No Holds Barred Review: Mario Kart 8 (WiiU)

Mario Kart 8 (WiiU)

Welcome Ladies and Gentlemen to the No Holds Barred review of the latest game to join the Mario Kart franchise. I’m the Guardian, and this is Mario Kart 8.

            Now it was only a matter of time before Nintendo started to roll out the big guns in order to save the floundering WiiU system, and one has to admit that out of all of them Mario Kart is one of the biggest, but a question still remains. Is Mario Kart 8 a good game?

            Starting with the single player we see a new, shinier, interface and few changes here and there. For instance, Nintendo have done away with the “Coin Battle Mode” from 7 and instead elected for a “Vs Mode” that allows you to set up races with custom rules, not a bad idea if you want to learn the tracks though admittedly it seems a bit redundant for the single player side of the game as you would think that the ‘Time Trials Mode’ would suffice in that instance. The changes don’t just end there however as the old ‘Balloon Battle Mode’ has also changed and, in my opinion, not particularly for the better. Now historically, the balloon battle mode in Mario Kart has always taken place in an arena map of some kind and as many would testify, this was a good way of having things. Not for Nintendo though it seems a they have decided to do away with this in favour of dumping you into a normal track (from the racing modes) and sending you off from a random start point to hunt down your opponents which, if anything, has just turned the formally fast paced balloon battle mode into nothing more than a 3 minute slog as you try to hunt down opponents on a map that is just far too big and complex to warrant any fast paced action.

            Thankfully though this seems to be the only place that Nintendo has fiddled with in any big way as the ‘Grand Prix’ and ‘Time Trial’ modes play out just as they have always done. ‘Time Trial’ allows you to race and learn the courses while setting lap times to show off to your mates with and ‘Grand Prix’ allows for you to choose a kart and cup to race for, basically your standard racing game campaign mode, and just like always it’s still as fun as ever and if you fancy giving yourself a real challenge then you can crank the difficulty up to 150cc (hard) or, if you’ve unlocked it, 150cc Mirror (very hard).

            As for the graphics of the game, all I can say is that not only are the graphics stunning but there is also a massive leap in quality when compared to Mario Kart Wii and Mario Kart 7 - though this is not surprising due to power differences of the WiiU compared Wii and 3DS. Also, from the looks of things, Nintendo have gone with a new, glossier, art style, for game and though at the same time; not only does it keep the classic Mario look and feel but also shows that the WiiU, though vastly underpowered compared to its competitors, can still make brilliant looking games, and that’s only counting the big stuff. Playing though the game, if you look past all the shiny stuff in the foreground, you can see that Nintendo has also put effort into all the little touches throughout the game as well such as weather, lighting and some particle effects, as well as adding spectators to stand by some of the tracks, watching the karts race. All in all, a very strong effort on Nintendo’s part and the art team for the game should be very pleased with themselves because of it.

            The graphics aren’t the only place that Mario Kart 8 amazes however as the sound work on the game is also just as staggering. With more orchestral scores than before and a limited use of Midi work Mario Kart 8 host’s one of the greatest sound tracks I have heard on a game to date, easily beating Child of Light by a solid margin. This level of quality is also upheld with the sound assets of the game…though if I’m truthfully honest I’m still unsure as to just how much of these assets have be recorded fresh for the game and how many are simply old assets being reused. Either way though the game still sounds great with each asset and soundtrack working brilliantly well with each track aspect of gameplay. Speaking of which…

            …The gameplay for Mario Kart 8 is just as strong as ever, if not a little more so and though I can’t make any firm statements as to the legitimacy it, to me it feels like Nintendo have tightened up the controls a little bit and made them more fluid, more immediate. Weather I’m imagining it or not though, the way the game controls is very nicely done and the implementation of the Arial, underwater and anti-gravity mechanics have also been done very well and flow seamlessly into the rest of the gameplay though I can’t help but feel that the anti-gravity sections don’t feel as impactful as they should have otherwise been as the game still plays out the same as if you are on a normal section of tack, minus the slight drift to the left or right when you’re driving on a wall that is, but other than that the gameplay is still strong, still a lot of fun and changed or not I still find myself loving every minute that I’m racing…well that is until a blue shell blows me up right on the finishing line and the reptilian gitt Bowser takes my first place position!!!...bloody blue shells...hate them.

