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I have been playing Destiny on the Xbox One (and more recently on the PS4) for, well, pretty much since the day it came out (here and there, an hour or two a day) and I’ve decided to write a review about it and talk about some of the things it does really well and some of the things that are god-awful annoying.

Let’s start out with my major gripe about the game: the story.  Or the pretty much lack thereof.  Sure, there is a ‘campaign’ that you fight through (with a linear path from start to finish, but with the option to go back and play areas or do open-world patrols) but realistically, the story is pretty much non-existent.  After the first mission you get a little cut-scene of The Speaker whom tells you a little bit of story you get a sense of who you are, what the Ghost is, what the deal is with humanity, and other bits.  That being said, his conversation is basically (and I’m gonna quote him here) “I could tell you of the great battle centuries ago.  How the Traveler was crippled.  I could tell you of the power of the Darkness, it’s ancient enemy.  There are many tales told throughout the city to frighten children.  Lately those tales have stopped.  Now, the children are frightened anyway.  The Darkness is coming back.  We will not survive it this time.”  And then leaves you there, with no back story other than basically: go kill the bad guys working for the Darkness and save the Light.  Don’t believe me?  Watch it!  This is only one example of the vague non-story telling in Destiny.  You’ve also got vague lady of vaguery (also known as The Stranger) who tells you “I don’t even have time to explain why I don’t have time to explain” (Watch it!).  This is perhaps my largest gripe about Destiny: I want more story and background.  That being said, they DO provide the backstory and history a bit: in a very round-about way: The Grimoire Archives.  The Grimoire Archives are found on the Bungie website and give you a lot of information about the enemies, NPCs, and other history about the game.  Unfortunately, unlocking these is not as simple as Complete The Game.   The only way to unlock information is to complete a bunch of different things including: finding all the hidden Ghosts, finding all the Golden Chests, killing a bunch of bad guys (kill x of type y to unlock their card, for example).  It is very frustrating but at least it is present.  It is also a massive time-sink for completionists like myself.  Very frustrating.

Another bit of frustration for me right now is the Mark system.  In order to get gear from Reputation Vendors (pretty much every reputation-based vendor except Iron Banner and Queen’s Guard).  This gear is generally Legendary (purple colored, lower only than Exotic) and considered pretty good, especially for getting the Light necessary to go beyond Level 20.  To get marks you can do bounties, daily strikes, the strike playlists, public events, or Crucible matches.  Sounds easy enough right?  Well any piece of gear can cost anywhere from 50-150 Marks to get.  In any given week you can only collect 100 Marks of each type (Vanguard and Crucible).  This means if you want to collect all the gear you will spend a good while waiting.  I strongly disagree with the arbitrary limit on Marks per week, as I have strongly disagreed with limit on reputation in any other game (I’m looking at you WoW).

Gameplay wise, Destiny is fairly standard FPS fair with customizability for your specific classes.  There are three classes to choose from: Hunter, Titan, and Warlock.  Personally, Warlock is my favorite class as it is has a massive special attack that lobs Void damage across the map to explode things spectacularly.  Each class has two sub-classes (currently, three total are planned) which deals a different type of damage (Void, Arc, Solar) with their abilities.  You can read more about the classes here.  There is a good balance therein and I haven’t really found one class that permanently dominates another.  Titans are very tanky, Hunters are very squishy (BUT SO FAST), and Warlocks are kind of middle of the road (and in the Sunsinger tree can auto-resurrect whenever you have a Super Charge).  Gameplay is moderately paced with fast combat and occasional lulls as you travel from one area to another.  I’d have to say gameplay is certainly a strong point in this game.  It’s very fun overall, even solo.  Partner up with a friend or two and everything is even better.  This game was clearly designed with a small group (Fireteam) in mind.  Normally this is a complaint for me, as I really enjoy solo gaming, but the matchmaking is pretty decent and linking up with people in the open world is very easy to do.

