GamesRadar - PS2 Previews

Tales of the Abyss - hands on (Tales of the Abyss)

Sep 25, 2006

PlayStation 2 owners have it made when it comes to role-playing games. With Final Fantasy making regular appearances on the console, fans can just sit back and wait for the next big adventure to be delivered to them. This sheltered console life mirrors that of Luke, the pampered hero in Tales of the Abyss - his every whim has been tended to inside his uncle's castle, never needing to venture out and discover what else might be on the horizon. Once he does manage to break free of his comfort ...

Tales of the Abyss - first look (Tales of the Abyss)

Aug 15, 2006

The Tales series meant very little in the US until 2004's surprise hit Tales of Symphonia. It blended intense action, beautiful graphics and... well... a passable story into a lengthy adventure hundreds of thousands found well worth undertaking. Flash forward to earlier this year, and suddenly, things hit the status quo again. Tales of Legendia, which arrived on the PS2 in February, was kind of a mess - though it looked great, mediocrity seeped through every ...

Tales of the Abyss (Tales of the Abyss)

Feb 15, 2006

Sequelitis is endemic in Japanese RPGs, but the Tales of... series stands alone in its naming conventions - no numerals for this baby. Keeping a handle on Phantasia, Destiny, Eternia, Symphonia, Rebirth and Legendia only gets harder as Namco releases the latest PS2 game, Tales of the Abyss. Abyss' story quickly reveals its epic scope: a noble son, Luke, finds he is the holder of a rare power - the seventh Fonim (a sort of element) - just as war breaks out with a kingdom which had kidnapped him ...

Teen Titans (Teen Titans)

Mar 10, 2006

"Back in my day,” say the oldest of the old-school gamers, “all we had was the local arcade, and we loved it! We happily dropped 25 cents a game to get our asses handed to us." Those days of traveling places to play games are gone, but a property from about the same by-gone era, the recently revived Teen Titans comic book franchise, will try to bring the arcade-style button-masher glory days back. Just because it's an old idea, it isn't necessarily a bad one. In Teen Titans, you ...

Tekken 5 (Tekken 5)

Nov 18, 2004

Normally when GM gets hands-on with a preview, that's literally it, 'hands-on'. But when we went to see Tekken 5 we were more fingers, hands, legs and bums-on. You see Tekken 5 doesn't come on some tiny sliver of a silver circle; it arrives in the colossal arcade-shape of a sit-down, two-player, widescreen, wide-seated cabinet. Which did make it harder to lug back into the office without everyone wanting a go.But size isn't the only reason that Namco's named kicker counts as a big game - there ...

Tenchu Fatal Shadows (Tenchu: Fatal Shadows)

May 4, 2005

If you're sick to the core of watching grizzled old men in body-hugging wetsuits limp-wrist their way around oil rigs and military bases, you'll be glad to know that Fatal Shadows performs the hitherto unimaginable task of making stealth actually sexy.Firstly, there's a noticeable drop in the number of men involved this time around. Former Tenchu protagonist Rikimaru has been axed in favour of series mainstay Ayame and newcomer, Rin. They're both women, they're both incredibly 'well-rounded' ...

Thrillville (Thrillville)

Nov 6, 2006

Ever wanted to make your own amusement park? Yeah, neither have we. One only has to imagine all of the red tape, legalese, investment concerns, zoning issues, contract disputes, liability claims, piles of vomit everywhere... you might be dead before you get around to designing your first ...

Thrillville (Thrillville)

Nov 2, 2006

Thursday 2 November 2006 Back in the day, everything from murdering naked innocents (Rampage) to initiating incestuous affairs (Kissin' Kousins) was par for the course for young gamers and no one batted an eyelid. Alas, times have changed. These days children must feel like chastised tabloid targets just for seeking to do something as comparatively pedestrian as repeatedly driving over a virtual prostitute or policeman. The fact that many children hanker after adult-oriented games goes some ...

Thrillville - updated impressions (Thrillville)

Sep 26, 2006

There's really only one problem with monster-selling games like Rollercoaster Tycoon and Theme Park: they're no fun. Somehow, these micro-management games found a way to strip all the amusement out of amusement parks. Can Thrillville change it all? The simpler setup feels like a good start: You're the young relative of a theme park tycoon and he's thrilled that you're coming on board to help him run the place (and stop Globo-Joy from taking it over). You've got carte blanche to improve ...

Thrillville - impressions (Thrillville)

Aug 8, 2006

Theme-park simulators are nothing new, but Thrillville might be the first to mix roller-coaster building with third-person exploration, interactive conversations, first-person shooting and nearly every other conceivable gameplay style to date. Casting players as a kid who inherits a chain of crappy theme parks from a rich uncle, Thrillville tasks you with cleaning up your new playgrounds and building badass attractions to draw in guests. So, OK, that part is old hat. But once the guests are ...

