Category: PC

Tunnel of Doom. Where does it lead?

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

Tunnel of Doom is a new action rouge-lite tower defence hybrid game developed by ‘Antti Vaihai’ ad published by ‘Digerati‘. Tunnel of Doom is said to be coming out in the second quarter of 2021 on the Xbox Series X, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch and PC. This looks like another little indie game with some action. Let’s take a look. 

Tunnel of Doom has a very simple story but one you can understand. You play as a woman called Angel. She is on an adventure to save her husband. So reverse Resident Evil 7 Biohazard. The wife is saving the husband and she is willing to go through a lot to rescue him. Whoso findeth a wife findeth a good thing (proverbs 18:22). She will go through a mine which has randomly generated layouts every time she progresses. She’s armed and ready for what comes her way in the… Tunnel of Doom.

Now these aren’t ordinary mines in Tunnel of Doom as there are monsters and dangers all in there not afraid to take her out (not to dinner). This is here the action tower defence part comes into play. Each ear in the mine is randomly generated including the resources, perks and what’s at your disposal to combat the hordes of enemies. You can set up obstacles like barricades and offensive contraptions like cannons. Plan before you face the horde. Now how they will enter and move, then set up to counter and give yourself the best chance possible to survive. 

As for the action part in Tunnel of Doom, Angel can also fight by herself too. This reminds us of Dungeon Defenders (an awesome game) where you set up towers and defences but your character can also go into the field and fight toe to toe with the enemies. Same principle. Angel can have both ranged and melee attacks. You and leap across gaps to traverse the room, smash boulders with your pick axe to get resources, action roll like in dark souls to smash pots or quickly evade… maybe. The roll looks real weak though. Also make sure to stack up on money too as there are beings that sell items like a shop. So grab what you need. Use everything to your advantage. 

Here is some information concerning Tunnel of Doom from their page:

  • Find Perks: Better traps. Improved weapons. More resources. There are 50 perks to discover, each offering an array of stat boosts and gameplay tweaks.
  • Dream Mode: Escape the mine to unlock this new, endless challenge.
  • Weapon Combat: If your revolver or rifle ammo is running low… improvise! Throw rocks or glass. Swing your pickaxe. Break out the TNT. Do what it takes to avoid being mobbed by the monsters!
  • Randomly Generated: The layout of the mine, perks, and monster battles change with each new game, meaning every run is different! 
  • Set Traps: It’s you against the hordes! Boost your chances of success and survival by strategically positioning cannons and barricades before battles begin.
  • Gather Resources: Smash lamps. Destroy crates. Blow up rocks. Search the mine for materials that can be used as makeshift weapons or ammunition for traps.

We checked out some Tunnel of Doom gameplay and it’s what we thought it would be for the most part. We expected the graphic style but didn’t expect the mining aspect of the game. We like that the character is completely involved in the action. We like that you can improvise too… to some extent. For example you can hurl rocks at the enemies to harm them or even throw glass at them too. Your dynamites can be used as weapons too which makes sense. The enemies do not look scary at all. Feel like we can solo punch them to death. 

Overall Tunnel of Doom looks like another good indie game. We don’t think the did the rouge-lite tower defence hybrid blended perfectly together but Tunnel of Doom did it well still. Not a fan of the graphics and the animations are alright. Tunnel of Doom might have a tough time on release but we hope things change. The developers ‘Antti Vaihai’ have done an alright job with Tunnel of Doom. We at X35 Earthwalker will have to hear where this tunnel leads. Now Tunnel of Doom may have a hybrid going on but even combined it isn’t comparable to… the ‘Earth Walk!’

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Hunting Simulator 2. The hunt continues

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

Hunting Simulator 2 is a hunting action simulation game developed by ‘Neopica‘ and published by ‘Nacon‘. Hunting Simulator 2 is said to be coming out 2021 on the Xbox Series X and PS5 but it’s already out on Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, PS4 and PC. Going out to hunt your some deer sounds like fun. Let’s take a look.

Hunting Simulator 2 is exactly what you think it is. You are literally going hunting. Heading out into the forest, walking around, crouching, hiding and looking out for animals or whatever prey you seek. That’s what this game is. Like hunting in real life though, there can be some dangers to man. For example, what if you come across a bear? Wouldn’t you know what to do? Would you be attacked? That’s for you to find out.

We have never played hunting simulator games before nor have we cared about them and the same goes for flying simulators. It’s not because we think they are bad… no, it’s simply because it’s not our type of game. We do know that in Hunting Simulator 2 you are working together with your hunting dog. Dogs… a man’s best friend they say but seriously the dog will be a very useful ally in the hunt. You must select your gear for the hunt from “the best official weapons and accessories”. In context they must mean the best hunting specific weapons and not the best weapons in the world; otherwise you would have the option of a heavy machine gun. That would make hunting interesting. 

