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Archive for the ‘Wii’ Category

Justin Lowmaster’s thoughts…a.k.a My Husband

I’ve been able to play good portion of My Sims Agents and I have had fun with it. The core of the game is solving mysteries and mini-puzzles of various types. It’s an adventure game, a puzzle game, and a detective agency management game all  wrapped up into one.

The games starts off with the player investigating some simple mysteries around town, but solving these hints at a larger story. Soon you become an official agent with a headquarters and everything. Your headquarters is where you control all the ‘sims’ aspect of the game. You can recruit new agents and decide where in your building they will have their desks at. On each floor you can arrange furniture and decorations with augment the skills and abilities of your agents.

You send your agents on cases that come in. You choose who to send not only based on their skills, but each agent has certain likes, dislikes, and personality traits that you can consider before deciding who to send. As the agents go on cases, their dialogue will give you ideas of what they like and dislike. During the cases, you will receive updates via the cell phone. Sometimes you will be asked for advice on how they should proceed. You are given some options and they will try what you suggest. This keeps you involved in the cases, so you aren’t only getting updates, but you can interact. If you decide not to reply, they will make a choice on their own.

Also at HQ, and anywhere else with a mirror, you can change your appearance. You can wear agent gear, street clothes, and other fun outfits. As far as I know this doesn’t effect game play, but being able to modify your appearance (and how you sound) can be fun.

While your detectives are on stake-outs and hunting monsters (or possibly hunting monsters with stakes, that might be in there), you roam the city searching for cases and following the clues that dig deeper into the underlying mystery that lies just below the surface of the city, festering like a sore, infecting the good citizens with fear and uncertainty. While I have not yet been able to play the whole of the game yet, solving cases seems to require many similar things each time; looking for clues, following footprints, and questioning witnesses. This doesn’t mean it gets boring. A large part of what makes it interesting to me is that with each case, more and more of the darkness that hides in the seedy underbelly is brought to light. Also, while exploring the map, if you look around carefully you’ll fine crates and treasure chests, and other secret places, which unlock new furniture, clothing, agents, and more.

While on cases, you’ll have to solve mini-puzzles to get clues. Some are mechanical puzzles where you must places wires, gears, cogs, and other parts to get a machine working. Picking locks requires you to move pieces around a grid to allow the key to pass through, and when analyzing evidence, you must place different colored balls (chemicals) onto a grid in such a way that none of them have any dots left on them. Placing one beside another removes a dot. As the game progresses, these get tougher and require more brain power to solve. There are also parts where you must use your tools to move objects around so you can get your character to otherwise inaccessible locations.

The game has a lot of humor in it, and does not suffer for it. It’s silly and quirky, but in a good way. It keeps it light and fun.

I’ve very little trouble with the controls. They are simple, intuitive, and respond well. A minor issue is when choosing what to say in a conversation, you can’t click options with the pointer, you use the nun-chuck stick to select. That works just fine of course, but I don’t see why you can’t select with the pointer, and if you try without knowing, you might say something you didn’t mean. I don’t think it will mess you up much before you figure it out. Another think that got me for a moment was arranging furniture in the headquarters. I wanted to place a poster on the wall, and I could not figure out how until I rotated it and the available spots appeared on the wall.

Overall, I am enjoying My Sims Agents. I like solving puzzles and unraveling mysteries. I plan to finish the game and I hope that it stays challenging and interesting. I think it will.

*My Thoughts*

I also am a huge fan of this game! Note that I grew up playing almost all of the  available Sims games so I knew without a doubt I would love this one too! I give this game 4 1/2 stars!

You can purchase this game for around $30.00-40.00 and know that it’s also available for the Nintendo DS!

Disclaimer: I was sent a copy of My Sims Agent to review from Electronic Arts. This review is 100% my opinion and has not been edited or reviewed by anyone. I was not compensated in any other way for this product review.

I’m a big Sims fan so I was pretty excited to get a hold of one of Electronic Arts latest Sims games, SimAnimals Africa . This game is available for both the Nintendo Wii as well as for the Nintendo DS, today I’ll be reviewing the Wii version of the game.

In this game you’ll find that your were chosen to restore the good energy, peace if you will, to the land. You’ll do this by completing various missions available in each specific territory in Africa.

The missions aren’t too hard. You’ll find that you need to befriend certain animals to utilize their special skills.  In order to befriend each animal, by feeding, petting, and playing various mini games with the animal you choose. Some of the animals that you’ll find in SimAnimals Africa include Zebras, Lions, Elephants, Hippos, and other most known animals that can be found in that part of the world.

