get some exclusive
was “practice.” Wrong. tion route. But it’s not just games content from Cartoon Network/Adult
shedding the green—GameTap TV Swim. OK, this programming isn’t
original programming will also be that exciting, but $83.40 for a year
available for free. (which comes out to a meager $6.95
This is especially nice considering a month) or $9.95 month-to-month
the cool new content the service is isn’t that bad when you factor in all
cooking up. Along with typical ho- the games and content you’re get-
hum interviews with popular celebri- ting. Plus, now that the Sega Saturn
ties, GameTap is also spearheading has been added to the already stag-
a sweet new series entitled gering pile of systems, nearly every
LTTP: Late To The Party Re\Visioned that takes classic modern console is represented. And
Episode 1 characters and has comic book hey, it’s a better deal than blowing
First installment of 1UP’s new show artists/writers “reenvision” them $5 on a simple port of Soccer (NES)
revisits gems you may have missed into animated shorts. Lara Croft is on the Virtual Console. P
like Final Fantasy XII, Kororinpa, and
The Lord of the Rings: BFME2.

©2007 truth
thetruth.com
PRESS START
> PREVIEW: EXCLUSIVE SCREENS AND INFO
Alone IN THE DARK

Not just another walk in the park By Bryan Intihar
Platforms: DUSTY OLD MANSIONS, fog-filled happened previously or what you’re and sound, but also smell,” says
PS3/XB360
towns, insane asylums—been there, supposed to do next? That won’t be a Polloni. This unique characteristic (at
Publisher: not so scared of that anymore. The problem here. “A ‘coming next’ trailer least for game A.I.) does give AITD’s
Atari
repetitive nature of survival-horror set- plays when you leave the game at the fuglies a leg up when hunting you
Developer: tings is killing the fright factor in vid- end of the episode to tease you into down, but you’ll find instances where
Eden Games
eogames, which is why we’re looking wanting more,” says Producer Nour you can actually turn it against them.
Release Date: forward to Alone in the Dark’s unex- Polloni of developer Eden Games. “This lets you actually bait enemies,”
Winter 2007
pected backdrop: New York City’s “Then, the previous trailer plays when says Polloni, “with blood trails or a
Central Park. Even the Big Apple’s you come back to help you get back cadaver, which can prove to be
craziest kooks are afraid of the spooks into the story.” Also, Eden isn’t ruling very useful.”
that lie within its 843 acres, especially out offering additional episodes (via
when night falls. And after recently download) after the game ships. It’s got air-conditioning: Even though
learning more about the game (which most of your time will be spent on
is a series reboot), we can say the It’s hot: As you guide Edward Carnby foot, you can also hop into vehicles
locale isn’t the only surprise in store. (yes, the same paranormal investiga- to get around NYC’s sprawling rec-
tor from the 1992 original) through reation area. These aren’t the typical
It’s episodic: While so many games Central Park, it’ll be important to bring videogame rides, though—AITD’s
look to the silver screen for inspira- out his inner pyromaniac. And whether cars come fully loaded with working
tion (and pale in comparison), AITD’s you’re torching stacked-up furniture, radios, heat, and AC. More impor-
structure takes a page from hit TV wooden roofs, or the game’s evil tantly, these features will factor into
series like Lost and 24. Each level will forces, “fire will behave as it does in gameplay. “You won’t be turning on
essentially act as an episode (the disc real life,” says Polloni. “It’ll propagate the radio for hits of yesteryear,” says
will contain around 11, each consist- in real time across flammable sur- Polloni. “You’ll be picking up distress
ing of 45 minutes to 1 hour and 15 faces and objects, moving at different calls, for example, which can give you
minutes of gameplay), complete with speeds depending on the material.” useful information like meeting points
plot twists and cliff-hangers. Oh, and for survivors. And if it’s a cool night in
you know those times where you It’s got an olfactory bulb: “Enemies New York City, the heater could come
put a game down for a while, only to can detect you with a full range of in handy getting that frost off the
come back and totally blank on what senses—including, of course, sight vehicle’s windshield.” P

©2007 TAG Fragrance Co.
> FAR-OUT FANS
PRESS START
Post-it Pro:
Ian Rickard > PREVIEW: EXCLUSIVE SCREENS AND INFO
Sure, anyone can piece together some
pixel art, but in order for it to stick out,
you gotta have some talent. Well, UC
Santa Cruz game-design major Ian
Rickard and a group of fellow students
definitely made an inviting portrait—
No More HEROES
the talented team recreated the first Heroically defying expectations
level of the NES classic Donkey Kong
on the windows of a campus building By Shane Bettenhausen
using only Post-it notes. We recently
had a chance to speak with Rickard to
see what’s next on his pixel plate. Platform: GRASSHOPPER MANUFACTURE’S humor in distinctive visual trappings
Wii upcoming adventure No More that bear a strong resemblance to
EGM: So why’d you go ape for
Donkey Kong? Publisher Heroes clearly stands apart from the Grasshopper’s divisive cult classic,
TBA rest of its third-party Wii brethren, Killer 7 (PS2/GC).
Ian Rickard: Two years ago, some Developer: and not just because it’s neither a We’re still a bit foggy on precisely
other students organized a Mario- Grasshopper spazzy minigame collection nor a how all these disparate elements
themed portrait. One of the big ele- Manufacture
last-gen port with tacked-on motion will come together in the final
ments of the selection of Mario was Release control. Rather, No More Heroes product, so we’re going straight to
[Mario creator] Shigeru Miyamoto and Date:
Fall 2007
differentiates itself by being phe- the source—enigmatic No More
his influence on games and his inspi-
nomenally weird...let’s just hope it’s Heroes Director Goichi Suda—for
ration to many of today’s engineering
a good weird. This surreal offering assistance. While he doesn’t exactly
students.
blends open-ended, Grand Theft reveal the true nature of the game-
EGM: OK, so now that Donkey Auto–style missions, frantic Wii-mote play, Suda adamantly explains pre-
Kong’s done, what’s next? swordplay, and bizarre, postmodern cisely what his new game isn’t.
IR: We’re probably going to be doing
Duck Hunt (NES) in the fall. And Zelda
(NES) next spring.
> IT'S NOT JUST ANOTHER
EGM: What? Nothing ambitious like WII MINIGAME COLLECTION
Master Chief saving the world from
an onslaught of Covenant? No More Heroes stands out among Wii releases by being...well, a real game. In a
sea of insubstantial minigame collections, a meaty single-player adventure seems
IR: No, no. We pretty much have to positively ambitious. It’s no accident, and Suda has no shortage of opinions on
stay with games from the ’80s. A sin- the state of Wii software. “Let me tell you one thing,” he insists. “I’m not looking
gle sprite from anything newer would to other developers’ Wii titles as reference points during the creation of No More
fill up all four floors. Heroes...I think a lot of developers are preparing original software on Wii presently,
but at least in Japan, you can’t deny the fact that developers are planting the soil
EGM: Guess we gotta wait for the on this new platform with unoriginal and entirely boring game concepts.”
next-gen Post-its, eh?
IR: Something like that, yeah! The 16-
bit Post-its.

T,
U R -S E A
E -O F -Y O D A CTIO N .
TO E D G O
D IV E IN E E D H O LLY W O
H IG H -S P
V E M E N TS
G U N M OS H Y O U R
TE R E A L MA
R E P LI CA S T E A L A N D SU N D E R W O R LD .
A S Y O U O U G H N Y C 'S
C K LE R
IT E -K N U W AY TH
N C E W H V E R 8 0 F U L LY
E X P E R IE H O
G W IT
S T E E R INS T O M IZ A B L E C
CU
AR .S
D R I V EAR 7 6 ON ®
BLE NOW
AVAIL®
2007 ®
rtable) system
PSP (PlayStation Po
®
Blood
Drug Reference
Intense Violence
S UMMER
Partial Nudity
Sexual Themes
Strong Language
http://driver.ubi.com
Driver® Parallel Lines © 2007 Ubisoft Entertainment. Driver, Ubisoft, Ubi.com, and the Ubisoft logo are trademarks of Ubisoft Entertainment in the U.S. and/or other countries. TM and the Wii logo are
trademarks of Nintendo. © 2006 Nintendo. “PlayStation”, “PS” Family logo, and “PSP” are registered trademarks of Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. Memory Stick Duo™ may be required (sold separately).
NO MORE HEROES (cont.)
> IT'S NOT KILLER 7 ALL OVER AGAIN

PRESS START
Although we had plenty of respect for Killer 7’s

wildly creative storyline, its complex web of
politics, religion, and insanity left most players
thoroughly lost without a clue. “The story of No
More Heroes proudly represents the antithesis
of Killer 7’s,” Suda explains. “It’s a story of the
maturation of a young man, so the narrative
should be more understandable for players.” So, rather than juggling seven
characters, each representing aspects of the protagonist’s fractured psyche,
here you only have to wrap your head around one hero, the amusingly named
Travis Touchdown.
Travis begins the game as an affable everyman who lucks into a killer find
via an Internet auction site—his very own beam katana (think: lightsaber).
Armed with this new weapon, he accepts a gig as a hit man...and later finds
himself caught up in an international assassination competition against the
world’s finest killers. Sound preposterous? Maybe not—perhaps this is a primal
fantasy that Suda knows gamers will relate to. “He’s actually a huge manga,
anime, and hardcore fighting otaku [fanboy],” says Suda of his new hero.
“Travis figures that if he’s going to turn his hobbies into something practical,
he’s going to become a hired killer.”
No More Heroes also diverges from Killer 7 in terms of structure and game-
play: That game’s simple, linear stages and ill-advised “on-rails” controls have
wisely been bulldozed, replaced by a wide-open world where you can travel
and fight with no restrictions. The fictional city of Santa Destroy, CA provides
a suitably quirky backdrop to the action and, thankfully, you’re not limited to
hoofing it around this sprawling metropolis. “Players will need to use Travis’
bike, the Schpel Tiger, to ride from location to location within Santa Destroy,”
says Suda. “While he’s in transit, I don’t expect Travis to encounter enemies,
but there might be set instances where there will be on-bike battles.”
■ Travis heads to Mexico for some gray

market Cialis and the donkey show.
> IT'S NOT RED STEEL ALL OVER AGAIN
Since most of No More Heroes’ combat

involves slicing up fools with Travis’ beam
katana, prepare to wield your Wii Remote for
some serious swordplay. But, as Ubisoft’s Red
Steel taught us, virtual sword fighting can feel
awfully haphazard and imprecise. Luckily, Suda
appears to be fully aware of this potential pit-
fall. “If you’re going to make a katana-based game, you’re going to run into a
lot of problems unless you adopt an advanced camera system,” he says. The
game’s dynamic camera makes it easy to determine how to best strike your
opponent—the precise motion you make with the Wii Remote isn’t actually
that crucial, but the height and angle of your attack are. Expect to encounter
a bit of a learning curve, but skilled players will soon be able to dismember
and decapitate foes, and even mix in a few wrestling-inspired finishing moves
(like a skull-crushing suplex) using the Nunchuk. Overall, it’s a far more brutal,
visceral approach to sword combat than we’ve seen in the past. “The Wii is an
entirely new device and requires a completely new approach to game design,”
says Suda. “You can’t take your past experiences into a Wii game and pray
they work just as well as before.” P

There’s only one place you can get hands-on training with the most advanced
technology in the world and that’s the U.S. Navy. If you’re up to the challenge,
log on the Life Accelerator at navy.com or call 1.800.USA.NAVY.
© 2004. Paid for by the U.S. Navy. All rights reserved.
PRESS START
This is scuttlebutttttt!!! By Quartermann
The PS3 is pretty USUALLY AROUND THIS TIME titles like PaRappa the Rapper got coming to the PS3 and 360 next
similar to the Xbox
OF YEAR, I’m digging through gamers groovin’ in a more simplis- year. OK, that’s not too frighten-
360 except for one
thing: Achievements. mountains of dirt thanks to all the tic fashion: pushing buttons to the ing...but this is: The Japanese team
Not for long, tantalizing tidbits I uncover at the beat of the music. Simple? Yeah. responsible for the series is hand-
though—the PS3 annual Electronic Entertainment Addictive. Oh yeah. Sony lets their ing the reins over to a new Yankee
will soon incorporate
Expo (E3). Not this year, though! No, rapping pup out again this July when development team.
in-game trophies with
its Home service. no. Because the formerly massive they release the original PaRappa
And if you remember, gaming convention is a little later this for the PSP, but it looks like the PS3 Rockin’ sequels
I teased these back summer, I’m sadly forced to delay my is getting thrown a bone, too. My Right now, Grand Theft Auto 4 is
when they were
anticipated rumor feast. So my stom- Sony spies tell me I gotta believe (rightfully) stealing all of publisher
called “entitlements.”
ach may be starved for scuttlebutt PaRappa the Rapper 3 for the Rockstar’s attention, but I caught
right now, but don’t worry ’bout ol’ PS3 is real. wind of other sequels coming from
Q-Mann—next month, I’ll digest all the controversial gaming superstars.
the juicy details for you. Until then, Haunted hill How many games? Three—expect
let these rumors fill ya up. Publisher Konami wants to keep the to hear official announcements about
sequel talk for their spooky survival a new Midnight Club (duh!), Bully
360 minute abs horror series, Silent Hill, quiet, but (yay!), and Red Dead Revolver
It doesn’t take an egghead to realize The Q is hearing all sorts of scary (huh?) sometime very soon...maybe
epic Spartan flick 300 is the perfect details. Like, get this: Silent Hill 5 is even sooner than you think. P
thing to crack on consoles. Hell,
movie critics said the film looks like
a videogame. So, uh, how come
nothing ever came out (besides the > Q-TIPS
shoddy PSP game)? Stupidity, likely, • Monster publisher EA sure is greedy—I hear it’s looking to snatch up the
but at least someone out there isn’t MLB and NBA licenses to complement its current NFL exclusivity.
completely brain-dead—I hear a
new publisher is preppin’ a 300 • Nintendo’s looking to level-up its role-playing fare—the company recently
game for the PS3 and Xbox 360. acquired developer Monolith Soft (Xenosaga) to make a Final Fantasy killer.
• Grisly first-person shooter Condemned is a guilty pleasure for a lot of gam-

PS3 getting a good rap
ers, enough so that I hear publisher Sega is making Condemned 2.
Before wannabe rockers banged
their brains out to Guitar Hero, music

07
JULY 20
COMING SOON
PRESS START
Another slim July
Undertow
Xbox Live Arcade • Chair Entertainment
If Battlefield’s “pick different units, capture command points” setup held hands
with Geometry War’s 2D, 360-degree arcade shooting and jumped into the
ocean together, you’d have Undertow. Although this underwater shooter clearly
rips off ideas from other games, it’s quite ambitious for a Live Arcade title, with
16-player online support, cut-scenes, and pretty amazing graphics.
NCAA Football 08
PS3/XB360/PS2/XB • EA Sports
Hot Shots Tennis You’ve once again led your Michigan Wolverines to
PS2 • Sony Computer
a victory over Ohio State, but your buddy (who’s a
Entertainment America
Bucknut) isn’t around to witness the massacre. Don’t
A cute cast. Extremely accessible play. worry: Thanks to NCAA Football 08’s new replay sys-
Fun challenges. Sounds like another tem, you can now create a vault of highlight clips and
Mario Tennis, right? Yes, but this time send them to your online pals. Nothing like rubbing a li’l
it’s the Hot Shots crew who’ll be trad- extra salt in the wounds of your college rivals....
ing their golf clubs for a racket. It’s a
nice changeup, but it’s even nicer to
see a company continuing to support
its aging console with new software
More July Releases
(hear that, Nintendo and Microsoft?). AniMates Panzer Tactics DS
DS • DreamCatcher DS • CDV Software
Tales of the Final Fantasy II Persona 3

World: Radiant PSP • Square Enix PS2 • Atlus
Mythology Guitar Hits Project Sylpheed

PSP • Namco Bandai
PSP • Ubisoft XB360 • Microsoft Game
If you’re having trouble making sense Studios
of the seven Tales installments, you’re Lair
not alone. Luckily, this lighthearted PS3 • Sony Computer Vampire Rain
role-playing romp will shed some Entertainment America XB360 • Microsoft Game
light on the overarching story, bring- Studios
ing characters from the entire series NASCAR 08
together for a fast-paced, open-ended PS3/XB360/PS2 • Worms: Open Warfare
dungeon hack. EA Sports PSP/DS • THQ P

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© 2007 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. Microsoft, the Microsoft Game Studios logo, Forza Motorsport, Turn 10, Xbox 360, Xbox Live, and the Xbox logos are
registered trademarks of the Microsoft group of companies. The names of actual companies and products mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.
GRAND THEFT AUTO IV
Welcome back to
LIBERTY
CITY
With a camera in hand, we take a trip to
New York to compare one Big Apple to
another: Grand Theft Auto IV’s Liberty City
By Greg Ford
Photography by Seth Kushner

GRAND THEFT AUTO IV
GRAND THEFT AUTO IV IS STILL A MYS- What we know the most about is the setting.
TERY to many. Sure, everyone’s seen the trailer, As in previous GTAs, LC is Rockstar’s version
and a few of us have seen a demo of the game of the Big Apple. And while those earlier games
running. But hard info? Not so much. You still made you feel like you were in a city, none of
jack cars, pilot choppers, swim, and pack heat, them made you feel like you were in the city.
but is that a surprise to anyone? All we know One of Rockstar’s biggest goals is to change
about multiplayer is that GTA4 (coming to the that and really nail the NYC feel.
PS3 and Xbox 360 this October) won’t be a Fact is, we’ve been impressed by what we’ve
massively multiplayer online game, nor a death- seen. Graphically, it’s a beaut. And since this
match showdown, but “will match single player,” is Rockstar’s most ambitious re-creation of the
according to a Rockstar rep. OK...good. We metropolis yet, we wanted to see how far the
know a little about the story: Protagonist Niko developers have come to mimicking NYC. So
Bellic heads to Liberty City from Eastern Europe we sent a photographer to try to match screens
to turn his life around, only to find that the won- shot for shot. Let’s see how close he came...and
ders his cousin promised were unfounded. in turn how close Rockstar did.

