Robert’s Games of the Year – 2018

Estimated reading time: 7 minutes

 

Game of the Year – Far Cry 5

While I have spent some time with the Far Cry franchise, I never really got into it until Far Cry 5 came out. After some goading by my brother I finally picked it up given its co-op campaign, a rare delicacy these days, and was not disappointment. Whether it be sniping from a ridiculous distance, running-and-gunning, or causing vehicular mayhem in the open ranges of Hope County, Montana, Far Cry 5 is great on its own, but is so much more with a friend. From flight suits to animal attacks to your very own canine companion, Far Cry 5 gives you, and a friend, plenty to offer and in true Ubisoft fashion, there is no end to the sheer number of sidequests that are spaced throughout the utterly massive and incredibly hectic Far Cry 5.

First Runner Up – Kingdom Come: Deliverance

I had longstanding mixed feelings about Warhorse Studios’ ambition RPG Kingdom Come: Deliverance for quite some time; I thought that they might be biting off more than they could chew and fortunately I was wrong. Set in the Kingdom of Bohemia (part of what is now the Czech Republic) during the 15th century, Kingdom Come: Deliverance set out to be something of a unique bird in a flock of standard roleplaying games and it succeeded in the most wild of ways; from the multitude of minigames that are the crafting system to the innovative yet extraordinarily challenging combat, Kingdom Come: Deliverance did just that. Unique, challenging, and massive in scope, Kingdom Come: Deliverance is a healthy 80-romp as Hal through Medieval times.

Second Runner Up – Ancestor’s Legacy

Ancestor’s Legacy came out of left field and hit me like a semi-truck; I mean come on, who builds an interesting and relatively unique single-player RTS game these days? The great folks over at Destructive Creations, that is who. In a world plagued by MOBAs, Destructive Creations took a turn at bringing something unique to the RTS genre and they succeeded where many others have failed. A pile of interesting campaigns? Check. Well balanced and brutal medieval European combat? Check. Implemented an utterly phenomenal cinematic combat camera? Check. I only hope that Ancestor’s Legacy is the first in a long line of stunning squad-based RTS titles from Destructive Creations as the world needs more of it.

Biggest Surprise – Warhammer 40,000: Gladius – Relics of War

I was utterly floored with the initial quality of Warhammer 40k: Gladius – Relics of War as it was one of the first Warhammer 40k titles in a long time that did not immediately set my gag reflex going. With the Warhammer franchise being such a long-standing and respected franchise it was only a matter of time until someone, anyone, would bring us a decent game; fortunately the great folks at Slitherine Ltd. And Proxy Studios finally did so. Climbing to the top of the veritable pile of garbage that has been the last decade’s-worth of Warhammer and Warhammer 40,000 titles comes Gladius – Relics of War, a semi Civ-like 4X strategy title set in the 41st millennium and it is glorious … “You carry the Emperor’s will as your torch, with it destroy the shadows.” Versus of Sigismund, Book CIV, Verse 1

Guilty Pleasure – Monster Hunter: World

PY in all of his glorious cutscened render

I never really bought into the Monster Hunter titles but the latest offering, Monster Hunter: World looked interesting with its drop-in multiplayer that is not all that unlike Destiny, massive monsters, and hilariously huge weaponry. When I first loaded up MH:W I was smitten almost immediately; the lush and stunning settings, the varying tactics, the interesting weaponry… it all added up to something I was not expecting … a rich and diverse universe full of memorable moments. Not even a year out from launch and certain smells or sights or sounds will send the pangs of nostalgia through my chest that ultimately drive me back to the enchanting lands of Monster Hunter: World.

Biggest Disappointment – Strange Brigade

It pains me to say this but Rebellion really dropped the ball here; fresh off the gravy train that is Rebellion’s portfolio and distantly following up the super excellent Sniper Elite 4, Strange Brigade set out to be something of a Zombie Army Trilogy meets Indiana Jones and … it failed. “Puzzles” were lackluster, combat stale, graphics were naught but varying shades of brown, and a forced-and-fake competitive model in a cooperative title were all mashed together to make “standard soup.” Perhaps the issue is that I was expecting a level of cooperative excellence as found in the Sniper Elite or Zombie Army franchises when in reality Rebellion was trying to dish out something more party-based (ala Mario Party), I do not know, but what I do know is that the 15-20 hours that I sunk into Strange Brigade amounted to nothing more than disappointment after disappointment. Hopefully Rebellion can take this one on the chin, pick up, and move on to their next project in quick succession; I would like to get the bad taste of Strange Brigade out of my mouth sooner rather than later…

Article by: Robert

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Strange Brigade - PS4 Review

There is an undeniable charm to the intentionally B-movie thrilled provided by Strange Brigade. Beneath the enjoyable presentation stands a solid if generally unspectacular action shooter that offers a great deal to do, even if at times what is being done can get a bit repetitive.

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Strange Brigade - XB1 Review

Out of the studio that brought us the vaunted Sniper Elite franchise along with a personal favorite, the Zombie Army Trilogy, comes their newest 4-person co-op title, Strange Brigade. An amalgamation of Indiana Jones-esque adventure and the co-op shooter goodness of the Zombie Army Trilogy, Strange Brigade is a fun, if troubled-at-times romp through oft-brown levels full of zombies, ghouls, skeletons, and these really annoying bad guys that run around with torches and blow flames all over you. Flames that will absolutely kill you in no time flat. Though I was thrilled to dive into the world of Strange Brigade, I came away both somewhat satisfied and more than a little confused; though it has a handle on its identity as a co-op shooter, there are plenty of quality of life change Rebellion can look to the past to gain inspiration from.


