Tag: PC

Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War. hmmmmm

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War is a new action First Person Shooter game developed by ‘Treyarch‘ supported by ‘Raven Software‘ but published by ‘Activision‘. Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War is said to be coming out November 13th 2020 on the Xbox Series X, Xbox One, PS5, PS4 and PC. It’s another Call of Duty game. We know what to expect but let’s hope this one has something going on for us. Let’s take a look.

Let’s get this out of the way first. Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War is another call of duty game. Most gamers should know what to expect. We have literally zero excitement for this game. From what we have heard and seen from most call of duty fans is that they don’t really care about the story (campaign). Multiplayer is where it’s at and then secondary it’s zombies. We expect people trying to drop shot, camp with snipers, spam the meta gun and hop/ jump around corners. We just hope Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War has something that actually interests us.

Now concerning the campaign this is all the whole website had to say about. “players will come face-to-face with historical figures and hard truths, as they battle around the globe through iconic locales like East Berlin, Vietnam, Turkey, Soviet KGB headquarters, and more.” This is literally all what the ENTIRE WEBSITE said concerning the campaign. So it’s taking a bit of a historical turn and players can expect to hear some maybe famous names. We have checked out some campaign gameplay and it definitely looks good and actioned packed. We don’t believe all the levels will be like that one but it definitely makes you want to see more. Since players will be in different parts of the world, we can expect a variety of environments and therefore hopefully different combat styles of the enemies. After all the countries do not fight the same way. Ask Vietnam (reference, if you know it you know it. if not then shame on you).

The multiplayer is where it’s at. The multiplayer in Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War is similar to previous Call of Duty games which isn’t a bad thing at all. It works doesn’t it? Pick your weapon. The maps have loads of spots for hiding and cover. So the return of the campers. Sniper rifles are dangerous and off course can one shot you. The aiming feels easy right now. The beach level looks very cool. It has multiple levels, water, sand, boats, lights and it’s night time. Nice design from a visual perspective right now. Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War is sticking to it’s fast paced gameplay. Quick respawns and sadly even quicker to die. We’ve seen people spray someone and kill them within a second, not including headshots. If someone sees you and aims well, then expect death almost instantly. Not our style. You literally die so fast. So you can kill someone, then they know where you killed them from because of the death cam then you respawn so fast and could even respawn behind that person and get instant revenge. S far it’s standard Call of duty multiplayer. Nothing standing out. You can call in abilities and support, so make sure to earn those.

Zombies is back and that’s a good thing for Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War. If you don’t know what zombies is then basically you and a team (or alone) must try to survive against a horde of zombies. To overly simplify it. Zombies has some new stuff. For starters squads can be created across platforms and console generations. Not only that, you are awarded for playing as the battle pass is advanced through time spent in Zombies. Concerning the upgrades and perks, there is crafting of items and even field upgrades. Old one like speed cola and juggernog are here too. Now about those weapons. All weapons have a rarity system like Apex legends and Fortnite as in the more rare it is, the better the damage. Fan favourite weapons are here too so be proud of that fans. Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War will also have what’s described as “Cold Ear-era weapons”. We’ve seen some futuristic and wacky weapons in there. It’s cool and gives of a more relaxed less serious image to this mode. Be chill and have a good time.

We checked out some Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War gameplay and it’s what we expected. The multiplayer will be what all the videos and streams be about mostly. Zombies will be second and campaign last. It’s fast paced, looks great, lots of action and does what it says on the box. The only real problem is meta weapons in multiplayer. There’s one gun (we won’t say which) which is dominating the matches. We even saw a match where everyone except one person was using that gun on the opposing team. That says a lot. So glancing needs to be improved for sure.

Overall Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War looks like a very good game. We never said the game wasn’t good. Just doesn’t interest us at all and it’s multiplayer isn’t our style. There’s cool modes like VIP where you must kill the enemy teams VIP while guiding yours safely to extraction. Gets tactical. Graphics and sounds are great. The maps are very good and there’s some variety in this game. The developers ‘Treyarch’ with ‘Raven Software’ have done a good job with this game. We at X35 Earthwalker will have to see what Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War really got. Now Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War may have more action and speed but none of that matters in the presence of… the ‘Earth Walk!’

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Samurai Shodown. Swords sharpened

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

Samurai Shodown is a action fighting game developed and published by ‘SNK‘. Samurai Shodown isn’t a new game and has come out in 2019 on the Xbox One and PS4 and also 2020 on the Nintendo Switch and PC. Also game out on Stadia. Interestingly though it will come on the Xbox Series X BUT not the PS5 in 2020. This game is definitely flashy and about powerful battles. Let’s take a look.

