PC Game Review: Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon

FAR CRY 3: BLOOD DRAGON
Platform: PC (UPlay)
Released: 2013
Genre: First Person Shooter
Developer: Ubisoft Montreal
Publisher: Ubisoft
Buy on Steam


How can you go wrong with a version of Far Cry 3 featuring a cyborg Michael Biehn fighting a horde of giant neon-glowing Blood Dragons spewing lazers out of their eyes and an army of cyborgs who all sound like Microsoft SAM on crack while wielding futuristic-looking weapons and a flamethrower in a landscape filled with neon colours to the thumping awesome beat of one of the best retro 80's soundtracks ever heard in a video game?
Short answer: You can't. Long answer: Look below.

From what I understand, Blood Dragon started out as somewhat of an April fools joke. Far Cry 3 done as a retro-futuristic shooter influenced by 80's sci-fi thrillers and action movies. However, at some point, somebody probably thought this idea was way too good to waste on an April fools so they went ahead and made it. The game was thought to be a DLC for Far Cry 3 but instead was made into a standalone game that does not require Far Cry 3 to install and run, which is a good thing as in many aspects, I vastly prefer Blood Dragon to Far Cry 3, even if the latter has a longer campaign and multiplayer. The game features the voice talent of famous action star Michael Biehn (Terminator, Aliens, The Abyss, Navy Seals) who does his best Snake Plissken voice, of course sounding endlessly badass. It really feels like he was always meant to be in a video game and this is further proof for it, and hopefully he will be more remembered for this role than his reprised role as Hicks in Aliens: Colonial Marines.

In an 80's dystopian version of 2007, where the world is suffering from the aftermath of a nuclear war between the United States and Russia,  Biehn portrays sergeant Rex Power Colt, a Mark IV cyber commando sent on a mission to investigate an island where colonel Sloan, an elite agent, has gone rogue. Confronting the colonel, it turns out that Sloan wants to take over the world (of COURSE) using the lazer-firing blood dragons as his weapons, from which he has taken blood and injected himself with it, giving him extraordinary cyber powers.
The story is pretty straight forward and never gets in the way of the gameplay, and is quite enjoyably cheesy, with all kinds of 80's clichés, such as a training montage and the cutscenes are portrayed in a wonderfully done 16bit style, similar to games you'd see in arcades or on the Sega Mega Drive back in the late 80's/early 90's.

IMMA FIRIN MAH LAZOOOOR!

Gameplay wise, Blood Dragon is near identical to Far Cry 3, but with its own twist on the game. Instead of choosing which powers you want to unlock, they are pretty much unlocked for you every time you level up, giving you time to focus on the game and making it a more streamlined experience. Tutorials are always popping up (to Rex' annoyance) to give you information about your skills and weapons, with the occasional PSA popping up to humorous effect. Also, due to Rex Colt being a cyber commando, he has no limited sprint and there is virtually no falling damage at all (which is used to great effect in a memorable scene in the game). This makes Blood Dragon a much more fun and enjoyable experience than the original Far Cry 3 in a lot of respects, since it's faster paced and you only need to worry about dying from getting your stupid ass shot instead of falling off a cliff. The controls are also identical to Far Cry 3 and if you've played pretty much any first person shooter or something like Crysis before, you'll most likely slip right into them.

The world map is notably smaller than in Far Cry 3, and Blood Dragon is indeed a much more bite-sized experience, and the gameplay elements remain mostly the same. You'll spend the majority of the game liberating Garrisons, slaying enemies and animals for XP and other bonuses, and doing side missions to unlock new weapon upgrades. There are however some interesting twists to Blood Dragon as the eponymous blood dragons are some of the most terrifying enemies I've ever faced in a game as they can kill you easily with their lazer blasts. Thankfully, they are near blind and moving slowly near them you can often avoid them, and they have an affinity for the hearts you rip out of the enemy cyborgs, so throwing them to distract them often works well. There are other minor additions but I'm sure you'll find those out on your own. The campaign itself is rather short and solves itself quickly. I played through the game in less than 2-3 days while I can usually spend a week or so on a game, though if you do every side mission and try to max yourself out, it will take a while for you.

Takin' down da choppa!

The graphics are gorgeous in Blood Dragon, everything is more or less oozing (sometimes literally) with a neon retro futuristic 80's influenced style that doesn't really remind me of anything from the 80's but still has that style to it. There's a lot of glowing lights used and it's really a feast for the eyes. Textures are pretty good and I especially like the details on Rex' arm. The music and sounds match the visuals perfectly as the soundtrack, composed by Power Glove, is a retro synthfest that perfectly captures the dystopian sci-fi 80's cyberpunk feel of the game. The main theme is extremely catchy and I found myself humming it long after playing the game. Thankfully the version I bought came with a soundtrack CD and I've already put the music on my mp3 player as I just can't get enough of it. It really is one of my favourite soundtracks this year, if not THE favourite soundtrack!

Those dam puns...

So all in all, is Blood Dragon worth the money? Gods yes, this is by far my favourite game this year. It has an amazing style that a lot of people have compared to Duke Nukem Forever and I have to agree, it's probably why the game appeals so much to me. There's just nothing like playing a character like Rex Colt that really makes you feel like a superhuman and gives you the ability to just have fun with a game instead of limiting you like a lot of modern games tend to do. The game also never takes itself too seriously, there's a loose humorous tone to it and I'm sure anyone who grew up in the 90's and 80's are going to love this game. It's a shame the game feels way too short and there is no multiplayer as I would've loved to play this co-op with a friend and it seems like there would be opportunities for it at times. I also had slight performance issues on my PC though that could just be my PC. Otherwise, this game is a must-have for fans of shooters and 80's retro futurism, and I highly recommend it!

SUMMARY
Gameplay: 8/10
Graphics: 9/10
Sound: 10/10

Average Score: 9/10

- Alyxx

Top 10 Worst Sequels

Sometimes when a franchise goes on for long enough, there's usually an eventual sequel that just doesn't live up to the franchise standards, or in worst case utterly destroys a franchise. Since we've looked at the top 10 best sequels, it is now time to deal with the worst, the ones that failed in my opinion. Here are some of my least favourite sequels. Keep in mind these are not necessarily bad games (with a few exceptions) but just failed to deliver a good sequel that could live up to the predecessor.


And no, I refuse to put Duke Nukem Forever on this list for 3 reasons:
1. I had fun with it
2. It actually felt like a sequel to Duke 3D, carrying over everything I loved about it
3. This is my list and I can put whatever I want on it.

