Dannie Kitten's Gaming Year

You may have read about my "Top Three Games of 2015" on Honest Games Reviews (http://honestgamesreviews.com/blog/hgrs-games-of-2015/) but as I mentioned there, I don't think picking just three games has given enough credit to the games of 2015. So I have chosen to expand upon that here and give you my top picks of 2015. 

I have found 2015 to be a great year for gaming. There have been a massive number of Indie and AAA games that have been hugely enjoyable. I've been thinking about formats in which I could write about my picks of the year...a top ten, choosing the best of the genres etc. And in truth I still don't know how I'm going to tell you about my favourite gaming moments this year. So I'm just gonna start writing and see where it takes me...

Best Game for Kids: There have been plenty of games I have been able to enjoy with my son this year and in fact I was going to give this to Octodad: Deadliest Catch purely based on how much time we spent laughing together at it. But seeing as this is the award for kids I should probably ask my kid what he thinks and his vote goes to Lego Dimensions because it's "really, really good. About a 1000% good" because "you can go in Homer Simpson's world as Batman". I should point out that this is one of the main reasons Lego Dimensions is great, unlike Disney Infinity which only allows you to use certain toys in certain areas Lego Dimensions gives you free reign to play as whoever you want whenever you want, which has gone down a storm in my house. 

Best Xbox One Exclusive: Some people love them, some people hate them but there's no denying that console exclusivity is here to stay. I'm not going to count timed exclusives in here, because unless you're a really impatient person you can get the game on any console at some point in time. These categories are for the games that will never see the light of day on the "rival" console. So with that in mind it is Gears of War:Ultimate Edition that has to win this crown. I know, I know it is a re-release BUT it is a damn perfect re-release of a game that is actually pretty old. Seriously load up the original and just feel how clunky it is. 

Best PS4 Exclusive: Now I bought my PS4 when I felt like there were enough exclusives on it that I wanted to play. A lot of people give Sony stick for not having exclusives, but I don't really understand where this comes from...I found it much harder to nail down my favourite PS4 exclusive of the year. I haven't been able to play some of the games I have on this yet, so they obviously couldn't enter into the list (sorry Bloodborne!). I opted for the game that I primarily bought the PS4 for, Until Dawn. I bought this and my brother came round the next night to play it and over the next couple of weeks I saw him much more than usual! Until Dawn is basically a game of a cheesy 90's horror film...and that's what makes it GREAT! Graphically the game is superb and the game really does have plenty of shocks. I can't wait to play it again and hopefully save more people!

Best Wii U: Seeing as we've given awards to PS4 and XB1 exclusives we obviously need to do it for the Wii U too. Choosing this was pretty hard too, much harder than it was choosing for XB1. But really there has been one truly stand out game on the Wii U and it ties in with the below award too...

Best Fan Service Game: In a year that saw a bazillion games getting a HD remake "because the fans wanted it" this award should have been a lot harder to give out. But in my mind the only game that can be considered a true fan service this year is Super Mario Maker for the Wii U. Super Mario Maker gave Mario fans the world over the power (and an incredible interface!) to make their own Mario levels. Honestly the UI is something dreams are made of and the ability to share your levels online and download other means you will never run out of Mario levels to try. 

Best Co-op: I love to play games co-op but this year, this gen even, I don't think there have been enough co-op games. Ark: Survival Evolved has changed that, finally. Ark is a great survival game, but it gets infinitely better when played alongside friends. Find it in Early Access now and grab it (if you're not one of 1,000,000+ who has already).

Best Multiplayer: I'm using multiplayer as online and against others to shoehorn this one in here really. And you can play the winner of this co-op in what is actually my favourite mode but anyway Star Wars: Battlefront is my multiplayer game of the year. Which is a good job seeing as the majority of the game is in the Online section. Fast and slick (when you're not suffering from lag anyway) Star Wars Battlefront is the most fun I've had in an online shooter for ages. 

Most Graphically Impressive: There have been many games this year that have been pretty damn beautiful. Hell seeing an AT-AT go down in Star Wars Battlefront is an amazing experience. But I have to say I find myself most blown away by Rise of the Tomb Raider. Even now when I have played a fair bit of it, I still find myself loading it up and being surprised at just how gorgeous it is. 

Shooter of the Year: As much as I have enjoyed the aforementioned Star Wars Battlefront it isn't my shooter of the year. Splatoon on the Wii U is. Just like Plants vs Zombies: Garden Warfare  did when that was released Splatoon brings the fun back into an over-saturated market, and it is family-friendly which will always win out in this house. But even if you don't have kids to play it with Splatoon is well worth picking up.