There’s some variety to the hunting locations in Hunting Simulator 2 as there is the texan desert, Colorado and the forest of Europe, all large areas. You’re a travelling hunter by the looks of it. Your hunting dog capable of tracking your targets. Also there are types of hunting dogs, like beagle, labrador retriever and German shorthaired pointer and the type matters as they have their own hunting attributes. So there’s quite a bit of stuff to think about before heading out into the vast wild. Hey! Is that a moose over there? We eating good tonight.

We checked out some Hunting Simulator 2 gameplay and it’s what we expected. Lush environments or dry environments, forests or deserts off course. A loyal well trained dog to back you up and just enjoying the hunt. There’s 33 different animal species for players to hunt. There’s over 160 accessories, weapons and clothing items to choose from and equip. Also they are brands like kryptek, winchester, verney-carron, browning and bushnell. So hunters out there might really like this. It’s hunting, what else can we say but the fact that the frames, visuals and performance will be much better now that it is coming to the next gen consoles, especially the Xbox Series X.

Overall Hunting Simulator 2 looks like a very good game for what it is. You are going hunting. You are working with a dog to hunt down your prey. Many different weapons, items, equipment and more. Multiple locations and hopefully some dangers. You hunt. What else? The developers ‘Neopica’ have done a good job. Now hunting simulator 2 might be the real hunt but it’s a complete walk in the par for… the ‘Earth Walk!’

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White Shadows. A colourless weird adventure

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

White Shadows is a new adventure platformer game developed by ‘Monokel‘ and published by ‘Headsup Games‘. White Shadows is said to be coming out in the year 2021 on the Xbox Series X, PS5 and PC. 

White Shadows is set in a weird, dark and apparently at times funny world. It’s the last city of earth and there’s nothing but half human, half animal inhabitants. Basically there was great war which caused a plague which destroyed almost all living things on the planet. Matter of fact, how the developers worded it is excellent. Here’s a direct quote: “the great war led to a plague which wiped almost all living things from the face of the earth. Or so they say. Nobody is safe outside the White City, and the birds are to blame for the plague. Or so they say. Only a shining coat of fresh white color will protect you from the plague, and you must earn your ration of color by staying obedient. Or so they say. But Ravengirl stopped listening.”

Did you get all that. This game White Shadows I supposed to be a “distorted” mirror of our world. A modern fable if you must. So you can imagine there’s going to be representations of character or events from real life in the game. This also means that White Shadows might contain some real life lessons for the gamers or giver the players something to think about. Beware of those as it’s the developers ideas and not always the best advice or lessons but it’s a game so you guys have to decide for yourself. In case you haven’t realised yet but White Shadows should straight away remind you of a certain game. Also black and white, with simple controls and messed up world. The answer is Limbo. We don’t need to say why. 

Like with Limbo, the controls for White Shadows are simple and some times simple is very good, especially for games of this style. Players need to focus on what’s going on around them in the world in White Shadows. You will see other beings actions taking place and even possibly vehicles moving around. Everything is black and hits with a strangely huge emphasis on the colour white. You are being told by the wolf overlords, who are the leaders, that you must be obedient to earn your color. apparently though the colour white has a horrible truth about it. This makes sense historically as in ancient times the colour white had a very bad meaning and represented negative stuff. So maybe this is a historical thing but definitely symbolic. 

This world has all sorts around here. There’s rats, wolves, birds, pigs and sheep. These are all beings like you. They are also buying into what the society and overlords say. This is an obedient you must obey brainwashed kind of world. Ravengirl (you) decides to not listen anymore and escape. The more you continue on the journey you learn more about your characters past and off course the world around you. You also gain the attention of the other half human, half animals around here. Who knows, they might follow you. Oh, we didn’t even mention the goal. Apparently there’s a resistance hidden in the belly of the city. Maybe that is also a lie made by the wolf overlords to lure in those who rebel for an easy capture and kill. Think about it. Look at the image above with a doorway saying ‘whites only’. If white was such a great thing then why aren’t those obeying citizens there trying to be white and get in. Why is the only one white our main character who’s trying to escape. We believe it’s a trap like being the chosen one in that weird movie about cat people. The chosen got sent away on a hot air balloon thing where they will eventually die. Getting rid of the doubter. If this is suppose to be a mirror of our world and the wolf overlords present the government leaders (maybe) then wouldn’t the real lose as they are going against a whole government who an army. We believe this is a trap.

