...SALE - Steam Summer Sale - Day 1

RUN AWAY BEFORE IT EATS YOUR WALLET!

It's here once again ladies and gentlemen the time of year where you're free and happy and the sunis shining and BAM your wallet gets gangbanged every day. Every day I will be here to break down what is on sale and recommending where I can. That being said let's check out the first day...

Sins of a Solar Empire: Rebellion - £5.99

"Command a space-faring empire in Sins of a Solar Empire: Rebellion, the new stand-alone expansion that combines 4X depth with real-time strategy gameplay."

Well if you like big ass 4X strategy games then this is definitely for you. Sins features a hellain-depth talent tree and political system which you'll need in order to survive the 3-4 hour matches on small maps..Explore the solar system and destroy everyone in your way, also watch out for space pirates who will systematically try to come after you (or whoever has the highest bounty) and ruin your day.

http://store.steampowered.com/app/204880/

XCOM: Enemy Unknown - £3.74

Take control of your own squadron of elite tactical soldiers in order to deter an alien invasion. As the commander you will oversee and issue orders to your squad which will be carried out in a turn-based combat sequence until either the threat has been eliminated or your squad is brutally murdered, when you're not murdering you will be deciding what to research and engineer in order to stay on par with the aliens, this style of tactical turn-based gameplay is similar to what you might find in games like Valkyria Chronicles (also great). It should be noted that people had different experiences with this game such as line of sight not working properly or things just being buggy for no reason, I can't comment on whether these issues have been fixed or not yet.

http://store.steampowered.com/app/200510/

The Witcher 2: Assassin of Kings Enhanced Edition - £2.99

"Enjoy a captivating story, dynamic combat system and beautiful graphics in the second instalment of the RPG Saga about the Witcher, Geralt of Rivia"

Well you don't get a lot of games this cheap that look this good and have a story this good for this little that's for sure. The hugely popular power-house sequel from CD Projekt Red is a monster of a game that will take you across a beautifully crafted world full of interesting characters as you murder, drink and fuck everything in sight. An absolutely stunning game which after a long ass time I am currently working my way through Witching everything as I go. Warning - This game may eat your PC slightly..

http://store.steampowered.com/app/20920/

Divinity: Original Sin - £23.99

"Gather your party and get ready for a new, back-to-the-roots RPG adventure! Discuss your decisions with companions; fight foes in turn-based combat; explore an open world and interact with everything and everyone you see. Join up with a friend to play online in co-op and make your own adventures with the powerful RPG toolkit."

SIRENS AND ALARMS! This game is in early access, you have been warned.

Divinity sees you take on the role of a Source Hunter and as a Source Hunter it's your job to rid the world of those who use the foulest of magics. That's what the description on steam says anyway, to me it looks like a combination of Diablo and Magicka which isn't a bad thing but it's hard to recommend things on early access when you have no idea if and when they will be finished products.

http://store.steampowered.com/app/230230/

Day Z - £16.99

SIRENS AND ALARMS! This game is in early access, you have been warned.

If you don't know what DayZ is by now there's a good chance you've been living under a rock of some form for the past few months because this game has been everywhere. What started as a mod for ARMA II is now being made into a full fledged stand-alone game and if you really don't know, it's an open world zombie survival/people being assholes simulator. It's in alpha currently and it was recently announced that they are changing the engine the game runs on which means it's still a long ways away from being done, that having been said if you do buy it prepare to be murdered for no reason or handcuffed and made to drink bleach by a group of random people laughing at you, that is of course when you're not falling off a ladder because of terrible lag and alpha bugs...

http://store.steampowered.com/app/221100/

Don't Starve - £2.74

"Don’t Starve is an uncompromising wilderness survival game full of science and magic. You play as Wilson, an intrepid Gentleman Scientist who has been trapped by a demon and transported to a mysterious wilderness world. Wilson must learn to exploit his environment and its inhabitants if he ever hopes to escape and find his way back home."

This game hates you, it hates your family, it even hates your dog. Your job is to survive in this hateful world by exploiting the environment and the inhabitants in order to get home eventually. If you're looking for a fantastic indie game that will leave you tearing your hair out from frustration and constantly spawning a new world then this is the one for you. The game also features Steam workshop support which means you can attempt other peoples horrendous creations, they are also launching a multiplayer component this summer so you can attempt to survive or just perish with other players.

http://store.steampowered.com/app/219740/

Dead Rising 3 Pre-purchase - £29.99

"Explore the zombie-infested city of Los Perdidos, and find a way to escape before a military strike wipes the entire city, and everyone in it, off the map."

