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 On 12/06/2016 at 12:46 AM by KnightDriver See More From This User » |
I got back into Netflix to watch an episode of the Skylanders Academy cartoon, watched highlights from The Game Awards on youtube, and played a heck load of Doom, all on my XBO. It all worked very seemlessly without crashes, slowdowns or other issues like what was the case on Xbox 360. Online multimedia on a console has finally been fully implemented. I'm happy about that. Now, on with the details.
I restarted my Netflix with a free month to watch episode one of Skylanders Academy. It was fine. It looks so much like the recent games. I didn't like the choice of voice actors for Stealth Elf and Spyro though. They seem like just generic teens: Spyro the ego maniac brah, and Stealth Elf the always sensible super girl. Boring. The story was fine though. They added a gross out Skylander character that's not a figure in the game. Probably 'cause kids like that sort of thing. He disappeared near the end of the episode, so I don't think he'll be a regular. Anyway, it's sort of neat to see the characters you've been playing in a game, in a tv show. I get a weird pleasure from it. I named all the characters I recognized in the background and called out all the locations I was familiar with in the game. Fun.
Then I watched highlights of The Game Awards on youtube. First trailers. Prey looked interesting with that goo gun. It's their version of Half-Life/Portal's gravity gun, I guess. It can do a variety of usefull things. Randy Pitchford appeared to talk about Duke Nukem being in the remastered Bulletstorm and showed a trailer. The audience didn't seem interested, but I was. Gameplay of Zelda: Breath of the Wild looked neat. I liked the fighting; seems not awkward and the camera is in the right place. I got all tingly with excitement watching the gameplay from Mass Effect Andromeda. Oh man, does that look fun.
The awards themselves were interesting. I can't believe Doom won for best action game. I mean, I love Doom but alongside Battlefield 1 and Titanfall 2? Doom is still more of a linear experience, kind of old school still. These more open world games seem a step above, especially Battlefield 1. Every clip I see from that game amazes me. I can't wait to try it. The director from That Dragon, Cancer gave a really moving speech. It was all I could do to keep the tears from falling. Good for Inside winning best art direction. There were a good bunch of indie games in the nominations, especially Firewatch. Nolan North gave a good speech emphasizing how games are a team effort. Several presenters and award winners said similar things.
Overall, this year's awards seemed better than they've ever been. I might watch the whole show live next year instead of just the highlights.
Well, after vids, I got back to Doom and finished every single collectible and challenge in the campaign. It took the whole day. There's only one campaign related achievement I have left and that's playing the first level on Ultra Nightmare mode. You don't have to beat the whole game on Ultra Violent to unlock it, it just unlocks about midway through the campaign, but you can only see it with a new save file. So you can't start it with your beefed up, mega hero from your first playthrough. Nope, you have to start with nothing and beat the first level with monsters that do a lot of damage - also, no checkpoints. I played it a few times without getting to the end of the first level. I'm really going to have to use a new strategy to get through it. I decided to put it aside for the time being and tried Arcade mode.
Arcade mode is the campaign levels but with special rules, scoring, and new items. You can play them on any difficulty level too. I played a few levels and, oh wow, what fun! You just tear through the levels and blast everything in sight, trying to pull off as many different sort of moves as you can. It made me think of Bulletstorm, actually. That whole game is like Doom's arcade mode. I didn't have much time to play more of it today, but clearly, this game will occupy me at least another weekend. I'm already looking forward to it.
That's a day. Bye!
I hate when you just have one achievement/trophy left that you want to get. In The Last Remnant I have two achievements left. One, I could get if I sinked enough more time into it. The last (worth 200 gamerscore) I will probably never get.
I watched the Game Awards live this year, and yeah, it seems better than I remember years ago.
I have so many games where I have just a few achievements left. There's always that one that's either hideously time consuming or just too darn hard to get. I like that XBO added a rarity stat to achievements. It makes me feel better about the ones I do get that are rare. I got a few of those today in Doom. One was worth 100 points. Upgrade all runes, I think it was.
I remember the game awards show being full of bad jokes mostly at the expense of gamers. Stuff that showed how self conscious they were of being off the mainstream of things. This one was pretty serious with lots of hearfelt speeches. Also, Michael Phelps presenting an award and saying how e-sports are as demanding as other sports. Bold.
Yeah, your right. Past Game Awards shows were very cringe worthy like that.
I also like the rarity achievements. A very nice addition to make achievements feel a little bit more special.
Diamonds and a special sound. Kind of nice.
You should try and watch a few more episodes of the Skylanders cartoon. They have an episode about the Imaginators, at least. The only problem I have with the show is Spyro's cocky attitude. He's Spyro, not Sonic. As far as CG video game cartoons go, though, this one's better than the last two I watched (Sonic Boom and Pac-Man and the Ghostly Adventures). There are a few funny jokes sprinkled around, too.
I didn't watch any Game Award things lately. I guess I didn't miss much, did I?
Right now I'm reviewing a Pinball FX2 pack called Bethesda Pinball, and one of the tables is based on the new Doom game.
I'll probably watch another one this weekend. I like seeing the other characters and trying to remember their names, and yes, Spyro's cockiness is super annoying. I really hated that. But I like the show in general.
There were some new trailers and gameplay shown. You should watch those.
Oh yea, I saw that Bethesda Pinball FX2 listed for like January. I have it on my list of games I want. Doom Pinball would be really cool.
The gunplay in Doom beats the competition with significant feedback and heft, there is more enemy variety, a satisfying weaopn upgrade system, non-Euclidian level layouts the likes of which we haven't seen much in modern game design. In terms of single player, BF1 was not competition at all. Titanfall 2 has a good campaign, but it comes with a lot of the limitations of the CoD style. All of them were effectively linear, but at least in Doom you had a lot of forks, levels that turned back on themselves, verticality.
However I am a big fan of Battlefield multiplayer in general, so it's somewhat of a draw. I give the edge to Doom because the action is more kinetic and agile, and because of the weapon suite, enemy variety, brutality, flow of encounters. The award is for Action Game, not map design. Old school FPS were less linear than modern FPS, btw. We don't see levels as expansive or labyrinthine as Hexen or Doom 1 these days.
Ok then. I haven't played the others. Just seems from the trailers that they'll full of variety. I agree with everything you say, though. Level design in Doom is very interesting and doesn't really feel too linear because each area twists and turns so much. The action in Doom is super fast and smooth. I feel like I'm doing a sport playing it. That's a good sign, I think.
I would get lost in original Doom all the time. I did that just a few months ago too.
You would mention Hexen. Probably my favorite from back in the 90s. I want a remake of that so bad now.
I got to get my hands on Doom. I think my little bro will really love it.
I didn't watch the game awards except for a few minutes. Awards shows dont really do it for me, even for stuff I like. I saw the guy who did That Dragon, Cancer was there though. I like that game, even though it's a little rough.
Doom finally made it into my top ten most played games this year. I wonder if it'll shoot all the way to number 2. It's not beating Minecraft this year. Nothing's gonna do that.
When I was looking for something to download on Netflix I saw that Skylanders Show. I didn't click on it because I never played the game but I did hope you were watching it. I didn't know there was a game awards show on YouTube. Who picked the games?
I'll watch another episode this weekend.
It was the Geof Kealey produced show. I think it used to be called Spike Video Game Awards. His method of choosing winners is discribed on the wiki page.
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