            My complaints about the exploding blue menaces aside however, we also see new plethora of track designs in the Original cup series (Mushroom, Fire Flower, Star and Special) as well as many redesigns of classic tracks in the Retro cup series (Shell, Banana, Leaf and Lighting) as well as 2 remixed of rainbow road and faster recovery when you those unfortunate moments of falling of the track during a race. Also, to top it all off we also have 6 new drivers joining the ranks (leaving us with 30 playable characters in all), though it should be known that you only start off with a handful of the classic Mario characters and unlock more as to play the games grand prix mode. And finally, to top it all off, 4 new items have been added to the game in the form of the boomerang flower, super horn, piranha plant and the one time item unique to Mario Kart 8 in the form of the ’8’ item that generates 8 different item at the same time – though I should stress that these items can only be used one at a time, they don’t all fire simultaneously…as fun as that would be to see.

            Also, in addition to all this, we see the return of the cart customization mechanic from Mario Kart 7 (3DS) that allows you to build your own karts and bikes before you enter the track select screen, in turn allowing you to make the best kart/bike you can (in conjunction to the stats of your chosen racer) before putting it to the test in one of the games online or offline modes. That being said however, much like the characters of the game, you are only given a small handful of parts to start off with an unlock more through collecting coins in the games online and offline modes. Also, mentioning the bikes, it seems that Nintendo have balanced the bikes a bit more since Mario Kart Wii as they don’t seem to be as overpowered as they used to be…though once again, this may just be my mind playing tracks on me so I recommend you take that point with a pinch of salt.

            Lastly, before I move onto my final thoughts and verdict of this game at any rate, we have the games multiplayer which, quite literally, plays out exactly like the games single player only you race and/or battle against friends and other living people instead of the games AI.

That being said though; I’m by no means giving the multiplayer a free pass as there are a couple of niggles that I believe should be pointed out. Firstly the servers seem to have a tendency to destabilise at times, dropping connection when transitioning between races and freezing the game for a moment or two when a new race starts. Secondly the matchmaking doesn’t seem particularly balanced at the moment and has a tendency to lead into instance where you’re pretty much in a trial by fire situation attempt to hold your own against some very experienced players – though admittedly, this can lead to some very fun races. So yes, the multiplayer is strong and a lot of fun to play

…now if only they hadn’t ruined balloon battle for me.

            And there we have it people. As for my final thoughts of the matter, Mario Kart 8 is a lot of fun with great graphics and a brilliant soundtrack and though I can’t be 100% sure on whether the gameplay has been re-balanced I can be certain that it’s been implemented exceedingly well and adds the overall strength of the game. The game modes are all good, both offline and online, and though I have my misgivings, as I’m sure many Mario Kart fans probably do, about the removal of the arena maps for the Balloon Battle mode I can also concede that it is far from bad and even though it’s not my particular cup of tea, I can still see many people having a great time with it in the online mode. Bottom line, if you have a WiiU and you like racing games, I can’t recommend this game enough. Would I recommend you rush out and buy a WiiU right this instant to play it however? Probably not as at this point in time I still believe that the WiiU’s library is still a touch to light and though there are some really good games out for it already, one of which you get free with every new copy of Mario Kart 8 you register with Nintendo by the way, I’d still recommend that you lay off the system for a little longer - or at least until nearer to Christmas when Nintendo releases the new Smash Bros.

            Lastly, in the instances that you wish to purchase this game, Mario Kart 8 is available from GAME and other leading retailers for £40 - £50 or from Amazon for £39, or your regional equivalent.

And with all that said and done it’s time for me to give my Final Verdict. I hereby give Mario Kart 8 a solid score of… 

7/10

(Great Game)

And with that Ladies and Gentlemen, all that’s left for me to say is a deep thank you to you all for reading. I’m the Guardian, stay safe out there and may we meet again.

No Holds Barred Review: Watch_Dogs (PC)

Watch_Dogs (PC)

            Greetings Ladies and Gentlemen. I’m the Guardian and welcome to the No Holds Barred review of Ubisoft’s latest, and most anticipated, game to grace our screens. This, is Watch_Dogs.

