Mitch has written a total of 335,654 words on this site.

mitch@gamersushi.com Twitter: @mi7ch Gamertag: Lubeius PSN ID: Lubeius SteamID: Mister_L Origin/EA:Lube182 Currently Playing: PUBG, Rainbow 6: Siege, Assassin's Creed: Origins, Total War: Warhammer 2

Somebody Please Explain Frozen Synapse to Me

frozen synapse

On a whim yesterday, a friend and I purchased Frozen Synapse on Steam to ward off the gaming drought we currently find ourselves in. The game was 50% off and it even comes with a second free copy, so it seemed like a steal.

I had seen a couple video on the YouTubes explaining the basic concept of the game, but when I tried out the game proper, I was a little taken aback. For the uninformed, Frozen Synapse is a turn-based tactical game, sort of in the vein of the planning phase from the old Rainbow Six games. You tell your troops what to do, down to the direction they face and where they’ll run, and hope that your choices lead to victory.

While I do get the basic mechanics of the game, I’m a little unclear on the multiplayer aspects. Since the game came with a second free copy, I had thought that there would be an AI vs mode, or maybe a co-op campaign. Unfortunately, the game has neither of those, but at 50% off it was hard to pass up.

Since Frozen Synapse is sitting on my hard drive, I’m turning to you guys for advice. How do I get my money’s worth from Frozen Synapse? What modes would you recommend for anyone who’s been interested in this game? What are your thoughts on it? The game has been getting pretty good reviews, so I’d like to give it an honest try.

What’s in a Game: Knights of the Old Republic 2: The Sith Lords

knights of the old republic 2 the sith lordsOne of the greatest games of all time (or at least the past couple of generations) was Knights of the Old Republic, BioWare’s fantastic Star Wars RPG/love letter to the franchise. They carefully crafted an interpretation of the Star Wars universe but set the clock back about 3,500 years, long before Anakin Skywalker was immaculately conceived by the midi-chlorians.

Set after the terrible Mandalorian War and right in the middle of the Jedi Civil War (it’s Star Wars for a reason, folks), the game followed an amnesiac Republic solider as he fought against the Sith and discovered his dark heritage. The game’s twist ending knocked everyone’s sock’s off, including mine, but the sequel, Knights of the Old Republic 2: The Sith Lords, drew me in way more than the first game.

Starting with the coldest of opens, Knights 2 dropped you on an asteroid mining station where you plot your escape with the help of Kreia and Atton Rand, the former of which helps you reestablish your connection to the Force, having lost it during the Mandalorian War. This is a similar sort of opening to Knights of the Old Republic, but the game went a different direction from there. While not a bad game by any means, KotOR 2 wasn’t exactly lauded by critics and tarnished the first game’s sterling reputation, if you’re prone to hyperbole. Why do I love it so much, though?

Continue reading What’s in a Game: Knights of the Old Republic 2: The Sith Lords

Twelve Minutes of Arkham City Gameplay Goodness

Since it’s Canada Day up here in the Great White North, I’ll make this short and sweet. Developers Rocksteady have dropped twelve minutes of Batman: Arkham City gameplay on us, and I’ve embedded it below for your viewing pleasure. You’ll see Batman beating fools up, jumping on fools and tracking fools from the shadows. There’s also a snippet of Catwoman gameplay, so enjoy that as well.

What did you guys think? Is this looking like a worthy follow up to Arkham Asylum? Hit me up with those comments!

Crysis 2, Transformers 3, and Why Movies Resemble Video Games

transformers 3

Today I went and saw the latest Michael Bay robot-fest, Transformers: Dark of the Moon, in theaters and something struck me on the way back home: this movie reminded me of Crysis 2 to a great degree. An ancient alien threat, hectic ground-level combat and amazing visual effects? Given that most of the final hour of Transformers 3 is seen from the perspective of Special Forces soldiers rather than Autobots, my brain couldn’t get away from Crysis 2 and the image of hopping around lower Manhattan killing vaguely robotic aliens in the ruins of a famous city (even though TF3 takes place in Chicago).

Like most Michael Bay films, Transformers 3 is too long, bloated and full of forced, painful humor, but the actions scenes are top notch. Still, I couldn’t get it out of my head that I was watching someone play a video game. Video games have been trying to be like movies for years, but it occurred to me today that they might already be there, or at least have attained the level of Summer popcorn-flick. People complain about the Hollywood-ising of the industry, but we’re too late: every big action game is essentially a Bay movie with threadbare plots and engaging action.

