2018

The Video Game Awards Post is back! Best, Worst, Disappointing, Surprisng and DLC awards all return for another year. Like always, these aren’t just games released in 2018, they’re games I completed for the first time in 2018. Who will follow Sunset Overdrive (2016) and Uncharted 4 (2017) in claiming the award  for 2018?

2017 for me wasn’t a great year for games, there were very few that I thought were great. Nintendo had a good year, but I’m not a Nintendo guy and I never will be. This year however, was very strong! There were three games in particular that could have won game of the year across outlets, unfortunately I have yet to play God of War, but Spider-Man and Red Dead Redemption 2 were spectacular. 2018 was a huge improvement and I hope 2019 can follow it, but that may be asking too much.

Without further ado, the awards!

Best Game I Played in 2018 - Red Dead Redemption 2

Runners Up - Firewatch, Dishonored 2, A Way Out, Marvel’s Spider-Man, Little Nightmares and Spyro the Dragon Remaster

As you can see, I struggled to narrow down a list of runners up, there were just so many potential winners this year. But once I played Red Dead Redemption 2, there was only one real winner. I’ve played a lot of good games, I’ve played a lot of great games, but I haven’t played a lot of amazing games. Red Dead Redemption 2 is amazing. In fact the last games I remember being this good were The Last of Us (2013) and Uncharted 4 (2016) not many games reach this level for me. I won’t spoil the story, but it’s one of the best stories ever. The voice acting is exceptional, Arthur and Dutch are two of the best acted characters I’ve seen. So many small details, fun gameplay, great side characters and lots more.

It took me a whole month to complete, and that was mainly the story and side missions. Even though it took so long, it never dragged, it was never dull. There were plenty of heists and every single one was fun, I couldn’t wait to see what the gang was going to rob next. I will say I was yet again left unimpressed with the multiplayer, but that doesn’t matter because the single player clearly didn’t suffer or get less effort put in. I’m sure there’s plenty who do enjoy it, but you can only steal so many horse carriages before it gets boring.

Arthur Morgan may just be the best acted, developed character of all time. He may be the best video game character of all time! He’s certainly one of mine. Now can we have Undead Nightmare 2 please?

This wasn’t even game of the year at the VGAs which I thought was nailed on, I really need to play God of War if it bested RDR2.

Worst Game I Played in 2018 - Zombi

Runners Up - Resident Evil Operation Raccoon City, Asemblance

This was originally a Wii U game, somehow it got ported to Xbox. Why? Why would anyone think this deserves to be played? It’s terrible. The melee attack is the same every swing, every zombie takes three hits to kill, and they just queue up in a line waiting for your bashing.  The one voice actor is a pain in the ass, he helps guide you through, but why he even cares about you I don’t know. Every time you die, you come back as a different person and start with no gear. The guy who’s guiding you talks to you like you’re the same person, even if you’ve died multiple times and are on your 29th character.

I really can’t say anything good about this game. I hated everything about it. Not only is this the worst game I played in 2018, it’s one of the worst games I’ve ever played. I can’t believe I had the stomach to finish it, I can’t believe I paid for it! I’m absolutely baffled as to why they ported it to Xbox.... BAFFLED.


Biggest Surprise of 2018 - Hotline Miami

Runners Up - The Banner Saga, Superhot

I wasn’t expecting much for Hotline Miami, and that only made it better. The soundtrack is one of the best ever, months after finishing it I still find my self playing the soundtrack. I love the retro graphics, most of the time I hate when games use the old style because we’re past it now, but it works here. The whole game just makes you think of 1980s, and I’m a huge fan of that. A huge arsenal of weapons, enemy types and well made levels. Most importantly, it’s fun as fuck. The kills and executions are soooo satisfying. Some levels can give you some trouble, but when you finally succeed you feel awesome. Play this game, please! Then we could get a Hotline Miami 3 right after I finish the sequel.


Most Disappointing Game of 2018 - Sea of Thieves/Horizon Zero Dawn

Runners Up - Watch Dogs 2

I honestly couldn’t pick this year, so it’s a draw. Sea of Thieves, oh Sea of Thieves. This should have been game of the year. This should have kept me playing for years. It didn’t. Why? Because there was absolutely fuck all to do. Oh wait, no, there’s lots to do! How about fight the same skeletons over and over for bounties, with the WORST combat in years. (It’s the same as Zombi) How about catch and deliver chickens? No? Neither sound fun? Wait, wait! This will get you, treasure maps! Read a map, travel to the right island and dig at the X to reveal treasure! Great, now you have some treasure what next? Well, all there is to do after that is buy very expensive customizable gear. That’s right spend hours and hours doing the same old shit, just to get some coins to customise your character IN A FUCKING FIRST PERSON GAME WERE YOU WONT EVEN FUCKING SEE THEM.

WHAT IS THE POINT? Seriously, why? Well done Rare, well fucking done. You fooled us all into thinking you made one of the best games ever and disappointed us. They actually turned achievements off so soon after the release it was so fucked. I’ve never ever seen that before. It’s so devastating to say this, the beta was amazing to play with friends, I had so much fun just with all the small details you’d expect in a pirate game, playing sea shanties together, guiding the ship with the map, reading the treasure maps to find treasure (before it got repetitive). It made sense the beta was empty though, but the full game was the same! I’d never have bothered if I’d known the beta was the full game. What was even the point in the beta? They didn’t change anything, they couldn’t handle the number of players, it was a colossal fuck up. Oh, but it’s okay! They’ve now started adding content months after release! Rare killed my buzz for this game so quick, there’s nothing they could add to bring me back. I’m not even go on a huge rant about all the bullshit that happened to me playing this fuck up of a game.

Now, I know Horizon Zero Dawn is a good game, but I don’t like it at all. That may sound strange, but to me it makes sense. The graphics are amazing, the world looks great, huge variety of weapon effects and skill points, lots of enemy variations, but I never got into it. I forced myself to play this every single time I played it. I hate robot enemies and I hate games with elemental effects, enemies resistant to certain effects and can only be damaged by specific ones, I absolutely despise that. If you took out the elemental effects and changed the robots to DINOSAURS, now this could’ve been a special game for me. If you liked it, that’s great and I understand why some would, but I hate to say it just wasn’t for me.



Best DLC I Played in 2018 - Spider-Man: The Heist

I didn’t play much DLC this year, there wasn’t really anything specially. The highlights would definitely be all three from Little Nightmares that added more story, but the best for me would be Spider-Man’s first DLC. The Heist wasn’t anything special really, but it was just great to be playing Spider-Man again, and introducing more characters to the game like Black Cat. Honestly, the best DLC for me really was adding the Sam Raimi suit to the game. Feeling like I was Tobey Maguire’s Spider-Man was VERY special.



Worst DLC I Played in 2018 - Watch Dogs 2: No Compromise

Now, this DLC wasn’t really bad, it was just one mission. ONE MISSION. The DLC was pretty pricey too, and to only add one mission is laughable. Like the original, Watch Dogs 2 disappointed, pretty much no missions were memorable l but I enjoyed it more than the first. But one mission? C’maaan.


Games I played in 2018 which I never reviewed, but I’ll give a mini overview of each one here.

Wolfenstein 3D - Just like Doom it's fun. Retro games at their best. I literally just ran through it, so no point in reviewing it.

The Witness - It's definitely overrated, I saw this getting 10s. I mean the puzzles are well made and the graphics are stunning, but it's not a 10! I'm yet to do the final puzzle as it's a doozy, but it's a game that makes you feel clever, as you get no help at all.

EA Sports UFC 3 - I'm a huge UFC fan and have a lot of fun with the games, even if it's just to play as the updated roster. I hate the scaling in difficulty though and every UFC game has done it, even back in their THQ days.

Well that's it for another year. 2018 was a huge improvement for gaming, some of the best games ever were released this year. Let's hope 2019 can follow it. I even played a host of great games released earlier than 2018, and I'm sure that will be the case in 2019. The Last of Us remains king, but Red Dead Redemption 2 gave it a run for its money this year.

Days Gone is one to watch of games with a confirmed release date. Of course Death Stranding, Ghosts of Tsushima and Last of Us 2 but no confirmed dates for those yet. I'll certainly have to play the latest God of War in 2019, but I'll need to start from the beginning, so expect a bunch of GoW reviews in 2019.

Happy gaming and happy New year for 2019!

Call of Duty Black Ops 2 (Xbox 360)

7/10

FIFA 19: The Journey (Xbox One)

6.2/10

Metro 2033 (Xbox 360)

7.9/10

Little Nightmares: The Residence DLC (Xbox One)

3.8/5

Little Nightmares: The Hideaway DLC (Xbox One)

3.5/5

Little Nightmares: The Depths DLC (Xbox One)

3.4/5

Little Nightmares (Xbox One)

8.5/10

Dark Void (Xbox 360)

5.3/10

The Banner Saga (Xbox One)

8.4/10

Horizon Zero Dawn: Frozen Wildlands DLC (PS4)

3/5

Marvel’s Spider-Man (PS4)

9/10

Toy Story 3 (Xbox 360)

7.6/10

Battlefield 3 (Xbox 360)

7.5/10

Shadow Complex (Xbox 360)

7.1/10

Call of Juarez: Gunslinger (Xbox 360)

6.9/10

UFC 3 (Xbox One)

7.1/10

Ducktales (Xbox 360)

6.2/10

Prince of Persia (Xbox 360)

6.7/10

Halo Combat Evolved (Xbox 360)

7.5/10

Fahrenheit (PS4)

6.9/10

Call of Duty 4 (Xbox One)

9.3/10

Overlord (Xbox 360)

7.2/10

Ori and the Blind Forest (Xbox One)

7.5/10

Halo 5: Guardians (Xbox One)

6.7/10

Flower (PS4)

5.8/10

Asemblance (Xbox One)

5.1/10

Tekken 7 (Xbox One)

6.4/10

Journey (PS3)

6.5/10

Oddworld: Stranger’s Wrath (PS3)

8/10

Vampyr (Xbox One)

7.6/10

Dying Light: The Followig DLC (Xbox One)

3,2/5

Flockers (Xbox One)

5.9/10

Enslaved: Odyssey to the West: Piggy’s Perfect 10 DLC (Xbox 360)

3.1/5

Detroit: Become Human (PS4)

8.2/10

Enslaved: Odyssey to the West (Xbox 360)

