Guys who like video games: pay attention. If you want to play video games with your girlfriend, but she's not really the gamer type, give these titles a try. One of them just might transform her into the nerd girl of your dreams.
This multiplayer game, from the studio that created Alien Hominid, challenges the players to rescue four princesses from various bosses while fighting minions along the way. Players start out as one of four knights -- blue, green, orange, or red -- each with a different type of magic power; blue, for example, can throw icicles at enemies. The game itself is nearly infinitely replayable, since players can unlock new characters and weapons that make the action different each time.
In addition to simply being fun, with lots of action and minion-beheading, Castle Crashers is absolutely adorable. The knights are short, squat little guys with grumpy expressions. Players can collect animal orbs to follow them around and assist with magic, defense, and other skills. These include Frogglet, a round frog with antlers who collect items with his tongue, and Rammy, a blob of a ram who headbutts the player's enemies.
This game is based on a movie based on a graphic novel series. Got it? Good. It is the sort of adaptation that could have totally fallen flat if the designers had tried to make it exactly like the movie, but thankfully, the minds at Ubisoft took their artistic and stylistic cues from the books by Bryan Lee O'Malley.
Scott Pilgrim vs. the World is a retro side-scroller beat-'em-up game in which players can play as Ramona, Kim, Scott, Stills, and one secret, unlockable character. Each one has different fighting skills, and you can even change Ramona's hair color! If you buy O'Malley's graphic novel, Lost at Sea, at the bookstore in the game, you level up; clever touches like this permeate the action.
In this game, players control a Grimp -- a character named for the combination of "grip" and "jump" -- by swinging it from tethers and jumping onto plant-like structures. The goal of this title, from Q-Games, is to collect Spectra, objects found throughout the world of this game. To reach them, players activate seeds, which grow into vines that can be climbed. The seeds are activated in turn by pollen found amidst the various "gardens," or levels. This game can be played singly or in a group, but it works best when with two or three people. Players can catch each other if one falls, or throw their compatriots up to a new spot on a vine. PixelJunk Eden is immensely adorable and strangely addictive.
Something all three games have in common is the level of teamwork it takes to successfully play. Players in Castle Crashers and Scott Pilgrim can revive fallen comrades, and in PixelJunk Eden, players can catch each other by using grappling hooks. This cooperative factor makes beginning players feel more comfortable, and can even improve communication between partners.
If you can game together and have a fun time, that says a lot about a relationship. So turn your girlfriend into a gamer and reap the benefits!