Best Character: The last time I did a gaming award thing was a few years ago and Kenny from Telltale's The Walking Dead won it. This award is just a little nod to a fun or well-written character. This year I found it quite hard really, as even though we've had many a brilliant game I don't think there has been much in the way of great characters. It was going to go to Chumbucket from Mad Max because he really did make me laugh, but I felt like this would be to cheapen the award. Life is Strange offered us some great characters but the dialogue was sometimes a bit jarring, which initially put me off giving this award to a character from that. But after much deliberation the only character this award could have gone to is Chloe. She is a really well-written character; she is flawed, scared and angry with a myriad of issues but she's also loyal and fierce. It was great fun getting to know her and I hope to see more of her again.

Best Telltale Game: Ok maybe I'm cheating here, giving Telltale their very own category but bear with me. This year saw the release of three (!) episodic Telltale games: Tales from the Borderlands, Minecraft: Story Mode and Game of Thrones: A Telltale Series. I have been lucky enough to play all three so I'm going to tell you which one you should buy if, for some crazy reason you have limited yourself to just one. And the answer is...Game of Thrones: A Telltale Series every time. This game was the perfect foray into the world of Westeros, featuring plenty of betrayal and nastiness from some of our favourite characters from the show (honestly Cersei's smirk translates just as well to a game world). This game truly pulls the rug out from under you multiple times throughout, and it is all the better for it. 

Honourable Mentions: There are a lot of games that I have had a LOT of fun with this year, so I'm going to give them a mention because I want to spread the love. 

The Escapists - One of the first games I streamed on Twitch when I began earlier this year, it is a great little sandbox game where you have to escape from different prisons. DLC is cheap for those looking for more places to escape from and there has even been FREE DLC! 

Everybody's Gone to the Rapture - I know this game got a lot of stick for being a "walking-sim" but when you really delve into it, was you get is a great story that is beautifully realised. Honestly I was flicking through my Twitter pics the other day and screens of this game were sandwiched between pictures I had taken at Lyme Park. I had to do a double take. It is THAT beautiful.

Sparkle Unleashed - I love me a good ball-busting puzzle game and this has filled the Zuma shaped hole in my XB1. And even though Zuma is now available through backwards compatibility I still find myself down "just one more level" on this. 

Plague Inc. Evolved - A late entry because I only picked it up in the sale but this iOS game has made a great transition to the home console. Well worth picking up!

King's Quest - Another episodic game, but this is releasing much further apart than anything Telltale does and has 1000G per episode! It's a great little game that serves as a decent nostalgia kick for any 90's point and click fans out there. 

Quest of Dungeons - A great little game that you put on for ten minutes and end up forgetting to feed the dog (or children) because of. Buy it.

Ori and the Blind Forest -  This game doesn't need me to give it an honourable mention, I'm yet to speak to someone who didn't love it. But it was a beauty of a game and if you haven't already you should play it. Now. 

Anyone who follows HonestGameReviews will have already read what is below, but if you haven't please read on to find out what my Top Three Picks of 2015 were. I think 2015 has been a damn good year for gaming and I'm excited to see what 2016 can bring us. I hope everyone has a fantastic New Year and I'll see you all in 2016! 

3. The Swindle

The Swindle is easily my favourite indie game of the year and is the perfect example of a simple premise that has been perfectly executed. The graphics are good but the controls and handling are where this game really shines, it is just so slick and responsive. The aim of the game is to complete a number of heists in the hope of doing the big one within 100 days. Each heist is different as they're all randomly generated so no two players games will be the same. Your character can die (mine does a LOT which I'm sure anyone who watches my Twitch streams is surprised to hear) but you can respawn with a new one minus all of the upgrades you had purchased. The Swindle is the perfect game to have pinned for whenever you have a spare ten minutes, but be warned ten minutes is never enough on The Swindle.

2. Life is Strange

Life is Strange is an episodic game that, to date, I have only played through once so it obviously hasn't had that many hours put into it. But this game makes it onto the top three list anyway because it is just that good. Yeah the dialogue is sometimes pretty cringe-y but Life is Strange deals with ideas that are rarely touched upon in this medium and it does it really well. In a year that saw a huge slew of episodic games Life is Strange is the standout title for sure. The graphical style is beautiful and whimsical making Arcadia Bay one of my favourite game locations of the year. For the most part the characters are engaging and well-written, but the best thing about this game is the way in which it explores "The Butterfly Effect". As always I'm spoiler free so I won't go into much more detail, but I see this being in a sale in the not so distant future and if you haven't already bought it then you should definitely pick it up then. Life is Strange is a brave idea of a game that actually worked and I can't wait to play it through again.