8.7/10

The Bridge (Xbox One)

6.5/10

Sonic the Fighters (Xbox 360)

3.7/10

Guardians of the Galaxy: The Telltale Series (Xbox One)

7.5/10

Horizon Zero Dawn (PS4)

7.9/10

Manual Samuel (Xbox One)

6.5/10

Uncanny Valley (Xbox One)

5.3/10

Alice Madness Returns: American McGhee's Alice DLC (Xbox 360)

2.6/5

Prey (Xbox 360)

7.4/10

Hotline Miami (PS4)

8.2/10

Red Faction Armageddon: Path to War DLC (Xbox 360)

1.9/5

White Night (Xbox One)

5.9/10

Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes (Xbox One)

6/10

Alice Madness Returns (Xbox 360)

6.5/10

Red Faction Armageddon (Xbox 360)

5.2/10

Heavy Rain (PS3)

8.8/10

Jurassic Park: The Game (PS3)

5.8/10

Party Hard (Xbox One)

7.3/10

Cel Damage HD (Xbox One)

7.9/10

Dying Light (Xbox One)

6.8/10

Yakuza 0 (PS4)

8.3/10

Batman Arkham Origins: Cold, Cold Heart DLC (Xbox 360)

2.9/5

JazzPunk (PS4)

6.9/10

Batman Arkham Origins (Xbox 360)

8/10

Mortal Kombat X (Xbox One)

7.4/10

Doom (Xbox One)

8.2/10

Sea of Thieves

6/10

Destiny (Xbox One)

6/10

The Vanishing of Ethan Carter (PS4)

6.6/10

Letter Quest: Grimm's Journey Remastered (Xbox One)

6.8/10

Late Shift

5.7/10

Rime (Xbox One)

6.6/10

A Way Out (Xbox One)

8.6/10

Superhot (Xbox One)

7.7/10

Watch Dogs 2: Human Conditions DLC (Xbox One)

2.4/5

Watch Dogs 2: No Compromise DLC (Xbox One)

1.9/5

Watch Dogs 2 (Xbox One)

7.1/10

Contrast (Xbox One)

6.4/10

Assassin's Creed Chronicles: China

5.9/10

Canis Canem Edit (PS4)

Canis Canem Edit developed by Rockstar released back in 2006. It was remade for newer consoles under the title; Bully: Scholarship Edition, the first version I had. The original was ported to PS4 in 2016.

Welcome to Bullworth Academy. Jimmy Hopkins, a young trouble maker, is shipped off to the academy by his mother, who's on her way to her honeymoon with her most recent marriage. Jimmy has been expelled from seven other schools, and is immediately warned by the principal to keep his nose clean. As the new kid, Jimmy is targeted by most of the school, but he can hold his own if it comes to a fist fight. Jimmy is soon befriended by Gary and Petey, who himself is a bit of a target for bullies.

Gary shows Jimmy around the school, tells him about the cliques and their leaders. The cliques include the bullies, the preppies, the greasers, the jocks and the needs. Each chapter of the story tends to focus on a certain group. After each chapter, Jimmy becomes friendly with that group, so Jimmy goes from hated to respected as the story progresses. You will do all kinds of missions for clique members and fight whoever opposes you. Ultimately you're out against the leader and it's there you'll really earn their respect.

9.4/10

State of Decay: Lifeline DLC (Xbox 360)

3/5

Splinter Cell Conviction: Deniable Ops DLC (Xbox 360)

3.6/5

Octodad: Deadliest Catch (Xbox One)

Octodad was developed by Young Horses, and released in 2015 for Xbox One.

6.7/10

Zombi (Xbox One)

Zombi was developed by Straight Right and released in 2015. It was originally created for Wii U and was titled ZombiU.

A zombie game, because there aren't enough of those already. Zombi is a first person action game, except it's very boring. It's so clunky, poor graphics, unimaginative plot and a lot more.

You die and that's it, well kind of. You spend the game being guided by an unseen character, he helps you survive and tells you what you need to do and eventually escape the zombie outbreak. You can scavenge a bunch of items from guns, bullets, melee weapons and health items. Your stock is limited, but if you die, say goodbye. Each time you die, you're switched to play as another survivor. You have to find the previous survivors supplies, but if you die before you get them, they're gone forever. The guide talks to you like you're the same person though, even if you've died twenty times and controlled twenty different survivors, it's dumb.

The gameplay is incredibly clunky, I only ever had a cricket bat for a melee weapon. I did the same weapon swinging animation over and over and over to kill zombies over and over and over. It was boring. Finding guns was a bit more entertaining as it was a bit more lively than swinging a bat eight time to just kill one zombie. You don't get around much, you're constantly running back and forth through the same locations and the lighting is awful. Everything is too dark and the poor map and HUD are useless.

The scanner is terrible to use, it's used to locate scavenging areas, as well as zombies, but it just felt like a chore to use, so I usually avoided it. There were upgrades but the combat never improved, there were a decent selection of guns to use though. Your character never speaks which I understand, but your guide never shuts up, it seems so unbelievable the way their conversations happen.

There isn't much to say other than this is one of the worst games I've played. There are way too many zombie games and this does nothing to make you think you should play it over hundreds of better ones. Just avoid this mess.

4.9/10

Brink (Xbox 360)

Brink was developed by Splash Damage and released in 2011. It's a first person shooter, that's effectively an online game.

The game takes place in a fictional city called The Ark. Two factions Security and the Resistance are at war. The Ark is a floating city built above a flooded Earth, rations and supplies are low with extra given to Security. This causes the Resistance to fight for their poor treatment. Lame plot right?

They try to force a story into a game that has none. Every time you load into a level a cutscene will play, it includes a bunch of no named characters randomly talking, like we should know them, but we don't. They're always angry and talk like they're developed characters, but they're not. It always seems that one of the random characters has a relative fighting for the other side too, for some reason they try to make you care about non existent character.

You're immediately lied to when playing this, you're fooled into thinking there's a story, but there's not. The solo and online is the exact same thing, just that you'll either be alone or with other players. It's effectively an objective based multiplayer game you can play alone. Playing alone will be your biggest mistake. The AI is the worst, they're fucking broken. If playing solo, you'll do all the work. If you're not trying your hardest, you've already lost. Your team of AI will practically NEVER help you with objectives, but the enemy team, oh the enemy team will fuck you up. This is by far the most unbalanced game in history. It's an online game, how they ever sold it with a story is false advertising and everyone involved should be jailed for stealing our money.

I'm not going to go into too much detail about Brink. It'll just turn into a massive rant, and I am done raging over Brink. It's unfair and doesn't deserve to be played. There was meant to be free running but it boils down to just vaulting. There's a decent amount of abilities like napalm grenades, turrets and plenty more, but none of them work because enemies take a shit tonne of punishment, but they'll drop you in less than a second, and you try and wait for an AI medic to save you, you'll see how awful the AI really is. You can pick difficulty level when playing solo, but there's only one level, and it's bullshit difficulty.

You can pick a side, Security or Resistance, it's very likely you won't care about either. Once you've completed one side, you can play the other where you'll do the exact same missions you've already done, just on the other side. The team announcer who talks to you while you're playing is annoying as fuck. They're always calling you brother and always panicking about losing command posts, which offer nothing to winning the mission. Your AI team mates will never help with the main objectives, but they'll never stop doing the pointless side objectives and love those command posts too. There's different classes that can do different thing, like give ammo, health, repair or plant hacks, you need to be the correct class to complete the objectives, and seeing as your team won't help, you'll have to switch a lot.

Some praise Brink really does deserve, is its design. The graphics on the characters are some of my favourite and the customisation is good too. It's just in an awful game. That style of graphics alone made me want a sequel. If they add a really story, better AI and a chance to win a gun fight, they could've got that sequel. It could be fun at times, a really enjoyable game surprisingly, but once you get put in a mission where it seems impossible to win, it usually is and it's just ridiculous to even try.

I fucking hate Brink, one of my most hated games I've played, but I like it too. I never really played online against people, I really wish I did because that's how it's meant to be played, but it wasn't sold to me that way. I was expecting a story, with free running and great customisation, but we only got one of those. This really should've been a rant, but I'm deflated when I think of Brink. Good riddance.

5.9/10

Ryse Son of Rome (Xbox One)

Ryse was a launch title for the Xbox One in 2013, it was developed by Crytek.

Marius Titus, a Roman Centurion, leads Rome in a battle against Celtic Barbarians. Marius gets Roman Emperor, Nero in a safe private room, where he begins to tell the emperor his story. A tale of how Marius lost his family, rose high in the Roman Legion and his revenge.

Ryse to this day is the best looking game I've seen. I was in awe just looking at Marius in his armour when I first started the game. The shine on his armour is beautiful, incredibly well designed. Sadly, that's practically all this game has. Once you start fighting you're quickly deflated. Think of the combat as a imitation on the Batman Arkham series, it's not a bad imitation, just a bland one. You'll soon be bored of just fighting back the same four looking barbarians. What's makes it even worse is the executions. They're just quicktime events, the enemies light up blue, yellow and red for you to press the corresponding button. It makes a wonderful looking game just look tacky.

You fight with a sword and shield, the shield works best for partying and can interrupt attacks. Taller, stronger enemies take longer to kill and will require you to dodge their attacks by rolling. You'll know you have to dodge when the enemy lights up bright red like a Christmas tree. You can also collect spears and use them to throw at enemies, especially archers I don't really know what else to say about it, that's the gist of the fighting and that's literally the whole game. There's a couple boss fights but they work the same way. You can use ballistas, but they work the same as spears just faster.

The story is decent, cliché and obvious what's going to happen at times. The cutscenes look amazing and the acting of Marius and Nero is great. There aren't too many characters, there's Vitallion leader of Marius' legion he's one of the best characters. Boudica is the daughter of the leader of the barbarians, and there's also the emperor's spoilt and annoying sons, Basilius and Commodus.

There's a multiplayer that shouldn't exist. There's a survival mode where you just fight for as long as you can. There's arena where you're given the same basic task and fight off a lot of enemies, in an arena where it moves mechanically and just seems completely out of place in a game set in ANCIENT Rome. All that and it's only two players, there's even a choice to play that solo, why when it's boring with another player? A max two player multiplayer and you can't even have one on one battles with your friends, huge error.


