Off the Newsstand: Game Informer Issue 229

With this rather slow two months for video games, it has allowed me to keep up Off the Newsstand with my reading.  Averaging reading a whole magazine each week.  As long as my subscriptions come at a steady pace, I will be able to post Off the Newsstand every week or two.  Earlier this week, I finished the May issue of Game Informer.  Here are my thoughts.

Not much has been said about Halo 4 since Microsoft revealed the game at last year's E3.  There were a few tidbits of what the game was shaping up to be through various videos made by 343 Industries showing the behind the scenes on Halo 4, but nothing as substantial as this cover story.  Game Informer's cover story is split into two parts.  The first part takes a look at the opening few hours of the main campaign and has the developers at 343 discussing some of the plot points of Halo 4 such as Cortana slowly dying, exploring Master Chief as a character rather than an all-powerful superhero and the mystery of the Forerunners.  The second part takes a look at Halo 4's multi-player now called Infinity.  Infinity has a story of its own as you train a Spartan IV aboard the UNSC Infinity.  Spartan IVs train on the Infinity's combat deck, which like Star Trek's holodeck or the Danger Room in X-Men can replicate any known environment for the Spartans to train on, in red vs. blue matches.  There is a new co-op mode called Spartan Ops, which allows players to complete unique missions and challenges with other Spartan IVs.  Spartan Ops will be updated every week with new missions, new challenges and a new movie sequence to advance the co-ops' story.  The multi-player story even converges with the main campaign as Master Chief will run into the UNSC Infinity and its' crew at some point in his campaign.  At first I thought this story on Halo 4 would not interest me much like last issue's Assassin's Creed III cover story, after reading it I am genuinely excited for Halo 4 especially the Spartan Ops, which I think it an excellent way of keeping gamers engaged with Halo 4 for weeks, months even years after completing the game.  Also packed into this Issue 229 of Game Informer was an in-depth playthrough of Guild Wars 2, some articles on the Game Developer's Conference (GDC for short) like a look at Quantic Dream's new engine for the PS3, a look at the winners of this year's Independent Game Festival and Indie Game Challenge and an interview with Epic's Mike Capps, a look at the controversy surrounding Mass Effect 3's ending and much more. 

Issue 229 is the best issue of Game Informer since February's Issue 226.  The cover story delivers, there are insightful articles on GDC and current issues in the video game industry, previews of the biggest games of 2012 and reviews of the biggest games of the first quarter of 2012 like Mass Effect 3, Xenoblade Chronicles and The Witcher 2.  Issue 229 is definitely worth the 6 dollars to buy it at your local EB Games or Chapters.

Launch Station: The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings Enhanced Edition

Released just under a year ago, The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings quickly became the best PC exclusive of 2011 with an incredible amont of critical success as the game went on to win 50 Game of the Year awards.  Now close to a year later, CD Projekt RED has brought their 2011 fantasy RPG epic to the Xbox 360.  For the Xbox 360 release, CD Projekt RED has added more content to deem adding it the Enhanced Edition to the name.  For those who has already bought The Witcher 2 for PC, do not worry that you are going to be missing out as you can download the Enhanced Edition update for free.

You control Geralt of Rivia, one of the few remaining Witchers (monster hunters in this fantasy world).  Caught in the political struggles of the kingdom of Terneria, Geralt has to pick his sides and make hard moral decisions in order to find King Foltest's assassin and clear his name.  The Witcher 2 for the 360 is not just a straight port of the PC version.  CD Projekt RED has worked hard to tailor the whole Witcher experience for the console.  The controls, targeting, camera and interface have been re-designed to best use the 360 controller.  Being the Enhanced Edition of Witcher 2, CD Projekt RED has added a lot of additional content to the game's console debut.  New adventures, new locations, new characters, new monsters and new mysteries, which add more hours of gameplay and expand the Witcher 2's rich story.  The Enhanced Edition of Witcher 2 also features a whole new opening cinematic that depicts the the events which sets-up the story for Witcher 2.

For those hardcore gamers such as yours truly that does not own an extremely powerful PC, the Enhanced Edition of Witcher 2 is the only way you are going to get your hands-on this critically acclaimed fantasy RPG.  If it was not for how much money I spent on video games in this past month and the fact I cannot play two huge RPGs at the same time (focusing on Xenoblade Chronicles at the moment), I would be picking up The Witcher 2 tomorrow.  Having heard great things about it and having tried the PC demo through Screwattack's streaming demo service, I have been looking forward to this game for a while now.  Before the end of this year, I will most likely pick up The Witcher 2 for my family's 360.  If you missed out on The Witcher 2 when it released a year ago and you own a Xbox 360, there is no better game that releases this week.  If you already have The Witcher 2 for PC, you are better off downloading the new update than picking it up for the 360.