As a zombie epidemic spreads through the streets, large barricades are quickly deployed to seal off the infected area of the city, and the result is two very different realities – one in which life appears to carry on, and another where the infected are eager to feast on your delicious brains. The ability to walk the safer of these two streets while still enjoying the mini-game distractions and other interactions Yakuza has to offer probably makes this deviation the videogame most in line with the political commentary of Romero’s Dawn of the Dead and more recent Land of the Dead.

Players will find themselves in Akiyama’s shoes as the outbreak begins, the chaos quickly engulfing the streets around Sky Finance while he works to keep his faithful assistant safe and absorb the events unfolding. After a brief bout of linear direction, Dead Souls cuts players loose to pursue the main narrative or slip into the infected areas of the city to tackle side-quests that involve clearing areas and rescuing survivors. This creates two zombie filled environments in the same setting, with players combating zombies while working toward a narrative goal, or using entry points to simply run around and fill the endless hordes full of lead.

While pursuing the story offers specific challenges with set amounts of zombies, the side-quest route ensures a steady supply that makes it harder to stop to catch a breath. Dead Souls isn’t subtle when it comes to adding fresh zombies by any stretch of the imagination – they will literally pour out of open windows, alleyways, and holes in the ceiling to keep you moving.

Tackling endless waves is made easier by a very loose and casual bit of gunplay that allows players to hold down a single shoulder button to fire freely at targets while running. Players can also hold their aim straight and steady while firing, tilting the analog stick up to attempt headshots. And occasionally it becomes necessary to target something with a reticule, though thankfully not very often because this proves the most sluggish method. The flow entirely encourages a run and gun approach that is broken only by the occasional arrival of tougher enemies that can move more quickly or hurl projectiles.

On the flipside, Dead Souls also offers a very rigid experience. The separation of the primary story from side-quests at times insists on players committing to one or the other based on how they enter the contaminated part of the city. The best example of this was early on while I was still playing as Akiyama, when the story direction necessitated reaching Sky Finance again – which I did, only to find that the way inside was blocked off by fire because I had entered the area via the side-quest route. The solution was to return to the unaffected area of the city and enter the contaminated zone the way the game intended, in order to hit the narrative points it had waiting along that route. I grasp why this is necessary, but it hurt my brain none-the-less.

The flipside to that complaint is that I was soon following Goro’s story and having too much fun with the narrative to worry about side-quests at all, though this did cost me some experience points, and leveling up characters is essential for bringing more items and skills to this zombie party.

Dead Souls certainly provides an easy invitation to those curious about the series, using the zombie lure while still providing the experience that will send some newcomers searching for earlier entries in the series. But in thinking about what the game brings to the zombie genre, I’m hard pressed for satisfying answers if you’re looking to primarily feast on the mechanics of dealing with the undead. The zombies are never really the focus here, rather flies to be swatted between points, with most boss encounters simply asking players to run circles around larger enemies while holding down the trigger.

Where Dead Rising was about killing zombies in ludicrous ways, Dead Souls is about clearing the path forward, aided by a sniping ability that helps target exploding objects – though I did find a front-end loader that provided a bit of fun running through the horde.

I’d like to suggest that Dead Souls is a far better story driven zombie game however, though that doesn’t seem like an overwhelming achievement given the pedigree of the zombie genre on average. What Dead Souls offers is a character driven story that can switch perspectives without losing a connection to the player, with charm, humor, and a superb level of voice-acting that perhaps makes the lure more filmic in nature, certainly allowing the strongest narrative elements of the franchise to shine.

As ridiculous as it sounds, Dead Souls offers a more realistic idea of the epidemic we’re so accustom to seeing in videogames, with a dramatically different pace that will best serve those willing to linger in the smaller details that create a convincingly complex world. For all the games that offer a plethora of ways to contend with the zombie apocalypse, Dead Souls’ narrative-minded focus and encouragement to explore and play as if nothing were out of the ordinary offers a legitimately different experience. If zombie-stomping is your core concern, your bloodlust will likely be better served elsewhere, but the way in which the undead provide a surreal layer of white-noise to the Yakuza experience is earnestly interesting and not simply the attention grabbing trickery it might appear to be.

