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News

- Google Announces New Platform Stadia at GDC, Will Launch 2019
  March 19, 2019NewsInstant, high quality streaming games… if your internet can handle it Rumors were abound online ahead of Google’s presentation this afternoon from GDC 2019. Many thought it would be a console, while others were more cautiously optimistic with bets on streaming services, à la last year’s Google Stream, which gave players access to a streamable version of Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey. The truth was somewhere in the middle, and yet even more ambitious. Stadia bucks the console model altogether by promising players streaming access to their game across any device running a Chrome OS or other Chrome-compatible browser software. In doing so, the tech company wants to eliminate the wait associated with downloading and updating a game, allowing players to jump immediately into playing. In a live tech demo, someone went from playing a streamed version of Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey on a Chromebook to a Pixel 3 phone with a connected controller. The gameplay immediately picked up in the exact spot, while the original device exited the session and back to the main page. He then migrated in quick succession to “the cheapest PC they could find”, according to Google Vice President Phil Harrison, to a tablet running Chrome OS to a television with a Chromecast Ultra usb dongle. Announced alongside this platform service was the only piece of hardware associated with Stadia, a controller. Images showcased a white, black and mint green color scheme to a controller boasting simple and smooth design feature. At a glance, you might mistake it for your XBox One controller. It connects not to your computer or device, but to your wifi signal, and it has two additional buttons not found on other controllers: a capture button and Google Assistant button. The first activates sharing to YouTube, simplifying the process of streaming or uploading to a single press. The other allows players to use the controller’s built-in microphone to seek help with a puzzle/encounter or search online for related content. Footage showed Google Assistant providing a “top result” YouTube video timestamped to the exact moment the player was in-game. Google spoke at length about the power of data centers developed specifically for handling the Stadia’s streaming and hosting, taking the graphical and processing burden off the players. Not only that, they seemed confident Stadia could revitalize couch co-op and other forms of interconnected play not capable with current console infrastructure. All of their games will be streamable at 4k and 1080p resolution at 60+ frames per second, and Harrison further promised support for 8k resolution at 120+ fps, a concern for the tiniest and richest fraction of the population at present. As for games, we saw much of Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey, and an ID Software representative announced Doom Eternal will be available to stream at launch. While other developers and studios were name dropped during the presentation, no other games are yet confirmed. The other highly discussed features of Stadia are called Crowd Play and State Play, and provides new interconnectivity between streamers and their viewing audience. A YouTuber’s community can queue to play with them throughout the broadcast, closing that gap between audience and content creator even further. Alternatively, you can jump into your own version of the game being streamed at the exact moment and setup, allowing players access to highly specific in-game moments. Finally, Google has launched their own first party game development studio that will be developing games directly for their online platform. Stadia Games and Entertainment will be led by Jade Raymond, who took the stage to introduce herself and express excitement over their future projects. Not part of the announcement was any discussion about required internet speed, data allotments or other personal infrastructure. Google pulled up stakes in Louisville, Kentucky only two years after construction began on city-wide Fiber support, leaving huge swaths of people floundering for internet access and drawing widespread criticism. Today’s announcement at GDC was all and promises and looking forward, and while the advent of high-quality streaming without being tied to physical consoles is exciting, it remains a far-flung dream for anyone toiling under data caps, ISP-throttled connections or an utter lack of coverage. Stadia will launch sometime in 2019. ...