Samurai Shodown takes place  between the events of Samurai Shodown V and the original game. Samurai Shodown is said to “carries on the legacy of the one true weapon-based fighter”. Simply put this is a fighter game like Street Fighter in the sense that it’s two characters on opposing sides of the screen and you use your attacks and whatever to bring the enemies life to zero. Off course this isn’t street fighter but something still very different. In Samurai Shodown it’s more about weapons like Soulcalibur but no 8 directional movement. The game being called samurai has an obvious theme. So expect swords, blades and flashy abilities.

Let’s talk a bit more about the fact that Samurai Shodown is coming to the Xbox Series X but not the PS5. We are seeing a number of games doing this. Develeopers are picking the Xbox Series X over PS5. Even one of the recent games we just wrote about called R-Type Final 2. A number of games are moving like this. On top of that. The Xbox Series X has been selling out like crazy in Japan. Japanese developers are going to be releasing games on the Xbox Series X and not PS5, especially thanks to Sony and it’s unnecessary censoring. Japan is a significant place when it comes to video games. It’s a fact that PlayStation, Sony is losing ground to Xbox, Microsoft. How many more nails is Xbox going to put into the PlayStation coffin?

We have never seen this game before so it’s new for us. We noticed that there’s mechanics around the weapons themselves. For example you can knock a player away from their weapon and off course they then are a much smaller threat, have limits and less range. This leads to certain tactics like knocking the enemy away from the weapon then backing off to get the weapon off screen or stand by their weapon and play keep away. It’s an interesting feature and reminds us off when Vega looses his claw knives in Street fighter.

We checked out some Samurai Shodown gameplay and it’s what we expected. There’s strange symbols, imagery, lots of flash and explosive moves. Weapons are the focus, a heavy theme and action, action, action. The characters don’t look that interesting to us though. No one stands out to us but the gameplay does. The special powerful moves get right to the point and does what you’d expect. It does look good and the background settings are very fitting and relevant to the Samurai theme.

Overall Samurai Shodown looks like another fighting game to us just having a mechanic that makes the game stand out but clearly still falls into the group. The graphics and visual aren’t impressive but possibly that could change with the next gen console Xbox Series X. It’s definitely flashy though. The developers ‘SNK’ has done an alright job. We know some gamers are looking forward to this. Now Samurai Shodown may have swords and flashy action but that’s all super dull when compared to the action of… the ‘Earth Walk!’

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R-Type Final 2. It’s gone crazy

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

R-Type Final 2 is a new side scrolling shooter game developed by ‘Granzella‘. R-Type Final 2 is said to be coming out in 2021 on the Xbox Series X, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, PS4 and PC. R-Type Final 2 definitely has something going for it. Side scrolling shooter games have a tough time standing out and a number of them are just too similar. Let’s take a look. 

Now we didn’t know anything about R-Type Final 2. We never heard of it. Even the story we aren’t sure of what’s going on. We do know that the main enemies in the R-Type are the Bydo. Humans are in a serious battle with the Bydo… for years. Simply put it’s man vs aliens with space battles and machines. Now that’s not the focus here. The focus is that you control big ships with mad firepower to destroy pretty much everything. So focus on that.

One of the main focuses on the R-Type Final 2 gameplay is to make players feel real good about destroying the enemies. There’s multiple weapons for clearly different purposes. There’s a charged up weapon that has piercing effect that flies through multiple enemies. Good for a line up. There are bombs for when extra damage is needed or just to clear out a group of them. Laser beams which have obvious purposes. There’s spiral based flaming attacks. There’s loads of weapons in R-Type Final 2 from what we have seen. 

Your weapons can be frontal or backwards which is a good feature. Games like this need loads of weapons, there needs to be a form of upgrade system. Some games do have this but something more is needed. R-Type Final 2 does try something that’s actually different. It seems like some levels have special conditions. There’s one stage that has decaying organisms. So new enemies are formed from the destroyed remains of other enemies. So basically as you play R-Type Final 2 you will face new and stronger enemies. Stage factors like this a good spin. 

Now the stages evolve as well. Off course players will be making changes to their fighters over time with different weapons and features. So the stage, enemies and fighters will be going through changes over time. What stands out to us more than any of that stuff in R-Type Final 2 is the ship designs. Like seriously look at them. There’s all sorts and types with some looking like living creatures. Technology has come a long way hasn’t it. 

We checked out some R-Type Final 2 gameplay and it’s what we expected for the most part. R-Type Final 2 brings a sense of progression as players will unlocked and develop new fighters of different types as they go through the game. Some ships (fighters) are clearly better for some levels than others because of their features. So it’s up to players to know what’s the best options for the situations ahead. We like the level of flashiness and explosives and special effects. Thos look amazing and the design of the aliens. We always respect creativity and we hope to see more unique and cool looking alien enemies. 

