My Usual Spiel: Battlefield 4, Lookin' good and Feelin' fine

Just a quick note on this review, as I finish this three expansion have already been released namely China Rising, Second Assault and most recently Naval Strike. I will go through the expansions in later post hopefully when all of them have been released, for this review I just want to focus on the initial game. Also I’ve decided to do a single score out of 10 and a what I like/didn’t like to give a better idea and sum up of the review though it doesn’t mean too much I’m just giving an honest opinion.

Release date: 31/10/13
Genre: First person Shooter 
Publisher: EA 
Developer: Dice 
Platforms: PC/PS3/X360 
Players: 1 to 64 Online 
Classification: M (ESRB)


Well that was quick, another Battlefield game already, I suppose it has been two years, it just seemed that every time I’d go back to Battlefield 3 there was a new expansion out though there was 5 different ones over that period too and 5 yet to come for Battlefield 4 but we’ll get into that later.

I was never terribly excited about Battlefield 4, after 3 I really didn’t know what to expect the game had changed so much since my beloved BF2 that I really didn’t think that much would change and suffice to say not much has changed, but what has changed has been good. It’s as if the feel of the game has been freshened up slightly, I used to dislike using battlelog, but having a bit of a poke around and exploring the various options has given me a better understanding of the whole thing. Even the parts that I found confusing in the last game regarding all the upgrades and unlocks for your weapon and also the main map interface just seemed easier to use. 

All good here at base, not blown up or anything.

 I’ve been having a lot of fun with the game since I’ve gotten it, and most of that fun was with friends of course. I managed to get Battlefield 4 for a bargain price at ozgameshop by purchasing the code only, usually I’d be sceptical of these sort of things but it went pretty smoothly I got the code emailed to me and I downloaded and installed and it was all fine though by “all fine” I mean that the game installed fine, there was still a few problems with connecting to servers and the games crashing but we’ll get onto that. Among a few changes China’s PLA (People’s Liberation Army) have made a return meaning that in some maps it’s the Chinese versus the Russians.
 

The new Chinese player models

I am now going to talk about the singleplayer mode cause I did play it but unfortunately it won’t be very high praise as it was quite insignificant. Practically being the same as before you were a part of a squad of American Soldiers and become part of a huge conspiracy/thingy except this time China plays a major role. So needless to say you go places, shoot people, blow up things, you survive explosions, buildings collapsing you listen to your squadmates and others banter alot, you smuggle people out, you make decisions, you do quick time events etc. It’s exciting don’t get me wrong but it’s just the same old go in shoot that, get him blah blah blah oh this happens oh that happens, meh well glad that’s over with time for multiplayer. I was reading an interview with the developers of the Battlefield series and one was saying that back in Battlefield 2 that “the game was pretty hardcore back then, with no singleplayer aspect apart from bot matches and only one game mode” and I though thought to myself “that’s all it needed!” though I digress some of the other game modes are fun, inc rush. This whole idea of matching other games awesome singleplayer mode like Call of Duty that DICE (or EA) has is just misguided, all they need is some kind of training mode for multiplayer and that’s it, the singleplayer mode is not needed and is a waste of time.

"Yeh I don't know why we're doing this either."

 This time when diving into Multiplayer I was determined to get to grips with the Battlelog. For those who don’t know the Battlefield 3 and 4 server browser and profile viewer/editor is accessed through Battlelog which is a site your web browser.  I been through it a few times and think I got the hang of what’s going on, I even updated my emblem which shows up on your weapon, occupied vehicle and player ID, you also see them in the player details bar of who killed you, this was useful information as some people have pretty funny emblems and I wanted to make one. I also signed up to Gravatar in order to change my avatar cause you know I like to fill out my profile. The Battlelog is pretty extensive with the stats showing lots of stats for the guns/items and vehicles.

The battlelog, much easier now that I know what the frack I'm doin

I purchased Premium for Battlefield 4 not too long ago and with that you get access to all of the current and coming expansions. Additional Premium Battlepacks which are sort of like prize bags where you can get anything from Weapon accessories, Dog Tags, Character customization and XP Boosts which I really need to remember to use. Premium also gives you priority in server queues, which is a huge help especially when you’re trying to join your friends and are 7^th in line. All of this is good but it meant spending another $50, but I suppose it works out cheaper in the end. I must say though that I regret getting the “unlock all pistols” free as I realise that unlocking things is all part of the game though I suppose I don’t use pistols all that much and would take forever to unlock them all. 

Hiding near the flag, I do that a lot.

I haven’t really dug too deep into the server browser and finding games as I’ve mostly been playing with friends so I’ve just been joining their games. I’ve had some issues connecting, you just need to basically keep trying then it eventually works, though once you are playing there is still some problems with crashing though after several patches it’s become a lot better recently. I really enjoy the new in-game interface it really brings out my eyes, wait no, it really makes things easier. The spawning interface shows you what vehicles are available at what spawn point and areas that you are able to spawn other then captured flags and the HQ, these are represented by white circles on the HUD. You can also select your squad members and see through their eyes through a smaller screen to check if it’s safe to spawn, something I’ve forgotten to do many times. The usual class options are there allowing you to pick your class before you spawn and also shows you what weapons and utilities you have selected, which reminds me actually I need to make sure I’ve got everything set up correctly all this stuff being unlocked is hard to keep up with things as it is.

