Known for providing an excellent arcade-style racing experience, the Forza Horizon series takes its third installment Down Under, allowing players to race across a variety of environments throughout Australia. Fortunately, the franchise has not lost any of its quality while making the lengthy journey to the Southern Hemisphere.

Forza Horizon 3 takes a slightly different approach than its predecessors when it comes to the overall concept of how the player interacts with the Horizon festival. Rather than being a random racer merely trying to make a name for themselves, this time you play as the person running the entire festival, who also happens to take part in all of the events. From a plot-focused point of view, this makes far more sense when it comes to showcase events, as the festival’s boss is the one racing in all of these ludicrous scenarios rather than one racer who happens to have been selected for each of the events. As more races, Bucket List challenges and “PR Stunts” (the formal name for all speed traps, drift zones, jumps, and speed zones) are completed, the festival gains more fans, and begins to expand. Across Australia, four festival sites in total will be opened and expanded, unlocking even more events to complete. Given that you are the individual making all the important decisions surrounding the festival, you actually get to choose where to open the next location for the festival when it comes time to aggressively expand.The game will offer two choices and provide a brief description of the area, in addition to providing community statistics once your choice has been made, informing you what percentage of gamers made that same choice at the same time and who from your friend’s list did the same thing. For such a small feature, the inclusion of choice and statistics makes the title feel far more connected rather than the previous two games which felt more like solo adventures until you played some online multiplayer.

On the topic of multiplayer, Forza Horizon 3 introduces online co-op play, allowing for friends or strangers to play through their festival adventures together while adding to their single player progress. Obviously this addition has made a significant improvement in the eyes of those who may not enjoy racing titles alone but thoroughly love them when playing alongside friends. While you do need to choose to play co-op from a pause menu, the way it is handled is relatively seamless. I did not find myself waiting for extended periods of time, generally only between 10 and 15 seconds to find a game, and never found there to be any connectivity or server issues. When switching back to single player, all of the progress carrying over reduces the redundancy felt by players and helps keep everyone invested in the game. While certain tracks will be repeated during events based on whether you are taking part in a championship or exhibition, not having to redo the last hour’s worth of racing simply because it was online is greatly appreciated. You can also choose whether you wish to play strictly races, games, or both when online, or you can opt to have a large free roaming session of online multiplayer.

However, there is one technical issue which plagues the multiplayer component moreso than the single player. Occasionally you will find your car lodged in an awkward position against rocks, cliffs, trees, or houses. If your vehicle is flipped over or on its side for an extended period of time, the game will reset your car automatically and you can continue on. Sadly, if your car is still upright, or the game does not deem it to be flipped over, it will not reset your vehicle. In single player, rewinding time and avoiding the collision is a simple solution, but in online multiplayer, the rewind feature does not exist. This means that if your car gets lodged in a spot which you can not maneuver out of, you will be stuck there until an event ends or someone else in the game is kind enough to hit your car out of that spot unless you happen to have discovered the manual reset option which is never actually explained or detailed in the tutorial. If you get stuck, it is possible to pause the game and press in on one of the analog sticks to reset your car, but unless you happen to be looking carefully at everything on the screen when the game is paused, you will likely never know it exists. Without the knowledge of this button, you will believe you are simply stuck until a multiplayer event finishes. Considering a large number of the games available online require hitting other vehicles, you can easily be stuck in a spot. Not having the manual reset button explained during the tutorial is a gross oversight, and results in the enjoyment being sucked from playing almost immediately when you find yourself stuck between rocks or trees in online play, spinning your wheels helplessly.

Issues with the reset button aside, the control mechanics are as solid as they have ever been in the Forza Horizon games. The various terrains will still cause cars to handle differently based on their design and tuning choices, and given the vast number of choices available for modifying a vehicle allows players to customize their cars for specific tasks or challenges. A Lamborghini Aventador will clearly never be great for taking off-road, but changing the tire pressure, tired width, suspension, or reinforcing the body with roll bars will all affect the performance of the vehicle and allow for that fine-tuning which gear heads will eagerly search for. Over time, you will also unlock body kits from various companies, allowing for complete overhauls in performance and appearance with a single option selection.

One of the biggest staples in the Horizon franchise is the music associated with the festival. Typically the focus has been electronic music, and while there is still a large emphasis on that genre, hip hop, alternative rock, and classical music are included, as well as the ability to listen to your own music through the Groove service. While this service is something you have to pay for, it is still a viable option for those who wish to listen to their own custom soundtrack in-game. Not all of the stations are available at the outset, and following the trend of running the festival, you decide which stations are unlocked in which order. This means if you happen to be a fan of hip hop, you can choose to have this station available for your listening pleasure far sooner than the classical station you may not wish to hear at all. Of course, you can always opt to turn off the radio stations altogether while playing so that you only hear the roar of your engine and the squeal of your tires.

In terms of replay value or sheer content, Forza Horizon 3 is sure to please. With more than 400 unique cars, more than 130 races and championships, Bucket List events, barn finds, 150 hidden bonus boards, online auctions for buying and selling vehicles, the ability to create your own races or Bucket List challenges, photographing every unique car via Horizon Promo mode, and online play, players can expect to easily put 40 or 50 hours into the game without thinking much of it. Even if you only plan on completing races and PR stunts until you finish expanding the festival, you will still be putting 15 or 20 hours into the game, minimum. Once you are done drooling over the gorgeous scenery and you make your way to the various showcase events, some of the moments will make you sit back in awe. There are usually several key moments during any event which pulls away from the player’s point of view, placing the camera in a more cinematic location, and slows down time for a spectacular jump. Even if some of the showcase races seem to be eerily similar to past Horizon events, seeing them in a new setting, with these moments or improved details will feel fresh. It may be a matter of adding multi-coloured smoke spewing from a fighter jet’s engines as it races across the sky, or a freight train with enough flatbed cars to allow your car to jump overtop, but players will find themselves impressed with the visuals and the grandeur of these events.