- Splatoon 2 Special Demo Provides the Game and Nintendo Online Service Free For 7 Days
  March 18, 2019NewsAre you a Kid, but not quite sure you’re also a Squid? Now’s your chance to find out! On March 19, Switch owners who haven’t purchased Splatoon 2 will gain access to a special demo of the game coupled with a free trial of the Nintendo Online subscription service. This allows new players a chance to try every feature of the game before committing to the full purchase price. Once you download the demo, Nintendo will email you a code that can be redeemed for 7 days of free online service, which is required to compete in online matches or cooperative play in Splatoon 2. The demo gives access to all of the major game modes, from 4v4 Turf Wars to Ranked matches to the cooperative Salmon Rush mode. Demo players can team up and play with friends who already own the full version of the game. If at any point during or after your 7-day trial you discover that Splatoon 2 filled the inky hole in your heart, Nintendo is offering a 20 percent discount on the digital version of the game. Your progress from the demo, including competitive levels and gear, will transfer over in full. However, you will need to pay for a standard Nintendo Online subscription to continue playing online. Splatoon 2 launched in July 2017, well before the Nintendo Online service was full implemented. During that time, Inklings could splat to their hearts’ content without any online subscription. That ended last September, when the full rollout cordoned all previous and future online capabilities behind the monthly subscription. This special deal likely wants to inject new life into both the service and Splatoon 2, and we have to admit it’s a cherry of an offer. Even if you don’t end up purchasing the game, Splatoon 2 is one of the best and most inventive cooperative shooters in the market, made all the more intriguing as a flagship Nintendo IP. Give it an honest shot, and you might be yelling “Woomy!” all the way to the top of the leaderboards....

Features

- Rebellion Inc: Graffiti and Creativity in Infamous: Second Son
  March 1, 2019FeaturesLaunch titles are in a notoriously tricky position. As much as they function as a showcase for new technology and increased graphical fidelity, they can also often be a time capsule for the idiosyncrasies of a new console generation before developers and publishers alike decide the gimmicks are better off largely ignored. Such is the fate of Infamous: Second Son, a launch title and console exclusive for the Playstation 4. Although technically a sequel to the earlier games in the Infamous titles, it shares very little connection with them. The premise remains the same though, urban superhero antics with a hip young protagonist in a major American metropolis. Where the first two games focused on Empire City and New Marais (a comic book style interpretation of New York and New Orleans respectively), Second Son is set in Seattle, a comic book version of… Seattle. Our protagonist Delsin Rowe is a typical rebellious hero type – he wears a beanie and a denim jacket with art stencilled on it, so you know he’s cool. His powers to turn into a cloud of smoke or a burst of neon make him a part of the urban landscape as much as a person. They also, coincidentally, show off the impressive (for 2014) particle effects of the PS4. But the other way that Second Son demonstrates that its main character is a cool young hip dude is that he does graffiti. This is where the game’s position as a first party launch title are most obvious. When you find the part of the open world map designated for a mural, you enter a special minigame, designed to showcase the full limits of the PS4’s motion controls! First you rotate the controller through 90 degrees and shake it like a can of spray paint, complete with authentic clacking noise from the controller speaker. Once you’ve oscillated the controller to the game’s, and presumably Delsin’s, satisfaction you then hold the trigger button down to spray the paint and move the controller to trace the stencil on the screen. Of course, the Playstation controller’s accelerometers being what they are, you really only trace the barest edges of the outline. Then the game cuts to black and fills in the rest of the detail and colour for you, saving you time and effort. The graffiti is just another thing to find scattered across the open world, ticking off percentages towards a 100% completion. But in building the clunky minigame into the process, it becomes more more memorable than a hundred radio towers or collectible knick knacks. The purpose of motion controls is to remove the distance from the player and the game, using the entire arm or body to dictate the actions of the character on screen rather than the remove of a controller button. This doesn’t always work – for every Wii Sports there is… almost any other Wii game. Although the graffiti art minigame doesn’t mirror the intended actions perfectly, the process is just slow and clunky enough to feel like an analogue real world motion. It slips into some kind of inverse uncanny valley, where the fact of being slightly unconvincing makes up the difference. The Plausible Canyon, if you will. You feel more of a sense of ownership. Delsin finishes the art, but he needs your help to start it. There’s also a choice to be made whenever you find a fresh spot to tag. Wrapped up in the superhero theme is the game’s Karma system, where your actions and their consequences shape not only how Delsin is perceived but the state of the world around him. Delsin faces a moral choice throughout Second Son, whether to be a hero to the downtrodden of Seattle or a brooding avenger indulging his own bloodlust on a quest for vengeance. Almost every action accumulates either good or bad karma, whether it’s healing a bystander or ripping out their life force to regain hit points. The same is true of the graffiti you create. You can create optimistic tableaus to uplift the spirits of the beleaguered citizens or edgy art to wake up the Sheeple, man! I am not any kind of visual or graphic artist – in fact, the ability to create art through hand-eye coordination is something I regard on par with actual wizardry. But creating art is a fantasy that not many video games will let you indulge. Destruction and violence are their own kind of art, especially when you have superpowers and the best particle effects 2014 could buy, but actually expressing creativity is much rarer. For all the teenage angst and faux-Banksy rebellion captured by the art pieces, you get an insight into the Delsin’s mind not just through the exposition he delivers but by his actions and how he chooses to express himself. And that’s worth all the particles and high definition textures in the world....