But don’t take that to mean that I’m in a hurry to help rekindle the games as art you hang on the wall angle either.

Journey is simply an experience, and one that I wouldn’t have been able to understand had someone tried to explain it to me beforehand, which someone did. Chris Lepine was going to write about the game here, and has since crafted some fine words you can catch up with here, but the moment I read them I knew that this was a Journey I would have to make on my own in order to discover some sliver of understanding.

Since my desire to have the longest scarf possible seems rather vain however, I’m still left wanting for words to begin describing what I found.

I can tell you about sinking heavy footsteps into glistening sands, or floating ever higher to ascend a tower, or even sliding down hills while the camera bends to let the light of the sun break through ancient ruins.

I can tell you lots of things, but I can’t convince you of the feelings such a journey inspired within me.

Maybe I should tell you that I met eight different people along that journey. I know this because the game has told me so, and I can only take that on faith since every encounter with another person provides the same anonymous companion that shares my own likeness. Perhaps one companion is less eager to chirp back with the musical notes of expression I continually sought to communicate some primitive intentions with. Perhaps one companion remains close at hand rather than rushing off toward the mountain in the distance. The only time the difference of your companion stresses itself is when they rush off beyond your line of sight with little regard for your company, and even then I can’t help feeling happy to find them again.

The nameless stranger that lingers on my mind is the one that crossed the icy mountain path with me, taking shelter behind stone markers as strong winds threatened to thwart our advance, and huddling in the shadows while large beasts flew overhead. As we overcame these obstacles, the path forward began to vanish in the rising winds, and my feet became heavier with each step forward through the thickening snow.

What kept me pushing forward on the analog stick was my companion, slightly ahead and providing a beacon, a reason to continue pushing against the blinding storm.

I had imagined that Journey’s limitations on communication would leave me saying that the game is about the most earnest connection two people can share, that it cuts away all the things we think we know about each other.

But Journey cuts deeper than that, to the raw source of motivation and hope we find in others, to the fact that our existence on its own is not enough to necessitate that we continue for our own sake. Certainly we live for ourselves to project strength and obey the demands of our DNA, but beneath that skin, we always hope for others to connect and share the journey with, strangers that we’ll never really know, but who when you strip external constructions away, are perhaps exactly the same as us.

Those were the first words of wisdom another player offered to me as I started my multiplayer session of Shoot Many Robots. And I was admittedly feeling underdressed for the occasion as we waited for the stage to load, still wearing the standard clothing while others were thumbing their noses at the Tsars of fashion with all manner of ridiculous headgear, belts, and heavy weaponry.

If I’d never jumped online, I’d have likely missed the point entirely because from a disinterested distance, Shoot Many Robots seems to simply replace the tired zombies of other party shooters with chainsaw wielding mechanical fiends and trailer park humor. There’s certainly some awe in how many bloodthirsty robots can fill the screen, exploding with bursts of oil and scrap metal as you fill them with lead. But watching others rack up kills in the hundreds while I nabbed twenty or so left me certain I was doing it wrong, which I was.

Between stages players can access their inventory along with a store, where items discovered during play become available for purchase via exceedingly large amounts of bolts earned whilst crushing the robot uprising. And that is the point at which a game that visually resembles a 2D Borderlands taps the comparison far deeper to produce spiraling lists of weapons and equipment that opens a vortex of customization opportunities.

There’s plenty of work creation going on here, earning bolts to buy items that help you earn more bolts, marching on in the quest to unlock ever more ridiculous toys before returning to playgrounds that split between short stages and survival arenas. My scores improved dramatically when I returned with a cowboy hat and jetpack, holding my 110%-American machinegun – a primary weapon that offers unlimited firepower. There’s also a secondary ammo-conscious heavy hitter weapon – everything from rocket launchers to Gnoming missiles.

