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360-gamer.com Issue 129

XBOX ONE
ASSASSIN’S
CREED IV
EVERYTHING YOU
NEED TO KNOW

BLACK FLAG
UBISOFT’S OPEN-WORLD ADVENTURE
INSIDE
WOLFENSTEIN:
THE NEW ORDER
REDEFINES THE ENTIRE FRANCHISE BATMAN: ARKHAM
ORIGINS
THE BUREAU: XCOM
NEXT-GEN MAYHEM
DECLASSIFIED
SAINTS ROW IV
ALL FOR ONE
FORZA 5, COD: GHOSTS,
DEAD OR ALIVE 5
ULTIMATE
BATTLEFIELD 4 FIFA 14
AND MORE!
+ MORE…

PREVIEWED

THE EVIL
WITHIN
RESI EVIL’S CREATOR
UNLEASHES A NEW
NIGHTMARE

001_360129[coverV5]NT.indd 1 07/06/2013 15:28

000_360129[ads].indd 1 07/06/2013 13:34
 BEHIND
THE SCENES
ISSUE 129
www.360-gamer.com
A LETTER FROM THE EDITOR Uncooked Media Ltd
3 East Avenue
Bournemouth
Dorset, BH3 7BW
So E3 has finished, Microsoft has shown its hand, and hopefully everybody www.uncookedmedia.com
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tech that’s going to kick gaming into seriously high gear.
Editors
We’re sure there are still plenty of you who don’t like all the “TV TV TV”, James Artaius – james@360-gamer.com
Ian Collen – ian@360-gamer.com
but you don’t have to watch TV on the thing, the same way you don’t have
JAMES Staff Writer Will Johnston
to use the internet browser or Netflix or anything else – it’s all just there if
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Design Launchpad Studios Limited
We’ve gone beyond the console wars; now it’s a battle for the entire living room – and it’s a battle
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IAN
… has spent the past
month being rather
chuffed about the
performance of his
beloved Norwich City.
Not only did the U18
squad snatch the Youth
Cup, the Canaries also
finished the season by
giving Man City an away
kicking. “Might take a few
hours for this smile to
fade away,” he grinned,
but that was getting on a
month ago now and he’s
still smiling like a loon.
WILL
… has been embracing
the outdoor life, shock
and horror! Not only has
he been on a camping
trip, he’s finally lived out
his childhood fantasy
of being Spike from
Transformers (or Scott
from MASK) by buying
himself two Brompton
folding bikes. “Bloody
expensive things, but
absolutely incredible
and they fold like f**king
Transformers.” Ride ’em
like T-Bob, baby!
Media Ltd. All text and layout remains the copyright
of Uncooked Media Ltd. All characters and artwork
shown in this magazine remain the © and trademark
or their respective owners. No part of this magazine
MATT KIRSTEN may be reproduced without the express written
permission of the publisher. 360 GAMER can accept
no responsibility for inaccuracies or complaints
… has also been on his … has just finished a stint arising from editorial or advertising within this
bike this ish. But rather of healthy eating, which magazine.
than a transforming one, has left her lean and
Matt has been making mean… and desperately
the most of the clement craving cheese. And not
weather by biking up and content with going on a ANOTHER QUALITY COLD CUT FROM
down the country on his celebratory cheeseathon,
Kawasaki ZX12R Ninja. she’s just thrown a bash
Even a spot of sunburn at Soho’s game-themed
only put him down for Loading Bar for the fans
a couple of days before and friends of her site,
he was back and cruising www.ready-up.net. Go
the highways like a cross check it out – Kirsten’s EST. 2003
between Lorenzo Lamas crew has a game-related 360 GAMER © 2013 Uncooked Media Ltd
from Renegade and Guinness World Record ISSN 1747-8103
Kaneda from Akira. and everything!

13,124

360-gamer.com 03

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 ISSUE 129

THE UK's LEADING XBOX 360 MAGAZINE

REGULARS
03 Editor’s Letter
42 News
92 Buyer’s Guide
120 Live Life
124 Subscriptions
126 Mailbox
127 Competition: Remember Me
128 Back issues
129 Next issue

GAME TRACKER
Alien Rage 74
Armored Core: Verdict Day 72
Assassin’s Creed IV Black Flag 06
Batman: Arkham Origins 22
Battlefield 4 (Xbox One) 40
Call of Duty: Ghosts (Xbox One) 37
Contrast 50
Dead or Alive 5 Ultimate 56
Destiny (Xbox One) 38
Disney Infinity 60
Dying Light (Xbox One) 33
Dynasty Warriors 8 68
Earth Defence Force 2025 78
EA Sports UFC (Xbox One) 34
FIFA 14 (Xbox One) 34
FIFA 14 112
Forza Motorsport 5 (Xbox One) 29
GRID 2 88
Hellraid 66
How to Survive 76
Madden NFL 25 (Xbox One) 34
Narco Terror 64
NBA Live 14 (Xbox One) 34
Need for Speed Rivals (Xbox One) 40
Pac-Man and the Ghostly Adventures 62
Painkiller: Hell & Damnation 86

06
Putty Squad 58
Quantum Break (Xbox One) 31

EXCLUSIVE
Rayman Legends 52
Remember Me 81
Ride to Hell: Route 666 70
Ryse (Xbox One) 31
Saints Row IV
State of Decay
54
90 ASSASSIN’S CREED IV BLACK FLAG
The Bureau: XCOM Declassified 101
The Evil Within 108 WE RAISE A PINT OF RUM WITH THE CREATIVE DIRECTOR OF
Thief (Xbox One) 32
Watch Dogs (Xbox One) 39
ASSASSIN’S CREED IV – THE OPEN-WORLD SWASHBUCKLER
Wolfenstein: The New Order 18 THAT REDEFINES EVERYTHING YOU KNOW ABOUT THE SERIES…

04 360-gamer.com

004-5_360129[contents]NTICJA.indd 1 07/06/2013 15:35

 18 22 60
WOlfenstein: the neW Order Batman: arkham Origins disney infinity

54
saints rOW iV

26 IntroducIng XboX one

The future of gaming is almost here and this is everything you need to know about it – the
81 Remember Me good, the bad and the ugly… and of course, the games!
86 Painkiller: Hell & Damnation
88 GRID 2 “Nazi robots and space stations; we may have been
90 State of Decay
here before, but The New Order promises to bridge
that tongue-in-cheek cheesiness with a rich story-
101 The Bureau: XCOM Declassified based adventure and plenty of kick-ass action”
108 The Evil Within Wolfenstein: the neW order – PAGe 18
112 FIFA 14

50 Contrast
52 Rayman Legends
54 Saints Row IV
56 Dead or Alive 5 Ultimate
58 Putty Squad
60 Disney Infinity
62 Pac-Man and the Ghostly Adventures
64 Narco Terror
66 Hellraid
68 Dynasty Warriors 8
eXcoMMunIcated
101 the bureau: XcoM
70 Ride to Hell: Route 666
72 Armored Core: Verdict Day
74
76
Alien Rage
How to Survive
declassIfIed
XCOM’s turn-based strategy has been replaced by Mass Effect-style third-person shooting –
78 Earth Defence Force 2025 and a trip back to the swinging Sixties, daddy-O!

360-gamer.com 05

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 06 360-gamer.com

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PIRATE OF THE CARIBBEAN:
CURSE OF THE BLACK FLAG
006-15_360129[AssCreedIV]NTICJA.indd 7
James Artaius
THERE’S NO MORE
ROOM IN ROME, THE
TEA PARTY IS OVER
IN BOSTON AND
DESMOND HAS BEEN
PUT OUT TO PASTURE.
ASSASSIN’S CREED
HAS HOISTED A BLACK
FLAG AND SET SAIL
FOR THE GOLDEN AGE
OF PIRACY, BUT WILL
THIS SEA VOYAGE BE
A JACK SPARROW OR
AN ANN DARROW?
“Miss Darrow, please! I’m offering you
money, adventure, fame, the thrill of a
lifetime and a long sea voyage.”
Carl Denham, King Kong (2005)
“Wherever we want to go, we’ll go.
That’s what a ship is, you know. It’s not
just a keel and a hull and a deck and sails
– that’s what a ship needs, but what a
ship is… is freedom.”
Jack Sparrow, Pirates of the Caribbean:
The Curse of the Black Pearl
“I’m a man of action, a swashbuckler, a
rogue, a wanderer. A man who can hold
his breath for ten minutes! I have no ties
and no regrets. I sail with the wind and
go where adventure takes me.”
Guybrush Threepwood, The Curse of
Monkey Island
Piracy is many things to many people.
Eyepatches, Somalians, Tony Blackburn.
But uniform to each and every definition
of the term is that pirates choose to live
their lives outside the law and according
to their own moral compasses. Which
is why swashbuckling pirates, Somalian
pirates, software pirates and even pirate
radio DJs fall broadly under the same
360-gamer.com 07
07/06/2013 13:55
 ABOVE: The ship-
to-ship combat
is even meatier in
Black Flag, with the
Jackdaw taking as
many lumps as it
dishes out.
BELOW: We may
have left all the
cannonballs aboard
the ship, but these
guys are still just
cannon fodder.
08 360-gamer.com
006-15_360129[AssCreedIV]NTICJA.indd 8
umbrella: they act lawlessly and to
their own end, primarily by procuring
and profiting from things that do not
belong to them.
In its purest sense, though, piracy
isn’t about theft but about freedom
– and freedom is in many ways the
foundation of Assassin’s Creed IV. In
one sense this means a literal, free-
roaming freedom; as demonstrated at
E3, Black Flag is a less linear gaming
experience that enables you to explore
the map and its adventures as Edward
Kenway – the father of Assassin’s
Creed III protagonist Haytham, who
“must chart his own course between
chaos and freedom”.
In a more metaphysical sense,
however, Black Flag is about a kind of
freedom that fundamentally reshapes
what we know about the Assassin
Order and the entire Assassin’s Creed
universe. Indeed, the parallels that
Ubisoft draws between the Golden
Age of Piracy and the white-hooded
Assassins make a political statement
that most people haven’t appreciated
– much as Star Wars Episode I: The
Phantom Menace, beneath all of its
mediocrity and hokum, is actually a
statement about society’s willingness
to surrender its freedoms.
Just listen to the way that recent
Black Flag trailers describe the 18th
Century pirates as sailors who “band
together to live their lives as they see
fit, establishing ideals of true freedom,”
and how the likes of Calico Jack and
Ben Hornigold are called “charismatic
captains who lived by their own code,
in a society built for those who would
truly be free.”
Here, then, is a world where terms
like “freedom” and “piracy” are used
interchangeably – where Charles Vane,
a man who tortured his captives and
cheated his own crew, is presented as
much a champion of freedom as he is
a mercenary murderer. And beyond
simply fighting the “evil” Templars,
having Edward Kenway as the hero
of this latest adventure transforms
our understanding of exactly who the
Assassins are and what they really
stand for.
ANARCHIST’S CREED
Throughout the Assassin’s Creed series
– or at least, the five titles that make up
the main timeline – the Assassins have
always been depicted as the heroes, a
small band of rebel underdogs fighting
for truth and liberty against shadowy
corporations and political dictators.
But truth is always in the eye of the
beholder; or, indeed, the protagonist.
And if you were thrust into the game’s
universe without all the Assassin back-
story/propaganda, you might find
yourself with a very different outlook
on who the good guys and bad guys
actually are.
Such was the case in the opening of
Assassin’s Creed III, where players were
07/06/2013 17:11

It’s not quite as glorious
as Renaissance Rome,
but the viewpoints are
still welcome moments
to gawp at the scenery.
put in the role of Haytham Kenway –
ostensibly the game’s protagonist and
hero – and were taken aback when
the plot dramatically swerved and
things were not what they appeared
to be. Could it be, then, that the entire
concept of the Assassins being a force
for good – and, by proxy, the Templars
being a force for evil – likewise not be
what it appears?
Perhaps. Perhaps not. But either
way we will explore the Assassin’s
Creed universe, and the two primary
powers that shape it, in a way unlike
ever before. As explained by creative
director Jean Guesdon in our exclusive
interview (see page 12), Haytham’s
father Edward is a man who has no
existing allegiance to the Assassins or
Templars – and he learns about their
conflict first-hand, from both sides.
006-15_360129[AssCreedIV]NTICJA.indd 9
“ASSASSIN’S CREED IV
TRANSFORMS PLAYERS FROM
FREE-RUNNING HISTORICAL
TOURISTS INTO FREE-ROAMING
HISTORICAL EXPLORERS”
Knowing the fate of his son, it is likely
that he (and, thus, the player) will leave
Black Flag with a far from black-and-
white understanding of what “good”
and “evil” entail.
Certainly the pirates and Assassins
share a lot of ideology in common;
they “live their lives as they see fit”
and abide “by their own code, in a
society built for those who would truly
be free.” Sound familiar? “Nothing is
true, everything is permitted” indeed.
Consider this: by aligning the morality
ASSASSIN’S CREED IV BLACK FLAG
James Artaius
MILES AWAY
TOP RIGHT: You’ll be
FROM MILES
exploring ruins and Without spoiling it for everyone,
uncharted jungles, Assassin’s Creed III concluded the
all Tomb Raider-like. story of everyone’s least favourite
Except without the protagonist Desmond Miles. So while
dual pis… oh, right. you will be controlling another of his
ancestors in Black Flag, you won’t be
using Desmond as the conduit. So,
just who will be our conduit to his
ancestor this time?
“I can definitely tell you that YOU
will be the hero of the present-day
storyline in Assassin’s Creed IV,” says
Jean Guesdon. “You will directly live
the memories of Edward Kenway
through your own Animus Research
Station, since you’re now a researcher
for Abstergo.”
That certainly jibes with what we
have heard and inferred about things
like Abstergo Entertainment that are
set to feature in the latest game – and
hopefully it allays people’s lingering
fears that Black Flag will somehow
reboot the Assassin’s Creed universe
in order to accommodate a new
‘conduit character’.
“The other thing I will mention is
LEFT: It’s still an
that while Desmond’s story is over, the
Assassin’s Creed,
so you’ll still get to plotline will be a direct continuation of
sneak up on the the events that transpired in Assassin’s
odd bloke with your Creed III,” added Guesdon. “We’re not
Hidden Blade, but ‘rebooting’ the present day, we’re just
the killing is definitely looking at it from another angle.”
more overt now.
360-gamer.com 09
07/06/2013 13:56
 ASSASSIN’S CREED IV BLACK FLAG
James Artaius

ABOVE: Using unsuspecting guards as crash mats

is still the best way to get down from tall buildings.

Not only does Assassin’s

Creed III’s epic seafaring
return, it makes up about
40% of the main campaign.

of the Assassin Order with the real-life
rapists and plunderers of the Golden
Age of Piracy, Black Flag forces you
to ask very serious questions about
who you consider to be the heroes
and villains in this fictional world –
and, indeed, in the real one.
THE MAGNIFICENT
SEVEN
Speaking of the relationship between
the game and real world, no fewer
working on Assassin’s Creed IV,” said
director Ashraf Ismail. “I’ll be the first
to tell you, this is one of the hardest
things to do in game development.”
And associate producer Karl Luhe
concurs: “When you’re just receiving
emails from someone who’s several
thousands of miles away, you know
nothing about the person, it’s hard to
read between the lines.”
In many ways it could be a recipe
for a real rum do. We’ve all seen what

A NOVEL IDEA than seven studios are involved in

realising the Assassin’s Creed universe
happens when there are too many
cooks in the kitchen, from the just-
As you may have noticed, Assassin’s Creed for Black Flag. Ubisoft Montreal is shy-of-greatness Deus Ex: Human
isn’t just a hugely successful videogame
handling primary development duties, Revolution (with all its outsourced
franchise – it’s a hugley successful trans-
media franchise. There are comic books, but Ubisoft Annecy, Bucharest, Kiev, boss battles) to the mismatched
novels, short films and soon a full-length Quebec, Singapore and Sofia are all and meandering Cloud Atlas movie
film (starring Prometheus and X-Men: First providing support for what is a truly (with its three directors) to the truly
Class’ Michael Fassbender, no less). Indeed, enormous undertaking. disastrous Aliens: Colonial Marines
we were first introduced to Black Flag’s
“One of the things we laugh about (with its, well, everything). And those
hero, Edward Kenway, in the Assassin’s
Creed Forsaken novel. is every minute of the whole week, who feel that the series lost its way
Clearly this could cause massive headaches for the studios somebody, somewhere in this world is with Assassin’s Creed Revelations
tasked with inserting a whole new game – or even just a new
character – into the continuity, trying to ensure consistency
with all the comics and books and the rest of the universe.
But thankfully Ubisoft has a dedicated team that exists for the
sole purpose of keeping on top of everything.
“We actually have a brand team that is in charge of all of
that,” said Jean Guesdon. “They are a really brilliant bunch,
as they need to know everything, including things that have
yet to happen, in the Assassin’s Creed universe. You saw that
with Edward showing up in Forsaken – that was planned a
long time in advance!
“The brand team is constantly communicating with our
collaborators to ensure such cohesion. Their work ensures
that our universe is truly trans-media, and that the novels,
comics, short films, et cetera are all important and meaningful
parts of a larger universe that keeps expanding.”

10 360-gamer.com

006-15_360129[AssCreedIV]NTICJA.indd 10 07/06/2013 13:57

 TURN
For our interview
with creative
director Jean
Guesdon!

“BLACK FLAG WILL BE THE CULMINATION

ABOVE: Redcoat
deadcoat, and no

OF ALL UBISOFT’S TOP-TIER TALENT

redemption. Ah, to
be a Brit – we really

PULLING IN THE SAME DIRECTION”

are a nation of
historical bastards.

and its potpourri of studios might be
fearing the worst.
But Ubisoft is keen to sweep such
fears aside. “It’s incredible when you
have so many employees – and we’re
talking like hundreds – when they all
believe in the vision and they all push
behind it, the results are spectacular,”
assures Ismail. Production manager
Ambre Lizurey explains things further:
“We have seven studios working in
collaboration on Assassin’s Creed IV.
It’s not Montreal versus Singapore
versus any other studio; it’s us working
on the same game.”
CLEARLY YOU’VE NEVER
BEEN TO SINGAPORE
Far from a disjointed hodgepodge of
ideas, Black Flag will be the cohesive
culmination of all Ubisoft’s top-tier
talent pulling in the same direction to
achieve something truly incredible.
Certainly, everything we’ve seen of the
game convinces us that this might not
just be the best Assassin’s Creed since
Brotherhood – it may in fact redefine
the entire franchise.
Many will lament that the cloak-and-
dagger stealth is giving way to more
overt combat, us included. But the
truth is that pre-gunpowder gameplay
cannot be the thrust of a game built
on muskets, pistols and cannon – and
neither should it. Black Flag must not
be assessed for what it isn’t; gamers
who loved stealthing around the Third
Crusade and Renaissance eras already
have those games, and this one does
not want or need to do things that have
already been done.
Instead, Assassin’s Creed IV offers
a completely new experience that
transforms players from free-running
historical tourists into free-roaming
historical explorers. A seafaring sandbox
spectacular, Black Flag combines the
prescribed narrative that the series is
known for with the kind of player-driven
gameplay only possible in an open-
world adventure.
Whether it can achieve the kind of
emergent gameplay of a Crackdown
remains to be seen, but the opportunity
to engage in epic sea battles, discover
untamed jungle ruins, plunder coves
and underwater treasures, and engage
in state-of-the-art combat that goes
from hand-to-hand and blade-to-blade
to pistol-to-pistol and ship-to-ship…
this ain’t your daddy’s Assassin’s Creed,
that’s for sure. Unless you’re Haytham
Kenway, of course, in which case it
very much is.
LEFT: This here is
Blackbeard. And
thankfully he’s not
being played by
Lovejoy.
HELLO,
BEASTIE
Okay, so we know that
Kenway will be battling
sharks. And we also
know that there will
be giant whales that
erupt from the sea and
threaten to smash your ship into matchsticks. But what other
weird and wonderful creatures might we encounter both
beneath and while sailing the seas?
Ubisoft Montreal has gone to great lengths to adhere to
authentic 18th Century history and real-life pirates, rather than
dealing in Robinson Crusoe romanticism or Jack Sparrow
hyperbole. So it stands to reason that tropes such as kraken
and ghost ships are off the menu. Or are they?
After all, this series is beloved for Easter Eggs such as the
giant squid in Assassin’s Creed II – and the last game that
featured a Kenway even had an appearance from the Loch
Ness Monster. So can we expect to encounter more of these
critters while exploring Black Flag’s ocean?
“That would be spoiling!” says Jean Guesdon with a big
smile. “You will definitely see real animals such as whales and
sharks, and I can tell you that these are terrifying enough from
up close.” Take our advice, cap’n: pull out your spyglass and
get it nice and close to the page so you can read between
those lines…

360-gamer.com 11

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360 Gamer: Assassin’s Creed IV stars
another of Desmond Miles’ ancestors.
Would you have preferred to explore
a protagonist from a totally separate
“genetic heritage” to Altaïr, Ezio and
Ratonhnhaké:ton, or is that bloodline
integral to the over-arcing Assassin’s
Creed experience?
Jean Guesdon: I wouldn’t say it’s
something that we were never willing
to go beyond, but for now we are
staying in Desmond’s bloodline, and
there is a very specific reason for that,
which you will see in-game.
The seafaring sections were hugely
popular in Assassin’s Creed III. Were
they a make-or-break factor in Black
Flag’s piracy setting, and at what
stage in ACIII’s development did
you feel confident enough to build
a whole game around them?
They were one factor, but not the
only factor. When we saw the early
tech demos of the naval sequences
in ACIII, we knew right away that we
had something special in our hands.
The gameplay was great, it was fun,
and it was fresh. We knew right away
that it opened up a new era that
was previously unthinkable for our
franchise: piracy.
We also knew we wanted to tell
the story of the Kenway family, and
we were already planning on going
backwards into the bloodline to
Edward. The age on which we would
focus on him lined up perfectly with
the Golden Age of Piracy. And that,
12 360-gamer.com
006-15_360129[AssCreedIV]NTICJA.indd 12
ASSASSIN’S CREED IV
BLACK FLAG
INTERVIEW
WE CRACK OPEN A TALL BOTTLE OF GROG AND CHAT TO JEAN
GUESDON, BLACK FLAG’S CREATIVE DIRECTOR, ABOUT TOPLESS
ASSASSINS, GUNPLAY VERSUS SWORDPLAY, GTA ON WATER AND
HOW LONG GUYBRUSH THREEPWOOD CAN HOLD HIS BREATH…
combined with our developing naval
tech, made it a no-brainer.
Speaking of Assassin’s Creed III,
Black Flag is a sequel in terms of
the series but it’s a prequel of sorts
to the last game. Did it ever have a
different protagonist or was it always
Edward Kenway?
It was always Edward. We created
Edward during ACIII, actually, and we
have seeded him in our universe since
then. A large portion of the ACIII tie-in
novel, Forsaken, stars Edward because
we knew he would be our protagonist
for ACIV. Edward is also referenced
both in ACIII and its DLC.
Games go through a lot of iterations
during development. Were there
any different settings or stories or
characters under consideration, or
any crazy ideas that simply didn’t fit
what Black Flag became?
It all lined up pretty well actually,
in terms of story. At first we were
worried we wouldn’t be able to have
Edward meet all the different pirates
operating in the Caribbean at that
time without cheating, or jumping
around incessantly, or just simply
cutting some characters.
But as it turns out we happened
upon an extremely well-researched
“[Our story] is set in reality, not
in a romanticised ‘piracy’ setting
that never existed”
book called The Republic of Pirates
written by Colin Woodard, which
tells the true story of how Blackbeard,
Charles Vane, Benjamin Hornigold,
and all these other famous pirates
were at the same place at the same
time, when they ruled Nassau, in the
Bahamas. They all tried to set up a
kind of democracy, the Pirate Republic
referenced in the book’s title. Of
course, it didn’t last long, as they are
all criminals, but it gave us a really
good excuse to keep every character
we wanted in the game.
As with any long-running series,
you have to cater to hardcore fans
as well as people who’ve never
played an Assassin’s Creed. How
do you balance keeping fans happy
and remaining accessible enough
for newcomers, especially with the
ABOVE: There have intricate storyline?
been some alterations
to the iconic Assassin
Again, this is something that came
outfit this time around naturally to this game. On the one
– including shedding hand, we are looking at the present
it completely.
day from a different angle this time
around. So while you will definitely see
Easter Eggs and references to known
subjects, the majority of the content
will be understandable by neophytes
and fans alike.
The same goes for our protagonist,
Edward. We are telling the story of a
man who has no previous family ties
to the Assassins or the Templars. He
happens to fall into a situation that
makes him discover this entire conflict,
from both sides. How he reacts to
07/06/2013 13:57
 James Artaius INTERVIEW
The huge success of
Assassin’s Creed III’s
naval sections was
important in deciding
the new pirate setting.

“You will sail the

Caribbean like you
would [drive] a car
in a modern-day
sandbox game”
that, and how he eventually comes to
deal with it, is our story. Because of
that, it is a very approachable story
whether you’ve played none or all of
the Assassin’s Creed games before.

As the Assassin’s Creed series has

moved further into the modern age,
gunplay has become as much a ABOVE: Red sky at
part of the franchise as swordplay, night, pirate’s delight.
That’s what you get
and some fans are disappointed for loitering at the
at the move away from the cloaks- docks, matey.
and-dagger gameplay. How do you
reconcile these different player
expectations and ensure that Black
Flag delivers the blazing guns and
the satisfying swashbuckling and
the shadowy stealth kills?
We look at all of these elements as the
tools that we are giving the player. We BELOW: Edward isn’t
are creating fun gunplay, fun fighting shy of getting his kit
and fun stealth tools, and it’s up to the off underwater. And
sharks aren’t shy
players to decide which one will be about biting his limbs
best utilised in each situation. off, either.
So, to answer your question, we
reconcile these player expectations
by making sure that all of these tools
are useful and fun to use, and that the
mission design supports each one
of them. It is then up to the player to
figure out which one they prefer, and
if the situation facing them could be
resolved by using stealth or gunplay
(for example).

We’ve heard a lot about Black Flag

being an open-world seafaring
adventure game, which many fans
have taken to mean something

360-gamer.com 13

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 “This open world will be full of
BELOW: If you’re not sure one sword is enough
to make them dead, stick ’em with a second
one just to be safe.

systemic activities, side quests and

collectibles… you are free to go
anywhere you want”

“We are telling the

story of a man who
has no previous family
ties to the Assassins
or Templars”
free-roaming like The Legend of
Zelda: Wind Waker or “Grand Theft
Auto on water”. Is this an accurate
categorisation, or are these fans a
bit off the mark?
They are completely on the mark. You
will be using your boat to sail around
the Caribbean like you would use a car
in any modern-day sandbox game.
This open world will be full of systemic
activities, side quests, collectibles,
and much more. You are free to go
anywhere you want and plunder any
ship, provided you are strong enough
to survive.

Something that sticks out to us is

that Edward, when underwater, is
topless without his robe and hood.
This is the most “exposed” we’ve ever
seen an Assassin protagonist, and
it’s very humanising. Maybe we’re
reading too much into it, but it seems
like a conscious decision to remove
his “Assassin-ness”. What was the
thinking behind revealing so much
of Kenway – and dare we ask, does
it foreshadow the character existing
outside the Assassin Order?

14 360-gamer.com

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Hmm, looks like a nod to
Bartholomew Roberts’
famous encounter with 42
Portuguese ships at Baía de
Todos os Santos to us…
It’s really only because it wouldn’t
make sense for him to dive with his full
attire on! (Smiles) But, you have picked
up on something interesting regarding
Edward. While he does discover the
Brotherhood throughout the course
of the story, at heart he is still Edward
Kenway, pirate captain. There was
a conscious decision on our part to
remove the peak on his hood, to even
remove his hood in some instances (like
our announcement trailer), to show this
other side of him.
He is definitely not your typical
Assassin for a large part of the story,
and we wanted to subtly allude
to that by revealing more of him.
How he comes to fully embrace the
Brotherhood and the Creed is really
the story we wanted to tell, so you will
see this transformation from brash
young pirate to Assassin.
How long can Edward hold his breath
underwater? We hear that Guybrush
Threepwood’s record is ten minutes…
(Smiles) He can hold his breath for
a reasonably long time, but nothing
close to Guybrush’s exploits! He uses
006-15_360129[AssCreedIV]NTICJA.indd 15
the Diving Bell to recover his breath
while underwater, which allows him
to fully explore an underwater area
without having to hold his breath for
inhuman amounts of time.
In seriousness, with properties such
as Pirates of the Caribbean, Treasure
Island and even Monkey Island being
so prominent, how hard is it to create
your own unique vision of the Golden
Age of Piracy?
Very early on we decided to strip
away all of the pop culture mythos
that has accumulated around piracy
and try to tell the most historically
accurate vision of the 18th Century
Caribbean that we could. The mistake
that most other media representations
of piracy make is that “piracy” is their
setting, so every last bit of scenery
and dialogue is pirate-themed. There
are skulls on every building, every
tree, et cetera.
We strive to tell a story set in the
18th Century Caribbean (the West
Indies), and that story happens to be
about pirates. But they live in a world
that also includes governors, empires,
James Artaius INTERVIEW
“Edward can hold his
breath for a long time,
but nothing close to
Guybrush’s exploits!”
ABOVE: You won’t slaves, merchants, real inhabitants
see mermaids and – and most of it, while influenced by
ghost ships here
(well, actually you the actions of pirates, has nothing to
might); Black Flag is do with them. By bringing this other
based on authentic, part to life, we are able to tell a story
unromanticised
pirate history. that feels different, because it is set
in reality, how it [really] was back
then, not in a romanticised “piracy”
setting that never actually existed.
We’re confident that this will make our
representation of piracy stand out!
Lastly, then, what else will make
Black Flag stand out? Why should
gamers – the fans of the franchise,
fans who left the series after Ezio,
or people who have never played
Assassin’s Creed before – check it
out on 01 November? Give us your
sales pitch!
ACIV is the freshest game so far in the
series. It has everything it needs to be
a truly great Assassin’s Creed game in
every sense of the word, but the way
the game is presented to the player,
the possibilities that are offered to
them at every moment, and the way
it is played, feels like nothing you’ve
ever played before!
360-gamer.com 15
07/06/2013 14:08
 Fantasia: Music EvolvEd
Publisher:
Disney Interactive
DeveloPer:
Harmonix
releAseD:
TBC 2014

Who’s the wizard dude? That’ll be Yen Sid. And

he’s not a wizard – he’s a sorcerer. You know, as in
‘The Sorcerer’s Apprentice’, as in the episode from
Disney’s Fantasia where Mickey Mouse simply can’t
be arsed to do some housework for his master and
foolishly decides to enchant some brooms to do
it for him, music by Paul Dukas. You’ll remember
it sounding a bit like, “dum, dum, dummedy-dum,
de-dum, de-da-diddy-dum…” Yeah, you’ve got it.
Now hum it. We guarantee that you’ll feel better
about yourself.
Rock Band developer Harmonix is working
with Disney to bring Fantasia to a new generation,
thanks to the magic of Kinect and a total disregard
for the beauty of classical music. Great. You’ll be
able to control the modern tunes with your hands,
waving them around like some mad conductor and
controlling all sorts of aspects of the music using
your entire body. Expect the on-screen visuals
to be suitably insane, for it to not be at all like the
original Forties animation, and that it will really
help if you like this season’s version of Sting –
Bruno Mars. He’s far from alone in being new and
unknown to us.
So who else is featuring? Over 25 “leading artists”
including Fun, with its track Some Nights, AVICII
and Levels, Kimbra’s Settle Down and one that we
actually recognise, Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody.
Beelzebub has a devil for a sideboard, you know.
Fantasia: Music Evolved won’t be available until next
year, will include multiplayer and will be released for
the 360 and Xbox One. Its production also probably
means that Harmonix isn’t currently busy bringing
Frequency and Amplitude to Live Arcade, but then
those classics could well be tied up with licensing
issues – though some form of remix would be pretty
darned welcome.

16 360-gamer.com

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000_360129[ads].indd 1 07/06/2013 13:36
 Nazi Robots
FRom space!
PUBLISHER: Okay, sO the header might be a slight exaggeratiOn, but the
Bethesda Softworks
pOint it that WOlfenstein is back! there’s nO multiplayer, but
DEVELOPER:
MachineGames there is a pOst-WWii alternate WOrld featuring nazi rObOts,
RELEASED: mOOn bases and frickin’ laser beams. get psyched!
Winter 2013
Wolfenstein has never really been a franchise well. even its most recent the previous game is pretty much
franchise that has done things like outing, 2009’s distinctively 7 out of gone, and in its place comes a new
everybody else. the original Castle 10 Wolfenstein, was an enjoyable if technology based empire with giant
Wolfenstein back in 1981 implemented flawed romp through an alternate mechs, flying drones and robodogs
some basic stealth strategies, while its fantasy World War ii landscape. but doing their evil bidding. the nazis
revival as a first-person shooter in where do you go after fighting against were even able to steal a march on
1992 with Wolfenstein 3D shaped an legions of undead nazis and travelling the first moon landing and have a
entire genre. since then it’s nailed near- between dimensions? the sixties, it base set up there. yes, we know, nazi
perfect multiplayer in Return to Castle appears, as that’s where Wolfenstein: robots and space stations – we may
Wolfenstein (2001), dabbled with the The New Order is pitching its nazi- have been here before, but The New
paranormal and generally stretched the blasting tent – although obviously it’s Order promises to bridge that tongue-
restrictions of its World War ii settings. an alternate sixties. in-cheek cheesiness with a rich story
BELOW RIGHT:
Go ahead punk, it’s fair to say that it’s never really taken this “re-imagining” of Wolfenstein based adventure and plenty of kick-
mech my day. itself too seriously, either. is set in a post-WWii world; a world ass action.
And yes, that pun it’s this ongoing evolution and where the nazis won and europe and, when it comes to kicking
has been around
almost as long as a willingness to get just a little bit is suffering under their oppressive nazi ass in Wolfenstein, that can only
Wolfenstein… bonkers that has largely served the regime. the paranormal element of mean one man: William Joseph ‘bJ’

18 360-gamer.com

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Blazkowicz. He’s been doing so since
1992 and is back for more in The New
Order – albeit some 15 years older and
with a touch of the Jason Bournes
about him.
You see, in one final WWII battle,
the series’ iconic hero gets knocked
unconscious and wakes up on the
shores of the Baltic Sea with one
hell of a case of amnesia. As was the
immediate diagnosis and treatment
of amnesia back in 1945, he gets
locked away in an asylum for the rest
of his life. That is, until some Nazis
come round to crack a few skulls and
inadvertently knock some sense back
into the one man who can stop them.
“For all its apparent silliness, it’s
the adventure behind the new order
that most intrigues us”
You see? There is
still some stealth
gameplay in there!
018-21_360129[ftWolfenstein]NTICJA.indd 19
Memory restored, it’s time to get
psyched once again.
We don’t have the specifics on who
exactly the key antagonist is and what
Blazkowicz’ overriding mission will
be, but we did mention Nazi robots
and cybernetic dogs, right? What the
move to the Sixties setting will allow,
however, is a bit more of retro sci-fi
vibe for Wolfenstein. We’re not talking
the kind of gleeful exaggeration seen
in the awesomeness of Far Cry 3:
Blood Dragon, but the likes of lasers
and other energy weapons, as well
as a variety of neat gadgets to play
around with. It may come across a
bit Terminator meets Austin Powers,
WolfeNSTeIN: THe NeW order
Ian Collen
ABOVE: Laser- but there’s more than enough being
guided miniguns:
teased here to bring a beaming smile
because why the
f**k not? to our faces.
You can be sure that Blazkowicz
is going to be kitted out with some
badass weaponry, dual-wielding
rocket launchers or packing laser
turrets for wiping out the (far from
undead) Nazi hordes – as well as
getting to jump into a mech himself
DOOM MERCHANTS
The impact and subsequent legacy of Wolfenstein 3D in 1992
isn’t to be underestimated. It wasn’t the first fPS, nor was it
the first actual ‘3d’ game, but id Software certainly led the
way in designing genuinely three-dimensional models and
locations to create an experience never before seen in the
gaming world (not to mention Hitler as a robot). It preceded
the iconic Doom by a year (also created by id) and laid the
foundations for a genre that still echo through Call of duty
and all other modern-day shooters. If you’re too young to
remember the original, the game was re-released on live
Arcade or you can head on over to www.wolfenstein.com
where Bethesda posted a browser-based version to mark the
game’s 20th anniversary last year.
360-gamer.com 19
06/06/2013 20:44
 “There’s a naughTy Twinkle in The
eyes of The devs ThaT suggesTs
preTTy much anyThing goes”

from time to time. The New Order
looks set to boast some impressively
open environments (although the
gameplay itself should remain largely
linear, we suspect) with the need to
pick out decent cover points and the
BELOW: The added option to do a running slide
robodogs have a
distinctively Alien into cover – although there will be no
look to them. It may ‘sticky’ or ‘snap-to’ system to interfere
explain why all the with your gunplay.
nearby trees have
acid burns on their There should also be plenty of
trunks, anyway. interesting boss battles, with both
giant mechs and menacing human
enemies to tackle. Only one villain has
been shown so far – a female officer
called Frau Engel, who mixes casual
flirtation with intimidation as she tests
your apparent Aryan loyalty while
toying with her handgun – and you’ll
get to meet many more like her as you
infiltrate the higher order of the enemy
ranks. We bet at least one of them will
have facial scars, someone will walk
with a limp and there will be a fight that
will more than match that robo-Hitler
battle from Wolfenstein 3D.
Of course, getting you to pick out
postcards from a pile is all just a joke,
and not really a test to see if you might
be a member of the Resistance that’s
still fighting the cause across Europe.
It’s a battle that will take you across
the continent, with London (or London
Nautica, as it’s now called), Paris,
Berlin and the mountains of Poland
among the locations, and even New
York is hinted towards in the game’s
first teaser trailer. You won’t be alone,
though, with a nurse from Blazkowicz’
asylum fighting for the resistance
movement and proving a key ally
(and love interest), along with a British
soldier and other characters you’ll
bump into on your travels.
And for all its apparent silliness and
all the obvious fun to be had packing
some epic weaponry against gaming’s
greatest (living) enemy, it’s the sheer
adventure behind The New Order that
most intrigues us. The game is billed
as a first-person action-adventure
shooter, and will give you the freedom
to explore its world and interact with
people in a story driven campaign, as

Anya’s there to help, which

means a voice in your ear on
missions and someone to flirt
with when you get back.

