#we are actually bungie friends now. i love multiplayer games

[saprophetic]

i was looking back thru the pics finn took and i totally missed this one earlier 😭😭😭

[mediabasedlife]

A Look Back At...The Last Generation (2013-2020)

I’d like to start this off by thanking those who encouraged me to write this article, my friends and family who encouraged me to rekindle this project despite my own trepidation. I hope its quality lives up to those lofty expectations.

     Say what you will about the hobby, gaming is in many ways the gift that keeps on giving. Every year there are hundreds, if not thousands of new offerings for every brand of player out there. And wouldn't you know it, there's a fairly significant portion of that library that are actually pretty good. Now, people will argue ad infinitum about what games are the best, or what consoles, or even which generation trumps the rest. This diversity of opinion is what has allowed gaming discussion to thrive just as potently as the medium which it encapsulates. Like any opinion, all of this is especially subjective; great games have been coming out pretty much every year since gaming began, a trend that seems like it will continue as long as gaming itself continues to thrive. While some may argue, I would say the latest generation thrived especially well. Ignoring the Wii-U, since I never owned one, and skirting around handhelds, the latest generation spanned the life of the Xbox One, the PlayStation 4, and technically, the Nintendo Switch. And through their seven-year life [switch notwithstanding], we saw the release of some truly excellent games - from top budget AAA titles to humble indie offerings. Now, in 2020, while we as a community are taking our first steps into the new generation of gaming, I think it fair to take pause, gaze back, and remember some of the games that made the latest generation so memorable for so many.

2013

    2013 marked the start of the last-gen, with the release of both the Xbox One and the PlayStation 4. Both consoles were built to shepherd out their predecessors, marking leaps in visual fidelity and infrastructure that would empower them to become the monoliths of gaming that they hoped to be. I won't say that both consoles had an equally vibrant launch, but they both tried to put their best foot forward. While the Xbox was busy desperately trying to become the multimedia center for your living room, Sony kicked off the next generation in style, releasing a whole seven days earlier than its competitor. With the Xbox not far behind, both consoles brought a suite of new, shiny games to play. Well, in theory, anyway. I'm not here to speak of the quality of the launch lineups of either console, but what I can do is list off the game that stood out, and why it made it onto my list.

-Assassin's Creed Black Flag      Black Flag actually saw its initial release on the PS3 and Xbox 360 almost a month prior to the soon to be current generation, but with both new consoles came a second release, one that came equipped with all the bells and whistles you'd expect from what was then a next-gen game. It doesn't look good for my list to start things off on a technicality, but this game is worth it. Black Flag remains one of my top three Assassin's Creed Games, which is saying a lot considering the sheer scale of the franchise. Fresh off the love it or hate it Assassin's Creed III, Black Flag looked to take a revitalized approach to the franchise formula, playing off of fan feedback, expanding upon what fans loved from AC3, and adding in new activities and a broader, fresher open world to explore. In it, you play as Edward Kenway, a charming rogue of a pirate who kicks the game off by stealing the identity of a defected Assassin. Expecting nothing more than riches and glory, his masquerade instead goes quickly sour, thrusting Edward into the conspiracy filled, secretive world of the Assassin and Templar conflict. What makes this story stand out is how different Edward was as a protagonist, seeing him acting largely indifferent to the traditional formula the assassin's creed games had followed thus far. The game's setting also helped it immensely; the game plays more like a pirate simulator, seeing players sail the Caribbean searching out treasures and fame, gathering a sturdy ship and a hearty crew, engaging in thrilling naval battles, and basking in the warm glow of the sun-drenched sands that define the game's many islands. Along the way, you interact with a bevy of historical or mythical figures, such as Blackbeard, Captain Kidd, Calico Jack, and many more. All of this came together to create an immensely satisfying game, a standout amidst its peers and predecessors, and an experience that still stands the test of time despite the numerous sequels it has received.

2014

    2014 was the year the new generation really started to pick up. The consoles had begun to get their footing, truly ushering in the next wave of quality games and proving their value to the players. Several critically acclaimed games got their start here or saw revitalized releases on the current generation of consoles. However, there were a few strays, games that elected to release on the prior consoles first and foremost, games that wouldn't see new-gen ports for some time, and others that never did, but still merited recognition and praise. But how many will make it onto my list? Well, you'll just have to read on.

-Titanfall     Titanfall was, for me, the first game on the Xbox One that truly cemented it as a worthy purchase. It was a melting pot of ideas and innovation that I immediately fell in love with. Built with an always-online principle, Titanfall sees players engaging in a pseudo-campaign of multiple, looping competitive matches. On the surface, you could easily glance Titanfall's way and see nothing remarkable. Another first-person shooter in a sea of competitors, all of whom had far more clout at the time. But what set Titanfall apart from the start was its dedication to movement, satisfying and fast-paced gunplay, and especially, robots. See, Titanfall's whole gimmick is this; players take on the role of Pilots, better than average soldiers of the far future who are deployed in times of conflict as superior ground troops, but more importantly, heavy artillery. As pilots perform well on the battlefield, they can call in the titular Titanfall, summoning their respective Titan to the fray. Titans are large, deadly mechs that can be piloted by the player to give them a distinct advantage in battle. What this translates to in gameplay is simple; as players make their way through matches, they build up a meter which when filled allows them to call down a massive robot to wreak havoc. Every player can do this, usually multiple times a match if they're good enough. Titans are fast, tough, and lethal, and fun as hell to control. But what kept the game balanced was the fact that titans weren't invincible. All players came equipped with anti-titan weaponry, alongside their usual loadout of rifles or handguns. This meant that anyone could take a titan down if they were savvy. The titans, coupled with the frantic movement and satisfying shooting, made Titanfall a one of a kind game. It's fitting, then, that the inevitable sequel would go on to improve on it in virtually every way, but that'll have to wait for later.

-Diablo 3     I will admit to not having played this in its initial release window, in fact, some years would pass before I finally picked it up on console during a sale. And though my time with it was quite belated, I would still consider it to be a genuinely fun game, one worthy of being on this list. In Diablo 3, players choose between seven classes; Wizard, Monk, Necromancer, Witch Doctor, Demon Hunter, Barbarian, or Crusader. From there, they are thrust into the demon-plagued land of Sanctuary, beginning their adventure in the town of New Tristram. Each class has a different backstory and a slightly different narrative throughout, but the core throughline is thus; you are sent to the village to investigate reports of a falling star, only to be swept up in a fight against hell and heaven itself for the fate of the world. In terms of game difficulty, the game sports an impressive twenty difficulty tiers; easy, normal, hard, master, and then sixteen levels of torment. Should players want an even greater challenge, there's also hardcore mode, which starts you off with permadeath: you get one life, no exceptions. Die, and the character is gone for good. Overall, I would say that Diablo's biggest strength is in its gameplay loop; Diablo plays like a top-down, hack and slash role-playing game, with players exploring the various levels in search of loot all the while battling hordes of enemies and leveling up, earning new abilities and skills that players can swap out to create their ideal builds. The core gameplay loop, while simple, is wildly addictive, with a massive loot pool to chase in an effort to grow ever stronger. Each class plays differently, but all of them are easy to learn. Diablo also supports local and online multiplayer, making it a great game to play with friends or family.

-Sunset Overdrive     Sunset Overdrive is a game I've previously covered on this blog before. In fact, I'd say I did such a good job that if you want to read about it, go read that article. But if you'd rather not click away, let me give you the TL;DR. Sunset overdrive is a satirical open world game made by Insomniac in which you play as a cocky and comedic hero out to save their city from a bogus energy drink that caused a pseudo-zombie outbreak. It's built around movement, with the player grinding on rails and running on walls and doing everything they can to stay mobile while gunning down the mutated enemies and exploring the environment. It's funny and feels great to play while being hampered by an underwhelming character creator and suite of customization options, but still manages to come out on top as an immensely satisfying game.

-Destiny     Destiny is the brainchild of one Bungie studios, the original creators of Halo, the next game on this list. Fresh off their amicable split from Microsoft, Bungie did what they did best; develop a truly great FPS. But this time, they added a twist; Destiny is equal parts Shooter, Looter, and MMO. It took these three core ingredients and mixed them together with gusto, delivering an immensely entertaining game that felt incredible to play both alone or with your friends. The story of destiny is a long one, but can be summarized simply; Some years in the future, Humanity met and allied with an alien being known as the Traveller, an alliance that heralded massive technological and social leaps, ushering in the new Golden Age of humanity. Unfortunately, the Traveller's natural enemies, The Darkness, attacked the solar system, destroying much, and whittling down the last survivors to a single safe city. In response, the Traveller created Guardians, reanimated protectors infused with the Traveller's power, tasked with defending the earth and all its colonies from the encroaching forces of evil that threaten this dwindling peace. Resurrected by a ghost, an emissary of the Traveller, you play as one of these Guardians; taking on the role of either the agile Hunter, the cosmically magical Warlock, or the strong and stalwart Titan. From there, you could either progress alone or join up with friends to take on the challenges of the solar system, pushing back the forces of darkness. Although lacking in longevity in its first outing, destiny was quickly expanded and iterated upon, turning it from an already impressive game to a true powerhouse and pillar of its genre.

-Halo: The Master Chief Collection     I won't pretend this started off as a flawless, perfect compilation of prior Halo games. But I love Halo, and I loved playing these games again, so it makes the list. Especially after all of the improvements and subsequent additions 343 made to the collection post-launch. On release, it featured Halo CE, Halo 2, Halo 3, and Halo 4, but has since gone on to include Halo 3: ODST and Halo Reach as well. If you're unfamiliar, Halo is a staple franchise in the Xbox lineup, and the master chief collection sought to unify all of the prior releases under one umbrella for the newest console. Halo is a sci-fi FPS franchise, largely following the saga of the titular Master Chief Petty Officer, John-117. John, or Master Chief as he is more commonly called, is a Spartan; a supersoldier of the future, who fights to protect humanity from an alien collective dubbed The Covenant. In the first game, Master Chief crash lands on an alien ringworld known as Halo, which later turns out to be an ancient superweapon created to exterminate all sentient life in the galaxy. Subsequent games only build the stakes from there, seeing John stave off one intergalactic threat after another in a franchise that continues to satisfy time and again. What the Master Chief Collection does is bundle everything up in one convenient package, while simultaneously offering tweaks and improvements to complement the technological advancements of the new consoles. It offers local and online multiplayer, both for its story and its competitive modes. Overall, even with the flawed beginnings, I would consider The master chief collection a must-have for Xbox players.

-Grand Theft Auto V     Ah yes, GTAV, the game that refuses to die. Technically, this game released on the Xbox 360 and ps3, but it's been put on the PS4/XBO and now even the PS5 and the latest Xboxes too. I won't be surprised if this game gets ported to the consoles that come after that, too, in seven or so years. This game just won't quit. But that's also a testament to the dedication of its player base and the overall quality of the game itself. GTAV is an irreverent, biting joy of a game, replete with humor and charisma. It was, and remains, the latest in Rockstar's open-world crime franchise, in which players take on the role of not one, but three separate characters trying to make their way through life in Los Santos California; Michael, a retired crook stuck in the witness protection system, Michael's former, quite deranged partner Trevor, and rounding out the cast is Franklin, a street-savvy up and comer. Together they go about committing numerous heists, shady deals, and more than a few moments of mayhem in their quest for glory. Its secondary selling point was a robust and open-ended online mode, where players could create their own character and participate in myriad activities with and against their friends and strangers for fame, money, and clout. This is the mode that has kept GTA going in the years since its release, and it is the mode that has seen the most improvements and updates as well. I spent a not inconsiderable amount of time in it myself, but it was always the story of Michael, Trevor, and Franklin that drew me in overall.

-Tales from the Borderlands     Tales from the Borderlands is the only Telltale game I'm putting in this whole list. Not for lack of quality on the other games' parts, but simply because this one has to be my favorite. For those unfamiliar, Borderlands is a series of FPS games that take place far in the future on the fringes of space; the titular Borderlands. It follows a revolving door of ragtag Vault Hunters, people who go in search of mythical, alien "vaults" that are rumored to contain vast amounts of treasure. They are incredibly popular, addicting looter shooters that match satisfying gunplay with beautiful cell-shaded graphics, topped off with charming and funny characters and not too shabby storytelling. Telltale games, on the other hand, are traditional point and click adventure games, released in episodic formats and usually broken down into seasons. They focus on storytelling first and foremost, showcasing incredibly compelling narratives influenced by player choice. You'd think, then, that these two dichotomous formats wouldn't pair well together at all, but Tales from the Borderlands proves that sentiment is wildly false. Tales from the borderlands took what was great about previous telltale games, and matched it perfectly to an original tale set in the Borderlands universe. It weaves an incredibly compelling narrative, filled with equal parts humor and feeling, and manages to tell one of the best Borderlands stories to date.

2015

    I don't have a lot to say about 2015. The new generation was still going strong and saw some truly excellent games grace its shelves, many of whom are going to appear below.

-Bloodborne    2015 kicked off incredibly strong with Bloodborne, the latest instant classic from the studio behind the equally popular Dark Souls franchise. Bloodborne melds the skill-oriented, punishing combat and exploration heavy maps of the Souls games with an eldritch, psychological atmosphere, a match so perfect it went together like peanut butter and chocolate. To espouse the story of Bloodborne would be an effort in itself, but  I shall do my best to summarize it; Shirking the more medieval settings of the Souls games before it, Bloodborne sees players navigating the victorian gothic town of Yarnham, a city plagued by beasts and monsters. It is these monsters you are tasked with dispatching, taking on the role of a Hunter of Beasts, sent to cleanse the town of that which ails it. But not is all as it seems, and the beasts may not be the only monsters Yarnham has to offer. Outside of its interpretive yet incredibly strong narrative, Bloodborne offered equally polished gameplay, iterating on the previously mentioned combat from prior dark souls games to create a punishing yet wildly satisfying gameplay loop that was easy to learn yet hard to master. Bloodborne forced players to always be on their guard but gave them no shield or barrier with which to do so, believing that offense was the greatest defense, making success hinge on your willingness to fight and your skill in surviving the nightmares that Yarnham had to offer. A melding of horror, action, and exploration, Bloodborne was a true success, cementing itself for years to come as a top tier action-RPG, and saw countless fans that remain dedicated to it to this day.

-The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt     I'm going to be blunt; This is one of my favorite games of the last generation. It is a top tier RPG, made up of an incredibly charming cast of characters, a beautiful open world, and a thrilling, fantastical narrative that all come together to make one of the best games to release in the last seven years. Though a sequel to not only two prior games, but also a long line of books, The Witcher 3 was surprisingly friendly to newcomers, of which I was one at the time. Despite its pedigree, I felt right at home in the world of the Witcher, quickly picking up on what I had missed in its long and storied life. The Witcher 3 puts players in the role of Geralt of Rivia, the titular Witcher, a magically enhanced human tasked with routing out monsters that threaten the world of man. This time around, Geralt is searching for his ward, Ciri, as he navigates a world fraught with monsters and men in equal measure. what starts as a simple search for a missing friend quickly blossoms into an adventure for the fate of the world itself. Though a fantasy RPG at its heart, the witcher manages to tell some particularly grounded and human stories, and this game is no exception. One moment will see you stalking a beast out in the wild, the next will see you navigating political intrigue in the courts of royalty. But it all flows together to create one of the best RPGs I've ever played, and one that earned a not inconsiderable amount of well-deserved praise when it first debuted back in 2015.

-Assassin's Creed Syndicate     Hot off the heels of the muddied AC Unity, Syndicate was the last proper Assassin's Creed game before the franchise would experience a massive genre and gameplay shift in its next entry. Where Unity saw too much focus on graphics and not enough care anywhere else, Syndicate finely balances all of its parts to create an impressive experience overall. This time around, players get to visit London, at the tail end of its industrial revolution. Out goes flintlocks and swords, in came steam and steel. This entry sees players in the role of both Evie and Jacob Frye, siblings fresh off their induction into the Assassin Brotherhood, tasked with dispatching justice on their Templar foes across London. The setting isn't the only big change for this game, as Syndicate saw an overhaul in both visual quality, scale, and gameplay. London feels lived large and lived in, with plenty of ground to explore and streets filled with people going about their day-to-day. Missions are split between Jacob and Evie both, with some allowing you to pick and choose and others forcing you into the shoes of one or the other as they work together to clean up the city. It innovated on the traditional gameplay loop, with this game having you going from borough to borough, toppling its templar leaders and expanding your sphere of influence with the aid of historical figures like Charles Darwin, Karl Marx, and Nikola Tesla. These famous faces are not the only people lending the Fryes their helping hand, as Syndicate also put the Fryes in charge of their own street gang, a ragtag group of brawlers and scouts that would come to their aid at the press of a button. Most times, conquering a borough involved you and your gang scrapping it out with those of the templar order, dusting knuckles to see who got the final say in the control of the area. This may seem at odds with the traditionally stealth-oriented approach prior games focused on, but that side of the game was not neglected either. Assassination missions saw fine-tuning and innovation as well, with players able to plan out and partake in uniquely tailored kills that matched the locale and personality of their target, from disguising yourself as a scientific cadaver to kill a corrupt doctor to allying with a guard and feigning capture to infiltrate and kill a target in the Tower of London. The game saw improvements out of combat as well, with Syndicate receiving a large overhaul in its parkour movement and general navigation. The Frye twins come equipped with a grappling hook that allows for speedy travel across London's many rooftops, while ground travel was made all the more expedient with the inclusion of horse-drawn carriages. The general parkour itself was also tuned, allowing for freer player movement and tighter directional control. All of this to say, Syndicate saw some truly welcomed improvements, iterating on the legacy and creating a lasting impression that stands up as one of the better games of the franchise.

-Star Wars Battlefront     While I've spoken of a Battlefront on this blog before, this is not that same game. Rather, this is Battlefront 2015, a soft reboot to the previous Battlefront line of games for the new generation of consoles. This Star Wars Battlefront was helmed and developed by Dice, famed for the Battlefield franchise, a line of competent and entertaining military-focused first-person shooters. They were known for solid campaigns, but more importantly, massive scale competitive multiplayer modes. This pedigree is shown heavily in Battlefront, with the game sporting 64 players competitive multiplayer, with teams taking on the roles of either the empire or the rebellion as they fight their way through maps taken straight from the star wars universe, from the snowy plains of Hoth to the immense forests of Endor and everywhere in between. The game was replete with game modes and had the ability to be played in either first or third person. Players were given access to a modest selection of in-universe weaponry, and could even take the role of recognizable star wars heroes on occasion. Visually, the game was stunning, with incredibly faithful and detailed recreations from everything to weapons to the maps themselves. It felt like a genuine passion project, built from the ground up by competent developers and made for fans and first-timers alike. Battlefront, much like many games on this list, has since been usurped by a sequel but remains an incredibly competent shooter and a genuinely fun game to play.

2016

    While 2015 saw the release of some truly impressive games, 2016 was a genuine powerhouse of a year. It saw the rise to prominence of Virtual Reality, through the oculus rift and the PlayStation VR. 2016 also saw the first re-released console of the current generation, in the form of the Playstation 4 Pro, a trend that Xbox would follow as well, seeing the release of 2016's Xbox One S, and in 2017, the Xbox One X. These were touted as faster, better performing, better-looking consoles than their base model predecessors, offering several enhancements to graphical fidelity and console performance, running games even better than they already did. And with these new consoles came an all-star suite of excellent games, a multitude of instant classics from big-name studios and fresh indie developers alike. Many of the games that released this year are ones I've individually covered before, but they still deserve their spot in this article. So without further ado, here are some of the most noteworthy games of 2016.

