Tiny Diggers – An iPad Construction Truck Game for Kids Age 2-5

The demo for Afro Samurai came out this week, and I immediatly jumped on the download, as I have been waiting for this game for quite some time.  For the uninitiated, I would recommend reading the excellent article at Wikipedia to catch up, as I could go on and on about the intricacies of the the show.  For the summary, Afro is a samurai, with a concience voiced by Samuel L. Jackson.  Also know that when Afro shows up, two things will happen: lots of dismemberment, and music by RZA will be playing.

After downloading the somewhat light-sized demo, I loaded it up, and immediately noticed the attention to detail that went into the graphic style of Afro Samurai.  The swirling headbands, the large, swaying afro, and of course the ever-lit cigarette.  I knew that Namco Bandai was going for a close to the anime style for Afro, but I was amazed at how close they got to it in this demo.  The sound is there as well, with Samuel L. Jackson, dropping in to give people an honest to goodness solid performace in Afro Samurai.

The demo is short, and give players a few places to engage in combat.  Attacks happen with the X and Y buttons on the 360 controller.  You can also jump with the A button.  There is also a slow down time button, called something creative, but it is, for the most part, a bullet time mechanic.  Fighting is fluid, and creating combos is simple enough, but the action starts to get repetitive.  It also does not help that we do not get any real sense of narrative from the demo, which leaves us distant from the action that is happening.

So far, I have to say that I enjoyed the Afro Samurai demo.  I have played through it a couple of times, and the animation for the game continues to pull me back in.  The problem is that once I get there, the game feels so repetitive without giving me any reason to continue.  The final product will probably have much more in the way of story, but for now, it is a wait and see title on my Gamefly Queue.