Not sure what kind of games you like, but if you like puzzle games or very interesting game mechanics then you need to "Braid" out of the Arcade. It is amazing. I just started the Mass Effect trilogy and if you like Bioware RPG's then I recommend those and Dragon's Age:Origin. If you are enjoying Arkham Asylum then make sure you pick-up Arkham City. In a similar genre I am a fan of the Assassin's Creed games (3 is still sitting in shrinkwrap behind Mass Effect post Christmas). A lot of people have reasonable complaints about all of the AC games so read up on those and make sure they aren't going to be problems you share before you invest in them. In the shooters world I very much second The Orange Box (though Portal is the best game in the box and is not a shooter). Halo 3 and Halo:Reach are both solid. If you want a big story line shooter with no multi-player then pick-up Bioshock. It is one of the best games I have ever played.
In what world is Dark Souls the easiest game on that list? I mean, I recommend Dark Souls highly, but it is a tough and intimidating game to get into of you haven't played games in a while. I concur with the rest of your choices, though. All good choices for getting back into gaming.
If you enjoy a good western, Red Dead Redemption is a must-have. Open-world game set in what's left of the "Old West", as narrated by Rockstar (who, along with Valve, can be considered the Pixar twins of the videogame world). Also the action isn't nearly as frenetic as what you'd find in a modern twitch-shooter; good way to "ease" your way back into this hobby of ours. OK, don't take my word for it:
Thanks everyone for the suggestions. I'm not a big fan of FPS games, pretty much because I've realized that I pretty much suck at them. Every time I visit my brother he tries to get me to play the latest COD and I just can't seem to be able to ever do it on an even adequate level. After playing a little more, I'd say that the Batman style of game is probably what would be looking for primarily to try for the time being. And I'm not even halfway through this one and already have Arkham City on order from Amazon. So between those two I'll probably be set for a while. I may also look into trying out the AC series after that. Thanks again guys.
I picked up some single player games because I used up all of my bandwidth last month downloading TV shows. Just finished Portal 2 yesterday and loved it. It’s a great puzzle game that I couldn’t put down. I got about 10 hours from the campaign and haven’t started the co-op chambers yet. Not bad for 20 bucks. I still might go back to the campaign and get the trophies for doing random challenges/tasks. Great game, I really appreciate its creativity and admire the designer’s ability to make some of those chambers. I've heard a lot of good things about Far Cry 3, but chose to get XCOM instead. I'll probably get it in the future.
Anyone play Darksiders II? I'm curious about it. I've heard it compared to Zelda, and that intrigues me, because I love those types of games. I am planning to get a Wii U and I'll be picking up New Super Mario Bros. U and one other game, and right now I'm leaning towards Darksiders II (can't play ZombiU because it is first person, and already own ACIII for my PS3).
The easier-to-harder was referring to the rest of the games after the first section. I've been watching a lot of Awesome Games Done Quick. It's a speedrun marathon raising money for cancer prevention. (Speedrunning = trying to finish a game as fast as possible, often abusing glitches, level skips and other tricks along the way.) Seeing Ocarina of Time completed in half an hour is a trip.