-Oxenfree     Where Bloodborne was the standout hit that kicked off 2015, Oxenfree did the exact same thing for 2016. Developed by the California based indie team at Night School Studios, Oxenfree is a supernaturally infused, slice of life adventure game that follows Alex, a witty, rebellious, soon to be high school graduate as she makes her way to the fictional Edwards Island, accompanied by her best friend Ren and new stepbrother Jonah. This small group of friends is meeting up with what they assume will be a large group to have a weekend bash, But what was supposed to be a boisterous weekend party turns out to just be two extra guests; Clarissa, a fellow student who has ties to Alex, and Nona, a mild-mannered girl who just so happens to be Ren's current crush. Their modest get together quickly goes south when Alex uses a small handheld radio to tune into a weird signal emanating from the island, unleashing the spirits of a sunken military submarine, long since lost at sea. These wayward souls possess one of the kids and scatter the rest across the island, forcing Alex to uncover the mystery of their death and find a way to save her friends and escape the island. The game wears its inspirations on its sleeve, taking queues from classic ghost stories as much as it does retro coming of age stories, but it adapts these ideas masterfully. As for how it plays, Oxenfree is a side scrolling point and click adventure game, built around exploration and dialogue rather than complex game mechanics. It explores the interpersonal relationships between all the characters as much as it explores the haunted nature of the island itself. It easily shifts between these disparate tones, with a story filled with as many supernatural spooks as sarcastic teenage banter, seamlessly integrating player choice into the mix to create a truly excellent narrative. Oxenfree also features a high amount of replayability, with player choice going on to influence which of the game's many endings, as well as touting a new game plus mode that adds an extra smattering of content for your subsequent playthroughs. Oxenfree was a gift that kept on giving, more than earning its spot on this list.

-Firewatch     Firewatch is the first of several 2016 games I've previously written about, and while my opinion of it may have not been the highest initially, ruminating on it since has led me to a new appreciation of the time I spent with it. I would recommend reading my original review, but the short summary is thus; you play as Henry, a man on the run from his troubles who takes a job in the Shoshone national forest, keeping an eye on the wildlife and ensuring nothing is amiss. Your companion through the game is Delilah, a voice through your walkie talkie, somebody else who has taken the same job as you over in one of the adjacent watchtowers. Throughout the game you explore the forest, keeping the area safe while exploring the mysteries of the area you now inhabit, all the while developing a friendly relationship with Delilah as you go. It's a simple, but satisfying first-person adventure game, with an emotionally charged but comedic narrative about one man's journey to get lost and find himself.

-Stardew Valley     Stardew Valley is a retro-inspired simulator game about a down and out office worker who inherits their grandfather's farm in the titular Stardew Valley. They leave their mundane life behind and embark on a new journey in rural life, building up the farm from a rundown, untamed field into a bustling agricultural powerhouse, all the while making friends and forming bonds with the locals that you meet along the way. Stardew plays like a dream and features a stunning pixellated art style that complements its easygoing nature. Stardew is a game you can get lost in with ease, featuring an incredibly satisfying gameplay loop; It's a charmingly simple sim, one that encourages players to make their own way and their own choices, with a multitude of different ways to spend each in-game day. You're encouraged to play the game at your own pace, experiencing its range of content as it comes, rather than being railroaded into any one path for progression. It's a game that encourages exploration, diversity, and freedom, one that never really ends. Stardew made waves when it first came out for being such an open-ended, friendly experience, and it has since gone on to be heavily expanded upon by its developer, seeing releases on even more platforms and accruing even more fans along the way. It's a game that's easy to love and hard to put down, a comfort food game that makes you want to revisit it time and again.

-Titanfall 2     Where the original Titanfall was an excellent Xbox exclusive, Titanfall 2 bloomed the franchise into a multiplatform powerhouse. While it kept the excellent multiplayer modes, Titanfall 2's biggest change was the inclusion of a proper single-player story, and it's this inclusion that sees Titanfall 2 earn a place on my list. Titanfall 2's campaign is short, but sweet, seeing players take on the role of Jack Cooper, a pilot in training under the mentorship of an experienced soldier named Lastimosa. Unfortunately, on their first field mission, Lastimosa is killed, forcing Jack to embrace his future role as Pilot in an effort to survive and keep Lastimosa's experimental Titan out of enemy hands. This Titan, given the codename BT, is unique among Titans in that it can freely equip the various titan weapons and abilities, while simultaneously having an expanded AI that allows it to perform better in combat than its contemporaries. Together, Jack and BT make their way through the Frontier, coming into conflict with the varied enemy forces that they were originally sent in to stop. The campaign is brief, but what it lacks in lengths it makes up for in entertainment; the banter between Jack and BT makes for some great dialogue, and the campaign is perfectly built around the shooting and movement tech that made the first Titanfall so distinct, creating a series of levels that are just as built around gunfights as they are around precise first-person platforming. The game's environments are also beautiful to look at, varying from gritty industrial complexes to lush jungle environments that are as nice to look at as they are to maneuver through. Accompanying the stellar story mode is the recurring suite of multiplayer offerings, all of which have been upgraded and improved upon to complement the innovations of the sequel. Where Titanfall was good, Titanfall 2 is great, and it's a continual shame the series hasn't been given more time to shine.

-The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim - Special Edition     This is another game that I've previously covered on my blog, and it's also another technicality. See, Skyrim technically released back in 2011 but saw so many re-releases in the years afterward that at this point the only device that doesn't natively play it are phones. With this particular re-release, Bethesda sought to give console players the same quality of life changes that PC players had been seeing for years, namely graphical improvements, stability patches, and most importantly, player-created content. Skyrim had developed a bustling and dedicated community of creators in its years since release, all of whom had made countless mods for the game that ranged anywhere from simple tweaks to full-on expansion sized stories, and the special edition release marked the first time Xbox and Playstation fans could get their hands on this library of unique content. It created a situation where the already hefty game could be made all the more robust with fan contributions. Don't like the music? Download one of the unique music packs somebody put together. Want any number of pop culture-inspired items? Looking for some new quests to spice up this five-year-old game? It's all there and more.

-Watch Dogs 2     You might be wondering why I've put Watch Dogs 2 on this list while its predecessor is nowhere to be found. While the first Watch Dogs was a middling revenge story that happened to incorporate some neat hacking based features, Watch Dogs 2 is where the franchise really found itself. It follows the story of one Marcus Holloway, a bright and witty young man who's been framed for a crime he didn't commit by a faulty surveillance network that monitors the city of Los Angeles in a pseudo-dystopic future not so removed from our own. So Marcus does what he does best, hacks into the network and removes himself from it entirely, embarking on a campaign to take the whole system down with the help of white hat hacker collective Deadsec. What sets this game apart from its predecessor is the charisma of its cast and the far more varied ways in which you can use the game's technology to your advantage. Hijack cameras, remote control vehicles, manipulate streetlights, the world of Watch Dogs 2 is yours to manipulate all at the press of a button. And if hacking doesn't get you where you need to be, Marcus has some skills of his own; he's particularly skilled at parkour and quite handy at non-lethally dispatching foes with a weapon of his own design, a billiard ball attached to a bungee cord. And if playing non-lethally isn't your thing, you can also accumulate quite the arsenal of homemade weaponry, all 3D printed from the base of your hacker collective. Watch Dogs 2 is a game about a group of people trying to take down a corrupt system using whatever means they can. It's a witty, satirical, but surprisingly grounded story told across a beautiful open-world recreation of Los Angeles, one that drew me in far more than its predecessor ever managed to do.

2017

    2017 might not have had the same pedigree of games as its predecessor, but it did see the belated release of the latest current-gen console; The Nintendo Switch. A revolutionary step up from the Wii and Wii U, The Switch took the gaming world by storm thanks to its ability to seamlessly transition from a home console playing on your TV to a handheld console able to go with you anywhere. The Switch remains a staple of the console market to this day, easily standing tall next to the Playstation and Xbox consoles both new and old. Aside from the Switch, there was still a healthy collection of games for people to enjoy, some of which will be highlighted below.

-Night in the Woods     Night in the Woods marks yet another game I've personally reviewed, and also stands proud as one of my absolute favorites of this generation. A humble offering from indie studio Infinite Fall, it was a gorgeously animated sidescroller of an adventure game that followed college dropout Mae Borowski as she returns to her small home town of Possum Springs to rekindle old friendships and reconnect with her family. Despite its anthropomorphic cast, it tells a genuinely human story, one that perfectly reflected what it feels like to revisit old haunts; how things can be so familiar yet change so much, seamlessly blending an emotionally charged narrative with a dark, suspenseful hometown mystery. Night in the Woods remains an absolutely incredible game to experience, showcasing themes like mental illness, sexuality, and identity through the lens of youthful wit and clever, dry sarcasm. I haven't played many truly perfect games, but Night in the Woods came damned close to being one.

-Kingdom Hearts 1.5/2.5     Ah yes, another collection of re-releases. Kingdom Hearts technically started back on the PS2, with the release of Kingdom Hearts 1. From there it blossomed into an incredibly diverse and lengthy franchise that saw releases on consoles and handhelds alike, from the PS2 to the Gameboy Advance. What these re-releases did was bundle all of the Kingdom Hearts games into one complete package, and tossed them all onto the PlayStation 4. It created a cohesive collection for this storied saga and presented it all in an easy to follow order that anyone could pick up and work through. Both games also offered the previously exclusive Final Mix content to the west for the first time, expanding on the already hefty games with more difficulty options, more enemies, more story content, and more challenges to keep the fun going and going. But what is Kingdom Hearts, I hear some people ask. Kingdom hearts is a series of action RPGs that follow the adventures of heroes known as Keyblade Wielders as they fight against the forces of darkness that threaten the worlds beyond. They play great, feature an especially enjoyable cast of characters, and tells a heartwarming story of good and evil. A joint project between Square Enix and Disney, Kingdom Hearts features an abundance of Disney characters and worlds, crossing over with various Square Enix properties in this epic struggle against light and dark. That's the easiest summary of the story by far, as delving any deeper would almost certainly confuse the casual reader, but let me say this; The Kingdom Hearts games are fantastic, well worth the time, and with these remastered collections, more approachable than ever.

-Nier Automata     Nier Automata is a tough game to talk about in-depth, on account of just how easy it is to spoil for people who haven't experienced it. But it was also one of my favorite games of 2017, so I'll do my best to give it its due. Nier Automata is somewhat of a hybrid game; it blends so many genres together but somehow manages to do each one of them justice. Equal parts open world, action RPG, Bullet Hell, and more, Nier Automata takes place in the far, far future, in the ruins of earth. Humanity has long since abandoned the planet and sought shelter on the moon, entrusting a group of humanoid androids to defend the planet from an encroaching alien threat. The story follows several of these androids; 2B, 9S, and A2, as they wander the ruins of humanity and fight back against the robot foes that the aliens use as soldiers. It tells an amazing story that all but demands subsequent replays to get the full breadth of its narrative weight across, with each subsequent playthrough seen through the eyes of one of the other characters. Equal parts sci-fi story and humanist breakdown, Nier Automata is a deconstructive, philosophical pondering wrapped in the guise of an anime action game. That's not to say it doesn't wear the disguise well; Nier Automata plays like a dream, with stylish combat and an accompanying score that makes for easy listening both in and out of the game. It's another must-play, especially with the remake/remaster of its predecessor soon to release in 2021.

-Persona 5/Persona 5 Royal     Persona 5 is an absolute joy of an RPG. It's slick, stylish, has a superb soundtrack, and tells a top tier story to boot. You take the role of a down-and-out high school kid who's been forced to transfer from his hometown in the countryside to Tokyo, thanks to a bogus police incident. Labeled a criminal and looked down on by the adults of his new school, the protagonist goes about bettering himself, raising his grades, and making the most of his new life in a new city. He forms bonds and relationships with the people around him, making fast friends with many of his classmates and even some chill adults along the way. Oh, he can also use a supernatural phone app to dive into the corrupted hearts of society, utilizing a special power to battle the evils that lie within and force them to change their ways and confess their deeds. Herein lies the dichotomy of the Persona 5; Much like the other Persona games that preceded it, the story it tells is a hybrid of supernatural mystery and coming of age drama, blending mundane highschool life with a fantasy adventure. It is equal parts life simulator and stylish role-playing game, as you and your friends do their best to repair a broken system using the fantastical powers they've been imbued with. These powers are the titular Persona, powerful creatures that embody the sides of ourselves we keep hidden behind the masks of society. These personas allow one to do battle with the shadows that lurk within these corrupted hearts, creatures that take on myriad forms inspired by religion and myth. Wielding this power, they embark on a journey of social reform, fighting a revolving door of less than scrupulous individuals that all culminating in a battle to change society itself. In spite of its overtly fantastical elements, the story it tells is decidedly grounded and surprisingly relatable; at its core, Persona 5 is about a collective of disenfranchised individuals trying their best to make it through life and change things for the better, a story that was and remains especially poignant and a welcomed escapist fantasy to fall into time and again.

-Slime Rancher     Slime Rancher is an adorable simulator game and one I've praised before on my blog. It blends first-person shooter elements with the farming simulator genre, tasking players to manage and explore a planet on the fringes of space that's almost entirely populated by a race of creatures known as Slime. Slimes come in a varied selection of types and sizes, but all of them have one universal similarity; they all produce a resource known as a Plort that you can trade to an intergalactic trade center for currency, which in turn allows you to upgrade your slime farm and expand into new territories. The gameplay loop is nothing but fun, with each new expansion bringing in new species of slime that you can wrangle and combine to make hybrids that in turn create more valuable plorts. As you make your way through the planet, you start uncovering logs left behind by your farm's prior owner, that weave a narrative of love and loss, a story that drives you forward in your quest if only to see how it concludes. You're not alone in this quest, though, as you have your slimes for company as well as several long-distance conversations via the computer in your home between friends and fellow farmers alike. Subsequent game updates have only expanded upon the experience, seeing new opportunities for trade, daily activities, and more, making an already invigorating and enjoyable game all the more so.

-Destiny 2     It's no secret that Destiny 2 had a complicated launch window. Many fans felt that Destiny 2 left too much of what made its predecessor great on the cutting room floor, electing instead to reset the player base back to zero and tell a brand new story. While I missed some of what Destiny 2 left behind, I was still somebody who found a lot of joy in Destiny 2, as evidenced by the thousand-plus hour count it tells me I've poured into it since its 2017 release. The game has also seen countless improvements and additions in the years since its release, adopting a new seasonal model and even going free to play after a point. Most recently, Destiny 2 saw the release of Beyond Light, the first in a new trilogy of expansions that hopes to continue the game forward over the next few years. So, while it might have had a rough start, it still remains destiny at its core, making it one of the best shooters on the market, coupled with a satisfying loot hunt and a rewarding structure that continues to keep its fans coming back for more. That alone lands it in my list of games for 2017, and the generation as a whole.

-The Sims 4    Though this game technically saw the light of day back in 2014, I didn't end up playing it until its console release here in 2017. Thus, I place it here. There isn't a lot of complication with Sims 4. If you're at all familiar with its predecessors, you know exactly what to expect. An engaging simulator game, in which you craft an individual or family and set them on the path of life, influencing them as they go or leaving them to their own fates so as to see what happens. You tailor their looks, personality, aesthetic...it's a premier example of micromanagement as entertainment. This installment shirked some of the advancements made by its predecessor but still manages to be a robust and enjoyable game all on its own, made all the better by continued additional content releases in the years since its premiere. It's a game that keeps on giving and seems primed to continue doing so for some time yet.

2018

    2018 saw the release of some genuinely top-shelf games, with the Switch continuing to establish itself against its contemporaries, while the Playstation continued to add excellent exclusives to its lineup.

-Far Cry 5     The Far Cry games have always been known for being competent shooters with large open worlds, and this one is no exception. Shirking the usual foreign locales, Far Cry 5 takes place a lot closer to home, seeing players cleaning up the rural backwoods of Montana, taking place in the fictional Hope County. In it, you play as a rookie cop sent in to apprehend an evangelical doomsday cultist; John Seed, The Father. This arrest quickly goes south, leaving you as the last lawman willing to stand up to the Seed family and free Hope County from their grasp. To do so, you systematically break the hold of his lieutenants, dismantling their bases of operations and taking down his associates in a slow climb to face him once more. Along the way you make friends and allies out of the locals, people with a similar drive to rise up and clean up their county. As far as the gameplay, Far Cry 5 is a mix of FPS and RPG elements, with a rudimentary character customization system and plenty of powerful guns to acquire. You level up and earn skills that augment your preferred style of play, be it stealthy or over the top, all in your pursuit of justice. Augmenting this quest is the world it takes place in, with players exploring lush forests, vibrant fields, and the general detritus of rural America. Hope county feels real, with looks to match, despite its farcical tone and over the top gameplay. All of this came together to make a Far Cry that felt fresh and fun, a genuine step forward for the franchise.

-God of War     Prior games in the God of War series were not known for subtlety, nuance, or humanity. Rather, they were violent hack and slash games that featured the titular God of War, Kratos, seeking and exacting bloody revenge on the greek pantheon for their slights against him and his family. They were by no means bad games, but they weren't what I would consider masterpieces either. Then, we were given God of War (2017). This soft reboot/Sequel for the franchise saw Kratos embarking on a distinctly more grounded story than its predecessors, navigating the perils of fatherhood while on a journey to deliver his late wife's ashes in the world of the Norse Pantheon. He is joined by his son, Atreus, a bright but rebellious young boy who seeks only to prove his worth to the gruff and distant Kratos. This more human story is accompanied by a more grounded approach to combat and gameplay; while it retains the emphasis on action, it feels more deliberate than prior entries, shifting the combat style from the hack and slash nature to a more measured approach, with players needing to conserve stamina and plan their attacks lest they get easily overwhelmed. The game also incorporates a more open world structure than its predecessors, seeing Kratos and his son freely traversing their environment, unlocking shortcuts, and finding means to double back on past areas in a level progression that feels more like a Souls game than the God of Wars of old. All of this came together to make a game that felt genuinely innovative, a fresh new direction for a pre-established franchise that was as welcoming to newcomers as it was to prior fans.

-Donut County     Donut County is a silly, short indie puzzle game in which you play as a mischievous raccoon delivering "donuts" to the unsuspecting populous around him. These donuts are, in fact, large sinkholes that expand as they eat different objects, eventually growing to swallow the entirety of the lot they were sent to. The core gameplay lies in this concept, with you controlling the various sinkholes from level to level, figuring out the order in which to consume the various objects on each map in order to grow in size. As the game progresses you unlock various upgrades to these sinkholes, like the ability to spit things out of them, adding new layers to the simple puzzles the game encapsulates. It isn't a terribly long game, as already said, only taking an hour or two to finish, but it cemented itself as a charming indie game amidst a sea of big-name titles.

-Marvel's Spider-Man     Developed by Insomniac, previously mentioned in the Sunset Overdrive excerpt, Marvel's Spider-Man is a rare example of a genuinely amazing superhero game. In it, players take on the role of Peter Parker, a Spider-Man who has already established himself as the hero we know and love, but one that still has room to grow and learn. What starts off as a triumphant takedown of one Wilson Fisk, the Kingpin, soon blossoms into a complicated web that involves a shady group known as the Demons that Spider-Man must stop from wreaking havoc on the city. But the game isn't just about the Heroics of Spider-Man; The Game showcases the best aspects of Peter's character, splitting the game equally between his time as Spider-Man and his normal life as Peter Parker, a scientist working under the apprenticeship of one Otto Octavius, while simultaneously working with his Aunt May at the local Homeless Shelter and trying to rekindle his forlorn relationship with Mary Jane. All of this unfurls simultaneously, weaving a web that melds incredible movement with fast and stylish combat, stellar characters, and a heartwarming tale, cementing itself not only as a great game but also as one of the best Spider-Man stories out there.

-The Missing: JJ Macfield and the Island of Memories     The Missing is a heartfelt, down to earth story told through the lens of a grisly but goofy premise. In it, you play as the titular JJ Macfield, a young girl who goes on a trip with her close friend Emily to a remote island off the coast of Maine. What is supposed to be a fun excursion takes a turn for the worse, as Emily goes missing, leaving JJ to track her down. Unfortunately, this quest quickly leads JJ to her death...but not for long. Resurrected by a bolt of lightning, JJ gains the ability to remove various parts of her body, as the island quickly goes from an idyllic wonderland to a psychedelic nightmare. Undeterred, JJ uses her newfound ability to traverse the island, ever searching for her lost friend. The Missing might sound like a horror game on paper, but it uses these macabre themes to tell a distinctly grounded story about dealing with personal identity and navigating a hostile and unfamiliar world, culminating in a heartbreakingly bittersweet twist that I won't spoil here. This is all to say; the Missing is an excellent game. It's a joy to play, despite its harrowing content, and it manages to convey its themes in a way that feels genuine and meaningful, telling a story that's still relevant to this day.