20 360-gamer.com

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 WolfeNSTeiN: THe NeW oRdeR
ian Collen

well as just blasting them to bloody
pieces (or green blobs if you live in
Germany). Heck, there’s even a looting
system to encourage you to scavenge
parts for weapon upgrades.
Certainly with former Starbreeze
developers behind the spanking new
MachineGames studio that’s handling
the game, and an advanced version
of the id Tech 5 engine (previously
seen in Rage) at its disposal, we have
many good reasons to be optimistic of
something both fun and suitably dark
to match the likes of The Darkness
and The Chronicles of Riddick. There
will be a point to it, a story that means
something, is what we’re trying to
say – but at the same time there’s a
very naughty twinkle in the eyes of
the devs that suggests pretty much
anything goes in The New Order.
Hopefully we won’t have long to wait
to see what this cocktail of gaming
greatness, tongue-in-cheek action and
twisted alternate-world narrative will
taste like. We’re prepped for something
special, even it’s only because our hearts
yearn for another classic Wolfenstein,
but these early signs have our palates
moistening nicely.
The absence of a multiplayer is a bit
of a kick in the balls, but if you played
the online side of those Starbreeze
games we mentioned then you might
be aware that its talents lie more in
creating an awesome single-player
ride of ultraviolence. Stick to what
you’re good at, is what we say, and
the developers are good at making
immersive action-adventure games,
while we’re great at shooting at Nazi
robots in the face.
ABOVE: There’s a
metaphor for lunatics
running the asylum
here somewhere.
TOP: Hmm, those
pesky Nazis have
themselves some
uber-weaponry. This
one’s called the Super
Destructor. Can you
guess what it does?
CASTLE
CRASHERS
There’s been talk of a Wolfenstein
film for the best part of a decade
now, but it seems like those distant
dreams may still be coming true after
all. Back at the end of 2012 it was
announced that Castle Wolfenstein
was in pre-production and would be
a film “in the vein of Captain America
and Inglourious Basterds.” The Rules
of Attraction director (and former
Tarantino collaborator) Roger Avary
is signed up for writing and directing
duties – the project was presumably
held up after he was arrested and
then convicted of gross vehicular
manslaughter in 2008.

360-gamer.com 21

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 Maybe there will be
flashbacks to missions that
Bruce engaged in while
disguised by a balaclava?

GIVING A NAME TO THE PAIN

PUBLISHER:
WB Games WE’VE HEARD OF FAR CRY TOUCHES FOR BATWING QUICK TRAVEL, A
DEVELOPER: BIGGER, DENSER CITY AND A YOUNGER AND LESS EXPERIENCED HERO.
WB Games
Montreal
NOW BATMAN: ARKHAM ORIGINS FINALLY FINDS A VOICE OR TWO…
RELEASED:
“Criminals are a superstitious, cowardly in the first place, or letting the grief out So why use the Origins label? Because
25 October 2013 lot, so my disguise must be able to by suspending your naked body from Batman: Year One was taken already.
strike terror into their hearts. I must be chains and skewers while swinging And anyway, the game will be set
a creature of the night – black, terrible. away in front of your folks’ portraits, during one specific day: a particularly
I shall become A BAT!” as tears and blood spatter an image violent Christmas Eve, when Bats
– Bruce Wayne, smoking a pipe, on paper on the floor? isn’t quite the highly refined fighter
November 1939 It’s easy to imagine a few alternatives depicted in Arkham Asylum and City
There must be better ways to get that could help a young man deal with (but he’s still quite tasty and has had
over your parents’ murder than waging the guilt of once being a defenceless some experience), which has had us
an unarmed one-man war on the young boy, and none of them – not thinking about him being just that
criminal underworld while dressed as even the classic bat/window/pipe- little bit rubbish.
the only mammal capable of sustained smoking moment – will be dealt with It was Frank Miller’s take on the
flight. Therapy, perhaps? Or alcohol? by Arkham Origins. early cases of the World’s Greatest
BELOW: Now Drugs? Random sexual encounters You see, Warner Bros’ new, in-house Detective that very much informed
just imagine him with débutantes? How about using an take on Bob Kane’s legendary hero is Christopher Nolan’s Batman Begins,
speaking with the
voice of BioShock’s inherited fortune to deal with the socio- not really an origins story in the usual and within the pages of Year One are
Booker DeWitt. economic issues that hot-house crime sense, it just deals with an early case. some frames that detail a very early

22 360-gamer.com

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encounter between Bruce Wayne’s
alter ego and some low-level thugs.
He very nearly kills one by accidentally
knocking him off a fire escape and,
in trying to save the criminal’s life, he
almost loses his own. Though quite
comfortable with the idea of putting
people in hospital, he’s not a killer –
and not killing someone when they are
trying to kill you is (so we understand)
not that easy.
So then, will Arkham Origins use
not-killing as a mechanic? It would
certainly energise some of the heavy
excesses of a combat system that
has previously enabled players to
enter a rhythm of button presses and
counters until the room is littered with
unconscious felons. Should Batman
get too carried away, how about he
accidentally snaps a neck and so
causes a Game Over screen, gives
up the cowl and goes to jail – or even
Arkham Asylum? Because it would
break up the fun of it all, we assume.
Though you can expect to suffer
the consequences of accidentally
knocking out someone you intended
to interrogate.
Still, it’s fun to imagine such things
that we haven’t seen the likes of
since playing Usagi Yojimo on the
Commodore 64, when it was possible
to accidentally kill a civilian and so be
left watching as the samurai rabbit
committed ritual suicide. But there’s
going to be at least one thing majorly
022-4_360129[ftBatman]NTICJA.indd 23
different about the version of Batman
seen – or rather, heard – in Origins,
compared to his later self from the
previous Arkham titles: a total lack of
Kevin Conroy’s larynx. Supposedly
this helps to signify Batman’s youth
and inexperience, or at least that was
one theory.
Conroy was born in November 1955;
his replacement, Roger Craig Smith,
in August 1975. Does the male voice
really alter that much in 20 years? Not
really, though middle-age can bring
‘ossification of the laryngeal cartilages’
– something that can actually improve
a signing voice.
This new and younger Batman has
been shown in action in a recent trailer
and, if his voice is meant to connote
youth and inexperience, it’s not that
apparent in his combat abilities and
investigative methodology. Unless
you count almost getting blown up
by a bomb and not getting crushed
to death by a falling shipping crate.
We don’t see him fumble in a fight or
almost drop a man to his death; he’s in
control, he’s surgical. He’s been active
and effective for enough time to make
Black Mask put out a hit on him, so he
isn’t a fledging crimefighter learning
his craft or a rich man in a smoking
jacket casually considering his road
to vengeance.
If you’ve been near Alton Towers’
Sonic the Hedgehog rides you might
well have heard Roger Smith’s vocal
BATMAN: ARKHAM ORIGINS
Will Johnston
chords doing their thing already.
The powerfully persuasive “Have a
BELOW: Pre-order great stay. Don’t forget to ride the
and you can play as Sonic Spinball – woohoo!” is one of
Deathstroke – but will
that be in multiplayer his lines, for he’s been the voice of the
modes only? nippy needlemouse for many years.
Obviously we’re contrasting a giddy
and excitable Sonic with a deep and
considerate Batman for theatrical
reasons, so we’d better add some
balance: Smith has also given us his
Chris Redfield in Resident Evil 5 as
well as affected Italian accent for his
portrayal of Ezio Auditore da Firenze
in the better Assassin’s Creed games.
LOOK BATMAN, CLUES!
Despite not having Paul Dini as a writer, you can expect WB
Games Montreal to get the most from the source material, as
evidenced here by a bullet casing that Batman finds at the
end of the trailer after coming under fire from Deadshot while
fighting Deathstroke.
It was manufactured by AmerTek Industries, which once
employed an engineer called Dr John Henry Irons before
he left to wear his own power armour and carry a massive
sledgehammer as the Superman wannabe, Steel (oddly, he’s
also known as the Man of Iron).
There are other suggestions concerning the wider universe,
too. In an earlier scene Batman finds a bomb in a case marked
‘Queen Industries’, CEO one Oliver Queen – Green Arrow. Or
at least he was the CEO before he found his conscience and
went all Robin Hood.
360-gamer.com 23
06/06/2013 20:57
 BATMAN: ARKHAM ORIGINS
Will Johnston

aBoVe: Riiiight,
because slamming
He’s also played Forge in Nicktoons’
Wolverine and the X-Men and was the
an explosive barrel
into someone narrator of TMC’s Say Yes to the Dress,
won’t kill them. in which women didn’t always actually
agree with the clothing they were
being offered.
Kevin Conroy, by comparison, is
mostly famous for being the voice of
The Caped Crusader since 1993 and,
BeLoW: That’s
Anarky in Gotham more recently, attending a Comic Con
City, right there. in Dallas where he told an eager crowd
“he’s in control… he isn’t a fledglng
crimefighter learning his craft”
of fans, “I can talk about it now, we’ve
been working for about 9 or 10 months
on the next Arkham.”
Wait… so he is going to be in Origins,
but in the role of someone other than
a playboy philanthropist/vigilante with
abandonment issues? He sure can’t be
playing Batman, since that part’s been
taken by the ‘Say Yes’ bloke. Well, he
is and he isn’t, as a later Tweet clarified
before it was deleted: “Confusion in
Dallas. I am in a new Arkham game
coming soon, not Arkham Origins
coming this fall.”
What we have here, ladies and
gents, could well be a Call of Duty
situation in the making, whereby two
developers tackle the same game
series but during alternate years to
enable annual releases. Rocksteady
Studios will be playing Infinity Ward,
while WB Games Montreal will be
doing a Treyarch.
This could even mean that Mark
Hamill (born in September, 1951) will
be returning as The Joker, but only
in Rocksteady games that put him
up against a similarly aged Conroy.
Arkham Origins’ clown prince of crime
will be vocalised by Troy Baker (April
1976) who you’ll recognise as playing
Booker DeWitt in BioShock Infinite,
Vincent Brooks in Catherine and, more
importantly, Robin and Two-Face in
Arkham City and Batman, Two-Face,
Sinestro, Brainiac and even bloomin’
Hawkman in LEGO Batman 2: DC Super
Heroes. So it was probably about time
they let him pretend to have green hair
and act insanely psychotic.

V for Homage
When Alan Grant and Norm Breyfogle
created Anarky way back in the late
Eighties, they knew full well that the
character looked quite a bit like V of
Vendetta fame. Originally a 12-year-old
child prodigy who disguised his age
by wearing a suit with a really large
neck, this anarchist (geddit?) enabled
Grant to write more political storylines The red eye is a giveaway
than previously possible. He’ll also be that this here is Deadshot
featuring in Arkham Origins and be – yet another assassin on
providing sub-missions, some of which we’re willing to bet Batman’s tail.
will be of a political nature. Should be interesting.

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000_360129[ads].indd 1 07/06/2013 15:20
 “It started by bringing gaming to life, by bringing life to gaming. Story. Character. Real emotion.
Then we added you; me, me, me. Definitely me. And 40 million of our closest friends. And with
every person we added, the world we created became richer. Filled with more joy. Adrenaline and
excitement. And the more of you we put in games, the more of you we put in entertainment, the
better they became. We added your movements. My moves. And my voice. And started a revolution.
So now we’re about to change entertainment forever. Again. Because we’re going to take all that
we have learned in over 30 years of innovation and use it to change everything for the first time.
You and your TV are going to have a relationship. It’s going to recognise my name, my voice, my
friends. My family. My movies. Me. It’s going to remember all the things I like, love and really love.
We’re going to use groundbreaking technology and the power of the Cloud to set my imagination
free. Free to create worlds and feelings I can only begin to imagine. We’ll all laugh more, cry more,
scream more and cheer more. While not just watching, and start feeling alive. Alive. Alive. ALIVE.”
– MICRoSofT HIVE MInD, 21 MAy 2013, 6pM GMT

ONE (BLURRED) VISION

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 XBOX ONE
Will Johnston

NOT A NEXTBOX, NOR A 720, A DURANGO OR A GARY – BUT AN

XBOX ONE. MICROSOFT FINALLY ANNOUNCED ITS MULTI-FACETED
WEAPON OF CHOICE FOR THE NEXT-GENERATION WAR, AND SO
IT’S DAMAGE CONTROL TO MAJOR NELSON – WE’RE GOING IN…
Don Mattrick founded Distinctive regrettable) thinking behind the name
Software when he was a 17-year-old. that nobody expected, as if he was
Five years later Test Drive, a cutting- ecstatic to be deconstructing a joke he
edge racing game he co-designed, had yet to tell. And so the unstoppable
was released to a public amazed by its Microsoft patter continued in various
scope and style. Around 26 years later forms, from various people at various
he stood before a worldwide audience levels of irrelevance, for over 33 whole
that was well trained in scepticism, minutes until an actual videogame was
and told it that never before in his finally shown.
entire career had he been as excited Xbox One has power, connectivity
as he was the day he revealed the with smart devices, and slick and swift
Xbox One. switching between apps, games and
Videogames “will look and feel like movies with the minimum of delay.
nothing else”, so Microsoft’s president And a Kinect that works, even at close
of Interactive Entertainment business range. Now imagine playing FIFA 15
told us with his Stan the ship salesman while having a Skype chat – incredible!
smile. TV will become more intelligent For gamers, as in those who primarily
and all your entertainment will come consider consoles to be devices to
alive and be in one place, thanks to play games on, the disappointment
an all-in-one system – one with the was deep and unforgiving. It wasn’t
power to create new experiences that raining, we were being urinated on.
look and feel like nothing else. In his And Microsoft couldn’t have been
overly gleaming preamble he outlined happier about it, as representatives
the remarkable (and some might say took turns to spout more steaming

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 ODE TO JOYPAD
liquid in the form of things we just
didn’t care about and certainly didn’t
want in our eyes.
Looking remarkably similar to the pad you’ve got right now but featuring 40-odd improvements, an These weren’t “compelling answers
internalised rechargeable battery and so a sleeker design down below, the Xbox One pad is at least to new questions” we were hearing,
one new piece of kit that everyone can agree is bloody brilliant. Its loveliness is partly down to smaller they were solutions to non-existent
analogue sticks that require 25% less effort to use, how the response time between input and reaction problems. Phrases like “take your
has been reduced by between 15 and 20%, and the way the new headset connector will enable higher passion for gaming and apply it to
fidelity communication. The real stars, however, are the dynamic impulse triggers that use magnetic your entire TV experience” were
sensors to give forefingers an incredible level of control while providing stereo vibrations. meaningless. We’ll be able to talk
Using guns, for example, will feel a great deal more like actually using a real firearm: rumbles can to our tellies? Pressing a button to
spread subtly from one trigger to another and, when combined with the joypad’s central vibration change a channel has never been an
system, it’s possible to feel sensations in your hands that have incredible depth. Fighting fans should issue for people whose “passion for
also note that the D-pad has been massively improved to be decidedly more ‘clicky’ and accurate, gaming” has them pressing many
too. Want. Want. Want. buttons, all the time.
You can use your smartphone
to make the Xbox One search the
internet? That’s interesting and all,
but smartphones can already do that
– and without the aid of a machine
that looks like it should house the
insane computer antagonist of a
direct-to-video Eighties sci-fi film.
And all those close-ups of the new
Kinect’s “eye” made it look every inch
a camera from an Orwellian future. It
certainly didn’t come across as being
friendly, or indeed welcome.

THE QUICKENING
As far as hardware reveals go, it’s fair
to suggest that Microsoft could have
done more to prevent hundreds of
thousands of its core gaming fans
expressing their fervent anger and

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 XBOX ONE
Will Johnston

“By their very nature, racing

games are fantastic for
demonstrating a new console”
FORZA that there will be even deeper options for of the previous model (see next page), so

MOTORSPORT 5
customising, painting and trading vehicles. at the very least you should be excited to
But if the crowds still look like cookie-cutter actually make use of it while not having to
You’re certainly guaranteed to be able mannequins, tears will be shed. There will sit in a different postcode. Head rotation
to pit a McLaren P1 and F1 against each also be more ways to share movies of your can be tracked, and could be used not only
other along the streets of Prague, but that races and potentially put people from your to enable left/right glances, but also as a
could have been predicted before a trailer Friends List by the trackside. method of fixing the perspective to create a
was released to showcase exactly that Forza Motorsport 4 made great use of the greater illusion of three-dimensional depth,
sort of thing happening. So what else did first generation Kinect which, considering for example. There you go, Turn 10 Studios;
it spend its time pornographically poring the problems inherent in the device, spells if you haven’t implemented such a wonder,
over? Extreme detail in textures, covering a great things for Kinect One implementation. you’ve now got a heads-up as to what we
variety of different materials that have been The latest all-seeing eye is a league ahead want as a free download…
mapped in acute exactness. Wow… check
out those bump maps…
By their very nature, racing games are
fantastic for demonstrating a new console
at its very best, since tracks and cars are
set entities and so can be drawn in as much
detail as possible, and tracks tend to loop.
What wasn’t shown was how the “infinite
power of the Cloud” will be employed, but at
least in knowing that such technology will
be used we can assume that some sort of
extra persistence will feature, layering new
levels of loveliness upon what we’ve already
experienced in Forza’s past.
For all the wizardry that such an inclusion
will entail, we’re still thinking it means that
(on a basic level at least) tracks will display
more wear and tear (don’t they always) and

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KINECT ONE
First things first: the new version of Microsoft’s
optical motion controller will indeed work in
small spaces. That’s been fixed. You won’t have
to knock down a wall to use your Xbox One
and, since the new device will ship with every
console, more developers will spend time and
money experimenting with it.
Processing an incredible two gigabits of data
per second, able to monitor six individual users’
skeletons simultaneously at thirty frames per
30 360-gamer.com
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apathy across the internet. Had they
merely been shown the console, a few
next-gen games that demonstrated
some level of newness and been
provided with a release date and a
retail price then the job would have
been almost a good one. If Microsoft
had countered the concerns about
‘always-on’ and second-hand sales
and alleviated any other issues that
had been raised, disseminated and
widely examined to much alarm after
myriad leaks, we’d all be content if
not largely positive.
The problem, of course, was that
the reveal’s gamer audience wasn’t
the one Microsoft was aiming at, and
the one that was – the multimedia-
second and track gestures performed with the
new Xbox pad, Kinect will be integral to the
console’s functionality – but you will be able to
turn its functions off if they freak you out too
much. The 1080p camera will enable Skype
chats to frame your face even when you’re sat
back on the sofa, too, which is a bonus. Faster,
more accurate, able to detect subtle wrist
movements, ever-so-slightly Mega City One –
it’s time to give Kinect another chance.
watching, NFL fantasy football-playing
kind – has yet to be solidified. And
even assuming it had, would it really
be the sort of audience that would
make time on a Tuesday evening to sit
down and stream the announcement
of the next Xbox?
Within 24 hours, 8.45 million people
had seen the One in all its unmasked
glory. As a live internet event it actually
attracted more viewers than the 2011
royal wedding. But really, how many
of those viewers would have logged in
because they were genuinely excited
about new ways of watching and
interacting with sports, or snapping
between Internet Explorer, Skype and
such TV delights as The Price is Right,
or a Halo television series that has
Steven Spielberg working somewhere
behind its scenes? Because that, for
the most of it, was very much what
we all got to see.
There were some games, of course,
yet nothing that would make a 360
gamer sit up and beg – though Call
of Duty: Ghosts’ German shepherd
certainly raised some eyebrows before
becoming an internet meme destined
to haunt Microsoft and Activision for
years to come. Forza Motorsport 5
and Quantum Break acted as the only
system exclusives shown, and even
they only appeared as pre-rendered
trailers. The former was pretty much a
given, the latter wasn’t explained well
enough to garner much interest and
featured nonsensical live action that
cut to very of-the-now CGI. Its trailer
made little of what the game would be
about and certainly wasn’t shown in a
manner that outlined why it had to be
an Xbox One, rather than a 360 title.
06/06/2013 21:00
 XBOX ONE
Will Johnston

QUANTUM BREAK
‘Calmly We Walk Through This April’s Day’ is
a poem that was written by American writer
Delmore Schwartz. And its penultimate line,
“Time is the fire in which we burn”, has been
nabbed by Alan Wake developer Remedy
Entertainment as the tagline for its Xbox
One exclusive, presumably because it’s cool
as milk. That much we know, because such
research is pretty darned easy these days.
But what we don’t know is quite how it will
blend a TV show with a game and how one
will affect the other, and that’s exactly what
gives the project its reason to exist.
The trailer certainly provides some subtle
clues, beginning with a live-action scene in
which a family is preparing to go on a car
journey when the mother (presumably) asks
her daughter (theoretically) what makes her
so different. The girl touches the woman’s
neck and we suddenly cut to a CGI scene
of a ship on a river, crashing into a bridge
and causing an incredible level of damage
in incredible detail. It seems that the kid has
some crazy mental powers, but their actual
scope and style still remain a mystery. It’s all
pretty intriguing stuff.
Despite the epic destruction, however,
Quantum Break’s trailer didn’t really achieve
much besides looking a bit wanting. With
current-gen CGI looking much like that of
the next gen, it’s hard to be all that excited
by the look because it seems very familiar.
It’s a Remedy game, though, and that means
that the narrative will at least be something
special and involving – and that the TV show
aspect and its interactivity will provide some
level of interest, even if the game itself is
again about wandering about and gunning
people down.

RYSE
Crytek’s long-awaited Kinect-based Roman
warrior simulation has been confirmed as an
Xbox One exclusive. And as this screenshot
demonstrates, it will even enable you to
headbutt ancient people in their ancient
faces. Fancy finding out how that works?
Then feel free to slap your forehead against
this page. See? Look at his reaction! What
larks. Raise an arm as if you are holding a
shield, slash the other as if it’s equipped with
a sword, walk about by… well, that may be
where the new control pad comes in, since
the game is set to use both technologies at
the same time. Probably for the best.

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 THIEF
Some people just want to see the world burn,
but not Garrett; he just wants to rob it of all its
precious things. Because when Thief returns (as
much as a series that has never appeared on
consoles can) it’s going to be all about burglary,
pickpocketing and low profiles.
Featuring massively open levels in which there
are never just one, two or half a dozen ways of
rinsing the world of precious things, it’s going
to be all about using the environment to your
advantage, so patience and observation will
be key. Armed with a compound bow that is
married with non-lethal arrows designed to
32 360-gamer.com
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cause distractions and extinguish light sources,
Garrett isn’t a killer and so should he find himself
dishing out fatal pain you’ll know something has
gone horribly wrong.
With the NPCs demonstrating a variety of
intelligences that they will use to track him
down, it’s not just going to be a simple matter
of keeping to the shadows, either. Enemies
will demonstrate greater inquisitiveness and
investigation skills than seen in the likes of
Hitman. And thankfully there’s Focus mode,
which highlights important environmental
features and enables slow-mo safe-cracking.
FORMULA ONE
Fifteen Xbox One exclusives were
confirmed for release during the
course of the machine’s first year,
which is impressive. They will all
eventually get their time under the
spotlight at other events, and many
may well make incredible use of
the barely-explained Azure Cloud
technology, but Microsoft obviously
wasn’t aiming to please the hardcore
– it was aiming at the FIFA and COD-
playing crowd.
And so confusing was Microsoft’s
explanation of the hardware in general
that it wasn’t until days after the event
that a spokesperson actually explained
it will be possible to turn the machine
off, and not just leave it on standby as
the next Kinect waited for the words
“Xbox on”. Would the camera need to
be switched on to make the machine
function? Apparently so, but we still
awaited clarification.
So no, as a reveal it was more of a
tease than anything. Would players (as
opposed to entertainment streamers)
really be needing a constant internet
connection to play these games? With
no one on stage to allay such fears, it
was the turn of an impersonal posting
on www.xbox.com to almost-answer
the question: “No, it does not have
to be always connected, but Xbox
One does require a connection to the
internet – we’re designing Xbox One
06/06/2013 22:26

to be your all-in-one entertainment
system, that is connected to the
Cloud and always ready. We are also
designing it so you can play games
and watch Blu-ray movies and live
TV if you lose your connection.” Well
that’s thoughtful.
The Xbox One will not need to be
constantly connected, but it will need a
connection. Microsoft corporate VP Phil
Harrison tried his best to make things
clear as mud. “There are many devices
in your life that require the internet
to function,” he told the curious folks
at www.kotaku.com. “Xbox One is no
different in that it requires, at some
point in the beginning and at various
times through its ‘on’ state, to connect
to our Cloud and to our internet.” It
has since been confirmed that, when
playing your own Xbox One in your
own home, it needs to connect once
every 24 hours. But if you’re signed in
on someone else’s Xbox, that becomes
once every hour.
For some people, needing to log on
just once a day will pose a problem
– and that’s even if they are one of
the 46 million gamers that currently
have an Xbox Live account of some
description. It’s very easy to imagine
“THE ONLINE AZURE SERVER TECH MAKES
THE XBOX ONE FAR MORE POWERFUL THAN
ITS RAW SPECIFICATIONS SUGGEST”
032-41_360129[ftONE_part2]NTICJA_v3.indd 33
scenarios in which anyone could be
unable to access the internet for an
entire day, without even having to go
as far as accounting for campers or
soldiers on active duty.
Going against that, and massively
in Microsoft’s favour even though it
really wasn’t detailed, is what having
a connection brings that has nothing
to do with authenticating accounts
and enabling users to see what friends
are doing. But to explain a reason
for gamers to be excited we need to
get back to (and start to be excited
by) the benefits of “the power of the
Cloud.” Simply put, the online Azure
server tech makes the Xbox One more
powerful than its raw specifications
suggest, and by quite a factor – a
factor that will increase over time.
FUTURE PERFECT
As Microsoft’s chief product officer
Marc Whitten explained before we
all had to hear more about TV, and
brilliant new ways to watch it while
doing other things, Xbox Live was
launched in November 2002 and
was backed by 500 servers to handle
inter-console communication. Right
now the Xbox 360 has 15,000 servers,
XBOX ONE
Will Johnston
DYING LIGHT
Techland continues its fascination with all things
zombie-like and open-world, but this time will add
a day and night cycle into the mix, and provide an
expansive environment in which you’ll be able to do
a Mirror’s Edge and perform free-running acrobatics
from a first-person perspective.
It’s to be a game of two halves, on loop. During the
day you’ll be on the offensive and able to hunt for
supplies and craft weapons. But as the sun sets, the
infected become decidedly more punchy than they
were during daylight hours. It’s looking to be a lot like
Dead Island, then, but with greater manoeuvrability and
a much more detailed urban environment to explore,
and that’s just fine and dandy by us.
Despite being bug-blind, the developer certainly
knows how to put players into the heads of survivors
battling against the odds. And with the extra grunt
provided by the Xbox One, you know Techland will
have plenty of power to bring a new level of excellence
to its favourite recipe. And hey, all the patches will be
applied automatically and without you even noticing.
360-gamer.com 33
07/06/2013 16:53
 IT’S IN THE GAME (AGAIN)

NBA LIVE 14 FIFA 14 EA SPORTS UFC

Poor NBA Live. It has had its ankles broken
by NBA 2K every season since 2006 and
was so thoroughly trounced last time that
it hasn’t returned to the court for four
whole years. Its last outing, NBA Live 10,
got so schooled that the entire franchise
was rebranded NBA Elite and became so
bad it was cancelled outright. It attempted
a comeback last year, albeit relegated to
Live Arcade status, and was cancelled yet
again. Now it’s back from the D-League as a
full retail release but, with such a damaged
brand and dominant competitor, does it
really stand a chance? Hey, Tracy McGrady
made it back to the Finals…
Considering that FIFA has been using
comparatively small tweaks to the physics
and gameplay engines to make notable
changes in recent years, we have to be
expecting big things from its Xbox One
debut. You can be sure there will be all-
new technology that will open up the
potential for a whole new range of ball
skills, animations and a fresh visual style.
The fact that EA Canada hasn’t been able
to talk about the next-gen version (beyond
barely admitting that it will be more than
just an upgraded port of the 360 game)
certainly suggests there are a few tricks
up its sponsor-covered sleeves.
While EA purchased the UFC licence from
THQ one year ago, its Ultimate Fighting
Championship game will be a more of
a sequel to the Tiburon-developed EA
Sports MMA than the Yuke’s-made UFC
Undisputed 3. Which, if you like more of
a Fight Night flavour to your combat, is
a very good thing (though it’s not such a
good thing for Fight Night itself, since the
UFC series has put the punch-’em-up on
indefinite hiatus). If the teaser trailer is any
indication then we’ll finally get to perform
Anthony Pettis’ Showtime Kick, where he
wall-runs up the cage Matrix-style and flies
off with a foot to the face. War UFC!

MADDEN NFL 25
John’s still not dead and, to celebrate 25 years of his National
Football League game, EA is going to finally unleash the power,
precision and pure unadulterated creativity of the ball carrier by
enabling quarterbacks, running backs and probably razorbacks
and silverbacks to perform 30 fresh moves, and string together
combo manoeuvres thanks to the brand new and never-seen-
before precision modifier. Expect the Xbox One version to do
something impressive with online stats and bring quite a few
fresh features to the party, and for Madden 25 to be the most
exacting depiction of the sport possible. Hut-hut, and all that.

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and at launch the Xbox One will have
access to 300,000. Which, as he was
keen to explain, is the equivalent of
the combined CPU power of every
computer on the planet back in the
year 1999.
At its most basic level, this means
that Live on the Xbox One will be
much faster and smoother, feature
multiple players at once and be greatly
more reliable. Matchmaking will be far
smarter and more tailored; you’ll be
able to ready one online match while
the machine’s three operating systems
enable you to play another game in its
entirety, or search the internet, listen
to music or watch TV via your voice or
the sway of an arm.
Games will update themselves
automatically. It will also be possible
for them to be stored on the Cloud,
along with any other saved digital
entertainment, and so be accessed
from anyone else’s Xbox One should
you log into Live with your ID – no
disc necessary. And the 500-gigabyte
hard drive that can’t be removed
but can be combined with USB 3.0
external storage devices? Combine
it with Cloud tech and the practically
infinite, non-game media you currently
have stored on your Xbox 360 will all
be easily transferable.
“XBOX LIVE WILL BE MUCH FASTER,
SMOOTHER AND GREATLY MORE RELIABLE”
032-41_360129[ftONE_part2]NTICJA.indd 35
Not bad. Not bad at all. But then
you also have to imagine what the
ability to access that computational
power can do for individual games,
whether single-player or online. You
see, on launch, an Xbox One won’t just
have access to its own architecture
but also three other, virtual, Cloud-
based machines, and so can take its
processing power from one to the
equivalent of five trillion floating-point
operations per second.
To put it in terms that won’t cause a
headache, when accessing the Cloud
the machine will potentially be 40
times more powerful than the Xbox
360. That’s what having a constant
internet connection can bring to the
party. And as more servers are added,
so the power increases. Unlike a PC
you can’t swap the console’s chips out
for newer and snazzier ones, but that
doesn’t mean the system won’t be
able to grow as time marches on and
more investment is made, therefore
making it in some way future-proof.
ALARM! ALARM!
By now your bullshit detector will be
singing like a canary, so it should be
explained that Azure Cloud processing
will only be available for some and
not all computations a game needs
XBOX ONE
Will Johnston
A FIGHT FOR
INDEPENDENCE?
Fear not, fans of indie games, the Xbox One will still be
home to such quirky delights – just not in the way we’ve
become accustomed. Bedroom coders won’t be able to
self-publish on the console or use XNA, but Microsoft is
planning to bring their wares to market via some form of
mechanism that, so it says, will make the process easier
and more affordable, as well as investing in titles that
show promise, much as it has with the likes of Trials HD,
Limbo and Castle Crashers.
Now, quite how it will all work wasn’t clearly explained.
But what is known is that all Xbox One games will be
available under the same tab on the new front-end. There
won’t be separate sections for On Demand, Arcade and
Indie titles as there is now; instead there will be a single
section – Games.
Within it, titles will rise to prominence based on various
factors. Which means that it will be entirely possible to,
for example, see that a gazillion people like Call of Duty,
but not far down below it find that titles such as Braid
or I MAED A GAM3 W1TH Z0MBIES 1N IT!!! are getting
increasingly popular as well. So there you go, Jonathan
Blow, you might want to have a wee bit of a think.
360-gamer.com 35
06/06/2013 22:27
 ABOVE: You’ll be
able to tailor your to function. Punching a terrorist in the
Home page to suit throat will be an action that on-board
your gaming and
multimedia tastes.
processors will need to handle, as will
anything the player does that requires
an immediate response.
Other processes such as lighting
and maintaining persistent worlds,
readying textures in the room you’re
about to enter and totally destroy
piece-by-piece, and any other activity
that isn’t reliant on the player’s direct
input, can all be offloaded.
What’s needed is for developers to
actually address the Cloud and learn
BELOW: It isn’t
all about TV, you where, yet again, the requirement
know. You can for an internet connection becomes
watch movies on a good and positive aspect. If the
your One as well.
connection was optional and players
were somehow encouraged to think
of the Xbox One as an offline machine,
devs would treat the Cloud servers
much as they’ve treated Kinect and
either ignore them completely or just
integrate them partially. And similarly,
making the new high fidelity Kinect
a standard part of the system means
it’s worth developing for, and in more
interesting ways.
For multi-format games there’s still
an issue, certainly. The PlayStation 4
won’t have set online requirements
and, consequently, developing a game
for two tiers of very different tech will
present issues. There are also those
times when connections will drop and
so titles that make use of the Cloud

36 360-gamer.com

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 XBOX ONE
Will Johnston

CALL OF DUTY: GHOSTS

And so we’re back to see where Infinity
Ward can take the franchise loved by tens
of millions and constantly derided by a
handful of jerks for becoming somewhat of
a series for meat-headed berks (that’s not
our opinion, of course… we’re just covering
the controversy). So then, what’s new? For a
start, the Modern Warfare moniker has been
dropped – we’re through the looking glass
here, people.
Aside from the rare stealthy divergence,
single-player COD has been about walking
down corridors of varying complexity while
occasionally pausing to blast some pop-up
targets, and that just doesn’t seem like the
sort of activity Ghosts will be specialising
in. So bloody hooray for that. Set in a future
where something pretty devastating has
happened, shifting the global balance and
denying the United States its superpower
rating, the story concerns a small group
of ‘Ghosts’ who are fighting back using
covert tactics rather than overwhelming fire
power, and that means stealth, sneakiness
and getting to wear a balaclava that’s been
painted with the image of a skull. Weirdly,
it also means that we’re imagining a game
more like a wider-ranging Sniper: Ghost
Warrior 2 than Black Ops II – and one that
features fish that behave like fish as well as
a dog called Colin.
Indeed, it was the appearance of the
German Shepherd and shots of him wearing
a Lycra suit festooned in mo-cap baubles
that inspired the most smiles at the Xbox One
reveal event, as well as the greatest derision
from those hoping to see what the next-gen of
games would enable: a dog, apparently. And
reactive fish, because we’re now living in a time
when it’s possible to accurately recreate the
behaviour of entire shoals of the beasts, not
just one. What marvels.
Although the game’s actual engine won’t
be completely brand new, it has had a far-
reaching overhaul that will undoubtedly
bring with it more delights than the ability to
accurately recreate an aquarium. What will
be interesting is how the new focus on being
ghost-like will filter into multiplayer, if at all,
because that’s where the real fight will be –
and it will be fighting Battlefield 4.

