Like me on Facebook and follow me on Twitter for the latest deals.
£19 off Xbox Live 12 Month Gold Membership
Get the hottest Xbox Live 12 month gold membership subscription at SCDKey. You can get 3% off and bring the price down to £34.03 with code “XBOX3%”. Check out more Xbox One Digital deals below.
Final Fantasy XV director Hajime Tabata has opened a new studio to work on AAA games, Luminous Productions.
Luminous is a new global studio within Square Enix, with its offices based in Tokyo. The studio aims to “utilize innovative technology and creativity to change the future of gaming and entertainment”.
While it’s not clear exactly what Luminous has been created to achieve for Square Enix, we can learn more from its numerous job listings.
On the Luminous website, listings say that the company is looking for talent to work on “AAA class games”. A 3D character artist listing mentions working on “Human, monsters and asset creation of weapons and small items”, which implies that the new studio won’t be straying too far from Final Fantasy’s subject matter.
It’s hard to pin down exactly what makes Far Cry so appealing. Is it the gunplay? The open-world sandbox? Perhaps the compelling villains? Or maybe it’s a combination of the three.
As a series, Far Cry has stood out for the ways it combines so many elements. So before we dive headlong into the latest in the series, Far Cry 5, let’s look back at its predecessors and examine how Far Cry’s unlikely formula has evolved in unexpected ways.
For more on the latest game meanwhile, check out our Far Cry 5 review-in-progress, the game’s weirdest mission, or some footage of Far Cry 5 running at max settings on PC. You can also watch our video feature on the history of Far Cry.
Released exclusively for PC, the original Far Cry–developed by Crytek–touts beautiful outdoor environments that had rarely been seen before in first-person shooters. These massive levels not only looked impressive, but they allowed you to approach combat in a variety of ways: on foot, in a jeep, on a boat, or even from the air. Large groups of enemies can be avoided entirely or lured in ambushes, which was the ideal way to play due to the enemy’s impeccable aim and your fragile health reserves. Scouting out enemy camps and planning out attacks is critical, but stealth isn’t always reliable. There are no melee attacks and no silenced submachine gun until a few levels in. Alerted soldiers will activate alarms and some fire flares to summon helicopters with reinforcements. There are flaws, however. Once stealth is broken, enemies always seem to know exactly where you are, a frustrating problem that’s exacerbated by the lack of a manual save function.
The game’s plot involves ex-special forces Jack Carver, who ends up marooned on an island that he must try to escape. However, he soon finds himself dealing with the evil Dr. Kieger, whose botched genetic experiments created mutants called the Trigen.
The game became a success upon release, and Ubisoft soon acquired the rights to the series from Crytek.
Instincts was a remake of the original Far Cry for consoles. It was originally planned for PS2 as well, but that version was ultimately canceled.
Instincts’ basic premise and characters are the same as in Far Cry, but levels are less open-ended and more linear due to the limitations of console hardware. There were, however, a number of changes and improvements to gameplay. Stealth is expanded upon to include a proper melee option and you can lay down traps to take out unsuspecting enemies. If you still prefer the all-guns-blazing approach, most weapons can now be dual-wielded. Finally, Instincts introduced a series of mutant powers known as Feral Abilities. These granted buffs such as increased speed, quicker health regeneration, and night vision. While overall less impressive than its PC ancestor, Far Cry Instincts still impressed for a console game of the day and sold well.
A slightly less well-received follow up, Far Cry Instincts: Evolution added some new weapons and vehicles, but otherwise provided more of the same. Released on the same day was Far Cry Instincts: Predator, a next-generation bundle for the Xbox 360 that packaged together Instincts and Instincts: Evolution. Finally, Evolution (the follow-up to the original Far Cry: Instincts, if you’ve lost track) got a Wii port called Far Cry Vengeance, which added motion controls.
During the release of all these console spin-offs, a numbered Far Cry sequel was in the works. Crytek had moved on to work on Crysis, so Far Cry 2 was developed by Ubisoft Montreal.
When Ubisoft surveyed players of the first game, many said they didn’t find very Jack Carver very memorable or likeable. So in Far Cry 2, you pick from a group of silent protagonists. As a mercenary for hire, you fly into a fictional war-torn African country to kill an arms dealer called The Jackal. Your mission goes south after contracting malaria, leaving you near-dead and The Jackal on the loose. While not as memorable as subsequent Far Cry villains, The Jackal was the series’ first true attempt at a charismatic foe.
