After god-knows how many hours of trekking around the world for clues in the story's main questline, I finally arrived in the frozen isles of Skellige--this game's interpretation of a borderline Norse/Scots warrior's land. Upon arriving, I was immediately accosted by an inlander, angered for some odd reason. rather than continue to reason with this dude, I immediately decided to whip his ass. What ensued was a quick and bloody murder, not only cutting apart this hapless native but his faithful dog companion, as well. In a matter of seconds, I thought, "shit, what have I done?" He probably wasn't really a bad guy, and neither was his buddy. It was deaths like this--deaths that took place virtually unseen on a frigid shore of shipwrecks and scuttled cargo--that would haunt me the most, mainly because they carried no immediate repercussion. You're a superhuman hunter who is respected by some and feared by most, trying your best just to find one or two of the only people on earth you give a shit about. There's no karma system to baby you or stupid little popups to tell you "YOU DID A BAD." You have to live with your decisions, which may or may not branch out into things that effect the world at large. Another similar dilemma occurred as I agreed to help a brother-in-arms--a fellow Witcher named Lambert who was out for revenge. He wanted a certain man dead for supposedly assassinating a close friend, and after a dutiful adventure looping from one place to the next I had found my man. This person in particular told a different story: of a clumsy Witcher that had bungled a contract and went rogue, necessitating a punishment to put him down. This man was now reformed, had a family, and just wanted to put the weary threads of the past away. I was faced with the decision of whether or not to allow Lambert justice by way of the blade. I have to admit, it was the longest I have ever lingered on a single decision in any game before. I was either going to put a good man's fate in the hands of a deadly individual, or risk the friendship and camaraderie of one of Geralt's only confidantes. The result of the decision surprised me, of course--as The Witcher 3 often does with its absolutely stellar characters and writing. I don't know shit about the Witcher series except that it's about a genetically altered monster slayer and it's apparently Poland's greatest export to the world. Witcher 3, since early previews and the "literally 200 hours of content" claims, had been steadily gaining traction in the last year or so. With many people (myself included) feeling short-changed by 2014's multiplat offerings (Nintendo gets a pass for 2014 due to overall excellence), W3 developed into a kind of "chosen one" to circumvent all the lazy crap we had experienced. Bloodborne, to an extent, was just as hyped, but for all the poor plebs that only owned an Xbox or a PC, Witcher 3 was the next best thing. Just like Dragon Age's latest foray, I intended to jump in to a third entry in a series I had never experienced before. Well, 80 hours and 2 goddamn system iterations later, I have my sufficient impressions. Short answer would be that the game is very good and very engrossing, but also very potentially taxing to play optimally. The long answer is going to be me telling you why this game is a fucking masterpiece. Let me preface this by saying that, like Dishonored, I bought the console version of this game and hated it. Not only were the graphics a bit downsized on Day One, but the framerate...for fuck's sake, that framerate. Now, things may have probably been patched for the better since then, but on day-one with a day-one patch already in the wings, this game ran like shit. It was a jittery mess and I doubt that it was hardlocked to 30FPS; normally I'm never a stickler of framerates but this was beyond awful. When your game runs at 26fps or lower for a majority of the time, the quality of the experience suffers a lot. Shit, Shadow Of Mordor was locked in at 30FPS and never faltered once--the game looked and felt beautiful. With Witcher 3, however, the initial concessions made to put this beast on consoles were just too much for me. Lucky for me I had recently upgraded my laptop to a dedicated entry-level gaming rig. Although it was souped up to play most recent games well, I doubted if I could even play W3--it was, after all, the "new Crysis 3." This was the new benchmark for if your machine was worth a shit. I was pleasantly surprised to find that I could run W3 on mainly all high settings, and with a nice fullscreen resolution. To tell you the truth, I'm stunned; framerate is regularly 38 to 45, with very rare dips into 31-29 in a few instances. Compare this to the constant stuttering on the PS4 I had and you have my official warning that the entry to this wonderful game may be quite demanding. If you're fine with the console versions, that's cool--but for those of you who need that level of stability in visuals and motion, you might have to rethink your purchase or take a look at your hardware specs. Myself, I only had an nVidia 960m 2GB card, though backed up by an i7 with 16GB of RAM. This is, by all means, still a very entry-level laptop and I was still able to run this bad boy at a very acceptable clip. This is, of course, providing you're fine with setting at