Edge 223 - Enero 2011

Hype

. L.A. Noire (360, PS3)
. Operation Flashpoint: Red River (360, PS3)
. Dirt 3 (360, PC, PS3)
. Dead Space 2 (360, PS3)
. Battlefield Play4Free (PC)
. Need For Speed: Shift 2 Unleashed (360, PC, PS3)
. Darkspore (PC)
. Rift: Planes of Telara (PC)
. Anomaly: Warzone Earth (iPhone, Mac, PC)
. YooStar 2 (360)
. Fight Night Champion (360, PS3)
. The Sims Medieval (Mac, PC)

Articles

. Uncharted 3 - Secrets & Lies (cover).
. Wish you were here? A new era for PC graphics.
. Credit Report - the state of modern arcades.
. An Audience With... Jonathan Blow & Chris Hecker.

Time Extended

. Guitar Hero

The Making Of...

. The X-Files

The EDGE Awards 2010

Best Game (mainstream)
. Super Mario Galaxy 2
. Rock Band 3
. Bayonetta

Best Game (indie)
. Minecraft
. Super Meat Boy
. Neptune's Pride

Best Visual Design
. Red Dead Redemption
. Bayonetta
. Limbo

Best Audio Design
. Red Dead Redemption
. Limbo
. Sid Meier's Civilization V

Best Online Experience
. StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty
. Halo: Reach
. Need For Speed Hot Pursuit

Best Developer
. Platinum Games
. Blizzard
. Harmonix Music Systems

Best Publisher
. Electronic Arts
. SEGA
. PopCap

Best Hardware
. iPhone
. Kinect
. Move

The Alternative EDGE Awards 2010

Most Unrelenting Violence
Kirby's Epic Yarn

Best Bugs
Fallout: New Vegas

Most Effective Tool For Ruining Friendships
Neptune's Pride

Most Aggravating Shopping Experience
Heavy Rain

Mightiest Flanks
Red Dead Redemption

Best Gateway Drug
Toy Story 3

Furriest Fur
Kinectimals

Slightest Return
APB

Wettest Game
Hydrophobia

Most Alternative Ego
Deadly Premonition

Most Transformative Update
Red Dead Redemption

Most People Saying "Fisher" Angrily
Splinter Cell: Conviction

Most Controllers Thrown at the TV
Demon's Souls

Most Poignant Reminder of Reality
Kinect

Most Excitable Commentator
Husky

Reviews

. Gran Turismo 5 - [7]

In spite of it's foibles, by sheer brute force of content and an overhauled physics engine Gran Turismo 5 fulfils it's primary objectives. It's a virtual matchbox collection, and much of the pleasure comes from shopping and tinkering, and then feeling the results as you push the car out on the circuit. But this is a production that feels increasingly aged in the face of modern game design. The creeping and eventually overriding feeling is that this meticulously precise simulation, and it's lovingly constructed catalogue of automotive history, deserved a little more game to come along for the ride

. Epic Mickey - [7]

An exhibit as much as a game and a skewed amble through animation history as much as an exercise in interactive storytelling, Epic Mickey may not always be entirely satisfying to play, but it's still enormously interesting to wander around with an eye open for the detailing.

. Call of Duty: Black Ops - [7]

As polished and pretty and fun as Black Ops often is, it feels more like a yearly update than a sequel, a new campaign with old multiplayer. The game isn't distinct from it's predecessors in any important way, and fatigue sets in quicker than before.

. Tron: Evolution - [5]

There is merit here which could have emerged after a longer gestation, but it's premature release has ensured that it's potential is largely de-rezzed.

. Splatterhouse - [5]

What we're left with is an update that is out of date, a re-imagining without enough imagination. To be this simplistic, the game needed a masterful melee system and a range of inspiring enemies; it tries, but it doesn't fully deliver on either count.

. Harry Potter & the Deathly Hallows Part 1 - [3]

It's hard to come away from this without a sense of persecution. It isn't just that it's a poor game, it's that it thinks it's good enough to survive on the coat-tails of it's licence - and that you won't have the wherewithal to discriminate.

. Dead Nation - [5]

The peerless control offered by the genre's move & shoot mechanics feels compromised by the grimy world, so while Dead Nation is still entirely playable, it feels trapped in a disappointing limbo.

. Golden Sun: Dark Dawn - [8]

An intelligent combat system, then, but one for which Camelot fails to find a suitable threat. Bar a few bosses, Dark Dawn is a pushover, never requiring you to brave the combat's depths.

. Hydroventure - [8]

While Hydroventure shares many of the long-standing criticisms of the Metroid series, it also shares most of it's strengths. The world is similarly intricately designed, granting a sense of satisfaction and progress and you slowly tame it by mastering your many powers.

. Ilomilo - [6]

While Ilomilo's calculated oddness may ultimately fall flat, it's most intelligent puzzles embrace three dimensions surprisingly well.

. Mario vs Donkey Kong: Miniland Mayhem - [7]

Despite a fiddly control scheme, in taking away direct control Miniland Mayhem has intensified the appeal to players' protective instinct which exists at the heart of the series.