Hello
Just another update, I won't be able to post any more game reviews for a while, due to my busy schedule, hopefully on my next holiday I should be able to post some more reviews.
Jonesy's Video Game Reviews
Reviews of past and present games
Saturday 20 September 2014
Monday 25 August 2014
Tomodachi Life Review
Tomodachi Life Review
After
spending countless hours playing Mario Kart 7 and Animal crossing, in which I
started to get bored of Animal Crossing (been playing it for 70 hours) I
decided it was time to find another game to play, it wasn’t long until I saw my
friend playing a game called “Tomodachi Life”, my first reaction was “not
another Sims game” however I quickly changed my mind when I saw how random and
funny the game was. After a quick decision I bought the game, anyway enough of
me rambling on, let’s get to the review.
Let’s talk
about the game, the game is set on an island inhabited by “Mii’s” which are the
avatars of the Wii and 3DS, you get to name your island, I named mine after my
favourite film Jaws, which is called “Amity
Island”, you than import your Mii over and it becomes the main Mii of the
island, you can customize your characters voice, your personality etc. You than
have to create other Mii’s, which can also be imported through the Mii
creation, scanned through QR codes from friends or the internet (I found a few
celebrities, like Stan Lee, Lana Del Ray, Joel off The Last Of Us) or created
through the town hall building on the island. Once the Mii’s have been created
you can give them food, clothes and gifts, which can level up the Mii depending
on if they liked it, once your Mii levels up you can give them a gift, ranging
from a Wii U to a Guitar or pocket money. Once you have imported or created you
Mii’s you will notice that the island only has a few buildings/lots later on in
the game you can unlock all of them by doing certain challenges like getting
married, helping Mii’s or just by having
a certain amount of Mii’s on the island, buildings/lots can range from a
theme park to a camping site, most of these buildings/lots serve as events,
like BBQ’s, markets etc, let’s just say they all serve as a purpose in the game.
Much like
the Sims Mii’s can talk to each other, fight each other, get married and have
children, you can send children off to become adventure, however you can’t
control the Mii’s, you can only give them advice or guidance, like if a Mii
wants to befriend another Mii or if he/she loves another Mii, the game can be
random, so Mii’s are more likely to befriend someone with the same personality
or if a friend suggested them, the game is random, so it could take hours or days
before they befriend someone. Mii’s also ask you to play with them, games can
range from guessing the zoomed in item, guess what the hidden Mii is, the mini
games are highly repetitive, which is the main negative thing about this game,
however it’s not bad game, maybe add a few more mini games in the near future. Tomodachi
Life also uses the street pass system, when you walk past someone with a copy
of Tomodachi Life you get an item, which can range from a hat to an outfit, the
street pass also allows you to send and receive adventures from other islands,
this is a fantastic feature if you ask me, so if you have a friend which plays Tomodachi
Life you can send you adventurer to their island, you can also send Mii’s you
have created to friends using QR codes, it’s simple to use and perfect for
people who can’t be bothered to create a huge amount of Mii’s.
Lets round
up the review, with all these points I’m going to give this game a solid
8/10
·
Strangely
Addictive
·
Mini
games are extremely fun
·
Random
gameplay and a lot of humour
·
Amazing
street pass system
The Cons
Some
of the Mii’s voices are annoying
Mini games can be repetitive after a while
Saturday 16 August 2014
Thursday 14 August 2014
Sunday 3 August 2014
The Bureau: XCOM Declassified Review
The
Bureau: XCOM Declassified Review
This
review will be brief (by brief I mean a few pages long) so I will mainly talk
about the main aspects of this game, at the same trying not to be biased (big
Xcom fan), this is also my first video game review so if there’s any mistakes
or spelling errors I’ll try and edit them later on.
The
Bureau is the 2nd latest installment of the Xcom series, the latest
was Enemy within, an expansion pack for Enemy Unknown. The Bureau strays away
from the previous
installments, being set in the past instead of the future and a 3rd person tactical shooter instead of a top down tactical map view. The Bureau is set in the earlier 1960s, the game focuses on an alien invasion and you play as William Carter, who sounds like Clint Eastwood, trying to stop the alien invasion, while finding a cure for a virus which turns humans into sleepwalkers, (Zombies which do not attack).
installments, being set in the past instead of the future and a 3rd person tactical shooter instead of a top down tactical map view. The Bureau is set in the earlier 1960s, the game focuses on an alien invasion and you play as William Carter, who sounds like Clint Eastwood, trying to stop the alien invasion, while finding a cure for a virus which turns humans into sleepwalkers, (Zombies which do not attack).
![]() |
Sleepwalkers, despite their appearance are harmless |
The game starts off with a meeting, the
director of a group called Xcom informs a number of representatives from the
CIA, FBI and US Army about a new signal, not human, one character blames
communists, due to the game being set in the early 1960s, after a brief
discussion it than skips to the main character William Carter, I won’t give any
more information about the opening, apart from that it jumps straight into the
action. After a brief introduction you jump straight into the action, aliens invading
and attacking a military base called “Groom Range”, you witness you fellow
solders get wiped out by alien forces, I must say this level is one of the best
openings I’ve played in a while, explosions and destruction everywhere. Let’s
talk about characters, most of the characters are dull and generic, these
characters are the more interesting characters, let’s start off with the main character William Carter, war hero
and CIA operative, who lost his family to a house fire, he blames himself for
what happened, Carter is one of the most interesting characters on the game, a
few other characters are Director Faulke, Carters boss who spends most of his
time talking about how to defeat the aliens and what’s the next step, Agent
Weaver is the second main character, she hates aliens more than Carter does and
the last character is Nico Dasilva, he only appears a few times in the game
despite being one of the most important characters, he appears in the DLC “Hanger as a playable character.