- Konami Code: An Introduction
  February 28, 2019FeaturesIf you were anything like me growing up, going on GameFAQs.com was a natural response to getting a new game. You popped the game disc or cartridge in, messed around in the world for a little, and then you ran from your room to the computer room to get online and find what surprises the game developers left you in the form of cheat codes. This concept may sound very familiar to you, but it’s likely you haven’t really thought about cheat codes in years. Why is that? What happened to cheat codes? And where did they even come from? In this series, I’m going to walk you through the history of cheat codes–beginning with the first known cheat code, the Konami Code–and we’ll explore together their development, rise, and fall through the years. Where did they come from, where did they go? For those unaware, a cheat code is a sequence input via a controller or keyboard during a game in order to unlock special abilities or perks. These abilities are usually found later on in the game, but when a player is impatient or eager, cheat codes help them get some gear early. It’s right there in the name–it helps them cheat. These codes aren’t accidentally placed in the game, nor are they mistakes on the developers part. Cheat codes are purposefully put into the game’s code for the express reason to give players a boost early on. This trend began with the first known cheat code, colloquially known as the Konami Code. One of the developers decided the game his team was working on was too difficult. He snuck in a sequence that, when entered while the player was in the game’s pause menu, would give them a full set of power-ups. It wasn’t discovered until after the game hit the shelves. At that point, there was nothing the other developers could do about it, as removing it from the game could cause other bugs and issues. Since then, variations of the Konami Code as well as other unique cheat codes have appeared in games across numerous platforms. If you’ve played the Sims, for example, you’ve probably overused the MOTHERLODE cheat code in order to get your Sims the biggest and best house there is. From aesthetic changes to power-ups to weapon improvements, cheat codes have been there for gamers to get them where they wanted to go, fast. So what happened to them? Let’s get into the theories Buying game guides or looking at online forums used to go along with playing video games like bread and butter. Guides have mostly adapted to the rise of the Internet, with some physical exceptions still kicking. For the most part, these and online gaming communities are flourishing. Why haven’t they brought cheat codes with them? There are a few possible reasons I’ve come up with for the recent lack of cheat codes and their decline in popularity and publicity over the years. A large portion of popular video games are now massive multiplayer online role playing games, or MMORPGs. Games like Destiny force players to work with each other to reach certain goals, so cheating isn’t encouraged. Players need to be on the same level (literally) in order to progress, and they need to get there fairly. One person can’t cheat their way to the top and expect to work well with those that got there with time and effort. Alternatively, battle royale games like Fortnite encourage players to work against each other, and while it’s more tempting here to want to use cheat codes in order to beat other players, there is still an unspoken rule in regards to the fairness of the game. Everyone is working toward that coveted first place standing. Using cheat codes to get better equipment fast and subsequently destroy the other players completely is simply no fun, and it’s not the way players or developers want the game to be played. Developers don’t even want to give players the opportunity to cheat, so they leave out any hidden cheat codes entirely. The reward in winning games like this is the work put into finding the best loot and the best hiding spots and learning to use those things to your advantage. It’s what the developers intended, and therefore how they expect players to play, and they’re not going to give them the means to defy the entire point and satisfaction of winning a game. Another fairly recent game element that may discourage players from using cheat codes is the introduction and popularity of loot boxes. Developers give players the chance to get better equipment quickly by paying for it. It’s more randomized and, for some, a major investment, but players may find it easier to pay a few bucks for an immediate reward rather than searching for the right buttons to press at the right time to unlock the items they need. Story-heavy games are also on the rise. Game companies are investing more time and effort into games that have an important and well-crafted narrative. This encourages players to follow the game in a linear fashion, in order to fully absorb and experience the story. Using cheat codes would cause players to potentially miss out on impactful or highly emotional story moments, and therefore they would not experience the game itself fully. For computer games specifically, game modifications (otherwise known more simply as “mods”) allow players to flex their own programming skills and directly influence the game code themselves. Developers don’t need to add in cheat codes to the original programming when players can and will develop their own codes and additions to break games and give themselves what they’re after. So what? I know what you’re thinking–if cheat codes have been phased out by all this cool, new stuff, then why should you care about them? Why am I writing this series? Like I mentioned at the beginning, cheat codes are a huge part of my childhood gaming memories. Maybe I shouldn’t brag about how often I used them, but for someone who has only finished two video games in their entire life (Celeste and Super Mario Odyssey, in case you were wondering), cheat codes were a godsend, a miraculous invention that let me experience later parts of the game without actually having to push the limits of my short attention span. So, when I had the realization that I hadn’t heard the term “cheat code” used in a really long time, I got curious. What happened to these once treasured pieces of knowledge? Ultimately, I’m not here to prove anything or say for sure what led to the demise of cheat codes. I simply want to lead you through a journey about the Konami Code and what came after. I hope you’ll join me next time as we dive deeper into what cheat codes are and how they developed. ...