1. Fallout 4

Anyone who knows me knows I am a HUGE fan of the Fallout franchise, and well, Bethesda in general. Bethesda can do no wrong for me and Fallout 4 has just cemented that for me. Fallout 4 has offered a vast improvement on all previous Fallout games and given us yet another amazing open world to explore. Graphics aren't quite as shiny as some of the other offerings this year, but it's a new Fallout game so most of us can forgive it for that. And for the first time your character has an actual voice - something I never realised I missed in previous Fallout games until this one. You don't need me to go into a ton of detail about a game as huge as Fallout 4, unless you've lived in a bunker you know of it and what it offers to gamers. Fallout 3 had always been the game I'd take to a desert island but Fallout 4 has hopped, skipped and jumped right over it. I have sunk many an hour into it already and barely scratched it's surface. But the time I've spent in the Commonwealth isn't nearly enough, and I fear that I could spend a year of my life on it and still miss some of it's offerings. If you're looking for a game that offers MASSIVE value for money look no further. Buy it. Now.

Worst Game of 2015: Toro

I mean, seriously, if this isn't on everyones worst games list it'll be a miracle. Everything about it is terrible and it had the honour of being the first game I ever deleted from my XB1 and gave a 0 star rating when forced to review it. To be fair on RecoTech they seemed to take all of the stick I sent their way quite well, even sending me multiple copies of their next release for review and giveaways. I'm still trying to decide whether that was meant as more of a punishment though...

One to Watch in 2016: Gears 4

I found this really tough to narrow down, and I was hoping I'd pick a little known indie or something less mainstream. But I'm a MASSIVE Gears fan and I am thoroughly invested in the universe so the opportunity to play another Gears game on the new hardware is hugely exciting for me. With the release of Gears of War: Ultimate Edition earlier this year my excitement for another Gears instalment only grew and I can't wait! Sorry to anyone reading this who was hoping to see something they had missed for next year!

KickBeat: Special Edition (Xbox One) - Review

KickBeat: Special Edition is coming out next week and the nice guys at Zen Studios sent me a code over so I could review it for you!

KickBeat is a rhythm game with a twist. Rhythm games have been pretty popular over the last few years, and in my mind peaked with the amazing Rock Band Blitz, which I loved when I reviewed it. Rock Band Blitz, however good it is, doesn't give you much to look at other than the buttons that mess with your vision long after your finished and this is where KickBeat comes into it's own.

KickBeat is Kung-Fu themed. Yes, really. Kung-Fu. The main protagonist fights wave after wave of enemies as you press the buttons. There are even 'Boss Levels' (The first of which is really good fun and played out to my favourite song off the game 'The Beautiful People' by Marilyn Manson). When I first read it I have to admit to thinking it'd be pretty bad. But when you think about it Kung-Fu does seem pretty rhythmic. I have NO experience whatsoever in the martial arts so I'm not sure how true that is, but certainly when you see a martial arts sequence in a film or whatever the choreography certainly makes it seem that way.

When you first load the game it looks pretty budget, just from the menu. But I didn't immediately go into the story mode (which is a rookie error BELIEVE ME!) so didn't see straight away just how gorgeous the art style is. It's hand-drawn and really is beautifully done.

So not being a complete idiot I did go to play through the tutorial first. Which would be a good idea if they weren't so boring. I know a tutorial is never going to be the most fun part of a game, but with rhythm games the music drives it, makes the player feel energised and the tutorial features a metronome only. There is a lot to take in with this game at first I feel, but nothing that doesn't make sense eventually (like holding the button down if the enemies are leaving a yellow trail behind them) and it does all feel very familiar if you have ever played another rhythm game.

I only stuck it through the first level of tutorial at first before I just wanted to play to some music. And this is where I made the biggest error...please don't make it yourself. I went straight into Survival mode. Survival mode is TOUGH. Which is great as you get better at the game and definitely adds to the longevity of it, but as a newbie it SUCKS! It is SO difficult and for about the first seven attempts I lasted only somewhere between 20-40 seconds. Which the first time I told myself wasn't too bad, until I realised that Survivor mode is graded in the amount of TRACKS YOU CLEAR. I still haven't managed to clear one!

So I ventured into the story mode. Which is OK. The story isn't as bad as it could be, but come on, it was never going to be groundbreaking either. The reason I prefer the story mode is for the pure fact that there is a learning curve present with it, whereas in Survival mode you are just thrown in at the deep end.