Let’s
talk about the gameplay, the gameplay is similar to the Mass Effect series, using quick
commands to order your squad to move or take down an enemy, which is great
apart from that sometimes your squad
fail to move to a specific location and will sometimes run at the enemy, it’s
not perfect and it’s not bad. The Bureau, much like every Xcom game uses a
squad system, recruit solders and create your own squad, the hardest part is making
sure they survive or its game over, I remember playing Enemy Unknown I spent
hours trying to keep my squad alive, The Bureau changes this it’s
a lot easier now, I’ve only lost one squad member compared to the number I’ve
lost in Enemy Unknown, anyway let’s talk about the classes, the classes are commando,
medic, sniper and engineer, each one has a unique power, so medics can heal
you, snipers/scouts can call support , engineers can lay down turrets and
commandos can distract the enemy. Much
like the previous Xcom games you can customize your squad, by changing the
colour of their suits, changing their weapon load out and backpack, the
customization is basic, but gets the job done. The only downside to the squad
system is that you can only pick two, which sometimes is a pain, because most
of the time you are outnumbered, however it adds a challenge to the game.
Let’s
talk about the enemies on the game, two words can describe them unforgiving and
annoying, I’ll explain why, enemies earlier on in the game are extremely tough,
even on normal difficult the enemies are hard to defeat, so expect to get
annoyed and end up throwing your controller out the window. Much like your
squad, the aliens have classes, so Snipers, solders (called outsiders), greys
(sectoids, if you’ve played Xcom Enemy Unknown, they are the easiest enemy to
defeat, not any more) and lastly Muton (The brute, if not the hardest
alien on the game to defeat, especially later on in the game). The aliens are
one of the smartest enemies I’ve seen in a game, they flank, they throw grenades;
communicate with each other and so on, my only negative thing about them is
that sometimes they run around like a headless chicken, meaning that you can easily
attack them and they won’t fire back.
![]() |
Keeping your squad alive is essential in this game |
Let’s
talk about the level designs and missions the level designs are amazing, being
set in the late 50s early 60s, so diners, garages, hair dresses and so on of
course with a twist, the aliens have built their own structures around former
towns, houses have been demolished, cars and trucks litter the street along
with corpses, the level designs are dark and gritty, later on in the game you get
to visit space and another planet, sounds fun but it’s really not.
Let’s
talk about missions; The Bureau has three types of missions, the first is the
main storyline, these missions are focused around the story, the second type is
side quests, which are mainly investigating small towns and military outposts,
blowing up alien factories etc, some side missions are unplayable, meaning that
you can only send your agents to do the missions, the higher the rank of the
agent the more likely the mission will be successful, my only gripe with this
is that you can’t fail the mission, unless you send your lowest agents, even
than you still have a chance to pass the missions, these missions are really
only used to level up your agents and to tell a back story to events happening
in the main storyline.
Let’s
talk about the sound, I won’t go into much detail about the sound, apart from
saying that it is great, the sound of gunshots and laser shots are well done,
however sometimes sound effects can be out of sync and some characters do not
move their lips when talking, however the music in the background makes up for
it, I remember playing one mission where you visit an empty camp site, most of the campsite was destroyed, the only thing which was left standing was radio which at the time was playing "Walking after midnight", it was amazing yet at the same time creepy because it was still playing despite a war going, if you like songs from 50s and 60s, like Buddy Holly, Hank
Williams and Patsy Cline, this game is perfect for you.
![]() |
Dialogue can a be a bit boring sometimes |
Overall
The Bureau is an amazing game, despite going through a number of developments, the
game was originally going to be a first person shooter similar to Bioshock,
however it was later changed, (the original E3 2011-2012 footage is still
around on YouTube, I’ll recommend watching it). The game starts off strong, but later on the
game gets a bit confusing, some features like, traveling through space and
going to other planets seem out of place, maybe because the game is set way
before the moon landing. I will also mention the downloadable content what has
been released, the first is a weapon, a light plasma pistol extremely useful
and powerful, the second is hanger 6 r&d, adds a short campaign to the game
and a new playable character. With all
these points The Bureau deserves to be a worthy
7/1O
The
Good
·
Amazing soundtrack
·
Interesting storyline
·
10-14 hours long
·
Large Level designs
The
Bad
·
Not enough side mission’s
·
Some characters seem boring and dull
·
AI Squad
·
Wednesday 30 July 2014
Hello fellow gamers, my name is Hayden Oliver Jones, or Jonesy for short. This blog will be about all video games, reviews, info about up coming games etc. I will release a review every two weeks, my first review will be a game called "The Bureau Xcom Declassified", an interesting game based in the sixties set around an alien invasion, this review will be posted on Monday 4th Augest.
Thanks for reading
Hayden O Jones
Media Student and Blogger
Thanks for reading
Hayden O Jones
Media Student and Blogger
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