With the year coming to end, it’s time to reflect on the best in gaming in 2019. That also means it’s time for The Game Awards, hosted by Geoff Keighley. While gaming sites put together their ‘best of 2019’ lists (and in some cases, ‘best of the decade’), Keighley and team have been busy putting together their own lists for the year. You should take a moment to check out the list of nominees.
Although this is a relatively new award in gaming, the first 5 years of the show have shown tremendous growth. Last year in particular included some of the most memorable moments from the show that will likely be shown leading up to the broadcast. You should expect a new game announcement or two, some live musical numbers, and a slew of guests in and around video games.
Is Hideo Kojima’s Death Stranding a lock for Game of the Year? What categories can we expect to see Outer Worlds take some hardware? Untitled Goose Game? We’ll find out the best of the best when The Game Awards streams this Thursday, December 12, from 5:30-9pm PST. You can catch the stream on your favorite services like YouTube or Twitch.
For more information on how to watch, head over to thegameawards.com
There are thousands of games out there with good plots. A title having a good storyline is often what pulls us back and makes us want to play more. It’s like reading a good book; you always want to know what’s coming next. This obviously isn’t news, but how many games are actually about telling stories? Not as many as you’d think right? This is where a new title, Where the Water Tastes Like Wine, comes in.
In Where the Water Tastes Like Wine the story, or should I say stories do more than just give you and idea what’s going on around you, instead they’re a currency. This subtle but enormously important difference is what makes this game so interesting for those of you that, like me, need to have a good plot to keep you hooked.
As you wander around a folkloric Depression era United States this narrative adventure will see you meeting various strangers. Communicating and becoming acquainted with these characters will grant you unique stories which can then be re-told to unlock new interactions. It is up to the player to pair the correct stories with the right characters to further the game. If you do well, these characters will reveal their true selves, bestowing you with the most valuable stories.
Where the Water Tastes Like Wine not only takes tales as currency, it focuses on stories as living things. Stories grow and are re-shaped with each re-telling and this is something the game really draws from. This is brilliant for anyone with a love of a good plot.
Any tale will fall flat if it’s told by the wrong person. I don’t think you’re going to have that problem here. There are some brilliant names in Where the Water Tastes Like Wine‘s cast. These include Dave Fennoy, (Lee – The Walking Dead,) Melissa Hutchinson, (Ashe – League of Legends,) and Sae Nijima of Persona 5 fame to name but a few. Even Sting from The Police is getting involved!
If a story about stories is something you want to explore then Where the Water Tastes Like Wine is available for your Xbox One, PS4 and Switch consoles now. Why not head over to your respective stores and take a look for yourselves?
Niffelheim is a harsh world of ancient spirits, a place for fallen warriors trying to reach the celestial halls of Valhalla. This side-scrolling resource management game is based on Norse mythology where you can choose from four playable characters who are trying to ascend to the dizzying heights of martyrdom. Join your ancient ancestors by fighting fiendish foes and building a strong fort to protect your totem.
A host of characters are at your disposal including several burly bearded men with hands the size of hubcaps and bellies like beer barrels or a Valkyre, the only female character who has a sure aim, wears war paint and generally looks formidable. There are four side-scrolling worlds you can explore:
The ancient bear mound
The one-eyed wolf forest
Moor of the desert Eagle
Ice dragon wasteland.
None of the aforementioned worlds are particularly friendly places, inhabited by wild wolves, walking skeletons and other beasts that you have to fight. However, there are plenty of trees to fell and rabbits to skin for feeding your belly and building your Fort.
Niffelheim is an Indie title developed with the Unity game engine and uses hand-drawn animation techniques that give it a quick and jerky feel similar to traditional stop-frame animations. Its mechanics lack fluidity in some areas, for instance when you die your character falls over unceremonious like a sack of potatoes accompanied by a moan like your passing a kidney stone. However, its simple side-scrolling levels are detailed in a quirky illustrative way that sets it apart from other games in its genre and there’s no denying it’s artistic style.
