Video Game Reviews

The Stanley Parable is one of those games that manages to earn my respect while kindling my wrath.  I love the fact that it’s a complete departure from the world of video games as I know it.  Yes, it plays like a first-person shooter without the shooting, but as the point of the game is to figure out the point of the game, it is a totally different experience.  Storywise, all we really know about Stanley is that he’s a faceless employee in some giant office building.  One day, as he realizes that he is all alone, a Stephen Fry-esque narrator begins explaining what Stanley does next.  The player then has the option to either go along with the narrator’s exposition, or deviate from the storyline.  Though this dynamic lends itself to multiple play-throughs, the elusiveness of what the game is trying to accomplish starts to border on pretension—this is where the aforementioned wrath-kindling takes place.  Though it’s definitely a creative take on the video game genre—especially regarding games in which the player’s choices shape the gameplay—at the end of the day, it feels like an angry nerd’s final project in a digital media class.  –Alex Springer

Zombie Tycoon 2: Brainhov’s Revenge
Frima Studios
Reviewed On: PC
Also On: PS3, PS Vita
Street: 12.09.13

After spending so much of my video game career slaying zombies, I was surprised at how attached I grew to my undead minions in Frima’s Zombie Tycoon 2.  The game allows players to assume the role of two mad scientists battling for dominance over an urban environment.  It has the point-and-click gameplay that is characteristic of many real-time-strategy games, however the player’s limited amount of troops require a different approach for success.  In a given scenario, the player commands four squads—typically two squads of zombies, a special unit, and one of two scientists.  The zombie squads can be morphed into different specialty squads by capturing certain buildings, which requires a bit of forethought since sometimes they can’t be changed back.  Despite its cartoonish character designs and environments, the game presents a solid challenge to players while allowing multiple methods to accomplish a given scenario.  At times, the gameplay feels a bit clunky and the camera rotation tends to veer off track, which is frustrating when enemy zombies tend to attack at a moment’s notice.  Though the game presents an interesting perspective on the RTS genre, the imperfect gameplay makes it difficult to multi-task when facing hordes of hostile undead.  –Alex Springer