Welcome back for another month of glorious gaming chatter here at TSA, and since this is the first ‘what we played’ of February, we thought we’d do something a little different this time around. Instead of the normal format, we were thinking we’d just tell you about the video games we’ve played over the past week. We hope you don’t mind such a dramatic shift in presentation for this piece.
We’ll start off this week with teflon’s inability to play a game he intended to try multiple times this week, Lara Croft and the Temple of Osiris. He even had a couple of co-op buddies lined up in Youles and Bunimomike, but it looks like their cooperative raiding of tombs will have to wait until Monday. Teflon did manage to find time for a bit of Dying Light this week, as well as (wait for it)… Destiny.
Dom keeps us going next with a bit of handheld gaming that wasn’t really handheld gaming at all, thanks to the wonderment that is the PlayStation TV. He has quite enjoyed playing Vita games such as Freedom Wars on a bigger screen, and being able to play them with a controller has also been a big plus for him. Dom also spent some time with Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate for review, and he’s still trying to finish Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag, noting that side missions continue to distract him from his primary objectives.
Jim isn’t the biggest fan of racing games (sim racers in particular) but you wouldn’t know that by looking at what he played this week. He started with Mario Kart 8, racing against his housemates for bragging rights, but he soon moved on to Driveclub, a game that’s close enough to an arcade-style racer to keep him interested. After that he rounded out his week with Dying Light, and he had some specific thoughts to share.
Having played Techland’s Dead Island when it launched back in 2011, their latest title felt instantly familiar. However, the more I have played, the more Dying Light has distanced itself from its predecessor. This separation is manifested mainly within its navigation parkour mechanics. For those wondering, the game’s free-running doesn’t quite mimic that seen in DICE’s Mirror’s Edge. Instead, it feels like a first person Uncharted or Assassin’s Creed, giving players a versatile and quick way to travel through the city of Harran. I won’t go into that much more detail now, check out tomorrow’s review!
Speaking of Dying Light, Tuffcub also spent some time with it and particularly enjoyed the co-op. He also noted that a few of the scarier moments in the game had him looking for a new pair of pants. On the handheld side, he played a bit more Baboon and threw in some Kick and Fennick for good measure, the latter of which he said was “extremely charming and lovely.”
Aran is up next and finished Saints Row IV Re-elected to start the week, an entry into the franchise that he says is the best one yet. He’s also been playing the Escapist for review, and a bit of Far Cry 4 as well, which might explain his sudden infatuation with elephants and prison-escape schemes.
Blair brings us down the home stretch this week and although he hasn’t had as much time to play games as he’d like, he did get to finish Majora’s Mask 3D and chime in a few details for those that missed his review.
It’s a remake done right, with lots of changes to modernise the game, but this may have a lot of diehard fans yearning for the more hardcore gameplay of the original. If only they had included a hard mode…
As for me, I didn’t have a chance to play anything for the final few days of the week but the beginning of the week did see me starting and finishing the flashy Resident Evil remaster that just released. I remember playing a metric ton of that game back in the 90’s but after beating it a few days ago, I’m not certain I ever actually saw the credits roll on the original PlayStation. The final area I explored with Chris and the final battle of the game didn’t look even remotely familiar to me, yet I remembered almost exactly where everything was when playing through the mansion.
So that’ll about do it for us this week. Since we did something so drastically different than normal with this article this week, we thought maybe you’d want to do something a little different too and head to the comments and let us know what you’ve been playing. I know, that’s not how this normally works but we think it might just work out and we’d love to know what you’ve been up to.
The Lone Steven
Picked up Far Cry 4 this week and it is excellent. It’s Far Cry 3 but with a few improvements. Stealth is improved this time around. No longer do you have to make the choice of taking out this guy and hoping his corpse is overlooked by his friend or find another way around. You are now able to hide bodies and this helps the stealth aspect of gameplay. Wildlife has a bigger role this time around due to the new bait mechanic. Throw a bit of meat and predators can take down your enemy but it can also backfire on you. AI seems to be a bit smarter but i can’t tell if it’s improved or if everyone retains the run towards the Rambo wannabe with a heavy machine gun attitude yet. That said, i can’t remember if Far Cry 3 did that so i could be wrong.
Kyrat, it’s wonderful and whilst it does risk being a bit generic in some places, it’s a wonderful place. So far.
There are a lot more side activities this time around and hopefully, all of them will be fun. I will confess, the hostage activity seems to be go here, save them and repeat untill all hostage activites are done. Hopefully, i’m wrong and every hostage activity is different and fun.
I also took an entire outpost out with a single arrow and nature on my side. Seriously, if you see an elephant locked in a cage, release it and watch the carnage!
Also, animals are dicks in Kyrat.
I also played Shadow of Mordor and completed the main story. It’s a crap ending. The final boss is a damn quick time event and it very anti-climax. It makes me wonder if they ran out of time or they just could not be arsed to have an epic final big boss fight. I hate it when games with a perfectly good combat system sacrifice good fights for a cheap QTE. Would pick up the sequel if they did one and Warner will probably want another Shadow of Mordor made in the future. Hopefully, it won’t become the one game that binds all Middle Earth Games. The One Game to rule them all. We need more Middle Earth Games. More RPGs for Middle Earth, more massive open world Middle Earth games and so forth.
element666
This week I completed Advanced Warfare on veteran,was expecting more of a challenge to be honest.
Also I’m closing in on the platinum for lego Batman 3 and I’ve been playing Destiny as is the norm!
TSBonyman
Dragon Age Inq, around 75 hours in and have no idea where i am in terms of finishing the story but i have just completed the ballroom mission. Still loads to do.
Driveclub, mostly in Japan. In the rain. With a slidey car.
Binding of Isaac: Restart – i’m calling it that because i always do.
Also took a punt at some of the plus games.
Apotheon, i wasn’t sure what to expect but it’s quite good, nice art style and loads of different weapon choices.
Rogue Legacy, most of my attempts lasted a less than a minute. It might not keep me coming back like Binding of Isaac but i’ll give it another few goes.
Transistor, as i thought before i played it – i like everything about it except that the gameplay simply doesn’t appeal to me. The singing was lovely.
mugsybalone
Civ 5 and Elite Dangerous for me. Tried the Battlefield beta, but I’m clearly too old and slow for it. Or just not very good. Finished episode one of Life is Strange, which was brilliant, and fully recommend to fans of the Telltale games or just, y’know, people in general.
Starman
More Assassins Creed Rogue, which has the most collectibles of anything I’ve ever played I think.