Cuphead

Date played: September 29th
Platform: Xbox One

Cuphead is a 2D run-and-gun action game, focused on boss battles. Walking in the time-tested footprint of Contra and Megaman, Cuphead adds a unique style and aesthetic, modeled after 1930's cartoons. Cuphead, the titular character, is a cup that shoots bullets from his hands.

He and his buddy, Mugman, once went on a stroll in the forest and stumbled upon the devil's casino. They go on an amazing winning streak, then agree to gamble their souls to the devil. Of course, they lose the bet. The devil agrees to give them one chance to redeem themselves by killing all the creatures on his kill list.

And so, the game begins. Cuphead can jump, shoot, dodge, change weapons, parry and use a special move. The whole game is focused on boss battles, with only a couple of platforming levels per world, compared to 6 bosses.

I started with one of the platforming levels, and it was not easy, considering it's the first level. Enemies come at me fast and hard, with a flurry of projectiles to avoid and gaps to cross. It's fun, and kinda feels like Metal Slug or Contra in these segments.

The real action is in the boss battles though. I only had time for one battle, but holy crap, it was amazing! The boss was split in 3 phases, each more difficult than the last. The first phase was against a potato, who lobbed dirt balls at me. The second phase was an adorable crying onion, that attacked with tears falling from the sky.

Finally, the final phase had me battle against a giant telekinetic carrot. Yep. I used my secondary weapon here, which is currently a short ranged spread weapon that resembles a shotgun. There's a shop in the world map where I can buy new weapons and accessories, and there seems to be a large number available, so that's really cool.

The carrot boss was incredible

The carrot wasn't too hard to beat honestly, but since the battle is split into 3 phases, it's still hard. I only have 3 HP, so it doesn't take much to die. Which I did. A lot. I have a feeling there's going to be a copious amount of dying in this game...

I have to take a moment and acknowledge the incredible artistry on display here. This might just be the best looking 2D game ever made, and I don't say that lightly. It looks like it's straight out of a cartoon... But it's more than that. It's the overall feel of the game. The music is particularly good. The filters added on top of the game look great.

The animation steals the show though. Even the loading screen is absurdly detailed, with a wonderful little hourglass, smiling at me as it spins around, playfully moving the sand inside it's glass body to the beat of the music. The attention to detail here is unparalleled. The bosses are easily the best part of the game, both visually and as a game. I just love Cuphead! Challenging difficulty, tight combat and beautiful style come together to make a really cool game. 

Watch Dogs 2

Date played: September 28th
Platform: PS4

The DedSec team needed some relaxation, so they headed to a karaoke bar in Marin County to chill. It didn't last very long though, as we received some live pictures of ourselves, clearly showing that someone is spying on us. Marcus takes the lead and tries to find the spy. This led me to a delivery truck a few blocks away. I cleared the area of security guards, then began a large data transfer from the truck.

It took a long time, so I had to drive around a little bit to avoid the cops, but I lost them pretty easily. The data we stole was crazy though... Basically, it seems like the FBI is cracking down on hacker groups, such as DedSec, by recruiting hackers and having them work as double agents within hacker teams. We still need a lot of data to make sense of it, but it's a big deal. It also raises some suspicions about Ray, the legendary hacker that insisted on joining our cause. Is Ray a mole?

To get some more info, Wrench thought a meeting with Miranda, the councilwoman, could potentially help. The mission itself was very simple, as I just had to drive her around as she and Marcus discussed the issue, but she promised to help.

I then decided to complete a few side missions. I hacked a few NSA guys, and honestly, something feels wrong here. Some of these guys sound fucking insane... but I'm really not sure what's up with this whole story.

This ambush against the police and the paramedics was pretty tough

I also continued the police corruption side story. This time though, it was more than just drug deals. The cops were working with the paramedics to move dead bodies around... This shit is getting real serious... So the mission was one of the more difficult ones so far. I actually failed twice, and both times, it was because I accidentally blew up the ambulance I was supposed to steal. The first time, it's because of explosives that were a little close, and a little too powerful. The second time, it was because I hacked the ambulance to get out of the area, but it hit another car, which caught fire and then exploded in my face, destroying the ambulance and killing Marcus. Third time's the charm they say. I cleared the area without destroying the ambulance.

Metroid Samus Returns

Date played: September 27th
Platform: 3DS

Writing about this game is really difficult. A lot of it is just about exploring the map and trying to reach new areas, so there's not too much for me to say. I've spent all of my time exploring Area 3, which is way bigger than anything that came before. There are dozens or rooms and paths to take, and tons of secrets to find in every little corner.

I am still missing a number of abilities, so there are still large portions of the map that are unavailable to me, so I'll have to come back later. I focused on Metroid hunting, and ended up killing 9 of them, some of which were Alpha, but most were Gamma. I'm getting better and better at fighting these bad boys. Freezing them forces them to land, then it's just a matter of waiting for a moment to counter with a flurry of missiles. It's harder than it sounds, but I think I've got it down now.

I now have 4 extra energy tanks, plus the lightning armor, so I can survive a good while against most monsters. There's some new ones that take a bit more to kill, even some that require a counter, then a rapid-fire counter.

Area 3's atmosphere is really cool. It's full of deep caverns, haunted by mysterious creatures, lurking in the shadows. The music is eerie and unsettling. Samus doesn't speak a word. It's just her, against a planet full of metroids and other dangerous beasts. In fact, I caught a glimpse of a gigantic mechanical monster. It was far away, and it moved away rather quickly, but I know I'm going to fight this thing at one point... 

Watch Dogs 2

Date played: September 21st
Platform: PS4

I started the evening with a new type of side mission, where I get to setup an ambush. I first have to scan the area for clues, then the future position of enemies and vehicles can be seen from the hacking view. Then, I set up traps and such, waiting for the enemies to arrive. The first one of these had me steal a car, and the second had me blow up some trucks. Blowing up the trucks was so much fun, I did it all with the drone and a forklift.

The view from Oakland is beautiful

I explored much of Oakland, focusing on gathering research points. There was a large variety of puzzles to solve, or bad guys to dispatch. I tend to prefer using the drone and it's explosive charges, since that's fully upgraded, but it attracts a lot of attention. Another violent method that I like is to call in some gang members to kill people. I'll even add cops into the mix sometimes. This allowed me to buy a few new skills from the tech tree.

First is a super useful reduction to the cost of hacking individuals. This really adds a lot of flexibility to my playstyle, as I can perform more hacks during an encounter. The next ability allows me to call in more powerful gang members. I've also completed most of the Scout X objectives, with only two remaining.

I focused the rest of my time on two side missions. One was an elaborate setup by the police, where corruption within the high ranking members of the force are making deals with gangs, while somehow blaming it on CTos or something. I'm still not done this story, but it's been very interesting so far.

Another side mission had me save a man from suicide. He was being framed by his employer, and this led him to want to kill himself. We got a geotag on him, then I hacked a camera at the top of a skyscraper. I then sent a reporter the files that can exonerate him and had her call the desperate man. This convinced him to continue on with his life. Another, similar side mission had me save a man from asphyxiation as he attempted suicide by locking himself in his running car... In a different side mission, I had to find some NSA agents and hack their phones to gather some info on a mysterious hacker named Had0ck.

