Mafia 3

Rating: 7.2

Happy Price: 19.99

Taking place in the turbulent late 60's in New Orleans, Mafia 3 has a lot to offer from a historical and cultural perspective in many different ways. Cars, racism, language, music, weapons, and countless other aspects were nailed perfectly. There is a great sense of authenticity in every aspect of gameplay which is a difficult thing to pull off right. 

Narrative

The strength of this game lies within the story and supporting characters which are incredibly detailed and developed for a video game. You play as the main character, Lincoln Clay, who is an ex Green Beret that conducted covert operations in Vietnam. When betrayed by the Italian Mob, he uses the same tactics in Vietnam to take down the gangsters that flood the streets of New Orleans. The game is portrayed like a documentary, with members of the senate interviewing your CIA correspondent that provides all the tactical data for your missions. It's a great way to show your characters past as a complete story, all the while developing your character in the present moment. It's one of the best narratives I've ever seen in a video game. 

Gameplay

It's a semi realistic open world with cars and guns, if you've ever played Grand Theft Auto or any previous Mafia games, it doesn't deviate much further than that. There isn't anything innovative here, its just stays true to the platform. 

Driving

Controls are tight and the driving physics are very good. Each car has a unique feel to it, and the shitty cars far outweigh the cool and fast ones, creating a nice system of always seeking and wanting the faster cars. Shooting while driving is simplified, as there is an auto targeting system that allows you to switch between what you want to shoot. This switches between the tires of a vehicle, the driver, or the engine, depending on what you're attempting to damage. You can only fire with your secondary weapon, so if you're built for stealth and have a silenced pistol you'll have a tough time shooting while driving. Wielding a .50 caliber revolver however, you can do some serious damage while driving. 

Stealth Combat

The best way to go about any mission is to use stealth, due to mob bosses having the police on their payroll, it's best you don't draw too much attention to yourself. Having the police and mob on you at the same time ensures death, or a loss of time since you'll have to evade the area to get them off your back. That said, enemy placement is designed for strategic stealth combat. It's very easy to lure enemies into your area and do stealth attacks, all the while avoiding others seeing it happen. The stealth attacks are gruesome and satisfying, usually involving multiple stabs to the neck and chest with a military Bowie knife, or quick throat slashes followed by a hug to break the fall. The green beret methods are reinforced and demonstrated. Headshots with a silenced pistol are a guaranteed kill as well, which is a huge plus over games that don't do this. I've never understood why it matters the damage rating of a gun in relation to headshots. Aside from bosses, headshots kill all enemies. There are some James Bond moments where you have to take out multiple enemies to remain detected, and getting three headshots in a row is very satisfying.

Shooting Mechanics

Mafia 3 uses a third person cover based system, and as stated earlier, rewards headshots and silenced weapons greatly. When shit hits the fan, or you anticipate it's going to, you can change up the arsenal to include more powerful weapons like an AK-47 or M-16 assault rifle. These more powerful weapons greatly enhance stopping power and allow for shots to the body to deal much more damage than the stealth based weapons which have very good accuracy. Getting into a shootout is not advised until much later in the game when your character has better weapons and more health. The AI is pretty good and will flank when they can, or will force you out of cover with grenades and other explosives. Many times I've died by being reckless, and one good shotgun blow will take you out. It's essential to be tactical since you're essentially a one man army. 

Progression

Conceptually the system is creative and makes sense with the world, but the execution of this is awful. Essentially your character has three underbosses, each with a specialties. One might be cars and explosives, another might be health related, etc. There are missions you can do to enhance your underbosses operation (which doesn't make a whole lot of sense as the person they kick money up to). The problem is when doing these missions, the game makes you drive across the entire map, get into a firefight, then return whatever you're trying to get back to base. Each of these missions can take 30-45 minutes, and they might not even progress the character right away. These missions increase how much your underbosses' operation revenue, and there are milestones as the revenue goes up. This makes it a very painful process to level up your character. These missions don't pay either, so not only will you not level up in every case, but you also don't get paid. So it becomes a gigantic waste of time.

