WHAT I’M PLAYING – BattleCry: Far-Goat Simulator

Over the weekend I started playing Goat Simulator and quite enjoyed the time I spent in Goat Ville. The game is essentially just a fun physics engine, with a goat as the lead. There are a lot of fun little jokes scattered throughout, with a lot of winks towards popular memes and pop culture news.

Goat Simulator is the latest in goat simulation technology.

Goat Simulator is the latest in goat simulation technology.

I probably won’t be playing the game that long though. I got it primarily for the achievements, which are pretty easy, and the lol’s. So once those are acquired, I don’t see myself playing the game much more.

The game was originally designed as a joke, internally in the Coffee Stains studio, during a one month game-jam, and a video was posted online for a laugh. It gathered such a following that the group decided to polish, and release it. The developer stated the game was designed as “an old school skating game, except instead of being a skater, you’re a goat, and instead of doing tricks, you wreck stuff”.

Originally released last year on Steam, the game has since been released on other operating systems, and mobile. The release on the Xbox 360 and Xbox One was its first time on a console.

Keep an eye out for the review.

Lately I had been spending a lot of time on the FPS genre, and I’ve had a hard time sticking with one title. I had originally started Far Cry 4 and then Battlefield: Hardline was released. I played Hardline during the EA Access window, and then didn’t go back, relegated to the backburner.

After I needed a little break from Far Cry 4 I jumped into Call of Duty Ghosts. I quickly wrapped that up within a couple sittings. I need to quickly jump back in to get a few achievements and then I’ll jump back to Far Cry 4 for the remainder of the week.

Battlefield_HardlineThis past weekend I did jump into Hardline while I was testing some Twitch Streaming and game recording, and managed to complete a few more of the story campaign missions. I think this weekend I’ll play more of that as well, but I am definitely falling behind on Far Cry 4Hardline has been fun, but it definitely is not a Battlefield game.  It’s primarily stealth based, and when its not, its a difficult shooter – as a cop, I guess you’re not really meant to shoot people, or absorb bullets. Ammo is limited, and the shootouts are intense, as they’re typically in claustrophobic areas, normally not pre-meditated, but defensive, stressful, and usually outnumbered shootouts. If that’s the intent, its pulled off well.

The single player does look pretty good, but sadly not as good as its Battlefield predecessor in any aspects but the cut-scenes. Single player luckily does look better than the multiplayer, but that component, while it does hold its own, still doesn’t feel as immersive as Battlefield 4.


Other newer/older/other games on the horizon:

NeverWinter is free to play, so I might give that a shot, even though my previous post a week or so ago said I would never. We’ll see. I said “never” to Goat Simulator too, and see what happened?

Assassin’s Creed Chronicles: China has been released, and acquired, so I’ll be playing that. I also have Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag to play more, and GTA V (Xbox One) to play and take lovely photos in.

Borderlands: The Handsome Collection is waiting. I’ve started with the Pre-Sequel in co-op, so I’ll have to spend more time on Pandora. But again, it’s another FPS, a genre that I’m pretty burnt out on.

Besides that, I have quite the backlog of games I haven’t even opened yet – waiting, eager – on my shelf, or digital library. All in due time games, all in due time:

Metro Redux, TellTale Bundle (Borderlands, Game of Thrones, Wolf Among Us), Shadow of Mordor.  So many :'(.


Keep an eye out for more Far Cry 4, and Battlefield: Hardline info, screenshots and reviews soon, and Goat Simulator review tomorrow. New feature: Achievement of the Week, on Sunday

NEWS – New Game Tuesday and New News Tuesday

Welcome to Tuesday. We got some new games and some news.


Big releases this week are Assassin’s Creed Chronicles: China, and Goat Simulator. 

And the big news includes: Write/Director Leaves Gearbox, New Microsoft IP, Steam Features, Halo 5:Guardians, Alan Wake Sequel?, Gears of War Cinematic Director Leaves Epic for Black Tusk, Destiny, and this week’s Xbox Deals With Gold.


assassin_s_creed_chronicles_china

Assassin’s Creed Chronicles: China (PS4, PS3, XBox One, PC) – Chronicles is a series of 2.5D Assassin’s Creed games developed by Climax Studios, and published by Ubisoft. The games will feature a new protagonist. China’s protagonist is Jun, who was trained by Ezio Auditore.

The follow up games later this year will be Chronicles: India, and Chronicles: Russia.

 

Release Trailer below shows the story and gameplay. I’ll be picking this up shortly and playing through it. The art style and gameplay looks intriguing, and I’m all about the Assassin’s Creed titles.

goats

Goat Simulator (XBox One, XBox 360) – Finally released on all the Xboxs, Goat Simulator is here. I played some over the weekend, and I’ll be talking more about it tomorrow, with a review on Thursday.