*Heavily audible sighing* Just don't. Don't pre-purchase this. Run away. Run away and never return! This doesn't need to be on here especially when it doesn't have a release date. Moving on...

http://store.steampowered.com/app/265550/


Far Cry 3 - £3.74

"Discover the dark secrets of a lawless island ruled by violence and take the fight to the enemy as you try to escape. You’ll need more than luck to escape alive!"

Well that's a bit more like it, take this unsuspecting island by storm as you murder every living thing on it in order to save your friends and escape even though there are plenty of boats you could take at any time and just leave..Now I am in the minority of people who didn't actually like this game because I just found it so damn boring. Vaas ^ is a great character and everything but the rest of the story and the characters are just bland and uninteresting and even unleashing tigers on enemy camps wasn't enough to keep me interested, and I played for a good 20 hours before finally giving up. BUT a lot of people really enjoyed it and it is a rather nice looking game, there's just no arguing with that one. It will probably get you in the mood for Far Cry 4 that's for sure.

http://store.steampowered.com/app/220240/

Democracy 3 - £6.45

"Have you ever wanted to be president? or prime-minister? Convinced you could do a better job of running the country? Let's face it, you could hardly do a worse job than our current political leaders. Crime, Unemployment, National Debt, Terrorism, Climate Change..."

I...I got nothing. A spreadsheet simulator with a political focus which allows you to experience what it's like to run a country. Personally I'd rather play Civilisation for that experience.

http://store.steampowered.com/app/245470/

Deal of the Day

Oh come on now, it's cheap and will last you for dozens and dozens of hours. This is definitely a game that needs to be played to be experienced, you don't get the same feeling by just watching a let's play on YouTube. Besides, this is a nice way to ease into the wallet crush that will be coming to you in the next few weeks.

Get it here for the low low price of £2.99. Hell you can even throw in the first game for an extra £1.39 while you're at it. Get Witchin

http://store.steampowered.com/app/20920/

News - Xbox @ E3

-XBOX @ E3-

A summary of sorts

So here's what's going to happen, I'm going to rattle off everything that happened during the Xbox conference in the order it happened then give some kind of opinion...lets go

Boom Phil Spencer

Swish

So Phil Spencer exploded onto the stage to open the show and began with the usual spiel of "thank you all" "you shaped the future of Xbox people, YOU DID!" oh and "we're dedicating the entire briefing to games"..Well fuck there's the first shocker, then the non-shocker of starting with their biggest profit churning, racist simulator..

Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare

Not the bees! Not the BEEEEES!

So we got to see some new footage of the yearly genocide simulator and it actually caused some levels of internal excitement for myself, it wasn't anything to do with the usual gruff militaristic dick swinging characters and it damn sure wasn't the overly emotional trailer where somebody gets exploded and we lose an arm or something. No. It was the fact that Codaw is set in semi-near future and there's fucking cyber suits and jetpacks and lasers and Kevin Spacey and homing rocket grenades and god damn robot bees that swarmed around for some reason not yet known! ROBOT BEES PEOPLE! 

It looks like CoD so nobody is going to lose their shit over that, the trailer showed us a nice quick transition between cut-scene and gameplay which I'll tell you now is a frequent theme in every damn conference this year. Yes it's nice and shiny and at least the new studio will bring some fresh life into the game..though really who gives a toss about the single player in Call of Duty games, you could cut it completely and not lose any money from the hoards of screaming children who have to play it on Xbox live in order to be cool

Cut to..Forza 5

Another quick speech about thanking the community followed by a track they forgot to put in the game to begin with, The Nürburgring, everyone's favourite track because most people can't name any other. They really wanted us to know how much effort they put into this, capturing the tracks curves millimeter for millimeter and such, oh and it's free, and you can get it now. What are you waiting for!! Nobody cares about Forza 5 though because there's...

Forza Horizon 2

Carrrrrrrrrr

Over 200 of your favourite cars that you'll never manage to afford because you're just not that special also look at this exclusive Lamborghini because cars you fuck! Apparently they're having a day night cycle with dynamic weather allllll in 1080p and fear not your drivatar will be waiting for you. 

Did you ever want to create a group of people for your driving, a club if you will, or rather a driveclub..*cough* yeaaa well now you can apparently. I don't know, Forza is just a racing game, the cars are shiny and so its the scenery and that's great and all but really cars can only look so much like cars and really I couldn't give a flying ball-sack about it. Nevertheless the "road trip of your life" begins September 30th so you better pre-order now before you can't buy it day one anyway.

