Bells and Whistles Review (Arcade)

The land of Meru is under attack from the forces of Iva. A young girl Melora sends out a signal for help and Twinbee answers. Queue one of the most refreshingly colourful and quirky vertically scrolling shooters to have graced the cabinets of arcades in many a year.

Taking control of one of the brightly coloured craft players must pretty much shoot anything that moves if they have a hope of surviving the onslaught of the Iva forces. The title may not bring anything radically different to the table in terms of what a vertically scrolling shooter should be but its charm and presentation make it seem fresh.

Bells and Whistles, for the uninitiated bears a passing resemblance to (among other titles), Xevious in the fact that you must not only shoot the assortment of ships flying towards but also bomb targets on the ground. The fire button acts as both shoot and bomb at the same time with a semi auto-target system picking out targets on the ground. This leaves the player to concentrate that little bit more on avoiding the aerial threat.

Holding down the fire button charges your craft up with a power shot, but that is the extent of any special powers the player has at their disposal. There is a distinct lack of the smart bomb style weapon we have come to almost expect from shooters these days.

Power ups are made available by shooting any of the clouds that float down the screen. Upon being shot the clouds will release a bell. These bells can then be shoot in order to change their colour- each colour representing a different power up ranging from speed ups to differing styles of shot type.

Stages are well presented and come across in the style of an anime comic. To compliment the brightly coloured stages they are populated with a selection of oddball enemies. The screen can become very crowded and the cute graphical style does hide a somewhat steep learning curve. The screen can fill up with bullets very quickly and once you are pinned in a corner it takes near Jedi like skills in order to get out due to your ship normally being just that little bit too big to fit through the gap in the bullets.

Unfortunately the most disappointing aspect of the game is the end of level bosses. Bosses are a touch on the small side and go down all too easily. There is also little indication if they are taking damage or not. All this was sorted out in later instalments of the series but here they are a let down and seem dull and uninspired.

Though the bosses may be disappointing the levels that lead up to them are chaotic enough to make up for it. Enemies come from all sides of the screen as well as rising from the depths of the stage. Though the levels are clearly two-dimensional the way they are drawn does a decent job of portraying the illusion of different layers and depth.

Bells and Whistles certainly has its faults and lacks the sparkle and shine of many of the titles that followed it. However, it is hard to dislike, as there is just something amiable about the game that makes it a constantly enjoyable experience. Ok, so the bosses are somewhat of a let down but that is mainly due to what we now expect form the genre. Later instalments in he series introduced better end of level bosses and a more rounded experience but for newcomers this is a good place to start.

Overall 7/10

Warhammer Quest Review (PC)

Many of you will remember Hero Quest – one of the most loved board games around and one denied a re-release by a cross ownership issue. What many of you may not be aware of is that many years later a re-imagining of the game along the same lines was produced called Warhammer Quest which moved it closer to the Dungeons and Dragons style of play. 

Warhammer Quest added a number of random elements such as tiles only being placed when characters moved through and exit and enemies being generated rather than already placed. There was also an attempt at single player building on the system tried out in Advanced Hero Quest.

The digital version of the game started life on iOS devices but has now made its way to PC where it sits alongside other Games Workshop properties that stick close to their board game routes such as Space Hulk, Talisman and Blood Bowl. Though the game may have humble beginnings its turn based, board game style is certainly a good fit for the PC so don’t let that put you off.

Players take control of a team of four heroes and enter dungeons on set quests. The dungeons generate randomly with monsters appearing as you move from one tile to the next. Explore enough and you’ll find you’re what you went searching for and normally have to kill a bigger, meaner beastie to win the day. In between missions you can travel to towns and buy new equipment, level up and generally do things that adventurers do via a menu system. As you move locations other random events and chance meetings with characters can also occur.

Combat is carried out by selecting an action and then clicking on the enemy. The chance to hit and damage done is then generated by the hidden dice roll. Enemies need to be approached with care as they normally outnumber you and will go for weak members of the party. It’s challenging enough to keep you on your toes but not unfairly difficult. Any party member that dies will also resurrect once the mission is over but they do lose any experience from kills they may have racked up.

Action is viewed from a top down perspective which gives you a clear view of the environment but can make it a little tricky to see what monsters are armed with. The information can be found by hovering over and enemy and even more detail can be gathered through a simple right click of the mouse though. We did get caught out a few times when the  Goblin next to us turned out to be a boss but on the whole you only have yourself to blame when things go wrong.

It all works remarkably well and proves to be compelling as you venture ever onwards in your hunt for loot. It certainly does get a little repetitive if playing for long periods but it’s only a minor issue. A far bigger issue is the amount of content locked away behind micro-transactions. Aside from the four main characters there are a whole host of adventures available to buy and we can’t help but feel a little short changed in that respect. They aren’t cheap either with them setting you back over a pound each. Campaign wise there is certainly enough here to keep you occupied without feeling the need to purchase add-ons so at least you shouldn’t feel cheated by the length of your adventure. The fact the game is single player only as well is a real oversight.

Overall, Warhammer Quest is a solid transition of the board game to a digital format. The mechanics work well and the feel of the game remains true to its source material. There’s some fun adventuring to be done as well. It’s just a bit of a shame players are so restricted in their choice of characters unless they commit to the micro-transactions. This could have been a rather lovely complete package for fans but it still remains an absorbing and competent dungeon crawler to keep you occupied for bite sized amounts of time.

