Now Playing – Kid Icarus: Uprising

Recently, my girlfriend got me Kid Icarus: Uprising for the Nintendo 3DS as a gift. Though I’m in the midst of preparing for Toryuken, I am trying to work this game into my rotation. Not sure where I am in relation to the total length of the single player, but I’m at Chapter 8 if you’re wondering where I’m at. Though I was expecting a good game, this one has kind of caught me off guard.

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Thoughts Going into Toryuken, Canada’s Next Big Fighting Game Tournament


In just a few days, Canada’s next big fighting game tournament touches down in Toronto. Toryuken is being run by the team at Toronto Top Tiers and I’m fairly certain it’s going to be hype. They were the same team behind T12 and overall, it was a great tournament and a great experience. I encourage everyone in the area to come down to body fools, support the FGC and get hype. If you can’t come down, make sure to tune into the live stream at www.twitch.tv/torontotoptiers.

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Trials Evolution Review


Trials HD took XBOX Live by storm when it first came out in 2009. Though it did not have the name recognition of the games it launched with as part of the Summer of Arcade promotion, Trials HD won gamers over in a big way thanks to its wildly addictive gameplay. To this day, Trials HD still stands as the best-selling XBOX Live Arcade game of all-time. Where was I during all of this? Not playing Trials HD. After reading the impressions and hearing people talk about it on podcasts, the game really didn’t sound like my thing. In particular, everyone focused on the game’s soul-crushing difficulty, which did not sound appealing to me at all. Instead of getting in on the action, I took in the horror stories from the community as assurance that I was doing the right thing by abstaining.

Not too long ago, Trials Evolution came out and I was originally set to ignore it just like I did its predecessor. However, after some thought, I figured that I should at least give the demo a shot, as the series has cemented itself within the current gaming zeitgeist. Instead of coming away from the demo with just a point of view, I found a new video game love.

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Game Design Talk: The Broken New Auto Block and Auto Tech Gems in Street Fighter X Tekken

Not too long ago, Capcom released a series of new gems for use with Street Fighter X Tekken. Though I’ve grown into being a gem-hater over the last few months, the original set of gems had little impact on the overall outcome of a match. However, I found out the hard way that the new set of auto block and auto tech gems are a much bigger deal. Why are they such a problem?

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Throwing Down on SRK Live

Ever since Shoryuken.com started running a 24/7 fighting game live stream, it’s been a goal of mine to dominate on the stream at least once. In the past, I’ve won a handful of games at best, and choked really bad at worst. The other day, however, I dished out some punishment. Playing Super Street Fighter IV: Arcade Edition Version 2012, I rattled off a 10-game winning streak to take my record to 10-0. Yes, that is me in the picture, capturing photographic evidence of this feat.

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Now Playing: Trials Evolution


Having never played a Trials game before, I approached this game with a great sense of fear. Though I’ve heard a ton of positive things about the series, the one point that has always deterred me from giving the series a chance is the game’s supposed difficulty. Based on how everyone talked about its difficulty, it really didn’t sound like an experience I’d be interested in.

Recently, I gave Trials Evolution a shot, just so that I could be a part of the current gaming community conversation. In hindsight, I’m kicking myself for not trying this series out sooner.

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King of Fighters-i 2012 Review


The first King of Fighters outing on iPhone was fantastic. It did an amazing job of translating the game into an iPhone-friendly experience with a simplified control scheme and some nice touches to the feature set. The only thing that put it a place below Street Fighter IV: Volt was its lack of online play.

SNK has addressed its main criticism with the release of The King of Fighters-i 2012, which is a brand new app and not an update to the previous game. If you haven’t played The King of Fighters on your iPhone before or already own The King of Fighters-i, is it worth the extra coin?

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Random Thoughts About the Relatively Early Days of Competitive Street Fighter X Tekken Play

Street Fighter X Tekken is just under two months old, which is not that old in the competitive fighting game scene. I’m still very much enjoying it. Hope you’re enjoying it too if you’ve been playing this game of late. Not really sure where I want to go with this post yet, but I just had a few thoughts about the early days of Street Fighter X Tekken that I wanted to capture somewhere. I’m just going to write off the top of my head and see where this goes.

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Marvel vs. Capcom 2 for iPhone and iPad Review


Marvel vs. Capcom 2 is one of the most beloved fighting games of all-time. Casual fans loved it for the over-the-top action between their favourite comic book and video game characters, while hardcore players made it the battleground for the most high-stakes money matches in the history of the genre. After conquering the arcades and consoles, Marvel vs. Capcom 2 is back; this time on your Apple iOS device of choice. Packing all of the characters and moves from the original, Capcom is hoping that you’ll take it for a ride one more time.

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Motorstorm: Apocalypse Review


Since the birth of the PS3, the Motorstorm series has been Sony’s go-to arcade racing franchise. Up until now, I haven’t played any of them. I must confess: I had no interest in giving the franchise a shot. I do like arcade racing games, but there wasn’t anything that grabbed me about Motorstorm, at least as someone on the outside looking in.

However, since Motorstorm: Apocalypse was included with the PlayStation 3D Display I picked up a few months ago, I figured I should at least give this a fair shake. Though I came into it fairly apathetically, did Motorstorm win me over in the end?

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