Review: The Flock

The Flock, an asymmetrical first person game of tag with a twist, when every dies at least once, the game comes to an end.  Unfortunately it’s hard to see the current population of 215 million plus actually wanting to play long enough to die that many times.

The basic premise of The Flock has all players starting off as strange gargoyle like creatures.  Your creature can run, jump and scamper, and when you stand still you become stone, and impervious to your prey.  There are no other attacks or actions, or special moves you can do as the gargoyle.  Your first objective from here is to lactate the light.  The light is basically a big flashlight with a terrible battery.

Once the first player finds the light, the game play changes slightly as you the carrier of the light are now the prey of everyone else and becomes a simpering weak human.  Taking away all the movement advantages of the gargoyle creature, you are left with only the light to protect you.  As the human you can only walk or sprint, you can’t jump or crouch or crawl or anything else.  You’re only protection is your flashlight which can burn up the other players who remain gargoyles.

Here the objectives change slightly, as now you as the human must run and hide from other players, while waiting for objectives to light up that you can activate for extra points.  You also gain points the longer you carry the light.  The other players adversely are trying to find you and attack you to take over the light.  The light however hurts them and their only protection is to stay still to avoid damage.

Well it’s kinda bright

This seems like a interesting concept, but it’s lacking in various areas.  For one, as compared to other asymmetrical games like Evolve, there is absolutely no teamwork involved here.  Everyone is out for there own score and objectives.  There is no in-game chat or any other form of communication to use, nor is there any benefit from working together as each individual is simply trying to get the highest score each match.

The other big issue, is after a match there is literally nothing else left to do.  Each match is the same, regardless of what map you choose to play on.  There is no variation to the game, nor is there any development to your skills or abilities.  There is literally  no replay value here.

The beautiful color pallet astounds

There’s not really much to look at here either.  Visually The Flock is drab and repetitive.  Every map though unique is dark and grey, with very little variety.  Though I will say there are generally some interesting areas to set up ambushes if you’re patient.  Character animations are also very limited, as you can see the gargoyle characters warping across the land and generally looking silly and un-detailed.

Sold as a horror game, there’s little to be afraid of with The Flock aside from wasting too much money on it.  With zero story progression, no replay ability and no other modes to try out, there’s little chance I will see the end game when 215 million other players die.

Thanks for reading, and as always, make sure to comment and like below, and let me know what you thought of The Flock.

Check out my review for Evolve for something much better to play.

Ark: Survival Evolved: Early Access Preview #1

Want to go epic?  Go Ark:  Survival Evolved.  One of the more recent entries into the survival genre, Ark: Survival Evolved brings one of the more polished early release titles to the fray.  This game of “large” adventure was developed by Wildcard, and is currently available on Steam in Early Access form.

I’m so pretty!

Like most games of the it’s like, Ark drops you into the thick of things, naked and alone, with only your fists to serve you along the way.  At first though, you’ll notice the incredible visuals.  Assuming of course your system can handle them.

On Epic graphics, Ark is beautiful.  The land is detailed and full of texture.  Water ripples against the wind, and the various weather affects set in quite realistically.  The sky ranges from clear, to overcast, to raining.  Fog rolls in amongst the valleys and hills.  In turn these effects also hinder your character in adverse ways.  Sunny days raise the temperature and cause you to over heat, where adversely the rain cools you off.   This is not to say of course that the visuals are perfect, this work in progress game is full of visual bugs and faults.  There are various clipping issues resulting in hilarious finds with creatures sticking out of walls or hills, or looking kind of obscene as they press up against each other in all the wrong ways.  There are also the whacky fun time trees that turn 2 dimensional and start waving frantically across your screen.

Though these small faults are funny and sometimes a nuisance they don’t break the game in anyway, and allow you to enjoy the unique survival aspects.  When you spawn you are treated immediately to the various prehistoric lifeforms.  There’s a fairly good amount of variety here with various types of dinosaurs wandering around.  For the most part these creatures are scaled fairly realistically and add to the Jurassic Park awe of seeing all these long extinct creatures go about their daily routines.

Hello little guy, wait why is the Theme to Jurassic Park playing?