I know that video games are hoping to move past this phase, but in a medium where it’s easier to give the player a gun and turn them loose, are we ever going to get past this stage? Crysis 2 was a pretty fun game, but given that a mindless movie like Transformers 3 can evoke it so heavily, it kind casts a dark shadow over the aspirations of many a development studio. Even games that we decree to be better than movies, like Uncharted 2 or Mass Effect 2, would ultimately fall flat on their face if they ever transition to the silver screen.

Past all my rambling thoughts regarding Transformers 3 and Crysis 2 lays a question for you guys: are video games becoming like movies or is it the other way around? As computer generated effects become cheaper and more believable, will we see more big set-piece films that try to wow our eyes instead of appealing to our brain? Will these movies become the Call of Duty of the film world, or are they already there? Am I just crazy? Go!

Double Fine, Trenched, and Owning the Downloadable Market

Sometimes the big tent-pole, triple-A title model doesn’t work, and a studio folds in on itself. This is a very common occurrence, and it’s rare that any given developer in this situation will regain their footing and continue making games. Thankfully, Double Fine, creators of Psychonauts, managed to dig themselves out of the Brutal Legend hole and converted their business model to making smaller, less financially risky downloadable games. This meant they were free to experiment with different genres and flex their witty writing muscles without subjecting themselves to the sometimes cruel whims of the video game playing masses.

Starting off with Costume Quest and leading into Stacking and Trenched (which I’ll get to in a moment), Double Fine has proven that they know how to make great games, and they’ve finally found themselves an audience that is receptive to their hard work. I did miss out on Costume Quest and Stacking (though I have heard they’re excellent) but I decided to check out Trenched, a mech combat/tower defense game, because those two play-styles mashed together sounds like a hell of a good time and it has co-op, which is always a plus in my books.
Continue reading Double Fine, Trenched, and Owning the Downloadable Market

Mitch Reminisces About Star Wars Galaxies

star wars galaxies shut down

One of the most important games of my youth was Star Wars Galaxies (when I say youth, I mean late teens, but stay with me), an MMO set in that galaxy far, far away. Produced by LucasArts and helmed by Sony Online Entertainment, the game originally started as a huge, unwieldy MMO where players could choose to become one of thirty-three (!) professions, combining the features of lower-tier classes to reach hybrid professions like Bounty Hunter or Bio-Engineer.

Besides having a class progression system from hell that was completely skewed (if you didn’t play as a close-combat character you were doing it wrong), Galaxies was unique in that it allowed players to set up their own towns on one of the game’s many planets, establishing new cities away from ones that might be recognizable to Star Wars fans like Coronet or Mos Eisley. This was one of the cooler aspects of the game to me, one that allowed me and my friends and guild-mates to set up huge player-run cities complete with a guildhall and all other sorts of interesting buildings, like faction specific bunkers.

When it originally launched, Galaxies was notorious for being fairly buggy and even several years into the game’s lifespan, this continued to be the case. My friend (GamerSushi user The Nage) and I glitched our way through several of the game’s dungeons, running a two-man team on instances that were supposed to take upwards of ten people to complete. We completed the Corellian Corvette missions by activating specific consoles while we were dead, or running across electrified floors before the game realized what we were doing.

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Saint’s Row: The Third Trailer Shows You the Business

If you tuned into the awesome season-ender E3 2011 wrap up podcast, you heard us wax philosophic about Saint’s Row: The Third and the changes it’s making coming into its latest iteration. Besides the improved graphical look and the unique visual style, the craziness has been jacked up another notch, which might seem impossible to players of the second game. The team at Volition are giving it their all though. The walkthrough for Saint’s Row: The Third that I’ve embedded below shows the gameplay that was touted at E3.

We’re going to try not to go too crazy with the trailers in the post-E3 news slump, but it’s nice being able to watch these things without the background noise that a convention tends to bring. What’s your opinion on the gameplay of Saint’s Row: The Third? Does it look like it’s up your ally? Is this one of your must haves for this Fall? Go!

