Rage - It has a nice visual aesthetic, the crafting is some of the better-handled I've seen in game with RPG elements, there is some
fantastic character animation on NPCs (something that's incredibly rare in games), and the main quest is fairly well-paced. Unfortunately, the gunplay is pretty average, the driving (which this game has you do a
LOT of) is pretty mediocre at best, and the RPG elements are few and far between. And while the game looks lovely, it only appears so from a distance as textures are very blurry and very noticeably draw-in as the character approaches things.
What sidequests there are often send you back into dungeons you've already completed just to wipe out more generic enemies, which gets tedious after a while. And the way the story plays out is abysmal, as the player literally spends probably 85% of the game just performing random tasks for random strangers that have no bearing whatsoever on the plot. I could tolerate that in a game like Fallout 3 because the quests were so well-executed (especially the story ones), but here the quests are not particularly interesting. There is barely any story here, and almost no memorable or notable characters.
Overall, it's a game I did enjoy playing, but the lack of story and mediocre gunplay (seriously, why do goons take
three headshots to kill in a non-RPG FPS?) really took its toll on me over the course of my 21 hours with the game. Sorry, id, but "slightly above average" just doesn't cut it during this Fall season with so many excellent games.
Child of Eden - I really liked this game, but man the final 3 or so levels of this game are pretty brutal (and there are no checkpoints). It's probably the best Star Fox game I've played since Star Fox 64, though.
It's a strange game, though, in that the game is both too short
and too long: there are only 5 stages + a challenge stage, but to unlock each stage the player has to collect stars by performing well in the stages. This means you inevitably have to grind stars for the later stages, which didn't happen to me since I really enjoyed playing the first 2 stages but it could be an issue for other players.
The music in this game is outstanding, though I'm not fond of the track they remixed for the "Beauty" stage (I don't care for that stage in general, really). And the developers did a
superb job of complementing the remixed Genki Rockets music with perfectly timed sound effects and vocal samples that play when the player "purifies" targets on-screen or shoots down incoming "missiles", especially if the player times things particularly well and triggers a "Perfect" by purifying 8 targets at once with the beat of the music. Likewise, this game is not technically doing anything extraordinary visually, but the way the visuals are used to complement the music is
stunning.
I love what this game does, as it hits that same vibe that the Bit.Trip games do in giving you the impression that you are creating your own soundtrack unique to each playthrough, reliant on your skill at the game. The game gets too hard too quickly for my taste and the lack of content does mean I can't recommend anyone buy it for full price at $40, though. But by all means, play it when it gets discounted in the $20 or so range. For all its faults, it's one thing that seems increasingly rare in Japanese-developed games these days: it's incredibly memorable and unique. And yes, it plays
fine with a controller. Actually, I never could get the Move controller to calibrate right with this game.