Spawn screen, the map is Zavod 311 on Conquest normal hence the smaller map

 Controls haven’t really changed, their basically fine, I’ve mapped my crouch key to one of my thumb mouse buttons which helps immensely and I’ve also finally found out why when I prone I jump immediately back up again (I was holding forward) apart from that I can’t see if too much has changed. The controls are you basic FPS controls so are easy enough to use and drive vehicles and fly helicopters and planes which seem slightly easier to fly then before though choppers are still massive targets for Anti-air anything. I do like the new truck vehicles and the Jet skis though their quite hard to manoeuvre being so twitchy, I managed to beach myself a few times. I must also say that boats are a bit OP with their main gun and two chaingun slots, especially in the Paracel Storm map which is heavily sea/island orientated oh and speaking of which, when that storm comes and the sea starts rolling it gets damn intense. 

Killer waves dude.

The character and vehicle customization screens are now much easier to use in my opinion, the kits have each customization now in categorized ‘slots’, weapons a that can be customised have a gear icon on them that leads to the weapon customization screen. The guns you unlock are now divided into sections i.e. assault rifles, shotguns making them much easier to sort through then Battlefield 3 where you just clicked through them all and you didn’t know what was a carbine and what was a “PDW”. I really enjoy the new in-game interface as I’m not sure the specifics of what they have done it’s just better than before, I approve!

Weapon choosing interface, it's complicated but still simple enough to manage.

 The graphics are beautiful as usual, sometimes I just stop to look around as it looks magnificent, then I get shot but meh, enough time to take a screenshot, seeing the Frostbite 3 engine in action is great  and most of the players and vehicles look damn real but of course they always have, you can’t really get much more real but they can try at least. What I liked most about the new maps was the difference in weather and time of day for example some were clear skies, others were either sunset, nighttime or stormy which I’ll get into with the Levolution, though some of the sunset (or sunrise I dunno what) looked amazing the sun glare was a bit too realistic, what I mean is it’s all well and good to successfully reproduce annoying sunglare but it actually gets really annoying sometimes. 

Ah what magnificent sunlight, just don't blind me please

 I can’t really say much else about the graphics though they look as great as they did last time, if not better. I enjoyed all the foliage and the trees coming down plus the major destruction of the buildings that has been toned back up to the levels of Bad Company 2, man on one map I saw the “Farm” flag (which is Alpha I think) at the start of a round which is a small farm settlement, about 10 minutes into the game it was completely flattened of anything that could be flattened and possibly some things that weren’t supposed to be able to be flattened.  There’s also something called Levolution which alters the map in certain ways such as buildings and towers collapsing and in the Flood Zone map you can destroy a Dam levy and well the place gets flooded and amphibious vehicles and boats start spawning. one of my favourites is the Golmud railway one where one flag is a train that if one team captures it starts moving along the tracks closer to their main base.

My thoughts exactly.

I can't tell you how glad I am that they've brought the Commander mode back from Battlefield 2, though technically it's not the same (nothing will ever be the same really). You need to be at least rank 10 to play as the commander and as before can be beaten to the role by a higher ranking player, you can also be voted out by mutiny though you can be "approved" of by players (giving you points) One of the biggest changes to the role is that the commander is no longer a player but I regarded as a "separate slot" on the server, this means that if you decide to go as commander you forfeit your player spot and if you want to go back to actually playing you have to rejoin the server. This sucks major balls and really deters me from going commander, especially when playing with friends. I think this change was mainly due to the Commander mode being able to be played on a mobile device such as an ipad (also available on android), which is fun but really it isn’t worth it, I wanna be a Commander on the field!. I miss all the hiding around your main base and killings those pesky Spec Ops infiltrators trying to blow up your stuff, of course I did that too.

I am in COMMAND, not sure which team is screwed more.

The commander mode is still a top-down view of the Battlefield however the available resources are a bit different this time around, for example some of the abilities like the Tomahawk missile and the gunship can only be used if you have control of a particular base whereas other things like map scans and supply drops can be used by spending “chunks” from the progression bar which are obtained by squads successfully carrying out orders that the Commander has issued. I’m actual thinking of getting a Google Nexus tablet so I can do some commandering in my spare time.

Here’s a full list

• Tomahawk missile strike: +50 points to deploy + kill bonus
• UAV deployment: duration: 10 seconds. +25 points for each kill your team gets within UAV zone
• Supply drop
• Map scan feature that reveals enemy infantry
• EMP strike: duration: 20 seconds. +25 points for each kill within EMP zone
• AC-130 Gunship against ground targets. +50 for each kill
• Vehicle drop
• Ability disable enemy commander for 10 second (I think) this one isn’t officially listed for some reason, probably added in a later patch

Hmm that vehicle drop didn't quite go as planned.

