Assassin's Creed Syndicate

Date played: January 30th
Platform: PS4
Session fun rating: 8/10

I spent a lot of time just clearing the areas and reclaiming the boroughs. I've cleared 4 out of 7 areas in the game, taking them over by killing the Blighters that occupy them, liberating child slaves, kidnapping high ranked enemies and just wrecking havoc on London in general. I also fought a lot of chests and other collectibles. This made me enough money to buy lots of upgrades for my gear, but also for my gang, the Rooks.

After that was done, I played another murder investigation mission. A war veteran had opened a munitions factory after he made some bad decisions in the war and caused many soldiers to die in combat. The mystery was thick, as there had been multiple shots fired near the scene of his death. I found some kids who were doing some practice shooting, a shop owner who was doing target practice, and a beer transporter who was in the area during the shooting. Using Eagle Vision, it was fun to look at the bullet trails and find clues until I found the murderer. These are some of the coolest missions in the game yet.

These murder investigations are fun and unique

Next, I met with Ned Wynert who offered me some lucrative missions where I must hijack horse carriages to make some money. Carriages are a nice addition to the game. Combat is pretty crazy in those things... I can boost, ram other carriages and even shoot enemies and other horses with my pistol.

Finally, I continued the story a little bit by completing another mission as Jacob. He continues to investigate the source of the poisonous elixirs being sold on the streets. This led me to a distillery where I met, of all people, Charles Darwin. While it's not clear yet why Darwin is interested in the elixir, he helped me sabotage the distillery and blow up the whole place.

Multiplayer Fridays: Savage edition

Date played: January 29th
Platform: PC
Session fun rating: 10/10

It's kind of become a weekly habit. Every Friday in the last few weeks, me and my youngest brother got together for some gaming, and last night was no exception. Most of our night was spent playing Rocket League, as usual, but we also played the demo for Toy Box Turbos and a bit Monaco.

Our first 4 or 5 matches of 2v2 Rocket League were pretty fucking rough. We didn't win and we had a hard time setting up plays. After a few matches, our plays were better, but we were still losing. It wasn't until about the 6th match that we were back to our old selves and dominating the field. In fact, we were absolutely excellent from that point on, winning almost every match.

We had remarkable teamwork and communication. It doesn't take much in this game to communicate what's happening. Simple statements like "I got it", "I missed it", "Careful, ball's coming fast", "Clearing" and "Centering" go a very long way to make a better team. It doesn't hurt that we're fast and have pretty good aim, but most of our success comes from communication.

One of the teams we played against, which we beat 8-4, stated "I think it's the worse I've ever been beaten" and "Can't argue against that teamwork...". When I told them that we were brothers, they didn't seem surprised at all!

I boost towards the ball and score while my brother protects it

After decimating our opponents, we played a couple of rounds of multiplayer Toy Box Turbos, which plays exactly like the old Micro Machines games, except that there are weapons. It was lots of fun, but it doesn't have a lot of lasting appeal, it gets repetitive pretty quickly.

Finally, we tried out another game I had in my Steam library that I had never tried called Monaco. This thing is a 2D, multiplayer stealth heist game. The coolest thing about it is that you can only see what your character sees based on his field of view, even though it has a top-down view. That means that to see around a corner, you have to expose your character to enemies slightly.

There are different classes, like a lockpick specialist and a dude who can knock out guards. It was fun to work together to take out guards and reach the exits, but it was sometimes really hard to tell what's happening on screen because the graphics are a bit too retro for their own good. It would have worked better if the image was clearer. I also enjoyed the smooth, classy jazz and the amazing French voice acting. The guards, with their heavily parisian accent shout out things like "Je vais te tuer!" and
"Merde, je ne le vois plus!". We played 3 or 4 missions together, then called it a night. 

Rocket League

Date played: January 27th and 28th
Platform: PC
Session fun rating: 10/10

Rocket League really is something special. For years, my competitive multiplayer needs were fulfilled by Call of Duty. There were others of course, like Mario Kart 8, NHL, Battlefield, Forza, Dirt and even Destiny. However, this year, even with Battlefront sitting on my shelves, I always end up going back to Rocket League...

Last night was no different. I decided to mix it up a bit though and selected 2 playlists at the same time, ranked 2v2 and ranked 3v3. This meant I alternated between the two modes every few matches, which added some variety.

I score a pretty aerial goal

2v2 has a remarkable amount of open space on the field, which really works to my advantage. When I play Rocket League, I drive real fucking fast. This means I often have amazing last second goals and saves, but it also means that when I miss a shot, it becomes very dangerous, very quickly. I play a high risk, high reward style. In 2v2, because there's more open space, I usually have a better chance of recovering and beating the other players to the ball, even when I miss. I don't have that luxury in 3v3.

I played really well last night. In fact, I looked at my stats for the PC version and I've been MVP 24 times out of 64 matches... That means I was the best player in the lobby 37.5% of the time. That's pretty damn respectable. I've also won 60% of my matches and have scored 1.6 goals per game. Last night, I even had a few blowout games where we won 8-0, 8-1 and 7-1, so it was a good night. I was sharp!

SteamWorld Heist

Date played: January 26th
Platform: 3DS
Session fun rating: 8/10

I think I've found my new hockey-watching video game with SteamWorld Heist. The fact that it's turn-based makes it easy to pause when watching the game, then play a turn or two between face-offs and periods.

I ended up playing quite a bit, clearing the first world. The captain of my team, Piper, fills the role of sniper and healer. Sally, the roughneck farmer, is my assault character, using a shotgun and her special ability to deal lots of damage. Ivan is my heavy, armed with a rocket launcher and powerful melee, he's a force to be reckoned with.

As usual, most levels are just about killing everything, looting everything and getting the hell out. However, in the dozen or so levels that I played, I encountered two bosses. The first was rather easy. He was basically just a bigger robot with more health and a grenade launcher, but with precise fire, I was able to take it out easily.

Chop Sue was fun to fight

The second was a lot more difficult. Chop Sue is a giant robot that builds other robots by just sticking parts together, kind of like Dr. Frankenstein. Aside from her immoral actions, Chop Sue is also one hell of a fighter. She had a few minions with her that she could reassemble after I had destroyed them. She also had a powerful melee ability. Finally, she could activate a shield that I had to destroy by shooting at it's power source, mounted on her back. It was a fun battle and it led us to the next world as our little team keeps fighting the evil robots of the galaxy.

Rocket League

Date played: January 26th
Platform: PC
Session fun rating: 9/10

Rocket League is like a comfortable pair of slippers. With jet engines.

What I mean is that it's a game that I like to play at anytime. In fact, most of my time playing it last night were while my 5 year old was taking a bath... I joined a different playlist though, trying the 3v3 standard ranked playlist. The different between this one and the one I was playing before is that pre-made teams are allowed here, so the odds of getting a good team are better.

