No Money for Music: February 2 - 8, 2014

The first month of the year is behind us, and Google is done featuring upcoming artists by genre. This week is another Antenna Sampler with plenty of variety as well as music to celebrate Black History Month. For a consecutive week, Starbucks picked a song as a free download. For explanations of musical picks and more, check out the list after the break.

Jetpack Joyride Review

While keeping up with video game news I heard of this phone application called Flappy Bird. It was a free endless runner that got so popular that something made the creator take it down from the store. I didn’t bother downloading it, partly because I don’t play games on my phone too often, but also because I already had a similar game that cost nothing, was easy to learn with plenty of challenge available, and most importantly did it with style. It’s time to blast off with my positive review of Halfbrick’s runner Jetpack Joyride.

Crowdsourcing Picks: February 2 - 8, 2014

The weekly list lets me record projects worth backing, some local and some worth exploring. Kickstarter had a daily pick for renovating Doggie Diner statues, so I knew a little bit when I saw a newspaper article about them. Video Game High School is getting ready for a third season, opting for Indiegogo instead of Kickstarter for the previous two seasons. Support the arts with projects like localizing a Japanese animated movie, or support efforts to hack your car. See for yourself if you like any of these projects to back them.

Enslaved First Impressions

Before Naughty Dog and Sony Santa Monica released their action titles for the PlayStation 3, a studio in the United Kingdom brought an action game to the system. The title showed promise of what the developers at Ninja Theory were capable. I was pleased to hear that the next title from the company would be a multiplatform action adventure title based on an ancient Chinese epic. While the acting and story engaged me during the first few chapters I played, my experience with other action titles of this generation left me thinking that Enslaved: Odyssey to the West was a good but not great video game in its genre.

No Money for Music: Week of January 26, 2014

This week Google featured upcoming R&B artists in addition to its regular weekly picks. Beyond that, you could download singles from Lana Del Rey and Warpaint. Additionally if you didn’t like the iTunes pick from Vance Joy, you could get the new U2 single that was advertised during the big American football game. Check out all the songs featured on the following list.

Why I Stopped Playing Heavy Rain

Last week I mentioned how I eventually finish some games and that I want to see the whole game before giving it a fair chance. For some of the titles in my library I think I spent too much time playing them to write a First Impressions piece, but I have not finished it yet. For a few of these games, I deliberately put them down, thinking I would finish them later but never got back to them. For these video games, or “interactive drama” in this specific instance, I’m going to explain why I did that. Here are the reasons why I stopped playing Heavy Rain.

Crowdsourcing Picks: Week of January 26, 2014

Welcome back to another week of crowdsourcing picks. I should probably get these updates out earlier so that I don’t feel rushed trying to post updates limited to once per day and stagger the original content with the aggregates. The Maple Key Comics project led me to find several new artists to follow in the future. I even added in the La Mulana 2 Kickstarter project for backing an independent video game with a grand and challenging adventure. See the projects selected for yourself.

Ghost Trick First Impressions

In previous articles I mentioned how much I enjoy adventure games. I have beaten all of the Ace Attorney games that have been released in North America to this point. The creator of the series decided to work on something different after finishing the fourth Ace Attorney game. I spent some time playing that standalone adventure, and I would like to talk about the refreshing experience I got when playing Ghost Trick.

No Money for Music: January 19 - 25, 2014

Google continues to offer looks at what to expect in music for 2014. This week in addition to spotlighting Alt/Indie artists, Google gives away Grammy Award winners music both old and new. For more alternative music, iTunes offered a single from Bad Suns to download. Check some of this music out.