The Vita was a little weaker this year, but overall those games that were released were solid. The Vita has lost steam since last year, but here’s hoping 2015 is the year of the Vita.
Freedom Wars took the monster hunting formula that Monster Hunter did so well and made it better. With the addition of weapons and the unique Thorn weapon, Freedom Wars shot players into massive hunts with other players or AI controller characters. The insanely deep customization options and fantastic visuals were a treat as well. Not to mention widdling a 1 million year sentence to zero is quite the challenge.
The 3DS is still going strong and this year there were many great games for this little system. Nintendo shows that it can still dominate the handheld market with its first-party games and a number of loyal third party developers.
Shovel Knight
Shovel Knight isn’t just any old 8-bit platformer clone. Shovel Knight does it exactly like we all remember back in the day but with a touch of today’s better controls and level design. Shovel Knight is very hard, but just the right amount of hard that only a few areas require constant restarts but they are oh-so-satisfying.
The PC was mainly about indie games this year. Steam was chock-full of them and many of them were fantastic but got overlooked by the AAA games. There were a few PC exclusives that stood out from the crowd and even surprised us a little.
Divinity: Original Sin
Divinity gave gamers what they craved most: lots of loot, a great story, and excellent visuals. This dungeon crawler is smart and packed full of great content as well as reviving the long-dead Divinity franchise. Coming up from the ground through a Kickstarter program; fans have really shown how much they love this series and it shines.
The Sherlock Holmes adventure series has had its ups and downs. If the story isn’t up to par with the show or books, it’s clunky controls or poor gameplay. Crimes and Punishments sound darker than they really are. Honestly, the game is more about the characters shining through and less about the crimes or gameplay.
The game starts out surprisingly cinematic for a point-and-click. Watson is dodging Holmes gunfire in his study as he ducks and weaves between pieces of furniture. It shows just how more nuanced the series is and just how much it has grown. Among the four cases you solve, neither of them is all that interesting. The game tries to get you thinking about big mysteries, but honestly, the dull way of going about the cases keeps you from really caring.
The gameplay consists of walking around areas and finding anything you can click on. Some items can be examined, and certain characters can be profiled, where you scan the character in slow motion to find interesting points. There are various puzzles as well, but these seem to be half-broken since pieces won’t snap in place and various objects won’t register. Surrounding is figuring out where to go and then solving clues to bring the whole thing together. Hopping back and forth between areas gets old, especially with the long load times. The character interactions are somewhat interesting, and I couldn’t help but smile at Holmes’ sarcastic way of going about things. Other than this, the game offers a dull experience of the detective mystery of old.
I played through the first two cases and, honestly, started losing interest. Each case has the same exact way of being solved. Wander around an area and pixel hunt, interview characters, run back and forth between areas, and rinse and repeat. The game looks really good, and the facial animations are surprisingly well done. Adventure game fanatics may love this game, but anyone else wanting a bit of action or suspense like in the Telltale adventure games won’t find it here.
The fear of Nazi Germany taking over the world was probably quite believable about 60 years ago. Nowadays, it’s a fascinating “what if” scenario that authors love to toy with. While it’s never usually anything good or nice, it usually shows how nations can come together and fight a larger enemy. The New Order does exactly this with a tight narrative and some pretty solid shooting.
Now, let’s just put all this aside right now. Wolfenstein has its nostalgic moments that feel archaic and ancient compared to modern shooters, but for some reason it will always be there. This includes health packs, ammo pickups, and level design. The narrative is actually a huge step up for the series. William J. Blazkowicz is an American captain helping fight the ever-losing war with Germany. Wolfenstein was popular for delving into the arcane and supernatural that was part of rumored goings-on by Hitler’s elite group. Weapons use ancient technology to have an advantage over the rest of the world. In Wolfenstein, Hitler succeeds, but it’s not Hitler here, but Deathshead, a Nazi general who is doing terrible and evil things to the world.
