Operation Backlog Completion 2025
Aug 172016
 

Gamescom 2016 has begun! Unlike E3, where I cover as much as possible, I usually only cover the Gamescom announcements that stand out to me the most. But just because there aren’t many big press conferences this year doesn’t mean we don’t have a lot to look forward to!

Final-Fantasy-XV-battle-screenshotI’ll update this post throughout the day if necessary.

First, Final Fantasy XV is playable at Gamescom (and a 53-minute gameplay video is available, although it may contain spoilers. 52 fantastic new screenshots were also revealed.

Kingdom Hearts HD 2.8 Final Chapter Prologue is playable again, as well. I’ve heard positive reactions to both.

Before we move on from Square Enix, NieR: Automata is coming to Steam in addition to the PS4.

…So weird.

During E3, we briefly discussed an upcoming Souls-like sci-fi game called The Surge, from the developers of Lords of the Fallen. Here’s the new gameplay footage shown at Gamescom.

I’m not entirely sure if I want to play The Surge, at least not until I’ve played more Souls and Souls-like games, but it definitely looks interesting.

And speaking of games similar to Dark Souls, Koei Tecmo announced a new demo for Nioh. It will be available to download from August 23 through September 6, and includes changes made based on feedback from the alpha demo.

A new trailer was also shown for ReCore, which has more shooting than I expected, but still looks interesting.

(I’m not entirely sure why people compare it to Mega Man, but maybe they mean Mega Man Legends?)

Unfortunately, while I was curious about Rare’s Sea of Thieves when it was announced, the newest gameplay footage didn’t give me any reason to be more interested in it than in other online games.

On the other hand, if I get any more excited for Yooka-Laylee, I might explode.

The Banjo-Kazooie vibes are so strong!

Now that we’ve had some wonderful Yooka-Laylee footage to boost our spirits, let’s brace ourselves to take a look at the newest game in the Metal Gear series… in which wormholes form an alternate timeline for a… co-op survival game with… zombies…?

You know, I wondered how Konami would continue the series without Kojima, but I don’t think anyone could have predicted alternate universe zombie-fighting.

This probably is one of the “bad” announcements and it’s definitely one of the weird ones. I have so many questions. Chief among them is “why?” Why?

Let’s move on to a game that should have zombies and see what Capcom had to show from Resident Evil 7!

I’ll admit, it doesn’t look a lot like Resident Evil. However, it does look like horror, and that’s something the series sorely needs.

Capcom has been evasive about what Resident Evil 7 itself will play like. The Beginning Hour demo isn’t necessarily indicative of the main game, and this new trailer shows a “found footage” tape you’ll find in the game.

I’m undecided about whether this is good or bad… but it’s the most interested I’ve been in a Resident Evil game in quite a while. Is it hypocritical to be optimistic about Resident Evil 7 and negative toward Metal Gear Survive?

Well, let’s move on to more horror: a trailer for the creepy new game we discussed recently, Little Nightmares.

According to Bandai Namco, Little Nightmares tells the story of a girl named Six as she tries to escape the Maw, “a vast, mysterious vessel inhabited by corrupted souls looking for their next meal.” It’s creepy, weird, and definitely one to keep an eye on.

Bandai Namco also showed a trailer for a game called Get Even, which is also horror. I’m not sold on it yet, but it’s worth a look.

These are the most interesting (or weird) things I’ve seen from Gamescom so far. What about you?

Aug 052015
 

No catchy title this time. Unlike last year when I shared great games from Gamescom, this year I’m just going to go through a few highlights of what has otherwise been a fairly lackluster show for me.

I went into Gamescom looking forward to two games: Scalebound and Final Fantasy XV. Therefore, I was very excited to watch Microsoft’s briefing to learn more about PlatinumGames’s new exclusive. What I saw didn’t impress me. I hate to say it, but I’m just not sure about Scalebound, and part of it is the protagonist.

Scalebound-protagonist

When Scalebound was announced, a lot of people wondered if it had a custom protagonist. Well, this guy’s name is Drew. He’s from Earth. Now he’s been transported to the fantasy world of Draconis, where he bonded with a dragon.

And he is incredibly annoying.

Maybe he gets better through character development. But right now I have a hard time seeing the charm that drew me to PlatinumGames with that guy on the screen. It also sounds like Scalebound might be open world, so let’s just say I’m unconvinced.