That's about it. There's not much to talk about when the gameplay is just fighting and heavily involved quick time events, or a cliché story and terrible multiplayer that shouldn't exist. At the same time, it's worth playing through once, even just for how amazing this game looks.

6.9/10

Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonus HD (PS3)

The first in the Sly Cooper franchise, released back in 2002 and developed by Sucker Punch Productions. A game I missed in the PS2 era, but thanks to a HD remake on the PS3, I finally got to it.

Sly is a raccoon and master thief, born from a family of many master thieves. Sly was to inherit the Thievius Raccoonus, a book full of skills and abilities from the Cooper family. The fiendish five, a gang of the world's most wanted criminals steal the book and kill Sly's father in the process. With the help of his friends, Bentley a brilliant hacker who's a turtle, and Murray, the driver and Hippopotamus, will fight off the fiendish five and return the family book back to Sly. Described as a master thief because he only steals from other criminals.

Each of the fiendish five is a boss fight, and their own level variation. There are a bunch of levels to each bosses area, where you'll have to complete the levels to unlock keys to progress to the eventual boss fight. You can also collect messages in a bottle that'll allow you to open a safe and learn some new skills. Sir Ranleigh is the first of the fiendish five, an aristocratic frog. Next up Muggshot, a game gangster dog, followed by Mz Ruby, a voodoo priestess crocodile. Martial arts expert, Panda king is the final boss before the leader of the five, Clockwerk, an immortal metal owl. Inspector Carmelita Fox follows you around the world as you take out the fiendish five, hoping to finally put Sly behind bars for his thievery.

The level designs are really well do and made far better with the cartoon noir style. Most of the levels are really fun, I wasn't into some of Murray's, they were usually races or guiding him through a long winded section were you'd be forced to restart as Murray could be killed from one hit. The boss fights are enjoyable, albeit easy. A couple could be beaten with just a few hits. Ms Ruby's boss fight is literally a long quicktime event.

The gameplay is pretty good, swinging and sliding along vines were fun ways to platform through the levels. The one hit kill was infuriating at times, but the game was pretty easy, horses shoes would also give you an extra hit before dying. You were also forced to start from the very beginning if you had run out of lives. You could unlike lots of moves, but most you wouldn't really use, like the explosive hat. Slo-mo was a cool and very useful power, made sections even easier. You unlocked all these cool moves only if you were getting all the collectables as you play. Once you complete the game and find all collectables to unlock all the moves, there's no point in replaying the game to test them out. You also collected coins throughout every level and they seemed to serve absolutely no purpose.

The art style and enemy design was by far the best thing about it. Sly, Bentley and Murray all are designed and portrayed well, as well as Carmelita. The fiendish five all look great too, the standouts are the first two bosses, Ranleigh the frog and Muggshot the dog. The levels are brilliant, they're fun to play and each suits the world they're set in. Sly travels through American casinos, boggy swamps, snowy Japan, and all the levels are well suited.

It's just too easy, mainly with boss fights and too short. I'm looking forward to playing through the rest of the Sly games. It didn't wow me as much as I'd hoped, but I'm definitely contiuning the franchise.

7.4/10

Resident Evil Operation Raccoon City (Xbox 360)

This game is terrible. See you in the next review!

...Ugh, ok then.

Resident Evil Operation Raccoon City released in 2012, and developed by Capcom and Slant Six Games. SSG shut down a year later, and this game most likely helped that.

So that's what companies are doing now? Using the name of popular franchises to sell games? NO! THIS DOES NOT DESERVE THE RESIDENT EVIL NAME. This doesn't even need to exist, seriously, why does it? The only purpose this serves is to damage the Resident Evil name. "But... but we put popular Resident Evil character Leon in the game", cheap ploys using popular characters and titles to STEAL money from gamers.

The Umbrella Security Service send out a team to Raccoon City, a team of four class-based characters to stop Dr William Birkin handing the US military his T-virus and retrieve the G-virus. Birkin has hired a group of mercenaries to make sure the deal goes through and will attack your team on site. The T-virus causes a zombie outbreak in Raccoon City, and the USS have to clear any evidence of Umbrella ever being there. There is a choice ending too, whether you complete or abandon your mission, completing the mission ends in you killing Leon Kennedy, like that's the way he'd go out.

The characters suck, they're hideously acted, everything they say is cringey and over the top acting. They look so plain, they're all in black outfits and have black masks. Each character is a class, and you'll have three AI with you if you play solo. I beg you to play with others if you're gonna play it at all. The AI is God awful, they won't kill, they'll just get in your way. The best they do is distract some of the infected.

The graphics are piss-poor, this came out in 2012 yet it looks like it's from 2007. The zombies are embarrassing to look at, the huge infected at the start looks like a baby tried to draw a Tank from Left 4 Dead, the red skinned zombies look like they came from a cartoon. The controls are clunky and hardy ever respond. Picking up weapons and ammo is a chore, you'll run away thinking you grabbed a new gun, but it's still on the floor laughing at you. You can execute mercenaries or do a gut shot if you hold the grab, which is cool, but you'll be instantly frustrated with the amount of times it doesn't work.

The gun play is surprisingly ok, but here's how they fucked that you; you get about two clips of ammo, so you're constantly dry looking for more. The combat is one of the worst, zombies will take 10+ hits using it, if you hold the attack button you can execute, but I wasn't told that and figured it out at the end of the game! Being heavily damaged will cause you to bleed, meaning the zombies will come gunning for you. You can also become a zombie if you're infected and don't have any anti virus spray. Your team can also become infected, and you'll have to put them down before they turn. You can revive all downed allies quickly. There's a decent selection of guns and grenade types.

It's quite short, but the levels seem to drag, you'll bore yourself with the dull acting, eye-gouginly bad graphics and tiresome tropes. Don't even get me started on being grabbed non stop by the Lickers, seriously, what's more frustrating then being grabbed over and over on games? You can buy guns and abilities but I barely used any. There's a tacked on multiplayer that I'll be aurprsurp any even played. There's five modes I played them all with a friend and it was one of the worst multiplayer experiences I've had, I'm not even gonna go into more detail about multiplayer. This game is so bad.

It's non-canon, so what's the fucking point in it?

4.6/10

State of Decay (Xbox 360)

State of Decay was released in 2013 and developed by Undead Labs.

First off, this is the my perfect kind of zombie guy. Tough, scavenging, building up your safe zone, cars, melee, guns and other friendly survivors. It's missing some stuff sure, but it's the perfect start.

There's a story, it's quite short and nothing amazing, but it's appreciated. You return home to Trumbull, along with your friend. You quickly find out the world is changing as there's a zombie apocalypse afoot. They soon make friends with other survivors and make their new home at a populated church. They meet a bunch of different groups of survivors, all with different goals. You and your new found friends plan to escape the town, which is the main objective.

This game has perma-death, meaning if you die, you're dead. You can play as all different characters, or you can stick to one if you can survive long enough. There's plenty of different characters to play as, you'll meet plenty along your way, and you can even recruit many back to your home base. You can build up your home base, build medical bays, sleeping quarters, watchtowers and more. Each character can build up their stats like stamina, shooting, wits for looting and plenty more.

There's lots to explore, the map is really big, way bigger than you'd think. There's loads of houses and shops for you to loot items, you'll find the right supplies in the right places, bullets in gun stores, medical supplies at the vets. You can travel around the huge map with a mass amount of different vehicles. You can loot rucksacks of supplies which will cost more stamina while sprinting, but you can rack 'em up in the boot of your vehicle. You have to hold the button to loot which is a slower process, but can be sped up holding down another button, at the risk of making more noise and alerting zombies.

Stamina and health are two of your biggest worries, especially in a game where there's perma-death. You can find plenty of health supplies and snacks to restore stamina, you want to always have them in your limited inventory. There's all kinds of melee weapons and types, heavy, blunt, edged. There's a huge arsenal of guns and types of ammo. You can even create silencers and other weapon mods, as well as health supplies if you have a medical bay and munitions shop at your home base. You can even relocate your home base to many different locations, and bring along all your recruited survivors.

Hordes will roam the streets and will come charging at you once you're spotted. A great way of destroying hordes quickly, is to open your car door as you drive past them and smash through them. Ploughing through zombies with your car is a quick way to destroy the vehicle. Zombies will jump on your vehicle and rip your door off if you don't dispatch them. Infestations will often occupy a deserted home, forcing you to clear them out if you want to loot it. There are different zombies types called freaks, swat zombies are armoured up and won't die by guns, ferals are tough and quick, they can tear you apart easily if you're unprepared. Bloaters cause a gas-like explosion and will take your stamina and health down if caught. Screamers will do just that and alert all nearby zombies and juggernauts and tall fat zombies, very difficult to kill and can kill you all too quickly.

As well as the main story, there's plenty of missions types, side missions, freak up, help nearby survivors, ally missions, recruitment, help out injured or lost allies, there's plenty to do. Problem is most of it is just repetitive and you'll get bored quick. Although the voice acting is really good, most characters are voiced by the same person and have the exact same voice. It's even worse when .you're doing the repetitive missions, you'll be quoting the game as you play. I tend to have stuck with a small group of characters and just switched between the group and learnt they're names and built up their skills, rather than play as every character and risk losing survivors who were low levelled.

There's survey areas that allow you to climb up a tall building and scout the land for vehicle's, hordes and possible loot areas. Your weapons can break over time, but you're able to get them repaired at base. You can store all items you've found at base, in return you'll be awarded influence which is sort of currency. You can spend influence to build up your home base and even use it to recruit a survivor to help you complete tasks. You can set up outposts at cleared buildings that help take care of hordes, execute zombies that are knocked down, and use your radio tower to find survivors and supplies. You can also send out runners to pick up supplies you had no room to carry yourself.

There's plenty of flaws, but so many more good things. It can get repetitive if you do anything but the story. It can get boring doing the same thing, especially when the characters sound and say the same things. Zombies would get stuck underground and was a huge pain if you were in a situation where you had to kill every zombie. The biggest issue for me was the lack of coop. This would've been a huge plus, it definitely would've made the repetitive missions more capable.

It's a great game, like I said it's my kinda zombie game. Fix a few issues like less repetitive missions, more voice actors, stronger graphics and coop, you're onto a winner. State of Decay 2 is coming very soon and they've done just that, it's coop! I'm very excited as this could be a stellar game, I'll find out soon.

