Tag: Multiplayer

Halo wars 2. The power of leader characters.

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

Halo wars 2 is one awesome game with lots of action and things to do. Gamers love having options so thing this game has a lot of it. If you don’t know about Halo wars 2 yet, then once again, shame on you. Go check it out. There are even none RTS (real time strategy) gamers playing the game and liking it.

Pretty much one of the main things about any multiplayer match are the leader characters. What leader character you and your opponent or opponents have makes a big difference from strategies, units to abilities. There are some leader characters that are currently considered a bigger threat than others. Leader characters are leaders based on main characters from the game, who are the head of your army. They are like the face of the army. There are currently 3 UNSC and 3 Banished leader characters. They are: Captain Cutter, Professor Anders, Isabel, Atriox, Ship master and Decimus. All three are powerful once used correctly. X35 Earthwalker himself will also be giving his words on this topic.

Captain Cutter: His leader powers are mainly orbital based and infantry seems to be his strong point. Captain Cutter has strong offensive and defensive capabilities. One of his significant abilities is ‘Battle hardened’ which is quite difficult to make effective as it should change how you handle combat. With this your aim is to keep your units alive so that the increased veterancy rate can take effort. While fighting, the unit that’s low on health you must call to the back of the army, don’t leave them there to die. This combined with ‘unsc raid’ which increases your infantry movement speed allows for easy hit and run tactics, meaning it’s also easier to keep units alive to gain veterancy. ‘Archer missiles’ and ‘close air support’ are high damaging powers that must be timed properly. Many times do people launch this as a game changer but the enemy just simply leaves the area. Be strategic with them. Maybe save it for finishing of a base as bases don’t move. You could also use them to force an enemy to get away from you, buying you some time or saving certain units alive. We will say that nothing compares to his powers that drop in units. It’s a great way of calling in reinforcements, flanking the enemy and replacing destroyed units with stronger ones. If you unlock all three drop powers and you wait for your army to get reduced a bit and then drop in odsts, a veteran cyclops, a tank, wolverine and more with high levels. This has made some enemies panic before. It’s just that good. Cutter is best to use with infantry but always be ready to mix it up when the situation calls for it.

Atriox: His leader powers are definitely more mystical. Atriox is definitely more defensive with his leader powers. His most significant ability is ‘unbreakable’ which makes all your units invincible for a period of time. This power once used correctly can easily turn the tide of a battle. We like to use it as a counter to enemies active leader powers like archer missiles if our army is grouped up. There have been times when one enemy used a glassing beam while the other used a scatter bomb and X35 Earthwalker’s units just stood in the middle of it all because they were invincible and still kept destroying the base. You do feel like a boss with that power. ‘Atriox’s bulwark’ is basically a superior ‘restoration drones’ as it not only heals your units but also grants invulnerability. Again it must be used with perfect timing like taking on another army or to survive a powerful active leader ability. This isn’t to be ignored. You can’t beat what’s invincible so keep your units in the circle or move your wounded there. ‘Dying breath’ gets ignored by some but this allows you to make some units still able to fight as normal even after losing all health for a period of time. Think about it. If you had 4 grunt squads you could still keep dishing out four grunt squads worth of damage which can give you the edge in a fight. You could even use the dead unit to hold of the enemy units while yours can get away alive. Atriox’s fortification power is essential, providing discounts on building and upgrading buildings and turrets. This will save you money, to some extent, especially near the start of a match.

Isabel: Her leader powers are very technology based. Initially we never liked her due to her powers have less use but after we dug into her a bit more we saw the use of her powers and what kind of bang they can produce. For example ‘Holographic decoy’ is actually so good. X35 Earthwalker has used these to scout enemy bases and activities and since they are decoys, you lose no units. He also use them to attract all turret fire first and then have his real units move in. It’s straight tactical here! It never hurts to have a ‘MAC Blast’ around. MAC Blasts should only be used to take out a specific enemy unit that is causing trouble, like a shroud or group of wolverines. Halo wars 2 is very strategic and so you must make strategic moves only (duh!). ‘Accelerated assembly’ is a must have for vehicle lovers. There isn’t a reason why you shouldn’t have it. It reduces build cost and time for your vehicles. This power should be combined with ‘The best offense’ which grants your scorpion tanks shields and improved canister shells. We have never lost a match with these two powers combined. After all, tanks with shields sounds scary. In the later stages of a match you must have combat salvage on standby. Throw all your vehicles at the enemy and wait for when they are near death, then activate your power to bring 8 of them back at your base when they die. Timing is key with this ability. ‘Ghost in the machine’ is only to use for extreme conditions. It allows you to take control of any enemy mechanical units you target. Send your decoys to charge an enemy army then use Ghost in the machine to take over at least half of all their machines (don’t take everything), this way you can make their army fight each other to reduce their numbers and if you have time send the last remaining straight at their base then follow with your own units. Isabel is only for the strategic.

