Passing on the Season Pass

It's surprising that the concept of downloadable content (DLC) has been around for 10 years now. Starting with the launch titles for the Xbox 360, DLC has become a major part of the industry as it gives the player more things to do in the game and keeps them from trading it in for something else. This need to keep gamers from trading in their old games has forced every major AAA title nowadays to have a plan for DLC or risk fading away into obscurity. With the industry's dependence on DLC, packaging all the DLC together in one purchase called a season pass has become a standard practice for every game big and small. What first started as a great deal has more commonly become a money gouging strategy by publishers.

The two most recent season pass offenders are Star Wars: Battlefront and Rainbow Six: Siege.

It has become common knowledge that Battlefront has great gameplay, but DICE clearly skimped out when it came to the content. Looking to make up for the short-sight, or what I like to call, "We need to get this game out now, better add this stuff later," DICE has provided 20 weapons, 16 maps, four playable heroes and villains, four new game modes, and an exclusive emote that players can buy in a season pass. The content seems reasonable until you look at its 70 dollar price tag. Seriously, 70 dollars! What does EA think they will achieve? They're scaring people away, rather than enticing them to pay for extra content. EA may be arrogant enough to believe severely overpricing their season passes is an acceptable practice, but it will come back to haunt them when gamers skip on the initial release of their games to wait for the inevitable Game of the Year version.

If you though Battlefront's season pass is bad, well the season pass for Rainbow Six: Siege is on a new level of exploitation. Spending 30 dollars on this season pass nets you seven day early access and instant unlock of eight new operators (which you can unlock free of charge by playing the game), weapon skins, 600 credits for additional in-game purchases, five per cent Renown boost, and two more challenges a day. I can't think of a worse way to spend 30 dollars. Outside of the minor boosts and cosmetic additions, everything contained in this season pass can be unlocked through regular play, meaning this pass only exists to gouge money out of Rainbow Six fans. Is Siege a AAA title or a freemium game, Ubisoft? Because how you treating it with this abomination of a season pass and the addition of unnecessary microtransactions are telling me otherwise.

Not all season passes are bad. Witcher III's expansion pass and the Mario Kart 8 DLC bundle price are two examples of great season passes. Just most of the recent offerings have been giving this option to buying DLC in bulk a bad name. Making new content for a game, no matter its size, can be costly especially with the ever-rising price of video game development, but that doesn't give publishers justification to gouge money out of the consumer that already pays close to 100 dollars for one title. Instead of enticing more people to buy more content for their games, these underhanded practices are good ways to keep people from buying DLC altogether.

E3 2015: Microsoft Press Conference Impressions

Microsoft and the Xbox One has been reeling since their infamous performance at E3 2013.  Microsoft hasn't truly won back the support of gamers and the Xbox One is suffering because of it.  What Microsoft needs to do is announce titles that gamers can only find on the Xbox One and commit to shipping them in a timely manner.  The last thing they need is to repeat last year's good showing with no followup.  In fact, three key exclusives from last year's show (Crackdown, Scalebound and Quantum Break) aren't even going to be at E3 2015.  So does Microsoft have a few aces up their sleeve or are we in for another disappointing performance?

After 90 minutes, I can safely say that was Microsoft's best conference in recent memory.  While nothing at the conference was mind-blowing, it had a good mix of new and existing titles along with a couple surprises.

Microsoft's big strength at this conference was live demos.  The live demos for Halo 5, Rise of the Tomb Raider, Minecraft on Hololens and Gears 4 were all well done and highly entertaining to watch.  Out of the all the live demos, the Minecraft on Hololens demo was the best as it perfectly showed the potential of using holograms to interact with games in brand new ways.  Also it was nice to see a greater focus on survival horror and more proportional characters for Gears 4.

Outside of the demos, Microsoft had some solid announcements around exclusive content for Xbox One.  Comcept and Armature's Recore with an intriguing mechanic revolving around building up a team of friendly robots shows loads of potential.  Rare Replay and Sea of Thieves both look to recapture the spirit of Rare's former glory in the forms of a compilation and new IP respectively.  Even the ID@Xbox showcase and Xbox Game Preview unveiling were fun to watch although the approach seemed to be very familiar to Sony's way of highlighting indies at E3.

The one area where the Microsoft conference faltered was when it came to third-parties.  Aside from the Dark Souls III and Plants vs. Zombie: Garden Warfare 2 reveals, they spent a good third of the conference on titles like Fallout 4, The Division and Rainbow Six: Siege without breaking any new ground on them.  In particular, the "exclusive" Fallout 4 gameplay was the same demo from the Bethesda conference with a minute of new content.  On top of that, EA had an embarrassing showing of their EA Access subscription service.  I feel a little sorry for Peter Moore as every announcement he made fell on deaf ears, but the fact is gamers aren't going to respond to EA's crap no matter how nice you make it sound.

While Xbox One backwards compatibility does fall under the good from this conference, I am little skeptical on its functionality.  As Microsoft traditionally loves to do when they take about certain console features, they were very vague in how they outlined backwards compatibility for Xbox One.  Also they made a quick mention to downloading the 360 game to the Xbox One when you put in the game disc.  Due to the vague terminology, I have a feeling that Xbox One backwards compatibility won't be how everybody believes it will be.

Overall, Microsoft's E3 2015 press conference delivered where it counts: first-party content.  It was a relief to see Microsoft pull back from relying on third-parties so much and come more into their own.  Although we won't know if Microsoft can follow-up on these promises until months down the line, they did build the positive momentum needed at this point in time.

Grade:  B+

Bit by Bit: May 2015

May was an exciting month for everything except games.  My Avengers review made the Arts cover for Imprint's May issue.  My Tomorrowland review hit the Imprint website last week.  I witnessed two great wrestling shows live.  And I did quite a bit of catching up with friends.

Not to say that I didn't play any games this past month.  From starting new purchases to diving into the backlog, I just did a lot of jumping between titles.  Now that both Splatoon and Witcher III have been released, I am not bouncing around as much.  Despite my current gaming stability, I don't have enough to say on one thing this month to do Game/Show/Movie of the Month justice.

I promise everything will be back to normal for June's edition of Bit by Bit.  As I will get to in a moment, June is going to be a very busy month for Silver Bit.

Most Anticipated Event of the Month
You may be wondering: why is June such a busy month for Silver Bit?  Well my uneducated hypothetical audience, June plays host to E3, the biggest video game convention of the year, and I am covering the show from start to finish for the fourth time now.

Coverage of E3 2015 will begin this Sunday with the return of The Big Questions article.  The show ramps up on Monday as coverage of the press conferences begin.  My impressions on Bethesda, Microsoft, EA and Ubisoft will be posted throughout Monday, followed by Sony, Nintendo and Square Enix on Tuesday.  Silver Bit's E3 coverage doesn't end once the show floor closes on June 18th.  The coverage will continue for the rest of June with a special edition of Bit by Bit to wrap up the show and the annual Top Games of E3 article(s).

While E3 may be one of the most exhausting weeks of my year, it is one of the most fulfilling.  I love sharing my opinions and insights on E3 with you guys and gals all week long.  Also it's tons of fun to gather a bunch of my friends together to watch the festivities with me.

Video of the Month
Microsoft is well-known for making a plethora of reliable products including the Xbox 360, Windows Vista and Zune.  So it's a no-brainer that they'd bring their patented reliability to the self-driving car market with a car powered by their excellent bing search engine.  Check out this promotional video by the great folks at Rooster Teeth to see the bing self-driving car in all its glory.  It just needs Internet Explorer and SmartGlass support, and it would be the greatest car on the planet!

The Game Awards 2014 Impressions

No fancy intro.  No intricate back story about the failures of the Video Game Awards.  I am getting straight to the point because I cannot think any other way to say it.  Although the Game Awards were a great improvement over the VGAs, I still found them disappointing and boring.  I understand a lot of good people put a ton of time and effort into making this show a celebration of games, but the show as a whole did more to make me question the point of it outside of the game reveals.  I spent three hours of my life starring at a computer screen to see about an hour of watchable content and I personally find that unacceptable.

