PC Gamer USA - March 2016

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REVIEWEDRAINBOW SIX SIEGE

GAME OF THRONES

ELITE DANGEROUS:HORIZONS

GRAPHICS CARDS RATED!

THE LONG DARK HE AMAZING STORY BEHIND ONE

F PC’S BEST SURVIVAL GAMES

BUYER’S GUIDGET THE RIGHT GAMIN

PC FOR YOUR BUDGE

GET THE

MOST FROM

YOUR GAMES

FAR CRPRIMA

THE ODDE

SPIN-OFF ALL TIM

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THE DREAM FANTASY CROSSOVER IS HERE

TOTAL WAR:WARHAMMER

MASS EFFECT ANDROMEDA

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DEUS EX:MANKIND DIVIDED

MORE!

Issue 276

MARCH

2016





@originpc







Hello, 2016There are so many reasons to beoptimistic about PC gaming in 2016. Inthis issue, we’ve selected 15 games thatwe think are going to make this yeargreat, or at the very least, kind of good,

from big RPGs such as Mass Effect: Andromeda to PC favorites like American Truck Simulator.

This month, we also spoke to the team behind The Long Dark, who left city (and big developer) life behind to create oneof PC’s best survival games. Check it outon p60. Enjoy the issue.

T A L K T OP C G A M E R

Have your say!Tweet us

@PCGamer

T I M C L A R K

G L O B A L E D I T O R - I N - C H I E Ft i m . c l a r k @ f u t u r e n e t . c o m@ t i m o t h y d c l a r k

#276 MARCH 2016

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Our team of writersT Y L E R W I L D E

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Currently playingRocket League

This monthTried getting intoCrusader Kings II butsoon got lost in a menuwith no way out.

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Currently playingVermintide

This monthLost his mind over StarWars, along with the restof the population ofplanet Earth.

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Currently playingLoot Hound

This monthCompared a game aboutwalking a dog in a park towalking his actual dog ina real park.

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6 MARCH 2016





Monitor10 THE TOP STORY

12 THE SPY

Previews16 Far Cry Primal24 Hue26 Grip28 Oxenfree30 EVE: Valkyrie

Features34 Total War: WarhammerDiscover the campaign content of the

Total Warcrossover.

40 2016 Preview 15 games we’re excited about in 2016.

54 XCOM 2Hands-on with Firaxis’s sequel.

60 Making The Long DarkWe talk to Hinterland Studio.

Reviews66 Rainbow Six Siege70 Life is Feudal: Your Own

72 Game of Thrones74 Galak-Z76 Assassin’s Creed Syndicate78 Hard West80 Nuclear Throne82 Chaos Reborn84 Total War: Attila –

Charlemagne86 Elite Dangerous: Horizons

Extra Life88 NOW PLAYINGWhat we’ve been playing this month.

92 TOP 10 DOWNLOADSGet the latest mods, demos and more.

96UPDATEChecking in with The Old Republic .

Hardware104 GROUP TESTGraphics cards reviewed.

110 BUYER’S GUIDE

R E V I E WContents #276M A R C H 2 0 1 6

34TOTAL WARWARHAMMERThe Creative Assembly on itshuge-scale crossover fantasystrategy game.

66RAINBOW SIXSIEGEJames Davenport breaksdown the doors of Ubisoft’scompetitive FPS.

104GRAPHICSCARDSDave James rounds up thelatest and best mid-rangegraphics cards .

34

104

66

8 MARCH 2016



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PROMOCODE ‘PCGAMER’ FOR 3 OFFROMOCODE ‘PCGAMER’ FOR 3 OFFROMOCODE ‘PCGAMER’ FOR 3 OFFROMOCODE ‘PCGAMER’ FOR 3 OFFROMOCODE ‘PCGAMER’ FOR 3 OFFROMOCODE ‘PCGAMER’ FOR 3 OFF

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Psychonauts 2 is coming to PC,

thanks to a successfulcampaign on Fig, the not-as-well-named-as-Kickstartercrowdfunding platform.

Double Fine was looking for $3 million tomake the game, and at the time we wentto press was well over 80% of the waythere with days to go. So, it might nothappen, but it seems very likely thatyou’re getting a sequel to the oft-talkedabout 3D adventure. Probably.

Psychonauts was a platform adventurestarring the psychically-powered Raz, who

escaped from his family’s circus to join a

psychic summer camp with the eventual

goal of becoming one of the titular secretagents. The sequel will be set insidePsychonauts’ HQ, which will be a mini hubworld, and the game will include new andexisting abilities for Raz. A lot of the game’soriginal devs will be getting together to

make this sequel, which asked for pocket

change of $3.3 million on the investor-friendly (let’s not get into that) Fig platform(which again, isn’t as well-named asKickstarter). Assuming it hit its target.Which it almost certainly did.

After Double Fine got the rights to Psychonauts back in 2011 and it was resolddigitally, the game’s cult following grew andgrew thanks to Steam/GOG sales andHumble Bundles. This is Double Fine’s thirdcrowdfunded project following Broken Age and Massive Chalice. Now, undoubtedly, thestudio’s most beloved game is getting asequel! Almost certainly.

Samuel Roberts

A LOT OF THE GAME’SORIGINAL DEVS WILL BEGETTING TOGETHER TO

MAKE THIS SEQUEL

DOUBLE FINE REVEALSPSYCHONAUTS 2

The long-awaited sequel from DOUBLE FINE is on its way (probably)

T H E T O P S T O R Y

10 MARCH 2016

T H E P C G A M E R V I E W O F T H E W O R L

O P I N I O N T E C H G A M E S





T

LARA CROFT’S LATEST

ADVENTURE MAY ESCAPE

ITS XBOX PRISON

SOONER THAN EXPECTED

T

H

E

S

P

Y

W H O W A T C H E S T H E S P Y ?

O P I N I O N I G A M E S I T E C H

course, The Spy can’t reveal what’s

in store for the aforementionedreader—that would ruin thesurprise. Just know, Troy Williams,who works in the WalMart onSpringfield main street, that TheSpy has big plans for you.

(Disclaimer: The Spy does notreally know where Troy Williamsworks or lives. The Spy thought thatif, by some astronomical chance,that guess was correct, Troy would be so freaked out that The Spywouldn’t have to spend time on anyactual retaliation.)

On the subject of gibberish,here’s the conclusion to the Kojima/ Konami saga. As was speculated afew months ago, Kojima has left thecompany and formed his own,independent studio—KojimaProductions. This new studio, then,

has the same name as his old studio,albeit without the (alleged) threat ofany of its employees being demoteddown to janitorial staff.

While no game has beenannounced, this Kojima Productionsreboot has already announced apartnership with Sony in a video

featuring SCE CEO Andrew House beamingfor all the world like a

cat who’s stumbledupon a large bowl fullof cream. While thenews will surely be aic in the nethers to

Xbox bosses, PCgamers have littlecause for concern. Ina now deleted Q&A,SCEE’s communitymanager posted tothe effect that, aftera period ofPlayStationexclusivity, Kojima

Productions’ firstgame will becoming to PC.

So far, the only official image

from the studio is of the newKojima Productions logo—a skull inwhat Kojima describes as a cross between a medieval helmet and aspacesuit. The logo represents“aiming the new world with thelatest technology and pioneeringspirit,” tweets Kojima. Whatever thehell that’s supposed to mean. TheSpy preferred it when he wasposting pictures of sausages.

In other platform semi-exclusivity news, it’s likely that LaraCroft’s latest adventure will escapeits Xbox prison sooner thanexpected. It had previously beenrevealed that Rise of the TombRaider would be coming to PC in2016, but it hadn’t been expecteduntil spring at the earliest. According to an Amazon France

listing, though, it could be with us as early asJanuary 29.

BUCKET LIST

Amazon listings arefamously inaccurate, andso it’s possible—evenlikely—that someone haspulled the date out froma bucket of enemadischarge. However, it’s

also easy to see why Square Enixwould want to get the new Croftadventure onto another platform assoon as possible. Reportedly, only330,000 copies were sold worldwidein the first week of sale onMicrosoft’s console tomb. Of course,releasing on the same day as Fallout4 probably didn’t help matters, but,whatever the cause, PC sales willundoubtedly be much stronger.

Last month, OthersideEntertainment announced SystemShock 3—the surprise sequel to a16-year-old game. Details areextremely light right now, but asurvey that can be taken on thegame’s website makes reference to VR—presumably in an attempt togauge just how interested System Shock fans are in leaving behindtheir mundane reality for one opento control by a manipulative AI.

The Spy would take that survey, but it asks too many innocuous-sounding personal questions. The

Spy already regrets mentioning the birthmark thing. Spy out.The Spy

The Spy knows thelocation of theRebel base.

he Spy is a very busy person. Everyfew weeks, The Spy must tail agrowing list of rival agents, compilea report on the latest PC gamingrumors, and steal a source ofdebilitatingly expensive vicuña woolin order to knit a fetching attachecase cover. Lately, though, The Spyhas struggled to fit these activitiesaround a new and all-consumingobsession. Because recently, in aletter published in this magazine, areader referred to TheSpy’s vital regular reportas ‘inane gibberish’.

The Spy has never been more offended—orat least, not since foilingthat regional cyber-terrorist. It turns out amild-manneredcomputer hacker’s insultscan be disarminglyspecific after they’vestolen all your personal data.

But enough about The Spy’sweird birthmark. The Spy is highlyperturbed by this reader’scomments. Is it The Spy’s fault thatlife is a seemingly random series ofnon-sequiturs that occur with nooverarching plot or connectivetissue? And so, The Spy demandssatisfaction. Of





U S E R R E V I E W SDota 2 . Rosh has a

Santa hat and I guessother stuff changed.Tony HeughThat’s certainly oneway to describe

patch 6.86.

CS:GO , because ofthe insane skill gap.And chickens.Hayden BurnsBe honest, it’s justthe chickens.

Rainbow Six Siege .It’s fun and excitingto play. My favoritegame right now!Phillip BreenIt’s fun bashingout walls with asledgehammer.

And in the game.

I’ve been burnt-outlately, so it’s beenClicker Heroes while depressinglydrinking beer.NecrospunkThis is maybe thesaddest thing we’veever heard. Youcould at least playCandy Box .

Cities: Skylines .What a dope game. I’lleat up any DLC it has!Harry BojanglesMake sure you buy itbefore you eat it. It’sonly fair.

Fallout 4 . It’sstrangely similar toSkyrim , but has itsown fantastic,post-apocalypticcharm. And a dog!Mr. SinfulCDogmeat is certainlya contender for Dogof the Year.

Got into MGSV quite late but

really enjoying theemergent gameplay.Dennis BandaAnother great game;another great dog.

S H O O TL I K EC L I C K W A T C H F O L L O W S E N D

steamcommunity.com/groups/pcgamer

facebook.com/pcgamermagazine

pcgamer.com @pcgamerPC Gamer, Future US Inc, 1 LombardStreet, Suite 200, San Francisco,CA 94111

[email protected]

youtube.com/user/pcgamer

your friends have made the mistake

of gaming on a console, we suggest

it’s time you find some new ones.

Check out our Steam group if you’re

looking for some multiplayer

companions. PCG

Such a splurgeI’m thrilled you’ve enhanced yourBuyer’s Guide. PC gamers are alltypes of people in various economicalsituations, so I’m glad to see a

breakdown of three different builds based on budget. In March 2013, Idropped a cool $1K on a GTX 690,not caring at all about the price-to-performance ratio. But now I have awife, a house and a kid and wouldn’tallow myself such a splurge.Thomas HoekThanks for the feedback. It’s

important to remember that PC gaming means different things to

different people—not everyone needs

the latest and best hardware to get

the most out of their hobby. PCG

Denied every timeI’ve requested four Steam refundsand been denied every time. Therefund is supposed to let youpurchase with confidence, but I feellike this policy is in place so they canscam you out of money you might nototherwise spend. This last request

was especially infuriating becausethey tried to troubleshoot myproblem and that put me over thetwo-hour playtime limit, which leadto a robotic response saying, “We willnot be granting a refund at this time.”I plan to boycott them in the future,and get any Steam codes I use froman outside website.Justin Newcomb

That’s bad form on Steam’s part. It’s

easy to see the positives of a set

refund policy, but it needs a personal

touch to make the right call in cases

like Justin’s. Has anyone else hadproblems with Steam’s new policy?

If you have then get in touch and let

us know. PCG

Vault Boy tattooYou’d think a guy with a

Vault Boy tattoo on his leg would’ve

played the original game. I’m not a

fan of turn-based isometric games—

especially ones with dated graphics—

but I love Fallout ’s lore, so I gave it a

go. I’m standing in a cave. There’s no

tutorial and I’m clicking my mouse

button to kill rats with a knife. A

couple of hours and over 30 reloads

later, I really can’t see myselfbothering to continue playing. But

after 26 hours, I’d completed the

game. Wow, what a ride: action,

suspense, tactics, survival.

While I enjoyed Fallout 4 and the

150 hours I invested in it, I never felt

any of those emotions playing it. It

goes to show that you should never

judge a game by its graphics.

Jason Orme

Yes! Old games are good

sometimes, even if they’re ugly

and obtuse. Fallout is a classicfor a reason. Seriously, though,

fuck those rats. PCG

Finally higherOver the past few years I’ve beengaming on a 2009 iMac, and have

barely been able to download anygames as most of them are just forWindows. I’ve been saving up all

year, and now I can afford to buy anice, new, powerful gaming PC! Mostof my friends are console gamers, andI was tempted to buy a console overthe past few months. However, I’ve

stayed strong to what my truepassion is. I may, however, find itstrange playing games such as Minecraft on a resolution finallyhigher than 720p, at a framerateabove 13 frames per second. I willalso love being able to download evenmore games that you guys at PCGamer have recommended!Sean CooperGood choice, Sean! Although if all

SEND A free Steam key for the funniest or

most insightful letter every month

14 MARCH 2016

Old Fallout is still deeperthan the new ones.

W I N N E R !



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Despite everything that’s absent, one of

the most surprising things about playing

Far Cry Primal is that it feels so

remarkably familiar. Its open world is filled

with side-quests, emergent events and

outposts. New (or, more accurately,ancient) protagonist Takkar moves exactly

like Far Cry 4 ’s Ajay—even down to the

rope that functions just like Far Cry 4 ’s

grappling hook. Stealth is similarly

identical. Sneak up to an enemy and you’ll

get a familiar take-down prompt,

triggering a violent insta-kill.

In other words, it’s a Far Cry game.

Unlike Blood Dragon , Primal isn’t a

spin-off. Ubisoft is calling it a full sequel,

comparable in size to Far Cry 4 . While the

time period means that certain longterm

staples of the series are missing, new, less

anachronistic solutions do much to

reintroduce basic systems—often inabsurd ways. What I mean is the owl.

Binoculars didn’t exist in 10,000BC, and

so Takkar must reconnoiter his

surroundings using a makeshift avian

system. With a press of a button, he honks

into a shell to summon his owl companion.

You then control the owl, gliding

around the area, focusing on enemies to

tag them. As in previous Far Cry games,

tagged enemies can be seen through

walls and obstacles. So far, so binoculars,

but the owl has a couple of additional

tricks. It can attack enemies, its giant,

feathered frame slamming down into the

faces of tribesmen. Later in the game, an

upgrade arms the owl with fire bombs,

which he can drop like a prehistoric B-52

bomber. The past is a strange place.

“In Far Cry , we take you to the lawless

frontier,” says game director Thomas

Simon of the series’ flimsy connective

tissue. “You’re in the known world, but

you’re in the fringe where some weird stu

is happening. The stone age world is like

that. It’s the origin of conflict between

humans. For us, it’s the perfect setting. It

respects the roots of what Far Cry is,

except in a setting that’s really differentand unexpected.” I’m forced to concede

his point: I was not expecting the owl.

BEAK PRACTICE

Despite its questionable historic

implementation, owl-based recon fits

comfortably into the Far Cry template.

Hiding at the outskirts of an outpost, I use

the owl to tag the various enemies within.

That done, I’m free to work my way

through, picking off the tribesmen inside

through a mixture of arrow headshots an

melee takedowns. My play style in past

Far Cry games made heavy use of bowsand stealth, and that’s just as viable here.

If your preference is for action, Far Cry

Primal should feel less directly

comparable to previous games. Obviousl

there are no guns, reducing Takkar’s

options to bows, clubs, slingshots, and

spears. There are no grenades in the

traditional sense, but you can throw a

‘sting bomb’—literally a nest of hornets. T

complement these options, Ubisoft has

again turned to the animal kingdom.

Unlike previous Far Cry games, Primal ’s

Takkar isn’t a fish-out-of-water newbie.

He’s a veteran of the fictional land of Oros

well versed in the brutality of the region.His experience manifests in his

relationship with animals. Far Cry Primal ’s

beasties are a big deal—giving the world a

feeling of ferocity above and beyond its

scattering of rival tribes. “Animals were

really dangerous,” says Simon. “They

were not afraid of man yet. A long time

Far Cry Primal is set around 12,000 yearsago, at the beginning of the Mesolithicperiod. This was, historians tell us, atime before the invention of almost all of

the mod cons that characterise previous Far Crygames. Guns, vehicles, wingsuits, hang gliders,mini-helicopters, rickety towers, purple suits anddubstep—the stone age world had none of these.

Ubisoft’s prehistoric playground isfilled with animal magic

F A R C R Y P R I M A L

LATER IN THE GAME, ANUPGRADE ARMS THE OWLWITH FIRE BOMBS

RELEASE

March 1DEVELOPER

Ubisoft MontrealPUBLISHER

UbisoftLINK

www.bit.ly/UbiPrimal

N E E D T O K N O W

P L A Y E D

I T

MARCH 2016

Far Cry Prima

P R E V I EW



ago, man was not at the top of the food

chain.” Far Cry ’s animals have always

been a fun and deadly part of the

emergent clash of systems, but in Primal

they play a much greater role. They’re

deadlier, more numerous, and boast a

more believable AI. More than that,

though, Takkar can tame them.

“We wanted to explore not only the

aspect of kill or be killed, but also the

concept of a bond being created between

human and animal,” says Simon. “It’s the

alliance between wolf packs and tribes of

humans—the mutual collaboration—that

pushed them to the top of the food chain.

We tried to recreate that concept, and it

allowed us to build on the Shangri-La tiger

of Far Cry 4 . We took that and expanded it

to our systemic gameplay across thewhole world.”

In practice, it looks a bit silly. Throwing

out a piece of bait, Takkar can walk up to

an animal and start the taming process:

that’s you, holding down a context-

sensitive button prompt until the beast is

your permanent, unwavering ally. I have

never once been able to tell a cat to do

anything, let alone a sabre-tooth tiger, but

Takkar can order his growing menagerie

to maul enemies on a whim.

TIGER FEAT

You can only have one animal ally at atime, but you can switch between them at

any point. Bears are big, unsubtle lumps of

teeth and claws that will happily follow you

across water. Lions won’t go for a swim,

but are more stealthy—stalking alongside

you as you creep up to enemies. Sabre-

tooth tigers and mammoths can be

ridden, useful in a world without cars.

For Ubisoft, as for the makers of the

Flintstones, animals are perfect for filling

out the gaps left by the removal of modern

technology. But while they’ll follow your

orders, they’re still independent actors

with their own AI and behaviors. “You’re

playing with a systemic toy,” says Simon.“They’re basically a superweapon that can

always surprise you, which reinforces a lot

of anecdotes in the game.”

My worry is they’re a bit overpowered.

In the build I played, my tiger friend

happily mauled an outpost full of people.

My only role was to provide light support

“A LONG TIME AGO, MANWAS NOT AT THE TOP OF THEFOOD CHAIN”

in the form of a quick spear to the head of

a pounced-upon foe. Your animal

companions are vulnerable, but can be

healed using the meat you collect off of

other animals. The only time mine was

ever in danger of being incapacitated was

when he decided to fight a bear.

The area of the map I had access to

was clearly near the start, to be fair. The

outposts were all ranked as easy, and I

was wielding some of the more advanced

skills and upgrades. In normal

progression, I’d expect more of a

challenge—reflected by the fact that parts

of the world will prove deadly to Takkar. He

can die from exposure in Oros’s colder

regions, and fire will be vital for survival.

BURNING ISSUEFire plays a big part in Primal overall—

reflecting both its importance as an

emerging technology, and the fact that Far

Cry games have always enjoyed excellent

fire propagation effects. You can set light

to any of Takkar’s weapons—not only

enabling you to start fires, but also

providing protection from animals that will

shy away from the flames. But fire also

limits your stealth options, because, of

course, it’s easy to see.

To be clear, Far Cry Primal is not a

survival game. The fact that cold weather

can kill Takkar is more about the difficultycurve. Those cold climates will initially

provide a challenge, but as you progress

new crafting options will let you create

winter clothes. Ubisoft is being cagey

about the exact nature of progression,

but, based on what I saw, tribespeople will

offer new skills and crafting recipes.

In general crafting has been fleshed

out—giving you more incentive to explore

the world and interact with (read: kill) the

animals you meet on the way. Recipes

require a greater variety of raw materials.

There’s also more variety in what you can

make. As always you can craft a larger

quiver or bag, but hunting also lets youupgrade weapons—tying the progression

of power to one of the series’ most

enjoyable activities.

For all that’s new, Primal emanates a

sense of familiarity. It’s not a reskin—the

animal stuff is too fleshed out and

interesting—but it is a variation on a pretty

well-worn template. In some respects it’s a

shame to see, especially given the series’

weirder roots. On the other hand,

outposts are clearly a hit, and Primal

seems filled with enjoyably ridiculous new

ways to clear them.

Phil Savage

18 MARCH 2016

Far Cry Primal

P R E V I EW

When the wholesquad is on point.

Double arrow is advancedtech for 10,000 BCE.


http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/pc-gamer-usa-march-2016 19/116 MARCH 2016 1

P R E V I EW

The prehistoric worldwas basically Mordor.







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The world of Hue is in a state of perpetualmonochrome until a researcher, yourmother, creates a mysterious ring thatgives the wearer the ability to see color.

But then she mysteriously disappears and it’s up toyou, the titular Hue, to use her magical color-seeingpowers to solve puzzles, avoid deadly traps, helppeople and discover her fate.

of personality. There also seem to be

some physics at play. Boats bob around in

a stylized ocean and I accidentally knock

over some items resting on a shelf in Hue’s

house. But it’s when I find a blue-colored

item shaped like an orange segment that

the real core of the game reveals itself.

The color is added to a wheel accessed

via the right stick on a controller. I’m

exploring a cave and I bump into a miner

trapped by a pile of blue rocks. I bring up

the wheel, select my newly acquired

power, and it disappears, freeing him. As I

make my way through a series ofpuzzle-filled caves, which serve as a

tutorial, I unlock more colors until the

wheel is filled with an entire spectrum.

The central mechanic inHue ’s puzzles

is activating a color on the wheel to make

items appear or disappear, to bypass

obstacles or navigate deadly terrain. It’s

not as clever asPortal ’s portals orBraid ’s

time control, but it works well enough.

One of the trickiest sections I

encounter is having to switch colors in

mid-air as I jump across a pit of spikes to

make life-saving platforms appear and

disappear. I like that the color-changing

concept is used for both puzzles and

platforming. The build I played had a

placeholder voiceover from the

character’s mother, so the final game will

likely have some narrative elements tostring the puzzles together.

MIX AND MATCH

Hue is an interesting game with a

distinctive visual style, but I’m interested

to see how the color-switching grows in

complexity as the game moves past the

tutorial levels. The developers have talked

about mixing colors coming into play later

on, but I didn’t encounter anything like

this. The version I played was pre-alpha,

so it’s far from finished. Even so, I’m eager

to play more.

Andy Kelly

YOU USE YOUR

MAGICAL COLOR-

SEEING POWERS TO

SOLVE PUZZLES

P L A Y E D

I T

A color-changing puzzlegame with a vivid art style

H U E

This indie platformer is being developed

by a new studio called Fiddlesticks, made

up of formerQUBE devs, and mixes clever

puzzles with a bold, vivid art style. It’s not

out until summer, but I spent some time

with an early preview build, and it’s already

showing a lot of promise.

At first it feels like a typical platformer.

The silhouetted main character reminds

me of the kid fromLimbo . The controls are

responsive, although I find the jumping a

bit floaty. I immediately fall in love with the

art style, because even though

everything’s in black and white, it has a lot

24 MARCH 2016

Game ame

P R E V I EW

RELEASE

JuneDEVELOPER

FiddlesticksPUBLISHER

Curve DigitalLINK

www.huethegame.com

N E E D T O K N O W

The animation is reminiscentof early Disney cartoons.



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The Rollcage series felt very much of itsera—that weird late-’90s/early-’00shinterland defined by The Matrix, theX-Files’ troubled post-Duchovny years,

and an inexplicable number of people being reallyinto Blink 182. Psygnosis’s original combat-heavyarcade racer felt less clean and futuristic than itsmain rival, Wipeout. And while it was never as

popular, its dark, industrial aesthetic earned itplenty of fans.

to the hefty feeling of weight behind its

preposterous vehicles.

As in Rollcage , it’s a simple enough

premise. In Grip ’s main mode, you must

race through the tracks, picking up

power-ups that grant deployable

weapons, shields and turbo boosts. What

sets these games apart is the cars.

They’re large, fast and sport wheels bigger

than their chassis. They’re designed to

drive up walls and along ceilings, and can

be flipped over with no penalty to speed.

It can be disorienting, especially as

you’re desperately trying to navigatetwisting tunnels, but lets Grip ’s designers

hide clever shortcuts throughout. In one

track, a small gap on the right wall of a

tunnel forks off into a network of tight

tubes that could have offered a significant

advantage had I not spun out of control.

