What I liked:

• Well, it’s something different!

What I disliked:

• Game itself isn’t very fun.

• Light on the content side, with few options.
• Some bad design choices and nagging little flaws.

I like a good puzzle game, especially on the PSP. There are three inherent pieces of gameplay crucial to any solid puzzler: (1) Making combos, (2) chaining those combos together, and (3) the aftermath of the combo, which can sometimes result in even more combos.

Puzzle games back in the day would have combos clear the puzzle field almost instantaneously, resulting in the board being shuffled around and the player hoping to get an extra combo or two. The more skilled player would have a second combo happen automatically after the first is set off, and so on. Today’s puzzle games now have a “metronome” like feature that allows players to set up their combos in real time before clearing the screen, making games like Lumines feel like completely new and exciting games. There’s something fantastic about keeping the chain of combos alive.

What I’m trying to get at is that Block Cascade Fusion isn’t very fun. Instead of allowing the player to chain and build on their combos, it seals them off from any interaction until the metronome sweeps the board (displayed as a Fusion countdown on the left hand side). There’s not much satisfaction in gaining a lot of combos since it feels almost out of your control. And if making combos isn’t very satisfying, well, there’s not much point to playing the game is there?

I do like the addition of “fake” trophies, though their inclusion doesn’t seem to unlock anything. But some of the game design choices boggle the mind. Why does the pause button have a 1-2 second delay before appearing (which in the mean time has the game running in the background)? Whose idea was it to have a sharp scraping sound/sparks when you’re placing blocks to the extreme left/right side of the blocks area? And wait until you see the huge wall of text in the help/tutorial screen…it’s as if a developer started to make spaces between paragraphs until they said, ah screw it, they get the idea. Block Cascade Fusion isn’t a whole lot of game, and commits the cardinal sin of gaming: it’s just not very fun.

What I liked:

• Fantastic production values and style.
• Simple, fun gameplay.
• A nice assortment of content with a variety of unlockables.

What I disliked:

• A few snags here and there with the controls, but nothing major.

Patchwork Heroes is the very definition of an excellent portable game—fun in small doses, addicting enough to try harder levels “just one more time,” and a really fun design that looks unlike anything else out there. What a wonderful little game this is.

You play as a small resistance fighter defending your hometown by climbing on top of massive incoming enemy warships and sawing off enough pieces until it eventually crashes. There are multiple types of enemies, but among the tools at your disposal are using bombs, gaining “mojo” to be invulnerable for a limited amount of time, stopping time and so on. There’s not really too much to the gameplay, though the game throws an assorted amount of challenge to different levels such as protecting certain parts of the ship, rescuing prisoners, and so on.

This game is not easy, though it does have an easy mode (which I never touched.) What really strikes me about the game is how charming it is…the music, the graphics, even down to all of the features this game has. For example, every ship has a number of prisoners you can rescue. After rescuing the prisoners you can go to a section of the menu to read up on all of them…or go to the “graveyard” and pay respect to those you didn’t rescue or were killed during the mission (which goes so far as to allow you to place flowers on their grave, revealing their face in the sky as a heavenly body as you salute them. Why? Well, why not?)

There are a few nitpicks I have with the game, like not being able (as far as I could tell) to permanently toggle the long-view camera instead of holding down the L button. The view is perfectly clear to use, even on the PSPgo screen, so I’m not sure why it’s not a selectable option. And while the way the menus animate is just neato, it makes navigating them slightly clunkier than most. The separate Challenge Mode doesn’t really challenge in some levels like the Story Mode does, as I was able to beat a few of them easily on the hardest difficulty. And I really wish the game would auto-complete easier difficulty levels if you complete them on a harder setting- for example, beating a challenge on hard gave me points, but I had to beat it on normal and easy as well to fully complete it.

Check out the demo on the PSP store, and if you dig the gameplay knowing that it just gets harder from there, I can tell you that it’s absolutely worth the $10. Sure it’s a little bit short (3-4 hours beating the single player, without unlocking the extras) but man, what a fun little game to have. If you have a PSP, you must check out this game.