10. Quake 2

When you compare Quake 2 to the original Quake, it's really hard to see it as a true sequel. Let's be honest, Quake 1 didn't have much of a story but it did have a setting, taking a lot of inspiration from HP Lovecraft and creating probably id's darkest horror setting to this date. The manual taunts you that the final boss will be Quake himself, and that Quake might just be a codename. Who knows, maybe it's one of the elder gods himself! However instead of fighting him, the final boss is just a giant slimy bitch who gives birth to the monsters you've fought and you kill her, leaving the real enemy still out there. The game didn't feel like it had any real closure and not even the mission packs helped add any to it. I was looking forward to beating Quake's ass in the sequel, Quake 2. So I put it in and what do I see? AN ENTIRELY DIFFERENT GAME ALTOGETHER!!! While Doom 2 might have felt a tad bit too similar to Doom 1, Quake 2 has the polar opposite problem, it's way too different from Quake to even REMOTELY be considered a sequel! The name Quake 2 is incredibly misleading in this regard and from what I understand, originally it was supposed to be a new IP and they just, well, couldn't find a name that wasn't licensed and stuck with Quake 2. While I'll admit Quake 2 isn't a bad game, and it's a hell of a lot of fun, especially in multiplayer, it's impossible to see it as a good sequel. And for that, it deserves a place on this list.

9. Fallout 3

While Fallout 3 isn't a bad game per se, it's simply too average and too tame to feel like a good sequel to Fallout 2, one of the most over the top and out there RPG's I've ever played. For crying out loud, I became a pornstar and fucked a guy to the point where he exploded! There was so much fun to be had in Fallout 2, the guns felt immensely satisfying, and you could turn on bloody mess from the beginning! It was an amazing game and how do Bethesda follow it up? They make a dumbed down semi FPS RPG that doesn't even bother finding a new setting, just badly ripping off the setting in the first game, throwing in a bland uninteresting story of "bad guys" vs "good guys" and leaves little to no room for actual roleplaying. That and the graphics haven't at all aged well. With mods, the game is slightly more tolerable but no mods can make the core experience any less disappointing. Overall I was really disappointed in Fallout 3 as it had so much potential to be a great RPG but they threw it out the window for one of the most overrated games this generation.

8. Deus Ex: Invisible War 

Again, in of itself, Invisible War is not a BAD game, it's just way too simplified and dumbed down when compared to the original Deus Ex. The story is also a bit all over the place and in some weird way makes all 3 of the different Deus Ex endings canonical. It's hard to explain how they did it but it sure left me a bit confused. As a shooter it works just fine and you can have a lot of fun being an asshole who just shoots everyone, but I wouldn't recommend this if you want an experience like the first Deus Ex gave you.


7. Bubsy 3D

Now, it's not like the first two Bubsy games were any kind of masterpieces so it's kinda weird that this game got made in the first place. While I'll admit Bubsy 1 and 2 had their charm on SNES and Mega Drive, there is no charm to be found in this game. Just look at the above screenshot and tell me if you can believe it's a PS1 game. Yeah, looks more like an early 90's experimental ALPHA of a game, doesn't it? It controls bad, it has zero to no redeeming values, the graphics are atrocious and it's hard to believe Accolade even released this game in such a state back then.


6. Ultima IX

To call Ultima IX anything but a giant middle finger to the fans of the Ultima series and anyone who actually cared about the characters and storyline in the games, considering it has so many inconsistencies and just outright WRONG things about it that makes it immensely out of canon with any of the other games, would be to lie. Not only that but to get this game working on any modern PC requires so many patches that it's just not worth the hassle. It's easily one of the worst games EA have ever published and makes Mass Effect 3 seem like a masterpiece in comparison.


5. Diablo 3
 
One thing is to release a sequel to one of most popular hack'n'slash RPG's of all time, Diablo 2, and stuff it with needless MMO elements and microtransactions. Another is to force you to be always online, even for the single player, and then having your servers rendering players unable to sign in. On top of that, Blizzard have treated the players like crap if they complained about this game and some have even lost the chance to even play it. It's one of the most notorious examples of forced online DRM in recent memory and should be setting an example no other companies should follow. I would much rather play any of the two Torchlight games since they are actually made by the people who worked on Diablo 1 and 2.


4. Metroid: Other M

While the gameplay in Other M is pretty good, it is very hard to ignore the bland emotionless voice acting from the heroine herself, Samus. Expected to be the game where we would finally see her express herself and find out more about her, instead we are treated to one of the worst acting performances ever in game history. The other characters don't do a better job either and the story is pretty bad to add to the pain of it. Other M is easily one of the worst sequels in history due to its utter failure to deliver upon its promises.


3. Banjo Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts

The Banjo Kazooie games are some of the most revered on the N64. While I am absolutely not a fan of them myself I can see how Nuts & Bolts utterly failed as a sequel. Originally meant to be the long awaited sequel Banjo Threeie, Nuts & Bolts instead tries to combine building cars and riding such cars with the platforming of Banjo Kazooie. Who thought this was a good idea? Microsoft sure did...


2.Tomb Raider: Angel of Darkness

Supposed to be a reboot of the entire franchise, Angel of Darkness failed to deliver on pretty much everything. Forcing in RPG elements that didn't need to be there and just all around having terrible controls and gameplay compared to earlier titles, Angel of Darkness stands as the worst entry in this legendary franchise. The only saving grace is that Lara looks damn good in this game as usual, but not even she can save the disastrous gameplay.


1. Dreamfall: The Longest Journey

It's hard for me to talk about Dreamfall because I loved The Longest Journey so much. I had really high hopes for the sequel and it seemed to be such a wonderful game when I saw the initial trailers. The graphics were breath taking and I had all these expectations. Well, Dreamfall made sure to quickly blow all my expectations out of the water... The game is loaded to the brim with inconsistencies that made me wanna throw the game out the window, the characters had incredibly bland voice actors, the story was atrocious and characters from the first game were used with little to no understanding for their deeper desires and what drove them in the first game. April Ryan had turned from an optimistic charming girl into a passive emo bitch who didn't care about anything! I wanted to just slap her so hard she'd start giving a fuck! Charlie, for some reason, was running the Fringe café, EVEN IF HE STATED IN THE FIRST GAME IT WASN'T A GODDAMN FULLTIME JOB AND JUST SO HE COULD GET OUT OF THAT PLACE! Emma claimed she believed April in the first game WHEN SHE CONSTANTLY QUESTIONED HER SANITY AND APRIL BARELY EVEN MENTIONED IT TO THEM! Charlie claimed to be skeptical when he ALWAYS BELIEVED APRIL! Also, what the HELL was up with that Ring girl? Why even throw all those references in there? Seriously, this game is one of the worst sequels I've ever played and to this day the ONLY game in my collection I actually sold. It makes me physically ill talking about this game, makes me on the verge of crying, because this game DESTROYED any hopes I had for The Longest Journey to become a franchise. It was such a horrible sequel that it just utterly VAPORIZED the franchise. Now Ragnar Tørnquist wants to make an episodic sequel called Dreamfall Chapters but I think it's safe to say he lost me with Dreamfall for good...