The controls are very Sim like, you’ll know exactly what I am talking about if you’ve played a Sim game before. I liked the twist on SimAnimals Africa because not only can control the area in “God mode” but you can also play as any of the animals you befriend. There’s an excellent tutorial when you start your game that will be extremely helpful in understanding the controls.

The music is great! I could listen to the sounds of Africa all day long! The graphics are also very fun and cartoon like, exactly what I would expect from a game like this.

I love the educational aspect of this game. I like how per say that when the lions needed fed, they eat the Zebra. I’ve played some games in the past where all the animals were friends and the meat eating species just didn’t eat the other animals. You can also mate the animals in order to grow a depleting population. Don’t worry, there’s just nuzzling, nothing explicit in any way.  I like that through this game kids are taught responsibility of caring for the world around them.

Overall,  I think this game is best for younger children. I believe with an older audience, that they’ll lose interest rather quickly after the various missions are completed.

You can purchase the Wii version of this game for around $35.00

** They also have a version of this game for the Nintendo DS**
Portable players will have several additional exclusive animals to play with, including parrots, meerkats, and cheetahs, and you’ll be able to talk to the parrot via the DS microphone and have him repeat what you said back to you.

Disclaimer: I was givenSimAnimals Africa for the wii system to review. This review is 100% my opinion and has not been edited or reviewed by anyone.

Personal Thoughts by my husband Justin Lowmaster…

When I first heard about Boom Blox Bash Party, I was very excited. I’m a big fan of the original Boom Blox game. We bought the original the day before my daughter was born and played it for hours and hours that day. It helped us relax.

Boom Blox Bash Party has all the same things that made Boom Blox great, and so much more. The main game play modes all revolve around blocks of some sort. In some levels you must carefully deconstruct towers (ala Jenga), while in others you win by throwing balls to knock down towers. Bash Party adds stacks of new modes and ways to interact with the blocks. New modes include paint levels where you color blocks to match them, space levels where the goal is to explode blocks outside an area floating in the void, and undersea levels where you have to toss blocks up to the surface without letting them touch the ground. New interaction ‘toys’ as they are called include a cannon you light and aim, a slingshot where you grab blocks (or the block animals) and fling them, and a new kind of ball, the Virus Ball.

In Bash Party there are also a few new block types aside from the standard bomb blocks (explode when hit) and chemical blocks (explode when two or more of these touch). The new blocks include Book Bux which add in-game money to your total (more on this later), Change Blox which morph from one block type to another, and the new Virus Blox. Virus infect other surrounding blox when exploded or when they are hit a Virus Ball (or touch another virus block). Infected blocks can spread like zombies in a crowded city under the right conditions. Activated virus blocks go poof and chaos ensues as whatever they were supporting collapses (like modern society when zombies run around biting people).

The Boom Bux allow you to unlock various items in the level building mode as well as unlocking levels. One of my complaints in Boom Blox was if you couldn’t beat a level, you were stuck (in that area at least) until you managed to get past it somehow. This happened and until a friend visited and we managed to beat a certain level. Before that, whole sections were unplayed. With Boom Bux you can unlock the next level in any given section after the currently unlocked level. No longer will you spend hours cursing at the skeletons attacking the kitties that you just can’t quite defeat. You can skip that level and move on, and take on the challenging level later.

The multiplayer levels are just as solid as the single player ones, but you get to have fun with your friends. Knock down each others towers, remove blocks hoping that the tower stays up just a little longer and crashes down on the next player, or work together to get a gold medal on all types of levels. Whether single player or multi-player, there are a lot of levels shipped with this game.

Now, the most important part of any game is: Is it fun? Just like Boom Blox, Bash Party is hours and hours of fun that anyone can enjoy. In fact, Bach Party, with the addition of connecting to Nintendo Wi-Fi, can provide a nearly unlimited number of levels. Played all the levels that came with the game? Just click the button and choose from the highest rated, newest, or random levels other players have created. Once you finish that level, you are given a chance to rate the level. This lets the best levels rise up, while still giving the new ones a chance to see the light of day.

I think Boom Blox Bash Party is a fantastic game for anyone. It’s easy to grasp the controls and concepts of the levels and I’ve never played any Boom Blox game with a single person who has said they disliked the game (and yes, everyone I played with had the ability to speak). There’s no need to play Boom Blox before playing Bash Party, but they are both great games. If you get one, get Bash Party because of the new features, but you’ll get the benefit of lots more levels if you get both.

