Recently 4A games and Deep silver remade their cult classic post apocalyptic shooter, Metro 2033. This remakes biggest selling point was that the developers had completely re made the game from the ground up instead of just converting the old engine, this allows for a better looking game that also performs better on lower power systems. The last light engine allowed new features to be implemented into the game, things like the weapon customization and different play style modes (one more action oriented with standard shooter combat, and the other a more realist style with limited resources and an emphasis on staying hidden and taking out enemies in the shadows.)
They did a very good job keeping the original games ominous atmosphere and even intensify it with the improved graphics and audio (I am personally a big fan of the lighting effects this engine has.) which will still give you that "I've found a very special game" feeling every time you play. As is always important in shooters the guns in Metro 2033 redux are exceptionally nice feeling, Revolvers have a slight delay while the cylinder rotates, smg's sound snappy but don't handle like they're made of paper, shotguns pack such a punch you can almost swear you felt recoil when you fired it, assault rifles feel naturally balanced between power and control and finally sniper rifles look intimidating and sound even more so with each shot ringing out full seconds after firing it.
The new engine included an improved ai system, upon my short time playing a bit of both the new and old version of 2033, I noticed myself having to think more tactically as my enemies now swapped cover and worked together to flank me.
As the final month of the year rolls around so does another thing, holiday themed game events. A commonplace in payday 2 seasonal events offer players a chance to play a special holiday themed heist, which also unusually rewards the player with a limited time mask only obtainable through the heist.
This years Christmas heist is a particularly interesting one. You are tasked with rescuing Vlad's (a criminally insane contact in the game) alcoholic brother in law from his downed plane and rescue as much of the cocaine he was transporting before the cops get a hold on it. The heist takes place at a logging mill and the evidence of a plane crash is evident, burning fuselage litters the map standing out bright orange from the dark greens and browns of the trees creating a setting that looks straight out of an action movie. The layout of the map is very interesting with multiple viable strategies from holing up in the logging warehouse in a "king of the hill" way, or if your team is fairly fast the trees and rock piles provide ample cover to dodge between. The mission starts with you having to escort the drunk pilot to a safe location and signal the escape chopper before the cops show up, after that it's simply holding off the police while simultaneously trying to recover the scattered boxes of coke in the forest.
Along with the heist this years event came with 4 user designed Christmas masks themed after things like the Grinch and the homicidal robot Santa from the popular show Futurama, and if everyone on your team are all wearing different holiday masks and you play the heist on the hardest difficulty you can search find a special mask or rather beard that's modeled after the producer of the games beard. Everyone was also immediately given a new weapon in the form of the iconic Chicago typewriter tommy gun (think 1940's-1950's era mafia). The gun is fairly decent with medium damage and accuracy and a very large ammo capacity, to balance this the gun has awful stability making very difficult to provide sustained fire unless stability improving modifications are added to the gun.
This years update was definitely a fun one with lots of good new content added and even came paired a long with a payday themed version of "12 days of Christmas" which you can listen to here.
Medal of Honor Warfighter is a first person shooter developed by Danger Close and published by Electronic Arts. Warfighter is the most recent installment of the Medal of Honor series and has been overlooked by many as another generic shooter with a few neat gimmicks.
Warfighter has a multiplayer mode that on the surface seems fairly basic but once you get into it shows all of its colors. The most intriguing part of the multiplayer is the fireteam buddy system, this pairs two players of the same team together and encourages you to work with one another by allowing you to respawn on your buddy, replenish your health and ammo and when your buddy scores points around you, you also get a small bonus. In order to help keep you with your buddy the game constantly shows you their silhouette (which can be a life saver in some situations) and also silhouettes the person who kills them allowing you to "avenge" your buddy, if you can kill the enemy player before the silhouette disappears your buddy gets a reduced respawn time.