High Quality, with only shadows and water at a moderately lower texture resolution. Since I've wasted so much space with bullshit techtalk, I might as well talk about the visuals. Simply put, they're gorgeous; just walking around and taking in the sunsets, moonbeams, constant weather effects and windy plains is wondrous. W3 has probably some of the most impressive areas constructed in games to date, the design putting Mordor and Inquisition to shame. The sheer quality of character faces and expressions is commendable, as are the fluid motions and animations in general. It's a really, really pretty game to look at, even with the outcries of downgrades trying to stifle the wonder and awe at every location. The draw distance in particular is amazing, with distant locations and traveling NPCs visible as far as you can see. Pop-in is exceedingly rare here, espousing the holy grail of "if you can see it, you can get to it." This is as good a place as any to segue into talking about how much there is to see and do; compared to Inquisition, there's no contest. Just for comparison, when I played Inquisition I was mainly wandering through very empty and dull spaces, trying in vain to navigate poorly-constructed mountains or hills, getting pissed off at the terrible platforming and general malaise of exploring. When you get a quest, you just go and collect a thing, or several things--those fucking shards, most likely. You collect a thing over and over for people you don't even care about. You're the Herald of Andraste, for fuck's sake; why are you collecting sheep wool? Compare this to Witcher's system of easily moving through your surroundings, actually having a platforming aspect worth a shit, and a variety of different cities, settlements, towns, and spookhouses. Every quest matters in Witcher 3, and sometimes you'll go through a variety of steps and sequences and research before reaching the climactic end. You get supremely involved in every character's story, leading to all kinds of battles and Witcher contracts. Sure, most of them will inevitably lead to some kind of physical conflict, but the content peppered along the way has been sublime. There's a few formulas like Witcher-detective sense looking and monster research that get used often, but the locations and options for seeing things through are varied enough to keep every mission feel fresh. Some missions are humorous, some delving into Lovecraftian horrors, others dealing with domestic issues and exorcisms. It's a far cry from the "here's your mission, collect or kill a thing, and you get points" system in Inquisition, which got boring, impersonal, and bland. Quests are especially important in W3 since they're also the only real source of experience points, too. Some of the best items are received through off-track missions, as well--and I rarely ventured off the path to a sum of zero. Exploring in this game actually rewards you with so much, whether it's a new checkpoint, rare treasures, new NPCs to see, or elite fights. That I was in the 2nd and 3rd areas at 30 hours and barely completed 20% of this area--in a game with likely 5 or 6 more huge areas to explore--is very impressive. Equally impressive is how the story never really punishes you for expressing an opinion or a decision. In Inquisition, every fucking choice was met with a slew of "Dorian agrees, Solas disagrees, Fartface agrees" dragging across the bottom of the screen. You were told immediately if something you did or said was conducive or detrimental to your standing with others. There is no Conversation Wheel in Witcher 3; there are no set values to your dialogue or action choices. You do what you want, and the world changes--for better or worse. So you've got all these missions and storylines, but how's the actual play? Well, one way I'd describe it would be "high-octane Dark Souls in miniature, deluxe." By that I mean the combat is methodical, requires precision, and can decimate you quickly. It's standard lite/heavy attack/parry fare with your various sign magic thrown in, as well as crossbow or bombs for good measure. However, your fights will vary in deadliness depending on how often you consult your bestiary and see what each creature's weakness is. Doing a bit of reading can change the game for you, so being prepped with the right magic or potion is a must for some of the bigger bosses offered up. My experiences with these mechanics have been mixed, but mainly on the positive side. Playing on the Hard difficulty (Blood and Broken Bones) was taxing at the start but rewarding when I got into a good groove. It's the kind of combat where 3 enemies is tough, 4 is a chore, and anything above this on the same plain will be hellish for you (at least until you begin to vastly outlevel your opponents late in the game). Enemies don't take turns; this isn't Arkham City. Early in the game, you'll get fucked up if you charge into engagements like a moron, and rightly so. Luckily, you have a decent arsenal of support magic available--melting armor, blanking brains, or creating a shield to absorb a hit will serve you well, especially when you start leveling these magics up to do a variety of different effects. You might want your fire spell to focus on melting armor, or you might utilize a spell tree wherein it becomes a constant