8.1/10

Jak and Daxter the Precursor Legacy HD (PS3)

Jak and Daxter originally released back in 2001, and was developed by Naughty Dog. A HD port of the Jak and Daxter trilogy was released in 2012.

Jak and Daxter is one of my favourite games ever. I loved it way back when I first played it, and was ecstatic when a HD version was coming to PS3. Daxter is one of my favourite video game characters of all time, and he's been my gamer picture on PS ever since I made my account. I never actually finished it back on PS2, but have made amends (more than a few times) on the PS3 version.

Set in a fictional world, were the human-like creatures have elongated ears. A bright and colourful world, full of unique and interesting areas. Jak, a mute, and his buddy Daxter, the loudmouth, embark on a dangerous journey to Misty Island. A creepy part of the world, filled with the dangerous dark eco. They see the two villains of the game, Gol Acheron and his sister, Maia. The two are ordering Lurkers to gather dark eco, the duo now spooked about the dangerous are caught by a lurker. Jak attacks it with an explosive barrel, shooting Jak back into Daxter, and knocking Daxter into a pool of dark eco. Daxter is shot back up and completely transformed into an otter-like creature. The two escape back home to Sandover Village, to inform Samos, the Sage of green eco, of the evil plans of the brother and sister. He is furious with the duo and informs them only the brother and sister can reverse Daxter's transformation.

The main objective is to collect power cells. There are 101 in the game and they will keep you progressing through the story. There are lots of ways to earn them; trade them for precursor orbs, defeating bosses, doing tasks for the locals, all sorts. As well as power cells, there are scout flies to collect. There are seven in each location, and collecting them all grants a power cell. I found the collecting addicting, it's the overall objective of the game, but it's not tiresome as you do so many different things to earn power cells.

The locations are wonderful and you can't wait to see where you're taken next. From sandy beaches to creepy jungles, snowy mountains to dark caves, and even a return to Misty Island. The creatures are unique too, they change during each location. The combat is simple, you have a sliding punch and a spin attack. You can also spin attack in the air, and do a double fist downward punch from the air. There's platforming too, and you and even crouch and do spinning rolls to reach farther. You can swim, but don't swim to far out or you'll be eaten by the terrifying lurker shark!

There are vehicle parts too, most are just reaching the end of the path, some hazards like driving over lava and getting to the end before you overheat. There's an area where you have free reign to drive around, you can also do a time trial race and collecting rings before time runs out. There's many puzzles too, but you'll usually be awarded with a power cell. Watching the animation of Jak and Daxter being awarded their power cell is satisfying and always a joy to watch. There's different eco types too which are sort of power ups. Dark eco is hazardous to you, green eco gives life, blue eco gives you a speed boost, red eco gives more strength and yellow eco gives you a projectile to shoot.

The music, graphics, characters and voice acting are amazing. The menu music is some of favourite. The music changes and fits every area you go to, they all have their own music. Stunning visuals made even better in HD. You just want to explore every new area and appreciate the well designed levels. The characters were fun and quirky, everyone was interesting, just a shame most of the side characters hardly featured. The voice acting was great Daxter is by far the strongest, as is his personality. All the side characters were well acted too, no character stood out as week.

Almost since the beginning of my gaming days, Jak and Daxter has been one of my favourite games ever. It still is 17 years after its release. The strange thing is I've hardly played Jak 2 and 3, even after how much I love the first. I've always been saving them because of my love for the series, I like knowing I've got two whole games to play. Maybe it's time... Naughty Dog, nobody does it better than you guys.

9.3/10

Dishonored 2 (Xbox One)

Dishonored 2 is the sequel to the first person stealth action game. It released in 2016 and was developed by Arkane Studios.

Emily Kaldwin has now grown up and is now the Empress of the Isles. Corvo returns and is the Royal Protector to his daughter Emily. They held a ceremony of remembrance to Emily's mother and former Empress, Jessamine. It's soon interrupted by Duke Luca Abele and Deliah Copperspoon, who claims to be Jessamine's half sister and true heir to the throne. The Duke's men start attacking, leaving you to then choose your character, Emily or the previous protagonist, Corvo. Whoever you don't choose is turned into stone, leaving you to save them and reclaim your throne, and dispose of all who helped in your removal.

Previously, we could only play as Corvo, now we can play as Emily too. Each character has their own powers and share a couple too, so it's worth playing as each character. I picked Corvo first as I played as him originally, I went through with a no kill, no alerts and no powers low chaos playthrough. I then done the opposite with Emily and got to try out a few new powers. It may not sound fun, a new killing/stealth/powerless run, but I loved it. I discovered everything myself, lots of trial and error trying to find a stealthy way around. As I wasn't killing, I also had to find the non lethal way to take out the targets. They were cool and unique ways to dispose of targets, rather than just sticking them with a blade.

Now killing in this game is really fun too, going on sprees against the guards with swords, guns, explosives, crossbow blots and more is great. For a stealth game, they allow you to for a more action approach too, though you won't last long at all if you're not careful. There were a couple new powers, far reach was an Emily exclusive, that acted very similar to Blink and allowed you to teleport short distances. Mesmerize stops enemies in their tracks as they are put in a daze leaving them vulnerable. Domino was my favourite of the new ones, you can link up enemies together, and whatever happens to one happens to another, if you shoot one in the head, the other dies giving you a two for one. Doppelganger has Emily reveal a clone of herself and Shadow Walk allows Emily to be a smaller target and difficult to spot by the enemies.

I love the art style to this game and there's a slight improvement on the graphics, there wasn't much room for improvement honestly. There's a lot of replayability, two different characters, two play styles, powers or no powers, low or high chaos. There's loads of paths and secret areas, good combat, fantastic stealth and great voice acting. Corvo now has a voice actor who does a fantastic job. The cast is great too, Rosario Dawson, Vincent D'Onofrio, Sam Rockwell and Pedro Pascal. There were great characters, Deliah is a fearful witch and a worthy main villain, Paolo was a standout too, he couldn't be killed unless he was killed twice in the same day. A special mention to the huge Clockwork soldiers, huge robotic enemies with four blades, very difficult in a fight and intense as fuck. They are terrifying when inactive as you have to stealth around them, being very careful not to wake them into a fight.

Some of the cool new features make the game more fun, if you're going for a no kill run but are spotted, you can now choke out enemies during combat to keep your non lethal playthrough. You can chain your possession power allowing you to switch from a hound, to a rat, to a person, to a fish all in one run. There are black market shops for you to purchase items or even Rob them, there's also plenty of notes and audiographs for more info on the world of Dishonored. The levels are huge with plenty to explore, lots of well designed levels and beautiful scenery, some of the best in video games. Two missions in particular stood out, the Clockwork Mansion, a mansion were the walls and floors can move, and take you to new areas of the mansion. There's another mission that takes place in the past and present at the same time. You're given a device that allows you to switch timeless and also has a mirror that shows what's in the other timeline as you play.

There really isn't much wrong with this game. I guess you could say it's short, especially if you play a non stealth approach, but you should play that way. It's not short playing stealthy and figuring everything out yourself. You could argue there aren't many new powers because Corvo gets none, they're all awarded to Emily which makes sense. The worst thing I could say, is I don't think it's better than the first game. The first was exceptional, one of the best I've played, Dishonored 2 is fantastic that being said. All that's next is to make it a trilogy, not much would stop me from preordering Dishonored 3.

8.8/10

Star Wars Battlefront 2: Resurrection DLC (Xbox One)

Resurrection released about a month after Battlefront 2. It's free DLC, so at least EA kept that promise of no paid DLC. (There's still time to fuck us there though) as it's free content, I won't be giving it a score at the end.

First off, it adds two new heroes, (Two that should've been in from the start) Finn and Captain Phasma. Finn is awesome, he's my favourite hero, along with Darth Maul in the game. Phasma is good, but she doesn't have as great abilities to make you ponder over picking her or someone with a lightsaber. I've had my best run as a hero playing as Finn, far better than Yoda online.

The Resurrection story takes place in the current film franchise, with Finn and Rey. Iden is now old, like Luke and Leia. You start off as Kylo Ren, (I mean, why not? The original story horribly forced in heroes) you find Del, who is married to Iden at this point. Along with Hask from the original story, he then goes on to kill Del. Iden is on the hunt for Hask, and finally bring him down. As Del and Iden have been married for so long, why not force a child of there's into the story? A young rebel who wants to follow in her mother's footsteps, that's not too cliché is it?

Iden and Del's daughter, Zay, wants to fight alongside her mother and help bring down Hask. Unlike her mother, she started with the Rebels and didn't blow up inhabited planets for a living. There are only three missions, space combat, ground combat, boring. Nothing new is added, nothing interesting, just bland. The acting was awful, Iden immediately gets over the death of her husband of thirty years, Zay also doesn't seem to care. The pair barely react to the news of someone incredibly close to them being killed. The two are joined on there journey by my standout character from the original, Shriv. The content is short, lazy and pointless. Shriv adds comedy and good acting, and Hask stands out again with his brilliant acting too. I didn't like Zay, still struggled to care about Iden, and cheaply adding in Kylo was poor. Thank God Rey and Finn weren't forced in.

If this is the end of the single player DLC for Battlefront 2, then I'm embarrassed. This is all they could do? The original campaign was really weak, and this short story was pointless and just bad. The only good thing was that Shriv came back. Hopefully they bring more single player content, and it's back when Iden was with the Empire, but God forbid you play as a villian. EA you fucking pussies.

Star Wars Battlefront 2 (Xbox One)

Star Wars Battlefront 2 was developed by EA, and unfortunately isn't the classic Battlefront 2 developed by Pandemic. It released in 2017, with the huge controversy regarding micro transactions. With such backlash, Disney stepped in and EA decided to temporarily remove them, only to plan on bringing them back.

This time we are treated to a story, it's set during The Return of the Jedi. The story stars Iden Versio, a commander in the Empire and daughter of an Imperial Admiral. She is leader of Inferno Squad, the other members; Gideon Hask and Del Meeko her right hand men. I won't go into too much detail of the story, but I will spoil the general plot. As you're an Imperial, you're a villian, which is a great and unique story for a Star Wars game. After only a few missions, you end up against the Imperials, here's why; while on a mission to extract an asset to the Empire, the planet is attacked. Iden and Del are trying to help civilians escape, Hask freaks out and calls you and Del traitors to the Empire. So, basically, you tried to evacuate civilians while on a mission to extract someone, and that's treason.... right.

