Battlefleet Gothic: Armada

Dev: Tindalos Interactive

Publisher: Focus Home interactive

Release Date: April 21 2016

Have you ever wanted to be the Admiral of a grand armada of star ships that have more guns and weaponry bolted into them then the entire world military combined? Well with a bit of effort you can do just that in Battlefleet Gothic: Armada.

Set in the grim darkness of the 41^st millennia you are chosen to be the Admiral of one of the various races available, in the base game this is a simple 4 races. You have Imperial Navy, The Eldar Corsairs, a Chaos Fleet, and the ever wonderful Orkz.

Each of these races also plays vastly different from each other, and in my opinion beautifully reflect the races of Warhammer 40k in their simple mechanical differences.

However when it comes to the single player of the game there is only 1 race that you are able to play, that being the Imperial Navy.

A short run down of the plot goes something like this: You are Capitan Spire, commander of a ship that survives a surprise chaos fleet attack. Fleeing the battle field you run back to the Gothic sector to meet with Inquisitor Horst and inform him of the coming threat. However being that the taint of chaos is involved, the council of the gothic sector deem it necessary that your faith and trust be put to the test. You are put to extreme and vigorous torture, and not only manage to survive, but survive with mind and body intact. Thus Inquisitor Horst and Lord Admiral Ravensburg promote you to Admiral and task you with not only constructing a grand Armada, but protecting against the oncoming threat no matter what it might be.

Thus it’s entrusted to you to protect the Gothic Sector. You will be raided from Eldar and Ork alike, as well as fending away the vast Chaos fleet.  Should 50 worlds fall to these various threats, then it will be game over for you, and for the Gothic Sector.

Outside of the single player there is a skirmish and multiplayer mode available for play as well. In these modes you can chose any of the 4 races, as well as 2 dlc races should you own them. Before you select which race you play they each have a general run down of how they work, so you can chose accordingly to which would best fit your play style.

In multiplayer you have the choice of two different type of game modes to try.

Persistent Mode involves leveling an admiral up, this includes building your armada from scratch, test your mettle against other admirals and see if you can create your dream fleet.  You’ll get a randomly selected mission type, however in between these missions your ships can suffer status effects.

On the other side you have Ranked Mode. You start with a level 8 Admiral and get 8000 points to create your armada, but once you’ve used all your points that is your fleet. You play against other players in 3 round matches.

So far I’ve had a fantastic time with Battlefleet Gothic Armada and I can heartily recommend it to anyone looking for a good Warhammer 40k game.

Battlefleet Gothic: Armada is available for 39.99$ USD or your regional equivalent.

It has a PEGI rating of 12+ and is without an ESRB rating currently.

Starbound

 

Dev: Chucklefish

Publisher: Chucklefish

Release Date: July 22, 2016

 

You flee the earth as it’s ripped apart piece by piece on your battered starship with nothing but your Matter Manipulator and your loyal pet, fleeing to space, what could the future possibly hold for you now?

Well the answer to that is incredibly vague because after you fix that ship, the universe itself is your playground.

I have owned this game for quite a while being a part of the initial wave of Early access adopters of it. With its release and final form out for the world to see, I dove back into the absolutely fantastic game known as Starbound.

The general story of this game goes along the lines of this. You are a part of a defense, research, and colonization force for earth. However on your graduation day some force arrives and ravages the earth. You and many others barely manage to escape as earth is destroyed. You see strange readings from a planet, and you go to investigate, and from there your characters story truly begins.

Starting the game is fairly simple, you choose one of 7 races. Humans, Apex, Floran, Avian, Hylotl, Glitch, and Novakid. From there you choose what difficulty you’d like to play on, Casual; no need to eat and there are no death penalties, a good choice for first time players. Survival; You need to eat and you lose 30% of your money and drop all items upon death, a decent spot after you’ve become experienced with the game and want just a little more thrill. Finally Hardcore; this is not for the faint of heart, when this character dies, all progress and everything on them and their world is deleted permanently.

