I’m of the opinion that kids games shouldn’t be garbage.

Just because a game is licensed or made for kids, this should not be used as an excuse to shove shoddy, unfinished games out the door. More often than not, short development cycles thwart any attempt to make a licensed game good, because much of the sales come from hitting the shelves at the same time as the movie a game is based off of.

That’s why I was happy to see that Toy Story 3 felt like a real game.

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“Friday Old Games” is a series of articles in which we review a game from the older generations of consoles, share why we picked it, and whether or not it holds up with time.

Back in 1992, id Software set the world (of PC gaming nerds) on fire by making the first in a new genre called “First Person Shooters”. The best part: Wolfenstein 3D was shareware, so it was not only legal, but encouraged that you give the first episode of the game to your friends.

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After surviving the giant traffic jam that is Seattle, I arrive at the Triple Door, ready to get my Bejeweled on. I’ve been practicing at home and I can almost get to about half of my wife’s high score, so confidence is high as I wait for the tourney to start.

I stretch out and do mental wind sprints to prepare my mind and my brain for some jewel matching frenzy.

I am wearing a suit in order to intimidate my opponents. They pretend not to notice or care, but I can tell that they are secretly terrified.

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“Friday Old Games” is a series of articles in which we review a game from the older generations of consoles, share why we picked it, and whether or not it holds up with time.

I have never been a PC gamer. When Half-Life came out for the PC, I was still rocking my Commodore 64 (which was just a teensy bit short in the RAM department). Besides I was too busy with my PS1 to worry about insanely awesome FPS games with pitch perfect atmosphere; I had some Battle Arena Toshinden to conquer.

In all seriousness Half-Life dropped with the force of a judo throw from Segata Sanshiro (which is equivalent to 10 megaton bombs.) It completely revolutionized the FPS genre. Everything from the graphics to the story to the puzzles to the combat pushed the genre in fantastic new directions. Even dedicated non-PC guys like myself stared enviously at our buddy’s copy and hoped for a console port.

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Sometimes, a mystery is surrounded by a puzzle; sometimes dozens of small, intricate puzzles that would confound and befuddle your average government agent.

Hidden away in the depths of FBI headquarters is the office of Nelson Tethers. Tethers is the top (and only) agent in the bureau’s Department of Puzzle Research. When a conundrum is too discombobulating for the rest of the FBI, it is up to Agent Tethers to elucidate the situation in Telltale’s latest, Puzzle Agent.

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We all have those games that we miss the first time around. With the busy release schedule of modern gaming, no one has time to play everything. That is why we at WingDamage present to you “Fashionably Late Reviews“. This is our series on games from the current generation of consoles that we may have missed on their initial release, but have gone back to experience now.

Ever since Grand Theft Auto 3, people have been trying to outdo the precedents established by Rockstar. They have had to go bigger and more over-the-top crazy with each game to keep things interesting. With GTA4, Rockstar tried to scale things back and make it a little more serious.

Thank goodness Volition didn’t do the same thing. 2008′s Saints Row 2 continues the tradition of open world games that provide a huge, goofy action experience where the world is your playground; a playground filled with fast cars, giant explosions, and rival gangs to take down. It marks the first time I have stuck with an open world game long enough to finish its story mode.

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"Explosive Movie Chase Scene: The Racing Game."

When my cohorts and I attended PAX last year, an unexpected game caught Jonah’s attention. It was an explosive new racer by the name of Split/Second. Unfortunately, I never got the chance to try it while I was there due to the long lines and numerous other games to check out. While it looked interesting enough, I quickly forgot about the game’s existence and it never entered my radar.

All that changed when the Xbox Live demo was released. Curious to give it a shot, I downloaded it. Not only was my racing itch scratched, it was done so in ways that felt fresh, exciting, and extremely polished. But the demo was just the beginning.

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"Looking for treasure... just like the Goonies."

In any given RPG, the wooden sword and cardboard shield you start with aren’t going to be the ones you keep forever. Usually you get rid of them by the time you hit your first town. But when you buy that new set of gear and equip it, only to find your character has only changed in numbers and not in appearance, it is a bit of a letdown.

If you are talking about old school sprite based games, I will concede that it was more trouble than it was probably worth to put visible loot into a game. Re-drawing that many sprites would be time consuming and prohibitively costly. Where 3D character models are involved, there aren’t a lot of excuses left when you are dealing with stat driven games and RPG mechanics.

There is nothing quite as addictive to me as a progressive, well thought out loot system that is reflected on your character.

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Mention Plants vs. Zombies to someone who hasn’t played it and they’ll look at you like you’re a little crazy. Like maybe you need to up your Lithium dosage a couple milligrams.

Mention Plants vs. Zombies to someone that has played it and they’ll look up at you with a big smile. They’ll then spend the next five minutes gushing about the game and how much they enjoyed it.

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Sometimes a game will catch your eye for no other reason than an interesting piece of cover art. In the case of Toki Tori, it was the high adorability factor that drew me in.

Toki Tori was originally developed for the Game Boy Color by Two Tribes B.V. and released by Capcom. They have since done versions for the iPhone, Windows Mobile, WiiWare, and PC. The GBC version was itself an update of Eggbert for the MSX 2.

I saw it on one of the many Steam sales last year and picked it up on the cheap. I had heard it was a cross between Lemmings and a platformer. They had me at Lemmings.

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