Before diving right into all the flaws with the Game Awards, I will admit there were some good to great moments in this show.  There were a good amount of reveals with Metal Gear Online, Adr1ft, Human Element and the new Legend of Zelda being the standouts in my opinion.  Speaking of the new Zelda, that gameplay footage, albeit being short in length, made me feel all giddy inside.  Just the sheer size of Hyrule made my jaw drop.  While I found them unneeded, most of the musical performances were done well especially the collaboration between Imagine Dragons and Koji Kondo.  Geoff Keighley's friend Greg from Scotland stole the show with his performance of classic game tunes from Mario, Sonic, Street Fighter and Tetris using lasers to produce the music.  After a performance that spectacular, Greg definitely deserves a job in the video game industry.  It is up to the developer and publishers now, give the guy a chance.

One of my main complaints with the VGAs was their complete lack of respect and effort put into the awards aspect of the awards show.  The Game Awards fixed some of that by putting together credible award categories, having most of the awards selected by of panel of industry veterans and highlighting more awards on the show than ever before.  While I do have some complaints about the handling of awards outside of the main stage (more on this in a bit), the Game Awards did a job leaps and bounds better than any of the VGAs.  Also the awards look much better than the stupid monkey statues they use to give out.

For everything good about the Game Awards, there were two or three things wrong with the show.  For a three hour show, it had no sense of pacing.  Some segments like Conan O'Brien's videos on the nominees for Game of the Year and Lindsay Stirling's performance of Dragon Age: Inquistion's theme song felt rushed, while others such as Keighley's asides with others in the crowd went on for far too long.  Speaking of Keighley's asides, these moments made two key problems with the show evident: the lack of rehearsals and poor representation of awards not shown on the main stage

It is understandable that a level of improvisation makes the show feel organic, but every conversation, speech and introduction came off as awkward and highly unprofessional.  The fact that you forget a member of the Hearthstone team was in the audience to accept their award for Mobile/Handheld Game of the Year, overheard a musical performance tuning their instruments on the main speakers or had a Sony representative call out the existence of a teleprompter is just unacceptable.  These unfortunate instances make the video game industry as a whole look like a laughing stock to casual viewers and people from other mediums.  These mistakes would have been ironed out with a few rehearsals before the show.

Building off of the lack of rehearsals, the awards given out off of the main stage were handled poorly.  Nobody is going to take these awards seriously if Keighley and company are just going to hand them out with little to no context.  Time may be a constraint, but have a pre-show or cut unnecessary segments in order to make these awards feel credible rather than awkwardly pulling people out of the audience to hand them their awards.  These parts just reinforced how unprofessional the show was.

Apart from the Game Awards itself, my brother and I found it next to impossible to view the show on our Xbox 360 and PS3.  We tried everything from looking on the dashboards to searching on the Youtube and IGN apps to no avail.  When we went to search for instructions on how to watch on our game consoles, all we found were press releases boasting the show was available on all platforms without any instructions on where exactly to watch it.  It is one thing to boast about the show's availability, but to not provide a means of helping people gain access to it added more frustration to this entire ordeal.

While the Game Awards is a disappointing and boring show, it is a small step in the right direction.  Sadly, this step has created a plethora of new problems that Keighley and company will have to overcome before the show can gain widespread credibility.  After this year's show, I believe efforts should be made on creating an awards show that competes with the DICE Awards and the BAFTA Game Awards rather than the Grammys and Oscars.  Despite the Game Awards having a few moments that are worth watching, I cannot recommend spending three hours viewing the Game Awards in its entirety.

First Byte: Fan Expo 2014 Gauntlet Part 1

A few weeks back, yours truly made the long trek to Toronto for Fan Expo Canada.  My main reason for going to Fan Expo this year was the plethora of upcoming games available to play at the event.  In total, Fan Expo had well over 30 games to play including Middle Earth: Shadows of Mordor, Halo: Master Chief Collection, Assassin's Creed Unity and Destiny.  While I was hoping to play every game on the show floor, that ambitious goal did not come close to happening.  In fact, I only got to play ten games.  Although that number might not seem like a lot, I got to play the games I was most interested in trying, and those with the shortest lines.  Considering I did not get a whole lot of time to fully experience each demo, I will be doing brief impressions on the games I played instead of doing separate first impression previews for each one. As I cannot fit all ten games in one article, there will be two parts to this Fan Expo Gauntlet.  The first part focuses on the demos I got less than ten minutes with while the second part previews the games that I got much more hands-on time playing.

First things first, I learned a valuable lesson at Fan Expo: I am horrible at racing sims and that's a fact.  I played three different racing sims on the show floor in Driveclub (exclusively for PS4), Forza Horizon 2 (exclusively for Xbox 360 and Xbox One) and The Crew (available on all platforms), and each game had a unique take on simulation racing.  Driveclub was solely focused on providing an experience that expertly replicates the nuances of driving.  With crisp graphics and precise controls, Driveclub seems to be tailored for a gaming steering wheel and throttle.  While Driveclub focused on a pure simulation of driving in a pristine environment, Forza Horizon 2 took the similar precise controls and crisp graphics and threw it in an open world.  The race I played in Forza was very interesting as the race dynamically moved from tarmac to dirt to grass causing me to think on the fly about how to control my car through the constantly changing terrain.  Even the great grip of the tarmac can be easily erased by a downpour, all thanks to Horizon 2's dynamic weather.  Although I ended up last in both Driveclub and Forza Horizon 2, I enjoyed my time with each game.  The same cannot be said about The Crew.  Ubisoft's unique street racing sim with a focus on team-play did little to impress due to the incredibly loose control of the cars and the complete lack of direction.  It may be nice to have an open world to drive around and explore, but when the only person able to initiate anything in the demo is the Ubisoft rep, there's a big problem.

Coming out of E3, The Order: 1886 looked like a promising new IP from Sony, but I still had some reservations due to the lack of demos on the game.  Once I saw that the game was going to be at Fan Expo, I was ecstatic to play it.  In fact, it was the first game I played on the show floor.  My ecstasy for The Order subsided when the demo ended after a mere three minutes.  You are dropped in the middle of Chapter 3 of the game with the objective to escape the alleyway.  Using the termite gun, you fire off a few rounds, try the special bullet time-esque pistol move, jump from multiple points of cover, activate a quick-time event and the demo is over.  Three minutes is nowhere close to enough time to form an opinion on the game other than hoping there is much more in the final product.  With only six months left until release, I hope Ready at Dawn has a lot more up their sleeve than this three minute disappointment.

Much like The Order: 1886, Far Cry 4 had a really good showing at E3 so again I was excited to get my hands on the game.  Very similar to my time with The Order, Far Cry 4 left a lot to be desired.  While The Order's problems stemmed from showing barely anything, Far Cry 4's problems stemmed from ridiculously long load times and severe pop-in.  You can give the benefit of the doubt to Ubisoft, but to show a game to the public in such a poor state does not help push pre-orders.  It will cause exactly the opposite to happen.  Despite those issues, Far Cry 4 gave you three scenarios in which to siege an enemy fortress: sneak, ride and fly.  I chose the ride option which allowed me to ride an elephant to siege the fortress.  While the destruction the elephant caused was a sight to behold, I found attacking the fortress to be ill fit for one person as I was easily swarmed and overwhelmed by the enemy AI on multiple occasions.  In my opinion, the demo would have greatly benefit from having two people cooperatively siege the fortress.  Due to the poor quality of this demo, my expectations for Far Cry 4 have lowered quite a bit.