Once you have your character you can choose to skip or play through the opening mission, however if it’s your first time I recommend playing it, it’s pretty interesting and it teaches you the basics of this game. Once away from the opening mission, you must repair your starship by going to a mining facility, once you’ve made your way through there seeing the sights and collected what you need, you speak to a shady man and his penguin group and they repair your ship. Now it’s as simple as fueling your ship and going and exploring systems outside of the one you started it. You’ll find creatures, and small towns and colonies of the other races scattered on these planets, or perhaps even abandoned ruins of said races.

 

Should you choose you can bookmark planets you like, or even place down a flag that will allow you to warp to it from anywhere in the galaxy so perhaps put one down and build a base around it! If you’re also into building, well if you wanted you can build an entire colony filled with people from every race flocking to live there, and some after a while might even wanna become your crew!

Building isn’t the only thing you’ll be doing in this game either, you’ll also be exploring and fighting many terrible creatures, or even capturing them to have as pets. Combat in this game is fairly simplistic, and is vaguely like Terraria. However there are 1 handed and 2 handed weapons in this game. All 1 handed weapons can be equipped in the right or left side of each of the 6 slots, and upon pressing x, you get a fresh set of 6 slots giving you a large number of options and combinations. However for weapons that are two handed, they take up both the left and right of a slot, however they come with special abilities. This can range from having an ability that teleports the player forward but causes an explosion where they were standing before, or perhaps twirling a spear in a cyclone of death, or in the case of rifles perhaps you’ll have a handy grenade launcher attacked to the bottom. Due to the games random ability assigning, the possibilities are limitless.

I’ve put quite a lot of time into this game both alone and with a friend or two, and I honestly can say that I’ve enjoyed every second I’ve played and rarely did I have a dull moment. Some might say that the sheer amount of things to do in this game can be overwhelming, yet I disagree, not once did I ever feel any pressure to do one thing or another, in fact I often bounced between many projects I started and didn’t finish, only to later comeback and work more on it. Weather I was digging for resources, or building a colossal empire with my bare hands, this game has had me smiling and enjoying myself.

So let’s look at the good and the bad of this game.

The good:

• Each race in the game is unique, and different, and all their armor and weaponry are very characteristic of the race, they don’t possess any passives so you’re free to choose what race you want and love the look of without feeling like you’ll be at a disadvantage from the start.
• Each world I’ve visited has been different in some way shape or form, even if the villages or colonies I encounter where the same in look, something about them always made them feel different.
• The game itself isn’t incredibly difficult yet it poses enough of a challenge especially at certain stages and it’s never been boring.
• The weaponry of the game is all really fun, and often sometimes even a little silly.
• Speaking of silly, the sheer amount of cosmetic items throughout the game is fantastic, there are hundreds of items to put over top of your armor to make you look just about any way you want!
• The game has musical instruments and with workshop support, or some hard work, can play any song you desire, get some friends together and you can even make a band.
• The game has steam workshop support, and its moding scene is already nuts.

The Bad:

• At times while playing the game I have run into some minor problems of the game losing FPS, but it was never serious and often just resulted in the game going slow motion rather than jittering.
• Certain mechanics can at times feel far more fleshed out than others, ones like farming, and the merchant system as well as abilities and upgrades.
• While I personally have been enjoying the story that was added to the game I feel it’s worth noting that it’s honestly nothing special or anything to write home about.

And The Ugly:

• Whatever this thing is:

My final thoughts on the game after playing it, are honestly nothing but positive, I plan to play it much more in the future and probably almost more than most games I own currently. I cannot recommend this game enough to you, it’s 14.99USD or your regional equivalent, and I beseech you to go and give this absolutely fantastic game a go, maybe even grab some friends and turn it into one heck of an adventure!

The game is rated T for Teen

Fallout 4: Vault-Tec DLC

If you’ve followed along with us recently, you might know that I hated the Fallout 4 Season Pass up to this point. Well, maybe not “hated”, but I haven’t exactly been pleased, either.

Mod: Morrowind Overhaul

Hi there! I’m here to write a quick review on the Morrowind Overhaul mod for the PC version of The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind.

