The Xbox One and the PlayStation 4 are here to stay, software and hardware warts and all. Everyone can now take joy in not needing to say ‘next-gen’ and start saying ‘current-gen’ (and yes, I get the irony of the headline). But even now, we’ve got to look to the future, because this may be the last generation of the console.
On the quantity-of-games front, PC gaming is resolute, with more indie titles filling it than references to deceitful cake on a Portal forum. The term “PC Gaming Master Race” is being flung around the Internet to describe those with the disposable income to build their own top of the range ‘rig’ and keep it that way, with the Steam Machines being released to increase the portability of the PC gamer.
A Steam Machine.
On the other end of the spectrum, casual gaming on smartphones and tablets is on the rise, with AAA companies releasing tie-in games to link the casual gamer to the console like Fifa 14 by EA Sports and Batman: Arkham Origins. The Ouya is offering Android gaming on a movable, high-definition screen.
So with the high price bracket aiming for PCs, and the low going for the handheld, where does that leave the console?
In the past, this was simple: it was a middle ground. While handheld gaming in the times of the PlayStation 2 and original Xbox was limited, this was still clear to see.
The PC required some knowledge to set up the games, and was more for those that were interested in its mechanics. This was perfectly balanced by the console, which boasted speed and simplicity – disk in, game out. But now the install times of the XStation One match the PC, but unlike a PC, can’t be ‘Alt+Tabbed’ out of to go on the Internet or work.
With Assassin’s Creed 4 and The Wolf Among Us pushing for episodic gaming (and Half Life 3, in theory –all those prayers of gamers have to go somewhere) the priority for quick loading speeds and more compact games becomes paramount. This is especially true in light of 320GB-gate, the discovery that the Xbox One can’t hold the 500GB that it promised.
Could Mario make it to iOS devices?
The solution to this problem would be to focus on Cloud storage, but with the vulnerability of online gaming, as seen by the PlayStation Network being hacked, this seems unlikely.
My prediction? Despite the recent bad news about its poor sales, Nintendo will make more money than the GDP of Bulgaria releasing iMario, iPokémon and iZelda for everyone’s iDevices, as their focus isn’t on being the best, but on the reliability of being the ‘family console’.
Microsoft will make a console with the capabilities of a PC – one that allows the installation of Microsoft Office and access to games while others are installing. A console that you can work on.
Sony, on the other hand, will fuse with its other hardware and release PlayStation Television (PSTV has a nice ring to it), to rival the home-media omniscience the Xbox One is currently pushing for. Within ten, fifteen years, we may see the end of the Console Wars.
I have often been of the opinion that the current games industry needs to be introduced to the term ‘the sky’s the limit’. No, let me put that more bluntly…
I think that the current games industry needs to be brought out to a baseball pitch, bent over by burly college students, and paddled with a particularly solid looking bat to the tune of ‘no more mister nice guy’ by Alice Cooper à la Dazed and Confused. On that bat would be the words ‘the sky’s the limit’, and, after a due amount of paddling, those exact words should also be imprinted onto the games industry’s buttocks, so that sitting down would be considerably painful for the next month.And, above all, the wielder of that bat should be none other than Timesplitters: Future Perfect.
In comparison to the modern gaming landscape, filled as it is with generic military shooters, remakes of generic military shooters, and (God help us) sports games, the land of Timesplitters was a world were next to anything could happen.
The game itself dealt with the titular timesplitters, an evil race of mutant creatures whose bulging biceps and menacing grimaces could put even Marcus Fenix to shame. Okay, sounds generic enough. But wait, here’s the catch. Said ‘splitters could also jump through time, and in doing so attempted to wipe out human race during various time periods in a bid for world domination.
You, the bald space marine Sergeant Cortez (the gaming precursor of Riddick; seriously, they’re both bald, ripped, and have weird goggle things) had travel back in time to destroy these creatures before their creation and save the world. What this meant in terms of the game itself is that its setting had nearly limitless potential, something it made good on with flying colours. In one section of the game, you’d be charging through a castle in the ‘20s with a steampunk machine-gun in hand and a pipe-smoking Colonel Blimp by your side, and in the next you’d be sleuthing through an evil genius’s layer with a 60’s swinger in a tight-fitting dress (seriously, don’t ask).
