The tower defense genre has always been one of my favorite ways to kill time when gaming. There’s something that is just so satisfying about building the perfect line of defense and watching your maze of death take care of everything. While this genre has previously been relegated to modifications and other derivative works (WarCraft III custom maps, etc.), now digital distribution services like Steam allow game developers to create fleshed out, full fledged titles. Orcs Must Die is one of these full fledged tower defense titles.

As the name implies, Orcs Must Die involves building a series of traps so that wave after wave of oncoming Orcs meet a grisly end. This sounds entertaining on paper but, as gamers know better than anyone, the proof is in the play. To see if Orcs Must Die is worth your money, hit the jump.

Long story short, yes. Orcs Must Die is a great little title that effectively combines the joy of building traps and mazes with the non-stop action of a third-person shooter.

The story of Orcs Must Die is pretty basic. There is a world full of Orcs and other beasts that is sealed off from the Human realm. There are portals that allow passage from one world to another, and it is up to an elite group of “War Mages” to keep the Orcs out. Unfortunately, these War Mages have been falling left and right to Orc hordes leaving only your character, the prototypical douchy bro who, despite his immaturity and ignorance, is the one person standing between the Orcs and the Human Realm.

In order to defend the Human Realm you need to set up a series of traps between the Orcs and the portals. Lucky for you there’s a wide variety of killing machines at your disposal. Spiked floors and Arrow Walls are just the basics. As you complete each level you’ll unlock a new tool of destruction. Expect to see some wacky devices like spring-board floors that send Orcs into pits of lava or a wall of blades that dice up any poor monster that steps too close to it. Unfortunately, these traps aren’t cheap.

The way the game works is that after each kill you get a small amount of money. In addition to these bounties, every time you clear a wave of monsters you get more money. Additional funds can also be found on the bodies of larger monsters like Ogres.

Speaking of larger monsters, there are a whole slew of beasts that want in on the Human Realm. On top of the basic Orc, which is relatively slow and pretty easy to put down, there are armored Orcs, fast but fragile Gnolls, Orcs with cross bows, giant Ogers that can stun your character with a bash from his club, and a whole host of other standard fantasy monsters.

One thing I really liked about Orcs Must Die is the third-person shooter aspect. I always get stressed out playing standard tower defense games because if there’s one hiccup in your tower line you lose the game. Orcs Must Die gives you a sense of urgency. If a few Orcs slip through you can put them down yourself thanks to a pretty hefty arsenal. You start the game with a crossbow (which can insta-kill most monsters with a head shot) and a sword. As you get further in the game you’ll unlock new weapons like the Wind Belt, which allows you to summon a gust of wind sending the Orcs into a pit of lava, or the Fire Bracers, which lets you cast a devastating fireball. Each weapon also has a secondary fire option allowing you more ways to stop the horde. For example the crossbow’s alternate fire stuns a small area of Orcs.

In addition to traps and weapons, you can also hire mercenaries to help the cause. Elven Archers and Paladin Guardians will eventually be unlocked when you hit a certain level. These mercenaries deal a decent bit of damage to the Orcs, but be careful. If you put them in a dangerous spot the Orcs won’t hesitate to bum rush them and take them down.

To add more depth to the gameplay, Robot Entertainment has included two systems for upgrading. First, at the end of each level you will be given a rating of one to five skulls based on your performance. If you don’t let a single Orc though the portal you’ll be taking home five skulls. These skulls can be used to upgrade your traps, mercenaries and weapons. For example, I upgraded my Elven Archers for fourteen skulls and in turn they now cost less money to deploy on the battlefield.

The other upgrade system is not persistent like spending skulls. Basically you can hire Weavers, magical sorceresses that will upgrade specific stats for your character and traps, once per level. There are two Weavers to choose from; Elemental and Steel. The Elemental Weaver will allow you to pay a certain amount of gold to have specific elemental damage upgraded. The Steel Weaver upgrades physical things like how much damage arrows do or how much money you get if an Orc dies in a trap. While these two upgrade systems are nothing new to gamers, they do add an additional level of strategy to the game.

