Video Game Reviews

NBA Inside Drive XBox Microsoft Microsoft has
made a respectable effort in its first attempt at basketball on the
XBox. But overall, this game will neither delight nor
disgust.  “NBA Inside Drive” (developed by High
Voltage) is a mixed bag with some mildly vexing flaws and a few
pleasing virtues. The graphics are very clean and clear, but
have a barren look that is too reminiscent of first generation
games. In fact, everything about this game ““ its
features, sound, graphics and gameplay ““ seems a notch behind
its technological precipice.  The game painfully lacks some
sort of tutorial. Playing is difficult because the foul shooting
meter is neither intuitive nor is there any way of figuring out how
to get the players to actually rebound the ball. (The rebound meter
turns out to be hidden in a menu under the options heading, not in
the pre-game menu.) The only modes the game comes with are
exhibition, season and playoffs, with notable absences such as
create-a-team/player or coaching. There is no online play either
and the most annoying aspect of the game is the A.I. (artificial
intelligence). There is nothing more frustrating than when the
computer is too stupid to react to advanced or realistic techniques
of basketball play. Instead of playing basketball as it should
be played on a court, the player is forced to adapt to the
A.I.’s supreme interception capability and mechanical
percentages. Despite these challenges, it is definitely a fun game
and a great starting point, but not worth a purchase unless Sega
NBA Live, the current paradigm, is sold out. -Robert Esposito

ShadowMan: 2econd Coming PlayStation 2 Acclaim
Armageddon is coming. Not the movie (that would be too cruel), but
that whole biblical end-of-the-world thing.  No sweat if
you’re Mike LeRoi, who has a bone to pick with the devil
after his minions slaughtered and beheaded LeRoi’s entire
family.  “ShadowMan: 2econd Coming” is a demonic
adventure infused with large doses of African spirituality. It
sports wonderfully eerie music and visuals to match.  LeRoi
undergoes a Jekyll-Hyde transformation every night thanks to a
voodoo mask bestowed upon him by Mamma Nettie, a big-breasted
voodoo chick confined to a Louisiana church. At night, Mike
becomes the ShadowMan while his weapons also undergo a similar
voodoo makeover. Acclaim got a number of things right in this
sequel to the PlayStation/N64/Dreamcast original. Namely, the voice
acting is excellent and rife with artistically warranted profanity.
The graphics and character models are up to par with the better PS2
titles, and the music creates the perfect sensation of
horror.  Unfortunately, the most important aspects of gameplay
are this game’s biggest flaws. Figuring out where to go
and what to do is tedious at times, though not as bad as the
original.  Also, the control is loose and sloppy, meaning that
manipulating ShadowMan’s jogs, jumps and shooting is an
exercise in patience and luck. Another annoying aspect of combat is
that enemies will often run right into ShadowMan, resulting in an
awkward situation where the enemies suffer damage even though
ShadowMan is faced in the opposite direction, flailing his arms
about in seeming futility. In spite of the excellent graphics, the
frame rate sometimes dips low, causing the game to move in a slow
motion. This flaw, however, is less vexing than the next one:
load times. So don’t be tricked into restarting the
system the first time, thinking that it’s not responding.
-Robert Esposito

“Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3″ Gamecube
Developer: Neversoft The biggest mistake a developer can
make is to ruin a great series by trying to change too
much. Luckily, the developers of “Tony Hawk’s Pro
Skater 3″ at Neversoft did not fall into this trap. 
They made sure not to alter too much of the multi-platform best
seller, while strengthening almost every aspect of the game. 
Graphics are awesome in this iteration, proving that Gamecube is a
force to be reckoned with, despite its Lilliputian footprints and
tiny game disks (they look like something out of “Starship
Troopers”).  The 13 initial characters are well rendered
and show visible emotions of pain as they skin their knees and
slash the sidewalk with bloodstains.  Thankfully, these
bloodstains actually live up to their names, staining the sidewalk
for the length of the run. As the player unlocks more features by
progressing through the career mode, special characters will become
available such as Darth Maul from “Star Wars Episode
I.” If this does not sound appealing, players can create a
custom skater (male or female) and even dress them as they see fit.
This makes for some interestingly apparelled skaters. Locales like
Los Angeles and Tokyo are available, along with seven other
interesting places such as airports and even a snow park. Beautiful
and varied, these skating parks are now much more interactive and
include objectives such as dunking the annoying foreman into a vat
of water in the foundry or triggering an earthquake in L.A. The
sound and music, though, were quite unimpressive. The sound effects
seems carried over from the original PlayStation version, and the
Alien Ant Farm and Sum 41 tracks can be a bit annoying, though not
out of place in this type of game. Only one level is available to
players at the beginning, the foundry. Thankfully, a
straightforward practice feature has been added, narrated by none
other than the man, Tony Hawk. -Robert Esposito