Bang, Bang! Boom, Boom! Borderlands 2

Bros, I have one question for you.  EXPLOSIONS?!?!?!  

Yes, that is correct reader; I ripped that straight from Borderlands 2!  The writing is THAT GOOD.  Can you believe it?  Borderlands 2 was quite a surprise for me; I liked the first game okay, but I was nowhere close to fandom.  I felt like the first Borderlands was very unique albeit INCREDIBLY boring.  I beat it in a weekend play though with a buddy of mine, and we enjoyed the heck out of it (Our very own, Elder!).  I remember picking the game up again months later to play on a lazy Sunday, and found myself unwilling to get through the tutorials – It’s really boring.  I ended up preordering this game not out of hype but rather because it was marketed with the bonus of a free extra character DLC, and as someone that buys video games I’ve come to realize DLC characters are either complete shite or game breaking awesome.  They can also be, like, eight bucks later.  I took a big old gamble on this game, but it was oh so worth it. 

Story

B2 starts the game in a very familiar fashion – a high moving vehicle running over a skag (think reptilian wolf creature with an Aliens mouth) playing a kick ass tune.  We are then shown the four main characters of the game on a train, Maya the Siren, Salvador the Gunzerker, Axton the Commando, and Zer0 the Assassin – I’ll talk more about them later.  They’re lured onto the train by the rich, powerful, and the king of douches, Handsome Jack, and he then tries to kill you by exploding the train (OMG, HE’S SO SMART!!!!). Lucky for you the game is just beginning, so you’re not dead!  I think you were wearing train explode armor.  Almost immediately after the BOOM, you’re found by the most loved video game character since Pikachu, the robot Claptrap; “Allow me to introduce myself - I am CL4P-TP steward bot, but my friends call me Claptrap! Or they would, if any of them were still alive. Or had existed in the first place!"   He is definitely an upgrade from the first game, and talks about more inane and hilarious stuff than ever before – in fact, the Claptrap jokes are probably my favorite in the game. Hey guys, if you like dat wub wub musix, Claptrap makes it…IT’SPRETTYCOOL.  He has a certain charm to him, like the guy you keep around because his enthusiasm is infectious, but he’s a total tool – he’s also the person your friends make fun of when they aren’t around because it’s hilarious.  I guess he really isn’t your friend per say, but definitely something to laugh at.  Boy, does old Clapper make the laughs.

Where was I?  Oh yeah, so you do a little adventuring with the robospazz Claptrap, and find yourself into a little town.  There you fight off bandits, and introduced to Sir Hammerlock.  Hammerlock is like one of those guys from those old nature programs; he goes around observing creatures, has a British Accent, and has a surprising amount of hatred to threshers (Think those big-ass worms from Tremors) that ate his arm.  He’s an alright chap by me, but he definitely isn’t as funny as the rest of the B2 motley crue.  Hammerlock and Claptrap task/guide(more of the former) you to the nest of bandits holding Claptraps boat (I lol’d at the fact a robot has a boat.  I’m guessing he’s trying to pick up honeys!). 

Guess who’s berating you while you’re doing this the whole time? Handsome Jack, that’s who!  The president of Hyperion informs you that you suck, he bought a pony comprised of diamonds, and names it Butt Stallion in your honor.  I love this man.  Well for a psychopathic, greedy, sympathetic mask-wearing mofo, he’s pretty damn entertaining.  HELL, he’s one of the greatest video game villains of the year!  …From that point on you reach Sanctuary where the good guy ‘bandits’ are.  You meet up with Roland, one of the four OG characters from the first game, and from that point on you meet many weird, psychotic, and hilarious characters that you help and in turn, get you closer to loot heaven.  The rest of the game plays out as a race to the Vault with Handsome Jack hot on your heels or fucking with you.  Luckily, you have a Guardian Angel…named Angel on your side.  They really don’t explain who she is or what she’s capable until towards the end of the game; she guides you to where you go, and explains what you need to get done to put down Handsome Jack and get to the Vault before he does.  She’s kinda weird, but cute in that awkward way.  She shows up in a weird live-action stripe on your screen.  She’s a girlie with a Mohawk that’s combed over, and she has alternates for bad words – shoot for shit.  If that doesn’t have your hummer running, I just don’t know you anymore reader!  I JUST DON’T KNOW.

