The Longest 5 Minutes

• Developers: Syupro-DX, Nippon Ichi Software Inc
• Publisher: NIS America
• Genre: JRPG
• Players: 1
• Platform: Steam, PlayStation Vita (reviewed), Nintendo Switch
• Release Date: July 28^th 2016 (Japan), February 13^th 2018 (North America), February 16^th 2018 (Europe)
• Microtransactions: None

Turn Based Magic

The Longest 5 Minutes is an old school top-down JRPG but with an added twist to the mechanic which I’ll go into later on.  First released way back in July 28^th 2016 in Japan this game has taken a long time to release over here in the west finally releasing on the 16^th of February earlier this year. As a fan of indie titles I try to look out for more obscure ones to try out as the fit perfectly on my Vita as quick plays but this one turned into something special for me and quite easily one of my favourite indies I’ve played.

The game takes your standard formula of JRPG mechanics but turns it on its head by starting you at the very end game battle right from the start. The whole ‘final battle’ takes place over a 5 minute period but this five minutes like the title of the game suggests is a lot longer than you think.

This final battle section plays more like a visual novel the way it’s set up as you have your multiple choice answers each time you interact in this section and depending on your choices you enter a different flashback to early on in your journey.

Time In Hand

The hero character you play with through the game, Flash, can’t remember how he ended up at the final battle with The Demon King so each time you ‘remember’ a piece of your memory you travel back to an earlier time in the story. These memories are all time stamped so you’ll see your at memory let’s say 6 seconds into the ‘5 minutes’ and it will be a level 6 memory so you’ll do this part of the story now for anywhere from 15 minutes to an hour depending how much you get into it.

During these periods of time it plays much more like your standard JRPG in that you explore, do certain tasks in the story and upgrade yourself and your companion characters gear and weapons. This part of the game is very reminiscent in style to the early Final Fantasy games from the NES/SNES era and the Pokémon franchise with it sticking to the old school 8 bit/16bit graphics look. This isn’t a bad thing in the slightest either as even still to this day seeing that style of game is still probably my favourite style and period of gaming and really plays on the nostalgia.

Overall you go through 39 of these memories throughout the whole thing and whilst on a single straight run through of the game you wouldn’t hit all of these I would highly recommend going back and changing through some of your earlier choices. When you do manage to change something in the game it opens up alternative memories to play through and ultimately by doing this effectively it gives you the chance of earning multiple endings.

So depending which ones you ultimately decide to choose to do you can either have a positive outcome at the end or it can end up detrimental.

During the more traditional JRPG times in the game as you travel around the world it can end up a drag at times. This is down to the random spawn drops of enemies. I get that it is one of the most basic aspects of a JRPG but even after 20 years of playing these sort of games occasionally when I’m just wanting to get to a marker location quickly it can be really frustrating every five steps you’re thrown into an encounter.

That’s Right! I Remember!

Overall through the 15ish hours I ended up putting into this game I did have a really fun time with it. The story was quite deep the more you learnt about your character Flash and the backstory of his friends. The villain character The Demon King was also quite a fleshed out villain who had far more in connection to the main heroes than initially anticipated but without spoiling some of the twists it’s hard to talk about.

My main bone of contention though is the pricing of this game, at £34.99 on the PS Store it is a very expensive title for an indie game. I would 100% recommend this to people but also to be cautious of what you are getting. It is still an indie game at the end of the day but you are paying a AAA release price for it so unless you are very into this style or look of games it may not be for you. If it is in a sale at any point which I’m sure it will end up numerous times then that time might be the best to jump into this one.

PROS

• Great mashup of a traditional JRPG mixed with a visual novel
• Concept of working your way backwards through the story is fresh and not utilized in half as many games as it should be
• Very reminiscent of early Final Fantasy and Pokémon games from Nintendo’s early days
• The throughout back style of the 8 bit/16 bit era works perfectly for this sort of game

CONS

• The price point of this game is very steep for what it is
• Random enemy spawns can be a frustrating grind to get through at points
• Relatively short for the style of game it is

VERDICT

7.8/10

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God Of War

• Developers: SIE Santa Monica Studios
• Publisher: Sony Interactive Entertainment
• Genre: Action-Adventure
• Players: 1
• Platforms: Playstation 4
• Release Date: 20th April 2018
• Microtransactions: None

Man Of Change

God of War is the newest reboot/sequel in the long running Sony franchise of the same name and boy oh boy what a new entry this is.

Whilst story wise this is classed as God of War 4 technically this is actually the 8^th entry into the series with 4 previous home console games, two handheld games, one mobile game and one Facebook game.  The less said about the non-home console versions the better though.

Also realistically if you’ve only played what’s classed as the trilogy you won’t have missed much from the other games.

I’ll start off first by saying whilst I was a fan previously of the other games and that while I expected to like this one I didn’t think I would anywhere near as much as I actually do now. Without a doubt hands down this is by far leaps and bounds above the rest. The change-ups they’ve made really do shake things up quite a lot and make this not only a really good sequel but also a fresh start for this series.

Dad Of Boy

This game picks up quite a while after the end of God of War 3 when Kratos had killed all the gods of Greek Mythology but now he’s living in Midgard in hiding with his new family. Story premise is simple enough, his wife Faye has passed so it’s up to him and his son Atreus to scatter her ashes on the highest peak of all the realms as is her last wish. Your relationship with Atreus is one of the main driving forces of the game with how cold and shut off from him you are early on to where you end up by the end credits.

It’s as much a dad simulator at times as it is an action-adventure game. Obviously there’s more to the story than that and you do encounter a wide array of characters from Norse Mythology on your path along with numerous other realms but without going heavy into spoilers it’s best to leave that one to find out for yourself as some of the twists and turns are another reason of why this game is so special. If you have a vague understanding of Norse Mythology though you might be able to piece together bits of the story as it goes along before reveals are made even though it is very loose at times with the mythology.

Whilst the other games in the series where very linear and rudimental in their design this game goes in a completely new direction. Gone is the single narrative path of the story and instead a far more open world adventure with numerous places to get side-tracked and explore which at times can have you completely leaving the main story on the side-lines for quite some time.

Conqueror Of Realms

All the different areas and realms shown to you in game all have a unique look and feel to them making each new place fresh and different yet Midgard being your focal point is always the biggest and main area though. The scale of these areas and how open they are to explore to you is one of the big plus’ to take away from this game as if you are a fan of open-world style games there is plenty for you to dive into and only makes you wish the previous games had this style instead.

Gameplay wise the combat has drastically changed but for the better in the long-run. The older entries where far more hack-and-slash which in 2018 is a pretty much defunct gameplay mechanic now and instead it’s more of a focused combat style. There is a learning curve to your new weapon The Leviathan Axe but once you master it and your rune upgrades it is a ridiculously powerful killing machine. Also having your backup CPU component in Atreus firing backup shots with his bow and arrow really helps and can really give you a leg up on higher levelled opponents.  It was fun destroying hordes of enemies with the blades in the old game but far more satisfying throwing the axe around and recalling it back to you for an added extra hit.

The upgrade mechanic has also had an overhaul in this game. The old style of just upgrading your standard attacks and weapons is still there but now with an added section to this implemented into the story quite crucially as a main focus point. Whilst your weapons and attacks do still have the basic upgrades you really get the maximum out of them when you use runes and talismans which give off stat bonuses and massive power ups.