Elsewhere, there are jumps, side-routes

and some fiendishly placed power-ups.

WORK TO DO

An Early Access release is due later this

year, and it’s clear from the pre-release

build there’s still lots of work to be done.

The car is too skittish and quick to spin

out, and the AI can become lodged in bits

of scenery. The weapons are incredibly

basic, too. As a proof of concept, though,

there are lots of promising signs.

Plenty of tracks and modes areplanned for the final version. Players will

be able to unlock new cars and upgrades

in a career mode, fight in big car battle

royales, and fall to their death in Precision.

This last mode is a variation on Stage II ’s

Scramble, which turns the game into a

platformer by presenting a labyrinthine

course of slim, floating pathways.

It’ll be a while before all that’s in place,

but Grip feels like it has the potential to

recapture Rollcage ’s moody aesthetic and

rapid action and remind me of why I so

loved the concept all those years ago.

Phil Savage

THE CARS ARE LARGE,FAST AND SPORTWHEELS BIGGER THANTHEIR CHASSIS

P L A Y E D

I T

Arcade racing goes back to theindustrial future

G R I P

Grip is positioning itself as Rollcage ’s

spiritual successor—two of its team

worked on the original games—and,

despite being built in Unreal Engine 4, it

isn’t doing much to modernize. It’s the

same chunky, flippable cars, the same

sparse, rocky tracks full of tunnels and

machinery, and the same drum ’n’ bass

soundtrack from some of the same artists

that backed Rollcage: Stage II . This, it

turns out, is a good thing. Grip ’s take on

the formula still feels great, thanks largely

26 MARCH 2016

Game ame

P R E V I EW

RELEASE

2016DEVELOPER

Caged ElementPUBLISHER

In-houseLINK

www.gripvideogame.com

N E E D T O K N O W

Floor or ceiling? It’simpossible to tell.



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When you first arrive on Edwards Island,it doesn’t look like much. You step offthe boat into a lifeless, abandonedcoastal town, with shuttered shops and

an empty car park. You’re here with a group ofteenage friends to hang out for the weekend. Yousit on the beach, play dumb games, shareembarrassing stories, and drink beer.

explore, solve adventure game-style

puzzles and use your radio to unravel the

truth about this enigmatic island and its

storied past.

The game is atmospheric and eerie,

but funny too. The dialogue between the

well-acted teenage cast is warm and

entertaining, and has a curiously natural

rhythm. You can butt in with your

responses without having to wait for a

character to stop talking, which makes the

conversations feel real, and not just like

people reading out lines.

TALKING HEADS

As people talk, speech bubbles float above

Alex’s head offering you different ways to

have her respond. Or you can just wander

away, and the dialogue will change to

reflect that. It’s some of the most

effortlessly natural-sounding dialogue I’ve

heard in a game.

The characters are interesting and

flawed, elevating them beyond the

usual American teenager stereotypes.

As much asOxenfree is a story about a

supernatural mystery and a creepy island,

it’s also a coming-of-age tale. The

relationships, particularly between Alex

and her new stepbrother, are compelling

and well-written.

And it’s all held together with stunning

art design. There’s an ethereal, hand-painted quality to the environments, and

the stylized 3D models blend beautifully

with them. A hazy atmosphere and soft,

pastel color palette lend the game an

artistic quality, and crisp animation brings

the characters to life.

I can’t wait to play more ofOxenfree . A

lot of love has clearly been poured into the

art, writing, and world design, and I love

the free, conversational dialogue system.

And, importantly, I can’t wait to find out

more about Edwards Island and the

supernatural events taking place there.

Andy Kelly

MYSTERY AND A

SENSE OF THE

UNKNOWN ARE THE

HEART OF THE GAME

P L A Y E D

I T

A supernatural coming-of-ageadventure set on a spooky island

O X E N F R E E

But then you decide to investigate a

mysterious cave and things suddenly take

a turn for the supernatural. You have a

radio and activating it brings up a dial.

Stand in just the right place and tune to a

certain frequency and you’ll hear ghostly,

otherworldly sounds—a clue that there’s

something strange about this place.

I won’t say what happens in the cave,

because mystery and a sense of the

unknown are the heart of the game. But

afterwards, the group become separated.

You, Alex, are then free to wander the

island to try to find your friends. You

28 MARCH 2016

Game ame

P R E V I EW

RELEASE

January 15DEVELOPER

Night School StudioPUBLISHER

In-houseLINK

www.nightschoolstudio.com

N E E D T O K N O W

The first place you visit isthis eerily empty town.





I flew alongside it, watching it through my

side window, and could hear the deep,

thundering roar of its engines. I really felt

like I was in the shadow of a colossal

physical object. Then someone blew me

up with a homing missile.I’ve played a lot of virtual reality

games andValkyrie is among the

most convincing. The sensation of

being there is really quite remarkable.

As you weave through asteroids,

firing your miniguns at enemy ships,

launching missiles and watching the

smoke trail curl into the distance, you

genuinely forget you’re sitting in front of a

PC clutching a gamepad. You’re there , in

that ship, in an asteroid field, and it’s

absolutely exhilarating.

The game itself is fairly simple: a

streamlined, accessible, almost arcade-

like shooter. You move with the left stick,roll with the bumpers, boost with A, brake

with B, and activate a limited use

anti-missile turret with X. To lock onto an

enemy ship, you just look at it and

squeeze the left trigger. The reticule

precisely follows your head movements,

and the longer you hold it, the more

missiles are loaded. Then you simply let

go to fire your salvo. Squeezing the right

trigger fires your miniguns: a pair of loud,

booming cannons on either side of the

cockpit that glow orange as they heat up.

But this simplicity is by design, because

complexity in VR games can shatter the

illusion. The more intuitive a game’s

controls are, the more immersive it is.

INTO BATTLE

The game will come with some PvE

missions, but it’s largely focused on online

multiplayer. During one battle I foundmyself chasing another player through a

field of debris. They’d squeeze through

narrow gaps in giant, floating chunks of

shattered metal to try to shake me, and I’d

give chase, firing my miniguns. It was

incredibly exciting, and tracking them by

just moving my head felt completely

natural. All the while I was leaning back in

my chair, gritting my teeth and leaning

from side to side, fully lost in the moment.

The controls are simple, but the game

does have depth. Ships are split into

familiar class archetypes (fighter, support,

heavy, etc), but you can combine theirtraits to create your own hybrids.

Support ships can fire a beam that

eats away at an enemy’s shield or

restores an ally’s. You can sacrifice

your homing missiles for a warp drive

that gives you a sudden, blistering burst of

speed. And some ships can drop energy

bubbles in the battlefield that will sap the

shields of any enemy pilots who fly

through them. There’s an XP unlock

system, an in-game currency, ship

customization, and everything else you

might expect from a modern competitive

multiplayer shooter. Game types range

from simple deathmatches to morestrategic point-capture modes.

Death, asEVE fans will know, isn’t the

end in this universe—your mind leaps into

a fresh body, a clone, and you appear in a

new ship. But one of the best ways to

avoid death, I found, was by slamming on

the ‘brakes’, spinning my ship around on a

pivot and surprising my pursuer with a

burst of minigun fire. After a particularly

long killstreak, I felt like a legendary space

pilot, even though I was just a man sitting

in a room in London with a plastic box

stuck to his face. That’s the power of VR.

Andy Kelly

Set in the EVE Online universe, Valkyrie is a space combat game designedspecifically for VR. It features intenseStar Wars-like space battles, but it was

something a lot more mundane that really sold it tome. During a battle in an asteroid field, I flew awayfrom the action briefly to follow a mining barge Isaw moving slowly through the spinning rocks.

Strapped into the cockpitof CCP’s amazing VR shooter

E V E : V A L K Y R I E

YOU’RETHERE , IN THAT SHIP, INAN ASTEROID FIELD, AND IT’SABSOLUTELY EXHILARATING

RELEASE

2016DEVELOPER

CCP GamesPUBLISHER

In-houseLINK

www.evevalkyrie.com

N E E D T O K N O W

P L A Y E D

I T

The combat is veryBattlestar Galactica.

30 MARCH 2016

EVE: Valkyrie

P R E V I EW

You’ll need at least aGTX 970 to run Valkyrie .



You don’t get to see New Edenthis close in EVE Online .

The warp drivein action.

MARCH 2016 3

Game ame

P R E V I EW





Straplin

OUR 15 MOST

WANTEDGAMES OF 2016

34 Total War: Warhammer40 Hitman

42 Mirror’s Edge Catalyst44

Deus Ex: Mankind Divided

45 Firewatch45 Worlds Adrift

46

Superhot

47

Stellaris

48 Dishonored 248 Mass Effect Andromeda

50 Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord51 American Truck Simulator

51

Endless Space 252 Doom

52

Overwatch

Contents

The next 12 months in PC gaming

42

48

MARCH 2016 3

Hitm

2 6 PREVIEW

3444

52



“WE’RE NOT RESTRICTED TO MAKING

ALL OUR GUYS 20MM TALL”

34 MARCH 2016

Total War:Warha r

2016 PREV W



First off, Al Bickham, the avuncular voice

of Creative and one-time writer for this

magazine, talks me through the campaign

map. At the time of writing, Total War:

Warhammer has entered alpha. But for

Creative Assembly, that term meanssomething slightly different from other

studios. It means that the game is up and

running, and feature and content

complete, but still needs lots of work—and

any of those elements could still be

changed or dropped.

“Even months and months ago, all the

functions were working, so we’ve really

been able to polish it from an early stage,”

says project lead Ian Roxburgh. The team

have given themselves five months to get

the game finished—whether or not they

succeed, we’ll find out in the spring.

I’m given a fifteen-minute tour of the

Greenskins campaign. The Greenskinsstart their campaign in the isolated

Badlands, the area south of the human

Empire, and to the southwest of the main

Dwarfen kingdoms, ensconced in the

World’s Edge mountains. The Badlands

looks a very Orcy place as we zip over it, a

bone-strewn desert festooned with brutal

buildings, extremely unfriendly flora and

the heavy-jawed skull icon of the Orcs

nailed on any crag that can hold it.

Notably, there’s not much of a way out

for the Orc and Goblin tribes from this

desolate wasteland. South are the undead

Egyptian deserts of Khemri; west is the

authority at the start of the game. But the

Orcs have to get there through a single

tight mountain dale, Blackfire Pass,

somewhere that is guarded closely by

both the Empire and the Dwarfs.

How the Orcs escape that area and

how they comport themselves when out

and about are hard decisions for a game

designer to make, as they’re not

exhaustively detailed in the tabletop gam

this is drawn from—it only deals with

battles, really. So I sat down with designe

Rich Aldridge, lead character artist Matt

Davis, Bickham and Roxburgh to talk

about how they translate and design a

faction for the game, from scratch.

RACE RELATIONS

“The first thing we did,” Roxburgh says,

“across all the factions at the same time,

is just played the living hell out of the

eighth edition tabletop game.” This gavethe team an understanding of every race

how it worked, its strengths and

weaknesses, and the general mechanics

of the game, as well as all the lore. (And

then the Age of Sigmar update to the

tabletop game came along and killed the

Warhammer world. They opted to stick

with the eighth edition.) “Everyone who

needs to make key decisions is familiar

with Warhammer and the game.”

The next stage was working out how a

the races best fitted into a Total War

context. “Very early on, we wanted them

to feel very different [from each other].Not just the unit rosters, but the way that

they play in the campaign.” Then they had

to choose which races they could put in,

out of the sixteen or so official races from

the eighth edition rules.

Unexpectedly, to decide that they first

had to decide on the art style. “Like any

fan, we went ‘oh, we want all the races!’”

In the grim darkness of Horsham, UK,there is only Warhammer. This time I’mat The Creative Assembly’s top secretheadquarters (it’s the giant building

opposite the church steeple), to see TotalWarhammer’s campaign mode and to talk to theteam about how they build a faction.

The Creative Assembly talks about Orcs, the campaign mapand the art of making a faction

T O T A L W A R W A R H A M M E R

RELEASE

2016DEVELOPER

The Creative AssemblyPUBLISHER

SegaLINK

www.totalwar.com/warhammer

N E E D T O K N O W

sea, and beyond it a continent of hardy

Lizardmen; east lie the ruined lands of the

twisted Chaos Dwarfs with their deadly

war machines. Southeast is the land of

Nagash, greatest Necromancer of all time.

Crawling under the northwestern lands

are the Skaven. (None of which are

included in this game—yet.)

So the Greenskins pretty much have to

attack the Dwarfs or the Humans, and

neither of those wars are easy to win. After

all, the Dwarfs walled themselves up in

those mountains millennia ago, like

stunted survivalists except without thehoard of canned food. Though they’re

slowly losing ground, they’re heavily-

armed and fighting every inch of the way.

The Empire looks like easier pickings

when you look at the wider map: huge

open provinces divided between

squabbling Elector Counts and the

occasional vampire, with no real central

MARCH 2016 3

2016 PREVIEW

Total War: Warhamme

The campaign map isTotal War ’s best ever.



Roxburgh recalls. “But it’s a massive,

massive undertaking to do even four races

to the level we want and to the depth that

people expect from Total War ... We had a

long session of working out how detailed

the characters would be, whether they’d

be high poly or more cartoony, and

technically looked at how the animations

would work, because there are so many

skeletons.” (That’s skeletons in the sense

of basic animated figures, not the hordes

of undead in Sylvania and Khemri.)

This research was necessary because

to work out how many factions they could

get into the game and how many units perfaction, they had to know how much work

they were taking on. “Every single faction

in the game has more rigs than any other

Total War game,” says Davis, the lead

character artist. “Even within the factions,

they’re so different—a heavily-armored

spearman isn’t going to share any parts of

the model with a lightly-armored

spearman. A Reiksguard Knight isn’t going

to share anything with a Greatsword, who

isn’t going to share anything with an

Empire state trooper. We’ve limited the

amount of different parts for each

character, which allows us to put a lotmore detail into each of those parts, so

our poly counts are pretty similar—for

everything except monsters.”

For the animators, Davis reckons,

Warhammer is “way more” than four

times the size of any other Total War

game. Not only has the team had to

employ many more animators than usual,

they’ve even changed the way models are

assembled. As a side effect, this has given

a much-needed boost to performance.

But why these five particular races—

Dwarfs, Chaos, The Empire, Greenskins,

and Vampire Counts—for the starting area

of the Old World? After all, the Wood Elves,Bretonnians and Skaven also all inhabit

this central world—and Chaos, though a

core threat to the world, tend to be

restricted to the Chaos Wastes, way out of

the way at the north pole (actually a

spiralling vortex into a hell dimension).

“You have to put it all together as one big

jigsaw puzzle and see how it best fits in

the long run,” says Roxburgh, “...which we

can’t talk about right now. There are some

difficult decisions, because you look

across all the races and there are so many

cool things. We’ve been quite ruthless, the

way we’ve planned.”

Once the factions had been decided

and the roster for each sketched out, the

team went deeper their playstyle and

mechanics, as Roxburgh explains. “You

work out the individual design features of

the different races, and the different

balance between the techs and the skill

trees, and how you can use the IP, and the

data that goes into a Total War game, to

push the race in a certain direction. Every

race is like a separate Total War game.”

HAMMERED OUT

The Greenskins, for example, need to

build up momentum, by fighting andraiding, which allows extra allied Orc

armies to spawn nearby and follow your

army. Should your ‘fightiness’ meter drop

below the Waaaagh level necessary to

maintain it, these allies vanish. And should

it drop low enough for Animosity to kick in,

your troops will turn on each other.

Once the factions were nailed down,

the unit rosters were started on. How do

you pick units when you’ve got a huge list

like the Empire? Do you really need eight

schools of magic in there? “Primarily, it’s

what works design-wise,” Roxburgh says.

“What combination of units reflects the

flavor of the Empire. Because you know

early on you can’t do them all.” For

example, though the Orcs have their core

Big ‘Uns medium infantry in the game, I’ve

not seen any sign of their Goblin allies’

extensive Squig troops.

Finally, the art team gets to startplaying with the units, though building

them is a bit different from the normal

Total War games. “When we approach

this, we have to do a very big sanity check

at the beginning,” says Davis. “Because

when everything’s this cool, it’s always ‘we

have to do that because it’s awesome’—

and I admittedly get excited. But you need

to get it down to a manageable list you can

get done in time. Then you take all the

models for a type—say an entire 40-man

block of Empire spearmen—and see what

the theme is. Then you prioritize that,

because that’s going to be the heart and

DO YOU REALLY NEED

EIGHT SCHOOLS OF

MAGIC IN THERE?

36 MARCH 2016

Total War: Warhammer

2016 PREVIEW

Implementing Azhag’smount was a major task.



LOOK WHO’S TALKING The tricky business of Warhammer diplomacy

“EVERY RACE IS LIKE A SEPARATE TOTALWAR GAME”

Total War has acomprehensive, ifslightlyunpredictable,diplomacy system,where you get toexperience theshonky AI up-front.Creative Assemblyinsist that they’remaking it work forWarhammer, but Ihave to wonderhow...

Most likely to: Poparound and ask if theycan borrow a cup ofbloo- coffee, and perhapscome inside.

Least likely to: Borrow your Steak & Garliccookbook.

V A M P I R E C O U N T S

Most likely to: Daubthemselves in war paintand run screamingthrough your house in anenormous horde.

Least likely to: Sign thepeace treaty in triplicateon every page.

G R E E N S K I N S

Most likely to: Invite youto a traditional ritual,where a volunteer eruptsin unholy mutations andturns into demon.

Least likely to: Return your car keys.

C H A O S W A R R I O R S

Most likely to: Saysomething serious whilefrowning, which you can’tunderstand because ofthe cod German accent.

Least likely to: Leave thedoor to the Empire openwhilst they go on holiday.

T H E E M P I R E

Most likely to: Reveal how your ancestor trimmedtheir ancestor’smoustache, and that’swhy they’re invading.

Least likely to: BeatUsain Bolt in the 100m.

D W A R F S

MARCH 2016 3

2016 PREVIEW

It never looked like this on your tabletop.



“IT REALLY FEELS LIKE YOU’RE LEARNING A

NEW GAME EACH TIME”

THE OLD WORLD A tourist’s guide

1C H A O S W A S T E SThe nasty frozen land

where the Chaos hordescome from, armies ofheavily-armored warriors andknights riddled with diremagic and carrying weaponstwice their own size. Oftenaccompanied by demons.

2T H E E M P I R EA bit like the old Holy

Roman Empire, this is a messof parochial humanaristocrats with privatearmies who would spend alltheir time fighting each otherif one of them wasn’t elected

Emperor every now and then.

3B R E T O N N I ABretonnia’s knights are

the flower of French chivalry, jousting and rescuing fairmaids. Someone at CreativeAssembly must really loveBretonnia, because therehaven’t been working rulesfor them for ages .

4T H E B A D L A N D SWhere the Orcs and

Goblins come from. TheGreenskins also spread overto the other side of theWorld’s Edge Mountains, andthe Goblins are pretty mixedin with the Dwarf holds, like a

bad apartment share.

1

3

2

4

Total War mountains havenever been so pointy.

38 MARCH 2016

2016 PREVIEW



flavor of that unit. We’re not restricted by

making all our guys 20mm tall—we can

add more detail.”

And then the team had to choose the

heroes for each faction, from the array in

the army books. Legendary heroes like

Thorgrim or Ungrim, the Slayer King, play

differently from each other and from your

customizable Lords, especially as they

unlock magic items through personal

quests. “We move so far from the generic

Total War y stuff, into those little quirks

that give every character that bit of

individuality,” says Roxburgh. For

example, putting mounts on the campaignmap (like Azhag the Slaughterer’s wyvern)

took a lot of new code. The quest battle

system—how heroes unlock their unique

gear—was also created at this time.

On the design side, the team also

allowed heroes and monsters to attack

multiple enemies at once, to reflect their

huge power on the Warhammer

battlefield—though they’ve dispensed

with the tabletop game’s slightly odd

dueling system. “There’s no specific

mechanic for it,” says Aldridge, “though

there will be various reasons why you

might want send one of your characters to

take out one of theirs, because it will do it

better than a unit would, so there’s an

element of gameplay there.”

Once a unit has been designed, the

artists finally get to make it, based on the

tabletop miniature. As these are so small,

they actually have to create extra detail,especially for characters who’ll be

appearing in cutscenes, such as the

legendary characters. “We want stitches

and memory folds in clothing, all those

little things,” says Davis. Once the models

are done and animated, then they’re sent

over to Games Workshop for approval.

At last, the designers get to implement

the Total War side of things, converting

the capabilities of the various troops and

heroes into terms that work within the

context of Creative Assembly’s game. For

the heroes, Aldridge explains, “we’ve got

two facets, the battles and the campaign.

You take the background of those

characters and see what might fit those

areas, like a weapon or a talisman. When

you unlock an ability, it ties in with the lore

and you get a big wow moment, and then

you have smaller upgrades in between

that.” So you might specialize the black

Orc lord Grimgor Ironhide to be a

straightforward melee monster, unlockin

his unique armor and weapon, while

setting up Azhag as more of a troop

buffer, and creating a custom lord to

specialize in raiding. That does mean mos

of the legendary heroes aren’t much

better than the other lords until you startfollowing their quest chains.

After that, the team had to differentiat

and balance the tech trees of the races

and the skill trees of the heroes. The Orcs

tech tree is fairly flat and short, but the

dwarfs have two, while the Empire and

Vampire Counts need to construct

buildings to access different elements of

their tree. “It really feels like you’re learnin

a new game each time,” Roxburgh says.

CLASH BY NIGHT

The Creative Assembly has actually

changed how it balances its games,making it more automated. “We’ve had

new systems put in for testing units

against each other,” Roxburgh explains,

“and can just massively auto-run

combinations overnight. We’ve made a lo

of tech to make that more efficient.”

The team Creative Assembly has

assembled certainly gets Warhammer.

I’ve done my best to make this narrative

seem coherent and linear, but in fact I had

to interrupt them multiple times as they

bantered about which unit they hadn’t pu

in that they were most missing. Al was

fond of his customized Ogre Maneater

snipers, Ian reminisced about theunreliable Skaven Doomwheel and

Screaming Bell, Matt enthused over the

Indiana Jones cheesiness of the Khemri

Casket of Souls bursting from the desert

sands, and Rich praised the Skaven’s Hel

Pit Abomination—“the rat that just keeps

on giving”—which prompted a full

decorum breakdown as they shouted at

each other about warpstone and “typical

overpowered Skaven units.” That

quintessentially beardy-weirdiness is

quintessentially Warhammer, and it bode

well for the final game.

Dan Griliopoulos

“WHEN YOU UNLOCK ANABILITY, YOU GET A BIGWOW MOMENT”

MARCH 2016 3

Total War: Warhamme

2016 PREVIEW



“If anyone asks, just two palshaving a lovely round of golf.”

Holiday destination orcrime scene? Well, both.

40 MARCH 2016

Hitman

2016 PREVIEW

B E TAHitman ’s

February beta willlet you sample a

prologue missionbefore the game

hits in March.



This is the palace in Paris, as seenin our issue 281 cover feature.

Regrettably, security is more observant—

there’s a shout from an opposing window,

and a buff, dark-suited guard raises an

assault rifle. A sheik, however, isn’t the

sort of person you shoot on sight, even if

he’s using restricted property as a junglegym. The guard hesitates and instead

calls me over, but a silenced Silverballer

pistol is already in my hands.

Back inside, I drag the evidence to a

darker corner and begin creeping out of

the attic in which security has set up shop.

47 must be rusty because I’m spotted

within seconds: one guard intercepts me,

a second becomes suspicious of his

former colleague’s leg protruding from the

shadows. Again, my respectable disguise

grants a stay of execution, and I acquiesce

to the first bodyguard’s request to escort

me out before his friend finds the corpse

and puts two and two together. By thistime, of course, the mark has left the

catwalk and I’ve missed my chance. In

Hitman killing is easy, but assassination

requires a professional.

The level I’m playing, Paris, is vast: five

floors of baroque palace populated by

300 fully simulated NPCs in among less

advanced crowds of guests. The palace is

in a perpetual state of organized chaos,

with AI routines overlapping and

interacting to convince you that you really

are a gate-crasher. The memory of

Hitman: Absolution ’s corridors and

prescriptive checkpoints fades before I

leave the entrance hall, but the new

Hitman isn’t a reboot in the strictest

sense. Everything that’s happened in the

series until now will continue to influence

the events of Hitman . Rather, creative

director Christian Elverdam says it’s a

distillation of the moments and behaviorsthat define Agent 47—this is high-class,

jet-setting espionage, not bumping off

pimps in alleyways.

The first time you encounter Paris,

you’ll want to take a deep breath and

spend an hour or so exploring. To help yo

make sense of the chaos, the map is

marked with Opportunities. These are

typically the gateways to showstopper

kills, like bringing down that lighting rig.

They’re snippets of information overhear

about the palace that trigger quest-like

objectives while leaving it down to you to

achieve them. If you’re a purist, the entiresystem can be disabled.

EPISODIC SYSTEM

Hitman is billed as a ‘world of

assassination’—Io wants these levels to

remain living puzzle boxes long after

release. At launch, Paris will be joined by

the seaside town of Sapienza and a

Marrakesh setting. Three levels sounds

miserly until you step into the chateau an

understand the scale and the possibilities

of each arena: there’s a gulf between

killing a mark and perfecting the hit.

This Starter Pack, as Io is calling it, will

be joined by three more full-size levelsreleased at monthly intervals, and you ca

choose to purchase each new level on its

own (with the Starter Pack reduced in

price accordingly) or pay the standard

price for a full game and get the lot as

they’re released. It’s a curious episodic

system for a triple-A stealth game, but

combined with Io’s intent to patch

time-limited targets with new behaviors

into existing levels and the expansion of

Absolution ’s player-driven Contracts

mode, it could nurture the community

spirit that’s made Agent 47 an icon.

