Small Arms is a four-player side-view combat game that puts a great deal of importance on collecting and using a bunch of heavy weaponry as often as possible. Or to put it in more common terms, Small Arms is Super Smash Bros. without the Nintendo characters and with a much heavier focus placed on weapons. The focus on weapons, which are constantly running out of ammo, makes the game feel quite different from Nintendo's Smash Bros. games. But it also means that you spend too much time hunting for new weapons and not enough time using them. The result is a neat, but flawed game.

The characters in the game cover a good deal of "cute little guy" territory, starting with the ever-scowling Marky Kat. There's also a ninja, a dinosaur, a robot, a chicken, an evil-looking mutant tree, and more. They're OK but don't really offer much personality, unless you count the sentence or two of descriptive text that each character gets for a background story. There are 12 characters to choose from, though four are locked when you first start playing. The difference among the characters is their starting weapon. Each weapon has two firing modes and can be aimed at any angle using the right analog stick. So Marky Kat's chaingun fires like a chaingun but also has a shotgun blast as an alternate fire. The crossbow can shoot exploding shots, the ice arm can shoot either machine gun-like shards or a freezing cloud, and so on. Though the weapons cover fairly standard territory, they're the most interesting part of Small Arms.

Unfortunately, you don't spend quite as much time shooting as you might like. The weapons all run on an energy meter that drains rapidly when you fire. So instead of focusing all your attention on the savage act of murdering your opponents, you also have to spend a lot of time looking around the level in search of batteries to recharge your current weapon or new weapons to grab. Because the melee attacks aren't very potent, remaining fully armed is really your only chance at survival. Your movement options include a double jump and a dash move that you can use for an extra vertical boost if needed. Some of the game's levels have tricky platforms that can be tough to reach if you aren't good at moving around. Additionally, a few of the levels feature forced scrolling. This gives you another thing to think about while immersed in a fight that's taking place on top of a fast-moving train.

The main mode has you go through a series of stages to fight against increasingly difficult foes, and you'll get a simple boss fight at the end. Challenge mode is a fighting game-style survival mode, where you have to face off against enemies over and over again until you finally fail. Shooting range lets you play a quick bonus game, where you have to shoot paper targets as they move by, but this one doesn't ever change and isn't much fun at all. As you might expect, the real action is in the battle mode, where you can play with up to four players either locally or over Xbox Live. Ranked games are limited to two minutes, but in player matches, you can configure more of the options for scoring and decide whether players can join in the middle of the match. You can also play any combination of local and Xbox Live players. So you can start a game with two other players locally, then invite a fourth from the Internet. That's pretty cool.

The setup for Small Arms and the options it gives make it sound like a great game, but unfortunately, the payoff isn't quite potent. The gameplay's focus on weapon hunting means that you have to be careful with your ammo, which isn't much fun at all and plays against the rest of the game's frantic action. The characters are small on the screen, which makes it easy to lose track of what's going on when two or three players get into a bunch. Also, when you're playing online, the camera sometimes focuses specifically on one of the other players and occasionally goes so far as to scroll you all the way off the screen. That's incredibly annoying.

Graphically, Small Arms has a good sense of futuristic-but-furry style to it, with some decent level designs to go with it. But the game is short on graphical effects and good weapon blasts, which brings it down a notch. The sound is also standard and devoid of personality. You don't get any voice clips from the characters. Instead, you get standard explosions and a decent soundtrack that is complete with a catchy, shuffling drumbeat to accompany the main menu.

The achievements in Small Arms are good, with many easy ones that you'll get for simply playing. But there are also plenty of tougher ones, like scoring five kills without losing a life. Small Arms also has a neat viral-style achievement that you get for playing online against someone who already has the achievement. The idea is that only members of the game's development team started out with this achievement, so it works its way through the Small Arms player base over time. But most people seem to already have it, making you wonder if it's not working properly or if there just aren't many people out there playing Small Arms. Either way, it's a zero-point achievement, which really neuters it.

When it doesn't strike out on its own in an interesting way or duplicate the game it's trying to clone more effectively, Small Arms has just enough Smash Bros. in it to disappoint you. While it does have some interesting online options, the gameplay doesn't hold up well enough to make it a worthwhile purchase for its midlevel $10 price tag.