The world is fully alive, and interacts not only with the player, but with itself.  Raptors roam the jungle, taking down prey in packs.  Sabertooths fight mammoths on the frozen hill sides.  The occasional Tyrannosaurus Rex might pop up and try to take out a Brontosaurus.   All of these NPC creatures act more or less as they should, and will react to the player’s presense around them.  Though the various herbivores will generally ignore you, don’t get too crazy and steal a stegosaurus egg and expect not to get chased down by angry parents.

The character creator is also fully purposed and allows you to create a wide variety of character looks.  From the normal, to the sublime to the outright weird.  You have a lot of control over how your character is going to look.  This means there are a lot of ugly characters out there unfortunately.

Optimization on all these graphics is still a work in process, and can vary from server to server once you add in lag and latency issues on top.  This can be a major detractor on the very full official servers, but can be avoided by finding a smaller unofficial server where the lag can be avoided.

That covers the look and feel of Ark: Survival Evolved, stay tuned in a couple of days when I dive into the gameplay and more detailed features of the game.

As always, don’t forget to comment, and like below, and let me know how your experience with Ark:Survival Evolved has been.

For amazing gameplay videos of Ark, check out The Neo Nerd, and The Flying Squirrel Girl on Youtube now!

 

Fractured Space: Early Access Review

Welcome to space.  Fractured Space.  Where massive capital ships duke it out over vast, asteroid filled maps.  This tactical shooter is all about controlling these regions and taking out the other team before they can.

The first thing that will strike you about Fractured Space is the amazingly detailed ships.  Each ship in the available three classes has an incomparable amount of detail.  The lighting effects are especially good showcasing the ships precise design.  Each ship is entirely unique, and easily recognised from a distance.

These ships are gorgeous

Of the three classes of ship there are large carriers equipped with a potential variety of fighters, fast support cruisers which can repair other ships, hunters which have a blink ability to outmaneuver the other ships.  Each class, of course, has it’s own set of unique abilities, strengths and weaknesses to help you get an advantage over the other ships.  Though these differences help each ship seem even more unique than their appearance, the actual abilities aren’t that unique from other similar games.

gameplay is similar to other recent beta’s like World of Warships.  Teams start off on opposite sides of the map, and must race to control various flags or bases across the map.  Each base captured adds experience for the controlling team, and gives you a place to retreat for cover and repairs.  As you defeat enemies, or take over more bases, experienced gained advances you in level, and returning to a base upgrades your hit points and shields.   Battle continues until one team can capture the opposing team’s home base.

These explosions are really dynamic

These battles are usually fairly quick affairs.  The fights are often decided by rock, paper, scissor, as each class suits taking down another if piloted well.  You need to be slightly ambidextrous to work with the default controls as well when they require much mutli-pressing buttons with one hand or the other.  Once you get past this though, the short battles are still fun, but don’t always feel that tactical as you are generally just spamming the attack button and waiting for your special abilities to refresh.  Though taking advantage of positioning does help some, the map is fairly open and generic.  Ducking in and out of cover, or around asteroids doesn’t happen often, and battles quickly become more about numbers and accuracy.

After each battle, you gain experience used to obtain higher tiered ships and purchase new abilities for your current ships.  These new ships add a bit more strategy to the combat with stealth features, long range attacks and the such which opens up new strategies and play styles.

Tech Tree!

Fractured Space is still in development, and I am sure these minor gripes will be worked out in time.  Varied maps and effects would be great, but the overall gameplay is still quite good, and the ships themselves are really beautiful.  I am looking forward to coming back to this game upon release the see the new features and available ships.

As always, please comment and like below, let me know what you think of Fractured Space.

For my preview of World of Warships head here next!

 

Skulls of The Shogun: Rewind Review

Another week, another Rewind Review!  This one just barely qualifies having been released way back in 2013! Back way before the flying cars, insta cleaning clothes, and weather control that Back to the Future II promised us this year.  Though it’s not as old as some of the other games I have featured so far, this is still a great game to pickup on play if you get the chance.

A 2D tactical RPG, Skulls of the Shogun takes inspiration from other classic games like Final Fantasy Tactics, and Advance Wars.  Taking place in a colorful cartoon world, Skulls of the Shogun takes this inspiration and rolls with it in all sorts of fun and intuitive ways.