Overall R-Type Final 2 looks like a real good game for sure. There’s loads of action, unique and cool looking enemies, customisation, multiplayer is going to make R-Type Final 2 a serious game. Just being able to play with others is a big deal. The graphics of the ships, enemies and the visuals of the firing and attacks are very good. The developers have done a very good job with this game. We at X35 Earthwalker look forward to seeing what R-Type Final 2 will do. R-Type Final 2 may have loads of action but that action is real boring when compared to… the ‘Earth Walk!’

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Sword of the Necromancer. Solid combat

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

Sword of the Necromancer is a new dungeon crawler action role playing game developed by ‘Grimorio of Games‘ and published by ‘JanduSoft‘. Sword of the Necromancer is said to be coming out in the last quarter of 2020 on the Xbox Series X, Nintendo Switch, PS5 and PC. Sword of the Necromancer doesn’t look flashy but looks like solid action. Let’s take a look.

The story of Sword of the necromancer is actually quite simple. You are this dude called Tama. The girl you love is dead but you won’t leave her dead. So you do whatever it takes to bring her back. This apparently means acquiring the Sword of the Necromancer (the title by the way) and slaying enough monsters and even the necromancer himself to get enough soul power to bring Koko (the girl) back to life. We at X35 Earthwalker condemn the practice of necromancy, so don’t go grabbing death swords to bring back a loved one. You’ve been warned. 

Now just take one look at Sword of the necromancer and you already know what you are getting yourself into. It’s pixel graphics, you going through what looks like dungeons and you are swinging your sword at many foes. That’s all you need to know really, but there’s something more though. This sword, sword of the necromancer, has an unsurprising ability where the enemies you kill can be brought back to life under your control. You keep what you kill. So eventually you need to raise an army of monsters to help you destroy necromancer and the guardians.

Now it’s not just your sword that you will be wielding. The weapons are different and there are relics to acquirer to help you out. Also the weapons are random generated so you will get something different from your friend… or by pure chance you do get the same thing. The problem is you only have four item slots. So you can equip a monster you defeated to summon it against your enemies, or you can equip the bow and arrows or go for a giant axe, or maybe equip a shield which protects you from projectiles. There’s a whole lot of different combinations of resurrected monsters, relics or weapons. So get creative.

As you fight and defeat enemies you will level up. As you fight alongside the monsters you turned and summoned they will get stronger too. So there’s quite a bit of management to do. Levelling up is key as you need levels to improve your stats and upgrade. If you die (you will die… probably), you lose all your equipped weapons and monsters but keep half the levels you gained. On the other hand there may be opportunities for you to leave the dungeon. Doing this let’s you keep all your equipment but lose all your levels. So you need to take risks to become the ultimate killing machine. 

We checked out some Sword of the Necromancer gameplay and it’s what we expected. It’s nothing flashy or fancy. It’s your dungeon crawler, action game. A solid game at that with a cool new concept of turning defeated enemies into allies. This concept along will catch the attention of gamers. We like this concept and it makes you wonder what monsters you want to aim for, how useful they will be and who to spend time fighting alongside to level up. The pixel style works here and the designs look good. Work went into this game for sure. Again, nothing big or special but solid.

Overall we like what we see. It’s interesting and cool. Best of all Sword of the necromancer has local co-op. You can play with a buddy and face the dungeons together. Local co-op is just the best. You hear that Halo Infinite! MAKE SURE TO HAVE LOCAL CO-OP!!! Sorry readers we don’t know what came over us. *clears throat* The graphics are nice, the combat is solid and the options seem plentiful. This game just needs a bit more and some flair. The developers ‘Grimorio of Games’ have done a good job with this game. We at X35 Earthwalker will have to see what Sword of the Necromancer truly brings to the table. Now Sword of the Necromancer may have a great concept but it’s a dumb one compared to the creativity of… the ‘Earth Walk!’

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Hood: Outlaws & Legends. Not all outlaws are legends

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

Hood: Outlaws & Legends is a new multiplayer, action, stealth game developed by ‘Sumo Digital‘ and published by ‘Focus Home Interactive‘. Hood: Outlaws & Legends is said to be coming out in 2021 on the Xbox Series X, Xbox One, PS5, PS4 and PC. Hood: Outlaws & Legends is definitely doing something different concerning the concept. Let’s take a look.

Hood: Outlaws & Legends is set in a violent medieval place with an oppressive government. It’s being called a state. This place is crazy though as there are rebels, scum, thieves… basically outlaws out here and they are making some moves. Simply put, it’s Robin Hood. Hood: Outlaws & Legends is based on a rare concept that’s not easy to do right. There’s so many rival gangs and are trying to steal from the rich to give to the poor which will of course gain the support of the oppressed people. These gangs are competing against each other while off course the rich will want to protect what’s theirs too.