I've been playing the multiplayer of Battlefield 4 for a while and I'd have to say I'm liking it a lot better than the previous incantation, it's just some things that have been tweaked in the gameplay that makes playing so much easier of course the thing that makes this is always your squad members, if you're playing with friends you always have the better time than playing with people that you don't know who can most often be idiots. And that's another thing, the amount of aggression and vulgarity I see in Battlefield is abhorrent compared to other games things like people calling each other “fucking idiots” for doing simple mistakes, I even got flamed for being a shit commander when all I did where some bad UAV points (putting them over enemy bases) but the map was so small that was what we needed. Also the names are just disgusting, I saw a guy called “ScreamingFetus” in BF2 and I see other guys called “TangledHairyAnus” and I just think why? It’s not even funny it's just wrong, I’ll admit “Sexmegoood” was kinda funny but the guy was a total wanker flaming people for god knows what. In the end if you have great friendly team members and even friendly enemies, it’s a much better game, even when they’re not your actual friends. I had heaps of fun when we were given orders by the commander or squad leader to take a certain base or defend it and we did our best to (and you get more points as well), it’s the comradery that makes it great. 

Go go guys! attack that control point!

In regards to Hardcore and Normal modes, my friends and I most often play normal, as hardcore mode is really just a bit too hardcore for me lol as there’s a lot of support things like repairing the chopper while sitting in it, healing teammates, spotting enemies and knowing how much health your vehicle has that is hard to do in hardcore. The only real reprise hardcore has is that when you shoot someone first you will kill them rather than emptying almost a clip into them and then them killing you, so we play normal really all of the time. I’ve been experimenting with the Engineer class a bit more as thankfully there are handfuls of times where every person in the squad isn’t an engineer, and I’m also getting better at primary weapon kills as I have made the switch to using carbines rather than the PDW (Personal Defence Weapons) that the engineer start out with as the starting one is quite hard to use. I’ve also been attaching RDS (Red Dot Scopes) to my weapons on recommendation from a friend and I have to say they are amazing as I always using iron sights before which was often quite difficult to see the target, of course make sure you only use the no-zoom scopes or failing that the 1x zoom scopes.

Waargh! oh man this be dangerous, good thing I have my magical blowtorch which repairs all damage to the chopper regardless of where it is, though if that's how it works why the hell do I have to be hanging out of the damn thing, they need another "middle of the chopper" seat.

Battlefield 4 has probably been my favourite multiplayer experience since Battlefield 2, not to say it’s better though just now I’ve got to grips with things and am really enjoying the new battlelog and weapon/vehicle customising, I appreciate the new Commander mode and am having heaps of fun playing with friends and working as a team, I look forward to the expansions, unlocking more weapons/gear and being the commander with my tablet.

9/10

What I like:

• In game interface is much better
• ‘Levolution’ is awesome! (despite being a wanky title)
• Playing with friends and/or friendly teammates/enemies is great
• Commander mode is back!
• Game feels better overall then BF3

What I don’t like:

• We don’t need no Singleplayer story
• Bugs, lots of them, at first
• Should be able to do things in loading screen i.e. open battlepacks look at stats etc
• Community is full of angry knobheads with stupid names though there is the occasional nice person

JD

Our choo choo train!

My Usual Spiel: Saints Row IV, Turn the epic crazy up to 11

Release Date: 12/9/2013
Genre: Action Adventure
Publisher: Deep Silver

Developer: Volition Inc.
Platforms: PC, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360
Players: 1 or 2 Co-op and multiplayer.
Classification: R for REFUSED (in Australia)

When the infamous Saints Row the Third was released there were a lot of people asking how Volition was ever going to top the semi controlled chaos that was the storyline and the gameplay,  but now they’re saying that again about the latest installment.

Part of the cast from Saints Row IV from left to right: The Boss, Pierce Washington, Shaundi, Matt Miller, Kinzie and Asha Odekar

Having not played the original two Saints Row games I found Saints Row the Third one of the most enjoyable games I have played in awhile, I rightly considered it a fun alternative to the sometimes tedious realism that the Grand Theft Auto series creates and does well of course but sometimes you just need to let loose, and I mean hanging off choppers while shooting a rocket launcher then parachuting onto the top of a skyscraper then falling off that or shooting people dressed in animal costumes in a game show entitled “Professor Genki’s Murder Time Fun Time”. So because of that you could in all regards view Saints Row the third as a wacky brother to GTA but the next in the series shakes this theory up quite a bit.

Oh yep, that's a big ship alright.

Without spoiling too much yes this time around the leader of 3^Rd Street Saints (aka you) gains presidency of the United States after stopping a nuclear missile from exploding the country, then the Earth gets attacked by Aliens and you have to stop them. This was a bit of a drastic step as I thought as the Saints Row series could have possibly gone from a humble street gang to taking over two cities to taking over the whole of the United states in this installment rather than you being president right from the start then a out-of-nowhere alien invasion. So I guess I feel like they kind of went a bit further then they should but who knows really there will always be way to go in the future, not to mention prequels everyone loves prequels even if it’s going over past game content, actually wait. The usual Saints Row wit and flair is there obviously, the white house seems more like a party house with MP’s drinking beer and watching strippers dance on poles installed in the rooms, on your walk through the halls of congress you get stopped by Keith David with two documents and you shortly have to decide whether to end world hunger or cure cancer, gawd, I was playing it at a lan at that point at was so concerned that I had to walk outside and ask people their advice on my decision, how democratically-minded of me.

Being the president means making difficult decisions.