Decimus: His powers are all about buffing his army. Straight of the bat you have access to ‘Killing frenzy’ which grants your units a damage boost when they kill. Straight away this is an advantage over your opponents. Combine this power with ‘Siphon’ which allows your units to gain health in proportion to damage to have dealth, which make things really nasty. A few grunts and other units with siphon and killing frenzy makes them too hard to kill if played right. They can just stand there healing themselves and killing. This can even allow early attacks. ‘Boundless Siphon’ is a must as it grants permanent small siphon to all your units, don’t need to say more here. Then get ‘Boundless rage’ which increases your units speed and damage permanently as well. Now let’s do some maths: Killing frenzy + siphon + boundless siphon + boundless fury = unstoppable army. Bring that to school with you. The last major power that we think you should invest in is the ‘Decimus drop’ which calls in Decimus who has a lot of health, can draw in enemies and give them the best slap ever. Decimus is that simple. Scary aggressive army which allows rushes and quick attacks. 

Professor Anders: Her powers are all forunner technology. This lady is all about the sentinels. ‘R & D’ which Reduces costs and build times for global infantry, vehicle, and aircraft upgrades. The best thing is that the turrets gain shields. which is a real boost to defense. It’s up to you how much points you invest in R & D. Get the ‘Protector sentinel’ as soon as possible so that you can start building them. These things are fast and melt structures. They should not be used for combat just yet. So run away (ya wuss). We never bother with ‘ark defense’ as it isn’t all that powerful and easy to avoid but once combined with other powers have it’s uses. ‘Sentinel beacon’ on the other hand is very good. Have some siege turrets at the back of your base and it will make defending so much easier as every shot releases aggressor sentinels which take no scope shots at enemy units. ‘Sentinel synergy’ makes your protector sentinels combat worthy as they now have more health and damage plus a bonus of shields. It also adds more aggressor sentinels to ark defense and sentinel beacon. The retriever sentinel power lets you summon a retriever sentinel. This unit gets treated like the other ultimate units which is a mistake. The retriever sentinel is much weaker than the scarab and condor. It can’t stand up to them nor can you send the retriever into an army and think it will win. Use it as a big support only. Anders is all about the sentinels but everyone knows this so don’t be predictable as some will see you as Anders and go straight for anti air so please mix it up.

Shipmaster: His powers are teleporters mainly. Shipmaster is X35 Earthwalkers favourite leader. At first look, shipmaster seems like he has the weakest powers. His powers directly are weak. They are heavy strategic. ‘Teleport’ has many uses from quick travel even to dodging enemy leader powers like close air support and eradication. ‘Extraction which allows you to instant transmission your slected units back to base and heals them is essential as you can attack the enemy and then when taking too much damage come straight back to base, healed and ready for another attack. We don’t bother with ‘Glassing beam’ anymore as their are other powers that are more handy than direct damage. Advanced cloaking should only be used if you will have lots of marauders and a shroud or two as it grants marauders the cloak ability and shrouds special ability gets improved. This means a cloaked army and marauders can be used for scouting. ‘Displacement’ allows you to move enemy units to another location. Many use this wrongly, they just send parts of an army away while they are getting attacked. This is bad the army will just come straight back. Timing and situation is so important. X35 Earthwalker once used it to send all the engineers who were healing a scarab far away making the scarab easy to kill. Mass cloaking is powerful as your whole army gets cloaked. It’s powerful but easy to counter as all the enemy needs is one detect unit, so knowing what your enemy has is essential before using. Tactical gateway is maybe the scariest power as you can use it to transport entire armies all the way across a map, even behind the enemy base. Beware as your enemies can use the portal too. Almost all of shipmasters abilities can be used for different strategies. That’s why scouting is important with him. Most likely the hardest leader to use.

Sergeant Forge: His powers are vehicle based. He was  the strongest leader by far because of one power, ‘Rolling economy’. This reduces costs and build times for Supply Pads, Generators, and their upgrades. The worst part is that you can access this from the start making a normal supply pad which costs 150 instead cost 100. This doesn’t sound bad but when you build 3 supply pads you save 150 supplies which is enough to buy another supply pad or 1 marine squad. So basically Forge players can build faster and have more resources than anyone else. In a RTS game, speed is everything. X35 Earthwalker tested this. If you could get to citadel base and 10 marines in 5 mins then with Forge he had way more marines in a faster time which is too big of an advantage. We are glad that it’s getting fixed. Grizzly Battalion is not needed as you can just build the grizzlies yourself. Only get when you have no other good powers left to unlock. Other from that he almost functions like Isabel. If you are going vehicles the accelerated assembly is a most. Scatter bomb isn’t that great at all either. It’s so easy to dodge. We end up escaping with all out units alive most of the time. We wonder how Forge will be affected after the patch on his rolling economy power.

All the leaders are fun to use but we definitely believe that some are better than others. If you take away Forges rolling economy then he is the weakest. If you counter Anders sentinels then she becomes quite useless as well. Cutter, shipmaster and atriox is harder to counter as they are more diverse in their powers but less obvious on how to use them. Some are more support based than solo fighters. Overall we have had victories with all of them and they are quite diverse from each other. Interested to see what the new character leader will be like. Try them out… also remember to try the ‘Earth Walk’!

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NeuroVoider. The party soon starts.

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

NeuroVoider is a new stick shooter RPG game developed by ‘Flying Oak Games’ which is already out for PC but coming out on Xbox One and PS4 on the 17th of March. The story of the game is simple. The game is set in the future where robots have wiped out humanity and you play a brain that’s had enough of what’s going on and wants to do something about it about those robots that do nothing but party all the time. So you take control of robot parts and go to destroy them all and their leader the master NeuroVoider. 

