Order of the Blue Gartr - Blogs - Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?u=32461 Blue Gartr Forums Built for the gamer inside all of us. Fresh to Elite, join our community supporting Final Fantasy, World of Warcraft, other MMOs, and all sorts of games en Sun, 19 Jul 2026 06:39:15 GMT vBulletin 5 https://cdn.bluegartr.com/images/styles/bluevb4/misc/rss.jpg Order of the Blue Gartr - Blogs - Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?u=32461 Destiny 2: Lightfall Review -- What Comes After the Fall? https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=513 Mon, 10 Apr 2023 21:44:01 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/b50b02eeaa87579ab856e18289c701bd.jpg It would be disingenuous to argue that the Destiny of today is the same...
It would be disingenuous to argue that the Destiny of today is the same Destiny that Bungie released in 2014 (or even when Destiny 2 released in 2017). It is well documented how the original direction for the story changed in the eleventh hour and Bungie launched the game narratively adrift, cobbled together partially using fragments of their original plan. Still, from that tenuous foundation, Bungie has managed to erect something that is truly good -- a conflict between ancient and antithetical forces, stories of loss, grief, and redemption, competing armies and races that stand together as equals, and payoffs for narrative threads that were stitched together from the most meager scraps. In fact, most would agree that Destiny 2 has become a gold-standard for both the live-service model and the looter-shooter genre.

Bungie unveiled their long-term plan for the franchise in 2020 and recent years have seen them present a largely coherent narrative that has built on annual expansions and seasonal storylines, some admittedly more relevant than others. Last year’s expansion, The Witch Queen, was lauded as a new high bar in storytelling for both the Destiny franchise and Bungie. But in the distance, behind that impressive story, the title of this year’s expansion and the penultimate chapter in this ongoing saga loomed as an ominous specter. Destiny 2: Lightfall is finally here and it has the unenviable task of maintaining those expectations and moving the ongoing story into its final act.

As ever, this will be a review of the latest Destiny 2 expansion, a discussion of the previous year, and an examination of the state of the game as it approaches its final arc and enters its ninth year.

And, as is the norm, expect this one to be long~

There was a point when Bungie announced that the Light and Darkness saga would conclude with Beyond Light, The Witch Queen, and Lightfall. However, in the lead-up to The Witch Queen, they revealed they needed another entry to finish the story as they envisioned, and added next year’s The Final Shape as the concluding chapter. Having played through Lightfall, there are a number of ways this can be read. One completely fair reading is that the challenges of game development and impacts of a global pandemic impeded their ability to tell the story on their original timeline. Perhaps the simplest take is that Bungie needed more time to get the pieces in place for this saga’s climax. A less generous spin would be that the decision was driven by the seasonal storytelling, that they needed another four seasons and this expansion exists to get them the time they needed. The most concerning interpretation is that this is the story Bungie wants to tell and we should be concerned about their ability to stick the landing next year. I am going to be upfront, Lightfall was a narrative disappointment. Even removing the high bar The Witch Queen created, Lightfall fails at adequately setting the stage for the final act. And that is especially unfortunate given how much this expansion does right. There are a lot of issues, but I am going to focus my critiques on three areas -- the story, the macguffin, and Strand.

The final moments of Season 19 set the stage for Lightfall and ended with the Traveler rising into space to confront the Witness and its fleet of pyramid ships that had arrived on our doorstep. And the opening moments of this expansion deliver on that tease. Lightfall opens with a cinematic space battle where the Vanguard and its allies, allies we have brought together over the past few years, clash against these forces. However, this is the Witness, the fearsome threat that had previously doomed humanity and crippled the Traveler before the events of Destiny 1. With a flick of its finger, it slices ships and ghosts into pieces, showing the power of our opponent. Indifferent to our forces, the Witness reaches out, touches the Traveler, and receives a vision that motivates it to send Calus and his Shadow Legion to Neptune in pursuit of a mysterious object known as the Veil. Players chase after Osiris who is insistent that the Witness will become unstoppable if it is able to get the Veil, and the story of Lightfall unfolds from there as the focus shifts away from the Witness and the threat it poses to the Traveler and humanity and instead to Calus and his efforts to secure the Veil.

In the lead-up to Lightfall, Bungie presented the role that players would fill as the tip of the spear in the battle against the Witness. Ever since Bungie redefined the narrative of Destiny and reimagined the Light and Darkness as foundational forces, rather than antagonists, the Witness has become an ominous presence, synonymous with all the negativity that previously surrounded the Darkness. The Witness is the long-time adversary of the Traveler. It was responsible for causing the collapse, but for years, we did not know what it was. This entity was finally given a name in The Witch Queen, and after preparing and amassing an army of allies, we were ready to stand with the Traveler to confront this ancient opponent. Except none of that mattered and the entire campaign occurs away from that fight. Players have no direct interaction with the Witness and the events of Neptune feel like they are occurring over an undefined period of time while everything else stands still. Someone on Reddit pointed out that you could string the opening cutscene and the final cutscene together, and they flow perfectly because our actions on Neptune are so immaterial to the actual story.

This is going to be an unpopular opinion, but I do not like Thor: Ragnarok. It suffers from narrative whiplash, jumping from emotional and significant moments to humor and quips without giving the characters and the audience an adequate amount of time to feel the weight of the significant events that transpire. The main narrative of Lightfall is similarly plagued by this issue, but made worse when juxtaposed against the stories that happen outside the campaign. Characters who experience loss or defeat during the campaign quickly jump back to humor and jokes, as if there is no emotional weight to the story’s major beats. This is best exemplified by Nimbus, one of the new characters introduced on Neptune. Throughout the campaign, they interject too much humor and ruin moments that should have at least a modicum of solemnity. And yet, during the post-game, Nimbus has an especially poignant storyline where the events of the campaign impact their behavior and decision-making and they emerge with a better understanding of what it means to be a Cloud Strider in service to the people of Neomuna. We have known for a longtime that Bungie has different narrative teams, but when the seasonal storyline can handle similar sequences of events with more complexity, maturity, and depth, it feels like the wrong team was given the responsibility of writing Lightfall’s narrative.

Even with all the complaints against the writing, almost universally, the biggest criticism of the Lightfall campaign relates to the Veil. Bungie has had an overreliance on using lore for storytelling since the start of the Destiny franchise. And while they have gotten better with their storytelling, the lore still does a lot of heavy-lifting. That is not the case here. The Veil has been mentioned in the lore (I think), but it was never prominently featured in the game’s story, so it never needed to be explained. Bungie just put out an entire expansion with the Veil at the core, and I could not tell you what it is. Even the people who make a living discussing the game’s lore cannot explain it.

Players arrive on Neomuna to help Osiris keep the Veil out of Calus’ hands, but at no point does he (or rather Bungie) think to explain the Veil. Players never learn what the Veil is, what it does, or why it matters. In fact, by the end of the campaign, when all is said and done, players still do not have any clarification about why they needed to protect the Veil or what were the consequences of letting it fall into the Witness’ grasp. The problem is not that the Veil is wrapped in mystery, rather, seemingly everyone knows what the Veil is except for players, and that is never resolved. The Witch Queen was built around the mystery of how Savathûn got the Light, and the way it drove the story and was eventually resolved was a huge part of why The Witch Queen was so highly praised.

This review has been a challenge to write, partially due to having to rewrite entire sections because Bungie has been putting out weekly pieces about the future of the game, and somehow the narrative is one of those areas. Just over a week after Lightfall's release, Bungie stated that this year’s storyline would continue to expand over the year, independent of the seasonal stories. There is zero part of me that thinks this narrative continuation is the result of the overwhelming criticism of Lightfall, but rather, Bungie was forced to reveal it months earlier than planned because of the sentiment around the expansion. On one hand, a part of me still has faith that Bungie will do the Veil justice and properly reveal why it was so important to this story. But at the same time, this feels like another case of Bungie being so caught up in wanting to keep secrets to surprise players that they shot themselves in the foot again. I think Lightfall would still have been maligned, but it would not have been so widely condemned if they had said something along the lines of, “This year we're trying something new with the story. In addition to the seasonal stories, players who purchase Lightfall will get to experience a story that expands throughout the year." prior to the expansion’s release.

We have all played games which warn players, "If you proceed past this point, you will not be able to go back.” That prompt signifies it is time to complete any leftover side-quests before proceeding to the final battle. Unfortunately, that is the most apt description of the Lightfall campaign -- a side-quest to acquire a new power before the final act.

Strand is a brand new darkness element that exists on Neomuna and is somehow connected to the Veil. Players are the first to discover and learn to wield it (the fact that certain enemies have Strand shields aside), and it is, arguably, just as important to the narrative as the Veil. The Witch Queen campaign was fixated on Savathûn and solving the mystery of how she acquired the light, so every objective was in service of moving that plot forward. Conversely, rather than concentrating on Calus or the Veil, the Lightfall campaign must take detours to understand Strand. Honestly, this is one of those strange scenarios where, while a new element and subclasses can be hugely beneficial and transformative for Destiny 2, I hope Bungie does not introduce one with The Final Shape so they can devote their attention in its entirety to delivering a satisfying narrative conclusion.

When Stasis was introduced in Beyond Light, many players expressed frustration that it took a long time for players to gain full access to Stasis and its kit. Throughout the campaign, players would get tastes of Stasis, but they needed to finish the campaign to unlock the subclasses and then complete several quests to unlock all the grenades, aspects, and fragments. Prior to Lightfall, Bungie stated that they had heard this complaint and factored it into unlocking Strand. And they definitely listened in some regards, but the final execution is still not without its blemishes. Starting with the good, it is infinitely easier to fully unlock Strand. At the end of the campaign, players get access to a nearly complete build (I do not remember if I was able to immediately unlock four fragments or only three) with additional perks unlocked by collecting a currency that drops from defeating enemies on Neomuna with Strand. Mostly playing through post-game content, I believe it took me two days to fully unlock all the options for my Hunter. While that sounds great, the introduction of Strand during the campaign is a series of disappointments. Throughout the campaign, players get tastes of Strand, but it is only for limited stretches. Rather than getting to dive head first into it, Strand feels like a reward for eating our veggies.

So I just spent a few paragraphs criticizing the introduction of Strand, but we have reached the part of the review where I pull a bait-and-switch and praise Strand. To put it simply, Strand is a ridiculous amount of fun. While Strand hurt Lightfall’s narrative, it undeniably helped better define the Light and Darkness. Even before Stasis was introduced, players had imagined how a potential poison-based element would look. Weapons like Thorn and Osteo Striga and the Necrotic Grips added fuel to this fire, and when images of green subclass icons were leaked, players felt sure we were finally getting poison. Instead, Bungie used this opportunity to delineate the elements associated with the Light as those related to the physical objects and sensations while the Darkness comes from the abstract or intangible, such as dreams and emotions (Stasis’ fits into this paradigm requires a bit of a stretch).

Strand is derived from the energy between things that connects them and Strand is about pulling on this energy and using it to create, manipulate, and unravel. Gameplay-wise, this translates to grappling across the map, binding and suspending enemies, and spinning threads into bombs. While Strand has many of the same functions as other subclasses (unique ways to clear the battlefield and immobilizing enemies), its most distinctive feature is the way it is built around repositioning -- both zipping into the heart of combat to unleash damage and cause disruptions and quickly escaping with ease. Movement and gunplay in Destiny 2 has always received high praise, and the way Strand seamlessly weaves these elements together makes it shine. When Stasis shipped, its identity was largely centered on crowd control, but many of its tools were oppressive to the point that they overshadowed the other elements and Bungie needed to drastically rein them in. Yes, there are parts of Strand that feel a bit overpowered at times (both its ridiculous levels of crowd control and its damage mitigation), but I think both of those can be tuned in ways that do not break the identity of the element and subclasses.

This paradoxical evaluation from the narrative perspective versus the gameplay experience does not only apply to Strand, but also the campaign. Given the narrative deficiencies, it is almost jarring how many great set pieces and bombastic gameplay moments are featured throughout the Lightfall campaign. Some of the standouts include a harrowing sparrow escape from Calus’ ship, a race against the clock to escape a building rigged with explosives, swinging through the Vex network (my ongoing reservations on our ability to enter a digital space aside), and my absolute favorite sequence of the Lightfall campaign, fighting alongside Caital and her Cabal army to hold the line against swarms of Shadow Legion forces which eventually overwhelm and drive players back. Bungie finally delivered on a gameplay experience I have been begging them to introduce for years, and it has me hopeful that Bungie can deliver on the promise of this saga. At least from a gameplay perspective.

Like The Witch Queen before it, Lightfall offers a legendary difficulty that is again a satisfying and challenging experience. I know a lot of people thought this campaign was harder than The Witch Queen’s, but I disagree. Context is important and I believe Lightfall’s campaign feels harder because players are weaker than they were three months ago due to overall adjustments to player power (more on that in a little). Conversely, my perspective might be skewed by the novelty of experiencing this level of challenge in a Destiny campaign during The Witch Queen. Lightfall also introduces a new challenging enemy type, the Tormentors. These towering servants of the Witness are the first new enemy species(?) added to the game since The Taken King in 2015 and are a welcome addition. Tormentors are like the Lucent Hive in that they require your attention whenever one (or more) enters the battlefield. These opponents can fire off powerful attacks, quickly close the gap, and even suppress players’ abilities. Personally, I found the most challenging encounters occurred in small spaces that were clearly designed to provide an advantage to their toolkit, so I favor the Lucent Hive, but only by a little. At the same time, a lot of the impact of the Lucent Hive faded because of how criminally underutilized they were outside The Witch Queen campaign, so hopefully Bungie does not repeat that mistake.

One area where the gameplay underperforms the narrative is in the latest raid, Root of Nightmares. This raid occurs across the Witness’ pyramid ship which was damaged by the Traveler’s terraforming power in Lightfall’s opening cutscene and is a visual and auditory spectacle. Over the past few years, and especially in last year’s Vow of the Disciple raid, Bungie has defined the Witness’ aesthetic motif. The cold stone structures, dim orange lighting, and straight lines of the Witness’ ship are broken up by chaotic white roots and organic growths. Even the audio cues players hear as they traverse the raid, the sounds of creaking and breaking, tell the narrative of two opposing forces struggling to coexist. It is not just sensory, the narrative build-up to the release of Root of Nightmares was one of the best Bungie has done. Nezarec, recently revealed to be one of the Witness’ disciples, has been reborn and prior to the raid’s release, was tormenting the dreams of the people of Neomuna. Running around Neomuna, players could hear mysterious whispers what could only be understood by equipping older pieces of gear connected to Nezarec. I am not sure if this is still the case, but Nezarec spent the week and a half leading up to the raid taunting and antagonizing players in an attempt to draw them into the raid.

While all of that made the new raid shine, the gameplay experience might be one of the most disappointing Bungie has produced. Historically, Destiny raids have featured multiple encounters and mechanics that build in complexity from one to the next. The first encounter might introduce a simple mechanic, but that is the basis of the next encounter which adds complexity and also features a boss that serves as a damage check. Some raids, like Last Wish or Vow of the Disciple, are mechanically heavy, requiring players to memorize and call-out symbols. Other raids are not at that level of complexity, but what has been consistent across all raids is the need to work with your teammates.

Root of Nightmares consists of four encounters, two mechanical puzzles (using the term as generously as possible) and two boss encounters. My biggest issue with this raid is that the mechanics are so simplistic, with most requiring no coordination between teammates and only the third encounter actually requiring any communication. But even that encounter can be done by two people while the rest of the group just kills adds. There are entire encounters where I have found myself completely disengaged with what was happening as my teammates dealt with mechanics while I just shot waves of adds. Root of Nightmares launched on March 10, and when I started working on this section back then, my fear was that there would be a lot of players who only knew how to add clear. That fear has become a reality. In the weeks since, I have been in groups where every single person has double-digit clears, but I was the only player who knew the mechanics.

There are a lot of players who do not like the mechanical complexity of raids or find them too challenging. Many of those players have heaped praises on this raid for how easy it is to finish and how much more welcoming it is, especially since so many players can just kill adds. Look, I am all for more players experiencing raids and getting clears, but raids are supposed to be the pinnacle of endgame content. Yes, it is super frustrating to not get a clear, it sucks to spend your night struggling against a tough encounter, and I am sympathetic to players who feel intimidated by complex mechanics. But raids were the one thing that offered that experience in Destiny 2 and we get one new raid a year. I am not saying that every raid needs to be on the level of complexity of Last Wish or even Vow of the Disciple, but this game already features copious amounts of accessible content, I do not think it is unfair for one activity to have a higher bar to success. What is especially discouraging is, as far as I am aware, amidst all the conversations they have had recently, Bungie has made no comments about this raid’s difficulty, so it sounds like they do not share my sentiments.

I mentioned that part of the challenge of the Lightfall campaign came from the need to recalibrate since players are not as strong as we were prior to Lightfall. When I reviewed The Witch Queen last year, I praised the Void 3.0 update that allowed for better customization, build-crafting, and for the seasonal mods that made the Void subclasses feel powerful. At the time, it felt like a needed change to bring the old subclasses to the same footing as the more recently introduced Stasis subclasses. But that sentiment started to fade the more time I spent with Void 3.0, and the flaws that were hidden by the initial excitement became more and more glaring as Bungie continued to update the remaining Light subclasses. Players embraced the build-crafting and created powerful builds that could perpetually tear through armies by spreading explosions from one target to the next, infinitely chain abilities so that gunplay became largely irrelevant, and even stand against the toughest foes and survive their strongest attacks without flinching. This increase in ability usage permeated the game, and even the Crucible was plagued by invisibility, overshields, and overwhelming regeneration.

There are some players who want games like Destiny 2 to be easy so they can feel like powerful beings, flying across the battlefield, throwing out explosive abilities, burning through hordes of enemies, and emerging on the other side without a scratch. That is not my idea of fun. Don’t get me wrong, I definitely spent time in Sarutabaruta pulling trains of Crawlers that I could burn down with a single high-level -ga spell. But there is a big difference between doing that in a starter area versus that level of power in endgame content. I came to Destiny from a Halo background, so I was in love with the gunplay from day one. I have not enjoyed the previous year because of how easy it was to become over-powered and for guns and gunplay to feel unimportant.

Lightfall is a drastic turn in the other direction. The biggest change is shifting the game to put players at a power-level disadvantage for much of the content, meaning that things generally take more shots to kill and dish out more damage. This has even expanded to the world, with enemies on Neomuna being set to always be at a higher level than players, making that planet feel like it is always a threat. Personally, I love this change. I am relying on my guns again, I actually have to pay attention to the environment and cover, and the game does not feel as mindless as it has for the past few years. But, as you might expect, this drastic a change and recalibration has not made everyone happy, and a lot of players have expressed frustration at this new difficulty. Prior to Lightfall, a frequent complaint from players was that they had to compete against their allies to have fun in a lot of activities. In fact, Bungie was praised last year for the enemy density in some of the more recent activities because it meant there was plenty to fight and players were able to utilize the builds they had crafted. Those conversations make it feel at least a little contradictory to then complain when one player cannot burn down an entire room of enemies in five seconds.

Another huge part of this shift in power is the result of overhauling the game’s mod system. There is no denying that this new system is far less complex than the previous system. Warmind Cells, Elemental Wells, and a lot of the functionality tied to them has been removed and replaced by more straight-forward stat buffs and a choice between on-demand or temporary buffs. The best way I can describe it is, the old system was a froyo shop where you had dozens of frozen yogurt choices that you could mix and match with tons of toppings that you could pile on, resulting in something that could be amazing or could be a mess; The new system is more of a traditional ice cream shop with a handful of flavors and fewer toppings that have been chosen to deliver a more cultivated experience.

The old mod system offered a lot more creativity, but it could be daunting for new players who were not around to learn the basics when there were fewer options. Assuming they could even acquire all the mods. The previous system was built around a suite of basic mods that were available to all players, with additional mods sporadically introduced during different seasons. The only way to acquire missing mods, if you skipped a season or joined the game late, was from a single vendor who would offer a random selection of mods each day. As a result, players would often be stuck waiting months for important mods or a key mod for a specific build. The new system gives players to almost everything up-front, but is far more limited. Still, I would be remiss if I ignored the near-infinite Threadling build I have going on my Warlock currently and acted like the current system does not allow for some powerful builds. If I am not mistaken, the previous iteration of the mod system started in Shadowkeep and Bungie built on it over three years. I would be surprised if we did not see new mods introduced over time that help players develop even more creative builds.

The mod system rework has also come with an oft-requested feature, loadout management. Players can finally create a build, save it, and then swap to it at anytime with a press of a button. Previously, unless you used a third-party tool, switching loadouts was a manual process that was tedious and cumbersome. I can personally attest that I would play every subclass, but only ever had one or two optimized builds because of how difficult it was to switch gear and change mods. Plenty of games have successful loadout management systems, so this might not seem worth a ton of praise, but Bungie delivered on something that players have been begging for, and it works pretty much flawlessly. The system is intuitive to use, easy to navigate, clean, and it is one of the best implementations in recent memory. You can even save ornaments, so players can easily swap their appearances when necessary for things like Iron Banner weeks. My only complaint is that we cannot save artifact unlocks, but that is a minor complaint that will become even more minor next season.

For all the good of those systems, the other side of the coin is the mediocre Guardian Rank system and the abysmal Commendation system. Bungie has a habit of seizing on annual releases as an opportunity to reinvent systems. In addition to the mod system, they have also introduced Guardian Ranks, a reimagining of the Triumph Score system that was introduced in Forsaken which was itself a reimagining of Destiny 1’s Grimoire Score. When it was announced, Bungie discussed their intention behind the system and stated their goal was for Guardian Ranks to denote a player’s mastery of the game. However, because of how it has been implemented and the types of tasks required to increase a player’s rank, it just quantifies how much a player is willing to grind, rather than serving as a metric of skill or mastery. Still, Bungie has acknowledged some of the flaws with the system, reduced some of the requirements, and already started moving around some of the tasks, so there is a world where Guardian Ranks eventually functions as originally described.

Conversely, I have a hard time seeing the Commendation system ever serving its described purpose. When Lightfall was announced, Bungie also revealed that they were finally introducing an in-game Looking for Group feature and the hope was that commendations would work hand-in-hand with that system to reward helpful players. If a player guided a raid, you could give them a commendation for being helpful; If a player slayed out during a Crucible map, there would be a commendation for being a skilled player. The Looking for Group feature has been delayed until a later season, but that is not the problem with the Commendation system. When Lightfall released, a weekly reward was tied to giving twenty commendations and there were steep requirement for both giving and receiving commendations to climb the Guardian Ranks. Rather than serving as a way to acknowledge helpful or high-skill players, it became a mandatory thing that players had to engage with after every activity.

Bungie has already made numerous changes to the Commendation system since Lightfall's release and I am sure they will continue to tweak it. However, I think the damage has been done. I did my weekly raid clears earlier this week, and in two of the three runs, someone reminded the group not to leave without handing out commendations. It was not because there was something exceptional about either of those runs, rather, commendations are a thing we just do after activities. To really hammer the point, I could not tell you what the actual post-raid commendations were, I just went down the row and gave everyone a commendation. All that said, taken together, I think these two systems are functioning, not as described, but as intended. Guardian Ranks and Commendations are not systems to show mastery of the game or praise other players, respectively, they are systems to trick the part of our brains that like seeing numbers go up. All the conversations about these two systems, systems that have very little bearing on the game, highlight how successful they have been at achieving that goal.

For all my complaints about Lightfall, there is no denying that I have been playing a lot of Destiny 2 since it released. Still, I do not know how long that is going to last. This week, I knocked out my three raids early, played a few rounds of Iron Banner, played a few Gambit matches, and have not touched the game since. At the start of this review, I mentioned I also planned to use this space to evaluate the previous year of Destiny 2 and express my sentiments about the game’s future. This is the point where I have to come clean and admit that this past year has been the least engaged I have been with Destiny 2. While Bungie has done a lot to improve Destiny 2, they continue to neglect the competitive experience, part of a broader neglect of the core playlists. I am pretty indifferent to the stagnation of the Strike playlist, partially because PvP is more interesting to me, but also because, even if Bungie never released another Strike, they continue to support the PvE side of the game with new content every season.

On the other hand, the competitive gamemodes, the Crucible and Gambit, receive barely any attention from Bungie. Bungie has, as recently as a month prior to Lightfall, insisted that PvP is a core part of Destiny 2. There are a lot of players who will say that Destiny 2 will never be a balanced competitive game and PvP players should play Valorant, or Overwatch, or any number of shooters that exist to offer competitive gameplay. To the first point, they are probably right, but I do not think the majority of players who enjoy PvP in Destiny 2 are asking for that. Destiny 2 can offer a thriving PvP scene while not being an e-sport. Not only has Destiny 2 supported a vibrant PvP community in previous years, there have been points throughout the franchise’s history where the competitive side of the game kept the game alive during its content droughts. Lightfall is the big annual release and Bungie could not be bothered to create a new PvP map. If that does not tell you how Bungie prioritizes the Crucible, I do not know what will.

And I hate saying that because the Crucible is where I have spent countless nights. For years, I would get on and play with friends and clanmates who were invested in PvP. Sometimes we would do it to pass time before a raid, sometime that is all we would do. That stopped happening last year. Bungie has been horrendous about supporting PvP for years, but the shift away from gunplay and the over-use of abilities in PvP has made the game less fun. Bungie put out a blog post detailing a number of changes they planned to make to the Crucible experience, and a lot of it sounds good, but I am tired of words and not delivering. I had hoped that updating the Competitive playlist last year would reinvigorate my Crucible spark, but somehow Bungie managed to even drop that ball and made a ranked playlist where the ranks are again meaningless. I have reached the point where, rather than investing my time in a part of the game that Bungie may or may not eventually prioritize, I would rather spend my time in other games.

But for all my issues with how Bungie has mishandled the Crucible, it is still miles ahead of Gambit, Destiny’s PvE/PvP hybrid gamemode. I am not going to spend a lot of time discussing Gambit because it feels like is barely an afterthought to Bungie at this point. The best evaluation of Gambit is that it is in roughly the same neglected place it was last year, but a more realistic evaluation is that it is in a worse place because the full suite of 3.0 upgrades has continued to tear at its wounds. I am admittedly spending more time in Gambit this season, but that has more to do with the reintroduction of my favorite Hand Cannon in the franchise and less to do with Gambit itself. Gambit started as an interesting idea of a competitive PvE gamemode with occasional disruptive PvP invasions, but that was years ago and it has not kept up with the rest of the game. There are so many issues with Gambit and a lot of players, myself included, do not know if there is a way to save this gamemode.

There have been a lot of sentiments that Lightfall is the worst Destiny expansion ever. I cannot disagree with this reaction more strongly. There is no denying that Lightfall was an enormous narrative disappointment, but beyond that campaign, it is actually a really good expansion, as evidenced by the spectacular player numbers in the weeks since. One of the issues for Bungie, however, is the divergent impressions of players who play the campaign and leave versus those of the players who stick around. And this is especially problematic because, I would venture that the majority of players who stick around are players who have been playing for years. We have been waiting in line to ride the roller coaster; we are not going to get off ten minutes before our turn. The other players, the ones who maybe picked up Lightfall because of praise around The Witch Queen, they do not have the same level of investment as older players.. but are also at the same distance from the ride as us.. Okay, look, this is not a perfect metaphor. The point is, players who have been here for nine-years are not going to leave right before the end of the ten-year journey.

Are you familiar with the sunk-cost fallacy, the tendency of people to stick with an activity, even when they can get more enjoyment elsewhere or might not even enjoy the activity, because they have already invested time and money? I am sure most of us can relate to sticking with a television show or series just to see the ending. That is kinda the point I have reached with Destiny 2. This is the ninth year for the Destiny franchise and Destiny 2 is going into its sixth year of content and service. Over the past few years, I have repeatedly asserted that Destiny 2 knows what type of game it is and it is difficult to see the Destiny experience undergoing a drastic transformation. I still think Destiny 2 is a great game, but I can also admit that it is not a great game for me anymore. And it is hard for me to disconnect my evaluation of Lightfall from that growing sentiment. Still, not many games could have kept me this engaged over this many years and although it has its flaws, I think the good parts of Lightfall outweigh the bad. As the franchise approaches the final year of the Light and Darkness saga, I can feel my time with this franchise approaching its end and I just hope that Bungie is able to deliver the satisfying conclusion this saga deserves.


You will fail, you will fall, and then you will get up.

All images owned by Bungie. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=513 Pokémon Scarlet and Violet Review -- A World of Possibility https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=508 Tue, 20 Dec 2022 13:00:00 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/b21e4ef9559fbae33447e90dac0866a0.png Like many, there was a point that I grew tired of experiencing the same...
Like many, there was a point that I grew tired of experiencing the same Pokémon adventure with only a fresh layer of paint applied from generation to generation. I can actually pinpoint the exact moment it happened -- on Route 17 on Ula’ula Island in Pokémon Moon. That was the first core Pokémon game that I did not finish when I picked it up when it originally released. When Pokémon Sword and Shield were announced, I was excited to play the game on the Switch, but I was not expecting an especially deep investment.

Well, I was completely wrong. Pokémon Shield is my most played game on the Switch and has grown to become my favorite entry in the Pokémon franchise. Sword and Shield were the first Pokémon games that delivered the experience that I had been craving from the franchise -- a challenging Pokémon experience where team choices, stats, and strategy actually mattered. The things that took the games from a twenty to forty-hour game and made it a game that maxed out the in-game playtime clock and only stopped playing because the the next generation released were the core competitive experience, the introduction of a ranked ladder, and the steps taken to make that competitive side of the game more accessible. Naturally, I was more than a little apprehensive when Pokémon Scarlet and Violet, the core ninth generation games, were announced and knew they would not live up to my expectations. Even with my reservations, the actual finished product has been more of a mixed bag than even I expected.

Pokémon games have been knocking at the door of open-world gaming for a few entries now. Sun and Moon’s Poni Plains and Poni Island, Sword and Shield’s Wild Area and expansions, and the Monster Hunter-styled areas of Pokémon Legends: Arceus have allowed the Pokémon franchise to dip its toes into the open-world format, breaking the surface, but not committing to dive headlong into the change. Pokémon Scarlet and Violet are the full open-world format that fans have been clamoring about for years. After a brief introduction that gives players a taste of the open-world format, players are told to create their own adventure. While there are three major storylines intended to drive that adventure, each is completely open-ended and players are free to choose where they go and which objectives to pursue.

In previous Pokémon games, movement and environmental abilities have been used to control progression and dictate how players encounter the world. You start with simple movement and add new movement tools as you progress through the game. It is a similar progression approach that was employed by older Legend of Zelda games where players were given a tool, mastered that tool, and then used it to unlock new areas and a new tool. Unlike Breath of the Wild, which gave players access to their full suite of tools within the game’s opening, Scarlet and Violet give players access to movement very early and then leaves it to them to choose when to expand on those capabilities. Within the games' first hour, players encounter Koraidon (Scarlet) or Miraidon (Violet), the box legendaries that serves as transportation and movement across the Paldea region. These pokémon can fly, swim, and climb walls, similar to Pokémon Legends: Arceus’ ride pokémon, but the transition between modes is more seamless. Or rather, they can as you progress through the game. Yes, there is still an order (running comes before swimming, for instance), but once you start expanding their movement capabilities, it becomes apparent how to do so, and players can choose when to seek out and acquire the upgrades. Miraidon (and I assume Koraidon) was one of the best parts of playing Violet. In previous games, I usually have felt a strong attachment to my starter, but playing through Violet, I definitely felt a stronger bond with Miraidon. It certainly helped that it had certain traits and mannerisms that resemble Toothless from the How to Train Your Dragon franchise.

Of course, that is not to say Game Freak has executed the shift to a non-linear open-world game without any stumbles. Breath of the Wild received a lot of praise for allowing players to immediately go from the Great Plateau to the final confrontation with Ganon without any additional requirements. However, that worked because Breath of the Wild was an action-adventure game. That is not the case here, Pokémon games are role-playing games where leveling is a core element of progression. While Sword and Shield increased the level of pokémon in the Wild Area based on the number of badges players had acquired, I do not think there is inherently something wrong with having areas with pokémon of different levels in different parts of the world to steer progression.

Rather, the problem is more about how the games handles their major encounters. Scarlet and Violet give players the freedom to craft their own adventure as they complete the three storylines, but the developers created these with a clear sequence in mind. For example, as is the norm, one of the storylines centers on completing the eight gyms and becoming a champion. While players get to choose the order they want to tackle the gyms, the levels of the gym leaders’ pokémon are all predetermined and, with no guidance, it is easy to get out of order and challenge a gym leader with pokémon ten or even twenty levels higher than your team. This fundamental issue, coupled with various others, reinforce the sentiment that Scarlet and Violet are Pokémon games built around an open-world structure without the proper thought on how that change would influence other aspects of the games.

What is especially disappointing is that there are numerous open-world role-playing games that exist and have successful devised solutions that could have resolved this issue. Game Freak could have given players better guidance on the recommended order, they could have provided information on the level of the gym before challenging them, or, they could have instituted level scaling based on the number of badges acquired. Personally, I would have loved to see level scaling, especially since Sword and Shield scaled the pokémon in the Wild Area based on the number of badges acquired, so it is not like Game Freak has never experimented with this concept. Beyond progression in the world, there are other aspects of these games that suffer due to the open-world structure. For example, open-world games often feature resources which are typically used for crafting. In Scarlet and Violet, this translates to items dropped from wild pokémon that are used to craft TMs at the expense of reusable TMs. It is frustrating to see a feature that has existed in some form since generation five removed to conform to other games when it does not also provide a meaningful addition to the gameplay experience.

But this broaches one of the bigger issues with Scarlet and Violet, the lack of polish and finish on the game. To put it bluntly, Scarlet and Violet feel like they were rushed out the door due to the greater Pokémon franchise’s generational cadence when they needed more time in the oven. Even given its size, I imagine most would agree that Paldea is the shallowest region in franchise history. For instance, take the academy building at the center of the region. It is an impressive and imposing structure with a visible tree house and observatory. But once you get inside, players do not explore any of those areas and just rely on menus to travel from one location to the next. This lack of depth carries over to the towns where most lack any distinctive character, there are almost no houses that can be entered, and the majority of shops are simple menus. Even smaller things, like pokémon closing their eyes when asleep, are absent in these games and make them feel like a rushed product (although that was admittedly fixed in a patch a few weeks after release).

There are also a number of features and quality of life improvements that have been removed with no explanation or reason. Take the set battle setting or the ability to disable battle animations, features that have existed in Pokémon games since the first generation. The removal of these options is not game-breaking (especially in the case of set battles, since players just need to click no each time), but their removal reinforces the critique that corners were cut to get these games out. The games also lack a battle arena akin to Galar’s Battle Tower or Unova’s Battle Subway, an endgame feature that has been present for years. Can these features be added later? Yes, one-hundred percent. I honestly would not be surprised to see an endgame battle arena as part of the inevitable DLC, but that still does not make these games feel any less unfinished today.

Unfortunately, these issues are not even the worst problems plaguing these games. Scarlet and Violet suffer from horrendous visual and performance issues that have seemingly been exasperated by the shift to an open-world format. Perhaps the best encapsulation of these visual issues came during the cutscenes around choosing my starter. During this sequence, there was a visible delay in loading the objects as the camera switched between the characters involved in the conversation, almost if the game was only rending what was immediately visible and it could not load objects like the trees and flowers fast enough as the camera bounced between the characters. Beyond that, some of the other problems include the games' inability to maintain a reasonable framerate, declines in performance as there are more objects on the screen, noticeable slowdowns during weather, lighting issues, screen tearing, and frequent occurrences of the camera clipping through the map. Even the pokémon storage boxes somehow perform poorly. One of my biggest annoyances was the games’ inability to maintain models at any meager distances. When you get even a slight distance away from a character or wild pokémon, the movement stops looking smooth and starts to resemble stop-motion animation, assuming the model even loads in properly. I do not think I can stress how minimal the distance is -- the distance from the camera to the edge of an arena during a gym battle (but not online battles, strangely) is beyond the distance. Speaking of online battles, the performance feels like an enormous step backwards from Sword and Shield as the games cannot even process adjusting the health bars if multiple pokémon take damage from the same move.

In some ways, it is surprising to see these flaws after many of them were prevalent in Pokémon Legends: Arceus, but at the same time, given the short timeframe between that game and the release of Scarlet and Violet, maybe it was naïve to expect those issues would be adequately addressed. Having said that, I do not want to be misconstrued as excusing these issues. I firmly believe Game Freak deserves all the criticism they have received for the problems with these games. What makes these graphical and performance issues especially strange is the juxtaposition of things that look great and things that do not. Some of the character and pokémon models, animations, and the details are a vast improvement. But then the world itself looks undetailed and unremarkable and many other character models are bland and uninspired. Honestly, it is just another notch against these games that make them feel like they were rushed when they needed more time.

So this has already been a pretty meaty review that has been weighted with major criticisms of Scarlet and Violet, so the natural conclusion is that these are two games that can be easily skipped and ignored, right? It is actually a bit more complicated than that. To put it simply, Scarlet and Violet are fun to play and actually do a lot of things right. The core Pokémon experience still plays phenomenally and, for all their flaws, Scarlet and Violet elevate that experience thanks to the open-world setting. I have played other monster training games and none of them have ever been as enjoyable or delivered a comparable experience to Pokémon games. I grinded my way through both Digimon Cyber Sleuth games and I scratched the surface of Temtem at the request of a friend. And I think it is telling that those have been some of the more well-received games in the genre and none of them were as fun to play as Scarlet and Violet when some would argue that these are some of the worst mainline Pokémon games.

Soon after enrolling and arriving at Scarlet’s Naranja or Violet’s Uva Academy, players are tasked with going out into the world to find their own treasure, and that pursuit is framed by the games’ supporting cast. As I mentioned earlier, the narrative of Scarlet and Violet is largely told across three parallel storylines constructed around the three “rival” characters, Nemona, Arven, and Penny. Nemona is most similar to classic Pokémon rivals and spends the game encouraging players and looking forward to the day when you can stand on the same level as her. Her story scratches the surface of the fairly classic tale of someone who reached the pinnacle only to feel isolated at the top, but Scarlet and Violet fail to give Nemona the chance to exist beyond her passion for battling. Arven is the son of the region’s professor and his narrative begins with hunting down special ingredients and battling giant pokémon that have been appearing around Paldea, but quickly transitions to a heavier story. The final subplot revolves around Penny, a meek student who has been drawn into helping disband the "evil organization" of Scarlet and Violet, Team Star. Like some of the recent games, Team Star is not motivated by grandiose plans, instead, befitting the school setting, the team that have been classified as the bullies of the academy.

I am not about to suggest that these stories offer the same depth as a game like those of the Final Fantasy franchise, the Xenoblade Chronicles games, or The Witcher 3, but for a Pokémon game, I was not expecting this level of storytelling. Part of what makes these storylines (two of them, at least) shine is the characters struggle with the consequences of their decisions. Unlike the gym challenge storyline which does not really vary from start to finish, the other two start with straight-forward introductions, but then mature into complex stories that do a remarkable job helping develop not only their central characters, but the supporting cast and even the world of Paldea. I will admit that I did not particularly like Arven or Penny, but I still cared about their stories and those involved. The shortcomings of Nemona’s place in the story are only heightened when compared against Sword and Shield which nailed the gym challenge. It is difficult to go from Galar’s packed stadiums with an entire narrative and region built around becoming a champion to Paldea’s smaller, less grandiose stage where gym leaders do not have the same level of celebrity or status merely from being gym leaders. It also does not help that the champion rank is not really explored, and there is nothing like a gauntlet of champion ranked trainers that players unlock after beating the Pokémon League.

While these storylines are great, some of the strongest in franchise history, I am less sold on Scarlet and Violet’s setting. Specifically, the regional academies were too restrictive and shoehorned into every corner of Paldea. Pokémon games have always featured young protagonists, but it is weird to go to a school with traditional classes like math and history, and then leave that school as part of the curriculum to go out and become a Pokémon master. Also, why are there characters who look to be in their twenties or thirties (or older) who claim to be students? I have so many additional questions about the Paldean education system and none of them are particularly good.

Ever since generation six, Pokémon games have established a unique gameplay mechanic meant to shake up the combat experience. X and Y introduced Mega Stones and Mega Evolution, Sun and Moon featured Z-moves, and Sword and Shield had my favorite mechanic, Dynamax. Scarlet and Violet contain their own unique combat innovation, the Terastal phenomenon (yes, it is a stupid name). When a pokémon Terastrallizes, its appearance becomes crystallized, its typing changes to its Tera-type, and moves that match that typing become stronger. One of the interesting parts about Terastalling is that, while pokémon can lose their normal typing, they do not lose the same-type attack bonus. This effectively gives a pokémon the potential to have three boosted moves in their arsenal. But Terastalizaiton can also be used defensively to remove a glaring weakness or reduce incoming damage. Tyranitar’s four-times weakness to fighting moves has always been a detriment, but Terastrallizing into a ghost-type can turn that weakness into an immunity and cause an opponent to waste a turn.

I have two competing perspectives on Terastrallizing. From a single-player experience, Terastrallization is handled pretty well. Unlike some of the earlier mechanics, players cannot use it to sweep through every battle as it needs to be recharged, but, unlike Dynamax, players can use it in more than just major battles. At the same time, it is only used by opponents in major battles and it was poorly implemented as a last resort tool in those battles. There is a scene from one of the early trailers where the grass-type gym leader Terastrallizes his Sudowoodo from a rock-type pokémon into a grass-type. Visually, it was an exciting moment to see Sudowoodo go from fake tree to real tree, but it was a strategically poor decision, a trait shared by all gym leaders. I would have loved if this gym leader had not used Terastrallization to transform his pokémon into a grass-type, but to gain an advantage against pokémon that are strong against grass pokémon. For example, watching the water-type gym leader Terastrallize a Gastrodon into a fire-type to eliminate its weakness to grass-types while also taking advantage of the Storm Drain ability that would make it immune to water-types would have been a far more successful and powerful use of this mechanic.

Every pokémon has a Tera-type, usually based on its typing (a Charizard can be either fire-tera or flying-tera) but players can acquire pokémon with different types by playing Tera Raid Battles or by collecting Tera shards. Tera Raid Battles are similar to Sword and Shield’s Max Raid Battles and Dynamax Adventures, but with a few refinements. Four players come together to tackle tough opponents with empty slots filled by NPC trainers. Rather than playing until the opponent is defeated or four lives are used up, players must now defeat an opponent before the timer runs out. Knockouts of NPC-controlled pokémon do not affect the timer, but whenever a player-controlled pokémon faints, a chunk of time is removed, so bad teammates can do significant harm to a raid attempt. Every player largely acts independently of one another, so you are no longer constrained by needing to wait for others to lock in their moves. Additionally, the NPC trainers are not a detriment like they were in Sword and Shield and can actually assist during the hardest raids, a welcome addition given that the higher tier raids really draw attention to how many players do not know what to do when Pokémon battles require actually planning and strategy. Like a lot of parts of Scarlet and Violet, Tera Raid Battles are good on paper, but suffer due to the games’ performance issues. Higher tier raids feature health gates which trigger various effects (things like removing your buffs or the opponent gaining shields) and battle can slow to a crawl if multiple gates are triggered at once. When playing online, the games can struggle with processing buff and debuff stacking that cause the target pokémon’s health to take an enormous hit.

Players can also swap a pokémon’s tera-type by collecting fifty Tera shards which are primarily acquired from Tera Raid Battles. This is honestly an incredibly cumbersome and unnecessary mechanic. Let us say you wanted to change your Charizard’s Tera-type to water. You check your map and hunt down the four to five water Tera Raid Battles and get two to three shards after clearing each of those. You are still well under the fifty shards you need, so now what? Your options are, join other players’ raids to acquire one to two shards each, or clear out all the other raids on your map to get a new set of raids to respawn. This mechanic feels grindy for the sake of being grindy and, given that I do not see that many incentives to swap Tera-types for players who are not engaging with the competitive side of these games, mindlessly grinding away at raids does not contribute anything to the competitive experience.

So full disclosure, I finished Violet's main campaign last month, worked on this review, but then waited until the ranked season started and I was able to climb to Master Ball tier before finishing this review. I understand that competitive Pokémon is not for everyone, that is completely fine. But for me, the thing that is going to keep me sinking hours and hours into Scarlet and Violet, is not the single-player experience, but the competitive ladder, so I wanted to spend some time with that. And barring a few issues of varying severity, I am largely enjoying the competitive experience. Scarlet and Violet’s ranked ladder is structured similar to the one introduced in Sword and Shield. There are eleven ranks broken into five tiers -- Beginner, Poké Ball, Great Ball, Ultra Ball, and Master Ball. Players only match with others in the same rank, so a rank seven Great Ball player will only match with other rank seven Great Ball players. Players receive a number ranking upon reaching Master Ball based on, unless I am mistaken, a background Elo-style ranking formula, so players still only match against others at their relative skill level.

Unlike games like Destiny, Overwatch, or Call of Duty, where the developers constantly release balance patches to change metas and make adjustments, one of the things that I find really interesting about competitive Pokémon is that Game Freak only really balances the games once every three years. Instead, metas in Pokémon develop as players create and experiment with new strategies to overcome what is currently popular. Additionally, competitive Pokémon has hundreds of moving parts, so there is never a singular best pick. One of my favorite parts about competitive Pokémon, especially in the early days when some of the strongest pokémon are not eligible for competitive play (or even in the game), is seeing the diverse metas that develop.

As I started spending time playing competitively in Sword and Shield, it made me realize that competitive Pokémon spent years shackled by archaic role-playing game mechanics. However, similar to the more recent generations, there have been a number of changes that make it easier than ever to build competitive teams. Breeding pokémon and acquiring egg moves is easier than ever, mints can be found in the world, and mints, bottle caps, ability capsules, and ability patches can all be acquired from raids. Honestly, with many of the changes, it is possible to build a viable competitive team without spending a second engaging the breeding system. Battle Points (BP) have been eliminated and replaced by League Points (LP), a currency that players can amass from playing the single-player game, so it is easier than ever to acquire the items that speed up Effort Value (EV) training, a necessity given that Poké-Jobs have been removed. Having said that, it seems that Poké-Classes would have been a perfect replacement for Poké-Jobs, especially given the school setting. There are still the aforementioned issues with changing Tera-types, but building a competitive team does not require nearly the same investment as it did a few generations prior.

However, there have also been a number of changes that have harmed the competitive experience, some more significantly than others. Similar to some of my criticisms of the gym storyline, the arenas used in competitive matches are also a huge step back from those featured in Sword and Shield. Sword and Shield set its competitive matches in the same stadiums as the gym battles which created a superior atmosphere to Scarlet and Violet where matches are essentially held on a high school track. The cheering crowds in Paldea also do not help that atmosphere. There are only around a dozen characters standing around the matches in Scarlet and Violet, but there are only a handful of distinct character models. It is also not possible to change the location of ranked matches, although I have heard that this criticism does not hold for casual matches, so I am not sure I understand the logic there.

All the issues I have mentioned so far negatively affect the overall competitive experience, but do not affect the actual gameplay experience. And if that was where my criticisms ended, it would be disappointing, but not the worst problems. However, there are unfortunately a number of problems and steps backward even from a gameplay perspective. Some of these issues are fairly minor, like removing the ability to view an opponent’s team after a match. It was a nice feature, and removing it hurts the experience, but not drastically. One of my bigger complaints is that effectiveness of moves does not change in response to typing changes or when a move changes its type. When the core mechanic of this generation is built around changing types, this is a huge problem to overlook. The games also exhibit some strange behavior in doubles when a pokémon is knocked out, acting like it is still there until the spot is filled (assuming there is a pokémon in reserve to take its spot). I will admit that some of these problems might sound like nitpicking, which is a fair critique, but the fact that none of the issues I mentioned were present in Sword and Shield makes these stumbles inexcusable.

Unlike my single-player perspective on Terastrallization, as a player who engages with the competitive side of Scarlet and Violet, I am far less enamored with this new mechanic. Similar to Dynamax before it, I like how Terastrallization is more flexible than some of the earlier mechanics and allows players to adjust their Tera-strategies around their opponents. And while it is far too early to say for sure, and I can definitely see the potential in Terastrallization, my early impression is that Dynamax was a more enjoyable mechanic. I loved that, in addition to the health and offensive boosts from Dynamaxing, there were additional benefits that Dynamax moves provided that allowed for supplementary strategic considerations. Some of my most successful teams found ways to use Dynamax not just offensively, but to create opportunities for late game success, and the less complex nature of Terastrallization feels like a step backwards. Early on at least, it also feels that Terastrallization enables some powerful sweeping strategies that are driving the meta and team building. At the same, Terastrallization somehow also feels less essential than Dynamax. I had plenty of matches during Sword and Shield which were decided because of how a Dynamax went, whereas I have already had plenty of matches where I have not needed to Terastrallize or used it to counter only one of my opponent’s pokémon, while the rest of the battle played around more straightforward gameplay. There is something to be said that teams have to be more robust in generation nine and who knows, I might grow to love Terastrallization as this generation continues, but right now, I am not the biggest fan.

Like Sword and Shield before them, Scarlet and Violet continue the trend of not allowing every pokémon to be caught or even brought into the games. This is invariable going to be a sore subject as some fans still believe that every pokémon should be available (ignoring that it was not possible to catch every pokémon as far back as Gold and Silver). Personally, I see the benefit of these limitations, especially from a competitive perspective where a more limited Pokédex makes team building significantly more accessible. But even from the single-player context, four-hundred pokémon is more manageable than over one-thousand which has again allowed me to complete a living Dex.

Somehow this has become my longest review, and I think the reason is because of how conflicted I have felt. If this were a bad game across the board, this would be an easy review to write -- “Pokémon Scarlet and Violet are bad, do not buy these games.” But that is not the case. There are many things that are a lot of fun in these games, and I am not going to lie and pretend I have not been enjoying playing this generation. But it is still frustrating to look at these games and see all the things that could have been done which would have made them great. At the end of the day, Pokémon is more than just the games, it is a juggernaut of a media franchise, and the cadence of introducing new pokémon with a new generation makes it impossible to say if there will be any meaningful lessons learned from the missteps of these games. Personally, I recommend Scarlet and Violet, but I also acknowledge that I am someone who really enjoys competitive Pokémon and my view is skewed by this being the competitive platform for the foreseeable future. But I also think it is completely reasonable to want to wait to see if Game Freak can patch some of the performance issues or wait for the price to drop or a sale. And it is also completely reasonable to pass on these games.


You Pokémon Trainers are the treasure of Paldea.

All images owned by Nintendo. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=508 Overwatch 2 Review -- Pre-Release Balance Patch https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=505 Fri, 28 Oct 2022 23:25:08 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/3343c7e11b7def71687d7fad2231bfb1.png 2016 saw the release of Overwatch, a brand new Blizzard IP that showed the...
2016 saw the release of Overwatch, a brand new Blizzard IP that showed the world what a competitive first-person hero shooter looked like when the well-established Blizzard polish is applied. The game was an immediate success that crushed the competition. It was widely praised for its competitive gameplay, mechanical diversity, colorful setting, and unique heroes.

But that was over six years ago, and the Blizzard of 2016 is not the Blizzard of today -- or rather, the public perception of Blizzard is not the same. Overwatch released at a time when Blizzard was one of the mostly highly regarded gaming studios, but Overwatch 2 has released, using that term as generously as possible, at a time when the company has been sinking into a festering molasses of its own making. Various missteps, miscues, scandals, lawsuits, and even federal investigations have knocked Blizzard from the perch the company previously enjoyed. And like the company’s reputation, Overwatch 2 has fallen far shorter than the bar it set in 2016.

Overwatch (herein referred to as Overwatch 1) was originally unveiled in 2014 with an animated short that saw the heroes Winston and Tracer clash against the nefarious Reaper and Widowmaker. It immediately captured the attention of fans who wanted to learn more about the characters, the world, the conflict, and the overall story. However, Overwatch 1 was primarily a competitive shooter and the narrative was largely pushed to the background, instead being told through infrequent comics, short stories, and animated shorts. While the game occasionally offered PvE content, they were, at best, inconsequential flashbacks which did not move the story forward and did little to appease the fervor of fans. And then even support for the competitive aspects of the game seemed to fall off. Players wondered why the pace of balance patches, heroes, and new maps waned. Near the end of 2019, Blizzard announced Overwatch 2 was in development and firmly placed the blame for Overwatch 1’s lack of support on the resources that had been devoted to developing the sequel. But Overwatch 2 was heralded as the solution that finally moved the narrative forward while also allowing Blizzard to better support the competitive side of the game. Well, it has taken nearly three years to arrive and the product Blizzard has delivered is vastly different from what they promised in 2019.

Overwatch 2 was initially announced as a stand-alone PvE sequel. Players who wanted to experience the game’s PvE content and narrative could pick up Overwatch 2, while those who only had an interest in PvP could keep playing Overwatch 1 and the competitive sides of the two games would seamlessly play together and interact. That changed earlier this year when the separate release was abandoned and it was announced that Overwatch 2 would completely replace Overwatch 1. That announcement was fairly inconsequential, but it coincided with a number of more significant changes. Instead of a paid release, Overwatch 2 would be adopting a more free-to-play monetization structure built around seasons and battle passes and would be releasing without the PvE content.

I am just going to rip off the band-aid -- as it exists today, it is disingenuous to consider Overwatch 2 a sequel and not a balance patch. When it was unveiled, Overwatch 2 was presented as a PvE sequel to Overwatch 1. Blizzard went so far as to initially structure the game so you did not need to purchase Overwatch 2 if you only cared about PvP. Yet here we are with Overwatch 2 released and being played, and none of the PvE content that was originally promised is included. And honestly, it feels like Blizzard knew they could not treat this as a true game release. If you are not someone who follows Overwatch, I imagine you might not have known Overwatch 2 was coming. I do not recall seeing a lot of advertisements or pre-release material, and if you remove the things I saw while watching the Overwatch League, I am not sure I saw any promotion.

All that is not to say that Blizzard slapped a "2" on Overwatch 1 and called it a day. For starters, they removed the Assault game-mode and introduce Push, the first new competitive game-mode since the game’s initial release (not including temporary game-modes like capture-the-flag). The release of Overwatch 2 also coincided with some of the largest changes to the structure of the PvP game since role queues and restrictions on team composition were introduced in 2019. The most noticeable is that each team can only have one tank and matches are now five-versus-five, down from six-versus-six. Ever since it was announced earlier this year, the justifications provided for this change have highlighted the developers desire for Overwatch 2 to be a more fast-paced game which leans into more aggressive play-styles and greater opportunities for big plays. Tanks often dictated fights in Overwatch 1, but eliminating a tank means fewer shields and shields have a smaller impact on engagements, reduces the protection offered by tanks which forces teams to clump up less, and requires players to have greater environmental awareness. It is still too early to tell how successful this change will be for achieving their goals, but in the short-term, it seems to be moving the game closer to that vision.

A number of heroes have also undergone significant reworks, some more drastic than others. There was a point during the development of Overwatch 2 where, every few months, Blizzard would unveil the new visuals of the heroes and go into detail regarding any changes. But then those reveals stopped, and while every hero has received a graphical redesign, it does not feel like every hero went under the lens and was updated to the same degree. It is certainly fair to argue that not every hero needed to be reworked significantly. However, removing an entire tank from team compositions has changed how tanks play, and when you have tanks like Reinhardt, Zarya, and Orisa who have been updated and changed, while other tank characters saw no major changes, it only adds more fuel to the narrative that Overwatch 2 was rushed out the door. Although, I am willing to concede that might be partially my bias as a D.Va player speaking.

Like many of you, when Overwatch 1 was still relatively fresh, I sunk an extensive amount of time into the game and enjoyed grinding my way up the competitive ladder. At the time, Overwatch 1 was still a highly polished game, Blizzard was supporting the game with new heroes, balance patches were more consistent, and the game received numerous accolades. Yes, as time went on, Blizzard dropped the ball and the cracks and blemishes started to form, but the foundational gameplay of Overwatch 1 would not have been so highly regarded if it was not a good game at its core. That aspect of Overwatch 1 is still present in Overwatch 2. The shooting, movement, and unique hero identities are still there and still feel phenomenal and have benefited from years of player feedback. Some of the biggest issues, excessive crowd control, stuns, and abilities that take players out of the game, have been removed, making Overwatch 2 more enjoyable and less aggravating. Seemingly drawing from their experience with classes in World of Warcraft, Blizzard has introduced passive buffs that help define and create distinct identities for the roles. As a tank player, I will admit that I had my reservations about the change to five-versus-five, and while it is not perfect, I did not anticipate how well it would work for the most part.

For those who did not play Overwatch 1, Overwatch 2 is a first-person hero shooter. While the game offers an arcade with a rotating set of game-modes, the primary game-modes are the five-versus-five Unranked, or Quickplay, and Competitive playlists. Players compete in different objective based game-modes -- things like escorting payloads and capturing objectives. The original impetus for Overwatch 1 was a massively multiplayer online game, akin to World of Warcraft, and heroes fall into one of three classic identities: tanks, supports, and damage. One of the strengths of Overwatch 2 is the diversity of heroes and how the different playstyles all fit within the same gameplay structure. There are close-range brawlers, long-range snipers, characters who soar through the air, characters who turn immobile, and so on, all competing in the same arena. Every hero has a handful of abilities, largely crafted around their role. Tanks can produce shields or mitigate damage, offensive heroes can increase their damage or set traps, and support heroes can heal or provide additional benefits. Overwatch 1 was developed to be a competitive game from the start, and its gameplay and balance are structured around that vision. And while no game like this will ever be perfectly balanced, Blizzard tries to situate the game around its heroes and their counters (more on this in a little).

As I mentioned earlier, Overwatch 2 has moved away from the previous monetization strategy, one built around the loot boxes that were more prevalent when Overwatch 1 released, and adopted the battle pass model that has become fairly ubiquitous in games lately. I am not going to debate the merits and flaws of loot boxes versus battle passes, nor do I think it is valuable to go into the legal obstacles against loot boxes. Instead, I wanted to highlight how this shift has also resulted in Overwatch 2 being far less generous with cosmetics than its predecessor. While Overwatch 1 players were never guaranteed specific cosmetics, the game was surprisingly generous with loot boxes and players could expect to earn them with some consistency. Yes, you might not get the only-available-for-a-limited-time legendary event skin for your main, but you could be fairly confident that you would acquire some cosmetics just by playing. Worst case scenario, you could acquire enough in-game currency to purchase cosmetics over time. That is no longer the case. On one hand, yes, they are only cosmetics and they do not really matter to the actual gameplay experience of Overwatch 2. But on the other, it still does not feel great that the only way for players to acquire cosmetics now is through the battle pass or from the store. And speaking of the store, a single legendary event skin costs $19, almost double the cost of the battle pass! In the past, Blizzard has even allowed players to unlock specific skins and cosmetics by playing the game, and the recent Halloween event feels like it would have been an ideal opportunity to offer such a reward to appease fans who were inevitably going to be unhappy with this new miserly approach.

Monetization approach aside, monetization in Overwatch 1 was purely cosmetic, but that is not the case anymore as new heroes are tied to the battle pass. More than any other change, this has the potential to undermine some of the core concepts that helped Overwatch 1 succeed as a competitive shooter. Overwatch 2 is a game about heroes, picks, and counter-picks. For instance, Zenyatta is a support character that can heal allies and afflict opponents with a debuff that increases the damage they take. Whenever I am playing support and see a Zenyatta on the opponents’ team, I switch to the newest hero, Kiriko, because she has an ability that can remove that effect. But I only have access to her because she was given to players who had purchased Overwatch 1, and a new player who picks up the game but does not buy the battle pass would not, which means I am at an advantage and Overwatch 2 is walking precariously close to the edge that plummets into pay-to-win territory.

To make matters worse, Overwatch 2’s battle pass has taken a number of cues from some of the worst aspects of different iterations. If you win a game in the Competitive playlist, you only get two-hundred-fifty experience, three-hundred-fifty if you play an in-demand role (read: support). Matches do not reward meaningful experience, and instead, leveling is largely done through challenges. Each level requires ten-thousand experience and completing one of the six daily challenges rewards three-thousand experience. However, players can only benefit from completing three challenges a day. To better frame this issue, a player who did not purchase the battle pass unlocks the new hero at level fifty-five, or after earning five-hundred-fifty-thousand experience. A player can earn nine-thousand experience a day from completing challenges and there are sixty-three days in a nine week season. That means, a player can earn a maximum of five-hundred-sixty-seven thousand experience if they complete all three challenges every day. See where I am going with this? If a player misses six challenges, they will not earn enough experience from challenges to unlock the hero. And this discussion has not even acknowledged the timing that a free-to-play player would unlock the new hero while they are only locked out of Competitive play for the first two weeks of a new season. Yes, my calculation ignores the random hero challenges, weekly challenges, seasonal challenges, bonus experience for grouping up and double experience weekends, but those are just poor attempts to conceal the glaring flaws with the system. Also, unlike most games where the battle pass is used to deliver mostly cosmetic rewards, there is no premium currency. Instead, players earn an inconsequential amount from completing weekly challenges.

Blizzard claims that this change is intended to position them to better support the game in the long run, but those type of statements from game developers do not often support that narrative. The lead-up towards Overwatch 2 and their lack of continuous support for Overwatch 1 have also not helped assuage the concerns of players. And it is more than just Blizzard’s track record, there have been numerous recent games that have promised the stars only to fall far shorter. While Blizzard has promised new maps and game-modes in future seasons, they also have not gone into much detail beyond Season 2. Given the history of Overwatch 1, I doubt vague promises carry much weight with players. That said, they have committed to producing a new hero every two seasons, or every eighteen weeks. No matter how you feel about the shift to the seasonal model, if Blizzard is actually able to support the game and stick to this schedule for new heroes, that is a good thing. But that “if” is enormous.

And all those concerns and issues I have raised have not even broached the currently unaddressed and still largely unseen PvE content. Overwatch 2 was announced with the promise that PvE content would be a separate cost, but players who had paid for Overwatch 1 and did not care about PvE would incur no additional costs to keep playing the game like they had been for years. That is no longer the case and players will need to buy a new battle pass every eighteen weeks, at a minimum, to have access to every hero and stay current for PvP. But that is just for the battle pass and Blizzard has not discussed how they will be monetizing the game’s PvE content. There is absolutely no part of me that believes the PvE content will be free, nor do I think it will be included in the battle pass. I can envision a world where Blizzard adopts an episodic format and do not think that would be the worst approach for this game. But I also do not think it will go over well if players are asked to pay whenever new PvE content is released in addition to being asked to purchase a new battle pass every nine weeks.