While there is a significant issue with the reset button never being explained, particularly before going online, every other aspect of Forza Horizon 3 is guaranteed to satisfy players. The sheer volume of content available will keep any racing fan’s attention for extended periods of time and the beauty of Australia’s environment encourages exploring every inch of the terrain. Cars handle exactly how you would expect, community-designed liveries are available by the thousands, and you are constantly being shown how your own performance compares to that of your friends. Online co-op play is a monumental addition to the series, and hopefully one that continues to appear in any successors within the franchise. Forza Horizon 3 has set the new standard for arcade racers, making it a necessary purchase for any fan of the genre or series.

The Good

• Phenomenal quantity of content, both single player and multiplayer
• Co-op progress carries over to single player
• Breath-taking visuals
• Cars behave differently based on surface, speed, and tuning
• Increased variety in music and cars

The Bad

• Fails to inform player of manual reset button at any point, potentially leading to infuriating online situations

The Score: 9.6

Following Joule as she ventures across Far Eden in an attempt to terraform it into a hospitable planet, ReCore combines exploration, RPG elements, and creative platforming to create a memorable experience, albeit one not without its issues.

At the outset of the adventure, Joule has a solitary robotic companion named Mack. Contained in a familiar canine body, Mack’s core offers little in the way of unique advantage over his late-game counterparts, but serves as a fantastic introduction to the mechanics of the game. Over the course of the initial dungeon-esque segment, players are informed about the different colours associated with enemies. Red, yellow, and blue robots will attempt to interrupt your progress, and to better your chances of defeating them, selecting the same colour from Joule’s gun will inflict more damage to the enemy in question. When enough damage has been dealt to an enemy, the player is faced with a decision, as there are two separate ways to dispose of an enemy, with each method yielding a different benefit. You may choose to extract the opponent’s core (the powerful, coloured orb which acts as a power source) but doing so will immobilize you temporarily as you engage in a tug-of-war with the robot, or you may simply shoot the robot until it explodes and provides you with crafting materials.

Cores are used to upgrade Joule’s robotic companions and make them stronger, but crafting materials are needed in order to product stronger parts for them. While “Prismatic” foes (i.e. bosses) require you to extract their core, and “Corebytes” (i.e. incredibly weak enemies) simply get destroyed, the vast majority of aggressive robots will force the player to choose and reward them appropriately. This balancing act is an interesting one which adds an extra layer of intricacy or strategy to combat, but nothing is more infuriating than working through a dungeon location and having to discard some of your extracted cores simply because you found stronger ones and your inventory is full. Considering how integral the core extraction mechanic is, the inventory for cores is extremely limited and could benefit greatly from allowing players to hold an additional 10 or 15 cores at any given time.

ReCore does a satisfactory job sculpting the environment of Far Eden into a believable terrain. Clearly the society has focused heavily on robotics and technology, but without human care for decades, the harsh climate of the planet has reclaimed the majority of modified land. The drifting sand, rock formations, massive pieces terraforming equipment, and buildings still in existence all fit perfectly together. Unfortunately, while there are no shortage of collectibles to hunt down, there can frequently be times when you have nothing to keep your attention for several minutes as you explore. Obviously there should not be an endless stream of items to locate, but when you are traversing large open areas in the name of reaching your next objective, it can feel like quite a lengthy and chore-like task without puzzles or items rising intermittently. Instead, you will frequently see enemy robots erupt from the sand in front of you to distract you for a few moments. After dispatching each party of robots, the already lengthy trek feels that much more painful as it has been drawn out two be two or three times as long.

When you do see puzzles or collectibles, you may or may not be able to access them at that time due to which robot companions you have with you. There are five different robot frames in the game, all of which have unique abilities, and are needed for overcoming different obstacles, and you are able to select any two of them to travel alongside you at any given time. However, there are only a couple of cores used to animate these frames, meaning you will need to change which frames are activated depending on which puzzles you are presented with. There is only one place to activate different frames, Joule’s “Crawler” (the base of operations for our protagonist). Fortunately, each companion core will gain experience and level up, even if they are not with you as you explore Far Eden. This prevents the typical RPG issue of two or three companions becoming incredibly strong, but having several others who are far lower levels than your usual party members.

Returning to previously explored areas after unlocking a new robot frame will generally result in several more dungeons and powerups becoming accessible, but you will find yourself constantly returning to your “Crawler” and having to swap out companions before finding the closest fast travel station to where you had been and travelling back to that specific puzzle. It is also a very distinct possibility that there is no fast travel station near your previous location, and you must spend another 3 or 4 four minutes travelling across the wasteland to reach it again. The game would have benefited significantly from the ability to fast travel back to the precise location from which you had recently warped to your Crawler. If the argument is made that you need the fast travel stations in order to actually travel in that manner, why is it always an option to teleport back to Joule’s Crawler regardless of where you are? That same function should be available to revert back to that location, even if it disappears after you use it once or fast travel to a different location in the world.

There is a strong enough plot presence throughout the main quest line to provide players with motivation for their actions and provide some background information, but similar to Dead Space and Bioshock, there are audio logs scattered through the world which offer far more insight into the world and events leading up to the present situation. Those who strive to locate all of them will gain some far more interesting insight into the world of ReCore than those who do not put forth the extra effort. It would have been nice if one of the log sets (and similarly, the dialogue from companion robots) had not been in a completely fictitious language which makes no sense to the player. Even with subtitles, the dialogue is expressed through foreign symbols and blocks rather than actually providing context or meaning to the jibberish being heard.

