video games | Gumballs Plays Games

Bethesda’s epic E3

Posted on June 15, 2015 by GumballsPlaysGames

I just watched Bethesda’s E3 showcase from last night and I have to say I’m pretty impressed. The DOOM gameplay looked great and I’m all of a sudden excited to play it even though I’ve never been huge into the franchise. The guns, combat animations and environments just looked downright awesome and I can’t wait to shoot and chainsaw my way through that world.

The Elder Scrolls card game took me by surprise, but given the popularity of Hearthstone I can see how they’d want to try to cash in. I’m not so sure it’d be successful, as Hearthstone does what it does so well I don’t think there’s room for another fantasy card collecting game.

The Dishonored 2 trailer was pretty neat, and I especially like that they showcased the female character. I think it would have been better to make the game focus solely on the female protagonist, but giving the player the choice to play as either isn’t so bad.

The Fallout 4 coverage at the end was mindblowingly awesome! Everything they showed blew me away, and I especially like the way the game opens. Giving the option to play as either a male or female character again is pretty nice and having a voiced main character will certainly be interesting.

The mobile game seems pretty cool and I’m going to try to check it out later today. The Pip Boy companion app is also a neat idea, but the best part of the entire showcase was the November 2015 release date! Unfortunately I’ll be deployed this Fall, so I won’t be getting my hands on Fallout 4 until next summer.

Streaming Elder Scrolls Online: Day two

Posted on June 14, 2015 by GumballsPlaysGames

Hey there, just wanted to pop in and let you know I’m about to give Elder Scrolls Online some more time and I’ve started my Twitch stream over at Twitch.tv/jdh5153. Feel free to swing by and check it out. Hopefully ESO will start to grow on me!

Playing Fallout: New Vegas again

Posted on June 7, 2015 by GumballsPlaysGames

With the announcement of Fallout 4 this past week, the previous two Fallout games have been getting a lot of love again. Both Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas have seen huge jumps in sales this week, and the ultimate / game of the year editions of both are currently on sale on Steam for $11.99 each ($4.99 for the standard editions) until tomorrow morning. If you haven’t picked up either game before, now is definitely a great time to do so.

I spent a couple hours digging back into New Vegas today (probably too much time really) and it’s been a blast! I originally played both Fallout games (referring to 3 and New Vegas of course) on the 360, but now I’m playing through them on PC.

I hooked my MacBook (running Windows 10 Preview via Boot Camp) up to the TV and checked out Steam’s Big Picture mode, which I hadn’t really used before. It’s pretty cool to navigate my games on the TV using a controller and I really like the interface. It’s also nice accessing Steam menus in game by pressing the home button on the 360 controller.

I had some great fun on some missions I either breezed past or completely ignored during my initial playthrough years ago. I’ve been taking my time making sure I get the most out of New Vegas this time.

The three missions I undertook today were incredibly enjoyable, however it took forever to find the three boxes of Sugar Bombs required for the delightfully mischievous conclusion to the Come Fly With Me quest. It was entirely worth it though, as the quest now ranks as one of my all time Bethesda favorites. Not long after I embarked on That Lucky Old Sun in which you encounter the hilariously awesome “scientist” who goes by the name Fantastic.

I can’t wait to play more of New Vegas! How about you, are you going back and playing the previous games in anticipation of Fallout 4?

Trying to figure out Dark Souls

Posted on April 11, 2015 by GumballsPlaysGames

I played Dark Souls once before, not long after it became a huge ‘hit’ out of nowhere. I had heard the game was unforgiving, and as someone who often gets mad and quits games when they die, I should have known Dark Souls wasn’t for me. I remember having absolutely no clue what I was doing and repeatedly dying while trying to climb some stairs on the mountain side, VERY early in the game. At that point I gave up and swore never to come back.

Well now that I have a 360 again, I downloaded Dark Souls and decided to give it another try. I think all of the Bloodborne talk lately got me wanting to check out the Souls experience again.

This afternoon I still had absolutely no clue what I was doing. I had to Google what Humanity was and still couldn’t quite figure out what to do with it. I made myself human and redeemed some humanity (by redeemed I mean I used it so a number shows in the upper right corner) but have no idea what affect that had.

I managed to make it past the stairs I got stuck on before, but it was ugly. I’m absolutely terrible at anything that involves timing and can’t parry an attack to save my life. I basically ran up to enemies while holding my sword in two hand mode and flailed at them until they died, all while taking a few hits here and there.

I wandered around aimlessly and used up quite a few Estus flasks and my divine ability or whatever (I’m playing as a Knight) and somehow made it to the second boss after summoning another character (which I assume is another player?). The boss immediately sent me flying off the bridge into the ether and to my death. I started off back at the campfire way back below those stairs I was stuck on before and decided to call it quits again.