So it’s basically a three way battle in Hood: Outlaws & Legends. The guards of the rich/soldiers vs the players and their team vs other players and their team. That’s right. While you are sneaking around, assassinating soldiers and making your way to the goods. There are other players doing the exact same thing with their team. You might be hunting or being hunted. The treasure is right there and the area looks clear but they could be right there hiding. Waiting for you to turn your back. So it’s PvEvP. The game has a saying, “We are all outlaws… but some of us will become legends.” You need to prove you are the best. This concept does remind us of Hunt: Showdown. Hood: Outlaws & Legends is a fight but also a race.

Since Hood: Outlaws & Legends is also a stealth game and dangerous A.I enemies are around, you need a plan. It’s like trying to rob a big super secure bank (obviously not as difficult). Running through the front door scream with weapons out is a bad move for sure. Each character in your squad have their own skills and “mystical abilities”. So know your characters, know the situation and know what needs to be done and who ought to do it. Now when it comes to facing the other players, there’s where things will get loud. Think of it sort of like ‘For Honour’ where you need to judge your distance and timing very well to get the hits on your enemy and back off, evade etc. So mix it up out there.

There isn’t that much on Hood: Outlaws & Legends. The concept and past games tells you everything you need to know. It’s a team based game for the most part. Whether you need a group of friends or if there’s matchmaking, we don’t know. So pick your character, have your team, sneak around towards the objective, take out guards and get the goods. Most likely running into the other teams of players. How many teams per match or world, we don’t know either. Just prepare for a fight. 

We checked out the Hood: Outlaws & Legends trailer and it gives a good idea of what to expect and it’s what we expected. It’s definitely more brutal than we thought though. There appears to be executions of some sort. Weapons with special effects, possibly stuns. Not clear if there’s a penalty for losing an ally. Is there permalinks death? Who knows.

Overall Hood: Outlaws & Legends looks like an alright game for now. It has potential to be much better and very good but only when we see more. The concept is rare and difficult to pull off. There’s many factors. The developers ‘Sumo Digital’ have done an alright job so far. We at X35 Earthwalker will have to see what Hood: Outlaws & Legends becomes. Now Hood: Outlaws & Legends may have a brutal battle of outlaws but those outlaws are just children in comparison to… the ‘Earth Walk!’  

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Immortals: Fenyx Rising. The god’s hope

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

Immortals: Fenyx Rising is a new open world action adventure game developed by ‘Ubisoft Québec‘ and published by ‘Ubisoft‘. Immortals: Fenyx Rising is said to be coming out the 3rd of December 2020 on the Xbox Series X, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, Stadia, PS5, PS4 and PC. Immortals: Fenyx Rising is looking like a big mythological adventure. Let’s take a look. 

The story in Immortals: Fenyx Rising is quite simple. The greek gods are in trouble (again). This time their powers are getting nerfed and sealed away (being sealed away was stated in the trailer). Not only that, ‘Typhon’ who is the deadliest titan in greek mythology is rolling up to the gods. It’s about to be a full fledge war against weakened gods. The gods will lose. Their last hope is now a “new winged demigod” called ‘Fenyx’. She’s going to save the greek gods and prevent the ‘dark curse’. It’s going to be an epic battle for sure.

Immortals: Fenyx Rising right from the start gives of a friendly look and feeling. This also makes sense as it’s coming to Nintendo Switch too. Some people have compared the graphic style to Fortnite which is a compliment as loads of people played that game and it was incredibly successful. This would suggest that Immortals: Fenyx Rising will have a family friendly design and pretty much all gamers are welcome. This is a good move though, as the bigger the target audience, the more potential gamers. The graphic style overall looks very good. 

Speaking of graphics, just check out the Immortals: Fenyx Rising world. It’s large, after all it is open world. The world is huge, colourful and got a lot going on. There are large creatures just minding their own business. Structures and completely different environments. There’s civilised areas, wilderness, plains, tall mountains, rocky canyon like area and forests. There’s also what looks like a volcanic area too. So there’s clearly a lot of variety here and places to explore and fight in. This would also suggest that there’s a variety of enemies to face, based on their environment. There is a confirmed 7 different regions.

There is character customisation in Immortals: Fenyx Rising. You don’t need to play as Fenyx. You can change up your character with good levels of customisation. You can change skin colour, markings on the face, hair colour, male female are what’s clear so far. You can find a bunch of amour and equipment which unlike some games you actually see your character wearing the armour and wielding the equipment. That’s cool.   

