Review: Tenchu – Fatal Shadows
by botherer on Aug.11, 2005, under The Rest
It’s time for a few scientific experiments.
1) Take a teaspoon full of antacid powder, and a shot-glass full of lemonade. Put the antacid in your mouth, and then straight away pour in the lemonade. Don’t drink it, and for the sake of all things holy, don’t swallow at any point. Keep your mouth closed for one minute.
2) Stand with your back against a wall. Press your heels tight against it. Now, without moving your feet, bend over and touch your toes.
3) Stay with your back against the wall. This time, without the aid of a mirror, try and look at your own face.
It is a review, I promise. Of the new Tenchu ninja-em-up for PS2. Walker branches out.
Fascinating comments thread on this one. I appear to have managed to piss off the vociferous Eurogamer readership with everything I’ve written so far. But this time they seem especially cross.
August 11th, 2005 on 20:11
I especially like:
“I have plenty of game playing friends who can rant with the best of them. Their metaphors are funnier and less self indulgent.”
“Not good, guys. Pointless ranting and exaggeration.”
and
“Shame on you Eurogamer, shame on you!”
Withering disdain for mediocrity is what you do best; don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.
August 11th, 2005 on 20:46
“Withering disdain for mediocrity is what you do best; dont let anyone tell you otherwise.”
’tis true.
Most Eurogamer subscribers obviously have cold, humour-less hearts.
Most seem to unashamedly applaud shite games.
August 11th, 2005 on 21:35
I thought that the comment saying, “IGN usually has bullet points, saying the number of levels, the features, the modes, the number of characters, etc. This is the stuff I want to read.” was best.
Personally, I suspect that I enjoyed reading that review several orders of magnitude more than I would have enjoyed playing the game.
No matter how many bullet points it had on the back of the box.
August 11th, 2005 on 23:22
Some people just refuse to accept when a series as fallen from grace though, to be honest, i’ve never thought Tenchu was up to much.
genre fan mass self-delusion seems to be becoming a regular feature on this blog as of late.
August 12th, 2005 on 02:52
never taken interest in Tenchu series myself, but you were really too harsh on poor game. sometimes, the line between humorous perspective and flatout insulting is rather thin, doncha think?
August 12th, 2005 on 09:41
“IGN usually has bullet points, saying the number of levels, the features, the modes, the number of characters, etc. This is the stuff I want to read.”
That’s not a review; that’s a press release. If they want all that, they should just read the back of the bloody box; lazy sods.
That’s like those film reviews where the critic spends 96% of the review outlining the basic plot before grafting “you’ll have a blast!” onto the end.
August 12th, 2005 on 10:25
I don’t actually understand what the problem with that review was. I didn’t particularly like the Thief comparison, admittedly – it seemed slightly superfluous. However, the piece as a whole was solid and clearly performed its duty as a review. I actually wonder whether the majority of critics of it actually read the entire article, or just read the first paragraph and skipped to the score.
August 12th, 2005 on 12:22
You missed the ‘bless you’ gag.
August 12th, 2005 on 12:32
Man! You’re right. If only you’d been there earlier.
August 12th, 2005 on 14:30
I liked the Thief reference. As I am a complete Thief Fan-Boi(z) and it PWNS Sphincter Cell and Metal Arse Solid. Hur hur.
August 13th, 2005 on 12:06
My favourite:
“‘Its the job of us readers to go on rants. I expect a review to provide objective information about the pros and cons of the game at hand.’
Bollocks. If you want boring, unimaginative and unremarkable reviews then read Edge magazine……. “
August 13th, 2005 on 13:44
Don’t replace the lemonade with fizzy water…I made someone throw up that way!
August 13th, 2005 on 16:56
Heh – did you do that talk?
Stevie D got the head girl and a senior teacher at Guildford High School to do it once. I like to think the assemblies Steve did were slightly better than most.
August 14th, 2005 on 11:36
The best review I’ve read in ages. More please.