Teamwork

Still, I performed rather well, making good plays from the back and midfield, going in for a shot when the opportunity presents itself. I had a particularly spectacular goal when I started flying at the ball from behind the center line and hit it straight into the goal from above. I had another cool goal when I rammed into the ball near the net, then it was stopped by the goalie, but I was pushed in the ass by a teammate, which gave us enough power to push the ball through the defender and into the goal! The fact that both of us had the same car made it look even cooler...

Rocket League

Date played: January 25th
Platform: PC
Session fun rating: 10/10

When I sat down on my couch, I had the intention to make a new Super Mario Maker level. Then I thought to myself, "I could play a couple of games of Rocket League first...". More than 2 hours later, I was still playing some ranked 3v3 matches.

I've taken a liking to the ranked playlists recently, the quality of play is just so much higher than the regular matchmaking. Since this is on the PC version, I wasn't ranked yet, so I had to play 10 qualifying matches. I did rather well overall, getting a few MVP's and a good amount of goals, assists and saves. When I completed the matches, I was bumped up to the Bronze I class.

Ranked matches are full of action, like when. I score through 3 defenders here!

That's when the action heated up considerably. I mean, people were popping aerials all the time, making insane saves and generally just playing much better. I think I held my own, scoring a few goals and making some clutch plays, but man, it's real intense and requires constant concentration.

In one match, I made an absolutely epic save, maybe my best one yet. The other team had an open net, so one of their players took a high speed shot from close range, the slot, as we would say in hockey. I was riding the wall next to the goal at the time, so I boosted at just the right time to made a sideways, airborne, rocket propelled save! I watched the replay from the shooter's perspective later and he must have felt robbed, We lost that match, but I felt real good about my performance.

Assassin's Creed Syndicate

Date played: January 23rd and 24th
Platform: PS4
Session fun rating: 8/10

London is huge and filled with chests to open, collectibles to collect and areas to take over from the Blighters. Most of my time was spent doing this kind of stuff in the Lambeth and Thames boroughs. That means I did a lot of exploring and running around. The Thames part was really weird for a game like this, since the entire borough is a river. That meant a lot of swimming, but also a lot of jumping around on barges and boats.

The side missions that liberate the boroughs are all pretty straight-forward, but they are definitely entertaining. They usually require that I simply kill the area's leader, but they run away if they know I'm around, so I usually use a lot of stealth to get the job done. Surprisingly, this is the first time that I find stealth fun and frustration-free in an Assassin's Creed game. The throwing knives are great for long range kills, while the zip-line can be used to make a quick escape or set up elaborate aerial kills. I'm also enjoying setting up behind cover, then whistling at an enemy to attract his attention to finally stab them ruthlessly.

As of this moment, you all work for us!

I also completed some side missions for none other than Charles Dickens himself. He has founded a sort of ghost hunting club, determined to investigate mysterious ghost sightings scientifically. The best of these had me following clues to find Spring-Heeled Jack, a famous legend of Victorian era London. This "thing" has been spooking people and I think it's killed a few too, though that wasn't clear. I followed some clues using Eagle Vision, following footprints and claw marks. Eventually, this led me to a hidden underground room where I fought the thing directly. It has horns, a weird cape and some large claws, but it's human. It ran away the first time I fought him, but I killed him the second time I confronted him.

Another type of side mission was a murder investigation that would have felt right at home in a Sherlock Holmes game! I had to investigate clues in a small area, then speak to multiple suspects until I was sure that I had found the killer. It was a pretty cool sequence.

Finally, I completed a few story missions. Evie continues her search for the piece of Eden by intercepting a carriage carrying important documents for Miss Lucy Thorne, one of Starrick's top associates. The twins paired up to steal the cargo, which led to a really cool chase in the middle of the night. Jacob drove the carriage while I shot at enemies with my pistol. I was horrified to discover that the best way to take out the enemy carriages was to shoot their horses dead, which makes the vehicles flip over and kills it's occupants...

The next mission led Evie and her friend, Henry Green, to the Kenway family house. The Kenway family was the star of Assassin's Creed 3 and 4 featuring Edward, Haytham and Connor. We found a secret room where tons of pirate artifacts were stored, including some information on the location of the piece of Eden. Just as we picked up this stuff, Miss Thorne showed up, but we managed to slip away from her by traveling through some underground tunnels.

Meanwhile, Jacob investigates a new drug that's been introduced and trafficked by the Blighters. Before the mission, Alexander Graham Bell gave the twins a new tool, some hallucinogenic serum that can be shot at enemies to make them freak out and fight their friends. It's been real helpful to disperse larger crowds of enemies... Jacob chased down one of the drug dealers and received information on some drug cargo. So he headed out to the location and cleared out the area, then recovered the drugs. I'm not sure where this part of the story is heading, but I assume I'll take out some drug lord soon.

SteamWorld Heist

Date played: January 24th
Platform: 3DS
Session fun rating: 8/10

There's been a lot of good buzz on the internet about SteamWorld Heist. Strangely, it plays absolutely nothing like the last game by that studio, SteamWorld Dig. In fact, Heist is a 2D turn based strategy game featuring robotic space cowboys... yep.

My little robot team scours the galaxy in search of precious water, and defends it against raiders and thieves. Each level is a randomly generated enemy spaceship, each with a different set of objectives, though in most cases, it's about killing everyone then getting the hell out. The coolest thing about the game is the novel aiming mechanic, where shots can ricochet off walls for crazy bounce shots.

I played through the first 5 or 6 levels and along the way, I gathered a few new teammates and some new gear. There are different classes for each player, like an assault class and a sniper class. I really like the combat in this and I definitely feel like this game was worth my money, at least so far. 

Yoshi's Woolly World

Date played: January 23rd
Platform: Wii U
Session fun rating: 9/10

As is my usual Sunday morning routine, I played some video games with my daughter. She loves Yoshi's Woolly World, so we completed the fourth world together and played one level from the fifth.

After going back to a couple of older levels to gather all the flowers and yarn balls, we played the last few levels of the jungle world. Yoshi Branches Out was a simple, but fun level that marks the return of a classic item, a spherical platform with a rotating arrow on it. The platform moves in the direction of the arrow once Yoshi steps on it, making it a powerful, but dangerous tool.

Next, we headed to the world's final castle level. It featured a sort of pipe maze deep underground. The final boss was fucking awesome, a giant piranha plant! I had to swallow, then spit out some bombs to hit the thing in the mouth. It attacked me with it's big mouth, but also with some spiked branches and smaller plants.

I run away from the giant piranha plant in the 4-S level

Since we managed to get all the flowers in the world, we unlocked the secret level, the return and revenge of the giant piranha plant! As is the norm with these secret levels, this thing was fucking difficult... Throughout the whole level, I was being chased by the giant piranha plant, adding a sense of urgency to the already very difficult platforming. After over a dozen tries, I made it through to the end and could move on to the fifth world.