- Alyxx

Top 10 Best Sequels

Top 10 Best Sequels
by Alyxx

When an IP becomes a hit, usually that means a sequel. Both in the movie business and gaming world, sequels can either make or break a franchise and here we're going to look at 10 of my personal favourites.

10. 
It takes a lot to improve on a game like Mass Effect, and in some ways, I still prefer Mass Effect since I see Mass Effect 2 as less of a RPG and more as an action/adventure game. However, as a sequel, Mass Effect 2 does improve on Mass Effect 1 in a lot of ways as well as continuing the story in a nifty way. The cover system is improved, you now have ammunition to worry about which gives you more reason to use multiple weapons instead of sticking to one weapon constantly since you had basically unlimited ammo in ME1, graphics are much improved as well, conversations feel more alive and overall, the game feels better and controls more fluidly. While Mass Effect 3 is also a stellar title, I still think Mass Effect 2 is slightly better.


9. 
How do you make a sequel to Doom? Easy, you give people more Doom! Doom 2 is essentially a retail expansion to Doom as the improvements are extremely subtle and it's really similar to Doom in most ways. However this is not necessarily a bad thing and the level designs feel better, the new double barelled shotgun is a kickass addition and the new enemies pack a punch too. A classic shooter made more classic! And John Romero is the final boss...


8. 
Speaking of classics, do you remember Duke Nukem 1? No? How about Duke Nukem 2? Not that either huh? Well... what about Duke Nukem 3D? I'm sure you have because Duke 3D is one of those sequels that was so good that it pretty much put the earlier titles to shame, something that is not easy to do mind you. While it's technically a remake of the first game with a new storyline and enemies, it's a great sequel as well and in my opinion one of the best shooters of all time. This is the game where Duke got his attitude, his one-liners, and his legendary status among gamers. Hell, it's so good that even today, people are still making mods for it.


7. 
Borderlands 2 is yet another example of a perfect sequel. It removes the annoying elements from the first game and improves on the rest. The story is better, the characters are more memorable, the guns are better, the loot is better. Overall, Borderlands 2 is actually so good that it retroactively makes the first game better as well since it makes you care more about the story and characters in it! That's not easy to pull off, mind you! It also has one of the best villains of all time, and teaches us the age old lesson that in order to care about your enemy, you have to know him, and Jack's constant teasing throughout the game and messing with you and your friends really makes you want to see him pay in the end, and the ending of this game is a thousand times more satisfying than the one from the first game.


6. 
It's sort of a hard task making a sequel to Tomb Raider. After all, the first game was such a stellar success that it would be hard to pull off in no shorter than a year after it. While Tomb Raider 2 is technically similar to the first game, a lot of it updated and it does feel better to play as well as having a more interesting story. It also has some of the most memorable levels from the entire franchise, including the sunken Maria Doria ship which is one enormous level that feels like it has a story to tell and first time playing this game, exploring everything was a wonderful feeling. It truly is a magnificent sequel and highly recommended to all action/adventure fans.


5. 
Making a Call of Duty sequel these days must be a task of pretty much colossal proportions. The franchise is the highest selling in gaming history and Treyarch had a lot on their shoulders when making this game. I was glad to see that Black Ops 2 is easily the best Call of Duty made and I can see myself playing it for years ahead. It also helps that it's the most PC friendly CoD I've played and they've really went that extra mile to make it inviting to new players as well. Everything about it is an improvement over any previous titles and I am happy to call myself a Call of Duty fan because of this game.


4. 
We all know the reason people got a Nintendo back in the 80's. Mario. The first Super Mario game was an amazing success that proved to people what games were capable of and Super Mario Bros. 2 also was a great game, even if it was a reskinned Doki Doki Panic. But Super Mario Bros. 3 is one of the sequels that just outclasses both of them. It is easily considered one of the best games of all time, if not one of the best NES games of all time. The amount of detail, passion and just outright fun put into this game is mindboggling from an 8bit console and it stands as one of the best titles Nintendo has ever produced, and also one of the most challenging.


3. 
Let's face it, the first Mega Man game wasn't really impressive. The difficulty was way too high even if the graphics and music was pretty good. However, Mega Man 2 improves on pretty much everything, delivering an experience that surpassed the original by lightyears. The music is arguably the most memorable on the NES, up there with titles like Zelda, Metroid and Super Mario, and it's just all around the best Mega Man game in the series for me.


2. 
Where Mario was the reason most people got a Nintendo, Sonic was the mascot for Sega and while the first Sonic game was a big reason most people got a Mega Drive, Sonic the Hedgehog 2 arguably is more memorable as it introduced multiplayer with the cute foxy sidekick Tails. Still keeping up the level design which centered around high speed as well as intricate platforming, Sonic 2 delivered more of the great stuff from the first game, but with a ton of more fun to it. Also helped that Michael Jackson was involved with the music...


1. 
While some may argue that Super Metroid is the best 2D Metroid, my personal favourite will always be Fusion. Not only does it have more of a story to it, it's also more streamlined and easier to play for me at least. The music is great, the sound effects are incredibly atmospheric and it's the only 2D Metroid that comes close to really making me feel frightened. Whenever the SA-X comes walking, my skin crawls for real and I get goosebumps, especially when playing with headphones on. It's easily the best GBA game I know and the best Metroid sequel in my opinion.

PC Game Review: Tomb Raider (2013)

TOMB RAIDER
Platform: PC (Steam)
Released: 2013
Genre: Action/Adventure
Developer: Crystal Dynamics
Publisher: Square Enix
Buy on Steam

Tomb Raider definitely has a special place in my heart. I grew up with the Tomb Raider games on PC and Lara has always been a bit of an idol for me and an inspiration to follow my dreams and do what I want and not letting anything get in my way. The Tomb Raider games, from 1 to Chronicles, all share the same excellent gameplay that in a great way blended action with adventure and to this day they remain some of my favourite games. And while Angel of Darkness was an indisputable failure, TR Legend and onward all felt like great Tomb Raider games. However, for Lara's new adventure, she is reborn from scratch, given an entirely new look and personality. Square Enix has taken the chance to make a proper Tomb Raider reboot, giving her an origin story where she transforms from a shy bookworm into the bad ass adventuress that she is known to be. What they did was create probably the best Tomb Raider game yet and something entirely different from what fans of the series have come to expect. So naturally, going into this game with any expectations would not be doing it justice. You'll simply have to take it for what it is, and what it is, is one of the most gripping origin stories I've played recently.