A slow burning Indie title
As you explore the ethereal world of Niffelheim a strange crow flutters down to a nearby perch and gives you some advice, well it’s not really advice it’s more like a mini-quest that you have to complete to unlock more resources. There are many other characters throughout the game that give you other quests which push the gameplay forward but the ultimate aim is to form the portal to Valhalla by collecting different magical pieces.
I have heard some people refer to this game as an RPG. In my opinion, it’s more of a 2D resource management game similar to Kingdom with elements of an RPG. Yes, there are skill sets and weapon upgrades but there’s no multiple choice dialogue options that change the flow of the game. Everything you collect helps to upgrade your Mastery level whether it’s cutting down trees or killing animals and collecting herbs for cooking. In general, the gameplay is quite linear and you can walk or warp to different areas to forage for more resources.
If you kill enough wolves you can upgrade your armor at the forge with a wolf helmet, boots, and a bone harness and as the game progresses your armor becomes more elaborate and sturdy. You can place items in a quick access menu for when you need them during combat or for food. The other items that you collect are easily accessed by scrolling through the menu with the R1 and R2 buttons on the controller.
There isn’t much voice acting, most of the speech is in the form of written excerpts. However, the intro scene has some narrative exposition by a gravel-voiced actor introducing the game. “Holy flame destroys all Earthly ties.” Kinda makes you feel like brandishing a sword, growing a beard and renaming yourself Bjørn Schniffelheim. Okay, perhaps I was getting a bit carried away but the narration is still good and worthy of a mention. The transition scenes have nice static artwork that reminded me of Pillars of Eternity and the melodic music and bagpipes fit this stoic retelling of, a Norse legend – Niffelheim The World of Mist.
Your fort is your stronghold and within its infinite walls, there are plenty of strange devices for creating new things such as a sawmill, a forge and an Alchemy workshop for creating spells. You can also make some home improvements by chopping down more trees and upgrading your building to a castle or citadel. The stronger your fort the easier it is to resist the attack of the hoard which spawn periodically and lay siege to it.
Food is one of the main focuses in Niffelheim and you have to kill animals and gather resources or you will starve. It is a constant battle to fill your belly throughout the game. In fact I had to eat so often that I felt like a diabetic who had to keep their blood sugar under control. However, be careful what you eat when your roaming, raw meat isn’t recommended and can reduce your health points by 40 causing nausea, promptly followed by death. Ouch!
Combat is quite tedious and when I say this I mean it’s like having a slapping contest with your little sister. The mechanics are basic with the square button assigned on the controller for either kicking enemies to death or using one of your weapons such as an Axe or Bow. You can easily switch weapons with the L2 button on the PS4 controller but combat doesn’t feel like it was the game developers first priority and as such feels lacking.
The game has some frame rate issues and stuttering which did start to bother me the longer I played it and the worlds could do with some expanding. However, there is a wide variety of different weapons and spells that you can upgrade or buy from the merchant’s shop in Temple city and the gameplay does become quite addictive once you get in to it.
Verdict
The action tips which were added in an earlier mod are welcome and help flesh out the overall mechanics of this videogame creating something that is a slow burner with some intricate survival mechanics. Anyone who wants a quick fix combat game will probably be disappointed as this isn’t its aim, survival, and consolidation of your resources is more of a focus. there are many different beasts and baddies to discover if you put in the time and effort.
This review is based on a retail copy of the game provided by the publisher.
Decay of Logos, at its heart, is a plucky, independently developed third person action-adventure aspiring to fill the behemoth sized shoes left by massive hits like Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild and Dark Souls. It’s easy to see those inspirations in the game, utilizing the enemy respawns at checkpoints similar to Dark Souls and the vibrant colors and dungeon puzzle solving similar to the iconic Zelda series. Undoubtedly, Decay of Logos on the Nintendo Switch has a vision and goal in mind, but unfortunately it falls well short of the mark in terms of execution.
Time to fight the trees.