Now moving on to the player and their weapons. The first thing I need to say about warfighters guns are that they look, sound and handle amazingly. The guns are all based off real world variants that the different nationalities use. The customization is fairly in depth allowing you to change the length of the guns barrel, the flash hider used and the orientation of the weapons stock allowing for a numerous variations of the same gun that perform uniquely. The game lets you start off picking any soldier from any weapon class and then changes the order in which soldiers and weapons unlock for you based on who you choose. The soldier classes are the assaulter (uses highly adaptable assault rifles), Demolitions (heavily armored and uses short range high caliber carbines), Point man (uses assault rifles similar to the assaulter but moves faster and has flash-bang grenades instead of lethal grenades), Heavy Gunner (uses light machine guns to provide suppression), Special Ops (very similar to point man but geared more towards short range conflicts), and the sniper (not much to say about them they use sniper rifles and designated marksmen rifles to fight from a distance).
The multiplayer mode has your generic modes like team death match and capture the flag but has an interesting mode called hot spot. Hot spot has one team try to defend one of five bomb caches at a time while the other team tries to destroy it, the catch is that the defending team knows where the next bomb cache will be before the attackers do allowing them to setup a defensive position.
Warfighter is a great game that was overlooked by many due to bad review at launch because of un-addressed launch bugs. While there are still a few active servers (around 2 to 3 full servers on weekdays and around 5 on the weekend) it could be more lively. The game is pretty fun to play and if you can find it for cheap i'd recommend getting it.
Teleglitch is top down perspective survival horror game with an interesting lighting system. You play as an android tasked with exploring multiple space stations that have lost contact and weird things are happening (think of the game Dead Space) the weird part is that each station has key rooms in the same spot but smaller rooms and corridors are completely randomized making each play through moderately different. The interesting thing that the light does is that it acts as a spawn for enemies, you project a single light source that illuminates a large area around you but if a column or wall blocks your lights way its pitch black and allows enemies (from spider mutants, zombies, androids and deranged humans) to spawn.
You start the first level with only a pistol with sixty rounds and 3 bombs, you can pick up other weapons from item bins randomly littered throughout the stage or pick them up off of dead enemies (same goes for health items) its relatively hard to aim in the game but it fortunately doesn't take much to kill most enemies in the game, it being usually around a shot or two.
The other mode in the game is the arena mode, in this mode you first pick one weapon set of the nine available giving the user a variation of play style choices and then has you fight against a set wave of specific enemies in a set environment but randomized level until you can make your way through all 4 environments trying for your best score
Counter Strike Global Offensive is a sort of touch up on the enormously popular team shooter Counter Strike Source. In Global Offensive they have continuously updated the game adding things like weapon skins to trade among your friends and practical things like weapon balances and other adjustments.
The Operation updates are limited time events that after purchasing a ticket to players get access to a new pack of maps (some created by community members others by valve.) along with the chance to get new weapon skins or get old ones that aren't normally being given out anymore. Op Vanguard brings 6 new maps: Bazaar, a classic to counter strike looking Mediterranean streets map, Facade, A mostly indoors criminal headquarters setting hidden in a shipping yard, Marquis, Modeled after the streets and subway of France, Season, a Japanese bio-technology research lab, Workout, a high class modern looking gym and finally Back Alley, alleyways near the docks leads to lots of corridor fighting.
Vanguard also updates my favorite game mode arms race (first to get 2 kills with every weapon in the game wins) adding 3 new maps to it which is great because the selection isn't a very big one so new maps are very welcome. And it adds a campaign mode which is just a string of scenarios (from bomb defusing/planting, to hostage rescues on all of the maps in operation vanguard.
Warning viewer discretion is advised, Hotline Miami is a very violent game that is not suitable for all audiences.
For those of you who haven't read my review Hotline Miami is a top down pixilized psychedelic murderfest set in the 80's when the mafia scene was large and government conspiracies were afoot.
