Friday, August 16, 2019

Where Did You Go, Burnadette?

It was funny, enjoyable, and interesting. My wife identified with Burnadette enough to be concerning. I liked it. I hear the book is totally different, and that's fine with me. Go see it with your wife.

Read more...

Tuesday, June 4, 2019

Assassin's Creed Odyssey



I am a huge fan of the AC series.

Well, except for Liberation. While the story was engaging and the gameplay elements that were added in were cool, the issues it had being ported from the Vita to PC were horrible and I couldn't finish it. My NPC escort would get hung up on ladders, trees, whatever. Oh, so annoying, especially after I had just finished III and Black Flag, which were fantastic.

I went on to Rogue, and felt right at home, back in the familiar controls of Black Flag and III, and loved seeing characters I was familiar with, people I knew and a story that blended so well from episode to episode in North America.

I finished Rogue the other day and instead of going on to Unity, I thought I'd give Odyssey a try.

Holy crap, culture shock.

The controls are different. The graphics are different. The gameplay is different.

And in this case, different is good.

It took a little time to get used to the new controls, because they are quite a bit different than III-Rogue. Perhaps a controller would be better, but I like the fine targeting control with the mouse.

Combat is actually a skill to master, and is much more difficult. In all of the previous AC games that I played i could easily take on a group of six to ten guards and tear them apart. Now three give me trouble.

As you progress in the story you unlock large scale battles. Pro tip: make sure you take the Warrior's Second Wind ability or there is no way to heal during battle. After dying about six times in that battle I had to reset my abilities to better suit large scale combat, which cost about 500dm (the currency, Drachma, which the game tells us was used up until Greece entered the EU in the early 2000's).

Act I of Odyssey is set in Greece long before the Assassins and Templars, some time after the Battle of Thermopylae showcased in the movie 300. You take on the role of a Spartan child grown up to be a mercenary, during the Peloponnesian War. The story is very interesting and engaging, and there are a lot of side quests to keep me interested in exploring the open world.

Upgrading the armor and weapons gets tedious, however, because you have to do so every 2 or 3 levels for your kit to remain relevant, and the numbers you're dealing with for damage are ridiculous. For example, I am spec'd Assassin. My hunter damage is 250-ish, my warrior damage is about 300, my assassin damage is over 5300! And even then some enemies of the same level (though are captains or other similar elite baddies) are not killed by an assassin strike, and I have to use a charged strike which doubles the damage o.O

And it isn't just the armor and weapons you need to upgrade, you have a ship, also. And lieutenants to lead your ship. As with the other games, upgrades and style sets are available for your ship, but that requires more money and more resources, and after upgrading my kit to level 11 (i'm now 13) I didn't have enough money and resources to do any upgrades on my ship. I could spend entire days just farming resources, which isn't what i want to do.

Instead of using your assassin's vision there is some sort of telepathic connection to a golden eagle that flies ahead and marks all points of interest in your vision. Many of the skills I was comfortable with in the earlier titles seem to be getting a primitive treatment in Odyssey, which I really enjoy. It feels like the things we do in Odyssey will someday become the standard for assassins and templars.

Overall, it has a semblance of the AC feel, but easily stands on its own as an exciting RPG adventure that keeps my attention and makes me watch the clock for the time when the babies are in bed and my wife is watching crime shows so I can go play Spartan until way too late in the evening.

Read more...

Sunday, March 3, 2019

Battletech

Woah, there's some dust and cobwebs on this page. I guess I should do a little housecleaning. Well, maybe later.

Today I wanted to talk about Battletech by publisher Harebrained Schemes.


I played this game a lot with my friends as a kid. I loved the idea of piloting giant robots across the battlefield, ripping the arms off of them, and beating them with it like a club. I loved the chess-like strategy, and the utter chaos when a plan goes wrong.

As with most of the games I played as a young teen, this game was introduced by my friend Damian's brother Brian, but after that my friends and I were hooked, and this became one of our regulars.

I saw this one on Steam, and have to admit I was excited by the nostalgia. But as with most things, nostalgia isn't what it used to be, so I delayed purchasing it. I've been burned too many times to go through that again.

My buddy Tony bought it and told me it's a lot like the board game, so I bit the bullet and bought it.

Things I like:

  • How similar it is to the tabletop game.
  • The weapon selection
  • Death from Above
  • The available mechs (and the expansion adds more)
  • Campaign mode (not just arena deathmatch. thank you)
  • career mode (yes! campaign style play, make your own story. thank you)
  • playing a match against my buddy was fun and reminded me of the tabletop


Things I would like different:

  • More multiplayer modes:
    • I would like it if your friends could play through career mode or the campaign together in a lance
    • I would like it if you could have more than one opponent in a match, or in teams.
    • I would like the option to do skirmishes against the computer in team matches, (i.e. Me and my buddy against two computer opponents)

Things I don't like:

  • It is seriously difficult to get a start in career mode. There's a good reason that you get a benefactor in the campaign. Mechs are expensive.


I guess that's it. I really enjoy this game as is, and would like more options to play with my friends as well.

So if you're an old fan of Battletech, or if you played the rpg Mechwarrior, or maybe even if you enjoy watching old indie movies like Robot Jox, give this a try.

Battletech by Harebrained Schemes Steam Link

Robot Jox
PG
 1989 ‧ Cult film/Indie film ‧ 1h 25m

Read more...

About This Blog

Reviews of anything Soulie is asked to Review! Right now its mainly video games, thanks to RocketXL Marketing. But if anyone else asks, and if he has the time, Reviews!

  © Blogger templates The Professional Template by Ourblogtemplates.com 2008

Back to TOP