GFMSL #7

From cars with football to steampunk airships, total domination to stripping, we've explored a range of games so far in GFMSL but now we're taking to Panau.




I'm pretty sure I hold the record for the most hours in Just Cause 2 at 185 hours but I could be wrong. Having played through the campaign 3 times and 60% completion in free roam I enjoyed Just Cause 2 from start to finish (I still play it to this day!). 

Everything from the NPC behavior to the dense jungles just make the feel like there's a cause to playing it (pun intended). The story and side missions aren't anything to awe at but the freedom to do whatever you want in a country like sandbox really hits home. You could tether a bus to a plane or go on a tank rampage in the city. Anything that uses tethers is possible.

Of course you may argue that the tethers could snap and crush your dreams but that's where the mods come in. A trainer called the bolopatch gives you options like infinite health, multiple tethers and invincible tethers. There's also plenty of other mods like the ZXZ's black market mod or the island in chaos one. All can be found here.

So what does Just Cause 2 offer? Well here's a breakdown:

Pros:

Decent graphics (impressive for 2010)
Plenty of activities (providing you have an imagination)
A good-not great story
Better optimization than Just Cause 3
Choice of over 100 veichles

Cons: 

Health system a bit too harsh
100% completion glitch (can be worked around with a mod)


So in conclusion i'm putting Just Cause 2 in the good games section. 

Weekly Roundup #21

It's the first day of the new year and some great games are upon us. Here's 3 news stories from last year.

First up the steam awards winners were announced yesterday. GTA V, Portal 2 and Goat simulator were among the few that won awards. Steam users could collect trading cards and craft emoticons and backgrounds. 

Users could earn trading cards by either voting for a game or completing a queue. If you collected all 9 you could craft a badge and receive 2 new items and a chunk of exp.





Along with the awards was the winter sales which saw almost every game on Steam have a price drop. Borderlands, Steep,
Witcher and loads of others all had great deals. You can head on over to Steam and purchase some now.














And lastly we want to talk about the lack of posts. There's no excuse and we promise to bring more content in 2017. If you want to support us you can check out the Patreon here and get some great gaming stories like inside Steam for $1!

The Cyber Pixel Game Awards 2016

Welcome to our first annual awards post where we categorize the games that came out this year. 2016 has been a successful year for video games in both AAA and indie game terms and we thought why not celebrate that as today is the last day of the year.

We've been preparing this since the 28th of August and since then we have been compiling information to deliver this award ceremony. 

All these games have came out in 2016.


This is a post based on our opinions and yours. So here is the categories: 

Best FPS

Best RPG 

Best Open World 

Best Action Adventure 

Best Platformer

Best Free to Play

Best AAA

Best Indie

Best Art

Best Sound

Best Gameplay 

Best Story

Best Replayability 

Best Developer 

Most Mentioned

Worst Game

Best Game (based on amount of nominations on this list) 

Let's start.


Best FPS

1. Overwatch



 
Overwatch, the game that killed Battleborn and gained a loving fanbase. Blizzard's new IP will go down as one of the greatest FPS games of all time.


Runner ups

2. Battlefield 1

3.  Titanfall 2

4. Call Of Duty: Infinite Warfare

5. Paladins



Best RPG

1. Starbound 





Despite being around in early access in 2013, Starbound was released last July. Combining Terrarria with space created an interesting open world sandbox game which to this date has millions of fans.

Runner Ups

2. Dark Souls III

3. Final Fantasy XV

4. Ember

5. World Of Final Fantasy 



Best Open World

1. No Man's Sky

Despite the rough launch and 3 months silence from Hello Games, No Man's Sky holds the record for not only being the biggest open world of 2016 but of the century. 


Runner Ups

2. Watch Dogs 2

3. Tom Clancy's The Division 

4. Planet Explorers 

5. Steep



Best Action Adventure


1. Watch Dogs 2 

Watch Dogs 2 takes the original gameplay from the first game and improves on it, giving out a better experience to fans and newcomers alike.


Runner Ups

2. Deus Ex: Mankind Divided 

3. Hitman

4. Mirror's Edge Catalyst



Best Platformer

1. Roguelands

Blending RPG and side scrolling. Roguelands lets you explore the galaxy with your friends and save the universe from the monsters that inhabit it. 


Runner Ups

2. Headlander

3. Salt and Sanctuary 

4. Mighty No. 9

5. Even the Ocean


Best Free to Play

1. Paladins 

Often described as an Overwatch clone, Paladins takes the top spot for its over the top gameplay and fast-paced fun.


Runner Ups

2. Heroes and Generals

3. Hunger Dungeon

4. Zone 4

5. Angeldust 


Best AAA

1. Battlefield 1

Battlefield 1 is no doubt the best Battlefield yet. Destroying its main competitor Call Of Duty and taking the series back in time we think it deserves the top spot.  


Runner Ups

2. Sid Meier's Civilization 6 

3. Titanfall 2

4. Dishonored 2


5. Mafia III


Best Indie

1. Stardew Valley

Created by one man, Stardew Valley took Steam by storm and was the solution to a PC version of Harvest Moon. Worthy of the top spot.


Runner Ups

2.  Aragami 

3. No Man's Sky

4. Quadrilateral Cowboy

5. Guardians of Orion

Best Art

1. Abzu 

Released in August, Abzu took notes from Journey and used a story driven experience to deliver a short but sweet game to fans.

