I’m so sick of seeing that every time I boot up the Master Chief Collection and try to get into a multiplayer match. I’ve tried on and off for the last two weeks and still have not been able to reliably find matches. This weekend there has been some improvement, but the matchmaking process is still not flawless. 343 put out a patch last week that seemed to improve the matchmaking process for most people, yet I’ve found the matchmaking process still to be slower than it should be. Also, they have yet to add all of the other playlists they removed (such as Team SWAT) which is disappointing.
I’ve been able to find a few matches this evening with wait times as low as a minute (a massive improvement over launch week where I’d have to continuously back out of matchmaking and retry for 15 minutes or longer just to get into a single match).
I should be excited that I can finally play some Halo multiplayer, however with Dragon Age, GTA V and Farcry 4 now out, Halo is probably going to take a backseat for awhile. The Master Chief Collection was one of my most anticipated games of the year, but its rocky launch has soured my attitude toward the collection right now and I’m having too great a time with Dragon Age and GTA to even think very much about Halo right now.
I’ve read that Microsoft has been honoring requests for refunds for those who own digital copies of the Master Chief Collection, however I think in the long run once everything is working smoothly I’ll still be happy to own the collection. One thing I can say is I probably won’t be buying Halo 5 during launch week now.
Has the Master Chief Collection’s launch affected your excitement for Halo 5 or future Microsoft games? Are you going to be sticking with Master Chief Collection or are you have you already given up hope?
I believe I’m about 5 or 6 hours into Dragon Age: Inquisition and I’ve been having a blast. I’m enjoying the characters, gameplay and exploring the world. What’s especially fun are all the weird little things that pop up in RPG’s. For example in the video above I send an enemy flying off a cliff and to his death which is always amusing.
Also it’s fun to be able to ‘jump climb’ up mountains, something I learned from Elder Scrolls games which can make getting around the world just a bit quicker than taking the long way around.
I look forward to advancing further into Dragon Age: Inquisition and exploring the insanely huge world. I definitely recommend checking out the third Dragon Age game if you haven’t done so already. It’s a blast!
Yesterday I got an e-mail from Microsoft celebrating one year of the Xbox One and it included some pretty interesting stats about my year. It pointed out that I’m in the top 5% of Xbox One gamers with 6650 gamerscore earned on the Xbox One. I’ve also spent 371 hours gaming on Xbox Live on the Xbox One which places me in the top 25% of gamers. It’s kind of cool to learn about these stats and see where you fit in with the rest of the Xbox One community.
If you’re interested in seeing some more stats you can check out rewards.xbox.com/myrewards and see what you’ve done over the last 30 days.
In other Xbox news, the long awaited HBO GO app has finally arrived on the Xbox One. I’m glad to have the app because the interface is nicer looking and easier to use than my Dish On Demand interface.
You Don’t Know Jack 2015 has made its way onto the Xbox One this week in the Jackbox Party Pack. The Jackbox Party Pack is a bundle of five party games for just $24.99 on the Xbox One. It includes You Don’t Know Jack 2015, Drawful, Word Spud, Lie Swatter and Fibbage XL.
All of the games make use of mobile devices (any phone or tablet) in place of controllers (You Don’t Know Jack can be played with a controller in single player mode only). When you launch a game you’ll see a room code on screen and anyone who wants to join in simply goes to Jackbox.tv on their device and types in the room code and their name / nickname and they’re in the game. This allows you to have as many players as you have devices since you’re not limited by the number of controllers you own. It’s a great way for anyone to join in on their own device.
The games will display questions or prompts on the TV screen while the players input answers on their device. For You Don’t Know Jack you’ll see the ABXY buttons on your device, while for other games like Fibbage you’ll type in your answer (in Fibbage you’re presented with a question and all the players must try to enter a lie they think the other players will choose. You get points when people pick your lie, and also if you happen to choose the one correct answer on the screen).
You Don’t Know Jack is a blast as always and completely worth the $24.99 price alone. The presentation is great and the game is a blast. My only complaint is it seems like there’s a minor delay during the Jack Attack section of the game. I’ve felt like I’ve tapped first only to lose out to another player a few times. Despite this the game is still enjoyable.