The results are delightfully ludicrous with a party of four, filling the screen with bullets and scrap metal as the waves of mechanized terror endlessly crowd the screen. Shoot Many Robots can’t escape the limited appeal these types of quick party shooters offer, but the vanity options and depth of experimentation raise the bar significantly, begging for plenty of time in finding the ideal balance of stat raising items and range versus power weapons. If you happened to be playing the game alone, the value falls of fairly quick – this is about joining others and arguing about the perfect tools for surviving the robocalypse after all. And while that emphasis isn’t necessarily at the top of my agenda, I’ll certainly tip my cowboy hat to a game in that vein that merits the ten dollar pricetag with an immense amount of toys to unlock and talk about.

Of course, you can give the demo for the full game a shot and let me know what you think.

[Being a bird of modest upbringing, Review Crow was initially put off by the title of this latest eShop release. For instance, Review Crow certainly doesn't go around insisting that humans refer to him as Awesome! Awesome! Review Crow, and he very well could given that such a statement is rooted in absolute fact.

However, after scratching up the touchpad for an afternoon, Review Crow feels that there is something to this minigolf business beyond silly outfits providing birds with brightly colored targets.]

Caw ca-caw, caw caw caw! Caw c-caw, caaaaw! Caw c-caw caaaw! C-caw caw caw caw, caw caw – caw, c-caaaaaw ca-caaw!

[Review Crow appreciates any game that takes into consideration the fact that he only has one talon free to use at a time. The touchpad is used to set the direction of a stroke, and pulling back the ball allows players to set the force of the swing as well as a small meter that influences the angle of strokes.

Review Crow feels that this simplicity should make the game easily accessible for all humans and perhaps even slow-witted Blue Jays.]

Caw! C-caw caw! Caaaw! Cawww! Caw c-caw caw caw! Caaaaw! Caw Caw; ca-caaw! Caw!

[Because Review Crow doesn't like to stay in any one spot for more than a few minutes, being able to slip in a quick nine holes is ideal. There are three locations for circuits, Asia, Europe and America, and trick shot stages where players can attempt to collect shiny coins with the least number of strokes.]

Caw caw, c-caw caw caw! Caw c-caw caw caw! Caw caaaaaaw! Caw c-caw caw; c-caw caw caw c-caw caw c-caw caaaw!

[Earning cash is essential to unlocking higher rated circuits and trick shot stages, as well as terrifically hideous clothing. Review Crow enjoys making human players look as ridiculous as possible, because humans are ridiculous and should be forced to acknowledge this while trudging through their grey, featherless world.]

Caw ca-caw, caw caw caw caaaaaaw! Caaaw! Caw caaaaaaw c-caw caaaw! Caw c-caw caw caaaaaw! C-caw caw! Caw c-caw – caw caw c-caw caaaw!

[Review Crow feels that the course designs are rather clever for something designed by humans, offering a mix of straightforward shots to always ensure some earnings, and also providing slopes and obstacles that require experimentation. However, Review Crow doesn't understand the difference between scoring an "eagle" and an "albatross" and feels that if humans spent time in a tree with either of those snobs they would not name good things after them - the obvious choice for all successful shots is "Crow".]

Caw caw, c-caw caw caw, caaaw! Caw ca-caw, caw caw caw caaaaaaw; c-caw caaaw! Caw, Caw caaaaw caw c-caw – caw c-caw caw caaaaaw!

[Review Crow is aware that you silly monkeys spend much of your day rushing around to earn colored paper and shiny coins while Review Crow laughs from his tree, but feels that trading $4.99 of it toward this portable minigolf quick-fix is a reasonable investment that should adequately entertain your easily distracted brains.]

Metal Gear Solid 3D sits alongside four other releases of the game – 3 on the PS2 and most recently within the Metal Gear Solid HD collection for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. With that in mind, it seems more sensible to sort out the good and the bad of this latest 3DS version rather than rambling on about one of the most narrative rich releases in gaming and sticking a number to it.

