Moving On

A few days ago I took a job writing for Gamespresso.  While I will try to still post to PBG occasionally, my focus has been shifted.  I ask anyone who read PBG to please come join me on this new site.  I'm excited for future content to come.

Blake Hester

Far Cry 4 - Valley of the Yetis Trailer

Source: PlayStation

Coming March 10, 2015, Far Cry 4's Valley of the Yetis DLC puts protagonist Ajay Ghale against the Himalayas, a dangerous cult, and Yetis. Yeah, freaking Yetis. We're very excited about this and you should be too.  For more info on Valley of the Yetis, stay tuned to PBG.  

Hunger Screenshots

Hunger is the new game from Swedish developers Tarsier Studios, the minds behind LittleBigPlanet PS Vita.  Tarsier's official blog had this to say about the game:

"At its heart, Hunger is a simple idea. A young girl is trapped in a labyrinth full of monsters and wants to escape. It will be your job to help her do this. It’s a genre we’re calling ‘suspense-adventure’, on account of the fact that there will be plenty of both. Coupled with an unnerving ‘Dollhouse Perspective’, tactile controls, and characters with soft, dark centres, Hunger will take your hand and let it go at the worst possible moment!"

Check out some eerie screenshots for Hunger below.  For more news and info, keep it locked here on PBG.

                     Source: Tarsier Studios

Hunger - Teaser Trailer

Source: Tarsier Studios

Developed by Tarsier Studios, the studio behind LittleBigPlanet PS Vita, comes the new game Hunger.  Described in a blog post as being "suspense-adventure," due to the game having "plenty of both," Hunger will follow a young girl as she tries to escape a labyrinth known only as "The Maw."  For more information on Hunger, keep it locked on PBG.

Technical Issues

Due to a failing internet connection, our Twitch stream got cut short tonight.  Hopefully future streams will run more smoothly.  Sorry for the inconvenience.

Twitch Tuesday!

I usually do a "Twitch Monday," but was just far too tired yesterday.  So, yesterdays missed stream will be done tonight at 8pm Eastern Time (5pm CST).  Once again, I will be streaming The Wolf Among Us, I'm doing episode three this week, and I invite anyone to join and contribute to the conversation.  See you there!

Link to profile.

The Order: 1886 Review

Title: The Order: 1886

Platform(s): PlayStation 4

Release Date: February 20, 2015

ESRB: Mature

Review by Blake Hester

In The Order: 1886, London hangs by a thread and its rescue or demise lies in your hands. But with nothing as it seems, achieving a solution may be easier said than done. Developed by Ready At Dawn, The Order: 1886 tells one of the more interesting stories in games of the past few years. Its use of film techniques to tell its story, coupled with the game's solid gameplay and excellent combat, as well as its interesting twists on history, make for a very good experience. But The Order's often lengthy stretches with no action, misuse of a great location, and poor use of Quick Time Events ultimately take away from the game being something great.

Taking place in an alternate Victorian London, The Order tells a story of a secret war that has raged for centuries between a species of Halfbreed Lycans and Mankind. Keeping man safe and the war away from the public eye are the Queen of England's Royal Knights, or “The Order.” Knights of The Order are sworn under oath to protect man from the Halfbreeds and are bound to allegiance by the use of Blackwater, an elixir that extends life and speeds up physical recovery. When a mysterious attack plagues the London trade monopoly, The United India Company, The Order is sent in to rectify the situation. The Order quickly blames the anarchist group, “The Rebellion,” for mixing with the Halfbreeds in an effort to overthrow the monarchy. A desperate battle begins between The Order and The Rebellion and it is a race against time to save London from those who wish to see it brought to its knees.

Players are given control of the Knight, Grayson or “Sir Galahad,” whose blind allegiance to The Order often stands in the way of him seeing the corruption that digs its nails deep within the back of those who control London. Conspiracies run deep, pitting many groups against each other, all the while masking secret alliances. Galahad must search for answers quickly or the entire species may be at risk and the very cause he has fought for for centuries may be for nothing.

One of The Order's main draws is its fascinating story. The game tells a story of brotherhood, betrayal, and rebellion. The game builds up a rich lore, and it's hard to not want to know more about The Order, this centuries old war, and how things became the way they are in London. The story's pacing is slow, but deliberate, never giving players an absolute conclusion and always leaving them wanting more. As Galahad digs through the layers of conspiracies, The Order inches you closer and closer to the edge of your seat as one answer is given and another is asked. By the time the credits roll, players are not given a full resolution. But it doesn't feel as though the game robs you of answers, rather it leaves you wanting more.

The Order takes place takes place in 19^th century London around the time of the Industrial Revolution. But, the game is an alternate view of history where technology is far more advanced and items such as the zeppelin and the fully automatic rifle were invented decades before they were in our universe. Ready At Dawn bends history in a way that is as believable as it can be. Rather than giving Galahad lasers and iPhones in Victorian London, the imported inventions usually are only borrowed from a few decades after 1886. This makes their inclusion in the game more believable, implying that the universe this game takes place in is only maybe forty or fifty years more advanced than our own.

Even the game's completely fictional arsenal makes sense with the time period. Weapons such as the Arc Gun that weaponizes a Jacob's Ladder and the Thermite Gun that sprays a layer of iron oxide and aluminum before shooting a flair to ignite it stay true to the inventions and discoveries of the time. A lot of care was taken by Ready At Dawn to make liberties with history believable and it shows as I was willing to suspend my belief as far as they asked me to.