This straight away looks like another simple shooter game where it’s just grab a controller, blow stuff up and have some fun. It’s good to have games like this from time to time. Games that don’t require too much and any can give it a go. The rooms, content and items are all randomly generated so there should be higher replay value and makes each play of the game quite different. A random generated always seem to have permadeath as well. Which is what this game has, so some care must be taken when advancing through the levels and robots. 

There are numerous robot parts for you to find, collect and scavenge. The amount in this game allows for a lot of weird to cool combinations. Some parts have insect like legs while others hover above the ground. For a simple game, a lot of work has gone into as there is said to be 8736 unique enemies to combat. That’s a big number. Many they each are a mix of the different robot parts available. Maybe that’s how many different parts there are, we don’t think so but it’s a possibility. There are multiple weapons to use. Some fire what looks like small bars of energy while another weapon fires electricity. You can boost yourself to dogde enemies and incoming fire too. You can have more than one weapon at a time from what we have seen. There is said to be gigantic bosses to take on like the v2.0 rampager who has multiple sections to it and fires from different angles. We don’t know much about other bosses though.

The graphics are nice for the style of the game and the sounds are also nice but the music is much better. One of things the developers seem point out is the sound track, which is said to be amazing. It was made by ‘Dan Terminus’. From what we have seen and heard from others gamers, many seem to like this game already. After all it does look fun with it’s many explosions especially with the fact that this games allows 4 player co-op. Just imagine four brains with their weapons blowing things up, looks like real chaos. We always respect games that have local co-op. It reminds us of moments when you would just play with people right next to you. The developers, ‘Flying Oak Games’ did a nice job with this game. Overall it is good and this should appeal to multiple gamers. Let’s see what happens with this game in time. Regardless of what happens… always remember to do the ‘Earth Walk’!

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Brawlout. Fighting it’s way to us.

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

Brawlout is a competitive platform fighter game developed by, ‘Angry Mob Games’, coming early 2017 for the Xbox One, PC and PS4. Let’s admit it. What’s the first thing that comes to your head when you look at this game for a few moments? Super smash bros brawl. Off course! What else could it be. Now that’s definitely not a bad thing as that was a excellent game. Meaning this game has a great foundation to build there game on.

Games like this are competitive. So it’s the same rules. You have to knock your opponents out of the arena. So you must fight your opponents and beat them up, raising their damage percentage number. The higher the number, the further you can knock them away. We are sure there must be items to use and extra modes like stock, health and more. Well there should be, especially if this game wants to make a name for its self knowing which game it is like. From what we can see, there are currently 8 characters to choose from. Each is said to be very different in their move-set and combat style. For example Paco the frog is all about using his tongue to draw enemies in to grapple and give them a close range beat down. Chief feathers looks like he is more of an aerial fighter, having wings and all. Olaf Tyson uses ice based attacks. We saw him create ice pillars and shoots a projectile that freezes enemies. We bet there is a projectile ranged fighter and an armoured heavy fighter as well. Who knows?

You have special attacks and normal attacks. Using special attacks consume your rage meter but when the meter is full your character is stronger. This just adds a layer of strategy to the game in terms of timing and opportunities. You must decide when to use a special attack not spam too much as then your character is weaker. Nice idea we believe. Also there are other attacks that you have to ‘grow’ out. Basically you can unlock new attacks for each character as you play. We aren’t sure whether they are unlocked through meeting certain conditions like perform 30 combos on your enemies or whether it’s just from a level up system like experience points.

The real competitive stuff seems to come in the online tournaments that players can join to take on others. If the developers play their cards right and get many gamers attention. This game could be played professionally. We can literally see this game being played in real tournaments. Well smash bros did and this game is made in 2017 so we assume this game would be better in most ways, then why not. Apparently there is a story campaign. In the world of Brawlout wars and conflict is constant. The character you pick is the representative of it’s race A figure known as ‘The Hood’ approaches you and there may be a way to stop all wars.

The animations and graphics of the game are excellent. It all flows so well indeed. The sound effects go well with the action. This game looks extremely good right now. We at X35 Earthwalker really like the look of this game. The developers, ‘Angry Mob Games’ did a excellent job with this game. We truly want to see how well it is received by the gaming community. This game is definitely worth checking out.

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WRC 6 – Racing against the world

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

WRC 6 is a racing simulation game developed by ‘Kylotonn Racing Games’ coming out the 3rd of March for the Xbox One, PC and PS4. It’s suppose to be the official game of the 2016 FIA World Rally Championship season. So straight away the game has set the expectation bar for themselves. This game needs the tracks, the racers and the conditions at the very least otherwise it will fail in bringing gamers the WRC experience.

This game looks promising as you can race through the 14 official events, key locations in the WRC and take part in the special stages. What’s really cool about this game is that they even tried to replicate the conditions that the drivers had to deal with in the 2016 WFC. You will have to tackle fog, snow, mud, night driving, engine breakdowns, punctures and possibly more. This should make gameplay more intense and in some cases annoying. We hope that there will be a mode where you can control what conditions will be in certain races.