Getting the lay of the land

Set in ancient Japan, you take the role of a recently deceased Shogun.  Killed by his own lieutenant during battle, he is relegated to the afterlife as a skeleton. Faced with waiting in line with thousands of other fallen soldiers to the end of time waiting to get into the afterlife, the general instead decides to take matters into his own hands and raises an army to push his way to his rightful reward.

The playful art style mixes well with the almost constant shade of humour in the game.  Dialogue and character choices are both funny, and light hearted.  The third wall is broken often as the characters question not only the game mechanics, but the player’s actions.  This cleverness tends to fade a little as the game proceeds, but not so much that it isn’t still funny at times.

You got that right buddy!

Each character class has a unique look and animations.  The only fault visually is occasionally the screen becomes crowded with units and objects and it can be difficult to pick out the object you want, though the game does try to assist with a pop up when several items are selected close together.

Each battle is a 1v1 turn based affair.  The game starts you out with very basic commands and units and does a good job of dishing out new elements with each new battle.  Every different unit comes with it’s own stats and abilities.  Infantry have solid defence and good knockback, but are slow and don’t deal that much damage.  Calvary have long movement range and high attack, but no knockback.  There are various other units like archers and magic casters to fill out the ranks.  Your general is also controllable in battle and gains new abilities as the story progresses.

I’m a beast!…. errr Demon…

Each of these units can be upgraded during any single battle in the unique manner of eating the skulls of fallen foes, even though as they will tell you themselves, it’s pretty gross.  Each skull adds hit points to your units including your general, and when 3 skulls are consumed your unit becomes a demon and gains an extra action each turn.  This extra action can be extremely useful in most battles.  Along the way you will also find various potions and power ups to assist you in winning.

On later maps you will also be tasked with some minor resource management.  Rice paddies can be conquered to give you rice to pay for new troops at barracks.  There are also other buildings to be conquered to give you access to more powerful units.  Rice paddies are limited, and each one including the other buildings can be conquered by the opposing force at any time.  Controlling the map becomes very important on these levels.

Just a little exposition

Each map has different objectives, and several can be won in different ways.  Defeating the enemy general, defeating all troops, or moving a unit to a specific marker may all be ways to win.  Several maps have multiple stages and differing objectives in each stage.  This with the overlapping humour keeps the game fresh and fun throughout.

This is a fun game with a long campaign, multiplayer options and a ton of laughs.  With a regular price of $10.99 on Steam it’s definitely a bargain, and will fill up hours of your time.  If you are a fan of strategy games, good humour and want a game that is easy to get into, this is a great one for you.

As always, if like this review, or have played the game, make sure to like and comment below, and be sure to follow me on Twitter!

Missed last weeks Rewind Review?  You can catch it here!

Don’t Starve Together: Beta Review

What makes a great game like Don’t Starve better? Why playing with friends of course. Journey into the world of Don’t Starve with up to 5 friends in Don’t Starve Together. This standalone expansion brings with it a whole new style of play to explore the strange and wonderful world of Don’t starve.

If you are not familiar with the gameplay of Don’t Starve, the concept is simple. Your character is dropped in the middle of a strange wilderness and you must use your wits and whatever else you may have brought with you to survive. Don’t starve Together removes some of the story of the original, but the basic concept remains the same. You, and your friends, are dropped through a portal into a random area of the procedurally generated map. You are immediately tasked with finding the basic resources to survive. With the day and night clock running, you need to do so quickly before the darkness sets in, and you are relatively helpless.

A very eclectic bunch of people

This is where the sense of balance from the original game can sometimes feel off. The original game has enough resources scattered around the spawn areas for you to usually be okay the first night or two so long as you are careful. You have only one mouth to feed, and a small pool of skills to use depending on which character you have unlocked, and in play. With Don’t Starve Together, you are open to choosing from among the entire cast of eclectic characters from the original game, and the DLC, Reign of Giants. This early access to all the characters gives an interesting chance to mix and match various skills together to see if they can coexist. This process however is often hit and miss, as the resources available early on, are much different than what you would find in the single player game. This often means that you spend a lot more time harvesting basic items like food, as you need to travel farther to collect enough for two or more mouths to feed.

Famous last word?