What I liked:

• Simple controls and rules that are easy to pick up.
• Fair amount of modes.
• I enjoyed Uematsu’s renditions of Bach’s classics.

What I disliked:

• Takes to long for blocks to clear.
• No autosave.
• Pacing is a little unbalanced.

Puzzle games and portable systems seem to go hand in hand. So when a new puzzle game is released, it has to stick out from the crowd. Kurulin Fusion is your standard color match puzzle game. What it has that tries makes it different are the music and the fusion block gameplay.

So basically you have two types of puzzle pieces, orbs and fusion blocks. If an orb touches a fusion block of the same color it will disappear, along with any other same colored orbs that it is touching. You can “fuse” the fusion blocks together to form a bigger and bigger block that will add a higher multiplier to the score. The game is as simple is that. What you really want to do it arrange your blocks in a way that when they fuse orbs will drop onto fusion blocks adding a chain bonus to your score. You can also hold on to a piece that you may think will come in handy later. This really helps when playing in the Mission mode.

Another big point about this game is the music. The score was arranged by famed Final Fantasy composer, Nobuo Uematsu. All of the songs are remixed versions of classic tunes by Bach. Each of them is unique, and certainly fits the games futuristic art-style.

While the game’s core elements are easy to understand, the game is actually fairly tough due to some balancing issues. When playing in arcade mode there will be random times when the action speeds up. The speed ramp up is so severe that if you don’t act fairly quick, you will have a stack of blocks you will have no clue how to fuse. If you survive the onslaught the game will slow back down again and you can catch your breath. The ramp up speed for when going up a stage also seems just a tad too fast for my liking. I also wasn’t really a fan of having to save the game manually. I had completed almost all of the mission mode and turned my PSP off thinking that the game would save it for me. When I turned my PSP back on I was far from trilled, seeing that I would have to complete all of that over again.

While Kurulin Fusion has it flaws, if you are a fan of puzzle games you will certainly find something to like out of it. The game is easy to learn, but do to some pacing issues may not be for everyone. While it may not be the best puzzle game, for the price you will certainly find enjoyment. If you are a fan of Uematsu’s previous work or even Bach, downloading it for the music is not out of the question.

What I liked:

• Top notch art for the levels, the monsters, and the cards.
• Two great control methods.
• The strategy involved in choosing what cards to bring to a stage.
• Great replay value, lots of different modes for each Phase.

What I disliked:

• Having to do some grinding to get enough coins for cards.
• With the Guide turned on you lose the great look of the levels.
• The music while good, gets a little repetitive.
• No initials for the local leaderboards.

It seems like every week there is a new tower defense game being released on some digital distribution platform. They seem to have become the new “twin-stick shooter”. So if you are going to release a tower defense game, it must stand out against the rest of the crowd. Creature Defense, in my mind, does just that.

Right off the bat it isn’t your normal tower defense game. You are given 5 cards that you can bring into the level. Those are the only things that you can use to attack the enemy monsters. Each card summons a monster to the field which costs a certain amount of mana and they each have an element attached to them. The tactics are much like rock-paper-scissors; Fire is strong against Forest, Forest is strong against Water, and Water is strong against Fire. There are also Light and Dark with are strong and weak against each other. You progress through the waves like another game getting more mana for each monster you defeat. Thankfully there is a fast forward mode, so you can speed things up. When you either your base resistance is zero or you clear the final wave the Phase is over. After the Phase ends you are given coins which can be spent on stronger cards that you can bring into the fray.

The real strategy in the game lies which cards you will bring into a Phase. You will need to make sure that you have something that could counter all types of elements. You will probably need three or four tries to get your deck just right. This makes the game challenging, yet still easy enough from anyone to pick up. The artwork for each card in this game is also beautiful. Each time I saw that I unlocked a new card I would go to the shop just to look at the card art.