WRC 6 is definitely a step up from the previous release in pretty much every way. There are two new game modes, world wide leader boards, weekly challenges for gamers to take on, play as the best drivers in the championship and free access to the full 2017 esports WRC.

We like the information the game gives you as you race. For example in some gameplay that we checked out, we saw at the top of the screen an arrow will appear before any turns and corners come. The arrows show you not only what direction you will go next but also what kind of turn it is. So if a arrow going right but bends at almost 90 degrees shows up, that means very soon you will have to do a sharp turn right. We like this very much and it will help gamers who have a hard time keeping an eye on the road while checking out mini maps to know where they are going, like with other racing games.

There are multiple ways to enjoy this game. You can hone your skills and take on the game in single player. You can get competitive with other racers from around the world and we all know that racing games have always been very competitive. Best of all you can take on your family and friends as WRC 6 has split screen multiplayer. What’s interesting though is that when in split screen, your opponent is intangible so you can’t knock each other around or get in the way. This is a great idea but we hope it’s a option when starting up matches as being able to block your rival behind you is also a strategy.   

Overall this game looks good and does a great job at creating the WFC experience. The graphics look nice, the environments are well done. The sounds of the cars and friction with the road are all very good. The developers ‘Kylotonn Racing Games’ did a very good job with this game. We wonder what other gamers will say about this game… but regardless of what they you must never forget to the ‘Earth Walk’!

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Halo 5 Warzone. Underestimated Weapons

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

 

Warzone in halo 5 Guardians is great fun. It’s also big and very chaotic at times. Warzone isn’t like other games. Normally in games like gears of war, your threats are right in front of you. In Warzone your threats are from a mile away, right up in your face, from below and from above. You could be sprinting across the map just to run into a shotgun wielding spartan. You could be sneaking around the edge of the map and then all of a sudden you have a giant hole in your head thanks to a sniper. You may be on a killing spree and having a great time until a random banshee out of nowhere bombs you from above. It’s not fair at times but hey, that’s Warzone. Now many have talked about some req weapons as rubbish or useless and we at X35 Earthwalker don’t think so at all. Off course there are some req weapons that even we don’t use but we will talk about some of them.

The ‘Needler’ is very underrated. We have hardly seen people use this weapon. X35 Earthwalker said, “The regular Needler is a good gun but the tier 2 ‘hail storm’ is extremely good. It fires faster than normal, with more ammo and the needles track enemies much better. You don’t know how many times I have gotten double and even triple kills with this weapon. There was even a time when I got an overkill on the ‘Spire’ map fighting for control over the spire. You only need a few needles to make them explode and they die fast. I have even got a killing frenzy from using the whole gun and then grabbing another one. You have to be smart though. Don’t just run up to enemies and start spraying, chances are, you will die. You must fire only a small amount of needles for each enemy and change targets fast. If you just run up to one enemy and fire, you will always kill them (unless you miss) but if you run up to two then it can go either way. When it comes to bigger groups… be smart.” 

The ‘Saw’ use to be bad in our opinion and rightfully be ignored by spartans except for the tier 3 ‘the answer’. X35 Earthwalker said, “I never use to like the saw at all. Diamondz L45 and I use to love it in halo 4 but here it is too weak. There were times when I would beat someone using a saw with an ‘Smg’. Like why and how. That isn’t right. Then there was a time where someone with an smg beat me when I had the saw but lately I think the halo 5 update increased it’s power because know it does a great job at destroying shields and applying pressure to vehicles. Just by playing smart and picking my targets carefully, I was able to get killing sprees with the saw. The tier 2 saw ‘appetite of destruction’ is even better. I feel like it does ever so slightly more damage but the extra ammo and clip size does make a difference. When you have that gun do not be afraid to attack light vehicles like ‘wasps’ and ‘banshees’ as the drivers always panic when they receive constant rapid damage. They crash into walls and whatever trying to escape. Never be afraid to use that ammo. By the way, it isn’t a gun that allows you to take on two at once, remember that.”

The ‘Sentinel beam’ has been dissed by almost everyone. No one has anything nice to say about this req weapon except that it is cool because it fires a laser. X35 Earthwalker said, “The Sentinel beam is not that strong at all but it does have one awesome feature that many do not know about. This req is like super effective against the wasp. This makes me so happy as people love to use that thing all the time. When I for the first time used the sentinel laser against a wasp it literally burned up before my eyes. No, it wasn’t a already damaged wasp. It wasn’t smoking or on fire. I am not sure how effective it is versus other vehicles but I believe it’s an anti vehicle type weapon but that doesn’t mean it’s not good against Spartans. When using it on enemy players they tend to panic because of the laser and constant damage. It works pretty much every time. So you literally have to experiment with this weapon.”