After fleeing from the Empire, Iden and Del eventually find themselves working with the Rebel Alliance. Despite being very high up in the Empire, Iden and Del were clearly ruthless to be so high up. The rebels take them in and quickly rise up the ranks in the rebel force. Leia and Iden are even laughing and joking with each other early on. Hey Leia, she worked for the people that blew your fucking home planet up... It's dumb. Leia, Han, Lando and Luke are all badly forced into the story, they're even playable in some missions. Each mission with a hero felt like it was a demo for the online, it was terrible. Although the story wasn't great, if they swapped the hero missions for more with Iden, it would've been stronger. Of course they didn't have the balls to keep us as the enemy.

A little more on the story, after all, this is what sold me on getting the game so soon. There aren't really any new characters, but one in particular is probably the best in the game, Shriv. Shriv, a big player in the Rebels adds a lot of humour, and a lot of his jokes land. I was always happy when he was accompanying me on my mission. Iden was an ok character, her story was set up well, but the poor character development and flat personality made it difficult to really care about her. Del is much stronger, incredibly likeable and good company, it was pretty hard to believe he was so high up in the Empire, he seemed too nice. Hask, the villain of the story was quite strong too. Very well acted, intense, just how he turned on you was ridiculous.

There are plenty of space battles during the campaign, I'd go as far to say there's more missions in space than on the ground. If you told me that before I played it, I wouldn't have been happy, but the space battles were far stronger and more fun. There was some stealth included, it worked well but there wasn't many chances to use it. You can pick your loadouts during missions, and edit your abilities. You could also use cards during the story but I never did, I hate the card system and can't believe that survived from the first game. It's really short too, there's just no time for anything to develop. Iden felt cast aside which was a shame, they forced the heroes into the story and quickly made them best friends with the rebels, it was tacky. The story wasn't really interesting and was done carelessly.

Onto the multiplayer. There's a lot less modes, a bunch had been removed from the game. There was a couple of additions, Strike and Starfighter Assault. Strike has you in a battle to complete objectives in two teams, Starfighter Assault has teams of pilots engage in an objective based match that's across multiple stages. You can use crafting parts to upgrade cards, but who cares? That's pointless shit, crystals are the in game currency, both are a crock of shit, they're just a cheap ploy to get you to spend real money. No full price game should ever have micro transactions, but hey, at least they made their season pass free right? Oh, that's just because they ripped everyone off who bought the first and had to win them back somehow.

Battlefront now spans across all film eras, but they cheaply removed everything to do with Rogue One. Now the original trilogy, prequel trilogy and current film series are featured. The same heroes are back excluding some of the DLC characters like Greedo amongst others. So, now they've added two new film eras, how many new heroes do we get? FIVE. FUCKING FIVE. what the fuck, are you serious? Fucking five? The original Battlefront 2 added seven-fucking-teen. They didn't have heroes in the first game, but they added seventeen, and that was only across two eras! You're telling me, three whole eras, tonnes of heroes and you can only add five? Iden's one but no one gives a shit about playing as someone you control throughout the story, and Poe is only a vehicle hero, so they dont really count. From the prequels we get Darth Maul and Yoda.... Two. Where's Obi Wan? Anakin? Mace Windu? Grevious? From the new films? Rey and Kylo. Two again? Sure they gave us Finn and Captain Phasma as free DLC, but the game didn't even release with them? How can a game released in 2005 be so superior to one released in 2017?

There's practically a whole new roster of guns, I loved a lot on the first, but most don't reappear. I struggle to even find a gun I like using. I realised, as much as they added in, they took even more out. There's no battle scenarios now, they were shit but that's more gone. No more survival either. Hey they added arcade! Oh, cool, can you play online with a friend? NO OF COURSE YOU CANT, WHY WOULD SOMETHING SO USEFUL BE IN AN EA GAME? you can only play arcade in splitscreen, but not online. What the fuck is wrong with EA and Dice? How can they keep getting the Star Wars Battlefront series so fucking wrong? How? All they had to do was just make Battlefront 2 (2005) with better graphics and throw in the new film series, the hard work was already done for them.

God damnit EA. You fucked it up, AGAIN. What's worse is they'll get another chance, Battlefront 3 will happen. LucasArts didn't even make it to a three, and they perfected it. FUCK YOU EA, you've tarnished the Battlefront name. NO, you murdered it, buried it, only to dig it up again and shit all over it. I don't think I've ever been so angry at a video game's fuck up, granted EA are no stranger to my gaming rants. I grew up on Battlefront, the first was fantastic I loved it. The sequel was near perfect, addictive as Hell, a major improvement with a shit of additions and amazing cast of heroes, they were missing only Qui-Gon. A game twelve years old was clearly so ahead of its time, EA have only reached a fifth of the original. The original was made when companies cared, they actually wanted to make good games. Now? Now it's all about money, creating so little, for so much more money. It's companies like EA that have really screwed over gamers and passionate developers.

When Battlefront was announced it was being rebooted, I couldn't have been happier. The original Battlefront 2 is one of the best games I've played, very likely in my top five games ever. After what I've seen them do in two games, I wish they just left it in the past. The best thing EA could do now, is fuck off Battlefront 3, it doesn't deserve to exist, or at least be EA's game. Fuck that off and just remaster the original, it's what we gamers deserve. The only games that come out now seem to be remasters, why not remake games that actually deserve one. This shares the name of one of the greatest video games in existence, but it's just a cheap imitation.

6.9/10

Firewatch (Xbox One)

This is the start of the 2018 games, the following reviews could feature in the end of year review.

Firewatch released in 2016 and on Xbox One later on that year. It was developed by Campo Santo, and it was their first project. It's a mystery adventure game, but ultimately a walking simulator.

It starts out with a small text story, allowing you to make some small changes. It tells the story of your character and how he met his wife. As the story goes on, we learn his wife has Alzheimer's, and how she has moved out to live with her parents. It's an emotional story and at this point we know neither of these characters.

After Henry's wife moves back in with her parents, he decides to take up a job in the wilderness as a fire lookout. It's set in 1988, and the beautiful cartoon graphics are some of the best I've seen. Henry is completely alone, there are other fire watchers out there, but you never come across them, just some notes they leave each other in the lock boxes. You do have regular contact with one other  lookout, Delilah. She basically shows you the ropes and guides you through your daily tasks.

A huge part of the game is the conversations with Delilah. You talk to each other using walkie talkies, she speaks to you from her tower, while you're out doing your tasks she gives you. We have never seen Delilah or know her previous, these are two people who are talking for the first time. We watch the relationship build, and it's the best part of the game. The voice acting from both Rich Sommer and Cissy Jones, potentially the best voice acting I've witnessed. The chemistry between the two lookouts is fantastic. You the option whether to respond to most conversations and what you want to say, proving this isn't just a walking simulator. The game does a fantastic job of balancing emotion, humour and eeriness, the way Henry just shuts down when Delilah asks about his wife right after they were taking funny little digs at each other.  The sarcastic jokes, interesting conversations and fearful consequences of their choices make every conversation worth listening to.

You're armed only with a map and a compass, the map marks your location, so you always know where you are, but you always have to get your map out to see where you are. You also have rope, allowing you to climb up and down high surfaces. You have free reign to explore and you want to because the forest is so beautiful. At the same time you don't, as you want to do your tasks and see what happening next.

You never see other people, the only time you do, they're pretty far away and you're unable to see their faces. You come across two drunk girls, littering and skinny-dipping, breaking the rules and causing fire hazards by setting off fireworks. Will you break their stereo? Trash their campsite? It's up to you. Your actions will have consequences. Things take a turn for the worse as you find strange equipment, and that your conversations with Delilah have been recorded. That's why you get choice dialogue, it may come back to haunt. It starts to get creepy, your conversations are being listened to, personal information about you and Delilah is found on notepads, a strange fenced off area, tracking devices, it becomes quite the mystery.

Walking simulators aren't the most exciting genre, but they're story based, so a strong story helps make a good game. This is how I'd describe Firewatch; it's the king of walking sims. If you've never played it, you really need to. The worst thing about it is its length, but prolonging the story would most likely weaken. Campo Santo's first project couldn't have gone any better, they made themselves noticed, and any game the develop now I'll be keeping an eye on.

8.6/10

The Simpsons Game (Xbox 360)

The Simpsons Game was developed by Visceral Games. It released in 2007, the same year as The Simpsons Movie, but not a tie in with the game.

The Simpsons family discover they are characters in a video game and are in possession of super powers. The playable characters are Homer, Marge with Maggie, Bart and Lisa. Homer has the ability to turn into a ball and roll into enemies as well as turn into a gooey homer and fire projectiles. Marge can use a megaphone to recruit Springfield citizens in to do her bidding. Bart becomes BartMan and uses his powerful slingshot and flying ability. Lisa can use her saxophone to stun enemies and her Buddhist hand to attack and freeze enemies.

The game is one big parody of video games. You will notice hundreds of small nods to some of the biggest games in history. Some levels transport you right into a parody of an in game world. Grand Theft Auto, Medal of Honor and Pokémon are three games that are directly given a level based on their worlds. The enemy's aesthetics change every level to keep in theme, most enemies will look like they're taken right out of other games, Madden and Street Fighter are two games in particular. The character set ups change every level, two Simpson family members are paired up together and it's also co-op.

It's an action platformer, with a lot of puzzles. It can be frustrating to play alone, constantly switching between characters to complete puzzles. Split screen co-op is the perfect way to play. A lot of the action gameplay is just beat-em-up and completing puzzles to get to the next section. Each level is completely different and you can't wait to see what's next, what games will be parodied. You can also see a bunch of video game posters spread out clearly parodying other games like Need For Speed and Mortal Kombat.

Across their journey through video games, The Simpsons music free their 8-bit selves as they're cast away and left to die, stop Will Wright, (The creator of The Sims) defeat Matt Groening, (The creator of The Simpsons) stop an alien invasion and win a dance of with God. Some levels are featured right from the show itself, Homer returns to the Land of Chocolate, killer dolphins rise up once again and Lard Lad returns to life attacking Springfield.

Outside of the main story, you're given the opportunity to explore Springfield in free roam. All the notable sites are there, as well as hundreds of the characters to see. Each character has their own collectable item, that'll help improve their powers and health bar. Comic Book Guy pops up to tell you you're doing generic things in video games, like double jumping and combos, they're in the form of game cliché collectables. Each level also has a time challenge, they are relevant timed missions to each story level you already completed.