Saints Row IV was originally intended to be an expansion for the previous game but then changed so that it was a full sequel. This does mean that the graphics have not exactly changed much since the last installment but in my view the graphics were fine to begin with, not super trying to be realistic but not poor-looking either. Also the quality of the graphics is far less a topic of conversation than the eye candy on offer, the city of Steelport is pretty much the same as it was before but the inclusion of the alien buildings and ships and also the interior of the Alien vessels look pretty cool, not to mention the massive alien ship hovering over the centre of the city, though the ship which acts as your home when you’re not in the simulation does look kind of bland. As the city is supposed to be a “computer simulation” of itself you do notice many things that denote that for example there are matrix references with the water and parts of the landscape and buildings turning into 1’s and zero’s on certain occasions and cars and people sometimes ‘bug out’ by flipping around or the models suddenly twisting into wrong sizes and contorted shapes. The city is still as fully functioning as it was in the previous game with normal ‘simulated’ inhabitants etc the major changes are all the statues, billboards, posters, some stores and general signs and advertisements are all changed to a general theme of fear and submission by the alien invaders and their leader, the main antagonist Zinyak.

Looks like something from an Orson Welles film

Probably the most drastic change in the gameplay is the way you move around the city right from the start in this new simulation you are given superpowers that allow you to sprint faster than cars and jump as tall as houses and small buildings this along with other powers that you receive over time that help you move around such as wall jumping/running and air “dashing” and gliding quickly makes using actual vehicles seem pointless, even more pointless by the fact that to upgrade these powers you need to collect data clusters which are scattered throughout the city that you can spend as a currency for upgrading your current powers and when you acquire new ones through doing the story missions. Collecting these is heaps of fun and you jump and glide and dash across the city and even at the start where your power aren’t that good it’s much more practical and rewarding to jump and sprint across the landscape collecting data clusters to get better powers then driving a fast car there for the sake of efficiency which will be made redundant when you get better powers anyway. As you progress you unlock more powers such as the ability to throw energy blasts and objects around with telekinesis and one of my personal favourites is the ability to charge down to the ground from above superman style and create a huge shockwave.

Gliding through the air, probably my favorite thing to do in the game, you can see some data clusters on the top of those smokestacks.

A feature that has made a return from the previous game is your “hub” which now instead of it being your phone is now just a hub where you access things like the map, your ‘quests’, your normal and power upgrades menu, ability to phone homies etc and your money laundering account is now your ‘cache’ but works relatively the same way. Basically most of the hub menu features have returned including the upgrades menu where you can upgrade your health/stamina/weapons/homies etc and you can also increase your strength i.e. the power of your punches and how far you can throw people. The character creation is a bit less extravagant this time but you can still go pretty crazy I just tried out the randomizer a few times then managed to come up with a guy who I think looked exactly like my character from the previous game when I gave him the “clean cut” haircut he had before which was kind of weird though I don’t remember him having eyes that big, but meh there’s your usual array of modifiers so you can create your own crazy avatar. The simulation of the city of Steelport basically has basically the exact same layout and shops inc plastic surgery, tattoos, street and fetish clothes etc  as before though the Saints hideouts have been removed and the “Planet Saints” shops have been changed to “Planet Zin” though you can still get all the regular saints gear from there. I was going to go my usual jeans, skate shoes, trilby and purple dressing gown but decided to go with a jacket, shirt and tie this time being the president and all and it worked quite well, I didn’t really experiment much with clothes after that I just go with what works really.

Lookin cool with my "Lazor Razor"

Even with having all these awesome powers I was still interested in seeing what was to offer with the weapons as I’d heard of some of the Alien weapons inc the Abducto-matic and the Inflato-Ray. You do use the Alien weapons throughout the story mode and they are ok I spose, there is an alien version of each type of weapon but I decided I’d go with regular weapons since I’m a human fighting aliens though because most of these weapons were from the previous game though I went with the police versions of each rather than the gangster versions I had used before. There are 7 categories of weapons inc Melee, Pistols, SMG’s, Shotguns, Rifles, Explosives and Special, each category has different sub classes i.e. semi automatic and pump-action shotguns and each sub-category has various models of itself for example a water pistol model for a rifle. This makes quite a large selection of weapons available not to mention the new special weapons which aside from the usual flamethrowers and grenade launchers there is the addition of the Lasergun and Minethrower arms used by Alien enemies. Though my most favourite  weapon would no doubt be the infamous Dubstep Gun as not only does the gun fire “wub” blasts to the beat of the song it plays, these blasts can also be upgraded to explode creating massive damage, this gun uses no ammo but requires a charge to fire and pedestrians dance to the music when firing, seriously what could be better?

The Dubstep gun in action demonstrated by GamingMistress

I was also thinking whether I would use the car shop again and I did right at the start to create my little smartcar that I loved so much from the previous game in the Saints Row style but realised almost immediately after that that I shouldn’t have wasted so much money as I wasn’t going to need a car at all, and even if I did need a car you get that many vehicles to use in your garage (inc flying vehicles) for free from doing the story missions so that using the save-a-car system is a novelty thing at best. Also now when you dial-a-car from your hub it just warps you straight into it so there’s another thing about vehicles that has been automated. Apart from the new alien vehicles (and some new city vehicles) everything is pretty much the same as before and as you do various missions you unlock new Alien and novelty vehicles mostly from the previous game which have little or no significance for this one. I can honestly say that the vehicles are really in this just for looks, for you at least.