The ‘Plasma pistol’ is a powerful weapon that many just seem to avoid using because they most likely believe that another weapon would be better and maybe so but never underestimate this req weapon. X35 Earthwalker said, “The plasma pistol is one of my favourite req weapons because of how good it is and how strategic it is. This weapon especially the tier 3 plasma pistol ‘Void’s tear’ makes everything easier. This finishes enemies so quickly. It is anti-vehicle as it stuns and disables vehicles allowing you to take enemy vehicles. It’s best feature is that you can noob combo enemies. A noob combos is when you use a charged shot to drain a spartans shields and then headshot enemy straight afterwards. This has brought me so many kills before. Matter of fact on the level ‘battle of noctis’ I got so many kills because I would catch many out in the open with noob combo kills. The range of the plasma pistol when using smart link (basically zoom) is ridiculous. You can lock on and shoot enemies from so far away that it’s funny at times. Find the right spot and equip a long range precision weapon and you’ll have a great time.” 

The ‘Gunfighter magnum’ was a cool addition to the load out reqs. The pistol looks different and fires differently. It isn’t the best pistol at all, matter of fact we believe it is the worst load out pistol but once understood and used correctly, it may give you the edge. X35 Earthwalker said, “This pistol does less damage than the regular pistol but it has a much higher rate of fire. This weapon at least gives you more chances to hit that head shot. This gun can actually kill enemies really fast but you have to make sure not to miss any shots though. If all the shots hit, then the enemy drops really fast. It feels like a revolver from an old western movie with a quick draw and reload. Thanks to the high rate of fire the shield of the enemy will fall quite fast meaning it’s good for melee kills. Get sort of close to the enemy and rush them while firing as fast as you can, then when close get your fist into their face. Simple right? At the end of the day you basically just have to practice with this weapon.”

The ‘Energy swords’ have been claimed as useless by many which we say is ridiculous, their reason isn’t good enough. Off course if you run across the middle of the map, in the open, you will get gunned down by snipers, battle rifles, dmr’s and more. Use strategy spartans. X35 Earthwalker said, “The energy swords are excellent reqs and very powerful in the hands of a strategic and patient spartan. Just because you have a sword doesn’t mean you have to use it and run around with it all the time. Play normally for a while and wait for the opportunity. I have had multiple moments where I zoom into an enemy base at the right time and get over kills, kiltrocity and other multi kills. Swords naturally give you a speed boost so abuse that ability. Also by using power up reqs you can change the type of attack. Take things slow with active camo or charge through with speed boosts and a overshield. You could do the same with hammers but swords don’t slow you down as much plus swords have the natural speed boost.”

Off course there are some reqs that we truly believe aren’t worth using like a regular boltok and supressor. Their higher tier versions are much better and have low level requirements to unlock so there is literally no reason to use it. That’s a blog for another time though. Over time we will be uploading more clips of game play by X35 Earthwalker and friends on this website overtime so feel free to check them out to see some action. Pretty much every req has some sort of use and never just write something off because others are saying something about it. Be the one who makes it work. That’s what we do but whatever you do… make sure it’s at least the ‘Earth Walk’!

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Ghost Recon Wildlands beta. Open soon

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

Ghost recon wildlands, developed by Ubisoft, will be released on the 7th of March 2017 for Xbox One, PC and PS4. The game is set in Bolivia but a few years in the future. The country has become the largest producers of cocaine in the world. The ones behind this is the Santa Blanca drug cartel with their vicious tactics and influence has made the country narco state meaning that the countries economy is dependent on the trade in illegal drugs. This has brought forth fear, violence, injustice and lawlessness. Since getting into a all out war is not the solution here, stealth is the way to go. This is where the players, as the Ghosts, come in. An elite US special forces team, deployed behind enemy lines stop this all: the cartel and the corrupt government.

The open beta is available from February 23rd to February 27th. which is a fair amount of time due to the fact that the full game will be available a little more than a week later. In the open beta you’ll have access to the Itacua region of the game which is a good place to warm players up to the game and get ready for the worse to come. We heard that another region is also available called Montuyoc which is said to be much harder than Itacua by a considerable amount. This area is not for new players due to the drastic level in difficulty; however we aren’t 100% sure if Montuyoc will be available though. The open beta is free and available for Xbox One PC and PS4. The beta and even the full game is completely co-op with up to three other players so bring your friends in on the action but if you want to play by yourself then a.i team members will accompany you. You will have access to the full game’s vehicles and weapons to carry out stealthy operations or full blown fights to fight take on missions against the drug cartel.

Now some gamers may be wondering if you get anything for taking part in the beta. Well there is and it’s not a small prize where you just get a ribbon or character skin. If you participate in the open beta you’ll get access to the “Unidad Conspiracy” mission if you play the full game before March 31. For those who are a fan of Ghost Recon may be tempted to really get into the game. It’s not a bad prize at all if you ask us.

We are still very interested to see the leaders of the drug cartel in action as they really do stand out. We like how different they look and seem from each other. Each has an important role and look like they mean business. Their different departments show that this cartel isn’t some little kids game but a fully organised operation that has put some thought to it. The leaders are: El Yayo (head of production), La Reina De La Belleza (head of trafficking), El Cardenal (head of influence), El Muro (head of security) and El Sueno (leader of the cartel). El Yayo is a reluctant worker for the cartel because his family was threatened by them. He may end up helping the ghosts bring the cartel down. El Cardenal is the false preacher who was removed from the catholic churches for preaching forbidden cults. It seems the cartel has him manipulate and trick people with false sermons and messages. El Muro is the personal body guard to the leader. He looks like the typical tough guy who can hold his own in almost any situation. We are expecting a boss battle here. La Reina de la Belleza had a violent and traumatic childhood and this is probably what helped make her what she is today. We couldn’t trust her just from looking at her. Like she has a knife near by. The leader El Sueno has dangerous written all over him. He is brutal but acts religious at the same time which doesn’t make sense. It would be interesting if he has some sort of supernatural abilities. We would actually like that.