We checked out some Immortals: Fenyx Rising gameplay and it’s not exactly what we expected. You can fly, which is like one of the best mobilities ever. You can get and form some serious god type weapons too. Get giant mallets, fire arrows and use god powers. Fight in the air, melee on the ground, dodge and react to giant monsters and fast foes. There’s wide open spaces and numerous abilities to use to your advantage to create combos, and even launch foes. The combat is looking quite free style and good substance. Now one thing that should be clear is that our character is incredibly powerful. You can defeat and sash enemies with almost no problem. The enemies do come off as too simple so far. This game isn’t anything crazy though as you know what to expect overall. For example if you look at that game ‘breath of the wild’ it’s similar in the sense that there’s a big world, travel around, face monsters, some too strong, reach areas, enter places, solve puzzles upgrade your character and get new stuff. Immortals: Fenyx Rising does this well from what we have seen.  

Overall Immortals: Fenyx Rising is looking like a good game so far. Colourful, relaxed and big action. There’s got to be collectibles, secrets and more all around the world. The flying is cool though but the puzzles are looking real advanced and cool We saw a laser area where you have to fly through and avoid the lasers. The graphics and sounds look real good, the environments look real diverse. The developers ‘Ubisoft Québec’ are doing a very good job so far. We at X35 Earthwalker look forward to seeing what else is happening with Immortals: Fenyx Rising. Now Immortals: Fenyx Rising may have gods and titans but those two are complete jokes if they faced… the ‘Earth Walk!’

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Xbox is currently winning… by far

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker
 

Xbox recently announced the design and price of their newest next gen console, Xbox Series S. So know gamers get a choice between the Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S. After all, gamers like having options. This new smaller console has not only sealed Xbox’s victory over the competition but also extended how far they are ahead. We will talk about this here. So fan boys (especially playstation and PC) drop the emotions and get logical. Be mature about this. Let’s take a look.

Let’s clear up the most basic subject first, the games, or should we say exclusives. Sadly and not surprisingly many gaming websites and so called reviewers fail this section due to them not being smart or honest. Xbox Series X has lots of exclusives. You can call them console exclusives if you want but exclusive none the less as gaming consoles like PS5 and Nintendo Switch won’t have them. Let’s make this clear again. PC is not a console. It isn’t an gaming console. Go on the internet now, type in consoles. All we saw was new and old consoles like Nintendo 64, Xbox’s. Playstation etc. No PC! We kept scrolling down and dow but no PCs. So a game that’s on the Xbox but also on PC is still an Xbox exclusive.

The argument back in the during the Xbox One and PS4 days was that Xbox didn’t have exclusives while PlayStation did. First of all Xbox did have exclusives just not big named ones, secondly not anymore. Xbox Series X has over 20 exclusives. 22 to be exact that we know off. PS5 currently has revealed 9. So Xbox Series X has over twice as many exclusives coming as PS5. That’s a huge difference. These exclusives are big names too. We have written about the majority of them. The names will also be links. They are: Halo Infinite, Second extinction, Call of the sea, The ascent, Scorn,  Bright memory, The medium, New genesis phantasy star online 2, Hellblade 2, Grounded, avowed, Forza: Motorsport, State of decay 3, Psychonauts 2, Stalker 2, Everwild, Warhammer 40000: dark tide, Tetris effect: connected, The Gunk, CrossfireX, Fable, Exomecha. Now that’s a lot. There’s also lots of gamers who wants to play these games. It’s also a variety of genres too. Racing – Forza: Motorsport. First person shooter – Halo Infinite, Second extinction, ExoMecha. Exploration (also adventure) – Call of the Sea. Cartoony-ish (also adventure) design but – Psychonauts 2, The Gunk. Horror – The Medium. Top down shooter – The Ascent. Etc etc. Simply put, there’s lots of options here. 22 > 9. Since we checked out and wrote about majority of these games, 16/22, we can confirm that they are great games with some looking real special. 

Now we already talked about the build of the consoles in another post. Clearly Xbox Series X is stronger and you can expect better visuals and graphics. We think PS5 will have better load times though. Xbox Series X will have faster load times too but PS5 will just be faster than that so it’s not the biggest deal at all. Power, graphics, visuals > Load time. No contest. What Xbox is also winning at is price. Xbox Series X and the Xbox Series S are prices respectively at $500 and $300 so £380 and £230 (we care about and include the UK readers). Now that’s amazing. PS5 price hasn’t been announced but they can’t go lower than that without making a huge loss. Xbox can afford this loss though. Last time we checked Microsoft has WAY more money than Sony. So we can assume that the PS5 will be more expensive or possibly match the price of the Xbox Series X. That’s just the X though. Remember the Xbox Series S? Xbox has stated that the Xbox Series S has: Custom 512 GB NVME SSD, powered by Xbox Velocity Architecture, Faster load times, Steadier frame rates, quick resume for multiple games, ultra low latency, all digital gaming experience, 1440P at up to 120FPS, 4K upscaling for games, DirectX Raytracing, Variable Rate Shading, Variable Refresh Rate. So it’s still a beastly console for sure just smaller but obviously the Xbox Series X is better. It’s just a great second if you can’t afford the main big thing.  