will also have to function perfectly well
should it become unavailable. We’re
just thankful that the internet is only
getting stronger.
Think of the situation in this way:
Battlefield 3 shipped with a disc
that could be installed to the Xbox
360’s hard drive and, in doing so,
players could enjoy higher resolution
graphics. Those without the space or
the arse could still play the game, it
just wasn’t quite as pretty or quick to
navigate as it would have been after
installation. It’s not a perfect analogy,
sure, but what it does is prove that
we already operate in a framework in
which Xbox games work better when
allowed to stretch themselves, while
it should be noted that the quality of
internet connections is moving in a
positive direction no matter who your
provider is.
ONE MISSION
The Xbox One certainly has its eye
more on the future than the present,
and Microsoft has a billion dollars
to invest in developing Xbox One-
exclusive games. Unlike the current
predicament, where ‘exclusive’ just
means that a title won’t be appearing
on another system, if that title is

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 DESTINY
First alluded to back in 2008 via a scrawl on a wall in
Halo: ODST that declared ‘Destiny Awaits’, this will be
Bungie’s first multi-format outing since the developer
galloped out of Microsoft’s stable, and will add light
RPG touches to the usual mix of rewarding science-
fiction set in a highly developed universe. Three races,
three classes and a lot of shooting online and off – with
Master Chief in the rear view mirror, there’s a lot to live
up to and probably a vast array of fan fiction to write,
but you can certainly be ready for a game that pushes
next-gen graphics to… well, it’s going to be pretty.
Will Destiny be able to inspire the same level of
fandom that Halo managed to maintain? Most certainly,
and thanks to the combinations of races and abilities
you know it’s going to feature a lot of depth, and a
soundtrack you’ll be humming for years.
38 360-gamer.com
032-41_360129[ftONE_part2]NTICJA.indd 38
designed to employ the Cloud tech
that Microsoft owns, operates, is
constantly expanding and is currently
leading the world with, then it will be
impossible for it to appear anywhere
else, even in theory.
Well that’s one positive dealt with.
How about some negatives, such as
how the new Xbox would have to
include a completely different set of
silicon and another, older, operating
system to actually be compatible
with your collection of 360 games?
Whether it’s something as complex
as Skyrim or as basic as Geometry
Wars doesn’t matter; both games still
require 360 architecture that simply
doesn’t exist on the Xbox One in
any form, since it’s a fundamentally
different machine.
The harsh reality is that even if
software emulation were employed,
the result would be as choppy and
inconsistent a gaming experience as
if you were to use a Macintosh to run
a game developed for the PC before
both computers shared similar chip
sets. You’d end up with an absolute
mockery of a game that you loved.
And so while a lack of backwards-
compatibility is unfortunate, it is at
least understandable. The only way it
would be possible would be to include
a 360 core inside the One, with which
would come higher costs.
The Xbox One is supposed to be
an “all-in-one” solution to all of your
entertainment needs, or at least that
was the ever-so-self-satisfied yet easily
disprovable sales pitch. It doesn’t have
an RF input, either, so if you do want to
control your TV through it you’ll need
some other form of digital box. And if
you want to play your old collection
of games you’ll need a 360. But then
the 360 was far from 100% compatible
with original Xbox games anyway. And
if anyone mentions TV yet again there’s
going to be hell to pay.
As a gaming device it’s certainly
got a lot of potential – and that’s even
taking into account the amount of its
on-board eight gigs of RAM that will
be consumed by a trio of operating
systems designed to make it operate
with great agility, enabling it to switch
between functions and restart games
from a low power state in the blink
of an eye (or at least, the gesture of
an arm or utterance of a phrase). But
what remains concerning, confusing
and in dire need of explaining to its
06/06/2013 22:27

absolute fullness is how it will enable
you to use the second-hand games
market to your advantage.
ONE TRUE RELIGION
With a brand new game bearing an
RRP of £49.99, it’s been incredibly
easy to negate a fair percentage of
that price against software you own
but no longer want, much like the
manner in which the cost of a new
car can be offset by trading in an old
one. Many gamers only buy the latest
games because they can exchange
and so save some money, such is the
economy we’ve all grown accustomed
032-41_360129[ftONE_part2]NTICJA.indd 39
to. The issue that the developers and
publishers have is that, when a game
is resold, they don’t see any of that
money whatsoever, outside of what
they can redeem from selling DLC or
online passes. But why should they?
You can resell your car quite freely so
why would the games industry be any
different? The bastards.
Well, people buy new cars and new
games for completely different reasons.
And there’s no kudos for owning a new
copy of Alan Wake 2 over a second-
hand one, whereas punters line up to
buy new cars simply because they
get a new registration plate. And bits
XBOX ONE
Will Johnston
WATCH DOGS
We’ve been giving Ubisoft’s next IP our sexy stare for
quite a while now, since it looked like it’s going to be an
absolute peach from the first time it was shown. An open
city and a PDA that enables it to be manipulated, cutting
edge graphics, a harsh noir sci-fi feel in a contemporary
setting… and that’s before you consider that the bloke
you’ve been trailing because you suspect he might be
a pervert is actually a real person and not an artificially
intelligent bot. It’s time to get paranoid.
Most excitingly, Watch Dogs’ multiplayer mode
will enable adversarial and co-op encounters within
its main campaign and will also spread itself across
a variety of forms, including some sort of SmartGlass
interaction. There are even rumours of cross-play that
will have some players being involved via the internet.
Incredible stuff. But thankfully, while the game will
encourage such always-connected gameplay, it will
also be totally optional. Phew.
on a disc don’t deteriorative while car
parts do. And who sells car parts? Car
manufacturers, who make a great deal
of their profits thanks to the spares
and repairs market.
But that’s not even the point – the
point is that you can enter a games
shop just a few days after a title has
been released and there’s a chance
that some other gamer has already
360-gamer.com 39
06/06/2013 22:27
 BATTLEFIELD 4
As impressive (and unable to sell itself as much
more than a greatly improved Bad Company)
as the 17-minute demonstration was, back when
we saw it in Stockholm, it didn’t really answer
the questions that true Battlefield fans wanted
covered. The series is famous for providing multi-
vehicular combat across expansive maps and,
while we know that we’ll be getting more detail
and more destruction, our fingers are crossed
that on the Xbox One we will also be getting
64-player servers and so nothing less than a
total war experience.
But even ignoring player count (and 64 players
are all but guaranteed for the next-gen machine)
there’s plenty new to impress, not least the wider
range of environmental interactivity. Explosive
NEED FOR SPEED RIVALS
As mentioned in a tweet emitted back in
late April, from Criterion’s vice president and
creative director Alex Ward, the developer is
moving away from the racing genre. Thus,
EA’s car-based bout of cops ’n’ robbers has
had to find a new set of coders. Forget Black
Box’ The Run and its quick-time silliness, and
enter the very Swedish Ghost Games, based
in Gothenburg. It’ll be using DICE’s Frostbite 3
engine to power its entry, and that’s Swedish
too. Expect Rivals to be pretty Scandinavian
and to get incredibly depressed during the
long winters, though probably not – it’s not
that sort of game.
While we’re all very happy about the return
of Ferraris and inclusion of more gadgets,
it’s the new AllDrive system that inspires
the greatest level of curiosity. It’s designed
to eliminate the line between single and
multiplayer, which means that you could be
40 360-gamer.com
032-41_360129[ftONE_part2]NTICJA_v2.indd 40
charges can be placed on dams, for example.
You’ll be able to trigger an explosion and flood
entire areas of the map, and so totally alter (quite
literally) the flow of battle. It will even be possible
to locate a building’s power conduits and then
destroy them, thus swamping any enemies inside
in darkness before you and your team enter to
wipe them out. There’s also going to be a greater
emphasis on water-based combat this time, with
fights taking place across stormy, swelling seas
as well as a ferocious amount of customisability.
The question is, will the Call of Duty crowd care?
After all, Battlefield 4 doesn’t (so far) have dogs
or AI fish.
quite happily burning away from the filth only
to find that your rear view mirror has become
filled with a car driven by someone on your
Friends List. Now, there are still quite a few of
us who like to play offline and not have to be
humiliated by the greater skills of our chums,
so will having a race completely altered by the
sudden input of an actual human being really
be something we should be that excited by?
Ideally, the new system will have an ‘off’ switch,
just in case we’re feeling ‘shy’.
bought, played and traded it back,
and it’s now on sale for a few quid
less than it was. And why spend extra
money just for some polythene wrap
and a DLC gun? Why not give the shop
100% of your cash and not give the
publisher, and so the developer, any
of it? That’s the point.
The second-hand games market
certainly is problematic. Microsoft’s
solution is to leave the prickly issue
of whether games can be traded in or
resold down to individual publishers.
Microsoft won’t charge a platform fee
to retailers, publishers or consumers
for transferring games. However, each
publisher can partner with retailers to
set up whatever transfer fees they
like – or they can opt not to support
game resale, either across the board
or on a per title basis.
This effectively gives each publisher
the ability to impose an Online Pass-
style system at the point of resale. EA,
for example, might allow Battlefield 4
to be traded in or resold at Game, but
require a transfer fee to activate it for
use on a different console – a fee that
would be entirely down to EA and
Game to decide. It could, of course,
deem that Battlefield 4 can be traded
in or resold anywhere, without any
fees whatsoever… or that it cannot be
sold again at all.
Such restrictions aren’t just intended
to redress an imbalance on who makes
money from development, though.
Once an Xbox One game is installed
you’ll never need to insert the disc
again, since it will run off the HD, and
07/06/2013 09:45
 XBOX ONE
Will Johnston

so it needs to be tied to an account,

otherwise multiple versions could be
installed across different Xboxes. And
that’s called piracy.
You will be able to take a game to
a friend’s house and play it on their
console, but you’ll have to log in with
your own Gamertag. Each account also
provides access for “up to ten members
of your family”, who can access your
library of shared games from any Xbox
One. So how does it know who is really
your “family”? We’re not sure, but the
fact that Kinect can now detect things
like your heart rate conjures up some
Orwellian ideas…

VERDICT was so keen to highlight its smartarse TV-

Despite featuring a slower 8Gb of RAM
than the PlayStation 4, the Xbox One could
still be punching well above its far from
inconsiderable weight – and the potential for
deeper, more reactive games that feature
huge and persistent worlds is massive and
unique. We still can’t fathom why Microsoft
ness, since little of what was shown will even
be relevant to the UK (or indeed, countries
that aren’t the USA) for quite a while. Or, you
know, to gamers.
We were certainly impressed with the
speed at which it can move from app to
game and do both at the same time, and
we’ll accept the new Kinect as long as we
can still use buttons and sticks to select
content when our throats are hoarse and
our arms are knackered. And by “content”
we mean games, ideally at a resolution of
3840 x 2160 on TVs we don’t even own yet,
because Microsoft is aiming for the future
with a console that will bolster in power with
the Cloud. And hey, your Gamerscore will
carry over! Colour us excited, if cautious.

360-gamer.com 41

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REFLECTED GLORY
We’ve been expecting to hear
more about a sequel to agile run-
and-jump-‘em-up Mirror’s Edge
since 2011, and so have quite a few
of you. Well, part two has appeared
as something you might like to buy
on Amazon’s Italian and German
sites, and has since been flagged
on a page run by the game’s own
publisher, EA. Huzzah!
BAD BUSINESS 101
Despite a whopping 6 million units
of Borderlands 2 being flogged,
BioShock Infinite managing an
impressive 3.7 million units shipped
and NBA 2K13 doing better than
a cool 5 million – AND revenues
being raised by 47% – Take-Two has
failed to actually post a profit in its
last financial quarter. No, we don’t
understand either. It’s madness.
SOLID SUTHERLAND
Remember David Hayter being
kicked to the kerb for Metal Gear
Solid V: The Phantom Pain? Turns
out there’s a pretty good reason for
that after all: Kiefer Sutherland has
been announced as the new voice
of Snake. Quite a coup, that.
42 360-gamer.com
042_360129[newsMAIN]NTICJA.indd 1
SCREWS FROM THE WORLD
OF XBOX 360
DEFIANCE DOING OKAY…
SAME NOT SAID FOR STAFF
During the evening of Christmas Day 1986,
30.15 million Eastenders viewers watched in
anguish as Dirty Den served his long-suffering
alcoholic wife with divorce papers just before
the synth-drums of doom kicked in. Don’t worry
about Ange, she went on to marry the saviour of
badgers Brian May – but why are we reminiscing?
SyFy’s Defiance has been deemed such a hit that
a second series will begin production in August
for airing in 2014, after 2.7 million United States
viewers watched the show’s two-hour premier.
Our television habits sure have changed a little
bit over recent years.
It’s not a fair comparison, of course – we’re
mentioning different countries and different
genres, but the fact remains that on both sides of
the Atlantic there are more televisions in homes
and more viewers watching a lot more shows
across many more channels. Audiences have
become splintered, so it was always going to be
a bit of a gamble to tie a new sci-fi programme
to an online game – especially when you consider
that future favourites like Firefly never saw a
second season.
Thankfully for Trion Worlds, developer of the
Defiance MMO shooter that links with some of
the events of the TV show, its game has become
quite a hit too, with over a million registered users.
A second series means more DLC and support, so
it’s time for champagne, Party Poppers and bums
on photocopiers, right?
Well apparently not for a great many of Trion’s
workers, who have been asked to hit the bricks
NEWS, VIEWS & LOOSENED
ABOVE: When society broke down, spray tan salons had to
develop new methods.
since the San Diego developer has “reorganised”
its teams in a “rapidly changing industry”, despite
the success of a new title that requires constant
maintenance. Incredibly, initial reports that hit the
wires suggested as many as 80% of staff were let
back into the wild. That figure has since been
claimed to be greatly exaggerated, although
it’s fair to suggest that quite a few people have
indeed lost their jobs.
It’s not unusual for such things to occur after
a game has been shipped, though we expected
that a massively multiplayer online title would
require quite a few hands to maintain its online
quality and create fresh content. So far the links
to the programme have been scant and more
would certainly be welcome, but it probably
doesn’t help that the show and the game take
place in different settings.
The last update for Defiance, Plague, tied
directly with the TV episode that aired on SyFy
on 17 June. Hopefully it won’t be the last update.
07/06/2013 15:52
 BUZZER BEATERS
LAST-SECOND SHOTS THAT BEAT THE DEADLINE CLOCK THIS ISSUE
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles:
Kinect Doodle Jump Murdered: Soul Suspect Out of the Shadows

ABOVE: Nope, it’s not Batista from WWE. It’s
everyone’s favourite divisive dev, Denis Dyack.
ETERNAL APOLOGY
X-MEN DESTINY DEVELOPER NOT A CROOK
Denis Dyack probably didn’t expect to end up
pictured in a magazine while looking like he was
doing a passable Jonathan King impersonation.
But then he probably never imagined that he
would have to post a rebuttal on YouTube to
address allegations made by www.kotaku.com
concerning his role in making X-Men: Destiny
shite, either.
At near 34 minutes in length it’s a pretty long
vid. In it the ex-Silicon Knights president counters
concerns from prospective Kickstarter investors,
regarding the site’s claims that he diverted money
provided by Activision for the Marvel disaster
to other projects. Dyack certainly had a lot of
explaining to do – and with good reason. Funding
for his new company’s spiritual successor to the
GameCube classic, Eternal Darkness: Sanity’s
Requiem, had taken a massive dive since the
article hit, because few people want to give
money to claimed charlatans.
Well, the claims were nonsense. Apparently
Dyack was so keen to do a good job with X-Men
(especially after the way Too Human tanked)
that he actually had Silicon Knights invest more
of its own money into the project – so much, in
fact, that its actual earnings would suffer unless
the game did really, really well. He even had to
persuade Activision that he wasn’t crazy and that
the $2 million he was ready to invest wasn’t the
desperate act of a madman. He had other points
to counter, of course, many of them concerning
how he’s a bastard to work for. Give it a listen.

CHARMED RESPONSE
HUMAN ELEMENT DEVELOPER SUFFERS HUMAN ELEMENT
When Robert Bowling left Infinity Ward to form
new development studio Robotoki, he took with
him a life-size statue of Simon “Ghost” Riley from
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. And why the hell
not, eh? Actual-scale models of heavily armed
soldiers are cool and Bowling is rightly proud of
his time as COD’s creative strategist.
Armed with a highly convincing assault rifle,
masked in a balaclava and sternly overlooking a
Los Angeles street from an open window, Ghost’s
warrior stance made for a mightily impressive
sight. Then, on 30 May, the developer’s offices
had a big 911 panic button installed just to add
extra security – and a day later something quite
magical happened.
“One of our designers, who shall not be shamed,
pressed it on his way out, because apparently
when boys find buttons that they are unsure of,
their first instinct is to push it”, Bowling explained
in an interview with www.polygon.com. And so it
came to pass that the LAPD arrived, guns ready,
and stormed the building. Screaming at Bowling to
raise his hands before taking him into custody, they
went room to room and floor to floor searching
for threats that never existed – he wasn’t a hostage
and there were no terrorists.
It’s like a cautionary tale for modern (warfare)
times and one that could have ended in tragedy
ABOVE: If Ghost was to blame then you
had LA’s finest not behaved exactly like they’ve would expect him to have at least been
been portrayed in the Police Academy movies. met by a sniper round.

360-gamer.com 43

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 NEWS, VIEWS AND LOOSENED SCREWS
FROM THE WORLD OF XBOX 360

UK XBOX
360 CHARTS

A(NOTHER) NEW HOPE

1 GRID 2
2 FIFA 13
3 Dead Island Riptide
4 Metro: Last Light
5 Resident Evil
Revelations
6 Halo 4
7 BioShock Infinite REPUBLIC’S DARK TIMES COULD BE NEARING AN END
8 Tomb Raider
9 Injustice: Gods “The opportunity to do a new while they’re at it, cheers. And maybe
Among Us Battlefront, which is one of the something along the lines of Jedi
10 Crysis 3
very popular Star Wars games, or Knight – they’d all work delightfully
Ah, TOCA Touring
Car Championship some of the other traditional games online, for multi-players. Such is the
has certainly come a that were made, is very exciting.” modern need.
long way since it first
So said EA’s chief financial officer, But what’s this? By checking out job
appeared in 1997 and
featured an in-car view. Blake Jorgensen, at the Stifel 2013 listings it seems that the developer
Since then the series Technology Conference held in New will be focusing not so much on the
has duly morphed into
GRID, which kind of York on 21 May. What an incredible Xbox 360 and Xbox One, but a great ABOVE: You’d have thought we’d be over
means that GRID 2 is flirt; that’s exactly the sort of thing deal on mobile platforms; if you want things like this by now – but you’d be wrong.
TOCA 4, if you follow
our logic. Good to see
we wanted to hear. to work for it as a level designer, it
it perform well despite So Electronic Arts will be making would help if you’ve got experience in
not featuring a cockpit Star Wars games, that’s for definite. making casual games.
cam – Codemasters is
not dead yet. What’s also known is that the brand Still, we are expecting some serious
new and decidedly Nordic DICE LA (and good) Star Wars titles to enter
will be the new studio handling the production. And while you can bet
honours. Add a new Battlefront and that they’ll be released alongside the
we could all be piloting AT-STs and new movies (and smartphone stuff),
blasting Ewoks by this time next year, they won’t necessarily be tie-ins but
which is potentially a very good thing could relate to the classic trilogy. Help ABOVE: Just release an X-Wing game and we’ll
ARCTURIAN – we’ll take another X-Wing Alliance us, EA – you’re our only hope. forget all about that Kinect monstrosity.
POONTANG
Seems like Sega has
been doing well, and
certainly a lot better
than the 1.31 million

PANDAS NOT FUNNY

people who thought
that nobody could
f**k up Aliens: Colonial
Marines. Indeed, it
only sold 0.05 million
less than the all-but-
guaranteed crowd
pleaser Sonic & All
Stars Racing, while
just 680,000 people
picked up the London
Olympics 2012 title.
EA SELL SELL
If it wasn’t for the fact
that Andrew Wilson is
EA Sports’ executive
vice president, nobody
would have cared that
he sold his 32,085 EA
shares. Is he off? “He has
no plans to leave EA” a
spokesman pointed out.
He was just counting
on the stock value not
climbing any higher than
the $21.42 it reached
when the company
acquired the rights to –
yep – Star Wars.
THEY CAN EXCUSE TEENAGE LADS FOR BEING DICKS
No, not pandas as in bears famous
for their lazy sexual problems, but
PANDAS: the Pediatric Autoimmune
Neuropsychiatric Disorder Associated
with Streptococcus. Yeah, that one.
Apparently it can make 17-year-old
boys do all sorts of weird obsessive-
compulsive things.
Things like make pipe and napalm
bombs, for example, and talk to their
schoolmates about the many ways to
make pipe and napalm bombs. Things
like meticulously mapping out a gun
and bomb attack on a high school, and
writing step-by-step notes on how to kill
as many classmates as possible before
committing suicide when the SWAT
team arrives. Things like that – or at
least such was Grant Acrod’s mother’s
explanation, after her son was arrested
on 23 May in Oregon, USA.
Thankfully Grant (who’s a nice guy,
apparently) didn’t actually manage
to murder anyone but he was found
to have all the ingredients necessary
to do so. Explosives were discovered
hidden under the floorboards of his
bedroom, he had a gun, and then
there was the whole to-do list and the
reason you’re reading about this in a ABOVE: Aren’t you a little
videogames magazine. short for a Stormtrooper…
of death? Sorry.
It went a little bit like this, you see:
“Get gear out of trunk. Carry duffle
in one hand, napalm firebomb in the RIGHT: Despite the Call
of Duty references, his
other, walk towards school… unzip
actual inspiration was the
bag and begin firing… cooly [sic] state Columbine Massacre.
‘The Russian grim reaper is here’”.
To be precise it was noted that such in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 in
actions were all to be carried out while which it’s possible (in most versions)
Airport Stalk was blaring out of his car to massacre a whole bunch of innocent
stereo, which is the music from the people in an airport. Oh. Dear. Bail was
infamous No Russian mission found set at $2 million.

44

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STUPID WHITE MEN
GUN LOBBY RELOADING, RE-AIMING – NOT RETREATING
When Reverend Franklin Graham recently joined
19 other religious leaders for a meeting at the
White House concerning gun legislation, he put
forward an idea that could hit US gamers directly
in the pocket. “How about when someone is the
victim of gun crime,” (he probably didn’t exactly
say), “they and their family receive some money
raised by taxing violent games?” The man’s a
genius and one who no doubt speaks to God
on a regular basis – you can tell.
The assumption here, of course, is that violent
games are responsible for such ugliness in a
country where firearms aren’t quite freely available,
but are certainly freely available enough for them
to easily fall into the hands of those who want
to go a little gun crazy when they’ve had a bit
of a bad day (not to mention their children). So
360 GAMER IS DEAD – LONG LIVE
YOUR FAVOURITE MAG IS CHANGING NEXT MONTH…
ABOVE: From the next issue on 17 July, this is what the mag will
look like. But it won’t have this month’s cover artwork, obviously.
045_360129[newsMiddle]NTICJA.indd 2
NEWS, VIEWS AND LOOSENED SCREWS
FROM THE WORLD OF XBOX 360
how about actually taxing guns, or magazines,
or bullets?
That’s practically Communism! Well, how about
working out why other countries that have guns
and violent games don’t have such a problem?
What a waste of time. But fear not, since luckily
United States vice president Joe Biden was there
to… oh dear, suggest that there would be no legal
reason why such games shouldn’t be laden with
these taxes.
Joe’s not totally insane, however; he is actually
going to wait for more studies to be made into
violent games and their effects on developing
brains before engaging further with the taxation
plan. Developing brains? As in, those housed in the
skulls of children? Apparently so, despite violent
games being age-restricted. Hmm.
It’s an exciting time for gamers,
with the Xbox One due to touch
down before the year is out, and
we’re making some changes as we
move forward into the new gaming
generation: as of next month, with
our historic 130th issue, 360 Gamer
will become ONE Gamer.
Just as 360 Gamer has led the way
with 100% independent coverage of
the Xbox 360 for almost eight years,
ONE Gamer will be at the forefront of
the Xbox One revolution, bringing you
the latest reviews, previews, news and
in-depth features on the new console.
But we damn sure aren’t abandoning
the Xbox 360.
With 129 issues we’ve published more
magazines dedicated to the 360 than
anyone else on the market. ONE Gamer
will be the premier destination for all
your Xbox One info, but we’ll be covering
both consoles side by side. Whether
you get a One or you stick with the 360,
we’re going to be your one-stop shop
for all things Xbox.
Everyone on the mag is going to
buy an Xbox One as soon as possible,
RIGHT: It appears
that if you have a
shiny smile you’re
free to talk bollocks.
© WHITE HOUSE
BELOW: If it weren’t
for epic videogame
tech, Rev Franklin
wouldn’t have such
amazing CGI hair.
COURTESY OF BILLY GRAHAM
EVANGELISTIC ASSOCIATION
but we’re all keeping our Xbox 360s –
especially since the new machine isn’t
backwards-compatible – so you can
still count on us for the 360 coverage
that you know and love.
There’s plenty of life left in the 360
yet – Microsoft plans to sell another
25 million in the next 5 years, behind
games like Grand Theft Auto V – and
we’re down with the console until it
breathes its last breath. But we’re also
going to lead the way with all the next-
generation scoops, especially with
some exciting new plans that we’ll be
talking about shortly.
So don’t be afraid of change – change
is good! But the more things change,
the more they stay the same. And ONE
Gamer will continue to be the very best
place to get your fix of Xbox 360 and
Xbox One gaming alike.
360-gamer.com 45
07/06/2013 16:25
 MY
TWO TIERS BEFORE BEDTIME
It’s easy to forget some basic statistics
when you’re in a hurry to buy a game
for a nephew’s eleventh birthday
and lack the imagination and/or
arse to actually get the little blighter
something that isn’t Xbox-related.
During the rush before his arrival
there were brief thoughts of buying
books, or some LEGO, or a survival
kit, maybe even his first Swiss Army
knife. Whatever the present, it had
to be cool – and I had no intention of
hunting for a fez. Easy: a game, then.
A bloody excellent videogame. Such
things were firmly in my territory, so
how could I fail?
These days more adult women play
games than boys under the age of 17,
that’s how. Around 43% of gamers
are aged between 18 and 49, with
those in their thirties doing the most
spending. It was not always thus, but
then it didn’t really matter how old a
gamer was back in days long gone,
since whatever their age they’d mostly
be playing relatively non-violent fare
in which characters never actually
spoke through speakers, and certainly
didn’t use language of the blue variety.
My sister wouldn’t like swearing, nor
46 360-gamer.com
046_360129[Column]NTICJA.indd 1
LIFE
would she appreciate her young boy
enjoying eviscerations.
Right, CEX, let’s see what delights
you have that I can use to imprint my
existence firmly into a malleable mind.
Oh, there’s… a 15-rated game. Ah, oh
yeah – that’s an 18. Now that one’s
going to blow his mind… but it carpets
F-bombs everywhere.
Having already forced Blur upon
him, racing games had been dealt
with. I know nothing of sports and
care even less – maybe SSX? Almost,
but maybe not. And so the packed
shelves were starting to look bare.
What was wanted was some form of
signature title that an uncle could
vouch for and be associated with that
wasn’t “kiddie”; something I could
enthuse and chat about. Well hello
there, XCOM: Enemy Unknown – to
hell with your BBFC 12 badge, you’re
going to be his!
What occurred to me just before I
found the epic battle against aliens
was that the majority of games I had
initially picked up would have been
perfectly viable, were it not for an
explicitness that I thought could easily
be disabled or at least muted. I’d have
ABOVE: I was nine
when this comic gave
me the willies and I
turned out… fine.
Right tOP: If the
XCOM atmosphere
gives him nightmares
then I’ve done my job
of being an uncle.
Right BOttOM:
Dragons with laser
eyes? What’s not for loved to give him Devil May Cry, for
an 11-year-old to like? example – it could lose its nastiness
Ah, the swears. without diminishing its excellence, but
BELOW: Yeah, well no. The parental lock activated by my
Devil May Cry would brother-in-law wouldn’t censor the
take quite a bit of game, it would just would stop it from
adjustment, but it’s
still just a fun fighting running entirely. Indeed, it turned out
game at heart. that to even play XCOM he’d have to
ask his dad to enter a code into the
console. This I hadn’t considered –
bad uncle.
It’s not that kids don’t buy console
games because they don’t like them,
they just don’t generally have £40
spare and can buy a mobile game
for a few quid instead. Why not have
diluted versions of “adult” games,
then, using much the same tech but
wearing different skin? You know, like
how Blood Dragon uses Far Cry 3,
but without insisting on rude words
and still being available to buy in a
shop, and so be able to be wrapped
in paper. Makes sense to me, but then
again so does XCOM being rated for
everyone and kids having access to
games that feature guns.
06/06/2013 21:02
 Because shiny discs
have had their day

delightfully daft malarkey

ABOVE: Abdul had

Foul Play
Prepare for the roar of greasepaint
and smell of the crowd, as esteemed
daemon-hunter and gentleman
adventurer Baron Dashford readies
himself to deliver an entirely factual
account of grand adventures that
have taken him from the murkiest
alleyways of London town to the
ancient catacombs of musty Egyptian
tombs. He looks a bit like Monopoly’s
Rich Uncle Pennybags, if you ask us,
reimagined as even more of a gay
icon. Brilliant.
But is Dashford really an honest
fellow or is he talking out of his PB
Winterbottom? Such is Foul Play’s
grand point; it’s not just your standard
co-op brawler set in them Victorian
times, y’see. Points aren’t awarded
for merely dispatching a long parade
of villains, but rather for impressing
the audience by demonstrating
feats of physical prowess and, along
with his young twink of a partner
Scampwick, performing manoeuvres
with exaggerated enthusiasm and
vigour. Or, if you prefer, showboating
and bullshitting.
Don’t concern yourselves with the
violence that will be meted out against
the villainous horde – they’re all paid
actors who have learned how to take
a fall as well as a kick in the nuts. It’s
going to be a vaudevillian version
of Double Dragon, then, and what’s
not to like about that? Not a damned
thing, we say – at least not a damned
thing unless it turns out to have been
coded by monkeys. So we’d better at
least consider the developer and its
history, because if you can’t be overly
judgemental based on a developer’s
previous form we may as well all go
home right now.
Mediatonic’s name suggests that
it is one of those companies that
has offices on Soho and Brighton
and performs media tasks that you
would never have imagined were
actually necessary until you suffered
the Powerpoint presentation. Well,
“Games as a Service” is its motto/
mission statement/mantra thing,
and it does indeed have an office on
Wardour Street and another down
by the pebbled coast.
You can already check out some
of Mediatonic’s previous games for
iPhone, if you like – neither Monsters
(Probably) Stole My Princess nor
a weak spot that no
true gentlemen would
dare to harvest.
TOP RIGHT: These
thuggee cultists (or
whatever they are) are
still pissed at Indiana
Jones for drawing
that gun.
RIGHT MIDDLE: Amateur Surgeon Hospital are actual
Looks like these mad
ancients really should fighting games, but they do feature
stop worshipping the delicious cartoon flourishes and have
Goddess Alopecia. met with some praise… and some
scorn. But what does “games as a
service” even mean?
According to the website, once one of
its titles “goes live to the public” it “then
starts to use analytics and business
BELOW: Daniel Craig intelligence to understand how players
started out acting in are experiencing” the games. Teams
amateur productions “work tirelessly to improve every live
much like this, you
know. He played the game and develop the new content
top hat. and features that keep our players
entertained.”
Yeah, probably not best to dwell
on that sort of thing, since “we put
out patches after release” might well
cover it. Good luck incurring the costs
following such practices on Xbox Live
Arcade or, you know, just get it right
before release. Could be a corker, could
be a right pair of clown shoes.

360-gamer.com 47

047_360129[arcadia]NTICJA.indd 1 06/06/2013 21:03

 REALTIME THE KEY DATES IN YOUR GAMING
DIARY FOR THE MONTH AHEAD

19 JUNE 21 JUNE 21 JUNE

WEB GAME HISTORY OF GAMES MOTO GP 13
CONFERENCE, INTERNATIONAL If you’re hankering after a
PARIS CONFERENCE, racing game that features
This will be the place MONTRÉAL all the circuits, riders,
for the leaders and Here’s where academics, bikes and sheer bloody
innovators of Europe’s web, social and mobile curators and museum excitement of 2013’s
games industry to stop, collaborate and listen exhibitors introduce the general public and MotoGP season then this,
to details concerning advancements in design, students to the history of videogames and right here, is probably
business, community and legal areas of online reflect on the “methodological issues they what you’ll want to be
game development and publishing. By the look raise”, which just reminds us of some really getting. It includes both Moto2 and Moto3,
of last year’s Web Game Conference, another boring university lectures that managed to customisable riding aids, in-depth setups and
orgy of Bacchanalian excesses is highly likely – leech the fun out of pretty much any subject. a brand new career mode and it will not stop
bring a spade. Expect Pac-Man to meet a sea of tweed. until you are dead.

21 JUNE 24-28 JUNE 26-28 JUNE

ASHES INTERNATIONAL GAMES FOR HEALTH,
CRICKET 2013 SIMULATION BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS
Where else will you be AND GAMING With a keynote talk given by the Oculus VR
able to have the likes of ASSOCIATION founder and Oculus Rift VR headset designer
David “Bumble” Lloyd 2013, STOCKHOLM Palmer Luckey (isn’t he?), you know this one
commentating on your Well if it isn’t (and it definitely is) the annual won’t all be about Kinect and balance boards.
every move? Nowhere conference of the International Simulation Good. Game developers, investors, health
outside wild hallucinations, and Gaming Association – and a whole professionals, researchers and health industry
that’s where. Full 360-degree bat control, options week to be spent focusing on the role of stakeholders will be there, too, but we’ve still to
for automatic field placements, fully licensed gaming (in all its forms) solving the grand hear if Mr Motivator will also be attending. We
teams of the English and Australian varieties societal issues in education, innovation and do quite like the idea of playing games to heal
– get ready for your very own field of dream. sustainability. Special focus: gaming for all ailments, though. Got a serious case of man-
Cucumber sandwiches and Pimms optional. transport and logistics. We shit you not. flu? We prescribe an afternoon on your 360!

28 JUNE 28 JUNE
LOST PLANET 3 MINECRAFT
It’s going to be very cold For less than 15 quid
outside so here’s hoping you’ll be able to buy
that Capcom has added a retail box edition of
some kind of atmosphere, a game that’s already
and not one that’s reliant dominated the Live
on ridiculously unhelpful Arcade charts for longer
AI teammates, either. than we could have ever hoped. It’s almost
New multiplayer modes, as popular as COD, you know. And if you
snow, lots of shooting, mechs and temperature don’t know why because you don’t have an
management systems will all be yours if you internet connection then now’s the time to
dare take shelter on a planet… that is lost! Yet get creative. Minecraft gives us hope that
somehow found, potentially behind your sofa. mankind isn’t doomed – it’s wonderful.

9-11 JULY 17 JULY

DEVELOP, 360 GAMER IS DEAD…
BRIGHTON LONG LIVE ONE GAMER!
Monthly trade magazine The Xbox One is on the horizon and we’re
Develop features tech- changing with the times: as of next month,
heavy contributions from 360 Gamer will become ONE Gamer. All
anyone working in the the info is over on page 45, but suffice to
videogames industry but, say we’ll be your number one destination
as its name might suggest, is actually aimed at for all your Xbox One AND Xbox 360 info!
them-there developers. Its yearly conference
has been held by the sea since 2006 and has
built up quite a reputation for being the place
to go if you want to keep up to date with all
things game development-based.