Boom Blox Bash Party retails for 29.99 and is rated E for everyone.

Disclaimer: I was sent a copy of Boom Blox Bash Party for review from Electronic Arts . This review is 100% my opinion and has not been edited or reviewed by anyone. I was not compensated in any other way for this product review.

My Baby First Steps is a follow up from the popular My Baby Boy and My Baby Girl Nintendo DS games. What’s this game about?  In so many words, you’ll be able to learn the do’s and don’t in the world of virtual parenting!

Fun Game Features

My Baby First Steps is available for the Nintendo DS and the Wii.

Personal Thoughts by Justin Lowmaster…

NERF N-Strike Elite is a rails light-gun shooter by EA Games. It is an decent alternative to the more violent and bloody rail shooters such as Dead Space: Extraction or any of the House of the Dead games. While it isn’t a game I enjoyed a lot, it will do well for certain audiences.

Key Game Features

* The NERF: N-Strike Elite Game – Enjoy a classic rail shooter packed with arcade style shooter action where your path through the game is laid out in advance so you can concentrate on having fun.
* NERF Switch Shot EX-3 Blaster Included – Bundled with the game is the NERF Switch Shot EX-3 Blaster, which is compatible with other games utilizing the Wii Remote, and as a standalone NERF gun with a three NERF projectiles capacity.
* Decoder Lens Attachment – Your blaster includes a detachable decoder lens through which special codes and enemy weaknesses can be seen in-game.
* Multiplayer Support – NERF: N-Strike Elite features 2-player off-line. multiplayer co-op functionality for twice the fun.
* Multiple Available Characters – NERF: N-Strike Elite features access to four different characters, each with their own arsenal of NERF blasters
* Weapons Selection – Weapons available in NERF: N-Strike Elite include 16 different NERF blasters, both real and fictional, each with their own specific strengths and weaknesses.

This games enemies are robots who shoot NERF darts and the weapons the players use are also foam NERF projectiles. I have not played the first game in the series, but I believe that in that game the players are in a training course. In the second game, the robots have gone awry and are in ‘real’ danger.

I myself enjoy games like House of the Dead, so when I started the NERF game, I wondered how it would compare. While I hoped for a similar game that was just geared for a younger audience. I was, sadly, a little disappointed. While at its core, it is like any rails shooter. The camera moves around and you fire at whatever enemies pop up. My biggest complaint is the fact that enemies take many hits so sometimes you just stand there holding the trigger, waiting for a robot to explode, then going to the next one. I’d call it slow-paced. There aren’t enemies popping up all over forcing my to quickly blast them. Some robots show up, I hold down the trigger, and wait. Even on the harder difficulty, the only difference is that you take more damage and the rockets you blast from the sky move faster.

Another issue is that there is very little ‘feel’ to the game. The robots will move somewhat when hit, but there is little to no feedback to know you are hitting one. Obviously they are getting hit with foam darts, not shotgun shells, but still, some reaction would be nice. There isn’t much in the way of impending danger. Your shield is the only ‘health’ meter you have, and when it drop to zero, you simply are asked if you want to return to the previous checkpoint or to the menu. Also, to reload you have to shake the remote. This is awkward and I kept wondering if I’d shake something loose, but I didn’t. Shooting off-screen to reload, like most games like this, would have worked just fine. It auto-reloads when you run out of bullets though.

In game you can shoot canisters that you spend to upgrade your weapons. This makes them stronger, hold more ammo, bigger scopes, the normal things in this type of game. I did not find any bonus modes or options, but they could be there.

The game is short, beatable easily in just a few hours. That’s not too uncommon for any of the rails shooters I’ve played. There are three difficulty modes, but playing on Hard didn’t make it much more a challenge as nothing changed that I noticed besides the amount of damage I took and the speed of one enemy. Basically I just had to replay more often. The levels appear to be the same for every character, you just have a different set of weapons to choose from.

The game comes with an actual NERF gun that you can remove the firing mechanism from and insert the Wii Remote into to play. Attached to the top is the Red Reveal scope. It’s a red bit of transparent plastic that will sometimes reveal a specific target to hit. I believe you could play the game without it, but it is meant to be played with it. For me it was kind of a gimmick and didn’t make the game better. Didn’t make it worse though.

Final Thoughts…

All in all, Nerf N-Strike Elite falls short for me, but if you’d like a rails shooter that isn’t full of zombies and blood spattering everywhere, it is a viable alternative. I could have been better with faster paced game play. I worry the younger audience it is meant for will also tire of the repetitive times when the same few robots show up and you just stand there waiting for them to explode. It’s not a bad game though, just could have been better.

