Lo wang is back and full of even more dirty jokes than ever before in the latest instalment of the Shadow Warrior series.

Shadow Warrior 2 combines excellent melee and shooting physics with extremely satisfying gore. Dismembering demons into several pieces with katanas and exploding heads with a pump action shotgun will certainly give you a frantic adrenaline rush. This is all made possible thanks to the fast movement, fantastic weapon sounds and enemy feedback.

Melee combat feels very responsive, with a variety of different animations for each weapon. Players can perform strong attacks which include spinning your blade in a circle motion; this is particularly effective when you get surrounded by a cluster of enemies. Moreover, gun-play feels equally as enjoyable with good reloading and firing animations. The deep sound of shotgun shells clashing against metal armour is a good example of how enemy feedback, in the form of audio, can help make combat feel even more satisfying. Speaking of gun-play, there are over 70 weapons to collect with their own individual weapon design. Admitting, a lot of the weapons are useless, but it’s still nice to see nonetheless.

In addition, the game adds new special abilities that include increasing the damage dealt by your weapons for a limited time. However, these abilities are very generic and lack any real innovation. Furthermore, the game has a loot system which gives you ‘gems’ that allow you to upgrade your weapons. Gems add specific elemental damage traits to your weapons in order to kill enemies that are vulnerable to certain elements. The gems were clearly designed to add more depth to the combat system, but instead they serve little to no purpose as you will acquire over 50 of them within three hours of playing the game. In addition, you can change them in the middle of any combat scenario, eliminating any real danger if the player didn’t prepare well. To add even more salt to the wound, the gems merely improve a percentage stat on your weapon. Personally, I feel as if the developers focused more on quantity, than quality; there is a lack of creativity in all the customization.

Unfortunately, the negatives don’t stop there; enemies {although plenty of variety} turn into bullet sponges, even with the best gems equipped. This made the game feel like a chore to play at times, especially on ‘hard’ difficulty.

In terms of story, shadow warrior 2 is a mixed bag; if it wasn’t for Lo Wang’s cheesy dialogue, I wouldn’t finish it. You play as Lo Wang and your aim throughout the game is to free a trapped soul named Kamiko who is stuck in your head. Throughout the game, you exchange some hilarious dialogue as your arrogant, sarcastic personality conflicts with hers. Personally, these exchanges are the best parts of the game as they highlight its potential to tell a good story, but at the end it fails dramatically down to level design and pacing. Characters are introduced with no backstory or context, making me feel clueless at times.

Shadow Warrior 2 takes a very different path from the first game; there is now a questing system with loot and skill rewards upon completion. As well as the main quests, the game also has side quests which are very uninspiring as they generally consist of fetching ingredients and returning to the quest-giver.

The game features co-op allowing you and your friends to complete the story and collect loot together. I like the addition of co-op as it makes the grind a little more entertaining, but soon gets boring as you realise how repetitive it gets.

Thankfully, in terms of graphics, Shadow Warrior 2 is beautiful, environments have vivid colours, packed with good textured foliage and lighting effects. The game also has a respectable range of video settings to get the best performance possible, running well on a variety of different systems. Moreover, the soundtrack is blood pumping at times, helping the combat feel more satisfying and worthwhile.

Overall, Shadow Warrior 2 has a solid combat system which feels very satisfying for the first couple of hours. Furthermore the dialogue is hilarious at times, showing that the game does have its own personality. However, the story fails to keep me motivated due to uninteresting characters and horribly boring quests with little variety. Personally, the game feels very hollow with tons of wasted potential.

Indie games come in all different shapes and sizes, renowned for being weird and wonderful: Clustertruck is no exception.

Developed by Landfall Games, Clustertruck is a chaotic physics based platformer with the concept that ‘the floor is lava’. The game has a total of over 100 different levels in the ‘campaign mode’ in ten different worlds. Furthermore, there is also an endless mode, level editor and steam workshop support.

Within each level, players will be greeted with many wacky obstacles including spiral wheels, humongous falling rocks and wooden beams. The variety of obstacles is reasonable, with level designs varying in complexity as you progress. At times, the difficulty can send you into a rage, but for some reason, I couldn’t stop smiling throughout my playthrough, even on levels which took more than 20 minutes to complete. Personally, I think this is because of the hilariously ridiculous nature of the game; everything from the title to its gameplay feels like a good joke. Moreover, even though there is no writing or story line, Clustertruck still has its own personality shown through its design.