I did have to really battle against myself with this game though. By this I mean that because you are fighting enemies my natural impulse was to mash their corresponding button so as not to get got. Which, inevitably, lead to me getting battered. It is something that I really struggled to quell, as I'd see them moving closer and closer and just want to strike. Old habits die hard I guess.

There are some breaks in the game which shows your character pull a cool move on the last enemy they attacked. I actually really enjoyed this as it showed how much the developers have thought about the music and how much thought they put into making it fit the game perfectly. These moments always happen at a natural break in the rhythm of the music, like in the bridge before a chorus for example, and really help keep the game flowing, giving the player a moment to relax their stressed out fingers.

This game is tough but it is fun. There is also a Split-Screen mode, so that you can play against a friend which is a really good feature, and definitely one that a game like this needs. It is tricky but in a good way really, as I for one definitely don't feel I'll ever be proficient enough at this game to tire of it. There is plenty of life in it, and is a good one to load up if you have a few friends round for a last man standing type of game. I'd say that it is definitely worth trying!

6/10 TRY IT!

A code was provided for the purpose of this review

Watch Dogs -Thoughts cont.

Hey! 

So as you all know I've been playing through Watch Dogs recently. If you follow my Twitter account (link in the side) you will have seen me venting my frustration last night. I wanted to LOVE this game and in all honesty at the minute all I feel like I do is tolerate it. It's not that bad really. But it's not the great game we were promised either. Which I just find so disappointing. 

My progression stands at just over 50% at the minute so expect more thoughts in the coming weeks. I'm in Act II right now and I have to say that even the story is starting to grate a little (never mind the utterly tiresome Fixer Contracts!). The story is just so-so, which again isn't what I expect from a powerhouse such as Ubisoft. 

I think what the now current-gen of gaming is teaching me is that the little guys should not be overlooked in favour of the big guys. Watch Dogs has been hugely hyped for a couple of years now and so for it just to be ok is extra disappointing. If I'd gone into it with no expectations it might not have been that bad. But due to the enormous ad campaign behind it it was kinda hard to not expect more from it. 

I have played the online a little now, and have to say that I find this the most enjoyable part of the game so far. The 1v1 hacking is my favourite at this point. I love watching them getting more and more panicked as the percentage creeps up. The frantic running is pretty funny!

Anyway, as I said you can probably expect more thoughts on this game as I continue. This is by no means a proper review so don't expect a blow by blow account of what works and what doesn't. I guess this is just my way of venting frustration at a game I really wanted to love. These are my honest opinions, so if they don't change or I have nothing more to add really then I won't be posting again. For now, of I had to sun up my Watch Dogs experience in one word it would be disappointment. Bitter disappointment. 

Keep gaming people!

xXx

Next Gen

So what did you all plump for? I waited and waited and waited and never really knew which one to get. My heart for this gen was totally with Xbox 360 I adored my machine and spent many hours with it. PS3 never really floated my boat, some of the games were AMAZING - Heavy Rain and The Last of Us I'm looking at you - but I felt like I was constantly battling with the interface and controller.

As any of you that read my musings on the Xbox One at the time will know I wasn't particularly impressed with either at the time. But as I researched them more I started to lean more towards the PS4, much to my partner's disgust - he is and always will be a Microsoft fanboy and literally recoils at the sight of me on my Macbook - but that system just seemed to be aimed more towards the gamers.

We left it for awhile and for a good while it was easy to ignore the next gen. The friends we had who had preordered the Xbox One (interestingly we had none that had preordered the PS4) liked it enough but didn't really rave about it. They had all kept their 360, a console we still have plenty of games left to play, for instance I STILL have not completed Skyrim, despite being 150 hours in...I just love exploring a little too much. We didn't feel like we were missing out at all really.

Christmas came and went, we got our children's birthdays out of the way and then it was getting closer and closer to the release date of Watch Dogs. Yes it was coming out on the last gen too, but who really wants to buy a new game on an old console?

So we finally plumped for...

The Xbox One. I know, I know. I HATED it at last years E3, but after waiting awhile it became more and more apparent that, for us, for our gaming preferences it HAD to be the One. The exclusives, the promise of future releases and above all the games currently available on it swung it for us. So now we have a One proudly sat underneath the TV next to its older (and more loved) brother.

It is good. Not mind-blowing, and certainly not game-changing yet. Maybe it will be in the future, but for now, for me at least it's a means to an end. I needed it to play Watch Dogs, Plants vs Zombies split screen and RYSE. But it's not earned my heart yet.

I'll be posting some opinions on the games I've been playing recently in due course.

Keep Gaming!
xXx

DLC - For Love or Profit?