This title is rated Everyone 10+ for fantasy violence and can be purchased at various locations as well as Amazon.com .

Disclaimer: I was sent a copy of NERF N-Strike Elite for review from Electronics Arts . This review is 100% our opinion and has not been edited or reviewed by anyone. I was not compensated in any other way for this product review.

EA Sports has released a sequel to their EA Sports Active Personal Trainer called EA Sports Active More Workouts. This game was released on the 17th of November and is available for purchase for just $39.99.  I was given an advanced copy of this game to review thanks to the people over at EA.

I’m sure many people would like to know how EA Sports Active More Workouts compares to EA Sports Active Personal Trainer. We’ll for many reasons that I’ll point out, I feel like a lot of gaps from the first game have been improved upon.

When purchasing EA Sports Active More Workouts, you’ll find that not only do you receive the game itself but also nutritional guide booklet by Bob Greene. You’ll find that this book recommends helpful steps to increasing your activity level and achieving a healthier lifestyle. I personally am a fan of the recipes!

I’d like to point out that for this game you’ll need to  purchase the resistance band and leg strap. The accessory pack retails for $20.00. Also this game uses the Wii Balance board but it’s nice to know that purchasing it is not required.

If you have a profile from EA Sports Active Personal Trainer, you can easily import that into EA Sports Active More Workouts as soon as you load the game up. You can then choose to customize your avatar in the desired attire ( work out outfit, hat, shoes), look ( skin color, hair style and color) body build, as well as enter your weight. My husband whom is also playing along side me, really liked the feature that you can weigh yourself with the wii balance board to get the most accurate weight measurement, a feature that was not available in the previous game.

After setting up your profile you’ll find in your own personal menu a fitness journal in area in which you can input data on your daily eating and exercise habits. I know after I answered the quizzes I was feeling a little guilty about not drinking enough water and eating enough vegetables each day. It was great to be aware of the areas I was lacking in so I could make it my goal to improve on it each day.  I found all the questions in this section were revised from the the previous EA Active game.

You have the option of adding other exercise you may do through out the day in your journal. I usually add when I go walking and when I do extensive housework.  I like that this option is there so I don’t feel like I am sitting around on not doing any sort of exercise all day. Plus it’s great to add so I can work toward to earning the various trophies available as rewards for a job well done!

A new feature that was added is the weekly fitness tracker in which you can view and compare your personal stats. You’ll find on this chart the calories you’ve burned, a chart of your weight, and the number of workouts, total exercise time, and number of miles covered in your EA Sports Active workout. Trust me seeing, how much you’ve done can be really encouraging in keeping you working out and working toward a healthier life style!

There are 35 all new exercises, which means there are now 89 in all! I like that you can create your own personal workouts in so many different ways! If I want to work on just cardio, upper body, lower body, or abdominal, the options for me to put that together are all there! There are all-new cool down/warm up stations as well as warm weather activities like water skii-ing and paddle surfing!

Did I mention there is also a co-op mode? I like that you can work along side a friend or your spouse! There’s nothing like have an accountability partner to work on maintaining life changing goal together!

There is a six week challenge! What the six week challenge consist of is a series of 24 pre-set workouts. I’ve learned that the length of this challenge is ideal for weight loss and that the workouts are designed to focus on different muscle groups intensively throughout the allotted time slot. You can choose an easy, medium, or hard workout. I’m probably going to go with easy since I nearly never exercise and would probably really be hurting if I upped the difficulty too much. Another thing my husband and I love about the six week challenge is that we are now given the ability to choose the days of the week to work out. My husband unfortunately missed the last two days of the 30 day challenge from the first EA Active game and nothing he did counted!

I’m really excited about the new six week challenge in which starts tomorrow on the 20th of November! My husband and I, along with many other people around the web are taking part in this challenge together. I am hoping to give everyone at least a weekly update on how the challenge is going for myself and my husband is also going to write his thoughts on this venture on his own blog!

I think most people will really like EA Sports Active More Workouts as it truly is the perfect personal trainer in a box and great for every member of the family! It saves a trip to gym and you can escape to beautiful island beaches all from the comfort of your living room!  I’m totally ready to feel the burn! How about you?

Disclaimer: I was sent EA Sports Active More Workouts for review from Electronic Arts . This review is 100% my opinion and has not been edited or reviewed by anyone. I was not compensated in any other way for this product review.