            Now before we begin I should make one thing perfectly clear, Watch_Dogs, by no means, lives up to the hype but then…how could it? Let’s face it, after all the hype that surrounded the game since we saw it at E3 2012 it would have had to have teleported the princess Zelda herself in front of my computer to even come remotely close to living up to its reputation but does this mean Watch_Dogs is a bad game like so many of the pissed off masses claim it to be? No, not by any means, but it does have its fair share of problems with the first of which being the games story.

Now, just so I’m clear, I’m not saying that it’s a particularly bad story by any stretch of the imagination as it is indeed serviceable, but at the same time it’s horribly clichéd. Basically you play as Aiden Pierce, a hacker and thief, who pissed off the wrong people and got a hit taken out on him in which his 6 year old Niece paid the price instead. As such this leads Aiden to become “the vigilante” of Chicago, a man on a quest to take revenge on the people responsible.  So basically the whole plot boils down to the same revenge storyline we’ve heard a million times before as you hunt down the people who hurt your family and make them pay in blood…lots….and lots….of blood, but surely this clichéd plotline is compensated by a strong main character though…right? Sadly this isn’t the case as Aiden is a pretty boring character for the most part, not to mention an arse and a walking contradiction who makes constant claims to how much he cares for his family but will gladly put them in danger for the sake of his quest at the drop of a baseball cap. It also really doesn’t help that the scripting and dialogue for Aiden is horribly done and leads to him being played far too straight which detrimentally gives Aiden the depth of a damp carrot and thus creates and uninteresting character that makes it next to impossible for most players to form any sort of attachment to him at the best of times.

I have to admit however that even though Aiden is hardly up there with my favourite characters of all time, I still see some hope for him as a character. Or at least I do if Ubisoft fixes up its writing team between now and the almost inevitable sequel and straightens out his character with better writing, more depth and more humanity than the empty overcoat that we were given in the first place and even then it still comes down to whether or not Ubisoft doesn’t decide to bin him off in favour of a clean slate and a fresh new character like they did with the first Assassin’s Creed.

That being said though, Aiden may be the main character but he’s by no means the only one as alongside him on his quest we also have hired gun, and criminally underutilized, Jordi Chin, the skilled hacker Clara Lille and the absolutely brilliant, if not slightly eccentric and vastly drunk, computer genius T-Bone. All of who, I should add, are amazing fun to have on screen – especially T-Bone, a personal favourite of mine.

And as for the villains of the piece? Well for the majority of the game the villains do their job well. You hate the bastards by the end and you wish to see them dead…very dead in fact…but there is one overall problem hanging over them (and the rest of the story when you think about it) and that is the fact that their ultimate reason for doing what they did, and the entire reason you end up on this quest in the first place, is incredibly weak…almost insultingly so as a matter of fact and though I’m not that I’m going to spoil anything I will say this. When you find out just why the hit was taken out on Aiden in the first place you may just want to faceplam your hand through your head…or if not right then and there, you will by time you finish thinking about it.

            And with that, I suppose it’s time to move onto the much bigger issue at hand, the elephant in the room if you will, and that is the games graphics. Now as I’m sure many of you are aware, especially considering how late this review is, that there has been a great amount of controversy surrounding the graphics of Watch_Dogs. Simply put, this controversy being, for those who don’t know, a massive downgrade in graphics since the games initial showing at E3 as well as Ubisoft releasing statements saying that the game hadn’t been downgraded at all – a blatant lie that’s easily proven if you run the E3 trailer next to the final game…which I’m going to do right now in fact:

            But this isn’t the end of it however, as the graphical problems of the game run deeper still due to Ubisoft having done a poor job of porting the game to PC, causing the games frame rate (FPS) to cap out at 40 on most player systems (PC) even though the games auto-configure function sets the game to “the best” graphical options for that specific system. For example, on my system the auto-configure sets the game to ‘high’ but I can only get a solid 60FPS if I run the game on the lowest graphical option, a really annoying thing for me to have to do considering the amount of money I invested into my system and basically a slap to the face from Ubisoft, not just to me but to all PC gamers. Hardly a smart move on Ubisoft’s part when all things are considered.