Valve Treats Us With Meet the Medic and Free Team Fortress 2

Valve certainly is doing everything they can to make up for a lack of Half-Life 3, now aren’t they? After dropping Portal 2 on us earlier this year, they’ve turned their attention towards their other critically-acclaimed darling: Team Fortress 2. With this week’s Uber Update promising tons of content and a new Meet the Team video to boot, Valve also announced today that Team Fortress 2 will be free forever. Now isn’t that quite the how-do-you-do? As you might except, Meet the Medic is filled with blood and guts, albeit in that Team Fortress style, so use discretion if necessary.

Not my favorite Meet the Team video so far, but the Sniper and Spy trailers would be hard to top. So there it is, more loving from Valve to all of us. Apparently there’s some discontent out there concerning Team Fortress 2’s new price tag, but this game has been around since 2007; chances are, you’ve gotten your money’s worth by now. What do you guys think of the new trailer and Team Fortress 2’s low, low price?

L.A. Noire Heading to PCs Everywhere this Fall

bro game reviews la noire

Friends, PC gamers, countrymen, lend me your ears: Team Bondi’s critically acclaimed 1940’s crime solving game L.A. Noire is hitting the PC this fall. In a recent post on the Rockstar Newswire, the company confirmed that they have heard the cries of their PC faithful, who have rightly felt a little left out after not seeing a version of Red Dead Redemption on their platform of choice last year.

While no exact release date was confirmed in the post itself, I’m going to go ahead and guess it will come out in November, along with about ninety percent of the other games this fall. The game will feature support for the mouse and keyboard setup along with the option to use a controller, and it will be able to run 3D if your rig is set up that way.

So there you have it, PC gamers, Rockstar does care about you after all. L.A. Noire was a favorite around the GamerSushi offices (or it would be if such a place existed), so I’m glad that everyone who missed out on playing it over the summer will get a chance to do so later this year. Hopefully you didn’t listen to our spoiler cast too intently, although due to some people (*cough* Jeff and Anthony *cough*) not finishing the Homicide desk, it was pretty light on the reveals.

Now that you know that L.A. Noire is coming to the PC, what say you? Are you going to be picking it up? How do you think the game’s mechanics will blend in with the PC control scheme? Does this give you hope for future Rockstar games?

Source – Rockstar Newswire

Gears of War 3 Horde 2.0 Walkthrough Drops the Facts

One of the great surprises of E3 2011 was the reveal of Horde 2.0 in Gears of War 3. With all the improvements made to the multiplayer, it shouldn’t have caught us off guard that Epic would be turning their loving eyes to Horde mode as well, but this really came out of left field. Taking away from player data from Gears of War 2, Horde 2.0 features a whole host of usability improvements seen in the multiplayer of Gears 3 (like enemy tagging and the tactical overlay) and adds the ability to use an area as a base and fortify it with static defenses, turrets and the fearsome Silverback mech suit. There’s a new Horde 2.0 walkthrough narrated by Nan McNamara, the voice actor for Anya Stroud, and I’ve embedded it below.

Much like Halo: Reach last year, Gears of War 3 might dominate our lives when it hits on September 20. I have my copy pre-ordered and paid for, and I can’t wait to tuck into this triple threat title. We may have to have a GamerSushi Game Night for this when it comes out (non-Xbox readers, don’t worry, we might have something in the works…). What do you guys think of the new improvements to Horde?

What Are You Playing: It’s Too Damn Hot Outside Edition

la-noire-nicholson-electroplating-screen

Salutations, faithful readers, it is I, your humble Canadian, back for another round of What Are You Playing. If you’re new to this recurring post, the basic set-up is pretty simple: I ask you what video games you’re playing, and you answer. It doesn’t have to exactly be video games per se; if you want to launch into a (spoiler-free as I haven’t seen the show yet, and people may not have read the books) discussion about the season finale of Game of Thrones, feel free to do so. It’s an open forum, but we’d love to get your thoughts on some current games, and maybe some oldies too.

For me, I spent the morning playing Nicholson Electroplating, the new Arson case for L.A. Noire. I bought the Rockstar Pass when it was on sale a while back, so I got all the DLC for the game for a reasonable price. Nicholson Electroplating is a very action-intensive case and the investigative aspects are relatively slim, but it’s a solid addition overall. It also got me that much closer to rounding out the achievements for L.A. Noire, so that’s always good. Besides that I’ve been finishing off my Evil karma run-through of inFAMOUS 2 and getting back into Halo: Reach in preparation for this year’s Bungie Day. A friend of mine also picked up The Witcher 2 on Steam, so I’m going to log into his account and play it when I have a moment. I’m also trying to desperately bring myself up to a respectable level on StarCraft 2 so I don’t embarrass myself. It’s hard though, but I’m working on my three barracks build.