Watch Dogs 2

Date played: September 25th
Platform: PS4

Last night, I booted up the game and intended to continue the mission with Lenni, the crazy hacker lady who's holding our systems hostage with ransomware. Then, another player joined my game and just hopped into my car. I don't know why, but it just felt like it was time to go GTA-style. I drove around with the other guy for a while. We stopped at a few restricted areas to fight some dudes, took some big jumps, drove fast and fought cops. It was mindless, and so much fun!

I ended up in the middle of a small suburb called San Mateo, which is a very rich area with large mansions and sports cars all over the place. I explored it a bit, finding a couple of research points, money bags and a unique vehicle. The vehicle is a hilarious scooter with a pink paintjob, depicting unicorns and rainbows. It also makes a "magic" sound when accelerating...

Unfortunately, Mother Nature had other plans. I lost power in my house, which of course, turned off my PS4. Unfortunately, since I had been fucking around, the game hadn't saved in a long while, so I had to spend a bunch of time re-exploring San Mateo... I spent a good amount of time solving environmental puzzles. These are some of the most enjoyable missions because there's a ton of possible solutions in most cases.

In one case, I used a forklift to build a makeshift staircase for my jumper drone. In another, I remote controlled a car and rammed into into some guards protecting an item. In another, I sent in a bunch of cops and gangsters to create a huge street war, distracting everyone away from the area I needed to access. Watch Dogs 2 is at it's best during these moments.

I decided to continue the Hacker Wars story missions and headed to a restaurant in the southern end of the map. This place is owned and operated by the Sons of Ragnarok, one of the most dangerous gangs in the city. The yard behind the restaurant was huge and filled with dangerous criminals. My objective was to sabotage some of their computers and devices, then make it look like it was done by Prime_Eight! I methodically destroyed and killed everything in my path from the safety of a nearby sidewalk.

Lenni, the head Prime_Eight hacker, was fucking furious with us, since we sabotaged her relations with the Sons of Ragnarok, but she still had the upper hand, since we were still stuck with the ransomware. Marcus had enough of this shit and managed to find the main bunker from which the rival hacker group works from. After destroying their defenses, I went in and hacked their system.

A tricky puzzle in the heart of the Prime_Eight bunker

This was a surprisingly complex hacking mission, with a 5 minute timer limit and all. Lenni had set up an elaborate series of connections throughout the bunker, rigged to some powerful explosives. This was meant as a failsafe against police or other authorities, but the situation called for extreme measures. I scrambled to complete the puzzle, to Lenni's astonishment, then found the way to disable the ransomware from the Prime_Eight computers nearby. 

Watch Dogs 2

Date played: September 24th
Platform: PS4

Last night was all about side quests and collectibles. Honestly, it's kind of all a big blur... I tried focusing on getting research data, to unlock some of the more advanced skills. I'm trying to focus on the gadgetry tree, since dropping IED's and electroshock devices from my drone has proven very useful. I now have a speed boost for the remote controlled devices, as well as larger explosions for my IED's. This means I barely ever do anything on foot anymore. I mostly just use my drones.

I also tried to get myself a new trophy that seemed relatively easy. It asks that I make a jump of 140 meters, so I looked at a guide and it showed only one acceptable location. I went there and used the ninja motorcycle to get the most speed possible, but it didn't work. I tried different bikes, and different ways to use the boost, but I can't hit the 140 meter mark. Some people online are saying the Chopper is best bike for it, so I'll try again with that instead.

During my time exploring last night, I also completed a number of smaller side missions, like some ATM hacks. The best was when I hacked into a guy who distributes child porn as he was having a conversation with a buyer. I fucked with his equipment for a while, then started short-circuiting any hard drive he connected to his computer, destroying his business. Another had me humiliate the CEO of Haum by hacking into his gym and changing the settings on his treadmill to make him fall hilariously and distribute the video on the internet.

At the end of the evening, I decided to finally go meet the hacker from Prime_Eight who has been fucking with us. She installed some ransomware on our systems, and wants to meet with Marcus to discuss a solution. She basically wants us to discredit ourselves, which isn't going to happen. The crazy hacker lady (seen above, getting a UV tatoo on her face...) is gonna have a nice surprise from DedSec. We're going to fuck with Prime_Eight by destroying some of their gear. This crazy lady is dealing with the wrong crew.

Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle

Date played: September 24th
Platform: Switch

I finally found some time to sit down with my daughter and play some video games. She became intensely interested in Kingdom Battle, and so doesn't want me to continue without her being present. This means I can barely play this wonderful game, so I was pumped to sit down and play some more of the 3rd world.

The spooky, Halloween-themed world is full of new challenges in battle. For example, there are now some enemies that can teleport anywhere on the map. This is really tough for a few reasons. First, they are very unpredictable in their movement, meaning that more vulnerable party members (I'm looking at you Luigi...) are easy targets for them. Second, they don't trigger the instant counter attacks of Mario and Luigi, seriously screwing with my usual battle tactics.

These guys are a real challenge!

I gotta give this game credit. Just when I thought I had a good system, it throws in some new enemies that fuck it all up. There's also some Boos that haunt certain maps. When a party member walks too close, the Boos possess them, then transport them to a random location on the map the next turn. Let's just say I positioned my people more defensively in those maps...

We ended up playing through to world 3-4, each battle more challenging than the last. The hardest one had me escort Toadette through a very large arena, with new enemies popping up at every turn. I failed this mission once, because I didn't think of all the angles and left Toadette exposed at one point. The next round, she was surrounded by my party members the entire time, moving as a unit.

The battles are more and more difficult as I progress, and each decision becomes hugely impactful. One wrong move can mean defeat. Visually, the 3rd world is lots of fun to explore. It's filled with spooky stuff. My favorite place was a small farming village, which immediately reminded me of old school Westfall, the iconic starting zone from the early days of World of Warcraft. My daughter enjoyed the decor too, spotting magical floating books and scarecrows in the background.

Metroid Samus Returns

Date played: September 23rd and 24th
Platform: 3DS

It's really difficult to write about games like this. When a game is focused on exploration and combat, there really isn't that much to write about. That's a shame too because I am absolutely in love with Samus Returns, and I'd love to write about it endlessly.

I made my way out of Area 2 and made slight progress in Area 3. The Gamma metroids are the main enemies in this area, and the are a lot of fun to fight. The can fight from air or ground, launching a variety of highly damaging attacks. They require swift dodging and take a long time to kill. However, when I manage to land a melee counter on them, Samus savagely leaps onto the aggressive alien and shoots right through their skulls, dealing lots of damage.

Some of these guys even fight across multiple rooms! They can traverse through special walls, moving the battle from room to room. I loved this! Of course, this wouldn't be a Metroid game if I hadn't picked up some new abilities along the way...

Gamma Metroid are fun to battle against, even if they're ferocious

The first upgrade I got was the Varia suit, which allows me to traverse high temperature areas and reduces damage taken in combat. I also got the wave beam, which is a more powerful version of the main weapon that also traverses walls and enemies. This is a huge advantage in combat, as each shot can potentially hit multiple enemies. Next, I picked up the high jump boots, which allow me to reach higher areas. This makes the game feel way better too, more like Super Metroid. I'm also pretty happy that I found a new energy tank and even an Aeion gauge upgrade during my adventure.