Fight Night: Champion. Review

It is difficult to write about the games that have no direct competitors. After all, no matter what shortcomings did not have the same single instance of this particular fan of the genre or kind of sports to choose is still not out of nothing. In this so profitable for yourself the situation is now in the new Fight Night, which, if they have to compete with someone, it is only with the earlier parts of the same series. This situation is convenient is it that a publisher, who can easily sell the same game from time to time, nothing in it particularly no tinkering. In this way, and there was a series of Fight Night, which if anything has changed for the better, because it is a picture. And all the other innovations, for the most part, only hurt the game play. In Fight Night: Champion also promised us a lot of positive changes, and even a new, hitherto unseen in sports, "Scene" mode. From it, we'll start.

Breakfast of Champions

Posed in the title game Champion Mode, tells about the hard life of a young, budding boxer. Not very original. Yes.

The main character - Andre Bishop. Simple black man who refuses to cave in under the powerful promoter, whose right on his face says that he is the chief villain. Coached Andre glib, good-natured old man. Even the main character is crazy brother (also a boxer) and the object for courtship (daughter of an evil promoter). The whole company is playing a banal story, can already be seen a thousand times in any film about boxing, or any other martial arts. Five minutes after the start it is clear who is bad, who's good and what this is all over. The main and only advantage of the plot - it's the way it is served. The highlight of the story are unique, insanely beautiful videos. Which, incidentally, well engineered and animated. Heroes of the knitting face, swear, fight and look at it almost as if alive. You start with a certain interest the simple story, as told through these commercials.

Unfortunately, by the illuminations in the story mode has yet to fight. Why unfortunately? The fact is that for every fight, there are special here, the plot reasonable restrictions. For example: Andre injured his right hand in the first round. The remaining battle can only be used with your left hand. Or rival had bribed the judges and win the battle should be a knockout. At first it amusing. But such restrictions are in almost every match. And as time goes on they are delusional. One can not beat an opponent on the case, the second, being with you in the clinch, takes stamina. Gradually the battle turned into a circus, diluted with arcade mini-games. Of course, the box it looks like nothing more than a ballet on ice.

As a result, Champion Mode can be viewed only as a "first attempt", because in its present form is no special interest he represents. Although, with due diligence, in the future because it will end up with something interesting.

Lunch champion

Some experimentation with a couple of evenings Champion Mode, most players probably will return to the regime of Legacy, which was, and seemed to remain for Fight Night main. Creating their own boxer or choose a ready, we will step by step, fighting the battle will lead to the blockheads of our league title and do all that he was in the hall of fame as the greatest hitting hands on the nose in history.

The system of a fighter has undergone some changes and became more complicated and more interesting at the same time. First, let's say that the kinds of training are now two: Skill train and Athletic train. For the first type of training for the battles and experience points are added, which is necessary to invest in specific skills: different types of punches to the head and torso, the speed of hands etc. At the same time, putting points into this or that skill, we are increasing and the characteristics of a fighter, associated with it. Invested in the left hook? Get one for speed and accuracy of +3. In addition, bleed skill to a certain level, we get the kind of perks, such as increased chance to stun the opponent an uppercut to the jaw.

Athletic train, in turn, brings experience points, but quickly become one of the six key indicators of a fighter. A useful thing: down, for example, the rate of speed, chose one of the types of training and quickly pick it up. The main thing is not to overdo it. The fact that training spend and endurance, not rested properly before the fight, you run the risk to enter the ring half life target, which is to raise his hands and could not. In short, the schedule of the boxer turns very compact, and despite the fact that we must have somewhere to find time to participate in any promotions known sports brands. In fact the same training is now held in special camps scattered around the world, and the travel They need a lot of money.

Food poisoning is the champion

And most importantly - action. He, too, has undergone some changes, most of which at best can be called controversial. Apparently in pursuit of entertainment fighters markedly increased health and stamina. As a result, the intense scuffle can now proceed to the seventh round. It looks weird, when two burly guy with a taste hit each other for twenty minutes, and none of them is not experiencing any discomfort. This occurs in part because that was further developed by a stupid system counter, stuck to the game since the last part. Serious damage can be applied only when you catch the opponent on hit. It feels a noticeable kink in the balance, which is the second game in a row the authors did not want to fix it.

Some changes have affected management. Significantly redesigned system blows, so that now sticks do not have to turn the circle on the floor - a circle. All hits were hanged in the direction that was at times more convenient. In addition, the back button control, which is accessible at any time, not got even a menu.

Finally that has changed for the better without any reservations, that is on the schedule. The game looks simply gorgeous: the character models, lighting, the behavior of materials, all done just fine.

Fight Night: Champion was very uneven. Following its original tradition, the authors bring more dubious innovations than positive. Meanwhile, a bunch of old sores series in need of treatment, left without their attention. At the same time boxing fans still do not have much choice but to play from the same series. And if you take into account this fact, Fight Night: Champion and champion indeed.