The majority of the game is about taking on missions for the two warring factions, helping out other mercenaries, and trying to surviving the harsh African environment. While not a full-on survival game, Far Cry 2 attempts to offer a more realistic experience and a tone that feels oppressive. Everything is old and falling apart. Vehicles need to be fixed regularly and guns degrade over time leading to them jamming during inopportune moments or even breaking entirely. This encourages you to spend your hard-earned diamonds on newer weapons from arms dealers rather than scavenging from dead enemies. There’s also the personal maintenance you need to carry out to keep your malaria in check. You’ll receive Malaria attacks randomly throughout the game and if you run out of pills then you’ll need to take on special missions to get more.
Outside of the warring factions’ cease fire zone, everyone is hostile towards you except for a small group of fellow mercenaries. Not only do you take quests from them but you have a special buddy who will show up and help you if you die. However, your buddy can also get hurt and if you don’t have any healing kits left you’ll have no choice but to put them down.
All of this is compounded by a punishing save system:you can only save at designated save houses, raising the stakes of each firefight as more progress could be lost at any moment. You might decide that dead buddy isn’t worth loading the save for after all.
Far Cry 2 is a game that wants to you live in its world. You can’t simply fast travel anywhere, but instead need to take the bus to stations on the map. And while later entries have eclipsed it on a technical level, the deep brown and orange color palate of the African Savanna is a beautiful and unique setting for a game. There’s a day / night cycle and impressive fire propagation tech, where wind can carry a flame across an entire field.
Far Cry 2 has perhaps the most mixed reputation in the series. Some found its save system and demanding gameplay too punishing and frustrating. The random malaria attacks, while in theory a great idea, could often be an annoyance and in some cases prevent you from progressing at all. It does however have dedicated fans, who love it for its dark tone, and who still consider it to be the series’ high point. In many ways Far Cry 2 created the base that future games would follow but its sequels would take a radically different approach to tone.
Far Cry 3 takes its cues from the Far Cry 2 formula, once again taking place in a large open world. After criticism of the last game’s hardcore mechanics, Far Cry 3 tweaks everything to offer a more fun-filled playbox. You can now save anywhere you want and instantly fast travel to previously discovered locations. Guns no longer degrade and you will gradually accrue a massive arsenal of weapons. Far Cry 3 is also a prime example of the Ubisoft world structure that we recognize today. Borrowing from the Assassin’s Creed series, you’ll climb radio towers to reveal the map and locations of nearby activities and outposts. Scoping out a base, tagging enemies, planning out your attack, and then executing it is a satisfying way to exert your influence upon the world. Thanks to the game’s improved stealth you can take out whole bases without being detected, something that wasn’t as viable in previous games.
Far Cry 3’s island hosts a large variety of animals that can be used to your advantage. Hunting down and skinning animals feeds into the game’s crafting system, which you can utilize to upgrade the number of guns and amount of ammo you can hold, among other buffs. Introducing light RPG mechanics, completing objectives and killing enemies levels you up and puts points into an upgrade tree, which is visually represented as a growing sleeve tattoo.
The game’s narrative returns to a fixed protagonist named Jason Brody, a 25-year-old Californian rich kid who gets kidnapped by pirates. Much of the game’s story fell flat for some players, but its main villain, Vaas, is hugely memorable. Vaas’s playfully sadistic nature and memorable monologues made him one of gaming’s great antagonists.
While Far Cry has already been a well-known and loved in the gaming community, Far Cry 3’s playful sandbox opened it up to a larger audience and made it into the massive franchise it is today.
A standalone expansion, Blood Dragon is an 8 hour independent slice of Far Cry 3 decked out in all things ’80s. Set in the dystopian future of 2007, you play as Cyber Commando Rex ‘Power’ Colt, voiced by ’80s action star Michael Biehn. Rex must fight his way though an army of cyber soldiers and deadly blood dragons to take out his former commander, Colonel Sloan.
Every aspect of Blood Dragon is a play or homage to the ’80s, such as the game’s scanline overlay, VHS tracking loading screen, and cheesy action movie plot featuring intentionally terrible dialogue. Completing the whole package is the excellent soundtrack from synthwave duo Power Glove, who invoke the sounds of films like Terminator and Escape from New York.
Blood Dragon doesn’t add anything particularly new to the Far Cry formula, but its over-the-top aesthetics and dialogue is enough to carry its short campaign. As a fun standalone experience it won people over with its ’80s charm and quickly sold over 1 million copies, becoming one of Ubisoft’s fastest-selling downloadable titles.
