E3: Best in Show- Downloadable Delights, Bionic Commando Rearmed and Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved 2

For Best in Show, Tech-Gaming is highlighting all the outstanding games
shown at E3, 2008. For us, these are the must-play titles, that we had a hands-on
experience with, at the show.


Swedish developer GRIN seems to have given a retro game a near perfect high-def
make-over, with Bionic Commando: Rearmed.  Available for the Xbox Live Arcade and Playstation
Network, the game features a protagonist, who with a mechanical arm is able to
swing and elevate himself from platform to platform. This arm allowed the NES
version of the game to stand out among a plethora of run and gun side-scrollers,
letting the player perform sweeping gymnastic maneuvers around the more sedentary
enemies.

GRIN has been diligently faithful to the source material, from the
chirpy remixes of NES songs, reimagining of 8-bit graphics and fonts, and the recreation
of the game’s colorful levels. While we thought the swing mechanic was a
dead-on reproduction of the original game, Retronaut Jeremy Parish, told us
that it wasn’t quite exact. Still, after a few minutes of play, we were
swinging from edge to edge like we did twenty years ago.

Mutiplayer was handled especially capably. When both players are on-screen,
the camera assumes its default position. When one player begins to move further
away, the camera moves back, to show a wider angle of the action. If the gamers
separate even further, a split-screen is utilized to display the action, with
no effect on the game’s framerate.  

Overall BC:R has shaped up quite nicely; it’s readily apparent that a
lot of thought has gone into this recreation. We’ll be downloading this game
when it becomes available at the end of July for very reasonable price of ten
dollars. Let’s hope enough gamers purchase Bionic Commando: Rearmed to make Magic
Sword, Black Tiger
, and Ghosts and Goblins remakes feasible for GRIN and Capcom.

 
Geometry Wars 2: Retro Evolved 2
takes the masterful additions of the Wii’s
Geometry Wars: Galaxies, and integrates them into six new play types. Fans of
2005’s GW:RE will notice the addition of the multiplier system; when enemies are
destroyed they will leave yellow triangles that multiply the player score. This
adds a distinct risk/reward model to the game, as players are lured into dangerous
areas of the board, in hopes of increasing their scores.

Specially, GW:RE2 adds six play types to the gameplay model: Deadline,
Evolved, King, Waves, Sequence, and Pacifism.  King was one of our favorites; it this mode
circles appear on screen. Players can only shoot while inside one of the
temporary circles. Play favors clearing a section, then high-tailing it to the
next circle. Co-op play on this mode was an amazing experience, with gamers anxiously
yelling directions to one another.

Pacifism, on the other hand, turns normal Geometry Wars play on its
head. In this mode there is no shooting and no smart bombs, instead gamers try to
lure enemies through gates that explode when you fly through them. It’s particularly
satisfying to entice a large horde of adversaries through the gate, who then
explode just a moment before your impending death.

Xbox 360 owners will be able to enjoy Bizarre Creations latest work on
August 6th, for the price of ten dollars. The one downside of this is
that GW: RE2 will offer only local co-operative play, meaning you’ll have to
coordinate your attacks with friends beside you, not across the ‘net.

About Robert Allen

Since being a toddler, Robert Allen has been immersed in video games, anime, and tokusatsu. Currently, his days are spent teaching at two southern California colleges. But his evenings and weekends are filled with STGs, RPGs, and action titles and well at writing for Tech-Gaming since 2007.

50 comments

  1. Who the hell is Jeremy Parish, and why are you listening to him?

  2. There’s a lot of purple between those two screen shots. Purple is the new brown?

  3. Nice overview of DLC

  4. He’s 1up, retro games guy. Most would defer to him in the area of older games; he’s one of the experts in the industry and has his own podcast dedicated to older games- Retronauts.

  5. Is that M. Bison is the lower left of the Bionic Commando shot?

  6. I probably get both now.

  7. No real surprises here. I’ve been hearing BC is great for months now.

    and GW2 is expected to be great.

  8. Can’t wait for both of these!

  9. It’s a shame they took out all the Nazi stuff. It’s more fun to kill Nazis.

  10. Some of those new modes on GW sound cool. any change of DLC for new modes?

  11. No 1942 love?

  12. “Shmuppy wrote: No 1942 love?”

    No, since it was so close to release (it comes out this Wednesday, Capcom decided not to show it?

    “Tex wrote: Who the hell is Jeremy Parish, and why are you listening to him?”

    Jeremy was very cool and knowledgeable, and has played NES Bionic Commando more recently than me. Like Mike R stated, he’s the industry expert at all thing retro gaming. Although Chris Kohler from Game|Life is no slouch 😉

  13. Nice overview. Great E3 coverage here!

  14. tech-gaming makes me smart. I had to look up sedentary in the dictionary, ya bastards.

  15. No casual games here, thank G-D!

  16. BC:R for PS3 here I come!

  17. What about lesser known DLC games? Anything worth buying on that front?

  18. You should do an article: E3 – Best in Booth Babes

  19. Yeah, booth babes FTW!

    Seriously, sounds like two hot (pun intended) games for my 360.

  20. Wait, you played Bionic Commando when it first came out? How old are you Deserteagle? Damn!

  21. For DLC, I’m most excited for Castle Crashers for 360 and Fat Princess for PS3.

  22. $20 spent on these two, unless I win a 1600 point card from you guys!

  23. Am I the only one to not love Geometry Wars?

  24. Does anyone else think this is a step back for Bizarre? After the 60+ levels on Geometry Wars Galaxies, I’d like to see them move forward and offer at least 60+ levels with new game types.

  25. Now you mention it…

  26. listened to Retronauts…BORING!

  27. When does GW: RE2 come out?

  28. bah, GW:RE2 doesnt look very improved…

  29. When is GW coming out?

  30. Can’t wait for the new Bionic Commando!

  31. I’m really looking forward to Bionic Commando: Rearmed. I plan on buying it as soon as it’s released. Geometry Wars 2 looks great as well, but I won’t be able to play that unless they port it to the PC after a while like they did with the first one.

  32. Both sound better than falling on a bed of knives.

  33. I hope these are as good as you say. I buy Xbox Arcade titles and with the exception of Carcassone, never play then again after a week.

  34. Article sez August 6th!

  35. Keep the info coming

  36. He’s like 78. Give or take a couple of years. The sad thing is that occasionally when he plays Wii games, he falls down and breaks a hip.

  37. I am truly excited for Geometry Wars 2 😀

  38. Geometry Wars + 4 players = done deal.

  39. New Bionic Commando looks pretty good, hope they dont screw it up.

  40. The new Bionic Commando is looking pretty sweet. I’ll probably have to get it, considering I still have the original and it was one of my favorites.

  41. I would love to see Capcom do some remakes of some of the old MegaMan games, with updated graphics, kinda like Maverick Hunter X on the PSP.

  42. I’m really pumped about both of these titles, but more so for Geometry Wars 2. Seems like it’s everything the first game was and then a lot more.

  43. BC kind of reminds me of TF2 for some reason.

  44. i cant wait for bionic comando it looks great

  45. No love for Castle Crashers?

  46. If Bionic Commando is anything like the original, it will amazing. I remember beating that game when I was only 8 years old. That’s some serious hand-eye coordination there. Game was not easy. I wonder what the leaderboards will be like.

  47. Geometry Wars…Co-op….

    I can’t wait.

  48. I so want Geometry Wars…

  49. Before I read the article, I saw the screenshot and was like “hey, that looks like Bionic Commando!” One of my favorite games of the NES era, as my brother would play it all the time as I watched.