Strategy Guide Reviews

A Strategy Guide for your Strategy Guides

Monday Gaming Diary: The Creed and a Podcast

By Leave a Comment

Assassin's Creed® Unity_20141112155617After my horrific experience with Assassin’s Creed III, I wasn’t sure if I would ever get back to an AC game. Assassin’s Creed Revelations bored me, AC3 was absolutely broken, and I was done. I didn’t even give ACIV a chance, which I’ve been told over and over again that was a mistake. Oh well. It looked like it had a lot of sailing, and I hated the sailing in AC3. It was seeing Assassin’s Creed Unity at E3 that made me want to reconsider my stance on the franchise. Now that it’s here, I couldn’t be happier.

Okay, so maybe I could be. The texture-popping issues have been a little jarring, but since the latest patch released, there have been very few issues at all. And really, even if it wasn’t fixed, I kind of wouldn’t care. The game is so much fun, and so many of the mechanics have been vastly improved since the last AC game I played. I love that you can now control the parkour down buildings. I love how much smoother the parkour is in general. I love the crowd events. I love how the crowd dynamically changes. I love the murder mystery side quests. And OMG how I love the co-op.

Last night, I teamed up with a few friends for some 4-player co-op and we spent two hours doing nothing but running around the overworld and completing crowd events and stabbing random guards for looking at us oddly. We did a couple of actual co-op missions, and those were fun too, but we had more enjoyment running around and doing stupid things for ridiculous reasons. If I had more time, I’d set up weekly ACU sessions just for random stabbings.

In addition to a weird fixation I’ve developed on stabbing people in horrific ways, Chris and I discussed starting up a podcast for SGR. We’re brainstorming ideas, honing content, and I hope to have something official and up and running by December. If there’s anything you all would like us to have in the podcast, please give us your ideas here and on our FB page.

Also, I’m going to keep the Zelda poll up and running through the end of November. So far, Wind Waker HD is in the lead…

In Pursuit of Platinum: Sherlock Holmes: Crimes & Punishments

By 2 Comments

B2RIDGvIgAAD_bBI’ve gotten on a Platinum trophy kick lately with games. I don’t really care about my GamerScore on Xbox Live, but for whatever reason, I really want those Platinum trophies. I’m not sure if it’s how shiny they are or if I simply like the idea of trophies better than Achievements, but I’m all in if I think I can get that beautiful piece of virtual platinum.

The latest pursuit has been for Sherlock Holmes: Crimes & Punishments, a game I was meh about when I saw it at E3 and then fell in love with it when a review code fell in my lap. One thing I will say about this Platinum trophy list is that it is possible to get all of the trophies your first time to play as long as you’re willing to take your time, possibly compromise your moral decisions, and reach all of the right conclusions. Otherwise, you’ll be replaying the cases.

From just my first playthrough, I was only missing three trophies, which therefore made my path to Platinum all the easier. All I had left to do was reach every single conclusion possible (something I didn’t do as I was rushing through the game), max out the personality alignment, and win all of the final scene QTEs. If you don’t pick arresting the culprit for each case, you won’t get to see all of the final QTEs. If you don’t pick arresting the culprit for each case, then you won’t max out your personality alignment either.

Fortunately for me, I only had to replay each case once, and I didn’t have to finish the last case entirely. As soon as I reached a conclusion I didn’t make last time, the trophies dinged in, I danced around my office in glee, and then I quit the game.

Now that that distraction is out of the way, I can focus on what I’m supposed to be working on, like Assassin’s Creed Unity, strategy guides for Skylanders Trap Team, Call of Duty Advanced Warfare, and Sunset Overdrive, and maybe Dragon Age: Origins. Or maybe I’ll just work on my Platinum pursuit for Diablo 3 on the PS3; I only have 2.8 million more gold to go!

Monday Gaming Diary – It’s ridiculous how many copies of The Legend of Zelda I own

By Leave a Comment

Zelda-Logo1In preparation just for in case Twilight Princess wins in the current poll I have running (see, look over to the right sidebar), I pulled out the GameCube from dusty storage and set it up with my office TV. I don’t even have to unplug one of the other consoles because the GC is pre-HDMI days. Score one for old school. As I dug through all of my discs and accessories–I thought I lost my one memory card, but I didn’t–it dawned on me that I have way more copies of the original The Legend of Zelda game than I possibly need.

Since I was part of the ambassador program for the 3DS, I have a digital copy of the game on my 3DS. But that didn’t stop me from buying the virtual console version on the Wii U for whatever reason. And then while rummaging around in the ghosts of GameCube past, I stumbled across my Legend of Zelda Collection, a GC disc that contains the original game, Adventures of Link, Ocarina of Time, and Majora’s Mask. I don’t remember how I got this disc, I think it was for either registering my GC online or signing up for a Nintendo Power subscription. I know I got the strategy guide for the collection through Nintendo Power, so I really don’t remember how I got the games. I know I couldn’t buy them in the store. Maybe it was for purchasing and registering Wind Waker? It’s amazing how I don’t know.

The point is, I have three copies of the original The Legend of Zelda across three different platforms. I no longer have the original cartridge, as I gave my sister the NES and all of the cartridges when I got the GC. I believe her husband still has them and plays them often.