I even got myself a new Aeion ability, and it's a big one. Rapidfire allows Samus to shoot at a very high speed for a short time, consuming the Aeion gauge. It's an expensive ability to use, but it hits like a motherfucking freight train. it also works wonders against small, swarming enemies. Finally, I picked up the grapple beam, a staple of the bounty hunter's arsenal. This allows me to grapple and swing on specific types of blocks. It also allows me to destroy certain barriers.

I just can't wit to see what Area 3 holds. So far, it's been dangerous, hostile, scary and filled with things that want to kill me. It's also quite large, and requires that I hunt down 8 metroids to progress. I fucking love Samus Returns, it's incredible. 

Watch Dogs 2

Date played: September 23rd
Platform: PS4

I completed one short side mission where I hacked a woman's bank account. The only real progress I made story-wise, was to identify the woman who has managed to hack into DedSec. She's from Prime Eight, and while completely annoying, is highly skilled also, and is helping the bad guy fuck with us, essentially. She even hacked Marcus' phone to have a pixelized cat show up on screen at random times. I have a mission to track her down now.

This Prime Eight hacker is fucking with us...

The rest of my time with the game yesterday was just fucking around. I mostly went after collectibles in Marin county, including research points, research data, paint jobs, clothing and even a unique sports car. I also played a sailboat race, which was pretty interesting.

I first had to buy a sailboat, and since I have tons of money, I went with the most expensive, most performing one available. The race I chose was around the world famous Alcatraz island, home to a derelict prison, turned into a tourist attraction. The sailboats don't have engines, obviously, so wind is the only way to propel the vessels forward. There's a wind indicator on the minimap, and you basically just have to line up your boat accordingly, while sailing around buoys. I did all right for my first race, but fucked up when the wind was just not going my way. I placed 3rd, but I know I will do much better next time.

NHL 18

Date played: September 22nd
Platform: PS4

I spent the evening at one of my brother's houses and he had just bought NHL 18. I've always loved these games, going back all the way to NHL '95, but I haven't played it in a few years. I think the last one I played seriously was NHL 14. Still, the basic controls and concepts haven't changed too much, so I was able to pick it up rather quickly.

Now, I have a shameful problem with the modern NHL games. I shoot like a fucking blind person. Seriously, I don't know what it is, but I often have trouble aiming my shots. Maybe I just don't understand the aiming system well enough... Either way, this means that I'm usually a great defensive player, and that I set up some good plays, but that I rarely stick the puck in the back of the net.

This was true against and with my brother. We played one match against each other, replicating last year's Stanley Cup final game between the Nashville Predators and the Pittsburgh Penguins. I had the Pens, and it was a really close game. It went to 4 overtime periods before my brother won the game 3-2.

We then played online, as a team, against other players. We held our own, fighting hard, but ultimately, we lost both matches we played, one as the Montreal Canadiens, the other as the Ottawa Senators. I had a lot of fun playing with my brother, but if I gonna play this again, I have to figure out a better way to aim my shots.

Watch Dogs 2

Date played: September 21st
Platform: PS4

DedSec ran into some real trouble... It seems that our follower numbers were inflated by bots. This is devastating to DedSec, as it destroys their credibility. The source of the fake fans was a social media service called Invite, so of course, Marcus heads to their headquarters to hack into their systems and learn about the situation and hopefully, stop it.

After some sneaking around and some drone scouting, I made my way deep into the building and was about to complete the mission when I was interrupted by the ponytail guy who has been showing up. He was also the man who bumped into me at the party on the beach in the first moments of the game. Turns out, this guy is the head of Blume's ctOS team, and he's really just been playing with us.

In an instant, he plugged our backdoor access to ctOS and has red flagged Marcus in the system, making him a wanted criminal instantly. I had to escape the building and flee from a level 4 wanted level. This meant heavily armed police and helicopters... I made a run for it, but took a wrong turn inside the building. I almost died, but managed to reach a back door and escape to the streets. I called in a car with my phone and drove away as quickly as I could. I almost escaped by hiding in a tunnel, but my car got stuck.

I went for a nearby parked truck, but was seen by the cops and had to run away again. This time, I drove a good distance to lose the cars, then hid underneath an overpass to hide. This worked, but it was a little too close.

These events left DedSec and it's members devastated. It seems Marcus is the only one that still believes in the group, due to all the negative backlash from the internet and fellow hackers. Marcus won't give up though. Seeing that his friends need a morale boost

This brings us to the weirdest segment in the game yet, a hacking party in the desert. Everyone had festival outfits, with Wrench's leather strap outfit stealing the show. I explored the festival a little bit. There was a "bad poetry" exhibition, with audio of really bad poems scattered among neon plastic models. It was weird, but funny. Marcus convinces everyone to join the festival's competition as DedSec, even though everyone really things we're done with that name.

The Jabberwock is SOLVED!

The competition was super cool. I had to solve a hacking puzzle to activate the Jabberwock, a giant dragon structure. When I succeeded, I was rewarded with some hardcore flame-throwing from the structure, but more importantly, DedSec was still alive, at least in our minds. We met a mysterious man at the party, who offered us some drugs. High as a kite, the group parties all night.

Marcus quickly realized that the drug man was not just a crazy drug man. In fact, he's a world famous hacker named Ray (I think he made an appearance in the first game...), and he wants to join DedSec to help us rebuild and fight against Blume and the other corporate conglomerates that abuse people's data.

Back at headquarters, the group reluctantly accepts Ray into their ranks. He has great ideas, starting with a way for us to get back in the game. Horatio works for Nudle, the Google equivalent. We devise a plan to infiltrate Nudle and plant a backdoor access in their server farm. This is no easy task, except that Nudle bus drivers aren't really monitored very closely. We had a way in.

Marcus and Horatio stole a Nudle bus, then just drove it inside the Nudle campus, never raising any questions. The campus is fucking amazing... Ubisoft has done a wonderful job of making the place feel like the Google campus. I mean, the server room even had all the multicolored piping that was so famous on the internet a while back. We have access to the Nudle servers now, which will help us fight against Blume.

Metroid Samus Returns

Date played: September 20th
Platform: 3DS

I need to sit down and play this game some more, because it's simply wonderful. While I didn't play for very long, I still managed a bit of progress. I beat one Metroid, relatively easily. I was rewarded with a new Aieon ability, Lightning Armor.

This thing is very useful, and very powerful. It's basically a shield that can be activated at any time. It absorbs damage by draining the Aieon gauge. This allows Samus to traverse to new areas that are covered by damaging thorns. It's also great in combat when the energy bar is getting low. Finally, it also improves the counter-attack somehow. The description isn't too clear, but it feels like it has slightly more range and that the stun lasts a little longer.

Later, in a small room, I shot a piece of rock on a statue that turned into a rolling monster of death. This motherfucker was way harder than the Metroids for me, mostly because of it's unpredictable jumping patterns. I died a lot here, but ended up killing the beast with a ridiculous flurry of missiles and a bit of luck. I was rewarded with the boring, but useful spring ball. This allows Samus to jump while in morph ball mode. I love this game.