It might also help sort out whether you’re better off spending the equivalent of what the HD collection costs to get your mitts on only one of the titles that release offers, which presents a pretty tall hurdle from the outset.

The primary draw for Snake Eater 3D ownership is the chance to watch Metal Gear Solid 3’s generous helping of cinematic sequences in 3D.

Many of the long speeches and explanations that litter the game remain rather flat for the trouble, given that there simply isn’t a great deal of action involved in listening to men explain their plans and the history of the franchise. But Snake Eater heavily subscribes to the MGS school of thought that the most important part of forming a specialized military unit is recruiting several paranormal wierdos, which in turn offers plenty of sequences giving firearms a chance to push out from the screen while swarms of bees work to get in the player’s face.

Within the game proper, the 3D effect manages to make aging environments seem less flat, but there’s a consistently muddy feel that left me playing the game the old fashioned way and cranking up the 3D slider whenever cut-scenes took over. There’s also an awkward switch into first-person shooter mode that will give your eyes a jolt as the screen fights to keep projecting a 3D image while changing perspective.

Snake Eater 3D puts the 3DS’ touchscreen to use as a quick means for inventory management and for switching between auto-aim, first-person and third-person options for weapons. This provides easy access to camouflage and health screens, but given that you could always break from the game to manage items and weapons, there’s no real tactile advantage.

The slickest trick in Snake Eater 3D’s goody bag is using the 3DS camera to create camouflage patterns. Players can suspend the game to take new pictures, and trying to find ridiculous patterns was a worthy distraction as well as a tactile advantage with the chance to blend into any environment based on the ability to find similar colors in the real world.

To balance out the good of that addition, Snake Eater also challenges players to physically use the 3DS tilt sensors to keep balance over tree branches and bridges, a task I feel is utterly ridiculous in a game where one is trying to keep all eyes on the screen to avoid detection.

While many seem to favor the 60fps HD version, I’m going to insist that the smaller scale of the 3DS’ screen makes this old warhorse look a lot better versus an HD revisit that couldn’t entirely hope to hide the age of the game. On a portable system, Snake Eater manages to hide its years more successfully while also adding to the ambiance of jungle creatures and sounds.

That last observation likely owes plenty to the way I squished the portable near to my face, and leaves me feeling that the major draw here is for fans that want to be able to take Snake Eater anywhere and/or simply curl up under the covers with the game. It’s worth mentioning that the smaller screen requires sharper eyes to spot hazards in the jungle such as trip wires, mines, and the never ending supply of soldiers, which really makes the HD version more functional and less frustrating in the end.

Players not in possession of the Circle Pad Pro can use the single analog pad and the direction buttons to move and readjust perspective simultaneously, which makes Snake Eater 3D similar to Peace Walker on the PlayStation Portable as far as basic controls. Using a Circle Pad Pro frees up the face buttons however, which makes reloading weapons, climbing trees, and aiming at enemies far less frustrating.

It’s worth mentioning Peace Walker as an example of a Metal Gear Solid title that was created to provide a portable experience, delivering a full game in the series via pockets of play that fit a handheld. Snake Eater 3D is a game revisited to take advantage of the 3DS, but certainly not designed to fit it in the way Resident Evil Revelations recently has – I can’t imagine playing a quick round of this on the bus for instance. Battery charge time can become a major issue given how long players can linger before reaching a crucial boss encounter, suddenly forced to find an outlet or break for a recharge. This isn’t a deal breaker, but certainly something to keep in mind while watching cut-scenes and crawling through the jungle.

I can’t escape the feeling that newcomers would be better served by the HD collection released during the Holidays last year. Snake Eater 3D doesn’t offer the revolution some might have imagined when the title was originally announced, it simply delivers a portable version of a fan favorite with Yoshi toys scattered throughout the game – which make a delightfully familiar sound when shot.

