The Future. Touched by the Light of The Traveler, we have braved the Stars. But an ancient Darkness is coming to end us all...
Destiny... The Place where it will all end. Or, maybe, all begin? Who knows?
I do. At least, I had a chance to see (my) Destiny in... I'm hesitant to say "in its full glory", because this was supposed to be an Alpha Test. But truth be told, that Alpha looked more polished, played far better and was a lot more stable than some "finished versions" of certain Battlefield games of a certain Franchise I will not mention here.
Bummer.
To illustrate that point, during my... I'd say good 15+ hours of the Destiny - First Look Alpha, in Single Player, Co-Op and Competitive Multiplayer, 15+ hours in which I raised all three possible characters/classes to the Alpha Level Cap (of 8), explored every part of the Alpha Campaign Map, and participated in every activity and mission the Alpha had to offer, I disconnected once (ONCE!), couldn't log in three times, and was victim of a single obvious bug, where I repeatedly found myself in a completely empty Social Hub usually teeming with other players.
Let me reiterate. One Disconnect. About 10 Minutes of not being able to log-in (which means I couldn't play). One Obvious Bug.
Of course, I only saw a fraction of Destiny's full content in the Alpha, and it was a part of the game we had seen footage from for quite some time, so it stands to reason, that this was a quite polished tidbit I could test. And it played like a dream:
Solo-Missions and Exploring in a huge area, in which you could just run into other random players, potentially having the joy of triggering a public event - a mini-mission with often surprising difficulty, but grand rewards.
A full Co-Op Mission with diverse and fun engagements, featuring two good boss-fights.
Two PvP Maps for "The Crucible", playing a venerable "Capture and Control" game-type, in a PvP Suite that already seems more polished and balanced than many other shooters were at release.
And it really played amazingly well. And it looked amazingly... amazing. Digital Foundry took a look, and the Alpha ran at a solid 30 FPS in 1080p - and Xbox One owners rejoice, that same is the very possible performance you will get to enjoy, too. At the cost of any Kinect features, but still, I'd say it's a win. Final PS4 numbers for the full game are not yet known, by the way.
Destiny's release is less than three months away, and if this is the state of the Alpha, I can see great things for the coming Beta in July, and even greater things for the full release on September 9th.
Destiny doesn't reinvent the wheel. It's not terribly or outrageously inventive, like for example Okami, Shadow of the Colossus or Little Big Planet were. It's a Sci-Fi Shooter from the guys that brought you Halo 1-3, plus ODST and Reach. That heritage is very evident - some might say too evident. If you played Halo you will find yourself instantly on very familiar ground with Destiny. You will also, obviously, see parallels to Borderlands.
So what's so special about Destiny?
Everything.
No, it's not (yet) perfect. Yes, everything it does has (kinda) been done before. But never has "Everything" looked and worked this good.
And in an Alpha, to boot.
In the last week(s) - hey, I do have a life - I have taken the time and now posted
several more posts about many if not all aspects of the Alpha, look at the different Classes, the "Alpha
Campaign", Co-Op, PvP
Multiplayer and other stuff.
With quite a lot of direct gameplay
footage, so scroll down below for Part 2 :)
Now, you had enough of pretty pictures and want so see some Action? You wanna take a look for yourself?
Well, here you go (but please look in HD)!
Spotlighting the 3 Different Classes with Action from the Alpha's Open World, on good Old Earthen Russia:
For all your Playstation or Xbox or PC Gaming needs, especially the European needs, head over to Amazon UK - best deals in Europe (mostly). For TV or Movie Streaming needs, as well. Yes, I do buy there myself. Exclusively. Unless I find a better deal, elsewhere...
These are my impressions of Sony's E3 Press Conference, and as the title may suggest, I was generally stunned, sometimes amazed, but a little let down, too.
But first, here it is, in its fully glory:
The games:
Destiny: Casting Peter "Game of Throne's Tyrion" Dinklage as a really, really small one-eyed robot companion might not be entirely PC, but it's fun! And Destiny itself keeps looking better and better. Granted, it looks very much like Halo in a different dress with some cooler Powers, but still. Very Good. As it should. Release is only a few months away, with the Beta starting next month - and, as was announced, a 3-Day Alpha coming to PS4 this week (to register for a chance to join, go here). Playstation will get some exclusive content, including one full co-op mission, and a new PS4 Destiny Bundle will feature a WHITE PS4. Yay?
The Order 1886: Not so much action, but much more gloom in this gameplay snippet of the upcoming 3rd Person "Victorian Steampunk meets Werewolves" shooter. And... well, while it looks really nice - and gloomy - the gameplay doesn't wow me. At all. Too much control taken from the player, and put together with earlier gameplay footage, I get a feeling of it being a very narrow, almost on-rails experience. It's too early to tell, yes, but the high hopes I had, have died a quick ugly death.
PS4 Exclusive, for Life!
Entwined: A fish may love a bird, but where would they built a house together. No, not the edge of the river. On Playstation. As somewhat of a closet romantic, the game's premise (fish, bird, love) was instantly appealing. Controlling two different characters with each stick was intriguing. The mesmerizing graphics alluring. The price point, at 10 US Dollars (and it's available NOW), convincing. Of course, it might turn out to be ridiculously bad, but it looks nice enough to set itself apart from the "usual PS4 indie fare".
Might be exclusive, but it will come on PS3 and Vita, too.
Infamous - First Light: Stand-Alone DLC, basically small games in themselves you don't need the big game for, are starting to become something of a trend. And it's a pretty smart way to give people a teaser of what the "mother-ship" (the big, full game) might play like. Infamous - Second Son is the next game getting a stand-alone expansion, telling, presumably, the story of one of Second Son's NPCs. You don't need Second Son to play it, but if you do, you get some "additional content" - which could mean anything, really.
It's coming this summer, and will be showcased at E3 in the coming days. All only on PS4.
