Friday, June 24, 2016

E3, Rocket League, Warhammer: Vermintide

Steam Summer Sale is on.  Go get some games. 

E3
  • God of War 4 looks amazing.  It's one of my favorite franchises so I was happy to see it return.  
  • Dishonored 2, Mafia 3, and Deus Ex: Mankind Divided, excited to play these this year.
  • Xbox one games coming out on Windows 10 is huge for me now I really don't need an Xbox one and I can play Forza Horizons in 1080P with 60 fps on my awesome racing rig.  
  • Call of Duty actually looks awesome, the trailer they showed got me really interested. 
  • Horizon Zero Dawn - Go watch a video of this game in action.  Too bad it was delayed to next year.
  • Resident Evil 7 fully playable in VR!!!!!!
  • The new South Park game looks incredible.  If you never played The Stick of Truth you really should.  
  • Overall a decent show.  I really liked the Sony conference as the whole show had a live orchestra playing throughout the whole show.
Rocket League
  • Almost 400 hours on PC.  
  • Season 3 began this week and the competition has gotten a lot tougher.  I started out a pretty low rank and having a tough time moving up.  
  • They added a new arena to the ranked matches that has a 2 levels that I really don't like but the presentation of it is amazing, the puddles of water on the floor and the neon lights look really good so it is growing on me.  
  • They also added item trading so you can now get better items by trading in the extras you randomly receive.  It's okay, I've gotten a couple of cool things.  

Warhammer: End Times - Vermintide

  • Like Left 4 Dead except you are fighting rats instead of zombies and there is a progression system along with weapon/armour upgrades so it's more fleshed out.
  • The game is more focuses on melee combat but each character does have a ranged weapon so there is still some shooting involved.  
  • The goal is to make it through the level and if successful you will get a chance to roll some dice to get some new gear.  
  • Last night we played and got to the exit but one person was running behind who I will not mention and we went back to get him and all died, so we didn't get any new gear.  Thanks Porkchop. 
  • Each run takes about 20 minutes so the game sessions are a decent length.
  • It's a little buggy but it's entertaining if you play a couple a sessions at a time. 

Friday, June 3, 2016

Rainbow Six Siege, Overwatch, Uncharted 4

Rainbow Six Siege Starter Edition

  1. For $15 you get the whole game but only 4 out of 20 characters and a bit more grind to earn the other ones but if you just want to get your feet wet it is worth the purchase.
  2. We picked this up yesterday to play in our group session last night and had a great time.
  3. We only played the terrorist hunt mode which is against the AI without trying any of the tutorials so it took a bit for us to figure out but we managed to start winning the scenarios towards the end. 
  4. The game is pretty dynamic with the destructible environments, the AI was blowing up doors, walls, and ceilings even rappelling in through the windows.   Sean in particularly didn't like the bomber dudes as he got killed about 3 times early in the match and there is not a respawn if you die but you can watch the rest of the match from any players perspective.  
  5. We played for about 2 hours and really wanted to go back in but it was getting pretty late.  
  6. I've read that the PVP play especially in ranked mode has a cheating problem but I think the game is worth the $15 for the single player scenarios and the terrorist hunt mode.  
  7. They pick 2 random characters for you initially and give you 600 credits to purchase 2 more.  These characters have special abilities so you can choose the ones that fit your play style.
  8. In order to unlock the other characters you can either pay more money or use the in game currency which dies require a grind.  The game says about 15 hours of play to unlock one character but you can decrease the time by completing challenges and such.  You are getting the game at a discount though. 
  9. Once we started playing there was an itch to open up more of the characters so the game does have a good compelling way to make you want to spend money.

Overwatch

  • This is Blizzards first first person shooter game and it feels like they have been making them a long time.
  • It's a team based shooter where kill/death streak is not that important so if you are tired of COD then this may be a good alternative except that you probably want to have a group of friends to play with.  
  • There are a ton of characters to choose so you can pick the play style you want but you must also be willing to change your playstyle vs what the other team is doing. You can change your character multiple times during the match and at anytime. 
  • The game is very different than COD, going in lone wolf and just killing the enemy is not a good plan.  You must strategize with your team and be aware of the overall game and not just the enemy in front of you.
  • I'm playing on the PC with a controller and its the first game where I can be competitive vs other players using kb/m as most of the characters you don't need precision aim as the guns have a large radius of attack.  
  • You don't level your characters or change their weapons in any way so it's a bit of a let down there but they want to keep the game balanced.  You can open up different skins and other cosmetic additions for your characters by earning chests through playing or purchasing them.  

Uncharted 4

  • Finished the game last week and it was a great game but Uncharted 2  is till my favorite.
  • I enjoyed the story and thought it was the best one. The characters were very fleshed out and the banter between them enhanced the story immensely. 
  • The combat is still the games weak point.  I think they simplified the melee combat too much as it never felt great to use. The encounters relied heavily on stealth and if I messed that up I would face about 5 guys to many.  They would just keep coming and it was irritating.  I think I may have killed a couple hundred enemies. 
  • They have a ton of unlockables and about 10 different graphic filters that look really interesting, the whole came in pixels art? 
  • I will wait awhile before I play again as I think the replay-ability is a bit less in this game since it was so story heavy.  There were some pretty long climbing sections as well.  
  • Overall they ended the series perfectly and I'm excited to see what is coming next, after the Last of us 2.