GRAND THEFT AUTO IV
NEW YORK CITY
LIBERTY CITY
THE SQUARE
Make no mistake; GTA4 has
impressed many doubters with its
graphical splendor, delivering the
series’ first bona fide gawker. But a
pretty world can only serve to draw
you in. It’s the people who fill that
world that make you want to stay,
and that’s where GTA4 has us most
intrigued. More specifically, we focus
our attention on Times Square, the
most recognizable intersection on the
planet and a bustling slice of human
idiocy, both in the real and virtual
world. In the NYC pic, the corner and
crosswalk teem with activity, with
some people walking at a determined
gait, others casually crossing the
street. Most of all, their minds are on
their own immediate destination. And
you know what? While LC’s square
ain’t as dense (we really didn’t expect
it to mimic Manhattan’s nearly 1.6
million inhabitants), those peds give
off the same “I couldn’t give a s***”
vibe. They’re going about their own
thing and, amazingly, aren’t all copies
of each other. And don’t forget the
signage and stock-market ticker: The
GTA-style satire makes its mark again.

GRAND THEFT AUTO IV
THE BROWNSTONES
OK, we couldn’t find an exact match
for these NYC staples, but we have a
good reason why (besides LC’s fuller
trees—wrong season!). See those
elevated tracks in the background?
We know of no such tracks that have
brownstones next to them. Now, part
of this may be due to the game only
copying four of NYC’s five boroughs,
but what about this: Transportation
between the boroughs and Jersey is
easiest via the subway, but Rockstar
hasn’t put as much emphasis on the
underground, instead focusing on
aboveground tracks that go above
the already modeled city? Could be.
We do know that the developers have
put a lot of emphasis on the interi-
ors. One of our favorite parts of the
demo was seeing Niko slip into one of
these apartments—a detailed flat with
lots of furniture—gun drawn, before
escaping through the back door. The
thought of a more compact but deep
city, complete with details like people
sitting on the stoops and birds chirp-
ing and Niko looking their way, only
further gives Liberty City life.
LC
NYC

GRAND THEFT AUTO IV
NYC
LC
THE SKYLINE
This NYC/LC showdown features the
biggest aesthetic differences simply
because of the game’s more stream-
lined city. The real city is much more
developed (especially apparent to the
right of the Empire State Building). But
take note of all of LC’s skyscrapers (as
well as that beautiful sky). Rockstar
is stressing vertical density, meaning
when you’re touring the financial dis-
trict, the buildings towering above you
will block out the sun and really give
you a sense of being encapsulated in
this city, just like in the real thing.
NYC LC
■ The Brooklyn Bridge, one of the oldest suspension bridges in the world, serves as the connection between Manhattan and Brooklyn (Algonquin
and Broker in LC). Now, how many of you will have Niko (shown here) plungin’ off it the minute you get the game? Thought so...sickos.

GRAND THEFT AUTO IV
UNDER THE TRACKS
If you’ve been following our GTA4 coverage (both in
EGM and on 1UP.com), you know we love the little
touches. Like when Niko breaks a car window with his
elbow in order to unlock it. Or the way he takes a big
step up and shifts his weight when he approaches a
curb while walking. Or pedestrians taking a drag, chat-
ting on a pay phone, or just leaning against a wall. In
these particular shots, LC doesn’t feature as many
storefronts as this packed NYC strip, yet it has just as
much going on: folks minding their own business, faded
bills on the foreground pillar, trash on the sidewalk.
You’d better believe we’d love to see more shops along
the street...all the better to rob and escape out the back,
something Rockstar tells us is indeed possible.
LC
NYC
NYC LC
■ Whether in the real world or in the game, Times Square is inundated with ads. But rather than trying to sell you on something (like in the real world), GTA4 just looks to
entertain—hey, we’d gladly clog our arteries with a Heart Stopper Burger from Burger Shot. Better yet, we can wash it down with the one crossover: ice-cold beer.

GRAND THEFT AUTO IV
NYC
LC
THE COASTER
We’ve put a lot of focus on the hearts
of the cities so far, and rightly so, but
it’s worth pointing out that GTA4 isn’t
all high-rises and wild cabbies. Places
like Broker and Alderney (GTA4’s ver-
sions of Brooklyn and New Jersey,
respectively) offer some diversity
in the environment (though noth-
ing like San Andreas’ boonies). The
Coney Island riff here has the same
run-down, dilapidated look of the
real thing. And again, you’ll notice a
misplaced elevated-track pillar in LC,
which in the real city is a block away.
NYC LC
■ Admit it, these two shots look amazing. No, it’s not a landmark or anything iconic, but still.... The way the hill crests. The crisscrossing fire
escape. Even the streetlamps. The fact that the developers modeled a seemingly random street so well has us itching to explore Liberty City.

WARNING
AFTER APPLICATION OF NEW TAG ALL-NIGHTER, YOU’LL BE REQUIRED TO ENTERTAIN ALL MANNER
OF BOUNCING BABE-A-LOIDS. FAILURE TO STAY UP MAY RESULT IN SERIOUS LOSS OF ACTION.
Introducing All-Nighter. Show us how it’s done at

SleepLess-ScoreMore.com
GRAND THEFT AUTO IV
GRAND THEFT APPLE
A list of NYC locales that we want to appear in GTA4
New York City has way more sin than Sin City—you only need to know where to find it. We chatted with the metropolis’ most in-
the-know people to uncover a handful of spots that simply must show up in GTA4. Our criteria: We wanted seedy, salacious, or
underground. But ideally, all three. —Todd Zuniga
Happy Ending
302 Broome St., Manhattan
Formerly an exotic massage parlor, Happy Ending is the Lower

East Side’s most heavenly spot...if your idea of heaven is wild
chicks, ridiculous dancing, and brain-bending martinis. The
bar/club hybrid inspires decadence from its attendees, and its
sauna rooms turned party coves would make a perfect spot
for down and dirty deal-making in GTA4.
City Sub
450 Bergen St., Brooklyn
The building and its name are both nondescript. But if you can
fatten up the main character in GTA4, this is the place to do it.
Inarguably, Brooklyn’s City Sub serves up the most delicious
sandwiches on the planet. Each one is painstakingly prepared,
so the lines are murder. But when the cops aren’t on your tail,
this would be a great place to cool down.
Bohemian Hall & Beer Garden

29-19 24th Ave., Astoria, Queens
A slice of Munich nestled in the middle of Astoria, this legend-
ary summer outpost is far from the horn honks and general
mania of Manhattan. A perfect fit for GTA4, it plays host to
some serious goofballs, who drunkenly stumble around, happy
as beer-filled clams.
Hotel Chelsea
222 W. 23rd St., Manhattan
The body count from past visits to Liberty City has piled up,
but all those deaths don’t equal the amount of ghosts that
spook the hallways of this legendary hotel. This creativity-
seeping locale has hosted quite an eclectic mix of hyper-
talents, from Jimi Hendrix to William S. Burroughs to Edith
Piaf. Shazam!
French Roast
78 W. 11th St., Manhattan
There’s no sleeping in a Grand Theft Auto game, so French

Roast, the premier eat-late spot, makes perfect sense. Open
around the clock, this low-lit West Village gem looks indiscrim-
inate, but the food is delicious. You’ll also always find some
local drunk—Johnny Darko, specifically—ready to tell tales at
the bar, no matter what the hour. P

DEPTH
CHARGED
We grab a joypad and go beneath
the surface of BioShock, the
unfathomably deep, wet-and-wild
Xbox 360 shooter that’s smarter
than you By Crispin Boyer
“TODAY WE’RE GOING TO SET bulkheads with customizable powers “I’ve always loved games where it’s
UP A DEFENSIVE PERIMETER,” and weapons, smart and motivated never the same experience for you
says Ken Levine, and we’re instantly enemies, and torturous moral choic- and for your friends,” says Levine,
grateful for two things. One, that es that involve killing what appear to “where the game empowers the
he’s the president and creative be 8 year olds. Other sunken plea- player to drive the process and make
director of a game company and sures: the occasional flaming teddy epic decisions. We try to make it so
not, say, prepping us for a frazzling bear and a camera to capture all the there are five different ways to do
day in mall security. And, two, that high-minded carnage and research everything. There are so many stimuli
Levine and his studio, Boston-based new killing skills. in BioShock’s world, so many things
Irrational Games, are famous for PC Trip wires? Check. Telekinetic that do cool s***.”
titles (such as System Shock II and tornado-generating doodad? Got
Freedom Force) that give players the it. Helpful hovering machine-gun Submergence day
freedom to be who they wanna be. drone? Got two of those. And with All this “cool s***” has lured a for-
So we’re going to assume that that we’re braced to build our secu- midable following to BioShock,
setting up a perimeter in BioShock, rity perimeter, seconds away from an especially for a new franchise. Few
Irrational’s first made-for-console onslaught of genetically jacked-up games, after all, have a fan base
game, will be fathoms more interest- enemies known as Splicers blow- as frothed up as the one at www.
ing than doing it in many other first- torching through the steel hatch in cultofrapture.com, where the most
person shooters. Due on Xbox 360 front of us. However this encounter common message-board worry
August 21—and, we expect, the PS3 plays out—and we’ll get to that is—yikes!—what if BioShock is too
eventually—BioShock is an under- later—we know we can replay it daily short? (Levine predicts a 25-hour
the-sea adventure bulging at the and never see the same scenario. playthrough for aquanauts who take >

COVER STORY
a holiday pace.) Today we’re going

leagues deeper than anyone has yet
ventured into the game’s world, play-
ing levels for the first time and exper-
imenting with never-before-revealed
weapons, powers, and strategies. ■ Your guns evolve visually as you mod them with steam-
If you’re not yet in the cult, we’ve powered gadgets and other moving parts. “By the end of the
game, [they] look insane,” says Lead Designer Bill Gardner.
got your Kool-Aid. BioShock begins
in 1960 with your character adrift in
the North Atlantic after a plane crash.
“Keep that [airplane] tail in mind— fog known as “rapture of the deep.” and pooling on cracked floors. If
you might see it again,” Levine says We know the feeling when we exit BioShock supported Smell-O-Vision,
as we watch the mangled fuselage the bathysphere and begin our first think grandma’s attic crossed with a
sink to Davy Jones. We have only tentative explorations. Something tropical-fish store’s Dumpster.
one way to swim through the flam- very bad has gone down in this “We didn’t want a modern-day
ing plane fuel: toward a lighthouse dimly lit underwater town. The Art city because we’d have to use arti-
towering above the whitecaps. Inside Deco décor—all streamlined indus- ficial barriers to limit where players
we find a bathysphere that carries trial design and terrazzo floors and can go,” says Levine, walking us
us down to “a city where the artist rich woods tinged with the func- through the design process that led
would not be censored, where the tional contraptions of a Jules Verne to BioShock’s sea-based setting.
scientist would not be bound by submarine—has degenerated into “Rapture is more natural. You can’t,
petty morality, where the great would moldering opulence. Tables are say, take a plane to fly somewhere
not be constrained by the small,” overturned. Libraries have been else. And we’re nerdy enough to care
claims the narrator of the bathy- ransacked. Blood stains walls. Bing how the city works. You’ll find [out]
sphere’s propaganda film that plays Crosby and Billie Holiday croon from how the city’s powered, how they
as the fathoms tick away. tinny speakers and gramophones. “I get their oxygen—and it all factors
Buildings loom up from the abys- love the feeling of a place trapped into the gameplay.”
sal gloom, connected by Habitrails in time,” says Levine, who com- New city areas—from a hospital to
of pressure-proof glass that span posed one of the game’s tunes and a forest greenhouse—open as you
neon-lit boulevards patrolled by consulted his pop for oldie music gain powers and complete objec-
sonorous blue whales and other life worth licensing. (“That’s BioShock’s tives. Eventually you can explore all
aquatic. This is the city of Rapture. target audience,” he jokes, “people the buildings and regions you saw
It’s a name with significance for the in their 70s and 80s.”) Mingled with on the bathysphere ride down. “The
religious as well as for scuba divers, the music: a constant drip, drip, levels are pretty sprawling—lots of
who worry that dallying too long at drip. The sea is reclaiming this city, nooks and crannies,” says Levine.
depth will bring on a drunken mental leaking through buckled bulkheads “It’s not one long corridor like in >

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for updated rating
information.
© 2006, 2007 ATLUS Persona is a trademark of Atlus USA. SHIN MEGAMI TENSEI, and SMT are registered trademarks of Atlus USA. © 2007 Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. All Rights Reserved.
"PlayStation" and the "PS" Family logo are registered trademarks of Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. The rating icons are trademarks of the Entertainment Software Association.
COVER STORY
■ Look for little plot touches everywhere. “The story should

work on several different levels,” says Irrational’s Levine.
most first-person shooters.” You can

revisit any areas you’ve already seen,
with very little load time between
PRIVATE LIVES
them, but the game never forces you BioShock’s enemies think before they shoot
to retrace your steps with backtrack-
“Our enemies don’t just sit around waiting for the player to show up with a pistol,”
ing missions. “Generally, the game-
says Irrational’s Ken Levine. Indeed, BioShock’s adversaries, called Splicers, have
play flow is on the level you’re on,” lives of their own. They wander Rapture, nosing around dead bodies, vending
says Levine, although he adds that machines, and locked doors, looking for life-giving Adam (more on that later).
previous levels house caches and They’ll also react to the sounds you make—you’ll need to be stealthy if you’re not
other goodies worth hunting for. “Our ready for a fight. And they start in different places each time you play, making it
attitude is let the gamer tell us how hard to get the jump on them if you retry an area. “Our levels are so nonlinear,
much they want to backtrack rather you never know where they’re coming from,” says Lead Designer Bill Gardner.
than us dictating it.” Competing for limited resources in what Levine calls BioShock’s “A.I. ecology,”
Not far into Rapture’s first area, Splicers often get into scraps with each other—and sometimes even take on the
however, we reach a point of no lumbering Big Daddies. But their smarts extend to combat. They can see what
kind of weapon you have and will egg you into a melee if you’re not packing heat.
return. Walking through one of the
“They learned this lesson from Indiana Jones: Don’t taunt the guy with the pistol,”
glass tunnels that connect the city’s
says Levine.
structures, we look up to see the
Splicers understand their environment and will seek cover when the shooting
airplane tail section tumbling through starts. But the scariest part of all: They’ll make a dash for the nearest medical
the cobalt murk. It collides with the station when their health runs low. It makes for bittersweet relief if you’re on the
tunnel. Millions of gallons of seawa- losing end of a fight. On the one hand, it’s nice get a breather while the enemy
ter pour through the shattered glass. runs off to lick his wounds. On the other, you know the Splicer is just going to
Wading through frigid H2O that looks return—and with full health, no less—unless you managed to hack into and
too real (Irrational has an artist work- booby-trap the medical station. “There’s nothing more fun than watching the A.I.
ing solely on water effects), we bare- try to use that thing,” Levine says, “then seeing all the green smoke come out of it
ly make it through the exit hatch at and the Splicer choking to death on that stuff.”
the end of the tunnel. We’re cut off.
We can’t go back. Our only choice is
to head deeper into Rapture.
Red tide
“Look, this is an M-rated game,”
says Levine. “We wouldn’t be having
this conversation if we were making
a movie.” The conversation in ques-
tion follows our first encounter with
a Big Daddy about two hours later in
the game. These eyes-on-high-beam,
pressure-suited monstrosities have
become iconic of BioShock and are a ■ “The A.I.s have head-tracking technology,” says Levine. “You’ll see them looking at
linchpin of its labyrinthine plot—and points of interest and even commenting on what they see.”
not just because you’re supposed >