Throwing it right out there that besides the fact that Strange Brigade uses literally two colors, brown and I'M ON FIRE DAMMIT (that is a real color, I swear), it is an absolute wonderful game to watch in motion. Crisp, clean, and 60 FPS through and through. And brown. Did I mention it is brown? Oh so much brown. Light brown, dark brown, medium brown, slightly-less-than-dark brown. All sorts of it. I swear this was the late 90's with all the browns (looking at you Quake franchise). Sure, the levels are gorgeous if linear, traps are numerous and lifesaving (yup, I said that), and overall quite predictable, but still… BROWN. Oh, and the pop-up crucified mummy things? They are way over-used for ghetto jump scares.

But the first one? You will likely poop your pants. More brown. So … much … brown.

The four playable characters (or five, if you have the season pass), true to traditional Rebellion standards, are varied and interesting to hear as they babble. My personal favorite is Gracie Braithwaite because man oh man that accent. Utterly delicious. There is the Rebellion trademark character Frank Fairburne (who I am quite convinced, is simply Chris Pine in disguise), which is a play on the other Rebellion titles' primary characters, Archimedes de Quincy, all-around pretty boy and in my personal opinion, a little b*tch. Then there is the epic badass, Nalangu Rushida, a local to the setting of the game who is pretty wicked great. Outside of different amulet powers (i.e. magic that you charge up and unleash to devastating effect), there really is no difference between the characters outside of their little quips, and my thoughts on that are, if the person has a wildly attractive accent, why not play them? With the Season Pass you get a new skin for each (which is a ridiculously horrible color change; Gracie goes from badass worker-lady to doe-eyed milk maid in the span of zero to "this sucks", and let us not speak of Fairburne's skin…). You also get a new character, Winston Bey, who is actually a pretty solid guy, is nigh-identical to the other four. A little variety would be nice…

Speaking of variety, Strange Brigade does have one particular area where there is plenty of variety … and that is in how to rid yourself of the pesky living dead. You can pull out your trusty sidearm and pew-pew them to death (again). Fancy a 1920's-1940's era sub or light machine gun? You can do that too. Looking for some single-action rifle goodness that can turn them baddies into pink mist at 200 yards? Strange Brigade has you covered. Me? Oh I myself am stupid for the shotgun, especially after adding the quickfire upgrade (yeah, you can upgrade your weapons, but it is a stupid and painstakingly annoying process), which is less about firing and more about reloading… Anyhow, it makes baddies fly back and it hits a whole pile of them at a time. Love it.

What I do NOT love is that in co-op games, since your loot is not instanced, it was a constant battle between my brother and I for who gets the next treasure chest or who gets that pile of coin. Think that is bad? That badass magic amulet I mentioned before? Yeah, you need to charge that by killing dead things and sucking up their souls (I did not realize the living dead had souls)…. Except those are not instanced either so it really became a case of neither of us feeling much desire to move on to the next pile of enemies because we both wanted to hang back and grab all the precious souls that we could so we could do some nasty damage to whatever was coming our way. That was with my brother who I have been playing cooperatively with all of my gaming life… Trying that in a public match or even with four friends? Rage-quitting will be the new old thing again.

That same rage-inducing, party-destroying mechanic can be found with the collectibles and the weapon upgrades. See, weapon upgrades are runes, runes that you need to find via chests, and because those chests are not instanced that means the first person to the chest gets the find. In theory it forces players to work together; in practice it just goes to show that gamers are greedy and that all it takes is a single player to ruin the experience for a great many others. On that same topic, trying to upgrade to a new amulet is an ordeal and one that is unfair to the casual gamer; you have to essentially find each and every little secret or obscure item in order to maybe get the chance to upgrade. That is, assuming your asshat teammates let you get it. Which they will not, because they are busy trying to upgrade THEIR equipment/amulets.

Though I may be harsh on Strange Brigade it is because it is coming from a studio that has consistently put out top-quality, engaging, enjoyable, and replayable titles; Zombie Army Trilogy, next to Tom Clancy's The Division and Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon: Wildlands is one of the most-played titles in my household. Sniper Elite 3 is literally one of the only games I have 100%'ed … since the Super Nintendo was the primary household gaming system. I can say this with utter certainty … After beating Strange Brigade I will not be back to play it again for a long, long time. I cannot say the same for other Rebellion titles, as they are not chalk-full of reused and tiresome puzzles, simple and predictable levels, or sympathetic player characters. Sure the mid-mission briefings done old-school Newsreel-style with a bit of comic relief thrown in are spectacular, but it just feels "off."

However, even an off title by Rebellion is still a solid title; while I cannot imagine Strange Brigade being the next big franchise in cooperative shooters, it is still, as mentioned, an enjoyable if confusing affair for those that have played titles from the old Rebellion.

Game Information

Platform:
Microsoft Xbox One
Developer(s):
Rebellion
Publisher(s):
Rebellion
Genre(s):
Action
Adventure
Mode(s):
Single Player
Online Multiplayer
Other Platform(s):
Sony PlayStation 4
PC

Source:
Provided by Publisher

Article by Robert

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