Overall 7/10

Final Fantasy VIII Review (Playstation)

Square return after the not so much ground-breaking as ground-shattering master class of all things fantastic that was Final Fantasy VII. With this in mind Final Fantasy VIII had an awful lot to live up to. Although it has a fair go at it, it doesn’t get close to the true inspiration of its prequel.

Set in a futuristic high-tech world, Final Fantasy VIII focuses on the story of ‘Squall Leonhart’ as he becomes entangled in what turns out to be an epic story. This is basically how the story goes- starting as a member of an elite military team you proceed to make a bitter rival in a guy called Seifer. From here you undertake a few missions and exams, which then leads to a sniper attempt on an unsavoury character known as Edea the sorceress. That’s disk one.

You then end up in jail, a military faction goes on a revolt and several mystical things happen. The twist comes when you realise that Edea is actually all the characters' long lost Nanny from when they were kids and if that’s not the most stupid thing we have ever come across in a role-play game then we don’t know what is. Anyway you go through the whole ‘is she really a good person being controlled’ bit, before realising there is a greater evil at work that you must stop. That’s about it for the story apart from the fact you flash back in time with another character and go through his entire life as well. Now I understand that is a very simplified version of events but it took us eighty-three hours to get through and I cannot remember all the details. Needless to say the story does keep you interested and though it makes the odd far-fetched claim, you may well be quite happy to go along with it as it unravels.

Story aside, Final Fantasy VIII changes the control system of VII with magic now being drawn from enemies in combat instead of coming from materia, and Guardian Forces (as they are now known) are summoned very differently. Instead of a one off hit from the huge beasts that drains magic, they now have hit points and can be damaged while being cast. This change to the system is where the big flaw in the game lies. The problem therefore, is that you find yourself constantly calling the Guardian Forces in every single battle. The removal of magic points means that as long as the huge beasts are not killed then you can call upon them as many times as you want. This acts to take a lot of the skill and fun out of the game as you end up sitting through the same animation over and over again.

Furthermore, the other major problem is the difficulty setting. When a game is in excess of eighty hours long it does not need to be completely unforgiving in every single battle that you find yourself in. It is so unbalanced sometimes that two or three random battles can be more deadly than the massive great boss creature at the end of the section. This is not helped by the way that creatures adjust to how powerful you are, meaning that if you are having trouble beating something you cannot go and fight some smaller monsters to make you go up a few experience levels. If you do this, then the returning monster will be even more deadly than before.

Another concern is the actual setting of the game. We can’t quite put my finger on it but it just seems wrong. FFVII, FFIX and X all had perfect settings. But the sterile, futurist world simply lacks the feel of an epic adventure. Its just too dull.

To sum up, then, it’s a shame that Final Fantasy VIII falls short in a few areas. If the control system had not been so drastically altered it might well have been another classic adventure. Unfortunately, while the game is graphically superior to FFVII, in terms of setting, story and controls it lags way behind. Whilst it does hold your attention, We can think of at least four other games in the same genre on Playstation that are much more fun to play (FFVII, FFIX, Breath of Fire 3 and Suikoden 2).

Overall 7/10

Trine: Enchanted Edition Review (PS4)

Regular readers will know that we covered Trine 2 on the Wii U some time ago, indeed it was one of our first reviews of a new game with retro style. We also liked it a lot and gave it an impressive 9/10. Trine 2 was our first experience of the series and with that in mind we were often unsure about heading back to the first game. With the special or ‘Enchanted’ edition of Trine recently released and a new PS4 in the office it seemed a perfect time to experience the first part of the adventure.

If you haven’t come across a Trine game before it’s basically a platform/puzzle game where you control three different characters. You have the Knight who can fight and use his shield to block stuff and gains abilities to break down walls. The wizard can create blocks and shapes which can then be used as platforms and the thief uses and bow and can attach to wood with her grappling hook. 

The characters can be cycled through as you play and the real genius is that most of the puzzles don’t have a set way of being completed so that any of characters can get through. This allows players to work things out in a way that best suits them and gives a wonderful range of flexibility to play.

As characters progress they level up by killing monsters and collecting vials of experience from within the levels. This then allows them to unlock and upgrade their abilities allowing for more shapes to be summoned, fire arrows or charge attacks. Any essential skills are given to you so you can’t level up in the ‘wrong’ way.

The real stars of the show are the levels themselves as they are brilliantly designed. Perhaps not quite as flawless as the levels in Trine 2 - but of a stupidly high standard none the less. They also look absolutely gorgeous running in the Trine 2 engine. If ever you were waiting for a game to use that share button on the PS4 pad then this is it.

It’s also worth saying that the game is different enough from Trine 2 to be worth looking at as well. The basic gameplay is the same but the levels are different enough and the enemies moving from goblins to the undead also further separates it from the sequel. The plot is just as stupid but it all moves along at a quick pace and the whole thing never stops being enjoyable.

Overall, it would have been easy to dismiss Trine (especially as the sequel is already available on the PS4), but it is well worth getting into for newcomers of the series and fans of the second game. The mechanics still work as well as ever we found it to be an impressive and magical adventure throughout. Add in the lovely new graphics and it becomes something that should be looked at by any PS4 owner.

Overall 8/10