We checked out some White Shadows gameplay and it’s exactly what we though it would be. It’s Limbo. Off course trying to do it’s own thing and it does stand out with a different type of atmosphere. It’s simple controls, obvious objectives s in it’s clear what you have to do. The main information and story is from what you see happening around you. There is going to be interactions though. What kind? We aren’t sure but that’s something for players to think about. It’s said that it’s the interactions that drive the story forwards. Well gamers, are you going to change the fate of this city or are you going to fall right into a trap? What about the world outside of the city? Questions are here.

Overall White Shadows looks like it’s going to be an alright game. Heavy symbolic and representative games tend to try too hard but maybe this one will be pulled off very well. You even wonder how is this little Ravengirl going to stand up to, be a threat or change anything in this city. Maybe she fails in the end and falls back in line with no hop.e We hope something big happens. The developers ‘Monokel’ have done a good job here. The game looks very good and heavily detailed. It has to be with this black and white design. Now White Shadows may have dark secrets but this darkness fades when it comes to… the ‘Earth Walk!’

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Back 4 Blood. Infected horde that is!

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

Back 4 Blood is a new cooperative first person shooter game developed by ‘Turtle Rock Studios‘ and published by ‘Warner Bros Games‘. Back 4 Blood is said to be coming out 22nd of June 2021 on the Xbox Series X, PS5 and PC. You can describe this as a zombie game. This game looks like it has potential. Let’s take a look.

The creators of Left 4 Dead are behind Back 4 Blood. Also Turtle Rock Studios are the guys who made the awesome game ‘Evolved‘. So Back 4 Blood has a lot of minds and behind this one and the expectations are high. So the story here is basically the typical that there’s a serious infected horde of creatures out here and humanity is near extinction but conveniently a small group of humans are fighting back and out here trying to save humanity. Yet whole armies lose and get folded but four people and a guy with a sloppy mid section (his belly) can win but whatever.

Let’s go over Back 4 Blood this quickly. For starters most of the characters look like they could survive. Some look like complete losers but it makes sense that it’s random survivors as in they would look different to each other. There’s 8 characters to choose from, referred to as ‘Cleaners’. They are immune to the virus (off course they are). The missions are overall a simple format in a sense that it’s all about fighting off against a horde of enemies. Does reminds us of world war z in this regards. You must work together, stick together and cover each others backs as there are some mechanics that will mix things up and even ruin an entire mission. Many of you by now have seen some gameplay and so you know what to expect. 

Your primary weapons in Back 4 Blood are guns and something for melee like a baseball bat, knife etc. Expect the typical arsenal of weapons like pistols, assault rifles and off course shotguns. Head shots are the key and best way to take down regular infected called ‘Sprinters’. They just run at you and try to swing and beat you to death. That’s right, there’s some variety to these infected creatures. Retches are the fat ones who create acid pools on the ground so common sense says don’t step in them. Bruisers are the big tall ones with a clearly mutated arm which they use to smash you around and crush you. Keep your distance. The Ogre is the big bad boss one. It’s huge, towers over you and has wide range sweeping melee attacks and can even throw a large projectile at you. Hockers are the annoying ones who likes to trap you and your allies leaving you vulnerable. 

Here’s where some of the problems show up in Back 4 Blood. The bruisers also come straight for you and they become top priorities as they will destroy you if you get too close. Like with other infected Bruisers have weak points of their bodies which you need to hit to take them down efficiently. So accuracy is needed and not mad man spraying of bullets. You can easily run out of ammo. The Hockers are the worst as they fire ensnaring web like stuff that incapacitates you. They see to hit you from nowhere at times but oh boy the infected can sure hit you while you are trapped. You need an ally to come along and free you by melee-ing you. So make your shots count, aim for weak points, keep an eye on your team mates, stay away from bruisers and don’t step in pools of acid. Our main probably is the lack of variety of infected though. We hope there’s more that they haven’t shown yet. Games like this could easily benefit from a large variety of infected like ones but let’s see how they pull this off with their current cast. 

There is some competitive stuff to Back 4 Blood as you can go against players. Either be human or the ridden and off course both sides have their own abilities and weapons. So it’s like Overrun in Gears of War Judgement where one side is human while the other is the Locust. Off course modes like this have a tough time balancing everything but they will learn as they go along. Do your best developers. The other thing is that. There’s also a card system for your characters that definitely mix things up. Get different builds all the time and work with what you got. We definitely like this mechanic as it adds more layers of strategy, options and tactical approaches to the different situations. Card builds are game changers and when done right definitely adds to the game. 