Sadly, the end-game component of ReCore is anti-climactic, and forces the player to locate more and more prismatic cores before accessing the next floor of a tower. Players who willingly searched for as many prismatic cores as possible before reaching this point may be able to complete the entire tower without ever leaving it, but the majority of individuals will likely have to exit after each floor and hunt down more cores. This process is painfully irritating due to a combination of the fast travel mechanic and the lack of information regarding items in the overworld. While each dungeon will state from the overworld map just how many of its collectibles remain hidden, you are not able to see the locations of the overworld cores unless you happen to be in that section of the map. It may seem like a minor detail, but while hunting prismatic cores, it would make the process significantly simpler if you could see the cores you had not yet collected from a fast travel station or Joule’s Crawler. Instead, you must choose a part of the world to travel to and then open up the world map from there to find out if you happen to be near any or even in the same part of the world as any you have not yet located. If the cores were never displayed on the map, this would also not be an issue, but because they do appear in some circumstances, it results in an awkward and infuriating game mechanic.

Visually, ReCore is a phenomenal game, and taking a few moments to revel in the scenery is a must. However, the desire to explore every inch of the landscape will occasionally be marred by the obnoxiously long loading times. Any time you use a fast travel station, enter a dungeon, or progress to a separate area of the overworld, a loading screen will appear and remain there for a minimum of 15 or 20 seconds. Even returning to the main menu from the pause screen results in a lengthy load time. The worst I personally experienced was during a boss fight in which I died approximately 90 seconds into the bout. In order to reload the most recent checkpoint, which had been from just outside the door leading to the boss chamber, I had to wait just over a minute to resume playing. This was an extreme example, and I never experienced anything close to a minute after that, but the average load time is roughly 25 seconds. In the end-game events which require you to travel the world collecting cores until you reach specific numbers, this can be an extremely unpleasant aspect simply due to how frequently you need to fast travel and enter dungeons.

ReCore is an enjoyable experience that fans of open world exploration will find themselves drawn to, but players will need to exercise a great deal of patience while long load times and grinding for cores take their toll. The plot is interesting enough to keep players engaged, with audio playing on occasion as Joule walks through various environments, but only those who hunt down the additional audio logs will truly appreciate what has happened on and around Far Eden. The combat mechanic is relatively simplistic, relying on colour matching to do the most damage, but limited inventory slots render exploration and collection excursions relatively short in duration so as not to waste or lose resources. The platforming segments are incredibly varied throughout ReCore, but at no point are they perplexing or require extensive amounts of thought to overcome. The gentle difficulty climb allows the game to be accessible to younger or inexperienced gamers, although those looking for a significant challenge or a thoroughly polished title may have to look elsewhere.

The Good

• Interesting plot keeps players invested in quests
• Experience gained by inactive party members
• Beautiful environment

The Bad

• Incredibly lengthy load times
• Fast travel mechanic leaves much to be desired
• Only able to swap out cores and use resources in one location

The Score: 6.4

Genre Survival Horror, Crafting

Developer The Fun Pimps Publisher Telltale Games, The Fun Pimps

Consider combining the survival features of Don’t Starve, with the crafting and building mechanics of Minecraft, while the zombie plague of DayZ are constantly hungry for human flesh. 7 Days to Die is an interesting and exciting premise, but unfortunately 7 Days to Die fails on almost every level of execution. Instead of creating a thrilling hybrid of gameplay mechanics 7 Days to Die is a technical mess, which runs worse than any other current generation console release I have experienced to date.

Now before going forward I must acknowledge the elephant in the room – 7 Days to Die is still in Early Access form on PC. But the console release has no mention of the content available within the console version being an ongoing or Early Access product. As such this review will be reviewed with the same standards of any other release. Let us begin.

7 Days to Die’s premise is outstanding, but the entertaining foundation breaks down quickly, as the clunky, unstable and technically flawed mess, ruins almost any chance of this premise reaching its full potential.

7 Days to Die is without almost any story content or goals to achieve; players must survive at all costs and utilise the crafting mechanics to increase their chance of survival. Players are spawned randomly in an open world environment that is infested with the undead, and every 7 days a blood moon will rise causing the zombie menace to turn into a frenzied pack of hungry dogs. When players initially spawn they are greeted with 8 basic survival tasks to complete in order to get a brief understanding of the gameplay features and how to utilise them. Initial frustration begins as almost no tasks are explained aside from the brief statement given, which meant I had to seek online advice in order to progress on a few occasions. There are no helpful hints within 7 Days to Die and even the brief 8 tasks players are given do not come close to scratching the surface of the many facets players must comprehend in order to survive.

7 Days to Die expects players to manage their food and water intake, their body temperature and health, as well as building up resources during the day in order to craft and prepare for the upcoming day of survival. 7 Days to Die does offer a lot of choices when entering the main survival mode, with options to change zombie behaviour and spawn rate, lengthen and shorten game time, alongside the choice of 6 different difficulty levels. Choice is one element where 7 Days to Die greatly succeeds, allowing players to truly customise their experience depending on how they want to play.

It became a constant frustration as I would venture out into the open world to collect food and water, only for 7 Days to Die’s technical problems to appear. The technical complications throughout 7 Days to Die make learning and understanding each facet or survival a painful and frustrating task.

One of 7 Days to Die’s biggest issues is the atrocious pop-in, which meant pieces of the land would randomly appear in front of the character as I was exploring. I could only ever see about 10 metres in front of my character at all times, anything beyond that point would be blank and spawn in when I eventually got closer; there were even times when I would find myself walking through a grey void as the world itself could not appear before my character arrived. The issue could at least be explained if the visuals were AAA quality, but sadly 7 Days to Die has some of the worst visuals on current generation consoles. Textures look muddy, sticks look pixelated up close, and even random newspapers found on the ground turn into a mash of colours and incomprehensible scribbles; I haven’t seen visuals on this level since the PlayStation 2 era. 7 Days to Die unfortunately hits the technical trifecta, because despite the poor visuals and absurd pop-in 7 Days to Die constantly has framerate issues that slow the game to a crawl, or simply freeze it in place, which meant having to restart the entire game. These are just a few of the technical issues that completely ruin the promising premise 7 Days to Die has to offer.