-Super Smash Brothers Ultimate     Smash games have always been good, and Ultimate more than earns its moniker. This is the Ultimate Smash game; iterating on its predecessors without changing anything for the worst, Ultimate is an unabashed love letter to the series as a whole, incorporating every character and every map from every prior game all in one upgraded package. If you don't know what Smash is, let me explain; Nintendo is known for a lot of fantastic first-party titles, from Mario to Kirby to Metroid, and countless others. Smash takes all of these well-loved characters, throws them in an arena, and has them fight for supremacy. Debuting on the Nintendo 64, Smash has seen one major game release for every Nintendo console since, culminating in Smash Ultimate on the Nintendo Switch. As earlier stated, it features an absolutely enormous roster of playable characters, featuring every fighter from the previous games and several new additions for good measure. This roster was only further expanded with the release of the fighter passes, seeing an additional eleven fighters across the two that have thus far been released, ranging from surprise hits like Persona 5's Joker to fan favorites like Banjo and Kazooie. While not featuring a traditional story mode, Ultimate makes good use of its characters in a suite of different game modes that can be played both alone or with friends, online or locally. It's a fantastic party game and an equally praiseworthy fighter, rewarding skilled play but catering to casual players and newcomers alike.

2019

    2019 marked the slowdown for the current generation, shadowed by the whispers of a new age of consoles. This made for a simple year for games, but one no less stacked with noteworthy games and worthwhile experiences.

-Kingdom Hearts 3     After years of waiting, 2019 finally saw the release of Kingdom Hearts 3. The wait might have been long, but the game delivered on the hype, simultaneously closing out the narrative arc that had begun so long ago with Kingdom Hearts 1 and beginning a new chapter for fans to look forward to. In service of this goal, Kingdom Hearts 3 wrapped up the majority of dangling storylines from all the previous games, while still leaving a handful of mysteries to chase into the future of the franchise. It featured a new suite of Disney worlds to explore, and incorporated Pixar properties for the first time in franchise history. The new content accompanied refined and polished gameplay mechanics and a complete visual overhaul, while still retaining the heart and soul that defined the games thus far. It all came together well enough but was later expanded upon through the release of Re: Mind, the game's beefy expansion that rebalanced gameplay and added in hours of new story content to better cap off the story. All told, Kingdom Hearts 3 was another great game, building on a legacy that seems like it will continue well into the future.

-Devil May Cry 5     For those not in the know, Devil May Cry is a series of games that follow the life of Dante, a half-demon sword for hire as he does his best to kill monsters and eat pizza. It's a franchise known for skillful, precise, stylish combat mixed with goofy, over the top stories, usually involving Dante and his associates contending with the fallout of his family, the demon king Sparda and his brother Vergil. While not a flawless franchise, it saw several excellent releases over the years, but then went depressingly dormant. Devil May Cry 5 was the perpetual waiting game, but 2019 saw it finally come out, accompanied by mass acclaim and praise. it really seemed like all the years of waiting were well rewarded. DMCV features three playable characters; Nero, a fellow demon hunter first introduced in Devil May Cry 4, Dante, the series' staple protagonist, and lastly the mysterious V, a newly introduced character for this game. Together the three were tasked with working together to take down the demonic Qliphoth and its master, Urizen, an immensely powerful demon lord. The game looks gorgeous, marking the first time the games have looked truly next-gen. Accompanying this boost in visual fidelity is the franchise's staple; combat was finely tuned to be more stylish than ever, with each character having a variety of tricks at their disposal to dispatch the demon hoard that stood between them and Urizen. Devil May Cry was back, and it was better than ever.

-Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night     Bloodstained is the spiritual successor to the Castlevania series, helmed by its most prominent contributor Koji Igarashi. Starting its life as nothing more than a simple Kickstarter, it blew through its funding goal and a few years later saw its release on the current generation of consoles.  It's not a particularly complicated game, but it is particularly fun, with it adapting many of the staples that made Castlevania so great. As a spiritual successor to Castlevania, the games play very similarly; both are side scrolling hack and slash games that take place in fantastical gothic castles, and both see protagonists with varied combat and magical aptitude on their quest to take down the castle's owner. In the case of Castlevania, that owner is Dracula, but in the case of Bloodstained, players are tasked with defeating Gebel, an alchemically modified human known as a Shardbinder. You play as another one of these Shardbinders, Miriam. Miriam and Gebel are the lone survivors of an alchemical experiment that gave them the ability to wield a power called shards, crystalline embodiments of demonic essence. The narrative is simple, but the gameplay is where it shines; as players progress through Gebel's castle, you can accumulate more and more shards, all of which give Miriam access to new abilities, abilities that go on to aid her in her continued exploration. This creates a very satisfying loop; explore the castle, collect shards, unlock more of the castle to explore. Augmenting her shards are a suite of craftable and upgradeable weaponry, a selection of melee and firearms that allows players to diversify their preferred playstyle and experiment with what works best in any given situation. Subsequent content additions have added even more to the game, in the form of new modes, difficulties, and playable characters, adding to the replayability and longevity of what was already an excellent experience. Despite starting from simple roots, Bloodstained rose up and became something all on its own, paying homage to its inspirations while cementing a name for itself as a new staple of the genre.

-Catherine Full Body     While originally releasing in 2011, 2019 saw an expanded re-release complete with new characters, new stages, and hours of extra story content. At its core, Catherine and its Full Body re-release are unique gems in the gaming world. One part puzzle game, one part dating simulator, it blends the complicated world of relationships with macabre block puzzles, all the while weaving a beautiful tapestry about one man's quest for love. In it, you take the role of Vincent Brooks, an unambitious 30-something simply going through the motions of life. He has a steady relationship and a stable job, a group of colorful and enthusiastic friends, but it's clear from the start just how much he's stagnated. His current girlfriend, Katherine, is starting to ask the big questions; marriage, children, their future. Unable to parse these ideas, he loses himself in his time at the local bar with his pals, shooting the shit and getting sloshed. That is, until, a new flame suddenly appears; the seductive temptress Catherine. One thing leads to another, and it comes to pass that they spend the night together...maybe. This is where the game's narrative really kicks off, with Vincent having to navigate the day to day, attempting to reconcile his long-time love with his possible new fling. This story is juxtaposed against the game's core gameplay loop, which sees Vincent forced to climb the deadly tower of babel each night in his dreams. To do this, players must stack blocks and avoid the perils and traps that each stage presents, making a mad dash to the top of the tower before the bottom collapses in on itself and Vincent plummets to his doom. For you see, this isn't an ordinary dream; if you die on the tower, you die in real life, making this desperate ascent a race for his very life. Each stage of the tower represents the game's various core themes, and each gets more and more complicated as the game progresses. In the interim of these climbs, players are set about answering multiple-choice inquiries that influence the direction of Vincent's relationships, with each answer adjusting a conspicuous morality meter that eventually comes to determine which of the 8 endings you could attain. With Full Body, this number was increased to 13, to adjust for the inclusion of a new paramour; Rin, a mysterious piano player that sets up shop in Vincent's favorite bar. Both Catherine and its Full Body re-release are excellent games, but I was especially smitten with the layers of extra content and story that Full Body brought to the table, additions that made Full Body one of my favorite games of 2019.

-Untitled Goose Game     Untitled goose game is a simple premise on paper; players take on the role of an ornery, mischievous goose as it wreaks havoc through a small English town. Equal parts puzzle and stealth game, the goose has a laundry list of tasks it seeks to complete, from stealing hats off people's heads to infiltrating the local pub. It's not a long game by any means, but it has a ton of replayability in the form of additional tasks and challenges that only present themselves after your first playthrough. These range from time-based completions to additional bouts of mischief and all of them are incredibly satisfying to chase down. Untitled Goose Game has a quaint, painterly art style that compliments the charming simplicity of the game's premise, accompanied by a dynamic, classically-toned score that rises and falls in prominence as you go about your goosely business. All said Untitled Goose Game is a genuine treat, a brief but whimsical game that's just about having fun and goofing around.

2020

    It's no secret that 2020 has been a rough year for a lot of folks. Between a pandemic, political controversy, and general drudgery, it's a year that feels like it can't end soon enough. But in spite of it all, 2020 was also a fantastic year for games. Serving as the last hurrah for the Xbox One and Playstation 4, we saw the release of some truly excellent stories that kept players going through the long months of an otherwise mediocre year.

-Animal Crossing: New Horizons     Releasing right at the start of widespread quarantine, New Horizons supplied people with something they couldn't easily do in their own lives; escape. Animal Crossing New Horizons is the perfect escapist fantasy for the year it released in, seeing players partaking in an island getaway in the hopes of colonizing and forming an idyllic town on an untamed paradise.  At their core, the animal crossing games are simple simulators. You create your character by selecting a few presets; hair, eyes, skin color, and then you're let free to explore your new locale. With this latest release, that locale is the aforementioned island, a small paradise in the sea dotted by trees and rivers, accented by flowers and weeds. You start your life on this new Island with a handful of other residents; the Nook Family, the proprietors of this island venture, and two random villagers who are looking to make a life on this island the same as you. Things start small, with everyone working together to set up tents and create a bonfire and find some food for a welcome party. Afterward, the game synchronizes itself to your console's date and time and sets you off on your way. Unlike other simulators on this list, Animal Crossing is a unique breed, running concurrently to the real world, continuously progressing in real-time. Flowers grow, trees produce fruit, and each day is a new adventure. It follows the general turn of the seasons for your respective hemisphere, celebrating holidays and alternating available activities with each passing day. As for what you can do yourself, the opportunities are legion; you can catch bugs, go fishing, search for fossils, chat up your villagers, visit other islands, and much more. As you progress, more ventures open their doors to you; catch enough bugs and fish, and you can elect to have a museum built to showcase your finds. Collect enough resources, and you can build new furniture and create plots of land that encourage more villagers to come and move to your island. Everything you do is in service of continued growth, but also serves just as simple fun, a charming, easygoing distraction from the concerns of the day-to-day.

-Final Fantasy VII Remake     The Final Fantasy franchise is a long and storied one, replete with highs and lows. One such high was 1997's Final Fantasy 7, a game that quickly cemented itself as a fan favorite and an absolute classic. Now, in 2020, FF7 is back...sort of. See, FF7 Remake is the first in a line of games that will eventually go on to tell the entirety of the original FF7's story, which means that this release is only the first portion of a much larger narrative. Adapting what was originally the first few hours of the original game, FF7 Remake expands upon the opening section of its predecessor, simultaneously remaking the old content for modern audiences and adding in new aspects for old fans. FF7 Remake improves upon the original in practically every way, serving as a genuine remake that still manages to retain what made that original game so memorable and important to fans. The game might be new, but the heart is the same; FF7 Remake follows the story of Cloud Strife, an ex SOLDIER turned mercenary hired by an eclectic group known as Avalanche to dismantle a local power plant that's poisoning the planet. What starts as a well-intentioned but extreme case of eco-terrorism quickly explodes (pun intended) into a much larger story that sees Cloud and Avalanche bringing the fight straight to the corrupt Shinra Corporation and beyond, culminating in a battle against fate itself. Because this remake only covers a portion of what will go on to be a much larger narrative, it only scratches the surface of what makes the original FF7 so great, but it does so with gusto; the game plays and looks better than ever, bringing with it a heartfelt and compelling narrative that keeps you hooked the whole way through.

-Minecraft Dungeons     Minecraft Dungeons takes the charming, voxel visuals and world of Minecraft and melds them seamlessly with a charming, easygoing dungeon crawler that's approachable for casual and experienced gamers alike. Where Minecraft is an open-ended sandbox game about building and exploring a blocky world, Minecraft Dungeons sees a collective of heroes on a quest to defeat the evil Illager, a powerful sorcerer whose armies have been sweeping the land leaving destruction in their wake. It's not a very complicated story about good and evil, but it doesn't have to be; Minecraft Dungeons prioritizes it's simple and easy to master gameplay first and foremost. You collect loot, battle recognizable Minecraft enemies, and progress through a litany of stages on your way to fight the big bad. It's not very long but encourages you to play it time and again, collecting better gear and trying your hand at the many difficulty levels for additional challenges. It's not the best looking or the best playing game that released this year, but it had heart and made for a short and entertaining way to pass the time.

-Ghost of Tsushima    Ghost of Tsushima isn't a game to scoff at. One of the best looking games of the generation, this PS4 exclusive is one part historical timepiece, one part action-adventure, and one part stealth game. It follows the story of Jin Sakai, a samurai and one of the last survivors of the Mongol invasion of his home island of Tsushima, Japan. Left to die, he is found and nursed back to health by a wayward thief who teaches Jin the art of stealth and subterfuge, seeing him off on his quest for bloody revenge on the Mongol invaders that have encroached upon his homeland. To do this, he must first build up a fighting force of equal minded, skilled warriors, all while dismantling the various camps and operations the Mongols have set up in the absence of the defeated Samurai army. Jin can approach this in one of two ways; relying on his prowess as a formidable Samurai, Jin can challenge the many enemies in the game to flashy yet precise sword combat, or he can utilize the recently learned skills of stealth, infiltrating their encampments and silently picking the Mongols off one by one. There's no wrong answer to how you choose to play, although it takes some time for Jin to accept his new roles as both Samurai and assassin. Both methods of play feel equally as stellar, too; Combat in this game is incredibly polished, finely tuned swordplay that focuses on timing and well-planned strikes to dispatch your foes with ease, while the stealth feels tense and requires a distinctly tactical approach, planning your routes and cleverly dispatching foes so as to not raise suspicion. But the game isn't just about taking out your enemies. Ghost of Tsushima boasts one of the most beautiful open worlds I've ever experienced, a vibrant and gorgeous landscape dotted with myriad activities and side quests for you to explore and enjoy. One moment, you could be doing battle with a wayward group of Mongols or bandits, while the next could see you tracking a friendly fox to a shrine, composing a haiku in the shadow of a large tree, or recuperating your strength at a small hot spring while you ruminate on your adventures thus far. Ghost of Tsushima is an incredibly varied game, alternating between intense highs and calming lows, all coming together to become one of the best games of the last generation.

-Spiritfarer     While I have not finished this game, it more than deserves recognition on this list. In it, you play as Stella, a young girl who takes over as the ferryman for the River Styx once Charon retires to the afterlife, tasked with providing for the wayward souls who live on the river as you ferry them to their final rest. To do this, Stella must collect various resources and build up her ship, outfitting it with living spaces and various commodities tailored to her current passengers. These aforementioned passengers will, in turn, begin to open up to Stella, tasking her with making certain foods or visiting different locales, all in an effort to give these wayward souls a proper farewell on their trip to the afterlife. Spiritfarer is a simple simulator game about resource management and exploration that showcases a lovely, genuinely heartfelt story about love and loss, one that will put a smile on your face as easily as it brings a tear to your eye.

     And with that, I close out this hefty list, closing out the last generation. This compendium hardly scratches the surface of the last seven years' library, but hopefully, I did a good enough job remembering some of the games that made this last generation so great. There are a lot of games that I've still yet to play, resting in wait in my backlog for the time they get pulled out and given their due, but for now, this concludes my walk down memory lane. The last generation saw some excellent additions to the vast and ever-expanding library of video game history. Here's hoping the next several years can say the same. The start of the new consoles is off to a very promising start; in the last month or so alone we've seen excellent releases from both indie and big-name developers, fresh takes on old franchises, and new IPs alike. So, here's to the Last Generation, here's to the Next Generation, and here's to gaming overall; may it continue to thrive for years to come.

[sentinelkelly]

Destiny 2: Curse of the Butthurt Man-Children Review

Destiny 2 has been in trouble for awhile now and despite what the crying man-children on Reddit, Twitter, Facebook, the Bungie forums and the hack of journalists from Kotaku, Forbes (lol did I really include them?), IGN, and Polygon, I strongly believe Destiny 2 is getting better in some aspects and worse in others. I still believe this game have great potential in the future, but for Destiny 2 to be great, Bungie needs to be less reactive and beat the community to the punch, sort of speak. More on that a little later. Let’s get on to my blasphemous opinions.

The Story

The Curse of Osiris story reminds me of Call of Duty: Black Ops III’s story. Let me explain before you get triggered: The Call of Duty, in my opinion, always had a great story despite how you felt about the multiplayer and it’s community. When I played Black Ops III’s campaign, I couldn’t help but to be lost in the plot and be almost put to sleep. The plot was convoluted and had too much filler content that further added to my confusion. This is exactly how I felt playing Curse of Osiris’s story. Although people think the story was pretty fast, I beg to differ. It took me about 4 hours to complete, excluding getting distracted by Public Events and in real life stuff. Then again, I wasn’t speed-running. Maybe that’s why, but it was definitely longer than the Dark Below which a lot of people forget about. Bungie squandered a perfect opportunity to effectively use the Osiris lore.

At the same token, Bungie opened the door to expanding the Osiris lore  (besides a webcomic) and revealing some Saint-14 lore. I would also love some Dredgen Yor lore at some point too. Time well tell how much more lore we’ll get and of whom.

Eververse

Dear Lord... I hate the fact that the loot pool is so large and RNG is still what you expect from a Destiny game. If I had to pick which is worse between Treasures of Ages and Illuminated Engrams, I wouldn’t answer because there is no lesser of the two evils. Although, at least I get the armor in Destiny 2 while I still haven’t get a single piece of AoT armor for any character on Destiny 1... on Xbox and PS4.

At the end of the day, her wares are still optional, cosmetic to a certain extent, and not game breaking. That’s all I truly ask for in microtransacions. You can make the argument that the Ghost Shells increase xp gains, points out nearby chests and all that jazz. Then, I’ll rebuttal by calling you a retard and ask a simple question: “How does differ from other Ghost Shells and how does it give you an unfair advantage in the Crucible?” Basically, the only people who still hates Eververse are unlucky like me, poor/cheap people and conspiracy theorists that think Bungie is intentionally making her stuff look better than the non-microtransaction gear. Stop being poor. Taste is subjective.

Mercury

It’s a very small area that I would’ve forgiven if you could freely explore the Infinite Forest, Past Mercury, and Dark Future Mercury. However, you can’t. You can only replay the story missions and adventures to go to those places. Not to mention there’s only one Lost Sector. There’s enough space for at least three. Mercury was over-hyped. The Infinite Forest was filler. More could’ve been done.

Despite that, the visuals are beautiful as always. Past Mercury gives you a sense of peace and serenity while Dark Future Mercury makes the atmosphere more grim and dire. Also, doing Flashpoints on Mercury doesn’t require to actually do a single Public Event. You just have to kill majors that are running around the map.

The Leviathan Raid Lair

I have not played it yet, but I heard great things about it. It’s a shame that Bungie advertised it as just a shorter version of the current raid with different bosses and mechanics because I had low expectations and now I think I might be in for a great time.

I’ll update more when I can finally play it.

#TwoTokensAndABlue: Public Events were Nerfed

So much with being rewarding. Less xp gains, lower probability getting exotics, and quite frankly more of a reason not drop everything to go do one.

The Current State of Crucible

Crucible is still like listening to music on Spotify without premium: You gotta play until you get the gametype you want or keep backing out until you get the match you want. There are also no signs of old Destiny 1 game modes returning and the current ones being separated. 

At least, we get to tell future Kinderguardians that for a weekend, the Destiny Community was able to play a large game of laser tag and then there’s the return of Mayhem Clash. MC is the only thing making PvP worth play to me.

Armor Ornaments

I’mma just say it: Most of the ornaments makes the armor look ugly and/or are uninspired. Above all, I’m extremely disappointed with Future War Cult’s. All it does is change the color scheme to white and blue. That’s it.

I do like the fact that you can unlock ornaments account wide. For example, unlocking the Crucible Titan Mark ornament unlocks the Crucible Hunter Cloak and Warlock Bond even if you never played on the other characters.

“Heroic” Strikes

Oh boy... Where do I begin? I was very excited about this. A good percentage of my Destiny 1 playtime was shutting my brain off after a long day and running Heroic Strikes if I liked the modifiers. Destiny 2 said, “Why don’t I just take Vanguard Strikes, raise the power level and call it Heroic Strikes? That’s it!” Bungie did say that they will add modifiers, but two things: 1) Why didn’t you just wait? If it’s incomplete why release it now when you could do so later complete? 2) I hope the modifiers aren’t the Destiny 2 Nightfall modifiers. Please God no.

