GamesRadar - PC Features

2009's best under-the-radar games (Machinarium)

27/11/2009

It's a rare occurrence nowadays, but every once in a while, a game you’ve never even heard of comes along and absolutely blows you away. Sometimes it's a little indie gem that didn't get enough promotion. Other times, what appears to be a quick cash-in turns out to be an awesome game. ...

The Top 7… Things we hate about sports games (Madden NFL 07)

2/11/2009

Where are the flying cars? For years, our science fiction promised us that in the 21st century, we’d all be zipping around the country with speed and style in shiny hovering vehicles. Sadly, we all know how that turned out. It sure seems like we were made the same kinds of promises about our “next generation” of sports games too. ...

Top 10 cover athletes with criminal records (Madden NFL 2005)

10/07/2009

It seems that character matters little when it comes to deciding who will be the public face of your sports franchise. As a result, the history of sports games that have featured past, current, and future criminals on their covers is extensive. That is why we’ve picked ten cover athletes/criminals and ranked them in order of least-criminal to most-criminal. ...

Maelstrom - Explosive unit-by-unit reconnaissance (Maelstrom)

26/01/2007

Swirling together a post-apocalyptic worldwide conflict between the surviving "haves" and "have-nots" of Earth with some cranky alien squatters makes for a confusing mix of combatants. As every Real-time Strategy fan worth his weight in dirt-farming knows, the key to victory is a keen knowledge of his units and their abilities. Fortunately we're here to help by bringing you the skinny on the three warring factions of Maelstrom, the forthcoming terrain-altering RTS from KDV Games and ...

Same name, completely different game (Mafia II)

9/10/2009

We absolutely know that you've been waiting with eager anticipation for a feature to come along that catalogues examples of new games that share an identical name with an old game. It doesn't happen very often, so it's genuinely exciting when it does. Anyway, we've written that feature, and this is it. Direct all messages of thanks and amazement to the comments thread. K? Cheers.

Afrika | PS3 | 2009

The new Afrika: Is ...

20 MASSIVE games of early 2010 (Mafia II)

2/10/2009

Christmas '09 is cancelled, but early next year looks amazing. ...

GC 09: The five most hotly talked about games at Gamescom (Mafia II)

21/08/2009

At any games show there are always a handful of titles that are so impressive they fuel an excitable word-of-mouth buzz that rises above the raucous din of the showfloor. And things at Gamescom are no different. We've seen an absolute ass-load of games since we arrived, but we're only talking obsessively about a select few of them. And after chatting with other show-goers, it's pretty obvious which games have had the most impact and left a ...

GC 09: 23 reasons to be fired up for gamescom (Mafia II)

17/08/2009

Gamescom is unquestionably more low profile than E3’s explosive LA shindig. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t plenty of reasons to get pumped up for the upcoming event in Cologne. Hell, we can think of, oh, at least 23 examples why you should give a damn about the ‘European E3.’ And they all take the form of potentially amazing games. Below you’ll find a line-up of some of the most exciting titles due to ...

Mafia II: The Interview (Mafia II)

23/04/2008

We've covered Mafia II extensively over the last week, unveiling all sorts of exclusive new tidbits about the swank 1950s crime drama - but the real highlight was getting to chat with 2K Czech's Daniel Vavra, the game's writer and director, via e-mail. Vavra's script for the original Mafia: The City of Lost Heaven helped win the game critical acclaim and a cult following; with the sequel poised to dwarf it in size, scope and pretty much ...

Mafia II: Meet the goons (Mafia II)

11/04/2008

As we've pointed out ad nauseam in our coverage of Mafia II this week, the first Mafia set a high bar for storytelling in GTA-style crime games. Assuming it follows through on the standards set by its predecessor, Mafia II will likely be as much about the complex relationships between its deeply flawed criminal leads as it will be about shooting mooks in the face and blowing up storefronts.

To give you an idea of what you can expect from this 1940s-'50s mob drama, here's everything we know about the game's main characters so far: ...