The same poor quality is found in the audio, as almost every zombie has the exact same growling noise and almost every single time I began mining it made the exact same sound; regardless of what item was being used or being mined. Weapons in 7 Days to Die have the same audio issues, with most bullets absent of sound altogether, or sounding like a cheap cap gun. With the issues I experienced both visually and in audio form, I was left astounded that loading times after death and when initially loading a map can be upwards of one to two minutes. Those times are generous because most of the time the loading process will freeze the entire experience and force another manual restart.

Combat throughout 7 Days to Die is also bland and borderline broken. When engaging in combat almost every enemy will not acknowledge the fact they have been attacked, as the enemy will keep swiping and moving as if nothing has happened – before they eventually fall down. There was one occasion when an angry bear attacked me almost instantaneously upon spawning in the map, but the bear was unable to deal any damage. Fighting for my life I simply held down the attack button and finished off my attacker with my bare fists in about three minutes, as the bear could do nothing but growl and swipe to no avail as damage could not be delivered to my character.

One of the few positives in 7 Days to Die’s features is the crafting system, which can actually be enjoyable during the time the game decides to run well. There are over 400 items to craft and experiment with, and 7 Days to Die’s creative mode allows unlimited resources to create and experience every item. Crafting is not without its issues as navigating each menu mirrors the cursor-like control system found on the PC, meaning every selection and decision must be made utilising the analogue sticks with no options to simply manoeuvre each menu with the directional pad. This cursor control system is clumsy and made crafting and experimenting with items become an agonizing process.

7 Days to Die does feature local split screen and online multiplayer, but the experience within both of these options is much worse than playing alone. Split Screen can actually provide some enjoyable moments, but due to the horrible performance that enjoyment is quickly squashed. Online is even worse, as the framerate and pop-in issues become a constant battle. There were minutes at a time where I was running through nothing but grey empty void, as 7 Days to Die could not keep up with the fact I was walking through the environment. Even when I did experience a few seconds of smooth gameplay, it wasn’t long until 7 Days to Die would either freeze or simply remove me from the online session with an error message. 7 Days to Die’s multiplayer experience is so horribly produced that the entire feature is barely playable and the split screen options (while appreciated) can hardly perform under the strain of double the activity on screen.

7 Days to Die is a horrible port that is so technically broken that I cannot even comprehend how it has been launched in this state. Despite having a unique and interesting premise, the console execution has been so poorly produced that it should be avoided at all costs.

If you desperately want to experience 7 Days to Die’s unique brand of zombie survival crafting that is your decision, but be mindful 7 Days to Die is borderline unplayable, broken, and frustrating. With such an interesting premise, it is unfortunate to see such an excellent idea presented in such a poor product.

The Good

• Interesting and unique premise.
• Fun crafting system…

The Bad

• …ruined by poor cursor-based menu navigation.
• Ugly visuals, atrocious pop-in and constant frame rate issues.
• Constant game freezes that require restart.
• Basic and bland combat.
• Poor multiplayer performance, both online and locally.

The Score: 2.0

Considering myself a veteran hero shooter and MOBA player, I decided to grab fellow editor and MOBA noob Devon McCarty to see what his experience with the Battleborn Open Beta was like compared to mine.

Story Missions

Nathan (the veteran): I’m not sure if there’s going to be much of a story joining Battleborn‘s story missions, but they are definitely fun to play. A group of up to five players jump in, choose their characters and run through a linear environment killing everything in their path. I loved that the environments in both missions looked very different to each other. One was set on an icy planet, while the other was set mainly inside a metallic structure. The mission structures were fairly similar for both missions, with a mini boss fight about halfway through, and then a final boss fight at the end. They were a lot of fun, and took roughly 30 minutes on the normal difficulty. There aren’t really any MOBA elements in the story missions, apart from levelling up your hero from level one each session, so I believe they will be perfect for newcomers to test out the different playable characters and their abilities.

You can tell that Battleborn is being developed by the minds behind Borderlands, with the same witty humor peeking its head up in the dialogue.

Devon (the noob): For my first foray into the game, a lot of the people that joined in on my campaign were just running around and blasting the hell out of everything. Everyone joined in easy enough and we all followed whatever path was available for us to take. For the Beta, there were only a handful of missions available, and obviously it was limited and left me wanting to see what else was in store. Saying that, the last few beta’s I’ve played left me with the same feeling, and when the game came out, far exceeded my expectations.

5v5 Multiplayer Game Modes

Nathan: This was the first time I’d played Battleborn‘s multiplayer modes, and I was interested to see how much they drew from MOBA games like League of Legends, DOTA 2 and SMITE. There were two game modes in Battleborn‘s open beta, Incursion and Meltdown (a third will be available at launch called capture).

Incursion sees each team moving minions along a single lane to try and destroy two enemy spider tanks. The spider tanks are essentially turrets from the MOBA genre. It keeps the action centered as each team meets in the middle of the map and participates in a tug of war. I’d say this is MOBA newcomer friendly, with novices not having to worry about protecting three lanes. There appears to be enough strategy for veteran MOBA players with three neutral camps to fight over which spawn powerful allied mercenaries that help push the lane. There are also turrets and health stations to purchase around the map with the game’s currency, shards, that players can collect from crystals on the map and from minion deaths. It’s very fast paced, and the 30 minute time limit kept games from dragging on.