COVER STORY
■ Red means go: Don’t be on the warpath of a Big Daddy when his eyes go crimson. His terrifying
bellows of rage blur the screen and stun you, leaving you open to one mega melee pounding.
to seek out and take down three in he says. “You have to show that You can’t shoot the little girls. You
each section of Rapture. Each Big exploitation or there’s no choice to can’t hurt them in any way, except in
Daddy protects one of the Little make here.” The team’s big chal- that moment when you’re given the
Sisters, gaunt 8-year-old girls who lenge, he explains, was to go only choice [to harvest them].”
pop out of hatches to scour areas for so far with the graphical presenta- Don’t assume that choosing to
corpses. The girls aren’t what they tion of harvesting. There’s a reason harvest the Little Sisters rather than
seem. They’ve been genetically engi- you don’t see it actually happening save them sends you down some
neered by one of Rapture’s residents onscreen. “We did it basically so you irreversible path in BioShock. Much
to drink the blood of the dead and crossed the threshold of informa- of the game’s rich story (which
convert it to Adam, stem-cell goo tion so the player understood what we’ve left vague to avoid spoiling)
that fuels all superpowers in Rapture. was happening, but no more,” says has you torn between two charac-
You want Adam; acquiring it is at Levine. “You don’t need to show ters, Atlas and Tenenbaum, who
the heart of your character-custom- anything else and you shouldn’t harass you regularly on your radio.
ization options. But here’s the tricky show anything else, because we’re Atlas’ family is trapped in Rapture,
part: Once you take down a Big not going for a prurient thrill here. and he wants you to harvest all the >
Daddy (no small feat, which we detail
on page 75), you can opt to either
“save” the Little Sister and get a wee
bit of Adam or “harvest” her and get
the maximum amount. What hap-
pens when you harvest her? Well,
you figure it out. Your hand pulls the
whimpering girl offscreen, you hear
some squishy noises, and when your
fist reappears it’s holding organic
material and the Little Sister is gone.
Seeing this, it’s easy to imagine
backlash from the mainstream
media, maybe a Fox News story
about a new game that lets you kill
little girls—never mind that the Little
Sisters aren’t exactly human. Levine
says it’s a risk he’s willing to take
to create a compelling experience.
■ Kodak moments: You eventually get a camera you can use to research enemy weaknesses.
“We’re making a game where the
Snapping action shots earns you points—earn enough and you get bonuses against different Splicers.
theme is the exploitation of people,”

COVER STORY
Adam you can find so you can soup

up your powers and rescue them.
Tenenbaum, on the other hand, is a
former Nazi scientist who created the
Little Sisters and wants you to save
them. “So all of a sudden you’re like,
‘Wait a minute...who do I listen to ■ 1337 haxors: You’ll find ways to auto-
hack if you don’t dig the minigame.
here?’” says Levine. “Atlas is telling
me these aren’t little girls anymore,
and that his wife and child will die that grant powers. You’ll find plas- you and blast enemies), and medical
unless you power up your character. mids that let you unleash telekinesis, stations (which will poison Splicers
Tenenbaum, meanwhile, begs you to fireballs, freeze rays, Splicer-stun- who try to use them for health).
not hurt her children. What we’re try- ning electrical jolts, and swarms of BioShock even has its own invention
ing to do is not have a white hat and insects. Some plasmids turn enemies mechanic that lets you build custom
a black hat, not have an angel and against each other (really the saf- plasmids and pimp out your guns.
a devil, but have it be ambiguous, est way to take down Big Daddies). Each of the six weapon types has
which is that much truer to life.” Others make them appear hostile to two customization slots, as well as a
automated turrets and security cam- magazine for homebrew ammo. You
Power struggle eras, which will send out flying robot can increase the rate of fire of your
Depending on what kind of hero you drones armed with machine guns. shotgun, for instance, or alter the
want to create, you can focus on In addition to the plasmids, you’ll grenade launcher so that its rounds
saving all the Little Sisters or har- find passive character-tweaking sub- don’t damage you when you blast
vesting them, or mixing and match- stances called gene tonics. These point-blank enemies.
ing. If all you care about is building do everything from boosting health If all this talk of Adam and plas-
the maximum roster of superpow- to granting semi-invisibility to caus- mids and gene tonics and hacking
ers, harvest all the Little Sisters you ing more damage when you melee- makes the prospect of character
find to get all their Adam. (Levine attack Splicers from behind. Some building in BioShock sound dizzy-
didn’t want to spoil how saving Little increase your hacking skills—yet ing—especially since you must find
Sisters instead of harvesting them another subset of BioShock’s seem- specialized machines to tinker with
affects your character, although we ingly limitless character abilities. Via every aspect of your hero—Levine
know you run into the girls later in a block-shifting minigame that feels is unapologetic. “I do not deny that
the game.) In BioShock’s capitalistic straight from PopCap.com, you can this is a game with a lot of cool stuff
character-development market, you hack any contraption in Rapture, in it,” he says. “Think about a game
spend Adam at special machines including vending machines (for like Zelda: If you were to pick it up at
called Gatherers’ Gardens to buy dif- lower prices on health and plasmid the end and try to figure out what’s
ferent plasmids, body modifications fuel), security bots (which hover near going on, you’d be totally lost. But >

PLAY IT YOUR WAY
We ponder three paths through one of BioShock’s rooms...
COVER STORY
“Let’s pretend we didn’t just do that,” says Irrational’s Ken Levine after a particularly ungraceful attempt at tackling three enemies. And that’s the
beauty of BioShock: Do-overs are often even more fun than exploring new territory. Because enemies always spawn in new locations and, as Levine
frequently reminds us, “everything in the environment is a weapon,” we found ourselves restarting areas just to come up with more elegant solutions to
dealing with bad-guy Splicers and Big Daddies. Here to back up our words are three ways to play in just one room....
Start here
START Welcome to Port Neptune, a Rapture fishery that provides food for the
city. We haven’t been to this area yet, but we can assume it’s crawling
with Splicers, monitored by security cameras and turrets, and might even
be home to a wandering Big Daddy and Little Sister. But this game ain’t
gonna play itself. Pick your plan of attack and let’s clear this room....
1. The run-and-gun approach

Not the thinking type? Not a problem—grab your biggest gun and go
gung ho if you want. BioShock is a first-person shooter, after all. But play-
ers who take the direct approach, be warned: Despite BioShock’s adap-
tive difficulty, you’ll die a lot unless you play it on Very Easy mode. “That
[mode’s] for the people who just want to be tourists, just play the game
and get through it,” Levine says. “Very Easy is for the dumb jocks. On
Normal mode, if you’re not taking advantage of the environment, you’re
not going to do as well.”
Sure enough, we blunder into the firing arc of an automated turret while
1 almost simultaneously triggering a security camera. Hovering drones buzz
into the room and pepper us with machine-gun fire. Splicers on a mezza-
nine hurl grenades at us while others flank us on the ground. We go down
pretty fast. Too bad we weren’t playing on Very Easy.
2. The environmentalist approach

If nothing else, our brief blazing-guns approach above gave us valuable
intel on this room’s innards. We found out the hard way about the security
camera and turret, but we also noticed pools of water on the ground and
electrified trip wires—known as trapbolts—spanning the room. Hmmm.
So this time we take it slow, staying out of range of the security cam-
era and creeping behind the turret. We zap it with our Electrovolt power,
which disables electronics and stuns enemies. With the turret momentarily
short-circuited, we hack it to turn it against enemies. It begins firing on
the Splicers wandering deeper in the room. They scatter, but not before
we use telekinesis to reposition trapbolts across exits. Enemies dash into
2 the trip wires and—bzzzt!—they’re toast. Others Splicers run toward us,
but we light ’em up with our Incinerate power. They freak, dashing for
the nearest pool of water to douse the flames. We’re waiting for them. As
soon as they dive into the pool, we hit it with our Electrovolt, which con-
ducts a lethal charge through water (in contrast, it only stuns enemies if
you zap them directly).
We’ve turned the environment to our advantage. But amidst the chaos,
we hear a Godzilla roar. Uh-oh—a Big Daddy has wandered into the fight
and got tagged by a stray bullet. His red viewports are focused on us.
He’s coming our way. Taking him down on our own will be next to impos-
sible. Hmmm.
3. The enemy-mine approach

One lesson learned early in Rapture: Ammo is scarce in this town. So
why waste it all taking down a Big Daddy when you can turn your own
enemies against him? Typically, Splicers will avoid Big Daddies and vice
3 versa. Targeting the behemoth with your Enrage power, however, chang-
es that. His Little Sister scrambling for cover, the Big Daddy instantly
goes aggro and turns his grenade launcher on the room’s Splicers, who
return fire.
Meanwhile, we get on with our old tricks, hacking turrets and rearrang-
ing trapbolts so they cross the Big Daddy’s path. While we’re at it, we nail
a few Splicers with our Security power. Now the camera sees them as
enemies and sends in the drones. Everyone is shooting everywhere but at
us, giving us time to improvise some explosive devices. We telekinetically
bond three grenades to a TNT barrel, then hurl the whole megaton mess
at the Big Daddy. Booom!
He’s just finished mopping up the last Splicer and now, half weakened,
he’s turned his red eyes on you. He blunders through trapbolts that ding
his health meter. He approaches a pool of water. We think you know what
to do next....

COVER STORY
■ Stop, drop, and ROFL: Splicers understand their environment, so they’ll hunt for health stations
when hurt and take a dip on hot days like the one above. Teach them a lesson in conductivity!
they give you things steadily, and we

follow that model.”
HEY, HOW'S IT PLAY?
Under pressure We go hands-on with BioShock
That brings us back to where we
With atmospheric visuals on par with Gears of War (BioShock uses a modified
started, taking stock of our powers,
version of that game’s graphics engine) and a sea of character-customization
guns, and ammo to build a defensive options and gameplay strategies, Irrational’s underwater adventure certainly
perimeter against the encroaching astounds on paper. But all the nifty powers and Einstein A.I. in the world won’t
Splicers. The only factor left to con- save a shooter if its fundamentals are f’ed.
sider: the environment. Rapture’s Fortunately, the developers designed this game to be a first-person shooter,
world works just like your own. er, first. “It’s just one where you can do all this other cool stuff,” says Irrational’s
Water conducts electricity. Objects Ken Levine. Consequently, BioShock is on target with the things you’d expect.
and substances that logically seem Head shots do significantly more damage. The garaged-together guns have a
satisfyingly heavy feel when you fire them. You can lean around corners to survey
flammable—oil slicks, books, stuffed
an area for enemies before rushing in. You get a map, a journal of important story
animals, enemies—will burn. It
points, and an onscreen mission arrow to keep from getting lost in Rapture’s dark
makes for anything-goes gameplay and twisted structures. Aiming control did feel twitchy—not as finely tuned as in
that has the BioShock quality-assur- triple-A shooters such as the Halo series—but Levine assures us we can tweak
ance testers inventing impromptu sensitivity settings until the game feels just right.
attack strategies daily. We had other nits to pick. Why not let players unleash all of BioShock’s pow-
This is a shooter you play on your ers, weapons, and environmental-based killing strategies in a multiplayer mode?
terms. “It’s like a game of roving Why don’t enemies you freeze and shatter with your Cryoshard power melt into
boss battles,” says Levine. “You pools of water (instead, the bits of ice just disappear)? To these gripes, Levine
gives the same terse response: “BioShock 2.”
decide where to fight Splicers and
Big Daddies in a level. You set up
the ambush. You hack the security.
You manipulate the A.I.s. The theme
again is that everything is a weapon.”
Far be it from us to tell you how to
use these weapons. The Splicers are
nearly done blowtorching through the
door. This fight is all you. P
Check EGM.1UP.com for a full

month of extra BioShock coverage,
including gameplay videos, extended
hands-on impressions, and much more.

REVIEWS
> giant bug spray, archaic roleplay, harvesting hay, and rowdy seamen
92
ODIN SPHERE
> THIS MONTH IN REVIEWS

> CONTENTS
82 Resident Evil 4
83 Escape From Bug Island
2D OR
84 Ninja Gaiden Sigma
86 Pirates of the Caribbean:
At World’s End
NOT 2D?
88 Spider-Man 3
89 WarTech: Senko no Ronde
90 Tomb Raider: Anniversary
92 GrimGrimoire
92
93
Odin Sphere
SimCity DS
PS2 has the answer
94 Pokémon Diamond/Pearl
95 Final Fantasy
96 PQ2: Practical Intelligence WHOA...MAJOR CASE OF DÉJÀ
Quotient VU THIS MONTH. Just look at that
Innocent Life: A Futuristic
> HOW WE RATE
97 lineup. Are we going backward or
Harvest Moon something? It’s a remake special! And
98 Reviews Wrap-Up besides the recast Resident Evils, 10 to 9 Excellent
Ninja Gaidens, and Tomb Raiders,
even Innocent Life is a Harvest Moon 8.5 to 7 Good
reimagining, just with a robo-boy
looking for love (and the proper 6.5 to 5 Average
harvesting schedule) instead of a real
one. Hmm...really? While it’s fun to
4.5 to 3 Bad
relive some of our favorite gaming 2.5 to 0 Terrible
95 moments, even more fun would be
experiencing new ones...like with out-
FINAL FANTASY of-nowhere Game of the Month winner
> SCORES AND AWARDS
THE VERDICTS
Odin Sphere. This 2D side-scroller Reviews: You can also find the lead (OUT OF 10)
RPG brawler (whew) impressively stole EGM review on 1UP.com. The second MERCHANT
the thunder from even the Pokémon

juggernaut, showing that the PS2 still
and third reviews—you’ll find those here.
Awards: We dole out awards to games
9.0
EXCELLENT
based on their scores. Platinum: all 10s;
has some juice. Also impressive: Half LEON
the games this month won awards—if

Gold: 9.0 average and up; Silver: 8.0 6.5
AVERAGE
average or higher. Game of the Month
84 you count Shame of the Month as an

award...which I absolutely do. Kudos,
goes to the highest-scoring game with
unanimously “Good” scores, and Shame
ASHLEY
1.5
TERRIBLE
NINJA GAIDEN SIGMA Escape From Bug Island! Kudos. of the Month is the reverse. Simple.
—Greg Ford, Reviews Editor

PAGE PAGE PAGE
83 88 90
Bug Island: Spider-Man: Raider: Too
Stomp this Third time’s young for a
stinker no charm face-lift?
THIS MONTH'S REVIEW CREW