We checked out some back 4 Blood gameplay and it’s exactly what we thought it would be. It’s the Left 4 Dead formula which many gamers enjoyed. Group of four, working together, shooting and fighting through a horde of infected creatures who are all out here ready to destroy all humans. If someone in your squad dies, you can bring them back. They show up glued to a wall and cannot get out. You must approach them and save them. Reminds us of the bring back system in Gears 5 in Escape mode for a dead teammate. Being careful with your ammo, finding awesome weapons during the mission. There was a powerful machine gun that literally was like the answer to these infected creatures. It was rapid fire, heavy destroying rounds and left nothing alive. Oh and rightfully so, friendly fire is a thing so don’t go unloading shotgun shells in the backs of your friends. It hurts. X35 Earthwalker once took a shotgun shot and it had no effect whatsoever. He actually didn’t know he was shot until he turned around. 

Overall Back 4 Blood looks like it’s going to be a fun game for sure. We really enjoy multiplayer games, especially cooperative games. This looks like a casual shooter and survival against a horde. The popular fictional survival scenario. Causal on the surface but on the harder difficulties we know this game gets really hard to beat. We had hoped this game is very difficult and glad to hear that it is. It’s been positive reports s far and that’s good. The developers ‘Turtle Rock Studios’ have a done a very good job so far. We at X35 Earthwalker will keep an eye out for this game. Now Back 4 Blood may have dangerous infected but they are all fodder against… the ‘Earth Walk!’

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Tetris Effect: Connected. Fantastic Game!

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

Tetris Effect: Connected is described as a tile matching puzzle game. Simply put… it’s Tetris. You know what it is. This game is fantastic! Sure it’s Tetris, but it’e not Tetris and we will get into that later. We are so glad we played this game and it surprised us severely. Don’t let the fact that it’s a tetris game throw you off. Let’s take a look.

Let’s get this out of the way. We don’t like Tetris. We don’t care about Tetris. We never cared about Tetris. Never owned a Tetris game. We care about Tetris Effect: Connected though. Like for real, Tetris is boring… but Tetris Effect: Connected isn’t. We have spent lots of time in Tetris Effect: Connected and had lots of fun in this game. It’s the best Tetris game by far. Do not underestimate this game. We have seen gamers who never cared about Tetris now enjoying Tetris Effect: Connected. That speaks for itself. By the way Tetris Effect: Connected is currently an Xbox exclusive. Best experienced on Xbox Series X though. 

The main mode which is the campaign called ‘Journey Mode’. Here you go through a series of levels where you play Tetris but the main goal is to clear lines. There are three difficulties really as the fourth is practice mode which doesn’t even include all the levels, has no game over and is the slowest speed. In Normal difficulty you must clear 36 lines, beginner is 30 while hard is 48. Also the higher difficulties are overall have faster Tetriminos (the falling blocks) falling speed. For example the first level ‘The Deep’ ca rise up to a fall speed of 3 while in Hard it goes up to 8. The problem we have with Tetris Effect: Connected is that the jump from normal to hard is too big but if you reach the later levels in normal difficulty you would be use to higher speeds than the early hard mode levels anyway but still…. too big of a gap.

The levels in the journey mode are beautiful and vary heavily from each other. You have sea level types but they vary for example ‘The Deep’ has manta rays but concludes with a massive whale. This level is one of the best ways to start of the game. It’s a beautiful display and you see the movement around as you progress through the Level. Mermaid cove has mermaids. Turtle dreams has turtles. There’s also Jelly fish Cgorus and Dolphin Surf which has a immensely bright moment in the level where you come to the surface with the dolphins. Epic stuff. Some levels come with a song with lyrics while others is just music but for the most part the music is very good and we like the songs. The song in balloon high is the best though. It’s relaxing or gets you hyped with the action, making things intense. The big boss level is metamorphosis which has 90 lines to clear on Normal difficulty. It’s a huge battle where the Tetriminos will fall at high speeds which are impossible to work with if you are new to the game. More on that later. Journey mode is awesome, very challenging and you’ll spend good time here training.

The next big mode is off course Multiplayer which what makes Tetris Effect: Connected a different game from Tetris Effect. Some idiot online wanted to spend his day arguing with X35 Earthwalker about that. What a loser. Hopefully he gets a life. Multiplayer is where the action is at after training through Journey mode. Here you can find all the true new stuff. We do recommend players go through the tutorial for helpful tips as there are tricks and certain aspects of the modes you need to be aware of in order to do good. Once you enter multiplayer you see a massive pyramid but at it’s base is the top reflected to make a full shape. Just imagine a pyramid on top of a pyramid but connected at the base. It’s in the center of this galaxy and players names are floating around this massive structure and in the Milky Way looking galaxy. You can select your guardian avatar which is the different images and shapes you unlock through playing all through Tetris Effect Connected. For example if you level up you can unlock the Moon, Nabla and Sun through playing online matches and you get a bonus if you win off course. You can unlock others through playing specific modes or a certain number of matches etc. They are cool and the one you select becomes like your symbol. Cosmetic stuff. There’s 84 in total. There’s orbit mode which allows the player to fly around the galaxy and view players avatars, their names and see the pyramid from different angles. There are three types of multiplayer: Ranked, Friend and Local. Ranked is for points and against random Tetris Effect: Connected players around the world. Friend is a private match where you can invite friends. Local is local couch play. Bring a friend over, family or beat your spouse at Tetris and damage your marriage. 