Lara acts and looks a lot more natural than ever in Tomb Raider 2013.

One of Tomb Raider's strengths is that of storytelling. Trapped on an island with her friends and no way to get away, Lara has to learn to survive in a harsh environment and she is more than often forced into bad situations she has to escape, and you can see these situations all affecting her, toughening her more and more as she goes along. The game's main focus lies on Lara's evolution and dynamic transformation and pretty much everything centers around watching her grow and mature, with several subtle details showing it. For one, as she starts out, she'll act with regret when killing someone and doesn't seem used to it. However, as the game progresses, she slowly adjusts and even starts to enjoy it near the end. She'll look increasingly bruised and scratched and her clothes will start to deteriorate from damage and such. One of the most beautiful things about this game is that we discover Lara's latent abilities and instincts together with her naturally as we play and it builds a very strong empathic connection with her that is unlike most games I've played lately, and the game does so without ever putting you directly in Lara's shoes. The game is constantly third person and Lara will act smart enough to do certain things on her own, such as going into stealth automatically when enemies are nearby or light a torch before a dark area, regardless of whether you do it or not. However, she never does anything that seems counter-intuitive or intrusive and you are still very much in control of her actions.

Afraid of heights? Me too...

The gameplay is very reliant on quick time events and most actions require these to be performed in some manner, and whether this is a flaw or not depends entirely on your taste. The quick time events during certain boss battles did feel very intrusive and not very intuitive at first and ended up stalling the game a bit for me. I often died simply because I didn't time the events or perform them correctly, or quite simply didn't react fast enough. However once I got into the game these quick time events became like second nature to me and adjusting to them was easy enough. It's only a minor annoyance and nothing that broke the game for me, thankfully. Otherwise the game plays mostly like a third person shooter, similar to the old Tomb Raider games, though your weapons often fulfill more functions than just being used for killing, and some tools serve functions beyond what they're meant for. 

Most of the game centers on exploring the island and you get XP rewards for finding salvage, which  you can use to upgrade your weapons, hunting animals and doing challenges. These challenges differ but mostly center around finding a certain number of objects of some kind. Every so often you will level up and gain a skill point, which can be used to teach Lara a new skill. However, the most striking thing about Tomb Raider is that it made me rethink about killing my enemy. At one point, an enemy was crushed under rubble, dying from the wounds. I stood there, holding the machine gun I took from him, aiming at him, but I hesitated. I couldn't shoot him. I heard him saying "stay with me" and... I felt sorry for him. I lowered my gun and watched him die and after that I actually cried a bit. It was a very intense moment from the game that I will never forget. Later on in the game as Lara kills more enemies, they start talking about her as you listen in on their conversations and some of them even start to fear her. The game is just full of fascinating details like that. There is also a multiplayer mode, a first in the main series, where you can select several characters and compete in team deathmatches and other modes. While I haven't played the multiplayer extensively, what I played was fun and went smooth without any lag or dropouts. However, a part of me can't help but wonder who at Square Enix demanded this mode to exist. I mean, most people play Tomb Raider for the single player experience so why the multiplayer? It's obviously a bit of a tacked on afterthought to extend the game's life, although like I said, the multiplayer is done well and I have no complaints about it.

Lara's weapon of choice throughout most of the game is the re-curve bow, which serves several purposes beyond killing.

The graphics in Tomb Raider are simply outstanding and some of the best this generation. On high end PC's you can even enable TressFX which makes Lara's hair incredibly lifelike, each hair moving separately. At times the game is breath taking as the sheer scope of the island is enormous and the locations all have their own feel to them. It does feel like the old Tomb Raider games where Lara would go to different locations, however in this game all of them are centered on just one island so there's still a very unifying feel to them and you can revisit them as many times as you like, even after the main game is over, to complete challenges and such. One flaw is that the graphics are actually so natural and lifelike that you can get lost easily in this game. Unlike previous games, the level design can feel a bit confusing since it's supposed to look realistic. Of course, I actually kind of like this feeling, and after a while I instinctively began to look for clues in the terrain and ended up not really using the survival instinct key at all which is more or less a "hint key" in this game. The characters are all well designed and feel like they have depth and personality to them. The facial animation definitely holds up well and this game did manage to get a few tears out of me at times.

The voice acting is incredible too, especially Lara's voice actress. In the past, Lara has always been given a very cold voice, but in this game, she shows a much broader spectrum of emotions. The performance left quite an impression on me and is probably one of my favorite game roles of the year. The other voice actors do very well too and overall, the sound in this game is incredible. The music though feels a bit forgettable, especially when held up against the original Tomb Raider music. The game did a nice throwback to the original Tomb Raider theme, though most of it I couldn't even remember and it felt more like background ambiance. This is just a taste thing though. The music wasn't horrible, it just wasn't memorable.


SUMMARY:
GRAPHICS: 10/10
This is possibly one of the best looking games this year, definitely up there with Crysis 3 and Bioshock Infinite in terms of just featuring breath-taking visuals. The details on Lara's hair, outfit and the environment is incredible on a medium to high end PC and I strongly recommend playing this game on PC over consoles because of the increased detail.
SOUND: 9/10
An outstanding and unforgettably emotional performance from
Camilla Luddington lends Lara Croft some humanity at last and the sound effects all add to the atmosphere
of the island. The music is good but sadly not that memorable at all. It mostly serves to enhance the mood
rather than create it, which is the only thing I personally dislike about the sound and something I miss
from the older games.
GAMEPLAY: 9/10
The quick time events annoyed me a bit, but otherwise the game feels like a very good modern
action/adventure game, in the same vein as Uncharted. The incredible story kept me going until the end
and I loved every second of it.

FINAL SCORE: 9/10

This is one of the best games I've played and the best Tomb Raider game I've played. While the
unforgetable music and sometimes annoying quicktime events keep me from giving it a perfect
10/10 score, this game is SO close to perfection for me.
It's gritty, dark, emotional and feels like a true survival mission. Watching Lara Croft mature into the
legend she is and how she survives the worst odds is a fascinating and unforgettable experience and one I
plan to replay more than once.
If you're at all interested in action/adventure games, if you're a Tomb Raider fan or not, get this game. I
strongly recommend it as it is one of the best this year.

- Alyxx

PC Game Review: Aliens: Colonial Marines

ALIENS: COLONIAL MARINES
Platform: PC (Steam)
Released: 2013
Genre: First Person Shooter
Developer: Gearbox Software
Publisher: Sega
Buy on Steam

"In space, no one can hear you curse."