It wasn't quite Hit and Run 2, (something we all still want to see) but it was worthy of its own stature in the series of Simpsons games we've seen. It was a really fun co-op game, with great levels and hilarious game spoofs. It's unfortunate that the sequel was cancelled, there's been a lack of Simpsons games the past decade, I'm starting to think we may not see another one.

7.6/10

Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare

Advanced Warfare is one of many, many games to be released annually in the CoD series, this time developed by Sledgehammer Games, their first in the series.

Advanced Warfare is its own series, and set in 2054 and expands to 2061. It stars Kevin Spacey as Jonathan Irons, head of Atlas, a private military contractor. You play as Jack Mitchell, a private. Mitchell and his best friend, Will Irons, the son of Jonathan Irons, our on a mission in Korea with their squad. The mission goes south, and Will is killed. While attending Will's funeral, Jonathan Irons recruits Mitchell into Atlas.

Atlas is filled to the brim with new weapon technology, most notably, the EXO suit. The EXO suit gives the soldier who wears it all sorts of abilities; scaling walls, double jumps, air dash and a bunch more. Not every suit can do each ability, some can do a few and others do something different. Gideon and Ilona accompany you on most of your missions, both characters are some of Atlas' best soldiers. You're also reunited with your old sergeant, Cormack, who is now a member of the Sentinel Task Force, who has their own technology, allowing them to go invisible. One of Cormack's best men, Knox, accompanies you on most missions after meeting.

The EXO suits are great to use, they give off so much variety because they can do so much, and they change up most missions. There's different grenade types too, smart, threat. One highlights enemies in red and the other will lock on to a target, and blow up what's in its path. Another cool thing is mute mines. You don't get to use them yourself, but they're so cool, the blast is silent and no one can here it, the game even goes quiet too. Some guns highlight enemies in red when you aim your reticle at them, whatever gun had this, I was using, they were incredibly useful. Later on you can wear a tank-like suit, you can just rush at the enemies and go guns blazing.

One thing CoD games have always got right is gameplay, that's no different here. The shooting mechanics are second to none, the running, jumping and dashing all flows together well, grenade throwing, vehicle driving it's all good. Veteran difficulty is far too easy though, it wasn't even a challenge throughout. The AI are useless and are just there to block your path, all the characters are good, well acted and you care about the ones you're supposed to, Gideon and Cormack being the strongest. Here's the strangest thing about this game; you're voiced and modelled by Troy Baker (the famous voice actor in video games) and yet he practically never says a word, occasionally in the cutscenes, but nothing in gameplay. Why on Earth would you cast one of the best voice actors as a lead character to not speak? The checkpoints were a little glitchy at times too, I died and was put back a lot further than expected, I carried on playing and counted the checkpoints until my death, six! I was put back six checkpoints when it should only be one.

I felt like I outgrew the CoD series. My last in the series I got when it was brand new was Modern Warfare 3. I have most of them and just not gotten round to them. I wasn't expecting much and had already written of Advanced Warfare. I was definitely surprised, and enjoyed the story. I was always against the future plotlines, but after playing through one, I have to give them credit for doing something different, as most are set in the past or present. I'm not sure whether there'll be more Advanced Warfare, there's definitely room for more and they did end with sequel in mind. I guess in my eyes, CoD is sort of back.

7.5/10

Oddworld: Munch's Odyssey (PS3)

Munch's Odyssey is another story in the Oddworld series. We play as both Munch and Abe from the earlier games.

The game starts with Munch, a frog-like sea creature whose species is fished to make a delicacy in the supermarket. After being fished to near enough extinction, Munch is captured and tested on. Abe is tasked with helping Munch escape and the two must work together. It's single player but you can switch between the two. Each has their own abilities and you can only use each character to do certain tasks.

It's a puzzle game where you must find the exit, while also saving trapped Mudokons and Fuzzles. The more of each you save, the better your karma is at the end, which has a huge impact on how your story plays out. You can collect SpooceShrubs, which are used to upgrade your fellow Mudokons to better fighters. These are so useful for taking out large patrols. You can also meditate to to regrow SpooceShrubs over and over.

Some levels give you a lot of space to roam around, but most levels are quite linear and easy to know where you're going. Only Munch can swim, I like the swimming mechanics too, as Munch can swim fast and jump high over obstacles. Each character can die while you play, you will only fail of both characters are dead. You can revive a fallen friend by locating the respawned egg.

Munch is a very slow mover, but once you find a wheelchair, he can navigate far quicker. He can also operate cranes which are often used to pick Abe up, and lift him over high walls. Munch's powers allow him to jump even higher in water, faster walking speed and firing a zap to attack enemies. Abe can carry Munch and throw him, to lift him over obstacles. He can also posses enemies and have them attack each other, which is a great way to dispose of your foes. Abe can also command fellow Mudokons to attack enemies and wait to stay safe. There are a number of different enemy types, each have their own ways attack, but most can be possessed and made to attack each other

The humour is easily one of Oddworld's strongest points. Some of the puzzles can be quite challenging and it's often frustrating. I don't think it done a good job at indicating you to save Mudokons and Fuzzles, I often forgot that was an objective. The worst part was that I had been forgetting to save friendlies, which lead to poor karma, they didn't even let me do the last mission, I just got game over practically. I was furious, you could only complete the game if you had good karma, I felt like I wasted time after not being able to finish the last level.

I love the Oddworld series, but this falls short of Abe's Odyssey, but it's still worth playing (once).

6.7/10

Dear Esther (Xbox One)

Dear Esther released in 2016, four years after its initial release on PC.

It's a walking simulator, and honestly, that's all you do. You walk around an island that's completely isolated. While walking, there's a narration going on. A man is reading letters to his deceased wife, her death is revealed throughout the story.

There's no direction and it's not always obvious if you're going the right way. You only really know you're headed the right way when the narrator starts to talk. It's a very short game that's full of just walking, sound like your thing?

The acting is really good, the actor done a great job at making the dialogue interesting and worth listening to. The map is well designed, the grassy fields, the dark caves and beach side areas look fantastic. The design is easily the game's strongest point.

The walking speed was ridiculously slow, there's no way to speed it up, and it's very frustrating. The game is way too short, and by the end of it, it doesn't feel like it was really worth playing. The walking speed is probably so slow so the game lasted longer. I also found the ending really strange, not sure if others found that, but it left me baffled.

Very short and only moderately interesting. If you can get it for a very cheap, then it's worth thinking about getting.

 5.3/10

Assassin's Creed Syndicate (Xbox One)

Syndicate released in 2015 and is the ninth (Christ almighty) installment in the series.

First off, Syndicate is set in Victorian England which is the perfect setting. I loved the setting and it's the best by far. Walking around London in the 1800s, scaling Big Ben, it's fantastic. For the first time you play as two assassin's, Evie and Jacob Frye, brother and sister. I really liked both of them, Evie is one of my all time favourite assassins.

Jacob is a brawler and is open to fighting, Evie is more stealthy and is better for a quieter approach. You can pick and swap anytime you choose. A lot of missions are specific to a certain character and will automatically change if you're the wrong one. It seems like it should be coop being able to play as two characters, but it's not. Your sibling isn't even AI controlled which is disappointing too, you're always alone and your sibling is nowhere to be seen once the cutscene ends.

London is in Templar control, lead by Crawford Starrick, one of the stronger AC villains. You'll see some significant historical figures throughout including Queen Victoria and Charles Dickens, even Winston Churchill in the WWI segment. Jacob and Evie must take back London, they can takeover each area by completing side missions in each area and then defeating the gang leader of that controlled zone.

The design of London is perfect, the tight roads, riding horse carriages, the people and children roaming the streets. There's plenty of activities like fight club, carriage racing, child liberation missions where you free children from hard labour. You can upgrade each character and unlock new skills relevant to each. A lot of the side characters are pretty weak, some aren't given any time to develop and some of the more important ones like Henry Green, an avid ally, just fall flat. I couldn't tell you what was going on in the present day plotline, frankly I stopped caring about that long ago and just disregard it lately. God knows what the WWI segment was about and why it was even included, it just felt so irrelevant.

The combat was very weak, it was just smashing the fight button and then occasionally countering when needed. I almost always tried to avoid open combat and stay stealthy because the combat got boring almost instantly. The hallucination darts were a huge help, as they turned enemies against each other. Being able to recruit your friendly gang mates and order them to fight enemies, leaving you to skip past them and continue your objective. The grappling hook was an amazing tool, it allowed you to scale tall buildings instantly and let's you cross building from across the street, finally a useful tool and the ability to climb faster.

The horse carriage riding was good, but the small roads made it impossible to drive through, especially when a carriage going the opposite way was coming. Fighting on rooftops of horse carriages and trains were incredible. Kicking an enemy off a moving train was so satisfying. The free running was fucked here, having the press A to scale building and B to climb down messed with you, even when you just wanted to vault over a wall you'd have to press one and it was always the wrong one, I can't even remember which let you vault over the wall, they had a system that worked for years and tweaked it in Unity, but they failed miserably here. Multi-finishers were a great idea, but they never ever worked.

This should've been my favourite AC game, by far, but it wasn't. It was almost a chore to play at times. It's a decent game, but it should've been far better. An improvement on Unity, but far from the levels of Black Flag. Please stop making Assassin's Creed games every year, actually give yourselves time to craft a great game, you're only hurting your own reputation releasing games of quality that are so inconsistent. I hope they revisit this era and the Frye twins again one day, but they wont. They always bin off their setting and characters after one game, unless you're called Ezio.

7.5/10

Skyrim: Dawnguard DLC (PS3)

Dawnguard was the first DLC for Skyrim and it released mid 2012.

The Dawnguard are a group of vampire hunters who have enquired about you joining them. You're actually given a choice whether to side with Dawnguard or vampires. Choosing Dawnguard will give you an awesome crossbow, or joining the vampires will turn you into a vampire lord and grant you some cool powers.

Being a vampire lord allows you to transform into a gargoyle like beast. You can hover over the ground and drain life from your foes. It's pretty cool.

There's plenty of main quests and side quests. It's a good story were you're given the choice of who to side with. You're also granted a new follower, who is by far my favourite, Serana. Serana is a vampire and daughter of vampire master, Lord Harkon.