In light of the small amount of time I got to play Mortal Kombat X (a mere three minutes, in fact), I am going to keep this short and sweet.  Mortal Kombat X was a lot of fun.  The controls felt responsive, it was a lot more approachable than past entries as I put together some unique combos with ease, the interactable elements were well integrated and the game has more than enough blood, gore and violence to keep any Mortal Kombat fan happy.  Although my time was short, I came away impressed with how Mortal Kombat X is progressing.  Finishing foes with fatalities cannot come soon enough.

First Byte: Destiny

Unless you were living under a rock sometime during the end of July, a beta for a little game called Destiny was released to the masses.  While Bungie did give a small taste of Destiny through the PS4 exclusive alpha back in June, the beta marked the first time gamers got a substantial piece of the game to play.  Available from July 17th to 27th on Sony consoles (PS3 and PS4) and July 23rd to 27th on Microsoft consoles (Xbox 360 and Xbox One), the Destiny beta gave players five story missions and one strike co-op mission to complete, the Old Russia wastelands and Guardian Tower to explore and the Control PvP match-type to compete in along with some addition content such as a new story mission and PvP match-type only opened for brief periods throughout the beta.  With the financial backing of publishing powerhouse Activision and the unstained reputation of developer Bungie, Destiny has easily become the most anticipated game of 2014 well before people ever got their hands on the game.  This beta marked a chance for millions of gamers the world over to try this major title without dropping 70 dollars to buy it or spending hundreds to play it at a gaming convention.  The Destiny beta was an unprecedented event, but that leaves one question: did it succeed in convincing those skeptical to buy the game and reinforcing the beliefs of those already excited for the game?  Although the true answer to that question will only be revealed on September 9th when Destiny is released to the public, I will be sharing my initial opinions on Destiny and recap my experience with the beta in this edition of First Byte.

Before launching right into the game, the Destiny beta starts off in a character creation screen.  In this screen, players choose their class (titan, warlock or hunter), sex (male or female), race (Human, Exo or Awoken) and other physical features.  As I am not the most adverse at character creators, I only spent a few minutes creating my unique Exo warlock.  Those interested in tweaking every little feature of their character to perfection might be disappointed in Destiny's focus on using preset features and colours for character creation; however it does keep players from spending an unnecessary amount of time in these menus and moves them into the action right away.

After finishing the character creation, the first cutscene plays setting up the conflict between the Traveler and the Darkness and the players' need to bear arms against the threat of the Darkness.  The first mission starts as my character is resurrected by a Ghost (your character's robot companion played by Game of Thrones star Peter Dinklage) and it plays out much like your standard fare tutorial introducing the core mechanics of the game.  Considering you gain one level every mission in the early stages of Destiny, the four other introductory missions are very similar as each one introduces a new element of the game such as special moves, vehicles, public events and new enemy races.  Once you complete the first mission, you are given access to the Tower, Destiny's social and non-combat hub.  While at the Tower, players are able to view messages, buy new weapons, armour and ship upgrades, decode encrypted items, store items in vaults, take on single and multiplayer bounties and interact with fellow guardians.  Exploring the Tower offers players a peaceful distraction outside the intense firefights of missions and multiplayer matches.  The Tower is not the only place guardians are able to roam as players can explore each major setting of the game at their leisure.  In these "explore" areas are loot caches to find, enemies to fight, secret areas to discover and side missions that come in the form of beacons to complete.  Considering I did not get a chance to play the multiplayer portion of the beta, Destiny's open world areas are where I spent most of my time and I spent most of my time exploring Destiny's open world areas and they were a fun way to kill some time.

Although I am not a huge fan of first-person shooters, Destiny got its hooks in me.  Even with the limited selection of missions and activities to do, I kept on coming back every chance I had and I believe it had to do with Destiny's excellent hybridization of expertly polished FPS gameplay with the empowering abilities and skills found in many RPGs.  The gun play is very reminiscent of Bungie's entries into the Halo series as each gun has its own strengths and weaknesses in effectively dealing with different situations from long distance shootouts to up close and personal brawls.  The RPG elements are excellently implemented as players gain levels independent of learning new skills such as hovering, draining health when using your melee or supercharged special moves.  Gaining levels never feels like a grind because there are plenty of opportunities to earn experience through missions, explore mode, multiplayer matches and public events.  Another impressive element of Destiny comes from the enemy AI.  It floors me how well the enemies react to your tactics by moving from cover to cover, flanking when you are busy fighting another enemy or swarming when you make a mistake.  Destiny's enemies are unlike the regular FPS grunts as they offer a considerable yet satisfying challenge for players of any skill level.

While I thoroughly enjoyed my time with Destiny, there are still a few issues I ran into during the beta.  The most prevalent issues came with the side missions and public events in explore mode as I ran into far too many missions and events with the exact same objectives.  The randomized nature of these activities is definitely a factor in this repetition, but Bungie should make a large enough pool of side missions and public events in order to avoid repetition of missions and events altogether.  The other issues I found were more graphical glitches like a enemy teleporting through objects, errant collision boxes the level designers forgot to remove or stuttering during loading screens, which are not that serious.  Hopefully, the beta helped the programmers and designers at Bungie find all the bugs and balancing issues needed to make Destiny a better game come launch.

Skepticism best describes my opinion of Destiny before taking part in the beta.  Due to the incredible marketing might Activistion is putting behind it, there is no doubt that Destiny will be a success upon its release, but would it actually be live up to the hype is whole other question.  The excellent quality of the Destiny beta has completely changed my opinion on the game.  In a year with a significant lack of triple A titles, Destiny will shine brighter than any game on the market this holiday season, possibly challenging Call of Duty in sales.  We will only know come September 9th if Destiny is the revolution in console MMOs that it is being hyped to be, but I do believe we are on the cusp of something special regardless.

Top 10 Games of E3 2014 Part 2

Welcome to the second part of Silver Bit's Top 10 Games of E3 2014.  In the previous article, we took a look at the games that just barely made this final five.  E3 2014 saw some great games grace the show floor, but only a handful can walk away as the most impressive games of the show.  While all the games on this list are among the best of E3, the games in this top five could easily walk away with top honours depending on one's opinion.  To reiterate,  the only games eligible for this list are those available to play on the show floor.  Now with that reminder out of the way, it is time to count down the final five games in Silver Bit's Top 10 Games of E3 2014.  Hope you enjoy and feel free to share your favourite games of E3 2014 in the comments.

5.  Sunset Overdrive - XBONE
There are only a select few Xbox One exclusives that really get one hopeful for first-party content on the machine and Insomniac Games' Sunset Overdrive is champion over them all.  All of Microsoft's offerings nowadays seem to fall under the same experiences they delivered last generation, but Sunset Overdrive is the shining example of what happens when you give a team of creative minds full control over their vision.  Sunset Overdrive is pure unadulterated fun wrapped into an open-world third-person action game.  Stuck in Sunset City during the Awesompocolypse, the player is tasked with cleaning up the mess made by the launch of FizzCo's Overcharge Delirium XT, an energy drink that turns anyone who drinks into mindless mutated creatures known as the OD'd.  Sunset Overdrive gives players tons of options to tackle their task through fully customizable characters, a slew of creatively designed weapons and plenty of solo and multiplayer missions to complete throughout Sunset City.  Traversing Sunset City is incredibly fluid as players are able to wall run, grind rails and wires, instantly switch between grinding and zip-lining, bounce off of any surface and use other crazy acrobatics.  Although Microsoft will not push Sunset Overdrive as heavily as Halo or Forza, it is a game that Xbox One owners should not overlook this holiday season.