flamethrower. The skill tree thus far is varied enough to offer some neat playstyles, but how many you can equip depends on your level. And boy, does leveling take a while. Overall, after 60 hours or so getting used to the combat, I'm satisfied with it. It takes some brainpower to make use of your skills in the best way possible, and you're given ample options to customize what your modus operandi is for tackling enemies. Almost every spell or skill will come in use for a certain breed of beast, so it's up to you to strategize which upgrades benefit your playstyle. It's not the most complex fighting system in existence, but it's not the worst. It's definitely better than the MMO-style flailing you could fall into with Dragon Age. Playing as Geralt, a sarcastic yet somewhat altruistic and honorable white-haired dude, is pretty fun. The story beyond all the infinite sidequests concerns him trying to find an old protege--and a lot of missions concern themselves with finding or tracking down missing persons. SO far, it's been leading to some colorful places and characters, so I have no complaints. The writing thus far has been great, and many shades better than the "good or bad!?" choice wheel in other RPGs. As I've mentioned before, one of the reasons I love W3 so far is that there are no cut and dried good/evil options. You do as you please and deal with the consequences. After I accidentally instigated a murderous barroom brawl, I realized one of the drunk patrons was the missing brother I was supposed to find from an old sidequest. I had killed him, failing that mission. Hours and hours later, this was brought up again in a distant city, as a pub patron decried me as a murderer who had a penchant for instigating fatal fights. Other paths you take may shut out characters or events, so the world is constantly changing with your choices. You can work for free or haggle for monies when you come to collect. You can change sides midway through a contract or fulfill your original bargains. My nitpicks about W3 are mainly concerning difficulty and inventory management. As I've said before, the fights can be a bit brutal at high difficulty early on, and so many battles will require sustenance to maintain your HP. On higher levels of the game, some enemies can just becomes sponges to damage, turning into unfun slogs if you don't have the proper equipment. Additionally, taking down powerful groups of enemies will sometimes devolve the combat into a game of endless dodges and roll, sometimes giving the monsters a combination of speed and unblockable attacks that basically demands you just dodge/roll around at all times to have any hope of survival. It's a small blight on combat in general but one that lessens the fun of it. The inventory was initially a fucking mess, just like in every action RPG--full to the brim with questionable potion ingredients and trash heap junk. It's a dumb menu with even dumber, smaller text, but not a dealbreaker. It's best to ignore your alchemy stock unless you really want to sell off plants for 1gold each. Myself, I'm lucky to have divined even the basic health potion mechanics; everything else is a crapshoot. Good luck finding the right plants in the wild; you won't, and will just likely have to run back to an herbalist for everything anyway. As of this writing, though, the developers have long since patched the game with not only a variety of storage spaces in the overworld, but a greater degree of item filters and separation. Hats off to CDProjekt Red for taking the initiative to fix that. It's been 60+ hours. I have no idea if I'm closer to the endgame or not, but I'm currently at a spot where I'm required to gather people for a kind of epic showdown. Part of me assumes this is drawing to the "endgame," and yet I'm barely level 20; there are so many missions that suggest an even higher level. There are tons of hidden gear sets, ridiculous stories to uncover in the world, and mysteries to solve. To continue to offer and dangle interesting material after 60 hours in a game like this is comparable to the 50+ hours I spent with Xenoblade Chronicles on the Wii, which has to be some kind of record. That CDProjektRed has graciously put out small DLC packs for cards, side missions, and shiny new armor sets is even cooler--a company that has been supporting the game with tons of patchworks and great content since the first week in release. I'd strongly recommend Witcher 3, especially if you're coming out of Inquisition, tired and fatigued by badcombat and even shittier mission structure. The story was there, but the bullshit fetch quests abound didn't enthuse me to finish the game. Witcher 3 is definitely worth the time and effort to play, especially if you yearned for something more than BioWare has put out as of late. I've been obsessed with it since first booting it up. Is it really all we were lead to believe? First impressions and official game reviews seem to suggest yes. Witcher 3 is a viable GOTY candidate due to how incredibly massive it is with interesting content, characters, and places to go. I've thought about it often, certain experiences and decisions following me to the bitter end, always making me question if it was worth it to become altruistic in moments of strife, or to strike down others in a sound