I was able to pre-order my Xbox One X: Scorpio Edition, and I can’t wait. I love new consoles, but here is the kicker, I don’t have a 4K TV, so the feature I want from this super powerful console is an Ultra 1080P/60 FPS mode. I know some games are going to have it, but I hope it is a common occurrence.
I want the high res textures with super-sampling. I want to run games without screen tearing or frame hitches. Devs are saying the Xbox One X is like a fast PC with an NVidia GTX 1070 in it, and the 1070, while it can do some games in 4K, really shines at running games with max settings in both 1080p and 1440p, so while there are not a lot of 1440p resolution TVs out there, if you render the games at 1440p and then downscale to 1080p it should look amazing! (Yes I know that is what super-sampling is, which I mentioned earlier!)
While I hope the 4K is great with the Xbox One X, and that people with 4K TVs love it, I just want a true full featured 1080p experience which neither the PS4 or the Xbox One were ever really able to provide, but the Xbox One X should be more than up to the task!
Have you ever enjoyed a game a lot, but then another game came along and distracted you, so you never finished the first game? Well that happened to me with Dragon Age: Inquisition. I was almost done with Inquisition when the The Witcher 3 came out, and while Inquisition is a great game, The Witcher 3 is almost perfect. The 2017 Xbox Ultimate Sale had all the Inquisition DLC marked down, so it was the perfect time to jump back in. The question is, does the game hold up?
Pretty much. Dragon Age: Inquisition kind of lives in The Witcher 3’s shadow now, so it will always be viewed as a less than. A lot of people out there like to rag on it now. Especially after Mass Effect: Andromeda, which had all of Inquisition’s flaws, but to a much higher degree, and it makes Inquisition look worse because of the comparisons. Which is a shame. The party members and the main quest for Inquisition are very well written, and I really enjoyed finishing up their story. Not to mention it still has the old school pause-able combat, and I love being able to get tactical when I need to.
I have had a lot of fun going back and playing this game, and if you haven’t played it yet, I still think it is worth your time. I know a lot of people out there have decided that in hindsight it is not very good, but I think it is still a great game, and it offers a ton game for your money. Is it as good as The Witcher 3? No, but very few games are, and that shouldn’t take away from the fun you can have with Dragon Age: Inquisition. I have enjoyed rejoining the Inquisition.
Square-Enix announced a while ago that they were trying to sell off IO Interactive in order to recoup the losses that the studio generated. It was a sad tale for a studio that created one of last year’s best games. However, this morning things got a lot rosier. IO Interactive posted a letter on its website stating that the developer was now independent, and that it retained all rights to the Hitman franchise!
This is awesome news! Season One of Hitman was great, and I hope they are able to get to work quickly on Season Two or Hitman’s follow up. I will be here cash in hand. Good luck newly independent IO Interactive! We are pulling for you!
I think it is time for the PC Gaming show to come to an end. It is long and boring and the hosts try very hard to make everything seem exciting, but it is not. Some of the games they showed were interesting like Griftlands:
Still the games shown at the PC Gaming Show could have just as easily been shown at another showcase. Though hats of to Microsoft for saving them the Age of Empires Definitive Edition. It looks great.
The company that was really swinging for the fences though was Ubisoft. They announced a Mario tactics game, Mario + Rabbids: Kingdom Battle (AKA Mario XCOM), and they finally showed us all a glimpse of where they are headed with Beyond Good & Evil 2:
Though this trailer did leave a lot of people confused because it looks like it will be a radical departure from the first game. And even more confusing because it is a prequel, but it still has a ‘2’ in the title. Still, it is exciting to see that it truly does exist and that people are really working on it. Even if it does have all the Ubisoft buzzwords attached to it, open world, co-op, and game as a service.
Sony closed out the second major day of E3 (third if you count the EA showcase, but I am not), and as always they know how to put on a great show. Trailers for all their major first party games were on display, and they all looked great. Shadow of the Colossus is coming back again, and who doesn’t want more Uncharted. Though the big news for me was Monster Hunter World, but not for the reason Sony wanted, but because it is coming to the Xbox and PC as well. I will leave you the way Sony left us, with Insomniac’s Batman Spider-Man:
Let me know your thoughts about this year’s E3 showcases, or what games you are interested to hear more about.
First up I watched the Microsoft show, and you can tell that after they got ripped four years ago for focusing on TV and movies that all they will ever talk about from now on is games. It was trailer after trailer. I am guessing with the PS4 winning the console war this generation they wanted reassure everyone that the Xbox would have plenty of games to play too. There is even one for The Paladin. It is a first person space dwarf mining and shooting simulator from the people that made Goat Simulator called Deep Rock Galactic. Here is the trailer:
Of course Microsoft finally dropped the name and price of their new box. It is the Xbox One X and it will come out November 7th for $499. While I get that ‘X’ matches the Xbox branding, it sounds the same as ‘S’ when anyone says it, so it causes a lot of confusion as to which console people are talking about. It is also interesting that Microsoft is again going to be $100 more than the PS4. Though I am guessing all that hardware costs a lot of money. I mean it is the first water cooled console that I can remember. The 360 was supposed to be, and after the $1 Billion Red Ring of Death controversy they probably wish they would have followed through on that.
The biggest announcement by far was that Original Xbox games were coming to Xbox One this year starting with Crimson Skies. I must have given my copy away, but this is great news. I can only hope that this means they are turning on some form of the OG Xbox Live service so we can play these games with our friends. More info is coming soon, and I cannot wait to hear more.
All in all it was fine show. They gave us Mixer.com viewers a free copy of Rare Replay, so that was nice. The games looked good, if not overly exciting, and they confirmed that Sea of Thieves and State of Decay 2 would be delayed to next year, which is a bummer. I will be getting an Xbox One X though.
Next up I watched the Bethesda show which was ummm, well, if the Xbox show was unexciting the Bethesda show was a waste of time. It was only thirty-five minutes long and mostly showed trailers for games that were already out. Though at the very end they did announce The Evil Within 2 and Wolfenstein II, and the later looked great! Here is its trailer:
If you were hoping for a new open world RPG like I was, well guess what there wasn’t one, so I hope you like the ones you have, because now you will have paid Mods that don’t break your achievements! Sorry I should take back the exclamation point and replace it with “…” Ugg, who cares. Anyway lets hope today’s E3 shows show us something mind meltingly cool!