Evolve

Ooo I'm tingling

Coming to you at some point in the future is this game from 2K wherein you can assume the role of 1 of 4 classes: Assault, Trapper, Medic and Support and in all likelihood ignore your entire team and run off to solo victory. Doing that however will end with you getting buggered sideways by the monster. Nothing of major interest to see here right now so I guess we're just sat here waiting for some gameplay which I'm sure we're all violently desperate for right...right?

Assassins Creed Unity

The four douches of the revolution

Hark, it is the sound of the yearly outing into the exciting life of an Assassin only this time it's in wonderful, exotic FRANCE. Set during the French Revolution you are Arnaeu/Arno/Arnold some studpid named guy who for an assassin stands out way too much in a crowd. The selling point this year is that you can play co-op with 3 of your friends making the combat even more trivial than it ever has been, don't get me wrong it looks like a  great way to spice up the gameplay and if you can go through the story missions with friends I'll be made up, if it turns out to just be specific co-op missions then that's a little less exciting.

Definitely have to give a circular clap to Ubisoft though because their crowd tech is damn good from what they showed here, like I said though the whole being an assassin thing doesn't work the further forward you go. They just stand out in every damn crowd, it worked great when you were skulking round Jerusalem in the first game but the French revolution? Come on. Well, it can't be worse than 3...

Dragon Age Inquisition

Rawr

Absolutely no gameplay to see here people move along. Things to note though, there are actual dragons in it and it's shiny looking, also there's premiere content first on Xbox so there's that. Morrigan will be disapproving everywhere October 7th

Sunset Overdrive

Eugh

Fuck all the grim dark mythological nonsense this games got blues and greens and a main character that makes me want to rip his eyes out. Sunset Overdrive is weird to say the least, it's totally ludicrous and self-referential and looks hella fun. You get to zip around on wires and jump on things and shoot carbonated beverages at zombies, why? Because fuck you that's why. You don't even have to do it alone, 8player online co-op with dedicated servers for all your zombie killing city traversing needs. Look for this slice of colourful pie October 28th

Super Ultra Dead Rising 3 Arcade Remix Hyper Edition DX Plus Alpha 

...

Yes that is the actual name of the DLC for Dead Rising 3 which is available right now. You'll be able to cosplay as your favourite Capcom character and fight the zombie masses using a ridiculous array of super moves and power ups with 4player co-op so go fucking nuts.

Dance Central Spotlight

Xbox exclusive, digital only annnnnnd who cares it's a dancing game they're all the same.

Disney Fantasia Music Evolved

No idea but it's coming out in Fall or Autumn for the real people out there.

Fable Legends

Legendary..

Ohhhh what fresh hell is this, it looks like Fable and smells like Fable and hell it even sounds like Fable, that is to say it sounds like terrible English accents from Ye'Olde merry LANDAN. What we were shown was some terrible looking multiplayer that was a bit Diabloy but not as good. You can either be Agar the standard strength warrior man, Rook the thief rogue person or Winter the incredibly obvious mage. If any of that sounds frightfully boring then you can always play as the villain/dungeon master/evil overlord and set traps and monster spawns and bugger it you could just play Dungeon Land because it's the same thing only the dungeon master gets a laugh button soo yea. Though the freeze and shatter effects looked nice...Multiplayer beta coming Fall/Autumn only on Xbox.

Some stupid cutaway nonsense with people talking about favourite games or something equally useless.

Spark/Project Spark

Well well well what is this game? Some kind of world creator with a shiny look to it withhhh multiplayer and co-op campaign and space and Conker of all the random characters to drag out of the retirement home. Not a damn clue but I like world creation so hopefully there will be more to see soon.

Ori and the blind forest

Enough fun it's time to get serious. Again it's a trailer that said very little but damn it did look pretty. You're some kind of fox/Eevee thing and either you're trying to save your giant panda buddy or rescue him or he's died or something but regardless you're going to go on an emotional roller coaster and probably feel quite bad for all these pixels at some point..assuming you have an Xbox One because it's exclusiveeee.

Halo, is it me you're looking...4?

Well, apparently it was kind of a big deal as far as franchises go so it seems only right that they reskin and re-release Halo 1,2,3 and 4. November 11th you'll be able to revisit those big floating rings in space to wipe out alien species for whatever reason. They talked a big game with this one, retouched graphics, switch between new and classic graphics, multiplayer is the same as it was and all this applies to all 4 games. In total we're looking at over 100 MP maps, every Halo map ever released on running on the original engines at 1080p all on lovely dedicated servers mmmmmmmmmalso if you like achievements then guess what there's a few with this..4000 gamerscores worth. Yes 4000.