The Vault System is Still a Mess

Imagine every single file on your computer was on your desktop. No folders. Just right there in front of your face. On top of all that, you can only have 200 of those files on your computer before you have to start deleting stuff. That’s where we’re still at. Not to mention you can hold up to 50 different shaders on your person, yet Bungie decides to make more than 50 unique shaders. It gets better: Duplicate Dawning shaders will sort into separate stacks depending on where they were received from. Dawning shaders received through Eververse will fall into one stack, and shaders earned through activity rewards will be sorted into another. This is not a bug and was intentional. On top of all this: no increased vault space, shader kiosk, or mass deletion option.

Prestige Mode Locked by CoO-Paywall

It seems like the less you invest in Destiny 2 (monetary-wise and in playtime), the more your opinion matters somehow in comparison to actual dedicated fans of the game. The whole issue was that people who didn’t owe the DLC, can’t play the 330 version of the Nightfall & Leviathan Raid due to vanilla players not being able to reach the new level cap. Trials of the Nine was also blocked. Note: Normal Mode was bumped up for both the Nightfall and Raid so you can still reach 305 playing those. Trials ALWAYS required people to have the latest DLC and patches. Hell, Nightfalls got the same treatment in Destiny 1, and mind you, there was only one difficulty. The only people that were angry were the disgruntled Destiny 2 players who stopped playing a long time ago and/or already owns the DLC. Trust me, if you’re a hardcore fan of Destiny or remotely likes it, you would’ve made arrangements to get the DLC.  Don’t come at me with that “I love the game, but have no money” bullshit. This was all a case of “What if my friend buys Destiny 2 and I can’t play with him/her?!” Um... tell them to buy the game used/on sale and the DLC? Maybe you could buy it for them so you can play with them? Gee, this is a difficult situation I’ve never been in.

Trust me, no one who hasn’t bought Destiny 2 at this point won’t buy it because of all of the ruckus this community is making. Due to Bungie getting cuck’d by a bunch of poor people who don’t even play their game anymore that complained about a theoretical situation, the first Faction Rally of Season 2 was postponed to I assume (I hope) at the beginning of 2018. 

Quality of Life Updates Frequency

I remember a time Bungie was constantly adjusting things like the economy and user interface on top of tuning weapons and subclasses, squashing bugs and things of that nature. Destiny 2 received its first Quality of Life update in December on the day of this DLC’s release. Yeah, Bungie fixed stuff here and there between vanilla Destiny 2 and Curse of Osiris releases, but there was the over abundance of legendary shards some people had to deal with, shitty RNG not giving people what they want, etc. that was just improved. The difference between patches and QoL updates to me is one fix problems and the other improves on what was working fine but can be frustrating. There is less of the latter.

The State of the Destiny Community

Everything that I’ve stated thus far is forgivable. However, Destiny 2′s state of being the target of hit pieces of gaming media and butthurt “fan” backlash is 10% Bungie being reactive, 10% Bungie making dumbass decisions, 80% self-proclaimed fans having buyer’s remorse. Destiny 1 was considered an abomination of game around this time last year for whatever dumb reason people came up with. Destiny 1 was shitted on repeatedly. Now all of a sudden, people love and miss Destiny 1 so much. It was the community’s constant bitching that made Destiny 2 the way it is. Bungie had to find a way to not repeat Destiny 1, but guess what... people flipped flopped. Ask any Destiny fan how they felt about Destiny 1, I guarantee all will praise it, but half of them were singing a different tune last year. Destiny 2 and Curse of Osiris is the community’s fault. Bungie had some part in the blame, but: 1) Me and every other non-Bungie employee don’t know what’s going on behind closed doors at the studio in Redmond, WA. 2) If anything, blame the leadership at Bungie. Why are you getting mad some artist or sound engineer. They don’t program the game or have authority to do whatever they want to the final product if it’s outside of their department.

We are the point where people constantly complaining about bullshit like optional microtransactions and plays other games are considered “concerned fans.” Meanwhile, people like me who are objective, still actively plays the game despite it’s current state, and can compliment game when something is done right gets accused of being on Bungie’s payroll. The toxicity of this community reached heights I never thought possible and it makes me cringe to be an actual fan sometimes. Not to say I’m an angel, which I’m not, but at least I provide constructive criticism to Bungie and lash out at little Jimmy who claims to hate the game so much. I’m against people who insist upon passing on their misery onto other people who are actually enjoying the game. I’ve looked on GameStop’s app and Destiny 2 is worth between $12-18. I can recommend better games for that price. If you have Destiny 2 on disc and are that dissatisfied with it, I challenge you to sell it. If you have it digitally, I’m sure you can get a full refund somehow. I challenge you to get that refund. A reasonable adult, tries to get their money back and move on. If you don’t at least try, you’re full shit.

Bungie’s only unforgivable sin is giving birth to a community of entitled ingrates.

Final Verdict: 7.75/10

This could’ve been better and it could get better in 2018. However, out of the gate... it does not live up to the hype.

[kiyote23]

One Person’s Broken Is Another Person’s Perfect (Classic Flashback)

This post originally appeared on dorkfam.net on July 1, 2016.

“Are we ever going to play The Division again?” OtherMark asked.

“I dunno,” OtherOtherMark replied, “Is The Division going to not suck anymore?”

I winced, partly at the reply, and partly because I was repeatedly falling to my death in the Vault of Glass jumping puzzle. Four months ago, OtherOtherMark was really excited about The Division. Destiny was looking long in the tooth. Our raid group completed King’s Fall. This was the end game content that we’d been working on together for a couple of months, since early December. And with the end game content mostly completed, the group started to drift apart as players started playing other games. Destiny was no longer holding their interest.

Destiny was the first modern online multiplayer game I had played where I became really involved in a group. In Destiny, you can group up into a fireteam of up to six people, and to do the raid, you’ll need six, so the first step was finding a group of people who could play together. It started with friends, and then friends of friends, and pretty soon we had a group of six who played at the same time and played well together. And so we did strikes, and played in the Crucible together. And it got to be a thing, you’d look to see who was online, and you knew you would be playing with them, often until late into the night. It became this wonderful social aspect to an already almost sublime gaming experience. I finally started to understand why this was all my friends were talking about last year.

But that social aspect was diminishing, and it looked like we were going to move to The Division. And that didn’t quite happen. Not every one in the group made the jump, and The Division didn’t have the end game that we needed, or wanted. It didn’t have much of an end game at all. Certainly not the raid that we worked towards as a group.

I spent most of March leveling up in The Division. I completed the story, and then there wasn’t much to do but to grind out better gear in the Dark Zone. The Dark Zone is an a special area within The Division. The Division is a beautiful open world design, where players move freely through a detailed recreation of midtown Manhattan. You complete missions and encounters on this map to get better gear and to advance your character. But in the middle of this map lurks a large section that is walled off, and can only be entered through select portals. This is the Dark Zone, and within the Dark Zone, The Division becomes a significantly different game.

In the regular game world, the player runs into randomly generated groups of bad guys to fight, but also civilians to help, and most significantly, no other players, except for those that you invite into your game session. You could play the entire main game solo if you wanted to, though you will see and run into other players within the safe areas where you restock armor and sell your loot. But once you leave the safe areas, the streets are yours and yours alone.

In the Dark Zone, you run into other players, players who are ostensibly agents of The Division, like yourself. But the Dark Zone is a place of no rules, and so not only can you see the other players, but you can shoot them. The Dark Zone was The Division’s unique take on PvP, and it could have been very interesting, creating a unique gaming environment.

I didn’t find The Dark Zone to be much fun. I don’t mind PvP, and while I like to keep my PvE and my PvP separate, I can play in a mix. I used to love to play on PvP servers in Warcraft, even though I almost exclusively played PvE. I wouldn’t even duel with people. I tried it once, found it tedious, and moved on. In Warcraft, you knew when you were in a PvP situation. It wasn’t ambiguous. But The Dark Zone was a big mess of ambiguity. A player who was helping you could turn and stab you in the back at any moment. A guy who ganked you earlier could help you out. You couldn’t trust anybody, and basically came down to people taking advantage of weaker players. Maybe if they had disabled level advantages, it might have been better.

I saw a lot of people defending the Dark Zone on Reddit, and I spent a lot of time wondering why they liked it so much. I think they wanted PvP. Some people really enjoy PvP, the challenge of playing against other actually human players instead of the somewhat limited and predictable AI. And that’s fine. I’ve been playing death matches online since Quake. I play Crucible in Destiny, though it’s not my favorite. I think that if you enjoyed The Dark Zone in The Division, it was because you decided that you were going to go rouge. You either went in with a fire team with the intent to go rouge, or you were a solo rouge. Then the ambiguity is gone. Or you play with the notion that everyone you see is a rouge, and stay away from them. And it did make it spooky, because other, so-called friendly agents wouldn’t be tracked on your HUD, so suddenly you’d see a group of gunmen appear out of nowhere.

The problem was that you couldn’t preemptively defend yourself, without going rouge yourself. It was like a game of chicken—you didn’t want to be the first one to shoot. If you went rouge, then not only could they kill you without getting marked for it, but they’d get bonus experience for it. So, if you’re going to play with the mentality that everyone in the Dark Zone is a rouge, then the only way to play it effectively to plan on going rouge yourself.

Which is why I think it’s flawed design on the developer’s part. The idea was to create this sense of ambiguity, this idea that these agents that are supposed to be on your side have flipped to the other side, and you don’t know who is who. But with no real consequences for flipping, in fact, there are actual bonuses and better gear for flipping, then the ambiguity is gone. Everyone is out to get you, because it’s really just a free-for-all.

Here’s how I would fix it: once you go rouge, you’re cut off from The Division, and you have to find the opposition, and make contact with them, and build rank with them, probably through ganking Division agents in the Dark Zone. Eventually, you get enough trust with the opposition that they send you back to The Division to become a double agent, except The Division doesn’t trust you right away, so you have to rebuild some rank with them, probably through not ganking Division agents in the Dark Zone while killing rouges. Then you’d have to make a choice at some point, who to betray, the opposition or The Division. Man, now I want to play that game.

The problem was that there was nothing else to do. I had spent most of March in The Division‘s rendition of Manhattan, taking out looters and rioters and guys with flame throwers and mercenaries. Block by block, I took out bad guys to defend civilians. It was made pretty clear who was bad and who wasn’t, at least to me. The civilians were always a little jumpy around me, skittish if I got too aggressive, a nice touch since I don’t think I could hurt any of them if I tried. I could shoot the tires on parked cars (which I’ll admit, I did a lot) or stray dogs (I never did, and it bothered me when my teammates would), but I couldn’t shoot any of the bystanders.

It was a game without an endgame. You could grind gear in The Dark Zone, but since outside The Dark Zone I was already like a god, basically unstoppable, why bother? There was no reason to play a mode that I didn’t find fun, and that was all there was to do.

What is the end game? Most video games have a story, or at least try to, though in Destiny‘s case, it was sort of loosely stringing missions together with some sort of tangent. It really didn’t matter, because the missions were engaging and fun.

So, the end game is what you do when you want to keep playing the game, but you’ve completed the story. For a multiplayer game like Destiny or The Division, that usually means PvP or a raid. The problem with The Division was that the PvP was more frustrating than fun, and there was no raid.

They did add The Incursion, which was supposed to be the first end game option, but I never played it. From what I heard, it was wave after wave of bullet-sponge bosses, and you needed serious gear to run it. In fact, a whole new tier of gear was rolled out just for The Incursion. To help you grind gear outside the dark zone, a new set of daily and weekly missions were available, but again, it seemed like a lot of work to grind gear for a mission that just didn’t seem fun, which was disappointing because the main story had been fun, and the missions were different and varied.

What Destiny did was a brilliant. Players left because there was only two options for end game, PvP and the raid. The raid was difficult to set up because you needed six players who knew what they were doing, because it was complicated. And you only had a week to complete it, and that’s assuming that you started on Tuesday, which most people didn’t. There were checkpoints through the raid, and if you made it to a check point, you could start there the next day. And when you were learning the raid, you’d need the checkpoints. And really, you could say that part of the end game in Destiny, once you completed the story missions, was getting gear good enough to go on the raid, something that took a little grinding to do. Also, players left because they had completed the raid, and it wasn’t holding their interest anymore.

So, Bungie raised the light limit, to give players something to work towards, and then opened up new paths to get the light limit. Now, in addition to PvP and the raid, you could do the revamped Prison of Elders/Challenge of Elders, which was sort of like PvE Crucible. You could also get higher level gear from the faction vendors, and they made it easier to grind faction rep. So now, just running the daily missions became a way to get better gear and raise your light level.

What happens when you hit the light limit? I don’t know, probably drift into another game for a while. The next update will be in September, and there will be new content, and the light limit will be raised again. There will be a new raid. That will make four raids. I’ve only completed one.

The Division is still on my hard drive, and I’ve been updating it, though I haven’t actually played it in a long time. Things could have changed. The conditions that I’m writing about were in late March, early April. I had a lot of fun playing the story of The Division, and the mechanics and gameplay were pretty solid. It was disappointing that the game didn’t scale well. Once we got to a high enough level, the bad guys just seemed to become bullet-sponges, and the difficulty was upped by sending them at us in overwhelming waves. I think part of what propelled me through The Division through most of March was the uncovering the map, learning the game and how to play it effectively, and grinding out better gear. There’s a whole world of crafting and improving gear that I was just starting to get into before I hit the why bother point. I’m keeping it because there might come a time when I want to get back into it, a point where they’ve fixed things and made changes to end game, or created more story to work through.

I’m still grinding through Destiny, daily. Destiny‘s April update came right when I was losing interest in The Division. At its core, Destiny is a lot of fun. The first thing I did when I dropped back into Destiny after being in The Division for so long was jump. When you jump in Destiny, you can soar. You can float all around the map. In The Division, you’re stuck on the ground. But more than that, the basic mechanics of Destiny are smoother and sweeter. It’s more fun to pull the trigger in Destiny, more fun per round fired. It doesn’t matter than I’m ranging over the same maps that I’ve ranged over a hundred times before, it’s just fun to be there.

Last night we were playing Iron Banner with DMot, who wasn’t part of our core raid group, but had filled in a couple of times when we needed a sixth. He admitted that he hadn’t been playing Destiny for a while, but had been playing The Division. It was fun, he said, “But I always knew I’d come back to Destiny. You can always come back to Destiny.”

And we did. We all came back.

from dorkFarm http://ift.tt/2GkBbt1 via IFTTT

[bizarredawdler]

Halo 3 and My Experice With It.

Since Halo 3 was officially released on this day 10 years ago, I figured I might talk about my experience playing the few chunks of the game when I had the chance, and how over the years I came to appreciate and understand the impact that series has had on the video game industry as well as why so many people love that series.

So my first instance of actually playing Halo 3 was when one of my high school friends called Marc-André, invited me over to his house on weekends to play a few multiplayer matches as well as do a few of the missions in the campaign. I'll admit that, at the time, I wasn't really a fan of FPS games in general, but he LOVED that game, and wouldn't stop talking about how awesome the story was, how he had amazing online matches as well as how good he was at completing the campaign at the hardest difficulty setting (admittedly, he was a bit of a show-off... :P). So out of curiosity I decided to give it a shot.

Sure enough, we played multiplayer matches online and offline, and I got killed. Multiple times. In humiliating ways! One particular instance that stuck with me was when I did a 1v1 match against him in a relatively small map, and we were both on the opposite side of the map. Just for fun, he decided to throw a plasma grenade as far and high as he could, and through sheer luck, he managed to get me and score a point, even though he couldn't see me and I was on the opposite side of the map. We both had a good laugh about it!

And yet the funny thing is, even when I got killed that many times and so quickly as well, I was still enjoying the game, and I think one of the reasons is because depending on how you would get killed, your character would ragdoll in different ways, and I remember enjoying seeing myself get blowned away by a plasma grenade and flying 10 feet in the air with my character wailing his arms and legs. It was something that was strangely satisying to me. It helped that it didn't take long for your character to respawn, so there was very little down time. And when I did get good and started having a few kills, it was really fun and I started to understand one of the main things that makes this game and the series really good: Master Cheif feels so satisfying to control!

And that satisfaction was made even more apparent when I played the co-op campaign with Marc-André. This was probably one of the first games that made me aware of what I liked seeing in a character in general. One of the things I liked a lot about Master Cheif was that he was a one man army, and you could feel that when you controlled him. Each time he hit an enemy with the stock of his gun , the impact felt satisfying. Every time he jumped, there was this awesome momentum and weight that made you feel like you had a badass armor on and was ready to take on the world. Every time you weilded a big weapon, there was this beautiful balance of weight and enhanced strength that made you feel like you were carrying something heavy, but you were strong enough to carry it easily. All those subtle gameplay elements really emphasised the awesome power Master Cheif had. Not only that, but I loved the fact that you didn't see his face, because #1 It put more emphasis on his cool looking armor and #2 It allowed him to have this aura of mystery and anonymitiy to him that added a lot to his character, and I liked that.

I remember also being surprised by how good the music was. Usually with FPS games, the orchestral music tends to be bland or just there to serve it's purpose, but here, I felt like the orchestral music had personnality and enhanced the gameplay and story moments a lot.

Unfortunately, this was pretty much my only experience with the game, as I have never actually sat down and played through the entire trilogy by myself, since at the time I didn't own an Xbox 360 and my parents weren't to keen on me having video game consoles at the time, and so after high school, I pretty much just forgot about the series and moved on...

... that is until last year, when I met @afronick and @thathomestar on tumblr. Upon seeing their Halo posts and discussing more about it, I discovered that the game had a huge impact on FPS games that I wasn't aware of when I was in high school. They both made me understand just how much the game contributed in terms of FPS gameplay mechanics that would become the standard for a very long time, and seeing their hatred for the newer games in the series and how those games missed the mark in terms of what made the original trilogy so good made me realise how passionate the Halo community was. It made me understand that my friend Marc-André wasn't exaggerating when he talked about how much he loved that game, because now I saw other people speaking as passionately as he did about it. I also began to understand that Bungie itself was a huge reason people loved the games so much, as from what my friends told me, they had a pretty good relationship and friendship with their fans that you don't really see often with big AAA video game companies, and I appreciate them much more because of it.

In conclusion, even though my experience with the series is pretty limited, I'm glad I had the chance to play Halo 3 a little bit, as it taught me that sometimes I should try things that are out of my comfort zone video game wise, because who knows: I might enjoy it and it might turn out to be a classic I wasn't even aware of.

Happy 10th birthday, Halo 3 : )

[lostsolsdestinyblog]

The Potential Benefits of Hosted Lobbies in Destiny 2 PvP and PvE

I’ve been thinking about Destiny and matchmaking for a long time now and I’ve written and spoken tens of thousands of words on the topic. I think what Bungie has achieved thus far with Destiny has been incredible and even through the ups and down, they as a company have managed to create a franchise unlike anything we’ve seen before.

One of the biggest challenges the studio faced early on was in how to build and match players in an online, persistent and seamlessly matchmade universe. There is a great video from GDC a few years back of Justin Truman breaking down how the developers achieved this. I’m not going to go into too many specifics here, but I encourage anyone interested to watch the video as it is really fascinating. The end result was a PvE experience of planets made of a collection of connecting zones of “public bubbles’’ each of which were for the most part built in a circle with sections between that allowed the game to match us and our fireteam members with new guardians as we moved zone to zone. There are also off-shoot “private bubbles” which are the branching off story missions, strikes, etc, accessible by just us and/or our fireteam.

PvP meanwhile remained mostly unchanged from Halo in the general setup and approach. We and our teammates still queue for matches and are then matched by different variables (region, connection, skill, etc) with other players. This was done in D1 on a peer-to-peer network and in D2 a hybrid system in which every activity is hosted on Bungie servers vs player consoles in D1. All told these systems for PvE and PvP have performed well enough to make Destiny one of the top game franchises in the world and as well crafted as the systems have been overall, there is always room for improvement with anything and I believe after 4 years of experiencing this game, the cracks in both systems have started to show through.

I believe of the two environments, PvE has been much more successful in achieving the goals the developers had for what they wanted Destiny to be. That said we have seen areas where the current architecture leaves more to be desired. In my opinion the most glaring examples would be:

The ability to match larger groups of friends for activities like Court of Oryx, Archon Forge, Escalation Protocol, and Blind Well.

The ability for players to easily group up and find other random players within the game to do higher endgame PvE content such as Nightfalls and Raids.