If I could change one thing about this it might be the amount of grinding one has to do to get cards. After you clear all 5 stages on a phase you unlock a card that is from Sony’s “The Eye Of Judgment”. These cards are extremely powerful and also extremely expensive. I had to grind for a few hours just to get enough for one of them. But I can’t really fault the game for that, it keeps bringing me back. This game has got its hooks in me and I don’t see them coming out anytime soon.

What I liked:

• A great amount of new content and restructuring of old levels.
• Addictive, fun gameplay.
• New camera for the PSP version feels “right,” moreso than the map-level view on the PS3.
• Nice unlockables and great online support.

What I disliked:

• Knowing what you unlocked after earning medals can be confusing.
• Despite three different difficulty levels users might find even casual to be a significant challenge.
• The unlockable PSP theme is missing icons present in the latest firmware.

PixelJunk Monsters Deluxe had a lot going against it for its October 1st launch… there was a huge amount of games coming out that day (for release on the PSPGO launch) and the $20 pricetag threw some people for a loop, as it was more expensive than the PS3 game and expansion combined (despite the extra content the PSP version offers). Also another tower defense game, Fieldrunners, was cheaper and had more attention as a Minis title.

Too bad, because this is easily the best PSP title available on the PS Store. The objective is simple: protect your villagers from monsters by building towers out of trees along the field. Build air units to tear down flying enemies, and ground units to blow up the crawly critters. Towers eventually upgrade in a number of better areas (power, range, speed of attacks, etc.) by destroying enemies, through gems collected from dead enemies, or by the user dancing at the tower base. Your little guy runs around the map, collecting coins to build more towers and gems to research new towers and build them before more monsters come.

It’s an incredible amount of fun, and for some reason PJM feels better on the PSP than on the PS3. Maybe it’s due to the quick blasts of play (though levels usually last from 10-20 minutes apiece, and you will fail the first time) or the new camera that zooms in on your character, creating a bit more connection to the user with the little guy than on the PS3, which simply shows the whole map with no camera whatsoever.

For PS3 vets, this has a whole new island with two new towers (both of which add a significant amount of new strategy), new monsters (which are shuffled in the old islands and levels), all the content of the expansion pack (Encore), a new unlockable progression system (the fire tower, one that let me beat a ton of levels in the first island, is now locked away instead of readily available which significantly changes the dynamics of play in the first two dozen levels you’ll play), new unlockable content like themes and music, and finally a new infrastructure section that allows you to play online, a first for the PixelJunk series. It’s a shame the unlockable theme is a bit old as its missing a few new icons, creating question marks in their place and not looking all that great, but the other content is great and worth going for. I had a blast with this game, and I can’t recommend it enough for players who want a fresh challenge even if you played both Monster games… and believe me, this game is plenty challenging.

This game was purchased for review purposes.

What I liked:

• The leaderboard support. The game has both local and online leaderboards with PSN friends.
• The gimmicks for each table are different, i.e. playing golf or bowling.
• The “arcade” feel to the tables. Using tilt has a greater effect on the ball than in most games.
• The in-game achievements for each table.

What I disliked:

• Limited modes to view the tables while playing.
• The controls for “Tall Mode” seem off, tilting seems switched. No good way hold the PSP.
• There is a lot of flickering when going online to update scores.
• No in-game music while playing.

I wasn’t expecting much when I bought this game. I figured, “Hey a pinball game on PSP… yay.” I didn’t expect that I would become so addicted to “bowling” or “playing some golf”. I mostly think this has to do with how the ball moves on the table. It seems to be a little more controllable than in other pinball games. You can use the tilt to correct a shot so that you get a strike in bowling, or just to make sure you don’t lose the ball down the center. In other pinball games I feel that the tilt really never does much, and when it does you have locked your paddles by then. The in-game achievements brought me back to playing certain levels as well. I have been trying to bowl a perfect game in bowling now for a few days, no luck yet.