The gameplay itself was largely of the run-and-gun vibe, though in the story mode things got varied up from time to time; at one point you’d make your way through a haunted, zombie infested mansion (a level, that, back in the day, managed to work faster than a vindaloo-flavoured laxative in soiling my kegs) armed with a good ol’ double barrel, whilst a few chapters latter you’d be piloting a six-story robot blasting everything around you to ash.
Throughout the entire game (which included an arcade mode, a challenge mode, and a map maker mode), however, was an overarching sense of tongue-in-cheek humour that many a CoD or Battlefield game should take note of, so that you could be in the ridiculous situation of shooting cyborg monkeys with a harpoon gun, something that I personally hold as the absolute benchmark of any game, period.
All in all, if you own a PS2 and fancy an anarchic, humorous and above all fun game to kill some time, then Timesplitters is definitely for you.
Though I would like to say the reason I am focusing on Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception in this article is because I have successfully completed the first two games in the series, unfortunately if I did I would be lying. I regrettably entered into the Uncharted franchise just after the third game was released, and instead of obeying the principles I usually uphold of playing games in the order of release, I instead dove straight into the newest game in the series.
I have already been told by fans of the series that I have missed out by not playing Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune’ and Uncharted 2: Among Thieves, but I have assured them that after playing the third game it is something I definitely plan on doing. However, as I haven’t played these two games, I cannot comment on Uncharted 3 in relation to the other titles, or say that Uncharted 3 is any better or worse. What I can do is comment on Uncharted 3 as a stand alone game, and I can start by saying that this game is fantastic.
‘Uncharted 3: Drakes Deception’ is, obviously, the third title in the very popular and critically acclaimed Uncharted series on PlayStation, developed by Naughty Dog and released in 2011. According to developers, it is an action-adventure third-person shooter platform game, which translates as it being similar to games such as the Lara Croft series. You play as the protagonist Nathan Drake, a wise cracking, your-every-day-kind-of-guy fortune hunter who travels the world in search of treasure and artefacts.
What makes Nate so unusual as a computer game protagonist is how relatable he is. The developers wanted him to be a believable character, and he really is, more so than any other game character I have encountered. He stumbles when he runs, he narrowly clears obstacles, and he freaks out when he finds himself in absurd and dangerous situations, rather than assuming an unnaturally tough façade in the face of danger. This makes him much more likeable, and realistic.
Much of the character’s movements were created through performance capture technology, where real actor’s body movements are tracked using cameras in order to be digitally reproduced in game. Nate is also played by video game royalty Nolan North, who many keen eyed gamers would recognise as being the actor behind Desmond Miles in the Assassin’s Creed series, as well as hundreds of others.
Because of Nate’s likability, you become heavily invested in the narrative of the game, to the same extent as if it were a film or book. The rough plot follows Nate, a descendant of Sir Francis Drake, and his quest to find the lost city, the Iram of the Pillars, before more sinister forces do. The game sees you explore desert cities, French chateaux and even a sinking ship, each location being a platform style level, in which a varied number of gameplay styles are utilised in order to progress. This is balanced really well, with no one element, for example the acrobatics, gun battles or puzzle solving, gaining the upper hand. As a huge fan of third-person gameplay, this is one of the best examples, and the varied gameplay means you don’t get frustrated or bored if you tire easily of one particular style of play.
I mentioned earlier of Uncharted 3’s similarities to Lara Croft, as it is the one game I would find it easiest to compare Uncharted 3 to. However, while the Lara Croft games are good (focusing mainly on the games prior to the series most recent reboot) I would say that Uncharted 3 seems to have more scope. Though both follow the same linear structure, with less opportunity for exploration as seen in other third-person adventure games, Uncharted 3 is created on a much grander scale, if only it being much longer, and harder, that many of the Lara Croft games.
Though I am a fan of the Lara Croft games, if given a choice I would probably choose Uncharted to be my favourite. I am one level away from finishing this game, and so hopefully I will do so before too long – and I would highly recommend you do the same if you haven’t already.
Tom Seaman takes a nostalgic look back at the game consoles that defined the many stages of his life.
For most of my gaming life, I was limited to what genre of games I played.
Platformers, a few action adventure games, some light RPGs, but never really fully grasping a genre and going along with it.
I never really had the time or money to invest in one genre, and therefore stuck to investing all my time into Pokémon.