Watch Dogs 2

Date played: September 20th
Platform: PS4

San Francisco still holds many secrets, but aside from a couple of research points and research data, I focused more on the main missions and side missions last night. I started with a drone race, an activity I hadn't tried yet, but didn't do too well. The racing circuit was really cool, but clearly, my drone was too slow. There's a skill I'm missing, so I'll try again once I have it.

Next, I completed the last few graffiti tag missions. The last one was crazy, as I had to tag four different areas of the world famous Golden Gate Bridge! That thing is gigantic... The puzzles were relatively simple, but the view was absolutely incredible. After the last tag, I couldn't resist the urge to throw myself off and die in a glorious splatter, hundreds of meters below.

What a view!

I then decided to get back to the main missions. Good thing I did too, as I'm getting tutorials about things I've been doing for hours now... I first focused on the Haum story, a tech giant who is selling advanced gadgets to consumers. These gadgets gather a ton of data on people, which is then sold to other companies, including insurance and credit companies. As you can imagine, that can be devastating to people's lives. What's scary is that it doesn't seem very far from the truth...

The missions had me do a variety of activities, though most of them were easy to complete with my drones. I think it's because these were supposed to be really early missions, but I've done a lot of stuff already and have good equipment and skills. In the end, we hacked into a televised interview by the president of Haum, destroying some of their credibility. There's another guy that keeps showing up, ordering powerful people around, but there's not much info on him yet. The other story was focused on New Dawn, a large criminal organization hidden behind a zealous religious group. The missions here were a bit more involved.

By far, my favorite moment was in one of the missions, where I had to recover a truck from a restricted area. I sat, far away, in the safety of my luxury car and sent out my drone. I took out a number of guards by making shit explode, as you do in Watch Dogs. I sent in a couple of gang members. I wrecked the fucking place. Then the cherry on top. I remote controlled the truck I had to steal past the gates, right into the safety of the street. I then just drove over there and picked up my target, passing the mission without ever being close to the objective. It's fantastic really. 

Watch Dogs 2

Date played: September 18th
Platform: PS4

Yesterday was all about exploring Oakland, to the east of San Francisco. It's definitely a rougher area. There's gang members everywhere, and they pull out their guns at the slightest offense, so it's more dangerous than what I have been dealing with in SF. I fast travelled to the southern end of Oakland, which is right next to a large restricted area filled with security guards. I had attempted to clear this area before, but got fucked up by the cops.

This time, I was more methodical and let the enemies fight my gang members, and eventually the cops. I stayed at a good distance and just waited for them to all kill each other, then I went in and collected all the loot.

I also spent some time shopping for cars, since I had a good amount of money, and have been satisfied with my pistol and shotgun, so I haven't had to spend on guns. I bought a couple of standard looking cars, since they were so cheap. I also wanted to buy a new performance car, and ended up with an old school Porsche lookalike. The car is pretty and it's fast, but it's also kind of a wild one. It's rear wheels often spin out, but it's been really easy to control the power sliding, so I like the car a lot.

I completed a number of side missions, mostly focusing on graffiti tagging and Driver: SF missions.The graffiti tagging is actually a lot of fun, since they are really just big navigational puzzles. Each is very different, and each requires a different approach. Some of the harder ones also take a long time to complete.

I typically start these missions with a bit of scouting with my quadcopter. I survey the area and look for opportunities to climb up. I've even gone as far as trying to lift vehicles with small forklifts to reach higher ground, but that doesn't work. Usually, there's a trick to it. For example, in one case, I had to drive off the highway and jump onto the roof a building, then drive into a jump to reach a second building. I spent a lot of time trying to reach that spot, but I hadn't spotted the jump. Another had me use a series of window-washing cranes, and another had me use a giant construction crane. These missions were all a ton of fun to me.

This graffiti tag mission's solution was really clever

I continued picking up research points, research data, clothing, paint jobs and money bags as I explored, fighting a few gangsters along the way. I often call my big truck from the phone app to create a climbing path for myself, which works more often than you would think.

One of the main missions was nearby, so I went to meet Wrench to hear what he had to propose. There's this company called Haum, and they manufacture a product similar to Amazon's Echo, or Google's Home devices. Haum claims that their device is 100% safe and unhackable, even calling out DeadSec by name. Of course, the guys took that as a challenge, so I'm gathering info on them now.

Another main mission had me meet with Sitara to help her protest at the Church of the New Dawn, or something like that. This church is apparently more like a cult than anything else, and DeadSec doesn't like it when people get fucked with, so we decided to fuck with them. During the protest, I had to infiltrate the church building and find some info on one of it's leaders by hacking a computer.

The place was very well guarded, with guards at every corner. I methodically eliminated them from outside the building, taking advantage of my Jumper RC, Quadcopter and even my "on call" gangsters. The place was almost cleared when I entered, then I just knocked out the remaining guards. I almost got caught, but I quickly distracted a guard with a hack to save the day. I got the info on the guy and am ready for the second leg of the mission!

Metroid Samus Returns

Date played: September 16th
Platform: 3DS

Samus Aran is back, and she's amazing.

After the events of the first game, a few remaining Metroids are found on their originating planet, SR388. Samus Aran is dispatched to exterminate them and eliminate the threat, for good.

Metroid Samus Returns is a re-imagining of Metroid II: Return of Samus, on the original Game Boy. I have to admit, I've never played that one, so I don't have a point of reference. But one thing is for sure, Samus Returns is an fantastic game in every way. Even on the aging 3DS hardware, it manages to look great, taking great advantage of the 3D display and dual screen setup. The graphics look great, which surprised me! The beautiful music also stood out right away. I heard tones from other games, though I can't quite say which exactly...

After the brief animated intro, the game begins in earnest. I have to kill 40 Metroids. That's it. That's the objective of the game. I love that.

I'm quite early in this 2D, classic Metroid game, but I'm loving it already. There's a great map, tons of hidden secrets, a slew of new abilities to discover and an army of new enemies to battle. Samus is well-equipped so far. I've got the charge shot, freeze shot, morph ball, morph ball bombs, spiderball and of course, the good old missiles. She also has the ability to free-aim, which adds a lot of flexibility to combat and makes the game feel modern. She can even scan the environment to see hidden blocks for a limited time, and fill out the map in a small radius.

However, the biggest addition to the famous bounty hunter's arsenal is undeniably the melee counter. Inspired by Metroid: Other M (it's ok, that was one of the good parts of that game!), it allows Samus to counter most attacks, then follow it up with a beam shot. It's relatively easy to pull off, but requires concentration against some enemies.

I made it through two main areas, though of course they still hide many secrets. Progress between areas is gated by a large statue. It can be crossed by giving it a special item, which is only found by killing Metroids. To reach the third area, I've had to kill 5 of them, each of them slightly different. The idea is the same in every fight, where the creature will attack with sweeping motions, floating in the air. These attacks can be countered, unless the beast has it's electric shield up. It can also float above Samus, dropping bombs that can be shot to replenish health and supplies.

One battle in particular was very difficult for me, as it took place in a room where parts of the floor were covered in damaging thorns. This meant little to no room for error during battle. Maybe I could I have been more efficient with it? Maybe it would have been easier if I had picked up the freeze beam first, but I didn't. Either way, it was the only battle that killed me, and it killed me about 10 times.

Finally killing the Metroid was fucking glorious. I'm going to kill them all. Every last one.  

