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| Assassin's Creed 3; the most popular game at the show, complete with a five hour queue |
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| Hall 6: Boasting the biggest and most imposing stands, especially Call of Duty Black Ops 2 and XCOM |
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| Nintendo Booth: Showing off the latest hardware and games using the new tablet controller |
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| PlayStation Booth: Packing games for all ages exclusive to the Sony Brand |
Need of Speed Most Wanted
Criterion’s extended break from their famous Burnout series
continues with their second remake in the NFS series. Updated for the modern
console generation, the 2012 version of ‘’Most Wanted’’ now features an open
world, autolog support and more in depth customisation options.
In the Samsung booth, ‘’Most Wanted’s’’ online mode was
available for play supporting up to eight players, free to cruise around a
bordered off section of Fairhaven city, much the same way as Burnout Paradise’s
demo in 2008. Here we all met up next to I-92 for a jump challenge; two dirt
ramps were placed at either side of the highway and each driver was ranked by
distance across three attempts. When the challenge was up, leader boards were
shown as well as medals for feats such as taking the least damage and the top
speed achieved. Police were turned off for the demo to keep the focus on the
challenge which can likely be changed at any time both online and off.
Most racing fans will immediately notice some similarities
between it and Burnout Paradise such as the damage models on the vehicles and
the nitrous boost earned from pulling off drifts and other stunts but Most
Wanted ensures that it maintains a similar gameplay style to its predecessor,
Hot Pursuit; the game definitely feels more realistic and less arcade like but
never strays into Test Drive Unlimited 2 territory to keep the enjoyment
intact. Drifts are more difficult to pull off and the insane speed levels found
in Burnout have been quelled significantly. While there wasn’t much of the open
world available to explore in the demo, Criterion Games is sure to add in the
much needed depth necessary to explore the open world that was disappointingly
absent from NFS Undercover back in 2006.
‘’Most Wanted’’ is looking to be another successful entry in
the long running series. Fans of both Hot Pursuit and possibly the Burnout
series should have problem enjoying Criterion’s latest game which begs the
question as to whether they will keep remaking NFS titles, (Could they be doing
Undercover next?) return to their popular arcade racing series or embark on a
new franchise possibly instructed by EA. Regardless of this the developer
continues to do a good job on the NFS series, sometimes bettering the studio
that came before it in their efforts to update the series.
Dishonoured
Arkane Studio’s Dishonoured, named ‘’the game Arkane has
always wanted to create’’ takes some cues from Deus Ex, in that it offers
multiple ways to approach a given situation, with the added twist of playing as
a supernatural assassin with access to many interesting powers.
Shown off at Gamescom 2012, ‘’Kaldwin’s Bridge’’ tasks Corvo
Atano with kidnapping Solomon Kaldwin from his house by the docks to gain
leverage over a currently unknown faction. Atano begins in an alleyway filled
with darkness, two guards stand in his way at the main gate to Kaldwin’s estate.
I noticed several ways to progress while playing; I used blink, Atano’s short
teleport power to climb a shabby building opposite the gate to take out the
guards from above, I hung back in the darkness and nailed them both with the
crossbow and eventually possessed a rat to sneak under a gap to the right then
climbed through multiple buildings to reach the front of Kaldwin’s house. Also
guarded, I went on to possess a fish and swam under a bridge to a less guarded
area, clambered up above the guard’s vision cones and blinked over to an open
window. From here I blinked into a library and sneaked past two non-hostile
cleaners before coming to an electrical barrier. After several deaths I finally
sneaked past the lone patrolling guard through getting rid of the lights and
headed upstairs to confront Kaldwin in his study. Fortunately for me he was
gazing out the window with his back to me, so I took him down non-lethally and
used the nearby fire escape and teleportation to reach the buildings and
eventually the alley where I started all without arousing any sort of attention
or alert the guards.
