Twice the action, twice the guns, twice the arcade cabinet size, and TWICE THE PLAYERS! Time Crisis II might be one of the most literal translations when Namco gave this crew the objective "make the second Time Crisis game" as it evolved its gameplay and expanded the horizon in order to make the game big enough for two players (I bet selling those gigantic cabinets to arcades and movie theaters gave Namco a nice chunk of change too).

There's something I inherently adore about the "lone wolf" setting the original Time Crisis had, something the mainline games would never return to. So I can't help but love the original game just a tad bit more. Still, this game is awesome and feels a bit more fair with how they design the enemy attacks, giving you a decent warning to react in order to avoid getting hurt! Time Crisis II is an appropriate step-up from the original experience in the ways that really matter the most.

A great action platformer with a buddy-cop story that's really fun to see unfurl. Ratchet & Clank ups the ante of typical platformers, by giving our fuzzy hero an assortment of destructive weapons to take on the oncoming foes!

This would be a considerably humble game compared to the sequels, as they emphasized more and more on the gun-toting action as time went on. However, all four of the mainline games on Playstation 2 would shine in their own ways. The first game being with its emphasis on platforming fun.

A great successor that expanded on concepts and presentation while doing some globetrotting! The House Of the Dead 2 is likely the most popular entry in the series, and that's for good reason! It's fun, fast-paced, and is teeming with a fun art style and sound design, it's always a blast to play! While SEGA was having trouble in the console department, their output in the arcade scene showed no signs of slowing down!

Of course, I can't forget that the goofy voice-acting helped make this a memorable experience as well. It's hard to say if it was lack of direction or something else, but there's mysterious sense of endearment coming from it. It almost alleviates the dreary and gory zombie-slaying experience to make it more charming and funny.

I can't wait for this to also get a garbage-ass remake.

A reasonably good game, considering the sporadic quality regarding games based on pre-existing IPs back then. Buster Busts Loose is a really neat platformer that tried to ride the line of speed and careful control.

Something that holds it back, in my opinion--and something the devs couldn't help--is the fact that it's not in widescreen. Unlike Sonic, the design makes way for points where you can't react quickly enough to what's coming, so the game feels unfair more often than the more well-known blue blur of the gamingsphere.

Regardless, it feels pretty good to play and satisying to see they kind of gave a shit when it came to providing a challenging game for Tiny Toons fans. I also like how a decent chunk of the game is locked out if you choose Easy difficulty.

A good little overhead car combat-ish game by the veterns behind the original Twisted Metal games. Calling All Cars has some charm to it, and the game feels damn good to play! I just think as a whole package it felt a bit lacking. It continues to be shunned as one of those early PS3 download-only games.

It's sitting in a pile of a whole bunch of other IPs Sony fully-owns but never ported to anything else, thus rotting in its obscurity. Why games like Dead Nation can continue to live onward on PS4/5 but this remains inside PS3's download-only hell is beyond me.

Few things were more baffling to me than the hype this game managed to garner, despite looking like a boring collect-a-thon with slow gameplay and tedious enemies to shoot from the very beginning. From what I recall, people were convinced this was going to be some Metal Slug successor because of the art style, and they didn't pay attention when the devs involved cited SPECIFICALLY the Metal Slug games on Neo Geo Pocket, which were less run-n-gun and had more emphasis on exploring.

Regardless, this game is worse than those. It doesn't help that I really don't like Paul Robertson's art, which I find the be nothing if not obnoxious. The game functions perfectly fine, but I still have a hard time thinking of anything remotely enjoyable about this. From what I see, though, that initial hype was long forgotten and a lot of folks see it for the mostly-miserable experience that it truly is.

Shit sucks lol

Gameplay: Explosive action
Characters: Explosive racism
Overall: Okay I guess

Okay, I'll actually review Crackdown. It's a neat world to hop around and blow shit up. Leveling up your skills feels pretty satisfying, but the gameplay stays mostly the same from beginning to end. You can get a flow of the monotony, turn on a podcast or something, and sink hours into the campaign. Especially since the game has no music or even interesting atmosphere to speak of.

While it's called "Crackdown" I only "crack up" at how dumb all the stereotypical boss profiles are. "Juan Mendez Escobar is head of cocaine distributions of his failed night club. Hang Wang Wei-Shin is the leader of the Shai-Gen, and knows the secret of underground martial arts." Fucking ridiculous shit lmao

Neversoft's final entry, and they managed to make it insanely repugnant. Guitar Hero: Warriors Of Rock shits up this franchise so far off the path, it's practically unrecognizable. The last 3 games already felt so damn soulless, but the leaps and bounds to remove any remaining scrap of heart is enough to make me gag.

Their overinflated "epic" adventure mode is so embarrassing, further marred by including narration from geriatric rock star Gene Simmons, who sounds like he needs a nap the entire time. And all these otherworldly designs of once beloved/loathed characters are stupid as hell. It almost feels like the board meeting was "how can we make guitar hero more EPIC?!" It's 2010, that obsession checks out, right?

This ended up killing the franchise as well as Neversoft, laying this series dormant for a number of years. Somehow, this wasn't the worst we could see from Guitar Hero.

Genuinely awful experience, despite what reviews back in the stone ages said. It's no wonder they went back and fixed their numerous mistakes (from the terrible slowdowns to the boring enemy/weapon placements) about a year later with Metal Slug X. Please avoid this blemish on the run-n-gun franchise and experience it the way it was meant to be played with its immediate remake.

I also find it weird that they still port this game separately. I get game history preservation, but unbeknownst folks probably feel tricked into wasting 8 dollars at times.

Among the entire Metal Slug library, this is the best game made without the original team. Unlike the last two games, Metal Slug 6 doesn't appear to be severely rushed or crippled from underbudgeting. The enemy variety is large, the stages are lengthy and interesting, there's actually a couple branching paths, and the new weapons are fun to use!

There are also the attributes tied to individual characters which made replays more interesting. The lowest points, however, would be the venues, backdrops, and music. The backgrounds are these ugly paintings instead of crisp pixel art like it always was before this, and the music is either droll, or too busy as it's aped as a remix of a previous song.

Overall, this is leagues better than 4 and 5, but doesn't quite capture the tight design of 1, X, and 3. They just don't have it in them to make something as remarkable as those, but that's okay! This is still not bad.