My one complaint about Orcs Must Die is that there’s no multiplayer. I understand that the game is suppose to be an arcadey title with a heavy focus on leaderboards, but I can’t help but imagine how much fun this game would be with other players. It could be something as simple as co-op or a last-man-standing type of game mode, just something so that I can play with my friends. To be fair, Orcs Must Die is a $15 title, so the exclusion of multiplayer is totally justifiable. I just hope that Orcs Must Die sells well so that Robot Entertainment makes a more in depth sequel with multiplayer.

All in all, Orcs Must Die is a fantastic budget title with more than $15 worth of entertainment. Available on both Steam and Xbox Live Arcade, you should do yourself a favor and check it out. It’s a great way to kill time while killing Orcs.

This review of Dungeon Defenders must begin with a short study of M. Night Shyamalan’s film, Lady In The Water. It’s a worthy comparison in its own way. Both game and film feature casts of characters who must defend their precious jewels from evil (in the film it’s a lady and in the game it’s an actual jewel).

One character in Shyamalan’s film also serves as a metaphor for the game as a whole. It’s Reggie the Guardian, that guy with one super buff arm and one regular arm. Translate that into Dungeon Defenders; from one side it seems to have true strength as a co-op RPG. Take a look from another angle, and it’s a rather bland tower defense title.

By looks alone Dungeon Defenders is bound to catch people’s interests and hold them for a good time. Graphically, the game delivers sharp, 3D cell shaded characters with smooth animation, who can be customized leveraging a wide color palate. The environments are also highly detailed — one can really get a sense of the grittiness of each stone on the castle wall, the inherent magic of glowing crystals, etc. It is apparent that Trendy Entertainment makes good use of the Unreal Engine in this regard.

If the game were to fall short presentation wise, it would be for the simple fact that it is full of completely worn fantasy tropes. The Squire (knight), Huntress (elf), Apprentice (wizard) and Monk (okay, wizard again) are not breaking away from convention. No matter how much one customizes their outward appearance or how wacky their names (and no matter that Trendy chose to render them as cute yet vicious children) they are just the same old characters with predictable abilities.

The environments fair no better. Triteness can be found in the snowy castle, the fiery forge, the cellar, etc. for a total of 13 levels. Then again, what is there to expect from a game with “dungeon” in its title? Dungeons are dungeons. At least, in this game, they are well designed and make for compelling strategy from a tower defense perspective.

A big part of what makes Dungeon Defenders fun is that, unlike other tower defense games, it challenges the player to strategize on multiple levels. Traditionally, the map is the player’s best friend. It is critical to have that bird’s eye view to determine the various choke points where you can catch baddies in crossfire, the places where you want to divert the flood of enemies. That’s only the beginning with this game.

Each round in Dungeon Defenders is broken up into a Build phase and Battle phase. This introduces the next level of strategy. During Build, the action is essentially paused, giving the player unlimited time to determine whether defense or offense is the best approach. The choices are really diverse since the game also allows you to cycle between characters and take advantage of their respective arsenals, accommodating any play style.

Examples — for those who like to hang back, it may be best to set up the Squire’s spiked barricades, with the Apprentice’s magic fireballs and the Monk’s lighting aura traps. Then, in Battle you can use the Huntress and her crossbow, dispatching enemies from afar while they spend their time trying to break down defenses. For the more adventurous, it may be fun to set up the Apprentice’s towers, Huntress’s mines and gas bombs and the Monk’s slow aura trap. Then, go gung ho with the Squire swinging his two sided broadsword in the midst of explosions and debris.

Dungeon Defenders offers a robust RPG experience on top of this all, making for the last level of strategy — character progression. Whereas Build phase allows switching between characters, only one can be used in Battle. Essentially, the game forces the player to think about which character she wants to level up since XP is rewarded only to the one used for finishing off the stage. The more a character is leveled up, the stronger her towers, traps and walls are. So, depending on play style once again, it will behoove you to favor certain characters, leveling up certain abilities at the expense of others.

There is also plenty of loot to be had. From more jewel resources to weapon upgrades to pets that augment the character’s stats and/or attack enemies, vanquishing the evil horde offers more reward than just satisfaction. Albeit, sometimes navigating the RPG portion of Dungeon Defenders screws with pacing.