Trailer


On to some news for Tuesday:

Writer/Director Leaves Gearbox

Matthew Armstrong has left Gearbox Software. Credited as a writer and game design director of Borderlands.

“Things changed. No longer working at @GearboxSoftware. I will always love Gearbox, but it’s adventure time.”

New Microsoft IP at E3 2015

Xbox head Phil Spencer announced that new exclusive IP would be announced this June at E3 2015. He confirmed that it would not be another military space marine game or racing title.

I’m excited about E3. And I’ll be live blogging the day of the press conferences, June 15. So look out for that.

Steam Features Unlocked to Paying Customers

Valve announced that, in a move to protect its customers against spamming and phishing, it would be locking some of its features to all but paying customers.

Users who have not spent the $5 will not have access to features such as sending friend invites, voting on Greenlight, or submitting content on the Steam workshop.

New Halo 5: Guardians Trailer

Regardless of the fact that its a trailer announcing pre-order bonuses, it is a pretty cool gameplay trailer showing off new weapons and abilities. The trailer focuses on Spartan Locke taking out Covenant in pursuit of Master Chief.

Alan Wake Sequel Possibilities

Remedy has announced that even though the Alan Wake 2 sequel project was scrapped, a prototype was created after the first was released. The company opted to work on their next game Quantum Break instead. But the possibilities are still there.

“For Alan Wake, from the get-go, we assumed there was going to be a sequel and we mapped things further out when it came to character, story, details and focus changes. We knew we would have to iterate and refine, but there was always a rough road map there.”

Remedy is 100 percent focused on the upcoming Xbox One exclusive Quantum Break, which was just recently delayed until 2016.

Epic Cinematic Director Leaves Epic

Greg M. Mitchell, who was previously responsible for the cinematics in the Gears of War franchise, has left Epic Games to join Black Tusk Studios, to most likely work on, yup, cinematics, on the next Gears of War game. Way to branch out.

“BIG NEWS!! I’m leaving Epic, but heading to @blacktuskstudio to work on #Gearsofwar!! I’ll quote Marcus Fenix, by saying “NICE!!” :)”

Destiny’s House of Wolves Reveal Trailer

Destiny has launched a newer trailer showing off some new information about the upcoming DLC House of Wolves: New social space, new characters, new gear upgrades.

There’ll be a Twitch reveal tomorrow.

XBox Deals With Gold

Mostly Call of Duty games this week on sale. Maybe it’s time to get Advanced Warfare? Let’s see . . . (nope):

Call of Duty: Ghosts and Ghosts Hardened Edition are 60% and 40% off on the Xbox One, respectfully, and Never Alone is 40% off. Ghost review is upcoming, and check out the review for Never Alone here.

Ghosts, Black Ops II, and COD 3 are on sale as well, on the Xbox 360.


That’s all for today. Check in tomorrow for thoughts and impressions of Goat Simulator, and Thursday for the review.

It’s raining, so don’t go outside.

-iRogan

Games Needing to be Played, and News Needing to be Read

…But not really. News is not important. It’ll be there tomorrow too. And the next day.


Some times I go through weird phases where I’m just absolutely addicted to playing games and everything else suffers. Currently I’m playing the following:

  • Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag –  To fill my 3rd person, open world, platformer void. To play an Ubisoft open world game, requires somewhat of a balancing act in priorities. Their games are typically filled with activities to complete, sights to see, side missions to pursue and stories to experience. The struggle is trying to balance these equally. Focus on one, and you start to get the feeling you’re missing out on the world around you, or your perks and upgrades are falling behind. Or, the dread of missing something entirely, which can’t be recovered. It’s stressful.
  • Battlefield: Hardline – To fill my FPS void. This is currently the freshest game on the market, and I don’t typically play games fresh. Normally to avoid bugs or server issues, or just my back-log of games. In this case I’m playing it for the single player campaign. And enjoying it! Stealth Battlefield, who knew! Continue to check back for my impressions, and Review.
  • Cities: Skylines – These type of games are great, but they’re a time sink. So going forward, to ensure I don’t lose focus on my other endeavors, I’ll probably just have to set a timer. Play the game, improve my city. Take a break until tomorrow. Continue to check back for my ongoing impressions and Review.
  • Sniper Elite 3 – Currently playing this in co-op with a friend. We’re about half way through, and we are not the stealthiest bunch.
  • Forza Horizons 2 – Still playing through this, wrapping up the Storm Island DLC, some achievements, and will check out the Fast and the Furious DLC  next week.

