Videos

Peep this opening cinematic for Witcher 3 in which a single crow kills a man

News, Trailers

By William Chandler

I’ll be the first to admit that I’ve been unable to complete either the original Witcher or the Witcher 2 due to a combination of hating the combat systems and extreme laziness, but I played the first few hours of Witcher 2 and then saw a friend of mine play the last thirty minutes so it’s basically like I beat it.

Anyway, I’m hoping the Witcher 3 will finally be my bag so I’ll be able to give the franchise the attention it deserves and, based on the gameplay I’ve seen of it so far, it definitely seems like that’ll be the case. Further solidifying this notion is CD Projekt Red’s dedication to releasing badass trailers for the game and the one they released a few hours ago is no exception. Revealed to be the opening cinematic for Witcher 3, the trailer, which is titled “The Trail”, features Geralt tracking someone down using a trail of clues that are made apparent through flashbacks of prior events.

In one of the flashbacks some huge jerk is shown cutting off the head of a girl’s horse in order to halt her forward progress and she responds by somehow using a crow to blow a hole in his fucking head. I dunno. But you should probably just watch it.

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt drops February 24th, 2015 on PC, PS4, and Xbox One.

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Shed a tear for the unparalleled beauty of these Halo 2 Anniversary cinematics

News, Trailers, Video Games

By William Chandler

I’m absolutely failing at my self appointed position of obnoxious cynic as of late. But there is just far too much cool shit coming out for me to allow my duty to get in the way of pure, red blooded honesty. And, honestly guys, I’m super fucking stoked for the Master Chief Collection. Yeah, I’m aware of its nearly pointless existence aside from filler material until the next major entry in the Halo franchise can be released, but it legitimately seems like Microsoft and 343 are trying to do right by actually putting a lot of work into it.

The trailer above just shows the visual overhaul on the cinematics in Halo 2 Anniversary and, man, they straight up shattered my rose tinted nostalgia goggles. Honestly, I was under the impression that the studio would likely try to keep the visual style of the original in order to perhaps preserve some of the old school (or, well, old-ish) gaming charm but nah. They went all out instead and I’m extremely pleased that they did. Blur Studios, the company responsible for the beautiful cutscenes in Halo Wars, are reportedly in charge of these too, and it shows.

It’s just too beautiful. I’m softly weeping just like ten year old me did for the original version of Halo 2.

Make God watch you play Gods Will Be Watching

News, Trailers, Video Games

By William Chandler

Mad props to the folks over at Deconstructeam for this decidedly dope and stylish trailer for their new game Gods Will Be Watching. I like it because it does a great job of setting the tone and whatnot without revealing too much. But, in case you wanted to know exactly what this game is, I’ll allow the video description to do my job for me:

Gods Will Be Watching is a point and click thriller about hard decisions and moral dilemmas in order to survive. A series of dramatic puzzles where both the narrative outcome and the ethical approach to the problem matter as you progress through your adventure. There’s no good or evil, just decisions, with only you as the judge of your actions. Is eating your friends the best way to stay alive, or just the easier?

The game drops on July 24th on Steam.

I hope you guys want more Dark Souls 2 because there is some more Dark Souls 2 to be had

News, Video Games

By William Chandler

According to this overall mediocre announcement trailer, there is roughly three episodes of more Dark Souls 2 for you to die in. What’s the deal with this arbitrary episodic format you ask? Exactly how long is an “episode” of content in regards to Dark Souls 2? They’re certainly making it seem like it is broken up by locale, but most locations in Dark Souls 2 usually only take maybe an hour each to get through, so perhaps these are straight up massive environments. I don’t know, man. Sometimes I don’t have all the answers.

Dubbed The Lost Crowns, the DLC has you traveling to distant foreign lands to recover three crowns that King Vendrick once owned. That’s all we know right now. I want more Dark Souls 2 so I’m relatively excited, but I can’t help but be bummed at how cheap and uncool this announcement trailer is.

It looks like you can expect to be playing Episode 1 of The Lost Crowns on July 22nd.

Peep this video explaining the much needed netcode improvements in the new Battlefield 4 Patch

News, Video Games

By William Chandler

Better late than never, as they say. Battlefield 4’s often chastised low tickrate problem is about to be fixed. The most noticeable improvement by far is in the hit detection, meaning you won’t find yourself getting shot for a few moments after you enter cover and whatnot. But that’s not all!

According to this post on the official blog, there are several other notable improvements like:

• Improved/reduced explosion induced camera shake
• Character collision improvements
• Fix to reduce object damage mismatch between client/server.
• Fix explosion packs not being able to be shot sometimes
• Improvements for client side packet loss
• Client crash fixes

Honestly, this might just be enough to get me back into playing the game. If only briefly.

Metro Redux is yet another re-release of a game for next gen consoles

News, Trailers, Video Games

By William Chandler

Metro Redux is a packaged re-release of both Metro: 2033 and its sequel, Metro: Last Light for next generation platforms, joining Tomb Raider, The Last of Us, and many others in what is becoming a disturbing trend. I suppose they’re really trying to fill out the sad libraries of these new consoles, but it just seems so pointless. I really doubt that too many people who own a PS4 or Xbox One either did not own one of the previous gen consoles, or simply skipped these games the first time around. This means that a lot of their market are just bored consumers who want to see what the same game they’ve already played looks like with better lighting and shadows. And that is a really fucking sad thought.

Either way, I like the Metro games. I think the developers’ hearts are in the right place and that they’re trying to do some pretty intriguing stuff with FPS level design and storytelling. Of course I think people should play these games, it’s just hard to get behind such obvious attempts at cash grabs.

Remember, not so long ago, when everyone bitched constantly about remakes of games that were actually fairly old? Fairly old, as in more than five years at least. Now we’re getting remakes of games from two fucking years ago. What a strange time to be a gamer.