Review extravaganza! Dishonored, Resident Evil 6, Mark of the Ninja!

Oh boy oh boy, October is under way folks! We have three new reviews up for you today - two of them are a little late to the party, but the latest arrived early and is sitting quietly in your living room as you prepare, making you feel uncomfortable!

First up we have Kozeeii's brilliant review of the brilliant Mark of the Ninja in which he paints a beautiful word picture, then tattoos it on a ninja's back, poisoning him in the process:

Mark of the Ninja is, at its core, a 2D platformer. The twist is its focus on line of sight and inventive use of sound. All guards have a cone of vision, which can be increased with the use of items such as searchlights, flashlights or Night Vision Goggles. You’ll need to avoid their vision to remain undetected, but also be as quiet as a church mouse. All sound impacts on your surroundings leaving an expanding circular sound wave from the point of origin.

Gameboffin follows up with an equally excellent review of the significantly less excellent Resident Evil 6 - out now on the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 and coming out soon on PC - although from what you'll read here, it seems like a bit of a mixed bag:

You can approach RE6 multiple ways. Split into character-specific chapters that intersect during certain moments, there’s no direction given to the order in which you should play each chapter. Going through each character’s campaign does little to highlight the moments when all of the stories combine, so it’s worthwhile having a bit of a search online as to the best order for the story to make the most sense – if the story is even important to you. Everything is presented in high-budget, cinematic detail, with lots of “We need to get to X, just because” moments and plenty of side characters needing saving. Resident Evil 6 is a stuffed pillow case hanging on the mantelpiece on Christmas day, except that your initial excitement at seeing such a bulging bevy of gifts soon turns to dismay as you realise that your parents simply raided The Two Buck Shop.

Finally we have a game which has yet to come out - Arkane Studio's Dishonored, available on the PC, PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 on Thursday. I asked Joaby if I could review Dishonored, he laughed in my face. I don't mean that figuratively either. It was demeaning. It looks like he made the right choice though, because he had a great time:

There's so much to love in Dishonored, and so much of it is just small stuff. The way shadows aren't some all encompassing invisibility cloak is wonderful, and it really makes you think about stealth in other games. The fact that a guard won't always stay on his patrol is another - they're still obviously following a path, but if the big bad overseer abandons his post to hit the WC and it lets you sneak through his area undetected, you feel less like you're exploiting an AI and more like you're exploiting a weak bladder. Of course, if you happen to be hiding in the WC when he decides to go that feeling of success will be somewhat mitigated.

Well that sounds good then! What did you think of Mark of the Ninja and Resident Evil 6 - and are you excited for Dishonored? Let us know in the comments below!