December 4, 2015

2nd Annual Game Awards Report

Posted on December 4, 2015 by Fionna Schweit

Last night was the second annual Game Awards, with a full line up of presenters, world game premiers, and musical acts.  Most people probably came for the world premieres, of which there were several.  Included were: Where the Water Tastes Like Wine, Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End, Shaq-Fu: A Legend Reborn, a Telltale Games Batman title, Far Cry Primal, Psychonauts 2, Quantum Break, Rock Band VR, Shadow Complex Remastered, Rocket League‘s Xbox One release, Star Citizen, and The Walking Dead: Michonne.

This is of course also an awards show so here is a list of winners and some of my reactions from the event:

GAME OF THE YEAR: The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt (CD Projekt Red/Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment) – The polish studio behind The Witcher 3 really cleaned up this year, taking home several big awards. I guess I need to play it, since it was really off my radar since it’s a seriously large game that takes so much investment. Im not surprised this happened with the scale and scope, but it did have to beat out Fallout 4 and MGS:V

DEVELOPER OF THE YEAR: CD Projekt Red – Ok I was surprised at this, I haven’t had a chance to play The Witcher 3 yet, but I know it’s a huge beautiful game, but I thought with two huge games this year Nintendo was a for sure this one.

BEST INDEPENDENT GAME: Rocket League (Psyonix) – This one actually kind of disappointed me, the other choices were Axion Verge, Her Story, Ori and the Blind forest and Undertale. All of which I think have better story since well Rocket League doesn’t have a story. There are way too many indie games for this award to work, like did anyone consider Besiege, or Honey pop  (ok that’s a joke). The guys at Psyonix deserve this for sure but I think its hard to nail this category since it just has so many things.

BEST MOBILE/HANDHELD GAME: Lara Croft Go (Square Enix Montreal/Square Enix) – Ok this one was hands down going to Laura Croft go, no questions. If you haven’t checked it out do so. The only real competitor here was maybe the Vault game from Bethesda but the two are super different.

BEST NARRATIVE: Her Story (Sam Barlow) – Her story is not a game that I played, or even heard about at all before this awards show, I honestly disagree with this one it should have been Life is Strange, which I adored.

BEST ART DIRECTION: Ori and the Blind Forest (Moon Studios/Microsoft Studios) – Not surprised here, the bright color pallet and whimsical imagery win this one over the darker tones of most modern AAA games.

BEST SCORE/SOUNDTRACK: Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain (Ludvig Forssell, Justin Burnett, Daniel James/Kojima Productions) – Get what you pay for here, MGS:V was a great game, with amazing visuals, great sound, and a story that mostly did a good job, a well-deserved win here.

BEST PERFORMANCE: Viva Seifert (Her Story) – Other than the presenter confusing the game that won this award, I found myself again surprised that a game that was so under the radar cleaned up so well. I’m sure Viva’s performance was brilliant and this win means I need to check out Her Story for sure.

GAMES FOR CHANGE: Life is Strange (Dontnod Entertainment/Square Enix) – At least Life is Strange gets the nod here, I can’t help but think this is mostly because the main protagonist is a member of the LGBT community and thus the game focuses on some of those issues, but it’s nice to see the shout out.

BEST SHOOTER: Splatoon (Nintendo EAD Group No. 2/Nintendo) – I am so glad this won. Splatoon is one of the best games of this year, and I am really glad to see it receive recognition for what it is an amazing multiplayer shooter.

BEST ACTION/ADVENTURE GAME: Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain (Kojima Productions/Konami) – Glad to see that Metal Gears Open world playground gets this award. The game is amazing, and if you haven’t played it go do it, that’s all I can say.

BEST ROLE-PLAYING GAME: The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt (CD Projekt Red/Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment) – Another win for the polish CD Projekt Red, since this was one of the only major RPGs to come out this year I wasn’t super surprised.

BEST FIGHTING GAME: Mortal Kombat X (NetherRealm Studios/Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment) *Disclaimer I know nothing about fighting games* Iv played this game at the arcade, and it’s a pretty game, but its also the only AAA fighter released this year, so the win is a gimme.

BEST FAMILY GAME: Super Mario Maker (Nintendo EAD Group No. 4/Nintendo) – Seeing Nintendo getting the shout outs at a major game awards show still feels really odd to me, but this has been an amazing year for Nintendo,

BEST SPORTS/RACING GAME: Rocket League (Psyonix) – there are other sports racing games?

BEST MULTIPLAYER: Splatoon (Nintendo EAD Group No. 2/Nintendo) – This one I kinda disagree with, there were other great multiplayer games this year, and while Splatoon was the most original I don’t think it was the best and most polished. I really liked the idea of MGS:V winning this for Metal Gear online, but it didn’t happen.

MOST ANTICIPATED GAME: No Man’s Sky (Hello Games) – Can we stop giving the award to this game please? I get it ok, people want No Man’s sky, and have since they announced it like 4 years ago.

ESPORTS PLAYER OF THE YEAR: Kenny “KennyS” Schrub (Counter-Strike: Global Offensive/Team EnVyUs) – This was a surprise to me, and it was less surprising than the next win.
ESPORTS TEAM OF THE YEAR: Optic Gaming – woah, surprised here, expected this to be a League Team or at least DOTA2.
ESPORTS GAME OF THE YEAR: Counter-Strike: Global Offensive (Valve) – this is a given since its getting its own League on cable TV. With the annoucment that we will be getting a show on TBS on Friday nights and with over a million dollars up for grabs, CS:GO is going to win this no problem.

TRENDING GAMER:  Greg Miller – who? Sorry but I have no idea who that is, honestly and I watch a lot of YouTube.  Props to greg for the win, guess I know who he is now.