Depending on which ones you use with your armour or weapon it can really make the difference in each enemy encounter for better or worse. This style of upgrading is very similar to the one in something like Horizon: Zero Dawn where it really is essential if you actually want to get anywhere in the game.

Vision Of Beauty

Visually I know I say this for a lot of games this generation but this one really is stunning to look at. The amount of little details they’ve put into every area of the environment is incredibly impressive to see. From seeing seagulls soar through the skies to the ripples in the water as you’re sailing along exploring there isn’t a dip in the quality of visuals you see.  The difference in even how Kratos looks compared to the older games you can really see the difference.

Now before I get lynched I know some of the older games are on systems like the PS2 and PSP but even comparing the newer PS3 versions to this it’s ridiculous the improvement this generation has made in regards to the visuals. When you consider how good games like the Uncharted series, Assassin’s Creed and Horizon: Zero Dawn all look and how this still manages to improve over them visually it’s a damn near impressive feat.

After finishing the main story too the actual post-game is where the game really goes all in with all the extra missions and realms to explore along with a ‘secret true ending’ to find. There is more than enough meat to this game to keep you occupied for a good chunk of time after the first credits roll and frankly you won’t want to put this one down anytime soon anyway.  Some of these post-game missions can be a real challenge though but as long as you have sufficiently levelled yourself throughout you are in for some damn fun fights!

God Of War

I honestly struggle to think now after playing through this how it can possibly be topped. With a year of big top tier releases like Detroit, Spider-Man, Red Dead 2, Kingdom Hearts 3 (??) etc. right around the corner the fact that this early on in 2018 we have a clear front-runner for game of the year is astounding.

This game really is a credit to the series and the system as a whole for completely reinventing an already loved franchise by turning it on its head and the outcome being for the better.

PlayStation continue to show once again why they are dominating this current generation after throwing out masterpiece after masterpiece of first party games and this just adds to the pile they are stacking up now. The benchmark was already high for the PS4 but this has already for me personally gone straight to the top as game of this generation without a shadow of a doubt.

Just as a final note for that statement too – no I don’t count Last of Us Remastered in this generation as it was a PS3 game ported but it would definitely give that game a run for its money on gameplay and quality storytelling.

PROS

• Fantastic storytelling
• Great changeup to the gameplay mechanics
• Wide selection of areas each with enough originality to keep it fresh and new
• Graphically stunning with a world whilst doused in mythology really comes alive as you play

CONS

• Some enemy types you encounter can be repetitive and only slightly in look and design to others
• In all honestly my only other flaw was the game ended and I feel I’m going to struggle with other games now with how near perfect of an experience this one was to play

VERDICT

9.9/10

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South Park: The Fractured But Whole

• Developers: Ubisoft, Ubisoft San Francisco, South Park Digital Studios LLC
• Publisher: Ubisoft
• Genre: Adventure, RPG
• Players: 1
• Platforms: Xbox One (Reviewed), Playstation 4, Microsoft Windows, Switch
• Release Date: 17th October 2017
• Microtransactions: No

SJW Assemble!!

Are you a South Park fan? Are you victim to feelings of offence? Do you have a penchant for ass jokes? These 3 questions need to be answered before playing South Park: The Fractured But Whole. The correct answers to get the most out of this little game are Yes, No, Yes. Other variations of answers can gleam you some entertainment. No, No, Yes for example will tide you over very well, if a little tiring, which is the same as Yes, No, No…

That’s enough of that, for transparency for this review, I’m in the Yes, No, Yes camp here.

Much has been made about the alleged difficulty select screen. This is where you choose your skin colour. White being easy and black being difficult. When in actual fact this doesn’t effect the games difficulty. It’s a joke about how reactionary people are (Mainly SJW types whom feel they need to scream and shout about everything). If this joke has caused offence, then please understand you are the joke. I did my research… 95% of the articles I found raging on this are written by white folk. Virtue has been signalled.

Holey Rusted Butt hole

On to the game… it certainly looks South Park, animated and voiced exactly as the cartoon series. You play as the new kid in the town, starting off seemingly at the end of stick of truth. Cartman, now bored of playing a fantasy game, has arrived as his superhero alter ego The Coon. Convinces everyone to join in and now we are all super heroes.

The story doesn’t really go anywhere beyond the super hero thing. Which does get stale pretty quickly. Here in lies my problem with South Park The Fractured But Whole, the game is long winded. Extremely funny in parts (again provided this is your sense of humour), but the repetitive nature of the missions and the length of the game does drag the game down to boring.

I’m sure Matt and Trey felt this themselves, as the game references multiple times the time constraints on the production of this game. Even mocks it’s lack of depth over the first game.

Overall this South Park game took me a little over 25 hours to finish. There were periods of 3 or 4 days of not playing it because of game fatigue.

I Fart On Your Face

The combat system feels very similar to Stick Of Truth (from what I’d played of it), turn based battles, sometimes requiring real strategy to compete. I’m not familiar with the differences between South Park The Fractured But Whole and Stick Of Truth, I’ll update this review once I’ve played Stick Of Truth properly.

Combat is amusing, with some very funny super moves. You’ll fight multiple opponents during most battles, occasionally fighting bosses with a slight twist on the mechanic such as try to exit the area, or feed a beasty.

You unlock different allies during the game to allow you a party of up to 4 heroes to kick ass.

Power-ups and trinkets are earned or found which give you and your team buffs. I can’t say I noticed much besides a health boost or drop.

Who Is The Coon?!

There’s not much else that can be said about South Park The Fractured But Whole… It’s a interactive South Park series. Which I found very funny at times, and other times tedious.
As I mentioned earlier, the game states a few times that they never had enough time to properly flesh out the story on with this game, and you feel it.

Overall if you’re a South Park fan, you’ll enjoy it, just play it in hour long stints though otherwise the back and forth nature of the game type becomes pretty monotonous.

PROS

• Funny (obviously objective)
• Looks and feels exactly like South Park
• Combat is solid and surprisingly deep

CONS

• Long… so very long
• Gets stale
• The ending falls really flat

VERDICT

6.5/10

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The Evil Within 2

• Developers: Tango Gameworks
• Publisher: Bethesda Softworks
• Genre: Survival Horror
• Players: 1
• Platforms: Xbox One (Reviewed), Playstation 4, Microsoft Windows
• Release Date: 13th October 2017
• Microtransactions: No

Love, Building On Fire

In The Evil Within 2 you play as Sebastian Castellanos, the hero from the first game. Haunted by the memory of your daughter being burned to death in a house fire. You are racked with guilt over the fact you couldn’t help her. Your partner Kidman (who has a great ass by the way) contacts you and tells you you daughter is alive, she is the core of the STEM. The STEM being the shit hole mental realm that Sebastian survived in the first game, he’s not overly chuffed about going back.