Little Big Planet 3: 4 player co-op (Yay!). New companions with new abilities. Cute, funny and endearing, a world to play and build in and get lost. LBP seems to never put a foot wrong, right down to the adorable lisp of the presenter. And know what else? LBP3 will be able to play ever single LBP level made by the community with LBP 1 and 2 - on the PS4, with enhanced graphics.
It's so damn cute, it's hard to not like. I will try, but I will fail.
PS only.
Bloodborne: The game most may know as Working Title: "Project Beast", coming from the creator of Demon Souls and Dark Souls. Which makes it pretty damned hard, not to get excited. Really, really excited. You don`t see much in the CG trailer, but it looks dark, foreboding, dangerous. I'm so happy.
Coming to PS4, possibly only PS4.
Far Cry 4: Looks gorgeous. Grappling Hook? Insta-win. The wing-suit? So much better than the sparsely doled-out hang-gliders of FC3. Co-op? Well, it's there, even if it might not be 4-Player (what a novelty), but it looks fun...ctional. You can never be sure about the actual fun. What does sound awesome is that on PS3 and PS4 you can (allegedly) invite players to join you, even if they DON'T own the game! Now, where was I? Right. Attack Elephants? Well, kinda. FC3 was great, but had its fair share of frustrations, most due to the lack of options moving around. FC4 seems to have learned from that. New moves (hijacking vehicles via takedowns), new location (gorgeous Himalayas) and hopefully even more diverse missions, and I'm loving this game already.
Coming this Holiday on consoles and PC near you.
Dead Island 2: Sequel to the surprise hit of Dead Island (Duh!), it was shown off in a small trailer. Funny, but who knows? Dead Island was First Person Zombie Survival with a focus on Melee Combat, and I wasn't too interested in it. Which kinda goes for this one, too.
Battlefield Hardline: Cops vs. Robbers, Battlefield Style. Leaked a few weeks ago, then presented at the EA press conference, including a closed Beta exclusively for PC and PS4 starting RIGHT NOW (well, yesterday, but back then it broke PSN for an hour, or so), I don't really know what to make of it. Car chases around a City, changing venues, different cars. It looks fast paced, but that might not be a good thing. But it could be fun. I got me a Beta Code, and I will report.
Coming Later this year, to all consoles.
Magicka 2: Coming to PS4. Magicka was, apparently, an up-to 4-player co-op, fantasy RPG. With wizards wielding laser staffs, or something. Apparently it was also pretty challenging, yet funny. Done by the people that will bring us Helldivers soon, Magicka 2 looked very enticing.
Coming. Sometime. Somewhere.
Grim Fandango Remastered: Coming to PS4 and PS Vita, one of the most iconic and wonderful Adventures ever made, is getting the re-vamp treatment, exclusively on PS consoles. If you're old enough to remember Monkey Island and other Lucas Arts greats, you will already be salivating uncontrollably. Truth be told, right there, I loved Sony to bits.
Coming.
AB-ZU: I want it. From the Journey Creator, under the sea. Beautiful, eery, fascinating. Words fail a bit. I'm totally stunned.
No Man's Sky: And I'm floored. Infinite, procedurally generated planets in a possibly "infinite" universe. Exploration. Space Combat. FPS-Combat. Colors. Seamless transition between ground exploration, space exploration and ground again. Walk around, jump into your Space Ship, fly off to another planet, walk around again. No loading screens. Floored.
If you loved Star Trek, and you kinda missed the planet exploration from Mass Effect 1 in the later games, it's hard not to get excited.
This seems to be a Timed Exclusive on Sony's Platforms, coming... well, not soon enough.
Mortal Kombat X: Gruesome, maybe too gruesome, but if you like the 2D side-scrolling beat-em ups, this one looks pretty, pretty deep, and pretty... well, gruesome.
Batman - Arkham Night:
Finally, some gameplay. And Oh. My. God. Huge City, lots of
verticality. The Batmobile - 'Nuff Said! It's simply amazing. Looks,
gameplay, everything I was hoping for. Of course it got delayed until
2015, but still.
PS4 will also get some exclusive content, here.
Then we had a few more Trailers, one for The Last of Us - Remastered (nice, not in the least, because apparently the Last of Us Zombie enemies will make an appearance in the Diablo III Ultimate Evil Editions on PS4 and PS3), and one for Metal Gear Solid 5(that scene where he rubs ashes from an urn on his face made me cringe - how melodramatic can it be before it gets unintentionally funny?), then one for Suda 51's Let it Die.
And there was that announcement about GTA V on Next-Gen Consoles and PC, but seriously, who cares? ;) Note of interest, current-gen GTA V players can import their online stats from PS3 AND Xbox 360 to the PS 4 Version. Nice.
The Indie-Games: Now, as much as I like Indie Games, I've
really had my fill, since PS4 barely has anything BUT Indie Games. So I
really don't care, especially about all the Pixel Graphics stuff. I
don't see the appeal. There was one that looked at least decent, Talos
Something, but apart from that, enough with the Indies, already.
Free to Play: I hate it. It's rarely if ever done right. Even
Warframe, which is great fun and is finally now turning into the game it
was supposed to be, does milk you for money in the most unexpected and
frustrating places. I don't know why they thought this was a good idea
to push this a something big, but that was huge let-down for me. Don't
get me wrong, Planetside 2 might turn out great, but I was sorely
missing one sentence here: "Free to play - but NOT pay to win!"
And at some point it was mentioned that the PS Vita has over 100 games in development. Some are Free to Play. Most might be indies. Yay...
And then there was other stuff. Something. I don't know. Why? Because as Europeans, all that PS Now and PS TV makes us do is get angry at being left out. Again. As always. Second-class citizen, complaining here. But if you care:
PS Now is switching from Closed to Open Beta on PS4 on July 31. US and Canada. Play streamed Playstation games on your PS4, and soon on your PS3, Vita and select Sony TVs. There`s talk about rental prices going from 3-20 dollars, as well as subscription models.
And if you buy a PS TV for 99 $ US, you can just plug that into your TV, get a DS3 (PS3) controller, and use PS Now. At least, that's how I understood it.
