And now for the sequel. That’s the trick, isn’t it? If a game is successful then the studio end up being required to do it again, and it must be the same, but more so and different. Getting that right can be a peculiar challenge. There’s a stack of shortcuts available, of course, because you’re building on existing technology, fiction, and art, but there’s also the challenge of not throwing away that advantage and actually making something better, or more interesting. That’s the challenge that Gearbox now face with Borderlands 2: to build on the relative success of their left-field post-apocalyptic space frontier, and to carve out wider horizons for one of the most interesting hybrid-FPS projects in mainstream gaming.
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Rock, Paper, Shotgun
Posts Tagged ‘2K games’
Pandora's (Gear)box
Hands On: Borderlands 2
By Jim Rossignol on April 4th, 2012.
What A Scream: Bioshock Infinite’s Boys Of Silence
By Adam Smith on March 20th, 2012.
The Boys of Silence sound like an incredible New Romantic band so I was slightly disappointed to find that they’re actually blind men with two gramophones soldered onto their heads. If ever a game needed less mechaniman monstrosities and more synth pop, Bioshock: Infinite is that game. With these cantankerous “walking cameras” that emit the shriek of a thousand sirens and Mr Tickle’s dangerous yet sorrowful offspring it’s a world full of ruined metal men. What do they do for fun? Brief footage of a Boy of Silence below, along with Mr Levine and others enthusing about the concept.
Wild Palms: Bioshock Infinite Footage Shows Handyman
By Jim Rossignol on March 14th, 2012.
Levine describes this latest “heavy hitter” character as “sort of a tragic figure.” The video goes some way to explaining why: a heavily-scarred gentleman trapped in a giant, ape-like robotic suit, at the centre of which is what appears to be a heart in a glass case. Threatening, indeed, but you really wouldn’t want to share his fate. There’s a bit of footage, and even a few glimpses of concept art for what the handyman could have been in other, hideous incarnations.
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Sand In Your Pants: The Itchy New Spec Ops Trailer
By Craig Pearson on March 13th, 2012.
Spec Ops: The Line is on a mission to prove it’s not just the sand that’s gritty with this new “Community Gameplay Trailer”. Whoever the Spec Ops community is, they’re sick puppies, as this is nothing but a catalogue of human misery: Argos filled with skulls, a Littlewoods of pain, an Innovations dedicated exclusively to a helmet that stops brain matter from staining your nice rug. Bad things might go down in the desert, but you won’t have to worry about worming bits of lobe out your finest shag with the Brain Buster! Act now and get Butt Blaster, the amazing all-in-one rifle butt cleaner and clockwork radio.
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The Future Of The Past
Mecha Patriots: All We Know About BioShock Infinite
By Craig Pearson on March 8th, 2012.
BioShock Infinite is by far the game I’m most excited about this year. I’m torn between wanting to know everything, and wanting it to be a surprise, but that plan was somewhat undermined by being sent to New York to cover the reveal of the game. My attempts to wipe it from my brain by drinking lots of vodka and dancing with Kieron (we linked arms and kicked legs) around a restaurant failed. Instead I’m burdened with The Knowledge, and an insatiable desire to know more. Last night’s reveal of the Motorised Patriot, part a new class of enemy called Heavy Hitter, I added to my Levine Shrine. He talked to G4 of how the Patriot is a fearless killing machine, and how the Heavy Hitters “… are enemies that are used to not just be more powerful, but to augment the abilities of the more traditional BioShock enemies. You’re going to come across them in certain areas of the game, and they’re going to provide a really unique challenge.” Everything we know about the floating World’s Fair, including footage of the patriot in action, is below.
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Some hold it, some walk it...
Hands On: Spec Ops: The Line
By Adam Smith on February 6th, 2012.
As I sat in 2K’s lobby waiting to play Spec Ops: The Line, a man played The Darkness II on a nearby consolebox. If I were to estimate, I’d say 84% of his time was spent eviscerating people, tearing them limb from limb, punching gaping holes through their most precious parts and lopping off their screaming faces with a twitch of his tentacles. It truly was one of the most gruesome displays I’ve ever been witness to. That man was Shawn Frison, senior designer at Yager Games. In Spec Ops, he has helped create something far more brutal than the comic book killfest of The Darkness.
The Darkness II’s Tentacular Executions
By Craig Pearson on February 1st, 2012.
The Darkness II is violent. How violent? It has executions, but it has different categories of them. CataGOREies, if you will. This pair of trailers is part of series showing what you can pull off. Mostly limbs, it seems.
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The Darkness II Demo To Drop This Month
By Craig Pearson on January 12th, 2012.
What are you doing on Jan the 24th? Apart from celebrating the ten day anniversary of my 33rd birthday, I mean? I will be playing The Darkness II demo on Steam, weeping at how it’s only 11 and a bit months until I’m 34.
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New X-COM Incoming, Old X-COM Cheapens!
By Adam Smith on January 5th, 2012.
EDIT: added Gamersgate deal.
Steam’s daily deal sees the complete X-COM bundle reduced to £3.05, while the complete pack is £2.49 at Gamersgate. It’s as if they think the whole internet is talking about the series. You probably don’t want Enforcer and Interceptor but if you don’t have them, you almost definitely want the other three. They are £1.01 each on Steam. I still play the original on a regular basis and find it laughable that it’s available for a pound and a penny. HA!
You Say Du-Bye And I Say Hell-O: Spec Ops
By Adam Smith on December 22nd, 2011.
We sent Craig into what I can only assume was the heart of a diabolical sandstorm to take a look at Spec Ops: The Line. Despite misgivings, he admired the impressive spectacle, most of which seems to be due to the game’s setting in a decaying and sand-suffocated Dubai. A new trailer, which shows a fair bit of gameplay, does manage to impress with its sense of scale. There are towering, shattered buildings and a beach’s worth of sand being dumped onto unsuspecting enemies. That goes along with some cover-based shooting and some excessive violence, including a foot stomp that Isaac Clarke would be proud of. Put on your shades, then take a look.
The Darkness II Co-Op Contains Festive Fun
By Adam Smith on December 20th, 2011.
It’s all sleigh bells ring-a-ding-jingling and jolly little scamps scurrying about the place in search of the true meaning of Christmas in these latest trailers for The Darkness II. Except for all the evisceration, shooting-in-the-face and limb-lopping, which is what you’ll see for every single second that isn’t a series of logos angrier than Mr Angrylad Furyface from Hateville, Nebraskinforabeating. That actually leaves precisely no room for festive fun of the seasonal variety, but plenty for those who celebrate the cathartic kiss of axe and intestine. These are the murderous folk available in the recently revealed co-op mode.
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