So whilst being tore apart with guilt, and still stilling with all the PTSD you can shake a stick at, Seb is sent into the STEM to recover her. That’s your set-up

Burning Down The House

The Evil Within 2 starts with it’s camera up your ass, before attempting a little bit of heart string tugging. You see your home in front of you… We I assume it’s your home, Sebastian can be a bit of a mentalist, so he could be prepping for a home invasion. The house is a blaze, you run toward the building, panic! Your daughter is inside!! double panic as you move the camera…DEAR GOD it’s horrible. Smash through the window, up the stairs SWEET BABY JESUS this camera is hideous in enclosed areas, like say the house you are forcing me through straight away. You get to your daughters room and hit full blown in the face poor voice acting 101. A ghostly daughter arrives and we are dealt fake out #1 of the game.

Welcome to The Evil Within 2, the intro did nothing for me, but it’s there as the platform of motivation, it doesn’t have the weight of The Last Of Us, but very few games achieve that kind of emotional pain.

Now the first Evil Within was a complete and utter mess (in my opinion), so I wasn’t overly confident that much will have changed in this one. The camera crawling up my ass, the floaty turning and the fake out so early on. Honestly I was concerned…

Psycho Killer

Along comes chapter 2, pretty visuals are about. Some very heavy Twin Peaks influence in the look of this level. With a main villain slowly being introduced to us, an artist whom takes a snap shot at the point of death. Trapping the victim in a perpetual loop of the last few seconds of their life. I like it, but still nervous, not down to the atmosphere, just nervous the game will at any moment just screw itself out of the good will it’s earning from me.

We carry on, having some very nice visuals. Not pretty looking sweeping vistas like Horizon Zero Dawn, but more murderous and differently pretty. Stepping into chapter 3 was when the game itself truly begins.

Taking it’s cues from Resident Evil 4‘s intro, chapter 3 has you coming across some strangely possessed individual, and having to dispatch them. Then moving onto to a loving nod at the village opening in Resident Evil 4. We are then given a open piece of the world to investigate. At this point I had a smile on my face. You can taste the RE4 heritage in the game, Shinji Mikami seems to have hit his stride again. But will it hold out?

Slippery People

The Evil Within 2 plays in multiple ways. You have open(ish) world sections, where exploring is a must. Linear point A to point B levels, and heavy stealth sections.

Stealth played apart in the first game, but was ultimately pointless as I recall, this game really ramps it up, especially in the early game when you and your weapons are weak. Sneaking around and getting those stealth kills is really important because you want that sweet sweet green gel.

The enemy A.I is very squiffy, I played on default difficultly (Survival) and found their detection a bit hit and miss. There’s nothing more frustrating than sneaking up like a filthy ninja, only to get within kill range and the shit bag notice you. In the later game this doesn’t matter so much because your more upgraded, and have better weapons to dispatch the zombie shit-bags.

During the game you come across a few pure stealth sections or “feck up and you will die” sections. Having not played them on the hardest difficulty yet, they were manageable, I can imagine these being a utter pain in the ass at higher difficulties. You can upgrade your stealth sneak ability, which leads me on to…

Memories Can’t Wait

Upgrades return from the previous game yay! You must collect green gel from fallen foes, then spend that lovely sticky icky on making yourself a better person.

You have skill trees to upgrade, Health, Agility, Recovery, Stealth and Combat.

All pretty much self explanatory, with the occasional “special” ability you can unlock by fully upgrading a path.

Along with upgrading your body and mind, you can pimp your weapons too. Reload Speed, Rate Of Fire, Capacity and Power. I like being able to upgrade my weapons throughout a game, tis fun. Although, for fully upgrading a weapon, you don’t unlock a special perk with that weapon (like in Resident Evil 4).

But you do unlock special buffs for the Warden. What’s the Warden? It’s this game crossbow, the previous games crossbow was called Agony. Name change is all I noticed, but not having the first game seared into my brain I could be wrong.

You get various bolts throughout The Evil Within 2, to help dispatch the baddies. All with different traits such as: Explosive, Freeze, Shock, Smoke and Harpoon. When you upgrade these to the max, they get a perk eg. the Harpoon bolt at max upgrade adds fire to it attack. So these thing are pretty sweet.

My first play through, I just used the pistol, the laser sighted pistol, max upgraded. Until, I unlock the revolver, then that was it.

Houses In Motion

The Evil Within 2 is a far superior game compared to it’s prequel, it’s a pretty good game by itself. The problems I have with the game are small for the most part. So let’s just tackle them, these are my problems with the game.

The camera can be very very frustrating at times, especially down the corridors and tight rooms. I understand this is to evoke tension but it just feels frustrating.

There are a few enemies in the game, particularly the white women with knives, that get so close that you can’t aim at them, and your regular melee attack often doesn’t phase them. They are close enough, that bringing your weapon up, your arms will actually be aiming past them.

Enemies seem to have invincibility frames, I’ll shoot someone in the head, they go through their “I’ve been shot in the head” animation and immediate follow up shots seem to do no damage.
This happened to me so often, that my tatic became shoot them in the head, wait until they return to default, shoot them in the head. Repeat until dead. It’s a minor annoyance, but an annoyance nonetheless.

One hit kills return, this isn’t to bad. It’s mainly bosses or mini-bosses, so you won’t feel to ripped off.

Final complaint is an odd one…

Born Under Punches

The game takes itself far to serious, deciding to play the straight man all the way throughout. The problem with the serious angle is, if you don’t execute it well things come across poorly.

The voice acting isn’t great, but it not cheesy enough to get a laugh out of it. It’s serviceable to get the story across, yet not enough to evoke emotion. Being as serious as it is, means the atmosphere dark and down. After 2-3 hours of playing though I became desensitized to the “Horrors” around me.

The game never had me scared, this isn’t a macho thing, it just never got to a point where it was scary. The story will tell you time and time again that was you are seeing or experiencing was scary. But, it just wasn’t.

At the beginning it was a little tense, the not knowing. But as I said, after 2-3 hours or so, you’ll be playing this action stealth game just to enjoy the visuals, learn about the story.

And She Was

So with all that said, where do I stand on the game.

I found myself enjoying the story, but not so much the performances of the voice actors or script. The boss fights are a little hit and miss, but overall pretty nice.

My first playthrough took me 22:40:5, I collected 39/40 files, 9/11 slides, 29/32 keys, upgraded all but 3 of my bolts, and nearly completely levelled my character up. The fact that I even bothered to collect these items, and use the term “My first playthrough” should tell you that, overall I enjoyed the game.

Play it for the journey, the story and some nice crazy visuals. Also if you are a Resident Evil 4 fan, this should tick some boxes for you.

PROS

• Some great enemy designs
• Plenty to collect and unlock
• Story is interesting
• Reminds me of Resident Evil 4 (thats a pro for me)

CONS

• Poor voice acting
• Too serious
• Lack of scares

VERDICT

8.1/10

The post The Evil Within 2 appeared first on Show Me Games - Independent Gaming Site, and Community.

EA Sports UFC 3

• Developers: EA Canada
• Publisher: Electronic Arts, EA Sports
• Genre: Sports Sim, Beat’em Up, Fighting Game
• Players: 1 – 2
• Platforms: Xbox One (Reviewed), Playstation 4
• Release Date: 2nd February 2018
• Microtransactions: Yes

The Champ Is Here…

So I get EA UFC 3, throw it into my console, 2Gb update… yeah sure crack on. It’s TIME!!!!!……. freeze screen….crashed. Second time lucky lets go mother fuckers!!!! Loads up, picture of Conor MacGregor… Press Any Button to continue.. Let’s get some fighting done… What…wait a user agreement… This game cost me £52.99, there’s next to no effort gone into the box art, and nothing saying I need to sign a contract to play the fucking game I’ve just purchased.