Reviews

- You Should Play Octopath Traveler…Today!
  July 3, 2018ReviewsThe free demo of Square Enix’s new JRPG is available on the Switch right now, and our reporter Chase found lots to love in the first 3 hours. Octopath Traveler is a new RPG coming to the Switch by way of Square Enix, in collaboration with Acquire. You can experience what’s promised to be a lengthy, character-driven campaign in just two weeks, on July 13. Or… …you can download the demo and start playing immediately! Now, you might hold the rational opinion that demos, while great for sorting out your feelings on a game before purchasing, are for sampling, only. You’ll be starting over with a new file once you purchase the full game. Don’t waste your time. And normally, you would be right. But Octopath Traveler allows players the rare opportunity to transfer over any progress accrued in the demo to one file on the retail version of the game. This gives you a legitimate reason to download it immediately for the low, low price of zero real monies. As the name would imply, you can begin Octopath Traveler in one of eight ways, each corresponding to a potential party member. These prologues are character unique and also serve as tutorials, teaching you the basics of interaction, combat and the special Path Actions they possess. This is the first of Octopath Traveler’s unique characteristics. The eight main party characters each possess a tool for interacting with the world around them, fitting thematically with their backstory and persona. For example, Cyrus the Scholar can Scrutinize people and things, granting him insight into events he wasn’t around to witness firsthand. In the demo, Scrutinize gathered clues for an investigation, and I can see it being used to uncover well-hidden sidequests and optional content. On the other hand, Olberic the warrior can Challenge NPCs to combat, which strikes me as a fairly static and barefaced ability. Other path actions allow you to recruit NPCs to aid you in combat, each with various strengths and weapon skills. Hopefully, the game will provide opportunities to reward players for cunning use. Depending on the character you choose at the beginning of the game, your experience might be drastically different. I started with Olberic, once in charge of protecting a king but who now lives out a quiet existence in a small hillside village – some fantasy as heck stuff. Throughout the demo, the old warrior regarded the circumstances of his disgrace with sadness while also protecting the townsfolk from smalltime brigands. In another playthrough I was Tressa, the daughter of a merchant family looking to prove herself after meeting a charismatic trader with a gorgeous boat. Her head was full of big dreams, and her heart is full of adventure. I was immediately enamored with her prologue and Path Action, which allows you to trade with a wide variety of NPCs for items you might not find otherwise. But not all of the prologues were winners. Primrose was a dancer who witnessed the murder of her father and now searches restlessly for the three tattooed man who perpetrated the act. Except, she’s accepted a job as a “dancer” in a dirty town for a dirtier master. Her prologue was paved throughout with constant reminders the people in her life treat her like garbage. At a particularly low point she is being assaulted and coerced by her master, and Prim thinks to herself that she can bear anything except letting those who murdered her father get away. Yuck. Hopefully, her story takes a more positive and balanced tack in the full release. Even though my mileage varied on the characters, the combat was refreshingly engaging. More complicated than simply whittling down a health bar, encounters in Octopath involve a careful dance of breaking an enemy’s shield and exploiting their weakness. Shields can vary in strength depending on the enemy, and once broken you get a single turn to unleash hell before they recuperate. Teammates help with this – diversifying your available weapons and magics make sure someone is poised to blow up the armor chink everyone else opened up. But there’s one more wrinkle: Boosts. If your character used a regular attack on their turn, they will gain a charge of power called a Boost. These stack several times and can be spent to power up any attack or spell by a maximum of four magnitudes. Want to pierce a large baddy with a spear strike? Boost it, baby. Scourge the earth with a multi-target firestorm? Boost! Heal your party from nigh mortal wounds? You guessed it: Boost. You won’t gain a charge on the turn you used a boosted attack, so make sure to plan smart. Beyond everything else, Octopath Traveler looks gorgeous. The developers describe it as having an “HD-2D” aesthetic, but I see it more as a pop-up book decorated with lovingly crafted 16-bit artwork. Buildings and trees dot a 3D landscape like papercraft dioramas while stunning light effects play off rippling waters and moody skies. The visuals make traveling about both towns and the overworld a constant delight. I’ll have more complete thoughts once the game is released on July 13, but you will be hard pressed to find a better 3-hour free experience on the Switch right now. Even if you aren’t normally a JRPG fan, Octopath Traveler’s novel approach to visuals and storytelling might just win you over....