What Konami really serves up here is an intimate means of revisiting a favorite entry in the series with a few bells that don’t do much in the way of whistling, and as much as I enjoy any chance to tango with the Cobras again, I’m hard pressed to recommend paying the price of admission here.

The way these two characters talk about the zombie apocalypse being a heavy metal dream come true, I was fully expecting this point and click adventure game to contrarily be a sobering tale of how such an incident is not cool at all, and is the last situation that anybody would realistically want to endure.

In a way, Metal Dead does defy romanticizing the idea of being one of the few human survivors among hordes of the living dead, but in a much zanier way than expected.

Metal Dead’s graphics are a notch or two above MS Paint quality, but that being said, there is still a strong sense of composition and variety put into the game’s building full of zombie-ravaged rooms, each of which is meticulously decorated with debris or half-fallen apart zombies. The whole game gives off the feeling that this was a deliberate, albeit low-tech aesthetic choice, one which pays off in the long run.

The soundtrack matches the low-tech visual design, composed of a variety of MIDI tunes that should resonate with anybody who owned a computer during the mid-90s. There is no audio to accompany the game’s dialogue, but the characters, free of obligation to have all of their lines spoken aloud, have a lot more to say. Considering the wildly exaggerated accents that some of the characters have, it might have gotten a bit off-putting if the player could actually hear these characters talking all of the time.

Another sign of this game’s robust quantity of dialogue is that Malcom, the game’s protagonist, seems to have something clever (or at the very least, different) to say whenever the player attempts to use a command when it is not appropriate. Admittedly this is almost always necessary in adventure games, especially to someone such as yours truly, who kind of sucks at them.

The dialogue is amusing in its own overly graphic manner – bear in mind that the rooms are caked in varying degrees of dead body parts, something that our hero is always quick to give some verbal notice to. If there was one complaint that I could hold against Metal Dead’s dialogue however, it would be that the text that appears over characters has a nasty tendency to blend into the background at times.

Gameplay is handled in a traditional way for point and click adventure games. Players have five basic commands that can be triggered by a click of the mouse: looking at an object, walking to a point, talking to a person, interacting with an object, or using a selected item from your inventory. Each of these five commands, oblivious to context, must be selected either by a menu that slides out from the top of the screen or by right clicking to cycle through the commands, which gets somewhat cumbersome.

Call me lazy, but I think that giving the clicks the gift of context would do wonders for Metal Dead’s occasional clunkiness; for example, when I walk to a door, it should be implied that I want to open said door and go into the room behind it. Having two different “go to” cursors depending on whether or not the passageway has a door in front of it is rather counterintuitive. This is by no means a game-breaker, but in these reviews, I usually have some trivial aspect that I have to harp on, and this is the one that stuck out the most.

With minimal exception, Metal Dead’s puzzles are moderately challenging, but if stuck, Malcom can seek counsel from his friend-turned-disembodied zombie head that he keeps in his pocket. I want to say it reminds me of Nick, the head from the upcoming zombie-themed action game Lollipop Chainsaw, but it seems a bit unfair to compare aspects of this game to one that isn’t even out yet just because I heard of the latter game first.

However, not unlike the already existing Blackwell series of adventure games, advice can only be given by the protagonist’s dead partner when nobody else is around, either because people will freak out if they see somebody talking to a dead guy, or because getting hints is a shameful act that should be done in privacy; you can’t just whip it out in front of everybody, after all.

Once you shake the notion of this being a survival horror game, something which should be obvious to you by the time you get a couple of hours in and realize that none of the zombies ever attack you, what you get in Metal Dead is a well-crafted comedic adventure. Despite the title, Metal Dead isn’t so much about the zombies and music as much as it is about the puzzles and laughs, and there’s nothing wrong with that.

*Metal Dead was created by Walk Thru Walls Studios, a two-man independent developer based in Brisbane. You can find more information about the game via their website by clicking here.