However, a big change in my life had happened. My parents broke up, and with it a whole array of changes to my gaming life occurred (obviously overshadowed by the actual issues at the time). To cut it short, it kind of led to a bidding war… a bidding war for my love.
I’m going to be very cut throat with what I say here, but please be assured that I do love my parents and that they are not horrible people.
My mum met my future step dad, and with him came a Playstation. Upon hearing my enjoyment of this, soon my Dad bought a Playstation and a plethora of games.
I was forbidden to take one game to the other parent’s house, however I would often have two of the same game due to my parents’ stubbornness with both wanting to buy me a certain game for Christmas/birthday. It was a strange weird time, but with it came a huge diversification to my gaming habits.
I ended up having more games than ever, and a huge amount of time to play them.
With the versatile nature of the Playstation, I played a lot of different genres.
For a while I got really into Tekken 2, and would play non stop to unlock characters and complete the game with each one.
I still remember Roger the Kangaroo and the Devil fighting it out in this truly ridiculous game.
I ventured into sports and played weeks worth of Gran Turismo 2, building my way up in the racing world until I had a fleet of cars to choose from. FIFA 2000, my first football game, resulting in me returning for 10 years straight.
I even sunk hours into 4 playthroughs of Final Fantasy VII and experienced my first JRPG in all its bewildering glory.
The Playstation was able to mature me into playing almost any game.
I was no longer tied down to platformers (although I played the crap out of Crash Bandicoot), and felt like I could pick up almost any game and feel comfortable with the mechanics and gameplay.
It also gave me plenty of distraction from my life at the time. I didn’t particularly understand why my parents were breaking up, nor did I like all the changes that were happening. It was a weird time for me and the Playstation was an easy sanctuary to delve into in order to avoid this.
It sounds kind of sad and probably not healthy, but it made the transition easier and more stable, and for that, I am thankful.
Unsheathing Raiden’s lightning-spitting high-frequency blade and carving through the head of an adversary cyborg refreshes sword fighting with grisly intensity. Leaving one-legged half bodies hopping in circles before falling onto the ground like freshly sliced deli salami realises the power and precision which Hideo Kojima captured in his E3 2010 tech demo.
Delicate meat-slicing isn’t the flesh of the gameplay, it’s more the juicy, gooey centre you unwrap after hacking and slashing your way through hordes of enemies. Platinum have taken the E3 tech demo, and added their combo-learning, attack blocking hack and slash mechanics. It mirrors Bayonetta almost button-for-button; you’ll start with a strong and weak attack and to build up your fuel cells which, when full, let you switch into a time-slowing ‘blade mode’.
Only when enemies have been beaten to everything-but-pulp will you be able to use the blade mode. With 360-degree control of your blade, you can half, quarter or twelve your adversary into equal slices for the next pizza party. For smaller enemies, a single ‘blade mode’ cut means domo origato for Mr Roboto, but for bigger guys, hacking off limbs can force them into hilarious Holy Grail-esque fighting tactics.
Picture by game.123.com
Slicing through a weak point activates “Zan Datsu” (or ‘Stab and Grab’ as it’s affectionately called) letting you tear out the cybernetic ‘heart’ of your enemies and crush it with your fist to refill your health and fuel cells. There’s a weighty rhythm to furiously parrying and swiping at an enemy before delicately dissecting them and harvesting their ‘organs’. There’s joy in learning the motions.
A lack of aerial manoeuvres and enemies means you can’t ‘juggle’ your foes, at least until you unlock more secondary weapons later in the game. Fights have a tendency to be two-dimensional, particularly as the game likes to hurry you down long corridors. Encounters are best in wide open environments; Raiden can freely jump around from enemy to enemy, stabbing as he goes. It’s a shame that by the second level Raiden is running through sewers, bashing his sword against identical cyborgs.
Picture by game.123.com
Seeing the carved meat lie on the floor is unsettling. Even the desensitized shell of person I am, I still felt a little queasy after watching it for the first time. Raiden’s mass slaughter replaces Snake’s ‘knock ‘em out and sneak by’ espionage. In the first level, you’re being charged at by sword wielding cyborgs, and the only way forward is kill your way through – only to then find a giant cyborg (a primary antagonist) slaughter an African prime-minister before your eyes.
