Crave

The start of point-and-click adventure games to go?

(Credit: LucasArts)

As a gaming system, the iPhone has had its share of praises and attacks, but it's hard to challenge the appeal of retro titles on the system. With a perfect version of Myst under its belt, the iPhone's gone one better with a release of The Secret of Monkey Island: Special Edition that launched last night on iTunes.

For those who don't remember, The Secret of Monkey Island is perhaps one of the most celebrated graphic adventures in the once-popular genre. Originally released in 1990, there were three other sequels released, the last in 2000. LucasArts once had that genre all locked up with titles like Full Throttle, The Dig, and Sam & Max Hit The Road. In graphic adventures, generally, the main character wanders around a series of landscapes, interacting with the environment and picking up items as the story unfolds. The various rooms and spaces of the game are displayed like giant panoramas, static but full of areas to explore. Being point-and-click based instead of control pad-focused, it's probably the perfect genre to make a new splash on the iPhone and iPod Touch formats. First off, the original graphics resolutions match what the iPhone can output. Secondly, there's a ton of good, cheap content just waiting to be rereleased. Monkey Island is $7.99 on the iTunes store, several dollars cheaper than the recent Xbox Live Arcade release.

By swiping fingers, you get a revamped graphics mode or the original, more pixelated but authentic version. The music and gameplay are all retained.

We hope other former classics get released in short order. Space Quest, the Gabriel Knight series, Maniac Mansion, or our personal favorite blast from the past, Tass Times in Tonetown.

Any others you'd like to see?

The Star Wars movie series is over, but the brand name lives on, thanks to spin-offs like toys, novels, and, of course, video games. The dozens of Star Wars video games released over the past 20 years have gotten something of a bum rap--after all, the source material inspires such loyalty that a video game made with minimal involvement from George Lucas can't possibly live up to fans' expectations (and yes, a lot of those Star Wars games were pretty mediocre, too).

Some Force powers being...um...unleashed.

Aiming to remedy this, and update their product line for a generation used to slick action-packed experiences such as Gears of War and Halo 3, Lucasarts has created a game designed to appeal to adrenaline junkies and Star Wars fans alike. By "unleashed," the game's title indicates that the mystical Force powers used so sparingly in previous Star Wars games are the main star here--and using them to toss enemies around, rip open giant metal doors, and zap lightning bolts from your fingertips is very fulfilling experience, judging from our hands-on time with the game.

At its core, this is a basic follow-the-path third-person action game, where your character (Darth Vader's secret apprentice, if that's important) walks down corridors, finds an open area full of enemies and has to wipe them all out before moving on. Despite the somewhat repetitive set-ups, the game's all-too-brief opening level where you play as Darth Vader himself, is a total kick.

A note for trivia junkies--Darth's familiar guttural tone comes not from James Earl Jones but an amazing soundalike named Matt Sloan, who was discovered playing the voice of Darth's cousin, Chad Vader, in a series of popular Internet shorts.

SAN FRANCISCO--If you're a big Star Wars fan, you may find yourself salivating at the chance to play LucasArts' forthcoming game, Star Wars: The Force Unleashed.

Video: Game puts players inside the 'Star Wars' saga

That's because the game will place players inside the films' narrative, in particular in between Episode III and the original film, now known as Episode IV.

LucasArts released a trailer for the film Thursday, and in it, you can see the benefits of two new technologies that should change video games forever: Euphoria, a bio-feedback artificial intelligence system, and digital molecular matter, which provides more realistic physics and physical reactions.

Check out the trailer and see for yourself.

Concept art for the Xbox 360 version of Force Unleashed

Ever since Nintendo unveiled the Wii and its funky remote, gamers have been dreaming of Wiimote-controlled lightsaber battles. It's been a long time coming, but LucasArts finally revealed its Wii lightsaber game: Star Wars: The Force Unleashed.

We've known about Force Unleashed for a few months now; the game has been scheduled to hit virtually every major platform for some time, and its absence on the Wii's upcoming titles list didn't go unnoticed. Now it's finally been announced for the Wii, and a few new details have come out about the game. The Wii version of Force Unleashed will be more focused on lightsaber combat than the other consoles' versions, and include a two-player duel mode so two Wiimote-wielding warriors can get their Jedi combat on.

Geeks flailing about with Wiimotes as if they were lightsabers. I sense a disturbance in the Force, as if a million flat-screen TVs cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced.

(Credit: Telltale Games)

The premiere bunny and dog freelance police duo of the gaming world are coming back for another round. Last year, Telltale Games released Sam & Max Season One, a series of six episodic, downloadable adventure games starring Sam and Max, the comic book characters turned video game heroes. Nostalgic gamers, still full of happy memories of LucasArts' 1993 adventure Sam & Max Hit the Road, ate up these new Sam & Max games. The episodes were first available on GameTap but later were released on Steam and can now be physically purchased on a disc.

Fortunately, gamers don't have to wait another 13 years to have further fun with the furry freelance flatfoots. Telltale Games has just announced that Sam & Max Season Two is coming. Telltale Games has released very few details about the new episodic games, but we do know this: the photo above shows a cafe in which Sam and Max will possibly go during one or more of their adventures. Hey, if you want spoilers, go read GameFAQs. The first episode of Sam & Max Season Two will come out this fall.

LucasArts had only one PC game to show us, with all of its more hardcore content coming out for consoles. A LucasArts rep showed off an internal demo of Fracture for the Xbox 360, and it looked great, but for such an intense action game to bypass the PC seems weird, especially since it didn't appear to be doing anything graphically that a high-end PC couldn't do, either. We got the usual "No, but the PS3 and Xbox 360 are the right platforms for this title at this time" response when we asked if Lucas was ditching the PC entirely. We were assured, though, that if it has any PC news for us, at least for the more hardcore gamer, it will be in touch. So we shouldn't call?

Thrillville puts Windows Games for Live to good use.

(Credit: LucasArts)

On the casual front, we saw Thrillville: Off the Rails, a sequel to Lucas' original Thrillville amusement park building game. This update will have more of a party game aspect, with roughly 30 minigames included with the updated park builder. Thrillville will be coming to PCs, as well as consoles, but it will have no online multiplayer component, instead offering standard party game multiplayer via a split screen on a single system. Lucas says that it's researching other methods of getting two players to use one PC, but for the moment, you need to pair two people on one keyboard, which has been done before on the PC with games like You Don't Know Jack. Of course, that was before the Wii, the Xbox 360, and Guitar Hero changed expectations of how a party game should play.

As for Games for Windows Live, Thrillville will offer a basic Live component, with none of the larger online features required of a more full-fledged Live integration. Since there's no online multiplayer, you don't need voice chat or any other player matching features. Rather, Thrillville will use Games for Windows Live to give you an in-game alert if someone on your friends list comes online for the purposes of chat only. That seems like a useful, inoffensive feature, rather than the more full-blown Live that, depending on your membership level wants to get its fingers into your wallet with its fee-based services.