Angus Morrison

I’m dangling from a lighting rig threefloors above a packed fashion show,dressed as a sheik. If a model or themark himself should look up, their last

sight will be of Agent 47’s junk, or whatever it is hekeeps down there. Probably another weapon. Butthey don’t and, modesty preserved, I haul myselfonto the rig to start planting explosives.

Everything’s permitted in thisclean-cut assassination sandbox

H I T M A N

THIS IS HIGH-CLASSESPIONAGE, NOT BUMPINGOFF PIMPS IN ALLEYWAYS

RELEASE

March 11DEVELOPER

Io InteractivePUBLISHER

Square EnixLINK

www.hitman.com

N E E D T O K N O W

MARCH 2016 4

Hitman

2016 PREVIEW

E A R L YA C C E S S ?

More and morecontent will be addedtoHitman followingrelease, including

new levels.



You jump, you run up walls, you climb, you

slide. This is Mirror’s Edge , all right—the

only thing that takes some getting used to

is that protagonist Faith has slightly

different reaction animations while you’re

platforming. And I might only be picking

up on that because I’ve finished Mirror’s

Edge five times (I truly loved it). Catalyst

definitely feels like it takes place in the

same world as the original game. And if

the story turns out to be junk, that will be

faithful to the original too.

It looks like easy combat is the

compromise I have to make to have

another Mirror’s Edge game. I get to keep

the platforming more or less as it was, but

there has to be a sacrifice. And yes, I was

one of the four people who thought having

optional guns (and they were entirely

optional) in the original was a nice pace

breaker, as well as an occasionally

cathartic way to turn the chase on yourattacker. Instead, during the demo I tried,

you get really simple hand-to-hand

combat where the timing of button

presses doesn’t seem as essential as it

does when you’re free-running.

If that’s what it takes to get Mirror’s

Edge back, so be it.

Samuel Roberts

RELEASE

May 24

PUBLISHER

EA

DEVELOPER

DICE

LINK

www.mirrorsedge.com

N E E D T O K N O W

42 MARCH 2016

Mirror’s Edge Catalyst

2016 PREVIEW

A city straight from theDystopia Starter Pack.

“Why did I never think to hail ataxi before?” Faith wondered.

O P E N W O R L DHow it works is yet to berevealed, but instead oflinear levels, Catalyst is

set in a larger openenvironment.

Parkour and recreation

M I R R O R ’ S E D G EC A T A L Y S T

I’ve been to three E3s, and 2015 was the best one by far. Not only were Fallout 4,Shenmue 3 and a Final Fantasy announced, but I played a Mirror’s Edge

sequel that kept all the good bits of the original.Catalyst is a surprise to me, because the consensuswas that the original sold modestly, and businesssense says that’s how sequels don’t get made. Thisopen-world follow-up is somehow the real deal.



IF THAT’S WHAT IT TAKES TOGET MIRROR’S EDGE BACK, SO BE IT

MARCH 2016 4

Mirror’s Edge Catalys

2016 PREVIEW

S T O R Y This is Faith’s origin

story, for thoseinterested in the Mirror’sEdge narrative. What’s

that? You’re not? Ah yes, carry on.



In Mankind Divided, Eidos Montreal isdoubling down on the elements of Deus

Ex it brought back to life in Human

Revolution. The series’ fourth title hasnew ways to experiment with AI, super-detailedenvironments filled with double the amount ofnon-player characters and, at the center of it, AdamJensen, your ever-evolving cybernetic superbeing.

It’s layering systems on top of those of the firstgame, getting closer to the original intent of Deus

Ex, while the new team puts its own contemporaryspin on the series.

Combining augmentations can twist

the approach you take in the game. The

Icarus Dash, for example, offers Jensen

the chance to make a run at enemies—but

they’ll hear you coming. Combine it with

another ability, though, and you can make

it work for your strategy. “So you can use

the Icarus Dash,” says Fortier, “and you

could combine that with the SilentMovement augmentation and then you

can do Silent Dash, and it gives a whole

other motivation or interest in getting

the Silent Movement augmentation as

well. There are other combinations like

that that are possible, and I think that’s

one of the things we wanted to strive for

with this one.”

The idea is that many of the

augmentations have different uses when

you apply a different thought process and

methodology. While the trailers might dial

in on the action elements to make them

seem more exciting, you can still ghostlevels and talk your way out of some

situations. This is, essentially, still Deus Ex .

JENSEN OF YOUR DREAMS

“You end up building your Jensen in the

way that you want,” Fortier explains. “He

could be a master hacker, completely

invisible, or he could be this all-powerful

death-dealing machine and just ripping

through people and protecting himself

and just shooting everything.” Sounds

exactly like the sequel to Human

Revolution I want.

Samuel Roberts

“YOU END UP

BUILDING YOUR

JENSEN IN THE WAY

THAT YOU WANT”

Adam Jensen gets aserious upgrade or two

D E U S E X :M A N K I N D D I V I D E D

“There’s a lot more freedom in your

abilities, you can punch people more than

two times without running out of energy,”

gameplay director Patrick Fortier told

PCG’s Tom Senior a few months back.

“You’re free to chain lots of things

together, so like a charge move into the

bomb move, and you can create combos

with your skills, you feel more like a

superman in this game.”

RELEASE

August 23DEVELOPER

Eidos MontrealPUBLISHER

Square EnixLINK

www.deusex.com

N E E D T O K N O W

C Y B E RF O E S

New enemy typesrequire different

strategies. A punch inthe face might notdo it for this guy.

J E N S E N2 . 0

Jensen has newabilities, which he can

combine to deepen your tactical

arsenal.

44 MARCH 2016

Deus Ex: Mankind Divided

2016 PREVIEW



Worlds Adrift goes toe-to-toe with VRto be named technological leap of 2016

W O R L D S A D R I F T

Firewatch is a narrative-driven game thathas some things in common with gamessuch as Gone Home, but ends up feelingreally different because of its choice of a

more open, Wyoming wilderness-based setting.Each day within the story contains key events, butthere’s also the freedom to explore, with moreenvironments opening up over time.

Written by Sean Vanaman, who worked on

Telltale’s brilliant first season of The

Walking Dead , the story explores your

character, Henry, and his evolving

relationship with Delilah, the voice on theother end of his radio. As the title

suggests, your role involves being on the

lookout for forest fires in this potentially

toasty environment.

With art by Olly Moss—whose

wonderful minimalist movie poster work

you’ve almost certainly encountered on

the internet or in old issues of Empire

magazine—all signs point towards

Firewatch being another cult favorite

narrative-driven first-person game on PC.

If nothing else, expect Firewatch to have

the best sunsets of 2016.

Samuel Roberts

Explore the wilderness in thisintriguing first-person adventure

F I R E W A T C H

Whenever I hear about a small indie studiotackling an MMO, it’s tempting to let myhead hit the desk. MMOs are ruinouslyexpensive to build—just look at the

issues DICE and Ubisoft encounter doing thenetcode for shooters. So when Bossa announced aphysics-based MMO about sailing the clouds as asky pirate, I almost dismissed it. But Worlds Adrift is supported by technology that not only makesphysical simulation on this scale possible, but couldchange the way all online games are developed.

Tech start-up Improbable has been

working to make indivisible computingdivisible: in Worlds Adrift , small groups of

objects are assigned their own physics

engines. When more objects spawn or an

area gets busy, additional engines swarm

to accept the load. This allows Bossa to

make every object ‘real’—if you want

cannons to do more damage, make your

cannonballs from a heavier metal.

This is a landmark in PC gaming as it

means any dev can have their own version

ofWorlds Adrift running on Improbable’s

servers alongside Bossa’s, making it the

progenitor for a new breed of MMO.

Angus Morrison

RELEASE

February 9

PUBLISHER

In-house

DEVELOPER

Campo Santo

LINK

www.firewatchgame.com

N E E D T O K N O W

RELEASE

2016

PUBLISHER

In-house

DEVELOPER

Bossa Studios

LINK

www.worldsadrift.com

N E E D T O K N O W

This MMO hassky-high ambitions.

Expect to besunsetted out.

MARCH 2016 4

Firewatch / Worlds Adrif

2016 PREVIEW



It looks easy, but it takes real effort to bequite so effortless. InSuperhot , time only

moves when you do. Each step, each jump

and each shot creates another window for

your enemies to respond. It feels like it

should be leisurely—giving you space to

identify each threat as it approaches. But

it only takes one bullet to bring you down,

and your enemies can fire one off in a split

second. Taking a step forward to grab a

pistol may seem like a good idea, but it’ll

give a foe a brief window of opportunity to

bring you down.

Each level is fraught with tension, but

it’s worth riding out for the moments of

RELEASE

2016

PUBLISHER

In-house

DEVELOPER

SUPERHOT

LINK

www.superhotgame.com

N E E D T O K N O W

46 MARCH 2016

Superh

2016 PREVIEW

I’ve noticed a trend among thecommentators who’ve seenSuperhot’s trailers. They think itlooks easy. In fact, that’s the whole

point. It looks easy. Superhot plays out in a series ofaction vignettes—each scene’s script reduced to asingle sentence of all-cap words. “IT WAS ASETUP.” “YOU’RE NEW, YOU FIGHT.” There’slittle in the way of prelude. Instead, each levelexists as a standalone ballet of improvised violence.Do you grab an ashtray, or go for the gun? Do youtake cover, or dodge, weave and shoot?

A first-person shooter that makesyour effort look effortless

S U P E R H O T

impromptu choreography. It frequently

feels brilliant as the game places you in

scenarios engineered to make you look

cool. At times, it’s straight out of an action

movie—throwing your gun at an

opponent, punching them out, then

catching the gun in mid-air.

There is a plot, but it plays out around

the levels—in eerie corrupted flashes

during brief moments of downtime. InSuperhot , you play a person who’s playing

on a computer. You’re sent a crack that

hacks into the remote server belonging to,

you’re told, the developers of an unnamed

FPS. Between each set of levels you

message your friend to trade stories

about what you’ve seen. It doesn’t matter

what you actually type—just bash away at

the keyboard and the dialogue will appear.

What started as a strange and

experimental gamejam is set to become a

strange, experimental and, above all,

accomplished full game.

Phil Savage

Probably don’t strafeto your right.



Paradox is making 2016’s biggest strategy game

S T E L L A R I S

RELEASE

2016

PUBLISHER

Paradox Interactive

DEVELOPER

Paradox Development Studio

LINK

www.stellarisgame.com

N E E D T O K N O W

Paradox makes big, complex games, andStellaris could be the studio’s biggest andmost complex to date. It takes thereal-time pausable grand strategy of

previous titles, and applies it to a sprawling spaceepic about the rise and fall of galactic civilizations.In addition to being big, it’s broad, usingprocedurally generated galaxies, random eventsand player-driven research options to add a hugedegree of variety to each playthrough.

The use of a procedurally generated

galaxy means that Stellaris ’s early game is

all about exploration and expansion. Itworks much like the many space-based

4X games, but in a more detail-oriented

engine. Stellaris isn’t just about gaining

ground. Players must also keep planets

efficiently managed through governors.

As the game progresses, there’s a

gradual shift towards diplomacy and

conflict. The galaxy’s other inhabitants are

also procedurally generated, meaning

each playthrough will be against races

with different traits, technologies and even

ethics.Stellaris is offering near-infinite

potential for player-driven storytelling.

Phil Savage

MARCH 2016 4

Superhot / Stellari

2016 PREVIEW

It wouldn’t be spacewithout asteroid mining.

Enemies shatter likeglass when killed.



The part of Mass Effect: Andromeda I’mmost excited about is seeing thatuniverse more fully realized. With theMako returning, and the move to the

Frostbite engine, Andromeda will be as big a leapfrom ME3 as Inquisition was from Dragon Age II .

Here’s everything we know. The combat will be familiar,

but will build on what we saw in ME2 and 3 . Characters

from the old trilogy won’t be returning, because the story

is set in an entirely new galaxy. Expect an all-new cast,

then, with familiar species from the first trilogy. Co-op

multiplayer has been strongly teased for a return, too, by

senior development director Chris Wynn. As of August,

the game was just entering the casting process. Finally:you’ll be playing this in 2016.

Samuel Roberts

A fresh start for BioWare’sgalactic epic

M A S S E F F E C T A N D R O M E D A

RELEASE

Late 2016

PUBLISHER

EA

DEVELOPER

BioWare

LINK

www.masseffect.com

N E E D T O K N O W

“I have landed on themysterious planet of Arizona.”

Set 15 years after the first game, Dishonored 2 features both Corvo andEmily Kaldwin as playable characters,and takes us from Dunwall to the more

exotic setting of Karnaca. Emily has lost her throneto someone Bethesda describes as a ‘usurper’—inthis city, she’ll find a way to win it back.

The reveal teaser for Dishonored 2

features a new supernatural ability not in

the 2012 original: enormous tentacles that

can be used as a kind of substitute for

Blink. Creative director Harvey Smith

confirmed that abilities seen in the E3 CGIteaser will indeed make it to the game. We

also see Emily clashing with clockwork-

style mechanical enemies that may

require alternative forms of strategy (we

see Emily using an EMP-like mine to take

one of them out, for example). Dishonored

is one of the modern immersive sim elite—

more strategy and a change in setting will

keep it feeling fresh.

While the release date is spring, it’s

notably one of the only games coming in

early 2016 we haven’t seen in action yet.

I’m expecting it later in the year.

Samuel Roberts

Return to the corrupt world powered by magic and whale oil

D I S H O N O R E D 2

RELEASE

Spring

PUBLISHER

Bethesda

DEVELOPER

Arkane Studios

LINK

www.dishonored.com

N E E D T O K N O W

Clark Gable wasn’t impressedby his latest fuel bill.

48 MARCH 2016

Dishonored 2 / Mass Effect Andromeda

2016 PREVIEW



ANDROMEDA WILL BE AS BIG A LEAP ASINQUISITION WAS FROM DRAGON AGE II

Big, expansive planets toexplore in Frostbite.

Under attack bytiny reapers?

N E W H E R O

During the recentteaser, someonespotted the name‘Ryder’—could be your new hero.

N E W C R E WSpotted in the E3trailer is a Krogan

companion—everyparty needs one.

MARCH 2016 4

Mass Effect Andromed

2016 PREVIEW



TaleWorlds has a difficult job ahead of it. Mount & Blade: Warband is a cult RPGclassic. It’s ugly, but offers unrivaled

depth in regards to player freedom. It’s acomplex game, but falters through an unwieldyinterface and a tutorial that isn’t fit for purpose.For Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord, accessibility is abig deal, and that means balancing the needs of anexisting, passionate community with the desire toattract and welcome a greater number of people.

Existing Mount & Blade players will be

able to hit the ground running. Rather than

fill Bannerlord with new features,

TaleWorlds is focused on expanding andimproving existing systems. Once again,

you’re able to forge your own destiny, as a

merchant, landowner, arena champion,

local hero or nefarious bandit.

GREATER COMPLEXITY

But these options exist within a much

smoother and more in-depth framework.

The simulation of economy and politics is

more accessible through a better UI, and

more complicated under the surface.

Another important part of Warband is

its mod scene. For Bannerlord , TaleWorlds

is doubling down on mod support. “The

new engine that we have is so much easierto work with for modders,” says Yavuz.

“We’ll be supporting multiple mods

together, so players will be able to cherry

pick the mods that they want, and use

them altogether to exactly customize their

experience. If, for example, one changes

the user interface, another edits some

items, and another is some political thing,

players will be able to combine those and

play their dream game.”

Phil Savage

“PLAYERS WILL BE

ABLE TO CHERRY

PICK THE MODS

THAT THEY WANT”

Popularizing the medievalRPG sandbox

M O U N T &

B L A D E I I :B A N N E R L O R D

“I think our basic solution will be the main

storyline,” says TaleWorlds’ founder

Armagan Yavuz. “We want to preserve the

sandbox feeling of the game, at the same

time making it more accessible. The best

way to do that, I think, is to make a

storyline so that the player, when they

start, has various goals, has a quest andknows what to do and how to proceed.

Once they’ve progressed a little bit, and

know how to play the game, then the

storyline should take a backstep and just

give the player general goals and options.”

RELEASE

2016DEVELOPER

TaleWorldsPUBLISHER

In-houseLINK

www.bit.ly/Bannerlord

N E E D T O K N O W

G R A P H I C SThe original was not

a pretty game.Bannerlord looks farnicer, and is packed

with incidentaldetail.

S T R A T E G Y The world map

functions much likebefore. It’s just you, your horse, and amap full of towns

and soldiers.

The potato-face vaccine

was greatly appreciated.

50 MARCH 2016

Mount & Blade 2

2016 PREVIEW



Here’s your regular PC Gamer reminderthat yes, Euro Truck Simulator 2 is agenuinely great game. It’s sustained meand fellow PCG trucking enthusiast

Andy Kelly through countless miles of relaxing,oddly compelling virtual highways. There are fewgaming experiences that can rival the uneventfullysuccessful delivery of eight tons of cheese to aGlasgow warehouse. And ETS2 developer SCSSoftware is soon set to do it all again.

On the road again

A M E R I C A N T R U C KS I M U L A T O R

RELEASE

February 3

PUBLISHER

In-house

DEVELOPER

SCS Software

LINK

www.americantrucksimulator.com

N E E D T O K N O W

ATS gets rightup in your grill.

Getting political in Amplitude’sspace strategy sequel

E N D L E S S S P A C E 2

The original Endless Space was Amplitude’s first attempt at making a 4Xstrategy. It showed. Despite a few cleverideas and a gorgeous UI, it never felt as

essential as the bigger, uglier Galactic Civilization series. Endless Legend was a vast improvement—ever more beautiful and packed full of wellconsidered tweaks and changes to an otherwiseunadventurous genre. For Endless Space 2, Amplitude plans to push things further still.

To do this, the team is introducing a new

internal politics system. Rather than

representing your empire purely throughnumbers and influence, each ideological

bloc within your territory will vie for power.

If you want to transition towards a

scientifically driven empire, for example,

the most effective method is through

laws. For that to happen, the senate’s

scientific faction needs to gain power.

This isn’t a passive system: the

makeup of your empire will matter. Each

race is predisposed to an ideology, which

can be altered through events. Other

civilizations’ schemes will have an effect,

too. Endless Space 2 is, after all, still a 4X.

Phil Savage

RELEASE

2016

PUBLISHER

In-house

DEVELOPER

Amplitude Studios

LINK

www.yourvision-theirfuture.com

N E E D T O K N O W

My face when a goblin thingis hogging the microscope.

American Truck Simulator , like ETS2 , will

deliver a compact recreation of one corner

of the continent. Initially, the game will befocused around California and its

surrounding regions, but, over time, new

parts of the country will be introduced.

New for ATS is weigh-stations, SCS’s

way of using US tax and safety regulations

to create another small wrinkle along your

journey. Beside the standard cargo bays,

there’ll also be more difficult to access

drop-off points, which can be selected for

additional XP. As with ETS2 , ATS will be

connected up to SCS’s growing World of

Trucks platform, providing an online

metalayer for your trucking empire.

Phil Savage

MARCH 2016 5

American Truck Simulator / Endless Space 2

2016 PREVIEW



Isuspect Blizzard can’t do wrong with its

new team shooter, Overwatch—withmore than seven million peopleregistering interest for the beta, it’s in

safe territory. Nonetheless, it’s heartening to seeBlizzard try to do right by the game. When the betareturns, it’ll be a lot closer to the launch version,including a new progression system that’ll unlockrewards as you play, but nothing that’ll affect game balance. In other welcome news, Blizzard hasconfirmed all maps and heroes released post-launch will be free.Chris Thursten

Blizzard’s multiplayershooter gets better and better

O V E RW A T C H

Why shoot on twolegs when one will do?

It’s been a long time coming, but I’mexcited for what I’ve seen of idSoftware’s rebooted and reimagined Doom. Singleplayer footage shows slick

and gory action featuring new versions of oldenemies like cyberdemons and mancubi inhabitinga horrifying and visually impressive Hell. Myfavorite guns are back as well, including the supershotgun, plasma rifle and BFG, and players will beable to increase their killing power by acquiringweapon mods as they progress through the game.

I got hands-on time withDoom multiplayer

at QuakeCon 2015. It was a limited look,featuring only a single map and a handful

of weapon loadouts, but I enjoyed the

speed of the combat and some of the new

weapons, including a static cannon that

builds a powerful charge the more you

run. I also had fun with runes—power-ups

that appear intermittently in the arena and

can transform a player into a powerful,

flying, missile-flinging Revenant. SnapMap

looks promising too, a built-in utility that

will allow players to create custom maps

and game modes, and easily share them

with the community.

Chris Livingston

Stomp demons into goop in Bethesda’sfaithful FPS revival

D O OM

RELEASE

Spring

PUBLISHER

Bethesda

DEVELOPER

id Software

LINK

www.doom.com

N E E D T O K N O W

Revenants can fly via jetpackand tear off your arms.

RELEASE

June

PUBLISHER

Activision Blizzard

DEVELOPER

Blizzard

LINK

www.battle.net

N E E D T O K N O W

52 MARCH 2016

Doom / Overwatch

2016 PREVIEW



IT’S HEARTENING TO SEE BLIZZARD

TRY TO DO RIGHT BY THE GAME

T E A M P L A Y Teamwork is key, here.

This isn’t the game for youif you want to go on a solo

killing spree. Victory meanscarefully maintaining yourteam’s momentum while

denying it to youropponent.

H E R O E SOverwatch will include

21 heroes at launch. They’rea diverse and versatile bunch,

and mastering each takesconsiderable time despite the

game’s simplicity. The bestplayers are good at several:

swapping on the fly is akey strategy.

MARCH 2016 5

Overwatch

2016 PREVIEW



XCOM 2

F E A TUR E

We play alieninvasion sequel XCOM 2, themost exciting

strategy gameof 2016

RESISTANCE

ISN’T FUT ILE

By Phil Savage



’m in trouble. I need to put a soldier on the back ofa flatbed truck, so I can hack the device it’scarrying and abscond with the alien secrets inside. As it happens, the truck is on fire. It shouldn’t be, but I used a grenade to take out the Advent trooperstanding next to it and things sort of got out of

hand. I’ve got three soldiers left—the fourth havingdied earlier—and I don’t want to lose another to afire I’ve made them stand in. Sadly, I can’t see analternative, so I pick the XCOM agent with themost health and tell them to burn themselves alive.That’s when the Sectoid shows up.I“The aliens are brutal in XCOM 2,” says

lead producer Garth DeAngelis. “I’mreally proud of that. If you look at theSectoid, for instance, of EnemyUnknown versus XCOM 2, the Sectoidin Enemy Unknown could mind-mergeand they could shoot their gun. They

can shoot their gun in XCOM 2 as well, but they can also do an attack called

‘mind spin’, which will panic ordisorient you. Or mind control you.That can happen as well. The first alienin the game can mind control you.”

That isn’t what happens in myplaythrough. It’s the second mission,and, after battling through Advent

troops, I’m now experiencing my firstalien encounter. One of my soldiers is

MARCH 2016 5

G men me

F E A T

RIGHT: Citiesare Adventstrongholds.Their citizenswon’t besympatheticto XCOM.

Sectoids are badnews in XCOM 2 .



but I have a secret weapon: a Ranger.His sword attack is a guaranteed hit,and does huge damage. In any othersituation it would be a risk—leaving meout of position, and vulnerable to

assault. Here, there are no otherenemies. I’m clear to take down mytroublesome foe and leave with the

remnants of my team. I remember XCOM: Enemy Unknown as a gameabout caution, about sticking to goodcover and using overwatch to punishaggressors. In XCOM 2 , DeAngelis

explains, encounters more resemblecombat puzzles.“The battlefield is your playground,”

he says, “so where do you move? Howdo you take advantage of cover andflanking? That’s the puzzle aspect. Also,predicting what the aliens want to takeadvantage of. You learn that as you go.

You might need to get tongue-pulled afew times before you get the hang of it,

but eventually you’ll know how to

W E L C O M E B A C K , C O M M A N D E RThe successes (and failures) of the

XCOM

series

1 9 9 4U F O : E N E M Y

U N K N O W NMicroProse’sturn-basedclassic, also

known as X-Com:UFO Defence .

1 9 9 5 X - C O M :

T E R R O R F R O MT H E D E E P

Exactly the samegame as UFO

Defence , exceptunderwater.

1 9 9 7 X - C O M :

A P O C A L Y P S ETakes the X-Com

formula andfocuses it down toa single cyberpunk

city.

1 9 9 8 X - C O M :

I N T E R C E P T O RX-Com goes to

space, and bringsall the pop-culturereferences it can

carry.

2 0 0 1 X - C O M :

E N F O R C E RA bad third-person

shooter, with atenuous

connection toX-Com .

2 0 1 2 X C O M : E N E M Y

U N K N O W NFiraxis’s reboot

brought thestrategy back, and

was largelyexcellent.

2 0 1 3T H E B U R E A U :

X C O MD E C L A S S I F I E DA bad third-personshooter, tenuously

connected toXCOM .

2 0 1 3 X C O M : E N E M Y

W I T H I NEnemy Unknown ’s

brilliantexpansion. Addedrobots and gene

splicing.

THE ZOMBIE HAS THE DROP

ON MY SOLDIER. I’VE BEEN

OUTFLANKED BY A CORPSE

now on fire. The Sectoid waves a hand,and a psionic purple tendril reaches outto a dead Advent soldier. He gets up. Itturns out Sectoids can reanimatepeople, too. This is bad. The zombiehas the drop on my burning soldier. Ihave been outflanked by a corpse. Mysoldier is able to take down thereanimated agent, but not before he

removes a significant chunk of herhealth. A turn later, uniform aflame, shesuccumbs to the fire.