All my experiences with Overwatch 2 have come from the perspective of someone who previously played Overwatch 1. And I am thankful I played Overwatch 1 because the new player experience is horrendous. In Overwatch 1, players had to reach level twenty-five to unlock the Competitive playlist. That was enough time to try things out, learn about the game’s core mechanics, and figure out a few heroes you liked (this was also before role queue was introduced, so it was important to be able to play a diverse set of heroes). Overwatch 2 has removed the account level, so players need to win fifty Unranked matches to unlock the Competitive playlist. That is a completely reasonable change. What is not reasonable is that the game locks new players out of most heroes, and they have to play one-hundred matches to unlock them all. Beyond the obvious stupidity of this, there is going to be some subset of players that pickup Overwatch 2, win their fifty Quickplay matches, and then start playing Competitive without having access to the full hero roster. Blizzard claims this is so new players will not be overwhelmed by the initial size of the roster, but I am not convinced it is not driven by some combination of engagement metrics and psychology of exploiting that part of our brain that likes seeing unlocks. I convinced three friends to pickup Overwatch 2, and they just did not have an enjoyable experience. Of the three, only one is still playing and working to unlock every hero and gain access to the Competitive playlist. One of them tried the game for an evening, saw how many characters they still needed to unlock, and uninstalled that night. This is obviously anecdotal, but I am curious how many other players will have a similar experience and whether Blizzard sticks with this approach or changes their strategy.

When I was debating writing this review, I was torn because the Overwatch 2 that is currently playable is undeniably an unfinished product. Overwatch 2 exists to deliver PvE content, but none of that is in the game. In the end though, it was Blizzard’s choice to release the game when they did, so I do think it is fair to evaluate it based on its current state. Still, while the game does not have any of the narrative PvE content that was originally promised, near the end of the month, Blizzard rolled out their annual Halloween event which offers a glimpse of what fans might expect from the eventual release which left me feeling conflicted. I played through this year’s Halloween Terror three times, and I doubt I will touch it again for the rest of the event. Part of this is because, apart from a handful of event challenges, the rewards feel fairly inconsequential. The bigger issue, however, is while the gameplay is fun, filled with Easter eggs and secrets to discover, and is a definite improvement over the stale horde mode that was repeatedly featured during Overwatch 1’s Halloween Terror, the Overwatch gameplay framework did not really lend itself to especially engaging PvE content. For those who have experience with Destiny 2, this event felt like a Strike mission, but worse. It was fairly effortless, had basic objectives, and culminated in a simple boss encounter. Even before the success of Arcane, I firmly believed that Blizzard would have better satisfied the fans craving to learn more about the narrative and world of Overwatch by releasing an animated series, rather than a sequel. If this is a preview of what Overwatch 2’s PvE content will offer, a collection of “endlessly replayable” missions that are comparable to strikes in Destiny 2, I do not think players are going to be very happy with the final product.

If I had been playing Overwatch 1 when it released and had written a review at that time, I imagine I could have transposed my evaluations of the core gameplay between the two reviews. There was a period in my life when I committed the time to grinding Overwatch 1, to improving my skill at the game, and to climbing the ladder. But that was years ago, and I thought that time had passed. I may have been wrong. For the past few weeks, I have found myself drawn back in, playing Overwatch 2, and enjoying the experience of climbing the ranked ladder again.

And yet I struggle to recommend Overwatch 2. Blizzard’s inability to support Overwatch 1 over its lifetime, the extreme shift in monetization, the general abominableness of Blizzard and its parent company Activision, are just some of the reasons that contribute to the mountain of reasons to not play this game. Still, I would be lying if I did not admit that, at its core, as a competitive first-person hero shooter experience, Overwatch 2 is a well-polished and fun game. I do not know how long I will be playing Overwatch 2, I cannot speak to the quality of the future PvE content, and there is definitely uncertainty around the long-term support of this game, but right now, I am having fun playing Overwatch 2.

“You’re one of those heroes, aren’t you?”
“Not anymore.”


All images owned by Blizzard. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=505 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Shredder’s Revenge Review -- A Love Letter to a Bygone Era https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=503 Mon, 26 Sep 2022 17:26:24 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/df5b50bc8a3e47de10ec7259a811f370.png Late last week I came across an amazing Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles...
Late last week I came across an amazing Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles themed mecha figure that is planned to release early next year. And after picking my jaw off the floor and adding a reoccurring calendar reminder to keep an eye open for the inevitable announcement of the Michelangelo mech, I remembered I had never finished my review of the recent Ninja Turtles beat-em-up. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder’s Revenge is the latest entry in a largely forgotten genre that attempts to strike a balance between a deluge of nostalgia and a satisfying and enjoyable gameplay experience.

For many of a certain age, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoon that originally aired in the late 1980s and ran for nearly a decade was a cornerstone of their childhood. This classic series drew inspiration from the comic books created by Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird while also deviating heavily from the darker and more serious source material. Of course, like many Saturday morning cartoons of the time, that series was less about telling a compelling narrative and more about serving as a vehicle to sell action figures. Regardless of that intention, the series was a commercial and cultural success, giving rise to apparel, food, feature films, and video games. The most popular of those video games were the side-scrolling beat-em-up arcade games that allowed groups of friends to pick their favorite turtle and play together to thwart the Shredder’s evil plans (at least until everyone ran out of quarters).

There have been numerous iterations of the Ninja Turtles over the years, but Shredder’s Revenge is a nostalgic cornucopia that mostly roots itself in the original cartoon series. The game opens with Bebop and Rocksteady hijacking the airwaves to broadcast the Shredder’s latest harebrained scheme, a plot involving the head of Krang’s android body and the Statue of Liberty. Naturally, the turtles speed off to Channel 6 News to thwart this plot and the story progresses across sixteen levels (or episodes) which send the turtles and their allies across New York City. Over twenty years after it went off the air, this is a game that could seamlessly blend in with that original series. Each level is filled with waves of robotic Foot Soliders; the bosses draw heavily from the cartoon’s rouges gallery (although some are less iconic and more bargain bin); and each level is filled with cameos and references to events, characters, and locales from the original series and those classic arcade games.

Shredder’s Revenge is not just a carefully and lovingly crafted homage to the original Ninja Turtles cartoon, but also to old-school beat-em-up arcade games. A few years ago, a video game themed bar opened near me, complete with around a half dozen arcade machines. While I was able to resist for a time, I caved when they rotated in the original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles arcade machine. And while it sent me back to my youth, it also surprised me how clunky movement felt in that game. Shredder’s Revenge isn’t a game that is trying to revolutionize the genre, but rather takes the experience out of the arcade and tweaks it to deliver a more modern and enjoyable product. Movement and combat are a lot smoother and are structured in such a way to keep players engaged and increasing their combo count. Players can dodge, counter, and quickly recover from hits to hop back into the action. The game also offers a wider variety of moves (compared to the attack and special attack of its arcade ancestor), but not so many that it ever feels overwhelming. Each character has a powerful and unique area-of-effect super move that charges over time as players defeat foes and rake up longer and longer combos. Players can also charge their super bar by taunting, which makes the game a bit easier since it guarantees you can enter every fight with a full super bar, but that slows down the combat, and honestly, where’s the fun in that?

Like many of its predecessors, Shredder’s Revenge throws hordes of Foot Soldiers at players, sporting different colors like those old arcade games to easily denote differences in weapons. As players progress, those adversaries will be supplemented by variations on the Mouser, Rock Soldiers, and even Triceratons. The developers did not hesitate to pull from the Ninja Turtles’ rich catalog of opponents from across their numerous comics, cartoons, and even other video games to continuously add variation to the combat and game-play experience. At the same time, it is never so oppressive that you can’t enjoy the environment and look for Easter eggs that hearken back to the old cartoon or old games. I imagine there will be some subset of players that will be disappointed that the level of difficulty of the game, but I think this game was crafted with a specific audience in mind. It feels like the developers wanted players to notice all the little things that were placed to ignite that nostalgic part of our brains that overwhelms objective judgment. This game wants you to shout out, “I recognize that!” at the sight of the Party Van or “I got that reference!” when the Punk Frogs cruise by on a roller-coaster.

The game offers two game-modes, a classic arcade mode and a story mode. Both use the same levels, but the story mode offers a top-down map from which to select levels, hidden unlockables, challenges and side quests, and character progression with new abilities to unlock. While the story mode also features (slightly) more story, you will be disappointed if you go in expecting an especially deep or engaging story. The story is minimal, at best, but also feels like a perfect match to the stories of the old Saturday morning cartoon series. Just like that cartoon, no one is here for the story, they are here for the titular turtles. On the other hand, the arcade mode plays like another entry in the Ninja Turtles arcade pantheon. Players start with a fixed number of lives and continues and must reach the end before running out. It also lacks the character progression of the story mode, but many of the upgrades are unlocked at the start, although some are unavailable.

The beat-em-up Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles games were the pinnacle of arcade games in my youth. They managed to slam together the Ninja Turtles and video games, producing a final product that was very much the sum of its parts. Like many of you, I remember going to arcades and quickly burning through handfuls of quarters button-mashing my way through these games with friends. This all changed when we managed to snag Ninja Turtles 2 for the Nintendo Entertainment System. My brother and I (and our friends) were freed from the compulsive need to hoard quarters, we could play these games as much as we wanted. This sentiment only grew stronger when another friend acquired Turtles in Time for the Super Nintendo. But at the same time, these at-home games couldn’t capture the excitement of 4 players, each controlling a different turtle, running rampant across a stage. But those console limitations are long forgotten, and Shredder’s Revenge not only recreates that classic arcade experience, it exceeds it by letting six players (I believe it is capped at four players for local co-op, however) traverse through a Saturday morning cartoon dreamscape together. I have played through the game three times now, once solo, once with a friend, and once with a group of four (I am still trying to get a full team of six going), and this is definitely a game that is more fun the more players you bring. Given that lack of complexity in the game, the increase in players translates to more enemies and bosses with larger health pools, but that does not make it any less fun. All that said, I do not believe the game currently supports cross-play, which is definitely a letdown in an era that is starting to tear down the cross-platform barriers.

There is no denying that this game is built on a foundation of pure, refined, and triple distilled nostalgia. And I could fawn over that nostalgia until the sun comes up, but nostalgia alone is not enough to produce a satisfying game. Tribute Games took that nostalgia and tempered it with copious amounts of love for the source material and built a modern take on those arcade classics. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder’s Revenge feels like a natural evolution of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles the Arcade Game or Turtles in Time. There is no denying this game does not do anything revolutionary nor does it advance gaming in an especially meaningful way, but that was clearly not the intention behind this game. If you grew up playing those games in dimly lit arcades or on a crowded couch, I imagine this game will hit all the right notes. And yes, getting together with a group of friends to blitz through the Shredder’s army of Foot Soldiers to stop his evil plot is just as good as I remember it from my youth.

Shredder...where's that SHREDDER?
...
What are you talking about? I'm looking for my electric cheese shredder. I'm just dying for a pizza ~ Donatello



All images owned by Tribute Games. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=503 Kirby and the Forgotten Land Review -- The end of the world never looked so cute https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=501 Thu, 04 Aug 2022 13:26:55 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/dfc224a9d79a002c63f9f504d32f976b.png At this point, we can all recognize the post-apocalyptic setting. It is...
At this point, we can all recognize the post-apocalyptic setting. It is frequently featured in dystopian narratives where civilization has collapsed, cities are abandoned and retaken by nature, resources are scarce, and order is replaced with lawlessness. These are the familiar staples of a genre that has, especially in recent years, been heavily used across various forms of media. Kirby and the Forgotten Land takes that well-traversed foundation and puts its own spin on the genre by asking, what if it was also shockingly adorable?

Like so many of Kirby’s other adventures, Kirby and the Forgotten Land opens with an interruption to the idyllic life of Dreamland. Dark storm clouds appear in the skies above Dreamland and Kirby watches as numerous Waddle Dees vanish into a mysterious rift before being sucked into it himself. None of that is particularly important. What is important is that Kirby wakes up alone on an unknown beach and, after a brief introduction to some of the game’s core gameplay mechanics, attempts to ingest a car, fails, and becomes that car (all without losing his headwear). Kirby’s anomalous transformation raises a wellspring of questions (Kirby can eat rocks and seashells, why not a car? Is there an upper limit on the size of objects Kirby can consume? How does Kirby drive the car??), but none of those questions truly matter. Taking it all in stride, Kirby cruises through an overgrown and largely abandoned city with an upbeat tune playing as Nintendo clearly draws its line in the sand -- in the clash between post-apocalyptic setting and adorable character, the almost sickeningly cute Kirby will not be deterred or dragged down.

Of course, that is not to say this game is just about Kirby attempting to eat non-digestible objects and becoming those objects in a ridiculous manner (although, don’t get me wrong, this definitely happens -- more on this in a little). Before long, Kirby stumbles across a group of the recently displaced Waddle Dees and a strange blue creature being hounded by unfamiliar critters. And although the Waddle Dees are ensnared and swept away, Kirby frees and befriends this seemingly helpless native, Elfilin. Elfilin informs him that all the Waddle Dees have been captured, and the two set out to free the captured Waddle Dees and help them create a new safe haven in this unknown world. As the story progresses, Kirby and Elfilin visit various abandoned and disrepaired locales and eventually learn what drove this world to its fate.

If you have played a core Kirby game before, the central gameplay of Kirby and the Forgotten Land will feel like another entry in the franchise with some minor evolutions. Ever since Kirby’s Adventure, Kirby’s copy ability, the ability to steal the powers of several of the enemies encountered across his journeys, has been a central element of Kirby’s identity and core to many of the franchise’s gameplay experiences. While there are many abilities that do not appear in this game (Beam/Spark, Stone, Wheel, Feather, etc.), most of the staples have successfully made the jump to 3D. Kirby’s arsenal is also supplemented by two new additions, the drill and gun abilities. Although he has fewer abilities in his toolkit than some of his other adventures, similar to some other recent Kirby games, Kirby can upgrade his abilities to increase their power and gain additional capabilities. Sometimes this is simply increasing the size and power, like upgrading the standard Sword ability to the towering Gigant Sword, but other times, it translates to more significant changes. For instance, upgrading the Fire ability provides it with a pair of flaming wings that can singe foes as Kirby glides across the map. Upgrading abilities requires collecting materials from bonus stages that generally require players to show mastery over a specific ability or play-style in a limited amount of time.

The other significant new gameplay element introduced in Kirby and the Forgotten Land is the Mouthful Mode. Similar to the peculiar Kirby-car situation, there are a handful of items that Kirby will encounter throughout the game that Kirby can attempt to gobble (fail to gobble..?) to take on their appearance. If Kirby eats a safety cone, he takes on the appearance of that cone and can use its conical shape to spearhead enemies and cracks on the map. If he eats attempts to eat a vending machine, Kirby can instead waddle around the map pelting enemies with coke cans.

Mouthful Mode is an interesting concept, and it is executed in a way that opens up some new gameplay options, but it also feels largely superfluous when considered against the larger franchise. While there is an undeniable charm to seeing Kirby adorably wrapped around a metal ring or illuminating the world with a light bulb stuffed in his mouth, these forms feel like they were already possible with established abilities. The car segments could be replaced by wheel sections, the hammer or stone abilities could largely serve the same function as the cone, and a warp star would have provided the same gameplay as the arch segments. Mouthful Mode does not take away from the game, but it is likely a one-off and not an especially meaningful contribution to the franchise.

Apart from a handful of side-games and spinoffs, the Kirby franchise has largely stuck with a familiar side-scrolling format from its inception on the Game Boy and early adventures on the Nintendo Entertainment System, through Nintendo’s transition to 3D on the Nintendo 64, to even the modern era of gaming on the 3DS, Wii, and Wii U. As I started writing this review, a bumped into a strange question: Is Kirby and the Forgotten Land the first true 3D platforming game in the Kirby franchise? That led me to the mistake of visiting WiKirby, and after spending far more time than I had initially intended on extensive research into the franchise, I emerged with a definitive answer: Yes.

While there are some reviews that teeter on suggesting otherwise, Kirby and the Forgotten Land is not an open-world game. It is a 3D platforming game more akin to Super Mario 3D World rather than Mario Odyssey or even Bowser’s Fury. Like many of the other platforming games in the franchise and genre, Kirby and the Forgotten Land is comprised of thematic levels separated into a number of distinct stages. These areas include cities that have become overrun with wildlife, an abandoned amusement park, a desolate desert, and a handful of others. As you would expect, the stages largely adhere to the theme of the area in which they are located, with each stage still feeling mostly unique and offering its own spin on that theme. Each stage can be completed by reaching the end and freeing the captured Waddle Dees, but there are additional Waddle Dees that can be freed by completing hidden objectives. Some Waddle Dees can be found by exploring secret rooms or following side paths, while others are freed after eating three servings of ice cream in a stage. Each stage is also filled with a plethora of enemies to swallow and abilities to acquire to try to uncover secrets. There might be a handful of exceptions, but unlike earlier entries in the franchise, I cannot remember needing to carry an ability from one level to another to reach a secret in this game.

The Waddle Dees rescued by Kirby congregate to form the aforementioned and appropriately named safe haven, Waddle Dee Town. In addition to housing the most adorable population of survivors in a post-apocalyptic world, Waddle Dee Town also serves as a hub which features additional structures as Kirby continues to progress through the game. These include a house for Kirby to relax between his adventure, a shop to upgrade his abilities, a Coliseum where Kirby can enter a gauntlet to challenge previous bosses and powerful foes, and a handful of the game’s mini-games. Waddle Dee Town also houses the game’s post-game content, a condensed and more challenging run through each of the game’s earlier levels, culminating in a clash against a familiar secret boss. It is not nearly as difficult as the final three levels of Super Mario 3D World, but it is a nice offering for players who might have found the campaign too easy.

For as much as I have enjoyed Kirby and the Forgotten Land, I also have to admit the game does not really do anything new or especially innovative. Yes, this game moves the Kirby franchise away from its 2D roots into the 3D platforming world; yes, this is a very well done game; and yes, it is a very fun. But if you are looking for an experience you have not had before, you will likely be disappointed. The game almost feels like it takes the format and formula of Super Mario 3D World and replaces the Mario franchise elements with elements and gameplay cues from the Kirby franchise. Coupled with the game's unique gameplay mechanic being a twist on something that has part of the franchise since 1993, it can feel like Kirby and the Forgotten Land does little to move the franchise or genre forward. Even the game’s post-apocalyptic setting is fairly ubiquitous across nearly every form of media. Having said all that, it is an enjoyable experience and a really good Kirby game, so I do not necessarily think the lack of innovation is a bad thing that dramatically takes away from the game, but it was still something that needs to be mentioned.

While it might not feel like the most innovative game, in many ways, the shift from traditional 2D platforming to 3D platforming for the Kirby franchise highlights an interesting evolution to the introduction of gaming to new players. Kirby was envisioned as an early introduction to gaming for children and has largely adhered to that original intent throughout the franchise’s history. As far as 3D platforming games go, Kirby and the Forgotten Land is not especially challenging and older or more skilled players are not likely to struggle with even the game’s secret challenge courses or post-game content. But even for someone like me, not every game needs to keep me on the edge of my seat, not every game needs to care about min-maxing, and not every game needs to task players with overcoming arduous mountains. I personally enjoyed playing and 100-percenting Kirby and the Forgotten Land because I was not looking for something overly complex or demanding. Sometimes it is enough for a game to be a well done entry in a long-running franchise that captures the charm of an adorable character while offering a simply fun gameplay experience. If that is something that sounds appealing, I fully recommend Kirby and the Forgotten Land.

Every ending is a new beginning ~ Marianne Williamson


All images owned by Nintendo. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=501 Destiny 2: The Witch Queen Review -- Long Live the Queen https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=496 Mon, 04 Apr 2022 02:41:19 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/88627e09381002f9a1127bfbdffb437c.png In 2015, Destiny’s first true expansion, The Taken King, introduced...
In 2015, Destiny’s first true expansion, The Taken King, introduced players to the pantheon of Hive dieties: Oryx, the titular Taken King, and his two sisters, Savathûn, the Hive god of deception and Witch Queen, and Xivu Arath, the Hive God of War. Although players slew Oryx, Savathûn and Xivu Arath remained as looming presences in the shadows of the franchise’s narrative. Last year, Savathûn took on a more significant role, manipulating and driving much of the ongoing story. Destiny 2: The Witch Queen picks up shortly after the culmination of year 4, bringing players into direct conflict with Savathûn in her own realm.

This will largely be a review of Destiny 2’s latest expansion, but it will also be a reflection on the previous year and a long-term evaluation of this game and franchise.

And as usual, this is going to be a long one, so grab a snack and buckle in~

The narrative problem with characters built around tricks and manipulation is that they become easy crutches for writers to turn to whenever an unexpected twist or shocking outcome needs explanation. Loki always has another card to play; Every step is according to Aizen’s plan; and Savathûn has a hand in every plot. Savathûn, Oryx’s conniving sister, has been orchestrating events in the Destiny universe for ages time and has been one of the driving forces in the Destiny 2's story since its second year, albeit often in a secretive role. She played a role in shaping the events of Forsaken, laid out traps to launch the Season of Opulence, manipulated guardians to do her work in Shadowkeep, directly interfered with the plans of the Black Fleet during the Season of Arrivals, and then ensnared and took on the guise of Osiris to manipulate players and the Vanguard over the course of the ongoing storyline of year 4. Savathûn has always been lurking, ready to manipulate a situation or spring a trap, and any time there has been anything suspicious, the community has been quick to look for hints of Savathûn. All that is to say, Savathûn was not a minor villain and there has been a lot of build-up around her.

The final season of year 4 saw Savathûn enter into a bargain with Mara Sov, the Awoken Queen of the Reef, to free her of her worm, the parasitic lifeform that gave her tremendous power and immortality, but at the cost of becoming a slave to its immutable need to consume. In the climactic moments of the season finale, Savathûn’s connection to the Darkness was broken and her immortality ended, but she escaped before a killing blow could be struck. The Witch Queen opens with the sudden appearance of Savathûn’s massive throne world over the recently restored Mars, a planet that narratively disappeared because of the return of the Black Fleet in last year’s Beyond Light, but actually disappeared due to game and development constraints. Upon exploring her throne world, a Gothic castle surrounded by a dreary and forlorn swamp, players soon encounter Hive opponents unshackled from the Darkness and wielding the Light. The narrative unfolds from there, as players try to uncover how Savathûn and her Lucent Brood gained access to the Traveler’s blessings and the Light and what her greater plans entail.

I have not shied away from criticizing Bungie’s narrative decisions and writing in the past, and I would be lying if I said that I was not apprehensive of their ability to actually deliver a satisfying story after years of building-up Savathûn. Destiny has had some good narrative expansions (Forsaken and The Taken King), and it has had some that failed to reach that bar (pretty much everything else). And then there is The Witch Queen. From a narrative perspective, this is, by a long shot, the best Destiny expansion we have ever seen. I also do not think it is a stretch to argue that this is the best story Bungie has ever told, across all their franchises. For years, Bungie has set pieces on the board with little resolution, but with The Witch Queen, they have finally delivered on mysteries and story threads that have been in place for years. Savathûn is handled brilliantly and the expansion about the queen of deceptions and lies is filled with enormous twists and revelations for the Destiny franchise, some that undermine elements we have believed since Destiny 1, but in a completely believable and organic manner.

It is not just the narrative, but also from a gameplay perspective, The Witch Queen campaign ranks among the best campaigns Bungie has produced. The Witch Queen campaign is comprised of long missions with challenging fights, a welcome break from the brief campaigns that could easily be completed in an afternoon which have been a hallmark of too many Destiny 2 expansions. The Witch Queen also abandons the campaign formula of the past three years. Forsaken was structured around a hit list, which made sense given the revenge narrative of that expansion, but ever since the success of Forsaken, Bungie has over-relied on that sudo-open-world approach for the subsequent campaigns. With The Witch Queen, gone are the days of chasing after the main boss’s lieutenants, running around to complete patrol objectives, or hunting for chests. Instead, the campaign offers spectacular story missions that help the narrative flow from one story beat to the next with little downtime. My favorite mission puts players against a fearsome sniper that will not hesitate to one-shot players (reminiscent of the experience I wanted from the Rifleman in Forsaken), follows that with an encounter that hearkens back to one of my favorite fights in Destiny history, and then culminates in a vehicle escape that would feel at place aboard an exploding Halo. I would go so far as to rank that mission on the same level as The Covenant from Halo 3 or Halo’s Silent Cartographer, this expansion is that good.

There was a point in Destiny 2’s history where Bungie made a shift and stopped rewarding the game’s higher-skilled players. The most challenging content offered no meaningful rewards or, at best, meager cosmetics. That trend has reversed course in recent seasons and Bungie has been taking steps to embrace the more serious players again. In that vein, The Witch Queen finally brings back a higher difficulty option for the campaign. While the difficulty is not on the same level as Master level content or day one raiding, it was still a challenge and I died more during this campaign than I ever have in any Destiny campaign. Now, on one hand, numerous players and reviewers have praised Bungie for this difficulty setting, and I was certainly happy to not breeze through the campaign in a single afternoon, but at the same time, I do not think the amount of praise is justified given the original Destiny shipped with a difficulty selector and it is a feature that exists in numerous other games. There are certainly aspects of the higher campaign difficulty that deserve praise: The way the challenge scales when playing in a group; The way rewards have been balanced so players can progress from one mission to the next without needing to level; The copious supply of upgrade materials so players do not need to hinder the experience by using a bunch of random gear; these are all things for which Bungie deserve praise. But the reintroduction of the difficulty setting is a low bar to heap on accolades.

As spectacular as the release and initial wave of content around The Witch Queen has been, that is not to say the complete package has been flawless. As has become the norm, Bungie also launched the latest season in the game’s ongoing storyline. During Shadowkeep and the start of year 3, Bungie started using the seasonal release model to focus and craft an ongoing story. Although it started out rocky and has had its low points, I think most players would agree that, narratively, it has drastically improved and the story that was told across year 4 is widely seen as a high point for storytelling in Destiny. However, there is also no doubt that this seasonal cadence has led to some stagnation

The central pillars of the Destiny gameplay experience, the movement and shooting, have always been exceptional. Bungie has spent over twenty years perfecting that experience. Their problem is that gameplay experience has been positioned into what amounts to different iterations of the same activity for years. Whether it is the latest match-made activity packaged with a new expansion or the newest seasonal activity, for several years now, it has felt like Bungie is going for a passing grade when we know they can deliver so much more. This is certainly an unfair comparison, but looking at the diversity of experiences featured throughout the franchise’s raids and even in The Witch Queen campaign highlight the excellent variation in content Bungie can produce. While, yes, content should be accessible to players at all skill levels and Bungie intentionally limits the complexity of activities that feature matchmaking, I do not think those factors mean these activities cannot be more creative. There are only so many times players want to shoot crystals, dunk orbs, deposit motes, or stand on plates, and we are long past that point.

As often as I have felt a nagging tinge to give it a try, I have never played Final Fantasy XIV, but on several occasions, I have had conversations regarding Yoshida’s perspective on player retention. Instead of building a game around the expectation that players will log in every day or week, they have instead focused more on delivering compelling story beats and engaging content that draws people in. If a player leaves or takes a break, the Final Fantasy XIV team has faith that they can continue producing high-quality releases that will draw those players back. The Witch Queen was exceptional, the seasonal stories have been getting better and better, and Destiny’s core gameplay experience is second to none, so I wish the game did not place so much pressure on players to log in consistently. I am not complaining about things like loot lock-outs, those are fairly standard. One of my biggest issues is that, as good as the seasonal stories have been, it has felt like a chore to log in each week to run the largely similar seasonal activities for a couple minutes of plot progression. Having said that, this most recent season concluded after around a month, so maybe Bungie has responded to the discontent from the community (or the season was not as fleshed out due to their focus on Witch Queen, it is too early to say for sure..).

Last year, Beyond Light introduced the first element and subclasses associated with the Darkness, Stasis. As a whole, the Stasis kits were regarded as far superior to the Light subclasses and offered greater flexibility and options for customization. Over the past year, speculation ran rampant regarding the presumed element Bungie would introduce with The Witch Queen. However, when they officially revealed the expansion last summer, they announced that this year would be devoted to updating the existing Light subclasses rather than introducing a new element. The Void subclasses were updated with The Witch Queen, with Arc and Solar scheduled for later this year. Prior to this update, the Light subclasses were self-contained trees. Players would choose one of three tree, and that would define their kit. These kits were built around specific identities and the perks were intended to synergize together. For instance, if I chose top-tree Dawnblade, I would have access to a set of perks that promoted in-air mobility and combat, whereas choosing bottom-tree Dawnblade would offer perks intended to encourage a more powerful playstyle built around explosions and burn damage.

With Void 3.0, the trees have been removed and switched to the fragment and aspect system introduced with Stasis, and while this has, in some cases, resulted in the removal of perks, it is an overall positive shift that allows for far greater customization and build-crafting. Players choose from a selection of fragments, unique to each class, and then equip aspects which are shared across all Void classes and allow for modifying individual facets and playstyles. Coupled with a selection of seasonal mods meant to highlight the Void subclasses, this change has already allowed players to develop some powerful and unique builds. And while it has further heightened the weaknesses of the Arc and Solar subclasses, I am eager to see how Bungie updates those in the subsequent seasons.

Chasing random rolls on weapons and gear has always been a central tenet of the Destiny gameplay loop. And while Bungie has experimented with different forms of targeted weapon acquisition in the past, for the first time in the franchise’s history, players have complete agency over their gear thanks to the newly implemented crafting system (with some caveats). Specific weapons have blueprints which, when unlocked, allow players to craft a weapon that can be leveled up with use, permanently unlocking perks that can be selected for each of the weapon’s slots. Not every weapon can be crafted currently, but Bungie has stated that they will be looking to expand the pool of options as time goes on. There is still some randomness to the system, as players need to acquire each weapon and there is an added element of randomness to whether it the weapon can become a blueprint (and most weapons require multiple copies of the same weapon), but the system makes acquiring perfectly rolled weapons more tenable.

Unfortunately, as encouraging as the crafting system sounds, Bungie shackled the system with limitations that prevent it from delivering the flexibility players were initially promised. When it was announced, the system was touted as a way for players to experiment and customize their weapons based on their needs or changing circumstances and a solution to reduce hoarding and storage clutter. The system initially released with (and still currently suffers from) limited resource caps, but Bungie has acknowledged and will be adjusting (read: removing) some of the resource issues that have hindered crafting. Still, weapon crafting requires a significant time investment to fully unlock a weapon which means players are chastened to dismantle their crafted weapons. Even with the changes Bungie has already implemented, there is still a substantial cost to reforging a weapon, so I do not imagine many players will actually be modifying their weapons to experiment with different perks or builds.

Given Bungie’s pedigree and the well-deserved accolades for their recent triumphs with the PvE side of the game, the PvP sides of the game, Crucible and Gambit, have been in a neglected place for several years and, unfortunately, it look to continue to be a point of consternation. While the seasonal model has helped Bungie achieve a steady cadence of patches to address pain points and balance, the core PvP experience is in desperate need of attention. It is mind-boggling that, as of this writing, not only has it been over nine-hundred days since the game had a new, original PvP map, there are fewer maps in the game now than there was back then (eleven maps were removed with Beyond Light). While The Witch Queen brought back two maps, Bungie claims there will be a new map coming next season (with a Destiny 1 map remastered during the subsequent season), and the team is reportedly working to bring Rift, a game-mode originally introduced in 2015, to Destiny 2, none of these feel like major causes for celebration. I am not asking for drastic overhauls of PvP, but I do not think it is unrealistic to expect new maps with major annual releases.

Still, credit where credit is due, Bungie reworked Trials of Osiris last year and the community has largely praised them for turning what was once a game-mode that previously catered to smaller and smaller pools of the most high-skill PvP players into something that even the average player can engage with and get rewarded from playing. And while the playlist is more accessible than it has ever been, I would have preferred to see them invest the resources into reworking the ranked playlist, a playlist that has been largely abandoned since the end of year 2 (Bungie recently announced a rework of the ranked playlist is in the works, but no details have been provided). A large portion of the playerbase has always undervalued PvP, saying that Destiny is a PvE game first with PvP on the side. And while Bungie’s actions over the past few years have certainly given credibly to this stance, the developers have repeatedly asserted that PvP is a core element of the game and is not going anywhere. Bungie has taken steps to tweak the overall gameplay to bring better balance to PvP, such as tweaking abilities and balance to bring a greater focus on gunfights over abilities, but there is still so much more that could and should be done.

At the same time, I suppose I should be happy that I spend more time in the Crucible and barely touch Gambit as that game-mode is in far worse shape. Although the game-mode underwent a significant rework with Beyond Light, it also lost two of its six maps and continued to suffer from core issues. With The Witch Queen, Bungie has again tweaked Gambit, but many of those changes did not have the expected effect and have exasperated many of its core problems. Since its inception, Gambit has suffered from the ammo economy. The randomness of heavy ammo drops could completely swing a match, especially in the hands of a competent invader (or an invader using a low-skill weapon). In an effort to combat this issue, Bungie has adjust the game-mode’s ammo drops, so all players receive the same ammo. This sounds great on paper, except it essentially guarantees invaders always have heavy ammo. Coupled with the continued rise in low-skill weapons, this has only amplified the invader problem. For years, I have said that Gambit suffers from being a hybrid PvE and PvP game-mode. I do not know the solution to fix the core issues that plague this game-mode, but I cannot see a world where Gambit thrives without a broad and drastic rework.

Over the past year, one of the common discussions around the Destiny community is whether Bungie should have released Destiny 3 instead of transitioning Destiny 2 into an ongoing, ever-changing game. Ignoring the time it would take to develop Destiny 3 and the lack of support Destiny 2 would receive during the interim.. the question has merit. Destiny 2 was never meant to be a game that lasted this long. It was originally intended to last for two, maybe three years, but after ending their partnership with Activision, Bungie was able to start making Destiny 2 the game they envisioned. A huge part of that was shifting away from installments and instead focusing on producing an on-going game, but there is no denying that building the game’s long-term future on what was intended to be a temporary foundation has come with noticeable issues. At the same time, while this will probably continue to be an issue for the foreseeable future, this will also most likely only be temporary. Destiny 2 is moving towards the final act of what is being called the Light versus Dark saga. This is speculation on my part, but I believe that the end of this arc will also coincide with the end of Destiny 2. But, that’s admittedly speculation, and I could be completely wrong and these are fundamental issues that Bungie will need to address.

For all the good I have to say about The Witch Queen, my biggest two reservations are how unfriendly the game is to new players and stagnation. One of the solutions Bungie introduced to combat the game’s increasing size (in terms of space on systems, but more the time it took to develop and update) was the Destiny Content Vault, or DCV, which essentially came down to removing older, less played content. This has had tepid reception, at best. As someone who has been playing the game for years, I do not mind that content that I no longer engage with is removed, but it has also made the game much less accessible to newer players. As a result, Bungie has shaped the story to be from the moment your character wakes up in the universe and the events that transpire from there, primarily focusing on the arrival of the Darkness and Black Fleet. Which in theory sounds fine, except players only get the expansion stories, not the ongoing seasonal stories. These ongoing, year-long stories have been a great improvement, so it would be nice if new or returning players could view the cutscenes or even if Bungie created story recaps whenever content was removed, so these players are not just thrown in and only given an incomplete picture of the story. At the same time, even when all the story content was available in game, new players were not starting with Destiny 1, so that criticism admittedly loses some steam.

Destiny 2 is not the first ongoing game that I have spent years playing, but it is the one that I have felt suffers the most from stagnation. Part of this sentiment undoubtedly stems from the six month season that capped the end of Year 4 and preceded The Witch Queen, and to Bungie’s credit, I have truly enjoyed the past month. But I am also definitely not engaging with the game nearly as much as I have in the past. It does not help that it feels like Bungie is unlearning some of the lessons they previously learned. Things like forcing players to level and invest in a gun before getting to enjoy it, something that Bungie has repeatedly said did not feel good in Destiny 1, is now a core part of the crafting system. There are other examples, and while none are enormous issues, but seeing Bungie revisit some of these mistakes can make one question the progress that has been made over these eight years.

For all the praise I have for The Witch Queen, my final thoughts are a bit more tepid and divided. If The Witch Queen was a standalone game, the latest entry in a long running series, I would be effusing endlessly about it and heartily recommending it. But The Witch Queen is not a standalone game. Destiny 2 is a live service game, and so my praise is more reserved and that recommendation gets a little trickier. I still think Destiny 2 is a great game and The Witch Queen is an exceptional release that is worth picking up. I think most would agree that it is the best Destiny expansion Bungie has produced and they have finally started to deliver on some of the mysteries and story elements that have been building for years. However, I cannot overlook that Destiny 2 is not a friendly experience for new players and starting out can often feel like attempting to scale a mountain without the proper gear or a guide. When I reviewed Beyond Light last year, I said the Destiny franchise was going into its seventh year and the game knew what it was. I still stand by that sentiment and, at this point, it is hard to imagine a drastic change in the Destiny experience. While the game has its flaws, as a long-time player, none of those flaws significantly hamper the game for me. But I also acknowledge that my experience is very different from the experience of someone who never played Destiny 2 before or someone who is looking to return to the game. As much as I would love to recommend The Witch Queen to everyone, to get more people playing it, to build out our group to play with, there is no denying that Destiny 2 does not offer a complete experience for new players. Still, if you have ever been interested in giving Destiny 2 a shot, I still believe The Witch Queen is the best expansion the franchise has ever seen. Just know that my evaluation is colored by seven years playing Destiny and the new player experience is through very different lenses.


I'm not upset that you lied to me, I'm upset that from now on I can't believe you ~ Nietzche

All images owned by Bungie. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=496 Pokemon Legends: Arceus Review -- In the Beginning... https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=493 Tue, 01 Mar 2022 16:21:41 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/4b3eb7c4941b737c73886a41f7c6ec68.png Pokémon mythology straddles the line between unrealistically insane to...
Pokémon mythology straddles the line between unrealistically insane to completely bizarre. The games put players in control of children, ranging in age from ten to seventeen, who capture pokémon to battle and climb their way to the ultimate pokémon master of the region. On one extreme are common pokémon, barely different that ordinary animals in our own world, but on the other are creatures that, according to legends, have defied death, created the land and sea, ruled over time and space, and even maintained the balance between life and death. Announced with the Pokémon twenty-fifth anniversary, Pokémon Legends: Arceus is the first game that looks to confront some of this mythology.

And by that I mean, it is a game that tasks players with capturing the pokémon that (supposedly) created all of reality.

If you have played a main-entry Pokémon game at any point over the last twenty-five years, you have had roughly the same experience -- players set out from a home town, pick a starter, travel throughout a region, catch a myriad of pokémon, battle countless trainers, overcome eight thematic gyms, undermine the grandiose plans of an evil organization, and defeat an unbeatable champion to take their place as the new champion of a region. While some of these elements are still present, Pokémon Legends: Arceus abandons many of these staples, offering a more novel Pokémon experience. Players still control a teenage child, but instead of starting in a modern and established region, players awake to a gleaming silhouette of Arceus who tasks them with seeking out (read: capturing) all the pokémon before dropping them through a rift in space and time (literally) into the Sinnoh region’s past, at a time when it was known as Hisui.

During this era, people and pokémon did not live together in the same way as the contemporary games. Many of the characters encountered through the game, especially early on, range from wary to downright terrified of pokémon. And they have every right to be. Outside the safety of Jubilife Village, the early precursor to the Sinnoh region's Jubilife City, roam fearsome pokémon that do not behave like any pokémon players have encountered before. One of the biggest breaks from traditional Pokémon games is that wild pokémon do not initiate random battles and will often directly attack players on sight. Players need to dodge and evade aggressive pokémon in the wild to avoid taking damage and getting knocked out, or send out a pokémon to draw the wild pokémon's attention and start a battle. Of course, that is not to say every pokémon is a threat and everyone is perpetually on edge around them. As is the norm, a professor lets players choose a grass, fire (the obvious choice), or water starter pokémon, from a collection of starters from other regions, before tasking them with helping him compile the region’s first Pokédex.

In the same way that Pokémon Sword and Shield were the first games in the franchise to truly capture the spectacle of rising to become, what is essentially, the biggest sports celebrity in the region, Pokémon Legends: Arceus is the first game to consider what would go into actually building a Pokédex that is a research encyclopedia. For over twenty years, players have only needed to catch one of each pokémon to fill out the Pokédex and learn everything there is to know about a pokémon (ignoring shinies and other variants). That is not the case here, and building the Pokédex is a significantly more complex and time consuming process. Players need to catch multiple versions of the same pokémon, catch them at different times of day, catch them while sleeping, observe them using different moves multiple times, feed them, and various other tasks. You cannot argue that this is not a more realistic take on the creation of a research log-like Pokédex, but at the same time, the execution makes the game feel incredibly repetitive and unenjoyable. Tasks like using the same move move twenty or more times or catching the same pokémon ten times from behind are not engaging or fun. Honestly, compiling the Pokédex feels like the type of task that would have existed in a game ten or twenty years ago, not in a game produced today.

To make many of these combat-related tasks even less engaging, Pokémon Legends: Arceus largely downplays the combat and battling side of the game. In total, there are probably less than a dozen trainers to battle throughout the course of the game’s story (you do fight many of the same trainers two or three times), and even catching pokémon no longer requires battling them. In other games, catching pokémon required running around in the grass, hoping the pokémon you wanted would appear in a random encounter, weakening it, and then catching it. Pokémon Sword and Shield tweaked the formula slightly by largely moving away from random encounters, but the catching process remained mostly untouched. While you can still go through that process to catch a wild pokémon, Pokémon Legends: Arceus shakes up this aspect of the franchise by, in many cases, eliminating the need to battle. Like Pokémon Sword and Shield, wild pokémon roam the world, and while you can trigger a more traditional battle by throwing out one of your pokémon, you can catch wild pokémon without ever engaging them in battle. There are even pokéballs that are specifically designed for catching unaware pokémon. Given the need to catch multiples of the same pokémon, this is a welcome change, but, and this relates to one of my biggest complaints about this game, are there a lot of people who play Pokémon games to catch tons of the same pokémon and not battle?

I have touched on the fact that I really got into the competitive side of Pokémon during Generation 8 (there is a whole conversation that could be had about the different experiences competitive and non-competitive players have with Pokémon and how many mechanics many players do not even know exist because the single-player campaigns are so easy), and I get that there are a lot of people who have never touched and will never touch competitive Pokémon. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that. But are there really a lot of people out there who are just playing the games to catch hordes of pokémon? Is there really an audience that is served by this shift in the core gameplay experience?

It is more than just the way that Pokémon Legends: Arceus minimizes the battling side, the game also tweaks the battle system in ways that undermine a lot of that depth that I have learned to appreciate and explore. Most people regard Pokémon as a turn-based game, but that is not actually accurate. In a turn-based game, you would go, then your opponent would go, then you would go, and so on until a winner is decided. Chess and tic-tac-toe are turn-based games, but Pokémon is not. Pokémon is a round-based game where players pick moves at the start of a turn and then every pokémon on the field acts out their turn based on the speed order (that is an oversimplification, but it is close enough). Pokémon Legends: Arceus is closer to a turn-based game with some modifications. If you are engaged in a one versus one battle (against a wild pokémon, for instance), you likely will not notice the change, but during the game’s trainer battles, taking out an opponent’s pokémon usually translates to them sending out something that is super effective against your pokémon and knocking it out before you are given another chance to act. The game also features a system similar to the combat system in the Bravely Default franchise which allows players to leverage turns and damage to alter the turn order. Attacks done using the agile style will be weaker, but will allow a pokémon to attack again sooner, sometimes immediately afterwards. Conversely, using the strong style means a pokémon’s attacks will become stronger, but will come at the expense of potentially delaying their next turn. There are also a number of additional changes that feel like major steps backwards and oversimplifications for seemingly no reason, so the trade-offs for this new battle system do not feel worth the sacrifice.

Given the lack of gyms and gym leaders to serve as boss fights, the game instead features battles against enormous versions of specific pokémon that shift the gameplay to more closely resemble an action game than a role-playing game. Players will need to dodge attacks while throwing balms (bags of a pokémon's favorite food) at these frenzied adversaries to whittle down their health. Each boss has a stun condition that will leave them open for players to throw out a pokémon for a traditional battle which will allow players to do a burst of additional damage to the boss. Given the context of the game and the aggression towards humans exhibited by the wild pokémon, yes, this mostly fits. But at the same time, from a gameplay perspective, it feels out of place to only have a handful of encounters employ this different battle experience. Having bosses that largely do not require using your pokémon to battle is just another example of the game's minimization of the core Pokémon battle gameplay.

Instead of the linear routes that constitute the majority of older Pokémon games, Pokémon Legends: Arceus opts for a more open-world design that allows for greater exploration and freedom. It is not a true open-world game, however. Jubilife Village serves as a central hub, and from there, players choose one of the five areas to go explore. Each part is set in a different part of Hisui with different environments and pokémon (although some pokémon appear in multiple areas). While none of the biomes feel small, and there is plenty of room for exploration, they also never felt especially large.

This might be a personal perspective, but part of this feeling comes from the emptiness of the wilderness. Pokémon Legends: Arceus is set in the past, so while the absence of human settlements is completely understandable, it should have come with a trade-off of a world overflowing with wildlife, or in this case, wild pokémon. It also does not help that the pokémon in the world do not interact with each other at all. The game wants to present the world as being so hostile that wild pokémon will attack players on sight, but those same pokémon are seemingly not so aggressive and feral that they care about the presence of other pokémon species in the same area. Exploring a world before the relationships between humans and pokémon were formed is certainly an interesting idea, but it feels like the concept and its consequences were not fully explored.

And then there is the visual elephant in the room. Prior to the release of this game, one of the biggest criticisms of the trailers and pre-release material was that it looked visually disappointing. Unfortunately, those early impressions were, at best, spot on. There is no way to sugar-coat this issue, Pokémon Legends: Arceus looks horrendous. I am not someone who cares a great deal about graphics and usually have no qualms with sacrificing top-of-the-line graphics for a distinct art style or direction. In most cases, a game’s graphics must be truly substandard and especially distracting for me to bring it up as a negative criticism, but that is exactly what is happening here. The game has atrocious draw distances, textures that look terrible both at a distance and up close, water that looks like it is from the GameCube era, at best, and even character models that look like they are alternating between two frames when viewed from a distance. And while the game is going for a specific visual style (I assume, based on the weird shadow effects), nothing about that justifies its graphical shortcomings.

Playing through Pokémon Legends: Arceus has been a strange affair for me. When the game was originally announced, I did not feel excited and was not planning on picking it up. I do not know how much of my evaluation of the game has been shaped by my early trepidation towards this game but I was swayed by the praise and affirmations shared by so many other players and reviewers. So I have doubted and questioned some of my evaluations and experiences with this game, especially as I have been working on this review. It feels like a game that was created by developers who were either out of their element, or looking to beta test ideas for another release. I have touched on some of the visual and gameplay shortcomings, but even narratively, there are far too many loose ends and characters that are not fully explored for this to feel like a fully fleshed out product. In the end, I can only share my thoughts and feelings, and for me, this is not a game I would recommend. Having said that, many others have enjoyed it, so if it looks interesting to you, maybe you will have a more enjoyable experience. For me though, I just hope this is a one-off experiment and am looking forward to the next, more traditional, Pokémon game.


The beginning is the most important part of the work ~ Plato

All images owned by Nintendo. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=493 2021 BlueGartr Staff Picks -- Celebrating Another Trip Around the Sun https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=490 Fri, 31 Dec 2021 19:39:06 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/fdc62c78c4c1a8bacd8c11eceb465305.png The end of the year is upon us, and like last year, 2021 has definitely...
The end of the year is upon us, and like last year, 2021 has definitely been a strange year. The ongoing pandemic, global supply chain issues, and numerous scandals and crises have impacted the gaming world this year. All of those factors have led to a year without a lot of strong contenders for Game of the Year. Like previous years, the lack of great games has led to a limited number of selections this year. Or maybe it is just a sign we are all finally getting old and do not have as much time for gaming..

In any case, here are the BlueGartr staff’s picks for games of 2021!

Sonomaa

FFXIV Shadowbringers
Even though it came out before, the patches have added such wonderful content and such amazing stories that I cannot help but want to continue to play it on multiple characters.

Runner up: Satisfactory
I have dumped countless hours into building bad factories with even worse conveyor systems and I cannot stop.


6souls

I played a number of new games this year (Hitman 3/Tales of Arise/New World/Sable), but I've only finished one of them, Hitman 3. Arise scratched my JRPG itch that I haven't felt since Ni No Kuni II, New World provided hunting & gathering ASMR, and Sable is a calming exploration, but there is just something about finding creative ways to kill people in Hitman. I also tried a couple Early Access titles, Valheim & Dyson Sphere Project, but I've dropped them until they add content that I am interested in (DSP has been conveyor belt updates for the past half year).

Some of my older favorites got significant content updates this year. Skyrim got new and old mods from the Creation Club added in a neat bundle, Surviving Mars got new maps and official shit to do for the first time since 2019, and Destiny 2 (besides having an above normal year for good story content) got a Bungie 30th Anniversary pack that added a dungeon, a cringey, but fun gameshow playlist, & the D1 Y3 Ghorn. Solid.

Skyrim re-releasing again;

Quote Originally Posted by Krandor View Post
Can't imagine anyone on PC would be in any rush to play this with the limited mod support right now, it hasn't added anything of value for the PC crowd


My game(s) of the year are boring. I can't seem to put down and/or retire from Destiny 2 and Surviving Mars. There is just something about doing the same thing over and over again that feeds my need.




Also, for the meme;




Serra

This year was supposed to be an easy pick for me. Releasing at the end of last year, I expected Cyberpunk 2077 to easily be the best game I played this year. Instead, it is one of the few games to earn the dubious distinction of being a game I quit and returned. And as a result, I found myself searching to pick a game of the year this year. Partially because I didn’t play a ton of games this year, but I struggled to think of a game that really made a strong impression on me or which consumed a large portion of my gaming time.

While there was no game that met those criteria, there was one game that impressed me so much at the time I played through it, I one-hundred percented it twice in a row -- Metroid Dread. Metroid Dread is a bit of an oddity, given that it felt like an olive branch to appease fans until Nintendo has more news on Metroid Prime 4, but at the same time, it is the first side-scrolling Metroid game in nearly twenty years, it offered a brilliant update of the classic side-scrolling Metroid experience, and it can stand with, if not stand above, some of the great games in the genre that have released in recent years. And in a year with a lot of turmoil, Metroid Dread offered the right amount of familiar comfort and new fun to earn its place as my game of the year.


So those are our games of 2021, but what about yourselves? Were there any games that really impressed you this year or any games that consumed your gaming time? Let us know below.

And as ever, Happy New Year, everyone! Here's to hoping things start turning around in 2022! ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=490 Metroid Dread Review -- Things That Go Bump in the Night https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=488 Thu, 04 Nov 2021 21:14:16 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/cc842463bd2ea0dbe18d57d470a17fc3.png Back in 2017, Nintendo surprised fans with a title card for Metroid Prime...
Back in 2017, Nintendo surprised fans with a title card for Metroid Prime 4. The original Metroid Prime ranks as one of my favorite games of all time, so you can imagine my despondency when the only significant news around this title over the past four years has been the 2019 announcement that the game was not meeting Nintendo’s expectations and development was restarting. Going into E3 this year, there was a faint glimmer of hope that Nintendo would finally share some positive news on Metroid Prime 4. That did not happen. Instead, Nintendo stunned fans by announcing that Metroid Dread, a new side-scrolling Metroid game, was in development and would be out by October. It is definitely not Metroid Prime 4, but this game is an outstanding olive branch to pacify ravenous fans.

Barring a few exceptions and prologues, Samus’ adventures through the Metroid franchise have largely followed the same opening steps: Samus arrives on a planet alone and must explore and unravel mysteries while encountering and overcoming numerous obstacles by herself. Isolation and facing challenging situation are baked into the franchise’s DNA, so it was surprising to see Metroid Dread as the full title of Samus’ latest adventure. Yes, the game’s initial trailer heavily featured Samus running from an unrelenting and unyielding mechanical adversary, disconcerting audio chirps, and abrupt musical cuts, but emotions that run adjacent to dread have been core to the Metroid experience since its inception.

Metroid Dread follows 2002’s Metroid Fusion. In her last adventure, Samus destroyed Planet SR388 to wipe out the dangerous X Parasites. However, when a video reveals the presence of the X Parasites on a new planet, Planet ZDR, Samus sets out eradicate the species before they become a galactic threat. As is the norm, Samus’ adventure starts with her losing the upgrades she had amassed in her previous adventure, but in a departure from the traditional Metroid formula, Samus finds herself trapped within the planet’s underground cave systems. It is a small change, and it is far from significant, but removing Samus’ ship as a familiar safe haven for players to retreat helps bolster the sense of dread Nintendo seemingly intended to capture. Samus needs to work her way back to her ship, fighting through swamps and forests, undersea facilities, scientific labs, and various other environments filled with inhospitable foes.

The most dangerous of these foes, and the ones that are best at spreading dread, are the mechanical E.M.M.I. The E.M.M.I. are indestructible robotic enemies that will relentless pursue Samus and one-shot her, triggering a game over, if they catch her. If caught, there is a brief windows where players can counter the E.M.M.I. and escape, but the timing is difficult to pull off and often feels random. Thankfully, the E.M.M.I. only patrol enclosed areas, aptly dubbed E.M.M.I. Zones, so players do not have to spend the whole game with a constant and crippling sense of dread, and dying to an E.M.M.I. will restart players just outside the E.M.M.I. Zone. There are seven total E.M.M.I. scattered throughout the map, with the later E.M.M.I. featuring unique abilities to make them even more formidable. The E.M.M.I. zones punctuate the game, ensuring that, as Samus becomes more and more powerful, players never become too comfortable. While traversing the E.M.M.I. Zones is a tense affair, Samus is eventually able to defeat each one, opening their zones for more casual exploration.

Having said all that, I was honestly not a fan of the E.M.M.I. Even though I knew what I was getting into each time I entered an E.M.M.I. Zone, the game-play felt out of place from the rest of the game and franchise. I did not mind the emphasis on stealth and evasion, but gradually becoming stronger so you can take on tougher opponents or get past specific obstacles is a core piece of the identity of Metroid games. Regardless of how strong Samus had become or how many upgrades she acquired, the E.M.M.I. remained impervious and each E.M.M.I. encounter was an interjection that largely interrupted this progression. I dreaded the E.M.M.I. Zones, not because of a sense of fear, but because these segments felt frustrating, and I question if this is the type of dread Nintendo was looking to elicit.

Long-time fans who have been eagerly waiting for a new 2D Metroid game will be happy to hear that Metroid Dread plays like those classic games, albeit with a few smoother, more modern updates. If this is your first foray into the franchise, Metroid Dread is a side-scrolling metroidvania style game, a portmanteau derived from the Metroid and Castlevania franchises which largely inspired the genre (yes, I hate the term too, but it is what it is..). The world is comprised of a variety of different biomes and progressing through the game requires acquiring power-ups to bypass different obstacles. Finding missiles allows Samus to open missile doors; Acquiring the Morph Ball opens narrow passageways to exploration; Obtaining the Spider Magnet lets Samus traverse and hang from specific walls and ceilings; And so on. The game features a healthy collection of familiar upgrades while also introducing a handful of new abilities that I can imagine quickly becoming staples of the franchise going forward.

Visually, Metroid Dread is a 2D game in a 3D world. While there is nothing exceptional about the game’s graphics, it is pretty much exactly what you would expect from a modern 2D Metroid game. As I said earlier, isolation has been part of the Metroid franchise for many years, and the sterile, abandoned, and rundown environments of Metroid Dread help carry that mood forward. Samus wanders through a variety of different locations and the visuals and musical cues help capture the sense of being alone on a foreign planet. Apart from occasional interactions with her computer, often featuring some variation of, “you’re not strong enough,” there is very little guidance to figure out where to go next in this strange, inhospitable world. There were times I felt the game's pacing was a bit too fast and new abilities came too quickly, but that is a fairly minor complaint. For the most part, the game flows seamlessly from area to area, with the only load times being the awkward elevator and train rides that separate the biomes.

While Nintendo has not released a side-scrolling Metroid game in nearly twenty years, the genre has not stood around idly and there have been numerous games that have continued to carry the torch, some which have garnered high praise. Going into this game, one of my concerns was how Metroid Dread would stack up against games like Hollow Knight and the Ori franchise. The short answer is, not only can Metroid Dread stand with the other recent great games in the genre, it might be the best metroidvania in recent years. A huge part of my evaluation comes from the game’s combat. It isn’t the core running and gunning that stood out (although that aspect feels great for the most part -- the free aiming is not the most intuitive at times), but the general challenge and combat that felt great. Metroid Dread is a surprisingly difficult game and there were plenty of encounters with generic enemies that put me near death. Of all the metroidvanias I have played in recent years, I only recall Hollow Knight giving me the same sense of challenge or satisfaction. While not my favorite feature, the game also brings back some creative and challenging Speed Booster and Shinespark puzzles that really push players to understand the game’s mechanics and movement.

However, the game’s bosses are where the combat and game-play really shine as many are punishing encounters where damage can quickly spiral and players are pressured to execute these tense fights flawlessly (or as close to flawless as possible). It always surprised me how quickly I could go from full health to struggling to survive after just a few hits. These battles are heavily structured around learning mechanics and attack patterns, reacting quickly to cues that precede screen-covering attacks, finding brief openings to dish out damage, and taking advantage of melee counters, a technique introduced in Samus Returns which players will learn to make liberal use of to replenish health throughout the game, whenever possible. There is undoubtedly a lot of trial and error involved in these boss fights and more than a bit of frustration when the exuberance of finally getting past a challenging boss is replaced by the crushing realization that you have only overcome its first phase.

Another reason Metroid Dread feels like a strange title for this game is because Metroid games put players in control of the coolest and most bad-assed female character in gaming, bar none. Ignoring Metroid: Other M (which Nintendo is apparently doing too), Samus has always been cool, collected, and largely emotionless, even when faced with daunting and enormous tasks. For example, in the game’s second trailer, Samus faces off against one of her long-time adversaries, Kraid. As the lumbering behemoth howls at her while chained to a wall, Samus casually stands before him, just out of reach and unmoved by his fury. This is only one example, and Metroid Dread is littered with moments that reinforce the powerful image of Samus as a character who faces fear head-on.

When the original Metroid was released in 1986, it started what Nintendo is now calling the Metroid Saga. Metroid Dread’s reveal was also paired with the announcement that it would be the final entry in the Metroid Saga. To this point though, the Metroid franchise has only consisted of the Metroid Saga, so it is hard to imagine what the games look like without the titular metroids featured as a core focal point. On its own, Metroid Dread is a great return to the side-scrolling Metroid experience, but as the final piece in this saga, it does not feel as epic or grandiose as you might expect for a thirty-five year journey. The game did not feel short (although I admittedly played through it twice in a row -- once on normal and a second time after unlocking hard), but I also wanted more from it. Some of this undoubtedly stems from the game being a surprise reveal instead of news about Metroid Prime 4, but another part is because Metroid Dread is seemingly intended to set the stage for something unknown.

When people talk about the transition from 2D to 3D, Mario 64 and Ocarina of Time are often cited as games that perfectly evolved over time. And while the Metroid franchise skipped the Nintendo 64 and that early transitional period, Metroid Prime deserves its place in those conversations. As such, I was a little apprehensive about Metroid Dread. When it was announced, it felt like it was a game that was cobbled together to satiate fans who have been eagerly waiting for any morsel of news on Metroid Prime 4. No one is going to argue that Metroid Dread pushes the Metroid experience forward, but it is a game that adheres to the franchise’s side-scrolling roots and can hold its own against some of the best contenders in the genre. Metroid Dread is not Metroid Prime 4, but that does not take away from the fact the game is fun and challenging and that is just downright enjoyable to play.

Cowardice, the dread of what will happen ~ Epictetus


All images owned by Nintendo. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=488 Spelunky 2 Review -- Cave Story https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=486 Mon, 04 Oct 2021 18:06:24 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/870f6b57633606539f434274cda594d9.png There was a moment a few weeks ago where I had my best Spelunky 2 run...
There was a moment a few weeks ago where I had my best Spelunky 2 run ever. I was trying to unlock the third shortcut which required me to carry an item from the first level all the way to the end of level 4-4. By chance, I had acquired a number of great items, the compass, spike shoes, Kapala, and a four-leaf clover. I had made it to the second level of the Tide Pool, level 4-2, saw the exit, and promptly misjudged the distance I had to fall, stunning myself, dropping the crucial item I was carrying, and letting physics carry the item over the edge into the waters where the Great Humphead was eagerly waiting to eat me and end that run. That’s Spelunky 2 in a nutshell, a rouge-like where a single mistake, miscalculation, or distraction will inevitably completely ruin a run. And it is also the sequel to one of the best rouge-likes I have ever played.

Start reading reviews of the original Spelunky and you will start to see the same word repeated: perfection. There are many who regard Spelunky, released in 2008 (and later updated to HD in 2012), as a perfect game. Players controlled Guy Spelunky (or one of a handful of unlockable characters), a cave explorer armed with a whip, a handful of bombs, and some ropes as he explored randomly generated cave systems. While players could reach the “final” level with some practice, the game held a bevy of mysteries, some which required pulling off truly obscure and daunting feats. Spelunky was a quintessential 2-D platforming rouge-like; players always started at the same point, dying would send them back to the start, and because each level was randomly generated, no two runs were the same. And while the game did not feature many upgrades or improvements that could be useful on subsequent runs, at its core, Spelunky was a game about learning and knowledge. Players needed to learn how each trap and enemy operated, and progressing deeper required learning more about new traps and enemies, and discovering how to overcome those obstacles.

So how do you follow such a highly regarded and praised game? In interviews, Derek Yu, the game’s creator, stated that he kept coming up with new ideas while working on his book covering the first game’s development. As such, he envisioned a sequel that was an extension of the first game. Spelunky 2 does not attempt to reinvent the wheel or experiment too wildly, it instead builds on the experience of its predecessor, updating and refining many of the things that made Spelunky standout. Like its predecessor, the premise of Spelunky 2 is very straightforward -- players choose a character and then set out to progress from one level to the next, delving deeper and deeper into the randomly generated cave system, collecting treasure, fighting enemies, and eventually (hopefully) becoming rich. That’s not to say that Spelunky 2 does not deserve to be called a sequel. The levels are bigger and more detailed, there are new items to collect and enemies to encounter, and there are plenty of new secrets to uncover. Spelunky 2 is not an unexpected surprise like the original game, nor is it a revolutionary or new experience, it is simply an updated take on the Spelunky experience. At the same time, it also shuffles that experience enough that longtime fans cannot simply breeze through the game relying on their old muscle memory.

Levels in Spelunky 2 follow roughly the same format, players start at the top and work their way down to the exit which leads to the next level. Along the way, there are gems and gold to collect, occasional shops to visit, hidden chambers, and a horde of dangerous adversaries and thematic traps to impede or extinguish your progress. If I had to give one description to define Spelunky 2 it would be that the game is brutally fair. The game lays out its rules clearly and then challenges players to achieve perfection (or as near as possible). Fall short, make a mistake, or choose poorly, and the game will punish you. Arrow traps will always fire if something is in front of them; cavemen will always spot you from the same distance and charge at the same speed; explosions will launch things and getting hit by an object with momentum will stun and hurt you. Mastery of Spelunky 2 comes down to learning how to anticipate and evade dangers while balancing the run-ending risks against potential rewards.

