Today the Adrenaline Vault is pleased to offer a unique inside look at a new young-adult fantasy book series being launched that’s heavily influenced by the world of gaming. This spring, Toonopolis: Gemini will be available for purchase. It’s a book featuring characters who inhabit a cartoon-themed universe created by author Jeremy Rodden. I was recently able to speak with Mr. Rodden about the new book series.

Rodden describes Toonopolis as “a combination of different genres, broken up into subgenres organized in a fashion not unlike videogames, cartoons and comics.” The focus of his novels is on their cartoon characters, which populate the “Tooniverse” and its various themed cities (a medieval town, an underwater environment, and even a city entirely based upon the rules and feel of classic role-playing games). Toonopolis explores the adventures these characters have as they interact with one another and with mysterious outside forces beyond their understanding.

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Publisher: Tripwire Interactive
Developer: Power of 2
System Requirements: Windows XP SP2, Vista, or Windows 7; 1.7+ GHz or better processor; 1 GB graphics memory; DirectX 9-compatible; 250 MB hard drive space;
Genre: Casual Strategy
ESRB Rating: Everyone

I usually applaud simple, fun games. I’ve been pleased by their resurgence due to the ability to play them on smartphones, XBLA, etc. In general, I think there’s always room for both the giant blockbuster titles as well as the little simple pass-the-time sort of games. Dwarfs?! falls into this latter category, designed for the casual gamer to take a break from their day and go mining for some gold.

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Publisher: Sega
Developer: High Voltage Software
Genre: First Person Shooter
ESRB rating: Teen
Release date: Available now

At the time The Conduit was released on the Wii, there was some praise heaped upon it, labeling it as one of the best first-person shooters…for the Wii. Perhaps the best. This was before Goldeneye 007 and several of the Call of Duty games appeared on the console, I should add. Like nearly every movie that surpasses $100 million at the box office these days, a sequel was quickly ordered, and now, about two years later, we get Conduit 2 (minus the “The” because, no joke, the developers thought it would be easier for people to say).

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I was watching television just the other night and a videogame was being advertised. It was a first-person, war-themed shoot-em-up, something a la Call of Duty. My wife turned to me inquisitively and asked me if that was a game I would like to play, if it was up my alley, so to speak. I knew it was somewhat of a ploy; my wife loves videogames, but doesn’t really like games that involve killing. We don’t have kids yet, but we will someday, and I’m sure being the parents we’ll be, we will introduce them to gaming, but probably in a rather controlled manner. This particular game, which highlighted “realistic wartime action,” would most definitely not make it past mom’s censors. But her question intrigued me: what did I think of such games?

I quickly ran through the games that have a permanent place in my library. I have loads of them, but often I’ll play them a few times and then disperse them to true lovers of the genre. But of course, I have some keepers, titles that I’ll play over and over again. Some of those currently include Team Fortress 2, Left 4 Dead 2, Batman: Arkham Asylum and, naturally, all of the franchises from my youth (Mario, Zelda, etc). I realized that conspicuously absent were any games whose main objective was: as a human, realistically harm another human. I throw that modifier in there because Team Fortress 2 is all about murdering one another, but it’s so cartoony I never really thought about the characters as real people, which I think makes a difference.

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Publisher: 2K Sports
Developer: Visual Concepts
Genre: Sports
ESRB rating: Everyone
Release date: Available now

Well, the Masters has ended, which means that sports fans are now left with two options: the NHL playoffs and the start of baseball. Nothing against hockey, but as the weather begins to get warmer, I’m personally going to prefer to indulge in a sport without ice or anything else that reminds me of the cold days I can now safely put in my rearview mirror. So, in accordance with the sporting calendar, we’re treated to the baseball genre’s newest entry: Major League Baseball 2K11.

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Publisher: Atari
Developer: Behaviour Interactive
Genre: Action-adventure
ESRB Rating: Everyone 10 and older
Release date: Available now

I rarely rush out the door the day a game is released, but awhile back when Ghostbusters: The Video Game hit the market, I was there in a flash. The Ghostbusters franchise is one that is very dear to my heart, and usually anything branded with a no-ghost logo is considered awesome in my book. So when I heard there was going to be yet another GB game, I was extremely anxious to play, especially considering how much I enjoyed the previous one.

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Publisher: Electronic Arts
Developer: EA Tiburon
Genre: Sports
ESRB rating: Everyone
Release date: Available now

Spring is in the air and March Madness is reaching its end, but before the first pitch can be thrown on opening day, there’s one more epic sporting event to undertake: The Masters (“A tradition unlike any other,” I believe the tagline goes). It’s fitting, then, that EA has chosen this timeframe to release (as it does every year) its newest Tiger Woods golf game, aptly named PGA Tour 12: The Masters.

