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New Game – Dead Island Riptide

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I got bored of playing Borderlands 2 & GTAV multi-player was only a short lived experience. Developers seem to be focussing on multiplayer or single player experiences so not many more co-op games left to play on the 360. Next gen seems to be moving towards introducing the MMO experience which I'm looking forward to playing with Destiny & The Division.

Back to the 360 & Dead Island Riptide, the story follows on from the first game with the same characters. I did not keep my save from the first game so started a new character with Xian. Your helicopter lands on a military ship & after quite a bit of FMV to lay down the foundations for the story you finally get to control your character through a prologue section. The prologue section is a tutorial to the games control, I lost sound part way through which lessened the experience but good to see the game keeps its trademarks bugs from the first game.

After the prologue surprise surprise you land on another island, I'm disappointed that the developer seems to have stuck with the same formula from the first game. When you land on the island you can then send out party invites & join up for some 4 player questing, zombie slashing & looting.

Beggars can't be choosers & the Claptrap Boys don't really have anything to play....


Tomb Raider: sighteeing

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I've been through quite a few spectacular sections in this now - running through burning buildings with things collapsing as I go, jumping across a bridge as it was being demolished, ziplining from the top of a mountain down to the beach.




In some ways it's similar to a Metroid structure of game, where as you progress you're given new upgrades which allow you to access parts of the world which were previously hidden away.  The main difference here is that there is very little back-tracking, and I can only think of a couple of places where I went past a room or entrance without getting the ability to enter it very soon afterwards.


Having said that, there may well have been a number of hidden areas that I didn't notice.  A few hours into the game you're given the ability to upgrade your pick, which allows you to climb walls like the above.  The indicators of where you can use upgrades are generally well hidden until you know what to look for - bundles of white cloth, ropes wound around timbers, chalky walls.
 

 After escaping the burning monastery, Lara has to avoid several machine gun emplacements and make her way down the mountain.  After the first descent, you find a stunning area with a ship suspended by ropes.  This ship is huge - and you have to zipline down onto its surface.  By the end of the sequence, the ship's hanging by a single rope and Lara's no longer on board ...




Then down to the sea, and meeting up with the survivors.  They want to repair a boat to escape the island, but we know that's not going to happen - Lara wants to take the boat inland.  Before that can happen, Lara's off to explore shipwrecks to pick up a pulley system and play around on the masts.




Stunning game, and fun with it.  I hope it throws in some new ideas soon, though, or even finishes - it's starting to get a little samey in terms of gameplay, even if the location changes.

Tomb Raider: massacres

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This is the 2013 game called Tomb Raider, as opposed to the 1996 game called Tomb Raider.  I completed the 1996 game called Tomb Raider back in 1998, after I completed the 1997 game called Tomb Raider II.  I also played a significant amount of the 2007 game called Tomb Raider Anniversary (on the PS2) which was a remake of the 1996 game called Tomb Raider but not the 2013 game called Tomb Raider.  I'm not sure if I completed that.

I hate it when games have the same name.

Anyway, the 2013 game called Tomb Raider is actually really good.  It's easily recognisable as a game in the Tomb Raider series, not only because of the name - there's a lot of exploration, working out how to get to different places, and an athletic female hero.  However, there are also a lot of deaths, which goes against some of the plot of the original games.  In the first Tomb Raider, the bloke who employs Lara and then subsequently double crosses her is meant to be the first human she ever kills.  In this game, which I think is set before that first game, she's gunning down hundreds.

I don't remember a Tomb Raider which is quite so bloodthirsty, in fact.  There's a flimsy story excuse as to why Lara is happy to shoot men, along the lines of them being brainwashed and it being a kill-or-be-killed situation, but when Tomb Raider II came out one of the chief complaints was that Lara was too gun-happy and this is magnitudes worse.  At times it's less of an exploration game and more of a strategic cover shooter.  Hiding behind crates and popping out to kill enemies is eerily reminiscent of Read Dead Redemption and LA Noire.

Despite this (and the heterogeneity of modern game design), I'm enjoying the game.  There's no global travels for Lara here, no separation of the game into areas and levels - instead, as I explore the island more I'm appreciating the value in getting to know one area so well.  It helps, of course, that this one island seems to include tropical beaches and snow-capped mountains.  There's a good sense of geography in the game, though, and some of the scenery is spectacular.






I'll continue to play this, no doubt, although I am starting to tire of the excessive grittiness and attempts to shock.  I've lost count of the number of cutscenes with Lara covered in blood.

New Game – Mass Effect 2

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After completing Assassin Creed 4 I decided to take a break from the PS4 & return back to the 360 to start playing Mass Effect 2 ( I really should go back to Dishonored at some point). I am enjoying this game far more than the first, I found the side quests really boring in the first game & then rushed the main quest to complete the game.

Good to see some characters from the first game returning, I have just recruited Garus to go along with Zaeed in my group. The levelling up of the characters is far more simpler than the first which is a bit disappointing but thankfully the mini games for hacking etc are far easier.

I'm currently focusing on side quests to recruit team members whilst also scanning planets for resources needed for upgrades & research.

Even though I have the PS4 I expect most of my gaming this year to still be on the 360 tackling the back catalogue which still includes Mass Effect 3, Bioshock Trilogy, Dead Space 2 & 3, Fable 3, GTA V & a few more I forget.

LA Noire: completed!

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I had only a few missions to complete in that game, it turns out, all of which involved hunting down various corrupt officials and getting them to talk.



I think that shooting him in the leg was probably a bit excessive, but as I said previously the game has taken control of my character's actions in order to progress the story.  This has just got worse as the game's progressed - it's not longer merely Phelps being over-zealous in questioning; it's now Kelso shooting people during cutscenes.

Still, at least I get to drive between these and watch people being shifty.



The endgame saw me exploring a creepy dilapidated house, in which a madman had been holed up.  The game carefully told you that he was mad several times, before showing him folding origami cranes over and over again.  Finding these in the house was quite a shock.





The final missions turned into a run-and-gun cover shooter, with the madman seemingly able to convince dozens of men to lay down their lives just to keep me away from him.  Naturally, that didn't work, but it was pretty tense, running around the sewer systems and popping out to shoot people.  It felt pretty familiar in some ways, reminding me of gameplay in Red Dead Redemption.

I finally found the flamethrower man, who turned out to be someone that Phelps and Kelso had served with.  Funny that all the main characters turned out to be linked in some way, given the size of the city the game's set in.


And then the end of the game sees Rockstar killing off the main character again, but this time I have little sympathy left for him - even after he helped to save everyone else.


After the credits, you can go back and play in free roam mode, which means that you no longer need to worry about how much damage you cause when driving.  I enjoyed that, and ended up with some amusing accidents.


Overall, a great game, but the story was crowbarred in a little, which spoilt the interactivity somewhat.  I hope a sequel could improve on that.