 Now it looks like from what I said that the whole game is about the same exact game as the first, but it really isn’t.  There are a couple of plot twists that really change the game up, and actually instill a connection to the characters.  SHIET, a lot of the side quests you go on give you an opportunity to know many of the side characters, and that, in of itself, is incredibly rewarding (in sooooooooo many ways).  A fantastic example of B2 sidequest nonesence is helping out Marcus the gunsalesfreak. He tasks you to go out in this rather long quest to get his lockbox in the underbelly of a city.  You’re thinking there’s probably some stupid rare gun in there.  NOPE.  Just, y’know, freaking nudie pics of the hottie, Mad Moxxi.  And PLOT TWIST.  Mad Moxxi catches wind of this, and will gladly take those pics off of you for some dang loot.  And to make money off ‘em….That pretty much encapsulates the lunacy of B2. I.  LOVE. IT.  I don’t think there’s been a game that makes me actually laugh as much as this one; can you think of a game in recent history with such profound silliness? I think the characters’ charm really adds to your experience. 

Gearbox did a good job of adding new characters and keep familiar faces around.  My favorite NPC character is a new one, and her name is Tiny Tina.  Tina is Pandora’s best demolitionist, and she’s thirteen.  She talks like a hipster, and kind of like the characters from Adventure Time.  At one point you have to get some bombs and junk for Tina, so she can make some bomb-ass missiles; “"That's Mushy Snugglebites' badonkadonk. She's my main squeeze. Lady's got a gut fulla' dynamite and a booty like POOOW!" You meet up with her during one of the main missions, but she also has some jobs for you as well.  My favorite side mission involves getting guests (a bug she named Sir Reginald, a doll she names Princess Fluffybutt, and a homicidal bandit named Fleshstick) for Tina’s Tea Party.  IT’S SO FUNNY.  God!  The whole thing turns out to be a trap where she can kill the bandit.  I can’t emphasize enough; do the side missions.  It’s worth the loot and the adventure. This is great, and makes B2 a lot more than just a kill and loot game.  I don’t want to tell you too much about the main story…except IT’S FUCKING AWESOME.

Graphics

B2 employs cel-shaded graphics.  So long half of ya!  I don’t get why peeps hate cel-shaded so much, it’s really not that bad (Wind Waker won me over.) I feel like that makes game pop, and really feel like you’re in a different world.  To me, it saps the realism completely out of the game, so when you’re playing it you have no idea what’s gonna work – No fall damage.  Not really graphics related, but damn dats nice.  Why do you want to play something that feels and looks so realistic? B2 is a huuuuuuge game, and has many different areas that you can explore (with tons of easter eggs!  My favorite is the Minecraft area!).  There are some frigid mountainous areas, toxic dumps, ancient ruins, jungles, robo-cities, rundown floating city and many more.  I have to admit that some of the textures don’t load initially, and will pop randomly sometimes.  I must proclaim internet, that’s my biggest gripe about the game, and it’s a pretty small babby one at that. 

Gotta love Minecraft!

Gameplay

Let’s start with the characters.  You get to choose from Gunzerker, Assassin, Siren, Commando, or Mechromancer (if you have the dlc).  You don’t get to customize them in a typical way when you start a game, but you do pick up different skins for them.  Some of which drastically change their look or are just palette swaps.  So each character has one special ability which distinguishes itself from the rest; Gunzerker can wield two of any weapons at the same time, Assassin can project a hologram and turn invisible, Siren psylockes baddies (she puts ‘em in a psychic bubble thing), Commando can summon a turret, and Mechromancer can summon Death Trap a floating giant robot. Now if that doesn’t interest you, things get a lot deeper.  Each character has three different skill trees that alter how they play and what their special ability does.  You gain points to put skill trees as you level up.  This is really fun for huge RPG nerds, the level of customization is really high.  You obtain class mods that allow you to get benefits to your skill tree, and are definite incentives to try out different loadouts.  They are definitely my favorite type of loot to find! I made an assassin in my first run of the game.  Snakeyes was a deadly sniper, but wouldn’t mind slicing bros in half if they managed to shrug off a headshot (Borderlands logic, FTW!).  I later dabbled with throwing shurikens.  Pretty damn fun!  I liked the sniper tree the best because the more headshots you get the more your critical damage grows.  It’s super awesome, and it makes you feel i-n-c-r-e-d-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-b-l-y powerful.  Actually that’s one of the best things that B2 captures is the sense of power.  At the beginning, you get crushed into space doodoo by enemies easily, but towards the end you a true balla playa.  I love that gradual transition into video game zen.  I also played with the other characters as well during other playthroughs with my bros and pals.  I think the Mechromancer is my favorite character because she has this really unique skill tree called Anarchy – and it is nucking futs.  Basically you have anarchy that builds into a stack that grows if you kill a guy or your mag empties; it restarts if you prematurely reload.  The stack gives you benefits of added damage, and other skills play with Anarchy as well.  It’s pretty complicated sounding, but it was the deepest RPG and most unique I’ve seen in recent years.  B2 kept bringing me back to try out different skill trees and what a different class mod would do.  It’s more than addicting.  