48 360-gamer.com

048-9_360129[Release]NTICJA.indd 1 07/06/2013 16:20

 GAMESRADAR
Magrunner: Dark Pulse

Deadfall Adventures
Set in 1938 and featuring
ancient artefacts, Nazis
and maybe even a retro
montage sequence in
which a plane flies over a
map while a line is dotted
Batman: Arkham Origins from Egypt to Guatemala
and onto the Arctic, the vibe here
would be Indiana Jones – if Indy was
PES 2014 Konami
JUNE NOVEMBER all about shooting lots of things like
Prey 2 Bethesda
Ashes Cricket 2013 505 Games Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag Ubisoft he’s practising for a game of Painkiller.
Dark Kalypso Media Battlefield 4 Electronic Arts Rainbow 6 Patriots Ubisoft 27 SEPTEMBER • £44.86
Deadpool Activision LEGO Marvel Super Heroes WB Games Ryse Microsoft
Lost Planet 3 Capcom Need for Speed Rivals EA Sacred 3 Deep Silver
Mars: War Logs Focus Home Interactive Watch Dogs Ubisoft Sanctum 2 Reverb Publishing Grand Theft Auto V
Minecraft Microsoft Secret Ponchos Switchblade Monkeys Three men are on a
MotoGP 2013 Pqube TBC 2013 Sherlock Holmes: Crimes & Punishments mission to deny women
Painkiller: Hell & Damnation Nordic Games Air Conflicts: Vietnam PQube Focus Home Interactive a protagonist role in
South Park: The Stick of Truth Ubisoft a Grand Theft Auto
A.R.E.S.: Extinction Agenda EX Aksys Games
game and, if previous
JULY Armored Core: Verdict Day Namco Bandai Spartacus Legends Ubisoft
history is anything to
Dynasty Warriors 8 Tecmo Koei Ascend: Hand of Kul Microsoft Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles:
go by they might just
Out of the Shadows Activision
The Raven Nordic Games Bandfuse: Rock Legends Mastiff Games be unstoppable. It’s not so much
Bound by Flame Focus Home Interactive Tekken X Street Fighter Namco Bandai bigger as it is a great deal deeper and
Tour de France 2013 Koch
Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons 505 Games The Croods Namco Bandai somewhat weightier than what came
The Smurfs 2 Ubisoft
Castlevania: Lords of Shadow 2 Konami The Dark Eye: Demonicon Kalypso Media before. You know you’re interested.
The Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing TBC 17 SEPTEMBER • £44.86
AUGUST Castle of Illusion Sega
Combat Wings WWII City Interactive The Walking Dead: Season Two Telltale Games
Disney Infinity Disney
Madden NFL 25 EA Crimson Dragon Microsoft Thunder Wolves bitComposer

Payday 2 505 Games Dark Souls II Namco Bandai World Series of Poker: Full House Pro Microsoft LEGO Marvel
Rambo: The Video Game Reef Entertainment Destiny Activision WWE 2K14 2K Games Super Heroes
DiRT 4 Codemasters Yaiba: Ninja Gaiden Z Tecmo Koei If you imagine that
Rayman Legends Ubisoft
Dragon Age III: Inquisition EA Zeno Clash II Atlus
Traveller’s Tales won’t
Splinter Cell Blacklist Ubisoft be providing yet another
DuckTales Remastered Capcom
opportunity to chase
SEPTEMBER
Earth Defence Force 2025 D3 Publisher TBC 2014 after an inordinate amount of plastic
Enemy Front City Interactive Fantasia: Music Evolved Disney
Deadfall Adventures Nordic Games studs then you haven’t been paying
Killer is Dead Kadokawa Games Homefront 2 Crytek attention. This time it’s Marvel rather
Farming Simulator 2013 Focus Home Interactive
Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII Square Enix than DC that will get to show off its
FIFA 14 EA Murdered: Soul Suspect Square Enix
LocoCycle Microsoft finest characters, as they fight and
Grand Theft Auto V Rockstar Sniper Elite 3 505 Games
Magrunner: Dark Pulse Focus Home Interactive solve minor puzzles. Again.
NHL 14 EA The Dark Triad: Dragon’s Death Autoloot Games
Metal Gear Solid: Ground Zeroes Konami 21 JUNE • £37.85
The Evil Within Bethesda
Obscure Focus Home Interactive
OCTOBER Oddworld: Abe’s Oddysee – New ‘n’ Tasty
The Witcher 3: The Wild Hunt TBC
Batman: Arkham Origins Warner Bros. Just Add Water Thief Square Enix
Rambo: The Video Game
On-rails shooters and pet
simulations are what you
might know developer
Teyon for having put out
in the past, so what hope
is there for Vietnam vet
John when he finally
walks that long road home? Hey,
anything’s possible when Rambo is
involved, though you best prepare
some body bags just in case.
30 AUGUST • £29.86

PRICES ARE CORRECT AT THE

Ascend: Hand of Kul Thief TIME OF GOING TO PRESS

360-gamer.com 49

048-9_360129[Release]NTICJA.indd 2 07/06/2013 15:56

 First Look Will Johnston

PUBLISHER:
Focus Home
Interactive

DEVELOPER:
Compulsion Games

RELEASED:
Winter 2013

Contrast

n ow here’s something that’s just that little bit

awkward and quite a bit cool: Didi is a young
girl with a young girl’s view of the world and an
imaginary friend who looks like an older, savvier
and above all sexier version of her.
Dressed like a woman who is mid-way through
a costume change that will transform her from
an extra in Cabaret to Ragged Robin from Grant
Morrison’s The Invisibles, Dawn resides comfortably
on the other side of puberty and looks as if she
could sell you cigarettes while pointing the way to
the champagne room.
So is Dawn the woman that Didi yearns to be?
Is Contrast a game about a child’s dreams of
womanhood and overt yet controlled sexuality?
We’ll leave that for another time (though the
name could be a clue) – a time when we have
code. Right now we have Portal-ish and Limbo-
esque mechanics to consider.
Set in a sublimely twisted Twenties vaudevillian
dreamscape, in which Didi manipulates the lighting
and perspective in three-dimensional environments
to enable Dawn to explore a two-dimensional
shadow world, Contrast is a platform-puzzler that
requires spatial cognition as well as more standard
and less brain-melty jumping skills.
It’s also chock-full of intrigue and sub-plots,
and seemingly quite adult melodrama, as told
by silhouettes cast against walls – Didi has quite
the dark imagination, it seems. We’re reminded
slightly of the two girls from Peter Jackson’s
Heavenly Creatures. Perhaps she’s mad but, if
so, it’s a madness we’d quite like to handle.

50 360-gamer.com

050-1_360129[SS_Contrast]NTICJA.indd 1 06/06/2013 08:32

 LIGHT AND DARK
Check out Dawn as she strides across shadows that only exist because the real
world contains a light source, as well as the means to partially block it – and Didi
has an impressive imagination. Dawn can leap from this impossible 2D world to the
‘real’ one and back again, too, should physical alignments be in her favour – and by
doing so she’ll be able to reach previously unattainable goals.
Compulsion Games has only recently found a publisher in the form of Focus
Home Interactive and, with a Live Arcade release expected at the end of the year,
there’s plenty of time to wonder where Dawn is going, why she is heading there
and how it all relates to Didi’s possible insanity.
What is obvious is that Contrast will use its art style as a mechanic – and that’s
a concept that has a lot of merit, even without knowing if it’s to be employed in a
winning way. It certainly won’t be the first game to use light and perspective to
build puzzles, but top hats off to the art direction. The game could well be one
that’s as worthwhile to watch in action as it is to play.

VAUDEVILLE EMPIRE
Look to the right of the screenshot above and you’ll see that Didi has managed
to get the merry-go-round working and is currently enjoying a ride, while Dawn
busies herself by staring down the camera lens with smouldering attitude. Now
imagine the scene in motion and see how the horses’ shadows cast across the
wider environment would move as they bob up and down, thus creating navigable,
scrolling platforms for Dawn to run and jump along. Expect puzzles to eventually
become a great deal more convoluted than that, and to be spending a long time
as a young girl wandering around streets and playhouses looking for 3D solutions
to 2D problems.
So far Contrast certainly looks inviting as well as involving, and will no doubt
be crammed with mysteries to discover and solve by, well, moving stuff around
and switching things on and off and running and jumping. You can expect a lot
of drama to come from such shadow play and for it to be an uneasy yet enticing
balance between the joyous and wonderful, and the nightmarish and threatening.
If the puzzles are designed with half the authority of the visuals, we could well
have another quirky Arcade winner.

360-gamer.com 51

050-1_360129[SS_Contrast]NTICJA.indd 2 06/06/2013 08:32

 New ScreeNS
RAyMAN LEGENdS
We’re going out on a limb
PUBLISHER:
ubisoft T o say that Rayman Legends
harks back to the classic
DEVELOPER: games of old would be something
ubisoft montpellier
of an over-simplification of exactly
RELEASED: what the series has brought since
30 august 2013
its welcome resurrection with 2011’s
Origins. What Rayman delivers isn’t
old-school gaming, even though the
core platform-puzzle-combat combo
could easily date back to the 1995
original; instead the series reflects a
time when creativity was absolute
and developers didn’t feel the need
to adhere to pre-determined notions
of what games should be.
You want a lead character with no
limbs that has floating hands and feet
BELOW RIGHT: Is instead? Sure thing! How about letting
that electricity? him fly using his hair? No problem!
Underwater? Health
and safety isn’t going Colourful and creative platform worlds
to be happy with this. where just about any childhood fantasy
FRENCH FANCIES
UBISOFT MONTPELLIER: This French studio has marshalled the
Rayman franchise from the beginning, as well as delivering the ever-
awesome Beyond Good & Evil. Fingers crossed for a sequel, eh?
52 360-gamer.com
052-3_360129[rayman]NTICJA.indd 1
can be realised? Go for it! Sadly, few
people outside the Live Arcade circuit
get to enjoy that kind of freedom in
this modern age of big business clones.
But certainly if Origins, and what we’ve
seen of Legends so far, is anything to
go by, then Rayman is still very much
the man for letting all those wacky
ideas slide.
In Legends, Rayman and his long-
time buddy Globox stumble upon an
enchanted forest. Inside they find a tent
filled with paintings, each one depicting
a different mythical world – and yes,
they get sucked into the paintings and
have to run, jump, punch and fight their
way through each of them. You’ll get a
new ally, though, in the form of Barbara,
who will also double up as an additional
playable character for some bright and
breezy co-op action.
This could easily turn
into the Where’s
Wally equivalent of
Finding Nemo.
The core gameplay may not have
changed a great deal over the years,
but the style and visual flair sure have
evolved. Origins was a real looker and
Legends should offer more of the
same – but with plenty of fresh quirks.
The latest world to be showcased
takes place under the ocean waves,
with Rayman and the rest of the crew
tackling a new breed of underwater
enemies and challenges, including
mines, tunnels and a rather well-
dressed shark.
The series’ enduring appeal, though,
comes from the creativity within those
levels, whether it’s the inspired musical
interaction (see the ‘Rock Legends’
boxout) or the imaginative use of
simple puzzles within the exploration
and combat system. Hitting switches
or taking out the legs of an enemy on
06/06/2013 09:45

’ARMLESS FUN: Rayman first appeared back in 1995 and, spin-offs aside, Legends is his fifth title.
ABOVE: You don’t
need an arm to swing
a mean punch. If
anything it improves
your reach.
RIGHT: Homing
missiles, eh? No
doubt there’s a
sneaky way to turn
those back on your
would-be assailants.
BELOW: In the
gloomy underwater
depths, you’ll be able
to manipulate light to
your advantage.
052-3_360129[rayman]NTICJA.indd 2
SHOTS: RAYmAn LEgEnds
Ian Collen
stilts may seem pretty obvious, but
there are subtle layers and depth to the
action that go far beyond such simple
gestures. For example, Legends also
introduces a gameplay mechanic that
sees you having to control light and
dark to balance stealthy sneakiness
with the manipulation of enemies and
the environment.
You can be sure that Legends will
be packed with brilliant ideas, very
simply implemented and all under
ROCK LEGENDS
the guidance of some fluent and (on If the gameplay trailers don’t give it away already (especially the ‘Mariachi Madness’
walkthrough), music is very much at the heart of Rayman Legends. You will often
the face of it at least) straightforward
be encouraged to time your gameplay inputs to the rhythm of the guitar-based
gameplay. And if you liked how this soundtrack to help ensure the perfect playthrough and nail a pretty decent tune to
worked in Origins then be happy that boot – and, quite clearly, it’s not going to be as plain and simple as matching notes
Legends is using an advanced version on a scrolling highway.
of the game’s UbiArt engine – and In Legends, you’ll get to time jumps to the beat of the music and even land punches
to match the bassline in a seamless combination of aural and visual stimulants. Heck,
that means more multi-dimensional
you can even slide down zip wires to hold a guitar sustain and there are a wealth of
elements, improved lighting and even other interactive ways to keep the rhythm alive. It’s not a crucial factor – you don’t fail
better visuals. if you miss a few notes – but it’s just another wonderfully endearing reason why the
We scored Origins a 9 back when Rayman games can be such good fun to play.
reviewed it in 2011, so we probably
don’t need to explain just how much
we love the series. Even if it doesn’t
really seem like your kind of game, it’s
well worth looking up the gameplay
videos (we’ve posted a few on our
own YouTube page) just to get a sense
of what Rayman Legends is all about.
And if nothing else, it deserves to be
applauded for not caring about what
other people think and just having the
balls to be creative, indulgent, daft
and quite possibly brilliant.
360-gamer.com 53
06/06/2013 09:45
 New ScreeNS

SAInTS ROW IV
GeorGe DubyaDubyaDubyaDubya Wub-Wub-Wub-Wub bush
A rguably the early Saints Row
games, and their unrelenting
PUBLISHER:
Deep silver

desire to blend some of the most DEVELOPER:

Volition
horrific ultraviolence imaginable with
American frat-house humour and an RELEASED:
23 august 2013
awkward gangsta styling, were too
confused to take seriously. We’ll just
put that out there, despite having a
lot more time for part two than we
did the fourth GTA game.
Well Saints Row IV is clearly aiming
to make like a Honey Badger and stop
giving a shit altogether. The next entry RIGHT: Volition really
does need to get
in the series simply doesn’t care. It Schwarzenegger to
just does what it wants – and what it provide the screams
wants is for you to not worry about for this attack.

rhymes or reasons, and instead kick BELOW: Here’s the

back and astonish your face with the Dubstep weapon in
ridiculous malarkey you can get up to full effect. When will
the madness stop?
as a superpowered President of the Not in the game – we
United States. just mean dubstep.

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 SHOTS: SAInTS RoW IV
THE MODS: Not only can you mod weapons – you can totally alter their skins, too. Will Johnston

RIGHT: There better

In short it’s going to be Prototype
be Agility Orbs to
find, or some other in clown shoes, Crackdown with cock
justifiable reason to punches and a game that’s so beyond
be quite so jumpy.
ridiculous we doubt any videogame
commentators will even get concerned
by its civilian casualties. Mech combat,
aliens, guns that make people dance
themselves to death to dubstep, special
mind powers…
We’re all up for the freedom to be a
dick in a cartoon world, we just wonder
about the structure. The Third was fun,
but narratively it was impossible to get
drawn into or care about. Maybe we
should stop thinking like grown-ups.

NOT-COP KILLER
LEFT: Well that’s
one way to get So here’s The Prez about to go all El Mariachi on some cops, since it’s not a guitar
disillusioned young case he’s holding but a rocket launcher. Yes it’s all very clever, and no doubt Robert
males to come out Rodriguez will love the homage, but we’re more interested in the fact that the cops
and vote. aren’t cops any more but shape-shifting aliens. How very Duke Nukem.

KOCH PUNCH…

VOLITION: Formed in 1996 in Champaign, Illinois, USA and no longer

owned by THQ (but rather the more amusingly named Koch Media),
we were impressed by its 2005 take on The Punisher.

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 First Look
DEaD Or
aLivE 5
ULtimatE
Bigger, Better, stronger, faster… mostly Bigger
e were never going to get DLC
W
characters for Dead or Alive 5
– producer Yosuke Hayashi had been
very clear about that. Additional cast
members would put those who couldn’t
afford it at a disadvantage and make it
difficult to balance the game, so instead
they’re releasing a whole new version
for 30 quid with new characters, hurrah!
Well, hurrah if you have a spare 30 quid
lying around.
Ultimate takes Dead or Alive 5, adds
the excellent features from Dead or
Alive 5 Plus for the PlayStation Vita
and pours a few extras on top to
sweeten the deal. It’s not just revised
characters; there are also a bunch of
new stages and combos for all the
existing cast, which should hopefully
sort out that balancing issue. Not that
Dead or Alive was ever a particularly
serious tournament game – it’s mostly
about tag team battles, unusual stage
designs and bikinis.
Joining the roster is Momiji, a shrine
maiden and Ryu Hayabusa’s disciple
from Ninja Gaiden (we’ve also seen a
sneak peak of the Ninja Gaiden stage,
which looks amazing). Alongside her,
the additional new characters include
Jacky Bryant from Virtua Fighter and
Ein and Leon, who we last saw in Dead
or Alive 4.
The extra modes created for the
Vita are available, too, and although
56 360-gamer.com
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Maybe subtlety
will be available
as DLC one day.
only Skill Info Plus and some additional
PUBLISHER:
tecmo Koei
training modes have been announced
so far, they are pretty good. The first DEVELOPER:
team ninja
is the Lessons mode, in which you’re
able to train with each character and RELEASED:
06 september 2013
get used to a system where strikes
beat throws, throws beat holds and
holds beat strikes. Then there’s the
Combo Challenge mode, which helps
you learn long combo strings before
challenging you to pull off the most
difficult available.
You can also use custom music in the
training modes and there’s an online
version that enables you to practice
with a friend, which is super useful.
It’s a feature we’d like to see in more
fighting games, and seems like a no-
brainer to us, but is often absent from
the bigger titles. But then again Dead BELOW: We think he
or Alive has always offered excellent insulted her outfit.
online options, including Spectator
mode with open chat.
Two special limited editions are
planned: one featuring everyone’s
favourite pin-up ninja warrior in the
Kasumi-chan Blue edition, with Ryu’s
apprentice in the Momiji Red pack.
Each will include its respective cover
girl’s poster, playing cards, life-sized
tapestries, download codes for the
“Ultimate Sexy” and “Idol” costume
packs and a soundtrack CD. Because
nothing says “fighting game” like a
tapestry, eh?
06/06/2013 13:03
 SHOTS: DeaD or alIve 5 UlTImaTe
STUDENT EXCHANGE: Kasumi and Momiji were free DLC characters in Ninja Gaiden 3: Razor’s Edge. Kirsten Kearney

RIGHT: Tasdf

LEFT: Hitomi and Ein

trained together in a
previous game and
are good friends. Um,
except for today.

GOING THROUGH A STAGE

Among Dead or Alive’s standout features are its stages, each of which features danger
zones where a platform can be used to your advantage, throwing enemies into oncoming
traffic or chucking them off the edge – then moving on to a new area below at specific
moments and causing extra damage for good timing. Ultimate will feature new stages
with these quick-time event areas, including one from Ninja Gaiden.
Fresh characters also change things up when it comes to the Tag Team mode, which
LEFT: It’s definitely offers some new deadly combos that you can take your time learning while training.
illegal to knock a And costumes still play a large role in DOA, so the limited editions will come with some
policewoman’s of the best designs included.
hat off. Whether it’s really worth a whole new title, though, is questionable. While beefed-
up versions of fighting games have been a tradition for generations, nowadays there’s
RAzOR RAmON HARD GAY really no excuse for not adding new moves via patches and new costumes, characters
and stages as DLC. Hopefully in the next generation we won’t need to buy a game all
over again to get this sort of content.

TEAm NINjA: Started by Tomonobu Itagaki in 1995, Tecmo’s former

dream team has been seriously struggling since his departure – the
latest instalments of Ninja Gaiden being particularly sore points.

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 First Look
PuTTy Squad
The Blue BloB group iS BaCk again, again
O h,bitthedesign,
excitement of it all – 32-
a nippy 68EC020
microprocessor, two whole megabytes
of RAM and a new Advanced Graphics
Architecture chipset that took the
previously available colour palette
from a pathetic 4,096 colours to a
quite ridiculous and eyeball-shredding
16.8 million. Only 256 could be used at
any one time, of course, but then there
was the improved Hold and Modify
mode that could display 262,144, as
long as they weren’t asked to perform
any feats of agility and enjoyed using
Deluxe Paint IV.
The Amiga 500 was dead – long
live the Amiga 1200, and the new
and incredible games (and creative
software) it could run. Games like
Putty Squad, which famously never
actually came out in 1994, two years
after the computer’s release, despite
receiving high accolades and featuring
on a cover-mounted demo disc that
made many a 1200 owner slip around
in their own juices.
Such disappointment was somehow
down to problems finding a publisher,
and to this day that fact still doesn’t
sit down and behave properly. Ocean
Software published the game on the
Super Nintendo, after all, and wasn’t
it more expensive to produce silicon-
rich cartridges than to duplicate 3.5-
inch double density floppy discs? Hmm.
58 360-gamer.com
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All great games should
enable players to use
Groucho Marx disguises.
Something was clearly wrong – very,
very wrong.
PUBLISHER:
System 3
Well history has proven that the DEVELOPER:
System 3
Amiga 1200 was a failure, offering too
little, too late and at too high a price to RELEASED:
TBC 2013
compete with not only the increasingly
powerful PC, but fourth-generation
games consoles too.
Commodore went bankrupt the
same year that Putty Squad was
supposed to be released. And while
the game made a great number of
SNES owners very happy indeed,
what with its amorphous hero who
could be stretched, take swift strides,
absorb items, inflate to float, punch
enemies and even become a fish, its
no-show on the 1200 was just one of
many signs that a million Amiga fans RIGHT: This is what
happens when Putty
had failed to get with the times and forgets that he has an
move on. allergy to nuts.
So was it the fault of the machine?
Maybe not. Putty Squad was to have THe RacInG lIne
been made available for the immensely
popular PlayStation 2 in 2003, yet it
never arrived – and no further word of
its emergence was heard until 2008,
when a new version was announced
for the PlayStation Portable and the
Nintendo DS… but that game didn’t
materialise, either.
And now to today and System 3’s
claim that, yes indeed, 2013 will be SySTem 3: Founded by Mark Cale in 1982, and having since received
a number of subtle name changes, this Britsoft company released
the year that sees the asexual lump of
Ferrari Challenge: Trofeo Pirelli for the PlayStation 3 in 2008.
sentient, non-Newtonian fluid arriving
06/06/2013 09:46
 SHOTS: PuTTy SquAd
SHE’S LUMP: Putty Squad was also planned for the MegaDrive and MS-DOS PCs, but failed to arrive. Will Johnston

on current-generation consoles – and, RIGHT: Oh, for the

more importantly, as a Live Arcade time when character
design was left to
release. The publisher has already arty eight-year-olds.
made claims that the PlayStation Vita
version will know exactly where the
game is being played. So if you play it
inside a football stadium, for example,
you will unlock some football stadium-
related content.
Whether this is bullshit or not is up
to you to decide. This is, after all, the
same publisher that produced the
isometric delights of The Last Ninja
in 1987, but recently claimed that a
remake of the classic just wouldn’t be
possible on the PlayStation 3 or Xbox
360 because they weren’t powerful WIDE BLUE YONDER
enough. Seriously, an actual System 3 Putty Squad isn’t just about glooping around worlds like a cartoon set of elasticated
representative once said that to our blue bollocks, you know, collecting stars and hitting some things while trying to avoid
face. And this was a game that we others. It’s also about using items to get past various dangers, and even getting into
played on the Commodore 64, back rockets and floating about. Amazing stuff, eh?
What’s more amazing is how review code actually made its way to magazines like
when pubic hair was but a myth. Chins
Amiga Power and CU Amiga, where it scored 91% and 94% respectively. The game’s
were stroked. animation was said to be “masterful”, the level design expansive and inventive, and
So should you be excited that Putty by using stunned enemies as weapons and finding secret doors and items hidden in
Squad might actually appear this blocks it owed no small debt to Mario. Best not release it, then.
year on a console that already houses
Giana Sisters: Twisted Dreams, as well
as a number of platform titles that
take ancient concepts and wrap them
in modern-day loveliness? Can it really
compete with the likes of Fez, Braid or
even Limbo? System 3 seems to think
so, which is why these screens have RIGHT: It would be
impossible to find
been released. Bring it on, we say – it anything like this in
can’t hurt us any more. the Indie store. Fact.

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 New ScreeNS
Each character has their
own moves and can be
used in other levels, plus
Toy Box mode.

DISNEY INFINITY
LITTLE BIG DISNEY
ith each new morsel of info
W
PUBLISHER:
Disney Interactive
about Disney Infinity we get
more and more excited. It’s reaching DEVELOPER:
Avalanche Software
near-hysteria now that we’ve found
out about the Toy Box Racing mode RELEASED:
20 August 2013
and seen the nifty new trailers for the
Pirates of the Caribbean and Monsters
University play sets.
Each play set unlocks related movie-
themed levels, with the Power Discs
adding vehicles and character-specific
abilities – including your own pirate
ship and sneak and prank attacks, like
the use of a toilet paper launcher from RIGHT: Jack Sparrow
the Monsters University story (where has his patented
Sully, Mike and Randy go up against swagger and plays
nice with characters
rival school, Fear Tech). from other franchises.
The biggest news is that, as well
as creating puzzle levels in Toy Box BELOW: The graphics
look amazing and the
mode, you will be able to create tracks gameplay styles seem
in a full-on kart racing mode. We’re different in every level.

1 2 3 4
Play sets don’t just give you access to new They also unlock whole new level themes and stories
characters with moves and abilities that can to play through. It could get pricey if you want to
be used in Toy Box mode… add them all to your collection.

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 ShOTS: DISNEY INFINITY
IT fIGUrES: The highly detailed figures are made by Play Arts, which also makes Square Enix’ Final Fantasy figurines. Kirsten Kearney

The Pirates-themed
stages look enormous,
but how much you get
to explore isn’t clear yet.

confident that Avalanche can pull it

off; having produced Cars 2 and Toy
Story 3’s incredible Toy Box mode, it
knows what it’s doing.
While the highly popular Skylanders
BELOW: Consider works on a basis of levelling to unlock
the sheer scope of abilities, Disney Infinity uses packs
the Disney universe of Discs you can buy to add items
and Infinity could
potentially live up and skills from characters such as
to its name. Aladdin, Mickey Mouse, Peter Pan
and Dumbo. The packs will be sold
like trading cards, so you can swap
those unwanted doublers with friends
– it’s beginning to sound like highly
addictive but rather expensive fun.

UNTIED
Originally Disney Infinity had a June release date to tie in with the upcoming Monsters
University movie, but the game has slipped out of the summer blockbuster window to
August. More time on polishing the game and less focus on pushing one movie seems
like a good move to us – and we’re more psyched for a Wreck-It Ralph theme anyway.

KArTOON rAcEr

AvALANchE SOfTWArE: Cars 2 was a surprisingly robust racer for

a kiddie title. We hope to see the same excellent physics used here
in the recently announced Toy Box Racer mode.

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 First Look
pac-Man and the
Ghostly adventures
He’s come back for your cHildren
W wanted
ay back in 1979, Toru Iwatani-
to make a videogame
that would appeal to women, since
arcades back then were dark, gloomy
places full of men glaring at screens,
slaughtering aliens and blowing apart
gigantic space boulders. Someone
obviously had to do something to
make them more enticing places for
the ladies to venture, along with their
purses full of coins.
And what did ladies love 34 years
ago? As ever, eating and fashion. Or
so Iwatani considered, but graphical
limitations of the time had plenty to
say about the possibility of a game
about playing dress-up and swooning
at shoes. Eating it was, then. And so
it came to pass that one day Iwatani
was primed to devour a pizza, picked
up a tasty slice, and left behind a two-
dimensional yellow face that looked
hungry if you stared at it with the right
level of imagination.
Pac-Man was never called Pizza-
Man, of course, but it was once known
as Puck-Man. That is, until some highly
artistic types found that by scratching
away at the P, and so making it look
like an F, an otherwise quite innocent
arcade cabinet would take on a totally
different vibe.
Anyway, back to 2013. Pac-Man and
the Ghostly Adventures isn’t the first
time F**k-Man has been rendered in
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062-3_360129[pacman]NTICJA.indd 1
PUBLISHER:
namco bandai
DEVELOPER:
namco bandai
RELEASED:
Winter 2013
riGht: Oh now we
get it – Pac-Man
gets to suit up and
gain a tongue-
grabbing ability.
thrills and pills
-
To ru iwatani has now retired
from the game development,
but before doing so he proved
to the world one more time
that he was an absolute god
of videogame design by going
back to his roots, and actually
drastically improving upon
them. for real.
released in 2007 and still
one of the Xbox live arcade
games you really do need to
own if you value pure arcade
loveliness and perfection,
Pac-Man Championship Edition is an absolute peach that only the mentally infirm
wouldn’t love dearly. but if it was aimed at women, like the original game, you’d have
to wonder what sort of message it was trying to entice them with.
rather than just avoiding four ghosts (blinky, Pinky, inky and clyde) and gobbling
dots and fruit, the idea is to lead an absolute mass of the spectral suckers around a
maze until you’re trailing a long tail of them about and can’t possibly lure any more.
Then it’s time to chow on a power pill and devour the whole lot, with each successive
devouring adding to a points multiplier. That’s right, women; be a tease and then make
a fortune. Gobble-gobble-gobble.
06/06/2013 09:47
 SHOTS: PAC-MAN AND THE GHoSTLY ADVENTurES
KERCHING: Pac-Man was the first videogame avatar to become a marketable mascot. Will Johnston

Rave culture really

has changed a lot
over the years.

RIGHT: Thasdf

three dimensions, but it will be the first TOP RIGHT: Iwatani

time he appears in a game that’s also made no real money
from inventing Pac-
a computer-animated show, likewise Man, other than
called Pac-Man and the Ghostly what he received as
Adventures. Airing later this year on standard wages.

Disney XD, the cheesy mouthful of

a show will be aimed not at women
but their kids. Kids who, presumably,
would also like to download and play
an Xbox Live Arcade game of the
same name. See, it almost makes too
much sense.
The lead role will be voiced by Erin
Matthews, who we understand is a
woman. Crazy. You can probably
expect the Ms Pac-Man version to
feature Vin Diesel as the lead, but we RIGHT: Thanks to
digress. Painted in bold, almost flat colour coding we
colours that are as easy on the eye as can tell that this
ghost is probably
they are on a graphics processor, this Blinky. And a
platform adventure will still be about communist.
gobbling stuff for points and fending
off attacks from troublesome ghosts, WAKKA-WAKKA
as well as, quite inexplicably, donning
a gecko costume for reasons that we
can’t quite work out right now. Has
someone done something dodgy to
Pac-Man’s pills?
The answer is unknown, but what
is for certain is that there will be a big
world to explore, plenty of stuff to
nosh, some classical sound effects and
another opportunity to wheel out that NAMCO BANDAI: The Tokyo-based Nakamura AmusementMachine
Manufacturing Company began in 1955. Synonymous with arcade
Marcus Brigstocke joke about rave
games, this year it went and published Star Trek.
culture and recreational drug use.

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 First Look
Persevere with that
car and it will explode
and fill the screen with
flames and confusion.

NaRco TeRRoR
Yippee-ki-YaY, muDDY FunSterS
H aving been singled out for
some special (and particularly
PUBLISHER:
Deep Silver

wrinkly) attention by Nancy Reagan, DEVELOPER:

ZootFly
rapped about by the out-of-tune cast
of Grange Hill and scornfully derided RELEASED:
Summer 2013
by FBI director William S Sessions
(who decreed that Eighties arcade
games inform players that this wasn’t
something winners did), you really
have got to admire the evergreen
(yet often quite red) resilience of
recreational drugs.
The more the powers-that-be (and
Grange Hill) stamp them down, and PlaNe cRazy
make arrests and thus fill prisons at an
See, we weren’t fooling around when we said that rick would also get to fly aircraft
inordinate expense, the more narcotics and kill a ridiculous amount of people while airborne – incredible stuff. What’s even
investors their and business partners more surprising is that a reasonably-sized videogame publisher is even bothering to
leave severed heads in the streets of make this sort of thing without lazily tethering the game to something like the new
Mexican border towns. It’s a crazy and Gi Joe movie. Don’t bedroom programmers tend to release these sorts of games for
pennies on the indie channel?
seemingly unending situation, and
Well somebody, somewhere certainly thinks that Narco Terror is a pretty good
such drug-related violence even has a idea or we wouldn’t be here. it’ll undoubtedly make a pleasant change to be armed
name: narcoterrorism. See, and there with weapons that don’t fire cats, that’s for damned sure. that said, we’ve yet to see
you were thinking that the title of this exactly how power-up tokens will improve rick’s arsenal. We can hardly wait.
twin-stick shooter was just pulled out
of a hat.
Purposely sounding as though it,
too, came from an Eighties arcade
game, Narco Terror is all about a
very personal war on drugs, waged
between exceptionally well funded
and heavily armed criminal gangs RIGHT: Obviously
equipped with tentacles that infiltrate you couldn’t possibly
every aspect of society… and a man release a game looking
like this unless you have
called Rick Quinn, who can run in a firm understanding
one direction WHILE SHOOTING IN of irony.

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 SHOTS: NaRCO TERROR
LjuBLY juBBLY: Ljubljana is just two hours from Venice and London, and an hour from Alpine skiing and Mediterranean sun. Will Johnston

The only good red

barrel is an exploding
red barrel.

THE OTHER. That’ll be his special ops
training, then. Had they taken such
deadly skill into account, it’s doubtful
that the drug cartel would have ever
bothered kidnapping Rick’s daughter,
because now they’ve got him pissed –
and that means a lot of kids are going
to be missing their dear daddies come
Christmas time.
It’s an homage to the Eighties in
many ways, but mostly to the action
movies in which a man’s daughter gets
kidnapped and he ends up killing a
few hundred people, each one going
to their grave as another pithy one-
liner is uttered by a rugged hero who
probably has an ex-wife that doesn’t
understand him.
In one of the screens shown on
these very pages, you might even
notice enemies all dressed up as Bruce
Willis’ portrayal of no-nonsense New
York cop John McClane. Expect much
hilarity to follow as they move about
in predictable ways and get shot to
death by one man (and his optional
co-op buddy) armed with three-way
shotguns, Tesla coils, a batch of other
weapons that can be powered up and
a big sack of grenades.
Rick isn’t just adept at twisting his
spine to line up shots, either; he’s a
bit of an ace pilot and doesn’t care if
he’s flying a helicopter, a plane or just
going for a stroll. He’s still perfectly
capable of raining death upon those
who dare to stand against him, as will
his partner. Such variety will no doubt
work in Narco Terror’s favour, as well as
inspiring the phrase ‘old school’ to be
dragged out and given a good airing,
yet again – it has been a while, after all.
RIGHT TOP: Look Twin-stick shooters used to saturate
closely and you might Xbox Live arcade but a lot of time
just notice that these
John McClanes even has passed since we’ve seen one of
have little bald spots. any real note turn up for inspection. It
could well be time to bring back the
RIGHT BOTTOM:
This is why Rick’s thrills of a classic shoot-’em-up, and
chiropractor is doing who knows – maybe the Dead Island
very well indeed, publisher will be the one to do it to a
thankyouverymuch.
high level of authority.
all this old school (that’s twice!)
action has certainly got us hankering
for some simpler, more violent co-
op pleasures, but we’d still be a lot
happier if SNK just released Ikari
Warriors on Live arcade. That’s not
important right now, of course, since
it’s entirely possible that Narco Terror
BELOW LEFT: Looks will scratch similar itches – as long
like Player Two has as it doesn’t turn out to be a garbled
found themself an
improved and super- mess of explosions, firepower and
shot shotgun. unfunny humour.

LORD OF THE FLIES

ZOOTFLY: This Slovenian dev was established in 2002 in Ljubljana.

In 2007 it ran into trouble with Sony for making a Ghostbusters game
without permission. You probably know it best for Prison Break.

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 New ScreeNS
Imagine if Dead Island’s
zombies could fight with
blades and you’ll perfectly
get Hellraid’s swordplay.

HELLrAid
It’s gettIng hot In heeere…
A re you a gamer in your thirties
who remembers with pained
PUBLISHER:
tBC

fondness a time when first-person DEVELOPER:

techland
games didn’t have to involve modern
soldiers and even weren’t afraid to RELEASED:
tBC 2013
put guns in the gauntlets of knights?
Then Techland is aiming its follow up
to Dead Island Riptide right at you,
the outrageous flirt. We can almost
feel it blowing in our ears.
If Hellraid was vaguely reminiscent
of Nineties games in mould of Heretic,
Hexen and Quake when it was first
revealed to us as a series of still shots,
then seeing it in action takes away the
vagueness almost totally and stamps
it to dust. It might as well be Heretic 3
as built with a nod so heavily towards BELOW: You know
Dead Island that its neck might snap, the deal – zombies
charge you and you
since the game is going to similarly be get to kick them to
about magical staffs zapping hideous the floor.

1 2 3 4
You don’t need much imagination to see that But then Dark Souls was out to kill you, whereas
Hellraid’s dark fantasy setting looks quite a Hellraid is much more immediately empowering
lot like Dark Souls… and for (up to) four to enjoy.

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 ShOtS: HEllRaid
tItanS: We can’t see skeletons move without missing the magical stop-motion work of Ray Harryhausen. RIP. Will Johnston

They’re not into that

– they won’t take
their clothes off.

BElOW: Don’t worry,

minions of the underworld to bloody undead ghouls have
bits and pieces. no need for eyes. And
The homage is crystal clear – and is that a jawbone?
Ooh, nasty.
that’s before we even consider four-
player co-op, swordplay, crossbows,
telekinesis, how the wizard can cast
shields on the other three players as
well as teleport about areas, an open
world to explore, RPG levelling… we’re
getting pretty convinced. Techland is
financing Hellraid all by its lonesome.
There’s no publisher attached as yet,
but brilliantly the developer has stated
that it wants to make a game without
any outside interference. Bravery!

1994 and all that

Not a gamer in your thirties, or are but you never played Heretic? Well then, here’s a
picture that we hope will prove we’re not just making stuff up as we go along. See, it’s
practically the same game but just lacks bladed weapons, levelling, randomised loot
and contemporary plushness. The problem: Heretic was never that popular…

ChROME ORIGInal

tEChland: You’ll know this Polish dev as using the Chrome Engine
to make Dead Island, but might not know that its 2003 FPS Chrome
used it first. Hence the name, see.

