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Darryn Bonthuys

Meet a soldier’s best friend in Call of Duty Ghosts

May 22, 2013 at 11:15 am | 50 Comments

So the cat is out of the bag, and now everyone knows that I wasn’t just cycling around Venice Beach trying to find Tenacious D last week. Call of Duty Ghosts is aiming to step things up a notch for the franchise later this year, and while baysplosions and 60 frames per second are par for the course as with any COD title. There is something else that’s new as well. Military trained killer attack German Shepard dogs. And their cute dog goggles. Or doggles. Ha!


Darryn Bonthuys

Call of Duty Ghosts – Paranormal Attacktivity

May 21, 2013 at 8:00 pm | 26 Comments

It’s a hot day in Los Angeles, and it’s even hotter in the massive bus that we’ve all been bundled into, as we make our way to go grab an exclusive peek at the upcoming Call of Duty Ghosts, as well as two other Activision games that we can’t mention just yet. It’s a new era for gaming, and with Call of Duty having influenced the current-gen for better or for worse, a new start for that franchise as well.


Geoffrey Tim

The Next Xbox: It’s nearly time

May 21, 2013 at 12:00 pm | 83 Comments

Today’s the big day. The big reveal. After months and months of rabid speculation and the feverish churning of the rumour mill, today we finally find out what’s inside Peter Molyneux’s cube! Incidentally, (and of much lesser import) today’s also the day that Microsoft reveals its next-generation Xbox. What are you expecting to see?


Zoe Hawkins

Don’t Starve – simple and addictive

May 17, 2013 at 3:30 pm | 24 Comments

As impressed as I am with Minecraft, I am completely unable to play it.  Not because I'm a n00b (although that would probably also be true), but because I can't play any first-person games without turning green and doing my best Linda Blair impression.


Geoffrey Tim

Can the Wii U claw back?

May 10, 2013 at 3:30 pm | 16 Comments

It’s starting to look pretty grim for Nintendo’s Wii U. While the company’s systems thrived on third-party support in the past (The NES and SNES are home to some of the best games ever made), Nintendo consoles have increasingly become reliant on first-party software. The problem is that without third party support, only die-hards end up buying your hardware – and third party support for the Wii U is dwindling at a rate of knots.


Darryn Bonthuys

Review–Super Little Acorns 3D Turbo

May 6, 2013 at 3:30 pm | 4 Comments

There’s a lot to be said about games these days. They’re massive, cost more to make than a presidential not-a-compound and require more input than a feedback form at the post office. But sometimes, the smaller game on the opposite end of the spectrum can be just as effective. Super Little Acorns 3D is one such game.


Darryn Bonthuys

The top ten most ridiculous retro video game ads

May 3, 2013 at 3:30 pm | 15 Comments

Marketing a game is pretty easy these days. A mysterious package here, a bribe over there and a few teaser trailers thrown in for good measure and BAM! Job done, time to hit the bar. The thing is, gaming adverts these days are missing a certain something, a particular ingredient that has been lost over the years. I’m talking about downright tripping the light fantastic madness. Here’s ten adverts from yesteryear that downed a bottle of absinthe and then had some crystal meth for breakfast.


Geoffrey Tim

Star Trek review – Worst Contact

April 30, 2013 at 3:30 pm | 26 Comments

I have to be honest. I'm a little bit ambivalent when it comes to Star Trek. I’ve enjoyed Gene Rodenberry’s past tales of intergalactic diplomacy, and I even quite liked J.J Abrams’ reboot, but I’m hardly what you’d consider a “Trekkie”. I’m not big on licenced games that try cash in on people’s established love either, so I was expecting this new game based on Abrams’ rebooted Star Trek continuity to not be very good. It has exceeded my expectations…by being far worse than I had ever anticipated.


Darryn Bonthuys

Johnny Walkerthrough – Surgeon Simulator 2013

April 24, 2013 at 3:30 pm | 26 Comments

Every so often, we get a weird game on our doorstep that can’t be played with a conventional train of thought. That’s when people come to me. And usually pay me off with some cheap scotch. These are the Johnny Walker-throughs. And today, we’re attempting heart transplants and organ removals.


Garth Holden

LEGO City Undercover review

April 23, 2013 at 3:30 pm | 11 Comments

Meet Chase McCain. This small, yellow cop lives to fight crime. Sadly he has more charm than brains, which forced him to leave Lego City after his last big case. Now he is back, looking for forgiveness and to work out how the villainous Rex Fury got out of prison. Now, with Lego City suffering its worst crime wave ever, it is up to Chase to get to the bottom of the case, with the help of his one-liners and his useless sidekick, Honey.


Tauriq Moosa

Bioshock Infinite and How to Deal with Religious Wonder

April 22, 2013 at 3:30 pm | 17 Comments

[Spoiler free, but intended for those who’ve played the game]

The thing about Bioshock Infinite, apparent to anyone, is the sky-shattering, apocalyptic, and transcendent existence of the city of Columbia. So often, we speak about incredible settings as being “characters in themselves”: if this is true, then Columbia has many of the properties of the god from the Old Testament: Here is a place vengeful and jealous of other living spaces, which watches you, demands your love, attention, adoration; it demands the slaughter of all who oppose or threaten its existence. It is omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent: it knows all, can do all, and is all.


Gavin Mannion

Metacritic: Defending the Critic

April 22, 2013 at 12:30 pm | 27 Comments

You don’t have to go far to hear about how bad Metacritic is for the gaming industry. Kotaku recently wrote a great piece about it and Adam Sessler also had some good points in his recent video. This isn’t a new complaint either, IGN covered it a year ago and so have countless other sites.


Darryn Bonthuys

Call of Duty Black Ops 2 Uprising DLC Review

April 18, 2013 at 3:30 pm | 10 Comments

There’s no denying that those extras for Call of Duty Black Ops 2 are a tad pricy. A season pass is going to cost you a pretty penny, so it better be worth it. Revolution was the first map pack released for the game, but it wasn’t exactly the best example of DLC, appealing to hardcore fans only in the long run. Uprising follows in those footsteps with an approach that only hits some of the necessary targets.


Geoffrey Tim

Injustice: Gods Among Us review

April 16, 2013 at 3:00 pm | 37 Comments

NetherRealm successfully rebooted Mortal Kombat, returning the series to its roots and making the hyper-violent fighter relevant again. It’s now taking on the DC licence for a second time, trying to atone for its sins with the frankly awful Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe. Injustice: Gods Among Us does away with Mortal Kombat’s baggage and with it the gratuitous violence, focusing instead on just the heroes and villains from the comic books. It’s a better game for it.


Darryn Bonthuys

An interview with MLG co-founder Mike Sepso

April 16, 2013 at 2:30 pm | 2 Comments

Our final interview at the Call of Duty Championship last week was with none other than the MLG co-founder himself, Mike Sepso. Starting from humble beginnings, the MLG has evolved over the years, yet Sepso remained down to earth, eager to talk about the future of esports as an entity and the direction that it was heading in.

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