I'll say it, these things are really OP

The gameplay works in a very similar manner to the previous game, in the simulation you have “entry/exit points” rather than hideouts that let you go to and from the Zin ship you have stolen. The activities are different this time around with the exception of Tank Destruction and Fraud which has become much easier now with the ability to launch yourself high in the air, the activities mostly revolve around using your superpowers which include super sprinting across a mapped course and a simulated racetrack dodging barriers Battletoads style, jumping and running up tower platforms, using your telekinesis to hurl objects in a new Professor Genki game as well as the Genki superpower showdown which is like some sort of super power WWE style wrestling match. As I mentioned before there are lots of data clusters for upgrading your powers scattered around the world and sometimes you need to use powers like telekinesis and super stomp in order to get at them, there is also statues of Zinyak to destroy and various audio logs which contain quotes from the characters.

Professor Genki's M.O.M, where you must pick up and throw the correct objects which is either humans, cars or Genki heads into the correct spinning hoops.

The sound and music in Saints Row is excellently over-the-top, the pulsating beats and pounding dubstep soundtrack to the game menu mixes well with the classical music remixes and I was more than often physically dancing to some of them, especially this one. The game includes a small range of radio stations with fully licensed songs, some of which are used to great effect in story missions especially Haddaway’s What is Love during a scene when you’re flying the ship. As I mentioned before because it’s almost unnecessary to drive vehicles Volition decided that because you spent the majority of your time in the simulation they have made it so you can listen to the radio while on foot, and this actually creates some great moments where you’re shooting up enemies to  Blur’s ‘Song 2’ or flying a helicopter to ‘Flight of the Valkyries’. Probably my most favourite station is the Klassik 102.4 which is interestingly hosted by Zinyak himself, this station has lots of great classics my favourite being Jacques Offenbach’s, Orpheus in the Underworld: Infernal Gallop which creates a hilarious soundtrack when doing anything really. The voice acting in Saints Row is great, I liked the first male voice and I love making a character that fits it so well, there’s some interesting celebrities in some of the cameo roles.

What is love! baby don't hurt me....

There have been many games that have stirred controversy over the years and the Saints Row series is today’s prime example. The game was refused classification in Australia due to the Rectifier Probe weapon (which was removed from the game) and the “Girls night out” mission where Shaundi and the player consume alien drugs and receive superpowers, this though was still in the game, the one I played at least. Though this was minor in my view, though the game has a large focus on sex and sleaze and there is plenty of scantily clad women around though there is no actual on screen sex, you can have sex with any of your ‘crew members’ aboard the ship (this is amusingly referred to as "romancing your crew member") and this is obviously off screen. A few times throughout the game I noticed that they would have been a bit more enjoyable playing as a female character and after I had finished the game I did start out with one just to quickly see the differences, it’s an invigorating way to play the game if anything though it’s a real change to the way I usually play.

The banned rectifier probe (pictured with another classy looking melee weapon), I don't have a screenshot of how it works but you get the idea. I don't know about you but I prefer the lazer samurai sword.

I enjoyed my pants off (not literally) of Saints Row IV there was just something so exhilarating and free of bounding, gliding and zooming over the landscape, the story is heaps on fun to play and each mission no matter what type of thing it is parodying there’s always that sense of Saints Row wit and flair. The game does have a bit of the GTA syndrome that when you do finish the story mode there’s little to do (challenges) etc though you can re-do almost any mission you like (to an extent). This series represents some of the best things gaming has to offer, chaos, freedom and fun and that’s what it’s all about.

JD

Free as a flying squirrel.

My Usual Spiel: Sub Rosa, trust, deceict and greed simplified

Release Date: 17/8/2012
Genre: Indie Team-based FPS
Publisher: Cryptic Sea
Developer: Cryptic Sea 
Platform: PC/Mac/Linux
Players: Online Multiplayer
Classification: Unclassified

The Latin phrase Sub Rosa, meaning “under the rose” in English basically means anything secret or confidential, it is also the name of one of the best small indie games I’ve experienced. I found out about it through my good friend Brok Power who had previously shown me the original Ace of Spades.

Sub Rosa is a 3D FPS (First Person Shooter) which brings so much more to the table than your average FPS that you may not understand it all until you actually play it. Set in an alternate laissez-faire 1980's city, you join one of three corporations with one goal: making money. Gameplay involves tense deals, double crosses and car chases between these opposing teams or ‘companies’ named Goldmen Inc (Gold), Monsota (Blue) and OXS International (Grey) situated in a very plain looking city at various levels of sunset.

 
Sub Rosa Gameplay (version 0.7b)

Sub Rosa was originally created by Cryptic Sea for the 7 Day FPS game jam, hence it’s simplistic nature, like Ace of Spades the first primarily noticeable thing about Sub Rosa that is the graphics are minimal at best, you’re in a city of tarmac roads and 3 dimensional block buildings with not much else other then parking garages and grassy areas, if you can call the green parts grass that is, there aren’t even any trees (as yet) and the characters and vehicles are all of a similar minimalistic style, it’s often hard to distinguish what team you’re driving past as only their ties are coloured which makes it hard to see from a distance. Of course this is all expected in which the original version was made in 7 days for a competition and I think they’ve done a pretty good job, after all it’s still in beta. The plain black/white/grey menu screen fits perfectly and I am impressed by the amount of options available, I found the game is not able to be alt-tabbed but you can get around this by playing in windowed mode which isn’t too bad, there are a few servers available but none in Australia though the ping seems to be ok in most cases.