Know what’s even crazier? I’ve never once finished the original game. Not. Once. I always get to about level 7 or 8 and then get bored or I become too frustrated at those damn blue darknuts to continue. Seriously, fuck those guys.

darknut

 

Not sure why I keep buying this game. Maybe it’s the nostalgia of it? Maybe because it reminds of when I was the strategy guide writer for my friends, drawing up the maps and telling them where to go? Maybe because it’s spawned so many great game ideas? Or maybe it’s just something I feel the need to own and own it everywhere. I’ll probably buy it on the next several handhelds/consoles. It will be on my handheld I have in a nursing home, and I still won’t have completed it.

Fucking darknuts.

Monday Gaming Diary: Tying Loose Ends as November Rush Sets In

By Leave a Comment

redhotbulletsIn a sense, I have this week “off” from reviewing a game for my main job, which means I can focus on wrapping up a few strategy guides I have to review and well, forcing myself to sit an finish Dragon Age Origins and continue that prep work before Inquisition. So yeah, I don’t have anything coming up at all, for that matter.

I did finish up Bayonetta 2 over the weekend, so both guide review and game review will be coming this week. The short version of it is, Bayonetta 2 is probably the best game that so few people will be able to play.

So much else to finish as well, such as Shadow of Mordor and Sunset Overdrive, which I have on hold for the strategy guide. Oh and of course Skylanders Trap Team that has been on the back burner due to everything else.

Why is there so much awesome releasing at once? On the one hand, it’s such a great problem to have, but on the other, it’s killing both my wallet and free time.

In some unfortunate news, there will not be a Lords of the Fallen strategy guide. From E3, it looked like there would be one, but something fell through, and I got the word from Prima Games over the weekend that there will be no such guide. Considering it looks to be a cross between Darksiders and Dark Souls, I have a feeling that a strategy guide would be greatly wanted/needed.

And I just pulled the trigger on purchasing Call of Duty Advanced Warfare. I need help.

Tuesday Gaming Diary: Extra Life Wrap-up

By Leave a Comment

Oh, did you make plans?

Oh, did you make plans?

Well I did it, I stayed up for over 24 hours straight to do nothing by gaming things this past weekend in the name of raising money for Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals, or more specifically, Children’s Medical Center of Dallas. I flew to Iowa, packed up my Xbox 360 and all of my Dragon Age games, and prepared myself for some gaming greatness with my EvilCast crew (and two writers here at SGR!).

Of course, as these things go, nothing really went as I had planned.

For starters, remember that 3DS poll I posted? It was unanimously suggested that I play Ocarina of Time 3D while getting my Zelda tattoo, but that never happened because I left my 3DS at home. I realized it when I got to the airport, pulled out my 3DS bag and noticed the 3DS wasn’t in the said bag. Ocarina of Time 3D wasn’t even in the bag because it was in my 3DS! I literally hung my head between my knees in defeat. I couldn’t believe I had left that behind. Most likely, I saw the 3DS bag in my purse, and just assumed my 3DS was within. Just goes to show that rushing around at the last minute never produces a positive result.

That also meant I had no gaming distractions while on the plane, which I suppose was good on the way there as I had a review to write for work. But man, I was unbelievably bummed, especially when the second thing fell apart for me.

As I said earlier, I brought all of my Dragon Age games, which included Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age: Origins Awakening, and Dragon Age 2. I knew I wasn’t going to complete all of them, but I at least wanted to start DA2. Yeah I didn’t get close.

The tattoo adventure, while awesome, took a good chunk of time out of playing since Chris’s tattoos were rather large. That was about 4-5 hours of DAO time I couldn’t have, which was actually quite precious, even if I didn’t realize it until it was too late. I reached the final boss at about 2 a.m., and after trying at least 8 times, I had to turn the game off. I was so upset, I was close to crying in front of everyone. Blake told me to stop, that obviously I’m too tired and I’m not performing as I normally would. I was pissed at him for saying so, but he was right. The lack of sleep was affecting my thoughts and obviously my emotions as well. So I thought about playing Awakening instead, but when I saw you could import your final save from DAO, I closed that down in a hurry.

It’s now nearly 4 a.m., and I have NO other games to play. I left my 3DS at home. I had counted on being able to finish DAO and move on to the next games. I played some Diablo 3 with Chris, but the problem was, I know that game so well, it wasn’t keeping me awake. I constantly blinked for long periods of time. We even tried to create hardcore characters to fight off the fatigue, but that didn’t work either. We joined Ross and Blake for some Towerfall Ascension, which was far more fun than I thought it would be.

It’s now 6 a.m. and every second I’m awake is killing me. During the last 30 minutes, we finally got Blake to play some League of Legends, and even though I was standing up to watch him to keep awake, I was nodding off. While standing up. I’m quite possibly too old for this shit. As soon as 8 a.m. hit, I bolted upstairs for bed. I didn’t say goodbye to anyone. I felt bad about that, but I was not thinking clearly. After my four-hour nap, I apologized profusely to my host, but he was fairly cool with it.

Will I do it again next year? I really want to, but man, staying up that whole time when you can’t have caffeine is hard when you’re this close to 40. I still don’t feel like I’ve fully recovered, but I suppose having kids doesn’t help the recovery process much either. But for now, I have to focus on the reviews staring at me…and finishing DAO, dammit. I think going back and buying a crap-ton of potions will help; it was probably stupid to face the final boss with only 15 potions on hand.

Top Posts & Pages