Create an experience within an online, open world, multiplayer game in which players are able to meet, connect and easily communicate with the other players we come across within the game.

PvP has fared much worse and I think that, while applying the general principals and format of Halo PvP to Destiny has not been a failure by any stretch of the imagination, it has also led to many of the biggest problems that Destiny has faced over the last four years in both PvP and PvE. Those issues include:

It is incredibly anti-social as we are continuously matched with new groups of players who we never speak to and most of the time don’t see for more than one or two games (if they don’t leave the queue between games and the game doesn’t break up the teams)

SBMM vs CBMM the eternal debate

Solo player (and small fireteam) vs full fireteams

The struggle to maintain healthy player populations to be able to implement the best overall matchmaking experience for everyone

Playlists instead of playing the game modes we want to play

A PvP experience that the devs have tried to condense populations through aforementioned playlists, but has then been re-fragmented by separate Quickplay and Competitive modes, as well special PvP events like Iron Banner and Trials, plus the addition of Gambit, weekly game modes and Crucible Labs.

Difficulty maintaining healthy weapon, class, ability and super balance in both PvP and PvE as things are deemed to be “too good” and/or “overused” by the community in single game modes/playlists, but would suffer performance issues in other PvP modes and PvE if modified.

Having a more difficult time overall with the balance of PvP vs PvE

All of these things are known issues and nothing I’m writing here is anything I haven’t written before, but with teams inside Bungie’s studio now confirmed working on the next iteration of the game, I think it’s one of the biggest issues that need to be looked at in the continued growth and development of the game and franchise. I know there are constant discussions within the studio on these things and the goal is always to make the game the best that it can be and the matchmaking experience as a whole and particularly in PvP can be better and I think the solution is the same today as it could have been for raid matchmaking from the beginning.

I believe Destiny would be a much better game with a Perfect Dark Zero/ Gear of War approach to matchmaking for some of PvP and PvE endgame and the basic systems and functionality are already built into the game through private matches and Guided Games.

To start with PvE first, this is the same thing I’ve advocated for over the last 3 ½ years and while Guided Games is a limited approximation, it hasn’t really panned out as an easy way to meet up with and group with random players to run raids. I understand why the clan limitations are in place as well as limiting it to only one random joining, but I think there are ways to do a full lobby system and still allow for protections for players and teams. The other benefit to going with a full lobby system for endgame PvE matchmaking is that it could be used to allow for larger groups of friends as well as friends + matchmade teammates for endgame activities like EP, Blind Well, etc. Future activities of that nature could easily be set up to be in zones specifically designed for a group lobby.

What has changed in my opinion in how this could work over the last year in particular is in how PvP really should be integrated into this system to a degree as well. To that end I firmly believe that the base Destiny PvP experience should be a hosted lobby system and Quickplay should be removed completely. The framework already exists to do this with private matches. The only thing missing is the ability to fill out those hosted lobbies through matchmaking. I believe the benefits of doing this would be immediately felt across the entire game.

It would eliminate having to play random game modes and allow players to play exactly what they want and love

It would allow players to choose what maps they want to play as well as set scoring and rules. This system could also be set up to allow for curated weapon loadout rules (thus letting players decide to prohibit weapons deemed “op” or “unfair” for particular modes or maps rather than petitioning for them to be nerfed or altered.

It would make the game infinitely more social and allow more opportunities for players to communicate and develop bonds and friendships in healthy ways. One of the big issues with the way PvP is currently setup is that we are always opted-out of chat by default. The reasons for this are quite obvious given the history of toxicity and abuse in games that have open chats, however it’s much more difficult to constantly be toxic when joining lobbies that stay together game-to-game with a single host, as toxic behavior would just get players removed from the lobby.

The other big takeaway from that is that it would be a set lobby going game-to-game together and as such would offer a much better chance for social interaction. This took place in both PDZ and Gears when I played as even players who would join and not talk would almost always end up speaking after playing within the group enough games to get comfortable with the personalities within the lobby.

If we want gaming and gamers to be better to each other and to enjoy these things we love without all the negativity and hatred, it has to start with having tools in place to actually build positive relationships and this has been in the past I believe would be within Destiny a wonderful way to achieve that.

It eliminates the SBMM/CBMM debate as lobby hosts would have oversight over team composition and rules as well as the fact that a group all playing together in a hosted lobby would be much less likely to accuse each other of nefarious behavior. A healthy mix of Region/Connection/Skill could be built into the matchmaking for the lobbies and if players were lagging, either on the host/party end or those joining, players would have the ability to leave or hosts remove lagging players and allowing each to look for a better match to stick with.

It also eliminates the solo vs fireteam issues as in a hosted lobby system players tend to actually be communicating (including the randoms who join) and hosts have the option to require mics as well as to restructure team compositions match-to-match if it’s lopsided one way or the other.

It instantly eliminates issues for player populations outside of competitive play.

It allows a format where new game modes can be added to the lobby choices for both casual play and also testing for competitive modes without requiring a separate weekly mode like we currently have for doubles, Breakthrough, Survival and Rumble, as well as Crucible Labs. It could all be rolled into the hosted lobby system allowing play and testing without splitting populations.

It frees up the developers to refine the current PvP matchmaking system for ranked competitive and tournament play like Iron Banner, Gambit and Trials.

The possibilities here in particular are really interesting in a myriad of ways, not the least of which is in limiting the current PvP matchmaking format to those modes, I’m curious if it could potentially be within a more reasonable cost range to allow for dedicated servers or at least a more secure ecosystem for Comp, Trials, Gambit and IB, while running the current hybrid p2p system for the hosted lobbies that would replace QP.

It would also allow the devs to incentivize those modes more and make them the place players need to go to play for XP and rewards (thus giving everyone reason to actually want to participate there still), while also having the hosted lobby system where players could learn modes, maps and weapons as well as find friends and teammates in a more laid back environment (which D2’s ultra sweatfest QP currently is not) to then go into Competitive play with.

It would not only allow Trials to be the premier endgame PvP activity it was intended to be, Iron Banner could also be the true endgame tournament it was envisioned as.

It would also allow the developers greater freedom to curate those experiences as well by possibly enacting loadout restrictions and even making adjustments to balance specifically within comp/tournament play.

It could potentially take a huge load off of the PvE vs PvP balancing dilemmas through the aforementioned benefits, but it also could be a place where players who meet and group to play PvP could also then go to raids and EP type PvE events and vice versa.

It’s funny that as I have been contemplating writing this all up the last few days, I was actually recording a feedback video yesterday on my day-to-day Destiny experience lately and I met a player who had just bought Destiny for the first time the day before and it was interesting hearing his experience as someone who’d never played before.

The fact that we actually met and started talking in-game was pretty remarkable in and of itself. I barely ever stream, but I was streaming my play and recording my commentary on the game and as I did so, I got a viewer and they stuck around. I’d never had that, so after I finished my thoughts for the video, I decided to play some PvP and shoot people with Telesto. Then as I’m playing and talking I started hearing an echo. It took me probably 2 minutes to realize what was going on and that someone else was in the game chat. I’m always opted-in and it’s only the second time in D2 I’ve come across another player with a mic (happened about 5 times in 3 years of D1).

So I said hello and we started talking and partied up and he’d just got D2 the day before and had never played D1. I told him how shocked I was to hear another player and how rare it is and asked him what his experience had been with chat. Turns out I was the first person he’d spoken to in the game and he’d had the same experience I did 4 years ago when I logged in on launch day and went around saying hello to everyone in the Tower, on patrol and in the Crucible and wondering why no one had mics.

The last Bungie game he’d played was Halo 3 and he’d been surprised there was no chat in the Farm and on patrol, but had expected to have the lobby full of colorful chat in Crucible that was Halo 3 PvP and he said that the lack of communication is off-putting as a new player, particularly when he’d been trying to do PvE content that seemed to him to be more team-oriented like public events, etc.

The point of that is Destiny is a social game that isn’t the best at allowing us to be social. It’s a game that thrives on and works best when we are playing with other player and in fireteams and yet it doesn’t give any tools to encourage or enable forming the connections to build them. So whether a system like I’ve described or something completely different, I think that the game needs to evolve and grow in these areas and that it will ultimately lead to a better experience for players of all levels and investment as well as for the developers themselves, Bungie and the Destiny franchise.

Thank you.

[entergamingxp]

DualShockers’ Favorite Games of 2019 — Laddie’s Top 10

January 1, 2020 5:00 PM EST

2019 was truly a wealth of gaming experiences that I loved, from Control, to Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order, and more. Here are my top 10.

As 2019 comes to a close, DualShockers and our staff are reflecting on this year’s batch of games and what were their personal highlights within the last year. Unlike the official Game of the Year 2019 awards for DualShockers, there are little-to-no-rules on our individual Top 10 posts. For instance, any game — not just 2019 releases — can be considered.

As we entered 2019, my ever growing backlog of neglected or unfinished games had grown to epic proportions. I vowed to be better in 2019, so I made a New Year’s resolution that I would play and finish every game I acquired in 2019 before moving on to another. Well, it was a nice thought, but resolutions are meant to be broken and with only a few days left in the year, I have yet to play the very first game I purchased in 2019, Resident Evil 2.

Unfortunately this pattern continued as I found myself in a bit of a gaming funk, and for most of the beginning half of the year, gaming felt different, like I was doing it more out of habit rather than passion.  Had I truly lost interest in the one hobby that has been my comfort zone for as long as I can remember?

Don’t get me wrong, there were a few bright spots throughout my despondency, but it wasn’t until August that I finally got my gaming groove back. On a whim, I bought Remnant: From the Ashes, and that old familiar feeling was back, baby! Now, that game wasn’t previously on my radar and it’s not perfect, but sometimes you just need a little unforeseen inspiration to get you going again.

After Remnant, it seemed the hits just kept coming, and it was looking unlikely I’d get to finish the previous months’ games that I skipped. With that being said, I feel my top ten would look a lot different than its current state considering I have yet to finish Devil May Cry 5, The Outer Worlds, A Plague Tale: Innocence, as well as a few other titles that went unplayed. Never the less, top 10 lists must go on, and here are my favorite games of 2019.

10. Anthem

Anthem: it’s not only one of my favorites of 2019, it’s also one of the games that broke my heart with bitter disappointment. Early impressions of Anthem gave me the hope that BioWare was on track to release a game that would not only counter Destiny, but show Bungie how a looter shooter, live service game was to be done straight out of the release gate. Well, as you know, Anthem did not deliver any of this and released a glitchy game in a skeletal state that felt like an unfinished symphony. EA had perpetrated a betrayal that was of Aliens: Colonial Marines level and within weeks after Anthem released, the game was a ghost town as gamers went running back to Destiny.

Despite all of this, the game with the longest loading screens known to man still managed to give me a few moments of fun. First off, the game is graphically stunning, and is easily one of the best looking games from this generation. While the execution of the story was a bit bland and the characters were mostly forgettable, there was an underlying lore that could still be the impetus of a great game or even sequel. Anthem’s greatest strength was making you feel like Iron Man once you entered your Javelin, the powered exosuit that comes in three flavors to appeal to different gameplay styles. Donning the Javelin suit gives you a super fluid movement both in flight and underwater that was almost as enjoyable as Titanfall’s parkour and jet packs. This also made for super-fun gameplay that unfortunately was lost due to lack of content.

EA and BioWare have made some improvements and promise to continue making Anthem a better game, and I really hope they can turn it around, but with new games always on the horizon, even the biggest Anthem supporters like myself might be reluctant to come back.

Check out DualShockers‘ review for Anthem.

9. Remnant: From the Ashes

The term “Soulslike” tends to inspire rage in me, and I refuse to accept it as a genre. Now, my experience with Souls games is very limited and consists mostly of Bloodborne. It’s not the punishing gameplay that sent me running from Yharnam, but rather the lack of checkpoints in the beginning. I grew up in a time where games were often difficult and had bad checkpoints that didn’t save automatically, I appreciated the challenge back then as I didn’t have my own money to purchase every game that caught my fancy, so anything that prolonged my interest in a game was welcome. However, as an adult who wants to play all of the games but has limited time, I prefer games with overactive checkpoints and generally steer clear of anything described as Soulslike. On a whim, I purchased Remnant: From the Ashes and fell in love.

I think the thing that appealed to me most with Remnant was the combat, which like all good Souls-inspired games has a rhythm that depends on dodging as much as it does attacking. While most Souls games are hack and slashes, Remnant: From the Ashes is a third person shooter. As you get to know me, you will learn, I like to shoot things in video games. Early on I died a lot but instead of becoming frustrated, I actually enjoyed the challenge of getting better. The game also features procedurally-generated levels where the enemies differ each time you play. Combine that with the unique look and feel of the four main areas of Remnant: From the Ashes, the game never gets boring.

Check out DualShockers‘ review for Remnant: From the Ashes.

8. Borderlands 3

Borderlands 3 for the most part sticks to the creed, “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” While there’s a few slight improvements in gameplay and graphics, the game is still the irreverent, looter shooter packed with a “bazillion” guns that we have come to expect from the series.

Featuring an all new cast of Vault Hunters, along with a few familiar friends, the most notable improvement in Borderlands 3 is the ability to leave Pandora and visit other planets. Not only does this make the game more expansive, each planet has its own look and personality which is a nice break from the somewhat drab Pandora. Borderlands 3 isn’t rocket science; it’s hours of mindless fun, and at the end of the day, that’s all I really want from a Borderlands game.

Check out DualShockers‘ review for Borderlands 3.

7. Destiny 2: Shadowkeep

I’ve had a love/hate relationship with Destiny since the first game’s alpha. I always go back to Destiny but I have to admit that the constant changing of rules and its grindy disposition makes me a little crazy. I love Bungie’s dedication to the game and with Shadowkeep I feel that they finally nailed Destiny’s potential, even if it took them five years to do it.

While parts of Destiny 2 went free to play, Shadowkeep seemed to be a love letter to their dedicated community and proved Bungie can sustain this massive game even without Activision’s backing. Destiny 2 is one of the most frustrating and riveting gaming experiences I’ve had this generation, and while I’ll stray from it for weeks, even months, coming back to it always feels right.

6. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare

There’s not a Call of Duty game that I haven’t played, but the epitome of the series for me were the first two Modern Warfare games. Since Modern Warfare 2, I’ll admit that the series has had its shares of hits and misses, but each year I wait unapologetically for the newest iteration and hope it will be great again. Since Infinity Ward welcomed back several key members who had left for Respawn after Modern Warfare 2 and created a new engine for the aging beauty, there was hope this was the year that the series would return to its former glory.

I have to say, I wasn’t disappointed. Finally gone was the Treyarch imprint of the Pick 10 system in multiplayer that I hated; in its place was a more streamlined and highly customizable system which gave average players like myself a chance to actually compete. Some of the larger maps took some getting used to, but for the first time in Call of Duty there is no paid DLC, and the new maps have been correcting some of the shortcomings of the launch maps.

After last year’s Black Ops 4 decided to focus on Battle Royale instead of a campaign, Modern Warfare was back with one of the best and most poignant campaigns to date. While it never reaches the level of   guilt that Spec Ops: The Line left me with, Modern Warfare does a good job of showing  the horrors of war by making you question the morally grey area of who is good and who is evil. This hits you the most when you play as Farah Karim. Her backstory is heartbreaking, but necessary to show how she became the kick-ass rebel commander of the Urzikstan Liberation Force.

Modern Warfare is one of the most engaging games of the year and has offered Call of Duty a new lease on life. I’m still regularly playing (and enjoying) Modern Warfare and looking forward to what it has in store for the future.

Check out DualShockers‘ review for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare.

5. MediEvil

MediEvil was a real turning point for me in gaming. Not only did it thwart my gaming habit to obsession, it also paved the way to my PlayStation fangirl-ism. For the record, my heart might belong to Sony, but I’ll play on anything you set in front of me. Up until last year’s God of War, I always credited MediEvil as being my all-time favorite game. In fact, my love of the game runs so deep, I’ve always said that if I ever won the lottery, I’d singlehandedly fund a Kickstarter for MediEvil 3.

The game looked like a scene out of Tim Burton’s A Nightmare Before Christmas and featured elements of action-adventure, hack and slash, puzzle, and platforming games. The end result ended up being an irreverent story of an unlikely hero that attracted a cult following who were very vocal in getting Sir Dan Fortesque resurrected from the dead and obscurity in a newly remastered version of the beloved game. I always felt MediEvil was ahead of its time, so it’s no surprise that it still feels like a fresh concept in 2019 that I still have a ton of fun playing.

4. Concrete Genie

Sometimes a game can still be fun and entertaining while raising awareness. Concrete Genie from Pixelopus tackles the subject of bullying as experienced through the game’s protagonist, Ash. Through Ash’s eyes and paintbrush, you will escape the wrath of the bullies through a visionary narrative where your art and imagination come to life.

At first it appears as if Concrete Genie is just a glorified graffiti simulator, but as the story unfolds and Ash gains different powers and abilities, the game soon turns into something that feels like inFamous Lite. It’s a unique and charming game that I won’t soon forget. It also contains an optional VR mode that really exemplifies the concept of art coming to life. I absolutely adore Concrete Genie.

3. Darksiders Genesis

The last new game of the year I played quickly earned a spot high on my top ten of 2019. I’m a big fan of the Darksiders games, and when I heard that a prequel dungeon crawler would release so soon after Darksiders 3, I was giddy with excitement.

Darksiders Genesis lets you play as Strife for the first time, but you can also play as War, who was the star of the first game. Despite its isometric view, Genesis still looks and plays like a Darksiders game. The ability to switch between Strife and War is like getting to play your two favorite Diablo classes at once. It makes for great combat situations as well, as opens up the challenge of figuring out when to use Strife and when to use War in various situations. Surprisingly, it might be my favorite Darksiders game yet.

2. Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order

From the moment I heard Respawn Entertainment hired Stig Asmussen and that he was going to be lead on a Star Wars game, I was over the moon. However, once I remembered EA was involved and that there hasn’t been a good Star Wars game in so many years, I started to worry that I was just setting myself up for disappointment.

You should always go with your first instinct, because Jedi: Fallen Order is so good. Everything about it just speaks to me. It feels like it’s an amalgamation of every game I have ever loved from Uncharted to God of War set in one of my favorite cinematic universes. Wielding a light saber in this game is the closest I’ll get to being a Jedi; well, I prefer the Dark Side, so we’ll go with Sith. For someone who has loved Star Wars for their entire life, I’ll be forever thankful for this game and Respawn Entertainment.

Check out DualShockers‘ review for Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order.

1. Control

I fell in love with Control back in March when I played an early build of it at GDC; I knew then this game was something special. Remedy rarely disappoints and their games are all unique experiences, but Control is definitely Remedy at their best. I love the look of the game: it’s dark and eerie, which immediately sets the perfect mood and tone for what is to come.

What really attracted me was the gameplay. Sure, you have a service weapon that takes on various forms which is cool in itself, but once I started unlocking Jesse Faden’s psychic powers and learned how to use them all together, it was next level gaming. On consoles the game suffers from a few performance issues, but it didn’t diminish my love of Control.

The best way I can describe Control and the reason it is my favorite game of 2019 is that it made me feel like I was starring in an episode of The X-Files that was directed by David Lynch. Trust me: that’s the ultimate compliment in my world.

Check out DualShockers‘ review for Control.

Check out the rest of the DualShockers staff Top 10 lists and our official Game of the Year Awards:

December 23: DualShockers Game of the Year Awards 2019 December 25: Lou Contaldi, Editor-in-Chief // Logan Moore, Managing Editor December 26: Tomas Franzese, News Editor // Ryan Meitzler, Features Editor  December 27: Mike Long, Community Manager // Scott White, Staff Writer December 28: Chris Compendio, Contributor // Mario Rivera, Video Manager // Kris Cornelisse, Staff Writer December 29: Scott Meaney, Community Director // Allisa James, Senior Staff Writer // Ben Bayliss, Senior Staff Writer December 30: Cameron Hawkins, Staff Writer // David Gill, Senior Staff Writer // Portia Lightfoot, Contributor December 31: Iyane Agossah, Senior Staff Writer // Michael Ruiz, Senior Staff Writer // Rachael Fiddis, Contributor January 1: Ricky Frech, Senior Staff Writer // Tanner Pierce, Staff Writer // Laddie Simco, Staff Writer

January 1, 2020 5:00 PM EST

from EnterGamingXP https://entergamingxp.com/2020/01/dualshockers-favorite-games-of-2019-laddies-top-10/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=dualshockers-favorite-games-of-2019-laddies-top-10

[ciaclouddearding-blog]

Halo reach firefight versus matchmaking

Can Firefight Versus on custom games be played 4v4? You, your buddies Or just yourself , and your ally's have to make the Spartans life a living hell.  Want to play a Rocket Fight with only Grunts in a Versus situation? It's fun and all but locking weapons behind firefight tiers is lame.  Every game will essentially be the same except the players' reactions ; this allows Bungie to create Leaderboards with this gametype that pertain to skill and other factors, and can be fully tracked in-game and on Bungie.  For example: Chattyness, Skills, Competitiveness Fun or Competetive and loads more.  The menu background image for Firefight in Halo: Reach.