Unlike many other rouge-likes, runs and levels in Spelunky 2 are surprisingly short. Even ignoring how easy it is to die, I would estimate I spend three minutes or less on most levels. This might sound surprising given the heavy pressure the game places on players to take it slow and gradually learn how to survive, both through its limited resources and punishing difficulty fairness, but the game juxtaposes this pressure against an insta-kill mechanic if players spend too much time in a level. After around five minutes in a level, a specter will appear that will unrelentingly chase players and kill them if they come in contact with it. It is challenging to balance urgency and caution, but Spelunky 2 deftly strikes that balance. In a number of ways, the specter perfectly encapsulates the learning process in Spelunky 2. When you start playing, the specter will make frequent appearances and pressure you to reach the exit, often resulting in hurried decisions and deaths. But as you invest more time into the game and build up your knowledge, that experience will pay off and it will become an uncommon visitor, even on the later, more challenging levels. Or maybe I just got faster at dying.

For the most part, every stage is comprised of four levels of increasing difficulty. The levels in a stage are designed around specific themes, and reaching a new stage requires learning about the latest dangers and finding ways to survive. For example, the first level is a cave system occupied by primitive cavemen with simplistic spikes and traps built into totems. The spikes in the Tide Pool are comprised of bright red coral and the ornate lion statues hide spike traps. Although there are some basic enemies that appear in nearly every stage, foes like bats and spider, most enemies also vary from stage to stage, with later levels introducing more durable and dangerous foes. The aforementioned cavemen are replaced by more challenging enemies like the impervious Pangxie or deadly Yetis the deeper into the caves your expedition progresses.

Another thing that differentiates Spelunky 2 from many other rouge-likes is that, apart from a handful of shortcuts that allow players to skip some of the earlier stages, there are no unlockables to make subsequent runs easier. The only unlockables are characters and they all play the same. There are no characters who move faster, jump higher, or start with more resources. Players start every run with four hearts, a whip, and a handful of bombs and ropes. Making it deeper into the caves of Spelunky 2 comes down to developing the skills to progress farther and learning how to avoid making costly mistakes. While I understand that this aspect of the game might be unappealing to some players, it helps to maintain the game’s rules and Spelunky 2’s identity as a game with a strict adherence to those rules. For instance, fall too far and you take damage and get stunned; Fall beyond a certain distance, and you will die; there are no exceptions.

While Spelunky 2 is a great experience on its own, the game also allows players to team up with up to three friends for four player expeditions. While the original Spelunky offered couch co-op, Spelunky 2 also allows players to team up online. In co-op, only one player needs to reach the exit to pull all surviving players through to the next level. Additionally, if someone dies, they are not permanently dead for the remainder of that run, as a dead teammate can be revived on the next level by finding and cracking open a coffin. While this might make it sound like the Spelunky 2 experience is significantly easier with friends, the trade-off is that co-op expeditions cannot use shortcuts and must be completed from start to finish in a single run. Another trade-off comes with money and items. While players pool their money, making it easier to amass a surplus to spend in shops, the effects of items are not shared, and items on a player who dies are lost unless another teammate can collect them. As much fun as I have had with Spelunky 2, I have had more fun playing with friends, laughing over the untimely mistakes and the stupid ways we manage to die and end runs.

I usually try to beat a game before writing a review, and although I have seen the credits, I still have a long way to go before I can say I beat Spelunky 2. As players progress through Spelunky 2, they fill the game’s journal with entries on the enemies encountered, stages visited, and items uncovered. There are still a number of spots waiting to be filled in my journal, and like the original game, there are a wealth of mysteries to solve in Spelunky 2. These range from secret areas and chambers, to secret bosses, to rooms full of seemingly identical items with no use, to entire secret stages I have yet to uncover. I am sure I will eventually rely on the internet to discover which puzzles I am missing, but for now, I am loving the exploration and unknowns as I strive to improve. Can I say I have beaten Spelunky 2? Yes, but there is still so much more to do before I consider myself done with this game.

Spelunky 2 is an exceptional game that I recommend wholeheartedly, while also acknowledging it is not for everyone. For starters, there isn’t much of a story, so anyone looking for a rich narrative experience will leave disappointed. The game is also challenging, players will fail a lot, and it takes time to develop the skills to achieve success. If you are a gamer who does not enjoy that type of experience, it is unlikely that you will enjoy Spelunky 2 -- and there is absolutely nothing wrong with that. But if you want a game that you can sink time into, both to master the game and to unravel a wealth of mysteries, Spelunky 2 will not disappoint.


Digging tunnels. Day after day, that’s my job.

All images owned by Mossmouth. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=486 New Pokémon Snap Review -- Pokémon Geographic https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=482 Fri, 02 Jul 2021 17:50:06 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/9d00e008f0269336c3e34078e91bf9c0.png Conflict and stakes are typically a core element of video games. Some of...
Conflict and stakes are typically a core element of video games. Some of the most memorable games tell stories about the clash between the forces of good and evil, battling to prevent or overcome great calamities, or the struggle to survive. Of course, there are also competitive games that are built around the conflict of gamers pitted against other players or teams. And then there are games like New Pokémon Snap, games without any of that. What is the point of a game without conflict or stakes and is such a game worth the time it takes to beat? Well, I suppose that depends on what you are looking for in a game.

Over twenty years ago, capitalizing on the burgeoning Pokémon craze, Nintendo released Pokémon Snap, a “rail-shooter” that tasked players with taking pictures of Pokémon in their natural habitats. Pokémon Snap was a drastic departure from the gameplay of the core games of the franchise and this experiment was beloved by fans who have implored Nintendo to release another entry over the years. Last year, seemingly out of nowhere, Nintendo announced a sequel as part of the Pokémon franchise’s twenty-five year anniversary celebration.

New Pokémon Snap follows the story of a research team led by the non-tree-inspired Professor Mirror that sets out to unravel the mysteries of the Lental Region. Pokémon in the Lental Region have been observed exhibiting a strange glowing phenomenon, and Professor Mirror’s goal is to understand why. Of course, this is the Pokémon universe, so that translates to preparing a self-propelled hovercraft and sending a child to explore the mysterious forests, active volcanoes, unexplored tundras, undersea caves, and various other areas that comprise the Lental Region with not much more than a camera, and endless supply of fruit, and a song that gets more annoying the more you spam it. Along the way, players encounter over two-hundred different Pokémon drawn from the franchise’s eight generations. Although there are some I would have preferred to not see included (like the myriad of Magikarp that seeming inhabit ever level), I was pleasantly surprised by the wide variety of Pokémon featured in the game.

In case it was unclear, the heart of New Pokémon Snap is about taking pictures of Pokémon. Sure, you might occasionally come across two Bouffalant crashing into each other or a pack of Mightyena angrily chasing after a Furret, but this is a largely peaceful game without a lot of conflict. Players travel through each course taking pictures of Pokémon in the wild to fill out the Photodex, New Pokémon Snap’s photography-focused take on the traditional Pokédex. Each picture is then evaluated and given a star rating, from one to four stars, and a numeric score.

The simplest way to think of the star rating is as a measure of excitement in your photograph. If you take a picture of a Charizard that is simply standing still, it will only be worth one star, but capture a shot of that same Charizard unleashing a flamethrower at an angry Tyrantrum and it might be worth four stars. At the same time, the quality of the photo earns a point score which determines if your photo receives a bronze, silver, gold, or platinum rating. Was the subject facing the camera, was it centered, and were other Pokémon in the shot, are all questions that affect the number of points a photo receives. Honestly, the rating system is not great. I have talked at lengths about my sentiments regarding games that encourage or offer avenues for improvement and the importance of feedback in that process. New Pokémon Snap does not really tell you what went wrong or why a particular photo received its rating, so players are largely at the mercy of a system that can often feel subjective.

Completing the Photodex only requires capturing a single picture of each Pokémon at any rating, but players are encouraged to capture the best photo of each Pokémon at each star rating and that is the challenge of New Pokémon Snap. While the routes and encounters on each stage are essentially fixed, it is a puzzle to figure out how to elicit the unique behaviors from the different Pokémon. Sometimes it is as simple as throwing a fruit or playing a tune, but some photo opportunities require triggering reactions from nearby Pokémon or solving environmental puzzles. One annoyance is that the game only lets players evaluate one picture for each Pokémon from each run which felt like a cheap trick to boost replayability. Given this limitation, I found the best solution was to let the system pick the best photo, rather than deciding for myself. While it is the most optimal solution, it also removes some agency from players which is admittedly not a great feeling. The game keeps track of your highest scores and after each run, the points are tabulated which contribute to the Research Level of the course. Increasing the Research Level makes the Pokémon more trusting which creates new photo opportunities, causes new Pokémon to appear, and can unlock alternative routes.

Given that this is a game about photography, it should come as no surprise that New Pokémon Snap does not slack on the visuals. This is not a hyper-realistic take on Pokémon, like Detective Pikachu, but the world and Pokémon still look great while maintaining the franchise’s traditional cartoon appearance. Pulling from the diverse collection of Pokémon that have been created over the years, most of the game’s different biomes are occupied by a unique selection of Pokémon (baring a few exceptions like the aforementioned Magikarp that reside in almost every environment) that look at home in their specific settings. Two-hundred Pokémon does not seem like a lot, especially given that there are currently probably over one-thousand unique Pokémon (counting the various forms), but each course is packed with Pokémon and photo opportunities.

When New Pokémon Snap was announced, there were two vocal camps. One wanted the game to adhere to its predecessor’s roots and stick to the on-rails format, while the second hoped the game would offer more freedom, drawing inspiration from the open-world games that have become the norm in gaming lately. I can understand both sides of this argument. The on-rails aspect was part of the charm and simplicity of the original game, but at the same time, that was over twenty-years ago and gaming has changed. In the end, New Pokémon Snap does not deviate too much from the original. The Neo-One, the aforementioned self-propelled hovercraft, slowly follows predetermined paths, albeit with the ability to follow forks that can be discovered as players play through each course.

When I started this review, I mentioned how games are often built around stakes. If Mario does not succeed, no one will stop Bowser and save Peach; if you fail to claim a Notorious Monster, you do not have a chance at the drop; if you lose a game of Overwatch, your rank goes down; if you do not pay off your loan from Tom Nook, you cannot go further into debt. New Pokémon Snap has none of that. If you fail to capture a shot, you can run the course again and the Pokémon will return to their original positions and perfectly recreate the opportunity. Part of this is undoubtedly due to the decision to make the game a rail-shooter, but that decision also means the game does not have consequences or urgency. From a game-play perspective, I can understand why New Pokémon Snap is designed this way, but it also makes the game feel completely scripted. New Pokémon Snap is supposed to be about capturing photos of Pokémon in their natural habitats, but the Pokémon end up feeling like Disney Animatronics following pre-programmed directions. While there are variations in some of the courses, it does not do enough to make the Lental Region really feel alive.

This brings me back to the questions I posed at the start of this review, what is the point of New Pokémon Snap and is it worth the time investment it takes to beat? Honestly, New Pokémon Snap is something of an oddity for me. Although I played the original as a child, we did not actually own a copy. I remember playing it at one of my friend’s houses, and later renting it from Blockbuster, back when that was a thing, but that was my exposure to the game. The original Pokémon Snap was also incredibly short, able to be finished in five hours or less, so it was a quintessential rental game. New Pokémon Snap is thankfully much longer, but the story is minimal and not especially engaging. I can’t tell you how many hours it took to finish, but I have sunk over twenty hours across the past few weeks in an effort to take pictures of all the available Pokémon and earn diamond ratings for all four photo options (a goal I am still working to complete). While this is not a game I have loved and I have my issues with the rating system, the challenge of capturing the perfect photos has been a puzzle I have personally enjoyed.

A huge part of the appeal of New Pokémon Snap is that there has not been a Pokémon Snap game in over twenty years. It is great that Nintendo finally decided to revisit this franchise, but at the same time, the game does not reflect over twenty years of evolution in gaming. I think the most accurate description of New Pokémon Snap is that it is more Pokémon Snap. If you are someone who has fond memories of the original game, have nostalgia for that experience, or want a simple, low stress game, New Pokémon Snap might be for you. New Pokémon Snap is a game that makes no secret of what it is offering. The game invites you to snap pictures of Pokémon and that is the exact experience the game delivers.


Gotta snap ‘em all!

All images owned by Nintendo. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=482 Special Report: E3 2021 https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=480 Fri, 18 Jun 2021 12:00:00 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/4e8397d817d8b676a3eba50f23caac9e.png After missing 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic, E3 returned to the Los...
After missing 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic, E3 returned to the Los Angeles Convention Center this year. This should have been a triumphant return and an exciting week for gamers, but in addition to the fact that a number of companies offered digital presentations last year during the planned E3 period, E3 has been in a weird place the past few years. In the past, there were three big press conferences from Microsoft, Sony, and Nintendo and the various developers typically used the exhibition floor to showcase game-play and demos of their upcoming projects. In recent years, however, publishers have been hosting their own press conferences and the press conferences of the big three have felt less like must-watch events. A few years back, Nintendo stopped doing press conferences altogether and instead opted for prerecorded presentations, and this year, Sony even skipped E3. So rather than my usual E3 breakdowns, I figured I would try something new this year and talk about some of my personal standouts from E3 2021~

Halo Infinite (XBSX, XB1, PC)
I have made no secret of my love for the Halo franchise and knowing the next entry was pushed back to some point in 2021, I was expecting some major news about Halo Infinite, and while there was a trailer, it mostly focused on multiplayer. Yes, there was additional information shared over the course of the week, but learning about seasonal plans, cosmetics, and battle passes was not what I was hoping to see this week and did little to assuage my concerns about this game. It is especially strange given that there has been one game-play reveal, almost a year ago, which, while it showed promise, had more than a few issues and left a lot of questions. I also have concerns about some of the game-play decisions on the multiplayer side, specifically the seeming embrace of mobility featured in the trailer, but I am willing to give it a chance to see how it feels in practice.

Oh, and I am really not feeling this new knockoff-Cortana AI..


Slime Rancher 2 (XBSX, PC)
I accept that the inclusion of this game on this list will be a head-scratcher for most people, but I am thrilled that there is a sequel to Slime Rancher in the works! The first game was an open-world game which featured farming, exploration, and mysteries. It was an adorable game that was just fun to play and the sequel looks to recapture the charm and mood that made the first game so enjoyable. I am a little bummed that it is seemingly an Xbox exclusive, but I played the first one on PC after it never came out on the Switch, so I will get over that.


Elden Ring (PS4, PS5, XBSX, XB1, PC)
I am somewhat torn about this game. On one hand, it looks to be a new FromSoftware game that will fit in perfectly with the Souls franchise and Bloodborne. I will admit that there is a part of me that wishes FromSoftware would explore a new aesthetic, but the graphics look gorgeous and the world looks incredible. I am also excited to see what they do with a more open world and think the mounted combat looks great. But on the other hand, I am pretty over George RR Martin.


Guardians of the Galaxy (PS4, PS5, XBSX, XB1, NSW, PC)
Even as someone who reads comic books, the Guardians of the Galaxy were not on my radar until the Marvel Cinematic Universe made them household names, so it is hard for me to separate other iterations of the characters from the ones I have seen in the movies. Even without that issue, this game stood out to me for the wrong reasons. It is hard to judge the dialogue of a game off a trailer and a brief game-play demo, but what they showed of team definitely lacked the charisma of their movie counterparts. Also, I think it is a mistake to only let players control Quill. I want to give this one a chance, but the game-play that was shown and SquareEnix’s missteps with the recent Avengers game do not have me hopeful.


Metroid Dread (NSW)
Continuing a recent trend where they announce a game and then reveal it will be out in a few months, Nintendo unveiled the newest side-scrolling Metroid game in almost twenty years, Metroid Dread (but also, there was a conspicuous lack of information on Metroid Prime 4, so take that for what it is worth..). This follow-up adventure to 2002’s Metroid Fusion, adds stealth elements to the Metroid formula as Samus must battle (avoid) indestructible robotic enemies called EMMI while uncovering the ultimate fate of the metroid creatures. Nintendo devoted a considerable chunk of time during their Treehouse: Live segment to showcase the game-play, and from what they’ve shown, the game looks to hit all the right notes to remind players of those classic Metroid games. Having said that, while Nintendo has not put out a side-scrolling Metroid in years, other developers have embraced the genre. Games like Hollow Knight and the Ori franchise have perfected the formula, so I am curious to get my hands on this game and see how Nintendo approaches the genre after so many year. Also, can we take a moment to laugh that Nintendo doesn’t consider Other M a side-scrolling Metroid game?


The Legend of Zelda (NSW)
2021 is the thirty-fifth anniversary of the Legend of Zelda franchise and Nintendo devoted a bit of time to discussing their remaining plans, as minor as they are, for the franchise this year. This included information on the upcoming DLC for Hyrule Warriors, a segment on the remaster of Skyward Sword, a Zelda themed Game and Watch, and a new trailer for the sequel to Breath of the Wild, announced to be coming out in 2022. Look, there was a new trailer and I feel contractually obligated to state that I am excited. Having said that, the trailer was a minute and a half and there was only about thirty seconds of new game-play footage. Am I excited for this game? Yes, one-hundred percent. Will I buy this game on day one? Also yes, undoubtedly. Was this trailer one of the best moments of E3. Ehh, not really (yes, it hurt me to say that..).


I had a conversation with a friend earlier this week and we both agreed that it feels like E3 is becoming less important. So many game companies relied on their own reveals and presentations over the past year, so I am curious to see how long trade shows like E3 remain relevant. But, maybe we are just getting older. In any case, those were my standouts from E3 2021. What were your thoughts this year and what games made an impression on you, positive or negative? Feel free to leave a comment below! ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=480 Outriders Demo -- Just Passing Through https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=476 Sat, 13 Mar 2021 14:48:34 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/1edb07f8febd3c3c1358807f92f1a70f.png The looter shooter genre is something of a peculiarity. On one hand,...
The looter shooter genre is something of a peculiarity. On one hand, there is no denying that the genre has seen a boom for several years now. But on the other, many of these games have been released in an unpolished state, and while some adjust and adapt over time, others fail to meet those initial expectations (or worse). So given this stigma, it is strange that so many offer demos or beta tests which allow players to experience the game and make initial impressions without having to commit. Available next month, Outriders is the latest entry in the looter shooter genre, and like many of its predecessors, there is a free demo that lets players get a taste of what the full game will offer.
Note: this review is based on my experiences with the Outriders Demo which is an unfinished product and may change before the final release. A review of the final product may follow its eventual release next month.

For the sake of brevity (I hope..), I wanted to focus my thoughts on the Outriders Demo on three topics, the world, gameplay, and the hook and long-term prospects. The Outriders Demo lets players experience the first two to three hours of what is purportedly a thirty to forty hour game. After ruining the Earth, humanity traveled through space and arrived at the planet Enoch. The game opens as the first teams land on the lush and lively planet to prepare it for the rest of the survivors. However, a storm dubbed the Anomaly strikes and everything rapidly falls apart. Players wake up thirty years later to find the paradise and promise of the game’s prologue has been replaced by slums, despair, and an endless conflict. Whereas the opening moments of the game are vibrant and beautiful, the meat of the demo is comprised of varying shades of brown. I only downloaded the Outriders Demo because a friend asked if I was interested in giving it a try, and prior to that, had only seen one or two trailers. If my only experience with Outriders came from this demo, I would think the game abandoned the colorful and promising prologue in exchange for something completely bland and uninspired. Since trying the game and as I have worked on this review, I have watched more of the pre-release content and I was shocked to see that later parts of the game embrace color and outlandish and creative designs. Much of the promotional material promises more varied locales, but that visual shift from the prologue to the game’s first section was still incredibly jarring and disappointing. I imagine it will fit into the game’s narrative, but the visuals that comprise the majority of the demo are not doing the game any favors.

Unfortunately, it is not just the visuals as the game’s narrative seemingly drops the hopefulness of a fresh start for humanity and replaces it with what feels like an unoriginal and uninspired edgy and gritty story. This is best encapsulated by Shira, one of the two characters players encounter before and after the time-skip. During the opening, Shira is a hopeful engineer who talks about giving humanity a second chance, takes selfies, and has ambitions and plans for the future. When players encounter her again, she only cares about doing what it takes to survive the war she has been fighting for thirty years. It also does not help that the game tries to make most of its characters out to be these tough and hardened bad-asses, but the writing is just terrible. Given how depressing the complete tonal shift felt, I honestly do not think it would have hurt the game to just cut the initial section. Exploring Enoch and learning about the Anomaly are mysteries for players to unravel in the full game, and I do think the story and world have potential, but the brief story beats players experience in the demo have undoubtedly tempered my expectations.

Outriders is a third-person looter/cover shooter which supports up to three player co-op and with a heavy emphasis on role-playing game elements. There are two key components to the gameplay, one side that feels really good, and one side that does not. Let’s start with the good. Players choose one of four classes (only supporting three person co-op when there are four classes feels like a missed opportunity) with each class having its own distinct identity and gameplay mechanics. The developers have done a great job crafting these unique and largely offensive toolkits that allow each class to feel powerful in its own way. The game’s approach to healing is also really intriguing and helps craft each class’ identity by playing into their strengths and roles. For instance, the Devastator, my favorite class, is a close range tank that heals by killing enemies that get too close. It can launch itself into the middle of a group of enemies, wrap itself in stone to protect itself from damage, and then fire off powerful earthquakes that devastate the enemies and heal any damage that has been inflicted. As much as these abilities complement each other, the classes really shine in co-op when you start to synergize the abilities of different classes together. Characters have a variety of abilities to weaken and entrap enemies and set them up for your friends to unleash their own powerful attacks. Playing with friends is when the game really stands out as, even in the demo, you can become a roaming squad of death that cuts through enemy lines, unleashing explosive and powerful abilities.

If you have read or watched any impressions about the Outriders Demo, you have probably seen high praise for how the game gets players engaged with the loot system early (as in, you can already engage with the loot system during the first two to three hours). One of the common criticisms of the looter shooter genre is that looters force players to reach and engage the endgame before they can really start to experiment with perks, mods, or builds. That is seemingly not the case with Outriders. During one of my playthroughs, a random chest in the second mission dropped a piece of armor that increased the strength of one of my main abilities and made my character feel more powerful. Early gear offers perks that allow you to build and customize your character and its abilities based on your playstyle. Although crafting was not available in the demo, from what I have gathered, you can dismantle guns and armor to remove perks which can then be crafted onto other pieces of gear, which is a great system to give players flexibility in building their characters. I am curious to see how these powers develop as players start to find higher tier loot and how strong some of these perks allow players to become. I am not expecting the game to venture into the same territory as Risk of Rain 2 in terms of embracing letting players become over-powered, but at the same time, I could see them getting a lot closer than a game like Destiny that limits power creep by limiting how strong players can become. Each class also has a robust skill tree with various perks, but the trees did not seem especially interesting when I skimmed them and it seems that the core of customization will come from armor and weapon perks.

But then there’s the bad. Outriders is a looter shooter, and while the classes and loot feel great, the shooting does not. The shooting feels clunky and unsatisfying, guns sound mushy, using cover is not as crisp and responsive as you would expect in a cover shooter, the game could use more weapon diversity, and the level design reminds me of the era when cover in video games was there to be cover and nothing else. It is almost as if the developers focused so much of their attention on making the classes and abilities feel good that they neglected the gunplay. Don’t get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with ability-driven gameplay, but abilities in Outriders have cooldowns. Yes, some of those cooldowns are short, in the range of ten to fifteen seconds, but when players do not have any abilities available, they are forced to engage with subpar shooting mechanics. All that said, when I was playing Devastator, I found a gun that gave my character a shield that recharged as I did damage with that gun. It helped me overlook some of the flaws with the game’s gunplay because my weapon played into the class’ identity and made my gun feel like another piece in the class’ kit instead of a different part of the gameplay experience. I will be interested to see if this was a unique case, or if the game finds ways to capture that feeling in other ways. Another thing that really hurts the shooter experience is the heavy motion blur, which is especially bad when turning and causes heavy drops in frame rate. Motion blur is one of those things in gaming that I am pretty sure no one likes, but is especially problematic in a third-person shooter which wants players to fight in the thick of enemies, often by using abilities that leave them literally in the middle of a horde of hostiles. The developers have said they are aware of the criticism and are toning down the motion blur, but I am waiting to see how it changes with the final release.

Every game needs a hook. Whether it is a ten hour single-player game, a multiplayer player-versus-player game, or a looter that wants you to sink hundreds if not thousands of hours into it. Having played through the Outriders Demo on three classes (sorry, Pyromancer), I see the hook as leveling and building your character, cranking up the world tier, and facing tougher challenges to unlock better loot. The developers have even discussed some of the endgame activities that open up to players after finishing the campaign as well as the game’s crafting and customization, so there is definitely more than thirty to forty hours of gameplay. More specifically, they have described activities called Expeditions which are post-game levels with new mechanics, challenges, and storylines with difficulty tiers designed to test players' skill and builds. As I have mentioned before, I love games that allow me to develop and show mastery by investing more time into them, and the character builds and customization look like they can scratch an itch that Destiny has been missing. That said, the demo was only two to three hours long and then opened up to let players repeat quests and missions. Naturally, players grinded those missions and found the most optimal ways to farm loot which the developers quickly patched. I understand that they probably did not want players to spend the month leading up to the game’s full release farming amazing gear that trivialized that content, but at the same time, players are always going to find the fastest way to get loot in a looter, so it concerns me that the developers were already so quick to act to stop that.

Outriders is a looter shooter, but unlike most recent entries in the genre, it is not a live service game, so I am curious to see how long it will last (or if that is even a concern for the developers). I do not know if there are plans for additional content or expansions, but I imagine Outrider’s longevity depends on how well the game does upon release. I can see a world where the game does well and merits additional content, but the developers have also said it is a complete experience out of the box, so I could also see a world where they release the game, support it with any necessary patches, but then start working on their next project. If the goal of the Outriders Demo was to get me interested in the game’s full release, it succeeded and put the full game on my radar. While I found the gunplay, world design, dialogue, and other aspects disappointing, I can see potential in the character customization, loot, and endgame content. Outriders is not a game I am planning to pick up at release, but the demo has me interested enough that I will be checking reviews and early impressions before I make a final decision.

...our manifest destiny to overspread the continent allotted by Providence...

All images owned by People Can Fly. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=476 Risk of Rain 2 Review -- Can’t Stop, Won’t Stop https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=473 Sun, 31 Jan 2021 15:23:48 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/f84baf2dab0e74140452e6e804a24549.png As I have gotten older, I find myself gravitating towards hobbies where...
As I have gotten older, I find myself gravitating towards hobbies where the outcome is affected by the time I invest. The more time I spend running, the better I do on race day; I can create better dishes because I have years of cooking experience; and naturally, I am drawn to games where I can develop my skills and improve over time. If you have ever played a rouge-like, you will agree that this ideology is core to these games. The past few years have seen some stellar entries into the genre and I have enjoyed the journey towards mastery in many of them. In a category with games like 2018’s dungeon-crawling Dead Cells, the rhythm-driven Crypt of the NecroDancer (and its Hyrule-themed follow-up), and last year’s Game of the Year contender Hades, the game that has been capturing my attention lately is Risk of Rain 2.

Rouge-likes are named for one of the first games in the genre, Rouge. For those who have never played a rouge-like (first, I am disappointed), there are two defining features: procredurally generated levels and perma-death. Items, enemies, and often the levels themselves are randomly generated so no two runs are ever the same, and if you die, you have to start over. That’s not to say you start from the same place every time. In addition to the mastery that comes from repeatedly playing the game, rouge-likes typically allow players to unlock new abilities or items that can benefit subsequent runs that carry over from one run to the next. For instance, beating a boss in one run might unlock a bow that can now randomly be found in subsequent runs. Risk of Rain 2, a sequel to Hopoo Games’ 2013 Risk of Rain, is a 3D rouge-like that can be played by one to four players and is just an exceptional take on the rouge-like formula.

As is the case in many rouge-likes, Risk of Rain 2 is light on the story (I believe there is a story told through lore entries, but I am not here to read through all that..). Start it up and after choosing a character, players are dropped into the world and told to get to work. In the case of Risk of Rain 2, this means finding and activating a teleporter. Activating the teleporter spawns a boss that must be defeated to progress to the next level where that cycle repeats. Throughout each level, swarms of enemies continuously spawn that drop cash when killed which can be used to open chests on that level which reward items and perks to make your character stronger. At the same time, the difficulty is continuously ramping up the longer and longer your run takes, so while you are spending time to make yourself stronger, the enemies trying to kill you are also getting stronger. Like many rouge-likes, you progress as far as you can until you reach and defeat the final boss or get defeated yourself.

While all that sounds fairly by-the-book, what makes Risk of Rain 2 so great is the polish and Hopoo Games’ spin on the typical elements of rouge-likes. Take the worlds of Risk of Rain 2. Risk of Rain 2 eschews the completely random and procedurally generated levels typically featured in rouge-likes in favor of fixed levels with random elements. Most levels are drawn from two options, each level with a different theme and style, and player spawn locations, enemies, shrines, and item chests are all randomly placed. Movement is critical in Risk of Rain 2 and you never want to stop moving, so revisiting the same level structures helps the game craft a flow from player spawn to teleporter. Each level is also not exceptionally large, so experienced players can reach the teleporter after starting a level in around a minute, if they so desire.

If you ever watch a clip of Risk of Rain 2, especially a clip from a deep run, you are probably going to be overwhelmed by what you see. Screens covered in enemies, projectiles, particle effects, and tons of game-play information. And yet, play through the game, and it does not feel that way. The game does not just throw players into the deep end, it is a gradual process. With the always visible difficulty timer, players can stay informed of the level of challenge before them, and by the time you are facing thirty or forty enemies at once, you typically have also amassed the tools and know-how to identify the biggest threats and to manage the horde. Going back to the flow of the game, enemies don’t just randomly spawn, most spawn close to players so the game constantly keeps players immersed in the action. Apart from a few exceptions, most enemies actively pursue players at all times. Since the game wants players to keep moving, it encourages players to often run backwards, compressing and keeping the constantly spawning swarm of enemies into the tighter cone of their field of view.

When I originally started playing Risk of Rain 2, I thought it was a third person shooter. But then I tried out the Mercenary, a katana-wielding character who uses dodges to fly in and out of combat. Risk of Rain 2 isn’t just a shooter, it is a third person action game that offers a different experience and play-style depending on which of the nearly a dozen characters you select. There are characters that rely on long-range weapons, there are characters that utilize close-range melee attacks. From movement capabilities, to primary fire and offensive tools, and even status effects and utility abilities, each character feels unique because their kits have been crafted to not encroach on each other. Take the three melee-focused characters: the aforementioned Mercenary is crafted around flying into combat, dishing out damage, and avoiding attacks; another most resembles a robotic Spider-Man that flies around punching and grappling enemies; and the kit of the third focuses on getting in close to poison and weaken opponents. I have spent the past few weeks convincing a cadre of friends to pick up Risk of Rain 2 and what surprises me is that almost none of us play the same characters. Across over a half-dozen people, only two have gravitated towards the same character (and those two have never played together, so take that for what it is worth). Although players initially start with only one character, the generic run-of-the-mill Commando, a handful of additional characters can be unlocked by completing a variety of tasks. Some of these tasks are straight-forward and simple, while others are more obscure and often happen just by playing the game. For instance, to unlock the Huntress character, players must beat the third world, whereas another character requires players to “free the survivor suspended in time” with no explanation what that means or what it entails. Because each character plays differently, each has its own learning curve. Mastery of one character does not translate to expertise with another, and whenever you unlock and start playing as another character, you will question the decision. Until you put in the time and master that character, at which point the cycle can start anew with another character.

The character diversity also translates to differing levels of utility for the many items available to collect. An item that creates a healing aura while stationary is pretty much worthless to a mobile character like the Mercenary or Commando, but it is one of the best items for players who choose the Engineer since the Engineer places stationary turrets that share the Engineer’s items and buffs. This is especially noticeable in co-op since a larger, more diverse team is better able to take advantage of a wider array of items. Similar to characters, items are unlocked by completing various in-game tasks and once unlocked, items are added to the potential pool players can acquire. Most items also have a stacking effect so players can, more or less, become infinitely powerful. Some of these effects are based on percentages, some are flat numeric effects. One item provides a ten percent chance of critical hits and can be stacked up to ten times for a one-hundred percent effect, Another provides additional jumps, seemingly infinitely, based on the number collected. Of course, like many rouge-likes, the random selection of items you find plays a huge part in determining if your run succeeds or fails. I have had runs where everything just clicked, where I found a good balance of items to keep me alive and items to increase my ability to dish out damage, and I have had runs where my items did not synergize with my character and the game’s difficulty ramped up and overwhelmed me before I could ever find my footing.

One of the things that really helps Risk of Rain 2 stand out is that Hopoo Games did not limit players for the sake of balance. If anything, one of the best parts about Risk of Rain 2 is that the game is not scared of players (or enemies) becoming over-powered, it embraces it. In a sense, every run is a race to see if you can become over-powered before your enemies. The game features two types of difficulty, a selectable difficulty which affects things like enemy scaling and health, and a run difficulty which is constantly going up the longer the run. Spend too much time in a level or run and you’ll start facing more powerful enemies. For example, when you start out, you will face simple lizard enemies called Lemurians. As your run goes on, you will start to randomly encounter larger, more powerful versions called Elder Lemurians. While rare and challenging at first, the Elder Lemurians will eventually completely replace their smaller counterparts, so hopefully you amass the tools to combat them in time. There are also elite versions of enemies that are even stronger and have additional effects, and as runs go longer, they spawn more and more frequently. This difficulty mechanic creates an interesting balancing act. Do you race to the end, knowing you will not have an overabundance of items, but the difficulty multiplier will remain low? Or do you spend time looting every chest and face the tougher levels and opponents that come your way? And how does that calculus change the deeper into a run you get? On some of my longest runs, runs that have taken multiple hours and gone twenty-plus levels deep, I have gotten so powerful that I have been able to burn down bosses in a few seconds, but also required me to constantly stay in motion as the endless swarm of enemies on the screen would quickly hammer me and cause my health bar to rapidly fall if I ever slowed down.

Given the amazing competition in the genre, this might sound controversial, but I think Risk of Rain 2 is the best rouge-like I have played. All these elements, nearly a dozen (and soon to be more) characters, over one-hundred unique items, the game’s difficulty system and enemies, and the score (oh my gosh, I forgot to talk about the game’s bangin' score) all come together to produce a truly fun and engaging experience that just gets better as you sink more time into the game. If you are looking for a game that you can start and finish in a few sessions, that is not what you will find here. But if you want a game that will challenge you, that you can learn to master, and which will reward the time you invest into it, I whole-heartedly recommend Risk of Rain 2. Just know, it is probably going to be a journey and you are going to die a lot.


Explore, Fight, Loot, Die, Repeat

All images owned by Hoppo Games. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=473 2020 BlueGartr Staff Picks -- How Did You Survive Quarantine? https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=471 Thu, 31 Dec 2020 23:26:19 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/fdc62c78c4c1a8bacd8c11eceb465305.png Here we are at the end of 2020. I think everyone can agree that this past...
Here we are at the end of 2020. I think everyone can agree that this past year has been a strange one. As activities in the world and social gatherings were canceled, more and more people embraced gaming as a refuge from the challenges and difficulties of the world. I can personally attest to nearly a dozen individuals who either bought their first systems or returned to gaming after many years. And while there have definitely been some standout games this year, there is no doubt that the ongoing global pandemic has impacted gaming as a lot of games were delayed or fell short of expectations. In the past, the BlueGartr staff have not hesitated to pick older games that captivated our attention, and this year, with all the delays and extra time to spend gaming, it was older games that made the biggest impact this year for many of us. So here are the BlueGartr staff’s games of 2020.

BaneTheBrawler
The only new game I've played this year, that I can think of, is Among Us. Fun whodunnit party-game, best with 7-10 people. PC version is only $5, mobile version is free, cross-play enabled. Great for socially-distanced hangout sessions with your friends. Other than that, I've been on my usual rotation of Civ 6, Stellaris, and FFXIV. If Cyberpunk makes it to release this year, that might be a strong contender. I'm pretty excited for it. Will make a new post if that's the case.
Edit: It did, but I didn't pick it up. So yeah.

My wife's pick would definitely be Animal Crossing: New Horizons.


Byrthnoth
My gaming has been largely retro this year. I broke out a bunch of RPGs that I did not finish (or finish to my satisfaction) in my childhood and did battle with them in 2020. Suikoden III, Xenogears, Xenosaga, Legends of Dragoon, FFXI, FFXII, etc.

The two modern games I played were FFXV and Hades.

Hades was fucking fantastic. For years I have suspected that devs would get a lot more immersion bang for their buck if they paid more attention to story and a lot less attention to graphics. Hades was that game. They saved on graphical asset budget by making it roguelike and invested the extra capital in scripting 20 slightly different greetings for a fan in the one stadium level. The game was fun and the story / intricacy of character interactions was orders of magnitude better than I would have ever guessed.

FFXV went the other route and I would consider it mediocre at best. I played a lot of it (did everything afaik) but the characters were more 2D than Hades, the battle system was not challenging, and it reeked of design by committee. Honestly, if it wasn't a pandemic there is no chance I would have completed it.

So yeah, Hades.


Gredival
Given that I'm perpetually on a backlog, my pick is also old. I finally got around to playing my copy of Xenoblade 2 because I bought and finished the remastered Xenoblade 1 for Switch (a constant Dolphin to-do that never happened).

Hoping for an experience on the level of Xenogears, I came out a tad disappointed. The story is driven by a lot of big themes on the level, or past the level, of Xenogears -- identity vs. memory, survivor's guilt, resource wars, refugees, nihilism and purpose... but it is all ancillary back-drop for the main cast who never justify being the center of the universe. If they were just caught up in events beyond their control that would be one thing, but in most instances it is their journey that pushes the backdrop conflict forward. On their own, three of the five main cast members have compelling stories. Unfortunately, the protagonist is not one of them. Rex dips too far into being the everyman that we are supposed to read ourselves into and as a result he ends up being a boring one-dimensional Gary Stu whose sole motivation is a promise he makes to a girl. And his ties of companionship to the rest of the cast never feel totally justified or completely established. Rex never earns the loyalty of those around him unlike all the other "guy who can unite the world" narratives. The other odd man out is the amusing (in a slapstick anime sense) Tora and his maidbot. However clever and meta the humor is though, they (and the rest of the Nopon) seem to be distractingly out-of-place in the narrative. Maybe it's the rose colored glasses, but I was able to forget about Chuchu in Xenogears; Xenoblade will not let me forget about the Nopon.

However despite all this disappointment with the narrative, the game still held my attention and ate my time as a game itself. The open world exploration is wonderful, the Monolith team having been the same crew that was tapped to handle Breath of the Wild (i.e. Assassin's Creed: Hyrule). The combat is addictive, but with a steep learning curve that includes learning a lot about optimization compelling you to adhere to some semblance of min-maxing to progress (although you can of course just over-level yourself and brute force). The random rare blade resonation mechanic can take care of any gacha game withdrawal you might have.

Perhaps I missed out on the true gem of the new series by not having a Wii U for Xenoblade X which actually prominently featured mecha.


Sonomaa
I played FFXIV a ton, the only games I played on the regular were Modern Warfare and Animal Crossing. I enjoyed Doom Eternal and Hades and a little bit of Genshin.

Satisfactory though, I binged that game a hell of a lot, 105 hours according to steam. I am actually excited that the next patch in early access breaks saves because I want to start again and experience it all over except with eyes unclouded by lulz.

Among Us is fine I just hate being mean.


Ragns
My unoriginal entry would be Doom Eternal but it's pretty hard to hate when you enjoyed the previous one.

Considering how high I put Breath of the Wild the previous years I pretty much have to put Genshin Impact on top of my list for 2020.

Otherwise, I would probably put Half-Life: Alyx somewhere but my Valve Index is still in the mail.
Last minute edit: I got it right before Christmas and I was so not ready for this. I rarely felt so tensed up playing a videogame.

I guess we could also count Among Us for when I'm in my chaotic neutral moods.


6souls
Primarily Destiny & Surviving Mars w/mods. I tried a number of other games throughout the year and out of those, Genshin Impact held my interest for the longest at a months time.

New for me this year:
  • PC
    • C&C Remastered
    • Halo MCC
    • Phantasy Star Online 2
    • Ragnorium
    • Stardew Valley
  • PS4
    • Destiny 2: Beyond Light
    • Dragon Quest Builders 2
    • Fall Guys
    • Far Cry 3 Classic
    • Genshin Impact

Pretty much kept it to games that I could sink a lot of time into.


Serra
Back when I reviewed Pokémon Sword and Shield in January, I had finished the campaign and played enough ranked to reach the max rank in both the singles and doubles playlists and place somewhere around the top one-hundred-thousand. Having never devoted a lot of time to competitive Pokémon I was pretty happy with that accomplishment and my time with Pokémon started to wane. And then the pandemic struck and we started quarantining. With nothing better to do, I set a goal to reach the top one-thousand in the doubles playlist. I have talked about my love for ranked playlists and the introduction of a ranked playlist in this generation drove my interest and playtime throughout the year. Between playing around two-hundred (or more) matches a month, diving deeper into the complexity of the Pokémon games, reexamining my matches and striving to improve, work-shopping teams, learning from top-tier players, metas that changed every few months, two expansions which introduced new Pokémon and strategies, competitive Pokémon has dominated my gaming year. A few months after my review, I placed in the top twenty-thousand. And then top ten-thousand. I spent most of the year bouncing somewhere between the top two to five-thousand and finally reached my goal in November. Although my playtime has declined significantly since then, there is no doubt that Pokémon Shield (and Sword, by extension) has been the most impactful game for me this year.


So those are the games that helped the BlueGartr staff get through 2020. What about yourselves? What games helped you survive 2020? Feel free to let us know below.

Happy New Year, everyone! Here’s to the end of 2020 and the start of 2021. It has got to get better from here, right? ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=471 Destiny 2: Beyond Light Review -- Hello Darkness, My Old Friend https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=470 Thu, 03 Dec 2020 20:08:48 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/ba23bc5bd394a9e11228fd605d47100e.png After a delay of nearly two months, Destiny 2: Beyond Light has finally...
After a delay of nearly two months, Destiny 2: Beyond Light has finally arrived. This past year was been Bungie’s first year self publishing Destiny 2 since splitting with Activision and there have been some undeniable growing pains. While Year 3 had its share of flaws, the Fall expansions are the Destiny franchise’s biggest content drops which lay the foundation for the upcoming year and have the potential to be a clean break from the previous year’s issues. Beyond Light is more than just another Fall release though, it is also the first piece of a story currently planned to cover the next three years. So I think it is safe to say there is a fair bit of pressure on Bungie to stick the landing.

Shadowkeep, last year’s Fall expansion, was promoted as a story focused on the resurgence of the Hive on the Moon and the appearance of strange Nightmare enemies. However, at the end of the campaign’s first mission, players encountered something not featured in any of the game’s promotional material, a Pyramid. These strange objects have been vaguely referenced as avatars of the ambiguously defined Darkness throughout the history of the Destiny franchise. The later part of Year 3 was spent dealing with the arrival of additional Pyramids and the encroaching Darkness. Invited by the Darkness, players arrive on Jupiter’s moon Europa. This frozen moon was once home to facilities that experimented on advanced technology and pushing humanity to new levels, but is now occupied by the House of Salvation. Empowered by the Darkness, this new Fallen group wields the power of Stasis, Destiny’s first new element. But the Fallen are not the only ones to receive this new power, and as you can imagine, as players delve into Europa, it is not long before the Darkness reaches out offering players access to Stasis.

For the majority of the Destiny franchise, the Traveler and the Light have been presented as good while the Pyramids and Darkness have been presented as evil. But as the name implies, Beyond Light is about crossing that line and delving into the Darkness. At the heart of this is the Exo Stranger, an enigmatic character introduced in the original Destiny campaign who then vanished for some unexplained reasons (read: poor writing). The Exo Stranger comes from a future where the Darkness won and has returned to guide Guardians to prevent them from being corrupted by its powers. And while it sounds intriguing to explore the other half of Destiny’s narrative dichotomy, this core aspect of the story falls incredibly short. For the majority of the past six years, the Darkness has been presented as an oppressive and destructive force that was responsible for the death of uncountable lives and caused the collapse of humanity’s Golden Age. Crossing the line and embracing the powers offered by the Darkness needed to be a bigger deal. Unfortunately, so much of Beyond Light’s campaign is spent dealing with the Fallen, Stasis comes across as just another tool for players to utilize. This is best captured by a moment near the end of the Beyond Light campaign where Commander Zavala, the leader of the Vanguard, basically tells players that Guardians cannot use the power of Darkness. But this conversation occurs while I was standing in front of him with the darkness-based subclass that I literally just unlocked equipped. And that was the end of the conversation. I get that this story is far from over and Bungie can potentially do more to make these events feel significant, but at the same time, this was a huge step and not giving it that weight is a wasted opportunity.

Another reason Beyond Light’s approach to the story of the Light and Darkness is such a disappointment is that there are several exceptional story-lines throughout the rest of the expansion. The narrative focus on the Fallen and their leader Eramis does a great job with one of the franchise’s core enemies. Before the Traveler visited humanity, it uplifted the Fallen, and their society collapsed when it fled. These events and the consequences of the Traveler’s actions have been discussed in the game’s lore, but Destiny’s approach to lore has never been especially accessible. Beyond Light finally puts this story front and center and gives players some context for the first enemy we encountered back in Destiny 1. Much of Beyond Light’s post-campaign content focuses on the story of the Exo Stranger and uses her to finally answer numerous questions. Although the character has been largely absent, fans of Destiny’s lore have known certain things about her past for many years, and Beyond Light confirms those facts and expands her connection to characters and organizations that have been at the periphery of the Destiny story for years. Praise aside, and I have made this complaint before, I am tired of the non-playable characters doing nothing. Bungie has spent a lot of time world-building only to leave the actors on the sidelines. This time around, the worst offenders were Eris Morn and the Drifter. For the past year, Bungie has been setting Eris and the Drifter up to be something of a dark counterpart to the Vanguard. But after arriving on Europa and an initial cutscene, they did nothing. I am not saying they need to be involved in missions (although that is a conversation I would like to have eventually), but have them do more than sit around a campfire while I am out doing everything.

Of course, it would not be a Fall expansion without a new raid, and Destiny 2’s best content continues to set a high bar for the franchise. Similar to some of the best raids in the franchise’s history, the new raid, The Deep Stone Crypt, ties into Beyond Light’s narrative and the raid’s first completion changed the world, triggering new story-lines and activities. The Deep Stone Crypt features some amazing set-pieces and, like previous raids, is built around encounters that are unlike anything we have experienced before. With the Deep Stone Crypt, Bungie has also continued their recent trend of making the day one raid experience accessible to more players. From releasing the raid on a Saturday, to the contest modifier which caps players at twenty levels below each encounter, to giving player more time from the release of Beyond Light to prepare for the new raid, the Deep Stone Crypt saw some of the highest day one engagement numbers. That said, while Bungie has taken steps to make the raid more accessible, I have seen a fair bit of frustration from players who came back to Destiny 2 or do not play the game too seriously who felt they did not have access to all the weapons and tools that players who play the game year round had available. Honestly, I do not think this is a problem as the day one experience is supposed to be challenging and players who spend more time playing Destiny 2 should be better equipped and should be better positioned to succeed. While I am happy to see more people attempting and succeeding on day one, this raid has also raised some questions about whether players are becoming too powerful and have too many survival tools at our disposal. One raid is not a definitive enough data point for me to make such an assertion, but this is a topic I will be following.

As you can imagine, introducing a new element as the Destiny franchise goes into its seventh year has shaken up some of the core gameplay of Destiny 2. Stasis is an ice-based element which slows and freezes opponents and allows players to build walls and obstacles. Unlike previous expansions and subclasses, the process to unlock Stasis is built into Beyond Light’s campaign. Stasis subclasses are more customizable than the light-based subclasses we have had for the past three years, and players can choose individual perks based on their playstyle rather than picking from pre-decided sets of perks. There are also quests to unlock additional abilities and customizations after the campaign which tie into the post-campaign storyline. Each class gains access to one new Stasis subclass; Revenant, Shadebinder, and Behemoth, for Hunters, Warlocks, and Titans, respectively. The Revenant takes advantage of the Hunter mobility and uses its abilities to freeze and slow targets. Shadebinders are ice wizards which summon an ice staff to freeze opponents and shatter them. Behemoths are hulking wrecking-balls which rely on freezing targets and setting up ice walls and then shattering the ice by punching or charging through them for added damage.

Out of the gate, the Shadebinder was the strongest and most well-defined subclass. Unlocking additional abilities made the subclass even more powerful and played into the fantasy of an ice wizard rushing into battle, freezing its opponents. The subclass was arguably too powerful, which has already resulted in a few nerfs, although the pendulum may have swung a bit too far in some regards. On the other hand, the Behemoth felt incredibly lackluster at first, but after unlocking additional abilities and spending some time working on a build, it has become a lot more fun. Of the three new subclasses, it benefits the most from players spending time thinking how they want to play and building around that. For instance, I have paired exotics that boost my survivability and recharge my melee ability so I can charge in and repeatedly slam into opponents. As someone who prefers to play Hunter, the Revenant feels fine, but it does not stand out as much the other two. For example, in PvP, Shadebinder just feels powerful and I have constructed a build that makes Behemoth fun to play, but with Revenant, if Stasis as a whole was not so incredibly strong in PvP, there is a good chance I would not be using this new subclass. While its abilities are functional, I wish they synergized better or played into the class identity a bit more.

Speaking of PvP, while Beyond Light has brought some major changes across many aspects of Destiny 2, the Crucible has unfortunately received almost no attention with this expansion. I am not asking for a lot, but I do not think it is too much to want a few new PvP maps with the big annual expansion. Last year saw the return of Trials of Osiris which was intended to offer endgame content for high-skill PvP players. Trials of Osiris is a tournament-style game-mode where players prove their skill by trying to win consecutive matches. Unfortunately, lower skilled players see Trials as an insurmountable challenge and the lack of meaningful rewards (and the delays to Beyond Light) caused the population to plummet. Bungie has made a few changes to make the loot more desirable, but I cannot speak to whether those changes will be effective or not because, as of this writing, various bugs have caused Trials to be canceled each weekend. As I have touched upon before, I love ranked playlists. This is not the most popular opinion, but I do not think bringing Trials back was the right decision and wish Bungie had instead invested those resources into improving the ranked playlist. If done correctly, it would actually be accessible to all players and offer rewards and challenges for high-skill players. While, it unfortunately seems Bungie has largely abandoned the ranked playlist, at a minimum, can the playlist actually use rank-based matchmaking again?

On the other hand, Destiny’s third core game-mode, Gambit, has undergone some major revisions. Introduced in Forsaken, Gambit is a hybrid game-mode that combines PvE and PvP elements. Six months after its introduction, Bungie unveiled Gambit Prime, a higher skilled, more complex take on Gambit. With Beyond Light, Bungie has simplified Gambit to one version that combines elements from the two modes. This new version of Gambit opts for some of the simplicity of the original Gambit over Gambit Prime’s overly cumbersome mechanics, but requires less time commitment because, like Gambit Prime, it is a winner-take-all single round. While these changes are great, many of Gambit’s problems persist because it is a hybrid game-mode. From the PvE side, Destiny is a game where players are incredibly strong and have numerous tools for burning down enemies, especially bosses, which hinders Gambit’s attempts to be competitive. It also does not help that there is a large portion of the Destiny player-base that abhors and avoids PvP, so high-skill PvP players and low-skill weapons can make the PvP side of Gambit feel overwhelming. I do not see Bungie ever removing Gambit, but I also do not know if there is a fix for these problems.

Gambit is not the only part of Destiny 2 that has seen significant change. Beyond Light has also brought a number of behind the scenes and foundational changes to Destiny 2. Two of the more controversial changes have been sunsetting and the Destiny Content Vault. Up until Beyond Light, players could take any weapon or piece of armor and raise it to the current level cap. This created a situation where, if I could keep using all my perfectly rolled gear release after release, Bungie would have to embrace power creep and create gear that was inherently stronger than what I had, or there would be no incentive to chase new loot. Destiny 2 is a looter and if there is no incentive to chase loot, that is a huge problem. The solution Bungie decided upon was sunsetting; a piece of gear can be raised to new level caps for a year, but not beyond that. If you have ever played a massively multiplayer online role-playing game before, the concept of sunsetting will sound commonplace, just without the name. A new expansion comes out, there is a new level cap, and you hunt for new, more powerful gear to replace all your old gear. Bungie’s problem is that players have been able to bring their gear forward since Destiny 1, Year 2, so there is a vocal portion of the player-base that is overly attached to their gear. It also has not helped that Bungie did not execute the change very well.

When sunsetting was announced, some, like me, hoped that if a gun was reissued, Bungie would use the opportunity to shuffle the perks or offer new perks. That has not been the case. So far, it seems that reissued guns have the same perk pools, so players are being told to chase the same guns, just with a new max power cap. To make matters worse, this was the first season of sunsetting, so a large number of weapons were taken out of the pool. And while this was expected, there was also an assumption that the world loot pool would be refreshed with reissued guns and armor. When Beyond Light released, that was not the case, but to their credit, Bungie has added more drops from the previous year in response to complaints from players. At the same time though, many of these drops are not set to the power cap a year from now, but from the season they were released. This problem was best exemplified when one of the new campaign missions rewarded an old gun with a power cap below the current season. If I am doing old content, I get that the loot pool for those activities are not going to be updated. But if I am doing new content, the rewards should be at the new power cap. Especially if Bungie is taking the lazy route and just reissuing guns exactly the same as when they originally came out.

The other major controversial change is the Destiny Content Vault. When Destiny 2 came out in 2017, Bungie was still partnered with Activision and therefore had to abide by the contract which stipulated they would release a new, numbered entry into the franchise every few years. This was not their original vision for the game, and when Bungie went independent, they committed to Destiny 2 being a game they would support for many years to come. However, Destiny 2 has been growing to an unmanageable size, both in terms of disk space and complexity. For example, the game was over one-hundred gigabytes last year, and that is with seasonal content that was removed at the end of each season. Last season also introduced a gun that would soft-lock players in one of the Season 2 campaign missions which forced Bungie to spend time to fix an interaction in a mission that was, at best, rarely played. The inelegant solution Bungie devised was to remove older, less played content so that they could better support the game. And while this was done for Destiny 2’s long-term sustainability, losing campaigns, raids, PvP maps, and entire planets is a bitter pill to swallow.

The Destiny Content Vault has not been solely about removal, however. Beyond Light has brought back the Cosmodrome from Destiny 1 which plays a central role in an updated New Light experience for new players. Last year, Bungie created the New Light experience for new players, but, if I am not mistaken, this was an introductory mission that then dropped players off in the Tower with little guidance. New Light felt like it was designed for the player who wanted to play with their friends, not a brand new player to Destiny 2. In response to those criticisms, Bungie re-hauled New Light, offering a new story-line which serves as a tutorial and teaches various game mechanics. I have not played the New Light content, but I have heard a lot of good things about it, although I still wonder about the overall Destiny experience now that new players cannot play some of the older campaigns. While Destiny 2 offers a free-to-play option, that name is something of a misnomer as it is more free-to-try. Much of the older content that was removed was free content, so players who do not purchase Beyond Light or one of the older expansions will be limited in what activities are available.

Destiny 2 is a game that has an enormous disparity between when the game is good and when it is not. When it is good, it is a great experience. But when it is not good, it can be a slog with few reasons to motivate players to log in and engage with content. And unfortunately, Destiny 2 Year 3 skewed heavily towards the not good. Part of this undoubtedly stems from the fact the Year 2 was, arguably, the best year in the Destiny franchise. However, I have said for a long time that players cannot hold Destiny 2 to the same standard that Year 2 achieved since Bungie's partnership with Activision afforded them many additional resources. And then there’s the elephant in the room, the ongoing global pandemic. We will never know how much the pandemic affected the past year’s content and Beyond Light, but there is no denying that it has had an effect. There is honestly a part of me that feels Beyond Light could have used more time, but Bungie felt pressured to get it out after having already delayed it nearly two months.

While working on this review and being engaged in the community, I have seen a lot of opinions about what Beyond Light was able to deliver and where it fell short. The thing is, I think a lot of players created unrealistic expectations for this expansion. I have seen a lot of comments from players who expected Bungie to shake up the Destiny experience and offer something drastically new with Beyond Light. The Destiny franchise is going into its seventh year. The game is pretty set in what it is. At the end of the day, Beyond Light is more Destiny. If you enjoy the core Destiny 2 experience, the phenomenal shooter gameplay, chasing rolls on weapons and armor, engaging with the different core playlists, you will probably enjoy Beyond Light. But if you are expecting something more than that or are tired of Destiny’s gameplay loops, I imagine Beyond Light will disappoint. As someone who was not always happy during Year 3, I can confidently say I am having fun playing Destiny again. But a year is a long time, so I also know that there is a good chance I will end up taking breaks from Destiny 2 throughout the year. And at this point, I am okay with Destiny 2 being a game that draws my attention for extended periods of time, but also being a game that doesn’t need my attention every day.

A side should always be taken. Even if it's the wrong side.


All images owned by Bungie. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=470 Genshin Impact Review -- Breath of the Waifu https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=467 Sun, 01 Nov 2020 03:01:06 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/d35fe776d0a3ea6b4c4dba526111b76f.png Since 2014, I have had a consistent fall routine: pick up the latest...
Since 2014, I have had a consistent fall routine: pick up the latest Destiny release and then throw my sleep schedule and anything resembling a good habit out the window to binge for a week or two to prepare for the new raid experience. So you can imagine my dismay when, likely because of the ongoing global pandemic, the upcoming Destiny 2 expansion was delayed by nearly two months. What was I to do? Not spend the fall binging? Maintain my good habits and not grind? Act like a reasonable and responsible adult?? Thankfully, I was saved from that dilemma when another game emerged to fill that hole and whet my appetite for grinding, Genshin Impact. But is this game worth grinding?

Genshin Impact is a free-to-play third person role play game. While visiting different worlds with their sibling, the player-controlled Traveler encounters a being referred to as the Unknown God who abducts their twin and leaves the Traveler stranded. The Traveler awakes in the unfamiliar world of Teyvat, meets the strange traveling companion/partner in crime/emergency food Paimon, and sets out to find this Unknown God and reunite with their missing sibling. But Teyvat is a world with its own problems, and after arriving in the nearby city of Mondstadt, the Traveler is quickly dragged into a conflict that looks to involve the world’s various nations, seven gods, powerful monsters and entities, and numerous other foes shrouded in mystery. Like a lot of massively multiplayer online role playing games and free-to-play role playing games, the story is a work in progress that will be expanded upon and continue in subsequent updates. As such, it’s hard to really talk about and evaluate the game’s narrative because it is currently incomplete.

At first glance, Genshin Impact looks like an amalgamation of a number of different games, most prominently, Breath of the Wild. On the visual side, the world, character designs, and art style resemble Breath of the Wild with an anime-influenced spin. In terms of gameplay, the stamina bar and climb anywhere exploration, the gliding mechanics, and even the game’s puzzles and self-contained dungeons all bear more than a passing resemblance to Breath of the Wild. In fact, these similarities led to one of the more notorious (and stupid) stories prior to the game’s release. There’s no way you can look at Genshin Impact and not draw comparisons to Breath of the Wild, but the developers at miHoYo have crafted their own world and experience. For instance, while Breath of the Wild was set in a world that had suffered a calamity, Teyvat is more vibrant and alive. Towns are larger, visually unique, and are filled with numerous characters to interact and are more bustling. At the same time, most of the towns and the vast majority of characters occupying these towns feel like they don’t matter. I don’t think it is a stretch to say that over ninety percent of the people and places in the towns are completely pointless. Genshin Impact is a brand new game, and over time, this might change as the developers come up with quests to make more of these characters relevant. But as of now, most of the towns just feel like filler.

Another major departure from Breath of the Wild is Genshin Impact’s approach to exploration and narrative. I love Breath of the Wild, but I can look at the game objectively and see that Nintendo wanted players to explore Hyrule and craft their own story, to the point that the game’s narrative served as support to the gameplay experience and suffered as a result. Genshin Impact provides a more structured and narrative driven experience, so players are more clearly ushered from one objective to the next. Although players often have the freedom to choose how to approach those objectives, this narrative structure comes with greater restrictions on exploration. In a lot of open-world games, exploration is not about exploring, but just ticking off objectives and map markers. And while Genshin Impact is not as bad as the worst offenders, the game’s emphasis and approach to grinding brings it pretty close. The more I progressed through the game, the more I found myself only exploring Teyvat because I needed to grind to even progress the story.

While there’s no denying miHoYo looked to Breath of the Wild for inspiration in terms of visuals and exploration, Genshin Impact’s core combat is a drastically different experience. Every character can use one of five weapon types, swords, spears, heavy weapons, bows, or magical tomes (coincidentally all weapon archetypes resembling those featured in Breath of the Wild). Each character also has access to two abilities based on an affinity with one of the seven elements, wind, fire, water, earth, ice, lightning, and nature, with the Traveler able to switch between elements (currently only wind and earth, but the others will presumably follow eventually). In most situations, up to four characters can be used and players can freely switch between characters in and out of combat. The heart of the game’s combat revolves around switching between characters and chaining abilities together to unleash damaging combos. For instance, I often combine my archer Fischl’s electric ability with a character named Xiangling’s fire ability to trigger the overload status effect which causes an area of effect explosion, and then use the Traveler’s wind ability to draw in enemies and trigger the swirl status to spread the effect. Figuring out the best way to synergize your character’s abilities to take down tough opponents is where the game shines, while also unfortunately putting a spotlight on the game’s gacha mechanics.

As I said earlier, Genshin Impact is a free-to-play game and if you have ever played a free-to-play mobile game with a gacha system, you will recognize a lot of mechanisms in place that are used to keep players sinking time and money into the game. The game features incentives to pressure players to log in every day, temporary events, a myriad of currencies, more than half of which seemingly serve the gacha system, and its own iteration of the stamina systems prevalent in so many free-to-play games. As I have been following stories about Genshin Impact while working on this review, one thing I’ve noticed is that this is the first time a lot of players have been exposed to a game with these free-to-play mechanics, and especially a gacha game. While there are some exceptions, gacha games have largely been confined to mobile games. If you’re one of those players who has never experienced a gacha game, it is important to realize what type of game this is and to be aware that many of the game’s powerful characters and weapons are locked behind chance. Yes, Genshin Impact gives you a handful of characters with different elements and a steady flow of premium currencies so you can definitely play the game without spending a penny, but it would be disingenuous to act like the game is not designed to encourage players to spend money.

While there are issues and criticisms with a lot of the free-to-play mechanics, those issues pale in comparison to the ones that are the result of the game’s grind. Genshin Impact requires a lot of grinding. Progression of the game’s story is locked behind an account level called the adventure rank which is raised by doing things like completing quests and opening chests in the world. Every character has his or her own level which is primarily raised by using experience books. There are also weapons to grind, materials to collect, and currencies to farm. And that’s not even discussing all the grinding associated with the game’s gacha. Look, I played Final Fantasy XI and I still play Granblue Fantasy. I am no stranger to games that require grinding, so when I say that I have problems with Genshin Impact’s grind, I like to believe that I have given the game more than a fair amount of leeway. One of my big problems with Genshin Impact is that the grind takes a lot of the fun out of this game. Exploration loses a lot of its appeal when I’m not exploring for fun, but to find every single chest so I can get twenty to thirty experience closer to the five thousand or more I need to rank up. In the same vein, combat, in my opinion the best part of Genshin Impact's gameplay, feels like a waste of time when enemies reward experience in the low teens and my characters need tens of thousands of experience to level up. I’ve gotten to the point that when I see monsters or enemies in the world, I don’t fight them if they’re not guarding a chest or part of a quest because it feels pointless. I have had conversations with others playing the game that you eventually feel compelled to fight monsters to farm materials, but I’m not sure introducing more grinding is going to alleviate my issues with the game’s grind.