There comes a point in the game where you're assigning rackets to each of the three underbosses, but then have to assign a district to someone. So this gets strange as well, and doesn't make any sense. For example, if I have region New York that has 2 rackets available. I can take over both rackets, and assign them to person A. But then, when I've done all the missions in region New York, I can assign that to someone. If I assign it to person B, they get all the rackets inside that region, and person A loses them. It's a strange system, and I'm not sure what the purpose behind that is. I guess it gives the player some short term flexibility, but ultimately the person that takes over the region's revenue increase, hence progressing your character.

The currency system offers some nice flexibility, but currency is not consistently rewarded and it's difficult to plan out your personal progression tree. There is no telling when you'll receive a mission that is heist related, or assassination related. Missions that require you to steal large amounts of cash, result in a cash reward which is the lifeblood of staying fully equipped and ready to take on harder missions. When the objective is to eliminate a target, nobody is paying you to do that. You have to search the facility for cash, and it's not guaranteed that there will be a sizable amount. The advantage of the currency system is if you're skilled enough using stealth, you can save up enough money to buy powerful weapons regardless of whom you have running rackets or districts.  

Soundtrack

The soundtrack is amazing, and was the most inspiring part of this game. They've taken hits from the era and tend to sync up songs with storyline missions that bring you inside of Lincoln Clay's emotions. The problem is these works of art were not created by the game developer, but the execution of applying them was done very well. It made driving those long distances doing side mission chores that much better. They also had great voice acting with the radio DJ's that complimented the radio stations. For a sense of the music, check out this playlist.  

Summary

Mafia 3 passes as a decent game, but it had some technical issues as I've had the game crash THREE times during my 30 hour campaign. It's generally unacceptable to have a game crash even one time, but three is terrible. It would leave me frustrated because I essentially lost about 45-60 minutes of my life due to them. The gameplay was ok, the story and characters were fantastic. This is not something you need to play, but if you're looking for a great story pick this up on sale if possible. 

  

Batman: The Telltale Series

Final Rating: 8.3
Happy Price:TTG go on sale a lot, wait until its on sale for $15 or less.

I played a Telltale Game for this first time this year and the first one I tried out was Game of Thrones. After playing the game, I found a whole new gaming genre that fit my interests. I enjoy action based games but sometimes its nice to sit back and enjoy a well written story. After that I tried The Walking Dead (Season 1), The Wolf Among Us, Life is Strange and of course my favorite Tales from the Borderlands. So when I found out that Telltale Games was making a Batman game, I was ecstatic. I found a new game genre that I love, throw in the fact that I'm a bit of D.C. nerd and you have a game thats right up my alley.

Some of you might not even know what Telltale Games are so they're  a small/indie development and publishing company that specialize in graphic adventure video games. The games are usually split up into 5 episodes and each episode is approximately 2 hours long so the entire games usually takes about 10 hours to complete. The gameplay itself is usually simplistic, you have very limited movement when controlling your character and all action sequences are handled by quick time events. The biggest aspect of the gameplay is the very in depth talk paths, you ultimately get to chose everything your character has to say. This may not sound very exciting but these games are driven  by the narrative and by putting you in difficult moral dilemmas. Even if it is just a video game, its never easy choosing  gets to live and and has to die.

That's a quick run through how Telltale Games play and work but how does that translate to this new Batman game? Knowing that Batman doesn't kill so I was very curious, how Telltale was going to deal with this since most moral dilemmas revolve in Telltale games revolve death but with this game that obviously couldn't happen. I think Telltale did a great job with this, you often times have to chose between saving one person or another who (is it whom?) are not necessarily in life or death scenarios but they're certainly in precarious situations. There are also situations where you have to chose between going to an event either as Batman or Bruce Wayne. Both options have their pros and cons so you have to weigh it out and pick what you think is the best option.