Having a Build phase for the player to architect the perfect playhouse of death already brings the game to a halt. Having to cycle through menus, sort through items, sell items, lock certain ones, bank jewels, upgrade stats and so on, one can run out of breath. It doesn’t help that in the beginning characters are relatively slow as well. Sometimes it can feel like an eternity to travel from point A to point B just to set up a single tower or to repair a wall. Even when speed stats are accounted for, it is just hard not to yawn when traversing the map.

Another frustration comes from the fact that Dungeon Defenders favors co-op to the point that it marginalizes those who like to play solo. The game doesn’t scale, so the same amount of enemies that four players would experience is the same amount single players experience. In other words, if you play by yourself, you die. There may be a chance to survive solo on easy difficulty, but, who wants to be stuck playing on easy?

The game has a penchant for randomizing bosses, hammering this frustration deeper. The scenario happens something like this: you’ve managed to get to level X on your own (quite a feat!). You’ve gotten to the last stage of the level, and it seems like you’ll pwn this thing. Then the words pop on screen “an ogre has appeared”; that’s enough for a rage quit because that green behemoth has thousands and thousands in health points and the rest of the horde has broken through. Expect this to happen a lot; and if you’re not playing with three others, it’s a hopeless enterprise.

Pulling from the Reggie the Guardian metaphor from the beginning of this review, the game is strangely imbalanced, because the co-op side of things is great. Strategy takes on a whole new dimension when others are involved, and you feel the camaraderie in teamwork when taking down hordes of foes, including the seemingly juggernaut ogre. It has to be said that Trendy Entertainment had sought to build a co-op focused game early on, and they achieved their goal, even though the final product has one super buff arm and one mediocre arm.

This is the second week of my personal, three week journey through blood and horror. Beginning with a review of the highly anticipated Dead Island, this month started off rather well. If you liken it to a plot in a good B-movie horror flick, this would be around the time we get a twist. Whether it’s a good one will surely depend on your point of view.

While horror films are lauded for their incongruous material, that’s not something you really want to see in a video game. Not when incongruity means poor design, lack of depth and self mutilation. On that note, I have to say I feel my review of BloodRayne: Betrayal is going to hurt me more than it hurts you.

The concept is rather inspiring. Take the unlikely, bloodlusting heroine, Rayne, from the recognizable BloodRayne franchise. Insert her into an old school  hack and slash platformer. Then dress it all in bright 2D visuals with generous amounts of gore. Who doesn’t love old school platformers, vampires and furious deluges of blood? You can’t miss. Yet, somehow WayForward did miss. Not only did they miss, they turned the proverbial gun around in an act of self defying trickery and shot themselves in the foot. Never you mind the charming, vapid plot.

The biggest pain point is in the controls. Take the unusual but strangely appropriate metaphor of Swiss cheese that has been left out for a few days; the controls are full of holes and have taken on superfluous, toxic elements. There is no crouch. There is no block. There is only a questionable mechanic that forces you to run forward and quickly change directions to skid, then jump for a high backwards flip.

Let’s save the holes for a second and focus on the skid mechanic. While this skid jump has potential, (showing off some visual flair in character animation) combining it with the way levels are designed only causes the game to work against itself.

Prime example, around the eighth level, Rayne is forced to jump across a series of narrow moving platforms lest she falls and instantly dies in green acid. To up the challenge, WayForward placed acid geysers in between the jumps. It begins to feel like the awesome platformers of old; and it would be enjoyable except for that pesky, mandatory skid. This guarantees that forward momentum will cause Rayne to skid off the platform, fall and die.

It’s not just this skidding that will have the player getting used to her death scream. Raise the marker on this next scene. BloodRayne: Betrayal‘s horrible controls, take two.

The lack of a crouch/block/walk option is sorely missed. WayForward tries to balance this out by giving players the ability to suck an enemy’s blood for health in case Rayne takes damage (given that the particular enemy bleeds). Granted, this could have delivered challenging, strategic gameplay in theory. However, in application it’s ugly and frustrating. Throughout the entire game, enemies and projectiles will come at Rayne from all angles resulting in overcrowding and range issues thus rendering this ability null and void.

