STACK #129 Jul 2016

GAMES

FEATURE

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standing guard on the corner of the booth. A gameplay presentation of XCOM 2 kicked off the visit (sadly, there was no playable code). XCOM: Enemy Unknown made our top 10 best games of the year list in 2012, so we were keen to see what was new. Twenty years after the aliens arrived on earth, celebrations for Unification Day are under way with a statue erected in honour of the anniversary. However, the resistance fighters are intent on bringing it down in a morale-boosting action, and this is where the demo begins. Visually, the game looks different from Enemy Unknown, with camera angles boasting a more cinematic look. Keep an eye out for a new alien enemy in the game known as the Viper – a snake-like beast that crushes its enemy with its tail. This is certainly a title we’ll be keeping an eye out for when it releases in November this year. Rising Tide is the first expansion for Civilization: Beyond Earth , an entry in the franchise that gave developers creative freedom from the restraints of historical events. But it was the online shooter Battleborn that we fought off the crowds to see. During a presentation, Gearbox announced that there would be 25 playable characters in this MOBA-styled title, which features single- player story missions and multiplayer modes to boot. Best of all, we got to try it out, jumping into a five-player co-op game. Selecting Oscar Mike, a character that most players of first- person shooters will recognise (I know, it’s a predictable selection to make, but he looked so cool), our 20-minute session felt like it was over in five. It’s colourful, varied, and features a cracking score. Although Gearbox have yet to reveal too much of the game, again, it’s a title we’ll be keen to play on launch. After procuring the license in 2012, we suspected that Creative Assembly had been beavering away on a Warhammer-themed Total War long before its official reveal earlier this year. At E3 we finally got to see the gameplay. In a hands-off demo our hosts took us to the Battle of Black Fire Pass, and enthused about the opportunity they’d been given to meld two different worlds into one exciting

winning opportunities, the result would’ve been 1-1, and the majority of the crowd would’ve left the stadium satisfied. EA’s conference took our breath away with the Mass Effect: Andromeda intro and Star Wars: Battlefront gameplay, while Ubisoft delivered its customarily concise and action-packed offering, throwing in new IP For Honor and ending with the next Ghost Recon adventure, Wildlands. Taking heed of the criticism levelled at developers last year (Ubisoft in particular), it was refreshing to see so many titles not only featuring female protagonists, but presented by female developers during the press conferences, too.

Still buzzing from the rousing media conferences, and equipped with a decent pair of trainers and a bag of lollies to assuage the jet lag, we hit the floor literally running at midday, following the crowds surging onto the show floor like the Encierro in Pamplona. First up was a beeline to Take Two, moving around a large crowd snapping pictures of the life- sized Battleborn figurines

JULY 2015 JB Hi-Fi www.jbhifi.com.au

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