The fifth world is set in the snow and the first level didn't disappoint. Accompanied by a snowy, jingle filled version of the game's theme song, Yoshi grew a large snowball by pushing it through the level. It was real easy, but also very satisfying. I can't wait to see what else awaits us in this snowy land of cuteness!

Pokemon Picross

Date played: January 23rd
Platform: 3DS
Session fun rating: 7/10

Nintendo put out another free to play game on 3DS, this time it's Pokemon Picross. The concept of Picross is really cool, though it's kind of hard to explain. It feels like a distant cousin of Sudoku or something. I played a few levels and enjoyed it, though I'm not sure I'll play it again. 

Soccer with cars, shooting with shapes, diving and kicking

Date played: January 22nd
Platform: PS4
Session fun rating: 10/10

I went to visit my youngest brother last night and we spent most of our evening playing video games. Of course, Rocket League was the first game we played. I don't know why, but we really struggled to win games consistently. We were whiffing balls often, missing easy plays and generally just not playing that well. We had a few good matches here and there, and a few very good plays, but in general, we kinda sucked.

We decided to try something else to see if we would perform better, so we tried out Geometry Wars 3 and played it in co-op. This game is fucking rough though, it requires intense concentration and honestly, I think my brother's TV was a bit too small for this game. We still played through 3 levels, but we couldn't clear the 4th.

Divekick can be played with this controller...

Finally, we tried out Divekick, an amazingly simple, yet complex fighting game. Basically, it's a 2D fighting game, but players can't move their characters. There are only 2 buttons that do anything, dive and kick. Dive is actually more of a jump, while kick is a sort of air kick. Each character has it's own little specifications concerning their dive height, kick speed and kick angle. It creates some fucking amazing battles. It's a fighting game that is boiled down to it's very essence, and it works really well.

Rocket League

Date played: January 21st
Platform: PC
Session fun rating: 9/10

I logged a few games of Rocket League on PC last night. It seems like I was matched up with better players now, like Semi-Pro, Pro, Veteran and Expert, so the matches were all rather challenging. It felt good to play with some competent players. I still did really well, including a match where I scored 5 goals and we won 8-0, but there were some tough matches throughout the night.

I actually developed a bit of a rivalry with a pair of players, I think they must have been a couple. It all began when I played my first match of the night. Early on in the match, I hit a bad bounce and I scored in my own goal. There wasn't much I could do, but it still sucks whenever that stuff happens. One of my teammates started insulting me in the chat. I let it go at first, but he kept making comments throughout the match, so I replied with some nasty talk of my own.

I score against my rivals

We ended up playing against each other in the next match and I soon found out that the other player knew him in real life. I really wanted to redeem myself for the bad play early on, and I really wanted to show this guy I was a good player, despite my error. Let me tell you, it was fucking intense. At times, we were just tackling each other instead of making the right play. I ended up playing well against both of them, but we were at about the same skill level, so the match was real close.

I spent most of the night playing in the same lobby as these guys, sometimes on their team, sometimes on the opposing team. Towards the end of the night, our chat was friendlier and we had developed a sort friendly rivalry. It makes me wish there was some sort of tournament mode in online play, or like, a best of 7 series or something, to build up rivalries and adapt to the play style of others.

Assassin's Creed Syndicate

Date played: January 20th
Platform: PS4
Session fun rating: 8/10

I played a bit more of Assassin's Creed Syndicate and honestly, it just keeps getting better and better every time I play. I completed a few simple missions in the White Chapel area. In one mission, I had to free children from their work in a factory by killing all of their captors. In another, I had to grab a target and carry him using a horse carriage. This opened up a gang war mission where I had to kill a bunch of Blighter gang members and their boss.

As a reward, Jacob and Evie received a train! A whole train! Amazingly, this thing acts as a mobile base for the duo. I got to see other areas of the city by riding the train and boy, this game's map is fucking huge! There is a LOT of stuff to see and do in London, so I can see why there are horse carriages all over the place, it really helps with travelling through the city.

In the next mission, which takes place on the South-East end of the map, we met with none other than Alexander Graham Bell! He gave us a new tool, a sort of grappling hook, or rappel, that can be used to climb up buildings in a flash, and can create rope bridges between large gaps. While this may seem like a simple tool at first, it makes the entire game a whole lot better. Navigation is less frustrating and much faster thanks to this amazing device. Sometimes, it almost feels like a Batman game because of it!

Evie rappels up Big Ben, overlooking the famous Thames river

Using this new tool, Evie helped Bell hook up some fuse boxes on and around Big Ben. This was easily one of the coolest missions yet. I got to do some crazy climbing and rappelling on the rooftops of the English government buildings. The sense of scale was absolutely incredible... Big Ben wears it's name quite well.

After this, I spent some time completing side objectives and gathering collectibles and gold. There are a lot of skills and upgrades to purchase, so money seems to be more important than ever in this game. The more I play this game, the more interesting it becomes and I'm excited to get back to London and explore it some more.

Tales from the Borderlands

Date played: January 19th
Platform: PS4
Session fun rating: 10/10

I finished Tales from the Borderlands!

WOW! What an ending! Episode 5 was easily the best in the game. It starts right after Rhys is made president of Hyperion by Handsome Jack. Unfortunately, Handsome Jack had other plans and used his new found network access to begin building a cyborg army and take over the world...

Rhys, betrayed, decides he must fix the situation, so he escapes Jack's office and heads to the space station's power core to destroy it. This would destroy the Helios station, but it would also stop Jack from ruling Pandora. As I escaped, I found Yvette, who had been locked in a cell by Fiona, Sasha and Loaderbot. I released her despite her betrayal, in the hopes that she will redeem herself and help me destroy Jack.

It wasn't too long before Rhys was in the power core room. With Yvette's help, I started dismantling the power core Rhys' cyborg arm, triggering an alarm across the station and prompting all it's residents to escape. With the last upgrade piece in hand, Fiona, Sasha, Gortys and August rush to the caravan rocket to escape. Unfortunately, Vallory had given instructions to her two thugs and August to grab Gortys, the missing piece and leave the rest of the team to their fates on Helios...

The sequence ends with one of the thugs and August taking the caravan, Gortys and Sasha, leaving Fiona and the other thug behind. Fiona finds an escape pod and plummets towards Pandora. Meanwhile, Rhys and Yvette managed to destroy the power core, despite Handsome Jack's efforts. Eventually, they escape Helios thanks to Loaderbot who stayed behind on the space station to save them...

Rhys crashed down on Pandora near the wreck of Helios. He had a final confrontation with Handsome Jack who still inhabited his cybernetic implants. Bravely and painfully, Rhys removed his cyborg arm, data port and eye, destroying any trace of Jack in the process. Rhys collapsed de to his wounds...  Meanwhile, Vallory had assembled Gortys into it's gigantic final form. This summoned the vault to Pandora, but it wasn't as easy as walking in and taking the loot...