I know plenty of games have this, but isn’t it time it goes. I scroll down the very very lengthy user agreement. I have recently filled court people work in my personal life, the amount of paperwork I filled to sue, was considerably less than the user agreement. That’s fucking outrageous, I have to pay for the game, from a retailer, whom if I take the game back and same the reason I don’t want it is because I have to sign a contact in order to play the game, the store will most likely argue the toss even though it’s my consumer right. Disgusting!

Fuck it, lets play it…

And It’s All Over…

Just like the previous UFC games from EA they have their hands tied as far as aesthetics are concerned. The Reebok deal is still hurting the brand for me, so we have the dull white tiles of the last game only some how less engaging this time around. More tiles than last time implying much more to do…we’ll get to that.

With the only real splash of colour and interest coming from EA advertising their paid for loot boxes for the online ultimate team mode… so I signed a User agreement and paid £52.99 to have you advertise to me? Thank you, I feel like a valued customer.

So game modes lets list them: The words in red are there actual names

• Career Mode (G.O.A.T Mode)
• Vs mode (Fight Now)
• No Take Down Mode (Stand and Bang)
• Knock Down Mode (Knockout Mode)
• Tapout Mode (Submission Showdown)
• Online Pay Us More Money Mode (Ultimate Team)
• Tournament Mode (Tournament Mode)

Plenty to do right? wrong! Let’s have a quick look see at each one

Maybe It’s Time To Retire After Such A Beating

Straight away congratulations on adding a tournament mode, a mode that should have been in the very first game, so waiting 6 years for it was fine. Thank you EA… Anyone remember UFC: Undisputed 3? I do, it was bloody good fun, that had a great tournament mode, in fact it was very highly praised for it. UFC: Undisputed 3 was the last game THQ made before EA got the UFC brand.

EA borrowed much from the mechanics from Undisputed whilst adding, their EA UFC submission thing. You’d think they would have taken the aspects of the aspects of the THQ titles that the fans loved and had them straight away… this is EA we are talking about, they like to parse everything out, and slowly drip feed these features in each iteration under the guise of “new features”.

Here we are 3 games and 6 years into EA owning the brand, and the biggest and best addition is a tournament mode… just a standard tournament, you can’t choose to fight Pride Rules, you can’t choose a different cage. But at least it’s here, and that’s something. One slight little extra with the tournament mode is the loose weight category. Just means that you can fight opponents who aren’t in your weight class normally, bit like the old Pride style weight classes.

Stand and Bang and Knockout Mode just seems to similar it’s stupid. Knockout returns from the previous games, get hit enough you get knocked out. Stand and Bang is the standard game but with takedowns switched off, and shite commentary from Snoop Doggy Dogg… Yes Snoop Dogg, Joe Rogan didn’t want to come back to record more stuff. To be fair I don’t blame him.

Submission Showdown is just submissions to win, bit dull and frustrating to be honest.

What An Embarrassing Loss

The creator character has returned, with no noticeable difference, meaning shit. It’s terrible really is, you can spend hours if you like shaping the face of whomever you want create, only to be let down by a piss poor choice of hair cuts, and pathetic beards, which make your character look like he’s whacked glue on his chin or lip then face planted a barbers floor.

Gameface makes a triumphant fart of a return. I’ve attempted on multiple occasions to create a decent Gameface character, but besides a golf game many years ago, it always fails… Such promise wasted with half assed effort… Seems to be par for the coarse over at the EA headquarters.

Winner By Disqualification

Let’s have a quick chat about the career mode. Is it better than UFC 2? Yeah-ish. This year you start in the minor leagues instead of The Ultimate Fighter. WFA is you’re home, after you’ve won a couple of fights it’s off the UFC. I would have preferred fighting in the WFA, then moving into the TUF house, onto the UFC and making a move for the title but no. It’s all rather rapid.

Gone are the training mini games of old, instead opting for a known amount of stat increase, with the potential to injure yourself, and receiving a de-buff for the next fight. The an extra addition they’ve put into the career mode is social media, you have to hype your fight. Each week of training you have 100 points to spend on either training, learning new moves or social media (mainly twitter). Once you are in the UFC you have contract obligations like turning up for television interviews or other press junkets. You don’t actually do these, the trailer would have you believe you go to weigh ins and the like but nope.

These obligations often cost a lot of your points like 70 or 40. Sometimes, you’re required to do two of them in one week. One will be 70, the other 40, failure to to attend these things will result in you taking a cut in pay for the fight. Now i’m sure you can see that 70 + 40= 110 points, so it’s impossible. It’s things like this that just go to show the lack of play testing.

Dotted through your UFC 3 career the occasional cut scene will play, I witnessed maybe 6, during my 33 fight career, they pretty much dry up once you are the champion. Meaning being a champion doesn’t feel special, you’re best off winning the belt then calling it a day. The only real other thing you can do when you are a champion, they offer you a weight change to fight the champion of that weight class. Two belts woot!

Ultimately, it’s an average Career mode, nothing special, but EA MMA had a more engaging Career…nearly 10 years ago…

Pay Per View, Pay Per Play, Pay To Win…

On to UFC 3’s Ultimate Team Mode… You are give a fighter and set of moves in the form of cards, the fighters are on a set number of fight deal, the are a random level, and so are you’re moves. You fight against other peoples Ultimate Team members, increasing your ranks and earning pseudo money by completing challenges.

Are you getting your ass handed to you over and over again? Give EA money and they will give you more cards consisting of Fighters, moves, and stat boosts… Please fuck off. The problem here is it feel like a money phone game shoe horned into this £52.99 game, not only a mobile phone game, but one that is based around you spending money to get better.

EA have had a hell of a lot of kick over the past 12 months as far as loot boxes and micro-transactions, I know it’s kinda part of the sports model they have, but it’s still not kosher as far as I’m concerned. With so much effort placed around the Ultimate Team mode in UFC 3, it means there’s a large chunk of the game I don’t care for. Another miss.

Final Round

The game looks pretty, moves well (when it’s not staggering), there are a good amount of fighters across two female classes and all the male classes. Some legends are thrown in there to mix it up, but still now Oleg Taktarov, Marco Ruas, Don Frye, Dan Severn or even Bas Rutten. I understand that’s just me wanting them, but most of them have been in the UFC: Disputed games.

Bruce Lee makes a return, apparently the father of mixed martial arts… I beg to differ. But at least Mike Tyson isn’t here this time round.

On the whole I think this is a lesser game than UFC 2. There’s “more” to do this time round, but more nothing is still nothing.

The tournament mode is the only plus point the game has over the previous title. Instead of buying this game, I highly recommend you purchase UFC 2 from a indie game store, you can pick it up for next to nothing nowadays. It’ll keep you entertained if you have folks around,. Just grab a pad and pencil and draw up you’re own tournaments.

There isn’t enough here to warrant the price tag, I’m sure the developers are limited both by EA head sheds and WME as to what they can add to the game. Due to UFC wanting to emit it’s public image as a sport like football, Basketball and Baseball. But by doing so the UFC product looses some if not all of it’s character.