Overall we want to see what this game and the beta have in store for us gamers. The game is looking real good so far. The developers ‘Ubisoft’ did a great job so far. Let’s see what happens with this game but whether we see or not… you just can’t forget to do the ‘Earth Walk’!

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Halo Wars 2 so far

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

Hello friends and fellow Earthwalkers. We have been checking out some of the action in Halo wars 2. So far we are liking it. The online battles are big and explosive just like we hoped. The size of the maps are large enough to allow retreat and recovery, flanking and distractions. We do seriously hope that the developers made their maps with our feedback in mind. What can be confirmed is that the game has a lot going on and there is so much to take into account when in matches.

The maps have multiple things on it. There are supply crates and locations that once captured grant you additional energy. These two in particular are incredibly important. Get your crates as fast as possible and make sure to at least capture the energy points on your side of the map otherwise you will be at a medium sized disadvantage. Some maps have additional things on them to make things more interesting. We hope some maps have structures like ones that increase population or that giant covenant cannon thing. Off course they have to be balanced though.

There are lots of options in matches due to the large amounts of units, and leader abilities at your disposal. What’s really great is that now you can see what each units strengths and weaknesses are from a quick glance. They have a colour coded: red, amber, green and black system to show how well they fight against unit types. Amber means normal, green means very good, red, means very bad while black means can’t do anything. For example the ‘Cyclops’ unit (from what we remember) will have orange for infantry, green for vehicle and black for air. This means that Cyclops are alright against infantry, great against vehicle and can’t do anything against air. This makes understanding units and deciding what to build much easier and quicker.

We do wish that they kept the leader power skill tree look, which was in the first beta, instead of the wheel but that’s the decision they made. Maybe it’s because everyone is use to the wheel from the first Halo wars. It’s still nice but the skill tree looked much cooler and new. There are lots of abilities to unlock and use. As you kill units, capture energy locations, upgrade, basically do useful things in matches you will be awarded with skill points that you can spend to unlock leader powers like eradication or specific upgrades like making your units move faster. This is one of those decisions that are actually strategic. First of all choose what suits your style or the type of strategy that you are going for in the match. Next thing to think about is the situation of the match. For example your enemy may have a large army and you need to help thin them out so you may unlock mines to do damage as they approach you. Or maybe close air support to deal big damage to all their units. Or at the start of the match you get the upgrade that increases infantry speed so you can capture areas and get supply crates before the enemy. Think carefully instead of just picking whatever seems cool.

Seeing Decimus getting dropped in for the first time was quite cool to see. He has a ton of health, comes with a shield and does all kinds of destruction. He’s like a combination of the ‘War Lord’ from halo wars 2 and the ‘Brute chieftain’ from halo wars 1. He pulls you in and greets you with a nicely crafted hammer. We believe that their are hero units and then there are super units (they may be called ultimate units now). So the War lord and Spartans are powerful hero units but ultimate units like Decimus and Condows are things that terrorise the battlefield and strike fear into the hearts of players. Don’t even call their name or they might just show in your room (made you look). We believe the best thing to do is to get your ultimate unit as quickly as possible while not neglecting everything else like resource and unit management. 

Seeing the amount of leader abilities, the upgrades and everything else that’s going on shows that game is, just as I hope, more strategic and fights can almost easily go either way. Games should always have a way that allows players to forma a comeback, even if it is a small chance. There are leader abilities that can wipe out or heavily damage entire armies. There are units that can hold of many units while your army can retreat and heal up. There are options here and we love that. From what we can see, we am loving how Halo wars 2 is turning out and want to see what else happens with this game.

This is just some of our initial thoughts and views of the game and of what we know. Have fun with Halo Wars 2 and do the ‘Earth Walk’!

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Death Squared. Puzzle action squared

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

 

Death Squared is a new multiplayer puzzle game developed by ‘SMG Studio’, coming out ion February 14th for Xbox One, PC and PS4. Death Squared is a cooperative puzzle game for 1, 2 or 4 players where each player gets to control a squared shaped robot which needs to be guided to a matching colour-coded goal. This does sound easy but with puzzle games, it never is. There are traps and hazards which will destroy and kill your robot.

Straight away from looking at the game, We at X35 Earthwalker could tell that it’s fun and has some humour to it. We could tell that from the design of the robots. The robots may come in the four colours red, blue, green and yellow and have similiar looks but it’s the prints on their faces that gives it away. There are many prints. like an ‘X’, mustache, laughing face, cross bones, heart, tiger stripes and even a skull. It would be better if these robots have voices and actually talk to the players but we will see. The same faces can have different markings so customisation of the robots is there.