The multiplayer modes are: Connected, zone battle, Score attack and Classic score attack. Classic score attack is where you face an opponent 1v1 to see who gets the highest score. Old school classic Tetris. Score attack is the same but it’s all modern Tetris though. Now here’s the good stuff. zone battle is about crushing your foe. Not score. It’s whoever loses first. First to two. Cause your opponent’s side to fill up to the top. As you clear lines in fancy ways you send trash to your opponents side which builds up forcing them higher to the top of their screen. So clearing doubles, triples, quads, clearing in combos, T-spin or whatever it is called all contributes. Single line clears don’t contribute at all. Your best tool is the zone mechanic. This mechanic is new to Tetris Effect: Connected (It was also in the inferior Tetris Effect). Basically you stop time and have limited time to clear lines and each cleared line goes straight to the bottom of your screen. Can save your life but the best way to score points. This zone if done right can completely destroy your opponents one shot. There’s ways to win but you need to know what you should and shouldn’t be doing. More experienced players than X35 Earthwalker has lost to him because X35 knew what to do while they didn’t.

The last mode is Connected and this is truly awesome. You and two others face actual bosses who are playing Tetris just like you. It’s 3v1. The bosses are the stupid zodiac signs. They are in groups of three and you face each one one right after the other. For example on normal difficulty you face: cancer, libra and scorpio. Each boss has their own abilities which are designed to mess up the players. For example they might make your next two falling blocks super large taking up so much space. Cause your Tetriminos to fall extremely fast. Rise up your screen, drop in explosive blocks, rotate your field etc. Some abilities are more dangerous than others clearly. The three need to keep clearing lines like in zone battle to contribute to the meter. When it’s filled all three of your fields combine into one big one and you need to create as many lines as possible. The more you do the stronger your combined attack against the boss to force them to the top of the screen. Once defeated the next comes after a quick statistics break. There’s more after hard difficulty. They won’t go down easy.

Lastly is Effect mode where you can try out what looks like community made challenges. They are set though and mx things up. Some have conditions, others are about scoring in a time limit. It’s different from journey and multiplayer and brings in some adventurous stuff. There’s even one where you have to clear 40 lines as fast as possible. Simply put there’s lots to do here. Another thing we wanted to talk about tis that Tetris Effect: Connected trains you. It actually forces you to think faster and be faster. When you first start playing Journey mode you really struggle when the speed reaches 4. Higher speeds like 6 becomes too much and you complain at how fast it is.As you play a bit more and get use to the shapes you find yourself naturally able to handle speed 6 and up to 8. When you first encounter a level with a ruthless speed of 10 you get shocked and fail, again complaining that it’s too fast, which it is. Then over time you find yourself easily handling speed 10. We can now do speed 14 and 16 if we have enough space and actually plan and decide where that piece should go within the practically ‘no time’ that we have to think. This game forces you to be fast. You stop complaining ad say bring it on. You take on those speeds and find yourself handling it. We got faster and better. Since X35 Earthwalker is the best, smartest and wisest gamer of all time he grew in skill way faster than other players and these speeds are very doable for him. Off course we aren’t dedicating our lives to be the Tetris pro players as we have a bigger life and much more going on but for how much we do p[lay it, we are easily masters who are getting better. 

There isn’t really a negative to Tetris Effect: Connected except for the big gap in difficulty between Normal and hard. Other from that, there’s no problems. It’s Tetris and stays as Tetris. Thus game has lots to do. If you want to get serious you can with effect mode. If you want a challenge you can do journey mode on normal difficulty and higher. If you want to get competitive with others you can with multiplayer like zone battle. If you want to relax there’s relaxed modes in effect mode and there’s theatre mode where you can just watch the stages you play in journey mode, control the transition and listen to the music. Literally use Tetris Effect: Connected as your music player. Talk about a versatile game. Unpopular opinion and PlayStation fanboys get mad when wee say this but Tetris Effect: Connected is a better game than Demon’s souls remastered and spider man: Miles Morales. We aren’t joking. If you judged them for what they are, Tetris Effect: Connected is a better game. Don’t make the mistakes simple minded people make by assuming that this games boring because it’s Tetris and there’s no guns, giant axes, huge monsters and death. This game is fantastic. Very hard and unforgiving but fantastic.