That’s probably enough out of me, so what about you guys? Has anyone tried Nicholson Electroplating, and what did you think? Opinions of the L.A. Noire DLC overall would be good too. Anything else that you’re playing? Let us know!

Prioritizing the Remaining Video Games of 2011

batman arkham city

I won’t lie to you, GamerSushians, I’m a little worried about the rest of the year. I’ve been managing to squeeze in every big title so far this year, but I think I’m going to lose track of everything come September. Gears of War 3 is already pre-ordered, as is Battlefield 3. Beyond that, though, things get a little out of control.

With three games that I want to get coming in one day, and a couple more must haves before that, I’m going to have to start making cuts. First on the chopping block is Batman: Arkham City. I really enjoyed the first game, but I don’t think that the second is going to draw me in; I’m just doubtful that Arkham City will give me a different experience than I had with Arkham Asylum. Don’t worry, I’m also passing on Modern Warfare 3 so you can’t give me flack for that.

What about you guys? Which titles are you passing up this year, if any? Why are you giving them up for different games?

Ezio Started the Fire in This Assassin’s Creed: Revelations Trailer

As GamerSushi’s one-man Assassin’s Creed Defense Force, it’s my job to pump up the jam about UbiSoft’s latest historical adventure game. Assassin’s Creed: Revelations is the third game starring everyone’s favorite Florentian noble man Ezio Auditore and is set to conclude his story in a grand fashion. UbiSoft originally showed off this bit of gameplay during their E3 press conference, but they’ve just release it with developer commentary, albeit sadly lacking any Mr. Caffeine. So, without any further ado: doodly-doodly-doop!

This is Assassin’s Creed with executive producer Michael Bay, it would seem. It’s still looking great, though, and it’s nice to know that Ezio is still as spry as he ever was. What do you guys think about the new trailer? Will this finally put an end to Ezio’s story? Are you as excited as I am that we can finally assassinate people from Eagle Vision?

Review: inFAMOUS 2

infamous 2 review

The original inFAMOUS was a nice surprise back in 2009, a new IP in a market crowded with sequels and reboots. The game cast you as Cole MacGrath, a young bike courier who gains electrical superpowers after being caught in the middle of a large explosion that leaves him as the only survivor. inFAMOUS combined open-world aspects with a touch of RPG progression, awesome super-powers and threw it all together with a fun method of travel and a moral compass that you influenced through your actions.

As enjoyable as the game was it did have a few flaws, most notably its very binary karma system, but it was a refreshing, fun game that we don’t get a lot of these days. Hopping around Empire City blasting lightning at bad guys and helping or hindering the common folk (depending on your alignment) was so engaging that I had no trouble playing through twice to see the good and bad outcomes of the game. Two years later, Sucker Punch Productions is bringing Cole back, sending him down south to New Marais in order to gain new super powers in order to fight The Beast, an apocalyptical enemy mentioned at the end of the first game. Does inFAMOUS 2 pull of an “Uncharted 2” leap in quality, or does the game fizzle out?
Continue reading Review: inFAMOUS 2

What do You Want From Sony and Microsoft’s Next Gen Systems?

xbox 720 rumor

Hot on the heels of Nintendo’s Wii U announcement at E3 2011, Videogamer.com is reporting that a “high-ranking industry source” at Crytek has leaked the news that Microsoft will announce their Xbox 360 successor next year at E3.

Whether or not the source can be trusted (every rumor comes from a “high-ranking person” these days) we can’t deny that Sony and Microsoft are finally turning their eyes towards the future, perhaps even more so now that Nintendo beat them to the punch. Speculating on whether or not this is a real leak is probably a waste of time; it’s more likely than not that this is just an attempt to get some hits. What’s more fun and productive is guessing what Microsoft and Sony’s next gen consoles will be like.

The Xbox 720 and the PlayStation 4 (or whatever they end up calling them) will no doubt feature beefed up graphical capabilities, but how far will they go? The article sates that Microsoft will include DirectX 11 in the new system, which seems pretty reasonable to me, considering how far along technologically we’ve come since the Xbox 360’s launch. What about Sony, though? What problems from this generation do you want them to fix? Sound off!