Mafia: the story so far (Mafia II)

10/04/2008

Mafia opens in 1938, as gangster Thomas Angelo arrives at a little diner to meet with an Irish cop named Detective Norman. Tommy's come to Norman to ask for police protection for himself and his family, but Norman - abrasive and impatient - scoffs at the idea. Tommy insists that he doesn't expect something for nothing, and that what he knows can help bring down a notorious mob boss named Salieri. Norman, still skeptical, demands to hear the ...

8 games with disastrously botched rescue missions (Manhunt)

30/07/2009

Generally, the first rule when it comes to rescuing hostages is ‘don’t let everybody get horribly done in.’ But sadly, this proves too much of a stumbling block for many game heroes. Be it accidentally killing geriatrics with a killer virus or letting the damsel in distress get crushed by a cow, the following rescue missions all get botched. Spectacularly.

&# ...

Sequelise me (Manhunt)

2/10/2006

Monday 02 October 2006 Even the most unsellably weird games tend to spin off a sequel - or five - so putting our heads together to come up with a list of one-offs that deserve a reappearance was harder than we'd thought. Still, here are our 12 picks that either changed the gaming world too quietly for anyone to notice, had a heart of gold buried under a ton of faults, or are just plain teasing us by not going for that magic '2'. Manhunt PS2, Xbox, PC (2003/2004) It might be certifiable under ...

59 levels to play before you die: M - S (Marc Eckos Getting Up Contents Under Pressure)

21/03/2008

Bloc Party's song "Helicopter" can make anything amazing, but it didn't have to work too hard during the tram-ride sequence in Getting Up. Say what you will about the game, but frantically leaping between four aerial cable cars and shimmying around their edges to spray paint a single giant message - all while dodging machinegun fire and tossing riot cops - felt overwhelmingly badass the first time we did it. ...

Box art that got it all wrong (Marvel: Ultimate Alliance)

22/05/2008

Ah, the box art story. Ol' R'liable we like to call it, always good for a laugh and sure to inspire conversation about what makes cover art good, bad or legendarily awful. This time though, we're going a different route and focusing on covers that totally botch the simplest rule of box art - it should reflect the product cleanly and clearly. These poor examples couldn't even keep it together long enough to be regular old "bad box ...

Disney buys Marvel: who benefits? (Marvel Universe Online)

31/08/2009

Unless you were dead this morning, you’ve heard the news – Disney has bought Marvel Comics for four billion dollars. Cue the speculation machines and “lolz Spaderman vs Mickey moose” arguments, right? ...

The 10 most common game design mistakes (Mass Effect)

22/05/2009

Making games is hard. Making fun of them isn’t. It’s really, really easy, actually. Of course, we wouldn’t be so critical if we didn’t love them so damn much (and if we weren’t, you know, critics). We think games are just the bee’s knees, and that’s why we get so pissed about all the stupid crap they do ...

Games George Bush should play now he's got time on his hands (Mass Effect)

20/01/2009

So, today is the day when George Bush finally - finally - exits the White House. His eight year stint in the presidential hot seat will be remembered for many things. Most of them bad and with terrifyingly global ramifications. But GamesRadar isn't the place to pick apart George W Bush's political legacy. No. That's what the rest of the internets is for.

Instead, we mark the historic momentousness of today by cooking up some ...

"Mature" games that are actually mature (Mass Effect)

14/10/2008

Real world definition of "mature": Showing the mental, emotional, or physical characteristics associated with a fully developed person; involving serious thought. Videogame definition of "mature": Shits, tits and gibs. ...

The BioWare Technique (Mass Effect)

2/06/2008

If you love role-playing games, you love BioWare, a company set up in 1995 by industry legends (and medical doctors), Greg Zeschuk and Ray Muzyka. Consistently the greatest RPG creators for the past decade, they have developed an enviable list of triple-A titles including the Baldur’s Gate saga, Neverwinter Nights, Knights of the Old Republic and Jade Empire. They also created a gun-toting cigar-smoking dog with four arms in MDK2, but ...