How To Play Matchmaking Firefight Alone We actually set that up by accident in about 15 seconds.  However you may buy Firefight voices using your cR in the store.  Anyone here with seniority knows Halo 5's campaign was one of the most disappointing out of all the games.  Already mentioned and still planned is the introduction of Campaign Matchmaking and some substantially awesome changes to the Firefight Matchmaking experience, the latter by way of cooperative multiplayer maestro, Larzy B.  Next off is a Campaign Preview Featuring the audio directors Marty the legend , and Jay.  The appearance of your custom Noble Six character from Campaign will carry over to Firefight, with a selection of voices from other characters to choose from including characters from past games, such as the , , and Sergeant Johnson.

Score Attack Achievement in Halo: Reach Already noted by players as a great way of boosting your Credits in Halo: Reach.  The two human-controlled Covenant players join the battle as Elites with the sole objective of taking down the Spartans.  The center rift curves around a bit to a second spawn point, only you won't find any Spartans appearing there… Bungie used Courtyard to unveil a brand new Firefight variant.  Players are allowed to customize their , background, color which now includes formerly unavailable ones: black, olive, etc.  This means you don't have to play with your friends.

How To Play Matchmaking Firefight Alone First off we have the Firefight Preview where 4 Bungie workers introduced in the video talk about Halo behind the scenes while they play some firefight on the map Waterfront.  During these Bonus Rounds, the player pool of lives cannot be used, but any player killed is inactive until the commencement of the next Set.  The fun part about all of these variants is that -- aside from Score Attack -- you can mix and match features.  You can set how long you want the game to last for before you start the game.  Special medals will be earned by both Elites and Spartans in this gametype, as well.  These games came 5 years apart so of course halo 5 would come on top.

SDCC 10: Halo: Reach Adds Versus Firefight The spartan counter you saw was the amount of lives left for the defending players.  You may scroll down for your basic guidelines.  I hope 343i puts it in Halo: Infinite.  In an effort to keep your first campaign experience spoiler free, we've decided to wait for a bit before we deploy the campaign playlist.  You can still create custom games and play it.  Well, is for the internet connection, its very hard to find players with good internet when having a bad internet, it also happens me all time, but the only way to fix it is turning off your computer, playstation 3, wii, or any other thing that uses internet, so you get a better connection and more chances of it to work.

Can Firefight Versus on custom games be played 4v4? Elites have infinite lives in this gametype and will receive no points for kills, however their statistics will be shown in a full Post-Game Carnage Report, as will the Spartans.  Halo: Reach Firefight Gameplay: The Basics Firefight is at its core a survival game mode, in which the squad of up to 4 players must fight wave after wave of enemies, working together to hold out for as long as possible before they are overwhelmed.  As these updates go live, Jeremiah will publish the full details to our Optimatch forum so you can pore over the subtle nuances of each individual change.  You want Classic Firefight as normal is only one set.  Your job as the elite is to simply kill the spartans until they run out of lives.

Halo Reach vs Halo 5 Halo 5's multiplayer has more upgrades and a matching system more balanced than Halo Reach's.  I have personally done this without being banned, but do not abuse! I've played nothing but Firefight and Campaign in Reach and actually still fire up Score Attack today.  That other spawn point is where a second team will begin when playing the new Versus Firefight mode.  I will never forget the night i got the Vidmaster Challenge: Endure achievement.  Extra lives will be unlocked every 2,000 points scored after the beginning of the round.

Why doesn't Firefight Matchmaking ever work? When the timer runs out or the Spartans run out of points, the teams swap sides for a repeat match to see who ends up with the highest score.  So Reach did indeed launch without matchmaking for the campaign.  It was never 'God, I want to fire up Guardians to play some Firefight'.  Halo: Reach Firefight Playlists and Game Types At the moment, the following two with four Game Types are available in Halo: Reach.  So Reach and 5 are both widely loved games, but also widely hated.

Firefight in Matchmaking? Don't quote me on that though.  Get Bungie Pro to bump up your File Share, render videos, and get this emblem. But the question is which is better? Someone's first Halo game is the best one.  Players will either be or Elites, and those that are chosen to be Elites are aided by other Covenant troops such , or.  As it most likely won't be in.  In addition to the full matchmaking support and completely customizable games shown back in June, Bungie is letting loose a couple of new Firefight modes and a new map.  Bungie also had two other new Firefight variants on display.

[barbosaasouza]

Monster Hunter: World PS4 Review - Taming the Beast

Several hours into Monster Hunter: World, a buddy and I took on an Anjanath, one of the tougher monsters in the first region you can explore. We paid no attention to its structural and elemental weak points, nor its potential ailments. We didn’t really plan our powders and potions. We simply joined up in the Ancient Forest and went after it, not bothering to fire a flare to bring in more assistance. Two or so hours and three resets later, we called it a night, thoroughly frustrated.

With some games, that would have been enough to send me packing for good. You’re looking at the guy who put $130 into For Honor and ended up playing less than 60 minutes. With Monster Hunter: World, though, I wanted to go back, I just didn’t really know why.

The next day, I loaded into Monster Hunter: World and brought up the notes the Chief Ecologist had on the Anjanath. I learned about all the things I didn’t bother to study the night before. I took this knowledge to the smithy and forged the proper weapon, then went to the training yard and learned how to use it. I prepared potions and powders to keep me from fainting, then I went back to the Ancient Forest and helped a group of random players dispatch the Anjanath like it was nothing. That was the moment I realized you only get out of Monster Hunter: World what you put in, and I was hooked.

Let’s Go on an Expedition

Backing up to my first few hours in Monster Hunter: World, it wasn’t just the Anjanath that had me on the brink of quitting, it was also the co-op mechanics. Trying to play Monster Hunter: World with friends is a lot like trying to eat soup with a fork. You can do it, but nothing about it is intuitive. Perhaps I’ve been spoiled by the ease of playing co-op in games like Ghost Recon Wildlands and Destiny 2, but the system Monster Hunter: World uses is bad.

For instance, you can only play an assigned story mission together if you and your friend have both progressed far enough. Seems fair, but Monster Hunter World will make you start almost every main story mission solo. You’ll remain by yourself until you watch a cut scene, at which point either you or your friend will have to exit their session to join the other. However, if you are a solo player looking for help from random gamers, the SOS system works quite well, and you’d probably feel that the multiplayer and co-op mechanics are solid. Most of the trouble with co-op is directly related to trying to play with specific people.

Monster Hunter: World is best experienced when you’re lost in a cycle of exploring, resource gathering, and crafting. I probably say it too much, but open world games are at their peak when you want to spend time in the environments. I love visiting the Smithy and seeing what it will take to craft my desired armor, looking for a related quest, then heading out to gather the necessary supplies. It’s a system that ensures all the locations and monsters will remain relevant even after you’ve completed the main story.

I didn’t care much for the narrative in Monster Hunter: World. The premise was fine but playing it through was forgettable at best. Two encounters with a monster named Zorah Magdaros were so bad I was laughing. Even now, I’m not sure what I did to progress. There were points in the first encounter where my objective was to drive away another monster. I never ended up finding that monster, but apparently it grew bored and took off on its own.

The second battle was a tiny bit better, but stilled flawed from start to finish. I found more objectives, but the quest continued to move forward even when I hadn’t completed them. It ended with about 10 minutes of me running back and forth, loading cannons and firing away while someone was screaming at me about how it wasn’t good enough. I was just glad when it was over, although it wasn’t really. There were still more assigned quests to complete and more regions to discover. More cut scenes to watch while you wait for Monster Hunter: World to get out of its own way.

Welcome to Astera, Population: 1

I have given Destiny 2 a verbal beatdown that borders on cruel, but Monster Hunter: World could take a few notes about how Bungie handles social spaces. With Destiny 2 I always feel connected. I can be a solo player in the Tower and it feels alive. In Monster Hunter: World, it’s just you in Astera unless you head up to the Gathering Hub. I think I’ve been there twice, and I have no idea why anyone would need to go back. It leaves me feeling somewhat alone when I’m playing, even though I know thousands of others are in the same space. Monster Hunter: World puts the armor, loot, and resource systems of Destiny 2 to shame, but I can’t help feeling like Astera is a missed opportunity as a social space.

That lonely feeling continues when you head out on an expedition. Yes, you can fire that SOS and be joined by a few fellow players, but it feels forced. It’s the difference between inviting someone into your home to visit and bumping into strangers while you’re running errands. You may not talk to those strangers, but you take comfort from knowing they’re out and existing in the same space as you. I’m not saying Monster Hunter: World needs to be more like Destiny 2, but there’s a disconnect with the co-op and multiplayer for me.

What Monster Hunter: World gets right is your Palico companion. I created Chuck, my real cat with an attitude. Chuck is a genuine benefit when I’m playing alone or even with one other person. He attacks the monsters I’m battling, heals me, digs up extra resources, and manages to work “meow” into everything he has to say. He has his own armor and gets a weapon, and I find myself caring just as much about his gear as I do my own. It really feels like Chuck, and I’m equally as defensive about him in-game as I am in life. When a monster attacks him things get belligerent, although in truth he saves me far more often than I save him.

The Palico system is one of the best in Monster Hunter: World. You can level your Palico up to make them more efficient, and they act as a gadget delivery system for perks you unlock. I can count on Chuck for a timely heal, or to toss down a Shock Trap when I need to pin a monster down and cause some damage. I can even connect with my friend’s Palicos when they’re offline, taking two companions with me, both of which put in work.

Try Not to Get Trampled

The studying and planning in Monster Hunter: World is perfection. The actual combat, however, can be a bit wonky. Capcom has done a great job with the environments, making them as much a part of the fight as the weapons. I’m a big fan of using verticality to my advantage, jumping on the backs of monsters and stabbing them in the face. The problem is there’s just too much inconsistency. Mounting a monster feels like it’s as much about luck as it is skill. That system, like the monster’s hit boxes, feels sloppy.

As far as striking a monster with your weapon, that feels tight. I can’t recall thinking that I’d landed a blow that didn’t register. The problem comes from the monsters moving around with you in close proximity. Yes, I get that they are huge and you’d get trampled, and that’s fine, but what isn’t fine is when you’re consistently getting knocked down, or even fainting, and you’re certain you got out of the way. Perhaps once or twice, but time and time again I was left feeling cheated, and that’s a tough one to take when it sends your team back to Astera as the final faint.

The monster AI is another example of what Capcom got right. These beasts go about their business in the world whether you’re there or not. They move between zones and live their lives. Often you can pass by them and, so long as you don’t go mean mugging them, they’ll just continue on the path. Most monsters won’t fuss with you if you don’t give them reason, although there are exceptions.

Even when the fight begins, the monster AI is on point. There are no health bars, so you must depend on visual cues and monster behavior to get a sense of how you’re doing. Chop a tail off and the beast will howl. Hurt it enough and it will limp off towards its nest, desperate to recover. This often makes me feel like I’m the real monster in each encounter. I’ve attacked this creature in its habitat, often unprovoked, and when it is so hurt that it limps away to try and recover from near death, I hunt it down and finish the job. That’s some nonsense right there, but I do love my fancy Zorah Magdaros armor.

Peak monster hunting is done in groups of at least two. My buddy prefers to strike from range and I like to fight in a phone booth. Eye gouging, foot stomps, and Chuck’s claws taking chunks of flesh. It’s a messy style, and it’s most effective when I have a co-op friend there to provide heals and ranged distractions. I can count on my pal to draw the monster near a cliff so I can try for a mount or lure the beast into a trap where it can be put to sleep. Things get a bit more hectic and unorganized with a group of four, especially if a couple are random players, but group fighting is almost always better than going it alone.

Welcome to the Jungle

I’m on the fence with the visuals of Monster Hunter: World. The monsters look spectacular, and the environments feel very much alive. I played on PS4 and it’s a good-looking game, but as a PC player, I mumbled to myself more than once about how I couldn’t wait for it to come out on Steam this fall. Give me that glorious Diablos fight in 2K with about 90 fps and I’ll dance at your wedding. However, even as far as the PS4 is concerned, games like Horizon Zero Dawn and the Uncharted series look better. That’s not a dig at Monster Hunter: World. Those are two stunning games and I don’t feel like Monster Hunter: World is far behind.

I’m more than 70 hours deep into Monster Hunter: World. Although my copy was provided by Capcom, the price of admission for the average gamer is well worth it. My interest is waning, though. Maybe I’m asking too much, but I really wanted a living, breathing game. Even though Monster Hunter: World does have events, it falls short of what it would take to keep me invested for the long haul, but that’s okay. As a first-time player of the series, Monster Hunter: World has given me unique experiences and memories that, for better or worse, other games will be measured against for years to come. That has to be a win.

This review is based on a PS4 download code provided by Capcom. Monster Hunter: World is available in retail and digital stores now.

Monster Hunter: World PS4 Review - Taming the Beast published first on https://superworldrom.tumblr.com/

[brothermouzongaming]

Destiny 2: my thoughts, hopes, and fears

When I joined Destiny 1 I was very very excited to see what the house that built Halo would do now that they had moved on. Admittedly I was unprepared for the very different experience Destiny offered. It interested me, the idea of a simultaneous world the gamers would live, cooperate, and compete in. During the opening months, I was pretty into it, running through the gaunt story to really head out into the world and get a taste of that endgame loot I had seen on guardians in the tower. I was, however, bored by December. Not skilled enough to take on the raids or even hang in PvP reliably (”Git Gud” rings out in the background). My boredom wasn’t eased but amplified by releases like Shadow of Mordor, 2k, Dragon Age: Inquisition, and Far Cry 4. Not to mention Bloodborne, which I still haven’t beat yet.  So I look up, a year and change passes and I forget all about Destiny. My adventures in the worlds mentioned above really dragged me away from the quick and frantic bullet hell that is Destiny. As more and more games came I never got around to my Warlock and before I knew it Destiny 2 was on shelves. I had missed out last time, I wasn’t going to make the same mistake twice.

Fuck me right?

Thots

So I played the story, as meaningless as it seemed, it was definitely better than the D1 campaign experience. On I went me and my friends through strikes, crucible matches, lost sectors, public events. We did it all seldom the Leviathan, at that point, I lacked the finer survival skills needed to survive (I’ve completed it 3 times since :D ). The experience felt thin, but this wasn’t new to me because D1 at launch was thin. It did worry me however that this was our second go around; shouldn’t a sequel feel a bit bigger? I’m not talking scale, but the endgame options in games like this, in particular, are critical to success in the eyes of the gamer. Ignoring that voice in my head telling me to put my controller down, I continued. The loot was disappointing but not just disappointing, but clearly, it was a shallow pool, to begin with. I could’ve made an Arthur meme from how many times I got the same gauntlets over and over and over and over again. Even today they’ll come by and say what’s up, mocking me. 

As the weeks went on, something else wasn’t sitting right. These worlds, they were nice, but they lacked reasons for me to come back and explore...wait....where are the collectibles? I had completely forgotten that we used to have little treats of lore and other info waiting for us in hiding. Along with some simple things like jobs, I was wondering what in the hell would cause such a drastic step back. We were officially regressing. I didn’t give in to the voice although it was screaming in falsetto at this point. Curse of Osiris drops and holy shit was I mad. A world space you can barely turn around in it’s so small, a sad excuse for a story expansion, the same loot issues to the point where it was almost unnoticeable, mind-numbingly grindy missions for Vex weapons, ONE FUCKING PUBLIC EVENT, ONE Lost Sector (it’s also by far the smallest in the whole game). 

On top of it all, Bungie had been beating their dicks about as fervently as they possibly could, making sure to hype that DLC at every turn. Destiny 2′s problems really become amplified when you look back and remember just how “excited” the team was and how they genuinely thought players would like the changes they made and the pathetic efforts they attempted at making it better in the form of the CoO dlc. A dlc now requiring another round of “making it better” from Bungie after several debacles. I honestly don’t think they bit off more then they could chew. Does anyone remember the fact that Destiny 1 was supposed to be a 10 year experience that would allow us to carry our character through it? Sure the franchise may have a ten year lifetime but even Mass Effect let you bring over your character. Instead, they literally start all over, new character, none of the old raid/strike/challenge specific loot (and yet old loot in the form of exotics and an arsenal of reskins), Remember when Destiny 2 was going to have “too much content”? I piss my pants laughing every time I think about it. There is quantifiably less content from weapons to their stats, the gear pool is ankle shallow, there are fewer reasons to grind and look for gear/weapons you want. 

I see people on the Bungie forums go back and forth and both sides have a lot of good arguments. Destiny 2 does offer more worlds that are (overall) larger, and definitely more visually impressive. Where it falls flat is what kept players through the first lull in Destiny 1: the solid shooting mechanics, deep intriguing world, the lore and how it was distributed to the player (which could’ve used work imo), and the rpg aspects shown in random stat rolls for gear. This kept the players going beyond the level cap and outside of multiplayer; after they had done the strikes so many times it was almost scary, gotten bored of non-milestone related events, finished the assigned job and whatever the game offered. The hunt for the perfect gun is a hunt the players deemed worthy time and time again. Those are the things they chose to cut, either cause they hate their fanbase (obviously not), or they wanted to appeal to a larger audience. This was the only outcome Bungie should’ve seen coming and for some reason, they seem to be caught out time and time again. 

Slather on that sweet micro-transaction paste and you got yourself a shit cake. As if gutting the deeper gaming mechanics, stopping all grimoire cards and other major means of lore distribution, reskinning a large amount of the arsenal both from Destiny 1 and within itself, and debuffing the player wasn’t enough. A lot of what could’ve been left in the world as far as loot is concerned was locked away behind the cold dead face of Tess, the Eververse employee who handles the in-game purchases both with bright dust and silver (their premium currency players pay to obtain). Eververse would hold some of the best items in the game as far as ghosts, ships, emotes, and sparrows are concerned. Not only that but event-specific items were even locked away with statistically no chance of any player getting most of the items from the said event. Pushing players to spend their money where they can try their hand, not even an honest shot, via the slow machine-eque loot box mechanic. Ah, look, an instance where cosmetic loot boxes can really fuck up a game and what it could be. 

Hoeps

Destiny at its core is good. The universe is wildly enthralling with a mystique that draws you in, it makes you want to find out what the hell is going on. The shooting is sharp and responsive, you feel the grip of the gun in your hand and the kick when the trigger is pulled in a very natural way that emulates the experience well. The guns are intriguing, alien weaponry and future tech are hard to conceptualize but a lot of guns in Destiny will make you go “hmm” with intrigue as you wonder exactly how much ass this gun is going to rip when you get it out on the battlefield. Rat King, Wardcliff Coil, Legend of Acrius, Crimson, Vigilance Wing to name a few. I hope Bungie can find the spark that drove Halo, a franchise that wasn’t perfect but shined because of the painstaking effort put into it. I’m not asking for Halo 2.0 but I am damn sure demanding better of this bring a developer like Bungie.  

Fiirs

I fear Bungie have completely lost their way. These aren’t the people that made Halo, someone came in the night and took what heart they had and locked it away somewhere no one can seem to find it. For a project as ambitious as Destiny is, there is no passion, no drive to actually make the next big franchise. They seem perfectly content to merely talk about it. Halo was nothing but a fps that amazed because of the world and the mechanics. Yes, the multiplayer was a hit but if you ask me that is exactly why it was. I would’ve thought that in the face of what might actually be one of the greatest franchises in Halo, Bungie would be hungrier than ever to prove that it was no fluke. More and more I’m convinced it was just that. Normally I’d blame the publisher especially with Activision’s stink all over this, but some reports insinuate that all this was Bungie’s doing because making game content was “too hard”. A mountain of an achievement they volunteered themselves to climb up. So what do they do to make up for it? Decide to fuck the people that help make them... yeah if you aren’t worried about Bungie I’d love to hear your thoughts because I need some hope. 