F1 2017

Date played: September 16th
Platform: PS4

I felt like driving fast cars yesterday afternoon, so I played a bit of F1 2017. Having recently completed my first Grand Prix, in Australia, I was headed to the second race of the season, China. Before that though, I got an invite to a special event, where I got to drive a classic Williams car, from the late 90's. I had to use it to pass a number of other, older cars within the allotted time limit. The event was easy, but driving an older car was a great way to contrast how much these things have progressed in the last 20 years.

I drive the 1996 Williams FW18 against the older, 1988 McLaren MP4/4

In China, I managed to complete all 5 practice programs with a perfect score. China is a really fun circuit... It's got the longest straight in the entire F1 calendar, and it's got a couple of very big, sweeping turns that require speed and good throttle and brake control. Thanks to the game's fantastic training programs, it wasn't too long before I knew every corner of the track and felt ready to set a qualifying time.

I went through Q1 and Q2 without too many problems, sitting around 3rd to 5th with my lap times. However, it's in Q3 that I surprised myself with a really good fucking lap. It was maybe a little too good for my difficulty level because I got the pole position with it, which is highly unlikely for a Force India... I may have to bump up the difficulty a little bit. Still, I was really happy to get my first pole position, and I'm confident that I'll do well in this race. The circuit if favorable to my speed-focused Force India, which makes up for my car's mediocre aerodynamics and chassis.

I can't wait compete in the race!

Watch Dogs 2

Date played: September 15th
Platform: PS4

I just can't get enough of this game right now! Watch Dogs 2 has a way of keeping my attention. A lot of that has to do with the huge variety of activities that are available at any time. I've lost myself in Driver SF challenges, thanks to my decision to buy a proper sports car from a dealership. The car is reminiscent of a modern Corvette, and it's very, very fast. It's also surprisingly easy to control compared to some of the lighter cars in this class.

Of course, as I drive around to get from mission to mission, I end up getting distracted by 14 different things in 8 different directions. That's been really fun... I picked up a number of research points, new skills to unlock, paint jobs, clothing and cash. All of these usually come with a puzzle, a combat encounter, a hack, a platforming challenge or any combination of these. It's been captivating for me.

I guess yesterday, I was feeling like driving missions, because the only real mission I did was all about eKart racing. These little electric karts are solar-powered, and they handle pretty damn well. They're enjoyable to drive too. I had to complete a race, then find a battery in an industrial park. The improved battery allowed me to take on a more difficult race. I then had to go to Nudle's offices in Silicon Valley to find a micro-chip that would improve the kart's speed. I won the championship, got some new fans and can now call the kart from the phone app. This also unlocked some more kart races, all of which I completed with a 1st place!

eKart races were a lot of fun!

All these things were cool, but they couldn't compare to the 3 minutes where I completed an online hacking challenge. This mode returns from the first game, with a few improvements. The idea here is to get close to an enemy player, hack them, then stay in the vicinity for approximately 2 minutes without being spotted. The enemy player doesn't get to see a name tag above me, so I have the advantage. The radius is relatively small, so depending on the area, this can be pretty easy or really hard.

In this case, I chose to change cars to have a more innocuous appearance, hopping into a bland, old school Beetle. I approached the enemy slowly, following traffic rules and trying to blend in as an AI driver. I started the hack and continued to drive in a way that mimics the AI as best I could, while doing a U-turn when the guy had his back turned.

He was definitely looking for me, shooting at random people on the street, hoping to hit me. At one point, he even shot at my car, but when I didn't react, he turned his attention elsewhere. Towards the end, his shootings attracted the police, who managed to kill him. I changed cars when he died, and had enough time to complete the hack as he respawned. Watch it below!

There's something to be said about Ubisoft managing to make virtual hide and seek a fun game mode... 

The Walking Dead: Michonne

Date played: September 13th
Platform: PS4

I finished The Walking Dead: Michonne!

I abandoned this game back in November last year and I'm not really sure why. I guess other games kept my attention... Last night, I decided it was time to play the 3rd and final episode. At the end of episode 2, Michonne, Pete, Paige, Sam, Alex and James were in the house. They have taken Randall (the bad guy I guess) hostage. Sam, Alex and James have just lost their father to the walkers, so the atmosphere is already pretty fucking bad, but it got worse real quick.

The children bury their father

We got a radio call from Norma, Randall's sister. She says that she has our friends from the boat in the beginning of the game, and that she will trade them for Randall. Much of the episode was about preparing for the meeting and hostage exchange, while also dealing with the father's death.

The best parts of these games are the conversations, and the decisions that go with them. The action scenes are fun to watch, but the real fun is in trying to talk my way out of bad situations. For example, Paige and Sam disagreed on how to handle the Norma situation. Paige wanted to run for it, while Sam wanted to fight. I convinced Paige to stay, while convincing Sam that we were trying to negotiate, not fight.

Later, I handed out ammo and weapons to everyone, getting them ready to fight if required. Since the beginning of the game, Michonne has been having visions, hallucinations and hearing voices all related to her two children, who both died during the first days of the walker problem. One of these hallucinations led her to Alex's room, the youngest child in the family, who must be around 5 years old. Poor kid doesn't even know his father's dead yet...

I sat with him, since he looked worried. The conversation was difficult, but I decided to tell him, as gently as possible, that his father was dead. Then I hugged him, and gave him time to grieve. This scene was really difficult for me, probably because I saw my daughter in the kid... Yes, I cried.

At dawn, Norma arrived with her crew and our hostage friends. We spoke a little bit, and quite honestly, I genuinely felt that Norma just wanted her brother back, and that we would be able to have a real discussion and negotiation. It went relatively well for a while. We were making progress...

Then Norma's crew decided that they didn't like how their leader was handling the situation, seeing that she intended to just trade the hostages. The crew wanted fucking vengeance... One of the guys shot one of the hostages, then things went badly really quickly. We gave Randall back, and they gave the remaining two hostages back.

Shit went from bad to worse, because as soon as Randall was freed, he attacked Michonne, who killed him with a pistol shot to the neck. The firefight broke out, and of course, this attracted some walkers... At one point, Norma was grabbed by some walkers, and I was given the choice to let her turn into into a walker or to shoot her in the head. I chose mercy and shot her in the head...

We retreated to the house as the remaining crew members attacked, flanked by walkers. The bad men threw some molotov cocktails in the house to burn it down. I rushed to the second floor to save the two young boys. Unfortunately, this was way too close to Michonne's loss of her two girls, so she went into full on hallucination. I had to choose to leave my girls or stay with them, so of course I left, but it was clearly a very emotional moment for the heroine.

In the end, most of our team was alive, and we managed to escape the walkers and Norma's crew. We went back to the boat and sailed off into the sunset. I enjoyed the story, but this was very clearly a side project for Telltale. It was very short, and not as good as the main series, but still worth playing.

Watch Dogs 2

Date played: September 12th
Platform: PS4

Watch Dogs 2 has really grabbed my attention and interest... I haven't continued any main story missions, instead spending my time on exploring, side missions and other activities like races and such.

One of the most interesting side missions surprised me. It seems that Aiden "the Fox" Pierce, the hero from the first game, is visiting San Francisco, and has been captured by some gangsters. Marcus had to help him out of course, so I went to the location and hacked into a camera in Aiden's cell. I distracted a guard that was walking nearby, which gave Pierce enough time to grab him, then escape. I was rewarded with Aiden's iconic, yet hated, clothing.