It should be said that at first Incursion can be a little daunting, even for a veteran player like myself, because of how focused the action is. Battleborn is a very pretty game with lots of colourful explosions and attacks flying across the screen, and it can be confusing telling what’s what until you become more familiar.

Devon: Meltdown was my instant favourite. It was the only time where I knew exactly what was going on and had a blast with it. The goal was simply to escort your minions (little robot dudes) into the giant robot face of your opponent. The little dudes would run into their robot face and destroy it.

I know it sounds simplistic, but I had a blast defending my guys, and destroying the other teams. Of all the game modes available on the Beta, Meltdown was easily my favorite.

Nathan: Likewise, my favourite game mode was also Meltdown. Like Devon said, Meltdown is played on a smaller two-lane map and has teams pushing minions into an incinerator to score points, with the first to 500, or the most points after 30 minutes, winning. This map required more strategy because if one lane was left open, the other team could gain the advantage by pushing its minions into its incinerators. Like Incursion, there are turrets and health stations to purchase around the map to provide advantages for your team.

I like that Battleborn has taken MOBA elements, and changed the formula a bit to create game modes that are accessible for veterans and newcomers alike, but also have room for strategy. The 30 minute timer is a great edition, with most games over by the 20 minute mark anyway.

The Heroes

Devon: I’m still pretty new to MOBA style games. So I kept picking Oscar Mike, which turned my game into a first person shooter. There are so many different character classes to pick from, each with their own level tree to follow, that I would have probably been even more confused by picking something I didn’t understand. At least with Oscar Mike, I had a solid foundation to work from because a dude with a rifle is the same all over.

Nathan: Battleborn‘s hero selection appears to be quite impressive. There’s a nice variety of heroes to fit each playstyle, and most of them were fun to play as. Not every hero will be playable from the get-go, with players unlocking heroes by levelling up or by completing a challenge associated with the hero. Some are even unlocked by playing the main story missions.

Class wise, there are long range snipers, damage absorbing tanks, support characters that heal and shield, assassins with skills that hit hard and fast, and mages that deal steady damage. Each class has a different playstyle and they were all fun to use. My favourites were Rath, a melee based swordsman who’s attacks give him lifesteal, Orendi, a ranged mage who throws down an area of effect spell that is great for clearing minions, and Reyna, a ranged character who can apply an overshield to herself and an ally while launching homing missiles at enemies. With 25 playable characters, it will be interesting to see how balanced all of the characters are when the game launches, especially the characters unlocked at later levels.

The most important topic: Gameplay

Devon: Playing “Meltdown” was the only time I ever fully understood my objective. I played through the campaign with some people and we couldn’t figure out what was going on. We had already killed everything to kill, and then we couldn’t find a path or objective to pursue. It was frustrating because all of the sudden, a gate that was up dropped and we could continue. No one had done anything, it just decided to do so. I’m hoping little things like that are fixed for the full release of the game.

Nathan: Battleborn‘s gameplay was so much fun; I couldn’t stop playing. It’s a first person shooter at its core, and almost feels similar to Borderlands in this regard too. Each character gets a primary attack, a secondary attack, a couple of skills and an ultimate attack. The skills all run on a cooldown system, so you don’t have to worry about mana consumption which keeps the action fast paced.

I must admit that at first it was all very overwhelming because of how colourful Battleborn is, but, like most MOBAs and team-based shooters, once I worked out what each heroes’ skills looked like, it was easy to keep track of what was going on. Gearbox has made several great shooters, and Battleborn‘s Open Beta suggests Gearbox’s next venture could be no different.

Overall thoughts on the Battleborn Open Beta

Devon: Battleborn has a heck of a lot going for it. It’s fun, lighthearted, and easy to pick up and run around in even if you’re not exactly sure what to do. The most fun I had (like any game) was playing with some friends and having them coach me through our objectives. My main concern would be the connectivity issues with doing big parties. That’s the concern with any online heavy game and I always try to be a little easier on a Beta since it is just that. However, if I pick the game up and start having the same connectivity issues I had with the beta, I will be very disappointed. Overall I am looking forward to this title and look forward to hearing more about it.

Nathan: Unlike Devon, I had no connectivity issues during the Open Beta, playing across both Xbox One and PC. I’m extremely excited for Battleborn, and I’m glad it’s not too far away. From my brief weekend with the game, it appears to be shaping up to be a solid first person shooter with interesting re-imaginings of staple MOBA elements. The hero selection can make or break games like this, but it looks like Battleborn is on the right track. I was worried about Battleborn‘s multiplayer modes and thought they might be dumbing down the MOBA genre for shooter fans, but I actually really like the direction Gearbox Software is taking with the multiplayer.

Battleborn will be available worldwide next Tuesday, May 3rd.

Developer Remedy Entertainment Publisher Microsoft Studios

Platform Played On Xbox One

Video games, as a visual story telling medium, have often been compared to film and television in their presentation of stories. It tends to be difficult to pair great gameplay with great storytelling because one often takes precedent over the other. Quantum Break takes exception to this, delivering a captivating story that’s well written and superbly acted, accompanied by fun, fluent gameplay.

Part game, part television series, Quantum Break is a story about time, travelling through it, controlling it, manipulating it. It’s a well written, captivating story with interesting characters and unexpected plot twists. You play as Jack Joyce, who is involved in an accident that gives him powers to manipulate time. Quantum Break’s narrative isn’t a morally black or white one. The game’s antagonist, Paul Serene leads Monarch Corporation and seeks to use his time powers, acquired in the same accident, for personal gain. There’s no clear right and wrong here, with nearly every character portraying a selfish side that they seek to justify. This morally ambiguous theme is also represented in the four choices you make during the game. Rather than impacting on the overall story arc, the choices lead to different events taking place to reach the same conclusion. It made me want to replay the game, to see the effects of making the other choice.