- How RBI Baseball 17 Ruined My Life
  June 5, 2018Features / ReviewsRBI Baseball 17 is Randy Johnson, and I am the bird. A few days ago, I was gripped – no, seized – by an unflinching desire. It was powerful, it was overbearing, and it led me to spend £26 (roughly $35) on the Switch eShop. This desire was to play some baseball. Little did I know that this innocent craving would lead me on a journey far more intense than I had ever expected. I had to find a new baseball game to scratch this inexplicable itch, and so my search began. It was a pretty short search, because my immediate thought for any game right now is “is it available on the Switch?” And so, a quick dip into the Switch eShop revealed to me RBI Baseball 17, bathed in radiant light and calling to me in a way that I simply couldn’t resist. So I bought it. Little did I know how much my life was about to change. I’m an English person, born and raised in the UK. The UK doesn’t do baseball, it does cricket – an interminably slow and methodical game in which huge hits are often discouraged and traditional matches last up to five days and can still end in a draw. I do, of course, love cricket because it’s a stupid and ridiculous sport – but baseball has always had an allure. It’s fast-paced, it’s hugely popular, and snacks are mandatory. The thing is that because the UK doesn’t do baseball, I know not one goddamn thing about it. My understanding of the rules of baseball are this: person pitches ball, other person attempts to hit ball very far, people then run. I don’t know how long an inning is, or what RBI even stands for. Turns out that this is a pretty big problem if you want to play RBI Baseball. RBI Baseball is a series which first appeared back in the ’80s, and friends of mine have very fond memories of playing it on their chunky grey Nintendo consoles of the day. It disappeared for years, to be revived recently as the official MLBPA baseball game, overseen by people who actually work in the baseball industry. This is great if you want realism and accuracy, and the game has been applauded for the efforts it goes to in getting small details correct. However, as a pick up and play experience, it’s… baffling. The first thing that happened when I started up RBI Baseball 17 was that it asked me if I wanted to update my roster. Good of the developers to keep the available players up to date, and I did download the update despite each name being as incomprehensible to me as a Lovecraftian horror. I didn’t know any of these people, what they do, how good they are or how badly one might wish to yell abuse at them from the stands. Not me, of course, I’d never do that – the UK doesn’t do baseball. Once the updated roster had been downloaded I was offered an opportunity to customise it – a further experience in bewildering futility to someone as clueless as me. Each screen has an absurd number of statistics that you can use to judge a player and a roster – or could, if they mean anything at all to you. My next choice was to choose my favourite team. An array of incredible names are available, including the familiar Cubs and the unknown-to-me-but-doubtlessly-huge Orioles. I opted for the Pirates, simply because it was the coolest name on the list. At this point, eager to escape the utterly awful menu music, I ploughed into my first game – a “full 25 / 9 innings” game, which means literally nothing to me. My first opponents were the Cleveland Indians, and reader? They absolutely destroyed me. You see, RBI Baseball 17 has no tutorial. It offers little on-screen hints (press B to swing!), but there’s absolutely no indication about, you know, when to do that. This led to me seeing this a lot: Eventually I sort of got into the swing (har har), and even managed to get myself one whole run on the scoreboard, when it switched me to pitching. I guess that that’s how baseball works? Maybe this is what an inning is? I was absolutely none the wiser, but I ran with it and