            Setting the controversies and problems aside for a moment however, the question still remains, just how well do the graphics hold up? Well, I would certainly be lying if I said that they were bad. The weather and water effects are beautiful and the partial effects on steam pipe explosions are truly something to behold; also the textures aren’t to be sniffed at and the lighting and shadow effects are masterfully done for the most part – sometimes even to a truly staggering level with one great example being a projector in the first safe house you visit that realistically reacts realistically to Aiden’s position in front of it…not an easy thing to put into a game by any means.

That being said however there are a few things that could have done with some more work. For instance I would have liked the cars to show a tad more variety in the damage you can cause them and though the lighting effects across the game are brilliant and very nicely done, the city at night can seem a bit lacking. Other than that, and the obvious graphical downgrade (which is still BS by the way) the graphics of the game hold up pretty nicely, though it would be nice if Ubisoft released a patch now to stop Watch_Dogs running like arse on my computer.

EDIT: Not my usual forte to sling an extra paragraph in the middle of a review but I think in this case I’ll make an exception as certain things have now come to light since writing this section on the graphics of Watch_Dogs, or to be more exact it has come to light, at the hands of a community member who probed the game files on the PC version of the game, that all the original E3 graphical effects are in fact still in the game – disabled by Ubisoft themselves.

As to why the effects where disabled is unknown at the time of me writing this but there are many suspicions, rumours and theories as to why, ranging from a conspiracy between Ubisoft, Microsoft and Sony to Ubisoft being a bunch of idiots who don’t know how to make games. Thankfully though I don’t have to write out all these theories as the brilliant TotalBiscuit has already done a video outlining them and as such I have linked it below for your viewing pleasure. Enjoy.

            Moving on we have the audio and sound design with both being pretty good for the most part with the soundtrack for the game being very well scored and matching up brilliantly with the in-game situations that it plays over. Unfortunately though, this is spoiled slightly by the in-game radio (available while walking as well as when in a vehicle) which is so full of crap that I can’t help but think Ubisoft hired a hipster who just used their personal iTunes library to fill the tracks list because they couldn’t be bothered with looking for some proper music to put into the game. To be honest I can’t help but wonder if Ubisoft didn’t realise this as well during the production as they had the forefront to include a ‘Media App’ on Aiden’s phone that allows you to pick and choose what songs play on the radio which I greatly appreciated – though the list of tolerable songs available was a very short one indeed by time I got through with it.

As for the voice acting of the game. The voice acting, for the most part, is also very well done with a terrific main cast and all voices matching up perfectly. Though honestly, Aiden’s voice could have done with a bit more emotion at times but, as I said before, I think this is less to do with acting skill and more to do with bad direction and a badly written script.

            Moving into the gameplay now; we encounter a 40 hour campaign and Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood levels of side missions to work through throughout the city. However, this isn’t as good as it sounds as all the side-missions in the game server little to no purpose, besides cluttering up the map, and lead pretty much nowhere. This also includes, annoyingly enough, the side missions that are linked to the games campaign, and don’t think that you get and sort of pay off at the end because the most you ever get is an achievement, an unlockable of some sort and little to no closure for the vast majority of missions and while I’m at it, the game suffers some sizable difficulty spikes at times as the mission constraints have a tendency to range from normal to ridiculously high which makes some missions stupidly easy to fail which something to keep in mind as I’m sure it will annoy a lot of people as they play through the game.