The New Order captures this cry for help from the rest of the world with torture and a small rebel group working together to bring down the New World Order. While the atmosphere is captured quite well, the game does dive into some past Wolfenstein stuff that accidentally brings you out of this modern take on the series. Things like linear-level design and enemy AI. Sneaking on an enemy and killing everyone in the room doesn’t alert other enemies. They will walk right past dead bodies and not bat an eye. There are also too few cinematic cutscenes with long, dragged-out battles that are extremely difficult and require multiple attempts. This type of poor pacing leads to a constant reminder of past games in the series and just how old the series is.
The actual gunplay is solid, with great-feeling weapons—not just any weapons, but weapons that you have to switch between as the situation calls. I used every single weapon, along with the multiple modes they have. I did feel the stealth areas were a little unnecessary and slowed the pace down too much. This is forced by lieutenants with headsets that will call in backup if they aren’t taken care of quietly. Outside of those series-specific issues, it just felt too much like the same ‘ol FPS to really be anything revolutionary or truly memorable.
Multiplayer is also nonexistent, so the team could focus on a great single-player experience, which is rare for shooters these days. Does the campaign feel like it was worth cutting a multiplayer mode? That’s hard to say. I just can’t help but recall so many good moments that lost momentum due to tried and tired FPS issues that Wolfenstein kept getting lost in. Sure, the shooting was solid, but those moments of torture and the uniqueness of Wolfenstein were just kind of let down.
With all that aside, the game doesn’t look as good as everyone was claiming. ID Tech 5 isn’t all impressive. The textures are really low resolution, and the lighting effects seem fairly dated. I looked at some textures that looked like they were pulled from a PS2 game. The facial animations were awkward, and the water effects did not look next-gen. Maybe my expectations were too high, but right away I noticed all these flaws within the first 5 minutes of the game.
In the end, The New Order is a solid shooter and one of the best on next-gen consoles; just don’t expect anything revolutionary for the genre—just for the series. This is a great step in a new direction for the aged Wolfenstein series, but it still needs a little more to be anything memorable.
This is my review for Diablo III when it first came out. You can read it to get an overview of the original game, but here I will focus on what’s new. While the console versions are still pretty much the same, a lot has been balanced, and the game is overall more comfortable on consoles. The UI and controls have been tailored for controllers, and they work very well. Each button is mapped to an attack or a shortcut. Outside of this, the difficulty has been better balanced than normal and is actually quite easy. The game runs at a smooth 60FPS at 1080p on the PS4, and it looks gorgeous. There is so much content here that you will have dozens of hours to play.
Now for the Reaper of Souls expansion. My biggest complaint is going to be that it’s quite short (can be beaten in less than 5 hours) but is a lot of fun. All new enemies, bosses, and a continued story that was so great in Diablo III. New armor and loot are also welcome, but overall, it’s still the same game behind it all. I wouldn’t drop $40 on this by itself, but the inclusion in the $60 package is a fantastic deal.
Diablo III on consoles is worth every penny. You get the fantastic Diablo III, along with its expansion and all the other fixes and balances from the PC version. The hand-tailored controls and console experience are done very well. This is by far the best RPG and/or dungeon crawler you will find on next-gen consoles.
Destiny has been a long-awaited next-gen shooter. With one of the biggest hype trains in existence known as Bungie, Destiny had a lot of push behind it. It was dubbed the next-generation social interaction shooter. Destiny is also the most expensive game ever made, coming in at around $250,000,000. Sure, they made that back already and then some, but was the cost worth it? I sadly have to say it wasn’t. Destiny is probably the best, slightly above-average shooter you will ever play. While I was continuously disappointed, the further I got into the game, I just couldn’t put it down. Destiny is a strange dance of mediocre story and atmosphere mixed with fantastic gunplay and challenging gameplay. So just how does a game split like this?
First off, the story feels nonexistent. There aren’t many cutscenes, and all we are really given is a synapse and a crisis to dwell on. There’s a story about a Traveler, which is a giant alien-looking moon/ship hybrid that appeared above Earth one day. With all the alien fighting, there is a last-standing faction of humanity called the Guardians. You just so happen to be the only one who can make it through all these alien strongholds to finally bring light back to the traveler. It honestly never really makes sense, and towards the end of the game, you forget what happened in the beginning. Once you get down to the shooting, you forgive the paper-thin story a little.