I feel these games would be better given to another developer and WME give them a little more free reign.

I do not recommend EA Sports UFC 3, even if you are a fan of MMA. Get the second one instead.

PROS

• Tournament mode
• Plenty of Fighters

CONS

• Offline game slow down
• No parry’s
• User agreement
• Sparse character creator

VERDICT

4/10

The post EA Sports UFC 3 appeared first on Show Me Games - Independent Gaming Site, and Community.

The Hunter: Call Of The Wild

• Developers: Expansive Worlds
• Publisher: Avalanche Studios
• Genre: Simulation
• Players: 1 or 8 player online
• Platforms: Xbox One (Reviewed), Playstation 4, Steam
• Release Date: 2nd October 2017 (Xbox One, Playstation 4), 16th February 2017 (Steam)
• Microtransactions: None

Rest The Meat Until Room Temperature…

Here we are at TPC Sawgrass, there’s a 135 meter shot from the blind, wind will play a little over such a range. Make sure you aim just behind the front leg, otherwise you’ll be in for a long day. I’d play a .270… Oh deer, oh deer he’s missed, that was startling. It’ll be a long while before a shot lines itself up like that again.

Welcome to The Hunter: Call Of the Wild, a hunting game that leaves you to go hunting… Oh my, what a concept.

Expansive Worlds have tackled a hunting game, with confidence, and respect. Deciding instead of the bombastic story driven mess of the Cabela games, glorifying the mass slaughter of animals. They play more subtle, and simulation like.

The Hunter: Call of The Wild (for consoles at least) has to huge open maps. One themed European, with animals you’d more likely find across the continent, and another themed American. The attention to detail in these environments is beautiful. Dynamic weather and lighting effect how your hunt will go. Rain obscures your vision, but also masks some of the noise you make. Clear bright sunny days mean you can be seen for miles, so take your time. In fact, you should always take your time.

Heat Oil in Frying Pan Until Smoking Hot…

Playing The Hunter: Call Of The Wild is a chilled experience, if you rush around you’ll spook the game, then you may as well be on the moon. There is nothing much else to do in this game except hunt. There is a shooting range on both maps, and you’ll be given micro missions like kill a ‘Whitetail at night’, or take a photo of a ‘Fallow deer’.
These “missions” only seem to be there to try and push you away from your comfort zone, and venture into the wild. Which is a good thing.

Wandering off into unexplored areas is nice, you’ll find old wrecks of buildings and wind farms, with lovely vistas to behold. But you can’t do anything with them, some places maybe nice hunting grounds so stick around, and soak up the atmosphere.

Place Your Steak in Pan and Cook at High Heat For 30 Sec Each Side…

Now you can, and most likely will kill all you see in The Hunter: Call Of The Wild when you first start playing it…hell even when you are 20+ hours in, you’ll take a shot at anything you lay your eyes on. For me this started to feel cheap, the hunt had lost itself, turned into something lacking finesse. It wasn’t the game that had done this, it was me, the player. I had forgotten it’s a simulator.

For those who don’t know, in the states you have to apply for tags, these tags will give you the opportunity to hunt for a certain animal for meat or trophy. You then head out with your Black bear tag, to then hopefully fill up your freezer for a year.

If/when you set yourself personal tags in game, this adds a whole new dimension to the game. Let’s say you and you hunting partner decide at the beginning of the playing session, lets hunt Red Deer Stags only. The hunt becomes real. Your hunting partner or yourself take those snap shots at a Roe Deer Doe 350m away, scaring the animals in the immediate area. Instead, you watch them. Trying not to spook them.

After, and hour or so, you may happen to see a Red Stag standing proud on a ridge, with the sun just dipping behind him, sending god rays through his antlers. looking down your sights, you try and pick that perfect shot. Bring him down quickly (we don’t want to be following blood trails for the next hour), otherwise you may make him run. Meaning an even longer stalking session. Your breathing becomes tense, the sense of the hunt comes through in spades when you play the game like this. Meaning that one kill, feels more rewarding than the mass slaughter of Roe Deer Does.

Medium Heat, Cook For a Further 1 Mins 30 Sec Each Side…

So this game is a hard one to score. Because the tiny unfinished parts actually chip away at the score. The Hunter: Call Of the Wild started right out of the gate as a easy 8.5-9.0/10 game. As you start to settle into the pretty looking world, the cracks creep into view.

What cracks you say? silly ones really, floating stones or patches of grass. Deer running and stopping in trees (this doesn’t happen all the time, but it’s happen often enough for me to mention it here).

Then there’s the clunky and awkward menu system. It feels like it’s not been optimised for consoles. For instance, if you wanted to look at your hunt history, the game shows you a list of what you have killed. Showing approximately 20, with a scroll bar to the side… you’ve no means of getting to that scroll bar. Myself and Mr. Bilsborough tried for a while, but to no avail.

These seemingly tiny issue really frustrate, because they simply shouldn’t be there.

Rest The Meat, Before Serving…

I understand this game isn’t going to be for everyone, I do believe the game does a good job at forcing you to chill the fuck out. The calmer you are as a gamer, the more game rewards you by presenting you stags and bucks. In a paradoxically, if you want more action in The Hunter: Call Of The Wild, slow down.

What The Hunter: Call Or The Wild is to me is simply put, a Zen game. I play the game to wander the beautifully rendered pseudo-Germany or pseudo-America. The game is slow and lovely, with beautiful lighting and immersive sounds (when you turn the music off).

With the addition of a little more polish, and correcting of silly clipping issues like the floating grass, The Hunter: Call Of The Wild would easily be a high 8 or 9. But as it stands, I’ll give it a respectable Show Me Games 7.8.

PROS

• Very nice atmosphere, brought on by the beautiful lighting and sounds.
• Slow, and chilled gameplay which is surprising pleasant in multiplayer.
• The thrill after an hour of stalking a certain species, only to have a beautiful specimen appear is really something special. Tense and fun.

CONS

• Clipping issues, mainly cosmetic.
• A.I can be squiffy at times.
• Clunky menus

OVERALL

7.8/10

The post The Hunter: Call Of The Wild appeared first on Show Me Games - Independent Gaming Site, and Community.

Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus

• Developers: MachineGames
• Publisher: Bethesda Softworks
• Genre: First Person Shooter
• Players: 1
• Platforms: Xbox One (Reviewed), Playstation 4, Switch and Steam
• Release Date: 27th October 2017
• Microtransactions: None

Achtung Baby!

Hello folk and welcome to Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus. Now I’m only really familiar with the original Wolfenstein, and then the subsequent generic crap that came out up until MachineGames‘ Wolfenstein 2014.

I missed Wolfenstein 2014, but was reliably told from sources I trust that it was a fun little number. Roll around E3 2017, Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus trailer spiked my interest. The cut scenes looked mental and over the top, the action visceral. This may be a reason to step back to Wolfenstein.

Along came Mr. Dan Smash, who had a copy of the game, offered it to me for review, and now we are here…

Dam Busters

The game opens up with a rather lengthy cut scene recapping the fuckin’ madness of the previous installment/s. Setting the scene for the chaotic drivel that’s about to unfold over the next 10-13 hours.