Runner Ups

2. Aragami

3. Stardew Valley

4. Eagle Flight

5. Overwatch

Best Sound

1. Battlefield 1

Everything from the screams of the battlefield to the launch trailer song. Battlefield 1 takes our top spot due to its superb audio experience.

Runner Ups

2. No Man's Sky

3. Guardians of Orion

4. Overcooked

5. Stardew Valley



Best Gameplay

1. Stardew Valley

Tend your crops, explore caves, socialise, visit new areas. Stardew Valley doesn't fall short content wise and for a 1 man project that's pretty impressive.

Runner Ups

2. Civilization 6

3. The Witness

4. Overwatch

5. Slime Rancher 


Best Story

1. The Banner Saga 2 

The second part of the Banner Saga franchise, The Banner Saga 2 takes the mythological story driven experience further and has a brilliant ending that we won't spoil.

Runner Ups

2. Abzu

3. The Walking Dead: A New Frontier

4. The Price of Freedom

5. Deus Ex: Mankind Divided 


Best Replayability

1. Sid Meier's Civilization 6

The seventh game in the franchise, Civilization 6 improves not only the graphics but updates the way the game feels. People have spent hundreds of hours playing the game since launch and they continue to as it's in the top 10 played games on Steam.


Runner Ups

2. Grim Dawn

3. Stellaris 

4. Unexplored

5. Loot Castle



Best Developer

1. Hideo Kojima 

Kojima is one of those developers who care about what they work on. With Death Stranding on the way let's hope his recent departure from Konami is for the best. 

Runner Ups

2. Corey Davis 

3. Scott Mercer 

4. David Prassel

5. Sean Murray (he tried his hardest)


Most Mentioned

1. No Man's Sky

Hello Games's No Man's Sky had the media rapt with confusion for 2 months until they finally released their debut update, the foundations update.


Runner Ups

2. Overwatch

3. Battlefield 1

4. Stardew Valley

5. Tom Clancy's The Division 


Worst Game

1. No Man's Sky












No Man's Sky has been a cluster****. With missing features and bugs galore it had arguably the roughest game launch in history. This being said things are looking up for No Man's Sky in 2017. Even though it has won 3 awards it still has mostly negative reviews making it not eligible for the best game list.

Runner Ups

2. Mafia III

3. Ghostbusters The Video Game

4. Mirror's Edge Catalyst

5. Unravel


Best Game

1. Stardew Valley

Eric Barone brought a better version of Harvest Moon to PC. This was received with high appraise. Stardew Valley wins the best game out of the whole of the Awards.

Runner Ups

2. Battlefield 1

3. Overwatch 

4. Abzu

5. Sid Meier's Civilization 6



That's the list! Thanks for reading and we widsh you a happy new year.

Steam Winter Sale 2016

Tomorrow marks the most important date for Steam of the year.

The winter sale.

Every year Steam holds the winter sale and the summer sale but December is when gamers have cash in their pockets ready to buy games. Unfortunately, this means nearly everyone at Valve is working on bringing it out and alongside Dota 7.0 but this means if a game was scheduled to release sometime this week, it probably won't hit its date.

One of these games was Guardians of Orion (GOO) which had a huge 2.0 update set for yesterday but it is now 6 PM and all we've received is an apology from the devs due to the fact steam won't approve the request to launch.

Weekly Roundup #20

Orion 2.0, Jingle Jam 2016 games shortage and the third Zup! game.

First off Orion, that game about the dinosaurs and the Activision lawsuit is now approaching its biggest content update yet. 2.0 delivers ships, open world galaxy exploration, at least 30 new maps, missions/quests, achievements, steam trading cards, new enemies, more items (including an ion blade) and a heap of other cool stuff.

If you're interested here's a link to the Steam page but hurry because after the 20th (the release date of the update) the game will be priced at a hefty $15 compared to its current price of $1. 

Also in January we will be talking to David, the founder of Trek Industries about the 2.0 update and what's coming in the future


If you were one of the people who bought the Jingle Jam 2016 bundle in the last few days then you won't be getting everything that is shown. 

The Humble Bundle page for Yogscast's latest Jingle Jam shows that some games are 'sold out for new purchases'. So far the only game that has this status is King Arthur's Gold but the games tomorrow, on the 23rd, 30th and 31st have been given this status aswell.


Lastly Zup! 3 has been submitted to greenlight. For you unfamiliar with the Zup! series it is a set of 3 games (so far) made on click team fusion 3. The objective is to click the red box and make sure your ball lands in the green area. The first game was given overwhelmingly positive reviews for the fact the game had 118 achievements which could be earned in less than 15 minutes of playtime. 

These achievements could be used on steam to spell out a word on your profile and some had pictures like the face of Gabe Newell. The second Zup! was released 2 months later but this time had 229 achievements. If you're interested in being a collector you can buy both of them for less than $2!

Tom Clancy's The Division is now Free for the Weekend

The weekend is here! This time Steam has given us The Division, Ubisoft's rpg shooter to try out.

Until Monday Steam users can download and play the Division which takes place in a quarantined New York after a small pox outbreak. The game can be downloaded here.

Hello Games are Hiring Staff

Since the new update for No Man's Sky Hello Games have been talking again and this time they're looking for staff. 

On Monday Sean Murray tweeted saying:

Happy Monday! If you are looking for something new, we are hiring:



He then gave a link to a page where a list of jobs were vacant. Could this mean we could be getting updates for No Man's Sky faster?