The entire level is made of squares and literally, there is a lot of details on the squares. Some squares have different markings, colours and coating. The graphics of the game is very good. The scenery looks like a giant section in a mechanical factory. It looks the the whole thing is like a simulation by a computer with square levels in an area surrounded by lots of space. The music is more like ambiance, just a simple tune in the background. This may be like this because the developers wants all the focus to be on communication between the players. 

X35 Earthwalker has checked out some of the levels already and he said, “The levels throw a lot of stuff in there for the players to think about. It actually causes players to stop, think and plan amongst each other, before continuing. Some levels have blocks that hologram squares which is tangible for the robots of different colour and move when the same coloured robot moves. There are levels where pieces and even rotating parts move as the robot of the same colour move. There are switches which activate spikes from the ground that destroy any robots on top of it. There are levels that have lasers that will destroy any robot that of a different colour that makes contact with it. There are even levels that combine all of this stuff together, creating crazy scenarios. I like what I see so far”. We agree.

This is the kind of game that will get you vex with your friends and family. Maybe your younger sibling accidently gets your robot killed because he moved when he wasn’t supposed to. Maybe your friend forgot that all this time they can move through any hologram squares that’s the same colour as they are, wasting many minutes. Or that one friend who decides to get his friends killed but tries to make it seem like it was an accident. This game starts of very fun but will quite quickly become a challenge and then a head scratching challenge. If you don’t have any temperance (self control) and long suffering (patience) then be careful as you don’t want to get too mad with friends and family. So think twice about this.

It has been said that there is a section in the game called the ‘Vault’ which has a bunch of levels that are only for the brave. We guess that these levels must all be very hard to complete to near impossible to solve. We hope there are some levels like that though because there are always gamers out there who won’t stop until they beat it. Those guys will have fun.

Overall this seems like a fun puzzle game that will keep you occupied for a good while. A lot of work has gone into it. The developers ‘SMG Studio’ did a good job with this game and we at X35 Earthwalker want to see what becomes of this game. Even so… You must not forget to do the ‘Earth Walk’!

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Crypt of the NecroDancer. Got the moves?

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

 

‘Crypt of the NecroDancer’ is a new action, indie, RPG game but also classed as a rhythm dungeon crawler, developed by ‘Brace Yourself Games’ coming to Xbox One 10th of February but was released on other platforms last year in February as well. Straight away the title of the game should straight up tell any gamer what this game contains. Dancing, music and dungeons. If that’s what you got also, then you are correct. In Crypt of the NecroDancer you control ‘Cadence’ who is the daughter of a famed treasure hunter that has gone missing. She goes off to look for him but accidentally falls into a crypt owned by the NecroDancer, who steals Cadence’s heart and forces her to challenge his minions to retrieve it. Now you are forced to fight through the dungeon but your actions tied to the beat of the music. You must beat the Necrodancer.

This game has a very friendly look to it. It reminds you of the old retro games with that pixel like graphic style. So straight away you want to try the game. The rules and controls of the game are simple. Move, attack and doge enemies in tune with the beat for the best success. There is lots of music and the game even said that it has an award winning sound track plus 4 remixes of a track. So you have options but it gets better. This game has a fantastic feature. It grants players the option to instead import custom music from their MP3 collection. So groove and play to your own tunes. Plus if you have a dance mat connected by USB then you can link it up and get your moves on. We at X35 Earthwalker encourage movement and exercise. There is two player co-op where each player has their own health but share the gold and spells. This means you can show off your moves to a buddy of yours.

The enemies in the game are all dancing. Who ever said skeletons can’t dance. Literally, everything in this crypt seems to be effected by the music and tunes. You can only move or attack if they do the action on the beat of the music. Everytime you get it on the beat boosts your scoring multiplier. You don’t automatically take damage for missing the beat but it does reset the scoring multiplier and you may end up in the path of an enemies attack. As you go through the game, you will find new items, armour, treasures and weapons to use to your advantage. There are lots of weapons in this game like: a dagger, broadsword (which can hit multiple enemies), whip, bow, flail, rifle and much more. All having their own range, damage and mechanics. Find the one that best suits you and your situation.

There is a nice range of enemies that all seem to know how to have a good time, with their dance moves. The dungeon is split into 4 zones which each have four levels. The first three levels always have many enemies, an exit to find and a mini boss for you to overcome but the last level has a big boss who wants you dead. The last mechanic that gamers should be aware of is that you want to complete the level before the song finishes otherwise you will be sent to the next level automatically but miss all the rewards you would get for completing the level. From what we have seen, the game seems quite fun and the whole rhythm mechanic is a nice touch to a dungeon crawler. Music is always enjoyable and impacts the experience of the game, plus having the option to choose our own music is great. The flow of the game is definitely changed according to the song but flows well nonetheless. This game isn’t for every gamer though as you do at times feel restricted to the music and if that annoys you then it’s not for you.

Overall it seems like a fun game but only for some types of gamers. The developers ‘Brace Yourself Games’ made something nice. Regardless… you must never forget to do the ‘Earth Walk’!

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Conflict: Desert storm. An example co-op game

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

 

Desert storm is an action tactical third person shooter game developed by ‘Pivotal Games’ that came out in September 2002. In this game, you control the most feared special operations forces in the world: the elite British SAS or the US Delta Force squads. These teams consist of: Bradley (the leader), Foley (the sniper), Connors (the heavy weapons) and Jones (the combat engineer). The game takes place in the Persian gulf war.