Overall Tetris Effect: Connected is an awesome game. One of the best games of 2020 easily and worth playing even now. The graphics are amazing, the particle effects are the second best we have ever seen so far. It would all look better on an Xbox Series X (we currently don’t have the next gen console). So many colours, great music with variety, excellent effects, multiple game modes, boss battles which ascends Tetris as something complete new. There’s local play up to three players. Tetris Effect: Connected is a multiplayer game with many things available. We are glad we gave this game a chance. We would give Tetris Effect: Connected a 10/10. A perfect game. There’s isn’t really anything bad about it except one level where the fireworks effect you get as you do a big move, it causes a lag that does mess you up but that’s the only real negative. Everything else is great. It’s available on the Xbox game pass so you can even get this game for free and play the whole thing. There isn’t much to say as it’s Tetris at the end of the day. It’s kind of hard to mess up Tetris. Now Tetris Effect: Connected may be considered a perfect game but it’s filled with flaws when compared too… the ‘Earth Walk!’

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Spirit of the North. An Iceland adventure

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

Spirit of the North is an adventure game developed by ‘Infused Studio‘ and published by ‘Merge Games‘. Spirit of the North is said to be coming out in the year 2021 on the Xbox Series X. It’s already out on Nintendo Switch, PS5, PS4 and PC. The action is this game takes place in Iceland. Already you know this isn’t going to be a normal game.

Spirit of the North is set in a winter cold, mountainous land that they said was inspired by Iceland. Quite a lot of what you see are based on nordic folklore. So that’s interesting and brings something different to the action. Games that have stories or in game elements based on certain folklore and mythology bring something new and unusual. Very different from the norm. You basically control a red fox. Very normal. You then encounter a female spirit fox who’s called the guardian of the northern lights. These two foxes are working together. Their stories become one. So we just join them.

One of the things that has been said about Spirit of the North that’s unique is that there’s no narrative or dialogue. This was done on purpose. Its up to players to figure out what to do, explore around on this journey and be aware of your surroundings. This land is ruined and a civilisation is lost. So look around, explore your surroundings and solve puzzles. That’s right. Puzzles. Players need to use their heads solve some situations or what’s set before you.

The setting and style of Spirit of the North reminds us of another cold winter game that was also about a journey and based on folklore. That game is ‘Never Alone’. Obviously Spirit of the North is third person and you control a fox but Never alone also has a spirit fox partner but yeah. In Spirit of the North, players get to explore places with practically no variety. It’s a cold Iceland like area so we aren’t surprised. Expect mountains, tundras and glaciers. 

We checked out some Spirit of the North gameplay and it’s good. You’re just a fox but it’s the spirit fox that helps you do the impossible stuff. Slide down ice trails, launch through rings, get empowered, follow the red trail in the sky, activate ancient mechanisms and off course solve puzzles.   It’s exploration yes but there’s a clear direction and you can go at your pace. No enemies, no real danger and no rush. So be a fox and relax.

Overall Spirit of the North looks like a very good game. It’s definitely an adventure and a unique one. Two foxes out there making things happen and traversing their world. It’s not our type pot game but we can tell it’s a good adventure. It would also look it’s best on the Xbox Series X. The developers ‘Infused Studio’ have done a very good job. We at X35 Earthwalker haven’t got any problems with foxes so hopefully these two don’t change our mind. Now Spirit of the North may have nordic folklore and two foxes but those aren’t as interesting as… the ‘Earth Walk!’

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The Dark Pictures Anthology: House of Ashes

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

The Dark Pictures Anthology: House of Ashes is a new interactive drama, survival horror game developed by ‘Supermassive Games‘ and published by ‘Bandai Namco‘. The Dark Pictures Anthology: House of Ashes is said to be coming out in the year 2021 on the Xbox Series X, Xbox One, PS5, PS4 and PC. This is the third game and the one we have the highest hopes for. Let’s take a look.

The Dark Pictures Anthology: House of Ashes is set in Iraq in the year 2003. A war or should we say conflict is coming right to it’s end. Rachel King is a CIA operative and she’s been ordered to work with a military squad. Their orders is to check out, what they have been told is, an underground chemical weapons facility. Already we know this is a whole lot of bull crap. As if the Iraqi would have an underground chemical weapons facility. The location is the Zagros Mountains.

Once they reach the coordinates, Rachel and the squad are attacked by a local patrol being led by Sergeant Salim othman. Already we know this is an important character as he has a name and significance. In the middle of this battle between squads, sinkholes open up caused by earth tremors. Both squads fall in. Turns out underground is a buried Sumerian temple. Something bad, very bad, evil has awakened down there and these two squads are in danger. It’s a labyrinth down here to make things worse. So now the two squads have to make a decision: Either put aside their differences and work together to survive or will they instead go alone and prioritise their own survival? 

