Tom

Call of Duty Black Ops III – The Last COD Game I Will Ever Play

April 23, 2016 0 Comments

Call of Duty: Black Ops III is a game which I was actually thoroughly enjoying. The gun play and new mechanics added an interesting twist on the Call of Duty series.

I am however not going to write this as a positive review, simply because the game has marked me as cheating. Firstly I haven’t even touched the multiplayer mode of Black Ops III – anyone who reads my reviews or checks my profile will see I have absolutely no interest in the multiplayer side of this type of game. I was playing the single player campaign, in offline mode.

Secondly, I wouldn’t even know HOW to cheat, even if I wanted to. But one matter which really irks me is, even if I was cheating in single-player mode, why would anyone get a ban for that in the first place? Surely bans from playing multiplayer games should come when you play multiplayer? People who know me will know I am not that sort of person, where as people who read this will probably think I am just throwing my toys out of the pram. Believe who you wish at the end of the day. Heed my warning though.

Due to the lack of any support from Steam or Treyarch themselves, this will be the absolutely last Call of Duty game I ever buy, review, or even lay my eyes on. After doing some research into the matter, many people have been experiencing this issue, even people who play online, who just happen to be on a server with a cheater have received a ban as well.

I’m sorry Treyarch – take your game back to the consoles.

Tom’s Score Card
1) Stay away
2) Not Recommended
3) Only recommended when on sale
4) Recommended
5) Highly recommended
6) This is a must play

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Smite – My First Proper MOBA Experience!

April 17, 2016 1 Comment

Smite is a third-person online MOBA game, developed by Hi-Rez Studios releasing on PC, Xbox One and due to be released on PS4. You play as the visage of a god from mythological lore and take part in different game modes against other opponents.

The major difference with Smite over other MOBAs is that you play from a third person perspective, and plays with the same sort of controls as other third person action games. The game is very arcade like in that the majority of your abilities are skillshot based rather than selecting a target and having your character auto aim for you. The game has over 70 different gods to play as, each having their own unique play style, abilities and characteristics. There are at least seven different game modes to play in, Conquest, Arena, Joust, Assault, Siege, Clash, and Match of the Day. My favourite mode out of them all has to be arena. The matches take no longer than 20 minutes, and the players that take part in them are genuinely really nice to be around. Being a fairly novice player at Smite compared to a lot of people, I felt that Conquest, which is considered the main game mode, had a much more hostile community vibe to it with more abuse and flaming coming out of chat than any other mode I played in. As with most MOBA type games, your characters equipment plays a key part in how well you perform, and Smite is no different. There is a wide variety of different gear to choose from, allowing you to play your character however you choose.

Smite is built using the unreal engine 3.0 technology, which provides graphics full of detail and presenting a higher graphic level than most MOBA games. The character models are all high in detail and really well animated using rag doll effects. The game’s sound effects are OK, you have to pay extra for your characters voice pack, but you still get a little bit of flavour speech here and there.

The tutorial system at the start of the game does a very good job of explaining the games main mechanics and explaining the main game mode, and I felt it got me to a sufficient skill level in order to jump into the main online game. I have been playing for about ten hours so far, and I am at that point where I can quite often find myself at the top of the kills score board, and having the least amount of deaths too. I am not saying I am absolutely amazing all of the time, but I don’t feel as if I am being carried by my team anymore and doing more good than not. This is the sort of game where practice makes all the difference – the more you play the better you’ll get.

I can honestly say I am completely hooked on Smite, and have been playing it for the past week every night after work.

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Dragon’s Dogma: Dark Arisen – Review by TeamTom

April 9, 2016 0 Comments

Dragon’s Dogma: Dark Arisen is an action role playing game, developed by Capcom. The original game was released on PS3 and Xbox 360 in 2013, before the game was finally ported to PC in January 2016.

The game starts with your character being super overpowered, with really rare equipment and dealing tons of damage, giving you a sneak peak into the type of end game content you have to come. But yes, you do get nerfed back down to the regular level 1 RPG character, in your rags and sticks for swords. You are able to choose between a number of different classes, or vocations as they are called in DD. On top of being in control of your character, you will also gain a party of up to three more “pawns”, these too take on specific roles in the group, such as tanks, damage and healers. I found this to be a really nice addition to the game as I wasn’t expecting such mechanics from an RPG game like this. The party controls and management system is basic at best, but the AI is fairly in tune with what they should be doing, and the two basic controls, attack and follow, are both really responsive as well.

The combat system in DD against the smaller style of enemies is very generic hack and slash, there is no real special combos or special abilities to come across, The warrior class is probably the most basic class to play, but is probably the one I would recommend for your first play through. Where DD’s combat system really comes into its own, is when you get to scale larger enemies, such as giants, and cyclops. This allows you to climb onto enemies backs and swing at them to deal more damage. This is a feature that I haven’t really seen incorporated into combat systems in recent memory, the last time I remember coming across it is in Shadow of the Colossus.

