Aramation Games

Build-a-Lot is a casual game that aims to replicate the experience of flipping houses. You’re tasked with improving 8 neighborhoods by purchasing lots, building houses, upgrading them and selling them. Each stage has specific goals (such as a minimum rental income, number of specific house types…) which must be met before the time expires in order to move to the next stage. Campaign has 35 stages, and you can play in the “casual” mode which eliminates the time limit and specific conditions.

The gameplay is solid but gets repetitive pretty fast. There is a limited number of structures available which you must construct every stage if you want to meet the goals. Banks allow you to stop paying city taxes, workshops allow you to hire cheaper labor and inspect homes so they don’t break down, and sawmill makes it cheaper to by raw materials required to build new homes and structures.

In the end, if you’re looking for a simple diversion, this game is good enough for a few minutes. However it isn’t a real estate tycoon kind of game offering deep insights into the housing market, all the challenges of flipping houses or dealing with city zoning by-laws. Those are better left to real life and TV shows.

[Download demo and buy full version from BigFishGames]

Rating: 60%

There are plenty of puzzle games on Sony’s PSP and the latest puzzle compilation is actually a port of PS3 game called “Go! Puzzle” (go figure). It is actually misleading since there are 3 different puzzle games rolled into 1 package.

In Skyscraper, you must climb to the top of the building by clearing each floor. The way you do it is by navigating from left to right by stepping on the same colored tiles only. It is a timed event, so you must do this pretty fast or else start from the bottom of the building again. Swizzle Blocks task you with forming a square of 4 colored tiles to clear them. Occasionally, new blocks will be added from the left and from the right of the playing field, and you must rotate the tiles to clear them. Last game in the package is Aquatica where different colored mines drop from the top and you must form vertical or diagonal lines of 3 same colored mines to explode them.

Overall, there is nothing wrong with these games, but Go! Puzzle PSP doesn’t contain any new exciting additions to the puzzle games. These are just average games and you’ll be mildly entertained for the first few minutes. The only one with lasting value is Skyscraper as it involves a fair amount of strategy. If you want to clear blocks, I recommend you get Lumines or Lumines II instead.

Rating: 35%

Assassin’s Creed (PC)
Altair’s adventure in the times of the Crusades comes to PC with new mission types.

Ikaruga (X360)
Arcade and Dreamcast game Ikaruga features vertical shooting with white-black gameplay.

Other releases:

• Baroque (Wii)
• Overclocked: A History of Violence (PC)
• Plushee (DS)
• Sam & Max Episode 205: What’s New, Beelzebub? (PC)
• Summer Sports: Paradise Island (Wii)

Sony’s finally launching DUALSHOCK 3 controller in North America this week as they began shipping this last-gen controller to retailers. Set to retail for around $55, it is compatible with current listed games:

• SCEA - Formula One Championship Edition* (PS3)
• SCEA - MotorStorm* (PS3)
• SCEA - PAIN (PSN)
• SCEA - High Velocity Bowling (PSN)
• SCEA - MLB 08: The Show (PS3)
• SCEA - Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune (PS3)
• SCEA - Resistance: Fall of Man* (PS3)
• SCEA - Ratchet & Clank Future: Tools of Destruction (PS3)
• SCEA - Go! Sports Ski* (PSN)
• SCEA - Folklore* (PS3)
• SCEA - Heavenly Sword* (PS3)
• SCEA - Warhawk* (PSN / PS3)
• SCEA - Super Stardust HD* (PSN)
• SCEA - Snakeball (PSN)
• SCEA - Toy Home (PSN)
• SCEA - PSOne Emulation (PSN)
• SCEA - Piyotama (PSN)
• SCEA - PixelJunk Monsters (PSN)
• SCEA - Blast Factor* (PSN)
• Sega - Condemned 2: Bloodshot (PS3)
• Ubisoft - Lost: Via Domus (PS3)
• Ubisoft - Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six Vegas 2* (PS3)
• EA - Burnout Paradise (PS3)
• KOEI - Dynasty Warriors 6 (PS3)
• Capcom - Devil May Cry 4 (PS3)
• Atari - Dragon Ball Z Burst Limit (PS3)
• Disney Interactive - Turok (PS3)