In addition to the gameplay, there are a variety of different ways to jump from truck to truck, depending on your position. For some illogical reason, players can jump much further when at the back of a truck, instead of the front. This justifies the seemingly impossible time results on the leaderboard. Players are rewarded via time and skill bonuses, gained from near death experiences. You then get the option to spend these points on new abilities such as jetpacks and grapples. Yes, I said jetpacks on trucks!

The fun doesn’t end there; thanks to the level editor and steam workshop support, players can create their own eccentric maps and share them with the rest of the world. The interface of the level editor was intimidating to me at first, but soon become manageable. Personally, any developer that allows modding support should be praised highly.

Moreover, The controls are thankfully simplistic, suiting the pace of the game very well. The responsiveness of the controls is fantastic on mouse and keyboard, but as it is a very fast paced game, I cannot recommend using a controller as you won’t get the best experience.

In terms of art style, Clustertruck is very simplistic with bright non-textured colours. I would love to have seen some more experimental/bizarre colours to credit its overall gameplay. The soundtrack works well with the pace of the game, but a little more variety would have been nice to see.

Overall, Clustertruck was an absolute blast to play and is easily one of the most enjoyable games of 2016 so far. More variation in the soundtrack and the addition of more colours would complete the game for me, but as far as platformers go, this is one of the best. Furthermore, I can’t thank the developers enough for adding steam workshop support. Finally, for the price of $14.99/£10.99, I strongly urge you to pick up Clustertruck now.

Halo Wars 2 Wish list

As a big fan of the original Halo series and the RTS genre, I cannot wait to get my hands on Halo Wars 2. Furthermore, now that the game will be releasing on PC as well as the Xbox One, players can finally take advantage of the superior mouse and keyboard. Although, the fist Halo wars was only available on the 360, the developers still managed to do a very decent job of implementing controls on the controller, so If you are an Xbox One owner, there’s no need to worry. Anyway, enough rambling, here is my personal wish list for features I want to see in Halo Wars 2:

1. Fully Destructible Environments

As with other RTS games such as Company Of Heroes, fully destructible environments would create intense battle-scarred locations, making the player feel more immersed as they are reminded of where a brutal battle once took place. Imagine having the ability to annihilate buildings with scorpion tanks and scarabs.

2. Huge Variety of maps with dynamic weathering

Map locations are a key element of any game and help increase its overall replayability. I would love to see 343 take advantage of the halo universe and include maps from multiple planets with various different features that could help/hurt certain units. This would force players to change strategies depending on what maps they are faced with. Similarly to games like battlefield, it would also be great to see random dynamic weather effects which could potentially change the face of battle.

3. More Interesting Generals/Leaders

In Halo wars 1, players were introduced to a very limited amount of generals to pick from on both factions. Therefore, more generals with interesting, unique abilities/units would make the game feel more dynamic, adding multiple different play-styles and strategies. This is another area where 343 can take advantage of the Halo universe by adding more characters from previous games, or perhaps allowing us to create our own.

4. More customization

To improve upon the first Halo wars, I would love to have the ability to make your own personal army colours and potentially armour. This feature would work great in online matchmaking with other people from around the world. Furthermore, it may allow players to form clans with specific emblems and unit colour/paint. In addition, I think it would be a great idea to add a xp carrier for each unit: the more enemies it kills, the more xp it gains. This xp could then grant the units new weapons or armour. Therefore, making players feel attached to specific units and thus play more protective over those with high experience.

5. MOD SUPPORT

Releasing a game on PC opens much more doors, including the most significant door of them all… mods! Allowing modders to create custom maps via steam workshop is a brilliant way of extending the life and play-time of a game. However, as we’ve seen with fallout 4 and Skyrim, mods have been made for console games as well, so maybe Xbox One players can also experience the possibility of mods on Halo Wars 2.

Overall, I feel confident that Halo wars 2 will be a success when it releases on February 21^st 2017. If there are any more features you think I’ve missed out, please leave a comment down below.

WHAT WE WANT TO SEE IN RISING STORM 2

After the release of the new gameplay trailer, the excitement levels move up a gear for many fans of the series. Personally, this is my most anticipated online first person shooter of the year, surpassing battlefield 5 and leaving it for dead. As a big fan of red orchestra/rising storm, my expectations and ambitions may be very optimistic, so without further ado, let’s begin.

1. Maintain the Realistic Tactical Element of its Predecessors

This is by far the most significant feature which sets the franchise apart from all the other games in its genre. When a game can be played for over 300 hours and still not get boring, you know that your money has been well spent (this was the case with rising storm 1 and red orchestra).