I love the way Quantum Break tells its story. An all-star cast perform the voice and physical acting in the four episode live action television show and the game. Every performance is great, giving the characters a feeling of authenticity. Shawn Ashmore (X-Men: Days of Future Past) is charismatic as Jack Joyce, delivering each line wonderfully, and Aidan Gillen (Game of Thrones) is captivating as Quantum Break’s antagonist Paul Serene. The pair are surrounded by a supporting cast that all do a solid job in the game and show episodes, especially Lance Reddick as Serene’s right hand man.

As you make your way through the five acts of Quantum Break, you can choose to stop and read short passages, such as emails between employees of the Monarch Corporation or radio broadcasts. While it’s not necessary to read all of these to enjoy the story, my experience was definitely improved by taking the time to read everything I could. You learn more about the mysterious intentions of some characters, and can begin to piece together the history and motives of Monarch. I don’t often read collectibles in games, but Quantum Break’s were all meaningful.

Quantum Break wants you to care about more characters than just the protagonist, which is harder in a game when you’re only controlling the main character. However, by giving the supporting characters a larger role in the television show, I felt an emotional connection to all of them, despite their motives not always being for the greater good.

The television show segments of Quantum Break take place at the end of each Act. They carry on the events of the story between acts, meaning skipping them will leave you confused with the story. It’s a quality piece of television too, not simply thrown in as a marketing ploy. It’s directed and shot well, with a nice pace throughout each 20 to 30 minute episode. Action sequences aren’t only restricted to the game.

Of course, Quantum Break is a game, and great games require great gameplay. Being a third person shooter, gameplay largely consists of shooting enemies. The fun comes from the introduction of time powers, which make combat fast, fluent, and a joy to partake in.

There are two core powers in Quantum Break: stopping time and slowing time. Jack Joyce can create a bubble of frozen time on the battle field, allowing it to be peppered with bullets before it collapses, sending all of those bullets flying into whatever is inside the bubble. The player also unlocks an ability to freeze time around themselves, stopping enemy bullets and granting some health regeneration. The final time stopping ability is a powerful explosion which decimates any enemies in range, and freezes them in mid-air for dramatic effect.

The time slowing powers include a dodge and a fast run, to move behind enemies that have shields and to avoid bullets or grenades. While the time stopping abilities allow Jack to control the battlefield and enemies, time slowing abilities are used to move around an arena quickly, and flank enemies – especially when you upgrade the ability to offer a slowdown when aiming down sights just after you’ve dashed. Quantum Break’s time abilities and smart AI, which actively seek to flank you, made me feel very powerful because I was forced to use all of the time powers intelligently. They are all really fun to use, with the right balance found between offence and defence.

Apart from time powers, Quantum Break is a cover based shooter. I absolutely love the cover system in Quantum Break, and it adds to the fluidity of combat. Rather than pressing a button to hide behind cover, Jack will automatically take cover when he approaches an object. It’s such a great mechanic, taking away cheap deaths from when you don’t move in and out of cover due to a failed button press. It’s so intuitive that it felt weird when I went back to play a game that required a button to be pressed when moving in and out of cover.

Enemies in Quantum Break are quite varied. You’ll face off against your normal henchmen, but there are also shielded enemies that require you to shoot an exposed core on their back and enemies that are immune to your time stopping powers, and can even nullify your powers. Developer Remedy Entertainment has found a nice balance between all enemy types, not over saturating levels with any one type to keep combat fun and varied.

Gameplay looks great throughout the whole experience thanks to the Northlight Storytelling Engine created by Remedy Entertainment. Quantum Break is visually stunning, with characters and the world looking almost life-like. Lighting is projected beautifully in all environments, adding mystery to abandoned warehouses, and a futuristic feel to Monarch Corporation’s offices. Similar to LA Noire, the actors and actresses have been represented in-game wonderfully by the Northlight engine, a bonus to this being the facial expressions by the cast during dialogue scenes. Further, character movements look really smooth and natural, rather than just a set of the same animations that are seen over and over again. Shawn Ashmore IS Jack Joyce. The artists have also created some great visual effects with the time powers, and the time stutters that occur. The slowdown when the final enemy is killed in a combat sequence is highly satisfying.

Additionally, Quantum Break has great sound design complimenting the visual fidelity. The score is wonderfully composed, heightening the action of combat sequences, and adding extra emotion to key narrative scenes. Gunshots sound impactful – assisted by the strong vibration feature on the Xbox One controller – and the distorted audio during time slow down sequences adds to the atmosphere. Remedy Entertainment has nailed the visual and sound design on Quantum Break.

Without spoilers, I’ll just add that Quantum Break has some great level design. Time freezing segments look great, especially when people are shown frozen in the midst of performing an action. And there are a couple of interesting set pieces in the game, particularly one involving a giant container ship.

Despite being successful in so many areas, I have my doubts about the decision to require players to stream the television episodes rather than including them on the disk or in the download code. During my time with Quantum Break, I played through the game twice, watching the television episodes twice across about a week. I had mixed results with the streaming process. At times it was fine, but about 50 per cent of the time I ran into content buffering issues, something that doesn’t happen to me when using other streaming services. There doesn’t appear to be an option to change the video quality either, so players on slower services or with limited data plans may have a negative experience, which is an issue considering the relevance of the television episodes tying into the plot of the game. There is an option to download the episodes for those having streaming issues, but the file is about 72GB.

My only other issue with Quantum Break is the way the story concludes. The third part of the final Act feels rushed, and the final scene is a bit ambiguous – I feel it’s unclear what actually happened to the characters involved. Quantum Break ends much like a season of television does, clearly setting up events for the next season, and not necessarily tying everything up. The game finishes, but the conclusion isn’t as satisfying as the build up.