 

Guns. SO MANY GUNS.  If you ever wanted to play a game that was all about guns, this is it.  The game even boasts eight different weapon manufacturers.  All these different brands have different quirks to ‘em; Torgue shoots slow moving bullets…BUT THEY EXPLODE, and you use Tediore guns like grenades..when you have to reload because THEY EXPLODE.  Ok.  There are also several different weapon types: sniper rifles, pistols, smgs, assault rifles, rocket launchers, and shotguns.  All of which behave differently based on what brand they are; Jakobs makes my favorite pistols, big ole Dirty Harry magnums –BANG! The level of depth in the weapons you find is incomparable.  It’s also worth mentioning when you get to higher levels weapons get different added bonuses like damage, reload speed, or element damage.

Now to the meat and potatoes.  

 B2 plays a lot like the traditional Halo FPS.  In terms of health, you have a shield that gets depleted first, and then health (unlike Halo you can see numerical values of both your shield and health that change based on your level and equipmunk…equipment).  You have a melee attack, can crouch, have a super unrealistically high jump, throw grenades, shoot gunz, zoom in, and use your special ability.  Pretty standard here, nothing complicated.  I think that’s why I like this game so much.  It’s not terribly complicated to play (albeit if you’re a headshot master then you’re pro in dis game), but it’s the strategy behind how your character plays is what keeps the game interesting.  It’s hard to find two people playing the same character the same way, and that’s awesome.  B2 isn’t a terribly difficult game, but when you unlock game+ it is much harder.  A cool factor in the gameplay mechanics is that if you play with more characters there’s a higher chance for better loot and more enemies to fight.  It’s always better to play Borderlands with a friend, and I treasure that.  

I guess I COMPLETELY forgot to tell you what you do in this game!  You kill a bunch of baddies.  They come in all sorts of psychotic varieties, midgets, dudes with shields, scary/gross/huge/fire beasts, and robots!  Actually there's a bunch more, but that's just a little taste my friends.  I don't normally have a hard-on for enemies, but B2 does such a great job.  They all have stuff to say, and are either kinda off-putting or hilarious.  There were many great one-liners from the baddies; some involving them doing stuff to your corpse or begging you to shoot them in a head (That's an actual quest!!!). My favorite are the Goliaths.  They are these big dudes with buckets on their heads.  If you knock off their head buckets, they go into a rage, their head will extend in a alien stalk-like way, and will kill ANYTHING.  They have the best random lines.  My personal favorite that comes up often is a gradual screaming of "hey" as they run towards you.  So you shoot these minions, get money, get loot, get experience, and they are the true heroes of the game.  They sacrifice their bodies for you to grow.  What troopers!

The menus! Oh the menus!  I love ‘em.  It’s comparable to Dead Space’s virtual reality menu.  It’s really sweet to see all the info at a flick of a button.  Also, dat ass.

A new reward aspect implemented in B2 is Badass Ranking.  And it’s…BADASS. So they reward you for killing dudes, making explosions, and shooting dudes in the crotch.  The more badass stuff you do, the higher your rank, and you earn badass tokens for every time it raises a level.   You can spend your tokens on passive boosts like faster shield recharge, faster gun reload, more damage, and all sorts of neat things.  I really love this system, and it’s even MOAR BADASS when you can brag how much higher your ranking is compared to your poop friends.