The vault came with a bonus... a giant rock monster. Gortys tried to protect Pandora from the monster, but it was a losing fight... The only option left was to destroy Gortys to close the portal and send the monster back to it's home. There's a shit ton of stuff going on here, but basically, Vallory was killed by the monster as she tried to destroy Gortys with a rocket launcher, and Fiona and Sasha completed the job she started, destroying the friendly little robot and closing the portal.

That's when the game stopped the storytelling gimmick it had been using and brought the game back to "today", with Fiona and Rhys captured by the mysterious masked stranger. Long story short, after the Helios crash, Vaughn saved us from our captor and led us to his base, where he had surprisingly become the leader of a band of Hyperion refugees...

When we finally interrogated our captor, we discovered that it was Loaderbot! He modified his body to use one of Jack's exoskeletons, then put on some clothes to protect his identity. The reason he captured us was to find out why we had destroyed his friend, Gortys, without us knowing who he was so that he would get the full, honest story.

We decided that if we planned it well, we could reassemble Gortys and kill the guardian monster. This would revive Loaderbot's friend and grant us access to the vault! Rhys, Fiona, Vaugh, Sasha and Loaderbot decided that they should invite 3 friends to help with the plan. In a clever sequence, I got to choose who joined our team. Based on my decisions, some of the characters were not available.

I settled on August, who turned out to be Vallory's son, and who finally decided to be on our side. Then of course, I picked Athena, the badass vault hunter. Finally, I got Janey Springs, Athena's fiancée and skilled mechanic.

The final sequence was fucking incredible! It's kind of too much to detail here, but there was a ton of awesome action, including a great sequence where Rhys, August, Athena, Janey and Loaderbot went inside Gortys to pilot her, kind of like Robotron, or Evangelion. Gortys fought the monster bravely and, with the help of all her friends, killed it! The gameplay here was some of the best in the game, requiring that I input a series of commands quickly while the action evolved. Shit, there was even a great moment where Gortys pulled out a giant sword and slashed at the monster!

Friends celebrate victory!

With the monster defeated and the vault open, our little team celebrated and cheered. Rhys revealed his crush on Sasha to Fiona, who gave him his blessing. The two heroes then entered the vault together to get the loot. Just as they opened the big chest in the vault, they disappeared and the credits rolled, leaving some room for a sequel.

Tales from the Borderlands is a very cool game that works because of the strength of the writing, voice acting and comedic tone. The story was worth seeing through and the action was better than any other interactive story I've played before. I had a great time with it!

Rocket League

Date played: January 19th
Platform: PC
Session fun rating: 9/10

Sometimes, I love video games so much that I do some real stupid shit.

For example, last night, I bought Rocket League on PC. It was an impulse buy with no good reasoning behind it. A complete, useless luxury, My only real reason for getting it was to have it look slightly nicer and run slightly smoother.... And it does! Combined with my wireless Xbox One controller, it felt like a real console experience, but prettier.

I pass the ball to myself, then score!

Bad life decisions aside, I definitely had fun with the game. One of the fun little quirks of buying a new version of the game is that I have a bunch of stuff to unlock again, I'm not ranked and I'm still considered a rookie...

So, I was matched up with players with less experience and less skill than I'm used to... It was so fucking weird honestly. I watched as beginners slowly, painfully tried to make plays. I was leagues ahead of them all, scoring goals left and right, kicking the ball from my end of the field to theirs with ease.  I almost felt bad for them. Almost.

I decided to try out some ranked play instead, hoping for better opponents. In the first couple of matches, I was still a dominating force on the field. However, my last match pitted me against one of the best players I've ever played with. This guy had such amazing control of his car, it was a real sight to behold. He would carefully, precisely line up his car with the ball at the right angle while in midair, would block shots that I didn't even know could be blocked and even scored a goal while upside down in the air. I was very much impressed with his skill, even if we lost 6-1. On the bright side, I'm the one who scored our lone goal...

Tales from the Borderlands

Date played: January 17th
Platform: PS4
Session fun rating: 8/10

I played through episodes 3 and 4 last night, I was really engrossed in the story... There's a lot of stuff that happened, so I won't detail everything here, but the story is real good, the characters are still as awesome as ever and the game is still fucking hilarious. There were even a few touching moments sprinkled throughout.

Episode 3 starts with the team grabbing the weird, spherical artifact from the Atlas facility and escaping the clutches of Vasquez and August. It was soon revealed that the artifact is in fact a friendly little robot named Gortys. It seems like this little spherical machine can find the vault, named the Vault of the Traveler. This vault teleports across the galaxy every 10 minutes, making it impossible to find. However, Gortys can "summon" the vault, but he needs a few upgrade parts to do this.

When we exited the Atlas facility, we were confronted by a new enemy, Vallory. She is a big bad lady who had hired some of the bounty hunters that were chasing Fiona and Sasha earlier. As she spoke to us about handing over Gortys, Vasquez and August caught up with us. Vallory was pissed that the deal for the key went sour and she asked me who was responsible... When I told her it was Vasquez' fault, she shot him in the chest with a shotgun, killing him instantly!

In the nick of time, Athena appeared out of nowhere and saved us from Vallory, August and the thugs. It turns out, Athena has been hired by Felix to keep Fiona and Sasha safe. We followed Gortys' instructions to find a piece of his upgrade. This led us to a weird abandoned bio-dome built by Atlas. Interestingly, as Fiona and Athena searched for the upgrade, Rhys and Sasha start to build a real relationship, potentially romantic...

After lots of perilous adventuring in the dome, we found the upgrade, a set of legs for Gortys. Unfortunately, that's when Vallory, August and the thugs caught up to us. Athena was captured and taken away... Vallory then coerced the rest of the team into helping her find the remaining upgrade piece for Gortys...

Episode 4 reveals that the last piece is on the Hyperion space station, Helios. We had to formulate an elaborate plan, full of ridiculous assumptions and potential problems. It required Rhys to recover Vasquez' body to use it as a template for a costume. Using advanced tech, Rhys could mimic Vasquez entirely, including his voice. In a horrible, yet hilarious sequence, Rhys must peel off a Vasquez "face-pizza" off a psycho's head... Basically, the psychos like to cut off people's faces and use them as a mask.

As this was happening, Fiona went back to see Scooter to get him to build us a rocket ship to Helios. Scooter is a really cool character... He's obviously very stupid, except for his mechanical skills, but he's also a real sweetheart. He builds a rocket for us, and we were ready to blast off. Rhys, Fiona, Sasha, Scooter, August and the two thugs get on and launch the rocket into space, accompanied by absolutely great music by Twin Shadow.
Unfortunately, stuff goes wrong and the rockets attached to the shuttle are about to explode... Fiona and Scooter head out to detach the rockets and save everyone. While Fiona managed to complete her task successfully, Scooter gets his hand stuck... In a heartfelt moment, Fiona releases the rocket, sending Scooter off to his heroic death. It was actually really sweet. We honored him by releasing a satellite that broadcasts his catch phrase "Catch a Ride!".