The shooting mechanics are solid and extremely fun. Each sci-fi gun has its own personality, and you actually learn to like a certain class of weapons or switch between them when the situation calls. There are a lot of RPG elements mixed in that feel similar to Mass Effect. Take into account your class leveling; the cap is at a weak 20; and the unlocking of attributes with various armor you pick up. You will use everything at your disposal to kill the hordes of aliens you encounter, because this game is extremely tough. There were sections I had to retry over and over again to get the strategy down right. Now the game is built around a light MMO play model. There are open “maps,” and within these maps are non-respawnable areas filled with “darkness” with little to no checkpoints. Of course, the game was designed for co-op, but I played through it just fine by myself.
With all the grenade tossing, super-charged stomping, shotgun blasting, and class powers getting thrown around, you start to realize something. The game is pretty much the same everywhere you go. There are only a few select enemy types, and you will be killing them thousands of times before the end. It honestly gets quite old. Instead of the large planets, you thought you could wander; there are just large maps for each of the four planets. Yes, just a mere four. Old Russia is on Earth, the Moon, Mars, and Venus. While it’s pretty awesome to see these planets being recreated, I really felt cramped. This game is so small for such a large scope of design. With the level cap at 20, you can blow through the entire game with three other people in less than 20 hours. This could have been remedied with varied objectives or even scripted events, but instead, it’s nearly the same mission over and over. You have a companion called Ghost (voiced by the bored-sounding Peter Dinklage) who you must protect, and that’s nearly all you do. Scan this area. Cover me while I scan this area.
Destiny really had a lot of potential but seemed to have shrunk in scope during development. The best moments I had were the raids in which you could compete with players online. Each planet had one to two raids, and it was extremely satisfying when you finally killed the end boss after chipping away at him for over 30 minutes. However, there are a few moments like this in Destiny. I honestly can’t really recommend this game to the average gamer wanting to just pick up the latest shooter. Avid FPS players will find all the little flaws and weak spots in the game. When it comes to visuals and audio, Destiny really delivers. The game looks fantastic, despite areas like the Moon and Mars looking overly bland and boring. While it looks good on a technical scale, it feels like it lacks any type of artistic flair. I honestly kept thinking back to Halo too much. You can see the obvious inspiration from that series bleed into Destiny a little.
With all that said, Destiny has tight gunplay and some fun moments during raids, but that’s really it. It feels underwhelming in scope, is extremely repetitious, and will bore most players. However, there is some sort of spark that sticks in the game that keeps you going and racking up your kill count. The gunplay is rock solid, and I honestly have to say this is the best slightly above-average shooter you will have played in a long time.
Samsung is the top dog right now in the phone business. They know what customers want and know exactly how to utilize the Android OS on their device the best. With the Note 4 being my second Samsung Android phone and my fourth Android phone in general, I have to say Samsung has finally perfected the smartphone. Even after playing with this thing for three days and running numerous apps and benchmark tests, I can’t find anything wrong with the phone. I honestly really tried hard to find some minute detail that I overlooked and just can’t like I was able to with previous Android phones. Why is this phone so perfect? Let’s start with what’s under the hood to get an idea of why this phone can do what it can do.
Under the Hood
The Note 4 is a beast in small clothing. There is so much going on under the hood—so much amazing hardware crammed into this tiny shell—that I am just flabbergasted at how Samsung was able to pull it off. Let’s start with the basics. The phone is 6.04″ tall, 3.09″ wide, and 8.5mm thick. That’s not a lot of room to cram this much hardware into. The phone actually has a good weight to it—not too light but also not too heavy. It doesn’t feel overly cheap like the iPhone 6 does. The actual material doesn’t feel cheap either. The edges are solid aluminum and won’t bend or twist in your pocket or under pressure. The back has a faux leather texture, which feels extremely nice. While Samsung is known for cheap plastic backs, faux leather makes up for it.