With the Patriots AI destroyed, the war economy enters a slump and the PMC’s aren’t very happy about losing a sizeable chunk of income. Raiden, bringer of justice and protector of the weak, is determined to stop the senseless killing. A knowledge of MGS4’s story is useful, but Rising implies a lot of the Raiden’s backstory without being overly verbose or patronising.
But don’t be expecting anywhere near the storytelling calibre of other Kojima productions. Unsettling subjects such as child soldiers, moral grey areas and exploitation of vagrants work towards some potentially hard-hitting revelations. Rising almost arrives at twist of Metal Gear proportions, but it’s quickly ignored in favour of getting you to turn more cyborgs into circuit boards.
While much of the story boils down to an earpiece telling you to kill the cackling baddie set on world destruction, if you look hard enough you’ll find Kojima’s greater themes, especially if you’ve followed the series’ fiction.
Picture by game.123.com
Kojima’s ‘stealth espionage action’ elements, however, don’t shine through so well in Rising. About a third of confrontations can be avoided completely if you choose to.
Boxes, oil drums and girly mags (albiet replaced with 3D holograms for depth-craving cyborgs) attempt to recreate MGS4’s stealth elements, with the addition of Raiden’s see-through-walls visor. Without the ability to walk, crawl or fire ranged weapons, chopping people up dwarfs sneaking in terms of depth.
Avoiding combat sequences and progressing without being stopped by invisible walls is rewarding, but having your cover blown because you couldn’t control your character right isn’t fun. Extravagantly running through a target with a sword is your ‘silent takedown’ option. It sums up Rising’s clumsy and unsubtle stealth experience.
Ignoring stealth and getting into swordplay allows you to upgrade your blade in addition to the weapons you pick up from bosses. Used in conjunction with your blade, they shake up the pace of your attacks. Without these weapons, the first few hours of the game feel very repetitive. The corridor levels pair you against the similar enemies in increasing numbers which kill enjoyment, particularly when difficulty spikes.
Much like Bayonetta, rising gets better on the second playthrough – I only mastered the flow of battle in one of the final bosses. Additional weapons, secret upgrades and VR missions to find will give you reason to dip back in to some levels – but you’ll want to avoid the more tedious missions.
Picture by game.123.com
Rising’s swordplay always feels good – it combines the weight and rhythm of traditional hack and slash with a precision the genre has never had.
While the narrative and environments fall flat, mastering the power Raiden’s blade beams with might and style. It’s not a perfect fusion of Metal Gear stealth and Platinum action. It’s a challenging hack & slash with Platinum’s golden mechanics pushed into the world of Metal Gear – but sometimes it just doesn’t fit.
Here we are at the beginning of a new year with new games and soon enough an entirely new generation of platforms. 2012 has been quite the year for games and at the same time it has been quite strange. This generation for consoles has been the longest yet, almost reaching a decade and yet there have been some incredible and innovative releases. We have seen the launch of the PSVita and the WiiU and Steam has grown into a mammoth for the PC world. But enough of the inspirational stuff, we at the Exeposé Games team want to produce a year in review. This isn’t the ‘Game of the Year’ prestigious awards which will be in our print edition, this is just a quick look at some of the defining features of 2012 and the best moments that this year’s games have produced. So here it is the ‘Exeposé Games Year in Review 2012’
Top 5 weapons of this year
1. Anything in Borderlands 2: Yeah it’s a slight cop out because there are a ‘kajillion’ guns but it is impossible to decide because there are just so many. When you pick up a gun in ‘Borderlands’ you never know what will happen when you pull the trigger, be it a gun that shoots acid or a gun that instead of reloading you throw as a grenade! It’s pure insanity, match that with a script as sharp as armour piercing electric bullets and you have yourself an arsenal of madness.
Photography by Official Xbox Magazine
2. Bow and Arrow:Far Cry 3 and Assassin’s Creed 3: It has been a great year for hunting old timey style. With the dawn of that underrated badass Hawkeye in Avengers Assemble, all of a sudden bows and arrows are cool again. One of the more satisfying aspects of Far Cry was picking off the pirates (80% of which are happy to admit they have the clap) one by one whilst they run around manically trying to you. This year with the new Tomb Raider and Crysis games sporting more stringed weaponry, this trend is far from over.
3. Bricks and lots of them: This has been a good year for the Lego games with the releases of the last Harry Potter game, Lego Batman DC Heroes 2’and most recently Lego Lord of The Rings. The unique humour and ability to tell a story through blocks has made these puzzle games fun for all ages. From wands and batarangs, to swords and heat vision, Lego has provided us with some of the greatest weapons of this year to cause blocky carnage.