Furthermore, with the original rising storm, squad leaders would have the ability to throw smoke grenades, place artillery marks and act as a spawn beacon for the rest of his/her squad (these players would be communicating orders to the rest of its members). This feature forced players to work as a team as each class had an actual purpose, similar to that of the battlefield franchise. As well as squad leaders, engineers were vital for destroying tank traps thus enabling the tank to advance. All classes had a player limit to them, adding more realism as it prevented teams from completely overpowering the opposition. Weapons didn’t have perks to give them a huge advantage over those at lower levels (in realism mode). Moreover, players didn’t hop around the map with gold weapon skins and special abilities: it was simply you and your rifle. As a result of the simplicity, tactics advised from your commander had to be listened to. Finally, the game felt like it had a front line in every battle, which would slowly advance as time moved by. Therefore I really hope that tripwire implement these features again with rising storm 2, as they are to me, the soul of the franchise.

2. Aircraft

Understandably, this is quite an ambitious point as it could either make or break the tactical element of the game. However, if this is implemented well, it would add a fantastic new dimension of strategic ideas. In order for this to work, the NVA (North Vietnamese Army) would need anti-aircraft guns positioned in several areas across the map. As a big fan of the battlefield Vietnam DLC, it would be a dream come true to see the return of the Huey.

3. Real-Time dynamic Weather effects

This feature would introduce more immersion than ever before, for example the impact of heavy rain on the surface, leading to slower tank and player movement due to the thick mud. Although I would love to see this feature, I have doubts that Tripwire would have the budget for this.

4. Big maps with more traps

I would love to see maps based upon Vietnamese fishing villages, jungles and urban city centres. All maps should encourage a range of different tactics such as the need for flamethrowers for clearing out Vietnamese bunkers and tunnels. Furthermore, some new traps would help bring something new and unpredictable to the battle. However, if Tripwire continues to create maps to the high standard of their other games, than fans will have nothing to worry about.

5. Badass Soundtrack

It cannot be a game based on the Vietnam War, if you can’t hear distant radios playing classic songs from The Rolling Stones. On the other hand, I don’t want to see a constant soundtrack throughout the game; instead I would like to hear music playing on distant radios and vehicles similar to that of the battlefield Vietnam DLC.

Carrying on from its predecessor, N++ is a fast paced, momentum-based platformer determined to make you ponder your every move. Leaping over mines and being chased by rockets whilst trying to collect gold coins has never felt so satisfying yet at the same time agonisingly frustrating.

With no narrative in mind, this game is purely about passing each level and achieving the highest score possible. The basic principle of N++ is to collect as many gold coins as you can, open the exit door and escape the level. During each level, players will be set by a timer in which they have to complete the objective before this runs out- each coins adds more time. You play as a ninja with very limited abilities, asides from being able to jump very high when you gather enough momentum off objects. Personally, I love the minimalistic element as it adds to the challenge and makes the completion of a level feel so much more satisfying. On the other hand, if you aren’t very good with holding in a burning rage, this game might not be best for you and your controller’s health. As with other platformers like super meat boy and ironically the other N+ plus game, this game can get incredibly difficult.

The game comes complete with 2,360 hand-made levels and thousands more fantastic custom maps thanks to the new Level Editor feature. Furthermore, there is local co-op and competitive modes where up to four players can play on the same computer. This is a feature which I have to give the developers a huge thank you for implementing. Moreover the ‘Level Editor mode, although confusing to begin with, is incredibly fun and allows you to share the map with all your friends online. Thankfully, the game has full support for keyboard and controllers which for platformers is a must. Although, you can play fine with a keyboard and mouse, I would recommend an Xbox 360 controller, not just for this game, but any platformer.

In terms of art design, N++ is a masterpiece, giving you the choice of over 60 colour pallets to choose from. These can range from a retro-arcade aesthetic to a shirt worn by Jimi Hendrix- the variety is phenomenal! However, most of the colour choices have to be unlocked at different stages of the game, which can be annoying, but at least it rewards the player for breaking their controllers. Moreover, the colours always contrast really clearly to help players determine which objects are safe and fatal.

The soundtrack works well with the art design, transforming the vibrant colours into suitable music. All the songs are available from the beginning and players can switch between them at any time, or choose to put them on shuffle.

Overall, N++ expands massively form its predecessor, adding more maps, colours, obstacles and of course the ability to create your own map and share it with the world. The level designs are fantastic, with some being more suitable to the novices of platformers and other designed with long time veterans in mind. I can safely say that N++ is the best platformer I have ever played and I strongly recommend this to anyone who enjoys this genre of gams.