Again, I might be a bit biased, but since I cannot take advantage of any of that in the foreseeable future, I don't much care.
Last year, Microsoft was all about Media, this year it was all about games. So, I guess Sony had to pick up the Media stuff, and they ended that with announcing that one of the best ever graphical novels, Brian Michael Bendis's "Powers"will be realized by Sony into a live action TV series, green-lit for two seasons, and available for PS Plus members for free. In the US. Somehow I doubt Europe will get any of that. I'm a huge fan of Powers, and with BMB on as executive producer, well, I have extremely high hopes.
And that was it. Or was it? Oh, right, there was this itty-bitty trailer for Uncharted 4. You saw it. Drake gets up, walks away, some voice over dialog. Nothing special. Until you realize that this was NOT pre-rendered footage, but captured from the IN-GAME engine. Which means, that as amazing as that looked (and it did looks amazing), that`s how the characters will look while PLAYING the game. It's going to be 1080p, aiming at 60 FPS. Looking like that.
Think about that. Then smile.
For all your Playstation or Xbox or PC Gaming needs, especially the European needs, head over to Amazon UK - best deals in Europe (mostly). For TV or Movie Streaming needs, as well. Yes, I do buy there myself. Exclusively. Unless I find a better deal, elsewhere...
Here it is, the full Conference, for those that still haven't seen it:
And I'd say... okay. Good. -ish. Some was a bit meh.
All in all, Microsoft definitely delivered on one thing - it really was all about the games. Now, the games themselves, well, there were some gems, some things I found personally a bit disappointing, one in particular that positively surprised me, and some stuff I have no use for.
One recurring theme, kept popping up, though: Timed Exclusives. Microsoft seemed to have dug pretty deep into its pockets to get timed exclusives for a lot of 3rd Party Game DLCs, as well as one Multiplayer-Beta (eVolve, that one is). Most interesting might be that two games from Ubisoft, a studio that traditionally has always had a very loving relationship towards the Playstation consoles, a part of that roster of "I get it before you do because my X-1 is amazing" list. And yes, this really is all about the money. You can say all you want that "Ubi finally realized what the better platform is", but the only reason you give timed exclusives is because someone pays you a ridiculous amount of money for it.
Okay! Games:
Call of Duty - Advanced Warfare: Looks pretty enough, like a cross between (the best Halo campaign ever) Halo - ODST and the non-Titan part of Titanfall. "Boosters" they called them, mini-jet packs that seem to allow you very quick vertical or lateral movement.
This is my one positive surprise really, as I had abandoned CoD with MW2, but the boosters seem to give the SP campaign a bit more flexibility, movement-wise. On the other hand, if you found the Halo Bunny-Hopping annoying, well, this might take that annoyance to a whole new level.
But it looks good, new, fresh (if any CoD game can be called "fresh"), and one can only hope that it will give you more open environments to take advantage of the new movement options.
MS will have timed exclusive on new DLC.
Forza Horizon 2: I kinda missed that. I really don't care for driving games, so I went and made myself something to eat. There was something about seamless multiplayer, open-world Drivatars, but it's cars, so... no, thank you.
MS Exclusive Title. I think.
Assassin's Creed Unity: 4-Player co-op. However that will work in an open world when traversing the city. Or maybe it's just during "missions", which are then area-restricted. Looks gorgeous. French Revolution, Heads on Pikes. And the movement. Dear God, the fluidity of dropping down over ledges... beautiful. The gameplay looked nice, but it was all very rush-rush. Oh, and Ubisoft finally listened to me, and made a "sneak-posture" for sneaking around. Apparently the days of "Walk Slowly" and completely upright when sneaking up on someone are finally in the past. Took them long enough.
Another MS DLC timed exclusive.
EVolve: The people that brought you Left 4 Dead made a Multiplayer only game - and a very asymmetric MP experience at that. It's the title I see the absolute most grief-potential this year. 4 people vs. 1 monster. And as soon as people get their hands on it, they will spend days looking for unfair exploits and glitches, ruining it for everyone else. Mark my words. I hope I'm wrong.
MS not only gets all the DLC first, but also an exclusive MP Beta, presumably quite soon.
Super Ultra Bla Bla Bla Dead Rising 3 DLC: 4 player co-op, all previous Dead Rising Heroes, and pretty much everything Capcom ever made in the last 31 years, comes as crazy DLC to Dead Rising 3. And it's available now. As in NOW! It's an incredible fan-service, so let's hope people will appreciate it. Knowing that 80% of gamers are too young to even remember Street Fighter II, who knows...
Since it's for DR3, it's, of course an MS X-1 exclusiv, and, for now, Download Only.
Fable Legends: 4 player co-op. Dungeon Crawling. Annoying Dialog, Fable style. Plus, 1 guy can be the bad guy, in a "Tower-Defense" Dungeon Master kind of way. And while it looks quite fun, like 3D Diablo, I will admit, the banter did get annoying.
X-1 exclusive.
Sunset Overdrive: No 4-player co-op. Which seems to make it the exception on this day. Funny Trailer, but for me the biggest disappointment. While the movement and environmental traversal seemed okay (if not as exhilarating as you'd think it should be), the gun-play was bland, slow and simply average. It's very colorful, but so are crayons, and children still make horrible pictures with them on your bedroom wall-paper.
X1 exclusive.
Halo Masterchief Edition: Halo 1-4, remastered, one box, one disc, 4000 Gamer Points on X-1. Yay! Seriously, I thought Halo 3 was good, Halo 4 was bad-ish, and I never really played the others. So what? The best Halo games I played are those not in the box: ODST and Reach. Those had 4-player co-op, by the way. I don't care about Halo as much as the next guy. I don't. It's not worth killing for.
X-1 exclusive, obviously, also including the Halo TV Series, but possibly more interesting: over 100 MP maps, and it's all on dedicated servers.