With any Samsung phone, you will be familiar with the hardware button layout. A menu button, volume rocker, and power button, as well as two soft keys. I actually have to compliment the volume rocker here; it feels more solid and easier to find with your thumb. Instead of the whole rocker being flush, each side sticks out a tad more than the middle section. One thing that will throw users off is the new task list softkey that replaced the soft menu key on the Galaxy S5. It took a while to get used to this, as I was always hitting the app list key, thinking the app menu would come up.
After the sleek and comfortable design is looked over, you will notice what is probably the best-looking phone screen available right now. The 5.7″ Super AMOLED screen just looks fantastic. While Samsung device owners will be used to quality screens, this one is a huge jump up. Being twice the resolution of most large phone screens. This screen has a whopping 2560×1440 resolution with 515 PPI. every other smartphone, including the iPhone 6 Plus, which has a 5.5″ screen and a 1920×1080 resolution. This quad-HD screen is just addictive to look at. Everything, no matter what it is, just looks gorgeous with deep colors and a vibrant backlight. The screen is also much brighter than previous Samsung phones, but for some reason it uses less battery power than even the Galaxy S4 did.
For the picture lovers out there, the Note 4 has one of the most powerful phone cameras available and is one of the few that can shoot in full 4K resolution. The Sony IMX240 camera allows 5K photos. The 16 MP rear and 3.7 MP front-facing cameras are just fantastic. With the front being a 3.7 MP camera, it is a better quality camera than the average 2 MP front-facing camera that most phones have. Under the rear-facing camera is a heart rate sensor as well as a UV sensor. This heart rate sensor is more useful than you think. Want to take a selfie with a better rear camera? Press your finger against this sensor, and it will snap the photo for you. Health nuts will also love the sensor for fitness apps.
Let’s get to the heart of the phone. The Note 4 uses the Snapdragon 805 chipset, which sports a Krait 540 quad-core CPU at an astounding 2.7 GHz. The GPU is the Adreno 420, which is one of the most powerful phone GPUs out right now. The phone also sports some of the most RAM you will find at a solid 3GB of LPDDR3 RAM. The internal memory is 32GB, which is great for photo takers and gamers. What does this mean to the average user? Your phone will operate at lightning-fast speed with no slowdown when switching or using apps. If you want to know just how powerful the Note 4 is, take a look at the screenshots for benchmarks from 3D Futuremark’s benchmarking software. The Note 4 ranks as the fourth most powerful phone in existence, while the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus are way down to 31 and 26, respectively.
There are other hardware features, such as 2.4/5GHz WiFi and even an MHL-AV link for connecting your phone to your TV. While the Note 4 surprisingly lacks the USB 3.0 port seen in the Galaxy S5 and Note 3, it is replaced with a fast-charging Adaptive Charge technology that allows the phone to fully charge in 1 hour.
While that is a lot of technology, there is one thing that the Note series has been beloved for, and that’s the S Pen. This little guy does so much and becomes so useful in situations you didn’t think it would. The software suite for the pen may be small, but it is all useful. Artists will love how accurate the pen is for drawing thanks to pressure recognition and pinpoint accuracy. Writing memos is extremely easy. Once you pop out the pen, you can use it to highlight text, write down email addresses, phone numbers, and links, and turn them into usable actions on your phone. This is a very neat idea and even comes in handy at job sites. The pen hides away on the bottom right of the phone and is completely flush. It feels nice in your hand and is nearly as long as the phone. My favorite feature is being able to have your phone alert you if you leave your pen somewhere and even show you where you last had it on Google Maps.
Software
Software-wise The Note 4 uses a tweaked version of the Galaxy S5 OS. With a better drop-down menu and more options in the device settings, you can completely hand-tailor this device to every possible need yourself. One feature I wanted to save for last is the fingerprint scanner. Yes, I know the iPhone 5S started it, but it’s a fantastic feature to have. The sensor is actually more responsive than the 5S sensor, as it also recognizes the tip of your pad. You honestly would have no idea the menu button has a sensor built into it. I found linking my PayPal account to the sensor for logging in was great and added a ton of security. You can even set this as a lock screen and save up to three different fingers.
