Call Of Duty: Advanced Nowhere, Review

Call of Duty: Advanced warfare, the latest installment

in a gaming franchise that represents everything wrong with games today.

The issue with Call of Duty is its economy of scale. The franchise has grown exponentially to be one of the most popular games franchise in history. The franchise has however just become a bloated cash cow with the likes of Activision in a frenzied state of cash grabbing, manipulation and pure market penetration and saturation.

Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare is like a pyramid scheme, only there to make as much money for those at the top while offering as little as possible to those at the bottom (the customer). Call of Duty has been the same copy and paste job for the last 6 years offering a limited campaign, broken peer to peer multiplayer with no signs of actual dedicated servers appearing anytime soon.

For a franchise that has been going for a while, one would think there would be enough experience among developers and publishers to give us an evolved game that improves on the last with some original game play mechanics, not just last minute jet packs, to appeal to 8 year old children.

The game was absolutely imbalanced from day one with an overwhelming majority of players

using the Bal-27 and the ASM1, that’s two guns out of approximately 20. What this shows is the disregard for common sense and lack of respect they have for consumers. These mistakes only end up with the community voicing its anger,
resulting in various “Nerfs and Buffs” to make the game a little more playable, if you chose not to be a Bal-27 sheeple. The best part of the entire game are the rendered cut scenes in the campaign where great visuals and voice acting offer a glimpse of the technology should give us.

The fact that Call of Duty still hasn't provided dedicated servers is unbelievable as Battlefield can do it, a direct competitor. Too often the host ‘rage quits’ and the game ends prematurely, or you experience players lagging yet somehow always managing to come out on top! The multiplayer is just a shooting gallery of mindless Rambo style players in it for themselves with little appreciation for team work.

It’s time the Corporation of Duty: Money Warfare remind themselves of their duty to have a little respect for their consumer base and give a little more than just explosions, jet packs and lasers! Those who played Call of Duty 10 years ago are not still 12 year old kids!! 

Alien Isolation, Review

Alien Isolation

Alien Isolation, for me, was my favourite game of 2014. Alien isolation is bursting with atmosphere with environments faithfully recreated in a retro fashion in keeping with the original movie by Ridley Scott. The soundtrack to the game is absolutely brilliant, dynamically changing when you encounter the Alien itself and calms in moments of respite. Rarely has a games musical fruition played such an integral role in raising my heartbeat or lulling me into a false sense of security just to be pounced on and killed by a Xenomorph.

There was an overriding sense of genuine care taken by the developers The Creative Assembly and published by Sega. After the disgrace that was Alien: Colonial Marines, it seemed as though fans of the franchise would never get the game they deserved. That was however, until, Alien Isolation arrived! The game itself has some of the best graphics of any available on console and PC with some of the most visually stunning and immersive environments offering a claustrophobic 25 hours of gameplay that had me glued to the TV, in the dark with my Headset on full. When you find yourself walking slowly through the medical station with bodies lying torn up all around you, with beep of your motion tracker ticking and suddenly the Alien crashes from a vent in the roof and you’re suddenly forced to hide. These moments gave me more than my fair share of scares, which is unusual.

What makes the Alien such a menacing obstacle is the non-scripted AI, meaning the Aliens movement can’t be predicted and you can try and second guess it at your own peril. There were many times I thought the Alien had gone round a corner and through a door just to do a 180 turn and come charging at me, resulting in the inevitable death scene.

The game has no automatic saves, relying on the player to reach static save points (modules on walls). This save mechanic, I feel, really added to the experience as it forced me to take my time and plan strategically, what route I planned to get to the next save point. The game does punish players for not following the rules. Running is an option but attracts so much noise the Alien will appear and will be more aggressive and actively hunt the source of noise (the player), making progression slow and painful at times. The trusty motion tracker gives an idea of distance and direction of danger but even your one saving grace has a drawback, the beeps attract the Alien and it will again hunt and kill you if not used with caution. 

The game itself was met with generally good reviews except a few stating the games length as an issue as well as the difficulty. I find it ridiculous a review would site a game being a few hours too long as an issue, that's more value for our money as far as i'm concerned. As for the static save points, that manage pace in a game where pace and planning is everything, I see no issue there either. The game is meant to played in a way that is faithful to the original movie, not some Rambo/Call of Duty fest where running and gunning like headless chickens wins the day!!

Fatalities, Brutalities....FINISH HIM, Mortal kombat X review

Mortal Kombat X

The words fatality and "get over here" are synonymous with everyone's favourite violent beat 'em up and violent is an apt description for the franchises latest iteration, Mortal Kombat X.

The improvements span the entire game, and for the most part, the game feels fresh, new and a genuine attempt at bringing Mortal Kombat to the next Gen. The graphics are great for a beat 'em up, the game play is smooth and flows well. The campaign is good fun, but not nearly as lengthy as MK9’s brilliant story mode. NetherRealm studios do a good job with introducing the story, with quick time events and contextual fights thrown in for added fun. The story however didn't hold up in my opinion as I found all the old characters that I really care about, Baraka, Night wolf, Rain, The cyborgs (to name a couple) were rarely seen, if at all, throughout, only for one of them to be killed off half way through by my new favourite D’Vorah.

Too much of the game was spent focused on the four new generation of fighters, Cassie Cage, Jaqueline Briggs, Kung Jin and Takashi Takeda. While the characters are interesting enough, I felt as though the other characters that make the franchise memorable for millions were not given enough time to be fully fleshed out. More time playing as Sub-Zero or Kotal Kahn would have been great, especially as the new Bad guy Kotal Kahn seems a bit of a wimp getting slapped about in all his engagements, it just felt loosely put together on occasion and would probably have benefited from an extra 2 hours to fully make the campaign a worthwhile experience.

The multiplayer is expansive with every game mode you’d expect from a fighter, plus more. Online and offline modes offer plenty to stuck into, including the new faction war, where players pick one of five factions to fight for. Points earned through wining matches, meeting specific targets and faction specific challenges all contribute to leveling up your profile as well as your faction. There is however little incentive to compete fully after it become apparent you've picked the losing faction while Lin Kuei have an overriding majority of players while Special forces around 6%. There is nothing stopping players from switching to the winning faction to get a reward then simply switch to whatever one is winning next. 

The faction war concept initially  got me excited but after waiting over 45 minutes to play a single faction match it quickly seem a good idea on paper, not fully realised, and that is a shame.