So I picked up a Wii U yesterday, and my initial impressions: First, there is the big out-of-the-box system update. It screwed up on me once, but the download picked up right where it left off, so it really wasn't too bad. Once I got the system updated, I was able to get it going pretty easily. The next thing I did was move all my Wii data (game saves, downloaded games, and whatnot) over to the Wii U. This was very needlessly complicated (first put an SD card into the Wii U, download the transfer software, format the SD card, move it to the Wii, download the transfer software THERE, actually upload the data to the SD card, move the SD card BACK to the Wii U, and let it upload to the Wii U), but ultimately didn't take very long, either. All together, it took me about an hour and a half to get everything set up. Once it was all set up, though, I found a lot of neat features to play around with, before I even started either of the games. First, I set up the Gamepad to be a TV remote. It controls the TV and my cable box, but it can't control the DVR aspect of the cable box, yet, so you can't really throw away your cable box remote. Its a useful feature if you're playing and want to change the channel, but otherwise it isn't that useful. You can't look at the system wtihout reviewing the GamePad. You can do virtually everything through the GamePad, so I can honestly say in the few hours I've spent with the system, the majority of the time has been with the TV on a different channel, and everything has gone through the gamepad. Setup, creating Miis, and even playing games can all be done on the GamePad. This meant my wife could sit and watch her movie while I was playing around with the new system. It has its own set of speakers which are pretty loud, there is a mic for voice chat, and a camera for taking pictures (you can create Miis with a picture, now), or for video chat. There is also a jack for headphones that is also compatible with headphones that have a microphone on them (i.e. basic iPhone headphones), so you can chat with those. Basically, the GamePad can do everything that the TV can do in terms of display, meaning if you don't have access to the TV, you can still do almost anything on the WiiU. Another feature they're pushing hard is WiiU TVii. Once you get into this, it asks for your basic cable package, your favorite movies, TV shows, and channels. It takes all that info and creates a profile for you. Once you log in, it will tell you which of your favorite shows are airing right now, which will be airing soon, and so on. If you've set up the remote function, it'll change the channel to your favorite shows or movies for you, and it will display the channel grid and allow you to look for shows on the gamepad, too. It also asks for your favorite sports teams (currently limited to NCAA football and basketball, and professional football and basketball), so it'll display the scores from your favorite team or let you know when games are going to air. The point is that (eventually) it will allow you to live chat with other fans of the shows you enjoy while they're airing, although none of the shows I've added had that functionality yet. They're apparently working on controlling the DVR through this app, as it says that functionality is "coming soon." None of it is really necessary, but that doesn't make it less fun to play around with. It also has Netflix, Amazon On-Demand, YouTube, and HuluPlus. You can stream through the TV or through the GamePad, so again, it is useful if someone is watching the TV and you want to watch something ELSE on the GamePad. It is backwards compatible with the Wii, but you have to open the Wii Menu. At that point, the GamePad becomes useless, and it is EXACTLY like playing the Wii. Television only, using the Wii Remotes, and it even locks you into the small amount of memory the initial Wii had (Despite the Wii U having a 32 gig hard drive). Basically, if you want to download more virtual console games or WiiWare, you may still need an SD card to put it on, because of the artificial limits set by the system. It seems silly, honestly. One feature I would LVOE to see them implement is the ability to play Wii virtual console games on the GamePad. The controls are basically the same between the WiiU GamePad and the Wii Classic Controller, so that would be a fun feature (you could play Ocarina of Time or Super Metriod on the GamePad), but it doesn't look like Nintendo is eager to implement that feature. Finally, there are the games. Right now, there aren't a lot of games out for the WiiU, and this is the biggest drawback. I ended up just getting New Super Mario Bros. U. I've played it for a while and it is pretty much what you expect from a side-scrolling 2D Mario game. Fun, somewhat challenging, and lots of hidden secrets and things. It is clearly designed for multi-player, but I'll be playing that later when my brother and his kids come over to play. NintendoLand comes with the system, and this is just a collection of mini-games to show off the functionality that just doesn't capture your imagination. Wii Sports was one of those rare games that not only showed off the system's capabilities, it was a fun game all on its own. NintendoLand is really not. Overall, so far, I'm enjoying the system. I love that I can play games and just use the GamePad. I still have a couple of other games I want to try out (DarkSiders II and the WiiU version of ACIII), and once the game library expands a little bit I'll be much more pleased. One thing I am eager to try is ACIII Multiplayer, and to see if I can play it through the GamePad. I know Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 is capable of being played on the GamePad, even in multiplayer, so I am hoping that ACIII is, also. If it is, I may trade in my PS3 ACIII copy for a Wii U one.
So as I mentioned before, my PS3 died. I got one of the new PS3s. I don't know if this is something that is new, but somehow there is a Anynet functionality between my PS3 and TV where if I turn on my PS3, it'll turn on my TV and automatically change to the HDMI channel the PS3 is on. When I turn my PS3 off, it changes back to the cable. That is pretty fucking awesome. Given that I'm playing my old games again, I lost about 3.5 hours today on Deus Ex: HR. God this game is fun as fuck to play again. Apparently they are working on a movie. <a class="postlink" href="http://movieline.com/2012/11/21/deus-ex-human-revolution-movie-video/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://movieline.com/2012/11/21/deus-ex ... vie-video/</a> I honestly just want a sequel.