Dragon Age Inquisition: You didn't see much, just a short trailer. And, of course, the almost mandatory "X-1 gets it first". DLC, that is. One thing that you did notice: It's not visually stunning. Even if it's in-game engine footage, some of it, especially trees in the distance, looked pretty... ordinary. It most definitely did not looks as amazing as... The Witcher 3 - Wild Hunt: Wow. Skyrim with mythological monsters and a deeper fighting system. And it looks... just... jaw-droppingly good. And fun. And there's sex.There totally was Sex in the latest trailer. So, I really can't wait for this one. A huge open world, beautifully realized, with adult themes that don't try - they just are.
Rise of the Tomb Raider: The Second game in the TR Reboot. They showed a trailer. There might have been exclusivity with something, I don't know. The TR Reboot was a great game, the Definitive Edition on next-gen just beautiful. I wasn't much about archeology or riddles (those it had were almost annoyingly simple environmental... not really puzzles, but... annoyances), and it was sorely lacking in intellectually challenges - so more of that would make this one really Rise to the occasion.
The Division: If you don't know about it, what are you doing here? One of the most anticipated new IPs in the last few years, we now saw one further bit of Gameplay - which looked like the old gameplay. From last year. And, to my eternal chagrin, they had these "totally scripted and acted-out but trying to sound natural" voice-overs from the "players". Seriously, Ubisoft, stop that. People don`t talk or act like that when gaming online. Not in the least. That said, I still want it, very much so...
Inside - The new game from the creators of Limbo. And it looks like... Limbo. In color. And an industrial wasteland-slash-1984-slash-Brave New World-slash-Zombie vibe. It's still 2D, and it's still a bit creepy, and it looks like fun, but... just not something spectacularly new.
And then there was Project: Spark, the "make your own game" game, lots of indie-titles, a few teasers for games we don`t know anything about (Phantom Dust and Scalebound will be X-1 exclusives) - and then came the Crackdown.
No, really, Crackdown 3, which is actually just called Crackdown. MS exclusive. 4-player co-op. New Studio, but the creative director from the first game. The second sucked bad. They took out manual aim and scoping - even for sniper rifles. The argument was, and I'm not kidding here: "If you could already choose a body part to aim at with pin-point accuracy, why would you want to aim manually through a scope?"
And that was it. Oh, no wait, there was some dancing stuff, too. Nevermind. Well, it was better than last year. It was friendlier, not as arrogant and more fun. And it was about the games. And it did show that a lot of established cross-platform IPs will give stuff earlier to Xbox this time around. But, then again, what's the point of getting it early on one platform? I mean, it's not like that many people will train on new MP maps on one platform, and then play against people on the other platform. I mean, who in their right mind would do that?
And the one word you didn't hear: Kinect!
For all your Playstation or Xbox or PC Gaming needs, especially the European needs, head over to Amazon UK - best deals in Europe (mostly). For TV or Movie Streaming needs, as well. Yes, I do buy there myself. Exclusively. Unless I find a better deal, elsewhere...
Boy, we were hot for that one. Turns out, it's not all it was supposed to be (as some recently surfaced screenshots showing what was intended for next-gen consoles before they had to downgrade the graphics), but it's still a great game. If you can play it...
Now, we all know how, let's call it "unfortunate" the days around the
WatchDogs launch were when it came to online connectivity. UPlay was
down, taking part of Xbox Live with it, and pretty much stopping a lot
of people from enjoying parts or even the whole game.
What you don't know, is the reason.
So... prepare for "Da Truth!" (from a certain point of view ;)
As an unnamed (that means anonymous) source confirmed to me when we met
yesterday at the Playboy Mansion, Ubisoft and UPlay had come under cyber
attack - from Hackers. Right on the day Ubisoft launched a massive game
about hacking. Who would've thought?
The way he put it, "On May 27th, a day which will live in infamy, the
United Studios of Ubisoft were suddenly and deliberately attacked by douche-bags. Little, 20-40 year old virginal douche-bags that launched a DOS
(that's Denial of Service) attack on the Ubisoft and Uplay servers from
about a million basements in their mothers' homes. The kind of Douche-Bags
that think 'hymen' is what they say to their only friends after donning
their headsets!"
He was obviously upset.
"Uhm, aren't you describing pretty much all of your programmers and most of your employees?", I wondered.
He chose to ignore me.
"And why?" he asked. "Just because they can?! Just because they need to
flaunt their superior intellect in the face of the three people in this
company that make enough money to buy ourselves pretty much everything
they only know from internet porn? Do they think that makes a man
happy?! And when did porn ever do anything good?!"
"Well, there was that one time, at band camp-" I began, but speaking to him when he was like that was a losing proposition.
"So, they're smart! So what?! Didn't stop the ice hockey team from
dunking their heads in toilets, now, did it?! So, yes, let them be proud
of their win! Hoo-Fucking-Ray for them! They bloodied our nose, but that
won't happen again. We`re alert now. We're paying attention. And when
they come at us again, we'll sniff 'em out and tear 'em apart like...
like..." and there he faltered, then looked at me for help.
I said "Uhm... like uhm, cameras? With... laser-... uhm -teeth? ... that can... sniff?"
"Exactly", he said. "Just like that! D-bags won't even Know what hit 'em... (we should make a game about that... yeah...)".
"Look, man" I said. "Maybe it was more of a... I don't know, an
acknowledgement. Like, some friendly hazing. I mean, these people are
crazy smart. (and I`m pretty sure that whole virginal thing isn't really
true anymore and you just said that because you're kinda angry).
They're smart. And they know it. But they're kinda secretive, too. You
threw 'em into the spotlight. Which, in itself is quite a compliment for
them. 'Look, Ma! All those years I spent in the basement on my
computer? It's gonna make me a superhero!' But that's the thing, man.
They're not superheroes. They're Anti-Heroes. So, they couldn't just
come out and say 'Well done!'. These guys are creative, unconventional.