Oh!  And the DLC involving the season pass is primo.  No, they don’t raise the level cap, but they do offer some different flavors of awesome.  One’s about treasures out in some desert, and there’s flying sand skiffs (Return of the Jedi fantasies fulfilled!), and pirates?  The other involves a brand new vault being discovered in a crater.  Mr. Torgue (of Torgue guns! He’s oddly reminiscent of the late Macho Man Randy Savage) sponsors the BAD ASS TOURNAMENT OF BAD ASSES.  It’s pretty bad ass.  Sorry I already rehashed a joke.  Needless to say this one has a lot of explosions, memorable characters, great boss fight ROBO DRAGON!!!!, and more Tiny Tina and Mad Moxxi! Go GET IT.

Borderfuckinglands.  I love this game.  I love it a lot more than I ever expected.  After several playthroughs, I’m pretty certain no other game this year has kept me more entertained.  I’m pretty sure this is game of the year material here, but we’ll see soon enough…who knows maybe the latest COD will take me by surprise! (I’m fucking kidding.) IloveyouGearboxcanIhaveyourbabies?

Warcraft Anonymous: My Return to Azeroth

It had been about a year since the last time I had grabbed my gnome rogue and fought murlocs in Azeroth. I thought of World of Warcraft a time or two since then but had no interest in returning to such a time sink. Well that all changed last week. I don't know why but it only took one article to make me remember that it was not just any MMO or just another game I liked, but it was actually World of Warcraft that I wanted to play. So, I did what any addict would do and just got "a taste". I downloaded the 10 day for the new expansion and dove on in.

At first I had no real interest in it. I was playing but felt no connection to it. Then, the moment happened. I remembered how much I sucked with my rogue and decided I was going to start a new character and do things right. So here I am, playing my level 17 Undead Warrior and loving it again. I am not sinking a ton of hours into it but it has been fun just to play for a little bit at a time. The recent changes have made the game so entertaining. The skill points are streamlined to perfection, they added a pokemon style pet fighting game, and being in a good guild can help you level faster. The stress and annoying nuances are gone and I am loving it. Sure, I feel a little guilt for getting back in it (thus the addiction connection) but I am having fun and not ashamed of it. WoW really is the best MMO of all time and I love the heck out of it.

The Legend of Zelda: Death Is a Badass

Before jumping into this review, I want to give you bros a foreword.  Darksiders 2 is pretty much the metal version of Zelda.  Swish that thought around, and let it culminate….  

 

DEATH IS ZELDA’S NEW BADASS BOYFRIEND!!!! Death is literally the most badass version of Link that I could’ve asked for; yes more so that Shadow Link.  No, this isn’t heresy.  I’m a massive fan of the Zelda franchise (albeit majorly disappointed with the latest outing, Skyward Sword), but I feel like this is the Zelda game I’ve been waiting for a long time.  Let’s break it down.

Story

I honestly couldn’t tell you what the first game is about.  I played the first Darksiders a long time ago, and all I remember about that game was War (one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse) got screwed over and got his ass landed in some eternal imprisonment.  I can gather flashbacks of angels and demons, and very boring, clunky gameplay.  I liked the first game, but I had no hype for it.  I had no urge to ever pick it up ever again.  Fast forward some time later, the trailer for DS2 was released.  There was something very different about this game, and it really piqued my interest.  There was something that was dark, mysterious, and adventurous about it.  

Darksiders 2 picks up as Death, War’s brother, searching for a way to free War; they’re bros after all.  Death looks for this witch/weenie/crowman to magic a way to get his brother back.  Well, a heated argument ensues, and Death ended up killing the guy –WOOPS.  A magic amulet breaks, and Death is warped to a WHOLE NEW WORLD (cue Aladdin carpet ride).  It’s the dwarf kingdom…wait these guys are huge, but look like dwarves and they make everything….Hmm.  FORGELANDS.  So you do some stuff for these giant ass dwarves, who I might add, seem completely capable of doing, and you find out a lot more shit going on behind the scenes.  There’s something corrupting all the lands, and blocking Death’s means of saving humanity and War – its called corruption.  10/10, great name!  Corruption has something to do with Death’s people, the Nephilim (Stupid strong, blood thirsty peeps).  So after a certain point DS2 involves Death adventuring around different worlds and freeing them of the corruption. 

