Hotline Miami 2: Wrong Number Review

Roaring onto the late indie scene of 2012 in a shower of ultra-violence, gore and neon, the original Hotline Miami made incredible waves in many gaming circles.  There was a lot to love in this top-down package. most obvious being a super-cohesive aesthetic described as  reminiscent of the most garish parts of the 80's mixed with a healthy dose of Refn's Drive. Mixing this with an incredible soundtrack pulsing in time with twitch action, and your left with a game capable of leaving you with a sense of synesthesia, all while your heart rate rises.  At a modest length, it's understandable that fans would want more, especially with no other games out there quite able to replicate what it does so perfectly.

That is, of course, until we got the sequel.

Late to the Party: Hitman: Absoultion

Price I paid: I don’t remember. It was part of a bundle on humblebundle.com.

Stealth games are a lot like sushi to me. I don’t like sushi but I do like wasabi, so I sometimes eat sushi as an excuse to cry tears of joy and horseradish as I shovel wasabi into my face. I don’t like games that focus on stealth, but I like some of the amusing and stressful situations they create and some of the mechanics they use.

The Order: 1886 Review

The mantra "style over substance" is as good as any of a jumping in point in order to understand The Order.  From screenshots, to the first time you see it in motion, there is no doubt that Ready at Dawn has managed to deliver one of the most impressive visual packages in the whole history of gaming.  The moody atmosphere of a dark and dreary Victorian era London essentially oozes out of every facet of the game, and manages to mix light elements of steampunk and gothic horror to a surprisingly cohesive degree.

But once you get past all the visuals, where does that leave you?

VGR 5.07

Studio is full again as we come back from a week long snow hiatus.  We're getting caught up with 2 weeks worth of news, Dragon Age, Destiny, Wolfenstein, DoA, Nvidia Lawsuits, Selfie-sticks, The Order, GDC, MKX, Resident Evil, and even Rock Band, plus a host of other things.  Packing it all in under 2 hours?  That's the real challenge, so make sure to check it out!

-=Download 5.07=-

Late to the Party: Hammerwatch

Price I paid: $1.43 (It was part of a seven game bundle on humblebundle.com)

Hammerwatch deserves the title “cooperative dungeon crawler” more so than any other game I have played. While I enjoy Diablo II, Champions of Norrath, and Dark Alliance, they tend to test the limits of how much I’m willing to forgive a person when my friend has 15,000 more gold than I have but refuses to help me buy new armor to protect my under-leveled behind that the enemies seem to love so much. Hammerwatch, thankfully, focuses on removing the unintentionally competitive aspects of the genre that don’t hamper the fun.

Evolve Review

To really put this review into perspective I have to go back to my first year after leaving the Navy. I officially left the military in early 2009, coming back to my small home town, and sleeping on my cousin's couch for a few months before I was able to move on with my life. During this brief time with little responsibility, and a bit of money saved up, I had quite a bit of free time on my hands. I filled a good bit of this with Left 4 Dead, a game which had come out the previous year. My favorite thing about the game was the multiplayer versus mode, allowing you to play on a team of special infected against the survivors. During this time I had a number of friends on Steam who played, and one in particular who went by the name LaggyFish invited me to join a clan he was a part of. If you listen to the podcast then you may have heard me mention TAW (The Art of Warfare) clan before, and how the semi-competitive clan gave me a chance to really learn the game, and play with a group of people who were as passionate about the game as I was. They helped me to learn the maps, what the best routes were to take as the survivors, which areas were best to pull survivors as a smoker to get an instant kill, which areas to pounce from as a hunter for the greatest damage. The comradery and shared passion helped to really make that game for me. Evolve however, has not recaptured that experience for me.

VGR 5.06

Kickstarter is once again under the microscope for us, as we look it's history, success stories, and failures.  Movies are getting made out of board games, Fake DLC gets a video tutorial, and the best Final Fantasy fighting mash-up returns for round 3.  Also Aliens.

-=Download 5.06=-

VGR 5.05

We stretch out interests out a bit to talk about the Marvel Cinematic universe, get our hopes up for Fallout 4 (again), and have some first impressions for Evolve, Apotheon, Sunless Sea and Darkest Dungeon.

-=Download 5.05=-

VGR 5.04

It's Trey, Kevin and Miguel this week, talkin' 'bout some Dark Souls, Final Fantasy, the FCC, Besieged, ToeJam & Earl, Joystiq, and all sorts of other stuff.  Also shout-outs to the gaming club at UNCG.

-=Download 5.04=-

Dying Light Review

In recent memory, Dying Light might be one of the most derivative games I’ve played.  While in some cases that might be seen as an insult, for Techland’s open-world-zombie-parkour simulator, it’s borrowed from the best in order to make one of their best titles yet.  The influences are worn on it’s sleeve, taking Dead Island’s basic gameplay structure, and mixing it with a healthy modicum of movement from Mirror’s Edge, the end result being a very large game, with a some great interplay between gameplay systems.