Genshin Impact has been out for just over a month now, and its initial impression reminds me a lot of Granblue Fantasy in its early days. I’ve been playing Granblue Fantasy for years now and have seen the steps taken by Cygames to improve the player experience and not hamper the game’s narrative. It is definitely possible that miHoYo will make similar changes to improve the overall experience. Then again, the game reportedly made nearly two-hundred-fifty million dollars in its first month, so it is hard to imagine any drastic changes at this time. There have been more than a few cautionary pieces written from journalists and gamers worried about the snowball that Genshin Impact might start in the gaming industry. It's definitely possible that we're about to see an influx of free-to-play mechanics permeate gaming, but honestly, it feels way too early to have those concerns. I've definitely encountered my share of technical hiccups, but from the music, to the voice acting, to the core gameplay, Genshin Impact feels like a solid game. I have no doubt that it would not be doing so well if it did not feel as such.

Genshin Impact has promise, but personally, I think they took the free-to-play approach and steered hard too hard into that. The story seems interesting, albeit more than a little cliché at times, but then there are so many hurdles for players to overcome to progress through the available story. The core combat gameplay experience is enjoyable and the world has the potential for exploration, but the game’s approach to grinding undermines those aspects. I know there are some people who have loved Genshin Impact and have poured a ton of time (and money) into it. For those players, more power to you. I think Genshin Impact wants to be the game that occupies the most of your gaming time. For me though, Genshin Impact has been a nice distraction, but it has not done enough to be more than a game I play from time to time when there aren’t other games demanding my attention. Maybe it will become something that I want to invest more time into down the road, but as of now, I’m not stressing if I do not log in everyday, if I’m not using my stamina optimally, if I miss events, or if I fail to draw a featured character. And given what I've seen from the game so far, that's perfectly fine with me.

This world is full of unsolved mysteries.

All images owned by miHoYo. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=467 On Matchmaking https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=464 Mon, 31 Aug 2020 20:09:45 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/e12a5491515df1fbea60ea0cb7ccc11d.png If you have followed any communities around competitive first-person...
If you have followed any communities around competitive first-person shooters this past year, you have probably seen a flood of complaints about matchmaking. Late last year, there was a surge in skill-based matchmaking, or SBMM, in games like Call of Duty, Apex Legends, Destiny 2, and even Fortnite. But what is skill-based matchmaking, why does it exist, what are the alternatives, and why did it become so prevalent if there was seemingly such vocal opposition to it from players?

Let’s start in the beginning by looking at the problem that has given rise to this influx in skill-based matchmaking. Imagine a brand new player who picks up a game with a competitive game-mode. This inexperienced player excitedly hops into their first match and goes against high-skill players and gets stomped. It’s just one match though so the novice player gives it another go... ...only to soundly lose again. And again. And again. This player who is just starting out keeps matching and losing against better players and actually improving or even having fun in this game starts to look like an insurmountable hurdle, so they quit playing altogether. Look, no one goes undefeated and losing is part of gaming. But it is something different to lose in a game where you never stood a chance. In the simplest terms, the main issue that skill-based match-making is intended to solve is players matching against others so outside their skill range that the game is decided before it even begins. Game developers want players to have fun because players who are having fun are more likely to keep playing a game. They are also aware that it is not fun to get trounced over and over. My theory is that the rise in skill-based matchmaking in competitive games lately, especially first-person shooters, is because game developers have looked at the data and seen that skill-based matchmaking is the best way to keep players having fun and keep them from moving onto another game.

So how does skill-based matchmaking work? I cannot speak for every game, but a lot of games maintain a background rating for every player in player-versus-player game-modes commonly referred to as a player’s match-making rating, or MMR. This is different than a player’s rating in a ranked playlist as it is a hidden value which is often affected by a lot more than just winning or losing. Players typically do not know what all goes into it, and it is likely that every game developer has their own formula. For instance, in a first-person shooter, a player’s match-making rating might factor in wins, losses, accuracy, head-shot accuracy, kills and deaths, efficiency, and many other metrics. While we might not know everything that goes into a game’s match-making rating formula, at the end of the day, those factors produce a score for every player that goes up as a player performs better and goes down if their performance declines. The game’s matchmaking then attempts to build matches so that players with roughly equal scores (or scores within a given range) are placed in the same match. In its ideal form, skill-based matchmaking creates two teams of roughly equally skilled players, and if a player is playing at their best, they should win half their games and lose the other half.

One of the purported benefits of skill-based matchmaking is that it creates an environment that is more conducive to player improvement. A lot of people claim that the best way for a player to improve is to play opponents who are slightly better. Conversely, some suggest that better is better, and skill-based matchmaking makes it harder to improve because the skill brackets only expose players to others who are making the same mistakes and do not punish those mistakes in the same way as higher skill players. The reality is, there is probably some truth to both these statements. The competitive ranked ladder for Pokémon Sword and Shield is broken into eleven ranks and players who reach the highest rank are given a numeric ranking. Every month, the rankings reset and players fall back two ranks and have to climb back to max rank. As a result, every player in the top rank, whether they were a top-one-hundred player or someone ranked over one-hundred thousand, is put in the same pool. For a brief time at the start of each month, there is a massive disparity in skill levels as players work their way back to max rank. But, on the other hand, I have also seen matches that have pitted players at complete opposite ends of the skill spectrum that, while not the most competitive matches, introduced the lower skilled player to aspects of competitive matches that they would likely have not been exposed to for some time if they had been playing others at their own skill level.

Having said all that, there are obviously some significant criticisms of skill-based matchmaking. One of the most common is that developers sacrifice connection quality to ensure players are at roughly the same skill. After all, what’s the point of an even match if you cannot hit your target? In first person shooters, lag can prevent you from hitting your shot or allow your opponent to close the gap and kill you before you can even see or react. It’s arguably worse in fighting games where even a few frames of lag can drastically change the outcome of a fight. Skill-based matchmaking also makes it difficult for players to experiment or try ‘fun’ load-outs or strategies. If a player works to master and become successful with a specific character or weapon, their matchmaking rating rises, which would then place them against higher skilled opponents. But because of their success and the tougher opponents, it becomes difficult to try to learn how to use a new weapon or character. This issue is especially problematic given how buffs, nerfs, and balance patches can have a major impact on what is and is not successful in competitive matches.

Another problem tied to skill-based matchmaking is the effort and incentives to put in effort at different skill levels and how it affects match-making ratings. This problem is not inherent due to skill-based matchmaking, but when it is present, skill-based matchmaking shines a light on it. Before that though, we need to talk about sweating. A lot of gamers use the term sweaty to refer to high-skill players. However, the term did not originally relate to a player’s skill, but their effort. Calling a player sweaty was another term for a try-hard. Skill and skill ceilings are relative to each player, and if skill-based matchmaking is working correctly, a player should be winning around half their matches only if they are playing at their best, or in other words, sweating. Just because a lower skilled player cannot perform at the same level as a higher skilled player does not mean the lower skilled player cannot put in the same relative effort. I recently listened to two competitive gamers discuss the nerves that come with competition. A player who has reached the highest level knows what it is like to compete to win a championship or title. On the other hand, a player who has only ever made it to the second day or the second round of a tournament has that feeling when they reach and try to overcome their own competitive ceiling. These two agreed that players can only relate to the highest level they have reached, but that does not mean the player who has never reached the finals cannot relate to the nerves a player feels competing in the finals. The player who has not made it as far just feels those pressures much earlier than the player who knows what it is like to move past that point.

When Destiny 2, Year 3 started, Bungie switched most player-versus-player activities to skill-based matchmaking. This change was met with vastly different reaction from players at different ends of the skill spectrum. Lower skilled players loved it because they had a more casual experience and, as intended, they did not have to worry about getting crushed by higher skilled opponents. Conversely, high-skill players lambasted skill-based matchmaking because they were constantly thrown in matches that forced them to try hard and use their best load-outs. When skill-based matchmaking is working correctly, it prevents lower skilled players from getting stomped, but it should also mean that all players, regardless of their skill level, should have to try their hardest if they want to win. In other words, players who had a casual experience had that because their match-making rating was not accurately assessing their actual skill level, and was putting them in matches against lower skilled opponents. In the case of Destiny 2, the reason this happened was because the incentives to put in effort, and therefore have a more accurate match-making rating, were greater for players at the higher ends of the skill spectrum. During Year 2, the game’s ranked playlist offered a powerful weapon for players who could hit the max rank in the ranked playlist (which also changed to skill-based matchmaking in Year 3, but that is a different discussion). This meant that players had to either perform at a high skill level to acquire the weapon or work to improve to reach that level. On the other hand, players who avoided the ranked playlist or only played to acquire the lower tier rewards never reached their true skill ceiling. This issue only became more pronounced when Bungie reintroduced Trials of Osiris, an endgame player-versus-player activity designed for high-skill players to prove themselves which, again, only provided an incentive for high-skill players to put in effort.

So if players are not matched based on skill, what are the alternative forms of competitive matchmaking? Apart from some specific cases, there are two major alternatives, connection-based matchmaking (CBMM) and rank-based matchmaking (RBMM). As the name implies, connection-based matchmaking places the emphasis on connection quality. This has the benefit of reducing issues like lag, but risks creating scenarios like the aforementioned situation where new players or lower skilled players might struggle to find their footing. Connection-based matchmaking also creates a more casual experience as participants are more or less drawn from a random pool of players with varying skill levels. If you want to try in every match, you can. If you want to relax and play a few matches while enjoying a beer, you can do that as well. If you want to try some crazy load-out or strategy, you can do that too without feeling like you are playing at a disadvantage.

Rank-based matchmaking is similar to skill-based matchmaking, but is usually reserved for specifically denoted ranked playlists. Unlike match-making ratings, in ranked playlists, a player typically gains point for a win and loses points for a loss, regardless of their performance. As a player wins more matches, their rank goes up and they gradually face tougher opponents until they reach a point where they are winning and losing roughly the same number of games and their rank stabilizes. At that point, the player needs to improve their own performance to keep climbing the ranks. One of the big advantages over skill-based matchmaking is that rank-based matchmaking provides a visual representation of a player’s skill. Players know where they fall on the skill spectrum and can see if they are improving. When I started playing Overwatch, I originally placed in gold tier. Some weeks my rank went up, some weeks it went down, but I was able to gradually improve and work my way to mid-diamond over the course of several seasons. I have since stopped playing Overwatch and prefer not to imagine where I would place if I completed my placements. Of course, that visual information only works if the game actually uses rank-based matchmaking. As I mentioned earlier, Destiny 2 switched its ranked playlist to skill-based matchmaking in Year 3, which effectively made the ranks meaningless. However, Bungie did not confirm this change for over six months, so the ranked playlist served to misinform many players of where they fell on the skill spectrum. When Trials of Osiris returned, there were a lot of players who struggled to win even a single game and many of these players could not understand why Trials was so difficult when they had been able to hit max rank in the ranked playlist.

While there are similarities, there are some key differences between rank-based matchmaking and skill-based matchmaking. For starters, rank-based playlists typically have stakes attached to winning and losing. And especially in team-based games, the emphasis on winning can be a frustrating experience. Since players can only increase their rank by winning, a player’s rank will go down if they lose, even if they were the best player on their team or even the entire lobby. Anyone who has spent time in a ranked playlist in a team-based competitive game has probably heard of the term, Elo Hell. This term refers to the situation where a higher skilled player finds themselves repeatedly losing, and therefore dropping in rank, because of low-skill teammates. It is worth noting, some games have developed systems to prevent players from falling too far below their actual skill level (intentionally or not) and there are many who argue that Elo Hell does not actually exist.

Unlike skill-based matchmaking and connection-based matchmaking, because of those stakes, rank-based matchmaking typically cannot exist on its own. If skill-based matchmaking is seen as unforgiving to experimentation, rank-based matchmaking punishes experimentation. Still, games have found ways to work around that criticism. For instance, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate gives players a different rating for each character. That way, if a player unlocks the Elite Smash tier with their best character, they do not have to worry about matching against others at that skill level if they decide to try out a new character. Around a year ago, Overwatch adopted a similar system, splitting its ranked playlist into three categories. Now, a player earns a different rank based on whether they play as a tank, damage, or support hero. While it is not as specific as the one in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, it allows players to experiment with different roles without worrying about whether they are playing their best role.

There is one important caveat to this discussion that I have been avoiding, and that is the source of complaints against skill-based matchmaking. Love them or hate them, there is no doubt that streamers and content creators have become a core part of the gaming experience in recent years. When it comes to competitive games, these players want to create content that features amazing victories, crazy combos, massive kill streaks, and in the same vein, their audiences want to be entertained by that content. It is more entertaining to watch someone get a tactical nuke in the latest Call of Duty rather than see them finish a match with a barely positive kill/death ratio or to see them get a string of Victory Royales in Fortnite instead of dying before finding a gun. However, while it sometimes feels like content creators and their followers have a vocal influence on games (whether that sentiment is accurate or not), it is important to realize that they are, at best, a vocal minority. Having said that, one of the arguments in favor of skill-based matchmaking is to protect average players from content creators and the highest skilled players. But the same criticism that content creators are a small minority goes both ways. Content creators and players in the top one-percent are a small portion of any game’s player-base. When games use connection-based matchmaking, lobbies are going to be filled with a wide range of players. Sometime yes, there will be a top-tier player in the lobby. However, if a player is repeatedly getting crushed, it is more likely that they are a below average player getting crushed by average players rather than a case of them going against top-tier players over and over.

Skill-based matchmaking is not perfect, but it is also not as flawed as the loud voices that clamor for its demise suggest. For a long time, I supported skill-based matchmaking because I believed it gave players the best opportunity to improve. However, as I have talked and listened to more players, I’m not as convinced that is always the case. I also do not think every player is always looking to improve, and do not think there is anything wrong with wanting a casual experience from time to time. Part of what motivated this piece was the removal of skill-based matchmaking in many, but not all, of Destiny 2’s competitive playlists and the resulting discussions. Personally, in part because of this change and my own experiences, I believe a diversity of matchmaking styles is better in the long term. But, having multiple playlists also means dividing your player-base and I am thankful that I am not responsible for balancing that diversity with adequate playlists and rewards and other incentives. Given the different experiences that different matchmaking styles offer to players at different points on the skill spectrum, I doubt there will ever be a real consensus. That said, I think we can all agree, a ranked playlist should use rank-based matchmaking.

Please bring honor to us all ♬
 ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=464 The Last of Us Part 2 Review -- The Case for Social Distancing https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=462 Tue, 21 Jul 2020 02:29:45 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/231daa475efa7d6caf02cf351e06564d.png As society came to a screeching halt back in March, and many of us...
As society came to a screeching halt back in March, and many of us suddenly had an unexpected surplus of free time on our hands, I found myself revisiting the 2013 masterpiece, The Last of Us. The Last of Us was set in a post-apocalyptic world ravaged by a global pandemic. The game followed Joel and Ellie, two survivors who set out to travel across the United States. Developed by Naughty Dog, it was an intense journey, as Joel and Ellie had to face hordes of infected and some of the worst sides of humanity as the game explored the darker side of survival. However, what made The Last of Us truly stand out was how, even in that brutal setting, Naughty Dog managed to tell a story filled with hope as the relationship between Joel and Ellie developed. The Last of Us was my Game of the Year in 2013, and combined with the fact that 2020 has been largely defined by an actual global pandemic, there was no way that I was passing up The Last of Us Part 2.
There will be some spoilers for The Last of Us, but if you haven’t played it by now, that’s on you.

The world of The Last of Us follows the aftermath of the collapse of society due to a global pandemic caused by a highly infectious strain of the Cordyceps fungus that turns humans, essentially, into mindless zombies. In The Last of Us, Ellie was immune to the infection, and her journey with Joel was built around delivering her to the Fireflies, a militant group of idealists trying to save society, to try to find a cure. In the game’s climax, Joel discovered a cure would require sacrificing Ellie, and not willing to lose the girl he had come to see as an adopted daughter, Joel fought his way through the Fireflies, escaped with an unconscious Ellie, and then lied to her that there was no cure. The Last of Us ended with Joel and Ellie arriving on the outskirts of Jackson, Wyoming, a community of survivors that was attempting to create something that resembled normal society from before the pandemic. The Last of Us Part 2 picks up a few years after that. Joel and Ellie, now in her late teens, have settled into life in Jackson. They have roles in the town, participate in community events, have close ties, and Ellie is even involved in teenage drama. While The Last of Us focused on telling its story from Joel’s perspective, Part 2 puts players in control of Ellie. Ellie isn’t the young teenager players knew from the first game. She’s becoming an adult, and as such, she’s discovering herself. In the game’s early moments, players get to see how the simple and idyllic life in Jackson has allowed Ellie to have a (relatively) normal life. She’s involved in teenage drama, has a complicated relationship with her maybe-girlfriend, looks to art and music to express herself, has a rebellious side, and is often the case with teenagers and their parental figures, has grown distant from Joel. That life is shattered when a group of outsiders attack Jackson. Against the advice of those who care for her, Ellie sneaks out of Jackson on a revenge-driven mission that forms the basis of a powerful and heavy story.

Ellie’s journey takes her to the long-abandoned ruins of Seattle. Some time following the infection, the government’s disaster response forces were overthrown by a group called the Washington Liberation Front or WLF. By the time Ellie arrives in Seattle, this militaristic group has long established itself and controls the city, but is currently at war with an opposing faction called the Seraphites. The Seraphites were once led by a woman who preached that the fall of the old world was brought about by humanity’s reliance on technology and machines and this group resemble an underdeveloped cult. While the WLF and their tactics resemble those of the modern military, the use of trained dogs, military style checkpoints and patrols, and modern day weapons, the Seraphites are more primitive and are more inclined to attack from places of cover, use bows and arrows, and communicate through various whistle sounds. As Ellie traverses Seattle in search of her targets, the game pits her against both these factions and groups of infected that occupy various parts of the city.

From the start, Naughty Dog stated that they wanted The Last of Us Part 2 to feel like a brutal commentary on violence, and a number of design decisions were made with that goal in mind. For instance every enemy has a name, their allies will respond emotionally to their deaths, and even dogs will react when you take down their owners (by the way, there are dogs now and you will have to kill them from time to time). And while these changes certainly adds an element of realism to the game, at the end of the day, it feels like a cheap tactic because this is a video game that forces its players to eliminate countless enemies to progress its narrative. Don’t get me wrong, there are times when you can avoid some enemies. But there are also many encounters where trying to leave early will alert the enemy and get you killed. More often than not, the game wants you to fight your way from one objective to the next. Also, I don’t remember the camera angle in the first game zooming in so much when you were killing someone, which is another change that feels like a cheap trick. While the gameplay falls short in this regard, the story of The Last of Us Part 2 feels more successful, with a few caveats. Without going into spoilers, the story of Ellie’s single-minded focus on revenge, the parts she’s willing to throw away and things she loses along the way, and the brutal lengths she is willing to go to accomplish her goals, certainly elicits an emotional response from players. However, and don’t get me wrong, the first game was also fairly brutal and dark, but it juxtaposed that darkness and brutality with hope. In addition to the fact the entire premise of the first game was about whether Ellie could be the cure for a world ravaged by a horrible pandemic, her character brought a lightness to the game’s narrative. From the puns she told, to her cheerful demeanor at times, and especially the familial relationship that developed between Joel and Ellie all gave players a sense of hope. Part 2 doesn’t really have that. While it is successful at telling a dark story, and maybe one that is more realistic in the world the games establish, I would argue that this focus comes at the cost of player enjoyment.

A number of reviews have praised the game’s graphics, and while I agree that Naughty Dog has done an amazing job crafting a beautiful game, most of the game is spent in the overgrown ruins of Seattle. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying Seattle looks bad. Quite the opposite. It’s just that visually, Seattle doesn’t feel that distinct from the other overgrown cities that dominated most of the first game. Also, and this is admittedly a minor issue, I do have some doubts regarding the extent that nature would overtake such an urban expanse. All that aside, while most of the game is spent in the ruins of Seattle, the game’s opening deserves special praise. Part 2 opens in the snow-covered mountains of Wyoming and from the way the snow falls off tree branches if you bump into them to the way your tracks in the snow seemingly stay forever, the game’s opening act sets a stunningly high bar. As detailed and beautiful as the world of The Last of us Part 2 is to behold, the character designs leave quite a bit to be desired. Not the main cast, mind you. Characters like Ellie have lots of little details that shed clues about their personalities and pasts. However, the rest of the characters that fill the world feel like they received barely enough attention. For instance, giving each enemy their own unique name felt like a waste when I found myself wondering if there were only two character models for the generic Seraphite soldiers, one for males and one for females.

Like its predecessor, The Last of Us Part 2 is a third-person survival action game. While players are given an arsenal of firearms, ammo is not exactly plentiful and Ellie must rely on stealth to get through most encounters. Although the gameplay is largely unchanged, the encounter design in Part 2 is definitely an improvement over the first game. The plentiful options for cover feel more natural and building around Ellie’s handful of new movement options make the world feel less like a video game. Ellie can squeeze through the narrow cracks in the walls in the crumbling buildings in the abandoned sections of Seattle, crawl through the overgrown grass, and go prone to hide beneath neglected vehicles and rubble. It also helps the enemies will also use and check these environmental shortcuts and hiding places, which makes them feel like they exist for more than just their role in a video game. Ellie can also jump which expands on her exploration options, but this mechanic feels clunky in most scenarios. Part 2 also does an excellent job using elevation in multi-tiered areas that add a new dimension to encounters, stealth, and combat. The game’s listening mode, which allows Ellie to identify and locate distant enemies based on their sounds and movements, also returns and is one of Ellie’s most indispensable tools. Although, I thought the feature was toned down a little and felt like it took a few upgrades before it was as strong as during the previous game. Speaking of, like the first game, players are encouraged to scour the world for collectables, resources, and materials to upgrade Ellie’s arsenal and abilities which is another factor that encourages players to defeat every enemy. When Ellie initially arrives in Seattle, players are given a large area with multiple buildings to explore and the game leans towards an open world approach. Thankfully, this section is short-lived as it embraces some of the worst parts of open world games. While there are later sections where players are given multiple routes through an area, for the most part, the game is very linear.

One of the most memorable aspects of The Last of Us was Naughty Dog’s ability to maintain a high level of tension throughout almost every encounter. It didn’t matter if you were in a room full of humans or infected, progressing towards your objective was a stressful affair. Years later, I still remember feverishly pressing square to execute take-downs, even though repeatedly smashing the button didn’t actually do anything to speed up the process. And while Part 2 puts players in many similarly challenging positions, that sense of tension is largely undermined by the game’s checkpoint system. The game is very generous with checkpoints, to the point that it seemingly gives players a checkpoint after every clean stealth kill. While this sounds great on paper, it really hurts a game built around stealth and resource management. In the first game, you could spend fifteen to twenty minutes clearing a room or encounter, set off the last enemy or two, and then have to quickly decide if you wanted to die and lose all that progress, or use some of your limited resources. Not only did this change alleviate much of the game’s tension during encounters, it also reduced the pressure to use supplies and ammo. It got to the point that I was getting frustrated that I had to leave ammo behind because I wasn’t using it and the game limits how much players can carry.

The Last of Us told an emotional and powerful story. Following the game’s brutal opening, it established that Joel was a hardened survivor in a world where emotion and hope were liabilities. When Joel met Ellie, she was just baggage that he was tasked with transporting. But players got to experience a journey where the hardships they experienced together changed Joel until he saw her as a surrogate daughter, and that journey drove the game’s climax. When Part 2 was announced, I was apprehensive as, apart from one lingering question, I felt we had seen Joel and Ellie’s story to its conclusion. The Last of Us had established an interesting world filled with the potential for other powerful stories. So why continue with Joel and Ellie? Having played through this game, it doesn't help that it feels like Part 2 wants to tell two stories. And while players are invested in Ellie’s story because The Last of Us already did the heavy lifting to get players to care about her, her story feels tangential to the more interesting story of the conflict and events in Seattle. On the other hand though, having experienced the complete story that Naughty Dog wanted to craft with Part 2 I can, for the most part, understand why they chose to tell that story the way they did. I have my opinions on that story, but can also admit that the changes I have in mind would have been a completely different experience.

From the moment it was revealed, The Last of Us Part 2 was one of those games that faced an insurmountable hurdle. Its predecessor was nearly universally praised, and while gamers were excited when Part 2 was announced, many doubted if it would be able to reach those same heights. And then came the leaks. I will admit that I avoided most stories and discussions about this game once the leaks started because I was planning to pick it up and didn’t want the story spoiled. There are a lot of people whose minds are made up without even having played the game. Some of them made their decisions based on accurate information from those leaks, some of them made their decisions based on inaccurate information (and some based on their biases or preconceived notions). I accept that there’s nothing I can do to convince any of them that The Last of Us Part 2 is worth playing. However, if you’re not in those camps, and you’re debating picking it up, I recommend The Last of Us Part 2. The game undoubtedly has its flaws and it doesn’t reach the same heights as the first game, but it is still a good game that tells a powerful story. And it feels weirdly timely given the whole global pandemic.

Before you embark on a journey of revenge, dig two graves ~ Confucius 


All images owned by Naughty Dog. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=462 Final Fantasy VII Remake Review -- On That Day, Twenty-Three Years Ago https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=459 Mon, 04 May 2020 19:04:57 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/5461bd57c5e1a7351195c104afaaedee.png Back in 2005, the opening cinematic of Final Fantasy VII was released as a...
Back in 2005, the opening cinematic of Final Fantasy VII was released as a technical demo for the PS3. It was a visually stunning update that lit a fire across the gaming world as fans begged Square-Enix to remaster the most iconic entry in the Final Fantasy franchise, originally released in 1997. Ten years later, to cheers and roaring applause, Square-Enix answered those pleas by unveiling the first trailer for Final Fantasy VII Remake. And after nearly five years of development, Square-Enix has finally released the first entry in the Final Fantasy VII Remake saga.
[I am going to do my best to avoid spoilers, but you’re on a forum with deep roots in the Final Fantasy franchise, reading a review for a remake of a Final Fantasy game that came out over twenty years ago, soooooo...]

There are a few things we need to get out of the way immediately. This is only the first entry in a saga that will be told over a currently unknown number of entries. As such, Square-Enix has expanded the content which previously covered seven to ten hours into a full thirty to forty hour game. There’s also no way to look at Final Fantasy VII Remake’s narrative and not see how this game has been shaped by the impact that the original Final Fantasy VII has had on gaming culture for over twenty years. Because the game is building on a foundation that has been well-established for over twenty years, there are numerous moments throughout the game that are never properly explained, but will resonate with longtime fans who have played Final Fantasy VII uncountable times before. The best examples is Sephiroth, the most iconic villain in the Final Fantasy pantheon. In the original game, Sephiroth makes "his" first appearance near the end of Midgar and serves to motivate the group’s subsequent journey. In the Remake, however, Sephiroth makes his first appearance within the game’s first hour and maintains a presence throughout. As someone who has played Final Fantasy VII numerous times, I can’t disconnect my prior experiences and knowledge from the Remake, so I would be curious to hear how these moments played out for new players. Then again, given BlueGartr’s history, maybe this is the wrong place to bring that up.

All that leads to the next point, this is not just a high-definition update, but a full remake of the original Final Fantasy VII. Although the first chapter plays out as an updated take on the original bombing mission from 1997, the game quickly introduces new elements and twists not featured in the original game. Yes, if you’ve ever played Final Fantasy VII, the game is going to feel very nostalgic and tread familiar territory. The game is still set in the fantasy/cyberpunk city of Midgar where an eco-terrorist organization called Avalanche is waging a war against the Shinra Electric Power Company for its exploitation of Mako Energy harvested from the planet. The story follows Cloud Strife, a spiky-haired mercenary who wields an unbelievably large sword, his spirited childhood friend Tifa Lockhart, the loud and rambunctious Barret Wallace, and the cheerful but mysterious Aerith Gainsborough. And yes, the story is largely driven by the same key events: Avalanche destroys two Mako reactors, Shinra retaliates, and events unfold from there that eventually place the group hurtling towards a greater threat. Interposed between these events are scenes and sequences that expand on the characters, motivations, and the world of Final Fantasy VII. Players spend significantly more time with characters like Jessie, Biggs, and Wedge, see Tifa question the group’s actions, and get to explore the slums beneath Midgar and interact with the citizens who live down there. Beyond those changes are the strange hooded specters that were featured in early trailers, who maintain lingering role throughout the game and play a significant role in distinguishing the Final Fantasy VII Remake from its predecessor.

One of the challenges with expanding this part of Final Fantasy VII into a full game is that the original game didn’t spent a lot of time developing the characters to that point. And that wasn’t a problem because this section was only seven to ten hours of a thirty to forty hour (or longer) game. In fact, fans of the original will remember that one of the first big expositional moments doesn’t occur until after the group leaves Midgar and travels to the town of Kalm. Final Fantasy VII Remake devotes considerable time to expanding on a lot of the sections and interactions between the events in the original story to give players more time with the cast. For instance, in the original, the story pretty much immediately progressed from the first reactor mission to the next, but in Remake, an entire sequence is spent with Jessie, Biggs, and Wedge which serves to fill players in on Jessie’s background and motivations and helps to develop Midgar. I’m not going to go so far as to say I hated the added time spent with these characters, but at the same time, knowing where the story was headed, a lot of these new sections felt like unimportant distractions. That said, these detours were probably necessary to give Cloud some needed character growth. While Cloud is still largely the stoic and emotionless protagonist he was during this section in the original, these additions helped to crack his tough exterior which makes for much better interactions with characters like Tifa, Aerith, and Barret. In the same vein, while Midgar was a fairly linear story in the original game, the Remake lets players get a better picture of the disparity between those living above and those living below by offering a number of side quests that allow players to explore and interact with the slums.

While there are parts of Final Fantasy VII Remake that some fans might disagree with, I doubt there are many who are disappointed by the drastic graphical improvements. Over twenty years ago, Final Fantasy VII’s visuals were defined by the technology and technical limitations of the time. And while the backgrounds were often beautiful and the cutscenes were remarkable for their time, there’s no denying the in-game character models were comically blocky. Square-Enix has redesigned the characters to appear more realistic while staying true to their iconic looks. And it’s not just the characters, but the world itself that has received a graphical overhaul. Whether you’re playing through a section on the upper plate or completing side quests in the slums below, the visual details do a great job of emphasizing the different sides of life in Midgar.

Great care has also gone into both the game’s score and voice acting. From the moment you start the game, the game greets players with a new version of the memorable Opening ~ Bombing Mission track which has been beautifully updated. Remake does an exceptional job of maintaining this high musical bar throughout its playtime, mixing in new tracks with updated remixes of iconic themes and songs. My one complaint, and this has been an issue with a number of recent Final Fantasy games, I need Square-Enix to find a better way to incorporate Victory Fanfare. Don’t get me wrong, I would argue that Final Fantasy VII Remake has some of the best voice acting I’ve heard in a game in a long time, but hearing Barret belt it out from time to time after battles just did not work for me. Speaking of the voice acting, special praise needs to be given for the voice acting and writing of both Tifa and Aerith. Especially in regards to Tifa, I think it’s fair to say that Final Fantasy VII Remake has already done a lot more with her character than the original did across the whole game. One of the best examples is Tifa’s perspective on Avalanche’s actions and mission. Whereas Barret is unwavering in his commitment, Tifa expresses doubts throughout which do a better job framing Avalanche in a world that feels more gray than twenty years ago. Yes, Shinra is an evil corporation, but Avalanche is resorting to eco-terrorism to achieve their goals, and people are getting hurt by those actions.

Another significant update from the original is the new combat system. When earlier trailers for Final Fantasy 7 Remake showcased the new battle system, a lot of fans, myself included, were disappointed that the game was seemingly abandoning the iconic Active Time Battle system (ATB) of the original in favor of a real-time system seen in action role-playing games like Final Fantasy XV and the Kingdom Hearts franchise. However, having played the game, I will admit that the new system ended up growing on me and while there is still a part of me that misses the old system, I can appreciate how the Remake built upon and iterated on that system. The combat system isn’t purely a real time battle system, but a hybrid that incorporates elements of the ATB system. Every characters has an ATB gauge like the original, but can use basic attacks at no cost. The ATB gauge fills over time and as players use basic attacks, and once filled, players can open the command menu which slows time and allows players to choose between items to use, spells to cast, or a variety of abilities which cost one or two ATB charges. Players control a single character at a time while the other party members are controlled by AI, which has become the norm in recent games. However, players can either direct party members to use their ATB charges or freely switch between characters to control the best character for a particular situation. Once you get the hang of it, it is a fairly fun and flexible system that manages to innovate on the old system without abandoning everything players previously loved. All that said, as has been the norm in a lot of Square-Enix’s recent real-time combat systems, camera controls can be hit or miss. These issues become especially pronounced in closed areas or when you’re trying to flip between targets on the fly.

While I have a lot of praise for Final Fantasy VII Remake, that’s not to say the game is perfect or without flaws. From the beginning, we’ve known that this was only the first part of this saga, but we don’t know how many parts this journey will end up covering or how long it will take for us to get the entire story. We also don’t know when the next entry will come out and whether any progress from this game will carry over, or will each entry be essentially a fresh start. It also doesn’t help that this game focuses on such a small part of the whole. A lot of players were apprehensive when it was announced that this entry would focus entirely on the early parts of the game confined to Midgar, and having played through it, I go back to why not wait and release the full story? Especially when you look at a lot of the additional content that adds to the game’s playtime, such as the aforementioned segment between the bombing missions, the expanded sequence in the Train Graveyard, or the section that must be completed before starting Chapter 15, it's hard to shake the sense the game isn't filled with unnecessary bloat. Don’t get me wrong, there are sections I am glad Square-Enix expanded upon. However, if you remove all the superfluous content, I imagine there are less than twenty hours of content.

It is hard to review this game knowing Square-Enix could have made an HD remaster of the original Final Fantasy VII and fans would have loved it. And although the game’s bones are largely the same, the visuals, the music, the core gameplay, and yes, even the story have seen updates and changes. It’s also hard to review a game that’s the first piece in a saga that, as I mentioned earlier, we don’t know how long it is going to take to play out. One of the major questions that Remake has raised is, will this saga remain true to the original game and story? While some of the narrative changes are minor and likely will not have a significant impact on the story going forward, there are others that could drastically alter the story if Square-Enix decides to go in that direction. Should you play Final Fantasy VII Remake? Final Fantasy VII is one of the most beloved entries in the Final Fantasy franchise, this is a forum with deep ties to that franchise, and yes, you should. But know that this is not a perfect recreation of the game that most of us have played before, and going forward, who knows what this saga has in store for us.


The reunion at hand may bring joy; it may bring fear.
But let us embrace whatever it brings.

All images owned by Square-Enix. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=459 Pokémon Sword and Shield Review -- The Great British Poké-off https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=454 Fri, 31 Jan 2020 23:53:37 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/0a1868619c0d09eadcf41304b1b2513e.png Earlier this month, Nintendo announced the two-part expansion pass for...
Earlier this month, Nintendo announced the two-part expansion pass for Pokémon Sword and Shield. Unlike previous generations, instead of a slightly different sequel entry, Nintendo is expanding on the existing games and giving players the opportunity to continue their journey to explore new areas and content with their existing Pokémon and teams. Given that I’ve poured nearly two-hundred hours into this generation over the past few months, I thought this would be a good reason to revisit and finish a review I intended to release back in November. And because the competitive grind has kinda consumed my gaming life lately..

As soon as you get through the introduction of Pokémon Sword and Shield and step outside your house for the first time, there is a moment of wonder. The first impression of the United Kingdom inspired Galar Region seems alive and full of life. There are groups of Wooloo (an adorable new sheep Pokémon) grazing in the fields in the distance and Butterfree and outlines of bird Pokémon flying in the sky. It is an incredible moment. Unfortunately, there are few visual moments in the game that reach that same level. There’s no denying that these two games have their flaws. There was no way that they could live up to fans’ massive expectations and there are a lot changes that upset fans. But that first moment encapsulates the sentiment that there some things that this generation does better than any before it. It is a pity that those great moments can be juxtaposed against moments that fall far shorter.


For instance, take the Galar Region and the world of Sword and Shield. The Galar region is essentially broken into two halves, and connecting those two halves is a sprawling free-roam zone called the Wild Area. The Wild Area is an experience fans have wanted for years. Although the game is still very linear, as soon as the Wild Area it is available (pretty much after the second town), players can go wherever they want and find a diverse selection of Pokémon. Different Pokémon are available in different parts of the Wild Area and the selection changes depending on the weather. Players can even encounter wild Pokémon that are significantly higher leveled and can one-shot your Pokémon with a single attack. Instead of random battles, Pokémon wander the fields and players trigger battles by running into a wild Pokémon, similar to the recent Let’s Go games. It’s a small but welcome change that makes the Pokémon feel more alive and distinct. Some Pokémon will run away from you to try to escape, while others will chase you down (which raises some questions about their intentions and what they’d do if they caught you and won, but those are probably better left unanswered..).

However, beyond the Wild Area, the rest of the game features some of the smallest and most linear routes in the franchise. I remember my early experiences with the Pokémon franchise and how traveling from one town to the next was a harrowing affair that would often leave my team nearly wiped out. The Pokémon games have been stepping the difficulty back in recent entries, and now most routes are essentially one screen. I would love to see Game Freak make every route resemble the Wild Area or, at a minimum, start swinging the pendulum back towards the length and challenge of those early games. That said, it’s worth noting that the upcoming DLCs look to embrace the Wild Area with both releases featuring their own Wild Areas which, if I’m not mistaken, will serve as a central hub with additional areas built around them.

Another issue with the Wild Area is that, as enticing as it might be to spend time there, it makes it incredibly easy to over-level the rest of the game. Given the diversity of Pokémon featured in the Wild Area, it is easy to find opponents that are weak to your Pokémon’s type and moveset. For instance, one of my friends found an area with Pokémon that had a four-times weakness to grass Pokémon and ended up fully evolving his grass starter before reaching the first gym. Even with the small routes and not spending a large amount of time in the Wild Area, I struggled to keep my team low enough that gym battles maintained some semblance of challenge. To make matters worse, Game Freak has made it even easier to over-level your team, even Pokémon you might not be using. For years, older fans have asked the games to provide a difficulty setting or even allow for level-scaling. Sword and Shield have gone in the opposite direction and instead made experience share a feature that cannot be disabled.

What makes this especially unfortunate is that this is the first time that the games have featured a gym challenge that feels as epic as the narrative suggests. In Pokémon Red and Blue, the gyms resembled themed martial arts dojos. And although they have become more stylized over time, they have stuck to that structure. However, this contrasted the narrative where gyms and the trainers who fought their way through the gym challenge were supposed to be a big deal in each region. Pokémon Sword and Shield tell a familiar story with players setting out on a journey to become the champion of the Galar Region. However, that largely cursory story in previous generations is at the heart of Sword and Shield and create an experience that twenty years of Pokémon games have failed to achieve. For the first time ever, gym battles are no longer small affairs, and if you’re going to fight your way to be the very best, you’re going to do it in front of cheering crowds in packed stadiums. Sword and Shield are the first games to really match the narrative idea of the gym challenge with their thematic appearance. As you play through and clear more gyms, more fans start to recognize you, say you’re their favorite, or comment how they saw your last match on television. When you make it to the final stadium, there’s even a kid who’s waiting around just for the chance to shake your hand.

Ever since the first generation, Pokémon games have featured two parallel stories, the gym challenge and a second story built around the region’s evil organization. In previous games, the gym challenge was mostly there to usher players from one town to the next while the second story actually had a storyline, conflict, and climax. While the gym challenge in Sword and Shield still directs the player’s journey, it also takes center stage with the other narrative coming in second to the point that I wish they had excluded it. I get that every Pokémon game has had one, but this one feels almost like an afterthought. Even Team Yell, the group presented as this generation’s “evil organization” in the game’s early promotional material, are just a group of rowdy fans built into the gym challenge narrative. In service to the gym challenge storyline, players largely play the role of a bystander for several of the events of the second story. I know some players were unhappy with this, but at the same time, it fits better with the narrative that you’re just another trainer in a region that already has a hero, the current champion, who is out there solving the crises. It would be hard to believe you’re just another challenger in the annual gym challenge if you were the person out there saving the world from calamity.

If you’ve played a Pokémon game before, you know what you’re getting from a game-play perspective. Pokémon Sword and Shield are still the same turn-based role-playing game, but the game features a number of quality-of-life changes and unique ideas. For instance, players will spend far less time backtracking and revisiting Pokémon Centers as players can move their Pokémon in and out of their parties anywhere in the world and the game’s camping and cooking allow for healing on the go. Sun and Moon’s Ride System has been simplified and streamlined which also helps the game-play experience flow better. A lot of the pointlessly restricting mechanics have also been removed, creating a much more enjoyable experience. Things like forgetting and relearning moves are now free and can be quickly done at any Pokémon Center which allows for a lot more experimentation in combat. Speaking of combat, the game features an easily accessible info panel that keeps players appraised of what is happening during battle. With the press of a button, players can view important information like changes to stats, status conditions, and weather effects, which is a great feature for competitive players. Long-time players will be glad to hear that much of the early hand-holding is reduced and experienced players can finally skip many of the early tutorials. While this is a welcome change, it’s also a little crazy that it has taken over twenty years and eight generations of Pokémon games to get here.

The recent Pokémon games have featured gimmicks meant to add a new dimension to battling. X and Y featured Mega Evolutions while Sun and Moon had Z-moves. Dynamaxing and Gigantamaxing are Sword and Shield’s novel battle spin, and while it is definitely a gimmick, I think it is the best gimmick yet. When it was first revealed, I assumed the feature would trivialize combat like Z-moves in Sun and Moon, but that’s thankfully not the case. Any Pokémon can Dynamax, which increases its size and health and changes its move-pool for three turns, but only one Pokémon per battle. Some Pokémon can Gigantamax which makes them even bigger, changes their appearance, and gives them access to unique moves. For the most part during the campaign, Dynamaxing is reserved for battles against gym leaders which made the feature feel like a bigger deal. That said, gym leaders always saved it for their last Pokémon which made it fairly predictable and easy to work around. Still, the way Dynamaxing plays out during gym battles, with the music changing and the crowd cheering, was just another thing that fit perfectly with the tone of the gym challenge. Players can encounter Dynamaxed Pokémon in the Wild Area by visiting Dynamax Dens, rock structures scattered around the area. Players can battle with generic NPCs or invite up to three other trainers to join them in taking down these Pokémon (although the system could be more responsive), and once defeated, every trainer is given the chance to catch it. My only real complaint about the system was that there were no Gigantamax forms for the three starters, but that complaint will be resolved by the first DLC release.

While the Pokémon games have been criticized for being too easy, that complaint goes out the window for me when you add in the competitive ladder. I know that playing Pokémon competitively intimidates a lot of players, but it still surprises me how many people never participate in this aspect of the games, especially since so many players invest the time into breeding and training competitive Pokémon. Yes, there are players who use some super cheese-ball teams, but it is a lot of fun to construct and refine a team that can counter those compositions and compete with other builds. Dynamaxing also adds a great new dimension to competitive battles. Competitive battles face the same restrictions (three turns, only one Pokémon can Dynamax), but whereas you know it is coming on the last Pokémon during gym battles, players can Dynamax any of their Pokémon which creates some really interesting strategies and counter play.

Starting with Pokémon X and Y, the Pokémon games have taken more and more steps to make the competitive endgame experience more accessible to the average player and Sword and Shield have continued the trend, making it more accessible than ever. It used to be that you would pick a Pokémon, would hunt for the right ability, then go through a long and largely luck-based process to breed one with the right egg moves, nature, and individual values, and finally effort train it so that Pokémon could actually compete. Effort training requires minimal effort, although I still prefer the version offered in X and Y. In addition to X and Y’s ability capsule and Sun and Moon’s hyper training, Sword and Shield introduce items that change a Pokémon’s nature and wild Pokémon with egg moves. As someone who has spent countless hours breeding the perfect Pokémon, there’s a part of me that’s disappointed that they’ve simplified this process, but there’s a bigger part that acknowledges that process just took time and required no real skill. Additionally, one of my biggest complaints about playing Pokémon competitively was that I would play though the campaign, would be invested in my team, but then would have to build an entirely new team for competitive. With these changes, half of the team I used to reach max rank in the competitive ladder was the same team I used while playing through the game’s campaign. All that said, I would like if each season series was longer as I’m not sure if I’m going to want to grind to max rank every month.

And then there’s Dexit, the term Pokémon fans have for the fact that many Pokémon were cut from the games and only four-hundred Pokémon (including the news ones) can be caught. Around six months before the release of Sword and Shield, Game Freak announced that not every Pokémon would be available in Sword and Shield due to vaguely defined balance constraints. This naturally upset a lot of fans as part of the Pokémon experience has been the ability to bring your favorite Pokémon forward (whether it is the same one you’ve transferred between games or by breeding or catching it again), and cutting so many Pokémon ruins that experience for a lot of players. I can empathize with people who couldn’t use their favorite Pokémon, but it is hard for me to really relate because my top three favorite Pokémon all made it into Sword and Shield. However, the question I keep coming back to is, there are nearly one-thousand Pokemon (and possibly over one-thousand when you add in all the forms), so at what point is it okay to restrict the number of Pokémon? If not one-thousand, then what about two-thousand or five-thousand? At some point you end up with fifty or even one-hundred Pokémon on a single route, and I don’t think anyone wants to slog through that (yes, I’m making some assumptions about the longevity of the Pokémon franchise). Beyond that though, from a game-play experience, I think trimming the number of available Pokémon was the right decision. For me personally, last generation was the first time I didn’t finish a Pokémon game, but this time around, not only did I finish the game, but this is the first time since Generation II that I’ve bothered to catch all the available Pokémon and even constructed a living Dex. Just playing the game, I actually cared about the Pokémon I was encountering, even if it was a Pokémon I’ve been fighting for over twenty years. It’s also worth noting that each DLC region will contain over one-hundred Pokémon which will be available to all players, even those who don’t purchase the DLC, as a free update.

When Nintendo announced the Switch was going to be a home console that also fills the role of a portable console, fans knew that it meant, amongst other things, the next core Pokémon games would have to be released on a Nintendo home console for the first time. Look, I get that Pokémon Sword and Shield are controversial games and as I said in the beginning, there was no way that these two games could live up to fans’ massive expectation. While they certainly have their flaws, I don’t believe they deserve all the criticism they’ve received. If you like Pokémon, the core experience is still and is still great and there are a lot of things this generation does better than any before it. I’ve put in nearly two-hundred hours into the game over the past few months, and I imagine that will only continue to rise as I devote more time into training new Pokémon, grinding away at the competitive ladder, and when the two DLC packs release later this year. And for me, that's more than enough reason to recommend these games.


There are many players in the game, but only a handful of champions ~ Matshona Dhliwayo

All images owned by Nintendo. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=454 BlueGartr Staff Picks - Game of the Decade https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=452 Tue, 31 Dec 2019 21:26:29 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/360521fbcf8c1d01034c6026496e4318.png 2019 was something of an odd year for gaming without a lot of exceptional...
2019 was something of an odd year for gaming without a lot of exceptional standouts. Luckily, 2019 also signifies the end of a decade, so let's instead consider the past ten years of gaming! This decade has seen an expansion in the scope and potential of games. We’ve seen games that have told amazing stories that stay with us years later and seen games that have been true works of art. The 2010s also saw competitive games grow e-sports to new heights and saw gaming culture and gaming personalities emerge and claim a spot in the public eye in ways that no one could have imagined ten years ago. We've seen games push the boundaries through technology, and we've seen games do amazing things with minimalist approaches. There have been a lot of amazing and impactful games this decade, so let’s look at the BlueGartr staff’s games of the decade.


Byrthnoth
Realistically, FFXI. The game was in its twilight for a lot of this decade, but it had the biggest impact on me.

Nier: Automata is my second place because it revived my hope in RPG stories. RPG stories have been super clique for most of the genre's history. If you had asked me before Nier, I would have said that the remaining interesting depths had been plumbed in the early 2000s. Nier showed me that RPGs can still tell compelling, original stories even now.


Brill Weave
The Last of Us or Fallout 4


Ragns
10- Papers, please: It's hard to read anything in this game without a weird Russian-ish accent. I really liked how the gameplay incorporated with the story.

9- Overwatch: Would've put this higher on the list if it weren't for the recent Hong Kong drama but it's a nice "snack" game you can play casually.

8- Pokémon Go: Hey it was fun for the 2 months it lasted!

7- Doom: The most accurate modern adaptation of old school games.

6- Fallout: New Vegas: Like Skyrim but with guns.

5- Undertale / Deltarune: Fuck you Toby Fox.

4- Skyrim: For a change I get bonuses for getting lost.

3- Doki Doki Litterature Club: Who doesn't like a dating sim?

2- Minecraft: Remember when FFXI and FFXIV both sucked really bad? So much I hosted not one but two BG official Minecraft servers.

1- Zelda: Breath of the Wild: I rarely felt so good for thinking I broke the game mechanics but it was all according to the keikaku. Also Link is cute.


Gredival
I have to give it to FFXI. Even though it only existed in what I consider it's true form for four months of 2010 (albeit Visions and the 80 cap itself hadn't broken the game fully), this is one of those situations where you only appreciate something once it is gone. This decade saw games reach a broader market than ever before, but with games no longer competing for the "gamer" market we saw the rise of new practices in monetization like DLC and loot crates. It is telling that WoW Classic, a game most of us would have derided as casual in XI's heydey, is what passes for "old school" MMO gameplay.

XI represents what gaming has lost and will probably never regain, and signifies how fast generational gaps emerge now.


Sonomaa
In no particular order:
Doom: Possibly one of the best shooters I've ever played, I loved it from start to finish and it made me so happy to murder the fuck out of demons

Titanfall 2: The other best shooter, like Doom I've played through its campaign multiple times, unlike Doom its multiplayer is fantastic, except everyone is so much better than me it's terrifying

Final Fantasy Record Keeper: A mobile game so good I spent enough money that I forced myself to quit

Minecraft: Played a shit ton of this, still do

StarCraft II: The second best Blizzard game, but I love RTS games

Diablo 3 Reaper of Souls: Post 2.0 patch this game is a gem people ignore and they are wrong.

Final Fantasy XIV: The place where I get to dress up as 2B and fight a train, yeah, it was a job for a little bit, but now that I'm a filthy casual, its great

Borderlands 2: I played so much Blands with Michaera, its still some of the fondest times Ive had in gaming

God of War: The new one made me feel so many feels, I cant wait for the sequel

Batman Arkham City: This is a tough call between this and Asylum but City wins out for just being more of the same but better

Honorable mentions: Horizon Zero Dawn, FFXI, Dead Cells, Fire Emblem 3 Houses, Nier Automata, World of Warcraft before it got shite.


6souls
Skyrim - Something about being an OP stealth killing machine that I can never get tired of.

Fallout: New Vegas - I can never get enough Mojave wasteland justice. Although I've never completed a playthough, I find the gameplay leading up to the forced choice to be incredibly engaging.

Fallout 4 - Despite all of it's faults, I've done five full playthroughs and I can still squeeze a lot of fun out of the game. I still haven't modded the game, maybe for my sixth.

Deus Ex: Human Revolution - My favorite cyberpunk title released so far. Another "OP stealth killing machine" simulator.

Borderlands 2 - My favorite wasteland fantasy shlooter. I've played the game mostly solo and I enjoy the challenge that can pose.

Just Cause 2 - I love blowing shit up while doing madcap acrobatics.

Skullgirls - My favorite fighting game since Capcom Vs SNK 2. Solid mechanics and an awesome soundtrack.

Age of Empires II HD - I play the RTS genre probably a bit too much and this game gets my most attention. I create various head canons of destroying other nations.

Destiny 1 & 2 - The most solid FPS gameplay on console. I'm really into the lore, too.

Mass Effect 2 - My favorite BioWare RPG and I have rose-tinted glasses in the sense that I think this was the last great game from the studio.

Dynasty Warriors: Gundam 3 - This series of Gundam games solidified my love of Gundam mecha. So much mindless hacking and slashing while getting enthralled in the lore.

Grand Theft Auto V - Another game I've never finished, but only because it's all too easy to get distracted embracing my murder boner. I enjoy getting lost in the mindless killing while real life times are tough.

Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag - I've never had so much fun controlling a boat. Sea shanties are a huge bonus and I still hum some of them out even today.

Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain - I love methodically fucking with unaware NPCs.

Hitman 2 - Methodical murder boner.

Ni No Kuni II: Revenant Kingdom - The most fun I've had with a JRPG since the PS2-era. I get so much joy out of this game.


Serra
I knew it would be a challenge to narrow all the games I played this decade down to a single choice. I spent a long time debating it before settling on three games that, to me, defined the decade in gaming. So, in no particular order, here are my top three games of the decade:

Destiny (1/2): At the start of the decade, I was still playing Final Fantasy XI. However, by the next year, I had stopped and assumed it would be the last MMO-esque game I would play. And then along came the release of Destiny in 2014.. While it certainly has had its ups and downs, there’s no denying the Destiny franchise has delivered exceptional FPS gameplay that has consumed more of my gaming time this past decade than any other.

Breath of the Wild: I’ve definitely played a lot of great games this decade, but in most cases, when I finish a game, I don’t revisit it again. That’s not the case with Breath of the Wild. This is the game that I can go back to, even years later, and still find myself adoring the world and exploration. Breath of the Wild took the open world experience that has grown to dominate this decade and perfected it in ways that still stand out. For a long time, this game was either in my Switch or on my nightstand so I could easily play it whenever I felt the need. For me, Breath of the Wild delivered the best gameplay experience of the decade.

Minecraft: I will admit that my experiences with Minecraft have been limited, at best. Although I never sunk a large amount of time into the game, I’ve followed the amazing stories of things players have done in Minecraft for years. I can look at gaming today and see the impact that Minecraft’s unique approach to the player experience has had today and no other game comes close to the freedom that Minecraft offers players. Earlier this decade, Minecraft was the an introduction to gaming for a lot of kids and it expanded the idea of what the boundaries of what games can do. There's no denying the impact of Minecraft both inside and outside gaming.


So those are our choices for Game of the Decade. Feel free to share your own or even your game of 2019 below!

Happy New Year, everyone! Here's to 2020 and the new decade, may it be better than the last! ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=452 Destiny 2: Shadowkeep Review -- Dark Side of the Moon https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=449 Thu, 31 Oct 2019 21:51:02 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/2cbd5abb79a5b2ad3c4205786c4273bc.png In 2010, Bungie announced they had partnered with Activision for their...
In 2010, Bungie announced they had partnered with Activision for their next franchise, Destiny. Although we will likely never know all the details, ardent fans of the franchise have always been aware of tensions between the two companies due to competing visions and goals for the franchise. However, in January of 2019, Bungie announced they were ending their partnership with Activision and were taking complete control of the direction of the Destiny franchise. A few months later, Bungie put out a ViDoc and interview where various members of the studio talked about their plans for the future and, for the first time, mentioned three letters that have loomed over Destiny from the beginning -- MMO. Shadowkeep marks the start of Destiny 2, Year 3 and is Bungie’s first Destiny release as an independent company and their first major steps to create the game they wanted.

Those who played Destiny 1’s third year expansion, Rise of Iron, will notice some parallels with Shadowkeep. Like Rise of Iron, Shadowkeep is heavily built around nostalgia. Shadowkeep brings players back to a familiar location, Earth’s Moon. In Destiny 1, the Moon was the second major location players explored. While Fallen scavengers scoured the surface, a sprawling cave system hid a dark and terrifying Hive stronghold below the Moon’s surface. In the years since those adventures on the Moon, the Hive have expanded their presence and built a new fortress watched over by an ominous red spire known as the Scarlet Keep. Shadowkeep’s narrative opens with an assault against this fortification, but quickly evolves into a greater threat. The Moon has become occupied by shadowy specters of enemies players have defeated over the course of the Destiny franchise called Nightmares. Players are reunited with Eris Morn, a brooding character from Destiny 1, who assists players as they attempt to unravel the truth behind these powerful phantoms and their seeming origin.

There are some things that Shadowkeep’s narrative does really well. The opening mission where players fight alongside NPCs to establish a beachhead on the Moon is an experience I have wanted in Destiny since the beginning (it is admittedly unnamed frames, but, you know, baby steps are still steps..) and the big reveal that motivates the entire campaign is one of the biggest narrative moments in the entire franchise. But then there are the moments that fall flat and unfortunately, the moments that shine are outnumbered by the ones that do not. A large part of this is because Shadowkeep is about fighting enemies from the past. As the name implies, these are enemies long-time players have already fought and defeated many times over the course of the Destiny franchise. Far too much of Shadowkeep is spent hunting down these enemies which don’t really contribute anything to the narrative. Worse still, from a gameplay perspective, these encounters are essentially repeats of encounters players have undertaken numerous times before.

And then there’s the continuing narrative. Ever since Destiny 1’s first content expansion, The Dark Below, one of the franchise’s biggest critiques has been that the original release of Destiny 1 laid the groundwork for a story that Bungie has done little to progress. Most expansions have been largely self-contained, and while there are moments, such as the ending of the original Destiny 2 campaign, which suggest the story is going somewhere, there hasn’t been much done with the Light, the Traveler, and the encroaching threat of the Darkness. The Shadowkeep campaign builds towards a climax that seemingly comes to an abrupt stop after teasing some major story revelations. Starting with The Dark Below, almost every Destiny content release has told a mostly complete story through a campaign which then ends with that release’s raid. For instance, in The Taken King, the campaign ends with players defeating Oryx, the titular Taken King, and the Kings Fall raid sends players to deliver the final blow. I personally like this approach because it keeps the raids grounded in the game’s narrative and players who don’t do raids or endgame content more-or-less get a complete story. Shadowkeep is not like that. The campaign’s finale feels like it sets up the new raid, Garden of Salvation, and leaves players hanging. I believe all players, not just the ten to twenty percent that will complete a raid, deserve closure. Except, then you do the raid and it doesn’t really tie into campaign at all.

I feel my criticisms of the story of Shadowkeep are fair, but with the caveat that there is still content coming that could still build on the narrative. Bungie has been very open with players that they are trying new things with Destiny 2, Year 3. One of the major changes is that they are trying to tell an evolving story over the course of the entire year. While Garden of Salvation does not have strong ties to the Shadowkeep campaign, it establishes an enduring conflict of the season. For some currently unspecified reason, Vex forces have started invading the Moon. Over the course of this season, players have been working with Ikora Rey to go on the offensive and launch a counter-attack. While the Shadowkeep campaign is similar to previous Destiny campaigns, in that it can be finished in a few hours, this story has followed the pattern of the Year 2 seasonal stories and has unfolded from week to week. Additionally, this narrative is reportedly intended to build on the events from one season to the next. On one hand, as someone who plays Destiny 2 year-round, I enjoy seeing the story progress each week, even if some of those weeks are minor steps at best, but there is also no denying that Bungie is time-gating content to keep players coming back week after week. That criticism also applies to the Shadowkeep narrative. While the story has continued past the campaign, the events that have pushed that narrative have felt more at random and have occurred based on Bungie's scheduling decisions rather than being open for players to pursue at their own pace.

When Bungie decided to use the Moon as the backdrop for Shadowkeep, it was inevitably going to split the Destiny community. While some players look at the Moon and have fond memories and nostalgia from their experiences in Destiny 1, others look at the Moon and see reused assets and something that was taken away with Destiny 2. I know there are players who think it was as simple as dragging and dropping the files for the Moon from a Destiny 1 folder into a Destiny 2 folder and tweaking them a little. Honestly, I barely acknowledge that opinion. I have no doubt that Bungie put a lot of work into building and redesigning the Moon for Destiny 2. This isn’t the same Moon we spent so many years exploring. The surface of the moon has been torn open by glowing chasms and fissures and many of the familiar structures from Destiny 1 have fallen into disrepair since our early adventures. Some of these are nice throwbacks for long-time players. Locations like the Shrine of Oryx and Traitor’s Ketch are collapsed and decrepit, seemingly as a result of our many battles in Destiny 1. However, for players, there’s only so much time you want to spend exploring a familiar area you previously spent years exploring. It also doesn’t help that much of the promotional material focused on the Scarlet Keep which ends up being largely unused. The Scarlet Keep is a completely new areas that players have never explored, but it ends up only barely used. Players can't even access the Scarlet Keep when in the game’s open-world patrol mode.

While Shadowkeep is not as substantial an expansion as other fall expansions, part of this undoubtedly stems from the number of significant background changes. In addition to the aforementioned split from Activision, Bungie moved Destiny 2 to Steam, launched a free-to-play entry called New Light, and introduced cross-save so that players can freely move their characters between platforms. While the move to Steam and free-to-play option are great for bringing in new players, Bungie unfortunately continues to do a poor job of making the game accessible to those new players. While ardent players stay informed by watching live-streams, reading blog posts, and scouring news pieces, a lot of important in-game mechanics are never easily explained for newer players. This is best exemplified by New Light. New players are given an introductory mission, a remaster of the first mission from Destiny 1, which teaches basics like movement, shooting, and a few abilities. Unlike Destiny 1, however, these new players are then dumped in the Tower with no real guidance. Shadowkeep raised the minimum level so every player can immediately hop into the Shadowkeep campaign. While this sounds great, this is a third year expansion and, just from a gameplay perspective, assumes players are familiar with certain systems. And what about the new player who wants to experience the story of Destiny 2 from the beginning? New Light feels like it is structured for the new player who has friends who already play the game, not someone who picks the game up on his or her own.

Last year’s fall expansion coincided with several changes meant to improve the core gameplay experience. The release of Shadowkeep has seen the implementation of changes and systems meant to introduce new role-playing game elements and depth to that core experience which is still in a good place. One is the introduction of new champion class of enemies which have allowed Bungie to create a novel spin on team composition. Aficionados of typical role-playing games know the advantages of running a team comprised of characters who fill different rolls. Supports, tanks, and different types of offensive characters all bring their own strengths and weaknesses. While Destiny has always had distinct classes, the franchise has never had content that required players to run specific team compositions. Instead, these new enemies force teams to coordinate and plan their weapons and load-outs. For instance, in a single encounter, one player will need a weapon that can break an enemy’s shield to prevent it from healing while another player needs to bring a weapon that can stagger a powerful enemy that will otherwise unrelentingly charge the team while taking little damage. It only really matters in specific high-level content, but it is a step in the right direction for players who want to do more than mindlessly shoot everything without any planning or preparation. The game has also reintroduced different difficulties so that hardcore players can push themselves for better rewards and, for the first time ever, the game also offers content which players can repeat indefinitely to farm for end-game armor and materials.