[mindthump]

Destiny 2 is a test: Can Bungie live up to its promises? http://ift.tt/2qEskNl

Bungie made promises for Destiny that went unfulfilled for years, and clearly wants to avoid a repetition with Destiny 2.

Thursday’s gameplay reveal for Destiny 2 shared more than footage of updated graphics, fresh abilities, and new weapons meant to make the Destiny devoted drool. Bungie delivered a full-on preview that would have felt right at home at the Electronic Entertainment Expo (the big game trade show in L.A. each June), and showcased that the studio is attempting to avoid the mistakes it made on Destiny 1. Increased access to endgame content, making sure players have enough content to keep them busy, and a gripping story are Bungie’s priorities.

But not everything promised at an E3-style press conference is actually delivered when the game ships. Here’s what we hope Bungie delivers on, and where we still have room for concern.

Above: Ikora, Cayde-6, and Zavala (left to right) are the stars of Destiny 2.

What’s encouraging

Destiny 2 will try to address lack of access to endgame content

When Destiny players are finished with the campaign, and when they’re achieved mastery over the standard player-versus-player Crucible modes, they have three options for fresh challenges.

Raids are six-player activities that require precision shooting, puzzle-solving, and acrobatic prowess. Nightfall missions are punishing versions of regular story quests. The Trials of Osiris is a weekly multiplayer tournament that leaves little room for error. Destiny players need skilled, dependable partners for all three, and that’s not always an easy task.

When Destiny players don’t have enough friends online for Raids, or the Nightfall, or Trials, they often turn to websites like DestinyLFG or The100 to find partners. Use of either site is tantamount to rolling the dice and hoping a team doesn’t pull a player that isn’t experienced enough to be of any use, or who doesn’t have the requisite gear to keep up with everyone else.

Or a jerk who makes racist, sexist, or homophobic comments. Or someone that refuses to listen to directions and insists that they know a better way to do things.

To address this issue, Bungie has created a feature for Destiny 2 called Guided Games. Destiny Clans will now be able to advertise themselves in-game, rather than having to post Clan pages to Bungie.net. The Guided Games feature will enable players to look through lists of Clans, find one that looks attractive, and offer to play Destiny with the Clan’s members. Clans, in turn, can advertise an open slot on a Raid or Nightfall or Trials team, and pick up a new player to fill the group. The Guided Games feature could remove a major roadblock to players’ capability to enjoy Destiny’s satisfying endgame activities.

Above: Destiny 2 will feature new matchmaking systems to help players find one another.

Patrol maps might become key sources of content

Unlike most first person shooters, Destiny features large, open maps as well as more traditional story missions with a beginning and an end. When Destiny players go on Patrol missions, they have the freedom to go where they live, and choose from an array of different activities that usually don’t take very long to complete.

The problem with Patrols in Destiny is that they grew stale. The available missions are repetitive, and players who’ve finished the story and made headway into the endgame may have no reason to bother with Patrols anymore, which removes a large chunk of Destiny’s content from rotation.

Bungie announced even larger maps for Destiny 2 and a collection of new activities for players on Patrol, like “adventures” that sound similar to traditional MMO quests doled out by characters you meet on the open maps. Bungie described “Lost Sectors” as something akin to dungeons in fantasy-type MMOs, discrete areas with a boss character to defeat and loot to earn. It would be nice if Patrol missions remained a fun, viable option for all Destiny players even when they’ve advanced into the challenging endgame activities.

Destiny 2 begins with strong characters 

The biggest disappointment with Destiny is the lack of an adequate story. The narrative in Destiny is a throwaway tale that felt divorced from the rest of the game. It was unmemorable, and certainly not up to snuff with the tales told by Bungie in the Halo series.

Destiny 2 focuses its story on three characters that are voiced by Hollywood talent, and who Destiny players have come to love over the past three years. Cayde-6, Ikora Rey, and Commander Zavala, played by Nathan Fillion (Firefly, Castle), Gina Torres (Firefly, Suits), and Lance Reddick (The Wire, Fringe) respectively are the tentpoles on which the campaign in Destiny 2 is hung. When the Last City is destroyed by the evil Cabal, Cayde, Ikora, and Zavala are scattered, and the player’s mission is to find and bring home our three heroes.

Because Cayde, Ikora, and Zavala are characters with whom Destiny players have established relationships, Destiny fans will have more motivation as characters in the narrative themselves, which should provide a forward momentum and sense of direction that Destiny campaign lacked.

Above: Destiny 2 players will face off against old enemies, on new worlds.

What’s worrisome

Only one Raid

There was a wide disparity between the quality of the Raids in Destiny. The Vault of Glass was an eerie challenge for which players had not been prepared by the campaign. Platforming, puzzle-solving, and extreme team coordination were new aspects of the Destiny experience for players who tackled the Vault, and it was amazing.

Crota’s End, the second raid, was too easy to beat. King’s Fall, the third raid, was akin to the Vault, a foreboding adventure with satisfying puzzles and challenging platforming sections. The fourth and final Raid, Wrath of the Machine, was better than Crota’s End but still not very exciting.

The point is that Raids are difficult to construct, and so it’s understandable that Bungie hasn’t had time to devise more than one Raid for the release of Destiny 2. But the danger here is a repeat of what happened with the Vault in Destiny until Crota’s End was released, running the same Raid over and over again for lack of a second Raid to challenge players.

No details on how Guided Games work

It is entirely possible that rather than solving the problem of lack of access to endgame content, the Guided Games feature could simply drag the same sort of risks involved in using DestinyLFG or The100 and put them into Destiny, rather than keeping them outside the game.

We really need to hear some details as to how Guided Games works, and how it will solve these problems, before believing that Bungie really has a handle on this issue. It’s just as likely that MMOs and FPS games simply do not mix well in some cases, and that problems forming groups for Raids in particular are an inevitable consequence of this unlikely blend of genres.

Above: Destiny 2 will be released on PC as well as PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. Who knows where players will go?

Image Credit: Bungie

A PC release may splinter the audience

I play on both PCs and consoles, and now I’m faced with an uncomfortable choice that Destiny didn’t force me to make: which direction do I go in?

The chief concern here is visual fidelity. PCs can kick the crap out of consoles where visuals are concerned, and the Destiny 2 gameplay footage shown Thursday was beautiful. Bungie has a real gift for creating artistic, vivid visuals, and they’re going to shine on a souped-up gaming rig much brighter than on the PlayStation 4 Pro, or the standard Xbox One.

And then there’s always the mouse-and-keyboard versus control pad debate that PC and console gamers love to indulge in. When highly competitive multiplayer activities like Trials of Osiris demand the pinpoint precision of rapid headshots, the sensitivity of a mouse could be a huge draw for Destiny players that have the option to migrate from the console versions.

Considering that only 50 percent of Destiny players finished a Raid, according to Bungie’s presentation on Thursday, splintering the player base across three platforms instead of two might make it more difficult for players to find groups for Raids, even with the new Guided Games feature.

Destiny 2 could be as many steps back as steps forward for the franchise

Bungie’s Destiny 2 reveal showed off improvements that seem to address key complaints players had with the first, but until we have a chance to run through the story, explore the new, open worlds, and try to find Raid partners, they’re all promises that Bungie may or may not be able to deliver on the day Destiny 2 launches.

As a Destiny player with around 2,000 hours sunk into the game, I’m willing to be patient with any early missteps with the sequel. My concern is the friends who tried Destiny, bailed out early, and never came back. I had to use DestinyLFG and The100 for months before I finally found an endgame Clan, after which Destiny became an entirely different experience.

I’d like to be confident that Destiny 2 will have a much smoother launch, and that Bungie will have solved the first game’s looming issues. So far I’m optimistic, because Thursday’s presentation showed that Bungie really does understand what it did wrong with Destiny.

VentureBeat's PC Gaming channel is presented by the Intel® Game Dev program. Stay informed about the latest game dev tools and tips. Get the news you can use.

[gamegeekzeu-blog]

Destiny the Collection has been a competitor for our next essential pick for a while now. Luckily, there was nothing holding us back anymore after Bungie revealed Destiny 2 and we got hyped for the sequel. In fact, Destiny is still so good, we were just trying to complete the new record book and reaching highest light level instead of writing this article! Two and a half years after the release of Destiny on the PlayStation and Microsoft platforms, you can just pick it up and relive the strikes and raids, grind to complete quests or jump right into a really good competitive multiplayer experience.

I remember the excitement and anticipation we had when Destiny released almost 3 years ago. I’d pre-ordered and pre-downloaded the game and sat there ready at midnight waiting for the game to unlock. To experience this vast and interesting world. The world that Bungie visualized and put together for their fans. Three years and many, many, many updates after the game’s release that vision is fully realized with Destiny – The Collection.

Destiny – The Collection brings together every piece of content made for Destiny. You’ll get the base game along with Expansion 1: The Dark Below, Expansion 2: House of Wolves, Destiny: The Taken King and the brand new content, Rise of Iron. To make the introduction to the Destiny Universe a bit simpler, players will get a Level 40 Character Boost.

This is a great way to get the full experience of what it would be like for someone new to the world of Destiny. In no time you will be blasting your way through all those strikes, quests and raids. If you already have Destiny and love it then you will already have the extra content and will only need to buy the Rise of Iron DLC. For anyone new though, this will be the best way to get the full Destiny experience.

#gallery-0-10 { margin: auto; } #gallery-0-10 .gallery-item { float: left; margin-top: 10px; text-align: center; width: 33%; } #gallery-0-10 img { border: 2px solid #cfcfcf; } #gallery-0-10 .gallery-caption { margin-left: 0; } /* see gallery_shortcode() in wp-includes/media.php */

You start the story returning from the land of the dead, being revived by this strange little machine which is your ghost. Earth has fallen and you make your way to the last city. The Speaker (a wise mayor like figure) explains what happened while you were away. To unravel the mystery and story, you have to battle the armies of the darkness by completing missions and strikes. Your character grows by gaining the usual XP, but you also get new weapons and armor which raises your light level. The light is power given by the Traveller, a giant orb hovering over and protecting the last city.

The grind for good gear and armor is long. There are four different types marked by the colors green, blue, purple and yellow. Each type is stronger and has better perks to power boost. The Level 40 Character boost is essential for new players today. Just as it says, this boost once used, immediately raises the player’s character to Level 40 and provides a bunch of gear that is appropriate for a level 40 player. Using the boost is not mandatory and players could grind their way up to level 40. However, taking the boost is the best way to ensure you can play all of the new content right from the get go. You don’t need a PlayStation Plus subscription to play through the story modes but if you want the full online experience and want to participate in the multitude of “Strikes” and “Raids” then you will need the PlayStation Plus subscription.

Dark Below & House of Wolves

Let’s get this right out of the way. The Dark Below’s new raid, Crota’s End, is the best, and perhaps the only reason to purchase The Dark Below. The Vault of Glass raid introduced objective-based gameplay that’s more interesting and varied than anything else Destiny had to offer. Crota’s End offers an improved vision of that same added objective-based gameplay. Making the new raid the most interesting addition you’ll find in this add-on. It’s an infuriating peek at the excellent game Destiny could have been – provided that you have five friends with level 28 characters you can round up via text message or phone (seeing as there still isn’t any raid matchmaking).

That inconvenience alone is infuriating, but it’s compounded by how little there is to do in The Dark Below aside from the new raid. I blazed through the three story missions and the one new strike in under two hours, and in that time, I saw barely anything substantial that I had not seen in Destiny vanilla. A strong sensation of “déjà vu” crept in as I tore through multiple Earth and Moon areas I have visited and revisited countless times since Destiny’s initial launch. The strike mission felt particularly samey, lacking the extra challenge and sense of urgency that made the original group of strikes my go-to grinding activity.

Of course, none of this changes that Destiny is still fundamentally solid in its core gameplay mechanics. The act of combat isn’t any less enjoyable in The Dark Below, but it has nothing more to offer either. Yeah, some Hive Knights will drop the same sword we have played with for one mission in the original (which is a blast while it lasts), and you get a hoverbike that can do backflips in mid-air, but neither addition is supported by gameplay that makes them feel necessary or even useful.

#gallery-0-11 { margin: auto; } #gallery-0-11 .gallery-item { float: left; margin-top: 10px; text-align: center; width: 33%; } #gallery-0-11 img { border: 2px solid #cfcfcf; } #gallery-0-11 .gallery-caption { margin-left: 0; } /* see gallery_shortcode() in wp-includes/media.php */

House of Wolves brings much more to the table, which is a double-edged sword: There’s now more to do in Destiny, but that doesn’t necessarily make it a better game. At first, I was blinded by how much more I liked this expansion than The Dark Below, but over time, the shine wore off. House of Wolves kicks off with required story missions, which originate in a new social space called the Vestian Outpost. Located in the Reef, the home of the alien race known as the Awoken, the Vestian Outpost feels completely different from the Tower: A perpetual purple twilight combines with a minor-key musical intro to lend an imposing sense of foreboding to the place.

House of Wolves maintains that momentum with its new strike, The Shadow Thief, which is perhaps the best one in the entire game. The first third of the strike takes you through familiar areas on the Moon, and then you get teleported to the boss’ spaceship, a new setting, for the rest. The tight quarters of the ship make for some tense combat, and unlike The Dark Below’s Omnigul strike, you can actually hurt the boss during a few encounters prior to the final battle with him, which makes for a far less annoying fight.

That’s where House of Wolves’ two new modes, the Prison of Elders and the Trials of Osiris, come in. Both are unlike anything else in Destiny, and both are terrific. The Prison of Elders is a “horde” mode à la Firefight from the HALO series, pitting three Guardians against waves of enemies. The challenges rotate among four different difficulty levels from 28 to 35 (one level above the new cap of 34).

House of Wolves does offer an arena in which Guardians succeed solely by their skill: the Trials of Osiris, a three-on-three elimination mode in Destiny’s competitive multiplayer component, the Crucible. Each match is a best-of-nine affair, with individual rounds lasting two minutes. Gear statistics and Light levels matter, as in the Iron Banner. The setup is the perfect proving ground for Guardians who have been honing their PvP skills since Destiny’s launch: Teamwork and communication are of paramount importance, but one skilled player at level 34 can destroy an entire squad in mere seconds.

Buying entry to the Trials of Osiris — which only runs Friday to Tuesday, with one map selected each week — will allow you to play until you win nine matches or lose three. A unique reward awaits those few Guardians who are talented enough to run the table and go 9-0: the Lighthouse, an exclusive area on Mercury. The Trials of Osiris is an intense, heart-pounding experience. Many of the matches come down to a deciding ninth game, and nothing in Destiny comes close to that do-or-die final round’s tension, excitement and potential for heart failure ;)

House of Wolves finally starts to follow through on a bit of Destiny’s promise. There’s something in it for everybody, from PvP fans to co-op players to the five people who care about the game’s story. The expansion doesn’t fix most of Destiny’s myriad problems, and it doesn’t meaningfully change the moment-to-moment experience of playing the game. But House of Wolves is the first time I felt Bungie started to deliver on those E3 promises.

The Taken King

Many of the quest lines take you to Destiny’s new territory, the Dreadnaught. This Hive spacecraft contains several memorable waypoints, like the Court of Oryx, which is a public boss arena, and a gigantic crashed Cabal ship. It feels much bigger than it is, in fact, because of how much is hidden in its every nook and cranny.The Dreadnaught holds tons of tucked-away collectibles, chests that don’t always have obvious ways to open them and dynamic quest lines that make you face off against entire platoons of enemies. Regardless of how much time you spend scouring it, it always feels like there’s more to discover.

Those secrets also make the Dreadnaught come alive in a way the other destinations don’t. The realms of Destiny have always looked beautiful but felt hollow and static. The Dreadnaught makes the first decent argument to date in favor of Bungie’s continued refusal to add an in-game map.

Waiting at the end of The Taken King is some of the toughest content Destiny has ever offered, but unlike past endgame content, it all feels fair. That’s particularly true of King’s Fall, the new raid, which requires maximum coordination with zero margins for error. It’s the most challenging stuff Bungie’s ever built for Destiny, but it doesn’t cheat.

The Taken King’s best content is often the stuff that highlights one of the game’s worst remaining flaws: For an online game, it can be really hard to find people to play with. The Taken King’s three best repeatable sources for loot — the weekly Nightfall, the new raid and the Court of Oryx — don’t feature matchmaking at all, requiring you to use third-party websites to fill a fireteam if you don’t have any friends online.

Rise of Iron

The latest DLC “Rise of Iron” tells the story of the Iron Lords. Back in the day, there was some serious technology around called SIVA, which was capable of self-replicating and terraforming. The Iron Lords thought they had SIVA covered thanks to the mysterious traveler appearing, but they were wrong. During an epic battle, the Iron Lords were all but wiped out. Lord Saladin is the last remaining Iron Lord and he needs the assistance of the Guardians because SIVA is back with a vengeance. Your task, should you choose to accept it is to do what the Iron Lords couldn’t and take down SIVA once and for all.

Apart from that open cinematic to set up Rise of Iron’s content, most of the story is told over your comms system as you travel around. It is an interesting story to unravel but it doesn’t live up to the brilliant story that was The Taken King. The story itself is shorter than I would have liked, taking only around two hours to plow through. It is interesting to learn the backstory of things like the Felwinter’s Lie shotgun, who Felwinter was and how he died but that whole story still feels like we aren’t told the full story which is a shame.

Where Rise of Iron shines is in the content outside of the story, the Strikes and Raids. There is some repetition in there with the likes of Sepiks Prime and others returning in an infected SIVA form which makes more like a retelling of what we already know rather than adding brand new content but it somehow works, which is a validation of how fun strikes and raids are.

#gallery-0-12 { margin: auto; } #gallery-0-12 .gallery-item { float: left; margin-top: 10px; text-align: center; width: 33%; } #gallery-0-12 img { border: 2px solid #cfcfcf; } #gallery-0-12 .gallery-caption { margin-left: 0; } /* see gallery_shortcode() in wp-includes/media.php */

The brand new raid will require 6 Guardians and like with previous raids, requires communication throughout in order to achieve success. In the raid you won’t be overly prompted with what to go, rather the team must figure it all out. The elements of planning, solving the problem and then executing the plan is a highlight and is greatly satisfying when it all comes together.

To compete in raids you’ll need to be level 40 (so use that character boost) AND have light above 350. Achieving that light level will require a bit of grinding to find new gear but with a wealth of content to play through across all of the expansions, there is plenty to do in order to make that progression.

Rise of Iron on its own may not quite live up to expectation, admittedly being a little underwhelming but Destiny – The Collection succeeds by way of the some of its parts. When I first reviewed Destiny it was good but the grind got to me. It just felt like it was begging for more content. As Bungie added each piece of content the game started to realize it’s potential with The Taken King really making the game shine. Rise of Iron may not be Destiny’s finest moment but when complimented with all the tweaks and innovation, and the content that proceeded it, Destiny finally feels like it has reached its full potential and is well set up now for Destiny 2.

Verdict:

It’s hard not to act over-enthusiastic, but there’s so much I love about this game. The story, the characters, the visuals, the grinding with friends, the online multiplayer experience, and the captivating music.

https://open.spotify.com/album/5ZJrV5uHaqQbQNdMIPhSct

Some flaws are still in the game, such as lack of/ bad matchmaking, loading time between missions/ matches and that f*cking idiot of a Cryptarch. But I have high hopes these issues will be resolved in Destiny 2 later this year. There is so much charm in this game and it makes me want to play over and over. To see if I can beat my friends or get the gear I don’t have yet. Completing the Books is especially addictive. This beautiful Bungie universe deserves more love than people who only played year 1 give and will be one of the best experiences you’ll have with your friends yet on PS4. Definitely a PlayStation 4 Essential; go get it!

Koop Destiny the Collection nu!

Official website Destiny 1 + 2

PS4 Essential 02: Destiny the Collection; a must have experience! @DeeJ_BNG @Bungie @yosp @DestinyTheGame Destiny the Collection has been a competitor for our next essential pick for a while now. Luckily, there was nothing holding us back anymore after Bungie revealed Destiny 2 and we got hyped for the sequel.