I should probably mention the story is definitely one of the low points of the game (not the lowest).

Game Feel

There’s something INCREDIBLY satisfying about this game.  It’s instantly relatable if you’ve ever played Ocarina of Time, Twilight Princess, or even Wind Waker.  At its core, Darksiders 2, is an action adventure game, and to its best merit it is exceedingly fun to explore its unique world.  Like I mentioned earlier, Death visits several different worlds in this game, but without a doubt, the first one (the one with the oxymoron dwarves).  There is something incredibly breathtaking when you get the chance to roam the massive grasslands...of the Forge Lands.  The scenery is totally magnificent, and they do a great job of making each world have a different look and feel.  In the Forge Lands, it makes you feel like you’re a part of some lost side story in Lord of the Rings AND IT’S FUCKING AWESOME.  You find a lot of ancient ruins, tombs, and dungeons that look and feel like it’s been around for centuries.  Another great world is the World of the Dead; and its stupid creepy.  I really love it; the ground is dark and decayed with a continual rolling fog.  It feels bleak, looks like it belongs on a cover of a 70’s metal record, AND IT’S FUCKING AWESOME. And lastly there is Lostlight; it’s some middle ground between Heaven and Hell.  And it lets you teleport to Earth, too – PSSST. Earth’s pretty lame.

Most of the fighting in this game is kind of like Devil May Cry or Bayonetta in the sense that it’s high adrenaline, 3^rd person hack ‘n slash.  I really enjoy that style of gameplay because it’s fast-paced, relentless, and very difficult.  I guess I forgot to mention there’s no blocking…unless you have a shield equipped! A blue hedgehog put it best; “GOTTA BE FAST!”  So in other words, it’s rewarding when you defeat a room of skeletons or skittish giant-ass panthers.  You can also become ultimate reaper when some bar fills up, big gaming cliché – I think that’s the only aspect I don’t like of the actual combat. Besides using a scythe, two actually, you can use a secondary weapon.  There are a couple different types of secondary weapons including a staff, claws, AND A BIG ASS HAMMER.  Guess which one is my favorite!  There’s also magic.  Magic is what I focused on in my play through; mostly because I felt like it leveled the playing field – there’s rooms where it’s at least 10 to 1 with one or two BIG ASS versions of the regular evil minions.  Magic’s focus was to play more defensively; you can summon several ghouls that are quick and fierce to fight your foes for you.  The best part was they rack up your combo meter like crazy.  You can also summon a swarm of crows to peck away at your foes – it’s helluva lot more useful than it sounds (Think The Birds!)  There’s another skill tree that’s more focused on melee combat, but I didn’t use that one.  From my understanding it’s more about using big, sweeping attacks, and agility, teleporting moves as well.  Then we have the enemies.  

This game has a great variety of enemies, mini-bosses, bosses, and secret ass bosses.  I love ‘em all.  I will admit, however, towards the end of the game the enemies are lame and pretty cheap.  I’ll get to that later.  I think my favorite part of this game is there’s many dungeons that you completely can skip or accidently pass up, that have really great bosses and dat sweet loot.  Speaking of loot, it’s an important factor in DS2.  You get chunks of armor and weapons when you kill baddies or open dem sweet azz chests.  You’ll find different pieces of armor with varying attributes or bonuses (like frost damage).  It can actually become quite engrossing to find all the chests in a dungeon because you gotta know what you might find.

Most of the game takes place in varying dungeons based on which world you are on, and most of them are great.  Every dungeon has an overlying theme (Kind of how Zelda has Fire Temple, Water Temple), and has puzzles based around newly acquired gear or gameplay mechanic.  This is great with me, because the puzzles are varied and change up the gameplay from fighting all the time.  The level design on some levels is truly inspired; there’s a huge elevator themed level that you try to open the different levels to get to one specific one to fight the boss.  In every venture in the dark dungeons, Death employs a great skill of acrobatics or PoP’s (Prince of Persia).  If you hadn’t figured out yet, Death is a very agile bro-killer.  He is adept at climbing around, jumping, and doing general PoP acrobatics like wall running.  It’s a positive change of platforming compared to the first Darskiders, where you just walk into a room and kill dudes – Yeah, that’s the whole game.  