DeAngelis smiles as I recount myexperience. “That’s great to hear,” hesays. “You have the Adventadministration on the front lines.They’re tactically interesting to fight,but we want the surprise—the reallycool stuff—to come from these aliensthat are emerging from the shadows asthe XCOM resistance grows stronger.In this world they’ve always beenbehind the scenes. Humanity doesn’t

really know if the aliens are there ornot. They just know there’s this Adventadministration that are their saviours.And now XCOM is pulling these moresinister aliens to the front, and you haveto fight and face them.”

CUT LOOSE

Two of my soldiers are dead. Theremaining two are critically injured.The Sectoid could finish me off here,

56 MARCH 2016

XCOM 2

F E A TUR E

RIGHT: Don’tlob grenadesnear thistrain, unless you want tohack in aninferno.

With the right Gremlin upgrade, you can hack Advent mechs.



counter that and get in front of it.” Inshort, the aliens are Firaxis’s attempt tocounter the go-to strategies of EnemyUnknown players. Or, to put it anotherway, to fuck with their fans.

Overwatch still has its place, and has been significantly improved. In the fourmissions I played, it once again

functioned as the cautiously sensibledefault action—now with the added bonus that the second soldier in anoverwatch chain will no longer attemptto fire on an enemy killed by the first.But the new classes offer a moreinteresting selection of abilities andupgrades. Better opportunities existaside from just moving and shooting.Right now, my favorite new class isthe Specialist, whose Gremlin dronecan hack objects at range and befurther upgraded with new assault ordefensive options.

PANIC A HACKThese upgrades are invaluable in early

battles, when you’re in charge ofweak-willed rookies prone to freaking

out mid-mission. The Specialist’sRevival Protocol upgrade—availableonce they’ve been promoted toSergeant—can remove negative statuseffects, including panic. With it, youcan spin a disastrous affliction into anet positive. Later in my hands-onsession, a rookie loses it during anencounter with a Viper. He takes anautomatic panic shot, hitting the snakelady, but not finishing her off. Using theGremlin, I remove the effect. Thesoldier now has a regular full turn withwhich to finish off his foe. Not that thisis a tactic you want to rely on, as

panicked soldiers can just as easilygrenade the wall you’re using ascover—blowing it out and leaving youharmed and exposed.

The Specialist also saves my skinduring a timed mission to hack into an

Advent network. I had eight turns,most of which were spent dealing with

Advent troops outside a petrol station.When I finally reach the building thathouses the terminal, I have one turnremaining, but the only soldier in rang

of the terminal has been grabbed and bound by a Viper. Fortunately, I realizeI can send in the Gremlin. Hacking aterminal has a guaranteed effect—inthis case breaching the network—andalso provides a chance of picking uptwo bonus rewards.

The likelihood of unlocking these bonuses is based on the difference intech score between the hacker and theterminal they’re trying to unlock. I’moffered a permanent bonus to mySpecialist’s hacking score, and a fourweek upgrade to my home base’sscanning ability. Other potential

rewards are more immediate, such as blinding nearby enemies for a couple oturns. I receive nothing—my Specialistscore is too low. Luckily, this time therisn’t an associated penalty. Later in thecampaign, failed attempts can triggernegative effects.

SPOILS OF WAR

Timed missions aren’t XCOM 2’s onlytrick for putting the player underpressure. Enemy Within’s Meldresource is gone, but a new loot systemtakes the same trick and applies it on a

smaller scale. Downed enemies have a

ENEMIES CAN DROP LOOT

THAT SELF-DESTRUCTS

AFTER THREE TURNS

MARCH 2016 5

XCOM 2

F E A TUR

If it’s in a glowing capsit’s probably worth steal



G men me

chance to drop loot that will self-destruct after three turns. That loottakes the form of weapon attachments—from scopes that increase aim torepeaters that can instantly kill a target.It’s a bonus less essential and abstractthan Meld, but useful enough.

The effect is lots of small-scale,focused bursts of risk/reward decisionmaking. If loot appears at the start of abattle, there’s no guarantee it will still

be around when it’s over. Retrieving itcould be disastrous, but better weaponsmeans being better equipped to dealwith future missions. Between the newabilities and the external pressures,XCOM 2’s challenge isn’t just about thebrutality of the aliens—although theyare brutal. There is also plenty of scopefor shooting yourself in the footthrough poor decision choices.

“We wear that as a badge of honor,that it’s a challenging game,” says

THE CAMERA TRACKS FROM

SOLDIER TO SOLDIER AS

THEY TAKE THEIR SHOT

The minigun does the job,

as long as it hits its target.

DeAngelis. “In fact, we want it to be brutally challenging. We want you tohave to overcome those odds, becausethe sense of triumph is truly powerful.We want players to be able to learn thatand earn that on their own.”

It’s not all failure anddisempowerment. In XCOM 2, eachmission starts with a moment ofempowerment—a chance to ambushthe enemy and take them out unseen.

This concealment phase is in keepingwith the idea of XCOM as a guerrillaforce. When your soldiers arrive on themap, they’re undetected, and willremain so as long as they don’t openfire, move too close to the enemy, orcreate excessive noise by smashingthrough a door or window. In this way,I’m able to surround a group of Advent,setting the majority of my force toconcealment overwatch—a specialambush variant that tells your soldiersto only open fire if detected.

Once the trap is set, I tell my final

soldier to attack. This reveals the squad,triggering their overwatch. The entireattack plays as one continuous scene—the camera tracking from soldier tosoldier as they take their shot and wipeout the enemy. Concealment onlyworks for the first encounter of each



XCOM 2

F E A TUR

mission, and even then it’s easy to messup. My first ambush failed when I

positioned a soldier near some civilians.“They’re scared that there are thesehumans running around with guns,

because they think they’re in a utopia,”DeAngelis explains to me. “They thinkthey’re safe.”

ALIEN EXPERIMENTS

The sense I get of XCOM 2 is that it’smore open to experimentation. Itsdifficulty feels designed to punishill-judged plans, rather than penalizingthe player for not following a specific,linear solution. The meta-strategy ofthe Geoscape is the perfect example of

this, in that you can no longer lose thecampaign purely based on specificfactors. Building a resistance is a verydifferent prospect to stopping an alien

vanguard, and that’s had a pronouncedeffect on how you interact with theworld. For one thing, there are nolonger any satellites to screw you over.

“I think that’s why I lost my firstplaythrough of Enemy Unknown,”DeAngelis says. “I still remember it

vividly. There were other ways youcould lose, of course, like if you triedthe alien base a bit too early, but

satellites were something you had to

prioritize early. The beautiful thingwith XCOM 2 is I’ve played throughmultiple times and it’s always like, whatdo I want to do first? There seem to bea lot of options that could potentiallywork, or ways I have to adjust based onhow the game’s panning out.”

Failure in XCOM 2 is tied tosomething called the Avatar Project. It’s

represented by a bar at the top of theGeoscape that tracks progress towardssomething incredibly bad the aliens areplanning. Your strategy lies in balancingthe need to grow the resistance againstthe requirement to stop the aliens fromcompleting their evil masterplan.

“If I prioritize trying to get to tiertwo armor first,” DeAngelis says, “I’mforgoing building the resistance andfinding a new region. That could endup biting me in the ass because I don’thave time to get to a facility, and the

Avatar progress rose. It’s constantly a

balance of how do you pull that off, andit feels different every game becausethe rate of Avatar progress being filledchanges every game.”

Dark Events similarly mix things upand feel like an attempt to level thepower curve as your squad becomesmore effective through research,abilities and new gear. Dark Eventsfunction as alien research, and willenhance your foe in a variety of ways.Examples include improved Adventarmor and additional reinforcements

during missions. Counter-ops will beavailable to prevent the enemy gainingthese upgrades, but again, it ties intothe overall Geoscape balance.Preventing the enemy gaining oneadvantage may come at the cost ofcompleting some equally importantproject yourself.

It’s clear that Firaxis has thoughtcarefully about the particulars of

Enemy Unknown. Every aspect of XCOM 2 feels like a response, from theprocedural maps that provide longevityover multiple campaigns, to the

shifting, broad and open-ended strateglayer, and the opportunity ofexperimentation that it provides. Thisisn’t a sequel that only offers more ofeverything that made its predecessor senjoyable. It’s a total rehaul, and anopportunity to take the basic formulaand recontextualize it in a way that’swell suited to XCOM ’s punishingdifficulty. It’s a sequel designed for itsfans, and, based on what I’ve seen, nex

year’s most promising strategy game.

L I N E U P

How XCOM 2 enhances customization

F A C ENot sure aboutthose sharpcheekbones?Change themfor somethingelse.

A T T I T U D EIs your soldiertoo aggressive?Not aggressiveenough? Tweakthat here.

H A I RChoose a do fromthe huge number

of styles andcolors. A

Fauxhawk,perhaps?

C L O T H E SYou can choose primary

and secondary hues ofpretty much any color.

RIGHT: Proceduralgenerationhas a greatimpact on thechallengepresented byeach map.

EVERY ASPECT OF XCOM 2

FEELS LIKE A RESPONSE TO

ENEMY UNKNOWN

Hacking objectives

have a turn-time limit.



INTOThe

WILD

The story of Hinterland, a team ofdevelopers who left city life behind tomake THE LONG DARK , a survival gameset in a remote Canadian wilderness.

By Andy Kelly

60 MARCH 2016

Hinterland

F E A TUR E



“I wanted creative freedom and to get closer to thecraft,” says Raphael van Lierop, founder and creativedirector of Hinterland, the studio in question. “When

you run big projects you feel like you spend moretime wrangling meetings than making games.” Thecreation of Hinterland was a chance for van Lierop tocall the shots without having to worry aboutquarterly earnings reports or being pressured intoremoving risky features. “It’s scary as hell, but it’sthrilling. We could never have made The Long Dark with a publisher.”

The decision to base Hinterland on Canada’s Vancouver Island—an unusual setting for a game

studio—was a personal one.

urvival games are bigger than ever onPC, but it’s a saturated market. Forevery DayZ there are dozens ofunimaginative, derivative zombiegames released to exploit this suddensurge in popularity. Sitting quietlyamong all this chaos is The Long Dark.It’s a survival game, sure, but one thatfollows its own path, making noattempt to ape its peers. It’s a

philosophy that mirrors that of the studio making it. And theresult is one of the most interesting, stylish and understated

survival games you can play today.

“My wife and I didn’t want to raise our family inthe city,” van Lierop explains. “But once we’destablished ourselves here, it became about notwanting to give up on my passion for making games.”The studio is located in a small frontier mining townat the foot of a mountain range, and surrounded byforested foothills, hiking trails, and a glacier-fed lake.It’s the perfect place to develop a game like The Long

Dark, which is itself set in a fictional slice of snowy,rugged Canadian wilderness.

Leaving the bustle of the city behind, and thefreedom that brings, is an important part of

Hinterland’s philosophy as a studio. “The mental andemotional process of abandoning urban life, and therelative safety of that job market, mirrors the processof us wanting to create something with anindependent spirit outside of the mainstream,” vanLierop tells me. “Our studio is in a literal andfigurative hinterland.”

Warren Heise, who left a job at BioWare to joinHinterland as The Long Dark’s user interface artist,

jumped at the chance. “While it was difficult to leavemy friends at BioWare, it was time for me to move onto new challenges,” he says. “Two of my biggestpassions are spending time in nature and makinggames, and when I found out about the projectHinterland was working on, I just knew that I had to

be a part of it.”

LEFT: Eachregion, fromthe frozencoast to theforest, has itsown distinctlook, feel, andatmosphere.

MARCH 2016 6

Ga ena e

F E A T

Hinterland’s cozystudio is located on

Vancouver Island.





natural habitat. Moving through these spaces createsa deep connection that’s often lost in urbanenvironments, and we want to evoke that connectedfeeling in The Long Dark.”

GREAT OUTDOORS

Heise knows this feeling intimately, having completedthe famous Pacific Crest Trail—a grueling 3,000-milehike from Mexico to Canada that was recently thesubject of Jean-Marc Vallée’s film Wild. I ask him ifhe had to resort to any of The Long Dark’s survivaltechniques on his journey.

“Basic first aid, gear management, and routenavigation while enduring hot and cold weather werethings I had to be constantly aware of. I also didmultiple repair jobs on my pack and shoes andharvested edible plants. This experience definitelyinformed my work on The Long Dark.”

“I feel very comfortable working in this kind ofenvironment,” says Eric Gabas. “My back yard inKitimat is a forest that goes on for hundreds ofkilometers before you see any asphalt roads. Kitimatis an indigenous name meaning ‘snow people’, and Iremember the snow reaching as high as the rooftopssome winters.”

It’s impressive that, even with those stylized,

almost cartoon-like visuals, The Long Dark’s frozen

wilderness still feels very real. “Realism is a subjectivemeasure that has nothing to do with how somethinglooks,” says van Lierop. “It has to do with howsomething feels. As long as our experience feelscoherent and true to its own internal rules, it feelsrealistic. To me, this is a reminder of how misplacedthe race for photorealism in graphics has been forour medium.”

“Our textures are hand-painted,” says Gabas. “Weuse the same Photoshop brushes our concept artistuses. We use a little visual overlay in our textures andon-screen, which makes them look less perfect, and

more like the art.”

FOOD FOR THOUGHT

“We’re often fighting people’s preconceptions aboutrealism more than realism itself,” says van Lierop. “Anexample of this is how we handle starvation. Inreality, starvation would be a long, drawn out processthat would take weeks to kill you. In the game it canhave dire consequences within a few days.” This, hesays, creates a more compelling interval in which totry to solve the problem. “This immediacy makes itmeaningful, even though it’s not strictly realistic.”

Audio is also important. The Long Dark’s sounddesign is as impressive as its art, from the cold crunch

of snow under your feet to the ghostly howl of a

“WE WANT TO CREATE AN

EXPERIENCE THAT ELICITS STRONG

EMOTIONS FROM PLAYERS”

LEFT: Wolveswill attack ifprovoked, but you can turnanimalattacks off if you’d prefer amore relaxing

experience.

MARCH 2016 6

Hinterland

F E A TUR



“THE BIGGEST CHALLENGE ISLIVING UP TO EXPECTATIONS,

INCLUDING OUR OWN”

64 MARCH 2016

Ga ena e

blizzard. “A lot of our sounds come from foleyrecordings we’ve done ourselves,” says van Lierop.

“It’s a combination of great source material and thewonderful artistry of our sound team. Audio isunusually critical in this game as we present a lot ofgameplay-relevant information through audio cues.It’s part of the user interface.”

The Long Dark’s minimal interface has beensteadily improving since the first alpha release. Aswell as Sims-style meters that tell you how hungry,tired, cold, or thirsty your character is feeling, yourcharacter vocalizes their needs, too. You also spend alot of time rooting through your backpack for stuff,among the many items you’ve scavenged.

“Inventory management is a challenge in anygame,” Heise explains. “Our particular challenges lie

in making it feel, as much as possible, like the player issorting through a real backpack and how they wouldorganize and maintain their gear.”

The struggle, he says, is in creating an immersivesystem that reflects the reality of managing a pack,

while also creating an easy to use interface thatdoesn’t frustrate the player. “We’re constantlythinking of how to balance these two goals, whichoften seem at odds with each other.” The idea, he tellsme, is to keep the player as immersed as possible.“There’s still some work to do, but with every update,we get closer.”

LIFE SUPPORT

The Long Dark’s development has been a change ofpace for Hinterland. After raising almost $200,000 onKickstarter to get the project up and running, it’s beenin Early Access on Steam for a year, and has sold over500,000 copies. “The Long Dark would be a shadow

of its current self if not for Early Access,” says vanLierop. “We came to the platform with someambitions, and then were able to far exceed those due

LONE SURVIVORS Amazing humans who beat the odds

0 200 400 600 800 1,000 1,200 1,200 1,400 1,600 1,800 2,000

J O S E I V A N4 8 6 D A Y S

Eating seabirds, fish, and turtles helpedthis unfortunate castaway survive for

16 months in the North Pacific.

P O O N L I M1 3 3 D A Y S

After his ship was sunk, this Chinesesailor famously survived for 133 days

on a tiny wooden raft.

A D A B L A C K J A C K 7 3 0 D A Y S

An Inuit woman who survived onSiberia’s rugged Wrangel Island for two

years with no human contact.

A L E X A N D E R S E L K I R K 1 6 0 6 D A Y S

A Scottish sailor stranded on Más aTierra island for over four years. The

inspiration for Robinson Crusoe.

It’s a small, close-knitteam, and everyone

has a say in thegame’s development.



LEFT: Detailsin the sceneryhelp to paint ahauntingpicture of aworldsuddenly hitby some

cataclysmicevent.

MARCH 2016 6

Hinterland

F E A TUR

to the overwhelming support from the community— both in terms of revenue and engagement.”

The game’s community is very vocal about thedirection they’d like to see the game go in. TheHinterland team listens to them, but they also have tofollow their own instincts.

“There’s definitely a balancing act,” says vanLierop. “We’ve always been clear with our communitythat we want their feedback, but they don’t drive

development. And we’re fortunate that they’recomfortable with this. It’s a level of trust that we don’ttake for granted, and we constantly strive to exceedtheir expectations.”

I ask him what the biggest challenge has been inmoving from a large studio to a small indie outfit.“Generally, learning to do more with less. Beyond

that, the challenges have changed depending on thephase of development. When we started, it waskeeping the lights on. Now it’s living up toexpectations, including our own.”

The Long Dark’s journey is far from over. For thepast year the focus has been on its survival systemsand sandbox. The team are trying to make the gameas tight and playable as possible, and nailing down itsdistinct look and feel. But the next step is more

ambitious: they’re making a story. With voice acting by Mark ‘Commander Shepard’ Meer, it’ll be the taleof a bush pilot, Will Mackenzie, whose plane crashesin the Canadian wilderness after a mysterious,apocalyptic event. Combining survival with a focusednarrative is an intriguing idea, and I can’t wait to seewhat they come up with.

The game has alreadysold half a million

copies, and it’s noteven finished.



BULLET HELLOFind friendship, build a home, and then lose it all in the fantastic series revival,

RAINBOW SIX SIEGE. By James Davenport

Then we gotthe idea to usethe objective

room as a trap

With teamwork, Siege is a gamewhere you can reinforce or smash

walls and tiny, fleeting relationshipstoo—more dating sim than twitchtest. It’s this special social element,combined with impressive tacticaldepth, that makes it one of the bestcompetitive shooters I’ve played.

The primary modeis five-on-fiveobjective-basedmultiplayer, each teameither defending orattacking an objective.Every round openswith a planning phase,

in which the defendingteam uses abilities andresources (wall reinforcements,barbed wire, traps, explosives) toslow down, distract, or destroy theenemy team’s encroachment. Duringthis phase, the attacking team sendstiny remote control drones tosneakily survey the defense. Holdingdown a button marks the last seen

Come get your armor, nerds!” said RonBurgundy69. He placeda container on the ground and danced around it. I wish hecould’ve seen my grin. It was the kind of small, light-heartedgesture that kept an entire evening of Rainbow Six Siege fromteetering into a hapless string of simple mistakes, head-to-

keyboard contact, and creative insult slinging. Because without teamwork,no matter how messy, Siege is just another deathmatch shooter, albeit onewhere you can reinforce or smash walls.

position of defending players, whiledefensive structures are

communicated over voice chat.Plans initially form based on

which operators are picked, becausetheir special abilities arm the teamwith different tools. On offense, wemight focus on making noise and

chaos by choosingcharacters who can

break reinforcedstructures, send clustergrenades throughwalls, and carry flashgrenades. Or we couldgo in surgically,

assembling a team thatcan detect and take outelectronic devices, and carry big riotshields and precise weaponry.

A plan might then evolve based onthe recon stage. After scouring themap with drones on offense orstationary cameras on defense, weconsider where the enemy mightcome from and base our strategies

around map advantages ordisadvantages. With destructiblesurfaces, it’s important to rememberthat sightlines aren’t just limited toopen doorways or windows, but any

breakable surface. Each map is alabyrinth of levels, rooms, and surfacetypes, littered with all sorts ofdomestic debris.

The aural landscape is decidedlyless busy, the only components

beyond natural ambience are thefootsteps of players and short boutsof percussive violence. It’s an eerieeffect that contributes to the urgencyof proper preparation. There’s lessthan a minute to find the objective orset up defenses, which weights everydecision with consequence. ForRonBurgundy69, playing as Rook,throwing down that armor wasprobably quite the thrill.

I know, because when I’m settingup bulletproof barricades as Castle, I

brace my entire self against the F key

as the dense weave unrolls and snapsinto place. A voice in the back of myskull says “You should’ve barricadedthe south door, idiot.” When I’mplaying Thermite, watching the fuseon a breach charge begin its slowpath towards detonation, I kick off aninternal debate over when to startcooking a frag grenade. The friction issuch that I feel my heart might pop

before the shooting even starts. I lovethis kind of (self) destructive tension,even if I’m not sure it’s good for me.

Siege makes you think about how you’re thinking the more you play. On

defense, for example, our initialinstinct was to hang out in theobjective room and build a fortress. Itworked half the time. Then we gotthe idea to use the room as a trap. Wefortified it as normal, but hung out onthe perimeter until the enemy teamgathered around the objective, thencame in from the floor and ceiling,

breaching a few intentionally openwalls, and laid waste.

But now we expect them toexpect that plan, which means werevise to accommodate for layers and

layers of potential. Siege is best as a

N E E D T O K N O W

WHAT IS IT?

A tactical multiplayerfirst-person shooter.

EXPECT TO PAY

$60

DEVELOPER

Ubisoft Montreal

PUBLISHER

Ubisoft

REVIEWED ON

Nvidia GTX 980 Ti, IntelCore i7-6700K, 16GB

RAM

MULTIPLAYER

5 player co-op,5-on-5 versus

LINK

www.rainbow6.ubi.com/siege

S M O O T H O P E R A T O R S

Which characters to unlock first J Ä G E RVital, but simple, hisActive Defense systemprevents grenades fromdetonating within itsgeneral vicinity. An easy,useful job for new players.

S L E D G EEquipped with asledgehammer, thisoperator forces you tolearn which surfaces aredestructible.

R O O K You have one job. Give your friends some armorand yell at them until theypick it up.

T H E R M I T EHis breach charges canbust through reinforcedwalls, a good way to learnhow to poke holes indefenses.

66 MARCH 2016

R E V I E W



Rainbow Six Sieg

R E V I EW

If you’re a Tom Clancy fan,this probably counts as porn.

Many of the settingsare suburban.

The Magpie is a kindof teeny turret.

Peekaboo.

Eventually you canunlock Robbie the Robot.



Rainbow Six Siege

R E V I EW

The last seconds of thegame often look like this.

Behind my mask,I am sad and alone.

The terrorism can feel a littleclose to the bone at times.

I’m fairly sure sights shouldmake things look closer.

I hope you have goodhome insurance.



It’s an intense,hyper-focused game —game in

italics foremphasis

psychological race, where you’reattempting to outwit instead ofoutshoot your opposition.

The race isn’t so simple, though.It’s not always easy to find a randomgroup of people willing to forgo old

win-win-shoot’em habits in order todevelop a good plan, so a vaguerestlessness saturated each team. Outof this, archetypes began to emerge,and usually for the better. Any timethe Lone Wolf somehow took outthree enemies, when the BumblingIdiot (me) pressed the grenade keyinstead of the healing key, or whenthe Lame Leader barked anotherlame command, I felt a thrill,laughter, frustration, something—allfrom my teammates’ personalitiesemerging through their play styles.

Siege is an incrediblyexpressive game, andthough I love playingwith rigid tacticians, it’sfar from a waste with amotley crew.

Finding buddiesisn’t difficult. In my 15or so hours with thefinal version on andafter launch, I’ve had no issues withmatchmaking, the outlier being aninstance or two where it took longerthan a minute. And play has beensmooth for the most part. About one

in every ten matches has some kindof lag or server desync issues, butthere are usually players with anabsurdly high ping in each of thosematches, too.

To have the motleyest crew, you’llneed to unlock some operators. All20 are locked from the get-go behindRenown, which is a currency tied towinning matches, completingchallenges, and performing helpfuloperator-specific actions. Some may

be concerned that the presence ofconsumable Renown booster

microtransactions means that

unlocking all of the operators will bea grind. It’s not.

After completing all of theSituations (singleplayer tutorialmissions), watching the tutorial

videos, and playing a few rounds of

multiplayer (a two-hour process), Iunlocked over half of the availablecharacters. The Renown drip slowsdown as you unlock more operatorsin each category, but in anotherfour-hour session, I earned enoughRenown to unlock four more. Theremaining microtransactions arelimited to gun skins, purely cosmeticflair, most of which can be earnedthrough Renown in time. None ofthem are necessary (unless you askme about the floral skins) or get inthe way of playing the game, and

with the promise offree maps andoperators for everyonehenceforth, thepresence ofmicrotransactions feelsconstrained in Siege. Ifonly the narrative wasconsidered as much.

SAY SOMETHING

The lack of a campaign will smart forsome, but small doses of story hurt

Siege more than if they weren’t thereat all. There are terrorists wearing

white masks, constructing a biological weapon, and generallymessing things up in suburbia,airports, banks, and cafes onChristmas. The result is a looseassemblage of domestic imagery, allof which is too evocative of recenttragedies to feel tasteful.

While I’m happy to see that theenemies aren’t whack-a-mole MiddleEastern stereotypes, I can’t say I feltsuper enthralled to be playing a bombdefusal level where the fiction is thatthe terrorists gassed and gunned

down students en masse on a college

campus. This isn’t to say that theseplaces or situations are never to begrounds for fiction, but that the gamefails to say anything meaningfulabout them beyond ‘terrorists bad,military force good!’ is prettyreductive and disturbing.