Released only two years after Far Cry 3, Far Cry 4 carries over much of the same structure as its predecessor while offering a brand-new story and setting. Its protagonist, American-raised Ajay Ghale, returns to where he was born–the fictional Himalayan country of Kyrat–to spread his mother’s ashes. But in typical Far Cry fashion he gets himself involved with a rebel movement and a civil war with the Royal Army and the Kyrat King Pagan Min. After the overwhelming positivity towards the charismatic Vaas, Far Cry 4 recreated much of that success with Pagan Min. Unlike Vaas, Pagan Min is more complex, with his status as the ‘bad guy’ being called into question over the course of the game. It also didn’t hurt to get excellent voice actor Troy Baker in to bring Min to life.
Unlike the more linear narrative of Far Cry 3, 4 has branching choices that determine which member of the Golden Path rebellion you follow, leading to different missions and story paths. Far Cry 4 has a variety of ways it can conclude, including a secret ending you can trigger in the first 20 minutes of the game.
Gameplay is similar to Far Cry 3 but with a couple of new additions. Thanks to the added elevation of the rocky Himalayan mountains, Ajay has a grappling hook you can use to scale certain cliffs, and he acquires a small helicopter that lets you go almost anywhere on the map. Or you can choose to take the scenic route aboard an elephant.
Expanding on previous games’ outposts, there are four major fortresses the player must capture in Far Cry 4. While these larger, tougher camps can still be done solo, you are also given the option to bring in a co-op buddy to help you take them down. The explosive mayhem of Far Cry is greatly enhanced with a buddy, but you can’t do any story missions co-op and player two won’t carry over any progress back to their game.
Far Cry 4 sold well and was praised as an improvement over 3 but some were disappointed in how it felt merely like more of the same, which is understandable given the short time gap between the two games.
There’s something to be said about Far Cry’s willingness to try new and interesting settings with each new game and the peak of this is Far Cry Primal. Set in 10,000 B.C., you play as a primitive human tribe’s hunter, seeking revenge on a tribe of cannibals that destroyed his village. It’s impressive the lengths Ubisoft went for the authenticity of the setting, going so far as to invent their own dialect based on a reconstructed Proto-Indo-European language.
Without any guns, combat has greater focus on melee but otherwise many of the Far Cry staples fit right in. You’re still climbing towers to reveal the map and taking over camps to unlock new activities. The newest change is the ability to tame and summon animals. Birds can scout out camps and tag enemies for you, and a sabertooth tiger can rush in with you during an attack.
The response to Far Cry Primal was a rather mixed one. Some love the game’s unique setting and enjoyed the ability to tame animals. Others feel it was simply another Far Cry with a different skin. Being released only a year-and-a-half after Far Cry 4, the fatigue people were already starting to feel towards the series grew even stronger. Ubisoft would give the series a longer break before it would return.
Announced in 2017 and releasing on March 27, 2018, Far Cry 5 takes the series to the USA in fictional Hope County, Montana. The area has been taken over by a militia doomsday cult run by Joseph Seed who has established himself has a religious figurehead. For the first time you get to create your own protagonist, and you must then team up with the locals to help them take back their homes.
The timing of Far Cry 5’s setting and themes created quite a stir given the current political climate of the US. Ubisoft’s says there’s no connection with current political events, but it understands that comparisons will inevitably be drawn.
The gameplay expands co-op further than we saw in Far Cry 4, and when not playing with another human, there are AI buddies you can summon to assist you. These include Nick the pilot or animals such as Boomer the dog and a bear named Cheeseburger. Towers have been removed, with new sections of the map unlocked by simply exploring and talking to the area’s cast of characters. Otherwise, Far Cry 5 provides much of the same fun Far Cry we’ve all gotten to know.
For 14 years, Far Cry as a series has evolved and changed in dramatic ways. It’s not afraid to try new and weird settings, and even though its narratives have never been top-notch, they typically feature interesting and compelling characters. It continues to push its open-world sandbox and expand upon the freedom of player expression though gameplay. Everyone loves Far Cry for their own reasons, and lets hope the series continues to push forward and evolve in the future.
A new patch is now available for PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds. Following a round of server maintenance, developer PUBG Corp. has deployed Update #8 for the PC version, adding new weapon customization options and a few other features to the popular battle royale game.
The centerpiece of the update is the new weapon skin system, which gives players the ability to customize their guns’ appearance with a variety of new skins. These can be acquired from loot boxes and applied to weapons from the Customization menu. You can take a look at some of the skins we’ve gotten in our gallery.