Decay of Logos is packed full of ambitious and interesting mechanics, but it’s certainly a shame that nearly all of them feel so poorly implemented and broken that it makes the game a slog. The most egregious example of which is undoubtedly the mystical elk companion that the developers themselves say is intended to be the core of the gameplay. The elk companion is used as inventory management, a solution for puzzles, help for traversal as a mount, and occasionally a partner in combat. The only issue is that, at least in the Switch version of the game, the elk companion is frustrating and unreliable to a point of hindrance.
In my time with the game, the elk was missing a majority of times, rarely came when called upon, frustrating to use as a mount, and a test of patience to get in position for a puzzle solution. The inventory management aspect of the elk was difficult to use, as when my character found something new the elk was nowhere around and I would have to make a decision about which gear to leave behind. It was simpler to leave the elk alone due to the frustration that ensued in trying to make it useful, but the issue would always rear it’s antlered ugly head when Decay of Logos required the use of the frustrating elk.
Elks: The bane of my existence.
Elk related issues aside, there are problems abound in the gameplay mechanics of Decay of Logos. The player character has an internal meter of exhaustion and if you do not sleep at the designated save points often enough her stats will diminish and ultimately lead to her hits being half as strong and her defense lowered. The exhaustion mechanic wouldn’t be too much of an issue, but it seemed like your character never stayed well rested for very long and the rest locations were spaced fairly far apart.
Functionally, the mechanic felt like a permanent stat de-buff that ranged in intensity. For example, I rested at a save point then ran across the area to a puzzle location only to find out I didn’t have the required items, but in checking my inventory I noticed my stats were already de-buffed due to exhaustion. This seemed to greatly hinder my willingness to explore, which is one of the pillars of the game’s design.
Decay of Logos prides itself on a hands free exploration that tosses the player into the world and tasks them with figuring out things for themselves. Whether or not this is a positive is a matter of taste and experience with the genre, as there are games that can pull off a hands free model exceptionally well. However, Decay of Logos would greatly benefit from some more player guidance due to some confusing map designs that will often have the player running in circles, without so much as a map, looking for items to complete puzzles.
These are deep mechanically intrinsic issues I have found in the game and it only gets worse from there. The Nintendo Switch port of Decay of Logos is severely broken in ways I’ve yet to see on the system before. I could rattle off my laundry list of bugs and glitches all day; I took a hit from an enemy and the game lost sound, I paused the game a few minutes while my Switch was docked and the game ran at an abysmal and laggy framerate until I undocked and re-docked, I tried to use a healing item and I lost all ability to move my character, I fell off a platform and was stuck in the falling animation inches from the ground. The list goes on and on and is frankly unacceptable for a game claiming to be out of beta or early access.
The most heartbreaking part of all of these issues is that when you play Decay of Logos, it’s clear to see the intentions and the artistic flair the developers bring to the table. The game has a striking crisp style paired with a moody atmosphere and thought out world that’s built by exploration and interaction. However all of the faults quickly pile up and make the game a true test of patience that unfortunately make it nearly impossible to recommend to anyone, especially the Switch owners who have an added amount of bugs and issues to contend with. Only the most masochistic gamers with an overabundance of time on their hands should willingly attempt to tackle this beast.
This review is based on a retail copy of the game provided by the publisher.
Are you tired of Vader Immortal yet? Don’t worry; next time I’ll try something different. But I figured that if I was going to play through Episode 3, I should do it with you guys. That didn’t quite work out, but I still managed to have some fun in the Lightsaber Dojo mode. Check out the video below:
Big Drunk Satanic Massacre, orBDSMfor short, is a twin-stick shooter game. With that sentence alone, you can probably already tell whether this is a game for you. But since I don’t think our dear review editor would be satisfied with a one-sentence review, I’ll elaborate.BDSMis indeed a twin-stick shooter, but it’s also a dungeon crawler of sorts. Players control Satan’s brother, Lou, through various stages set mostly in hell. The game has a strong focus on humor, but is it funny enough to be worthwhile?
