Geekly Review #185

A day late, but that’s because we’ve just enjoyed a 3 day weekend thanks to the Bank Holiday. It’s also a shorter week for us this week as we’re into the final stretch before the other half of G.S.R.R Will, gets married on Friday. Here’s what we’ve got up to on our extended weekend.

Titanfall 2

I got Titanfall 2 for Christmas, but before starting it wanted to complete a few other games and clear some backlog. Prior to starting TF2 I cleared Wolfenstien: New Order, Uncharted 4, Far Cry Primal, Tomb Raider & Firewatch. Well after clearing all those games I felt a bit of gaming fatigue and needed to take a break. Then Zelda came out, so TF2 ended up falling down the list. But I finally picked it up and completed it over the past week. I was genuinely surprised with how good the campaign was for this. Reviews all favoured the campaign when they hit, but I was honestly very hooked to it. Each level was very different from the last and had a unique tone to them. From the factory that creates artificial words twisting and turning to the level where you flick between modern time and the past at the press of a button. And you do get rather attached to your Titan B-T. Short campaign though, but when a game is built for mainly multiplayer and they put together a campaign to accompany the multiplayer aspect of it, what can you expect really? I enjoyed it very much.

Horizon: Zero Dawn

And very late to the party with this one, but I finally got Horizon: Zero Dawn. Holy Shit! this game is something else. I’ve clocked up 5 hours play time on Monday (I bought it Monday afternoon) and have been blown away by it. The intro of the game having you play as young Aloy is brilliant. The visuals from the get go are just stunning. Everything about this game so far is just wow. I’m progressing through the main questline currently, but have found myself side tracked with the side quests and just hunting. The hunting is awesome, I love crouching in the long grass familiarizing yourself with the walking pattern of a watcher then striking when the moment is right. Some of the machines you tackle in the early stages can be a challenge but it’s all worth it for the salvage to increase Aloy’s items, armour and weapons. Will questioned was it like Far Cry when I told him I’d been playing it for a while. While it’s nothing like Far Cry in terms of taking over towers and such, there are a few elements that are borrowed from the series with regards to the crafting mechanics. Hunt certain machines and wild life to create an upgrade for your resource pack. Pretty standard mechanic really. I cannot wait to get back onto this.

Get Out & John Wick 2

And away from games, I spent the Sunday evening watching some films I’d wanted to check out on release but never got around to. Get Out & John Wick 2. Get Out had some pretty damn awesome twists and turns in it. While I knew the general premise of the film, it still left my wife and I stunned at the turn of events. And when Rose said one word towards the end that didn’t make sense initially, when it clicked with what exactly was happening it was a real “woah!” realization moment. Great film which I couldn’t recommend enough. John Wick 2 was pretty much what you’d expected it to be. Another 2 hours of stylish murder. While the film was once again about John getting revenge for something, thankfully this time it wasn’t as brutal as his adorable puppy being killed. Some excellent scenes from in Italy feature in this film. Looking forward to more of the John Wick franchise.

– Murr

Overwatch

Season 4 is over and the anniversary update is live. How did everyone do this season? Did you reach your target SR, I know I didn’t. When I first did my placement matches I was ranked really low, around 1400 SR I think. I was pretty annoyed by it as I felt like I was better than that. I’m not an amazing player, but I’m pretty decent. As I ranked so low I kind of lost interest in playing and only really picked it back up again towards the end of the season, I eventually finished just under 1900 SR, so I’d made some progress, but still pretty low really. Season 5 imminent and I’m determined to make some good progress and get a lot higher in the ranks.

I’ve been playing a lot the last week mainly just to try and unlock some of the anniversary items and so far I’m doing pretty well. I’ve unlocked some of the new skins – which all look awesome, and a few of the dance emotes too. There has been quite a lot of controversy around the amount of items up for grabs this update and the fact that there isn’t much time to try and grab them all. I have a feeling that the dance emotes will be set to a permanent unlock instead of timed for the event.

The Overwatch team have also started teasing out what could be the reveal of a new hero! Exciting!

I think I’m going to start streaming some Overwatch on my YouTube channel, starting with my placement matches when I’m back from being married and having some time off. So tune in!

Gwent

Gwent went in to open beta last week! It feels like its been in closed beta for ages and I’ve not actually played it in a little while, so it was a nice little prompt for me to jump back on and see what’s new. From the off I could see that challenges have been added to the game for single player. These are basically a great way to get to grips with the game and the different factions whilst also earning a nice amount of ore to then buy kegs with.

Since the release of the open beta I’ve mostly played scoia’tael and I have to say that I’ve been really enjoying using them. A lot of the cards can be used across different combat rows and most of the cards work on either buffing your units or debuffing the enemy. You can create some very interesting strategies with them. I’m going to try and focus on getting more cards for that deck to then build up my own one.