More trouble stems from thegunplay. Every other action in thegame is a personal burden—theplacement of defenses, insertionpoints, and communication—a single

bad decision can make or break anentire match. The guns don’t feel as they carry the same weight. Feedbacis light and recoil is very forgiving.This enables the sloppiest momentsin Siege. Gun fights are loud, short,and have potential to devolve intofamiliar run and gun twitch bouts.Moments like this run counter to

Siege’s emphasis on cunning and

patience, but since shootouts makeup the smallest part of the game, Idon’t feel they disrupt my enjoymententirely. I’d just like to sweat beforeeach trigger pull as much as I do

before reinforcing a wall.But Siege makes me sweat

enough. More than enough. So muchthat I have trouble playing it for longstretches. It’s an intense, hyper-focused game—game in italics foremphasis. In italics because it’spossible to talk about Siege in thesame watercooler conversations as

CS:GO or Dota 2. In italics becausethey look cool and so is Siege. Itmakes no bones about what it is andnearly no compromises for its designas a Tactical Multiplayer Shooter™,and I admire Siege for that.

Most tactical games take a whileto get there: to the tipping pointwhere I’m no longer struggling withcontrols, communication, or matchflow. After the first match in a typicagame of Siege, I know my role, myteam and I have developed arelationship, and we’re settling into aunique rhythm. For a game with so

many branches of complexity andpotential, Siege is the only shooter Iknow that encourages such tacticaldepth, player expression, and creativteamplay. It’s a game that wastes notime getting to the primal, creative,social, everything core of what makecompetition so much fun.

90An accessible and deeplysatisfying shooter thatrewards planning andteamwork over a quick

trigger finger.

V E R D I C T

Accusations of LAG or hax.

Someone blew up the hostage room as Fuze (again).

Everyone fell off the roof.

Threw a grenade instead of healing your ally.

Friendly fire. You can hear a teammate cooking dinner.

Fatally shot in the toe through the crack under a door.

Blinded by your own flash grenade.

Uplay.

A cat sits on your keyboard during the breach.

Y O U L O S T Defeat distribution inRainbow Six Siege

15°

25°

10°

10°

10°

5°

5°

4°

15°

1°

MARCH 2016 6

R E V I E W



TWIDDLE AGESThis earthy survival sim rams its message home: LIFE IS FEUDAL: YOUR OWN.

By Leif Johnson

In its bestmoments, Life

is Feudal recallsa simplicity we’ve lost

There’s a lot to admire about that

devotion to realism, particularly as itallows interactions with objects thatmost of its genre cousins would shyfrom. Stumble across an elm in thewoods, and you’ll find you can yankoff its branches or shave its trunk forbark or just chop thewhole thing down foruse in a buildingelsewhere. But in thisfeudal world, you’ll findno Skyrim-style bagsthat hold more than anentire merchant’s shop.

If you want to use thatlog you chopped down,you’ll have to slowly haul the thingover to the site. And then you do itagain. And again.

Anyone who attempts to do thisalone is doing it wrong. Hate people?Don’t bother. Life is Feudal places aheavy emphasis on cooperation andsocialization. In the absence ofenemies such as zombies or

There’s a warning about Life is Feudal that’s seemingly builtinto its very title—that little play on the word ‘futile’ that’s atad too perfect to be an accident. Be grateful for it. You couldend up like me, fully confident that months of sampling othersurvival sims like Rust and ARK: Combat Evolved had

prepared you for what this medieval themed variant has to offer. But afterspending several minutes combing the beach I’d washed up on for the flintthe tutorial told me I could use to make an axe (along with some branchesand plant fibre), I knew I was wrong. This was real. A little too real.

dinosaurs (or even animals apart

from oxen, deer, and the occasional bear), it’s other players that matterhere. In Life is Feudal, it takes a

village to make a village.Having some peasants to help out

doesn’t fix everything, though,especially when eachserver has a fixed limitof 64 players at a time.That means that eventhough PvP combatand a rudimentarymorality system exist, itnever reaches the

potential for the realwars implicit in thetitle as there’s rarely enough peopleactive to build the kind of heavyfortifications required. (Not tomention that the combat is a slowmess that poorly mimics Mount &

Blade and drains your stamina to thepoint of uselessness in seconds.)

Thanks to the labor costs requiredto perform the simplest tasks, even

the busiest servers often have littlemore than a couple of huts and a sadlittle wall to account for weeks andweeks of work.

Find the right group, though, and you’ll find some gratification in thegrind. The sluggish pace means thatthe construction of a cottage—often aforgettable placeholder for something

better in other games—is an eventworth celebrating. The vast amount

of skills involved means players havea tendency to slip into focusedcareers when playing with others,which helps create the illusion of a

bona fide working society. Does itsometimes feel like a new real-world

job in the process? You’re darnedright it does. All the same, I foundsome quiet satisfaction in theknowledge that I was buildingstructures that would help mycommunity survive and not justclocking in hours for pay that I’d useto pay someone else. In its best

moments, Life is Feudal recalls a beautiful simplicity we’ve lost in themodern world.

RUSTIC CHARM

It doesn’t hurt that the world itself isquite the looker in spots, even if ittended to bog my GeForce 780 downto slideshow speeds on mediumsettings. However, I doubt that looksalone will be enough to keep mecoming back until something, at least,speeds up in Life is Feudal.

Just the same, there wassomething deeply fulfilling about

finding the myriad uses for objectsaround me that kept me hooked evenafter enduring the occasional crashand lingering bugs. For a while, atleast. Right now, having just spent anhour trudging back and forth to a treeto help build a simple chest, I’m morethan ready for the Renaissance.

N E E D T O K N O W

WHAT IS IT?

A realism-focusedsandbox survival sim

set in the Middle Ages.

EXPECT TO PAY

$40

DEVELOPER

Bitbox, Ltd.

PUBLISHER

In-house

REVIEWED ON

Windows 10, 16GB RAM,GeForce GTX 780

MULTIPLAYER

Up to 64 players perserver

LINK

www.lifeisfeudal.com

68An attractive medievalsurvival sandbox thatunfortunately getsbogged down in too

many demands for time.

V E R D I C T

D O - I T - Y O U R S E L F E R What it costs to build a cozy cottage on your own

Heated in a kiln setto 1,000 or higherand made from flux,rock, and sand.

100

D O O R M O D U L E S

Sound simple? You’ll need to make an anvil andforge to make the pieces (and you need the skill).6

Each dragged individuallyfrom the hills.

W I N D O W M O D U L E S

Requires that kiln again, and Carpentry.

B U I L D I N GL O G S

250

40M O R T A R

5

C L A Y T I L E S

Each fired in a kiln.

70 MARCH 2016

R E V I E W



Life is Feudal: Your Ow

R E V I EW

“A giant, Sancho!I must fight it!”

It’s both a boar fightand a bore fight.

This pretty scenery can dragperformance down on Ultra settings.

It only took a week to makethis. What? Stop laughing.

Rocket launchers werecrude in feudal times.



STALETALETelltale’s episodic GAME OF THRONES adventure has finishedseason one. Read the Stark truth about it here. By Leif Johnson

It adds apersonal layerto choices thataffect the lives

of hundreds

Telltales’ protagonists are HouseForrester, but I’m more than a littleconvinced I could describe them to a

casual watcher of the HBO series andleave them thinking I was talkingabout the Starks. There’s Forrestersquire Gared Tuttle, who joins theNight’s Watch and frolics withwildlings just like Jon Snow. There’sa matriarch who couldwork as a body doublefor Catelyn Stark, and ayoung girl in King’sLanding who’s basicallySansa with an edge.

At least such servilemirroring makes

Telltale’s few more-or-less original additionsall the more appealing, as in the caseof the Star-Lord-esque AsherForrester and his endlessly likeablesellsword companion Beskha. Asherand Beskha’s adventures hint at whatcould have been, but the seasonoverall leaves a bitter aftertaste ofStark deja vu.

Game of Throne’s reliance on thefamiliar especially poses problems inthe appearance of well-knowncharacters from the TV series (each

Far into this first season, one of the characters looks up to findthe constellation he’s been searching for right where it needsto be. There’s no waiting for a particular moon cycle or time ofnight; it’s as though it never moves. Much of the season iswrapped up in the same sense of inevitability. Time and time

again, I tried to alter its soul-crushing scenarios in my favor, but mytroubles seemed as destined to fall into place as those stars.

voiced by their HBO actor). Theywork best in cameo, as with a tensemeeting with Cersei Lannister that

still makes me shudder months later.But one infamous jerkwad inparticular sticks his sadistic nose intothe rivalry between the Forrestersand the neighboring Whitehills forseveral episodes, and the plot tension

suffers from theknowledge that he’s notgoing anywhere soon.He’s still kicking onHBO, so no matter howcruel or disgusting hegets, I know all too wellI can’t end his crap

with a well-timedcrossbow bolt.True to expectations, it’s a brutal,

vicious world. The great strength ofthe season is its technique of adding apersonal layer to choices that affectthe lives of hundreds—something youwon’t get in either the books or theHBO series. In theory, we’re actualplayers in the game of thrones. It’sone thing to watch or read about NedStark’s choices and argue about whathe should have done; it’s quiteanother to discover what you actually

end up doing on the spot. And true toform, the series throws some gutpunches that initially left mefrantically attempting to figure outwhat I could have done to avoid its

Aeschylean tragedies.

FATAL FLAW

As it turns out, not much. The castmay change, the words may shuffle,

but eventually Thrones succumbs to

that now-classic Telltale awarenessthat your choices don’t really matter.That stings less in games like Tales

from the Borderlands, but it’sespecially damning here as the appealof the Forrester saga partly rises fromthe hope that GRRM’s horrors couldhave been avoided if we’d been incharge. To say nothing of the othertroubles, such as two advisers soopposed that they come off aspolitical cartoons, entire sideplotsthat seemingly have little import forthe main narrative, and a season

finale that relies far too heavily oncliffhangers and unresolved threads.I don’t regret my time with Game

of Thrones. It captures thehopelessness of the main series well(although at times it threatens to

venture into parody), and in theabsence of any true resolution, Iappreciate that it let me vent myfrustrations by ramming Valyriansteel through the skull of aninsufferable asshole with the help ofthe usual button prompts and arrowkeys. Deep down, I want to lookforward to another season. I kind of

want to finally see what’s so specialabout the North Grove. But afteralmost a year of misery piled onmisery and after months of placingmy hopes on cliffhangers that lead tonothing substantial, right now I’mconvinced that for this world, wintercan’t come quickly enough.

N E E D T O K N O W

WHAT IS IT?

A six-episode Telltaleadventure that takesplace in the Game of

Thrones universe.

EXPECT TO PAY

$30 for thesix-episode season

DEVELOPER

Telltale Games

PUBLISHER

In-house

REVIEWED ON

Windows 10, 16GB RAM,GeForce GTX 780

MULTIPLAYER

None

LINK

www.telltalegames.com/gameofthrones

65Gets the feel right, butrelies too heavily onfamiliar themes to forma memorable identity of

its own.

V E R D I C T

M I S E R Y A N D D E S P A I R : W H O W O R E I T B E T T E R ?

You’ll be frowning a lot in Westeros, so it’s best to put your best face forward

B E S K H ASellsword companion of

Asher Forrester

C O T T E RFriend to Gared Tuttle

S E R A D U R W E L LFriend to Mira Forrester

T A L I A F O R R E S T E RDaughter of Lord Forrester

72 MARCH 2016

R E V I E W



Game of Throne

R E V I EW

Dragons: alwayspleased to see you.

Look out, it’sgot your arm!

Has actual dragon .Is still miserable.

“I’ve alwaysloved you.”



ACE OF SPACEWhy it’s a lot of fun to be a showboating space spelunker

in GALAK-Z: THE DIMENSIONAL. By Chris Schilling

This sci-firoguelike has

rightly earnedits fearsomereputation

I blasted a bulbous plant, whichreleased electrically charged polleninto the path of another, obliterating

his shields just in time for him to seea missile salvo arc toward his cockpit.Laughing, I boosted clear... andstraight into the hungry grasp of agiant space bug. I died less than ascreen’s width away from the exit.

Galak-Z is greatwhen things are goingright, but it’s brilliantwhen they’re goingwrong—and there areplenty of ways for thatto happen. On oneoccasion I decided to

take things slowly,methodically advancingthrough a maze-like interior, stayingbeyond the sight cones of patrollingcraft where possible and luring loneships into devious traps. Havingamassed a tidy haul of scrap, Imeandered toward the exit, only tobe struck by a jet of flame that hadburst forth from a hole in a pipe.Startled, I panicked, shooting a gastank that whirled around beforesettling on a trajectory that saw itsmash into my cockpit and explode,removing my final sliver of health.

This sci-fi roguelike has rightlyearned its fearsome reputation. Youwill perish, and often. I won’t lie andclaim failure isn’t frustrating, but winor lose, you’ll have a wonderful timedoing so. It may not always be fair,but then it wouldn’t be a roguelikewithout fortune involved. And, if onlyoccasionally, it will fall in your favor.

But luck comes a distant second toskill.Galak-Z might have a steeplearning curve, but it’s a reminderthat mastering an unorthodox controlsystem can be hugely enjoyable. At its

simplest level, it’s like Asteroids, in

Igot cocky. I’d reached the objective marker, but found myselfambushed by an enemy fleet. Too many to take on in such anenclosed space, I opted for flight over fight, hoping to either losethem en route to the extraction point, or isolate them and pickthem off one by one. Weaving through a labyrinth of tunnels, I

passed by a spider’s lure of space junk, wheeling away a split-second beforeit lurched forward and grabbed one of my pursuers.

that you rotate to aim and thrust tomove in that direction, but it’s morenuanced than that. At times I

wondered if I would’ve preferredmore maneuverability at the cost ofweight, but I’m happy with the

balance: with maximum thrust speed, your ship is on the brink of feelingskittish. If the odds can seem unfair,

you’re given the toolsto escape the stickiestof situations, whether

you’re strafing, boosting, or applying your rear jets to get outof harm’s way.

Then there’s the

juke, which sees yourship spin out of thescreen and dive back in. It’s ashowboater’s dream, designed toencourage dangerous play—like

boosting towards an enemy, lifting offat the last second to land behind youropponent, and swiveling to unleash a

barrage into its rear. Worth the risk?Undoubtedly, though the screeching

insectoids, powerful empire fleetsand snarling raiders you’ll face arenot to be underestimated. They’reoften smart, yet capable of errors in

judgement—with clever positioning you can get a larger craft to blast itsdiminutive allies before they race offto call backup, or get two factions tofight one another, distracting themlong enough to peel away to safety.

EPISODIC And if the 25 randomly generatedmissions are all, broadly speaking,salvage quests, Galak-Z works hard tocontextualize your adventures. Ittakes place over five TV-style‘seasons’, with five episodes in each.It looks and sounds for all the worldlike a great lost Saturday morningcartoon from the ’80s and while theoverarching plot won’t win anyawards, the script is light and wittyand the performances are terrific—likeable protagonist A-Tak and his

officer Beam share a warm rapport.There’s even something movingabout the game over screen, whichshows an empty helmet with acracked visor floating by, a brutalreminder of the stakes.

But as much as it stings to lose aship equipped with half a dozenpermanent perks, there are enoughthrilling discoveries to dull the pain.Indeed, by the beginning of thesecond season you’ll have a wholenew series of combat techniques tolearn. Its final surprise for PC ownersis a mode that unlocks checkpoints

after every episode rather thanforcing you to survive an entireseason with just one life. Reachingthe end may still be beyond someplayers, but putting the bountifulrewards of Galak-Z within the reachof many more budding space cadetscan only be a good thing.

N E E D T O K N O W

WHAT IS IT?

A stylish, intelligentshooter withpermadeath.

EXPECT TO PAY

$20

DEVELOPER

17-Bit Studios

PUBLISHER

In-house

REVIEWED ON

Intel Core i5-4440 CPU@ 3.1GHz, 8GB

MULTIPLAYER

None

LINK

www.17-bit.com/galakz

88Challenging butimmaculately calibratedcontrols power anexciting and enormously

rewarding sci-fi roguelike.

V E R D I C T

S C R A P M E T T L E

How to avoid being turned into space junkD O N ’ T S H O O T !Why start a fight when you caneasily avoid it? Give your triggerfinger a break and only open firewhen the way ahead is blocked.Oh, and save your missiles forthe toughest opponents.

J U N K A R O U N DIt doesn’t always payto head straight for

the mission marker. Weigh upthe value of upgrade chestsagainst the risk of tackling theenemies you tend to find nearby.

S T A R T S M A L LIn a battle, focus onthe smaller ships

first—some will getreinforcements, while otherscan be a real nuisance when youneed to take down more

U S E P R O T E C T I O NThe best value item you can buy,particularly in the early game, isa temporary shield. This willstop your permanent energybarrier from depleting, allowing you to stay in fights longer.

74 MARCH 2016

R E V I E W



Galak-Z: The Dimensiona

R E V I EW

Redeem crash coins to geta head-start with perks.

A faint blue ring around your ship showsthe range at which enemies can hear you.

Imperial ships and supply crateswill keep you well stocked.

Arcade mode means you loseless progress when you die.

The weighty rumble from boosts andexplosions feels great on a pad.



LONDON FALLINGSome new treats freshen the familar routine in ASSASSIN’S CREED SYNDICATE.

By Christopher Livingston

Like diving intoa pile of leavesfrom the top of

Big Ben

Syndicate offers other new toys and

features, mostly cribbed from otheropen-world games but still enjoyableenough to freshen the proceedings, atleast for a while. Horse-drawncarriages enable GTAesque hijacking.You can direct thugs from your gangto do some of yourfighting for you, a laSaint’s Row. Combat isArkham-style as youtake on huge crowdswith counter-attacks,combos, and finishingmoves. These things

are initially fun—Ireally did enjoy my firsthandful of hours with the game—butby mid-Creed they mostly begin tofeel like a chore.

You play Syndicate as Jacob andEvie Frye, a brother-sister assassin

Alexander Graham Bell, one of several historical celebritiesI’ve met within mere moments of setting foot in VictorianLondon, has given me a rope launcher. With it I can quicklygrapple my way to rooftops, and create ziplines between buildings to zip across. It provides an alternative to

freerunning across rooftops, which feels the same as it does in otherAssassin’s Creed games: fun and dynamic at first, but ultimately a bitroutine, and sometimes even exasperating. Which is not a bad way todescribe Assassin’s Creed Syndicate itself.

team who are well-written and

skillfully voiced. Jacob, whilepredictably cocky and sarcastic, isstill funny and likable, and Evie, themore serious of the two, is herselfprone to moments of charm andlevity. I liked both characters a lot,

especially in the scenesthey shared with oneanother. For most ofthe game, they’re

basicallyinterchangeable to play:save for a few high-level abilities they have

identical skill trees.Only near the end ofthe game do they really begin to feeldistinct, with Jacob more of a brawlerand Evie more focused on stealth.

The story itself is impenetrableunless you’ve been taking detailed

notes for the last 40 or 50 Creed games, which I admit I haven’t.Thankfully, it’s also limited to briefinterludes. The main missions aretypically better than anything else inthe game, often taking place in hugeareas crawling with foes andcontaining several side-objectivesthat can be tackled creatively. Lessenjoyable are the repetitive sidemissions to liberate the various

districts of London. Free childrenfrom oppressive sweatshops bykilling all the evil foremen,assassinate Templars in well-guardedareas, perform bounty huntingmissions by kidnapping a target andspiriting him away in a carriage, orengage in a battle at a gangstronghold. Each of these encountersare repeated all over London, againand again, offering little distinctionfrom one another.

GREAT EXPECTATIONS

As beautiful as Victorian London is,the buildings eventually become justa series of obstacles—things to run,rope, and clamber across withouteven really looking at them. Theimpressively bustling crowds becomeless captivating as you realize they’re

just a collection of robots that spawnthe same series of underwhelmingcrowd events like ‘catch the robber’or ‘scare the bullies.’

The final boss fight lets you swap back and forth between Evie andJacob during the battle, a fine idea—

but the fight itself is unimaginative

and unrewarding, designed to bedifficult above all else. Like divinginto a pile of leaves from the top ofBig Ben, the first time is a thrill, thetenth is a yawn. Assassin’s Creed

Syndicate’s new toys entertain for awhile but the novelty ends hours

before the game does.

T H I N G S Y O U C A N ’ T D O I N A C : S Y N D I C A T E

Scored by how big of a shame it is

N E E D T O K N O W

WHAT IS IT?

An open-world actionadventure game set in

Victorian London.

EXPECT TO PAY

$60

DEVELOPER

Ubisoft

PUBLISHER

In-house

REVIEWED ON

Intel i7 x980 3.33GHz,9GB RAM, NvidiaGeForce GTX 960

MULTIPLAYER

None

LINK

www.assassinscreed.ubi.com

66Syndicate ’s new toys andstrong charactersfreshen up the Assassin’sCreed formula, but only

for a while.

V E R D I C T

S H A M E S C A L E

There are old-timey bikes in the game and you can’t ride them. Come on!

If Rockstar had made Syndicate , you know there’d be playable cricket.

There’s a dog, but it’s not your dog.

Shove a kid playing tag, and he’ll just stare at you. Lousy urchins.

I shot him in the face.No reaction. Lame.

0 25 50 75 100

KILL CHARLESDICKENS

PLAY TAGWITH KIDS

OWN A DOG

PLAY CRICKET

RIDE OLD-TIMEY

BIKES

76 MARCH 2016

R E V I E W



Assassin’s Creed Syndicat

R E V I EW

“Wait, the steampunkconvention was last week?”

Rooftop carriagefights. Watch your step.

London: proudly poisoningthe planet since 1810.

Yes, you can divefrom Big Ben.



Hard West is told in a series of shortfrontier stories, which play out aschoose-your-own-adventure textprompts on an overworld map andturn-based combat scenarios. Theformer part is quite good. The voicednarration is excellent, the writingefficient, and thedecisions you makeinterestingly affect latercombat. In one story Isent my posse too far

into a crumbling mineand busted acharacter’s hand,causing an aimingpenalty later.

You can also find or buy stat-boosting or usable items—poisongrenades, doses of opium, magicrelics—along with special abilitiesand weird experimental guns to passout to your crew before combat. Allthat customization is a lot of fun.

The turn-based tactics, however,are often a bore. The rules will be

familiar to XCOM players—move

T

here are no Clint Eastwoods in Hard West, no cigarillo-chewing badasses who stare down the sherriff’s posse in themiddle of the street. That’d just get you killed. It’s more likeI’m controlling the Wilhelm-screaming extras in a big

western shootout, popping up and firing one shot at a time,turn after turn—a lot of staying put and shooting at squibs in the dirt.

your characters around a gridded board, take shots with somepercentage chance of hitting, hide incover to minimize risk—but Hard

West’s dense game boards andirritatingly strict line-of-sight rulesmake daring movement nearly

impossible, and insteadof adding tragedy to

your story, losing acharacter usuallymeans restarting the

mission. Thatrepetition is aggravated

by a couple of things:each combat scenario ishand-designed, so

repeat playthroughs lack surprise,and some objectives are just boring.Stealth, for instance, is pretty silly,

because the guards don’t move fromturn to turn, so you can just dutifullyclick where their vision cones aren’t.

There are great little stories toearn in Hard West, like the time Icorrectly predicted an enemy was

going to move on the next turn, and

hit him with a special artery shot thatmade him drop dead after a fewsteps. I’ve only used some of thespecial abilities effectively a few

times. It’s like pulling a very specificcard in a complex board game,holding it all game, and then finallyslamming it onto the table—oh yeah!That’s a hell of a good feeling.

But the other things that maketactical combat fun—forming andexecuting a plan, taking a chance,telling a story—are muted here.Enemies either stick to cover andmust be whittled down if you can’tsafely flank them, or are dumbenough to end their turns in theopen. And there just isn’t much roomto move around and try out

interesting tactics. Get too close to agroup of bandits to play with ashotgun’s area attack, and the nextturn one of them is likely to walk upto your dude and shoot him in theface. Time to start over. With littleroom to err as part of my story, mystory becomes a pretty dull one.

N E E D T O K N O W

WHAT IS IT?

A turn-based tacticsgame set in a

supernatural old west.

EXPECT TO PAY

$20

DEVELOPER

CreativeForge Games

PUBLISHER

Gambitious DigitalEntertainment

REVIEWED ON

Intel i7 @ 3.47GHz,12GB RAM, Radeon R7

260X

MULTIPLAYER

None

LINK

www.gambitious.com

61The developers haveaced the presentation,but Hard West ’sturn-based combat is too

rote to be engrossing.

V E R D I C T

SIGH NOONHARD WEST’s supernatural gunfights aren’t as fun as its setting and style. By Tyler Wilde

The strict rulesmake daring

movementalmostimpossible

78 MARCH 2016

Hard West

R E V I E W

The demon prince neverlearned about cover systems.

A character’s ‘luck’ depleteswhen a shot misses them.



The home of technology

techradar.com



HAIL TO THE KINGThe post-apocalypse has never seemed cuter, more frenzied or more essential than in

Vlambeer’s NUCLEAR THRONE. By Edwin Evans-Thirlwell

A fortuitousthwack with a

wrench mightclear out an

entire corridor

After a couple of runs, I’ve justrealized that during these franticsearches, the camera stays centered

on her lopped-off head—a subtlehindrance in a game that’s soddenwith wonderful little touches.

A character mutation dramaticallyincreases the force with whichenemy bodies are thrown by a fatalblow, transforming thisbullet-hell into a gameof banking shots andpinball table multi-kills.A fortuitous thwackwith a wrench mightclear out an entirecorridor, but Rads (XP

points) must begathered before theyblink out of existence, so this mightcost you an upgrade if you can’t mopup all the Rads in time.

