‘Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II – The Sith Lords’ (nice short title there) turned ten on the PC this year, and it hasn’t had a major update in almost as long, but imagine my surprise when I looked in my Steam queue and there it was getting a 175 MB patch. It is a great update too. It includes widescreen support, save sync, Steam Achievements, a few bug fixes, modern controller support, and last but definitely not least mod support through Steam Workshop.
The widescreen support was a great addition since before you had to play the game in windowed mode for the game to run on a widescreen monitor, but the mod support is what really makes this update special because now to get all the unlocked content in the Restored Content Mod all you have to do is subscribe to it. It pretty much makes the unofficial patch official. Who knows maybe they will in the next update (we only have to wait ten years to find out).
If you didn’t play this game when it came out because it was a broken mess (who can blame you), there has never been a better time. Also since this game is always on sale it will probably only set you back a couple of bucks. It is great to see old games like this get fixed. I guess it is time to finish that Light Side play though I have always be meaning to get back to.
The third Batman game from Rocksteady Studios has finally come out, Batman: Arkham Knight, and I am in love with it. Rocksteady says this is their last game about the Dark Knight, and if that is true it is a wonderful way to go. That is not to say the game is without its faults, it has some big ones, but the positives far outweigh the negatives. Between this game and The Witcher 3, we already have two game of the year contenders.
Arkham Knight takes place about a year after the events of Batman: Arkham City, and all the criminals of Gotham have teamed up to take the Batman down. The most obvious two being Scarecrow and the new mysterious, totally not the Red Hood, titular Arkham Knight. There is no holding back this time, the entire city is at stake, so Batman gets to use all his tools to save the city! If this is your first Arkham Batman game don’t worry, you will pick up the story quick.
The story can get a little goofy at times, and they keep trying to tell you that Arkham Knight is a totally new character even though they keep more than hinting who it is. So if you are thinking, “Hey is that just the Red Hood in Batman armor?” Yes, yes it is. If you are new to the Batman universe than that will mean nothing to you, but if you have at least some knowledge of Batman’s lore it will explain a lot of this story.
The combat continues to be awesome, free-flowing, brutal, and rhythmic. Like a dancing game that allows you to punch people in the face. The better you dance the less you get hit, and the more sculls you crack. It is great. All of Batman’s stealth attacks still work too, so if you are more of a stalker in the dark sort of person, you will not be disappointed either. You have a ton of gadgets to play around with to mix things up a bit as well.
In Batman: Arkham Knight like in previous games you get points as you go and do Batman stuff, and you can cash in these points for better gear. Don’t worry this time around it didn’t feel like Batman was helpless until he upgraded his gear. He is awesome, and he is just getting more awesome as he goes. While we are talking about gear, I guess we need to talk about the Batmobile. Since this seems to be the most divisive component to the game.
For the most part I think the Batmobile is great. Cruising around taking out bad guys, and going on epic chases throughout the city. All good. Heck the Riddler quests that everyone mocked before the game came out are really fun. They are silly and challenging in perfect Riddler fashion, but then there are the drones. Oh man the drone sequences are terrible, and they are always clustered together, so you have to kill like 100 drones to get to something else.
To kill drones you go in to “Battle Mode”, and then dodge around until your cannon reloads. Fire your cannon, and then dodge around until it reloads again. If you can do that awhile without getting hit you can do a special move. Sometimes the drones fire missiles at you so you have to use your machine gun to shoot them down because I guess Batman doesn’t know what a flare is. While the hand-to-hand combat is a fluid dream, the drone combat is a clunky mess. It would have been fine if it was something that you only did once in awhile, or was an optional mini-game, but when you are in the middle of a drone area the game kind of grinds to a halt.
Still if you push your way though the drones, the game gets amazing again, and all the dodging and reloading fades to the back of your mind. Batman: Arkham Knight is a massive achievement that is held back from being perfect by one madding play type in game with dozens for wonderful ones. I guess they can’t all be winners. It is worth it get past those drones because the rest of the game is magnificent.
So thanks to the Steam Summer Sale I was able to pick up a game from 2004 for pretty cheap. “2004? Shouldn’t they pretty much be giving that away?” You might ask, and for any other game you would be right, but for Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines it is a different story. Fans have kept this game going far past the lifespan of any normal video game, and there are no signs of it slowing down. It has become as they call it in the gaming business ‘Evergreen’. In the movie business they might call it a cult classic.
Well what makes Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines, so special? An interesting story, cool skills, a unique setting, and choices that feel real and not just good or bad for a start. Honesty there hasn’t been a game like it before or since. When it was launched a lot of people skipped it because it was completely broken, which did the developer Troika Games in, but because of all the awesome potential in Bloodline the fans have fixed it, and added to it to make it a game that at some point should be at least be tried.
The game starts with a fun questionnaire that determines your class, and then tries to preset your skills. You can manually change it all if you want, but it is a pretty cool way to start the game, and every time I play Bloodlines I just go with it. After that you learn that you are a new vampire who has been turned at a very interesting time for the Kindred (what vampires call themselves). There is a power struggle between the houses, and you get to figure out what is going on and who you back. It is an engaging little story, and interesting to play around in. It is perfectly setup to let you explore their little vampire version of LA.
I love the skill progression in this game too. For completing objectives you get character points. These points you use to buy the aforementioned skills. The further along the skill tree you go, the more points the skills cost. There aren’t levels, so playing around with certain skills doesn’t totally screw you over it just gives you more options. Options are what makes this game so good.
My least favorite part of Bloodlines is that it seems like it was designed by a deviant thirteen year old. Everything is way overly sexualized. Luckily there are player mods to tone this down a bit, but it is still a terrible “art” (soft core) style. I understand that the world of vampires is always going to be a little sexy, but Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines goes way to far. The graphics also don’t hold up, but again luckily there are fan made textures that make the game a little less harsh on the eyes.