Scooter and Fiona share an intimate moment before the man's heroic death

We landed on Helios and Rhys, disguised as Vasquez, quickly discovered that he had been betrayed by Yvette, who sold us out to the late Vasquez... It was really fun to impersonate Vasquez, I always picked the most awful, asshole responses in dialogue. After many dangerous encounters, Rhys found his way to Handsome Jack's office where the last Gortys upgrade was hidden.

In an awesome twist, Handsome Jack offered Rhys a way to rule Hyperion, using a secret data port. Thinking I could "fix" Pandora with this power, I accepted Jack's offer and became president/king/ruler of Hyperion, to Fiona and Sasha's horror... I hope I can use this power to help people, but we'll see how it goes. Episode 5 is set to be one hell of a ride!

The Legend of Zelda: Triforce Heroes

Date played: January 17th
Platform: 3DS
Session fun rating: 9/10

My friend and I played through the 4 areas of the second world, Riverside. It introduces the water rod and the gripshot.  The water rod is really cool since it can create big fountains that act as platforms, allowing the heroes to get to higher ground without creating a totem. It also creates walking paths on water and reveals certain enemies. The gripshot is more traditional, allowing the heroes to cross large chasms by grabbing onto wooden posts or even other heroes.

In general, the Riverside area was a lot more fun than the Woodlands. The puzzles were trickier, the combat was more challenging and the items were more entertaining. My friend is really good at this game, it was great to have someone with me who knew how to fight and thinks quickly. We died a couple of times, but it was never enough to make us fail.

Our little team was pretty good

My favorite part was the final boss, a sort of octopus monster where we had to use the gripshot and the water rod as a team to defeat him. We were really close to dying, with only one heart left, when my friend made some strategically placed fountains, then I got on top and pulled at the enemy's weak spot with the gripshot. We killed it swiftly and claimed our prize. It helped that my friend was wearing an outfit that allowed some wider water fountain platforms...

With my loot, I was able to purchase the Zora outfit which allows me to travel faster in water I think. It looks pretty cool! I'm feeling better about this game now that I've played some more difficult parts.

Yoshi's Woolly World

Date played: January 17th
Platform: Wii U
Session fun rating: 10/10

My Sunday morning father/daughter gaming routine continues with more Yoshi's Woolly World. We completed 5 levels in the 4th world, the jungle. The first level we played, Lakitu Peekaboo, wasn't all that great, it was just an auto-scrolling level filled with Lakitus throwing spiked balls.

However, the next one, Rollin' Down the River, was just fantastic. As the name implies, Yoshi must travel down a river, jumping on wooden bridges, floating pieces of wood and later in the level, a raft. Scattered throughout the level are giant fish enemies that jump out of the water and attack Yoshi. The raft section was amazing as it wafted with the river's current, then it blazes down a giant waterfall.

This giant fish might be adorable, but he's also quite deadly

We then reached a castle level, Knot-Wing the Koopa's Aqua Fort. This level makes clever use of water, switches that change it's depth and Poochy, Yoshi's friendly canine mount. There were switches scattered about that changed the water level, so I had to hit those, then ride or guide Poochy to specific areas quickly to progress. The boss was a repeat of a previous castle, but the mechanics of the fight were slightly different.

I think the coolest thing about this game is that every level has a unique mechanic, or theme. Sunset at Curtain Falls is very exciting, since it plays almost like a mine cart level from Donkey Kong Country. Yoshi grabs on to curtains that slide down their holding rods. There were lots of tricky jumps between curtains, an awesome loop and an exhilarating drop at the end of the level.

Finally, we played Spooky Scraps Don't Get Spooked, an inventive level where platforms are only revealed and usable when a weird, ghostly fabric covers the area. When behind the fabric, Yoshi is only a silhouette and the fabric moves quickly through the level, so it was challenging to make it through alive.

I just love Yoshi's Woolly World, it's so much better than I ever expected and I'm glad I gave it a chance.

Toy Box Turbos demo

Date played: January 17th
Platform: PC
Session fun rating: 7/10

Micro Machines on NES was an important game for me. It was a Christmas gift when I was quite young, maybe 7 or 8 years old, and it became one of the games I played the most during my childhood. The 2 player mode was fucking awesome and I spent hours and hours playing against my brothers. In fact, it might have been the game that gave birth to my love of racing games.

By all accounts, Toy Box Turbos is a Micro Machines game, except it doesn't have the license for it. The demo was pretty cool, featuring 2 cars, both of them taxis, and maybe 3 different tracks. It looks real pretty, handles real well and is just a lot of fun, I just wish the demo had more to it I guess.

This game is awesome...

They do some cool stuff with the camera to makes things more exciting. There are also some weapons, though I was so far in first place that I never got to use them. And of course, the main draw here are the incredible tracks. The best was set on a kitchen table, including a toaster jump, a dangerous mixer obstacle, spilt milk, jam and other fun stuff. I loved what I played of this and would like to play some more, preferably in multiplayer.

Mario Kart Wii

Date played: January 16th
Platform: Wii
Session fun rating: 6/10

I was visiting some friends last night and their 3 year old has taken a liking to Mario Kart Wii, so his dad and I played a few races with him. He's obviously a little too young to play, but he still manages to move his cart slowly through the track. For me, it was pretty tough to get back into the game after playing a lot of Mario Kart 7 and 8. Mario Kart Wii has a few really weird things about it, like weird items that don't make much sense (lightning cloud???) and odd motion controls. We still had fun with our three little races, and it's really cool to see a young child be interested in video games like that!

Rocket League

Date played: January 16th
Platform: PS4
Session fun rating: 8/10

BOOM! I smash the ball into the goal!

I played a few rounds of 3 vs 3, rocking my favorite car, Takumi. I did pretty well overall, got a few MVP's and scored a few fancy goals, though nothing really crazy. I had competent team mates for the most part, and played against competent players, so it was always fairly close.

"Kids, I remember when..."

Date played: January 15th
Platform: PS4
Session fun rating: 10/10

I spent some time at my brother's house who invited me, another of our brothers and a couple of friends to play some video games last night. It started with a bunch of Rocket League. At first, we did some 2 vs 2 locally, picking random teams. The first match was rough for everyone, no one was warmed up. However, after a few rounds, people got comfortable and we had some really fun matches. I played well, as usual, I even had a very good aerial goal somewhere in there!

Then we decided to do some 4 vs 4 online in Chaos mode, a mode we don't play very often. It was lots of fun, but it's a completely different game. Having 8 people on the field makes things a lot more complicated and a lot more difficult. Getting the ball out of the center of the field is a real feat, so scoring is also quite difficult. We actually got into overtime at 0-0, then I scored the winning goal after another 5 minutes of playing! 10 minutes of grueling fighting...