Where this game really nails it is, its not necessarily an interpretation of Batman but rather it gives you option for you to chose the type of Batman you want to be. Do you want to send a message to the criminals of Gotham by being absolutely Brutal or do you want to work within the law a little more  and by more merciful when it comes to dealing with the criminals. A cool feature at the end of the game actually rates you between being merciful and brutal. In case anyone is wondering, I ended up with a 92% merciful rating so obviously I chose the law abiding approach.

Although I really enjoyed this game, it does have some issues that need to be addressed. The biggest issue of this game is the fact that it has some serious frame rate issues. In some cut scenes, the frame rate ends up tanking and it can make the gaming experience a little less enjoyable. It bothers me because if a game has frame rate issues in cut scenes that means its poorly optimized. The good news is there have been patches released to fix most of these frame rate issues but if you bought the game in 6 months, you're still likely to run into a few.

My only other complaint with the game is, episodes 4 and 5 just feel shorter than usual. Both of these episodes ended up taking an hour and a half so they feel shorter than the first 3 episodes. It certainly didn't feel like the story was poorly edited and moments were cut out but I can't help but feel like the game could have been an hour longer.

Now that I got the "cons" out of the way, I do want to talk about some of the the "pros" and an important one to talk about is the price. Its not a full priced game. The games cost $25 so although they are shorter and they are also cheaper.

I have watched a lot of animated Batman movies, TV's shows, Live Action Batman Movies and have even played a few Batman video games and I think Telltale did the best job with Bruce Wayne. Instead of the game feeling like another Batman story, its Batman and Bruce Wayne. You play as both equally and they both have very interesting story arcs. In some ways, its almost more fun to play as Bruce Wayne than it is Batman.

Since this is a narrative based video game, the story is obviously the most important aspect of the entire game and Telltale does a great job of it.The game kept me on the edge of my seat for most of it and although I don't want to spoil anything but I do want to mention that they had a very interesting story arc with the Wayne's family history. What also got me very excited about the story is, its not all about the Joker. Nothing against the Joker but it just seems like he's a bit overused and its nice to see some other Batman villains get a chance to be in the spot light.

I do want to give out a friendly warning about the game though. This is not an action based game, there is very little action in it. That may seem like an obvious statement but it seems like some people buy these games without realizing what type of game they are. I always describe these games as interactive movies or TV shows. You have control over dialogue and decisions but you can't go flying off somewhere and just start beating the crap out of anyone you want to. If thats more interesting to you and a game that's revolved around the story doesn't interest you as much, I would recommend to go out and play the Arkham Knight series.

But enough about me and my opinions, I want to hear from you guys, what did you think? Don’t just hit the like button (you can if you want to) but tell me why right or wrong.

Uncharted 4 vs Rise of the Tomb Raider

I've wanted to talk about do a side by side comparison of Uncharted 4 and Rise of The Tomb Raider for a little while now but I wanted to wait until I had some time to sit on both games and really think about them. I have broken the games down into 15 categories which I will be comparing the two games and finding a winner for each category at the end, I will add up the scores and find out who the winner is.

With that being said, major spoiler alert to the following games...Uncharted 4 and Rise of the Tomb Raider.

1). Protagonist

Uncharted 4: Nathan Drake is arguably one of the most likable video games characters ever created. First and foremost, he's a badass. He takes on thousands of enemies and mows them down like nothing. He's a treasure hunter, incredibly intelligent and most importantly, a witty smart ass. Some companies create characters who are trying to be cool, he's not trying...he just is.

Rise of the Tomb Raider: Lara Croft is the best representation of a female character that I have ever seen. She is not overly sexualized with monstrous breasts and at the same time is stunningly beautiful. But it’s not just about her looks, she's tough, mentally strong and very motivated. She doesn't back down from a fight and will always come out on top. She's the type of woman that little girls should look up to. With that being said, my one gripe is that she takes herself very seriously. I would like to see her lighten up a little bit.