Living proof that God has a goofy sense of humor
Dan “Shoe” Hsu
Editor-in-Chief
Shane Bettenhausen
Executive Editor
Also on
EGM’s old grudge match with Just when he thought he was deck...
Halo developer Bungie recently out, they pull Shane back in.
got a Needler shot in the arm. Who? Those damned cuddly
New Halo 2 maps, the Halo 3 pocket monsters. Now, he can’t Sam Kennedy
Editor-in-Chief
beta...EGM-Bungie relations are rest until he catches ’em all (and 1UP.com
currently at an all-time low. See makes rival trainer Bryan cry).
Shoe’s April 25 blog post for all Now Playing: Pokémon Pearl, Garnett Lee
the details (and video!). Ninja Gaiden Sigma, Planet Managing Editor
Now Playing: Halo 2, Halo 3 Puzzle League, Uncharted 1UP.com
Blog: egmshoe.1UP.com Blog: egmshane.1UP.com
James “Milkman”
Mielke
Jennifer Tsao Crispin Boyer Executive Editor
Managing Editor Senior Editor 1UP.com
She didn’t find sunken treasure Never let it be said that EGM
or Atlantis or even Nemo when editors are afraid to go deep Matt Leone
Previews Editor
she helped Crispin research for a cover story. Crispin got
1UP.com
this month’s cover story, but the bends, nitrogen narcosis,
Jennifer did learn one important and one wicked case of Scott Sharkey
fact: Dressing up like a Big Jacques Cousteau beanie rash Staff Writer
Daddy scares the sea otters. researching BioShock at 20 1UP.com
Now Playing: Crackdown, fathoms. Must...get...ointments.
Jenn Frank
Pokémon Diamond, PQ2 Now Playing: Puzzle Quest People Person
Blog: egmjennifer.1UP.com Blog: egmcrispin.1UP.com 1UP.com
Bryan Intihar Greg Ford Mark MacDonald

Director
Previews Editor Reviews Editor
GameVideos.com
Bryan surfs the Web in search of Getting intimate with New
any info that’ll give him the edge York City’s tiniest details is Demian Linn
over fellow Pokémon trainer never easy for a die-hard Red Managing Producer
Shane. Listen to these grown Sox fan, especially during GameVideos.com
men battle it out on the EGM baseball season. But that’s the
Ray Barnholt
Live* podcast, and then feel free sacrifice Greg made for the
Staff Reviewer
to laugh at them (we do). GTA4 preview. At least Yankee MyCheats.com
Now Playing: Dead Rising, Stadium isn’t in the game...yet.
Ninja Gaiden Sigma Now Playing: Pokémon Pearl Andrew Fitch
Blog: egmbryan.1UP.com Blog: egmford.1UP.com Staff Reviewer
Greg Sewart
Michael Donahoe Brooks Huber Staff Reviewer
News/Features Editor Editorial Intern
After seeing Spider-Man strut Hoping to compete with this Nick Suttner
his sexy stuff on the silver summer’s epic lineup of block- Staff Reviewer
screen, Michael decided to buster films, EGM decided to
Todd Zuniga
follow his lead out in the real beef up its advertising. Brooks
Staff Reviewer
world. The result? Uh, not so drew the shortest straw, hence
good. Our advice: Just stick to his predicament. But what he
the game, kid. doesn’t know is that they were
Now Playing: Odin Sphere, all short straws. Sucker.
Gears of War, Halo 3 Now Playing: Punch-Out!! (Wii)
Blog: egmhoe.1UP.com Blog: egmbrooks.1UP.com
Jeremy Parish Joe Rybicki

Features Editor, 1UP.com Staff Reviewer
Having almost caught ’em Now that Sony’s figured out
all, Jeremy needs only one the whole playing PS1 games
more capture to complete his on PSP and PS3 thing, Joe’s
Want more? Pokédex: the elusive INTIHAR! turned back to his trusty PSP to
Looking for a review
It’s a shy creature, but fierce catch up on some older games.
of a game we didn’t
when cornered. Shhh, be Unfortunately, there appear to
have enough time or
vewwy vewwy quiet.... be a few kinks left to work out.
room for? We’ve got
Now Playing: Pokémon Pearl, Now Playing: PQ2, Cooking
you covered. Check
1UP.com for all your Odin Sphere Mama: Cook Off, Carcassonne
up-to-date review Blog: jparish.1UP.com Blog: opmjoer.1UP.com
needs. Bravo.

REVIEWS
■ God, looks like somebody

has a case of the Sundays.
Wii
RESIDENT EVIL 4
■ Publisher: Capcom ■ Developer: Capcom ■ Players: 1 ■ ESRB: Mature
What are you buying...for a third time?

THE VERDICTS
(OUT OF 10) wMILKMAN: By now, you must know constitute a whole new game, which knife, and shaking off face-sucking
that RE4 completely rocks—it was means fans aren’t getting cheated, nasties with real-world moves adds
MILKMAN
EGM’s 2005 Game of the Year, after especially considering the $30 price urgency to an already incredibly
8.0
GOOD
all—so I won’t waste your time by
extolling its many virtues here. And
even if you’re a vet of the GC and
point. But it’s amazing how a game
that once looked so good can look so
dated after a couple years of seeing
intense experience.
wMICHAEL: Unlike Milky, I never

MARK PS2 outings, this Wii-make offers games in high-def. complained about the newfangled
9.0
EXCELLENT
something new: RE4 action mapped gameplay. In fact, I actually found the
to near-first-person-shooter-style con- wMARK: Milky’s right on the visu- Wii’s point-and-shoot controls made
MICHAEL trols. But moving your character with als—RE4 may have lost that “holy gunning down Ganados a helluva
9.0
EXCELLENT
the Nunchuk’s analog stick doesn’t
aim, it only moves your field of view,
f***ing s***” wow factor, but the sharp
graphics still ably support its other
lot easier than before...maybe too
easy—I breezed through tough parts
with enemies often out of view unless awesome features: an engaging story, that originally pissed me off in the
you wave the Remote around, hold- a deeply rewarding character and previous versions. But I will find time
The Good: The best
Resident Evil on Wii? ing B while pressing A to shoot. weapon upgrade system, and a truly to chew out Capcom for not includ-
Sounds good! Essentially, it’s more complicated creepy atmosphere no other game ing anything new in this old (but still
The Bad: Fussy con- than it sounds, which saps some of can match. Though they suffer a bit amazing) game. Is it that hard to throw
trols = No joy
the fun out of it. The “Separate Ways” when things get hectic, the Wii-mote- in some extra costumes or weapons?
The Shakes: Intense
waggling replaces missions that first appeared in the enabled controls generally serve RE4 Hell no! Well, at least the cheapo price
button mashing PS2 version are intact and practically well: Aiming weapons, swiping your tag takes away some of that pain. P

Wii
ESCAPE
FROM BUG
ISLAND
REVIEWS
■ Publisher: Eidos ■ Developer: Spike
■ Players: 1 ■ ESRB: Mature
Bring on the exterminator

THE VERDICTS
(OUT OF 10) wG. FORD: Well, I suppose our luck wMARK: Greg, Greg, Greg... of cheesy American action flicks and
was bound to run out. After two very complaining about the horrendous horror movies (see Resident Evil). But
G. FORD
good tongue-in-cheek campy experi- controls and frustrating combat? even I can’t recommend Bug Island
2.0
TERRIBLE
ences—Grindhouse in theaters, Earth
Defense Force 2017 on XB360—
Escape From Bug Island squashes the
It’s called Escape From Bug Island,
Greg—“Escape,” not “Fight.” The
game never gives you a reason to
as anything more than a kitsch party
game in between Wii Sports and
WarioWare sessions (take a swig of
MARK good will with steel-heeled authority. attack monsters (save a handful of your beverage of choice every time
1.5
TERRIBLE
This survival-horror adventure game bosses), so I think you’re supposed Road House reject Mike disturbingly
follows the path of one Ray, who’s to just run from everything instead. points his shotgun at your in-game
A. FITCH trying to figure out what the deal is on Fun! And the crappy cut-scenes love interest).
4.5
BAD
an island of overgrown insects. Sound
premise for some kitschy B-movie-
and laughable dialogue? That’s the
developers telling you to skip the hor-
Still, the game’s not quite as unplay-
able as these other two suggest. Yes,
style fun, sure, but what EDF does rible story as well. Yippee! No, what the controls are “old school” (to be
so right (simple, responsive controls Bug Island does well is the balancing kind), but they’re not much worse than
The Good: Fun,
schlocky concept that make killing hundreds of mindless minigame that appears whenever you most pre-RE4 survival-horror games.
The Bad: Ugly enemies fun), Bug Island mutilates. cross a log bridge...come in expect- My main problem’s with the lack of
graphics, frustrating Antiquated tank controls (you turn ing anything more (like a half-decent variety: Ray’s got an astounding total
controls, and more!
your body before moving forward survival-horror game for the Wii), and of four offensive attacks: high, medi-
The Ugly: The
canine men...get ’em rather than pressing a direction to run) you will be sorely disappointed. um, and low—plus the long-range
a mask! often make the simple act of moving “hurl rocks at a bug’s face” option.
a chore, and sluggish attack motions wA. FITCH: I’m the kind of guy who’s Bug Island’s not exactly horrible...it’s
(hold a button then swing the Remote, endlessly amused by the Japanization just horribly repetitive.
or hold two buttons then swing for
thrown weapons) mean deadly crit-
ters will be all over you as you flail the
wrong way.
And the game’s twist will excite only
fans of backtracking, who, as far as I
know, don’t actually exist. Bug Island
has plenty more wrong with it, as you
can see by the screens on this page,
but that just leaves these other two
reviewers something to chew on.
REVIEWS
■ Want to see the visual difference between the Xbox and PS3
versions? Go to GameVideos.com to see a comparison video.
PlayStation 3
NINJA GAIDEN SIGMA

■ Publisher: Tecmo ■ Developer: Team Ninja ■ Players: 1 ■ ESRB: Mature
Wait...ninjas do Botox now?

THE VERDICTS
(OUT OF 10) wSHANE: When I originally reviewed Luckily, the fantastically deep smarter. As far as the new stuff goes,
Tecmo’s genre-redefining action- gameplay overshadows any visual hic- though, I’m not impressed. The Rachel
SHANE
adventure for Xbox (way back in EGM cups. Returning vets will adore Ryu’s sections feel like an afterthought, and
9.0
EXCELLENT
#178), I honestly gushed, “I’ve never
played a prettier game.” Well, times
change...and modern games such as
new toys (eviscerating enemies with
dual katanas feels particularly brutal),
and busty Rachel’s all-new levels
the pointless tilt controls (shaking the
joypad to boost magic attacks) make
me wonder why they bothered.
BRYAN Gears of War and Lair clearly push the deliver an obscenely violent change of
9.0
EXCELLENT
graphical envelope far beyond Team pace. Genuinely new content doesn’t wG. FORD: This being my first tour
Ninja’s stunning last-gen achieve- abound, but Sigma remains such through this order, I had high expec-
G. FORD ment. It’s impressive, though, that the an expansive, challenging, and well- tations...and came away mostly
8.0
GOOD
visuals in this remake can still hang
tough on PlayStation 3—thanks to
paced thrill ride that you won’t care. impressed. Like these guys say, the
fighting engine is divine. The graceful
some expert nip/tuck artistry, Ryu wBRYAN: Ditto on the graphics. Even combat (minus some occasional iffy
Hayabusa’s adventure looks sexier with those strange visual miscues, targeting) makes you appreciate the
The Good: Most pol-
ished, value-added than ever. It’s a shame, then, that Sigma looks significantly better than art of the counterattack. What you
version to date weird glitches (sync problems that both Xbox installments. But it’s the won’t appreciate, though, is the god-
The Bad: Feels a tad make the screen “tear” when the brilliant gameplay that keeps Ryu at awful camera, which bogs down every
antiquated and glitchy
camera moves, odd bouts of loading, the top of the action crowd. The com- big battle with bouts of babysitting.
Ridiculously Sexy:
Rachel’s idle anima- even in combat) make it feel a bit like bat is extremely fast and fluid, and the Given the game’s age, though, the
tion a slapdash port. formidable enemies force you to fight rest holds up remarkably well. P

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XB360/PS3
PIRATES OF THE
CARIBBEAN: AT
WORLD’S END
REVIEWS
■ Publisher: Disney Interactive ■ Developer: Eurocom

■ Players: 1-2 ■ ESRB: Teen
Yo ho ho and a bottle of ho-hum

THE VERDICTS
(OUT OF 10) wBROOKS: When it comes to sum- Boss battles manage to shake legendary pirate Jack Sparrow allergic
mertime pirating fun, At World’s End things up with some 1-on-1 duels. (yeah, even unto death) to water? The
BROOKS
gets a little too close to walking the These battles are a more close-up, developers got so many of the visual
6.0
AVERAGE
plank for our liking, though it has
its good points. The attention to
detail—such as the rowdy pirates in
concentrated form of combat, but
again, the long pauses between
attacks and dodges kill the flow.
details dead-on...didn’t they think that
maybe the gameplay should be at
least marginally decent too?
JOE Port Royal or Jack Sparrow’s inebri- Exploration-based puzzles break up
4.0
BAD
ated mannerisms—is spot-on with the sword-swinging, but they’re more wGREG S: Outside of my esteemed
the films. It’s painful, then, that the of a burden than pleasure, forcing you colleagues’ complaints—which I agree
GREG S. swashbuckling combat (if you can call to scrounge far and wide for a few with wholeheartedly—the thing that
5.5
AVERAGE
it that) consists of only a few simple
sword swipes that don’t always feel
hidden rum bottles. keeps sticking with me in At World’s
End is how incredibly quiet Capt. Jack
responsive when you try to pull them wJOE: At World’s End poses so many has become. While nothing’s going to
off. And why does every enemy sol- burning questions. Why, for example, make this dreadfully straightforward,
The Good: Detailed
environments, a spot- dier/barman/sea crony turn his back am I allowed to use my sword in some mediocre action game great, more
on Jack Sparrow after only two sword clinks? Such parts of town but not others? Why quips from our hero and his compan-
The Bad: Pirates antics cause some serious déjà vu: does the game insist on telling me in ions would have at least given the
can’t swim
attack, attack [enemy turns his back], the most ridiculously explicit detail game more personality and thus made
Dirtiest Power-up
Name in a Disney attack, and he drops. Simple? Yes. where to go next? And why, in the it a wee more compelling. But as it is,
Game: Jackanism Fun? Well, if repetition is your thing. name of all the gods of the deep, is all it’s got going for it are the graphics.
Heatstroke
With several movie-based videogames falling short for yet another summer (see Spider-Man 3, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End ),
here are four flicks coming out over the next few months that we think would’ve had a better chance for virtual success...
THE BOURNE ULTIMATUM 28 WEEKS LATER STARDUST HAIRSPRAY

A highly trained operative on the Uh, hello? Packs of rage-filled While Harry Potter and friends Now, when you start getting cast
run uses everything and anything zombies (and we’re not talking receive the videogame treatment as an overweight momma (when
in the environment to avoid his Night of the Living Dead–style again in Order of the Phoenix, in real life you’re a dude), does
pursuers. No, we’re not recapping shambling wrecks here—28 may we suggest the same for that mean your acting career is on
the new Splinter Cell game (check Weeks’ infected undead haul ass another epic fantasy: Stardust. the rise or heading into the crap-
out our preview on pg. 24). That like Olympic sprinters) chasing the This tale (based on Sandman per? Either way, we think John
just happens to be the basic prem- first flick’s survivors through the author Neil Gaiman’s novel) has it Travolta’s role as the jovial Edna
ise of the Bourne trilogy, which dreary streets of London? Making all: dashing heroes, teeth-gnash- Turnblad would make for one
concludes this August with the a game based on this follow-up to ing witches, elves...and a gay helluva boss fight in a videogame.
release of Ultimatum. Now, if such 2002’s surprise hit 28 Days Later pirate? Robert De Niro, arguably Just look at him...er, we mean
a scenario is good enough for sure sounds like a no-brainer the greatest living actor, assumes her...him...her...whatever. And call
Sam Fisher’s developers, don’t you of a videogame to us. And just the supporting role of the swash- us crazy, but we see this fitting
think Universal Pictures should’ve imagine the online multiplayer buckling fancy-pants Captain in perfectly on Wii: all the non-
capitalized on bringing Jason possibilities—we’re thinking along Shakespeare. Ah, we can see it traditional gamers who swooned
Bourne (played by Matt “Do you the lines of those Resident Evil now: Tingle (of Zelda fame) ver- over Cooking Mama’s thrilling
like apples?” Damon) to a console Outbreak (PS1) games, only fun. sus De Niro in a battle for the big- sno-cone level would surely enjoy
in addition to theaters? We’d even Quick, someone fill these T-Virus gest fruit in gaming. Our money’s a waggle-based beehive hairdo
settle for Ben Affleck. canisters with Monkey Virus. still on Tingle. styling session.