Quantum Break is a phenomenal game and piece of storytelling. It blends video games and television together in a smart way, creating a connected interactive story across two mediums. Quantum Break’s narrative intelligently deals with themes of time and time travel, offering a unique spin on the formula. The acting is wonderful across both mediums, the dialogue is well written and the story is entertaining. Remedy Entertainment’s Northlight Storytelling Engine is revolutionary, enhancing the way the story is told in the video game portion, creating a beautifully looking game, and providing gameplay that is smooth, fluid, and feels natural. Quantum Break’s gameplay is heaps of fun. All of the time powers are useful, the automatic cover system is intuitive, and the shooting mechanics are solid.

Quantum Break is one of my favourite experiences on the Xbox One so far. Developer Remedy Entertainment has told an engaging, entertaining story, and backed it up with great gameplay. You need to play Quantum Break, it’s a new IP that I’m looking forward to seeing more of.

The Good

• Entertaining, well written narrative that blends game and television mediums
• Great acting performances from the whole cast
• Fun, fluent, fast paced gameplay
• Time powers

The Bad

• Television show buffering issues

The Score: 9.0

Using the S.P.E.C.I.A.L. system, each attribute comes with 10 perks each, giving the player 70 to choose from. From there, perks can be ranked up to become more powerful and effective, which technically makes the total number of perks 275. According to Kotaku, players will be given 28 points to start out with.

The trailer showcases how the rankings work and what the perk menu looks like. Hovering over a perk also provides a little animation with Vault Boy and sound effects to boast.

Check out our screenshots that break down the information the trailer reveals.

S.P.E.C.I.A.L.

Some of the perks

The main perk menu

Source: Kotaku

Fallout 4 is set to emerge from the vault on Nov. 10, 2015 for the Xbox One, PlayStation 4 and PC.

What do you think of these revealing perks? Let us know in the comments below.

Platform Played PlayStation 4

   Developer/Publisher Milestone S.r.l

Earlier this year I reviewed Ride, which was a motorcycle racing game developed by Milestone S.r.l. Ride was overall a disappointing experience and I believed motorcycle enthusiasts deserved something better, fortunately this is where MotoGP 15 comes in. Though MotoGP 15 is also developed by Milestone, it delivers a significant step up from the aforementioned release.

One of MotoGP 15‘s most impressive aspects is the amount of options it gives to the player. MotoGP 15 contains the full roster of official 2015 Moto GP Championship riders and bikes, but it also contains all the riders from Moto2, Moto3, and Moto GP 2 Stroke Champions. The roster is downright impressive and each bike category feels significantly different from the last. Moto3 offers a subdued experience due to the lack of power, while the Moto GP delivers a powerful roar as they rocket down the pit straight. The significant difference in each bike category offers plenty of options when choosing your perfect ride, but there are also plenty of options on the track.

MotoGP 15 allows players to alter almost every single aspect of a race, allowing you to create your perfect competition. Want to ease your way into MotoGP 15 to learn the ropes? Allow for auto braking. Want to re-enact an entire championship? Choose to experience the entire weekend at full race length. I loved having complete power over each race, and the astounding amount of options given to create that experience is greatly appreciated. The vast customisation options truly shine when playing online, but I shall get into that a little bit later.

MotoGP 15 begins with the creation of your custom rider, but sadly the options are limited. One of the biggest downsides of the custom creation is the lack of the ability to alter your riders face. Instead players must choose from a range of preset photographs. It’s certainly an odd procedure and it explains why your rider never takes off his helmet in pre-race celebrations. Aside from this the options are very thin. Almost everything you do in MotoGP 15 is awarded with experience, which will unlock new wearable items; though these items are merely colour swaps. Unless you truly want your rider’s personal items to match the team you’re riding for, there is almost no reason to alter these options once they are chosen.

Your created rider will mostly be used in Career Mode. This mode begins in the Moto3 category, as you win races and gain fans you will start to move to better teams and ultimately become Moto GP World Champion. As with most racing based Career Modes players will increase in popularity after each race, as well as being given the option to acquire sponsors and change teams. Though your overall popularity doesn’t seem to factor into anything at all, this makes the number simply a pointless figure. It would have been nice if there was something tying into your popularity, perhaps bonus cash from merchandise sales that could have culminated towards your GP credits total. GP credits are earned after each race and can be used to purchase bikes, though the selection is steeply priced and after three seasons I’ve barely been able to purchase six rides.

Moving through each racing category in Career Mode is greatly rewarding, as your victories and success determine how fast your rise to the pinnacle of racing will take. Each victory feels like another step to proving yourself worthy of the Moto GP category. Career Mode also allows improvements to each bike, in the form of data packs. These packs are earned from each race you complete and testing sessions. I loved the idea of earning more data packs from these testing sessions, which does a great job at replicating the process teams take to improve their bikes throughout the season. If you want to turn up the difficulty and continue your journey after becoming World Champion, you can, as Career Mode seems to have no end in sight.

MotoGP 15 delivers where it matters most, on the track. As I mentioned earlier each bike feels significantly different and the racing conditions will also alter the feel of each ride. I loved the feeling of your bike struggling as you power through a corner at breakneck speeds, and the audible grunt of the engine stressing as you push it to the very limit. Altering the physics of your ride will also alter the feel and sound of your bike. Unfortunately once again Milestone has implicated a sub par version of the Rewind system found in most racers. Like Ride the timer in-between use isn’t shown and if you don’t fix your mistake after one rewind, you must then suffer the consequences. Of course you don’t need to implicate the Rewind system at all, but the fact that Milestone once again has provided an odd version of the system is frustrating. Especially when facing AI of higher difficulty, these racers will push and shove in order to get to the top. Those able to master the lower difficulty will certainly have their metal challenged in these highly difficult settings.