An infrared transceiver at the back of the device uses science and magic to silently detect the connection, which the 3DS makes no mention of until Resident Evil: Revelations loads and acknowledges the situation by offering to enable control style-D. As expected, this control option allows players to tackle Revelations as if they were using the dual analog controls offered by the PS3 and/or Xbox 360.

Guiding Jill through the derelict cruise ship with the Circle Pad Pro offered two observations.

The first is that the Circle Pad Pro makes the first-person option of moving with the gun drawn within Revelations more noticeable. While that mode can be used in the standard controls with style-C, it would be easy to miss it entirely if you just started the game without digging into the matter more. With the Circle Pad Pro, pressing the left trigger throws you into FPS mode, making the option much more pronounced. Style-D also places the weapons at the ready, with the right trigger firing guns, and the right shoulder button activating the secondary weapon.

This really can’t be called a better way to play, simply a different way. But while bouncing around more in FPS mode as a result, my second observation was that the added heft of the circle pad offers my hands a better means of grasping the 3DS for long periods without feeling my hands cramp. However, I’m not going to tell you that using the 3DS has been morphing my hands into claws, which I might often say about the PSP. The Circle Pad simply offers a more comfortable means for me to hold the device during lengthier gaming sessions.

Whether or not you need the Circle Pad Pro is one of those personal questions I can’t answer for you – it’s a bit like recommending a pair of pants, one size isn’t going to fit all here. I can only say that handling one made it unlikely that I’d go without one, which I’d also have said about the Classic Controller Pro for the Wii. So if you don’t want to buy one, make sure your hands never come into contact with it.

If you’ve been longing for dual-analog controls, and are aware that only games made to support the device will work with it, the Circle Pad Pro will be exclusively sold through EB Games / GameStop beginning on February 7th for $19.99.

Nintendo’s booklet says the battery you insert into the Circle Pad Pro is good for 480 hours – I’m going to have to take their word on that at the moment.

Today the game hit Xbox LIVE Arcade for 800 Microsoft Points, and will appear on the PlayStation Network next week for $9.99 – or free to PlayStation Plus subscribers on that platform. Like last year’s release of X-Men Arcade, The Simpsons Arcade game was what I often longed for on home consoles, rather than the infuriating adventure games we got instead.

The Simpsons allows up to four players to join the game locally or online, as well as offering both the North American and Japanese versions of the ROM. This port of the arcade classic also lightly stirs the play-mode options, offering a setting that challenges players to complete the game with a single life – and I salute anyone who can accomplish such a feat.

The Simpsons is as mercilessly brutal at devouring your lunch money as any of Konami’s old arcade creations, perhaps the most hungry of them all. However, since the game provides a free-play mode that ensures anyone can see the ending, we don’t really need to get hung up on the difficulty here.

What deserves a few more words is how visually interesting the game is, proving equally important historically, along with providing a delightful nostalgia trip that has me thinking back to the first time I saw the four-player cabinet back in an era when arcades still existed in abundance.

Much like the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, unique attacks, subtle character animations, and background action brings a richer sense of life to the title. But the level of detail within The Simpsons represents a real peak in creating a game as animated as the source material.

Supporting characters continually appear with health regenerating food and temporary weapons, and the game exploits any chance to squeeze out references to the show while traveling from the streets of Springfield to the Nuclear Plant, including an appearance by Matt Groening’s signature rabbit. But the game also takes interesting liberties, creating a dream sequence where players fight curious donut enemies or a graveyard full of zombies, neither of which feel out of place within the eight stage trip.

There’s also an immense spirit of curiosity, providing players with a myriad of objects that can be picked-up and hurled at enemies – from soda cans to the family dog. The end of two different stages even feature a mini-game where players compete for points by mashing the buttons repeatedly to either fill a balloon with air or slap their own character’s face to wake them up.

It’s an expectedly short trip that asks you to bash on bosses like all Konami beat ‘em-ups of course, but as much as I prefer the X-Men and TMNT licenses, this just might be the more interesting dose of nostalgia from that era for all the extra trouble the game goes to in creating curious bits of interaction in both the background and foreground – whether you’re shaking a tree for apples or getting hit by a swinging door from a storefront.