After this, we decided to play a bit of 2 vs 2 NHL 15, Sens vs Habs of course. It's been a long time since I played a hockey video game, and I've always had trouble scoring in these games, though I make pretty damn good plays. Thankfully, my partner is a pretty good scorer, so we managed to hold our own, though we didn't win a game.

Finally, we got into a bit of Towerfall. The Last of the Order, the Turncloak Soldier, the Vigilante Thief and the Vicious Vessel fought to the death for victory! As usual, Towerfall is a lot of fun and is very very fair. We swapped wins all night until we were simply too tired to continue.

Tales from the Borderlands

Date played: January 13th
Platform: PS4
Session fun rating: 8/10

I played through Episode 2 and it was action packed!

This episode picks up right after the end of the first one, where Rhys, Fiona, Vaughn and Sasha had just found a map that will lead them to a vault key. Rhys was acting really weird and that's because he has a new "guest person" in his cybernetic mind, ostensibly from the time he plugged in a random device in his brain in episode... That person is a holographic representation of Handsome Jack, a dead Hyperion legend.

While Rhys was chatting with Jack and freaking out, the rest of the team found a computer with an eye scanner lock, and a dead body. In one of the funniest, yet most disgusting scenes yet, Fiona uses a spork to scoop out one of the dead man's eyes to log into the computer... It worked, and they got some info on Atlas, the old company that left Pandora a long time ago, and owners of the vault key that was shown on the map.

The team leaves the car combat arena in the trailer that Felix had brought and they head to Fiona and Sasha's home town to get supplies and gear up for their raid of the Atlas facility that contains the key. Unfortunately, Pandora is a shitty fucking planet, so while travelling in the caravan, they were attacked by wild flying creatures and a gigantic rampaging beast. On top of it all, the Hyperion station starts shooting at them with "Moon Shots", huge cannon blasts.

Fiona tries to save Rhys and Vaughn, but only manages to save a shoe

What followed was a really cool action sequence as we tried to avoid moon shots, flying monsters and the large beast. It was really well done, with slow motion effects, over the top movements and actions, funny bits of dialogue and a very cool song. Unfortunately, Rhys and Vaughn fell off the caravan and the team was separated... The two men were stranded in the desert, then shit got real bad. Vasquez himself showed up with a big gun and made the them start digging their own graves... Using his cybernetic eye, Rhys made the gun fire on it's own, then during the confusion, our trusty Loader Bot showed up and flew us out of Vasquez' reach.

Meanwhile, Fiona and Sasha reached Hollow Point, their home town, and found some supplies in their house while they got the caravan repaired. The mechanic, Scooter, is a cute little dude that loves cars, women and cars, in that order. Fiona agreed to have him as a sponsor if ever she has another race in exchange for free repairs. Unfortunately, Fiona has a huge bounty on her head, so it wasn't long before her and Sasha were attacked with bounty hunters. As they escaped, another, more dangerous bounty hunter showed up, Athena. This was a spectacular chase sequence in the city until they managed to get away and reach Scooter's place to get their caravan back.

It turns out, Rhys and Vaughn were also there, trying to get "their" caravan. That's when one of the cutest scenes in the game happened... Rhys said that Fiona and Sasha were their friends and adorably, Fiona replies "Yes Scooter, these are our friends." with a sly little smile. They got back on the road with the repaired caravan and reached the town that the map led to. After a small puzzle, we found the secret entrance to the Atlas facility.

Unfortunately, when we got inside, we were captured by Vasquez, who had recruited August to his crew. They sent Rhys and Fiona inside with the map pieces, then the episode ended. I didn't like this episode as much as the first one, but it was still lots of fun, very funny and the story is cool. I can't wait to see what happens next!

Rocket League

A golden opportunity

Date played: January 12th
Platform: PS4
Session fun rating: 9/10

I didn't have much time to play video games last night, so once again, I went back to my favorite game of 2015, Rocket League. I mostly stayed in the same lobby all night, which meant that I played with the same people a lot. I think we all stayed because everyone was about at the same skill level and the matches were all very close. We won more than we lost, but it was always real tight.

My best play was when the ball bounced high up in the air while everyone was in our zone. I saw a golden opportunity, a wide open goal and a high ball, so I boosted as fast as I could, jumped from mid field, waited in the air for the perfect moment and then side kicked it into the goal. It's a simple play, but it was done at very high speeds and required patience, while I was in the air. I kinda wish they would release more downloadable content, just to have new cars and stuff.

Tales from the Borderlands

Date played: January 11th
Platform: PS4
Session fun rating: 9/10

Tales from the Borderlands is an interactive story game by Telltale, the people behind the excellent The Walking Dead interactive stories.I bought this game during the PSN holiday sale for less than 10$ for all 5 episodes, so that was a pretty good deal, and it had some positive buzz on the internet.

Last night, I played through the first episode. As the title suggests, the game is set in the Borderlands universe, the shooter/RPG hybrid games from Gearbox Software. The hero is Rhys, a man who works for Hyperion, a big evil corporation. He is about to receive a promotion, but when he gets to the meeting with his boss, things go very wrong.

His real boss was thrown out of the airlock into space by Rhys' rival, Vasquez. The smug son of a bitch laughs in Rhys's face, demotes him to janitor and when I started to confront him, he punched me out. Rhys is kind of a cyborg... He's got a robotic arm and an eye implant that lets him scan objects and interact with software. Using this cool eye thing, he gathered some info on a deal Vasquez was trying to complete where he was about to buy a vault key, the legendary loot caves of planet Pandora. To get revenge for his demotion, Rhys teams up with his friends, Vaughn and Yvette, to steal the deal for themselves.

Vaughn is a financial officer for Hyperion, so he steals the money needed for the deal, ten million dollars. Yvette, a procurement officer, secures a shuttle for transport to Pandora, a car and a powerful stun baton for her friends.

There was a confrontation with bandits where Yvette sent down a giant robot to help us fight. This was a cool sequence because it required some quick action, but also some decisions, like the type of weapons the robot uses and which targets he attacked. There's a lot of stuff going on in this game, so I'll skip some details, but long story short, the deal didn't work out and the money is stolen by bandits.

That's when the second main character is introduced, Fiona. She is a professional thief, born and raised on Pandora with her sister Sasha. They were raised by Felix, a criminal with a knack for fixing and hacking electronics. It turns out, the vault key was a fake that had been built by Felix. Sasha became close with a man named August, who has connections to Vasquez. Fiona sells the fake vault key to August, who then sets up the deal with Vasquez. Then Rhys and Vaughn meet with August to buy the key.