    I usually don’t like to overlap games of the same genre (or more than one Ubisoft game), so Shadow of Mordor and Far Cry 3 are currently on hold, and currently waiting on a fourth, to try out the GTA V Heists, but luckily nothing else new or notable is on the immediate horizon.

neveralone

Tomorrow I’ll be posting a new Review, of Never Alone, and I’m thinking about a new weekly feature centered around Achievements. Just gotta think of the concept and logistics – pretty much everything actually. Achievements are a pretty big deal to me.

And now, this:


OneDrive Supports Music

Microsoft announced today that the free cloud storage, OneDrive, included with Microsoft products, and Xbox, will support music uploads, which can be streamed through the Xbox Music app. The only issue I still have is that the app needs to be snapped to the side. Once minimized, the music stops. This is disappointing, as the 360 has the background music functionality. Hopefully this potential update comes soon, if they’re even working on it?

Nintendo Mobile Clarification

Further clarification came out today about the enlightening news regarding Nintendo’s mobile plans. As reported yesterday, Nintendo has partnered with DeNA to develop a mobile platform and service. Nintendo confirmed that they will be the ones developing the mobile games, with hopefully their first releases later this year, and DeNA will be developing the services to run on multiple types of devices.

Star Craft is Ending?

The Star Craft story is coming to an end. Revealed today, Blizzard has stated that the next expansion to Star Craft II, Legacy of the Void will be the conclusion to the Star Craft story, started way way back in Star Craft 1. They stated that the franchise will continue on, but the characters for now, fates sealed, will see a satisfying conclusion to their story.

Halo: Nightfall Blu-Ray

I haven’t actually had the chance to watch this series yet. I did enjoy Forward Unto Dawn, for the most part, but this new series has received mixed reviews, even with a notable producer in ridley Scott, and a larger budget.

The Master Chief Collection, however, is finally more stable, and I’ve been able to plug through more of the Halo 1-4 campaign missions in weekly late night co-op. 343 Guilty Spark in Halo: CE is still the buggiest level, nearly game breaking at points, but we made it through, thankfully, and we’re now able to complete the campaign.

Forward Unto Games!

-iRogan


What I’m Playing, Pipe-line Projects, and your News Fix

As Assassin’s Creed IV – Black Flag warms up, and I’m loaded into the head office of Abstergo Entetainment, I’m happy to see the triangle logo is still in place. Curiously missing or at least less prominent in the last few Creed title, I was beginning to worry they had done away with the logo entirely. Worrisome, considering I do have the tattoo on my wrist.

Animus Unite

Animus Unite

Assassin’s Creed IV – Black Flag, not really considered a new release anymore. Can’t fault me for sticking to my slow methodical pace through some of the AAA titles on my shelf. Not that I don’t bang off a new title now and then, but it really needs to grab my attention. Or must stray from the default 3rd person Ubisoft Open World platform genres, FPS, or Racing title.

But when it comes to the Assassin Creed title, I’m usually always at least one generation behind.

I think the title’s annual similarities is the reason. They sometimes take months to complete, and the next edition then comes out later that year, and is just more of the same type of game play with tweaks to the story. At least when you consider Assassin’s Creed II, Brotherhood, Revelations. III started the trend into the right direction, and then IV really is a breath of fresh air. Because you’re on a boat. Ha!


Assassin’s Creed IV is the current title under review, and as mentioned in an earlier post, I wrapped Never Alone (Kisima Ingitchuna) in co-op, so expect a quick review of that. I’m also playing Sniper Elite III in co-op, and playing through Forza Horizons 2 Storm Island DLC. In the pipeline is Far Cry 4, and Shadow of Mordor.

Lastly, I’ll be providing my first impressions of EA and Visceral’s Battlefield Hardline with the early Access on March 12th. Cities: Skylines is also on the list for the next PC game I want, but I’ll need to upgrade my graphics card first. So close :(.

Tomorrow morning I’ll be posting a friend’s review of Evolve, as she’s been playing it on the PC, and has some thoughts. Very nice of her to provide that.


To increase game-time, gotta get news-time out of the way…

Uncharted 4 Delay

Naughty Dog’s highly anticipated release of the next Uncharted game, 4: A Thief’s End has been delayed until spring 2016. It’s not uncommon for Naughty Dog to delay games, as they do have an incredibly high standard for their products. The wait will be worth it, and it gives me the extra time to save up for a PS4.