Winner: Uncharted: I'm sorry, this is a tough choice. I like Lara as a character but Nate has this wittiness and banter that make him such an enjoyable character.

2). Shooting Mechanics

Uncharted 4: The shooting in Uncharted is not great, it’s serviceable but at average at best. It’s the one thing that I’ve always hated about the Uncharted series. Also it always annoyed me when I finally find a gun that I like but then the next chapter starts and the gun is gone.

Rise of the Tomb Raider: I don't like the guns in Tomb Raider either, I think the guns in Tomb Raider might be worse than the ones in Uncharted. With that being said, using the bow and arrow in Tomb Raider is extremely satisfying. When you get that head shot using a bow and arrow, it feels like you're on top of the world. The game also has a simple RPG game mechanic of experience and leveling up. Its very basic but it’s nice to get experience for kills, it just gives the kills more meaning.

Winner: Tomb Raider by a long slide.

3). Combat/Stealth

Uncharted 4: Uncharted has very basic combat and combo system. It’s just Square, Square, Square (or maybe Square, Triangle, Square) but the combat animations have been improved and they do look a lot better. For Stealth, the game does add some stealth features where you can actually tag AI. The stealth is still really basic but does work well. 

Rise of the Tomb Raider: The combat in Tomb Raider is primarily revolved around her axe, she stabs people with that and it just feels gruesome. The stealth works really well and I have no doubts that some people can beat entire levels by stealthily sneaking around.

Winner: Tomb Raider, Each level feels like it’s designed to give you multiple options and allow the player creative freedom to play the way they want to play.

4). Platforming

Uncharted 4: The platforming in the game is extremely refined. I didn't find myself dying too often while climbing, jumping or traversing which is always nice. As well as the platforming works there is too much of it. By the end of the game, you are completely sick of it.

Rise of the Tomb Raider: Unfortunately its not quite as refined as Uncharted, there were a couple instances where I died and it felt like it was the games fault. The one big bonus I really liked about the platforming was, there seems to be more variety. The climbing arrows was a very nice addition.

Winner: Tomb Raider-Oddly enough, it just never gets sickening.

5). Collectables

Uncharted 4: There are 109 treasure to collect in Uncharted so there is a decent amount to look around and try to find. The problem is, there really is no reason to unless you want the PlayStation trophies.

Rise of the Tomb Raider: The game has a lot to collect between coins, relics, documents, murals, the list goes on. What I like is, they all have meaning. When you pick up ancient relic such as a cup. There is a story behind the cup,text pops up telling you the history. Lara is talking about the item or reading the document, its a nice little touch. Plus there is an added bonus getting experience for everything you collect. 

Winner: Tomb Raider, The games makes it so you want to collect everything.

6). Exploration

Uncharted 4: Out of the 4 uncharted games, 4th installment certainly has the largest playable area. The problem, there really isn't a reason to go exploring.

Rise of the Tomb Raider: There is more to explore, there are secondary missions. Hidden Tombs, caves with hidden items or maybe wolf dens. I spent a good 10 hours just walking around and exploring the nooks and crannies of each world.

Winner: Tomb Raider, there is not much to say.

7). Puzzles

Uncharted 4: The puzzles in Uncharted are easy enough you won't be stuck for hours but at the same time, tough enough to get you to stop and think about it for a second. Some are memory based and some are kind of tricky. The Cross Puzzle comes to mind where you have to match the 3 crosses with the 3 lights, that one took me a little while but once you stop and think about it,its not too difficult.

Rise of the Tomb Raider: There are a lot more puzzles in this game over Uncharted but its nice because if you don't care about the side quests then you can avoid most of them by not going into the ancient Tombs. There is one puzzle that stands out to me and thats the Orrery Puzzle. You not only have to solve the puzzle but there is this element of platforming where you're jumping from platform to platform but nothing is stationary, everything is rotating around in a circle.