One of the biggest changes to the Destiny 2 experience that players interact with everyday has been dubbed Armor 2.0. In the previous armor iteration, players chased armor with randomly rolled perks and selected fixed bonuses to various stats. This new armor system flips that chase. Perks are now unlocked from doing activities and are slotted into armor pieces with randomly rolled stats which do things like increasing a character’s health or reducing ability recasts. In the old system, if a piece of armor didn’t come with a perk I wanted, it was worthless. With this new system, there is more flexibility and room for fine-tuning. While a piece of armor might not provide the stat bonuses I want, I might be able to slot it in and use other pieces of armor to fill those stat deficiencies. The reintroduction of stats that were initially removed with the release of Destiny 2 also allows players more control over their characters which has already produced some powerful and fun builds. If you want a build that can run around throwing out grenades every few seconds, there's a build for that. If you want a mobile character that can dive between characters and throw out melees, you can build that character. All that said, while I like that this change gives players more freedom over their builds and allows for more customization, I hate the way it made much of the gear I grinded for last year worthless. And this isn’t the first time either. It happened at the end of Destiny 1’s first year, it happened with the release of Destiny 2, and it has happened, to varying levels, at the start of every year of Destiny 2. Bungie needs to get better at not invalidating the time players invest in previous releases.

For Destiny 2’s more competitive-focused players, the game still offers the player-versus-player Crucible and the player-versus-environment-versus-player game-mode, Gambit. After a handful of tweaks over the course of the last year, for better or worse, Gambit hasn’t changed much with Shadowkeep. On the other hand, after a year of being largely ignored, the Crucible finally has received some welcome attention. Bungie has also promised to devote more attention to the Crucible going forward, but they’ve made similar promises in the past, so we’ll see how the rest of the year pans out. Many of these changes have been made in response to player complaints and to seemingly create a better experience for new players. The Crucible now offers more options and is no longer broken into two major playlists. While nodes for Rumble (solos) and Private Matches remain largely unchanged, the previous Quickplay playlist has been replaced by the Classic Playlist which offers players a similar connection-based experience. A subset of players have complained about Destiny 2’s reliance on connection-based matchmaking for Quickplay the past year, and the new director places a greater emphasis on playlists which use Destiny 2’s hidden background matchmaking rank (MMR), or skill-based matchmaking, in response. These rotating playlists are intended to give players a more even Crucible experience where they match against others in the same skill bracket. As expected though, we’re already seeing complaints about questionable connections, so it is only a matter of time before those complaints become deafening.

While I personally don’t have anything against skill-based matchmaking, the changes to the Competitive playlist are more glaring. The 4v4 Competitive playlist has been replaced by 3v3 Survival and a 3v3 Freelance Survival playlist. I have nothing against these changes and have actually found myself enjoying the strategic changes that 3v3 have introduced. My problem is that the Competitive playlists seemingly also relies on skill-based matchmaking rather than the player’s visible rank (Glory). Destiny 2 locks certain weapons behind the Competitive playlist (the current iteration requires players to acquire a set number of points from winning matches) and every season, players’ rank points are reset to ensure every player has a chase. This has created a scenario where top-tier players who are working their way up to their actual Glory end up going against lower-skill players. Under the current system, players still start at the bottom, but are seemingly matching against others at the same skill-tier while working up the ranks. Personally, it feels like this system is a hybrid of the worst parts of two options. I’m not going to pretend that I’m the best Crucible player in the world, but I do play at a fairly high skill tier. My first Competitive match of the season was against three players who all had the Unbroken title, a title acquired by reaching max Glory in three seasons. It would not have bothered me if this had just been a random occurrence when both teams were at low points, but at least one of them had over four-thousand Glory. If the game is going to use the background MMR for matchmaking, then give me the Glory and the corresponding rewards from the start. The caveat to this is a player receives bonus Glory for winning a match when his or her MMR is higher than the current Glory (I was getting over double the base points for a win until I was around five-hundred points away from max). While this means higher skill players climb faster for wins, it also feels like a lot of extra work when there are seemingly easier options.

As someone who has spent a lot of time with the franchise, I have two competing evaluations of Destiny 2: Shadowkeep. There is the side of me that is invested in Bungie and the Destiny franchise and wants Bungie to succeed. That side looks at Shadowkeep, acknowledges the major changes at Bungie, can see all the behind-the-scenes work that went into this expansion, and is hopeful about this upcoming year of content. But there is also the part of me that is a consumer who purchased a product that was put out, and that part of me is disappointed in Shadowkeep. I’ve tried to give my honest impressions, the good and the bad. There are also a lot of things I didn’t touch on and there’s an entire discussion about microtransactions that have been dominating the community discourse lately (tl;dr: they’re cosmetics, I’ll care when they start actually affecting the game). It’s not Fall for me without a new Destiny release, and while Shadowkeep is far from perfect, there are a lot of things which give me hope that Year 3 will be a good year.


Everyone is a moon, and has a dark side which he never shows to anybody ~ Mark Twain

All images owned by Bungie. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=449 Fire Emblem: Three Houses Review -- The New School https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=446 Sun, 01 Sep 2019 17:42:33 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/680c9bd93a8ef6b08164af131336d6e5.png Long-time fans of the Fire Emblem franchise have seen the recent games...
Long-time fans of the Fire Emblem franchise have seen the recent games shift away from the brutal and hardcore tactical role-playing game where your favorite characters could get killed in the blink of an eye into a relationship/dating sim where your favorite characters could get killed in a blink of an eye in brutal and hardcore tactical role-playing battles. Fire Emblem: Three Houses is the latest entry in the franchise and first console Fire Emblem game released in over a decade. Three Houses is another change in the franchise, replacing much of the emphasis on marriage/children with more slice-of-life elements. Don’t get me wrong, it is still a brutal tactical role-playing game where your favorite characters can get taken in the blink of an eye. It’s just this time, they’re your students.

Three Houses is set in Fódlan, a medieval fantasy continent broken into three distinct countries. At the center of them all is the Church of Seiros which is headquartered centrally at the Garreg Mach Monastery, a school where the children destined to lead these three nations are divided into houses and taught how to fight and lead armies. Think of Harry Potter’s Hogwarts, but slightly older, (slightly) less magic, and (probably) more murder. Players take on the role of Byleth, a silent protagonist with a mysterious past who can talk to a mysterious green-haired girl that only he or she can see. So, you know, your typical J-RPG protagonist. Soon after the game’s opening, Byleth arrives at the school and becomes a professor in charge of one of the games titular three houses. In typical gaming fashion, players are forced to choose a house far too early to make an informed decision and are then subsequently given over a half-dozen students to supervise and educate (read: train to be your personal army).

Each house has distinct characters and themes. The Black Eagle House is led by Edelgard von Hresvelg and has a number of powerful melee units as well as a few useful mages. Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd leads the Blue Lion House which is a house of knights and chivalry. As such, the house has a number of lance users which naturally evolve into mounted units. Finally, the third house is the Golden Deers under the leadership of Claude von Riegan. Unlike the other houses, this house has more bow users rather than close-range fighters. Although players can recruit from the other houses over the course of the game, the central characters for each embody the three houses and remain with their own houses. I personally sided with the Black Eagles for my initial play-through (currently my only play-through) and enjoyed the dynamics of the house. The story heavily focused on Edelgard and her ambitions, but several of the other characters didn’t feel completely like side characters. The stories of many of the others (including some initially outside the Black Eagle House) do a good job of expanding the world and better explaining her motives. Although I can’t speak for sure about the other houses, I imagine players can expect a similar experience where the house leader takes center stage and the remaining cast plays support.

As you can imagine, in a game built around choosing one of three houses, that initial choice eventually produces significant differences. I’ve only had the opportunity to play though one of the campaigns so far, but I imagine it is a safe assumption that Three Houses’ first act is more or less the same for each house. Players are assigned missions which don’t really revolve around the individual characters and the houses fill roles that are seemingly interchangeable. However, the consequences of this choice manifest in the game’s second act when the houses’ stories split. For the Black Eagles, the second act is when Edelgard’s story takes center stage and she becomes the major driving force for the game’s narrative. That said, the build-up of the first act doesn’t feel entirely rewarding because the second act was much shorter. The game spends the first act letting players get to know the students through various interactions and conversations around the school, but at the point when those interactions and relationships are meant to payoff, things feel rushed. That said, I still have two campaigns to play (and an eventual story DLC), so the whole might provide a more complete and satisfying experience.

At its core, the gameplay of Three Houses largely adheres to the franchise’s roots. It is still a top-down, turn-based, tactical role-playing game. Each level is essentially a giant puzzle, where players start with a fixed number of units against an army of foes, and the goal is to defeat your opponents and get all your students out alive (or as many as possible). Each fight isn’t just about taking into account whether your unit can defeat his or her opponent, but predicting what your enemies will do on their turn. As ever, there is also an element of randomness as every attack has a probability of success and failure. Similar to Shadows of Valentia, the game also gives players the ability to rewind and redo a limited number of turns if necessary. While the combat decisions feel mostly the same as previous Fire Emblem games, the effects of the iconic weapon triangle have largely been removed, although some weapons still provide advantages over certain foes. Weapon durability is back, so players need to remember to maintain their weapons between battles lest they break down during an inopportune moment. Magic, on the other hand, doesn’t break down, but instead has a set number of uses per battle.

Three Houses also introduces a number of new features to the combat experience. One of the biggest is a visual change which makes combat feel more like war. Units are no longer alone in battle and are instead surrounded by armies which adds to the scope of each skirmish. During confrontations, players can see these troops rallying and clashing around each other and troops will even run off when their commanders are defeated. Characters and these armies can also learn and use abilities which come with trade-offs and additional effects and add a new strategic element to battle. In place of pairing from the recent games, players can now assign a limited number of adjuncts from the reserves which provide significantly toned down battle support. The game also introduces massive monsters which offer a completely new challenge. These opponents can occupy multiple tiles on a map, are far more defensive and durable than standard enemies, have massive area of effect attacks, and require different tactics and approaches.

Although combat feels largely the same, albeit with some tweaks, the classic class system has undergone some drastic changes. In previous games, every character had a class which could then be upgraded to one or more advanced classes upon reaching the necessary level. In Three Houses, characters level skills which are required to pass class exams which unlock at specific level intervals. Although each character has their own strengths and weaknesses, in theory, there is nothing that stops players from turning characters like the diminutive and magically inclined Lysithea into a defensive Fortress Knight and the stocky Raphael into an offensive mage. While skills develop through battle (for instance, using a bow in combat increases bow skill), many of the advanced classes require players spend time developing characters’ skills outside battle.

Between missions, players spend the rest of the month at the Monastery to fulfill Byleth’s duties as a professor. These duties include a number of distractions from combat and players can spend time instructing students to help increase their stats, go fishing, grow and harvest plants, and even grab meals with students and staff. By completing activities in the Monastery, players can increase Byleth’s professor level which increases the number of actions that can be completed in a single session. Garreg Mach Monastery essentially expands the between mission segments of prior Fire Emblem games and in many ways feels like a natural evolution of those activities. That said, I’m personally not a huge fan of this hub. There were times that the activities I had to do in the Monastery felt like chores and distractions that kept me away from progressing the game’s narrative or moving onto the next mission or battle. While players can choose to largely avoid the monastery and spend their weeks doing random battles in the world, this isn’t optimal and your characters will likely be worse off. Players are given several opportunities to instruct students over the course of each month to increase specific skills. The number of times a student can be taught depends on his or her motivation, which is best increased by interactions around the Monastery. As a result, there were times when I’d have to choose to not spend my free time doing battles because I needed to optimize my next teaching opportunity. For fans of the recent Fire Emblem games, it is also worth noting that Three Houses has removed the dating/offspring element. While I know some are unhappy with this omission, it required a stretch to make sense in Fire Emblem: Fates and would have made no sense in Three Houses, so I’m glad the feature was removed.

I was really excited to play Fire Emblem: Three Houses. Having played a lot of Fire Emblem games though, I honestly didn’t find myself enjoying the early parts of the game because of the emphasis on the activities within Monastery. However, as I kept playing the game, and as the story developed, I found myself loving the game. I understand that the slice-of-life school section gets players more attached and invested in the students, but there are still parts of me that wish the school activities had been toned down. I also wish that investment paid off more in the game’s second act, and I accept that I’m putting a lot of faith in the two-thirds of the story I haven’t experienced -- faith that might not actually be rewarded. Usually I like to beat a game and do as much as I can before putting out a review. Unfortunately for this review (although certainly not the worst problem), I only managed to finish the story of the Black Eagle House. I spent nearly sixty hours on my first campaign, and the only thing that stopped me from immediately starting another was that I needed to finish this review. Now, with this out of the way, if you’ll excuse me, I think it is time I dive back into Three Houses.

Growing up is losing some illusions, in order to acquire others ~Virginia Woolf


All images owned by Nintendo. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=446 Special Report: E3 2019 https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=443 Fri, 14 Jun 2019 20:05:18 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/74cd8b9d4d165b2ba0f407538b58a1cb.png If you’ve heard or read any stories about E3 this week, you’ve probably...
If you’ve heard or read any stories about E3 this week, you’ve probably seen at least a few largely tepid reactions to the annual gaming conference. A core part of E3 are the presentations from Microsoft, Sony, and Nintendo which showcase their upcoming release schedules. We’re nearing the end of a console generation and Sony chose not to attend E3 or host their own presentation this year. Coupled with the expectation that Microsoft would not be revealing any relevant information about their own upcoming console, this E3 had the deck stacked against it before it even began. Still, the annual conference has come and gone, and we’ve have some great games to look forward to this coming year, so let’s dive in!

Microsoft
There were a lot of people, myself included, who felt that Microsoft had a chance to really make an amazing impression at E3 this year given that Sony would be absent. Over the course of their presentation, Microsoft featured sixty games, many which will be out later this year and early next year. Microsoft opened with a trailer for The Outer Worlds, a sci-fi role-playing game where players must battle an evil corporation. Developed by Obsidian Entertainment, this game seemed to blend a Fallout/Elder Scrolls game with Borderlands. Next up, Ninja Theory unveiled Bleeding Edge. Bleeding Edge is a 4v4 online third-person hero melee game which essentially sounds a lot like Overwatch in third-person. After that, Microsoft showcased a new trailer for Ori and the Will of the Wisps which, apart from the creepy giant spider, continues to look gorgeous. This was followed by a trailer for Minecraft Dungeons, a top-down hack-and-slash adventure game akin to games like Diablo. I’ve never actually played Minecraft, but I imagine this aesthetic is a good way to get kids into different genres (if you wanted to start pushing that looter addiction early..). Next up, Microsoft showed footage of Jedi Fallen Order. EA had prominently featured this game in their own press conference the day before, but more footage was definitely not a bad thing as I cannot wait to get my hands on this game in November. Microsoft then moved on to a trailer for Blair Witch (the game) before presenting a trailer for one of the most anticipated upcoming games, Cyberpunk 2077. Developed by CD Projekt Red, there are not enough words to describe how excited I am for this game. The new footage was great and we finally got a release date for this game, April, 2020. After that, Microsoft shared a trailer for a cute side-scroller called Spiritfarer, a new trailer for the upcoming Battletoads game, and then a strange story-book game titled The Legend of Wright. Microsoft then featured a quick ID@Xbox segment and briefly discussed Xbox Game Pass before announcing its plans to bring the program to PCs. Microsoft then premiered trailers for a new Flight Simulator, a remastered version of Age of Empires II, an odd post-apocalyptic winter game called Wasteland 3, and Psychonauts 2. Microsoft also announced that Double Fine Productions would be joining Xbox game studios which had me concerned that Psychonauts 2 would become an Xbox exclusive, but those fears have since been squashed. Microsoft returned to the Star Wars universe with a trailer for Lego Star Wars: the Skywalker Saga which will presumably follow all nine movies. After that, we got a trailer for Dragon Ball: Kakarot, an action RPG which looks like it will follow the story of Dragon Ball Z from Goku’s perspective. Next up were trailers for the ‘interactive thriller’ 12 Minutes and a cute game featuring deer called Way of the Woods. Microsoft's next trailer was for Gears 5 which continues the story of Gears of War 4’s Kait and will be out this September. They also announced a new game-mode, Escape, and an upcoming multiplayer tech test this summer. Afterwards, Microsoft featured Dying Light 2, a Lego-infused expansion for Forza Horizon 4, and an expansion for State of Decay 2. Microsoft then announced that Phantasy Star Online 2 (a game I wish I had time for) and CrossFire X (a PC game I’ve never head of?) are coming to Xbox. Microsoft then showed a trailer for the upcoming Tales game, Tales of Arise, and a new trailer for Borderlands 3 which mostly felt over-shadowed by the game's reveal a couple months back. Next up, Microsoft announced a game that had been leaked for some time, Elden Ring, which is a project between FromSoftware and George RR Martin. At this point, Microsoft’s press conference was nearly over, but before concluding they discussed their streaming plans with Project xCloud and briefly teased their new console, Project Scarlett. While I’m sure there are some people who were excited by this, Microsoft didn’t really reveal anything apart from a few buzz-words, so I personally felt this was a waste of time and actually hurt their press conference. However, before concluding, Microsoft unveiled a new trailer for Halo Infinite. Although this was a great trailer and got me incredibly excited for the next entry in the Halo franchise, they announced Halo Infinite will be a release title on the next Xbox which put a significant cloud over my excitement as I had a faint hope the game would be out this year. As I said at the start, with Sony absent Microsoft had the potential to really shine this year. Although their press conference wasn’t bad, and there are definitely a number of exciting games on the horizon, it feels as if Microsoft didn’t truly seize on the opportunity. Then again, maybe that’s just to be expected as this console generation enters its final stretch.

Pros
There are a ton of exciting games across a wide variety of genres coming out this year
Cyberpunk has a release date!
Fallen Order continues to impress
New Halo trailer!

Cons
Cyberpunk is almost a year away..
Project Scarlett was a waste of time
Halo Infinite is over a year away..

Final grade: B


Nintendo
As has been the norm for the past few years, Nintendo used a Nintendo Direct rather than a traditional press conference. Nintendo opened with a reveal of the next DLC character(s) for Smash Ultimate, the heroes from the Dragon Quest franchise. I’ve never really invested a lot of time in Dragon Quest games, so I’m not especially connected to these characters, but whether they excite me or not will depend on their kit. Nintendo followed this with a trailer for the Dragon Quest 11: Definitive Edition which will be released this September. After this, Nintendo showed a new trailer for Luigi’s Mansion 3 which will feature both co-op and what looks to be a multi-player horde mode. The next trailer was for a tactical RPG set in Jim Henson’s Dark Crystal which ties to the recent Netflix series. Nintendo then reminded players of the upcoming Link’s Awakening remake which I’m sure will be great, but still looks a little strange. Nintendo announced a 3D remake of Trials of Mana, which is coming out next year, and a collection of the previous Mana games which is available now. Nintendo's next trailer was for a port of The Witcher 3 for Switch, and while I don’t know anyone who does not love The Witcher 3, this port didn’t look great, and it is hard to get excited with Cyberpunk less than a year away. After that, Nintendo showed a new trailer for the upcoming Fire Emblem: Three Houses. Nintendo went into more detail about the story and some of the choices that players will face which made me even more excited for this game’s release next month. Next up, Nintendo announced Resident Evil 1, 5, and 6 will be coming to the Switch, revealed a trailer for No More Heroes 3, unveiled Contra Rouge Corps, and announced the release of a collection of previous Contra games. A brief trailer for Daemon X Machina took the stage next. I would have liked a longer trailer as this game will be out in September, but I imagine we’ll get more information before then. Nintendo then unveiled a trailer for a remake of the classic Panzer Dragoon before briefly touching on some news for Pokemon Sword and Shield. Nintendo had a Pokemon Direct last week, so this was not especially informative, although some of the news that has come out over the week was not what fans wanted to hear. Afterwards, Nintendo featured a trailer for Astral Chain which will be out in a few months and looks to continue Platinum Games’ legacy of great action games. Next, Nintendo showed trailers for a top-down gangster game called Empire of Sin, Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3, Cadence of Hyrule, and the latest Mario and Sonic at the Olympics. Animal Crossing fans were in for a disappointment as Nintendo showed a trailer for New Horizons and announced that the game had been delayed till next March. Returning to Smash, Nintendo shocked fans with the reveal that Banjo-Kazooie would be joining Ultimate’s roster. Nintendo’s E3 Direct was nearly over, but before concluding, Nintendo announced a full sequel to Breath of the Wild is currently in development. Although they didn’t offer much beyond a stunning reveal trailer, the fact they unveiled this game and the fact it is going to be a sequel to Breath of the Wild makes me hopeful the game will be out before the end of 2020.

Pros
Two exciting new Smash characters
New info on Fire Emblem: Three Houses sounds great
There are a ton of exciting Switch releases before the end of 2019
Breath of the Wild sequel in the works!!

Cons
No news on new Switch models
Nothing on Metroid Prime 4
New Zelda is at least a year away

Final grade: B


Game of E3: Cyberpunk 2077
I know a lot of people have said this E3 was disappointing, but there were some great reveals throughout the week. Games like Fire Emblem: Three Houses, Jedi Fallen Order, Daemon X Machina, Final Fantasy VII remake and a remaster of Final Fantasy VIII are all coming out this year. And we got trailers for Halo Infinite and a new Zelda. But, for the second year in a row, my game of E3 is Cyberpunk 2077. While many of the games I listed have me excited, if you told me I had to pick only one game from E3 to play next year, it would be, without a doubt, Cyberpunk 2077. The game just looks breathtaking. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=443 On Getting Good https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=439 Tue, 30 Apr 2019 19:27:04 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/9da6d7b72a4d0c5a113edd99e1cc34d4.png Stop me know if you’ve heard this one: FromSoftware puts out a new, highly...
Stop me know if you’ve heard this one: FromSoftware puts out a new, highly anticipated game. Like many of their recent games, this is an incredibly challenging and punishing game. While there are many who enjoy the game, there are others who find the game too challenging which inspires a string of opinions and articles that argue that games should have an easy mode (and the expected string of counter-opinions and arguments).

Having read through far too many of these pieces the past few weeks, the central thesis in favor of an easy mode can be presented as such: Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice is a great game, more players would be able to play and complete the game if it was not so punishing and did not require players to perform at the current skill-threshold, and including an easy mode would not have a drastic negative effect on the experience the game is able to deliver. Conversely, the counter-position can be presented far more succinctly: ‘git gud.’ Rather than focusing on the merits or detriments of an easy mode, issues of accessibility, or discussion about artist integrity, I wanted to focus on an adjacent topic -- namely, the notion of personal improvement.

Whether the issue is with the difficultly of a boss or level in a single-player game or with an overpowered weapon or meta in competitive multiplayer game, ‘git gud’ is a common response from players or community members meant to dismiss complaints from perceived lower skilled players. However, while its tone is derisive, the underlying message of the expression is that the recipient should focus on improving his or her own performance rather than complaining or asking for things to be easier. This message comes from the perspective that most challenges can be overcome by putting in the requisite time and effort to improve. Of course, it is important to note that the amount of time and effort necessary can be very different for different players.

Not surprisingly, this philosophy is core to the experience of many of the recent challenging FromSoftware games. At times, playing these games can feel like repeatedly slamming into an immovable wall where players make little visible progress for extended stretches. Struggling players often complain that the difficulty requirement is unfair, but one of the best things about these FromSoftware games is that the encounters in these games are fair because they follow established rules. Enemies and bosses have set moves which take a set time to complete, cover a set distance, and take a set time between moves. At the end of the day, these opponents follow these rules and it is up to the player to learn the rules that restrict a particular adversary and then work around those rules to overcome the challenge. Some players, perhaps due to previous experience or faster reflexes, are able to learn an encounter faster, while others will struggle for some time. However, the rules are the same for all players, and by putting in the time, every player can, in theory, learn the rules and overcome the obstacle.

Earlier this year, I reviewed the exceptional indie game Celeste. Celeste is a side-scrolling platformer largely built on the idea that failure can be a valuable teacher. The game keeps a running tally of the number of times a player dies in a level, not to shine a light on the player’s shortcomings, but to highlight the lessons that could be learned from failure. A stage might take ten tries, another might take one-hundred, and another might take over one-thousand. However, by repeatedly attempting the levels and learning from previous mistakes, a player can improve his or her skill and make progress through the game. This notion of working through failure to improve works especially well in Celeste because the game’s core narrative focuses on overcoming self-doubts and the voice in your head that says you cannot do something. The only way to overcome a challenging obstacle is to attempt it. and if you fail, it just means you have another opportunity to try again.

While challenges are more fixed in single-player games, multi-player games open the door for other players to influence the necessary skill requirements to complete a task or goal. Those of us with endgame experience playing Final Fantasy XI can probably remember the competition to claim NMs, HMNs, Kings, and even triggers in Sky. The fights themselves were not especially hard, especially as players learned the mechanics of the fights. Ignoring the whole issue of bots, claiming these coveted targets was a matter of reflexes and other players were essentially the measuring stick to evaluate if someone was good enough. Competitive player-versus-player games offer another venue for players to measure their skill against others. Players play these games to win, but the only way to win is to improve your skill and perform better than your opponents. Games like StarCraft, Overwatch, League of Legends, and many others use ranked playlists to identify and explicitly state a player’s skill level.

One of the things that makes player-versus-environment game-modes distinct from player-versus-player game-modes is that the former has a fixed skill ceiling while the latter has an infinite skill ceiling. In player-versus-environment game-modes, a player knows the skill requirement of a challenge and once the player exceeds that requirement, he or she can proceed past the challenge. Sure, a boss might have a second phase and a new set of moves, but at the end of the day, that’s just moving the goal-sticks. In player-versus-player game-modes, every game, match, and encounter plays differently because players behave randomly and sporadically and the things that worked in one match won’t necessarily work the same in another. I used to love playing Super Smash Brothers Melee, but I didn’t enjoy the Wii and Wii U entries as much and did not keep up with the franchise. I’ve been having a lot of fun with Smash Ultimate, and after reacquainting myself with the franchise by finishing the campaign on hard and playing with some friends, thought I was ready to delve into online play. I was wrong. Playing competitively against others online is completely different monster and I’ve had to develop many new skills and techniques to succeed. Luckily I know that the only way to improve is to keep playing, and although I lose a lot, I can see (small) improvements in my gameplay.

Destiny 2 took the idea of ranked play a step further with pinnacle weapons. In season 3, Bungie introduced a ranking system to Destiny 2’s competitive playlist and unique rewards tied to hitting specific point thresholds. The most coveted are powerful weapons that shine in the hands of high-skill players. For many players, it isn’t difficult to hit the rank requirement to acquire these weapons. For others, it is a challenge that can last all season. And some players view the challenge as so insurmountable, they refuse to even set foot in the competitive playlist. As I said earlier, the effort needed to overcome challenges can be different for different players and acquiring these weapons is no different. Contrary to opinions of the Destiny community, Bungie has worked to make the competitive playlist more accessible to players, and this season players could reach the necessary rank requirement in as few as sixteen matches. However, because other players will acquire these weapons quickly coupled with the fact that they might not hit the required rank after a full season has led some players to berate Bungie for introducing these weapons and demand they make them more accessible rather than even attempting to improve their skill to earn these weapons.

The thing about ranked playlists, whether it is after ten placement matches or a season of play, they identify a player’s actual skill rating. For a player under the skill requirement for one of these weapons, whether they are eventually attainable or not comes down to the player’s mindset. Psychologists have a theory on two different mindsets when it comes to individual ability: fixed versus growth mindsets. Players with a fixed mindset believe that a player’s ability or skill level is set in stone. For someone with a fixed mindset, either they are good enough or they are not. Failure is seen as a permanent outcome and critical feedback is seen as a personal attack against something the player cannot change. Conversely, a player with a growth mindset looks at ability as something that can change with time and practice. For them, failure is a chance to learn and feedback can highlight places for improvement.

When I used to play Overwatch more frequently and actually kept up with the community, one of the things I found interesting was the different perspectives on rank from players at different skill tiers. There were many players who viewed their rank and progression to higher ranks as something to chase. It wasn’t uncommon for a player to make a post when, after several seasons of work, he or she reached a rank like Diamond or Masters after starting in Bronze or Silver. However, there were some players, seemingly more common at lower ranks, who didn’t view ranks as a chase and would instead complain about their placements. These players could not fathom that they were not top tier players. The game must have placed them incorrectly, or they kept getting paired with bad teammates, or there were other factors outside their control which kept them out of the higher tiers they deserved.

We’ve all played with teammates who cannot take responsibility for their shortcomings and will look for anything to blame but themselves. Whether it is bad teammates, lag, the enemies' loadouts or weapons, an imbalanced map, or any number of other factors, these players can always find an excuse for their own poor performance. Conversely, the ability to be critical of one’s own performance and self diagnose is a necessity to improve as a player. If I lose a match in a PvP game or against a challenging boss, one of the first questions I always try to ask is whether I played a perfect game. This might surprise some of you, but the answer is usually no. Did I die because I over-extended beyond the range of my support teammates? Did that boss punish me for getting too greedy with my hits? Did I mistime a block or miss my shot? Although no one likes to highlight their own flaws, these are the types of questions that open the door to improvement. Of course, that’s not to say things like lag and the other factors I mentioned above don’t bother me. I am no stranger to tilt. However, blaming these issues, issues outside my control, instead of focusing on my own mistakes leaves little room for improvement.

Hidetaka Miyazaki, the director of Sekiro and president of FromSoftware, has said that he creates these games for players who are willing to persist. In an interview, Miyazaki stated that "the basic approach to his games is to let players experience a sense of accomplishment through overcoming difficulties." Getting good is not an easy process. It is different for everyone and some players will struggle for a significant amount of time. However, just because a player can’t beat Genichiro or Moon Presence, acquire one of Destiny 2’s pinnacle weapons, hit Masters in Overwatch, or reach Elite Smash right now does not mean he or she cannot get there eventually. I get that no one likes to lose and some players might never overcome some challenges, but skill ceilings should be things we strive to hit instead of asking for skill ceilings to be brought down so they are easier to reach without the same effort. Sometimes failure is the best teacher and the only way to improve is to keep trying and fail a lot. And if that's not convincing enough.. ..well, git gud.

Winning is temporary, better is forever~
]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=439 Kingdom Hearts 3 Review -- The Wait is Finally Over https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=435 Fri, 01 Mar 2019 01:22:16 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/467cb870f28a5d7b7fe2c100d4d20cc5.png After nearly thirteen years (or over thirteen years if you played the...
After nearly thirteen years (or over thirteen years if you played the Japanese release), Square Enix finally released the sequel to Kingdom Hearts II and the third numeric entry in the Kingdom Hearts franchise. Before I get into this review, it’s impossible to talk about Kingdom Hearts 3 without acknowledging the time it took to get here and games that came before it. Part of the issue is the peculiar numbering system the franchise has adopted. Yes, Kingdom Hearts 3 is the third numeric entry, but it is not the third game in the Kingdom Hearts franchise. And to get to the point of Kingdom Hearts 3, we needed the stories of those games (well, maybe not coded/Re:coded). My point is, we shouldn’t look at Kingdom Hearts 3 as a game that took thirteen years to arrive, we should look at it as a game that arrived seven years after Dream Drop Distance.. ..which is marginally better. Now with that out of the way..

For those who haven’t kept up with the franchise, Kingdom Hearts began as a series that combined the characters and role-playing game elements of the Final Fantasy franchise with the worlds and stories of various Disney properties. What sounds like a peculiar and impossible combination actually produced a fun and exciting game with an engaging story and a surprising amount of depth. Since its inception nearly two decades ago, the franchise has developed its own voice and identity and continues to tell the story of the enduring battle between the forces of light who wield strange key-shaped weapons, appropriately called keyblades, and those who use the ambiguously evil power of darkness. Kingdom Hearts 3 is the final piece of a story arc that began in 2002 with the original Kingdom Hearts. Following the events of 2012’s Dream Drop Distance, Sora, the franchise’s spikey-haired protagonist, and his allies set out to combat the mastermind responsible for all their prior adventures and mishaps, Xehanort. From the beginning, Xehanort’s goal has been to orchestrate a clash between light and darkness and Sora and his allies must unite seven warriors of light to stand against Xehanort’s thirteen darknesses.

Before its release, Tetsuya Nomura, the director of Kingdom Hearts III, stated that this game would not feature any Final Fantasy characters because the franchise had grown beyond its early need to rely on them. While fans might be disappointed to not see the return of reoccurring character like Cloud and Squall Leon, Nomura is not wrong. Kingdom Hearts has become its own entity that can stand on its own feet. At the same time, what is also true is that Kingdom Hearts has also grown beyond the need to rely on the stories of the game’s featured Disney worlds. Don’t get me wrong, visiting Disney worlds has always been part of the Kingdom Hearts experience and I’m not saying that part needs to be eliminated. However, I don’t believe that playing through a largely irrelevant world-centric story is needed anymore, especially when around half those stories largely retell events from their respective movies. While I enjoyed visiting places like Frozen’s Arendelle and Big Hero 6’s San Fransokyo, I didn’t enjoy having to play through those stories just to get to the brief but relevant cutscene sequence at the end of each world. One of my biggest complaints against Kingdom Hearts 3 is that most of the story is crammed into the game’s final act and as a result, the game feels like it rushes to its conclusion and wastes a lot of the potential that had been built up through the previous games.

While the game’s narrative might leave long-time fans disappointed, the gameplay experience Kingdom Hearts 3 delivers is a nearly perfect evolution of the franchise, albeit with a few noticeable issues. Like its predecessors, Kingdom Hearts 3 is a third-person role-playing adventure game. Players control Sora who can attack enemies with his keyblade or hit them with magic spells. He is accompanied on his journey by Donald, who fills the role of party mage, and Goofy, the requisite tank, as well as occasional party additions like Mike and Sully in the Monsters Inc. world and Woody and Buzz in the Toy Story world. The reaction commands and form changes from Kingdom Hearts 2 have been removed, but in their place, Sora can trigger a wide variety of attacks and abilities during combat. Allies have team attacks, repeatedly casting the same spell can unlock a more powerful version of the spell, and each keyblade has its own transformation which unlocks different abilities. However, the most powerful abilities are the attractions which allow Sora to use attacks based on famous Disney rides. For instance, early on, Sora has to fight the Rock Titan from Hercules. After a certain point, Sora can summon the Big Thunder Mountain Coaster attraction and continue the battle from atop the ride. It is crazy and over-the-top, but perfectly encapsulates the tone of the franchise. Still while all these features make combat fluid and exciting, there’s no denying that all these abilities can start to feel over-powered and make the game feel too easy. Even playing on the hardest difficulty, I never felt the game really challenged me as previous Kingdom Hearts games have in the past. It would have been nice to disable some or all of these abilities as it was too easy to instinctively hit triangle whenever a prompt came up, but even consciously making an effort to not use them, I rarely found myself struggling in combat.

While the game’s combat has definitely been updated, the use of separate and worlds unfortunately highlights how other parts of the franchise have not kept up and evolved past some of the old tropes of Japanese role-playing games. Because each world is separate and undoubtedly took time to develop, most feature long stretches of linear paths. The game also features a number of long cutscenes that can take players out of the experience, especially those that focus exclusively on characters and stories in the different Disney worlds. Like I said earlier, I’m not saying the franchise needs to abandon the Disney worlds, but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t pull out my phone during some of those cutscenes. Because each world is so disconnected from the core story, there were times when I felt myself wanting to just rush ahead to get to the next section. The game’s final acts are also heavy on exposition and after dragging its feet for most of the game, inevitably feel rushed.

Kingdom Hearts 3 also feels like a game that is stacked full of features, some of which inevitably just work better than others. To highlight a few, the game has item synthesis, cooking, a plethora of mini-games, and there’s even a self-contained open-sea sailing feature. Oh, and as is apparently required by current gaming law, the game has a phone which lets you take pictures and selfies. While it is great to have all this variety, at times, it feels like some of these ideas just built up over the game’s long development cycle. All that said, long-time fans will be happy to hear that Kingdom Hearts 3 brings back the gummi ship and it is the best rendition the franchise has ever featured. To discover new worlds, players need to partake in a ship flying mini-game. Kingdom Hearts 3 ditches the rail-shooter style mini-game from previous entries and replaces it with a free-flying experience. Players are dumped into a large open space and can pretty much fly wherever. There are plenty of battles to fight, treasures to find, and secrets to discover while flying through space. Whereas previous gummi ship segments felt like a minor hurdle to progress the game, I found myself choosing to spend time in this iteration of the mini-game. I’m not going to lie, I don’t think it would be too much of a stretch to say I spent over ten hours on the gummi ship feature alone, it is that enjoyable.

Visually, Kingdom Hearts 3 is a gorgeous game and is the best the franchise has ever looked, but that shouldn’t be too surprising given that the franchise skipped a full console generation. The first world Sora visits is Olympus, which admittedly looks a little strange. It isn’t that the world looks bad, it is just that the two-dimensional characters look somewhat off in the new graphical engine. Thankfully, this is only one of two worlds which return from previous games, and Kingdom Hearts 3 wisely abandons the other classic Disney worlds. In their place, Sora’s adventure takes players to new worlds featured in more recent films under the Disney umbrella which all featured computer animation. This has led to comparisons which not only do a great job showcasing how close Kingdom Hearts 3 gets to some of the original films, but the care that went into recreating scenes from those films. And it is not just the worlds that look beautiful. Cast a spell, use an ability, or summon an attraction and the world will fill particle effects and explosions. Kingdom Hearts 3 has its problems, but visually, it is an over-the-top and stunning experience.

Early on, I realized I couldn’t close this review the same way for long-time fans and newcomers. I’m going to be upfront, because of misdirects, retcons, and games released across different systems and platform, the Kingdom Hearts franchise can be hard enough to follow for long-time fans who have kept up all these years. If you have never played a Kingdom Hearts game, it is hard for me to recommend Kingdom Hearts 3. This game is the final piece of a convoluted multi-game story arc. As such, really enjoying Kingdom Hearts 3 requires playing through several previous games (or, at a minimum, watching a few YouTube videos). On one hand, those games are now available in easily accessible collections, but on the other, some have not aged very well. My point is, if you have never played a Kingdom Hearts game, while Kingdom Hearts 3 is a fun ride, it is not the best place to hop on.

Now, for the long-time fans, if I’m being totally honest, as another long-time fan, Kingdom Hearts 3 has been a difficult game for me to review. There is no way for me to write a review that disconnects myself from the years I spent waiting for this game. As such, I can’t help feeling that years of anticipation have inevitably skewed my ability to give an impartial evaluation of this game. Yes, I’m disappointed by the narrative approach employed, but I loved when each world finally touched the main Kingdom Hearts story. Yes, the game crawled towards its conclusion, but that conclusion brought together storylines from over a half-dozen different games. Or take the gameplay, yes the combat feels great and is incredibly satisfying, but I can’t deny that parts of the gameplay experience have not kept up and the combat often feels too easy. If you’ve played Kingdom Hearts before, yes, I strongly recommend picking up Kingdom Hearts 3. Kingdom Hearts started out as a simple story about Final Fantasy characters interacting with Disney characters. Since then, it has become something far more convoluted. And in the end, it seems apt that my feelings about Kingdom Hearts 3 are complicated and not very simple.

"May your heart be your guiding key."

All images owned by SquareEnix ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=435 Indie Games You Might Have Missed in 2018 https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=433 Thu, 31 Jan 2019 20:14:40 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/dd7c883260828ede3b663eee85312625.png When I was thinking about my game of the year for 2018 last month, one...
When I was thinking about my game of the year for 2018 last month, one thing that stood out was the number of great indie games that I played over the past year. I’d go so far as to say that some of the best games I played last year were not major AAA titles, but indie games produced by smaller studios. I once heard someone express an apt sentiment about indie games, that the best indie games focus on a single aspect and perfect it.  There are obviously other pieces to these games, and some are able to do many things exceptionally well, but there's always one part that is near perfect. The three games here each embody this characteristic in their own way.

Moonlighter
Moonlighter is a top-down, dungeon exploring role-playing game and was one of the indie games I was most looking forward to last year. Near the cozy town of Rynoka are a series of mysterious dungeons. For a time, the town was sustained by the adventurers who scoured the dungeons and the merchants who sold the wares the explorers brought back. However, in recent years the town has suffered as adventurers stopped exploring the dungeons and merchants ran out of items to sell. Players control Will, a shopkeeper turned adventurer who sets out the single-handedly revive the town. Moonlighter’s defining feature is its core game-play loop -- explore, sell, upgrade. Players explore the dungeons, fight enemies and collect items those enemies drop. They then return to Rynoka to sell the items to the townspeople and then use that money to upgrade the town, their shop, and their gear. It is a fairly straight-forward game-play loop, but Moonlighter executes it in an incredibly satisfying way. Every time you escape the dungeon with a backpack full of loot, you know those rewards will be the fuel to make your next expedition even more successful. At the same time, it never feels like the game really attempts to evolve this loop. As you venture into later dungeons, the enemies get stronger, but you're now equipped with stronger weapons and more health and armor. Similarly, upgrades become more expensive as the game progresses, but so too do the items players can sell in the shop.

I’m admittedly not the biggest fan of pixel-art and feel it is somewhat overused by indie studios, but even I can concede that when its done well, it can look gorgeous. Moonlighter is one of those games where pixel-art is used exceptionally well to create a beautiful product. Each level has its own unique theme and the enemies and environments work together to make each one feel distinct. However, one area that falls short is the game’s combat. I mentioned earlier that the game-play loop doesn’t change throughout the game. Part of what contributes to this flaw is that your character never changes or gets new abilities. Will starts the game with a sword and shield (technically he starts with a broom, but that gets quickly replaced..), but players can purchase any of the initial weapons soon after. Beyond weapon choice, there isn’t a lot of depth to the combat. Although the game does not restrict players from changing weapons, the upgrade system puts pressure to pick a weapon and stick with it. Don’t get me wrong, the exploration and combat are fluid and feel great, but you approach every encounter more or less the same way which can start feeling repetitive by the end. While the combat leaves a fair bit to be desired, the sales side of the game is surprisingly involved. Selling items isn’t just a matter of returning to your shop and throwing things on a shelf (although, don’t get me wrong, the game keeps track of the price items sell for, so you can just do that). Players need to zero-in on the ideal price for each item. Sell for too little and your excursions into the dungeons can cost more than you make. Price too high and you won’t sell the item, or worse, you’ll sell the item but have a negative effect on its demand which reduces how much you can make on subsequent sales. The shop side is just as much a part of Moonlighter and players spend a solid chunk of the game figuring out how much is each item worth, adjusting those prices based on demand, growing the shop, and dealing with the added challenges that a busier shop brings, such as customers with unique demands, special order, and shoplifters. Taken together, the two halves create a charming whole.


Hollow Knight
Originally released for PC in 2017, Hollow Knight is a hack-and-slash adventure and exploring game with a healthy dose of platforming in the style of side-scrolling Metroid and Castlevania games. Hollow Knight tells the story of the Knight, a silent and emotionless protagonist on a mission to explore and uncover the secrets of the once mighty insect kingdom known as Hallownest. Hallownest was previous inhabited by a number of bug species, but in the time since, has mostly fallen into disrepair. I think it is more than just the fact that I’m not a big fan of bugs, but Hollow Knight’s visuals and world somehow sit in the balance between stylistically cute and subtlety creepy. The game is never very explicit about much of its story, but players are able to get an idea of the events and conflict that transpired by piecing together the narrative scattered throughout the game’s world. Players journey to a number of areas, from rocky caves to overgrown forests, to abandoned cities and the sewers beneath. Hallow Knight’s stylistic use of color sets these areas apart and makes the game stand out. For instance, when players first dive into Hallownest, they’ll be greeted by mostly black and white caves accented by shades of dull blue. I’ll admit, this initial area is not very impressive and will make you question why Hollow Knight has received such high praise. The game never really deviates too far from this dark style, but expertly uses accenting colors to make the different areas feel unique. For instance, vibrant greens overflow in the city’s overgrown gardens while the mines on the outskirts brighten the deeper players explore from the glow of exposed pink crystals. The use of color gives the game a very distinct and beautiful style.

Like many games in this genre, players are thrust into this adventure with a fairly basic toolkit and access to only a limited number of areas, but open up more of the world by progressing through the game and unlocking new abilities and moves. I’ll admit that there were more than a few occasions where I found myself wandering the world with no idea where to go next, but that just added to the world-building. The need to explore and find things on your own helps Hallownest truly felt like an abandoned kingdom. The Knight is initially armed with only a sword, but eventually gains access to magic, movement abilities, and other strange powers. Players can also equip charms which provide a number of unique effects. Combat in Hallow Knight often relies on precision and timing, best exemplified by the game’s approach to healing. Players gain access to healing through use of an ability called focus early on, but healing must be done in-game and takes time. During combat players need to anticipate their opponents' moves and time the ability correctly because if a player stops, whether voluntarily or because of a hit from an enemy, the energy is consumed and is not returned. Boss fights can be especially grueling as many will require multiple attempts to learn their mechanics and leave only brief windows for healing. That said, every encounter comes down to surviving long enough to learn the mechanics and timing which leads to an immense sense of satisfaction whenever you overcome an arduous foe. It is also worth noting, since release, the game has received a number of free DLCs which have added new and challenging content, some of which continues to taunt me and keeps bringing me back. Except the Path of Pain.. I have no intention of attempting that challenge..


Celeste
The last indie game on my list is the phenomenally well-received Celeste. Celeste tells the story of Madeline, a young woman on a mission to prove herself by climbing the titular Celeste Mountain. Celeste is an elegantly simple side-scrolling platformer that is also incredibly unforgiving and encourages players to learn from repeatedly failing. And make no mistake, you will fail. A lot. The game keeps a running tally of the number of times a player has failed in each level and overall, and those numbers can start to climb very quickly. Levels are built around a specific area of the mountain, an abandoned city, broken down ruins, a decrepit hotel, and so on, with each level broken into several short, self-contained “rooms” which each serve as a checkpoint. Each level introduces a new feature or ability that builds on the core jumping and platforming mechanics. As you progress through a level, later rooms build on the challenges and add new elements around that new feature which push you to perfect your technique. Once you beat a level, you move onto the next which requires you to take everything you learned throughout the previous level and merge it with another new aspect. Thankfully, the platforming and controls feel tight and responsive, which is a necessity in a game that punishes players for a lack of precision. Beyond even the challenge of the main story, the game has a number of additional hurdles for its more hardcore audience. The game offers collectibles and secret levels for players who crave even more challenging platforming precision.

The exceptional platforming isn't the only thing that's great about Celeste. Another thing that helps Celeste stand out is its story and the creative way it approaches anxiety, personal doubts, depression, and the journey to deal with them. Throughout her journey, Madeline is plagued by self-doubt which physically manifests as a mirrored doppelganger of herself that pursues her from level to level. Sometimes she serves as an actual obstacle, other times she appears just to mock Madeline’s shortcomings. The game’s central philosophy, that it is okay to fail, is core to Madeline's struggles. It ties the player’s own journey and failure into the game’s overall narrative in a way that helps players feel invested. Celeste does not have an especially deep story, but as you progress, it is impossible not to end up caring about Madeline and her personal journey. Visually, the game relies on a fairy simple pixel-art style. Like I said earlier, I’m not the biggest fan of pixel-art, and while I normally would be more critical of Celeste, the vibrant colors and charming visuals work for Celeste and help it stand out. It also helps that the game’s visuals are also paired with a catchy and memorable chip-tune score. Although it has been delayed, I’m eagerly waiting on the opportunity to return to the mountain with the upcoming free DLC that is supposed to be released sometime this year.

Just play. Have fun. Enjoy the game. ~ Michael Jordan

All images owned by their respective studios. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=433 BlueGartr Staff Picks - 2018 https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=430 Mon, 31 Dec 2018 22:25:19 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/fdc62c78c4c1a8bacd8c11eceb465305.png As gamers, the end of the year provides an opportunity to look back at the...
As gamers, the end of the year provides an opportunity to look back at the library of games each of us has finished over the last year. 2017 was an exceptional year filled with numerous phenomenal games. Compared to that overwhelming bounty, 2018 offered far fewer noteworthy games. Perhaps as a testament to the lack of remarkable games this year, we’ve got fewer responses this year compared to past years. Regardless, welcome to the 2018 BlueGartr Staff Game of the Year List!

Byrthnoth: Nier Automata (PS4, XB1, PC)
This is the first time that I haven't said FFXI, but this year I am going with Nier: Automata.

I initially wrote off Nier: Automata as a pantyshot delivery vehicle with a thin plot designed to target sexually frustrated young men, like Bayonetta, Dead or Alive, FFX-2, etc., but it was so much more. The creators of Nier: Automata clearly started with a thoroughly weird dream of the next chapter in their series and then worked backwards (eventually tossing in optional pantyshots.) The plot was weird but cool. Following the plot, the gameplay switched from hack'n'slash to other modes ("minigames"?) as required by the story, which makes total sense in a futuristic setting where everyone is using machines. Most of the minigames were little less polished than the hack'n'slash mode, but they were functional and better for storytelling than showing a cutscene for any type of plot-essential action that doesn't fit in your one mode of interaction (Xenosaga, Star Ocean, etc.). I don't want to spoil anything, so I'll just say that Nier: Automata was an enjoyable trip to the uncanny valley and I hope to go back some day.


BaneTheBrawler: Subnautica (PS4, XB1, PC)/Civilization 6: Rise and Fall (PC)

Standalone Game Release: Subnautica. A delightful survival/construction game set on an alien ocean planet, it has elements of horror inherent in the setting: the horror of the depths. Thalassophobes beware, because this game has you go deep into the dark reaches of an alien ocean teeming with life big and small.... and deadly. Accompanying you on this journey through the depths is a story of greed, cheerful corporate disregard for human life, and a sense of loneliness, all reminiscent of Portal. The game has a reasonably robust crafting system allowing you to build tools, gadgets, vehicles, and homes. The base-building alone is great fun, as you find blueprints for modules capable of different tasks, and assemble them however you see fit to build a base that meets whatever needs you have. The gameplay loop of meeting your survival needs (air, water, food, power, materials) is rewarding, if perhaps a touch grindy. But the grind is to scale with your ambitions, and so does not wear oppressively on the player. The creatures are a mix of thoughtful realism and fantastical horror. Some are more believable than others (lookin at you, crashfish) but all fit into the world's rather extensive ecosystem. I love this game and look forward to their first expansion which is set to feature the Arctic biome, and a new character/story.

Expansion/Addon: Civilization 6: Rise and Fall. Civ 6 was already pretty robust, especially with the modding community busily at work, but Rise and Fall added several new mechanics: Loyalty, Eras, and Alliances. The Alliances seemed to me somewhat lackluster, but perhaps that's because the AI is still not very smart. Loyalty and Eras, however, were a fun addition to the game, with Loyalty solving one of the most aggravating tactics: Forward settling. Now, cities insufficiently supported by surrounding loyal cities will slowly lose loyalty and declare independence. If an enemy nation exerts enough pressure (or conquers the independent city), the city may then join their empire. This leads to some interesting new strategies for cold-wars. The Era mechanics are an interesting, if rather passive, addition. Your progress throughout each Age of the World determines the bonuses (or penalties) you receive in the next: A Dark Age, Normal Age, Golden Age, or Heroic Age. In a Dark Age, you suffer penalties but may choose powerful double-edged bonuses to try to reclaim your glory. In a Normal Age, your choice are somewhat more mundane, and offer only mild bonuses. In a Golden Age, your choices are potent bonuses which can cement your place as a great Empire. In a Heroic Age, only reachable by going directly from a Dark Age to a Golden Age, your bonuses are numerous and powerful, giving you the chance to build a truly great empire. Maintaining the "era score" required to hit the Age you desire is another element to track in the already intricate dance of Civilization, but it is not so burdensome as to be a bother. As with past entries, Civilization 6 only gets better and better with expansions and mods. I eagerly await the recently announced Gathering Storm expansion, which plans to add long-desired features like Canals, Climate Change, and Natural Disasters. 

Honorable mentions: Spiderman, God of War, and Red Dead Redemption 2. I didn't actually play any of these, but I may as well have, because my fiancee watched Letsplays with me in the room that went through the entire story (I missed a lot of Red Dead's story, but got the gist). Good games, good stories. Dutch is an asshole, Doctor Octavius makes me sad, and Tealc dad of war best dad of war.

Post-Choice Honorable Mentions: Smash Bros and Stellaris's Megacorp expansion. Both great, but launched too late in the year to win imo.


Serra: Destiny 2 - Forsaken (PS4, XB1, PC)
Given how much time I’ve put into the Destiny franchise, it might be surprising that it has only found its way onto my list, even as an honorable mention, once. Forsaken, the latest expansion to Destiny 2, is my game of the year for a number of reasons. For starters, Forsaken brings Destiny 2 to the best place the franchise has ever been. Bungie has seemingly also found a better way to support the game with continuous content over the course of the year. However, I’m admittedly a pretty die-hard Destiny player and was going to play regardless of the quality of the expansion. Not only has Forsaken given me a reason to log back in nearly everyday, but it has brought back a lot of my friends who had previously stopped playing. While the numbers have dropped over the past few months and fluctuate with content releases, I can’t think of a single day that I’ve logged on and been the only player online.

Honorable Mentions: Celeste, Hollow Knight, Smash Ultimate


Happy New Year, Everyone! Here’s to 2019! ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=430 On Secrets https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=428 Fri, 30 Nov 2018 15:13:16 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/2f9bb29b90d2e59cd7feeba0ec72fd69.png If you have ever wandered away from your main goal in a video game,...
If you have ever wandered away from your main goal in a video game, there’s a good chance you’ve stumbled across some type of secret. Secrets have been part of video games since nearly the very beginning. Whether it was a secret intended to assist players, or a hidden Easter egg, developers have been hiding secrets in games for years. The advent of the internet has changed this quite a bit, but game developers still hide secrets in their games, sometimes to help players, other-times to surprise.

The history of secrets in gaming is widely attributed to have originated back with the game Adventure on the Atari 2600. In those early days, Atari had a culture of not displaying the names of developers. While the official stance was that this was to prevent competitors from identifying and luring away their programmers, the developers felt it was a policy to reduce their stature and weaken their bargaining power. As a result, the developer of Adventure, Warren Robinett, created a hidden room that gave him credit for his work on the project. Robinett didn’t tell anyone about this room, and when the game was published, a random player ended up discovering the secret. By that time, it would have been a costly project to update the code to remove the room, so Atari decided to leave it in, and thus the first secret was born. From there, Atari made it an official policy that secret Easter eggs should be hidden in all games.

Secrets and Easter eggs became fairly common from then on in various games. While some secrets were messages or mementos coded into the game by developers for their own enjoyment or for fans to stumble upon, another type of secret began to appear in games. Typically off the normal path or hidden from players, these were secrets intended to help players or give them an edge. For many gamers, the Warp Zones of the original Super Mario Bros. may have been one of the first hidden secrets discovered. Warp Zones were hidden areas that allowed players to jump past levels. The first is located in world 1-2. By riding a lift up and running on the roof over the exit pipe, a player can reach the Warp Zone which allowed him or her to jump ahead to Worlds 2, 3, or 4. Another popular secret which is rumored to have started similar to an Easter egg but works to help players is the Konami Code. While many associate the code with providing additional lives in Contra, it actually originated with the NES port of Gradius. The story behind the code goes that Kazuhisa Hashimoto, the developer of the NES port, found the game too difficult to finish during testing and created the code. The code was left in the game and only discovered after release, and similar to the hidden room in Adventure, would have been a costly endeavor to remove and was left in the game.

As time passed and games evolved, new approaches to secrets developed. Some developers fully embraced the idea of secrets and built games around the idea of secrets and discovery. Secrets are at the core of games like The Legend of Zelda and raise the question, what is classified as a secret and what is not? For instance, is a sword hidden under a specific gravestone a secret? What about a heart piece located outside the map? What is the difference between the merchant who gives you rupees for finding him under a random bush versus the one who steals your rupees? All these items were described in the manual, so do they even count as secrets in the same way as some of the earlier examples? Of course, that’s not to say that the game did not feature its share of Easter eggs and other secrets. Players who finished the original Legend of Zelda unlocked a harder second quest, but players could unlock this immediately by entering their name as ZELDA (I’d be curious to know how many people did this unintentionally). And as far as Easter eggs go, one of the more obscure ones is hidden in the layout of the first five dungeons in the second quest.

Sharing is another way that secrets have changed as time and technology has developed. Back in the early days of video games, a player either found a secret by themselves, or heard about it from another player who stumbled upon the secret. Word of mouth was really the only way for one gamer to pass a secret along to another. During my childhood, my friends and I would discuss the games we played and the secrets we discovered at lunch and recess. Anytime two kids had played the same game, there was almost a guaranteed discussion of the different things they had discovered. Of course, the advent of the internet changed this forever. Now, a secret did not need to come from someone you knew, but could be shared by someone on the other side of the world. Whether it was an Easter egg or a secret that provided an advantage to players, it was easier to find that information online.

Easy access to the wealth of information online also introduced a new dimension to secrets: people making up fake secrets. Before the internet, we all had at least one friend who made things up for seemingly no reason. They would tell you about some cool thing in a game, but when you went home to try it out, you’d never be able to find it or pull it off. You’d then ask them to show you, but they never would be able to, and at that point you’d know they were making things up. The internet took this to an entirely new level. Strangers could create fake evidence to try to convince people of secrets that did not exist. I can still remember seeing images of players riding Yoshi in Mario 64, captures of Link collecting the Triforce in Ocarina of Time, or detailed guides on how to acquire Mew by using Strength to push a truck near the S.S. Anne in Pokémon Red/Blue. Fake images and videos allowed these people to fool others into thinking these secrets were real, and if you couldn’t pull it off, well you must have done something wrong.

Considering their long history, it should come as no surprise that secrets continue to permeate games today. However, developers trying to keep their secrets hidden in this modern era have faced a new challenge: data-mining. While there’s no denying that the internet has made it far easier to share information and secrets, in some ways, data-mining has eliminated the challenge at finding secrets altogether. Especially in online games, whenever a game or update is released, eager fans quickly dig through the files looking for anything and everything new. When I played Final Fantasy XI, whenever an update was released, I knew exactly which new pieces of gear I would be hunting and which activities I needed to do, even before downloading the patch. Breath of the Wild featured numerous Easter eggs for fans of the Zelda franchise. The map was dotted with landmarks referencing events, characters, and locations from previous games. However, as soon as players got their hands on the game, data-miners shared lists of locations and the Easter eggs those locations referred. I’m sure some players appreciated having access to the information, but it also took away some of the sense of exploration and wonder stumbling upon one of those Easter eggs would have provided.

Recently, developers have turned to new ways to keep their secrets hidden and even used the data-mining culture to surprise gamers. Having spent a lot of time in the Destiny universe, I have a large amount of appreciation for the effort Bungie puts into Destiny’s secrets. Back during Destiny 1, Bungie hid a secret weapon that required the community to discover and play an alternate reality game, read and translate binary, and solve math puzzles. More recently, one of the coolest secrets Bungie kept hidden from players was the Whisper of the Worm sniper rifle in Destiny 2. When the Warmind expansion was released, data-miners discovered there was a hidden gun, but no one knew how to acquire it or if players could actually acquire the weapon. Several weeks later, a player stumbled upon a random enemy which triggered an event. This discovery, coupled with the earlier data-mining discoveries whipped the community into a fervor. Unraveling secrets always brings the Destiny community together and watching so many players working together to reach the end of this puzzle made me eager to get home and dive in myself.

Every game these days seems to have some type of secrets. Sometimes it is something that the developers want players to find and use it to encourage players to explore. Whether it is a secret boss, secret tool or ability, or even secret level, there are countless games that have embraced the use of secrets as a core gameplay element. Sometimes developers use secrets to hint at their future plans for a game or franchise, sometimes going out of their way to reveal the secret when fans don’t find them. There are even some secrets that developers leave hidden and are only discovered by players many years later. And there are still some secrets that hark back to that original Easter egg and are included at the whim of a developer. What are some of your favorite secrets or what are some of your favorite stories about video game secrets? Feel free to share below!

The best way of keeping a secret is to pretend there isn’t one ~ Margaret Atwood
]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=428 Destiny 2: Forsaken Review -- The Road to Redemption https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=425 Mon, 01 Oct 2018 16:37:23 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/c819f28b62e15c1d812f4f42f43a4c59.png For both long-time fans and newcomers, Destiny 2 was seen as a bit of a...
For both long-time fans and newcomers, Destiny 2 was seen as a bit of a disappointment at release. While the initial release was met with high praise, in an effort to respond to criticisms and issues raised by the community over its predecessor’s three year lifespan, Bungie made a number of design decisions which ended up having a negative effect on the long-term experience. Over the past year, Bungie has taken great strides to remedy many of these problems and has made a number of significant changes to the Destiny 2 experience. All these changes culminated in this Fall’s expansion, Forsaken. Forsaken is intended to serve as a turning-point, not just to the gameplay experience, but also to the franchise’s narrative journey.

Early on during the reveal and marketing for Forsaken, Bungie revealed that the narrative journey of this expansion would be driven by a single stunning event: the death of Cayde-6. Across the franchise’s four years, Cayde-6 has had the biggest personality and is widely regarded as Destiny’s most beloved character. The game’s opening mission has players team up with Cayde to stop a prison break. The first half of this mission is more of a tribute to Cayde than anything else, and his interjections and actions throughout serve as a final sendoff. However, by the end of the first mission, Cayde is killed by Uldren Sov, a largely irrelevant character from Destiny 1. The personal element of the Forsaken campaign is a nice break from the narrative tone of most other Destiny stories to this point. Whereas most Destiny campaigns have focused on battles against major threats to humanity and pitted players against gods and conquerors, Forsaken is a story driven completely by revenge. An enemy killed one of our closest allies and we are going to kill him, regardless of what it takes.

The Forskaen campaign unfolds as players set out to the Reef and the Tangled Shore, one of Forsaken’s new explorable regions, to hunt down Uldren and his eight Barons. The Barons lead a new type of enemy, the Scorn, which are dead Fallen which have been revived and transformed. The Forsaken campaign opens up to let players choose the order they want to hunt down the Barons, although the level requirements create a recommended order. The eight Barons are intended to be unique encounters which pit players against different mechanics and challenges. I say intended, because although the Barons are each unique, there is no denying that each fight is little more than a bullet-sponge. Take the Rifleman, in the lead-up to Forsaken, the promotional material presented this adversary as an ace sniper who would pick you off from any direction if you stuck your head out too long. Now, I wasn’t expecting a Metal Gear-style sniper fight (I mean, I was hoping for something like that..), but I don’t think it is asking too much for the sniper fight to not be winnable with a sword. Additionally, while it is clear that each of the Barons has a different, unique personality, players simply don’t spend enough time with any one Baron to really know or care about them. All that said, although the Baron fights might not be the best part about Forsaken, the narrative story of the campaign and beyond is immensely satisfying for long-time Destiny fans. While players hunt the Barons, Forsaken’s story reveals Uldren has other goals which connect to mysteries and secrets which Bungie has been building up and hinting at for many years.

