Microsoft Windows

Review: Club Penguin Plush Toys and ClubPenguin.com

Dennis Gray — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 13:42:00 -0500

Last year, Disney bought the online virtual polar landscape that is Club Penguin, a virtual world where kids romp and play as penguins do.

This year, they've introduced a plush toy line that extends the virtual polar landscape into the thawed real world with the Club Penguin Series One figures, produced by Jakks Pacific and available at www.ClubPenguin.com/clubpenguinshop.

As of this writing, there are 13 plush polar players to collect, from barristas to cheerleaders, from firefighters (are there fires on a glacier?) to fairies. they've got you covered with any interest your younglings have.

The plush toys themselves are of high build quality, with all the attributes and costuming of the characters they represent. The cheerleader has pom-poms, the soccer guy has a soccer ball and athletic jersey, you get the idea. The figures are roughly 6 inches tall, and soft enough for kids to hurl at siblings without fear. But the real hook for getting moms and dads to buy these plush toys is the secret unlock coin that is attached to the tag. It doesn't seem to be the cuteness factor of the plush toys themselves.

These secret coins unlock features inside the Club Penguin game for players to use exclusively. The virtual items range from guitars and items to decorate their virtual igloos to 'puffles', which resemble small balls of fluff with eyes, which are the virtual pets of Club Penguin. So in short, buying a Club Penguin toy in the real world means instant celeb status in the frozen virtual world.

Club Penguin, the online game and virtual land where kids pretend to be penguins living in a city-sized floating iceburg landscape, is full of activities like ice fishing, and other games that earn virtual coins to buy virtual stuff in The Penguin store, and social networking with other penguins - er - kids - through a heavily controlled web-chat mechanism that protects the kids privacy and keeps them from revealing any personally identifiable info. You can visit their website for details on the privacy aspects of the online game, but I allow my son to play the game mostly unsupervised due to the strict controls placed on the players.

Club Penguin, the online game is free - mostly. There is a paid option, and to take full advantage of the secret coin with the Club Penguin plush toys, you'll need to be a paid member of the service. That said, there are still lots of sctivities to keep young ones occupied, ages 6-10 being the target audience.

So as a gift, these plush flightless birds might be suitable for kids already plugged in to the Club Penguin scene, or into penguins in general. But if your kids aren't driven to waddle or hang out in igloos, you may want to pass. The $20-30 price is high for the toy itself. Its really the benefits inside the Club Penguin game that make this a worthwhile purchase.

Review: HotWheels.com Turbo Driver Controller

PD Love — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 21:42:55 -0500

Hot Wheels has taken a computer game based on their standard toys
another step farther. With the Hot Wheels Turbo Driver Controller,
gamers can race in an online "Race the World" event hosted at
HotWheels.com. And with a Car-tridge loaded onto their controller (see
insert), the link to the Hot Wheels cars I grew up playing with is
complete so that the player is experiencing the race using the care
attached to their controller.

For game play, the Hot Wheels games are PC based and no too
complicated. The graphics are fairly rudimentary and the game play is
simple. But these are not bad attributes for a kids game. The kids
seem to enjoy the simplicity and ease of play. And, they are not
hampered by the level of the graphics. The challenge for racing
against other contenders remains regardless of the precision of the
pictures on the screen.

The controller itself takes a little
getting used to. It is a bit bulky for smaller hands but can be set
down on a desktop to be played. I have never been a great fan of a
joystick to steer a car (most racing games I have played I played with
a steering wheel controller) but the kids seemed to adapt to it fairly
well. The addition of connecting a car to the controller seems gimicky to my but again, seemed to add to the appeal for the kids so score another one for Hot Wheels with the younger crowd.

The
racing action is again rudimentary and basic. Good for kids but adults
need not get expectations too high. We have experienced Hot Wheels
games in the past but they have been more challenge based (puzzles of
sorts to see how you can get your car to hit, destroy, blow up or
overall demolish a scene based on angles and acceleration) which kept
interest based on the challenge. This racing game did not keep my
interest for long but did maintain the kids for over an hour on first
play, which is pretty good for their attention spans.