I want to briefly talk about Lostlight; aka the poop.  This level is kinda boring because you are tasked to go to Earth, Heaven, and Hell.  I say this is boring because it’s hackneyed, and we’ve done this too many times in video games – Diablo says hi.  Lostlight is actually just a hub for the other three worlds.  This is kinda disappointing. Earth is all post-apocalyptic and dirty.  There’s zombies running around, and it’s awful.  For whatever dumb reason you are pretty much forced to play this area as a 3^rd person shooter, and it is not fun.  You have to find three things and shoot dudes while looking.  I can’t for the life of me figure out why they would suddenly change gameplay so drastically, and it feels really, really rushed.  I ran into three or four glitches in this area, and one of ‘em corrupted my save file (that wasn’t too bad because I had several saves going on).  Even more frustratingly, I couldn’t turn in my quest in one glitch.  I kept going back to Earth to make sure I didn’t miss anything, and this was making me lose my mind. Heaven and Hell aren’t nearly as bad, but Earth definitely soured my experience.

My favorite side quest-esque thing to do in this game is play in the Crucible.  The Crucible is a endurance/fighting arena you can participate in for really great loot.    You don’t get an opportunity to save in between waves, and when you finish five at a time you talk to the champ.  He’ll let you leave with a prize or continue the greedy fight.  You get to replay a lot of the bosses you encounter, and it’s incredibly difficult.  I spent a couple hours playing just this; it’s really addicting to try to finish the whole damn thing.

 

End of the line, Darksiders 2 is incredibly fun.  If you’re in the mood for a more hardcore adventure game, this is your best bet.  I’m actually happy to say I had way more fun than I ever anticipated, and EVERYONE SHOULD BUY IT.

Rating:

My Hype Train of Opinion 2: Picking a new system is kinda like voting.

He just got run over by a Warthog...

So last night I had a thought, picking a new video game system is like voting. Most of us have already made up our minds on the best system a year before we even see them. There is a reason for this, just like the political parties, we pick what fits our needs. I realize now, that I could not live without my PS3. I love my NFL Sunday Ticket, oversized Blu-Ray player, and Uncharted. So, when I first hear of the PS4, I will probably be all over it like Cartman's mom was all over the Denver Broncos.. Basically I have turned into a Sony slut. I had an Xbox 360 that I did love, because of the online service but I can live without that. I have found other features to be more important.

Same goes for handhelds, as much as I think the Vita looks cool, I will pick Nintendo every time. I cannot turn down handheld Mario and the rest of the first party games. The point is, the company's are not competing for experienced gamers, they are competing for the noobs. Just like campaigning for President, the old folks minds are made up. You have to convince the youth.

Now if you look at each system like a political party it goes something like this:
1. I believe the Playstation 3 is our Republican candidate. It is not extremely accessible, but it has a strong and determined fan base that will never turn on it. Also, Playstation is the older company that still is looking out for the best in gaming. It can be a turnoff for people that have never played the God of War series, but may not want to jump in on the 18th iteration. Sony fans will eat up everything put out though. Thus, there is massive love for there first party games and the characters that inhabit them.

2, Xbox is the democrat. The 360 tries to incorporate and appeal to everyone. Men, women, children, animals, ghosts... whatever, they all love an Xbox. Microsoft finds out what people may want and then tries to convince them that they do by producing the crap out of it. Just look at the Kinect. People wanted motion control that felt like they were totally in control and Microsoft delivered. They are always to give everyone something that they want. This has also been an issue. They lack first party games and their fan base is not as loyal as the PS3's they are much more likely to flip and make an educated opinion in what is best for their gaming. With that being said, they have a HUGE fan base and are generally loved.

Ugh.

3. Nintendo is our independent. Half the time I do not know who their audience really is (One minute it is kids, the next adults, and the seniors)  and what in the heck they are doing. Like Ron Paul, they will say and do a billion smart things, just to do something absolutely crazy. I love them for that.

