Warhammer 40k Space Marine is different; the game throws out most of the slow paced conventions fans will be used to and lays itself neatly into the action category. Don’t go thinking this will be a change for the worse, instead imagine you’ve been magically whisked down onto the game-board just like in that Robin Williams movie; Jumanji, You’re no longer hovering over an army of nicely painted plastic figurines. You are one of those figurines and down here this is real, there’s no rolling of dice or taking turns – this is war baby.
Imagine you are the geeky looking wizard Harry Potter for a moment. You’ve just got back to your dorm room after watching Hermione Granger take a shower, she wasn’t aware you were spying of course (thanks to your father’s handy cloak of invisibility). Well earlier you had agreed to go scrumping with that git Ron Weasley but now you just fancy a night in with your PlayStation 3, and who could blame you?
The problem is you don’t have anything decent to play because that old git Professor Dumbledore has forbidden anyone to play first person shooters since the Hogwarts massacre of 2003. What’s worse is that you can’t even play online because Hogwarts still hasn’t got broadband access, damn BT and their unwillingness to roll out copper in imaginary rural areas.
So you decide to make your own game by mixing together a few things in your cauldron. First you throw in a few building blocks that have been laying around the place; following that up with the stash of LSD that you’d been saving for the prom. After letting the mixture bubble for a while your attention is drawn to your roommates music collection; it’s all mostly new age crap but he does have Moby’s 2008 album ‘Last Night’ still sealed in cellophane. Without hesitation you unwrap the shiny plastic disc and drop it into the mixture. Twenty minutes or so later the concoction is ready and a new game is born - that game is Super Chime Deluxe for PS3 and here is the review.
There is almost no doubt in my mind that last year you missed a rather unique game called Chime which was released on XBox Live Marketplace and Steam. In short Chime was an addictive musical puzzle game that looked a bit like Tetris and sounded like a steamy naked yoga session with Carol Vorderman. Well this time around PlayStation 3 owners have no excuse to gloss over the game because it has been re-released with a brand new name; Chime Super Deluxe, an exclusive multiplayer mode and even a handful of additional new tunes.
So what is the game actually about? Well it’s funny you ask because I just went to the official website of the game to find out and here’s what it says: Place blocks, build quads, get coverage, make music. In other words; you need to place Pentomino blocks onto a grid to create solid shapes consisting of four or more pieces. This is building a quad, and to beat the stage, you need to fill the whole thing with quads which is a lot harder than you might think. Why? Well if you don’t make perfect quads with your shapes then any left over pieces remain on the board, this potentially can help you make new quads but invariably they’ll actually just get in your way until they eventually disappear. I said 'quads' a lot of times there didn't I?
What has this got to do with making music then? The clever part is that the game board isn’t just a board, it’s a musical instrument of sorts. All the while you mess around with the blocks a peaceful music track is playing gently in the background - as you place blocks onto the grid you are also adding notes seamlessly into the backing music. What I love about this is that you are effectively creating a brand new remix of each song every time you play. With random block sequencing it means the chances of you playing the same board in exactly the same way are very remote indeed, if not impossible.
Here are just a few of the songs you can expect to hear in the game:
Tender Hooks by Plaid
Play With You by Jorden Milnes
Brazil by Philp Glass
Ooh Yeah by Moby
Sympathy by Joe Hogan
In reality it doesn’t matter how good the music is (but yes it is very good) because making the remix doesn’t really do anything except vary things up for your ears - the actual block play is where everything really happens. The idea of the game is to completely fill the game board but doing so within 3, 6 or 9 minutes is damn tricky.
Thankfully, they’ve made things a tad easier; to unlock the next game board you only need to cover at least cover 50% of the grid - of course you won’t be getting any highscores that way but at least you’ll not be stuck on the same board each time. Oh did I mention that each board gets progressively harder to fill because the shape changes? No, well I have now!
Chime Super Deluxe is a nice looking puzzle game with bright crisp HD visuals and a great selection of backing tunes. It will never replace Tetris, but is much better suited for chilling after a stressful day at work. If though, you do want some frantic fun, and you have some extra Dual Shock controllers handy, then why not invite your mates around to play with you? The Co-Op and Versus modes ramp things up significantly and I can predict a few raised voices bellowing in anger when someones quad has been stolen.
Sadly it is my job to inform you that there is no online play over PSN. Yup - I know it’s a ruddy great shame because CSD would be very suited to it. Don’t ask me why it’s not there because I don’t know!