Once the visual assault has finished, you are then given a intro in the style of a flashback, to when you where a little boy. You are on your bed sobbing, a caring mother comforting a poor frightened child, only for your abusive father to come home and generally be a dick. This here is Wolfenstein attempting pathos… For me it didn’t work, came across forced especially after the madness recap (more on this later).

Then whack! You are in, you are B.J. Blazkowicz, the same chap from every other Wolfenstein game, and why not. Due to the events of the last game, you are captured and without the use of your legs.

This intro level has you control Mr. B.J as you are being attacked aboard a ship, all whilst scooting about using a wheel chair. It was fun, stupid, but fun.

Nazi Gold

Whilst you are bipedal-ly impaired, the standard level of health is 50… I figure, ok, makes sense, I’m injured how clever. It’ll just last this one level… it does not last just one level.

Now being the ass clown that I am, this started to bug me, yes I get that it’s just a number. But after 30 years of gaming 100 is my full health situation. You can over-health yourself all the way up to 200, then your health cools down back down to the 50 of my bane.

Wolfenstein, why do you toy with my mind like so. It’s a small annoyance, that after a few hours of gaming does start to really piss me off. Fortunately for the sake of my sanity this gets resolved due to utter fucking madness during the course of the story. Yay!

Iron Sky

Let’s touch on the gameplay shall we before talking story.

The shooting mechanics are solid, the guns feel like they are firing hot pieces of pointy metal as they should. Action is fast and frantic, plenty of gore and dismemberment… which is always fun.

Axes are used as the melee weapon, to a very gory end. In fact, I’m pretty sure I just ran up to most enemies and axed them to death… it’s rather satisfying.

There’s a mild levelling up system, which give you buffs. So say, get X amount of head shots, and head shots do more damage. Kill folk with explosives you take less explosive damage. Simple things like that.

Every one of your main arsenal has 3 upgrade slots, with their own specific upgrades. For instance your pistol has a silencer, magnum rounds and extended magazine, whilst the Strumgewehr has a scope, armour piercing rounds and a quick reload magazine. These do really make a difference, and are very much welcome when you find one.

Later in the game you get to choose between three “power-ups” of sorts. One, allows you to constrict yourself though small holes, and help stealth. A piece of shoulder armour, which allows to you charge at folks and breakable objects like a bull. Finally some extend-o-legs, which allow you to be…taller? Now, don’t fear if you feel you have chosen poorly, the other power-ups can be found during side missions, provided you speak to the relevant NPC on the Sub.

After plugging through a few levels, the manic pace of combat and lack of new weaponry started to feel stale to me. Add to that, the level designs are often a confusing mess as to the direction I should be going. Bringing the kinetic pace to a sudden deflating stop.

New Orleans especially had me walking in circles, pouring more water over the already ebbing feeling of this game. Only to then finish a level, and be greeted with an entertaining cut-scene.

The Not See Party

Story…tone deaf I think is the phrase here. As mentioned at the top on of the review, Wolfenstein tries hitting you with pathos right from the off, but only goes and undermines everything with trying to be wacky.

You’ll probably hear a lot of people claiming the game is Tarantino-esque, it isn’t. The writing isn’t clever enough. It must be something to do with Inglorious Basterds, which simply means it has Nazi in it. I’m honestly baffled when this is brought up. It’s got more in common with They Live than Tarantino.

Through the first half of the game Mr. B.J laments during the levels, because he’s gonna die and not see his unborn children. Then the game thinks fuck it, this is getting a bit tired, lets go mental instead. Then you get something crazy (funny, entertaining don’t get me wrong) which resolves everything. Almost, like they’d written themselves into a corner.

The leader of your uprising dies early on, so you do a mission recuse a couple named Grace and Super Spesh… Next scene Grace is in charge… Wait, what, why?!?

This is Wolfenstein, trying to hard to be crrrrraaaaazy. It is funny, don’t get me wrong, there’s a few laughs here.

The father story arch from the beginning of the game, is sort of just thrown at you. To be wrapped up, again like they’d written themselves into a corner…

My favourite moments in the game are when you don’t have to fight.

Two scenes stand out to me:

One is walking through the streets to deliver Macguffin #23568. You see a small town under Nazi rule, with the KKK standing proud on the street corners and generally acting like twats. It’s funny seeing them being put in their places by the Germans. This level reminded me of Die Hard on the Gamecube, not an amazing game, but had some great little concepts.

The other is much later where we meet the Fuhrer himself… his frustration and lack of caring at that point of the game echoed with me, I found I had sympathy for digital Hitler.

A New Dawn

Upon completion I breathed a sign of relief. It was done, a decent ending, extremely open ended mind. But I was glad it was over, I enjoyed what I’d played, thanks and goodbye.

Wolfenstein was a mixed bag really, as much as I may have seemed to have really hated it, that’s not the case. The core game is competent, there’s plenty of collectables. The voice acting is fantastic (it’s the script that’s the problem). The graphics are pretty, and there’s some very entertaining sections.

It’s just, with it trying so hard to be edgy and wacky all at the same time, the two didn’t compliment each other that well. Maybe over a shorter game, but running me just over 13 hours to complete. I felt Wolfenstein fatigue by the end, unfortunately knocking what could have been an 8 down a little.

Each level breaks down into, find the commanders kill them to stop the alarm, next section, rinse and repeat. There are some very short side missions, and then you can kill the Uber commanders. You unlock these, by collecting Enigma cards from dead commanders. These missions are just go kill this commander. Very simple, take about 5-10 mins. Nice little extra killing if you don’t need a rest.

PROS

• Gun play has a nice feel in short bursts
• Voice acting is great
• Nice graphics

CONS

• Repetitive
• Repetitive
• Same stuff again and again

VERDICT

7.5/10

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Wulverblade

• Developers: Fully Illustrated, Darkwind Media
• Publisher: Darkwind Media
• Genre: Side Scrolling Beat ’em Up
• Players: 1-2 (campaign), 1-2 (survival)
• Platforms: Switch (Reviewed), Xbox One, Playstation 4, and Steam
• Release Date: 12th October 2017 (Switch), Steam and Playstation 30th January 2018, Xbox One 31st January 2018
• Microtransactions: None

Ryse

Welcome to Roman occupied Britain 120AD. The Romans are pushing north into Caledonia, 3 Heroes say “Ack! Ney!” to that, whilst eating tatties and neeps they fight back against the Roman might.

Wulverblade is an unashamed classical side scrolling beat’em up. You have lives, you have weapon pick ups, and you have special moves. The things that help define Wulverblade however are somewhat surprising.

Triarii

Wulverblade offers 3 characters to choose from:

Caradoc, 6ft 2in, of angry family man not willing to give up his land or freedom to these foreign invaders. He is the main character of the game.

Brennus, 6ft 7in of beastly brawn, Caradocs brother, the powerhouse and main damage dealer of the pack.

Then, last but certainly not least we have Guinevere, 5ft 9in, deft and lethal with her blade. The younger sister holds her own against the legion.

As with multi-character beat’em ups each character has slightly different stats, and attack types.

Caradoc stats are pretty even on stats with a slight edge towards defense. He is the main character after all, so you’d expect this.

