All posts in Xbox Live Arcade

Review: Crimson Alliance

I’m missing Diablo just as much as the rest of you. When there’s a title that provides the same thrill of decimating enemies and looting their corpses, especially with a group of friends, I pay attention. Enter Crimson Alliance, an Xbox Live Arcade title that does just that. Certain Affinity has gotten the dungeon crawling genre down to a science in this co-op brawler that serves as a great weekend play with friends — especially those who might need a refresher course in grinding for glory.

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Review: BloodRayne: Betrayal

BloodRayne wasn’t always a stylized, comic book-inspired adventure. No, the series has a very different background, having evolved from a third-person action/adventure game (three-dimensional, mind you) to the gorgeous side-scrolling slasher you see in BloodRayne: Betrayal. Frenetic, fluid, and positively gushing with decapitations, geysers of blood, and vampire antics, this retro throwback is an exciting new direction for Rayne. And while its sometimes finicky controls mar its attempt at fast-paced platforming, it’s still a satisfying play, even on its lowest difficulty.

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Review: Crazy Machines: Elements

You’ve got a basketball, a board, some levers, and a rope. You need to push over a few bowling pins on a nearby ledge. What do you do? If you enjoy deliberating on what you could actually build to help accomplish this task, then Crazy Machines: Elements is a game you might be interested in. Do you remember the Incredible Machine game series on PC? Crazy Machines is a spiritual successor to the popular titles, and after a few successful releases it’s finally come to the Xbox Live Arcade. In this wacky puzzler, there is no plot line or characters to muddle up the action. Just you, toy trucks, balloons, ramps, and other miscellaneous items.

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Review: Pinball FX 2: Ms. ‘Splosion Man Table

I’ve always been a big pinball fan. I wasted so much time when I was supposed to be doing homework on my parents’ computer with the 3D pinball game included with Windows. Something about the bumpers, the pixelated display screens, and high scores just gets to me. It’s addictive. Admittedly, the last time I actually played on a real table was far too long ago. Luckily, there are titles like Pinball FX and other arcade options that allow for quick bites of frantic pinball action even where pinball shouldn’t logically be played: a console. Several tables are available for purchase for Pinball FX and its sequel Pinball FX 2. Most recently, Twisted Pixel’s explosive darling Ms. ‘Splosion Man has burst onto the scene with one of the best tables yet. Cotton candy panda!

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Review: Fruit Ninja Kinect

Like Angry Birds, I had never heard of Fruit Ninja until it rose to incredible heights of popularity. As a consistently top-ranking mobile app, it’s finally making the leap to plenty of other platforms (including Facebook), and most recently Xbox Live Arcade. And where its life as an iPhone/iPad app relied heavily upon usage of the touch screen, Fruit Ninja Kinect now has the power of the Xbox 360’s pricey peripheral to back it up. While core Xbox 360 users such as myself still have yet to find a meaty title to sink our teeth into, Fruit Ninja Kinect is as satisfying as it is bizarre, as long as you break up your gameplay sessions into short, juicy chunks.

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