Indeed Dishonoured is often based around trial and error
gameplay and for that it adopts a significantly slower pace which may not
appeal to all players; yet the game is still more than capable of providing the
great satisfaction of figuring out a solution twinned with the pure enjoyment
of sneaking around in the shadows. The artificial intelligence is also fairly
sharp for a stealth game; based on difficulty enemies will react to spotting
the player based on a three tiers or strike system that forms above their
heads, the first being suspicious, the second being investigative and the third
being alerted. The many powers give way to many different playing styles though
these are mostly geared towards stealth. While the developer has shown a more
aggressive and direct approach to gameplay, this requires a good amount of
skill in using the tools and weaponry at Atano’s disposal. When spotted, combat
with multiple enemies is very challenging and Atano’s powers do not regenerate
quickly at first, so you’ll be taken down quickly in the earlier stages of the
game though once upgrades to the mana bar are obtained this shouldn’t be too
much of an issue. The level design (at least for this part of the game)
incorporates all manner of power combinations through stretching both
vertically as well as horizontally. Gone are the days when only one set of
guarded stairs led to the player’s objective, players are sure to come up with
solutions to objectives that may not have been intended by Arkane.
Regardless of these issues, Dishonoured has the potential to
be a highly versatile single player experience, possibly offering up more
player choice than any other game this generation.
Crysis 3
The match begins as a VTOL carrying a team of highly trained,
ruthless CELL personel crashes to the ground, caused by an oddly medieval like
projectile. Stranded in a section of the Liberty Dome, now an eerie swamp, the
team makes its way towards a crumbling museum, having received orders to dig in
for two minutes and wait for extraction. Suddenly a splitting crack is heard a
medium distance behind the main assault troops; they rush to the dilapidated
second floor of the museum shocked to find their recon comrade’s lifeless body
on the ledge overlooking the swamp, his head twisted halfway round like a
horrific owl. The approaching evacuation waves off, explaining that they must
hold and secure the area before risking a landing. Some of the CELL troopers
begin to panic, wildly aiming and swinging their weapons; one trooper heads
across a makeshift bridge built from rotten planks to the upstairs of the main
building and spots a greyish outline moving gradually round a corner into the
next room. He calls the team and they move into position at the doorway; bursting
into the room, the troopers fire there weapons sporadically hoping to catch
their illusive enemy, but the outline is gone. Before they can react, an
explosive tipped arrow strikes true in the centre of the room, taking out over
half the team in the process. Far from the dead troopers, a nanosuited soldier
perched on the rocks near the edge of the swamp reloads his bow, above the dead
troopers in a ruined attic, his partner using himself as bait, packing the same
advanced cloaking technologies; they sneak off to hunt down the rest of the
CELL unit, picking them off one at a time with each dead trooper soon to be
added to their ranks.
This is the heightened tension and suspense contained in
Crysis 3’s hunter mode in its demo at Gamescom 2012, taking heavy inspiration
from the classic 1987 thriller Predator; a mode that utilises the series
ultimate strength in the shooter market, more so than any other amendment or
change to the popular series since its debut five years ago. Playing as one of
ten CELL troopers choosing from three different load outs, you’re always on
edge, feeling as if the hunters could come from anywhere, whereas while playing
as the team of two hunters that gradually grows with each kill, you must be
cunning and efficient to take down the entire team before the two minute timer
runs down. While the hunters are permanently cloaked, they can still be spotted
easily at close to medium ranges and will be gunned easily at the hands of a
whole team of CELL infantry. Indeed both sides require teamwork to win the four
rounds the match is comprised of; the CELL sticking together and the Hunters
devising tactics to lure the troopers to their deaths.
Other changes were also mentioned in an introduction video by
developer Crytek. Players will again be kitted with nano suits, but on some of
the modes such as Crash Site which take place on larger maps, a Pinger or two
will be available to drive and hijack (The alien walker first seen in Crysis 2)
Heavy weapons will also be placed on the maps which will each host skirmishes
for twelve players on console and sixteen on PC. Customisable suit modules will
return along with the ‘’New York Feed’’; much like NFS’s autolog system, this
will offer live challenges and stat tracking. Challenges are divided into
social which are more substantial feats set by friends, chance challenges which
are set by Crytek for the whole community (perhaps similar to Mass Effect 3’s
weekend operations in which all players are rewarded through the culmination of
the community’s game time) and lobby challenges, which are much more simple and
can usually be beaten in a single match.
Despite still being in pre alpha software, Crysis 3’s
multiplayer suite is shaping up to be the biggest and best of the series, with
a fully unique mode or three to boot with the possibilities of the nano suit.