Each side has their own perks and abilities. The main quests have you often running around dungeons and being attacked by gargoyles. The Dawnguard base and Vampire base are pretty cool to explore and there's lots of characters to engage with. If you choose to be a vampire there are special perks you can unlock by feeding on corpses.

This is the strongest DLC in Skyrim for me. The fact you're given a choose of who to side with. It's a little overpriced but worth playing. Personally, I chose to side with Dawnguard, you get to keep Serana as a follower too!

3.7/5

Skyrim: Dragonborn DLC (PS3)

Dragonborn is the final DLC for Skyrim, and it released at the very end of 2012. Taking you to a whole new island, Solstheim.

A dragon priest named Miraak, has similar powers to you and is a Dragonborn himself of sorts. You must track down five black books that will give you the knowledge to defeat Miraak.

Solstheim is a pretty big island, giving you plenty of new places to explore. There is plenty of new quests and side quests to complete. There's new characters and dragon shouts, and even a new home for you to inhabit. I think it's the best of all the possible homes, it's certainly the biggest. New enemies that are pretty creepy and challenge to fight too, as well as a new material called Stalhrim, you can craft armour and weapons from the rare material.

The main questline is great short, but it's prolonged by the black book side quests, they are repetitive though. Each black book quest teleports you to a similar looking area with the same enemies, it's sort of a maze too. You just keep finding the next book until you finally reach the end. By far the worst quests in the whole of Skyrim. The main questline is quite enjoyable and leads to an epic final battle with Miraak.

It's a pretty big add on filled with lots of new content. Most of its good, the only downfall is the black book side quests. It's a strong DLC overall and worth playing if you already love Skyrim.

3.6/5

Skyrim: Hearthfire DLC (PS3)

Hearthfire released at the end of 2012, just shy a few months from a whole year after Skyrim released. There really isn't much to talk about in Hearthfire, there's not a lot of content with it and there's nothing story related.

The biggest feature is that you can now build houses. Yes, that's how much Minecraft has taken over video games. Now you can see where Fallout 4 got it from. You can build three houses in three of the smaller town, where you couldn't buy a house. Houses are excellent for storage and if you're like me, you have a load of shit you need to pack away. So you can choose one of three locations, or all three and get building.

The building is tedious, you have to get a boatload of materials. Iron to make nails and hinges for doors, clay, wood and quarried stone. You need to hoard these items, and I might really hoard them if you want to build all three houses, even more if you want to build three wings to each. It's a long boring process and a lot of back and forth to store all the materials, as you'll become over encumbered instantly.

That's not all, once you've built your houses, you'll need even more material to build your furnishings. OH COME ON. That's where I drew the line and gave up. I built a few weapon plaques and some mannequins to store my outfits and weapons, because that's all I wanted to do. A weird glitch occured though, sort of an infinite money glitch too. I found that once I applied and outfit to a mannequin, it'd stay there. I could take it off and put another outfit on instead, but every time I re-entered my house, that same outfit was there. I could take it off the mannequin, and leave, enter again and I could stock up on that outfit to sell. It really fucked with me though, as I couldn't present my outfits how I wanted, and ultimately I fucked off all my new houses. Even after five years this glitch still works.

The other big feature is adoption. You can go to the Riften Orphanage and take your pick. Your new child returns to one of your selected homes, where they spend the rest of the game droning on. Adoption is a wonderful thing, but in Skyrim, what's the point? The kid in stuck in your house walking around acknowledging you, and occasionally give your useless items like sweet rolls and tankards. Thanks kid. They are literally just their to pawn their trash onto you.

Probably the most pointless DLC to come out for a game. The ball was dropped here, and they never done anything to fix it, or even make this a good piece of content. If you've avoided it this long, well done. Keep it that way.

2.4/5

The Elder Scrolls V - Skyrim (PS3)

Skyrim was released in 2011 and developed by Bethesda. It's the fifth game in the Elder Scrolls series, and like everybody else, I'm waiting for Elder Scrolls 6!

This review is gonna be a little different, everyone has played Skyrim and everyone knows how good it is. I think it's a brilliant game, but it has problems. It feels wrong to shit talk Skyrim, but that's what I'm gonna do because everyone likes this game. This is why Skyrim isn't a 10/10 like most scores it gets.

For a game that came out at the very end of 2011, it's ugly. The characters look bad, the Khajit's, Orcs and the other races look pretty good, but the Nord's look like they came out of the previous generation. The texturing is pretty poor too, sure the game is huge and it's impossible to make everything look good, but still could be better. The dungeons are the same. There's like four variations of dungeons, you have to go through a lot during the game, do you really wanna go through the same place over and over? Repetition sucks.

Bugs. Name a buggier game than Skyrim.... I'm not sure there is one. I've had to restart my game from earlier saves numerous times from game breaking bugs. The worst thing that can happen in gaming is a game breaking glitch, if you can't start from an earlier save, you're fucked. Getting stuck in the geometry countless times is infuriating. Characters and followers randomly dying and disappearing.

A game that has so many characters, and yet you hear the same voice actor over and over, takes all the realism out when most people sound the same. The dull and repetitive quests, restoring the Thieves Guild having do twenty small jobs where there's only three different kinds is the most boring part of the game and no fun. Difficulty doesn't seem to matter, even if you dumb it down to the easiest difficulty, you will still find yourself getting your ass kicked.

After all that, it's still a fantastic game. There's so much variety and so much to do. You can play this game for hundreds of hours and feel like there's still so much to do. This is a great game, with a tonne of problems. Enough of the remasters and ports, give us Elder Scrolls 6 already.

8.5/10

The Witcher 2 (Xbox 360)

CD Projekt Red developed Witcher 2 in 2011 on PC, it was released a year later in 2012 on consoles. It's a sequel to The Witcher released back in 2007 on PC.

Story revolves around Geralt, a Witcher who is trained to slay monsters. Geralt is accused of killing King Foltest, and is imprisoned. Geralt is suffering from amnesia, but he remembers witnessing the king's assassination while being interrogated. This leads to Geralt trying to track down the real killer, there are three split paths leaving some replayability. I also didn't appreciate the random events where you were made to play as random characters during the story, especially when you were first introduced to the character was when you controlled them and you're wondering "who is this guy?"

You get the impression it's open world, but it's very linear, I felt that was the wrong approach, but you do get free reign to do some roaming. This is a difficult game, if you're a button masher, you're gonna have to adapt. The combat is intense, one hit will do a lot of damage to you. It's all about swing, block, swing, roll. You can't keep swinging, you gotta pay attention to your enemies or you'll get a quick death. Geralt is armed with two swords, one for human enemies, and one for monsters. You can use each sword on the opposite enemy, but they do very limited damage in comparison to the true weapon.

The world of Witcher is wonderful. The medieval setting and incredibly British accents were perfect. The eccentric characters, the unique monsters and of course, the brilliant dwarfs you are easily the most entertaining. There's side quests, but honestly I didn't enjoy any of them, I was just paying attention when it came to the story missions. There's a skill tree for you to explore, there's signs which act as spells for you to cast, and a good inventory system allowing you to equip clothing and weapons that suit you. A good loot system easily allowing you to pick up useful items and simply sort it within the menus.

I found it so overwhelming and quite complex. So much is thrown at you and you're never really given a proper tutorial or time to digest all the features. It's more of just learning as you go along. There's an overcomplicated menu that's filled with different sections, some I just never looked at. For 2012 I thought the graphics were amazing, I remember being in awe looking at the detail of the characters and scenery. The voice acting is really good, it stands out in the background characters how well they're voiced.

There's side activities like fight club, which is far too easy as it's just quick time events, rolling dice which isn't that interesting and you're never really given the rules, and there's arm wrestling which is one of the worst activities I've seen in a game, it's all to to with balancing the cursor, but it's so unbalanced as your cursor is correctly placed it takes an overly long time to start moving in your favour. There's bartering and crafting too, you can also equipped bombs and destroy monster nests.

I'm not sure what to say about Witcher 2, I know it's a good game, but honestly, I wouldn't want to play through it again. I found it too complicated and the story was confusing at times, the side activities weren't interesting enough, but the characters, graphics and voice acting were all really good. I'm excited to play Witcher 3 after all the good things I've heard, but I can't see myself going back to two.

7.7/10

For Honor (Xbox One)

For Honor released early 2017 and was developed by Ubi$oft. It's a multiplayer based fighting game, between Vikings, Knights and Samurais. There's a campaign, clearly little effort went into it, but I thought this was worth a try, especially over a free weekend.

It has a very unique combat system, it's pretty challenging to get used to, I thought I'd be terrible up against other players, but if you have a small amount of practice anyone can get used to it. You have to change direction of your attack and block using the right stick, if your opponent has the same direction, they'll parry you. It's a good system and can be quite fun, the online fights are intense as fuck.

All the work went in to the multiplayer, but that's not enough to sell a game, hence why I've never bought it. I had a lot of fun online, I soon got tired of it, but it's worth playing for sure. There's a bunch of modes; Dominion - 4v4 and capturing three points, Brawl - 2v2 elimination match, Duel - 1v1 and Elimination which is 4v4. The problem is very few have 'honor' playing online, you'll be fighting one v one, and then some other guy comes charging in and putting mashing against you while you're already fighting another. Some people just run away when they're close to death and you have to give chase, people can be incredibly frustrating to play against. When you get people who actually learn the combat and play the game correctly, it's great. If you're outnumbered, it's not always a bad thing (unless one is button mashing) it's amazing blocking two enemies and then getting the better of them.

After every match, you can deploy assets in territories held by other factions, BUT WHO GIVES A FUCK. I've never understood why shit like this exists in games, does anyone really care if their chosen faction holds the most territories? FUCK NO. You can play any faction anytime while playing online, and they each have a number of heroes you can choose to play as. You can edit their look, perks and finishing moves.

Aesthetically this game is beautiful, the Knights, Vikings and Samurai all look amazing. The movement is some of the best I've seen, the way the characters run, the weapon swinging, perfect. The battles look fantastic too, just looking off into the distance and seeing all these warriors going at it, you really felt apart of it. The castles and temples all looked great too, you just wanted to explore and admire the scenery.