4.  Valiant Hearts: The Great War - PS3, PS4, XBONE, XB360, PC
The UbiArt engine has proven time and time again that the most beautiful games do not need to have the largest polygon count.  In fact, the art in 2D games can be just as beautiful or even more than their 3D counterparts; just look at Rayman Legends and Child of Light for proof.  Valiant Hearts: The Great War is the next title to use the UbiArt engine and the game looks spectacular in terms of its visuals and gameplay.  Valiant Hearts follows the story of four individuals as they try to survive the horrors of World War I.  Starting in different locations and allegiances, the stories of each character interconnect with one another through a common companion--a dog named Walt.  Throughout the game, the characters are thrust into various situations from sneaking behind enemy lines to blowing up bridges.  Valiant Hearts offers players plenty of puzzles to complete through interacting with the environment and other characters or sending Walt to reach areas the characters cannot normally reach.  The interplay between using the characters and Walt to solve puzzles and the mature tones of the story have me very excited to venture into the world of Valiant Hearts in the near future.

3.  Batman: Arkham Knight - PS4, XBONE, PC
In recent years, The Dark Knight has become an incredible force within the video game industry thanks to the folks at Rocksteady.  One can argue that the Batman: Arkham games are single-handedly the greatest licensed games to grace the market.  As the final entry in this acclaimed series, Rocksteady looks to pull no punches with Arkham Knight as Batman and his world are being supercharged with new abilities and content.  The moment from the E3 demo where Batman steps out onto the balcony of his hideout and peers out onto Rockstady's Gotham City will make anybody's jaw drop.  The expansiveness of this open world is breathtaking and I can see myself drowning hundreds of hours exploring every nook and cranny of Gotham City.  With how vast Gotham City will be in Arkham Knight, Batman needs another way to traverse the city than just his trusty grappling hook and cape.  For this final installment, the Batmobile has been added to The Dark Knight's arsenal.  Aside from the vehicles primary purpose, Batman can summon the Batmobile at will, use it to immobilize enemies, have it clear obstacles and launch himself into the air.  The Batmobile is not the only addition as Batman's combat and stealth abilities are receiving considerable upgrades in speed and precision.  Although Batman: Arkham Knight will no longer be gracing consoles this year, the game looks to be on the road to surpassing its predecessors' legendary quality.

2.  Super Smash Bros. for Wii U and 3DS - Wii U, 3DS
Arguably the most anticipated game of 2014, Super Smash Bros. for Wii U and 3DS had one of the best showings of the show.  Nintendo went out of their way to make Super Smash Bros. the most important game of the show.  They gave fans three character reveals in Mii Fighters, Palutena and Pac Man, an incredible live tourney held in the Nokia Theatre and multiple kiosks to play on the show floor.  Seeing the two versions in motion is a thing of beauty.  The Wii U version flows at an incredible clip and all the new characters, stages and items look to fit in with the polished gameplay.  While the 3DS version may take some time to get use to the controllers as I have heard from many video impressions on the game, it looks just as polished and refined as its Wii U brethren.  Much like Far Cry 4 in part one, Super Smash Bros. for Wii U and 3DS are both hard to sum up in words.  I highly recommend watching the Super Smash Bros. Invitational or one of the live demos from Nintendo Treehouse Live at E3 to see how great these games play.

1.  The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt - PS4, XBONE, PC

As great as Super Smash Bros. for Wii U and 3DS may be, there is one game greater than it this year.  That game is The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt.  Not much has been shown of Witcher 3 since its reveal back in early 2013, but CD Projekt RED let the floodgates loose at E3.  The Witcher 3 gives players a living, breathing open world to explore.  In fact, the map is 30 times larger than the previous Witcher games.  Plus the amount of freedom in The Witcher 3 is incredible as players can venture to any part of the map at any time and pick up and put down story and side quests whenever they choose.  On your way to a quest objective and feel like helping a traveler in distress along the way or starting up a whole other quest, you are free to do that without penalty.  The world is shaped around the player's choices in combat, regular conversation and pivotal story moments.  Every piece of media for The Witcher 3 from E3 has been nothing short of phenomenal from the blood-pumping pre-E3 trailer to the show floor demos.  While The Witcher 3 may not earn the same amount of money Elder Scrolls, Dragon Age or Mass Effect rake in, this game and its ambitious scope prove why anybody should spend close to 600 dollars on a next generation console.  The next generation of video gaming truly begins on February 24th, 2015 with the release of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt.

Top 10 Games of E3 2014 Part 1

Silver Bit's month long coverage of E3 2014 comes to an end with the annual Top Games of E3 list.  This year yours truly is going to switch things up as this list will be a Top 10 list instead of the Top 5 lists from previous years.  Due to the change, it will be hard to contain all these games in one article.  To solve the problem, I will be splitting the list into two parts with part one covering numbers 10 through 6 while part two covers numbers 5 through 1.  As I could not physically go to Los Angeles to experience E3 in person, efforts have been made to watch as much gameplay footage available online to narrow down the best games for this list.  Like in years past, the only games eligible for this list are those available to play on E3's show floor.  Without any further stipulations, let us count down the first five games in Silver Bit's Top 10 Games of E3 2014.

10.  Mario Maker - Wii U
If there is one Nintendo property that people have grown tired of over the years, it is Mario.  Mario releases may come at an accelerated rate these days, but you cannot blame Nintendo for sticking with what sells especially when they need it the most.  I will admit that Mario's 2D platformers have not added much to the formula since New Super Mario Bros. for the DS.  Mario's recent stagnation in two dimensions makes Mario Maker such a breath of fresh air.  Giving the player full freedom to create whatever 2D Mario level their heart desires in such an official form is a dream come true.  Mario Maker allows players to build levels using classic Mario assets such as blocks, warp pipes, goombas and koopas, two different styles of graphics (original NES graphics and the New Super Mario Bros. graphics) and the ability to instantly switch between editing and playing levels at any time.  Mario Maker is the next logical step in taking 2D Mario games to a whole new level.  There is an incredible amount of potential in placing the creation of new Mario levels in the hands of the players and this writer is excited to see what crazy contraptions come from it.

9.  Evolve - PS4, XBONE, PC
Coming from the minds that brought us classic cooperative shooter Left 4 Dead, Evolve looks to take competitive and cooperative shooters in a brand new direction.  Evolve is a four vs. one multiplayer shooter where the team of four has to work together to beat the one.  It might seem very unfair if the one was not a gigantic monster.  With this unique dynamic, matches involve much more than straight-up firefights.  Playing as the monster involves taking advantage of the moment-to-moment action to decide between striking the opposing team or avoiding combat in order to eat roaming creatures needed to evolve into more powerful stages.  On the other hand, the hunters need to work effectively as a team in order to track down and kill the monster before it becomes too much for the team to handle.  Matches in Evolve become hectic games of cat-and-mouse as both sides wrestle for control of territory and resources while contending with the unpredictable computer-controlled creatures that inhabit each map.  Since Turtle Rock Studios announced the game this past January, Evolve has been nothing but impressive especially with its showings at this year's E3.

8.  CounterSpy - PS3, PS4, PSV
Not much has been seen of Dynamighty's PlayStation exclusive outside the trailer found on PS4 demo kiosks across North America.  Considering CounterSpy is being published by Sony, one would have thought the gaming giant would make mention of it at their press conference.  In fact, the only footage available of CounterSpy at E3 is from the demo on the show floor.  It is a shame because of how great CounterSpy plays.  CounterSpy is a side-scrolling stealth game that has players sneaking through enemy bases in order to prevent nuclear war between the United States and Russia.  Trusted with a silenced pistol and stealth know-how, the player jumps between cover, shooting and taking out enemies on the fly.  In particular, the cover mechanics for the game are very interesting as the camera changes from a side view of the stage to slightly tilted view of the player and their sight from cover.  Overall, CounterSpy looks like a delightful downloadable that deserves a lot more attention than it is currently getting.  Watch some gameplay for it, CounterSpy might just surprise you.