(Although, admittedly, being a hacker and then hacking the game servers
for a game about hacking so the people playing the game could, in fact, not
go out and hack other people may not be that ingenious - unless the
utter simplicity Is the genius. You never know. There`s a lot of pretty
funky mold in those basements...) But still. They could've just 'given
you props by busting your chops', man. Or something."
"Who the hell are you, now?!" He was looking at me. "Jay Fucking Z?"
"That- that's all you took from that? Fine. I'm just sayin', man. Don't
take it so hard. It's not like it... ruined your whole life, is it?"
Wrong thing to say.
"What?!" he screamed. "Didn't ruin-? People were unhappy. The Customers
were unhappy. They had paid for a game experience like no other and we
couldn't deliver. They don't care whose fault it was! You know why?
Because it's not Their job, it's Ours! And in their eyes we failed! We
failed! We went out and built and bought new servers, and we made sure
UPlay could handle twice as many people, twice the people that even Have
UPlay accounts, and then we even rented additional servers just for the
launch week to double That! Redundancy in Depth! And all of that turned
to Shit. Not because of the hackers. Because of us. Because when we
were contacted, I refused to take pictures of myself with a shoe on my
head and post them online. (The USU doesn't negotiate with terrorists,
cyber or otherwise.) And it was my pride that led to our fall, to our
epic fail. We failed the customers. I failed the customers. My life is
forfeit. My life is worthless, without meaning. It's dark and drab and
cold and lonely and-" He stopped, stiffened, then looked down towards
his bellybutton, seeming just a tad bit peeved. "Easy with the teeth
down there, you two."
And I said, "Yves", I said. "Priorities..."
DISCLAIMER:
None of this ever happened. Nobody is supposed to feel insulted by any of this. It's supposed to make you laugh.
I don't condone any illegal actions, nor will I admit to a certain
admiration of people that are able to do such illegal actions. I plead
the Fifth.
I don't condone any demeaning actions, either. Bullies blow.
The people and places mentioned in or alluded to in this short work of
utter fiction are not real, and do not refer or allude to real places or
people. No, there is no Playboy Mansion - that`s just a myth, a magical
place fathers tell their sons about to make them do their chores,
because if they work real hard and get real rich, they may one day be
invited there.
Perceived similarities to reality are nothing but your own dirty thoughts.
Also, this story is not even mine. I was just holding it for a friend - whose name I can't seem to remember.
Now, mom's got my dinner ready, and tonight me and the boys have a big
raid planned in the Rift. Yes, me and the boys. Plural. Of Course we
don't allow girls in our clan. If I learned anything in my 34 years,
it's that girls are like, not real. Or at least, really not like the I like ones on
the internet...
Watch_Dogs is available on PC, PS3, PS4, Xbox 360 and Xbox One. A Wii-U version will (maybe) come later.
For all your Playstation or Xbox or PC Gaming needs, especially the European needs, head over to Amazon UK - best deals in Europe (mostly). For TV or Movie Streaming needs, as well. Yes, I do buy there myself. Exclusively. Unless I find a better deal, elsewhere...
So, maybe that Title was a bit... iffy, but it got you reading, so there's that.
(Updated to include the MP modes, I missed. Thanks Tetsou88 from the Ubi-Forums)
Watch_Dogs. What a ride it has been, and the game's not even out yet. From "awesome next-gen launch title" to "delayed, with major graphics downgrade" to "5-27-2014, and no, those graphics are just fine", Watch_Dogs has created quite the online hype - and not exclusively in a good way.
Michigan Avenue Bridge in Watch_Dogs
But that's all water under the Michigan Avenue Bridge, now (that's a Chicago reference with digital proof, by the way), with the game being released in a bit more than two weeks.
And it's shaping up quite nicely, if the following "lore" and gameplay (single player, side activities and 1v1 multiplayer) vid is any indication (the longer gameplay walkthrough starts at 14:30, but it's all worth watching):
Well. That does look nice. So what did we see here?
I mean, apart from the whole "the internet knows your porn-consumption", "everything is connected" conspiracy... well, we can't really call that a theory anymore, can we? It is true, the internet knows, and thus people know. One of the the questions Watch_Dogs poses to the player, is what do you do with that? Knowledge is power, and with great power comes great... fun. I guess.
Nimble little minx
What we see seems very akin to what I'd imagine Assassin's Creed: Modern Online Warfare might look like, albeit with less climbing and more cars. Plus: Jedi Smartphone Tricks. The movement does seem quite similar, even a bit more energetic, yet not as vertical as what the Creeds offered, but hey: did I mention cars? Doing "something" to regional enemy "outposts" to "unlock" the area, also seems familiar. But WD comes with a cover mechanic and a "sneaky-stance", the second of which I am still waiting for in the Creed series, so hello obvious evolution.
I do need some kind of connection...
All in all, Watch_Dogs' Chicago, controlled by ctOS (ctOS is Chicago's Central Operating System, a Computer in control of a city's interconnected electrical systems), looks and feels quite enticing - and exciting: An open, living city (confirmed via tweet: without loading screens), criminals and damsels in distress, a legally misunderstood hero, and, with access to ctOS, lots of possibilities to interact with that world.
There's a very deep and socially aware storyline somewhere, too, I'm sure, but the joy of open world games always lay (for me anyway) in doing exactly the opposite of what the story wanted me to do, and see how it holds up, once the open world is supposed to "stand on its own."
But let's look at some details, especially from the longer gameplay walkthrough:
Is there a waiting period for the military grade stuff?
First off, guns. Quite a good amount, too, including a .50 cal Sniper Rifle. It remains to be seen if WD will actually accommodate long-range enthusiasts in any meaningful way (i.e. 100+ meters), something nobody seems to have asked or commented on, yet (aside from Ubisoft's own game description, touting "long-range sniping" as one way for the player to tackle enemies), but we can hope. Unless the Rifle is just a token offering to check all the "weapons needed in video game" boxes, and I haven't really seen anything confirming that the player could get to the roof of some of these skyscrapers, but at least head shots seem to equal One-Hit-Kills even with handguns, (and you can blow out tires on moving cars, which is very awesome) so, yes. Hope. And not just for the sniping, but combat in general. Unless you prefer the sneaky way. Which is cool, too.