Overall
this game is geared toward kids and seems to hit its mark. I would
have been sorely disappointed if I had purchased it for myself (outside
of the nostalgia aspect) but I probably would not have sought it out in
the first place. The kids seemed to enjoy it and again, that appears
to be the intent so I agree that is scored well as such. The option to
add additional cars to the controller gives some longevity to it, a
chance to change things up a bit, but at around $15 each, we will not
be adding to our collection anytime soon.

Review: Guitar Praise: Solid Rock for Mac & Windows

Kimberly — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 19:41:17 -0500

One of the problems with games like Guitar Hero for families is the "T" rating for lyrics. For Christian families or fans of Christian rock music, Digital Praise's Guitar Praise offers a family-friendly alternative for both Mac OS X and Windows.

Guitar Praise is a fun game if you like Guitar Hero. Besides the lack of story modes and downloadable content, the gameplay is nearly identical. You strum the notes, pick your songs, and try to make the high score, unlocking more songs as you go. A plus to Guitar Praise is that your first version comes with a wireless guitar so you can rock out halfway across the room once you get the songs memorized. (I actually do know some people that good.) Unfortunately, you still have to buy your second guitar, which you do with any other game like that, so I wouldn’t really count that as a minus. The lyrics show up on-screen, but none of them are inappropriate, so you don’t need to worry about that. And if you still don’t want the lyrics on because you’re worried that the words might be offensive (e.g. child’s party, etc.), then you can go in the settings and turn the lyrics off.

We found the guitar controller to be sturdier than the Rock Band and Guitar Hero controllers, and a ridge on the third fret button makes it easier to figure out where your fingers need to be.

Digital Praise tech support says you must be logged into an admin account to save profiles (you have to be logged in as admin to install). This runs contrary to the philosophy of the game itself, though. The great thing about this game is that parents can allow their kids to play it without having to make sure all songs are appropriate, but in order to do so, you have to log in as admin, disabling parental controls, and allowing them to go online without filters. We've found a workaround that adds a few extra steps, but it eliminates this problem:
1. Log into your admin account, and install Guitar Praise from the included CD.
2. Launch the game, go to "Band Members," and create a profile.
3. Quit the game, and go to the Finder.
4. On the root level of your hard drive, find the Users folder, then in there, the Shared folder. Open that, and find the Digital Praise folder.
5. Single-click the Digital Praise folder, and choose File: Get Info. In the resulting window, scroll to the bottom, and reveal the "Sharing and Permissions" section. If you don't see a list below it, select the triangle on the left so it points down.
6. Click the lock, and enter your password. Click the + button, and select the names of all other users on the computer (shift-click for more than one).
7. Click Select. Then for each username, change "Read Only" to "Read & Write".
8. Click on the gear-shaped button next to the +/- buttons, and choose "Apply to enclosed folders." It will give you a "can't be undone" dialog, so just give it permission.
9. Close the Info window, and you're all set. Switch to your child's profile, launch the game, choose "Band Members," and create a new profile or use the existing one.
It sounds complicated, and it shouldn't be necessary, but once finished, you shouldn't have to worry again.

Except for that one obvious flaw in the game, this is a lot of fun as long as you enjoy Guitar Hero. This one’s even (somewhat) portable...if you have a laptop. Either way, this game is an easy way to play a Guitar Hero-like game if someone’s busy with the TV! :^)

I recommend it for anyone age 10 and up or anyone used to playing Guitar Hero-style games. Parents looking for an guitar game that their kids can play without monitoring lyrics will love it.

Review: Strong Bad's Cool Game for Attractive People Episode 4: Dangeresque 3 for PC and Wii

KevinLeeC — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 16:00:00 -0500

There’s nothing quiet as enjoyable as finally getting to see a much-anticipated movie sequel; like Star Wars Episode I or Indiana Jones IV. Well, okay, so anticipated sequels don’t always work out as their creators hope. Which means that Strong Bad had better be careful because episode four of the popular Telltale Games Strong Bad Adventure series is the much-anticipated sequel Dangeresque 3: The Criminal Projective.

To bring you up to speed, Strong Bad has written, produced, directed and starred in two previous Dangeresque movies. The title character (played by Strong Bad) is a tough, no-nonsense, vaguely-crooked cop who does things his own way. Nobody, but nobody stands in the way of Dangeresque ... especially when he has his nunchuck gun (the only gun that never runs out of ammo).

The third film in the trilogy was promised to fans years ago and is finally being delivered in the form of the newest Telltalle Games adventure.