4. Your ability to make choices: If there is one thing I have learnt from The Walking Dead series is that I am a terrible human being and I should never be given charge of other humans. The experience is truly harrowing and emotionally up-roaring. You feel the consequences of every decision. Just like any weapon it has a result only this result is more disruptive and painful than any gun. I have never felt like a bad person until I played this game and I am the one who use the rope dart way too liberally in Assassin’s Creed 3!
5. Vegetables: In Sleeping Dogs the executions are brutal and entertaining. From electric eel tanks to electrical substations. However, one of these diabolical weapons of destruction stands above the rest. The darkly hilarious Pak Choi execution whereby you pick up your victim and drop him on a rather pointy vegetable. Its good green family fun that teaches you the importance of reaching your five a day.
Top 5 Villains of the year
1. Vaas, Far Cry 3. So yeah this guy is crackers. The trailer says it all. It shows Vaas from a first person perspective explaining the definition of insanity. His voice, his eyes, his movement are all just so unsettling, you never know what he will do next he is just pure insanity. At the same time he is incredibly charismatic and likeable. There is just something so engaging about him. I can’t really do it justice so check out the ‘Definition of Insanity’ trailer.
2. Zombies: Yup the brain munching undead horde have featured in all sorts this year including, Black Ops, ZombieU and The Walking Dead. It seems we as gamers just can’t get enough of bashing, slicing and blasting away the undead. Maybe it is the ever present over the top gore or the racism against our deceased bretheren but whatever the reason these guys are great to kill and still scare us to this day!
3. Handsome Jack, Borderlands 2: Handsome Jack is hilariously insane. Whereas Vaas is just unsettling, Jack is just gut-splittingly funny. He is witty and has a great dark sense of humour. You find yourself eagerly awaiting his dialogue and his moments on screen just to hear what nonsense and backchat he has to say next. Credit to Gearbox, the writing has always been incredibly tongue in cheek and quick, Handsome Jack personifies this skilful dialogue. Keep an ear out for his magnificent diamond encrusted horse, ‘Butt Stallion’.
4. Raul Menendez, Black Ops 2: He is probably the biggest super-villain of the year in that he has scale and ambition. His tragic back story really creates a deep and emotional character that is so believable and his motives are pretty justified as opposed to just simply take over the world. He is charismatic and it shows in his massive following. I found myself both sympathetic and hateful towards him as the tragedy revealed the reasoning behind the menace.
5. Your targets, Dishonoured: It is hard to pick an individual from ‘Dishonoured’ because all the characters you target are just so delightfully evil. They scheme, they plot, they murder, they poison and it works so well. They all work so well with each other to create horrible individuals that you look forward to disposing of. Then out of nowhere the game gives you opportunities to non-lethally dispatch them, making the decision making element even deeper. If you want to see a collection of horrible b***ards look no further than ‘Dishonoured’.
Top 5 Developer Gaffes
1. Frank Gibeau on EA policy: Anyone noticed that it’s nigh-on impossible to buy a single player game with zero multiplayer functions these days? It may be something to do with a boast by EA President Frank Gibeau that:
“I have not green lit one game to be developed as a single player experience”
And while he may have meant features like Apps or online social content, as he stressed in a hurried restatement, to a gaming world that is beginning to be aggrieved by the pretty cynical efforts to cram profitable multiplayer options into everything that moves *cough cough f’ning Mass Effect*, it provoked more than a few raised eyebrows. Thank the good lord for Bethesda.
2. John Hemingway on The Mechromancer character: Talking about the DLC character for Borderlands 2, lead designer John Hemmingway talked about the character’s skill tree ‘Best Friends Forever’, a set of skills designed for those who “suck at first-person shooters”. All well and good. Unfortunately, instead of calling it Best Friends Forever, he referred to it as ‘the girlfriend skill tree’. Whoops. Cue a frantic twitter attempt to rectify the situation on the part of Gearbox senior management, and outrage all over the internet.
3. Jessica Merizan on Mass Effect 3: What she said in her role as Bioware Community Manager on the Bioware attempt to rectify the ending debacle: ‘When I played [the DLC] it really drove home the fact that my last choice wasn’t setting me up for a certain ending… and the ending I got was reflective of all my experiences whether I played just Mass Effect 3 or all of the trilogy’.