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 New ScreeNS
DynaSty
WarriOrS 8
Because genocide is okay if you’re angry
S ome of you may question just
how the Dynasty Warriors
series (and the Warriors franchise in
general) is able to keep ticking along
like the Energiser Bunny of gaming.
We certainly don’t know many people
who play the games, let alone speak
with affection about a fresh addition
to the series – as with the impending
Dynasty Warriors 8. But, unsurprisingly
given the franchise’s ongoing theme,
Dynasty Warriors is big business in
the East and, it seems, does just about
enough trade in the West to make the
localisation worthwhile.
Not that we’re knocking the series,
you understand – the games are all
usually pretty solid affairs, even if
they have become largely repetitive
button-mashing feasts of slaughter,
using the same mechanics and adding
only a few new features each year on
a limited budget. But then it could
be argued that Call of Duty spends
billions doing the same thing, so who
are we to complain if people are still
digging it?
Dynasty Warriors 8 is being built
using the same engine as 7, so don’t
expect too many changes to the
gameplay, other than a few new moves
(including a frenzied ‘Rage’ mode for
ploughing through enemies), a revised
weapon tempering system to combine
pairings for greater effect and some
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068-9_360129[Dynasty]NTICJA.indd 1
It may be based on
ancient Chinese history,
but that doesn’t mean it
has to be authentic in its
combat and weaponry.
added tactical depth to the action.
Instead, this latest outing is aiming
PUBLISHER:
Tecmo koei
to give you more options in terms DEVELOPER:
omega force
of game modes and adding greater
weight to its core Story. RELEASED:
12 July 2013
This means new characters and more
refined episodes for the long-running
saga, which chronicles four ancient
kingdoms’ battles for rule over the
Three Kingdoms of China. There will be
‘What If?’ scenarios that enable you to
play and replay key events with long-
dead characters being resurrected
(leading to multiple endings), a new
Commander mode that tasks you
with creating a base and building it up
BELOW: As always,
through battles, and the return of Free expect your enemies
and Gallery modes. to approach you in
You’ll be getting more menu options convenient lines or
a perfectly placed
is the bottom line, along with some arc to swing a sword
slightly tweaked visuals (bigger and through. Cheers lads.
more varied environments, mostly)
and a few more meaningful cut-scenes
during the Story mode.
For the rest, you’ll be slicing and
dicing your way through hundreds
and hundreds of enemies (who kindly
form a rather gentlemanly queue)
and racking up enormous kill counts
before wiping off the blood and doing
it all again – just like you always have,
and just like you always will. Some
people like it, some people don’t – and
by now you probably know which one
of those you are.
06/06/2013 09:51
 SHOTS: DynasTy Warriors 8
TO THE DEATH: In the event of global annihilation, all that will survive are bacteria and Dynasty Warriors 9. ian Collen

RIGHT: Tasdf

ABOVE: If we’ve
learned anything at
all about Chinese
history, it’s never to
underestimate an old
man with a beard.

RIGHT: With new

characters coming
to the fold there
will be around 77 to
choose from, with
the freedom to swap
them between stages.

LEFT: We’re told

that the game will
go “deeper into
the drama” during MAN BEATS HEAVEN
the Story mode, so
Dynasty Warriors 8 uses a Three
expect lots more
angry faces and
Point System that allocates each
serious exposition. character to the realms of either
Heaven, Earth or Man. In a rock-
paper-scissors format, one element
FIGHTING FORCE
will be more powerful than one
other, but weaker to the next – in this
case Heaven beats Earth but loses
to Man, Earth beats Man but loses to
Heaven and Man beats Heaven but
loses to Earth. In gameplay terms
this translates as an indication of
how your character balances up against a potential rival.
If you have an advantage you can lower an enemy’s Spirit Gauge to access the new
Storm Rush move, which adds a barrage of powerful blows to the X and Y buttons for
a neat finisher. Being at a disadvantage is not necessarily a bad thing, however, as this
opens up the new Switch Counter move. Basically it enables you to dodge an incoming
OMEGA FORCE: This Japanese dev has been making Warriors games
since the dawn of time (well, 1997 at least), pausing only to make such
charge attack and turn a potentially losing situation into a winning one. Okay, so that’s
diverse titles as Bladestorm and Fist of the North Star: Ken’s Rage. not exactly going to revolutionise the gameplay but we guess it certainly pays to know
your enemy. Or least, pay attention to the glowing icons above their heads.

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 First Look
Ride to hell:
Route 666
Get your kicks from an rts on motorbikes?
PUBLISHER:
Deep silver R egular readers of 360 Gamer
might recall seeing a similar
DEVELOPER: couple of pages in our last issue on the
black forest Games
resurrection of long-thought-dead Ride
RELEASED: to Hell: Retribution – and if you read the
summer 2013
small print you may have noticed how
two further games based in the Ride to
Hell universe were also planned. While
we still know little about Beatdown
(other than it’s a “rock ’n’ roll brawler”
most likely coming to mobile devices),
Route 666 is certainly a rather quirky
take on the greasy, leather-clad world
of bikes and brawn.
While Retribution looks set to focus
on the combat surrounding the world
of biker gangs from the Sixties, Route
666 is planning a far more tactical
approach. You’ll still be whacking guys
around the head with bike chains or
pulling shotguns on fat blokes with
Gateaux the line
Black FoRest Games: Formed from the ashes of Spellbound
Entertainment in 2012, this German developer recently brought
Giana Sisters: Twisted Dreams to Xbox Live Arcade.
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beards, but it will be in more of a man-
management RTS style. Don’t expect
anything too complex – this is only a
low-key Live Arcade spin-off, after all –
but there’s just about enough on show
to distract our attention away from the
sunshine outside.
You take control of Jack Rod, the
sole survivor of a defunct biker gang
called The American Heroes. With your
old crew in tatters, it’s up to you to
rebuild a team of brawlers to reclaim
the highways and byways, and leave
any rival gangs who stand in your way
on the scrapheap. This means slowly
recruiting new members with differing
special abilities, as well as upgrading
and expanding your own roster of skills
and weaponry – and then putting them
all to good use when it comes to the
ongoing sequence of fights.
We don’t know quite how
authentic the highway will
be, but hopefully it will still
be a fairly picturesque ride.
The action itself is like a real-time
chess match, with you able to place
your pieces (or gang members)
into certain formations to counter
the rampaging bikers on the road
ahead. There are three main types to
choose from, with Brawlers getting
up-close for beatdowns, Gunners
offering bullet-powered support from
a distance and Medics poisoning
enemies and healing your crew – and
there are several variations on these
key styles to play with.
With both offensive and defensive
strategies in place, the battles then play
out with your gang following orders
on the fly, while you’ll be able to either
take Jack into the heart of the battle
and mash some enemies (with attack
options on the face buttons) or marshal
your troops from a safe distance. Okay,
06/06/2013 09:52
 SHOTS: RIde to Hell: Route 666
ROAD WORKS: The original Route 66 ran between Chicago and Los Angeles and covered nearly 2,500 miles. Ian Collen

ABOVE: The Medic is so it’s not exactly XCOM but there’s

basically a pair of tits certainly some potential for a little light-
in a sidecar. You
can’t say that Route hearted relief from the ho-hum run-and
666 is skipping on -gun clones.
the clichés. It also helps that the game has a
RIGHT: The Gunners Borderlands-like, almost cartoony
do pretty much what visual style and there seem to be
you’d expect, but you plenty of nice ideas in among the
can equip them with
increasingly potent skills, upgrades and weaponry at your
firearms to do it with. disposal. Quite how long this appeal
can last after a few fights that all seem
to follow the same sequence of events
(only against increasing numbers and
slightly tougher enemies) remains to
be seen, but with the usual XP rewards
and some classic backdrops of a
1960-era Route 66 packed with diners, HULL’S ANGELS
small towns and other dust-covered
There should be plenty of scope to shape your gang in a variety of ways, with different
distractions, we’re rather looking playing styles and tactics on offer depending on who you recruit to your crew, and
forward to finding out. the kind of skills and upgrades you choose to allocate. There are six primary gang
Ride to Hell: Route 666 may not have styles, and each has its own strengths and weaknesses against certain enemy types,
been what we were expecting but, so it will be wise to mix things up to counter the impending threat. You can also switch
BELOW: The key between offensive and defensive tactics to dish out the most efficient attacks while
decisions will be in after our concerns for the wellbeing of
also giving your troops the chance to retreat and heal their wounds before they wind
placing your troops Retribution weren’t exactly alleviated in
and picking the right
up in the gutter.
tactics to crush your
last issue’s comeback, it’s probably the Perhaps most importantly, you’ll be able to allocate three unique skills to your
opposition. Ride to Hell title we’re most interested leader that can increase the potency of your gang in numerous ways, or impede on
in – if only because there aren’t a lot other gangs’ capabilities – so at least there should be plenty for you to think about.
of tactical combat games that feature
motorbikes, and the idea of building
up a badass gang is the kind of thing
our schoolboy dreams were made of
(although back then it was on BMXs).
As a cheap-and-cheerful alternative
to the mainstream, there might just be
some kicks on this Route 666 after all.

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 New ScreeNS

ArmOrEd COrE:
VErdiCt dAy
It’s lIke Forza For robots wIth guns and wIthout races
hat better way to take control of
W the last remains of the planet’s
PUBLISHER:
namco bandai

rarest minerals than by waging a war DEVELOPER:

From software
of absolute attrition, powered by the
least mechanically efficient machines RELEASED:
autumn 2013
conceivable? But hang on a minute,
surely just by ceasing the production
of mechs, couldn’t humanity give itself
at least another hundred years to work
out the… and we’ve been overthinking
again. If you fancy tinkering with over
150 robo-parts before engaging in a
series of epic online battles then clunk-
clunk-clunk this way.
Armored Core V was disappointing
to many of the few fans who actually
played it over here in the West. Verdict
Day needs to broaden its appeal and BELOW: Why use
ideally iron out its irks, and it’s going parachutes when you
can soften your fall
to do that by enabling players to fill with massive engines
spaces in their team with AI units that thrusting massively?

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 SHOTS: Armored Core: VerdiCT dAy
UNENDING WAR: This will be the 15th Armored Core game to have entered service since 1997. Will Johnston

ABOVE: More energy

get smarter the more they are brought
will be spent during
this battle than will be into battle. Sounds pretty nifty, but
claimed from the oil then we haven’t even considered the
field it’s about.
real-time strategy delights that await
LEFT: Hey, give us those who’d prefer to play the game
some Snowspeeders as a commander type leering over the
equipped with battlefield, because that’s going to be
grappling hooks and
we’ll show ’em all possible too. Nice.
who’s boss. With a smoother frame-rate and
an eye for accessibility that doesn’t
diminish the depth, From Software
might just have something here. it’s
not as if it hasn’t had the practice and
it’s about time the genre had a title to
be proud of.

EPIC STRUGGLES
You’ll also get a single-player campaign to wander through on your lonesome, but it’s
Verdict Day’s persistent online battle zones that should really offer you reason to play.
You will be able to drop in and out of ongoing battles that won’t be over until they’re
over – and that could take a good long while of hectic heavy metal warfare.

BRUTAL DELUXE

FROM SOFTWARE: Founded in 1986 in Tokyo, this dev was best

known for its Armored Core games until Dark Souls’ daddy, Demon’s
Souls, impressed the West’s most masochistic PS3 owners in 2009.

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 First Look
aLieN rage
Well, ThaT’s easIly undersTandaBle
N ow here’s much of a pity: City
Interactive went and released a
trailer and, for much of its 36-second
running time, it seemed that finally a
developer had found the brass balls
to create a game in which the player
takes the role of an alien, fighting back
against the usual human space marine
commando-types.
And not any old alien, either, but a
heavily armoured, utter badass of a
bugger that boards a space station
(or possibly a ship) and appears to
be plenty pissed that its backyard
has been sullied by unwanted guests.
Well about bloody time, so let’s hear
it for the bigger guy! And, you know,
technically the Earth mammals would
be the foreigners.
Alas, no. Despite Mr Angry “alien”
being framed as very much the hero
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rather than the villain of the piece (in
our eyes at least), it took but one look
PUBLISHER:
City Interactive
at the press release to discover that DEVELOPER:
City Interactive
such a game was not to be. Check it
out: “players assume the role of a RELEASED:
TBC 2013
highly trained elite commando on a
mission of sabotage” and “whether
fighting across beautifully composed
sci-fi vistas, or working co-operatively
to buzzsaw your way through hordes
of aggressive enemies,” the game is
primed to deliver “a sustained burst
of arcade aggression”.
Great, that’s a lot of aggression and
now the word “buzzsaw” has made us
think of Gears of War. Things couldn’t
be worse, right? Been there, done that,
own a variety of expensive t-shirts. “In
the war on aliens, some problems are
solved with the pull of a trigger.” Good
lord – is it still 1995?
ONe-SHOt KiLL
Turns out that this isn’t
a third-person view of
the hero you’ll have the City iNteraCtive: Founded in Warsaw back in 2002, when Lemon
chance to play. Interactive joined forces with two other studios. Sniper: Ghost Warrior
was a surprise hit in 2010, since it was mangled rubbish.
06/06/2013 13:18
 SHOTS: AlIeN RAge
a GEaR LINE: An anagram of the title is ‘Anger a lie’ - coincidence or a hidden meaning? We’ll go with the former. Will Johnston

How about the

opportunity to play
as this chap… again?

Alien Rage is to be a hardcore sci-fi
shooter, so we understand. It’s got the
DNA of the best classical first-person
games as well as a healthy arsenal of
weapons, all equipped with various
firing modes and 21 enemy types in
need of extermination. Actually, that
doesn’t sound so bad.
There’s no mention of whether the
game will feature recharging health or
the need to find packs, however, or if
it’s going to provide just two weapons
to swap between, as is the boring and
modern way. Indeed, the trailer didn’t
even demonstrate any first-person
shooting whatsoever. It just had an RIGHT: Is that an
alien or is it Mongrol
alien, full of rage, and a human armed
from Pat Mills’ ABC
with a ridiculously big gun. Warriors strip?
So will you be told where to go and
what to do at all times and never need
to find a keycard, or will you actually
have to explore and not just simply BELOW: Humanity
follow a waypoint between rooms of could have at least
knocked before
death? Could the developer of the storming into this
not-bad Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 really guy’s galaxy.
be the one to take the genre back to
simpler, yet more complex, times with
Alien Rage and not just do a Sniper:
Ghost Warrior? The first trailer isn’t
saying, the little tease.

THE NamE GamE

For reasons best left to historians to argue
about, Alien Rage used to be known as
Alien Fear. Games often have a change
of title, of course – FIFA 14 was famously
going to be called Balls until the marketing
team sobered up and had a word – but
when names change they don’t usually
become the same as another game that
already exists and can be downloaded to
iOS devices.
Yes sir, Alien Rage is already a game
but one in which a flying saucer has no
fun whatsoever zapping away from left
to right while dodging screens full of man-made obstacles, only to receive a Game
Over screen the nanosecond one hits the alien’s hull. It’s not very good, then, but it
is available for free, shares the same name and for reasons not explained by its light
awfulness will only work on devices running iOS 6.1 or higher.
Presumably when City Interactive had a meeting and picked a new name, nobody
thought to check Google to see if it was already taken. They could’ve just called the
game Rage… oh, wait. F.E.A.R? Hmm, this is hard. Maybe that’s why they didn’t bother.

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 First Look
HOW TO SuRvIvE
whEn will it EvEr Stop?
Z ombies, zombies everywhere
and not a drop to drink – this
seems to be the basic premise of How
to Survive. And you’re not just lopping
the heads off those that would eat
your brains but you have to make an
effort to survive, too, finding food and
shelter. It’s a touch of realism brought
into a genre that’s so overplayed it’s
getting ridiculous.
Why we feel the need to repeatedly
explore these apocalyptic zombie
games is a question for the ages. We
will look back on this time the way
we do at space shooters on arcade
machines: as a fun but ultimately
unimaginative period in the history
of gaming. Surely, with the wealth of
stories and traditional mythological
tropes as yet unexplored, we could
come up with better ideas for new
games than ‘zombies are trying to
eat your brains – kill them’, yet here
we are again. But at least this time
it’s more than just a brain dead (in
every sense) shooter.
You get to play as one of a wide
variety of characters stranded on an
archipelago off the coast of Columbia.
Just staying alive after being left in
this remote hell hole following an
unexplained accident would be pretty
difficult – and it is, as you’ll need to
make basic provisions, finding food,
water and shelter. How pressing these
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The setting of an island
off Columbia makes this a
little bit different than your
typical zombie title.
requirements are remains to be seen,
but other survival games of this type
PUBLISHER:
505 Games
usually have you on a limited timer to DEVELOPER:
Eko Studios
find water and supplies before you
start to fade away. RELEASED:
Autumn 2013
We’re promised a unique survival
guide to keep us on the right track
and you’ll need it. Beyond the basics
you must collect resources to make
items, with an early tool you might
create being a fishing rod to provide
food. But later on this will evolve into
creating a variety of weapons with
which to defend yourself, including
Molotov cocktails among other tasty
explosive treats.
Once you wander into the open RIGHT: Making
you’ll be faced with hordes of zombies your way through
to deal with. It’s all presented from an a zombie-infested
swamp in the middle
isometric viewpoint, which helps ramp of the night seems
up the scares and sense of urgency. folly if you ask us.
But it also gives a good idea of location,
so you can avoid as many enemies as SuRvIvE THIS
possible or seek shelter when things
are getting bad and you’re out of
items, and short on water and food.
You won’t necessarily have to face
the undead alone, as the game can be
played in local co-op and also online
with friends – together you can build
up your arsenal and provisions to live
and fight another day.
There are challenge modes included 505 GAMES: As well as publishing How to Survive, 505 Games
recently released Terraria for Live Arcade. It seems the publisher
as well, where you and a friend can
is all about bringing survival to the digital download party.
face increasingly difficult enemies
07/06/2013 17:08
 sHOTs: HOW TO SURVIVE
TOp DOwn: Literally another angle on zombie survival. This one’s isometric. Kirsten Kearney

that vary in their type, as is the way ABOVE: Is your soul

with zombie games these days. We worth saving though?

wouldn’t be surprised to see spitters RIGHT: It’s like

and exploding undead. watching Dead Island
With an avalanhce of zombie titles while hiding up a tree.

currently available and plenty more in

the pipeline, maybe it’s the last hurrah
for this genre. We’re barely finished
playing Resident Evil Revelations,
Dead Island Riptide and Activision’s
utterly woeful The Walking Dead:
Survival Instinct. And once the World
War Z movie has been and gone, we
really hope not to see any more come
over the horizon.
It’s time to bury the undead once
and for all and move on – there are
so many other genres and concepts
to explore. At least How to Survive
does make a genuine stab at bringing
a new angle to proceedings; it would
be great to see the island survival LAsT DAy Of THE DEAD
element and co-op played up, but it’s While the glut of zombie games can’t last,
more likely that this Arcade title will there are still several of them either on the
focus on the action. shelves or on the way. Keep your crowbar
Despite our malaise about the handy for the remainder of the year with
genre, How to Survive looks pretty forthcoming titles including Dead State and
The Grinder, and the recently released State
fun. And along with Terraria, Brothers: of Decay (see page 90).
A Tale of Two Sons and LocoCycle The next-gen consoles will hopefully see
hitting Arcade, at least there’s a lot a move towards other genres. It’s not that
of original stuff appearing on Xbox we have a problem with post-apocalyptic
Live. Priced right and with a well- scenarios; we hope to outlive the majority of
humanity, for sure. But it’s How to Survive’s
implemented co-op mode, this could other elements of exploring, collecting resources and creating tools and weapons that
well be a worthwhile purchase when we’re most interested in. If there is a little more to the tool creation mode than most
it arrives in the autumn. action games allow for, we’ll be happy.

360-gamer.com 77

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 New ScreeNS
Will Johnston

PUBLISHER:
D3Publisher

DEVELOPER:
Sandlot

RELEASED:
TBC 2013

Earth DEfEnsE
forcE 2025
VILLaGE PEoPLE
Imagine if XCOM was run by the world’s toughest military types, who
also had an unstoppable penchant for cosplay that had been getting
more expressive in the years since the first alien invasion. Actually, you
don’t have to – just look at the four playable members of the EDF, each
one with their own favourite weapon set and ability.
The Fencer is heavily armed and can use heavy guns as well as a javelin
for when things get personal. The Wing Diver is an update of 2017’s Pale
Wing and so can fly with a jet pack. The Air Raider is able to summon
air raids, deploy health recovery generators and force shields, and the
Ranger can run about and shoot stuff. And all of them can be used at
once, in four-way co-op – two very special weapons apiece.
And you can forget the relative sobriety of Insect Armageddon – this
time EDF is going back to basics, just with even bigger, more destructive
weapons and greater customisability. What it won’t be doing is fighting
across a city that actually looks particularly pretty; cast in flat light and
looking a bit like a Blue Peter project, you and your friends would do it a
favour by bringing it all down.

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 T he truth that we were not
alone came as radio waves
from deep space and four years
later, in 2017, their broadcasters
arrived, filling our skies with alien
forms. How could these entities
be regarded as friendly when we
instantly named them Ravagers
and readied our guns before we
even said hello? Maybe they just
wanted to borrow a cup of sugar? It
wasn’t a great year for intergalactic
diplomacy, that’s for sure, but you
have to admit that it was a vintage
year for excessive, unadulterated
and very, very silly arcade fun. Much
property was destroyed, a million
bugs were slaughtered, giant robots
fell, flying saucers were blown up…
joy was had.
Now on-demand for £14.99 and
a rare find in actual shops, Earth
Defense Force 2017 was released
back in 2007 but remains a fantastic
game for those who can overlook
graphical plushness for unrelenting
shooty-shooty pleasure. But the
2011 Earth Defense Force: Insect
Armageddon follow-up didn’t so
much expand the action as focus
on, and thereby limit, it.
Armies of massive ants became
mere handfuls, a city that could be
totally reduced to rubble featured
indestructible buildings. Levelling
up was boring and so new Western
developer Vicious Cycle managed
to improve the body, but not the
soul of the enterprise. Which is why
we should all be stoked that the
original Japanese dev, Sandlot, is
back in control for 2025. Can we say
it’s going to be mental or are we all
too PC these days? It’s certainly not
going to be sane, that’s for sure.

AERO SMITHS
There are quite a few mistakes Insect Armageddon made that 2025 won’t
be repeating because Sandlot really does know what it’s doing, whereas
Vicious Cycle seemed to have taken a wild and incorrect guess. Examples:
the game will be lengthy, where last time it was overly short. There will be
more missions, enemies and a wider range of enemy types than ever before,
too. Don’t be that shocked, it’s not as if a great deal of power has been spent
rendering the city, but that’s just fine since you don’t join the EDF because
you’re a graphics whore; you do so because you’re a pure arcade gamer
who wants to see aliens, and the world, burn.
Aiding you on this noble quest will be a return to ludicrously powerful
weapons that don’t spend much time being absorbed into alien carapaces
before having a notable effect. We’re hoping for 2025 to be the Deadly
Premonition of co-op shooters, and to have all the greens and browns
of more Modern Warfare wiped away by a title that really doesn’t give a
damn about realism, because it remembers it just wants to be your new
favourite game. It won’t make a dick of sense, but we’re expecting to play
with our faces fixed in a smile.

360-gamer.com 79

078-9_360129[SS_EDF2025]NTICJA.indd 2 06/06/2013 13:07

 INDEPENDENT OPINION YOU CAN TRUST

TRAITORS TO THE CORE

Although we may be a strictly Xbox 360 magazine (with new
Xbox One distractions, obviously), that doesn’t mean we’re
isolated or exclusive in our gaming choices. We’re certainly
not raging fanboys who refuse to accept life outside of
Microsoft’s shiny console and between the team we’ll play
anything from the PS3 to the 3DS, Wii U, PC and mobile
platforms. It’s the reason why we’ll frequently name-drop
the likes of Uncharted and Mario Kart and why we’ll probably

88
be playing The Last Of Us as much as we will State of Decay
before the next issue hits. The Xbox is still our console of
choice, but a little diversity can go a long way.

PAGE GAME VERDICT

81 Remember Me 7 BODY
86
88
Painkiller: Hell & Damnation
GRID 2
7
8
COUNT
90 State of Decay 8
ZOMBIES 5%
DEMONS 60%
CARS 10%
THE FRENCH 25%

It’s almost refreshing in 90

its brainless simplicity
and there’s more than
enough fun to justify
the massacre
PAINKILLER: HELL & DAMNATION – 86

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080_360129[revIntro]NTICJA.indd 1 07/06/2013 14:03

 NEVER MIND, NILIN.
AT LEAST WE CAN
REMEMBER IT FOR
YOU WHOLESALE...

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 You can eventually
upgrade Nilin’s Spammer
gauntlet to move objects
and steal power sources.

T he process of reviewing a game

is usually a straightforward
BELOW: Observe carefully, folks – this is what
“Leaper” state after years of rewriting
their memories.
process; you play from start to finish Daily Mail readers think gamers look ilke. It’s hard to imagine that in 70 years
and by the end you should have a good time we’ll all be copying and pasting
idea of whether you like it or not. It’s BOTTOM: They don’t crop up very often but our cherished memories like films
you have to be prepared for the odd quick-
then a case of firing up the typewriter time event. Hammer time!
on a hard drive but, even though the
and turning your scribbled notes and premise is a bit far-fetched, the game
short-term memories into something handles the moments of memory
that gives the reader some insight as manipulation with a certain degree of
PUBLISHER:
to what to expect. But sometimes a confidence. This world is less about
Capcom
game comes along that makes you extreme sci-fiction with laser rifles
DEVELOPER:
Dontnod scratch your head in bewilderment. and a flair for the intergalactic; it’s
Entertainment
Not because it was tricky or hard to more about pushing – and sometimes
RELEASED:
get to grips with, but because you even forcing – a concept that invokes
Out now
can’t decide if it was worth investing a sense of disbelief while staying
AGE:
16 PEGI the time. Remember Me is one of relatively grounded in other areas. We
PLAYERS: those games. also have to give credit to Dontnod
1
Capcom’s latest is set in the year
XBOX LIVE:
No
2084 and centres on a futuristic vision
PRICE:
of Paris. An international corporation
£49.99 named Memorize has effectively
www.capcom-europe.com hijacked the world’s economy with
its natty Sensation Engine. Not to be
PLUS
confused with the processing chip in
+ Neo-Paris looks
fantastic the PlayStation 2, this device can be
+ The combat has implanted directly into the brain and
lots of rhythm enables memories to be exchanged
+ An intriguing story as commodities. The result of this –
while it lasts
perhaps unsurprisingly – is that people
MINUS
become addicted to memories that
- The enemy AI is
fairly mindless make them feel happy and elated.
- Memory mixing is This leads to a segregated population
a bit boring where the rich live out their lives in
- The vocal talent is blissful ignorance while the poor
really lacking
gradually succumb to a subhuman

82 360-gamer.com

081-5_360129[revRemember]NTICJA.indd 2 06/06/2013 13:08


for crafting one of the best opening
sequences we’ve ever played. It’s just
a shame that cracks start to show as
you venture further in.
The game starts by introducing us
to a Memory Hunter named Nilin. It
seems that, somewhere along the
way, she got mixed up with the Erroist
movement that’s trying to bring down
Memorize. As punishment for her
betrayal, her former employer sends
Nilin to a correction facility so that her
memory can be wiped. There’s been a
lot of talk about Dontmond’s decision
to go with a female lead and, although
there’s really no escaping the fact that
Nilin’s derriere protrudes proudly from
the cover art, her realistic dimensions
and strong demeanour make her a
far more natural fit than the typical
heroine. She even helps the game
pass the Bechdel test.
Before Nilin’s memory is purged to
the point where she forgets her own
palindromic name, she’s offered a lifeline
by a mysterious figure called Edge (no,
not from U2 or WWE). He guides her
through the facility while hacking doors
along the way and, as Nilin tries to piece
together the remaining fragments of
her memory, the player is free to absorb
the abundant pristine white walls and
clinical lighting. It’s like a mix of 2001:
A Space Odyssey’s ambience and the
technological sophistication of Alien.
081-5_360129[revRemember]NTICJA.indd 3
You’ll see androids that complete ABOVE: He may be
mundane tasks for their human big, but white armour
plating is soooo last
masters, holograms that help you season. For shame!
discover hidden items and gigantic
robots that try to crush Nilin with
their metallic hands.
On the surface it’s a beautifully
realised world that entices you to
look closer. But once you pull back
the veneer, you’re left with static
ApplyIng pressure
In addition to the four basic attacks, Nilin has a number
of special moves called S-Pressens. Each one has its own
recharge time that you can significantly reduce by using
Cooldown attacks. The Sensen DOS stuns all enemies that
are close to Nilin, while the Logic Bomb deals heavy damage
within a set radius. These skills can be used one after the
other to clear space quickly. Later in the game, you’ll gain
the Rust In Pieces special that makes robotic enemies turn
on their allies and the Sensen Camo ability that temporarily
turns Nilin invisible. It often pays to spam the Cooldown
attacks so you can use the S-Pressens more rapidly.
REVIEW: REMEMBER ME
Matthew Edwards
ABOVE: It may fall short in the mechanical
stakes, but this game is one seriously good
looking piece of work.
environments that funnel you along in
a linear fashion. At its core, Remember
Me is an Uncharted-style action game
that sees you shimmy up drainpipes
(of course they still have those in the
future!) and leap across pitfalls as you
try to reach your next destination.
Sometimes you will have to evade
the machinegun fire of a persistent
helicopter or move across a spinning
billboard before it changes screen,
but on the whole you’re free to go
through the free-running motions at
your own pace.
In addition to the rooftop acrobatics,
the game invites you to crack some
serious heads with Nilin’s repertoire
of martial arts manoeuvres. You start
off with a basic three-hit combo that
can be customised with four different
types of attack. Power attacks cause
additional damage and can be used
to break an enemy’s guard; Regen
attacks will recharge some of Nilin’s
health; Cooldown attacks enable you
to use your specials more often; and
Chain attacks amplify the effect of the
previous hit. In this respect, the game
shares some similarities with the cult
classic God Hand, as you’re free to
customise the sequence of a combo
in any way you choose.
Unfortunately that’s where the
comparisons with the beat-’em-up
greats end, though. Instead of button
360-gamer.com 83
06/06/2013 13:08

mashing, the game employs a rhythmic
system where you input the next attack
during the final few frames of the
previous hit. It sounds fairly technical
on paper but you’ll soon get the hang
of pulling off eight-hit combos like
they’re going out of fashion. And if an
enemy tries to stop you mid-flow with
a telegraphed strike, you’re free to hit
the evade button before continuing
your bare-knuckle symphony without
interruption. You can even use Nilin’s
Spammer gauntlet to pepper the
weaker enemies from afar before
moving in and polishing them off with
an Overload finisher.
It’s a fairly elegant fighting system
that’s let down by simplistic enemy
AI. You start off fighting Leapers that
include the ghoul-like Prowlers, the
more durable Skinners and a sub-
variant that can turn invisible. These
guys have a habit of swarming you
en masse, but it’s easy to despatch
them with a fairly basic combo. The
temperamental nature of the evade
84 360-gamer.com
081-5_360129[revRemember]NTICJA.indd 4
The further you make
it along the eight-hit
combo chain, the more
potent your strike will be.
systems means that you’ll frequently
drop an otherwise well-planned
combo, but when you can recharge
your health using the Regen attacks
you never really feel like Nilin’s life is BELOW: If a German
in any real danger. bounty hunter holds
a knife to your neck,
As the Leapers eventually give way it’s probably best
to more advance enemies like the to just say, “ruhe
Elite Soldiers with their electrified bewahren.” Trust us.
shielding and the robotic sentries
that bombard you from afar, there’s a
hope that Remember Me will pick up
the pace with something less Dynasty
Warriors and more Devil May Cry. But
try as it might, it never quite achieves
this. Instead of wading into a group of
enemies with flair and precision, it’s
often far easier to move around in a
circle while picking off the stragglers
that move away from the pack. They
never try to flank or corner you, they
just move aggressively forwards with
their arms held high.
It’s a crying shame. This cyberpunk
world deserves so much better than
an artificial thought process that was
SmaSh and Grab
Although the game is linear to the point where backtracking
is almost nonexistent, there are a number of hidden items
that will help make your life easier. Every so often you’ll
come across an Errorist screen that hints at the location of
a SAT Patch that will increase your health or a Focus Boost
that will award you more stocks for your special attacks.
By leaving no stone unturned you’ll also discover Mnesist
Memories that offer more insight into the history of Neo-
Paris and Scaramechs that bestow bonus experience points.
You normally hear the Scaramechs before you see them.
06/06/2013 13:08

ABOVE: You can set up a memory Overload
by using Power attacks. She may have dinky
arms, but Nilin has skills.
arguably bested by the original Streets
of Rage back in 1991. Even the boss
battles tend to boil down to cheap
tricks that you can abuse to secure a
victory rather than challenging you to
push the combat system to its limits.
Maybe it wouldn’t be so noticeable if
Dontnod had gone with something
more conventional, but the fact that it’s
tried to capture the heart of battle with
something a bit different just makes the
outcome all the more disappointing.
It’s almost as if it didn’t have time to
develop the core system beyond the
prototype stage.
As scathing as that sounds, though,
Remember Me is far from a bad game.
As the story starts to progress beyond
the slums of Neo-Paris and into the
Errorist prison camps and Memorize
installations, the game puts forward a
few philosophical questions about the
FORgET ME KnOT
+
TOTAl REcAll + I, ROBOT: The world may be full of androids but
the focus is on human memories.
081-5_360129[revRemember]NTICJA.indd 5
ABOVE: Unless you frailty of human memory. Do Androids
expose them to a Dream of Electric Sheep? this most
bright light source,
these Leapers remain certainly isn’t, but by the time you reach
invisible. Remember the fairly obvious conclusion you’ll be
that, at least. left with more moments of reflection
than your typical blockbuster. That said,
the voice acting in this game is some of
the worst we’ve heard in a while. Not
Nilin specifically, but the supporting
cast often gives the impression that
English isn’t their second language, let
alone first.
Aside from the tempo-ticking
combat and pedestrian platforming,
the third and final facet of Remember
Me’s gameplay is the memory mixing.
As the world’s most talented Memory
Hunter, Nilin isn’t just limited to stealing
ABOVE: The robots memories – she can also change a
may look intimidating person’s outlook. This only crops up
but they never really
present much more about five times in the game and it’s
than a hindrance. mostly a gimmick. You can rewind or
fast-forward a memory while turning
items on or off until you achieve the
desired effect. There’s no real rhyme or
reason in finding the correct formula,
so you just have to keep at it until
everything falls into place through trial
and error.
With so many excellent titles already
vying for our attention, it’s hard to
recommend something that feels like
a good (but not great) game with
some poorly executed ideas. Those
opening moments will almost certainly
REVIEW: REMEMbER ME
Matthew Edwards
suck you in and you’ll probably be
compelled to follow this eight-hour
expedition to its conclusion, but once
you’ve seen the credits and popped
the disc back into the case you may
feel like it was a missed opportunity.
We really hope that Dontnod comes
back to Nilin and Remember Me for
something more refined in the future,
otherwise this is one game that may
best be forgotten.
The subject matter that Remember
Me tries to address is one that’s
relevant to us all. Without our well-
structured memories we would
have no perception of anything. Our
memories are what make us who we
are and it’s one of the reasons why
the thought of developing dementia is
such a frightening prospect. The idea
of manipulating someone’s memories
is an interesting one, but Dontnod
has only succeeded in turning this
concept into a rudimentary beat-’em-
up. There’s so much about the game
that screams style over
substance but, even so,
this game is still one hell
of a looker.
06/06/2013 13:09
 Painkiller: Hell
& Damnation
You shoot, things die. What else do You need?
G aming, or at least shooters, used
to have a much simpler way of
life. Bad guys would head towards
you, often in very neat lines, and you’d
shoot them until everyone was dead
and you could move on to the next
room and do it all again. It was a world
before Call of Duty with its airstrikes,
tattooed dogs and cinematic trudges
PUBLISHER: through crumbling architecture, and
nordic games
it’s a world where Painkiller still happily
DEVELOPER:
the Farm 51 lives today.
RELEASED: Although you can probably date
28 June 2013 this style back to the early Nineties
AGE: and the likes of Doom and Quake, the
18 Pegi
original Painkiller and sequel Battle out
PLAYERS:
1-2 of Hell were 2004 PC releases – and
XBOX LIVE: it’s those two titles that have been
Yes combined in Hell & Damnation for
PRICE: what is essentially a very old-school
£24.99
FPS remake. This does mean that it’s
www.painkillergame.com
still a rather repetitive blast through
Plus darkened corridors, shooting identikit
+ Pure and simple enemies in a relentless stream until
shooting
they’re all dead and you move on to
+ Fun weapons and
combos
the next room. However, it’s almost
refreshing in its brainless simplicity –
+ Collectibles add
replay/exploration and for the budget price tag there’s
Minus more than enough fun to be had to
- Largely repetitive justify the massacre, despite many
- Several annoying frustrating flaws.
flaws There is a story but it’s both pretty
- Could have been a pointless and barely told, so we’ll skip
Live Arcade title
straight to the meat of the action:
lots and lots of demons will try to kill
86 360-gamer.com
086-7_360129[revPainkiller]NTICJA.indd 1
If you stand still you’ll
die. So as daft as the
‘bunny hop’ looks, it pays
to bounce around like a
rabbit on a space hopper.
you and you have to shoot them all
dead. That may sound like it can get
BeloW: Enemies can spawn from random and
unseen places, but the number per level is set
so you won’t get bullshit infinite streams – like
boring after a while, and it can, but some modern shooters.
much like the Dead Island games, the
appeal comes from picking up new Bottom: The enemies don’t change a lot,
but there are some nice locations – with a
and increasingly powerful weapons rollercoaster ride through this funfair being our
to do it with. We were grinding along personal high point.
through a few levels with a shotgun
and starting to feel the pace when the
grenade launcher (with an underslung
chaingun for secondary fire) appeared
and then suddenly there was gleeful
slaughter once again.
The weapons are all pretty simple
and straightforward affairs, with only
the Soulcatcher really going beyond
the traditional. It can suck the souls
directly from demons rather than just
picking them up once they’re dead.
Considering these souls disappear all
too quickly (and for every 66 gathered
you enter a super-powerful Demon
mode, so we ended up chasing after
them a little too much for our liking)
it’s quite a handy tool – especially
when you can start using it to possess
enemies and turn them into badass
allies for a short burst.
However, each weapon does have
an Alt Fire option that leads to some
interesting combinations, such as
freezing enemies before shattering
them with a shotgun, electrocuting
them or pumping out explosive bolts.
You can then add two more custom
06/06/2013 13:09