If you want to get an idea of what the humor inBDSMis like, just think aboutDuke Nukem. Outside ofthe looks, Lou is basically Duke if he was a demon. He regains health by drinking what the game calls “milk” (but is clearly meant to be an alcoholic beverage), spends “quality time” with random women, and trades in pithy one-liners regularly. I won’t jump into the debateabout whether that sort of character is appropriate in this day and age, but I will say that it does get stale after a while. The comedy, for better or worse, also takes advantage of pop culture references. The game’s cover art parodiesDoom, and that ties directly intoBDSM’s backstory. That part is actually clever; the basic setup of the game’s plot is that humans (represented byDoom-esque space marines) have colonized Hell and turned it into a tourist spot. That’s entertaining, but a lot of the pop culture references just seem like they’re there to be there. For me, the humor was definitely a mixed bag, but it may be different for you.
The bigger issue for me was that the gameplay was very repetitive. I appreciate the decorative backdrops of the different levels, and the variety of guns available, but the core twin-stick shooter gameplay just gets boring quickly. I personally feel that this style of gameplay works best how it was introduced: as a type of quick arcade-style game. Without more to break up the action, and with levels that are definitely longer than they should be, it just isn’t that compelling in terms of gameplay. WhereBDSMgets some points back, though, is in its character designs. Fitting within the humorous aesthetic, the character and monster designs are very clever. It’s a shame you can’t see them better in game, given the top-down perspective, but I still hope that the artists involved go on to bigger and better things.
BDSMisn’t just another mediocre title floating around the eShop, like some of the other games I’ve reviewed. There was clearly a lot of work put into it, and it can be fun to play. If you like this style of humor, then it will keep you entertained, but even if you don’t, the gameplay works well enough. It’s just too repetitive for me to fully recommend it. Take a look at the trailers for yourself, and see if they do it for you. If so, well, Lou and I will see you in Hell.
Sim games, when they’re done well, are a beautiful thing. I mean … they give you the chance to be pretty much anything you want to be. Being a journalist, for instance, I obviously want to play a game in which I get to be a journalist. You’re thinking that I really need a life and a break, right? Well, I don’t, and this is exactly what I want to do so I’m going to tell you all about Headliner: NoviNews, which is due to hit our screens December 11th.
Coming to PS4 and Xbox One from the clever souls over at Unbound Creations, Headliner: Novinews will see you become just that; a headliner. In this role, you will get the chance to choose the headlines that will shape society. Whether you try and be virtuous and report the truth or just garbage your integrity from the off and embrace fake news is entirely up to you.
Set in fictional Novistan, you will become chief editor of the country’s largest news publication. From your chair in the newsroom, you’ll have to choose which stories the paper is going to run. Sound simple? Well, to do this effectively, you’ll need to balance the local political climate with social sentiment and personal interactions. This is the media, after all; keeping everybody happy is going to be a bit of an uphill battle.
Once you’ve decided exactly what you’re going to publish, you’ll be able to see firsthand what sort of an impact your story has had. As always, your decisions have consequences, so you’ll have to plan your actions wisely.
The stories you choose to report on and events that may spin from these are randomized. Not only will this mean that you experience unique outcomes and endings based on the path you take through the game, but it will also make for bags of replayable fun.
“I’ve always been interested in how media shapes people’s perceptions, which in turn shapes reality. What stories we deem newsworthy, and how we report on those stories, fundamentally changes our entire society. Headliner: NoviNews explores the trials and tribulations of trying to remain unbiased in an inherently biased world“, said Unbound Creations founder and director, JaKub Kasztalski.
If Headliner: NoviNews sounds like something worth exploring, it will be appearing on your consoles at the price of £11.74, or $13.99 for you nice folk across the pond. This is definitely an interesting concept and might open your eyes to a few of the decisions we have to make before putting pen to paper. As you may soon see, it’s often the writing that’s the easiest part.