The loot system is still a massive clusterfuck.  You will get that ultimate exotic or legendary engram drop and it will turn into a Strange Coin or Mote of Light or something otherwise useless (or even worse, an item for a completely different class).  Item drops are rare as it is, and having them turn into nothing in front of you at the asshole Cryptarch is SO FRUSTRATING that I almost threw my controller at my TV.  This is not how you get people to want to play the game guys.  Though, the opposite is true also: when you get an item that you weren’t expecting (such as a legendary engram becoming an exotic which is how I got Gjallarhorn on my Warlock a while ago) it feels AMAZING and laugh worthy (especially considering my situation where I got the engram off a level 6 trash mob in the Cosmodrome on a patrol).

All in all, Destiny has a lot going for it, some good and some bad.  It’s a very enjoyable game but it was totally over-hyped.  There are a lot of pending expansion packs to add more content to the game, but honestly, story-wise, the game is severely lacking in non-multiplayer content.  Replay-ability for the solo missions is very low.  Multiplayer is pretty well balanced; most of the matches I played in were won or lost by a matter of 2-3 kills or otherwise very even.  When blowouts happen (and they do happen) it is VERY frustrating if you’re on the receiving end.  This is expected for a game like this however.

Overall, I’d give Destiny a strong 7/10 but bordering on a 6/10.  Maybe 6.5/10 is most appropriate.  Fix the story system, fix the loot system some more, change the Mark system, and you’ll get a bump.  Until then though, seriously, WHERE ARE MY GORRAM LEGENDARIES?!

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Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel. More of the same old stuff from our friends at 2K Games. 4 (or 5) New Playables. Bajillions more guns. A new aspect of the original story. SPOILERS ABOUND, please don’t read too much further if you’re interested in the story.

Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel (from now forward, TPS) is the 3rd game in the Borderlands series, but pretty much takes place in between the first (Borderlands) and the second (Borderlands 2) games.  It takes us on a journey through the world of Elpis, Pandora’s moon, and Helios, Hyperion’s station above Pandora, so we can witness the rise of Handsome Jack and Hyperion as a whole.

It is an interesting play through for anyone who has completed the first two games and has developed an (understandable) hatred of Handsome Jack.  SPOILER ALERT! Handsome Jack isn’t a heinous asshole in TPS, at least to start.  He starts off in the game literally saving your hide (something that Lilith is frustratingly confused about) and trying his best to save the lives of the people of Elpis.  His hatred of ClapTrap units remains in full swing.

Traveling and fighting on the moon of Pandora, Elpis, starts off with a frustrating and new mechanic: O2.  Elpis has no oxygen, and when you first arrive you find yourself suffocating.  This entertaining character, Janey, introduces herself as she saves you from asphyxiating in the vacuum of the moon.  She tells you that you’ll need an O2 kit, called an OZ Kit by the locals.  The OZ Kit also has the added benefit of granting you a unique ability: BUTT SLAM!  Yes, butt slam.  Jump into the air (double tap jump to float or get higher) then hold the crouch key to slam into the ground and cause a shock wave of varying types of damage.  It replaces the relic slot (that granted special add-ons to your characters in the first and second games) which is kind of frustrating but also very entertaining.  My roommate and I spent hours just slamming enemies in the game.  BUTT SLAM!

As for the playable classes, there are 4 (with a 5th planned to be released on Nov 11th), each with a different special:

There is Athena, an ex-Crimson Lance assassin armed with the Apsis shield special.  You bring up the shield, it absorbs damage from your enemies and then you fling the shield at them and it explodes spectacularly.  It’s difficult to aim the shield to start but once you pick it up properly.

Then there is Wilhelm,  a Hyperion scientist/engineer with robotic augments.  Yes, it is the same Wilhelm from Borderlands 2, before you ask.  Wilhelm is equipped two drones: Wolf and Saint. Saint will heal you while Wolf will shoot enemies for you.  They are super useful early on and in boss fights.

Then there is Nisha, a lawbringer of sorts.  She is armed with a special ability that locks onto targets to allow you to get easy kills.   That is to say, you activate her special ability and your cursor will home in on any nearby targets.  Pull the trigger and watch the heads fly!

Finally there is Claptrap AKA Fragtrap.  Claptrap’s special is wildly unpredictable and fun regardless.  There are too many things to list for Claptrap’s special, which basically gives random buffs to all people nearby.  You can view them all here.

You can get a quick overview of the Action Skills by watching this awesome YouTube clip: YouTube!

Admittedly I could have recorded this myself, but honestly I am tired, just recovering from a cold, and Halo: Master Chief Collection just came out.  Please cut me a break.