I know I'm late to the game, but is anybody regularly on Madden '13? I picked it up for cheap, and I'm looking to play somebody who is as extraordinarily mediocre as I am.
I abandoned Far Cry 3 most of the way through the game. I'm on the mission called Betting Against The House or something similar, where I'm manning a gun in a helicopter just after Spoiler rescuing the brother from the airfield I have literally no chance on the mission. It's not a matter of skill; the helicopter simply turns too slowly for me to gun down the guys with rocket launchers. I've seen some complaints about it that state you can just change the mission difficulty in order to improve your helicopter's resiliency, but that has not seemed to be the case for me. Can't tell if it's a bug in my game, or what. Probably played the mission 30 times so far; I know where all of the guys are standing, I just have no chance to shoot them down before I've taken 3-4 rockets and crashed. I inevitably take one rocket when I fly past the bridge into the first area of buildings before I'm turned enough to shoot the rocket guy on the roof, and then I get gunned down as I circle back to the airfield.
When you're turning the gun are you aiming down the sights the whole time? That could slow it down. Sorry if that sounds like a dumb question, but I don't remember having problems with that mission and I kind of suck at shooters, but that is exactly the kind of mistake I would make. Speaking of Far Cry, I'm not that unimpressed with the multiplayer, it's like a stripped down version of COD, but more importantly the players I've encountered so far seem to be there to enjoy the game instead of camping and/or maximizing their K/D ratio.
You mean like a secondary fire view (e.g. scope/iron sights)? I don't think that's an option with the mounted gun - I believe there's only one firing view. In any event, the problem isn't bringing the gun to bear. It's that I am pointed out the side of the helicopter, and am taking fire into the front of it. I can't actually rotate the gun far enough to shoot the guys with the launchers - I have to wait until the pilot turns the helicopter, and by then it's too late.
After 5 more tries yesterday at lunch, there IS a secondary firing view (that I wasn't using), but it has not proven any more helpful in getting my bitchass pilot to turn the goddamn helicopter around so I can see the dudes shooting at us.
Anyone else has one of the newer PS3s and a Samsung TV? I don't know if I posted about this before but my TV and Samsung made this Anynet connection where if I turn on my PS3, my TV will turn on and automatically switch the input. Then if I turn off the PS3, it'll switch the input back to where it was before. Small, but cool shit. Anyone play the Metal Gear Rising demo yet? I shit myself seeing that it was now available.
I think I’ll wait for the Metal Gear that Kojima is working on. I never liked Raiden much and felt like the whole ninja thing was trying too hard to win people over. If you’re looking for an action game, the new Devil May Cry is supposed to be very good: God of War is around the corner too:
Far Cry 3 has gotten great reviews as one of the top shooters around. Assassin's Creed was a fairly good game, although I can't recommend it because, quite frankly, I just couldn't finish it. I got bored with the whole thing. I'll probably pick it back up in a while, and I have still been playing the shit out of the ACIII multiplayer, but the story just wasn't enough to hold my attention or keep me coming back like previous AC games. Personally, I have been playing a lot of New Super Mario Bros. U. It takes me back to the old school side-scrolling Mario games that I grew up with, which I realize is the point, but I didn't play the Wii or 3DS versions. My only qualm with this version is that 1-ups are stupidly easy to come by. I've had 99 lives for most of the time playing. It seems completely silly to still have the whole "lives" thing be a thing, especially when it is so easy to gain extra lives. I've also been playing it a ton because I can play it in detach mode on just the WiiU Gamepad, so I can actually play while my wife is watching TV. Fuck I wish this system had more games, and that the ACIII multiplayer on WiiU had more than 12 fucking people on it. I would absolutely sell my PS3 version for the WiiU version ACIII Multiplayer had more people.