Darkest Dungeon

Dev: Red Hook Studios

Publisher: Red Hook Studios

Release Date: January 19, 2016

                        “Slowly, gently, this is how a life is taken”

The narrator chimes over as your poisoned enemy is killed. This is just one of the many lines you will hear in encouragement, and dissuasion.

Darkest Dungeons is an Eldritch, hard as nails dungeon crawler. The core concept of the game is collecting a party of 4 from your town to go out and explore the lands surrounding a manor that once belonged to your family, who’s name use to be of wealth and power, but is now of horror and holds many a dark secret.

I am actually one of the few people who bought this game when it first popped up in early access on steam, and with baited breath and some attention I played it during its original conception, and I can say that I’m very pleased with what it has grown to become, and is everything I expected the game to be when it’s launch finally happened.

The general story of this game is simple and explained quick and effectively through its opening cutscenes. For once in a review I do not think I should give away the opening, and the feeling of hearing the story spoken by the absolutely wondrous narrator of the game, Wayne June

Moving forward, the general concept and mechanics of this game are certainly not difficult to understand, however using them properly and to the best effect possible can be the difference between you’re entire party being wiped out, or you returning to down with packs full of loot. After the cutscenes are finished you are introduced to the games mechanics, you use a party, usually of 4 to traverse the lands of the tainted manor. You’re party will consist of 4 of the 15 hero classes; The abomination, Arbalest, Bounty Hunter, Crusader, Grave Robber, Hellion, Highwayman, Houndmaster, Jester, Leper, Man-at-Arms, Occultist, Plague Doctor, Vestal, and finally the Antiquarian.

Each hero has their own story to tell, and as they run the dungeon, the horrors of it will tear them down, both physically and mentally. In Darkest Dungeon there are 2 bars you have to manage on each member of your party, your health, and your sanity. After losing enough health a character will be at death’s door, any damage from that point on has a chance to kill the character, and if a character is killed, they’re gone for good. However in my experience the health bar is the easiest to manage, however a characters sanity, it ebbs away slowly and once that bar has filled, the character has a chance to have an Affliction, or in a slim chance become Virtuous. If a character becomes afflicted they become selfish, masochistic, or many other things, and they begin to take actions on their own at random without you being able to stop or prevent it, they may even refuse to do an action you tell them to, and sometimes may harm themselves or teammates, all the while their actions cause the other party members to become more and more stressed, and if you cannot get out of the dungeon quick enough, this often has a cascading effect that leads to most of the party being afflicted. However on the flip of this coin there is also the slim chance that your character will become virtuous, throwing away the most of the stress damage they have taken, and from that point on, they begin to say and take actions that actually relieve the stress of other party members.

Outside of those two bars, every character you acquire comes with unique traits, camping and combat skills. The traits the characters have often dictate how a character will act within certain situations inside of town, or in the dungeon. Yet each character also plays it’s role in combat, and where they are positioned in the party order, actually effects what abilities a character can use. As an example, plague doctors have abilities that they can only use if they are last in the party line up, while most of the Crusaders abilities require them to be within the first two spots.

Outside of that on longer voyages into dungeons of much higher difficulty, you more often than not will have to camp at some point. Camping is crucial to making sure your party can properly survive the hellish landscape of the dungeons. During a camp each of your hero’s has a set of abilities that they can use, and each does a variety of different things, either healing stress or HP, buffing the party for future fights, or simply making sure you do not get ambushed. However be wary as if you do not have the food to do it, or a party member is afflicted, camping may prove to cause some complications.

Past all that the last mechanic you should be aware of is how to relieve stress after you’ve left a dungeon. Stress is the one factor in this game that persists no matter what and after a foray into the depths simply leaving also causes stress build up. To rid your heroes of this, you must have them do one of 6 things in town. Drink, Gamble, Sex, or, Meditation, Prayer, Flagellation. The hero’s traits will determine just how much stress is relieved from one of the activities.

While in town you will not only be relieving stress, but after enough forays into the depths, new places in town open, a sanitarium for curing unwanted traits and illness, a blacksmith for upgrading your hero’s gear, getting more housing sorted to bolster your roster, the training grounds to improve your hero’s combat abilities, a camp of a nomad to better help your hero’s when forced to camp inside a dungeon. These are the many things you will be tasked with doing while in town, and using the spoils of your foray into the dungeon, gold and heirlooms alike, you will upgrade these buildings to strengthen yourself, for the eventual plunge into the manor itself, to topple the evil that tries to release into our world.

