Something For The Weekend – 04/03/17

So, who’s been savouring a new Nintendo Switch? Who’s exploring the sublime The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild? Who’d playing the huge new open world game from Guerrilla Games, Horizon Zero Dawn?

It’s been a fantastic week for games, but whatever it is you’re up to I hope you’re having a lot of fun.

In the News This Week

• All the announcements from the Nintendo Switch Nindie Showcase
  Nintendo love their indies, and there’s tons of new games with exclusivity and special features just for Switch. SteamWorld Dig 2, Flipping Death, Runner3, WarGroove, Overcooked, Celeste and plenty more. Switch is going to be great if you like indie games.
• Microsoft announce Xbox Game Pass subscription service
  Download and play any of the 100 games on the service for £8 a month, including Halo 5 and Gears of War: Ultimate Edition. Oddly, quite a few people can’t get their head around what this entails!
• EA’s Peter Moore to become next Liverpool FC CEO this summer
  I certainly didn’t see this coming, but it’s a dream job for the lifelong Liverpool supporter. Hopefully he can help them in the Ultimate Team transfer market?
• Warner Bros. announced Middle-earth: Shadow of War
  And mentions Xbox Project Scorpio support!
• Orisa is Overwatch’s new centaur tank character
• Ubisoft announce a new Avatar game
  “The world, itself, is staggeringly well-fleshed out,” Bunimomike said. “I’d be up for a game in this universe. Just make it a good ‘un.”
• Oculus cuts prices on Oculus Rift and Touch controllers
• Over 900,000 PSVR headsets have been sold so far
  Running ahead of schedule, with the original target having been 1 million sold by mid-April.
• Donnie Yen to star in Sleeping Dogs movie
• London to get a parade of video game characters
  Welcome to Brexit Britain.
• PS+ to include Tearaway Unfolded, Disc Jam and Lumo in March

Games in Review

Our Horizon Zero Dawn review landed at the start of last week, but you can find it here. This week, however, was dominated by one game and one new games console.

• The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild – Switch, Wii U – 9/10
• forma.8 – PS4, XBO, Wii U, Vita, iOS PC – 8/10
• 1-2-Switch – Switch – 6/10
• LEGO Dimensions: The Lego Batman Movie Story Pack – PS4, XBO, PS3, X360, Wii U – 6/10
• Torment: Tides of Numenera – PS4, XBO, PC – 5/10
• Ghost Blade HD – PS4, XBO, Wii U, PC – 5/10
• theHunter: Call of the Wild – PC – 4/10
• Nintendo Switch – Hardware review, no score (but it’s good!)

This Week’s Features

Sadly, with the demands of reviewing the Nintendo Switch and the wonderful Breath of the Wild, it’s meant that a number of other previews and features have had to take a back seat. Still, I managed to take a look at Bulletstorm: Full Clip Edition, which is a game remaster I don’t think many people knew they wanted, how Milestone are taking a bit technological step forward with MXGP3 and Unreal Engine 4, and I talked about the fascinating Wildlands documentary that Ubisoft made to accompany their game.

Dom revisited Chime Sharp as it comes to console, talking about how it evolves the block-dropping genre of puzzle game, while Jake went hands on with Yooka-Laylee’s wonderfully retro platforming, which you can see in action here:

Following up on some of this week’s biggest releases, we had a huge interview with Guerrilla Games’ Samrat Sharma about Horizon Zero Dawn. In something of an addendum to our hardware review, I took a look at the Nintendo Switch’s online features and how Nintendo still have one foot in the past, and put together a quick guide to some of the accessories you might want to pick up if you’re getting a Switch.

Lastly, What We Played quite predictably featured the Nintendo Switch, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and Horizon Zero Dawn.

Trailer Park

Middle-earth: Shadow of War’s announcement trailer

See Styx: Shards of Darkness’ co-op play in action

Milestone announce off-road racer Gravel

Eddy Gordo returns to Tekken 7

Injustice 2’s Doctor Fate gets a gameplay reveal

Your Achievements

Youles gets us under way by restoring his 100% trophy record in Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare 2, completed Sniper Elite 4 on authentic difficulty with Crazy_Del alongside him, and blitzed the Watch Dogs 2 Human Conditions DLC, despite some annoying quirks to the mission structure. Busy week!

Speaking of Del, he’s also been enjoying For Honor with Tony C and Roynaldo as his online buddies. He’s already managed to prestige four of his characters!

Eldave0 succumbed to the excitement and casually bought a Nintendo Switch on his way home from work. All he’s played so far is the demo to Snipperclips, but he’s liking the hardware itself. The Division also saw a lot of play time from him, as he rounded off the main storyline and busied himself with the collectibles and encounters, and he finished Resident Evil 7 and made a start on the DLC.

The Week Ahead

What do we have to look forward to next week? Well, let me give you some of the highlights:

• Ghost Recon Wildlands – PS4, XBO, PC – 07/03
• LEGO Worlds – PS4, XBO, PC – 07/03
• Atelier Firis: The Alchemist and the Mysterious Journey– PS4, Vita, PC – 07/03 (US)
• Disc Jam – PS4 – 07/03
• Darknet VR – PSVR – 07/03
• Loot Rascals – PS4 – 07/03
• Sub Level Zero Redux – PS4, XBO – 08/03
• Shift Happens – PS4 – 09/03 – Out now on XBO & PC
• NieR: Automata – PS4 – 10/03
• 2Dark – PS4, XBO, PC – 10/03

So with that, enjoy your weekends, and we’ll see you next time!