When you do find a good balance of skills between your characters the game shines. For instance mixing Wigfrid’s combat skills and good starting armour with Wickerbottom’s smarts allows you to quickly build an advance base and defend if you work together well. And yes, all the playable character’s names start with ‘W’. Pick the wrong combination however, and even good teamwork can lead to frustrating death, upon death.

Yep, death by penguin

Really though, this game is meant to be played with friends. The game worlds available to drop into are varied, and many run with different settings and mods and figuring out how to survive with strangers, or just avoid them and make your own spot in the world has it’s moments. When it comes down to it however, the best aspect of Don’t Starve Together is going in with a group of friends and experiencing the weird and wonderful world. With a good set of friends, the general wit and humour of Don’t Starve, it’s impossible not to have fun, even when one of your friends accidentally dies after running directly into a wolves den, or opening a mysterious chest that suddenly begins winter.

Graphically there is no difference between either version of Don’t Starve. Don’t Starve together however includes the full content of the original game’s DLC as well as some new items, creatures and biomes to explore. The game runs relatively smooth, with only a minor amount of lag up to the 6 player limit. Though it is possible to allow more players onto a server, the game becomes unplayable due to lag, and latency issues.

Fighting off night Terrors

The Dev team at Klei Entertainment are quite active, and as this game is still officially in beta I am sure they will iron out the balance wrinkles. They may even be able to expand past the 6 player maximum. If you enjoyed Don’t Starve, there is absolutely no reason why you won’t enjoy Don’t Starve Together. For new players to the game, it gives a unique opportunity to work with others to learn the mechanics, or have a friend help you start off. Overall this is a great addition to this game’s universe and I can’t wait to jump in with my friends and play some more.

Thanks for reading as usual, and be sure to comment and share below, and let me know what you thought about Don’t Starve Together.

Don’t forget to follow @TheNeoNerdBlog on Twitter, and Subscribe to his channel for more funny videos like this one.

And while you are here, check out my preview of World Of Warships, a great looking upcoming multiplayer battle sim.

World Of Warships: Beta Preview

Time to engage!

World of Warships is an action packed tactical wargame. Emphasis on the action. Taking from their previous games, Wargames.net uses the same mold with World of Warships. The free to play model gives you instant access to one tier of small warships to start your campaign to collect them all. Like with Wargames.net previous entries, World of Warships has you earn experience points and cash that allow you to research and buy new ships and upgrades. From my early closed Beta test experience so far, they have done an adequate job of not making new equipment and ships seem inaccessible. You can generally find yourself able to afford a new ship after only a few battles, assuming you can hit the enemy on a fairly regular basis.

It’s a lot of fun watching enemies explode.

Early gameplay is pretty fast paced as early ships are small and maneuverable, and don’t carry much fire power, nor hit points. These first few battles are quick and allow you to get used to the basic controls, navigation and firing techniques. Though the actual combat is more action oriented, and not a true simulation, it still takes a fair amount of skill to judge distance and speed before firing your canons, or loosing torpedoes.

As you gain experience, higher ranked ships become available. These ships vary in class from cruisers, to destroyers, to massive battleships or aircraft carriers. World of Warships does a great job offering a varied amount of combat once these second and third tier options open up.

Cruisers, the first ship type you have access to, offer balance in performance and firepower. They are fairly maneuverable and the higher tiers carry both an assortment of guns, as well as torpedoes, and anti-aircraft flak guns. Destroyers are fast and highly maneuverable. They tend to favour those who enjoy the torpedo game and can move quickly into range to fire, and escape by dropping smoke screens to hide themselves and allies. Battleships are the heavy hitters, and tend to stay at range firing massive guns for similarly massive damage. The aircraft carriers offer the most unique play experience, as they mostly lack any direct fire weapons and must rely entirely on their loadout of planes. When choosing and aircraft carrier, you find yourself generally moving between an overhead tactical view of the entire battle, and to your various planes, either fighters, bombers, or torpedo bombers. This mix of styles is very welcome, and offers variety to each battle.

It’s almost as much fun watching yourself explode.

Visually, the details of each ship really stands out. You can zoom out and in, and see even tiny details like deck plates on each ship. Water effects are solid, and explosions are vibrant and effective. Throughout each battle you are given both visual and audio cues to let you know your status, and any potential threats. Incoming fire and torpedoes are clearly identified, and warnings flash on your screen if you are on a collision course with one of the many small islands.

