Friday 30 October 2015

Player Preview - Subaeria





 Title: Subaeria
Developer: Studio Illogika
Status: Early Access
Release Date: 2016

Official Site: http://bit.ly/1NGMidI
Steam Page: http://bit.ly/1l05olG


Hey what’s up, Serpentine here taking a look at the rouge-lite puzzle action game, Subaeria, developed by studio Illogika, primarily a mobile developer this will be their first original PC title. In a somewhat near future, post-apocalyptic setting where the world as we know it has completely flooded, you play a young girl called Styx who has recently become bankrupt or credless as it’s called in the game after taking out numerous loans from the big two companies of the world, Soma and Amos, to feed her virtual reality addiction. Unfortunately in Subaeria your bank account determines which areas of the underwater labyrinth you are allowed to enter and entering a restricted zone can end poorly.


In every zone of Subaeria, robots controlled by Soma and Amos known as cleaners patrol the area for any citizens found where they shouldn’t be. If any are found, they will be met with deadly force as the cleaners will aim only to kill with their sawblades, laser rifles, missiles and other weaponry. While these Cleaners are deadly killing machines, they also come with one major flaw in that if a cleaner controlled by the Soma Company comes into contact with the Amos company cleaners they will destroy themselves. A pretty big flaw considering that both companies’ cleaners patrol the same areas and are conveniently colour coded for you to take full advantage of. There are outlier Cleaners with no company association though that you will have to be aware of. To be able to move freely through zones and areas you will have to clear out each room by tricking these robots into colliding with each other or with other elements like laser walls or explosive barrels. There are multiple puzzle elements to help you eliminate the Cleaners like pressure plates that change the colour of laser walls, motherboards that need to be activated and more. You won’t be able to leave a room until there is only one Cleaner left at which point it will shut down and open the doors for you to proceed on your journey. Every zone is procedurally generated with the key areas being shuffled around requiring you to do a little bit of exploring to get where you need to be, plus each new run will spawn different programs and sniffs to use providing a somewhat unique experience with each new run.

Using the collision method of eliminating the cleaners is really the only way to do it as you have no weapons that can deal with them directly. However you do have a little droid that follows you around and is capable of loading up 2 programs that can help you out including things like changing a Cleaners company owner, Placing a decoy to attract Cleaners away from your position and a healing program. Many of these programs will require your drone to get up close and personal with the target and it can only go about an arm’s length distance away from you so you do have to play the risk and reward game when attempting to use one of these programs. The programs also work off of a charge system that when depleted will render that program useless and drop it from your droids ability list. Programs aren’t too rare though with you easily finding a new one by the time you have depleted the equipped ones charges. There are also passive upgrades for your character called sniffs that can be found around Subaeria just like programs can. These sniffs give bonuses like reduced damage from lasers and a distance increase that your droid can travel away from you. Both programs and sniffs while being obtainable for free out in the world can also be purchased with creds that you can find randomly around the world or by destroying Cleaners however they can be a bit pricey.


As you travel through the different zones of Subaeria you’ll meet other people with their own little story’s and snippets of information about the world. To expand upon that there are also text logs that can be found around the world or just sent to your droid that can contain important story elements as well as some other information like emails from Soma and Amos about your financial status. The main overarching story to the world has the people of Subaeria separated into certain zones depending on their financial standing, the zones borders being patrolled by homicidal machines called Cleaners. Most of the poor people are addicted to an extremely popular virtual reality game called The Eden Experience that simulates Subaeria and its people, something that you later find to be more then it seems.


Other features of the game include multiple endings for each character with 5 endings currently in the game for Styx. There will be a total of 4 characters in the game at release ranging from the poorest in Subaeria to those in power.

Altogether Subaeria provides a really cool world and setting to explore with puzzles that will require you to think and act extremely quickly. Hearing one of the steel blades activate puts you into an instant panic especially as they somewhat camouflage into the background and suddenly appear. The puzzle variation is a little limited at the moment but that should fix itself overtime as the game is in early access. With the addition of the other 3 characters Subaeria will have a ton of replay ability especially if you aim to unlock every characters multiple endings. If you like puzzle games that aren’t exactly hard to solve but require you to act quickly and you enjoy the 1 game 1 life gameplay of Rouge-lites then Subaeria is defiantly worth a look.


Anyway, that’s been my player preview for Subaeria. The game will be officially releasing sometime in 2016 but is currently available on Early Access for $13 or your regional equivalent. If you want to find out more about the game check out the links below. Thanks for reading and I’ll see you guys next time.