In terms of mechanics, Strong Bad 4 is identical to its predecessors. You navigate through the game world using your mouse or Wii remote, click on things to activate them, use a map to move from one location to another, open an inventory, and save/load your game sessions.

In terms of look, Strong Bad 4 works on a whole new level. The bulk of the game is actually played inside the movie. The brief opening sequence has Strong Bad taking the video tape of the film to the basement for a premier screening for his friends (all of who have roles in the film). The opening credits flash by and the game adopts a more cinematic style. No longer content to merely show the scene, the camera seeks to add context by coming at the subject matter from unusual angles. Close-up shots give insight into the characters (admittedly limited) emotional states. Special effects add drama; as do the frequent static lines when the scenes change unexpectedly.

Really.

The new camera work imparts the feeling of an action picture to the game. Aiding and abetting the illusion is the frequent use of action-movie clichés. For example, the story opens at a retirement party for Renaldo, Dangeresque’s fez-wearing side-kick (a role played with great earnestness and occasional inconsistency by Coach Z). The soon-to-be-retired cop is just the first entry in the Strong Bad cliché fest.

Along the way we meet the estranged father (in a scene which is sure to delight die-hard fans of Strong Bad), we rescue a secret formula, retrieve stolen rocket launch codes, defeat a villian at a high-stakes game of cards (hint: paper beats rock and rock beats the ace of spades ... really), jump from a roof, escape in what must be the most bizarre car chase in movie history, hear the protagonist’s tag line (“Looks like I’m gonna have to jump”) over and over, and witness the ultimate betrayal. All of the roles in the game/film are played by the familiar characters from Free County U.S.A. Somehow (the game never explains it) Strong Bad has coerced them into acting with him.

The thing is, this works surprisingly well. The whole game is infused with a cheerful Judy-Garland-Mickey-Rooney-there’s-an-old-barrel-we-can-make-into-a-car goofiness. Never mind that you can see the cardboard backdrop which represents the skyline of Brainblow City; it doesn’t matter. When Dangeresque is “driving” his car and you can see the Cheat repeatedly pulling a tree past the window to make it look like the car is moving, it just adds to the charm. Watching a supposedly dead character cross behind the actors during a touching scene is laugh-out-loud funny.

Of all of the Strong Bad games so far, this one is the most entertaining. Who can resist the opportunity to jump into the shoes of a genuine action hero for a few hours. At $8.99 this game is a bargain and might convince you to play the rest of the series. I can only hope that the final installment -- which features the elusive Trogdor -- will be as good.

Review: Pipe Mania for PC

KevinLeeC — Sat, 01 Nov 2008 11:26:37 -0400

For in explicable reasons, the set-up for Pipe Mania sounds like it was cribbed directly from Super Mario Sunshine. The story begins with a spunky Italian-named plumber who faces the unenviable task of cleaning up a tropical island and he needs your help. Any resemblance to the Nintendo classic ends there.

Pipe Mania is the modern re-incarnation of the classic puzzle game. Game play involves assembling a complete pipe running from a spigot to a drain. Pipe pieces are dispensed at the left edge of the screen and you must place each piece before you’re awarded a new one. Since you have no control over which piece will be dispensed next, you need to try to plan ahead and place the pieces where they’ll do you the most good. While you build a timer ticks down and some sort of fluid -- called flooze in the early levels, but replaced with a variety of things as the game goes on -- is released into the pipes. If you haven’t completed the pipe and too much fluid leaks onto the floor, you lose.

In the beginning, the pipe pieces are simple straights and curves. The difficulty increases, though, as the game goes on. New pieces are introduced including cross-over pipes and one piece which cycles through a variety of shapes until you put it down. The game boards also get more complex as you advance. Immovable obstacles force you to creatively route your pipes. You might be called upon to build the pipeline so it passes through a pump, reservoir, or teleporters. Additionally, you’ll have a chance to earn special bonuses by running your pipeline through a treasure chest. The sheer variety of pieces and environments extends the replayability of the game, but fails to address the fundamental design flaw -- the penalty for leaving unused pipe pieces on the game board.