Badass ranks are still present in TPS, and just as useful as ever.  It’s great to be able to upgrade all your characters at once (and cool to see a level 1 fly through the early game!).  Baddass ranks are basically nods from the developers to gamers, rewards for repeat playthroughs and making more characters.

Golden keys,  are just as plentiful as ever thanks to the generous devs.  Make sure you grab them early and often.  They make grabbing cool loot super easy.  I use two or three every 5 character levels to make sure the loot stays relevant.  I then stow it in the stash and bank to trade it around.  Make sure you do it with other people around so you can trade.

Overall Thoughts

TPS is a must-have for fans of the Borderlands Series and completionist fanatics.  That being said, it’s a lot of the same-old, same-old stuff.  Go to location, kill bad guys, collect items, then pray that the loot fairy smiled upon you and your party.  Once you reach the end-game (which takes a play-through or two) it rapidly becomes a fight for the best guns and gear.

The game is not super difficult, as evidenced by the fact that my roommate and I defeated both the end game level and the repeat level in our first goes.  You will fall down a lot (probably) but Fight For Your Life is a saving grace and an easy way to keep yourself in the fight.  You can still be picked up by your allies (both using the normal method which is slow, and alternatively using OZ Kit O2 supplies which is super fast).

The game can be frustrating however, as evidenced by one of the quests to collect 50 white-grade weapons and turn them in (which was… SO draining). and random encounters with bosses that are seemingly too difficult for their level.  These events are largely few and far between however.

Visually, the game is just as beautiful as I remember it being in Borderlands 2.  There is something extra there though, and we haven’t figured out what it is yet (since my roommate has times when the game chugs along as opposed to flying through Borderlands 2).   The effects for fights and elemental damage are visually satisfying (corrosive damage is goopy and green, frost damage is a light blue, explosive damage is EXPLOSIONSSSSSSSSSSSS, etc).  The style is very cartoon-y and entertaining.  I must say it’s one of my favorite aspects of the game, just sitting there and driving around and looking at all the detail and effort they put into the styles and depth aspects.

Overall, I’d give TPS an 8/10.  TPS is a very fun game, but it’s certainly a simple re-hash of the same old formula of Borderlands and Borderlands 2.  There are new character classes, locations, and a story (as well as a few game play mechanics) but it’s all boiling down to go to location, kill things, collect loot, bring it back eventually devolving into a loot fest.  It is fun for sure, but it can surely become a slow haul grind.

But then again, HEY LOOK ORANGE LOOT!

And that is all there is to it.

Game on people, and I’ll see you on Elpis.

Wilhelm Badass Ranks

Find me on Steam here, and let’s play some! 😀

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EA to Shut Down Online Support for Battlefield 2, Crysis 2 & Many More in June – IGN.

Are we honestly surprised?  This is what happens when companies maintain the game servers and the activation servers.

Eventually they say “Well, we’re not getting any new revenue from these games, so screw it.”

“Technical Hurdles” to making the games work include convincing some executive that it’s worth paying a developer some money to change a few lines of code and release the server software to the public so we can maintain the servers for games we want to play.

In other words, classic EA.

I’ll never forgive you for buying out Origin Systems and then killing off two of my favorite game franchises: Wing Commander & System Shock.

You showed your true colors then, and you’re letting them show now.

I only wish you weren’t so big that there was no chance for you to fail, because if any company in the gaming sector deserves to die off, it’s you guys.

Seriously.

You are the worst thing to happen to gaming since the ancient “Enter word 5 from sentence 2 of paragraph 3 on page 22 of your game manual to begin playing.” era.

Ugh.

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A very cool feature. Almost enough to make me get one.

Almost.

News: Microsoft Confirms PS4 Can Be Connected To Xbox One | MegaGames.

If it had backward compatibility, I would have bought it already.

But it doesn’t.

For whatever reason.

(the reason being, that way they can make you buy the Xbox One version of your old games for full price, thus double charging you for content you already own)

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Far Cry 3 – Blood Dragon is a stand-alone add-on/extension/expansion to the blockbuster game Far Cry 3. Blood Dragon is VASTLY different from Far Cry 3 in terms of the story, but very similar in terms of gameplay.