There are various other little features, such as a download booster. If you have weak WiFi, the phone will use your 4G speeds along with WiFi to break data up into packets and increase your download speed. I tested this with my work’s WiFi, as its max speed is about 4 mbp/s. I downloaded a 250MB app, and the download booster kicked in and showed me a comparison bar. While the WiFi was pulling in about 4 MB/s, the 4G was pulling 35 MB/s. Of course, this is only if the file size is over 30MB to keep everything you download from kicking in the booster.
Another neat feature is emergency assistance. Add your contacts, and you can press the power button three times, and it will send pictures and sound recordings to those contacts. This is great if you are in a car accident with no one around and need help. While this isn’t a substitute for 911, it can be used in situations where 911 doesn’t apply.
Overall, the Galaxy Note 4 is just a fantastic phone all around. With a solid physical design, a gorgeous screen, a very useful S Pen, and various other software features, you are just going to fall in love with this phone.
Logitech makes some pretty fantastic products, and it doesn’t surprise me that they make the first Bluetooth keyboard that actually interests me or seems useful. Most are too small, too big, or just don’t feel right. The K480 is perfect for anyone with big hands or multiple devices.
While the keyboard isn’t exactly portable and won’t fit into any small carry-on bags, it doesn’t need to. What got my attention right away was being able to switch between three devices on the fly. The turn dial on the left allows switching between a tablet, phone, and computer all at the same time. Why would you need to do this, you ask? Well, you may be using your computer like normal while texting a friend or typing up a report on your tablet, or vice versa. You can do your research on your computer while you type on the tablet and still chat with a friend. Some people may not need to multitask like this, so having three channels is great to have without having to re-sync your keyboard with every device you use every time.
With that said, you can fit a 7″ tablet laying sideways with a 4″ wide phone next to it, or a 10″ tablet by itself. You can also have the 7″ tablet standing up with a 6″ phone laying sideways. It’s up to you. The keys feel great and click just right. The keyboard looks “bubbly” and sleek, with the keys concaved just right. The actual layout makes sense and works with Macs, iOS devices, and Android. With the FN key, you can use the top row as F keys on a PC, and without it, they are your regular functions on a touch device, such as a menu, home screen, recent apps, media keys, screenshot, volume, etc. It’s a smart layout and one of the best I’ve ever seen on a compact keyboard.
Actually, getting this thing to function with a device isn’t that hard, but Android users may find switching between devices a little annoying when having to select the default keyboard. Using the Logitech app to allow you to type without touching the keyboard is needed. This is actually an issue with the Android OS and not the keyboard itself.
The PC and Mac have their own software that allows you to use the shortcuts on the desktop. It’s fairly easy to connect and use without much hassle. Now the biggest issue with this keyboard is that it uses standard AAA batteries, which blows my mind. In this day and age, most of these gadgets should have internal batteries, but maybe this will cut the price down? I don’t know. Just make sure you have rechargeable AAA batteries handy. The other downside was the weight. This thing is pretty heavy by itself, and even more so if you have a tablet and phone on it. It’s meant to sit on a desk or table, so don’t expect it to be comfortable on your lap.
Developer: Crystal Dynamics/Nixxes Software/United Front Games
Release Date: 1/28/2014
Available On
This is exactly how you do a game series reboot, right? I wish I could end my review with that, but I need to tell you why. Tomb Raider suffered through a few mediocre games during the first run of the series during the late 90’s and early 2000s. The first reboot did well for the series by maturing Lara and giving us better controls and a more cinematic experience. Now comes Tomb Raider (2013), a fantastic game that shows the more human side of Lara. The game starts out with you and a science crew on a ship on the way to an archeological site, but things go awry when Lara decides to head to the Dragon’s Triangle off the coast of Japan. A mysterious storm destroys the boat, and Lara and the team are stranded on this island. There is a mysterious cult trying to sacrifice people to a sun goddess to end these storms. Lara has to deal with this if she wants, of course.