Anyway, there`s lots of different guns, that, hopefully (there is that "h"-word, again), have their own unique characteristics and handling.
Focus on the Head
And judging from the shown combat, with cover-shooting, and the ubiquitous bullet-time slo-mo (something not only restricted to shooting, mind you), it's good to know that gun-play will be a viable option, especially when combined with the hacking and distracting seen in the video while infiltrating the ctOS Control Center.
It looks like a lot of fun, playing with, and then killing the AI - something I have learned to really enjoy in my time playing games, from the over-the-top skill-kill-setups of Bulletstorm, to the fiendishly gruesome and creative options of Dishonored.
Look, up on the Wall. It's Electro!
Manipulating good AI is always a joy, and something WB Creative Director Jonathan Morin said in an early April interview, about how enemy NPCs in WD will not automatically associate something going wrong around them with a hidden perpetrator and start looking (or even worse, know who and where that person is), makes me hope that what happens in the video around 18:15 (IED explodes, takes out guard, and apparently right after the other guards shoot at the player's location) is a glitch or from old code. And according to (not only) the "ctOS Report", the options are indeed many: Traffic Lights, Street Lights, Bridges, Steam Pipes, Fuse Boxes, Road Blockers, Cameras, Stuff that Moves... Trains... and, possibly, More Stuff. Cellphones, maybe.
It's a playground, for sure, and it will be very interesting to see, how diverse that will really "play out". Will players really experiment and enjoy the options, or will you soon fall into a trot of "run, shoot, disable, steam pipe, boom, repeat"?
Choices, choices...
Undoubtedly, the developers put a lot of thought into their vision of Chicago, but to really make people enjoy and employ the variety of options, each must be effective in their own way - and not just one way. I imagine foot chases might get pretty stale, if all you really do is wait for your prey to run past a conveniently placed fuse box. Hacking, as other gameplay aspects, like Combat, will feature upgrades and a skill tree, although not that much is known about it. There will be an upgrade to completely plunge virtual Chicago into a black-out, though. Which sounds like fun, if a bit drastic.
Let me put that necklace on...
On to the systemically generated "side-missions" of a "potential crime" - something that just happens, something that is not even a mission per-se, something you can actually choose to engage in or just walk by, should your conscience allow it. Fans of the TV show "Person of Interest" will be familiar with the concept of a computer program using electronic surveillance to predict crimes. In WD's Chicago, ctOS, the City's Master Control Program, does just that, and with the player's access to ctOS, he can choose to follow potential victims, then intervene once these potentials turn into a "Crime in Progress".
I remember that term from Batman: Arkham Origins, specifically from trying to get these annoying challenges done and waiting at certain locations for the always similar "random crime" to occur. WD seems to go for a different approach, something seemingly less predictable in form and outcome, yet it's still unclear how varied those events will be (the two shown in the video look depressingly similar, not in the least for once more portraying the stereotype of the victimized female), or how exactly player actions will have an impact: Can you hack someone's bank account (on a side note: Morin confirmed via twitter, that you can hack multiple bank accounts and only have to go to an ATM once to collect your loot) and send them on a desperate crime spree, then swoop in to save the day? Wouldn't that be something?
Just like you saw on the telly!
Public actions will influence how the city and its inhabitants will regard you and react to you, from helping you out (possibly via a shop discount) to calling the police on you, but how much personal influence can you really exert on the individual?
But if what is claimed in the vid turns out to be true, and the criminals once you're in pursuit actually do act unpredictably, these events should at least be an enjoyable distraction - for the first 50 times or so. There's always a potential pit-fall with these kinds of semi-random "Help Me! Help Me!" events, especially for those closet heroes among us.
Crime stopped. Literally.
Because how can you walk away once you get a number- I mean, the name of a potential victim? And when does NOT walking away, over and over and over, become tedious? Will you be able to simply traverse the city, without having to rescue kittens at every corner?
We'll have to wait and see, but I am (once more) hopeful, that with WD's generally more gray moral approach, they won't constantly pressure the hero types into saving their fellow citizen from durance vile.
Finally, then, to the Multiplayer, only one of (EDIT:) six modes was portrayed in the first vid, so let's take a look at another video, previewing three of the different MP modes (Ubisoft confirmed again that Multiplayer is completely optional and can be turned off completely):
Now, that does not look half bad. And it's apparently seamlessly integrated into the game, with the matchmaking for the 4v4 working in the background while you play, the match starting when everyone is ready. And yes, just to say it again, there are NO MAP RESTRICTIONS for the MP modes. The whole city is open. This is confirmed. Twitter. Tell your friends.
Let's look at the modes seen here:
Who are you? Who, Who? Who, Who?
Online Hacking Contracts (1v1), is more of a deadly hide and seek, something that the Profiler in your smartphone does not make very easy for the hacker. In both videos, the hacker does not get very far into his hack before being detected and forced to flee, but apparently "Mission Success" is a pretty pliable term here, and rewards are awarded even for partial hacks - as long as you get away alive.
We don't get fooled, again!
Speaking of which, Hacker Spared" does sound so much better than "I let the Bastard got away!" But... did he? As seen in the first vid, if someone tried to hack you, you hack 'em right back! Yes. Retaliation, a founding principle of every modern society - and PvP video games.
Teenage Wasteland!
Funnily enough, if you let the hacker escape alive, you, as the hacked, are rewarded a Mission Success. But if you as the hacker kill the intended hacked, you fail. At least that's what the red writing indicates to me. I guess that makes sense, but it's still weird.
As I was alerted to by my (one) avid reader(s), there is another, less dangerous variant of the Online Contracts, that simply involves tailing the main character unnoticed. It gives less Notoriety (i.e. XP), but the hacked will not be alerted that he is hacked, and it's thus less likely to end in potential bloodshed. Not that it will be easy to inconspicuously tail another player should he choose to race recklessly through the city, mind you.