I consider myself a pretty huge fan of Alien. Not just the first two movies but I can even say I find qualities about Alien 3 and Alien Resurrection that I like (the latter being Winona Ryder and I know how much everyone hated her in that movie but I thought she did great). Of course when it comes to games, I've always wanted a true Alien game. We've gotten plenty from the Aliens vs Predator franchise but never has there been a true Aliens game. That is until Gearbox announced they were working on what would essentially be the first true Aliens shooter and even a sequel to the hit movies Aliens and Alien 3. Seeing all of this I couldn't help but feeling the hype. I looked at what they showed us, what was told and I wanted to believe so badly that this game was going to be great. I wanted it to be the best sci-fi horror FPS out there, I think we all did. And that was the impression I got from the demo footage. I pre-ordered the collector's edition and paid about 90$ for it, placing my trust in these guys that they could make a game worth the price. In short... they didn't. However while others have been trashing this game, I still found some things about it I liked. But let's get the negative things out of the way first.

You'll most frequently find yourself dying from acid burn as the armor even at 100% capacity can't take it...

The most obvious flaw about ACM is the broken AI. Ranging from tolerable to outright frustrating, I frequently found my team mates standing right in front of their enemy just firing away and getting killed and most of the time they were utterly useless, or even just firing blindly at cover like a retard when an enemy was hiding. Playing this game offline is an experience in bad AI unlike most games I've played lately and even with the latest patch there are still glaring issues with it. The aliens themselves aren't even that frightening, most of the time they act completely like bugs even if the movies prove they have the capacity of independent thought. They are stronger in numbers since that allows them to confuse you and get the better of you. Facing one of them they usually go down in a few shots, which needless to say is the most disappointing aspect about this game. If you at ALL expect a sci-fi horror game, you're going to be majorly disappointed. This game is balls out sci-fi action all the way, even more so than the Aliens movie which was pretty action-focused to begin with. The levels are pretty much all about fighting hordes of aliens and surviving and there's barely any real horror to it. The aliens also can easily get very cheap kills on you due to the bad programming and I died a LOT due to either just getting acid on me or being meleed by an alien. It felt cheap and like I died because of the game and not because it was my own fault. This is obviously a huge issue that is hard to play around and avoiding getting close to the aliens is a must, or just balls out melee'ing them before they get the chance to do the same to you. In co-op most of these issues are further exacerbated by lag issues that causes the timing to get screwed and my co-op partners frequently died because of simply not being able to defend themselves against essentially teleporting xenos.

"I've got a bad feeling about this."

The story isn't exactly great either, but it does the job and offers a few new interesting twists on the Aliens universe. It has you going back to locations from the first two movies while the Weyland Yutani corporation tries to screw you over by sending mercenary soldiers after you. This is another criticism I commonly find about the game, most people comparing this to "making the game like Call of Duty" however I actually like the mercenary soldiers. They definitely do a good job making Weyland Yutani a far more threatening force than in the movies, and the mercenary forces are far more powerful than the aliens in this game and offer most of the competition you'll find since some of them carry heavy weaponry and unlike the aliens, don't jump around or teleport as much, instead using cover and trying to outsmart you. It's an interesting concept, of course hampered by the bad AI, but something I enjoyed nonetheless as I feel the game would have been boring just fighting xenomorphs. I was very happy to see some roles return from the movie, such as Michael Biehn reprising his role as Hicks (he was my favourite non-Ripley character from the movie), and Lance Henriksen as Bishop. The other characters aren't as interesting sadly and most of them feel a bit like cookie cutter stereotypes. The lack of roleplaying also is a bit of an issue. You're essentially tied to the role of Winter throughout the single player campaign whether you play co-op or not and there is no option to choose which marine you want to play and you're basically just given one. And the ending is definitely a bit disappointing and leaving me with a bit of an empty feeling.

"They mostly cum at night... mostly..."

However all of the levels are done with a great deal of atmosphere, at one point you have to sneak around without weapons and this part actually got me quite immersed and felt scary as hell. And several times I just admired the locations and set pieces in the game, especially the space jockey and the derelict, which was probably my favourite level. The Giger-esque design is as timeless and alien as ever and it felt just like being inside the movie. The graphics have also been really improved by the latest patch and the lighting is really good. The weapons are also really good, all of them feeling part of the universe. Firing the pulse rifle the first time and hearing that modulated sound I had a small fangasm, I must admit and the guns all feel great to fire. And while you are limited to carrying a primary and secondary weapon as well as a sidearm, you can access a weapon menu wheel any time to switch out your gear in-game so you technically have constant access to all in-game weapons which I love. Other shooters should take note of this function! I also love the increased variety in xenomorphs, having not only the drones but also spitters, tanks and even a reprise from a new alien queen... The sound design is spot on with the xenos sounding exactly like they did in the movies, and as mentioned the pulse rifle sound is as classic as ever in this game and all of the weapons have very good sounds, especially the FWOOOSH of the flamethrower. Music is very close to how it was in the movies and adds a ton to the already thick atmosphere and I really loved it.

Oh crap...

The versus multiplayer is where the game shines. Taking away the bad spawning and unbalanced teams from AVP 2010, ACM offers a few interesting game modes and all of them feel fun to play. You can also here customize your character with skins and loadouts and thank god, I was able to play a female marine in this mode and customize her as much as I wanted. This is easily my favourite part of the game. If I want to blast some aliens with my friends, I just play some TDM in ACM and it works well. I have few complaints about this mode altogether and I think they did a great job with it. The xenos might feel a bit weird to play at first, especially if you're used to the controls from AVP, but I got used to them pretty quickly. The best thing of course about versus is that the AI is basically non existant since everyone are human players and it makes the aliens feel way more natural.

No thanks, not into Facerape, vagina-face.

SUMMARY
GRAPHICS: 8/10
With the latest patch, this game oozes atmosphere like alien drool. Lighting is great, and the locations from the movies are recreated and still manage to feel fresh and different. The only criticism are the character models who definitely look a bit flat and under-developed at times. For a game from 2013, this is really below the standard but it's tolerable.
SOUND: 10/10
Nothing bad to say about it. Everything is really true to the essence of the movies, from the xeno noises to the weapon sounds to the music.
GAMEPLAY: 4/10
This is where the game lacks the most. Everything is hampered by terrible AI, co-op lag issues, and just the fact the game feels both too easy and too hard at the same time and feels really unbalanced because of the many cheap deaths you experience. In multiplayer most of these issues are fairly non-existant though, which is the only saving grace.

