First Impressions News, First Impressions Features

Shooting sinners with pinpoint precision

While we’re not quite finished with our BioShock: Infinite review yet, we figured that we’d bring you a few impressions of the title’s PlayStation Move controls to tide you over while you wait. Sony made a big deal out of the support during its E3 press conference in 2011, hauling creative director...

Cheery bye

Commander Shepard has walked a long and dangerous road – and with Mass Effect 3’s final DLC offering, Citadel, that road comes to a heartfelt and engaging end. What starts off as an opportunity to unwind and relax at the galaxy’s centre of operations takes us on a rather wild ride absolutely packed with cameos and in-jokes. The...

Bloody good

Consider Dawnguard’s arrival on PlayStation 3 a late Hallowe’en present from Bethesda. The latest The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim expansion is full of vampires, creepy rituals, spooky old castles, and a lot of violence. There’s also a lot of epic questing thrown in for good measure, too. Just like Dragonborn, there’s an awful...

Sitting beside the furnace

Hearthfire isn’t quite what you’d expect from a piece of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim DLC. This doesn't offer an epic journey into the heart of an unknown land – it’s about expanding your experience through lovey-dovey stuff like making you and your spouse a new residence from scratch, or adopting children. In...

Back to the brink

After more than a year without DLC, the PlayStation 3 version of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim finally gets some love from Bethesda. In this case, the latest Skyrim DLC to release on other platforms is the first on PS3 – and it’s arguably the best of the bunch. In an attempt to make up for the delay, Bethesda and Sony saw fit...

Firewall flattener

Sony’s sneaky Sly Cooper series has always enjoyed a wide array of mini-games. The emphasis certainly became more pronounced in later entries, with Sly 3: Honor Among Thieves dividing fans due to its hearty helping of side content. Sly Cooper: Thieves in Time – the fourth entry in the series – follows in its...

Second screen

LittleBigPlanet 2’s hotly anticipated cross-controller add-on launches later today in North America (tomorrow in Europe), and we’ve already been lucky enough to experience the content's first couple of stages. For those out of the loop, the $4.99/€4.99 expansion adds several new cross-controller levels to the PlayStation 3...

Write off

Given the affection PlayStation fans still have for Destruction Derby, it’s surprising no one’s attempted to recreate the smash-heavy vehicular formula on PS3. It may be late to the party, but DiRT Showdown is exactly that: a game that can’t be pitched without referencing Psygnosis’ 1995 hit, like its inspiration it’s hard to...

End of the line

Spec Ops: The Line owes a lot to the Uncharted series — and not just because Nolan North lends his voice to the game’s gruff protagonist Captain Martin Walker. The combat – which takes place from a third-person perspective – is hugely derivative of Nathan Drake’s series, as you meander between conveniently placed vehicles...

Cycle shattered

Well, it looks like SEGA got the abysmal message about Sonic the Hedgehog 4: Episode 1 and actually did something about it. We're happy to report that, based on our time with two zones of the game at PAX East, the long-awaited Sonic the Hedgehog 4: Episode 2 plays a lot closer to how our nostalgic hearts remember the series before...

Carnage

Twisted Metal is an important brand for PlayStation veterans. Many will have fond memories of weekends spent with turbo-charged cars and homing missiles, settling disputes between friends and family. It’s a franchise that, like WipEout and Gran Turismo, is an important part of PlayStation’s iconography. And if a short hands-on with Eat...

When Sony debuted Escape Plan at GamesCom last year, we were so infatuated with the game's Tim Burton-esque artstyle that we failed to pay attention to its actual gameplay

It was only when we attended a PlayStation Vita preview event at the tail-end of last year, that we really got a feel for the mechanics behind the Fun Bits Interactive developed...

MicroStorm

When you think MotorStorm you think big cars, off-road mayhem and more collisions than an engine can rev at. Peep in the direction of Evolution Studios’ PS Vita/PlayStation Network title, however, and something far different than expected can be found. Sure, there’s the occasional bump, and driving definitely takes place off-road...

Let’s get it started

Gaze upon the launch spread of PS Vita — WipEout 2048, Uncharted: Golden Abyss and those cheeky Little Deviants to name but a few — and it’s easy to overlook the system’s in-built software. Stop salivating over Nathan Drake for ten seconds, though, and flicking around Vita’s bubbly operating system uncovers a pile...

Wow-pEout

PS Vita’s launch line-up is crammed full of quality, yet WipEout 2048 looks to rocket past many of its competitors right out of the gate. Set before the other games in the franchise, 2048 takes fans back to the start of the anti-gravity racing league and gives SCE Studio Liverpool ample opportunity to experiment with its high-speed baby...

Floaty

The presence of Keiichiro Toyama, famous for his work on the Silent Hill and Siren franchises, is welcome in the launch window of PS Vita. Seemingly breaking away from his horror roots, Tomaya serves as creative director on Gravity Rush, a game that allows players to reject the rules of gravity itself in the palms of their hands. Kat awakes...

The latest tennis contender

The recent Grand Slam Tennis 2 demo on PlayStation Network supports PlayStation Move, so we got to grips with its motion controls to see how it shapes up. Ever since Sports Champions redefined motion controls with its table tennis mode, we’ve longed for a similarly accurate tennis game. Both Top Spin 4 and Virtua Tennis...

Skill based control has become a foundation of EA Sports' output this generation

Tiger Woods, Skate and Fight Night have all experimented with right analogue stick inputs, bringing a new level of fidelity to traditionally arcadey experiences. Grand Slam Tennis 2 mimics EA Sports' ambition, bringing a new level of shot precision to the game of tennis. Dubbed "Total Racquet Control" by a..

Hustle and flow

Hustle Kings knows it’s up against a tough crowd. Like the similarly styled Top Darts, it’s vying for attention against Uncharted: Golden Abyss and WipEout 2048 in the PlayStation Vita’s launch line-up. What chance does a pub game simulation have against such blockbuster names? At first glance, not a whole lot — but Hustle...