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REVIEWS
■ Only after pummeling him 10

stories up did Spidey realize the
dude’s just the plumber.
PS3/XB360
SPIDER-MAN 3
■ Publisher: Activision ■ Developer: Treyarch ■ Players: 1 ■ ESRB: Teen
With great graphical power comes great graphical responsibility

THE VERDICTS
(OUT OF 10) wSHARKEY: I can only imagine what Maguire sleep-talks through the same wBRYAN: As these two debate the
Uncle Ben would say if he had picked stupid line for the dozenth time. game’s graphics (for the record, I’m
SHARKEY
up Spider-Man 3: “You’re on next-gen more in Sharkey’s camp), allow me to
5.0
AVERAGE
platforms now, Spidey, and you sure
as hell don’t look it.” You know that
“PS2 game with shiny characters”
wBROOKS: Sharkey seems to have
woken up on the wrong side of the
web. PS2 graphics? Really? Despite
tell you about the unbalanced boss
fights. Even with the improved com-
bat system, you’ll actually dish out
BROOKS look that plagues PS3 and 360 ports? some objects popping in, this PS3/ little damage, which drags out these
7.5
GOOD
It’s dripping all over this webslinging- XB360 version of Manhattan looks encounters (those infuriating but-
filled action game. That, and vicious great. The story may be more comic ton-press sequences don’t help here,
BRYAN slowdown when you break objects. book than movie (think rampant liz- either...sorry, Brooks). And while I
6.5
AVERAGE
The rest of the game is a pretty
straight-up combination of the bet-
ards, mad bombers, and a gang of
Gothic Lolitas), but the action is all
enjoy the mission diversity, I was hop-
ing for a livelier metropolis. I know if I
ter bits of Spider-Man 2 and Ultimate here, and mission variety abounds. saw my friendly neighborhood Spider-
Spider-Man (which isn’t a bad thing, Webslingin’ remains the selling point, Man swingin’ by, battlin’ some foes, I
The Good: Looks all
right for a PS2 game, but we expect more), except with but the combat—although built from wouldn’t just stand there nonchalantly.
webslinging still fun absolutely punishing quick-time but- the ground up for this game—still I’d point, scream...do something! P
The Bad: It’s not a ton-pressing events. A, B...ugh! A, consists of random button mashing.
goddamn PS2 game,
B, Up...damn! A, B, Up, X...f***! And Also, those quick-time events aren’t Even wannabe heroes need a hand.
the voice acting
Whipped: Slinging with each failure we get an unskip- that horrible, but they certainly falter If you need help keeping MJ happy,
MJ across town pable cut-scene during which Tobey next to those of God of War. hit up our SuperGuide at EGM.1UP.com.

The Fastest
Thing Alive
Races Home
To DVD
■ Hey, robo-fattie on the

right—how about you stop
hitting the bolt buffet?
Xbox 360
WARTECH: SENKO
NO RONDE
■ Publisher: Ubisoft ■ Developer: G-Rev
■ Players: 1-2 ■ ESRB: Teen
Would be at home on Dreamcast

wMATT: Remember back when it was wSAM: As a fan of both shooters and fight-
acceptable for a console game to be 20 min- ers, I dig the shooter-fighter mashup con-
utes long because it was an arcade port? You cept—it’s just a shame that it really doesn’t
know, before things like cheap, simple Live work as well as you’d imagine. The game’s a
4-DVD SET
Arcade games and $60 retail 360 games made bit too chaotic and inexact, and I kept thinking
the concept look silly. WarTech: Senko no I’d much rather be playing a dedicated shooter
Ronde is dated in this respect, offering a con- or fighter. That, and like Matt says, the price
tent-light 2D shooter as a “full priced” game. is nuts. For $60 bucks you can find a lot bet-
You’ve played the video games, read
But calling it a 2D shooter is oversimplify- ter games—shooter, fighter, or otherwise—to the comics and watched the feature
ing things. In fact, it’s arguably not even 2D. spend your dough on. The novelty’s fun for a
Basically, it’s a 1-on-1 competitive shooter, while, but that’s about it. film until your eyes bled. But your
with 2D gameplay and 3D graphics, set up like
Sonic The Hedgehog fandom cannot
a typical fighting game. Neat concept, and it wDEMIAN: Yeah, I’m going to have to go
executes it decently, with a good variety of ahead and be the echo on this one: interesting truly be an obsession without this 4-DVD
characters, distinct attacks, and fun special concept, less interesting execution, and defi-
moves/boss attacks that add some strategy nitely far too expensive. As a fighting game,
collectors’ box set of the afternoon
to the action. But the WarTech is light on the moves and strategic TV series. It’s juiced up with a
controls aren’t as twitch- depth; likewise, as a shooter, it’s way too
friendly and built for quick short, and when your opponent launches a printable script of the pilot episode,
THE VERDICTS
movements as you might hail of bullets in your direction, your best bet
(OUT OF 10)
storyboards and more. “Way Past Cool!”
imagine, so matches is to simply hit the shield button rather than try
MATT
often boil down to each to dance through a seam in it. I can’t stand the
4.0
BAD
player throwing up as
many bullet walls as pos-
sible until one player hap-
art style, either—sure, the paint-by-numbers
(big-eyed/busty/Hot Topic outfits) anime char-
acters are one thing, but a robot with bunny
pens to absorb enough ears and a purse? Not on my futuristic inter- shoutfactory.com ®
SAM
5.0
AVERAGE
damage to lose. stellar battleground! © 1993 and 1994 DIC Entertainment, L.P. & © SEGA
DEMIAN
4.0
BAD
The Good: Little else like this out there
Available At:
The Bad: It moves slower than you’d expect
Online: We didn’t get to try it yet, but we’ll let you know next month if it has any problems
EGM’s Top 5:
Unorthodox health
power-ups
REVIEWS
1
5
Mushrooms: Mario series

What kind of message was
Nintendo sending when it reward-
ed snackage on ’shrooms?
PlayStation 2
Floor poultry: Final Fight

Dining off the ground may sound
rank, but remember: Eat it within
TOMB RAIDER:
five seconds, and it’s all good!
ANNIVERSARY
3 ■ Publisher: Eidos ■ Developer: Crystal Dynamics
■ Players: 1 ■ ESRB: Teen
A worthy celebration
wJOE: Wow. Crystal Dynamics isn’t messing sets the standard for remaking classic games.
around with this whole Tomb Raider thing. Reliving the signature moments here delivers
The neck needle: The Anniversary is an excellent reimagining of the the same thrills as a decade ago, not because
Chronicles of Riddick (XB) original game, with some gorgeous settings, the developers exactingly re-created the origi-
OK, seriously, would you stick clever level design, and even a fair share of nal, but because they used the new engine to
your neck there? Anyone? reasonably challenging puzzles. Like Legend create a vision that lives up to my fond memo-
before it, it feels almost as much like an ries. The PS2 manages the requisite natural
2 homage to Prince of Persia as to the original lighting and lush details—if only the broader
Tomb Raider, but that’s a good thing; Lara vistas didn’t cause the game to sputter. I’ll
was always meant to be as acrobatic as we accept the technological limitations and han-
see her here. In fact, Anniversary feels like dle the camera, though, to get to the game’s
the game Tomb Raider was supposed to be feeling of isolation, exploration, and wonder.
all along. An occasionally squirrelly camera
and infrequent control issues mar the overall wCRISPIN: Checking out Lara Croft in the
package...but the problem is, by the end of original Tomb Raider today is like looking at
Doing nothing: Halo 2 (XB) the game, when things start getting really the yearbook photo of your acid-washed,
They say the best offense is a ridiculously difficult, the camera and unreli- feathered-haired high school sweetheart and
good defense, so sit back, enjoy able controls become thinking, “I thought she was hot?” But playing
the view, and charge that suit. fairly significant. Overall, the bargain-priced Anniversary is like finding
THE VERDICTS though, Anniversary’s a out that ex-girlfriend is now a runway model.
1 (OUT OF 10)
fine showing, an excellent This game is beautiful—and it respects your
JOE service to fans, and proof nostalgia with clever reimaginings of famous
8.5
GOOD
that the series is back on
the right track for real.
encounters (like the T-Rex) and puzzles (such
as the Sword of Damocles). Control feels
loose—off-kilter leaps killed me more than
wGARNETT: I’ll go Joe anything—but I’ll take it over the original’s
GARNETT
one further: Anniversary rigid grid-based system any day.
8.5
Gettin’ busy: Grand Theft GOOD
Auto III (PS2/XB)
CRISPIN
When the cars started rockin’, the
politicians came a-knockin’.
8.0
GOOD
The Good: Gorgeous levels, interesting puzzles
The Bad: Squirrelly camera and controls
You’ll Die Often: Good thing load times are fairly minimal

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PlayStation 2
GRIM-
GRIMOIRE
REVIEWS
■ Publisher: NIS America ■ Developer:

Vanillaware ■ Players: 1 ■ ESRB: Everyone 10+
Harry Potter Gone Wild

THE VERDICTS
(OUT OF 10) wGREG S: This 2D side-scrolling real- Stone.” This is what Harry Potter wA. FITCH: Not in the same league
time-strategy game (as opposed to would have been had it been written as the rest of NIS’ library, eh, Greg?
GREG S.
the typical overhead view you see in as a daytime soap. You mean recent clichéd mediocrity
6.0
AVERAGE
these resource-managing games) is a
real departure for publisher NIS, which
is better known for so-deep-you’ll-
GrimGrimoire is fun at first, but
not in the same league as developer
Vanillaware’s Odin Sphere (see below).
like Ar tonelico and Atelier Iris? I’ll
gladly take Grim over those, thanks.
No, the game doesn’t totally solve
RAY drown Japanese RPGs. And it’s also the problem of how to do RTS on a
6.0
AVERAGE
a tad disappointing. Not because it’s wRAY: I’m not a huge RTS con- console, but with its 2D, teleport-any-
pretty shallow, but because it lacks noisseur, but I have a good idea of where-on-the-map gameplay, it ends
A. FITCH any multiplayer options (a no-no in what works. And I know that viewing up surprisingly playable.
7.0
GOOD
this genre) and is superrepetitive. Even
as you progress and unlock new skills,
GrimGrimoire’s action from the side
(rather than overhead) isn’t very help-
Greg’s spot-on in pegging this as
a Harry Potter clone, though (well,
the game is never really compelling. ful. To the developers’ credit, the con- aside from Grim’s weirdly sapphic
Unless, of course, you’re a Harry trol scheme cleverly handles selecting undertones). Sure, most games are
The Good: Beautiful
visuals Potter fan. Lillet Blan’s adventures crowds of units, but it still ends up hardly original, but Grim borders on
The Bad: at magic school and the characters cumbersome and never as fast as a criminal—literally! A Snape-like pro-
Superrepetitive she meets parallel the story of the traditional RTS. Sure, it’s gorgeous, fessor who, we’re assured, isn’t evil?
gameplay
“boy who lived” so completely that but this game deserves a high-def “Gammel Dore” as bearded headmas-
J.K. Rowling
Called: She wants it’s almost creepy—right down to presentation, or at least a system that ter instead of Dumbledore? Uh, get
her story back an object called the “Philosopher’s can handle all of those 2D sprites. your legal team ready, NIS.
PlayStation 2
ODIN
SPHERE
■ Publisher: Atlus ■ Developer: Vanillaware
■ Players: 1 ■ ESRB: Teen
Valkyrie in profile
THE VERDICTS
(OUT OF 10) wA. FITCH: Gorgeous hand-drawn art make up for this tepid start, though, bite-sized bits is a brilliant idea, too—
straight out of a medieval storybook. and all of the characters control dif- just when you get bored, you’re given
A. FITCH
A soaring musical score by the famed ferently enough that the game never a new character to chow down on.
8.5
GOOD
composer of Final Fantasy Tactics.
Charming storytelling elements clearly
devolves into tedium. Take the time to
savor Odin Sphere—they don’t make
too many like it anymore.
wJEREMY: If Odin Sphere had to get
by on its good looks, it would still be
inspired by Norse mythology and the
MICHAEL Brothers Grimm’s classic fairy tales. one of the most compelling games of
9.5
EXCELLENT
Yes, it’s safe to say that Odin Sphere, wMICHAEL: Whoever said 2D is dead the year—its hand-drawn artwork is
a 2D side-scrolling action-RPG that neglected to kill off this beauty. What so beautiful that you have to wonder
JEREMY feels like a “lost” Super NES title, Odin Sphere gives up in geometry it why people ever made such a fuss
9.0
EXCELLENT
might cause a fair bit of excitement for
the more Japanophilic among us.
makes up for with its insane amount
of detail—the characters, enemies,
about polygons.
And happily, the game has far more
True to its fairy-tale inspiration, the and backgrounds are crafted with to recommend it than simple visual
game unfolds as five separate “books” such intricate care that it’s a miracle panache; Odin Sphere’s an inven-
The Good: Old-
school Super NES– read by a little girl, the first of which it even runs on the PS2 (some bosses tive fusion of RPG and brawler. Once
style action centers on a Valkyrie princess—I’d absolutely slaughter the game with you get the hang of brewing potions
The Bad: Old-school actually have preferred a choice of slowdown). Apart from this nagging and growing sheep trees in the thick
slowdown
the five protagonists, as her tale is issue (what do you expect—it is a 2D of battle, you’ll find a surprisingly
Good Lord: Odin’s
a demon here, not the least interesting by far. The four game), the experience is consistently deep adventure and a gripping story.
a god brilliant subsequent stories more than exciting. Cutting up the story into five Simply amazing.

