Wacky Wednesday Week 28

Cops...you so sneaky...

Motivating Monday Week 28

Time to get back on track!

Now that I FINALLY got all the WiiU coverage up I am going to return to my previous format of posting something Motivating on Monday and something Wacky one Wednesday.

For this week I am doing a bit of self plugging of myself.

I recently put together a rough edit of a strictly video demo reel.

Check it out! Please don't hesitate to leave some feedback.

Click here!!!

-Travis

ZombieU (WiiU) Impressions

From the outside ZombiU could look like just another shooter trying to cash in on the zombie craze. It is when you pick up the controller that you begin to realize that ZombiU is actually doing some new and fresh things to help it stand out from the horde.

ZombiU's single player is less about story and more about survival. The player must stay alive as long as possible through the zombie attack, and once the player is taken down, they will respond as a brand new character. The fun of this comes in the fact that as the new character you can reach the point that you're previous character was at to find out that they are not a zombie. I personally thought this was a great idea to keep the player retrying after every death.

My personal hands on time was with one of the multiplayer modes. The mode I got to try out pitted one player verse the other in a game of capture the flag. Instead of two players fighting against each other on the same screen though, one player (me) was given the pro controller and played on the big screen, while the other player (some random dude) used the WiiU tablet controller.

My goal was pretty simple...stay alive and capture as many flags as possible. I was satisfied with the controls of the game, only problem I ran into is how similar the pro controller is to the Xbox 360 controller, yet the right buttons A,B,X,Y was flipped with the right thumb stick. After some hours of play through I can't see this being much of an issue anymore. So how about the other guy? What was he up to at this time?

Well while I was running around scared out of my mind, the other player was setting up attacks on me with multiple zombies. The gamepad worked similar to an RTS style game, where the user would map out where they want zombies to be at, how to attack, etc... The gamepad player was also trying to capture flags as well, just using this unique style of gameplay.

Things just got serious.

As far as graphics and sound, both were at high quality. The game looked great, and the sound tried to capture great submersion.  The audio is something Ubisoft is really trying to make right, and you can tell this since one of the ZombiU stations could be played with some really nice headphones.

At the end of the day ZombiU will come down to how much content it has in the final game. The core elements of the game seem unique enough to catch a gamer's attention, but without enough content it could fall flat.

We will be finding out how well the final product does soon enough.

-Travis

Rayman Legends (WiiU) Impressions

What a gorgeous looking game!

First off if you didn't get the change to check out Rayman Origins that came out last holiday season, go do that right now! I guarantee you will find it for extremely cheap!

Rayman Legends was more of the same with new levels, new characters, new concepts, and better graphics.

RL was one of the games that I was not able to get any hands on footage of, but I did get some hands on time with it. I took control of Rayman with the new pro controler, while someone else controled a little helper named Murfy. This seemed to work very similar to New Super Mario Bros U, where I would try to run through the stage as fast as I could, and they attempeted to assist me in doing this. In RL this concepted seemed much more important...many times I was not able to make it through a particular section, because the guy with the gamepad did not react soon enough to help me.

If you did not get a chance to check out the first trailer for RL, there were some cool WiiU exclusive features shown off. It looks like the WiiU version will take use of the WiiU gamepad in a crazy way. Check out the video below for more on this.

Rayman Legends felt more like what I would want from a new version of New Super Mario Bros. Great graphics, great gameplay, great coop, and great new additions. Keep an eye out on this beauty releasing later this year.
-Travis

Pikmin 3 (WiiU) Impressions

This is still the Pikmin you played many years ago, in fact if you played either of the new play control versions of Pikmin, then this should feel very familiar to you.

Pikmin 3 does take advantage of the WiiU game pad, but maybe not as much as you would expect. During the demo I could move around the map and scope out my surroundings with the touch screen. As far as controlling my character I was using a Wiimote and nunchuk combo.

The demo featured two different game modes; a boss battle and a fruit collecting challenge.  I was able to get hands on time with the collecting mode, and watched a guy take on the giant boss. I also got some gameplay footage of this boss battle you can check out below. Pikmin 3 feels extremely similar to the past games...I am actually a bit surprised how little of a change the game series went through. Keep in mind this is only a demo though, and many other surprised could await us at launch.

You may notice that the character being played is not series veterans Olimar or Louie, but instead a nameless character that looks very similar. My guess is the story will develop to later on show these characters from the past.  This nameless character controls just like Olimar from past games, and with the ability to use the Wiimote to point and click, managing your Pikmin is as easy as ever before.

The demo featured two types of Pikmin, the original red guys and a new breed of rock Pikmin. These guys seemed to operate similar to the purple Pikmin introduced in Pikmin 2. With their added rock like weight they can smash through things with much ease.

As far as graphics are concerned Pikmin 3 does not disappoint. The HD really helps with managing all the chaos taking place on screen. Also the "macro" look with all the extra depth of field is a very nice touch.

Pikmin 3 is scheduled to release somewhere in the launch window, and from the little bit of hands on time I got I can say it could very well be a worthwhile purchase as your first WiiU game investment.

-Travis