Players can find weapon skins in two new types of loot boxes: Triumph and Raider. Triumph is a type of random, weekly crate that requires a real-money key to open; Raider, meanwhile, is a non-random loot box that can be unlocked without a key. PUBG Corp. has outlined the drop rates for each crate and the skins they contain on the Steam forums.
To commemorate the one-year anniversary of PUBG’s Early Access release, PUBG Corp. is offering players a free anniversary weapon skin. Everyone who logs in to the game from now until May 1 will receive the Year One – SCAR-L skin, which you can see above.
In addition to that, the new patch addresses a handful of bugs, including one that would cause a player who is exiting a slow-moving vehicle to be treated as if they were hit by it. PUBG Corp. has also said it is “considering” implementing region-locking to “provide a better gameplay experience.” You can find the full patch notes on Steam.
With WrestleMania 34 just a few weeks away – on Sunday, April 8th, in New Orleans – it’s the perfect moment to look back at all the times we’ve had to pick our jaws up off the floor. WrestleMania, for decades, has delivered some truly memorable shockers – sweet surprises that will live in our memories forever.
With Brock Lesnar putting his Universal Championship on the line against Roman Reigns, AJ Styles defending his WWE Championship against Shinsuke Nakamura, and Charlotte attempting to stop Asuka’s two and a half year win streak, and (perhaps) a final appearance by The Undertaker, this year’s event looks to be another supercard for the ages.
Sea of Thieves‘ first week of availability hasn’t been entirely smooth, with the game suffering from a variety of server problems and other technical issues. A new update–the first since launch–has now been released to alleviate some of the problems that players continue to deal with.
Following a batch of server maintenance, the update is now available on Xbox One and PC. As detailed on the game’s official website, this “contains a wide array of fixes across our services, stability, and game experience.” It’s a sizable download, ranging from 10 GB on Xbox One to nearly 20 GB for the Xbox One X and PC versions. Rare explained that it opted to go for a full game update because it was the fastest way to get the fixes into players’ hands. “If we’d wanted it to be a smaller client update we would have had to delay by a number of days, and felt the priority here was releasing the improvements to our player base,” the company said.
Rare also shared full patch notes for the update (version 1.01) on its forums. These detail the long list of bugs that have been addressed, which range from Black Dog pack items not showing up and snakes facing the wrong direction to lost cosmetic changes and chests that can’t be picked up. There are also improvements to performance, and screen tearing should be less common. You can see the full patch notes below.
Much as it did after the launch issues, Rare also shared another developer update video, which you can watch above. It’s noted that demand for the game has been “off the charts” and the current priority is to get it working as intended. Several known issues remain even with this update installed, and those are discussed in the video. Those include delayed gold and reputation rewards, delayed Achievements, and Bounty quest skeletons being impossible to find.
Rare also said it’s listening to fans’ requests for improvements to the game and that it’s discussing those and will talk about them in a future video. One change it has already confirmed in response to feedback is the cancelation of the proposed death cost penalty. You can read more about the game in our Sea of Thieves review and check out some beginner’s tips to help you get started.
Significant performance optimisations across all platforms, specifically targeting the 4K native resolution of Xbox One X.
Further improvements and optimisations for all platforms are ongoing.
Sea of Thieves conveys nature’s beauty and wrath with aplomb, and sailing across the open ocean in a creaky vessel can make you fall in love with its impressive presentation. This romantic connection can be felt most when sailing alone, but Sea of Thieves is primarily designed to be played with a trusty crew. Doing so allows you to revel in buffoonery and appreciate the value of teamwork, delivering an entirely different perspective on what it means to be a pirate.
These awesome moments make the initial hours of the game feel like you’re embarking on a special journey, but this love affair is quickly tested both by the game itself and other players, some of whom on PC are already employing hacks to put your interactions on uneven footing. Sea of Thieves is just that: a game that belongs to conniving robbers, who see fit to disrupt well-meaning players despite gaining no prize other than gold for purchasing cosmetic items. This is to be expected to a degree, and I’d be lying if I said there weren’t moments when I screwed over someone else for the sheer delight of asserting power and punishing another player’s naivety.
Even so, sabotaging others didn’t make me happy for long, and certainly didn’t provide me with anything meaningful enough to warrant developing my underhanded side. To that end, playing as a trusting do-gooder is often more fulfilling, though the aforementioned aggressors and a surprising lack of depth to missions curtailed this approach, too. After 30 hours, I’m left wondering when I’ll jump back into the game again. A part of me feels like I’ve seen it all; another part of me knows I’m using that as an excuse to take a break from grinding through another shallow quest in search of gold.