What she should have said: ‘It’s 1.9 Gigs of pictures and a weird cutscene which entirely spoils the pacing of the final rush toward the citadel, and you still don’t really find out what happens to your girlfriend or why a tiny child is determining the fate of the galaxy, whatever that fate is because that’s not really explained either. And it’s all you’re getting’.
4.Chris Metzen on the Mists of Panderia expansion for World of Warcraft: For those unaware, the latest expansion for WoW revolves around the mysterious island of Pandaria… wooohhh… lost out at sea and hidden by powerful magics… wooohhhh… and inhabited by a strange race of fearsome beasts KNOWN ONLY AS……. Pandas. Of the Kung-Fu variety. VP Creative Development Chris Metzen:
“This is no joke”
Whatever helps you sleep at night.
5. Stanley Woo (On ME3) again: Stanley Woo was or is known as something as a menace on the Bioware forums. A Bioware employee and moderator, he was quick to defend the company against any criticism, constructive or otherwise, and punish those who said it. He wins the top spot for this little gem, referring to the highly controversial utterly terrible ME3 ending:
“If you wish to sum up the conclusion of a multi-part epic game series as “Red, Green, and Blue,” then feel free to. But please don’t then complain that the endings are oversimplified. You are the one who has slapped that label onto it, not us.”
Top 5 Art in Games
1. Ghost Trick: released in 2012 on iOS having previously been released on DS, was widely praised for its fantastic animation, and it’s not hard to see why. The art style works seamlessly with the dynamic of the game, and it’s genuinely such a pleasure to watch, which is something not many games that rely on cut-scenes for plot development can offer.
2. Skyward Sword: It dazzled last year with its gorgeous, ethereally glowing scenery and its quirky character design reminiscent of its predecessor, Wind Waker. While the excessive bloom can occasionally induce headaches, it’s still a joy to explore the vast, scenic worlds that lie below the clouds.
3. Dishonored: The dystopian steampunkery of Dishonored was one of the most impressive settings of this year’s game haul. Playing around in such a large and varied world is fun enough even without the fantastic design and attention to detail that this game has.
4.Journey: for the most part, is simple, monochromatic and not too taxing on the eyes, but its simplicity allows for incredible vistas, subtle yet brilliant animation and truly gorgeous, engaging gameplay. From the creators of Flower, a similarly simple yet enticing game, this little indie game is a wonderful hidden gem of artistic flair that shouldn’t be missed.
5.Bastion: while released all the way back in 2011 on XBLA, was brought to the iPad in 2012, and so deserves a mention. Heartbreaking soundtrack and fantastic narration aside, this game makes the most of some absolutely phenomenal hand-painted scenery to make the game feel like a painting come to life. The bright colours and watercolour-like texture bring a naivety to the game that only serves to make the tale of the apocalyptic Calamity all the more poignant.
And one to look forward to:
Bioshock Infinite. Oh my god. Have you seen the trailer. The colours, the floating city, the brilliant style – the art alone makes me want to throw bundles of money at the developers, Irrational Games, just for having created something as visually stunning as the first Bioshock in a completely new and compelling setting.
Top 5 Ridiculously over-sexualised characters
1. Citra Talugmai, Far Cry 3: I’m desperately trying to write this with as little knowledge of Far Cry as possible. I haven’t played it yet, so don’t tell me anything! According to the interweb, Citra is a warrior-goddess-totally-hot-holiday-romance-may-kill-you kind of gal. Mystical powers and plot relevance aside, she’s totally fine despite chilling on an island with no decent healthcare or cosmetics. She does little except questionably sexually assault you in a drug induced hallucination. Sounds pretty sexualised to me.
2. Cortana, Halo 4: If the below picture doesn’t tell you Microsoft know how to make their fans happy, then I don’t know what does. The vast outpourings of Cortana porn that accompany each iteration of the series are a testament to the designers’ ability to make an AI construct stupidly attractive, for no real reason other than LOOK AT THE VIRTUAL VIRTUAL-BOOBIES. In my spaceship, the AI is going to be a large black gentleman with a gravelly voice. Maybe then the marines will stop being mown down while they’re gawking and actually f’ning fight. But regardless of how distracting she’d be in a combat zone, she definitely takes the crown of most-fantasised about AI. Poor old EDI must be crying her eyes out.