Competitive Decryption Combat (4v4, only available on Next Gen Consoles and PC), looks like even more fun, and quite diverse fun, at that.
Get the file...
With two teams of... hackers (apparently, you will always look like the main character in your game, but look like someone else in other people's games - but you CAN make it so you'll always look like the same someone else), well, two teams of hackers fighting for a file, that you have to first hold, then decrypt.
...get away...
It's an interesting mix of Capture the Flag, Hold the Flag and Don't let the Baddies get close to the Flag. The file is acquired by downloading it to your smartphone, and can be stolen by downloading it from the enemy's smartphone once you get in range - and stay in range (and alive) for long enough to steal it. If the file carrier dies, the file is free to be grabbed anyone, and from there it's a matter of keeping the file and decrypting it, i.e. keeping the enemy away from it.
...win?
There are obviously different ways to do that, but with all of WD's Chicago as your map, you can take the whole match on the road, try to flee your pursuers and keep the file out of their hands during decryption. Decryption as seems to be a lengthy process, even if proximity to your team members will speed up the process. If the enemy gets close enough to try and steal it, the decryption halts until you get out of their range.
It's still unclear how the respawn system works, or if a partly decrypted file, once lost, then recovered, will have to be decrypted from scratch, but the enormous round time (28 minutes for a 4v4 match) seems to be designed to allow for lengthy back and forth exchanges.
And then, there's the ctOS Mobile Companion App, allowing people on their mobile devices to challenge players in the game to a checkpoint race-course through the city. Sounds simple enough, but where`s the "versus" aspect?
Reach out, touch me
Well, should the player accept the challenge, for the duration of the race, the person on the Mobile App gains control of ctOS, i.e. all those hacks you could use while driving to stop pursuers will now be used against you, from road blockers to steam pipes to traffic lights. Additionally, the person that holds control over Chicago in the palm of their hands (not my words), can set the police on your trail, and keep track of you with a helicopter and its spotlight.
Impending BOOM!
From the short gameplay shown, it seems that the ctOS Mobile App functions akin to a very simple Real-Time-Strategy game, with limited resources (police cars, hacks etc.), so a bit of tactical thinking and quick reactions will definitely be a plus.
The player in the game tries to reach the end of the course before time runs out or he is stopped, while the mobile player (obviously) tries to prevent that - and can actually gloat over his victory (or lament his loss) through an instant message system from mobile app to game. A feature that most definitely won't be abused by the chronically immature. In any way. Ever.
Goddammit you ****-ing ****-tard on ****!
But the app is free, is not region restricted (you can challenge people around the world, but with the inevitable lag that will incur, you might not want to), and you don`t even have to own the game. Which makes this, after Splinter Cell: Blacklist Spiderbot, another potentially very enjoyable mobile game Ubisoft releases for free to everyone. Which I kinda like.
Playing any of these modes will net you experience you can then use to upgrade your character, underlining the seamless nature of WD even more (although it's not known if playing on the Mobile App will translate to XP for your game character, or be used to upgrade your mobile app playing abilities).
As I said, I was told by my rabid fan base, that I had missed two MP game modes - but I actually missed three. The first, Tailing, I already mentioned. The second and third are still somewhat shrouded in mystery, but here's what I could find out: Free Roam (only available on Next-Gen and PC) allows up to 8 players to team up and just roam the city to have some fun.
UPDATE: Creative Director J.Morin went on twitter again to give some new info on Free Roam:
"Free roam is a bonus way for players to go in the entire city without
any activity and define together what to do. You can flag who is
friend/enemy with others and then its up to players to define the rest.
It is not a controlled experience."
Might that mean, players could possibly create their own Multiplayer Modes, albeit in (for now, at least) private lobbies? And what about a DLC "Free Roam Mission Editor", where you could use existing "missions" or objectives from the Single Player, from ctOs Control Centers to Side Mission Objectives, and play those out in PvP versions? I don't know, but it would be pretty cool...
And there will be a Race-Mode, letting you participate in car-races against other players on predetermined tracks, UPDATE: which has been confirmed to be on all platforms, current-gen consoles included.
Well, that was quite a lot to see, a lot to know, and a LOT to do. We may only have been given a small (and somewhat repetitive) glimpse of Watch_Dogs here, but it does seem to come with a quite staggering amount of content - and that`s without even mentioning the main story missions, something that Ubisoft usually does quite good, but just free-roaming Chicago, online or not, might be gratifying enough on its own.
I mean, aside from the usual mini-games like poker and whatnot, there's also this whole other game-inside-the-game, the
Digital Trips. Using some kind of Cyber Drug, the player enters an
altered state of mind, an altered state of Chicago. Three different
trips are known, Spider Tank, Madness and Conspiracy.
No Words :)
Spider Tank has you killing and destroying stuff in a tank that... well, looks like a spider, a mechanical Spider of Death, with Gatling-Guns and Rocket Pods. Destruction earns points, and points earn Spider Tank Upgrades.
Madness is a Game Mode reminiscent of Grand Theft Auto, but with Demons, as you are supposed to take an armored car into the streets - and into as many "demons" as you can. Again, upgrades are available through playing the mode.
Come with me if you want to live
Conspiracy, then, appears to be a cyber-zombie hunt in the streets of Chicago. Imagine you're Kyle Reese, it's 2014 and hundreds of T-800s have infested Chicago, but only you can see them. You're Rowdy Roddy Piper, They Live as cyborgs and not aliens, and your special glasses are just an eye-patch. Not that I don't have had enough of zombies, but the trailer from the season pass is definitely intriguing.