fury to prevent more suffering. You're not the chosen one, you're not a herald, and you're not a king--this is simply the collection of stories bound to a mercenary hunter. The mercy, vengeance, glory, and failure is yours to own and no one else's--you inherit the world's state without being bound by a realm of karma and definable reward. At the cusp of completeing the main storyline, I'd even go as far as to suggest W3 deserves a place in my all-time greats list, as well. It's just one of the best in its class, and a masterpiece in the action RPG genre. By definition, an RPG should strive to do more than offer numbers and inventory slots and abilities to equip--it should offer you a role. Seeing the world as Geralt and shaping the structure of his twilight adventure has been an utmost pleasure; a triumph of RPG design, writing, and technical attention. September is less than a month away, which means the Gamespocalypse is upon us. Yes, the nonstop barrage of games that doesn't even cease past December is coming, and we all need to prepare for the onslaught of preorders and potential disappointment. Next month is just the first stage of this "event" but it might be the most pertinent--at least before Fallout 4 in November. Ina lot of ways, it's an important cluster of releases: a swan song, an ultimate eventuality, a final quarterly effort, and a resurrection. These are, of course, MGSV, Super Mario Maker, Mad Max, and Destiny.
Yes, I know the last title on this list is a mindblowing thing to consider, but also consider this: Diablo 3 was in similar dire straights for a large part of its initial release. People fucking hated it alongside everything it shipped with. Now consider how awesome the Ultimate Evil edition is, and how revolutionary Reaper of Souls was for the redemption of the title. Destiny is, for the time being, looking like its Reaper of Souls moment could be coming just about a year after its initial release. The expansive revamp, titled The Taken King, comes in the middle of September and offers everything from the removal of gating content through Light (now gone) to a litany of easier, more fun objectives, tasks, and storyline material. Even that floaty robot is getting rewritten and re-voiced by everyone's favorite everyman, Nolan North. I never thought I'd see this day, but I'd strongly consider dipping my feet back into Destiny--a game that was fun yet flawed, and had eventually morphed so much that I felt the magic disappeared sometime last October. A year's exodus from a development fraught with changes and confusion has made me receptive to the new makeover, especially now that the wicked RNG system of raids and gating people from experiencing everything unless you owned a specific item set seems to be void. The main event is, of course, MGSV. What else can be said for it besides the gushing over rocket punches, goat kidnapping via airlift, and of course the HARSH REALITIES OF WAR. MGS, as a series, has always been such a strange and fascinating juxtaposition of philosophical and political ideals against the reality of being just a game, and one filled with goofy shit. There will not only be child soldiers and internal organ bombs, but horseshit traps and cardboard tanks to wear. It's the perfect cocktail of insanity in the tasty brew of espionage action, now upped considerably in the wake of the new and improved Fox Engine. Konami may be a major fuckup as of this writeup, but this is the last masterpiece they need to push out the door before they become hellbound forever. Mad Max has to be the unluckiest game on the list. Forced to follow up not only the best movie of the year so far AND releasing on the same day as Kojima Magnum Opus, the odds are already stacked against it. Add the fact that this is WB's followup after a disastrous and lackluster Batman release--with almost no real in-depth gameplay walkthroughs--and you've got a recipe for low sales numbers and MEDIOCRE reviews. I want to be optimistic for Mad Max, I really do--but more and more hands-on previews just seem to say it's depressingly average and we aren't really getting any other footage to suggest otherwise. Compare this to the hours of gameplay we've seen for MGSV and the uber chaos on display for the other Avalanche game, JC3. Super Mario Maker looks so amazing that it may in fact become the genesis of a new age in the franchise. No more will people have to download weird Kaizo hacks of Super Mario World; the essence of hard-as-nails, goofball Mario levels is now on the WiiU, and I didn't expect to want this little factory as much as I do now. Making a dramatic appearance at the new Nintendo World Championships, it's truly amazing how much we're going to be able to create with this game. Even better are things like online sharing, daily challenges, rankings, stats on level completions, and favorites--things I almost didn't think Nintendo would care to implement. It's looking like a fully-featured piece of software with enough lifeline to last eons. The Mario games of the future may not be in the hands of Nintendo anymore, but of those who take the time to master this new software. E3 BEST-OF-SHOW Technically, I'm incredibly late with this, but here we go: a bitesized group of things coming fairly soon and have tangible release windows. I