Crytek is sure to whisk away thousands of shooter fans on the ultimate hunt
when the game launches next February.
PlayStation All Stars Battle Royale
As a collaboration between Superbot Entertainment and Santa
Monica Studio and Sony’s answer to Super Smash Bros, ‘’All Stars Battle
Royale’’ pits the most popular PlayStation characters together across stages
inspired by popular franchises.
Available to play at Gamescom was the game at its current
stage with twelve characters including Ratchet and Big Daddy on the maps Hades
and Aldan’s Tower. The gameplay itself is so far based on a time limit of three
minutes, defeating opponents involves not knocking them off the screen but instead
using super attacks charged up by collecting power orbs earned by attacking
other players. Controls are handled similarly to Smash Bros; you’ll use the
square, triangle and circle buttons in tandem with the left stick to pull off
different moves for each character. Items are also availiable such as the
hedgehog grenade from the Resistance series and the Razor claws from Ratchet
and Clank which are dropped at random and soon break after extended use.
Ratchet: The closest to the ‘’Samus’’ of the group so far,
the Lombax favours mainly ranged combat, bringing several recognisable weapons
to the fray including the sonic eruptor, Mr Zurkon, negotiator (Rocket
launcher), plasma striker (Sniper rifle)
robot bombs and his trusty wrench. For super attacks at level 1 Ratchet
whips out the RYNO 5 and fires in a straight line, annihilating all enemies in
the blast zone. Level 2 sends out Clank and his chronoscepter (Found in ‘’A
Crack in Time’’) to swing at enemies, taking them down instantly while also
slowing them down with time bombs and at Level 3, Ratchet and Clank hop into
their ship Aphelion (Also in the future trilogy) to take out enemies across the
entire stage.
Big Daddy: The slowest (though not by much!) of the
characters so far. The iron clad monstrosity wields both a powerful drill and
several plasmid powers including incinerate and electro bolt as well as his
underwater suit built for ramming and stomp attacks. His level 1 super attack
puts him in rage mode, ramming into the other players with reckless abandon,
level two sends out a little sister to do some damage, while Level 3 submerges
the entire arena in water, allowing the Big Daddy to zero in on all the players
for easy takedowns.
Aldan’s Tower: A mixture of InFamous and Sly Cooper, this map
is similar to the Donkey Kong stage in Super Smash Bros in that it gradually
scrolls upwards to the top; much the way Cole and Zeke ascended the tower in
InFamous. Once the top has been reached, Carmelita from the Sly Cooper series
shows up on a helicopter and takes aim with her shock pistol shown by a red
reticule on the screen.
Hades: This map begins with the players under attack by a
boss from the God of War series who smashes the ground to damage the sides of
the environment and stuns the characters if they are hit by its purple blades.
Eventually Patapon (from the strategy game on PSP) arrive and distract the boss
so the players can duke it out in earnest.
PlayStation All Stars Battle Royale has great potential and
is sure to be popular among the Sony community and while the game is generally
fun to play (and most of us would jump at the chance for a Super Smash Bros on
PS3) it ultimately underwhelms slightly due to little innovation and uniqueness
that separates it from Nintendo’s famous series. The combination of different
themes in arenas is a welcome addition but that’s pretty much where the
differences stop. Having no health bars prevents ganging up on one character,
but at the same time, it’s difficult to tell when you’ll knock any power orbs
out your opponents and as for the super attacks themselves, they’re sometimes
overpowered and nigh on impossible to avoid; I was able to dominate with
Ratchet’s level 2 super move as one hit was fatal and once the other players
respawned, they were immediately exposed for me to take them down again in a
brief cycle of unfairness and unbalanced gameplay. The super attacks thus far
also seem to blend together at some points; both Ratchet’s and Sly’s super
moves both pull the camera out to view the entire map, only possessing
different themes based on the game series they originate from and Kratos’s
level 3 attack in which he runs around as the God of War with his huge sword is
practically identical to Clank’s swinging of the chronoscepter. Serious
innovation is needed for Battle Royale or the enticing notion of pitting our
favourite characters together won’t be enough to warrant a full purchase, much
the same case with PlayStation Move Heroes last year who featured the three popular
characters but none of the engaging gameplay.
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