7.  Mortal Kombat X - PS3, PS4, XBONE, XB360, PC
Mortal Kombat has seen its fair share of ups and downs over the years especially during the PS2, Xbox and Gamecube years.  With the success of Mortal Kombat 9, things have gotten back on track for the franchise.  Not to rest on their laurels, Ed Boon and NetherRealm Studios are making big changes to series while expanding on successful mechanics introduced in Mortal Kombat 9 and Injustice: Gods Among Us.  Mortal Kombat X's biggest departure comes in its roster and story as the game takes place 25 years after the events of the previous game.  Since 25 years have passed, the roster will consist of brand new characters such as Cassie Cage (daughter of Johnny Cage and Sonya Blade), Kotal Khan (a blood god) and D'Vorah (a human/insect hybrid) along with some returning favourites like Scorpion and Sub-Zero.  Although gameplay remains very similar to past Mortal Kombats with the return of fatalities, special moves and x-ray moves, there are some interesting additions in the form of fully interactable environments and combat variations.  Much like Injustice, combatants can use parts of the environment to launch themselves into the air, set traps for opponents or use as additional weapons.  Speaking of combat variations, each fighter has three different variations to choose from which changes their move sets, strengths, weaknesses and weapons.  With all the new additions and refinements to Mortal Kombat X, gamers all around should be excited to dive back into this fighting game franchise come 2015.

6.  Far Cry 4 - PS3, PS4, XBONE, XB360, PC
Far Cry 3 surprised everybody back in 2012 with its excellent gameplay and vibrant open world.  Two years later, Ubisoft is at it once again with Far Cry 4.  To sum up Far Cry 4's showing at E3 in one word, it would be jaw-dropping.  Instead of having an entire island at your disposal, you now have an entire country in Kyrat.  On foot, in car and through the air, Far Cry 4 gives the player an incredible amount of choice to explore Kyrat however they want.  Gameplay gives the player the same amount of freedom as you can play solo or with a friend, use items and animals found in the environment to your advantage and freely move between modes of travel at any time.  It is hard to describe everything that makes Far Cry 4 such a standout among the sea of shooters releasing this year.  It is best to watch some gameplay footage of Far Cry 4 and see the awesomeness for yourself.

Well, this marks the end of part one.  Hope you enjoyed the list up to this point and feel free to share your favourite games of E3 in the comments.  If you want to continue reading, click this link to see the conclusion to Silver Bit's Top 10 Games of E3 2014

First Byte: Microsoft's Power Play

Ever since Microsoft announced the Xbox One to the public about a year ago, the system has been on a roller coaster of twists and turns.  Never seeming to be on solid footing, Microsoft has tirelessly been rebuilding their damaged reputation after alienating most of their audience at E3 2013.  Changing their policies one week after E3 was the first step, but there is a lot more that still needs to be done.  This past week Microsoft made the next significant steps in changing their tainted image for the better with two big announcements.

The first of Microsoft's two announcements concerns a brand new version of the Xbox One hitting store shelves in a few weeks.  This new Xbox One will run for 399 dollars and come without the Kinect sensor.  With this announcement, Microsoft looks to compete more directly with the PlayStation 4 instead of having one hundred dollar difference between the prices of the two systems.  Sadly if you live in Canada, the roles have now been reversed as the PS4 is now 50 dollars more than the Xbox One due to the poor projection of the Canadian dollar this year.  Microsoft's first real jab at taking some of Sony's profits lands on Monday, June 9th which is the first day of E3 2014.  It is not hard to imagine as a result that Microsoft's conference will be directed towards convincing potential customers to pick up this cheaper Xbox One that very day.

The second announcement from Microsoft involves some changes to Xbox Live.  In particular, it involves new free services being added to the free Xbox Live membership.  No longer will streaming apps such as Netflix, Hulu, Twitch and ESPN be behind the Xbox Live Gold pay wall.  This change cuts out the need for consumers to buy a Xbox Live subscription on top of their other subscriptions just to enjoy the same apps which are free to use on other consoles.  To make amends to current Gold subscribers which only use the service for streaming apps, Microsoft is offering refunds to these subscribers up until the end of August.

It has been well documented that yours truly is a critic of Microsoft especially the direction their game division has taken in the past five to six years.  When they do something right, this writer still has to give credit where credit is due.  While I personally have some reservations, Microsoft made two good moves this past week in removing the Kinect to drop the price of the Xbox One and moving streaming apps from the Gold pay wall.  Lowering the barrier of entry to the Xbox One and Xbox Live opens Microsoft's newest piece of hardware up to a broader audience that may have been scared away by the need to own Kinect and subscribe to Xbox Live Gold to get the most out of the system.  Coupling these changes with a plethora of quality exclusives that play to a variety of genres and differentiate themselves from Sony's offerings could help move a lot more Xbox Ones.  The announcement of Halo 5: Guardians this past week and releasing the first gameplay footage of Sunset Overdrive two weeks ago should get some more hype building around Microsoft and the Xbox One.  Now Microsoft needs to capitalize on this wave of good press with a great showing at E3 to continue building momentum for the Xbox One going into the last half of 2014.

As good as these announcements are, there are a few key details Microsoft has not touched which could sour this good news.  First and foremost, Microsoft has not mentioned anything about selling the Kinect separately from the Xbox One as of yet.  Considering Microsoft designed the entire system to run at its full potential when paired with Kinect, it would be silly not to give those people who purchase the Xbox One for 399 the option to buy a Kinect later.  With the Kinect, the next question is the price of the unit on its own.  The smart decision would be to release the unit at or under 100 dollars in order to avoid alienating the customers who purchase the cheaper Xbox One, but it would not surprise this writer to see Microsoft try to make a profit off of these people by pricing the Kinect between 120 to 150 dollars.  The other detail Microsoft has not mentioned yet are the exclusives coming to Xbox One in the near future.  Halo 5 is coming in Fall 2015, the next Gears of War game is in the earliest stages of development and Fable Legends has not seen the light of day since it was announced back at Gamescom 2013.  The only title confirmed for this coming Fall is Sunset Overdrive.  Hopefully at E3 Microsoft will shed some light on what is coming for 2014, but it needs to be something really big or something completely new to get the attention of the masses.  Microsoft cannot keep expecting to push their new system to the heights of the Xbox 360 with two shooter franchises people are quickly growing tired of, a fantasy RPG series that has never lived up to its true potential and a racing series that has overstayed its welcome.  Microsoft needs to show more initiative in being a first-party force on the Xbox One rather than a passive hardware creator that gets third-party exclusive items or DLC every once and awhile as it is the only way to convince the audience they lost to consider buying their system.

With these announcements, Microsoft is inching towards reestablishing a connection with their lost fan base and moving away from the negative connotations currently associated with the brand.  The more good will they can generate towards the Microsoft and Xbox brand, the closer Microsoft gets to cutting Sony's considerable lead in this new generation.  E3 2014 will be very significant event for all console developers including Microsoft as we get see if the promises made of power and new experiences brought on by the next generation come to fruition.  The need to deliver at this year's E3 is huge.  It could be the difference between ending Microsoft's current woes or making them even worse.

The Seventh Generation: Essential Games

What makes a game essential?  Is it the cutting-edge graphics, the gigantic scope, the innovative gameplay or the masterful mechanics?  An essential game may include one or more of these aspects, but having these aspects does not automatically make a game essential.  In this writer's honest opinion, an essential game is not the highest rated or most popular game out on the market.  An essential game is one that NEEDS to be experienced by everyone who plays video games.

There were a ton of great games from this past generation.  To boil all those great games down to a list of nine essential games is an incredibly hard and daunting process.  This writer took a lot of time and care in putting together a list that encompassed the experiences that defined the seventh console generation from the largest blockbusters to the smallest experiments.  There may be some omissions such as BioShock, Grand Theft Auto IV or The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, but this writer has not played enough of these games to even form an opinion on them much less name them an essential game of this past generation.  Without further ado, let us dive into the final entry of The Seventh Generation, the essential games of the last console generation.