I don't quite know what it is about Hotline Miami but this game easily found its way into my list of favorite games from the second I started playing it. Everything about this game was executed near perfectly from the quick twitch gameplay to the best soundtrack I've ever heard in a game. While on the surface the game looks like nothing more than a murderous gore filled rampage the plot is actually very rich and interesting, the only catch is that you the player are given key parts and you have to piece together what you have and fill in the blanks to realize what's really going on and to find out who's leaving you those messages that send you on those murder sprees.
Moving on from the story part i'd like to address the other reason I love this game. For a game that only Took me around 4-5 hours to beat HM has yet to bore me in the 13 hours I've logged on it, I always find myself coming back to it to try and beat my and others high scores or just to kill a few minutes while im waiting around.
For those of you who don't know Payday 2 is a co-op shooter that has you playing as one of 4 masked criminals on a variety of heists. The Hoxton breakout is part of crimefest an event put on by the games studio that included tons of free content in the form of new masks, weapons, enemies and of course breaking out Hoxton
Hoxton was one of the four original members of the payday heist group until between the events of payday 1 and 2 he was ratted out arrested and since then has been waiting in jail, until now. The heist starts with you intercepting a convoy leading Hoxton to a retrial escorting him into an armored truck and guiding the truck down the streets of D.C. The second part has your crew help Hoxton break into the F.B.I. and search their servers for whoever had him arrested. Upon completion of the heist you're allowed to now finally play as the foul mouthed British man that is Hoxton (the Hoxton already in the group who is Dallas' brother has been renamed to Houston) you also unlock a toothbrush shank melee weapon.
The crimefest included a host of other new features including a revamped skill system, the previously mentioned new masks and weapons, the ability to change the time of day on some heists, and a few other things (The game is also currently on sale for 75% off and the original for 90% off I recommend grabbing both.)
I apologize about the picture I don't know why it looks weird and the constant option changes but i'm not used to recording games and wasn't aware on how much of impact it had on system performance.
Left 4 Dead 2 is an action oriented zombie shooter game that's styled like a series of movies. You take control of one of 4 survivors, Ellis: the stereotypical gun toting red neck, Coach: a chubby guy who's got a heart of gold, Nick: the sleazy gambler and finally Rochelle a low level reporter who was reporting on the evacuation when she got stuck with all of them. The game features 6 mini campaigns taking you through environments that vary from carnivals filled with zombie clowns to the swampy bayous.
Unlike most zombie games l4d2 isn't a horror survival its an action packed bloodbath where you and some friends mow down hordes of zombies as they barrel towards you at a full sprint. To complete this task the game provides you with a multitude of pistols, rifles, shotguns, a wide variety of melee weapons, and even in some cases a grenade launcher. But when there's powerful weapons there's powerful zombie, these zombies are known as "special infected" and include zombies with super agility, acidic spit, super strength among many others.
I've personally found left 4 dead 2 to be a very fun and enjoyable game with many just barely made it and action hero moments, especially when you've got a group of friends to play with as the game was made with the intention of co-operative play. I'd highly recommend getting this game and it goes on sale frequently and on occasion is even free to download and keep forever.
Warface is a free-to-play first person shooter by crytek (creators of the crysis series) that focuses on player interaction and co-operation. When I last reviewed Warface it was fairly slow and laggy but since then has been refined and patched until it was finally mostly lag free and ran smoothly.
Most of the core assets of the game (user interface, graphics and map design) has stayed the same but there has been changes to the stats of guns and other items as well as other guns and maps added into the game since full release.
The most major change about the game is their choice to switch from using a gaming social media site called g-face and switched it over to steam. This overall was a very smart decision as g-face was a sort of failed at launch type of website that only had warface as a playable game. The switch to steam however helped make the game much stabler (due to being given access to much better servers to host the game on) and a way larger amount of people will see warface on steam vs g-face meaning a higher amount of people will download the game.
The game has more or less remained the same with some nice improvements added to make it even more appealing so if you have a computer that can handle it and you have some time to kill I would definitely recommend you play this game
Civ 5 is a turn based strategy game where you settle your people and manage your resources until you've built an empire and if you so wish rule the world with an iron fist or coexist peacefully with your neighbors. Throughout the game you get to build your own empire choosing what cultural aspects you want to focus on like science and religion or if you want to be passive or violent and based on those you can develop certain technologies or open up more job opportunities.