If you have no memories of the arcades and/or have never found other means to sample the title, it would be easy to imagine that the game simply pasted The Simpsons franchise over an existing framework, and that isn’t entirely a false assumption. But that framework provides the foundation for a game that devours the source material and emerges with an experience still worth revisiting, even after all these years. And despite what the screenshots suggest, you can play the game without tacky borders.

Within the videogame medium, ghosts have an equally dickish reputation, from the boards of Pac-Man to the haunted houses of Super Mario Bros. But this weekend I had a chance to catch up with perhaps the worst yet via The Hidden, which released for the 3DS back in November.

The augmented reality game asks players to walk around areas in the real world while the 3DS camera is used to layer blob-like phantoms on the screen – the game seems hesitant to call these creatures ghosts, but they fit the ghostly bill. The player’s task is to scan and destroy these creatures, which will have you spinning around as if grabbed by a seizure as these ghosts quickly twitch out of your field of vision while throwing some form of ectoplasm excrement at you. The player must somehow meet the challenge of calmly readjusting their perspective to keep these critters on screen without throwing the 3DS into the nearest ditch.

The game is hilariously terrible, perhaps the champion of such pursuits on the handheld to date – one of those interesting ideas that has no room to evolve beyond the “hey isn’t this neat for five minutes” factor.

The real long-term humor stems from the game stressing players be mindful of their surroundings, but at the same time making it necessary to visit new Wi-Fi areas to discover more ghosts and progress the game. The Hidden absolutely encourages players to find new destinations in which to play, and thereby look like a complete ass in public, which is just a little bit wonderful despite the awful act of playing the game.

If you still owe any of your frenemy’s an xmas gift, this might just be the ticket.

Clutching the 3DS and lurching forward through the ship is a very intimate experience, bringing back unnerving sensations and a slower pace of traditional horror the mainline series has largely moved away from in the pursuit of high-grade action. Entering a dining hall where food is rotting on tables and a strange vapor hugs the floor finds me several shades hesitant about the prospect of moving forward any further, and it’s rather terrific being gripped by that feeling of apprehension again.

The demo offers a very short taste, allowing space for players to dispatch a few monstrous biohazards of varying size and stamina before reuniting Jill with her partner and triggering the ending cinematic cliffhanger that leaves us all waiting for the game’s release on February 7th. For some reason that escapes me, Capcom has limited the number of times you can load the demo to thirty. Dying doesn’t count toward that count if you don’t exit back to the home screen, which is good, because despite the low enemy count I died quite a few times along the way.

Thankfully, my repeated deaths owed no blame to the controls, which work rather spectacularly with a single analog pad – we’ll have to wait a little longer to see what difference two can make. But in the meantime, Capcom’s solution should serve you well – pushing forward or backward on the analog pad to move through the ship and pressing the same pad on an angle to readjust your perspective.

On the chance you haven’t previously read about the game, Revelations still abides by the stop and aim approach to weapon use the series is known for. Aside from some initial hesitation, I found the single analog movement very functional, and didn’t catch myself moaning the absence of a second pad just yet.

Revelations offers quick and convenient access through the controls, using the d-pad to switch weapons and face buttons to use secondary weapons like the knife or grenades as well as life saving herbs. The touchpad allows access to inventory management, as well as the supply scanner picked up along the way, which allows players to search the area for hidden supplies.

The difficulty came purely from claustrophobic rooms, where three enemies within a tight space required quick thinking, in so much as you need to toss a grenade and lay down some shotgun shells before said biohazards get the jump on you – and even then you can rapidly tap Y to try for a second chance at survival should one of them pin Jill down.

If you’ve ever been a fan of the earlier entries in the series, it’s definitely worth booking some passage with Revelation’s demo. The atmosphere alone justifies checking it out while we wait to see how the full release comes together in February.