Continuing the topic of price this is also where Xbox beats PC. PC has officially lost their advantage. The silly so called pc master race idiots use to say you save money on games and stuff like that and that PC has the best performance. One thing at a time. First of all you know what’s better than getting games at a discount… getting games for free. With Xbox game pass ultimate you can literally just download games (not own) and start playing the full game. We literally got some awesome games for free (the game pass ultimate obviously has a monthly cost) and dive into them. Free > discount. All day everyday. Also being on the same pass has it’s own perks too (check their website for full information) including discounts for buying games. So yeah you save money with Xbox Series X (game pass ultimate)… not PC. Now concerning performance. Well if you check the specs of the Xbox Series X and PS5, they easily match PC (the high end ones) and the Xbox Series X might even be better. 12 teraflops, 4K gaming and 8K ready, up to 120 FPS all for £380 or $500!! How much does it cost to build those super high end gaming PCs? What’s that? Stop mumbling under your breath. Louder! Oh, over 1000! Some sources are saying $1920 – $2070! Another saying $1500. Another saying $2000. You get the point. The Xbox Series X matches high end PCs while only costing $500! With your high end $1500 PC you could buy three Xbox Series Xs or buy one and buy all the games they plan to release. You could buy one for you and your sibling with fancy controllers. You could buy one for the master, one for the dame and one for the little boy who lives down the lane. So who’s saving money? Consoles. that’s who. PC has been dethroned. Facts.

Now to put the nail in the coffin. xCloud. We wrote about this before. Simply put you can play your games like Minecraft, Halo, Ori and the will of the wisps, Sea of thieves and much much more on your phone or tablet. So you could play on the bus, in the park at your aunties house etc. xCloud makes Xbox the most versatile platform too. At the end of the day it’s still options for the gamers. We are going to try out cloud gaming with Xbox to see for ourselves how it feels. This what if someone is using the TV then we can still game. Can be useful. If you want more information you can check their website.

Sad we have to explain this again but quickly, yes most of the game son Xbox will also be on Windows. Why? Who owns windows? Microsoft. Who owns Xbox? Microsoft. So from a business perspective it makes no sense to put your games on one and no the other. They want to earn money. So that’s how it’s going to be. most xbox games will be on PC. PC isn’t a console. 

Let’s sum up here. Xbox has the price advantage over both PlayStation and PC concerning the consoles AND the games. Xbox Series X will have 22 exclusives while PS5 will have 9. Xbox Series X will have the best or joint best performance with PC (the super high end ones only) in terms of graphics and visuals. If you take price into account then Xbox Series X easily better than PC. Xbox also has xCloud to allow the playing of games on portable devices like phones and tablets, so they have versatility advantage too. So price (games and consoles), exclusives, versatility, deals all goes to Xbox. So yes Xbox is currently winning… by far. No more master race nonsense and PlayStation needs to up their game. Let us know what you think. Now the Xbox Series X may be the most powerful console but it’s still too weak when compared too… the ‘Earth Walk!’    

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Halo Infinite. What we want to see

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

Halo Infinite is the game that so many many people have been waiting for. It’s a First Person Shooter looking like an open world game developed by ‘343 Industries‘ and published by ‘Xbox Game Studios‘. Halo Infinite is coming out on 2021 on the Xbox Series X, Xbox One and Windows 10 PC. Halo Infinite has so much potential that it’s crazy. There’s so much room for the good stuff to make this the best game of the year easily. So here we will just talk about what we want to see but we won’t give away everything. Let’s take a look.

Now as the universes ultimate strategist and easily the most intelligent gamer ever, X35 Earthwalker knows what he is talking about is is the most authoritative. Off course we like to hear from you guys so let us know what you think. First things first, Halo Infinite has dropped huge hints of open world. We are convinced that it’s open world and if you want to see our first G-blog post on Halo Infinite then use the link here. Hall is one of those games who can easily make their game open world. Look at the previous halo games and check out those levels where you ride a warthog through the mission and there are trees, structures, rocks etc and you can see how Halo is capable of exploration. When you look at the map in Halo Infinite, just imagine it bigger. Imagine being able to eventually explore the entire Halo ring. After all the Halo ring is basically a planet.