Now let’s go over a few things. It’s the The Dark Pictures Anthology so we know what to expect but we want some significant changes to make this game better. The last two games were fake threats as in their was no real monsters, demons or supernatural aspects at all. First game had gas that caused hallucinations while the second was demons that was all in someone head. None of it was real. House of sand needs to have actual supernatural threats and aspects otherwise we will straight away write off the game as trash. We don’t want the same thing or factors. Mix it up for the big finale.

Next they need to make The Dark Pictures Anthology: House of Ashes real good is to make the game brutally hard. The other games were too easy. The heartbeat time your button press segments were too easy and not intense at all. They should make the room for success smaller to increase difficulty. The time you have to press a button needs to be shorter. Creation riskier decisions need to have multiple swapping button presses to increase a greater chance of fail. The moments where you have two decisions to choose from and a bar appears to show you that your time to choose is running out needs to have pausing the game disabled. If you can pause it defeats the whole point of the timed decisions. Lastly create a form of punishment or negative for players who because of one bad decision start the game from the beginning. Either give them different paths or a harder play through or something as it’s pathetic for gamers to back out because they failed. 

Overall The Dark Pictures Anthology: House of Ashes looks like it’s going to be the real deal and hopefully what we want. If the developers make changes to please big babies like markiplier and 8-bit Ryan then we are ready to be disappointed. If they listen to us who has real wisdom they would make their best game in the series by far but let’s see. Big developers tend to not be very smart. We don’t know how well the developers ‘Supermassive Games’ have done so far. We at X35 Earthwalker are looking forward to this game. Now The Dark Pictures Anthology: House of Ashes may have some hype but that’s not enough alone to move… the ‘Earth Walk!’

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Metal: Hellsinger. Kill to the beat

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker
 

Metal: Hellsinger is a new rhythm first person shooter game developed by ‘The Outsiders‘ and published by ‘Funcom‘. Metal: Hellsinger is said to be coming out in the year 2021 on the Xbox Series X, Xbox One, PS5, PS4 and PC. Some games have good music while others are all about the music. Kill to the beat. Let’s take a look. 

Metal: Hellsinger keeps things simple when it comes to what the game is about. Players control what’s called the unknown who is part human and demon. This unknown is all about vengeance. So another angry character. You are in hell (rightfully so) and here blasting and fighting through hell and the many demons in your way. Destroy the demons and their leaders… all to the music.

The music mechanic is the best standing out point of Metal: Hellsinger. Do everything to the music. Metal music though. So expect things to be different and quite serious. We hope the music is actually good though. Not a fan of metal. The more in sync you are, the more damage you do to your enemies and the more intense the music gets. So listen to the music, get the rhythm and fire your weapons to the beat. Nice and simple. We don’t know how merciful the game is when it comes to the timing though.

The target of your revenge is referred to as the “red judge”. She is the main bad guy and you have to take her out. Now remember that you are fighting in hell apparently but there is a completely different design for it. Hell’s true name here is the infernal planes which is made up of thousands of hells. All bad. Each location is different have their own stuff going on and maybe own specific enemies. We like the different designs on hell. There’s a frozen world too so that’s cool. The developers must keep the variety going.                                                                                        

We checked out some Metal: Hellsinger gameplay and it’s not what we expected. It has a more DOOM feel. It’s about slaughtering all your enemies mercilessly. It is about revenge after all. Theres many weapons, enemies and  around in this game. We know that there are bosses and killing them will discourage the hordes. There’s a wide range of weapon too. They each have their own ‘ultimate ability’ which are game changers. We definitely would like to see more gameplay and information concerning the enemies in the future. There’s also executions where you finish of a wounded enemy with some style. It really is about the music as killing and attacking to the beat gives you the most damage bonus a and gets the music to be real crazy. 

Overall Metal: Hellsinger looks like a good game. It does what it says on the box. You move around, blast demon, maybe dance but timing your shots and attacks. The graphics aren’t excellent but still great and need to be improved. The sounds are alright but this game is still in development. So we expect it to get better. So run, gun, dance a little and have fun. The developers ‘The Outsiders’ have done a great job with this game. Now Metal: Hellsinger may have weapons and revenge but those certainly do not move… the ‘Earth Walk!’

 

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Curse of the Sea Rats. These ain’t rats

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

Curse of the Sea Rats is a new action adventure game developed by ‘Petoons Studio‘ and published by ‘PQube Limited‘. Curse of the Sea Rats is said to be coming out in the year 2021 on the Xbox Series X, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, PS5, PS4 and PC. Curse of the Sea Rats has got an interesting twist going on here. Let’s take a look.

In Curse of the Sea Rats some weird stuff happened. A group of heroes, through magic, got transformed into rats. Flora Burn is the evil witch that did this. So now Douglas, Buffalo, Akane, and Bussa, as rats, must continue their mission to rescue the admirals son… but also to break the curse and go back to their original form. That’s important because who wants to be a rat? If you said yes, then close this page and unsubscribe (just joking).