There are many times where Rayne will attempt to steal life from an enemy, only to lunge at an adjacent, non-bleeding enemy. Damage taken. When the player just wants to stand and fight, Rayne will be in the middle of a combo on one side of the screen while a dandy vampire ripped straight from the Castlevania franchise on the other side pulls out a gun (block button, wait, no block button?!?). More damage taken.

Rayne is on a moving platform that has reached the top of the screen, soon to descend. She can’t go anywhere because there’s a temporary acid gyser in the way. An illogical rocket is headed straight for her. Crouch would be useful. Instead, the player gets death. It truly is like the game is trying to offer up great gameplay in terms of control scheme, at the same time ruining it by incompatible level and combat design.

BloodRayne: Betrayal, take three. If anything good can be said about the game, it does have clean animation. After playing through all the mire and muck, it can be a delight to see Rayne chomp down on a bad guy, see him wither in her arms; or, during a combination, see heads pop off with spires of blood.

But the delight only goes so far. This is because once you’ve seen an enemy die in a shower of blood, you’ve seen them all. Also, the environments become recycled quickly. The game takes the player through dark forests, a gothic castle, catacombs, etc. all with repetitive backgrounds. In the end it all makes for a trite experience with less than unique platforming.

To top it all off, the game doesn’t provide much replay value. You can collect gems and kill enemies enough for a high score. Then again, in another act of self deprecation, the faulty combat turns this quest into something nearly impossible — points are liberally deducted for missing a kill streak or taking the slightest damage. You can collect red skulls for health and ammo increases … and that’s about it.

If BloodRayne: Betrayal works at all it’s in starts and stops. Honing in on one thing at a time, like the animation, one can arguably find areas that are enjoyable. A platforming section here or there may be fun to play through once. The part where Rayne runs the gauntlet of enemies just before the castle crumbles under her feet can provide hack and slash relief with excessive (in a good way) blood and dismemberment. Put it all together, however, any fun to be had gets lost in a vortex of suck. Pun totally intended.

With Diablo 3 and Torchlight 2 right around the corner, there is no better time to fill that desire we all have for an enjoyable dungeon crawler than right now. Crimson Alliance sets out to do just that. And in all honesty, it can — if you let it.

This co-op action RPG for the Xbox Live Arcade is a throwback to titles like Gauntlet and  provides the most basic elements of your typical dungeon crawler. This isn’t a bad thing, but it is up to you to decide if that will provide enough content to your liking. For me, it did.

The first thing to mention is its unique pricing structure. You can either purchase Crimson Alliance for 800 Microsoft points and get one character, or purchase for 1200 Microsoft points and get all three characters. Unfortunately, there is no suggestion I can make as to which you might want to purchase. It is completely up to you whether you see yourself sticking to just one character or dabbling in all of them.

Again, sticking to the typical elements of a dungeon crawler, the characters available to you are the ranged, magic casting mage, the elusive assassin, and the heavy melee focused mercenary. Each character allows for a solid single player experience and a fantastic co-op experience. However, there are some that end up falling into specific categories.

The mage, for example, is a very solid support class that works best in the co-op environment while the assassin operates best in the single-player environment. This isn’t to say that these two classes aren’t enjoyable in either environment, it is just that each class ends up having its obvious advantages and disadvantages. But in the end, this is where that sense of strategy can come in.

Once you have your character setup, it is time to dive into the many dungeons laid out in front of you. These pre-made dungeons provide a ton of replayability across many facets. In order to fully understand what I mean by this, let me rundown what a typical dungeon is like in Crimson Alliance.

While the video below will provide the best understanding of the dungeon experience, simply put, you will make your way through very well designed environments full of unique enemies, hidden areas, and puzzles. Using the tools provided to you, you will kill your way through the dungeon, get some loot from chests, and kill a couple waves of enemies to finish out the dungeon.

Describing the game in such a simple manner does it a disservice though. Sure it doesn’t redefine the dungeon crawler experience, but it definitely uses a proven method that results in a very enjoyable experience. Each dungeon provides a number of unique combat situations that allows for the player to approach them in an endless number of ways.

