open world

Grand Theft Auto V Review

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Grand Theft Auto may have created the open world genre, though it’s clearly not the only game in town anymore. Since the release of GTA IV, the genre has been taken to new heights by the likes of Assassin’s Creed, Batman’s Arkham games, Saint’s Row, Infamous and many more. Despite my ambivalence towards Red Dead Redemption, I respect the fact that it progressed the open world formula in a number of meaningful ways.

With so many new components to draw from, what influence would they have on Grand Theft Auto V? Based on the final product, not much. The latest installment in the series feels like Rockstar ignored the work of others and continued down their own path to make things bigger and better. Can’t necessarily blame them for it, as this is another fine effort from the pioneers of the open world genre.
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Red Faction: Guerilla Impressions

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The sensation of power that came with using Parker’s hammer for the first time was awesome. I don’t know what space age technology or magic is packed into it, but it breaks stuff really well. With it, you can topple any building in the game, which is probably a lot more fun than it should be. During the few hours I’ve put into the game, the most fun I had with it was though aimlessly traversing through Mars, while destroying every building I came across.

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Hands-On With Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag

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After the last two disappointing console releases, my perception of the Assassin’s Creed franchise is in the toilet. The series has hit the point of saturation where the annual release schedule not only wears me out, but the quality of the product suffers for it. In particular, Assassin’s Creed III was a buggy mess that still would have fallen short of the mark had it been bug-free.

I want to believe that a jump to next gen is the kick in the pants that this franchise needs, but so far, this doesn’t look like it.

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Early Red Dead Redemption Impressions

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Of the big titles this generation that I had on my to-do list, Red Dead Redemption has stuck out like a sore thumb. Having won over 160 game of the year awards (according to the cover art of my game of the year edition), it’s one of those must-play titles that I just never made time for. Why? Well, partly because of my general aversion to long games, and partly because of my general aversion to anything western-themed. If it weren’t so critically acclaimed, I probably wouldn’t have made any time for it at all. Better late than never, right?

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Saints Row: The Third Review

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Saints Row: The Third did not win me over right away. Having only played the demo of the first game before and hating it, this from a gameplay mechanics perspective felt as derivative and janky as its predecessor. Having said that, it becomes readily apparent that gameplay is not the focus here. Instead, this is all about playing a Grand Theft Auto-like experience with the humor and ridiculousness pushed to extremes. Once the game heats up, it manages to dress up relatively unremarkable mechanics and turn them into a title that’s arguably more fun than it should be.
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Sleeping Dogs Review

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The Sleeping Dogs origin story has been documented ad nauseam, so I won’t do that here. Nor did it matter to me much, anyway. I’d never played a True Crime game before, and even after it came out to mostly positive press, it still wasn’t a game on my radar. Had it not been for its awesome demo, I probably would have let this one slide. Though I can’t speak to the game’s quality before it came out, the end result is pretty rad. This is one of the most fun open world games I’ve played since Grand Theft Auto IV, and might be my favourite one yet.

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Dead Island Review

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The original Dead Island trailer – as amazing as it is – ultimately did much more harm than good for my perception of the game. After watching it, I had high hopes that it would have more emotional weight to it than your run-of-the-mill zombie slaughter-fest. Then the preview coverage ultimately revealed that the contents of the trailer had virtually nothing to do with the actual game. Feeling burned by the misleading ad, I refused to buy or play this until it hit the bottom of the clearance bin. Maybe the trailer did little to reflect the final product, but that’s not to say the final product is bad. In fact, I’m actually really impressed with how the game came together.

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Assassin’s Creed III Single Player Review

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Ambition hasn’t been part of the Assassin’s Creed playbook for awhile now. Ever since Ezio’s debut, the last two spin-off titles felt like cash-grabs to strike while the iron’s hot. They didn’t do much to push the story forward, and their gameplay innovations varied wildly from great (the ability to call out fellow assassin’s for help) to bafflingly awful (tower defence). Though I’ve gotten some enjoyment out of these two games (more the first than the second), I’ve been waiting with bated breath for the real next step in the series.

Sporting a new world, a new main character and numerous revisions to its gameplay, Assassin’s Creed III has no shortage of ambition. In fact, had it delivered on everything it set out to do, this really could have been one of the best games ever. Unfortunately, this same ambition is the root cause of its many shortcomings.

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Early Impressions of Assassin’s Creed III

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Will the real sequel to Assassin’s Creed II please stand up?

As much as I enjoyed Brotherhood (and despised Revelations), they are essentially Champion Edition and Turbo sequels. Their innovations were minimal and their overall impact to the bigger story was inconsequential. Case in point, the start of Assassin’s Creed III make virtually zero reference to Ezio’s later adventures.

Now that ACIII is here, is it the leap forward we’ve been hoping for all along?

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Micro Update: Assassin’s Creed III

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I picked this up last week. Roughly 6 hours in and it’s starting to pick up. Working through some other writing projects, but I will have some early impressions soon! If you’re playing Assassin’s Creed III, what do you think so far?


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