Portal
Originally bundled with Half-Life 2 and Team Fortress 2 in The Orange Box, it looked like Portal would be overshadowed by Valve's heavyweights.  Fortunately, Portal was never overshadowed.  The game's expertly crafted humour, perfectly developed villain and incredibly unique puzzle mechanics made Portal an instant classic.  Portal has the player take control of a test subject at the Aperture Science Enrichment Center.  Equipped with only the Portal Gun, the player is tasked with completing a gauntlet of test chambers which grow more difficult and dangerous as the player advances.  Throughout these chambers, the player is constantly berated by a computer AI known as GLaDOS.  While GLaDOS is the antagonist of Portal, she spouts the funniest and most memorable lines of the game.  Even though Portal can be beaten within a few hours, you grow to love the characters, the enemies, the dialogue, the Portal Gun, the level design and the puzzles.  If it was not for this little game stuck on The Orange Box, gamers would have never learned to think with portals.

Rock Band
At one point or another, everybody has wanted to be a rock star.  The dream of singing your heart out, shredding the strings on a guitar or smacking a set of drums in front of a sea of thousands is one that many imagine, but few actually live.  Many games have tried to emulate the thrill of being a rock star, but only a handful have succeeded in fulfilling this childhood dream.  Rock Band is among the pinnacle of these games.  Using the plastic instruments that come packaged with the game, one can emulate being in a band with friends and family or play the guitar, drums or sing solo.  With the focus on local multiplayer, Rock Band quickly became the most popular party game of this generation because of its excellent accessibility.  While sequels and future rhythm games made improvements on the original, nothing will ever beat the euphoric thrill of getting three to four people together to play in Rock Band.  Rock Band brought the rhythm genre to its greatest peak and no other rhythm game has been able to recreate the magic this game created.

Mass Effect
The Mass Effect trilogy as a whole encompasses the three greatest games of this past generation.  Perfectly blending the combat of a third-person action game with the complex systems of a RPG and single-handedly revolutionizing the art of storytelling in this medium as one's decisions followed them throughout each game in the series, the Mass Effect trilogy is an astonishing feat of artistry.  As great as all three Mass Effect games are, this writer can only choose one for this list--the original Mass Effect.  The sole reason this writer bought a Xbox 360, the original Mass Effect is unlike any game before it.  You are given the freedom to create whatever Shepard you desire.  Male or female, good or evil, tactically savvy or guns blazing, the player's Shepard is not just their avatar, it is an extension of themselves.  From the heart-racing thrill of threatening a journalist on the Citadel to the heart-wrenching indecision of choosing the fate of a crew mate, an entire fleet of soldiers or a small group of Council delegates, Mass Effect is never afraid in giving players decisions no matter their difficulty.  If there is one RPG that you play from this past generation, make it BioWare's sci-fi masterpiece Mass Effect.

Super Mario Galaxy
Just like Super Mario 64 defined the 3D platformer during the fifth console generation, Super Mario Galaxy defined the future of this genre.  No longer restricted by flat surfaces, Mario traversed a number of spherical planetoids on his way to retrieve all the missing stars.  Playing around with gravity in interesting ways, Galaxy provided new ways to maneuver around a three dimensional space.  The motion capabilities of the Wii remote are expertly used to ease jumping, interact with objects in the environment and control Mario on different rides such as a ball or a manta ray.  Super Mario Galaxy is the premier platforming game of this generation and it should not be skipped over by any gamer.

Uncharted 2:  Among Thieves
This writer considers Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception to be the best entry in Naught Dog's venerable series.  Although if it was not for the excellence of Uncharted 2: Among Thieves, there would be no third entry in the Uncharted series.  That is the reason Among Thieves makes this list over Drake's Deception.  Uncharted 2 launched Nathan Drake and Naughty Dog into superstardom.  It is an exhilarating roller coaster ride from beginning to end with some unbelievable set pieces like battling mercenaries in a collapsing building or traversing a moving train as a helicopter guns Drake down.  Aside from the Hollywood blockbuster-like moments, Uncharted 2 has a solid base of third-person shooting, visceral hand-to-hand combat and parkour-like platforming.  Uncharted 2: Among Thieves single-handedly created a juggernaut franchise for Sony this past generation and going forward into the future.

Batman:  Arkham City
Batman: Arkham City is the ultimate superhero and ultimate Batman game.  Arkham City is a fully realized world where the player is given the skills and abilities to explore every nook and cranny, fight waves of convicts, tackle story missions or collect hundreds of creatively hidden collectables.  One can easily lose tons of hours just playing around in Arkham City's open world.  Any gamer no matter if they are hardcore fans of the Dark Knight or know nothing about the Caped Crusader will enjoy the amazing experience Arkham City offers.  It puts you in the shoes of a superhero like no other game has ever done before and few could possibly do after.  Batman: Arkham City is the best licensed game of this generation and arguably of all-time.

The Legend of Zelda:  Skyward Sword
Unlike Twilight Princess, which launched with the Wii, The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword is built from the ground up for the Nintendo's motion-based console.  In short, Skyward Sword stands as the pinnacle of the Wii’s library, an example why high definition graphics do not make games better and why motion controls are not just a gimmick.  Skyward Sword offers one-to-one swordplay like no game has ever achieved before or since, an excellent array of items with intuitive motion controls from old favourites like the bombs to new choices such as the beetle, mind-bending puzzles, beautifully constructed dungeons and a wonderfully orchestrated soundtrack (a first for the Zelda series).  Arguably the greatest game of this generation, The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword stands as the embodiment of the pure fun and emotion brought forth by Nintendo's mission with the Wii. 

Journey
Journey is one of the most unique experiences of this past generation.  There are no tutorials, no real instructions.  You are just dropped into a seemingly barren desert with this profile of a mountain in the distance.  The controls are simple yet incredibly intuitive, the graphics and art are just jaw dropping, the music is beautiful and the puzzles, while simple, are very charming and engaging.  Journey is a soothing and relaxing experience that can easily be finished in one sitting, which makes the game easy to replay again and again.  This writer cannot stress how amazing of an experience this game is.  Journey is a game that cannot be captured in words or through video.  Journey is a game that must be experienced to understand its greatness.

The Walking Dead
Unlike any experience in this medium, The Walking Dead transcends the title of being a mere licensed game.  Fans of this property or not, The Walking Dead is an emotional tale that anyone will easily be drawn into.  The Walking Dead will make you laugh, cry, scared, disgusted, shocked, surprised, intrigued and every emotion in between.  When everything is said and done, you will be amazed at how much you care about each and every character you meet and interact with in this game and contemplate on what could have been if you made different decisions.  The Walking Dead is hands down the benchmark for modern adventure games and should be experienced by all gamers mature enough to play it.

The Seventh Generation: PlayStation 3

The third and final console to look back on is the world's best Blu-Ray player, the PlayStation 3.  All joking aside, the fortunes of the Playstation 3 were the exact opposite of the Xbox 360.  The PlayStation 3 had an extremely rough first few years on the market.  Coming off the incredible success of the PlayStation 2, Sony got complacent with the PlayStation 3.  Sony's ignorance cost the company as the PlayStation 3 fell far behind the competition.  It took a large price drop and a console redesign before the PS3 started moving off the shelves.  While Sony had problems getting consumers to buy the PS3, their first-party development in both the downloadable and retail spaces and their extensive library of third-party exclusives made convincing arguments for owning Sony's third console.  Once Sony turned their string of bad luck around, the PS3 became the console of choice for many gamers this past generation.