Brennus is extremely biased toward power, with agility and speed being quiet frankly awful. Playing through, that speed became a serious hinderance.

Guinevere, poor power, excellent speed and agility, and with defence comparable to Brennus. Her speed helps greatly especially, with her juggle mechanic (sounds rude).

9th Legion

So on to the combat mechanics (should be short and sweet this one). You have Attack, Strong Attack, Block, and Jump simple. Now something that confused me a little at first (mainly because I didn’t read up on it), your Strong Attack button doesn’t do anything until you pick up a weapon to Strong Attack with. I am stupid, so that is the answer for that. Just thought I’d mention it, because there are a few folk like me out there.

Ok, moving onwards, your block isn’t just a defensive shield in Wulverblade, oh no, you can counter/parry your opponents. Which in the later game becomes very necessary to survive. This happens by pressing your block at the right at the point the enemy hits you. Your character flashes red, and you gain an attack bonus for a few seconds. In those seconds, cut the bastards arms and legs off.

Jumping is more of an avoidance tactic I found, but depending of your character you can cause juggles, which are always fun.

The game litters the floor with items either for points, or weaponry, such as: Arms, heads, seax knife, Spartha, pilums and more. You can use these to throw at your opponents. Other weaponry can be found, which then allows use of the Strong Attack. These weapons often have special attributes like recover health, or armour piercing. Be mindful when using these weapons, as the break with over use. Also, should you get hit whilst holding one, you will drop it, meaning you’ll have to pick it up again.

Wulverblade allows the arcade stable for beat’em ups, an area of effect (AOE) attack. Just like it should be pressing Attack and Jump at the same time damages all those in close proximity, but at a health cost to the player. Sometimes however, you need to tell Romans to back off no matter the cost.

Finally, you have your bomb attack. Call of the wolves, you bellow your battle cry and a pack ferocious wolves come charging in to gnaw on the enemies flesh! Pretty cool, you only have one though, so use it wisely.

The Boggart Of Darwen Barrow

Wulverblade is a pretty looking game, it’s got a very definite art design. The characters are nice and chunky, very cleanly drawn, and well animated. The backgrounds and levels are pretty.

As you play through the levels, the game although being a 2d game as far as sprites are concerned. Does use parallaxing to it’s artistic advantage. You’ll have characters running past in the foreground out of focus, even in the far background. One level has an archer running in the distance, turning and shooting at you, this works very well.

The music is also fitting. Wulverblade is a passion project by a chap named Michael Heald of Fully Illustrated.  Mr. Heald designed each character, came up with the story concept, and put in the leg work for each step of the way, for the past 5 years.

A unique thing about Wulverblade, is the heart. Whenever you play a level you unlock a little production piece or video. These for me are the gems of the game. You are given mini history lessons, pictures and videos of Roman forts and settlement remains in mainland Britain. This is a where a bias comes out in me, and It would be remiss of me if I didn’t admit it. I love history, I love these lands. I love the uniqueness of each country within these lands.

Wulverblade, makes me want to have many a road trip.

The sites in this game are in driving distance of my home. I’m inspired by this passion project, to visit these sites, and the feel the land myself.

Woden Law

Enough gushing, unless it’s Romans blood.

The game is played out over 8 levels. Taking about, 15-20mins each. Wrapping up with a boss fight. I’ve played the game Co-op to completion, which is fun. Certainly the way the game was intended to be played. It would be great if with an update you could play 3 player co-op. But it could get a little to chaotic.

Playing the game single player become pretty difficult near the end, especially the finally boss. I simply couldn’t do him on my own. I don’t profess to be the greatest gamer, so you may defeat him easily.

Other game modes include Arcade, which is as it implies. Turns the game into an arcade game, by that you are limited to 3 lives, and 3 continues. There isn’t a travel map, just cutscenes and Roman slaughter.

Wulverblade also gives you an Arena mode. Play solo or co-op slaying wave upon wave of baddies to set the worlds highest score.

The game feels like a perfect fit on the Switch. Adam brought his Switch to Play Expo and we just clicked the joycons out and smashed a few levels of sat there. Was great. (Adam lent me his Switch for this review, this game and Zelda have sold me on the Switch).

Overall

Wulverblade is a great beat’em, the extra content makes it worth it alone to me. The cost of a game can often shape my scoring. There is enough here to have fun with certainly. Especially co-op, grab a mate, a few beers a take-away bash through Wulver. But if this game was £35+ I’d of expected a bit more content. As it happens £14.99 in the UK, is a great price. Adding the much coveted value for money accolade.

I was fortunate enough get a review code. This game is certainly worth £14.99 if only to support the dev. I’ll be picking a random Show Me Games group member and purchasing Wulverblade for them.

PROS

• Fantastic graphics
• British history and lore
• Co-op gameplay
• Value for money

CONS

• Can lose track of character in the melee
• Some cheap hits

VERDICT

8/10

The post Wulverblade appeared first on Show Me Games - Independent Gaming Site, and Community.

Arizona Sunshine

• Developers: Vertigo Games
• Publisher: Vertigo Games
• Genre: FPS
• Players: 1-2 (campaign), 1-4 (survival)
• Platforms: Playstation 4 (Reviewed), Microsoft Windows
• Release Date: 27th June 2017 (PS4), 6th December 2016 (everywhere else)
• Microtransactions: None

Head Shot Boom!

VR games are fun, Zombie games are fun too. If only there was a game out there that combined the two. There is? There’s a fuck ton of them? Oh, well if only there was a good one, that’s where Arizona Sunshine pops in.

You play Captain Generic Gobshite #1226445, starting in a cave you make your way through valleys, mines, train yards, a military base and little townships.

Your mission is to get to a radio tower and get out of the Zombie infestation. Simple, we don’t need much here at show me games to have fun.

Zeds Dead

I played the game using two move controllers you can however play using the joypad or the Aim controller (Mr. Ashton prefered the Aim controller). I liked having both arms free to swing and aim two guns independently.

Movement in Arizona Sunshine is tackled in a couple of ways, with the move controllers we have the teleport or warp mechanic. You aim where you want to warp to. The camera goes black and comes back upon completion, it’s often referred to as blink warp or blink teleport. The Doom VR game will use Blink warp as its main mode of transport.

This can take awhile to get used to if you haven’t played many VR games, but you’ll soon be warping out quickly and smoothly without much issue.

The joypad or Aim controller will allow normal transport, using an analog stick. I personally find this mode of transport causes me a little discomfort dependant on the speed with which you travel.

If you look to the floor whilst in the game, a halo is shown, showing you your orientation to the camera. It’s recommended that you have yourself facing the camera as much as possible, as sometimes your aiming will be off due to the camera recognition of your positioning. The Vive version will no doubt be better due to multiple Lighthouses.

Boomstick

Shooting feels great here, headshots are extremely satisfying.  Dual wielding makes you feel awesome, especially during those pimp moments with a double head shot.

Plenty of firearms can be found dotted around the game, mainly pistols, but the occasional shotgun, SMG, or assault rifles are thrown in for good measure.

Sniper rifles are placed in a couple of areas in the game for you to have a dabble at long range head poppery. When using the sniper rifles you are looking down the scope it very fun.