I decided to visit a little island sitting below the bridge between San Francisco and Oakland, since I had a side mission there to hack a tower. At one point, I had to go on a Grand Theft Auto inspired rampage. As anyone who's played a GTA game will tell you, just fucking around and causing mayhem is one of the most enjoyable aspects of these types of games, and Watch Dogs 2 has a set of unique techniques that add some fun to this.

"Inspired by Grand Theft Auto"

So as I was trying to ruin a girl's selfie (she had a selfie stick, I had to mess with her), when I noticed some cops arresting a young woman. I decided this was a good time to mess with the cops, so I used one of my favorite techniques, and called in some gangsters to attack the cops. I took out my trusty quadcopter and hacked the cops when the gangsters attacked to give my guys an edge. Combine that with a few vehicle hacks and it was a perfect storm of destruction, with Marcus watching safely from a distance. It's fucking great, and lots of fun to do on it's own.

There's a lot of collectibles hidden in restricted areas, which are usually guarded by gang members or security guards. I have a lot of fun trying to just get rid of enemies from a distance, using my skills and gadgets to infiltrate the areas. Each is like it's own little battle arena, which reminded me of how the recent Batman games are structured.

During my exploration, I stumbled upon a unique vehicle, a large radioactive waste disposal truck. It's got a great look, but more importantly, I can now call it with the car app. When collecting items, it's often useful to have a large vehicle to climb onto, so this truck will come in handy. It's also a very durable vehicle, so I suspect it could be useful later in missions where I will be chased by tougher enemies.

I upgraded some of my skills with the research points I've collected and earned. The skills are pretty expensive, so making choices can be really difficult. I settled on upgrading my gangsters and unlocking the Massive Vehicle Hack skill. This thing is fucking crazy, since it hacks all cars around Marcus for 10 seconds. This is useful for clearing a path on a busy street, or creating general mayhem when needed.

I then decided to try a few races, starting with a dirt bike event. I fucked up a couple times, but this one wasn't too hard, I just had to be careful not to go too fast, as it's easy to overshoot landings from jumps sometimes. The next race was a different story though, since it was an ATV instead of a motorcycle. This fucking piece of shit vehicle handles like complete garbage. At first, it didn't seem too bad, but the slightest thing will make the ATV lose traction and spin out easily. It took me many attempts to get the gold medal here. This was probably the worst part of the whole game for me so far.

Later, I decided to explore the West end of Marin, since I had a nearby Scout X picture to take. The remote area led to a large lighthouse, with a few collectibles scattered around. My next mission was back in San Francisco, so I had to cross the Golden Gate Bridge. I figured I could try out a little boat ride for the first time instead. I jumped down from the lighthouse and stole a nearby fishing boat. I then drove it across the water, heading for the next side mission.

I loved this mission! I had to find the source of a 52 Hz audio signal being broadcast nearby. This is the same signal as the lonely whale, a real life whale who sings at a different frequency than all other whales. The mission was more of a hacking puzzle, and these are some of my favorite gameplay moments in the game. I had to use my drone to fly around and connect all the wires together using intersections that rotate. It's hard to explain, but it's a really cool method.

To end my night, I decided to assault a huge restricted area, filled with heavily armored guards with big, dangerous weapons. I was doing ok, killing or tranquilizing enemies methodically. However, at one point, the cops showed up and unfortunately, saw me. I got into a huge battle against both the cops and the guards, but it was a battle I was meant to lose... I got overwhelmed when the police helicopter showed up and died. Watch Dogs 2 is way better than I was expecting.

Overwatch

Date played: September 24th
Platform: PS4

Today's play of the night is a perfect example of how essential having a healer is. I jumped into this losing match, already in overtime with the other team controlling the point on one of the Lijiang Tower maps. Of course, there was no healer, so I picked Mercy, fully expecting the round to end before I could do anything. I was wrong.

Our Symmetra held the point long enough for me to get there just after she died, then I helped McCree survive a Reaper attack. This gave us enough breathing room to finally retake the point, against all odds. I keep him alive as he kills anyone who jumped on point, but get shot by Widow from above. The fighting was far from over though. I saved Orisa from death at the last instant, which was enough for us to establish a strong hold on the objective, and won the round. We even won the match in the end... I think I'm a pretty good Mercy sometimes!

Watch Dogs 2

Date played: September 10th
Platform: PS4

I played a TON of Watch Dogs 2 this weekend!

There's kind of too much to describe here. Most of my time is spent just wandering the world, looking for stuff to do. This game is really good about that. There's always something to do just around the corner, and everything is a little puzzle or a little enemy encounter.

Money bags, exclusive clothing items, missions leads, paint jobs and even cars are hidden all over the place, protected by obstacles. This could mean a crazy trek with the Jumper drone, a platforming challenge, a combat encounter, a hacking challenge, a billboard to paint, a Scout X pic to take, a closed circuit to reconnect, etc. There's really lots of variety here and usually, there are many ways to solve a problem. This makes it so easy to just get lost in the world. The great radio and music just make it even easier.

The side missions are all really interesting. For example, one of Sitara's cousins has a bit of a live streaming addiction, so I had to hack into her network and fuck with her a little bit, so that she loses the taste for streaming. Another mission had me look for mysterious public payphones that ring on their own. I have been enjoying the Driver: SF missions too. Some objectives are just to get to a place on time, but others ask that I visit landmarks, take big jumps, or in one case, I even raced against a speedboat on the beach!

I'm racing against that boat in the background!

Still, I got some stuff done in the main story, but not much. One of the bigger story threads so far has been the Cyberdriver movie, which features an autonomous car similar to K.I.T.T. from Knight Rider. Our latest stunt is to steal the car and modify it so it actually becomes autonomous, as opposed to being just a movie prop. This meant stealing the car from the lot and getting away with it, so it was a fun car chase.

After we had the car in our possession, we started making some heavy modifications to it, including a boost button and more importantly, the ability to driven remotely. Sitara also went nuts with the paintjob, making the car a great spokesperson for Deadsec. The next mission was a lot of fun, since I had to show off our new car to the press by going on a wild car chase through the city. People were shocked when they noticed the car had no driver. At first, press thought it was a publicity stunt for the movie, but when they saw the paint job, it became clear that this was not a planned event. This was good publicity for Deadsec, earning us a bunch of new fans, but it also attracted the attention of a mysterious man. More to come on that later I guess.

I'm loving Watch Dogs 2!

Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle

Date played: September 10th
Platform: Switch

Well, my daughter didn't really have a lot of free time this weekend, so I only got to play a little bit of Rabbids Kingdom. Instead of going through the new levels, I decided to go back to the first world and take on some challenges, now that my team is much stronger. This was a good decision... While most of the challenges are more of a puzzle than anything, having decent firepower still makes it a lot easier.

Challenge levels are really difficult, but satisfying to solve

I played about a dozen challenge levels, including a few from the second world, and explored the world map with my newest exploration abilities. The challenges can be really tricky... In one map, I had to lure an ice stomper enemy from a distance, then position Mario between the lured enemy and another one, then end the turn. On their turn, the closest enemy would attack Mario, which bumped him back to the next enemy, which would bump Mario again, to the objective. It's hard to explain I guess, but it was really fucking clever.