            Moving forward I’ll be quick and go over what I like and dislike about this game.

What I Like;

·        The games art style capitulates the horrors your characters are witnessing in a very dark and dirty look, and it helps set the atmosphere for just how awful a place your hero’s must traverse through

·        The Narrator is one of the best parts about the game, delivering his lines with enthusiasm and clarity, setting the tone of the world, and what is happening on screen with his whims, and jabs at the player.

·        The game is not afraid to punish you. If you didn’t bring enough food, or torches, the game will not be kind and let it slide by, your heroes will suffer for your mistakes.

·        The events that occasionally happen within town are very interesting, and can often force a player to take an expedition they simply cannot properly prepare for, or it can give a long needed relief to someone who may be on the brink of failure.

·        All of the hero’s that you can control are diverse, different, and each has their own story to tell. None play the same even though you can get multipul of one hero, each’s traits and characteristics will help set them apart from the others

o   The ability to name your hero’s also adds the ability to help you remember who has what, and if you wished, you can name them after friends and family and see how they fair in the Darkest Dungeon.

·        The trinkets that you can acquire and equip to your hero’s are always fascinating, and the design of each is fairly interesting and unique, and I really like that the lower quality ones still have really good effects, but they also come with detriments as well

What I dislike;

·        When it comes to healing for stress you are extremely limited and as far as I am aware, none of the current characters have stress heals.

·        It slightly bothers me that certain heroes simply will refuse to go out on a dungeon run with others

All in all, I honestly can say that I really love this game. I find myself coming back to it constantly, for its challenge, atmosphere, and in general gameplay. I cannot recommend this game more to people.

            The game is available on steam for 24.99USD or your regional equivalent.

            The game is rated T for Teen

Riders Of Icarus: First Impressions Review

Developer: WeMade

Publisher: Nexon America

Release Date: Jul 6, 2016

Sneaking up behind the giant spider as it skitters along it’s way, spell and crystal charging in your hand, when you suddenly leap forward into the air, landing onto it’s back with gentle grace, causing the spider to go into a panic, you use your wits and natural ability to calm and bring the spider under your control, and thusly become your friend, and mount for battle!

RogueLands

 

Dev: SmashGames

Publisher: SmashGames

Release Date: Nov 6, 2015

Warping into a hostile zone with nothing but your blazing blue saber, brushing against a strange pods, items drop and fill your inventory as a stone plant worm erupts itself from the pod and rushes you.

These are most likely to be your first few minutes into the game RogueLands, a 2D Rogue Lite crafting, experimenting, and exploring game that I’ve enjoyed. This game was brought to my attention after watching a few streamers play this game together over the course of a few days, and I was instantly interested in this game by it’s charming style and simplistic combat mechanics, yet deep crafting and class working.

Thoughts About Fallout 4’s Season Pass

I paid for Fallout 4, but I ended up with The Sims: Wasteland Edition.

Uncharted 4 Review

 

(The following review contains minor spoilers that were known pre-release. Also: multiplayer will not be factored into this review)

Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End released almost ten years after the original. With a few game of the year awards in their back pocket and an established reputation as one of, if not the best developer in the world, Uncharted 4 came out with an immense amount of hype. Would the game have the same lovable characters, incredible set pieces, and a fun gameplay that the original trilogy possessed?! Well, unsurprisingly, the game totally delivered on every front.

Uncharted 4 takes place a few years after Uncharted 3 as Drake has now retired to a normal, boring life. He’s now married to the love of his life Elena, and everything seems to be going great. The marriage is working out. Their years of discovering ancient cities garnered enough treasure to pay off the mortgage, and they are happy. However, it all gets turned upside down when Nathan’s long lost brother, Sam finds Drake. With that, players get sent on a narrative that will be remembered for years to come.