The game does some interesting stuff with perspective and story telling. Basically, the whole setup is that Rhys and Fiona are held captive by a mysterious man. They then tell their part of the story to the man. Sometimes, they contradict each other, so I get to see and play both sides of the story. It's also really fucking hilarious in general. The writing is excellent, with good jokes and great timing. It helps that there are some very good voice actors involved, like Troy Baker and Nolan North. Honestly, I even laughed out loud more than once, a feat that is pretty damn rare in video games.

Fiona fights in the arena, wearing an iconic bandit mask

The rest of the episode sees Rhys, Fiona, Vaughn and Sasha team up to get the money back from the bandits. I fought some monsters, charmed some bandits and met Zer0, a vault hunter. This all culminated in a hilarious, over the top sequence in a bandit combat race with motorcycles, cars, buggies and trucks. It felt like a parody of Mad Max or something... In the end, Felix betrayed us and tried to steal the money during the race, but it was booby trapped and exploded. The money is gone, Felix escaped and the team is stranded with no money and no vault key.

At the very end of the episode, with the help of Rhys' bionic eye, they discover a secret room under the arena and find a real, genuine map to a vault.

Yoshi's Woolly World

Date played: January 10th
Platform: Wii U
Session fun rating: 9/10

I love my Sunday mornings... I get to drink a nice warm cup of coffee and play video games with my daughter. Today, we played some more Yoshi's Woolly World, completing 3 new levels. Before that, we got the last flower and yarn balls from the second level in the world, so that it we would get the secret level as soon as we finished the boss level.

The castle level was infested with little chicks that don giant egg shells with drawings on it that make it resemble a full grown chicken... The shells are dangerous for Yoshi, but they also act as jumping platforms, creating some fun puzzles. The boss was a giant chick that hid in a giant egg shell. It wasn't too hard, but it was lots of fun.

This giant chicken was fun to fight!

The special level was a real fucking bitch. The gimmick was that I had to ride on the cloudy coattails of a single bullet bill throughout the entire level. To make it worst, the whole thing is auto-scrolling! It was really difficult, but after over a dozen tries, I made it through and we celebrated with high fives and cheers.

The fourth world opened up and it's a giant jungle! We only played the first level, but it was a good one. Most of it was revolved around fighting little monkeys that climb all over the place and spit watermelon seeds at Yoshi.

Assassin's Creed Syndicate

Date played: January 9th
Platform: PS4
Session fun rating: 8/10

Well, it seems that the freezing issues I had last time are gone... So I continued the mission I was on with Evie, where I had to assassinate a man named David Brewster, a scientist. He held a "piece of Eden" in his lab and was doing experiments on it. It seems like these things are important, but it's really not clear why yet. After the mission, I met up with Jacob and our mentor. The twins suggested that it was time to go to London and help liberate it from the Templars, but our boss didn't like that idea at all. Jacob convinced Evie to just jump onto a train and go to London, ignoring instructions from the Assassins.

London awaits!

That's when the game really starts... London is absolutely spectacular with it's big streets, dense construction and beautiful architecture. The game looks really good graphically too, so that helps make the city more believable.

We met with an Assassin called Henry Green, an Indian assassin who has been working in London for most of his life. He showed us around a little bit, then the world map opened up. As usual for this series, there's a TON of stuff to do and discover in the huge city. There are chests and other collectibles to collect of course, but the most interesting thing is liberating the different boroughs from the gangs that occupy them.

I explored the map a little bit, in the borough of White Chapel. Interestingly, there are horse-drawn carriages that can be used as vehicles for Evie and Jacob to use as transportation. These things are pretty fast and there was even a combat encounter with them, where I could ram other carriages and use my new pistol to shoot enemies on the fly.

I completed two side missions that help liberate the city, one where I had to assassinate a Templar, the other where I had to clear out an area held by a gang and kill it's leader. There's a lot of new stuff in this game, like a big skill tree, leveling up and buying different types of weapons and armor. It's also really cool that I can switch between Evie and Jacob at anytime. I prefer the way Evie animates and talks, but Jacob is cool too.

Rocket League

Date played: January 9th and 10th
Platform: PS4
Session fun rating: 8/10

I score a goal here by juggling the ball past those two guys

I played a few rounds of Rocket League last night, some in the 3 vs 3 ranked mode then a few more matches in the standard mode. I played pretty well as usual, but I did it with a different car this time. I used the little can, colored it pink and purple and put on a pink smoke engine, it looks fucking rad!

Rocket League

Date played: January 8th
Platform: PS4
Session fun rating: 10/10

My youngest brother came to visit and we ended up playing Rocket League all evening. We were also joined by one of his friends later at night. As usual, we were really strong, winning most of our games, including a few blowouts like 8-0 and 7-1. We tried out some ranked 2 vs 2 matches, where the competition was a lot stiffer. We lost some matches here, but we played well overall and won more than we lost.

My brother scores after I made him a slick pass

At one point, we decided to make matching cars, a team of firemen. We had the same colors, rocket boosts, antennas and hats, so I think it made us look pretty intimidating. Throughout the evening, we had some really sick plays, so I took a few videos that you can watch below!

The Legend of Zelda: Tri Force Heroes

Date played: January 6th
Platform: 3DS
Session fun rating: 8/10

I love the Zelda series, though there's always a few games that piss me off, like Majora's Mask and the two NES releases. Back in the GBA and Gamecube days, there was a multiplayer Zelda game, Four Swords, and while it was really difficult to get a group together due to the nature of multiplayer games during that era, I loved it the few times I got to play it with others. Tri Force Heroes is kind of the spiritual successor to those, so I was pretty excited to play it, but I didn't want to play it with strangers.

When my friend received the game for Christmas, I decided it was a good opportunity to play it. Last night, we played together through the first area of the game, a forest. The tricky thing about this game is that it requires 3 players to play, so we were joined by a stranger. The structure is kind of odd too... There are basically 4 sets of areas in the forest, and each of these has about 4 rooms.

The key move in the game is a "totem" of heroes, where players can pick up each other and built a tower to reach higher areas and attack taller enemies. It works pretty well and it requires pretty damn good coordination from each player. There are also items to pick up, like the bow and bombs, but a player can only hold one of these, so each player ends up with an item "task" in many of the levels.

The four areas we played were all pretty cool. We rode on floating platforms, built totems to attack enemies and reach higher areas, fought a few bosses and solved some little puzzles. I really like using the bombs so far, more than the bow. Our stranger friend was competent too, so that helped us. We did die once, but we learned from our mistakes and didn't die again the whole evening.

One of the most important elements is the weird, yet efficient communication system. On the touch screen, there are about 8 different messages that can be sent to other players. For example, I can shout at someone "Over here!", or show them that we should build a totem and there's even some cute cheers. It works surprisingly well and makes it easier to succeed.

There's a story to this, but it's some of the most awful fucking garbage I've seen in a while. Basically, we must bring style back to a princess that is all about fashion. I barely read anything that scrolled onscreen since it was so terrible...

The Bib Bomb Outfit is badass!