Since the initial release of Destiny 1, one of the biggest criticisms against the Destiny franchise has been the lack of content for players who reached the endgame. Yes, the games have featured amazing raids which pushed and challenged players, but for players who reached the pinnacle, there has been essentially one challenge per expansion. Enter the Dreaming City, the second new explorable area in the Reef which is Bungie’s answer to the player-base’s requests for more endgame content. The Dreaming City is a gorgeous endgame region that players gain access to after completing the Forsaken campaign and is an area exclusively devoted to endgame players full of powerful enemies, challenges, and secrets. Honestly, I don’t think it is a stretch to say that the entire Forsaken campaign works in service to setting up the Dreaming City and the endgame. For many of us, there is no denying the nostalgic sensation of Final Fantasy XI’s Sky. From invisible platforms, to strange symbols, to peculiar enemies which reappear in different locations, the Dreaming City is full of mysteries that players have been eagerly attempting to unravel. Additionally, since the second week, the Dreaming City has changed in appearance in response to events in the world which has introduced new stories and mysteries.

While the Destiny franchise has had its share of issues over its lifetime, one area that has always excelled has been the core gameplay. Nowhere better exemplifies Bungie’s expertise with shooter mechanics than the latest addition to players’ arsenals, combat bows. Bows feel incredibly crisp and precise and I have yet to encounter someone critical of the gameplay experience of using a bow. At release, one of the biggest complaints against Destiny 2 was that the load-out changes made the game feel less fun than Destiny 1. Personally, I really enjoyed the Destiny 2 load-out system, especially the way it put an emphasis on primary weapon skill in the Crucible, but I understand the complaint from other players that it was more fun to have access to a shotgun or sniper rifle at all times. As I said in the beginning, Bungie has worked to respond to the criticisms levied against Destiny 2 this past year, and one significant change has been reverting load-outs to more closely resemble Destiny 1. Players now have far more freedom to craft their load-outs, albeit with some ammo restrictions that prevent players from running rampant with three shotguns.

New load-outs aren’t the only things that have changed the Destiny 2 sandbox. With Forsaken, Bungie has introduced new supers and subclass nodes for every existing subclass. These new supers are meant to fit within the existing mythos for each subclass, while also offering players a new way to play. In some cases, these new supers feel like an organic evolution of an existing super. For instance, the Sentinel new super allows Titans to turn their handheld shield into a portable wall that can protect and empower allies. Other supers are a drastic departure from the existing subclass. My favorite new super is the Gunslinger’s new Blade Barrage super which has Hunters hammer enemies with a deluge of flaming knives. It is incredibly satisfying jumping into the air and unleashing this attack against a boss or army of enemies. For the most part, these new supers and their associated perks synergize incredibly well to create fun play-styles and experiences. At the same time, it also serves to highlight how some of the old supers are not as well balanced and could use some updating.

Bungie repeatedly stated that a number of the changes made to Destiny 2 with Forsaken were intended to rekindle the desire to come back, day after day after day and to reward the most ardent Destiny fans. One of the most welcome changes has been the reintroduction of random rolls to Destiny 2. In an effort to appease Destiny 1 players who complained about good guns made irrelevant by bad rolls on random perks, every weapon and armor in Destiny 2 was given a fixed roll. This had the unintended effect of making repeatedly running content largely pointless -- after all, what was the point of running a raid if you already had every piece of gear? With random rolls, there’s always a reason to sign in and play the game. Sure, you might not be increasing your character’s power, but there’s always the possibility of getting a better roll on a weapon or piece of armor. Bungie has also thrown in a few curated rolls on weapons to appease collectors. In addition to those more tangible rewards, Bungie has also introduced pages for collections and triumphs to give players things to chase from day to day, season to season. Triumphs track specific accomplishments which reward points which add to a player’s triumph score. While many accomplishments are visible for players to chase, there are more than a handful of hidden accomplishments to encourage players to scour the world for secrets. Similarly, collections serve as a way for players to track which items they’ve collected and which still elude them. Collections and triumphs are just one way out of many that Forsaken encourages players to spend more time with Destiny 2.

As is the norm with prior major Destiny expansions, Forsaken challenges the most powerful players with a new raid, Last Wish. There is no denying that the three raids released during Destiny 2’s first year are some of the best PvE content available to players. While they’ve all had their strong points, they’ve also had their share of flaws. I personally felt that some of the encounters veered too far into the realm of strange mechanics, while also straying away from the emphasis on teamwork and instead drifting back to encounters that could be carried by one or two strong players. I honestly questioned whether the raid team would ever be able to top Destiny 1’s best raids. It is too early for me to say this definitively, but I think Last Wish might be my new favorite Destiny raid -- which is saying a lot, given my fond memories of Destiny 1’s first raid, Vault of Glass. There are challenges that emphasize timing and group coordination, there are puzzles that require solving mental puzzles, and there are encounters that put the onus on every player to perform and hit their targets. Best of all, Last Wish is hard. This new raid now holds the record for the longest time to world’s first and fewest first twenty-four hour completions -- only two groups managed to finish Last Wish in the first twenty-four hours. It took my group over twenty-four hours to complete, twelve of which were spent struggling against the final boss. Yes, in subsequent runs I’ve been able to clear the raid far faster, but figuring out the mechanics and encounters the first few days was such an incredible experience that reaffirmed my faith in Bungie’s raid team. One of the best parts of Last Wish is that the raid isn’t self contained, but has been the impetus for the changes occurring in the Dreaming City. Last Wish ties directly into the Dreaming City storyline in a way that no other Destiny raid has done, making it feel more like an essential part of the Forsaken experience, rather than something for only the most hardcore players.

For the most part, the Crucible and Destiny 2’s PvP offerings have not changed too drastically with Forsaken. Over the past few months, Bungie has been making minor tweaks and adjustments to the Crucible to make it feel more chaotic like Destiny 1. From increasing the speed of combat, to decreasing time to kills, to increasing the number of players in quick-play, to the new load-out changes, there have been a number of adjustments that have dramatically changed the Crucible over the past year. Most of these changes take some time to get used to, but I wish Bungie would return to the larger map sizes of Destiny 1, especially now that they’ve increased the number of players in quick-play. Bungie has also done more to give players reasons to participate in PvP. Destiny 2’s last DLC, Warmind, introduced powerful exclusive weapons that could only be obtained from playing in the competitive playlist, and Forsaken builds on this by introducing a quest system for these rewards. As ever, there are also a number of quests for exotics that are tied to achievements in the Crucible. Personally, I wish there was more incentives for players to participate in the competitive playlist so that the ranking distributions actually resembled Bungie’s stated goals. Of course, I understand that there are a lot of players that do not enjoy PvP and will complain whenever any type of reward requires spending time in the Crucible. However, Destiny 2 is a game with both a PvE and PvP element, so players who want everything should be expected to participate in everything.

Forsaken also introduces a new game-mode called Gambit which is PvE/PvP hybrid mode. Players work in a team of four to defeat AI opponents to collect points needed to spawn a boss. During this, an invader from the other team can come over at set intervals to hunt down players with a lot of points. Gambit was clearly designed to bring players from both sides of Destiny 2 together. The PvP players can show their expertise by invading or taking out an enemy invader, while the PvE players get to shine fighting waves of enemies and against the powerful bosses. It is a chaotic game-mode that is still fresh and in need of adjustment, but shows a lot of potential. Strategies and metas are still being worked out, but playing Gambit with three friends, working together and coming back when down by a significant margin is an exhilarating rush.

A lot of people, myself included, would argue that the Destiny experience is in the best place it has ever been. Many of the problems that were present when Destiny 2 originally released have been corrected, and it finally feels like Destiny 2 is building on the lessons Bungie learned with Destiny 1. That doesn’t mean I don’t have concerns about the future of Destiny 2 and the franchise. In the past, I’ve touched on my issues with the Destiny community. Bungie reintroduced random rolls on gear, and the community has already complained that they are too random. The community wanted exotics to feel rare and they wanted it to be memorable when you finally received an exotic you’ve been chasing, but now they’re too rare. The community complained that it was too easy to reach max level and it didn’t mean anything, but now that there is a significant grind which requires doing challenging content, it is too hard and it takes too long. Players have even complained that there is too much to do everyday and they can’t keep up. The Destiny community has a hard time admitting it, but the state of Destiny 2 at release was directly the result of Bungie’s efforts to respond to community complaints during Destiny 1. My biggest concern is what is going to happen when Bungie tries to appease these voices again.

I will admit, I am in no ways an unbiased source when it comes to the Destiny franchise. I did pretty much everything there was to do in Destiny 1, I kept playing Destiny 2 from release until Forsaken, and I’ve already no-lifed Forsaken pretty hard during the first two weeks to be able to beat the Last Wish raid. Still, I feel confident saying there has never been a better time to pick up Destiny 2. I’ve logged in pretty much every day for the past month and have always had numerous things I needed to accomplish. Everyday there are challenges to overcome, secrets to uncover, milestones to complete, and rewards to collect. There have been days I just haven’t had enough time to get everything done and I think most would agree that this is a great problem to have. It may have taken four years to get here, but Forsaken is finally the Destiny experience so many of us have been waiting for. And it has been worth the wait.

Everybody, sooner or later, sits down to a banquet of consequences ~ Robert Louis Stevenson


All images owned by Bungie. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=425 On e-Sports https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=421 Wed, 01 Aug 2018 19:47:14 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/6f62b688be2a2794a25d2631dc068b63.png This weekend, thousands of fan’s gathered at the Barclays Center in...
This weekend, thousands of fan’s gathered at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn to cheer as the London Spitfire and Philadelphia Fusion competed in the Grand Finals of the inaugural season of the Overwatch League. While this isn’t the first major e-sports championship, or even the largest, the Overwatch League is the first e-sports league I've followed closely and offers a good starting point to consider the history of e-sports and recent efforts to bring e-sports to more mainstream audiences.

It is difficult to say when e-sports really began because competition has always been part of gaming. Whether it is competing directly against another opponent in a game like Pong or competing to beat another player’s high score in games like Space Invaders or Donkey Kong, many of the earliest video games have encouraged gamers to compete with one another. As early as the 1980s, competitive gaming events were televised. Shows like Starcade and Nickelodeon Arcade allowed players to compete against others playing video games. The 1990s saw the start of cross-country tournaments. In 1990, Nintendo of America launched the Nintendo World Championship which visited twenty-nine cities and culminated in title matches in Los Angeles. The growth of the internet during the 1990s also helped communities connect and develop their own competitive tournaments. For instance, started in 1996, QuakeCon is one of the oldest running gaming tournaments. QuakeCon started from a simple desire of fans to meet and compete in person, but has been embraced by id Software and has now become an annual celebration of the company’s games. This period also saw the formation of the first professional gaming league, the Cyberathlete Professional League (CPL) and prize pools that offered thousands of dollars.

While competition and e-sports developed over many years, the release of StarCraft in 1998 and the Brood War expansion, a few months later forever changed the trajectory of gaming. In 1999, South Korea decided to invest in upgrading the nation’s broadband internet network. StarCraft was perfectly placed to take advantage of this environment. StarCraft did not require high-end specifications, offered an incredibly high skill ceiling for the most devoted players, and unlike competitive first-person shooters, was less dependent on reflexes and twitch game-play, instead placing a greater emphasis on strategy and planning. During this era, e-sports began to take on a more professional appearance. Professional teams and leagues were established, corporate sponsors began to provide funding, and the South Korean government created the Korean e-Sports Association to provide supervision and oversight. South Korea developed an identity as the home of the best e-sports players which has persisted to this day.

For a time, StarCraft was synonymous with e-sports, but as time has passed, professional gamers have spread out to more diverse games. Maintaining the early first-person shooter roots, games like Counter-Strike and Halo have maintained professional competitive leagues, tournaments, and followings. Sports games like the Madden franchise and, more recently, NBA 2K have also seen some success at the professional e-sports level. There are also a number of tournaments for fighting games, but many of those maintain an intentional distance from the more professional e-sports scene. In 2009, League of Legends was released and opened the door for multiplayer online battle arenas (or MOBAs) to become some of the biggest names in e-sports. Two of the biggest e-sports are League of Legends and Defense of the Ancients which are the basis for a number of professional leagues around the world. Over the last ten years, there has been a significant increase in the number, size, viewership, and prize pools of e-sports. In fact, last year’s Defense of the Ancients championship, the International 7 currently holds the record for the largest e-sports prize pool, coming in at over twenty-four million dollars, although this year looks to be on pace to exceed that amount.

As e-sports have grown, there has been a greater push to create a more mainstream appeal. This past year has been especially noticeable for these endeavors with both the NBA 2K League, which paired e-sports teams with existing NBA teams, and the aforementioned Overwatch League drawing support from outside the typical e-sports scene. The Overwatch League has taken some of the biggest steps, such as Blizzard’s efforts to bring in ownership of existing professional sports teams during the league’s planning stages. While traditional e-sports ownership is definitely present, teams are also owned by relative outsiders like the Kraft group, owners of the New England Patriots, and Kroenke Sports, owners of the St. Louis Los Angeles Rams. Blizzard also looked at the structure of existing leagues for traditional sports and worked to create a global league built around local teams with the hope that it would foster team loyalty from fans.

Compared to most traditional sports, at least in the United States, e-sports have not been as burdened by broadcast contracts and have done a superior job embracing online streaming as a tool to reach a wider audience. Platforms like Twitch and YouTube have made it far easier to broadcast and watch e-sports than any other sports. Not only was I able to watch every single Overwatch League game without spending a penny, if I missed one, it was incredibly easy to watch a replay on Twitch whenever I wanted. And to my knowledge, e-sports have always employed this, or a similar, approach. Back when I watched competitive StarCraft, I can’t recall watching a single tournament live. Compare that to the NFL, NBA, NHL, or MLB where I’m not sure it is even possible to watch a game after it airs (except 2 am replays of college football) without jumping through more than a few hoops.

At the same time, there has definitely been a push to bring e-sports to a wider audience by showing important events on traditional media platforms, although this has largely occurred late at night or on some of the alternate ESPN channels. However, this might be changing as the Overwatch League worked to feature the grand finals live on ESPN. While the second day of the grand finals fell to ESPN3, the first day aired on ESPN during prime time on a Friday night. Of course, I’d be remiss if I discussed the impressive presence of the grand finals on ESPN if I ignored the far less impressive viewership. Nielsen estimates that Friday night’s ESPN broadcast was viewed in 215,280 households, Saturday’s afternoon finale on ESPN3 was watched in 59,800 households, and a recap that was shown on ABC on Sunday afternoon was viewed in 358,800 households. These numbers are not great. However, and completely ignoring the fact that Nielsen estimates are pretty terrible, does it really matter? The way that e-sports have embraced online platforms inevitably comes at a cost of traditional media platforms. Until the commentators pointed out the grand finals were airing on ESPN, how many viewers even knew it was available outside Twitch?

One of the bigger challenges for e-sports is that the leagues are still facing some growing pains. Some of it is expected as players need to adjust to their new roles as representatives of professional organizations. At the same time, many of the best players have roots firmly planted in streaming. These leagues need to find a way to ensure that the streaming lifestyle is not more lucrative if they want to keep getting the best talent. Another growing pain more inherent to the gaming platform that e-sports need to figure out is how to ensure their product features the best players playing at the pinnacle while necessary balance patches can produce an ever-changing gaming environment. Since the start of the Overwatch League season, there have been two new heroes released (although Wrecking Ball didn’t actually make an appearance), two new maps, and nineteen patches (some fairly minor, but others have been meta-shifting). Throughout this season, most fans would agree that the New York Excelsior was the team to beat. However, when the meta changed for the last quarter of the season, the team lost as many games as they had to that point and then barely avoided getting swept during the playoffs. It is an especially noticeable problem as the league MVP became largely ineffective in the final meta of the season. On one hand, the league understandably does not want these games played on old builds, but at the same time, there’s a reason the NFL and NBA wait till the off-season to make rule changes.

As someone who had never put a lot of effort into following an e-sport before this year, it has definitely been an entertaining season. Part of that undoubtedly stems from the fact that the team I arbitrarily picked because they had the best D.Va skin won the season, but like other sports, it is great watching the best players competing against each other. While there are inevitably more than a few people complaining that e-sports aren’t sports, just like I’m sure there were people who complained when motor sports became a thing, I have no doubts that e-sports will continue to grow and continue to make inroads with more mainstream audiences. All that said, I have no problem calling them traditional sports, but can we please stop using the t-sports distinction? It is dumb and I immediately write off anyone who insists on calling the NFL a t-sport..

Winning isn’t everything, it’s the only thing ~ Vince Lombardi
]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=421 Special Report: E3 2018 https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=419 Fri, 15 Jun 2018 21:25:26 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/df2c21f74388e0392d6f913726c058c3.png E3 2018 is officially over. Personally, I’ve come to evaluate E3 more by...
E3 2018 is officially over. Personally, I’ve come to evaluate E3 more by the ability of gaming companies to spark my excitement for games being released in the coming year, rather than games scheduled for some-point in the indefinite future. Going into E3 this year, I know I had a lot of expectations across the board -- there are many games in the pipeline that gamers have been anxiously awaiting, and it was about time for the next entry for a number of franchises. Maybe it’s because of those high expectations, but this year’s E3 honestly fell kinda flat. Don’t get me wrong, there are definitely games coming out this upcoming year that I’m really excited for. However, it felt that E3 largely didn’t do much to fuel that excitement, rather than poking at some already lit coals.

Microsoft
As has been tradition, Microsoft was the first of the big three to host their press conference. Microsoft opened on Sunday afternoon with what should have been a slam dunk, the reveal of the next entry in the Halo franchise, Halo Infinite. This teaser started with various shots of different landscapes and locales before finally revealing Master Chief’s iconic helmet. Don’t get me wrong, I really enjoyed this teaser (especially listening to the familiar notes of One Final Effort), and the fact that everything shown was running on the new game engine certainly helps, however it is hard to feel especially excited for a reveal that featured no real gameplay or story cues and really didn’t tell players anything other than that there is a new Halo game in the pipeline (which, duh?). Afterwards, Microsoft announced that their press conference would cover fifty upcoming games, a definite step in the right direction from some of their previous showings. Next up, Microsoft revealed a sequel to 2015’s gorgeous platformer Ori and Blind Forest titled Ori and the Will of the Wisps. Next up, FromSoftware unveiled their newest project, Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice. Regardless of what the developers say, this action-adventure game, set in the sixteenth-century, looks a lot like a Souls game with Samurai, which is not a bad thing. Bethesda took the stage next to show the first gameplay trailer for the next entry in the Fallout franchise, Fallout 76. This was a little weird given that Bethesda had their own press conference scheduled for a few hours, and it was expected that Fallout 76 would be front and center. SquareEnix was next up, revealing a trailer for a new game set in the Life is Strange universe called The Awesome Adventures of Captain Spirit. Based on the trailer, I have no doubts that this game was designed with the singular goal of pulling at your heart-strings and breaking hearts. A new trailer for Crackdown 3 again featured Terry Crews and the over-the-top gameplay of the franchise and again reminded me that the franchise was originally used to give players access to the Halo 3 beta.. Good times. Nier: Automata’s complete edition got a brief trailer before another stunning trailer for Metro Exodus. A new trailer for Kingdom Hearths 3 followed, this one featuring the game’s January 29th release date, which would have been huge.. ..had SquareEnix not revealed it a few hours earlier. Of all the game’s shown that are coming out this next year, without a doubt, this is the one I am most excited for, but, it has also had years to percolate and build up hype. Rare was next, showing a trailer for upcoming content updates to Sea of Thieves. I will admit that I want to be excited for this game, but there has been nothing to really rekindle my excitement since the game’s beta/original release. Battlefield V was briefly shown followed by an obligatory segment on the latest entry in the Forza franchise, Forza Horizon 4. With this being the first gameplay segment featured during this year’s Microsoft press conference, I couldn’t help wondering how many gamers are racing game enthusiasts to justify these segments every year. Don’t get me wrong, these games always look gorgeous and the new features and experiences sound good and all, but are there really games who watch E3 waiting for these segments every single year? Microsoft then briefly touted several studios they had brought in-house before a brief trailer for We Happy Few, coming out in a few months. This game still reminds me of Bioshock, in a good way, which is enough reason for me to still be excited. PUBG was next, which, I remember when a lot people said the announcement of PUBG on Xbox was huge last year, but since then, Fortnite happened, sooooo yay? To celebrate the game’s ten year anniversary, a Definitive Edition for Tales of Vesperia was announced. I admittedly fell off the Tales’ franchise, so I’m probably not the person to ask about this one. The next segment featured a teaser and gameplay for The Division 2. I didn't keep with with The Division past its initial release, so I’m curious to hear what long-time players thought of the reveal. I will say, I do have some questions about the change in setting and seeming change in story direction, if anyone would like to explain all that. Microsoft then briefly touted their Xbox Game Pass program, which I did not know was a thing, but sounds awesome, before a brief segment on indie games and ID@Xbox. Shadow of the Tomb Raider was next which featured a trailer which seemed in line with the latest entries in the franchise, so good news for those who have been enjoying it since its reboot a few years ago. A trailer for Session, a new skating game was next, which felt like an odd game to feature, followed by another trailer for the MMO Black Desert. Every time I see anything about this game’s story and setting it excites me, until I remember it’s an MMO. Microsoft unveiled an over the top trailer for Devil May Cry 5 next, followed by a trailer for upcoming DLC for Cuphead called The Delicious Last Course which has me both excited and terrified, and then a trailer for the still adorable Tunic. Bandai Namco then announced Jump Force, a 3D anime fighting game which looks to bring together characters from Dragonball, Naruto, One Piece, and other franchises. The next segment featured Dying Light 2. I never played the first game, and I wasn’t too enticed by the gameplay shown, but the choice/consequence system they described sounded pretty impressive. Microsoft then briefly took us back to our childhoods.. ..our painful childhoods.. ..with a teaser for a new Battletoads game before a trailer for Just Cause 4. Microsoft then announced three new entries in the Gears franchise, a mobile game, a tactics game, and the fifth numbered entry in the franchise. This new game looks to be about what you’d expect from the Gears franchise, although I admittedly stopped playing after the third game (cause the story felt complete and I don’t want to hear anything else >.>). And with that, Microsoft’s press conference drew to a close. Except not, because they had one more game to unveil: CD Projekt Red’s Cyberpunk 2077. This was more of a teaser than anything, but given what a phenomenal game the Witcher 3 was, I imagine most gamers watched this one more than a few times. So that was Microsoft’s press conference. Honestly, it wasn’t bad, and while Microsoft showcased a number of great looking games, I didn’t walk away from their press conference with a great feeling of excitement for this coming year.

Pros
New Halo
Souls + Samurai = Sekiro
KH3 Finally has a release date
Cuphead DLC: coming soon to a broken controller near you!
New Gears
Cyberpunk 2077

Cons
Halo Infinite was a teaser, at best
The biggest games felt like they’re in development, not coming out this year
Cyberpunk is not out now..
Nothing that knocked my socks off

Final grade: B-


Sony
Sony took a different approach this year. Their press conference started in what appeared to be a weird church-like venue with an intro that honestly sounded kinda cultish. Sony opened with one of the games that I am most excited for, The Last of Us Part II. What made this trailer especially cool was that the opening scene was set in a church that resembled the room where the press conference was occurring. In any case, this trailer started in a peaceful church before transitioning to a gameplay segment which featured the same brutal action and combat that defined the first game. The Last of Us did a phenomenal job of using violence to tell its story, and this trailer seemed to leave no doubt that the tone hasn’t changed in the sequel. Unfortunately, the trailer did not end with a release date, so it seems like it'll be a while before we get to enjoy this one. Afterwards, rather than showcasing a lot of games, Sony revealed that they were opting for what they called a more intimate press conference which focused on four cornerstone games, rather than the trailer filled press conferences of the past. As they changed venue, they announced that God of War has a new game+ mode coming, showed a preorder trailer for Call of Duty: Black Ops 4, recapped a number of announcements from last week, and showed a brief story trailer for Destiny 2: Forsaken that was, in my opinion, far worse than the reveal Bungie hosted last week. After the intermission, Sony unveiled a samurai game called Ghost of Tsushima. This game looks gorgeous and the action definitely had some Witcher vibes, but there was such little shown and no real context given, I feel it is too early to give an adequate evaluation. Sony then took another intermission, briefly showing trailers for Control, a game that reminded me of 2016’s Superhot, a Resident Evil 2 remake which looks like it has been updated to resemble Resident Evil 4, a strange game from the creator of Rick and Morty called Trover Saves the Universe, and a third trailer of E3 for Kingdom Hearts 3. The next cornerstone of Sony’s press conference was Death Stranding which still looks incredibly weird. Honestly, somehow I felt less interested in this game after this segment. I wasn’t excited for this game before, and the gameplay shown looked like a lot of wandering around an empty world. I imagine it’ll be some time before this game is out, so maybe it can win me over before then. Sony then briefly teased Nioh 2 before jumping into the final game, Spider-Man. I’ve said it before, but this game looks like it merges the Arkham games with the Spider-Man universe -- which is definitely not a bad thing. I will say, one thing I didn’t like about the Arkham games was that it felt like they tried to cram too many characters in at times, and while this trailer revealed a number of Spider-Man’s rouges, the Sinister Six is a thing in the Spider-Man universe, so I’m cautiously optimistic it’ll work better here. Spider-Man is coming out in a few months and I already have it preordered, so this game already won me over before it aired. And that was it for Sony’s press conference. If I’m being honest, this was probably one of Sony’s worst press conferences. It might have been different if more of their games had release dates, but of the four cornerstone games they showed, the only one with a release date is Spider-Man, and we’ve known about that for a while. The worst part about it though, their press conference gave the unfortunate feeling that there isn’t a lot to be excited for coming out soon.

Pros
The Last of Us Part II is looking amazing
Ghost of Tsushima looks gorgeous
Spider-Man still looks great

Cons
I feel less excited about Death Stranding
Sony didn’t really show a lot
What is there to be excited about this year?

Final grade: D


Nintendo
I think most would agree that Nintendo has had a pretty good year. The Switch has done exceptional and they’ve put out a number of phenomenal games since its release. Going into E3, gamers wanted to know how Nintendo would continue to support the Switch for the rest of year two and beyond. Like usual, Nintendo again chose to do a Nintendo Direct this year. Nintendo opened with a trailer for Daemon X Machina, a game that looks like an Armored Core game with giant robots fighting bigger giant robots. This was followed by a trailer for the upcoming DLC for Xenoblade Chronicles 2, Torna the Golden Country, which will focus on events preceding the game. I will say, of the three Xenoblade games, I enjoyed this one the least (although that’s more a testament to the other two entries), but DLC that gives me more Mythra is a definite plus in my books. Nintendo then briefly covered the two upcoming Pokémon games, Let’s go Pikachu and Let’s go Eevee. I’m not especially excited for these game, but let me know when we have more info on the core Pokémon game coming for the Switch. Next up, Nintendo showcased Super Mario Party which features some impressive gameplay uses for the Switch and just tells me I need more friends with Switches. Nintendo then showed a trailer for one of the games I’m most excited for, Fire Emblem: Three Houses. The added power of the Switch looks to be adding some new dimensions to the visuals and combat, so I cannot wait for this game, although next Spring feels so far away.. Nintendo then announced that Fortnite would be available for Switch that day before trailers for Overcooked 2, the pixel fighting game Killer Queen Black, and platformer Hollow Knight. They also announced that Octopath Traveler would finally be out on July 13th and that a demo would be available on June 14th. Nintendo then quickly showcased a number of quick reveals and release dates for upcoming games and DLC. There was a wide variety of games shown so it felt like Nintendo was trying to show there were things for a lot of audiences before moving to their next game which was the crux of their press conference: Super Smash Brothers Ultimate. This was a long segment and there was a lot of info to digest. In addition to covering a number of the changes for this entry in the franchise, Nintendo announced that every character from previous Smash games would appear in Ultimate, Gamecube controllers would be supported, Ridley would finally be appearing, and the game would be out on December 7th. While I didn’t play as much Smash 4 as I would have liked, the Smash franchise is near and dear to my heart, so this will definitely be a day-one purchase for me. Still waiting to see if they announce a bundle with Gamecube controllers though. Like previous years, Nintendo then spent the rest of E3 using their Treehouse segments to really dive into their upcoming games, but I’d say these segments weren’t nearly as strong as previous years. Then again, that’s probably at least partially due to the amazing games they featured the last two years (Breath of the Wild and Mario Odyssey).

Pros
Fire Emblem is out this year
A ton of games coming out this year
Smash Ultimate looks like it is going to be a beast

Cons
No new info on the core Pokémon game
No new info on Metroid Prime 4
Not as strong a line-up as previous years

Final Grade: C-


Game of E3: Cyberpunk 2077
There were three games in the running for me this year: Kingdom Hearts 3, a game I’ve spent years waiting for which finally has a release date and had three different trailers and had hands-on impressions, The Last of Us Part II, a sequel to my 2013 game of the year that looks to carry the same brutal magic, and Cyberpunk 2077, a game that we really don’t have a lot of info about, apart from a teaser. Even with all my talk about E3 being about games coming out in the upcoming year, Cyberpunk 2077 is the game that has me most excited. There are few games that get me to go back and purchase every game in the franchise just so I have the complete story, and CD Projekt Red’s Witcher 3 was one of those games. I don’t care how long it takes to come out, their next game is definitely a day-one purchase. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=419 On the Grind https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=417 Thu, 31 May 2018 22:14:07 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/1aec66d3d40c5681622f9f51d0c8618e.png How many crabs have you killed? If you asked the average person, they...
How many crabs have you killed? If you asked the average person, they would probably consider it a strange question that doesn’t merit much thought. However, if you’re someone who spent years playing Final Fantasy XI, I imagine that question is not so easy to answer. From Gustaberg, to Valkurm and Qufim, to Kuftal and Boyahda, it felt like we were always killing crabs. Looking back on it though, burning away hours murdering mostly identical blue crabs was kinda a weird way to spend our time..

What is the grind? In gaming, grinding typically refers to performing repetitive actions over and over to make your character more powerful or gain some type of advantage. Grinding manifests in a variety of ways across different game genres. In role-playing games, one of the most common forms of grinding is the leveling process where players must repeatedly fight monsters to gain experience to raise their levels. If an area or boss encounter is too difficult, grinding experience offers a simple way to become stronger. In the aforementioned example, killing crabs in Final Fantasy XI provided experience which helped players increase the level of their characters. Leveling was a core part of the Final Fantasy XI grind, and crabs just happened to fill a need. RPGs also often feature the familiar item grind. A powerful item might only have a five percent drop rate, so players will spend hours fighting the same opponent over and over in hopes of receiving a rare drop. Massively multiplayer online RPGs are notorious for their item grinds, as players can spend weeks/months/years farming the same opponent in hopes of obtaining a highly desirable item. In many racing games, the grind is largely focused on winning enough money. From Mario Kart to Gran Turismo, additional racers, vehicles, or accessories can regularly be purchased using an in-game currency. Players must repeatedly win races or collect currency to purchase a coveted item. Fighting games offer their own spin on the "unlocking grind": characters. Often times, additional characters are locked behind specific requirements such as playing for a certain number of hours or beating a mode multiple times with different characters. Players can spend hours grinding away at these objectives to unlock every character. First-person shooters like Call of Duty build a progression system around their grind. As players gain experience from playing matches, they unlock additional weapons and perks. Some of the best weapons and customizations can be locked behind higher levels, so players spend hours playing these games to unlock everything.

Grinding isn’t only about obvious and tangible returns. Sometimes grinding is about less palpable rewards, such as increasing a player’s skill. In both fighting and racing games, the grind to unlock new cars and characters, respectively, trains players to perform at a higher level. The hours you spend speeding along the same courses teaches you how to hug corners and take turns better. In fighting games, the time spent grinding inevitably teaches new combos and counters. Competitive first-person shooters often use the skill-based grind to give players a target to spend hours chasing. For instance, in Overwatch’s competitive mode, players are given a skill-rating and corresponding rank. You earn points for winning a match and lose points for losing a match. Players can spend hours grinding away and improving their skill as they work their way up the skill groups. In a game like Overwatch, the grind is mostly focused around reaching that next skill group. In other games, unique rewards are locked behind higher skill levels. The latest season of Destiny 2 introduced a competitive ranking system and a powerful weapon for players to chase. While the actual execution is more of a time grind than a skill grind, the way it was initially presented to players was that it would be a weapon that would only be available for players who managed to grind their way to the highest skill tiers to incentivize players to work to improve their skill.

Given that grinding is so prevalent across such a wide variety of games, why does it exist? Is grinding just a facet of gaming, or does it serve a purpose? The simplest answer is that grinding gives players something to do. For instance, in fighting games, completing the story or arcade mode usually does not take a large amount of time. If a player is skilled enough, there are many fighting which can be "finished" in under an hour. However, introduce a grind for characters or costumes, and suddenly players have a reason to invest their time. In role-playing games, the grind is a central part of the experience that keeps players playing instead of rushing from one boss fight or cutscene to the next. First-person shooters use the grind to give players goals and sustain their player-bases. Whether it is unlocking a new weapon or perk, or leveling up your skill-rating, a target to grind gives players a reason to keep playing a first-person shooter and its competitive player-versus-player modes. Massively multiplayer online games similarly use the grind as a tool to keep players coming back. For those of you who player Final Fantasy XI, think back -- how much did the hunt for an elusive item or the desire to level a new job motivate you to keep playing?

Of course, that’s not to say that there is not a bad side to grinding. For a lot of gamers, there are some forms of grinding that are considered uncreative game design and poor tools used to extend play-times and conceal a lack of content. Poor drop rates on highly coveted items are one of the frequently criticized examples. Players invest the time to learn the mechanics of an encounter, but then must repeat it over and over, without significant deviation, in hopes of receiving a rare drop. These grinds can leave players feeling like their skill does not matter and that they are at the mercy of a random number generator. At the same time, and while there are certainly extreme examples, most player-bases are voracious and will quickly consume content faster than developers can produce it. Grinding then becomes a question of quality versus quantity. Another common example criticized by players is level caps/damage scaling. Instead of relying on player skill or mechanics, damage scaling forces players to spend time grinding to increase their levels before participating in challenging fights. Of course, players also want a progression system and a feeling of reward for reaching higher power levels. The final boss of Destiny 2’s latest raid, the Spire of Stars, was highly criticized during the week of its release because many players felt they were being penalized for not reaching a high enough level for the encounter (the fact that this raid dropped less than a week after the latest expansion was released was seemingly irrelevant to these players).

Recent trends in mobile games have been gaining notoriety for relying on grinds to keep players playing and spending money. In many mobile games, players must expend energy to complete tasks or participate in activities. Typically, energy recharges over time, but can also be recharged by spending real-world currency. Limited-time events are often coupled with low drop rates to put pressure on players to spend real-world money or risk missing out on highly desirable characters or items. While it has been nicknamed “Grindblue Fantasy,” I actually think Granblue Fantasy strikes a reasonable balance between a luck-based grind and a skill-based grind. While many limited events definitely have low drop rates, many challenging fights also reward drops which can be collected and turned in to obtain the item. Instead of spending hours grinding in hopes of getting lucky in an all-or-nothing situation, the game offers a more tangible measure for players to know how much time and effort they need to spend grinding.

I find grinding to be an interesting topic, especially given my own gaming background. Like many of you, I spent years playing Final Fantasy XI, and the grinds in that game make most modern grinds feel tame by comparison. I cannot think of another game where I tried to get a single drop every week for over a year. Having spent a lot of time playing Destiny and its sequel, I’ve seen arguments from both ends of the spectrum from the game’s player-base. Destiny 1 had random rolls for perks on weapons and players constantly complained about the time commitment to try to obtain a perfectly rolled weapon. When Bungie got rid of random rolls in Destiny 2, the player-base complained that they had no reason to play activities anymore as players didn’t need to obtain multiple versions of the same weapon (these complaints occurred simultaneously with complaints about some of the few grinds Destiny 2 kept). As Bungie has introduced new grinds in the latest expansion, the player-base has once again turned to vocally complain about the time commitment grinding requires. The reason I bring up this example is not to poke fun at the contradictions of the Destiny community (although..), but to highlight the complexity of grinding. As gamers, we want quality content, but we also want a lot of content and a variety of content. We want reasons to play content, and we want things to chase, but we also don’t want to spend hours and hours chasing the same thing. We also want our rewards to feel special and create a lasting memory, but we don’t want it to take too long to obtain those rewards. While some games come closer than others, I don’t think grinding will ever find a perfect balance. Maybe Final Fantasy XI desensitized me, but I find it humorous listening to gamers complain about grinds in other games as a result. Then again, I’ll be the first to admit that I would be happy never having to fight another crab again. Oh wait..

Everyday I'm hustlin'  ♪
]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=417 A Way Out Review – The Shawshank Redemption Split-Screen Experience https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=414 Mon, 30 Apr 2018 20:09:29 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/7a008443c4ca7950f1c3ae85a3bcf2b0.png A while back...
A while back, I lamented the decline of split-screen gaming and the shared experience those games provided. Flash-forward to a few months ago, a friend showed me a trailer for A Way Out, a game being developed by Hazelight Studios which was built around those memories of split-screen gaming. Split-screen gaming is at the core of the game’s unique narrative approach so much that it cannot be played alone. As you can imagine, the opportunity to experience a new take on split-screen gaming was not one I was willing to pass up.

As I mentioned, A Way Out cannot be played alone and must be played with a partner. The game follows prison inmates Vincent Moretti and Leo Caruso. The two meet in prison where Vincent has just arrived to start serving time for the murder of his brother, a crime he claims to have not committed, while Leo is serving a sentence for a jewel heist that did not work out. Leo is brash and hot-headed, while Vincent is more cautious and will try to talk his way out of situations. Before long, the too connect over a shared hatred of the same gangster responsible for their incarcerations and set out to escape prison and hunt him down. Players need to work together, both in prison and outside, to solve challenges throughout the game. For instance, at one point, Vincent might need to watch and distract the guards as Leo chisels a way out of his cell. Later on, Leo might need to sneak a concealed Vincent past a guard so Vincent can unlock a door so the two of them can solve a puzzle together. While most situations have a single solution, some places give players the choice between a brash action offered by Leo or a more level-headed choice by Vincent. Does your duo steal a car or do you try to sneak by the police? Do you knock out a guard or try to talk your way out of a problem? Do those choices ultimately matter? Probably not, but they work to further develop the different personalities of the game’s protagonists.

Vincent and Leo are the core of A Way Out and, as you can imagine, receive the most attention and character development. The way that the two protagonists with clashing personalities are forced to work together to achieve the same goal is one of the best parts of the game's story. You get to learn more about them and their backstories as the game progresses and sends players on detours to explore their lives. Players get to see Leo’s single-minded toughness peeled away when he visits his wife and son, and Vincent’s gruffness is softened when he interacts with his wife. At the same time, it also shines a light on the lack of depth of the supporting cast. Pretty much every supporting character, even the game’s antagonist, can be summarized by a handful of words. While I can brush off some of it, the brief interactions with the characters’ families felt a bit too jarring. Both characters face conflicts when visiting their families, but the game is too quick to resolve those issues, using them only to develop the protagonists rather than really adding anything to the supporting cast. Over the course of the game’s narrative, you get the definite feeling that Vincent and Leo create a strong bond, but the interactions with their families are so rushed, you don’t really get that same feeling from them.

Most of the game occurs in vertical split-screen, so players can look over and see what their partner is doing at any time. While not especially original on its own, A Way Out adds its own unique spin to the split-screen experience to tell its story. One player might be in the middle of a cutscene or conversation while the other is able to run around freely, playing mini-games or solving puzzles. At one point, Vincent needs to sneak a wrench to Leo who must then hide it while prison guards search Vincent’s cell. The player controlling Vincent is stuck in a cutscene, unable to do anything, while the player controlling Leo has a short time to solve the puzzle. During especially important conversations, the game will expand the relevant character’s screen, but for the most part, the game sticks to the split-screen format.

If you’re picking up cues that the A Way Out might be heavy on the dialogue and narrative, but light on the action, you’re not too far off from the truth. A Way Out was directed by film director Josef Fares, and that cinematic background comes through very strongly, so much so that the friend I played with remarked on multiple occasions that the game would make for a great movie or mini-series. Yes, there are puzzles and action sequences, but the game is largely built around its narrative with those pieces scattered throughout. For the most part, players will spend their time wandering around, looking for tools and solutions, and moving from one objective to the next. The action takes the form of fist-fights, car chases, and even gun-fights. That said, don’t expect any phenomenal mechanics from any of those segments. Take the gun-fight sequences. By most standards, the shooting mechanics are pretty bare-bones, letting players aim, shoot, and reload. The enemy AI is fairly simple and won’t give players any real trouble. But, those shooting segments work to serve as an obstacle that must be overcome before moving to the next narrative segment. As long as you go into these sections with that in mind, these pieces are good-enough to be passable, while not detracting too much from the game’s overall experience.

Given that the game cannot be played alone, there are two approaches to playing A Way Out. The first is to rely on the game’s built in matchmaking. I will be upfront with you all, I have no idea how this works, but I imagine it matches players based on progress through the major checkpoints. However, I don't think it is a stretch to say that this game is meant to be played with someone you know. A large part of my enjoyment came from joking around with my friend, working together to solve the puzzles, and competing during the game’s various mini-games. I cannot imagine I would have had the same experience if I had played the game with random strangers online. Ideally, I think the game would play even better if both players were sharing the same couch, but online worked fine for us. Now, a game that can only be played with another player might seem like a cheap way to boost sales, but Hazelight made it so two players only need one copy to play together. One player just needs to download the demo, and then the person with the purchased copy can start a session and send them an invitation to join. It is a fairly simple and seamless process -- we played on PS4, but I imagine the process is similar on other platforms.

There’s no doubt that A Way Out has its share of flaws, but as a split-screen co-op experience, it is a fun journey to share with a friend. Halfway through the game, my friend and I were both expecting the revelation that Leo would be the one who killed Vincent’s brother, breaking the bond between the two. Although that twist did not occur, the way the game frames the final chapter works wonders to change the tone after the experience it spent the past few hours building. A Way Out is a game about the friendship that develops between Vincent and Leo. While it is not necessary to play the game with a friend, I feel confident that sharing that experience with someone you know, either online or on the same couch, makes for a far better experience.
“...some birds aren’t meant to be caged.”~ Red


All images owned by Hazelight Studios. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=414 On Tilt https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=411 Wed, 28 Feb 2018 22:14:10 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/52b2cf06f64bae390cb916546d243303.png If you’ve played a competitive first-person shooter, you’ve probably been...
If you’ve played a competitive first-person shooter, you’ve probably been here before: One minute you’re playing a match, things are going fine, and then, BAM! Someone hiding across the map picks you off with a sniper rifle. It’s irritating, but it was a good shot, so you go on your way. Until a few minutes later, when, BAM! That same sniper, sitting in the same spot, picks you off again. Now you’re annoyed. You grab a sniper rifle to pick that person off, hop out, line up your shot, and, BAM! They’ve got you a third time. Next thing you know, you’ve thrown ten lives at this same person, completely lost track of the rest of the game, and carved a place for yourself in their next montage video. Welcome to the world of tilt!

Before we can really discuss tilt, we need to understand what it is and its roots. In the simplest terms, tilt describes a state-of-mind where a player becomes frustrated or angry and allows those emotions to negatively influence his or her behavior, decisions, and performance. While it is easy to notice the signs from the outside, in that moment, the player typically does not realize it until it is too late and the damage has been done. While many gamers talk about tilt, it did not originate in video games. Before it was adopted by gamers, tilt was a term used by poker players. In the world of poker, tilt refers to a state where a player becomes frustrated and plays over aggressively. Maybe you lose against a better hand; maybe you fold against a weak hand; or maybe it is just a string of bad hands. In poker, there are a lot of things that can happen which can frustrate a player. Like gaming, when a poker player is frustrated or angry, they start making bad decisions which can quickly produce a spiral of even more negativity. However, many poker players attribute the word to pinball machines. For those who have never used a physical pinball machine, players can manipulate the trajectory of the ball by nudging, or tilting, the machine. To combat this, machines contain mechanisms which, when triggered, lock the flippers and cause the ball to fall out of play. This locked up state was referred to as tilt. An angry player, who acts out of frustration following an undesirable bounce, could hit a machine, trigger the sensor, and produce an even more detrimental outcome.

We’ve all felt angry or frustrated while playing games. But having those feelings is not the same as being on tilt. I think most of you would agree that one of the fastest ways to get frustrated and angry is to lose. No one likes to lose, but when you play a competitive game, losing is just part of the experience. When you play a shooter, it is inevitable that you will eventually get killed and lose a match. When you play a fighting game, you cannot avoid getting hit and losing rounds. When you play a strategy game, there is no way around losing units and engagements. Like I said, losing is part of the competitive experience. And yet, sometimes those losses and defeats carry an extra sting which can push us onto tilt. While one death might not bother you too much, repeatedly getting killed by the same person, over and over and over is an almost guaranteed way to end up seething when playing a first-person shooter. In fighting games, it’s one thing to lose a match against a skilled opponent. It’s another thing to lose a match against a person spamming the same combo over and over. It’s especially annoying if it is a combo that you cannot avoid or counter. When I used to play a lot of Starcraft, there was nothing that got under my skin like cannon rushes. I hated cannon rushes because I always thought of them as a low-skill strategy which required quickly trapping the enemy rather than actually building an army and out maneuvering your opponent.

When a player becomes angry and frustrated, the concern is that those feelings can start a snowball-effect which grows uncontrollably. People often say they’re getting tilted when bad things happen in a game, but that frustration we feel isn’t tilt. There isn’t anything wrong with frustration as it is a natural feeling when things do not go our way. Tilt occurs when we let that frustration influence our actions. If you’ve ever played a team-based competitive game with voice-chat, you’ve probably had the experience of a player angrily screaming into their mic. Who knows, maybe you’re the person prone to such outbursts. Maybe they’re complaining about the player who killed them for the fifth time, maybe they’re blaming their teammates for letting them die. Regardless, this is an example of letting frustration and anger take control. Communication is key in many competitive games and tilt-induced angry rants prevent successful communication. For starters, when a player is raving over a death or loss, they’re not providing critical information, such as the location of a sniper or the types of units around a corner, to their teammates. To exacerbate the issue, the other players on the team cannot communicate as effectively when one person is filling the team-chat with loud and unending vitriol. Another example of letting frustration take control of our actions is rage-quitting, the act of angrily leaving a match or game. One of the biggest problems with players who rage-quit out of frustration is that the player on tilt often does not experience the consequences and instead forces their teammates to bear the brunt of their poor decision-making. While many games will attempt to alleviate this burden by bringing in another player mid-match, some games do not. For instance, because of the way skill rankings work in Overwatch, players cannot join a competitive game once it has started. As a result, if a player lets frustration affect their behavior and quits early, the players who remain in the match are left with a major disadvantage. Becoming tilted can even influence our actions to the point of more physically tangible ramifications. We all either know someone or have heard stories of people who have broken their controllers in a fit of rage after a bad game. I image most players don’t consider it normal to angrily hurl a controller across the room, but, as frustration grows, there are some players who, even for a moment, can let frustration control their actions and behave out of character. Given the cost of controllers, this can become an expensive lesson in anger management.

When a series of bad decisions or outcomes occur in a game, players will often claim they’re getting tilted. However, in my opinion, to be on tilt rather than just frustrated or angry, a player must not realize it for some period of time. Now, I’m not saying it needs to be a long stretch of time. In a real-time strategy game, it could only be for a single engagement; in a fighting game, maybe it is only a single round; and in a first-person shooter, it can last against a single opponent, but for some period of time, frustration must have a negative impact on the player’s action to be considered tilt. In the best case scenario, a player catches themselves on tilt and either makes the necessary adjustments or takes a break from the game. On the other hand, a player might realize he or she has become tilted, knows that they are not behaving as they would normally, but then continues to play, slipping deeper into tilt. I will be the first to admit that I’ve caught myself in this situation more than a few times.

While tilt usually comes up in regards to competitive multiplayer games, those aren’t the only games where tilt can occur. It is just as easy for AI opponents to push players to the point that frustration clouds their judgment and negatively influences their behavior. For anyone who doesn’t think they can get tilted playing single-player games, I recommend giving Cuphead a spin. Cuphead is a run-and-gun side-scrolling platformer where players must defeat a series of unique and challenging bosses. For the most part, Cuphead is about memorizing patterns to know when you must dodge and when you can attack. While a successful boss encounter usually only takes one or two minutes, I found myself spending over an hour on many of the game’s encounters. There was nothing quite as infuriating as getting close to the end of a level and losing due to a series of attacks that left me without any room to dodge. It certainly doesn’t help that whenever you die, the game is kind enough to show you how close you came to beating the encounter. As much as I love the Fire Emblem franchise, there’s nothing quite like getting to the end of a long level, thirty-plus turns in, and then losing a character due to an unlucky critical hit or missing an attack with a high probability of success. I’ve definitely dived back in and let my frustration and impatience influence my decision-making to the point of not being able to reach the end of the level again.

Cooperative multiplayer games offer a number of sources, beyond just AI opponents, that can give rise to tilt. Given BlueGartr’s Final Fantasy XI roots, I’m sure many of you have experienced frustration from not receiving a drop from a boss or raid. In many loot-based games, not getting a drop (either because it didn't drop or because it went to someone you felt was less deserving) is bound to produce frustration. There are plenty of players, myself included, who spent more than a year chasing after a single drop. For as many of us that eventually received our coveted items, there are countless others who gave up because the frustration became too much to take -- some might consider this coming to their senses rather than tilt though.. In cooperative games, a teammate’s repeated poor performance can push many players onto tilt. Sometimes tilt will cause a player to berate another rather than providing constructive criticism. I’ve personally caught myself doing the opposite when overly frustrated in cooperative games, shutting up. While not as aggressive as yelling at a teammate, I’m still letting anger and frustration affect my behavior instead of discussing how to solve the problem. Other times a tilted player will just leave the activity in frustration. I recently had a player launch into a string of expletives and then drop out in the middle of a Destiny 2 raid boss because another player died during a critical point. This left the five of us remaining with a more challenging task as most Destiny raid content is designed with six players in mind and our team lost a sixth of our damage potential.

While most gamers focus on the negative aspects of tilt, there are also positive elements that come from understanding tilt. For starters, a player that realizes they are on tilt can use it as a learning experience to improve his or her gameplay and not repeat the same mistakes. Whether it is learning which sight-lines to avoid in a shooter or learning how to counter an especially annoying move, tilt can be a powerful teacher. In my aforementioned Starcraft example, knowing the effects of cannon rushes on my mentality taught me to be more aware of my surroundings and my opponents' movements. Another benefit that comes from understanding tilt is learning how to use it to your advantage. As I said before, we have all felt anger and frustration while playing games. That sentiment applies to you, your teammates, and your opponents. If you can affect your opponent’s mental state and put them on tilt, you can have an advantage. In many games, one of the most well known ways to disrespect an opponent is t-bagging -- the act of repeatedly crouching over a defeated opponent simulating the act of sticking one’s balls in the other person’s mouth (never thought I’d write that sentence..). T-bagging is seen as juvenile, immature, and childish. It is also remarkably useful at getting an opponent on tilt. We all know someone (or maybe it’s you) who becomes unhinged after getting t-bagged. One of my friends I played shooters with used to make it his personal mission to hunt down any opponent that t-bagged him and then t-bag them after every kill, regardless of whether it was safe or not. If t-bagging is too crass for you, games like Destiny and Overwatch offer players a collection of emotes which can work as a great tool to upset an opponent in PvP. If I repeatedly snipe the same opponent or knock someone out of their super I always make sure to throw out a wave (or bow in Destiny 1) because I know there’s a chance it will upset their mental state even more.

Is it possible to avoid tilt? Honestly, probably not. As we’ve discussed, it’s natural to get frustrated or angry when you lose, when things do not go your way, or when you are not performing your best. And it’s only natural that repeated frustrations will affect our behavior. So given that tilt is unavoidable, what can we do? Well, to start, a player must realize that he or she is on tilt. When you lose over and over, is it that your opponent is just better than you, or are you letting your emotions drive you to play more aggressively or carelessly? It is admittedly hard to take that step backward and evaluate your behavior when you’re in an agitated state, but that itself might be a telling sign of tilt. Once a player realizes he or she is on tilt, the next constructive step is work to get off tilt (you could also just sink deeper into tilt, but that’s not really what we’re shooting for..). Unfortunately there is no universal solution to tilt. For some people, it’s easy to take a moment to refocus and calm down. Others need to step away from the game for some time to clear their heads. For me personally, my response to realizing I’m on tilt varies from game to game. When playing PvP in games like Destiny, where I care about my kill/death ratio, or Overwatch, where tilt can promptly make a large dent in my skill rating, I’m quick to put the game down if I catch myself letting my emotions negatively influence my performance. Other times, often when playing single-player games, I try to take a quick moment to calm down and take a few deep breaths before attempting the tilt-inducing activity again. In the end though, dealing with tilt is a constant process. We can’t avoid it completely, but we can work to get better at catching it before it does too much damage, and maybe that’s just good enough.

The best fighter is never angry ~ Lao Tzu
]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=411 Super Mario Odyssey Review – A Man of Many Hats https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=409 Thu, 01 Feb 2018 05:03:29 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/ad3e5f76b44498b0681d7df1291c0b84.png Say what you will about Nintendo, but there is no denying their...
Say what you will about Nintendo, but there is no denying their willingness to experiment with Mario and his self-titled franchise. From his origins in the age of arcades, to his platforming roots, to his adventures with go-karts, across golf courses and soccer fields, to his pioneering forays into 3D, to even his evolutionary steps bouncing between multitudinous gravitational fields, Nintendo has not shied away from taking Mario into new territories. Mario Odyssey is Nintendo’s newest Mario experiment: a massive, open-world, platforming adventure. Having spent a good chunk of the past few month scouring numerous worlds for collectible Power Moons, I feel confident in calling Mario Odyssey one of Mario’s most successful experiments yet.

While Nintendo has taken Mario all over the place, one thing that hasn’t changed is the central conflict of the core games: Bowser captures Princess Peach and Mario sets off after them to save Peach and restore peace to the kingdom. That said, while the early Mario games did not do much to elaborate on Bowser’s motivations, the recent games have seen Bowser’s actions propelled by seemingly misplaced romantic sentiments. Mario Odyssey is the natural evolution of this shift, as Bowser’s latest kidnapping is intended to culminate in his wedding to Peach. Following the game’s opening, Mario finds himself stranded in the monochromatic Cap Kingdom, a kingdom occupied by sentient floating hats. In the Cap Kingdom, Mario encounters his newest nonsensical sidekick, the unambiguously named Cappy. Like Mario, Cappy is on a rescue mission, trying to save his sister who was captured and currently fulfills the role of wedding tiara atop Peach’s head. Mario and Cappy eventually find their own ship, dubbed the Odyssey, to pursue Bowser across the world. The duo set off on a globe-trotting adventure, chasing after the dissonant wedding party and visiting various locals where Bowser has stolen famous artifacts needed to create an extravagant wedding ceremony (a magical wedding ring, a stunning wedding dress, a beautiful bouquet, and so on) -- say what you will about Bowser, at least he’s willing to go all out.

Ever since Mario 64, Mario games have been built around a similar game-play structure: diverse worlds where Mario collects a number of specific collectibles which subsequently open additional worlds. Mario Odyssey does not drastically change this structure, but it makes a few substantial and important tweaks that work to move the franchise forward. Like its predecessors, Mario Odyssey tasks players with hunting down Power Moons, this game’s level-based collectible, requiring that players collect a certain number in each world before advancing along to the next. Unlike previous Mario games, each world is presented as another step in the journey and collecting extra Power Moons in one world has no effect on the number needed to advance in the next. Like previous Mario games, players arrive in a world and are directed to their next objective. However, Mario Odyssey only directs players to the Power Moons necessary to advance the game’s narrative while also requiring additional Power Moons to move to the next level. The rest of the Power Moons must be found as players wander the worlds which are noticeably larger than the worlds of previous Mario games. Another tweak that helps foster the sense of exploration is that players are no longer pulled out from a level upon collecting a Power Moon. Coupled with the larger worlds, many of the Power Moons are not the significant investments that they would have been in previous Mario games, so players are encouraged to wander around and examine the things that seem out of place. A larger cactus, a single rock on its own, or even a crack in a wall could be a hiding place for a Power Moon. All that said, while others have heaped accolades on Nintendo for this change, I’m pretty sure this feature existed in Banjo Kazooie and Tooie on the Nintendo 64. Don’t get me wrong, it’s definitely a feature that makes Mario Odyssey a better game, but on its own, it is not something amazing revolutionary for 3D platformers.

As is the norm, Mario and Cappy venture across a number of gorgeous and colorful worlds during their journey. Worlds range from snow covered mountains, to island paradises, to lush tropical forests, to a city filled with towering skyscrapers. Some of these worlds are vast and invite players to take a closer look at curious sights in the distance, while others are intricately designed and encourage players to look behind every corner and twist for a hidden secret. And as it is a Mario game, don’t be too surprised if each world hides at least a few nonsensical secrets -- one minute you might be rolling through burning desert sands, the next, you might find yourself in a frozen cave. Each world also comes with its own colorful denizens and unique outfits for Mario to wear, befitting the traveling tone of the game.

Like the game-play structure, the core game-play of Mario Odyssey doesn’t deviate too far from the model established by Mario 64, albeit with an obligatory spin on the Mario experience. This time the spin comes from Cappy, who transforms himself to take on the appearance of Mario’s iconic red cap which is damaged in the initial battle against Bowser. In addition to the apparent ability to freely change his appearance, Cappy also provides Mario with the somewhat disturbing ability to possess and take complete control over friends, enemies, bystanders, and even some inanimate objects -- an ability with ramifications that are better left unconsidered. Mario can also throw Cappy to use him as a weapon or a jumping pad, but his possession-ability lies at the heart of Mario Odyssey’s game-play, puzzles, and challenges. Each target provides Mario with a new set of abilities and movements and finding new targets to capture and the abilities they provide is an enchanting experience that will captivate players looking for puzzles to solve. The diversity of the targets Mario can gain control over creates a unique collection of abilities that work hand-in-hand with the open-world and the game’s emphasis on exploration. That said, the myriad of abilities really encourages players to use the split Joy-Cons as many of the moves require some type of motion control, so it is something to be aware of if you’re the type of player who prefers to keep your Switch in portable mode.

For all the praise I could heap on Mario Odyssey, for me, one of the best parts is how much of the game opens up after finishing the main story. The game’s structure, treating each world as an individual step chasing after Bowser and Peach, encourages players to go from one world to the next without turning back (I assume you can revisit previous worlds, I just never did). After the credits roll, however, new worlds open up and extra Power Moons are unlocked in the previous worlds. At times, it honestly felt like there were just as many new Power Moons to collect upon revisiting a world after the game’s climax as I had collected during my initial trip. If you played Breath of the Wild, the sheer number of Power Moons to collect and the way that many of them are hidden will feel similar to the Korok Seeds scattered across Hyrule. Similar, but definitely not quite as insane.

In many ways Super Mario Odyssey book-ended an exceptional year for Nintendo which started with the release of the Switch and Breath of the Wild, and ends with a strong contender for the best Mario game to date (and an amazing Xenoblade game -- but that’s another story). While a lot of people have called Mario Odyssey a major evolution of the Mario experience, I personally see it as more of a refinement rather than an evolution. Mario Odyssey takes the things that made many of the previous 3D Mario games great and executes them in a near perfect way. It might have taken twenty years, but Nintendo has taken the bar they set with Super Mario 64 and elevated it in a way that has me excited to see how they choose to experiment with the Mario experience next.


Let's do the Odyssey ♬

All images owned by Nintendo. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=409 BlueGartr Staff Picks - 2017 https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=407 Sat, 23 Dec 2017 04:07:40 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/fdc62c78c4c1a8bacd8c11eceb465305.png Maybe you’re here because you’re curious what games impressed the...
Maybe you’re here because you’re curious what games impressed the BlueGartr staff this year, maybe you’re here because you need a last-minute gift idea, maybe you’re here because you’re stuck in an airport due to a flight delay and need a distraction from the painful reminder that you hate flying. Whatever the reason, welcome to the 2017 BlueGartr Staff Game of the Year List. As is tradition, I’ve asked the BlueGartr staff to share the games that impressed them the most over the course of this year. It was especially hard to select the best game this year thanks to the numerous phenomenal games that came out -- which is honestly not the worst problem to have.

Byrthnoth: Final Fantasy XI (PC)
Final Fantasy XI wins game of the year for a fourth consecutive year in my heart. This year, the game saw the release of new Dynamis content in spite of reduced player numbers and the NA+JP communities used server transfers to coagulate on specific servers. Although the game is very different from how it was in its youth, so are we all. I think it has aged quite well in Vana'years, and even if the faces change, you can always go home.

Kalmado: Final Fantasy XI (PC)
(Echoing Byrthnoth) While I know nothing of current endgame and what not I'm compelled to agree. For me, I knew this because I love the Soulsborne realm but returning to XI has been far greater fun than my recent beginning of Dark Souls 3.

BaneTheBrawler: The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (Wii U, Switch)
FFXIV: Stormblood was pretty good, but I've been AFK from the game for most of it (only played enough to finish the 4.0 storyline; still got the level 70 duty finder stuff to do), so It's getting only an honorable mention.

Runner-Up: I thought Mass Effect Andromeda was solid, but since I never did finish it I guess I can't really rate it completely. From what I saw of it, it was generally a good game. It didn't live up to the hype of ME1/ME2/95% of ME3, but nothing really would. Still wanna go back and finish it.

GOTY: Breath of the Wild, of course. GF and I finally got a Switch a couple days ago (got a good deal, but Zelda's our only game for now), and it's good. Really good. Hits my nostalgia buttons, reminds me of OOT and Windwaker, my two favorite Zelda games, while also being something new and amazing. I can foresee it getting a little grindy, like Skyrim, but that's expected out of a Zelda game.

Addendum: I bought the Breath of the Wild DLC pass. Worth it. Loving Master Mode, further than i got in normal mode now and loving the challenge. the gadgets and other stuff are cool too.

Brill Weave: Dragon's Dogma (PS3, PS4, XB360, XB1, PC)

2017 for me was more of an example of established franchises fucking up. Valkyria Revolution and Mass Effect Andromeda are great examples of that. It was nice to see CoD go back to WWII but I'm old. My previously 20/20 eyesight now requires glasses. My reflexes are shit. Anything by Ubisoft in general can suck a dick after the Division debacle. Destiny 2 was essentially a version update imo.

I'm going with Dragon's Dogma. IDK it's either that or Fallout 4 still which wasn't a 2017 release. And get off my lawn.

Lucavi: Cuphead (XB1, PC)
Cuphead gets my game of the year simply for doing something I never considered possible from a video game: a 1930's art style complete with one of the best soundtracks I've heard from in a game. There were plenty of great games this year, but nothing beats Cuphead in terms of originality and the sheer enormity of scale of such a passion project by a small team.

Ragns: Doki Doki Literature Club (PC)
Doki Doki Literature Club: What a cute game. Even better if you have a software that tracks the files that are modified on your filesystem. Yuri 4 life especially considering she might be in the sequel/prequel?

Sonomaa: Nier Automata (PS4, PC), StarCraft 2 (PC)
Nier Automata has been one of my favorite games this year
StarCraft 2 has been what Ive played the most though, Co-Op is fab

Insanecyclone: Fate/Grand Order (Mobile), Xenoblade Chronicles 2 (Switch)

Mobile: Fate/Grand Order.