A Three-way deal gone wrong at the highway near the park, you can actually see the bullets whizzing around.

Once you enter into a server or the very useful driving or shooting ranges you immediately notice a few ways that Sub-rosa differs from your normal FPS, the basic controls are mainly the same, WASD to move left mouse button to shoot, E to enter vehicles, TAB to show the map etc, when you first move around you’ll notice you character doesn’t quite stop as soon as you take your finger off the move button they sort of slide to a stop, making general moving around and especially getting into cars a bit awkward. 
 

"What a mess" "You're tellin me"

The game uses a one-hand one-object way of handling items and uses the number keys as an ‘inventory’ rather than a “click 1 for main weapon” click 4 for knife” etc style so for example if you can only pick up an item or drive a car if you currently have nothing in your hands (or hand) and you “store” an item by pressing the number keys which have 5 slots. This makes things kind of tricky when you’re starting out or trying to do things quickly i.e. pick up suitcase, pick up disk, select suitcase, open suitcase, insert disk, close suitcase, put away suitcase , get gun out etc you can spend a lot of time remembering what to do (especially dropping items which uses the tilde ~ key- very annoying trying to explain to every new person how to do it) but I spose you do get used to it after a while.

"No I'll take the disc, drop it, you need to press tilde, yes the little squiggly line next to the 1 key, oh wait we're in a car" "How the hell do we even speak we have no mouths" "Will you two shut up back there!"

Before a match you start in your company’s base which contains your vault and available cars. You can purchase various items inc. guns, vehicles, bandages and stocks (by pressing Q), the mission items are provided and dropped for you. As you earn money you can purchase better items to help you succeed (the 9MM is always free but you cannot purchase if you’re money is on minus figures). I’m still not exactly sure how buying stock works but there’s a pretty good explanation on the Sub Rosa Gaming site which is a great source of information for the game.

The buying screen which you can use at any time while in your own base, that's our vault I'm standing in front of by the way.

Basically the gameplay is round based, with different game modes I've detailed below.  These modes often revolve around items like wads (or blocks) of money, suitcases and 8-inch floppy discs, yes you heard that correctly you’re killing each other over information stored on a piece of technology which is probably older then you, though that’s what they used in the 70’s and 80’s. These items are used in the game as objectives and for wheeling and dealing depending on the game mode, most of the time you have to acquire a certain colour of floppy disc as a primary goal and another as a secondary goal, the primary winning you and you company more money obviously, here is a brief description of each below.

"Ok drop the case, and I'm gonna check it too, so no funny business"

 Transaction: This round is the most frequent of the game modes, the three teams either start off with a disk, cash to trade for the disk, or nothing at all. This mode usually involves the teams with the disk and the cash organising to trade and the team with nothing often either pretends to have money or just comes in shooting- the object of most games is to retrieve your primary objective (disk or cash) and bring it back to the vault inside your base.

3-Way Deal – This mode is almost always the most tense, all 3 teams have disks and have a different colour disc as their primary goal, the teams must communicate to organise a clean trade or double cross.

Acquisition: In this mode all teams have to acquire the floppy disks from enemy NPC characters driving limos around the city. If you fail to do this the NPC’s drive out through the tunnels on the edges of the map and the round finishes.

Race: As the name says this mode involves a race around the city in a pre-determined track blocked off by barriers with white banners as gates. This is one of the most interesting game modes as it has a special rule that the first player who fires a gun they lose $10,000, though once any player on any team has shot everyone is free to shoot as they please.

Acquisition mode can get pretty nasty

 All modes apart from race usually involve some kind of communication with another team, you can do this by pressing the Y and U keys, there is no global chat (though there is same-team chat).  The city environment consists of flat and angled roads, buildings and some grassy spots with many key areas:

Company Bases: Located on 3 corners of the map, this is where you start in a round depending on which team you are on.

Buildings marked with letters: A, B, and C are parking garages, with some being multi-level. D is a large open building, often called the “factory” or “warehouse”. Brok likes to call it "where people go to die".

The Park: A patch of green near the middle of the map. Very popular for 3-way trades.

The Dead End: Yep that’s it, the only one on the map. A favourite spot for gold-blue deals.

Civilian cars be found on various carparks, in race mode barriers are set up to mark the course, there is also some other grassy patches, pillars and gaps around the city. You should be cautious if asked to perform a deal in the dead end or building D as these are places with limited cover and prone to ambush.

The city map and memorandum (mission briefing)

I must admit I’ve had a lot of fun in the game; it’s the unpredictability of it that leads to many fun albeit incredibly tense encounters when one loose shot can turn an already tense deal into a shootout where one team member grabs the case and limps bleeding through a hail of bullets back to the car before the driver screeches away and floors it back to base with another car in hot pursuit. My friend Brok and I have had lots of fun playing it while voice chatting and it’s makes it that much easier than trying to type everything, it’s amazing also the amount of strategy involved as you try to co-operate with or outsmart the other team. The only drawback I found is that if you’re playing over LAN you have to be all on the same team otherwise you’re going to hear each other’s strategy.

If you like Indie games or just FPS with a twist and are looking for something different, this is a good one. I leave you now with a video made by my friend Brok aka Mr. Pink

JD

We built this city....