Nuclear Throne’s greatness lies inhow all its variables pull against eachother, giving rise to shifting layers ofstrategy, surprise and white-knucklebrinkmanship. Yet for all its complexsystems, the game is always intuitive,marrying responsive top-downshooting to a rocky yet predictableprogression curve. The majesticaudio design plays a big part in

making the game accessible—that

Nuclear Throne often resembles a foodfight in a particularlymessy branch of McDonald’s, but don’t let its showers ofpixelated gristle deceive you. This is a precision-engineeredpost-apocalyptic roguelike of insidious grace and flexibility.Consider the Chicken. She doesn’t collapse on death like the

other characters: head and body part company, and you’re granted a fewseconds to guide her spurting torso to a health pack and thus, resurrection.

bombardment of yelps and splats isactually a nicely judged set of cues,enabling a halfway-skilled player to

read a battle almost by ear alone. Your goal is to overcome 15

procedurally generated levels, brokeninto seven themed areas (plus a smallclutch of secret levels, among othersurprises). Between chapters you can

pick mutations for yourcharacter, which rangefrom the prosaic—increased health, orfaster movement—toesoteric mutations thatsuit more advancedtactics, such as being

able to tunnel intowalls for shelter.Map layouts and item drops vary

hugely, but there’s enough uniformity between playthroughs that you canplan ahead. Each area theme (rangingfrom slippery ice plateaus toscrapyards and bejewelled cavesystems) spans a fixed number oflevels, boss encounters crop up at thesame point in the sequence everytime, and each layout is home to acertain number of weapon and ammocrates. This leads to some deliciousquandaries as you weigh the needs of

the moment against those of

scenarios to come. A mutation thatenables normal movement throughcobwebs might prove decisive in achapter or two, but a mutation thatoccasionally restores ammo when

you kill something has widerapplicability. Likewise, should youwaste those bazooka shots on amurder of Uzi-wielding crows, orsave them for the boss you know is

just around the corner?

CRYSTAL TIPS

Choice of character also shapes thethe challenges ahead. Besides aprimary and secondary weapon slot,each protagonist sports an active anda passive ability that caters to aparticular playstyle. The coward’s betis Crystal, who starts with morehealth and can transform briefly intoa bullet-repelling chunk of amethyst(a later mutation allows her toteleport while in this state). A riskierpick is Melting, who dies easily but

reaps a greater Rad haul per kill,allowing him to access powerfulupgrades much earlier—oh, and hecan blow up corpses from afar.Same-screen co-op play allows you toexplore how these special abilitiesmay complement each other.

Given a certain degree of talent,the game can be completed in underan hour, but there are daily andweekly challenges to dip into, and

you can loop the campaign after beating a certain boss to replay levelswith different mode criteria. Evenwithout all that, Nuclear Throne is an

experience you’ll want to relive, forthe inexhaustible joy of glidingthrough hails of ordinance, and forthe many small discoveries you makeevery time you return. Roguelikesdon’t come much greasier orgrubbier, but they’re seldom thiscompelling, either.

N E E D T O K N O W

WHAT IS IT?

A lightning-fasttop-down roguelike

shooter.

EXPECT TO PAY

$12

DEVELOPER

Vlambeer

PUBLISHER

In-house

REVIEWED ON

i5, GTX460M, 4GB RAM

MULTIPLAYER

Two player co-op

LINK

www.nuclearthrone.com

90Nuclear Throne is acrowning achievementfor Vlambeer, and one ofthe finest action-

roguelikes ever made.

V E R D I C T

G U N N I N G F O R T H E T H R O N E Four pixelated protagonists

R O B O TCan eat guns to restore abit of health. Gets access

to high-tech weaponsearlier in the game.

H O R R O RGets an extra choice of

mutation at level-up, andcan spend Rads on a

devastating particle beam.

Y U N G V E N U ZFaster fire rate and reloadtime on all weapons. Canshoot twice per click with

more knockback.

P L A N TExtremely quick, and also

able to immobilizeenemies by throwing a

clutch of tendrils.

80 MARCH 2016

R E V I E W



Nuclear Thron

R E V I EW

Carry two different weapon typesto avoid exhausting your ammo.

Eyes’ telekinesis sucks in itemdrops and enemies alike.

Watch out for crows—they’ll swoop behind you.

There are many explosiveterrain elements. Use wisely.

Night vision is useful, but onlyin a handful of levels.

Sometimes you spawnright into trouble.



Summoning or casting a spell, youonly have a percentage chance of itactually working. But that chance ismalleable in a couple of basic ways.You can cast magic to slowly bringthe general aura of the map over toeither Law or Chaos,making your spells andsummons moreeffective, and you canspend mana points to

directly boost thechances of a spellcreating a snarlinghellbeast instead of asad magic fizzle.

Every move counts. Matches areshort, each allowing only one moveand attack per unit, and one spell orsummon. High ground gives hugebonuses for attacking, and hugedisadvantages for enemies below.Spells like Tangle Vine can cut offincoming units, only for your rival tofly a Pegasus over the top of a nearby

hill. By default, each wizard is weak

Y

our love for or frustration with Chaos Reborn hinges on onequestion: do you feel lucky? It’s a game of surprising depthand complexity, where wizards wage war by castingpowerful spells and summoning hideous beasts—but it’s also

one where, almost guaranteed, your dragon with a 90%chance to clobber the enemy in the next hex will fail miserably five timesin a row, only to be casually annihilated by a passing goblin.

and barely able to clonk a GooeyBlob, but give them an elephant for amount, a magic sword and magicshield, and suddenly they become amonster-killing machine.

Every creature has its specialities,such as the paladin

being able to strike back, and the undead being immune tomundane attacks. You

get a good selection, but it’s a manageablearmy, with every unitcarefully chosen to pullits weight.

The random element never goesaway, but it’s the layering of elementsthat soon takes priority. The terraincontrol, the psychology, thepreparation and twisting thenumbers in your favor, all of it makesrounds of Chaos Reborn tense andtactical. It’s also fair, generally. Forevery moment where the RNG turns

round and punches you in the face,

it’ll have done it to your opponents.It’s just that those moments neverfeel as sour.

There’s a singleplayer mode called

Realms of Chaos, which plays like asimplified Disciples/Age of Wonders—an RPG map, where you explore,recruit helpers in towns, and fight atimer to avoid being Banished. It’snot a mode worth buying the gamefor, but a well-implemented andsurprisingly comprehensive bonus,with just enough scripting and scopeto let good worlds stand out.

Chaos Reborn lives and dies on itscombat, and it hasn’t lost any of itscharm since the original Gollop

version. Sadly, the community is asmall one, making it hard to get a

good game going, and putting morereliance than there should be on thesingleplayer side. It deserves a biggerplayerbase. Provided you embrace itslove of random chance and are OKrolling with punches, it’s a fantastictactical game with far more than luckon its side.

N E E D T O K N O W

WHAT IS IT?

A remake of JulianGollop’s classical

wizard dueling game.

EXPECT TO PAY

$20

DEVELOPER

Snapshot Games

PUBLISHER

In-house

REVIEWED ON

i7, GTX 970, 8GB RAM

MULTIPLAYER

2-4 (deathmatch andco-op)

LINK

www.chaos-reborn.com

87Chaos Reborn is a truewizard’s wheeze, and afine return to our screensfor one of gaming’s

oldest tactical classics.

V E R D I C T

DICE BY THE SWORDCHAOS REBORN hates to be predictable. By Richard Cobbett

It hasn’t lostany of its

charm since theoriginal Gollop version

82 MARCH 2016

Chaos Reborn

R E V I E W

It’s over, I have the... oh, you alsohave the high ground. Never mind.

Anyone can learn it, but it’scrammed with subtleties.



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BEING FRANKBefitting a king of kings, TOTAL WAR: ATTILA—AGE OF CHARLEMAGNE

has way too many titles. By Dan Griliopoulos

The Danes arereally good at

sailing, sacking,looting and

raiding

The map is much more limited,barely encompassing the

Mediterranean. What Charlemagne offers that The Last Roman didn’t is abetter range of factions.

The worst of these is theLombards—German invaders who’vedisplaced the Romans from the northof Italy. They’ve got abuffed version of thetributary-statemechanism of theSassanids from themain game, and littleelse. Similarly, theEmirate of Cordoba in

Southern Spain has adifferent (worse) takeon the tributary-state mechanism,plus fast research and reducedreligious unrest. Then there’s thepagan Saxons from Westphalia, whoget bonuses to raiding, focused on theFrankish kingdoms, but are a bitsurrounded and doomed. All of thesefactions have standard dull units,with few advanced troops.

The Avars are a so-so traditionalhunnish horse army long settled inPannonia, a peaceful region backedup against the edge of the shrunken

map. Their task is to survive the shortterm onslaught of the Slavs, and buildtheir power up to defeat theinevitable Frankish crusade—theAvars follow a lightning-worshippingpagan religion called Tengriism,which the Christian factions findintensely irritating. Over in theBritish Isles, Mercia is dominant inEngland, but starts surrounded byenemies. Capturing the country is apleasant challenge, even if they haveuninspired troops (again).

The Kingdom of the Danes have a

raiding playstyle familiar to older

A ge of Charlemagne expands Total War: Attila with a newcampaign setting that takes it into the medieval era. Thefirst big Attila expansion—The Last Roman—laid thegroundwork. That was set a hundred years after the fall ofthe Western Empire. It featured a really interesting mobile

Roman faction, The Expedition, and four less interesting rejigs ofbarbarian factions that had survived to that era. Age of Charlemagne takesthat structure and runs with it.

you and your brother Carloman afterthe death of your father, and alongquite stupid lines, really. You’ve beengiven a huge, long thin strip ofprovinces wrapped around your

brother’s territory, and you start witharmies in exactly the wrong places todefend against the Saxons inNorthern Germany and Gascons inSouthern France. Should Carlomandie before you (which you can, uh,

help with) you can choose to claimhis lands, and conquer his (horriblywell-defended) capital. Once you’veunified the Empire, you get to go andstamp on heretics all over Europe.

A new game mechanic has beenintroduced: war weariness.Essentially, the longer you’re at warand the worse you do, the more thepopulation gets pissy, eventuallystarting a rebellion to stop the war.This finally reintroduces a bit of zestinto factional politics; sometimes you

just need to give up on a campaign,

lick your wounds, and return later.It’s still no Crusader Kings II , butthen not every game needs to be thatcomplex, and god knows Total War isfeature-heavy anyway.

Age of Charlemagne is anotherslow step forward for the Rome IIdynasty. Many of the rules are stillobscure (what exactly is armyintegrity?), the UI is still complex andunhelpful (why does the game show

you global food levels when onlyprovincial food matters?) and thetroops for most factions are deadlydull. Despite all that, the game-

breaking bugs are almost all gone,and most of these factions haveinteresting mission sets with early-and mid-game challenges—especiallyCharlemagne himself. Age of is agood gaming tidbit to tide you overuntil the Orcs arrive in Total War:Warhammer next year.

N E E D T O K N O W

WHAT IS IT?

A Total War: Attila expansion set in the

Middle Ages.

EXPECT TO PAY

$15

DEVELOPER

The Creative Assembly

PUBLISHER

Sega

REVIEWED ON

Intel i7, Nvidia GTX 970,Win 7 64 bit, 8GB RAM

MULTIPLAYER

Two player, versus orco-op

LINK

www.totalwar.com

74A diverse array offactions to experimentwith, that drag the Total

War series back into the

medieval era.

V E R D I C T

gamers who played the much-praised Viking Invasion expansion.

Jutland, their home province, is onthe edge of the map and surrounded

by allies, so fairly secure. Theirfaction quirk is twofold: a set ofmissions that screw the entire nation,army and economy, unless you get

busy sacking England;and a bunch of bonusesthat make them reallygood at sailing, sacking,looting and raiding.

Your first ten turns orso are spent slowlysailing across the Baltic

to England’s fair shoresand declaring war onanyone you meet, before sackingevery coastal town and eating theircrops. This tedious start isameliorated by their awesometroops—I mean, who doesn’t likeunit types like Berserkers or onecalled simply ‘Big Axes’?

RAZER’S EDGE

In the northern corner of Spain, behind a line of razed provinces, sitsthe kingdom of Asturias—the easiestof the campaigns. Though their

troops are yawnworthy, it’s easy torebuild the burned provinces andsuddenly have huge amounts ofmoney and food rolling in, allowing

you to pick off the isolated factions to your east and then take on theEmirate of Cordoba. The faction’stwo quirks allow the razing andabandonment of their ownsettlements in the face of anadvancing enemy, and a hugely-increased ambush chance.

The big faction is the Kingdom ofCharlemagne. The huge kingdom of

the Franks has been split between

84 MARCH 2016

D L C R E V I E W



Total War: Attila – Age of Charlemagn

D L C R E V I E W

Rainy, grim… it’s gotto be a British battle.

Burning Valencia: all part ofmy European Cup strategy.

The AI’s still not 100%.

The cityscapes arestill utterly lovely.

Primitive barn-raisingor a very quiet siege?

C H A R L E Y M A I N The ups and downs of a famous king

742 ADCarolus is born as first son ofPepin the Short.

750 ADPepin gets promotedfrom Mayor to King.

769 ADThe Aquitanians rebel.Carloman sulks and won’t help.

774 ADCharley defeats the Lombards,proclaims himself their King.

800 ADThe Pope declares CharlesHoly Roman Emperor.

749 ADCharley must share everythingwith his brother Carl. Oh man!

768 ADCharley and Carloman inheritshared control of the kingdom.

771 ADCarloman mysteriously diesage 20. Fancy that.

788 ADCharley has conqueredmuch of Europe.

813 ADCharley crowns his son, Louisthe Pious, as co-Emperor. Dies.

All men fearedIsaac the Floral.



TERRA FIRMAExploring strange new worlds in ELITE DANGEROUS: HORIZONS.

By Andy Kelly

The terrain isprocedurally

generated,based on real

science

First you have to fit your ship withthe right equipment. It’s fairly cheap.You need a planetary landing suite,

then you need a vehicle hangar andan SRV to fill it. You can find these atmost stations. It’s good that Frontierhas made Horizons’ big featureaccessible, and not something onlywealthy players can enjoy.

Got everything?Then it’s time to startlanding on planets. Anew HUD displaysyour altitude, speedand angle as you comein. Ensuring you don’tcome in too fast, or at

too sheer an angle, iskey to transitioninginto ‘glide’ mode. When this happensyou drift down towards the surface athigh speeds before reverting to theregular flight controls.

Like docking, it’s a fun process,and the feeling of gliding across thesehuge swathes of rock and ice is reallysatisfying. You can land anywhere, aslong as it’s flat enough, then activateyour SRV and go for a spin.

When you bring up a system map,any astronomical object with a blue

Horizons is what Frontier is calling a ‘season’ of expansions,the first of which is the ability to land on airless planetsand moons. For the first time since the game launched youcan now leave the cosy orange glow of your ship’s cockpit. A new vehicle, the SRV, can be driven on the surfaces of

these vast alien worlds, and a variety of land-based missions have beenintroduced to take advantage of it.

icon next to it can be landed on.These range from icy moons toplanets, including Sol’s own Mercury.

On most worlds you’ll find smallsettlements. Some of these you candock with and access the usualstarport services. Others are heavilyguarded, and attacking them formsthe basis of many of the new surface

missions. Other thanthese small areas,there’s a whole lottanothin’ out there.

Even so, the varietyof the terrain, which isprocedurally generated

based on real science,

can be stunning. I loveorbiting a planet andspotting some mysterious smear onthe surface, only to fly down anddiscover it’s a massive

a

yon of iceor a colossal crater. On some planets,enormous ring-worlds dominate theskyline. On others, the parent star isso close that the landscape is paintedin vivid colors by its dazzling glow.

The SRV, or Scarab, is fun to drive,with a bouncy suspension that comesin handy on worlds with very lowgravity. It also has thrusters that let

you leap into the air or soften alanding after a long fall. Headlightslet you explore worlds facing awayfrom sunlight and you can defend

yourself, or attack, with on-boardlaser turrets. Ships and SRVs canshare the same space: on oneoccasion the sight of anothercommander’s massive Lakon Type-9rumbling overhead distracted me somuch that I drove off a cliff.

JOB OFFER

It’s a shame the mission system is stillso messy. I picked up a surface job ona moon, to destroy two ‘skimmers’ (atype of flying security drone). Thelocation was listed, helpfully, as‘planet’ and there was no radarmarker. I drove around for a bit—remember, these planets are toscale—and found nothing. Did theymean the skimmers flying around thecity where I picked the job up? Itargeted one, and it said ‘mission

target’, so I shot it—only to be blownto pieces by the city’s defenses for breaking the law. As great as Elite Dangerous is—and it keeps getting better in many ways—it’s still plagued by structural problems and soulless,incoherent missions that feel far toomachine-generated to be compelling.

Frontier has achieved somethingincredible in Horizons. Being able tomove almost seamlessly from space tothe surface of these gargantuanworlds is awe-inspiring, even if thereisn’t that much to do on them yet. Inaddition to the planetary landing

stuff, your $60 buys you futurecontent including commandercustomization and multi-crew ships,

but there’s no way of knowingwhether any of this stuff will actually

be any good, so it’s something of agamble. Whether or not you havefaith in Frontier, this first installmentof Horizons will make Elite’s alreadymassive galaxy even bigger.

N E E D T O K N O W

WHAT IS IT?

The first of a series ofexpansions for Elite

Dangerous .

EXPECT TO PAY

$60

DEVELOPER

Frontier Developments

PUBLISHER

In-house

REVIEWED ON

GeForce GTX 970, IntelCore i7-950, 16GB RAM

MULTIPLAYER

Massively

LINK

www.elitedangerous.com

T O U C H D O W N How to land on a planet

1 A P P R O A C HAs you close with a

planet or moon, don’t comein too fast or too steep. Anew addition to the HUDwill tell you if you are.

2 G L I D EIf you come in at the

right angle and velocity you’ll transition into a glide.Maintain your speed andkeep your ship steady.

L A N DActivate your landing

gear, find a level piece ofterrain, then gently,carefully lower your ship tothe ground to land.

E X P L O R EAccess your vehicle

hangar and, if you have onestored there, you canlaunch a surface reconvehicle and explore.

An expensive expansion, but Horizons ’planetary landings are a fantastic

addition to Elite Dangerous .

E A R L Y A C C E S S

86 MARCH 2016

E A R L Y A C C E S S R E V I E W



Elite Dangerous: Horizon

E A R L Y A C C E S S R E V I E W

I hope you rememberedto bring a sweater.

A stranger I bumpedinto on Europa.

The SRV and spaceflightcontrols are very similar.

That crater’s thesize of Wales.

Don’t forget to requestdocking permission.



Seems to be growing well,”

I tell the malnourished

farmhands before

ripping their gourds from

the ground and stuffing

them down my trousers. Strangely,

they’re cool with this, so I try selling the

grotty vegetables back to them to see

what happens. They buy them. They

actually buy back the gourds they sawme steal. Fallout 4 ’s wasteland is my

own personal pick ‘n’ mix.

A kidnapped baby isn’t the driving

force behind my exploits in this

nuclear-ravaged world. No, my primary

motivation is building an increasingly

epic looter’s paradise loaded with disco

balls and pictures of kittens and musical

pressure pads that play La Cucaracha

badly when you walk on them. The boy

comes second after I finish my dance

floor, which is probably never, and the

whole ‘avenging my dead wife’ thing is

third, I guess.

So, pockets unfeasibly loaded withcorn and melons and something called

‘tatos’ which are a mutated tomato/

potato hybrid that sadly does not work

well in song (“You say tato, and I... also

say tato”), I travel to Sanctuary. The

quaint neighborhood I lived in before

being frozen for 200 years is still

standing, and despite peeling paint on

the houses and the cars outside them

turning to rusted husks, it’s a home I’m

committed to rebuilding. My every

second exploring the Commonwealth is

spent looking for shiny items like a

massive featherless magpie, a magpie

“The whole ‘avenging my dead wife’

thing comes third, I guess”Why I can’t stop stealing in FALLOUT 4

MY PRIMARY MOTIVATION IS

BUILDING AN INCREASINGLY EPIC

LOOTER’S PARADISE

he sun never sets on my empire,part from once every 24 hours.

with opposable thumbs who can

fashion those objects into something

cool. A magpie on a mission.

CLEAN SWEEP

A guard in Diamond City strikes up a

conversation but I ignore him and focus

on scanning the background for

umbrellas and spatulas. I walk through

majestic environments staring entirelyat the floor. I make a beeline for a broken

mop in a super-mutant’s lair because I

need its precious cloth and that futon

won’t make itself. Old newspapers and

ashtrays and duct tape and desk fans

are the new gold (the old gold, gold, is

fairly useless).

B E N G R I F F I N

THIS MONTH

Stole never more than 250lb

of rubbish.

ALSO PLAYED

Cook, Serve, Delicious!

88 MARCH 2016

E X T R A L I F ECONTINUED ADVENTURES IN GAMING



I ’m crawling up Mr Slave’s ass

and screenshotting things Ican’t legally put in this

magazine. I’m near the end

ofThe Stick of Truth after powering

through it from start to finish in one

weekend, and I’m currently battering

my way through some unspecified

white stuff with a flaming katana, while

Butters Stotch politely comments on

our very pink surroundings.

The Stick of Truth is a perfect digital

representation of the South Park

universe that hits every right note, from

the broadest strokes (ManBearPig,

Kenny dying) to the most granular

details (funny flavor text for every item,Big Gay Al calling the iPhone I just

climbed across inside this anus). The

combat, borrowed from Nintendo’s

turn-based Mario & Luigi games, is a

little too repetitive and the end boss is

rubbish, but keeping it simple allows me

to just enjoy exploring this detailed

representation of the show’s town and

the character interactions. It’s a rare

kind of licensed game—and by that, I

don’t just mean it’s a good one. It’s a

tie-in that actually stokes my

enthusiasm for the fictional world it

adapts. I can’t remember a game doing

that for me since KotOR . As such, it’s

reminded me of why I love South Park,

and caused me to check in on the TV

series for the first time in about four

years. Turns out it’s having one of its

best seasons in ages, targeting the

current cultural conversation about

political correctness, and taking shots

at all parties, as is the show’s way.

THE TRUTH

It’s easy to forget that while most

sitcoms are funny for about seven

seasons at best, South Park has been

good almost consistently for about 20

years. The game is a tribute to that.

While its jokes can be crass or

horrendously disgusting, there’s an odd

sort of warmth I get from being in that

town around those characters—it’s not

just a parade of gross jokes, it’s a fiction

with a very specific and weird sense of

humor, and The Stick of Truth

celebrates its vast iconography.

One weekend with it makes me thin

the sequel, with improved combat andmaybe some branching dialogue or

quest design, could be one of the best

RPGs of our age. They almost got there

already with The Stick of Truth .

“It’s not just a paradeof gross jokes”

My routine involves loading up with

lightbulbs and hotplates and teddy

bears until I can’t carry any more, giving

another ton of junk to my begrudging

pack mule of a companion, then

hotfooting it back to base after everymission to empty my stash. I imagine

typewriters and paintbrushes and

battered books streaming from pockets

en route like a crappy breadcrumb trail

made from sheer garbage.

I can do a lot with these materials,

though, like scandalously shredding an

American flag and using its material to

make a doormat, mounting stuffed

animal parts on the walls of my

bedroom, scrapping plungers and

pencils and using their wood to build a

fence around my most annoying settler

who keeps asking me for drugs, and

harvesting copper from telephones towire up my electricity pylons and

creating a promotional radio station

that broadcasts a humblebrag across

the Commonwealth. My ultimate aim is

collecting enough human bones to

make a pool I can swim in like a

detestable Scrooge McDuck.

My every action in Fallout 4 is taken

with homestead expansion in mind, and

as such it’s spoiled other games for me.

I don’t want to play something in which

filling my clown-car pockets with alarm

clocks and spatulas isn’t handsomely

rewarded. I’d steal you if I could.

Proudly wielding THE STICK OF TRUTH

Why won’t anyoneuse this toilet?

My one rule: to live here youmust wear silly clothes.

S A M U E L R O B E R T S

THIS MONTH

Killed Kenny nine times while

waiting for the credits to roll.

ALSO PLAYED

Ephemerid: A Musical

Adventure, Overwatch

I always try to dress mycharacters like me.

The most contrived part of the story isthis homeless guy selling goth gear.

MARCH 2016 8

THE GAMES WE LOVE RIGHT NOW

N O W P L A Y I N G



Blizzard recently added

definitive skill stats to the

Overwatch beta.

Previously, you only

knew how many kills youhad participated in—a truncation of kills

and assists that helped players focus on

how much they’d contributed, rather

than how many of ‘their’ kills had been

‘stolen’. I was worried at first that the

change would alter the tone of the

game, but it hasn’t. The number of

killing blows you land is actually the stat

that’s easiest to ignore, because it’s the

one with the fuzziest relationship with

the only end-of-game result that

matters: whether you won or not.

Competitive shooters often have a

problem with players chasing high

scores over victory, and at first I thoughtOverwatch did as well. As I’ve sunk

more time into it, however, I’ve started

to appreciate how much one player can

achieve when they don’t seek out

combat at all. This is a game about

momentum and strategy, while you’re

trying to sweep the rug out from under

an entrenched team of defenders or

making plays to sap the force from an

attacker’s onslaught.

Lucio’s my new go-to, a support

character who I’d initially written off as

drably passive. He’s a Brazilian DJ

whose music either heals or provides a

speed boost—you can switch between

the two instantly, and boost the effect

once every 12 seconds. He can skate up

walls and his burst-fire music-gun-thing

hits surprisingly hard, but while

outmaneuvering and gunning down

enemies can be fun from time to time,

the real satisfaction comes from the

sense that you’re orchestrating your

team’s attack strategy.