GTA Online Heists Launch Issues

Tell me if you’ve this before…Rockstar’s long waited Online Heists DLC update has had a bumpy start, as players are experiencing problems connecting. After about 24 hours the service seems to be more stable. This news isn’t entirely surprising as the GTA Online mode had a rocky start to begin with, and there’s been a lot of hype for this DLC to boot, so obviously a lot of people would be trying to play it as soon as they could. Now I just need some friends to play it with. 😦

Titanfall DLC for Free – One Year Anniversary

Celebrating the one year anniversary of Titanfall, the 3 DLC packs have been made free. This includes nine new maps. No use to me, as I had already purchased the season pass on launch, but this does give me the motivation to jump back into the game. Unknown is how long the free season pass will be available for.

Check my review from Titanfall: Not Here, but Here

Remember Me 2 is “Ready to be Made”

Capcom’s Remember Me developer, Dontnot, has made a statement that the sequel is, technically, ready to be made.

“We know what we would do for Remember Me 2,” said Dontnod creative director, Jean-Maxime Moris. “The main story has been written, we know what we would add to the recipe. We know what we would fix. It’s a game that’s ready to be made, but that decision is Capcom’s to make.”

So development hasn’t been started. Better than no news I suppose. I have a lot of Reviews “ready to be made” too. They just have to be written first. :p

Check my review of the first game:  Remember Me

That’s all for now. Check out the Evolve review tomorrow.

Go Outside!

-iRogan

New Game Release Tuesday, and the Report

Tuesdays come and go, and my wallet becomes a tad lighter, and my game shelf, or Steam account, a little fuller. Also, after the break is some news. Tomorrow we’ll discuss current works in the pipeline, and what I’m playing.


We’ll start things off with some new and notable releases for Tuesday, March 10th, 2015:

  • DmC: Definitive Edition (Xbox One, PS4) – I played this game when it first came out on the 360 and really enjoyed it. It was very stylized, quick paced, and didn’t require the same amount of  practiced button mashing sequences it’s predecessors required. Definitive Edition includes the DLC and some different modes. I don’t need to re-buy it.
  • Hotline Miani 2: Wrong Number (PS4, PC) – I played the first on the PC, and will likely play this one as well. The first was original, and colourful, and brutal. And difficult. While it was interesting, I quickly found it to be repetitive, and inevitably didn’t make it much further than the first few levels.
  • Assassin’s Creed Rogue (PC) – The PC release of last year’s, last-gen finale to the Assassin’s Creed III and IV Black Flag trilogy. This game came out the same week that Assassin’s Creed Unity was released on the current gen consoles, and was plagued with some bugs and lack of polish.
  • Cities: Skylines (PC) – I’ve always loved simulation games. I’ve never been particularly good at them, as I’m usually pretty quick to go bankrupt. That being said I am excited for this new City Sim game. Reading through some of the reviews, the game sounds like a better version of the SimCity reboot in scale and management, but lacks the visual quality and helpfulness if something is going wrong within the city, and does not have any disasters to play with. Very excited to try this out.
  • Far Cry 4: Valley of Yetis (Xbox One and PS4) – DLC for Far Cry 4. A further reminder that I have yet to open this game, yet its been sitting shiny on my shelf since November.

In other news…

Turkey Bans Minecraft?

Last month, the country’s family and social policies department initiated an investigation into Minecraft, for allegations that it’s too violent. Arguably, Minecraft is a game that encourages creativity. Granted, there are monsters in the game, and you have some weapons to defend yourself, but the game doesn’t encourage the player to attack the other players or villagers. As of today, the proposal to outright ban Minecraft is moving forward, as the report shows that the game is too violent.

Who knew?

Xbox’s Weekly Gold Deals

The latest offering of Deals with Gold for Xbox Live Gold subscribers is up, offering some new discounts for established titles. XBox One has 2013’s Tomb Raider Definitive Edition on sale, Ryse: Son of Rome Legendary Edition, and Dragon Age: Inquisition. Xbox 360 has 3 Assassin Creed games for sale: Assassin’s Creed, Assassin’s Creed Revelations, and Assassin’s Creed III.

Battlefield Lo-Res

Visceral Games announced today that Battlefield Hardline, the next installment in EA’s Battlefield franchise, won’t be able to hit today’s standard TV resolution (1080p) on either major console.

As Visceral is targeting 60 frames per second, Battlefield Hardline will run at 720p on the Xbox One and 900p on the PlayStation 4. This is the same situation as we saw for Battlefield 4, which launched at the end of 2013.

Hardline on the PC will be optimized for 1080P of course, with higher quality settings. March 17th is the launch. I’ll be playing it March 12th, with EA Access, to let you know my impressions.


Out!
-iRogan