The first set of tools available to you in combat — irregardless of class — are your light and heavy attacks. There are also consumables that can be acquired. At your disposal are deployable turrets, monster bait, healing totems, and throwing axes. As you can imagine, the variety these consumables can provide are where another element of strategy lies. Finally, there is an ultimate power that each class has which is acquired by killing a number of enemies. This is that fail-safe ability you will undoubtedly need in dire situations.

httpvh://youtu.be/wIj4FLe5TSA

Throughout each dungeon you will also have explosive barrels at your disposal to either pick up and toss at your enemies or simply hit the barrel to light it, and let it explode where it stands. While these can be very useful, you will come to find that there are far too many explosive barrels scattered throughout dungeons. This can either make things too easy at times or overly frustrating as you accidentally hit one in a frenzy and allow for you or your friends to take damage.

Taking damage will quickly become the largest element of frustration as each dungeon is ranked in a leaderboard based on your score. This score is largely dependent on the idea of a multiplier. This multiplier increases as you successfully kill enemies without taking damage. Unfortunately, this is where the combat falls apart as you will do whatever it takes — be it cheap or repetitive — in order to maintain that multiplier.

They are called leaderboards for a reason though. And the challenge is certainly there at higher difficulties. Unfortunately, the default difficulty proves to be an extreme pushover. I strongly recommend increasing the difficulty unless you are just looking for some seriously mindless fun.

And if leaderboards are truly your thing, then you will thoroughly enjoy the challenge maps that can be unlocked by finding the hidden map inside of each dungeon. These challenge maps are meant to be played over and over with the idea of just improving your overall score. Each challenge map has the same concept: kill waves of enemies until there are no more waves. Simple yet an absolute blast to kill some time in.

But let’s be honest, dungeon crawlers are only as good as the loot you can get. This is both an area of strength and weakness for Crimson Alliance. Weapons actually have both advantages and disadvantages to their use as they cater to a certain play style. For example, if you are in a combat situation as the mercenary where you find the need to manage a large group of enemies, it might be best to equip the sword and shield which increase shield bash. This made each piece of loot useful and I never really felt like I was completely replacing gear.

Unfortunately, the biggest weakness here is the way in which gear is acquired. You can either purchase the loot with in-game currency from the many mercenaries that become available to you or you can acquire it within the dungeon from chests that can only be looted once. That enjoyment of finding a unique upgrade is completely lost here.

At its surface, Crimson Alliance is a bit shallow. But if you take advantage of the tools provided, tweak the difficulty at times, and play with a group of friends, the depth starts to show. It won’t deliver in areas that other action RPG games do, but there is no denying this title is an absolute blast to play.

I admit that I barely heard of Digital Reality’s SkyDrift, an aerial racing game available on Xbox Live and PSN, just a couple of weeks before it launched. However, what I’d seen impressed me. For a downloadable game, SkyDrift looked like a truly polished title. I had high hopes for this aerial racing game, and luckily most of them came true.

SkyDrift features three modes in its single player campaign. Power Race is a fairly standard race with varied power-ups. You have staples like machine guns, shields, and homing missiles. The catch is you can only carry two power-ups at a time, and if you fly over the same type twice it’ll get upgraded to a more powerful version.

Plus, at anytime you can sacrifice one of your power-ups to partially fill up your boost meter. If you’re in first place and you don’t need that repair power, you can sacrifice it to generate some boost to extend your lead. Overall, there’s nothing terribly surprising with the power-ups. You’ve seen them before in Mario Kart, Blur and numerous other games, but they work well here.

Survival races are a little bit different. You need to stay ahead of the pack while a timer counts down. When the timer hits zero, the plane in last place is kicked out of the race. The last man standing wins–which obviously is what you’re aiming for.

Speed Race gets rid of all the power-ups and instead litters the tracks with speed rings. Fly through one of them and true to their namesake, you get a huge boost of speed. These races were fun because trying to hit every ring in a lap can be a bit of a challenge and controlling your plane can get a little tricky at super high speeds.

The game controls nicely, with the right control stick being used to roll your plane to tighten its turn radius. I know I’m not a pilot in real life, but SkyDrift made me feel more like one. Again, none of these race types are the freshest things around, but they’re all well done and fun. Power Race really reminded me of Blur, which for me wasn’t a bad thing.