As the name might suggest, the bulk of the golfing action revolves around The Masters, the major PGA tournament held at the Augusta National Golf Club. For the first time in the series, Augusta has been completely re-created, so you can get a fairly realistic sense of what playing those 18 holes feels like. There are 16 courses included in the game (including such fan favorites as Pebble Beach), with at least 20 others slated to be available for download. Throughout the game, you hone your golfing skills to win the ultimate prize—the illustrious green jacket.

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Publisher: Capcom
Developer: Capcom
Genre: Fighting
ERSB Rating: Teen
Release date: Available now

It has been a whopping 11 years since the world last saw the heroes and villains from Marvel and Capcom battle it out in MvC2: New Age of Heroes. Since that time, the highly successful game has been ported to various systems, most recently in 2009 where it made a popular comeback on the PS3 and Xbox Live Arcade. Now, Capcom has rolled out the 3rd game in the franchise, Fate of Two Worlds, incorporating both new and old characters in an attempt to revitalize the series for a whole new audience.

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Publisher: Bethesda Softworks
Developer: Obsidian Entertainment
Genre: First-person shooter/ RPG
ERSB Rating: Mature
Release date: Available now

Even though the Fallout games for the Xbox 360 have shown tremendous replay value and depth, they have also been defined by exceptional downloadable content. Fallout 3 offered several new missions and quests which opened up the world in novel directions, allowed for expansions to the player’s created character, and even helped resolve some questions left over from the game’s conclusion. Needless to say, many have been excited about New Vegas’ first bundle of downloadable content, Dead Money.

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Publisher: Deep Silver
Developer: Techland Development
Genre: Racing
ESRB rating: Everyone 10+
Release date: Available now

Racing games will always be a dime-a-dozen in Videogame Land. It’s one of the simplest, yet still most enjoyable concepts for couch competition. However, as the industry has grown, racing games must continually reinvent themselves, finding new ways to stand apart when compared to similar and often times antiquated titles. Some franchises, like Need for Speed have gone down the road of realism, trying to offer games which feature physics-based handling and detailed car mechanics. Other racing games, like nail’d, are trying a different strategy – being completely insane.

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Publisher: Xona Games
Developer: Xona Games
Genre: Retro Arcade
ESRB rating: Not rated at press time
Release date: Available now

I’m going to assume that at least once in your life you’ve been exposed to the arcade sensation that was known as Space Invaders. A simple concept to say the least, Space Invaders allowed you to fire shots at a horde of enemies that would slowly creep down the screen. Even though the game is decades old, it’s obvious its influence is long-lasting, as evidenced in Decimation X3.

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Publisher: Xona Games
Developer: Xona Games
Genre: Retro Arcade
ESRB rating: Not rated at press time
Release date: Available now

Xona Games has been extra busy as the holiday approaches. With their last entry in the Decimation series just released, two days later they have followed it up with another foray into the old-school arcade game arena with Score Rush.

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Publisher: EA Sports
Developer: Immersion Games
Genre: Wrestling/Fighting
ESRB Rating: Teen
Release Date: Available now

If there’s a sport that seems to be growing in popularity at a lightning fast pace, it’s mixed martial arts. For those of you who are perhaps unaware, mixed martial arts (MMA) is a full contact sport which allows for various fighting styles and techniques, including strikes with hands and feet, both while standing and on the ground. Winners are decided by fighters either knocking out their opponent, having their opponent submit, a technical knockout as determined by the referee or by the total amount of points earned by the end of the match. Trying to capitalize on its recent fame, EA Sports has released their take on the activity with its video game titled simply MMA.

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Manufacturer: SunFlex
MSRP: $35.00

When it comes to game controllers, I find that I usually like the standard. I can remember when new gaming control pads were introduced for the original Nintendo, but I usually just found them to be uncomfortable. I only mention this so you understand my usual level of skepticism of “new” controllers, especially those from 3rd party vendors. My belief is that when the software designers aren’t on the same team as the hardware designers, it’s probably not going to work out all that well for the gamer. And then I was asked to review the Snakebyte Wii Premium Remote XL+.

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Publisher: Konami
Developer: Immersion Games
Genre: Wrestling
ESRB Rating: Teen
Release Date: Available now

Wrestling is one of those activities that just seems made for the world of video-gaming. Love it or hate it, the theatricality of the sport, even on its worst day, is enough to garner a smile and some amusement. Americans probably think of showy wrestling as something home-grown, but Mexico has had its variation, lucha libre (which means “free fighting”) as an organized sport since the early 1900s. Today, the Mexican style of wrestling comes to consoles with Lucha Libre AAA: Heroes del Ring.

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