Journeying from their home to new lands in England, Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla’s viking tribe comes near the shore, noticing crucifixes adorning churches. It’s hilarious to them – a religion that celebrates not only a defeat, but symbolizes the torture device that killed the Christian’s prophet. It’s a clever way to sell Viking beliefs and culture,… Continue reading Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla (PS4)
Recent real world reports revealed Donald Trump’s administration performed forced hysterectomies on immigrants, a story that compares to the blathering fear mongering over illegals and terrorists in Watch Dog: Legions. A privatized police force roams the city, guns almost always drawn, leering checkpoints scanning every Londoner as they pass. Given the number of cameras, there’s… Continue reading Watch Dogs: Legion (Xbox One)
Ghost Recon: Breakpoint seems anti-conservative. Torture bad, the narrative says. In flashbacks to Iraq, the antagonist played by Jon Bernthal is stuck in the mid-2000s, projecting Bush-era aggressiveness. He’s repulsed by those who won’t abuse prisoners. Protagonist “Nomad” keeps a firm heroic posture in story sequences. Then in-game, Nomad bashes heads in with pistols to… Continue reading Ghost Recon: Breakpoint (PS4)
The first kill comes quick in Far Cry: New Dawn. As things go in numerous contemporary videogames, it’s a crouch, wait, pounce sequence. Doing so brings up an animation in which the victim is spun around, punched in the stomach, put in a headlock, then stabbed in the eye by scissors. Far Cry: New Dawn… Continue reading Far Cry: New Dawn (PS4)
Here’s the concept of The Crew 2: A bunch of rebellious motor geeks set up unsanctioned races across the United States in order to gain personal online infamy. Street racing? Plausible, complete with civilians fleeing in terror as cars drift along sidewalks. Power boat racing on the Vegas strip? Probably not. There’s tone deaf and… Continue reading The Crew 2 (PS4)
Guns. You like guns? Far Cry 5 likes guns. It has all kinds of guns. Machine guns, pistol guns, assault guns. Guns on rooftops. Mounted guns. Guns for walking all stealthy and guns for making noise or blowing stuff up. Guns dressed with American flags like some people dress their poodles, others wearing skulls, the… Continue reading Far Cry 5 (PS4)
Time travel is a central mechanism to Fractured but Whole. That’s appropriate. The UbiSoft production skims 20 years of South Park lore. From the surreal early seasons, filled with miniature pets and gay dogs, to the languishing of recent safe, centrist-leaning parody, including PC Principal. Maybe it’s the development timeline; Fractured but Whole is classic… Continue reading South Park: The Fractured but Whole (PS4)
Explain the Mushroom Kingdom to any adult who didn’t grow up with it: There’s a hero Mario and his brother Luigi who get bigger by eating red-capped mushrooms and ride a dinosaur while saving red-capped mushroom people who are different than the mushrooms that make Mario & Luigi big and they all fight this angry… Continue reading Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle (Switch)
Bolivia’s population exceeds 10 million people. In Ghost Recon: Wildlands, most of those 10 million deal cocaine. Ghost Recon doesn’t have time to develop characters, or it simply doesn’t care. The four American soldiers dropping into Bolivia to deal with the illicit drug trade serve as blank canvases, optionally painted with stars and stripes during… Continue reading Ghost Recon: Wildlands (PS4)
Like an internet argument turned videogame, For Honor pits vikings, knights, and samurai against one another. Although SpikeTV tried the same thing with their show Deadliest Warrior, UbiSoft takes the premise into a dull, vapid tale filled with muscular combat. It’s Dynasty Warriors by way of a western studio, and a prime example of how… Continue reading For Honor (PS4)
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