Another challenge was all about using team jump to reach a location. Another was about clearing a path for Toad to escape. They kind of all revolve around a specific solution, usually solved within 1-3 turns. It's pretty cool, and it rewards me with cash and research points, so it's worth the trouble too. I think I've had enough of the challenges for now though, so hopefully, I can play world 3 next weekend!

Final Fantasy VII

Yuffie has joined my team!

Date played: September 10th
Platform: PS4

I had a few minutes to kill, so I played a bit of FFVII, though I really didn't get much done. Most of my time was spent walking through the world map and completing random battles, just outside of Fort Condor.

I knew this was a good time to recruit Yuffie, who I remembered had to be found in a forest, so I wandered the nearby forests until I got into a fight Yuffie. I beat her, then had to answer a series of questions accurately for her to join our party. Yuffie joined and replaced Red XIII in my current lineup. Yuffie is a peppy teenage ninja girl from a far away land. She uses a cool ranged weapon that looks like a giant shuriken, and she hits pretty hard.

With my newest party member in tow, I went to the next town, where Sephiroth was seen. Junon used to be a fishing town, but since Shinra has established itself there, the pollution from their reactors has killed any fishing business that was left. It's now more of an industrial village, dominated by an absolutely giant Shinra cannon at it's peak. The best way to get info on Sephiroth is to infiltrate the soldiers stationed in Junon.

I had to dress up in soldier gear and practice a parade with my fellow warriors. It was a bad mini-game, but it was a pretty funny situation...

Watch Dogs 2

Date played: September 8th
Platform: PS4

There's soooo much to do in Watch Dogs 2!

I spent much of my time just roaming around and exploring. I'm collecting new songs with the Shazam equivalent, I'm collecting research points to upgrade my skills, I'm taking Scout X pictures to gain some followers, I'm gathering intel for side operations and I'm just having a great time.

The side missions are particularly interesting, since they are little stories of their own with interesting characters. For example, one basement-dwelling, dubstep-loving amateur hacker has been taking DeadSec's name to do bad things. We found his location, then I went to pay him a little visit. I hacked into his computer's webcam, then hacked his phone to call 911, then made a nearby electronics device explode. The kid was on his headphones, playing a video game, so he heard none of this. The cops were sent when the 911 operator mistakenly interpreted the blown device as a gun shot. It was glorious, well written and well animated.

I've got a bunch of new skills and gear too. The biggest addition to my arsenal is the quadcopter, a flying drone equipped with a camera. It's been great for recon and hacking. In my skill tree, I spent some points on a special skill called "Mass communication disruption", which basically kills every cell phone in a wide radius. This has been helpful in stopping 911 calls and distracting people. I've also got a little electric grenade thing that has been really cool during combat encounters.

Quadcopter!

There's a ton of this little stuff in the game, and it really makes it feel like a real place. I also completed my first Driver: SF mission, which is basically just a bunch of taxi missions. Still, it's a nice little addition. It's also pretty cute that they called this Driver: SF, probably a direct reference to Driver San Francisco. This is a 2011 Ubisoft game about driving in San Francisco, which I played and loved when it came out.

Finally, I also played one of the game's numerous race events, a downtown time trial on a dirt bike. I got the gold medal for it, along with some followers and cash, but it was kind of tight, considering this was the easiest race. I'm thinking I might need a skill from the skill tree for the harder ones. This skill is basically a speed boost when driving, but it drains my botnet hacking energy.

I've also had a few online encounters. Watch Dogs 2 is one of those games that has seamless multiplayer, so often there are players that join my game. I haven't done any of the online missions yet, but I've fucked around with a couple of guys who joined me, taking car rides and stuff. The online stuff in the first game was pretty fun, so maybe I'll mess around with it later. 

Watch Dogs 2

Date played: September 7th
Platform: PS4

I jumped back into Watch Dogs, but honestly, I ended up fucking around more than doing any real missions for most of my time. I decided that Scout X would be a good place to start. Scout X is an application on Marcus' phone that tracks landmarks and gives me followers for publishing photos of them.

Honestly, the photo app is lots of fun to use more fleshed out that you would expect. I set up waypoints for the scouting locations, then had fun taking selfies with my new, slick clothing, fun filters and expressive faces. It was a good way to learn my way around downtown, and it was fun to just roam and take pics while some good music on.

Hiding in a car is a great way to escape the cops

Later, I decided to start a mission. In this case, I had to break into a movie studio and steal the script for an upcoming hacker movie called "Cyber-Driver". The idea is that DeadSec will use the script to make fun of the shitty movie, and release a fake trailer to show what hackers can really do. It's fucking stupid, but it makes for a fun mission.

I invested a few research points into some new skills, including a skill that allows me to make cars move in a direction of my choice. This opened up many new ways to approach encounters, and thankfully, the studio lot was chock full of cars to hack! This was the first real mission, and it showed, because there was a lot of bad guys there...

I tried being methodical, hacking junction boxes and other objects in the hopes of taking out as many guys as possible with electrocution. I also sent a few cars straight into the bad guys, killing a few instantly. When I had a good shot, I would use the tranquilizer gun to knock out a guy. I even used my little jumper drone to hack open some doors and stuff. There's really a lot of options to get stuff done in this game, and that's really fun. Eventually, I was seen, but managed to shoot my way out with my pistol, then hide.

With the script in hand, the group of hackers had what they needed to make a mock trailer, and it was pretty great to watch. There's so much to discover in this game, I'm really excited to see more of it!

Overwatch

Date played: September 6th
Platform: PS4

Today's play of the night is a textbook example of how to play well as a team together. Competitive mode is really where I should be spending my time. I'm fucking tired of Quick Play because team composition is complete shit usually. Hanzo and Widow on offense is a very common sight there, and I'm tired of having to pick Roadhog because he's the only tank that survives without a healer. Or healing without a damn tank.

This play is in competitive mode, with people that use microphones (I need to use mine...) and it makes a huge difference. I'll let the action speak for itself.

Watch Dogs 2

Date played: September 5th
Platform: PS4

After months of procrastination, I finally booted up Watch Dogs 2, a game I've been really excited to play, but I was dealing with a bit of open world fatigue after FFXV and Horizon. Now that it's been a little while, it seemed like a good time to start. The first Watch Dogs game was one of the biggest titles in the first year of this console generation. It had been hyped to hell, and was highly anticipated. When the game came out though, reviews and general opinion was pretty negative, but I was really interested in the premise, so I picked it up anyway.

I loved it. While it's true that the characters were shit, particularly the main protagonist, the gameplay was pretty damn solid. Hacking stuff was fun and innovative, and the open world was well made. Watch Dogs 2, so far, has proven to be a huge improvement already.

In the wake of the events at the end of Watch Dogs, where Aiden Pierce managed to take down ctOS in Chicago, Blume corporation doubles down on it's intrusive software and manages to launch version 2.0 in every American city... The data collection is so intense that it is taking over many decision-making processes, like whether to to give life insurance to someone based on their habits. It drives every major corporate decision and honestly, it feels like humans are losing control of their lives to algorithms. That's a really cool concept, and it's explained really well during the intro.