But Microsoft had more than just Scalebound, so let’s move on. I appreciated hearing more about the Xbox One’s backward compatibility, which I hope will eventually expand to include the Xbox 360 games I have.

They also showed trailers for an adventure game called Thimbleweed Park, which looks old-school and entertaining, and We Happy Few, which… well, I’ll let you see for yourself.

Yeah, that one stood out to me. It’s a survival roguelike, so I don’t know if I’ll play it, but it certainly knows how to set the mood.

Next, the trailer for Dark Souls III was just fantastic and reminded me (yet again) that I need to really get into the Souls series.

The Halo 5 focus was on multiplayer, so I was less interested, especially since it will not have local multiplayer. I’m not big on multiplayer to start with, but I’ll miss the ability to sit down and play with my friends. Rise of the Tomb Raider looks interesting, and while it’s great to see a hoped-for announcement like Halo Wars 2, I don’t get along with RTS games.

Halo Wars 2 closed out Microsoft’s conference.

I didn’t watch EA’s live either, just checked out the highlights. Mirror’s Edge: Catalyst could be interesting, and The Old Republic: Knights of the Fallen Empire sounds pretty cool (even if it won’t be my first MMORPG).

Garden Warfare 2 might be worth playing, and Unravel looks just as adorable as it did at E3.

EA may not have had the most fantastic show for me, and I’m not interested in the Blizzard show tomorrow, but I was excited to see what we would learn about Final Fantasy XV today! The trailer revealed last night didn’t know much, but they wouldn’t hold a special Active Time Report during Gamescom if they didn’t have exciting announcements, right?

…Right?

No video game company trolls its fans better than Square Enix. Many fans went into Gamescom hoping to learn Final Fantasy XV’s release date. And they announced… that they know when they’re going to announce the release date.

There also might be a new demo available to anyone, and they also know when they’re going to announce details about that.

To be fair, they gave some information about the game. It will have a serious, emotional story in addition to the more lighthearted moments seen in Episode Duscae. Family bonds are a theme alongside bonds of friendship. Lunafreya is in a difficult political situation but has great inner strength. Airships may or may not be possible.

And they claim it has a villain who will top the previous games’ villains. That’s a bold statement to make, especially in response to a question mentioning the appeal of characters like Sephiroth and Kefka. I love a good villain, so I’ll be interested to see just what makes Final Fantasy XV’s villain so great.

At last, they shared a tiny bit of new gameplay.

Between Scalebound uncertainties and a lack of Final Fantasy XV details, this Gamescom wasn’t very eventful for me. What games stood out to you–for better or worse–at Gamescom 2015?

Aug 132014
 

Before I get into the main topic of this post, I’d like to talk about something else. This has already been a sad week, and it’s only Wednesday. We’ve lost two major actors in the past two days. On Monday, Robin Williams died. I haven’t seen as much of his work as most people have, but still enough to be saddened and shocked that he’s gone. Then yesterday, Lauren Bacall died. Although it’s unusual for someone from my generation, I’ve seen more movies with Lauren Bacall in than Robin Williams.

Let’s take a moment to remember and pray for these two, along with all others who have died.

Now that I’ve started this off on an unhappy note, don’t worry. We’re going to brighten our moods by discussing something fun–video games! Most of these will be from Gamescom, a big gaming event currently in progress in Germany, but before we get to that, I want to show you the first trailer for A Bird Story.

A Bird Story is a short game, the spiritual follow-up to one of the best games I played last year, To the Moon. This will bridge the game with its eventual sequel, and I can’t wait. If it’s anything like To the Moon, it will be amazing.

Now, onto Gamescom! Gamescom isn’t as big as E3, so my feature for it won’t be nearly as extensive. In fact, I’m not going to discuss every game that was shown, and I’m not even going to go in order. I’m going to discuss the games and news that mean the most to me.

Let’s start with EA’s press conference, which occurred this morning. Believe it or not, I enjoyed it less than their E3 show. They started off strong, with more footage from Dragon Age: Inquisition and a new trailer. I’m excited for this game. I just need to play DA2 already.

Am I the only one who thought of Harbinger during this trailer? …Yes? Okay, moving on.

EA also discussed Star Wars: The Old Republic, which I’m almost interested in (since it’s a Star Wars RPG), but not enough to actually try it. I wish they’d announced a third Knights of the Old Republic game. That would catch my attention.