The story SUCKS. There's three campaigns and six missions in each. The story revolves around The Blackstone Legion, a group filled with members of each faction. Other than that, I have no idea what really happened in the story. It did an awful job at informing you of what was happening and who you were. You just seemed to be bouncing around and changing characters during the campaigns. I don't know a single name of anyone I played through the campaign. There was a level system for the story only for some reason, you only got experience points towards it if you got the last hit. You could do all the work and then an AI runs in a gets the last hit, all they do is get in the way.

The story was so poor and unengaging. I'm certain every character you played as had the exact same voice actor, and the Samurai's had American accents.... So little effort. You walk around doing pointless tasks and it was only ever appealing when doing the boss fights. They attempted humour quite often, and it fell flat every single time, it was cringey and I hated all the characters anyway, they failed to make me like anyone. The worst part is the annoying Viking who constantly screams "RAIDER", it's terrible acting and just laughable how bad it is. Just don't bother with it, it's so clear they rushed I because it's a multiplayer focused game they never cared about it. It's only there so they can say they made one unlike the original Titanfall and Star Wars Battlefront.

A lot of people only play multiplayer these days, if you're one of those gamers, you'll have no reason not to give this a go, the multiplayer is pretty good, I got bored pretty quickly because I don't play multiplayer a lot nowadays. As a story game I was so disappointed. They so clearly did not try, it's shameful. Ubisoft dropped the ball here, doesn't matter though does it? Their failures always get rewarded with sequels.

6.1/10

Middle Earth: Shadow of War (Xbox One)

Shadow of War released at the end of 2017 and is the sequel to Shadow of Mordor. Seeing as I recently reviewed SoM, I'm just really going to speak about the new features. Most of the good things are back, like the Nemesis system, so there's no point repeating myself.

First off, the story again is quite weak. It's great being in Gondor, but the human allies again are lacking, but they're a big improvement on the last group, you feel more invested with these characters, but it's still weak. It's all about orcs, but I guess there's got to be a human side. As well as the fortress battles, the Nazgul play a big part in the story, and you're often pitted against them. I think the story is slightly stronger, but we need more orc storylines, that's why we play these games!

One of the new additions was difficulty, there was now three difficulties instead of just a standard one in the original. I went for Nemesis, as it was the hardest and would give the best the nemesis system had to offer. It was challenging too!

So there were new orc types called Ologs, they were much larger than regular orcs, and were like mini trolls. They were tough, but could be dazed by arrows to the end, and you can even ride them to bash through other orcs. There's also orc classes now, there's tricksters, tanks, assassins, marksman and many more. Each had their own abilities and you had to think on how to take orcs out instead of just going in swords blazing.

There was plenty of new traits for the orcs too. Iron will meant you could never recruit that orc no matter what, betrayals from already recruited orcs, blood brothers which meant two orcs had a close bond and could even rescue each other as you were about to kill them. You can now only recruit orcs if they are a lower level than you, anyone who is higher has to be shamed, that happens by beating them and choosing to shame them over killing them, lowering their level by five. Orcs can now also adapt to your fighting style, forcing you to constantly change how you fight.

There is equipment for Talion now, outfits, swords, bows and daggers, all have different stats and you can unlock more through chests, and even purchase some orcs to recruit in your army. Because you could buy as many orcs as you wanted, I constantly found orcs  with the same names, it really took away from the unique personalities I thought the game had, every time I looked at the army screen, I was noticing too many orcs with the same name and it felt cheap. I found no use for micro transactions as you always found equipment by killing orcs, and there's infinite orcs to recruit. I thought it was just a cheap way for Monolith to make more money. If you purchased equipment at a low level, it would be absolutely useless by the time you've leveled up and have just wasted money. You can get XP boosters, they lasted a certain amount of time, but they were real time, you didn't even need to be on the game and you'd lose time, if you set it. There are also gems they give boosters to your equipment, you can level up gems for better boosters, but I think this whole section was a pointless addition.

The towers were now Sauron Towers, and when you took over one, you could use it to locate collectables. Bonus objectives now give you rewards, so they feel like they're worth doing. Executions were no longer triggered by your combo, you'd have to build up your might to be able to do them, this was a big improvement. You could also daze an opponent by exploiting their weaknesses, that left them completely open, and couldn't defend themselves at all. You could also employ a bodyguard, by choosing one of your recruited orcs and call upon them to help fight with you. Another problem was having to hold down the 'A' button to do so many things, it was so clunky and would always end up doing something different to what I wanted, and got me killed a lot. It was easily the most frustrating thing, and needs to be changed ASAP.

There are lots of new skills and my favourite was the double jump, as you could really cover a lot of distance and it was simple to control. What was rather odd, was having to relearn skills you got in the first game, what, did Talion forget how to do it all? There's plenty of new areas, you can explore Gondor and Cirith Ungol, two complete different areas. There were now Drakes too, very similar to the fell-beasts a new creature for you to fight against and ride once tamed. It's cool flying around.

I loved the new personalities of the orcs, the first guy who killed me was talking about how he killed the "tark", a name orcs often called Talion, he then became known as 'Ashgarn the Tarkslayer', I loved that. I liked how an orc you killed could have cheated death, and they are literally built back from lost pieces. The more you killed an orc, the more messed up and built back from old parts they looked. I did feel so many orcs came back to life too often, but that just might be on nemesis difficulty. If you were knocked down and about to be killed, one of your loyal followers could jump in and save your life, I was blown away by that the first time it happened.

Now on to the big selling point; the fortresses and their overlords. Now this is what The Lord of the Rings was all about! Big epic battles, and that's just what we got. You'd pick your best followers to go with you and attack the fort. You'd have to take over a bunch of checkpoints and fight off enemy orc captains who attempt to stop you. After taking all the points, you enter the fortress and face off against the Overlord. It's never a one on one fight as they always have back up, you have to plan your fight though, by knowing their strengths and weaknesses, you'll do yourself a favour. There's nothing worse than accidentally enraging an Overlord, as they're powerful enough, you don't want to give them a power boost.

After taking over fortresses, you'll have to defend them too. You have to set up your orc captains and pick your overlord. You can also pick your defences too, like spikes to stop people climbing up and reinforced walls. They work the same way as attacking, just that you have to defend the checkpoints this time. Every time they take a checkpoint, a new captain will arrive, so you want to defend as best you can, so you don't get overwhelmed. A huge flaw happened as I was defending a fortress, while I was in the middle of a massive fight, my screen just cut to black, and then said I'd lost the fort. It was ridiculous as I was in the middle of defending a point and got ripped off.

You can recruit captains from forts and get them to infiltrate the fort as a spy, be wary though, as your spies could be instantly killed if discovered or captured and you'd have to attempt to free them. Another disappointment was that I started to randomly lose recruited orcs, I'd go to the army page and just noticed a number of my friendly orcs had just been replaced by enemy ones. They were never killed and even if they were, I was never notified and I lost a lot of orcs I grew accustomed to. Although they're only orcs, you do grow attached to them pretty easily once you've recruited them. You could get a skill to revive orcs that had fell in battle, providing they were still on the army page. There were also war pits, which allowed you to send in friendly orcs in a one on one fight, if they won, their level increased, it's a great way to boost orcs.

I loved Shadow of Mordor, and I love Shadow of War. I think this improves in every way, the story is what needs the most work, but all the little additions really added a lot to this game. Improve the story, involve more orc storylines and get rid of the damn micro transactions, there really is no need for them!

8.9/10

The Turing Test (Xbox One)

The Turing Test is a first person puzzle game, released in 2016. The closest game to this for me is Portal, they are quite different too. Let's see how it compares to Portal.

You play as Ava, sent to excavate a small moon orbiting Jupiter, called Europa. Along with a research team who have already been sent out, Ava is the last on their shuttle and is finally awaken. She is women by the technical operations machine (T.O.M) an artificial intelligence that tells Ava her crew mates are in danger, this leads to Ava going through a number of tests as she sets out to help her research team.

As Ava is making her way through the tests, she speaks to a member of the research team, informing her she is not in control of her own body, and in fact Tom is controlling her. Not only that, but the crew as found a microorganism that could possibly make humans immortal, meaning their will no longer be any death.  Will TOM allow them to get it back to Earth? TOM expresses the dangers of what could happen if it gets back to Earth.

The tests are designed in a very similar way to Portal, in the way you do one puzzle in one room to open the door and progress to the next. They work differently though, as you have no portal gun, rather a a tool that collects power balls to help open doors. As well as the power balls, there are power boxes too. The puzzles increase in difficulty and even different coloured power balls emerge to get you thinking more. You can even solve puzzles with the help from pressure pads, cameras and mechanical robots.

The length of the game is what you make of it really, obviously if you struggle with the puzzles it'll take a while. The puzzles weren't too challenging, but they weren't simple either, a few required some trial and error, and others you really need to think about.

The loading times were far too long for a game with not much to it. It looked beautiful though, it was well designed and if you explored in between the puzzles, you could find lots of interesting information about your crew mates. The music was really fitting too and I enjoyed the expositing between Ava and Tom, who were well acted also.

It went in the games with gold program around a year after its release, which doesn't sound good, to give a game free so soon, but it's much stronger than you'd think. I actually bought it about two months before it went free.... Worth it though.

7.5/10

Batman Arkham City: Harley Quinn's Revenge DLC (Xbox 360)

Released mid 2012, and the only story content DLC for Arkham City. As the title suggests Harley Quinn comes up with her own revenge scheme on Batman, following the events of the story in the base game.

The story spans two different timelines. You play as both Batman and Robin, the latter is on the path to find Batman after he's goes missing during the hunt for a grieving Harley, who has captured a bunch of cops.

It's great getting to play as Robin, I've always loved getting to play as others in the Arkham series, but it's always limited to just challenge maps. Now we get a whole story that has a new playable hero, equipped with his own abilities. The story blends well together as you swap between the dynamic duo throughout.

Robin plays very similar to Batman, besides being able to glide around. Robin is also equipped with a shield capable of blocking bullets, which always comes in handy. Robin is also armed with a big stick making it simpler to knock out some thugs.

It's a interesting story, it keeps you engaged while you try to figure how the world's greatest detective went missing. It's relatively short, but that's often the case with DLC unfortunately. There's also a great end boss fight with Harley Quinn, a bit different to the usual ones as it's entirely stealth focused.

It updates the ending, but it's not really a necessity to get it, but as with the Arkham series, their content is always brilliantly developed. If you don't think this is the greatest DLC to exist, you'll certainly see more good points than bad. In my eyes it's easily worth it.

3.6/5