If the game dispenses a piece that you can’t use, you have two choices; tuck it in an out-of-the-way corner of the game board or stamp it down on top of an another unused piece. Placing one piece on another causes the destruction of the first piece and costs the player 25 points. Leaving an unused piece on the game board at the end of the round costs the player 50 points. In other words, unless you are very, very lucky and manage to fit in all of the pieces which are dispensed, you’ll lose points. This style of punitive game play is frustrating and robs the game of much potential enjoyment.

Pipe Mania offers a decent variety of game play styles including the story mode which takes players through various puzzles in various island environments, arcade mode which ramps up the pressure with survival-style game play on a moving grid, classic which grants you access to some of the earlier incarnations of the game, and cooperative which allows to players to build at once. It’s hard to gauge the game’s potential audience, though. Casual gamers may well find the frenetic game play (the clock is always ticking down toward the moment when the fluid starts flowing) frustrating. Hard core gamers who enjoy time pressure may not find enough here to hold their attention. At best it’s a mildly amusing diversion, but if that’s what you’re looking for, there are plenty of other fish in the gaming sea.

Review: Strong Bad's Cool Game for Attractive People Episode 3 Baddest of the Bands for PC and Wii

KevinLeeC — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 21:01:01 -0400

Sometimes you just have to pity poor Strong Bad. At the opening of the third installment of Strong Bad’s Cool Game for Awesome People, his vintage Fun Machine gaming console suffers a meltdown. He can no longer indulge his taste in vintage Videlectrix titles like Math Kickers and Snake Boxer. Fortunately, he can get it repaired by Free County USA’s one fully-licensed Videlectrican. Unfortunately, that title is held by Bubs the avaricious proprietor of Bub’s Concession Stand.

Bubs agrees to repair the ancient game machine (which bears a suspicious resemblance to an Atari 2600) for “a sack full of money.” Logically, Strong Bad decides to get the cash by hosting a Battle of the Bands and keeping the entry fees for himself.

Wait? Did I say “logically”? In what universe is it logical to host a Battle of the Bands as a way to raise cash? Well, nowhere. Unless your a sitcom character. In that case, wild schemes aren’t merely reasonable, they’re mandatory.

The key to really enjoying the Strong Bad games is to just go with the flow.

Which isn’t to say that the puzzles aren’t logical. Strong Bad realizes early on that he’s going to need celebrity judges to make his Battle of the Bands a hit. An entry form for a fan contest for the band Limozeen points the way. If Strong Bad can create the most awesome album cover photo, the members of Limozeen will hang with him for a day.

Creating the photo for the album cover is a matter of finding the right elements to match a prototype cover that the game provides. Discovering what you should do isn’t hard. The fun lies in figuring out how to do it.

With Limozeen secured as celebrity judges, Strong Bad must next find entrants for the contest. Marzipan’s three-piece folk/rock band Cool Tapes can’t perform because they’re already booked for an environmentally conscious concert called Bat Aid; Pom-pom needs a singer who can improvise lyrics, and the famous Two-o Duo (Coach Z and Bubs) split years ago and will need a little intervention if they’re ever going to work together again.

As Strong Bad, you have to find a solution to each of these problems. Before the game is done, you’ll find yourself using household chemicals on wild animals, committing petty crimes and framing others, and eventually cheating to undermine the competition.

For alert players, the game tosses in some clever references to the history of pop music and offers an explanation as to why every album seems to have a least one awful song written by a supporting member of the group. It also pokes fun at “snooty rock journalism” by setting Strong Sad up as a wannabe journalist who is duped by a clever ruse involving an alleged indy band. (To say anymore would give away a very clever moment in the game ... suffice it to say that you’ll laugh out loud when you get the joke.)

Parents of younger children should exercise caution with the material as there are some mildly objectionable words and Strong Bad isn’t exactly a stellar role model. For older kids (who are probably already fans of Home Star Runner) this is an entertaining game and a nice change of pace. The folks at TellTaleGames.com are to be commended for releasing such consistently entertaining character-based adventures. At $8.95 per episode or $34.95 for the season, the Strong Bad games are a decent value and well worth playing.

Review: Ford Racing Off Road for PC

KevinLeeC — Sat, 18 Oct 2008 12:39:30 -0400

In 1986 Ford Motor Company teamed up with the SoftAd group to produce The Ford Simulator. Rendered in glorious 4-color CGA graphics, this ground-breaking promotional game included a virtual showroom and gave players the opportunity to drive one of sixteen different Ford vehicles on a variety of courses. As I recall, the game could be had for the price of shipping and handling; about six bucks.