Winner: Tomb Raider because the Orrery is the coolest puzzle I have ever had to solve.

8). Voice Acting 

Uncharted 4: Uncharted has the two biggest voice actors in video games right now, Nolan North (Nathan Drake) and Troy Baker (Sam Drake). I can't just compliment them though Emily Rose (Elena Fisher), Richard McGonagle (Sully), Warren Kole (Rafe)...the list goes on and on. Everyone does a spectacular job and there wasn't a single moment in the game that made me think, "that feels unnatural or just poorly scripted."

Rise of the Tomb Raider: Lara Croft’s voice actress Camilla Luddington was one of the best performances that I saw all year. I know this is very subjective but I love the way her voice sounds and her accent certainly helps. The problem is some of the supporting actors and actresses had small moments where things did seem somewhat forced.

Winner: Uncharted, the three main voice actors just have this chemistry with one another so everything just feels natural when the three (Nate, Sully and Elena) are talking.

9). Character Development

Uncharted 4: A lot of the character development winds up happening in the 2 flash back chapters. In the 2 chapters you play as young Nathan Drake where you meet an old woman and she talks about Nate and Sam's mother. The other big moment of character development in the game is at the very end in the epilogue. I won't go into too much detail about that right now but specifically Nate and Elena really have changed for the better.

Rise of the Tomb Raider:If you look at both games (Tomb Raider 2013 & Rise of the Tomb Raider), Lara has developed so much in these two games. She went from being a scared young woman and she's slowly turned into the Tomb Raider. I'm excited for the future of this franchise for this reason alone.

Winner: Uncharted, the epilogue pushes this game to the top. If you're a fan of the franchise then the epilogue is everything you want in an Uncharted game.

10). Secondary Characters

Uncharted 4: Uncharted has 3 main secondary characters and they're Sully, Sam and Elena. Sam is the new character of the franchise and probably the least likable but as the game progresses he starts to wear on you a little bit. Sully is much older in this iteration but still a fan favorite and Elena is the love interest of the game. Elena and Sully are both such strong support characters for Nathan himself, sully being the father figure and Elena being the rock who ends up being there for Nathan when he needed her the most.

Rise of the Tomb Raider:The two big secondary characters in this game are Jonah and Jacob. I liked Jonah in the first game but his character seems to take a step back in this game and he's just less prevalent. Jacob is a new character in this game and he's not going to be in another one but there isn't a lot about him thats overly that great. Tomb Raider is more about Lara going off onto her own where Uncharted has Nate is almost always working with someone else.

Winner: Uncharted, Tomb Raider is Lara Croft where Uncharted is Nathan and his team.

11). Cut scenes

Uncharted 4: This game flawlessly transitions from gameplay to cut scenes and then back to gameplay extremely well. In the one chapter there's a sequence where Sam, Sully and Nate are at the auction. As Nate is platforming from building to building, Sully is also talking to the games antagonists Rafe and Nadine, the way it the game cuts back and forth between the 2 sequences is something special. It honestly felt like a movie.

I do have to mention my favorite cut scene in the entire game. It's towards the end when Nate and Elena are in the house of Thomas Tew. This is where they discover there was dinner among pirates, Henry Every (Avery) and Thomas Tew wound up poisoning all the other pirates in Libertalia so they could keep the treasure for themselves. I know its not historically accurate but I still loved this scene.

Rise of the Tomb Raider: The cut scenes are a little less are a little less memorable in this game but there is one that stands out to me. Its towards the beginning when Lara is captured by the main villain organization, Trinity. The next thing you know, Lara wakes up and she discovers that not only was she capture but her step mom, Ana was as well. The games main protagonist starts to strangle Ana so Lara will divulge information. Lara doesn't know anything but thats when one the big plot twist of the game happens, you find out that Ana actually works with Trinity. Also, Ana is a bitch. 

Winner: Uncharted, the game is driven by the cut scenes.