3. Anyone vaguely female spoken to by Commander Shepherd, Mass Effect 3: Now, of course a game which allows players to woo women (and by woo I mean hit the obvious dialogue response until they fall into your arms, just like real life) isn’t going to get very far presenting a parade of homely soldier gals. We gamers are a simple breed. And throughout the series the good people at Bioware have continued to make it clear they understand this by working very hard to demonstrate that there’s clearly an attractiveness requirement for female special forces operators, or that Shepard is the luckiest/seediest bastard alive. And one could attribute the increase in virtual squadmate attractiveness to increases in technology but by Mass Effect 3 its gone waaaaaay further than that. The above is Ashley Williams, given one hell of a makeover from her appearances in the previous two games and now looking like… well, fill in your own superlatives here. The Asari are as always a race entirely comprised of blue promiscuous attractive women, and they are all over your space-armoured ass. The reporter and the new PA are both particularly svelte and will happily have you pretty much at hello. Tali, longtime masked favourite of many players, is revealed to look like (Spoilers)
4. This again- Seduce Me: Yeah yeah yeah I’ve used it before blah blah blah. You aren’t reading this for the scintillating prose. Just look at the pictures. As if you needed to be told. For complicated analysis of the above, try here, he says, shamelessly.
5. Juliet Starling, Lollipop Chainsaw: Yeah. One of the cleaner pictures available. Cheerleader. Chainsaw. Lollipops. Zombies. Tiny Skirt. High School. One of Japan’s saner offerings. Truly. It’s a grittily realistic RPG with a complex moral choice system and profound revelations about the global economic system and human reality. Not so truly. You don’t even have to play it to know what kind of squeal she makes every time she chops up a zombie. Yeah.
Top 5 handheld games
1. Sticker Star: the latest, but perhaps not the best in the Paper Mario franchise, nevertheless brings back the humour and silliness of the first three games. The concept of stickers as battle items is somewhat gimmicky, but mostly it works well, after all, gimmicks is what Nintendo does best. Altogether, Sticker Star is fun, lighthearted and worth the wait.
2. Pokémon Black and White 2: While it’s true that Nintendo are flogging a near-dead Rapidash with the Pokémon franchise, Black and White didn’t disappoint. Ignoring its over-reliance on online connectivity – come on, Nintendo, I don’t actually have any friends – the game does end up doing what Pokméon does best: establishing a bond between you and your chosen starter Pokémon much stronger than any trifling familial bond. The added features, such as seasonal Pokémon and new battle mechanics, increase the replayability and ensure kids will be playing for years if they ever really want to catch em all.
3.Professor Layton and the Miracle Mask: It revitalises the lovely art style that Layton games are known for by introducing 3D animation. It can seem jarring at times as it switches schizophrenically between 2D and badly-designed 3D, but the story and logic puzzles bring back the classic Professor Layton charm that we know and love, with the added daily downloadable puzzle a nice bonus too.
4. CRUSH3D: It didn’t exactly have the most engaging or comprehendible of plots, yet it still stood out with its novel approach and use of the 3D capabilities of the 3DS. The action revolves around perspectives, logical thinking and the ability to “crush” the world to reach new places; once the easily ignorable plot is glossed over, the game was really quite fun.
5. The Room: Whether you agree or not, apps are really the new branch of handheld gaming, and it is for this reason that The Room makes the list. Widely praised and greatly hyped, The Room is one of those escape-the-room type point-and-click logic puzzles, but the design is so beautifully intricate that it stands out as something spectacular rather than just a run-of-the-mill app. I have no idea what I’m doing half the time but it’s bloody GORGEOUS.
And one to look forward to:
It’s got to be Pokémon X and Y. It’s just got to be. Finally, it seems like Nintendo are ditching their desperate need for all new Pokémon to be spikier than the love child of a hedgehog and a fox’s penis. And it’s 3D. ❤
Top 5 Anticipated Games of 2013
1.Grand Theft Auto 5: One of the most popular franchises returns with what looks like its most graphically stunning and in-depth world to date. Set in Los Santos (Los Angeles) and the surrounding Californian countryside the environments look varied, the characters on typical tongue in cheek GTA form. The proposed size is bigger than San Andreas, Red Dead Redemption and GTA IV combined so this looks like to be Rockstar’s most ambitious production to date. Put on top of that three playable characters and you have the biggest game of the year.