Like I said, most people's minds are already made up.. Just like elections in the United States. Both sides have strong forces that are trying to pull the new players and the confused to their side. My advice, stop trying to appeal to everyone (looking at you motion controls) and stick with what ya know. Do what you have been doing for years, fix what us fanboys want, and the rest will fall into place.

My Hype Train of Opinion 1: Treyarch vs. Infinity Ward

Last night I played Black Ops II until 4 in the morning. While this may not seem like a huge feat to anyone, it is for me. I absolutely hated MW3... I refused to pay for another Call of Duty and would be content waiting for Battlefield 4. Then I remembered that this was a Treyarch year. That's right, I think Treyarch makes better CoD games than the creators of the series Infinity Ward. This seems to be an uncommon way of thought based on some conversations I have had through the years, but look at the evidence. Even at Treyarch's worst (World at War), they still created something funny and original. Those darn dogs were terrifying and silly at the same time.

Treyarch has always taken some chances where Infinity Ward has not. Just look at the zombie mode they created. Sure, Infinity Ward had Survival Mode in MW3 but it can not touch the originality of the original Black Ops' Zombie Mode. JFK and Fidel Castro working together? Are you kidding me?! The mode was so off the wall and created a very complete game. It did not feel like an add-on, but instead showed how hard the studio had worked to make Call of Duty something for everyone. My girlfriend who hates video games even played zombie mode with me. Zombies were such a great low risk way to get everyone involved in the game.

THE ORIGINAL NUKETOWN... CHATEAU!!

Now, this is not a review for Black Ops II. I will say it has beyond exceeded my expectations. I am addicted in about every way and I think it has finally replaced my all time favorite Duty, the Original, OG, Call of Duty. That game had it all and was an extremely innovative shooter. Treyarch still attempts to be innovative, Infinity Ward does not. The original Modern Warfare was exciting but it's sequels took no chances. They never changed the formula. There was no growth and it seemed to me they were just in it for the money. Treyarch takes less popular ideas (going back to WWII for World at War, and just the whole Black Ops idea) and make an incredibly creative experience. I hope Treyarch continues to pump out fun shooters that never take themselves too seriously. Now, back to shooting up futuristic LA... looks about the same to me.

Hotline...HALLOWEEN

Happy Halloween!  I hope yours isn’t as sugary bittersweet like mine (I think I had one trick-or-treater!); I really wanted to scream “WHAT TIME IS IT?!” whilst wearing my sweet Finn hat. Yeah, bro. You heard right, big Adventure Time fan.

What the hell am I talking about? Uhm, so I wanted to make a Halloween special post, but I hadn’t really played any worthy games as of late.  I recently completed this indie phenom called Hotline Miami –you can find it on Steam for about $10.  The game’s not really scary, but it’s trippy and rather creepy at times. They wear masks!!!!!!!!  FITTING.

So this game is a 2-D top down fuck ‘em up.  Yes.  It’s like an old school GTA, and it’s in the best way possible.  Hotline casts you as a dude with a troubling career – a hit man.  The game is set in late 80’s, and you guessed it, Miami! At the beginning of each level your phone rings in your 8-bit apartment, and you are given a “mission” – The jobs are described as menial jobs like cleaning up a mess at so-and-so’s address.  It’s very blatant, but you can’t help to appreciate it.

Each level plays out generally the same; you are tasked to murder every thug in the building.  This is so much fun!  You are given either melee weapons, guns, or your fists to finish off your foes.  There’s a lot of depth here; if you use guns it alerts the nearby dumbbutts to your vicinity, but it gives you quicker kills.  Melee weapons can generally OHKO most guys (aka crack their skulls!), and can also be thrown at enemies.  Melee weapons are actually my favorite because they don’t alert bad dudes, and the kills are much, much more visceral. And lastly, the fists.  Oh the fists! So you cannot really kill guys with one hit like the crowbars, axes, knives, and other assorted headbusters, but you can knock them down!  When you knock them down…you can execute them!  This gets pretty crazy, and if nothing else, the scene in Drive comes to mind – When Ryan Gosling crushes that dude’s head repeatedly in the elevator.  Blood all over. Heavy breathing.  Brains on your shoes. It’s JUST like that, I swear! You have to mash the left button of your mouse like a madman to kill off this scum as quickly as possible.