BELOW: The PC version, which hit last October,
already has four DLC packs adding new levels,
multiplayer maps and weapons. Expect to see
them on the 360 soon as well.
fire options, which enable you to fire
out grenades without having to swap
weapons, for example. You’re not
exactly overloaded with fun guns,
but by the time you reach the last of
the game’s 13 levels (with a bonus 14th
unlocked upon completion) you’ll be
happily swapping between them to
mix things up.
In fairness, Hell & Damnation does
a decent job in staying true to those
earlier games – to the point where
mashing the jump button (the classic
‘bunny hop’ technique) is the quickest
way to move around – while the trusty
Unreal Engine 3 upgrades the visuals
and physics to an acceptable, though
still fairly rudimentary degree. It also
offers up plenty of collectibles and
reasons to replay levels and explore
every diversion from the otherwise
linear path, including secondary
BANG, YOU’RE DEAD
+
DOOM + DEAD ISLAND: Swarms of enemies close in and all
you’ve got to play with is an increasingly fun range of demonic ass-
kicking weapons. You shoot, things die, credits roll – it’s a simple life.
086-7_360129[revPainkiller]NTICJA.indd 2
REVIEW: PAINkILLEr: HELL & DAMNATIoN
objectives that tie into the Tarot Card
system (which gives you various in-
game boosts) and a fair chunk of
the Achievements.
But for all the fun we had blasting
demons to bloody pieces or riding a
rollercoaster through a hellish funfair,
there are still several reasons why Hell
& Damnation may not appeal quite
so much to a more modern audience.
The repetition is one thing, but seeing
the frame-rate fall to pieces during
a boss fight or some poor collision
detection – including moments where
we’d either get stuck on the scenery
or find ourselves wedged between
two enemies and unable to move to
ABOVE: The boss avoid a bludgeoned death – make this
fights can be quite a little too old school for our refined
tricky but have an gaming palate.
easy-when-you-
know-how strategy It can get tiring at times, then, and
to figure out. it can be more than a little annoying
with its overly dark corridors that you
can barely see in and its technical
glitches. Not to mention a rather shitty
final boss fight that had us swearing at
the TV, especially when we got him all
the way down to a quarter health, then
got trapped against the scenery and
died – twice.
However, there’s still a fair amount of
fun to be had and even a split-screen
and online co-op mode along with
standard multiplayer modes for the
sub-£25 price tag. Maybe a watered-
Ian Collen
down Live Arcade version would have
been more appealing, but if you just
want a quick hit of demon-blasting
action then Hell & Damnation is a
refreshingly pure and simple way to
get it.
VERDICT
While it would be easy to be critical
of Hell & Damnation for what it isn’t –
and that’s a detailed and technically
accomplished FPS in the modern
COD mould – we’re happy to accept
its flaws and acknowledge it for
what it is: an old-school shooter that
enables you to blast seven shades
of shit out of a legion of monsters
before grabbing a bigger gun and
doing it again. It’s not going to win
any awards, it’s probably going to
get a kicking from the oh-so-serious
gaming press and it may even annoy
the heck out of you at times. But it
offers plenty of classic, fun gaming
with a lot of bloody
headshots – and for the
sunny side of £20 we
won’t begrudge it that.
06/06/2013 13:10
 GRID 2
Become the ultimate Race DRiveR
I t’s worth pointing out that many
members of the 360 Gamer
forum still hook up for regular races on
the original Race Driver: GRID, such is
the enduring appeal of a well balanced
and highly accomplished racer. The
good news here, then, is that GRID 2
manages to build upon those rock-
solid foundations to deliver a superior
PUBLISHER:
performance – even if not really pushing
codemasters Racing
the boundaries of the genre beyond
DEVELOPER:
Racing Studios what we’ve seen before.
Southam
It has quite an interesting set-up, with
RELEASED:
the menu screen offering you only the
out now
new World Series of Racing career
AGE:
7 PeGi mode or some online action. All those
PLAYERS: Quick Race options and other custom
1-12
events are packed within the ongoing
XBOX LIVE:
career, so even if you just want to play
Yes
for fun there’s still some reward in it. As
PRICE:
£49.99 for the career itself, it may sound quite
www.gridgame.com short with just a five-season calendar to
race through, but given the breadth of
PluS
events and challenges GRID 2 offers an
+ Solid, exciting
racing experience that’s as deep and diverse
+ Great variety of as most of the top racers.
events and styles You step into the racing boots of an
+ Expanded online accomplished driver recruited to be
options
the poster boy for a new racing series,
+ Uses your first
name! but in order for it to be a success you’ll
miNuS have to impress and recruit other
- Nothing really drivers from around the globe. Simply
standout or new put, this means three seasons spent
- Lots of slow loading wowing drivers and fans alike in North
America, Europe and Asia before
88 360-gamer.com
088-9_360129[revGrid2]NTICJA.indd 1
everything goes all mainstream and
you get two final seasons of full-on,
all-in event racing.
You start out with a few pretty basic
though thoroughly decent rides, with
new cars unlocked through vehicle
challenges. You don’t earn a currency
as such, so for better or for worse you
won’t have to worry about buying new
cars or upgrades, though you can play
around with liveries, sponsors and so
on. Instead you’ll need to win fans in
order to boost your status and earn
entrance to bigger and better events
– and the bigger and better cars that
come with them.
ABOVE: It’s possible to write off your ride, but
It’s a simple system that frees you up the Flashback system returns for rewinding and
to focus on the key aspect of GRID 2
correcting your mistakes.
– the racing itself. There are no aids
or assists and the five difficulty levels and the bonuses for drifting round
(which you can switch between at any corners (in all events) are perhaps
time) only really change the quality of greater than for nailing the smooth
the AI and lap times/scores you have curves of the racing line. But its true
to beat. However, you can soon find success comes from the range of
your home and the perfect balance events and tracks at your disposal.
of hot and hard arcade racing to suit While some racers focus purely on
your driving skills and both challenge the car porn of your showroom, we’d
and reward you. argue that the circuits and challenges
As you’d expect from Codemasters, laid down within them are the real
the racing itself is slick and agile with stars of GRID 2.
the handling contrasting greatly Whether you’re gliding around the
across the muscle cars, lightweight loose corners and tight turns of the
drifters or 4WD street racers. GRID 2 Algarve or Yas Marina GP circuits,
possibly comes across as a little more hurtling through the streets of Chicago
arcade-oriented than its predecessor, and Abu Dhabi or sliding round the
06/06/2013 13:10
 REVIEW: GRID 2
Ian Collen

mountains of Japan there’s rarely a advancement of its predecessor and ABOVE: There’s a
dull moment or any tedious repetition not a great leap forward, either in little over-emphasis
on drifting through
in the game, and there’s not a weak terms of your progression or the visual these corners for
link in the nine main racing modes. fidelity on display. us, but the game
And with the addition of LiveRoutes – But for every gripe there is a slap also allows for some
nice wheel-to-wheel
where the whole area is mapped out on the back, whether it’s the engineer rubbin’ and racin’.
and the track can change from lap to calling you by your first name, the
lap (so you don’t just need to master detailed damage that affects your RIGHT: Between
impressing rival
one circuit, you need to master the driving (you can turn it off, but we racing teams, vehicle
whole city) – there’s plenty to keep quite liked seeing our over-exuberance challenges and promo
you on your toes. impact on the tyres), the balance of events, you shouldn’t
be short on options
It’s not entirely flawless, but our finesse and aggression required for for your next race.
only complaints are relatively minor the Overtake events or the social
niggles, such as the absence of a network montages that give you an
cockpit camera, the way the otherwise odd sense of pride as you see your

VERDICT
stellar AI can stick to your car (and name up on a virtual Twitter feed. And
hardly ever loses out in a collision) this all adds up to another rock-solid
and the painfully slow loading times – and hugely impressive package from It might not be a major progression
which we’re assured were optimised Codemasters – and something we can from the original, and games like
for retail, but are still going to hurt. imagine our forumites playing for a Forza 4 may have a touch more style
Plus, GRID 2 is more of an obvious good while to come. and sophistication to them, but GRID 2
is a cracking arcade racer that bristles
The Racing (On)Line with depth and diversity. One moment
you could be screeching around city
As you’d expect the online side of the game has seen
streets in a Subaru BRZ, the next
some notable upgrades, with Codemasters’ impressive
you’re tackling the Red Bull Ring
RaceNet system getting a welcome makeover. You will
be able to race pretty much all of the key events online, in a BMW 320 Touring Car, and the
as well as undertaking the new Global Challenges, contrasting demands of the varying
making new enemies in Rivals mode and hooking up circuits and race modes should be
with friends in the playful My Party option. ABOVE: The eSPn enough to pull you around the barriers
coverage manages
There’s a nice progression system in place, with cash and XP to spend on new of your comfort zone. If GRID floated
to avoid being too
parts and upgrades to your cars – with new rides and accessories unlocked as cheesy or over- your boat then prepare to be happy,
you level up. As with the main game it’s not a huge advancement, but the online intrusive, while the but if you’re still halfway through
action marks welcome progress in a very tidy package and makes for a good YouTube tie-in offers
reason to keep hold of your copy of GRID 2 for some time yet. some nice montage- Forza Horizon there’s no
based feedback. harm in waiting until a
few quid gets knocked
off the price tag.

088-9_360129[revGrid2]NTICJA.indd 2 06/06/2013 13:10

 StAtE Of DECAy ARCADE REVIEW
James Artaius

LEft: The combat, BELOW: The game

especially with melee has a full day/night
weapons, is meaty cycle – and if you’re
and satisfying, but still out when night
is absolutely best falls, your party will
advised against. likely fall too.

28 DAyS greAter thAn other zombIe gAmeS

A lthough it’s ostensibly an open-
world zombie game, in truth
to keep when your rucksack is getting
full, you’re going to love it. It’s a rock
levelled-up character? Do you form
a rescue party for a group you sent
that’s a pretty misleading description hard survive-’em-up where you drive out that hasn’t been heard from for a
of State of Decay. It is open world and around the game world harvesting few days? It’s utterly engrossing and
it’s definitely full of zombies, but it’s supplies, managing outposts and a fantastic, free-roaming time sink.
so much more than either of those resources, rescuing and helping other And just like the best sandboxers, you
genres (yes, “zombie” is totally a genre survivors, and where if you choose to can keep playing pretty much forever
these days). It’s a truly gestalt, sandbox take on a swarm of zombies you’re once you’ve finished the main story.
experience that will be many things to doing it all wrong. Being quiet and
PUBLISHER:
microsoft Studios
many people. stealthy here is crucial.
DEVELOPER:
As a whole it’s quite unlike anything You’ll hop in your truck and search
Undead Labs else, but parts of it feel like a host of empty houses one by one, a la Will
RELEASED: different games and movies. Its open- Smith, desperately looking for food
out now
world landscape is a lot like Red Dead and supplies. Searching quietly is safer
AGE:
18 PegI
Redemption. Its emergent, tell-your- but slower, while rummaging quickly
PLAYERS:
friends-about-your-adventures vibe is through draws will likely attract zombie
1 just like Skyrim. As a post-apocalyptic attention – and these zombies do not ABOVE: Head to a viewpoint and you can tag
XBOX LIVE: survival experience, it’s almost exactly piss about. They will utterly own you useful destinations, supply locations, enemy
no whereabouts and so on. It’s bloomin’ handy.
like the I Am Legend movie. And its and should only be engaged as a last
PRICE:
deep squad management and perma- resort – or from behind.
1600 microsoft Points
death punishments are very much Sure you can go to your Locker and
www.undeadlabs.com/
stateofdecay like XCOM. fetch a big shotgun, but that loses you
State of Decay is all of these things, Influence – a stat that rewards you for
PLUS
but it would most reliably be described accumulating items for the group’s
+ Empty yet rich
open world as a survival-RPG. The game is all about benefit. Go blast some cadavers and State of Decay follows the likes of
+ Emergent inventory juggling, intricate resource level up your Fighting attribute if you I Am Alive in delivering a full, retail-
adventuring management, squad shuffling and – want, but maybe you’d be better off quality experience as a Live Arcade
+ Fantastic RPG most importantly – thinking before just searching quietly and running away download. Unfortunately, like the Dead
mechanics
acting (and especially before shooting). (boosting your Wits and Cardio) and Island titles, it’s an awesome zombie
mInUS
It also has a pretty darn steep learning keeping the group happy. game that’s plagued by rough edges
- The story is
threadbare curve that makes the first few hours You’re constantly measuring such like pop-up, frame-rate hiccups and
- Characters could less about surviving the game than risks and rewards. Do you help out a all manner of unpolished ugliness. But
be deeper enduring its mechanics. neighbouring settlement in the hope again like the Dead Islands, none of
- Incredibly rough But if you love levelling, managing of gaining allies and supplies, at the that matters because its
around the edges
your loot and prioritising which items risk of permanently losing a precious core is so damn great.
The best zombie game
since Telltale’s opus.
90 360-gamer.com

090_360129[StateOfDecay]NTICJA.indd 1 06/06/2013 22:29

 Essential Series

Your essential guide to the iPad mini and iPad

The world’s favourite tablet Customisation

itip – taKinG sCREEnsHots

computer, the iPad, has never been

Some apps can save images to the camera roll, but you
can take screenshots from the iPad screen by holding the

How To Use… Wallpaper home button and tapping the power button.

Step 1: Know Your Wallpaper Positions Step 3: Applying Custom Wallpaper Step 4: Downloading Custom Images

so compact, and never been so

It’s an obvious point, It’s also possible to apply To get images from the
but if you don’t know, any image you choose Internet, load up Safari
‘wallpaper’ is a term as wallpaper, provided and use the Google
used to refer to pictures that it’s already been Search box in the top-
in the background saved in your Camera right corner to search
of electronic device Roll folder. This obviously for ‘iPad mini wallpaper’
displays - the applies to photographs by typing it in. There are
decoration, if you that you take yourself, plenty of perfectly sized
like. There are two but also images that you user-created options

affordable! And if you want to get the

wallpaper slots on the save from the Internet as that look great for you to
iPad mini that you can well. This custom option choose from. When you
fill, giving your tablet a also lets you resize your find one you want, open
bit more character: the images by zooming in it in the browser window
background of the or out, as well as moving and hold your finger
home page behind the it to help decide which down on it, choosing
app icons and also the part of the picture you ‘Save Image’ when the
lock screen. want to focus on. option appears

most out of the iPad mini, then we’ve

Step 2: Applying Stock Wallpaper Step 5: Applying Images As Wallpaper Step 6: Creating A Home Page Image
The iPad actually To apply an image, all While you can put any
comes pre-loaded you need to do is go to image behind the Home
with a fairly large (if the ‘Wallpaper’ option in page, don’t forget that
rather boring) selection the Settings menu and it’ll be obscured by all
of stock wallpapers choose where the image the app icons so you
If you really want to jazz up that you can apply to is coming from. When might want to choose
either the home or lock applying custom images, something that fits.
your iPad’s display, then using

crammed this guide full of detailed

screen (or both), which you can move and scale Creating your own

custom wallpaper is crucial. It

you can find by going the image first – drag it image is a good way of
to the Settings menu, around with your finger, ensuring it works. The

can set your iPad apart from tapping the ‘Wallpaper’

option and then
pinching to zoom in or
out. Press ‘Set’ and then
size you’ll need depends
on which version of the
everyone else’s, show off some ‘Wallpaper’. They’re all
the right size for the
choose which screen
you would like the image
iPad you’re using. For the
iPad Mini, for example,
of your own character and even iPad display, so they to be the background a good wallpaper is
can’t be resized when
be a bit arty at the same time…
wallpaper for: lock, home 728 pixels wide by 1024

iPad mini
iPad mini

advice, step-by-step tutorials, tricks,

you apply them. or both. pixels high.

38 39

p038-039_Customisation_Wallpapers.idml 1 20/12/2012 16:31 p038-039_Customisation_Wallpapers.idml 2 20/12/2012 16:31

and plenty of app recommendations. Easy-to-follow step-by-step tutorials

Plus, it’s all jargon-free too!

Every vital iPad mini topic covered:

Setting up
Customising
Communication
Video And Music IN-DEPTH
GUIDE TO

4G
Photography
Education
Gaming
iOS 6
Navigation
And much more!

AVAILABLE NOW – ONLY £9.99

iPadMini_hseAd_SupA4.indd 1 07/06/2013 12:05
 BUYERS’ GUIDE
THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE
TO XBOX 360 GAMING!
Here's all of our recent reviews, a selection of genre must-haves
and some bargain bucket classics…
ESSENTIAL
SHOOTER
PUBLISHER:
Ubisoft
DEVELOPER:
Ubisoft Montreal
RELEASED:
01 May 2013
FAR CRY 3: BLOOD DRAGON
First things first: this isn’t actually DLC;
Blood Dragon is an entirely separate,
standalone Live Arcade title. It’s just
a reskin of Far Cry 3 – the exact same
game engine, mechanics, tactics and
nickel-slick shooting, but with a coat of
fluorescent paint straight out of 1984.
It’s also a nod to direct-to-video fare
like Bloodsport 4: The Dark Kumite,
which hijack the names of famous
action franchises while bearing zero
resemblance to them.
It’s a daftly delightful homage to
the excesses and just plain naffness
of Eighties action movies, starring
Michael Biehn dressed like a T-800
while wielding himself an Auto-9 in
ENEMY AT THE GAMES
Happy headhunting
Who’d have thought that the noble
art of camping would go from a dirty
deathmatch tactic to a fully fledged
genre in its own right? Not us, that’s
for sure, but two million sales for
Sniper: Ghost Warrior don’t lie (well,
other than implying that the game
is any good). Nor did Square Enix
deciding that Sniper Challenge was
the best way to push pre-orders for
Hitman: Absolution, and a damn fine
job it did too.
ALSO WORTH A PUNT…
Dead Space . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
Battlefield: Bad Company 2 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Halo 4 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Sine Mora. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
92 360-gamer.com
092-9_360129[buyers]NTICJA.indd 92
9
the “future world” of 2007. Cyborgs
are everywhere, everything is simply
dripping with neon and the music
recalls sublime synthscapes of John
Carpenter and Vangelis. And if you
don’t get why all of that is funny and
awesome then Blood Dragon is plain
and simple not for you.
It’s marvellously meatheaded and
supremely stylish – and a far cry(!) from
the main series’ delusions of grandeur.
It delivers the kind of sheer ludicrous
spectacle, cheesy one-liners and VHS-
era overindulgence that you’d expect
of an Arnie movie marathon. Blood
Dragon is to Eighties action movies
what Machete is to grindhouse cinema.
But the very best snipe-’em-up –
and one of the best shooters, period
– on the 360 is Sniper Elite V2. If you
are tired of being bitched out in Call
of Duty for your pixel-perfect shots
from afar, you might just find your
true calling in 505’s skull shatterer.
You can even kill Hitler in it.
AND THE REST…
9
Battlefield 3
EA / EA DICE
28 October 2011
As an online experience it’s phenomenal. As
an overall FPS package? It loses a point for
aping the worst of the opposition and laying
a single-player turd on an otherwise pristine
multiplayer carpet.
9
BioShock Infinite
2K Games / Irrational Games
26 March 2013
Simply as a shooter BioShock Infinite is up
there with the best of them, but that simplicity
was never its aim – and that’s its true strength,
since completion brings as many answers as it
does a weighty conclusion.
9
Gears of War 3
Epic Games / Microsoft Game
Studios / 20 September 2011
If you can dismiss the game’s limitations
and simply enjoy it for the all-action, trigger-
clenching, Imulsion-soaked massacre that it is,
then very few shooters do the basics quite as
well as Gears 3.
8
Serious Sam 3: BFE
Mastertronic / Croteam
17 October 2012
This is the manly, red meat-eating, tough-as-
nails, Lee Marvin version of an FPS. When it
enters gear it’s an insane beauty of an old
school shoot-’em-up, proving that Modern
Warfare is indeed for pussies.
06/06/2013 20:42
 Sponsored by

ESSENTIAL CHEAP THRILLS

STRATEGY People always complain that games are
too expensive, and they’re not wrong.
While you can usually get new releases
for less than the £49.99 RRP, if you delve
a little deeper into the www.shopto.net
bucket, you can get yourself two or even
three times as many games for the same
chunk of change…

PUBLISHER:
Xbox 360 Special
Kalypso Media
Edition White 4Gb
DEVELOPER:
Haemimont Games TROPICO 4 8 Kinect Bundle
Price: £169.85
You know the best
RELEASED: Tropico 4 is an almost perfect console While Tropico 3 was set during the thing about a brand
26 August 2011 new console being
real-time strategy game. It’s bright, Cold War, Tropico 4 brings us into
announced? It means
cheery and well presented, and it the modern era, with USA and Russia that you can pick up the
doesn’t come with the complexities now fighting for your imports and old console for an absolute steal. This special
that previous PC-oriented RTS titles exports, as Europe, China and The edition white 360 with a special edition white
Kinect has an RRP of £249.99, meaning you
have shoehorned in. This may not be Middle East wait in the wings. You may can save a whopping 70 quid on this ice cool
to everyone’s liking, but the wealth of not be blowing things up or defeating bundle that comes with Kinect Adventures
challenges on offer and the varying huge armies, but shaping the world of and Kinect Sports.
ways in which you can sculpt the island Tropico 4 is a beautiful break from the
in your own style is both impressive routine fodder that we’re otherwise
Bulletstorm
and hugely addictive stuff. accustomed to. Price: £5.86
It’s still on sale for little
more than a fiver, there
ALSO WORTH A PUNT… are still folks out there
who haven’t played it, so
XCOM: Enemy Unknown. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
we’re still going to pimp it
Anomaly: Warzone Earth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 here. it’s one of the finest
Carrier Command: Gaea Mission . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 shooters of this generation,
Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3 . . . . . . . . . 8 mixing searing comedy
R.U.S.E.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 with a Skillshot-driven
combat system to astounding effect. Indeed,
it’s so awesome that Epic Games bought
the developer and gave it the Gears of War
franchise to play with.

Cabela’s Survival:
Shadows of Katmai
Price: £9.85
So, you’ve done everything
on Tomb Raider and you
want to play something
similar without buying a
PlayStation 3 just for the
Uncharted games. Well, if
you have a penchant for
PUBLISHER: ESSENTIAL ironic or guilty gaming,
maybe you should go and grab Shadows of
505 Games ALTERNATIVE
8
Katmai. It’s a B-movie title all the way, but it’s
DEVELOPER: not without its moments – and occasionally
Starbreeze it’s absolutely (unintentionally) hilarious.

RELEASED:
TBC BROTHERS: A TALE OF TWO SONS Skate 3
As the mainstream continues to go will have you captivated from start to Price: £15.85
Activision infamously
for the bombastic, cinematic and finish. It’s a heartfelt experience, one killed the music genre
spectacular, it’s reassuring that games that feels more human and endearing by oversaturating it with
such as Brothers can brighten up our than we’ve become accustomed to, Guitar Hero spin-offs, but
somehow people forget
lives. It may be short, but it offers a despite the bleakness entwined within that it did exactly the same
brilliantly simple story and gameplay its watercolour world. You may not thing to the skateboarding
set-up with a neat co-op-in-single- be there for long, but we doubt you’ll genre with the Tony Hawk
series. Remind yourself
player twist and an adventure that regret one minute spent with Brothers. exactly why skating games used to be so
friggin’ awesome with Skate 3 – a grown-up
ALSO WORTH A PUNT… Tony Hawk and, sadly, perhaps the last retail
skater we’ll see.
Fez . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Alice: Madness Returns . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
Enslaved: Odyssey to the West . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
PRICES ARE CORRECT AT THE
Shadows of the Damned . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
TIME OF GOING TO PRESS
Deadly Premonition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

360-gamer.com 93

092-9_360129[buyers]NTICJA.indd 93 07/06/2013 16:59

 BUYERS’ GUIDE
THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO XBOX 360 GAMING!
ESSENTIAL
RACER
PUBLISHER:
EA
DEVELOPER:
Criterion Games
RELEASED:
02 November 2012
NEED FOR SPEED
MOST WANTED
On the surface, Criterion’s latest may
be just another entry in the Need for
Speed series. But if you pop the hood
and look a little closer, this blistering
racer has much more in common with
the Guildford-based developer’s road
rager, Burnout. And that’s not a bad
thing at all.
Most Wanted thrusts you into the
icy cool world of street racing on the
highways and byways of Fairhaven,
the studio’s latest ode to the American
sprawl. There the goal is simple: tussle
through the ranks of street racers in a
bid to climb to the top of the ten most
wanted wheelmen/women in town.
WELCOME TO JOHNNY CAB!
Let’s make some craaaaazy money…
If there’s one Xbox game we deeply
regret never being made backwards-
compatible with the 360, it’s Crazy
Taxi 3. Sadly it seems like that will
never happen now, but at least we’ve
got the Live Arcade version of the
ALSO WORTH A PUNT…
Forza Horizon . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Blur . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
F1 2012. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed ....8
SBK Generations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
94 360-gamer.com
092-9_360129[buyers]NTICJA.indd 94
9
You’ll have to go toe-to-toe with a
slew of rival racers (and the police) all
jockeying for the chance to ram you
off the road in true Burnout fashion.
Nestled alongside this is an equally
impressive array of multiplayer modes,
all easily accessible and tracked through
the latest iteration of EA’s ingenious
Autolog system.
Fast, furious and probably the most
fun you’ll have behind the wheel of a
digital car this side of the Xbox One,
Most Wanted proves yet again that
Criterion Games really is the best in the
business when it comes to crafting a
rollicking racing game.
original to keep us all happy. Sadly
Crazy Taxi is at a disadvantage to the
Dreamcast version that it’s ported
from, as it no longer has the excellent
soundtrack and the licensed shops
and restaurants.
By the same token it’s also got
three-gen-old textures, draw distance
and physics, but somehow the game
manages to elevate itself above all
of this. That’s because, beneath all
the presentation issues, there still
beats the heart of classic Sega arcade
perfection. For 800 Points (or a fiver
for the retail Dreamcast Collection
in CEX) it’s a brilliant blast down the
halcyon highway.
AND THE REST…
8
DiRT 3
Codemasters Racing
Codemasters / 24 May 2011
DiRT 3 could’ve been a lazy update but, by
listening to fan feedback, Codemasters has
crafted a sequel that tightens up the racing
physics and offers much more content –
especially in all-important rally events.
9
Forza Motorsport 4
Microsoft Studios
Turn 10 Studios / 14 October 2011
While we can’t quite bring ourselves to award
Turn 10’s latest the full marks, if you want
the deepest, most comprehensive, most
rewarding and most satisfying 360 driving
game money can buy, this is it.
8
Split/Second: Velocity
Disney / Black Rock Studios
21 May 2010
Burnout meets Michael Bay? Sure it might be
a bit simplistic, but thanks to its super slick
visuals, retina-ripping speed and massively
destructive set-pieces, it’s still plain and simple
fun. Lots and lots of fun.
8
WRC: FIA World Rally
Championship 2
Black Bean Games / Milestone
07 October 2011
If you want to try something that steers
towards simulation – but not so much that
you may as well just buy a Subaru – WRC 2
is a methodically crafted racer with tangible
passion in the mechanical detail.
06/06/2013 20:42

PUBLISHER:
Rockstar
DEVELOPER:
Rockstar San Diego
ROCKSTAR GAMES
RELEASED:
19 October 2007
PRESENTS TABLE TENNIS
Rockstar’s approach – that Table
Tennis reaches out to anyone,
including those who haven’t held a
joystick/pad/paddle since the days
of Pong – is so in tune with what
Microsoft set out to achieve with the
360 it’s a shame this wasn’t available
at launch. The idea of a 21st century
spin on ping pong is so bonkers that
perhaps no-one other than Rockstar
could have got away with it. But within
a matter of minutes, this little heart-
warmer reminds you why you love
videogames. It’s a gloriously stripped-
down example of current-gen gaming.
PUBLISHER:
Telltale Games
DEVELOPER:
Telltale Games THE WALKING DEAD
RELEASED: Trust is a great thing, and rarely has it
10 May 2013
been used in a game dynamic with so
much emotional heft – and inspiring so
much outright paranoia – than in this
blisteringly effective take on Robert
Kirkman’s comic book. Although it
was brought to the public’s attention
thanks to the TV series, the reliance on
the original source work has brought
with it a tremendously effective
graphical style that effortlessly renders
three-dimensional drama as a two-
dimensional game.
ALSO WORTH A PUNT…
Blue Dragon . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
Fallout: New Vegas. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Monkey Island: Special Edition Collection . . . . 9
Gray Matter . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
Saints Row: The Third . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
092-9_360129[buyers]NTICJA.indd 95
Sponsored by
ESSENTIAL
SPORT
8 MLB 2K13 (USA)
Anyone looking for a long-term
single-player experience might
be disappointed, as you could
comfortably play through everything
in the course of a weekend. But Table
Tennis is designed to be a social
experience, whether that means
everyone crashing round yours for a
best of three, winner stays on tourney
(highly recommended, by the way)
or challenging complete strangers on
Live. It’s stylish, simple and elegant,
with a social ethic that makes it one
of the most surprising and desirable
games on the 360.
ESSENTIAL
ADVENTURE
7
9
Its characters are as convincing as
you’d find in the show, the dialogue
has wit without feeling contrived, and
the pacing flows and hits similar beats.
More reliant on emotion than action
(and all the more involving because of
it), this collection of episodes – now
also available on a single disc – proves
that point-and-click adventuring can
be used in a manner that makes any
other treatment seem unworkable and
forced. And it’s scarier than Resident
Evil has managed in years.
AND THE REST…
6
2K Sports / Visual Concepts
05 March 2013
Thanks to the late renewal of the licence, it’s
identical to 2K12 (which scored an 8) with new
rosters and online leagues removed. But while
2K13 is “better” because it’s more current, the
score reflects the reverse innovation.
8
NBA Jam: Extreme Edition
EA Sports / EA Canada
05 October 2011
It loses the Remix Tour of the previous game,
but makes up for it with tighter gameplay,
the ability to switch players, Team Fire mode
and much more. All in all this is the ultimate
realisation of NBA Jam.
8
PES 2012
Konami / Konami
14 October 2011
In terms of a pure footballing experience, we
haven’t enjoyed a PES this much in years.
If you just want a top-quality and exciting
game of football, PES 2012 is finally a worthy
alternative to FIFA once again.
8
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 14
EA Sports / EA Tiburon
28 March 2013
With Legends of the Majors mode and 32
licensed golfers (including a handful of
women who have their own LPGA Tour
events), through sheer style and depth of
content, Tiger Woods 14 delivers another
Championship performance.
360-gamer.com 95
07/06/2013 17:00
 BUYERS’ GUIDE
THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO XBOX 360 GAMING!
ESSENTIAL
FIGHTER
PUBLISHER:
Zen United
DEVELOPER:
Arc System Works
PERSONA 4 ARENA
RELEASED:
20 May 2013
The Persona series may not be big on
the 360 but it has a huge following
on other formats. It’s noteworthy for
its mix of J-RPG combat within the
context of a secondary school, where
your ability to summon powerful
demons is fuelled by the links you
develop with fellow students. So who
better to oversee the transition to a
pure beat-’em-up than the mastermind
behind BlazBlue and Guilty Gear, Arc
System Works.
With so many excellent fighters on
the market it can be hard to pick one
or two to invest the time with. Many
players would overlook Arena as a
PUBLISHER:
Turtle Beach ESSENTIAL
DEVELOPER: PERIPHERAL
£89.99-£249.99
CALL OF DUTY:
RELEASED:
04 November 2011
MW3 EAR
FORCE LTD
EDITION
Looking for a neat headset to enjoy
Modern Warfare multiplayer? Then
check out Turtle Beach’s Call of Duty:
MW3 Ear Force, which comes in four
flavours all with a custom-textured
finish, MW3 insignia and Call of Duty-
embossed headband.
Foxtrot boasts an in-line amp,
microphone monitor and boosts
for variable bass and dynamic chat.
Charlie is USB-powered, boasting
eight amplified speakers and a
5.1 channel amplifier. Bravo packs
a rechargeable battery, 18 MW3
presets, sonic silencers to eliminate
background noise, sonic lens to
widen or narrow sound fields and
an auxiliary input, to listen to your
own audio while playing.
96 360-gamer.com
092-9_360129[buyers]NTICJA.indd 96
9
strictly hardcore venture, but it caters
just as well for Persona scholars as it
does arcade stick aficionados – it’s
clear that Arc is a master of its craft
and this is easily its most inviting
fighting game to date.
Arena offers a surprisingly accessible
fighting system, but one that doesn’t
skimp on the bottomless depth that
the diehard combo crowd craves.
It also does a spectacular job of
reworking a traditional J-RPG party
into a diverse roster of sluggers. The
UK release may have been delayed,
but this is one prize fighter that’s only
going to get better with age.
The big daddy, Delta, boasts 18
personalisable presets, MW3 voice
prompts (indicating battery levels and
such), wireless Live chat and digital
RF sound, Dolby 7.1, dual-pairing
Bluetooth to chat or answer your
mobile while playing, as well as all
the sonic and boost augmentations
in the Bravo model. It might just be
the most badass headset around.
AND THE REST…
9
EA Sports MMA
EA Sports / EA Tiburon
19 October 2010
It looked like EA’s work in creating the best
pure MMA simulator was all for naught. Then
it was announced that it had bought the UFC
licence from THQ. If you want to see what
Undisputed 4 is gonna look like, start here.
9
Street Fighter x Tekken
Capcom / Capcom
09 March 2012
Capcom goes out with a provocative ensemble,
seduces another big hitter and then heads
home to make sweet music in its salacious
studio. No matter how you look at it, Street
Fighter x Tekken is the best kind of love child.
8
Injustice: Gods Among Us
WB Games / NetherRealm
Studios / 19 April 2013
Comic fans will appreciate the attention to
detail, fight fans will unravel the intriguing
combat system, while casual players will
discover a story that pits The Man of Steel’s
mettle against The Dark Knight’s resolve.
8
Naruto Shippuden:
Ultimate Ninja Storm 3
Namco Bandai / CyberConnect2
08 March 2013
A spectacularly animated nostalgia trip for
those who know the plot, but the core fighting
system manages to be very accessible without
feeling too diluted. A rare anime game that
amplifies its subject matter rather relies upon it.
06/06/2013 20:43
 Sponsored by

ESSENTIAL
AND THE REST…
KINECT

8
PUBLISHER:
THQ 7 Fruit Ninja Kinect
Microsoft Studios / Halfbrick
10 August 2011

DEEPAK CHOPRA’S LEELA

DEVELOPER: A near-perfect port of the original iOS version,
Curious Pictures it’s pretty groovy, it supports two players and
it makes getting all of your five a day a very
RELEASED: First things first: this isn’t a game, typical gamers. While it features therapeutic experience. A great download and
11 November 2011 a free one, if you buy The Gunstringer.
though it’s hard to explain exactly simple gaming elements, at its core
what it is. Suffice to say, if you know it’s about meditation and chakras
who Deepak Chopra is, then this is and other such things. Its efforts
definitely for you. If you don’t know to empower you to reach states of
who he is, but you enjoyed the sheer zen-like relaxation are occasionally
tranquillity of titles like Proteus, Flower, scuppered by Kinect’s limitations,
The Endless Forest and even the yoga but the technical shortcomings aren’t
and tai-chi in the Your Shape series, enough to hold back a compelling
then you’ll almost certainly enjoy it. If creative effort.
you’re only interested in no-scoping or
beating things up, though, you may as
It’s absolutely unlike anything else
– be it a videogame or otherwise
8
well stop reading now. – you’ll ever see. And that alone is Kinect Disneyland
Leela is a lot like Wii Fit in that the reason enough to recommend that Adventures
Microsoft / Frontier Developments
kind of people who love it aren’t your you at least investigate it. 18 November 2011
It’s not “just like Disneyland” in that it’s literally
an inch-by-inch recreation of the park and
rides, it’s also “just like Disneyland” because
adults will turn into kids and whole families will
be mesmerised.
ESSENTIAL
IMPORT

8
PUBLISHER:
Michael Jackson
Majesco Entertainment
The Experience

NBA BALLER BEATS (USA)

DEVELOPER: Ubisoft / Ubisoft Montreal
HB Studios 15 April 2011
It’s a shame that Jacko’s dead, and that Kinect
RELEASED: Sports developers make a lot of noise – in time to the music. It’s like Rock wasn’t around 20 years ago, because this
11 September 2012 would’ve been absolutely massive. As it is, it’s
about “realism” and “authenticity”, but Band with a basketball – and it works the ultimate dance-come-karaoke game for
90% of games are played with a pad – amazingly well. It could legitimately be any would-be King of Pop impersonator.
and even on Kinect, you’re pretending used as a training aid to improve your
to play with an imaginary ball. Unless handle if you shoot hoops, but it’s fun
you’re playing NBA Baller Beats, that even if you’ve never picked up a ball in
is, which throws you a real ball, stands your life.
you in front of Kinect and makes you The Achilles heel, though, is space.
employ actual basketball skills. This is by far the greediest Kinect
A rhythm-action game, you have game in terms of the room you need
to dribble the ball – everything from – and because you’re hurtling a ball
crossovers and pump fakes to pull and
flow dribbles and backward Hopkins
around at a fierce pace, expect your
lamps and TV to take a few knocks.
8
UFC Personal Trainer
ALSO WORTH A PUNT… THQ / Heavy Iron Studios
28 June 2011
Cave Shooting Collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Japan UFC Personal Trainer is really a fitness game
Man vs. Wild with Bear Grylls . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . USA disguised as a Spartan drill sergeant, enabling
Mayhem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . USA you to tone up by smacking the hell out of
Nurarihyon no Mago: Hyakki Ryouran Taisen. . . Japan punchbags and tossing tyres around a gym,
Onechambara Z: Kagura . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Japan rather than by flower-power Yoga.

