Most Recent: Previews

Beatbuddy Hands-On Preview: A New Approach to Rhythm Gaming

Posted on May 6, 2013 by Nicole Kline

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Beatbuddy is a super adorable side-scrolling rhythm game made by a small German company named Threaks. It was on the show floor at PAX East, and after seeing their adorable plushy mascot on backpacks all over the expo floor, I needed to find out what this game was all about. Not only do they have a great little fellow to promote their game, they’ve also got fantastic gameplay to back it up. I was more than happy with Beatbuddy, and I was ready to stand there and play it for another hour, if they’d let me. (more…)

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Anomaly 2 Beta Impressions: Creeps Vs. Towers Multiplayer… Fight!

Posted on May 2, 2013 by Troy Matsumiya

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The original Anomaly: Warzone Earth was a crazy fun twist on the ubiquitous tower defense genre, placing you as the creeps fighting against the towers. So it is very exciting to learn that Polish developer 11 Bit Studios is putting the final touches on a sequel, aptly named Anomaly 2, highlighted by what should be its killer feature: creeps versus towers multiplayer. Oh, yeah, you read that right. (more…)

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Secret Ponchos Interview: Dueling With Yousuf Mapara and Jose Lopez

Posted on April 18, 2013 by Warp Zoned Staff

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One of the games we were most excited to see at PAX East 2013 was Secret Ponchos, the intense twin-stick arena fighter set in the world of a Spaghetti Western. Contributor Anthony Amato, Senior Editor Nicole Kline, and Editor-In-Chief John Scalzo met up with President and Creative Director Yousuf Mapara and Art Director Jose Lopez and had a fantastic conversation with them while trying out the game. Nicole got her butt kicked by an eight-year-old, but that didn’t mar our first impression of the game, which was: we want more as soon as possible. Read on for the full interview we conducted with the incredibly talented guys at Switchblade Monkeys. (more…)

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Secret Ponchos Hands-On Preview: These Outlaws Will Steal Your Heart (Literally)

Posted on April 18, 2013 by Nicole Kline

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Secret Ponchos is a top-down, twin stick arena shooter stylized as a Spaghetti Western – characters, locations, music, and all. Developer Switchblade Monkeys has taken their love of those old Italian movies and married it to twitch-reaction arena mechanics, creating a game that took PAX East 2013 by storm. After seeing the trailer, it was on the top of my list of must-play games that weekend, and I was not disappointed by my experience. (more…)

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Transistor Hands-On Preview: Speechless

Posted on April 8, 2013 by John Scalzo

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Supergiant’s first game, Bastion, was an action RPG in the Legend of Zelda mold that didn’t tread on any new gameplay ground. But its narrative voiceover (provided by actor Logan Cunningham), and the way it integrated music into the story, moved Bastion beyond being just an enjoyable XBLA title and pushed into Game of the Year contender territory back in 2011.

The developer’s second game, the sci-fi action RPG Transistor, made its worldwide debut at last month’s PAX East show. Using a similar isometric view, it’s clear that Transistor shares a fair bit of Bastion’s DNA, but it is also so much more. It’s almost like Bastion turned up to 11. (more…)

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Dead Island: Riptide Hands-On Preview: Wasting Away in Zombieville

Posted on April 3, 2013 by Nicole Kline

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Dead Island: Riptide is a sequel to Dead Island, which was released to middling reviews and disappointment after a strong advertising campaign in 2011. Deep Silver’s marketing for the sequel has already stirred up controversy with their plan to include a “bloody torso” statue in the UK special edition. The game itself will be out this month, and was playable on the show floor at PAX East. The developers were showing off a cooperative mode, allowing you to work together with other players to fortify an area and keep the zombies out. But between collision issues, terrible graphics, and hysterical ragdoll phyics, the game was a jumbled mess.

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Watch Dogs PAX East Impressions: Hack the Planet, or Maybe Just Chicago

Posted on April 2, 2013 by Nicole Kline

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Ubisoft didn’t have Watch Dogs playable on the show floor at PAX East, but the game still had an enormous presence. The publisher showed a special behind-closed-doors presentation of the game, which included a special Watch Dogs lanyard as a giveaway (and if you were wearing it on the show floor, you may have gotten a surprise visit from a Frag Doll with a free t-shirt). I would have much preferred being able to play the game myself, but what I saw on the screen was a somewhat impressive, if disappointingly short, display of the capabilities of main character Aiden Pearce. (more…)

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The Last of Us Hands-On Preview: Tension and Fear Win the Day

Posted on March 28, 2013 by Nicole Kline

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I wasn’t sure what to think when I first saw trailers for The Last of Us, Naughty Dog’s first non-Nathan Drake game in six years. It certainly looked like a Naughty Dog game, with the same style and graphics, but this was set in a post-apocalyptic world, one in which humans had been infected by a strange fungus, which left the victims zombified. The remaining survivors of humanity lived in terror in a wasteland. While the Uncharted games had dabbled in science fiction (remember those crazy mutants from the second game?), this was the studio’s first real deviation from reality. I was doubtful that they could pull it off, mainly because the market is so saturated with these types of games, and in the end, not many of them are that great. But from what I saw in the half hour demo at PAX East this past weekend, Naughty Dog just might succeed. (more…)

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