DLC is meant to prolong the longevity of a game, but instead it seems more and more developers are releasing downloadable content that should have been included in the retail version.

Personally I LOVE DLC. I have spent a hell of a lot of money on all the DLC packs for, amongst many others, Mass Effect 1 & 2, Fallout 3, Fallout: New Vegas, Dragon Age: Origins, Gears of War 1 & 2, Borderlands and various Call of Duty games. I have also spent a small fortune on my Rock Band, Guitar Hero and Lips music libraries. I have no aversion to developers bringing out DLC - in fact I embrace it. I love that they are making it possible for us to go back to a game we’d completed and have something new to do, even a year after the release. 

Worth the extra 1200MSP??

But I think that should be the purpose of DLC. DLC should be an optional increase to an already amazing game. I feel there are some developers who are releasing below par games with the view to releasing a few DLC packs to cash in. Take the Call of Duty franchise for example. The games that include Zombie mode only include 1 map for the game mode. Now I am aware that Zombies isn’t the main focus for these games but if you are going to include something in a game I don’t think it should be half-assed, and to me that is what Zombies mode feels like. Particularly in the first CoD game to include this mode, Call of Duty: World at War. This zombie map basically saw players put in a hut and told to survive. There were none of the perks, machines or the desperate run to turn on the power. There was no long slog to learn the map. It was as basic as it could get so of course when DLC packs were released that promised fun by the bucket-load we all jumped at it and didn’t think twice about the extra 1200MSP spent. Our appetite for zombie annihilation was sated, for a while at least. But more and more DLC was released and we kept on buying. Overall how much have you spent on a CoD game? And after all that money, does it feel like a game with extras, or just a complete retail release? If you have bought all the map packs for CoD: Black Ops up to now you have spent £70/$105 on this game, would you have paid that for the disc in store? Somehow I doubt a game priced that high would do as well.

Resident Evil 5 was also a culprit. Capcom went as far as to release multiplayer DLC soon after retail release. The DLC was announced BEFORE the release of the game and included the games only online VS multiplayer. 400MSP saw players able to take the Mercenaries mode online and fight in 5 different modes, Slayers, Survivors, Team Slayers, Team Survivors and Versus. Surely this is something that should have been included in a $60/£40 game?

DLC is an amazing way to prolong the enjoyment gleaned from a game. I completed Mass Effect 2 last year but when ‘The Arrival’ DLC was released I was as excited as I had been when playing the game for the first time. That to me is what DLC should be. Improving an already amazing game. Not making a game complete at an extra cost.

Hi Everyone!

My name is Danielle and I’m a 24 year-old student from Manchester, England. I’ve been given the opportunity to write about one of my main passions in life…gaming! And I can’t wait! I’ve been a ‘gamer’ since I was about 4 when my parents bought a Sega Mega Drive and from that moment I was hooked. Sonic was my childhood, I played it all the time, even managing to get my techno-phobe mum addicted. Thankfully gaming has progressed massively since then and luckily enough my dad was always keeping on top of the consoles released so growing up we had every console pass through our house. When I was 13 I started my own personal collection of consoles. It started with the Gamecube, mainly just because my little brother wanted one and I wanted to beat him to it. I played Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker to death and it is still one of my most loved games despite it’s flaws. Graphically the Gamecube never quite did it for me so I soon progressed and in a short amount of time I ended up with a PS2, XBox, PSP and a DS (the big old silver one, I’m pretty sure it’s still hanging around here somewhere!).

Anyway long story short at one point I ended up owning all of the main consoles by the time the next generation was coming out. The improved graphics, immersive stories and online playing got me even more hooked and I haven’t looked back since. I cannot imagine not having games in my life, which is, unfortunately, a great disappointment to my mother.

I have to admit that for many years I looked past the FPS genre, preferring RPG’s, racing or general simulation games. The first time I picked up an FPS was in 2008 and it was Halo 3. A game I had heard a lot of hype about and it served it’s purpose in that it brought me to love FPS’s but unfortunately I could not come to love Halo. For me the physics in it are all a little arcade-y.

My current set-up (with which I am very happy with) is a 47inch LCD TV with PS3, XBox 360 Elite with Kinect. I also own a Mac and a PC (although I’m still yet to go past simulation games on these) a 3DS and a Windows Phone. I love playing any games I can get my hands on, be it a free download on the Xbox or phone or a massively hyped release on the PS3. My main console is the Xbox, I love it dearly and have cultivated my new account Dannie Kitten in the last year to what I feel is an impressive Gamerscore of 45000 ish. It’s not brilliant by any means, but it’s mine and I’m proud of it.