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 BUYERS’ GUIDE
THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO XBOX 360 GAMING!
ESSENTIAL
PUBLISHER:
ARCADE
505 Games
TERRARIA
DEVELOPER:
Engine Software
RELEASED:
The first urge is to point an accusive
27 March 2013
finger, but Terraria isn’t actually much
like Minecraft at all – and is all the better
for it. It certainly includes elements
from Mojang’s construction/exploration
classic, but you’ll also note touches of
the likes of Spelunky, Castlevania and
the pleasurable little indie classic that is
Epic Dungeon.
You and up to four players on a split
screen (or eight over Xbox Live) enter a
procedurally generated world, equipped
with naught but some basic tools. Your
first task is to build a shelter, because
the sun is falling fast and the zombies
ESSENTIAL
PUBLISHER:
MUSIC
Harmonix
DEVELOPER:
Harmonix ROCK BAND BLITZ
RELEASED: As much as it was a step forward when
29 August 2012 plastic instruments were introduced
to the genre, it can’t help but feel like
a step back to return to the joypad
jukeboxes of old. But where the main
Rock Bands were about chutzpah and
social play, Blitz returns to the pure,
gameplay-focused, single-player roots
of Harmonix’ music games.
You control all the note lanes, each
representing different instruments and
vocals. Reducing all the instrument
parts to a single joypad seems like
ALSO WORTH A PUNT…
DJ Hero. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Rez HD . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Rock Band 3. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Def Jam Rapstar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
Rocksmith. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
98 360-gamer.com
092-9_360129[buyers]NTICJA.indd 98
8
will rise… Minecraft! Yes, we know. But
building these structures isn’t really
what the game is about; exploration and
discovery is key to the adventure, and
either looting or crafting new equipment
that enables further exploration and
greater survivability.
At times freeing and exciting, at
others claustrophobic and spooky
but nearly always worthwhile and
cathartic, Terarria is what can happen
when you’re not a mega-publisher
working with multi million-dollar
budgets and can be free to truly
experiment.
8
dumbing down, especially when each
one only has notes on the left and
right (so you only use two buttons),
but the key is to flit between every
lane and maximise all your multipliers
simultaneously. And it’s eardrum-
bustingly glorious.
It’s a throwback, rather than a step
back, sure to delight fans of Frequency
and Amplitude, though it may still
disappoint those expecting a more
familiar Rock Band experience. And the
lack of local co-op is simply criminal.
AND THE REST…
9
Dust: An Elysian Tail
Microsoft Studios / Humble Hearts
15 August 2012
Originally an Indie Game, Dust won the 2009
Dream.Build.Play Challenge and a contract for
an Arcade release. It’s easy to see why, since
it’s one of the most endearing, compelling and
enjoyable Live titles we’ve ever played.
9
Limbo
Microsoft Studios / Playdead
Studios / 21 July 2010
One of the most haunting and original games
ever seen comes not on a disc from a triple-A
studio but as a 117-megabyte download from a
little Danish developer. It is your sworn duty to
support such brilliance.
9
Quarrel
UTV Ignition Entertainment
Denki / 25 January 2012
There’s little chance of Quarrel’s quirky hybrid
gameplay converting anyone without a taste
for cerebral action, but a great game is a great
game regardless of genre. And this fits the bill
perfectly thanks to its clever mix of concepts.
9
Stacking
THQ / Double Fine Productions
09 February 2011
Packed (or, indeed, stacked) with bizarre
humour, gorgeous visuals and ‘branching’
puzzle solutions. Simple enough for casuals,
rewarding enough for hardcores and a true
must-play for everyone.
06/06/2013 20:43
 ON THE SHELVES
Sponsored by

Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons Dead Island Riptide Metro: Last Light

The latest reviews from the pages of 360 Gamer Shooter Racer Adventure Sport Action Alternative Strategy Fighter Platformer Kinect Puzzle

TITLE PUBLISHER SUMMARY ISSUE REVIEWED SCORE

Aliens: Colonial Marines Sega “It manages to get so much right, but its greatest flaw is revealed when the action kicks in.” 124 7
Army of Two: The Devil’s Cartel EA “The Devil’s Cartel is not a terrible game, nor is it a very good one – it’s just an exercise in mediocrity from start to finish.” 127 5
BioShock Infinite 2K Games “In parts it’s like a piece of interactive adult literature, but it’s still a game where blowing heads off can be mightily satisfying.” 126 9
Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons 505 Games “You may not be there for long, but we doubt you’ll regret one minute spent with Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons.” 128 8
Crysis 3 EA “Is an absolute blast, right up until it falls apart during the finale.” 125 7
Dead Island: Riptide Deep Silver “Dead Island is back mostly doing what it’s beloved for. You’re in for another slightly shonky yet considerably pleasurable time.” 128 8
Dead Space 3 EA “It’s less horrifying than the prior games, but the fact that its co-op is arguably better than the solo alternative is dead impressive.” 124 8
Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon Ubisoft “Blood Dragon is to Eighties action movies what Machete is to grindhouse cinema, resulting in nothing but shit-eating grins.” 128 9
Fist of the North Star: Ken’s Rage 2 Tecmo Koei “As a Fist of the North Star game it’s as imperfect as the first one, but as a Warriors-style brawler it’s definitely more enjoyable.” 124 7
Gears of War: Judgment Microsoft Games “We’d have liked a meatier campaign and a smattering of spectacle, but especially online this is still the beast we know and love.” 126 8
History: Legends of War PQube “The real horror of war is that Legends very nearly succeeds but is ultimately let down by a succession of clumsy errors.” 126 6
Hitman: HD Trilogy Square Enix “Welcome though they are, the HD improvements are not perfect. That said, we’re glad that this restoration exists.” 124 7
Injustice: Gods Among Us WB Games “Injustice: Gods Among Us is one of the most well-rounded fighting games that we’ve ever played.” 128 8
Metro: Last Light Deep Silver “Despite rising from the ashes after finding a new publisher, Metro: Last Light may well be extinguished for good.” 128 6
Naruto Shippuden: UNS 3 Namco Bandai “CyberConnect2 once again proves that, when it comes to adapting anime into videogames, it’s got some serious ninja skills.” 126 8
Ninja Gaiden 3: Razor’s Edge Tecmo Koei “This is a welcome attempt to address issues, yet it’s woefully obvious that one key element remains elusive: actual pleasure.” 127 6
Omerta – City of Gangsters Kalypso “It’s been made on a budget while being sold at a premium price, but Omerta is a cracking little crime management game.” 124 7
Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance Konami “To play Revengeance through really is to experience the result of a fractured development process.” 125 7
Monaco: What’s Yours is Mine Majesco “Charming, challenging and hugely enjoyable - and an absolute blast with your mates.” 127 8
Persona 4 Arena Zen United “We’ve had to wait for the privilege longer than most, but this is one prize fighter that’s only going to get better with age.” 128 9
Resident Evil: Revelations Capcom “This isn’t the game that’s going to save the series from its current identity crisis. It’s just a damned good Resident Evil game.” 128 8
Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 Namco Bandai “Most if not all the sins of the father have been addressed and Ghost Warrior 2 provides many a memorable moment.” 126 7
Special Forces: Team X Atari/Microprose “When it works, Special Forces: Team X is fairly decent, but all too often it just doesn’t.” 125 5
Terraria 505 Games “At times freeing and exciting, at others claustrophobic and spooky, but nearly always worthwhile and cathartic.” 127 8
The Cave Sega “Really could have done with being a lot more like The Lost Vikings than it actually is.” 124 7
The Walking Dead: Survival Instinct Activision “The words ‘piss poor’ aren’t sufficient to describe this game’s inadequacy; it is absolute shit.” 127 2
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 14 EA “Part-time putters could possibly pass, while seasoned swingers will find plenty to justify yet another annual payout.” 126 8
Tomb Raider Square Enix “Whatever your stance on grave robbing, we implore you to go raiding once again.” 125 9

WHAT’S HOT Recent hits we’d recommend…

9 9
Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon
Ubisoft / Ubisoft Montreal
It has the kind of ludicrous spectacle,
cheesy one-liners and sheer VHS-era
overindulgence that result in nothing
but shit-eating grins. Blood Dragon is to
Eighties action movies what Machete is
to grindhouse cinema; a throwback to
when games only cared about delivering
pure awesomeness on a stick.
Persona 4 Arena
Zen United / Arc System Works
With so many excellent fighters on
the market it can be hard to pick one
to invest the time with. Many players
would casually overlook this as being a
strictly for hardcores, but Arena offers a
surprisingly accessible fighting system
that doesn’t skimp on the bottomless
depth that the diehard crowd craves.
8 8
Injustice: Gods Among Us
WB Games / NetherRealm Studios
Injustice succeeds because it offers
different things for different players.
Comic book fans will appreciate the
attention to detail, arcade stick owners
will unravel the depths of the fighting
system, while casual players will discover
a cool story that pits The Man of Steel’s
mettle against The Dark Knight’s resolve.
Resident Evil: Revelations
Capcom / Capcom
This isn’t the game that’s going to save
the series from its current identity
crisis and it’s not irrefutable proof that
Capcom has turned over a new leaf.
It’s just a damned good Resident Evil
game that lives up to the series ongoing
legacy. Revelations may just be the
herbal remedy you’ve been looking for.

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 Previews
Up close and personal with tomorrow’s top titles

Page game

101 The Bureau: XCOM

Declassified
108 The Evil Within
112 FIFA 14

108
101 The 35-yard volley that
had just been spanked
into the top corner was
certainly worthy of the
wall-shaking shouts
FIFA 14 – 112

200
KNee-JeRK ReaCTIONS STaT aTTaCK

7
WHERE’S THE LIGHT SWITCH?:
The Evil Within alien-slaying XP
SURPRISINGLY GOOD:
The Bureau: XCOM Declassified as in change of
“Gerraaaaaaard” underwear
STEADY EVOLUTION:

35
FIFA 14
NICE SUIT:
years since
The Bureau: XCOM Declassified a well-dressed year -yard ‘worldy’ Resi 4!

100 360-gamer.com

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 FROM STRATEGY TO FPS TO THIRD-PERSON
SHOOTER, IS RESISTANCE STILL FUTILE OR
DOES XCOM ALIENATE ITS FANS?

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 hen a successful videogame
PUBLISHER:
2K Games w series first launches into a new
DEVELOPER: genre, it tends to stick to its heritage
2K Marin
– after all, it wouldn’t make a whole
RELEASED: lot of sense if Gears of War suddenly
23 August 2013
morphed into a kart racer, or if Ryu
XBOX LIVE: and Ken swapped their sparring gig
No
for space marine armour in a Street
Fighter-themed FPS. However, if you
consider the likes of Halo Wars, Metal
Gear Rising and World of Warcraft,
these are notable instances where an
established series has jumped from
one defined genre to another with
considerable success. And following
our hands-on with The Bureau at a
recent showcase, it seems that the
Back To ThE FUTUrE
+
EnEmy Unknown + ThE SixTiES: By going back to the days
of the Space Race and the Cuban Missile Crisis, XCOM Declassified taps
into retro-futurism.
102 360-gamer.com
101-5_360129[XCOMBureau]NTICJA.indd 2
spot-changing routine is working for
XCOM as well.
Last year’s XCOM: Enemy Unknown
was a top contender for best game of
2012. It took a seemingly forgotten
style of squad-based strategy and
reworked it into something slick
and engaging while holding onto its
hardcore edge. It made you agonise
over every tactical decision for fear
of losing a treasured soldier, then
tempted you to risk it all by closing
in for a capture rather than shooting
from afar. It was such a breath of fresh
air that we couldn’t help but question
2K’s decision to adapt the series into a
third-person shooter, but thankfully
the transition has been less painful
than we anticipated.
Instead of a being a sequel to Enemy
Unknown, this is a prequel that begins
with the very founding of the XCOM
organisation in 1962. Alien forces have
begun invading the Earth but, rather
than a global focus, the story centres
on the United States and an XCOM
agent named William Carter. This is a
significant change, as traditionally the
plot has been overshadowed by the
combat. The flow of time is also less
of a threat as, until you start the next
main mission and progress the story
forward, you’re free to undertake as
many side-missions as you please. In
06/06/2013 13:15
 Matthew Edwards PREVIEW

It may not be full-fat cover

but half is still better than
nothing. And hey, you can
always retreat if necessary.

other words, there’s no chance of a
major city being turned to glass just
because your attention was focused
elsewhere at the time.
Our hands-on took the form of
an assignment where Carter had to
investigate a strange alien tower that
loomed over a suburban town. As the
XCOM chopper offloaded Carter and
his team into the surrounding streets, it
was clear that the population had been
infected with some kind of sleepwalker
virus: its inhabitants were completely
oblivious to the alien activity and were
simply mumbling to themselves in a
dreamlike state. It’s at this point that
the cinematic ceased and we were
given control of Carter and his two ABOVE: You really
don’t want to be
accompanying teammates – one of
stuck in a reloading
them a guns-blazing Commando and state when an Elite is
the other an Engineer with a savage this close. Still, there’s
always melee…
Scatter Laser.
As we took in the scenery it became RIGHT: By equipping
clear that 2K Marin had taken the your agents with
different backpacks
slightly exaggerated style of Enemy
you can enhance their
Unknown and applied it to the picket particular strengths.
fences and Cadillac motors of the
Sixties. We were given orders to locate
a fellow agent named Da Silva and, as
we made our way past a roadblock
and edged towards his location, we
took the opportunity to ambush a
patrolling Outsider and his Insectoid
cohorts. So we pulled up the Battle

KEEp IT ClAssy
In addition to the Commando and Engineer, the player will be able to recruit the
Recon and Support Officer. The Recon is handy with a sniper rifle and can pick off
enemies from afar, while the Support Officer is limited to a pistol but can call in
artillery strikes to compensate. As you’d expect, the game features a permanent
death system – if you fail to revive a teammate quickly they’ll give up the ghost for
good – but you can always cheat the reaper by reloading your save file…

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 ABOVE: In addition Focus menu, which slows time to a
to the primary treacle-like pace and enables you to
operations, you
will be able to issue specific team commands – be it
undertake minor moving to better cover or letting loose
missions that bag with an ability.
you experience.
To say that The Bureau handles
like a third-person shooter version
of Enemy Unknown would be an
understatement; it’s in everything
from the aiming percentages that pop
up when you order a teammate to
target a specific enemy, to the shield
icons that indicate whether you’re in
BELOW: You can’t full or half cover. It feels like the same
capture the aliens battlefield, but one where everything
but it looks like happens in real-time as opposed to
researching their
technology will still turn-based assaults. You can depress
play a key role. the left trigger to pull up crosshairs
in order to line up an inch-perfect
headshot, and yet the combat is as
much about tactical co-ordination as
it is gunning down space invaders in
the streets with a bunch of prototype
plasma weapons.
As the Field Commander, Carter has
a range of abilities that include Lift and
Heal. The former enables you to dangle
a normal-sized opponent in midair
while the latter gives you the power
to heal the whole squad. Each ability
has a cooldown period that limits its
use and you can combine them in
certain ways. The Engineer’s explosive
Mine, for instance, can be planted in
front of a strong enemy before using
the Commando’s Taunt to fool them
into breaking cover. We used this
trick to take out a formidable Tech-
Commander that had been causing us
trouble with its deployable cover and
automated lasers.
After reaching a Resupply Station
and switching our Commando and
Engineer out for a Recon and Support
Officer, we finally found Da Silva holing
up in a house. He was clearly struggling
to fight the effects of the sleepwalker
virus, but thankfully he was still able to
tell us about the explosive traps he’d
planted around the house. So when
an alien convoy came knocking with
its Silicoids and Mutons – respectively
a living oil slick and an armoured
juggernaut – we were able to thin out

BAckpAckErs’ pArAdisE
Much like its predecessors, XCOM Declassified features an experience system that
enables you to hone the abilities of your agents. The Commando can use the Pulse
Wave to knock enemies out of cover and the Engineer can use automated turrets
to keep them pinned down. You’ll also find new backpacks that offer a variety of
effects, which include an increase to headshot damage and additional health.

104 360-gamer.com

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 Matthew Edwards PREVIEW

ABOVE: It seems
their numbers by detonating traps from
that the Bureau’s
the Battle Focus menu. We saved a lot headquarters will act
of ammo that day. as a central hub that
With the alien threat taken care of, you can navigate
between missions.
we were able to talk to Da Silva about
his ordeal. This took the form of some
dialogue choices where he filled us in
on the severity of his condition and left
us with two options: either take him
out for one last blaze of glory against WE LIKED
the alien hordes or promise him that + Battle Focus retains the depth
we’d find a cure. We’re suckers for the + The story is more fleshed out
nice guy act, so we told the diamond + Issuing orders is very intuitive
geezer to sit tight while we soldiered on
without him. That was the end of our
LEFT: Just because
you bleed green
WE DISLIKED
hands-on taster, but come this August doesn’t mean that - The gunplay feels a bit average
we’re definitely going to find that cure… you’re immune to - Seems to stick rigidly to the lore
headshots. Far from
hang in there, Da Silva! it, in fact! - It almost feels too familiar

HANDS ON
We liked this closer encounter…

ThE BurEau: XCOM

DECLaSSIfIED
While we know that some people
get a real kick out of the retro sci-fi
look, we were unsure whether 2K
Marin could do it justice. But it’s safe to
say that the developer of BioShock 2
has put our concerns to rest, as this
prequel is already starting to look like
another very worthy addition to the
long-running XCOM series. The switch
to a third-person perspective is much
less disruptive than we had imagined,
and with games like this on the horizon
it’s clear that the old Xbox 360 is still
far from done. So as long as it doesn’t
come at the cost of a proper sequel to
Enemy Unknown, we’re more than game
for some declassification.

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360 Gamer: What’s the thinking
behind the ‘Erase The Truth’ tagline?
Alyssa Finley: The game is set back in
1962 with the notion that President
John F Kennedy had set up a secret
government organisation to investigate
and cover up any infiltrations of the
American homeland. ‘Erasing The
Truth’ is kind of playing with that idea,
and also the inspiration behind our
title, XCOM Declassified. Basically, the
truth was erased but now we can tell
the story.
What are the advantages of having
a Support Officer and Recon on your
team as opposed to a Commander
and Engineer?
Each agent class brings something
different to the battlefield. The Recon
is kind of a sniper guy; he’s got long-
range shots and can invalidate cover
to take somebody out quickly. The
Support Officer is more of a cleric, if
you will, from Dungeons & Dragons
– he buffs up your team with the
same type of combat stims that you
probably saw in Enemy Unknown.
The agent combinations will depend
on personal play style; I prefer the
Engineer because I like to hold back
and have other people do all of the
hard work. If you give me a laser turret
and let me hide behind it then I’m a
very happy person!
Why did you focus the game on
protecting the USA as opposed to
the whole planet?
We wanted to tell the origin story so it
had to start somewhere, and although
it’s completely plausible that an alien
invasion might have been happening in
Russia or Europe during the same time
period, we really focused on the US and
its reaction to that threat. This way we
can make it feel a little more personal.
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106-7_360129[QA_Bureau]NTICJA.indd 1
The Bureau: XCOM
DeClassifieD
INTERVIEW
We prepareD for the alien invasion by probing AlYSSA
FInlEY, vice presiDent of proDuct Development at 2K marin,
about reloaDing save files anD the plasma-repellent
properties of hats in the Xcom spin-off…
How much impact will the dialogue
options have on the overall story?
You can change the course of the
game; your choices have a direct
impact on some of the plotlines.
What happens to the sleepwalkers
is related to the decision you make
about Da Silva, and some other
conversational choices – we try to
give the player the sense that what
they do in the game matters.
Is it possible to fail a mission while
still moving on with the story?
You can fail a mission but you’ll have
to start it again – we didn’t go with
the ironman approach.
What can you tell us about the
different mission types?
They include primary missions that
move the plot forwards; once you
finish one of these, time moves along
and you can never go back. There are
also side-missions; these are optional
and help you rank up your agents.
They also help the XCOM organisation
in general because you get additional
weapons and resources that you can
use in the primary missions. There are
also despatch missions that let you
rank up other agents. If you choose
to engage with squad management
you’ll have more backup teams when
you need them.
“[Dialogue] can change the
course of the game… you have
a direct impact on the plotlines”
Instead of the usual armour, XCOM
Declassified sticks Carter in a fedora
and sees him shrug off plasma fire
with his shield-projecting backpack.
Is this more of a stylistic choice or a
part of the story?
It’s absolutely a part of the story.
These guys weren’t prepared for an
alien invasion and they had no idea
that it was coming; they’re basically
trying to build a plan in real-time and
react. They wouldn’t have space-age
armour yet and they don’t have much
more than the clothes on their backs.
If you recruit a military guy like a
Commando, he might have fatigues
on but he won’t have space armour.
The classic games have always
adhered to the bullet, laser and
plasma tech advances. How are you
looking to push beyond that?
We’re sticking to the classic lore on
this one. We think that the existing
ABOVE: Fans of structure offers great progression and
Enemy Unknown provides tremendous room for playing
will recognise many
of The Bureau’s within those boundaries – that’s why
strategic elements. we really focused on innovation.
With that said, has there been any
scope to include new alien types?
Yes, we’ve been able to include aliens
previously unseen in XCOM– the
Zujari may’ve been hinted at, but
they haven’t been seen before. We’ve
also got enemies like the Titan – we
showed this guy way back in E3 2010
and it’s the same one that appeared
in that trailer. We also have lots of the
classic XCOM enemies that people will
know and hopefully appreciate.
06/06/2013 13:11

“We think the
challenge comes
from owning the
consequences of
your choices”
What can you tell us about the
psychic powers that will feature
in the game?
Mind control is definitely something
that we’re including in the game.
Anything that the Outsiders throw at
you, your XCOM research team will be
able to find a way to dismantle and
turn it back into something that you
and your team can take out onto the
battlefield.
The demo level we played was
more focused on the outdoor
environments. Will the full game
feature much in the way of indoor
firefights and locations?
I can’t talk much about what wasn’t
featured in the demo, but yes, there
will be fights that take place indoors.
We noticed that there were Easy,
Normal and Hard difficulty settings.
Does Easy remove the permanent
death penalty or is it uniform across
all levels of difficulty?
Perma-death is going to be there
no matter what, but the Easy mode
will give you more ability to prevent
that, which I think is critical. Easy
should mean that we give you more
room for bad decisions before the
consequences kick in. That feels like
the right kind of balance – perma-
death is pretty core to the XCOM
franchise.
Do you expect that most players will
simply reload their save whenever
they lose a key team member?
It is still possible to do that, but we
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Matthew Edwards INTERVIEW
ABOVE: This would
be about the time think the challenge comes from
you wished you’d owning the consequences of your
brought a Recon guy
choices by keep on keeping on. We
along for the mission.
include things like the despatch and
TOP LEFT: Smoking side missions to provide the tools you
indoors? Won’t
need to rebuild a team in real-time. But
someone please think
of the children! it’s not an endless well, either. You can’t
just grind along in our game – you can
put yourself in a situation where you
can’t finish a battle, or potentially the
war, because of bad decisions that
caused your agents to die.
BELOW: The visuals Can you describe a mechanic that
offer up a retro sci-fi you trialled in the game but, for
sheen, fusing Sixties
style with alien whatever reason, had to remove?
technology. In 2011 we actually showed this
notion of capture – you had a magical
cuff and if you chipped away at an
enemy’s health enough, they would be
weakened to a point where the enemy
or their weapon could be captured.
You then had a choice of whether
to redeploy the equipment in the
battlefield in real-time or take it back
to base for your scientists to research.
We had that all working and it was
actually pretty cool, but it really felt
like it was delaying a lot of gratification
for the player. It forced this choice
between not using this awesome
weapon now so you could have it later,
or using it for the rest of mission. It felt
like the wrong kind of choice for our
game, so we got rid of the capture
mechanic and focused more on the
idea that if you can get your hands on
it, you can use it.
Finally, speaking personally, what do
you like most about the game?
One of the things I really like about
XCOM Declassified is that it has a lot
of narrative content for those who
choose to explore it. There are some
gamers who just want to blow through
all the missions and be done with it,
but I’m someone who likes to read all
the notes and talk to others. There’s
a pretty deep back-story there for
people who want to poke around and
do stuff other than just shooting.
360-gamer.com 107
06/06/2013 13:11
 The evil WiThin
FROM RESI EVIL TO REVIVaL-hORROR
PUBLISHER: hat was once one of the most
Bethesda Softworks W beloved genres in gaming has
DEVELOPER: devolved into a shadow of its former
Tango Gameworks
self. We are, of course, talking about
RELEASED: survival-horror. It used be that games
TBC 2014
like Resident Evil and Silent hill could
XBOX LIVE: convince us to play with the lights
No
turned on and a friend by our side.
But ever since the advent of Resident
Evil 4 with its fancy roundhouse kicks,
most horror-themed games have been
more concerned with empowering
players rather than terrorising their
nerves. It’s a predicament, to be sure,
but if anyone has a chance of setting
this ghost train back on track, it’s
Shinji Mikami.
hill valenTine
+
ResidenT evil + silenT hill: It may seem like an obvious
analogy but it’s clear that The Evil Within employs a mix of fleshy
monsters and psychological chills.
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When Bethesda invited to us to
see The Evil Within in action, we were
initially disappointed that this was
going to be a strictly hands-off affair.
however, after seeing a tantalising
glimpse of the godfather of survival-
horror’s new fright fest, we were
partially relived that we didn’t have
to brave this horror ourselves. The
demonstration began, malevolently
enough, outside an insane asylum that
bore more than a passing resemblance
to the gothic architecture so favoured
by the Umbrella Corporation. a police
car pulled up just outside the gates
as two male and one female officer
emerged from the vehicle.
If this thing appears this
early on in the game then
we can only imagine what
horrors lie near the end.
The officer in charge is Sebastian.
he and his two colleagues walk past
some sporadically parked police cars
and notice that all the weapons are
missing. Then, as they make their
way into the asylum itself, Sebastian
notices the smell of blood before
telling the female officer to guard
the door. he doesn’t seem like the
most chivalrous type or some kind of
badass desperado that could work
his way through a terrorist camp with
just a bread knife; he’s just a normal
detective who’s doing his job, hence
why he’s a bit taken aback when he
discovers a dead body on one of the
waiting room chairs.
07/06/2013 16:26
 Matthew Edwards PREVIEW

It’s clear that something about When he regains consciousness,

this place isn’t quite right. And when
Sebastian enters the security room
he finds a quivering old man who
just manages to say, “It was Revic,”
before falling unconscious. We don’t
know who Revic is at this stage, but
the development team confirmed him
as a character in the game. The next
thing we see is Sebastian staring at one
of the security monitors as a cloaked
figured kills three armed policemen
before looking right up at the camera.
Cue a moment of tangible tension as
Sebastian backs away in shock, only for
the cloaked figured to appear behind
him as the screen goes dark.
Sebastian is swinging by his legs
in what appears to be a cannibal’s
abattoir. A butcher-like creature
pans into view before making its way
into the next room. It’s obvious that
Sebastian needs to get the hell out of
here and, after swinging across to a
nearby corpse, he liberates a knife and
cuts himself down. The player then
sneaks up to a huge chopping board,
pockets some keys and makes their
way across a suspended walkway
that overlooks a rack of rusty looking
chainsaws. But when Sebastian
inadvertently trips an alarm, we hear
the sound of a tree-feller firing up.
TOP LEFT: The other
male officer is called
Joseph. There’s a
good chance he’ll
crop up throughout
the game.

BELOW: If you
don’t want to see
something horrific
then don’t go near
the pile of corpses.
It’s that simple.

ShuT YOur TraP

During the second part of the demonstration, the player had to fend off some
zombie-like creatures that were storming the cabin. To give himself a tactical edge
the player planted a few trip mines by the windows, which then detonated as the
zombies clambered in. We were told that the full game will feature a wide variety of
these makeshift traps, in addition to full environmental traps that Sebastian can use
when his ammo reserves are running low. Our money’s on a leafy pitfall.

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 ABOVE: It may Blind panic ensues as the ghost
look like a lot, but of chainsaw massacres past slashes
the 360 Gamer
team gets through Sebastian across the leg as he
three times as stumbles into the next room. For the
much red wine on briefest second it looks like he may
deadline week.
have escaped the worst but, before
we have the opportunity to quote Mr
Solo, the light flashes on and a pair
of motorised threshing blades start
closing in, as the player desperately
manoeuvres the limping hero to the
other side of the room. He makes it by
the skin of his teeth and then bundles
BELOW: We’re Sebastian into a nearby locker – Solid
tempted to make Snake style – as a handy hiding spot
some kind of NHS before the butcher stampedes into
joke here, but we
know too many the room with all the grace of a rabies-
nurses to risk it. infected elephant.
By some sheer miracle, the butcher
forgets to check the locker as he tears
the room apart. We’re told that as long
as he doesn’t see the player go into it,
the chainsaw guy will never check the
locker. Even so, this won’t necessarily
apply to every enemy in the game. The
cat-and-mouse chase continues for a
few more minutes as Sebastian throws
a bottle to distract the butcher. He
then makes a break for an elevator that
lies at the end of a hallway filled with
abandoned wheelchairs and, when he
finally makes it outside, he finds the
asylum is now resting in the middle
of a large crater that’s surrounded
by mass devastation caused by…
something unknown.
As far as hair-raising moments go,
this opening sequence hints at a game
where knowing when to flee is just as
important as standing your ground to
fight. The Tango team also showed us a
smaller section that appears later in the
game, which sees Sebastian venturing
into an old cabin. The player finds a
syringe-like health item on the floor
before venturing into the basement
below. We then see a glimpse of the
combat system in action as Sebastian
raises his revolver before putting a
couple of zombie-like creatures down
with some precise shots.
The victory, however, is short-lived,
as after returning to the ground floor
the cabin is assaulted from all sides.

CAndLELiGht SkinnEr
During the cabin sequence we saw the player shoot one creature in the head for an
instant kill and another was brought to its knees with a shot to the leg. Instead of
finishing it off with a kick to the head, Sebastian used a match to set the demonic
creature on fire. Could this corpse-burning mechanic be similar to the Crimson Head
zombies from the Resident Evil remake? Only time will tell…

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 BELOW: It’ll be interesting to see the game’s
Matthew Edwards PREVIEW
save system. Maybe cassette tapes instead of
ink ribbons this time?

ABOVE: If only
This forces the player to run back into
Sebastian was
the basement, but instead of the area charismatic enough
they’ve just visited they appear in an to say, “Hi, how’s it
hanging?” it’d really
endless corridor as a wave of Stephen
lighten the mood.
King-endorsed blood washes over
them. Sebastian then finds himself in
a cluttered morgue as the paranormal
activity goes into overdrive.
Some kind of multi-armed witch-
spider thing emerges from a mass of WE LIKED
bloodied flesh and chases Sebastian. + Looks very dark and oppressive
The poor detective is swiftly knocked + Doesn’t go crazy with the action
off his feet and, as the screen fades to + Could be the scariest game ever
black, we hear the sound of a gruesome BELOW: It’s clear
death. The demonstration was short that fire plays an WE DISLIKED
and sweet, yet quite sufficient to scare important part in the - Sebastian is lacking personality
game, as you have
us absolutely shitless. Survival-horror is a limited supply of - The game does seem very linear
definitely back on the menu… matches to use. - We don’t want to wait till 2014

EYES ONLY
We felt the fear effect…

ThE EvIL WIThIn

While most supposed horror games in
recent years have struggled to make us
feel unnerved within our own homes,
The Evil Within managed it in a room
full of journalists and without us even
touching a controller. The atmosphere
of the game looks like a cross between
macabre Western horror and the more
supernatural shenanigans you’d expect
from an Eastern ghost story. It’s also
very clear that Mikami and his team are
dividing the game between moments
where standing your ground is feasible
and where running is the only option.
If the development team can strike the
right balance between them then this
could be the revival-horror we’ve all
been waiting for.

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 FIFA 14
Still giving it 110% at the end of the day
PUBLISHER:
EA Sports I t only took a quick glance at
the collection of games writers,
DEVELOPER: gathered around pods playing FIFA 14
EA Canada
at an ea office in guildford, for the
RELEASED: series’ appeal to resonate around the
27 September 2013
room. Sure, each was probably chosen
XBOX LIVE: for this particular mission because
Yes
of some pre-existing affinity for the
franchise, but the shared combination
of pure delight and anguish found in
the Beautiful game echoed out from
almost every chair.
there was a groan to our left as one
striker missed a chance that clearly any
virtual grandmother could have bagged
(while obviously his opponent could
only let out a surprised laugh) before a
IT’S IN THE GAME
=
SMALL CHANGES = BIG DIFFERENCE: there may not be any
major headline additions, but once again fifa is evolving into something
that offers up a refreshed approach to gameplay.
112 360-gamer.com
112-5_360129[preFIFA14]NTICJA.indd 1
collective roar to our right suggested
that something special had happened.
Sure enough, when the room turned
as one to see the replay, the 35-yard
volley that had just been spanked into
the top corner was certainly worthy of
the wall-shaking shouts. and perhaps
it’s the contrast between those two
moments that keeps us all coming
back for more.
We’ve mentioned in the past (and
in the previous issue) that fifa has
recently become about small changes
making a big difference to the overall
gameplay – and much is the same in
FIFA 14. While many of the headline
additions are merely evolutions of
By removing the LT modifier
from skill moves, it’s a little
easier to just twirl the right
stick and see what happens.
the physics system, or a few tweaks
to the controls or skills on offer, they
still come together to create a slightly
different way of playing. Just as we
saw FIFA 13 become a slower, more
considered experience, so FIFA 14 has
matured into something that expects
a little more time on the ball.
from simply watching experienced
players go head-to-head, FIFA 14
certainly seems to place a greater
emphasis on using skills and close
control to maintain possession, rather
than simply relying on squeezing the
right trigger and bombing down the
wings as before. those moves are
even easier to pull off, too, with the
06/06/2013 22:31
 Ian Collen PREVIEW
Players will now react and
adjust their position to the
ball, rather than gliding into a
pre-set shooting animation.

left trigger modifier being dropped The overall aesthetic isn’t just down ABOVE: We wonder
(it now initiates the new ‘Protect the to visual fidelity, but to the refined if the Xbox One will
integrate Fantasy
Ball’ system for tighter control under animations and an AI system that has Football stats in the
pressure) so you can roll around the players making (mostly) all the right UK, as it will for the
right stick at will for those fanciful runs in all the right places. We even NFL in the States?

stepovers and cheeky flicks. got a first look at the new Precision
The other noticeable thing about Movement system, which offers more BELOW: The Precision
watching from afar is just how good natural motion and a realistic ‘weight’ Movement system sees
the game looks – it’s almost to the that takes into account both balance players flowing more
naturally, but that also
point where if you squint your eyes and speed. means a few extra steps
just a little bit, you could swear you The result is players having to slow are needed to change
were watching the real thing. That down after a sprint or when making direction quickly.

is until you see the celebrations and
intermittent cut-scenes that still look
ugly and painfully unnatural at times,
but we’ll give the developers credit
that they’re a work in progress.
sudden changes of direction, and a BOTTOM: Little has
non-scripted and responsive sequence been said about how
of animations. On the plus side, this the Career mode will
pan out, but we would
not only looks the part, it also adds a expect a few changes
great new weighted first touch before to the system this year.

