If my last two forays into the Fallout Universe are anything to go by, it’s likely that it’ll be another couple of hundred hours before I “finish” Fallout 4, so I figured it’d perhaps behoove me to do a series of ‘my journey so far’ type pieces in the meantime. This is the first, I guess, but it’s also a ‘First Impressions‘ piece, so I’ll limit this one to the immediately obvious stuff, but with a bit of the ‘sense of occasion’ thrown in for good measure. Think of me as a modern day Herodotus, if you will; not only being witness to history as it happens, but, like, writing that shit down too. Continue reading “Fallout 4 – First Impressions”
Soooooo, as I’ve said before, many, many times; tomorrow, Tuesday 10th November 2015, is quite possibly going to be the best day in the history of the world, ever. I mean, some other stuff has happened on some other days – some guy cured Polio at one point, for example, and there was all the Moon-ey type shananigans and such, but crucially, crucially – on no other day in History did Fallout 4 come out, and in no other cycle of 24 hours did Fallout 4 and Rise of the Tomb Raider come out at the same time. That’s a fact – and you can check it if you want. Continue reading “In Which Fate Punches Me in the Nads. Repeatedly.”
They say hindsight’s 20/20, and it’s a maxim I’ve been thinking a lot about lately, particularly because I’m an idiot who decided to start a gaming blog just as Silly Season touched down with all the force of a category bajillion tornado. Would I do the same again? Has it been worth it, especially given nobody’s reading any of my stuff? Is sleep actually overrated, or are my lack of it, and these hallucinations I seem to be frequently having related in some way? Indeed, why would a pink elephant want to hide my controller and headphones anyway? Continue reading “Silly Season: My Experience So Far!”
The review I just wrote for Halo 5: Guardians – Multiplayer ended up being considerably longer than I expected, indeed considerably longer than some academic textbooks, so some stuff got cut just to reduce the chances of anybody reading suddenly slipping into a boredom coma. In amongst this stuff was some general observations I’d made about the Halo Community – which weren’t necessarily integral to the review – but which I thought might be worth mentioning anyway, for various reasons. Continue reading “Halo 5: Guardians – The Online Community”
Just the other day, I gone done a little rant about the whole “Freemium” games whatsit, and why it could, potentially, mean really bad news for actual, proper games and gamers. Today it was announced that Activision Blizzard (the publishers behind Call of Duty, World of Warcraft, and Guitar Hero) are buying King Digital (the guys behind Candy Crush Saga) so, even allowing for confirmation bias, I’ma go right ahead and put that news in the ‘worrying signs’ column. Continue reading “Activision Buys King Digital – Another Sign Freemium’s Coming Soon?”
This week it was announced that Nintendo are releasing their first mobile game next year, and Respawn Entertainment also revealed that they would be developing a Titanfall spin-off for Android and IoS – also likely to be released next year. Both of these, it seems, will follow the so-called ‘Freemium’ model, which has already begun its implacable rise to dominance in the world of tablets and phones. As you shall see shortly (if you stick around for the duration of this rant), I don’t like this at all, and moreover, the fact that actual, proper Gaming companies are firmly heading in this direction is very, very worrying indeed. Continue reading “Why “Freemium” Games Could Mean Bad News For Gamers”
Possibly due to some kind of mix-up, I’ve somehow managed to get me some tickets for the Brasil Game Show this year, and I think it’s fair to say I’m more than a little bit excited about it. For Gamers big conventions are basically our version of these “Music Festivals” whatsits that the kids seem to like so much, and for five glorious days Continue reading “Brasil Game Show 2015 – Things to Look Forward to!”
Not that long ago, whenever some non-gamer type would get all judgey about how much money I, quote-unquote, “wasted” on games and stuff, I’d be more than happy to point out (at great length) how completely and utterly stupid they were being. ‘Yes’, I would say (rolling my eyes a lot for emphasis) ‘the hardware can be expensive, but after that initial outlay, games represent excellent value for money, both absolutely, and relative to other forms of entertainment’. Continue reading “The Rising Costs of Gaming!?”
Because of the regional restrictions on Xbox 360 games, I tend to binge buy mine once or twice a year. A couple of years ago, it just so happened that the night before one of these splurges, I was talking to my best friend, who mentioned that one of his colleagues had become, and I quote, “unhealthily obsessed” with the Fallout games, and had all but withdrawn from the real world in favour of spending every available minute in a post-apocalyptic, virtual one.
Roughly twelve hours later, standing in a well-known game store, I noticed that Fallout 3 was on sale for £10. Now, rather than paying heed to what a more sensible person might consider a cautionary tale, Continue reading “Why isn’t every game like Fallout?”
QTX 