Team Fortress 2

I have recently been getting into more PC games, partially so I could play with friends and partially because every game developer decided to release their games all at the same time at the end of the year. Anyway, I upgraded my piece of crap computer to a better one, not exceptionally good but pretty good to do what I need it to do, I’m not a PC gamer so I’m not going to shed out ridiculous amounts of money on a computer.

My friend told me that I must get Team Fortress 2 because it’s ‘amazing’. I remember seeing this title in a store a long time ago, probably when it just came out and I thought it looked pretty damn awesome but I never played it until a few weeks ago, and I have to say this is  one of the best multiplayer experiences I have ever had. Team Fortress 2 is so much fun despite the high learning curve of each class.

I love the way this game looks. I have never seen a game that looks cartoony and fun yet so amazing and hard. Most of the classes actually take skill to master unlike in COD when anyone can have at least a small amount of success. If you’re one of those douche bags who run around with Ghost, Second Chance and a noob tube then this game might not be for you.

Each class is made up of a primary weapon, a secondary weapon and a melee weapon, some classes have more things, the Engineer has another two spots to create and demolish buildings and the Spy has an extra slot for disguises. Each class is different in it’s own way, they all wield their own weapons. The Soldier has a rocket launcher, shotgun and a shovel, the Scout has a Scattergun (shotgun), a pistol and a baseball bat, the Pyro has a flamethrower, a shotgun and a fire axe, the Demoman has a grenade launcher, don’t worry, it’s not like the noob tubes in Call of Duty, the grenades don’t explode on impact unless they hit someone, a sticky bomb launcher which can be detonated at anytime and a whiskey bottle, the Heavy has a mini gun, a shotgun and his fists, the Engineer has a shotgun, a pistol, a wrench, a PDA to create buildings and another to demolish. The Medic has a syringe gun, a medigun which heals people and a saw. The Sniper has a sniper rifle, a sub machine gun and a sword. Finally, the Spy has a revolver, a sapper which destroys buildings, a knife to backstab and finally a book of disguises.

These are all the vanilla loadouts of the classes, these slots can be change to different weapons, e.g. the Scout can change his secondary to a jar of milk or different energy drinks, the Demoman can have a range of different swords. There are a lot of items that I’m not going to go into because it would take forever.

Even though there is a learning curve on this game, there is a class for everyone. My favourites are the Scout and the Soldier. The Scout is definitely one of the hardest to master along with the Spy. The easiest is the Pyro, you’ll often hear people say W+M1, the mantra of the Pyro. If you play this game you’ll understand.

One thing I love about this game is that it is so balanced, there is nothing in this game that I’ve really gotten worked up about or that’s made me rage quit, in fact, I don’t think I’ve ever raged quitted from this game. I have shouted at my monitor because of Spies killing me a lot but then I stop and realise that the Spy class is really hard and either they are too good or I’m not playing right. Obviously Jesus made a really good comment on this game, ‘The moment you start making your vanilla weapons looks bad is the moment you have an unbalanced game.’ This is so true and Team Fortress 2 doesn’t fall into the unbalanced category. I still use the vanilla Scattergun for the Scout, I used the vanilla rocket launcher for the Solider for a long time, I use the vanilla syringe and medigun for the medic.

This game was recently made F2P, you may be called a F2P noob when you start, somehow I didn’t. A lot of people complained that they bought the game the day before it went F2P but to be honest, it’s worth the $10 or £10 or €10. There are a bunch of benefits to upgrading to a premium account, you can trade with other players, get more inventory space, that was the big one for me. I went into the store and found a cheap item that I wanted and bought it, it cost me 74 cents to upgrade my account. I have hardly covered anything in this article, maybe I’ll do another one on each class, discussing strategies and ways to play each class. There’s no reason not to try out this game, it’s free!

Competitive Gamebattles

I’m a huge fan of Machinima and Machinima Respawn and they do a great job of posting content of video games that people want on YouTube. Recently Respawn have been posting gamebattle matches with some of my favourite commentators playing. I’ve always loved the idea of playing competitively in a team and watching those videos coupled with watching the Call of Community a couple of days ago has really got me wanting to play some competitive Call of Duty.

Not too long ago was I hating the idea of putting Black Ops in my disc tray and even buying MW3 but lately I find myself really enjoying Black Ops once again. Maybe just playing some scrims or just playing some games for fun would satisfy me. Just playing against actual organised human beings would be good enough. Even though I would love to start up a team with my friends most of my friends aren’t beasts are Call of Duty, one is beast, two are good objective players and I would consider myself to be all right, maybe not a beast, an inconsistent beast would be the best way to describe me. I guess I could start up a team but we would get raped!

If you’re on Xbox and you want to play, not even gamebattles then add me and message me, Gamertag in ‘About’.