(SFBUHBNFT
TUBSUJOHBUKVTU

'038155&9"4)0-%A&.5&95,&:803%
DS "$&450
SIMCITY DS
■ Publisher: Electronic Arts ■ Developer: EA Japan
■ Players: 1 ■ ESRB: Everyone
Red-tagged by the building inspector

wGARNETT: Impressively, this miniaturized charm is watching your town come to life.
version of SimCity packs nearly every classic Everything’s so tiny and blurry on the DS,
'03.0/010-:5:$00/5&95,&:803%
)05&-50
aspect of raising a bustling metropolis from however—so never mind that for this particular
the bare ground. After tracing out roadways SimCity. But for an on-the-go city-manage-
and zoning a few parcels, I watched with ment simulator, this version is really robust:
anticipation as the buildings sprung up. And It’s got budget sheets, graphs, too-talkative
then the reality of actually playing SimCity on advisers with different personalities, and lots
a DS set in. Because neither of the two zoom of special buildings to research and discover
levels work well, construction planning really (including some sci-fi-themed ones). SimCity
built up my frustration. I was ready to throw up DS is deeper than I would’ve expected, but
my hands trying to play anywhere other than those annoying citizens that are constantly
sitting still; even the slightest bump made it asking me to build random things (that aren’t
impossible to be accurate with the stylus. really helping the city) have got to go away.
Still, that unique SimCity urban-planning
pride kicked in when my burg started grow- wNICK: It’s indeed impressive that EA has
ing, but the high faded awfully fast. Never shrunk down such a complex game without
have the DS screens felt so small; even the dumbing it down, but having to regularly hit
largest buildings lack the “Undo” button due to imprecise touches
the details key to their and a janky camera sucks out some of the fun.
THE VERDICTS charming appeal. Take I didn’t have as much of a problem with the '03%6$,4)055&95,&:803%
%6$,:50
(OUT OF 10)
this as a reminder that visuals as my compadres, but I can definitely
GARNETT just because you can relate to the headache of having to sit through
6.5
AVERAGE
put SimCity on the DS
doesn’t mean you should.
the whiny requests of my tiny denizens just in
case they offer something important. SimCity’s
still a uniquely addictive experience when
wSHOE: I completely everything’s clicking, but the DS just isn’t the
SHOE
agree. Part of the series’ best medium for burgeoning city planners.
6.5
AVERAGE
NICK
6.0
AVERAGE
The Good: Big-city sim in a pint-sized package
The Bad: Never has the DS felt so small
Overloaded: Only enough room for one saved city at a time
(FUNPSFBU)BOET0ODPN
REVIEWS
■ Well, for starters, he’s

gotta pop that whitehead.
DS
POKÉMON
DIAMOND/PEARL
■ Publisher: Nintendo ■ Developer: Game Freak ■ Players: 1-2 ■ ESRB: Everyone
A diamond and pearl are everyone’s best friend

THE VERDICTS
(OUT OF 10) wJEREMY: I’ve never been much for satisfaction. Pokéfanatics would be tive treadmill of a game that offers
Pokémon, being older than the target snapping this up regardless of its nearly limitless replayability and depth.
JEREMY
audience and having little patience quality, so it sure was nice of Nintendo
8.5
GOOD
for compulsive level grinding. But
Diamond/Pearl has me hooked—
which is strange, because it’s not
to make it the best Pokémon yet.
wSHANE: If you’ve been enjoying

wBRYAN: I’m right there with ya,
guys. The game’s still-solid turn-based
battles, new online features (anyone
SHANE terribly different from its predecessors. Nintendo’s whimsical take on cock- out there willing to trade a Squirtle?),
9.0
EXCELLENT
But the latest generation of Nintendo’s fighting for the last 10 years, you and graphical face-lift make this the
monster-collecting-and-battling RPG won’t have any trouble snuggling up best Pokémon adventure in a long
BRYAN finally demonstrates enough polish to Diamond/Pearl—like Jeremy says, while. But I gotta say, I’m bummed the
8.5
GOOD
and depth to feel rewarding. And real-
ly, this is probably the best time to get
this DS installment introduces plenty
of subtle refinements to create the ulti-
DS touch screen didn’t come more
into play (think Pokémon Ranger...
hooked; Diamond/Pearl carries over all mate Pokémon RPG. While only true except fun) during skirmishes. Still, it’s
the refinements of the earlier games, Pokémaniacs will appreciate the effect another pocket-monster blockbust-
The Good: Tons of
small refinements, upgrades the graphics, and features that differentiating normal-attack and er—now when will Nintendo bring this
online battles online battling. Head-to-head wire- special-attack stats has on gameplay, exact formula to a console? P
The Bad: Let’s ditch less fights aren’t new to the series, even casual trainers can marvel at the
the friend codes, OK?
but being able to wipe the floor with unexpectedly robust online options Still having trouble catching them all,
Familiarity:
Ultimately more of someone’s Pikachu from across the (although friend codes still suck, of Poindexter? Then head to on over to
the same country (or across the globe) is sweet course). Ultimately, it’s another addic- EGM.1UP.com to see our SuperGuide.

■ FF lifts many foes (like Tia-
mat here) directly from D&D.
PSP
FINAL FANTASY
■ Publisher: Square Enix ■ Developer: Square Enix
■ Players: 1 ■ ESRB: Everyone 10+
1/3 VERT
How to regift an anniversary present TRIM=2.625X10.5
wSHANE: Fresh-faced Final Fantasy devotees worth...the same can’t be said of the immi-
will surely enjoy this umpteenth remake of nently avoidable FFII PSP rehash due in July.
the game that launched a million cosplay and
fan-fiction atrocities, yet for oldsters like me wJEREMY: Shane must be an easy date.
who foggily recall questing through the original I’ve been with Final Fantasy since the start,
NES version, this latest rerelease feels a tad and there’s no way I’m putting up with this
inessential. Distressingly little effort went into lame excuse for an anniversary gift. The too-
crafting this anniversary package: Square Enix easy GBA Dawn of Souls game gets clum-
merely cobbled together aspects from the PS1 sily animated new graphics and a borrowed
and GBA remakes, touched up the graphics soundtrack? That’s not a celebration; it’s an
with high-resolution art, and added one new, amateur RPG Maker project. Sure, the under-
ultra-difficult dungeon at game’s end. lying game is still pretty decent, but seeing
But it’s hard to stay mad at this RPG rerun— this junky face-lift on PSP screams “waste of
at least it’s an enjoyable romp that remains potential.” I’d rather pretend the upcoming
surprisingly engaging 20 years later. Although Tactics remake is the real 20-year tribute.
purists will decry the seriously rebalanced dif-
ficulty (like the GBA version, this is a cakewalk wMICHAEL: Jeez, Jeremy...way to ruin our
compared to the original), nice anniversary party. Yeah, this is obviously
the modernization makes an easy cash-in for Square Enix, but the not-
THE VERDICTS for a far smoother, low- so-epic adventure is one of the best role-play-
(OUT OF 10)
impact turn-based RPG ing games currently out for the PSP (which is
SHANE experience that actually pretty sad considering how crusty this game Geeks transform into Alpha-Geeks
7.0
GOOD
invites replay thanks to its
party customization. The
$30 asking price feels a
is). And since I finally got around to playing
this for the first time, I didn’t mind the minor
gripes these guys are yapping about. But the LEARN:
by becoming fluent in:
tad steep, but most FF ridiculous number of random battles did annoy DIGITAL ANIMATION GAME PROGRAMMING
JEREMY
fans will get their money’s me—this really needed an autoattack button. DIGITAL ART AND DESIGN NETWORK ENGINEERING
5.0
AVERAGE DIGITAL VIDEO NETWORK SECURITY
GAME DESIGN SOFTWARE ENGINEERING
MICHAEL
ARTIFICIAL LIFE PROGRAMMING WEB ARCHITECTURE
8.0
GOOD
The Good: Best-looking version of FFI ever
The Bad: Not a particularly value-added package
COMPUTER FORENSICS ROBOTICS
Mysteriously Massive Font: Is this Final Fantasy: Large Print Edition?
www.uat.edu > 877.UAT.GEEK

PSP
PQ2: PRACTICAL
INTELLIGENCE
QUOTIENT
REVIEWS
■ Publisher: D3Publisher ■ Developer: Nowproduction

Your turn, Mr. Smarty-pants

THE VERDICTS
(OUT OF 10) wJOE: If you ask me, PQ2 is simply a cerebral challenge, you won’t find the cake. It gives PQ2 unlimited replay
one of the best puzzle games on PSP, anything much better. But if you look value, assuming a decent community
JOE
and possibly beyond. But it’s not for to games to turn off your brain, you’ll springs up around the game.
9.5
EXCELLENT
the faint of heart; while scrambling to
complete 100 puzzles in the five-hour
time limit, you may end up feeling like
hate this one with a passion.
wGREG S: I guess I must be turn-

wTODD: Greg “The Brainiac” Sewart
has never been mistaken for some-
GREG S. a complete idiot. Do not be alarmed; ing off my brain when I play games, one with his neocortex turned on, so
7.5
GOOD
this is normal. PQ2’s nefarious puzzles because I’m not nearly as enamored it’s no surprise this one didn’t wake
of logic and spatial reasoning are like with PQ2 as Joe up there. The game his synapses. I’m 2,000 percent with
TODD visual riddles, designed specifically to is a decent puzzler, but not Earth- Joe here. PQ2 kicked my ass—and
9.0
EXCELLENT
make you feel stupid until you finally
“get it,” at which point you’ll feel stu-
shattering. I do really dig the puzzle-
creation aspect, though. The interface
brain—in a million different directions,
but I loved how it made me feel idiotic
pid for not getting it sooner. It is, after is a tiny bit confusing at first—what one second, then Einsteinian the next.
all, just moving blocks around (some with having to pop up a whole new The puzzles are inventive, brain-bend-
The Good: Almost
limitless replay value with special abilities) to find a path to menu before switching out different ing, and unique (and about 87 out of
The Bad: The hard the exit. How hard can it be? Plenty pieces and all—but once you get past 100 are very challenging). Brain Age
puzzles are really hard. What’s more, a constant stream the initial stumbling blocks, it’s quite is the type of game that makes you
hard
of user-created levels traded online easy and rewarding. And being able to react; this is a game that makes you
Favorite New
Feature: Glass guarantees the inferiority complex share your creations with the rest of... think—and even punishes trial and
blocks should persist indefinitely. If you like well, creation? That’s just the icing on error (which I found out the hard way).
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For more information visit: http://virgin.1UP.com

PSP
INNOCENT LIFE:
A FUTURISTIC
HARVEST MOON
REVIEWS
■ Publisher: Natsume ■ Developer: ArtePiazza
Sowing the seeds of mediocrity

THE VERDICTS
(OUT OF 10) wJENN F: Innocent Life is different to spend more time doing the sorts stuff (unlocking new areas, upgrading
from the average agrarian simula- of things that appealed to me, being equipment, and raising livestock) hap-
JENN F.
tion, ostensibly because it’s set in the able to plan and spend my days as I pens either by accidental discovery
6.5
AVERAGE
future. As a neo-Pinocchio robo-boy,
you are tasked with renovating ancient
ruins into a giant farm.
wanted. I’m glad I kept at it, because
Innocent Life gradually blossoms into
a deep, contemplative experience.
or hours into the game—after most
people will have lost interest.
JENNIFER As you cultivate your farm and wMICHAEL: Jenn isn’t the only one
6.0
AVERAGE
make friends with the townsfolk, your wJENNIFER: Harvest Moon isn’t for who can’t water crops correctly—my
“human” abilities (like cooking and everyone, with its inscrutable game- idiot bot must not have installed his
MICHAEL loving!) slowly improve. But farming play and glacial pacing; a farming eyes, because he couldn’t aim in a
5.0
AVERAGE
can be tedious, and in some ways,
this is a game of order and protocol.
game only works if it doesn’t feel like,
y’know, farming. I hoped by now this
straight line, either. I also agree with
these gals on the pacing—the game
Worse, I could never seem to “aim” franchise would have figured out a starts off way too slow (though I’ll
my actions (hammering, watering, way to make watering and harvesting admit it does get better), with tons of
The Good: High
production values, hoeing!) where I wanted. crops more fun and less labor-inten- monotonous tasks that don’t make
peaceful gameplay The game itself is lovely, very pen- sive. And while I appreciate that the farming seem fun in any way. But the
The Bad: Slow, sive and philosophical—and really manual actually offers great tips and “future” theme annoys me the most.
ponderous, can be
slow. At the outset I was just bored, strategy, I have to wonder why they Seriously, making the main character
boring
Smart TV: Watching but as I unlocked more areas and didn’t put that useful info into the a robot doesn’t change the fact that
increases your skills possibilities, I appreciated being able game itself. Too much of the good we’ve harvested this moon before.
©2007 MIDNIGHT GAMING CHAMPIONSHIP
up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right,

b, a, start ain’t gonna save you now.
MIDNIGHTGAMINGCHAMPIONSHIP.COM
REVIEWS WRAP-UP
REVIEWS
The games that were too late...or too little
XB360/PS3
THE DARKNESS
■ Publisher: 2K Games ■ ESRB: Mature
Chronicles of Riddick maker Starbreeze puts

Vin Diesel on the sidelines to bring another
bad boy to your console, the possessed
mobster Jackie Estacado. The first-person-
shooting portions are merely standard fare,
but it’s Jackie’s demonic side that’ll grab ya.
His powerful tentacles can toss vehicles as
easily as foes, and if you’re really in a jam,
you can always call out some creepy helper
darklings to saw off an enemy’s head.
wBOTTOM LINE: If Starbreeze can tighten

up the controls, make this hit No. 2 for the
developer. Expect a full review next issue.
XB360 XB360 DS
SHADOWRUN TENCHU Z COOKIE & CREAM

■ Publisher: Microsoft ■ ESRB: Mature ■ Publisher: Microsoft ■ ESRB: Mature ■ Publisher: Agetec ■ ESRB: Everyone
While FASA Studio might not have delivered The series that helped jump-start the stealth- The DS version of the hopping dynamic
a true RPG sequel to the Shadowrun games action genre but then did nothing to advance duo’s adventures has been watered down
of yore, it’s crafted a uniquely compelling it over the ensuing 10ish years is now on the for a more single-user-friendly experience.
team-based first-person shooter, laden with 360, and...yeeeah. Pretty much the usual Translation: less brain strain here. The
life-giving trees, teleporting, and all sorts of Tenchu. Slinking around as a ninja, one- splitscreen is now horizontal, thus removing
other genre firsts. The learning curve is more button stealth kills, guards that forget about the PS2 version’s notorious simultaneous
of a learning sheer wall due to the complex- you moments after you’re out of sight—oh, play mechanic. Instead, you trigger Cream
ity of choices and the rock-paper-scissors but now if you jump in a cesspool, the rank, only during key moments of a stage—which
relationship between them, but if you put in green cloud around you will tip off the sniff- prompts WarioWare-style minigames.
the time and find the right group of people to sensitive sentries. Progress!
play with, you’ll have some fun. wBOTTOM LINE: Some puzzles demand
wBOTTOM LINE: This series needs a simultaneous use of the touch screen and
wBOTTOM LINE: If you can learn its intrica- ground-up remake, and if you think the 360 shoulder buttons, but it’s not as complex as
cies (easier said than done), you’ll love it. debut would be a good time for it, you prob- the PS2 game’s split-screen stuff. Wireless
We’ll let you know if we do next month. ably don’t call the shots over at Tenchu HQ. co-op and battle modes are fun for a bit.

DREAMERS WANTED.
D E G R E E S I N : CO M P U T E R A NI M A T I O N > D I G I T A L A R T S & D E S I G N > E N T E R TA I N ME N T B US I N E S S > FI LM > G AM E D E V E LOP ME N T > R E C OR DI NG AR T S > S H OW P R O DUC T I ON & T O U R I NG
THE SALES CHART
Amazon.com’s Top 20 for April
# Name Platform EGM Scores
1 Pokémon Diamond DS 8.5 9.0 8.5

Would you believe the two
new Pokémons garnered
half a million preorders
and have sold over 5
million units worldwide?
Pokéfever indeed.
2 Pokémon Pearl DS 8.5 9.0 8.5
3 Super Paper Mario Wii 8.0 9.0 9.0
4 Guitar Hero II XB360 Not Reviewed
5 God of War II PS2 9.5 9.0 9.0
6 Guitar Hero II PS2 9.0 9.0 8.5

The PS2 version may not
be able to rock the extra
downloadable content like
the 360 version, but it is
getting an exclusive ’80s
edition later this summer.
7 God of War PS2 10 9.5 10
8 WarioWare: Smooth Moves Wii 8.0 8.5 7.5
9 The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess Wii 10 10 10
10 Puzzle Quest: Challenge of the Warlords DS Not Reviewed
11 New Super Mario Bros. DS 9.5 10 8.0
12 Gears of War XB360 10 9.5 9.0

Gears’ multiplayer is still
bloody awesome...espe-
cially now that four new
maps are out. The pack
costs 800 points (or is free
if you wait until Sept. 3).
13 Brain Age: Train Your Brain in Minutes a Day! DS 8.5 9.0 9.5
14 Mario Kart DS DS 9.0 8.5 8.5
15 Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter 2 XB360 8.5 8.0 7.5
16 Marvel: Ultimate Alliance XB360 7.0 8.0 7.0 S C H O OL O F G AME D E V E LO P ME N T

Activision released a
new download pack that 800.226.7625 3300 University Boulevard • Winter Park, FL 32792
lets you fight as four evil
Financial aid available to those who qualify • Career development assistance • Accredited School, ACCSCT
villains. Or some new do-
gooders...if you’re into that
saving-the-world crap.
17 Tiger Woods PGA Tour 07 Wii 7.5 8.0 6.5
18 Katamari Damacy PS2 8.5 8.5 8.5
19 The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion PS3 9.5 8.5 9.0
20 Cake Mania DS Not Reviewed
fullsail.com
© 2006 Full Sail Inc. All rights reserved.