2.Elder Scrolls Online: Not being a huge MMO (Massive Multiplayer Online) fan I do have my concerns with this game. Personally I would much rather an RPG like Skyrim that explored the world of Tamriel further but with the same game play and style. An MMO will mean very different things indeed but having followed it closely I may, just may, be enticed by an MMO. Graphically it looks pretty good for an MMO but oh my lord the locations, THE LOCATIONS. It is on a scale vaster than any I actually thought realistic, spanning damn near all of Tamriel. So for me it will boil down to do I want to explore or do I want my RPG. It will be a tough choice to make. For the MMO loving world I am sure it will be a hit.
3.Watchdogs: Cast your minds back to E3 last year. It all seemed terribly dull, just a sequel here, a sequel there and maybe a dancing related Kinect game. Then out of the mists of mediocrity came Watchdogs. The visual urban setting intrigued me, it was deep and had great colours and lighting which created a very heavy and suppressive atmosphere. However, the main feature above all else was the game’s hook, controlling technology. By taking a good look at just how dependant on technology we are, Watchdogs has tapped into how that technology can be manipulated and controlled in ingenious ways. The results are in-depth knowledge of random people on the street, jamming mobile phone signals and my personal favourite, changing traffic lights to cause a pile up. It looks both clever and beautiful and I just can’t wait!
4.Pokémon X and Y: New Pokémon do I really need to say more? Alright I will. It is the first fully 3d entry in the series and from the brief trailer, it looks fantastic. The colours are vibrant and the Pokémon themselves are just as varied as ever as the trailer showcases the starter and the legendary Pokémon that will feature. Apart from that there is very little else to say except get hyped and get a ‘3DS’
5.Rome Total War 2: Potentially one of the most successful PC games of all time, Rome Total War provided gamers and history geeks with hours upon hours of empire building and nation conquering. Now with it’s sequel on the horizon both veterans and newcomers are excited alike. With incredible looking graphics and animation, it looks to provide the most intense and true to life experiences of classical warfare. Check out the trailer it is full of lovely Roman politics including daggers in the back and snakes in your bed. YAY HISTORY!
Well that is it for our year in review. Overall it has been a pretty good year full of laughs, chills and thrills. Now we are in 2013 and with it comes a whole new wave of adventure, mystery and fun. As the gaming community grows larger and larger everyday, the future for gaming looks brighter and a whole world of opportunities await the industry. Thank you all for a great year!
Throughout the entire game (which included an arcade mode, a challenge mode, and a map maker mode), however, was an overarching sense of tongue-in-cheek humour that many a CoD or Battlefield game should take note of, so that you could be in the ridiculous situation of shooting cyborg monkeys with a harpoon gun, something that I personally hold as the absolute benchmark of any game, period.
Though I would like to say the reason I am focusing on Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception in this article is because I have successfully completed the first two games in the series, unfortunately if I did I would be lying. I regrettably entered into the Uncharted franchise just after the third game was released, and instead of obeying the principles I usually uphold of playing games in the order of release, I instead dove straight into the newest game in the series.
Because of Nate’s likability, you become heavily invested in the narrative of the game, to the same extent as if it were a film or book. The rough plot follows Nate, a descendant of Sir Francis Drake, and his quest to find the lost city, the Iram of the Pillars, before more sinister forces do. The game sees you explore desert cities, French chateaux and even a sinking ship, each location being a platform style level, in which a varied number of gameplay styles are utilised in order to progress. This is balanced really well, with no one element, for example the acrobatics, gun battles or puzzle solving, gaining the upper hand. As a huge fan of third-person gameplay, this is one of the best examples, and the varied gameplay means you don’t get frustrated or bored if you tire easily of one particular style of play.
I mentioned earlier of Uncharted 3’s similarities to Lara Croft, as it is the one game I would find it easiest to compare Uncharted 3 to. However, while the Lara Croft games are good (focusing mainly on the games prior to the series most recent reboot) I would say that Uncharted 3 seems to have more scope. Though both follow the same linear structure, with less opportunity for exploration as seen in other third-person adventure games, Uncharted 3 is created on a much grander scale, if only it being much longer, and harder, that many of the Lara Croft games.
The Playstation was able to mature me into playing almost any game.
exeposedev 