Grenades however take a little while to get used to throwing. Well, at least my experience with the move controllers took a while. Due to the lack of weight, and the fact you have to actually throw the grenade there is a little mental disconnect. I ended up just under-arming everything I threw, then running away. My friend Ryan also had the same issue.

Door Is Ajar

During your meanderings through Arizona, you’ll happen across many cars, houses, and huts. One thing these all have in common is doors. Oh my, the doors.

Searching through abandoned vehicles, and buildings does warrant your time, but can be clunky with the move controllers. Reaching out out to open a door only to find you are a tad to close or frustratingly to far away happens often.

But walking down a highway, looking in the boot of cars is strangely immersive. Police cars often yield the most loot. But it’s worth searching other places. You may find a hidden weapon or two.

Brain Soup

Arizona Sunshine’s campaign took me approximately 3.5 hours to complete. I did it in one playthrough, stood up. With the exception of the mine level, I thoroughly enjoyed myself.

The mine level bugged me due to it’s darkness. Once I entered the mine, I was nervous but after 5 mins, my patience started to run thin. The awkward layout, the back tracking and the darkness even with the flashlight. I just wanted out. Now your experience may vary here, it was just one of my personal bug bares.

Once out of the mines, the rest of the game just cracked on at it’s nice pace.

Sarcy Shitbag

The games protagonist is a mouthy sarcastic shitbag. He’ll be chatty crap throughout the game. After 10 mins in I thought i was going to hate him, but I found myself warming to his nonsense. Also, due to the lack of actual story, he’s the only one speaking, so it would have gotten terribly dull without his gobby wit.

Press Start To join

Arizona Sunshine has a couple of game modes, Campaign and a Survival mode.

The Campaign we’ve just been through. The Survival mode, is exactly that. You must survive waves of zombies to score points and earn bragging rights.

Unlike the campaign, you can play this mode up to 4 players cooperatively. Which is pretty bloody sweet to be honest. Other than that there isn’t much else to say about it.

Wrapping up

Arizona Sunshine upon release for the Playstation was £9.99 for a limited time. The price then went up to £32.99. It’s price at the moment is £19.99.
Now I believe the cost of a game can and does effect the experience you may have with a game. It does me hence why I brought it up. Not that I have a specified monetary value per hour, but if something is finished in an hour and a half and it cost £50, I’d feel a little ripped off.

So my score is based on the amount paid and the current price (£19.99)

For that price I believe you are getting a fun, stress relieving game, which you could have fun with friends.

PROS 

• Smooth shooting experience
• Co-Op game modes
• Reasonable price

CONS

• Not much content
• Annoying as fuck mine level

VERDICT

7.4/10

The post Arizona Sunshine appeared first on Show Me Games - Independent Gaming Site, and Community.

Ark: Survival Evolved

• Developers: Studio Wildcard, Instinct Games, Virtual Basement, Efecto Studios
• Publisher: Studio Wildcard
• Genre: RPG
• Players: 1-75
• Platforms: PC, Playstation 4, Xbox One
• Release Date: June 2015 (Early Access)
• Microtransactions: None

Goodbye Life

Thrown on to Jurassic Park island! That’s how it feels anyway. Let’s jump in on the beautiful game that is Ark: Survival Evolved. Let’s start with what this game is lacking…any story whatsoever! There is nothing when you begin, no cut scene, no tutorial no nothing. Or there wasn’t when I’ve been playing it. I know it’s still in testing blah blah it’s been like that for years. A little something would have been nice.

Now I have let off some steam with that let’s get in to the gameplay, you wake up with nothing and a little bit of cloth to cover your bits, not knowing what to do or where to go, your first spawn could even be next to an aggressive dinosaur, where you die horribly in seconds and have to spawn in again. Once that is over with and you are in a safe spot, you can check out the beautiful scenery and how to play the game.

Punch trees and pick up rocks to get some materials, make yourself a pick and hatchet to help harvest them, level up in the lower levels nice and quick aaaaaaaaaaaand you are starving or dehydrated…run in to the water to drink, punch dodos to death and cook their meat on a campfire, you do what you have to to survive.

It’s a steep learning curve but you get used to it, a few levels in and you realise you can assign engrams to make some cool stuff! Melee weapons, ranged weapons, clothes, structures it’s all there, this is where you look at what you can unlock at level 80 and realise you have to get it! Goodbye life and hello ark!

Hello Ark

It’s got some glitches and it’s not perfect but this is one addictive game, started on the PC over a year ago and now it’s on console, it’s hard to get away. You build a 2x2x2 house out of thatch with a campfire and a storage box, realise you can upgrade the house to wood, then stone, then metal…you can make the house bigger, add floors, ladders, hatches, dinosaur gates for your tamed dinos, it goes on. It’s a builders dream, you just need to make sure you are in the right area and T Rex doesn’t walk past every 5 minutes.

Once you get to grips with the engrams and building its time to look at the fun stuff…the dinosaurs! Yeah that’s right you can tame the things, although it’s not easy and it’s not quick. You need to get your hands on some narcotics, which come from the plants dotted around everywhere, make yourself some narcotic arrows or stick to just beating a dinosaur unconscious with a club. Now comes the mind numbing task of taming the dinosaur, where you need the narcotics to keep it unconscious, and some food so it likes you. Then there’s the task of making sure no other player kills it or a wild dino kills it.

3 hours later, 400 bits of food and 300 narcotic berries and you have a dinosaur! Might be a slight exaggeration but that’s what happens later on when you tame higher level better dinos. The lower end ones usually take 5 minutes to an hour max.

Fast forward a week, you have a massive house with many floors, 25 dinosaurs all called something like Dave or Daisy, having a total of 12 hours sleep in 7 days, Ark life has kicked in. Once you get to around level 30 the dinosaurs open up a bit more, you can craft saddles for a lot of them and realise you can now get a saddle for a pteradon, it’s time to fly!

This in itself is great but it causes more problems, you find a better spot for your base, on the other side of the map! I think we relocated 4 times…it’s never fun.

Tribal Mentality

Playing on the online servers you can make a tribe for you and your buddies to get together and make mansions, group up to take down bigger and better dinos, or just watch each other die horribly and launch an arrow to their knee. Again this has a downside…others can do the same and others can blow holes in your base and steal everything you have worked hard for, killing Dave in the process (RIP little buddy). This game on PVP can be harsh, very harsh. But you pick yourselves up, fortify the base, add defences and try again, taming bigger and better dinos and leave them on aggressive so if it happens again the dinos get to play.

You start to become a master at this game and wonder what else the ark game offers, baby dinosaurs! Yes, that’s right you can play some Barry White and have them mate. Combining the stats of the mum and dad dino to create one with better stats, also just look at them!

Raising a baby dino is like taming an adult one, but 10 times harder and 10 times longer, I think I had to keep one fed for 2 days…2 days! It was worth it in the end and my Argentavis bird called Argelina Jolie is a beast. Get creative with them names! Dodo Baggins (Dodo), Ptaylor Swift (Pteradon), the list goes on…or just Dave (RIP little buddy)

I would definitely say grab a pick and have a bash at this game, it’s not for everyone, but I am most definitely addicted.

PROS

• In depth building
• Taming dinos
• Graphics

CONS

• No real story
• No tutorials

Verdict

8/10

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