Ford Racing Off Road from Empire Interactive and Strategy First is rendered in gorgeous full-color graphics, includes a virtual showroom, gives players the opportunity to drive one of eighteen different Ford/Land Rover vehicles in three different environments. It can be yours for the cost of $19.99 plus shipping and handling.

Both games function primarily as advertising for Ford.

Ford Racing Off Road concentrates (naturally) on the kinds of vehicles which are adapted for unpaved terrain. The game’s environments (divided into desert, water, and ice) are graphically rich and visually interesting. The early desert races send the player hurtling down narrow canyons, under stone arches, and through caverns, all while sliding on the soft desert floor. The water and ice environments are equally attractive and tend to leave you wishing you had time to admire the scenery.

Of course, since the word “Racing” figures prominently in the title, you’ll find you have to remain completely focused on staying ahead of your rivals. For variety, the game offers different kinds of races including First to Finish, Point to Point, Time Attack, Elimination and Gold Rush. Each race type has some defining characteristic which marks it as slightly different from the others.

For example, in the three-lap elimination race, the last two competitors are taken off the track at the end of each lap. Your goal is to stay in the race and finish first.

In Gold Rush you collect floating coins while racing the other competitors to come in first. (As the game notes, there’s no prize for second place.)

In Time Attack the idea is ... well, you get the idea. No matter what little twist the developers included, the ultimate goal is to come in first.

Which can get difficult if you lose control of your vehicle which seems to happen often when you leave the ground. To the developer’s credit, the cars do give a very real sense of heft as they barrel through the race course and power sliding is actually a lot of fun. Leaving the ground, though, seems to put your car into some sort of aerial ballet and there’s a good chance you’ll land facing the wrong direction. The two or three seconds it takes to re-orient yourself will be enough to move you from first to fifth and you’ll be hard-pressed to regain your standing.

Rerunning races in an effort to advance in Career Mode can become an exercise in frustration. Unfortunately, most of the tracks are unlockables so getting to play the whole game means beating the early levels.

One interesting feature is the way in which your vehicles can be damaged during the races. Frequent collisions with other vehicles will scar your vehicle and make it harder to drive. The money you win must be spent for repairs if you want to stay ahead of the pack in subsequent races. Although this isn’t a particularly innovative feature it’s nicely implemented in Ford Racing Off Road.

Another nice feature is the split-screen head-to-head race which allows other players to get in on the fun and provides a welcome change of pace from the main game.

In the end, Ford Racing Off Road is a reasonable (if not exciting) budget title which comes across as an extended commercial for the Ford product line.

Episode 58: Creepy Doll

Dale — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 09:36:38 -0400

Dale and Teresa are back without pumpkins.

Toy News

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MyKey helps parents control teen drivers
Apple's New MacBooks (Note: No FireWire!)

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Review: Spore for PC

KevinLeeC — Sat, 11 Oct 2008 16:28:31 -0400

With Spore, game designer Will Wright promised an epic and (epoch-spanning) experience. During the game’s eight-year development cycle, regular press releases and preview articles painted Spore as the most expansive game in history. (At one point the working title was Sim Everything.)

In the end, Will Wright and his design team delivered a product which may not quite live up to the hype, but does hit most of the right notes for an unusual and frequently captivating game experience. More importantly, Spore is one of the few games to provide players with actual choices which influence the course and outcome of the game.

Game play covers five stages. The first begins when a meteor tumbles into the primordial sea on a planet and a single cell emerges. You make some basic choices about the creature’s physiology (location and style of eyes, mouths, flagella, etc.) and you’re off on your own. The challenge is to find and eat enough food to survive, grow, reproduce and eventually work your way out of the sea and onto dry land. Each time your creature mates, you have a chance to tinker with its offspring. The new critter can be a minor variation of the original or you can strip it back to its fundamentals and create something completely different. Creatures don’t evolve, they are built. Your choices do change the way you can interact with the environment. Some kinds of appendages give you speed, others grant maneuverability. Some mouth parts are well-tuned for eating plants, others work best on the tender flesh of other cells. Your choices drive your behavior and your behavior influences your future.