FINAL SCORE: 6/10
I really want to recommend this game but for full price I can't. If you find it at around 10-30$ I'd say buy it if you're an alien fan. If not, you're probably better off staying away from this game as the terrible broken AI really ruins the overall experience. But there are still a lot of things in here to like if you're a fan of Alien and Aliens, and the multiplayer is something I enjoy about it. Overall the game is not bad, but it's not good either and falls just above average for me.

- Alyxx

Console Review: Sega Mega Drive / Genesis

A lot of people who grew up in the late 80's and early 90's undoubtedly remember the Genesis, or Mega Drive as it was known everywhere else in the world except for the US, and it's one of the 16bit consoles with the longest lifespan, together with the SNES. The reason I think is that it had a lot of great games for it, mostly pretty decent arcade conversions like Afterburner, Altered Beast and Golden Axe. And of course, we have the Sonic the Hedgehog games which in many ways I prefer to Mario games, but I like both equally.



Due to the popularity of the Mega Drive you can easily find it on eBay and other auction sites, and probably the odd second hand store and yard sale will feature one. It's very affordable and there are several versions of it. The model 1 Mega Drive is the biggest one and features a stereo sound headphone output which you can also plug to your TV to get proper stereo sound for your games. The Mega Drive II is a bit smaller, and doesn't feature stereo sound output, and the Mega Drive 3 is even smaller and also has limited compability with several addons for the console, such as the Mega CD and the 32X. There was also a version released by AtGames recently, which is basically just an emulator with a cart reader and gamepad ports, and features very lackluster sound output, also in mono. This one is not recommended if you're a fan of the console. In my opinion you should get the model 1 if you can.

What I like about the games themselves is that they are very affordable and easy to find complete in the original boxes. This is largely because Sega used plastic boxes for their games, kinda like the covers for VHS tapes. Nintendo on the other hand used cheap cardboard boxes that most people just threw away so if you want to find a complete SNES game it's probably going to cost you a lot more. Mega Drive games in general tend to be much cheaper than SNES or NES games so collecting for the console is very affordable, excluding the really rare games like Duke Nukem 3D and MUSHA.

There's a ton of different accessories for the console, and a lot of controller variations. There exists several turbo controllers, six button controllers and so on, even adapters that allow up to 4 players playing simultaneously, a must-have for party games like Bomberman. As previously mentioned you can also find the Mega CD addon which allows you to play optimized CD-ROM games and also regular music CD's, my favourite Mega CD games being Android Assault, Silpheed and of course Sonic CD. The 32X addon has a lot of games with advanced graphics such as Doom and Star Wars Arcade, but in general isn't worth having unless you're an avid collector.

While the Mega Drive might not have the legendary library of Nintendo, it does feature a ton of great games and it's a great console that I highly recommend to retro gamers as it's very affordable to collect for and finding complete boxed games is very easy.

- Alyxx

PC Game Review: Need For Speed: Most Wanted

NEED FOR SPEED: MOST WANTED
Platform: PC (Origin)
Released: 2012
Genre: Racing
Developer: Criterion
Publisher: EA
Buy on Origin

I grew up with the Need For Speed games. In the 90's, these games offered the perfect mix of great famous cars, fun gameplay and awesome music, all presented with sleek graphics and a lot of other neat stuff. Lately I feel the franchise has fallen down from grace a bit with titles like the NFS Underground games that were okay games but I just couldn't get into them. And don't get me started on Need For Speed Shift, which is just way too realistic and simmy for me. Although when Criterion, creator of the Burnout games (which are some of my favourite racers), were brought in and made 2010's re-imagining of Need For Speed: Hot Pursuit, I felt the franchise was back on track. Hot Pursuit 2010 was a great game with awesome graphics that brought me back to the 90's and reminded me of just how fun and simple these games used to be. You see, Need For Speed to me has always been about balancing fun and realism and that's always been the main draw for me to the franchise. And with the new Most Wanted, Criterion is back to bring Need For Speed into a more social realm, adding multiplayer and making Autolog a much more central feature, but still keeping what made Hot Pursuit such a great title. Is it worth it? Let's find out, shall we?

A lot of races start off with a stylish cinematic that adds a bit of flair to the game.

Most Wanted doesn't really have a story or plot per se, which is probably wise seeing as forcing plots into racers is something I usually disapprove of and most of the time I wouldn't give a rat's ass about the story either way. From what I gather though, the game is all about racing to become the Most Wanted, beating all the other 10 most wanted racers of the city and becoming the top by beating them personally. The game is fairly basic in that sense but there is still quite a lot to do.

Quite ingeniously, the game starts right off with you in your first car and you get a few tutorials to begin with that ease you into the game. I thought this was quite nice as each time you boot the game up, you just go right into it. The basic goal is to drive around, finding car hotspots to add to your collection, and upgrade these cars with new mods like boosts and tires and such by winning races of different kinds. In the game you have something called SP (Speed Points I think) and you get SP by completing races, doing challenges, getting milestones (basically achievements) and other nice things. In other words, the game has a wonderful sense of freedom about it, very similar to Burnout Paradise in a sense that you are free to roam about as you wish, doing takedowns on cops or just smashing through billboards and gates, although in order to progress the game you most likely have to do events.

An example of driving to an event and entering it.

 You find events by using the EasyDrive menu at the top corner, although usually when you get a new car and at the beginning of the game, an event is chosen for you. EasyDrive is actually quite a nifty feature as it keeps you in the game and you don't have to fiddle around that much with menus and can pretty much change cars, find events, customize your car, go into multiplayer and other things pretty much while driving, just using your d-pad. Once you pick an event, the event is marked on your minimap and you have to drive to it to enter it. Another practical feature is that you can sort of fast-travel to events you've already done so if you pick up another car and need to redo an event, you can do so easily by just quickstarting the race from the EasyDrive menu rather than having to drive to the location all over again. Once the event is completed you are pretty much seamlessly dropped back into the game world again and you can go on driving, pick another event and pretty much do whatever you want. All in all the single player is quite enjoyable and if you have other friends who play the game, Autolog keeps track of their achievements as well so you can compete with them. There is a discernable lack of visual customization in single player though which is a shame as I would love to be able to put decals and various paint styles on my cars and really make them my own. Instead the only way you can change the colour of your car (and also repair it if it's damaged) is by driving through pit stops along the way that are marked on your map and it's always a random colour. It's a bit annoying to be honest. Another thing is that while you can customize all the controls, I couldn't customize one certain key that is used a lot during the game and had to always press Right Control to use its function, quite annoying when I prefer using my gamepad for all the functions and I think most gamers would too. Another small nitpick I want to point out is that you'll crash. A lot. For some reason, traffic cars are DEADLY to you while other racers and cops can easily be taken down at high speed. But regular traffic can often make you crash violently. I have no idea why regular traffic cars are so extremely secure but it's kind of annoying. While crashing doesn't make the game stop or anything you get a small penalty with a "CRASHED" screen, so it is still quite annoying.

