J4MES OX4D

Half Life 2: Episode Two (2007)

God this franchise really embarrasses itself sometimes. Always starts of as a serious but casual military themed shooter and by the end its almost a cartoon as they fish for any business they can get. If they are gonna go down the nauseating influencer/celeb route then why not get ones that actually play the bloody game!

Looks to be a surprise hit! I didn't get the original as it came out off the back of many 3rd person-type games and it seemed a bit generic despite being mechanically solid. The sequel seems to have some notable improvements across the board and looks quite exceptional really. The part-procedurally generated environments also seem impressive and more fleshed out this time and the gunplay along with movement is probably as good as you could get with a game of this nature. Really considering picking it up and the co-op is supposed to be very good also. This also being a £40 game and not a broken and unfinished £60 is making it even more tempting..

I don't mind this - give Sledgehammer a crack at Modern Warfare, wind the series up for good and then IW can move onto something else next time with a bit of luck. Hopefully we wont see MW4 and that they keep dragging it out as painful as Black Ops has become. Just hope it isn't glorified DLC disguised as a full priced game - it's risky them doing back to back sequels but Activision have backed themselves into a strategic calamity with this release. Sledgehammer do try their best and are heavily under-resourced compared to the other developers and have a pretty extreme turnover of staff so I don't think they have too much to lose especially being put under so much pressure. Not sure if I'll get this one though - really depends on the other releases this year and whether there's enough in it. Baldur's Gate 3 next week which is massive and then all eyes on Starfield before the Metal Gear Solid Collection. If it's just a watered-down expansion then it will be a real shame and ultimately pave the way for MW4 in 2025.

Things are not going well for Overwatch 2 and they are looking to turn things around by bringing the game to Steam on August 10th Overwatch 2 Engagement and Player Investment Is Declining, Activision Blizzard Admits - IGN WWW.IGN.COM Activision Blizzard admits in its recent earnings report that the engagement and player investment in Overwatch 2 is declining. Other Blizzard games may follow in due course especially with Microsoft coming in and this game will be a good one to test the water. Pity you will need to double-DRM with Bnet still.

Absolute bellends Your Ubisoft account can be suspended and subsequently permanently deleted for 'inactivity,' taking your games library with it | PC Gamer WWW.PCGAMER.COM I have no idea when I last logged into my Ubisoft account. Maybe if they made some decent fucking games once in a long while, it would give gamers an incentive to actually login and use their shitty services.

Found this incredible compilation of all the levolution events and destruction in Battlefield games since 2011. Some of these still look absolutely spectacular especially the BF4 ones a decade on. Remarkably impressive technically even now and they look and sound incredible! Got a bit limited since BF1 and really started to feel flat up to 2042. Despite the silly terminology, these destructible elements added so much and even radically changed maps on the fly. DICE were really at their peak with things like this and I think it was taken for granted a bit back in the day and largely went unappreciated because we assumed that this is how gaming should be and where it expected to be now. Battlefield 2042 even after all the work still remains soulless and bland in this respect and it’s levolution events amount of mere inconvenience most of the time. I really hope the next Battlefield game goes back to these roots. No more WW2 titles or gimmick futuristic ones. BF3 and 4 just oozed unmatched atmosphere and detail.

Elder Scrolls Online FREE on Epic https://store.epicgames.com/en-US/p/the-elder-scrolls-online

Metal Gear Solid fans will immediately recognise this

PES 3, 4, 5 and 6 were absolutely legendary! Even the original and its sequel were amazing because they were perfect captures of the PS1 ISS originals with vastly improved visuals and smoother gameplay. 3-6 really brought in the realism as it shifted away from its more arcade-roots. PES going to shit after the 360 launched was so devastating and really surprising and despite rejuvenating around 2015, they still didn't get anywhere near where they once were IMO. PS2 + PES, GTA and MGS = great days!

Commandos 2 HD Remaster

This is what pisses me off about EA and Konami - they spent so many years working on things like ball physics, animations, AI and trying to create the most authentic football experience possible and they threw that all away by chasing easy money instead. PES brickwalled itself once the Fox Engine went as far as they could push it and EA stopped innovating when UT really really printing money daily. I used to love seeing FIFA improve around 2008-13 - EA were so passionate about the game back then and they really pressed home their advantage over the faltering PES back then and every new release was an improvement that strived to only get better as the next gen loomed. Instead of the usual PR shite we see today, the devs really understood football and did their best with the limitations. Other brands don't stand a chance now because of the required development and huge licencing costs. eFootball proved that something as simple as an engine change can set a company back 15 years and 3 years on, that game is still total horseshit compared to the final PES game. It's such a travesty these two still control the market and no real credible competitor is out there and probably never will be. The FIFA licence going up for grabs was massive and not one single publisher took it on which just shows there is not an alternative dev that can make a football game in the next 5 years and no publisher is willing to pay up and take a chance. People expected 2K to jump in sometime in the past 10 years and they didn't even dip their toes in despite dominating sports many years ago. They went the same way as EA too and their basketball games are horrifying. FIFA should be so much better than what it is right now. I honestly don't think we'll see a proper football simulator ever again or anything remotely close.

Well this looks a bit disappointing. Cringeworthy presentation too! TDU2 was an absolute classic which had a fantastic world and huge attention to detail. This looks like Forza from Wish and probably worse than The Crew 2.