Was never really into the Fate series that much prior to this but I waited for the NA release and it's been great. It's very grind heavy especially during events, but what game isn't, and it's pretty chill until Merlin drops. He breaks the game and is OP as fuck. I'd say check it out if have interested in altered history of historical figures gender bent(some of them) then check out Fate/Zero on Netflix.

Console/PC: Xenoblade Chronicles 2.

Probably because it follows some typical JRPG cliches this game really fits well with me. Yeah the main girl has some big ol titties but it's to be expected in a JRPG. Really don't see why people get so god damn upset over cultural differences. The gameplay may seem confusing at first but once you get the hang of how to do it then it becomes great. Tedious because of how much hp mobs have but great regardless.

I didn't play a lot of games this year b/c been using with irl stuff but I know if I focused more on Persona 5 I would include it too. Only put in an hr or so after it came out in may(?) but I plan on going through it and same w/ FF15 on my time off

I did buy Breath of the Wild on Wii U when it came out in March but didn't really play it much. Thought of double dipping and buying switch version instead

6souls: Destiny 2 (PS4, XB1, PC)
I'm so middleground on the game atm, but I don't have much else to play. Save us RDR2!

Serra: The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (Wii U, Switch)
I played so many exceptional games this year. Horizon Zero Dawn was an amazing new IP which hit so many high notes, Super Mario Odyssey felt like a fun and reinvigorating update to the Mario franchise, and Cuphead bounced me between anger and elation. The Destiny franchise and Granblue Fantasy continued to consume my gaming time (although the former is plagued by many flaws of late and the grind of the latter finally started to take its toll on me). However, for all the great games I played this year and all the time invested in others, none of them came close to Breath of the Wild. Breath of the Wild revolutionized the Zelda franchise and perfected the open-world experience. No matter how many hours I put into it, I keep going back to Breath of the Wild and never find myself disappointed.

Honorable Mentions: Horizon Zero Dawn, Super Mario Odyssey, Cuphead.


Happy Holidays and Happy New Year, everyone! Here's hoping 2018 brings us another batch of amazing games! ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=407 Destiny 2 Review -- The Empire Strikes Back https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=397 Sat, 30 Sep 2017 17:44:41 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/df5c633cc6f43b8e67b460806ba417ce.png There is no game that has consumed more of my playtime the past few years...
There is no game that has consumed more of my playtime the past few years than Destiny (hereby referred to as Destiny 1). As someone who spent years playing Final Fantasy XI, the loot-based progression, the community, and the challenging end-game content appealed to me. And, as an ardent fan of the Halo franchise, the first-person shooter mechanics were second to none. Some days I would spend hours rerunning raids in hopes of an elusive drop while other days, my time would be devoted to clashing against other players in the Crucible. For all its flaws, Destiny 1 really was an amalgam of a game that felt crafted for me. When Bungie announced that Destiny 2, the game’s first true sequel, would essentially restart the experience, it felt like a gut-punch. Suddenly the character I had been developing and the loot I had been collecting were meaningless. For the first time in years, I wasn’t sure if I wanted to keep devoting my time and energy to the Destiny universe. Well, it should come as no surprise that I caved and ended up picking up Destiny 2, and here we are, nearly a month later. I’ve spent countless hours spread across the game’s campaign, wandering new planets, fighting through a new and challenging raid, and learning new Crucible mechanics. I guess what I’m trying to say is, tuck yourselves in, kids, it’s time for another Destiny review!

For all its flaws, Destiny 1 introduced players to a new universe and laid the foundation for things to come. Players encountered the Traveler, a mysterious sphere that at one point ushered in a golden age of human advancement, but had long gone dormant, blessing a select few, the Guardians, with the ability to do great things through the use of its light. Destiny 1 also scratched the surface of a conflict between the Traveler and an ambiguously defined threat called the Darkness. And finally, Destiny 1 established a home for players in the Tower, a social space located in the last safe city on Earth filled with familiar NPCs and locations. If Destiny 1 was intended to build up a new world, the story of Destiny 2 serves to tear down much of what we’ve come to know the past three years. In the opening moments of the game’s campaign, the Tower is destroyed, our allies are scattered, and the light is stolen. At the forefront of this assault is the Cabal Empire, led by Dominus Ghaul. This imposing antagonist has led his forces to Earth to prove his worth by defeating the Guardians and taking their powers for his own. Throughout Destiny 1’s lifespan, the Cabal were the least explored enemy race. Introduced during the last quarter of the original campaign, the Cabal were never the focus of their own dedicated expansion. Players have clamored to learn more about this intimidating race, and Bungie has delivered in many ways.

A number of reviews and individuals have applauded Destiny 2’s story for finally delivering on the narrative promise of Destiny 1. If I’m being totally honest, yes, Destiny 2 has a better story, but I personally do not think it merits all the praise. Honestly, Destiny 2’s story suffers from one of the biggest issues that plagued Destiny 1: pacing. In addition to telling a story, the Destiny 1 campaign had the added challenge of introducing players to a handful of planets to explore and four new enemy races. While Destiny 2 builds on Destiny 1, it is also intended to serve as something of a fresh start to draw in new players. As a result, players have to travel the universe, visit new worlds, and (re)introduce themselves to former allies. Unfortunately, this means that players visit each location, do a few things, then rush to the next location. The worst problem is that the game fails to capitalize on the potential ramifications of Ghaul’s ominous tagline -- “Welcome to a world without light.” Destiny 2 is a video game about powerful heroes, so, as expected, players regain access to their light and the abilities it provides. However, as players travel from location to location and encounter the members of the Vanguard, the game only scratches the surface of the effects that losing their powers and their connection to the Traveler has had on these major figures from the first game. Because the game rushes from one location to the next, it never truly capitalizes on these emotional leads. All that said, the flow of the narrative feels more natural and the focus on the Cabal threat definitely helps the story feel more coherent, but at the same time, it would have been nice to see Bungie explore each location and the enemies faced in more detail. Some of it might come up in DLC (for instance, what are the Vex doing on Nessus?), but that possibility doesn’t conceal the flaw in Destiny 2’s narrative. Another weakness is Ghaul and the limited interactions players have throughout the campaign. Prior to its release, Bungie repeatedly stated that Ghaul would be an enemy players would come to fear and hate. Unfortunately, for a primary antagonist, Ghaul is more of a looming presence in the distance rather than an ever-present threat. Yes, there are a handful of cutscenes throughout the campaign that follow Ghaul’s actions, and yes, they certainly help to explain his motives, but they don’t do a great job of making him seem like a fearsome adversary.

For those new to the franchise, the core of Destiny 2 is still a game with Player versus Environment (PvE) and Player versus Player (PvP) components built around the phenomenal first-person shooter gameplay that defined Destiny 1, albeit with a few changes. Some of these changes are minor and understandable, others are more significant. Players still pick one of three classes and then switch between one of three subclasses per class, run around mostly in the first-person, carry three guns, shoot at various alien races (or other players) while avoiding the oncoming deluge of fire, and throw out the occasional grenade, melee, and super abilities. Six of Destiny 1’s subclasses return mostly unchanged, while the remaining three have seen significant modification. Hunters retain the golden-gun wielding Gunslinger and the Nightstalker with its debuff inducing void bow, while the Bladedancer has changed into the Arcstrider. Equipped with an electrified staff, Arcstriders acrobatically jump around the battlefield, flying from one foe to another. Warlocks can still throw out explosive balls of energy as Voidwalkers and fly across the battlefield as a Sith-lord on Stormcaller. Their new subclass, the Dawnblade, replaces the Sunsinger. Dawnblades carry a flaming sword which can fire off and rain projectiles down upon foes. Finally, Titans can still run around and slam into opponents with either their fists as the Striker subclass or flaming hammers as Sunbreakers. Their third class is now the Sentinel which gains a shield that can slammed into foes or thrown around like Captain America. Players unlock the three new subclasses through the progression of the campaign while the six old subclasses must be unlocked by leveling up and collecting items. Given the narrative approach The Taken King took to unlocking new subclasses, Destiny 2’s simplified quests seem like a wasted opportunity, but not a major issue in the long-run.

Based on an ever-problematic special ammo PvP economy, Bungie has tweaked the weapon loadouts. Instead of a primary, special, and heavy weapon, players now carry a primary weapon, a second primary with an energy modifier, and one power weapon. Primary weapons include scout rifles, pulse rifles, auto rifles, hand cannons, sidearms, and sub-machine guns, while power weapons consist of sniper rifles, swords, fusion rifles, linear rifles, shotguns, grenade launchers, and rocket launchers. I was somewhat apprehensive about this change for PvE prior to the game’s release, but honestly, it is really not as problematic as I feared. Yes, one of the powerful tools available to players has been replaced by another primary weapon, but I can’t really think of any current encounter where I needed access to more firepower. Maybe this is a testament to Bungie’s ability to adjust their gameplay design, or maybe this will be a problem down the road, but this change was not as detrimental as I initially feared. Another change that I am still fairly apprehensive about is the elimination of random rolls on weapons (and armor). In Destiny 1, two players could have the same weapon, but because perks were decided randomly, one person could have an amazing weapon with perks that synergized perfectly, while the other could have one that fell far shorter. In Destiny 2, every weapon has the same perks. Now, if two players receive the same weapon, they will receive identical weapons. Other, more eloquent individuals have discussed this topic ad nauseam, but personally, I don’t agree with this change. On one hand, yes, it is great that players don’t have to worry about having an amazing gun ruined by terrible perks and everyone is on a level playing field. On the other, grinding for weapons was one of the things that kept people playing Destiny 1. Was it frustrating at times? Yes, of course. But it still provided an incentive for players to keep running the same content over and over. In Destiny 1, there were powerful weapon with fixed rolls -- exotics, raid and Trials weapons. I feel that system could have been tweaked to allow easier to access fixed rolled weapons while also providing some weapons with random rolls to give the hardcore players reason to keep repeating the same content.

Another significant gameplay change is that timers for grenades, melees, supers, and the new class abilities have also been noticeably increased, seemingly to place greater emphasis on gun-skill in the Crucible. This has been compounded by the change to the armor system which has removed stats which reduced ability cooldowns in Destiny 1 (players can equip mods to reduce their cooldowns, but the effect is not nearly as drastic). While I can somewhat understand this from a PvP perspective, it also has the unfortunate side-effect of making PvE less fun. Using abilities to be a powerful hero, fighting against hordes of enemies is a lot of fun. There were some crazy builds (like spamming infinite grenades) players could pull off in Destiny 1 using specific armor pieces, perks, and stat rolls. Many of these really fun builds were only viable in PvE as they required swarms of enemies, so this change is more than a little disheartening. Abilities and supers are part of the Destiny experience. I could see them toning them down a little for PvP balance, but this change feels too drastic. Further reducing the ability to seek out those ridiculous combinations is the fact that class trees have been simplified drastically. Instead of picking individual perks, players now choose between one of two perk trees, each with four perks each. I’m not a fan of this reduction in choice to begin, but the bigger problem I have is that perks cannot be turned off, and some of these perks are actually detrimental based on an individual’s playstyle. For instance, on my Gunslinger, I refuse to unlock the last perk on one of the trees because the other three perks match my playstyle, while the fourth perk ruins the subclasses’ super viability in the Crucible. The only reason I know this, however, is because I played the Beta and got to experience that perk and knew it was problematic. Given the choice, I would happily use the fourth perk from the other tree, but that’s not an option with this new system.

Players have a wide range of activities to engage in across both the PvE and PvP spectrum and each week, players are able to view a list of objectives called Milestones which provide powerful gear and rewards. For the PvE crowd, there is exploration, weekly Flashpoints, the Strike Playlist, and a new raid. For all the activities available to players in Destiny 1, the worlds felt empty. Yes, there were patrols in the world, but they all felt pretty much the same. Public Events were fun, but they were also random and required external websites to track and pursue. Across the board, the worlds of Destiny 2 feel more alive and layered with activities. For starters, each planet has multiple landing zones which allow players to freely fast-travel with ease. Additionally, Public Events are now marked on the map and happen frequently enough that roving bands of players can easily jump from one to the next. Each week, one planet is specified as the Flashpoint and players earn powerful rewards from completing Public Events on that planet. There are also Lost Sectors, mini dungeons which can be done over and over, treasure chests and weekly treasure maps, narrative adventures and quests, and the obligatory patrols. Each planet also has its own reputation, weapons, and armor sets, seemingly replacing the factions of Destiny 1. As it stands, the worlds of Destiny 2 feel more alive and exciting than those of Destiny 1. Whether this will last, well, we’ll have to wait and see.

All that said, the worlds themselves do not feel like significant upgrades over the worlds of Destiny 1. Yes, the European Dead Zone is a larger area than any from Destiny 1, but the rest do not share that same sense of awe. Another unfortunate change is that there is less incentive to wander off the path and explore each and every corner of the map due to the removal of Dead Ghosts and Grimoire. Destiny 1 was criticized for requiring players to read most of its lore on Bungie's website. As players progressed through the game, they could unlock lore by defeating specific foes, collecting exotic items, participating in activities, and by collecting Dead Ghosts. The Dead Ghosts were strewn around the map, so players had to really search to find them all. Every point of interest is now marked on the map, so players have no real reason to stray from the path. Lore for important items is now contained in game, which is fine. However, in The Taken King, players had to collect fifty items to unlock one of the game’s powerful exotic weapons. Most players simply focused on collecting the items to complete the quest, but players also unlocked the detailed history of the Hive through each item they collected. A part of me can’t shake the feeling that we will end up losing a significant amount of lore this way. Given the colorful and beautiful worlds that Bungie has crafted, it is a little disappointing that so many players will never simply wander and instead just go from objective to objective.

Over the course of Destiny 1, Bungie took a number of steps to improve the Strike experience. Strikes are larger missions where groups of three players pursue a series of objectives before confronting a boss. While Strikes were initially fairly boring, they saw significant improvement with the release of The Taken King. Destiny 2 mostly maintains that level of quality, while not taking advantage of additional improvements released in subsequent patches and updates. This five Destiny 2 Strikes (six if you’re on PS4) are fairly fun encounters which have you explore areas you may have only run past during the campaign. Some of the bosses feature a variety of mechanics to make them more interesting, others feature mechanics that make them feel like something of a chore. Honestly, the biggest disappointment is the Bungie removed much of the incentive that compelled players to run Strikes. As Destiny 1 progressed, Bungie introduced Strike-specific-loot that was often desirable and coveted as well as a scoring system that rewarded player efficiency. All of that is missing in Destiny 2. The Strike playlist is just another means to power up -- one that takes longer to complete than most others, and is therefore not the best use of time. Conversely, the Nightfall Strike, a harder Strike which offers more powerful rewards, has seen some welcome changes. The most notable change is that Nightfalls are now timed, so players have to actually plan and develop a strategy before starting the Nightfall to avoid running out of time. Players gain access to the Nightfall much earlier than in Destiny 1 and these Strikes serve as a nice stepping stone for players to get ready for the later content which requires significantly more coordination and communication.

As with every new Destiny release, the biggest PvE activity is the new raid, The Leviathan. Taking place inside a gaudy and ornate palace on a massive world-eating Cabal ship, the Leviathan is nothing like any of Destiny 1’s raids. For starters, the Leviathan is not a linear raid. Players enter the raid and arrive in an open hub which leads to the different encounters. The order for these encounters rotates each week, which is a minor but nice addition. The Leviathan also features a sprawling underbelly which invites players to get lost searching for chests and shortcuts. I’m not one-hundred percent sure this is possible, but I know players can navigate to each encounter through the underground, raising the potential to pick the order of your encounters. The encounters themselves are also different than other raids. While Destiny 1’s raids were mostly built around boss encounters, the Leviathan’s encounters are more about mechanical encounters with only a single boss at the very end. Beyond that, the Leviathan is.. ..weird. Not to spoil anything, but the three main encounters are called the Bathhouse, Pleasure Gardens, and the Gauntlet (which is a deceptive title for what is essentially a Japanese gameshow..). In the newly established Cabal lore, sure it makes sense, but that doesn’t make it any less weird. If I’m being totally honest, I feel that Bungie might be stretching a bit with their raid mechanics. Yes, The Leviathan is a fun raid, but some of these mechanics are so convoluted, I can’t imagine how hard it would be for a group of new players who never played Destiny 1 to solve them all. It took my group multiple hours to solve each encounter on the first day and we all had multiple years and countless hours of Bungie raid experience to build upon. I would probably rank the Leviathan as Destiny’s third best raid (behind Vault of Glass and King’s Fall), but I also developed a strong hatred of Rise of Iron’s Wrath of the Machine due to its ridiculous challenge mode..

While the PvE content is certainly exciting and engaging, especially early on, the content I most look forward to is the new PvP content. Without a doubt, I spent more time playing Crucible matches than anything else in Destiny 1. While the PvE side suffered from content droughts, the Crucible was a constant source of entertainment and challenge. With Destiny 2, Bungie has taken steps to reset the Crucible to address some of the biggest concerns that plagued Destiny 1’s Crucible. As I mentioned previously, one of the biggest problems was the overuse of special weapons -- weapons like sniper rifles and shotguns that could one-shot an opposing player. Destiny 2 emphasizes primary weapon combat and gun-skill. Players now essentially have two primary weapons, heavy power ammo can only be picked up by one player, and abilities have been reined in. While I welcome these changes, time to kill (TtK) has been increased across the board as well. For instance, my favorite PvP weapon in Year 3 of Destiny 1 was a pulse rifle called the Blind Perdition which had a TtK of 0.87 seconds. The most comparable gun I’ve found in Destiny 2 is a pulse rifle called the Nightshade which has a TtK of 1.2 seconds. This might not seem like a lot, but these slower TtKs mean it is easier to disengage from combat and team-shooting is far more important. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t disappointed that I can no longer out-gun multiple opponents at once. Still, I’ve been playing Destiny 1 for three years, so I’m not too upset that I have to learn new mechanics and learn to rely more on positioning and teamwork.

Of course, there are some other, less desirable changes to the Crucible as well. For starters, unlike Destiny 1, Crucible activities are now grouped into one of two categories: either Quickplay or Competitive. Quickplay includes staples like Control and Clash, and the almost universally despised Supremacy. Competitive includes two game-modes, either Countdown or Survival. In Countdown, one team is tasked with planting a bomb while the other must defend or disarm. Teams alternate roles until one team reaches six wins. Survival gives each team eight lives and a team wins a round by wiping out the other team and depleting their lives. Quickplay matches are intended to quickly find matches based on connection quality while Competitive is supposed to pit players against others in their skill-range. The weekly Trials tournament also returns, this time dubbed Trials of the Nine. Honestly, I’m not too mad about the Crucible being broken into two playlists (unless I get a string of Supremacy matches..). What irritates me about this new structure though, is that Bungie has created a competitive playlist without including the key element players want -- player rankings. Especially given that they must have some type of ranking to match players in competitive, there seems to be no reason not to make that number visible to players. This whole thing becomes even more irritating when you remember that Bungie has had actual ranked playlists and visible rankings in their previous games. I can’t speak for everyone, but an actual ranking gives me a reason to keep playing competitive. I play competitive in Overwatch so I can work to improve and see my competitive ranking go up (and to unlock gold weapons..). With Destiny 2 (and Destiny 1 for that matter), I don’t get that feeling, so I feel no incentive to play Competitive. It also doesn’t help that, again, there are features that were developed over the lifespan of Destiny 1 that are missing from Destiny 2. The two most egregious are the lack of Private Matches and the fact that premade teams are matched against players who solo-queue. Also, why is there no free-for-all?

Going forward, there are three big questions facing Destiny 2: What is out there to keep players engaged, what does the endgame of Destiny 2 look like, and what does the future of Destiny 2 hold? Destiny 2, like Destiny 1 before it, is a persistent shared-world shooter. The game thrives when there are players doing activities, wandering the world, and fighting in the Crucible. This week saw the release of the Faction Rallies, a new event where players compete to earn tokens for a faction of their choosing to unlock new gear. We also know that both Iron Banner and the hard Prestige mode for the raid are on the horizon. That’s all well and good, but how long will that content keep players engaged? Faction Rallies are a fun event, but it lacks any depth. A big part of my concern stems from the loot changes. Every weapon is now one-and-done, and armor is almost entirely cosmetic. It’s hard to imagine that many players will keep doing the same content over and over for loot they already received. This leads to my next question, what exactly is the endgame of Destiny 2? Destiny 1 had multiple endgames. For all its flaws, one aspect of the endgame was farming tier 12 armor and searching for the perfectly rolled weapon. Destiny 2 has removed those aspects and many others, so what are players expected to do in the endgame? Not every player will be like me and want to spend their time in the Crucible. Without things to chase and pursue, I worry that Destiny 2’s player-base will begin to diminish more quickly than its predecessor’s. Finally, what exactly does the future of Destiny 2 hold? This is a broad question that can go a lot of ways. For starters, will we see the return of features that were released across Destiny 1’s lifespan? Will the content change to have more depth, or are the Faction Rallies the standard going forward? Will some of the new features be adjusted and improved upon? Some of the new stuff seems like half-steps that don’t fully capitalize on their potential. For instance, Guided Games -- essentially a matchmaking system that allows solo players to meet and join with clans for some of the harder content. Much of Destiny 2’s endgame content requires communication, and Guided Games says a mic is required. And yet, there’s no way to ensure players who join have a mic or are using one. Small but significant oversights like that feel poorly thought out and leave me concerned about Destiny 2’s future.

At the start of this review, I said there was a part of me that thought about not picking up Destiny 2. For all my worries and concerns, I am glad that I did not listen to that voice. Given the amount of time I've poured into the Destiny franchise, I imagine there will always be a part of me that has some trepidation. As a hardcore Destiny player, part of me is worried about the endgame, but then there's the part that says don't worry about it, there's always the Crucible. For all its flaws, it still has a phenomenal game-play core that makes the game just fun to play. Whether you’re considering picking up Destiny 2 for console or waiting for the PC release later this month, I recommend Destiny 2. At the end of the day, I’ve spent countless hours playing Destiny 1 and I’m still having a lot of fun playing Destiny 2. For a game that’s essentially going into its fourth year, I think that’s a pretty good place to be.

...the light will find its way.


All images owned by Bungie. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=397 Horizon Zero Dawn Review -- Tribal Girl Versus Robot Dinosaurs https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=390 Thu, 31 Aug 2017 19:54:24 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/fdef6551fed5aa0dba85ab2686e8a9d7.png The post-apocalyptic world has become a fairly common setting across...
The post-apocalyptic world has become a fairly common setting across various fictional mediums. Whether it is caused by biological weapons, nuclear war, artificial intelligence, or the growing and crushing spread of mega-corporations and garbage, there are countless narratives which tell the story of humans (or an adorable robot in that last case) trying to survive and rebuild after some world-ending cataclysm. Horizon Zero Dawn is another entry in this genre, but there’s something distinct and unique that sets it apart from all its compatriots -- the presence of giant robot dinosaurs that roam the world.

At its core, Horizon Zero Dawn follows the story of Aloy, a strong and determined tribal girl with a fiery personality which perfectly matches her burning red hair. The game opens with a newborn Aloy outcast from her tribe at birth for an unexplained reason. Not accepting that decision, Aloy dedicates her youth to train for a tribal custom called the Proving with the goal of becoming accepted back into her tribe and learning the circumstances of her birth. What starts as a typical coming-of-age story, albeit set in a strange setting, quickly changes gears, and what unfolds after the game’s first few hours is a completely different story. Aloy ventures out into the world to learn about herself and the world. While Guerrilla Games has crafted a beautiful world and intriguing setting, what really drives the game is Aloy. Aloy is smart and incredibly sharp, and, without a doubt, she is one of the most compelling new characters I’ve encountered in recent memory. From the way that she moves as she runs and climbs over the terrain, to the random quips she throws out during combat and conversation, almost everything about her stands out in a positive way. One of my favorite moments which best exemplifies Aloy occurred during one of the game’s main story missions. Aloy pulls up a map of the Earth and one of her allies remarks, with a definite air of superiority, that the Earth is round, not flat like she think. Aloy quickly retorts to explain why she knows the Earth isn’t flat, leaving her companion stumbling for words. It is a brilliant and perfect example of what makes Aloy amazing.

That example should give you a sense of how far in the future Horizon Zero Dawn takes place. Unlike many other stories which pick up either immediately or soon after the end of the world, Horizon occurs an indeterminate, but seemingly large, number of years in the future. In the aftermath of an unknown cataclysm, wildlife has taken over the world while human society has regressed into primitive tribes. I won’t spoil any of this, but Horizon actually does a brilliant job explaining the circumstances that produced its setting over the course of its story. Of course, from the beginning, players know something is amiss given the disparity between the level of human advancement and the highly advanced technological animals which prowl the wilds. Horizon isn’t just a story about Aloy, however, as it also serves to craft a new and intriguing world for players to explore. While the main campaign focuses on Aloy, through side-quests, both major and minor, players get to learn about this new and beautiful world. Players get to experience a number of diverse climates across Aloy’s travels. From snowy mountains, to wooded jungles, to sweltering deserts, and even abandoned facilities from before the collapse of humanity, Horizon offers a number of different environments for players to explore. It’s honestly somewhat surprising how beautiful the game looks given that Guerrilla Games’ is most well-known for their drab and dreary first-person shooters, the Killzone franchise.

Another departure for Guerrilla Games is that Horizon Zero Dawn is a third-person open-world action-adventure game. Aloy is thrust into a new world filled with ancient ruins, random relics from a forgotten era, and a burgeoning society. To be honest, I was surprised at the world and exploration aspect of Horizon. First-person shooters and open-world games are very different genres, but Guerrilla Games has made the transition seem easy. Whether it is quests or collectables which help provide additional information regarding the circumstances that preceded Aloy’s adventure, the world invites players to explore. Like many other open-world games, Horizon relies on maps and towers (of which, this game wins the award for the coolest towers) to provide players with a sense of what’s out there, but leaves the actual exploration up to players. Early on, Aloy acquires a piece of technology from the old world called the Focus. This provides game-play elements for players, but also dispenses critical information to Aloy during her journey. I do have some issues with how easily Aloy is able to adapt to technology so quickly without any previous experience, but I understand the necessity of this game-play element.

In addition to exploration, Guerrilla Games has also crafted a combat system that is a stark departure from the Killzone franchise. Throughout the game, Aloy battles human opponents and around two-dozen unique robot species with different abilities, strengths, and weaknesses. Some of them are large and powerful, others rely on stealth and traps, and still others rely on speed and numbers. To combat these opponents, Aloy is given a diverse arsenal of weapons with a variety of functions. For instance, Aloy can use one weapon to lay a trap to take down an unsuspecting foe, use another weapon to tangle it up to ensure it stays down, switch to a third to pick off critical components before it gets up, and use a fourth to deal damage once it has been hobbled. Early on I only relied on one or two weapons, but one of the best parts about Horizon is the way that it encourages players to learn and become more adept at combat, becoming more competent hunters as Aloy’s journey progresses. Aloy also uses a spear for close-range combat which also provides one of her best abilities, hijacking. Fairly early, Aloy gains the ability to hack into her robotic opponents to turn them into her allies. While most are used for combat, some can become mounts to ferry Aloy across Horizon’s vast landscape. That said, it is more than a little disappointing that most machines are locked to a specific area. I understand that it would be incredibly over-powered to have a giant robotic T-rex following me around everywhere, but it doesn’t mean it wouldn’t also be incredibly awesome.

As incredible and fun as Horizon Zero Dawn is, that's not to say it does not have its share of flaws. Don’t get me wrong, I loved playing Horizon -- so much so that it is one of the few games I bothered to get a platinum trophy and I already have the upcoming expansion, The Frozen Wilds, preordered. That said, compared to a lot of other open-world games, Horizon feels fairly short and the map feels constrained, especially as the story progresses and you’re given a better scope of the world. I think the whole game only took me around forty hours which is low for an open-world game, but doubly so given the fact that I did not really use fast-travel till really late in the game (fast-traveling requires a limited consumable -- yes, there is an item that allows for unlimited fast-travel, but I didn’t realize that till far too late..). However, all that aside, arguably, Horizon’s biggest weakness is its release date -- a few days before Breath of the Wild, a similar open-world game, set in a post-apocalyptic world overrun with technology, which, in many ways, redefined the open-world genre. It’s not that Horizon is bad, it’s just that it is so easy to compare it to Breath of the Wild which did many of the same things, but better.

If you forced me to describe Horizon Zero Dawn in a single, concise sentence, I would go with: tribal girl versus robot dinosaurs. Let’s be honest, the premise is ridiculous and awesome at the same time. However, as great as that description is, it leaves out much of makes Horizon truly stand out. If you instead asked me to describe the single thing that makes Horizon great, my answer would be simple: Aloy. I said earlier that Aloy is a phenomenal character and her story, the way that she interacts with characters, and the way that she deals with adversity form the heart and soul of Horizon. On its own, Horizon Zero Dawn is a good open-world game with a fun combat system, unique premise, and mysterious and enticing story. Yes, it has its flaws and weaknesses, but it is still a very good game. However, add Aloy to that mix and you’ve got a great game that I cannot recommend strongly enough.

...being smart will count for nothing if you don’t make the world a better place. You have to use your smarts to count for something, to serve life, not death. ~Elisabet Sobeck


All images owned by Guerrilla Games. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=390 Destiny 2 Beta -- How I Spent My Summer Vacation https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=388 Fri, 21 Jul 2017 11:26:46 GMT
Destiny, the game some consider the record-holder for the 'World’s Longest Beta' is drawing to a close. With the September release of Destiny 2 approaching, Bungie offered players their first taste of this new and improved(?) take on Destiny with the Destiny 2 Open Beta -- a Beta for the game we have been beta testing for three years, if you will. As something of an ardent Destiny fan, I felt it was my civic duty to explore this Beta during the early access period this week to provide an assessment of whether you should consider downloading it during the open phase this weekend (it is a free opportunity to play a game you may or may not be interested in the long-term -- the answer is yes, go download the Destiny 2 Beta while you can.).
Note: this review is based on my experiences with the Destiny 2 Beta which is an unfinished product and may change before the final release. A review of the final product will inevitably follow its eventual release in the Fall.

I’ll be honest, prior to the Destiny 2 Beta, based on reactions from the reveal event and E3, I expected the game to feel essentially like another iteration of Destiny (hereby referred to as Destiny 1). I had even written up an entire paragraph discussing how the Destiny 2 Beta was different from the prior Bungie betas I had participated in due to how similar it felt to Destiny 1. There is no denying that the underlying structure of the game presented is similar to the game we have been playing for nearly three years. However, I was legitimately surprised at how different Destiny 2 still felt from Destiny 1 at times. The Destiny franchise (the weirdness of that statement aside) has always been defined by two (sometimes competing -- although that's a discussion I plan to avoid) elements, PvE and PvP. The Destiny 2 Beta offers players four activities -- the first mission in the Destiny 2 campaign, one PvE strike, and two PvP game modes.

Destiny 2 is still a first-person shooter where players take on the role of a guardian battling against forces threatening the survival of humanity. Players have access to three classes and two sub-classes per class. Depending on the class and sub-class, players have access to different jumps, grenades, melees, and super abilities. A new addition is a set of support abilities available to players based on their class. Destiny 2 appears to be more restrictive than Destiny 1, and the Beta does not offer the full range of abilities for each sub-class. One of the most noticeable changes are the significantly longer ability cool-downs. Players complained that abilities played too large a role in PvP in Destiny 1, and seemingly in response, Bungie has increased cool-downs across the board. Now, I will admit that the current cool-downs feel excessive. However, I also remember that the Destiny 1 Beta did not allow players to modify those cool-downs, a fact that I think most players have forgotten. Part of me is hopeful that the eventual release will allow players to reduce their cool-downs through gear choices, but I also acknowledge that there has been no indication of such a gameplay element at this point.

Players equip three weapons, essentially two primary weapons and a power weapon (a category which includes sniper rifles, rocket launchers, shotguns, etc) -- a significant change from Destiny 1’s weapon structure. This, and some of the aforementioned changes, have pushed the gameplay, especially in PvP, to rely more heavily on primary gunplay. Given our limited experience with PvE, it is hard to fully understand what effect this will have, but for PvP, this is a welcome change. It is worth noting, Bungie has acknowledged that power weapon ammo drop-rates in PvE are lower in this build than the final release, but we’ll have to see just how much more frequent it will be.

Upon starting the Destiny 2 Beta, players are thrust into the first campaign mission. Although the first mission is a limited vision of the campaign, at best, this initial mission does a great job of breaking players away from the image we have spent the past three years sculpting. Destiny 2 is supposed to tell the story of a world where superheroes lose the powers that define them. I don’t know how much is due to the time I have spent in the Destiny universe, but I definitely felt that Bungie spent twenty to thirty minutes crafting an image of a hero for players, and then successfully tearing it down in the last moments of the campaign mission. As someone overly invested in the Destiny universe, I am definitely interested in seeing where the story develops and I believe this brief experience will entice new gamers to delve into Destiny 2. All that said, there is a part of me that can’t help drawing similarities to Halo 2 and feeling that Bungie is revisiting some of the same lesson they learned back in 2004 (like being able to understand our enemies..).

The other PvE element players can partake in during the Destiny 2 Beta is one of the game’s new strikes -- a cooperative mission that tasks three players with progressing through a level and taking down a powerful boss. I've heard a lot of praise for the new strike and even heard it called the best strike yet, but personally, I felt it was just another strike. Yes, the boss has some new mechanics, but Bungie has been introducing and experimenting with new boss mechanics since 2015’s Taken King, so it was hard for me to feel too excited. Especially in repeated play-throughs, there was nothing about this strike that made me feel strikes are receiving a significant overhaul in Destiny 2, and I think that’s an unfortunate evaluation for the PvE crowd. That said, the major caveat is that the biggest PvE experience, Destiny 2’s new raid, was not featured or explored in any way, shape, or form. Raids have always been the high-bar for PvE activities in Destiny, and although this new strike was not exactly a major innovation, I still have faith in Bungie’s ability to produce captivating and challenging PvE content.

Personally, the most enticing element of Destiny has always been the PvP Crucible and the Destiny 2 Beta offers players two PvP game modes where I have spent the most time. The first is a new iteration of the familiar Control mode which tasks players with controlling territories while battling enemy forces. The second mode is essentially a familiar search and destroy mode -- one team attempts to plant a bomb, the other team must defend or disarm the bomb. Control is framed as a more casual playlist while Countdown is presented as the more competitive option. Bungie has said they are looking to provide players with a way to prove their PvP prowess and a more casual option in Destiny 2, but if their answer is to provide playlists which require coordination and teamwork versus playlists which allow players to more easily solo-queue into, I can’t help feeling Bungie has missed the point of demands for ranked playlists. Again, the Destiny 2 Beta is only a sampling of what is to come in Destiny 2, but I am definitely a little hesitant given what we have seen so far. All that said, PvP gameplay feels amazingly crisp and smooth. Guns feel sharp and powerful, abilities (when available) are activated seamlessly during battle, and combat has a great flow. I'm not the biggest fan of the two maps we currently have access to, but I imagine that might just be personal preference. Of course, if you have been playing Destiny 1 for the past few years, there are a number of things which will feel off. The aforementioned emphasis on primary gunfights, the lack of abilities, and the need for team-shooting are just a few of the changes that will take some time to get used to. I'm not saying these are bad things, just that they are different and will take some getting used to.

In my introduction I joked that Destiny 1 has been a three-year beta test for Destiny 2, but the reality is that I do no believe that in the least. Destiny 1 has undoubtedly taught Bungie a number of lessons, and Destiny 2 serves as a clean slate for them to start over in a number of significant ways (I have another rant about that, but I'll refrain..). I attempted (and didn’t really succeed..) to keep this review fairly short as it is for a beta, not a full game, and I tried to write it for players who have never played Destiny before. As I said in my introduction, I recommend everyone give the Destiny 2 Beta a shot this weekend. It is obviously not complete and will undoubtedly be tweaked over the next few months, but this Beta offers a fair sampling of the Destiny experience. The Destiny 2 Console Open Beta starts later today and runs till Sunday. I hope to see you there. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=388 Special Report: E3 2017 https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=386 Fri, 16 Jun 2017 17:00:44 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/64532ed2ebf08023743d5b5bcc271fff.png Ah, E3. The time of year when gaming companies try to sell gamers on...
Ah, E3. The time of year when gaming companies try to sell gamers on their future projects, the big three try to show why their minor differences make them better than the competition, and gamers argue about why these two companies failed in their press conferences, but this company that I coincidentally support had the greatest press conference I’ve ever seen, even though they were more or less the same. E3, hoo-rah! That cynicism aside, one of my favorite E3 traditions is watching the press conferences and preparing these write-ups. Now it’s time for your yearly tradition of reading this special report -- unless it’s not your yearly tradition, in which case maybe you should pick up a new yearly tradition!

Microsoft
Going into Microsoft's press conference, there was one topic on everyone’s mind: Project Scorpio. After an announcement at E3 last year and countless leaks, Microsoft finally unveiled the newest member of the Xbox One family, the Xbox One X (XB1X) which will be released worldwide on November 7th. After spending a fair bit of time talking about this new Xbox’s specs, showcasing the improved graphics, and trying to convince gamers that this marginal upgrade would be worth their hard earned money, Microsoft then moved onto their upcoming games. Now, before I talk about the games, Microsoft waited until just before their final trailer to announce the price of the XB1X -- $499. This felt like an acknowledgment that Microsoft knew that upgrading to the XB1X would be a hard sell and they needed this E3 to sell players on their upcoming lineup. Time will tell whether they succeeded, but personally, I’m a bit skeptical. The first game Microsoft showcased was Forza Motorsport 7. I get that racing games do not place the same demands on a console as many other games while still looking incredibly beautiful, but at the same time, it’s hard to get excited about a racing game so I think this was a poor first reveal. Next, Microsoft unveiled Metro: Exodus, the third entry in the Metro franchise which will be released in 2018. Personally, I’ve never played a Metro game, but this game looked gorgeous and exciting and made me interested in a franchise I had only seen in passing. Assassin’s Creed: Origins took the stage next with an exciting trailer that got me excited for an Assassin’s Creed game for the first time in years, followed by a gameplay segment which completely wiped-out that excitement. I will admit that I have not played an Assassin’s Creed game since Black Flag, and this reveal did little to convince me to return to the franchise. Microsoft then announced that Playerunknown’s Battlegrounds would be coming to the Xbox in late 2017. I know some people really like this game and consider this a huge reveal, but of the DayZ/ARMA mods, I’m partial to Rust, so it was hard to get too excited. A brief trailer for weirdly geometric looking Deep Rock Galactic was next, followed by State of Decay 2, an open-world zombie survival game which didn’t look too impressive, but I imagine will excite fans of the first. Microsoft then showcased The Darwin Project, which looked like an uninteresting Overwatch clone, but has sounded better as the week progressed, before moving onto the obligatory Minecraft segment. Next, Microsoft unveiled a new DBZ fighting game, Dragonball Fighter Z, and an MMO called The Black Dessert which somehow reminded me of Assassin’s Creed, The Witcher, and Skyrim at the same time (not in a bad way). They then presented two indie-looking games, The Last Night and The Artful Escape, before a trailer for a Bandai Namco JRPG looking game called Code Vein (which may or may-not be an anime Dark Souls). Sea of Thieves, planned for release in early 2018, took the stage next. The world, the gameplay, and the social aspects of this game look incredibly fun, although I feel like I am in the minority in my excitement for this game. An uninformative trailer for Tacoma was next up, followed by Super Lucky’s Tale, a game which looks like an old-school platformer (so thank you to Yooka-Laylee if we’re returning to that era). Another platformer came next, the 2D, 1930s inspired Cuphead, which is finally coming out this fall. Terry Crews was then featured front and center in a trailer for Crackdown 3, which is apparently more or less the same as the first two entries -- which may or may not be a bad thing depending on your experiences with this franchise (if your experience with this franchise is only buying a copy to access the Halo 3 beta, then..). A number of quick clips of independent ID@Xbox games were shown next, followed by an artistic looking game called Ashen. Square-Enix then officially revealed a prequel for Life is Strange (which reminded me to download the first game as it’s free for PS+ players) followed by Shadow of War, a sequel to Shadow of Mordor featuring an overly loquacious orc general. Microsoft then unveiled Ori and the Will of the Wisps, a sequel to 2015’s phenomenal game and then announced that they were expanding their support for backwards compatibility to the original Xbox’s library. At this point they announced the price of the XB1X before moving onto their final game, BioWare’s Anthem. EA had teased this game the previous day, so there was a lot of excitement around this reveal and honestly, I think it lived up to the hype. Anthem looks like a massive open-world scifi game with a lot of potential. At the same time, while the trailer and scripted gameplay looked amazing, it reminded me a lot of Destiny’s reveal in 2013. Don’t get me wrong, I love Destiny, but the final product was vastly different than the demos and reveals along the way, so I’m maintaining some healthy skepticism at this point in Anthem’s development cycle. So that was Microsoft’s press conference -- a new console, some shiny trailers, but there wasn’t a lot that I felt I immediately needed to play. And I think that's a problem given that they needed to do well to sell gamers on the XB1X. I give them a passing grade this year, but not much else.

Pros:
Sea of Thieves keeps looking better
Shadow of War looks like it’s going to be better than its amazing predecesor
Lucky’s Tale reminded me of old-school platformers
Anthem looks promising, with the aforementioned caveats

Cons:
No major first-party games
Most of the so-called exclusives (all?) are not actually exclusives.
No Halo or Gears (although that’s supposedly in the works?)
XB1X is expensive, and this press conference did little to make it seem worth the price.

Final Grade: C+


Sony
While the lead-up to the Microsoft press conference was dominated by Project Scorpio, the lead-up to Sony's press conference was instead focused on a single game: The Last of Us Part 2. Unfortunately, while the first game featured was from Naughty Dog, it was a standalone expansion to the Uncharted series, Uncharted: The Lost Legacy. Honestly, I get that Uncharted 4 was extraordinary game, but there was no way that this game would satisfy fans’ cravings for more about The Last of Us Part 2. Next up, Sony briefly teased The Frozen Wilds, an upcoming DLC for Horizon Zero Dawn which served as a great reminder to pick up Horizon this week while it’s on sale. The next segment focused on Days Gone, the upcoming zombie survival game which appears to take place in an open-world. Sony introduced this game last year with an interesting trailer, but concluded their press conference with a gameplay demo that eliminated any interest I had for this game. Unfortunately, the gameplay featured in this year’s demo did little to reinvigorate that interest. Sony then showcased a new Monster Hunter game, Monster Hunter World. I will admit that, while I have tried multiple games, I am not the most ardent fan of the Monster Hunter franchise, but from what I’ve heard, fans were somewhat disappointed by this trailer, soo.. Sony then revealed a trailer for a new HD remake of Shadow of the Colossus, which, while it is one of my top-ten games of all time, was not exactly the most exciting reveal. They then presented a trailer for Marvel vs Capcom Infinite which felt like it failed to really elicit any excitement due to the incredibly poor character models. Honestly, I think the only thing people were talking about here on BG were the character models, so take that for what it’s worth. Sony then revealed the latest and obligatory entry in the Call of Duty franchise, Call of Duty: World War II, before moving onto a brief VR segment. This segment revealed gameplay for Skyrim VR, Starchild (a VR sidescroller which raised a number of questions..), a first-person asylum game called The Inpatient, a fishing game built from Final Fantasy XV subtitled Monster of the Deep, a first shooter called Bravo Team, and a VR adventure game featuring an adorable tiny mouse titled Moss. As someone who doesn’t really care about VR, most of these games seemed irrelevant, but I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t intrigued by Moss. Seriously, the tiny mouse with her cute little sword are adorable and I cannot wait to partake in her adventure. After that momentary adorable interlude, Sony moved back into the serious realm with a new trailer for God of War. For those who missed the reveal last year, this game picks up with Kratos and his son confronting dangers drawn from Norse mythology. This trailer teased more of the story questions and hinted at a number of mysteries which would be worth exploring. I’ll be honest, I have never been the biggest fan of the God of War franchise, and I have questions about how God of War’s hack-and-slash gameplay is going to translate to an open-world game, but I’m also incredibly excited to see what Sony does with this game. God of War is currently scheduled for release in early 2018. Sony then presented a new segment for Detroit: Become Human. As I said last year, if you’re a fan of Quantic Dream’s games, you are probably excited for this latest game. However, if you’re like me and do not find their games interesting, I imagine this segment did little to sell you on this game. Sony then moved on to one of the games I am most excited for, Destiny 2. Look, I could write an entire blog post about Destiny 2 (expect at least one, sooner rather than later..), so I will save you all from that. Destiny had its flaws, but I have a lot of faith in Bungie. I will admit I am still more than a little salty at their decision to not carry things over from the current rendition of Destiny, but I am also incredibly excited by many of the structural changes that are coming with Destiny 2. Destiny 2 will have an open beta in a little over a month, so if there is any part of you that is interested in this game, I cannot encourage you enough to give it a try. Sony closed their press conference with a gameplay segment focused on their upcoming Spider-Man game. This game was announced last year, and I will admit that I was not especially interested. However, Sony showcased gameplay that looked like a merger between Spider-Man and the Arkham games. This gameplay was one of the bigger surprises for me and I am actually pretty excited to pick this one up. With that, Sony closed their press conference. As it drew to a close, the overarching sentiment I could not shake was, “that’s it?” Yes, Sony showed some intriguing games, but at the same time, I did not feel especially excited at the end of their press conference -- at least not as excited as I have felt in previous years.

Pros:
Moss looks adorable
God of War still looks promising
Destiny 2!!!
Spider-Man looks like a day-one purchase

Cons:
Nothing about The Last of Us 2
VR seemed mostly irrelevant
Days Gone continues to look mediocre
A lot of gameplay/trailers, but few of them were actually worth getting excited about

Final Grade: C+


Nintendo
By Tuesday morning, expectations were pretty low for Nintendo. Nintendo again opted for a prerecorded Nintendo Direct followed by a day dedicated to deeper looks at their lineup. The general consensus was that Microsoft and Sony had both been pretty lackluster, and given that it was expected that Nintendo was going to focus heavily on Super Mario Odyssey, there wasn’t a lot of suspense. However, in thirty minutes, Nintendo managed to generate more excitement than Sony or Microsoft had done in double and triple the time, respectively. Nintendo opened with a new trailer for Xenoblade Chronicles 2 which focused on the relationship between the male and female leads and drew on more than a few iconic images for fans of Xeno- games. A lot of people have speculated and rumors have circulated that this game had been pushed back to 2018, but the trailer ended resoundingly, stating it is expected to be out this holiday season. Xenoblade was followed by the reveal of a new co-op Kirby game. As someone who loves Kirby, this was a welcome announcement and was the first confirmation that Nintendo is working hard to support the Switch with its stellar lineup. Next up, Nintendo showcased Pokkén Tournament DX, which would have been exciting, had Nintendo not discussed it in detail a week prior in a Pokémon dedicated direct. Now, fans have been asking for a core console Pokémon game for years, and in the first of their earth-shattering shocks, Nintendo announced that they had one in development for the Switch. Before we were given a chance to recover, Nintendo fired off another shot, shattering what was left of the Earth into even smaller pieces by announcing Metroid Prime 4. Yes, nothing but a title image was shown, but that doesn’t matter. The first entry in the Metroid Prime trilogy is one of my top-ten games of all time, and the other two are both exceptional games. Announcing a new Metroid Prime game, one which will more closely resemble the first was, without a doubt, the biggest announcement at E3 this year for me. At this point, I was in a fervor, so I may have been too hyped to accurately respond to the rest of Nintendo’s lineup. Nintendo unveiled a new Yoshi game that looked like a merger between Woolly World and Paper Mario and is slated for 2018 followed by a new trailer for Fire Emblem Warriors. If you’re a fan of either franchise, I imagine this game is already on your radar -- as someone who has enjoyed both Hyrule Warriors and the Fire Emblem franchise, I imagine I’ll be picking this one up. Speaking of Hyrule, Nintendo then visited the Zelda franchise, highlighting the Zelda gear for Skyrim for Switch and then the upcoming DLC for Breath of the Wild. The first DLC, The Master Trials, is scheduled for the end of this month, while the second DLC, The Champion’s Ballad, is scheduled for the holiday season. I’ll be honest with you all, Breath of the Wild is currently my front-runner for game of the year (by a long shot), so anything that adds more incentives for me to immerse myself in this rendition of Hyrule is a welcome addition. Nintendo then moved onto Mario+Rabbids Kingdom Battle which.. ..Look, there is no part of me that is willing to admit I am interested in this game. That said, I cannot deny that some type of merger between Mario, Rabbids, and XCOM sounds intriguing. It’ll be out at the end of August, so… Nintendo then briefly showcased Rocket League, complete with Mario hats, before moving onto what was supposed to be the crux of their show, Super Mario Odyssey. Scheduled to be released by the end of October, Mario Odyssey looks so promising. Colorful open worlds. Exploration. New hat-based mechanics. This game looks incredible and is a day-one purchase, without a doubt. For me, Nintendo won E3 with their “press conference.” It wasn’t just the amazing games they showcased, but it was also the fact that almost everything they announced will be a day-one purchase for me.

Pros:
Xenoblade is still on track for this year
New co-op Kirby
Core console Pokémon
Metroid Prime 4!!!!!!!
Zelda DLC looks substantial
Mario+Rabbids is probably going to be worth picking up..
Super Mario Odyssey looks stellar

Cons:
No dates for either the Switch Pokémon or Metroid Prime 4
...ummm? I’m stretching here...

Grade: A-


Game of E3: Super Mario Odyssey
Like many of you, I wasn’t really impressed by the first few days of E3, even though there were a number of games that stood out. However, by Tuesday morning, Nintendo had blown away the competition, and one game had claimed its place as my Game of E3. Of all the games at E3 this year, the one that stood out to me most was Super Mario Odyssey. I will admit, part of this comes from Nintendo’s brilliant decision to follow their Nintendo Direct with a thirty minute segment devoted entirely to Mario Odyssey which showcased the innovative and exciting new gameplay and a number of the gorgeous worlds. Even admitting that unfair edge, if there was a single game I had to commit to picking up on day-one, it is undeniably Super Mario Odyssey. Also, that jazz theme is incredible and has been occupying my speakers all week.

So there's my wrap-up of E3 2017. What were your thoughts? Who do you think had the best press conference? What games are you excited to play this year? What were some of your biggest surprises and disappointments this year? Feel free to leave a comment below~ ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=386 On the Future https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=383 Thu, 01 Jun 2017 04:16:28 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/4e3d15becd7224a5346167ed4797b061.png How often do you think about the future? Are you the type of person who...
How often do you think about the future? Are you the type of person who lives in the moment, or are you the type of person who needs to have a plan (and a series of backup plans for when the original plan inevitably fails)? If you fall into the latter camp, how far ahead into the future do you plan? Tomorrow? One week? A year? Ten years? The reason I ask this question is to posit another question -- how many of our favorite gaming franchises started with a plan? Some of the oldest gaming franchises have been around for around thirty years, and some of these franchises continue to build on an ever-expanding narrative. It is interesting to think how approaches to continuity and planning have changed over time as gaming has grown larger, and how this more modern era has been forced to work with the past while the blank slate that newer franchises start with allows for a different approach to storytelling.
(There are going to be spoilers for a number of games, so fair warning~)

Sometimes games don’t have complicated timelines, new games are just the next step in an ever-growing progression. Take the Super Mario franchise. These games do not have the deepest story and save for a few exceptions (Super Mario Galaxy preceding Galaxy 2, for instance), do not really have a chronological progression with each game serving as a self-contained entity. In most cases, it is probably a safe assumption that each game is followed by the next game released, with Peach getting captured again and Mario setting out to rescue her. Then again, continuity might not be the biggest concern in a franchise where seemingly bitter enemies can play golf so easily. The Mega Man franchise is another example of continuous narrative progression. Each game begins with a threat from Dr. Wily and ends with his defeat and/or capture. The next game occurs when Wily either escapes or fakes reformation and begins the cycle anew. The franchise has also used large leaps in years to separate eras (Mega Man X occurred after the original series, followed by Zero, and then Mega Man ZX), but each era has used the same approach to storytelling. And apart from the significant jumps, the sequence of the games is not that important. While somewhat greater planning in terms of continuity appears to have gone into some of the later eras, the franchise as whole still has feeling of independent games without much overall forethought. Similarly, the Pokémon franchise continues to build an ever-expanding world and where each generation can be assumed to occur after the previous generation. Red, Blue, and Yellow are followed by Gold, Silver, and Crystal, which are followed by Ruby. Sapphire, and Emerald and so on. Again, time is not really important to the franchise as each generation is mostly a self-contained entry and each generation does not take steps to set up the next (unless you buy into the crazy Pokémon timeline theories..).

On the other hand are games which have sometimes taken on complex and confusing timelines in an effort to introduce continuity years later. One of my favorite franchises, The Legend of Zelda, has one of the most convoluted timelines and the release of Breath of the Wild and its uncertain placement on the timeline has reinvigorated discussions of the Zelda timeline. Let me preface this by saying that I do not believe that Nintendo had a definitive timeline in mind when they released many of the early entries in the Zelda franchise. However, following the release of Ocarina of Time in 1998, I believe that Nintendo began to conceptualize a rough timeline for the Zelda franchise based on statements by Miyamoto in 1998 and later statements by Aonuma and Miyamoto in 2002. However, I also believe that it wasn’t until the release of Hyrule Historia in 2011 that Nintendo sat down and formalized their rough timeline (a position which is arguably supported by the timeline changes found in 2017’s Hyrule Encyclopedia). Over time, Nintendo has built upon the story of the Zelda franchise, creating a narrative comprised of largely individual entries which spans numerous games. In fact, many of the modern Zelda games are clearly designed with a definitive position on the timeline in mind. While not as convoluted as the Zelda franchise, the Metroid franchise is another example of a franchise where the chronological order of the games do not follow the release order. The original game, released in 1986, tells the story of Samus’ first encounter with Metroid species, but is then followed by the four Metroid Prime games (released from 2002 to 2007), Metroid II (1991), Super Metroid (1994), and Other M (2014). 2002’s Metroid Fusion is currently the last game on the timeline. Unlike the Zelda franchise, each game fits a clear and defined point in a linear timeline, telling the ever-expanding story of a single bounty hunter named Samus Aran. Each game is separate, but they also build upon her interactions with the Metroids, Ridley, and the Space Pirates.

While most of the preceding games have told separate narratives, some franchises tell their complete story across multiple games. These franchises can fall into two categories, the more rare franchises that were always intended to consist of multiple games from the beginning, and the more common franchises which receive sequels and expansions based on the success of the first entry. One of the best examples of a franchise which was always intended to cover numerous games is the original Mass Effect trilogy. From the start, the first game was seen as the first entry in a trilogy and introduced players to Commander Shepard, the vast universe, and the threat of the Reapers. In the game’s climax, Shepard defeats the Reaper known as Sovereign and vows to stop the encroaching Reaper threat. The second game continued the narrative and built on the events of the first game. The third game finished Shepard’s story with the arrival and final confrontation against the Reapers and carried the decisions players had made across the previous games to influence the outcome (somewhat less significantly than players had been led to believe). The Darksiders franchise is another example of a franchise that was clearly intended to tell a story across multiple games. The first entry in the franchise ends with War summoning his siblings, the other Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Vigil Games clearly planned to leave players with a cliffhanger that would entice them to pick up later games in the franchise to learn the full story, a strategy that has seemingly succeeded, considering the excitement surrounding the recent announcement of Darksiders III. Of course, I would be remiss if I did not acknowledge that it is safe to assume that the story of the Darksiders franchise has probably changed course since its inception due to the sale of Vigil Games’ parent company, THQ, in 2012.

More commonly, developers leave the door open for a sequel, but do not commit themselves to it with the first game in a new franchise. After all, who wants to appear so arrogant to assume they are guaranteed a multi-game franchise only to end up with an open-ended dud without a conclusion? At the end of Halo: Combat Evolved, Master Chief destroys the Halo, and as he is escaping, removes his helmet and tells Cortana, “I think we’re just getting started.” This opened the door for subsequent games, but didn’t lock Bungie into producing another Halo game. Of course, Halo ended up being a massive hit which defined the original Xbox and Bungie would release Halo 2 three years later. Given the success of the first game (and due to time and development constraints) Bungie left Halo 2 with a cliffhanger that left players anxiously waiting for Halo 3. Similarly, the Kingdom Hearts franchise began with a single game and conceptualization of a sequel only began after the first game’s release -- who really imagined a game which blended the Final Fantasy universe with the Disney universe succeeding on such a level? Sure, the original Kingdom Hearts planted seeds for a sequel with its secret movies Another Side, Another Story and Deep Dive, but look at the differences between those movies and Kingdom Hearts II. In an interview, Nomura even stated that development of Kingdom Hearts II did not begin until Disney was convinced to allow Mickey to have a greater presence in the game, which reportedly did not occur until 2003. Given the success of the Kingdom Hearts franchise, it is somewhat surprising how unplanned the whole franchise appears, with sequels, prequels, and time-travel filling in holes as it goes.

Of course, I’ve left off a third option: a game which tells a complete narrative, but then receives an unplanned sequel some time later due to the success of the first game. While there are many games that fall into this category (Final Fantasy X/X-2, Injustice/Injustice 2, BioShock/BioShock 2/BioShock Infinite), arguably the best recent example is The Last of Us which had its sequel announced a few months ago. The Last of Us told the story of Joel and Ellie as they traveled across a world that had been ravaged by a zombie fungal infection. Their story was an emotional journey which saw Joel become a father-figure to Ellie as he grew to see her as a daughter. In addition to its phenomenal gameplay and environment, The Last of Us did an exceptional job telling an emotional story. In fact, many individuals, myself included, regarded The Last of Us as the best game of 2013. The Last of Us Part II looks to pick up several years after the first game and tell a new, darker story. One of the things that has me truly excited about this sequel is that it wasn’t just about revisiting the world of The Last of Us, but that Naughty Dog wanted to do The Last of Us justice and took the time to come up with a suitable second act. In fact, Naughty Dog has stated that they spent years coming up with different ideas and only decided to make this sequel after developing a story that felt worthy of the first game.

As gamers, I think it’s natural to become invested in a world and sequels are a natural way for companies to offer gamers the opportunity to remain connected to a world over time. As such, the simplest way to ensure such an emotional investment from fans is to announce a game is a piece of longer story that will cover several games over many years. Still, sometimes plans change and promises regarding extended franchises can undergo drastic changes. Take the current Halo non-trilogy being developed by 343 Industries. When Halo 4 was revealed, it was announced that it would be the first story in a new Halo trilogy. A few years later, following the announcement of Halo 5, 343 announced that the trilogy had been expanded to a longer series of games. As a long-time fan of the original Halo trilogy, I can’t help wondering where the story of this new saga is going and how much of the original plan remains in place. Destiny is another example of a game sold to gamers on a plan which has seen drastic changes over time. When it was originally announced Bungie repeated stated they had a ten-year plan for Destiny and wanted players to feel their journey continued across the franchise. Personally, I was drawn to Destiny in part due to my many years playing Final Fantasy XI. A few months ago, Bungie announced that their original plans had changed and Destiny 2, the first true sequel, will essentially hit the reset button. Amongst the Destiny community, there have been numerous debates regarding how much of the game changed before its initial release, and when Bungie breaks one of the major promises from before the game’s release, I can’t help wondering how much of the original plan for Destiny has changed and allowed such a drastic change of course.

That’s not to say that games need a long-term plan in place to extend for a decade or longer. The best example of games which do what Bungie initially set out to do are of course MMOs. Like many of you here, the best example for me is Final Fantasy XI. Using expansions, Square Enix was able to expand the world, offer new jobs, enemies, areas, arenas, and content. They did not abandon the groundwork they had originally built, but they found ways to expand the game (ignoring the level cap increase beyond level 75, which is a completely different discussion..). When it comes to planning, there is no doubt that Square Enix did not have Final Fantasy XI’s expansions planned from the very beginning (look at the fact that at one point, Wings of the Goddess was supposed to be the last expansion). Yet, I think most would agree that each expansion served a role and felt like another piece of a larger whole. The success of Final Fantasy XI’s expansions shows that the entirety of a game doesn’t need to be planned from the beginning, but that working with existing frameworks can allow expansions to a game to feel like natural evolutions.

So how important is it that a developer has a long-term plan for a game or franchise? Does it matter if a sequel quickly arises from the success of a first game, or is it better to wait years as a developer crafts a follow-up that does the original justice? And is there a real difference between the more modern format of storytelling in gaming, where each game released is more or less a sequential story, or the older format where games are just released and fit a timeline that might not coincide with their release dates? As I said in the beginning, I find it interesting to consider the way that storytelling has changed when it comes to video game franchises over the history of gaming. As someone who has been gaming for nearly thirty years, it makes me appreciate where we’ve been, and where we might be going. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=383 The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild Review https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=373 Fri, 31 Mar 2017 21:04:12 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/88eb1ef0a8a9e356bae36bc18f14e635.png There are many who have argued that The Legend of Zelda franchise has not...
There are many who have argued that The Legend of Zelda franchise has not changed much since its last major evolution, 1998’s Ocarina of Time (and you could even argue that the third entry, 1991’s A Link to the Past was the last time the franchise really tweaked its formula). That’s not to say that more recent Zelda games have been disappointing, just that Nintendo has seemingly not taken major risks with the Zelda franchise. Perhaps that’s part of the reason that so many fans have fallen in love with Breath of the Wild, the latest entry in this iconic franchise. While there’s no denying that central elements of The Legend of Zelda franchise are still prominently featured in Breath of the Wild, other pieces of the Zelda formula have been either greatly tweaked or completely abandoned. In fact, Breath of the Wild does something that no game in the franchise has done for over twenty years -- it takes the experience of the original Legend of Zelda and updates in a way that feels completely fresh but also a completely natural evolution.

Sticking to tradition, Breath of the Wild opens with Link waking up, this time in a dark chamber. A mysterious voice calls out to him and directs him to pick up what is essentially a smart phone. The voice then guides Link to leave the chamber, and as he steps into the bright light outside, what greets players is a beautiful panoramic view of the Kingdom of Hyrule, complete with a number of familiar landmarks. As I said earlier, the foundation of Breath of the Wild’s narrative is built around certain traditional story elements, but the world that Link embarks into is different than any rendition of Hyrule before it. Yes, you play as a hero named Link, on a mission to rescue a princess named Zelda, and to save the Kingdom of Hyrule from an evil entity called Ganon. However, immediately upon stepping outside, players are greeted by a Hyrule which does not truly resemble the grand kingdom that so many other Zelda games have featured, but instead shows all the hallmarks of a world-ending cataclysm. Nearby structures are collapsed and left to ruin and the landscape is littered with the remains of ancient but advanced technology. Due to a case of amnesia, Link is left, like players, to try to unravel the mysteries of what happened to Hyrule.

While I am personally not a fan of using amnesia as a plot device to tell a story, I would be lying if I said I did not enjoy the narrative that Nintendo has crafted. Link, the ever-silent protagonist (who does talk, although we never hear his voice or words) is thrust into an unfamiliar world with little guidance or direction. Link’s amnesia actually fits really well, given that Nintendo wanted to create a vast and fresh world for players to explore. As Link travels across the world, visiting towns and landmarks, he can learn about Hyrule’s past and the events that drove it to its current state. While some characters remember the events that destroyed Hyrule, many of them are too young and only have stories of the great kingdom and the calamity that struck it. Link can also revisit locations from his past to collect memories which piece together his previous life and his connection to and relationship with Princess Zelda.