Maybe there was another campfire between there and the boss (I would hope so), but I certainly did not feel like running through all that again. Heck, I barely made it to that boss with my life intact and I don’t see the appeal in doing it all again. Furthermore I’m pretty sure all of my souls and humanity are irretrievable seeing as my body was thrown into the nothingness. Not cool.

At this point I’m not certain if I’ll try again. I don’t think I can take repeatedly trudging through the same area and enemies just to die again and again. I think I’m just not cut out for this game. I may take a look at a strategy guide or watch some ‘Let’s Plays’, but for now I think I’ll fire up Tiger Woods ’13 and relax on the links.

Going back to the Xbox 360

Posted on April 9, 2015 by GumballsPlaysGames

I sold my Xbox 360 shortly after getting an Xbox One and have often regretted the decision. At the time it made sense as I was looking forward while also attempting to cut down on clutter. I ended up trading in my 250gb 360 slim (which I had just recently upgraded to from an older Elite) to GameStop for some irrationally low sum (I think I got around $80 for the console and around 15-20 disc based games). Oh well, I got a second Xbox One controller out of it so it seemed like a good idea.

I haven’t really missed my 360 either. I’ve enjoyed my Xbox One immensely. The longing for another 360 came after returning from vacation where I spent a lot of time playing Minecraft on the Xbox One with my brother. He doesn’t have an Xbox One, and is still in high school so it’ll be awhile until he gets one. Therefore now that I’m back in Idaho the only way I can play Minecraft with him is on a 360. Sure, you’d say PC is an option, but he’s part of the generation that thinks PC’s are old fashioned. A phone is all he needs.

I’ve also been looking at the list of great Games with Gold releases on the 360 and I’ve found quite a few games have been given out for free that I never got around to playing. I also miss playing the Scene It games with Vanessa, so yesterday I ordered a $99 refurbished Xbox 360 from GameStop (along with a 2 year replacement plan).

I picked up the 60GB Lego Lord of the Rings bundle because it has the highest hard drive space of the $99 bundles. I have quite a few digital 360 games tied to my account, but I think 60GB will get me what I need for now.

I’m not certain which version of the 360 I’ll be getting as the page notes that models may vary, but I’m at least hoping I get a model with an HDMI port.

My only regret at this point is that I never transferred any of my 360 saves to the cloud. This was a huge mistake on my part because I’ll have to start many games over again should I choose to play them. I never finished Final Fantasy XIII but I got pretty darn far. Not sure I’ll want to start that adventure over.

My 360 should arrive tomorrow evening and I look forward to re-downloading a few of my favorite titles and checking out April’s Games with Gold. Too bad I didn’t have a 360 all along because I’ve missed a lot of great free games. Oh well.

Have you found yourself going back to a last gen console? Did you have to repurchase it or did you keep yours?

Borderlands: The Handsome Collection

Posted on March 25, 2015 by GumballsPlaysGames

Yesterday I downloaded the Borderlands: The Handsome Collection on Xbox One and excitedly jumped right into the graphically polished Borderlands 2. The first thing I noticed (after the annoying long intro you still can’t skip) was just how crisp everything looked. I played a little bit of Borderlands 2 on the 360 with my brother while I was on vacation and I can say the updated version on the Xbox One is much easier on the eyes. The damage numbers that pop out of enemies look especially clean (a weird thing to comment on, I know) and it felt so satisfying to watch those numbers fly around the screen again.

The gameplay is still the same as far as I can tell, but that’s fine as Borderlands 2 was a blast to play even on the 360. I never got too far into either Borderlands game, but I’m glad I didn’t as I’ll get to experience all of the gameplay in a superior format.

I played around the first hour of the game yesterday solo (I had my game set to open, but no one jumped in) and it was enjoyable, though I found myself dying more than I would have liked. After I hit somewhat of a road block I decided to back out to the menu and try to hop into someone else’s game. The process proved to be a tad unpleasant, as I had trouble joining a game and it took longer than I would have liked. I was initially matched into a game only to receive a message saying I wasn’t on the same patch version as the host which didn’t quite make sense (unless an update dropped while I was playing solo). After that I timed out trying to join another game, but eventually got into a game on the third try.

The multiplayer was as enjoyable as I remember it being, though Borderlands really shines when playing with friends (which I have yet to do). I’m looking forward to jumping back into the game with people I know and mowing down enemy after enemy with a variety of exciting weapons!

I haven’t tried out Borderlands the Pre-sequel yet (I’ll probably wait until I finish Borderlands 2, unless I get bored) so I can’t comment on the quality of that experience. I’ve heard it performs less smoothly than Borderlands 2 which is unfortunate if true. Hopefully it’ll get patched and the issues will be ironed out before I get around to trying it out.

Redbox now has Xbox One and PS4 games at more locations

Posted on March 13, 2015 by GumballsPlaysGames

I was browsing Redbox this evening and was surprised to find they now offer Xbox One and PS4 games. Redbox had been testing out the current gen rentals in select locations, but out here in rural Pennsylvania there are several kiosks now offering rentals for those systems.