What makes Tomb Raider so memorable is the struggle she goes through while surviving. She is nearly raped, suffers tremendous injuries, and has to cope with herself, dealing with the fact that she has to kill to survive. She is not comfortable with this at first and really struggles to pull the trigger. This adds layers of depth to her character that weren’t seen before. Not only is her personality more memorable, but her looks have changed. No longer is Lara wearing the short shorts and tight shirt with her huge bust. She has been knocked down a few cup sizes and is much younger, straight out of college, in fact. It’s hard to really describe her more than this; you have to play the game to really connect.
The gameplay in Tomb Raider has completely changed, but yes, there is platforming and gunplay. Both are tight and very well crafted. Gunplay consists of using scraps to create a pistol, bow, machine gun, and shotgun. That’s it. As you progress and find salvage in crates and dead bodies, you can upgrade these to look and feel like better weapons. There are many upgrades that increase damage and accuracy, as well as adding new ammo types. Lara’s animations are very well done and realistic, and this falls into combat. She scrambles around and ducks behind cover; the guns feel great to shoot, and you can see how inexperienced Lara is; she’s not a Navy SEAL or commando. Unlike other games like this, her stumbling animations don’t interfere with the game at all. You can still move around, you can dodge, and there’s even some melee thrown in. As you upgrade your skills (done at various campfires throughout the game), you can dodge, and through quick-time events, you can do some pretty gruesome kills.
While gunplay is tight and fun, exploring is just as important. This island is massive, and you can go anywhere; there are no limits. Fast travel via camps really helps, but there’s a reason for moving around everywhere: collecting hidden items. These range from relics, GPS caches, documents, etc. There are hidden tombs found throughout the game that hold area maps for these items. These tombs consist of cleverly made physics puzzles that are really fun to complete. You get rewards like art and 3D models to view. The whole game just has an amazing atmosphere and is so much fun to explore.
On top of all the climbing around, you get a climbing axe, which is an important tool for climbing and combat. Your bow is used for shooting ropes across valleys and canyons to pull items to solve puzzles, break doors, and access new areas. The whole exploring ideal in this game is just fantastic and really fun. I did have to think about how to get to new areas and actually try to navigate and experiment; that’s good game design. There is a Survival Instinct ability that highlights map markers and objectives, and when you unlock the skill, you can see items through walls.
The story itself is a bit confusing; the whole spiritual thing is a bit unbelievable in such a realistic world like this, but that is what Tomb Raider is known for. Lara is the main character here, and what she goes through was the main story for me. I loved every second of the story. The voice acting is awesome, and the graphics look amazing.
The multiplayer was tacked on late in development and is pretty boring. The combat was designed for cinematic gameplay, not multiplayer. It feels just like it does in the story, but it just doesn’t suit multiplayer well. I played all three rounds and got bored of the game. Some people may like it, but there are better multiplayer shooters out there.
Overall, Tomb Raider is one of my favorite games of all time and is really memorable. The voice acting is solid, and Lara’s new personality makes her more human and more relatable. The graphics are outstanding, and the gunplay and exploring mechanics are fun and very cinematic.
Definitive Edition
I have to say that the graphics upgrade alone is worth a re-buy. The game looks even better than the best settings on PC. Lara’s newly remodeled look is fantastic, and TressFX on her hair has finally been fixed to the point where there isn’t any slowdown from it. All textures and lighting have been slightly bumped up, and the smooth 60FPS in 1080p on next-gen consoles just looks gorgeous. This game still holds up well to this day, and I played the game all the way through with the same excitement and rush that I did the first time. The PS4 version has been specifically tailored to the controller and headset. You can now play most of the game with voice commands; however, there are quite a few, and it takes a while to remember them all. The PS4 speaker is used through most of the game as ambiance, but I found some narrative bits going through both the controller and TV to sound strange. The Definitive Edition is well worth the buy and is the best version yet.
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Try multiplayer. A lot of fun !