            As for the open world itself, we find a good sized map with plenty of places to go and explore. We also see a vast garage of vehicles at our disposal in order to transverse this world and it is here that we find another problem with Watch_Dogs, the driving. Now for the most part the driving isn’t too horrible but I can also see it annoying a fair amount of people (GTA V players in particular) as the cars feel less like cars and more like fridges, as proven by almost everything you crash into, be it a streetlight or another car, being flung out the way as if it’s been hit by a wrecking ball. The cars also seem to slide around at times in an almost arcade-like fashion, which I must admit is brilliant fun…until you’re being chased by thugs or the cops, then it’s a case of you smashing into nearly every part of scenery you drive past or having 5 cars just ram you into a corner or into multiply civilians – sufficed to say, the games AI is really cheap when it comes to the car chases…not to mention really annoying at times. Also, before moving on, I suppose I should also give some note to the stealth driving sections of the game where you have to use back ally ways and stealth tactics to avoid the cops. In short, it’s an interesting idea but at the same time incredible tedious; especially later on in the game where you have the police helicopter hunting for you which means you can’t so much stealth as just drive very quickly around it. Also while on the subject the unlockable hacking skill to disable helicopters doesn’t work unless you look directly at them which is impossible to do when in a car and as such means you have to get out of that car and look up as both the sniper in the helicopter, who never misses by the way, and ever police officer behind you starts taking pot shots at your head and then just to give the knife an extra twist, the disable the only works for a poxy for 30 seconds and then you have to do it all over again! Thankfully though there is a saving grace to this as the helicopter will eventually turn away after you’ve hacked it 2 – 3 times but that’s only if the cops haven’t turned you into a bloodied pulp before then…or you’ve killed all cops but considering the fact that the sniper has the BS ability to constantly lock-onto you however, chances are you will have died to several sniper shots to the head before you’re even close to killing half of the cops that are after you.

            Actually, this brings be onto possibly one of the biggest flaws, and one of the biggest exploits, of the entire game and that is the simple fact that you can get out of every, and I mean every chase situation by simply getting into a boat and sailing away. I’m not even kidding…one of the biggest components of the game, and it can be bypassed as simply as getting into a boat. Well done Ubisoft…well done. Here’s a tip; next time you make a game like this how about you give the Cops some boats as well as the high speed sports cars. Just an idea.

            Don’t think that driving and walking are the only ways to travers the world of Watch_Dogs however as you also get fast travel via the intercity train stations or if you can’t be bothered with that, from the map screen to any of the safe house locations across the city that you’ve gained access to via unlocking the ctOS towers scattered across the map which also unlock additional side missions and points of interest such as mini-games in the form of AR trips, that basically play out as over-the-top mini-games, drinking games, gambling or even chess if you fancy a game or two of that – a clear copy from Assassin’s Creed’s viewpoint system if I’m not mistaken. Unlocking the ctOS towers isn’t as simple as flicking a switch however as you have to make use of your hacking and free running skills (which basically play out as a much more watered down version of the Assassin’s Creed free running mechanic) to solve environmental puzzles that are barring your way to the tower. Unfortunately, don’t expect much of a challenge from these as they all pretty much play out the same and are very easy to work out.

            Moving on we see that the games gunplay, much like the driving, has an arcade-like quality about I, and for the most part works pretty well, though it is quite noticeable at times that this game really isn’t set up for running and gunning but rather a more stealthy style. For example, if you play like me you won’t need to delve any deeper into the weapons wheel than the silenced spec. ops pistol and the games focus mechanic, basically a slow-down mechanic that allows you more time to aim, as the games stealth system is well implemented and makes use of the games hacking mechanic to great effect via the CCTV cameras, through which you can distract guards, hack explosives to take out one or more enemies and open and close doors in order to help you sneak past specific patrols. This is also aided by Aiden’s ability to craft useful gargets on the fly (unlocked by the games, fairly standard, skill tree system) in order to distract and take out enemies or to even cause a blackout which allows you to sneak by un-noticed – only at night or inside building though. That being said however; if there is a silenced sniper rifle in the game it would have sure been nice to have found it as there where more than a few instances where it would have been very helpful to silently snipe out guards (or snipers) in practically troublesome positions as I snuck around their compounds – and if there isn’t a silenced sniper rifle in the game, then I have to once again question Ubisoft’s logic because the unsilenced ones, though functional, where useless for stealth.

            It would have also been nice if the game gave you some form non-lethal options for combat, much like Deus-Ex Human Revolution did, rather than the standard, “these bad guys – you kill”, system that they dump upon you as if your some sort of Terminator sent out to execute all criminals...actually…that would explain why Aiden is so bland if you think about it.

That little revelation aside however, Ubisoft has also implemented a karma system of sorts which is, strangely enough, much akin to the one seen in The Amazing Spiderman 2 which came out not to long ago…though thankfully in the form of a much more refined version.