12). World/Stage Designs

Uncharted 4: There is a wide variety of different environment and landscapes in this game. You encounter the ocean, a city market place, graveyard in England, Auction house in Brazil, Panamanian jail and Madagascar.  You bounce around so much but it all works flows together so well.

Rise of the Tomb Raider:You spend a little bit of time at Croft Manor, you spend a little time in Syria but spend 90% of the game in Russia. Although there is less variety, there is more to do and the seems to be more creative freedom.

Winner:Tomb Raider- I love the variety of Uncharted but different locations don't really offer up any new game play.

13). Villain 

Uncharted 4: The two main Antagonists who are working together are Rafe and Nadine. Rafe is a rich kid who is a spoiled rich kid who is really looking for a legacy. He wants to go down in history as the man who discovered Henry Avery's great treasure. Unfortunately he has lost some of his sanity in the process. Nadine is his partner but shes just a mercenary who doesn't really care about the treasure. To her, its just another job.

Rise of the Tomb Raider: The two main antagonists are Konstantin and Ana who are actually siblings. Ana is dying so her and Konstantin go to Russia to acquire the Divine Source. The Divine Source is this biblical artifact that grants immortality and so they simply want to save Ana from dyeing. They also wanted to give the Divine Source to Trinity and then Trinity would become all powerful and take over the world.

Winner: Uncharted, I liked Rafe better as a character and his motivations seem less stereotypical and it wasn't all about world domination. He was just a normal guy who became a little too obsessed with a treasure.

14). Story

Uncharted 4: The Uncharted series has always been about fictional history. They take these fictional places of mystery and a create a story of how Nate and the others discover these magical places. The 4th installment is no different but this time, its literally all about pirates from the golden age of piracy. I'm a big history nerd so these kinds of games are going to interest me. No to mention, who doesn't enjoy a good Pirate story?

Rise of the Tomb Raider:The story concept is similar to the Uncharted series but its a little more biblical. I don't mean that the game has heavy religious tones and pushing a Christian agenda, I just mean that the game has more of a biblical historical feel. The story isn't awful but it felt a little stereotypical with the Villains wanting to create a super natural army and wanted to take over the world.

Winner: Uncharted, for a very simple reason...Pirates.

15). Epilogue/Ending

Uncharted 4: The epilogue occurs about 15 years after the games ending so when the scene begins, it’s a little confusing. All you know is, you're a young blonde girl (about 15) and you have to piece together who you are by walking around a house. As you walk around the house you discover that you're Nathan and Elena's daughter, Cassie. The ultimate fan service though is the moment when you find out what Nate and Elena have been up to in the last 15 years. They continued to do what they love but found a way to do it safely and legally.

Another little detail that I have to bring is, some place in the middle of the game where Nate is walking through a city marketplace. In the market there is an option to play with a monkey. If you chose to play with the monkey, Sully will come up and tell you that we don't have time and you have to go. Nate basically calls him a kill joy and makes a joke that he's going to get a dog and name it after Sully. Flash forward to the epilogue, Nate has a dog and names her Vicki. Vicki is of course short for Victor which is Sully's first name.  Its the little things in this game that make it so great.

Rise of the Tomb Raider: The game ends with Lara destroying the divine source and saving the world. The epilogue is where is gets more interesting, Lara and Ana are outside talking about Lara's father. Then out of nowhere Ana is shot by a sniper and killed on the spot. You cut to the sniper and he asks a man about Lara and wonders if he should take her out and he of course says "Not yet." This ending was about a cliffhanger and to get you thinking about the future sequel.

Winner: Uncharted, Best way to end a franchise.

Winner 

Uncharted 4: 8

Rise of the Tomb Raider: 7

It’s a very close call and to simple put it Rise of the Tomb Raider has better game mechanics and overall game play but Uncharted has a much better story and the characters are more likable. If Tomb Raider sticks with formula for game play but comes up with a better story, I have no doubts that a Tomb Raider sequel could become one of the best games in the history of gaming.