Thursday 22 October 2015

Player Preview - Blood Bowl 2



  

Title: Blood Bowl 2
Developer:
Cyanide Studios
Release Date:
22/September/2015

Official Site:
http://bit.ly/1QOvRg3
Steam Page:
http://bit.ly/1ZTt4bk




Hey what’s up, Serpentine here taking a look at the turn based strategy game, Blood Bowl 2, developed by Cyanide Studios, the same guys behind Styx: Master of Shadows and Aarklash Legacy. Blood Bowl 2 has you managing and playing as your very own Blood Bowl team, Blood Bowl being like gridiron or American football but just a little bit rougher and set in the Warhammer universe.

The game plays player by player for one team and then switching over to the other team. Everything you do in Blood Bowl is tied to a dice roll weather you’re blocking an opponent, performing a throw or even just trying to pick up the ball which for some teams can actually be surprisingly hard to do. Most teams are made up of 3 different types of players with their own specific uses. You have your frontline that are your strongest players aimed at preventing any of the opposition players from breaking through to your ball carrier while attacking or to break through your enemies frontline to get to their ball carrier while defending. Blitzers that are aimed towards supporting other players due to their high mobility and finally backline players that are great at using the ball and scoring but are extremely fragile and need to be protected. 


For most of the game you will be attempting blocks on opponents, an aggressive action that can have 5 different results. On the low end you can push an opponent backwards, selecting 1 of the three possible locations for them to end up which is important when trying to clear a pathway for your ball carriers to get through unscathed. Then you have the 2 different successful tackles were your opponent will be downed, these two tackles work very much the same however there are player traits that can dodge the push tackle. Finally there are the failed tackles, the sides of the die you never really want to get. For both down your tackle will be successful against your opponent however in the process of the tackle you will also be downed. The worst result you can get though is attacker down. Your tackle will fail on the opponent and instead they will knock you down. Failing a block will result in a turnover so it’s best to leave 1 die blocks till last and get all your movement and double die blocks out of the way first. 


Having one of your players knocked down is bad for multiple reasons, the worst being that you have to roll on that players Armour Value to see if they receive an injury. If you fail the best outcome is to be stunned, the player will remain on the field but be unable to make an action for one turn. Being knocked out the player will be removed from the field but can make it back after a touchdown or halftime if they roll successfully on a 50% chance roll. Getting an actual injury starts off by having a player missing a game but can have players stats decrease or be out for multiple games and of course then there is the absolute failure state where the player can actually die which can be devastating if you have levelled up the player multiple times. You can purchase an Apothecary outside of the game that basically acts as a reroll on any injury a player may receive, you can only ever have 1 of these so it’s best to save it for the major stuff like deaths or stat decreases. If there are no injuries, knock outs or deaths then you just have the downside of the player having to spend some of its movement getting back up while it also counts as an action so you won’t be able to block with that player unless you blitz for a second action. Each turn you will only be able to blitz one player allowing them to move and block rather than just one or the other. Removing a player from play on your opponent’s side is a massive advantage especially if they have no players in reserve as now you have a numbers advantage. While you can perform blocks in the hope of knocking out a player or injuring them you can also push them off the field and into the crowd to remove them from play. This also has the same chance of injury as being knocked down.


Every player on the field has stats in four different categories that will help or hinder them in certain actions. These 4 categories consist of Movement Action, representing how many tiles on the field you are able to move in one turn. Strength, the number used in any blocks a player is involved in. Agility, used for dodging out of enemy players tackle zones and finally armour value that is used to determine if a player is injured when knocked down. It is possible to increase these stats during a level up however you will need to roll extremely high. To level up a player they must gain star player points by performing certain actions during a game including touchdowns, knock outs, injuring a player or performing skill based actions like passes. Once they reach the level up requirement you roll two die to determine whether or not you get an additional skill or statistic. Most of the time you will only be able to unlock another skill for your player in their specialisation like strength, agility and passing. Skills are an extremely important part of the game and can give your players significant bonuses like a re-roll on a failed dodge roll or if you roll a both down during a block you can get a skill that negates the knock down effect on your player. Reading through all of these skills and picking the right one is extremely important as players don’t level up all that fast especially some of the more specialized players that require up to 5 times the Star Player Points as normal players to level up.


