The Saboteur
The cross-platform release The Saboteur has received a lot of attention on Icrontic throughout its development cycle, but if you haven’t yet heard, it’s a GTA-esque third-person action game which takes place in 1940s Nazi-occupied Paris. The world is highly stylized, and uses sparing colors against a mostly black-and-white city to show the player’s progress. The idea was to create a Paris without glass walls, allowing the player to roam freely throughout the City of Light, which has been crafted to resemble the real Paris as closely as possible. While there is a lot of action and fire-power, most of the game’s missions will rely on the character’s stealth. Hide in the shadows, kill silently, disguise yourself in the enemy uniforms, and then use a bevy of different equipment and vehicle types to distract or destroy the Nazis while completing the various mission objectives.
PixelJunk Shooter
For the PS3 this week, we’re getting PixelJunk Shooter—a third-person scrolling shooter in the same simplistic graphical style as past PixelJunk games. Also like past games in the franchise, this game has a deceptive depth. The environment is a bit more closed up than most of us are used to from other scrolling shooters, but the little ships will have the ability to interact with nearly all aspects of the environment. The complexity of the environment allows players to use some cover tactics, and even use the environment itself as a weapon—using the dynamic fluids in the levels as weapons, for example. The game design encourages players to experiment with the environment while shooting down bad guys, and attempting to rescue friendly spacemen. There are co-operative and competitive multi-player modes, as well.
Hello Kitty Online
For the PC we’ll see Hello Kitty Online hit the shelves. In this new MMORPG, players will immerse themselves in the world of Sanrio’s famous Hello Kitty product line. Create a custom avatar, join up with friends, and help Hello Kitty and her pals, including Keroppi, Cinnimoroll, and Badtz-maru, rid the world of a formless evil presence which has taken hold of their world. The graphical style is, of course, based on the art of Sanrio’s various lines, but the gameplay is an interesting take on the RPG genre. While combat is a necessity in the game, and players follow a familiar path of talking to NPC and completing their quest lines, players level up not through defeating enemies, but only through collecting resources and crafting new items.It’s also free to play, so MMOers who enjoy the crafting aspect of the genre, and don’t mind some bubbly colorful graphics, might want to give this one a glance.
The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks
The Icrontic Spotlight release for this week is The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks for the DS. Zelda is having an out-of-body experience, and this time, she’s going to accompany Link on his mission to save her. In the dungeons, Zelda can occupy a massive suit of Phantom armor, which the player can then control with the stylus. As in almost every past game in the franchise, players will slowly become better equipped to handle the puzzles as the story plays out. A new piece of equipment this time is the whirlwind, which the player activates by blowing on the DS. The gameplay and graphical style is very similar to Phantom Hourglass. There is a train this time, rather than a boat, but players can still draw on the in-game maps, and use the stylus for many of Link’s powers.
The two featured games that are available at retail can be purchased through Ye Olde Icrontic Game Shoppe. The others are available online.
Following is a list of this week’s announced North American releases:
PC
- East India Company: Battle of Trafalgar
- Hello Kitty Online
- Playmobil 2 Pack
- Saira
- Tales of Monkey Island Chapter 5: Rise of the Pirate God
- The Saboteur
- Your Shape
Wii
- Flowerworks
- Magnetis
- My Dolphin
- Rec Room Games
- Silent Hill: Shattered Memories
- Stop Stress: A Day of Fury
- Tales of Monkey Island Chapter 5: Rise of the Pirate God
- Shinobi (VC – Arcade)
- Street Fighter Alpha 2 (VC – SNES)
DS
Army Defender- Ball Fighter
- DSi Mario Bundle
- myNotebook: Red
- Pop Island
- Puzzler World
- Rayman
- Salon Superstar
- The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks
Xbox
- The Saboteur
PS3
- The Saboteur
- PixelJunk Shooter
PSP
- James Cameron’s Avatar: The Game
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