The rentals are a tad pricey, at $3 a day, however that price point might work for someone who can finish a game in a binge session, or maybe for someone who just wants to give a game a try. I use Gamefly for most of my gaming rentals, however I might be tempted to grab something from a Redbox once or twice.

Have you rented a game from Redbox yet? What do you think of the pricing?

I’m still alive, I promise! (Persona 4, Shin Megami Tensei IV and more!)

Posted on February 12, 2015 by GumballsPlaysGames

Hey there, haven’t posted a whole lot lately and just wanted to apologize for that. It’s been a busy week and I’ve been getting dragged into a Persona 4 wormhole of sorts lately. I’m enjoying the game a lot on the Playstation TV and have probably spent more time playing it after work than I should.

I love Teddie’s facial expressions!

I am a bit sad that Persona 4 feels like it’s slowing down a bit now that the game is starting to open up. I miss the fast pace and voice acting of the first few hours. Now all of a sudden most of the dialogue is no longer voice acted and there’s not a whole lot going on. Trying to figure out what to do after school hasn’t really been appealing. I’ve just been doing the first thing available and skipping through dialogue hoping for something cool to happen soon.

I haven’t played any Dying Light since getting sucked into Persona 4, but I hope to spend more time with it this weekend. I’ve played a little Shin Megami Tensei IV and have made some slight progress, but I feel like the game has started to slow down now that I’m in Tokyo and I’m finding it difficult to stay interested.

I have had The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds sitting around for a few weeks and haven’t gotten around to trying it out yet. I also have barely put any time into Fantasy Life, and my town in Animal Crossing is probably burning to the ground right about now.

Consuming Surge and playing Persona 4 has pretty much been my after work routine this week.

There’s been just so much going on and not enough time to get into any of it (besides Persona) lately. I’m taking three weeks of leave starting on February 28th so hopefully I’ll have some time to make some progress on a whole list of things (I really should finish Dragon Age!).

Hopefully I’ll be able to post a few things this weekend! Don’t hate me, okay?

See you soon!

Medusa, I will defeat you (one day). Shin Megami Tensei IV

Posted on January 28, 2015 by GumballsPlaysGames

So a few nights ago I hit my first roadblock in Shin Megami Tensei IV, in the form of the Medusa boss battle. Up until that point I had been cruising along, never facing any particularly challenging moments. I was enjoying the progression of the story and the flow of the gameplay, when all of a sudden the cruel and monstrous Medusa showed up and stopped me in my tracks.

The fight felt like it was going well, until the first dialogue choice came about. Medusa asked my opinion of her statues and I said that they were ugly….Oops! This enraged her, thus increasing her attack power and she wiped out my entire party on the very next turn. Not cool.

So I walked myself out of Hades, determined to put an end to Medusa’s treachery. The next battle went about as smoothly as the first, and when presented with a dialogue option, this time I praised her statues which in turn lowered her attack power. “Hooray!” I thought, this is going to be easy now.

Not so much. I made it to the second dialogue exchange, which from what I understand marks the 2/3 point of the fight (or at least 2 out of the 3 dialogue exchanges) but soon after my character was killed which left me unable to swap my creatures out for fresh ones and also left me unable to use items to heal them. I wiped again.

I tried the fight two or three more times with no success, and decided it was time to grind. I brought all my creatures up an additional two levels (to the 12-13 level range) but fared no better in the fight. So I went back to the grind and got my Gremlin to transform into a level 18 Raiju once it hit 14. I’m hoping this will give me an edge when I return to Medusa’s chamber again later tonight and finally attempt to finish her off. Wish me luck!

I apologize for the glare, was grinding away in my car earlier as I had some downtime and it was bright outside.

Had a bit more fun with Destiny tonight

Posted on January 27, 2015 by GumballsPlaysGames

I jumped right back into matchmaking Strikes tonight, and I had a lot better luck as I was matched with people interested in actually playing the game!

I was initially matched into the Devil’s Lair strike already in progress and my teammates and I made quick work of the strike and final boss. Much more enjoyable with a team that works together!

After that I stayed in matchmaking with one of the players from Devil’s Lair and we actually matched with another third team member who was just as capable as the last. We knocked out the Nexus quite smoothly and I had an enjoyable time doing so.

My only complaint would be that no one used the team voice chat in either strike. I don’t know what it is, but no one ever wants to chat in Destiny. The same goes for the Crucible match I played to end the night, no one was using the team chat channel. Too bad.

I ended the night with a Crucible control match and went a respectable (for me) 20-13 (and we won!). I didn’t really get any notable gear tonight and still sit midway between level 24 and 25. Still, I enjoyed the night and look forward to running another strike or two tomorrow night, hopefully I’ll be just as lucky with the matchmaking!