Then, there was a piece of news that disappointed me. BioWare has been releasing short trailers for something with the tagline “You’ve Been Chosen,” and it looked like it was going to be a horror game. Well, apparently it’s a 4-versus-1 online multiplayer fantasy RPG. Huh. I’m much less interested now–but don’t worry, because we’ve got a lot of great horror news coming up.

Yesterday morning, I missed Microsoft’s show, but I don’t mind too much, since there were only a few announcements that interested me. There’s a Sunset Overdrive bundle, more information was given about the Master Chief Collection and the Halo 5 beta, and new trailers were released for Below and Ori and the Blind Forest, the latter of which interests me the most.

Then the Internet exploded, as Rise of the Tomb Raider was revealed to be an Xbox exclusive, but Microsoft’s Phil Spencer has since confirmed the exclusivity “has a duration.” This means it probably will appear on other systems after all.

Onwards!

Sony’s press conference has been the best for me so far. We got to see more of Bloodborne, which looks delightfully dark. It also reminds me that I need to finish the Souls games. Speaking of series I need to finish before the new one comes out, LittleBigPlanet 3 looks as cute and fun as it did at E3.

More gameplay from Middle-earth: The Shadow of Mordor was shown. I’m interested in that, in part because of its use of Lord of the Rings lore, but I’m not quite sold just yet. For one thing, it’s open world, which isn’t quite my favorite thing.

New trailers were shown for a couple of games I’ve been following for a while–Volume, a futuristic Robin Hood stealth game by the makers of Thomas Was Alone, and The Vanishing of Ethan Carter, a horror adventure game that looks very promising.

I was happy to see that, and I can’t wait to play it! But now, enough of games we already knew about–are you ready for some new game announcements?

A PS4 exclusive called Rime (which apparently was announced a year ago, but it’s new to me) has an art style similar to The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker and looks like it could really be fun. I’ve also heard it’s open world, though, so we’ll see.

Next up, Hellblade. Ninja Theory hasn’t released a lot of details about its new game, but the trailer gave off a dark fantasy vibe. I’ll keep my eye on it. Another one I’ll keep my eye on is a cute Vita platform game called Tearaway, which is being remade for the PS4 as Tearaway Unfolded. I don’t have a Vita, so I never played the original, but it looks interesting.

The next game I’m going to show you sounds like the antithesis of games I like. It’s a multiplayer (eh) sandbox (boo) crafting/building simulator (meh, I don’t even play Minecraft). So why am I showing it here even though I skipped over all the other games I’m not interested in? Mainly because, kind of like Tomodachi Life, you need to experience the weirdness of this trailer for yourself.

All right, let the debate begin! Is this pro-Communism, or is it making fun of it through the age-old art of parody? Whatever it is, the trailer has awesome music and is weirdly entertaining. It may be a multiplayer sandbox crafting/building sim, but thanks to GameInformer’s preview, I know it’s also an alternate history in which “projected clones” try to build a town at the same time after a 1960’s era Soviet experiment goes horribly wrong. You can vote for the buildings you want your town to build… and bribe officials to steer the vote in your direction. There are also turret battles with giant monsters. And then you mine the monsters.

I really don’t know what to say about it.

Anyway, enough of that. I promised you some horror! First up, a cancelled horror game is getting another chance. Until Dawn, a horror game based on slasher films, was supposed to come out for the PS3, but it was cancelled. Now, it’s been reinvented for the PS4.

It’s unclear to me if it’s going to be a true survival horror game, or an action game more along the lines of Alan Wake, but I’ll watch for more news.

But now, the biggest moment so far! During Sony’s press conference, they announced a horror game called P.T., by a mysterious developer called 7780s studio. To be honest, it didn’t impress me. Just another first-person horror game that ended with a shot of screaming people to prove its scariness.

There’s a demo out now for the PS4, but I didn’t really care… until I learned the demo was actually a teaser for something else… Check out this footage from one of the first players to finish the demo and learn the truth.

Hideo Kojima? Guillermo del Toro? Norman Reedus (I’ve never seen him, but it seems he’s a big deal).

In… Silent Hill? Wait, Silent Hills, plural? What is going on??

This raises so many questions. What is this about? Why was it hidden in a first-person demo? (I can’t imagine a Silent Hill game being first-person like that.) Is there more than one Silent Hill now? Does Kojima prefer playing little tricks on fans to announce his new games than making big announcements?

And the biggest question of all, will this be an amazing survival horror experience?

Share your thoughts, hopes, and reactions in the comments below, and be sure to tell me if I ignored your favorite Gamescom announcement.