XBOX ONE, 360 NIL

It’s a nailed-on certainty that FIFA 14 will be an Xbox One launch title and, while
the devs aren’t talking about the next-gen version of the game yet, you can expect
plenty of improvements and advancements – not least from the shiny new Ignite
game engine. Showcased at the console’s announcement, the engine offers up new
physics, animation and AI possibilities for even greater realism on the pitch. Simply
put, the One version of FIFA 14 will have an entirely separate list of ‘new’ features.

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 ABOVE: We found
a sprint, enabling you to knock the ball
that the best attack
is found through past an opponent and skip past with
skills and creative just a tug on RT.
play, rather than
The downside is that it does slow
explosive pace and
long through-balls. down those turns, which, as realistic
as it may be, can be punishing if you’re
defending and miss a tackle – as that
player can be a long way behind the
action before he’s back into full flow.
Whether it delights or frustrates,
it’s certainly yet another element
to constantly consider when you’re
playing the game.
BELOW: You’ll be
able to run a year- After we’d settled down with a few
round scouting matches, we also found a few tweaks
system to tee-up creeping in to how we were playing.
potential signings
in the bi-annual Whether against friends or the AI,
transfer window. there’s usually good reason to play
a slightly more patient game, using
the ever-impressive collection of skills
at your disposal – from the simple
close control options to the more
flamboyant tricks – to keep possession
while looking for the perfect through-
ball or a slick one-two on the edge of
the area. Building on the foundations
laid in FIFA 13, FIFA 14 offers up an
increasingly creative playing field that
tries its damndest to remove some
of the predictability of matches seen
over the years.
The new shooting physics play
into this unpredictability and the two
instances mentioned earlier were
probably a result of the new Pure Shot
mechanics, which add all manner of
potential outcomes to hitting the shoot
button. Tied into advanced physics
that incorporates the movement of
the player (no more dragging them
into place for the shot, they’ll have to
adjust themselves realistically) and the
momentum of the ball, you can see a
shot spin off your boot and curl away
from goal one minute, and the next
you can hit a rising shot perfectly and
hear the cries of “Gerraaaaaaard!” in
your head as the ball hammers into
the back of the net. Yes, there will be
those glaring misses, but at least this
time you’ll have some idea as to why
and not just bemoan the AI for being
such a dick. Because it’s always the
AI, right?

MAN U ON THE MENU

As mentioned last issue, FIFA 14 introduces a new interface for a much cleaner and
more accessible navigation of your options. Echoing the 360’s Metro dashboard,
you can scroll across a number of tiles on each screen with every option clearly
illustrated, and it makes jumping between the matches a much faster and far less
monotonous task. This may not seem like much, but it makes a big difference to
how the game feels and was on many people’s list of favourite improvements.

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 Ian Collen PREVIEW
The devs say they want to
“recapture the exhilaration
of scoring great goals”.
We’d say they’re on track.

LEFT: The new

There are a couple of new additions
combined shooting
we’d question, though. One is the mechanics create an
way that players all-too-frequently unpredictable system
that should see
go chasing that quick throw-in, to the
more in the way of
point where you can be watching an spectacular goals.
arrow scrolling the edge of the screen
for 20 seconds or so as they retrieve
the ball off-camera. And keepers can
punt the ball beyond the last defender
– which means you have to judge the WE LIKED
power of their kicks a little, but will + More creative and unpredictable
surely lead to possible exploitation + Looks almost real
(and repetition) once people figure + Cleaner, clearer menus
out a system to get strikers in behind BELOW: The Protect

the back line. But overall, we’d say that

the Ball system can
be used at any point
WE DISLIKED
FIFA 14 is an intelligent evolution for to give you tighter - Momentum adds defensive woes
the franchise and the new tweaks and control over the ball - Silly ‘quick’ throws
and keep nearby
features are almost all for the better. opponents at bay. - Cut-scenes look clunky

HANDS ON
It’s on the ball…

FIFA 14
To justify FIFA 14 as an upgrade over
last year’s title will probably depend
on how much you play FIFA 13. Regular
players will easily pick up on how the
changes to FIFA 14 alter the way the
game can be played and, personal
bugbears aside, should find a far
more fluent and creative footballing
experience that’s well worth another
£40. Others who maybe have casual
kickabouts with a few friends once a
month could probably get by without
it – or at least hold fire for the Xbox
One version, which is almost certain to
come with all manner of new bells and
whistles attached. But even as a 360
title, FIFA 14 is looking like a supremely
playable farewell to the console.

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360 Gamer: You’ve showcased the
main new features for FIFA 14, but
are there any other cool tweaks and
secondary additions under the hood?
Kantcho Doskov: One of my personal
favourites is our new mechanic, which
is holding – previously you could push
and pull your opponent, but now you
can actually hold onto him. Of course,
this is a little bit of a rule-breaker and
the referee will call it if he sees you,
but defenders do this in real football.
Sometimes they’ll take advantage and
grab the shirt of the opponent and just
hold them back a little bit, and that’s
something we’ve added.
We’re blurring the lines between
what’s legal and what’s illegal and it
just feels really, really good. If there’s
an attacker on a breakaway you have
a few options; you can try to pull them
back or just hang onto them a little
bit, and when you do it’s so rewarding
because that’s like your last resort.
You can get red carded for it, but at
least you have the option to do those
kinds of things, as real defenders do.
How hard is it to integrate all those
smaller details within the confines of
the animation system, the controller
and suchlike?
That can be an issue as there are only
so many buttons, but what we try to
do is keep it as straightforward as
possible, and that’s why we made the
change to Protect The Ball, keeping
it on the left trigger, because in the
previous FIFA games it was just a bit
too complicated. Not many people
knew how to actually shield the ball
so now we’re making it simple, it’s just
“We don’t want to have that arcadey
gameplay where you just sprint down
the line and cross it in”
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FIFA 14
INTERVIEW
WITH A QUICK CHANGE OF PACE WE WERE ONE-ON-ONE WITH
FIFA 14 GAMEPLAY PRODUCER KANTCHO DOSKOV. BUT THIS WAS
ABOUT INFORMATION, NOT POSSESSION, AND THANKFULLY HE
WAS MORE THAN WILLING TO SHARE A NEAT ONE-TWO…
one button; press the left trigger and
you’ll be in Protect The Ball mode.
Whether you’re dribbling, standing or
sprinting, there’s always going to be
a way for your player to try to protect
it from an opponent and it gives you
the tool on your attacking side to use
your physicality.
It’s that choice you now have as a
gamer to decide if you want to use
your pace or your strength. Sometimes
you can have both, sometimes only
one; it’s about knowing who you’re
playing with and what their qualities
are. With a player like Drogba, who’s
not the fastest but is strong, I would
be protecting the ball, whereas Theo
Walcott is smaller and weaker but
super-fast, so you might want to use
his pace more.
Building on what was introduced in
FIFA 13, is this slower, more strategic
approach your focus now, or is there
still scope for people bombing down
the wings like we used to?
One of the pieces of feedback we
got from last year’s game was that
it was too fast; it was a great game
but it was a bit end-to-end and there
wasn’t enough build-up play. That’s
where a lot of the fun comes into it,
trying to maintain possession, pass
the ball around and find that perfect
opening for a shot – and now with
the Pure Shot feature we’re making
it much more rewarding to get into a
good position. But it all starts through
the build-up; we don’t want to have
that arcadey gameplay where you just
sprint down the line and cross it in, or
do a lofted through-ball over the top
and use your pace.
But do you still have to compensate
for the rookies and casual players
who may still look to those basic
formulaic moves?
Our philosophy is to build a game
with simple controls that anyone can
use; your pass, your shot, your cross,
your through-ball – and now Protect
The Ball on the left trigger. It’s simple
button presses, you can enjoy FIFA
whether you’re new or a hardcore,
experienced player.
On top of that we have this second
layer of the skills, moves, all the tricks,
passes and fancy stuff you can do –
but it’s not necessary, you don’t need
to know all that stuff to be effective at
FIFA. If you’re interested in that side
of the game and you really want to
learn about it then this just adds more
depth, but it depends on the type of
BELOW: Use Protect gamer you are; you don’t need to use
the Ball to shrug off
weaker players trying it to be effective and have fun.
to nick possession.
Do you think that the new variation
of shot types in FIFA 14 makes things
easier or more unpredictable? How
do they all come together?
Basically what this does is make
shooting feel more realistic and more
rewarding; it doesn’t make it easier
or more difficult, it makes it more…
understandable. So when you are
07/06/2013 17:10

rushed, when there’s pressure on
you and the ball isn’t in the perfect
position, in previous years you would
most likely miss the target and the
ball would go wide – but you’d never
really understand why because the
animation wasn’t there to tell you
that the player was uncomfortable or
off-balance. Now we’ve added all of
these new animations that really show
where you’re being rushed, where you
have to dig it out or stretch for it, and
that really helps to sell the situation
you’re in and why the ball went wide,
went high or didn’t hit the target – it’s
now obvious.
The opposite side of that is when
you do have time, the player’s going
to do his best to adjust his stride – if
he’s a right-footed player and the ball’s
on his left foot, he’s going to step into
it with his strong foot. It’s these kinds
of changes that we’ve added to make
shooting more intelligent, so the player
knows his strengths, he knows his
strong foot, he knows if he approaches
the goal at a better angle he’ll get a
more accurate shot. If they don’t have
time it will be rushed, and that’s where
the new animations come in.
Those in the know will appreciate how
small changes can make a difference to
the overall FIFA experience, so what
116-7_360129[QA_FIFA14]NTICJA.indd 2
do you think is the most significant
change in FIFA 14?
The biggest alteration, by far, is the
precision movement and the new
technology we’ve introduced into
the step-based Locomotion system.
The reason I say that is because it’s
the fundamental layer of what FIFA
is built on, it’s the way players move,
and that affects everything else above
it; the dribbling, the ball control, the
positioning – it’s all based on top of
the players’ movement. What we’ve
done over the last couple of years is
build this system from scratch – it’s
completely different.
We started with canned animations,
then moved on to blended animations
Ian Collen INTERVIEW
“You can’t stop on a dime
any more and just turn in five
different ways in a second”
and now we have this new step-based TOP: Players will be
Locomotion engine. It’s really allowing able to move and
jostle for the ball
us to get the best of both worlds: the more realistically
responsiveness we had in last year’s than ever.
game, with players trying to get to
ABOVE: With Pure
where you’re asking them to go, but Shot you can still
in a way that’s more natural in terms screw things up –
of biomechanics. but at least you’ll
know why you did.
It’s taking into consideration the
foot plants, the weight shifts, how you
accelerate and decelerate and how the
momentum needs to be preserved,
so you can’t stop on a dime any more
and just turn five different ways in a
second – you have to think a little bit
more carefully about where you turn
and how you do so, which is true to
real football. And that’s going to have
a huge effect, as you can see by just
playing five minutes of the game.
360-gamer.com 117
07/06/2013 13:01
 LiveLife
Spotlight
on the XboX
live gaming
community

COMMUNITY NEWS the lateSt neWS FRom aRound

the online XboX WoRld

JUNGLE FEVER
those awaiting
the twelfth update
for Minecraft and
end of an error
expecting it to EA ditchEs NEvEr-pOpulAr ONliNE mONEy grAb
land in June will be
gut-wrenchingly
disappointed to
discover that it’s just T here was a time when online
passes for the likes of Skate 3,
not going to happen. Battlefield: Bad Company 2, Medal of
you will just have to
make do well enough without extra jungle Honor, Bulletstorm and Shift 2 Unleashed
features, redstone and a new tutorial mode would have, in real money, set you back
you probably have no use for anyway, because
you must be experts by now or you’ve been £6.50 had you purchased a second-
playing it wrong. Still, July is looking likely, so hand copy and wanted to play on live.
just hold on and soon you’ll be able to construct
the Wither by mixing skulls of Wither Skeletons Well those dark days are oh-oh-over,
with Soul Sand. oh yeah, new boss too. since the world’s largest publisher has
finally seen some form of sense that we
can’t quite fathom yet.
yes indeed, and to poorly paraphrase
gandalf, you shall not (need an online)
PLAY NICE pass to play any new electronic arts
it seems microsoft game in the future, either. the mega
has concerns about
retaliation between publisher has been busy going through
live users, which its archives and deleting the money
is why when you
complain about grabbing feature from its entire active
someone for dicking back-catalogue; the ones listed above
around or for being
particularly nasty, your name won’t be brought were just the start. that’s nice of ea,
into any action. the company has also changed ain’t it – bet you’re sorry about all the
the way such complaints are dealt with, since
it used to be the case that you could have an mean things you’ve been saying about
issue with someone and never, ever, find out it now. no? never mind.
if anything had been done about it; now you’ll
receive notification back to your console. So So why the sudden change of heart?
come on, everybody, get complaining about could it have something to do with what
each other! or at least, do if you have just cause
– microsoft is listening and now you’ll get proof. microsoft is planning for second-hand
games on the Xbox one (see page 41)?
has some shady deal been done above TOP: Now to inform
EA that no one likes
a tattoo parlour in downtown la? how
micro-transactions
come it’s now possible to pick up a copy either, eh?
of Mass Effect 2 for a few quid, activate
REALLY FAR CRY ABOVE: Now that EA
the Xbox live arcade
the cerberus network pass for nada
has taken its hand out
version of the original and get Zaeed in your team, FoR FRee? of our back pocket,
Crysis was pretty
special, despite not
oh there will be reasons, no doubt, but we kind of miss it.
featuring multiplayer, ea’s claiming that it has been listening
and it looks like it
won’t be the last
to customers and has finally understood
ageing crytek game that people never liked the system and
to receive a delightful
hd re-release. indeed, if the brazilian ratings
always found it to be a bit of a pain in the
board is to be believed (and we wouldn’t doubt bum… and bank.
it for fear of a capoeira kick to the face) then ABOVE: Of course, this move won’t stop EA
the original Far Cry will be heading to the Xbox
here’s the thing: if it is all to do with from trying to sell you unlockable stuff for real
360 via download sometime soon. it was a the Xbox one then it could mean that money once you’ve booted up the game… like our page at
crytek game too, of course, but one published
microsoft won’t be the only console www.facebook.com/
by ubisoft way back in 2004. not only was it 360gamer and
crytek’s first game to use the cryengine, it was manufacturer to employ some form of got any community or clan-related news follow @360_gamer
its actual first game ever. History.
second-hand game activation newness… you want to share with us? Fire an email on twitter and we
over to you, Sony. to mail@360-gamer.com now! can be bFFs!

118 360-gamer.com

118_360129[LiveLifePt1a]NTICJA.indd 1 07/06/2013 13:01

000_360128[ads].indd 1 10/05/2013 13:38
 The laTesT DlC fraggeD, TaggeD anD baggeD
DLC

Crysis 3: ThE LOsT isLanD

Price: 1200msP
Well £10.28 sure buys you some extra beauty to behold, but then Crysis 3 was never what could
be described as an ugly game – so what’s included for such a hefty cost? Well, that’ll be an entire
four maps based on a new (and lost) island in the Philippines (hence the name), two multiplayer
modes, Possession and Frenzy, and some new weapons in the form of the claw and Rhino. But is it
enough to bring new players online? not really, so you’re still going to find that matches are facing
an ever-decreasing number of combatants. How about some single-player extras, crytek?

DLC DLC DEMO

InjustIce: Gods AmonG FAR cRy 3 mAP edItoR ResIdent eVIl

us – KIllInG joKe
Price: 240 msP
An Ace chemical engineer quit his job to
become a stand-up comedian and all it took
was one bad day to drive him criminally
insane. such was Alan moore’s origin story for
the joker in his 1988 graphic novel, The Killing
Joke, and now you can download the three
outfits he wore within its beautiful pages.
there’s his casual tourist, Red Hood and final
confrontation getups to enjoy, but was the
story accurate? “I’m not exactly sure what
happened. sometimes I remember it one way,
sometimes another… If I’m going to have a
past, I prefer it to be multiple choice!” Weirdo.
PAcK: mARK IV style
Price: Free
Remember when you weren’t quite sure
whether or not you needed a copy of Far
Cry 3 to be able to enjoy Blood Dragon’s
direct-to-video eighties view of the year
2007? don’t worry, you weren’t alone. And
to add further confusion you actually WIll
need a copy should you want to enjoy the
pleasure of creating your own Blood Dragon
levels, thanks to this free dlc pack that
you’ll find on the dashboard under ‘extras’.
It’s pretty much the standard editor but
with a whole 50+ megabytes of new bits
and pieces, but it’s got a lot of heart.
ReVelAtIons
Price: Free
capcom couldn’t stop itself from charging
a bit of extra money for small dlc extras,
could it? that’s a rhetorical question, of
course, and we’re not really here to moan
about such tiresome practices that are even
more odd when you consider that a full
version of Revelations already came out on
the nintendo ds. But no matter, the demo
is pretty nifty and starts with jill Valentine
and Parker luciani hunting for a key so they
can begin to rescue chris Redfield aboard a
luxury liner that has suffered a breakout far
worse than dysentery – it’s proper Resi.

120 360-gamer.com

120_360129[Marketwatch]NTICJA.indd 1 07/06/2013 16:28

 N
LIVE LESeSredOthat…
e discov
This issue wh online ruined BioShock
it
… Flirting w parently.
Infinite, ap
BIOSHOCK
INFINITE
B ioShock Infinite began its
development back in 2009
and was announced with a May 2012
release date. Of course, it didn’t
happen and the game re-entered
development to include a possible
multiplayer option. Then in early
2013, Irrational Games announced
that multiplayer was being dropped
as it was ‘unnecessary’ to the overall
narrative, which was absolutely right
but meant a whole year had been
wasted with the game trapped in
limbo. It was finally released, in its
complete yet single-player-only state
on 28 March 2013 – but has the delay
damaged the game?
Technically, yes – it uses a very
similar graphics engine to that
featured in the previous games, so
it’s really starting to show its age;
environments look good, yet the
engine clearly wasn’t designed with
detailed character models in mind.
Those characters lack that next-
gen detail, being comparable to the
soulless, cartoony creations from the
likes of Fable III, and the least detailed
character is the one that appears the
most – leading lady Elizabeth.
Inspired by the 1893 World’s Fair,
BioShock Infinite is set in 1912 during
the growth of American Exceptionalism
and, while the game opens with a stab
at moral choices in the form of optional
racism, this is quickly forgotten about.
In fact nothing you do in BioShock
We’re not shy about our opinions on games, so why not join us and maybe you too can feel the joy of
seeing your name in print. Write a 250-word review for us and have the chance to get your work published
in the greatest and most modest Xbox 360 magazine in the world.
Send your review to our digital mailbag at mail@360-gamer.com, or alternatively post it at the
www.360-gamer.com forums for some feedback from your fellow readers!
121_360129[LiveLifePt2b]NTICJA.indd 1
Infinite will change your outcome,
and when it’s all over you’ll suddenly
realise that you’ve achieved absolutely
nothing at all.
The game later introduces the
concept of multiple realities, each
different from the last. Need to
acquire an item for someone? When
the dimensions are switched on you
and the NPC you’re helping is now
dead, your efforts up to that point
have been a waste of time. Your
friends may become your enemies
and your enemies may have already
been killed.
It’s all terribly confusing until
the ending wraps it up, but since
you finish up pretty much where
it all started, everything you do is
completely pointless. BioShock
Infinite is incredibly unfulfilling, lacks
closure and is a genuine chore to
play through. This, combined with
mediocre gunplay, out of place,
magic-like Vigors and dull characters
makes BioShock Infinite one of the
biggest disappointments of the year.
MY FAV U
ACHIEVO RITE
EMENT
TRIALS HD
After months and months and probably
then quite a few days more of practice,
SableRattler managed to do what is almost
the impossible and gain the Marathon
Achievement for Trials HD. “Ironically, I
was pretty banged up after an actual bike
accident so I found that I had plenty of time
on my hands to practice being perfect,”
says the gaming guru who we picture
playing while looking a bit like a mummy.
“Completing 20 levels without making a
mistake was probably a fluke, but I treasure
those particular 40Gs.” Well that’s pretty
damned amazing and will no doubt make you
even safer when you get back on the roads.
Got a favourite Achievement? Post it up at the
www.360-gamer.com forums!
ABOVE: She may
have the personality,
but Elizabeth’s look ARCADE EYE
isn’t for everyone. Fingering a future Arcade hit
LEFT: Flying cities
make sense yet
Vigors are simply
ridiculous. What a
crock this game is.
PLANTS VS. ZOMBIES 2:
IT’S ABOUT TIME
Now there’s a tagline that works on at least
two levels. One: we’ve been waiting for a
sequel to PopCap’s endearing masterpiece
BELOW: Why bother since pretty much the exact moment we
completed it and went back to start all over
about saving anyone
again. Two: the sequel will see Crazy Dave
if another version
(he’s crazy) doing a ‘Dr Who’ and taking
of them in another on the walking dead throughout history by
dimension is going implementing his tight horticultural skills.
to die? It will include new settings, new features,
new situations and the opportunity to see a
heavily muscled vegetable punch zombies
that walk like Egyptians. We’re there.
REVIEWER ARCADE ATTACK:
GARY GREEN
Live score challenge
Over-hyped, under- CALL OF JUAREZ
performing, and not
at all pleasurable.
GUNSLINGER
4
We believe in Silas Greaves. And if you’ve
realised that you have just read a Pixies
reference then more power to you because
READER’S you’re awesome – fancy being more so?
VERDICT And this bit goes out to all of you, by the
way. Then go to Gunslinger’s Arcade mode
and take on the Missouri Swamps and get
busy with some headshots. What we want
to see is a score higher than 722,510. You’ll
have to make every shot count, or at least
occasionally look at its fingers and make a
very confused face before making a highly
educated guess… Do it, because it’s just
what those low down varmints deserve.
360-gamer.com 121
07/06/2013 13:03
 your mag, online!
@360_Gamer
Talking wiTh
your fingers
Gothic-Chocobo cares about this
year’s E3 for one thing and one
thing only. “I so want a Fallout
announcement! Has there been any
news yet?” the Gothic one asked
over on the www.360-gamer.com/
forum with so much excitement that
the exclamation mark was in danger
of putting an eye out.
Bethesda has long since ceased all
Skyrim business and so it’s certainly
looking as if there are plenty of very
skilled people ready to head back
to the wastelands. You’d better
believe that G-C will be exploding
with joy at the thinnest sliver of
Fallout news, so why not pop over
to our hive of forumites and check
out the buzz.
The forum has many threads
of many themes, of course. One
deals with Achievements and, more
specifically, that moment when you
pop your 1,000G cherry. Not just the
first time, obviously – we all lost that
one years ago, but still there remains
that excitement and rush of blood to
the face when you get from one set
of 1,000G to another.
Sample Black, for example, passed
the 82,000 mark having earned 50G
for the ‘Welcome to the Penthouse
Achievement’ in Black Ops II – so
well done for that. Here, have an
emoticon :-) Our own co-ed 360
GAMER_Ian has recently rolled over
73,000, thanks to having stopped
playing FIFA 13 on one of our special
360 debug devices and started up
on his own damned machine. Feel his
joy. It’s furry.
Go on, do yourself a favour and
invent your very own forum thread.
Anything 360 or Xbox One-related
is welcome, there’s no fine imposed
for chatting about other systems,
and you won’t even get a hearty
slap should you start to talk about
your favourite cheeses. That would
be Edam shame… sorry.
122 360-gamer.com
122_360129[Website]NTICJA.indd 1
DirecT connecTion
Want to check out
all this content
right now? Got a
smartphone with
a camera, or a
webcam for your
PC? If so, grab
a QR scanner
programme and
point your lens at
the image next to this text, and you’ll be
magically redirected to a web page with all
CONTENT HIGHLIGHTS
this glorious content for you to enjoy.
And of course, there’s an awful lot more on
the site besides this, so put your feet up and
have a good old gander around the whole
bookface of www.360-gamer.com to find the hottest
daily news updates, plus reviews, screenshot
It seems like every single galleries and a feast of 360 gaming.
day more and more of
you are deciding that you
wouldn’t mind having 360
Gamer pop up on your
Facebook page to inform
you of what’s going on in
the world of Xbox, because
that’s exactly what’s happening. The more the merrier,
we say, so if you’ve remained shy about this whole social
networking malarkey then now is the time to take the
plunge and get your pants wet.
Sod finding old chums – we’re the only ones you need,
so come on in! The updates are lovely and there’s no easier
way to get in touch with the mag as well as other readers.
We’ll also notify you of competitions and occasionally post
some pics of cats playing videogames, which is no doubt
exactly what Tim Berners-Lee had in mind back when he 360 gamer
invented the worldwide web in the first place.
on youTube
Don’t forget, 360 Gamer has its very own
YouTube channel featuring all the hottest
videos of the games you can’t wait to play!
DigiTal revoluTions While the website only posts the stories,
reviews and previews that we think you need
You know how it goes.
to read, our YouTube channel updates with
You’ve been galloping pretty much every trailer we can lay our
across the rooftops of your hands on. Whether it’s a totally new game or
town late of an evening, just an update to something you’ve already
sliding down drainpipes heard about, we’ll have it. All you need to do
and swinging on lampposts is search for 360GamerDotCom on YouTube,
and, despite being an either via your computer or through the
absolute superhero, you YouTube app on your 360!
just haven’t managed to
get to your local magazine
stockist before they went
and dropped their shutters
for the day.
That’s not fun and can be
slightly embarrassing, but
there is a far easier way of
getting hold of the magazine – one that translates a mass
of zeroes and ones, beams them the through the ether
at pretty much the speed of light, and installs the digital
version of 360 Gamer right on the portable digital device
of your choice. It’s like magic, but with science and no
danger of being burned as a witch. classic reviews
Our digital edition makes the paper edition look like You may or may not have noticed that in
something that’s still based on technology invented then recent weeks we’ve been posting more and
properly employed by Steve Guttenberg circa 1450AD, and more reviews and previews from the 360
you can get hold of it by using such apps as Newsstand Gamer magazine to www.360-gamer.com,
or Pocketmags on your shiny iPad, iPhone and Android along with multiple daily news updates on
breaking stories. If you didn’t notice, shame
communication wonder machines.
on you! But if you’ve been eyeing up an old
Back issues are available, too, and you can even get hold
release on those pre-owned shelves but
of the magazine online by using that there internet. Visit don’t want to hand over your hard-earned
www.360-gamer.com, and we’ll sort you out. All you have cash before reading our official verdict,
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doing things that’s going from strength to strength, and and we’ll do our best to upload the review
then to strength again – possibly forever. as quick as a flash.
07/06/2013 16:30
 Galaxy
INSTANT EXPERT

Your essential guide to Samsung Galaxy tablets

Samsung’s Galaxy tablets are

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Instant Expert guide is designed
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and game recommendations too!

Every vital Galaxy topic covered:

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AVAILABLE NOW – ONLY £9.99

GalaxyA4HousAd.indd 1 06/06/2013 19:45
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 360 MAILBOX
THE PLACE TO HAVE YOUR SAY ON ANYTHING XBOX 360-RELATED…

CONTACT US YOU cAn GET In TOUch wITh 360 GAMER In A vARIETY Of wAYS:

THERE’s EMAIL! THERE’s THE POsT! THE FORUM! THERE’s THE WEB!
Yep, you can bung us one of them 360 Mailbox, 360 GAMER, Talk with other like-minded Like our www.facebook.com/360gamer
there ‘electronic mail’ thingies to: 3 East Avenue, Bournemouth, gamers through the forum: page or follow @360_gamer on Twitter
mail@360-gamer.com Dorset, BH3 7BW www.gamer.tm/forum and we can be BFFs!

Next-gen? No thanks
I must say with all the talk and revealing of
the next-generation game consoles I am still
not convinced that there is much to be that
excited about. Surely I am not alone in the
disappointment of Xbox One being more
of an entertainment system rather than a
gaming console.
I will be perfectly honest, I had no interest
in games until I saw Lost Planet running on
the Xbox 360 and that was the beginning of
my journey into gaming. Personally I still think
there are great things happening on the Xbox
360 to be more excited about than the next-
generation consoles. It is not all about fidelity
and how detailed it is, but the fact that we as
gamers get great games.
Personally I was looking forward to a new
GAME console not an entertainment system. I
am sure I am not alone in my disappointment,
and my concerns for what it means for
gaming. I know tablets have changed the
way games are played but I still would like a
gaming console that enables developers to
deliver great games that gamers can play
even if they do not sell 10 or 20 million units.
Thankfully there is some relief from
all this importance being placed on the
next-generation consoles; that there are
some great games forthcoming on this
generation of gaming consoles, and that
makes it exciting. with the amazing reveal
of Battlefield 4 and its incredible 17-minute
campaign demo I must say I am more
excited about Battlefield 4 than I am any next
generation console, and I will be definitely be
playing Battlefield 4 on the Xbox 360.
LIAM M DUNGATE (THANET), VIA EMAIL
It is THE ONE, Neo
I love the way everyone is bitching about the
Xbox One just being a Tivo, or how they don’t
care about watching Tv on it, or that they
only buy used games and always lend games
to their mates so they won’t buy it and will
stick to their 360s instead. You know what?
DOn’T BUY IT ThEn. Keep playing your 360,
but trust me a year from now there won’t be
any new games for it. That’s right, I’m calling
it: the 360 will have no new games come E3
2014. Stop living in a cave and just buy the
new console, muppets!
COLIN BURNs, VIA EMAIL
Ghost Recon saves Xbox Live
I was recently talking with my friend and
Xbox buddy, when he announced his Xbox
Live Gold subscription had run out and he
wasn’t sure he would renew it. he said he
played fIfA and cOD online and was fed up
with kids questioning his parenthood, telling
him he was shit or cheating, or just doing that
stupid singing thing. In fact, he announced his
subscription had run out a couple of months
ago and he didn’t miss it!
I thought about this and I have to admit, I
struggled to remember the last time I played
cOD or anything else online and enjoyed
ABOVE: Sounds like
the boys at Ubisoft
Paris deserve some
medals. Future Soldier
saved Paul’s Xbox Live
subscription!
LEFT: There are plenty
of games still heading
for the 360, so there’s
life in the console yet.
But Battlefield 4 won’t
look this pretty on it…
it. There’s a torrent of rants that make you
reach for the mute button before each match.
Each player seems more interested in ranking
up with their twin gold Uzis than winning a
match. Or they sit in the corner of a map and
don’t do anything else – they don’t capture
any Domination points, disarm bombs – then
they say after the match that everyone else in
their team is shit! Argh!
My friend maybe had a point… I might
not renew my own subscription. Then
about a week later, I played Ghost Recon
Future Soldier. I know this game has many
multiplayer faults, and a lesser man than me
might even call it a disc snapper, but I stuck
with it. And I actually found myself in a match
were everyone was trying to win the game!
There were guys from all over the world
playing: the US, Spain, UK, Ireland and who
knows where else.
Everyone was giving intel. “There’s two
guys near the objective,” “There’s a couple at
the top of the stairs”. Players were using the
different classes properly. There where hard-
fought firefights, curses, encouragements,
laughs and exclamations. Both teams were
swept away in the focus to win, and in that
ten minutes of gaming gold nothing else
mattered. After the game finished, one team
won by the narrowest of margins, all players
congratulated each other, talked about
highlights during the game, and all agreed
it was a close but brilliant match.
It harked back to the good old days of online
gaming, when strangers all played together
with a common goal: to have a good game!
Anyway, purely as a result of this one game, I
have renewed my Xbox Live subscription. And
I would like to thank Ubisoft for making Future
Soldier, and more importantly the Ghost Recon
gamers for renewing my faith in today’s online
gaming. And a word to my Xbox: I’m sorry for
ever doubting you.
PAUL DONAGHY, VIA EMAIL
PS – I was on the winning team, BOOM!

126 360-gamer.com

126_360129[letters]NTICJA.indd 1 06/06/2013 13:12


Achieve Total Recall
Capcom is one of our all-time favourite
studios for a whole host of reasons – not
least of which the fact that it isn’t just
willing to take risks, but it actually feels
obliged to do so. Anyone who lived through
the last console generation will remember
“The Capcom Five” and, fittingly enough,
that same commitment to innovation gave
us Remember Me.
Who else among the triple-A publishing
crowd would trust a team of crazy Parisians
to make a game starring a girl that’s all
about mind-bending existentialism? The
127_360129[Compo]NTICJA.indd 1
COMPETITION
same company that gave Ninja Theory the
keys to Devil May Cry and produced one of
the best games of 2012.
With its lavish futuristic visuals, dystopian
future setting and mind-bending Phil Dick-
ian questions about memory, identity and
reality, the super stylish Remember Me
ticks all the boxes on our sci-fi wish list.
Throw in combo-tastic combat from Street
Fighter producer Yoshinori Ono and you’ve
got a game that has been passed around
everyone on the team this issue – and now
it’s your chance to get your hands on it too!
WIN
Rem ! embeR
me
We’ve got five copies to give away to you
lucky readers and we’re doing things just a
little bit differently this month. Head over to
our shiny website at www.360-gamer.com
and click the “Competitions” tab at the top
of the page. Then just click the link for our
Remember Me compo, answer the question
and presto – you’ve entered!
The closing date for entries is midnight
on 16 July 2013, so get your ass to Mars…
we mean, to www.360-gamer.com… and
click the Competition tab pronto!
360-gamer.com 127
06/06/2013 13:12
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128_360128[backIssues]NTICJA.indd 1 06/06/2013 13:13

 ALL CHANGE
As of next month, 360 Gamer will become ONE Gamer
For all the details, flick to page 45…

Issue 130
is on sale
Wednesday
17 July or
turn to page 124
to subscribe

NEW NAME, SAME GREAT MAG ● NUMBER ONE FOR XBOX ONE
STILL THE BEST FOR XBOX 360 ● STILL 100% INDEPENDENT
360-gamer.com 129

129_360129[NextIssue]NTICJA.indd 1 07/06/2013 16:00


CELEBRATING THE BEST MOMENTS OF XBOX 360 GAMING
MONACO: WHAT’S YOURS IS MINE
PUTTING THE LIME IN THE COCONUT
PUBLISHER: “All I want you guys to talk about, if you have to, is
Majesco
Entertainment what you’re going to do. That should do it. Here are
DEVELOPER: your names… Mr Blue, Mr Yellow, Mr Pink, Ms Red,
Pocketwatch Games Ms Orange, Mr Violet, Mr Green, Mr Teal.”
RELEASED: If The Cleaner has an issue with being colour-coded
10 May 2013
pink, then the way he speaks in enigmatic ellipses never
REVIEWED:
Issue 127 expresses his homophobic rage. This is a man you don’t
cross, because he will end you – he has so obviously
already considered it.
Monaco takes on different forms depending on how
you play it, who you play as and who you play with.
Experienced and alone, it’s possible to focus on your
tasks, be stealthy as hell and be in and out of a heist
with little chance of detection or death.
At least if you play Mr Teal, aka The Gentleman,
and make use of his talent for disguise. Ms Red, The
Lookout, is a good bet too, since she can detect guards
at great range and so is always one step ahead. As Mr
Pink you can opt to knock people out and so take the
guards out of the equation.
Then you play with a single friend, right next to you
on the couch, and already there’s plenty of opportunity
for bickering, especially when things start going all
Wild Bunch. Communication is key when you’re a fresh
pair of newbie thieves, but with practice each player’s
130
130_360129[parting]NTICJA.indd 1
PARTING SHOT
role in the job at hand will become second nature.
And so you can start again, this time going for speed
as well as elegance while keeping the body count at
an absolute minimum.
But it’s when you attempt a job as a group of four
online players who have never met each other before,
don’t know anything about one another and have no
idea of individual styles that utter chaos can explode
out of any given situation.
Mr Green, aka The Hacker, should be focusing on
hacking, but he’s decided to start executing people. Mr
Violet, The Mole, smashes through a wall so he can claim
some coins – and in doing so he attracts the attention of
security. Worse still, if his player is inexperienced, he can
find himself bashing a wall by accident and subsequently
ruining what was one smooth operation. Such is the
game’s beauty.
Able to provide the background for many a tale
of supposed criminal expertise, and near perfectly
designed to promote experimentation, Monaco can
be taken seriously or casually or anywhere in-between.
Fun alone, with close friends or those you’ve never met
and will never see online again, it’s a modern classic
that highlights more faults in its players than it does
in the actual design. A near-perfect crime.
06/06/2013 09:55
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000_360129[ads].indd 1 07/06/2013 13:37