The first thing I will say about Blood Dragon is this: It’s super ridiculous and ultra tongue-in-cheek. I guess any game whose main protagonist is named Sergeant Rex Power Colt can’t take itself too seriously. And to it’s credit, the game delivers: it’s absolutely hilarious! The game itself has been described by Ubisoft as “an 80s VHS vision of the future.” I think my favorite part may be where the hero grabs an item and yells “I’ve got the touch! I’ve got the power!” (Reference) . It’s just so over-the-top in it’s campy-type humor. I love it.

Setting & Story

The game is set in an alternate reality in the year 2007. Canada is all but gone, nuked to oblivion to halt the Russian advance into America, and in the midst of the recovery the cybernetically modified Colonel Sloan has built a cyborg army on an island filled with dragons that “shoot lasers from their fucking eyes”. Yeah. Oh by the way, you’re a cyborg too. Bad ass.  So Colonel Sloan has been developing an army and plans on using the blood of the Blood Dragons to revert the world into a prehistoric state.  You eventually bump into the creations of  Sloan’s assistant, Dr. Carlyle.  Dr. Carlyle has created more terrors using the blood of the Blood Dragons: zombies!  So now we have cybernetic super soldiers, dinosaurs that fire lasers from their eyes, zombies, and robotic animals.  Oh, I didn’t mention those? Yeah, they’ve been converting the animals on the island into robots.  Go figure.  Cybernetic sharks are scary, yo.

The long and short of it is that you need to save the world from Sloan.  It’s a crazy, laser-gun, cheap-one-liner, run-and-gun fest.

Gameplay

The gameplay of Blood Dragon is very similar to Far Cry 3, as I said. You ‘liberate’ outposts of Omega Force soldiers, hunt animals to unlock weapons, and dig through the brush to find research data, VHS tapes, and TV sets. Each of these unlock better bonuses to weapons and additional missions.

Weapon upgrades are a neat feature and a welcome sight in this First Person Shooter. One of my favorite upgrades is for the Fazertron Assault Rifle. The Laser Rounds upgrade (with a description text of “Laser rounds because science rocks and burns, in that order.”) switches your rifle from firing bullets to firing lasers. LASERS man. Lasers. Oddly enough you still need to get ammo, but ammo is plentiful in this game so it’s largely irrelevant.

They completely removed the crafting element which was very prevalent in Far Cry 3.  It’s kind of frustrating, but realistically you’ll be too busy flinging cyber hearts at the Blood Dragons to get their attention that you’d like not bother with looking for flowers.  How do you get cyber hearts?  By sticking your cybernetic hand into the chest of fallen Omega Force soldiers.  Yeah.  KERSTAB!  Followed up by a hilarious one-liner: “Time to put your hearts into it!” or “Heartbroken? *chuckle*”.  I can’t overstate just how hilariously bad some of the dialog is.

For giggles, I recommend you watch the Kotaku video of Best & Worst One-Liners.

My one complaint about the game is that it’s kind of short: about 8 hours for me to complete (completely complete, all achievements).  That being said, the game is $15.  8 hours of entertainment for a little more than the cost of a movie isn’t bad at all.  I just wanted more.  It was so much fun.

Graphics

The game is built using the Far Cry 3 engine.  This engine is known for pushing pretty cool graphics.  Blood Dragon is no exception.  There’s lots of glowy futuristic lighting and doors that slide open automatically.  It’s very faux-future, which is exactly what I expect from a game set in 2007.  The game is pretty dark, as much as can be expected for a game set in a post-apocalyptic nuclear wasteland.  Explosions are fairly spectacular from a distance (though up close it’s not that great).  The first time you see a Blood Dragon is pretty intense.  THEY GLOW.  And shoot lasers.  I can’t reiterate this enough.  They shoot lasers.  I don’t know what else I can say about the graphics here.  It’s all pretty much visible in this video.

Overall

A (relatively) short, beautiful, entertaining game with hilarious dialog and enough content to keep me coming back (if for nothing else to execute more Cyber Force soldiers and rip out their hearts) for more.  There’s rumors of a sequel on the horizon, which I am eagerly awaiting.

Far Cry 3 – Blood Dragon.  Now available on Steam for $15.

Totally worth the admission and worth picking up.  Go get it now.