There are multiple planes you can unlock by winning races and progressing further in the campaign. A couple of them can only be unlocked by playing the multiplayer component. They all have varied top speeds, acceleration ratings, armor, etc.

The multiplayer portion has the same race types as the single player portion, and everything seemed to work just fine. I just don’t know how big the community is going to be down the line, especially because this is a downloadable title.

SkyDrift looks great for a $15 game. The colors are all vibrant, and it’s pretty impressive to see your shiny bright blue and yellow plane flying through a volcano and glowing lava. Sadly there were a couple of instances where if the camera was in the right spot, I could see through the environments.

While the game types are all fun, SkyDrift is pretty short. One could tell Digital Reality tried to squeeze some extra mileage out of their game by including reversed versions of some tracks, but it still felt like not enough. Hopefully Digital Reality will continue to support the game by releasing extra tracks as DLC.

It’s been too long since I’ve played an aerial racing game. I think the last time were the plane levels in Diddy Kong Racing. The game won’t wow anyone, but if you like arcade style racing games along the lines of Blur with planes–I mean, come on they’re planes!–you’ll enjoy SkyDrift. It’s only a lack of more content that holds it back from being even better.

When DeathSpank released on PSN and XBLA last summer it received no shortage of praise. Headed up by legendary Monkey Island designer Ron Gilbert, that title combined the strengths of adventure games with those of hack and slash titles like Blizzard’s Diablo seies. While there were some problems with gameplay execution, DeathSpank won gamers over with an irreverent sense of humor.

While The Baconing might not bear the moniker of its predecessors, DeathSpank is back. The hero to the downtrodden has put on too many undergarments and has thus brought on the apocalypse. He must cast the thongs into the fires of Bacon to stop the end of the world. Yes, it’s that typical sense of humor you’ve come to expect of the series. I wish I could say that the same quality was there. But that would be a straight up lie.

Most sequels attempt to recapture the magic that made their predecessors great in the first place, or better yet, improve upon it. In a curious turn of events The Baconing, however, does the exact opposite. Rather than improve upon the strengths of the previous titles, the game almost entirely revolves around combat — something that has never been one of the series’ strong suits.

Shifting focus away from the adventure game puzzles of the first two titles might have worked in The Baconing‘s favor had Hothead Games fine-tuned the combat. Unfortunately, rather than improve upon existing weaknesses, combat mechanics remain virtually unchanged from previous entries. As you might suspect, diverting time away from enjoyable bits to focus on the sub-par ones makes for a considerably less enjoyable game.

Quests are considerably less clever in nature and essentially all boil down to “go here, kill this”. While that sounds simple enough, fighting your way to your goal can be absolutely brutal even on the easiest difficulty setting. Quests will be going along smoothly when the player happens upon a particularly difficult group of enemies. These encounters lead to uncharacteristic spikes in difficulty that will send players back to the nearest checkpoint far too frequently.

One of the main culprits behind the frustrating combat is the ranged enemy. Archers attack from afar, slowly whittling health away while other enemies swarm the player with melee attacks. To solve this problem there is a shield bash attack that prevents damage for a few seconds repelling enemies and oncoming fire. Unfortunately, there isn’t really a way to retreat while using this ability. It’s all too common to find a fatal arrow in the back when retreating in desperation.

Also frustrating is the manner in which health is recovered. The number of health potions DeathSpank can carry at any given time is limited, so the majority of healing is done with food. Food heals you over time but unfortunately can’t be used in combat. This frequently leads to falling back to recover a bit of health, praying that a large enemy doesn’t come by and give you a smack, thus wasting your precious nibbles and sending you back to a checkpoint yet again.

Much of the fun in a hack and slash game comes from looting. Unfortunately the poor inventory system from the previous games also make a return. Menus aren’t clearly laid out and it’s difficult to tell which pieces of equipment are truly superior. Making something that should be one of the most fun elements of the experience into a frustrating, tedious one only continues to diminish an already disappointing experience.