Some events are pure races, others are about losing the cops. Here it's all about maintaining the highest speed.

Multiplayer is quite similar to single player although it has quite a few differences. While I haven't played it as much as I probably should, from what I gather, you find a public server with other people on it and you can race around, doing takedowns on each other for points and as you get points, you can upgrade your cars (which are a fixed set from what I gather) and customize your signplate. In multiplayer, events are timed and you have to drive to a meet up, upon the players there will take part in the event once it starts and you can't leave it. I don't know if you can select which event you wanna do as it seems to be forced, so I really wish there was a way of choosing from multiple events or at least implement a voting system so that players could vote on what event they wanted to do. It's not always I wanna do takedown matches, sometimes I just wanna race. You can also create private games for friends although I haven't fully tested this feature yet, I assume it's similar to public matches only that it's limited to friends only.

Get used to seeing this a lot.

There is one major flaw about the multiplayer I would like to point out though and I am not sure if this will be fixed in a patch, but there is absolutely no options in the menu regarding voice chat and it's pretty much always on by default. The only way to mute it is by manually using the EasyDrive menu to mute your fellow players one by one and it's time consuming, unnecessary and shouldn't have to be done just so you won't have to listen to a bunch of noise while driving. This is a huge flaw about the multiplayer in my opinion and really puts me off playing it as it's quite annoying to go into a public match and just be bombarded by lots of noise and feedback, especially since it's utterly useless when you don't use voice chat yourself. There should also have been an option to use a text chat window for those who prefer that, especially on the PC version where players have access to keyboards. There's just a lot lacking in this department, and in a game that focuses so much on social activity, it should've been mandatory to include alternate ways of communicating. I really hope they do add more options for voice chat in a future patch because as of now, it really is off-putting and having to manually mute players as they join is tedious.

SHUT UP! I'm trying to hear Skrillex!

The graphics are quite nice and you get a lot of options to customize them to your PC, although for some reason I found that the game does not run above 30 FPS and is capped at 30 FPS for some reason. It's nothing major but for a racing game, I would love to be able to play it at full 60 FPS to get better reaction times, but this is nothing major. I also found that there's a lot of glare from the sun in a lot of cases which is a nice realistic detail but it does obscure a lot of the view and can be a bit annoying. Otherwise the game is practically steaming with atmosphere, the asphalt looks real, rain and water effects splash of it and smoke comes off your tires as you drift.

Soundwise the game does a great job. The engine sounds are all varied and very typical of each car and you get a lot of realistic sound details. The soundtrack is also quite varied with songs from a lot of genres, ranging from rock to dubstep and a nice little feature is that while using nitrous, the music sort of phaseshifts or something into a much higher treble and it feels really cool. There's not much else to say about it.

The graphics are really good at adding atmosphere and making the world feel real.

SUMMARY: 
Gameplay: 6/10
EasyDrive does a good job keeping you immersed in the game, the world feels big and you have a lot of freedom. Events are fun and have nice little cinematics that add some flair to them. Multiplayer on the other hand can be a bit forced and lack of options for voice chat makes it quite offputting when you hear a bunch of strangers talking when joining a public server and with no option to mute everyone. Autolog does a good job making the game competitive even in single player and for the most part the game is a great seamless experience and a very social game too. Elements from the Burnout series makes it feel like a lot of fun and keeps you playing even when doing bad.
Graphics: 8/10
As usual EA delivers a great looking racer with tons of atmosphere, weather effects, changes from day to night and so on. The only downside is the lack of changing the framerate so you're capped at 30 FPS which for a racing game is a bit of a shame.
Sound: 7/10
Awesome diverse soundtrack, great engine noises and support for Surround sound makes Most Wanted a very great experience sonically. The major thing that keeps it from being perfect is the lack of options for turning off voice chat which can really ruin the multiplayer experience.

All in all, Most Wanted is a fun and enjoyable social racer and takes what Criterion did with Autolog in Hot Pursuit and makes it a more central feature. The game is very immersive and seamless and apart from a few minor flaws the single player is highly recommended. The multiplayer is definitely ripe for improvements though and the lack of an option for turning off voice chat combined with forced events makes the multiplayer feel a bit lacking, although it is fun once you get into it and upgrading your cars is a lot of fun too and makes you feel like you are always progressing both in multiplayer and single player.

Final score: 7/10

- Alyxx

Top 10: Underrated Games

So I made a list of the top 10 games I find overrated. So I figured I might as well make a list of the games that I personally feel don't receive as much recognition as they deserve. Here's my top 10 list of underrated games!



10. TRON 2.0

While this game sort of branches on being underrated since it's actually sort of a cult hit, just like the movie it's inspired by, I feel it doesn't really receive as much recognition among FPS fans as it should. For one, the graphics, which were incredible back in 2003, are still pretty sweet today and with some fan made mods, you can run this game in full HD glory on your PC and it holds up incredibly well. It also felt like a better sequel to the 1982 movie than TRON Legacy was and in terms of style, keeps more in continuity with it too. As a movie-licensed game, it's one of the best I've played and as a game on its own, the gameplay just feels deeper and better than other FPS's of the time like Doom 3 or Half-Life 2 which relied far too much on gimmicks like horror and physics, whereas TRON 2.0 feels more like a proper FPS RPG hybrid set in the TRON universe. Multiplayer is also a lot of fun and if you ever dreamt of having a lightcycle match or disc game with your friends, you can do it here. If you're at all a TRON fan like me, you OWE it to yourself to play this game at least once and it still has a pretty active fan community.

9. Wario's Woods

When talking about puzzle games, you often mention games like Tetris, Bejeweled or Bust-A-Move. But rarely do I hear people talking about Wario's Woods on NES/SNES. It's definitely one of the most addictive puzzlers I've played and I remember playing it a lot in my childhood. You play as toad, going from tree to tree in Wario's Woods and the goal is pretty much to blast away rows of 2+ monsters either vertically, horizontally or diagonally using bombs given to you by Birdo. Birdo has a timer though and once it's run out, Wario will take over and start spamming more monsters to blast away and knock the tree to make a giant Thwomp at the top to fall down, each knock making it fall further and further down, making the game feel increasingly claustrophobic. It's a pretty good puzzler and can get quite hectic on later levels. Highly recommended!