Thrillville: Off the Rails - EXCLUSIVE first look (Thrillville: Off the Rails)

Jul 3, 2007

Chances are pretty good that you didn't play the original Thrillville last year... but a whole bunch of kids sure did. So many went for the ride, in fact, that the amusement park simulator is getting a sequel this October. Thrillville: Off the Rails embraces its youth appeal by pushing everything to be bigger, wilder, sillier, friendlier and, of course, barfier. As theme park tycoon Mortimer's trusted niece or nephew, you still hold the dream job of building, designing and test riding every ...

Tiger Woods PGA Tour 07 (Tiger Woods PGA Tour 07)

Jul 26, 2006

For many seasons, Tiger Woods PGA Tour has relied on an arcade-like feel that gave any player with functional thumbs a -15 handicap. Good news though - from what we saw at Electronic Arts' Summer Showcase, Tiger has shed his quirky strokes and come out swinging the hammer with a more simulation-based method of play. The control scheme has been simplified, taking what worked in the past and applying more realistic effects to make the whole experience come alive. In 07, the entire swing runs off ...

Tiger Woods PGA Tour 08 - hands-on (Tiger Woods PGA Tour 08)

Jul 27, 2007

Confidence. On Sundays, on the 18th green, staring down a birdie putt for the win, Tiger Woods has it. Sergio Garcia? Not so much. After Garcia missed a putt for the win at the 2007 British Open, he lost the ensuing playoff to Irishman Padraig Harrington, and left any confidence he had in a deep bunker somewhere on the back nine at Carnoustie. As confidence plays such an important role in the game of golf, it's about time EA included it in its upcoming Tiger Woods PGA Tour game. And so it ...

TimeSplitters: Future Perfect (Time Splitters: Future Perfect)

Jan 6, 2005

If this preview merely discussed the new TimeSplitters' Mapmaker it would fill you with joy, excitement and yearning. PC gamers have long been able to intensify their appreciation of a given game with editing tools and suites, but while a few console games have provided map editors there's been nothing to rival Future Perfect's suite of design tools. It's incredible.Of course, this is Free Radical's third version, but it now appears to be the real deal. Memory-saving fixes enable users to build ...

TimeSplitters: Future Perfect (Time Splitters: Future Perfect)

Nov 26, 2004

"Monkeys will be reappearing." That breaking news comes straight from the mouth of Free Radical's David Doak, who spotters may know better as the character Dr Doak from Nintendo 64 classic GoldenEye. Doak may not be making a cameo appearance in TimeSplitters: Future Perfect, but the return of gun-wielding chimps is just what the doctor ordered, and will be greeted with jubilation by fans of the series. Now in the hands of EA, and following the current trend away from the numbers, Future Perfect ...

TimeSplitters Future Perfect (Time Splitters: Future Perfect)

Sep 20, 2004

(9.4MB, MOV)A quick glance at the screenshots might lead you to one of three conclusions: a) TimeSplitters Future Perfect looks exactly the same as the last one, b) No, really, it looks a lot like the last one, and c) It'll still be quite good. And you'd be right on all three counts, except c) because TimeSplitters Future Perfect won't be quite good. It'll be brilliant. Having played it extensively at EA's swishy San Francisco HQ, we can pay Free Radical's adroitly amplified FPS no higher ...

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles hands-on (TMNT)

Jan 26, 2007

The Turtles are back, but Vanilla Ice isn't. That's probably for the best, to be honest. Anyway, to complement the new CGI-heavy Turtles film that's out this year, Ubisoft is resurrecting the pizza-eating dudes. Apparently the new film is a bit darker and edgier than previous Turtles fare (harking back to the original comics and role-playing game) and the game will reflect that. While we've yet to see just how "dark" and "edgy" this'll be, the way the game plays seems, so far, to be a little ...

TNA Impact! - updated hands on (TNA Impact!)

Apr 18, 2008

You’d be forgiven for taking one look at TNA Impact and thinking, “It’s wrestling. How different could it be from any other wrestling game?” After all, it is wrestling, and it is very similar in many ways to other grappling games - specifically THQ’s long-running WWE franchises. However, after spending some time with the latest version of the game in our hands, we discovered quite a bit more difference ...

TNA Impact - hands-on (TNA Impact!)

Oct 16, 2007

Oct 16, 2007 Lets face it, the WWE is essentially the evil empire of wrestling. Mr. McMahon and his genetic superfreaks will always stand atop the heap of sports entertainment destroying all comers like they did WCW and ECW. With an increasingly stale product and THQs SmackDown! franchise delivering the same thing year in and out, wrasslin fans need a savior. Start bracing for Impact - literally - because Midway is developing TNA Impact for the PS2, PS3, Xbox 360 and Wii, based off the ...

Tokobot Plus: Mysteries of the Karakuri (Tokobot Plus: Mysteries of the Karakuri)

Aug 9, 2006

Ever dream of having an army of small metallic buddies at your command? Chances are that you weren't imagining these minions to be cute, but that's exactly the angle that Tokobot Plus works. Tokobot Plus expands on its previous PSP incarnation as it makes the journey to the PS2 by bolting on new levels, more action and simpler controls. With a pile of babybots to manipulate, you jog the main character Bolt through some platforming levels in search of ...