It’s not all bad though. The art style, music and voice acting are all what you’ve come to expect of the franchise. Buried under the layers of frustration and inadequacy players will find glimmers of amusement. While not all of the jokes hit their mark, the irreverent sense of humor leads to a few genuinely comedic moments in an otherwise unenjoyable experience. Amongst all the excretory humor and innuendo are some hilarious commentary on politics, the state of the world, and tropes of the genre.

While some fans of the first two DeathSpank games might be willing to suffer through the sub-par combat to get that next pun, others will leave The Baconing with a bad taste in their mouths. This is a game that turns its back on what made its predecessors so fun to play in the first place. If you’re somehow still interested and have yet to play the first two games you’ll probably have more fun with one of those.

Moonshade is mysterious; Moonshade is deadly. At least, that is what she boasts. So fast you won’t even feel it, she says. So quiet … ah, enough of the hyperbole.

Moonshade is part of the assassin class in Certain Affinity’s upcoming action RPG for Xbox Live Arcade, Crimson Alliance. The final character trailer released today shows her getting her deadly on with rapid knife throws, magic blades and some out-of-screen knockouts. Of course, Gamer Limit has it for you. Of course, it’s after the break.

If you find this trailer intriguing, make sure you also check out the gameplay trailer for Direwolf, wizard class. Crimson Alliance releases September 7. Will you be getting your action RPG assassin on?

Meet Direwolf in the new trailer for Certain Affinity’s upcoming XBLA exclusive, Crimson Alliance. Like all other maladjusted wizards of yore, he was shunned, treated like a pariah. But that didn’t stop him from building up his wizard powers.

Oh no, it only fueled him more to a point where he can now kick wholesale ass. Gamer Limit has the trailer for you, of course.

For those of you not familiar with the title, Crimson Alliance is a multiplayer action RPG where you take control of either a mercenary, assassin or wizard to battle the Cult of the Soul Siren to bloody death. Up to 4 players share one screen as they make their way through countless hordes of baddies. The whole affair reminds me of Gauntlet Legends.

So, Direwolf …

Grasshopper Manufacture is back with a strange new downloadable title. This time around the Shadows of the Damned development house is teaming with Digital Reality to bring an action-platformer to XBLA and PSN. The European developer and Grasshopper have worked together before, on the yet to be released horizontal shooter Sine Mora.

After the break we have a gameplay video of legendary Silent Hill composer Akira Yamaoka unveiling Black Knight Sword at Grasshopper Manufacture’s event at Gamescom in Germany. Let’s just say if you like marionettes, you’re in luck with this one.

[Gamer365 via Joystiq]

Chris Hecker (Spore, Quake) announced Thursday the price for early beta access to his latest espionage game, SpyParty, will be $15. This gets you access to the early beta, access to the forums and discussions, as well as the complete game once its released. Players who sign up through the game’s site will also have a chance to lay down $50 or more for their name to be included in the credits once the full title is released.

$15 dollars is a justified price, Hecker says, as it “has become the de facto price point for AAA Indie Games.” Is SpyParty a AAA indie game and is it worth $15 dollars? A good number of people certainly think so. Last time Hecker checked in on the numbers, there were more than 700 gamers already signed up and ready to go. That’s only a few months after he opened the sign up. Not convinced?

For those who are not familiar with the game, SpyParty‘s main mode pits two players against each other. One plays the spy who navigates through a dinner party trying to blend in. The other plays a sniper posted outside, scoping the various attendees under the auspices of eliminating this person with a bullet.

Instead of the action, blood and explosions one would expect from other spy games, this title focuses on subtleties of human behavior. So expect sophisticated AI acting like, well, humans. In its application at various expos, one has never seen a more tense session with two players gripping their controllers anxiously, eyes wide in stern concentration staring at a virtual dinner party.

While no official announcements have been made, Hecker wishes the game to be on all platforms, including the Wii U.

[source SpyParty]

Sony announced the the first annual PSN PLAY event Friday, vying to replicate the success Microsoft has had with its annual The Summer of Arcade sale. PSN will offer four games at retail, with a fifth game free to players who purchase all four. Pre-orders start Tuesday, August 9; and the event will last until Monday, September 19.