If you are in the need of an RPG to play because perhaps you are waiting for the price of The Witcher 3 to come down a bit, Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines is a fun diversion, and a true original. One of these days they will make a sequel or something, but until then apply the fan fixes and give it a shot provided you can see past the awful art direction. Though I understand if you can’t.
So if there are two things I like, comic books and adventure games are high up the list, so you would think that when The Wolf Among Us, based on the amazing Fables comic book series and developed by one of the best adventure game companies out there Telltale Games, came out in 2013 that I would have been all over it. I would have been except for the fact I have no patience, so waiting for episodes to come out is not my thing. I fully planned on getting it once the entire season was out, but I never got around to it. I kept talking about how much I wanted to play it though, so recently my brother got sick of hearing about it, and he bought it for me. I am very happy he did because it is downright delightful!
The game is set in the world of Fables. Characters from fairytales have fled their lands and are now living in New York City, but these are the darker characters from the original stories not the Disney versions. It takes a special kind of person to keep them in line. You play as Bigby Wolf (Big Bad Wolf), the reformed killer who is now the Sheriff for the Fables in their little corner of NYC, Fabletown, and you have to track down the killer who is preying on storybook call-girls.
Like I said The Wolf Among Us is a darker version of the story characters than many people are used too. If you are thinking this is similar to ABC’s Once, you would be wrong. The world the comics book created is vivid and real, and the video game does an amazing job of recreating it. I also love that they didn’t try to modernize it. The comic books are from the 80’s, and that is the decade that this game is set in. It works wonderfully. It is like video game 80’s noir. Just as I hoped it would be.
Now calling it a game might be pushing it. The Wolf Among Us is more like a choose your own adventure story. You can’t really lose because you will always end up at close to the same place, but how much you know, and how “good” your ending is will depend on how well you do your detecting. Even if it isn’t “gamey”, it is incredibly engaging, and there isn’t much like it out there. Telltale is in a class by themselves when it comes to modern adventure game story telling.
So here I am reviewing a game that came out in 2013 and you should totally play it. If you are 18+ that is. The Wolf Among Us is not a game for kids. If you are in the right age bracket though, this game should not be missed and it might be the best thing I have played so far this year. That includes the incredible Witcher 3! The Wolf Among Us is just so, so good.
There was a lot of news that came out of this year’s E3 press conferences, and I think it is one of the better years I have seen. Everyone had a major announcement or two, and I am really excited about the year to come. I am going to try and go through the press conferences in chronological order, but we will see. He we go!
Bethesda:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GE2BkLqMef4
Oh man Bethesda had a good show, and they had three epic games to show off: Doom, Dishonored 2, and of course Fallout 4. Any one of these games pretty much every publisher would kill to have, and Bethesda showed them all, and better yet they are not that far away with Fallout for coming out this year, and Doom and Dishonored next year. Great work guys. There is a reason they are one of my favorite game makers.
Microsoft:
This was Microsoft’s year to get back in the fight, and I think they did a great job. They showed off all their major franchises, and four of them are coming out this year: Fable Legends, Forza 6, Gears of War: Ultimate Edition, and the one they a banking on Halo 5, but by far the biggest news was that they figured out how to make backwards compatibility with Xbox 360 games work, and as I can attest to it works pretty well. Oh yeah HoloLens looks crazy cool. I think I may need one. Microsoft’s problem is that they are not showmen. If Sony would have had this lineup they would be dragging Microsoft’s dead carcass around. Still it was a good year for the boys in Redmond.
EA:
EA was doing its best to show that they are not the evil empire any more, and they did a pretty convicting job by showing me two games I want. No, need! Star Wars Battlefront, and Mass Effect: Andromeda. They also had a long boring section in the middle where they talked about sports and stuff, but pretty much they just needed to show Star Was and Mass Effect, and they did, so I will love them. For now.
Ubisoft:
Ubisoft did a good job of pretty much just showing that every game they make is on its way back to the market. Ghost Recon, Rainbow Six, South Park, Assassins Creed, and whatever else. If Ubisoft makes it, it is on its way to you. Plus the show was put on by the amazing Aisha Tyler, so they get a lot of points for that.
Sony:
Sony was in kind of a weird position this year. All of its games are coming out next year, but if there is one thing Sony knows how to do it is put on a show, and they did a wonderful job. Their theme this year was definitely we will have the games you want. Remastered Final Fantasy 7, check; Shenmue 3, check (Kickstarted anyway); Hitman, check; all your favorite Sony games, check. Considering that nothing was coming out this year, or was multiplatform, it was still an amazing show. It was fun to watch. If Microsoft would have had this show they would have been graded an ‘F’, but Sony played it just right, “We will have your games!”.
Nintendo:
Their conference was pretty much: “Hey you guys like Star Fox right?!!!” Luckily we do, but that was pretty much all they had. Mario Builder looked cool, but not exciting. The Wii U is going to need some games stat!
Square-Enix:
Square-Enix probably had the most new games to show, but pretty much all I cared about was their amazing Hitman trailer. It looks like the Hitman I have always dreamed about. Wide open areas with tons of different contracts to take out (not on dates), and all sorts of great gear to use. So good. Oh yeah there was some other stuff, but that was for other people, Hitman was for me, and it comes out in December!
AMD:
They pretty much had to release a new high-end video card, and they did! I can’t wait to see the benchmarks. Until then, they did what they needed to do. So good for them. nVidia needs the competition.
Like I said this was a great year unless you were Nintendo, and there are so many great games coming out. It is customary to declare a winner, but I am going to say the gamer was the winner this year. We are getting what we wanted from everybody, so no losers here! Again, unless you were a Nintendo fan. You lost. Sorry.