The creature stage builds on its predecessor and you find yourself struggling to survive on dry-land. You can make friends with your neighbors or try to consume them. Each action builds a sort of “reputation” that you have to live up (or down) to. Various in-game actions grant you access to new body parts which, in turn, grant you new abilities. Mate with another of your kind and you get the opportunity to re-invent your creation.

In the tribal stage, you control a village and your creations gain the ability to use tools and/or weapons. Conquer or befriend a set number of other villages and you’ll earn the right to move up to civilization. (For me, the path to civilization was strewn with the burned-out villages of those who opposed my rule.) Beginning with the tribal stage, you can no longer modify your creature, but you do have the ability to change its clothing. This (momentarily) takes away the creative freedom found in the other segments.

Civilization paints the same picture on a bigger canvas, but grants you the ability to design buildings and vehicles. This is the point at which the game begins to show some of the promised grandeur. The building tools are simple and elegant and even the most artistically-challenged player can create satisfying objects. Using Spore’s built-in connectivity, sharing your creations with the rest of the world is simple. Conversely, it’s easy to download other player’s creations. Sadly, some players delight in rudeness so players may be subjected to creatures and objects built or named with crude humor. Parents of young players may wish to keep an eye on the on-line portion of the game.

Once you’ve unified your planet (through conquest, conversion or diplomacy) you’ll gain space travel. From there the game unfolds in grand fashion with enough depth to keep you playing for a long time to come. In a manner reminiscent of Sid Meier’s Pirates, the relatively simple game mechanics set in a more-or-less open-ended playing field give an exhilarating sense of freedom.

In keeping with Will Wright’s philosophy of games-as-play (http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/14.04/wright.html) Spore is fairly open-ended. There are certainly objectives for each level and the game prevents you from moving to a new stage until you’ve met the objectives of the current one. What makes the game stand out, though, is the freedom you have in choosing how you will meet the objectives.

It is this creativity that makes Spore worth playing. Interested in a race of octoped herbivores? They’re yours. Would you like a steampunk civilization complete with armed airships and wagon-wheeled war wagons? No problem. Want to see critters with the sunny disposition of Klingons and the dashing reptilian charm of a Sleestak? We have those in stock.

Spore gives you a chance to play in a world with few limits, but not without consequences. Create to your heart’s content. However, if your race is primarily war-like you’ll never be a great diplomat and you may have trouble becoming a major economic power. Your race of religious pacifist will struggle in the face of an aggressor.

In this, Will Wright has given his fans his greatest gift -- freedom of choice coupled with the sense that choices do matter and an opportunity to learn that what we do today will have an impact on our future.

Review: Igor for PC

KevinLeeC — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 13:46:13 -0400

It must be tough working as a mad scientist’s assistant. You spend your days running about the lab picking up after the scientist, completing various meaningless tasks and interacting with various strange creatures. In the end, you’re left wondering if all of your work has made any real difference in the world.

Unless you were a Graduate Assistant somewhere, you’ve probably never had this experience and (most likely) never will. The closest you’ll get is Legacy Interactive’s movie tie-in game Igor.

The title character dreams of being more than just an unnoticed assistant. When his master unexpectedly departs this realm for the next, Igor decides to use the opportunity to further his own career. In game terms, this means going to a location, running around and collecting objects, solving a few very simple puzzles, watching a short cut-scene or two, being scolded when you try to advance without collecting enough objects, and then moving along to a new location. The graphics are average at best and the automated camera frequently frustrates your ability to see exactly where you are or where you need to go.

The control scheme is the standard WASD arrangement with one, mildly interesting twist -- the key-pad plus button allows you to change your chracter. The adventuring party consists of four characters; Igor, Scamper (a hyper-kinectic resurrected rabbit with a jump that would make Michael Jordan weep and a powerful electric attack), Brain (a rocket-firing ambulatory brain-in-a-jar) and Eva (Igor’s too-nice creation). To solve the game’s puzzles, you’ll need to switch roles frequently. Igor’s mechanical skills allow you to fix broken cogs. Scamper’s jump gives you access to objects in high places. Brain’s rockets come in handy when you’re attacked by various creatures and creations (including cyber-chickens and robotic blind orphans). Eva’s strength comes in handy when something needs to be bashed.

Each level is much the same as the last and the game offers no unlockables. So you’re left with something which is a pretty good match for Igor’s job description; run around, do what you’re told, and don’t bother to ask why.