Fibbage is my second favorite game of the bundle and it can get quite hilarious. So far I’ve only played it with two players, and I’m sure adding additional players would increase the hilarity quite a bit.
Lie Swatter presents you with a series of statements and players must decide whether they’re truthful or a lie. You get points for answering correctly and quickly. Again the more players the better and Lie Swatter can support up to 100 players.
For $24.99 you’re getting a nice selection of party games, and I highly recommend checking it out.
Microsoft is letting all Xbox Live Gold members on the Xbox One download and play Sunset Overdrive for free for 24 hours (Nov 22). If you like the game you can purchase it for $10 off this weekend only. Sunset Overdrive is an absolute blast and a refreshing new type of shooter with an entertaining story and enjoyable characters.
I definitely recommend checking it out and playing through a good junk of a great game for free today. All progress will be saved so you continue right where you left off if you purchase the game in the future. It’s worth noting that this is not a demo, but the entire game, and you can also unlock achievements while playing!
Halo Master Chief Collection’s matchmaking issues have rolled into day two unfortunately. After I got off work and got done at the gym it was nearly 8PM (MT) and I fully expected Halo’s issues to be ironed out by now, but alas matchmaking is still not running smoothly. I was met with the error message above (“The matchmaking process was not successful. Please try matching again.”) after about 30 seconds of searching for a Team Slayer match.
The most recent update by 343 was posted nearly two hours ago (another update should be coming rather soon):
Hopefully things will work out soon. Until then we wait. I guess I’ll check out Sunset Overdrive for now and maybe get back into Destiny if things aren’t up and running by this weekend.
Master Chief Collection is live today, but not without some issues. The game is currently suffering from matchmaking issues making it hard to find and get into multiplayer matches (I’ve been sitting at the screen above for 5 minutes trying to find a Halo 3 match).
We're aware of issues some have been having with matchmaking and we’re working around the clock, alongside the Xbox Live team, to address.
So far I’ve been able to play a handful of matches, however I’ve also noticed some of the matches have less than the maximum number of players in them (my last Halo 2 Team Slayer match was 3 vs 2). When it works the game is a blast. It’s been awesome getting reacquainted with the maps and nuances of each game and switching between the 4 Halo games with a touch of a button.
The menus are well designed and are incredibly quick and easy to navigate. You can select any of the campaigns (and any mission) in seconds or switch over to multiplayer with a flick of the analog stick and choose between a large variety of playlists spanning the four games.
There are playlists that just focus on a single game in addition to playlists that will switch you from game to game between matches.
There are also campaign playlists where you can choose to to play through a series of missions (or all of them) with friends.
I can’t wait to sink hundreds of hours into the four campaigns and hundreds of multiplayer maps! Hopefully the matchmaking issues get worked out soon, until then I’ll probably just play more of the campaign missions.
I wasn’t initially planning on picking up Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare, but after seeing the early reviews and looking at some gameplay I decided by the end of the day yesterday to buy it. That turned out to be a wise choice. I’ve been having more fun with Advanced Warfare than I have with any shooter in quite awhile. The multiplayer is much more fast paced than recent Call of Duty games and it’s quite refreshing. If you take the best parts of Titanfall and the best of Call of Duty you end up with a game that feels nearly perfect, and that’s Advanced Warfare.
I want to say more, but don’t have the time just yet. I can say I played the first two campaign missions and enjoyed them much more than Ghosts and Black Ops II’s missions. I’ve played a handful of multiplayer matches and have had an absolute blast. Everything feels just right and the pace of matches is much improved over Ghosts.
Yesterday I played my first two Kinect games on the Xbox One. That’s not to say the Kinect hasn’t been useful, I love using it for voice commands, streaming, logging in, switching / snapping apps, changing channels, the list goes on and on. I just haven’t used it to play a Kinect game yet (I have used Kinect features in games and enjoyed it). Last night I downloaded both Just Dance 2015 and Dance Central Spotlight and enjoyed both quite a bit.
I had never played a Just Dance game before, but right from the start I was impressed. I really love the sleek and quick menus and the collection of songs available is quite enjoyable. The game features about 40 songs but you can buy more for $1.99 a song (we bought a handful including PSY’s “Gangam Style” which is so fun to dance to I’m surprised it wasn’t included in the game).