Out of the gate, the PS3 was struck with a seemingly never ending string of problems.  The over 600 dollar price tag was far too steep for most people even the most enthusiastic gamers.  Programming for the PS3 was much harder than the other systems of this generation due to the PS3's Cell Processor.  Sony executives were making outrageous claims about the PS3's "monster" sales.  Game developers and publishers from Valve to Activision were voicing their disdain against the system.  The one glimmer of hope in the early days of the PS3 was Blu-Ray's win over HD-DVD as the definitive format for high definition home entertainment.  Despite Sony's PR nightmare with the early years of the PS3, things eventually turned around for the system.  Even with the better standing of the PS3 in later years, there were still a good number of mistakes made by Sony.  One big problem with Sony in general is the company's lack of commitment to an initiative or product if it does not have immediate success.  During the life of the PS3, Sony relentlessly tried to shove two different initiatives down the throats of gamers only to completely abandon them less than a year after announcing them.  These two initiatives were the PlayStation Move and 3D compatibility.  The PlayStation Move was Sony's answer to Nintendo's Wii and Microsoft's Kinect.  Much like the Kinect, the Move tried to bring in a casual audience to the PS3 only to alienate the system's primary audience of hardcore gamers.  Sony tried their hand at 3D compatibility with the PS3 when stereoscopic 3D was all the craze back in 2009.  Sony put 3D compatible logos on all their major games and even released an extremely overpriced 3D monitor to get people to adopt stereoscopic 3D into their lives.  Both initiatives were just gimmicks that Sony used to extend to life of the PS3, but neither caught on and Sony ceased to promote them.

While Sony has made a good number of mistakes with the PS3, they have made some good decisions as well.  People made fun of using Blu-Ray discs as the default format for all PS3 games upon first release, but it is the biggest strength of this system.  While Microsoft faced numerous problems with their dual-layered DVDs for the Xbox 360, Sony's Blu-Ray discs are nearly indestructible.  One would have to make a considerable physical effort to damage a Blu-Ray discs.  Also the PS3 never felt the need to chew up games like the Xbox 360.  Apart from the great success of the Blu-Ray format, Sony's first-party efforts during this generation were among their strongest.  From established franchises like Ratchet & Clank and God of War to newfound properties such as Uncharted and Infamous to experimental titles such as Journey and the PixelJunk series, Sony's first-party had an incredible amount of variety compared to that of Microsoft and even Nintendo this generation.  This vast library of first-party titles was complimented by the great number of third-party exclusives especially in the later years of the PS3 such as Metal Gear Solid 4, Valkyria Chronicles and 3D Dot Game Heroes.

One cannot talk about the PS3 without discussing the biggest event in the console's life-- the PlayStation Network Outage.  This outage happened during the spring of 2011 when hackers attacked PSN causing Sony to shutdown all online functions for about a month.  This outage served as the biggest scare for gamers to this date as hackers got ahold of millions of peoples' personal and even credit card information.  The outage is considered one of Sony's greatest debacles, but personally this writer believes it is a significant turning point for the Sony PlayStation brand.  This outage was a wake-up call for Sony.  They nearly hit rock bottom in the eyes of the gaming community due to the outage.  Many people to this day do not fully trust saving their credit card information to any online store including the PlayStation Store.  This outage showed Sony the horrors of not protecting their customers and has brought forth a brand new direction for the PlayStation brand as a whole.  While Sony has not entirely turned the company's consistent problems around after the outage, they have made greater efforts to push games like the slew of Sony exclusive indie games and initiatives such as PlayStation Plus which actually please and benefit gamers rather than bring in the most cash.  Personally, this writer does not believe Sony would be in such a great position with all the good will surrounding the PS4 if it was not for the lessons learned during the PSN outage.

While things started out the worst possible way for the PlayStation 3, things eventually turned around for Sony's third outing in console gaming.  Hard lessons learned from the PS3 has definitely changed the PlayStation brand for the better as seen with the overwhelming success of the PS4's launch.  Although the PS3 may never be considered in the same league as its predecessors,  it is arguable the best console of this past generation.

The Seventh Generation: Xbox 360

The second console to look back on is the first one out of the gate this past generation, the Xbox 360.  Microsoft stepped into the video game industry with the original Xbox, but the Xbox 360 was when Microsoft made their foothold in the market.  Launching a full year ahead of the PS3 and the Wii really helped the Xbox 360 establish itself as the must-have console for the early years of this past generation.  While the PS3 had problems with making the system easily accessible for programmers and the Wii was too concerned with the casual gaming audience, the Xbox 360 had the premier online service in Xbox Live, a prospering selection of downloadable games through Xbox Live Arcade and a good number of first and third party exclusives.  The more successful the Xbox 360 became, the more Microsoft tampered with this winning formula.  The later years of the Xbox 360 saw so many shifts in focus that have gone onto hurt this console and company's standing in various ways.

The Xbox 360 made some significant improvements over its predecessor.  Apart from enhanced processing power and improved online services, Microsoft completely reworked the controller for the 360.  While the original Xbox controller was cumbersome and uncomfortable to use, the 360 controller fit perfectly to the contours of a person's hands.  The 360 controller was so well received by gamers that it is considered among the best video game controllers of all-time.  Through Xbox Live Arcade, the 360 brought forth a new avenue to access games.  No longer did one have to go to their local video game store to pick up the latest game, there were hundreds of games, demos, downloadable expansions and extra content available to download from the system's marketplace menu.  All one needed to access all this content was an internet connection.  Xbox Live Arcade also gave independent game developers a chance to easily release games on consoles.  While these indy developers needed the support of Microsoft or a third-party publisher to get their games on this service, Xbox Live Arcade did offer an affordable way to create console games.  Some of the best games for the 360 such as Braid, Limbo, Shadow Complex and Trials were released through Xbox Live Arcade.  Speaking of games, the Xbox 360 saw the release of some generation defining games like Gears of War, Mass Effect, BioShock, Fight Night Round 3 and The Elder Scrolls: Oblivion before landing on other platforms.

The Xbox 360 was overwhelmingly successful with the core gamer audience despite the hardware problems.  There are always problems with technology, but the 360's problems like the infamous Red Ring of Death and the far too common ring scratches were widespread problems.  Although some people like this writer have never experienced such hardware failures, not everyone was that lucky.  Many people went through a good number of Xbox 360s in the last generation.  During this generation, Microsoft constantly improved the Xbox 360 hardware to avoid these hardware problems in later Xbox 360 hardware.  While the hardware improved over time, the 360's standing did not.  From 2009 onwards, Microsoft shifted the 360's focus from  the defined core gamer audience to a much broader all-encompassing audience.  Microsoft moved away from developing first-party software and pushing support for indy developers to creating new peripherals and fostering greater relations with third-party publishers.  The lack of first-party support and worthwhile exclusives pushed gamers away because there was nothing to differentiate the Xbox 360 from the PS3.  The onslaught of casual games brought on by the Kinect, Microsoft's answer to the Wii's motion controls, did not help matters either.  It did bring in the casual audience, but it also alienated a good portion of the 360's primary audience.  Microsoft's SmartGlass and multimedia initiatives made it even more evident that this company had no clue about what to do with the 360's success.

The Xbox 360 has definitely had its ups and downs.  The 360 started out as the dominant console of this generation in the eyes of gamers, but completely fell flat on its face in the past few years due to Microsoft's lack of focus.  The Kinect and SmartGlass were sadly glorified prototypes that did more to hurt the 360 than extend its life.  Although these mistakes, the 360 offers a great selection of games from the Triple A blockbusters to the independent darlings.  In the end, the Xbox 360 is hands down Microsoft's best console to date.

The Seventh Generation: Nintendo Wii

While it has been much longer than just a couple weeks, The Seventh Generation is back.  The first console to look back on is Nintendo's biggest gamble, the Wii.  Coming off of a turbulent run with the Gamecube (Nintendo's weakest selling game console at the time), Nintendo came to terms with the fact that they could not compete with Microsoft and Sony when it came to computing power.  Nintendo looked at their strengths, gameplay and design, and the risk taken with the Nintendo DS for inspiration for their newest console.  Instead of directly competing with the Xbox 360 and PS3 in terms of power, the Wii focused its entire design around one core mechanic, motion control.  Motion controls were attempted in earlier console generations, but they were never refined to the point of actually being more than a non-functional gimmick.  The Wii brought motion controls to the forefront of the video game industry and nobody could have predicted the success to follow.