Open world is just the start. The next thing that we want Halo Infinite to have is wildlife. We mentioned this in out first blog post about Halo Infinite. Halo Reach had large animals that can attack and kill you in the night mission with the spartan Jun. Those things were cool but so easy to kill. Halo Infinite showed deer or antlers. We need the wildlife yes as it adds to the environment. After all Halo is a massive planet sized ring. Surely there has to be bears, sharks, insects etc. Bring them in. Imagine killing the banished in the area but you take cover to regain your shields but a bear comes out from behind and one shots you. Scary ain’t it? Hold up though. This is Halo as in the 26th century… the future. Bring in some alien advanced looking animals too. Bring in beasts with large forearms and tusks. Animals that clearly aren’t from earth. Get creative! We want to see a dangerous but passive sand worm thing that you can detect through the rumble of your controller or headphones and you have to stay out of its path or its instant death. 

Another thing we do want to see… is the return of warzone. Warzone is the best game mode in Halo history in our opinion. It’s the perfect representation of a war. You could get ran over by a ghost, a dude snipe your head of with a sniper rifle, or a guy with a sword with three speed boosts running around. Anything can happen, like in a war. It forces players to react, adapt and deal with the constantly changing situations that happen. You think you are safe with Nornfang but then you get assassinated, robbed and tea bagged by a guy who is invisible thanks to active camouflage. Warzone is an excellent mode which does need some adjustments though for Halo Infinite. Warzone is crazy. So they need certain limits of the number of vehicles a team can have, the req weapons be split into tiers and thus make it easier to limit and manage. 

The next thing we want to see in Halo Infinite is a Battle Royale. Hate on it all you want but if there is any game that has the universe, design and right to do a battle Royale… it’s Halo. Look at the view of the land and level in Halo Infinite during the lift segment of the gameplay trailer. It looks perfect for a battle Royale. Imagine a huge map with mountains, grass, forests etc, someone is high up on. A Spartan on a hill with a sniper rifle trying to snipe but there’s someone with an active camouflage sneaking up behind them. Or someone with a banshee flying around looking for the right moments to strike but a player finds a rocket launcher that has homing capabilities goes to take him down. Imagine maybe 100 players. Everyone starts with the assault rifle. There are loot drops in the form of ODST style pods. Boosts to your shields can be found, armour abilities like active camp, sprint and even hard light shield or even bring back armour lock can be found but have limited uses like twice or whatever depending on how strong the ability is. Maybe each player can earn a respawn depending on the number of kills they acquire like killing 1 person gains a respawn but then need 5 kills to earn a second respawn. When respawning you can pick within a radius of where you died that you can ODST drop back in. It’s possible here. 

That’s some of the things we want to see in Halo Infinite and will make the game much better. Make it open world, bring in wild life, bring back modes like warzone and even breakout and do Battle Royale. This is just some of the stuff we want to see in Halo Infinite. Simply put, 343 Industries should not be afraid to try new things. Halo Infinite is being called “the most ambitious Halo game ever made” and even “the most expansive Master Chief campaign yet”. They need to live up to these. Get ambitious. Now X35 Earthwalker is excited for Halo Infinite. We will keep an eye on this game and see what happens. Now Halo Infinite may have all the potential but it’s nothing special when compared to… the ‘Earth Walk!’

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Inmost. Dark, atmospheric and action

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

Inmost is a horror puzzle platformer game developed by ‘Hidden Layer Games‘ and published by ‘Chucklefish‘. Inmost came out on Nintendo Switch, iMac and PC. Inmost isn’t our type of game . It’s pixel styled and very simple controls. It did catch out attention at some point we can tell it is very good. Let’s take a look. 

Inmost is quite simple to understand. It’s a dark, sad world with danger. You play as three different characters: A knight, a stranger and a little girl but yet their stories are interconnected. The story isn’t suppose to be pleasant. There’s a warning on their website which says, “player discretion is advised. INMOST is an intimate story of loss and hope that some may find upsetting.” That should tell you quite a lot. You see. little girl get neglected, mistreated, afraid, bad dad, she cut herself and the mum didn’t care at all. Abuse, kidnapped children, a cursed knight, etc. This game is dark but the monsters are darker. This is a shorter game as it’s been described as something you are suppose to play and finish in one go on a dark stormy night. 3-5 hours long. 

When you play as the little girl it’s the heaviest with narrative and story driven. There’s no actual enemy or danger but just figuring out what needs t be done. You may need to move a table or chair. Carry certain things around the house. You even play hide and seek with a toy who thew girl has conversations with. You see her pain and what she goes through. With the stranger it’s the main part of the game. You platform, move around, evade hazards and dangerous creatures, you climb, collect items, cut away tall grass, break down weak walls, mine things, break down wooden structures and use your wits and to defat your enemies and survive. The knight is the action part of the game. You actually aren’t defenceless. You can slash and destroy your enemies easily, dash, grapple around etc. As the knight you are powerful and can take a hit before dying. Three different styles. 