Battlefield over Call of Duty

I haven’t posted anything in a while so I thought I’d talk about something that is kind of important in games right now and will be later on this year. Lately I’ve been a lot more interested in Battlefield: Bad Company 2. I bought the game when it first came out and I immediately fell in love, I played a lot of COD near the end of MW2 and pretty much played COD over Battlefield most of the time, only going back for a game or two. Now I’m back in and really excited for Battlefield 3 and not so excited for MW3.

For me it’s the gameplay, I do enjoy arena games like Halo and COD but I love the open battlefields and realistic gameplay that is showcased in Battlefield. I understand that games like COD may take more gun skill to drop opponents and complete objectives but in Battlefield you have to work together, I mean it’s like real war! You have to revive to keep ticket numbers up, give ammo, spot people etc. There are a lot of games that I want for example, L.A. Noire, Portal 2 and games that haven’t come out yet like Skyrim but I haven’t been feeling the same way about MW3. The engine has hardly been upgraded since COD4 and I’m not a graphics whore! But seriously, the Frostbite engine has was upgraded from Bad Company 1 to Bad Company 2 and now they are upgrading it again! That shows that DICE aren’t looking for a game to crap out every year whether it’s ready or not, they want to take their sweet time making a quality game. Who knows, with Sledgehammer helping Infinity Ward on the campaign and Raven Software takes care of the multiplayer, we could see a great experience in online gaming, but I wouldn’t get your hopes up.

I know it sounds like I’m crapping on the Call of Duty franchise which I am and not very subtly but I do love Call of Duty no matter how much it angers me sometimes. In fact I am getting into it a little more thanks to Machinima Respawn posting competitive gamebattle matches and the Call of Community which just passed really got my hyped up to play Call of Duty.

I’m not sure if I’ll get MW3 but I’m not going to say no straight away. I know if something sells why stop selling it but I hope Activision one day see that enough is enough and do something about the franchise.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare

A lot of gamers whether hardcore or just recreational gamers will say that COD 4 is one game that you must play. I first played the COD 4 campaign a couple of weeks ago and it turned out to be my second favourite COD campaign, Black Ops being my favourite. It just felt so much more realistic.

Obviously I was a little confused at some parts of MW2 because I had never played the first Modern Warfare but this one filled in all the pieces. I managed to knock out the whole campaign in one sitting in an afternoon, determined to get it finished. Whilst playing I encountered the best Call of Duty mission I have ever played, sniping with Captain MacMillan. MW2 was epic, I loved the airport massacre mission just as much as the next guy and I love Ghost and the rest of the characters but the overall atmosphere of COD 4 captured me.

As soon as I completed the campaign I hopped over to multiplayer and had pretty good results. My friend previously mentioned that the snipers were immense, just like the rest of the community. I’m not a Call of Duty sniper, I can only snipe on Battlefield, so having good scores with a sniper in Call of Duty was a big deal for me. My best scores were with the MP5 and the M4 Carbine.

At first I was surprised that I hadn’t come across any hacking, turns out I just had to play the game a little more. Pretty much as soon as I came across the first floating enemy I took the game out of the disc tray, not only floating enemies but people advertising their COD hacking websites at the side of the screen.

Finally I can see why most fans still think COD 4 is still one of the best Call of Duty games

Crysis 2 Tips

• Crysis 2 isn’t like other FPS games. It’s not like COD where you just run around shooting people, I’m not saying that you don’t need a strategy to do well in Call of Duty but all it is, is you and your gun and nothing else. In Crysis 2 you are equipped with a nanosuit which possesses nanosuit abilities. This leads on to my first tip, use all of your nanosuit abilities. You can use one more than the other but it is important that you use all of them. If you don’t use all of them you are going to get beaten time and time again.
• A lot of people might not think this but I do, this is a very important tip, do not get distracted by the awesome water animation. On Skyline, I once sat in a corner to recharge and I got distracted by the water dripping off my visor and I was stealth killed. It might not seem like a big deal but you could be about to collect your 7th dog tag.
• Understand the maps. This one can apply to all first person shooters but in Crysis 2 it is especially important. If you are low on energy you’re going to need some where safe to recharge, you don’t want to be caught with your pants down in the open.
• Never shoot whilst cloaked. A lot of people didn’t know this one at first but if you shoot whilst cloaked it will drain all your energy, this goes for grenades and melee too. Handguns are the only weapon that doesn’t completely drain your energy. An easy way to switch out of cloak rapidly is to switch to armour, you’ll probably be getting into a gun fight anyway and it protects you from other enemies around you.
• This one applies to other first person shooters but again, I think this one applies more to Crysis 2 because of the nanosuit. Choose your modules wisely, they can help greatly with your nanosuit.
• A lot of people don’t like the idea of cloaking too much in Crysis 2. Some people say it’s like camping or it’s noobish or some people just aren’t used to it but it’s not. The game has given it to you, use it. If your opponent isn’t using it you’re already one step closer to killing him and not getting killed by his team mate.
• Watch Crysis 2 videos. Before I got Crysis 2 I drooled over it watching commentaries and tips videos. It will improve your game even if you don’t realise it.
• Finally, play the game. With experience you’ll know what the best attachments are, what the best modules are etc. Over time you’ll also know what cloaked enemies look like and understand the maps more.