The Order looks phenomenal. Character models and environments are meticulously detailed, giving breath to the world. Halfbreeds are truly terrifying and watching their American Werewolf-esque transformation from human to Lycan is equally as anatomically believable as it is visually horrifying. Districts of London, such as Whitechapel and Westminster amongst others, have their own distinct feels that make each area feel unique. But, I wish there were more opportunities for exploration in the game. Very early on there is a shot of the entire city, allowing you to take in this world that Ready At Dawn has created. But when Galahad reaches the streets, they feel claustrophobic and linear, as if the entire city was built out of alleyways.

The Order is a story driven game and it is a very cinematic game. Taking cues from games like The Last Of Us, The Order uses film techniques such as lens flares and shaky-handycams to heighten the atmosphere. Visual nuances such as dust and scratch marks add to the over-all look of the game, giving the impression that the world is affecting the game camera. Cutscenes can tend to be long, but it never feels like a chore to watch them. On top of the great story, The Order has excellent voice acting that gives characters plenty of emotion and personality. Even at their longest, I was always completely enthralled by the cutscenes, ready to learn more about the story.

The Order interjects small cutscenes into gameplay in an effort to make a more fluid cinematic experience. Things such as going through a doorway or rounding a corner may be substituted for a cinematic that shows characters having brief conversations or alerting players to an item of interest. I imagine this may be distracting for some, or they will feel that control is taken away from the player too often. But, personally, I thought this was a very unique and fluid way of storytelling for a video game and I found that control was never taken away more than that of a Telltale game, for example.

I did encounter a few muddy textures as the game loaded new areas and occasionally the frame rate dropped, but for the most part The Order is a fluid experience. Also, a few side characters or background NPCs will look fairly expressionless. But these are nothing that belittles the overall presentation. With that being said, there is a fog that surrounds the whole game that did have a tendency to lower my field of vision. This could have been included in efforts to add to the dark atmosphere of the game, but personally I found it distracting. This also hindered a lot of environments from standing out, as they were masked by a layer of murk.

The Order: 1886 plays extremely well. There is a weight to controlling Galahad that makes him feel solid and grounded in the world. Firefights are excellent and tense. Galahad, even when in the company of other members of The Order, is often outnumbered and taking only a couple of bullets can result in death. So this makes it necessary to be precise when aiming and smart when taking shots. Understanding when to hunker down in cover and when to move offensively is also necessary for staying alive in the game. Players can use Blackwater to revive themselves, but also to slow down time and take more precise shots at enemy weak points. Enemies and allies will communicate with each other, alerting one another when they are reloading, when to stay behind cover, and when they need help. This not only adds to the presentation of the combat, but also can be used strategically in the moment, allowing you to have better knowledge of what is going on around you. The firefights always had my heart in my throat as I never felt in control of the situation. Rather each bullet that I was able to get to make contact felt like a godsend.

One issue I did have with the game is that there is often too much time between action sequences. The first third of the game especially has many moments where you just make Galahad walk from point A to point B, then to point C, and then at point D you finally get to shoot someone. A lot of this is spent advancing the story, but I feel like a lot of that could have been done in cutscene rather than on foot. In the last two thirds of the game, this isn't as bad and players are able to engage in a lot more action and gunfights take a lot more time to get through. But forcing players to walk continuously through the beginning of the game can get incredibly stale and repetitive as there isn't much to explore and despite a handful of collectibles, there isn't much to see in the game either.

The Order's heavy use of Quick Time Events has been the thing of criticism in the time leading up to the game's launch. While it is true that the game is rife with QTEs, for the most part (though not completely), a lot of these don't feel like flaws in the game. Most of the QTEs are prompts such as pressing one button repeatedly to get an enemy off Galahad or to reach for an item that is far away, both which are constant in most video games. The use of QTEs such as this don't personally bother me and I never found them to be distracting in The Order.

However, there are a few examples of the game using QTEs as a crutch and ultimately taking away from the overall experience. The game has no melee system and during occasional stealth sections when a melee attack is required to maintain cover, the game opts for a time-sensitive button prompt that if missed leads to failure. This becomes especially frustrating towards the tail end of the game where an extremely long stealth section becomes boring and repetitive as you are forced to repeatedly start over because you couldn't press triangle in rhythm with the game. Similarly, boss fights in the game rely heavily on QTEs. These moments are built up to be extremely tense, but they lose momentum fast, as all you have to do is strike, then move the analog stick in the direction the game tells you to to evade. Boss fights come during very pivotal moments of the story and the game takes away the overall intensity of the moment with these simple button prompts. These moments feel lazy on the developer's part and hopefully later entries to the series will opt for more fleshed out melee mechanics and more intense boss fights.

The Order:1886 is an interesting ride. Its unique way of intertwining gameplay with its excellent story makes for a seamless experience that keeps players interested in what will happen next. The Order's twist on European history paired with its great gameplay and excellent combat make this a journey worth taking, but unfortunately too much downtime in the game mixed with lazy QTE sections don't give too much reason to stay in London once the credits roll on this entry. Hopefully a sequel will fix these issues and give us reason to return during the next go around.

7 out of 10

Very Good. This game is worth playing, but it may have unforgivable issues that hinder it from cracking the top three. It may be a fun game in the moment, but also may be forgettable in the end.