The first mission is a bit of a tutorial. I am given control of Marcus, a hacker also known as Retr0. He is in the process of infiltrating a Blume server farm and hack into a ctOS server in San Francisco. I can already tell that the game's gameplay is slightly different, and definitely improved, at least so far. The usual camera hopping stuff is still in, but hacking devices and people is a bit more involved now, with multiple options being available for each hack. For example, I can hack a door to open it, close it, power it off, attract enemies or even put a proximity trap on it. It's really cool so far.

I stealthily entered the facility, taking out guards with non-lethal melee combat or my single-shot tranquilizer gun. The controls have changed a lot too, and it kind of feels more like Assassin's Creed than anything else at this point. There's "Vault" button that is used for climbing, and it works quite well, but I'm still struggling a bit because in this kind of game, every damn button does something. I completed the mission by accessing the server, deleting his profile from the system and installing a back door application on it, then running away to safety.

This whole operation turned out to be a test or initiation for Marcus to join DeadSec, the hacker group that first took down ctOS in Chicago. They take me to a spot near the Golden Gate bridge to talk about the hack and to get drunk and high. They party for a while, when a jogger bumps into Marcus, knocking his phone down. The jogger picks it up a second, then gives it to Marcus. There was definitely something suspicious here, but we'll see if it amounts to anything.

San Francisco's DeadSec crew (Marcus is on the far left)

Eventually, drunk Marcus throws his phone into the sea. He wakes up in his underwear, sleeping in some half-naked girl's room. One of the DeadSec people calls Marcus on his new cell phone and asks that he come to the group's HQ, in downtown San Francisco.

I fucked around a little bit here, exploring all the options available to me. The in-game cell phone is kind of fantastic, better than even GTA V's. It's got an app store, a Shazam equivalent, a music player, a camera featuring tons of filters and other options, a great map app that looks just like Google Maps, a research app (skill tree) and a mission app. It's even got real time weather and other fun little tidbits. It's a really cool way to build a video game interface, and it works better than you would expect.

I stole a car (this is still an open world, GTA-style game after all), set up a waypoint to the hideout and drove for a while. I was in Marin county, which is north of San Francisco, so I had a good drive waiting for me. This was a good time to test out the music player app. The first game was chock-full of great music (in my opinion anyway) and the sequel seems to be just as good on that front so far. I also played around with hacking while driving, stealing cash from normal citizens.

Unfortunately, I wasn't very safe with my driving and accidentally killed a pedestrian, which brought on police attention. I drove quickly and hid in some bushes near my destination. The cops went away...

DeadSec headquarters is really cool, with each member having a little "office" to work in. The crew is really interesting and fun, though they all seem pretty immature. They all have their specialties and very distinct personalities, I like them a lot so far. I spent a good amount of time in here, exploring the hideout and speaking with everyone. There were many data logs with audio files that gave me a ton of background on everyone.

So that's when the game really starts I guess. I'm the newest member of DeadSec, and my job is to gain "computational power", ie: followers, so that we have enough power to take out ctOS, or at least expose it. It's a fun way to say to the player "Hey, go get points for doing shit, it'll work out in the end". For an open world game, that's kind of perfect really.

I really don't know where to start. There's a TON of different activities and missions available to me already, and the whole map seems to be open. I mean, there's main missions, side missions, activities with other hacker groups, collectibles to find, secrets to hack, selfies to take at landmarks, races, it's all there. I can't wait to just dive in and start exploring the city and doing fun shit. So far, I'm very impressed with the game in general. It's got a good tone, it looks great, the music rocks, the writing is interesting and the characters are miles better than anything in the first game.

The only little thing that bugs me is that there's a surprising amount of draw-in, or pop-ups, when traveling in a vehicle. Considering I have a PS4 Pro, that's pretty disappointing. Still, the game has great graphics. I particularly like the faces and motion-captured animation. Shooting has also been kind of weak, but thankfully, it's far from being a focus, at least so far.

Overwatch

Date played: September 5th
Platform: PS4

Today's play of the night is a great example of the "new" Roadhog, who can now move while healing himself, and takes less damage while healing. My team really struggled to get a foothold on the point, fighting on Lijiang Tower. During this round, I tried Reinhardt, Winston and Zarya, but nothing was working. I switched to Roadhog while the overtime counter was running and went on a destructive rampage, eventually taking the point. We lost the match, but I fought hard to the end.

Overwatch

Date played: September 4th
Platform: PS4

Today's play of the night isn't all that great, but it's pretty funny. As Reinhardt, I try to attack one of the points of the Nepal map. In a fit or Primal Rage during overtime, the enemy Winston goes apeshit and uses his ultimate to push people away from the point. In the chaos, he tossed me right into the point. Winston lunges at me as I begin to charge towards him, but he knocks me outside the point as I'm charging towards him. The charge momentum leads me straight into the back of the enemy Junkrat, who I promptly squish against the wall. I then kill a nearby Tracer who thought the match was over and believe it or not, we take the point! It was a really fun play, and even got Play of the Game with it, though it's not really deserved.

Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle

Date played: September 4th
Platform: Switch

Having met my first Game Over screen last time I played, I decided it was time to do something about it, so I reset all my skill points and re-attributed them. I was pretty systematic here, giving everyone their 3 main skills. Also, more and more enemies are starting to inflict status ailments, such as ink and freeze. That means I decided to give everyone the ability to remove status ailments with a team jump.

Mario now has a focus on movement, jumps and reaction shots. Luigi is heavily focused on reaction shots, with a bit of movement abilities. Peach is focused on dashing and healing. The changes were immediately apparent... I redid the battle that killed me and got through it unscathed, so I think it's safe to say that I made better decisions in the skill tree. This led me to the final battle of the second world.

The boss is a giant Rabbid that carries a refrigerator door as a shield. Luigi was captured by the fridge guy and frozen, so I was short one party member. Thankfully, that's when Peach decided to finally join the battle instead of sitting around in her castle courtyard. Peach is pretty cool as a character, but I don't think I'll keep her in the team. She has a lot of health, and she can heal allies by performing a team jump. She's equipped with a shotgun and a grenade. She also has a reaction shot ability and a protective aura for her team.

This boss was a lot of fun to battle

My biggest problem with Peach is her main weapon. The shotgun, while great with large groups of enemies at close range, is just too short-ranged for my style. Still, I had to use her for the boss battle, along with Mario and Rabbid Peach. The battle itself was really hard... The boss is huge, and cannot be dashed or jumped on. He has a wide area attack that freezes and destroys cover, and has a whopping 500 health. Of course, he's accompanied by some enemies too, so it was really challenging.

I ended up taking potshots at the beast whenever I could, sending out remote tanks and all that to distract it while healing up any damage he managed to inflict. I thought I had him, he was almost dead, then I shot him and celebrated! Too soon... The fucker had two more phases to dump on my ass!

I scrambled to reposition my team and got Princess Peach to tank the boss while I shot it from a distance. The third phase was the worst because the boss was accompanied by some support healers, so I had to kill them first, but they move quickly and the whole time, the boss had his sights on my party. It was tricky, but I managed to kill the boss and free Luigi, then head into the third world.

I didn't actually play any of the levels of the third world, my daughter was just really curious to see what the theme was, and she loved that it was a spooky, Halloween theme. The zombie Rabbids fit in perfectly with the game's silly tone.