Now Curse of the Sea Rats has also been described as a metroidvania game which means expect to use a map frequently, search for abilities and power ups to Be able to access new areas you couldn’t go before. Exploration will be key so don’t get lazy. metroidvania games require time and good observation skills. There has to be secrets. What game like this doesn’t have secrets? Just think about the collectibles you’ll have to find. The developers need to make it worth collecting them and feel good getting them. 

There are off course boss battles but this is a rat game, expect enemies that are around your size. We have seen a fat rat guy called fatso who uses barrels for his mobility and projectile attacks. There was even a Dracula rat dude who uses bats to hopefully not drink your blood. We even saw a large crab that definitely wants to crush you. There’s definitely more and games like this need many Boses of variety for epic battles. Hopefully they have the right music to go with it.

We checked out some Curse of the Sea Rats gameplay and it’s sort of what we expected. This game has hand drawn animations and they look good. There’s also what looks like 4 characters to choose from who are: David Douglas, buffalo calf, bussa and akane yamakawa. We say “looks like” because sometimes games like this have means to unlock hidden characters. This might be the case here in Curse of the Sea Rats. We saw that you can grab ledges, there’s combos for your attacks and there’s even a dash ability which can also be used in the air like with Ori and the Will of the Wisps. The characters have different weapons and combat styles with Bussa seeming to prefer his fists and physical strength over weapons. There is also special moves that can even clear a whole screen.

Overall Curse of the Sea Rats looks like it’s going to be a good game. Since it’s rats, we don’t have high expectations or expect the craziest things t show up or happen. Seeing their original human form would be cool though. Play the game to find out. The graphics are good for the times The developers ‘Petoons Studio’ have done a good job on this game and it’c clear hard work went into it. We at X35 Earthwalker don’t like rats so we might get biased with these characters. Now Curse of the Sea Rats may have rats but even they would be exterminated by… the ‘Earth Walk!’

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Quantum Error. Rescue gone dark

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

Quantum Error is a new horror first person shooter game developed by ‘Teamkill Media‘. Quantum Error is said to be coming out in 2021 on the Xbox Series X, PS5 and PC. Quantum Error is looking serious right now and it plans to come in big. It’s been a while since we got a game like this. Let’s take a look. 

Quantum Error is said in the year 2109 on earth. So ahead of us but not as far as Halo. Simply put a research facility called Monad Quantum got attacked by something unknown and now the whole facility is on fire. The facility is on lock down and a distress call was sent to the Garboa Fire department. You are Captain Jacob Thomas and was sent in by your Fire chief. You aren’t alone and have a crew, including your partner Shane Costa (he’s not a coffee). All you are there to do is save as many people as you can. Off course… it’s not that simple and things take a ‘dark’ turn. Brace yourself. 

As you can tell from the trailer below that Quantum Error isn’t your average game. It feels good to see another game like this. What do we mean? Think about it. What other first person shooter game you know, that’s based in the future, got monsters, in a facility and really dark… Doom 3! When we saw this, Doom 3 came to mind almost immediately. Both games are scientific games too in some ways. Except it was Doom 3 resurrection of evil where you went in with a team but you got separated and killed off. Quantum Error has a good thing going on here and it has our attention already. Expect gameplay to be slow since you don’t know what’s in the dark. 

Remember that Quantum Error is also described as a cosmic horror first person shooter game. We are seeing loads of scientific things and machinery. This game is set in the future and this is taking place in a research facility after all. so expect to see quantum science level stuff, powerful advanced machinery and stuff that is clearly sci-fi. Bullets; however still work the same. You see something dangerous, then shoot it. We saw the DOOM 3 standard arsenal as in the pistol, shotgun and machine gun. There will be more weapons and they need to be cool and have their own purpose. 

We checked out some Quantum Error gameplay and it’s what we expected it would be. It’s mechanics are looking good and it’s still being worked on. The graphics need to look better and more detailed so we are hoping for that. We really liked the darkness mechanics of DOOM 3 so Quantum Error has something good to work with. They just need to understand the balance of darkness and how to work that with combat. We did see a thermal camera and the player using that as a way to see through the dark and shoot the pistol at the same time. We also hope there is a wide range of enemies as tat keeps things interesting. 

Overall Quantum Error is looking like a good game. This is the type of game we have been waiting for. Good genre combination. Games like this need a good combination of jump scares and straight up dread. Doom 3 didn’t have the best balance of that. The developers ‘Teamkill Media’ did a good job with this game so far. We at X35 Earthwalker are looking forward to this game. Now Quantum Error may have the right genre combo but that combo is no match for… the ‘Earth Walk!’

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