Oh and there’s masks!  That’s probably what brings me back and back and back to this game.  This game has a score system that grades your quickness, variety, and combo chain score.  Depending on your score you unlock more weapons and masks.  Masks give you extra abilities.  My favorite is the frog because it lets you chain combos for a longer period of time; some other good ones are the giraffe (allows you a longer peek around your surroundings), monkey (allows you to kill and steal guys in one motion), unicorn (your guns are silenced), and the elephant (allows you to take more than one hit).

This sounds fun, albeit a little boring right?  Well, not even half-way through the game they drastically change up things.  I don’t want to give away too much, but the way they set it up is you get comfortable doing the same thing, and WHAM it gets real.  I’m talking police raids.  I’m talking you’re seeing dead people.  I’m talking serial killers are killing peeps right in front of your face.  

 

Hotline reminds me of the amAAAzing movie, Drive - The contrast of dark characters on bright colors of the background.  Hotline Miami’s colors are very bright and vibrant.  They do a great job of making the colors slowly changing/flashing – it makes the whole experience feel more surreal.  The music is probably my second favorite part.  It feels like they drew a lot from Drive, and they make a soundtrack that could fit in that movie.  It’s all dark, ominous, electronic/pop.  I was really blown away how well the music fits, and gets your blood rushing. (Here’s the soundtrack! http://soundcloud.com/devolverdigital/sets/hotline-miami-official)

The final thing I want to touch on is the story.  It’s presented to you in this Pulp Fiction meets Drive.  Hotline begins with you walking into a pitch black room that slowly reveals three figures wearing masks (you actually earn all three of them in the game) talking to you; pretty much demanding why you are such a psychopath.  There are a lot of trippy parts to this game, but the way the story unfolds you want to eagerly uncover why you’re sent on these ‘cleanups’. 

This game is what's keeping me from celebrating America (Fuck yeah!) and Assassin's.  IT'S THAT GOOD.

Welcome to my Zombie Hype Train!

So this weekend has found me mainly worried about zombies. With the return of the Walking Dead, Halloween, and the release of the game: The War Z... How could I not spend my time worried about those clumsy man eaters? Let me begin with a brief review of the Walking Dead season premiere...

SPOILERS APLENTY AHEAD!!!!!!!!!!!

 

TURN BACK!!!!!

 

 

Still here? Ok cool. So Season 3 of the Walking Dead began with zero dialogue. It was a depressing intro where you can finally see the signs of the world Rick and the gang inhabits catching up with them. Rick looks grizzled and crazed while the rest of the group looks tired and frustrated. It makes sense with the way the last season ended. The episode was a bit slow paced on the story side of things, but was chock full of zombie killin'! The most exciting kills definitely came from the fights with the zombies in riot gear in the prison courtyard. With that being said I don't understand why they just didn't uppercut those guys with knives to begin with. So after fighting the riot boys they arrive inside of the prison. Things slow down again until one of the gang takes a bite to the leg and then has Rick cut it off in a pretty gruesome fashion. Finally, it ends with team Rick realizing they are not the only ones inside that hell hole of a prison. All in all, I believe it is setting up for an awesome season, even if the pacing of this episode was a bit slow. 

 

So what about Andrea and her new ninja buddy? Well I don't think we saw near enough of them. Apparently Andrea had a rough winter and is on the verge of dying from what may be pneumonia. Micchone (Ninja lady) on the other hand is still doing her thing. I really hope they go deep into her back story this season as it is very interesting and perfect for the TV adaptation. I can't wait for next week and the rest of a season that will be pretty dark (if the first episode is a precursor)

 

Now, let me talk to you about a game you probably have never heard about. It's called the War Z and I am pumped about it!!!! You get to create a survivor during a zombie apocalypse and scavenge, kill, steal and hunt your way to safety. You can build safehouses, take over buildings, kill other players for their stuff and live out your own zombie fantasy. There is a leaderboard that is based on how long you survive and it has PERMADEATH! Once your guy bites the dust that's it. You're dead. Start over. It makes you really pay attention to what you are doing and not screw around, especially if you broseph has been around for a while. I plan on reviewing the crap out of it once me and my cynical partner, P, rage on some wobbling corpses.

 

Anyway, it is nice to be back and see y'all Broskingtons later!