Source – Videogamer.com

Battlefield 3 and the DLC Backlash (Updated)

battlefield 3 physical warfare pack boycottAs I’m sure you’re well aware, given my constant posting of anything slightly related to this game over the past few months, Battlefield 3 is coming out later this year setting its sights on taking the FPS crown away from Call of Duty. As is the norm with games these days, a bit of pre-order DLC was offered in the form of the Back to Karkand expansion pack which gives early purchasers access to the map pack on day one, whereas late adopters will have to wait and buy it at a later date.

While this did cause some outcry, the Back to Karkand controversy pales in comparison to the furor that has cropped up around the Physical Warfare Pack. This add-on is only availble in the UK through GAME and Gamestation stores and features items that will not be obtainable in the retail game. Naturally, fans of the game are quite incensed and a boycott has already been arranged on Reddit, calling for EA and DICE to remove this pre-order incentive from the game.
Continue reading Battlefield 3 and the DLC Backlash (Updated)

Are We Seeing Too Many Shooters?

ghost recon future soldier

One of the weird trends that I noticed during E3 2011 was the overall disdain for the mass amount of shooters that were on display. It didn’t really crop up until UbiSoft’s press conference, but once Ghost Recon and FarCry 3 came on the stage I noticed that most gaming journalists on Twitter started adopting a “oh, great, another shooter” attitude.

Sure, a lot of games these days do involve guns, but it’s been like that for the past few years and it seems odd that this is the year that people start ranting about it, especially considering that the quality of the shooters were pretty decent. I suppose that if you spend everyday writing previews and reviews and whatever else on shooter games it gets a little stale after a while, but consumers play them just as much if not more. The difference there is that game journalists have a venue for their output where people get to read that stuff.

In light of that, I thought I’d open up a little discussion for you guys to sound off on this topic: are we seeing too many shooters these days? I know that we’ve touched on a similar issue before, but this is the year that sort of seemed to tip things over the edge. What do you think? Are we inundated with too many shooters? Why do you think that is this the most prevalent style of game? Sound off!

GamerSushi Asks: What Was Your Game of Show for E3 2011?

battlefield 3 e3 2011 game of show

This is kind of a tricky GamerSushi Asks, what with all the quality showings from many publishers and developers, but I feel that we can get an interesting discussion going around this one. Now that E3 2011 is behind us, we can gaze back fondly at the at the games and scoff at the terrible press conferences and Mr. Caffeine.

Since we’ve seen everything that the industry’s biggest trade show had to offer, we’re going to open this up and ask you guys what your Game of Show was for E3 2011. There’s so many strong contenders from the shooters to the RPGs and the sandbox/adventure games that it might be hard to choose just one.

So what are you leaning towards? Personally, I’m thinking Battlefield 3 with Skyrim, Saint’s Row: The Third and Gears of War 3 coming in close behind. It was really hard to choose, but the tank video impressed the hell out of me and the multiplayer sounds super tight with lots of new improvements. I also know that at least one of you lucky devils made the trek out to L.A., so maybe there’s something we all missed that we should pay more attention to going forward? Hit me up in the comments, son!

Star Wars: The Old Republic Has an Amazing Opening Cinematic

I know that I’ve been quite vocal in my condemnation of Star Wars: The Old Republic’s hype train and its constant parade of pre-rendered trailers and no solid release date. After three consecutive E3s of all show and no tell, I was starting to get a little ticked off at the constant stringing along that TOR is pulling. Of course, being a gamer, I am a fickle creature and the recently released opening cinematic for The Old Republic is nothing short of mind-blowing. It’s seriously everything I love about Star Wars, condensed into six minutes.

I’m looking forward to watching this video again when I boot up the game, whenever that is. Lucas Licensing should just contract Blur to make a Star Wars movie with BioWare as the writing staff, because every trailer they’ve made have been better than the games they’ve been associated with (case in point: Force Unleashed 2). What do you guys think of the opening cinematic for The Old Republic? Was this sick, or what?

Nintendo E3 2011 Presser Breakdown

nintendoNintendo came late to the party this year, holding their press conference this morning as opposed to following tradition and doing it on Monday. With rumors abound about Project Cafe and lots of buzz around the 3DS, Nintendo was poised this year to once again steal the E3 crown. Did they succeed?

Details about their presser are after the jump!
Continue reading Nintendo E3 2011 Presser Breakdown