After all that we were shown some Halo Nightfall, some digital series that leads into Halo 5: Guardians. Speaking of which the beta for that starts in December, oh and it will run at 60fps on dedicated servers because they're the right way of doing things god dammit!

Phil Spencer changes his shirt and really loves that hip new indie game Limbo

"oh hey look at all our betas now look at all the shit coming out in 2015 starting with something from the guys who made that hip new indie game Limbo"

Inside

Well what can I say, much like Limbo this game looks dark, miserable and oppressive. Lots of grey palettes at work here (probably).

ID@Xbox

Apparently these guys love indies which is why they threw a giant compilation of indie games at us that are all coming to that Microsoft console:

Aztez

Knight Squad

Plague Inc

White Night

Earthlock Festival of Magic

Cuphead

Drifter

Lifeless Planet

Slash Dash

Fru

Lovers in a Dangerous Space

Mighty no.9

Grave

Threes

Fenix Rage

Woolfe

Idarb

Hellraid

Below

annnnd then that ended...

Cut to more terrible filler about people who love games

Rise of the Tombraider

Tense..

Well, the professional antiquity thief is back. Fresh from her last romp Ms. Croft is now in therapy and we are told all about her nightmares and flashbacks which we can assume are all related to that island she removed all the inhabitants from. Well whatever the case she's bound to end up going somewhere else and stealing more ancient shit. Also the name is god damn awful.

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt

Mmmmm

Holy balls and hell fire what a preview, Gerald is back once more doing some straight up witchin and shit. The footage we were shown was from 10 hours into the game and showed Mr.G quick footing around some forest and grasslands on the hunt for a big ass gryphon, on the way we see some fantastic decapitation of bandits at a camp. This game looks spec-bloody-tacular, it's one hell of a good looking overworld we see with fluid movement and traversal.

This damn game is going to murder my PC (because why would you get it on Xbox) and I'm fine with that, even more fine with the fact it's been pushed back to 2015. I want CD projekt Red to take as loooooonnnnng as they need to make this game everything it needs to be so we can bang all the ladies across the world.

Phantom Dust

So I was completely lost when this went down, never heard of it, never played it, never knew it was a big thing. Random cutscene of angel vs demon fight aside it is or was at least a card action game of sorts apparently so there's that.

Random BS about hours played on live 



The Division

Ahhh Ubisoft sure do love their weird future tech games don't they, almost as much as they love to hype up a game then delay it then it end up to be disappointing..anyway. The division is some kind of third person cover based shooter set in a world where some kind of virus is killing people and then the army nazis are killing the infected and stop me if this starts to sound familiar. We're not killing zombies or anything though no no, killing other people trying to survive is what we're in this game for though you can bet your balls that the other people trying to make it in the new world are painted as evil violent bad guys.

False promises go hand in hand with terribly commentated on-stage multiplayer and it's possible they took the cake with this one, it always comes across as completely false and disingenuous and just down right bad. "Ok I'm going to flank from the right, John you storm the front and"blahhh blahhh bollocks. Stop doing this, please, it really hurts my insides. Anyway The Divison will be getting all new content first on Xbox One along with all it's damn lens flare.

Scalebound

Well fuck Platinum games are out in full swing on the batshit-o-meter. We're treated to some hipster douchebag wearing headphones listening to his phat beats in a jungle or forest of some form and then BAM dragon dinosaur alien thing! and then BAM the hipster turns into a fucking knight who's all scaly (LIKE THE TITLE GET IT?!). But then, a new challenger approaches, a giant hydra with heads everywhere. Sounds horrific and un-winnable until your hipster jumps on the dragon thing and rides into battle like some kind of glorious..thing! I need this and I want this and Platinum take my money you wonderful people.

Crackdown

Well I didn't see this happening but it did and ooooo it looks shiny and cartoony and explodey. No gameplay to be seen but if I can drive a truck covered in C4 into a building in order to blow said building up to crash into the adjacent building and kill a guy like the trailer shows then sign me up now. If we get even half as much destructibility as the trailer implies then this game will easily surpass Saints Row as the new dicking around simulator.

Phil Spencer changes his shirt again
Blah blah thank you all, thank you we love you thank you etc etc who cares.

END!

Summary
Well credit where credits due Microsoft really did well this year, they had to after the severe beating they got last year so yes well done. Some promising exclusives on the horizon for the Xbox One so the competition is on like Donkey Kong.