This is a game that is from X35 Earthwalkers child hood. It’s a legendary game that he will never forget. The memories, the laughs, the struggles and more. It’s all there. There is literally no other game like this game for sure. Best to start of with the tutorial which by the way is amazingly done. This is how tutorials should be. Firstly a choice as to whether you want to take the tutorial or not and then explain and get into everything about the game. It takes you through positions, shooting, movement and more with assault courses, shooting ranges and special rooms. When you play the campaign you can switch between the four soldiers whenever you want. Each character has their own weapons and equipment so you must be smart about who you want to use for certain parts of the mission. For example it’s not best to use Foley, the sniper, when you are going into a building. You need medium to close range weapons in there.

Bradley has the assault rifle which also comes with a grenade launcher attachment meaning he is best medium range combat. He has a silence pistol so entering and clearing out buildings is second easiest for him. He has binoculars so scouting is what he can do also. He later gets access to special weapons too but more on that later. Foley has the sniper rifle so he can head shot and kill enemies from far away and because sniper rifles can zoom in, he can scout good as well. Connors has a light machine gun that can lay down lots of fire and damage at everything. Tanks are scared of him because of the powerful rocket launcher in his back pocket. Connors deals damage like no other. Jones has a silenced sub machine gun meaning he is the best at stealth and taking at enemies in buildings. The man also happens to have some mines, which he can use to cover certain doors or behind the team. It doesn’t stop there as in his pockets are also some C4 explosives which he can plant and then detonate with the trigger. He also has a shotgun making close range combat, like in buildings so easy. Combining all the skills and equipment of the team results in the fact that there isn’t a single situation these guys can’t handle.

Few times in the game there will be levels where your objective will be to destroy some really large or other specific targets and so for this, they equip Bradley with special equipment. The two that we remember are air strikes (the one that looks like a phone) and a laser designator. With the phone looking one, you could use it to call in air strikes on the location that you aimed at to destroy scud launchers, clear a large area of infantry or just to get a tank out of the way. These were limited. The laser designator didn’t have a limit but you couldn’t just use it anywhere. The most notable moment with the laser designator was when you had to use it to destroy a very large bridge. It can be used on tanks as well. With those stuff, you really do feel like you were special forces with exclusive equipment. 

If you play single player then you must use the command to make all your team mates follow you to have everyone moving at once. Depending on the situation, you may have to switch characters. Like the level that had the bridge, Foley was the best as you could snipe them and they can’t even hit you back. When a tank shows up, get everyone to a safe location, switch to Connors and blow up the tank with his rocket launcher. When you need to lock down an area or set traps with silence action then switch to Jones for his mines and C4. All the the characters have frag grenades, smoke grenades, medkits and a combat knife. The frag grenades worked exactly as you expect them to. The smoke grenades in this game is probably the best smoke grenades we have ever seen in a game in terms of effectiveness. Nothing could see you. The medkits recovered a lot of health and can be used to revive fallen troops. The combat knife is always exciting to use because if you sneak up behind an enemy and use it, it becomes a stealth kill execution. Another great feature about this game is that you can give weapons to teammates very easily and if a team mate is down, you can take things from them as well. So let’s say Foley is down but Bradley has run out of medkits then you can take a medkit from Foley to use on him and bring him back into the fight.

Multiplayer is literally the best way to play the game. This where all the memories for X35 Earthwalker himself comes from. He use to play this back when he was very young with his family. X35 Earthwalker would play Bradley, his sister would play Foley, his mum would play Connors and since it was three of them his sister got to control Jones as well. So much crazy adventures would take place. Times when getting new shiny weapons was more important than the fighting going on outside. They even created a ridiculous strategy to deal with tanks when out of rocket launchers. Jones would give his detonator to Foley. Foley would use smoke grenades to create a smokey path towards a tank, then Jones would run up to the tank with a C4 and plant one right next to the tank. Then try and make it far away or back to safety so that Foley can blow the tank up with a detonator. Sometimes Jones couldn’t get back we would have to blow up the tank with him but since when you lose health your body is always in one piece on the ground, we could just revive him with a medkit. How ridicolous is that? X35 Earthwalker and his family would split up and take strategic positions only to hear the screams of his sister being chased found and chased by the enemy so then everyone would run to her to help. It was so much fun. So much craziness and memories that it’s best explained through speaking and not writing.

There were a lot of levels and of a good length with clear and interesting objectives. One time you will be destroying scud launchers, the next time you have to eliminate a target and then next you have to do a rescue. The variety is good. The graphics and sounds were great for its time. The environments and level designs were nice to look at and the areas were different. The enemies are dangerous and numerous. There are infantry with rifles, sniper rifles, light machine guns and even rocket launchers. There are anti air tanks, anti-infantry tanks and regular tanks of two types of armour. There is even a helicopter that attacks you. Fight in cities, buildings and off course deserts. Play by yourself or go full in with split screen four player.

Overall this game is awesome and will always be special to us regardless of time. The developers ‘Pivotal Games’ did an outstanding job with this game. It’s still available on steam as well but whatever you do… Don’t forget to do the ‘Earth Walk’!

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