GAME OVER
> press continue for pointless plastic marines, flea-market tips, and man funk
Photography by R. Dodson/ SFMisfits, Inc.

> SEANBABY'S REST OF THE CRAP
Lost on Purpose You win, boredom!
WHILE THE UNITED STATES its heinous war crimes. would go unreported. If you made a
FINDS ITSELF STUCK in year one First, though, let’s examine how suit out of Army Men boxes, no con-
zillion of Operation: Pointless, we this invasion happened right under sumer could detect you. So there is
often overlook another inept military our noses. It’s simple— after two or no way that you could possibly know
operation that’s been going on inside three of these crap bombs, gamer that over 400 of these games have
our own borders since the late ’90s: brains adapted to ignore the signals made it to shelves. It’s time to wake
the Army Men occupation of our sent by any eyeballs looking at the up, America. Six out of every seven
Seanbaby is sick of consoles. It seems that no matter words “Army Men.” If they named anythings in this country are Army
Sarge telling him how
how much we hate them, or how the next one Army Men: I Planted a Men titles, and your children may be
to be soldier. One: He
is not made of plas- much we refuse to buy them, they Bomb In This Videogame Store, it next to enlist in the war of monotony.
tic. And two: Plastic send surge after surge of troops and
is not made of men. refuse to withdraw. This month, I’m
going to take a look at the numer-
It’s time to wake up, America.
ous attacks they’ve waged on each
of our consoles and hold the worst
Six out of every seven anythings in
Army Men offender accountable for this country are Army Men titles.
PAGE PAGE PAGE
102 104 106

Retro: Let’s Webslinger We find the
go antiquing vs. rum- best graphi-
with nerds drinker cal sizzle
Game Boy Color PlayStation

Tours of Duty: 4 (Army Men, Army Men Tours of Duty: 10 (Holy crap, they made
2, Army Men: Air Combat, Army Men: 10 Army Men games for the PS1!)
Sarge’s Heroes 2) Featured War Criminal: Army Men:
Featured War Criminal: Army Men Sarge’s Heroes
Of the four Army Men games on the Sarge’s Heroes is awful in every way you
GBC, the original truly set the standard could possibly imagine, and the devel-
by redefining bad graphics as we knew them. As hard as your brain opers especially stepped it up in the graphical-glitches department.
fought to discern shapes amid sandy clumps of dots, it was a losing Sarge will get stuck on invisible floor glue, fall through walls, levitate for
battle. For a time, I was sure that the game’s enemies were cookies no reason, and even manage to completely elude the game’s spazzy
wearing my mother’s face, but my Game Boy therapist assured me that camera. Sarge’s Heroes was instrumental in inspiring psychologists to
I was simply hungry and carrying unresolved teen angst, adding that change the clinical definition of insanity to “An individual or individuals
the enemies are clearly pickle cowboys riding on camels. who saw the first 19 Army Men games, then decided to make the 20th.
See also: dumbass.”
Real War Story: In Taiwan, a young boy spends 22 hours a day work-
ing in an army-man toy factory. His job is to eat a trail through the Real War Story: Despite shoveling out an incredible 10 installments
cockroaches so the workers with hands can reach the injection molder. on the system, the Army Men guys did not receive the You Did It
One day, the little boy sees this GBC adaptation of his hard work, and Participation Medal of PlayStation, the lowest honor our nation can
he cries for the last time. bestow in a time of peace. Better luck next 10 games, guys!
Game Boy Advance PlayStation 2

Tours of Duty: 3 (Army Men Advance, Tours of Duty: 7 (Army Men: Air Attack
Army Men: Operation Green, Army Men: 2, Army Men: Green Rogue, Army Men:
Turf Wars) Major Malfunction, Army Men: RTS,
Featured War Criminal: Army Men: Army Men: Sarge’s Heroes 2, Army Men:
Operation Green Sarge’s War, Portal Runner)
Featured War Criminal: Army Men:
In Operation Green, the already way-too-
Sarge’s Heroes 2
manyth installment of the series, the graphics have improved enough
that a player can now identify the shapes shooting at him or her. This After this many crappy games, Sarge has lost his will to fight. He still
lets the gamer focus on just how much the gameplay sucks. Due to can’t aim while moving, so you have to rely on his autotargeting sys-
design flaws in God’s plans for the chromosomal development of the tem if you’re one of those players who likes to hit things. The problem
game’s creators, this is an action game where you can’t aim your gun is, even when Sarge is locked onto an enemy at point-blank range,
while you move. Shooting anyone who doesn’t walk directly into your approximately no bullets will hit their target. And since it couldn’t pos-
line of fire requires a slow repetition of rotating and jerking forward. sibly be that the people making these games are horrible failures, we
Imagine an Etch A Sketch you can’t shake that occasionally kills you. can assume this is Sarge’s sad suicide attempt. It works, by the way.
Real War Story: In 2002, a Theta Chi fraternity pledge class was given Real War Story: For weeks, the lead designer of Sarge’s Heroes 2 was
a task during initiation week to each bring home the ugliest girl he actually a stack of cartoon dogs in a trenchcoat disguised as a human.
could find. This activity is commonly known as “hogging” and is, by all The staff first became suspicious when their project manager broke
means, what ugly people have had coming. While each pledge scoured into several parts and scattered whenever someone whistled.
the campus for barnyard monsters, the clever initiate who had sex with
Army Men: Operation Green received a posthumous commendation
from the national fraternity’s Hogging Council.
Xbox
Tours of Duty: 2 (Army Men: Major
Malfunction, Army Men: Sarge’s War)
Nintendo 64 Featured War Criminal: Army Men:
Tours of Duty: 3 (Army Men: Air Major Malfunction
Combat, Army Men: Sarge’s Heroes,
After over 30 games on PC and across
Army Men: Sarge’s Heroes 2)
every console, we come to Army Men:
Featured War Criminal: Army Men: Air
Major Malfunction. This game is so amateurish and awful that it looks
Combat
like it was only meant to be used as background action for a game-
Army Men: Air Combat tarnishes the design commercial. I kept expecting Sarge to turn to the camera and
series’ spotless reputation by actually being kind of good. If there’s say, “Are you tired of playing videogames like this when you could be
such a thing as an Army Men fan, this game’s fun pace and enjoyable MAKING them?” Then I’d either say “GOSH, YEAH!” or “OBEY THE
gameplay must have been a sad disappointment. TENETS OF REALITY, TV MONSTER!”—but most likely “GOSH, YEAH!”
Real War Story: The 87th game in the series, Army Men: Teen Real War Story: During a black-ops mission in an Ewok Village play-
Abduction Van Molester Chronicles, was cancelled during preproduc- set, Sarge had to open fire on eight hostile Ewoks. There were 120
tion because child predators felt that being associated with the Army survivors. That’s right—he missed so badly, he actually created 112
Men franchise would hurt their image. enemy combatants. P

> OLD-SCHOOL EGM
10 Years Ago...
GAME OVER
On the cover:
Gex 2: Enter the Gecko
Before the snarky Geico Insurance
gecko graced the boob tube, Gex
(the first smart-ass lizard) mucked it
up in a bunch of parody platformers
on the PS1. The first Gex sequel tried
to tackle the popularity of Mario 64
by riffing on popular TV shows and
movies. And apparently, he’s trying to
goof on Star Wars on our cover—but,
seriously now, everyone knows storm-
troopers don’t use lightsabers. Duh!
> RETRONAUTS PRESENTS
Game of the month:

Wild Arms
Only 10 games fell onto the laps of
Retro resources
the Review Crew this month. And,
role-playing underdog Wild Arms
Clues for wannabe collectors
(PS1) stole the show. Its best feature?
The “items.” Uh, OK....
By Jeremy Parish
BETWEEN WII’S VIRTUAL ally kind of sucks, but possession is

CONSOLE, XBOX 360’S nine-tenths of awesome. So where
LIVE ARCADE, AND PS3’S does a retro geek go for a fix of pure,
PLAYSTATION NETWORK (not to undistilled nostalgia?
mention GameTap over on the PC
Want to see
side—read up about it on page 44), The local scene
1UP’s visit to the retro-gaming fans have never had it Like the saying (kinda) goes, think
famous Japanese so good...if they’re willing to settle globally, shop locally. Major retailers
retro shop Super for downloading games. But imagi- like EB Games and GameStop have
Potato? Well,
Exclusive: Star Wars: Masters mosey on over to
nary ownership can’t compare to the conglomerated into a retro-hating
of Teräs Käsi bonusstage.1UP. real, physical goods: The heft of a monolith, cutting life support for any-
Well, a Star Wars fighter seemed cool com cartridge, the ritual of dust blowing, thing older than PlayStation 2. Better
at the time—random stormtroopers fussing with aging hardware, jiggling to support the little guy anyway. And
battling Boba Fett? Talk about an rotted cables, suffering through the what could be more “little guy” than
overdose of awesome! Or not—this lag of standard-definition content on the humble garage sale? Sure, 49 out
schlocky fighter just sucked. your shiny new HDTV. OK, it actu- of every 50 garage sales are going

> MALL OF THE INTERWEB
Finding games in person is fun, yeah, but sometimes it’s

easier to just comb the Web for the classics. Here’s a list
of retro-friendly sites to sift through.
GAME OVER
eBay
www.ebay.com
Yeah, yeah, you know about eBay—and so does everyone
else. That’s good in that it makes finding rarities far more
likely, but it’s also kind of bad because it means the days
of accidental bargains are pretty much over. Still, if you
don’t mind fighting off the snipers and paying a potentially
inflated price, eBay should still be your first stop for classic
game hunting....
Digital Press
www.digitpress.com
...That is, unless you prefer to barter with fellow gamers
rather than pawn-shop pros. In that case, stop by Digital
Press, the online companion to America’s longest-running
classic-gaming fanzine, where an entire forum has been
established specifically for the purpose of game swaps.
JapanGameStock
www.japangamestock.com
But what if you prefer your classics in a Japanese flavor?
We recommend the English-proficient online shop at
JapanGameStock; its selection of 8- and 16-bit import soft-
ware is truly awesome. Best of all, JGS is based in Osaka,
so you’re paying Japanese market value rather than inflated
U.S.-oriented prices. Overseas shipping can cost a pretty
penny, though, so buy in bulk to make it worth your while.
Shopping Mall Japan

www.shoppingmalljapan.com
For the truly rare, you’ll want to learn to use Yahoo! Japan’s
game auctions—tricky, since it’s all in Japanese and no
one there seems to do overseas shipping. Fortunately,
Shopping Mall Japan acts as a willing proxy service to
get your auction winnings to you. Its fees are pretty crazy,
though, so this works best as a last resort for those impos-
■ Tracking down ancient games may take a little work here in the States, but in Japan, it’s a sible finds.
cinch—retro stores (like Super Potato shown above) carry an abundance of oldies.
to be crammed with junk—Genesis the rut of thinking eBay is the only them all over the Internet, where
sports games, broken Duck Hunt source for retro collectibles, though. countless trading forums have been
carts...that sort of thing—but it’s that It’s just the tip of the iceberg, as established to uphold the cause of
50th stop that makes it all pay off. countless independently run game fair trade. The long-running Digital
Some legendary bargains have been stores peddle all manner of clas- Press is probably the biggest, but it’s
unearthed in people’s backyards, sics—all you have to do is find them. certainly not unique. Hey, we hear
including some amazing unreleased And even major online retailers like there’s a pretty great trading post at
prototype games. And when you’re Amazon.com make room for retro boards.1UP.com, too! And you tech-
done browsing garages, don’t turn games these days. nophobes needn’t go online to find
your nose up at pawn shops. They’re a good deal. Local gaming clubs,
kind of horrible, it’s true, and owners Peer-to-peer shopping small shops, and even the classified
have become savvier to the actual Still, nothing beats human contact ads are great resources for tracking
value of rare games. But it never and the comfort of knowing that your down goodies. And if you can swing
hurts to look. new acquisition is coming from a the cash, major gatherings like the
loving home, where it’s been stored Classic Gaming Expo are unbeatable
The global market with care by a dedicated gamer. for finding true obscurities—and you
Still, sometimes you gotta suck it For that, you’ll want to deal directly get to complete your transactions
up and accept the fact that your with other gamers. The great thing face to face. So if you end up getting
local market is full of people with no about the P2P approach is that gam- cheated, you’ll at least you’ll know
appreciation for the classics. When ers are everywhere. You can find who to hunt down.... P
all else fails, the Internet usually suc-
ceeds. Surfing the Net is a fantastic
source for hard-to-find games. In
fact, it’s so convenient to be able Some legendary bargains have
to find rarities on eBay in a couple
of mouse clicks that the thrill of the
been unearthed in people’s
chase has all but died. Don’t fall into backyards....
> COMMENTARY
GAME OVER > GRUDGE MATCH
Point-Counterpoint
What? I like rings, OK?
By Sonic the Hedgehog
I don’t see the problem here. So
Trilogy Tussle
I have a few dozen rings when
I get up in the morning—who
Sparrow and Spidey duke it out
doesn’t? But now Amy thinks Two blockbuster movies (and their game counterparts)
I ought to go on a 12-step
program to get off ’em. Quit
are competing for your scratch this summer, but who’s
the rings? Uh, I’m Sonic The got the dough to see (and play) both? Well, let’s see....
F***in’ Hedgehog, bitch. Sorry, but
I kind of need rings to live. What
if I misjudge a trampoline over in
Green Hill Zone and end up in a pit of
Pirates of the
spikes? Is that whatcha want? ’Cause I’ll make
it happen for you, toots. You can be little Ms. Perfect
Spider-Man Caribbean
Widow while your ring-junkie boyfriend gets skewered.
You need to get some

professional help Combat
By Amy Rose
I don’t mind a guy having outside
interests, but when your boyfriend Thug-thumpin’ glider brawls Like sword fights? You’d better!
Advantage: Spider-Man
gets up five times every night to count
his rings like a cracked out Ebenezer
Scrooge, it’s time for an intervention.
He used to tell me it was all to get
ahead—the occasional bonus stage
here, an extra life there. But lately, it’s Alter Egos
become like a sickness. I mean, the neighborhood
kids look up to him. What kind of a role model passes
out facedown on the front lawn after an all-night ring Shiny black suit works like Elizabeth Swann isn’t as hot in
Spidey ’roids giant boots
binge? He better get this ring habit under control or I’ll Advantage: Spider-Man
just take my chances with Knuckles—even the occa-
sional backhand from a raging echidna with fist spikes
beats the hell out of this.
Dress Code
> GUESS WHO
Tights mandatory Sparrow still sporting fragments
of the Technicolor Dreamcoat
Advantage: Pirates
Acrobatics
Web-based navigation Walk the rigging, not the plank

all over New York City
1 When it comes to movies, I dig comedies.