Chime Super Deluxe scores 8 out of 10 and is available for €9.99/£7.19 on the PlayStation Network Store.
I thought it was strange that we had a brand new Goldeneye game last month for the Nintendo Wii. I can quite understand if James Bond Blood Stone for PS3 is equally confusing. Not only have Activision re-imagined the N64 classic thirteen years after the original; they’ve also gone and released a totally new and original Bond game for the HD consoles starring Daniel Craig.
Keeping fish as a past time is typically considered more of a hobby rather than the lifestyle change of keeping a pet Dog or Cat. I suppose the main reason for this is that rather than having access to your whole home, Fish are enclosed in a small area and don’t create too much mess. Of course keeping Fish isn’t actually as simple as you’d think; to keep your Fish healthy and happy they’ll need a good amount of space as well as a clean environment. Keeping Fish in a tank without a filter and regular water changing will result in dirty water and unhealthy fish. Doesn’t it just make sense to avoid all that hassle and risk killing innocent fish when you could just enjoy the beauty of your Fish on your television screen with My Aquarium for PlayStation 3?
My Aquarium from Hudson Software originally appeared on the Nintendo WiiWare store and was popular enough to spawn a recent sequel. Now PS3 owners can experience the fun of keeping virtual Fish in High Definition because My Aquarium is now available on the PSN store.
Upon first booting My Aquarium you’ll be taken through the basics of introducing Fish into your first small tank and then if you fancy, you can individually name your Fish. After that very basic tutorial you’re then left pretty much to your own devices and with plenty of things to do.
At any time you can add or remove fish to your current tank up to the specified capacity. Small tanks obviously hold fewer fish than larger tanks. You can also customise the tank with plants, rocks, coral and other silly features such as a novelty Halloween pumpkin or a ship wreck. More advanced features such as the type of gravel, lighting and glass are very customisable too for those pros who know exactly what they’re doing. Of course I should mention that you’ll also need to feed your Fish and Plants regularly, this is simply done by choosing the food icon and using the analogue stick to move a food container around and clicking your X button.
Now people have called My Aquarium nothing more than a screensaver which I feel is a trifle unfair, yes it’s true that for the most part there isn’t much to do except watch the Fish swim around or just float there. Hudson have tried to keep your attention by not giving you everything up front, just like a typical PlayStation game with rewards, you unlock new Fish, new Plants and New objects the more you play.
As I mentioned previously, the graphics are High Definition and look very pretty indeed. I don’t want to go on record and say that this is the best looking Fish tank simulator in the world because it probably isn’t. The fish are colourful and well animated but won’t quite fool anyone but a small child into thinking they’re truly real. In game special effects are limited to water ripples, air bubbles and underwater lighting – they all do the trick and look good. Watching the Fish swim around is relaxing but for those that need a little extra chilling can enable the rich library of Classical background music that comes with the game, or if you prefer, any music stored on your PS3 hard drive.
A video of my very own Aquarium uploaded to YouTube.
Initially you have around 12 fish in your catalogue but this soon increases after every few days you play until you have a total of over 40 different fish. With such a pretty collection of fish it’s fortunate that you can have run multiple Aquariums at the same time, this mean that you do not have to constantly swap Fish in and out to see all the species you have unlocked. Those who like to can even take in-game screenshots of all your Aquariums to use as your PS3 wallpaper and even record a video that can be directly uploaded to YouTube.
Despite Hudson’s best efforts My Aquarium is not a game and gamers will probably not enjoy the subtle experience offered here, those who already are fish lovers are perhaps the only ones who will truly enjoy the benefit of keeping virtual fish. Downloadable content packs containing more Fish will be available shortly so don’t worry about not having enough variety.
My Aquarium for PS3 looks good, sounds good but will really be of long term interest to those who take an interest in the subject already. 6 out of 10.
Tuesday, September 27, 2011 at 3:48 PM 
Warhammer 40k Space Marine is different; the game throws out most of the slow paced conventions fans will be used to and lays itself neatly into the action category. Don’t go thinking this will be a change for the worse, instead imagine you’ve been magically whisked down onto the game-board just like in that Robin Williams movie; Jumanji, You’re no longer hovering over an army of nicely painted plastic figurines. You are one of those figurines and down here this is real, there’s no rolling of dice or taking turns – this is war baby.