Apart from the hardcore Nintendo fans that flocked to the Wii for the newest entries in Nintendo's venerable franchises (Mario, Metroid, Legend of Zelda, Donkey Kong and Super Smash Bros.), the Wii caught the attention of people who never considered playing video games as an activity for them.  The simplistic design the Wii Remote, which was intentionally designed to look and feel like a TV remote, and the familiarity of the sports included in Wii Sports, the game packed in with every Wii system, broke down the large barrier of entry video games had before this point in time.  No longer did people have to learn complex button presses to play games, they just had to mimic certain motions to get involved.  This universal appeal equated to monstrous sales for the Wii.  While the Wii may had been a minimal improvement over the Gamecube in terms of power and graphics, it easily outsold PS3 and Xbox 360, incredibly more powerful machines, this past generation.

Being the most successful system of the past generation did not mean the Wii was the best console of this past generation.  In actuality, the Wii was quite the opposite.  Although Nintendo and a few other developers used the Wii's under-powered specs to create artistically stunning games, the majority of Wii games can be considered lacking at best.  During the early years of the Wii, there was such a large number of shovel ware released on the machine that it was hard to discern between the good and the bad.  For every Super Mario Galaxy, there were dozens of shovel ware like Carnival Games and Chicken Shoot.  The Wii, much like the Nintendo 64 and Gamecube, suffered from a lack of third-party support.  While there were publishers like Sega, Ubisoft and EA that supported the Wii with numerous games, a good number of publishers such as Bethesda and Take-Two passed over the Wii due to its lack a processing power.

For Nintendo fans, the Wii offered a lot of great games both old (through the power of the Virtual Console) and new that you could not experience anywhere else.  Apart from the core Nintendo faithful and the new slew of casual gamers, the Wii did not offer enough to sway people away from the most cutting-edge systems in the PS3 and Xbox 360.  The Wii may be among Nintendo's most successful video game consoles, but it will never be remembered as fondly as its predecessors.

The Seventh Generation

It seems like just yesterday when all the hype over the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and Nintendo Wii consumed every facet of video game media, mainstream media and regular conversation.  Like no other console generation before it, video games were about to take a quantum leap in terms of graphics, processing power, interconnectivity and controls among many other things.  This console generation launched the video game industry to unimaginable heights.  Playing video games was no longer a niche activity for children and obsessively intellectual in the eyes of society.  Due to the popularity of this console generation along with ventures into different forms of interactive media (motion and social games in particular), video games made major strides in becoming a serious media in our culture much like films, books, music and art.  While video games still has many more years and possibly decades before it is on the same level as those forms of media, this generation really got the momentum building for the argument that video games as an art form.

Sadly with the eighth console generation already on its way and just about to shift into turbo with the release of the Xbox One and PlayStation 4 this November, it is finally time for these consoles to take a backseat for the next generation.  Big things are ahead, but the title for this series of articles is "The Seventh Generation", not "The Eighth Generation".  For the next month or so leading up to the launches of the PS4 and Xbox One, this writer will be taking a retrospective look at the all of consoles of this past generation (Nintendo Wii, Xbox 360 and PS3).  For the final article of this series, this writer will be listing the essential games from the past generation.  This article will not be your normal top ten list.  Essential games are not necessarily the best rated games of this console generation; they are the games that NEED to be experienced from the seventh generation of video game consoles.

This series of articles has been boiling around in this writer's mind for a long time.  To take this trip down memory lane should be loads of fun.  Enjoy the ride and The Seventh Generation will be back in a week or two with a look at the Nintendo Wii.

First Byte: Splinter Cell: Blacklist

Back when my brothers and I first bought a Xbox 360, Splinter Cell: Conviction was among the titles we specifically bought the 360 just to play.  After watching demos and reading reviews, we finally got a chance to pick up Conviction a few months after its April 2010 release.  For the first Splinter Cell game that we ever got our hands on, Conviction blew us away.  The smoothness of the controls, the stylishness of the executions and the slickness of the stealth all combined with the phenomenal story of a burned CIA agent pulled back into the game in order to correct past wrongs and get revenge on those who betrayed him.  This writer's fond experiences with Splinter Cell: Conviction has put a huge amount of expectations on Ubisoft's newest entry, Blacklist.  Developed by their newest studio, Ubisoft Toronto, Splinter Cell: Blacklist looks to combine Conviction's action-pack Mark and Execute system with the hardcore stealth found in the earlier Splinter Cell games (Splinter Cell, Pandora Tomorrow and Chaos Theory).  There have been quite a few posts on Blacklist already up on Silver Bit.  Instead of regurgitating the same points mentioned in earlier articles, I will share my first impressions on Splinter Cell: Blacklist in this edition of First Byte.

Due to many commitments and an ever-growing backlog of games, this writer has not been able to spend as much time as he has wanted to on Splinter Cell: Blacklist.  Even though I have not spent most of my free time playing Blacklist, I have put in just under ten hours into the game.  Funny enough, I have only finished two story missions outside of the intro mission in those ten hours.  A ton of my time has been spent on playing the optional side missions, trying out the co-op missions with my brothers and dying multiple times.  It has been well over three years since yours truly has played Conviction.  Due to the long time away from this series, it is taking some time to get back into the intricacies of Splinter Cell's mechanics.  Blacklist does an admirable of making the tutorials scattered throughout the first few hours as unobtrusive as possible.  Every mission in Blacklist supports three types of play styles: Ghost (stealth approach by using non-lethal takedowns), Panther (stealth approach by using lethal takedowns) and Assault (guns-blazing approach).  After each mission, you are shown the amount of points gained in each play style to see which one you lean towards and to post to leaderboards for bragging rights.  During my time with Blacklist, I have personally leaned towards Ghost with a little Panther mixed in every once and a while.  There are so many options to dispatch enemies from plain takedowns to guns to gadgets to the Killing in Motion system, Blacklist's version of Mark and Execute.  Speaking of Killing in Motion, it is the natural evolution of the Mark and Execute system.  While I have not pulled off anything as smooth and slick as what Ubisoft has shown off, it is a lot of fun to take out one enemy with a takedown and in a few quick button presses mark and execute a few other enemies in the immediate vicinity.  It is very smooth and incredibly empowering.  Apart from the sonar googles, there were not many gadgets to use to dispatch foes in Conviction.  Things are much different in Blacklist with Sam Fisher's new placement as the leader of Fourth Echelon.  There are tons of gadgets for you to use against the foes that guard your mission objective.  My personal favourites are the shock mines, sleeping gas and Tri-Rotor, but each gadget offers tons of options to tackle missions.  Aside from the story missions, which are all great so far, there are a number of side missions to complete.  Each of these side missions can be opened up from the SMI, Blacklist's centralized mission select screen, or by individually talking to each character on the Paladin, Fourth Echelon's mobile base and Blacklist's hub.  Grimm's missions focus on infiltration, Charlie's missions focus on wave-defense, Kobin's missions focus on taking out all enemies and Briggs' missions are a combination of all of the above.  These missions can be played solo or cooperatively both on and offline.  The side missions serve as great diversions from the main missions and allows the player to sharpen their skills solo or with a friend.  The Briggs and Kobin missions are the ones I have been spending the most time playing as I have not tried a Charlie mission yet and the only Grimm mission my brother and I tried was a two hour disaster.

Personally, I can dissect every little piece of Splinter Cell: Blacklist, but this post would go on for far too long.  In conclusion, Splinter Cell: Blacklist is a great game so far.  The pacing of the story is not the greatest especially compared to Conviction's campaign, the Grimm side missions can be unnecessarily unforgiving and Sam's new voice is quite jarring.  I have not run into any glitches or problems that hinder Blacklist in any way, but I have only played a little slice of the entire game.  I am hoping to put up a full review of Splinter Cell: Blacklist in the near future.

Rent, borrow or buy it.  Splinter Cell: Blacklist is a game that deserves some of your attention especially before the holiday flood of games sweeps it under the rug.