The only current struggle so far in closed beta, is the sometimes clunky match making system. Wait times can be long, and sometimes teams are very unbalanced either in tiers or total players. Though many of these issues are derived from the current amount of players in the closed beta. Overall however, the game seems to run smoothly even at the highest graphic settings, with only occasional lag and hiccups.

In it’s early state, World of Warships is looking to match the addictive nature of it’s predecessors. It offers a solid variety of gameplay options, and many ships for you to unlock and collect. With the premium options limited to a small variety of ships, and faster xp and in-game cash accumulation this should turn out to be another success.

Trove: Beta Review

A new dungeon to explore

Welcome to the colourful, voxel world of Trove. Trove, currently in open Beta is an exploration based, RPG building game. Sounds like a lot, and it is, but Trove pulls off this multitasking well.

Built around similar concepts to the ever popular Minecraft, Trove allows you to build might structures. This time however, rather than stone and wood, you use simple coloured blocks as your main building materials. Yes, there are ores and special blocks and artifacts to be found and mined to help build more detailed blocks for your castle or house, or mighty tower too. Trove however differs from Minecraft in many ways. Each zone you inhabitat, whether it be a player filled hub, or a dungeon filled adventure zone, allows you to port your constructed home with you wherever you go, and attach it to pre-determined home spaces in each area. These unique difference continue in most areas of the gameplay for Trove.

My new home

Where Minecraft’s basic survival mode tends to revolve around, well mining, Trove takes a different path here as well. Questing and exploring the various adventure zones and their differing biomes is the main ingredient to the fun of Trove. Each hub world contains various portals with varying difficulties that port you to these adventure zones. Here you will find many dungeons, ranging from small caves filled with skeletons, to massive, multi tiered tree house fortress among others. Combat in Trove is fun and fast paced, with attacks and skills you might more commonly see in MMORPG’s like WoW, or Final Fantasy Online.

Each player has the ability to switch between a great deal of different classes, from the basic Knight, to a Gunslinger, or a flying magical fairy, or even a Dragoon like fighter. The sheer amount of variety available to you is astounding. Enemies and items are also just as varied and amusing and are usually fun to fight.

So many choices

The only aspect that doesn’t shine as much in Trove’s current build, is the multiplayer. Though most hub worlds are filled with people, as well as the adventure zones, there is rarely the need to partner with another player to complete quests. Assuming you are in a adventure area fit for your level, most of the enemies can be defeated easily so long as you don’t take on too many at once. It also tends to be a bit of a competition in adventure zones trying to beat others to the highly contested dungeons strewn across the map, though the map does at least tell you which dungeons have been recently cleared.

But otherwise Trove’s world is filled with colour and adventures to be found. Content has been regularly released and there is almost always something new to try when you log in, whether it be a new class, new items, or a new dungeon design. Trove offers a lot of fun for casual players, and enough detailed building materials for people with time and patience to build amazing structures to show off in their hub worlds, or in their own home world where they can invite people to join. All the character models and classes are just as colourful and varied and offer a wide range of play styles for all types of players.

Overall 8/10

Early release review: Boid

I have just spent several hours with Boid,  a simplistic 2D RTS that has you take control of several amoeba like organisms in underwater cavernous environments and pits you against an equal foe located on the other side of the map. Brought to us by indie developer tinyBuild Games, also known for the satrical “No Time To Explain”.

The idea is simple, take over all control points on the map before your opponent can. Control points are broken into two basic categories,  spawn points that slowly spawn new troops up to a maximum of five at a time, and evolution points which allow you to morph your creatures into various upgraded forms, like a strong crab like creature, a long range laser canon, and speedy scouts among other variations.  You are tasked with controlling your flow of new units while strategically choosing which path to take and which upgrades to use and balance everything accordingly. All actions are controlled by a simple click of the mouse, and a side panel gives you a brief summary of units available, and selected, and you can use waypoints to help automate some of your troops to specific defense points or upgrades to capture.