actually managed to get one of the other team out. I had barely got the cork out of the champagne when this happened: It would appear that RBI Baseball 17 for the Switch is a very, very buggy game. This crash was a very small part of the issues that I experienced – the screenshot that serves as the header image for this article is one that I shared directly from my Switch, using the Gallery’s text function to draw a big red arrow to the fielder that had decided to try and make a break for it and escape the stadium, or the game, or reality itself, completely ignoring all of my attempts to steer him back to the field. While I respected his bid for freedom and his slightly alarming resistance to control, it did mean that the match had to be abandoned as it was entirely unplayable. So far, not so good. Despite the crashes and the bugs, I still really wanted to play baseball – not, I think, an unfeasible request. The thing is that I was still completely mystified by all of the names and the numbers and the acronyms. J. Jay has an AB of 347. What does this mean? Obviously it has a meaning to a true baseball fan, one who studied the bat while I was busy collecting rings on Mobius. It seemed that there was nothing for it. In order to truly enjoy this game, I would have to walk the path that was in front of me. I would have to become a baseball fan. Luckily, the excellent name of the (Pittsburgh, I have learned) Pirates means I already have a favourite team to support. Doing a little research I discovered that they haven’t won a title since 1992, and they haven’t won a World Series since 1979. They finished last season in fourth place of their division – out of five. Luckily, I’m all in favour of the underdog, so it was decided – I’m now a Pittsburgh Pirates fan. Luckily for me, the new baseball season started on March 29th, shortly after I first sat down to write this article. In order to get ready for this, I knew I was going to have to dip into some baseball lore. I dipped into the ultimate source of knowledge – Wikipedia – and found that there are articles specifically about a single team’s baseball season. I present to you the 2017 Pittsburgh Pirates season, in which: one of their infielders was found guilty of driving under the influence and missed the whole season, they lost their opening day match 5-3, and one of their outfielders was suspended for testing postive for performance-enhancing nandrolone. Clearly I had chosen well. Upon telling a friend that I had selected the Pirates as my team of choice, they congratulated me on picking “the losingest team in sports history”. The main difficulty with getting in to any sport is the terminology. Start watching a random game of a sport you don’t understand and you’ll be baffled by words casually thrown around by commentators – in cricket, for example, the bowler can throw a googly down to offside leg, and if the batsman is unlucky he’ll be caught at third man. Maybe he’s going to be more casual because he’s a nightwatchman, and perhaps the crease is a little dry. None of these words mean anything to you if you’re not into cricket, and so here I was attempting to understand the lingo of baseball. What does RBI even mean? I decided to crowdsource a little help, namely by going to Autosave’s very own Charles Wheeler: British fan of American Football. Just how, exactly, is one to get past the initial wall of exclusive jargon? I had hoped that the conversation would be a little more helpful, although it did lead to us both learning of the existence of the dog sport Flyball, which has improved both of our lives to no end. If someone were to make a videogame of that and put it on the Switch I would buy it in a heartbeat, because I make poor decisions. And so, dear reader, you meet me here at a turning point. A simple whim to play a baseball game has led to two things. Firstly, I am now a die-hard fan of the Pittsburgh Pirates and will follow their progress this season with deep interest. I’m deadly serious about this, and I invite you to check in with me on Twitter if you’d like to know how I’m doing. Secondly, if I’m being honest it sounds like they’re having a pretty rough time of it and I’m determined to get good at RBI Baseball purely so I can lead the Pirates to victory in a wholesome, drug-free way. Of course, it does rely on the game not crashing or bugging out on me, which really is a perfect metaphor for how the Pirates do in real life. Ah well. RBI Baseball 18 came out recently. Maybe I’ll give that a try… Since writing this article, further attempts to play the game have been stymied by it crashing literally every time. Caveat Emptor....