Which is leading, quite nicely, to the already announced Season Pass and its contents. Only two Digital Trips (that we know of), will be part of the vanilla game, with Conspiracy being DLC, and part of the Season Pass Bundle. It's a mixed blessing, those season passes, especially if, like this one, part of its contents are cosmetic in nature. Like, costumes and stuff. There's also a single player campaign with a different playable character included, as well as some more missions for the regular character, plus a Chicago Cosa Nostra Pack including a vintage Tommy Gun, but chances are, the savings of the Season Pass compared to the regular purchases will have Season Passers end up getting the costumes for free. Yay. But take a look for yourself, here`s the preview:
And before I go, a few more little tidbits of info (mostly from twitter and on via youtube):
The seamless online play will be available on all consoles, but only 1v1 Hacking and Tailing (and Racing (UPDATE: confirmed on all platforms), and probably Mobile App vs. Player) will be present on the Current Gen Consoles - no Free Roam or Decryption for Xbox 360 and PS3.
The Xbox 360 version will come on two disks, one being a mandatory 7.5 GB installation disk.
You cannot choose the weather in Watch_Dogs, but you can determine time of day by sleeping as long as you want.
Poker and other "Social Mini Games" are actually not. Social. No online for the mini-games. Bad Call, that one.
The Focus Ability in Multiplayer sessions will not slow-down time (Duh!), but still give you helping hints.
Cops will arrest you if you don't resist and are not "Wanted: Dead or Alive".
Open World Games has made an "informed guesstimate" of Watch_Dogs' map size compared to GTA 5`s map size, and WD comes up with about half of the whole of GTA 5, but most, if not all of it, city, as opposed to GTA 5's rolling hills and stuff. The way to this comparison included a digital mock-up of a part (20%) of the printed map of WD's Chicago included (I think) in some editions of the game, resizing it to fit with GTA 5's map, and then putting it five times on top of that.
Here's the result:
"It might not look big, but it will FEEL big", he said...
Watch_Dogs will release on PC, PS3, PS4, Xbox 360 and Xbox One on May 27th 2014. A Wii-U version will (maybe) come later.
For all your Playstation or Xbox or PC Gaming needs, especially the European needs, head over to Amazon UK - best deals in Europe (mostly). For TV or Movie Streaming needs, as well. Yes, I do buy there myself. Exclusively. Unless I find a better deal, elsewhere...
My PC had died. It just... stopped working at very odd times, and it got increasingly bad, to the point where I compulsively quick-saved after every single sentence I wrote. The damn thing just shut down, no signal coming, no power to the peripherals, but the blue glowy power light on the tower never went out. It was very weird. And annoying.
At the end of my personal, yet considerable, wits, I employed the help of a PC-Doctor. Who kept the thing for a week, then told me he has no idea why it happens. Then went on to tell me I just might have to do a full re-install of Windows 7, including a full wipe of the Hard Drives. Just to be sure.
I will spare you the details of losing pretty much all of my por-... all of my stuff, but there's only so much a 500 GB external hard drive will hold, so choices had to be made, sacrifices to be... sacrificed. Yeah. That's what I meant to write. Anyway, fresh from the install, two hours in, the same thing happened. And I was miffed. Call in to the Doc, who then tells me, that it now can only be on of two things: The CPU or the Motherboard. For the non-nerds, the CPU is the the Central Processing Unit, the thingy that does pretty all of the computer work. It sits, nestled in a motherly embrace, on the Motherboard, which is like the land and infrastructure on which you build that house they call a "Computer". He also mentioned, in a "on a side note" kinda way, that those were the two things he did not check when he did his check, ergo, there the fault must be.
Unfortunately for me, that meant buying new stuff, namely, a new CPU and/or Motherboard, which considering the age of my CPU pretty much took the "or" from the equation, faulty processor or not. The kind of motherboards that would support it, went out of production years ago. Very fleeting business, that is.
I did some research online - by which I mean, I checked on amazon for do-it-yourself build your own PC kits - but... well, I know what most of the stuff means, but I also know that I don't need most of the newer stuff. I don't want to play games on that thing, I just need a working "typewriter" with good web-functionality - most everything else, that's what my PlayStation is 4 (Ha! Get it?), and, recently, once more my trusty Xbox 360 (Dark Souls II, people!). Plus, I wanted someone, whom I could call upon in my hours of need, someone, who would not live in India, but kinda closer to home. Close enough to come buy and fix stuff.
So again I called my trusty PC-Doc, and told him what I wanted: Take my old one, use what you still can use, and put in new, and more importantly cheap, stuff until it works. And so they did. One day later, it came to my door, I paid for it, plugged it in, and was just in the middle of setting things up... and the same damn thing happened again.
In the end, what might have happened was this: A power surge damaged my old PC, either both the power supply and the Motherboard, or the hinky power supply eventually hinkied-up the MB, who can tell? When the first new MotherBoard was installed with a new CPU, the hinky power supply damaged that board, too, which in turn fired the CPU. Thinking it was just an odd coincide, they put in another CPU, test-drove it, and it fizzled again. Only THEN did they consider a faulty Motherboard, and the possible reasons said MB might have begotten these faults.
The final tally amounted to three CPUs (two fried), two Motherboards (one hinky) and one new power-supply. None of which I had to pay, since I never had gotten a working product, but it took quite some time. Plus a new graphics card - for which I DID have to pay - because the on-board GFX did not support audio output via DVI-HDMI, and since my TV is my monitor, that was pretty much not acceptable.
Over one full month of computerlessness. My Smartphone did get a healthy workout in that time, believe you me.
And, believe it or not, that was only the smallest of four pretty devastating things to happen to me in the last six weeks. Yeah. The smallest, the most insignificant. But you don't care, so I won't bore you.
Next up: Watch_Dogs :)
For all your PS4 or Xbox One needs, especially the European needs, head over to Amazon UK - best deals in Europe (mostly). For TV or Movie Streaming needs, as well. Yes, they did help me through this. Yes, I do buy there myself. Exclusively. Unless I find a better deal, elsewhere...
But never has "Everything" looked and worked this good.
: Looks pretty enough, like a cross between (the best Halo campaign ever) Halo - ODST and the non-Titan part of Titanfall. "Boosters" they called them, mini-jet packs that seem to allow you very quick vertical or lateral movement.