Another thing is all these trailers are nowhere near representative of the game or football either. Just a load of OTT nonsense with ludicrous animations, camera work and effects. These 'gameplay' trailers should all contain in-engine direct captures. Oh and I take it all back what I said above - EA did give us raw gameplay; about 1.7 seconds of it and it looks like FIFA 23, FIFA 22, FIFA 21, FIFA 20, FIFA 19 and FIFA 18. I really miss the 08-13 era because FIFA was just going from strength to strength and improvements were obvious and could truly be felt. The amount that was accomplished between 2007 and 2012 was so significant and although the series was propelled by a window of demise by PES as it struggled with a generational change, FIFA in that era had the licence and they finally had the gameplay to back it up with. Frostbite is a complete crock of shit for this game and the animations are worse than what they were a decade ago. The only difference with this engine is that there is a greater animation library but most of the time its just bloated with wonkiness and the engine itself cannot fathom which one to use so everything appears janky and cumbersome especially in slow mo. This was something PES nailed perfectly time and time again and things like the ball physics was a sight to behold as it captured everything perfectly. The games are also beginning to look so last gen too and I think we're getting to the stage where Frostbite is already pushed to its limitations, not just in this but with Battlefield too. E-Football is still two years off getting back to square one and that's wishful thinking and the other football game (UFL) is still not set in stone yet. Christ I miss the days when there was so much choice - Actua Soccer, TiF, ISS, Pro Evo, Adidas Power Soccer, Actua Soccer, UEFA Striker etc...

35 minutes of no gameplay and Erling Haaland and his pyjamas and that's it. Complete waste of time. These EA PR drivel events are so tiresome every year.

Kill confirmed for me. Doesn't require much brainpower and isn't super stressful. It's basically TDM with an additional extra. Still defies belief how many people play this and don't pick up tags right in front of them for easy XP though. I used to enjoy domination but once again, players not playing the objective can ruin the match. Literally no point in going 25-5 if you're team is 30-170 points down.

I nearly played that joke last night funnily enough🤣

Literally the whole of the UK could go net zero this time next week and China alone could absolutely negate everything we do in less than 24 hours by increasing their output by a measly 0.005%. I'm also paying an extra £7,000+ a year on haulage costs from my trade teams yet these vehicles in use 330 times a year not even exclusively to me contribute less than a single plane in operation for a week flying the same amount of time. Countries like China and the US should be setting examples but all that's happened is other counties have made commitments and the likes of China have capitalised on such reductions in productivity by increasing their own and then bolstering their overseas trade back to the countries who reduced their own output!

I know it’s not just heatwaves and I’m also not dismissing climate change - it’s a combination of media pressure on the public, shitholes like Twitter laden with misinformation, and absolute fucking morons like Sadiq Khan branding people (inducing local Muslim business owners) ‘nazi’s’ for being against aggressive environmental measures which is also proving to be a nice little forced revenue stream for his overseas business ventures. The majority of weather events attributed to climate change these days still remain factually unproven and records demonstrate that such extreme weather phenomenons have existed long before even records began. That’s not to say climate isn’t a factor today but the media are very quick to jump and play the climate change card. When the majority of climate protesters are hypocrites too, it can be impossible to sway other people especially with science still failing to provide concrete forwarding models. Them lot are really cashing in and they have nothing to lose and a guaranteed pile of money at their feet every 5 years.

This is an incredible remix!

I think a lot of it is fear-mongering. Climate is definitely an issue and things have to change environmentally, but there are several hundred instances on record where extreme incidents of weather have occurred that cannot be attributed to typical aggravating human factors. This time last year the UK had a 3 day heatwave where temps exceeded 35 and the record was broken, however 40 years previous, we experienced 15 days consecutive where it was greater than 32 degrees. The media and heavily-funded scientists tried to pin the phenomenon exclusively on climate last summer but it could’ve just been a nice few days of summer on a smaller scale than 40 years ago. It was bordering on Armageddon doomsday according to the BBC though! If there really is an emergency then how about start grounding more commercial planes and private jets instead of rinsing the public for money simply for driving their cars on roads they need to travel down. Also doesn’t help with most protesters being hypocrites and disrupting innocent people.

Skin? Ok, not sure what you’re going on about there. Also not sure how I am talking out of my ass by relaying public information. Maybe it’s because you don’t like what’s being said but I honestly thought we left the fanboy gatekeeping behind back in 2012. It’s also funny because the last time you accused me of ‘talking out my ass’, everything I said turned out to be 100% correct and that didn’t even stretch to the educated predictions I made after which was a sweet bonus😎

FTC and the CMA were simply acting in the interests of other global companies and the impact such a merger would have. I fail to see why you are so against this? MS were forced into damning admissions to in regards to their overall motive for the move and their knee-jerk purchases of other developers they have locked to their books but fail to support. Oversight bodies are perfectly within their right to raise any litigation or make rejections with credible reason. I find it really bizarre that you are so far up Activision’s rectum with this whole saga - it’s a merger of two multi-billion dollar companies that will have no benefit to gamers or developers and will likely suppress other companies from making independent strides. It’s not going to make Call of Duty any better - it’s just gonna make Bobby and Bill even more money and that’s it. it’s also not in the interests of legal bodies to pursue further litigation because it would simply be too costly and an impossible battle to win against a homegrown corporation with endlessly deep pockets who can easily sway judges who can’t fathom how to even work a toaster. Any gamer and developer would be rather concerned about what has transpired from MS in court.