A look at the menu on Xbox One. You can navigate either with hand motions, voice commands or with a controller.
The dancing in Just Dance 2015 is simple enough to make it accessible to just about anyone, but it can be challenging in a fun way with some more complex moves (some even requiring you to get down on the floor, or hold another dancer). At the end of the song you’re presented with a highlight reel edited by the ‘autodance’ feature which will make you look as good as possible (but still quite goofy if you’re me).
You can choose to share your highlight reel with the Just Dance community and even Facebook if you like. At the moment, however, the Facebook functionality in Just Dance 2015 is not working on the Xbox One for many users. Once it launches the IE app to connect to Facebook there’s a URL redirect error. I’ve e-mailed Ubisoft support (as have many other users) but I haven’t seen a response yet.
My highlight reel from “Gangam Style”. Not the best dancer, but hey there was alcohol involved!
There’s some multiplayer functionality available in Just Dance 2015 as well. You can compete with other dancers by adding challengers and you’ll see their scores alongside yours throughout the song. These are pre recorded scores you’re competing against but it gives you an incentive to up your game. I’ve also received challenges in my Just Dance feed from other players. I assume the game is curating these challenges rather than being issued by the players, but I haven’t played enough to know for sure. You can also compete against live dancers in the World Dance Floor mode, however I haven’t had a chance to try it out yet. When I was playing last night there were on average 25 dancers online in World Dance Floor mode at any given time throughout the evening.
Dance Central Spotlight is Harmonix’s dancing game available as a $9.99 download on Xbox One. As opposed to Just Dance which bundles 40 songs into a $50 package, Spotlight charges a minimal fee for the game and throws in a small sampler of songs (10 songs) and then allows you to purchase only the songs you want for $1.99 a song (some bundles are available for $3.49). I actually like this business model of charging just for the content you want. There are quite a few DLC songs available for download already with more to come (I picked up “Turn Down for What” and “Party Rock Anthem” so far and plan to pick up a few others).
Dance Central focuses more on a core set of moves and incorporates those moves into the various songs. The game wants you to learn those moves and master them as the difficulty raises and more and more moves are introduced. From my experience Just Dance has unique dances for each song and doesn’t reuse any routines, however this can lead to quite a bit of chaos (which can also be fun). Once you learn the moves of Dance Central it’s easy to nail routines and feel like you’re not just flailing limbs around like what tends to happen in Just Dance.
So far I’m enjoying both games quite a bit and they have me wanting to check out Harmonix’s Fantasia Music Evolved as well. I may end up picking Fantasia up in the few weeks to experience some more Kinect content. If you’re looking for some fun party games that make use of the Kinect I highly recommend checking out Just Dance 2015 and Dance Central Spotlight on the Xbox One.
After an exciting, though ultimately disappointing game (for those rooting for the Irish) last night between Notre Dame and Florida State, I’m reading hoping for a better result between the Ravens and the Falcons. So far it’s been pretty positive with Baltimore leading 7-0 early in the second quarter, however just as I began to write this Flacco threw an unfortunate interception in the endzone.
I’m glad to be back in the United States where I can watch football live on Sunday, rather than having to catch games on NFL Rewind (which I subscribed to while I was in Korea). It’s nice to be able to catch all the action as it’s going on, as I juggle games on my MacBook (Ravens), the TV (Seahawks) and my iPad (NFL Redzone / NFL Mobile).
I love how technology has made keeping track of gameday easier than ever. You no longer have to rely on half time updates or tickers and you can access the information you care about when you want it. With apps such as NFL Mobile and NFL Now you’re able to curate your own information (drive charts, highlights, scoring plays, stats, roster information and so on) with a few taps and swipes.
In addition to the mobile apps there’s also the NFL app on Xbox One which you can use in snap mode to keep an eye on other scores and also view stats and highlights in real time. I’ll usually snap the NFL app every now and then to get a quick look at everything assuming I’m watching the Ravens game on TV, otherwise having my iPad up next to my MacBook makes it easier to glance over at the NFL Mobile app in-between plays.
Gumballs Plays Games 