[battleborntap]

First Person Shooters as a genre have been around since Doom was released in 1993, and ever since, it has been widely considered one of the most liked genres (at least by Americans). With a wide variety of games and an even wider variety to the genre itself, let's take a look at some of my personal favorites!

Please note, these games all take place in the first person perspective, and have one of their main mechanics involving firing a gun or weapon of some kind. Games like Mirror's Edge and The Stanley Parable are omitted on the grounds that they are more First Person Puzzle Solvers rather than shooters, despite having the ability to shoot in these games. Also, I will only be doing one game from any given franchise, simply because I could pack this list with four or five sequels easy with all the games I've played. And finally, I can't say this enough, this is all based on my personal favorites and opinions. If you don't agree, that's fine! We all have our favorites, but this is simply a way for me to talk about mine!

So, without further delay, here are my Top Ten Favorite First Person Shooter Games!

#10. CALL OF DUTY: BLACK OPS (2010)

Of course a Call of Duty game made it onto this list, and MAN what a game it is! Call of Duty: Black Ops released on Ps3 and Xbox 360 in 2010 to much fan praise, and is often considered one of the last good Call of Duty games. While I am quick to argue that point (Advanced Warfare brought a focus to story for the first time in years and Black Ops 2 had probably, in my opinion, the best multiplayer in recent history), The original Black Ops had all three main modes (Story, Multiplayer and Zombies) on point for the launch of the game.

While the Multiplayer may not have aged well for the game, the Story mode is simply wonderful, and unlike the rest of the Black Ops series, YOU CAN UNDERSTAND WHAT THE HELL IS HAPPENING IN THE STORY! If you have to read a plot summary to fully understand what the hell happened in it, it's not a good story. As for Zombies, simply letting players become former presidents and fighting time traveling nazi zombies...what more do i need to say?

Overall, it's an impressive game by all accounts. It helped to prove that Treyarch had what it took to keep delivering on the CoD formula, and while it wasn't World at War 2 like me and several others had hoped for (Still hoping for it, personally), it was a great game to play all the same.

#9. DOOM (2016)

Doom is the grand daddy of all First Person Shooters, and the latest iteration into the franchise really does not disappoint. With brutal carnage kills, impressive graphics, and a return to what made the franchise fun in the first place, DOOM (2016) is easily one of the best games of that respective year.

The story is as basic as it comes; Hell has invaded Mars, and you were about to be sacrificed when s**t goes sideways. You escape, get a Master Chief Power Armor ripoff, and fight through rooms and hordes of Demons to try and prevent Hell from getting to Earth...You know, like the last three Dooms!

The combat in this is where it truly shines, giving you the ability to kill enemies when they are weakened with brutal finishing attacks. The weapons are all fantastic, and the enemies are tough, but manageable. The real problems are outside the story; Multiplayer seems tacked on and rushed, while SnapMap, the mode I was really excited for, is basically just Corridor maker, the more. Still, the story itself is fun as all hell...

#8. BIOSHOCK (2007)/ BIOSHOCK INFINITE (2013)

This one might seem like a bit of a cheat, but hear me out...I personally feel that these games are very much the same thanks to something called "Service to the Brand."

Let me ask you this. Why do people in Bioshock use plasmids? They are a part of a world where everything has gone to Hell, and now they need to do whatever they need to survive, including injecting themselves with chemicals to give them super powers! Now why do they do it in Bioshock Infinite use vigors, which are basically plasmids?...There's really no reason is there? The reason they use them is because the last two games released had Plasmids, and it wouldn't be the same game without them!

This is a common problem with sequels that differ from their original game, and honestly, the only reason I decided to lump them together is that, aside from story and some situations you encounter, they are basically the same game. Well crafted gun play with elemental magics, expertly written dialogue and story, and an all around impressive and fun universe to explore, these games fill me with a sense of wonder each time I play them. If I had to choose one, it would have to be Infinite, but it's by such a slim margin that I felt it best to lump them together. My list, my rules...

Also, We don't talk about Bioshock 2...just...no.

#7. STAR WARS: BATTLEFRONT (2015, Fight Me)

I know the original Battlefront games are well regarded and adored. I know many of the people who played this felt betrayed and hurt by the micro transactions and lack of content. I know it just feels like Battlefield with a Star Wars skin...But you know what? I don't care!

Star Wars: Battlefront is the Star Wars game I wanted to play when I first put the original Battlefront into my PS2. Was I disappointed by the lack of content? Sure. Did it feel like a cash grab on EA's part because they has acquired the license? Of course, it's EA. But I still enjoy the hell out of it.

The game play is fun and engaging, as well as more balanced than some large scale shooters. The available content, while infuriating that it's behind paywalls and a slow progression system, are rewarding and fun. The Heroes are overpowered, but not too much. Overall, I feel the game is good for one simple fact; for the first time in years, I felt like I was in the boots of a Stormtrooper.

Also, you occasionally get a Wilhelm scream to occur when you kill someone...so there's that.

#6. LEFT 4 DEAD 2 (2009)

How do you make a sequel to a decently balanced multiplayer zombie shooter? Change only who you play as and what their main quest is, then add more! That's exactly what Valve did with Left 4 Dead 2, and it worked great.

Playing as four new survivors with fun personalities, the game introduced three new special infected to deal with on top of the five introduced in the last games, the addition of choosing melee weapons instead of pistols, and helped to balance old issues and new ones that made the game well rounded and just plain fun to play ,whether you were with friends or a few randoms online.

Then Valve went one step further; They added in new content through DLC, some of which included the original five levels from the first game, where you can play as the first four survivors in the first five campaigns from the original game, but with the new enemies, weapons and everything! In general, Left 4 Dead 2 is just a damn fantastic game is you AXE me! HAHA!!

            I'm sorry...

#5. HALO 3 (2007)

Bungie hit pay dirt with the Halo franchise, and the third installment in the game is where all that effort peaked. Great gun play, multiplayer modes, and engaging story line that (mostly) resolved the conflicts of the last two games and more, the game was damn impressive on Xbox 360 when it came out, leading to it becoming the fifth best selling game on the console!

This was one of the big games me and my friends played for days on end, sometimes literally. It's one of the first games to give me a true love for shotguns in first person shooters, and the rest of the games since haven't felt as impacting to me. They've been fun to play, but this was the last game that made me truly enjoy the franchise in a nostalgic sense.

Maybe I'm just getting old? Maybe...

#4. PORTAL 2 (2011)

Portal 2 is much like Left 4 Dead 2; change little to nothing about the game, but improve the writing, add more content, and fix some bugs from the previous game. Unlike Left 4 Dead, however, this game didn't have a multiplayer mode in the original, so this one added one!

While the first game was a series of puzzles linked loosely together by an uncaring, vindictive god/computer named GLaDOS yelling at you and calling you names, the second game is a series of puzzles linked loosely together by an uncaring, vindictive god/ computer named GLaDOS yelling at you and calling you fat before you overthrow her and put a mentally inept ball in her place who slowly begins destroying everything around you, shoves GLaDOS into a potato and sends you both into a 1950's version of the labs you were exploring to be yelled at by a 1950's style billionaire voiced by J.K. Simmons!

The puzzles introduce familiar and new concepts, keeping them fresh well into the game. The dialogue is on point through out, with minimal dialogue feeling out of place or forced. The humor is even better than the first, allowing for visual gags more than the first game did and a few running jokes to boot. Ultimately, an impressive sequel to an already impressive game.

Also, this game made me fear/ hate certain birds...just sayin'

#3. BORDERLANDS 2 (2012)

how do you top a game that had literally a bajillion guns, a rapid fire sense of humor AND a cell shaded art style set in a semi-unique world? MORE GUNS! MORE HUMOR! MORE CELLS SHADED! AND A VILLAIN!

Yeah...if you really think about it, the first game didn't really have a main villain. Sure you had some minor ones, like Baron Flynt and Mad Mel, but they were more like sub-bosses than anything. Borderlands 2 had plenty of sub-bosses, but also gave us MOTHERF**KIN' HANDSOME JACK, OTHERWISE KNOWN AS THE BEST VIDEO GAME VILLAIN OF ALL TIME EVER PERIOD! With an actual story to get through, a villain to thwart, tons of fun new characters and old returning ones, as well as giving personality to the playable characters and the first games characters who act as NPC's this time around, the game did everything it needed to and then some.

This game established Borderlands as a franchise that's here to stay, and with follow-ups including The Pre-Sequel (Not bad, but not great) and Tales from the Borderlands (Fantastic Story, weird execution thanks to it being a TellTale game), there's no doubt in my mind that Borderlands is here to stay...

Can't really say the same for Battleborn...which is sad cause I kind of liked that one...

#2. OVERWATCH (2016)

Honestly, how could this one NOT be on this list? What is easily one of the best new franchises in YEARS, Overwatch brought exactly what it needed, and we keep getting more! With new characters and game modes being added, as well as regular balancing updates and more, the game shows no sign of slowing down.

If I had one complaint, it's that the game doesn't have a story mode. That said, we get plenty of information about the world and its characters thanks to digital comics, animated shorts, in-game dialogue and costumes, and a few other means. The roster is rich with diversity and ranges from easy to play to hard to master, and overall just is a fun time for everyone.

Hell, hte game hasn't even been out for a year yet and already we have three new characters, a new map, a new game mode and additional features like being able to make your own game mode ADDED IN FREE OF CHARGE! That's doing it right!

HONORABLE MENTIONS

The following five games are all fantastic in their own right, but didn't quite make my top ten. To save time, I'll only do a quick sentence or two for each, so please enjoy!

COUNTER-STRIKE: SOURCE - One of the first first-person shooters I played. Good combat and lots of customization both in game and in the variety of game modes.

GOLDENEYE 64 - A fun multiplayer title with an okay story mode. Best played with friends split screen...No Odd Job, please?

KILLZONE - I like to think of this as Sony's answer to Halo, but with space Nazi's instead of aliens. Regardless, it really made you feel like a soldier in an army instead of a lone wolf like most FPS games.

DESTINY -  Bungie's follow-up to Halo after leaving their flagship behind, the online, MMO hybrid was engaging, but didn't have much staying power if you didn't have a dedicated group to play with. With that and a lack of a real story, it felt like this was a half bake idea that will hopefully be more fleshed out in the sequel.

TITANFALL 2 - Improving on some of the pitfalls of the first game (Like console exclusivity), this is fun, fast paced, and in general a good game to play, especially if you have a friend or two in tow. Also, the story mode grabbed me with it's tutorial mode...so that says something.

Now, without delay, Here's Number 1!

#1. TEAM FORTRESS 2 (2007)

What started as a Quake mod eventually became the military themed hat simulator free-to-play sequel that Valve won't let you forget about. Tons of games release on Steam with some tie in to this, usually being a hat themed after whatever you're buying.

That said, once you get past the confusing as all hell economy the game has, there's a fun and engaging "Hero"-based shooter underneath. With nine classes to choose from, nearly limitless combinations for cosmetic customization and weapon loadouts. The story to the game is don similarly to that of Overwatch (Animations, comics, in game items, etc) but unlike Overwatch, many of the comics, animations and such contribute to the overall story of the game instead of just add little references to it.

The story itself is long, convoluted and silly, and perfect for the style of game it's trying to be. Overall, it's the game I've spent the most time in since I bought it back in 2007 (That's right, some of us PAID for this game), and it's easily my favorite First Person Shooter!

Thanks for reading! Hope you enjoyed! Wat are some of your favorite First person shooters? Let me know in the comments below, and until next time, I'm McNutty891! Have fun!

source : http://ift.tt/2oGhx4Q

[myupdatesystems-blog]

PS3 VS XBOX 360

New Post has been published on https://myupdatesystems.com/2017/04/05/ps3-vs-xbox-360/

PS3 VS XBOX 360

The reign of the Xbox is almost over. As of late the PS3 has been looking better and better. Looks like 2008 will be the year of the PlayStation. PlayStation 3 has many big name titles coming out this year and if the all games from the list are all actually released this year, all we can say is WOW. Note: The following list in no way represents the entire list of exclusive titles for each console. However, it gives us a pretty good idea of the games rumored to be released this year.

PS3:

Resistance 2 (PS3)

Guaranteed success. While the first was a great game and fairly big success, it was still just a launch title. Imagine what they can do after a couple years and games under their belt. 8 player Co-Op! Expect big things from this game.

Gran Turismo 5 Prologue (PS3)

Another guaranteed success. Anyone who plays Gran Turismo will grab this game. If you’re a fan, you’re a fan. The visuals continue to improve, HD replays, ’nuff said!

Haze (PS3)

Hopefully the game will finally end it’s long series of delays this year. This game promises some intense action, including 4-player co-op, drop-in, drop-out, split-screen, online, or local multiplayer options. The game continues to impress visually, with not only the quality of graphics, but the very cool, unique design elements.

Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots (PS3)

Who doesn’t know about this game? The game is still months away and is already epic. If any game could live up to the hype this game has garnered, leave it to Solid Snake, old or young. Like most of the games on this list, the visuals are amazing. The game looks to pack in an enormous amount of story and gameplay. The game features a immense arsenal of weapons and combat/stealth moves. If you own a PS3, you are almost required to buy this. You know you will.

SOCOM: Confrontation (PS3)

Still early on this title, few details have been released. The game will support up to 32 players online. Customizable weapons much like SOCOM 3. Also like the previous SOCOM games, the focus will be online multiplayer. Early word says this one will go the way of Warhawk, offering online only possibly with a bluetooth headset and all. After all, the original SOCOM kind of pioneered headset use on consoles.

LittleBigPlanet (PS3)

Possibly one of the most innovative, cute, and anticipated games of the year. Little Big Planet looks to expand the PS3 audience with this “build-your-own-game” game. Eat your heart out Nintendo Miis, this game looks great. The shear level of creativity allowed is staggering. The game also supports 4-player co-op and versus. Plus, it’s kid friendly without being offensively cute.

God of War III (PS3)

The PS2 went out with a bang (though it’s still hanging in there) with the original God of War, and most recently it’s sequel, still on the aging console. People have been waiting for a true “next-gen” God of War experience and it looks as though 2008 is gonna be your year, possibly. Not much is know as of yet, however, the games creator, David Jaffe, is no longer working on the series so we’ll just have to wait and see how everything turns out.

Final Fantasy XIII (PS3) – Final Fantasy Versus XIII (PS3)

You’re either a fan, or you’re not, though, you’ve got to recognize the scale of the Final Fantasy franchise. The games continue to set graphical standards with every release. The next, XIII, looks to make good on their reputation. Not only are they again improving every visual, and storytelling aspect of the game, they are overhauling the combat as well. The combat in Final Fantasy XIII promises the speed up and intensify the battles.

MotorStorm 2 (PS3) [Teaser Trailer]

Another sequel to a previous PS3 exclusive, MotorStorm 2 hasn’t revealed much, but from the trailer we can expect yet another pre-rendered bar set too high for them to reach with in-game graphics. Don’t get me wrong, the original looked great, but the video they showed a year earlier looked 10-times better. This was the prettiest of all the racers for a while, but we’ll see how the sequel compares to the likes of Gran Turismo 5 HD later this year. Some of the improvements include new cars/trucks/motorcycles, tracks, and best of all, a much needed 4-player split-screen mode. The game’s also said to include 16-player online support.

Killzone 2 (PS3)

So, video and screenshots have shown just how good the game really looks in action. But what about gameplay? The original was not exactly praised by critics, though I quite enjoyed it (minus the large number of glitches). It definitely wasn’t the “Halo Killer” it was touted as. The sequel will have to really prove itself in such a crowded shooter market. Guerrilla Games has yet to reveal any real details on gameplay, i.e. co-op, multiplayer, customization? The game sure does look good though. Guess we’ll just have to wait and see.

XBOX 360:

Ninja Gaiden II (360)

Finally on to the Xbox 360, I thought we’d never get here. Ninja Gaiden II, the first official, true sequel, promises to up everything that made the original so popular. More action, more bad guys, more blood (almost too much), and more speed. The game’s creators have also addressed the difficulty issues some (many) had with the other games. They’ve said that without dumbing it down, they will be changing the controls in order to improve and lessen the frustration to newcomers. They’re also adding new weapons to the game and a ton of new character animations to keep the visuals fresh.

Too Human (360)

An epic in the making, Too Human is already set to be part of a trilogy. Everyone loves a trilogy. They’ve created an enormous world with a unique technology and organic design. The game is built on story, including a very ambitious new dynamic camera system that’s supposed to always give you the best view of the action during gameplay. The game also features a plethora of RPG elements to keep you interested. As with most RPGs you can upgrade almost everything, from weapons, to armor, to special abilities that extend your combat. The game also features a unique combat system, using the right analog stick for both melee and ranged attacks.

Fable 2 (360)

Sequel to a game that was a giant leap in artificial intelligence, Fable 2 looks to surpass it’s predecessor in every way. The ultimate choice between good and evil. This time your options are even greater. Similar to another Lionhead game, Black & White, the player will be given a pet in order to help you throughout the game, and also as a friend you can bond with. Peter Molyneux, the games creator has said he wants the game to get the player emotionally involved. Just a guess, but you can probably expect that your dog will eventually die. In addition to a game with conscience, the game is one of the first games to introduce money into the game before it’s release. That’s right, you can begin earning gold to spend in Fable 2 before the game ever hits store shelve, thanks to downloadable arcade games on Xbox Live.

Banjo-Kazooie 3 (360)

Very little is know of Bajo-Kazooie 3, if that is in fact it’s name. Rare, the company developing the game, released a short teaser trailer back in September 2006. It really didn’t show any gameplay, however, it did show a new boxy art style you can see in the screenshots above. You can expect the regular Bajo-Kazooie platform elements, collect everything in sight, teamwork to reach different areas and beat different enemies, and large open worlds. The Xbox 360 isn’t exactly known for having many platformers, so this will be a welcome addition. The last time we had a Banjo game was back on the N64.

Gears of War 2 (360)

Do I really have to say anything? Gears of War 2. You knew they would make it. The first was such a huge success, it actually beat Halo for top online multiplayer game, if only because it was the last-gen Halo 2. The game features everything new the Unreal Engine 3 has to offer. More enemies on screen, more destruction, more realistic lighting, and more chainsawing action. Another emergence day awaits us this fall.

Halo Wars

Halo isn’t dead! At least the Halo universe isn’t. Halo Wars is the first Halo game that isn’t a Halo game. It’s a real-time strategy. While the game isn’t being developed solely over at Bungie, it is being developed from the ground up for the Xbox 360 and console gameplay. Meaning they’ve supposedly solved some of the problems that plague many real-time strategy games on consoles. Did you know that Halo was originally a real-time strategy game being developed for the Mac? It’s true.

Splinter Cell: Conviction (360)

The next step for Sam Fisher looks remarkably similar to a Bourne Identity type game. That said, it still looks great. They’ve dropped the green eyed goggles in exchange for a man bag (ala Jack Bauer), hoodie, and beard, and they’ve got a stripped down and dirty, raw, Splinter Cell game where you’re now a fugitive from the law. The new game looks to change more than Sam’s fashion, focusing on what Ubisoft is calling “All new improvisation-based gameplay”. Where your inventory is actually the world around you, pick up and throw chairs, etc. Use crowds to your advantage, similar to Assassin’s Creed. This could be a great way to freshen up the series, or it could go too far from it’s roots and lose fans.

Left 4 Dead (360)

Zombies, Co-Op, Valve, Source, ’nuff said. The “43 in Left 4 Dead actually means something, it’s not just l337 speak. That’s right, 4-player co-op for a zombie first person shooter. A lot of people have high expectations for this one, and it looks like it could live up to them. Not a fan of being human, well they’ve got you covered. You can choose to play as a zombie, or “infected” as they’re called in the game. There are a number of different types of zombies each with different strengths and weaknesses. The brain eating should commence around October.

Alan Wake (360)

Do you like psychological thrillers? Alan Wake is a presented as more of a “movie” like game than a traditional action game. They’re officially calling it a “psychological action thriller”. The game has been in development for a while now (it won GameSpy’s Best of E3 2005) and claims to have a 2008 release date, we’ll see. It looks beautiful, the developer’s have spent a lot of time on really capturing the mood of a thriller. They’ve included full realtime day-to-night lighting and weather effects.