The game isn’t without its faults though. No really having any music while on the tables can be a drag. I mean there are a few clips from the games whenever you first load the table or launch a ball, but there is nothing that plays while you are actually playing. There are only two view modes in the game as well. Wide mode is what I used, but I wish it was zoomed out a little more. There is also Tall Mode, but in this mode the controls seemed off, tilting was reversed for some reason and I couldn’t really find a comfortable way to hold the PSP.

So if you are looking for a good game to play on your PSP be sure to check this out. Having the ability to check my scores versus my PSN friends will keep me coming back just so I can remain on top. With the amount of franchises Sony has, I am sure these four tables won’t be the last.

This game was purchased for review purposes.

What I liked:

• Nice to see a popular flash game getting a PSP revamp
• New content available for the PSP version

What I disliked:

• Horribly glitchy and unpolished
• Can be vague and hard to figure out at times
• Game wasn’t really fine tuned to work with what the PSP has to offer.

The objective is simple: you’re trapped in a room, and you must use components of the room to escape. Place items in your inventory (a key, music CD, etc.) and try to use them in certain objects or combine them and find your way out. Simple, and pretty fun to figure out, plus the PSP version would be nice to have for a quick blast of adventure, right?

No, it isn’t. Because this port is horribly unpolished and glitchy, and left a bad taste in my mouth. Unsure of what to do next, I pressed select (because select acts as the menu button instead of start, for some reason) and asked for a hint, which you’re only allowed to do once per day. The text wasn’t formatted for the hint box that appeared, resulting in black text sprawling off the box into the black background, and wasting my hint. Great.

At one point, in a seemingly random button combination (I assume), I accidentally unlocked the debug mode with a full grid, coordinates, code on the screen, everything. The game’s analog movement with the nub is pretty awful, as it moves too quickly around the screen. That can be frustrating when you’re trying to click on a tiny radio button, or clicking on every inch of a wall to search for a hidden panel. Easy enough to do with a mouse, but maddening to do with the analog nub. I do hope more popular flash games make the jump to PSP, but this game wasn’t quite ready for release.

This game was purchased for review purposes.

What I liked:

• A solid port of the PS3 version.
• Some of the control choices, i.e. how to spin the gold melter.
• The Impact game mode
• The game has online leaderboards and tracks a ton of stats.

What I disliked:

• The controls take a little getting used to if you are coming straight over from Super Stardust HD.
• I wish the camera was zoomed out a little further.
• I miss the ability to play my own music.
• Not having a friendslist to compare scores with.

I would pick this up solely for the new Impact mode. In Impact mode you gain speed by boosting through enemies and other objects while only having bombs. It can get really intense as it takes longer for you boost meter to charge. I thought that I would miss not having a second analong stick, but they did the best the could with the controls on a PSP. Having the ability to spin the gold melter by holding down all the buttons is a nice touch as well as tapping buttons to do a spread effect. The visuals are great and it is very polished, as you would expect from Housemarque. As a fan of the PS3 version — I got all the trophies — you can’t really go wrong with this game.

Click Here to purchase Super Stardust Portable from Amazon.com

This game was purchased for review purposes.

What I liked:

• The controls are easy to learn, which makes the gameplay more enjoyable.
• The visuals look much better on the smaller PSP screen.
• The amount of puzzles in Puzzle Mode is just right.
• The Time Trial mode is the perfect mode for “snack gaming”.

What I disliked:

• The time where you are allowed to chain could be a little longer.
• The replay system isn’t really useful because they can only be viewed in game.
• As we said in the PS3 review, the special blocks don’t really add much.
• There is no option to remove the subtitles.

If you want to pick up Numblast, I would most certainly reccommend the PSP version over the PS3 version. Time Trial is perfect if you only have a few minutes to play, and if your trip is a bit longer there is always Endless Mode. This type of puzzle game is more suited to a portable platform. Sure you will be losing the trophies and online leaderboards, but the game looks so much better on the smaller PSP screen and I always think portable when playing a puzzle game. For the price, it is one of the better puzzle games on the PSP.

This game was purchased for review purposes.