Nothing is more divine than a fine laugh.
Advantage: Spider-Man
2 I know it’s not nice to brag, but, hey, I’m not

shy about talking about how stylish I am.
Opposition
3 I like lots of colors, I swear! I, uh, just choose
to wear one color...a lot.
Crazy crooks in goofy suits Crazy creature-men in
4 Some people name their pets. Perverts name

their privates. I name my little friends.
Advantage: Tie goofy suits
Advantage: Tie
5 My brother is a bastard. Not only is he

annoying, but he also copies me.
Winner: Spider-Man
Who am I? Dante from Devil May Cry
But we’ll give props to Pirates for bringing the swashbuckling genre
back into the limelight. Arrrrrr.

des er ves
g am i ng
e o s h o w
e e k ly vid
The w
The latest video game news, reviews and previews PART OF THE
from people who love games as much as you do.
A new episode every Friday on iTunes, Yahoo! Podcasts
or log on to http://the1upshow.1up.com
GAME
GAME OVER
> NOW THAT'S NEXT GEN
Future ’Fects
That’s street slang for games that look good By Jon Gibson
A new generation of consoles brings many upgrades: higher prices, bulkier
designs, but most importantly, ridiculous amounts of detail. We’re talking
effects, people—hair follicles, beads of sweat, and physics that would give
Newton an aneurysm. Here’s our breakdown of beautiful minutiae.
BEST BEST
W AT E R GORE
FORMULA 1 CHAMPIONSHIP ED. (PS3) GEARS OF WAR (XB360)
That Ph.D. in water physics came in handy for whomever pro- No one at EGM has ever murdered someone (as of press
grammed the windshield splatter here. The more you punch time), so a game like Gears of War is appreciated escapism.
the gas, the more dynamic the droplets of H20 look, creating There’s nothing like playing a deathmatch and taking a chain-
an effect scientists have labeled “really damn cool.” The rain saw bayonet to your best friend, especially after he tried to
streaks, it evaporates, but mostly, it mesmerizes you just long make it with your girlfriend at your birthday party. Die, James,
enough for you to collide your car against a wall. Oops. die! Uh, in the game, that is. Ha-ha!
Runner up: Dead or Alive Xtreme 2 (XB360) Runner up: Dead Rising (XB360)
BEST BEST
KE
IR
F
BO
OBS
O
E/SM
DEAD OR ALIVE: XTREME 2 (XB360) CALL OF DUTY 3 (PS3/XB360)
A few of our readers find the term “boobs” immature, so we Even better than a David Copperfield show in Vegas is the
apologize in advance for this: Boobs! Boobs! Boobs! Boobs! girlish giggling induced by tossing a smoke grenade into
Boobies! Boobs! Boobs! Boobs! Boobs! Boobs! Boobs! enemy territory in Call of Duty. Sure, Copperfield can make
Boobs! Boobs! Boobs! Boobies! Boobies! Ba-ba-boobs! the Statue of Liberty disappear, but could he go head-to-
Boobs! Bo + obs = Boobs! Boobs! Ready! Set! Boobs! Go, head with a T-34 tank and live to tell about it, all thanks to a
Boobs, Go! Saludos, DOA, saludos! trusty bit of smoke? Yeah, probably—he is David Copperfield.
Runner up: Rumble Roses XX (XB360) Runner up: Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter 2 (XB360)

BEST BEST
NS
X
O
FA C ES PLOSI
GAME OVER
FIGHT NIGHT: ROUND 3 (PS3/XB360) GHOST RECON: ADVANCED
WARFIGHTER 2 (XB360)
Capturing intricate facial details requires developers to really
dig into a console: We want to see the subtle expressions, Much like the first time you saw your sister naked, awesome
bloody gashes, and the all-too-real pores on the face of the explosions are hard to get out of your head. Try as you might,
fighter we’re beating to a pulp. Fight Night does that right. the combination of flame and gas is completely satisfying.
Hell, it’s probably the closest thing you’ll get to real fist fight- Wait, sorry—it’s the explosions in Ghost Recon: Advanced
ing without having to deal with that stupid thing called “pain.” Warfighter 2 that are thrilling, not your sister naked....
Runner up: Gears of War (XB360) Runner up: Crackdown (XB360)
BEST BEST
ING
ST
K
U
GR FF A
ASS BRE
THE ELDER SCROLLS IV: OBLIVION RESISTANCE: FALL OF MAN (PS3)

(PS3/XB360)
Try this: Take an Uzi, a sledgehammer, and a sock loaded
Have you ever heard someone recite the numerical value of pi with quarters, and break every single window in your house.
to the millionth decimal place? Well, the dude who rendered Really shatter them—every last one. Then stick a copy of
all the grass in Oblivion is probably crazier. He probably has Resistance into your PS3. We think you’ll notice that devel-
nightmares about grass, but by “nightmare,” we mean some- oper Insomniac did a pretty good job simulating a bunch of
thing else not appropriate for print. crap getting busted up. After all, now you’re an expert.
Runner up: Viva Piñata (XB360) Runner up: MotorStorm (PS3)
BEST BEST
T
M
UD/DI
R
SWEA
MOTORSTORM (PS3) FIGHT NIGHT: ROUND 3 (PS3/XB360)
Even if you’re a no-nonsense, work-time-funless adult, it’s With the snazzy graphical sophistication of the Xbox 360 and
hard not to resist the urge to pounce into a massive puddle PS3, games are finally showcasing what really stinks about
of mud. Going piggy really takes you back to the days of sports: sweat. Every punch in Fight Night: Round 3 is met
carefree fun...and MotorStorm excels at recapturing this feel- with a cloud of perspiration...just like in real life. Well, sort
ing in digital form. The gooey brown filth even affects game- of—mashin’ mugs may cause the funk to fly, yes, but is every
play—plowing through mud alters the track as you go. fight in a sauna? Seriously, cool down, guys! P
Runner up: None Runner up: NBA 2K7 (PS3/XB360)

> FINAL WORD
Fresh Meat
GAME OVER
Our whippersnapping interns debate age-old issues

Kids these days with their hip-hop and Hannah Montana got no respect for gaming’s
glory days...or do they? EGM’s oldie editors (average age: 32) quiz their two young
interns (average age: 24) to map videogames’ generation gap...
■ Alice Liang, 1UP.com Previews Intern ■ Brooks Huber, EGM Editorial Intern
What’s your favorite old- Super NES: Is that “old-school” enough? NES: Sure, the Super NES had prettier
The Super NES is my favorite console of sprite-based graphics and more than two
school system? (If you say all time simply because it plays host to so face buttons, but the NES supplied the foun-
PlayStation we’re going to many magically awesome games—why play dation you speak of, Alice. Blowing on car-
throw our canes at you.) crappy 8-bit NES duds when you could ven- tridges to get them to work, staying up late
ture though sophisticated fare like Chrono to beat-down Soda Popinksi in Punch-Out!!,
Trigger and Zelda: A Link to the Past? Super or even shooting quacking ducks two inches
NES had the balance between visual tech away from the television screen made for an
and gameplay creativity down to perfection. unforgettable experience. Oh, and Mario 3....
What classic franchise would Chrono Trigger: I know Chrono Cross Out of This World: Intriguing puzzles, a
(PS1) came out only seven years ago, but hulking ally, and a redheaded science geek
you like to see revived? seriously—whatever happened to rumored wielding a gat all came together to produce
sequel Chrono Break? After all these years, one of the finest action games ever. But
I wouldn’t mind seeing another entry into then it seemingly disappeared, as if into the
the pages of Chrono—preferably one with Disney vault, only to be idolized but never
Magus (or Gil, if you played Japan-only resuscitated. The creator said he wanted the
pseudosequel Radical Dreamers). The fans ending to be open to interpretation...how
know what I’m talking about. about re-interpreting it on the PS3/XB360?
Historically speaking, which Pong: All right, I’m a cheater. But even after Pong: You violated explicit instructions,
reading Spacewar!’s Wikipedia entry, I still therefore your answer shouldn’t count. I
game was more significant? have to go with Pong. Spacewar! may have must admit that I can’t pick Spacewar! out
Spacewar! or Pong? (No been 10 years earlier in the making—and of a lineup either, but I’m choosing Pong
looking on Wikipedia, you way more expensive—but Pong was pretty because it still has a soft spot in today’s
dang popular. Besides, I’d never even heard high-tech gaming culture. It’s been spoofed
cheaters.)
of Spacewar!. History has a way of forget- on YouTube, brought back to life with the
ting losers, and when it comes to pop-culture PainStation device (Google it), and it spurred
credibility, Spacewar! is the definite loser. Breakout, another ball-whacking classic.
What’s the first game tape Super Mario Bros.: Tape? I’ll go ahead Insert game here: My brain must have
and assume you’re referring to cartridges. wiped this precious memory from its data
you ever remember solving? I guess I’m not cool enough to remember banks, because I can’t recall the first tape I
back when videogames were on tapes, and ever solved. My childhood ADD is to blame.
I certainly won’t call them tapes in the here My attention span always dwindled before
and present. The first tape I solved, however, I reached the end of anything. Or maybe it
was Super Mario Bros. (in the Duck Hunt was all those Pixy Stix I snorted. Let that
combo cart). There, I added “tape” to my be a lesson for today’s kids who want to
vernacular. Can I join the cool kids’ club? remember solving Hannah Montana. P

> NEXT MONTH
Soul Calibur still burns
GAME OVER
August Issue (#218) • On sale July 3
> PREVIEWS
THE STAGE OF HISTORY BECKONS
If you’re hankering for a virtual fistfight, top-qual-
ity options abound—the Virtua Fighter, Tekken, and
Dead or Alive franchises all offer satisfying punch-up
action. But if you’re truly looking to give your opponent
something to cry about, it’s all about wielding sharp-
ened steel, and nothing beats Namco Bandai’s Soul
Calibur series for weapon-based fighting thrills. In
our world-exclusive preview, we’ll reveal the future
direction of this beloved
■ Final Fantasy XIII (PS3)
series...and you might
■ Army of Two (PS3/XB360)
be surprised by what
■ Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare
these new games
(PS3/XB360)
(that’s right, plural) have
■ Rock Band (PS3/XB360)
to offer.
We’ll also get the chance
to assault the reclusive develop- > REVIEWS
ers behind Square Enix’s Final Fantasy XIII project
with tough questions. Will they really be able
to pull off this ambitious 10-year, multigame
endeavor? Should you start working on your
cosplay outfit now?
Finally, next month brings a review of the
highly anticipated PlayStation 3 dragon-riding
adventure, Lair. And for all you jocks out there, NCAA
Football 08 will land in the expert hands of EGM’s
Review Crew. Will these summertime games be good
■ NCAA Football 08 (Multi)
enough to lure you away from that Slip ’n Slide? You’ll
■ Pokémon Battle Revolution (Wii)
just have to come trotting back in 30....
■ The Bigs (Multi)
■ Lair (PS3)
(All planned editorial content is subject to change.) ■ The Darkness (PS3/XB360)
> ADVERTISER INDEX
2K Games Colgate Max Fresh Nissan Motor Corporation USA U.S. Marine Corps - Recruiting
www.2kgames.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42-43 www.colgatemaxfresh.com. . . . . . . . . . .13 www.NissanUSA.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .23 www.marines.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .27
2K Sports Collins College Procter & Gamble Ubisoft Entertainment
www.2ksports.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .112 www.collinscollege.edu . . . . . . . . . . . . . .83 www.oldspice.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .15 www.ubisoft.com . . . . . . . . . . . . 2-3, 37, 49
Activision Disney Interactive Games Sanyo eneloop University of Advancing ComputerTech
www.activision.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32-33 www.disney.com. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19, 20-21 www.eneloopusa.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .85 www.uat.edu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .95
American Legacy Foundation Full Sail Real World Education Shout! Factory US Army Accessions Command
www.thetruth.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .45 www.fullsail.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .99 www.ShoutFactory.com. . . . . . . . . . . . . .89 www.goarmy.com. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .111
American Power Conversion Hands-On Mobile Sony Pictures Entertainment - Columbia US Navy Recruiting Command
www.apc.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .87 www.handson.com. . . . . . . . . . . .71, 91, 93 www.sonypictures.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . .29 www.navy.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .51
Atlus Software Hudson Entertainment Southpeak Interactive Vivendi Universal Games
www.atlus.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .69 www.HudsonEntertainment.com . . . . . .53 www.southpeak.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .65 www.vugames.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . .11, 39
Ball Park Franks iBuyPower Square Enix U.S.A., Inc
www.saralee.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .30, 31 http://www.ibuypower.com . . . . . . . . 78-79 www.square-enix-usa.com . . . . . . . . . . 4-5
CA Milk Processors Board Microsoft Targer Stores
www.gottmilk.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .73 www.microsoft.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . .41, 55 www.target.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .9
Codemasters, Inc. Namco Bandai Games America The Gillette Company
www.codemastersusa.com. . . . . . . . . . 6-7 www.namco.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .25 www.gillette.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .47, 63
ELECTRONIC GAMING MONTHLY (ISSN #1058-918X) is published monthly by Ziff Davis Media Inc., 28 East 28th Street, New York, NY 10016. Periodicals Postage Paid at New York, NY 10016 and additional mailing offices. For subscription service questions, address changes, or to order, please contact us at: Web: http://service.
egmmag.com (for customer service) or http://subscribe.egmmag.com (to order); Phone: U.S. and Canada (800) 779-1174 or (850) 682-7624, elsewhere (303) 604-7445; POSTMASTER: Electronic Gaming Monthly, P.O. Box 55721, Boulder, CO 80322-5721 (please include your mailing label with any correspondence as it contains
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unsolicited materials. Without limiting the rights under copyrights reserved herein, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in, or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior written notice of Ziff
Davis Media Inc. Copyright © 2007 Ziff Davis Media Inc. All rights reserved. Electronic Gaming Monthly is a registered trademark of Ziff Davis Publishing Holdings Inc. Reproduction in whole or in part in any form or medium without express written permission of Ziff Davis Media Inc. is prohibited. For permission to reuse material
from our publications or websites, or to use our logo, contact Ziff Davis Media’s Rights and Permissions Manager, Olga Gonopolsky, at: permissions@ziffdavis.com or Ziff Davis Media Inc. 28 East 28th Street, New York, NY, 10016 Tel: (212) 503-5438, Fax: (212)
503-3560. For article REPRINTS and E-PRINTS, contact FosteReprints at Tel: (866) 879-9144. Visit www.fostereprints.com to obtain quotes and order reprints online. Electronic Gaming Monthly and EGM are trademarks of Ziff Davis Media Inc. TM and © for all other
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GTA IV RESIDENT EVIL 4

8 pages of Liberty City

XBOX 360: 8-PAGE EXCLUSIVE PREVIEW

Display Until July 2

SPLINTER CELL, IRAQ?

Las Vegas, Nevada. It used to be

Use tactical planning to compete in

*SCORES PERTAIN TO XBOX 360TM VERSION

Available for the PSP® (PlayStation®Portable)

Two classic epics that launched the most

Game Experience May Change

Cover Story: BioShock Splinter

> LETTERS 44 Online Scene 84 Ninja Gaiden Sigma

ZIFF DAVIS MEDIA GAME GROUP

8 • ELECTRONIC GAMING MONTHLY • www.1UP.com

I RECENTLY HAD A CHAT WITH ONE

56 Grand Theft Auto IV:

ZIFF DAVIS MEDIA INC. SUBSCRIPTION SERVICE

10 • ELECTRONIC GAMING MONTHLY • www.1UP.com

> TRIVIAL Letter of the Month

Well put. > FAREWELL, FABIO

To each his own...but you’re Ask an EGM cover model...

12 • ELECTRONIC GAMING MONTHLY • www.1UP.com

14 • ELECTRONIC GAMING MONTHLY • www.1UP.com

Photograph by R. Dodson/SFMisfits, Inc

16 • ELECTRONIC GAMING MONTHLY • www.1UP.com

PAGE PAGE PAGE

ELECTRONIC GAMING MONTHLY • www.1UP.com • 17

every split second has been carefully

tailored to tweak emotions,” he says.

18 • ELECTRONIC GAMING MONTHLY • www.1UP.com

Let’s Get Digital

They say every dollar spent is a vote,

■ Calling All Cars

Certainly, it’s a blessing for you,

22 • ELECTRONIC GAMING MONTHLY • www.1UP.com

> PREVIEW: EXCLUSIVE SCREENS AND INFO

24 • ELECTRONIC GAMING MONTHLY • www.1UP.com

Conviction, however, is running

tion” so fast that you may not even

The developers say:

26 • ELECTRONIC GAMING MONTHLY • www.1UP.com

and purposes, a whole new game:

comfort,” says Ferland. “He has to

The gameplay says: > THE MULTIPLAYER CROWD

28 • ELECTRONIC GAMING MONTHLY • www.1UP.com

[Sam] has to find new ways of mastering

New content cracking down

> PLAYING FAVORITES > TAKE THIS JOB

34 • ELECTRONIC GAMING MONTHLY • www.1UP.com

1. What current emo band has a song enti-

2. Put these levels from your first game,

3. What’s the name of the WWE car-combat

5. So Kratos is the god of war, but who is

Game Over: Glad you did well, Jaffe. ’Cause we were

ELECTRONIC GAMING MONTHLY • www.1UP.com • 35

Updating you today on tomorrow’s heavy hitters

Some leaked beta footage revealed that the multiplayer

> EGM MESSAGE-BOARD POLL