Team based or lone wolf?

I enjoy a good game of Call of Duty but I also enjoy a game of Battlefield or Halo. I enjoy these games for different reasons and everyone will have a different opinion. Call of Duty, even if you’re playing a team game, is a lone wolf game. Even in Team Deathmatch or Team Slayer, everyone is competing for the kills. The fact that there’s a kill limit really increases the competition. In Battlefield the games aren’t necessarily based on kills as it is a class based game. The multiplayer is split up into different classes that are meant to perform different tasks to benefit the team. By introducing tasks that don’t involve killing, the game turns into something a bit more sophisticated. By not even showing the amount of kills, assists, deaths and kill death ratio, it changes how the game is looked upon even more.

Halo may have games like Team Slayer and Lone Wolf game modes but there are more team based games that are actually team based. Doubles requires a lot of team work to effectively eliminate the other two enemies. In Halo: Reach, with the introduction to jet packs, sprint, evade, active camo and armour lock it creates even more team work, different people who are good at different things need to choose the best load out to achieve their goal. A sniper might choose a jet pack to get to high places or active camo. A player who likes to rush might choose sprint or evade or even armour lock. Halo and Battlefield and other games like Homefront (a game that I have no intention of playing) all have vehicles, something that Call of Duty STILL lacks in it’s gameplay. The use of vehicles creates a sense of team play, especially in Battlefield, one player in charge of something, the other in charge of another thing. Personally the best game that has mastered both of these things is Halo, it has the team work part in some game types and has other game types that suit solitary players but in the end I would take a game that takes team work and communication, like Battlefield, over Call of Duty. It forces you to communicate with other players and actually use a strategy and use your skills to complete the objective. I would love it if games started to meander to the team work side of gameplay but there will always be games like Call of Duty that live on, I can only dream that a team based game will be the next COD killer.

Is Black Ops already boring?

Everyone gets excited when it’s that time of the year when the new Call of Duty is released. I was really excited for this COD title because I wanted to see how they would expand and create a new game as good as Modern Warfare, especially after the slight disappointment that was World at War. I say ‘slight’ because it was my first COD title and I personally didn’t find it that bad… until I played MW2.

Don’t get me wrong, I loved Black Ops, I prefer it to MW2, the campaign has certainly gotten better, the action packed missions like, sliding down a zip wire whilst shooting at windows and killing guys. It is definitely the best campaign yet. I know some people may say that the Modern Warfare series may have a better storyline and it may but it lacked the epic feel that Black Ops has. Yes I know, shooting a load of civilians is awesome but it still wasn’t action packed. This brings me onto the multiplayer. The multiplayer is by far the best so far out of the series. It’s great to see that Treyarc are trying their best to combat retarded campers by only allowing killstreaks to be awarded with kills with weapons on your person. I got to say that I don’t really enjoy a lot of the killstreaks, my current set up for Team Deathmatch and anything other than Free for All is, Blackbird, Chopper Gunner and Dogs, Gunship is way to risky, if I get eleven kills I don’t want to be shot out of the sky in an instant. If I’m in Free for All I usually swap Chopper Gunner for a Spy Plane. Spy Planes are really underrated and are extremely helpful in Free for All as everyone is an enemy. I don’t use Chopper Gunner because thirty kills is the limit and I’m not looking for a ridiculous amount of kills, just to win and dogs will most likely be able to do that.

I know a few people, including myself that weren’t sure about buying this game in the first place and in the end we all did. I love this game but it doesn’t stop me wondering about the next Call of Duty and how it’ll bring a new and exciting aspect to first person shooters. First person shooters need to do this or they’ll be tossed out with the rest of the garbage like World at War was. Infinity Ward did create the Modern Warefare series so I’m not as nervous but with ever increasing competition with first person shooters Infinity Ward can’t just release another Modern Warfare title, believe it or not, a lot of gamers actually don’t  just drink Mountain Dew and eat Cheetos, (even though I do enjoy those things) they have a mind of their own and they will realise that they’ve been playing the same game for three years.

I know the Call of Duty series won’t suddenly become popular, it’s one of the best, if not the best first person shooter out there and it will continue to sell but just because it sells doesn’t mean it won’t become popular. The Wii was poplar then suddenly everyone realised what they had done and went out and bought themselves an Xbox 360 or a PS3, the smarter ones, a Xbox 360.