My Usual Spiel: League of Legends, the MOBA I know

Release Date:  27/10/2009
Genre: RTS/MOBA
Publisher: Riot Games
Developer: Riot Games
Platform: PC/Mac
Players: 2-10 online
Classification: T for Teen


League of Legends, where do I start? I suppose I should start with explaining that League of Legends or “LoL” as I may refer to it in the remainder of the article, was and is still one of the biggest MOBA games of today, “MOBA” meaning “Multiplayer Online Battle Arena” and also “Action Real Time Strategy” (ARTS) it was the game to coin the genre but wasn’t the first of its kind as I will now explain. The gameplay from League of Legends is generally known to have been taken from Defence of the Ancients or “DOTA” which was a custom-made map for Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos and the Frozen Throne however this is only partially true. Aeon of Strife was a Starcraft custom map which in part inspired the creation of DOTA and the whole MOBA scene. League Legends is currently one of the top Esports games being played along with Starcraft II and Warcraft III in the RTS category and the Counter-strike series in the FPS category.


A very informative video series on the history of the MOBA genre.

I for one did like the idea of playing as a single unit in an RTS game, so much so that I did various experiments utilizing the addition of heroes to the Blizzard RTS series in Warcraft 3 such as editing multiplayer maps with the Warcraft 3 map editor so I (and my brother sometimes) could play a map as a single hero unit aligned with an ally cpu character, which was fun but hard to manage and sometimes annoying when you have to work with the cpu players constant attacking and retreating as it does in that game also it because hard to strive to the finish when you had to have buildings available for you to respawn with. I had a good time doing the same thing in Company of Heroes where I created a 2v2 or 3v3 cpu player fight and tacked myself onto one of the teams but played only as a single tank or sniper while the cpu players fought.

DOTA Company of Heroes style

 I never really played the Aeon of Strife Starcraft map, but I did play a bit of DOTA back when it first started, because DOTA was basically just a custom map and did not have much in the way of instruction and support for newcomers, which although this did improve it has now become a common theme that MOBA games have a very steep learning curve. DOTA was a MOBA at its most basic, the classic square map with the map split diagonally down the middle with two enemy factions controlling each side at the bottom left and top right corners  the three “lanes” which are defended by enemy towers and small “creep” units that move down the lanes to attack the enemy with each faction have a “home” structure which needs to be defeated to achieve victory.

The basic MOBA map layout

Though I liked DOTA there were some things I didn’t like, namely that I had no idea what items to get or in what order (this was soon fixed in League of Legends) and also the unforgiving fact that you had to be there at all times, in FPS games and sometimes RTS you can leave for about 3-5 minutes and come back and still be fairly competitive, well at least you can still kill other players, if you did that in DOTA you’d all of the sudden be outlevelled and spent the rest of the match trying to keep up and failing as you are pounded by the higher level players. I think even then I did feel that whole game based around that would be good idea.

The pioneering DOTA

 So in October 2009, 6 years after the first DOTA custom map was created, came League of Legends by Riot Games, the publisher who was known to have coined the MOBA (Multiplayer Online Battle Arena) name as a marketing term. My brother and I enthusiastically played LoL a lot when it came out as we were eager to see this game based around DOTA and also like other MOBA games it was completely free to play which was still quite rare for a game of this magnitude. and it was good, one thing I did enjoy was the way the game matched players of equal skill (at the lower levels), and it was just so much easier to play, the game had tutorials and information all over the place and best of all when you got into the game you a list of suggested items how to get them and in what order. We played for awhile until I got bored of the game and my brother tired of the unbalanced nature of the higher echelon as when the game first came out there was problems like this but otherwise I had a good experience with the game and was able to stay competitive.

Pushing a lane with a ranged character

Like most games playing League of Legends is pretty simple to learn and takes a while to master, it follows the usual MOBA map and play style which I won’t go into too much detail here about how you do things but basically you are a “Summoner” and you choose a “Champion” to use in the arena. You have to fight your way through the small creep units, taking down the towers and defeating the other players to get to your enemies castle and destroy it. This sounds quite simple but it quite complex, in order to stay alive you must know when to attack and when to retreat when to “push” your lane and when to fall back and defend and when to attack enemy players. Then there’s all the advanced things like teaming up to defeat enemy champions easier and venturing into the middle parts of the map in between the lanes aka the “jungle” where treasures and neutral monsters can be found. League of Legends has several different modes of play, there the most common 5v5 played on the “Summoner’s Rift” map, which is the classic 3 lane MOBA style, 3v3 which is played on the “Twisted Treeline” a smaller variant which runs horizontally with two lanes instead of 3, ARAM (All Random All Mid) which is played on the Howling Rift and is pretty much a head on collision course between the two teams with only one lane, and finally Dominion, which is played on the Crystal Scar map and is based around a ‘point capturing’ style of play.

The Twisted Treeline, a smaller variant on the classi MOBA map style

Controlling your champion is pretty simple if you have played any kind of RTS game before though when moving the camera is focused on your champion, you click on the minimap or main map to move or attack and use the QWERTY keys to activate your champion and summoner abilities though these are just the basic keys there are many more to use as your skills increase as with all games really. The game interface is relatively simple, you have your character portrait, level, stats, gold and items on the left hand corner, your Champion and Summoner abilities, Health and Mana in the middle and your minimap and menu buttons on the right. You also have things like your teammates portraits, health and mana, kill and assist info and target portraits around the main screen. The graphics as with most MOBA games are fairly cartoony with a cel-shading aspect that marvellously accentuates the heroes from the creep  and other units, you’d come to expect the cartooniness and this definitely doesn’t distract from the main game as it looks great, especially the lighting with all the glowing and how it adapts to the environmental dark and light places.