Finally, there are outfits to build that grant special abilities. To build them, materials and rupees have to be collected. The materials are randomly doled out when completing an area, creating a reason to go back to completed levels. There's also a challenge mode that increases difficulty, but I haven't tried that yet. I picked up the Big Bomb outfit and the Kokiri outfit. I like Triforce Heroes, but once I get to see all the areas, I'm not sure it will be able to keep my interest, though it's always fun to play with a friend.

Rocket League

Date played: January 6th
Platform: PS4
Session fun rating: 9/10

You know what's great about Rocket League? It's easy to just play a few quick matches between life's important tasks. With 5 minute matches, I don't mind playing a game or two anytime I have a few spare minutes. I did that a bit last night, playing a match here and there. At first, I played a few ranked matches and did pretty well, but I lost all my matches there. The competition is definitely better in these playlists. Both matches were really fucking close though, so I felt good about how I played.

I score in the midst of a melee near the goal!

Later, I ended up playing with the same group of people for about 4 or 5 matches. We were all pretty good and all had good sportsmanship, being polite and playing for the good of the team rather than individual performance. One of the players was a bit better than everyone and had a few incredible aerial shots, but he wasn't that much better that he dominated the match. I had a great time playing with these guys.

Assassin's Creed Syndicate

Date played: January 4th
Platform: PS4
Session fun rating: 4/10

I received Assassin's Creed Syndicate as a Christmas gift. The last time I played this series, it was Black Flag, which I loved. Last year, Assassin's Creed Unity was received very negatively, so even though I like this franchise, I skipped last year's game. This year though, it seems like Ubisoft has made some big improvements to the game with Syndicate.

Everything started off pretty well. The game stars Jacob and Evie Frye, twins who have joined the Assassins in the Victorian London era. They each have a target to assassinate, one is man who runs an smelting plant, the other a scientist that works for the biggest crime lord in town.

The first mission put me in control of Jacob Frye as he infiltrates the smelting plant. There are some major improvements that are immediately noticeable, mainly with the controls and UI. Everything is simpler, easier to read, easier to understand and easier to control. There's now a way to free run "up" and "down", to better control the character.

The mission itself was also a lot of fun. The level design and objectives in the missions seem a lot more focused than even before for the series, which is really good. It feels much better... There are tons of ways to approach an assassination and even some on screen indicators that show the different entry points that could be used. After killing the target, Jacob flees outside and jumps onto a moving train, then fights a flurry of enemies. During these battles, one of the enemies manages to change the train's path which leads it to a cliff. Jacob spectacularly defies death with his acrobatic skills.

Jacob Frye is an athletic man

The game then cuts to Evie, where I got to explore a much bigger area, a train yard. I got to experiment with combat a bit more, and have learned to love both the throwing knives and the smoke bombs. I helped a man escape the clutches of the gangsters, which rewarded me with a key to go deeper into the train yards.

That's when I just stopped having fun. I don't know if it's my disc, my PS4 or a glitch in the game, but the started to completely freeze after a few minutes of play. I tried a few things, like cleaning the disc and rebooting the PS4, but nothing worked. Inevitably, the game froze after 1-3 minutes without fail. PSN is down also, which might be playing a role in this, but it's not clear. I will try to do some troubleshooting, like rebuilding the game's database. Since I'm early in the game, I might also try to delete the game and save, then restart from scratch. It sucks though, since the game looks like a lot of fun...

Yoshi's Woolly World

Date played: January 3rd
Platform: Wii U
Session fun rating: 8/10

The holidays meant that I haven't played as many games as usual, especially on weekends, but I still managed to sneak in a bit of Yoshi's Woolly World with my daughter yesterday. We played only one new level, but it was fucking awesome.

To put this in context, you must know that my daughter has started school this year, and her desk neighbour started a trend in the classroom. The big thing in their class is rainbows. They draw rainbows, they color stuff with rainbow colors, there's rainbows absolutely everywhere.

Rainbows are pretty!

Level 3-7, named Fanciful Fluff and Feathers, is ALL about rainbows and fluffy clouds, so as you can imagine, my daughter loved it! The way the level is made, the rainbows grow and shrink to make for some moving, temporary platforms. The clouds were also a key element since I could jump into them, then climb out, creating some pretty cool segments. At one point, I asked my daughter why she loved rainbows and was surprised to hear just about the cutest damn answer I could have gotten.

"Daddy, everyone loves rainbows. They are pretty!"

We then went back into previous levels to gather flowers and yarn balls we had missed. We still have one level to go through and gather the remaining collectibles before heading over to the last level of World 3.

Multiplayer high jinks special edition!

Date played: January 2nd
Platform: PS4 / PC
Session fun rating: 10/10

Wow! I had an awesome time playing multiplayer games with my brothers and friends yesterday. There was lots of Rocket League, Towerfall and a bit of Nidhogg to end the evening. At first, I played Rocket League online with one of my brothers and one of his friends. We are all pretty damn good, so it was no surprise that we won every single game we played.

I make an aerial bounce pass for my brother, who slams it into the net at high speeds!

I mean, we fucking destroyed every other team... I felt like we were some giant ogre stepping on ants or something. Two teams even forfeited! My brother's friend was pretty much a defensive player, guarding the net, though he wasn't afraid to move forward when it was safe to do so. My brother ended up being more of a striker and brawler, going into the corners, tapping at the ball, scoring a lot when the ball bounced close to the net. As for me, as usual, I roamed at the center field line, pushed the ball hard into enemy territory and sniped from the middle of the field. Watch our best play here!

Later at night, another of my bros came over and brought 4 friends with him and we spent the evening playing video games. My bro and I introduced them all to Rocket League. It took a while for them to learn the controls, but of course, they learned the basics pretty quickly. We then went online for some 3 vs 3. Obviously, with some new players like that, it was pretty rough at times and we lost quite a few matches, but everyone had a good time. There was lots of screaming, cheering and swearing!

We then played a bit of of Towerfall. I only have 3 controllers, so we had to settle for that, but we had tons of fun. We tried a few variants... We started with a favorite, exploding corpses. The fucked up thing about this mode is that players still score points if their corpse kills another player with it's explosion, turning the battlefield into a dangerous minefield.

The next variant we tried was pretty cool. We had a single arrow per match, but we also had speed boots, infinite wings and our corpses turned into ghosts. The ghosts were particularly fun, since they can kill other players by bumping into them. They can also be killed by arrows and head bumps, but considering that we only had one arrow each, the game became very strategic very quickly...

Finally, we played a few rounds of Nidhogg on my PC. I love Nidhogg, but sometimes, it just turns into a stalemate. When two players with similar skill go at each other, the match often devolves into a fruitless, endless battle that just moves back and forth all the time. I wish the game had a special powerup to pick up or something after spending more than 5 minutes playing. We still had fun with it, but it was clearly not as big a hit as Rocket League and Towerfall.