would have done a detailed writeup on every conference but realized it wasn't worth anyone's fucking time to dig through so much text. Deus Ex: Mankind Divided Squeenix, non-entity trailers of things without any kind of release date aside, are in fantastic shape in the non-JRPG department. The sequel to the brilliant Human Revolution broke through with some great trailer gameplay, and an extended 20-minute walkthrough of a mission. Mankind Divided looks incredible in terms of visual fidelity and the awesome range of new abilities and mechanics being brought to the table. It stands to be the ultimate Deus Ex experience. I'm already predicting it becomes one of the best games of 2016. Just Cause 3 While Squeenix also showed the intriguing new Hitman series refresh, it was the definitive preview of JC3 that really blew my mind. With every new morsel of information about this chaos simulator, it becomes more and more apparent that JC3 is pure fun incarnate, brewed and bottled by the dozen. JC2 was tremendously hilarious and exciting, and with the debut of infinite C4, the wingsuit, and even more agreeable quality-of-life improvements, JC3 is yet another Squeenix game that is going to blow the roof off due to its sense of freedom. Mirror's Edge My fears about Mirror's Edge: Catalyst were cast aside as the details about the new open world setting slowly trickled in. "No guns and no boundaries--Faith IS the weapon," was the platitude recited, and so there was much rejoicing. It's good to know EA GETS it, and several gameplay demos were reported as very positive. The world's most interesting first-person game is bound to be a very welcome start to the year come 2016. Later on, Gamescom footage would all but confirm that the series was headed in the right direction. MGS5 What more can be said about Kojim'a magnum opus? It's shaping up to be the ultimate stealth action game, with a wondrous variety of tools, options, strategies and side-ops. Unlike the other open world games set to come out, The Phantom Pain, is a strange and surreal mix of the weird and the serious espionage. It's essentially the Just Cause for the more subtle action protagonist--if utilizing things like mini-robot walkers and horseshit traps is subtle. It took a long way to go from MGS2's cold corridors to MGS3's jungle warfare to the wide-encompassing ultimatum of MGSV--but the wait is going to be worth it. It combines the best aspects of Metal Gear in an engaging, do-as-you-like package. Expect nothing less than a masterpiece. Super Mario Maker See above. Fallout 4 It was Bethesda's first foray into a centralized conference of E3, and the first of the entire show to boot. With so much riding on Fallout's appearance, I was happy to see Bethesda offer an exciting look at how they've improved the game's 4th (5th?) entry. The customization for weapons, home bases, and character appearance represents a huge overhaul of the Gamebryo garbage dump standard, and even the overall graphics seem more approachable than the dumpster level of F3 and its ilk. Bethesda seems confident in the amount of shit they're pouring into this one, and even if it follows old-hat Fallout quirks, they'll be even more fun things to make and break apart. I'm still a little cautious about Fallout 4, but I'm definitely more stoked about the prospect of it than before. HONORABLE MENTION: HITMAN As mentioned previously, although Hitman was technically shown off with tangible gameplay, the guarantee that this series refresh offers zero microtransactions and a slew of free DLC updates is a gutsy, admirable move by Squeenix to take. It would be so easy to cough up bitesize bullshit into the franchise. The good people at IO went on record to say the game would be the largest Hitman ever on console, and things like season passes are "ripoffs" to customers that would not be injected into presales. Hitman could essentially be part of the best dual Christmas presents ever when it releases in December with Just Cause 3. *** === Special News Bulletin: Heir to the Throne === Everyone and their mom continues to mourn the loss of P.T., the Legendary Game That Will Never Be, along with the overall disintegration of the studio that brought us Castlevania, Contra, Silent Hill, and Metal Gear. While P.T. will eventually fade away someday as the last remaining PS4 harddrive croaks in a decade or so, a small studio named Lillith Ltd. has been secret toiling away at the spiritual successor to The Chosen One. Entitled "Allison Road," a 13-minute alpha demo has already given me nightmares--a good sign, I suppose, since P.T. was the first horror-related thing in any medium that has unnerved me in a long time. Although it's still about a year off from completion, the work that has been put into Allison Road so far is very encouraging. There's been talk of it migrating from a PC release to consoles soon, which makes sense given how broken people were about the PS4 losing its fascinating little demo. Honestly, Sony is batshit insane if they don't follow up with their "all your dreams will come true" approach from E3 and lock this new project into their release schedule. **** That's all for August; enjoy all the indie games PS4 pumps out and prepare for the glory to come in September. |
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