While there’s no doubt that Nintendo has spent more time on the story than previous Zelda games, the true star of Breath of the Wild is not Link, Zelda, or any of the myriad of characters encountered along the journey. Rather, the star of the game is the Kingdom of Hyrule. Nintendo stated that they wanted to recapture the feeling of exploration that the original Legend of Zelda provided. To achieve this effect, over thirty years later, Nintendo has crafted one of the most enticing and engaging open-world games I have ever played. An important part of this is that Breath of the Wild does something that has been missing in open world games which I didn’t truly realize had been missing until I played it -- it invites players to explore the world for the sake of exploration. When I think of most other open-world games, I think of RPGs. Those games typically incentivize players to explore by the promise of a reward (typically experience). The one exception I can think of might be Skyrim, but even my memories of exploration in that game are that it was driven by a desire to find new quests and rewards. That’s not to say that Breath of the Wild does not have its own incentives to motivate players to explore, but the world also does a good job of that on its own. With Breath of the Wild, I found myself climbing mountains and searching for new areas not because I knew there was a reward to be found, but because the world enticed me to explore every nook and cranny. As soon as Link is able to leave the initial area, he is given the freedom to go wherever he wants to do whatever he wants to do. Is there a mountain in the distance that looks suspicious? Go climb it! Do you think that structure across the field might be hiding something? Go check it out! Is there something that caught your eye on the other side of this lake? Go for a swim!

At the same time, this is also the most unfriendly take on Hyrule that Nintendo has ever crafted. From the fearsome monsters, to the wildlife, to even nature itself, everything is dangerous and out to kill Link. After leaving the starting area, players can encounter numerous enemies which can do large amounts of damage or even one-shot Link. In fact, although it is mostly occupied by simple Bokoblins, even the starting area has a handful of powerful enemies that can kill Link in a moment if players are not careful. This might come as a shocking break from previous Zelda titles where Nintendo has been criticized for overly drawn-out tutorial sections. Without a doubt, I died more in this game that in any other Zelda before (except maybe the NES era games). And it wasn’t even due to major battles. Sometimes I would see a group of enemies, think I could take them, and just get overwhelmed by their numbers or weapons. Luckily, Nintendo doesn’t punish players too much for their deaths and it is easy to hop back in and continue with Link’s adventure. Whenever Link dies, the map is marked with a red “X” to serve as a warning or reminder of where he fell (unless you’re a player like me who loaded a previous save to avoid permanent confirmations of my failings..).

Another key aspect of this freedom is how Breath of the Wild approaches Link’s arsenal. In almost every previous Zelda game, even the original, Link typical gained a new weapon or tool in a dungeon which then opened up new areas and challenges and eventually led to the next dungeon. In fact, the Zelda franchise has been praised for how well Nintendo designs the progression of each dungeon to teach players how to use new items. For instance, typically, when Link acquires a new item, players might face an initial challenge which teaches the basics to the new item. As Link progresses deeper into the dungeon, players become more familiar with the item by facing more complicated challenges, which culminates in a boss battle against a foe which requires a certain level of mastery over this item. As Link leaves the dungeon, he can now use this item to reach new areas and a new dungeon where the process repeats. In Breath of the Wild, Link gains access to his full arsenal of tools within the first few hours. In fact, as I mentioned above, Breath of the Wild doesn’t really have the long introductory tutorial section. Players are given a series of short puzzles to understand the basic mechanics of each of these tools, but from there, they are able to freely craft their own experience. While a limited arsenal might sound restrictive, Nintendo has done an exceptional job of crafting unique challenges which require players to figure out how to use combinations of these items in innovative ways. In fact, because Link does not have access to dozens of tools, it has allowed Nintendo to leave players without much guidance, which has led players to develop some truly creative solutions to many of the game’s puzzles.

In addition to his handful of tools, Nintendo has also crafted a new combat system for Breath of the Wild. Link can collect a wide variety of weapons, shields, and bows to use while facing the fearsome adversaries which occupy Hyrule. Link’s primary weapons consist of one-handed swords, spears, and two-handed weapons such as axes and clubs. In combat, Link can easily switch his weapons, bow, and shield based on the circumstances or opponent. Link can also parry attacks to stun an opponent or dodge an attack to open the opponent up to a rapid counter. This is arguably the best combat system Nintendo has developed for a Zelda game, and players will need to use these advanced techniques when facing some of the game’s more challenging opponents. While the new combat system deserves a lot of praise, one of the more controversial aspects is the durability of weapons. For the first time in a Zelda game, Link’s weapons wear out over time. Repeated use of the same weapon will cause it to break, forcing Link to use another weapon from his arsenal. While this doesn’t sound too terrible, the weapons are unfortunately far too brittle. Especially against tougher foes, it is not uncommon to go through multiple weapons. Now, I can understand why Nintendo introduced weapon durability given the combat system and the survivalist nature of the game, but at the same time, given that gamers have been conditioned not to use special/powerful weapons, this can be frustrating when facing a tough opponent when you are forced to choose between using a weapon you have been holding onto for a special occasion, or running away in the middle of a fight. At the same time, the game really throws weapons at players, so maybe this should be taken as a lesson against hoarding.

Similar to Skyward Sword before it, Breath of the Wild is a beautiful and colorful rendition of Hyrule. Nintendo did not go as far as the impressionist inspirations of Skyward Sword or the cell-shading of Wind Waker, but this is definitely not a hyper-realistic world as is typically found in open-world games. While the art-style might turn some people off, I think it matches Breath of the Wild perfectly. The art-style lends to some truly colorful and expressive characters which are the perfect fit in a Zelda game. In the same vein, much of the music of Breath of the Wild is perfect for the game’s mood. Much of the music is subtle and fades in and out to really give the sense that it is in the background. All that said, I was not the biggest fan of many of these tracks. Don’t get me wrong, there were some tracks that were exceptional -- I loved getting lost in the Lost Woods and I would argue that this rendition of Hyrule Castle’s theme is the best ever (I could hang out in Hyrule Castle engrossed in the music if it wasn’t full of monsters actively trying to murder me). But many of the common themes did not have the grandeur I expected from a Zelda soundtrack. Again though, I concede that this was an intentional choice given the style and mood of the game. It is also worth noting that Breath of the Wild features voice acting for the first time in a Zelda game. Not every line is spoken, but most important lines and cutscenes receive the treatment. While much of it is good to passable, there are some (read: Zelda) that never grew on me.

All this praise aside, it’s not to say that Breath of the Wild is without faults. The aforementioned weapon durability is something of an issue, but the game’s biggest weakness comes from its dungeons. As I mentioned above, Zelda dungeons have been previously built around the item found within the dungeon. With Breath of the Wild providing Link with his full arsenal of tools within the first area, this element has been eliminated. Each dungeon tasks players with pretty much the same goal, just with a different spin. While the dungeons have some cool ideas, they were also incredibly short and failed to offer a real sense of challenge. Even the boss fights felt like a letdown, given the amazing fights that permeate the rest of the game. When I reviewed A Link Between Worlds a few years ago, I noted that the change to the item formula in that game led to noticeably shorter and easier dungeons. With Breath of the Wild further tweaking the formula, it is somewhat disappointing that Nintendo has still not managed to solve that particular problem. Given that players have access to every tool for every dungeon, I would have liked to see Nintendo better incorporate these tools together to make the dungeons more challenging. That said, if you look at the dungeons in a vacuum, yes, they are disappointing. However, if you also add in the over one-hundred shines, the game actually features a number of really cool and challenging puzzles. Honestly, I bounce back and forth on this issue -- yes, the dungeons are a letdown, but if you look at them as a small piece of a larger world, the maybe it is not such an issue. Not really related, but I also want to point out, the game’s save system could really use some major revisions. I don’t know why we were limited to only one save (and a handful of auto-saves -- but those don’t count), but I was sorely disappointed by this design decision and really hope Nintendo patches it in the future.

Breath of the Wild has received nearly unanimous praise, with many going so far as to declare it the game of the year.. ..in March. There is no doubt that Breath of the Wild is a masterful evolution of the Zelda formula and is one of the most engrossing games I have ever played. Typically I like to beat the games I review just so I can give a largely complete evaluation. But, I do not want to beat Breath of the Wild. Could I? Of course (although technically you can beat it immediately after clearing the starting area, soooo..). Honestly, I am having such a great time exploring Hyrule, looking for new secrets, and even just farming items to upgrade my gear that I do not want it to end. Breath of the Wild is a major change for the Zelda franchise, and with the amount of praise it has received, it is natural to wonder what it means for the future of the franchise. I have no idea what the future holds, but if Nintendo can continue to build on what they’ve established in Breath of the Wild and fix some of the game’s flaws, I cannot even imagine the type of Zelda game we might have on the horizon.


“Link… You are our final hope.
The fate of Hyrule rests with you.”

All images owned by Nintendo. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=373 Resident Evil 7: Biohazard Review https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=367 Tue, 28 Feb 2017 22:29:22 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/773f78b4d11a2a6eb88598f8eb3ce6b2.png A few years ago, I reviewed Resident Evil 6...
A few years ago, I reviewed Resident Evil 6 and expressed my disappointment that the series had become overly convoluted and that Capcom had prioritized action and explosive set-pieces over survival horror. I believe I went so far as to suggest it might be time for a franchise reboot of Resident Evil. Naturally, when Capcom released a demo for Resident Evil 7 during E3 2016, I clamored for the credit I deserved for the seeming change in tone and structure. The demo teased a Resident Evil which had abandoned the explosions and bombast of the most recent games and instead had returned to the franchise’s survival horror roots, albeit from a first-person perspective. The dreary environment, the decaying manor, and the foreboding mood present in that demo were an appetizer for Resident Evil 7’s return to the fear and terror that defined the franchise and helped establish the survival horror genre.

Resident Evil 7 puts players in control of Ethan Winters, a generically named every-man protagonist in search of his wife Mia who vanished under mysterious circumstances three years prior. Ethan sets out to Louisiana after receiving an email from Mia beseeching him to come get her. Upon arriving, Ethan is forced to break into the dilapidated Baker Manor. After solving a handful of puzzles, Ethan is reunited with Mia, although she has no recollection of sending him a message. Their reunion is short-lived as Ethan soon encounters the savage Baker family who torture and trap him in their decaying mansion. Ethan soon learns of a strange affliction affecting both Mia and the Bakers and sets out to save his wife, escape the mansion, and survive.

There is no doubt that Capcom took the critical reaction to Resident Evil 6 seriously and decided to return to the franchise’s roots. There are undeniable nostalgic cues meant to remind players of the things that made the early games in the franchise so successful. Resident Evil 7 abandons the globe-spanning missions of the latest entries and returns to a more intimate and enclosed setting. Similar to the Spencer Mansion of the original Resident Evil, Resident Evil 7 takes place in a mysterious mansion (with an eerily familiar shotgun puzzle), albeit one that is far less well-maintained. The game reintroduces the puzzles and keys that force players to trek across the harrowing hallways. Inventory management and item boxes return and even the save system draws cues from the early games. However, it’s the story that feel most familiar to the franchise’s origins. Resident Evil 7 is not about bioterrorism or global threats, it is about being trapped in a spooky mansion where strange and unexplained events are occurring, where horror and danger lurk around every corner, and where the only respite can be found in well-lit rooms which house typewriters tape recorders -- wouldn't want things to be too modern. Resident Evil 7 feels like an undeniable evolution of the original Resident Evil, seemingly discarding the clutter of the rest of the franchise to remind players what attracted them in the first place.

A major part of what makes Resident Evil 7 succeed is how multiple pieces work together to craft a truly terrifying mood that keeps players anxious and on the edge of their seats throughout the game. The Baker Manor is truly a horrifying sight to behold. The windows are boarded up, sinks are filled with unwashed and disgusting plates, and signs of dereliction cover the halls. To make it worse, much of the game is spent in the dark and Ethan is forced to rely on the dim lighting provided by a flashlight. This only serves to draw more attention to the appalling sights which litter the mansion. Fans of the early Resident Evil games will remember how those games relied on fixed camera angles to obscure parts of a room so that players never knew if a monster was lurking out-of-sight. While the first-person camera eliminates this element, the constant sense of paranoia returns through a new feature: doors. Doors are no longer used as load points which provide a momentary calm. Instead, doors are a constant reminder that anything could be lurking out-of-sight and Capcom has done a phenomenal job animating the way that Ethan opens doors to emphasize this fact. Even during combat, when players are face-to-face with the horrors hounding Ethan, the game manages to maintain the sense of anxiety. Unlike most protagonists in the franchise, Ethan has no combat training. Capcom has stressed this point by adding a ridiculous amount of bloom following every shot, which, combined with limited ammo, creates even more stress during high-pressure combat encounters as every shot must count. All that said, I would argue that the biggest mood-setting element is the game’s sound effects. From the creaking of the floors, to the dripping pipes, to the wind blowing through holes in the walls, the sound effects work beautifully to keep players paranoid and constantly remind them that danger could lurk around every corner.

While the mood and environment help to craft a truly terrifying experience, the undeniable stars of Resident Evil 7 are the primary antagonists, the Baker family. Players will spend much of the first half of the game dealing with Jack and Marguerite Baker -- and by dealing with, I really mean hiding in corners and cowering in fear from Jack and Marguerite Baker. The Bakers are immortal enemies that will randomly appear and hunt Ethan down, forcing players to flee in terror as they hobble along in pursuit. While Marguerite will shriek and shout at players, Jack will rely more on taunting, reminding players that he is toying with Ethan and there is little he can do to escape. Yes, players can waste ammo to knock him down, but that’s only a temporary solution as Jack will come barreling through a wall in pursuit of Ethan before too long. In addition to the Bakers, Ethan also encounters zombie-esque enemies called the Molded. These lumbering creatures come in a handful of varieties and serve to break up the encounters with the Bakers. While some have complained about the lack of enemies, I personally viewed the Molded as a necessary supplement which allowed the game to focus on the truly terrifying Bakers. It also meant that the game did not provide players with an arsenal of tools, which, coupled with the aforementioned limited ammo, meant that there was nothing to take away from the horror during each encounter with the Bakers.

For all the good parts of Resident Evil 7, that’s not to say the game is without a handful of flaws. For starters, the majority of the game’s puzzles are far too easy, especially for fans of the franchise’s early games. For instance, there is one puzzle where players must track down three pieces of a lock to proceed, a fairly classic Resident Evil puzzle. In the original Resident Evil, players would have been forced to use context clues and would have been left to scour the rooms they could access in search of the next step in the puzzle. Resident Evil 7 provides a note detailing exactly where the three pieces are located, I believe in the same room. It’s somewhat disappointing and reduces the sense of exploration. That said, I can’t help feeling that the simple puzzles were partially the result of Capcom’s desire to ease fans back after the franchise’s last few action-oriented entries.

A more glaring issue, however, are the game’s handful of bosses. I don’t agree with the sentiment that the bosses are necessarily bad, just that they feel out of place given the tone of the rest of the game. After spending hours creeping around corners and hiding from enemies, bosses feel like enormous bullet-sponges which must be confronted head-on. Coupled with the fact the game throws ammo at you before a boss fight, these encounters lack the tension the game so carefully maintains through pretty much every other part. In some ways, this dissonance between the horror experience of the majority of Resident Evil 7 and the boss fights is indicative of the franchise trying to relocate its footing. It’s almost as if Capcom knew they had to return to the game’s survival horror roots, but since it is a Resident Evil game, it had to have bosses, and since they’ve been away for so long, they weren’t sure how to craft boss encounters that could maintain that tension. This feeling is also exemplified by the divide between the majority of the game and one of the later acts which tries to build connections to the franchise. While the majority of the game is built around mystery and horror, this act is clearly built for exposition, drags on, and is plagued by near-identical hallways. The game still maintains the feeling of paranoia and dread, but it does so through a fairly cheap tool-set, as if Capcom forgot they didn’t need such cheap tools for the majority of the journey.

A number of people have jokingly related Resident Evil 7 to a J.J. Abrams movie -- in that it is constructed around a nostalgic draw to things we remembered and liked, without offering anything new or novel. Yes, Resident Evil 7 uses a number of nostalgic cues to previous games, but I disagree with this sentiment. Resident Evil 7 creates a more terrifying experience than ever experienced in the franchise and the first-person perspective allows new ways to experience those classic Resident Evil horror elements without the limitations of the fixed camera angles. I consider Resident Evil 7 a successful return to the franchise’s survival horror roots, a step back from the action and quick-time events that felt so out of place. When I reviewed Resident Evil 6 nearly four years ago, I recounted a story from my childhood: the gripping fear I felt while playing the first Resident Evil that even the sound of an air-conditioner coming to life was enough to startle me. After around fifteen years, I think I finally have a new version of that story. This time it wasn’t an air-conditioner, but the sound of a loud motorcycle driving by that caused me to jump, pause the game, and do a couple laps around the living room. Honestly, given what Resident Evil 7 set out to do, I think that moment is some of the best praise I can offer.

(Re)Enter the survival horror.


All images owned by Capcom. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=367 Final Fantasy XV Review https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=365 Tue, 31 Jan 2017 16:09:23 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/242d5201466295adb82a4eb5cfbfcd68.png How well do you remember ten years ago? Do you remember when the Xbox 360...
How well do you remember ten years ago? Do you remember when the Xbox 360 was less than a year old and neither the PS3 nor Wii had been released? Do you remember when Treasures of Aht Urhgan was less than a year old? Do you remember when Peyton Manning did not have a Super Bowl ring? Do you remember before the iPhone and smart phones? A few months prior, in May of 2006, E3 rolled around and SquareEnix announced Final Fantasy Versus XIII. Final Fantasy Versus XIII was intended to serve as the third entry in the Fabula Nova Crystallis series along with Final Fantasy XIII and Final Fantasy Agito XIII. While both those games would eventually be released, Final Fantasy XIII in 2010 and Final Fantasy Agito XIII as Final Fantasy Type-0 in 2011, Versus seemingly vanished from the public eye. Trade fairs and conferences such as E3 or the Tokyo Game Show would come and go, often without any mention of Versus. Occasionally reports would circulate of behind-closed-doors trailers, but for the most part, Versus was a phantom. In 2013 this information drought ended when SquareEnix announced that Final Fantasy Versus XIII had been rechristened Final Fantasy XV and would be released for the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. Players are finally able to experience a game ten years in the making, so the natural question is, has it been worth the wait? Short version: not really.

Final Fantasy XV tells the story of Noctis and his band of brothers. The story begins as Noctis, the crown prince of Lucis, departs for his wedding to the princess Lunafreya. Joining him on his journey are his three friends, Gladiolus, Ignis, and Prompto. Before they can reach the wedding destination, the quartet hears news that the capital city has fallen, leaving Noctis as the sole remaining member of the royal family, and that the Niflheim Empire has claimed the nation’s magical crystal. Noctis and his friends set out to wage war against the Niflheim Empire and regain the stolen crystal. The stakes only grow larger as the story progresses, and Noctis and his friends uncover a feud that spans generations. As is often the case in Final Fantasy games, their personal journey eventually transforms into a mission to battle the forces of darkness, bent on enveloping the world. While Final Fantasy XV certainly follows a predictable pattern for the franchise with its storytelling, it also lacks much of the rich detail and development which characterizes many of the other Final Fantasy games. The game is comprised of fifteen chapters with each chapter focusing on a different and distinct step along the story. The issue is that the motivations for going from one step to the next are often muddled. Part of this undoubtedly stems from the fact that Final Fantasy XV is an open-world game and rather than progressing from one objective to the next, much of the game is interrupted by the freedom to explore the vast world. At the same time, there’s also an undeniable sense that this iteration of Final Fantasy XV’s story was rushed. Halfway through the game Final Fantasy XV becomes significantly more linear and the story scrambles from one plot point to the next without taking the time to expand the narrative much beyond a bare-bones outline. The game unfortunately largely relies on undeveloped exposition to keep players invested as the climax looms.

While Final Fantasy XV’s story might be incoherent and disappointing at times, what saves the narrative is the focus on Noctis and his friends and the chemistry and bond between these four characters. Unlike the typical parties in Final Fantasy games, these four are not brought together by fate, destiny, or chance. Rather, they are four close friends who have known each other for much of their lives, with (seemingly) no secrets between them, and a common mission to save their homeland. Given the initial open structure of the game, SquareEnix has wisely chosen to fill in much of the game with random dialogue instead of just wandering the world with background music. These range from discussions about landmarks and sightseeing, to questions about Ignis’ taste in coffee, to constantly ridiculing Prompto because he has no chance with Cindy. While you will inevitably hear many of the same statements repeated over and over during the course of the game, they help to develop the sense of friendship between these characters. Even when the party is camping or staying in hotels (which SquareEnix wisely forced players to do to actually collect on their accrued experience) those moments are punctuated by actions such as playing games on their phones around the fire or horsing around. Because their journey is not just about the major moments of spectacle, it helps convey the sense that Final Fantasy XV is more than just the story of the forces of good versus evil, but also the story of four friends on a journey. At the same time, it is undeniable that the game’s focus is heavily on Noctis at the cost of the others. This problem is only accentuated by the shadow of Final Fantasy XV’s ten year development. As a result, the fact that important character points (glaringly in the cases of Gladio and Prompto) are seemingly being left to be filled in by DLC is more than a little insulting.

Fans of the Kingdom Hearts franchise will immediately feel a sense of familiarity with Final Fantasy XV’s real-time combat system. Players control Noctis while the actions of his three compatriots are largely controlled by AI. While players can merely rely on button-mashing the attack button over and over, players utilizing such a strategy are likely to struggle through the game’s more arduous encounters. The true depth of the game’s combat system comes from following combat prompts to dodge and parry attacks, effectively directing your allies to use their abilities, targeting different limbs and weak points on your foes, positioning yourself to deliver powerful attacks in concert with your allies, and utilizing the warp system to hop in and out of combat as necessary. At the same time, it’s worth noting that the combat of Final Fantasy XV can feel complicated and cluttered, whereas combat in the Kingdom Hearts games feels more distilled and parsimonious. Noctis can equip four weapons at anytime from a wide arsenal comprised of a variety of different weapons. These range from Final Fantasy classics such as sword and spears to massive shields, guns, crossbows, shurikens, and even a sniper rifle. Players can easily switch from one weapon to the next, using whichever weapon is more appropriate for a given encounter, or which better suits a player’s preferences.

While combat is fun and enjoyable for the majority of the game, it is far from perfect. In addition to camera controls which are far from ideal, especially when trapped in enclosed spaces, the biggest weakness with Final Fantasy XV’s combat is that it lacks variety. Pretty much every encounter, whether it is a pack of wild animals, group of armed soldiers, or even one of the game’s major foes, can be approached in essentially the same way. Nothing exemplifies this problem more than one of the game’s biggest foes, the enormous Adamantoise. Before Final Fantasy XV’s release, this monstrosity was advertised as an arduous obstacle which would take many hours to beat, even for the strongest players. Yes, it can take multiple hours to beat Adamantoise. However, it never really feels that much more challenging than other adversaries encountered over the course of the game. Instead of serving as a satisfying challenge like many other super bosses, Adamantoise merely feels like an uninspired chore which must be beaten by players who care about the trophy/achievement. This problem is also highlighted by the game’s lack of significant boss fights. Given the appropriate similarities fans will draw to the combat system in the Kingdom Hearts franchise, the lack of memorable and challenging battles is an unfortunate blemish against one of the most unique combat systems featured in the Final Fantasy franchise.

With the success of games like Skyrim, Grand Theft Auto, and The Witcher 3, we are seeing undeniable pressure for more developers to break away from more linear storytelling and embrace the open-world philosophy in their games. Final Fantasy XV adopts said philosophy, at least for the first half of the game. From the start, players are dropped into the gorgeous continent of Lucis. Although initially restricted to mostly plains and desserts, players eventually gain access to various other terrains which comprise Lucis, including swamps, forests, and marshlands. Players tour the world primarily aboard the Regalia, the party’s car which can be controlled automatically or manually. While players are free to roam the world during the day, during the night, players are encouraged to halt their journey and stay at one of the game’s many rest stops which dot the map. The night is filled with fearsome and terrifying demons which will make quick work of the party, especially early on. Again, I can appreciate this dimension as it forces players to rest which works to build the sense of brotherhood between Noctis and his friends, but it is also something of an irritant for players who might be hoarding experience for one of the game's more expensive and rewarding inns. I will admit, I did not take these threats seriously until an Iron Giant appeared before the Regalia, bringing my joyride to an abrupt halt and forcing me to weave my way across the terrain, dodging foes while looking for the nearest safe haven to await the sunrise.

Of course, an open-world game means nothing if there is no reason to journey into the vast expanses, and while Final Fantasy XV thankfully provides numerous distractions, some are admittedly more successful than others. There’s no denying that many of the quests are fetch-quests which task players with traveling to a location, collecting an item or defeating a foe, and then returning to a quest-giver. Yes, it is difficult to be too excited about these quests. Coupled with the fact that the most common side-quests, the monster hunts which can be picked up from most rest areas, are restricted to only one active hunt at a time, the system feel like it carries an artificial burden which forces players to trek back and forth across Lucis numerous times. At the same time, one of the earliest quests tasks Noctis with finding the hidden arsenal of magical weapons scattered across the world which gives players plenty of opportunities and near constant motivation to wander into the wilderness to explore the beautiful landscape of Lucis. Final Fantasy XV is by no means the perfect open-world game. Still, the game features a myriad of fun and engaging activities which work to build up the world. As I’ve said before, many of these activities are mundane. But the time spent fishing, cooking, camping, and even taking pictures, help the game’s world serve a role in telling the narrative. Rather than a nice feature as in most other open-world games, I would go so far as to argue that Final Fantasy XV better succeeds at making the open-world a critical piece of the game's narrative because of these mundane activities.

One of the biggest peculiarities with Final Fantasy XV is the way that the game manages to perform so strongly in some regards, while faltering so disappointingly in others, many where the Final Fantasy franchise has excelled in the past. SquareEnix has created a beautiful open-world which players will want to spend hours exploring. They took a group of four seemingly uninspired protagonists and managed to build some of the best bonds seen in a Final Fantasy game. They created a captivating villain who players will want to engage with to understand his motives and his plans on a level I would venture has not been seen since Final Fantasy VII’s Sephiroth or Final Fantasy IX's Kuja. And yet, as great as that world is, the second half of the game is under-developed and rushed. They built amazing bonds between the characters, but rather than letting players delve into those characters, that content was seemingly left for DLC. And worst of all, the great potential of the world and villain is squandered by an incoherent narrative which fails to really take advantage of all the pieces and potential that the game has to offer.

Is Final Fantasy XV a good game? If I’m being honest, this is a difficult question for me to answer. I imagine there are many of you who, like me, wanted to love Final Fantasy XV. I wanted this game to be worth the ten years of waiting. I wanted this game to be the perfect merger of the Final Fantasy franchise and the open-world experience that I would want to immerse myself in for hundreds of hours. When I started this review, I stated that Final Fantasy XV has not been worth the ten year wait that fans have endured. But, I venture that there are very few games which are worth such waits. There is no part of me that believes that this version of Final Fantasy XV which players were able to play has been in development for ten years. But still, Final Fantasy XV cannot escape its ten year development cycle. Honestly, if you look at my playtime, I put sixty hours into the first half of the game, ten hours into the second half, and another thirty hours into finishing side-quests and post-game content. I easily got my money’s worth out of it. In an ideal world, Final Fantasy XV would be judged solely on its merits, and not weighted by its pedigree. But that's not the case, and for better or worse, this is a major entry in an iconic franchise. My recommendation? Play Final Fantasy XV, but realize that it is not going to live up to ten years of hype and it is a different type of Final Fantasy game. If you can do that, I think you can appreciate Final Fantasy XV for what it is -- a complex game that is fun and enjoyable, but also a little flawed.


We don't meet people by accident. They are meant to cross our path for a reason.

All images owned by SquareEnix. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=365 BlueGartr Staff Picks - 2016 https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=362 Sat, 31 Dec 2016 19:32:24 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/fdc62c78c4c1a8bacd8c11eceb465305.png As this year draws to a close, I imagine many of you can agree that it is...
As this year draws to a close, I imagine many of you can agree that it is good 2016 is finally over and are eagerly awaiting the fresh start that January 1st will bring. Still, for all its flaws and issues, 2016 was not without its standout games, and it wouldn’t be the end of the year if we didn’t take a moment to reflect on the year in gaming. As ever, I’ve asked the staff here at BlueGartr to think about the games they played over the course of this year and pick the ones which distinguished themselves from the crowd. Welcome to the BlueGartr Staff Picks for Game of the Year, Good Riddance 2016 Edition!

BaneTheBrawler: Stellaris (PC)
Stellaris, hands down. It's not perfect, but it's fun. A 4X game, Stellaris lets you create your own species and government to conquer a galaxy. I say "a" galaxy because it's not the Milky Way, though if you play as the pre-generated Humans (or if they show up in your game) Sol and a few other nearby stars will make an appearance. Like most 4X games, Stellaris has a lot going on, so I don't really want to go into it all here. But if you enjoy customization in your 4X games, this is a good one.


Byrthnoth: Final Fantasy XI (PC, PS2/3, XB360)
This year, FFXI gracefully transitioned into its true endgame, dropping PS2/3 and X-Box support. Missions finished up and we got a glimpse of what SquareEnix's continued support would look like. The reality was not as grim as many of our predictions. SE has continued to put out new armors/items and a battlefield or two every month, and this month we're getting a brand new event.

As fun as Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition was, I have to go with FFXI as the best game I've played this year.


Brill Weave: Legend of Heroes: Trails of Cold Steel II (PS4)
I think 2016 stood out because of the major fuckups that occurred over the course of the year. With No Man's Sky being a massive letdown and Ubisoft running The Division into the ground you had two major titles crash and burn in magnificent fashion. Granted they were both financial successes, these games did a ton of damage to reputations.

There really wasn't anything that stood out for me and said holy fuck buy me now. With that I'll go with Legend of Heroes: Trails of Cold Steel II as my game of the year choice.


Sonomaa: Doom (PC, PS4, XB1), Titanfall 2 (PC, PS4, XB1), Civilization VI (PC), Overwatch (PC, PS4, XB1)
I have to go with Doom as my favorite single player game.

Titanfall 2 had the best single player game with an AI buddy.

Civilization VI is best strategy game.

Overwatch best Multiplayer game since TF2.


Ksandra: Overwatch (PC, PS4, XB1)
I have to go with Overwatch this year, despite not playing for a bit. Most fun I've had in a game in a really long time. It met every single one of my expectations. I wanted a newer TF2, and I got a newer TF2. No complaints.


Ragns: Undertale (PC)
I was late into this but had to because the fucking fans wouldn't shut the fuck up about this game. Best drinking game ever if you follow the 1 shot per feels rule. Also most boopable goat of all the years.


Boyiee: Pokémon Sun/Moon (3DS)
As I've gotten older I've found myself playing games less and less. Days I'm off while the wife is at work where I could easily sit at the computer for upwards of 16 hours are now a thing of the past. I've gone from playing a game like WoW 7 days a week to barely managing 7 hours a week to raid. I bought a new computer and monitor and picked up major titles such as Overwatch, Legion, and BF1 but barely touch them at all. I have the privilege of having a job with a lot of downtime where I could play games and I bought a laptop to do just that, it barely comes out of my bag for more than Amazon and BG. I just can't seem to sit down and play anything or have the patience to play anything for more than maybe an hour or two any more.

Enter Pokémon Sun. Enter nostalgia. Somehow I've found myself involved in this friendly and familiar generation of Pokémon. I'm no breeder, or endgame player, but I somehow spent over 25 hours within the first few days of playing just on the first few islands. I skipped every generation since Diamond/Crystal, but there is just something about it this time around. I find myself using every minute of downtime at work to play, and playing until the battery dies in bed even when I have to be up early the next morning. Randomly doing things such as trying to get a Pikachu or Salamance, or an Eevee evolution I hadn't had or seen before. There is just something about this game this time around that I can't put it down. I haven't had this much satisfaction or enjoyment in a game in years and normally I detest games that are played alone or without someone to at least talk to while playing. I don't know if its just bringing me back to a place I haven't been in a while or if it is just perfectly executed, or both. Hands down my game of the year is Pokémon Sun/Moon.


6souls: Fallout 4: Far Harbor (PC, PS4, XB1)
Proper story and difficulty that were missing from the base game although the ending had no clear cut good/evil. I've put many more hours into Far Harbor than any other piece of content available in the game.

Runner-up - Deus Ex: Mankind Divided

Basically Human Revolution 2, which isn't a bad thing, but it doesn't add much to the overall gameplay. I loved the lore the HR brought and MD expanded upon, but the lack of a clear ending was a disappointment. It's as if SE was getting back at their fans for not wanting to Augment their Pre-order. Also, the single-use microtransactions set a new level of fail and the Breach mini game that was developed while the game was delayed adds nothing to the game other than being a time waster.

Honorable mentions -
The Division - Great single & multiplayer gameplay lvl1 to 30, ending clearly cut to be dlc and not much of a cliffhanger, Dark Zone is complete ass as PVP, game got better with v1.4 but not by much
Skyrim Special Edition - Prettier water, adds nothing to a non-modder, game actually runs worse than the previous version (crash to desktop, unpick-upable items everywhere, general F4 engine quirks)
Nitro+ Blasterz - My favorite fighting game of the year and solid gameplay, unfortunately has a small community due to being an animu fighter
Street Fighter V - Dumbed down enough to make pad play enjoyable, Season 2 seems to be a step in the right direction
Let It Die: Suda51's version of Dark Souls in a f2p concept
Star Trek Online for PS4: Despite having some game-breaking issues that interrupt progression and is clearly missing mechanics found in the PC version, the game is actually fun and adds redeemable lore to the canon
Resident Evil 7: Demo - Make horror horror again
Pokemon Go - Supplemental time waster with clear issues that won't be fixed for a long long time
Ingress - When PoGo turned out to be shit, the oldie picked up the slack and proved that turf wars and creating real-life drama is a lot more fun
Marvel Puzzle Quest - GOTY every year


Serra: Granblue Fantasy (Android, iOS)
Honestly, looking back, this has been a strange year in gaming for me. There is no doubt that there were a myriad of games released this year which, in many cases, I had been anticipating for years. While there were some games (like Fire Emblem: Fates and The Witcher 3’s phenomenal DLC) which met my expectations, others proved themselves unworthy of the anticipation (Final Fantasy XV being the most egregious). That made it especially surprising when a game on the fringes of my radar not only exceeded my expectations, but also carved an enduring place for itself as one of my most played games of 2016. My game of the year is Granblue Fantasy. The not-an-MMO mobile game which draws elements from classic RPGs stood out to me thanks to the beautiful artwork, captivating story, and phenomenal gameplay. It has been my most played game of 2016 and I imagine it will continue to dominate my playtimes into 2017.

Honorable Mentions: Fire Emblem: Fates, Final Fantasy XV (the first half)


Those were the games which stood out to us, but which games helped you make it through the mire that was 2016? Feel free to share your thoughts below or in this year's thread.

Happy New Year, everyone, here's to 2017! ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=362 Destiny: Rise of Iron Review https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=346 Mon, 03 Oct 2016 17:11:57 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/f2a663877304213debd6d150106859f8.png As the summer wraps up and the weather starts to cool, we’re reminded that...
As the summer wraps up and the weather starts to cool, we’re reminded that fall is here. There are certain things you can count on to coincide with the arrival of fall -- the leaves start to change, football season returns, pumpkin-flavored everything permeates everwhere, and gamers get to enjoy the annual release cycle for numerous major franchises. For me, this means it is time for the latest Destiny expansion, Rise of Iron. Rise of Iron was created by a smaller team and is definitely not the substantial and robust content update players were expecting to arrive this fall (many, myself included, expected Bungie to release Destiny 2 this fall), but it still looks to quench the thirst of a player-base that is seemingly always craving new content morsels to devour.
I apologize for the delay in this review. It may have been because I’ve been really busy lately.. or it may have been because I’ve been playing too much Destiny again -- who can really say!?

When Destiny originally released back in the fall of 2014, the story received the brunt of criticisms. However, probably from years of playing Final Fantasy XI, I felt that Bungie had laid a foundation back then for future developments to be built upon. The expansions since then have taken many of the early ideas which were presented in the game’s initial release and used them to tell more robust stories. Rise of Iron builds upon the Iron Banner, a week-long crucible tournament which occurs once a month and which was introduced during the Beta. Lord Saladin, the character who oversees the Iron Banner, reaches out to players, asking them to investigate a new Fallen presence on an isolated mountain known as Felwinter Peak. Saladin has always been a mysterious figure, arriving for a week at a time, vanishing without a trace, and offering weapons named after equally mysterious individuals (a fact Bungie has used in the past to instigate new quests). While Saladin attempts to maintain his secrecy at first, the investigation soon reveals the Fallen have acquired a new technology, SIVA, a relic of Saladin’s past. Long before the Ghost awoke players at the start of the game, Saladin was a member of the first guardians, the Iron Lords. They rediscovered SIVA, a self-replicating nanotechnology developed during the Golden Age which they thought could return humanity to its zenith. However, SIVA spiraled out of control and the Iron Lords sacrificed themselves to seal it away. In Rise of Iron, Saladin tasks players with battling these Fallen who have merged with SIVA while looking for a way to avenge the Iron Lords by stopping the spread of SIVA.

In many ways, Rise of Iron is similar to Destiny’s first two expansions, The Dark Below and House of Wolves. For starters, it is a fairly short campaign -- the main campaign is comprised of only five missions and can be completed in around one to two hours. While the narrative structure of Rise of Iron is better than those two expansions, it is also a step backwards from last year’s The Taken King. The story is mostly told through conversations during load screens or communications from your allies. One of the most noticeable weaknesses is that Lord Saladin (Keith Ferguson) comes across as too formal and stiff and fails to bring the same character and charm to the campaign that Cayde-6 (Nathan Fillion), Commander Zavala (Lance Reddick), and even Eris Morn (Morla Gorrondona) brought to The Taken King. The saving grace is Nolan North who does an exceptional job as the Ghost and has some especially poignant and emotional moments during this expansion. Still, the characters weren't the biggest flaw with Rise of Iron. Was it nice to learn about Saladin’s past? Sure, but in the end, the campaign feels like a fairly irrelevant side-story which doesn’t really add that much to Destiny’s narrative. Additionally, given the focus of Rise of Iron, I can’t help feeling that it would have helped develop Saladin and the expansion itself if Saladin had been more involved in the conflict against SIVA and the Fallen. I’ve mentioned before how Bungie would benefit from introducing NPCs to Destiny’s missions, but given the way Saladin talks about his allies and his personal burdens, this shortcoming is especially noticeable and detrimental in Rise of Iron.

Like those earlier expansions, the majority of the content of Rise of Iron focuses on a single enemy race -- in this case, the Fallen. After the initial skirmish, the Fallen forces begin to augment themselves and their technology with SIVA. These Fallen, dubbed the Splicers, exhibit new appearances and abilities which are upgrades over the typical Fallen encounters. Unfortunately, due in part to the limited number of Fallen enemy types, this change feels like a less challenging version of the Taken encountered last year. Compared to The Taken King, there’s no doubt that Rise of Iron lacks the same scope and breadth. Whereas The Taken King posed a system-wide threat, the Splicers and SIVA are mostly restricted to Earth. In all fairness, Rise of Iron was reportedly developed in nine months by a small team, so this smaller campaign is somewhat expected. Similar to The Taken King, completing the main campaign then opens up a number of additional quests. Honestly, having spent a lot of time with open-world games lately, I actually like the approach employed by Bungie -- forcing players to push through the campaign before allowing them to explore the world adds a sense of urgency and importance to the central campaign.

Rise of Iron also introduces players to a new social space, the Iron Temple, and a new area known as the Plaguelands. The Iron Temple opens up once players secure the outpost and serves as the base of operations for the campaign. Visually, the Iron Temple draws on knightly symbolism that has represented Saladin and the Iron Banner the past two years. Similar to the Reef before it, the Iron Temple contains new NPCs and quest givers as well as staples such as a Cryptarch, Vault, and Bounty Tracker. The Plaguelands builds off the familiar Cosmodrome, except now covered in snow. Only two areas are reused, however, and most of the Plaguelands are a new sight for players. The Plaguelands are covered in glowing technological vines to represent the ever-present SIVA infection and are littered with structures built by the Splicers and the remnants of the materials used in their construction.

Rise of Iron also offers players one new strike, two revisited strikes, and a new arena known as Archon’s Forge. The Taken King looked to break the bullet-sponge mentality of boss fights and presented new battle mechanics, but strangely, these fights seem to take a step backwards. While there are new mechanics involved in these three strikes, the final encounters require working through these added elements while repeatedly shooting at a boss. For instance, the newest strike, The Wretched Eye, sends players after a Splicer Priest while avoiding an impervious Ogre it has been experimenting on. Honestly, constantly avoiding the Ogre is more of an annoyance rather than a satisfying obstacle to overcome. Archon’s Forge is an interesting arena with some promise, but which falls short in many other ways. Similar to the Court of Oryx before it, the Forge requires players to farm triggers to spawn a variety of bosses. Unfortunately, due to inventory restrictions and the way Bungie has designed the triggers, players can only carry one trigger at a time. Bungie has since introduced a mechanism to get at least one trigger a day and increased their drop rate while battling in the Forge, but it is still not the best system. Worse, the Forge lacks the challenging mechanics that made Court of Oryx or even the Prison of Elders fun. Instead, each battle is merely a matter of mowing down every opponent present until a boss spawns and then rapidly dishing out enough damage to quickly take down the boss. The Forge also suffers from Destiny’s inability to easily group with people interested in the same activity. This is especially irritating if you’re attempting to initiate one of the higher-level encounters which require a crowd. Because of the way Destiny’s instances populate, you’ll often find yourself alone in the Forge and forced to exit and reenter in hopes of encountering a crowd.

For Destiny's most hardcore players, the most drawing element, and activity we'll inevitably revisit for innumerable hours is the new raid, Wrath of the Machine. Wrath of the Machine tasks players with delving into a Splicer den in the Plaguelands to deal a crippling blow to their efforts in the region. In some ways, Wrath of the Machine highlights the skills Bungie has developed in creating raids since the start of Destiny. Wrath of the Machine is a challenging endeavor which requires greater communication than previous raids. It introduces new mechanics, requires players to work together and in smaller teams, and continues the trend of putting greater pressure on each individual member to carry his or her weight. For instance, to enter Wrath of the Machine, players must divide into groups of two, and in each pair, each member must perform a different task. While this translates to three people doing essentially the same task, each one is mostly isolated and forced to stand on their own skill. Bosses present an interesting and challenging dichotomy -- does Bungie create bosses which are entirely mechanism dependent (such as Oryx in the King’s Fall raid) which means that players don't face any easier task for achieving higher levels, or do they rely on HP and damage-penalties based on level, which essentially turn bosses into bullet sponges. With Rise of Iron, Bungie has done a better job of balancing mechanics with the damage relationship. While there are mechanics to the boss fights, they are still mostly damaged through conventional means. Honestly, while Wrath of the Machine is currently a lot of fun, it is probably Destiny’s third best raid. While this sounds great, the problem is, Destiny only has four raids. I worry that Wrath of the Machine will end up feeling like Crota’s End in that players will feel an obligation to quickly and mindlessly burn through it in thirty minutes each week rather than repeatedly revisiting the raid for the challenge and accomplishment.

As ever, Bungie has also introduced new features to the Crucible for players who wish to test their skills against each other. For starters, players have access to a new game-mode called Supremacy. Defeating another player causes them to drop a crest which must be picked up to acquire points. Collecting an ally's crest denies the enemy points while picking up enemy crests rewards your team with points. Therefore, what matters isn’t the number of enemies you defeat, but the number of crests you pick up. As a result, someone like me, who typically hangs back with a sniper rifle or scout rifle with one eye glued to my radar, is at something of a disadvantage. Supremacy definitely rewards players who are more aggressive and willing to get close to their opponents. The second major addition to the Crucible is a feature players have clamored for since before Destiny’s release -- Private Matches. Players can now easily set up matches with their friends, dictate the game-mode, map, and various other rules. It doesn’t offer complete freedom, but it certainly provides enough options to satisfy players. I’ll be honest, I came into Destiny because of my countless hours playing Halo games. I love spending time in the Crucible and even if Bungie didn’t add any new features, every match is a new experience for me which is one of the things which keeps bringing me back to Destiny. That said, while I’m not the biggest fan of Supremacy, the fact that Bungie has listened to its fans and delivered on one of our biggest requests is definitely something that makes me smile from ear to ear.

As I said before, Rise of Iron is a smaller expansion built by a smaller team. Bungie has stated that they drew on nostalgia to inspire this expansion, and it certainly works. This expansion sends players to explore a new version of the first area they explored, tasks them with battling an advanced version of the first enemy encountered, brings back Year One favorites like the Gjallarhorn and Thorn, and even allows players to build an upgraded version of the first gun they used when starting out. In many ways, nostalgia is great, and it certainly works to keep players happy. On the other hand, part of me can’t help feeling that Bungie was looking to appeal to our nostalgia in hopes that we would ignore the delay in Destiny 2 and the flaws of Rise of Iron. I’ll be honest, I’ve poured a ton of time into Rise of Iron, so I definitely can’t say that it is a bad expansion. But part of the success undoubtedly comes from the fact that the refined gameplay mechanics are still present and are still capable of carrying the Destiny experience. As I’ve been working on this review and thinking how I wanted to evaluate Rise of Iron, I came back to thinking what role it is meant to fulfill. I think many would agree that Rise of Iron is intended to hold us over until the eventual release of Destiny 2 next year. Therefore, the big question that remains is whether there will be enough content to satisfy players for the next year. Right now, it's impossible to say. We already know there are mysteries and secrets which haven't been unlocked and Bungie has stated that they hope to avoid the massive lulls in content that affected previous years. Last year, Bungie promised players they would do a better job of balancing weapons (especially in regards to the Crucible). Give that they did a far better job in Year Two, I’m willing to give them the benefit of the doubt to see if Rise of Iron is just an introduction to Year Three which will continue to be supplemented in the coming months.


Prove yourself worth and the Iron Lords will rise again.

All images owned by Bungie. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=346 Granblue Fantasy Review -- AKA, the BlueGartr Guild Recruitment Drive! https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=338 Wed, 31 Aug 2016 05:24:41 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/94f54cd393c1c13c8cd59d3b891f23f8.png I had a strange revelation a few weeks ago. Actually, two strange...
I had a strange revelation a few weeks ago. Actually, two strange revelations. One, I was about to spend a lot of time at airports and away from home. And two, as if wasn’t already, my gaming time was about to consist of a single, overwhelming, and emphatically suffocating entity -- Granblue Fantasy. This put me in a predicament. Do I write a review on a topic of interest (perhaps on rankings in gaming..), or do I admit that mobile games can be both fun and addicting? Given the number of times I have spoken ill of Final Fantasy Record Keeper, you can imagine my conundrum. Of course, the obvious third option would be to ignore responsibility and just binge on more Granblue. Well, given that airplanes don’t all provide Wi-Fi (and I’m certainly not about to pay in the cases where it is provided just so I can feed my addiction..), here we are. Welcome to my review of Granblue Fantasy!

Granblue Fantasy tells the story of Gran/Djetta, a mostly silent protagonist who takes on the role of the player’s character, and his/her crew of skyfarers. The player receives a strange letter from his/her father which mentions the “end of the sky.” While preparing to leave Zinkenstill, the player’s home, a mysterious blue-haired girl named Lyria and her protector Katalina appear. The two are being pursued by the Erste Empire due to Lyria’s connection to the world’s primal beasts, hidden creatures which possess incredible and devastating powers. After escaping, the player teams up with them and sets out on a journey to reach the end of the sky and to protect Lyria. Central to this journey is the crew which the player builds consisting of a number of story-relevant characters and over three-hundred (give or take) randomly available members. This journey takes players across the world, the Phantagrande Skydom, as they traipse across the sky, battle primal beasts, confront the machinations of the Erste Empire, and attempt to learn more of Lyria’s mysterious powers.

While Granblue Fantasy certainly has an intriguing story and a wealth of fascinating characters and developments, what keeps it interesting and keeps drawing me back, personally, is the game’s addicting character progression and surprisingly detailed battle system. Players are able to choose from one of ten classic RPG jobs, such as Fighter, Priest, Thief, and Wizard. Reaching the maximum level of two jobs (level twenty) unlocks a specific Tier II job -- for instance, capping Knight and Lancer unlocks the Dragoon job. This formula continues for Tier III jobs with additional jobs unlocked by completing specific quests and requirements. Each job has two to three abilities, with higher tier jobs possessing more powerful abilities. Players are also able to equip a support ability from one of their other unlocked jobs. In addition to leveling jobs, players separately level their overall rank which provides additional attack and health. While Granblue’s job system is fairly robust, the true depth of character progression comes through the game’s weapon grid. In addition to a primary weapon, players are able to equip nine support weapons which provide perks and boosts to health and attack. Players can also equip one primary and four support summons which can provide additional benefits. A large part of the challenge comes from working to build a grid which harmonizes these numerous choices. For instance, doing the most damage isn’t simply about equipping the weapons with the highest attack rating, but requires taking into account the element of your primary weapon, the elemental composition of your party, the types of attack perks on your weapons, and equipping summons which can increase the effect of those perks. Maybe I’ll feel differently once I reach the maximum level (although I don’t actually know if there is a maximum level..), but part of what keeps me coming back to Granblue is that I feel like I’m constantly making progress. Whether it’s improving my weapon grid by powering up my existing weapons, acquiring new weapons and perks, or just leveling my overall level, every time I boot up the game, I feel like I’m doing something which is making me more powerful.

Of course, a great character progression system means nothing if there’s nowhere to enjoy the progress you’ve made. Thankfully, Granblue’s battle system is a nostalgic reminder of older RPGs. Players enter battle with up to four characters with two additional characters in reserve if necessary. These characters can be attackers, defenders, healers, or special characters which fulfill a variety of rolls. Combat occurs through a hybrid turn-based system. Selecting attack directs the player’s party to attack followed by the opponent(s). Between turns, players can use abilities, summons, and heal. Players and enemies also gain access to powerful charge attacks which build up through repeated attacks. Charge attacks can be chained together to deliver even more devastating damage to opponents. Additionally, every attack and offensive ability falls under one of six elements -- water, fire, wind, earth, light, and dark. The four primary elements form a circle where each element is strong against one while weak against another while light and dark form their own balance. Each character is assigned a single element while players can change their element by switching their primary weapon. Similar to Granblue’s character progression, excelling in combat requires synergizing characters, abilities, and elemental advantages.

As this is a freemium game, another central aspect (read: addictingly aggravating aspect) is the game’s lottery system which can be used to acquire characters, weapons, and summons. While progression through the story provides a full party, players looking to maximize their performance must often rely on random chance to acquire some of the best characters. Characters, summons, and abilities fall under one of three (four in the case of weapons and summons) classifications -- SSR, SR, and R. SSR are the most rare and typically most desirable and powerful. It’s worth noting, however, players do not need to spend money to acquire these characters. The game provides means to participate in the draw system even without spending money. Additionally, although it requires a fair bit of patience, it is even possible to game the draw system to acquire a guaranteed SSR character. While the game is produced Cygames, a fairly young company, longtime fans of the Final Fantasy franchise will invariably feel a nostalgic draw to the game’s artwork. Hideo Minaba, character designer for Final Fantasy VI and Final Fantasy IX, beautifully depicts the characters and summons. In the same vein, Nobuo Uematsu is behind game’s excellent soundtrack. The game also boasts a number of exceptional voice actors behind the characters during cutscenes and in combat. As far as mobile games go, Granblue is probably the most gorgeous and best sounding game available.

I would be remiss if I praised Granblue Fantasy while ignoring the game’s grind -- after all, there's a reason fans have nicknamed it “Grindblue Fantasy.” As I’ve mentioned, Granblue has a number of mechanisms which rely heavily on random chance. In addition to the game’s draw system, even acquiring loot from bosses is heavily reliant on the game’s RNG. Sometimes it can be generous (the game was throwing SSR event weapons at me two events ago), other times it can be brutal (this week, I emptied a treasure pool from over one-thousand five-hundred items to one-hundred fifteen before acquiring the single item I needed). There is no doubt that players of Granblue will spend a lot of time grinding and repeating the same events or fights over and over. However, as I mentioned earlier, one reason this doesn't feel painfully tedious, to me at least, is that the game still provides a sense of progress during these grinds.

As enjoyable as it is to progress through Granblue’s story, one of the peculiar aspects of the game is how often the story takes a backseat to other priorities -- namely the myriad of events Cygames throws at players. Like similar freemium games, Granblue limits the number of actions players can perform within a given time-frame. Most actions require AP to perform while raids require EP. The AP cap increases over time as players acquire more levels and recovers at one point every five minutes while EP is capped at five and recovers at one point every twenty minutes. Players who run out can use items (which can either be purchased or acquired through playing the game) to refill their AP and EP stocks. Honestly, from what I’ve heard, Granblue is one of the more generous games in this regard. To this day, I have yet to purchase one of these items and have a healthy stock even after burning through AP items the past two events. Seemingly every week, Cygames offers a new event for players to spend their AP and/or EP. Many of these events are raids, which, similar to the ones available at all times, allow up to thirty players to join in a single battle. Some events will focus on a single element and provide at least one SSR item or character for players to pursue while others offer more variety and options. For instance, the Rise of the Beasts event offers players the choice of four opponents, one of each primary element. Completing actions in the event rewards points which can be used to purchase items. Since all points are shared, a water user can repeatedly battle the fire opponent to acquire points to purchase water weapons. One of the most popular events is the monthly tournament, the Guild Wars. Players can join guilds and, typically once a month, complete in an event to acquire the most points. These events are especially popular as they provide a guaranteed mechanism to acquire powerful SSR characters -- albeit an incredibly grindy mechanism.. I’ll be honest with you all, one of my motivations in writing this review was in hopes of attracting more individuals to join our guild. Although we have our share of fervent players (read: addicts), we do not have the numbers to truly make an impact during Guild Wars and could use some more passionate players (read: addicts).

I will be straight with you all, I have definitely been one of those people who has made fun of the Final Fantasy Record Keeper crowd on numerous occasions. While I tried my hand at it, Record Keeper just didn’t do it for me. However, since Granblue Fantasy received an English option, I have been a frequent player. It is honestly the first mobile game that I’ve played for an extended period of time. Yes, Granblue Fantasy has its flaws -- there is no doubt that the game is built heavily around randomness and grind and Cygames has stifled third-party quality-of-life improvements while, at best, saying they’ve got things in the works. Still, for me personally, the pros far outweigh the cons. In addition to the constant feeling of progress I described above, another thing that keeps me coming back is the stellar community we have developed here on BlueGartr. While there is currently only a handful of us who really play the game at a heavy level, everyone has been helpful and tries to share any knowledge we have. Whether it is here on the forum or through Discord, there is typically always someone around who can answer a question or hop in to assist during a tough raid. Honestly, playing Granblue Fantasy reminds me a lot of playing Final Fantasy XI -- not just from a gameplay or perpetual-grind perspective, but also for the phenomenal communal aspect. If you’re looking for a fun mobile game or a new addiction, although it isn’t the most straightforward game to install, I hope you’ll give Granblue Fantasy a chance. At a minimum, you owe it to yourself to install the game so you can read the cavity-inducingly adorable Grand Blues comic series.

“...a foreboding but gentle breeze beckons the start of a new adventure.”


All images owned by Cygames. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=338 On Challenges https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=328 Sun, 31 Jul 2016 22:20:00 GMT Image: https://bucket.bluegartr.com/6cb40f2eab2fcfe6d2cbd7694f80e5ec.png One lay fallen beneath the colossus, which was suspended a few feet in the...
One lay fallen beneath the colossus, which was suspended a few feet in the air. In the corner of the arena, the five surviving challengers gathered, hunched over in fear and apprehension. They were weak, and after countless hours they were exhausted. Still, they knew this was their best chance. They had to try. The group charged forward, battling not just their mammoth opponent, but against a clock which ticked down its final minutes, unrelenting and unstopping. Their efforts were for naught -- two were struck down too early by their adversary while the remainder were forced to watch in despair at their weakness and inability to deliver the final fifteen percent of damage needed to topple their gargantuan adversary. This was my group’s eleventh failed attempt at beating the notorious airship BC of Chains of Promathia. It would eventually take around fifteen attempts to beat a fight I still consider one of the greatest challenges I have overcome in gaming.

Similar to so many other things, gaming has undergone drastic changes over the years. In this modern era of gaming, games have saves and checkpoints, health can regenerate, and few games can bury players under a mountain of difficulty that prevents them from progressing for days, months, and/or years. Honestly, many of the earliest games I played were so challenging, I never actually beat them until much later in life -- and I imagine many of you share similar stories. For instance, I didn’t beat the first game I ever played, the original Super Mario Bros., until I went to college. What made those early games so challenging? An undeniable element of the early era of gaming was that many games threw players in with little guidance or direction. Some of the best games, like the aforementioned Super Mario Bros., were designed to gradually teach players mechanics so they could quickly learn the elements of the game. However, others often left players to their own devices and left them to sink or swim. Consider the original Mega Man games. At the start of each game, players are given the choice of six to eight bosses with no information on their abilities or difficulties. While each level typically increased in difficulty, a player picking up the game for the first time would have no idea which levels were easier to progress through, which bosses were more challenging to tackle, or which levels were next to impossible for a beginner without abilities from another stage (such as using the Rush Jet Item-2 to clear Heat Man’s stage.).

Of course, there’s also no denying that inexperience played a role in making some of those early ventures into gaming especially difficult. Even years ago, many games were incredibly complex and forced players to deal with new or unfamiliar information. While some of this could be picked up through the normal progression of a game, there was also a lot which required experimentation and understanding these complex mechanisms. During many of my early forays into RPGs, whenever I would hit a boss or enemy which was too powerful, my solution was simply to run in circles, level my characters, and then plow through the boss. There was no finesse or elegance in my approach to these games, only brute force (and possibly Haste). A great example of this was the first time I fought Seymour on Mount Gagazet in Final Fantasy X. I can still remember running in circles on the slopes preceding the encounter to level my characters and to get all my characters and summons into Overdrive mode. Honestly, it wasn’t until I played Final Fantasy XI that I really learned and understood stats, buffs, and debuffs. Since becoming more knowledgeable about RPG mechanics, anytime I play through Final Fantasy X, Seymour is just another step along the journey.

At the same time, I also don’t feel that new gamers feel the same pressures which were present during earlier eras in gaming. The original Legend of Zelda was the first game I ever played which had a save system which allowed for gradual progress. Prior to that, every other game I played was an all-or-nothing challenge. Not only did players have to finish games with a set number of lives, but gamers also had to beat them in a single sitting. Back then, dying and starting over from the beginning was the norm, and no one questioned it. Now, players only need to clear a level once, can start from checkpoints within a level, and can start and stop whenever they desire (for the most part). The internet and ease of access to information has also undoubtedly helped make gaming become less challenging. The first game my brother and I ever beat was The Legend of Zelda, but we relied on the Nintendo Fun Club map to assist us, and we undoubtedly died countless times. Conversely, I only beat The Adventure of Link in college (when I decided to play through every Zelda game in a single year). Prior to that, the closest I ever got was miraculously beating Thunderbird once, only for Dark Link to slaughter me years before the internet taught me the corner crouching trick.

While there’s no doubt that certain games have become less challenging, there are also games which have embraced parts of the old challenging nature of gaming -- or at least offer the option to players. Many games provide varying difficulties to provide added obstacles for those looking for an extra challenge. For instance, first person shooters typically throw additional enemies with better weapons and abilities at players on higher difficulties. In Destiny, in addition to adding more powerful enemies and new mechanics, Bungie removes the ability to raise allies during each encounter of the game’s higher-level versions of the raids for players looking to tackle the hardest content. While the most recent entries in the Fire Emblem franchise, Awakening and Fates, are easier than the earlier games, players can choose to enable perma-death to remind themselves of one feature which made those games so punishing. Other games even allow players to tweak settings to adjust the challenge. In Bravely Default and Bravely Second, players can increase the encounter rate while reducing (or eliminate altogether) the experience and money earned. Of course, no discussion about embracing the challenging aspect of gaming would be complete without mentioning the Souls franchise. I will admit that I have only really played the first Dark Souls game, in part, because I can still remember how long it took me to beat the Asylum Demon.. That said, for many gamers, the brutal and punishing nature of the Souls franchise is a fond reminder of the challenges gaming used to offer. No other franchise is as unforgiving and satisfying to finish as the Souls franchise.

Given that modern games are so often perceived to be easier than they used to be, it should come as no surprise that many gamers have resorted to creating their own challenges. In Destiny, one of the most challenging weapons to use is No Land Beyond, a bolt-action sniper rifle which can be equipped as a primary weapon. Some of the best players will take this unforgiving weapon into the game’s more difficult content, both PvE and PvP, to test themselves. One of the more famous challenges in gaming is the Nuzlocke challenge in Pokémon. The premise is that players are only allowed to capture the first Pokémon encountered in an area, and any Pokémon which faints is considered dead and cannot be used again. Similarly, players of Fire Emblem games have turned to not restarting to ensure the original intention of perma-death could not be easily remedied. Players looking for an added challenge when playing Final Fantasy X have developed the No Sphere Grid Challenge -- a challenge that requires players never use the Sphere Grid to level or develop their characters. An even harder version of this challenge is the No Sphere Grid, No Aeons, No Overdrive challenge which sounds like it would be impossible and downright unenjoyable..

At the same time, gamers have also sought to bring self-imposed challenges to older games. I previously mentioned the Wooden Sword Challenge in the original Legend of Zelda which requires players to only use the Wooden Sword Link acquires immediately upon starting the game. Another challenge is the Three Hearts challenge which limits players to only the three initial hearts in various Zelda games. Since so many games involve a progression, where characters get stronger the deeper into a game a player progresses, many of these challenges are built around restrictions which maintain those initial powers or characteristics. Players looking to heighten the challenge of the original Mega Man games can attempt the Mega Buster Challenge which requires players only use Mega Man’s initial weapon and none of the powers acquired from the Robot Masters (although I wonder if some of the final stages are actually possible without those powers..). The older entries in the Final Fantasy franchise are no stranger to player imposed challenges. Whether it is the Four White Mage Challenge from the original Final Fantasy or the Four Job Fiesta in Final Fantasy V, gamers have been looking for ways to play through these classics in new and challenging ways.

For many, this modern era in gaming is viewed as easier and less challenging than the era so many of us grew up during. While yes, there are new technologies and changes which have made gaming easier, we can’t deny that the more time we spend as gamers, the more skilled we become. And even with all the developments which have occurred, gamers can still find ways to add extra difficulty to the games they play. Personally, I’m glad I don’t have a collection of games which I repeatedly fail to advance through. At the same time, there’s something to be said for overcoming a challenge which has slammed you down repeatedly. Final Fantasy XI was definitely brutally challenging during Chains of Promathia, but without a doubt, overcoming those challenges with a close group of friends was part of what made Final Fantasy XI so memorable. ]]> Serra https://www.bluegartr.com/blog.php?b=328