Sony goes further, giving players a free PS3 theme along with an unannounced “special gift” with each pre-order. Playstation Plus members will also get a 20% discount off every purchase during the event. This sounds like a good deal on the surface. But, I tell you, my wallet is terrified. Let’s break it down and do the math.

The first thing I noticed was the language surrounding these campaigns. I liken it to a croupier’s smile. It’s meant to be inviting, friendly. Yet, it’s only a facade and behind it lies the coldest, most calculating mind.

Notice that to Microsoft, The Summer of Arcade is a “party” and to Sony, PLAY is an “event“. Who doesn’t love parties or going to events? They’re fun! At the same time, respectively, it’s not a party and it’s not an event. They are both sales. They’re aimed at your wallet; and one would deduce it’s only festive and eventful when you’re the one receiving the dollars in said wallet, instead of liquidating them.

I trust that I’m stating the obvious. You’re a discerning reader who visits sites like Gamer Limit because you’re interested in more than just mindlessly buying and playing games. Through your practiced reading, you have gained the valuable skill of sniffing out the proverbial BS. Albeit, it’s a clever play on language. Hats off to the marketers.

With all the pomp and circumstance surrounding these festivities, however, someone is bound to take the bait. Both Microsoft and Sony have levers built into these sales that will then influence the behavior of more than one gamer out there. Call it Gamification 101.

A short re-cap — Gamification is the act of introducing game mechanics into things that are not games, i.e. a business process or transaction. That’s what Microsoft and Sony have done with their respective sales. To be specific, they’ve introduced achievements. When you buy all four The Summer of Arcade games, your achievement is a free copy of Crimson Alliance. Similarly, PLAY offers mini achievements in the form of PS3 themes and “special gifts”, along with the ultimate prize, PAYDAY: The Heist.

While I’d go for a free game myself, especially the Gauntlet Legends-eque Crimson Alliance, it’s not reaching a special checkpoint or completing a side-quest that gets me that achievement. It’s spending my hard earned money. Both Microsoft and Sony are exploiting our gaming sensibilities with their campaigns — the one thing they know will get the masses hooked into giving up the cash. It’s one thing to throw a bunch of flashy advertising at you for mere enticement, it’s another thing to get into your brain and play with your psyche.

So, how much money does one have to spend and on what?

The Summer of Arcade

• Bastion – 1200 microsoft points*
• From Dust – 1200 microsoft points*
• Fruit Ninja Kinect – 800 microsoft points*
• Toy Soldiers: Cold War – 1200 microsoft points*

* The lowest level of microsoft points once can buy is 1600 points, at approximately $20 a pop. This means, one is spending $60 on this “party”.

PSN PLAY

• Street Fighter III Third Strike Online Edition – $14.99*
• The Baconing – $14.99*
• BloodRayne: Betrayal – $14.99*
• Renegade Ops – $14.99*

* The total comes out to a little under $60. They sweeten the pot with PS3 themes and unnanounced gifts, as well as a 20% discount for Plus members. In total, with a 3 month Plus membership and the discount, one is paying nearly $66.

After all the semantics, theory and math comes a question: “Am I willing to spend $60 on these titles?” Of course, the answer is based on taste. As far as this year’s The Summer of Arcade is concerned, it is also based on hardware with Fruit Ninja Kinect. Albeit, it’s equivalent to a retail game with value in the eyes of the beholder.

Remember, there are many other games coming out this year, including but not limited to Dead Island, Batman: Arkham City and Star Wars: The Old Republic. Herein lies a greater dilemma and another question to ask: “With all the other anticipated games coming out this year, does this make sense?”

In the end, Gamer Limit cannot answer these questions for you. Neither can any other of the media outlets. It’s just that sometimes, I feel, that these media outlets should provide you with a deeper look at the mechanisms behind what we call news.

Way Forward and Majesco are bringing back femme fetale Rayne with BloodRayne: Betrayal. Wednesday, they released new screenshots of this side scrolling, hack-and-slash blood fest. Gamer Limit has them here for you.

Back in June, we got our hands on this game at E3 and recommended that you keep your eyes on this downloadable title for Xbox Live and PSN. Whether you’re into side scrolling hack-and-slash and gore, or a fan of the franchise. Did we mention that it has a knock-out art style? It does.