Now of course like real life you're going to make friends and enemies usually through diplomacy and "gifts" (bribery) you can get most other empires (which aren't historically accurate since the Mayans can declare war on Washington and the U.S.) to co-operate with you. But there will always be a few empires who prefer neutrality or just downright hate you (usually the Mayans) and with them all you can do is try keep the situation non-violent unless you're sure you can beat them in a war.
The game plays very simply all you need is a mouse but the amount of depth the game has is truly staggering your choice from where you settle to what you research can greatly vary with each game which gives civ 5 amazing replay value.
Octodad DC is an octopus simulator (kind of) by darkhorse studios. In Octodad you play as an octopus who has successfully disguised himself as a human (by wearing a suit and tie) who goes through tasks that would be easy for any human to complete but very difficult for an octopus (or most invertebrates) to complete all while trying to make it look convincing for his family and the general public.
Octodad first made its way into the world as a free downloadable game that a group of students made for a project, in the game you controlled octodad as he went from room to room completing tasks for his daughter, son and wife and at the end a chef with a weird accent (it sounds French and German at the same time) who can see through your disguise forces you to climb a ladder (a very difficult task for the octopus father) as the climactic finish of the student project.
Finally out of school the same group of students formed darkhorse studio and developed Octodad Dadliest Catch as the sequel to the original the game had the same controls where the mouse controls the legs and with a simple press of the space key changes the controls to one of octodads tentacled arms. the game was very much the same but improves on every aspect that the original had, with more levels, better graphics and user created content allowed. The game has multiple stages that take you from your house to an aquarium and even one level that shows the back story of how octodad acquired his suit (In every level there are 3 ties hidden throughout that you can use to accessorize octodad)
Octodad Dadliest Catch is a great but short indie game by a great group of developers that i dont think is worth the 15 dollar asking price but if you are patient enough can grab it for only 5 dollars on some game website sales.
Hotline Miami is a game by Devolver digital games is a top down shooter/brawler game that takes place in Miami during the 80's. The game was received very well by gamers and critics alike calling it the best "fuck-em-up" game released in the past few years. However many non gamers voiced their concerns about the extremely violent and bloody manner that the game purveyed.
I personally love the gameplay of hotline miami its extremely easy to pickup and play while still being hard to master and very unforgiving, one hit from an enemy and you are down and need to restart the stage from the beginning forcing the player to through trial and error choreograph the perfect murder rampage. The game is played using the wasd keys to move around shift to move your view around space to finish off a downed enemy and the mouse to attack, interact and lock on to enemies. As you progress you unlock more and more masks each giving the player a certain perk like faster walking or more powerful weapons. The weapons vary in the game from beer bottles to assault rifles, each weapon being useful for different situations (a hammer is better suited to be swung than a knife which can be thrown) Guns are always the most effective option but pose the threat of giving away your position (this can also be useful for luring certain enemies out of their regular positions)
You play as an unnamed protagonist (called jacket by fans because of the Letterman jacket he wears) who after meeting with three strangers wearing animal masks each discussing what he will do in the following days wakes up to find a message saying that a box of cookies was delivered to him, upon opening the package jacket finds a rooster mask and instructions to go to a specified address and retrieve a briefcase. Upon arriving at the address jacket murders everyone and takes the briefcase to the specified drop zone. The game plays out similarly throughout the rest of the story you receive jobs from an unknown caller and proceed to the address to carry out the murder occasionally getting visits from the three strangers in the mask.
There is not much more I can say without ruining the plot but the game is definitely one of my favorites, It has an interesting art style and game play mechanics amazing plot and surreal 80's synth style music that all melds together to form an extremely addicting game that's simple enough to just pickup and play for a few minutes or hunker down and play for hours trying to get the perfect score on a level.
