Author Archives: Alex De-Gruchy

Aug 07 2014
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My First Castlevania – Castlevania: Symphony of the Night

My-First-Castlevania

Although I love quality videogames regardless of their platform and have never been a biased fanboy, Sega and Sony have dominated the majority of my gaming experiences over the years, my list of owned consoles to date including Sega’s Master System, Mega Drive, Mega-CD and Dreamcast; and Sony’s first three generations of PlayStation. I’ve only briefly dabbled with PC gaming and I never actually owned a Nintendo console until my purchase of a Wii U last year – an admitted oversight for someone who has loved the medium literally for as long as I can remember. (Although I did spend far too large a percentage of my university years playing my housemate’s Nintendo 64, so there’s that).

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Jul 24 2014
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I Would Walk 500 Miles: In Praise of Journey

InPraiseOfJourney

In these days of retailer-specific pre-order DLC, creatively devoid annual sequels, not-so-micro microtransactions in full-priced games, and the general greed and soullessness exhibited by many videogame developers and publishers, sometimes it can be easy to forget just how inventive, creative and artistically powerful the videogame medium can be. But look beyond the crass greed and you’ll find countless passionate, hard-working developers and publishers creating imaginative and brilliant games which act as reminders of the potential of videogames as an artistic medium. Journey is such a game.

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Jul 10 2014
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Overlooked Gem: From Dust

From-Dust

We’re often warned about the dangers of playing god, but that didn’t stop me from genetically engineering the horrific abominations I keep chained up in my cellar and it didn’t stop me from buying and really enjoying god game From Dust.

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May 09 2014
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Bullets Over Brazil: In Praise of Max Payne 3

MazPayne3

“Time moves forward…” says the titular hero of Max Payne 3 at one point during the game, “and nothing changes.”

That isn’t necessarily a bad thing, as evidenced by the action-packed third-person shooter Max Payne 3, which, after two previous games in the series, once again drops embattled, world-weary, former NYPD detective and DEA agent Max Payne into a whirlwind of bullets, betrayal and painkillers. Welcome back, Max.

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Apr 15 2014
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Retrospective: Road Rash

Road-Rash

When I was a kid, years before Electronic Arts became the obscenely greedy, morally bankrupt parody of cartoonish supervillainy that they are today (“Bah! He was a rank amateur compared to… Dr. Colossus!”), to me they were a company synonymous with interesting and fantastic games due to the titles developed and / or published by EA that I owned for my Sega Mega Drive: The Immortal, Populous, John Madden American Football, Desert Strike, etc. (Also, it was easy to recognise EA Mega Drive games by the oversized boxes and oversized, yellow-chipped cartridges).

One such EA title I owned and became a huge fan of was motorcycle racing / combat game Road Rash, which debuted on the Mega Drive in 1991. The game would later receive ports to numerous other systems and would also turn out to be just the first title in a series that continued throughout the 1990s.

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Mar 13 2014
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Overlooked Gem: ZombiU

ZombiUGem

A few months ago, I wrote a two-part article recommending thirteen post-millennium horror games I had played and enjoyed (see part 1 here and part 2 here). Well, I better now increase that number to fourteen, as since the time of writing I’ve played ZombiU and it’s easily one of the best horror games I’ve experienced for a long time.

    Developed and published by Ubisoft and released exclusively on Nintendo Wii U as a launch title for the system in 2012, ZombiU is a first-person survival horror game set in London sometime after a zombie apocalypse has devastated Great Britain and left England’s capital teeming with the hungry undead, who are still much less ignorant and pushy than many of the people who crowd the London Underground every day in reality.

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Feb 14 2014
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The Life Of An Outlaw In The Old West Of Red Dead Redemption

RDR

I love westerns.

    Whether gravitating towards realism or a more romantic, mythical take on the realities of the time, the western is a genre of powerful imagery and archetypes, from the vast, sweeping vistas of untamed landscape to the mysterious and deadly gunslinger. It’s a genre that has permeated popular culture over the past century, as seen in the western novels of authors such as J. T. Edson and Zane Grey; television shows such as Deadwood; video games such as Gun (the less said about Custer’s Revenge, the better); the modern-day western comic series Preacher; and of course the countless brilliant movies: High Noon, The Man From Laramie, The Shootist, A Fistful of Dollars, Unforgiven, etc.

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Nov 07 2013
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13 Post-Millennium Horror Games You Should Play – Part 2

Nefarious2

This is Part 2 of a 2-part feature. Part 1 can be found here.

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