The screen interface at the starting area of the twisted treeline.

As a Summoner you play more matches and win and lose you receive experience and level up and also (depending on how well you do in a game) obtain Influence points (IP) this can be used to purchase Runes and some other items in the store. The other online currency is Riot Points which can be purchased with real money and is used to purchase Champions, Champion skins and booster items that increase the amount of IP you get from games, it is also used often as prizes for tournaments.

When starting a normal game of LoL against random opponents you first have to join the queue of your chosen game type, once you have done this and you are matched with a team you then you then need to do four things The first of which is to pick a Champion, these “champions” have many different traits inc different stats, spells and abilities but can be roughly classified under 6 types:

• Assassin: Champions who excel at sneaking around and burst-damage for quick kill

• Fighter: All-round melee champion who could have both tank and assassin traits.

• Mage: Champions who cast spells and have most of their power in their abilities

• Tank: Champions who have lots of health and abilities that draw enemies to attack them instead of allies.

• Support: Champions that have abilities that heal, strengthen or protect allies.

• Marksman: Are non-magical ranged champions

The store where you can purchase champions for IP or RP

You then need to choose your “Summoner spells” which are spells that you the Summoner use to assist your champion when playing, these include things like healing your champion and slowing enemy champions. After that you need to pick your Rune page and your Mastery page. Runes and masteries are an additional way of modifying the champions you select, runes give whichever champion you are playing with extra stats for example more health, armor, or things like lifesteal, there are many different kinds of runes which can be bought with Influence points (IP). Masteries are essentially a talent skill tree which is used in many games (most prominently MMO’s) and as you level up by playing LoL you receive more points to use for your mastery sheet, mastery sheets have 3 trees, Offense, Defense and Utility which you can points into one in particular or one or two,  you also can fill multiple mastery sheets depending on which champion you are going to use.

Runes and Quintessences page 

Masteries Page

Another thing you need to think about is items, as the game progresses you acquire gold through last hitting minions, killing Epic Monsters, destroying enemy turrets, and killing champions (or assisting) which is the in game currency of LoL, you use gold to purchase items from the shop from where you start, the shop consists of Defense, Attack, Magic, Movement, and Consumables categories. Many high-end items in the shop are obtained by purchasing low-end items which when purchased in order allowed you to create them.  I was pleased to see that the game had a “recommended items” list and even told you what to buy and in which order which you could just double-click each item to purchase and merged the two items together to create another one.

The recommended items screen makes things much easier to pick your items when in the heat of the match and having only 20 seconds to decide when respawning

Playing League of Legends online (as with most MOBA games) has quite a steep learning curve even when you are matched with opponents of a similar ability when you first start you are sometimes chastised with your lack of experience. But thankfully there are plenty of tutorials when you first start the game and suggests to try some matches with easier AI controlled players before going in the deep end but thankfully once you do you are matched with similarly ranked players which are hopefully of the same standard to you, it seems to work for me as I found that most of the time I was pretty competitive, winning more then I lost.

You learn lots of things fast playing League of Legends for the first time, you learn not to rush in recklessly and get killed many times, you learn to use the bushes to hide and you learn that continuously “pushing” your lane isn’t always the best idea and venture into the jungle and appear behind the enemy for a bit of stealth killing which is what’s known as “jungling”. When playing your champion you must remember their strengths and weaknesses and play appropriately to the type of champion you have selected i.e you wouldn’t charge forward with a ranged character as they are often weaker and you wouldn’t pick an assassin-style champion for basic lane-pushing and they are more suited for jungling.

'Jungling' with Udyr who is preferable champion to use for this style of play

League of Legends as I have mentioned has been a hit with the gaming community around the world, putting it on par with Starcraft II as one of the biggest esports games today despite being almost 5 years old today it continues to draw fans and competes fiercely with the likes of rival MOBA’s such as DOTA 2 and Heroes of Newerth. LoL is played as one a tournaments at the Lanslide that I attend almost solely for the purpose of playing League of Legends and possibly Starcraft II. I like it, I don’t find anything much wrong with it that the MOBA haters always seem to, sure it’s tough sometimes and the learning curve is steep but it’s a game that makes you want to co-operate with your teammates and win and I can tell you I don’t get that feeling with many games. Although the game is free I must admit I most definitely paid for it as I have spent almost $80 on new champions and skins to play in tournaments which I will probably never win but justify as donating to a free game that I like, it’s something I’ve never done before and I’m not sure why but meh, it was worth it as I may not be the best on the battlefield but at least I stand out from the rest.

Whether it's been a well-fought game or an imbalanced drubbing, seeing this is still incredibly satisfying.

League of Legends may be one of the more complicated MOBA games, with its runes and masteries and other champion customization features but it was the one that paved the way for the MOBA genre, and I approve.

JD

A thrilling match between two world-class LoL teams, in this video you can see how big LoL has become in esports.

Run away!