The ostensibly ultimate goal is to become a legendary pirate captain, a prestige that comes with a supposedly notorious-looking ship meant to instill awe. To reach that level of notoriety, you have to increase your reputation with the game’s three factions, each to the maximum level, by completing a series of quests. These include defeating reanimated skeletons of fallen pirate captains, digging up buried treasure, and capturing very specifically colored pigs and chickens. If hunting small animals sounds boring, you’re right on the money; the fact that it’s a dominant activity in the game is mildly baffling. The other two pursuits have their charms at first, but once you realize that the basic requirements of each faction’s quests are forever the same, monotony quickly sets in. Given that, maybe it’s not surprising that people opt to rob others of their treasures as a means to impress factions.
Again, the only reward for earning reputation–even for sticking it out and becoming a legendary pirate–is looking fancy. New guns are always only as good as the ones you started out with, and expensive attire is designed to impress, not to protect you from harm any better than a basic set of rags. This might be enough for some people to stick it out through the repetitive quests and often frustrating engagements with other players, but I can’t imagine why a dash of color here and a new collar there would inspire the ardent perseverance required.
All that said, I can still appreciate the dynamics of working with a friendly crew, and if I ever return to Sea of Thieves in the near future it will be to recapture those special moments. There’s almost no better way to kill time during a voyage than to act like an idiot on deck. Chugging grog to the point of vomiting is a regular occurance, as is catching it in a bucket to toss on a crewmate, clouding their vision with bile and booze. The drunker you get, the less stable you are, and the higher the chance that you’ll accidentally stumble overboard, much to the delight of everyone.
Coordinating with a team of three other sailors to properly stock your vessel and manage its equipment is the most immediate venue for skill development. The only time you’re truly tested is when engaging in battle against another ship, where you’re required to manage the speed and orientation of your boat, load and fire cannons on deck, and patch up holes from enemy fire before your ship fills with water and sinks. It’s great when you can fend off an attacker, but conversely demoralizing when stripped of your riches. Just because you sign up for that risk when you dedicate yourself to the game doesn’t mean losing all your treasure is any less of a hit to your enthusiasm when another crew takes over your ship.
Sea of Thieves offers other notable surprises, such as the appearance of a cloud-skull in the sky with glowing eyes, signaling a “raid” consisting of waves of enemies nearby. You can tackle these well enough with a four-person crew, but you are free to team up with others as well; just be prepared for them to turn on you when it comes time to collect the bounty of treasure.
You may also run into the infamous, massive Kraken mid-voyage, a moment that is exciting the first time around, but subsequently one worth avoiding. The Kraken’s gigantic octopus arms writhe out of stained black water–really, a trick to prevent you seeing that the kraken is just a group of disconnected arms without a body in the middle. Its arms can either grab your ship or pluck sailors from the deck, and you’ve got a limited amount of time to pummel it with cannon fire to free would-be victims. In the end, all you can do is damage it enough so that it slinks away–a deflating discovery that makes you think twice about future engagements, especially given that there’s no tangible reward for your victory.
There may come a time when Sea of Thieves is able to entice me back, and I imagine that will be with a mix of new mission types and hopefully the promise of rewards that allow for new types of interactions, if not improve my character’s capabilities. For now, it’s a somewhat hollow game that can be fun for a handful of hours when played with friends, and something worth trying out if you happen to be an Xbox Game Pass subscriber. Even though it’s hard to wholeheartedly recommend, I like enough of what I see to hold out hope that things will eventually improve as the game continues to be patched and updated with new content.
Iron Maiden, the iconic metal band whose skeletal mascot, Eddie, adorned the denim jackets of scary older kids in the 70s and 80s, will be the subject of Stern Pinball Inc.’s next pinball machine. In the first images of the Iron Maiden: Legacy of the Beast pinball machine revealed today, Iron Maiden’s trademark fantasy metal aesthetic (pyramids, ghouls, demonic forces) appears to be the perfect match for a pinball machine.
Check out Stern’s Iron Maiden art, features, and layout in the exclusive image gallery below. There are some shots of the cabinet as well. If the slideshow doesn’t suit you, you can also download hi-res images of Iron Maiden here.
Join Jake and Jean-luc as they liberate towns, loot prepper stashes, hunt down cultists and more cooperatively in Far Cry 5.