Summer of Struggle

My blog unfortunately ended up getting rather ignored during the Summer holidays, many family commitments and to an extent my own laziness, saw the blog get ignored. I did however, play quite a few games during those weeks. Most of my experiences were lows but there were a few high points. So, without further ado the first game I played and actually finished was the original Bioshock remastered for the Xbox One. It was fun to go back through memory lane but I one thing I definitely don't miss is the constant searching through every locker, box and desk. I like the survival elements, but I prefer a game now that paces gathering resources, rather than turn you into a magpie on steroids.
It's quite a long game as well and I did kinda feel like it was out staying it's welcome. You hit a point where there aren't new enemies being introduced and the difficulty curve slumps. Enemies become fairly tanky but don't pose much of threat when you have so much ammo, plasmids and cash to bully your way through the latter few areas.

The next game I played, woah man. What a point of contention and just talking about it to any other human being is liable to get me verbally or indeed physically assaulted. Zelda, Breath of the Wild. I quit this game, ten hours in and I was at worst bored and best aggravated. I'm not going to whittle in, it seems my gripes were not isolated and quite a few other people have the same opinion as me. I hated the weapon fragility mechanic, I hated the one shotting, I hated the far to big open world that was virtually empty, I hated spending 70% of my time climbing and I hated how aimless of a game it was. 
My experiences with the Zelda franchise aren't exactly spotless, I've had conflicts with entries before. The only title I've played and loved hard is Minish Cap, something about that game is just perfect but yeah, Breath of the Wild. It was a real misfire for me.

I started to replay Call of Duty Ghosts' campaign, but when I finished a mission and the game crashed and lost all my progress I just gave up right there and then. No matter, Modern Warfare is out soon.

I replayed Resident Evil 4 for the first time in years! Thanks to the Xbox Game Pass! (another mention, come on Microsoft, money under the table - know what I mean). I enjoyed it, I liked the new control scheme I was able to use and didn't think it looked to bad, I heard the the upscaled textures weren't amazing but it was still enough to creep me out here and there. Still can't believe how much ammo I ended up with, I had so many shotgun rounds I had to start spamming shots just to make room for other things.
Resident Evil 4 is truly a timeless game.

I started Devil May Cry 5 but for some reason I just wasn't able to get into it. The game isn't bad, not at all, I think it's a simple case of wrong game, wrong time. I got to Nero's second boss, the annoying flying creature. When I start proper I'll probably start a new game. Shame though because it really is a continuation of the original series, it was a bit jarring to play a hack'n'slash game and not use a shoulder button to strike.

I also played my second ever battle royale game and if anyone knows me, they'll know I personally despise this genre of gaming, one of the reasons is fairly shallow. It's because battle royale games have had a negative affect on the industry and I also find them the most boring way to play a shooting game. Why someone would rather run around an enormous map for twenty minutes, following strangers and hoarding ammo only to die in 2 seconds from someone you probably never saw coming.
The map is so open, there is so little cover you can't get a hunter sensation going. The variety of weapons and ammo types and power ups and armor and passive abilities just create so many unnecessary variables. I just really hate these games, they bore me to tears. I won my first match, I killed two people and played for over 20 minutes. In twenty minutes I experienced ten seconds, if that of combat. Wow! Player engagement is so high! But hey, these games are normally free and crammed with overpriced micro transactions and somehow, despite looking like a fucking horrible prospect, this business model works.
So yeah, I won't be a BR convert.

Lastly, I played Forza Horizon 4 which I was really enjoying until I qualified for the roster and then it turned into a live service racing game and lost any sense of racing career structure which was an immediate turn off for me.
Have to say though, gorgeous game and it is fun driving around very familiar settings (though I've never been to Edinburgh). I just wish it had structure, I didn't realise until over ten hours later after racing with the same car for what seemed like ages, that you can swap your class or type of car to change the race, within reason. 
I also hated all the crappy dialogue and those Top Gear missions were the absolute worst, especially with the cheese ridden voice over. 
This game made me miss Test Drive Unlimited (which is a fantastic game, shame they made it crap with the second game).

Anywho, that pretty much wraps my gaming experiences up. Only a few days time and I'll be playing Gears of War 5 which I'm very excited to play, hope the campaign is an improvement over Gears 4 and I'm also looking forward to giving the multiplayer mode and good go... Well, at least until Modern Warfare comes out then sadly I'm gone.