BEST FAN CREATION: Portal Stories: Mel (Prism Studios) – this flew under the radar, but it was really an amazing fan creation, playing portal again really made me happy and honestly made me wish for another portal game.

And that’s about that. The awards are still run by Geoff Keighkey and this year the aestitic shifted from spikes MAN MAN MAN style of last year, over to a cyber-styling that I really enjoyed. Also of note was Hideo Kojimas absence, apparently due to a legal issue with his (fromer?) employer Konami. Geoff called out Konami on how they were treating their golden goose. This was graet to hear. There was also a major tribute (like 15 minutes) to Satoru Iwata who’s genius is one of the major reasons Nintendo exits as a game company today.

There was also a huge packed line up of game trailers, premiers and additional information about already out games, take a look at all the video content below the drop

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Is Konami holding Hideo Kojima hostage?

Posted on December 4, 2015 by Fionna Schweit

Last night at the game awards Geoff Keighley leveled some fairly heavy accusations at Konami who reportedly did not “allow” Hideo Kojima to come to Los Angelos to accept the award that his game Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain won. Geoff did not mince words, calling out Konami for not allowing Kojima to come to the Game Awards in LA.

““Mr. Kojima had every intention of being with us tonight,” Keighley said during the proceedings, via Gematsu. “But unfortunately, he was informed by a lawyer representing Konami just recently that he would not be allowed to travel to tonight’s awards ceremony to accept any awards. “He’s still under an employment contract, it’s disappointing, and it’s inconceivable to me that an artist like Hideo would not be allowed to come here and celebrate with his peers and his fellow teammates.”

This adds to the ever growing pile of drama between Hideo and his former (or current?) studio Konami. Earlier this year and directly after the the release of MGS:V Kojima was reportly “dismissed” and a small party was held in honor of his departure. Konami later denied that this had ever happened, but it seemed like the horse was already out of the barn. While convincing evidence emerged in October that Kojima had left the company shortly after the release of The Phantom Pain, Konami denied the reports.

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Kojima is much beloved for his Metal Gear franchise and has been publishing in the game industry since the early 90’s. His departure from Konami would be to say the least a major shake up.

 

 

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The Overwatch beta is coming to an end

Posted on December 4, 2015 by Fionna Schweit

Overwatch is game that everyone wants to play, but very few have access to. It seems Blizzard has decided that even those few are too many to play its FPS-MOBA hybrid, and they will be shutting off their (currently up) beta servers next week. The beta servers have been up for about a month and a half and included one (semi)open weekend of play for many players, but the rest of the time were restricted to a small group of beta testers who were given access. You can read all about Overwatch oonn our site here but the long and short of it is that we liked what we saw, and cant wait for another chance to play it! The Beta is scheduled to end at 9AMPST on Decemver 10th, one week from today, the forums will stay open until December 18. There will be no new waves of players added untill the 10th, and players that are already in will not be kicked out. Blizzard also plans to add more players after it relaunches, but this is a blizzard game so most of what we know is vague and eventaully type of information.

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Blizzards  said in the announcement. “Since the start of the Overwatch beta in late October, aspiring heroes from around the world have battled it out in more than 900,000 matches. In this same period of time, we’ve also gathered invaluable information about our servers, core systems like matchmaking, and overall map and hero balance—thanks not only to the raw data we’ve collected from the game, but also to the numerous bug reports, suggestions, critiques, and experiences you’ve shared,” “This phase of development has been key, but now it’s time to analyze the data we have, dig into your feedback even further, and put that knowledge to use as best we can.”

PC game did a great video on why overwatch is not free to play which I really liked, it featured several developers and explained in detail why the game simply would not work as a free to play game you can watch it here

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Steam adds game deletion option

Posted on December 4, 2015 by Fionna Schweit

Many people find themselves regretting a spur of the moment steam purchase, knowing that that game will stay in the see-through grey text of a game that is not installed taking up space for the rest of time you have a Steam account. No more, Steam will now allow users to delete games. This option while it may seem frivolous is huge for many people who like to keep extremely organized and not have large gaps in their Steam library. I mean, how many of us have literally 100 uninstalled games we have 0 hours playing? Just me? oh…. well if like me you just cant resist a good sale this new feature might be a much wanted one.

The new feature was discovered by a Neogaf user  and seems to functional right now. Removing games is a simple matter of choosing Help, Steam Support, selecting the offending game and banishing it into oblivion with the button labelled “I want to permanently remove this game from my account”. This is a far cry for the pervious method of even attempting to have games removed from the list which involved a ticket to steam support and a lot of hope and crying.

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TRON Run/r is now available in early access!

Posted on December 4, 2015 by Fionna Schweit

The neon highlighted world of Tron is coming back to your computer. During last nights game awards there was a commercial featuring a bunch of awesome looking Tron Run/r game play. We dont know much about the “action arcade” title so far, but its TRON people! Neon! Shiny! Light Cycles! Flynn! In case you cant tell I absolutely love the Tron its neon accented world, the idea of it being in the silicone of computer chips, i find it all fascinating. So when ever Disney (current IP holder) shouts TRON, I tend to shout SHUT UP AND TAKE MY MONEY.

The game is in early access right now, and although the trailer didnt show much still images show a flying man (remember those flying suits from TRON: Legacy?) Light cycles, and a Neon accent feast for the eyes. So im in! So far the games page just says “Kevin Flynn…he is a legend. Space Paranoids, TRON the whole deal. The man came up with so many ideas. The world needs to see them. See what they tried to hide. So much unseen for so long. Here it is. The truth. RUN PROGRAM! More to come.”

Feast your eyes on a couple of stills below to get the general idea, I see a multiplier, and a score, so im thinking calssic arcade style racing game with different vehicles. What ever they do it better have Disks of TRON in it!

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