FAST FORWARD

As Lucio, I like to speed boost one group

of allies into and through enemy lines

before the other side can react, chipping

away at defenders from around corners

while deploying an amplified heal to

ensure whoever I’m with can take more

“Dropping Lucio’s ultimate at thispoint feels really good”Getting into the support groove in OVERWATCH

than our enemy can dish out. Do this for

long enough and you’ll naturally end up

creating space for the rest of your team

to catch up, no matter how considered

their own strategy or choice of hero.This usually results in a tense

back-and-forth around the objective, as

the defenders are able to return from

their spawn point more quickly but your

own advancing line refuses to budge.

Dropping Lucio’s ultimate at this point

feels really good: like hammering home

a point you’ve been developing for the

last couple of minutes. He leaps into the

air and slams the speaker of his

music-gun-thing into the ground,

sending out a wave of sound that grants

a substantial overshield to everybody on

your team. Suddenly, the scales tip

dramatically in your team’s direction:and either a capture point or outright

victory tend to follow.

Scoring headshots is fun (I play

enough Hanzo to say otherwise) but the

‘yeah, that was me’ feeling that follows a

successful push play as a support

trumps it every time. If there’s a

downside, it’s thatOverwatch’ s ‘play of

the game’ system is pretty bad at

recognizing things like heals or shields:

it, like bad players, tends to fixate on

damage done. At the end of the day,

that doesn’t matter. What matters is

that voice shouting “VICTORY”.

IT’S LIKE HAMMERING HOME A POINT

YOU’VE BEEN DEVELOPING FOR THE

LAST COUPLE OF MINUTES

A good defensive starting position can scoresome kills the moment the gates open.

The Hollywood map movesfrom western sets to sci-fi.

C H R I S T H U R S T E N

THIS MONTH

Danced all the way to the

capture point. Which is

considered bad manners.

ALSO PLAYED

Fallout 4

90 MARCH 2016

THE GAMES WE LOVE RIGHT NOW

N O W P L A Y I N G



Pray this never happensin real life.

Space is terrifying,and it’s everywhere.

The simulation is basedon real physics.

U niverse Sandbox 2 is a

science-based physics

playground that lets you

toy with the very fabric

of the universe like a

mad, evil deity. You can smash galaxies

together and watch them intertwine in a

beautiful cosmic ballet. You can lower

the temperature of the Earth until the

continents are lost beneath the ice, then

throw it into the sun to warm it up. Oryou can duplicate the Moon a hundred

times and watch in awe as they all

smash into each other and the fires

consume the planet.

It’s strangely cathartic, especially

combined with the gentle, ambient

piano soundtrack. Catastrophic

destruction has never been so soothing.

When you load the game, you’re

presented with a simulation of our own

solar system. The planets spin lazily

around the sun, going about their daily

routine, as they’ve done since the dawn

of time. But then you can intervene andtotally mess things up.

You can steadily increase Jupiter’s

mass until it explodes and the ensuing

release of energy and gravity sucks in

everything around it, including our sun,

to create a brand new solar system. Or

you can nudge Earth closer to the sun

than Venus until it heats up and

becomes a dry, barren desert world.And it’s all based on real astrophysics,

so you learn something in the process

about how the universe works. All it’s

missing is a Carl Sagan voiceover and a

Vangelis soundtrack.

COSMIC DAMAGE

The game comes bundled with a variety

of scenarios. Some are based on reality,

such as a simulation of Saturn’s ring

system or a star going supernova.

Others are more fantastical, like every

planet in the solar system suddenly

being catapulted into the sun or a vast,

“Catastrophic destruction has neverbeen so soothing”Smashing galaxies together in UNIVERSE SANDBOX 2

multicolored grid of glowing neutron

stars. But even at their most absurd,

these scenarios are designed to explain

to you how space works.

A toolbox of ‘powers’ lets you get

really destructive. The ‘explode’

function, as you might have guessed,

lets you click on any celestial body, blow

it up, and watch the surrounding object

get swept up in the chaos. Explode the

sun and the Earth just sort of driftsaway, sad and confused, into deep

space with all the other planets. Turns

out we’d be lost, literally, without that b

ball of nuclear energy in the sky. It’s

actually quite humbling when you

realize just how fragile our home is.

Universe Sandbox 2 is in Early

Access and is expanding constantly—

like the universe! A little cosmological

humor for you, there. There’s no real

‘game’ here to speak of, so it won’t hold

your attention for more than an hour at

a time, but it’s a fun, powerful, and

beautiful-looking tool. I find myselfloading it up when I’m swamped with

work and need a bit of a breather. It’s

like a really elaborate desk toy, or one o

those rubber stress balls. Something to

distract and soothe you. Let’s just hope

that none of this stuff happens to the

actual cosmos.

EXPLODE THE SUN AND THE EARTHJUST SORT OF DRIFTS AWAY, SADAND CONFUSED

A N D Y K E L L Y

THIS MONTH

Found causing destruction on

a galactic scale oddly relaxing.

ALSO PLAYED

Fallout 4, Endless Legend

MARCH 2016 9

E X T R A L I F

N O W P L A Y I N G I D O W N L O A D S I U P D A T E I R E I N S T A L L I W H Y I L O V



1 TRIBES

ENDLESS LEGEND

FREEWARE It’s time to dig out your trusty jetpack

MODS Free update addsSteam Workshop support

How here’s somethingspecial. Hi-RezStudios has made theentire Tribes seriesavailable for free,

including a couple of games thatdon’t even feature the word ‘tribes’in the title. There are six games thathave just had their price tags nixed by Hi-Rez: Earthsiege and its

sequel, Starsiege: Tribes and Tribes 2, plus Vengeance and a roguePlayStation 2 game named Aerial Assault. There are more tribes herethan in a Bruce Parry documentary—and if you got that referencewithout the aid of Wikipedia, feelfree to give yourself a gold star.

As many of the Tribes games are

purely multiplayer affairs, you might

have trouble finding a match by regular

means nowadays. Fortunately, there are

irregular means, including community-

run servers and fan-sites such as

tribesrevengeance.com .

Amplitude’s strategy game

Endless Legend was

given mod support

recently, so here are a

few prime picks. If you’re looking to

add to the small yet promising

selection, you can make new worlds

with ease thanks to the game’s

support for free map editor Tiled.

And speaking of, er, revengeance,

Tribes: Vengeance is the game to play if

you’d rather not bother with all that

palaver, as it remains Tribes ’ most

meaningful foray into the world of

singleplayer gaming.

Obviously multiplayer is still the

focus, but Tribes: Vengeance contained

a fully fledged campaign mode that

went beyond merely teaching players

the ropes. The piecemeal story issurprisingly intriguing, sprawling out to

incorporate five characters and two

timelines, and offering some nice

context for the galactic war.

That conflict, as ever, is fought by

jetpack-wearing warriors bounding

around enormous environments—this

is one of the most liberating FPS games

you will ever play. Which is not least

thanks to the addition of a great big

grappling hook, something that

complements the jetpack beautifully.

DOWNLOAD AT www.bit.ly/TribesUniverse

B R I T I S H I S L E SYou can now make and import maps, if you’re bored of randomly generated worlds.Obviously there’s a Game of Thrones one,but the best is this map of the UK.

www.bit.ly/EndlessMods3

P A L E T T E E X P A N S I O NGives you a wider selection of colors to pickfrom when you select a faction. Therecoloring even extends to the lovelyartwork featured on negotiations screens.


F U L L W O R L D G E N E R A T O RThis tool increases the available options forworld generation, meaning you can breakthe game in interesting ways. Why not makea map so big you can explore it forever?


2Look busy, Hi-Rez is

paying attention again.

92 MARCH 2016

T O P 1 0 D O W N L O A D S

FREE GAMES STUFF FROM THE WEB by Tom Sykes



3 DOOR KICKERS

MEETS SWAT 4

This Door Kickers modrecreates six SWAT 4 missions—taken from themain campaign and from

The Stetchkov Syndicate—andthanks to the tactically rich gameunderneath, it’s not an enormouslydifferent experience. OK, so it’s atop-down rather than first-person

game of strategic hostage rescue, but that affords a fresh perspectiveon some memorable maps. You’renot quite a pair of boots on theground here: you’re more removedfrom the action, directing your fourguys from room to room.

DOWNLOAD AT www.bit.ly/SwatKickers

BELLULARHEXATOSIS

Each room presents a block

puzzle (or block puzzles ), all

linked in the manner of a

Zelda dungeon. You’re a janitor, and to open this futuristic

facility’s various doors you push blocks,

barrels and crates onto switches, and

kick others across the room, all while

battling hazards such as giant roaches

and toxic waste. The various systems—

pushing, kicking, combat, toxic waste—

interact in a pleasingly clear and

mechanical way, and you’ll often be

given a number of methods for solvingpuzzles, some more expedient than

others. That’s something to remember

if that exponential move counter ends

up mocking you as much as it did me.

DOWNLOAD AT www.bit.ly/PuzzleDepot

PUZZLE DEPOT

1ON YOUR OWNThis is you, Todd Torial.

You’re a Box-Pusher ThirdClass, and you’re probably not

the star of the main game.

2WHAT A WASTEToxic barrels harm you if

you touch them, but they canbe kicked to limit your

interactions and health loss.

3HAZ ABOUT THATMost rooms contain

notes, computer terminals,and even chatty NPCs,

bringing the world to life.

1

3

2

MOD SWAT 4 comes to Steam... sort of

FREEWARE You want to getthat checked out

Not that there’s anything

wrong with purely

text-driven interactive

fiction, but I’m intrigued

to see Porpentine’s work heading in a

more visual direction. It’s heading

there on the back of a first-person

point-and-click adventure created inpartnership with Brenda Neotenomie

—one that resembles Myst , but with

more sentient eyeballs and strange

diseases. I’m neverentirely sure

what’s going on in a Porpentine story,

but they showcase some rare,

extravagant words, and there are

some striking images conjured by

putting them together. You’re trying

to save your giant, tubular sister from

illness here, if that helps.

DOWNLOAD AT www.bit.ly/BellularHex

5

DEMO Kick, push, it’s all in the mind

You probably shouldn’t kickdoors open in real life.

4

MARCH 2016 9

E X T R A L I F




6 THE WITCHER 3:

SCHOOL OF THE ROACH

This is a comprehensiveoverhaul that aims toalter pretty mucheverything, leaving just

the story untouched. While themod’s only in open beta at themoment, its main features are inplace, so if you feel like helping themakers test it, get downloading.

Heavy attacks and crossbows aremore worthwhile. You can only brew potions at a campfire, andchugging them in combat makes you vulnerable. There are manymore changes and together theypromise to transform the game.

DOWNLOAD AT www.bit.ly/WitcherRoach

MOD Felt Witcher 3 was too shallow? Get this mod

You are the oddly named

Half-Rats, a drunken shop

worker turned gunslinger in

a weird Wild West overrun

with foul hellbeasts. When he’s not

eliminating monsters, Mr Rats likes

nothing better than a juicy meat pasty

or a bottle of finest whiskey, items that

restore your health and armor in this

inventive mod for the originalHalf-Life .

The story takes place over a single

night: a night that begins with Mr Rats

escaping his humble shop after a

creature attack. The events that follow

aren’t dramatically exciting or inventive,

but there are a few standout moments

and enemy encounters, in a mod that

exudes a certain enthusiastic, scrappy

charm. Despite that scrappiness, it’s a

short but remarkably fully featured

campaign, boasting boss fights, a

range of environments, several NPCs,

and an ending that hints at even more

Half-Rats to come.

DOWNLOAD AT www.bit.ly/Half-Rats

8 HALF-RATS:A FEVER DREAM

MOD Hmmm, must have been rats

WHO MUST DIEFREEWARE You decide inthis dark adventure

One of the three patients

before you is infected

with... something or

other, and in a rather

miserable day at work, your task is to

shoot that infected person dead.

You’ll base your decision on the

outcome of various tests,

administered by pressing buttons

next to a mighty panel of TV screens.Those screens display looped FMV

that changes depending on the

situation, and it’s these changes you

need to note when you hit switches

to alter the music, release mood-

affecting gas, or order a heavy to test

their nature via more direct means.

If you just can’t cope with the

burden of choice, you can always

decide to off yourself instead.

Cheery, darkly intriguing stuff.

DOWNLOAD AT www.bit.ly/WhoMustDie

7

Cheer up Geralt, it mightnever happen. Oh, it did.

Yes, people are still moddingthe original Half-Life .

94 MARCH 2016

T O P 1 0 D O W N L O A D S

FREE GAMES STUFF FROM THE WEB by Tom Sykes



CARROTS AND CREAM

FREEWARE A game that will really grate on you

Written for Asylum Jam, this

is a short story about

digging up juicy carrots,

and grating those carrots

into a bowl. But it’s presented with the

sort of grainy visual filter and ominous

sound effects that you’d expect from a

horror game.

Is this an exploration of how

ordinary things can be made to appear

evil given the right context? Or is it a

propaganda piece for the Anti-Carrot

League? It’s almost certainly the

former, but I’m not sure I’ll ever look at

carrots in quite the same way again. At

a certain point the perspective

changes, and that horror element

becomes more overt.

DOWNLOAD AT www.bit.ly/CarrotsAndCream

9 FALLOUT 4 MODSMODS The first wave of essential wasteland tweaks

While Bethesda’s latestopen-world RPGhasn’t yet been givenofficial modding tools,that obviously hasn’t

stopped the usual suspects fromspelunking into the code andmaking changes where they can.

Many of the more egregious

bugbears have already been done away

with (leaving you to wonder what they

were doing there in the first place), while

the world’s top modders are doubtless

feverishly working on nudey mods as I

type this. If you’re enjoying the game as

it is, it might be best to wait until the

so-called Garden of Eden Creation Kit

arrives in early 2016, but there’s no

harm in making a few small quality-of-

life tweaks in the meantime.

As with all Bethesda moddingendeavors, if you’re looking to install

multiple mods, it’s worth grabbing the

Mod Manager for Fallout 4 , which lets

you safely add and revert mods with

little hassle. The following three should

be your top priority: a trio of small but

life-saving tweaks that make the

Commonwealth a much easier place to

manage, explore and rebuild.

10

Where to begin?

A BETTER WORLDBuild something beautiful

3 C R A F T A B L E A M M U N I T I O NYou can craft guns, so why can’t you do thesame with ammo? Now you can scavengebins for ammo parts.

www.bit.ly/FalloutMods3

2 H I G H E R S E T T L E M E N T B U D G E TYou can only build your settlements up somuch in the base game: this mod removesthose annoying restrictions.


1 F U L L D I A L O G U E I N T E R F A C EThe conversation options only offer the gistof what you’re going to utter. This modreveals what you’re actually about to say.


MARCH 2016 9

E X T R A L I F




Ihadn’t played The Old Republic in over two years. Like mostpeople, I took a

character to the endof their story and stopped. Sincethen, especially since the gamewent free to play, I’d assumed EAhad decided to let its flawed MMOquietly die. I couldn’t have beenmore wrong. While there’s been asteady drip of updates for years, Knights of the Fallen Empire represents a massive expansion fora game many thought extinct.

Fallen Empire is set five years afterour last visit to the TOR universe.

The war between the Empire and theRepublic has weakened both partiesto such a degree that a third party,the Eternal Empire, has managed todefeat both and seize control. Thus,while the original game featureddifferent stories for each characterclass, the new expansion positionseveryone, regardless of affiliation, asthe leader of a fragile alliance of oldfoes against the new threat.

BioWare uses what could have been a limitation as an excuse tointroduce a degree of nuance andmoral complexity that the Star Wars

universe hasn’t seen since, well, KotOR 2. TOR always dabbled inshades of gray, a necessary part ofletting us play as the baddies, but

Fallen Empire takes this to extremes by showing us Empire and Republicfighting side by side. There’s even thepossibility of a Sith/Jedi romance.

The enemy too is humanized. Anenormous amount of time is spent onfleshing out their society. Two of yournew companions are former Eternal

Empire officers, and they’re stillproud of their nation in a way. Evenone of the most OTT villains theseries has ever seen gets a surprisingdegree of character development.

Roughly half the story is availableright away, the rest to be doled out ona monthly basis over the course of2016. It’s only available to subscribers,making this a transparent attempt tohook players for longer, but it’s hardto suppress the urge to see how thetale eventually ends.

SOLO

At release, TOR awkwardly straddledthe line between BioWare RPG andtraditional WoW -style MMO. Thenew expansion dives right off thatline and into story-driven goodness.It is at times an almost comicallysingleplayer experience. Its heavy useof instances and more linear areasmeant that I outright forgot I wasplaying an MMO, at least untilsomeone called ‘BootyFett69’ coastedpast on a speeder.

This solo-friendly attitude isn’trestricted to the expansion, either.

The original singleplayer stories have been aggressively streamlined,removing the grind and enablingplayers to keep pace with the levelingcurve by only playing the importantstory missions. The ‘flashpoints’ (fourplayer co-op missions) that wereimportant to the main story have alsohad a singleplayer mode added,although doing so means missing outon TOR’s delightful co-opconversations. TOR always had somespectacular writing and thanks tothese changes it’s now more

accessible than ever.

All companions can now behealer, tank or DPS, ensuring they’realways useful, while a new outfitcustomization system lets you wear

whatever you want regardless ofstats. At every point BioWare hastried to get its uninspiring MMOsystems out of the way, and letplayers focus on the fantasy ofstarring in their own Star Wars story.

There’s a ‘but’ coming, and it’s a big one. All the pseudo-singleplayertrappings in the world can’t mask the

fact that TOR’s combat is stillold-fashioned MMO fare. The basichotbar combat was dated even whenthe game first came out; in a postGuild Wars 2 world it feels ancient.The whole system relies far too muchon number crunching and optimizedskill rotations, a surefire turn-off forthose coming to the game from a loveof Mass Effect or Dragon Age.

BioWare’s solution is a drastic one.The difficulty has been reduced to analmost absurd degree. Most combatencounters are astonishingly easy, asenemies simply can’t hurt you as fastas your companions can heal. It’s

jarring when even the much fearedevil Emperor hits like a weak kitten.It’s an ugly, heavy handed solution tothe game’s combat problem, but it’shard to see an alternative.

Knights doesn’t quite workproperly, TOR never has, but it’sworth putting up with the poor

combat for the great writing.

TOR ALWAYS HADSPECTACULAR

WRITING, AND NOW IT’SMORE ACCESSIBLETHAN EVER

BioWare does its best to convince us its MMO is a singleplayer game. By Tom Hatfield

N E E D T O K N O W

RELEASE

October 2015

PUBLISHER

EA

DEVELOPER

BioWare

LINK

www.swtor.com

THE OLD REPUBLIC:KNIGHTS OF THE FALLEN EMPIRE

96 MARCH 2016

WHAT’S NEW IN THE BIGGEST GAMES

UPDAT E



A N A T O M Y O FA N A L L I A N C E

Old enemies must come together

Koth and Senya areEternal Empire

defectors.

Affable SithLana Beniko,aka ‘DarthReasonable’.

Republicspymaster Theron

Shan runs your base.

HK-55 is just in it forthe murder.

MARCH 2016 9

E X T R A L I F


What’s cooler than a coolship? A cool capital ship!

Senya is a Knight of Zakuul,a neutral Force user.

Jedi, Sith, two defectors and amurderbot. Just one big happy family.



“A shooter so minimal there isn’teven a grenade button”

98 MARCH 2016

OLD GAMES, NEW PERSPECTIVES

RE I NS TA L L



A bout 14 million peoplelive in Shanghai, and by the end of Kane & Lynch 2 I felt like I’dkilled most of them.

The crowded, neon-lit streets of theworld’s largest city become soakedin blood as murderous psychopath

Lynch drags his reluctant partnerKane through endless waves ofgun-toting gangsters, corrupt cops,and the Chinese military.

The game was released in 2010 tomostly negative reviews, but hassince developed something of a cultfollowing. After a year of complexopen-world blockbusters, I thought itwould be interesting to revisit ashooter so lean it’s positively starving.

This is a game with one word inits vocabulary: kill. It’s a single-

minded, uncompromisingly violent

third-person shooter that’s sominimal, there isn’t even a grenade

button. You can shoot, reload, usecover, and that’s it. There’s a story,sort of, but it doesn’t really matter.The thin narrative is little more thana means of getting the duo from oneplace to another, and the majority of

the dialogue is Lynch shouting variations of “Fuck!” as he wades into yet another hail of gunfire.

But while Kane & Lynch 2 is aboutas low concept as shooters get, the artdirection is anything but. A dirty,distorted VHS effect degrades the

visuals, with compression artifacts to

N E E D T O K N O W

RELEASED

August 2010

PUBLISHER

Square Enix

DEVELOPER

IO Interactive

LINK

www.kaneandlynch.com

KANE & LYNCH 2:

DOG DAYSRevisiting IO’s minimalist, ultraviolent shooter. By Andy Kelly

suggest you’re watching the action o YouTube. The camera shakes andwobbles as if someone’s filming youwith a handheld camera, and gore ispixelated. These effects combine togive the game a rough, documentaryfeel, which makes everything seemgrittier and more brutal. When you

shoot someone in the head and seepixels rather than blood, it somehowfeels more savage. More real.

SHORT CUTS

It’s a gimmick, but an effective one.The sickly glow of neon signs, thetrash-strewn streets and dark, dingyalleyways make for an almosttangibly grim setting when viewedthrough this glitchy, grainy lens. Youmove from wide, busy thoroughfaresthrough apartment blocks, into illegasweatshops, and up to rain-soakedrooftops. The pacing is frenetic and

the scenery constantly changesaround you, which may explain thegame’s short length. It’s five hourslong, and that’s enough. Any moreand you’d collapse from exhaustion.

For a game entirely about shootinpeople, the combat is maddeninglyimprecise. Submachine guns spraywildly with exaggerated kickback.Shotgun blasts only seem to makecontact half the time. And you canempty an entire assault riflemagazine and your target will still bestanding. The sloppy, unpredictable

firefights add to the game’s sense of

MARCH 2016 9

E X T R A L I F


Moments of calm are rare.The action is almost non-stop.



messy ultraviolence—Kane andLynch are criminals, not trained

soldiers—but it also makes it a prettyunsatisfying shooter. When you runout of bullets you toss your gun awayand pick up another from among themass of bodies at your feet, althoughan automatic shotgun is about asexotic as your arsenal ever gets.

But here’s the thing. As simplisticand one-note as Kane & Lynch 2 is,it’s strangely compelling. The leveldesign, combat, story, and prettymuch everything except the settingand visuals are unremarkable. But in

the thick of a firefight, with thecamera shaking and your guns

blazing, you get caught up in themoment. Your senses areoverwhelmed and you forget you’replaying a completely rote third-person shooter. It’s all smoke andmirrors. The equivalent of aphotographer waving a stuffed toyaround to get a distracted baby tolook at his camera. But it works.

There are no real set-pieces tospeak of. The game is, somewhatadmirably, light on Call of Duty-stylenonsense. But there are a few

brilliant moments. After beingkidnapped and tortured, the duo are

forced to escape their captors whilenaked and covered in blood. It’sgruesomely hilarious: the stuff of aparticularly exploitative ’80s

video-nasty. You spend the wholelevel staring at their blood-soakedarses as they sneak past guards in thepounding rain—although their junkis, mercifully, pixelated.

IO’s environment design hasalways been incredible, and Kane &

Lynch 2 is no different. There’s anearly sequence where you bargethrough an apartment complex,

bursting into people’s homes as you

pursue a fleeing gangster. You getsnippets of the inhabitants’ lives—afamily eating dinner at a dining table,a junkie slumped in front of a TV—and it makes for a convincingly real,lived-in world. The visuals have aged

badly on a technical level, but the vaseline smear of the VHS post-processing and camera shake hide itwell. Proof that strong art directioncan make a game timeless.

There are moments when youemerge from the dark alleys of thecity into busy streets teeming with

traffic and people. Flanked by giant

It’s an uneasypartnership.

These street shootoutsare the best in the game.

S H A N G H A I N I G H T S Other games set in the world’s biggest city

B A T T L E F I E L D 4A multiplayer map, Siegeof Shanghai, features acollapsing skyscraper. Youalso visit the city in anearly mission in thesingleplayer campaign.

D E U S E X : H U M A NR E V O L U T I O NAdam Jensen visitsHengsha, an island off thecoast of Shanghai, inEidos Montreal’scyberpunk RPG.

S P L I N T E R C E L L :D O U B L E A G E N TThis sequel was actuallydeveloped in Shanghai. Amemorable level featuresthe Jin Mao Tower, afamous landmark.

A R M Y O F T W O :T H E 4 0 T H D A Y Released, coincidentally,in the same year as K&L2 ,this co-op action gamewas set in Shanghaiduring a terrorist attack.

100 MARCH 2016

OLD GAMES, NEW PERSPECTIVES

RE I NS TA L L

As naked as the day he wasborn, but with a gun.



neon signs, civilians are caught in thecrossfire as you exchange bullets withcops and gangsters. This collateraldamage is shrugged off, which is

bleak, but fits the dark, ruthless moodof the game. The only glimmers ofhumanity are Lynch’s concern for alargely unseen girlfriend and Kanetalking about his daughter—whoserescue was part of the first game. But

it’s only touched upon, and there’s nocharacter development whatsoever.

BLEED OUT

Then the gruesome twosomefoolishly leave Shanghai behind andfind themselves fighting throughdreary warehouses and gray train

yards. It’s a jarring change of sceneryand marks the point where the gameloses all its momentum. Without the

bustling neon haze of the city to flood your senses, you become increasinglyaware of how little the game has to

offer. The smoke clears and the

mirrors shatter. Your eyes glaze overas you murder endless waves of riot

cops and plead for it to end. It does,eventually, and you’re left with anempty, hollow feeling.

