mrglass

Games of the Month (tie):
NBA Street Vol. 2
Splinter Cell

PS2:
Amplitude: 7.5, 8.0, 7.0
MLB Slugfest 2004: 8.0, 7.0, 6.5
MVP Baseball 2003: 7.0, 8.5, 7.5
Clock Tower 3: 7.5, 6.5, 6.0
Dynasty Warriors 4: 7.5, 7.0, 8.5
NBA Street Vol. 2: 9.5, 8.5, 8.5 (silver award)
Splinter Cell: 9.0, 8.5, 9.0 (silver award)
Zone of the Enders: The 2nd Runner: 7.5, 9.0, 8.5 (silver award)
Primal: 6.5, 6.5, 8.0


Gamecube:
Army Men: Sarge's War: 4.5, 4.0, 5.0
Ikaruga: 8.5, 8.0, 8.0 (silver award)
The Sims: 9.5, 8.0, 8.5 (silver award)
WWE Crush Hour: 2.0, 4.0, 3.5


Xbox:
All-Star Baseball 2004: 5.0, 5.0, 5.5
Godzilla: 7.0, 4.0, 7.0
Furious Karting: 7.0
Red Faction II: 7.5
State of Emergency: 6.5, 6.5, 6.0
Tao Feng: 4.0, 6.0, 3.5
UFC Tapout 2: 6.5, 6.0, 5.0
Run Like Hell: 6.5


PSX:
Inuyasha: 6.0

GBA:
Sonic Advance 2: 8.5, 8.5, 8.5 (silver award)
Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo: 9.0, 9.0, 7.5 (silver award)
Golden Sun: The Lost Age: 8.5, 8.0, 8.0 (silver award)
Pokemon Ruby and Sapphire: 7.5, 6.5, 7.5

matrixrok9

Thanks!

CreatureX

Thanks for the scores. Disappointing score for Godzilla on Xbox. Can you list some of what they said about that game? Thanks.

Outlaw

Sweet! Didn't know Ikaruga was coming out so soon!

Gallant Pig

I can't believe Jon D. had never played the Splinter Cell for the Xbox. Do the reviewers for EGM only play games for the platform they review for? I can't fathom how a game that was Game of the Year for Xbox and was one of the top 3 or 4 for all around platforms could be not played by someone who works for a video game magazine? That's insane. Then in the next sentence he says "you won't care what you're missing". If he never played the original how does he know? Unless he means for someone who never played the original like himself.

Anyway here's what they said about Godzilla for Xbox.

Milkman (7.0) sluggish controls, enhanced graphics, new areas and extras.

Paul (4.0) sluggish controls, exploitative moves, only way to win is be cheap. Seems to think it's not genuine fighting.

CJ (7.0) perfect reason to invite friends over and drink beer

Groucho

Pretty sad month when the two "Games of the Month" are only Silver.

Gallant Pig

Yup and when one's a port and the other is a sequel (ableit a good port and a good sequel). Pretty crappy month for Xbox too. Although this is normally a slow time of the year. Realistically everyone is playing Zelda right now anyway.

Ralph Wiggum

It's a pretty thin issue.

I am surprisingly interested in Enter The Matrix now though.

Decker

Isn't Zelda a sequel?

What did they say about Splinter Cell, esp. in the graphics dept?

djones6746

If it was anything like the Gamecube version......outside of running around as Godzilla....nice sound...the game is pretty lame.

PixyJunket

You know there's a problem when the highest rated game is basketball.

Gallant Pig

Well Zelda is a very original sequel... NBA Street Vol 2. they beefed up the graphics/gameplay and played with the look of the game.. Looks cool though, but not a whole lot different than the previous NBA Street (which is a good thing in this case).

OK Splinter Cell, well the screens look kinda bad in one spot (Trigger a Meltdown) but the others look good.

Here's what they say about graphics:

Ethan 9.0 lighting effects have been noticeably dialed down, isn't as visually impressive as xbox version

Jon D. didn't play original xbox version (he calls himself an innocent dummy) the graphics aren't the main draw for him, looks outstanding but doesn't have any comparision for the original version

John D. one of the best looking PS2 games around,

Lastblade

Ikaruga should have been the game of the month. I know it is only a shooter, and to that, I say, it is ABOUT TIME A SHOOTER GETS THAT AWARD!

jrutz

One thing I hate about EGM is the huge discrepancy in group reviews. See Godzilla - 7, 7, and 4. That big of a drop makes me wonder to even take it seriously. Of course, I'll be picking up Godzilla for XBL and the customizable soundtracks.

