Assassin's Creed was undoubtedly one of the biggest releases of 2007 due to the game's incredible ambition. While the title does some pretty amazing things, it all also misses the mark in a few key areas.First off, the scale of the game is breathtaking. You can run and leap across the rooftops and through the streets of three humongous cities, as well as a small village and all of the l...

The Samsung SCH-u740 is a relatively new Verizon cellphone. It sports a unique dual hinge design that allows it to open vertically as well as horizontally, giving it the best of both worlds. It sports a full QWERTY keyboard, so that when opened horizontally, it makes for an excellent phone to text with. When opened vertically, the number buttons are located on the far left of the keyboard on ...

The Sansa m240 is a 1 gigabyte MP3 player from Sandisk, a well known electronics manufacturer. I picked up the product from woot.com, a popular deal-a-day website, for right around twelve dollars. Was it worth the sale price? Absolutely. Is it worth the retail price of $40? I’d have to give that a “no.” Aside from playing MP3s, the m240 also features a voice recorder and ...

Team Fortress 2 is the long, long, long awaited sequel to Team Fortress Classic, which was released before the new millennium. That’s right; Team Fortress 2 has been in production for over 7 years! It went through quite a few changes over the years, most notably the shift from realistic military shooter to something that looks like a Brad Bird movie. If that sounds like a complaint,...

Portal has been turning heads ever since it was announced earlier this year and I’m happy to say that not only does it live up to the massive expectations, it completely blows them out of the water. Portal is everything everyone wished for and more. Using the Aperture Science portal gun, you shoot portals in walls, floor, ceiling; you name it to escape various puzzles.The game mecha...

Half Life 2 is the long awaited sequel to the amazing Half Life, released for PC in 1998. Just as its predecessor set a new standard for first-person shooters, Half Life 2 has raised the bar once again. You return to the role of protagonist Gordon Freeman and to an Earth that is now overrun with an alien force known as the Combine. Although once you get a hold of that trusty crowbar and g...

Half Life 2: Episode One continues the story of Gordon Freeman and chronicles the events of his life following Half Life 2. I don’t want to spoil anything, so I’ll just tell you that it starts right where the previous adventure left off. Right off the bat, I’ll tell you that the beautiful graphics and amazing gameplay are all here, so you have nothing to worry about on t...

Half Life 2: Episode Two is the second part of what is going to be a three part trilogy. Instead of working Half Life 3, Valve, the developer, decided to do the sequel material in three episodes. That’s fine by me, because that just means that I get my fix faster.If you’ve read my review of Episode One, then you know that I was slightly let down by it. After the masterpiec...

I’m going to do something that many people aren’t willing to – I’m going to bash Halo 3. Keep in mind, if you’re one of the legions of players that are looking forward to Halo 3 for its multiplayer component, then run out and pick it up because everything you know and love about Halo’s multiplayer is there at its best. However, if you’re one of th...

You may think that giving this game a five in almost every category may seem a little excessive, but I assure you that it isn't. To put it simply, Bioshock is a masterpiece of a game. The gripping story, the astounding audio and video presentation, and the fantastic gameplay mechanics make it one of those video games that everyone true gamer has to experience in their lifetime.The game take...

Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare takes the famous franchise and removes it from the World War II setting for the first time, thrusting players into the present day in a heated middle Eastern conflict. To be honest, when I first heard about this, I immediately disregarded. Just as the market was flooded with World War II games, it's now being flooded with games about modern war. Fortunately, I...

Kane and Lynch: Dead Men for the Xbox 360 is a mixed bag. On one hand, you've got a riveting story and some of the best written characters that I've ever seen in a videogame. The game does gritty, hard-boiled crime near perfect. The first thing that I wanted to do after playing was watch Michael Mann's heist flick Heat and crack open an Elmore Leonard novel. Kane and Lynch are monst...

It's unfortunate that Zack and Wiki was released not long before Super Mario Galaxy, because it'll no doubt be overshadowed by the iconic plumber. Don't get me wrong, Super Mario Galaxy is an absolutely amazing game, but so is Zack and Wiki. The mixture of point-and-click adventure and surprisingly clever puzzle solving is one of the best things to hit Nintendo's innovative syst...

Without a doubt, The Simpons Game is the best videogame incarnation of the yellow family since the Simpsons Arcade game way back when. However, that's not saying a whole lot. There's fun to be had here, of course, and the humor is some of the best stuff to come out of the Simpsons in years, but it still feels really limiting. While it's nice to not be shoved into a car this time aro...

The day of Tony Hawk is officially over. Skate is now the champion of skateboard video games. Let's face it - we all know that Tony Hawk had his day in the sun and we've all been pretty sick of his games for a while. Well, skating fans, I feel your pain. As someone who has atrocious balance when walking, let alone riding a skateboard, I find it necessary to live out my skater fantasies ...

Stephen King is the undisputed master of horror. As an aspiring writer, I would love nothing more than to get in his head and find out - as scary as it may be - just what makes him tick. On Writing is probably the closest I'll ever get to realizing that dream, but it's a damn good look at what's there. Half memior, half writing advice, this is definitely one of the most motivational...

Let me preface all of this by stating that I am not usually a fan of self-help books. I know they help a lot of people, but I think most of them are filled with meaningless drivel that egomaniacs churn out in order to earn a book. This is why I was so blown away by The War of Art. Pressfield breaks down all motivational factors into one concept: resistance.He explains how resistance is the forc...

Overlord is a fun little adventure game that borrows heavily from Nintendo's popular Pikmin franchise. Unfortunately, it borrows so much that it feels like quite the rip-off at times. The control scheme is very similar and the general idea of controlling minions (just like you control pikmin) is clearly ripped straight from the aforementioned title.That being said, if you can get past that ...

The new Conan game is a bit of a mixed bag. While the combat is fun and brutal, it gets repetitive fairly fast and ultimately too boring to carry on the game. The graphics aren't the best the 360 has to offer, but they're good nonetheless. The voice acting is hit-and-miss, with Ron Pearlman doing a stellar job of voicing the main barbarian.Like I said, the combat is easily  the bes...

Timeshift has a fantastic gimmick - the ability to manipulate time - but unfortunately utilizes it in a game that's mediocre in every other way. Of course, I'm not saying it's bad, I'm simply saying that the ability to control time, as fun as it may be, doesn't make this a great game.You can slow, pause, and even rewind time to help you in your quest to take down the bad guy...