You wonder what all that deathand destruction really achieved. Kaneand Lynch successfully escape thepeople who, perhaps rightfully,wanted them dead, and live to fightanother day. But is that a good thing?It’s not like you’re rooting for them,

because they’re unsympathetic,one-dimensional killers. Your desireto keep them alive is so you can finishthe game, not because you’ll be sad ifthey die. In this respect, Kane &

Lynch 2 is a deeply cynical,misanthropic game with absolutelyno heart. And I think that’s the point.It’s a brazen, ghoulish murder-fest, astwisted and amoral as its heroes, andhas no pretensions otherwise. And

you’re a voyeur, watching theirwanton barbarism on YouTube,unable to turn away, complicit.

Kane & Lynch 2 is, fundamentally,a bad game. It’s clunky, simplistic,and unimaginative. But I love it

because of its distinctive, powerful artdesign and its utterly unapologetic

nature. It’s not trying to tell a story or

IT’S A DEEPLY CYNICAL,

MISANTHROPIC GAME WITHABSOLUTELY NO HEART

develop its characters. The onlymessage you’ll get from it is kill. It’s a

grotty snuff film found on anunmarked, worn-out VHS tape. Agrotesque celebration of violencestarring a pair of morally barrencriminals. Those first few hours,when the streets of Shanghai eruptwith gunfire, are exhilarating, butalso troublingly intense. As youunload a shotgun into a police officerand pixels obscure the ensuing mess

you feel bad for enjoying it. But youdo. You monster.

An ambush on a freeway isan early highlight.

MARCH 2016 10

E X T R A L I F


UNINSTALLPhil prefers a lynching

“Kane & Lynch 2 is a gameabout firing a gun for fivehours. You’d find more varietyin the blandest level ofthe worst Call of Duty .The inept cameramanfollowing Prick andBigger Prick shouldhave put a bullet intheir heads andsaved us all thetrouble. In the binwith it.”



JUST CAUSE 2’S AIR

PROPULSION GUN

LEFT: This is probablythe only time you’regoing to see a Just

Cause article thatdoesn’t contain ascreenshot of anexplosion. Enjoy.

Why Rico’s best weaponshould have come toJust Cause 3 . By Phil Savage

102 MARCH 2016

WHAT MAKES GAMES SPECIAL

W H Y I L O V E



I was disappointedwith Just Cause 3 formany of the samereasons that Andyoutlined in last issue’s

67% review. It’s an incrediblyrepetitive, grindy experience thatturns chaotic action into a chore.Overthrowing evil dictators shouldonly feel like a job if it’s your actual job. But worse than the failings ofJC3’s progression systems is howunimaginative its tools are.

There are a few exceptions. Thewingsuit, which is brilliant. Thetethers, which are ridiculous. Theopportunity to upgrade your infiniteC4 into a rocket-powered physics toy,which is an idea of unparalleledgenius. Elsewhere, though, it’s all

pretty standard. In the context of anabsurd action sandbox, the game’smany assault rifles are painfully dull.

Fortunately, I don’t think JC3 is beyond saving. All you need to do islook at its predecessor. Much like itssequel, Just Cause 2 is surprisinglyshort on ways to push against theouter limits of creativity. Its tools areeven more restrictive. You have asingle, weak tether, and a finiteamount of regular, non-rocket-powered C4. It’s more suited toimprovisational violence, but you

have only a limited set of optionswith which to create it. Two thingsexpand that sandbox: mods and DLC.

It feels strange to praise JustCause 2’s DLC, because much of itisn’t noteworthy. Rather than largecontent packs, all of the game’soptional extras are small, seeminglyinsignificant microtransactions.Much of them are pure filler, but onesmall addition—available as part of

the preposterously named Black Market Boom Pack—changed how Iinteracted with that world.

It’s called the Air Propulsion Gun,and, as the name suggest, it shoots airinstead of bullets. It’s a high-poweredshort-range burst of force that resultsin some of the best physics-basedmayhem since Half-Life 2’s GravityGun. It’s not quite on a par—Rico stilldoesn’t have much small-scale agency

beyond making things explode—butsending a soldier spiraling into the airwith a propulsion blast is funny in away that doesn’t get old.

GRAPPLE UP

The problem with guns andexplosions is they remove thingsfrom play. An enemy helicopter is aninteresting problem to tackle, but

shooting it down simply takes it outof the equation. That’s why the moreinteresting option is to grapple upand hijack it. The problem has beenflipped into a solution, thus forcingthe enemy to respond.

That’s also the genius of the airpropulsion gun. It doesn’t removethings outright. A soldier is sentflying backwards, but the impactwon’t necessarily kill him. A vehiclecan be flung into a group of soldiers,possibly exploding, but maybe not.It’s a weapon in form and function,

but one that doesn’t do directdamage. By shifting the kill to themoment of impact, you’re no longerinstantly removing the threat. Even if

your enemy only exists for a fewextra seconds, those lengthenedinteractions feel more dynamic,surprising and enjoyable.

It’s even better when combinedwith the community’s BOLOPatchtrainer—a tool offering invincibility,and infinite ammo and unbreakabletethers. Avalanche has never quiteperfected the balance of the JustCause series, and so I’ve always found

it better to forego the difficulty forpure, unrestrained action. Military

bases are cleared through a constantstream of powerful propulsion. Tens

of soldiers dance and flip helplesslythrough the air in a mass juggling acperformed by a petty, unkillable god.It’s one of the silliest power fantasies

you can play.I’d hoped Just Cause 3 would

build on this amazing DLC gun. Somuch effort has gone into improvingits physics and effects but there’sprecious little that makes use of suchenhancements. Like Just Cause 2, themajority of JC3’s weapons aredesigned simply to remove aspects oplay. I find it really frustrating thatthe game can be so creative in someaspects, and so tediously restrained iso many others.

My hope is, just like with JC2, Avalanche is saving its best tools forDLC. If that’s the case, it’s a shitty

business model, but I’d still happily

pay a few extra pounds for weaponsthat manipulated the world in moreinteresting ways. Just Cause 3 fallsshort of its reputation as a cartoonishaction playground. With some moreimaginative weapons, it would beinstantly, immeasurably more fun.

N E E D T O K N O W

RELEASEDMarch 2012

OUR REVIEW

88%

EXPECT TO PAY

$15

LINK

www.justcause.com

G U N S O F F U NThe best bulletless weapons

RIGHT: The airpropulsion gun isineffective againstbig objects, butultra effectiveagainst smallerones. Like people.

G R A V I T Y G U NHalf-Life 2 ’s iconic weapon lets

you solve puzzles and lob atoilet at some guy.

D U B S T E P G U NSaints Row IV is the master ofsilly, as shown by its dubstep

dance of death.

M E D I G U NIs it still altruistic if the purposeof your healing ray is to help

others to kill more?

S H A R K - O - M A T I CThis, from Saints Row: The

Third , made sharks erupt outthrough the pavement. Yup.

MARCH 2016 10

E X T R A L I F




By Dave James

GROUP TEST

U P G R A D E

Pick the perfect pixel-pusher for your PC

MID-RANGEGRAPHICS CARDS

104 MARCH 2016



The graphics card isthe hero componentof your gaming PC.

Above all else this isthe part that makes

your games look awesome. Or, onthe flip side, this the componentthat needs replacing when younotice stuttering performance in

the latest games.

While we’d all like to have agraphics card with X-factor, thereality is that most of us will never

be able to afford a Titan X or FuryX. Don’t let it get you down: thecards at the mid-range of themarket are stupendously powerfulthese days, as the selection on thenext few pages will attest. The

question is: which one is the best?

Q&ANvidia or AMD?At the top of the marketNvidia has pretty muchgot it all its own way: theGTX Titan X and GTX 980

Ti rule the roost. Butdown in the mid-rangethings aren’t as cut anddried, and each cardmust be judged on itsown merits.

In terms ofperformance-per-watt,Nvidia’s Maxwellarchitecture is supremeefficient. AMD’s coolinghas to work harder.

What aboutperformance in-game?While Nvidia has made anew generation of GPUsAMD has largely stuck

with its last-gen tech butshifted it into lower priceranges. That means thebest mid-range card fromAMD is based on its toparchitecture of last yearIn gaming performanceAMD cards represent thbest value right now.

How much videomemory do I need?Up until last year I wouldhave scoffed at the ideaof cards outside thetop-tier sporting 8GB, orlower-end options with

4GB. But things havechanged. Lower-endcards are far morecapable and moderngame engines far moredemanding—especially video memory. Withhigh-res texturesbecoming the norm, alarger array of videomemory can delivermuch smootherperformance. These day4GB is arguably theminimum you need.

DictionaryGPU—The GraphicsProcessing Unit does allthe intensive graphicswork, processing many jobs in parallel.

Video memory —ThisRAM on your graphicscard stores the graphicadata—such as texturesand polygons—requiredto draw each frame. If itoverflows (eg, due tooutsize textures), theGPU has to use ordinary

slower, PC memory.

MARCH 2016 10

Group Tes

HARDWAR



Group

Te

It’s based upon one of AMD’s top two cards of the

last generation, the R9 290. With the release of the

Fury cards, the R9 390 and 390X have been

relegated to second-tier options, but that means at

this level of the market you’re getting almost

top-end tech for a great price.

Across my gaming benchmarks the R9 390 was

batting around a 60fps average at 2560 x 1440 withall the graphics option bells and whistles turned

on—and absolutely knocking it out of the park at

1080p. There was a weird aberration while testing

with AMD’s latest Crimson drivers, however,

causing stuttering in Grand Theft Auto V .

AMD contends its R9 380X and 380 are the

1440p cards, but the R9 390 and its 8GB video

memory is where it gets serious. And even though

its Grenada Pro GPU (née Tahiti Pro) draws a fair

amount of power at peak performance the Sapphire

cooling keeps it chilled out and

impressively quiet. At this price AMD

has got it sewn up with the R9 390.

1 2

SAPPHIRE RADEON R9 390

NITRO www.sapphiretech.com $345

If you’re after a powerful graphics card for your

small form-factor gaming PC then you’re going to

have to spend through the nose to better the

diminutive GTX 970 DirectCU Mini from Asus.

AMD’s Radeon Fury Nano is about the same size

and does perform better in-game, but it’s also twice

the price while most definitely not twice as powerful.

When you compare the Mini with the R9 390we’ve just looked at, you can see that you’re paying

a premium for that impressively small but effective

cooling array, and for the engineering effort that has

gone into squeezing Nvidia’s traditionally full-scale

GTX 970 down into this compact form factor. Thus

it’s a similar price, while it lags behind the AMD card

a little in performance. Not by so much that you’d

lose sleep, but if you have the space in your PC you

should go with the Radeon option.

That R9, however, won’t fit into most small-size

cases because of its length, which makes

this card a fantastic option for the

smaller build.

ASUS GTX 970 DIRECTCU MINI

www.asus.com$345

You know you’ve got a serious graphics card the moment you

take Sapphire’s R9 390 Nitro out of its box. Plugging in this

beast merely confirms it. This is one beefy card, with three fans

atop a heavy, copper and aluminium cooling array.

You’d be forgiven for thinking this card from Asus would be

half the gaming beast the Sapphire R9 390 is, given the

disparity in size between the two. But it turns out this GTX 970

punches well above its weight.

90% 87%

1



Group Tes

H A R D W A R

3 4Continuing AMD’s recent habit of rebranding its

entire graphics stack—it only actually created one

new GPU this year, the Fiji—the R9 380X is

effectively the unreleased R9 285X. But that’s no

bad thing. I was disappointed that it never appeared,

having heard teasers of its existence from AMD

board partners a year back, but as it’s here now and

sports AMD’s latest spin of its Graphics Core Next(GCN) architecture I’ll forgive them.

It’s still a hefty step down in performance from

the top two GPUs in this month’s test, however,

while the step down in price isn’t enough. AMD

points to this and the R9 380 as its 1440p cards,

but you’ll have to sacrifice a lot of settings if you

want to get up to the 60fps mark. At 1080p this

relatively-pricey card absolutely flies, especially with

that chunky 4GB of memory giving it clear air over

the competing Nvidia GTX 960.

But it’s not hugely faster than the R9

380. It’s a little cooler and stays pretty

quiet, but the price is an issue.

XFX RADEON R9 380X BLACK

www.xfxorce.com$290

Because the 380 Nitro’s Antigua Pro GPU is based

on the old R9 285’s Tonga Pro silicon, it’s sporting

the latest word in Graphics Core Next tech, but

without a huge number of GPU cores or the R9

390’s vast 8GB video memory it finds itself a long

way off the pace. It doesn’t fall far short of the

recently-released 380X, to be fair, and is available

for a lot less than the younger card.Having two fans instead of the 390’s three,

Sapphire’s Nitro cooling does struggle a little with

the amount of heat the Antigua Pro GPU generates

While the XFX edition 380X only ever gets up to

69°C the Nitro 380 goes all the way up to a toasty

77°C. That doesn’t affect its performance, but

would have me concerned if I was thinking about

putting it into a cramped case with limited airflow.

If the price gap between the standard 380 and

the R9 380X was smaller, it would have been almos

impossible to recommend this card. As it

is, the Sapphire makes a decent case

as a budget option.

SAPPHIRE RADEON R9 380

NITRO www.sapphiretech.com$230

The R9 380X is the most modern card in this test, despite the

fact that the Antigua XT GPU at its heart was almost released

as the Tonga XT GPU around a year back. But is this a case of

better late than never?

The R9 380 Nitro looks for all the world like a literally

cut-down version of the other Sapphire card: similar cooling

design on a slightly shorter circuit board. The performance,

however, is far more truncated.

80% 79%

3

2

4



ASUS GTX 960 STRIX

www.asus.com$199

MSI GTX 950 GAMING 2G

www.msi.com$160

65There’s a significant price difference between theGTX 950 and its older GTX 960 sibling, both in realterms and psychologically. By ducking well underthe $200 mark it’s really pushing into properaffordable territory and represents the first rung onthe PC gaming ladder for proper next-gen gamingperformance at 1080p.

Topping 50fps in Battlefield 4 and 44fps in GTA

V at top settings, with 4x antialiasing and all thepost-processing effects you could want, this cardcan give you a genuinely great 1080p gaming PC foran impressive price. That was what its GTX 750 Tiforebear—the very first Maxwell card from Nvidia—promised, and the GTX 950 carries that torchonward comfortably.

It’s a shame it can’t be purely bus-powered likeits progenitor, but it still demands only a little juice,making it a quality drop-in upgrade card. The nextcard down the ladder is missing nearlytwo rungs in terms of performance;this one is a fantastic entry point.

Before the death of Catalyst drivers there wasn’t toomuch of a difference between this card and its R9380 compatriot. It mostly came down to thesoftware offerings, and Nvidia’s GeForceExperience could have tipped the scales for me. Butthe 960 is now falling further behind thanks to theslight performance boost that Crimson software

has granted AMD’s cards.Nvidia has no option to squeeze anything else

out of the GTX 960: the card is already performingas well as it can. And sadly it’s seriously limited byits memory system; with just 2GB of video memoryrunning across a miserly 128-bit bus there’s littlehope of it competing with the bigger boys above the1080p mark. In this day and age 2GB simply isn’tenough—at 1080p games like GTA V and Shadow of

Mordor are going to quickly fill it to bursting.Nvidia needs to put this card out to pasture, no

matter how effective its almost silentSTRIX cooling array is. The game is upfor the GTX 960—what’s next Nvidia?

While we’re waiting for Nvidia to release its new range of

graphics cards later this year, the GTX 950 remains the green

team’s latest device. And, while it’s a budget offering, it’s

nevertheless a worthy one.

Time has not been kind to the GTX 960. Where once it was a

decent mid-range option, it’s been superseded by AMD

competitors gaining a heavy performance lead thanks to their

new Crimson software.

71% 85%

108 MARCH 2016

5



GIGABYTE R7 370 WINDFORCE

www.gigabyte.com$130

7The first clue is in the name. AMD uses the R7nomenclature to denote a step down from itsproper R9 gaming cards. As a discrete GPU it’sobviously still designed to offer some gamingperformance, but it lacks the necessary pixel-pushing chops to compete with the rest of the cardsin this month’s test.

Look at the benchmarks and a significantperformance chasm has opened up between the R7370 and the speedier GTX 950, although not inpricing. One thing to be aware of, though: there is a4GB version of the 370 available for another $30,and that pushes it mighty close to the Nvidia card inboth price and performance. (The GTX 950remains a little pacier by my reckoning.)

When it comes to this more budget-oriented endof the market, where it’s all about optimizing yourin-game settings, Nvidia’s GFE still has the edge inmy recommendations. AMD’s competingGaming Evolved app is a horrible thingand best left uninstalled.

You’ll find AMD’s R7 370 in a host of budget gaming PC

builds, but beware the false economy: while the R7 370 can

deliver entry-level gaming performance you can get a lot more

power by spending just a little more money.

67%

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

AMDAntigua Pro

AMDAntigua XT

Nvidia GM204

AMDGrenada Pro

AMDTrinidad Pro

Nvidia GM206

Nvidia GM206

GPU

1,792

2,048

1,664

2,560

1,024

768

1,024

Cores

1010MHz

1030MHz

1088MHz

1040MHz

1015MHz

1127MHz

1253MHz

Clockspeed

4GBGDDR5

4GBGDDR5

4GBGDDR5

8GBGDDR5

2GBGDDR5

2GBGDDR5

2GBGDDR5

Memory

ESSENTIALS

256-bit

256-bit

256-bit

512-bit

256-bit

128-bit

128-bit

Memory bus

190

190

145

275

110W

90W

120

TD

STACKED UP

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

Asus GTX 970 DirectCU Mini

Sapphire R9 390 Nitro

Sapphire R9 380 Nitro

XFX R9 380X Black

MSI GTX 950 Gaming 2G

Asus GTX 960 STRIX

Gigabyte R7 370 Windforce

PRICE ($) BATTLEFIELD 4 @ 2560x1440

Minimum fps

Average fps

GTA V @ 1920x1080

Minimum fps

Average fps

34

61

7

37

2

34

49

75

22

31

290

40

52

21

21

230

39

50

20

17

199

37

49

23

9

160

33

44

17

10

130

22

29

10

13

MARCH 2016 10

Group Tes

H A R D W A R

7

6



B U D G

M I D - R A N

A D V A N D

Budget buildPC gaming is for everyone. Pick the parts you want to

build a new, well-rounded PC for a good price.

Mid-range buildYou want to run every new game at 1080p 60fps. This

recommended build will see you through.

Advanced buildYou’re looking for the best PC on the market and

superior components. But you still want to spend smart.

Build the best PC for your budget

Y O U R N E X T P C

BUYER’S GUIDE

KEY

110 MARCH 2016



T O T A L

$ 9 3 8

BUDGET

BUILDEnjoy 1080p gaming without

breaking the bank

Pentium Anniversary G3258Intel $70

Ludicrously cheap and overclockable, thedual-core G3258 rivals far more expensiveprocessors in gaming performance.

H81M-P33MSI $46

A bargain-priced microATX board that pairsnicely with the Pentium G3258, letting youoverclock into 4GHz+ territory.

Hyper 212 EVOCooler Master

$35

A legendary cooler, still the best for its veryreasonable price. Overclock to your heart’s

content with this.

Crucial Ballistix Sport1600MHz (8GB)Crucial

$51

Cheap, low-profile, and reliable. Does its jobThe best 8GB you’ll find.

EVGA 500W 80PLUS CertifiedATX12V/EPS12VEVGA

$45

A reliable PSU with enough juice to run yourCPU and a reasonably power-hungry GPU.

BX100 250GBCrucial

$85

Thinking about skimping and goingHDD-only? Don’t. The BX100 is much fasterand a fantastic performer for the price.

Carbide 200RCorsair

$70

The 200R gets the job done with toollesstrays and plenty of space. ATX-sized, so youcan upgrade that microATX board later.

VX2263SMHLViewsonic

$130

An affordable 1080p monitor with vibrantIPS image quality and low response times. Areal bargain.

CM Storm QuickFire RapidCoolermaster

$80

A no-frills mechanical keyboard with astandard layout and Cherry switches. Werecommend Browns or Reds for gaming.

HyperX CloudKingston

$80

Our favorite gaming headset, and it happento be as cheap as plenty of inferior cans. Agood buy for any gaming rig.

AMD R9 380 2GBSapphire

$200

AMD’s R9 380 is a refreshed R9 285, but itstill packs enough power to handle 1080pgaming at a decent price.

G303 Daedalus ApexLogitech

$46

The best gaming mouse sensor in existencepaired with buttons with extremely low clickdistance. Especially ideal for MOBA players

MARCH 2016 1

Buyer’s Guid

HARDWAR

M O T H E R B O A R D

P R O C E S S O

R

G R A P H I C S C A R D

C O O L E R

M E M O R Y

P O W E R S U P P L Y

S S D

C A S E

D I S P L A Y

K E Y B O A

R D

M O U S E

H E A D S E T



MID-RANGE

BUILDOur recommended build for

playing the latest games

T O T A L

$ 1 6 0 4

Hyper 212 EVOCooler Master $35

If it ain’t broke... the Hyper 212 EVO is a greatcooler for the price. Save a bit of money in

your mid-range build.

GTX 970 Gaming 4GMSI $335

Offers the best price/performance ratioright now, and MSI’s model is cheap andoverclockable, with a quiet cooler.

850 EVO 250GBSamsung $98

Samsung retains its top spot on the SSD pilewith the fantastically priced, very speedy850 EVO. Still the best price/performance.

CX600MCorsair$65

80Plus Bronze efficient, with enough powerfor a good gaming PC. Modular design is agreat perk that cuts down on cable tangles.

Deathadder 2013Razer $58

There’s not a huge range of price differenceson the best mice, so stick with the best for your mid-range build too.

HyperX CloudKingston

$80

Even for our medium build, we stillrecommend this decently-priced headset.There’s nothing better for the money.

G257HUAcer $280

A step up from 1080p to 1440p territory,with a vibrant IPS display and good responsetimes at a strong price.

S340NZXT $75

The stylish S340 has some nice touches,such as removable dust filters and space forhuge liquid cooling radiators.

K70 VengeanceCorsair$110

A great, full-size mechanical keyboard withan ergonomic wrist rest. We recommendCherry Brown or Red switches for gaming.

Z170 Pro GamingAsus $160

The latest revision of our favorite gamingmotherboard, with an M.2 PCIe x4 slot, Intelnetwork port, USB 3.1 and SLI support.

i5-6600KIntel $243

Intel’s new Skylake processor is nearly asfast as an i7 for gaming. Comes with someimportant memory/storage speed boosts.

Vengeance LPX (8GB)Corsair$65

8GB of reasonably fast DDR4, and one of thecheapest deals you’ll find. Corsair is reliable,and the RAM’s overclockable to boot.

112 MARCH 2016

Buyer’s Guide

HARDWARE


P R O C E S S O

R


C O O L E R

M E M O R Y


S S D

C A S E

D I S P L A Y

K E Y B O A

R D

M O U S E

H E A D S E T



ADVANCED

BUILDGo above and beyond with a PCpowerful enough to end worlds

T O T A L

$ 3 0 4 4

GTX 980 Gaming 4GMSI

$520

Right now the GTX 980 is the best valuesingle-GPU card for ultra 1080p and 1440pgaming, bar none.

Hydro H110i GT 280mmCorsair

$120

Quiet, cool and capable of providing even thmost aggressive overclocker with more tha

enough headroom to hit that 5GHz mark.

H WirelessSteelSeries $273

Our favorite wireless gaming headset, withgreat sound quality and a convenient batterswapping system for long gaming sessions.

Deathadder 2013Razer $58

Even if you’ve got money to burn, theDeathadder really is the best mouse you cabuy right now.

Predator XB270HAbprz144Hz G-SyncAcer $800

Simply the best: a 27” 1440p 144Hz IPSdisplay, with Nvidia’s variable refresh tech.

Supernova 850W G2 80 Plus GoldEVGA $145

A reliable, quiet, gold-rated EVGA powersupply, modular, with enough juice to sustatwo overclocked graphics cards and a CPU.

850 EVO 500GBSamsung $162

The 850 EVO is so good, there’s not muchneed to step up to the more expensive 850Pro for a gaming rig. Just get a bigger drive.

Core i7-6700KIntel $339

Intel’s new top-of-the-line Skylake processoIts new chipset includes important memorystorage speed boosts.

ROG Maximus VIII HeroAsus $240

Fantastic overclocking and stability, with agreat UEFI BIOS from Asus. M.2, USB 3.1 anon-board power, reset, CMOS, etc, buttons.

Savage Black 16GB @2400 MHzCas12Kingston

$137

Thanks to insanely low timings, these two8GB sticks of DDR4 are more than enough.

Noctis 450NZXT

$130

Thanks to its innovative interior layout anddaring design, this case is a pleasure to worin and a beauty to behold.

Ducky OneDucky

$120

An elegant set of keys from mechanicalkeyboard fan favorite Ducky. Renowned fortheir impeccable feel and build quality.

MARCH 2016 11

Buyer’s Guid

HARDWAR


P R O C E S S O

R


C O O L E R

M E M O R Y


S S D

C A S E

D I S P L A Y

K E Y B O A

R D

M O U S E

H E A D S E T



“It is not the strongest of the species that survive,nor the most intelligent, but the ones riding

sabre-tooth tigers and using owls as binoculars.”– Charles Darwin

I T ’ S A L L O V E R . . .

114 MARCH 2016

. . . U N T I L

MARCH

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Documents

PC Gamer USA - March 2016