The game is very silent for the most part which is a type of atmosphere still. Your footsteps and pulling stuff and interactions with environment are louder than anything else. So when something actually happens it acts as an alarm, alerting the player to take action. Some dangers are just like traps, a tentacle on the ceiling while others are small dark substances on the ground waiting for you to walk over it. Then there’s real threats like real monsters that pop up and chase you down. Dangerous and very hostile. You can beat them as the stranger and need to hide, out climb, duck and outsmart them. Players will need to think fast and do the right things to survive. It is a simple game at the end of the day with move, jump and action. It’s simple but very well done. Sounds, lighting, music and different play styles work well together. Not everything is consistent though like with the girl voice narrating the first section of the knight. You don’t hear her again until much later.

We checked out some Inmost gameplay and what it says on the box is what you are getting. It is dark as in there will be candles, fire, lights with some stuff you can’t see yet. Very atmospheric as most of the time things are quiet and your actions, movement are the loudest things in the game. Horror well the game itself isn’t scary but there are shadow and monsters of darkness that are real aggressive and jump out to get you. Thinking is needed to get through the area, and evade death and there is definitely platforming. Expecting climbing, jumping, moving stuff etc. The game is very simple to understand and it’s almost always clear what you have to do. The music or lack off does act to the atmopshere. The story was very predictable though even though they didn’t well to add emotions, sadness and disaster. The story connects up concerning the three characters you play in the game.  

Overall Inmost is a good game. It does what it said it would do, provides different styles of gameplay through the characters, a variety of enemies, dangers and even threats you will have to face later. Players have to be focused when playing and get strategic at times. Inmost’s graphics for a pixel style game is excellent. The music is very well done and adds to the experience. We didn’t get scared or emotional at all though so it failed there for us. The developers ‘Hidden Layer Games’ have done a very good job with this game. It something a number of gamers would get into. We at X35 Earthwalker  like this game and know it’s good even though it isn’t our style or our thing. Inmost may be telling a dark sad story but it has no effect on… the ‘Earth Walk!’

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Forza: Motorsport. Some real racing

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

Forza: Motorsport is the new Forza game developed by ‘Turn 10 Studios‘ and published ‘Xbox Game Studios‘. Forza: Motorsport hasn’t much information on when it’s coming out but we know it’s going to be coming out on Xbox Series X and Windows 10 PC. Forza: Motorsport was one of those games that stood out to us from the Xbox Showcase 2020. Let’s take a look.

Forza: Motorsport stood out for one reason only. The visuals. Off all the games being displayed at the Xbox Showcase, Forza: Motorsport visually looked the best of all of them. Everything they showed was declared as “footage captured in-engine”. What’s typical and very biased of many streamers and youtubers who reacted to the Xbox Showcase they lacked the skill and ability to notice this about Forza: Motorsport in the showcase. X35 Earthwalker clearly being greater and better than all of them noticed this and took the visuals into account. Racing games are basically the same at this point. Especially those who want realistic looking ones.

It’s harder to stand out in the racing game genre. You have V-Rally 4, WRC8, need for speed Payback, 2020 F1 etc which all went for a high graphics realistic looking game. Sure they have some differences and racing styles but you get the point and what the common denominator is. What really catches the eyes though is off course the visuals. That’s what it looks like Forza: Motorsport is aiming for. Their official announcement trailer which is embedded below showed the most impressive, visually, racing game ever. Now off course we have to wait for straight up actual gameplay graphics but if what we saw is truly all in-engine then the hopes can be quite high. After all it has the power and backing of the Xbox Series X. 

Forza Motorsport is going to need to do more than just racing across tracks with high speed because we’ve got that already. It shouldn’t just be about the graphics. What modes will there be, will the ‘career mode’ actually be interesting. What features will be there to shake things up. Last time we had that rewind ability which was excellent and gave the game a big stand out factor and something cool, for players to use to their advantage. So Forza Motorsport… what do you have for us this time. We aren’t feeling racing games right now. So give us a reason to want to care. We are impressed with the visuals but that ain’t enough. Bring the action!!

Forza Motorsport has the legendary green badge. You know what this means: “Games built using the Xbox Series X development kit are designed to take advantage of the unique capabilities of the Xbox Series X. They will showcase unparalleled load times, visuals, responsiveness and frame rates up to 120 FPS.” The Xbox website has also declared it will be 4K ultra HD and HDR. So it’s reasonable to have high expectations for visuals and graphics.

Other from what was in the trailer there isn’t that much to go on concerning Forza Motorsport. It’s a racing game with so far the best graphics and visuals. Yet it’s another racing game going for the realistic approach. We truly hope there’s more.

Overall Forza Motorsport is looking real good for now. The developers ‘Turn 10 studios’ are working on it. We at X35 Earthwalker will have to wait and see what happens. Now Forza Motorsport may have high level graphics but it looks like trash when compared to… the ‘Earth Walk!’

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