Basically the system works the same as any other karma system, you do good deeds and people help you, you do bad deeds and people will hinder you or in the case of Watch_Dogs you do good deeds, such as stopping crimes and not going on a mass murder spree, then you start to build a good reputation and people will come to see you as the protector of Chicago which means they won’t call the cops on you the moment your face is shown on a news bulletin. If you act like Trevor from GTA V however, such as killing everything with a pulse and then killing some more, then you will build a bad reputation and thus people will call the police the moment they recognize you and shopkeepers will trip their silent alarm the moment you walk into their store.  All in all a nice little system and though it would have been nice to see it have a bit more impact on the world around you and though it’s still nice to have the option, and the freedom, to choose how you want the people of Chicago to see you it really does feel underutilized.

As for the games controls, I strongly recommend that you use a controller to play the game if you have one available because Watch_Dogs control scheme is very much set up with a consoles in mind. To be brutally honest the only area where the game does well with keyboard and mouse is the shooting, other than that the rest of the game is very much controller base which, annoyingly, includes the in-game menu’s such as Aiden’s phone and the weapon select wheel which are all set up to be controlled via an analogue stick rather than a mouse. For some reason the game also has horrendous mouse acceleration on the pause and main menus for some reason. No doubt more examples of a shoddily done port if I’m not mistaken but then, how could I be when Ubisoft have given me some much evidence to work with.

            I suppose I should also mention the multiplayer mode of Watch_Dogs. Now when I first heard about it I was pretty much filled with dread as friends started to plan and threaten with going into each other’s games simply to troll but thankfully though this is far from the case. Granted you go into another person’s game but, from what I’ve seen and played, the player you face off against is always random and as for the game modes themselves, each is a new idea and though the multiplayer is a touch more limited than many would like and apart from the online hacking/invasion mode where you enter another players game and hack their phone while they try to find and stop you, or in the case of invasion mode; the roles are reversed, most of the multiplayer is the same stuff we’ve seen before in over games such as GTA V such as racing and capture the flag. As such there’s not a lot of variety to it sort of the one fun new idea but hey, at least that one idea is an entertaining one.

            Also before moving on, a quick letter to Ubisoft…

Dear Ubisoft, Stop using Uplay already! It’s bad enough that I couldn’t play the game on the day I got it for nearly 2 hours (with many people not being able to play at all) because your piss-poor servers fell on their faces but on top of that, even though you put your game on Steam you still force me to log into your Uplay client as well as Steam in order to play your damn game. I don’t need two damn middle men between me and my bloody game! So please, just kill of Uplay already.

            And with that, I guess all that’s left is to note down my final thoughts on the matter. Now I’m pretty sure most of you can see that, yes,  Watch_Dogs was massively over hyped over the last couple of years and yes, there was no way that it was ever going to live up to the expectations that everyone thrust upon and it also under delivers in multiple areas. But, even with all that ill-gotten hype surrounding it, Watch_Dogs is far from the bad game that so many people keep saying it is and in actual fact I really did enjoy it but at the same time I also know it has many things wrong with it (for cry out loud I’ve just written most of them down) but no game is perfect and when you look past all the buggery that Ubisoft dumped upon it you see a new IP taking its first shaky steps into the world and yet still able to shine as a great game, much like Assassin’s Creed 1 before it, and I honestly hope to see it go onto do great things if placed into some more capable hands. Maybe a better story and some more freedom to explore. A more interesting protagonist and a better use of cast as if at all possible, and heck maybe some fleshing out on the multiplayer would be nice as well but then, I’m not Ubisoft so hell if I know what’s going to happen with the next game but…until that next game is released, I guess all I have left to do is say that Watch_Dogs is available right now from Steam for £39.99 or your regional equivalent or if you wish to empty your wallet you can also buy one of the 5 limited editions via the Uplay client of Ubisoft’s online store (availability may vary) for anything between £50 - £95.

And with all that said and done I hereby give Watch_Dogs a solid…

7/10

(Great Game)

And with that Ladies and Gentlemen. I’m the Guardian, and I thank you dearly for reading. Farewell and be safe.