You can definitely tell this game was ported from the consoles as the graphics are average at best. The game is pretty poorly optimized as even though the graphics didn’t look brilliant, I wasn’t able to get the full 4k effect. The character models look pretty good once you get some more interesting looking armour and weapons to equip. Animation across the game is of a high standard though, with the regular combat hack and slash animations looking very cool when you can couple a few attacks together. You can get some really nice visual effects through the draw distance of the PC version of the game being superior, with some really nice looking environments when you are out in the open world. This is a game which is completely voice acted, all to a really high standard as well.

DD is a pretty hard game, even on the lower difficulty throughs, you will have challenges. You can really run into high level enemies without realizing it’s too late and your attacks do no damage at all.

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Stardew Valley – Thank You ConcernedApe

April 3, 2016 0 Comments

Stardew Valley is an indie farming simulator game releasing on PC in February 2016. The game was developed by ConcernedApe, and published by Chucklefish Games.

Stardew Valley is heavily influenced by the Harvest Moon series. At the start of the game, you are left a plot of land by your grandfather. When you arrive at this land, you will find it overrun with weeds, trees and rocks. Your aim is to clear this area and restart a farm that will make you money. There is a heavy focus on character interaction too. Allowing you to converse with plenty of NPCs around the town and develop relationships which can sometimes result in marriage. This has benefits to your farm as the NPC will also help out around the plot too. As you grow your farm day by day, you will unlock new ways to generate money, whether it is from simply growing crops in the fields, selling fish, or your livestock. The game also has a questing system which will also generate extra revenue for you as well.

The game’s day night circle is really a key feature in the game too. You will soon realize that there are just not enough hours in the day to get everything done. Not only are you battling against time, but you are also up against an energy meter too. I wasn’t that keen on the energy meter because literally everything you do burns the meter down fairly quickly. When you start out the game and are just clearing away weeks, you will perhaps get 5 minutes’ worth of clearing done before your character is out of energy and has to go to bed in order to regain it. You can regain your energy in other ways but the conventional way is just to head to bed and wait until the next morning. The game’s fishing system is also a little cumbersome too, it’s a small mini game when you head out to the waters to catch some fish; I personally found this a little too unforgiving but some may find the difficulty on the fishing feature to be a nice addition rather than just pointing and clicking.

Normally I am not a fan of this style of graphics, but Stardew Valley has just the right amount of character to make this work for me. The game’s vibrant colours and beautiful sprites just make everything click together. It really does remind you of the Harvest Moon series of games, but has its own unique charm to go along with it. The sound track for this game is also exquisite too, so much so that you can purchase the sound track individually too. The game’s ambiance sounds are wonderful too. This is one of the few games where I think not having voice acting worked in its favour, because if it had been done wrong, it could of spoilt the whole game for me.

This isn’t a hard game as such; it is just a time management game, and a waiting game for the majority of the time.

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Mark of the Ninja: An Indie Title Done Oh So Right

March 13, 2016 0 Comments

Mark of the Ninja is a side-scrolling stealth game, developed by Klei Entertainment. It was initially released on Xbox 360 in September 2012, before being released on Steam in September 2013. You play as a nameless ninja in current times.

 

Mark of the Ninja places a high emphasis on stealth. You are able to see how much noise your character makes by moving, or carrying out a certain action by a circular area showing so. Noise can be used against you, or to your advantage, such as creating a distraction to enemies to allow you to pass by. The game does have a combat system, but it is on the basic side. The combat is essentially a small QTE, requiring you to press the button shown on screen in order to carry out a clean kill of the enemy. You are able to use the environment against your foes too, such as cutting a chandelier to fall onto your enemies head, turning on electric wires to shock them, and many more creative ways to cull the bad guys.

 

Throughout the story mode, you are able to unlock extra mechanics to use, such as sliding kicks, hanging attacks or new tools to use out in the field like smoke bombs. You can upgrade these at any of the upgrade points in the game, using the talent points you have earned.

 

Visually, Mark of the Ninja ticks all the boxes too. Even though it is only 2D, you can see how much care and attention has gone into making this game look as good as it has. The backdrops in which you are in are gorgeous, plenty of awesome looking characters and bad guys too. Every single bit of animation looks spot on too. All of the characters move so fluidly it is almost perfection. The narrator and all other voice acting are done to an extremely high standard as well.

 

This game is by no means easy. You will at times find yourself almost rage quitting at how difficult certain stages are. Some points almost feel impossible until everything just clicks into place. That is what I loved the most about this game. Whilst there is an element of luck involved in a lot of situations, the main points always come from how skilfully your carry out kills, and distractions. If you practice enough, you will eventually heighten your reflexes and senses to allow you to progress.  Upon completing the game, you will unlock the New Game+ mode, which is seriously one of the hardest gaming experiences you will have. Enemies become more intelligent, they will kill you in a single hit, your line of sight is limited to which ever direction you are facing and you no longer have the radius area around you to show how much noise you are making. If you want a challenge, this game mode is certainly going to be for you.

 

The single player story mode took me just over 18 hours to complete.

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