Uncharted 4 has players try find Libertalia, a mythical (we think) pirate paradise that was supposedly created by Henry Avery and a multitude of other pirates to escape the law and store their treasure. Uncharted 4 took me all over the world to find clues about Libertalia, and the game did it with a lovable cast, incredibly fun gameplay that has a couple mechanics, and graphics that make it the most beautiful game to ever hit store shelves.

The first thing I noticed while playing Uncharted 4 is the focus on Drake’s past. Other than some quick childhood segments in the third game, I never really knew anything about Drake’s past. In Uncharted 4, that changes. The game kicked off with an awesome prologue and then tossed me right into a segment that took place many years prior. I learned more about Drake and his past in this game than I had the approximately thirty hours I spent beating the first three. The game significantly benefits from it, as well, as the stakes felt higher than ever. Along with that, it also gave me the real reason why Nathan was so obsessed with treasure hunting, which was something I had been wanting for years. While the chase for treasure was a great one in this installment, for me anyway, the back story was what got my interest. In a way, this game feels similar to me how Metal Gear Solid 4 felt. So many answers to all kinds of questions.

The story this time around seems more grounded and more mature than the prior three, and much like the more focused back story, the game largely benefits from it. While there is no shortage of Nathan’s signature one liners, the game reminds you that this adventure has do or death consequences with each chapter the game throws at you. This might have not happened if the cast wasn’t so damn lovable. While series regulars such as Nathan, Victor, and Elena were as lovable as before, Sam really steals the show here. The big brother to Nathan, you quickly see Sam’s influence on Nathan, and the voice actors, for both the younger and older versions of the characters, make the brothers’ relationship seem incredibly fleshed out. It didn’t take long for me to like Sam, as the game does a great job of integrating him with most of the cast. Uncharted 4 borrows the optional conversation mechanic from The Last of Us and it works out brilliantly as it’s used to, not only produce funny dialogues among the cast, but to delve deeper the past concerning Nathan, Sam, and Victor. There are a couple new villains in the game, as well. Rafe is an excellent character. He’s one of those characters you love to hate as he is extremely arrogant and sarcastic. He’s driven by one goal, and he’ll do whatever he can to achieve it. The other new villain, Nadine, isn’t as extreme, personality wise, but she is an incredibly capable, strong female character that I appreciated. Naughty Dog continues to lead the charge when it comes to that front.

There are some new mechanics in Uncharted 4 that we always needed, but didn’t know we needed it. One of them is the new grappling hook that opens up a whole new strategy to tackling, literally and figuratively,  the game’s enemies. Not only does it bring fluidity to intense gun fights, it also brings more strategy into the other new mechanic, stealth. While stealth isn’t completely new for  the series, it’s expanded upon enough to be a viable option during most parts of the game. There are now detection meters above enemies heads, and along with that, you can now tag enemies to keep track of them while sleuthing around. While the stealth isn’t on the level of Splinter Cell or Metal Gear by any means, it’s still enough to give players a completely new way to experience Uncharted. There are some parts of the game where stealth isn’t allowed as it reverts to the original formula of set piece -kill mercenaries- set piece, and that’s alright because it kept me on my toes through the intense 15 hours it took me to beat the game. While I won’t spoil the fantastic ending, I will say that the final boss fight, in my opinion, will go down as one of the best in history. The gunplay is more refined and the hand to hand combat feels more satisfying than ever.

With a great story, exciting gameplay, the best graphics ever seen on a console, and a cast that I’ll, along with millions of other Uncharted fans, will never forget, Uncharted 4 has surpassed my expectations. Despite being title, “A Thief’s End”, we truly don’t know if this will be the last Uncharted game. If it does end here, the ending was utter perfection. If not, I’m looking forward to the next adventure that Naughty Dog throws at me. Whatever happens, this game has defined the new generation and will go down as one the greatest masterpieces ever created.

 

Final Score: 10/10

 

 

Developer: Naughty Dog

System(s): Playstation 4

Release Date: May 10th

Fallout 4: Far Harbor DLC

Warning: there are some minor spoilers ahead; I summarize the very beginning of the main quest and give (mostly) vague hints about what’s in the middle of the story. I don’t give away any major plot points, though.

This DLC gave me mixed feelings.