Aside from Career Mode MotoGP 15 also offers the standard Grand Prix, Time Attack and single race modes. But the additional Beat the Time, MotoGP2 Stroke Events and Real Events 2014 modes add a considerable amount of challenge and gameplay. Beat the Time challenges players to use lower powered bikes in order to beat specific lap times, while 2 Stroke Events has players race as well known riders in fictional challenges. Real Events 2014 has players re-enact moments from the 2014 season, or alter the events. Real Events introduces each race with a small video from the actual real life race, but there is no voice over, or any form of further explanation. I think Real Events would have benefited from some form of voice over work introducing the challenge, or perhaps even throughout each challenge itself. This instead makes these modes feel like an afterthought, rather than an in-depth extra.

One of my small gripes with MotoGP 15 is the lack of commentary. Though there are lines of dialogue delivered after each race, these are repeated frequently and makes me wonder why so few lines were recorded. Like Ride the actual race itself is pure silence. There are no commentators giving their thoughts on the race and no pit crew voices. This may not matter to some, but as someone who loved officially lisenced racing games in the past for the excellent commentary track, MotoGP 15 refuses to go to the extra effort needed to provide it.

This goes double for the average visuals within MotoGP 15. Even at its visual best, MotoGP 15 looks like a crisp version of a last generation game, and even barely manages to visually outwit Ride. This doesn’t mean MotoGP 15 is horrible to look at, but it certainly doesn’t seem willing to go that extra mile to truly provide a beautiful looking racing game that bike fans deserve. Even post-race celebrations are hampered by the horrible character models Milestone has created. Sure your rider will never remove their helmet, but your pit crew will surround your rider in celebration. There was even a time when the entire pit crew consisted of one singular character model. It’s disappointing that MotoGP 15 is happy to rest on its laurels visually, instead of setting the bar, or at least gaining traction on the visuals delivered by its four wheeled counterparts.

As previously mentioned the customisable race options truly shine online. The options when creating your own lobby online are extensive, from choosing AI difficulty, race length, bike physics and more. If none of the lobbies online (which can be found with a simple search) tickle your fancy, simply create your perfect race and await your opponents. MotoGP 15‘s online component is impressively strong, which is mainly due to the great connection. This was easily one of the most stable online components I have experienced in a long while and it makes all the difference. Aside from the occasional frame rate dip, the experience is mostly perfect and it allows for some intense racing action against other players.

Whether you’re competing in single races, online championships that carry over between races, or competing in the new modes Sprint Season and Split Times, there is a lot to choose from. Sprint Season is basically MotoGP 15‘s version of FIFA‘s online championship mode. Players will have a certain amount of races to earn enough points to be promoted to the next tie, if you do not fulfill the requirements then you will be relegated. This mode adds bonus incentive to perform well against opponents, without directly making your opponents matter to your personal progress. Split Times on the other hands cuts each track into eight sectors, after an amount of time the player with the most won sectors is the winner. Though not many are currently playing this mode, Split Times added a new found level of intensity to each race, as you frantically push your bike to its maximum potential to split a few seconds off the clock.

MotoGP 15 isn’t without its flaws, from the thin rider customisation options, lacking visuals and the absence of any substantial commentary. MotoGP 15 is a substantial improvement from Ride and that is a great positive for two wheeled racing fans.

Racing is enjoyable and as difficult as you decide to make it due to the large racing customisation options, alongside the sturdy and genuinely intense online component. Milestone has delivered a serviceable two wheeled racer, despite some modes and options clearly lacking the extra effort needed to make them truly impressive.

If you are going to buy one two wheeled racer this year, do yourself a favour and avoid Ride, and instead enjoy MotoGP 15.

The Good

• Large selection of bikes that feel significantly different on the track.
• Customisable race options.
• Endless Career Mode.
• Stable and enjoyable multiplayer component.

The Bad

• Thin rider customisation.
• Average visual display.
• Modes lacking options and features.

The Score: 7.6

The early access weapon are officially included in the Ascendance DLC pack, but Season Pass holders on Xbox can access these new weapon now. The weapon in question is the OHM directed energy hybrid weapon, which can switch between an LMG and Shotgun on the fly, as well as an OHM-Werewolf custom variant.

Analog Addiction called Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare one of the “best Call of Duty in years”, and you can read the full review here.

SteamWorld Dig originally released for the Nintendo 3DS in 2013, before releasing on a number of new platforms; but this will be the first time it will be available for Xbox owners.

SteamWorld Dig for Xbox One will feature similar visuals to previous versions, with a number of tweaks that have been made to improve the overall experience. It was also revealed the Xbox One version will feature an elaborate Easter egg, with the studio stating it is “a gaming thing we really wanted to reference”.

There is no release date for SteamWorld Dig on Xbox One at this time, but Image & Form expect a release by “late May”.

The new Ascendance DLC Map Pack will contain four new maps, which include Perplex, an apartment complex in Sydney; Site 244, a large map underneath Mount Rushmore; Climate, a climate controlled enclosure; and Chop Shop, a black market exoskeleton industrial complex.

Alongside the new maps players will also receive the new OHM Multiplayer hybrid and weapon variant, a new Exo Grapple playlist exclusive to Ascendance DLC maps and Exo Zombies Infection, part two in the Exo Zombies adventure.

Coming first to Xbox platforms, the Ascendance DLC map pack will release March 31 in North America and April 1 in Australia. If history is any indication, Ascendance will release for other platforms sometimes in May; though no official release date has been revealed at this time.

Analog Addiction reviewed the original Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare, calling it the “best Call of Duty in years”, and you can read the full review here.