Both offline and online modes are already included in the most recent build. The offline version features a fairly good A.I. which can challenge new comers to the game and is a good way of getting acquainted with most of the unit types, and general gameplay. Multiplayer of course is where a game like this shines, as adapting to a human player’s differing strategies and changes of pace are where the real challenge and fun is. With the recent addition of leagues, and ranked play, you can easily lose hours to Boid.

Graphically Boid’s 2D graphics are simple, yet colourful and make it easy to identify unit types by their shape, as well as identify enemies. Winning and losing spawn points is shown graphically by quick flashes of light on the screen to give you a quick clue that you may need to investigate elsewhere. The submerged aquatic setting is full of life, and the lighting effects give great depth on what is otherwise a flat world.

Available now on the Steam Early Access program at a measly $3.29 CAD, Boid is a steal for anyone looking for an easy to pick up, but competitive RTS. One that is being well supported by the developer with regular updates and improvements.

Overall 8/10

Review: Evolve

Evolve is a truly “evolved” experience, pun intended. From the makers of Left 4 Dead, and Left 4 Dead 2, Turtle Rock Studio brings us a new genre of game with a focus on 4 on 1 combat. Although that initially sounds hard to balance, the developers have done a good job of creating a game that can sway in either direction based off of skill and not just numbers.

Landing on the planet Shear, Evolve’s primary gameplay revolves around a group of 4 player controlled hunters in search of an elusive, and also player controlled monster. The 4 class based hunters, which include fairly standard architects but with very unique abilities, include the medic, trapper, support, and assault classes. Each class has a unique set of skills and abilities which in tandem with the other hunters play a key role in both finding the beast hiding amongst Shear’s creative landscapes, as well as a variety of firepower and buffs to help take the aforementioned creature down before it can reach it’s third evolution and force a gameplay change where the hunters are now on the defense. This is where the core gameplay of Evolve shines. Early on the monster, either the hulking, grounded Goliath, to the flying electrically charged Kraken, or the stealthy Wraith can be easily cornered and killed by an experienced hunting team, however, a monster player with the right skill and patience can evade attack early on, and consume local wildlife in order to evolve and gain more health and abilities, in order to eventually gain enough strength to destroy it’s target, a centrally located power station, or the hunters themselves.

This slow shift of power throughout a match of Evolve, gives a very unique cat and mouse chase while both teams try to gain an advantage over the other. This gives a fun rush of adrenaline as you corner a level 1 monster and take him down, or adversely your patience pays off and you evolve to a level 3 monster and rain havoc on a group of hunters. The one restriction to this gameplay is a somewhat overwhelming reward system which forces you to play through each character and gather points in each weapon and ability before being able to unlock more hunters and monsters. Though this is generally done quickly as the hunters and you are usually using most of your skills throughout a match, leveling your monster requires more patience as you may be forced to use tactics you are not comfortable with. Great at taking down hunters with Goliath’s leap smash? Well too bad, you still have to level up your rock throw you always have trouble aiming before gaining access to Kraken. Depending on how often you are able to play, this slow release of new unlockables feels like it limits some of the game’s creative tactics as not all options are available to you early on.

Graphically the game is impressive on both consoles and the PC. Character models are solid, and the monsters’ rippling glowing skin, and earth shattering attacks are both fun to use and visually entertaining. The variety of terrain and fauna found on Shear adds not only to the visual but the gameplay as well, as several creatures and plants are hostile and can attack and kill both the hunters and the monster if you don’t mind your step. These additional features can also be used strategically to set up traps.

Although the game is obviously made for it’s multiplayer emphasis, it offers a single player mode, which allows players to get some practice in as either their monster or hunter of choice, and the AI is convincing enough to offer some challenge in the offline modes. There is also a surprising amount of extra modes beyond the basic hunt available both online and offline. This includes a find and destroy mission where hunters are tasked with locating 6 monster eggs and destroying them, while the Monster player defends, a tower defense style mode where the monster is given minions to attack a fortified base defended by hunters, as well as a 5 game series which gives the winning team new perks between each match that will greatly affect the gameplay moving into the next round. All of these extra modes give a lot of replayability and require the use of different tactics which keeps the game fresh.

Overall Turtle Rock Studios has provided another great multiplayer experience which benefits from its unique premise and setting, and with the promised regular addition of new hunters and monsters to play with should provide players a long term payout.

Overall 8.5/10