Being a sequel let’s take a look at what’s new in the game. A campaign mode has been introduced that will have you leading the human Reikland Reavers team from the ground up to potential champions. The mode starts off as a tutorial to the game so any newcomers may want to start there as jumping straight into a multiplayer game may be a little overwhelming if you don’t understand the mechanics. Later on though the mode will start adding scripted events that are only available in the campaign mode like the referee taking out your players because he has a grudge against your team or one of the commentators joining your team for a game. The commentators also play a bigger part in blood bowl 2 delivering most of your team’s backstory and sideline drama between and during games in a comedic fashion that some will love but others may find it a bit corny. Stadium Customization is now a thing with 5 unique stadiums that can obtain upto 10 possible addons and will be used when playing at your home stadium. A player Marketplace has been added for online play where you can sell and buy players to create better teams however this feature doesn’t seem to be fully implemented yet. Lastly there is the cabalvision or replay feature that saves replays of your games that you can go back to and watch if you ever want or you can also watch current top tier games live.


Online play is definitely where BloodBowl 2 excels, however it’s not your typical matchmaking system. You will have to register your team as part of a league and then register that team as part of a competition within that league. Open ladders act as your main play anytime matchmaking ques but it’s the actual tournament structured competitions that will have you playing simulated rounds each week against smaller groups of players. Unfortunately you do have to go looking for these types of competitions and it’s not easy to find one that is currently taking new teams, something that could be improved by showcasing new competitions on the league front page. The official Blood Bowl league also seems to be the only league that offers Cyans after every game, the in game currency. Currently there is no use for these Cyans but customizable items for your team are planned to be purchasable with these later this year as well as being obtainable as rare random drops after a game.


Due to the aggressive nature of the game I do feel that some of the physically stronger teams like the Orcs or Chaos have somewhat of an advantage in getting players levelled up and just winning games by eliminating as many of the opponents players as possible. The more fragile skilled based teams like the High Elves and dark elves can perform some really great plays but there will almost always be a bunch of injuries during a game that will eventually cripple the team in the long run. Playing one of these more fragile skill based teams will require a lot of strategy and luck to be successful. It’s extremely obvious as well when you take a look at the top teams in any of the ladders usually consisting of Chaos, Dwarven and Lizardmen teams in the top rankings. Unfortunately due to this players will concede games if they are up against certain races so as not to lose any of their important players. Doing this though does have some negatives including that you don’t earn any star player points for your players to be able to level up, while the game still counts towards your players aging which will eventually lead to them gaining age injuries and eventually retiring. 


Outside of the main game you can purchase staff members for your team for added benefits, re-rolls being arguably the most important allowing you to re-roll a failed roll or block. The apothecary is on equal footing when it comes to importance especially later on when you have skilled players as it allows you to reroll injuries and deaths, you’re only allowed to have one of these so use it wisely. The next few staff members will help you on the random kick-off events, increasing your chances at good events for you through cheerleaders, assistant coaches and team fans. Right before you go into a match you will also be given the opportunity to buy other bonuses like another apothecary if you are playing against a strong team, a star player if you have the spare cash to purchase one for the game and a wizard spell which out of all the available purchasable bonuses can be extremely powerful, able to knockdown large groups of players in one shot leaving many injured if a 50% chance roll is successful. The wizard spell, more specifically the fireball spell is the only bonus that probably shouldn’t be in the game due to how powerful it is however it is quite expensive to purchase and it does only work half of the time. 


Other features of the game include a bunch of statistics regarding your overall performance as well as team specific statistics so you can find what your team is lacking and try to improve it via skill selection on player level-ups or just changing your play style. I would like to see player specific statistics as well though to keep track of certain player careers. If you want to play some friendly matches either against your friends online or locally you can, for online play you will have to have the person on your steam friends list.

Altogether Blood Bowl 2 brings fantasy and football together quite nicely having you sitting on the edge of your seat for every block and roll. You can become incredibly invested in your players and team with each match adding to their own unique narrative and if they get injured or die, it can be devastating. The almost complete randomness of the game may not be to everyone’s liking but the randomness can create amazing moments in the game. To get the most out of the game you will have to go looking for a good, consistent league that runs competitions in your time zone or get together with a bunch of friends and create your own league competitions. If you enjoy turn based strategy and the competitive nature of American Football or any sports in general then Blood Bowl 2 is definitely worth a look. If you’re sitting on the fence maybe wait for the patch due for the end of this year as some more features will be added to the game that may sway you on whether or not to get it. 


Anyway, that’s been my player preview for Blood Bowl 2. The game officially released on the 22nd of September on PC, Playstation 4 and Xbox One and is available on steam for $45 or your regional equivalent. If you want to find out more about the game check out the links below. Thanks for watching and I’ll see you guys next time.