8. Conduit 2

When talking about the Nintendo Wii, it's not often you talk about what First Person Shooters were good on it. Sure, the Call of Duty ports might have been decent if very stripped down and you did have Metroid Prime Trilogy on it which added a good amount of FPS action. But one of the franchises that I think did best on it was Conduit and Conduit 2 is definitely my favourite of the two games. It feels kind of like a mix of Halo and X-Files and does a good job getting the most out of the Wii hardware, even supporting surround sound and running in 480p mode. One of my favourite things about this game and that makes me prefer it over the original is that the protagonist is voiced by John St. John, famous for portraying Duke Nukem himself and he definitely adds a big cool factor to the hero. Conduit 1 and Conduit 2 are must-play games imo if you own a Wii.

7. Gunman Chronicles

When talking about Half-Life, I often feel like the game is kind of overrated. Sure, it did a lot of cool things and it is a good FPS but there is one game I actually feel is kind of superior to Half-Life and also used the exact same game engine. In fact, it started out as a Half-Life mod. Gunman Chronicles does a lot of really cool and actually quite inventive things that in my opinion made it a totally unique game and so much more than just a HL mod. For one, it gave you guns that you could customize, like customizing the spread and amount of shells to fire with your shotgun, or customizing your rocket launcher so you could make it into a grenade launcher if you wanted to, and use your grenades as trip mines if you set them correctly. Also, the setting of literally having cowboys in space makes it even more unique and I don't think I've ever seen a game have such unique and diverse levels before with such an interesting cast of characters. It's a really awesome mix of western and sci-fi and even cyberpunk that I think is incredibly cool. Definitely worth checking out if you can find a copy.

6. Syndicate

 

Syndicate is a game that sadly fell completely under the radar last year. Sure, it might have been a disappointing reboot to the fans and the heavy use of bloom might have thrown a lot of graphics-oriented people off, not to mention the PC port was kinda shoddy but this remains one of my favourite games of 2012 and favourite games of all time. It nails down the cyberpunk aesthetic and really made me hooked on the multiplayer. The more I play this game the more I just love how cool it looks and how well it makes me feel like part of a cyberpunk universe and I just can't help but think that I might be one of the few people who are still into this game. So yeah, I consider it kinda underrated.

 5. Eradicator

When you talk about mid 90's First Person Shooters, a lot of titles come to mind. Duke Nukem 3D, Doom, Quake, but I don't think I've ever heard anyone but me remembering Accolade's Eradicator. I remember playing a demo back in the day and just totally being sucked into it and since then I've just watched it fade into obscurity while better known games get all the credit. At the time, Accolade didn't have a good credit and granted this was probably their last really good game. It didn't help either that it used the Build engine and came out around the same time as Quake and failed to gather any audience since those who weren't into Quake were into Duke or Doom. Still it's a pretty solid FPS with a really good sci-fi atmosphere and worth looking into if you're into old FPS's.

4. Starfox Adventures

For some reason, Starfox Adventures is pretty much universally despised by the majority of gamers, especially Starfox fans. And while I guess I could see why since it doesn't really play like a Starfox game, actually it has more in common with Zelda than Starfox, I definitely don't agree that it is a BAD game. There is a LOT I love about Adventures, especially the whole atmosphere of adventure it has, that it takes time to set up a compelling universe and that it greatly expands upon the characters and mythology set by Starfox and Starfox 64. I remember reading about this game back in the day and actually being really hyped about it. I wanted to play a different Starfox game and to this day, I would still claim this game is pretty good. So screw the haters, it's worth at least one shot and you can get it cheap on ebay these days.

3. SiN

Oh... boy... you wanna talk underrated? Talk about fucking SiN. It's one of those games that I would like to call "Half-Life casualties", simply because it failed because it came out at the same time as Half-Life. Even though in many ways, SiN was a lot more groundbreaking in ways that Half-Life couldn't touch. SiN had actual missions where the outcome decided how your next level was gonna be like. You could enter it from another area, you could sometimes even find entirely new levels depending on how your mission went and for the time, this was mindblowing. Another thing that SiN did, WAY before games like Doom 3 made a huge deal out of it, was interactive in-game computers. That's right, in SiN, you could use computers. You could even go into a cute little DOS prompt and dig through the files to find passwords and hidden easter eggs and again, for the time, this was INCREDIBLE. I cannot even begin to state why I think SiN is probably the most underrated shooter of the 90's but there are lots of them. It's only sad that Half-Life stole the glory because I think SiN could really have taken it if it had gotten a bigger fanbase. To this day it remains one of my favourite games and I am still amazed at how much groundbreaking stuff they did back then. It also helps that unlike Gordon Freeman, John R. Blade actually talks and has a wonderful Duke Nukem esque attitude that just makes this game really awesome and in many ways, it feels like a lost Duke Nukem Forever. In fact, rumors has it that it started as a Duke Nukem game but grew into its own thing. Ironically, it got a sequel around the same time as Half-Life 2, using the Source engine. SiN Episodes: Emergence was the first of several planned episodes but sadly Ritual Entertainment got bought out and no further installments are planned in the series. I highly recommend checking SiN out because it's definitely an underrated classic in so many ways. It's so good, it's a sin.

2. Super Mario Bros. 2

SMB2 is often referred to as the black sheep of the original SMB trilogy. And why? Because when people found out that it actually is just a reskinned version of another game, they felt deceived. Thus, SMB2 is considered a bad SMB game. But hang on a sec, just because it's a reskinned version of another game, why does that automatically make it bad? I want to disagree here. I think it's actually a pretty good game and I've had a lot of fun with it. And for once, it was a game where you could play as several different characters, each with their own abilities and the difference between Mario and Luigi was much further established here and almost completely ignored in further installments were Luigi was reduced to a mere palette swap. It also introduced several other characters that are now canon as well as Birdo, the first transvestite in Mario history. Almost kinda fitting she comes from a game that is considered the freak of the franchise. Definitely an underrated game by all accounts.

1. Daikatana

 

With an ad campaign stating you were gonna become Romero's bitch, and with the hype train going insanely off track and with a development cycle that can only be described as total chaos, it's a wonder Daikatana even got released. And when it got released, it was an underwhelming game that looked really dated in comparison with other games of the time. Thus, Daikatana is widely considered one of the biggest failures in gaming and also one of the worst FPS's of all time. But personally, having played through the game and even writing a review of it, I would have to disagree. What Daikatana did at the time was simply mindboggling, it was trying to establish itself as a co-op FPS experience, something nearly no games to that point had tried. It was extremely ambitious and in a lot of ways, it sort of failed but this is definitely a game that I feel is incredibly underrated as I simply love how much variety there is in level design and weaponry, and how the RPG elements makes it feel like a deeper experience than Quake for instance, and how you build comradery with your companions. I really got immersed into this game and simply loved it and to me, Daikatana is the most underrated game of all time.

- Alyxx