Some surprises: Pokemon games receiving mediocre reviews across the board, even though the online mags say it's better than that. And the fact that State of Emergency got generally decent reviews across the board. Might have to pick up this one for $19.99...

Jeremy

Gallant Pig

Godzilla is XBL? That would be nice.

It doesn't see like UFC Tapout 2 is XBL. Huge, huge mistake.

Josh H

I love the discrepancy in their reviews. It's realistic. One persons trash is anothers treasure. There's lots of games people on here rave about that I hate and would give a poor score too.

With EGM you just need to look at the editor descriptions (especially the genre's you like) and read for a while to see which editors you tend to agree with more, and put more stock in their reviews.

I love the set up as we often get three different opinions from three editors with different gaming tastes.

For instance, I don't like FPS's all that much, so I don't want to just read reviews from editors who love FPS's. I want to get the take on the game from an editor who isn't a big FPS fan and say really loves platformers (my favorite Genre). If an FPS gets a 9.0, 8.5 and a 5.5, and the low score is from an editor that doesn't like FPS's that well, I know to stay clear of it. If an FPS gets 3 9.0's including one from an editor that doesn't really like FPS's then I know to check it out as being a big FPS fan probably isn't required to enjoy it.

EGMs reviews are the only one's I put any stock in as I've been reading for years and know which ones to pay more attention to. I still play games and judge them for myself, but with the limited amount of time and extremely limited amount of cash I have now, EGMs reviews pretty much determine whether I even rent a game I was on the fence about.

jrutz

Godzilla has XBL support for downloadable content, not for multiplayer. But still, it good to know we'll be getting new maps and (hopefully) more characters to do destruction with!

Plus I mentioned this before, the customizable soundtrack will allow you to rip all the old Godzilla soundtracks while you play to get that total experience!

Jeremy

Gallant Pig

I like the EGM reviews they are just so short though. I'd like to see the magazine get thicker. It has a $4.99 price for tons of ads and very little substance. Thank god I'm getting it for free.

Josh H

I'd like some larger reviews as well. At least they do larger features on big games like Zelda, with a few pages of info and 3 full column reviews rather than one column with all 3 reviews.

The editor did mention and issue or two ago (I believe it was in the zelda issue) that the review section would be getting a major overhaul.

It's still by far the best gaming mag IMO. No other multi-platform mag is as well-written and I avoid single platform "official" mags like the plague.

I have no problem paying $20 a year for it (actually less as I always get the 2 year deal, but I don't remember the price off the top of my head as it's been a good while since I renewed.

duy37

egm is thin, but there's still a lot of stuff

i get it free too

i just wish there's more indepth reviews for xbox/gamecube. every month there's lots of previews for ps2 games

Josh H

It's a matter of volume of games though. There's more PS2 reviews and previews because the PS2 gets a good deal more games released each month that the GC or X-box. Most of them are crap games, but that's beside the point.

Gallant Pig

I'd agree with Josh, however it does seem a little biased. This month hey did like 4 full page or more (SC) reviews for PS2 games, they 2 full page or more views for GCN and they had zero full page reviews for Xbox and only condensed reviews for Xbox. They could have at least done one full page Xbox review. I mean at least do it for Tapout 2 or something, they did one for GCN on that horrible wrestling car game.

I think this shows they are catering more towards PS2 owners because there are so many more of them than there are Xbox or GCN owners. I'm not sure why GCN seems to get preference over Xbox in terms of review space though. Same thing last month as well, Zelda got a huge review, Xbox got one full page review and PS2 got a bunch of full page or more reviews.

I really don't care, it'd just be nice to see more fairness in the magazine, I mean at least GCN should be equal with Xbox. I love my GCN and am loving Zelda right now but I want my big ugly box to get some coverage too.

Lastblade

I think Xbox Nation is the best gaming mag.... but it is xbox only. For multi-system mag, EGM is the best, almost by default.

Gallant Pig

I think I have a free sub to Xbox Nation now, we'll see if it comes. Is it better than OXM? I have found them pretty good in the past.

DVDHO

Ya but alot of them games they reveiw are going to Xbox or GC and its waste of space to preview a game 2 or 3 times,once is enough,and EGM is not biased they have a hard on for Halo 2 right now and sneaking everything they can into every issue,plus they had a great right up about F-Zero for GC,and last month did a great job on the Zelda preview.