Deus Ex: Mankind Divided

Release Date: August 23, 2016
Played on: PC

Deus Ex: Human Revolution was one of my favorite games of last generation. I've played through it three times, done my no-kill run, even played the sub-par DLC. I even thought about playing through it again before Mankind Divided came out.

I loved the freedom and exploration. How many side things there were to find. You could probably plow through a game in 12 hours, but it begs you to break into every office and read every email.

My excitement for Mankind Divided was too much for me to wait for the Steam sale a few months after release. I needed to be in that future world again.

Editorial: Fear Effect

With the Kickstarter launching for a new Fear Effect, I decided it was time to dust off the double jewel case and see if I still enjoyed the original, almost 20 years later.

It was a weird time in gaming. Japanese games still largely ruled and anime was incredibly popular on Cartoon Network. At the same time, to appeal to American's, a lot of games sort of had this injection of "attitude." It's something you can see in the top walk through on GameFaqs. The author really told that mom off. Many games felt like a Mountain Dew commercial with samurai.

I remember drooling over the advertisements in previews in the Official PlayStation Magazine as far back as when it was still called "Fear Factor." (Before the metal band, Fear Factory, threatened a lawsuit)

Editorial: The 3D Beat 'Em Up

Beat 'em up games were incredibly popular on 8 and 16 bit systems. They usually took the framework of an arcade like game and let you and your friends team up. There was a hesitation when the 3D platforms were coming out. What do we do with the Beat 'em up?

Some games just boosted the graphics and stuck with 2D like Iron Man and X-O Manowar in Heavy Metal. But some took the challenge of 3D on.

There was a period in 1996-1998 where 50% of Playstation demo disks had a demo for the first level of a 3D beat 'em up called Fighting Force.

Tomb Raider Anniversary

Played on: PC
Release Date: June 1, 2007

I had a dream last week where I was exploring an Mayan temple and it gave me a craving for some old style Tomb Raider.

Luckily, during one of the Steam sales a few years ago, I picked up every Tomb Raider game up to the 2013 reboot for roughly $15.

Unluckily, the PS1 ports of those games don't support controllers and are basically unplayable with a keyboard. So I have four PS1 Tomb Raider games in my Steam library that I may never touch.

The original Tomb Raider has a special place in my heart. It was one of the first times I thought, "Videogames will never look more realistic than this."

In 2007 (during the second reboot of the franchise) we got Tomb Raider Anniversary which was a remake of the very first game with some of the additions from Tomb Raider Legends.